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Hat Guy narrowed his eyes in a way that made Durin feel like he'd been caught doing something bad. "...Why are you using a glider? Are your wings just for show or what?"
Hat Guy's last words were meant to just be his way of teasing. Durin knew that.
Unfortunately, it did not stop him from having to look off to the side and stew in despair a little, because really, they kind of are. At least right now they are.
When Durin got ahold of the letter from Hat Guy that stated he’d be visiting Mondstadt once more, he had been ecstatic. He had not seen his friend in a while, and naturally, there was a lot to show him! He wanted to show all the progress he made, like, maybe showing off his drawing skills (Albedo did say he had been improving these past few days…), or how the pigeons by the bridge aren’t really as frightened by him as they used to be.
(Although Hat Guy might scare the pigeons off. They don’t tend to like new-ish faces, and admittedly, Durin thinks that maybe Hat Guy doesn’t give off the idea he’s very friendly to most creatures.)
What Durin failed to remember, however, is that there was a small dilemma he was having. Maybe not so small, actually, considering he has been trying to fix this for a long while… that is to say, a few months.
The dilemma is this: Durin cannot fly.
It’s not that his wings don’t work. They do. It’s just that when he tries to fly, he fails. He cannot hold himself up in the sky for too long. Embarrassingly enough, he ended up speaking with everyone he could think of about this, and no one could find a possible solution. Not Albedo who made his body, and… well, there wasn’t really anyone else Durin could think to ask, but mostly all his friends knew he had this problem.
It was then that Outrider Amber had offered to give him a gliding license in the meantime, as a way for him to still be able to at the very least be in the sky.
“I know it’s not an actual solution,” she had told him, smiling sympathetically. “But I thought that maybe you could use it for now. It should also help in case you ever get in a situation you’d need to fly to get out of, maybe──although I doubt that would happen, haha.”
And──it was kind of her, Durin thought, to do something like this for him, who she barely even knows. He had accepted the offer, and it was nice, very nice at first, to soar through the skies in a way he had not realized he was growing unaccostumed to. Sometimes, when he closed his eyes, he even felt like maybe, if he hoped hard enough, he was actually flying.
And then that feeling left as soon as it came, because a gnawing sensation at the back of his head would remind him that no, his wings are still by his side, unused, yearning to unfold like a new chapter and take flight as they should while airborne, but they can’t. Not due to the fact they are incapable of flying, but because Durin is.
And that's not something Durin is prepared to admit to himself, because what dragon can’t fly? Dragons are meant to... function through flying, they do not regularly walk or run to places. And they, most certainly, have no need for gliders.
Yet here Durin was, having to utilize a glider to get down the mountain he and Hat Guy are currently standing over. Ordinarily, he’d have rushed down and only answered Hat Guy after, but this was a rare moment they’d been walking at Starsnatch Peak rather than a place like… for example, Dragonspine, in which rushing down would seem completely natural due to the cold──so all Durin could do was stand and figure out a way to answer, lest he seemed like he was escaping from something… which would not be wrong, he supposed.
"Um, my wings are..." Durin trailed off, feeling embarrassed and exposed and all the bad things at once. He had to be honest, though. It was good to be honest. Humans liked honesty, and if Durin was trying to learn how to be human, he had to be. "They... don't really work?"
Ok, that explanation was probably clear. Maybe a little wrong, since they do work, technically, Durin just can't figure out how to get himself off the ground for too long. But Hat Guy probably got the gist of it, and he'd let the topic go fairly quickly. Probably.
Hat Guy was strangely silent for a beat. Durin's not really sure what the other is thinking, even if he thinks he knows Hat Guy enough to kind of be able to read him. Even when Durin mustered up the courage to actually face the other, his face was──starkly blank, in a way that made Durin feel almost frightened, because he'd never seen Hat Guy look like that. Not blank in a way where he can't tell what the other could possibly be thinking.
Finally, Hat Guy spoke. It was a simple question, or rather, two questions, "...What do you mean they don't work? Are you injured?"
"I can't fly," Durin explained, which didn't really explain anything at all. When Hat Guy made a face that now bordered on concern, he tried to figure out how to word it. "Um... It's like... When I try to get myself to fly, it doesn't really work? Like, my wings definitely work when it comes to flying, they're not injured, at least I don't think so, and I even was able to fly for a tiny bit once!” Durin was very proud of when he managed that, even if it didn’t last for very long before he fell. “But I can't fly super high like I should be able to, and it's really hard to keep my balance."
"Huh." Hat Guy seemingly processed the information Durin told him. After a beat, he asked, "What do you mean you think they aren't injured?"
Right. Durin had said that, when anyone else would have just said they aren't injured and end it at that. But, truthfully... He scratched the back of his head in thought. "I mean, I don't think they are? But sometimes when I try to fly, they hurt a little. Albedo says I'm probably just putting too much effort though, and that with my new body, I'd have to figure out a kind of new technique when it comes to flying compared to the old one, because I'm a lot bigger now. I... I think it makes sense, but I just don't know how to do a different technique, and no one in Mondstadt has wings, so they can't help me much."
Durin briefly thought of Dvalin. As a fellow dragon, he'd probably know a way to help. But no, asking another dragon, especially Dvalin, wasn't an idea Durin found himself fond of. It felt a little embarrassing. They hadn't properly met yet, and Durin really wanted to make a good first impression.
Similarly, he’d also had a small thought of reaching out to Lord Barbatos, whom he has met, but he didn’t want to bother Mondstadt’s Archon with something so trivial. So both of those ideas went to the back burner.
That was partly why he felt like no one could really help him. Albedo was an option, since he made his body, but he cannot fly. Dvalin can, and Lord Barbatos can, but they are not people Durin found he could easily reach out to. That did not leave him with many options.
Hat Guy hummed like he was silently thinking of something, bringing Durin back to reality. The other crossed his arms and asked, "Is there really no possibility that it's an issue with your body itself?"
"Albedo thought it was a possibility too," Durin told him. "He even apologized prior to tests in case it was since he made my body, so it'd kinda be his fault. But then, he said he couldn't identify any issues with my wings, so it’s probably... a me thing."
The fact it was his fault stung a lot, and maybe he once thought about it before bed and cried until he fell asleep, but Durin decided to not mention that.
"I see," Hat Guy said. Then, "I can fly."
Durin blinked. "Yes," he replied, because it was a fact, so what else could he say?
Hat Guy blinked back. "I could help."
“...Oh,” was all that came out for a second from Durin. How had he never thought of this, was his first thought. Then, what if Hat Guy feels forced to help just because he technically can? So, he asked, very quietly, “Are you sure?”
Hat Guy looked at Durin like he had grown another pair of horns right in front of him. “I don’t make offers like that so casually.”
“Ok──” Durin could have just about started bawling his eyes out and hugged the other immediately, but Hat Guy wouldn’t like that much, so instead he just took a deep breath. “──Ok. Right now?”
Hat Guy shrugged. “I’m in Mondstadt for around a week.”
“Ok,” Durin repeated, voice coming out a bit more wet than he wanted it to. Upon remembering something Klee once said, he added, “yay.”