#genexalex

Gene clears his throat. He gestures to the telescope. “Shall we?”

The device is already trained on the full moon’s bright face, but Gene takes turns with the prince, ducking in to focus on particular features of interest. Alex bends over the eyepiece with the blanket curled around his shoulders like limp wings. Gene’s voice is a constant technical river in his ears. Some words Alex understands-- space rock, crater, impact-- but others are foreign-- penumbra, light year, stratosphere. Gene does his best to define them without using even bigger words. They finish on a wide, flat, surprisingly large crater.

“...that’s the Bay of Tranquility. It’s been marked as a possible landing site for a Technopolian probe. We intend to send one within the next year. It’s been theorized that our moon might possess frozen water.”

“Wow,” Alex breathes. He lifts up from the telescope. “...Aren’t you cold?”

“No,” Gene says, shivering.

The prince lifts up one arm as a blanketed wing and pulls Gene underneath. Gene protests politely the entire way, but it’s far too warm under the blanket to make good on his promises of “I’m fine out here.”

Alex shifts the blanket so it hangs evenly over their shoulders. He smiles warmly at Gene. They’re shoulder-to-shoulder now, nearly face-to-face, and Gene is glad that the moonlight is too weak to show the sudden flush in his cheeks. It feels...nice to be this close to Alex. The prince doesn’t seem to notice.

“Can we look at stars with this tell-nor-scope-dealy?” Alex asks.

“It’s telescope, and no,” Gene corrects. “You can look in their general direction, but even with the largest telescope available in Technopolis it’s nearly impossible to make out details. They’re very far away.”

“Oh.” Alex thinks. “Well, do you have any fun stories about them?”

“Stories?”

”Sure!” Alex tugs on the blanket until they’re both sitting on the parapet. He points to the brightest star in the sky. “We call that one Cerwein, the Guide. He was once a hunter of great skill in the Ancient King’s court. The gods placed him in the sky to guide other hunters for ages to come.”

Gene tactfully decides not to argue the idea of a man becoming a star. “In Technopolis, we refer to that as the North Star. Due to the planet’s tilt and rotation, it appears to always point due north. I understand many civilizations use it for navigation.”

“What about that one?” Alex gestures off into the night sky. Gene squints after the prince’s trailing finger.

“Well, there’s Betelgeuse, and Cetus, and that one there is Sirius, the ‘Dog Star,’ which is actually comprised of two stars that travel so closely together, they appear to be one--” Gene stops, and remembers with a little butterfly flip of his stomach how close he and Alex are huddled beneath the blanket. From space, they too might be considered one. He glances at the prince.

Alex gazes back at him with a serene, almost awestruck expression of utter joy.

“Are you listening?” Gene asks crossly.

“Every word,” Alex promises. “Tell me more, really.”

So Gene launches into a lecture on the gaseous composition of the outer planets, the trajectory of comets, the distance between their sun and every other star, and even the theorized complications of space travel when Alex very slowly tilts his head onto Gene’s shoulder. Gene stiffens with surprise, but not too much, not enough to seem like he dislikes the situation. “I-- er, Alex?”

“Hmm?”

“Are you tired?”

Alex rubs at his eyes. “...It is getting late.”

“Ah. Then perhaps we should wrap things up. I don’t want to be held responsible for an exhausted prince.” Gene moves to get up, although every part of him would rather stay.

“Gene, wait.” Alex tugs on the blanket. “We should do this again sometime. I had fun.”

“Really?”

The prince rises-- or tries to, as his foot twists on a stray corner, causing him to grab for Gene, pulling the blanket tight around the both of them until the two are nearly nose-to-nose. They stagger-step into a stable position. Alex giggles nervously. Gene does the same. The adamant glow in Alex’s eyes rivals the night sky above them. “I want you to tell me everything about the stars, Gene. Everything.”

Soft music from an unknown source fills the air. Three young women fly and pirouette, the golden glow of the sunset making their wings sparkle.

Gene watches his friend dance with her only fairy friends. Friends who, if pressed by their queen, would turn her into a frog immediately. Loyalty to their Queen is powerful amongst fairies. Even those who are banished like Twinkle are under her control.

The only way to escape its hold is to renounce fairy magic, to become a witch. Doing so takes away a fairy’s connection to the magic of their island. Sadness no longer means losing her power, a witch does not need the Golden Spellbook, or the Magic Tree Ceremony to keep her magic. But, witches can only use black magic, they lose pieces of innate knowledge that only fairies can have, and they lose their wings.It is almost impossible to truly be happy as a witch, the more powerful a witch is, the more she falls to the darkness of her spells.

At least, that’s what Twinkle says. She once told her friends that Baba Cara is one of the most powerful witches on the Enchanted Island, commanding even the more pleasant witches. It’s why she’s so mean.

Gene believes it’s because the woman is an awful person, rather than evil magic making her miserable.

The fairies’ dance is hypnotic, distracting in a way only fairies can be. He meant to take notes on it, build up more data to explain their existence, but he is enthralled.

He tears his eyes away, barely managing that, to look at his human friends. Alex is as hypnotised as Gene was, unable to focus on just one of the fairies. His face is gentle, blue eyes serene…

Gene moves on from those forbidden thoughts, reminds himself of their friendship. He is secretly glad Alex isn’t dazzled by just one of them, it means he hasn’t become attracted to any of them.

Ruby, on the other hand, hasn’t taken her eyes off Twinkle at all. She seems bewitched by her movements, ignoring everything else. As though she’s found a treasure chest full of gold and jewels.

It isn’t uncommon for fairies to beguile humans, Alex and Twinkle had once told him. Sometimes it goes on until the human’s demise, as fairies can live many centuries longer and age slowly. The Queen is older than she appears, though still young for her kind, the Wise Fairy even moreso. Sadly fairies often lose interest. Humans often end up in a dark place, plagued by greed or misery.

One unlucky man was Fourchesac. Years ago, he had fallen for the Queen’s sister. She had shown him secrets most wizards would kill for, let him eat magical treats and dance with her through the night. She had given Fourchesac access to powers a human should not have. Wizards are supposed to use alchemy and a few safer spells, not fairy magic.

When the Queen’s sister lost interest, he broke. Forchesac succumbed to greed and cowardice, swearing revenge against all fairies. For giving a human the power and knowledge he now possessed and for allowing him to hate all fairy kind the Queen banished her sister. No one ever saw her again. Fairies can be cliquey as well, shunning anyone they do not consider worthy of their time. A contrast to their otherwise sweet nature. This is another why reason they abandon human lovers. They often pick their friends, their sisters, over humans. Twinkle is nothing but sweet, so Gene held little fear that she would leave Ruby broken.

He turns back to the dance and lets his mind drift. He feels calm. Gene likes the outside world, where the air is fresh, where the sun shines in the day, the stars glitter at night.

The only problem is that things often don’t make sense, like fairies and magic. He’s slowly accepting there is something about the Enchanted Island that science cannot explain. But he still tries to.

As the sun sets over the horizon the fairies end their dance. They elegantly flutter to the ground as one. Twinkle bids them goodnight. Gene, Alex, and Ruby shake themselves out of their stupor. Alien has long fallen asleep, somehow unaffected by the fairies. Twinkle picks him up and carries him to the Chameleon.

Gene drives them to the bridge connecting the Enchanted Island and Kingsland. They can’t stay in the land of the fairies due to Twinkle’s banishment. None of them want to be woken up by an angry queen chasing them out.

They had all agreed that day to stay in Kendric’s castle for the night, as Alex is always welcome there.