Who: @angstfactory ft;Mickey @rubyrobshaw @leonidxs @holyemu @nananathanb
Where: Speedsters Go Karts and Batting Cages during the Spring Carnival Hurricane.
What: Tension in a small concrete building.
The second those winds started, Mickey had scooped up his boys in both arms and started rushing. Almost no different than a number of other concerned parents also ushering their children to safety around the area. “You seen Maverick?” Questions were flung out to those he might have passed, “Neve?!” Before the man sought shelter at the small building where Ruby work, almost like he’d unintentionally come there to be sure that woman was okay, too. He didn’t like not knowing where his family was, but they are grown men, they’d be fine, he was sure. Though Neve… Well, for their children’s sake, Mickey would have preferred to have her there. Safe and sound. “Shh,” bouncing the twins in his arms as Chester and Callum fearfully sobbed in his arms about the rough weather, “it’s fine, we’re alright buds.”
"Holy. Crap." Looking over to look out the ticket window now closed tight and seeing nothing but horizontal rain was wild, the sight kicking a sort of charged energy up inside of her, even as the roof of the big concrete box that was the speedster's hut creaked over their heads. Somehow both so loud and awkardly quiet, the atmosphere in the space was weird. Didn't help the sound of the little ones crying. "We're really socked in."
This just kept getting worse. Not only was he trapped in a small hut with strangers, but kids were involved. Leo was definitely not a kid fan, but…admittedly they seemed pretty distressed, as did their father. So Leo sighed, running his hand through his hair and standing. ”You can have my seat if you want it.” It meant Leo would have to sit on the floor, but it was fine. He was an asshole sometimes, but he wasn’t so much of one that he would begrudge a father and his small children his chair.
at least nathan had the foresight to pack ponchos, or they’d be drenched. emily’s competitiveness had taken over during the scavenger hunt, so when the clouds rolled in, she decided winning mattered more than shelter until it didn’t. that was how she, ruby, and nathan ended up squeezed inside the speedster employee shack, ponchos dripping, surrounded by everyone else who’d had the same idea. emily scanned the cramped room and sighed. the crying kids weren’t helping the knot in her chest, and being stuck in here with the worse person in the world felt like a personal nightmare. at least ruby and nathan were with her. she pushed her hood back and checked her phone—no service. of course. emily looked at ruby. “rubes, is there a landline or a radio or something in here?”
"Yeah, thanks," Mickey immediately plopped himself down onto the seat that got offered up to him. The twins were almost two, they were growing heavier by the day, so he wasn't going to turn down something that'd make his life easier. Callum and Chester were balanced on one knee each, his arms looped about their waists to keep them propped up protectively. "It's alright, daddy's got ya," the male continued to try and shush the twins as much he could. "Damn, anybody got some toys on them or something?"
The trio had come prepared to weather the scattered showers that had been forecasted for the day of the scavenger hunt. Ruby gave them access to some of the locations on the list, and Emily’s competitiveness urged them on in spite of the worsening conditions. They had crossed off more than half of the items on the list by the time they burst into the employee hut seeking shelter, their plan to take a photo doing something from childhood abandoned. Nathan dropped his backpack by the door and pulled off his raincoat, collecting Ruby and Emily’s as well to hang them up to dry in the small adjoining room. “There’s an old radio in our locker,” Nathan offered in answer to Emily’s question. He didn’t even work here, but he and Ruby shared the storage space anyway. His eyes narrowed as he glanced over at Mickey, more bothered by the sight of him than he was about the crying twins. Nathan considered ignoring him, but… He sighed and fished out a handheld water ring toss toy from his backpack, their something that holds a memory. “Here,” he said, holding it out to him. It was old, but hopefully colorful enough to distract the kids for a little while.
“oh, excellent,” emily said, already turning toward the lockers. it wasn’t hard to find ruby and nathan’s—there were only three in the whole hut. she snagged the radio, flipped it on, and got a blast of static until she fiddled with the dial and landed on a weather emergency announcement. emily walked back into the main room and set it on a table. “well,” she said dryly, “at least we’ll be well informed.” then she headed back to nathan as he handed over the scavenger hunt toy. emily slipped her arm through his and murmured, “we will want that back, though. eventually. when we get out of here.”
Absolutely dry as a bone, Aspen had taken shelter under the window's overhang the moment she'd felt a rain drop, and then ducked inside the hut as the first real rain drops had started their descent to the ground, so besides the close quarters and Mickey's munchkins crying, it wasn't too bad. "Oh! I saw something, too!" Giving a little gasp as she turned to look at the counter below the window, 'Aha!'-ing as she picked up the little stuffed sheep she'd noticed there when she'd paid for her go-kart ticket. "Here's this, too. It looks like one of the sheep from those old mattress commercials, actually." Bringing it over to Mickey, she offered it to one the boys with a little "Baaa" noise. "I mean, if Emily can't be helpful, at least her boyfriend can." Blowing Nathan a little kiss, she returned a grin to Mickey, and a little pat to his shoulder. "You hanging in there?" Honestly, he looked kinda stressed.
Completely unbothered by the number of displeased looks in his direction -- please, as if he wasn't well used to the assholes in this town being assholes -- his attention was only on the twins for now. "The hell is this?" He took what was given by Nathan with a sour look, handing it back over to Emily, the one bitching about getting it back, "Take it back now, it's useless. I was talking about a-- there we go," Mickey's eyes alighted on the sudden stuffed sheep coming into play, which instantly caught the boys' attention, too. Their cries became little sniffles of distraction as they each began to grab the stuffed sheep in different areas. With a grin at Aspen, "Thanks." Watching the boys a moment, he nodded. "Yeah, I'm good, just Neve has their diaper bag so let's hope these guys don't need to shit any time soon.." Mickey noticed Aspen was basically dry. "How'd you manage to still look like you came off a cover, Reynolds?"
aspen blowing a kiss at nathan put emily on edge. it was stupid, it was petty, and it shouldn’t have mattered. this wasn’t high school. nathan barely noticed aspen existed. this wasn’t high school. emily took a slow breath anyway, but the sharp comment still slipped out. “yeah, because finding a radio is sooo unhelpful. god, aspen, i forgot how clever you were.” she gladly took the toy back from mickey. she hadn’t wanted to hand it over in the first place. “fine,” emily said curtly, “but don’t start complaining when the two of them start fighting over the single toy.” her eyes flicked over him, unimpressed. what kind of father didn’t have his kid’s stuff? oh. right. the kind who contributed dna and called it parenting. emily turned away from both of them. honestly, the hell with the pair. she grabbed the radio and headed into the back room with the lockers, immediately digging through storage for anything useful. blankets, towels, whatever could make this miserable shack even slightly more bearable.
"Because that attitude is going to help anything, Emily." Aspen tossed back in return, mocking the blond's tone. "Those kids would probably just destroy that thing anyway, and it's obviously so important to you obviously." Eyes had narrowed at how she'd spoke to Mickey, hackles raising a little in protectiveness of her friends. Had it been Hattie she'd have lashed out altogether. The urge to just reach out and give her a good hard shove was almost overwhelming, but Emily had fortunately moved off into the back room and out of arms reach. "God, she's such a bitch." Mumbling it to Mickey she shook her head, and moved back to the window for another look outside to nothing but driving rain. "Can't even see the track out here."
nathan knew where everything was in the shack, she didn't even have to point out where the stash of cheetos were kept, he'd grab them when he wanted to. which was really fine, just great, just awesome-tastic, because she couldn't exactly figure out what to say to chester and callum, or mickey, or anyone now that they were trapped and it was a hurricane and also aggie was pregnant, and teddy wasn't speaking, and there was probably a fourth thing she was forgetting. instead of trying to engage with aspen, she just shrugged it all off, looking at leo and shook her head, "what's the deal with airline food?"
Nathan tugged Emily to his side through their linked arms, angling his ear down so he could hear her murmured words over the storm raging outside. He nodded in response, because of course they would get the toy back—right away, apparently, as Mickey handed it back to Emily. He wanted to laugh. It was predictably dickish of him, but then Aspen came up with a little sheep toy, making some unnecessary comment about Emily, and a slight grimace overtook his features instead. Why did she have to do that? Ruin the nice thing she was doing by being like that? And why did Emily have to engage? Nathan would’ve let the whole thing go by without comment, because it wasn’t worth it, had Aspen not blown him a kiss. The, ”Ew,” slipped from his lips before he could think better of it, and Emily stalked off, taking Nathan along. He picked his backpack up as they passed by it and dropped it by his usual stop by the lockers in the back room. ”Hey,” he said, gently laying his hands on her shoulders to stop Emily’s frantic searching of the room. ”You okay?”
Aspen fully ignored the others as she returned her attention to the window, watching to see if any cows blew by like in The Wizard of Oz, rolling her eyes at Emily. "Not all airline food is bad." The reply to the question not directed at her came absently. "I've had some fire food on airplanes, the Korean flight I was on once was crazy good." Then again, she had been flying first class.
emily stopped searching the room the second nathan caught her, and she looked up at him with a furrowed brow like she’d been interrupted mid-mission. “i’m peachy keen,” she said flatly then, without making a sound, she mouthed i hate her and flicked her eyes toward aspen in the other room. she wasn’t stupid enough to say it out loud. not if she wanted the she-devil to stay on the other side of the wall. emily stepped into nathan’s space and wrapped her arms around his middle, pressing her forehead to his shoulder like she could hide there. her voice dropped to a whisper. “i wish we had gills so we could just… leave,” she murmured.
“That’s a great example for my children,” he huffed, pretending as if he cared at all, but clearly Aspen disliked Emily so the man naturally leaned in to support her by giving Emily a harder time. As if Mickey himself was any kind of lovely role model himself, Neve was likely besides herself knowing their babies were stuck with him of all people. “Maybe you should just go do whatever you were going to do before you make my boys cry louder, alright?” He shooed them both off as best he could, but this only caused the boys to cry harder. “See what you did?” he threw out at Nathan and Emily, scowling their way. “Some people have zero consideration — we’re in the middle of a storm here, with two small kids who are scared, and we’ve got these two hot heads over here just screwing around like it’s funny.” Yes, he complained even after they had already gone off in search of things to help their little group. “Hey, look-it guys,” His attention refocused back on his twins while the others chatted about airline food of all freaking things. Picking up the sheep, he danced it around in front of their faces and playfully attacked them with it like he did with their dinosaurs at home. ”Rawrrr, I’m gonna eat youuu,” He growled out in a higher voice until their tears stopped and they were into giggle fits instead. Mickey exhaled, the noise music to his ears — definitely preferable than those shrieking cries.
Aspen couldn't help but enjoy every moment of Mickey standing ten toes down in her corner, lips pursing to bite back a grin, and this seemed to be the tune of the night. Especially once she'd caught Ruby trying oh so hard not to look their way when she'd be over by Mickey. So, she staying by his side, and even gave him a little more affection than she might have otherwise. Resting her head on his shoulder, gently running her fingers soothingly through his hair, and so on and so forth. For every glance she caught in their direction, she'd lavish him. Eventually, with the twins sleeping, and the howling of the wind becoming background noise, Aspen had fallen asleep leaned up against his side.
