bakerstreet | OTHERWORDLY.

or

or pick one of your own!

Edited 2015-05-27 22:11 (UTC)

[ It's not the plan (in fact, it's nowhere even in the same country as the plan) to end up in a small village, holed up in the only sturdy building with a good place on the top floor for a sniper's nest. They lost the Jeep when the nearby HYDRA base took it, and trudged back through the forest towards the SSR base, desperately keeping out of sight of the enemy which outnumbers and outguns them. This village is the logical place to stay for the night, which is why they move silently and haven't lit a fire. There's some biscuits still in the cupboard, and they sombrely split that between them. Bucky takes first watch to let Steve rest: he's been cutting a path through for them all day with that damn shield. He's setting up with his rifle for the night when she enters the room, and he quirks a brow. ]

Come up here for the view?

Something like that.

[ peggy had taken a little kip of her own: nothing lengthy and nothing deep, but enough to bring some colour back into her cheeks. enough to shake off the strained and grumbling attitude of someone who'd gone too long without shutting her eyes. but she'd gone from restful to restless in a matter of minutes, and had just now picked her way up trashed stairs and through old bedrooms. she tries to tell herself she'd not expected to find bucky up here, but the strategic recesses of her mind had known all too well where the sniper would roost. ]

It breaks my heart to see this-- [ she crosses her arms and leans against the door-jamb. all this emptiness. all this interrupted living. ] What a tragic view it turns out to be.

[ Once he's assured his scope is clean and he can see (far better in the dark and cold than he ever wants to admit), he sits up against the wall and crosses his ankles, looking as comfortable in his fatigues as a nobleman with his silks and a bowl of grapes. He grins wickedly at her. ]

Better one right here.

[ It's a bit of friendly, honest ribbing, with no serious intent, because he shifts his position immediately after. There's a war on. What's surfacing is a soldier. ]

Wanna sit down? Floor's sturdy.

[ she bites down on her smile. flattery came easy to soldiers' tongues -- but that didn't make each instance any less touching. especially when that flattery took a gentler shape than brash-and-crude advances. peggy raises her shoulder from the door's frame and takes a step towards his offered patch of floor. ]

-- So long as you're keen for the company, sergeant.

[ Always, given by how he inspects it for dirt (Agent Carter might wear trousers more than skirts and shoot the flame off a candle but she's still a lady), and then nods, satisfied that it's the most suitable he can make it without a mop. ]

Gets real quiet up here, [ he offers, when she's seated. ] but at least seems like it'll be a nice clear night. If krauts show up we'll see 'em coming.

Edited (typo) 2015-05-28 14:00 (UTC)

You will. [ she nods at the gun with its scope. ] Me? Well, I'll still be kicking myself for losing track of our binoculars during that last run-in.

[ the guilt ran deep -- no matter how likely it was that any of them (barring perhaps steve) could have just as easily lost the same. ]

You're our best eyes now.

[ But that's it, ain't it. He's Steve, but he's also not perfect, just pushes himself further than anyone else, and it's on the rest of them to keep up however they can. He casts a sideways glance at her. ]

We coulda lost worse.

[ The guns, the ones that shot blue instead of bullets, which Stark was still trying to figure out — they'd gotten damn lucky. Better the binoculars than an arm, or one of the team. ]

Could have. Certainly.

[ assent. peggy nods -- then at long last lowers herself to first kneel on the floorboards, then swing her heels forward so she could sit with her knees hugged against her chest. ] I never took you for a count your blessings sort, Barnes.

[ and yet she's impressed by such optimism. heartened by it, even. ]

Edited 2015-05-28 21:46 (UTC)

That's cos I ain't, [ he answers, with a dry chuckle. ] just keeping my feet on the ground.

[ They can't afford to carry too much: the words of loved ones next to their hearts and that's it. Because if he pushes that gap wider to fit all the sons and brothers and fathers he's killed, wonders if they were just as scared, every piece of could've, should've, and must've, it will come closing in on all of them, mercilessly. ]

[ his chuckle meets with her soft hum. a barely-there mmhm of agreement -- and an immediate silence that sounds much more like a clerkish mind recording details. filing away facts.

peggy knits her fingers together against her shins. and she asks: ] How old were you when you enlisted?

[ He's faintly amused, no idea where she's going with this line of thinking, but it'd be a nice game to while away the time. Always liked the smart dames better, though he thinks they probably don't care for him as much. ]

Twenty-five.

[ Enlisted. Hah. ]

Why do you ask?

[ a strange mixture of delight and reproach seized her expression. floated through her eyes. peggy knows better to underestimate barnes's intuition -- or the intuition of any man who'd clawed his way to a non-commissioned rank. most (most) sergeants worth their salt had a glimmer within of the same things that made intelligence officers so slippery: a means of reading through the shite and hearing the suspicion below.

fortunately, peggy's suspicion was all but harmless. ] We could have lost worse. [ a poor repetition of his own words. ] That's what you said. An odd blend of realism and optimism all at once -- and one not always shown by those who enlisted on account of the war. [ versus those who'd already been in fatigues, whether by career or necessity. ]

There's something very regular army about you, Barnes. [ perhaps that's why she likes his company so. ]

[ The corner of his mouth quirks up. ]

[ Cheeky, ] Sayin' I'm ordinary?

[ She's saying he's a good soldier. There's nothing more terrifying. Were he aware that he becomes the twentieth century's most efficient one, he'd laugh. Steve's the one who's born for this fight, bright with not a speck of the rot that's the War eating him through. He has bad days, sure, but Steve's resilience is one learnt over twenty four years of anger and pain at a body that always betrayed him, and he suspects the same is true of her. As for the rest of them, they're having their trial by fire, and God, they've been damned lucky so far. All it takes is a bullet. ]

Maybe you've just got a thing for fellas from Brooklyn. Ever think a'that?

[ A small, fond smile follows the statement. She wants his cards on the table, typical spy. He respects that, and he respects her, but if she wants a straighter answer she's going to have to fish a little more for it. ]

[ she laughs. chin dropping -- a sigh covering up the brunt of her chuckle. peggy's decorum rebels against so simple a verdict but...yes, there's a certain charm newly found in that borough. she had spent enough time in the backs of cars with steve, watching the same alleyways he'd always known with her own fresh eyes. a grimy beautiful awful thrilling bit of city. like a more earnest london. ]

I'm saying there's a modicum of grace found in the ordinary. Nothing less.

Edited 2015-05-29 11:16 (UTC)

[ He mirrors her smile, drawing a leg up to his chest and folding the other under it: a neutral position, neither threatening nor vulnerable. ]

Beauty in small places? That your specialty?

[ It's a little romantic, he has to admit. It's not what he expected of the always-coiffed Agent Carter, but it wouldn't be the first time the outside doesn't match the inside. ]

Details, sergeant. [ the apprehension isn't thick in her voice. but it's present. there's a narrow line found between saying something aloud, and knowing a man already knows it. ] My speciality lies in the details. They needn't always be beautiful.

[ but it's better when they are. call it her own meagre optimism -- one that grows with every day spent in captain america's company. ]

[ Aim somewhere else is the warning, and he heeds it. For all he likes to push, there's limits. And some people, they don't need it. ]

No, they needn't. [ he tries out her vowels for good measure, his gaze turning distant, as he glances out of the glassless window, towards the hills. ] Most of the time, they ain't. Just how it is.

[ And the ball's back in her side of the court, he suspects, just the way she likes it. ]

[ another hollow laugh. did she really sound like that? no. not at all. his approximation makes it sound somehow stranger. ]

I joined up straight after Middle Sixth. [ -- she offers this kernel of her own history. her own life. its not exactly a fair trade, as were they anywhere but lost behind enemy lines she might have been able to access barnes's file at any time. she might have learned for herself the exact day he'd enlisted. her own file, however...

peggy watches him while he watches the hills. ] St. Martin's is an all-girls academy. Imagine the culture shock to be suddenly in the army instead. I must have been daft to choose it--

[ and yet she shows no regret. not an ounce. ]

[ He turns to look back at her as she speaks, rapt at attention. ]

We invented the Lindy Hop. Safe t'say we're all a little [ a short pause, then, deliberately, ] daft around these parts. [ simpler to think they're both just two members of the same unit, in a little tug of war to find the perfect equilibrium. Anything less could mean death out here. ] So why not the WACs?

[ The question comes with a curious glance. ]

WRACs. [ the correction is a little thing. barely important, except the 'r' stood for 'royal' and it sometimes did her good to remind the americans surrounding her that she wasn't always attached to their units. she might have grown more and more accustomed to their ways and words and wiles, but peggy carter is a liaison first and foremost.

or had been. loyalties are tricky things once the heart gets involved. ] And I imagine they would have welcomed me with open arms had -- British Intelligence not earmarked me otherwise.

[ what a broad term. british intelligence. she says it now because she still can't quite admit to bletchley park, so cloaked in secrecy it had been. ]

WRACs, [ he corrects himself, mildly. Even if it's the same thing to him: an instrument of war. ] sounds like a story. You should tell it after the war.

[ After, like their futures aren't a blank, maybe when Steve's worked up the courage to ask Peggy to marry him. Like all this — won't haunt them at all. Bucky's not one for such indulgences. That's what it is, shameless sentiment. He believes what's there and what he has to, to keep going. Nothing more, or less. ]

Why, so you might repeat it ad nauseam to any pretty pair of ears who'll listen? Gather up their favours with tales of daring war-time ladies whose gentle resilience you see reflected in them? [ her lips curled up into a smirk. the words aren't harsh. they aren't even true. tonight, she expects she can trust barnes with vague outline of her secrets. he's a rake, but he's a loyal one. she sees that when he stands by steve. ]

I'll be damned before I'm nostalgic fodder for your pick-up lines. [ but her judgement and her ire are non-existent. an honest brightness persists in her eyes. as though (beneath the uniform and the resolute duty) peggy carter enjoys a good bit of teasing. ]

I do like talking about myself, [ he replies, with a light smirk of his own. ] and I managed melting all the dames in Brooklyn single-handed for nine years, Carter. I imagine I'll do just fine.

[ The smirk softens to genuine amusement; he's laughing silently. ]

Though I wouldn't say no if you wanted to talk me up.

All of them? Good Lord.

[ disbelief mingles with amusement mingling once again with mild admiration. hyperbolic, obviously. but she fed into that hyperbole in favour of even suggesting she might ever 'talk him up' -- despite the fact that, day by day, she feels herself liking the sergeant more and more. ]

agent peggy carter (mcu) / OTA

honne.

why hello there.

hello :>

what a perfect surprise.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

and mcu gives him three different birth years well done

ugh those villains.

timelines /jazz hands

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

enjoy this daring foray into headcanon :|

you live dangerously

no subject

no subject

no subject