The Avengers: Texters, Assemble!

-Downed Server-

It was quiet.

Too quiet.

Awkwardly quiet.

Half of the Avengers couldn't even meet each other's eyes. Tony babbled as he yanked on wires inside of the electric panel, and Bruce just nodded numbly, refusing to meet Natasha's eyes. Steve was determinedly staring out the large glass window, stiffer than a statue, and Bucky had snuck away to be hiding from both Steve and Natasha. The Black Widow was the only one who didn't seem fazed by the recent topic of "shipping," since she was still chatting quite naturally with Clint.

Pietro was offering unhelpful suggestions over by Tony and Bruce, evidently too bored by Wanda and Vision peacefully reading books side by side on the couch to even be near them. At least those two seemed fine with their discussed ship. They had never explicitly confirmed that they were dating, but it was pretty clear that there was a lot of mutual liking between them.

Thor and Loki seemed to be the worst off. Thor was pacing back and forth, shooting looks at his brother every few seconds, but Loki seemed to be ignoring him completely. He was huddled up in one of the armchairs under a blanket, looking extremely annoyed and grumpy.

It was too quiet.

"Alright, WHAT'S GOING ON?" Sam Wilson kicked the door open, looking down at everyone from the balcony. His angry expression morphed into one of surprise and confusion, and he glanced around. "Why's everyone so quiet? Who broke what? Who are we blaming?"

"NOTHING'S WRONG," Thor thundered up at the Falcon, eyes wide.

"NOTHING'S BROKEN," Tony shrieked.

"Blame Loki," Clint and Pietro said at the same time, and proceeded to glare at each other.

"Loki didn't do it," Bruce piped up, albeit meekly. "It's a downed server, Sam, that's all."

"And before anyone asks, Wanda didn't do it, either." Vision's eyes were still fixed on his book, but a smile touched his lips when Wanda leaned over to rest her head on his shoulder.

Sam looked confused. "Well, why is everyone so quiet? And why can't Tony fix it?"

"I DON'T WORK WELL UNDER STRESS!" Tony yelled, and accidentally yanked a large handful of wires right out of the box.

"Why the hell are you stressed?" Sam's confused expression was still in place. "Why does everyone look stressed? Loki looks like he wants to kill everyone---"

"How very intuitive of you," the god snapped, lifting his blanket to cover everything below his eyes. It was amazing how he still managing to look pissed, even while wrapped in blankets like a burrito.

"Steve looks like he got turned to stone over there, and Thor is generating so much static on the rug with his pacing I can see it glowing from here."

At the mention of his name, Steve jerked back to reality, turning to face his friend. "Oh, Sam. I didn't see you come in."

Thor glanced down at the rug and looked suitably abashed. "APOLOGIES, RUG," he rumbled.

"Right before the server went down, Fury popped in to ask about some of the stuff coming into his spam box. Most of it was shipping stuff." Natasha looked pointedly around at Steve, Tony, and Loki. "As you can see, it came as quite the shock to everyone. And now the chatroom is down."

"Why don't you ask that kid for some help? Didn't he say he was into computers?" Sam directed his question at Tony.

"Nonono, he's more of a web design kind of guy. Besides, I don't need him, this is a simple problem." Tony ripped another wire out of the box.