#Fig Faeth looked her mother in the eyes and said ‘you know something about bad habits.’ and you want me to be chill about it????

[ewwww-what]

You’re a piece of work, kid.

[jamiebluewind]

The Powers That Hurt Us

Fandom: Dimension 20, Fantasy High

Word Count: 1048

Notes: Takes place before season 1 of Fantasy High

Characters: Gilear Faeth, Sandra Lynn Faeth, Fig Faeth

Warnings: infidelity, sickness, mental health issues (please message me if I missed any)

Ships: Gilear/Sandra Lynn

Spoilers: Fantasy High Season 1

Summary: A boy is born with magic. His parents make a choice that will affect him for the rest of his life.

***

On a Tuesday afternoon, an elven child was born to two fairly ordinary people with fairly ordinary lives. However, the child was not ordinary.

His first few weeks were normal. He slept about as well as most newborns do. His bright blue eyes went from squinted shut to observing the world around him. He started grabbing for things and babbling. His parents never noticed when random things started to happen in his vicinity. An object in the wrong place was blamed on forgetfulness. The child's cry sounding like it was coming from inside the parent's bedroom was due to the acoustics of the house. Water that moved in an unnatural way was because they were overtired and seeing things. Even when he went missing only to turn up exactly where they had left him was dismissed as him crawling away and hiding somewhere during their search.

His parents kept mostly ignoring the signs until a few weeks after his first birthday. It started off simple enough. He was cranky due to teething and started throwing a tantrum. He kicked and screamed with all the emotions housed in his tiny body. All of a sudden, magic seemed to pour out of him. It formed into projectiles and shot out,  blowing a hole in the side of the house. One wizzed by his mother, barely missing her. It was at that moment - as they stared at their son and the damage to their home - that they realized there was something powerful within their son.

After waiting for what felt like eons, it was discovered that their son was filled with a powerful raw form of wild magic. Normally such a child wouldn't start showing any abilities until they were much older, but somehow their son had started tapping into his magic at an exceptionally young age.

His parents were given a choice. They could either send him for training or suppress his abilities until he was older. They asked if there was any risk to training. After learning there was a small chance that a magical surge could injure or even kill their son, they chose to suppress his powers.

The boy was fairly normal after that, never knowing he had a pool of magic within him. Suppressing his magic did cause him to be a bit ackward, but to his parents, it was a small price to pay for his safety. They said same thing the first year he was old enough to get into a magical training program. And the second year. And the third. Eventually, they decided that he was better off never knowing about the magic within him. He was a happy kid with a good life. He wasn't even the adventuring type, so his magic would only make his life harder. It was the right thing to do... or so they thought.

The thing about wild magic is that it demands to be seen. To exist. Suppressing it is never supposed to be a long term solution. It will always find a way to escape.

And that's what his magic did. With every wild magic surge that he absorbed, the boy was affected. It was unnoticeable at first and the effects were negatible. However, the surges kept happening and the magic continued to build. His body tried to get rid of it as best as it could, but it could only do so much.

As he grew up, he started to be known for having the worst luck while others around him seemed to prosper. Strangers sometimes strongly disliked him for no clear reason. Nobody seemed to care about what was good about him.

That was until he met someone. She was wild and strong and beautiful and completely out of his league, but she looked at him with a smile that reached all the way to her eyes. And he fell for her. Hard. And for the first time in a long time, he was happy.

They got married in a small ceremony and it wasn't long before they discovered that their family would be growing by one. He fell in love more and more with every tiny kick and watched the wildness that was once in his wife's heart calm the moment she held their daughter in her arms.

Time passed and they settled into a routine. His wife found work as a ranger and quickly climbed the ranks while he mostly stayed home to care for their daughter. It was a nice life. He was still unlucky sure, but he seen it as a fair trade for his family.

It was a normal day like any other when his world crumbled. When his little girl sprouted horns and he realized she wasn't his. When he discovered that his wife had cheated on him and lied about it for years. His blood boiled. His magic surged stronger than it ever had and pummeled his body from the inside as it demanded to be released. He lashed out at them and walked away from everything. His home. His job. His family. Nothing mattered anymore. Nothing.

The surges kept happening in waves with every hit of emotional stress. The wild magic - unable to break the seal to escape - went inward and attacked its host. His bad luck effect intensified. He aged. His hair started falling out. Objects would sometimes burst into flame or fall apart when he was nearby. He would randomly become frightened, poisoned, or overcome by confusion. People stopped listening to him. His stomach distended from the stress of holding the magic in, like water filling a balloon. The only reason he didn't die from it was because the magic sometimes healed him or caused him to levitate the slightest amount, which would cushion his falls. However, all he could see was his life falling apart, along with his body.

Through it all, the seal deep within him never broke. Space itself distorted around the seal as the wild magic condensed, making it virtually undetectable and nearly impossible to break. However, if it were to ever break though, a tidal wave of wild magic would released upon the world the likes of which have never been seen on the mortal plane. Anyway you look at it, Gilear was well and truly screwed.