Pietro is chewing gum. Chew. Chew. Now it's lost all flavour. Chew. He's sick of the gum. The Prof is saying something and Pietro tries to focus.
"-run a lap of the track and we'll time you."
Pietro frowns. "You want me to run?"
Charles frowns too. Today seems like a frowny sort of day, like if a storm cloud were a person. That didn't make much sense. Pietro is still getting the hang of imagery.
"Yes Pietro, I want you to run, that's exactly the point."
"Sure," Pietro says casually, though he's not entirely sure what's going on. He speeds up then, lets himself fizz like mentos in coke when they fizz everywhere. Everything is slow-motion, like in the Matrix. Charles' finger is crawling towards the tip of his stopwatch- who even has those anymore?
Pietro ambles over to Hank. Should he stick the gum in his fur? It'd be kinda funny- Hank would have to shave it. Pietro wonders if Hank's newly-hairless skin would be blue too, or would it be like a hairless cat. If he's going to be honest, hairless cats freak him out. He decides not to stick the gum on Hank. It would just be petty.
He wanders back to the Prof, and waits until Charles' finger finally hits the stopwatch, and then he lets time go back to normal.
"Yeah, I'm done," he says.
"Really?" Charles asks, raising a brow.
"Yeah," Pietro says again, pulling at his sleeves.
"Because I'm reading your most recent memories now Pietro, and you didn't run a lap at all."
"Hey!" Pietro says. "That's cheating."
"You cheated too Pietro," Charles says, sounding disappointed, which is ridiculous because Pietro didn't even sign up for this. He's never had to run in his life. He's heard that it's difficult and that doesn't appeal to him, not one bit.
"Fine. I'll run the lap," he says, somewhat grumpily. Charles presses the button and Pietro speeds up again. He jogs the first half of the track and then walks the rest of it. He never knew running was like this. Jesus. His lungs are burning. Is this what it's like for normal people when they try to go fast? Poor things. His heart goes out to them, it really does.
He finally makes it back to the starting line and plonks himself on the grass in front of the Professor. He gives himself enough time to get his breath back- though he doesn't bother getting up from his very comfortable position on the ground- before he sinks back into real-time.
Charles looks at the watch. "Well this is going to be useless," he admits. "Not even a second has passed."
"I guess I'm that brilliant," Pietro manages but wow he's got a stitch and can't imagine doing this again, like, ever. Do people run for fun? That seems absurd.
"Hmm," Charles says. "Hank, do you think you could get a more precise stopwatch made? I think we're going to need to go into smaller units of time here."
"Uhhh," Hank says, which really annoys Pietro. Everyone is so slow anyway, and Hank with all his verbal tics takes ages to say anything. Get on with it. "Why doesn't Pietro just run at normal speed? He'll still be getting fit?"
"Well…" the Prof says.
"No," Pietro says.
"That's a fantastic idea Hank," Charles says.
"No," Pietro says again.
"What?" Hank asks. "So what if you're not the fastest for once? There was a time when Charles could out-run 'll get good at it soon enough Pietro."
"I just really don't like running," Pietro says. "Like, I'm so fast already. Isn't that enough?"
Hank and the Prof exchange a look. Pietro hates when people exchange looks. That means they're about to disagree with him.
"But you need to be physically fit too," Charles says. "Imagine if you lost your powers somehow. You'd still need to be able to run, and fight like everyone else."
Pietro does admit that it does make sense, but it sounds exhausting.
"This is like, like asking you to play chess without using your powers Prof."
"Are you insinuating that I cheat Pietro?"
"Well you do," Hanks says under his breath.
"Well yes I know," Charles replies, "but still, the accusation stings."
Pietro begins biting his nails again. It's a bad habit- usually aggravated by people being really slow, which is every second of every day.
"If I have to do this, let's get it over with then," he says.
"That's the spirit. I'll go easy on you," Hank says, which isn't reassuring at all because he's like seven foot and all blue-muscle and Hank's 'easy' is probably miles above beyond Pietro's current ability.
"If you cheat, I'll know," the Prof says, quite menacingly.
"I know, I know," Pietro replies, and flashes over to the nearest bin and drops the gum in. He flickers back to the starting line and wishes actual running was as easy as his speeding thing.
"Ready, get set, go!" Charles cries, and Pietro really doesn't know how he went from breaking into the Pentagon to this, but that's not to say he's not enjoying it. Though he isn't enjoying it, not one bit. Exercise is painful after all.