logsinthenight | Making the Rounds [Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA]

Entry tags:

Making the Rounds [Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA]

characters: Bucky and Various (Closed prompts + Wildcard OTA)
location: Around Beacon
date/time: October 19 - 29
content: Catch-all for Bucky stuff
warnings: Just the usual occasional disassociation, swearing, and bickering with himself

I. Closed to Matt

The Soldier stops by the general store once a week to check the level of supplies and, on rare occasions, actually pick something up that someone in the house needs. The remains of the costumes are still strewn about, some on display, some just a mess in the boxes. The Soldier eyes them thoughtfully, something prodding at the back of its brain about scraps and raw materials, but fuck if it can work out what to do with that.

So it's there, picking restlessly at costumes with all the metal-scent and quiet mechanical arm-noises that entails, when Matt comes in.

II. Closed to Daylight

The Soldier has more than once spied Daylight visiting with spirits, and, thinking about its own spirit-friend, approached (somewhat nervously) to offer to see if any of Daylight's friends know Morse Code, in order to perhaps translate more phrases in their musical language to something the residents of Beacon can be taught to understand.

So here it is, following Daylight to the woods, bearing a pot of coffee securely in its metal hand (which can't feel the heat of the pot as "pain") and a bunch of very small cups and dishes it scrounged up, to see if these spirits appreciate its favorite drink. Always best to bring a little peace offering when planning to ask anyone to work on something, right?

III. Closed to Aziraphale

It takes a while to work up the bravery to come to Aziraphale with the request. But the Sergeant swore up and down that Aziraphale had offered, and seemed earnest about it. Seemed like he wouldn't mess with anything they didn't want him to. Like he would be polite and helpful and above all careful.

So one day when Crowley is out of the house and Aziraphale is finishing puttering around the kitchen, the Soldier sidles up a little and says, carefully not actually looking at him, "The Sergeant said. You could see happy memories."

Sucks to have the actual Soldier back, in some ways, don't it, Aziraphale?

IV. Closed to Bruce

There are a lot of odd people around Beacon, for a given value of "odd". Some of them are odd because they aren't human, or have obvious trauma, or particular reasons that they're obvious about telegraphing. The sneaky young man who avoids contact most of the time and visits the general store and Invincible when he seems to think no one else will be around doesn't fit into any of those categories. He hides and avoids people, he moves like he's more well-trained than he should be, and the Soldier is having a hard time pinning down just how old he actually is. He reminds it a little of Eleven, which makes it worry.

So the Soldier keeps a distant eye on him for a few days, or tries to. Occasionally it loses track, but always manages to pick it up again eventually. At least it does work out where the young man is staying, so it waits outside one late morning (ish; for a given value of "morning" in a place with no sun) to intercept him on his way out for the "day" at the time he usually appears. It doesn't do casual well, so it's just sitting on a tree stump within view, obviously waiting and watching the door.

V. Wildcard!

Got something you wanna say to the Soldier? Want to come to one of its classes at the gym? Got some other idea based on his daily routine? Just hit me up here!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Aziraphale is, indeed, finished puttering around the kitchen and finally has sat down to get some reading done, but puts the book down in order to speak with the Soldier, who he still sometimes calls Walter in his head.

"Yes, yes I can. I-- try not to do it on purpose, if you are wondering."

"No," the Soldier says. "I know. He said."

It's still hard to bring this up with Aziraphale, to even refer to the Sergeant, but the Sergeant already started it, and... it wants to know. Has to, or else there's no reason to even want more memories. Might as well just focus on new ones.

"He said. You could show me. One, maybe." It looks sidelong over at the angel, expression less neutral and a little more uncertain. "I just. If I knew there was something."

He brightens up, because he didn't expect that. "Do you... I mean, do you really want to? I'd be willing-- I'd be happy to provide, but.

"Well."

He doesn't want to say that Bucky's mind is a mess.

"We'll have to be careful. And patient."

The Soldier's mind is basically a maze of traps, electrified fences, buried landmines, and big stone walls, yeah. And it can admit to that readily. (We live with that this shit every damn day.) It nods a couple times. "I can be both of those things." It inches a little closer then, remembering how Crowley had wanted to touch it to do the full fear removal, and eases down to kneel in front of where Aziraphale is sitting. Within touching distance. "What do you need me to do? If you tell me first what's going to happen. I should panic less." It hopes. Or at least it should be more likely to keep panic to controllable levels.

"Just need you to relax as much as you can. And... be open. Because I'll see things you might not want me to see. I-- try not to look, and you know. I am an Angel, I've seen a lot of things. There's no judgment here.

But I might bring up memories you don't want to see, either. Sometimes the most beautiful memories are also the most painful. And I might bring you something that you won't understand.

I'll stop if you tell me or you get distressed. Alright?"

You're not filling the Soldier with certainty, here, Aziraphale. (Come on. It'll help. It's not like anything we see can be worse than what we saw all last week. You don't know that. I can't even fucking imagine anything worse than what we saw last week.) It focuses on the angel's shoulder. It's not sure if it can tell him to stop... but it can at least promise to try. "Okay. I don't care what you see. Technicians know everything anyway."

It settles on its heels on the floor. Hesitates a moment before letting Aziraphale touch it, and says, "Not. Not my name. Okay? Anything else."

"It might come up," Aziraphale responds. "If someone calls you your name," he adds, concerned.

"Are you sure about this?"

The thought makes the plates in its arm shift uncomfortably. But they made the decision together, Soldier and Sergeant both, and they're not going to change their mind now. Probably. "When am I sure about anything," it says with a sigh. "Please. Before I lose my nerve."

"No, no, don't do that. Alright, slow down. Would you like some tea first? Or-- help? I could make you calmer," he offers.

"Perhaps to lie down?"

No lying down. Absolutely not. "Too much like the Chair. Or the table. No one ever fucked with my head sitting like this. I'm pretty sure. And waiting longer will mean more time to talk myself out of it. Then I'll just be annoyed at myself for being a chickenshit."

Edited 2019-10-28 00:41 (UTC)

"Alright, alright. That's okay. Then-- the calming? Do you want that?"

He doesn't want to make the condition worse. That's definitely the worst-case scenario.

Aziraphale has done that before. It remembers, even if at the time it hadn't known what was happening. It hadn't been so bad. (Just like a little sedative. Took the fuckin' edge off. You weren't even there. If you think about it, I think about it. It's how this shit works. Yeah, okay... okay.) Crowley had done it even better, and they'd been fully functional for three whole days.

"Okay," it says out loud. Maybe if there's less stress, less distraction from fear, it'll be easier for Aziraphale to find something that didn't come out of a horror show.

He waves a hand over and makes sure that Bucky is in a calmer, more receptive mood. It's sort of like being hypnotized, it's much better when you're open to the idea.

Not that this won't work otherwise, but it'd be much trickier.

It is like a bit of a sedative. It's easy to see how the Soldier guessed it was drugged last time, not knowing what it was. Now that it's expecting it, the Soldier pays attention to the feeling-- not quite like Crowley's removal of fear entirely, but more like the fear doesn't matter quite so much. The urge to twitch and cringe away is still there, but it's easier to ignore.

"Still feels like being drugged," it comments, blinking a couple times. But it does, as the Sergeant says, take the edge off. "But that did do. Something. Maybe it will help."

"Yes, you're much calmer now," he responds, as he starts to move around in Bucky's brain as if dipping his toes into a wading pool.

He doesn't go very far at first, not wanting to disturb him too much. But he makes sure to make himself known wherever he pokes around - so he's not surprised.

"I don't know about much--" Because there is still a flinch at that sensation. That doesn't feel like being drugged. But it doesn't feel anything like the Chair, either, and doesn't actually bring up any kind of echo of other technicians working on its brain. It doesn't hurt.

The surface level of of the Soldier's brain is mostly made up of observations. It is always observing everything around it, watching others closely for signs of their mood and intentions, listening to more than most humans would hear, keeping slivers of attention on all potential exits-- not so intensively at the moment, but in general, it's still there in the background. A lot of its attention is currently focused on Aziraphale, current observations of him clouded by an only partially-remembered impression of another "technician", an actual doctor. There's no name, but the image is clear. That's not a happy association, not a bright memory.

(Is that him? Shit, can he hear me?)

That's the Sergeant's voice, all Brooklyn, near the surface as well. There's no real visual aspect to him, just kind of a disembodied voice.

Edited (missed a word there) 2019-10-30 02:58 (UTC)

"Yes I can, but only because you're so loud," he answers, a little laugh in his throat trying to wriggle his way out.

He follows the glimmer of light, faint and trying to make it stronger, bring it to the forefront. He won't know what it is until they get there together, but he weaves through the memories, trying not to touch anything that looks dark.

(I ain't loud, I'm-- You're loud. Shut up and let him look. You're the one who was so adamant about this. -- yeah, okay, fine. I'll shut up.)

Well, if they wanted to prove to someone that the Sergeant was there all the time, having them literally poking around in their brain is one way to do it.

Most of the memories are new, with only a few showing signs of being actually older than the Soldier's arrival in Beacon. There are positive memories from Beacon, but that's not what they're looking for. The glimmer of older positive memories is behind the mental, metaphorical version of an electrified fence and a field of ice. The Soldier can't get past it, not on purpose, because it can't see it. But there are holes in the "fence" here and there that Aziraphale, from the outside, can see and take advantage of.

Much of what's beyond the barrier is dark, still, too. Aziraphale will have to wade through a lot of torture, murder, and fear to get to something that shines bright. The Soldier can only sense echoes of what he's doing, now, stuck on the other side of the "fence" made by constant wipes and the near-death of cryofreeze. Whatever Aziraphale finds, he'll have to literally bring it back.

Take your pick of peaceful moments from the war, Aziraphale... or anything from Brooklyn. Even the bad times in Brooklyn are lit with a glow of love.

He looks after the ones from Brooklyn, trying to find the brightest one and bring it forward, following what he knows best: love.

It takes him awhile to latch onto a memory but he does so like a crane game, pulling onto it and trying to pull it forth, trying to avoid everything else around it.

While everything else shifts and stirs like Aziraphale is disturbing metaphorical mud to pull a shiny stone from the bottom of a very dirty stream, he can absolutely get the memory he wants, and getting it to the surface of the Soldier's shared mind is a lot easier than it could be. The shadowy, awful memories shrink away from it.

The memory unfolds as soon as he crosses into the part of the mind the Soldier can actually inhabit, filling the space with a hot afternoon out on a fire escape in Brooklyn, outside a shared tenement apartment.

It's late in the day, after a long morning and afternoon of work down on the docks, and it's too hot and stuffy for Steve to stay inside and still breathe properly. So here they are. He's soaking up the sun and relaxing, listening to the sounds of the city below, and the scratching sound of pencil on paper from Steve drawing next to him. Everything is calm and lazy, comfortable and even happy.

He opens his eyes halfway against the glare and rolls his head to one side, taking in the sight of his favorite person, head bent over the notebook, expression intent on whatever he's working on, and all of him fucking adorable. Steve looks up from his work, catches him watching, and smiles. It's a smile like sunrise, and brings one like it out on his own face, before he shuts his eyes again and decides to take a nap, tugging his cap down over his eyes. Everything's as it should be.

The Soldier sits back hard on its ass, blinking blankly at nothing for a long moment while it integrates that into the rest of its brain. "Fuck," it says softly.

Even as Soldier startles, Aziraphale holds onto the memory, trying to make sure it doesn't fall out of place somewhere it doesn't belong. He sets it down gently somewhere prominent, visible, reachable.

He doesn't know who Steve Rogers is - even if he had known anything about superheroes and caught a passing resemblance, he never would have guessed it from looking at the slight man scratching away at paper.

Finally, when it's settled, he looks back at Soldier. "Are you alright?" he asks. "Do you know who that was?" Because you love him, he doesn't say. And you miss him terribly.

"Steve," the Soldier answers hoarsely. It blinks again, eyes burning a little, and reaches up with the flesh hand to wipe at the tears starting to fall. It's so overwhelming. Not bad-- absolutely not bad-- but the feeling. It's as strong as fear ever was. "His name was Steve. I... never thought I could. Did. Feel like that. About anyone." It's kind of like what it feels about Misty and Scarlett, and a little like how it feels about Crowley and Eleven, but so much more than both those feelings.

Aziraphale leans over to help Bucky brush away his tears, and pulls out a pocket handkerchief to take care of the rest.

"He is very special. Do you remember what he was drawing?" he asks. "Do you think you'd like to see it?"

He tries to offer a reassuring smile.

The fingertips to its face make the Soldier twitch back automatically before Aziraphale can actually make contact, but it does accept the handkerchief with an air of mild embarrassment to dab at its eyes itself, instead. (We need one of these. Or a couple of these. Spare fabric. From the costumes. There's an idea.) Even the Sergeant sounds a little stuffy. Aww.

"I think. It was. The city. Or the fire escape. He was always... he drew what he saw. I think." That feels like part of the memory, somehow. The knowledge of what Steve usually drew, so there hadn't been any curiosity to look at what he was drawing now.

"The city," Aziraphale repeats. "Brooklyn, I imagine?" he asks. The furnishings in the room had looked quite a bit outdated, though Aziraphale has a hard time placing a date because, well, his own furnishings haven't been updated since the late Victorian age.

But he wonders if Soldier remembers more of the man now that he's come forward in memory. "Can you tell me more about Steve?"

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