Temba's Where The Heart Is

[doubled_speed]

WHO: Tommy Shepherd, OTA (Some closed or limited starters)
WHERE: Temba: Greenhouse, Diner, The Twin Roses
WHAT: Tommy got hurt in Not Temba so now he's staying home for traditional work
WHEN: Early August
WARNINGS: Tommy's attitude is going to be testy due to leg soreness/pain

1. New Plants Need Time | Greenhouse | OTA

Green. Tommy had never thought he'd feel so attached to the color. Yes, it was part of his uniform but this green space, this peace... It was magical in its own way. Somehow he hadn't noticed it in himself back home, the way that when he was stressed he ran to not only natural wonders, but ones that were in some way green. But here, on Agra 10, he had found some measure of peace in the greenhouse right at the start, and in a strange way, the place felt like home.

"I'm back babes," he called out to the plants, dragging along the bubble-olive tree that Obi-Wan had helped him dig up back in the other city. He needed to get it to the place where it would have its final resting and a chance to adjust. "I've brought new friends. Once I've got them in, we're going to do a prone. And it's almost harvest time, so everyone do your best."

There was peace, calmness, happiness to be had in finding the greenhouse still standing after all the stress in life.

"Now if only I had more hands," he mused as he kept going, limping along slowly. Stupid hurt leg. But he'd power through it. He always had.


2. Food Makes Family | The Diner | OTA

Okay, so maybe he hasn't done this in a while, but that doesn't mean Tommy doesn't know what he's doing. Okay, maybe he doesn't know what he's doing very WELL but dammit he's trying. And, with people everywhere and some of the diner help staff working their asses off exploring and Tommy no longer easily able to do that, he had come to do it instead. This afternoon he was falling back on a classic. Anyone who had an issue with soup as a side today was going to get serious glares from him. For now Tommy was working on making fresh noodles from one of the Coruscant grains he had just ground into flour for the purpose.

With the back door to the kitchen open he could hear someone enter the building and he called out from the back as loud as he could to let them know he was working.

"Hold on and there will be a fresh salad or fruit if you want. I'm working on a noodle-soup. Come on back!"


3. Welcome to the Roses | Twin Roses | Closed to Twin Roses Crew

Home. Tommy was one of the lucky ones and he didn't even know it. He had brought some new plant samples to try in the Twin Roses hydroponics system and had no clue that the ships had been juggled. Then again, save for the first assignments, this had really been his ship. It was, in a weird way (especially when considering his claustrophobia) home. He moved easily and confidently through the ship, not expecting that the people on it could be so different. And once in the hold he moved right to his hydroponics unites.

"Hey kiddos," he greated them. he'd heard once that talking to plants helped, and given they had to live in the more artificial environment of the ship, he didn't intend to not do it. "Got you some new friends seeing as the sorta pea-pod vine things weren't working out. Say hi."

And now it was time to get them started.

Later on, after he was done with that task, Tommy busied himself in the laundry area, sitting on top of the washer with a bowl of chocolate protein paste with slices of fruit cut up into it, eating as the machine worked on cleaning his clothes. His injured leg hung to the side, keeping all weight off of it.

We anyone to enter he would look them dead in the eye.

"What, never seen a dude washing laundry before?"

Well, they might have, but given Tommy was literally wearing only a pair of what looked like booty shorts, there might be another reason to be staring. Be glad he wasn't standing, because that shining silver script 'juicy' on the ass might just make some people react less happily. But hey, free shirtless dude. Comment on the faint scars on his skin and there might be trouble though.


4. A Mind Is A Beautiful Thing To Use | Young Avengers home | Closed to Quentin Beck

Learning for himself had never been something Tommy was good at. It was just something that was universally true. He'd been bad at school because even before his powers had come in he'd had some attention issues. After school had been brutal. And then, well, there hadn't been school at all. The Kaplans had stressed the importance of him getting his GED and it had been pure stubborn desire to get a job and his own place that had Tommy getting his degree.

But complex issues? Tommy had always thought himself too stupid to learn really useful and valuable things. He hadn't thought about how one putting together thousands upon thousands of electronics, even according to instructions, was teaching him things. Between that and watching Tony, helping Tony, having Tony put up with him, Tommy had started to think he could learn it. Except he'd run into a road block. How was he supposed to learn the basics?

Less mobile as he was after getting hurt in Not-Temba, his mind turned back to the thing he wanted to learn. So he did the only thing he could do. He borrowed some supplies from Tony's forge he would apologize when Tony got back and sat down in his home, trying to puzzle out different resistors Tony had put together into the systems.

"This is so fucking stupidly complicated," he hissed in anger. How could he have been so fucking smart in that damn fake-city!?

Comments

[kyley_b]

"You are. Just a little less and that's okay. There's enough of us now who can work."

[doubled_speed]

Is there though? Tommy's finally got things running smoothly enough that he almost thinks he can eat closer to his actual needs, and if he lays off, will that still be true?

"Maybe a day or two."

[kyley_b]

"Tommy, please trust me not to let things fall apart while you heal."

[doubled_speed]

"I trust you," Tommy insisted. "I... I've been doing this for two years. It's ahrd to let it go."

[kyley_b]

Kyle stops so he can look at Tommy fully.

"I know," he says softly. "I do, really. But it's kinda my job to look after you."

[doubled_speed]

Was it? That was normally Billy's job here.

With Kyle stopping, Tommy has to stop too. He wishes he knew how to say how much it meant to him, to be taken care of.

"You know I can't stay still, right?"

[kyley_b]

"Yeah, I know. So just like... take up knitting."

[doubled_speed]

Knitting? Really? Tommy sighed.

"I need something more than that. Something for my mind."

[kyley_b]

"Hey, I've been told knitting and crocheting takes brainpower, but okay," Kyle says as he gets back to moving that tree.

"What about learning some more of the stuff you were back when you worked for Tony? Any more luck in that area, like have you asked around?"

[doubled_speed]

"They probably do, but I don't know how to do them, and I'd have to go slow enough to not break the yarn or whatever," Tommy points out.

Not to mention he doesn't know how to knit.

He sighs at the question.

"The lack of response last time was sorta enough to be depressing," Tommy admitted as he started moving with Kyle again. "Beck came over to bug me about something, I don't know if that's going to go anywhere. I just... It's like all i can do is plants."

[kyley_b]

"Yeah," Kyle sighs. Anybody who thought super speed was easy had clearly never had it. He tries not to frown too much at the rest of what Tommy says.

"Yeah... I mean, that's not bad, though, Beck? He's got skills." He peers around the trunk at Tommy and offers him a smile.

"I think plants are pretty important," he offers.

[doubled_speed]

Tommy didn't know people well enough to talk about what a troublesome thing being a speedster could be for him sometimes. It just wasn't that easy.

"I have trouble trusting him, Kyle. The Beck in my world is evil. And in Billy's Dream the dude was ALSO evil."

At least he's complimenting the plants. Tommy smiles at that.

[kyley_b]

"Yeah," Kyle says. "I know. But like... He might not be. Everybody deserves a fair chance, right?" Something he believes to a fault.

Kyle beams right back. "REALLY important, actually. And it's hard work! And you did almost all of it alone! That's impressive."

[doubled_speed]

Everybody deserves a fair chance. That was true. Tommy sighed at the very statement, because frankly he didn’t want to give the guy a chance. It made him feel uncomfortable. But he supposed he didn’t have a choice but to oblige.

“Kyle, thanks for fluffing my ego up about the plants.”

He didn’t want to talk about Beck right now, even if he had to think more.

[kyley_b]

"Hey, it's true, not fluffing. You want this tree right over there, yeah?"

[doubled_speed]

"Yeah," Tommy agreed with a smile. Okay maybe he just smiles at Kyle, all the time.

The guy makes him feel like that.

"It's a good, accessible place."

[kyley_b]

"Okay, sweet." He wrestled the tree into place, slotting it into one of the pre-dug holes. He then set about moving soil back around the base. By the time he was done, he's sweating.

"Man," he said, standing up and arming sweat off his forehead. "Amazing you did all of this on your own before. No wonder you're ripped."

[doubled_speed]

Damn he's cute like that. And Tommy smiled at Kyle's comment.

"I'm hardly ripped, man. And I was never fully alone, but usually heavily alone. My strength is a mutation thing. I don't mind using it for useful things like this these days. Keeps me more or less fed."

ANd a lot of other people actually fed.

[kyley_b]

"You're pretty muscled, Tommy. Not bulky, but... yeah." He smiles again. "And we're just gonna get MORE food, so you can finally eat a proper speedster meal."

[doubled_speed]

Well, yeah, he is glorious, but mostly in his legs. He hadn't put the effort in to build up his body like Pietro was. One day maybe. But he smiles at the offer.

"Thanks, Kyle. For thinking of that."

[kyley_b]

He shrugs. "You're my boyfriend," he says simply.

[doubled_speed]

Said so simply, so unflinchingly. Like it's just an inherent truth. Tommy... doesn't fully know what to do with that. But in the end, he smiles.

"You know, possessiveness is really hot."

[kyley_b]

Kyle tips his head back to cackle. "Is it? Well, you're in luck, then. If some hot young dude starts hitting on you I will prrrrrrrrobably get pretty pissy about it."

[doubled_speed]

"No one is going to hit on me," Tommy laughed before leaning over to kiss Kyle, quick and light. "Come on, another ten feet."

[kyley_b]

"You don't know that." He rolls his shoulders and gets back to moving the tree, smiling.