apocalypsehowcomm | August Catch-all

Who: Bucky Barnes (AKA the dude who doesn't have a proper name right now) and OPEN
When: August catch-all
Where: ADI headquarters, ADI apartments, around town
Summary: Just working, training, and being quietly creepy
Warnings: Internalized depersonalization

I. Patrols - ADI headquarters, ADI apartments

Working security is not entirely mindless, but it's close. Patrol around the outside of the ADI building complex, patrol through the buildings, prod the occasional air vent in the ceiling or panels in the wall just in case there's someone hiding in there, then repeat. It's familiar. It's comfortable. It's not quite mindless, but it's close enough to let him settle into diffuse focus where he doesn't have to worry about lack of orders and going home to not having anything to do there, either.

He's not averse to company on the job, but he's not... exactly chatty.

Sometimes he gets restless and repeats the process around the ADI apartment complex, too. Spot him at night, whether shortly after dinner or in the small hours of the morning, walking at a regular pace around the apartment complex fence, eyes alert but tired. He might be more chatty now-- maybe, a little-- looking over anyone who approaches and nodding in greeting.

II. Keeping or Offering an Edge - ADI headquarters

A lot of his spare time is spent in the target range and training rooms at ADI headquarters. Patrols are easy, but they don't keep you sharp. And he needs to keep sharp, especially as he's found his strength and speed... a little lacking, around here. So he can't depend on it without maintenance. Plus, maintenance helps with the pain from the arm.

So he maintains. Strength exercises, shadowboxing, practicing his aim with guns, flipping and throwing knives.

And if he sees anyone in either room looking lost or clearly struggling, he drifts over. Clasps his hands behind his back and ducks his head. "I can help train," he offers.

III. Exploration - Around town

He doesn't want to be taken by surprise by any path he'll be asked to take for ADI or for a person who needs rescued or killed, or ever be unaware of ambush points, so he does a lot of exploring around town, too. Poking his nose into shops, prowling around suburbs and apartment complexes, and looking up at trees in the park. He doesn't ever sit down in a restaurant or on a bench, but he loiters outside the former and watches the latter like he expects them to bite him, though someone could possibly convince him to try either one.

More than once he gets the cops called on him, because he does most of his wandering around in his full mask and goggles, face comfortably obscured. It helps him feel stronger, for some reason, and it means he doesn't have to deal with making eye contact or controlling his expression. Fellow ADI transplants might find him staring in stony silence at a well-meaning police officer stammering through a warning to stop hanging around residential areas.

Wanna help out?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It is a question not quite asked like a question. It keeps her from continuing walking, tilting her head to the side thoughtfully. A small smile creeps on her face.

"I'm at Bonnie's," certainly not at ADI's apartments. "Should there be reason for me to think it isn't safe?"

So far, Wanda hasn't found it dangerous — and how could it be considered dangerous, when she's got the powers she has? She can't help but be appreciate, though.

"I won't mind," she waves a hand, motioning at the fence, "but I wouldn't want you to get locked out until morning."

He shrugs. The answer wasn't a no, and he does in fact have reason to believe this town isn't safe. "I won't sleep again, anyway."

He heads for the nearest gate out, hoping she follows along the fence, or waits for him.

Provided she does, he meets her on the other side after carefully closing the gate behind him, and explains, "I was ambushed three times last month. It might not be safe for you."

That, itself, is troubling. Won't sleep again. That seems a little detrimental to the mental health, but Wanda makes no comment of it, instead following along the fence until they reach the nearest gate.

"Three times?" The Winter Soldier would have plenty of enemies, but in this world where there history is reduced to nothing of relevance... "By who?"

Wanda doesn't mind the company, though, especially when it came willingly from a man that is but isn't a friend. She starts making her way down the path, focusing on the landmarks towards the flophouse.

When nightmares drive him not only out of bed but out of the apartment entirely, sleep just plain isn't going to happen for the rest of the night. He knows this from experience, by now.

He settles in to walk at her side, eyes roving around the trees, buildings, and street around them for threats. "Once, by young men in a group trying to take a thing I had been sent to retrieve. Again, by kelpies in the shape of different young men, aiming to kidnap to torture. Then by kelpies in their horse forms, on the mission to rescue those kidnapped and tortured." It's a lot of words at once, but he's giving a report, so it's easy.

It does sound like a report, and were it not for Bucky's serious tone, she would have thought he was joking. Kelpies, of all things? Clearly she's yet to experience the supernatural things that accost this world.

"Sounds like you're being kept busy," regardless of the nature of these attacks. "Did you have trouble dealing with them?"

"The humans, no. The first attack by the kelpies was a surprise, so I did sustain injury. I have since healed. The mission was no trouble from a tactical standpoint." It was just the whole... cutting people out of sealskins that was tricky. Because it was so weird. "But there were civilians to deal with," he settles on.

If it is something that someone without any overt powers can handle, Wanda doesn't think there is much to worry about in terms of managing the supernatural. Of course, Bucky is anything but 'normal', what with his left arm and strength.

Nonetheless, it is something of a relief.

"It's good that you've healed," it would be troublesome otherwise, if there was to be an unexpected threat in every corner. She glances over to him, curiosity on her face. "What is the last you remember before coming here?"

He hesitates before answering, but in the end, does answer. His voice sounds flatter than before, though. "Hauling the. Target. Out of the river. Verifying he was still breathing. Leaving before emergency services or allies could find him. Setting my shoulder and searching for civilian clothes." And that's it. That's the last hour or so of his time on their version of Earth.

Wanda is starting to recognize who Bucky means when he says 'the Target', but she's not going to test her theory—he certainly seems to be struggling with providing the information to her at all.

This, to her knowledge, was before she had even gotten her powers and met the Avengers. Certainly before the Sokovia Accords, too.

"We wouldn't have met until years later," she scrunches her nose. "Seems like we're all displaced from different times and worlds."

Yeah, Wanda may or may not ever have been told the story of how Steve's best friend was sent to murder him, and very nearly managed it. He frowns, mostly to himself, in thought rather than annoyance. "Belova is from later, too. She said. Time shouldn't work backwards." He shrugs a little. "But maybe it does. Or maybe this is not our world. I have found no sign yet of HYDRA through the usual channels."

Yelena? So, they've met.

At the idea that this is not their world, Wanda shakes her head in agreement. "The Avengers don't mean anything for the people here," and it is in her experience that they tend to be recognized, one way or another. "I wouldn't think too hard about what it means."

This world being not their world, the way time doesn't seem to work right, here.

"I also don't think you'll find sighs of HYDRA here."

Even from the time she is from, that organization is hardly a blip in the radar, anymore.

It'll take a while for this guy to stop looking for HYDRA everywhere, or to believe that it could actually be really gone even in their own universe. But for now, he can nod a little. "Probably not our world, then. One step to the side. Some things the same but not all."

He's maybe more comfortable with the idea then he should be. Like maybe he's thought about it before, a long time ago. (Being a science fiction nerd in the 1930s has its uses, apparently.)

There's probably no stupid former target in this world, if there's no HYDRA. He's not sure if he likes that thought or doesn't like it.

August Catch-all

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