nexus_crossings | The Silence of the Storm

Rations have been cut. Again. Everyone is on one bowl of watery soup a day. Sometimes with crackers, sometimes not. Most people are too tired and weak to do much more than sit around and talk, and nobody discourages them in the slightest. Work has to be rotated constantly as people weaken quickly, but the fires still need to burn, people still need to guard the cooks and rations, and the sick still need to be tended to. Soon the hardest job is keeping up morale while the big expedition comes back. All the gods and heavens of the multiverse help them if they don’t come back with supplies, and soon.

The boundaries have tightened to an almost suffocatingly small space. It doesn’t take much to imagine where they will be by the end of Winter, which at least makes planning a little easier. People are already relocating to deeper in the Plaza. Unfortunately it means that those who have enough energy to often end up fighting with their neighbours, as the close quarters tests everyone’s patience. There are a few spaces carved out for like minded people to shelter from the dreary situation. Mechanics and those like them have set up a nice little place close to the Crossroads Café, and a break area for those helping the sick is sheltered in a room behind the injured and ill. Zandros moves from groups to individuals, looking for help in creating some form of morale boosting display that will adhere to Isidor's instructions. People are surviving in whatever ways they can, but it's reaching breaking point.

((It's the Final Event Post, everyone! OOC Post is here! This is for those stuck at the hub while the Main Expedition is going on. There will be a second part to this post for the Return of the Expedition. In the meantime, have fun!))

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"...Steve?"

Oh man. Oh no. Peter feels a surge of shame mixed with worry uncoil in his gut and slither a chilling pressure into his gut to think that his bad call meant that Steve had to drag his cursed self all the way back here when he could have been helping protect the refugees they were looking after back at the base.

"I-I. I'm sorry. I just wanted to...help."

Steve reaches out and puts his hand on the edge of the cot, finding the blankets and following them up until he can reach Peter's shoulder, then his forehead, smoothing his hair clumsily. "Yeah. Can't stay as long as I'd like. I have to get back to the shelter and keep an eye on things there, but I wanted...to be around when you and Miles woke up."

He can't hide that he's deeply upset, but it doesn't look like anger or even disappointment. He can't fully process what he's feeling right now, in fact, but he knows he's going to need to give both of them hell at some point, but now is not that point.

"You scared the hell out of me," he says quietly. "Right now I'm just glad you're both all right."

"...you took care of each other out there?"

The hand in his hair makes Peter sniffle but he holds back from crying outright. He doesn't have the right to after everything that's happened. He's just so relieved to see Steve after the scare he went through.

"Y-yeah. Course. Don't leave the path." Again. Advice they should both be taking. Maybe they wouldn't be in this situation if they had. He wipes at his own eyes and nods while Steve's hand is still buried into his hair so the other can feel the motion.

"W-well, now we're even I guess." He looks down at Miles and it's enough to make Peter sit up straighter. Calm down, if only a little. "Of course we did. I wasn't gonna...I tried so hard not to let anything happen to him." Unfortunately, his scrawny butt wasn't enough insulation to keep Miles from succumbing to the cold. Or himself.

Steve's heart sinks a little at the comment about leaving the path, but he laughs anyway. It's a soft, pained chuckle, but he continues petting Peter's hair to soften it. "Dammit, I'm a bad influence."

"You both made it. If you hadn't held on to one another, you might not have. Either of you. That's...you're a team, the two of you. I like that. I like that a lot."

"We'll go over wilderness survival training in the spring. Maybe the summer." Camping trip? Yes.

Withdrawing his hand from Peter's hair, he gets up and awkwardly turns the chair he was sitting in, then settles in it backwards and rests his right arm across the back. "So. You took an ill-advised shortcut."

"Yeah, I guess we are."

Considering they're from different worlds and only get to see each other when they're both in the Nexus, Peter hadn't really given it any thought before now. But the minute it's out of Steve's mouth he's nodding because it's true. He's sure of it.

Miles and he are a team. Two Spider-Men out there doing their best.

"W-wilderness survival?" Miles is going to groan for days straight about his bygone failure of a boyscout outing. Peter just nods quietly. If it's what Steve wants, he knows he won't argue. All that acceptance and agreeable nature comes to a halt when Steve grabs the chair.

"Please don't--" He knows what you're doing. Oh my god stop. STOP. Peter's got both hands covering his eyes and when he peeks between his fingers to see Steve sitting there he groans softly. No. Nooooooo. Why is this happening?

"I'm begging you don't do this."

Steve was a city boy, too. He understands the visceral discomfort with camping. It's nothing he'd do for idle fun, anyway, as much as he does enjoy nature in small doses. He associates it with war, and covert missions. The boys are going to need to know some though, apparently, if they're going to be wandering in the Nexus.

Orienteering will be impossible to teach here, though. He'll have to consider how to approach that. Maybe a field trip to a neutral world...or is that overstepping?

Maybe he should think about this when the weather's tolerable once more, and let it go for now.

in the meantime, he pretends he doesn't hear Peter's protest--he does, but like a parent with a teenage kid, he has to enjoy his own ability to troll the child. It's not quite the same visual impact with his eyes bandaged and his clothes patched and worn, but Peter's groan of despair proves it's effective enough.

Steve bursts out laughing, probably the first good, deep laugh he's had since Christmas. "It's okay, I don't have a script prepared. That's all I got for you. Don't do that again, and we'll talk about better options later."

"Y...yessir."

Peter's not sure of what to make of the laugh, not at first. He's heard Mister Stark laugh before but it always seems to cut far too quickly back to a stern talking down to. The sarcastic yet stern dressing down doesn't come and eventually Peter has to let out the breath he's been holding.

"I'll...I'll be more careful."

Steve can't see Peter's face, but Peter can see at least part of his. There's no dressing-down forthcoming right now. Because Peter's not a soldier, and neither is Miles. They're not just kids, either. They're something in-between that Steve has no clear idea how to handle, but he'll be damned if he doesn't try muddling through it for their sake, because they need as many people in their corner as they can get.

And right now, they need rest. He reaches over, smooths Peter's hair again, and pulls the blanket in closer for him. "Get some rest," he orders. "I'm gonna keep an eye on Miles for a while, then go back to the shelter. If you need anything...I'll tell them to call me if you need anything they can't get you here."

"And as soon as it's safe, we'll move you both back to the clubhouse."

The Silence of the Storm

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