For Once, I Have Nothing Up My Sleeve

(directly following The Heirloom of the Heaviness You've Known)

Ryan hadn’t planned anything else for the day, and had finished their homework in a fit of anxious energy the previous night as they avoided worrying about the confrontation with Bill; now they’re completely free of things to distract themself with, and are also angrier than they’re ever comfortable being.

They want a distraction. More than that, they want to talk to someone who doesn’t think their powers are weird, or something to be controlled and hidden, someone who won’t care if they show up with their glasses off or their gauntlet out.

After about fifteen minutes of walking through Halcyon City, they realize that their feet have taken them to the brownstone headquarters of the Halcyon chapter of the Knights of the Round Table. Some part of the back of their brain registers that if anyone on the team hears about this, Ryan is never going to hear the end of it, but they don’t really care about that right now.

They head up to the second floor, knocking at the door of the headquarters and hoping that Lily, or someone, is there to let them in, because barging into this place of all places in Halcyon City is a *bad* idea.

A silhouette of a head with a high bun appears in the frosted glass insert of the door, as a voice comes into focus with it. “I get that it might not be the most flattering comparison, but do you really think Sir Galahad is going to play Zodiac Crossing? Heck, Sir Sadlad is actually kind of endearing once you get past all the crying. I’d call that an improvement over the original.”

The door opens with a squeak and Lily smiles brightly at Ryan, the smile almost immediately turning into an expression of confusion, and then frustration. “Uh… I gotta go, Sir Percy. I think Merlin made *another* appointment without telling anyone.” She can’t help but let her annoyance creep in at the edges of her voice. Pocketing her phone, Lily waves Ryan in with another little smile.

“Hey, sorry for the mess, but I didn’t realize we were expecting you and *Merlin* always insists that his business is his business, but I don’t think that really applies when it’s literally my job to know the business of everyone else in this office, you know?” She’s a blur of a cardigan and dark-wash jeans, running around the small room picking up papers, shifting boxes, and righting a tipped over statuette.

“Uh, this one isn’t Merlin’s fault, actually.” Ryan says, anger being replaced by sheepishness very quickly. It’s very hard to stay angry in the face of Lily’s apology and assumption that Merlin was the one who messed up here, when he very much wasn’t. “I was just stopping by and hoping that he was in--sorry if it was a bad time. I didn’t really check beforehand to see if anything was up. And don’t worry about the mess. I live at Big Base, this is nothing.”

Lily nods in memory of the truly incredible messes around the base. She drops the armful of mess on her desk and slides around to the back of it, producing a small round hand mirror from a drawer. Moving with practice from wall to wall, she opens one of the blinds and plucks a few leaves from a potted plant by the desk, resting them on the mirrors surface and chatting all the while.

“Thanks anyway, but the clutter still gets a bit overwhelming in here. You’re living at the base now? How’s everyone there? Like, uh...” she trails off, realizing she’s not sure if she actually still knows anyone from her time on the team.

“I’ve been living there for a few months, now,” Ryan confirms. “And it’s...well, it’s Big Team. Loud and friendly and messy. And doing pretty well, all things considered. AEGIS gave us a babysitter now, but he mostly stays out of the way and observes the unfolding chaos, so that could be a lot worse.” Ryan also tries to think of who they know who worked alongside Lily. “Aman’s birthday was about a week ago, but you probably knew that. One of the newer kids keeps breaking the panic room. So, everything’s pretty much normal.” They shift, remembering why they’re here. “Uh, is Merlin in? I don’t want to keep bothering you if he’s not--”

“Oh, no he’s not here, and he still refuses to get a phone, so I can’t call him back here. This is the next best thing!” Lily gestures to the mirror as the leaves sink into it, leaving behind a soft ripple across the glass. She rushes to pick up the mirror and hold it up to the window, flooding it with light for a moment.

“That should get his attention,” she looks at her watch, “and he should be storming in, in 3… 2…”

“Lily!” An angry looking Merlin throws open the door to the office “I thought I told you to stop-” Merlin stops in his tracks as soon as he sees Ryan, his jaw opening and eyes widening in surprise. “Ryan! I don’t- I didn’t- what are you doing here? I didn’t forget about a date did I!? I could have sworn I didn’t have anything on my planner for today, I’m so sorry.” Merlin tugs awkwardly at the sleeves of his robes, face red with embarrassment.

When Ryan sees Merlin, they give what’s probably the first genuine smile since the beginning of their conversation with Bill. It’s quickly replaced by sheepishness, though, as they raise their hands and shake their head to wave away Merlin’s apology.

“Oh--no, no, we didn’t have anything planned, I was just stopping by to see if you were free. It’s nothing important.” Ryan’s suddenly aware that they’re a bit of a mess--their glasses are still in their pocket, their hair is unkempt from where they angrily ran their hands through it. It’s not the first time Merlin has seen them looking less than perfect, obviously--you don’t traipse through a sewer with someone, or get backhanded into a wall by a magic criminal and come out of a mirror dimension, and look completely fine. But they’re not sure Merlin has seen them *upset* before, and are abruptly unsure of what to do. “If you’re busy, I can head out.”

"Oh! No no that's okay- I can- I can make time." Merlin gives a nervous glance at Lily, knowing full well he has other obligations to take care of. "What did you want to do? Did you have anything in mind?"

Again, Ryan is cursing their lack of planning. This is why they don’t do things spontaneously. They shrug, hands tucked into their pockets.

“I didn’t really have much in mind, just wanted to talk.” They cast around for some idea. “We could head out to the park or something and get out of Lily’s way?”

“That sounds like a great idea!” Lily beams and squeezes past the two to open the door. “Not like there’s much date-y stuff for you to do here. Have fuuuuuuun!”

As Ryan and Merlin are about to leave, Lily hold Ryan back with a hand on their shoulder, whispering as she passes them a business card. “Seriously, take him any time you want to. Just text me first and I’ll let you know if he’s here.” She finishes with a very serious thumbs-up before waving the two away and returning to her work.

Ryan looks down at the business card, and then back at Lily, before shrugging and pocketing it. It’s definitely good to have a point of contact, but they can’t say they understand why everyone is always so eager not to be spending time with Merlin. They turn back to him.

“I didn’t really have a plan when I stopped by,” they admit, starting to head for the door. “I guess I, uh, just wanted to do something that wasn’t making me angry. How’s your day been going? Anything interesting happening before Lily half-blinded you?”

Merlin sighs. “Well, today’s been pretty busy. See, one of our Consortium contacts told us about the leylines that run through the city, and Lily noticed that the increase in resonant magic across them has had subtle effects on the city’s flora. I started thinking, maybe there’s been other effects on the ecosystem. So I checked out a pine barrens that the leyline supposedly crosses and sure enough it’s had an interesting effect on the local geology. So, the mineral content in the park mainly consists of precambrian shield, as is expected of the great lakes area. However, the quartz of this area has an abnormally high proportion of beta-quartz, with discolorations and polymorphs not normally found in nature. I’ve been running some basic mana-capacity tests and I’ve found that it’s surprisingly resilient to fast charging and discharging of magic energies, making it an extremely promising reagent. I was just about finished conducting a dummy benchmarking spell sourced from one of the samples when a blinding flash of light interrupted me. And now here I am!” He looks sheepish for a moment. “Sorry, I started rambling.”

Ryan, who has been listening raptly, blinks at the apology. “No, you don’t have to apologize, this is the most interesting thing I’ve heard all day. I’m not sure, but if you come across any fossils near the leyline, I could take a look at them and see if the variations on the flora were persistent then, too, or if it’s more recent with the city growing and developing. I’d offer with just normal rocks, but I’m not sure it would work as well—the only way I have to describe it is that things that used to be alive like remembering when they were alive.”

Merlin’s eyes widen. “Umm, not to mix my personal and professional lives too much but uh,” He tugs at his sleeves, “would you wanna go hang out at the park and look at rocks?”

Merlin flushes, realizing how dorky that sounds after saying it out loud, even though he offered it to the exact right person.

Ryan grins. “If mixing your personal and professional lives means I get to go hang out at the park with you and look at rocks, please keep doing it,” they say. “Because I would love to.”