onebehind | magician's apprentice | been a hell of a ride but I'm thinking it's time to grow

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magician's apprentice | been a hell of a ride but I'm thinking it's time to grow

Dylan knew, coming out of the hospital if not going in, that getting sober wasn't going to be easy. He knew he'd have bad days and good days and days in between, and every therapist he's seen since then, every meeting he's been to has only reaffirmed that. They'd also armed him with a bag of tricks to deal with everything and everything in between, but -- well, today is one of the bad ones and nothing is helping. He's been pacing the house like a madman for the better part of the day, trying to find something to hold his attention long enough that he can stop thinking about running down to the nearest liquor store. He needs to get out of his skin. He's just shy of calling his sponsor. He needs to get out of the house.

He needs to get out of the house.

Stopping midway through moving a pile of books from one side of the living room to the other, he latches onto that idea and turns it over in his head. He needs to get out of the house.

He's moving again a second later, though this time, it's with a purpose, a clarity he hasn't felt like he's had in hours, days, weeks. He goes to Jack's room, tapping lightly on the door, and then after a beat and once he's been invited in, sticks his head in. Flashing him a smile that's equal parts reassuring and strained (he's fine, they're fine, this is nothing bad, he's just a little jittery, don't mind him), he tells him, "Hey. Pack your shit."

He has an idea. It'll be good for both of them.

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Jack flinches back as the lights kick on, squinting for a moment before his eyes adjust and he takes in the room. "Whoa," he breathes, because this is exactly what he would imagine a magician's workshop to look like - though maybe with a few additional rabbits, though the general disuse of the place would be a problem for them.

He heads toward the closest rig, looking it over, trying to see what it was for and how it might have worked without actually getting up close and personal with it.

"This was all your dad's?" he asks after a few minutes, looking back to Dylan.

"Most of 'em," Dylan answers, nodding. He looks away, seeking something closer to the workbench, and when he finds it, nods to a rig there. "A couple of them, up there, are mine, but ... "

He shrugs. Like he said, most of them are Lionel's; he's never actually gotten the chance to use the ones he's come up with, on stage.

Jack turns to watch where Dylan is pointing - and then turns back to Dylan again, eyes wide. "Yours? You mean you actually did some stuff?"

He doesn't mean that in the sense that Dylan might have just been saying he was into magic; more that he would be even more impressed with Dylan to know he had actually gotten to be on stage.

That's a dream he hasn't even considered for himself at this point.

He might also have been able to get the answer to that out of their connection, but he's a little distracted by his own excitement and curiosity.

"Ah, no," Dylan answers, a little embarrassed all at once. He hates to rain on Jack's parade; he wishes he had had a chance to get on stage. His whole life has been about distancing himself from magic, at least publicly, so there's no way he could have had a career in the business -- not if he still wants his revenge.

(He's careful to guard his reasoning there, if only because he might try and involve Jack, later, if he's old enough when the time comes.)

"I just like to build shit," he continues after a beat. "Maybe, sometime, I'll pass my designs along to another magician, be someone's ingenieur or whatever, but ... " He shrugs.

Jack is a little disappointed, but it seems to be more for Dylan than anything else - and then he shrugs, too. "That's still cool, though." He likes puzzles and locks and that sort of thing, but anything too big is a little beyond him. "What kind of tricks are they for? Or is that, like... trade secret shit?"

He grins crookedly, eyes bright.

Dylan studies him for a moment, like they may just be trade secrets but he's considering the merits of letting Jack in on them, anyway. Whether or not that's true, when the moment passes, he shrugs again, and turns away from Jack, scanning the room. When he seems to find what he's looking for -- one of the rigs, still covered by a cloth -- he heads for it. He puts a hand on it, but doesn't move to pull the cloth away, just yet.

"This's was one of Dad's, from when before he really made it big." A beat. "You know how a ZigZag Girl Illusion works?

Jack watches him - and then moves to follow when he heads for the rig. He tilts his head thoughtfully at the question, trying to put the name together with a visual. "Is that the one where, like... the magician, like... sticks metal plates in and then pulls the boxes apart or whatever?"

There are some hand motions to go along with that that do seem to indicate he knows what trick Dylan's talking about.

"Uh... is that one two people? I know most of the ones that involve cutting people in half have a second person in the rig."

"It is, yeah," Dylan confirms, Jack right on both counts. He hesitates for a minute, looking between Jack, the rig and back again, thoughtfully, before, "Pretty sure you could saw me in half, if you wanna try."

He's not so small as the average magician's assistant, but he still thinks he could make it work. The fact that he's offering to let Jack touch something of his father's, period, is a big step.

Jack's eyebrows shoot up at that offer. "Seriously?" He doesn't even try to keep the excitement out of his tone because oh hell yes. "That would be fucking awesome."

"I think the blades're over here," he tells him, headed for the rig in earnest, now. He finds them on top of the cabinet, and with a showman's flare, presents them to Jack, making sure they catch the light just so, making sure they look deadly. That said and done, he holds them out to him gingerly, as if they still might cut.

Jack is practically bouncing on the balls of his feet as Dylan retrieves the blades. He's equally careful as he reaches out to take them, partly because he doesn't know how sharp they might actually be but mostly because he's worried about managing to damage them somehow, considering they're literally historical objects.

"Oh, these are actually as heavy as they look," he says as he hefts them a little, getting a better grip. "Always kinda wondered if they were just playing that up."

"They're actually steel, even if they're not sharp," Dylan reminds him, gently.

He'll let Jack have another minute or two to inspect them as he pulls the cabinet open and gets in. It's probably a good thing that he's never been a particularly tall man.

"You wanna close me in here?"

Jack does look over the blades a little more before Dylan speaks again - and then he sets them aside to approach the actual rig. "Do I just... close this?" He pauses a beat. "I don't think you're wearing enough sequins," he teases.

Dylan snorts, resting his hand in the place cut out for the door to close around the assistant's wrist. "I'll find something for the dress rehearsal, boss, promise."

A pause follows, then more seriously, he tells him, "But yeah. Just close the doors."

Jack just snickers as he does, in fact, push the doors closed and put down the latches before he steps back. "Okay, um... tell me when you're good?"

Dylan waves his free hand at him. "I'm good if you're good."

Never mind the fact that, in the tight space of the cabinet, he's turning so that Jack can put the blades in without hurting him. It won't take him more than a second. He'll be ready by the time Jack has the blades in hand, again.

Jack moves to pick up the blades, hefting one so he can line it up with the slot in the side of the rig. It takes him a moment - but then he slides it into place, adjusting a little when it wants to snag on the sides of the track.

That one done, he picks up the second one, pushing it into place as well. He's torn between frowning in concentration and beaming like an idiot considering this is so fucking cool, so he's a little relieved Dylan can't see his face right now.

"Alright, you got that?" he asks, never mind the fact that he can absolutely feel the second blade just shy of his thighs. Jack is right in thinking that Dylan really can't see much, from inside the box.

"Now, what you wanna do is push the middle section to the left."

Jack takes a step back once he gets the blade into place - and then nods, mostly to himself.

"Right," he returns. "Or, uh... yeah."

He nudges the box a little in case he needs to get it moving - and when it moves freely enough, he pushes it to the left, as directed, until it stops.

And predictably, in the space where Dylan's midsection is, there's nothing. He glances down at the spot, pretending to wring his hands, hand, as best he can, fingers twisting and relaxing over and over again, and then looks to Jack. "Gotta say, not having a stomach is kinda weird."

Jack snorts, grinning - not that he's really stopped grinning at this point, because holy shit this is awesome. "I mean, you could try to make it the next diet fad or whatever?"

"People'd probably pay for it," he says by way of agreement. A vague gesture to his missing stomach follows. "But I really don't wanna have to explain all this to Mike, so how 'bout you put me back together?"

Jack laughs again - but does pull the box back into position. He pulls the blades out, pausing to lean them carefully against the wall before he undoes the latches and steps back. "Ta da," he says, his grin even wider now, and he rocks up onto his toes again, barely resisting the urge to bounce.

Dylan pushes out of the box, once Jack has stepped away, and gestures to it with a flourish, for the benefit of a nonexistent audience. A bow follow, and when he straightens again, he smiles at Jack. "Remind me, next time, to bring a pogo stick."

Not that he really blames him for being exicted.

Jack settles back onto his heels sheepishly, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. "Sorry, it's just... super cool?"

He knows Dylan's just giving him a hard time to tease him, but he recognizes he's maybe being a little overexcited about the whole thing.

But come on. It's literally history and literally magic.

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