Like everything else he did, Tommy woke up quickly.

And he woke up just as he was being laid down on a bed, and as somebody started to try and peel his crusted, bloody outfit from his body, and so of course as his eyes shot open he swatted the hand away and the first thing he said was, "NonoundressingmeI'dliketokeepmyclothesonyoupervert."

Brown eyes stared back at him, and Billy snorted, pointing out, "First of all, your clothes are all tattered and bloody. And second of all, I'm your twin, so you don't have anything that I haven't seen."

"Ugh," Tommy groaned, letting his head fall back, " 'llundressmyselfandyoucanundressyourselfbecauseyou'reatleastasbloodyasme ?"

The next thing he knew, Billy was hugging him and crying silently, and he blinked as he registered the fact that he was lying on Billy's bed in the Kaplan's house, and his body felt achy and his mouth felt like the Sahara Desert, and if zero equaled starving then his stomach felt like it was on about negative fifteen, and Billy was still hugging him and sobbing into his shoulder and saying, "I thought you were going to die, Tommy! You were dying, for a moment your heart stopped and you actually died! I thought I was going to lose you!" and who knew Billy even cared? But ugh, tears, were they really necessary? And oh look now Teddy was walking into the room and he was blond and not green anymore, and what was going on?

The last thing he remembered was—oh right, fighting aliens and saving the Young Avengers' ungrateful asses from a bazillion stupid alien laser-bullets, and a lot of blood and pain and... Billy crying? And wait, Billy was crying again?

"Get off me, ya moron," Tommy grumbled, trying to shove Billy away from him. "I don't do hugs. Or tears. Go glomp your Teddy Bear over there, that's what he's for, right?"

"Har har," Teddy said, coming over and placing a tray on the coffee table, with a glass of water, a bowl of soup and a plate of toast. "I see somebody's feeling better."

"Gimmegimmegimme," Tommy said eagerly, leaning half off the couch to try and reach the tray, only that Billy was still holding on to him and keeping him pinned down, but then he finally let go and wiped his face with a sleeve, and now Tommy's shoulder was all wet from Kaplan's tears, but it didn't really matter because food and water, and water had never tasted so sweet and soup and toast had never tasted so damn good.

It was gone in the blink of an eye—well, the blink of an eye for Billy and Teddy, anyway.

"Sowhat'sthedealdidwewin?I'massumingwewonbecausewe'reallstillalive," Tommy said, licking the buttery crumbs from his fingers. "Heydoyouhaveanymoreofthatsoup?NevermindI'llgogetsome."

And then he was up off the couch and starting to leave the room—and then the world was swaying around him and his legs were buckling, and Teddy was catching him in those large strong arms and just ugh this sucked.

"Tommy!" Billy cried.

"Whoadizzy," Tommy moaned, as Teddy held him steady. "FeelalllightlikeI'mgonnacrumbletodustandblowawayorsomething."

"And yet you can still talk a few thousand miles a second," Teddy remarked wryly, helping Tommy back over to the bed and sitting him down. "But you lost a lot of blood, so your blood sugar is really low, so it's probably better if you take it slow for a bit."

"Sit tight, I'll go get some more soup," Billy offered, running off to the kitchen.

"Takeitslow?Doyouevenknowwhoyou'retalkingto?"

"And by the way," Teddy said, crossing his arms as he looked down severely at the speedster. "Don't ever do that again."

"Dowhatagain?Talkreallyfast?Orrytogogetmyselfsomethingtoeatfromthekitchen?BecauseI'mprettysureIcan'tdoanythingaboutthefirstone,andthesecond—"

"No," Teddy said, slowly and carefully, lips pursed in a frown. "Almost get yourself killed. I have never seen Billy so freaked out."

"Should'veseenhimwhenyougotkidnapped," Tommy shrugged, because really how was Billy freaking out not normal? And why the hell was Teddy still glaring at him? If anything bad happened to Teddy then Billy would no doubt freak out even more than he'd apparently freaked out over Tommy, so really Teddy couldn't speak, the hypocrite.

But Teddy was still glaring at him. "Seriously," he said, "After he saved you, Billy wished all the aliens out of existence, and I can't even imagine what he would have done if you'd died, instead of, you know, almost died."

"You're welcome," Tommy drawled, enunciating slowly, "For, you know, saving all your lives in a split second."

If Tommy hadn't done what he'd done, they would all be dead, and it's not like he had another option or any time to come up with anything because he literally had like less than a second and there was like a bazillion bullets, and if he hadn't saved them then Billy would never be able to freak out again, so really what was the problem?

"And you know what, Altman?" Tommy continued, "You can just shut up right now, because we both know that I would do it again in a heartbeat."

Teddy at least had the grace to look slightly abashed, but before he could apologize or continue berating or whatever he planned to do, Billy was walking back into the room with more soup and Tommy said, "YouknowIhatebeingpamperedlikethisugh," which was about the closest he'd let himself come to saying 'thank you,' and he made a disgusted face that was there and gone probably before they even saw it, before Tommy dug in, because damn was he starving, and this low blood sugar thing really sucked and he needed to be able to run again without feeling like he was going to pass out because not being able to run made him feel weak and helpless and pathetic and he hated that feeling.

"I feel disgusting," Tommy announced, the bowl now empty and back on the tray, as he glanced down at himself and made a face, because his brother had been understating things when he'd said that Tommy's outfit was bloody and tattered. "I call first shower, because I shower fastest, and you are both snails and spend like an hour in the shower—and oh hey that rhymed!—okay?Okay."

And then Tommy was gone, and there was a bang! as he stumbled and crashed into the bathroom counter. "Thatwasn'tme!Itwascompletelythesink'sfault!"

Tommy's shower took less than a minute.

When he came out, clean and dressed in a pair of Billy's jeans and one of Billy's Avenger t-shirts, he looked infinitely better. His skin was still a bit paler than usual, but it was no longer caked with blood, and his hair was once again a pure silver-white, and stuck up in crazy spikes from him drying it super fast with a towel. He smelled of jasmine shampoo.

"All yours, little brother," Tommy said, waving his hand vaguely at the open bathroom door, steam wafting into the hallway.

"Hey, that's one of my favorite shirts!" Billy griped, glaring.

Tommy snorted. "Of course it is. It has Thor on it. Now go take a shower, you stink, and you're covered in my blood."

Sighing, Billy shot one last glare at his twin, before heading into the bathroom.

Teddy was showering in the other bathroom down the hall, so Billy didn't rush his own shower, taking the time to get himself fully clean, and then taking some more time just standing under the hot stream of water and letting it relax his tense muscles.

By the time he dried off and got dressed in sweatpants and another of his favorite Avengers t-shirts (that of course also had Thor on it), his exhaustion from battling the aliens and healing his brother had completely caught up with him, and he found that Tommy had apparently changed the sheets, since the other ones had gotten blood on them, and now Tommy was fast asleep half on the bed, his legs dangling off, as if he'd simply sat down on the edge of the bed waiting, but had eventually accidentally leaned backwards against the mattress and nodded off.

Billy smiled slightly. "Where my phone?" he mumbled to himself, looking around his room. "I need a picture of this."

He was in the process of digging through his backpack when Teddy padded into the room.

"What're you doing?" Teddy asked, leaning on the door frame and watching as Billy huffed and shoved the backpack back into his closet, before standing up and crossing over to search the clutter on his desk.

"Phone," Billy answered. He gestured to his white-haired twin on the bed. "Photo. I've never seen Tommy sleep before. Who knows when or where he usually sleeps. I should probably ask him. Maybe I left my phone downstairs?"

"Leave it," Teddy said, walking over to the bed and picking Tommy up, shifting the speedster so that he was lying fully on the bed, and in the right direction. "I don't think Tommy would appreciate you taking a photo of him sleeping. He'd think you were a stalker or something. Besides," Teddy gave a small, tired smile, "I think he has the right idea. I'm downright exhausted. That battle was intense."

"Yeah," Billy agreed, stumbling over and climbing onto his bed, settling down next to his twin. He patted the bed on his other side, and Teddy lay down beside him and immediately became Billy's pillow.

Tommy, seeming to unconsciously sense their body heat, rolled over in his sleep and snuggled against his brother's side.

"Whatthehell?!" Tommy yelped, as he woke up and realized that he was half draped over his twin's chest with Billy's arm around him, while Billy himself was using Teddy as a pillow, and no way did Tommy want to be involved in their snuggle-fest. He jerked away from them and tumbled onto the floor with a thump! which succeeded in completely waking up the two lovebirds, if they hadn't already been woken by Tommy's shout.

"Tommy, what?" Billy groaned, rolling over to the side of the bed to look down at his twin as Tommy scrambled to his feet. "Did you have to wake up and wake us up too? It's the middle of the night."

It was, too, Tommy realized, as he dashed across the dark room to glance out the curtains and see the moon hanging suspended in the dark violet sky, and the digital clock on Billy's dresser read: 3:26:54 AM.

"Yeah, Tommy, go back to sleep," Teddy grumbled from the other side of the bed.

"I didn't mean to fall asleep in the first place," Tommy huffed, whizzing over to the closet to see if Billy had a pair of running shoes he could steal. "Especially not in Billy's bed, and especially not cuddling with you two, because that is totally awkward."

"Oh come on," Billy said, pushing himself onto his elbows. "This is perfectly chaste and platonic cuddling."

"I don't do any cuddling," Tommy said, finding a pair of running shoes, black with red laces, and then zooming over to Billy's dresser to look for a pair of socks, preferably socks that matched.

"You're cuddly when you're asleep," Billy pointed out, and Tommy turned his head to glare at his twin, before grabbing a pair of socks and shutting the dresser, pulling the socks and shoes onto his feet.

"Hey," Billy called, as Tommy turned to leave, "Where do you usually sleep? Like, where do you stay? Where do you go home to?"

Tommy stilled at the question, pausing half a moment, before scoffing, "Who needs a home?"

"Tommy—" Billy started, but Tommy was already gone, a streak in the night that stirred up leaves with a cold gust of wind and left the sound of phantom footsteps a couple minutes behind him.

THE END.

Kind of an unsatisfying ending, I know XP But it felt like the right place, and I just wanted to keep this fic nice and short.

If anybody read this (there's like practically nobody in this fandom!), I'd love to hear your thoughts!