La'gaan didn't curse all that often. Not casually, anyway. He couldn't remember the last time he'd uttered "Neptune's beard" in anything other than anger or frustration. But this time it was appropriate.
He'd only been away four days. He hadn't expected anything to change in that time. So it was a little startling to run into Mal coming out of the bathroom, look up and see...
"Neptune's … what happened to you?"
"What?" Mal rubbed his chin. His chin, covered in tiny but prominent hairs. "What's the problem?"
"Are you growing a beard?"
"Yeah, so?"
"It's very... um." Truth be told, La'gaan had had very little to do with beards. Most of the Atlanteans who could grow facial hair seemed to keep shaved. Living in water would do that. King Orin was really the only bearded man he dealt with a lot, and it wasn't proper to pay too much obvious attention to the King's fashion choices. La'gaan had never been sure whether that beard was a publicity thing or not. He was certain his King wouldn't stoop to appeasing purists by flaunting his "purity" and showing that he could grow beard hair, but wearing one to look majestic would help. They certainly looked majestic.
Without stopping to think, La'gaan reached up to brush a palm across Mal's chin. The whiskers were tougher, more wiry, than other hair he'd chanced to touch, they lacked the light softness of his Angelfish's head hair or the oily stringiness of his own. The sharp tips prickled on his palm. He couldn't help but wonder if they'd feel the same underwater as above it. Head hair didn't.
Mal, for his part, stood perfectly still. Probably frozen in confusion, or just taken aback and not sure how to react. "Uh... La'gaan..."
La'gaan realised what he was doing and quickly pulled away. "Sorry." How does one apologise for suddenly rubbing somebody's face out of intense curiosity? "Sorry, I've got to... uh... go now." He turned and quickly marched down the hall in the opposite direction.
Maybe, if he was really lucky, Mal would forget the whole thing had happened.
The next time La'gaan saw Mal was for a private mission briefing, and the hairs on his chin were nearly half an inch long. La'gaan wondered whether they'd be more yielding under his hand with more length. He kept his hands to himself.
"So you'll be under radio silence," Mal said, handing him an actual paper folder. "No electronic communication, which is why I'm tellin' you this in person. You got all that?"
"I'm on it."
The time after that, they were maintaining the vehicles. Everyone on the Team had had a crash course in basic bike maintenance in case they broke down in the field, but it was best to do everything possible to make sure that didn't happen. Mal had a goatee with a little moustache.
"Hey, Mal. La'gaan." Karen shifted her stack of books to one hip and stopped long enough to give Mal a peck on the lips.
"Hey, Beautiful. So how long are – "
"Sorry Santa, gotta run."
"I do not look like Santa." Mal sounded wounded. He rubbed his chin.
"You're right, you've got more of an alternate universe evil Mal thing going on. Although your scariest evil power is the ability to tickle me to death." She rubbed her face. "Later, honey."
La'gaan watched her leave, wondering if the beard also tickled Mal's lips. He didn't ask.
Mal seemed to have settled on the little goatee. He still had it a week later when he fell asleep on the couch during one of the boys' video game all-nighters. Batman had always been disapproving about those but any attempt to bring the subject up was met with a very firm shutdown by Black Canary. While Jaime, Bart and Garfield pummelled each other on the television screen, Mal had dozed off next to La'gaan. That wasn't unusual; by the time those three were fighting each other it took forever for one of them to die and hand over the controller.
Mal's head was tipped back over the back of the couch, his mouth hanging slightly open. La'gaan glanced at the others, focused on their game, then back to Mal's face. He ran a couple of fingers softly along the edge of his moustache (smooth with the direction of the hair, rough against it) and then down his jaw. It was strange how something individually tough and pointy could be grouped with others of its kind and become smooth and shiny.
"Hey Lagoon Boy!"
La'gaan jumped and pulled back guiltily, but Bart's eyes were still fixed on the screen in front of him. "Yeah?"
"Get ready to take Blue's controller, I'm gonna pound him to dust!"
"Oh you wish!" Jaime leaned forward, biting his lip. "Hey, no superspeed!"
"Says the kid who hacked the console with his AI last week!"
"That was totally not on purpose!"
"Neither is the speed!"
La'gaan went to get snacks. It was amazing how obsessive some of his teammates could get over little things.