Oh, oh, oh it's magic (Xie and Kevin)

[xie_er]

Zhao Jing used to be a nobody, born into influence and wealth but always in the shadow of those around him. In magical circles he was even worse, a barely-remembered witch that didn't have enough power for any familiar to even consider looking twice at him.

Somehow, though, after many years (and a few suspicious deaths), he's managed to climb his way to the CEO of Five Lakes, his power - of both kinds - growing exponentially.

The previous CEO was surrounded by some unfortunate rumorus before his death, so Zhao Jing has been focused on repairing the reputation of he company and solidifying his support, mundane and magical, which means it is far too delicate a moment for Xie to be in the spotlight, even if he was promised he'd be allowed to stop hiding when the position was in Zhao Jing's hands.

He just has to wait a little longer, that's all, and it's not like it's difficult to only appear in his animal form whenever Zhao Jing is in public, just uncomfortable, and the last thing they need is for somebody to recognise Xie for any of the things he's done to help his witch get where he is today, when his position is still so precarious...

He tells himself all the excuses he's heard from Yifu, repeats them in his head like a mantra as he sits through all the meetings and negotiations, a little black cat and Zhao Jing's feet, watching the men and women he's speaking to for anything Yifu can use. He hangs around when Zhao Jing steps out the room, listens to what they say behind his back - that's his job with normal people, to be a pair of ears they don't realise are there. Even paranoid types who scan for bugs would miss him, which he finds funny, privately, because he is a bug of a sort.

Not that he's allowed to take his original animal form - a scorpion would be out of place if anybody caught sight of him, and Yifu doesn't like the idea of him hiding in pockets or anything like that. He says it's dangerous, that something could happen to him, but Xie privately thinks he just finds the form creepy. Even around other magical people, the cat is preferred - his job with them is to be a reminder that Zhao Jing has a familiar, and a relatively powerful one at that.

It's hard for familiars to change the form they can take, but he did it, for Yifu.

He tells people the cat is called Scorpion, and that somebody else named him - which is technically true, Xie does mean scorpion, and his parents named him - and that he's vaguely embarrassed to have such a fiercely named cat.

(He doesn't tell magical people anything at all, they know Xie isn't a pet so they're less likely to ask, at most they will wonder why his familiar always stays in animal form. Zhao Jing just tells them he's shy. He isn't, he doesn't care about people seeing him, but it's easier to do the things Yifu wants him to do when nobody knows what he looks like)

Xie hadn't always known he was powerful - when Yifu had taken him in he'd been told he wasn't much, but that maybe he could be useful. Later, when some witch had made an offhand comment about it, the story had become that Yifu recognised his power and took him in before anybody else could steal him away, that he just wanted to protect Xie from the people who would use him for his power. Xie was already so far gone by that point that he accepted it, that he told himself he was lucky he had Yifu to protect him, to guide him.

It's funny how easy it is to lie to yourself.

When the meetings are over for the day he finally shifts back to human form, spending a few minutes stretching out the kinks that come from forcing himself into a form that isn't quite his, especially with how much he's had to do it over the last few weeks, and then going in search of something to eat. He could probably just head back to his own apartment since he doesn't think Yifu needs anything else from him, not today, but the outsiders have all left and everybody in Yifu's manor at least knows Xie, even if they don't know that Xie and Scorpion are one and the same, so it's safe to be around them.

He likes to spend as much time here as he can get away with, likes to remind Yifu he can be useful in other ways... and maybe he likes to keep an eye on this new apprentice Yifu has taken on. He doesn't understand why he needs anybody else when he has Xie, but the last time he'd questioned somebody new in the house Yifu hadn't spoken to him for a week, so he doesn't voice that thought out loud - he just watches the guy suspiciously every chance he gets, and wonders how easy he would be to get rid of.

He's halfway to the kitchen when something makes him stop. A tug of power, the vague echo of chanting, there's a ritual happening and something about it is drawing him close. He frowns, confused, and follows the pull...

Comments

[weird_cop]

"Okay."

He stands a lot more easily now, though there's still a lot of pain, and kisses Xie again when they're standing.

"Thank you," he adds again, "for looking after me. And getting them back, even if I'm mad at you about the 'how.'"

[xie_er]

"I haven't done that much looking after you." Xie says with a sigh, but he kisses him back and helps him into the bed - he's not thinking about how much he looked after him while his memories were missing, just how helpless he's been since the house.

"I know you're mad. I'll make it up to you somehow." He promises, leaning over for another kiss

[weird_cop]

Kevin smirks into the kiss. "Oh I know you will," he replies, heavy on the innuendo.

"And you have. All week, you've been looking after me."

[xie_er]

Xie laughs against his lips and thinks "God I've missed you" through the link before pulling back a little just to smile at him.

"I've been doing my best," he admits, glad that it seems to have been enough, at least "I'm glad to have you back, though. You were still you but you weren't... my you. I lost count of the number of times I almost kissed you and then realised I couldn't"

[weird_cop]

"Do you want to know a secret?" Kevin asks, moving a hand to brush at Xie's hair.

"I wanted to kiss you, too. But it didn't feel right, not while I wasn't... your me, does that make sense?

"I think I fell in love with you a bit. Again."

[xie_er]

That Kevin could fall for him all over again in such a short space of time, even having learned about his past but without knowing even half of the things he'd been through trying to make up for it, it floors him a little bit. He's momentarily overwhelmed, but then he's leaning in to kiss him again and again.

"I love you, I love you so much"

[weird_cop]

It helped, having a bit of trust in himself, and not really seeing much of the past, but mostly it helped having Xie with him at every step. And the empathy probably helped.

It doesn't compare to how he feels now, though. It's not the same.

"I know. I could tell whenever you looked at me."

[xie_er]

"I suppose it was not very subtle" Xie admits, slightly sheepishly. It's hard, though, to keep up a mask around Kevin, and he doesn't feel like he needs to.

"It helped that you still knew how to cook" He adds, teasing.

The thought of food, though, reminds him that he hasn't had anything but that one protein shake in a while, and he should probably do something about that.

[weird_cop]

"No I didn't," Kevin protests. "I really want to have a decent meal when I get home."

But that reminds him that now he's more healed, he's really hungry too.

"Hey, do you think someone's going to bring us food here, soon?"

[xie_er]

Xie laughs and kisses him again.

"I'll take you back to the Jade Dragon" He promises - it would be nice for him to meet the old couple who run the place with his memories in tact, and for Xie to be able to actually introduce Kevin as his boyfriend.

Of course, he knows Kevin actually enjoys cooking, so he'll still encourage him to cook whatever he wants when they get home. Totally unselfishly, of course.

"Let me go see. If the others are still around I'll let them know you'll probably want to get out of here soon." Given that he can heal himself again, Xie guesses he probably isn't going to want to spend too long hanging around here.

[weird_cop]

"Yes please."

Oh yeah Kevin really wants to meet them properly. He feels bad for keeping Xie from them for so long.

Lisa is sitting on a waiting chair down the corridor, her laptop on her lap. She looks up when Xie appears, and her face instantly brightens at the sight of him.

"It worked then?"

[xie_er]

Xie smiles, kissing him again and then heading out in search of food and friends. When he sees Lisa, he smiles, nodding. He knows he still looks a mess - no sleep, no food and still wearing yesterday's clothes - but he also knows he looks like a human who hasn't slept rather than some kind of feral creature.

"It did, the bond is back in place, so he's going to be able to heal some more and get out of here soon. For now, though, we're both hungry, so I came to see if I could get some food."

[weird_cop]

Lisa can look past all of that, anyway. She's also still in her clothes from the auction.

"Alright, go back in and I'll go get you both something from the canteen. Tell him not to get carried away, we want him discharged, not logged as some sort of medical anomaly."

She shuts her laptop and tucks it away, smiling happily at him. "I'm glad you're both okay."

[xie_er]

Xie huffs, and then relays all of that to Kevin through the link just because he can. It feels good to use it again, even after only a day.

"Thank you." He tells her - for the offer of food and the the expressed emotion.

"I'm glad we are too."

[weird_cop]

"Fine," Kevin grouches, but he's happy to take enough so he can sit up, at least.

Lisa gets two hot boxes of hospital canteen food, which she dutifully brings to the room, expresses her pleasure directly to Kevin about seeing him well, and refuses to talk work yet.

"We're going you have a lot to talk about when you are back though," she says.

[xie_er]

There is another bed in this room, but it is not close enough to Kevin, so Xie has once again set up camp in the chair beside his bed - only this time he looks a lot less haggard about it and he's blinking normally.

He is in favour of this no-shop-talk rule, even though he can tell it's frustrating Kevin, but he can't help but ask one question.

"Am I going to have to try and get Du Pusa to come and give a statement?"

[weird_cop]

"It would help," Kevin says, but he'd understand if she didn't want to.

"You do have to get her to come over for dinner. She's awesome, by the way."

[xie_er]

"I'll see what I can do." He says out loud, then smiles over at him for the second comment.

"I'm glad you like her. I'm sure she'll come for dinner"

[weird_cop]

Lisa glances between them, her eyes narrowed in amused suspicion.

"You know you're doing that, don't you?"

Kevin huffs a laugh and smiles sheepishly at her.

"It's nothing weird. We're just planning a social engagement which you're not invited to."

This makes her raise her eyebrows in mock offence, and Kevin is unapologetic.

"Sometimes we don't want a bunch of cops at our affairs."

Lisa's eyebrows stay up.

[xie_er]

Xie's smile isn't sheepish at all, it's smug and pleased and happy because yes, they do know they're doing it, and they can do it again. It may have only been a day but he still missed having Kevin in his head, he's delighted to have that back.

"He gets special permission to be the only cop allowed because he's cute." Xie adds with a smirk.

[weird_cop]

Lisa smirks at him, looks at Kevin, and he supplies:

"Yes you count as a cop."

"Fine," she says, in a mock huff. "I can see you two are doing fine, so give one of us a call when you want a lift back from the hospital. Your car is at home."

She hugs Kevin goodbye, offers the same to Xie, still not sure enough to just hug him without offering first, and leaves them to each other.

"I want to have dinner with Du Pusa," Kevin repeats. "And go back to the Jade Dragon. And I want that date."

With his memories surging back, they've encountered a lot of the fresh viewpoints he's been forming, and the result is that he has plans.

[xie_er]

Xie accepts the hug, gives her a smile and a friendly goodbye, and reflects for a moment on how much has changed since the first time they met.

Not nearly as much as things have changed since the first time he met Kevin, though.

He turns back to his boyfriend when she leaves and smiles, reaching out to take his hand.

"I want all of that too."

[weird_cop]

Kevin squeezes his hand back, lacing their fingers together affectionately.

"And I want to clear out all that stuff in the storage unit," he adds. It doesn't do to just let that stuff stay in limbo really. Especially some of the memories he's just been ignoring.

Which raises the next question.

"How do you feel about getting out of the safe house?"

[xie_er]

"I've actually been thinking about that" Xie admits "I've been waiting to talk to you about it"

The last week was, obviously, not exactly the right time to have that conversation.

"I think we should start looking for a place"

[weird_cop]

After all this time, despite having telepathy, it's still amazing how in sync they are. Kevin knows that this isn't just the bond, it just makes the bond better.

He brings Xie's hand to his mouth and kisses his knuckles.

"Can it be near a gym? Can it have a gym? I really need to work on my fighting skills if this is going to be my life from now on."

It's odd - they've been living together for months at this point, been sleeping in the same bed since they moved into their current place. And yet - it feels like a step. Not a difficult one, but a significant one, anyway.