Archive of Our Own

The first time he saw the kid, he was huddled against a building, ass on the cold pavement, ratty brown jacket barely hugging his shoulders. A tip cup clutched in slightly trembling hands, head bowed, and shivering against the harsh February wind.

Marc himself is hunched inside a heavy coat against the snow and biting chill, limping along the sidewalk across the street from where the kid is sat, biting back a curse every other step he takes.

“Marc, that’s a kid.”

Marc huffs against the cold, squints his eyes against the bright white light of the cloud covered sky, and keeps walking. “Yeah, Steven,” he mutters, shouldering past a couple, “that’s generally how humans work.”

“But he’s alone,” Steven prods, and Marc grits his teeth.

“And I’m heading home,” he says, voice strained as he puts a little too much weight on his leg. “What’s your point.”

“A kid shouldn’t be alone on the streets like that. It’s so fucking cold, too–”

“What would you have me do about it,” Marc snaps, biting back a curse at the throb of pain shooting through his wrist as he clutches the coat tighter around his shoulders. He hadn’t bothered to actually put it on and isn’t going to now; it smells terrible.

(It isn’t even his, he found it in the dumpster he woke up next to. He’s pissed off and cold and in pain and really just wants to get to the shitty apartment he’s staying in where there’s even a modicum of warmth, privacy and safety.)

But Steven won’t shut up about the kid.

“I really, really didn’t expect to have to explain to you that–” Marc stops to pant harshly, his pace faltering, “the world is a shit place,” he finishes, blinking a few times to set his suddenly wavering vision straight.

Steven is silent for a bit, before “Marc, you’ve gotta slow down, you’re going to pass out at this rate.”

Marc doesn’t stop for another few steps, before his leg gives an exceptionally strong pang of pain and he has to bite his tongue in order to not cry out from it. The air is cold and painful in his lungs, and he manages to make it a few steps into an alley and to a wall before sinking down onto the ground.

Steven hums in contentment, and Marc squeezes his eyes closed, thumping his head back against the dirty brick at his back.

He sits there until he’s so cold he can’t feel his ass, until Khonshu’s judging presence beside him, suddenly, for whatever reason, becomes too much, until Steven gets restless again, telling him that now he’s apparently been sitting for too long. When he gets back up again, he doesn’t have more energy, but his leg hurts marginally less, and he does know he’ll make it home, at least.

When he looks over his shoulder, Steven a buzzing presence too close to the front for comfort, the kid is gone.

“We’re not here to adopt random homeless kids,” Marc says, warns, jokes, weakly, as he, half an hour later, finally closes their apartment door behind him and stumbles to the bed in the corner of the room, lowering himself down onto the mattress. His body, save the leg Khonshu probably helped with earlier, aches, and he really hopes the god fully heals him before he or Steven next wake up.

He half expects Steven to tell him that he’s gonna anyways, but there’s only warm, empty silence.

Marc passes out.

And–

Steven finds the kid.

It takes– a while. Almost a week, to be exact, of just wandering around in his off-time, looking twice at the face of every goddamn homeless person on New York’s streets.

To say Marc isn’t a fan of it would be a hilarious understatement, but Steven’s free time is Steven’s free time and he ignores him, resolutely wandering New York until he finally sees a familiar red beanie (and the person wearing it) on a park bench, lying on his side. He looks smaller than he remembers Marc seeing him, and seems to be sleeping. The same jacket is thrown over him, one of the sleeves clutched close to his chest like he fell asleep expecting someone to run up and steal it.

The park is small, semi connected to a cemetery a ways away, and Steven himself spotted the kid across a field expanse of roses– or what is probably roses in the summer, nothing more than unappealing branches and thorns in February– lined with dirt paths, smaller gravel ones criss crossing the garden, the field itself dotted with dormant fountains. The bench the kid is on is on the opposite side from Steven, and for a second he just stands there, staring, barely believing that he actually found him.

And then he manages to walk the meter between him and another bench, and sinks down onto it.

“There, you’ve found him,” Marc says after a few seconds during which Steven doesn’t do anything of note past staring at the passed out kid across the garden. “Are you happy now? We can go home?”

“Uh,” Steven eloquently tells him, before closing his mouth with a click. He doesn’t– he doesn’t want to go home, but the kid is sleeping, and it’s already rude to stare, forget waking up a random stranger just because he– what, what does he even want?

Marc sighs impatiently.

And then the kid opens his eyes, lifts his head, and stares directly at Steven.

“What the— fuck—” Steven says, and Marc heavily voices his agreement, and the kid is still staring at him, pushing himself up and swinging his legs off the bench so that he’s sitting, and his eyes are wide, thin, pale fingers clutching the seat beneath him through the jacket.

And Steven– well, Steven gets up, and takes one of the longer, winding paths across the garden, and the kid watches him walk closer the entire way.

“He’s gonna bolt,” Marc warns, and Steven keeps making his way over to the other side, gravel crunching under his shoes, turning to dry, dusty dirt as he steps back onto the main path running along the outside of the garden.

“Sorry,” is what Steven says the moment he thinks he’s within earshot, and he stops by the bench, a few feet away from the kid. “I don’t really, ah, have a good reason for why I was watching you,” he says, foot twisting in the dirt anxiously, “I’m not– a stalker, or anything,” he hastens.

“You kinda are, though,” Marc muses unhelpfully. The kid just blinks at him, body tense.

Steven resists the urge to roll his eyes. “I’m not going to, like, murder you or anything, is my point.”

“You could, though,” the kid tells him cryptically, voice small and young, and then he sighs, scooting over on the bench. Steven takes the hint and sits, keeping a good foot and a half of space between them. The kid’s words hang uncomfortably in the air, and Steven doesn’t know if the kid means that he himself is defenseless, or if, in the brief few minutes he’s observed Steven, he’s decided that Steven is capable of murder.

Which, well….

“You’re not, trust me,” Marc huffs.

The silence hangs, and Steven stares at the kid, trying to think of what would be socially acceptable to say in this situation. The kid just stares back at him, body the slightest bit tensed and tilted away. Marc’s warning of him bolting pulls at the back of his mind.

Then, abruptly– “What do you want,” he hears, and he jerks a little at the question, abrupt and direct and yet so very– resigned. “I’m eighteen, if that’s what you’re worried about,” the kid continues, shifting slightly, and his voice is quiet and subdued and hoarse, and Steven’s knee bounces.

And he– doubts that, but does so silently. He scoots further back on the bench, angling his body more towards the kid, propping an elbow on the bench armrest. It’s the type of bench with a pair of armrests in the middle, bisecting it, presumably to deter the homeless from sleeping on it.

The kid was thin enough to simply stick his legs between the armrest and the seat, cleanly bypassing the mechanism.

“That’s not,” Steven says, “That’s not why I came over here. Ah,” he licks his lips, unsure how to continue. The kid raises an eyebrow, expression very clearly reading then why the hell are you over here, and Steven clears his throat a bit. “Just,” he says. “To talk.”

The kid blinks at that. “To talk,” he echoes Steven, and one of his hands twitches, wrist flicking almost compulsively. “....about?”

Steven shrugs– he hadn’t thought his impulsive search for the kid through this far. He honestly had– quietly, internally– agreed with Marc when his alter had told him he’d never find the kid. Manhattan was big. New York, bigger. But he’d found him and he was here, now, so–

“Anything? I don’t know,” Steven blinks a little, “I like egyptology. Do you have any obscure interests?”

The kid is looking at him in a way that says he thinks Steven is a little bit insane, but “mythology’s cool,” he allows, shrugging, and Steven internally fist pumps.

The conversation he proceeds to have with the kid is one of the awkwardest and most stilted he’s ever had, in his entire life, he thinks, (and Marc attests), but the kid….

Actually listens, he thinks.

It’s less conversation, and more Steven timidly info dumping about Egyptian mythology– he chooses Ra’s creation of humanity, the concept of Nun and Ma’at, and a few of the early myths– but by the end of it, the kid isn’t tense as a bowstring anymore, and– he actually giggled at Steven’s explanation of why Khepri’s form of a scarab beetle was so symbolic of creation.

(It’s ‘cause they’re dung beetles, laying their eggs in balls of other animals' excretions, creating life from literal shit.)

It’s only when Steven’s phone buzzes with a text from Layla that he realizes it’s been nearly two hours– and he apologizes, and slides up off the bench, and the kid tells him goodbye, gaze lingering, body relaxed, corner of his mouth lifted.

Steven pretends not to hear when the kid calls after him to tell him he forgot his gloves on the bench.

“Why do you think—” Steven frowns, choosing words, “he didn’t, uh, bolt?” He settles on Marc’s earlier word choice as he muses quietly, skipping the bottommost step to the subway, “you were so sure he would.”

“Yeah, well, he should’ve. I don’t know what was up with him, maybe it was your endearing British self.”

“You don’t really think so, though,” Steven deduces, and leans against the subway wall, hands shoved deep in his pockets. He says, in the silence following the statement, “I liked him, personally. Good kid.” Then, “you don’t think so?”

“There’s something off about him. You–”

“Should be careful, yes, yes, I’ve heard it, I know.”

There’s a slightly amused silence, before “I was going to say you shouldn’t get attached.”

Steven blinks at that. “What? –Why?”

This silence is longer, and heavy with resignation. “We won’t be in New York for very long, Steven,” Marc sighs, and Steven purses his lips, shifting against the cold, dirty wall of the subway. He leans more of his weight against it.

“Doesn’t mean I can’t make a friend,” he eventually settles on saying.

Marc doesn’t say anything to that, and Steven pushes his way into the over crowded subway car, silently lamenting that he chose to go home exclusively during rush hour.

“See,” Steven leans forward on the bench a bit, “this was ma’at,” he continues, gesturing quietly with his hands, “it’s– basically, the cosmic order of the universe, this force that balances everything out the way it should be. That’s the, uh, conceptual bit, at least,” he shifts on the bench, sipping at his coffee. “Ma’at is also a goddess, however. She is the one who weighs the heart of each individual– either on judgment day, or at the time of each person’s death, it varies from source to source. She doesn’t necessarily enforce it, per se, but she is the personification of ma’at.”

The kid is clutching the coffee Steven brought him, having wolfed down the grilled cheese within the first two minutes of him accepting it. Steven himself is barely halfway through his own. The kid looks up at him, a little bit loose, light, relaxed, and Steven holds back a smile at that. “Is?” the kid asks, and then, “present tense,” he clarifies, and Steven tilts his head.

“Well– these concepts still prevail. I mean, it may have been ancient Egyptian, but it still exists as myths and a way of life today.”

The kid shakes his head. “No, I– I know, that’s not what I mean. I guess… I don’t know. It’s something about the way you say it all, like you actually believe it. Or– something. Sorry, I don’t know, I don’t mean to be rude.”

Steven– wants to giggle, a bit, internally. He, this, he.

(He wonders, sometimes, if Khonshu listens to his conversations with the kid.)

Instead of saying something that could be considered vaguely insane, he chews on his cheek, and– “You don’t think they’re real?” he asks, and the kid presses his lips together, leaning his back more securely against the back of the bench.

“Gods are,” the kid shifts again, tucking one of his legs under himself– he’s completely on the bench, other leg pulled up to his chest, arms circling around it, nursing his drink– “I don’t know. I mean, my parents were scientists, I don’t remember– at least, I don’t think they were very religious. Then when I moved in with my aunt and uncle, they kinda– taught me a little about most religions, let me sort of choose for myself. But I never really know,” he clears his throat, blinking a bit. “I mean, when there’s actual, real Norse Gods who can bend the laws of physics when they sneeze, who the hell knows what’s real.”

Steven nods. “Everything’s gotta be based off something,” he offers, and the kid nods enthusiastically– or at least as enthusiastic as Steven’s seen him yet.

“Funky shit happens,” the kid sighs, looking back down to his coffee, and Steven huffs a laugh, watching him, mind wandering over their exchange.

He decides not to ask what happened to the kid’s aunt and uncle. As the kid sits there, slowly sipping his– definitely cooled down by now– coffee and very obviously done talking for the moment, Steven allows the silence to linger, comfortable in the company. It’s a dreary day, and there’s barely anyone out, much less walking the park paths, so they’ve mostly been alone. That’s probably what’s contributed to the kid’s unusual talkativeness and, well— actually sharing something about himself, and Steven’s quite glad to sit in the wake of it and feel fondly the thin string of trust extended to him.

It’s a little while of silence, a little while of peace, and the kid finishes his coffee, and Steven’s own is long gone. Steven closes his eyes and is content, trembles with the light filtering through the dense cloud cover and the soft knocking of branches against each other in the breeze, clicking and clicking behind him. And then—

The kid jerks, and Steven opens his eyes to see him snap his head up, staring off into the distance, body taut, legs suddenly planted on the ground. Steven carefully sets the empty cup he’d been turning in his hands onto the bench next to his sandwich wrapper, watches the kid for a moment, ready to say something, but then–

“I–” says the kid, pulling his eyes to Steven with obvious effort, “uh, remembered– sorry,” he lifts off the bench, practically vibrating on his feet, “I just remembered I have– a thing, due for, work. I have to drop it off, before. Uh–”

“Oh,” Steven says, and he looks up at the kid, and has the hysteric urge to wave his hand in front of him, see the kid disappear like he wasn’t ever there. “You should probably do that, yeah,” he tells him, and the kid’s wrist flicks, and he nods.

“Yeah– sorry, for.” He waves a hand, hasty and quivering, one foot inching backwards, in the direction he’d been staring.

Steven nods, and smiles, and watches the kid turn and walk, then jog, then drop any pretenses and sprint down the path, taking some other way out of the park, probably, that Steven doesn’t know about.

Or he’s just going to jump over the fence.

Steven hopes not.

And then— distantly, if he squints his ears in the direction that the kid had gone, (“you know you can’t actually do that, right?”) Steven thinks he might hear sirens in the distance, faint and muted, but maybe definitely there. Ringing and ringing and ringing, and he wonders what’s happening.

He hopes the kid gets whatever it is done on time.

(He tells the part of his gut that tells him the kid wasn’t completely truthful to shut up.

It’s not his business, he decides, and he closes his eyes again, sitting and listening to the birds, the traffic, the sirens, the wind.)

The kid likes science, —chemistry, physics, math, Steven learns. He’s working towards a GED, and works on and off as a photographer for the Daily Bugle with a camera they provide him with. When Steven hears the last bit, he frowns involuntarily, and Peter grimaces a bit, agreeing that he isn’t exactly a fan of the news outlet's stance on Spider-Man either.

They spend a bit of time talking about the controversial Mysterio issue, then, but the kid quickly withdraws, wrist flicking again, and Steven drops the subject.

(Controversial subjects can be a sore spot for some, he doesn’t judge. Besides, talking about— that, had, for whatever reason, made him itchy, itchy, itchy all over, deep in his brain and his gut. It made him think something was wrong, so very wrong, and—

He drops the subject.)

The kid likes all the food Steven brings him, so Steven is never really able to gauge a preference off him. He figures, if he were as malnourished as the kid is, he wouldn’t have much in the form of preferences either. Still, he tries to keep up a variety. Always brings some for himself, as well, even he isn’t really hungry– if he’s gauged anything off the kid, it’s that he’s quite strongly opposed to charity (the gloves might have already been pushing it, the kid tried very, very, very hard to return them to Steven the next time they saw each other; Steven had done the smart thing and had worn a different pair of gloves that day, somewhat quelling the kid’s distress) so if he is gonna bring the kid food, and have the kid actually eat said food, he’s gonna have to do so himself as well.

Past that, Steven never actually learns much about the kid. He only shares when Steven asks, and even then he’s often met with subtle deflection or a changed topic. He does add to the conversation— allowing Steven to feel even remotely comfortable calling it a conversation— and sometimes, if it’s quiet around, and it’s a good day, and the stars, somewhere, align— he can even be labeled as talkative.

But those times are rare, and usually it’s Steven keeping up a soft monologue on whatever topic they slip into— usually Egypt— and the kid sitting beside him, watching the people that pass them by, or staring into the middle distance, occasionally interjecting with a comment or joke.

Steven doesn’t mind it. What the kid doesn’t say, he makes up for in how goddamn attentive he is to every word Steven speaks. That isn’t to say he doesn’t zone out sometimes– lose a few minutes, drift away.

There are good days, and there are bad days.

But, past that, all the– nervous glances and flinching, hyper awareness and occasional non-verbalness, compulsive finger flexing and wrist flicking, Steven– Steven finds he’s intensely grateful for the company anyhow. Besides, he can relate, immensely, and it’s– well. He just really hopes he can be at least some sort of brighter spot in the kid’s life.

(He never really figures out why he put so much effort into seeking out this kid. It’s– something itchy and weird in the back of his mind, so he ignores it. Marc says– once, jokes, when Steven’s at a bakery counter trying to decide what to bring the kid one day– that Steven’s using the kid as a replacement for the street actor he’d talked to in London.)

(Steven– doesn’t know. He doesn’t think he is.)

(It’s something itchy, deep in the bottom of his gut.)

“Oh, fuck– oh. It’s you?”

Marc stumbles back from the person he’d unintentionally staggered into and is met with—

It’s Steven’s fucking kid.

It’s dark out, it’s late— almost midnight, he thinks, maybe, and it's a real dark street, so he can’t really make out much of the kid, but it’s— definitely him. The same quiet, strained, hoarse voice, same small, protective hunch of his shoulders, same thin, skittering movements.

(Same tiny, tiny itch in Marc’s brain when he looks at him.)

Shit.

“It’s you,” the kid breathes again, more to himself than to Marc, he thinks, and he suppresses a frown at the strand of relief he hears laced through the words.

Marc grunts in response, moving back a bit to give them both space. It’s really quite fucked up how much they both keep running into this one kid, he decides, and allows the kid a friendly (he hopes) nod, preparing to step around him and continue his way down the street to the coffee place he’s taken a liking to.

The kid isn’t his. He’s Steven’s. Marc has a coffee to get to, and a Khonshu to convince to fuck off for a night.

But then the kid angles his body enough that the light from one of the nearby street lamps floods his face, and–

“Wait– holy shit, what the fuck?”

The kid’s face is– well, it kinda looks like a modern art painting, he thinks distantly. Deep purple bruises line the left half of his face, scratches littering the skin, the kind that you get from getting your face shoved into pavement, Marc would know. There– was, at least, blood running from his nose, but it’s dried and smeared now, and—

What the fuck. (Who would do that to a kid—?)

Marc is suddenly very, very glad Steven isn’t here right now.

This is– decidedly worse than the Gus situation. Even though Marc had nothing to do with it this time.

And– Marc had spoken without thinking, and realizes only belatedly that oh, yeah, he sounds nothing like Steven, which is who the kid is used to, and the kid jerks back from his words, loud and rough and abrupt as they were. Marc bites the inside of his lip, watching for further reaction and confusion, but the kid just looks at him, panting a little, from where he’d stepped back to, and Marc isn’t met with questions or a weird look, just wide eyes and a trembling figure.

And– he’s shivering, Marc realizes, not trembling, and violently, too.

“You–” Marc tries, and then very resolutely curses the entire situation. He’s not– good with children. Or… people in general. He’s not like Steven, or—

He just isn’t.

So— “What the hell happened,” he asks, and then– “shit, no, sorry– you don’t have to answer that. uh–” Khonshu, behind him, snorts “–are you alright?”

And– that’s a really stupid question as well.

The kid blinks at him, opens his mouth, closes it again. Says, “yeah, I’m– I’m fine.”

And– yeah. Okay. A really stupid question.

Marc resists the urge to grip his head.

“Do you…” he eventually forces out, “need help?”

“I can take care of myself,” the kid defends, and– well, obviously, Marc thinks, doesn’t say. You’re still alive, after all.

“Sure,” he agrees, tries for lightly. “I’m not saying you can’t. I am, however, saying I’ve got bruise cream and Tylenol. And a shower, if you wanna get the blood off. Do you,” he rephrases, “want help?” He represses the urge to press his lips together tightly, instead keeping himself relaxed and– he hopes– welcoming.

This is so goddamn hard.

Marc, Khonshu chooses that exact moment to get bored, what the hell are you doing?

Marc does the probably-not-smart-but-definitely-petty thing, and ignores him. “I’m offering, that’s all,” he tells the kid, who’s still looking at him with thin lips and shaking hands. His eyes keep flicking to behind and above Marc, and Marc quells the urge to turn around and follow the kid’s gaze to behind and above him.

All he’ll see is Khonshu, in all his impatient and disapproving glory. He knows Khonshu’s goddamn there. He’s ignoring him right now.

The kid doesn’t, though. Marc writes his weird glances off as nervousness. He shifts a bit in the cold, and the kid snaps his eyes back down to Marc.

“Oh–” the kid looks taken aback for a second, like he’s just registered Marc’s words, but then straightens slightly, drawing out a slow breath, from the pain, Marc assumes. “No, that’s– that’s alright, I,” the kid blinks a bit, shifting his weight and visibly holding back a wince, “I heal fast. I’ll be fine.”

Marc decides not to think too hard about why the kid seems to be so intimately familiar with how fast his body heals, he’s depressed enough as it is, thanks. Instead he shifts into an even more non-threatening stance, ignoring Khonshu’s agitation at the movement, and sighs. “I’m not going to turn you in to CPS or anything, if that’s what you’re worried about. I really won’t,” he promises, and– to his surprise, the kid nods.

“I know,” he says. “I just– I don’t—”

“Kid,” Marc cuts him off. “Just let me help you. Please.”

Marc– Khonshu warns.

Marc glances down, then, involuntarily, at the kid’s familiarly gloved hands, and the kid follows his gaze, shoulders tensing a bit, and Marc curses the action, because he knows this kid won’t want charity or pity, and that’s not, goddamnit, what Marc is offering, but–

The kid’s face crumples, then, only for a moment, but Marc sees it, and– “Please,” he says again, hoping the word manages to slip through the kid’s obvious protective walls. “We can at least both warm up then, yeah? It’s fucking freezing.”

Spector! This is not what we came out here to do. Stop this, Khonshu protests, and Marc resists the urge to roll his eyes.

The kid looks behind Marc again, breath hitching for a second, before— “Okay,” he says, and for a moment it’s so quiet that Marc thinks he might’ve imagined it, until “fine,” the kid says, louder. He looks away from Marc for a moment, down at the pavement this time, and Marc allows him a few seconds to do– whatever it is he’s doing, collect himself.

Khonshu stomps his foot.

We didn’t have anything that important to do tonight anyways, Marc thinks, knowing the god will hear him, we’re still just waiting on intel from Layla, just like we have been for the past few days. Besides, protecting the vulnerable, are we not?

He’s not vulnerable, Khonshu says, and Marc doesn’t know what the hell he means by that, because he’s– uh– a kid, but the god doesn’t argue any further, so Marc takes the win.

The kid follows him to his apartment silently, but he’s limping pretty bad, and Marc is internally extremely impressed by the lack of pained noises.

What the fuck, honestly.

When he opens the apartment door and walks in, the kid lingers in the hallway for a few seconds, uncertain, and Marc, already halfway across the room to turn up the heat, turns back to look at him.

The kid raises his eyes up to Marc’s face, biting his lip. “I can… its warm out here, too,” he says, one hand– the arm that isn’t clutched protectively against his chest– gesturing to the hallway he’s in, and Marc resists the very strong urge to throw his head back and groan.

“Sure,” he tells the kid. “But I’m inviting you inside, where it’s warmer. And there’s also no shower out there, or blanket, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but–”

“–you really don’t have to–”

“–I want to, though,” Marc says, and god, this kid is stubborn. “Look,” he sighs, turning back around and crossing the room, fiddling with the heating. “I’m not gonna make you come in, obviously you don’t have to, but that door’s staying open.”

There’s a few moments of silence, long enough that he begins to think that the kid will actually stay out in the hallway, before he hears the door close, and turns around to find the kid standing awkwardly inside his apartment.

He didn’t hear any footsteps.

That’s– kinda weird, Marc’s usually hyper aware about things like that, but he shrugs it off. The kid’s probably light as fuck, malnourished as he looks.

“Uh–” Marc says, moving towards the small closet in which he left the duffel with their clothes, not having really bothered to unpack it. He’d half expected Steven to do so, but the latter had been too interested in exploring New York while they were there, (and then had gotten obsessed with a random homeless kid that was now in their apartment, why the hell), and the duffel had stayed in the closet.

“Here,” he continues, finally finding the one t-shirt Layla had left behind once. It’s the only thing he has that would probably fit the kid, its got some StarWars reference on it. She wasn’t too attached to it, he thinks. He fishes out a clean pair of socks as well. “I don’t think I have anything else that would fit you, but here, these are clean,” he offers, stretching the clothing out to the kid who is– still by the door, subtly using the frame to support his weight. He points to the door to the bathroom next to the closet, “that’s the bathroom. And shower. If you want.”

It takes a minute, but the kid eventually peels himself off the door frame and limps over to silently take the clothes, looking to the bathroom door Marc had pointed out.

Marc rises to his feet. “You don’t have to,” he says again. “But there’s a clean towel in there, and soap. The water isn’t too bad, too.”

The kid blinks at him, before nodding, still silent, and moving to the bathroom.

The door clicks shut, a moment later, so does the lock, and only then does Marc allow himself to slump onto the ground.

He wants to scream. What the fuck is he doing. This is not—

He runs a hand through his hair, giving in to the urge to tug on it sharply, once. He cracks his neck uncomfortably, and sits for a moment.

Behind him, he hears the shower start, and the curtain to it move. Pity session over, he drags himself back up to his feet and across the room to where the rest of their belongings are kept, trying to remember which bag the medical shit is in. It’s not the black one, he knows that.

He sighs, and starts going through them.

The kid takes goddamn military showers.

The shower doesn’t run for more than three minutes, maybe less, before Marc hears it turn off, hears the curtain again. At least he’s had time to find the medical kit, and by the time the door quietly opens, Marc has found the bruise cream, setting the little canister of it onto the ground by the kit, turning to look at his impromptu guest.

When the kid comes out, he looks… worse.

Sure, he’s miles cleaner, but now that his face isn’t streaked with dirt, Marc can clearly see the dozen or so scratches littering the bruised side of his face, and the bruises look more colorful, too. The dark circles under his eyes are more prominent and there's another bruise on the other side of his face that Marc hadn’t previously noticed, and he ignores how its in the defined shape of a boot print.

What the fuck.

At least the blood from under his nose is gone. His hair is damp, having obviously been toweled off, and part of it flops sadly over his face, adding to the pitiful kicked-puppy look.

Layla’s shirt is short sleeved and exposes the kid’s arms– thin and bony, every muscle horribly outlined, and they’ve got bruises all over as well– as well as scars that Marc averts his eyes from. The kid is clutching his shirt– two, actually, one short sleeved and one long sleeved, Marc hadn’t realized he’d been doubling up (and he’d still been so small)– and jacket, and Marc gets up from where he’d finally found and opened up the medical kit (he rarely actually uses it on himself, sue him for not knowing where it was) to grab them. “I can wash these, if you want,” he offers, jerking his head to the washing machine that was visible through the bathroom door.

The kid gives them up without complaint. Marc thinks maybe he’s given up on protesting.

He isn’t sure if that’s a good thing or not.

He starts the wash, and when he comes out, the kid is on the ground by the med kit, having grabbed a roll of gauze and tape. He looks up with wide eyes, mouth open around an obvious apology, but Marc cuts him off.

“You’re fine,” he tells him. “Take what you need. It’s all easy to replace.”

The kid watches him for a moment, before nodding and picking up the bruise cream as well.

It’s Marc’s turn to stand uncertainly in front of the door to the bathroom. He doesn’t really know what to do with himself now, and he kinda hates it.

He goes to get the kid a blanket, and when the kid gratefully wraps himself in it, still looking pale and cold, Marc goes to make hot chocolate.

Steven likes the stuff, so he knows they’ve got some, and after opening a few cabinets, he finds the box of packets, and gets to work, allowing the methodical process to take his mind off the beaten up kid patching himself up behind him.

It doesn’t really work.

It’s after a really, really long silence between them that the kid finally speaks again– the first he’s said since he’d protested coming into the apartment.

Marc had made two mugs of hot chocolate, even though he himself doesn’t really drink the stuff, and has been sitting with the kid who had used the bandages for– something, while Marc had been making the drink, and was now using the cream on his– everything.

The kid hadn’t touched the drink yet, but had offered a thank you in sign, apparently not up to talking, and had pulled the mug closer to himself along the floor.

It’s been quiet, a weird– nice? sort of quiet, that Marc hasn’t really minded. The kid is a bit more relaxed, too, blanket loose over his shoulders as he finishes with the last of his (visible) bruises.

(Marc is under no illusions that there aren’t more under the shirt. He’s been– trying not to think about it. What the fuck.)

The kid sets the bruise cream carefully down on the floor next to the still open kit, cap screwed back on, and Marc’s attention raises from his drink to the kid, who’s now– staring at him. Or– it’s more relaxed now, not intense like it’s always been before. He’s more– considering Marc, maybe. Observing, instead of trying to frantically drill through his soul and pick him apart like some puzzle.

Marc bites his cheek sharply, takes a breath. Says, “how’re you feeling, kid?”

He gets blinked at again, not something he didn’t expect, honestly. Then the kid shrugs, glancing down and around, before his gaze lands on the hot chocolate he hasn’t yet touched, and he picks it up, hands regripping it as if it’s still hot for him to touch. He goes to take a sip, but aborts before the liquid reaches his lips. Marc feels the urge to tell him it’s cooled down by now– it’s warm, sure, but it’s fine to drink– but doesn’t.

The kid bites his lip, subconsciously, Marc thinks, and he resists the urge to mirror him. He seems to be considering something, cautiously glancing up at Marc every now and then— subtly, if Marc wasn’t looking right at him he probably wouldn’t have noticed, which is impressive— and lightly tapping, tapping, tapping his fingers on the mug he’s still clutching.

Marc gets slightly lost in the silence, the repetitive motions of the kid's fingers, so when the kid looks up at him— actually looks up, not just a glance— he’s slow to notice, and—

“My name is Peter,” the kid– Peter, shit– says, then, suddenly, voice low and slightly desperate, and the way he looks at Marc– searching and scared– makes him wonder just how many people actually know this kid’s name.

Steven doesn’t.

Steven never asked.

Marc wonders if it’ll be a breach of the kid’s trust to tell him.

Marc nods, meeting the kid– Peter’s slightly distressed gaze. He debates for a moment, before– “Marc,” he says, lightly jerking a thumb to himself. “With a C,” he feels the absurd urge to clarify, and Peter looks at him for a few moments, biting his lip again, before he blinks, and nods back, and pulls the blanket tighter around himself.

“Who do I talk to on the bench?” Peter asks, then, and Marc blinks in surprise at him, and the kid huffs a bit. “I mean, sorry, I just. You’re obviously not him,” he says, voice tentative and pausing, and Marc swallows.

“Uh,” he says, eloquently. “That’s Steven.” Then— “with a V,” he tacks on, because— fuck, this is weird.

“Oh.” Peter’s mouth lifts a little at the corner, and he shifts under the blanket a bit, reaches for the mug to— finally— take a tentative sip. “Okay,” he says, after recovering from the– apparently– still too hot liquid.

Marc’s had cooled down enough to be drinkable minutes ago.

He writes the over sensitivity to temperature off as lingering effects of the near hypothermia the kid had probably experienced.

Has probably been experiencing.

Marc distracts himself from the thoughts by downing the rest of his drink, getting up to put the empty mug in the sink. He turns around to face Peter, teeth pressing together softly, letting a quiet breath out through his nose. And then he makes the executive decision that he’s had quite enough of the day, yeah, even though he only fronted— what— two or three hours ago.

So, “I’m,” he says, glancing back at the door, making sure it’s locked, (it is, although he doesn’t remember locking it, maybe the kid did) “uh,” he gestures helpfully at the bed in the corner, on the opposite side of the room from Peter, hidden from Marc’s view by the half wall that separates the kitchen from the other room, “gonna go pass out. You can—“

He’s cut off by the kid jerking a little, like he’s come back to himself from wherever he’d gone, and then moving, rising to his feet with a badly held back wince, the hand not still holding his mug trembling slightly. And—

Oh.

That makes sense, kinda, actually. Whoops.

Peter thinks Marc’s kicking him out now, which— well. A normal person probably would, probably wouldn’t go to sleep in their shitty one room apartment with a random homeless kid they picked up an hour ago also there. But, well.

“No–” he interrupts the kid’s apologies, holding out a hand, “kid, it’s fine. Uh– Peter, sorry.” He chews his lip, tilting his head a bit. “Just, like, don’t rob the place, yeah?”

Peter’s foot twists down into the floor anxiously, and Marc sighs softly. “At least finish your drink here. You don’t have to stay the night,” he– pleads, if he’s being honest, but—

It’s silent for moments, stretching out and out, before Peter finally nods, breathes out a quiet, defeated, “yeah, okay,” and slowly, hesitantly, sinks back down to the floor into the puddle of blanket he’d left behind.

Marc reaches behind himself blindly, flicking off the kitchen light, and decides that– yeah, with all due respect, fuck you, Khonshu– he’s going to get some actual sleep tonight, instead of indulging in the god’s two hour mockery of rest that leaves Steven feeling like he got hit by a truck.

At least Khonshu makes it so that when Marc is actually hit by a truck, his alter doesn’t feel it later.

Small mercies, he guesses. Bitterly.

He crosses the room over to his bed, pulls one of the blankets off and tosses it to Peter, who is– surprise– still watching him, sipping at his drink. A pillow follows the blanket, and then another– Marc doesn’t like pillows, he always shoves his head off them halfway through the night anyways– and the kid blinks at him, before tentatively taking one and dragging it closer to himself, propping it against the wall and leaning back against it.

Marc stands there a moment, shrugs to himself a little bit, and— deciding he doesn’t have the energy to go through the ordeal of changing right now— flops onto the bed, rolling the last blanket over him, mumbling a— hopefully decipherable— “you can keep the light on” before shoving his face into the mattress.

And– to his utter fucking bewilderment, somehow– he falls asleep easier than he has (at least he thinks) in goddamn years, out like a light. It would be a colossal understatement to say Marc had– expected to not do that, had expected to lie awake for hours telling Khonshu to fuck off, especially with a literal stranger in his apartment, and, of course, the goddamn itchiness Peter causes, for some reason, burning all over.

And yet—

Marc wakes up alone, the next morning, Peter’s blanket neatly folded, Layla’s shirt the same way on top of it, everything exactly in the same place it had been before Peter had even stepped into the apartment.

Even the mugs in the sink have been washed and set onto the counter to dry.

Marc distantly wonders how the hell Peter managed to do that without waking him up.

And then— shit, he realizes— he really should’ve given the kid something to eat.

The morning comes and goes and Steven doesn’t front, so around the time Steven usually does, Marc finds himself stopping by a Subway joint, ordering two sandwiches, and heading to the park.

When he gets to the bench Steven and the kid frequent, Peter isn’t there.

Marc loiters around for an hour, the sandwiches cold and untouched next to him, until Layla texts, and then Khonshu’s all excited, and Marc– finally– has other things on his mind, can ignore the swirling thoughts, realizations like the fact that the only thing the kid took with him when he left were the socks, and that he never gave his own to Marc to wash.

Hours later, Marc comes home, tired and ready to pass out, and puts both sandwiches in the fridge, appetite nonexistent.

“Oh, thank god,” Steven says, five days later, when he finally comes by the park bench to find it actually occupied by the kid.

Marc had said Peter— cause that’s the kid’s name, Peter, (and god that's itchy,) Steven had never asked cause— well— it wasn’t really too imperative to their friendship, he’d felt— hadn’t been there on Tuesday, and Steven had gone to check every day following that.

He’d found an empty bench every single time.

Until today.

“I was beginning to worry Marc had scared you off,” he jokes, tries, at least, sitting down beside Peter. Peter uncurls a bit from the little ball he’d been in to look up at Steven, eyes tired. He keeps his knees up against his chest.

“Hey,” Peter says after a small beat of silence, and Steven smiles at him, reaching into his pocket to pull out a sandwich and a pastry, offering them both to Peter, before pulling a clear pastry wrapper out of his other pocket.

“I ate mine on the way here,” he offers. “Got hungry.”

Peter eyes the wrapper for a second, before snaking a trembling hand out from behind his knees to pull the food under the bisecting armrest and onto his side of the bench. “Thanks,” he mutters, quiet, before unwrapping the sandwich and taking a bite. He looks up at Steven hesitantly, and Steven– only then, because it’s faint, barely there– notices something.

He leans forward and squints at Peter’s face, then, and Peter turns it away hastily, but not fast enough for Steven to not see what was most definitely a fading bruise. He bites the inside of his cheek nervously. “Are you alright,” he asks, and Peter closes his eyes briefly. “That was definitely a bruise at some point,” Steven clarifies, though he doubts it’s needed.

Peter finishes chewing– deciding to take his time all of a sudden, Steven observes– before nodding. “It wasn’t too bad,” he says. He looks up at Steven, then, gaze searching for– something, before he shrugs, looking back to his sandwich, smiles tightly. “Someone opened a door in my face, I’m fine now.”

Steven really– he really hopes the part of his gut that tells him that’s a lie is wrong.

“Well, I’m glad you’re okay now,” he decides to say, and something in Peter’s shoulders relaxes, snapping in both relief and despair, maybe, and— he tells his brain to shut up and stop over analyzing every goddamn detail.

Peter raises his head to look across the expanse of dead grass and dormant rose bushes, chewing quietly, eyes someplace else, but he’s relaxed somewhat in Steven’s company, Steven can tell, and so he lets the kid be, leaning back against the bench and letting his own gaze wander, slowly follow that of Peter’s, across the garden and all the way to a leaning, gnarled tree on the other side, where—

Steven tenses automatically when his eyes reach the tree, locking onto the figure leaning lazily against it, radiating dickish judgment and unhappiness as Khonshu is wont to do, at least whenever Steven sees him.

And also— that’s just it. Steven… doesn’t really see Khonshu, not all that often at least. Not after they, he— well, mainly Marc, but Steven feels he said his part as well— and Khonshu had rehashed their agreement, reworked their lives after the Ammit job. Khonshu is Marc’s problem, and Marc Khonshu’s; Steven had been dormant when Marc had pledged himself to Khonshu and therefore could decide to simply not listen to the god when he didn’t want to.

He’d told Khonshu as much, too. Khonshu hadn't liked that concept very much, but Steven had stuck with it, desperate, hysterical determination allowing him to stick it out through the god’s many, many temper tantrums, and eventually Khonshu had accepted that Steven simply wasn’t available for use. He’d show up now and then, but only when they really needed Steven for something, and even then, it was usually Marc asking for him.

So why the everliving fuck is Khonshu here now?

Abruptly, Steven becomes aware of the kid— Peter— staring at him, leaned back and lightly tensed, gripping his sandwich tightly, and Steven rips his eyes away from the god, bringing them to meet Peter’s. The kid, hyper alert as he is, probably noticed Steven tense (hopefully he didn’t outright recoil when he saw Khonshu— he’s grown used to the god’s random, if rare, appearances, it’s just that this one was supremely unexpected) and therefore is now back to his cautious, huddled self, where before he was at least marginally relaxed.

Steven carefully blows out a breath. Great.

He’ll yell at Khonshu later, he decides. Right now, he forces the god to the back of his mind and a smile that he hopes is, however forced, still far enough from grimace territory to actually count as a smile onto his face, and sighs quietly, forcing himself to relax again. “It’s nothing,” he tells the kid, “I’m fine. I just…” and he trails off, because—

He doesn’t want to lie to the kid. He really, really, really doesn’t want to lie to Peter. Since discovering the system, and Khonshu, and everything that comes with, he hasn’t lied to anyone about any of it, but that—

That’s because he hasn’t had anyone to lie to. Layla knows everything anyways, and Gus The Fourth is a fish. And now….

“You just?” Peter prompts, and Steven blinks– if Peter’s prompting him to continue, tense as he is, it means Steven has been silent for quite a bit, and– that can’t be comforting for the kid.

Damn it.

Steven tilts his head a bit. “I thought I saw something,” he finishes, “it’s really nothing though, it’s fine.” He attempts to shrug it off. Apparently some of his signals get through to Peter, and the kid nods after a weighted moment, offering his own strained, grimacing smile. To Steven’s surprise, Peter opens his mouth, not for more of the almost-gone-by-now sandwich, but to say something, and then, of course—

Everything seems to happen all at once, but– there is most certainly an order to things, an order Steven sees, feels, knows, somehow, deep down where it's so itchy, and it goes as follows:

1. Peter’s eyes widen, wide, wide, so wide, body tensing beyond belief.

2. A car honks from the street just outside the park, just behind them, accompanied by angry shouting, and then a scream, and more honking, honking, honking.

3. The birds in the area go silent, somehow, as one, for a heartbeat, then two, and then erupt from the trees, flying, shrieking, screaming into the sky.

4. Peter, eyes still wide, opens his mouth again to shout something, entire body coiling tight like it’s about to spring—

5. Khonshu disappears from his peripheral across the garden.

6. Khonshu appears right behind their fucking bench.

7—

The world goes to shit.

Steven yells, leaping desperately off the bench, forward and to the side, and has just the presence of mind to cover his head with violently shaking hands as the world goes careening. The ground shakes, the air screams, or maybe that’s the people on the street behind them, or maybe that’s him, or maybe that’s Marc, surfacing in panicked distress, and Steven doesn’t know what’s happening, he doesn’t, doesn’t, and he lurches onto his hands and knees, panting and shaking and—

He flips himself around, desperately searching for Peter, because oh god, the kid, the kid, the kid, and it’s then that—

Peter is—

—Steven—

–—

He—!

Is on his side on the (burnt, it smells burnt, it feels burnt, oh god why is it burnt) grass, and he desperately throws his head up, darts his gaze around, a frantic, strangled yell tearing up from his throat. And—

The— everything around him is burning, smoke rising up and up, and he can hear sirens but— he thinks— they’re far away—

A body crashes into him, then, and he yells again, and rolls over with the momentum, scrambling onto his knees and—

Oh.

“Steven!” Marc yells, but Steven doesn’t even blink at his alter’s obvious panic. Instead he stares, jaw stuttering, at the little— and it is little, which feels wrong, but it is, it’s small— body on the ground, the body that had crashed into him just now, stumbling to his feet, bent over, one hand clutching at his side.

And well—well— everything is on fire and literally crashing down around them, and it is New York, so really maybe he shouldn’t be that surprised, but this is, it’s still, still— something.

(Itchy, the back of his mind supplies hysterically. He ignores it—)

It’s Spider-Man, on his feet now, still hunched to the side like he’s in pain, and— he is, Steven realizes, he must be, cause— well— he’s covered in burns, and so is—

So is Steven, on the back of his legs, on his right arm, his shoulder, and it hurts, fuck, shit, and he itches to summon his suit, take the pain away, but also— he— shouldn’t, doesn’t really want to, and—

“Marc,” Spider-Man gasps out then, ripping Steven from his thoughts, and he shoves the cold, burning pain down, down, down as Spider-Man takes a step— more of a lurch, really— towards him, and, “Marc.” His voice is tight, words forced out under gasping breaths. “Are you alright? We had a plan, I thought—”

Steven doesn’t really hear the rest of the sentence, though, because oh, oh, oh.

Okay.

It’s his favorite part, now, see.

He— Steven slumps a little, mostly in annoyance. “Yeah,” he says, interrupting the vigilante, and Spider-Man’s eyes widen a little, no doubt noticing the accent, “sorry. Um. No Marc right now,”

“Steven,” Marc growls, and Steven tamps down on the urge to snap at Marc to just take the goddamn body then, it’s not like he fucking meant to front in the middle of—of— whatever hell this is, and he pushes his teeth together, blinking a little.

Continues: “so if you two were having a little, eh, romp through the garden,” he looks around uneasily again, finally realizing that, shit, they’re in a completely different part of the park, and holy fuck he hopes Peter got out and away alright, “it’s— he’s not here right now, so.” He wrings his hands a bit. “Sorry.”

Spider-Man blinks at him, once, before taking a limping step closer. “Ste— you, uh, um. Fuck,” Spider-Man says, emphatic, and Steven resists the urge to gape a bit, before—

Steven! Khonshu decides to— fucking— jumpscare him, he swears, and Steven is going to, he’s going to, right fucking now, drop onto his ass and scream—

“Give the body back to goddamn Marc,” Steven hisses at the god instead, hand coming up to grip the side of his head, “I know, it’s always give the body back to Marc, give the body back to Marc—”

“Woah, hey, hey—” he feels hands hovering over his shoulders, light and uncertain, and he appreciates the absence of touch. He opens his eyes at the familiar voice, a voice he knows and somehow automatically trusts, even laced through with pain and tension as it is, and sees Spider-Man in front of him, crouching, eyes widened. And oh, he’s on his knees, Steven’s on his knees, he— isn’t sure when that happened, but. “Steven,” Spider-Man says, and the back of Steven’s brain itches, “you don’t have to get Marc if you can’t, you can just— you should, actually, go, please, get out of here. I can—” Spider-Man pauses to shoot a web at— something, behind Steven, he decidedly doesn’t look, “—deal with this. It’s alright. Can you get to your feet?”

It takes Steven, who is using a monumental portion of both his brain and effort to ignore, ignore, ignore Khonshu, (and hysterically, desperately wish for a now for some reason silent Marc to resurface), a definitive moment to realize that Spider-Man asked him a question, and to nod shakily in answer.

Once he does— “Okay,” Spider-Man tells him, hands, some-fucking-how firm and steady the entire time, lowering from the space above Steven’s shoulders. The vigilante glances behind him, and Steven follows his gaze, regretting it immensely when he’s met with Khonshu glowering at him from beside a burning tree. “Do that, then,” Spider-Man says, and Steven’s gaze jerks back to him. “You,” he raises a hand to point, and the visible burns on the raised arm and the suit make Steven’s itching gut churn, “you can go through the gate back there, the path from it should take you to the edge of the park. The ambulances should be here in a few minutes if you need them, wait outside. Just don’t say—”

Steven never got to find out what Spider-Man didn’t want him say, as it was then that, from somewhere behind him, there came a screaming crack, like a thousand gunshots at once, holy shit his eardrums could not have possibly survived that, and then Spider-Man is leaping at him, forcing him onto his back and to the ground, and the earth is shaking, he feels it, sees it, hears it, and then Spider-Man’s gone, suddenly, and he—

“Steven!” Marc practically screams, the same panic and heart stopping fear that’s got Steven paralyzed on his ass laced tightly through his alter’s voice, and Marc is there, Marc is there—

“Go, go, go,” Steven gasps out, rolling desperately to the side on the grass to avoid a pole violently slamming down where he’d been seconds ago, and—

—it’s—

he—

——

—!

Gasps in a rasping, screaming, tearing breath, followed by another and another, hands scrabbling against the ground under him, head hitting the rough wall behind him, and he—

Is Steven, he thinks blearily for an agonized second, blinking around, searching the area before him desperately.

And things are— no longer burning, he registers dully. Relieved, he lets out another breath, still shaking. The world is no longer burning, but he can see smoke rising over the tops of the trees a ways away, and everything very definitely smells like smoke– or, no, that’s, that’s just him– and— he’s in a different part of the park, again.

And— oh, fucking hell—

His chest is tight, and he leans forward over his knees, squeezing his eyes shut, hard, hand coming up to grasp at his chest. His breaths are ragged, and getting harsher and harsher, and he desperately tries to focus on them, tries to count and control, breathe in, deep, breathe out, all the way, all the way. His other hand finds its way to the wood chips on the ground under him, cause he’s— kind of in the middle of a garden— and squeezes, and that hurts, so he squeezes harder, pressing his lips together tightly against the pain, and—

He sits there.

After a little bit— at least he thinks, it could also be a lotta bit, he wouldn’t know— he comes back to himself enough to realize, with a dull gratefulness, that the burns he’d had on his arm, his legs, his shoulders, are gone, healed like they weren’t ever there.

His skin itches at the realization, and he rolls his shoulders, once, twice, feeling tight.

Moments pass, a squirrel skitters by, stuttering and uncertain, oblivious to Steven’s— and the world’s, just, y’know, in general— falling apart, and when it’s gone, up a tree and away, Steven sighs a little, and forces his eyes up, up, scanning the paths and trees around him, anguished.

He comes up empty– not that– well. He honestly doesn’t know what he’d been expecting, but Khonshu isn’t there, and Steven feels something sharp and tight curl in his stomach at the realization. After seconds, minutes, an hour, Steven breathes in—

And forces himself to get up, to move on tired, trembling legs, out of the park, down streets, into the subway.

He collapses onto a seat, longing for the bed in the corner of their apartment, and lowers, slowly, carefully, his head into his hands, quietly begging for Marc.

Steven fronts in the middle of a street.

It’s sudden, and disorienting, and he doesn’t know what triggered it. He stumbles a few steps before realizing that the body had been walking, and manages to get ahold of his legs and continue doing so, crossing the street to stop at the side of a building, red and brick and rough, and he puts a hand against the cold stone, blinking around.

It’s bright out. The sun isn’t out, because it apparently never is, but the white wintery light is still harsh and everywhere. His jacket– he looks down and oh, it’s Marc’s, actually– flaps suddenly in the wind, passersby pulling their hoods and coats tight against the stiff breeze, and he decides this is a good place to pause for a moment, so he pauses, and blinks, and breathes.

He isn’t in any pain, is the first thing he becomes aware of when he takes stock of the situation, which is good. The second thing he becomes aware of is that he doesn’t know where he is. At least the latter isn’t exactly new, they can’t always control their fronts.

The third thing he becomes aware of is blaring sirens, so loud and getting louder, and he whips his head up in time to see four NYPD cars go nearly careening around the corner, speeding down the street Steven’s on the side of, closely followed by an ambulance.

His teeth grit together at the noise, and oh, no– he isn’t free of pain, actually, there’s a growing headache he hadn’t noticed.

The noise didn’t help it, and he brings his fingers up to massage his head a bit, and then pushes it back from the forefront of his mind. Headaches aren’t new to him, it’s fine. It’s fine.

And then there’s a scream from behind him, high pitched and sharp, and his breath picks up, because no, he doesn’t want to do this again—

He whips his head around to see a girl, young and wide eyed and open mouthed, frantically slapping the arm of the girl next to her. She’s pointing up and up at the top of a building across the street from them and Steven, and he follows her gaze, squinting against the painfully bright sky, and—

Oh.

Steven blinks a bit, and yeah, it’s– definitely Spider-Man, running across the roof and leaping off it to follow the slightly faded sounds of the sirens blaring somewhere further down the street.

The people around him on the street stop to stare and point, a few of them looking mildly curious and excited to see the vigilante; more than a few glaring and muttering curses, throwing scornful looks and angry shouts. Steven breathes out harshly through his mouth, watching the recipient of it all swing down the street and around a corner out of view. And then he stands there some more, letting the wind buffet him, looking into the middle distance. Stares, stares, stares, remembering steady, hovering hands, burnt arms, gentle words.

He’s— it’s just, he thinks, that why, and how, and— this is the second time he’s seen Spider-Man in as many days (probably). And Steven wasn’t really– he wasn’t really expecting to see him in their short visit to New York, or seeking him out, honestly he hadn’t even thought about the vigilante all that much, but—

He blinks after him, and wonders if Marc has seen him. Before, that is. Before the incident in the park. Perhaps he has, the vigilante is said to be more active at night. And some (some) aspects of their jobs kinda sorta overlap. He wonders if it’s a coincidence that Marc had been so near Spider-Man just now, before Steven fronted. And—

It’s just weird, is what his convoluted thoughts are heading to, he thinks. Seeing Spider-Man just now. Seeing Spider-Man in the park. Everything that happened in that park, really, but mainly Spider-Man.

Weird and itchy.

After moments, he manages to tear his eyes away from the long empty street, turning his head back to face forward, ready to take on the task of figuring out where the hell he is; he pats his pocket, and oh, good, at least Marc had grabbed their phone.

And then he makes the mistake of raising his eyes to seek out a street sign, because instead of a street sign he finds, in all his godly glory— “Oh my fu–” he jerks back– only a little this time, he’s proud of himself– hand coming up to press against his chest. “God,” he says, breathing through his mouth, and then glares all the way up, up, up at Khonshu, standing in the middle of the sidewalk not a meter from Steven. “Not you,” he tells him, and “I thought we talked about this. Don’t– do that. Oh my god,” he mutters, fingers fluttering back down from where they’d been pressing against his suddenly pounding heart.

Through all that, Khonshu doesn’t look at him. He’s staring after the sirens, down the street in the direction Spider-Man had just taken, and Steven wonders again, distantly, despairing and annoyed, why the hell he fronted here.

And his head still hurts.

Steven sighs, and takes his hand off the wall, balling the cold fingers into a fist and shoving it into the jacket pocket. When Khonshu still does nothing to acknowledge him, Steven rolls his eyes, ignoring the further spike of pain in his head that causes, and forces himself to walk, past the god and further down the street, his back to the still audible sirens. He– thinks this is the right way to the nearest subway entrance. He’ll figure it out from there.

“I don’t know why I’m here,” he tells the god as he walks past him, throwing the words over his shoulder, “if you and Marc were doing something then I’m sorry, but he’s not home right now. And I’m not in the mood to continue whatever it was you had him doing, so don’t even try.”

He comes to a stop at the end of the sidewalk, standing a bit away from the few people also waiting to cross the street. He thinks the NYPD has reached whatever crisis it had been running to, ‘cause he can still hear the sirens the same as a minute ago.

After a moment, and against his better judgement (he likes to ignore Khonshu when he can, not that the god really spends much time with Steven as it is) he throws a look over his shoulder to see that the god hasn’t followed, but his head is turned to the side now, allowing Steven to see one blank, empty, ancient eye socket. He swallows, and waits.

Of course, it’s only when the stop light turns red and the pedestrian crossing sign blinks to life that Khonshu moves, forging after Steven and across the street, and Steven sighs a little, pressing his lips together, before moving to follow. Khonshu stops on the other side of the street, watching Steven walk up to and past him, and Khonshu says—

Peter.

And Steven grits his teeth again, lifting up a tired eyebrow, and doesn’t stop walking. He feels Khonshu follow him, though, and resists the urge to sigh again.

Khonshu is obviously waiting, and after a few more silent, petty steps, Steven breaks, and indulges the god: “What about him?”

And then Khonshu decides to be silent for a full minute, and then two, and then three, and Steven picks up his pace against the wind and the cold, half listening to the sirens fading with every block he passes. The air is cold in his throat, and he rolls his tongue in his mouth, but he thinks he’s beginning to get somewhat of a semblance on where the hell he is, and then—

Khonshu stops moving after Steven– he feels it– and Steven clenches his fist in his pocket, annoyed. He listens as he walks, and then, finally—

There’s, Khonshu speaks, and Steven’s spine tingles, Heka, threading his ka.

Steven blinks. Stops walking. Blinks again. “Magic? You mean he’s magic?” He asks, finally giving the god his full attention, turning to look at him. He doesn’t like looking at Khonshu, it makes his neck ache, but—

No, Khonshu says, scoffs, grip flexing on his staff. It isn’t his, and shouldn’t be there. It is a parasite, a leech.

Steven is, honestly— and privately, he hopes— surprised there’s no “much like you” tacked on. (Marc has had— many, conversations with the god concerning Steven, and what Steven is and isn’t. It’s been— it’s a process.)

He frowns, and then frowns harder. “But then what—?” He looks back up at Khonshu, who isn’t looking at him, but rather up and behind, skull turned to face the sounds of the sirens off in the distance.

It’s a few minutes before Khonshu speaks, long enough that Steven almost gives up waiting, hands scratching at the inside of his pockets, tongue still rolling in his mouth. Long enough for him to get goddamn cold, and god, he really just wants to go home.

Then, suddenly— Sometimes the cure is a taste of the disease, Khonshu positively spits, and looks back to Steven. Steven blinks. The domain of Nut is tampered with, and it will be fixed— mercilessly and inevitably, by any means necessary. Such is Ma’at. Humanity has never, and even more so in recent centuries, taken a liking to this.

Steven shifts uncomfortably in the street, fingers anxiously twisting a loose string from the fabric of his pocket. He blinks, annoyance quickly and efficiently dissipated by the topic of conversation, and tries to hang on to every word.

(It isn’t often Khonshu speaks to him to simply share information like this— and when it’s information on anything Egyptian— well. It’s an actual, Egyptian god sharing with him the actual workings of the world. Steven can’t help but be absolutely hooked. Even if the god in question is often a massive dick.)

(Although this time, this time— he can’t help but admit that it’s also the itch. The itching, itching, itch he’s come to associate with nothing and no one but Peter.)

In the distance, the sirens blare on.

Humanity, however, Khonshu continues, and Steven swallows, fingers twisting and twisting, itches and itches to break. They harness forces– like the, what you would call, “magic” aspect of heka– that should not be harnessed, speak and do what should never be spoken and done, and all because, as they have learned in their years of insatiable search for meaning, for power, for life— the chance for a world of their creation exists.

Steven blinks, and his neck aches, and Khonshu continues: And so the world breaks, again and again, at their hands, at their fingertips, always their doing. They don’t learn to not do it.

Khonshu stops, then, and for long, silent moments, Steven’s jacket blows and blows in the wind. He stares up at the god, head lightly pulsing.

They learn to fear, however, Khonshu continues abruptly, and Steven almost jumps, biting his tongue. The wrath. The powers greater than they. Nut and Atum and Ma’at. Heka. The universe. Humanity breaks, and Nut, Ma’at, the universe— fixes, and this—

He fixes Steven in place, then, staring and staring and staring, and Steven doesn’t shift, Steven waits, blinks, waits, waits—

This is the worst punishment, the fatal, apocalyptic hell— and whether through knowledge passed down, through subconscious terror, or through their own, seen eyes— they know of it, and thus every time they break, every time they mangle and tear, and they do, always— they will not rest until they fix it themselves. Because the alternative— the universe itself, ma’at and heka, the order that should be, they can never let happen, for anything that is out of their control, above their decisions, simply cannot be allowed to occur.

Steven’s breath stutters, and he breathes in through his nose, long and cold.

And their fixes— Khonshu continues, impossibly cruel and spartan in the face of the insurmountable, tyrranical terror and desperation gripping their minds— do prevail, if sometimes barely. They stave off Ma’at, the raging forces screaming for balance. Barbaric. They “work”, Khonshu scoffs, the sound screeching and rough against Steven’s ears in its ferocity, the sheer distaste dripping and dripping.

Steven wonders, then, as he feels the bitterness and pain in the god’s words– if this is why the rest of the Ennead left. Abandoned humanity, as Khonshu says. The endless cycle of humans breaking the natural order of things in order to feel any semblance of control over the world around them, bringing down the might of the world and universe, the gods, ma’at and heka, onto themselves. Learning to fear the natural balance that will always be, and going to extreme, barbaric lengths to stave it off.

His stomach swirls, and something in him itches.

The child you have befriended, Khonshu continues, breaking Steven out of his thoughts, and pauses. His gaze is still fixed on Steven, and he feels the stare lessen, the wind around them dying down to the natural late February breeze. Peter. Khonshu shifts slightly. He is a product of one of these fixes. Unfortunate as it may be, he, and the magic leeching through his ka, are holding sheer chaos at bay— chaos in the form of both the broken, unbalanced world, and the power and rage of Ma’at. The god pauses. Then, his suffering would never have been had ma’at been allowed to run its course, and yet he is necessary and— crucial, in the quelling of mankind’s terror. He is broken, and he is the cure.

Steven breathes out, suddenly hollow and shaking, mind running circles around what Khonshu just said, explained, told him. “A taste of the disease,” he finishes, breathless from the realization, and the god nods, once.

Such a crude thing; only possible through human fear of what should be. Of what is right. Of what their very essence can never allow.

Steven sways with the words— sways with the breeze, and looks up at Khonshu. Stares and stares and stares.

“Is that why–” he starts, and then realizes he can’t, can’t explain the feeling, the itch, almost painful in its intensity, but Khonshu just looks at him, and nods.

You can feel it, he comments idly, and Steven’s stomach churns. It’s uncommon, but not impossible. Perhaps it is your connection to me. Perhaps it is your disorder. I doubt that, though. Most likely it is a type of intuition, gifted to some at random. Whatever it may be, your subconscious recognizes the break in the world and the precarious, fragile pin holding it together, and it itches, from the fear, from the wrongness, from the inexorable pull of the heka. Perhaps…

Steven swallows. “Perhaps it’s why I found him? Why I– looked for him, and… I,” Steven grasps around for words, “felt drawn to him?”

Khonshu stands for long moments, silent. Perhaps, he allows, and then, probably.

“What–” Steven gasps out, burning, “what happened?”

Khonshu just looks at him, head tilted. The world broke, he says, like it’s that simple, and Steven falls, realizing he won’t get an actual answer. Maybe Khonshu doesn't actually know. Humanity tried to grasp control, once again, and failed. Fear and desperation caused them to turn to heka, and create the Wrong that we have now.

The god’s voice is– mournful, Steven thinks, and he once again wonders what it’s like, to watch things like this happen without pause, over and over, rinse repeat. “Do you think he knows,” Steven asks, begs, and the words are quiet and gone.

Khonshu is silent, and Steven closes his eyes. In the darkness, Khonshu says, it doesn’t matter. It will never matter. He pauses, and Steven blinks down at the pavement. He is what holds Ma’at at bay, and if one day he, the fix, fails, the universe will run its course. But for now…

He suffers, Steven thinks, says. It’s quiet, and quiet, and quiet, and then Khonshu moves, forward and past him. Steven lets him, doesn’t follow, doesn’t call after. He stands, and sways, and feels empty and sick. His breath trembles, hands stuttering, and he sinks to his knees right there, in the middle of the sidewalk. He blinks and blinks and blinks and swallows, and all he can see is the thin, young, hollow, dirty face, the staring, blinking, deep and utterly ageless eyes, the twitching wrist and trembling, trembling hands.

The cure, the cure, the cure, and the disease.

He stays there for a long while.

Four days later— three of which Steven came back to the bench to find it occupied with hungry, trembling teenager, (necessary, crucial, cure)— Marc fronts. It’s nothing unusual, nothing setting it apart from the ordinary way of things, or all the other times he’d fronted in those few days, except for the fact that— well, when Steven fronts again after, it is three days later, and they are in a cabin in the Netherlands in the middle of nowhere, very, very, very far from New York.

Marc apologizes, quiet and tired. Steven, at first, doesn’t care for it. He nearly goes to the airport and books a flight to New York right then and there, but common sense (and Marc’s increasingly panicked pleas to not do that, please) pull him back before he’s even out of the house.

It’s regret, regret, frustration, sitting loud and angry and sour and twisting, twisting, twisting his stomach.

When Steven can breathe, when Steven can listen and hear more than his own regret and pain and anger and anguished breaths— Marc explains that, well, their business in New York had been finished, abruptly, and they had to flee. He explains that Steven didn’t front, was quiet and gone for the latter two of those three days. Explains that they’re laying low right now and for the foreseeable future, that they (Khonshu and Marc) managed to accomplish whatever it was they were doing, that they might at some point be joined by Layla.

That last part is the only part Steven takes well.

But he sits, and sits, and listens, and when Marc is done, he asks, quiet: “what about Peter?”

And Marc tells him this:

He found Peter.

Not on the bench— although that had been where Marc had been heading. No, he found Peter on the corner of a street, slumped and huddled against the wall outside of a bakery, tip cup in hand.

He’d sat next to him. He’d told him— Peter, that is— that they were leaving, and that Steven wouldn’t have time to say goodbye.

(Marc doesn’t tell Steven that Peter looked resigned at the news, gut-twistingly relieved and so desperately, painfully crumpled. Steven knows anyway.)

He tells him he gave him— well, knowing Peter, Steven can imagine it was more like forced it on him, but still— some cash, one of Marc’s hoodies, and a pair of good walking shoes, along with thick, warm socks. A cup of coffee, too, from that one doughnut shop Steven had taken a liking to, the one with the cups that say “we’re happy to serve you!” in thin happy yellow writing. The ones Peter always stares at in a way that makes Steven itch and wonder, hands trembling. They’re happy to serve him.

Steven asks, after a moment, small and quiet and child-like— (Is it okay? Will it— will it be okay? Will it be okay, will it be okay, let it be— please let it be—)

Marc is silent—

Marc tells him yes, yes, yes, Steven. Yes.

And Marc tells him, after Steven doesn’t break, doesn’t crack and crumble and cry, that he gave Peter their phone number, made the kid promise to text it once he got himself a phone, at least to tell them he’s alive.

(Steven doesn’t break, doesn’t crack or crumble or cry.)

Four months after Steven and Marc leave New York, after Steven wakes up in that cabin, after Steven rages and twists and seethes— Steven’s phone gets a text.

From: 212-555-0195 (Unknown Number)

Hi. Uh. It’s Peter, from New York. Peter Parker. Marc gave me your phone number for when I could get a phone, and I finally saved up enough for one, so. You don’t have to, uh. Do anything with this, but. Just letting you know I’m alive, I guess. Hope you are too, and that you’re doing alright. Both of you.

Steven blinks at the message, a smile working its way onto his face as he reads it twice more.

He hadn’t been sure Peter would actually follow through on texting him. Or how long it would take the kid to actually get a phone. But here he is, and Steven’s grinning ear to ear, staring at the message like it’s the best news he’s heard all year.

He reads the message again, once more, to make sure it’s real, and something– something catches his eye. Something his brain had been skipping over the last few times. He frowns. Squints down at the screen. Reads the message again.

Peter Parker. Peter Parker?

It’s just the kid’s full name, but– that’s– that’s what it is, he’s sure of it now. The kid had never told Steven his last name, not until now. He– technically he hadn’t even told Steven his first name, that had been Marc. But—

Peter Parker.

The name makes something itch in his head. Way, way in the back, down deep. Actually, it makes his whole body itch. With– something, goddamnit. He doesn’t know what it is. It’s still been happening— well, less so now that he’s left New York, and Peter, but now it’s back sitting in his gut and itching, itching, itching. Khonshu’s words ringing in his head, ringing and ringing and hollow and empty. Heavy. Heavy.

Peter Parker, Peter Parker.

(International News. Breaking. Up on every channel, printed in every newspaper, every magazine, littering every social media site in existence.)

(Spiderman’s real name is– his name is—)

Steven shrugs, and flips the phone shut, putting it back in his pocket. He’ll answer once he gets back home, he doesn’t trust the reception here. But—

(His real name is Peter Park—)

Steven decides to keep in touch with Peter Parker.

(The cure, the cure, the cure, and the disease.)