Chapter Text
The city rebuilds, slowly, but it does.
As pillars of ice slowly melt and are dragged out, Macaque learns how to weave his magic tightly, until each glamor is firmly tied around his head. With each building that is fixed, Macaque gets used to the weight sitting on his head, erasing any trace in his movement that could give any clue about what’s hidden beneath his magic.
As the first month anniversary from the defeat rolls around, Macaque feels confident enough to go back outside, no longer hiding away in the destroyed dojo that is his base. He doesn’t approach MK, nor his friends, going as far as lessen up the muffling seals around his ears, keying in the human and his group so he could keep an ear out, ready to portal as far away as possible if anything happened.
He isn’t afraid, he isn’t. He just can’t risk it, especially now, as he is only just getting used to this. The crown gives him phantom pains, from time to time, so debilitating that Macaque can barely stand. He can’t afford to be weak, not in the aftermath where everyone is scrambling to become the top demon as soon as the big bad is down for the count.
Macaque needs to keep quiet, keep close, and be alone. He has to gather himself, find a better safehouse, and heal the injuries from the fight against Wukong. He is an easy meal right now, and Macaque can’t afford another fight, not until he is mostly sure he won’t just keel over at the slightest movement. He’s sure he would be better without the crown, but not really by much. The phantom pains aren’t even the worst, it's the instability of his magic.
Did Wukong have to go through this as well?
The idea of him, unable to call forth his magic, leaving him trembling whenever he tried to summon his cloud, whenever he tried to use his vision? The sensation of his own body betraying him, his own core revolting with each heartbeat, as the overload of celestial magic kept him locked tight and under?
Macaque throws up, retching, trying to dispel the awful thoughts, closing his eyes as the light makes the headache so bad it makes him want to cry.
“Fuck,” He rasps out, wiping his mouth off, shakily curling up, “Fuck!”
He breathes through his mouth, barely able to hold on, letting his feverish forehead thunk against the toilet seat. He forces himself to not think about it anymore, tightly locking away any straying thoughts, until his mind is blissfully blank, just concentrating on how cold the toilet sink feels against his skin, the faint pain tremors slowly going away.
Don’t think about it, he told himself, out of sight, out of mind.
He gives himself a few seconds to recover, a weakness he can’t help but take, and then slowly pulls himself together, faint traces of magic hiding from view the fillet, as Macaque stands up and goes back to searching for good properties in the city, the need to find somewhere safe, or as safe as it can be, pulling him forward. He can’t afford more weaknesses, not until he is hidden behind thick walls and powerful walls that will let him fall apart in silence.
Until then, he must keep going.
The kid doesn’t stop looking for him.
It’s been weeks since the defeat of the damned witch, and the kid keeps looking for him, managing to find him wherever he tries to hide, hands always holding onto some food offering to coax him out, as if he were a feral animal instead of a demon the mortal should know to avoid. It is denigrating, and Macaque only allows it out of fear of the kid finding other ways to find him.
( Would that Gold Vision of his manage to pierce through his glamor? The mere idea is terrifying, and Macaque makes sure to always hang around in a very specific pattern and places where the kid can easily find him, he does not want to find the answer to his question)
So, Macaque resigns himself to the almost daily visits from the human, and perfects his glamor with an almost obsessive energy each day he wakes up, until it is strong enough he doubts anyone could even see where the magic lays, hiding away the mistakes he wishes to keep out of sight. He isn’t even sure why MK is trying so hard, the big evil has been defeated, Macaque did his part, why can’t the human understand that and leave him alone now?
Still, he lets the human hang around, and listens as MK talks about his days, somehow the human’s mundanity becoming a grounding point to him, something to which he can hang onto as the migraines continue and the nightmares keep him awake for days on end. It’s hard to feel like it’s the end of his world, when MK comes by everyday and shares how a customer spilled soup on his lap or the new stray cat Sandy adopted, or how he bought himself a new sketchbook. It’s something he can focus on, instead of the pain or the memories that have resurfaced to haunt him.
He lets himself slowly relax into the routine, starting to answer back and talk back to the kid, until he almost starts looking forward to these meetings, a refreshing break from when he grows tired of trying to find ways to deal with his little… problem. His wariness dims, against his better judgment, and he is almost comfortable in MK’s presence. That’s probably why, when MK talks to him one particular afternoon, he is very caught off guard.
“What did you say?” Macaque asks, frozen halfway into taking a bite out of his noodles, looking at the human with wide eyes.
“I, um,” MK stumbles, probably also caught off guard by Macaque’s confusion and shock, “I said, if you would come to Pigsy’s tomorrow night? We, um, we’re having a small celebration, since, you know, it’s been four months since we defeated LBD.”
Macaque reels back, putting the bowl of food down before he spills it. He looks at MK, the human looking back expectantly at him.
“Kiddo…” Macaque hesitated, wondering what was the best way to say “No Fucking Way ”, but in a nice way.
“It’ll be fun!” MK rushes out, “Pigsy will close the shop early, and Sandy is gonna bring desserts, and Red Son is joining us and-”
“Kid,” Macaque cuts him off, “I don’t think any of your friends would appreciate me being there.”
“But…”
“No one from your group is going to want me there, and Wukong will probably throw me out of a window if I show up,” Macaque crosses his arms, “And If I’m being honest? I would probably kick him the second I saw him.”
“But-!”
“It’s just asking for disaster, kid, don’t bother,” Macaque huffs.
“And if I ask everyone to act real real nice?” MK says, leaning in, “I’ll make sure to keep both you and Monkey King separated at all times! Please, Macaque?”
Macaque frowns.
It was too dangerous. Anything could go wrong, and the mere idea of it made him hyper aware of the metal resting upon his head. Going would just be inviting disaster upon him, it was too much of a risk to even entertain. Sure, it would have been fun to show up and annoy Wukong, maybe sneak some food from the Pig and tease Red, but the possibility of his glamor failing or someone managing to see through it was too much of a con to outweigh.
“No kid,” Macaque shook his head, picking up his food once more, “Don’t insist.”
Maybe MK saw the way his back tensed, or how his fur almost bristled, or he maybe finally picked up a hint in Macaque’s annoyed tone, but the kid stayed quiet, and just nodded silently, letting an uncomfortable silence hang over the two of them. Macaque refuses to feel guilty, he can’t, not right now, not when he is still too weak.
The two say goodbyes quietly, and Macaque watches the kid walk off, and tries to refuse feeling guilty.
(Like on most things, Macaque fails.)
He manages to fix a small part in the destroyed theater, an attic that somehow didn’t collapse alongside the roof, and makes it his as fast as he can.
The fillet interferes with his muffling spells, and now living in the dojo is a nightmare and a half, especially considering how MK always went there when he wanted to talk, which was all too often for the shadow demon’s taste. So, the next best solution was to go back to the destroyed theater. The building was old, built with silence in mind, and it is situated in one of the most abandoned and quiet parts of the city, almost the perfect place.
The fact that it is destroyed it’s only a boon, many humans and demons turning away at the sight of the horrible destruction inside, unable to even come up with the idea that someone would be living in the rafters, walking on the broken beams, at ease in the collapsed second floor and roof, with barely a room to stay in.
The fact the attic is small is just another plus, it means less space to cover, and it soothes the more primal side of the demon who wishes for small and dark places to hide in whenever he was hurt. It’s also easier to accommodate, the wooden floor covered in rugs and thick blankets so the boards won’t creak, the walls covered in more blankets and salvaged curtains. The room is covered in abandoned furniture he found, also draped in clothes and rugs to make it softer. It makes the room easier to soundproof, a blessing whenever a migraine comes back to tear him in half.
It is dim too, only one window with tinted glass to let in any semblance of light.
In short words, it’s the perfect place to slump over and curl up whenever he is being weak, like right now.
A migraine had sneaked up on him as he came back from Mk’s visit to the dojo, which he visited only because the kid kept going there and he didn’t wish to expose his small hideout to the young human, the throbbing and pulsing headache quickly ramping up in intensity, barely able to slump down in the mess of blankets, rugs and pillows he called bed before pain overtook everything else.
He trembled, biting the inside of his cheek so as to not let out any sounds, eyes squeezed shut as his hands grasped the cursed crown on top of his head, wishing not for the first time he could rip it away. More than once he had tried, however, he had been forced to stop himself, as it was a useless attempt, and each one just left deep scratches bleeding and adding to the monumental migraine he experienced, the entire zone around the fillet was sensitive and filled with badly healed scratches.
He didn’t even know why he still got this head-splitting migraines, was it just phantom pain, or was his paranoia right in the fact this could be the indicator of something else? His ears may hear far and wide, but incantations for artifacts like the fillet had always been his weak spot, so the possibility was always there.
And, if it were, what could he even do? If someone truly had the prayer, and was using it, how could he even try to defend himself? No muffling spell could aid him, and he would be incapacitated for miles and miles, thanks to his damned hearing. No, best was to hope this was just phantom pains and hide, until everything had blown over and it was just another forgotten footnote in the legend of the Monkey King, as always.
After all, wasn’t that something he was adept at?
He had always been more of a detail than a plot point, in the end.