driftfleet | ( video )

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Who: Peggy Carter and YOU.
Broadcast: Fleet-wide, from inside the Marsiva.
Action: Y, for any other newcomers between now and the Shuffle.
When: This Week.

[ let us not dwell too long upon the awkward silences and humiliating nascent moments of agent carter's awakening. let it only be said that she woke with a start (despite the afforded comfort) and the broadcast didn't quite zoom in close enough to adequately witness the depth of her horror when she first raised a tentative hand to her forehead only to find an empty glass vial still sitting there. steve's blood had been poured away: returned to his native lands by way of the east river. both guilty and triumphant, she pockets the vial in her blazer and tells herself it's a problem for another time. after all--- ]

Bollocks. [ mistaking herself for a person alone, she swears. loudly and colourfully as she crosses the bay and knocks her knuckles against the too-intact viewing window separating herself from the rest of creation -- and no familiar blue-and-green marble in sight. peggy swears again: bollocks, damnit, and hell. unable to peer into the void for much longer, she turns her back on oblivion and is confronted once more with the too-sterile hospitality deck. she may be a tidy and precise sort of woman, but this much tidiness and precision makes her stomach turn. where is the stink of new york? the heat? the mess? the humanity?

feeling charged with purpose, she springs into (moderate) action. feeling alarmingly comfortable with technology she swears she's never seen before, she plays her fingers across a panel she doesn't know will connect her to the rest of a whol damned fleet -- but she's left with the burning certainty that it'll connect her with someone. imperiously: ]

I would speak with the individual -- or individuals -- in charge of this operation. Believe me when I stress there is a whole bloody cavalcade of laws, both domestic and international, you're breaking by holding me here. I demand to...

[ some of the fire floods from her belly. a little desperate, she changes tactics: ] Is anyone there? Hello?

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[ she turns quickly. and one a heel. demure-dyed fabric is tossed about her knees as the skirt's hem whirls with her sudden momentum. she stares at him and wishes (quite fervently) for a holster of her own. but strangers can be allies as easily as they're enemies, and so she tries to remain calm.

pleasant, even. peggy's mouth curves upwards with a ghost of a smile. ] Works? Perhaps. I rather think I made it work by accident. [ she doesn't understand how she knows its buttons and interface. their use comes naturally to her. ] Sorry, but you are--?

Indy. [Within certain academical circles, his name was sometimes enough to gain recognition. But he wasn't looking for accolades or to be recognized. This woman seemed harmless enough, but the charade wasn't for her benefit. The moment his hand was removed from the holster, anyone would be able to see he was unarmed.

Who were you talking to?

No one. [ an insouciant shrug. by now, she's quite recovered from the emotional overload that was her conversation with so-called captain barnes. ] And everyone. It's a feed that broadcasts straight to those pretty little ships out there.

[ a stiff point over her shoulder at the viewing bay. ]

[From his vantage point and angle, the viewing bay is just out of sight. Either way, the meaning is plain enough. A fleet.]

The British navy? [Not quite the power of the seas anymore, but he's resigned to broad guesses just now. He can't guess why they would have plucked him up or when they started having ships that looked like this.]

I should hope not. [ mild alarm. peggy shakes her head, and waves bounce. ] Not so fond of the navy. I think we've found ourselves in the belly of an entirely different beast.

[ her own confidence surprises her -- but then, she felt not quite capable of questioning the true existential horrors of space travel. it felt more and more acceptable by the moment. ]

Assuming you woke up here much like I did, at least.

[There was truth in that. Indiana had been in enough ships of varying sizes that he always could tell they were on the water. This ship was not wrestling with the sea, but it didn't seem to be wrestling against turbulence either. For all the constant thumming of machinery, he would swear they were on solid ground. His expression tightened as his eyes lingered on the viewing bay just out of sight.]

Only just. I take it you're not part of the crew. [Russia was where his suspicions went. The last thing he wanted to deal with was more Commies.]

Shanghai'd, I'm afraid.

[ a mild answer. the thumbs the communications interface and watches a light flicker on and off. on and off. ] Shanghai'd in space. [ bitter laughter. ] Still a better crossing than the Queen Mary.

Space. [His brow furrows and his look upward. It's all steel bolted ceiling above, yet his concept of space is skewed towards the vertical only. He does not bother to conceal his skepticism.] I take it Ming the Merciless is in the next room, then.

Come. Look.

[ peggy (it seems) has no patience for stubborn skepticism. the thick soles of her pumps echo through the sterile, empty space. she's turned away again and is currently marching back towards the bowed-out viewing bay so she might rap her knuckles sharply against the -- glass? god above, she hopes it's something stronger than glass.

and then she wonders if it isn't just a little easier to reconcile the idea of space because of what she'd heard down in the rat. hydra humours. hydra stories. she suppresses a shiver. ]

I don't know what else to call it: space.

[He hesitates a moment, but decides it's more important to know than to cling on some artificial sense of security. With a half step first, he plods forward to arrive around the corner to see the wide expanse of space waiting in sight.

Damn. But not even the night sky in the northern most parts of the world looked as clear as this did. Besides that, there was no sign of land anywhere below.]

Christ. I'd hoped you were lying.

Part of me hopes I'm lying too, to be honest. [ she watches him -- easier, really, to watch another person than to watch the glinting fleet in the distance. ] But it's not on my authority that I've learned any of it. This ship is connected to the littler ones out there.

There's people on them.

[ people like us. ]

[It's not hard to see which of those glimmering lights belong to the fleet rather than stationary stars. Some are far from one another, but there's two close enough to make the shape of them. In the vast emptiness of space, gauging distance is no easy task. A lifetime of experience is presently useless.]

Willingly?

As far as I can tell? [ a mild shrug. ] Willingly enough. I don't doubt their presence in this...bizarre situation is less than volunteered. But I got the impression there's a little more freedom to be found on the little ones.

A little isn't a lot. [Still. Smaller ship meant smaller crew. If he could get himself in the pilot's seat, then maybe...] How do we get on one of those?

An associate of mine -- [ because she doesn't yet dare to call him a friend. not yet, not again, not until a hundred other little questions are answered.

peggy taps the glass. if it even is glass. ] He's on one of those vessels. He tells me it'll be around about a week before us raw recruits have any opportunity to see the rest of the fleet face-to-face. So you'd best get comfortable here, Mister...?

Jones. Doctor Jones, actually.

[He grimaces and moves his hand away from the empty holster.] A damn lot this will do me, though. [There's no point in the ruse. Not anymore. Not when all that's separating him from all that is what he can only hope is the thickest glass to ever exist.]

[ ...and perhaps it had been imperceptible until now, but the tightly-wound tension in her posture dissipates all at once when he reveals an empty holster. peggy breathes a little easier. her eyes are a little brighter. had he a gun and should be prove to be a double-agent for these atroma folks, then she's quite certain she wouldn't have stood a chance. hand-to-hand, however--! ]

It wouldn't have done you much good, regardless. [ her voice is breathless with relief. ] With these walls? The ricochet alone would be fatal.

Only if I missed, sweetheart.

[His smile is brief and mischievous, but its only a temporary balm to the situation. There's no getting around the fact he's in outer space now. Now he wished he'd paid a little more attention to his Jules Verne.]

[ -- and she feels just about settled enough to roll her eyes. even the best miss once in a blue moon, no matter whose moon it might be. but instead of calling his bluff into question, she heads off another problem at the pass with a curt rejoinder: ]

'Peggy' will do fine, Doctor Jones.

[Ah, he knew a Peggy once. Now there was a girl with a set of pipes. If it hadn't been for Kate and Gloria, well...]

I'd call it a pleasure, if we were planetbound. [He turns back to the viewing screen and leans against the 'glass'. He squints at the stars, trying to rely on all those constellations he'd learned over the years. But he couldn't make out a single shape from any of them.]

... not that Polaris would do us much good here.

We must abandon all the old tricks. [ ... ] Most of them, at least. My contact assures me there are people involved in the fleet who can manage things like navigating multilaterally.

As for the Marsiva? [ a gesture to the larger ship around them. ] God knows how it determines its direction.

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