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“You some kind of walking steamroller? Go around,” Peter rolls his eyes but opens the door and walks inside.

The thing is, this would all be considered horribly pluty back in his day. Even standing here, he kind of feels like somebody’s going to look at him the wrong way and call the cops on him. It’s not going to stop him from looking around because screw ‘em, but still, the feeling lingers.

It’s sort of like the King Kullen in Queens, but maybe six or seven times the size. When they’d started opening them a couple years ago it’d been a big deal to have the butcher, the baker, and the grocer all in one place, but this store seems to sell every imaginable product and some Peter can’t even work out the purpose of, all in airtight sanitary packaging. It goes without saying that the prices are outrageous, but he can’t tell if that’s just the inflation or if this place is expensive even by modern standards.

He thinks it’s the tile floor; there’s not a single shoe print or speck of dust in sight, but he hasn’t seen an employee except the one he passed by at the till. This place is weirdly quiet except for the halogen buzz of the lightbulbs; both bereft of human touch and too full of bodies.

When he rounds the corner he trips over the same guy from earlier, bruising his shin and his ego. Peter really hadn’t realized how reliant on the Spider’s intuition he’d gotten to sense when there were people around he couldn’t see. “…My bad,” he pulls the other guy back up by his wrist.

There were many strange people that came and went in this apparent world-between-worlds, Echoes of all ages and shapes and powers. But despite the wild variation among them, it was always easily apparent which were Echoes and which were the native Aercons.

It usually helped that the new ones were too busy gawking at their new surroundings to really attempt to blend in properly.

Not that Legato himself made any effort to do so, but it was the principle of the thing.

"Are you planning on standing at the door all day long or are you going to enter the store," he asks the man in the coat and glasses, voice bone dry to attempt to bury the note of exhaustion. "There are others who would very much like to get inside out of the cold and do their shopping."

After all, he needed to replenish his first-aid supply. He had a feeling his slip back into... bad habits, would only continue to worsen and not having enough bandages on hand would make things messier than they already were.

"You must be one of those newly arrived."

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Peter takes the cigarette and turns it around in his fingers. For... some reason, half of it is orange. Does it matter which way he lights it up...? They make directional cigarettes now? He sticks the orange half between his teeth and lights the normal end.

"Haha. Who doesn't, these days?"

...This is a weak-ass cigarette. It's like breathing a few blocks away from a coal plant. "I'm Peter, by the way."

This guy looks....odd. Like he might flash some kids from within a trenchcoat or go political streaking or something. But, well, he also looks like he's been through something.

A little pity, or maybe just a little human empathy later (like .2 seconds), Badou offers up his pack. It's a good conversation starter, either way.

"Sure, man, what the hell. You look like you need it."

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@liightaga (starter call)

It's not that he hates the beach. Peter's seen plenty of pictures of the beach in places like California or Florida that seem perfectly nice. It's just that he's seen what gets fished out of the ocean and what factories pour into the ocean. He'll stay on the boardwalk, thank you.

The thing is, there's a kid pushing himself way too far over the railing, like he's going to fall off.

"Hey, buddy-" before Peter can even finish his sentence, the kid's in the water. He rushes to peer over the side and hopes that the kid's not drowning because he definitely still can't swim. He means, he'll dive after him anyway because it's a kid and he has to do something, but he's not optimistic about his chances of improving the situation.

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@hypnoticallycaucasian (starter call)

"Hey, pal," Peter stops next to him on the curb, both hands deep in his pockets. Even before he opens his mouth, he looks pretty well out of time. Collared shirt, slacks with a high waist, threadbare coat with shoulder pads. Behind the huge glasses, it looks like he hasn't slept at any point in the last century. Based on his accent, he's a New Yorker, but there's a weird click to his voice, the sort of accent that went extinct years ago.

"Can I bum a cig?" he's wearing gloves, but he takes them off before he pulls out his lighter. His hands are covered in scrapes and small burns, and underneath them hundreds of thin white scars, nearly invisible.

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@magnusmodig (starter call)

It looks like something out of a novel, is the thing. One of the ones about funny little men who live on Mars. The entire city is nearly as tall as the Empire State Building, covered in flat sheets of glass that reflect the evening light back at him. Peter's standing on the sidewalk gaping like a tourist, fingers tracing the queer camera they gave him. Something in his chest swells, and he's not sure if it's fear or awe.

Someone bumps against his shoulder and Peter reflexively swings at them. It's like punching a brick wall and Peter stumbles backwards.

He turns back a few pages, mentally. Someone snuck up. on him. Just someone on the street, not doing anything funny. And he thinks his hand's bleeding now. Just from punching some random on the street.

"Gah- sorry about that," Peter peers up at the stranger, adjusting large wire-rim glasses. God, this guy is huge. Wouldn't it be just his luck to get out of New York for an extra long weekend and immediately get pummeled to death by some meathead? One foot turns, ready to run if he's got to.

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starter call ⇒ ♡

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...One standard issue phone, they said.

This is a brick.

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his beloved <3

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