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apocalypsehowcomm2021-11-18 07:59 pm
worthallthis) wrote in apocalypsehowcomm2021-11-18 07:59 pm
[Log] November Catch-all
Who: Bucky Barnes AKA Winter and OPEN
When: All of November
Where: Various, see prompts
Summary: Working, training, and having a breakdown in Dogtown
Warnings: Nothing so far, just the usual internalized depersonalization
I. Suspicion in Early Days - ADI Headquarters
After sleeping surprisingly well for most of a day on the first of the month, Winter spends the next several days of his patrols in the ADI buildings and apartments walking more carefully than usual, with his hand closer to his gun, half-expecting a new nightmare around the next corner. Did they really wake? How would he know?
Even afterwards, he ducks his head at the sight of many of the ADI employees-- more than usual, even. He shot some of them, in the dream. Without hesitation. Did they remember? Did they care? Did they fear him now? (They should. He is dangerous, clearly.)
Catch him sitting as far from everyone else as possible at lunch with his tray, or walking steadily through the halls looking for potential trouble, or having an extra cup of coffee after a bad night.
II. Teacher - ADI training room
Every day after his shift patrolling the ADI buildings or part of the city, Winter is in the training room in the basement levels of ADI, either working through a routine himself, or available to anyone who comes in and wants instruction. He has some regular students, at this point; he also has some people he's invited to come and learn. He hopes they come.
When they've finished a session and are just hitting the point of being too tired to continue without making more mistakes, Winter says, "Walk around the room. Cool off. Then I will walk you home."
III. Cloudy Day Blues - Dogtown
After the whole thing with the pigs, Winter has kept an eye on Dogtown. On days he isn't working, and sometimes in the mornings on days he does when he can't sleep and needs to walk, he circles the district. Dips into the streets to prowl and look for signs of trouble. When he's told of the monitoring at the park, he visits there, too.
Clouds don't make him run, though they do make him start to back away slowly. He feels the building pressure, the building dread, and remains steady. He lives with fear every day, he's learned how not to run away from it. It's when the certainty hits him that he's just going to kill everyone he ever cared about-- it only took the slightest provocation to make him shoot his fellow employees in that nightmare, didn't it? he shot Steve and punched him six times in the face, didn't he? he's killed more people than he will ever remember, hasn't he?-- that he finally buckles and bolts.
He ducks into an alleyway as soon as the oppressive sky lifts again, backs himself into the corner of the wall and a dumpster, and shudders, trying to catch his breath against the fear. The despair. Who's next? Who will he kill next time? Meredith? Strange? Yelena? He stays in that alleyway for a long time, crouched down, head in his hands, until the sun goes down or someone else finds him.
IV. Wildcard
Got another idea? Hit me up on cacopheny @ plurk or just reply here and I'll roll with it!
When: All of November
Where: Various, see prompts
Summary: Working, training, and having a breakdown in Dogtown
Warnings: Nothing so far, just the usual internalized depersonalization
I. Suspicion in Early Days - ADI Headquarters
After sleeping surprisingly well for most of a day on the first of the month, Winter spends the next several days of his patrols in the ADI buildings and apartments walking more carefully than usual, with his hand closer to his gun, half-expecting a new nightmare around the next corner. Did they really wake? How would he know?
Even afterwards, he ducks his head at the sight of many of the ADI employees-- more than usual, even. He shot some of them, in the dream. Without hesitation. Did they remember? Did they care? Did they fear him now? (They should. He is dangerous, clearly.)
Catch him sitting as far from everyone else as possible at lunch with his tray, or walking steadily through the halls looking for potential trouble, or having an extra cup of coffee after a bad night.
II. Teacher - ADI training room
Every day after his shift patrolling the ADI buildings or part of the city, Winter is in the training room in the basement levels of ADI, either working through a routine himself, or available to anyone who comes in and wants instruction. He has some regular students, at this point; he also has some people he's invited to come and learn. He hopes they come.
When they've finished a session and are just hitting the point of being too tired to continue without making more mistakes, Winter says, "Walk around the room. Cool off. Then I will walk you home."
III. Cloudy Day Blues - Dogtown
After the whole thing with the pigs, Winter has kept an eye on Dogtown. On days he isn't working, and sometimes in the mornings on days he does when he can't sleep and needs to walk, he circles the district. Dips into the streets to prowl and look for signs of trouble. When he's told of the monitoring at the park, he visits there, too.
Clouds don't make him run, though they do make him start to back away slowly. He feels the building pressure, the building dread, and remains steady. He lives with fear every day, he's learned how not to run away from it. It's when the certainty hits him that he's just going to kill everyone he ever cared about-- it only took the slightest provocation to make him shoot his fellow employees in that nightmare, didn't it? he shot Steve and punched him six times in the face, didn't he? he's killed more people than he will ever remember, hasn't he?-- that he finally buckles and bolts.
He ducks into an alleyway as soon as the oppressive sky lifts again, backs himself into the corner of the wall and a dumpster, and shudders, trying to catch his breath against the fear. The despair. Who's next? Who will he kill next time? Meredith? Strange? Yelena? He stays in that alleyway for a long time, crouched down, head in his hands, until the sun goes down or someone else finds him.
IV. Wildcard
Got another idea? Hit me up on cacopheny @ plurk or just reply here and I'll roll with it!
II-ish
And that's what she'd needed today, when she came looking for a sparring partner. A hard fight, not a win, something to remind her that even when she's outclassed, she isn't helpless.
Not like she had been in the nightmares. Not like she had been when half the world was erased. Not like she feels if she thinks too long and too hard about fears made manifest as alien gods.
The restless energy, the jittery, trapped feeling is still there in spite of the ragged edge of her breathing, and she's about to protest the call to halt when her side twinges, ribs throbbing in a way that warns that she'd taken the last fall badly, and will be a spectacular rainbow of bruises come tomorrow morning.
She may be stubborn, but she's not stupid. She wrinkles her nose in irritation, but scoops up her towel to scrub over her sweat-damp face, then sets off to lope around the perimeter of the training room.
"If you're going home, I'll walk with you," she says. "But I do not need an escort."
no subject
"Well. We are going to the same place," he points out. They might as well go together.
And he wants to walk with her. Keep her safe, yes, but mostly just prolong the time spent. He won't say that, because it's a want and he's still not very comfortable expressing those, but it's really not hard to infer.
no subject
"That's why I said I would walk with you if you're ready to go back," she says. "I didn't know if you had other things scheduled."
They both often do. She certainly butts up against ADI's maximum hours more often than she comes in below them, and that's with only one department to report to. For now.
no subject
The tongue thing is adorable. He wants to smile but he isn't entirely sure how, still. There's something almost smile-like to his face, though.
no subject
"How many people have signed on to learn how to shoot?" she asks, and then clarifies, "I know you meant for your own practice, today. You wouldn't be leaving if you had a student. But I'm curious."
Both about how many students he has, and about how it can be extrapolated to how many of their fellow otherworlders are taking all of this truly seriously.
no subject
Yelena doesn't count among them; he taught her everything he knows a long time ago, and their sparring now is for conditioning and edge. And fun, a little.
no subject
She lets her pace slow a little as her breathing and heart rate begin to descend towards normal.
"Do any of your defense students seem promising?"
no subject
As for the rest... his expressions still aren't really obvious, but there might be a skeptical, uncertain cast to it now. "They have. Determination. But many of them have. Have. Disabilities? Meredith can beat someone to death with her cane. But she needs her cane. Stephen has nerve damage and his hands shake. Monika is very small. Kate is-- well, Kate."
So they do well with what they have, he trusts them to stay alive long enough to bolt or get to help, but he would not call any of them promising fighters.
no subject
And then the humour gutters and dies, and something hardens in her expression.
"Is Monika one of the children?"
no subject
Admittedly, the fights she described seemed pretty out there, more than the kind of thing Winter and Yelena are used to, but still!
no subject
She casts a bitter look around them at the training gym, lips pursing. "You should teach her to use guns," she finally adds, words dragging a little, as though she's reluctant to force them past her lips. "If she wants to learn. ADI will not protect her from the monsters, and things like the boars or the creatures from the last dream... Knowing how to shoot might keep her safe from those things until someone can take her out of harm's way."
no subject
no subject
Because no one - no one - should be shooting anything they're not willing to kill. (No one, in her opinion, should be less than 100% willing to kill any monster pigs or other patchwork horrors. But there are many less obvious monsters in the world, ones that walk on two legs and are indistinguishable at a glance from that friendly neighbour. Those may require a gentler touch, for people less broken than she.)
no subject