Bend Around the Wind by Scyllaya

Chapter 70: Thunderstruck or the Breakfast of Champions

Chapter Seventy

Thunderstruck or the Breakfast of Champions

Milky Way Galaxy

Sol System

Nine Realms / Planet Earth

'Hatchet, stop doing that, you're driving me crazy,' Stark said as he rubbed his temple. Hatchet looked up from where he was repeatedly kicking one of the bottom kitchen cabinets.

'What else am I supposed to do?' Hatchet asked.

'Kicking the furniture does not qualify as "doing something",' Stark told him. 'If you can't sit still, go somewhere else.'

'I'm not leaving,' Hatchet said as he crossed his arms over his chest. Stark sighed in annoyance.

If they had to go another hour like this Juyu was sure that the two of them would be the ones to attempt murdering one another.

Things between Loki and Thor had been peaceful as far as they could tell. JARVIS did not alert them to any damage or actual fighting. The few times Stark asked what was happening in his living room JARVIS just told them that they were talking. For some reason neither Stark nor Hatchet was reassured by that.

Bee was bored, anyone could tell, while Bruce and Drongo entertained themselves with a discussion Juyu wasn't able to follow after a couple of minutes. They tried to include Stark in their conversation, but he was too focused on whatever was happening in the other room to concentrate on anything else. Normally he was great at multi-tasking, so it just showed how worried he was.

'Can we watch a film?' Juyu asked. Stark's been insistent that they all enjoy Earth-entertainment, because "they needed to be educated". It was a fun way to learn about Earth, Juyu enjoyed watching films once she grasped why pretending to be someone else was fun for humans.

It was not hard to understand, she knew that mimicry and pretence were not easy skills, but she didn't get what the point was if everyone knew that the humans on screen were pretending. But some of them were so good at it, that she quickly took interest. It was a fun game to watch the humans act like others, and she learnt a lot about deception while trying to see when some of them made mistakes. When a cry was false or a laugh was empty, it was easy to see it. She was sure that that the next time she took another shape she would be lot better at "keeping character" as she heard humans call it. She even practiced her voice mimicry, copying one human after another. Really, it was fun.

Bee liked watching films too, of course she did not engage in them as much as Juyu, but she sometimes shifted shapes along with Juyu to show her some details she missed or just for no reason. She acted so carefree sometimes, so calm and attentive that Juyu just expected her to simply start talking too. It never happened, but she spoke without words now, she did not shy away from making faces, to chuckle, to snort. The moments when her eyes glazed over with anger or when she locked up and became unresponsive were few and far between and she always snapped out of it if someone called her name. Maybe this was the best she was going to get, but that would be enough for Juyu.

'Sure thing,' Stark shrugged. 'At least I'll stop wanting to crawl up the walls.'

Juyu doubted that he would be able to distract himself from what was going on in his living room with a film, but at least he was willing to do something rather that just to sit around and do nothing. That was something.

x-x-x

JARVIS' warning came a couple of hours later and a few seconds before they all heard the sound of glass shattering. Massive amount of glass from the sound of it.

Stark and Hatchet were on their feet first, unsurprisingly. Drongo and Bruce joined them on their way, coming out from the kitchen where they kept talking instead of watching a film with the rest of them. Bee followed them too, so Juyu stood up as well. She wasn't worried about Loki, not like that, he could take care of himself. It was just that "united front" Stark kept talking about.