Title: Repair
Fandom: Magic Knight Rayearth
Rating: General
Length: 900 words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Very just post-manga-canon Ascot and Zazu (pre-epilogue)
Summary: “You want to help?” Zazu blinked at him, smiles gone in his apparent confusion.

oOo

Ascot bit his lip, and winced. There were bits of… something mechanical, he wasn’t sure quite what it had been, spread over one small wooden table and two upturned crates, and a box of tools sat next to it. Other than that, this garden-room mostly held one fountain (not currently working), and a thin flower-bed around the edge of the room from which fruit vines grew up to coat the walls and ceilings.

He'd come because he thought that the kid from Autozam had said something about hiding out down here, only there wasn’t anyone at all. And while the bits and pieces across the table looked like they might be Zazu’s work, the tools in the box were all Cephiran ones, not from Autozam.

People were finding odd corners to work in all the time. It could easily be one of the smiths who had set themselves up to do some repair work out here, a break from being in their quarters. Ascot didn’t want to bother them, if that was it; didn’t really want to wait to find out if it was, either…

But just as he’d started to turn around, the door opened, and the surprised “Oh! Hi!” ended far too cheerfully to be anyone but Zazu.

“Hi,” Ascot said, waving a hand and then feeling awkward as Zazu crossed the room. “I remembered you said you’d found a room over here that no one seemed to be using…”

“You found me,” Zazu grinned at him, waving a small tool at Ascot. “I just had to go talk someone into lending me a smaller screwdriver, I can’t get the last bits of this apart.”

“What was it? Uh, is it?”

“It’s a clock – an older one.” Zazu dropped down by the crates, waving Ascot over, and Ascot tentatively knelt down next to him. “I went and complained I couldn’t work out how they worked at the – what do you call them, Smiths? And they asked if I wanted magic, I said not right now Geo would be mad, and then someone dug out a bunch of old broken stuff for me and said I might as well see if I could work it out and also give these a bit of a clean and see if I could get anything working again in the meantime. Which was getting rid of me, but nicely, and I wanted something to do, so…” he waved at one of the crates he’d spread parts of the clock out over, and Ascot realised it wasn’t empty at all, the faintest hint of magic coming from it. “But I’m not allowed to bring tools off the NSX without authorisation, and Geo’s got enough to worry about – anyway, these are what you’re meant to use on Cephiran stuff, so hopefully they’ll help me figure some of it out.” He patted the toolkit, and smiled.

The smile was bright, but there was darkness smudged about his eyes.

Ascot nodded, took a breath, and said “Would you like something to eat?”

“…Huh?”

“I just – I didn’t see you at lunch, and- my friends thought you might like – I brought this.” He waved a hand and summoned up the loaf-cake he’d taken from the dining room, along with a couple of bottles of the slightly-spicey drink that had been out. “And if you needed – I might be able to put a bit of magic back into the things which need power that way?”

“You want to help?” Zazu blinked at him, smiles gone in his apparent confusion. “I mean, that would be awesome, but I’m sure you’ve better things to do-“

“Not really, not right now.” Ascot shrugged, looking down. “I help out with things like the harvesting, things like that, but – I’m meant to be an apprentice, right now, so I’m meant to have a lot of time for studying and people won’t give me jobs to do that might interfere. Only the Naru’s told Guru Clef that he’s got to rest for three weeks so-“

“Oh,” Zazu said, quietly, and the smile this time was different. Smaller, but it set something warm in Ascot’s chest. “I guess we both need something to occupy us, then.”

“I don’t know anything about this kind of thing,” Ascot warned, flushing under that look. “But if you wanted to tell me about it, or-“

“That would be great.” The beam was back full-force now, as Zazu waved at the cake. “And you brought us a snack! Thanks – I forgot lunch, I was trying to sneak in to see Eagle while Geo wasn’t there brooding, but – anyway, this is great, I’d love to hang out. Do you really want to know more about these kinds of things, though?”

Ascot shrugged. “I’m meant to be studying,” he pointed out. “And I don’t know anything about this stuff, so there’s a lot to learn.”

“Well – tell me if I’m boring you, okay? But if you’re sure – have you ever used a screwdriver before?” Zazu handed him the small tool, with a grin, and a tiny piece of metal that Ascot couldn’t imagine would come apart further. “You see the screw here – that little indented cross, it’s pretty flush with the part – here’s how you take them out…”

Despite Ascot’s complete lack of knowledge, Zazu didn’t seem to mind walking him through how to use all the tools in the tool kit, and by the time the bells rang for dinner the two of them walked down together, smiles just a little more settled than they had been that morning.