Alternatively, Four Times Moana Made Some Good Calls and One Time She Didn't.
A cross-posting of a fic I put up on AO3 in July 2017.
Part 5 of the fanfic series, Where You Are.
Notes:
I'm not sure what happened, this entire thing was supposed to be about 3000 words and the very first story ended up surpassing that completely, so here are some little glimpses in the eight years between founding a new colony and the next fanfic in the series? The first is I guess fluff in two parts. Actually helpful proper notes: no, these aren't the Cook Islands but I couldn't resist the pun. Also, any resemblance to the real-life Fa'anui is coincidence, I just wanted a good generic name for a harbour town. If anything I'm probably taking more inspiration than I should from my hometown of Port Moresby.
Moana doesn't need his approval.
If anything he probably needs hers, not that he'd ever admit it.
But she's biting her lip and trying not to play with her hair as they pass through the beginnings of her new settlement, and she's all determined not to look at him but her eyes occasionally dart to his direction anyway, and if that's not the cutest thing he's ever seen her do it's probably close.
She's just about to ask, "Well?", as they pass by the framework of a pretty magnificent grand fale, when he lets out a low whistle, and she almost collapses in joy and relief.
"Gotta say, Chosen One," he says, stepping back to let a small group of her family's attendants pass by with food and water for the builders, "you really got something here."
And for a second it's like they're back on her outdated little canoe and he's praising her for finally perfecting a knot or tracking the right constellation.
"You really think so?" Moana says, eyes shining and smirk coming out as an earnest beam, before she collects herself, straightening her headdress. "I mean, yeah, of course you think so. Because it's great. Our settlement is great."
He raises an eyebrow. "Convincing, Mo."
"Oh, shush."
Maui nudges her with his elbow, his substitute for ruffling her hair whenever they were in public, and the space between them fills with her embarrassed laughter before she shoves him back, the Mini Maui tattoo on her shoulder inches away from ramming into his coconut tattoo. Pua adds in a playful little headbutt for good measure.
Maui laughs. He missed her. He missed them all. Why does he ever leave.
He clears his throat, his attention back on the building in progress as he traipses towards the main posts already up. "Hey, nice! Breadfruit wood?"
She crosses her arms, head held high. "Yep! Brought a few plants from Motunui, but, y'know, funniest thing!" she says, and raises her own eyebrow nice and high. "When we first got here, there was a grove of mature breadfruit trees near the shore, isn't that weird? Breadfruit trees at the perfect location, and lots of them the perfect age to build and make boats with?"
Maui leans on his hook, the most convincing frown on his face. "Hmm. That is weird."
She smirks, and leans against the post. "Isn't it?" she says. "Y'know, since breadfruit needs humans to spread. We thought we came across an old village!"
"No."
"Yeah!" she says. "But, also funny thing, there were no signs anyone ever lived here! I mean, what are the odds we'd find this amazing uninhabited island filled with wild breadfruit when all the other islands on the way here were former dead lands? Isn't that weird that no one thought to come here, when it's so close by? It's almost like they'd never even seen this big, convenient island."
Maui frowns, innocently as he can. "Hmm," he says. "Y'know, Rongo's been bored. Maybe he's putting up starter plants for the new voyagers."
"Yeah," she says, her lips twitching as they struggle to keep from bursting into laughter. "Rongo. God of Farmed Food. Personally came here without anyone asking him to and put up plants because he's just a nice guy. His idea. Totally."
Maui shrugs. "Or Tāne-matua," he says. "Birdbrain does love his fruit trees."
She rolls her eyes and punches him on the shoulder. "You old softie," she says. "Thanks."
"What?" he says. "What'd I say?"
"You admitted everything and you know it, Fisher of Islands."
He drops the act and winks. "You're welcome," he says, gently clapping a hand on her back. "I knew you'd pick this one."
He's missed that long-suffering giggle that says she's trying to be annoyed but she can't.
Moana puts her hand up against the breadfruit wood post, her huge brown eyes looking higher and higher until she can just about see the top of the bamboo scaffolding, and there's a fire in her mixed with the joy and pride. "This'll be ready by the end of cyclone season, if we keep up the pace," she says. "One or two visits from now, you'll be welcomed in the biggest grand fale this side of the ocean."
He nods, mustering the best smile he can. He may still not be super thrilled at the thought of pomp and ceremony but her people are and he shouldn't be surprised she is, too.
Plus, look at her, she's just so proud.
"Can't wait to see when it's done," he says.
She rolls her eyes. "Liar. If it were up to you we'd welcome everyone in that little shed from this morning," she says. "But thanks. That means a lot."
Her hand stays on the post a couple seconds longer than she probably meant it to.
Maui frowns.
She's nervous. He hates when she's nervous. It always makes him nervous for her and she ends up feeling guilty for even feeling like that and then he gets mad he can't just fight off the guilt with his hook and it just becomes this mess.
So, much as he still fumbles with the talking, talking will have to do.
"So what else you got planned for this patch of dirt, then?" he says, turning back towards the rest of the village in progress, the whole place humming with chatter and laughter and song as it enters the hottest part of the day and everyone takes a break from construction. "Looks like you're here to stay."
And it does. This isn't just some temporary deal that'll have them back on the ocean in a few days, this has the bones of a big village. There's a good amount of cleared forest, with scattered completed houses and some buildings for utility—different fale for cooking, storage, tapa production, and so on—not far off a little land sectioned off for a malae, in the distance some farms getting started. There's design here, a vision, and by the scale of this grand fale and its strategic position to have a view of the village and harbour, some plans for growth.
Fa'anui, they called the settlement. Great Harbour. And it looks like they mean to put every inch of it to use.
"I may have scouted the islands a bit during those missions to the east," she says, shrinking a little like she's admitting some sort of underhanded trick. "Out of all the ones we passed while we cleared the way for my fleet, I thought this one had the best location for a new village."
"For voyaging?"
"For trade," she says. "There's passages in all directions, islands in all directions, and the waters here are safe. This settlement can become a hub for voyagers from everywhere."
It's an unconvincing performance of an afterthought when she adds, "And the hundred or so neighbouring islands are a nice bonus."
He laughs, dangerously close to having her suffer the scandal of having her hair ruffled in public. "Called it," he crows. "You're getting predictable, Curly."
She elbows him right in the gut, and when he straightens back up she's back to surveying the pretty magnificent view of the village like nothing ever happened.
She's fidgeting again, gathering the mass of curls on her head into bunches, and she looks back at him and his hook before something sets and she decides to just go for it.
"So what do you think?" she says. "Of the village, I mean. Do you like it?"
He blinks. "Well, sure," he says. "What's not to like?"
That doesn't seem to do it.
"Is that what this is about? I personally need to like this village?" he says. "Kid, since when do you need my approval for anything? Half the time I can't even give you fashion advice."
"Because your choices are terrible," she snaps. "And I don't know. I guess, once we figured you pulled up this island and you got the gods to make it easy to settle, I just want to make sure we're not screwing up all your hard work."
She yawns, right there in the heat of the midday sun, the yawn he knows from their time voyaging, whenever she had to skip a turn sleeping.
Come to think of it, how long had they been working on this new village? It's still tradewinds season, and they've already come this far? How much overtime did she put into this?
"You're our first visitor, Maui," she says, nerves pushing past the exhaustion. "It's kind of a big deal."
He shakes his head.
His little voyager, always needing to prove herself.
Maui nudges her gently as he can, and her headdress still manages to come slightly askew.
"Hey," he says. "This is your island now, okay? I pulled it up as a gift for you mortals. Take care of it, sure, but you'll know if it's good when it's working. This isn't some sort of test where I smite you if I don't agree with the colour scheme. There's no need to impress me with just how big and fancy everything is."
And that does seem to do it.
She sighs, and straightens that headdress. Pua curls up and snuggles at her feet.
"The other villages have to like this one if we have a chance at keeping our trading partners and convincing people to settle nearby," she says. "I want people to voyage again, and when they do I want to welcome them to somewhere nice, not—"
She gestures out at the mess of construction sprawling out from the gentle hills down into its generous harbour, grand in scope and beautiful in design, but still very much in progress.
"All villages look like this when you're building them, kid," Maui says, mentally filling in the gaps, adding roofs and pathways and lines of drying tapa cloth here and there, piles of discarded coconut husks and the smoke of food being cooked. A real village, thriving under her watch. "And this one's gonna look even better when it's done."
"You're just saying that," she says.
"I'm not!" he says. "Hey, prime real estate like this? New islands, few days' sail from a fertility goddess, they'll be fighting to come over here, even if the neighbours' chief in training is kinda kooky-dooks."
He leans on his hook, and imagines the completed buildings once more.
"It's gonna be amazing, Moana," he says. "Trust me. You got nothing to prove to anyone but yourself."
Moana chuckles and she elbows him, gently this time, an unspoken thanks in those huge brown eyes.
And that's probably the only thing he likes about whenever she gets nervous, the part where she calms down and everything is okay again.
She nudges Pua back awake, and heads out back onto the paths, a sheepish smile as she gestures for Maui to come follow her. "C'mon," she says. "One more stop in this tour."
He picks up Pua, who grunts and snuggles up to him in thanks. "Okay, but I dunno how you can top that Mini Maui tattoo," he says, dodging the piles of rope and wood shavings.
She rolls her eyes. "Your fale, Maui."
"Right, right, right," he says. "So where am I hanging up my hook this time?"
And she's nervous again, just for a second, before the excitement pushes past the nerves and exhaustion and she turns and merely gestures again for him to follow her.
The chief's compound isn't far, a little ways from the grand faleand scattered over the flatter areas uphill. There's the chief's fale still in progress, not much different from the one on Motunui, and he's not sure why he's surprised, but the smaller fale aren't anything too fancy. Comfortable and well-made, sure, but not decked out in a clear effort to impress the guests. Maybe the end result of the rest of the village wasn't going to be as pompous as he feared.
The one she leads him to doesn't look that different from the others nearby, kind of a standard size for what you'd expect in the chief's family compound, albeit a little wider and taller than some of the others around. He'd seen similar ones back in Motunui, enough for maybe a small family at most. Maybe this one belonged to her mom's sister, or one of the cousins from that side since Moana's paternal cousins mostly stayed behind.
He gives it another once-over, smiles at the sweet ocean view on one side and the small drop on the other, with a view of the forest and the rush of a nearby river, and just here, between this fale and the chief's residence, a small area of grass just begging to have people sit and enjoy the sea breeze. If he didn't already know this was probably her aunt's place he wouldn't be above fighting or bribing someone for ownership.
"All right," he says, "who'd you kick out this time?"
Moana blinks. "Kick out?"
"Who respectfully volunteered to make room, then," Maui says. "I need to know who I'm thanking for the inconvenience."
Pua tilts his head, like he could actually understand human language.
"Maui," Moana says, "we didn't kick out anyone."
He stops. "I don't follow."
She stares at him, incredulous, before she's trying not to laugh.
"How'd you get the reputation as the smart demigod?" she says. "Maui, this is your fale."
His what now?
He looks down at Mini Maui, who just shrugs.
"My fale," Maui says, and it's like words don't mean anything anymore. He owns a boat and a hook. What was this about him owning anything else? "As in, my place. For me. Permanently. I'm not temporarily hijacking someone else's house. My fale."
"Yeah."
"In the chief's family compound."
"Yeah."
No, no, she doesn't seem to be getting this.
"The chief's family compound," he says, slower this time, because this can't be right.
"Yes!"
Maui opens his mouth to speak, closes it again, opens it, closes it again. Mini Maui rolls his eyes and briefly does a frankly uncalled-for fish impression, before he nudges at his host to say something. Which he ultimately doesn't end up doing.
Moana's red now, and shrinking in on herself, briefly playing with her hair before she puts a stop to it, but there's no hiding that worry no matter how much she liked to think of herself as something of a fellow performer and trickster.
"Look, we don't exactly have protocols for where to put a demigod's fale," she says. "The village chief's compound just seemed like the logical choice."
There was no explaining his way out of this one, either. Unless the compound's boundaries found a way to somehow have this place as kind of like an independent island in a sea of relatives, this was solidly within the same residential area, no fuzzy borderland where you could argue he was almost separate, this was barely a few minutes' walk from the chief's place itself. They meant to have him close by. They planned to have him with the sea on one side and the forest birds on the other and a whole sky all above it all. This was for him.
And if the rest of the village was anything to go by, this was Moana's idea.
She's bending down to pet Pua now, stroking his head a little before straightens back up. "Too much?" she says. "Is it too much? We could move it if you—"
"No!" he says, a little too loudly. "No, I mean, this is fine. Thank you."
She smiles past the exhaustion, singing back, "You're welcome."
It's a shaky few steps up the platform and into the actual building and he's surprised at the tremble in his hand as he puts his hook up against a post and looks around. "This is great," he says. "Nice smooth rock, forest wood, brand new mosquito screens, extra-large bamboo pillow, it's great."
Moana sighs in relief, and rolls down the tapa screens.
Hooks and spirals, hawks and boats. A sea of smaller motifs lovingly printed with templates he hadn't seen used in Motunui before. Just in case he didn't get the message that they made this with him in mind.
"We just had enough sugarcane frond thatch for your roof," Moana says. "We'll switch the rest of the roofs from coconut once our crops grow in."
"I'll have another word with Rongo."
"Maui."
"What?" he says. "He owes me!"
"Maui."
He huffs. "Fine," he says. "Independence. And all that. Baby's first settlement."
And there's this glow he feels inside, this warmth, as he just lets it soak in.
She swallows. "So do you like it?"
Did he like it?
No oranges hanging from the rafters, no coconut fronds decorating the outside posts, no flowers covering the centre post and spilling out onto the floor. None of the old village's bits of hospitality, none of the new settlement's little flourishes and grandeur. Just a normal house, a regular old fale. He's local now, and he's not sure he even remembers the last time he had a home.
And she's asking if he approves?
"Yeah," he says. "Yeah, I like it."
And she lets her eyes slip shut and takes a moment to bask in this little victory.
He claps a hand on the Mini Maui shoulder.
"You didn't have to, Curly," he says. "You got all these other projects going; this can't have been easy to make room for."
She nudges him. "Pssh," she says. "You fished up this island and got the God of Farmed Food to give us building materials. Least we could do."
"After calling this area the Hook Islands."
"Did you or did you not fish up this archipelago?"
He can just about feel that smug little smirk as she leans against him, Mini Maui cheekily adding another point to the scoreboard, and he's not sure he's even capable of caring right now because look at this. Look at what her village did. For him, of all people. All this impressive architecture, and she knew he'd be bowled over by a simple house.
"You're gonna do just fine, Chosen One," he says, for what it's worth. "You got nothing to worry about."
He's holding her back before he can realise what's going on, and there's a hitch in his breath he doesn't notice until it's too late.
"Hey, Moana?" he says, already wincing at the waver in his voice.
She doesn't tease him, not this time. "Yeah?"
He swallows. "You don't actually think I'm family, do you?"
And there's a silence, and it's only a few seconds but it feels longer than all those centuries on his forsaken island.
She breaks away and he can't bear to look at her directly, but her tone is gentle enough. "What else would you be?"
"Don't make fun, kid."
"I'm not," she says, a sting in her voice. "Why would I? Maui, even without your powers, where else do you think I'd ask them to put your place?"
And Maui, Demigod of the Wind and Sea, the trickster who ten times charmed sacred fire from Mahuika herself, has nothing to say.
She backtracks. "I mean," she says. "Is that weird? Do you not want to go with the family label? Because we can do with friends."
Friends? His first family in more than a thousand years, family that for once chose him instead of the other way around, and he'd just—?
Maui chokes back the tears threatening to spill out of him in a river to rival the one outside, and shoots her a watery smile. "No, not weird at all," he chokes. "Family's fine. Family's great."
If she still had any energy left, she'd probably be leaping up into his arms and smothering him in a surprisingly strong hug. But as it stands the work and the nerves seem to have left her exhausted for now, and she settles for letting her head rest against his chest before her arms lazily wrap around as much of him as they can, while Pua rests against their feet.
Moana yawns.
"Welcome to the family, then," she mumbles against him, and then adds, "Cuz."
Cousins. Okay. Okay, he could work with cousins. He'd never been a cousin before.
He hugs her back, and it takes all his strength just to remind himself not to crush her, because right now he doesn't ever want to let go.
A family. After all this time a family.
Why does he ever leave.
"Good to be home."