The kids are wrecked, try to go to him, but they're stopped. Bruce sets his jaw and ignores the broken voices that call his name, apologise, as they are dressed down, and put on temporary leave from the JL and all affiliated teams, per Bruce's discretion, and he will decide when they have proved themselves worthy of returning to hero work done properly.
Diana patches him up carefully, as Clark gives his kids the lecture of a lifetime, and when she's satisfied, clips the first aid kit closed again and takes his hand, dancing their fingers together, an offer Bruce follows like a command, getting to his feet and allowing her to guide her from the room, forcing himself not to turn back around and rush back to his kids, forcing himself not to gather all of them in his arms.
They don't want that.
Diana takes him all the way back to the medbay and he drops back into his seat at Steph's bedside, briefly casting a look towards Jon, towards Wally, all three of them unconscious, without vigil as their friends keep Bruce's kids trapped far away from the medbay, from the injuries they caused.
Diana wraps herself around his shoulders, and an alpha rumble reaches his ears, her best attempt to comfort him, and they stay that way until all the others come in, and fold around him too, dragging chairs close into a cluster of chaos Bruce holds close to his heart. Bruce forces Hal back onto a cot when he catches him wince, and the cluster moves to the other side of Steph's bed to stay together.
It's quiet, for the most part, breathing, and beeping, and the quiet hum of electricity Bruce curses his ability to hear, no matter how well he engineers the Watchtower.
Barry sometimes slips away to Wally's bed, Clark to Jon's, but Bruce doesn't move from Steph's side. He looks away, when Mera comes in to check on Arthur, and offers Bruce apologies, condolences, when Lois arrives in a flurry of refreshing, furious energy, and foists a hug on Bruce he sinks into willingly, until Clark tugs her away, and the two parents stand solemnly over their son's bed for some time.
Eventually, Hal reaches out to get Bruce's attention, and suggests they go to the nest. Bruce hesitates, he's still new to nesting, the euphoric, or relaxing effects it has on him leave him rattled by the unfamiliar biological reactions. They're patient with him, and Bruce dreads the day they get fed up with him, and decide to cut him loose. But it hasn't happened yet, and even if he risks drawing that day closer, he denies, whispering an apology that's dismissed. He has to stay with Steph. But maybe later?
"I don't get it, B."
His head snaps back around from looking at Hal, and Steph is watching him through slitted, watery eyes. She looks at him, pain and heartache and that familiar something Bruce never deciphered in her gaze, and he rises, stroking her cheek, grabbing her hand between both of his, pressing relieved kisses to it, relieved beyond words she's awake.
jonathan, drunk: don't... hey, hey, don't—don't tell steve that i'm in love with him
steve, very softly: ...you're in love with me?
jonathan: shit, no, not you, uh—
jonathan, turning to nancy: don't tell steve that i'm in love with him.
nancy, staring at steve who's looking at jonathan like he hung the goddamn stars: ...got it
à la mallrat, more gaang retail au shenanigans that bring me joy to think about <3
(this got kinda long so under a read more it goes!)
sokka's store has an on-going game on who can find the most ridiculous places that customers try to sneakily leave behind their jasmine dragon to-go cups. there's a point system and an online scoreboard for everyone that sokka regularly maintains
(katara is the reigning champ, despite the fact that she doesn't work there, bc she once found a cup behind the wall shelving and earned like 30 points for that find)
zuko has 100% been inside sokka's store before. sokka just doesn't remember bc he was in the middle of dressing their kids mannequins and he refuses to look any customer in the eye as he breaks their plastic legs to force the pants on them
hakoda and bato don't visit sokka at work, but they do visit katara bc she works at a sports store down the road and they want to use her discount lol
ty lee was iroh's first employee at the tea shop! she had to quit when she got a dancing job, but she was well loved. as part of zuko's onboarding process, he was forced to learn the names and hobbies of all the elderly regulars so they could accept him (and they did! zuko's biggest support system is a batch of grandmas now)
no one cares abt meeting the store card goals in the slightest. sokka tries to do competitions to convince them to try, and one day made the mistake of saying he'd venmo anyone who got a store card during their shift (and then 3hrs swiftly put an end to that challenge bc he refused to go any higher than $70 lol)
despite sokka's anger at him that day, chit sang was universally well-liked by everyone but zhao. sokka had a tiny crush on him when he first started (that never really went away, even if he learned chit sang is kind of an asshole lmao)
sokka has actually attended one of the plays that zuko worked on! but he chickened out on telling him bc he's not sure if it crossed a line in their whole thing or not
(zuko knows he was there. he also hasn't said anything bc he's not sure if calling sokka out on it crosses a line in their whole thing lol)
zuko and sokka's 'whole thing' is literally that they spent so much time doing their whole passive aggressive flirting (bc it's fun) that they have no idea when to ask the other out now. so instead of facing the mortifying ordeal of being known, they just flirt a lot and make everyone around them suffer !
toph has 100% asked zuko what he thinks kissing sokka would be like. zuko legitimately walked out of the store and left her to close that night (his daydreams are haunted with the thought tho)
zuko once slipped up in calling sokka 'pretty boy' as an intended insult to sokka's 'sunshine' but it backfired horribly on him bc that's the moment when sokka realized zuko is not immune to his sweet lil smiles
sokka does not have zuko's number (yet), but, technically, zuko does have sokka's number bc he's written it on his receipt and left it behind lol
(sokka draws a sun next to his name on receipts now bc he found out that zuko like suns and gold things)
zuko's least favorite color is blue. the day sokka found this out he refused to let zuko serve him for three full days until he could list 5 blue things that zuko liked
(sokka's eyes weren't mentioned, but zuko stared at them long enough before answering that sokka knows regardless)
