Work Text:
As someone who’d spent two lifetimes inventing various gadgets, talismans, arrays, and spells, Wei Wuxian was no stranger to experimenting.
As such, he was also no stranger to experiments failing.
Most of the time, they failed in frankly boring ways. Either he’d realize before he even started that the idea wouldn’t work, or he’d scribble down pages of notes only to come to the same conclusion.
Sometimes, the idea was sound, but he just couldn’t get the methodology right. Those experiments would be set aside, ready for a rainy day when inspiration might strike him to pick them up again.
And sometimes, like today, his experiment would take a completely unexpected turn and explode in his face.
This particular experiment was one he’d been working with on and off. He’d first had the idea back in Yi City, and had been refining it for years ever since he and Lan Wangji had settled back in Cloud Recess. It was meant to be an array that could repair damaged souls—like Xiao Xingchen’s and A-Qing’s—so that they would one day be able to peacefully enter the reincarnation cycle. If it worked, he could even see if he could use it to find any remnants of Mo Xuanyu’s soul.
So far, the array had been a dud. So Wei Wuxian didn’t think much of it when Lan Wangji knocked on the door to his experiment room to bring him supper, calling for his husband to come in.
He was in the process of adding some spiritual energy into the array when the door opened. Something must have distracted him, for all of a sudden he felt a surge from all the spiritual and resentful energy he’d stored into the array over the years. The energy slammed into him, knocking him onto his back as his meridians were assaulted.
The surge was over almost as quickly as it had begun, and Wei Wuxian could barely hear Lan Wangji calling his name past the ringing in his ears. He tried to sit up, but his body still ached and he couldn’t focus. He tried to take a deep breath, but all he could manage were short pants as panic overtook him.
It was as if he was back in the burial mounds, when he’d destroyed half of the Yin Tiger Tally. The backlash then had ripped his body apart, boiled his blood and burnt his bones to ash until there’d been nothing of him left.
Only this time, he hadn’t been alone when the backlash hit.
“L… Lan Zhan…” he called out between breaths. “Lan Zhan… Where… Where are you?”
“Wei Ying, I am here.” The voice was right next to him, but it sounded far away.
He turned his head, seeing Lan Wangji looking at him with concern. There were hands on his wrists as his husband checked his meridians.
“Are you okay?” Wei Wuxian asked. “Did the backlash hit you too?” Gods, what would he do if Lan Zhan had also been hurt? How could he be so stupid as to put the one he loves most in danger like that?
“I am unhurt,” Lan Wangji answered. As he spoke, he summoned his guqin. “Wei Ying, your qi— I will play Cleansing.”
The words made sense, but Wei Wuxian barely understood them. All he could think about was how much he’d fucked up. What if the backlash had hit Lan Wangji? Or… Oh gods, what if Sizhui had been the one to visit? How could he live with himself if he’d hurt their son?
Not only this time, but back in the burial mounds, too… He’d always left his experiments lying around everywhere, and A-Yuan was just a child, he didn’t understand the danger…
“Stupid…” Wei Wuxian muttered as the notes of Cleansing began to play. “So stupid, so irresponsible… “
“No,” Lan Wangji said sternly, not pausing his fingers. “Wei Ying could never be stupid.”
“Could have hurt you,” Wei Wuxian argued, tears beginning to fall from his eyes. “Could have hurt A-Yuan, if he’d come in… Lan Zhan, he’s so little, he could get hurt so easily! He runs around so much, and the Demon Quelling Cave is such a mess, gods, there are so many things that could hurt him, my poor little raddish…”
Wei Wuxian let out a sob, and Lan Wangji kept playing, continuing to repeat reassuring words as he did so.
Slowly, agonizingly slowly, Wei Wuxian’s sobs were reduced to a sniffle, and his breathing calmed as the guqin’s soft tone made his eyes droop.
He wasn’t sure how long he slept, but he awoke in bed with his husband spooned against his back. They were in the Jingshi; the candles had been snuffed, and the curtains drawn.
“Lan Zhan?” He prompted quietly.
“Hm,” sounded from behind him.
“What happened?” He had an idea, but everything had been so frantic.
“The storage capacity of the array overloaded,” Lan Wangji answered simply. “The backlash caused you to qi deviate, but Cleansing was able to reverse the effects. No one else was hurt.”
Those last words made him relax. “No one else? Good… That’s good.” He let out a long breath. Behind him though, he could feel that Lan Wangji was still tense. He was waiting to see if Wei Wuxian wanted to explain his reaction, but wasn’t going to pressure him to talk.
“The backlash,” he began to explain after a moment. “It made me remember what happened with the Yin Tiger Tally. And when I realized that you might have been caught up in it, I… I panicked. And I thought about if Sizhui or any of the juniors might have been there…” He trailed off, but it was easy to guess where his thoughts had spiraled to from there.
Lan Wangji’s arms tightened around his waist for a moment before he pulled away. Wei Wuxian turned to look, and saw him looking through his qiankun pouch. When he found what he was looking for he pulled it out and handed it over.
Wei Wuxian took the talisman and looked it over, confused. “A protection talisman?”
“Wei Ying created this talisman for the workshop. So that if any experiments fail the way the array did today, the backlash would remain localized.”
Wei Wuxian stared at the talisman, remembering having explained this to Lan Wangji years ago when he’d first created the talisman. Unless someone was interacting with something directly, like he’d been doing, they wouldn’t be hurt. He let out a huff. “Huh. Yeah, I did make that, didn’t I?”
“Wei Ying knew that the experiments would sometimes be dangerous,” Lan Wangji told him.
“And I already took precautions to make sure no one would be hurt if they visited,” he finished. He looked up to meet his husband’s gaze. “Well, I feel silly now.”
Lan Wangji leaned over to kiss Wei Wuxian on the forehead. “Not silly. What happened at the burial mounds…” He paused, trying to find his words. Eventually, he just shook his head. “Not silly.”
Wei Wuxian felt like he knew what Lan Wangji was trying to tell him. Of course he wouldn’t be able to think straight when he’d been hit with such an intense reminder of the pain and fear of his own death.
Finally relaxed, he wrapped his arms around Lan Wangji again, snuggling into his embrace. “Thank you,” he whispered. “For being there for me today.”
“Always,” Lan Wangji replied immediately, holding his husband close. “For Wei Ying… Always.”
-Fin-