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Chunk!

Max jerked around in his hammock and fell out. Thankfully the hammock was only a few inches off the ground. A few inches was a decent fall when you were only five and a half inches tall though.

Max grunted as he stood up and rubbed his slightly sore back. He looked around trying to figure out what the noise had been. The cold gave it away. He could feel it seeping into his body already and felt the hairs on his arms starting to rise up.

Max walked over to one of the two human sized dressers that made up half the wall of his little ‘room.’ He slipped under it easily and came out into the room proper. Yup, sure enough, the space heater that was supposed to keep his corner of the room warm wasn’t working. He walked up to it and gave it a good kick.

“Ow! Stupid machine.”

Max frowned at it. He sighed, and headed back under the dresser. He army crawled (that’s what Levi called it) to the back of the dresser where the power strip was. He hit the button and cut the power to the space heater. Levi had sounded pretty serious when he told Max to not just leave it on the whole time. He had seemed to be concerned about something catching fire. Max bet that it was even more dangerous when it was broken.

Max crawled back to his room frowning. He quickly did a sweep of it, and found what he was looking for. He grabbed the hoodie that Levi had given him. It was still way to big for him. It was the first Christmas gift he had ever been given though. It fought off a bit of the cold, but Max could still feel the shivers coming on. When you were as small as Max was keeping warm was extremely important. His body just didn’t produce enough heat on its own to keep itself okay in a freezing apartment in the dead of winter. Max suspected that it was an intentional part of the spell that transformed humans like Levi into homunculi like him.

Max grabbed a washcloth that doubled as his blanket and climbed back into his hammock, hoping that it would be enough to keep him warm through the night.

“Stupid Levi, forgetting to pay the stupid heat bill.”

Max sighed after only a minute. The shivers had started. It wasn’t working. He’d get sick if didn’t find someplace warm to be. Quickly. Unfortunately there was really only one option. Max flipped himself out of the hammock. This time he landed expertly on his feet. He threw away his blanket and crawled back out of his room.

He started over to Levi’s nightstand. He jogged, both to get there quicker and to help keep the cold at bay a little. He could still feel the cold seeping into him though. His hands and feet were especially chilly. He pushed himself and started actually running. It would be annoying to try and climb the ladder with numb hands and feet.

He reached the nightstand maybe ten minutes later. His hands were definitely starting to go numb. His feet were in a little bit better condition thanks to his socks, but he knew that wouldn’t last long.

Max had been staying with Levi for more than a year now. So there were a few things around the apartment that made Max’s life a little bit easier. One of them was the ladder that was hanging down from Levi’s nightstand.

The ladder was made up of yarn and toothpicks. Two of the little wooden sticks made up each step of the ladder. It was tied to the lamp up top and was plenty strong enough to handle Max’s minuscule weight. The nightstand was only about three feet tall. That was basically a three and a half story building to the teenage homunculus though. Max didn’t waste any more time thinking about the climb. He started his way up carefully and quickly. His feet were definitely starting to go numb.

Of course the stupid ladder swung and twisted as he climbed it. He really needed to get Levi to do something about that. It shouldn’t be that hard to fix. He only banged himself into the hard cold wood of the night stand once before deciding to slow down a bit. He really, really, didn’t want to fall and hurt himself. It would be embarrassing if Levi woke up and found a frozen Maxicle on his floor.

He managed to make it to the top without any other issues. The shivers were really starting to get to him though. He started shakily making his way across the room-size night stand to his friend.

Honestly Levi was more like an older brother to him than anything else. Really all that Max could see of Levi was his reddish blonde hair sticking out from under the blankets. Levi was bundled up under more blankets than usual. The human only had one space heater, and he had refused to use it for himself knowing that Max needed it much more than he did.

He made it to the edge of the nightstand closest to Levi’s bed. Max shouted as loud as he could. “Levi!”

Levi snorted in response. Max rolled his eyes and tried again. This time there was no response. Max knew it had been a long shot. Levi slept like a rock. Max had once watched Levi’s brother Matty draw a rather complicated clown design on Levi’s face while he had been napping. Max knew his relatively small voice wouldn’t be able to penetrate the human’s dreams.

Max grumbled and eyed the short distance between the nightstand and the bed. It wouldn’t be a problem normally. It was less than a foot. But Max wasn’t as confident with the violent uncontrollable shivers that were wracking his body. His teeth were the worst culprits of course. He was half surprised their chattering wasn’t waking up the human by themselves.

Max backed up about six inches then turned around. He started running, and managed to fall flat on his face. Max lay there for a second and contemplated just staying there. Sure it was cold. He really didn’t want to get up though. It would take a whole lot of effort and he really didn’t want to put such effort forward.

Max shook himself. He knew that the cold of the nightstand was leeching his energy away. He had to get up. First he flipped himself around and removed his socks. They had slipped on the smooth surface of the nightstand and caused him to fall. On the bright-side they were so numb that he didn’t even feel the freezing wood beneath his soles.

“Alright, round two!” Max said to himself. He got up and turned toward the bed again. He took a running start and easily cleared the distance. Levi had always been surprised at how far Max could jump. He said that Max was proportionately stronger than a human was.

His landing on the bed was not so graceful thanks to his hypothermic body. He could already feel the heat emanating from the mountain that was Levi though. He started crawling towards that heat source.

The jump and landing had taken even more energy out of his frozen body. He wasn’t at all sure he would be able to stand up. The closer he got the warmer it got. He had landed at the bottom of the pillow on the far side of the bed from Levi. This meant he had to crawl nearly two feet in order to get to his new space heater. Thankfully the bed was sloping towards Levi because of the human’s weight.

Eventually Max was able to just roll over to Levi. Unfortunately that only landed him on the outside of Levi’s blanket cocoon. Max could feel the warmth still seeping out from the blankets. He would probably survive fine where he was. He wouldn’t be comfortable though.

So Max crawled up closer to the pillow where he could see a gap in the blankets leading to a dark, and most importantly warm, cave. As soon as he reached the gap Max sighed in contentment. That was better. The heat that was being vented by the small gap was much more than what was seeping through the actual cloth of the blanket. Max continued his crawl into the dark recesses of the blanket cave.

Once inside he realized why the gap had been emitting so much heat. He also realized that he wasn’t nearly as numb as he was before when he felt a leathery surface beneath him instead of a cloth surface. Levi’s open hand had been lying right inside the gap slightly curled into a loose fist.

Max felt a different type of chill pass through him. He quickly took control of the fear.

“No.” Max spoke to himself firmly. “Levi isn’t him. Levi won’t use you.” He felt the muscles beneath him and the fingers around him twitch. Max froze as his fear spiked again. He hated being held in any way that he couldn't escape. He didn’t mind being touched as long as it was on his terms. But Levi was asleep right now. It would be all too easy for the human to simply grab him without knowing it and not let go.

Thankfully Levi didn’t do that. The twitch had been for another reason. Max saw Levi’s eyes blink open sleepily. Max froze again. He did not want to startle the human. Levi would realize that Max was there soon enough.

The grey eyes settled on Max. “Hey buddy.” Max felt an emotion bloom up inside him that he was starting to associate with Levi, and to a lesser extent Matty. Levi’s sleepy dark grey eyes were shining with a smile.

Suddenly the smile was replaced by concern. “You’re freezing.” Max stopped a flinch as Levi’s hand twitched again. Levi had probably just stopped himself from curling his fingers around Max to warm him up. Levi was thoughtful like that.

“Y-your, s-stupid sspace heater broke.”

“Ahh,” Levi’s eyes widened in understanding. “I take it you need a replacement heater then eh?”

“Y-yup.”

“Well come on in then.” Levi drew his hand farther away from the gap, and Max felt almost instantly better. Levi must have noticed because he said, “That’s better. You going to sleep in my hand all night?” Max could clearly see the mischief in Levi’s eyes, but he also heard the challenge behind his words.

“Maybe I will.” Max said defiantly.

“Sounds good meeee,” Levi let out a huge yawn, and Max winced just a bit. Loud noises were an issue for people his size. “Good night Max.”

Max frowned at him, “Good night.” He hadn’t really been serious about sleeping in his hand all night. Now that he had said he would Max felt like he had to. That was when he realized he had been tricked.

“Stupid trickster giant.”

Levi steadfastly ignored him.

Max frowned. Levi was obviously still awake, but faking it. He wanted Max to sleep in his hand. He probably thought it was a good step forward and would help Max deal with his issues. Max was highly annoyed that it probably was. Max sighed and tried to figure out how to get comfortable in the bed sized hand.

Levi smiled to himself as he felt Max shift and squirm in his hand looking for a good position. Eventually he felt the teen settle into a final place. The kid had to bend his knees a bit so that his entire body would fit onto Levi’s palm.

Levi nearly gasped, which would have revealed that he was definitely still awake. He felt Max reach over and tug on one of Levi’s pinkie finger. Levi only resisted for a moment before remembering that he was supposed to be sleeping. Max pulled the little finger down so that it was lying across his legs. He did the same with Levi’s other fingers so that they were forming a sort of blanket. Then Max grabbed Levi’s thumb and positioned it so that it was serving the kid as an excellent pillow.

“Stupid Levi.” Levi heard the quiet mutter and smiled. Stupid was the little fifteen year old’s newest favorite word. Levi knew what a huge deal this was though. This was the tightest that Max had ever let Levi hold him, and Max himself had been the one to initiate it. This was a huge step forward for the little teenager.

Levi marveled a bit, feeling the little guy in his hand. He could feel the boy’s tiny heartbeat, especially though his index finger. He could also feel his own heart beat against Max’s head. The kid was still a bit cold to Levi’s touch, but he was quickly warming up.

Levi smiled, and finally let himself drift off to sleep. He wasn’t concerned about accidentally hurting Max in his sleep. Once he was out, he wouldn’t move at all. Levi smiled as he felt a certain warmth in his chest that hadn’t been there before. It was the same feeling that was evoked when he hugged his little brother Matty. Levi smiled, happy that he had another little brother who he could watch out for and help.

Levi drifted away then into sleep. His last thought a silent prayer of thanksgiving to God for sending him Max. God was certainly mysterious sometimes, but He knew what He was doing. Levi knew that Max was helping the twenty-four year old himself to grow up just as much as Levi was helping Max to grow up. Levi and Max both sighed contently as they drifted away into a deep, joyful sleep.

Description
body div#devskin0 hr { }

Chunk!

Max jerked around in his hammock and fell out. Thankfully the hammock was only a few inches off the ground. A few inches was a decent fall when you were only five and a half inches tall though.

Max grunted as he stood up and rubbed his slightly sore back. He looked around trying to figure out what the noise had been. The cold gave it away. He could feel it seeping into his body already and felt the hairs on his arms starting to rise up.

Max walked over to one of the two human sized dressers that made up half the wall of his little ‘room.’ He slipped under it easily and came out into the room proper. Yup, sure enough, the space heater that was supposed to keep his corner of the room warm wasn’t working. He walked up to it and gave it a good kick.

“Ow! Stupid machine.”

Max frowned at it. He sighed, and headed back under the dresser. He army crawled (that’s what Levi called it) to the back of the dresser where the power strip was. He hit the button and cut the power to the space heater. Levi had sounded pretty serious when he told Max to not just leave it on the whole time. He had seemed to be concerned about something catching fire. Max bet that it was even more dangerous when it was broken.

Max crawled back to his room frowning. He quickly did a sweep of it, and found what he was looking for. He grabbed the hoodie that Levi had given him. It was still way to big for him. It was the first Christmas gift he had ever been given though. It fought off a bit of the cold, but Max could still feel the shivers coming on. When you were as small as Max was keeping warm was extremely important. His body just didn’t produce enough heat on its own to keep itself okay in a freezing apartment in the dead of winter. Max suspected that it was an intentional part of the spell that transformed humans like Levi into homunculi like him.

Max grabbed a washcloth that doubled as his blanket and climbed back into his hammock, hoping that it would be enough to keep him warm through the night.

“Stupid Levi, forgetting to pay the stupid heat bill.”

Max sighed after only a minute. The shivers had started. It wasn’t working. He’d get sick if didn’t find someplace warm to be. Quickly. Unfortunately there was really only one option. Max flipped himself out of the hammock. This time he landed expertly on his feet. He threw away his blanket and crawled back out of his room.

He started over to Levi’s nightstand. He jogged, both to get there quicker and to help keep the cold at bay a little. He could still feel the cold seeping into him though. His hands and feet were especially chilly. He pushed himself and started actually running. It would be annoying to try and climb the ladder with numb hands and feet.

He reached the nightstand maybe ten minutes later. His hands were definitely starting to go numb. His feet were in a little bit better condition thanks to his socks, but he knew that wouldn’t last long.

Max had been staying with Levi for more than a year now. So there were a few things around the apartment that made Max’s life a little bit easier. One of them was the ladder that was hanging down from Levi’s nightstand.

The ladder was made up of yarn and toothpicks. Two of the little wooden sticks made up each step of the ladder. It was tied to the lamp up top and was plenty strong enough to handle Max’s minuscule weight. The nightstand was only about three feet tall. That was basically a three and a half story building to the teenage homunculus though. Max didn’t waste any more time thinking about the climb. He started his way up carefully and quickly. His feet were definitely starting to go numb.

Of course the stupid ladder swung and twisted as he climbed it. He really needed to get Levi to do something about that. It shouldn’t be that hard to fix. He only banged himself into the hard cold wood of the night stand once before deciding to slow down a bit. He really, really, didn’t want to fall and hurt himself. It would be embarrassing if Levi woke up and found a frozen Maxicle on his floor.

He managed to make it to the top without any other issues. The shivers were really starting to get to him though. He started shakily making his way across the room-size night stand to his friend.

Honestly Levi was more like an older brother to him than anything else. Really all that Max could see of Levi was his reddish blonde hair sticking out from under the blankets. Levi was bundled up under more blankets than usual. The human only had one space heater, and he had refused to use it for himself knowing that Max needed it much more than he did.

He made it to the edge of the nightstand closest to Levi’s bed. Max shouted as loud as he could. “Levi!”

Levi snorted in response. Max rolled his eyes and tried again. This time there was no response. Max knew it had been a long shot. Levi slept like a rock. Max had once watched Levi’s brother Matty draw a rather complicated clown design on Levi’s face while he had been napping. Max knew his relatively small voice wouldn’t be able to penetrate the human’s dreams.

Max grumbled and eyed the short distance between the nightstand and the bed. It wouldn’t be a problem normally. It was less than a foot. But Max wasn’t as confident with the violent uncontrollable shivers that were wracking his body. His teeth were the worst culprits of course. He was half surprised their chattering wasn’t waking up the human by themselves.

Max backed up about six inches then turned around. He started running, and managed to fall flat on his face. Max lay there for a second and contemplated just staying there. Sure it was cold. He really didn’t want to get up though. It would take a whole lot of effort and he really didn’t want to put such effort forward.

Max shook himself. He knew that the cold of the nightstand was leeching his energy away. He had to get up. First he flipped himself around and removed his socks. They had slipped on the smooth surface of the nightstand and caused him to fall. On the bright-side they were so numb that he didn’t even feel the freezing wood beneath his soles.

“Alright, round two!” Max said to himself. He got up and turned toward the bed again. He took a running start and easily cleared the distance. Levi had always been surprised at how far Max could jump. He said that Max was proportionately stronger than a human was.

His landing on the bed was not so graceful thanks to his hypothermic body. He could already feel the heat emanating from the mountain that was Levi though. He started crawling towards that heat source.

The jump and landing had taken even more energy out of his frozen body. He wasn’t at all sure he would be able to stand up. The closer he got the warmer it got. He had landed at the bottom of the pillow on the far side of the bed from Levi. This meant he had to crawl nearly two feet in order to get to his new space heater. Thankfully the bed was sloping towards Levi because of the human’s weight.

Eventually Max was able to just roll over to Levi. Unfortunately that only landed him on the outside of Levi’s blanket cocoon. Max could feel the warmth still seeping out from the blankets. He would probably survive fine where he was. He wouldn’t be comfortable though.

So Max crawled up closer to the pillow where he could see a gap in the blankets leading to a dark, and most importantly warm, cave. As soon as he reached the gap Max sighed in contentment. That was better. The heat that was being vented by the small gap was much more than what was seeping through the actual cloth of the blanket. Max continued his crawl into the dark recesses of the blanket cave.

Once inside he realized why the gap had been emitting so much heat. He also realized that he wasn’t nearly as numb as he was before when he felt a leathery surface beneath him instead of a cloth surface. Levi’s open hand had been lying right inside the gap slightly curled into a loose fist.

Max felt a different type of chill pass through him. He quickly took control of the fear.

“No.” Max spoke to himself firmly. “Levi isn’t him. Levi won’t use you.” He felt the muscles beneath him and the fingers around him twitch. Max froze as his fear spiked again. He hated being held in any way that he couldn't escape. He didn’t mind being touched as long as it was on his terms. But Levi was asleep right now. It would be all too easy for the human to simply grab him without knowing it and not let go.

Thankfully Levi didn’t do that. The twitch had been for another reason. Max saw Levi’s eyes blink open sleepily. Max froze again. He did not want to startle the human. Levi would realize that Max was there soon enough.

The grey eyes settled on Max. “Hey buddy.” Max felt an emotion bloom up inside him that he was starting to associate with Levi, and to a lesser extent Matty. Levi’s sleepy dark grey eyes were shining with a smile.

Suddenly the smile was replaced by concern. “You’re freezing.” Max stopped a flinch as Levi’s hand twitched again. Levi had probably just stopped himself from curling his fingers around Max to warm him up. Levi was thoughtful like that.

“Y-your, s-stupid sspace heater broke.”

“Ahh,” Levi’s eyes widened in understanding. “I take it you need a replacement heater then eh?”

“Y-yup.”

“Well come on in then.” Levi drew his hand farther away from the gap, and Max felt almost instantly better. Levi must have noticed because he said, “That’s better. You going to sleep in my hand all night?” Max could clearly see the mischief in Levi’s eyes, but he also heard the challenge behind his words.

“Maybe I will.” Max said defiantly.

“Sounds good meeee,” Levi let out a huge yawn, and Max winced just a bit. Loud noises were an issue for people his size. “Good night Max.”

Max frowned at him, “Good night.” He hadn’t really been serious about sleeping in his hand all night. Now that he had said he would Max felt like he had to. That was when he realized he had been tricked.

“Stupid trickster giant.”

Levi steadfastly ignored him.

Max frowned. Levi was obviously still awake, but faking it. He wanted Max to sleep in his hand. He probably thought it was a good step forward and would help Max deal with his issues. Max was highly annoyed that it probably was. Max sighed and tried to figure out how to get comfortable in the bed sized hand.

Levi smiled to himself as he felt Max shift and squirm in his hand looking for a good position. Eventually he felt the teen settle into a final place. The kid had to bend his knees a bit so that his entire body would fit onto Levi’s palm.

Levi nearly gasped, which would have revealed that he was definitely still awake. He felt Max reach over and tug on one of Levi’s pinkie finger. Levi only resisted for a moment before remembering that he was supposed to be sleeping. Max pulled the little finger down so that it was lying across his legs. He did the same with Levi’s other fingers so that they were forming a sort of blanket. Then Max grabbed Levi’s thumb and positioned it so that it was serving the kid as an excellent pillow.

“Stupid Levi.” Levi heard the quiet mutter and smiled. Stupid was the little fifteen year old’s newest favorite word. Levi knew what a huge deal this was though. This was the tightest that Max had ever let Levi hold him, and Max himself had been the one to initiate it. This was a huge step forward for the little teenager.

Levi marveled a bit, feeling the little guy in his hand. He could feel the boy’s tiny heartbeat, especially though his index finger. He could also feel his own heart beat against Max’s head. The kid was still a bit cold to Levi’s touch, but he was quickly warming up.

Levi smiled, and finally let himself drift off to sleep. He wasn’t concerned about accidentally hurting Max in his sleep. Once he was out, he wouldn’t move at all. Levi smiled as he felt a certain warmth in his chest that hadn’t been there before. It was the same feeling that was evoked when he hugged his little brother Matty. Levi smiled, happy that he had another little brother who he could watch out for and help.

Levi drifted away then into sleep. His last thought a silent prayer of thanksgiving to God for sending him Max. God was certainly mysterious sometimes, but He knew what He was doing. Levi knew that Max was helping the twenty-four year old himself to grow up just as much as Levi was helping Max to grow up. Levi and Max both sighed contently as they drifted away into a deep, joyful sleep.