#this is a hoads headcanon drabble

[spyritevesta]

i am nobody (are you nobody too?)

Jack mourns. He lives and laughs and does his duty, all while he grieves for a life lost and his joy burns all the more strongly because of it. But the intangibility is still there.

The Guardians treat the intangibility as a disease. They try to heal it, to cure it, to fix him. 

She knows better.

This isn’t something they can fix, because there’s nothing wrong with him. Well, nothing other than the silver strands of celestial energy that tie him to that body. But even now the winter of his soul is breaking through it, no matter how much binding they rewrap. (no matter how big you build your snowman, spring will always come.)

Emily sees how this will end. Jack will return to the past, to his family, and finally be happy. The Guardians will worry, and panic, and finally have their flaws shoved straight into their faces.

Good.

Besides, it’s not like they won’t recover. Historically, they’ve been incredibly good at supporting one another in times of crisis or emotional distress (excluding jack of course, because if his core is joy, of course he must be fine. ugh). They’ll be alright.

The Seven Brightest Lights will notice him leaving, of course. But again, they have each other. They have their own goals, a common purpose to work towards. And they’re Jack’s kids; they know how to find joy despite pain.

So all the loose ends tie up.

Emily sighs a little and leans back on her hands, idly kicking her feet back and forth. She’s craving something sweet. Maybe a crepe. The question is, does she really want to go to the effort of making herself visible?

“Hey Rapunzel. What’s got you looking so mopey?” Cold wind curls against her face in a hello, as blue appears in the corner of her eye. Jack sits himself down next to her, legs swinging out into open air as he peers down at Tokyo.

“What makes you think I’m mopey?” She looks at him from the corner of her eye, raising a thin eyebrow 

“C’mon, you’re sitting in the highest spot you could find, you’ve been sighing--more often than you usually do, that is--”

“Ha, ha.”

“--and you’ve got that look on your face. The one where you’re sort of scowling, but more sad than angry. All… somber-y.” Speaking of looks on faces, his has that dumb look where he gets all concerned and his eyes start shining.

“I don’t.” She can see him deadpan and start to retort, so she groans and finally turns to face him. “Look, if I do look mopey, I dunno why. It’s not like I can think of anything to be sad about. Honest.”

His mouth twists, but he takes her at her word. Out of the two of them, she’s always been the one who’s found it harder to deal with negative feelings. As soon as she feels bad, she starts isolating herself and pushing people away. And then it just ends up being a vicious cycle of her feeling alone and awful and like everything is horrible.

But hey, at least now she can acknowledge that and stop herself from continuing to do so. Jack just never tells anyone that he’s feeling bad, and buries the pain underneath laughter and smiles, until someone finally sits up and notices.

Sometimes no one does.

Not anymore. She thinks, feeling her lip curl to reveal teeth. I won’t let my anger stop me from reaching out.

A cold finger touches her cheek, making her flinch back reflexively. Jack is looking at her with fond amusement coloring the arch of his smirk.

“Cold!” She snaps at him, shoving his shoulder (but not very hard. he’s made her soft, the little shit).

“That’s better! Now your scowl is back to normal!” He laughs and flutters his eyelashes exaggeratedly. “Filled with rage~!”

“I’ll show you rage, you little shit--!” She grabs for him, and he lets himself fall forward into the open air, laughing. She jumps after him, warm wind swirling around her form, propelling her after him. He’s faster than her, barely, but he’s still laughing far too hard, so she catches up easily.

“Tag!” She cries, and immediately dives down into the buildings below, to try and lose him. They both know this dance, and they’ve spent hours like this before. Just chasing one another across a city.

She loses him near Harajuku, and doubles back to hide near the cherry blossoms that are beginning to bloom in Naka-Meguro. Gods, she’s going to miss this once he’s gone. Laughing as she flies above the trains, she feels something wet on her cheeks.

Rain?

Pausing in midair, she looks up, even though she can feel how clear the sky is. Touching her face, she looks at her fingers, and yeah. They’re wet.

What?

She sniffs her fingertips, smelling salt.

Wait.

Is… is she crying?

Touching near her eyes, Emily realizes that yes, she’s crying. And she has no idea why. It’s not like anything is wrong. She’s not an expert at emotion, but she’s pretty sure this isn’t happy crying. Unless it is. Jack would probably know; he may not cry often, but he’s almost constantly on the verge of tears.

“Emily!” He almost slams into her, but pulls up at the last second. “Wind sounded worried--are you crying?!” He places his cold hands right on her face, wiping away the tears with his thumbs.

“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know.” She says, the words coming out small. “I just started crying without realizing it?”

It comes out as a question, but she’s confused. And feeling kinda shitty now actually, now that she’s been crying for a minute or so.

Gods she could really go for a crepe now.

“Ok. Do you want to talk about it, or do you want a distraction?” He asks her, shoving hands into his hoodie pocket. He rifles for a second, then comes back with a tissue.

“Distraction.” She takes the offered tissue, scrubbing the tears off her skin. It’s getting close to sundown, which means Tsar Asshole’s ship will be visible soon, ugh. Concentrating slightly, she gathers some of the water vapor into clouds. She feeds a little power into them and they rapidly begin to expand over the city.

Try to spy on us now, bitch. She thinks, not a little vindictively.

“Emily.” Jack lightly scolds, but there’s too much buried amusement for her to take him seriously.

“What? You know I don’t like Tsar Asshole.”

“Look, Manny has his flaws--”

“I mean, he completely left you--”

“--but the pressures of his position--”

“--completely alone, without a word--”

“--so we can’t judge him too unfairly.”

“--three. hundred. years.” She finishes, jabbing her finger into his shoulder with each word for emphasis.

“Alright, alright. Let’s not argue about Manny again.” He grins at her. “How about we sneak into a karaoke place, and have some fun?”

“You had me at karaoke.” She grins back, and follows him as they flip through the streets towards their destination.

She’s gonna miss him.

…

Oh.

Oh.

She’s gonna miss him. Because Jack is her best friend, and without him… she’s alone.

Shit.

[fabllama02]

So, i made a thing...