Just one night (a @journey-to-the-au Drabble)
Ok this is the part two! This is the comfort/ fluff of what happens after Six Eared Macaques previous rampage from Nightmares. I am glad I split these into two so people can pick and choose.
Mild trigger warning: Brief mentions of attempted SA (again nothing goes into detail at all but still sometimes this can still be a trigger.)
It’s over.
The nightmare is over.
Then why does it feel like i'm breathing but I can’t catch my breath?
Willow felt her heart beating too fast, her mind repeating the nightmare.
The cave still smelled of blood.
The imposter was dead. He lay there, finally revealed, a monkey of gray blue fur with a face of shadows. Nothing to be distinguishable of who, or what, his personality had been before it assumed the skin of their leader. Of her friend.
Of Wukong.
Her Wukong had come through the water of Water Curtain Cave in a flash of gold, eyes blazing red. Almost like a Heaven send. A blessing.
In that moment Willow had stepped forward, to the embrace of this nightmare she had dutifully taken as her yoke, a blur or fiery orange had smashed its way through the curtain of water.
“IMPOSTER!” He had called in challenge, his staff coming free of his ear. With a flick of the Kings wrist, the weapon grew in tremendous size.
The imposter had turned, hackles rising, bloody mouth circling back into a snarl. Wukong had roared. The imposter had screamed. Then they were upon each other. It had been a battle, long and difficult. Fur had flown, stone had shaken. At times the combatants had traversed the skies, shooting like two wayward stars from a bow through the Heavens. More blood fell.
In the midst of it, the imposter had cleaned the remnants of its meal from his mouth, making it impossible to tell the twisting and twining fighters apart. Which was which?
Willow had waited as finally, after gods and other immortals had been unable to tell who was who, Mama Courage and Wisdom stepped forward. Willow couldn’t hear the words being spoken between the celestials and Wisdom. She could only hear a ringing in her ears, a drumming of her heart.
She couldn’t catch her breath.
Willow's palms were wet with sweat and white. Whiter than porcelain. Courage took one of those hands, holding it tight. Breaking her numbness, her shock. Willow grasped the hand, holding on. The fear still coiled in her gut, a snake tightening its hold on her. But Courages hand was the anchor she clung to as her body battles within itself.
Wisdom had found him out, had picked out the real Wukong. A mother knew her child. That’s when the imposter had lost. He had felt it, probably, sensing the shift in the wind. In that moment he tried to run. The mirage of his disguise had fallen off in the fright. Wild white eyes, teeth bared of flesh. And now.
He was nothing more than a stain on the floor.
“Don’t you want to kiss me?” The words echo, still alive within Willows head.
Willow was trying to drown those words out.
She’s failing.
The storm inside her body is a rage of water, threatening to drag her down. Those blue eyes flash sharply in her head and Willow feels herself shake.
“Willow?”
She startles. She flinches, shaken from the very real echo of what had almost happened. “Reaffirm our union… Maybe more later.”
Willow looks up, kneeling on the stone floor of the cave. She doesn’t remember when she sat back down. Wukong stands before her. He blocks her view from the rest of the cave, from what the other troop members are beginning to clean up. He blocks her view from the bodies. But Willow still sees the imposter, has to see it. She has to kill the fear in her head that at any moment, any second, those ice eyes can come back and stare into her. To ask things of her that make her soul pull away and her body go cold.
“Willow?”
Wukong stands before her, eyes o so vulnerable. His voice is bleeding uncertainty, his hands fidgeting. He looks to her then looks away, confused on what to do.
Willow also doesn’t know what to do.
How do you tell your friend that someone wore their skin and killed and began to stalk her every step? Willow feels Mama Courage beside her, the hand squeezing. She looks up.
‘It’s him Willow. It’s our Stone Monkey.’ She signs and taps in her unique monkey way. It had taken a long time for Willow to learn this sign language, struggling but wanting to understand. Now, after decades of living together she had mastered this speech. ‘Go. You both need each other.’
‘What of you? He needs his mothers too.’ Willow signs back, not trusting her voice. That storm inside her throat is threatening to release, the track of her tears still wet. Mama Courage notices this and frowns in concern.
‘He needs a friend more. He needs you.’ She signs back. ‘And you need him most of all. To banish that demon, that nightmare. You are still shaking.’
It was true. Willows body still shook as if she had caught a deep bone chill. The blue eyes flash in her memory. Ice cold and drowning her from within Wukongs face. She had been chilled in a sense.
Before she could respond, Mama Courage had stepped away. She disappeared behind Wukong, going to help Wisdom with the mess and to spread the word of what had occurred. To reveal the truth.
Now it is just the two of them.
“It’s ok Willow.” Wukong spoke, gaze still averted. “I asked my Master if I could spend a night to … to fix the problems at home.” Willow watched as those hands wrung against each other. “But if - if what has happened- if my face brings you concern- makes you uncomfortable— I understand.”
Willow saw him step a bit off, unsure of what to do.
The eye of the hurricane was moving over Willow, that numb silence beginning to break.
Another half shuffle. He was moving closer to the carnage behind him, further from her reach. Further from her.
He’s just as afraid as I am that something has broken between us. The realization hits her like a slap.
The great wave within her, the one she had tampered down to keep her calm, to keep her cool as she had faced that monster covered in blood—
It broke through her.
Before Wukong could step further back, to disappear, to help, Willow had his face in her hands.
Willow braced her courage and stared into those eyes, determined to banish the fear that somehow, the monster had escaped. The Monkey King's eyes widened, gold within a sea of red. Willow pressed a kiss to his temple, a test.
If you are my sweet boy, my handsome monkey, she thought vehemently, this will prove it.
If you are that monster … I’ll see it in your eyes.
Willow waited.
Wukongs face was full of surprise. He blinked rapidly, uncomfortable about the intense eye contact. He looked away, looked to the side. Then he looked back up.
“Willow… what … what happened ?” For he could sense something beginning to churn within his friend. A tipping point of sorts and he, the cliff she balanced on.
The monster is dead.
Relief.
Willow breathed out. The air in her lungs shook.
Relief broke the iron in her spine. What little courage she had clung to swept away and she let it. In the dozens of decades she had been with Wukong, had cultivated and grown their trust and friendship, she had found and grown a safe place to be herself. Not Earth Reaching Willow of Polestar Palace, Eldest Daughter. To be her true self. To be one with the emotions she had suppressed. The feelings she had to repress as a princess unless she gave the wrong impression, put on the wrong face, among her fathers courtiers.
I want my friend. The longing was fierce and wild. It scorched her veins and pricked her eyes with fresh tears. A strangled sob passed between her teeth as she tried to stifle it with her fist.
“Willow?”
I need my friend - I need him.
She could be just Willow here, in his arms. She didn’t need to be a shield. She didn’t need to be a princess. She pressed her face into the crook of his neck, holding.
“The last thing I want is for you to go.” She whispered. And that’s when it fell. The tears came fast and hard, her body shaking with it. The hurricane was passing over here, the eye of the storm now past. The wind within her was full of the past years spent with the imitation of her friend. His watching eyes, his burning brushes against her hands. Those days when he had hinted, suggested, and plainly stated he wanted more—
Wukongs hands held her arms, cooed in her ear. “It’s ok Willow. Let it out. Breathe.”
“Don’t go…” she whispered, making a mess of tears on his shoulder.
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m here. I’m right here.”
Nightmares. She felt them all coming across her mind then, each time she lifted her face to catch a breath. The nightmares flashed into her head. But they weren’t nightmares.
“He can’t hurt you Willow. He can’t hurt anyone ever again.” Wukongs voice was fierce in that promise as he turned to press a kiss to her temple. Sealing the promise as he rubbed her arms like a mother to a babe.
They were memories. Of all the times the imposter, the Six Eared Macaque, had pressed her for touches. Had asked for kisses. Had attempted many times to get her away from the eyes of others. Earth Reaching Willow had walked the halls feeling eyes always upon her.
He had cornered her one terrible night and had reached for her. Willow had felt like a rabbit caught in a snare as his hand had caressed her face, had trailed to her lips. He had been interrupted by Rin Rin coming in to ask for bouquet suggestions, wanting to know what blossoms to pair best with what greens in preparation for a feast. Her friend had saved her that night and she didn’t even know.
None of them had known.
Each time the memory popped up, Willow flinched away, trying to curl deeper into the orange fur. Trying to burrow into her friend because he was real. And she needed that reality from the wake that was her mind. It grounded her, allowed her to be scared. Willow breathed him in. The imposter had never smelled quite right, had never felt quite right, hadn’t talked quite right. At least to her.
Wukong, this Wukong- her Wukong, smelled of the world, of growing things and sunlight, of ozone and wind. Of rain upon dry stone. The Six Eared Macaque had been floral and fruity, sweet like a honeyed nectar trap, like a carnivorous flower. And she the unwitting fly.
All the things he had tried to do to lure her in had failed. Willow had survived.
Barely.
My Wukong is here. My friend, my confidant, my partner in this eternity. I do not have to be brave anymore. I don’t have to be strong. Here, I can cry.
Nothing could ever replicate the muscle memory, the familial way that Willow and Wukong both folded into each other's embrace. They had hundreds of years to build this body-deep familiarity with one another. This instinctual trust.
Not even a six eared all knowing demonic monkey could copy that.
Willows sobs were not slowing. They were gaining traction instead. All the fear of years of living with a masked monster in their midst, all the close calls that Willow was remembering now, battered her. Wukong shifted a bit and she felt more than saw Wukong grow in size. Her arms moved apart, having to move from holding his face to grab his middle.
“I’m going to move us Willow. Is that alright ?” His voice is soft, questioning.
My sweet friend, so tender in his asking.
She can’t trust her own voice but nods. Then they were up, an arm beneath her leg and another holding her back. As the sounds of the waterfall retreated, Willow felt the tightness in her chest start to loosen. Breaths she couldn’t take before, that seemed to catch in her throat, came easier.
Each step took them away from the roar of the water. With each crash of tears, Willow curled into her friend. Mama Courage had been right. She had needed him.
Wukong finally stopped moving, settling the both of them down onto the stone floor. They were in an alcove, a bit of a stone hollow off of the main passageway. Willow looked up at Wukong then as he crossed his legs. He nestled her into his lap. His tail wrapped her own lags, a warm blanket against the cold.
“Comfortable?”
“Mhm..” Willow sniffed. Her nose would be stuffed later but she didn’t care. Couldn’t care. She wiped her eyes and tried to see through them.
Wukong looked terribly sad, his face on the brink of breaking itself.
“Oh darling…” she hiccuped. Willow touched his forehead. The golden circlet was cold across her fingers. “It’s not your fault.”
She could see it hurting, eating away at her friend. A worm within an apple core, destroying all the good fruit about it.
They only had one night. One night.
Willow wished for more than just a night.
“Wu-Wukong.” Her voice came out thick. Her monkey leaned into her touch, those golden eyes warm and full of love.
“You don’t need to relive those things.” He said. “Not tonight. Not ever again if you wish. You don’t even have to trust me again. My face … it has been used for terrible things…monstrous things. I see it in all of your eyes.”
Unspilled tears pooled in his face. “I can see it in your eyes. In my mothers. In my friends. In Ba and Ma and Liu and Rin Rins eyes.”
“You all have ghosts in your eyes and I can’t banish them. Because I caused them. ”
Those sad words were spoken with such sorrow, with such rejection that Willows was moving before she could think. Willow pulled his face down to hers.
“This isn’t your fault Wukong.” Willow said.
“It is completely my fault…”
“Oh my sweet Monkey…” She said into his fur. I wish you didn’t have to go- I wish you could stay here, stay with us with me, to help chase those memories into the dark. “How I missed you.”
Wukong swiped some of her tears off her cheek, rumbling not words but noises.
“But you have a pilgrimage to be a part of. You are needed there.” Willow says.
“I’m needed here.” The guilt is eating him, swallowing him up bit by bit. The words he couldn’t say were evident in his eyes. If I had been here none of this would have happened, they said.
“You will always be needed here.”
“Maybe not as welcome.” Wukong pulled back, looking away. “ A stranger took my face and committed atrocities. That face, my face, hurt you. My mothers. My friends. My home.” His voice is shaking. From anger, from sorrow, she did not know. Wukong was powerful. He had challenged Heaven, had defeated dragons, outwitted gods. He had shapeshifted into a thousand different things, had gained a weapon that matched his own abilities. He was a warrior, a King who cared for his people.
Wukong hadn’t been able to protect them. It ate at him. Swallowed him in an endless loop of pain.
“I wasn’t here to protect you.” He whispered. Wukong had burst through the cave, seeking his doppleganger with anger. When he had seen the bloody remains of Cloud, the smiling face of his imitation covered in blood and approaching his mothers and Willow—
He had lost it.
“Wukong look at me.”
He didn’t move his head, despondent. Willow dug her fingers in deeper to the fur, twisting the large monkey about just enough to see him clearly.
She carded those fingers through Wukongs fur, half comfort for her and half comfort for him. Those fingers plucked and pulled, tugged and tended in the ways the monkey king had shown her, all those years ago when she first came to Flower Fruit Mountain.
“It’s better than brushing,” He had said. “It’s a way we say we love one another and strengthen that love. A language spoken through our hands.”
Willow spoke that silent language now. She moved the fingers through and around his face, over his ears. Willow silently kissed the tears from his cheeks as she cried her own. His pain was hers. And hers was his.
In that silent and dark place the two took shelter against the world. Willow from her own memories. Wukong from his own perceived failings.
The story of what happened fell slowly from Willows lips. She held nothing back. Wukong would either stiffen or growl, huff or pull her closer at each new unearthed memory. Willow lived them again here and now, feeling the night slip between her fingers like grains of sand. She had only one night.
One night to banish that blue-eyed monster from its association with Wukong. I won’t let that demon take him from me.
It was a fierceness that surprised Willow. It gave back some of her strength, allowing her to speak nakedly about the truth of what had happened since Wukong began his pilgrimage.
I won’t let him be poisoned to me. I won’t let my experience of a few years erase more than a lifetime of memories.
Willow would not leave that between them. She loved Wukong too much to lose him to some faceless cannibal that had been a drop in the ocean of time they had spent together.
It would take more than a night Willow knew, to repair what things had been shaken. But she would get the worst of it done. She would find a way to see him again before his journey was done. She needed him. And he needed her.
If I have to blackmail all of Heaven I will. I’ll air my fathers own dirty laundry to steal a few moments with Wukong on the road. Then once he’s home I won’t let him go till he knows he’s wanted and loved by all of us. He’s family.
Willow cried and in turn counseled her friend. Wukong simply sat at times to listen, at others times he spoke of promises and things he would do, ways he would make it up to her. Willow would shake her head.
“Just be you. Just always and forever be my lovely Monkey.”
“I promise.”
And together, in the very heart of the mountain, the two wept. Once the sun rose, Wukong brought Willow back to his mothers. He said his goodbyes. The pain and indecision on his face was at war with itself. Willow, when her turn came to say goodbye, took Wukongs hand. She wrapped her pinky around his.
“When I see you again I’ll tell you of all the things we’ve done.” Willow whispered, pressing her forehead to his. “I will tell you of the seasons change and I will tell you of the coconut toddy and sweet plumb wine we drink for you on your birthday. Of Ba and Ma’s latest stunts, of how Liu and Rin Rin act cuter than ever as they continue to court. I will tell you of all the babies born and all of the younglings who try to prove themselves to their amors.”
Willow felt Wukong shake a bit. She tightened her hold on his other hand, squeezing. “I will tell you of the new trees we plant, of the new games we invent, of the new relationships we cultivate.”
“The most important thing I will tell you though is how much we love and miss you, Wukong. How we are all eagerly awaiting you back at home. How, even now, I can’t wait for your return.”
“You … mean that?” He stared, golden sunset eyes misting over with new tears.
“Oh love. You don’t have to ask. I always miss you.” She smiled. “You are my handsome monkey. My lovely monkey. My best friend. I want you to be happy. And if ever those fellows you travel with make you guess or judge yourself harshly— then I will remind them why I chose you. Of all the beings and people of the world and Heaven, I picked you. And you picked me.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“The sooner you go.” Willow said softly. “The sooner you will come back to Flower Fruit Mountain. And the sooner I can enjoy those peaceful days with my husband.”
Wukong gave one last desperate look back, and it took all of his family’s willpower not to call him, to beg him to stay. Instead, Willow waved smiling at him. Mama Courage and Mama Wisdom both held each other, smiling at their boy.
Marshal Liu stepped closer to the smaller group, along with Ma and Ba and Beng. A silent gesture of we will take care of them, in that action.
Wukong smiled, half heartedly, and leapt through the water. Gone as quickly as he had arrived.
Willow turned then, hands clasped within their robed sleeves. She had a task to do now.
“Marshal Liu?”
“You have an idea, don’t you Mrs Willow?”
“Are my thoughts that evident?” Willow smiled as Marshal Liu nodded. He kept pace with her. walking as Willow turned deeper into the cave.
“I need a few scrolls of parchment.” The idea had already taken shape in her mind. Wukong may be stuck within his duties to his pilgrims. But she was not. She would have to be wise, be careful. She didn’t want to turn this into a heavenly spectacle. She did have a few contacts, however, that could be trusted with the whole truth of her urgency. “I need to write a few letters to Heaven.”
“Heaven?”
“Yes. I know Liu. I don't write home often.” As the sounds of the waterfall faded again, Willow felt her heart thrum with determination. “One night is hardly enough time to heal what has been wrecked here. And I intend on calling on a few favors.” She would send her letters, seeking out sympathetic ears discreetly. She would help Sun Wukong heal just as much as he had helped her. They would do so together. Even if the distance may be great I will find a way.
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It’s almost 1AM but I have an overwhelming urge to write a little tuckington something so here goes. (Sorry Tucker doesn’t have dreads, I just know how to cut curly hair better)
Tucker hissed as his hair fell in his face again, blocking his view of the game board for the fifth time that hour. His hair was seriously getting so long it was messing with his day to day life and was just generally out of hand. It was annoying enough that it definitely had to be thread on he was currently losing yo Caboose of all people.
“Something wrong Tucker?” Wash asked from where he was cleaning his rifle. Tucker could hear the smirk in his voice without looking up.
“No!” Tucker snapped, the lie coming quickly to his lips because he really didn’t want to admit that Wash was right that he needed a hair cut.
Wash rolled his eyes and got up to stand over Tucker, hands on his hips. But Tucker refused to look up, pretending to be way more interested in his next turn than he was.
“I don’t see why you won’t just let me cut it,” Wash said on a sigh.
“And I don’t see why you won’t admit that it’d be weird,” Tucker snapped, hand coming up to push the hair away from his eyes with a bit too much force.
Wash shook his head, “I told you I helped plenty of the others in Project Freelancer cut their hair. I was perfectly good at it and it wasn’t weird. You’re just being a baby.”
Tucker let out a derisive ‘pft’ noise, but he was a lot closer to giving in than he let on.
“Oh I see, you’d rather just wallow in your misery than fix the fucking problem. Well I can see that’s going really well for you and isn’t making it so Caboose can easily kick the shit out of you at monopoly.”
At the Tucker slammed down his cards that he’d been holding and shot up to stand face to face with Wash. Well, more like collar bone to face but he wouldn’t let that distract him.
But when he opened his mouth a clump of hair fell into it before he could say anything. Spitting and flailing he turned back to Wash once he had gotten his curls more under control.
“Fine.” Tucker said in a resigned voice, “just do something about this.”
Wash looked surprised at Tucker’s acceptance but his shock quickly morphed into an easy smile that didn’t hold as much ‘I told you so’ as Tucker had been worried about. So, Tucker followed Wash into the bathroom and let Caboose finish the game of monopoly on his own, he didn’t even seem to realize Tucker had left.
“Sit,” Wash instructed as he pulled out scissors, a comb, and some clips that Tucker didn’t even know they had.
Tucker followed the order wordlessly and tried not to think about what was to come.
“Now how long do you want it?” Wash asked.
“Uh I don’t know, just get the bangs and shit out of my eyes and keep the rest of it away from my face.”
Normally Tucker would have a bit more of an idea of what he wanted, not that he would usually go to the barber’s with a bunch of pictures and a detailed plan, but he wouldn’t say he wouldn’t not do that. But he right now speed was definitely the priority.
Was was nodding about him and he lifted his hands to run through Tucker’s hair.
“Whoa what are you doing?” Tucker asked jolting away from the touch.
“Getting ready to cut your hair,” Wash answered with a raised eyebrow. “What the fuck do you think I’m doing?”
“I don’t know,” Tucker answered. “Just aren’t you supposed to wet down the hair first or whatever.”
Wash shook his head, “actually when you cut curly hair it’s better to cut it dry so you don’t cut more than you think you are. And it’s easier to make sure the hair stays in the right shape when it’s not wet.”
Wash just shrugged at the surprised look on Tucker’s face, “I told you I cut people’s hair before. And Florida was always really picky too, so I got good at it.”
Tucker just blinked up at Wash, enjoying the red creeping up his neck and the way he wouldn’t look Tucker in the eyes. Tucker just grinned after a second and settled back into his chair, ready to let Wash work.
“If I had known you were practically a licensed barber I would have put that to use years ago. Charge the reds for haircuts or something,” Tucker said as Wash slid his hands through his hair again and Tucker tried to let the conversation take his attention away from the tingle that rushed down his spine.
Wash just snorted, “yeah like Donut would ever let someone else cut the Red’s hair.”
“You’ve got me there,” Tucker admitted.
Unfortunately after that their conversation lapsed into silence and Tucker had nothing to distract from the feeling of Wash’s hands on his head and in his hair. Even when he began meticulously cutting at each curl and styling it just so, Tucker felt heat rushing up his back and was grateful for his darker skin making it hard to see how much he was blushing.
Hair cutting had always been a bit of a turn on for Tucker, though usually it didn’t actually accumulate to anything unless he was already attracted to the person doing the cutting. He never popped a boner for his barber back home at least. But the way his body was reacting just then made it a lot harder for Tucker to keep feeding himself the lies that he wasn’t attracted to guys at all and certainly not Wash.
He tried some deep breathing but relaxing under Wash’s fingers was definitely not the way to go. Instead he tried keeping his body as rigid as he could without seeming suspicious. But that just made it so that by the time Wash had stood in front of him and eyeballed the lengths of each side, Tucker felt more wound up than a virgin at his first strip club.
“Alright, that should do it,” Wash said looking down at Tucker with the small half smile of his. “Come check it out in the mirror.”
Tucker suppressed a groan, “I’m good here actually.” He said as Wash made room around their tiny bathroom mirror.
Wash’s brow furrowed, “you can’t see it from there, you’re too low, just get up and come look at it. I can fix anything you don’t like.”
Again Tucker pushed down the upset noise that wanted to burst out of his mouth and instead focused his effort on standing and making his way to Wash without making it super obvious he had a boner. At least he could make it to the mirror in two steps.
When Tucker finally saw his reflection he was surprised and pretty happy by the results. Wash hands taken too much length so the hair still fell around his shoulders, but it was growing out so much so it wasn’t being pushed into his face. And the short hair around his eyes was thinned and shaped away from his face so even as he turned his head it didn’t fall in his eyes. Overall the look was actually really nice too, as though Wash had known just how to cut it to suit his face shape. More than anything Tucker was impressed.
So impressed that he wasn’t thinking when he turned to compliment Wash on the look and the man was standing a lot closer than Tucker remembered. Close enough that Tucker may or may not have bumped into him, crotch first.
Wash blinked at him and Tucker jumped back as though he had been shocked. He quickly turned around and made his way out of the bathroom, calling behind him, “it looks really good, thanks for the help. I’m sure I’ll be unstoppable now. So anyway see ya later.”
He didn’t let himself think about how much Wash had noticed when he got back to his room and crawled under the sheets in shame.
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