We Broke Ham
Train whistle sound.
He muffled it by coughing, very loudly, and looking away, but Wade still gave him a raised eyebrow. $#!^. A train whistle? A full on awoooga? His comedic timing reflexes were too smooth and well-polished from years of use. It was just reflex, really, when seeing someone attractive. Of course, the only other person he’d ever done that in front of was Mary Crane, but it probably only happened now because of stress, and from being saved by Noir, and not because Noir was incredibly handsome to the average human.
“Hey, was that an--” Wade stopped, mouth half-open, when Peter gave him a look of sheer desperation. Peter’s cheeks were burning hot, and he thanked his lucky stars that Noir, with his colorblindness and all, probably wouldn’t be able to tell.
~Wooo, Mama! Didn’t he just carry you like a prince? Wonder what it’s like under the suit...~ said part of his mind, filing its nails and ogling the detective.
“Shut up,” he whispered.
“You alright, trotter?” Noir asked, and then Peter HAD to look up again.
Scars. The first things that stood out were the scars, patched around his face, lines of pale whitish-gray stark against the rest of the skin. His eyes were the color of iron shavings, dark and clear, and Peter got the feeling that they’d still be that silvery-darkness even if Noir were in total technicolor.
But the scars were just flecks on the skin, and the biggest shock of all was that Noir looked like an absolute sweetheart.
“Nothing!” Peter yelped. It was Noir’s mouth, really, the way it quirked at the middle, slightly confused. Noir looked younger than Peter had expected, with a slightly downturned nose and a burst of black-and-gray freckles. He looked like a cat, gray and curious, with black hair that grayed at the temples and seemed too fluffy to possibly fit in the mask.
Then Noir put on a pair of glasses. A round, completely adorable pair of glasses, which made his eyes look even wider. He blinked twice, as his eyes focused, and pushed them up his nose.
Aaaand Peter had been staring. For a while now. Whoopdeedoo, he was a creep.
Pete turned and walked to another side of the pod, acting natural (by whistling loudly and sweating, obviously) and quickly folding his arms over his chest in case a cartoon heart decided to pop out. He’d never realized how much he would hate those until he was in the presence of someone who was just objectively attractive, definitely not subjectively sexy in a strange, gumshoe, saved-me-from-a-mob-enforcer, secretly-a-softie way.
“Was that a train whistle?”
Peter jumped, and found Wade standing right next to him, whispering. D@#$. For a guy with such a loudmouth, he was really good at sneaking. Probably had something to do with the whole mercenary thing. Peter wiped sweat from his forehead and tugged at his collar.
“Nooo, I, uh, dropped some web fluid. That was a slider whistle sound.” Peter said, leaning back against the wall. Good excuse. Now, if he could just sink into the floor and vanish forever, his plan would be complete.
“Sure, okay, Mr. Awooga Man,” Wade said, eating another burrito, which seemed to have been drawn from the ether. “I always have that reaction when looking at people like him, y’know, with the younger monochrome lost-a-fight-with-a-broken-bottle Jeff Goldblum look.”
“It’s got character!” Peter said, then shrank back. Oops.
“Oh, character! Of course. Yeah. Sounds legitimate.”
“I am going to stuff you into a tiny bag and throw you out of the airlock,” Peter said. “Looney Tunes physics allows this. Don’t test me.”
The machine hummed, as though in agreement, as it started to move.
“Alright alright, we have liftoff,” PB said, clapping slowly. Noir looked around with wide eyes.
“This thing’s off the highballs,” Noir said, poking a wall. He prodded it again, and when the machine began to move, he looked frightened.
“Okay, no need to threaten. I get it. He’s just cute to you.” Wade said. Peter looked to him, expecting a smirk, but he didn’t seem as though he were joking at all.
And then he’d slammed into the other wall as the pod moved forward.
“Huh?” Peter hadn’t moved yet, but still made the mistake of looking toward the far wall.
Oops.
Rule One of Looney Physics: If you don’t want to fall, don’t look down OR toward whichever direction you’re falling.
Peter closed his eyes and coughed as he hit the wall, bruises crying in outrage. His chest was going to be twenty shades of purple tonight. He laid on his side, and opened his eyes to find Noir looking absolutely terrified next to him.
“Faster than railroad hoppers,” Noir said, knuckles white. He tried to push himself up once or twice, then gave in, sinking into the wall.
“Nothing to fear but fear--” the MurderCoffin jostled. Noir looked ill.
“It’s going to be just--”
The pod spun, and Noir cried out as PB pinched the bridge of his nose and Wade let out a genuinely excited “Woohoo!”
“Hey, Noir!” Peter called.
Noir looked to him, surprised. Peter cleared his throat.
“What do you call--” the pod screeched metal-on-multiverse and took a nosedive. Peter hit the ceiling and ignored the pain as PB’s foot hit his leg.
“What do you call a pig with no legs?”
“Please don’t answer that--” Wade began, before PB put a hand over Wade’s mouth. The shadows under his eyes were deep, as though he were carrying the weight of all of his friend’s terrible decisions in the sockets.
Noir paused, shivering a little bit, and trying to hide it. “Wh-what is it?”
“A groundhog!” A faint buh-dumm-tss could be heard above the roar of the warp-engine-whatever.
Noir stared, then, after a taut moment, his knuckle-whitening grip on the shuttle side relaxed. A smile pulled one corner of his mouth northward.
“That’s worse than the ones at Rickaby’s Comedy Night,” Noir said, looking relieved.
“Alright, we’re nearing the destination, so get ready to get dressed in whatever the hell Wade packed!” PB said, a note of dread in his voice. “Let’s go, team!”
Noir chuckled, and Peter continued watching for another moment, before the pod took a final turn and sent Noir’s spidey-squiggles back into a panic.
They fell toward the screen-wall, and as Noir scrabbled at the side, Peter made a decision that made every bruise on his back vow vengeance: he grabbed Noir by the waist and took the blow for him.
“Ksdfksj!” He coughed. His eyes became spirals for a moment, then he shook his head, and his thoughts jumped back onto their track. The speed of the pod had both slammed them into the wall and crushed them together. Noir’s chest was to Peter’s chest, their eyes were even, and their noses would have touched if Peter hadn’t shrunk even further against the wall, flushed.
“Thanks,” Noir said. His gray cheeks turned a darker shade of gray. Was he embarrassed about Peter saving him from hitting the wall? Yeah, that was probably it. “Didn’t need to do that. I’m made of strong stuff, pig.”
Well. That confirmed it--and there was something strangely comforting about being called “pig” again. Even if it was just because Toughman Detectiveguy was embarrassed that a pig had broken his fall.
The pod stopped. Peter began to slide down the wall. Noir stepped back and lowered him to the ground, looking not at him but at the clothing chest, where Wade had completely submerged himself from the chest up.
“Wade,” PB said, “this isn’t necessary.”
“Okay, okay. Gold sneakers or stilettos?”
“Sneakers. Why did you bring golden stilettos?” Peter ruffled through some of the clothes and pulled out a neon orange wifebeater, looked as though he were briefly considering it, then remembered that he was supposed to have dignity and picked a bright blue jersey of indeterminate team allegiance.
“Flavor!” Wade said, picking the golden stilettos anyway. “It’s the future. I’m pretty sure no one cares any more.”
“Men wear heels in the future? Horseknickers.” Noir said.
Peter cleared his throat and indicated the inch-high heels on Noir’s sleek black boots.
“You know what I mean,” Noir’s brow furrowed in an adorable way. No. Wait. Stop. Bad traitor brain. The angry 1930’s guy was a FRIEND, and more importantly, a human.
With that thought, Peter decided that he’d keep all of his emotions in the center of his chest until he died, and pulled a sweatshirt, pants, and a pair of Hello Kitty sunglasses out of the box without looking.
They were on in a whirl of motion blur--another perk of being from a universe unhindered by the laws of physics was that you never needed a changing room, only enough inertia to make a tornado-shaped blur. He now wore a completely respectable outfit not at all reminiscent of the bullies from Back to the Future: a pair of lime green pants, the glasses, sneakers with Japanese symbols and uwu-ing anime girls on them, and a sweatshirt that mysteriously depicted both the logo for the band “Thrasher” and Peppa Pig. They covered his Spider-Ham (Man) suit pretty well, and his mask fit in a pocket.
It’d be fine.
“You look like Noir colored you in,” PB joked, oblivious to the fact that he had slipped on a blue denim jacket with bright yellow leather capri pants that Wade had chosen “especially for him.” Wade himself wore, along with the stilettos, a heavily mistranslated shirt in English (red letters on a purple background screamed “Your existence owned by you, do what you like eat egg!”) and a pair of black pants with random silver studs in them.
“I don’t like your tone, railrunner.” Noir said, peering at the box. He managed to pick out by far the worst outfit of them all: bright pink dress shirt, silver pants, a new white hat that looked like its own but for the “1 800 ¿Estás abofeteando?” emblazoned in black on the side.
Wade stared for a long moment, then turned away, shaking with quiet laughter. Peter decided not to press the issue. PB looked deeply disappointed in himself and the world.
Then again, what else was new?
“Okaaay, so, splitting up last time was a bad idea, seeing as how I almost got--” Peter coughed loudly and tugged at his collar again. “Y’know. This time, let’s stay together.”
“Bingo,” Noir said, waving his hands up. Oh, god, he’d put silver gloves on over his costume gloves. He looked like Michael Jackson in his final days. Peter suddenly wished for a camera, desperately.
“I can take the lead,” Noir said, “I might be in little Peni’s weird science world, but I’m still the best damn PI there is. I’ll find our girl.”
“Aww, that’s sweet,” PB said. He peered out the viewport. “You sure you don’t want one of us to go out first? It’s pretty bright.”
“I’ll be alright.” Noir strode to the front of the pod. “I’m used to color, now.” Was it Peter’s imagination, or did his eyes dart toward him when he said that?
“Okay, if you’re sure.” PB elbowed Wade, who was still cackling in the corner.
Noir nodded, nudged the doors, and opened the gates of the first circle of neon anime hell.