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Though he had been hesitant to accept his help at first, Joey has been spending a lot of time with Lincoln since his first experience in the field. It is an odd sort of dichotomy, both of them still settling into their places in S.H.I.E.L.D., but Joey can tell it gives the ex-mentor some semblance of balance to help him begin to find a grasp on his powers – and finding a grasp on his powers is currently the single most important thing for Joey.
He isn’t melting any metal he passes by, not anymore – luckily bypassing that stage a little faster than he seems to have been progressing since. Lincoln tries to help him fine tune the powers, really tries – Joey admires his patience with him, admires how he can smile genuinely after he nearly melts Daisy’s computer, her child – he very nearly passes out when he catches the flash of silver lying out on the table near where they are practicing – but Lincoln turns it over in his hands carefully checking for damage and cracks some half of a joke about their asses state of fried-ness depending on the hard drive’s state of fried-ness, before suggesting they take their practice somewhere less risky.
Mack chuckles from where he has been watching the show from the corner of the room.
“You knew that was there, didn’t you?” Joey accuses, turning away from Lincoln gingerly shifts the laptop back to the position he found it in, crossing his arms and scowling at their teammate.
“Was a solid lesson in being aware of your surroundings,” Mack answers, still smiling as he shakes his head – and Joey isn’t certain, but he thinks he might wink, “that I don’t think either of you would have quickly forgotten.”
Lincoln is rolling his eyes.
“I’m really glad we’re close enough now that you feel comfortable putting my relationship on the line for a lesson.”
“So am I, Sparky.”
Joey is still scowling at him, not quite recovered from fearing for their lives just moments earlier.
“Okay, well, I noticed that you were messing with us,” he mutters dryly, “I’m pretty sure that should count for you never trying to teach either of us a lesson again.”
“He makes a solid point,” Lincoln smirks, already moving towards the door and the aforementioned less risky room, “not to mention between the two of us there is probably enough superpower to cause at least some minor discomfort.”
Mack’s smirk only grows wider, and he rolls his eyes at Lincoln’s turned back.
“I’m not Daisy’s computer or made of metal, so neither of your superpowers particularly concern me,” he glances pointedly at one of his enormous arms as he speaks, in an obvious gesture of ‘have you even seen me?’, and… yes. Joey most certainly has.
There is plenty else he could say, but he settles for shooting Mack one final halfhearted scowl before hurrying after Lincoln, eager to give his powers another go.
“Besides, once meltdown here gets a grip on his super-melding, he is making me my shotgun-ax and then you really won’t want to mess with me.”
xx
Lincoln does spend a lot of time with him, but he is also dating Daisy, and he is also constantly needed in the lab, and he also has new Inhuman’s to help every day – and sometimes, more often than he particularly likes, Joey is left on his own. He practices then, too, mostly because there isn’t much else to do around the base, not when his only job is learning to live with himself.
He starts practicing in the hangar, because if he goes to the far end there is enough space between him and the planes that he doesn’t have to be too concerned about messing up something he never should have touched.
Also, sort of, because more often than not – Mack is there, too. He is a friendly face and when Joey is at his loneliest, he can always count on getting a smile and a chat from the ex-director.
He is good with mechanics, he finds out – and after a while he starts calling him over from his practice, pointing to pieces of an engine that need to be pieced together, or weapons that need to be taken apart. He starts with bigger pieces, but as they spend more time together, as he hones his power further, he presents more precise things, things that Joey isn’t actually sure are in his capabilities.
“You took down one misplaced bolt outta Zephyr One last week, meltdown,” Mack is reasoning, holding the little pieces he wants him to meld together between them. They look particularly tiny in his enormous palm. “This really isn’t that far a reach.”
The little pieces in question, however, are far more intricate than a bolt that he can just melt away, and he shakes his head again.
“I can’t, I’ll just screw up all the work you’ve done. Use a tool.”
Mack doesn’t budge, regarding him with a raising brow.
“You have the skills you need for this,” he tells him stubbornly, after a long moment. “All you’ve done for months is practice. It isn’t a matter of what you can and can’t do, it is a matter of what you are letting yourself think you can and can’t do.”
Joey doesn’t answer, just shaking his head again as he crosses his arms and takes a small step back.
Mack sighs, dropping his hand back to his side as he watches his movements, and Joey can practically see the thoughts spinning through his mind.
“Look, you can practice all you want, but in the end, practice isn’t going to be what keeps you alive in the field,“ he says, shrugging before turning and dropping the peaces onto his workbench and moving towards the door.
Joey watches him go, tightening his arms across his chest as he mulls over his words.
xx
Daisy had told him he was more than welcome to go home, that he has shown them that he can handle himself in the Real World – but he asks if he can stick around, not entirely sure how to go back to the world, how to just slip back into the mold that was built for Before Him. She smiled knowingly, softly, and told him he had a place at S.H.I.E.L.D., on her team – as long as he wanted to stay.
It is the holidays now, and he has spent most of the month gathering a stack of gifts for his new friends. He doesn’t know how they do Christmas, if they do Christmas – but he does know that he isn’t the only one who doesn’t have a place to go home for the holidays. Collecting the presents seems appropriate.
He doesn’t make a deal about giving them out – instead sloppily scribbling respective names on each and slipping them beneath the tree he thinks Simmons made them put up when no one is around to see. The biggest is wrapped awkwardly with newspaper, because it is the only thing there was enough of to cover it – and he shoves it far beneath the branches, behind another larger gift someone else has already left.
They open presents on Christmas morning like they aren’t a fake-family, and Joey can’t wipe the smile from his face. He is surprised to have a stack of gifts of his own – Daisy drops them in front of him and smirks when he looks shocked, prodding his shoulder playfully as she sinks to the floor beside him.
“You’re apart of the family now, Joey,” she tells him, grabbing at the biggest of his presents that she has just dumped in front of him and pressing it into his arms. It is hard not to believe her.
Someone makes tea and Bobbi punches Hunter’s arm when he complains that it isn’t egg nog. Lincoln clasps a silver necklace around Daisy’s neck. Coulson sits suspiciously close to May on the couch, until she disappears and returns with trash bag for picking up wrapping paper (the floor is absolutely littered), and everyone helps shove it full.
“Oi, wait – there’s still one present left.”
Hunter pulls back from a corner of the tree, dragging an enormous, awkwardly wrapped gift behind him that Joey recognizes immediately.
“Bloody heavy,” Hunter complains, giving up and craning awkwardly over it instead, searching for the hastily scribbled name. “Mack, all yours.”
Joey suddenly forgets entirely how to not look conspicuous, feeling his cheeks burn red as he sinks further into the seat he’s procured – thankful that all eyes are on Mack and his godawful wrapping job.
He lifts the heavy item with ease, smirking pointedly at Hunter as he does – and peels the paper off just as easily to unearth the clunky piece beneath.
It is by no means delicate or carefully constructed, but he automatically finds the proper holds, and it settles comfortably against Mack’s enormous form. His smile widens fully as he realizes what he is holding, eyes shifting immediately, knowingly, over the team to find him.
“Oh my god, it’s your shotgun-ax,” Daisy realizes for everyone, clapping a hand over her grin. “Whose it from? Because they absolutely win Christmas this year.”
She doesn’t wait for an answer, and Mack doesn’t offer one – and Joey lets himself relax as the thrill settles away and everyone’s attentions are back to their own gifts and loved ones.
(He goes to the hangar after the festivities of the day turn into most of the couples splitting off for the night. It is kind of instinctive, kind of his place.
Mack is already there, already back to work on something that is beyond Joey’s understanding of mechanics. But he recognizes the little intricate piece on the top.
“I told you you could do it.” Mack tells him without even turning around, and he smiles just barely in spite of himself, watching his careful movements for a moment. “And I guess I owe you a thank you, too.”
He reaches a stopping point and turns to face him, motioning with a slight nod next to the bench where Joey hadn’t noticed his handiwork carefully propped.
He shrugs, feeling his cheeks burn all over again – much preferring the moments when the attention is anywhere but on him.
“I had a pretty good teacher,” he finally manages with a little shrug.
“Hate to say it, but Campbell does his thing well.”
Joey swallows, and he is sure Mack is testing him – which is 100% against the rules – but he plays along anyway, trying to push all his nagging self-consciousness aside.
“Lincoln is great. But I am pretty sure he doesn’t know a bolt from a nail. I meant you.”
He likes how Mack smiles at the unusual steady command of his tone– softer, a little different than he has seen him smile before.
“I know you are a frequenter of whatever-the-hell-Simmons-puts-together dinner option, but there are actually some restaurants that are not that terrible of a trip from base,” he pauses, eyes raking over him. “I could show you, sometime. Especially if you’re planning to stick around. Strictly off-record, meatloaf night is usually good to get out on.”
The corner of Joey’s lips twitch.
“Yeah. Yeah, I think I’d like that.”