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Nathan was standing on his balcony, overlooking the gleaming buildings of Providence stretched out before him, the wind sifting through his air, when he heard a soft exhalation of breath to his left and turned to see Wade standing next to him, hands clasped behind his back head tilted up to stare at the sky.
Nathan hadn't even heard Wade's footsteps.
“The sky is blue,” Wade remarked, tone expressing wide-eyed wonder.
Nathan looked at him, lips quirking. “Just figure that out, did you?”
“Oh, I knew the sky was blue,” Wade said haughtily, glaring at Nathan briefly out of the corner of his eye, before moving his gaze back to the broad expanse of blue spread above them. “And I know that you knew the sky was blue. But when was the last time you took a moment to really look at the sky and think, 'Wow, the sky is really fucking blue.'”
Startled, Nathan glanced up.
Wade was right. The sky was very blue.
“When was the last time you stopped to try to put a word to the exact color of blue that the sky is?” Wade asked, humming as he stared up at the sky, the ghost of a smile teasing over his chapped lips. “I'm thinking cornflower.”
Nathan made a noise of agreement. Wade was right. The sky was a cornflower blue at the moment.
“And the ocean looks blue at first,” Wade added, gesturing at the water, “but when you look again you can see that the reflections on the surface actually cause it to be to be a camo pattern of white and at least five different shades of blue and also black. So it can't really be described just as blue, can it?”
Looking at the ocean, Nathan saw that Wade was, once again, quite right.
“You get these thoughts often?” Nathan asked lightly, glancing at the man beside him. Curious. This was a side of Wade he wasn't sure he'd seen before.
Wade spoke, and Nathan let him.
“You get these thoughts often?”
“Not often,” Wade said, snorting. He glanced over at where the sun was hiding behind a veil of white clouds. “Having these kinds of thoughts too often would make my brain go ka-blooey, I think. It's fucking mind-boggling to take a moment to open your sights and realize exactly how small you are.”
Nathan was silent, but watching him expectantly.
Wade glanced at Nathan's cornflower blue eyes, then back to the cornflower blue sky, the fluffy clouds with it, the sun that looked so close—a banana cream pie in the sky—but was actually so far away.
92.96 million miles away, to be exact.
Wade grit his teeth as he tried to grasp the feeling of the few miles of Earth's atmosphere above him, followed by millions of miles of space to where the sun burned in a massive ball of plasma, and beyond that to distant galaxies where Skrulls and Kree and other aliens lived, out to the edges of space—if space even had edges.
Wasn't space both infinite and expanding, or something?
And Wade was just one teeny tiny human being—if he could even be called that—on a small ball of mud floating in space.
One small ball of mud floating in space, populated with over seven billion human beings.
One in seven billion, on a mudball that was one in several bazillion.
At least it was daytime, though, and the farthest thing Wade could see was the sun—he wasn't surrounded by stars that were millions and billions of light years away—wasn't looking at light that was millions and billions of years old, staring back in time.
It made Wade's brain hurt, all the weight of everything else pressing down on him.
“It makes my brain hurt,” Wade whispered, hands coming up to clench the railing in front of him, knuckles white beneath marred skin.
“What does?” Nathan asked quietly.
“This!” Wade didn't mean to shout, gesturing wildly around him, turning in a circle, eyes wide. “Everything! Because we're all so inconsequential, aren't we? And yet we all think the world revolves around us. We make the world smaller, wrap it around ourselves, because we simply can't cope with the reality. We can't fucking cope with knowledge of how little we matter in the entire scheme of things.”
Nathan was looking at him with a frown. “But we do matter,” Nathan said, voice full of belief. “We all matter. Every single one of us.”
Wade wanted to puke.
But that would be unsightly, so he opted for laughing instead, the laughter coming out more like sobs.
“That's where you're wrong, Priscilla,” Wade said as the sobbing laughter subsided and he stood up straight, looking Nate in the eyes and grinning. “We only matter to us, and only because we trick ourselves into believing that we matter. Time and the universe will keep on going without us—both existed long before any of us did, and will exist long after. You know that. You,” Wade gestured vaguely, lips pulling into something just shy of a sneer, “you especially convince yourself that you're so important. That you—one man—can go backwards and forwards in time, changing and fixing things.”
Nathan's brow was furrowed, and Wade laughed again. “We're so inconsequential, Nate! So to make ourselves feel more important, we make such big deals out of all the tiny, inconsequential things in our lives, just to make ourselves feel more important.”
Wade's gaze dropped back to his hands that had wandered back to clench over the railing again. “We make such big deals out of all the little things. All the things that don't really matter. Hatred is born from resentment over little things. Gender. Sexuality. Language. Religion. Skin.” He scratched at a large sore on his left hand. “But it doesn't really matter, does it? Any of it.”
Nathan was silent.
The sore started bleeding, and Wade grinned to himself wryly. “A girl smiled at me today. A little girl—couldn't have been more than seven. She had darker skin—I don't know what race she was; it doesn't matter. Except for when it does. But it only matters when we say that it matters—like how money only has worth because we say that it has worth.
“This little girl—I didn't even notice anything about her really except that she had huge dark eyes and a beautiful smile. I didn't even do anything to deserve the smile, y'know? She accidentally ran into my legs, and I steadied her so she didn't fall, and then she looked up at me and smiled.”
Wade's lips quirked slightly, gaze still on his hands, one of them absently wiping at the blood and spreading the red up his arm. “The smile couldn't have lasted for more than a couple seconds. But it made me feel all warm and light, y'know? I couldn't even help smiling back, and then she skipped away, and the moment was over, but my steps were light for the next hour. I wouldn't even recognize the girl if I saw her again.”
Wade looked up at the sky. “And that's what I mean—we create such significance out of such tiny things. And it's weird because some things should be allowed to have significance—like smiles—but some things—like skin—really shouldn't matter.
“And for that reason, I think that the internet is the purest form of communication.”
“The internet?” Nathan asked, tone confused.
Wade glanced at him, snorted, looked away again. “The world as a whole would be better if it operated like the internet,” he said. “I was on some random website earlier today, and something that someone had typed in a comment just made my day. Y'know? Their comment was funny and I laughed, and left a comment to say that what they'd said was brilliant, because whenever anybody replies to my comments letting me know that something I said made their day it always makes my day, y'know?”
When Wade glanced over, Nathan was looking at him like he'd never seen him before.
Wade looked away again. “But we can do that on the internet, because we can't see each other, and therefore we can't form judgments on each other just by the way we look, or anything else superficial like that. It doesn't matter that I'm a mercenary covered in freakish scars to whoever found my comment funny. It doesn't matter what someone looks like, it doesn't matter where someone lives—Egypt, Nepal, Australia, Britain, Ukraine, the United States—it doesn't matter.”
Wade laughed, spreading his hands over the cold metal of the railing. “I had this great argument with someone in Nepal about the pros and cons of a TV show. I didn't even realize they were from Nepal until I finally took a look at their profile page, where the country happened to be listed. But I wold never have known otherwise, y'know?
“And just think about it,” Wade continued, lips quirking. “Think about your closest friends. How would you describe them?”
A considerate pause for Nathan to consider this.
“Those descriptions no doubt involve mostly physical aspects about them, yeah?” Wade said, looking at him, grinning slightly at the confirmation on Nate's face. “Now think about how you'd describe someone you only knew over the internet.”
Another pause.
“And now all you can describe about them is their personality, right?” Wade said knowingly, still grinning. “Because you don't know what they look like, and it's never mattered. All that matters is how they conduct themselves through text—the words and the phrasing they use, which is all you have to judge someone's tone and personality. And that's all that really matters, isn't it?
“The internet allows of medium where we can communicate without societal judgmental shit getting in the way. It smudges away the boundaries and edges that we construct for ourselves to reveal that we're not all that different after all. Are we, Mr. Mind Reader?”
“No,” Nathan agreed, voice quiet, “we're not.”
“It just...” Wade sighed, and his hands gripped tightly over the metal railing again. “Don't get me wrong—I love killing. I just hate living in a world where it's necessary.”
A pause. Wade breathed in, breathed out. Sighed again and closed his eyes. “You—Spider-Man—Captain America—all you hero-types. You tell me it's not okay to kill because every single one of us has a life that matters.”
A pause, just in case Nathan wanted to interrupt.
He didn't, and Wade kept talking.
“But it doesn't matter. I've killed thousands of people—poor people, rich people, influential and powerful people and nobodies. None of them mattered—not really. Not in the larger scheme of things. The deaths only mattered to those close to them, and to those who hired me to do the killing.
“Because except to those people, the dead are just numbers. We can't afford to think of them as anything. We can't afford to feel pain for all those complete strangers who are dying every second from any manner of things.
“Everyone will die. Why does it matter when? Honestly I'd argue that how someone dies is much more important than when someone dies, but...”
Wade laughed again. “It never matters in the larger scheme of things. Time just keeps moving on. The world will not ever stop turning just because one person ceased to exist—the world will never stop turning no matter who or how many cease to exist.”
“That's not an excuse,” Nathan said quietly.
“No,” Wade mused, grinning down at his hands on the railing, forcibly relaxing their grip, “I suppose it isn't, is it? Because those deaths matter to someone, except for when they don't. We all hold onto people to help give us meaning, because alone we are meaningless. We're all living these lives, and we have to make them worth living somehow, otherwise we might as well be dead.”
He finally met Nate's eyes again, grinning. “And I imagine that if I were meant to die for all those I've killed, I would actually be able to die. What does it tell you that the world hasn't seen fit to do so yet?”
Nathan closed his eyes and didn't answer.
Wade laughed at him.
“But anyways, that's not what I'm talking about,” Wade said, waving a hand to brush that particular topic away, turning his attention back to the sky, which was slowly darkening as the sun lowered. “Because if there's one thing that the healing factor has taught me, it's that pain doesn't matter. People get so caught up in their pain, let it rule them and consume them—but pain is temporary. Pain will always go away—it will either heal, or be silenced by death.”
Wade looked down at the scabbed sore on the back of his head, dark with dried blood. “Pain is never forever. And it's never impossible to live through pain, no matter how great that pain is. It's all about how one deals with that pain.”
His gaze shifted to the sky again, the cornflower blue suffused with golden rays, white clouds racing through the atmosphere currents of wind. “And yet, of course our pain matters, because it lets us know that we matter—that we're alive. Nobody is ever completely free of pain, no matter the degree of the pain or what form it takes. It's always there—it will always be there. In this, we are all the same.
“Our only differences are in how we deal with that pain. Some make art of some form. Some—like you—try to make the world a better place.
“And of course, others lashing out. Hurting others. Hurting ourselves. Watching someone bleed out from a bullet through the chest; ordered scars on wrists hidden by long sleeves; trembling muscles pushed to their limits.
“It's all a language. Everything about our lives is made of languages of pain, and we're all begging for someone to listen. Because our pain only matters if someone listens—if someone else cares—because we only ever matter because other people say we matter—because other people give us meaning.
“A lone man wandering through the wilderness doesn't matter. Unless he comes back to civilization and starts teaching whatever he's learned, like the Buddha, or whatever. And then he matters—then he can matter even thousands of years into the future.
“We only matter when we affect someone else. The big things or the little things, good things or bad things—we latch onto the insignificant in our constant search for meaning. And some people hurt others because it's the only way they know how to get that affect—that meaning—because it's easier to hurt someone than it is to help them, nevermind that helping people is more rewarding. The meaning from bad deeds might flare brighter, temporarily, but the meaning from good deeds lasts longer.
“But you're a hero, Nate. You know that already.”
Wade lifted his face to the wind, letting it tickle slightly unhinged giggles from his mouth. “So none of us matter, except for when we do—and even then, we only matter to each other and all those we touch with our actions. And maybe the actions of a single human can matter to our entire world—this tiny mudball called Earth—because it's so very small, really. But even then time will wash everything away and erase all meaning except for that which is remembered, and even that too will fade, until there's absolutely nothing and it doesn't matter, and therefore it never happened and we all never existed.
“And in the entire universe, nothing that any of us do will ever matter at all.”
And then Wade lapsed into silence, gaze distant on the expanse of cornflower blue stretched over the silver buildings of Providence, his fingers curling and uncurling over the metal railing that had warmed beneath his hands.
Nathan watched him for several minutes, neither of them speaking or moving from their places.
Everything about Wade was calm except for his fidgeting hands and the deranged shadows behind his brown (burnt sienna) eyes.
Finally Nathan murmured, “You matter to me, Wade.”
Wade's lips curled. “I know.”
Wade's attention stayed on the sky, but Nathan's attention stayed on Wade, trying to reconcile this new, lucid, philosophical side of the usually insane and nonsensical Merc with a Mouth.
“Nate,” Wade suddenly hissed, looking at him and then gesturing desperately to the sky. “Look at the sunset, Nate!”
Nathan shifted his attention back to the sky, and the two of them stood there, watching the cornflower blue shift to lavender, peach and mango spreading along the horizon, tangerine and ornamental plum on the water.
“You have to pay attention to little, inconsequential things like sunsets,” Wade said, with a childish sagacity, his hand finding Nathan's and squeezing. “Even though sunsets happened every day you've lived and you've seen tons of them already, and even though sunsets will happen every day that you'll live until you die, and even long after that the sun will shine on and keep setting. But you've got to notice and appreciate the little, inconsequential things, because they're what give our inconsequential lives meaning. Take this from someone who can't die and has spent a long time wondering why he's still alive, and how the hell he can make that unwanted life worth living.”
“We're not inconsequential,” Nathan said, eyes still taking in the lurid sunset that was so vibrant he could practically taste the fruit on his tongue.
Wade hummed, leaning against him. “Just think—lots of other people are probably looking at this sunset right now. And lots and lots more people are looking at the sun from other angles—somewhere someone right now is looking at the same exact sun, and it's sunrise—and somewhere else someone is looking at the same exact sun, and it's overhead. But it's the same sun.”
“Yes,” Nathan murmured. “It is.”
“And somewhere,” Wade continued, “someone's looking up at the stars and waiting for the sun to rise. Someone, somewhere, is probably having this exact same kind of thought as I am. Somewhere someone is holding someone else's hand and murmuring sweet nothings.”
Pulling Wade closer, Nathan pressed a chaste kiss to the man's bald head.
“So we really aren't ever alone, are we?” Wade said, looking up at him. The lighting made his eyes dark and impossible to read. “We only make ourselves think that we're alone because we think the world revolves around us, and the world can only revolve around one person. Except that really, we're all our own suns, with our own worlds revolving around us. We're all people, and we're all our own protagonists, and therefore we're never alone, even in that feeling of being alone.”
“You're quite the philosopher today,” Nathan murmured, a smile on his lips, as he took in Wade's face bathed in the rosy, brazen light of the sunset.
“I have my moments,” Wade said, pressing closer, leaning his head against Nathan's shoulder as he watched the sunset. “However, it's giving me quite the headache. I'll probably be extra crazy and annoying tomorrow in compensation, forgetting all about this and insisting instead that the world is a hotdog to be eaten and drenched in ketchup. Except in the opposite order.”
Nathan glanced down at him, then back up at the sunset, smiling slightly. “I… am glad to have seen this side of you.”
Wade giggled. “I have so many different sides! Like a dodecahedron!”
Nathan laughed softly.
They watched the sky until it was purple-pluot-dark and peppered with sugar-crystal stars, Wade humming something under his breath.
The wind had a bit of a bite, now, nipping at their noses and stroking their skin into goosebumps and shivers.
Suddenly Wade barked a loud laugh. “I literally just hummed the entire Sugar Plum Fairy song from The Nutcracker Ballet! I am so in need of a drink it's not even funny. Please tell me you have rubbing alcohol.”
“No, but there should be a pack of beer in the fridge,” Nathan answered.
“Beer, beer, the tropical fruit!” Wade sang as he ran across the balcony, stopping at the sliding door to look back at Nathan. “But why is the rubbing alcohol gone?” he asked plaintively.
“Because you don't actually want to get drunk off your ass,” Nathan reminded him, following the man he loved inside. “You're an incredibly maudlin drunk. Last time you cried on my shoulder for hours, and then begged me not to let you ever drink yourself into such a state again.”
Wade glared at him as he took the six-pack out of the fridge. “We agreed to completely forget about that incident!”
“It's forgotten,” Nathan assured him, sitting at the counter as Wade joined him, passing him a beer. “But if it's any consolation, there are a great many people out there who have drunken themselves into a similar state. You're hardly alone in that.”
“Ugh, no more philosophy!” Wade complained, making a face before chugging half his beer in one go. He set the bottle on the counter, whining, “My brain hurts enough as it is. I've hit my philosophical hangover, and bringing those thoughts up again is akin to turning on the lights to a regular hungover person, so kindly shut up your piehole.”
Nathan chuckled and took a swig of his drink.
The beer in his mouth was bitter, but the smile on his lips was sweet.