I'm sorry this took so long. I'm drowning in school. Finished unlocked. So much potential for gay fanfiction. This chapter is shorter than the others have been but Dex deserves a happy ending.
A Very Obsessed Fangirl: It makes me deliriously happy that there are people in the world who read my work in their midnight fanfiction endeavors.
Anyways, I give you the last chapter of Not Just For Humans.
I am sitting on the counter watching Fitz make a hair dye. He's made a lot of them, and we sell them. He's pouring gulon poop into a bubbling yellow concoction. Alchemy is weird.
"I wish you'd let me pay you," I say to him.
"Don't need it," he replies, his brow furrowing as the mixture turns a snotty green. It is not supposed to be a snotty green. I snort, and then watch as he fixes it, pouring in a powdery mixture of artificial unicorn horn and ground feathers. It turns the pink color it's supposed to be.
"You sure looked like you needed it when I bought you Mallowmelt," color flushes to his cheeks.
"I'll pay you back,"
"Don't bother. You've more than made up for it. I should be paying you,"
"I don't need it. We've got plenty of money. That's the point of this whole thing," I raise an eyebrow.
"This whole thing?" He reddens more.
"Sorry. This whole...Revolution?" I laugh, tipping my chin up slightly. He glances up at me, red as a tomato. I bring his face towards mine with my hand. I have to lean down slightly because of my tall vantage point on the cluttered countertop. He presses his forehead into mine, the pink fading from his cheeks. I push our lips together. The familiar buzz comes through me, comforting and warming. We part as the hair dye boils over onto the counter. I manage to slide off the counter before it can get on my clothes, but some of the clutter on the counter couldn't say the same. Several wires were now coated in a shiny pink wax, a thin strip of metal fizzes away into nothingness, and an empty glass vial shatters.
All of these things are cheap and replaceable.
My team Valiant crest, however, is not.
I've still got the Moon and Sunlight ones, but the Starlight badge is sitting on the counter bright pink and half deteriorated. I'd taken it off after our last conversation with the council, trading it for the Dizznee crest, and letting it slide into the mess. Fitz notices it and curses under his breath several times as he picks it up to review the damage.
"It's fine," I told him. He shakes his head.
"It's not," he hands it over to me. It was a permanent dye. I can tell that it's not coming off.
"It totally is. It doesn't matter very much," Team Valiant mattered a lot to me until it didn't'. Back when my family was lower on the Elvin hierarchy and I had to fight to be seen.
Now all I've got to do is step outside and people are calling out to me.
I dig under the counter for the other two crests. I keep them at Slurps and Burps so the triplets can't get to them. I pull them out and drop them into what's left of the mixture. They sizzle as they turn pink.
"It's fine. I don't need them to feel needed anymore,"
"The council won't like it,"
"I'm sure it's the least of their worries concerning me," I crack a mischievous grin. This makes him smile. It's a small one, the sides of his mouth tilting slightly, a slight lift of his chin.
"I love you," he says. It's random. It's not the response I was expecting, but we knew it was coming for us eventually. I can feel the words as they come from his lips and float into my ears. For a second there are no issues in the lost cities. No classism, no wary council, no hierarchy. There's nothing except us for those seconds as I repeat his words back to him.
"I love you too."