I Sing the Body Electric

Steve

So it's aliens.

He didn't have a problem with the fact that he was frozen (mostly) solid in the Arctic for over half a century and woke up to a world that needed him to fight again. He was good at the fighting bit and was grateful that he wasn't completely obsolete yet.

No, it was the aliens part he was having some difficulty with.

(Oh, and Norse Gods too, but Steve was really starting to believe that this second chance at life might go a bit better if he learned when to pick his battles.)

Steve turns the folder in his hands again, thinking maybe if he makes it as upside down as he's feeling, it'll start making more sense. He's thankful Fury doesn't ask many questions about this ritual, as he repeats it many times and doesn't gather any of the results he'd wanted when he started. 

"I'm sorry," he says, running his eyes over the words once more to see if he's missed something. "but, in English, what exactly is going on?"

Fury smiles (or contorts his face into the equivalent of what might be a smile) and shrugs. "I'm not much of a science man myself. That's where Banner is going to come in. Stark too, if he ever bothers to get here."

That name, Steve knows. "Howard Stark is alive?"

He knew eventually he'd have to confront it. Eventually, beyond his nightmares, he'd have to confront the fact that he was 70 years away from home and most everybody he knew wasn't going to make that trip in one piece. It's just that, he'd been awake for a year or so, and everything was so fresh in his mind, he could pretend it was like yesterday . . .

But it wasn't.

He knew that. 

Fury shakes his head. "His son is, though. He's in the file. I didn't peg you for one to skimp on the homework."

Steve smiles sheepishly. "I didn't mean to, sir," he says, laying the folder flat on the table. "Truth is, I've spent most of the hour trying to get through the first page. Keep finding myself reading the same paragraph over and over again."

"It's not like you're going to forget it anytime soon."

He's right, 'less you decide to brain yourself on this table. 

(That, still, was something Steve was finding to be more than a one-time obstacle.)

Steve nods. "No point in objectively recalling what I didn't understand the first time."

"Fair point." Fury sits back in his chair and looks at the clock behind Steve for what might've been the fifth time since they've gotten here. "So, you know nothing about your new teammates?" 

Steve tilts his head, flicking past the first few introductory pages and into the profiles.

Romanov's face is the first to stare back at him, and he suppresses a groan. "I've run into Miss Romanov a few times around headquarters. We've talked once or twice but I don't know much about her." 

"You train with her?"

Steve bites his tongue against the bitterness of his answer and nods. He's trained with most of the agents at the New York HQ. It's not like he's had many options. 

"What'd you think?" 

She's been stalkin' me and is probably a few days out from poisoning my breakfast. 

"She's good," he says instead. "She's . . ." sly, a sneak, a liar  "graceful. Her and Rumlow have been a great help."

Which was true. Rumlow and Romanov were the only two people he had trained with during his stay who had managed to get him pinned more than once. Rare as it was, he enjoyed a good sparring partner. 

There's a look that passes Fury's face, and for a moment, Steve thinks he's on to him. "Graceful she is. I wish we could credit it to SHIELD training."

It feels like Fury's baiting him a little with that, so he decides not to answer. Instead, he turns the page and hard eyes and crossed arms glare him into a page turn. "I haven't met Barton before. Romanov has mentioned he was embedded somewhere on an extended mission."

"He was until I picked him up when Doctor Selvig called. He's one of my best guys."

Fury seems resolute in this in a way that Steve thinks he's just supposed to just get but doesn't. "He's a scientist too?"

"He's got an uncanny sense for things that smell funny."

"What kind of qualifications did he need for that?"

Fury's lip twitches. "He likes to sit on top of things."

Steve decides that that's the opposite of good enough but that he is willing to let it go anyway. He flips the page and finally sees an unfamiliar face. "Dr. Banner?"

"We're hoping he can help track this thing by what it emits. Gamma radiation, if you're interested." 

He is. Steve is very much interested but he doesn't get a chance to say so. 

"Lucy, you've got some 'splaining to do."

Steve turns.

Tony

He doesn't know what he expects to find when he opens the door, but it is still, somehow, irretrievable not that. 

Tony knows it's him. He doesn't think anybody could mistake him, honestly, or miss him in any way, his absolute mass notwithstanding. He's an absolute specimen. The image of this man sitting in a swivel chair reminds Tony of a particularly bad play he saw in high school. (Yes, he was ten, but he did have exceptional taste in the arts no matter what Rhodey had to say about it.) He's waiting for someone in this off-broadway performance to forget their lines or make eye contact with someone in the unseen audience and for this mess to collapse around them like the runner curtains he wishes it was attached to. 

He examines the scene more and sees his own face peeking at him over Rogers' shoulder. He's angry, for a moment, and then nothing floods him along with the realization that Nick intends the over-dressed freeze pop to be the leader of whatever group he's assembled.

It's funny. Tony wants to laugh but thinks that maybe it's not the hill he wants to die on today. He's already picked a fight with Coulson and knows that whatever Nick throws at him, he won't like. And now, he's going to have to take orders from Mount Rushmore's third cousin. 

The notion that he should have been briefed on this crosses his mind too, but he decides that it's not his hill either. 

He does take a moment to realize what this all means. That his opting to continue his father's search was actually a good idea and not just a check he signed every year for nothing. That there is life out there in the universe and that those Germanic fuckers with the weird helmets might've been onto something. That he had something going for him with the whole "willing to die for the suit you can't have, U.S. Government" thing. He takes a moment to just breathe in whatever the hell may or may not be going on, because he assumes he won't get another moment like this for quite some time. 

Howard Stark's pygmalion blinks up at him, and he knows the moment is over. 

"Mr. Stark, you're late," Fury says. "You can sit and wait for the others. The Captain and I were just discussing your new teammates."

He does sit . . . as far away from the Good Captain — who's still staring at him — as possible. "I hope you picked good from the litter. It's getting pretty nasty out there."

Nick's eye twitches and Tony feels the sort of satisfaction he's only ever been able to bring himself in moments like this. "I had hoped you would've left the dramatics at home, Stark. You and I both know nothing has happened yet."

"Thankfully," Tony agrees. "But I was referring to the inciting incident. I know how private you guys like to keep things, and I can't imagine the size of the dressing down you must've gotten."

He knew the infamous Council wouldn't like the spread he'd glanced over. Of course, that was the floodgate you opened when you signed your name on the land but forgot to disclose to the American public what exactly you were doing on it. Who could've guessed that the flood would only rush in faster when you added extra-terrestrials to the mix?

Nick tilted his head to the side. "We did suspect you, you know. Their source turned out to be untraceable, and we both know that the number of people with those capabilities is small."

Tony threw his hands up, turning to fully face Nick in an attempt to keep his eyes off of Rogers who seems to have no intention on paying him the same courtesy. "It's not my fault that you couldn't keep the Times out of your own backyard long enough to be invaded by aliens." Nick seems unmoved by this. "Of course I didn't call it in. If not for the fact that I wouldn't use a newspaper to get back at you all, you should at least believe that I couldn't have had any idea what was going on when it was going on."

Rogers coughs. "Why would you want to 'get back' at SHIELD?" 

Finally having an excuse to look at him, Tony does. "Because I'm spiteful and self-destructive and— Have you not read my file? Did Captain America not do the homework?"

"No," Rogers admits, looking more than a little sheepish. He gestures to the folders in front of him.

Tony raises an eyebrow. "I'm surprised you didn't start with mine."

Nick scoffs. "Not everything is about you, Stark."

"My file definitely is, though," he says, throwing Nick a look and a smirk. "I know 'cause I did the homework."

"You're young," Rogers says. From the sharp intake of breath, Tony knows that he immediately regrets it. "Uh, I-I mean, you're younger than I expected you to be."

Tony licks his lips. (Yes, he knows he shouldn't. Yes, he knows he's being tacky. No, he doesn't really care.) "You expected me?"

The look of abject horror in Rogers' eyes and the blush spreading across his face tells Tony everything he needs to know about their encounters from here on out: this is the hill he wants to die on.

He lets Rogers flounder for a few seconds before he regains control of the moment. "You know who I am?"

Rogers nods cautiously, his eyes wary of where this is bound to go. "Tony Stark. You're Howard's son."

He's not wrong. "That's what they tell me. I'm just surprised they didn't tell you more."

"If you hadn't noticed, Stark," Fury interrupts. "We've had more than enough to deal with over the last couple of days."

Tony scoffs and turns. "You really expect me to believe General Patton over here just got out of the ice?" He turns back to Rogers. "You've been defrosted, what, six months? A year?"

The blank look on the Captain's face is more than an answer. 

Tony rubs his eyes. He feels like he's the one who just woke up from 70 years of riding the world's worst snooze button and it's only a Tuesday. "Let me get this straight," he says to Fury. "You've put together a Russian ballerina, a Norse god, an over-watered gremlin, a museum curator’s wet dream, and a hotter version of Daddy Warbucks? This is the team you’ve assembled to save Earth and the rest of humanity?”

Fury looks like it's the last thing he wants to do and nods.

Silence permeates the room again. 

He knows he shouldn't feel hurt. He knows that he should be used to all of this by now — the secrecy, the lies, the need-to-know. It should all be second-nature to him at this point, as natural as breathing or walking. 

It's not, of course, but he's aware that that's his problem. 

He gets a moment to let the hurt wash over his face when the alarm rings and orders start being barked. Soon enough, he's safe in the suit, trying to convince himself that the real bad guy is down on the ground somewhere in Germany and not back on the Helicarrier. 

"Agent Romanoff, did you miss me?"

They're fighting a greasy, anthropomorphized Rudolph reject. 

Maybe they can do this after all. 

"Mr. Stark."

"Captain."

"What's the matter? Scared of a little lightning?"

"I'm not overly fond of what follows."

"I've come to put an end to Loki's schemes."

"Then prove it! Put the hammer down."

"Um, yeah, no. Bad call. He loves his—"

"Have care in how you speak. Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he's my brother."

"He killed eighty people in two days."

"He's adopted."

"Finally, someone who speaks English."

"Is that what just happened?"

"Nuclear deterrent. 'Cause that always calms everything right down."

"Remind me, again, what fortune you inherited, Stark?"

"Remind me how exactly I inherited that fortune, Nick?"

"Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?"

"You know damn well why! Back off!"

"Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."

"You're a spoiled child in a suit of armor—"

"You really need to read my file—"

"Take all that away, and what are you?"

"The guy who built the suit and did the fucking homework! Take the serum away and what are you? A fossilized version of the American Dream that never was?"

"I've seen the footage. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."

"I think I would just cut the wire."

"Always a way out?"

"I'd try flying into an ocean, but it's tacky."

"You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero."

"A hero? Like you?" 

Or . . . maybe not. 

They lose their heavy hitters.

They lose a couple of engines.

They lose . . .

"Is this the first time you've lost a soldier?"

"We are not soldiers!"

"Let's do a head count here. Your brother, the demi-God; a super soldier, a living legend who might just be living up to the legend; a man with breath-taking anger management issues; a couple of master assassins, and you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them."

"I have an army."

"We have the world's beefiest gymnast."

"And there's one other person you pissed off. His name was Phil."

"JARVIS, you ever hear the tale of Jonah?"

"I wouldn't consider him a role model."

"Stark, you know that's a one-way trip."

He does

. . . It's not.

Suddenly, he's on the other side of the portal.

He's come out of it with a new host of fears and a concussion, probably. 

Tony stares into the sky for a long time. Hulk is huffing life over him, Thor is grinning down at him, and Rogers has a heavy hand on his chest. He means to look at them or say something, but all he can do is just lie there. 

He speaks, he thinks. Creates some sort of diversion for himself. He thinks he hears something about shwarma and not winning the day and it all sounds well and good to him. 

But what he's really focused on is the endless sky looming over all of them.

After cleaning what it could, New York City called it a day. It had dead to mourn, bury, or find and as the hours passed, there was more exhaustion than hope to pass around. 

It reminded too many people of the towers. Not the chaos or even the immediate facelessness of it all, but the aimless uncertainty. It would take months, years to remake, repair, or replace everything that had been broken, burned, or destroyed. The city looked almost normal from the patch-job they'd been able to do just that day, but it was hard to ignore things like entire skyscrapers laying across Broadway. However, all the fires had been put out and there were enough National Guard members buzzing about the city for all the people who realized they're loved ones might've just been a little too unlucky in their afternoon commute that day.

It was time to rest, for those that could.

Tony was not one of them.  

Instead, he dangles his feet over the edge of "A" tower. With the exception of Thor, everybody's scattered about. Nobody had wanted to go back to where they were supposed to be. The Spylets and the Good Captain had clawed out and smashed the comms in their ears demanding they report to SHIELD's New York HQ. Banner, meanwhile, just had to throw one menacing look towards somebody in field scrubs and no one else tried to bother him. 

They had silently agreed to come to the Tower. (The thought of flying the suit to the mansion upstate lasted about as long as it took for Tony to get in it and decide otherwise.) Last he checked with JARVIS, Barton and Romanov were holed up together in the gym, Banner was passed out on one of the couches in his lab, and Rogers was conked in a guest room he didn't know he had.

The thought of going inside exhausted him. There was a Hulk-throwing-a-Loki-ragdoll-sized hole in what was supposed to be a living room and the normalcy of his bedroom would probably lead him into some false sense of security in the morning.

On the roof, he couldn't escape the sight of the damage. It wasn't visceral, but he couldn't lie to himself — he couldn't let himself forget. 

(Not like he thought he would, anyway, but his good ole war-mongering days of just about three years ago made sure he kept his t's crossed and i's dotted.)

He's decided to deal with everything chronologically. Back to front, he thinks, like a terrible French novel. It's been a hell of a week and—

He hears the door crack open behind. The steps are heavy and hesitant, so he figures it's either Rogers or Banner or maybe—

Rogers steadily lowers himself next to Tony. They're not touching, but Tony can feel Rogers' body heat rolling off of him in waves.

They sit a long while not saying anything, just breathing and looking. He can see out of the corner of his eye that Rogers has his head craned hard in one direction. Towards Brooklyn, his mind supplies, and he remembers for the first time that day that the man is from there. He wonders if it's the first time he's been back in the city, if that's why he's so hesitant to leave. 

Probably not, he reasons, but before he can figure out what to say about it, Rogers shifts and clears his throat. "About what I said on the jet-"

"Helicarrier," he corrects, not surprised that Rogers is the type of guy to do these things. He wonders if it's because he's young, which he knows the captain wasn't expecting. (Because he fucking said so to my face.)

He wonders if it's because he's Howard's son. 

"What?"

"It's called a Helicarrier," Tony says, trying to find it lurking over the skyline. "My guess is, you'll be spending a lot of time on one in the near future. People on the Helicarrier are different from the people at HQ. They will laugh at you."

He coughs. "Oh, thanks."

Tony can feel Rogers gear up to another pseudo-apology and does his best to beat him to it. "I think it's the thin air."

"Yeah?"

He thinks of the horror stories Carol used to tell him. "Haven't seen a single recruit come out of time on that thing the same as they went in. They're not supposed to step outside when they're in the air 'cause of the bends or something. Rumlow used to use it as an initiation, but he's been an asshole since birth."

"You know Rumlow?"

Tony smiles. (Grimaces, more like, but he's allowed.) "You still haven't read my file."

Rogers scoffs and rubs the back of his neck. "I was a little busy today if you hadn't noticed."

He's funny. Weird. "Had my head in the clouds for most of it. Couldn't tell."

Rogers chuckles a little but stops himself short. "Anyway, about what I said up there-"

"Don't apologize," Tony says. "I won't, and I certainly don't expect you to."

"I want to," Rogers tells him. His face is the more earnest than Tony thought a face could be and there's an odd twinkle in his eye. "I supposed the scepter didn't help anything, but things got out of hand. "

Tony thinks about that. "You ever hear about Lot's wife?"

"In the Bible?"

"She was, wasn't she," he muses, suddenly remembering that Steve is — was? — Catholic. "Her name was Edith, I think. Anyway, you remember what happened to her?" 

Steve nods. "Judgement was being passed on Sodom and there were Angels trying to get Lot and his wife out of the city. They left as the city burned and Lot's wife - uh, Edith - was instructed not to look back but she did and became a pillar of salt."

"Very good. I think you're the only person Catholicism has graced with the ability to tell a short story."

"Stark," Steve says, and he sounds like he's trying to hold back a smile. "What does that have to do with what I said to you on the ship?"

Tony shrugs. "It's a personal policy. Always move forward. Never dwell."

"You think you'll turn into a pillar of salt?"

"I think I'm the burning city."

They don't speak for a while after that.

The city is quiet. Quieter than Tony's ever not heard it in his life. There are no sirens, and he can count the cars that pass below them on one hand. There's no access to the island from the other boroughs or anywhere else, for that matter, so Manhattan's on its own for the night. 

He can hear the occasional baby whine and a few grieving howls, but otherwise, there is only sleep and nothing. 

He needs to break it. 

"They didn't tell you anything about me on purpose," Tony says, and it's an agonizing thing, but he figures it's best they do this now. "You know that, don't you?"

He seems to consider this. For a while, Tony only hears the wet crunching of Rogers clenching and unclenching his hands. When he finally does speak, it's measured and obnoxiously neutral. "They didn't tell me anything about anyone."

"You're a terrible liar." A few years of work on you and you'd make a half-decent agent. 

Rogers pushes out a hard breath. "I'm a soldier, not a . . ." Not a spy. "Okay, you know what? I shouldn't even have those files in the first place. It's invasive and . . . not how I like to do things."

Tony smirks. "Tell me more."

"I skimmed through the other files just before the briefing. I didn't like the idea of going through everybody's personnel file, but the Director said it was necessary, for the mission."

"And then you conveniently forgot to do it?"

Steve considers this and distinctly does not deny it. "Would you have read them?"

Tony considers that. The thought reminds him so much of Romanov it makes his skin crawl, and the fact that it's Rogers introducing the thought is nauseating.

The problem is, is that if Tony wasn't invited to the room where it happened, he could hack into it if he felt so inclined. (With one exception, of course . . .)

"I've got my own invasive technique that I'd argue is much more thorough than anything Fury could throw together." And then, "The only one I'd like to sneak a peek at is mine."

"Wait, what?"

"It's Nick's magnum opus," Tony explains. "That thing has never touched a piece of technology, as far as I've been able to find. It's handwritten or typewritten— It could all be in Braille for all I know!"

They share a small laugh. They drift in the warmth of it longer than is warranted, but a thought suddenly sobers Cap up. "Stark, I don't think I can . . ."  

Tony waves him off. "I wouldn't ask you to. I think it'd be cheating, actually. See, Coulson and I—"

And then it hits him again. 

Coulson

Grief is . . . not an emotion he's accustomed to. (He figures that's what this is, anyway.) He never grieved his parents because he didn't know them. He never grieved Peggy because she was still alive. He didn't grieve Obie because . . . Well . . .

Yinsen, he thinks, was the first. Even then, it'd mostly been more of a driven rage. He hated the idea of his tech being used to kill those he thought he was protecting. It was his tagline for the last handful of years and it still managed to be completely true. 

And I saw that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero accountability. 

He was accountable to Yinsen. He was accountable to Yinsen and Yinsen's olive tree and the soldiers in his convoy and all of the American soldiers who turned into nothing more than pink mist dampening the sand under the force of his weapons. 

The point was, this was different and Cap seemed to sense that.  

"I didn't know Agent Coulson long," he says awkwardly, lifting and dropping his arms at random intervals in what seems to be a real-time projection of his indecision of whether or not to touch Tony. "I ran into him a few times at the base I was in." And then, "He seemed like a good man."

He was. "You would've gotten along."

Cap nods. "Were you two close?"

He's jolted by this. Were you two close? 

In truth, he doesn't know. Of the memories he has of the beginning, he can't remember a time when Coulson wasn't there. Even when he wasn't physically there, he was omnipresent in the way things around Tony would continue to operate when he was gone. He remembers Coulson teaching him how to tie his shoes when Peggy was in a board meeting. He remembers Coulson asking after a burn mark that looked a little too festered to be an accident. He remembers introducing Rhodey to Coulson before Carol or Fury, despite his incessant begging. 

Look, man, I know you're, like, twelve and you don't get it, but this is THE Carol Danvers we're talking about here. 

I've got something better. 

And he believed it. 

But he remembers calling Coulson 'Agent' until he was eleven. He remembers all the holidays and birthdays he wasn't invited to with Coulson's family. He remembers Coulson hastily shoving personal photos into nearby drawers when Tony would come around, and he remembers when he finally stopped putting them up back after Tony would leave. 

Of course, none of that would come to matter much at all, because what Tony remembers most of all was Arizona and coming back home from Afghanistan. 

A shiver runs down his spine and he shakes the cobwebs from his head.

"You could say that," he supplies, the words tasting like bile in his mouth. 

He doesn't think much of it after he says it, but apparently, Cap does, because he huffs and asks, "Am I going to have to get used to that?"

He raises an eyebrow. "To what?"

"To only having half-conversations with you," he says, obviously annoyed. "You're the most cryptic person I've ever met." 

Excuse me? "Have you not talked to Itsy-Bitsy?"

Cap seems to consider this. "You may have a point there," he admits. "Fine. Second-most." And then, "You're definitely more cryptic than the New York Times crossword."

Is that a joke? "You do the New York Times crossword?"

Rogers nods, obviously proud of himself for having bothered. "Every day."

"Do you know any answers to the New York Times crossword?"

"Almost never," he says. "But I try."

"And you're trying now," Tony observes, because it's obvious. The fact that Rogers is out here with him at all right now shows more dedication Tony has ever seen anybody have in trying to speak with him. And, actually— "Why're you out here, anyway?" 

Rogers obviously doesn't expect this. "Hm?"

"It's—" Tony checks a watch he doesn't have on. "late. Last I saw you, you were dead on your feet."

"It's been a long day," Rogers states.

"And you just get chattier the longer it gets?"

Rogers really must not know what to say to this, as he doesn't say anything at all. 

Tony tries again. "Why are you here right now?"

"I wanted to apologize. I told you—"

"You're not any sorrier now than you would've been in the morning."

Rogers nods.

The conversation is starting to feel like a scratched CD, and Tony tells him as much. 

"I don't know what you want me to say."

Tony doesn't know either. Instead of admitting to that, he stands up. He stretches and folds his arms across the balcony rail he was just sitting against, looking back over the skyline. 

"Why are you out here?" Rogers asks him suddenly. 

Tony smirks. "For the same reason as you, I'm guessing."

That feels true enough. 

It doesn't matter.

He hears another rustle of fabric and soon enough he feels Rogers swaying beside him. "We should probably go back inside."

So that's how it's going to be. 

Okay.

"Nah," Tony says and turns to look at the man. His heavy eyes and haggard stance only filled Tony with questions and sympathy, but he knew they weren't there yet. "You go on ahead. It's not my bedtime yet."

Tony saw some sort of struggle pass the Captain's face, but figured if he wasn't going to say anything about it, Tony could save it for another time.

Saying nothing, Rogers just nods and begins to walk back to the doors. He gets there and opens them, only to stop and turn back to Tony. "Stark?"

"Yeah?" Tony asks, tilting his head just so. 

"I was wrong, today. On the je— On the Helicarrier." Rogers confesses.

"Okay," Tony says, hoping his face doesn't betray the primal fear crawling up his throat.

He very immediately feels like he's experiencing something violently intimate. 

Rogers turns back to the door again, only to pivot hard back around. "One more thing?"

"Sure."

"Today, when the bomb came and you—" Rogers points upward and makes what can only be described as a whoosh-ing sound in what, Tony assumes to be, a crude impersonation of the suit taking off. 

He doesn't stop making the sound until Tony nods to put him out of his mercy. 

Rogers smiles, reminding Tony exactly why they used to make cardboard cutouts of this guy. 

"What you did today," Rogers tells him. "I think it might have just been the bravest thing I've ever seen."

Huh. 

"Alright."

"Goodnight, Tony." Cap says.

"Night, Cap." Tony says.

There's a moment where Rogers doesn't move and Tony doesn't move, and Rogers looks at Tony and Tony looks at Rogers and they both just stand there looking like idiots but more importantly looking at each other and he's pretty sure he should be worried about that or mark it down because he could swear he's read about this in one of Pepper's stupid magazines that she insists on having in the waiting room to his office which is really her office now that he thinks about it but—

And then the door closes and the moment is over.

Tony breathes in. 

Tony breathes out. 

He figures it's been a weird enough day to warrant a night like this and shrugs. 

Radical acceptance, his therapist once told him. Find the peace to accept that which you cannot change in the world.

Bullshit, he had said to her.

He doesn't know if he believes that more or less now. 

He takes a peek at the sky and sees nothing but one big hole about to swallow him up again.