Chapter Text
So it's like this: Boboiboy is fifteen years old.
This would have been fifteen whole rotations around the sun had he been raised on planet Earth. As is, the sun is simply a steadfast companion blinking at the edge of the radar somewhere, he needs only to tap and zoom in to find it.
Boboiboy is fifteen, and he has seen and done more in life than most adults thrice his age.
Boboiboy is—reluctantly, and with every shyness—the galaxy's savior, as dubbed by many. Kind and brave, he is a hero through and through even where he is reckless with youth—no, maybe especially then. Anybody can tell you this if asked, everybody will.
And on top of that, Boboiboy is: a grandson, a son, a friend, a rival.
Somebody to many someone's. Beloved in every capacity though he'd deny it if ever confronted.
To the Elementals, however…
Boboiboy is more than just a friend or an owner or even a brother. He's everything.
It started with a hello. An awkward, fumbling introduction to a drained watch whose screen only managed to spark back to life every few seconds.
"Do you have a name?" Boboiboy asked empty air, remembering the feeling of wielding lightning in his hands for the very first time, that day his life took a sharp left turn, how he felt like an entirely different person throughout and came to the inevitable conclusion that there was more to this power than anyone had said. "Can I call you Petir until you can tell me?" he followed up with, when there was no response. The screen lit, and stayed bright for a few seconds longer than the stuttering pulses before, and Boboiboy took that as yes.
And that was enough for the beginnings of love beyond duty to seed.
Apparently—Boboiboy will find this out much, much later—nobody had ever asked before.
Angin and Tanah came next, then Api and Air, then Daun, then Cahaya.
Each time, Boboiboy welcomed them with open arms, in and outside battle.
In time, they all learned to trust it.
"Why are you awake?" A breeze giggles into his ears in echoing voices. Taufan. Boboiboy closes his eyes and doesn't protest the way it ruffles his hair. Even with the cool night air, it still feels too stuffy compared to the type of atmosphere he's used to, the one with sterile oxygen and ventilation turned up to max all day every day.
Boboiboy is sitting on the edge of the roof again, knees pulled to his chest. The planet they're on right now is colloquially called Earth. It is his father's home-planet, Boboiboy's birth-planet, and the planet where his grandfather lives—Tok Aba is somewhere below him, hopefully asleep, this late into the night. Boboiboy is visiting for the weekend, something he tries to do once a month knowing Tok Aba's age and knowing the nature of death, and knowing regret even more intimately.
Still, he doesn't like it, being here he means, on Earth. Opening his eyes, neck craning upwards, he strains against the moon's glare. The sky is cloudless with summertime, and yet, it is only a dusty gray void. The stars he loves are drowned out by the planet's own brilliance, and while he knows logically that they're still out there, it feels like he's lost them somehow. Eventually, he finds one sole stubborn light just shy of disappearing behind the treeline, and fixates on that.
"I can't sleep," he sighs. It's not a lie, though not the whole truth. His room doesn't feel his, and he's homesick for a home that's more a time than a place.
Out of the corner of his eye, Boboiboy notices with tired amusement a leaf being blown in loop-de-loops. Somehow, he is still surprised when it ends up smacking straight into his nose. He blinks, spluttering.
Taufan drifts closer, an invisible pressure curling around his shoulders habitually. "Oboi, you're thinking too loud."
"Am I?" Boboiboy asks back, a smile pulling at his lips as he pinches the leaf between two fingers and flicking it away from his face, finally tearing his eyes away from the above and giving his aching neck a break.
Somewhere in the distance, the city is alive. Even from here, far from the highway, there is the messy, unique cacophony of cars honking, of people talking in indistinct voices blending into murmur. Proof of life.
Boboiboy leans back, mindful of his grip on the edge, feeling an invisible not-quite-there hand pillowing his head, it helps him lay down slowly, until he is laid down with sanded-down roof shingles digging into his back.
"Taufan," he says aloud, eyes closed, feeling the wind play with his eyelashes, his bangs, his clothes, anything it can touch. "Taufan," he says again, because he found out long ago how much Taufan liked to hear his name said out loud.
Each time, Taufan answers with increasing enthusiasm.
"Have you..ever wondered what I was like before you guys?" The question slips out without him meaning to, exhaustion chipping at his walls.
A pause. The world seems to still for a second. And then: a tingling numbness, like the grainy static of an old TV, accompanies his next breath, a jittering in his bones. Boboiboy knows what he will see even before he opens his eyes. Lightning, neon red and hot the way food off the stove is, almost painful to touch but well worth every burnt finger and molten tongue, sparking at his fingertips, a familiar sensation climbing steadily up his watch-bearing arm—an experience Boboiboy has learnt to love because each and every time it meant Halilintar felt safe enough to manifest without command.
They've come a long, long way from where they first started, back when Boboiboy was a child still learning what responsibility meant and the Elementals knew nothing except what it was to be weapons.
"No," is the first thing Halilintar says, upon manifestation, a flickering phenomenon so bright it almost hurts to look at, whose form can only be barely glimpsed through the image burned at the back of one's eyelids from exposure.
Boboiboy is glad he had the foresight to leave his phone behind; it would have been fried in the face of Hali's unfiltered presence. He's lost three that way already, two to Hali and one to Blaze. "Eavesdropper," he teases lightly.
"No," Taufan echoes, sending a light wind to brush against Boboiboy's cheek.
And at the edge of Boboiboy's consciousness, he can feel the others rousing as well. He shushes them, they need rest. Gempa flickers online stubbornly anyway.
"We don't care," Halilintar lays it out like law. "You are you," he says this with complete and utter certainty. Boboiboy can feel Gempa and the others agreeing, a soft warmth blooming in his chest watered by the influx of positive feelings they're pushing up at him through their bond.
It really should be comforting. Boboiboy is sure Hali meant it to be that way, the lightning elemental having been with him the longest, through the bests and worsts of his life, and having witnessed and having held Boboiboy through a not insignificant number of crises, Halilintar had been privy to many of Boboiboy’s insecurities—in another time, for a different type of self-doubt, this heavy-handed assurance might have worked as intended.
Instead, it only makes something twist quietly in Boboiboy's chest. Because Boboiboy cares.
"Thanks," he laughs a watery laugh anyway, smiling as he blinks the tears away, knowing they're just on different pages and knowing they mean the absolute best.
Halilintar allows him to lean against his shoulder without complaint, not even when Taufan decided to join and threw himself against Boboiboy, squishing him between the two forces of nature and forcing Halilintar to bear both their weights else Boboiboy risk tumbling off the roof. Halilintar doesn't complain even when Gempa decided to join in as well, manifesting silently but unmistakably, and having the mind to wipe the tear tracks away from Boboiboy's face with a warm, dry hand even after they've long stopped before he moved to hug them all from behind, arms reaching across Taufan's and Halilintar's shoulders with ease.
Yeah, Boboiboy thinks, melting into the world's strangest group hug, this is nice.