Adjustments
A Princess Tutu fanfic by Klondike Aura
The air was electric around the couple. Downed power line electric.
Teasing was the normal course of the day for Duck and Fakir. Once he had found a way to give her human form again, an offer she accepted with barely any hesitation, they were back to their old ways. Their friendship and eventual courtship was marked with playful back and forths accented with light-hearted smirks and huffs.
Fakir, however, could see that his girlfriend (and what a strange yet wonderful thought that is, which felt as though the parts of his own heart were engaged in a series of jetes, to know that Duck is his girlfriend) was in no mood for such banter today. He kept things on the polite side to be safe but Duck remained cold.
It wasn't her. And that was starting to sour Fakir's mood.
"What's gotten into you?" he finally risked on their formerly silent walk to his house.
Duck shot him a glare. He resisted the urge to scowl; the last thing they needed was a real fight. But he didn't turn away from her harsh look, either.
"Did something happen at school?" he pressed on.
"Everything's fine," she bluntly not-answered.
Fakir just stopped in front of Duck, causing her to half-step and take a step back to keep from running into him, and furrowed his brows.
"This isn't like you, Duck."
She puffed her cheeks out and said, "I've been mad lots of times."
"But what are you mad at?"
Duck's expression deflated as the corners of her mouth tugged down.
"...I don't know."
Fakir sighed. What is it about girls? Sometimes he thinks it was easier back when it was just him and Mytho.
Duck, accustomed to her boyfriend's 'You're a Moron' sighs, decides his reward for his annoyance at her would be a punch on the shoulder.
"Well you don't have to be a jerk about me being mad!" she said before walking around him.
He fought the instinct to rub his stinging arm, a bruise likely forming under his sleeve. He can't remember Duck doing anything like that to him since the time she shoved him in the library. (And looking back, if he ever deserved to be shoved, that was the right time for it.) Great, now she really is mad at him.
And still walking to his house.
He wasn't looking forward to the rest of the evening.
The next day, Duck didn't seem to be mad anymore, either at Fakir or in general. She had even apologized for punching him. But she wasn't back to normal yet, either.
"I don't wanna mooooove," she whined, slumped on Fakir's bed with his pillow in her arms as she watched him write.
At least she wasn't mad anymore. Fakir didn't particularly like the whining but it was a step in a better direction.
"Then stay put," he suggested.
"But we should do more than just sit here. I mean, isn't it kinda boring?"
Ignoring the unintended implication that his writing is boring, which reached and horrified Duck's mind some scant seconds after the question left her mouth, Fakir said, "If you don't want to move, what else could we do?"
He had her there.
She eventually forced herself to stand up and ask, "Um, where's your bathroom?"
"You've been here how long and you don't remember?"
"It's different when I was like only a foot tall for most of the time."
He pointed the direction of the nearest bathroom. Duck put the pillow back on his bed and left.
Fakir continued to scratch out his current story, wondering what could be bothering his girlfriend. Must have been an intense practice session today. Ballet classes were very different now that they didn't have the likes of Mr. Cat instructing them.
His musings were interrupted by a bloodcurdling scream from the hallway. Fakir bolted out of his chair, knocking it over in his haste, and to the bathroom door where he could hear Duck sobbing.
"Duck? What's wrong?" he shouted, his voice harsh with fear.
"I'm bleeding!" she cried to him. "I'm bleeding a lot! It won't stop!"
"Did you cut yourself?"
Had he been careless? Did he leave something in the bathroom in disrepair only for it to hurt Duck now? If that was the case, the door would soon be in disrepair as well.
"No."
No?
Some small amount of fear ebbed out of him. But she was still panicking and apparently bleed-
…...oh no.
"My stomach hurts, too," she informed him. "Am I dying? I don't wanna die!"
Fakir leaned against the door, his face flushed with awkward realization and his mind a jumble of swears.
Why this of all things? Why here and now and without any girls in the house to explain it to Duck? It's bad enough that he knows what's going on, the result of growing up with a sister in the house, but even worse that Duck hasn't a clue.
This must be my punishment, he thought to himself. He's the one who found the way to make her a girl. Now she's every bit a girl, inside and out, and this part is included in being a girl.
He can't tell her. He doesn't even know or want to know everything he would have to tell her. But he has to say something. There she is on the other side of the door, certain that she was dying.
"You're not going to die, Duck," he forced himself to tell her as calm and collected as he could be after some silence on his side.
Inside the bathroom, Duck wondered how he could be so calm. Here she was, slowly bleeding more than she could ever remember, and he's just telling her she's not going to die. He hadn't even SEEN how bad it is or even WHERE all this blood could have come from! Maybe he's just reassuring himself so that he doesn't panic, too. And she could hear some discomfort. Surely he's trying to be strong for her sake. And after she was so awful to him yesterday.
"Fakir, I'm sorry I hit you yesterday!" she cried. "I know I already said it but I'm really really sorry and I wanted to tell you again in case-"
"No 'in case,'" he answered. "You're going to be all right."
"Are you sure?" she asked, sniffling.
"Yes. Now just stay there," he commanded as gently as he could. "I'll go and get you some help. Try to calm down and I'll be back soon. Okay?"
"Okay," she meekly whimpered, wishing with all of her might that her body would somehow right itself and that Fakir's assessment that she wouldn't die was true.
She listened as he hurried away, unaware of his small thoughts of relief in knowing he won't have to tell her himself.
Charon looked up from his work when he heard Fakir enter. His son not being one for casual visits, the smith waited for the reason behind coming here.
When the younger man remained silent, Charon pressed, "Yes, Fakir?"
"Could Raetsel come to visit?" he asked.
"This is sudden. I don't mind but why now?"
The response was murmured and Fakir was turning even redder.
"What was that?"
"...Duck needs to talk to a girl," Fakir said a bit louder.
"Is it bad?"
"She thinks she's dying."
Charon raised an eyebrow. What is it with these children and their dramatics? Though, with what Fakir's told him about the story that only kept from completely disappearing from the older man's memory by hooks and threads, dramatics are to be expected.
He guessed the stories don't account for these sorts of details.
"Put the tea on and I'll get Raetsel," the smith answered. "And do what you can to calm Duck down."
"You mean this is gonna happen once a month?"
Though the kitchen was the men's choice for their self-exile while Raetsel comforted and explained things to Duck, the redhead's dismayed outbursts made it to their ears loud and clear.
"Well, at least she knows she's not dying," Charon commented.
"Being a girl all the time is weird," Duck concluded to Fakir later, her back leaning against his as they sat together. Her knees were pulled up to her chest and he had one leg propped up to support his writing.
His blushing agreed with her sentiment.
After some fairly comfortable silence, however, he asked, "Do you regret it?"
"Wha? No!" Duck answered, carefully turning to face him. "I like being a girl! It's just... It's weird. And there's a lot of stuff I didn't know about. And it's not like you were thinking about that stuff, were you?"
"I'm trying my best not to think of it now," Fakir half-complained.
"Yeah... Sorry..."
She turned and they were once again back to back.
"And sorry I freaked out on you," she added, taking her braid and playing with the end. "And...and sorry again that I punched you yesterday."
"Don't worry about that," he said, turning his head a little to her. "But try not to worry me anymore, okay, moron?"
Duck gently elbowed him in the back, causing his quill to skitter off course, before leaning her head on top of his shoulder.
"I'll try not to, jerk," she said, a hint of a smile in her voice.
Fakir gave her a soft kiss on the top of her head and replied, "That's better."
fin
Author's Notes: I probably could have called this Put Fakir in the Most Awkward Situation Ever. Most all Fakir/Duck (or Fakir/Ahiru if you prefer) shippers turn Duck back into a girl but I haven't seen this particular implication of her presumably permanent humanity covered before.
I wanted to do a little more with Raetsel but her scene just threw the pacing of the drabble off. So she mostly got cut. Such is the nature of editing. D:
Lastly, Duck and Fakir have awesome pet names. XD; Pet names are weird because they don't work unless they're organic, like inside jokes. I suppose when you banter with someone a lot, the pet names aren't always flattering.