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Maximum legends don't die. Fabian can't die, so why? He coughs and hacks in the high school bathroom stall and a single red petal comes out in a wad in his hand. No. It's not real. It's something made up, a rumor circulating the school.
He drops the petal in the toilet, spits, and flushes. He adjusts his letterman jacket and leaves the stall. All good.
Back in the hallway he meets up with Riz.
“You good, Fabian?”
“Oh yeah, all good, The Ball. Let’s go.”
He's at the movies, sharing his popcorn with his girlfriend. His girlfriend. She laughs and whispers, pointing at the screen. “Look at the way Holmes is posing, isn’t that just like Riz?”
He can see it, plain as day, and he coughs. Mazey rubs his back.
“You good, big guy?”
“Yeah, fine. Just a kernel stuck in my throat.”
It's not a kernel. He can feel the soft tissue of the petal stick to his mouth, and he tries his best to discreetly spit it into a napkin without Mazey seeing. Again, the crimson announces his illness and he quickly tucks it away.
“...Love you,” he casually whispers, kissing her on the cheek.
“Aww, I love you, too.”
No more petals come during the movie. All good here.
“The Ball! You. Me. Beer pong. We’ve got this!” shouts Fabian from across the room at the house party on Sunday. They’ve both loaded up on Bad Baby Milk and Riz is swaying slightly as he makes his way around the kitchen island to the beer pong tables outside, but there’s no one Fabian would rather team up with at this moment. He’s got a feeling.
His feeling proves to be accurate as they sink ball after ball and crush their competition. In his drunken haze, Riz turns to him and gives him a tight hug, and Fabian chokes down the petal he can feel fighting to come up, masking it by chugging a cup of beer. Riz climbs his shoulders and he carries his best friend around the manor in a victory lap. Maximum legends don’t die, he reminds himself.
That night he dreams. He’s on a couch, hanging with Riz. It starts with Fabian leaning back and placing his arm around Riz’s shoulders, and the goblin doesn't object. Soon they’re cuddling, kissing, Fabian running his hand along the length of Riz’s tail, playing with the tuft at the end. Riz nuzzles in close, and suddenly the nuzzling turns to biting and Riz is working up a hickey on Fabian’s throat…
Violent coughs wake him up and he doubles over in bed, his whole body heaving and fighting for air. At last it comes out, a perfect red rose, the long stem scratching at his throat as he pulls it out. He vomits afterward, sick to his stomach at what he’s done, and even then he can feel the thorns of the root of the disease catch in his throat.
He sits at the edge of his bed, head in hands and he groans. He can’t die. He’s a Maximum Legend. He can’t let this disease kill him. He knows the cause of it; it’s obvious he’s in love with his best friend, but there’s no way an asexual, aromantic person can reciprocate these feelings. And if he dies, then Riz will know and Fabian can’t let that happen. He can’t let him live with the immense guilt of killing Fabian because he can’t love him back. He can’t do that to Riz.
And so he skips school the next morning, saying nothing to anyone, and he drives the Hangman to the hospital. It’s a fairly straightforward procedure: one Power Word: Heal later and the deed is done, the flowers gone. No more scratching at his throat, no more petals clinging to the back of his mouth. It’s so simple, to excise his feelings, to surgically remove his love.
He feels fine as he leaves the hospital and heads back to school where he excuses himself for his earlier absence, blaming his hangover for sleeping in. It’s believable. Everyone buys it. Even Riz, who climbs back on his shoulder and cheers for the beer pong champs. Fabian puts on his showiest smile. “Yeah, Riz. We’re the champs.”
It’s like a punch to the gut, the word is so jarring. It’s a word he hears every day, a voice he hears all the time, but together they’re just wrong. Fabian called him ‘Riz.’
“Fabian…?”
“Hm?” He doesn’t even look up at him.
“Are you ok?”
“Just fine! I feel better than I think I have any right to, in fact.”
“...Oh. Alright. Just… checking,” she says hesitantly. He climbs down from his shoulders and looks up at Fabian, but it seems like he can’t really catch his eye.
The bell rings, signalling the students to get ready for class and Fabian is gone in an instant leaving Riz to stand there wondering what had just happened.
Over the next two days, he is painfully aware of how different Fabian is now. He doesn't bring him coffee or complain about his caffeine intake, he’s not insisting on driving him home from school or sliding over the orange he always grabs from the cafeteria at lunchtime. And not once does he call him The Ball. It feels like Fabian Aramais Seacaster is slowly leaving his life. Riz sits quietly and observes all this, watches as Fabian always smiles at his friends. He still smiles at Riz, but something about the smile seems less bright than before, though just as genuine.
Something else about Fabian has been bothering him as well lately; ever since that morning he was absent from school, he hasn’t smelled the same. There used to be a faint floral scent that would accompany him, something Riz has picked up on since the end of freshman year, but it’s no longer there and Riz needs to know why. He skips school on Thursday to break into Seacaster Manor. The first place he checks is the bathroom, but there’s nothing new in there, and Fabian’s been using the same lotions, soaps and toothpaste that Riz is familiar with.
He sneaks into his bedroom next, checking his closet for any clues, and there, in the wastebasket, buried at the bottom, he finds it: a long-stem rose covered up in used tissues. Bits of mold grow on the petals, indicating that they were wet, and Riz tucks away this clue as the rumor running around school floats to the top of his brain: hanahaki disease.
He has a hunch, but he’s afraid to follow up on it any further because the idea that he’s right scares him too much. So he sits in his room, staring at the rotting rose in the baggie that he twirls in his fingers.
On Friday he recognizes the smile that Fabian gives him; it’s the same one he gives the freshmen and sophomores and all the students he doesn’t quite know but wants to make a great impression on. It’s his ‘Strangers’ smile. After that Riz decides to avoid him; seeing that smile directed at him hurts too much.
It takes less than a week for the rest of The Bad Kids to notice Riz’s absence whenever Fabian is around, and as the rogue once more begins to slink away at lunch as Fabian approaches their table, Adaine uses a Mage Hand to grab Riz’s collar and prevent him from vanishing.
“Alright, what’s going on here, Riz? You’ve been avoiding Fabian all week!” Riz shrinks and tries desperately to run away, but Kristen steps in and grabs his wrist.
“Yeah, you don’t stick around at all, and don’t blame it on your clubs! You’re always relaxed around us until Fabian arrives and then you skedaddle!”
Gorgug gets up and stands behind Fabian, who had just sat down at the table.
“Gorgug?” he asks, looking up behind him.
“You’re guilty of something, too,” says the half-orc. “You’ve been ‘off’ for the past week or so. You never call Riz ‘The Ball’ suddenly. What gives?”
“Oh, I haven’t?” he asks with complete non-chalance, and Riz flinches at the casualness of his voice. “I must have grown out of that cruel nickname.”
“I don’t buy it,” says Fig, leaning across the table and pulling out a flashlight which she shines in Fabian’s face as if interrogating him.
“Leave him alone!” cries Riz as he wrestles in Kristen’s grasp. “It’s fine! I’m fine!”
“Like hell you are,” mutters Kristen, her grip still too strong for Riz to break free. Adaine looks over at Kristen and nods, and Kristen casts a Zone of Truth on the group.
“Spill,” orders Adaine. “Why did you stop calling Riz ‘The Ball?’” she asks Fabian.
“I don’t want to anymore.”
“It’s because he has no love for me in his heart!” blurts out Riz, and then he immediately covers his mouth with his hands.
“Oh, now this is juicy,” says Fig, shining the light at Riz. His pupils constrict into little slits and he flinches from the brightness.
“Fig, put that away.” Adaine turns to Riz. “What do you mean by that?”
Riz shakes his head, not wanting to elaborate further.
“Riz, please? We can’t let the group go to pieces, and we need to know what’s going on,” she asks. She crouches down so he’s eye-level with him and reaches out to take his free hand in hers.
“Fabian? Is there anything you want to say?” Gorgug urges gently.
“...Hanahaki disease,” Riz at last whispers.
“...What?”
“...Fabian has – no, had – hanahaki disease. I’m… pretty sure he got rid of it last Monday when he was late for school.” Four pairs of eyes turn to look at Fabian, who sits impassively in his seat.
“Maybe I did,” he says at length. “It’s no big deal.”
“Fabian!”
“What do you want me to say?” Fabian asks bitterly. “I’m admitting it, aren’t I? Isn’t that good enough?”
“So, what, you went and had all your love for Riz removed??” spits Adaine. “That’s insane!”
“What? You want me to die? I’m a Maximum Legend! I’m Fabian Aramais Seacaster! I’m a Bad Kid! And you want me to die and leave Riz feeling guilty? He can’t help who he is, and I can’t help who I love, so it was the obvious choice! I still like the guy!” Riz flinches at Fabian’s casualness. “We can still operate as a party!”
“We obviously can’t if Riz is going to avoid you like this! Why didn’t you come to us? Why didn’t you talk to Riz?”
“I just told you, he’d feel nothing but guilt over how I feel!”
“Icouldhave toldyouthatIloveyoutoo!”
The table goes silent and all eyes turn to Riz.
“Well, I think I have something that I need to attend to!” Kristen says brightly, releasing her grip on Riz and turning around. “Bye!”
“Uh, yeah. I just remembered homework that I need to finish,” lied Fig, disappearing.
“Gorgug, how about we give them some space?” offered Adaine, and he nodded and stepped away from the table as well, leaving the Zone of Truth up for the two left at the table.
Fabian’s jaw had opened, and he was staring intently at Riz. “You… love me?”
Riz scratched at the back of his head while staring at something rude carved into the table. The cat’s already out of the bag. May as well go for it. “Well… yeah. You’re my best friend. How can I not?”
Fabian’s face falls. “...Oh. Of course.”
“But! But I love you so much I could burst, Fabian! What does it matter if it’s platonically!”
“I’d think it would matter a whole lot.”
“Says who? Some… rumor?”
“I’d think the flowers growing in my chest say so.”
“I think you gave up too soon, and that’s not the Fabian Aramais Seacaster that I know and love.”
“You… really love me.”
“I’m saying it a Zone of Truth, aren't I?”
Fabian lays face-down on the table, his words muffled by the dirty wood. “Oh, I blew it, didn’t I? I just really fucked things up.”
Riz climbs on top of the table and sits cross-legged next to the half-elf. “Hey… it’ll be alright. I’m sure of it.”
“I removed all my love for you, The Ball. How can it be alright? I mean, I removed my feelings and how I loved to see your eyes sparkle when you catch onto a clue, or how hot you look covered in someone or something else’s blood. How much I loved it when you climb on my shoulders or drink way too much coffee. I loved it when you cling to my back when you ride the Hangman and how you always smell like coffee. I loved the slight snoring sound you make when you finally fall asleep, and you always look so good wearing my jacket when you get cold, which is why I’d always insist that you wear it. I loved how smart and sharp you are and I took it all away!”
Fabian rolls his face to the side to look at Riz who is sitting shock-still.
“Fabian, what did you just say?”
“Oh, don’t make me repeat it, The Ball! I just spilled my heart out to you!”
“Fabian, you’re calling me ‘The Ball…’”
“Huh? I am?” He winces. “Agh! I…”
The coughing overtakes him, and Fabian’s body wracks painfully as he hacks and gasps for breath, just as he did the night after the party.
“No… oh no, what’s happening…?” he moans between coughs. Riz can only stare in horror as Fabian coughs harder and harder, until at last another long-stem rose emerges from his mouth. Hands shaking, Fabian removes the stem from his mouth and drops it on the table at Riz’s feet.
“Why..?” he asks weakly, staring at the flower. “I… I thought I got rid of everything. Why did it come back?”
“You remembered your feelings,” whispers Riz, staring wide-eyed at the rose.
“Am I going to die?”
“Not if I can help it! Fabian, I love you! Platonically! Now let’s go to the hospital!”
A few x-rays later, Fabian sits in a stark room, Riz next to him, as they wait for the results. After a knock at the door, a handsome dwarf doctor enters in and looks over at the young men.
“Ah,” he says brusquely, and with a few taps on the computer pulls up some images. The first shows a chest with a dark mass blocking the lungs.
“This is the x-ray we took before we went though with the Power Word: Heal last week on Mr. Seacaster,” he explains. He uses a laser pointer to outline some twists of darkness in the picture. “These are the roots of the rosebush that had taken hold of his chest. You can see the stems reaching up towards his throat. It was a very close call.”
He switches to another slide. This one shows no dark mass over the chest and lungs.
“This is the x-ray after the spell was cast; no more mass of stems and flowers. A clear-cut case of a successful removal.”
At last he brings up a third slide. “And this is how he looks now.” There’s a new mass in his chest, but unlike the dark tendrils of the first x-ray, this is a small mote of something bright.
“What… what is that?” asks Fabian, his hand flying to his chest.
“It’s a seed. What we call a True Love Seed. It’s what happens when one with Hanahaki has their love reciprocated. It’s harmless, and in fact, you might find that you feel lighter and happier than ever before. You’re a very lucky man, Mr. Seacaster.”
“...So even platonic love cures it?”
“Yes, it does. I’d say you’re very healthy, and you have a long life full of love ahead of you.”
Fabian lets out a loud whoop of joy and reaches over, grabbing Riz up in a tight hug.
“Riz, thank you! I love you so much!”
The doctor smiles. “Well, take all the time you need, gentlemen. I’ll see myself out.”
When they’re left alone again and Fabian puts down the goblin, Riz sighs. “I wish this would prevent you from doing more stupid things in the future, but I know that’s a pipe dream.”
“Hey!”
“But that’s one of the things I love about you. You did this so I wouldn’t feel guilty, and for that I forgive you. You were really, really stupid, but you had good intentions behind it.”
“Thanks, The Ball.”
Riz looks up at Fabian and shyly smiles. “So where do we go from here?”
“Can we go back to how we were before?”
He frowns. “I doubt we can go back as if nothing ever happened, but we can pick up the pieces and go from there.”
“I’d like that.”
And so they did.