ioduanlogs | Was that a shark on the conveyor belt?

Characters: Gene Khan, Miles Upshur, Aly Haskell, and y'all
Date: throughout June
Location: Aifaran and environs
Situation: Junebugs be buggin'.
Warnings/Rating: Prompt A: Depression/grief and unhealthy coping mechanisms

[A] | Gene | outside Aifaran | June 14 | closed to Pepper
Gene is just...gone.

With Tony's disappearance, Gene did what he does best, which was disappear, too, and hide himself. Being alone was safe, and he'd been alone for a while before he came here. Why not be alone again? He's used to it. It's fine.

(It's not fine.)

He has no control over anything, and he knows that. For someone who desperately needs to control some element of his life, especially about his family, this is something that hits too close to home and makes him spiral.

The only option is to run, and not think. Don't think. Don't ever think. Don't ever think again. Grief can only strike if you think, and if you don't think, there's no grief.

He doesn't want to be here anymore. He doesn't want to be in Aifaran. He doesn't want to be on Earth. He doesn't want to be anywhere.

Being in this little abandoned shack, shielded and invisible, is close enough to not-being.

[B] | Miles | throughout Aifaran | early June | open
Miles is walking down the street with his headphones in, and he's in a surprisingly good mood. He's got the scent of a story in his nose, and that's cheered him up immensely. Sure, he's gonna be making another enemy, but he's glad to have the kind of determination that only a new story can fix.

He's in such a good mood, in fact, that he starts to sing to himself as he walks, which eventually turns into dancing, which eventually ends in a park. Some bemused locals clap, and when the song's over and he realizes he has an audience, he laughs a little and bows. He's blushing a little, but you can't be embarrassed if you have no shame. Own it, Miles, own it.

[C] | Miles | Verdant Sentry HQ | early June | closed to Valdis
Time to get involved with the cops. Miles does not like cops, and the feeling is quite frankly mutual. It takes a little bit of doing, and a little bit of the Sentry jerking him around (assholes), before he finally gets to talk to Valdis.

"Hi," he says, waving at her. "You free a minute? You better be, after all the shit I just got."

[D] | Aly | outside Aifaran | early June | open
There's an odd creature outside the city. Well - odder than the creatures already here. It's not native, to be sure. An Earth-native might recognize it as a maned wolf, but...hello, there's something different about it. It's got two spiraling gazelle horns coming out of its head.

And it's stalking some completely oblivious bibiru.

[E] | Aly | throughout Aifaran | throughout June | open
Aly's learned her lesson about parkour for now, ever since dropping straight into the drink. Doesn't mean she doesn't go up on the rooftops every so often, especially at night. She likes to lie down and see the stars. They're strange here, but no stranger than they are Otherside, on the rare times she's been able to see them. The bubble they're in shines like the aurora borealis sometimes, and that makes her eyes water (she's not crying).

[F] | Aly | throughout Aifaran | throughout June | open
At other times, Aly's trying to be normal. She's trying to calm her anger down, and sometimes it even works. It's frowned upon to walk around obviously armed, but some days she takes her copper-headed mace with her, its iron core a deterrent to any faeries. You never could tell around here. She never, ever leaves her belt and its pouch behind, though. The antler knife inside it hurts a little to be near, and hurts worse for her to hold, but she won't risk being without it. It's death and blood, but it's necessary. And she works on sharpening it from time to time; not to harm anyone here, but for what she needs to do when she returns.

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"Don't," Pepper says, more fiercely than she intends. Tears are pricking at the corners of her eyes, and she bids them not to fall. Not yet. She shakes her head and breathes in slowly. "Don't do that to yourself, Gene. This isn't your fault, it isn't some punishment designed just for you, and it's not a punishment you deserve. It's just-- senseless."

That makes it no less cruel, she knows. The grief remains. As saddened as she is that Tony's gone home, it's Gene's despair that makes her heart tight.

She takes one of his hands between her own. "He's still alive, Gene, and he still loves you. So do I." It doesn't seem fair to remind him that Tony could return. That's hope he may not have the space for now. "You aren't alone anymore. You won't have to go through this alone."

"He doesn't deserve it," Gene says, not listening, "he'd just started to get settled in, his mechanic shop was starting, and me? What do I contribute? It should have been me."

He hangs his head. "How do we know it'll still..." How do we know it'll still be like it was? He can't even finish saying it out loud. Tony could have forgotten. They could all forget, when the Dreaming pushes them back, as it eventually will. And then...they won't love him. He'll be alone. And all these years here will have been for naught.

It's heartbreaking to hear Gene talk about himself like he's a waste of space. All the progress he's been making is eroding in the vacuum of Tony's absence. Pepper pushes down the part of her that wants to get angry; it won't help either of them turn this corner and get out of this shack. She's not even sure what it is, exactly, that she's angry about.

"We choose to," she replies simply. The fact is that they don't know for certain, but she's an advocate for what belief can do, especially here. "Because when you care about someone this much, when you're family, you just don't accept anything less. Your value isn't about what you being productive, Gene." Her gaze hardens slightly. "Now I want you to look me in the eye and tell me you believe I wouldn't waste my time and energy on someone who wasn't worth it, because if you can't believe you're important, at least tell me you believe that I believe it."

Gene sighs, because he knows that Pepper's not going to give up. He'd halfway hoped that she'd come to find him, deep down, although most of him wanted to just disappear, fade out of the world into the Dreaming or something beyond.

"You are," he says, raising his head, "the most stubborn person I've ever met. And considering that we both know Tony, that's saying something."

It's not a direct response to what she'd said, but at least it's progress, of a kind.

Well, it's better than another round of Gene blaming himself for something that's completely out of his control. A step in the right direction. The corners of her mouth curl up into a half-smile. If she wins battles before they get started, then there doesn't even have to be a fight.

"I hope you're not just noticing that now." Pepper squeezes his hand again. "Because otherwise your powers of observation may need some work." She takes a slow breath and weighs the wisdom of bringing up this invitation now versus later, when Gene may be more settled. "Will you come back to the city with me? Not to the Bridge - we've got a spare room in the townhouse and it's pretty quiet." Not middle-of-nowhere quiet, but definitely less busy than the Bridge. "You can take all the time you need, Gene; it just might be better to do it somewhere..." She glances around at the shack for a moment. "Not here. Not alone."

Gene sighs. "I don't know. I think I...being alone is safe. It means I don't keep waking up and hearing someone moving around, because then for a moment I might think he's back and--"

The false hope, every time he heard movement, would almost be too much to bear.

Before she could rebut anything, though, he took the chain with his rings off over his head and slid one off. "Take care of this for me," he said, passing it to her.

The pink one. The final ring that would give Gene godlike powers, and the one that he now refused to wear.

"Tony was holding on to it, and I didn't want to leave it, but I shouldn't have it. Not here." I'm not strong enough.

Pepper's eyes widen when Gene holds out the tenth ring, but the weight of what he's offering does not prevent her from taking it. If this is something he needs her to do, she'll do it. Carrying the ring for him is hardly a burden, except in that it was Tony's job. That is is Tony's job. She'll just return it when (if) he gets back.

"You've had it out here this whole time," she points out gently, but still closes her fingers around it to indicate she'll keep it. He is stronger than he thinks he is. Softly: "Do you think it'll get easier to wake up to other people the longer you wait, or harder? I don't think being out here in a hut that's falling apart is good for you, and I know the alternative isn't easy..." Patience. Not always her strong suit. Pepper would just really like to have him home. "Please just think about it?"

Good, she's taking it from him without a fight. Gene really hadn't wanted to press it on her, but he knew that just one slip from him could have been disastrous. It was going to be an uphill battle every day for the rest of his life back home. It didn't need to be that way here, too.

He'd wanted to try and bring Tony back, but what had stopped him from trying was running into the possibility that it might not work at all, and he'd be truly helpless, hopeless.

"I don't know," he says. "It feels safer to be alone." He knows that's a holdover from their time back on Earth, where he's the subject of an international manhunt. "It usually does."

Then he sighs. "I'll think about it. I don't want to be in the way." There's a long silence, and then: "I think I want everyone to just forget about me."

Was that a shark on the conveyor belt?

/sobs

SUFFER

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;-;

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