Chapter Text
Mugm sat there for a while longer, listening to Boomie's breath even out and feeling them lean their weight onto him as they fell asleep.
The room felt weirdly calm despite how trashed the city looked outside the window, maybe it was balanced out by the room itself - clean and organized at all times.
It wasn't officially Boomie's, he had the Vanguard 4 base, but he slept here a lot of, if not most of the time. It was just nicer, to go to a single building after missions instead of splitting up and sulking in their own empty grand bases.
Or 'more practical' as Boomie liked to call it.
Boomie never shared or expressed themselves openly like Galaxy. They were a closed book. And Mugm respected that, it took time to build trust.
Besides, it seemed like he understood what he needed to. That this was a team, that they worked together and that they helped people even through sacrifices.
Boomie was more fierce and aggressive than Galaxy- his agility and tactics were way better fit for defense, but he was way better taught in attack and offensive fighting styles.
His movement in battle and decisions reminded Mugm of his old friend in a good way, even if he'd never admit it.
So this made sense, a lot of sense, actually. Stormz' apprentice.
The concept felt weird, Stormz wasn't exactly teacher material. He was aggressive, harsh, and didn't tolerate failure.
Just like Rat.
And just like Mugm, a lot of the time.
Mugm wasn't better than them. He wasn't some innocent man caught mid way. He was more than just similar.
But looking into Galaxy's eyes to see that unyielding determination to be his best self just to see it crumble in failure made him realize things: punishment wasn't a way to teach everyone.
Some people, like Galaxy, already blame and punish themselves for failures without others saying a word. And Mugm adjusted for that. Made sure Galaxy wasn't too hard on himself.
Made sure he didn't hurt him more than he already was by the consequences of his own actions.
Just by looking at Boomie's discipline, as much as he was wildly different, it reminded Mugm how much different his and Stormz' training techniques probably were.
Now it made a bit more sense that Boomie was so focused on Slushly during the fight and set on avenging Stormz. It made sense why they were similar. Made him wonder if Galaxy picked up so many traits from him too.
Mugm continued to add this new information to every memory of Boomie he had while still holding their passed out body, it was just... interesting. Seeing all the small pieces connecting.
Really made him think how much more he'll learn about this guy, they seem pretty committed to staying after all. And Mugm is definitely not letting them die under his watch.
But he also kind of preferred not letting his legs go numb with one antler awkwardly close to his face, so he started to slowly maneuver Boomie out of the hug.
They let out a very displeased noise but didn't seem to protest much in their sleep, which surprised Mugm a bit - most warriors woke up at the slightest movement with their reflexes, rarely passing out like this in front of people.
Boomie must've been really tired.
He placed them down, back first onto the bed, and as gently as possible fixed the hair that somehow got tangled in his antlers.
He knew how sensitive some hybrid parts could be, so he fixed the hair near and around the antlers gently too, so Boomie wouldn't wake up uncomfortable, before tucking the blanket as high as possible and sitting back.
He didn't really have much to do for the rest of the morning, despite the fact he tried his best to carry on with Boomie's and Galaxy's missions while they were on their break, not all missions could just be done whenever.
He helped with the attacks on most powerful groups that were against them, but since Nufuli died things seemed to slow down a bit, mostly to on-call unpredictable village attacks Mugm couldn't exactly put in a schedule.
He just sat there for a minute, planning out the next few hours as much as he could, before getting up with a few loud floorboard creeks and a low noise from Boomie.
He looked back one last time, but they seemed to be deep asleep, so he quietly closed the door and walked through the hallway and main lounge right out the building.
He went to help the workers plan out what was needed to be fixed in the city for a while.
Made a list of what was on priority, the main tower and V1's quarters were, of course, first to be finished yesterday, but there were other things too.
The command blocks in Vanguard 3's base couldn't be left fully unprotected for too long, as well as the armoury near his quarters, but most of the workers ended up splitting out around the citizen houses.
The people still living there weren't left homeless, of course, but it'd probably be nicer for them to move back to their original, very much currently destroyed houses.
After about an hour of that, he gathered some resources from the few remaining undestroyed Vanguard outposts, the tools and backup blocks in them hopefully helpful for the repairs.
He gave them to the workers before going back to the quarters Boomie and Galaxy stayed in.
He thought about what food Boomie would eat right now, he did say he only ate gaps.
Then he remembered this was a shared kitchen and if Boomie brought anything they'd have it labeled.
He looked through the chests and sure enough there were things that looked nothing like what Galaxy or him would eat.
Some fancier looking spices that didn't belong in Mugm's collection, some dragon fruit and a nice amount of mushrooms. Different types and sizes, all neatly organized, per usual.
Mumg could work with that. He pulled together a rather simple mushroom soup, something that wouldn't be hard on the stomach, grabbed some water and entered Boomie's room again.
They were, somehow, seemingly still asleep. Probably needed a lot of the rest they were given, but if they didn't get up by dinner time he'd probably try to wake him up just to try and eat.
For now he left the food on his night stand and left again.
He quietly strolled to the door of Galaxy's room.
It was a gamble on if he was in there, he had every chance to just walk out or climb out of his windows, which he did quite a bit the past 2 days.
Probably just to clean his head.
Mugm still checked though.
He knocked lightly at the door, half expecting the silence to answer him.
"I don't want to talk." Came out of the other side of the door, surprisingly.
Galaxy's voice was quiet but clear, he didn't even sound upset, which was the part that weirded out Mugm the most.
...But he was willing to give him more time.
He let out a quiet "Okay" before turning back away and heading to his own room.
He definitely wasn't resting just yet, didn't need to, but he needed to restock a bit.
Grabbed a bit of gaps and rockets, switched out his dirty pants from all the running around, quickly dusted his netherite boots before deeming himself presentable enough to get back to work.
And just as he was getting ready to leave for the soldier station to check up on the injured survivors, his communicator buzzed.
Probably another village getting attacked.
He checked if all his weapons were in place on instinct before checking it.
Message from Rat.
Coordinates and a 'meeting' note.
None of them were even on duty, this wasn't supposed to be able to reach him, but it did.
A similar kind of dread nested itself in Mugm's chest.
This wasn't going to end well.