Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When Sue says she wants Reed to meet her little brother, he’s nervous. Which Ben claims to find silly, because Johnny Storm is thirteen years old and kids that age can be pretty easy to get along with- and because Johnny is as interested in space as his sister and fascinated by mechanics, all which are conversations Reed can sufficiently carry out.

The problem is, Reed is concerned that Johnny won’t like him. He loves Sue, and Johnny is basically her only family member. There are no parents that Reed can win over with flowers. It’s just Johnny. 

He brings flowers anyway because Sue likes the yellow roses, and he raises his fist to bang three times against the door. Rain patters around him, hitting the concrete in steady droplets, but beneath it he hears the faint hurried thud of footsteps racing across the floor.

There’s no mistaking that Johnny is Sue’s brother. They both share the same piercing blue eyes and light blonde hair, but faint freckles dust his cheeks and nose, and his face is softer where Sue’s is sharper. He’s smaller than Reed was expecting, perhaps he thinks that because the shirt Johnny is wearing hangs off his shoulders. He cracks the door just enough to look out, his hand gripping the edge to make stop Reed from slipping through.

“Hey,” Johnny greets, eyes glancing over Reed in a quick once-over. “You’re Reed.”

“I am. You’re Johnny.”

The blond’s eyes squint slightly. “Uh huh.” His gaze flicks to the bouquet in Reed’s hands and his eyes linger for a short moment, but then he steps aside and opens the door wider to allow Reed to fit through without a word.

“Johnny-“ Sue starts in a chiding tone from where she’s walked up to her brother in the doorway, but blinks when Reed steps inside. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Reed echoes with a small smile, his breath momentarily knocked out of his lungs. Sue Storm tends to have that effect on him. Even his mental image cannot compare to her now in front of his eyes- short blonde hair curled above her shoulders and a blue and white dotted dress that matches the shade of her eyes.

She spots the bouquet in his hands, her lips slipping into a grin before she turns to Johnny. “Go finish your homework.”

“But Reed is here.” Johnny protests, pouting. “It’d be rude to-“

“Excuses, excuses.” She waves him off. Johnny lets out an exaggerated groan, throwing his head back before stomping toward the stairs with all the drama of a teenager dismissed.

“For you,” He holds the roses out with careful precision, and she takes them delicately, her fingers brushing his. She holds them up to her nose and inhales.

Rising onto her toes, she presses a soft kiss to his cheek. “Thank you. They’re beautiful, Reed, really. Let me find a vase.”

He watches her turn and head towards the kitchen.

“Sorry it’s a bit of a mess.” She calls out as Reed hangs his jacket on the coat stand, some of the weather clings to the shoulders of his shirt. “I got back home from work late and well Johnny- he tidies sometimes, to a teenage boy’s standard of clean.”

“It doesn’t matter to me.” He replies and gets a little snort for his efforts.

“I know it does.” She knows him too well to be anything other than correct. His fingers itch to rearrange the pillows strewn on the couch and the glass on the wooden coffee table instead of on the coast nags the back of his mind.

Walking up behind her, he presses his lips to her temple. It grounds him in her presence. “Not in any way that matters.”

Sue hums in response, content and assured.

Johnny Storm is a talker.

“You’re not allowed to go to space without me.” Johnny declares and narrows his eyes; Sue chews a mouthful of pasta with a barely hidden smile. “You didn’t even want to be an astronaut before you met him!”

A fork gets jabbed in Reed’s direction.

“It’s… quite far away from becoming a reality.” Reed offers while his eyes flit between the two. The intention was for it to be a reassuring clarification but instead it comes off his lips sounding like an intervention. Though, neither of them pays him any mind.

“I’ll bring you back a rock from Mars.” Sue teases and Johnny goes a little red in the face. “You should see his room.” She adds to Reed.

“You’re the worst.” Johnny grumbles, with no real bite.

Sue rolls her eyes. “Oh, shush. Reed is more of a nerd than you are.”

“I’m not a nerd.” Johnny claims, quick and defensive. “And space is just cool.”

“You’ve always been interested in space?” Reed asks, his head tilting slightly.

Johnny shrugs. “Who wouldn’t be?”

Sue’s smile softens, and dabs at the corner of her mouth with a napkin. “He sat outside for hours when he was smaller, just waiting to see a comet to make a wish. Caught a cold right after too.”

“Why are you telling embarrassing stories of me? He’s your boyfriend. What about the time you went to the mall and-”

“What did you wish for?” Reed cuts in.

“A better sister.” Johnny deadpans. “Didn’t work.”

“You can’t fix what isn’t broken, little brother.”

They tease, but they never come near the line of teasing too much.

Sue has only praised Johnny. He’s a good boy, Reed. He tries to make it so much easier for me. He made me dinner the other night. Eggs on toast. I couldn’t decide whether to be grateful the house was in one piece, or if I wanted to smother him in a hug.

And Reed didn’t expect less. Not from Sue’s care. She’s the best example for a child to grow up with. But he figured the other factors would have more of an effect on Johnny. His circumstances up until now? Terrible. However, the boy is well-mannered and well… happy.

Glancing at Sue, a warmth settles in his chest at witnessing this side of her. The side that piles her brother’s plate high with food, that dresses up with her best clothes when attending a parent-teacher conference, the glint in her eyes when she teases him back and forth.

In the corner of his eye, he spots Sue getting ready to collect their empty plates.

“I’ll wash up.” He states, already reaching for Sue’s plate.

“No, please, let me,” Sue says and glances pointedly towards Johnny while the boy is busy scraping at the sauce remaining on his plate. Right, of course. She’s providing him opportunity to have a meaningful conversation with Johnny without her supervision. She collects their plates, stacking them on top of each other before taking Johnny’s from out under his nose. The boy lets out a startled ‘hey!’ despite there really being nothing for him to do to the plate.

Reed feels bad watching her head towards the kitchen to clean up their mess after cooking, but it slips from his mind when he looks back to find Johnny’s wide-eyed stare. If he’s happy that his sister left him in his situation, Reed can’t really tell. He thought they had been getting along prior to Sue leaving.

“So,” He starts, searching his brain to pick from the numerous conversation starters he thinks Johnny would be interested in. Perhaps his plans to invent the world’s first flying car, or his research on the exoplanet outside of their solar system. “Sue said you were doing homework.”

By the look on Johnny’s face, he hadn’t been expecting that. Not particularly interesting for him to discuss.

“Oh, yeah. It’s boring stuff. Analysis of poems.” His face scrunches up as he says it. “It’s okay, I guess.”

“I wasn’t fond of that either.” Reed says. “Do you prefer maths?”

He already knows the answer. Johnny links his hands on the table and glances down at them. “Yeah, I’m not very good at it though.”

That’s not true. Sue often praises Johnny’s intelligence, his high scores on every test especially maths and physics, and his English results are near perfect too. He remembers her beaming after he picked her up from Johnny’s parents meeting- she hadn’t even noticed the weird looks people send her for turning up (as if they expected Franklin Storm to make an appearance) this time. And then she’d asked if they could stop at a store so that she could buy him a cake. Unless this is a very recent development, he’s not sure what standard Johnny is comparing himself to.

“I’ve heard about your results,” Reed states and blinks in confusion when Johnny scowls. “You excel at it. You’re top of your class.”

Johnny mutters something, head tilted down so that Reed can’t read his lips, but he manages to make out the faint words.

Sue was better.

Ah.

Reed wants to say that by no means should Johnny be doing as well as he is in his academic life, not when his life has been so busy already. Not having a secure residence and routine lifestyle has been shown to stunt psychological development, and even when Sue turned eighteen years old it took time to convince their father to give her legal guardianship. From living with their father, to their aunt, to with Sue. Though he knows it wouldn’t be appreciated.

“I could help you, if you wanted me to.” He offers.

“Sue already helps me.” Johnny answers. “You don’t need to.”

“No,” Reed agrees. He suspects Johnny rarely needs his sister’s help either. “But I wouldn’t mind.”

Blue eyes stare at him. A familiar shade that Reed is used to seeing. If he’s looking for deceit, he won’t find it, and Reed assumes he comes to that conclusion when he eventually looks away with a shrug.

With the sudden quietness, Reed can hear the water rushing faintly from the tap in the kitchen and the clank of a plate being put onto a rack.

“You like my sister, right?” Johnny asks eventually.

“I love her.”

“She deserves someone good. Really good. Nobody can be better than her, but you should be pretty close. Don’t tell her I said that.” Johnny says, and Reed thinks this is the ‘talk’ Ben was referring to when he said it might happen. The blond leans forward, eyes squinting menacingly. As harmless as he seems, a threat shines bright in the ocean of his eyes- a protective streak that overcomes the softness of his features. “I don’t care if you’re a genius or whatever, are you going to be the best to her?”

“Yes.” Reed answers simply, because that’s the truth. Susan Storm… well, she’s everything. From the moment she chose to speak to him, to give him her attention, he knew that he was the luckiest man to have her and he would be the biggest fool to let her go- and Reed prided himself on being the opposite to an idiot.

The blond’s mouth twists as he seemingly swallows his words last second.

Johnny sighs, a little pink in the cheeks, before saying, “Promise?”

Reed outstretches a hand, and curls all his fingers to his palm except his pinkie finger. He gets a raised brow as a response, and maybe Reed isn’t the best with kids, but still, Johnny wraps his finger around Reed’s in a tight grip with a very slight curve to the corner of his lips. That’s what Sue walks in on.

Johnny clears his throat and leans back in his chair. “He’s alright.”

“I’m glad he has your approval, baby brother.” Sue says amusedly, and Johnny sticks his tongue out at her. She turns to Reed, with her eyebrows drawn upwards. “He didn’t torment you too much?”

A healthy amount, but Reed can’t bring himself to joke yet when they’ve just formed a fragile alliance. “Not at all.”

Not long after, Sue makes a quiet comment being tired. Reed presumes Johnny hears, because the boy lets out a loud yawn and picks himself up and away from the dining table, putting an end to their little gathering.

“Thanks, sis.” Johnny calls out and he walks by Sue to get to the stairway. She shoots out a hand to scruff up his hair, and Johnny scrambles into a sprint to dart up the stairs; Sue chuckles at his sudden disappearance, and Reed watches him go without an ounce of tiredness in his limbs.

The room submerges into black as Sue flips the lamp’s switch. The warm orange glow disappears.

“How did it go?” Sue asks into the darkness of her room, pulling the covers up to her chest.

“Well. I think. He gave me a talk.”

Sue snorts. “That’s Johnny for you. He’s just trying to be protective.”

Reed hums into the darkness of their room and finds her hand on top of the covers to tangle their fingers together. I’m glad someone is looking out for you, especially when you look out for everyone else. He will do right by Sue Storm, and if any way he fails… he won’t deserve her. However, Reed thinks of Johnny: all wide bright eyes, pale freckled skin, blond hair tousled across his forehead, someone who barely fits into his clothes and has been let down by so many people in his life- and Reed thinks, I will do right by you too.

“He was nervous to meet you too, even if he didn’t show it.” Nervous? Reed wouldn’t have thought he was nervous. After all, he did get threatened. “I think he pictures you as a celebrity in his head. I’m surprised he wasn’t asking you a dozen questions on your work.”

“Oh.” A celebrity? “I would’ve answered them.”

“He’s quite shy, if you can believe it.”

Reed supposes he can. He remembers the feeling of the tone shifting as soon as Sue departed and left the boy in Reed’s presence.

“I’m glad the two of you got along.” Sue says, with a sigh.

So am I.

Introducing Ben and Johnny isn’t at all like an introduction. It takes five minutes before the pair are kicking each other’s legs under the table with carefully blank faces while Sue asks Reed and Ben (though, almost entirely Reed) questions written neatly in her notebook. When she eventually does ask Ben another question, the table shakes as he chokes halfway through his sentence. Johnny innocently slurps through the straw of his milkshake.

“What was that, Ben?” The younger blond asks.

Ben clears his throat, hands folding tightly on the table to resist reaching for his injured leg.

Sue references this as the worst decision of her life.

While Sue and Reed study and discuss subjects that fall on the others’ deaf ears, Ben orders two more milkshakes and challenges Johnny to see who can finish it first. Reed almost wants to take notes. Ben has already won Johnny over, it’s genius really.

The good thing about Johnny and Ben getting along so well is that it means Sue has a babysitter. Usually Johnny comes along to almost everything, every outing to the diner, study session, and all of the above. It’s no problem- Reed has never had an issue with it, but it just means that him and Sue can have some time to themselves. A romantic dinner isn’t exactly romantic with a teenager beside you.

Personally, Reed thinks Johnny is mature enough to spend an afternoon alone, which Johnny also loudly protests (though he doesn’t sound very appalled when he finds out Ben will be staying with him), but Sue prefers if he has someone with him. Just in case. At the end of the day, he is still only a thirteen year old.

“We’ll be fine, Suzie.” Ben says, and bumps Reed lightly with his elbow. “The two of you take a break, I’ll keep the kid in check.”

“Uh huh.” Sue replies. “Because I’m only worried about him. Please don’t burn my apartment down.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Ben wraps Johnny up in a loose chokehold and ruffles his fist through the boy’s blond curls. “Right, kid?”

“Not a kid.” Johnny replies, shoving at Ben’s arms with a grin pulling at his lips.

Sue watches on biting lightly on the inside of her cheek. She loops an arm through Reed’s. “Okay, well… be good.”

Johnny and Ben stand side by side in the middle of the living room, eyes wide and Johnny’s smile way too large for his face. Sue’s eyes immediately narrow and scan over the apartment. An overly floral scent hits Reed’s nose and he cringes.

Obviously something is off.

Sue walks up to Johnny, bending down slightly to tidy up the jacket thrown over his shoulders and pauses to rub at a dark smudge. Johnny remains very still, almost as if he's holding his breath. “Why do you smell like smoke?”

“Because-“ Johnny starts, but catches Ben’s eyes over Reed’s shoulder. The older man’s shoulders raise up to his ears and he presses a hand over his face- which drops with remarkable speed when Sue casts him a glance. “I tried a new cologne.”

Sue hums disbelievingly. “Have you two eaten?”

“No.” Ben answers as Johnny says, “Yes.”

There’s a drawn out moment of silence.

“Benjamin Grimm.” Is all Sue says, with a withering glare as she marches off to the kitchen to investigate the evidence of the assumed disaster.

“…You’re a good cook.” Reed states confusedly.

“In my defence, I wasn’t the one cooking.” Ben answers, his voice low. Reed’s mouth shapes into an ‘o’. Arguably, that’s the opposite to a defence. “I was showing him how to make pizza. How did we mess up pizza? What are the chances she kills me?”

“Um.” Well.

Reed has never known Johnny to have a temper that causes him to snap and shout at his sister. He gets angry, of course, but it burns out faster than it flares. The teenage boy gets frustrated more than anything, and he screws up his face and crosses his arms and mutters under his breath. 

So, it’s hard to picture the screaming match Sue had described to him in his head. He never yells at me like that. I know he doesn’t mean it. Not really, I hope. He wasn’t even making sense, and he said… he said I was disappearing like our dad. I’m not, am I?

“I’m already late and-“ Her face screws up, and she presses the heel of her palm into her eye. “I would stay, you know I would, but I need to go to this. God, I feel like I’ve failed him. I didn’t even notice he was failing- I could’ve helped him-“

“We’ll be okay.” Reed reassures, rubbing a hand up and down her arm.  The blue of her eyes shine with welled up tears that she stubbornly blinks away. “I’ll speak to him, I’ll handle this.”

“Okay,” Her eyes flutter shut. “Okay.”

She doesn’t move for a short moment.

“Your flight.” Reed reminds gently. Though it feels insufficient. Sue tries- she has been trying her best every day. She is not a failure. Not everything that goes wrong is her fault. Sue takes a deep breath and springs into action, opening the car door.

“Call me,” She says, stepping out while Reed’s hand reaches for the empty space she's left behind. His heart aches for her. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

When Reed gets to Sue and Johnny’s apartment, he closes the door behind him a little loudly so that hopefully Johnny knows he’s there and maybe, though it’s wishful thinking, that he’ll come down to talk. It then occurs to Reed that it could’ve sounded angry, so he busies himself in silence flipping through a book on blackholes and the words barely register in his brain.

But it gets late, and Johnny has school tomorrow and Reed has work so there won't be much time for any talking in the morning.

His knocks go unanswered. The wise decision would be to turn away, since he is not welcomed and his presence will very likely be negatively received, but Reed inches the door open anyway and waits for any exclamations. When he gets none, he steps inside of the dimly lit room.

Johnny is curled over his desk, his head in his hands and blond hair sticking upwards like he’s been running his hands through it over and over.

“I just want to talk.” Reed announces softly, standing in the doorway with his hands raised placatingly- though Johnny isn't looking.

“I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t have to talk to you.”

“I know, Johnny. But it will help, whatever has you so worked up-“

A blond head of hair whips up, red rimmed eyes locking onto Reed. “What do you think has me so worked up? I failed three tests.”

Reed doesn't flinch, and steps into the room. At a loss of where to sit, he settles lightly on the edge on Johnny's behind him. “I know that you’re better than that. If you were struggling, why didn’t you ask for help?”

“Am I better than that, or I didn’t ask for help. Which is it?”

Reed hesitates. “Neither.”

“Get out.”

“Johnny, I only want to understand-“

“You’re not muh-muh-“ Johnny’s face twists up in rage, his fingernails digging into his palms as the words get muddled up in his mouth and refuse to leave his brain. Reed keeps his mouth shut, his face passive to avoid giving anything for Johnny to somehow possibly interpret as mocking. “You’re not my dad.” He eventually spits out and looks off to the side, shame burning his cheeks.

“I know,” Reed replies quietly.

“You’ll be gone soon anyway.” Johnny states angrily while staring at the wall, fists clenched in his lap. “Then there’ll be someone else, and then someone else, and Sue will move out-“

“I don’t want to leave.” Reed interrupts, his words raw. “I like it here, with your sister, with you.”

‘Like’ doesn’t even begin to cover it. It feels like Reed has finally found his corner, his people, who understand him and still love him because of it, and that there’s no one else in the world that is better than Sue Storm. Johnny’s words pierce through his chest like daggers and summon a wave of anxiety because it’s a fear he shares too. That he’ll lose this. He’ll never have Sue in his arms anymore, or see Johnny and Ben pulling faces at each other across the diner table when they think no one is looking, or see Johnny’s eyes light up when Reed shows him one of his diagrams.

“You’ll like it better somewhere else. You know, when you, Sue and Ben leave me here.”

Reed wishes for Ben’s ability to always know what the right thing to say is. He wishes that it was Ben here, not him, not Reed Richards who typically came off as cold and uncaring. Ben had formed a tighter bond with Johnny despite Reed being the one that should be closer. He’s not jealous, but all of this time he’s spent with Johnny- has he been doing something wrong? Not trying hard enough? Ben makes it look so easy, to joke, to play, to be gentle.

“I heard you.” Johnny says in Reed’s silence. “At the conference, you said five years."

Reed’s mouth goes dry. He remembers the exact moment. It hadn’t even occurred him to take note of Johnny’s presence- or that what he was saying was something Johnny should know prior and not find out with a crowd. “I did. It’s likely to be longer, with hurdles such as finances and workers and… it was only an estimate.”

Johnny scoffs. Reed feels the tips of his ear run warm, ashamed at his own words. Not even excuses. Empty reassurances. Of course he can’t account for sudden delays, but he’s taken into account every common interference that may happen and ran the numbers for those too. They should be ready to go in no more than 1879 days.

“I’m not smart enough to keep up with Sue or you, so I just- what’s the point in trying? And Sue didn’t notice, and I thought that she must know that too-“

Oh.

“Johnny.”

“So just leave me alone now.”

Oh.

“Johnny.” Reed snaps, resisting grabbing a hold of Johnny’s shoulders and shaking him. “Your sister thinks the world of you, don’t be foolish. And it was never my intention to make you feel like we were abandoning you.”

“But you are. I don’t want to be alone again. I don’t want to live with my dad, or my aunt.” Johnny rubs a hand down his face, holding it there. His voice trembles. “Can you leave? Can you get out, please?”

In the past year of knowing him, Reed has only seen Johnny come close to crying.

"Johnny?" Reed asks, eyebrows furrowed as he turns his head to glance at the blond standing behind the couch, standing in the darkness shadowed away from the television's light. 

The boy doesn't respond, head tilted down, and Reed looks awkwardly to the side waiting- but the silence only stretches. "Are you alright?" He eventually asks, concern stirring in his chest.

He gets up and rounds the couch to approach Johnny, who still keeps his head firmly rooted down. Crouching on one knee, Reed tries to catch a glimpse of Johnny’s face to see what the issue is. Is he hurt? Is he scared? Is this a joke?

"I tried to fix him, bu-but it's- it's just not the same." Johnny says, voice uncharacteristically quiet.

At this, Reed follows his gaze down to the small object clutched in Johnny's little hands. A piece of white sticks out beneath his fingers, and Reed takes note of the visor- an astronaut figure, he gathers. Johnny seems reluctant to let go, the figure held tightly in his hands as he refuses to reveal the extent of the damage to Reed.

Gently, he pries Johnny's fingers away from the figure and narrowly avoids dropping an arm to the ground.

It's... well, he has a handful of plastic limbs. All pulled apart. Not the type of damage that can happen from simply dropping the toy. Johnny clearly didn't pull it apart, and Reed is desperate to ask what- or who, did this. He can see where Johnny tried to fix it by pushing the limbs back into their joints but it's too disfigured to fit back properly so they easily fall out.

"It's an easy fix," Reed concludes, resting a hand on Johnny's shoulder with a smile. 

"Yeah?" Johnny finally lifts his head, and Reed is faced with bloodshot glossy eyes. Maybe it’s the light from the television glinting in his eyes and making it seem worse, but that doesn’t account for the gut-wrenched look on his face. 

For a second, Reed’s mind goes frighteningly blank.
 
With his hand holding the astronaut, he wipes his thumb across the dirty helmet- smudging some of it away.

"Good as new." He promises. 

A shaky breath falls from Johnny's lips and a tiny smile curls at the corners. "Okay. Okay, thank you."

“I don’t want you to be alone either.”

Johnny sniffles against his hand. “Get out, Reed. This is my room.”

And that's it. That's the end. Reed should leave. He has no right to stay and keep Johnny cornered like this. But he can't find it in himself to turn away when the tears pooled in Johnny's eyes begin to slip out over his cheeks and he whimpers quietly with suppressed sobs. So, he takes a risk.

He reaches a tentative hand out to the back of Johnny’s chair and turns it around, making the boy face him. Johnny covers up his face, blond tufts hanging over his eyes, and Reed pulls him gently off the chair and into his side as the first cry escapes from Johnny’s lips.

Johnny lets himself be tugged, almost collapsing into Reed’s side with the force of his own grief. Wrapping his arms around him, Reed lets Johnny cry himself out. He holds him just enough to let him know I’m here, I’m not going anywhere.

Reed doesn’t solve his problems with words. He solves them with a piece of chalk and a blackboard. But this? This seems to be working.

“This i-is so not cool,” Johnny mumbles wetly into Reed’s shirt, and Reed pats him twice on the back.

“I’ve been thinking,” Reed starts when Johnny has quietened down. "Me and Sue have discussed it. You have a clever mind, and five years is a lot of time.”

Johnny leans back, his eyebrows drawn together. "And?"

"And we could use another person on the Excelsior."

"What?"

Chapter Text

Reed pulls the sheet covering the stands off, raising a cloud of dust.

The suits are still held on the stands. Irrationally, he thought- or more accurately hoped, that they would be gone. But, of course not. They’re the exact same sight from that fateful moment. The moment that irreversibly ruined the ideal course for all of their lives, a singular moment that would never allow them to experience a day the same way again. Preserved and seemingly glorified in Reed's laboratory to anyone else's eyes.

Seeing them again makes his heart beat loud and fast in his ears. The panic, the shock, the confusion, the fear- it strikes him in the chest so suddenly, like he’s back in the ship. He ought to have gotten past this by now. Lingering in the past’s mistakes is a pointless practice when that time could be dedicated to creating a solution.

He should’ve burned them. The others don’t want to be reminded of what happened, and ideally neither does he- though, it’s impossible to try and ignore the memories when he lays eyes on Ben and hears a helmet cracking and splitting (like Reed built it out of plastic) in the back of his mind. When he sees Johnny lighting his hand on fire and his mind flashes back to a black helmet hiding Johnny’s face, and his suit burning away from fire that the extinguisher can’t reach.

If they saw this, they’d be horrified. He can’t imagine Sue’s face if she saw their suits. It could be reminiscent of the wide-eyed terror and her lips parted in silent cries when she wakes up from a nightmare, and Reed wishes more than anything that he could undo the pain that finds her in her sleep.

And Ben… Reed isn’t sure that he wouldn’t hate him if he already doesn't despite what he says: I need time. When is it enough? How long until Ben gets over his grief and resentment, unless something changes?

Reed folds the sheet neatly and places it on top of a desk and turns around, finding the stool he had left the night before. He picks up the same pencil, and puts lead to the page to return to improving the latest versions of their Fantastic Four suits- the previous ones had been vulnerable to fire above 1125 degrees Fahrenheit, too closely fitted for Ben’s movements, and Reed’s sleeves had ripped off after extending past fifty centimetres.

If it takes a hundred trial and errors, so be it. These will be perfect.

His biggest failures loom in the shadows of the laboratory over his shoulder, always creeping in the corners of his mind with every pencil stroke. Fireproof, stretchproof, bulletproof, resistant to cosmic forces… yet Reed can’t escape the thought that there’s something that is unforeseen. 

Obviously finding a cure is his top priority. If he created a cure then they wouldn’t even need suits, but it’s the least he can do to make sure Ben is as comfortable as possible till then, and Johnny needs a material that can withstand regular combustion to keep up with his mood that isn’t asbestos. Exposure to cosmic radiation is bad enough, Reed doesn’t want to increase the risk for cancer.

Soon enough, these suits will be gathering dust too once they lose their abilities. The rest of the world will shame them for it, but the public never knew exactly what happened on that ship. The main point of their focus is that they came back as heroes.

He’s never really sure if Sue is awake when he leaves the lab and enters their bedroom. She appears to be, but she’s too quiet and too still, so unlike her recent sleep patterns that it’s almost too good to be true.

He doesn’t tend to get much sleep anymore. It could become detrimental to his progress if it persists, but he needs to make the most of the day and night- progress requires sacrifices after all, and sleeping pills can take away that precious time and effect his ability to work.

Quietly, he slips into the bed beside her.

“You’re in there for so long.” Sue says without turning, making him jolt.

“I had work to do.” Reed replies, and then for good measure: “I’m sorry.”

“Did you eat dinner?”

“I did.” He tells her. Not exactly the truth she’s looking for, but not also not a lie. When Herbie had brough the plate into his lab he’d picked at it until it went cold and then forgot about it entirely.

Sue knows him too well- he sometimes wonders if she knows him better than he knows himself, and something in her tone tells him that she knows exactly what he’s left out.

“Good.” She pauses. “The boys miss seeing you. I miss you. It’s like you’re barely here, Reed. And I’m the one that can disappear.”

He cannot let himself dwell on it- that he would welcome Johnny’s usual antics that he would otherwise consider irritating under normal circumstances.

“Once I find a solution, everything will go back to the way it was. I just need more time.”

“Do you really think that?” Sue questions, voice quiet but steady. “What if this is our new normal?”

Have they lost faith in him entirely? No. He can fix this. All he needs is that one breakthrough.

“I promise,” He declares, and presses a soft kiss to her temple. She is still facing away from him. “Just try to sleep, alright?”

Reed is wide awake when Sue shoots upright, gasping.

Sue is- she’s gone. A second ago, she’d been in her seat and now all that’s left is empty space in a blink of an eye. She’s gone, and Reed doesn’t know where she went, and everything hurts. There’s a burning, agonising pain rooted deeper than his bones and his nerves that no amount of writhing can make more bearable- but his mind strays slightly away from the pain to think: Sue, Sue, Sue.

He can hear her. He can hear her screaming in his ear like she’s right there in the seat beside him, but she’s not. She sounds like she’s dying, Reed feels like he is, but the gap between them is too big and his hand reaches out helplessly. So many regrets, so many wishes- Johnny is too young to die, Reed promised him this would be the best moment of his life- not the last, and Ben who has always been there for Reed.

Fabric rips-

Sue reappears.

His hand lands on something solid. The curve of her shoulder. She flickers back into sight, bright blue eyes meeting his, her skin fading for a brief second to reveal her skeleton before reappearing.

“I’m going to go wake up Johnny,” Sue says, scrubbing a hand across her face. “For breakfast.”

He knows the real reason behind it, but he chooses not to mention it to her. On rare occasions does she become so lost in her head that he needs to reassure her, most of the time she just needs to lay eyes on Johnny. Whether that’s by cracking open his door to see that he’s still there and breathing, or otherwise.

“Ben! Johnny!” Sue cries, fumbling for the buckles securing the belts across her body. When she struggles for too long, she begins to fight them with growing intensity. “Johnny!!”

“You should come.” She adds. “Your work can wait for less than an hour.”

But Ben. But Johnny. But that is an hour wasted, but she’s staring at him, and he supposes he can give her this.

Johnny doesn’t look pleased at his sister’s decision to wake him, there are dark circles beneath his eyes which is evidence that he hasn’t been sleeping anyway. Reed knew this. Sue tells him that Ben and Johnny are both worried about each other, their neighbouring rooms don’t have thick enough walls to hide outbursts in the middle of the night. That makes the four of them as not sleeping.

The feeling of sitting down at the dinner table is what Reed imagines walking into a court would feel like.

The conversation is stilted, awkward where they try to fill in the gaps of silence with mundane topics- effectively dodging around the huge elephant in the room. Reed doesn’t speak much, if at all other than greetings and pleasantries- he simply has nothing of meaning to say. There is no new development to inform them of, therefore he keeps his mouth shut and lets their voices wash over him.

At some point, Sue chuckles and Reed realises how much he has missed that sound. Johnny laughs, his head propped up lazily against his hand. 

The tablecloth catches on fire.

“Woah.” The blond says and quickly lifts his hands off the table, fanning at the fire spreading across the table over to Sue.

She pushes away from the table and stands, and white smoke sprays onto the table, over all the food, and sending them all into a small coughing fit. Herbie lowers the fire extinguisher held between his pinchers.

“Aw. That was some good stuff, Johnny.” Ben groans, frowning at the plates. Similarly, Johnny finds himself pouting at his plate and shaking the remaining sparks on his hands out.

“I guess I should fireproof the tablecloth too.” Reed says with a furrow to his brows. He’s been avoiding fireproofing everything- because this is only a temporary issue. There’s no point tackling the small problems like fireproof tablecloths when solving the bigger problem also solves the smaller problems.

Johnny’s shoulders raise. “Whoops?” He offers.

“Erm.” Sue states unsurely, before sighing. “I wasn’t that hungry anyway.”

“Well, I was.” Ben objects. “At least you think I’m real funny, sparky.”

“Eh. I was more, laughing at you than ya know, with you.” Johnny claims, weakly, grimacing at the mess he’d created. Reed suddenly feels the urge to snap at him, that a joke like that is insensitive to Ben in his current state.

“Hmph. Whatever helps you sleep at night.” Ben raises one very gentle finger to pat Johnny on the head. The younger man’s eyes narrow into a glare. “Besides,” He lowers his voice, casting a side eye to Herbie who is trying to wipe his face. “It could’ve used some salt.”

Reed dumbly looks between the two.

“It’s alright, kiddo.” Ben adds. “You can stop pouting.”

“I wasn’t pouting.”

“You were.”

Reed’s gaze drops back down to his plate and its ruined products, and clears his throat.

“Well, I suppose I should go back to the lab.” He announces, as casually as he can muster. Except he can feel all of their eyes piercing into his face as he folds his napkin.

“Right.” Ben murmurs, dry and low.

Reed rises, and nobody says another word. Not even Sue- who is watching him with eyelids low in disappointment. Johnny’s stare burns into the back of his head as he retreats.

Reed is delicately lifting a vial of blood labelled ‘SUE’ when his laboratory doors swing open. He freezes, and then startles so badly that the vial almost slips from his fingers.

The oxygen in his lungs becomes trapped there as he holds his breath as Johnny’s eyes scan around the lab, the state reflecting Reed’s frantic mindset these days. It’s his responsibility to be concerned, to be desperately searching for a solution, that vulnerability shouldn’t be on display for anyone else to worry about.

“Why do you still have these?” Johnny asks, eyebrows furrowing. He raises a hand to his own charred suit but it hovers still in the air before dropping back to his side. “I thought ‘handling them’ meant getting rid of them not…” Johnny waves a hand over the display.

Reed swallows. “Because…”

Johnny looks over his shoulder for a brief second to raise an eyebrow. “Because…?”

“For research.”

“For research.” Johnny repeats. He glowers at the suits. “We’re not dead, Reed.” Johnny states harshly, voice hardening. “We’re still the same people. Ben is still Ben.”

“I know that.” Reed replies, slowly and confusedly.

“Do you?" Johnny snaps, not looking at him. "You don’t even look at him, and you know how the big guy feels about himself- now he’s wondering about how you feel about him too.”

That’s not what this is. He’s not afraid. He’s not disgusted. Not with Ben. Never with Ben.

Ben should know that.

Is this about breakfast? Reed is tempted to be out with it and say that he has been busy, too distracted to simply look at them- but that is also not the truth.

“We just want things to be normal.” Johnny stresses.

“Can’t you see that’s what I’m trying to do?”

“You’re the one making it weird!”

“Well my intention isn’t to make anything weird, I am only trying to fix things-“

“Ugh!”

Reed’s voice becomes lodged in his throat as he stares at the fire engulfing Johnny’s eyes and the flames licking his shoulders. He’s able to comfort himself in the fact that Johnny doesn’t react to their presence, that it doesn’t hurt him- but it hurts him to look at. Too many memories. Too many mistakes.

With the suit beside Johnny, it’s suddenly too much. He can picture the blond within it, trapped in it, burning alive within it.

He’d been so worried about Sue, and then Ben- whose suit was shifting and tearing, his helmet cracking as he writhed in muted horror and pain. Of course, Sue had been calling for her brother but there had been so much going on that once he turned around to follow her voice and he’d seen Ben he’d been unable to look away.

Reed had become paralysed with an absence of solutions in his brain. It was only when Ben tore through his seat restraints and reached for the nearest fire extinguisher that Reed realised his brother-in-law was on fire.

Reed has never felt so helpless in his life. Listening to his wife’s panicked shouting, watching his best friend change into something that he couldn’t understand, and then Johnny-

The fire extinguisher crumples between Ben’s hands as he sprays the foam onto Johnny’s body. The burst of flames is reduced to embers eating away at his suit, charring the white material black (not fireproof- why isn’t it more heat resistant?) and Sue stumbles out of her seat as the ship rocks beneath her feet.

For a moment, her translucent body reveals a glimpse of her skeleton- sharper than an X-ray. Reed’s arm hangs limp at his side, useless, as he struggles to steady the ship. He reaches to finish what Ben started, but the process is too slow, too complex. He forsakes the ordeal, and begins unbuckling himself from his seat restraints.

Ben pushes himself away, retreating into himself and gesturing a vague and uncoordinated hand over to Johnny. Reed is tempted to ignore him and act on the imminent danger that Ben appears to be in, but his brother-in-law, who is a baby faced teenager that Reed promised the stars and prepared him for his biggest dream, is burning alive. It is a hard choice he finds himself going along with, not that Ben gave him one in the first place.

The ship rocks again, and Sue falls and her helmet slams into the floor.

Lousy. Flawed. The suits. Reed’s shaky hands. The heat reaches his skin through the thick layer as he forcibly yanks at the clasps securing Johnny’s helmet in place- the glass now blackened, and he’s terrified of what he’ll see beneath it (blistered flesh, bone, the boy’s face twisted in unbearable agony that Reed isn’t sure if he has the materials to begin to fix) but also desperate with the need to see the blond at all.

Water streams over his hair, his face, his shoulders, and chest- icy cold and jarring enough to drag his mind out of its spiral. It shocks his system and forces him to focus.

He reaches one elongated arm across the room and twists the lever. The sprinklers turn off. Steams coils from Johnny’s figure and his clothes and hair dry near instantly.

A puff of smoke falls from Johnny's lips as an irritated sigh, and he crosses his arms. “For a smart guy, you're real dumb sometimes. A lot of the time. You wanna stay in here all the time? Fine. You want to fix us? Why don’t you make an effort before you have to fix your relationships with the people that care about you too.”

He massages his temples with his knuckles and turns to storm out, smoke still curling above his shoulder and off the wisps of his hair.

“Don’t mention the suits. Please.” Reed blurts. Sue would see right through to him.

Johnny hesitates. ”Whatever.”

This is how he fixes everything. 

Reed is unable to erase his mind of Johnny on fire, choking on his own breaths like the fire was burning through the oxygen in his own lungs as he writhed away from a heat that wouldn’t leave him.

At the time, Reed believed he was in so much pain. That he was feeling every bit of his skin that was being burned away. Luckily, he hadn't, but it had still been an awful case of realising that you're on fire, and that you must be being burned away, but yet you can't even feel the destruction that is happening to your own body. 

The talk show is a disaster the moment it begins. The questions pry too deep, too strangely. Sue sits through multiple questions inquiring about her feelings about being the only woman, about what it’s like being surrounded by men.

(“They’re not just men. This is my brother, my husband, and my closest friend.”)

It only gets worse when the host grins into the camera and calls it a “miracle of an incident.”

Then they cue the audio- grainy voice recordings from the mission. Their voices distorted by static, the background filled with warning alarms ending right before the ship’s power went haywire. The four of them sit in a silence with tense shoulders and schooled expressions in front of a live audience and camera, as their own shouts full of fear and panic echo back at them.

"Each of us played a key role in the mission." Reed explains, in response the host's question, the sounds in the video clip repeating in his head making it difficult to think. "I was fortunate enough that the three people closest to me were exactly the type of people I needed."

"Very fortunate, yes." The host agrees, with a smile. He turns towards Johnny. "You are only eighteen, correct?" The host asks, but then not giving him a chance to speak. "How lucky do you feel to have your sister on the mission- especially since she guaranteed you a space on the ship?" He winks to the camera.

"Sue is really the be-"

"Johnny earned his spot. Like the rest of us." Sue interjects smoothly. "Just because he's young doesn't mean he's unqualified."

"Of course,” the host says, blinking. He pivots smoothly back to Johnny. “Any plans to return to school? I imagine you’d be quite the celebrity.”

"Well, I'm kinda busy with saving peoples lives most of the time," Johnny replies with a shrug. "But that doesn't mean I won't go back. Eventually."

The host leans in, smiling wider. Reading facial expressions isn't one of his many expertise, but even he notices that the grin is too wide to be welcoming. "Any aspirations? I mean, you're a superhero. The Human Torch. What else could you possibly want?"

"Yeah, it's great. You know, a lot of people dream of being a superhero when they're kids, nobody actually gets to be one. Flying is pretty fun."

"And the ladies just adore you, don't they? You must be qualified in the ladies department.” Another wink. Some chuckles from the crowd.

Ben’s rocky brows draw close together as he stares at the host.

"It isn’t as cracked up as you think. It was- and it still is terrifying." Sue confesses. "We didn't know what the outcome of that mission would be. If we would die, or if we would even make it back to Earth. As grateful as we are for the opportunity to be able to protect you, it is a lot of responsibility."

“And we truly appreciate your bravery,” the host says, the words practiced. Then, smoothly: “What about you, Doctor Richards? Any regrets about bringing the people closest to you on this... fateful mission where you didn't account for the risks? The possibilities? One of whom was, essentially, still a child?”

Reed’s eyes flicker briefly over to Johnny. Still slightly soft in the face, light freckles still dusting his cheeks, blue eyes that used to be full of wonder dulled with something heavy. Something nobody else would notice unless you were there to know what he was like before.

“Are we going to die?” Johnny asks shakily, holding the oxygen mask tightly to his face. It fogs up with every breath. One breath in. One breath out.

He’s appears so small pressed into his chair. Like he’s all skinny arms and short legs again. His eyes big and wide but not with the wonder Reed used to be met with.

Johnny is- if not by the world’s standards, then Reed’s- a child.

”No.” Reed says, resting a hand on the back of the boy’s neck. He has to pull away after a few seconds as the heat threatens to burn further at his already singed palms. “No. I won’t allow it. We’re going to be fine.”

He meets Sue’s eyes over her little brother’s head. The tear tracks on her cheeks have dried, but the terror is still rooted onto the lines of her face. From where’d she helplessly stood to the side as Ben turned into stone, as Johnny caught fire again without the means to be able to put it out. He wonders if those lines will ever fade after this. 

She’s clinging to his words just as much as Johnny is, and her eyes linger on the space where his hand had rested. As if she wants to smother him with her touch but that display was horrible proof as to why she can’t.

Reed doesn’t lie, and he prays to any God out there that he hasn’t just told one.

“Of course I do.”

Sue cuts in again. Sharper. “Nobody could have anticipated what would’ve happened to us. Not even Reed. It was a very unlikely possibility that wasn’t even on our radar.”

"So then, do you have any regrets about letting your kid brother onto this mission that you claim, could've ended worse than it had? What if what happened to Mister Grimm-"

"I think we're done here." She states calmly, casting a perfectly polite smile towards the host. "We're very busy people, I'm sure you can understand. Thank you so much for your time."

Reed wishes for Johnny’s flames to burn the image out of his mind of Johnny falling through the air, flames put out. He had barely fallen before Sue caught him with an extended hand guiding a wave of light, and then Ben took the boy away from danger before putting a conclusive end to their battle with renewed strength and passion.

Reed’s mind slips into analysing, into all of the possible worst case scenarios as he checks Johnny’s pulse, his breathing, his head… and other than a slower than usual pulse and breaths slightly shallow- and for someone who had been lit on fire a moment ago, Johnny's skin is strangely cool to his touch- he seems fine.

But that’s not good enough.

Healthy people don’t faint for no reason. Overexertion is one of his immediate theories due to the lack of injuries, but the fight had been short and nothing past Johnny’s limits he’d previously observed. Their opponent didn't have any 'extraordinary' abilities besides being an overgrown mutated creature that crawled up from the sewers.

Sue hovers above his shoulder, eyes tracking every one of his actions with her bottom lip held between her teeth. Somehow, he still has her trust to take care of them. Not that he would ever do anything but the best- and he knows Sue must know this, but he also cannot imagine that all of their trust hadn't been shaken after the incident.

“‘M fine.” Johnny mumbles, blue peeking through low eyelids and he blinks dazedly before waving a dismissive hand into all of their faces. The breath that had been trapped in Reed's lungs falls heavily through his nose. Johnny shrugs off Reed's fussing hands, which the older man allows reluctantly.

“I don’t think you are. Why don’t you stay put for a moment?"

Johnny, of course, doesn’t listen to the rational advice. He gets to his feet in a staggered manner, only mildly protesting at Ben’s assistance by a hand on his shoulder.

He whirls around to face the crowd gathered around, blinking a little too hard at the motion, and throws his hands out. “Everything is fine! You're welcome!"

The crowd that had been speaking in hushed, worried murmurs now wave and loudly praise them. The clapping begins, further filling out the tense silence that had blanketed them.

"Well, see you in five?" Johnny announces quickly, casting a brief glance over his shoulder and it's only then that Reed realises maybe the darkness under his sunken eyes is more than just 'not sleeping' like the rest of them. That it's a real cause for concern (how hadn't he noticed earlier? Why can't he identify the issues before they become a problem?), and he becomes frozen with terror that Johnny will flame on and leave them, just to fall again away from their protection.

Luckily, Ben grasps Johnny's ankle to yank him back down to the ground and then plants a firm hand at the back of his neck.

"Why don't you take it easy, huh? Like Stretch said." The other man says, and Johnny doesn't offer a reply and just looks increasingly ashen in the face.

Reed corners Johnny instantly- who sits on the exam table with his legs dangling still as they did when he was younger and when Reed would stick a thermometer in his mouth.

It comes immediately back on the scans. The answer is simple. Too simple. It can all be explained by not eating enough calories. Reed stares at the results for a long moment. There is no deep, atom-level concern. It makes perfect sense, Johnny essentially burns energy whenever he uses his powers so he should’ve been eating more to compensate.

Reed should’ve realised this weeks ago. Then created a nutritional plan. Then this could’ve been avoided.

”You need to eat more. I’ve written you up a full schedule that you will need to stick to daily-“

”I haven’t been that hungry.” Johnny replies.

“It doesn't matter." Reed states. "I’ll need to run more tests-“

Johnny's brows furrow. ”Didn’t you just tell me what it was?”

"Just in case.” He finishes. "I don't want to make any assumptions."

"Ah."

"You'll let me know. If any symptoms, any fainting spells, reoccur?" Reed asks, holding the clipboard tightly in his hands. He's not going to snap at Johnny for not mentioning the other 'spells' that he'd just written off as exhaustion or side effects of having their DNA altered- like that reasoning was any better. He'll leave that to Sue who'll surely not be pleased.

For now, he'd much rather guarantee that that information won't slip by him again. So he doesn't need to think that he's about to watch Johnny crack his head open on the asphalt again. "Or any new symptoms. It's very important that you tell me these things so that I can plan for the worst and-"

"I'm fine." Johnny cuts in. "Or well, I'm going to be better. You figured it out."

"Right." Reed says, and hesitates. "But still-"

"It's in the past.” Johnny waves a vague hand in the air. “I'm fine now, you don't gotta beat yourself up over that."

"I just-" I need you to be okay. People your age should be worrying about grades, going into university, and not this. 

Still, Johnny is sitting in front of him. A little sharper in the face, more tired, and paler at the moment compared to when he was thirteen- but he is here. He's alive. They all are. He's made a lot of mistakes, and his guilt is enough to fill an ocean, but at least none of his mistakes resulted in him never seeing any one of them again. At least, one way or another- they're okay.

Johnny is looking at him expectantly, and Reed swallows the lump in his throat. To admit that Johnny has somehow made a connection in his mind is something he's not going to do now, but he does put a hand on the boy's shoulder.

"I'm glad you're alright."