Steve Rogers ☆ Captain America (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
punched_hitler) wrote2015-06-27 08:00 pm
punched_hitler) wrote2015-06-27 08:00 pm
☆ 33 ☆ (TEXT; Private to Bucky | SPAM; OTA)
[TEXT: Private to Bucky]
Hey, I need you to hang on to something for me for a little while, if you don't mind.
[SPAM; OTA]
[It's not that there's a new guy on the Barge - there's not. But anyone used to seeing Captain America around might notice that he's conspicuously missing as of Saturday - or, at least, he's not six-foot two and two hundred twenty pounds anymore. He's five-foot four and about a hundred pounds soaking wet, and he's not apologetic about it in the least. Same haircut, same voice, same style of dress (at least he asked for some civilian clothes that would fit), same attitude.
Steve goes about his day the same as he ever has - he goes for a run through the Barge early in the morning, and he shows up for his lunch shift in the kitchens and his shifts in the infirmary on time. He shows up at T'Pol's cabin for meditation, and he's even in the gym sometimes, working out against the bags. It's just that his mile has gone from two minutes to twenty, and he's got an inhaler in his pocket for those times when running or climbing the stairs - he's not taking the elevator, he refuses - gets to be a little too much.
Of course, he knows people are going to notice, but unless someone says something to him first, they're not going to hear a word about it from him. Actions speak louder than words, after all.]
[ooc: If anyone needs a reference, 1, 2, & 3, just with this haircut, still. Feel free to recognize him or not!]
Hey, I need you to hang on to something for me for a little while, if you don't mind.
[SPAM; OTA]
[It's not that there's a new guy on the Barge - there's not. But anyone used to seeing Captain America around might notice that he's conspicuously missing as of Saturday - or, at least, he's not six-foot two and two hundred twenty pounds anymore. He's five-foot four and about a hundred pounds soaking wet, and he's not apologetic about it in the least. Same haircut, same voice, same style of dress (at least he asked for some civilian clothes that would fit), same attitude.
Steve goes about his day the same as he ever has - he goes for a run through the Barge early in the morning, and he shows up for his lunch shift in the kitchens and his shifts in the infirmary on time. He shows up at T'Pol's cabin for meditation, and he's even in the gym sometimes, working out against the bags. It's just that his mile has gone from two minutes to twenty, and he's got an inhaler in his pocket for those times when running or climbing the stairs - he's not taking the elevator, he refuses - gets to be a little too much.
Of course, he knows people are going to notice, but unless someone says something to him first, they're not going to hear a word about it from him. Actions speak louder than words, after all.]
[ooc: If anyone needs a reference, 1, 2, & 3, just with this haircut, still. Feel free to recognize him or not!]
no subject
He is kind of expecting the reaction, by now, so he just stands his ground and lets her get a little closer before he explains, so he doesn't have to do it halfway across the deck. He at least doesn't look concerned, he's even smiling just a little, reassuring.]
I'm fine, Kira. I asked the Admiral to do it. I figured I'd better ante up if I was going to have an opinion on the matter.
you didn't see that. >.>
[Don't be too angry, Steve. She's worried about you.] You might make a point to some, but you won't make it for all of them. Every situation is different.
[With a sigh, she falls in next to him, holding herself back so he can keep up.]
there was nothing I saw nothing!
Also, if they're going to try to talk and run? They're moving glacially, because he just doesn't have the lung capacity, really, to do both, and it's not for lack of trying.]
Then I make my point to whoever I can. I don't care if I'm easier to hurt. I'm not afraid of being hurt. I'm more afraid of being part of a system that I'm not willing to fix.
[Okay, he's a little afraid of being hurt - only because he knows, knows, that Bucky is going to hurt whoever did it back, and that's not what either of them wants to happen, but it will, all the same.]
Re: there was nothing I saw nothing!
Trying to promote a mixed principle might bring a few to realization, but not as many as you showing them by example that great power comes with great responsibility.
[Yeah, she went there. Exelsior, motherfuckers.]
no subject
I don't know that there are any universal truths. Maybe especially not here. I can't make people like or even care about what I've done, but that doesn't make it any less the right thing to do.
[He shakes his head a little.] I'd like to think I've been doing that since I got here. But power's just a tool, Kira. And it's not always the right tool for the job.
Either way, it's done, and I'm sticking by it. [He can get it back, all he has to do is ask, but he's not about to. Not now.]
no subject
[And she feels oddly bad about that. But she also knows a few things: that Steve would defend her right to disagree, and that Steve won't change his mind no matter what she says.
she's quiet for a bit as they jog.]
What about the people - the beings - who've had what you'd consider powers for as long as they can remember? Are you going to tell them that the way they feel isn't legitimate? I spent a long time thinking I was a normal human, but I'm not, and I never was.
no subject
This time, though, when she speaks, he does start to slow down and come to a stop, because there's no way he can say what he wants to and keep going.]
This place isn't necessarily fair. It's not built to be fair, it's built to be a prison, but the kind of prison where people have the chance not just to serve out some kind of penance, but to fix whatever's gone wrong to cause the problem in the first place. I admit that I can't really understand what it's like to lose something you've always had, but I can understand that it's frustrating. But I think maybe it's necessary, to get at the heart of the problem, and I also think that it's a better way to keep people safe than the alternative.
And I know that we're not doing a good job of keeping people safe, either way, but I don't think adding more powers into the mix is the solution.
no subject
I don't see how what you're doing keeps anybody safe, though. Least of all you. I mean, it's entirely possible that people will stay off you by the sheer force of your personality, of course. [She can't help but grin. He's That Guy.]
no subject
Finally,] I'm not the only super soldier on board, and I was never the most powerful warden. This isn't about staying safe - why - [He almost asks why everyone keeps jumping to that conclusion. He just doesn't understand. The first thing Bucky assumed was that Steve was going to be jumped in the hall and killed, too. Part of him knows that yeah, he's a target now. But,] Maybe this is a way to prove that the wardens don't need power to protect us from that kind of thing. We can stop it from happening without that solution, because that solution isn't working. People are still getting hurt and dying.
[He finally does smile, a little.] My personality never kept people off before, but I managed to keep getting back up, anyway.
no subject
She shakes her head, though.] I don't know if I would have survived when Dean and Clementine came after Scott if I didn't have my powers. To be honest I don't understand why Clementine needed to kill him in the first place. I mean, if it was some kind of power-over thing? That's because we're wardens regardless, right?
[She hadn't realized she was still hanging onto this - well, maybe a little. But Scott is so forgiving and she feels like she can't talk about it with him. Steve is forgiving too, but somehow she feels like he can at least understand her anger and frustration, and it does tie into the question of power in the broader sense.]
no subject
He shakes his head, because,] Killing is always about power - about having the power to stop someone. If you don't understand it, that's not a bad thing.
[He wishes the world were a place where stopping someone didn't mean killing them - where it never meant killing them. He remembers when his world was like that, but it feels like a very, very long time ago, now.] Maybe you should ask her why she tried.
[It's not condescending at all - it's just a thought. Because if Kira - if anyone - can understand the motive, that's the first step in stopping it next time, isn't it?]
no subject
And maybe that's why she feels comfortable confessing.]
I don't know if I can. I can barely look at her, Steve. I look at her and I want to...
[She trails off, ashamed.]
I want to hurt her.
no subject
And it's not hard to realize that what he said was pretty stupid, in a way, because,] All those people that hurt Bucky? HYDRA?
I want to kill them. I don't want to give them a fair trial, I don't want them to rot in jail. The ones that aren't already dead? I plan to make that way.
[He doesn't tell a lot of people that. He absolutely hasn't told Bucky that. But honestly? He doesn't think Kira should feel ashamed for wanting to hurt the person who hurt someone that's important to her. Maybe that's why they're all in this mess in the first place, and maybe he's been thinking about it all wrong.]
I'm sorry. That was pretty heartless of me to say. It's just - you can hurt her here, sure. Maybe you wouldn't even be wrong. In fact, I wouldn't blame you. But here - here, the hurting just... keeps going. Nobody stays dead, and nobody leaves, not really. Nothing gets fixed. We have to treat things differently. Or, at least, we have to try.
What if someone else talked to her? What if I did?
no subject
[His offer makes her pause too, brow furrowing as she struggles with the idea.] Part of me wants to say yes, but it also kind of feels like, I don't know...cowardly. Like I'm letting someone else deal with my damage. I should put on my big girl panties, shouldn't I?
no subject
Yes and no. I think it would do both of you good if you asked, but I think it's not cowardly if you can't do it right now. I think it's honest, if that makes sense.