Julia Wicker + Quentin Coldwater
Language | Complete
The hologram ended and Quentin finally shut his mouth. Ever since it had appeared, he'd been sitting on the bed with his mouth hanging open trying to figure this out. The last memory that he had was sitting in the plaza area of Brakebill's while she showed him that for some reason she couldn't explain, she still had magic. There had been a coin on the ground in front of him and he'd picked it up to give him something to do with his hands while they talked and then he woke up here.
"What the fuck?" he said softly and got off the bed, wandering around the room. Everything he could possibly need was here, clothes, electronic devices to connect to the network here, even his messenger bag which still contained everything that had been in it when he'd left that morning to go to class. Was this a dream, he wondered, but it didn't feel like a dream. It didn't feel like a drug trip either since he wasn't doing any drugs and he was stone cold sober so this had to be real. As real as Fillory had turned out to be.
He walked over to the balcony and looked at the city and the water of the lake beyond. It was beautiful and he couldn't help but compare it to Fillory. Where Fillory was more like an enchanted fantasy kingdom, Atlantis was a city. They might be in a war to save creativity but it didn't look like it. It looked like any other decent sized city that he'd ever seen. Running a hand through his hair, he sighed and turned back to his room. Without thinking, he took the deck of cards out of his bag and started to shuffle them and then they exploded, just the way they had in his Brakebills interview. Quentin stared in wonder as they formed the same castle they'd formed then and he sank to the floor and stared. Magic was here, he could feel it and this was proof.
"What is this place?" he said aloud but there was a smile on his face. This was going to be fun.
Julia has practically squealed with delight when she read the alert, probably disturbing Davina while they were taking a short break from experimenting with combining their magic. It wasn’t just the name on her screen, either - she could feel the same way she’d been able to sense what was happening with him and the others during the end of their quest to bring magic back. There was no question of which version of Q this was. Quickly explaining herself to Davina, the girls decided it was close enough to dinnertime that they could just call it a day for now and Julia left the training room grinning like a little kid who’d just been given a rare treat. Apparently, sometimes Atlantis did take requests.
It didn’t take her long at all to scan the housing lists and find which one Quentin had been placed in and soon she was there. Once she was inside, it didn’t find her long to find Quentin and her smile turned into a teasing smirk.
“It’s Atlantis, dummy,” she teased him without pausing to say hello first. “Didn’t you listen to the hologram?” If she knew Quentin, he’d listened to a sentence between the daydreaming and wondering had started and hadn’t really processed a lot of that introductory speech. Who can really blame him? It wasn’t every day you were brought to another world by a weird looking coin. And somehow the idea that Atlantis really existed was even stranger than finding out Fillory was real.
As soon as he heard her voice,Quentin was on his feet. “Jules!” he cried and seconds later he had wrapped her in a hug. “I can’t believe you’re here too. This is great.” The last person he’d expected to find here was his best friend yet here she was and it made him happy to know that they could share this experience together. He let her go and stepped back. “Yes, I listened to the hologram but I was mostly in shock. I know it’s Atlantis but magic is here. I have it back…….I didn’t expect that.” He turned to face the house of cards and with a few hand movements, the cards were back into a deck and he put them in a pocket of his jeans.
“Does this mean that Atlantis magic is different from Earth magic? Or Fillory magic?” he said. “Some Greek god isn’t going to take a shit in that lake out there and fuck it all up is he?”
Julia hugged Quentin back tightly, holding on for more than just a moment, because for her it had been months since she’d seen him. She’d spent roughly 6 months in Whoverse London - which was just fucking weird to think about - and it had been almost a month since she’d arrived here in Atlantis, where Remus had been the only person who’d know her until the other Magicians had started showing up. With each new face, Julia had wished desperately for this one. All the god juice in the world couldn’t summon him, but they’d all known it was only a matter of time. If anyone was going to touch a strange coin, it was Quentin. It was a trait she was happy for right now.
After finally letting each other go, Julia grinned at his questions. Magic hadn’t been gone for her, but she’d seen the others get their magic back here. It seemed to be a perk of being in Atlantis.
“As far as I know, the only gods here are me and Thor,” she said, letting the statement hang casually. Without knowing exactly when he was from, she couldn’t say which would shock him more, but she was clearly enjoying the moment either way.
“Thor? That’s awesome!” he couldn’t believe it and then the other part of the sentence sunk in. “Julia, are you okay? I just saw you, I was hanging around the fountain at Brakebill’s and you came and found me, you’d quit law school and you showed me that you still had some magic but it was only a little and no offense but it wasn’t exactly enough to make you a god or I suppose a goddess would be more appropriate.” Quentin knew that Julia had been through a lot, he knew that it hadn’t been easy when she’d been reunited with her shade and having to deal with all the emotions but a goddess? He had hoped that maybe having even a little magic would have helped but now he was even more confused than he had been when he woke up here.
Julia laughed, partly at his question and partly at the moment it took for him to process what she’d said. “Thor, Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, most of the major characters from Harry Potter...” she said first, deciding he could stand to wait a beat for the explanation of her goddess status. She gestured towards his nearby bed before sitting down on it. This might not be a casual standing up kind of situation.
“That little bit of magic grew, Q,” she began before explaining that Our Lady Underground had taken Reynard’s magic and given it to her as a gift and that the more good she did with the, the bigger that spark grew. “I hated it at first,” she admitted. “Knowing I had any piece of him in me. I just wanted to get rid of it. I tried, after I found out where it came from, but it like fits me, super weirdly. So, uh, yeah, I’m basically a goddess now.”
Quentin listened to her, not quite believing it at first but as she went on, he knew it was true. There was a tiny flash of jealousy but he quickly pushed it away. She deserved this, after what Reynard had put her through, what she’d had to endure, it was only fair that something good came out of it. “Wow,” he said when she was done. The word certainly didn’t do what she had told him justice but it was the only thing he could say for the moment. “Does this mean you’re like… immortal? Or is this different from that. I..” he ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry that I don’t know exactly what to say. I’m glad though Jules, you’ve been through hell and I don’t have any idea what happened from the last thing I remember but that wasn’t easy either I’m sure.” He leaned over and hugged her again and held her tight. Even though he’d seen her only moments ago in his mind, this was a different Julia and he was just happy to see her smile again. When he let her go, he smiled at her. “It’s good to see you happy. It’s been a while.”
“You know, I don’t actually know,” she admitted with a shrug. “I don’t think so, but I’m not planning to test it anytime soon.” She could do some pretty amazing things, but despite all that power, she thought she was probably still human.
“I’ve really fucking missed you, Q,” she added after a brief pause. “It’s been [...] 7 months for me, since I last saw you. I haven’t been home in months. I’ve only been in Atlantis for about a month now, but before that I was [...] um, basically in Doctor Who. Or in that version of London.” It had been different from Atlantis. Quieter, mostly. There hadn’t been anyone else from home there, but there also hadn’t been a war.
“Please don’t. I don’t want anyone else dying,” he said. Alice’s death, niffinhood, and then restoring her had taken a lot out of him. “If I didn’t know about time loops and shit, I would say you were nuts since I just saw you but we both know there are a lot of timelines out there.” And he was dead in at least 39 of them. “You were in Doctor Who London? That’s fucking amazing, Jules. Did you meet The Doctor? And see the TARDIS? You are so damn lucky!” Quentin knew he sounded like a fanboy but it was who he was and he knew that he didn’t have to hide that from Julia, she knew him better than anyone so he just let his freak flag fly.
“Yep.” Julia grinned, loving Quentin’s little fanboy moment. She knew he would have loved being there and a part of her wished he had been, but she also wouldn’t trade the other friends she’d made there for anything, even if most of the ones who were here in Atlantis didn’t remember her. Or being there at all. The version of The Doctor here was one of the later ones, but he didn’t seem to remember and neither did Rose. Remus hadn’t been the only familiar face she’d found in Atlantis, but he had been the only one who remembered the things she did.
“A lot of the Harry Potter people were there, too,” she told him. “A lot of the same ones who are here now, but Remus is the only one who remembers it, so, you know, you have to love the multiverse.”
“Remus Lupin? The werewolf professor? I love him! I wish the teachers at Brakebill’s had been that cool. Is Harry Potter here? God I sound like a pathetic loser, I’m sorry about that. I guess I should ask if there’s anyone else from home here. Obviously I’m very glad that you’re here because it makes it all feel a little less weird.” Being in an alternate universe was a trippy experience as it was but this was an entirely different kind of trippy than Fillory from what he could tell. Despite the fact that they had had some rough patches over the years especially lately, he and Julia were good now and this would be a lot easier with her here. No matter what, she was and always would be his best friend.
“The one and the same,” she admitted. “We got pretty close in London. No one from home was there, so I kind of started hanging out with him and his friends. We went to the Harry Potter theme park together, which was kind of a trip.” She knew Quentin was just going to geek out about that. Eliot hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d said this place was like a wet dream for Q.
“Harry Potter IS here and a handful of people from home, too. Eliot and Margo, Kady and Penny, Alice. It’s about time you decided to join us.”
“You went to the Harry Potter theme park? You lucky bitch,” he laughed. It was a place he’d always wanted to go but had never gotten to it. Having the actual people here though was even better. He was glad that there were people from home here along with Julia and was smiling until she mentioned the last name and his mouth dropped open again. “Alice is here? Is she Alice? She’s not a niffin is she? Although if she was you probably would have warned me first. Wow. I don’t know whether to be glad she’s here or dread seeing her. I guess that depends on when she’s from.”
“Not a niffin, definitely,” Julia assured him. She couldn’t really answer the question of whether or not he should dread seeing her. That was something he’d have to figure out for himself. “Eliot and Margo are having a party tonight,” she said instead, shrugging, “so you’ll probably see her there, either way, but maybe the drinks will help.”
That probably wasn’t all that helpful, so she added, “the Harry Potter crew will be there, too, so you’ll get to meet Remus. And, uh, everyone else.” It was probably obvious that Remus was special somehow, compared to the others. None of them remembered being in London with them, which made her and Remus automatically closer.
She had a point, the drinks would definitely help if Eliot and Margo were in charge and he had a feeling he’d need all the help he could get. While things weren’t necessarily bad with Alice, they were certainly awkward. They’d had sex a few times since he’d brought her back but while he knew that he still loved her, she was angry with him and he didn’t understand exactly why. Maybe they could work things out here. Who knew?
“So what’s the story with Remus? I’ve known you too long to not see that you dropped his name and then changed the subject.” If he were a betting man, Quentin would bet that there were feelings there. Which he hoped that if it were true, she certainly deserved it after what she’d gone through. Although being a goddess wasn’t a bad thing either.
Julia hesitated just for a second before deciding to go with the truth. “We were starting [...] something in London, before we both woke up here,” she admitted, “but his future wife is here and his son, so that’s kind of [...] on pause.” She did have feelings for Remus, but more than anything, she treasured his friendship and she wanted him to be happy. If that ended up being with his future family, she didn’t want to stand in the way of that.
Quentin put his arm around her and pulled her next to him, kissing her hair. “I’m sorry, Jules. Even if things don’t work out, it sounds like you’ve at least made a good friend.” He knew the story of Tonks and Remus of course although this version of Remus was younger than the one he had read about from what he could gather. “Sometimes having really good friends is the best thing.” He had had feelings for Julia once but she didn’t feel the same way. It had hurt at the time but they were young and their friendship had grown into something he cherished despite all their problems the past two years. He loved her yes but in a different way and he wouldn’t change a thing.
Julia nodded as she leaned into him to affect the little display of affection and comfort. “He is a really good friend,” she agreed. That was what mattered to her. Whatever happened between Remus and Tonks, he’d become one of her best friends and was determined not to lose that.
“Come on,” she told Quentin with a smile, “you’ll meet him and everyone else at the party tonight, but in the meantime, how about a tour?”