Work Text:
“Quit it! Just fuc-frigging hold still,” Eiden muttered, trying to smile while swatting a hand reaching towards his hip.
“I am holding still,” Rin hissed, his hand casually drifting once more to paw at Eiden’s thigh from behind Huey’s chair.
“Bullshit. Grabbing at my ass is not holding still. Do it again, and I swear imma yank your hair when the flash goes off, brat.”
Rin grinned that maniacal and unhinged smile of his, totally unrepentant as his fingers wiggled in a threatening promise. Eiden pulling his hair would still be Eiden voluntarily touching him. He’d take that. "Promises... Promises..." He simped. He'd been tempted to say that wasn't the only thing Eiden could yank on, but that would have them sitting here longer and not fucking around in one of their rooms in a little bit...
“Boys,” Huey said dryly, his voice as weary as his expression was resigned. “Behave. Both of you. Rin stop poking Eiden. Eiden, come stand on this side of me instead of behind the chair. And Morvay, settle down. Eiden said if you keep fluttering around, you'll be blurry in the picture.”
“I’m just...” Morvay growled, tiny tail flicking back and forth from his fuzzy body as he flapped his wings. “I'm trying to find a good spot!”
"Light on the back of the damn chair, dumbass incubus! We only have a few Polaroid's we can use! It's not like we have an abundance of this fascinating earth stuff! And we don't need you messing it up,” Aster snapped as he continued to fiddle with the contraption Eiden had found at a roadside bazaar before swapping into his bright pink bat form. "If you make us need to take another one, I swear I'm going to...”
“Fine, shitty little vampire,” Morvay said, mischief glowing in his eyes as he flapped over to Eiden. “I'll sit in Master Eiden's lap, then! At least he'll make sure I'll be in the image!”
“No, dumbass! Back of the chair!” Aster insisted in a sickly sweet voice. "Like I would cut you out of the..."
"Of course you would! On purpose! Wouldn't he, Master Eiden?" Morvay tried to snuggle up close to Eiden.
Eiden gave him a hug then pushed him off. "Look. We're gonna take a couple pictures, you guys! So we each have one! I mean, it was an amazingly lucky find, but we have enough film to take one for each of us and then a few extra ones I wanna get with the guys at our next gathering... And besides, I took a picture of your pets, Aster. Two, in fact! So be nice to Morvay today."
"See! Screw you shitty little vampire!" Morvay stuck out his little tongue and made a rude gesture at Aster at he flitted above their heads.
“Children...,” Huey said again, this time with the kind of long-suffering sigh only someone who had lived many lifetimes and had come back from the proverbial dead could deliver.
He even added a little bit of annoyance to the sigh.
All the men settled down. It'd been a challenge just getting them all in a room together.
But... Huey was smiling. Not like Eiden or Rin's full force smiles, but it was something that could be considered a smile.
It was, something he was still trying to consciously do. Smile. React. Testing the boundaries of his motor skills and having a body again.
Of consciousness.
Of existing, again.
The truth was: none of them had really expected the gambit to work.
When Huey had split himself, no one thought there’d be anything left to "bring back".
Eiden, sent away to Earth, had carried away his 'soul' and essence, and the parts that remembered a little about emotions but was open to learning and changing. (That had been a new change this time when he'd re-created the vessel)
Rin, left on Klein, had received his magic, knowledge of altars, and memories from this last 're-boot', as Eiden called it. And a magic mirror where he could observe Eiden on earth, vicariously experiencing life as he watched Eiden grow up, but not experiencing life on Klein.
Huey, the 'empty vessel', unresponsive on a plinth, had still been a kind of left over glue to help guide Rin until he was ready to re-boot and Huey would see what that iteration would bring with the new knowledges integrated. He had been the 'setting' his split gemstone personalities had been a part of.
But somehow, with the altars balanced, the elemental spirits healthy and both vessels... boys... still whole and on this side of the summoning, they had done the impossible. (Aster said it had been the plan all along. Morvay said it was a fuck up and improperly worded incantation. The truth was a little bit of something else, but...)
And Huey had woken up.
And so, here they were now, lined up for a portrait like a bizarre family unit: Huey in the middle, his elegant gray suit crisp and starched; Rin to one side in dark layers with a rare, real smile tugging at his mouth; Eiden on the other, his arm slung a little too casually on the chair back behind Huey’s head.
The camera flashed and a white palm-sized piece of paper slid out.
Aster shifted and raced to grab it before Morvay could. Then he stood there shaking it back and forth like Eiden had told him to. (To make the image appear quicker... heh. Whatever. It was funny to watch the smaller man shake his ass and dance around.)
Morvay crowded in closer. Stared for a moment and then snatched the treasure away, flying back to the group to show it off.
Then the two familiars were fluttering around Huey like moths to a flame as they played keep away. Aster clicked his little bat claws impatiently as Morvay twirled away midair and dropped onto Eiden’s head like a fuzzy hat.
"Ugh! Morvay, not the hair!"
"But it's so soft!" the incubus chirped. As he shoved the art into Eiden's hand “See!!!! This is so amazing, Master!”
“Yeah, they're popular back on earth too,” Eiden said, lifting him off his head. “You know, you should go show Rin.”
“I would, but he'll snatch it.”
“'Because you won't stay still so I can see it properly,” Rin snapped.
Huey exhaled again. And held out his hands. Both small familiars dropped into his lap as the three of them looked at the photo in amazement.
Then Huey looked up at the two flanking him, and for a second, Eiden caught the shadow in his expression.
“Still doesn’t feel real, does it?” Eiden asked softly.
Huey looked at him, then at Rin, then slowly nodded. “I remember watching you both. It was like I was in a dream. And I questioned if it was even real or just wishful thinking. But I saw you through the mirror get older when I focused. And I felt all of you through the altars thanks to the link with elementals. But it didn’t… feel... like this. Not even close.”
Rin shifted closer enough that his shoulders brushed Huey's on purpose, so he couldn't mistake it for an accident or remnants of a dream. Rin, still skittish, didn't touch others much, so when he did, it was a conscious effort on his part as he sought a connection. "Yeah. It's a little strange to actually feel something, right?"
Eiden swallowed. “Do you regret it? Splitting yourself? Creating us?”
Huey tilted his head at the strange question. And then, gently he replied, reaching a hand to Eiden and Rin. “No. Because it let you both exist.”
Something in Eiden’s throat tightened. He hadn’t expected that.
Huey looked at Aster and Morvay, who were now midair dueling with pillows, having flown off and stolen them from a nearby couch. “I suppose this is what life really is,” Huey murmured, nodding his head at the two. “Messes and interruptions.”
“And money and influence!” Aster added from the ceiling, where he was kicking Morvay towards a bookshelf. “Just so we’re clear, I’m still older than both of you.”
“So am I! But you're shorter,” Morvay sang, grabbing Aster's throat bow and swinging him towards a wall as he shifted into his incubus form.
Their play fight was taking on that edge it got when they were going to need to be separated. Neither liked to 'lose', especially not in front of the Huey.
Huey’s mouth twitched.
“Quit it you two. Get over here,” Rin groused as Eiden reset the camera. “We still have more photos to take and I don't plan to be here all afternoon watching you two gremlins.”
"Riiiiiinnnnn!" Two voices entwined in harmony, but they landed on the chair.
“This time no groping me,” Eiden warned, pointing as he took up his place next to Huey.
“I make no promises.” Rin stuck out his tongue and wiggled it.
They smiled anyway. All of them.
~~~
As flash faded from their vision after their last photo and they were sorting the images out - who was getting which one (the next verbal battle starting to brew) - Eiden paused, taking in the image of Rin, Huey, Aster and Morvay crowded around the counter, pictures laid out on the tabletop.
The cool weight of the neon gemstone at his neck pulsed. Which was strange. Normally it just sat on his chest and was a comforting weight. He actually had to invoke its power to get it to flare or pulse. And he wasn't doing any essence magic or even thinking about it, but something about the moment made him reach up and touch it - fingers grazing the edges of the stone.
And suddenly, he asked, without thinking, "…How did this even get to Earth?”
The room fell quiet.
Four sets of eyes looked over at him.
Then each other.
Huey looked at Rin.
Rin blinked.
Morvay stopped squeezing Aster and Aster stopped pushing Morvay back.
No one answered.
“…Wait,” Eiden held the necklace up. “You guys didn’t...?”
“We didn’t send it,” Aster said slowly.
“Definitely not us,” Morvay added. "We were just fucking around with magic seals and drinking and feeling lonely and bad and hor..." Aster's long manicured fingers slammed across Morvay's mouth, shutting him up.
Rin shook his head. “That world was essentially sealed until the connection reformed. I'm embarrassed to say, I wasn't watching you for a few days. Your life was kind of pathetic then, y'know," Rin looked away for a moment. "You were pissing me off by letting your co-workers walk all over you, so I left to take care of some issues in the dark territory that were annoying the elemental spirits. I had no idea about the gemstone until I saw you were over here with them. And then I had to figure out what I was going to do about it.” He shrugged.
They all turned to Huey.
Huey stared at the gemstone and Eiden, his brow furrowed. “…I don’t know,” he said finally. “I didn't send anything through with you beyond a basket and blanket. I didn't want to cause any reason for rejection or interference crossing the portal.”
Eiden’s hand stayed at his chest as the gemstone pulsed soft and steady like a heartbeat.
“Maybe,” Huey murmured, “The spirits wanted to find you.”
Eiden smiled, bewildered as he gazed at the touchstone in his grasp. “…Guess that's as good a reason as any. At least it had good timing to save my ass from working myself to death. But I gotta wonder about the guy that bought it at a black market auction and wanted me to put it into a toy... and that I was working in that industry... God, how else might it have gotten to me if I wasn't working in that industry!”
Morvay laughed.
Aster rolled his eyes.
Rin reached out and quietly held Eiden’s hand, squeezing it behind Huey’s back. "Maybe that's something you'll find out. Maybe not. Does it matter? You're here, and in my eyes, that's all that matters."
And the gemstone flared again then settled down, quiet once more.
