location: park

"Why's it so busy?" Asher wondered out loud. His babysitting duties for the day had technically finished, but it was a sunny day and so one thing had led to another and before he knew it he had been agreeing to join Mars and Maria Elena on a walk through the park. After all, wasn't he always claiming nature healed most things?

But the crowd of people around was seriously messing with the calm atmosphere he had wanted, and he frowned a little as he looked around. "Is there something going on? Maybe we should go?"

location: mars' apartment

Mars was relentlessly protective of Maria Elena, from Asher's perspective at any rate. It wasn't a bad thing, if anything he admired the trait and felt suitably honoured to be permitted to take care of her as a result, but it meant in the time he had been babysitting, it had always been an organised affair - he'd known weeks in advance, there had been sheets of information stuck to the fridge with what to do in an emergency (which never happened), handovers where he assured Mars that everything would be fine. Sure, there had been a couple short notice instances, things happened. But never often.

And now the mist, and everything that came along with it, seemed to have derailed the carefully balanced ecosystem of the arrangement, and Asher found himself called in on shorter notice, emergency situations, or even coming in of his own accord to try and help out - realising the more he came by, the more he should try to help more. And here he was, at the doorway again, the concern that had been building underneath his chest only growing as the door opened and they exchanged the usual greetings.

"Are you like, alright?" His question probably came out dumb, but it was fuelled with as much caution as it was genuine concern, not wanting to overly pry. "No offence, but you look," a word for shit which wasn't shit, "not great." (Poor substitute, but it did the trick.) "I mean, I'm dehydrating more, but it's not this bad. I don't think anyone's this bad."