Php ssh2 - 504 Bad Gateway Time-Out

OK, I'm about to cry. I can't get past this time out issue.

1. I have a non-Laravel project I'm trying to run on Homestead and Forge.
2. The application needs to ssh into another box to copy some configuration info (irrelevant but for background on what/why_
3. I have installed php-ssh2 and verified it is loaded.
4. The Homestead vm is running Ubuntu 14.04 with PHP 7
5. The Forge machine is running Ubuntu 16.04 with the Forge stack including PHP 7
6. ssh2_connect('ip', port); times out
7. Given 6, it makes the request then doesn't get a response. The error in my log is:

2016/08/25 00:43:27 [error] 2704#2704: *1400 upstream timed out (110: Connection timed out) while reading response header from upstream, client: [my client ip], server: mydomain.com, request: "GET /test.php HTTP/1.1", upstream: "fastcgi://unix:/var/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock", host: "mydomain.com"

1. Everything else is functioning as it should -- remote db connection, php, etc.
2. I can ssh from the command line without any issue to varying ports xx.xx.xx.xx:88, etc,
3. I tried disabling ufw just to be sure it wasn't getting blocked somehow.

I know this has to be a configuration issue, but I'm just too sleep deprived and dense to figure it out. If anyone has any ideas, I'd be forever grateful.

EDIT: I tried phpseclib with the same result. Does anyone have the ssh2_ functions running under Nginx/PHP 7?