Word count: 0.9k words

Birthday gift for my friend Meg <3 (...except it's late). Prompt is technically for keefex bromance and I thought qpr keefex was a vibe (not that they're officially in a relationship, but just keep the vibes in mind)

Ig you can say it takes place during Unlocked? But also canon divergence. Having thoughts about non-verbal communication and autistic dex (I am not autistic but dex gives me vibes)

(I don't know much about sign language and realistically should've done research but also they're elves they can be different ig)

Warnings: one swear

"This whole fear you you have over controlling people," Dex began, "your power works because of the inflection of your voice, right?"

Keefe nodded.

"So, I have an... alternative."

Keefe raised an eyebrow.

"I'll be back, just wait here."

Keefe squinted at him, but shrugged. Dex leaped to his house briefly and went searching through his room. The thing he needed, he hadn't used or actually seen it in years, but it had been so important, so he managed to find it. He picked it up and quickly leaped back.

When Dex got back, he walked to the bed Keefe was sitting down and dropped a heavy book on it, plopping onto the blankets with a loud noise.

Keefe scrunched his nose, opening his mouth, only to shut it. He closed his eyes, let out a breath, then looked back at Dex to raise an eyebrow. It was meant to be a casual action, but Dex could tell how much being afraid to speak was weighing down on him.

"I know you don't like reading," Dex said, ignoring as Keefe rolled his eyes, "but if you actually decided to look at the title you'd see that it's about communicating without your voice."

Keefe looked at him, confused.

"Open the book and you'll see what I mean."

Keefe shook his head, but opened the book, scanning the table of contents for something, then flipping over to a page, seemingly looking for something.

He pointed at Dex, then the book, then the image of a hand signing 'why?'

Dex understood what he meant. "Speaking wasn't really my thing when I was younger. Still isn't, but I'm better with words now. Back during early days of Foxfire before we all met Sophie, I just... couldn't speak. My parents were worried but they figured that it'd be easier for me to communicate if I wasn't always forced to use my voice.

"Apparently signing was more common in the past, and it stopped getting taught as an important thing in Foxfire. But it helped me a lot. It still helps me, when speaking sometimes is too difficult."

He hadn't been looking at Keefe as he was explaining, and when he looked back at Keefe, he noticed that he had a pensive look on his face.

"What is it?" Dex asked.

'Empath', he mouthed.

He sighed. Right, Keefe's empathy ability had grown more stronger. He didn't think he was feeling too strongly when it came to any particular emotion, but Keefe must have been able to detect something.

"I'm alright," he said. "The non-verbal days aren't as awful as they used to be." He flipped the page back to the beginning. "We'll start with the basics, but it'll take a while for it to all really kick in, remember that. It's a whole new language."

Keefe nodded, a smirk on his face, a confident gleam in his eyes, as if he was prepared to learn the whole book.

•~•~•~•~•~•

The next time he leaped to Elwin's, Elwin greeted him with a smile on his face.

'Never seen him so excited for a book before.' He signed. 'Or this excited in general for a long time.'

Dex's eyebrows rose, excitedly signing, 'You know how to sign?'

'Helps with patients.'

'How's he doing?'

'His bodyguard had to force him to sleep.'

Dex laughed.

'Wish I thought of sign language earlier,' Elwin signed.

'It's not used often, I totally forgot earlier too.' Dex felt like shaking in excitement, something about being able to sign to someone who wasn't his family was thrilling.

After signing 'bye' to Elwin, he went to go see Keefe, and honestly, he hadn't felt this excited in a long time.

•~•~•~•~•~•

"Hey!" Dex said, grabbing Keefe's wrist. "What you just signed means "fuck you" and not "thank you" is that understood?"

Keefe threw his arms up in the air.

"Yeah, yeah, they're super similar. The triplets keep trying to use that to their advantage." He snorted. "It never works."

Keefe let out a chuckle. Then he signed.

"Hey you're doing it on purpose aren't you-"

Dex tackled him, laughing. Keefe signed 'thank you' for real this time, smiling fondly.

"You're so using signing to cuss people out, won't you?"

Keefe smirked, nodding.

"...I've done it before."

He raised an eyebrow.

"...I've done it to Fitz."

A full blown, unrestrained cackle burst out from Keefe's lips.

•~•~•~•~•~•

"Oh, sign language," Sophie remarked. "Didn't realize elves had that."

Dex shrugged. "Not too common."

Sophie gave him a pensive look. "I'm guessing that if you know it, there was a reason for it."

"Yeah," he replied casually.

"It'd be fun, to learn another language, I think," Sophie said. "The others would probably agree. Make things easier for us."

"Especially those who don't have telepathy."

She nodded. "Yeah."

•~•~•~•~•~•

Keefe draped himself over Dex, resting a hand on his head dramatically.

Dex wanted to push him off for being so dramatic, but decided not to. Instead, he pat his head affectionately.

'It's so fun being around you,' Keefe signed, and Dex felt oddly proud to see how fast he was learning. 'The heart's already devoted to someone, but treat me so nicely more and I might have to fall for you.'

Dex playfully shoved him off, bending over laughing. 'I need to be more mean, I think.'

He pouted, and Dex rolled his eyes. He'd turned his body away, but caught a flash of movement in the corner of his eye.

'Thank you so much for this.'

Dex smiled at him. 'No problem.'