Cult Of The Sun

Friendship Is Gay

It had been a month since Wukong left and the island had been almost entirely peaceful. Macaque had eaten enough immortal peaches to be sick of them and then some. He'd spent a lot of time with MK, some time with Mei, and a few others had also come to visit. It meant he had to put up with way too many jokes at his expense, and if he'd been in better shape more than one of them would probably have gone for a swim, but overall it had been nice. The only thing missing was Wukong and it was starting to get to Macaque.

He was sitting in the tree by the hut, eating another peach that the little monkeys had pushed on him without uttering a complaint. It was just him and the little ones right now and he'd spent a good chunk of the day being groomed and grooming them in return. The warrior closed his eyes, his head resting against the tree. His rest was disturbed when his ears twitched at the familiar sound of a cloud flying toward the mountain from above. His eyes opened as he looked up. "Wukong?"

"Macaque!" The king shouted as he leapt off the cloud, landing in front of Macaque and pulling him into a hug. "I convinced Laozi to look for a cure!"

Macaque was almost knocked out of the tree, but then he laughed as he hugged the king back. "Easy, Wukong!" He shook his head as he pushed and prodded for the sage to get off. "Are you trying to knock me off the branch?"

Wukong just laughed, falling back onto his cloud with Macaque held tight in his arms. "Nooo. Of course not." He teased with a bright smile. His eyes flared gold as he spoke, returning to their regular false gold when he was satisfied with what he saw.

"Yeah, Wukong, I'm okay. Could probably even use my powers if I wanted to." Macaque chuckled as he gave up escaping the other's grip. "The little monkeys have had me eating basically nothing but immortal peaches for a month. It's a good thing this tree grows its fruit so fast."

"Power of my mountain, Bud!" Wukong cheerfully replied. "I'm glad you're doing better." He nuzzled the warrior, relief apparent in the tension draining from his shoulders.

Macaque chuckled lightly. "I told you I'd be fine. One of these days you're going to start believing me."

Wukong pouted before his expression turned more serious. "Laozi said he'd need my help to make the cure. So I can't stay too long." His ears pressed back against his head as he said this, smile falling from his face.

Macaque frowned as he sat up, looking at Wukong warily. "What exactly do you mean he needs your help?"

"He needs a diagram of how the magic is flowing through your body and I'm the only one that can see it." Wukong slowly replied. "So I agreed to help him and came back to take a look and draw it for him."

"And that's all?" Macaque raised an eyebrow.

Wukong cleared his throat, glancing away from the younger monkey. "He asked me to run errands and fetch ingredients and samples for him too." His eyes returned to Macaque and he offered a confident smile. "Nothing too bad. I did worse stuff during the journey. I think he's intrigued by the unusualness of the situation."

"Samples? Wukong, what did you agree to?" Macaque frowned further and reached out to grab his hand.

"Nothing I'm not willing to do." Wukong firmly replied, taking the warrior's hand.

"Wukong, don't do anything stupid." Macaque's voice was tense as he studied the other, concern forming a hard ball in his gut.

"Give me some credit. I am the intelligent stone monkey." Wukong tried to joke, booping the other's nose with his tail.

Macaque swatted the tail away. "And it wouldn't be the first time you've given yourself over to heaven for me. "

Wukong gripped Macaque's hand tighter. "And I would do it again and again." He scowled, tail lashing behind him. "But that wasn't what happened. I only spoke to Laozi. The deal is between him and I. Not Heaven."