When We're Rollin Through the Wild Wild West

[geonomy]

Who: Everyone! EVERYONE!
Broadcast: IF YOU WANNA
Action: Everywhere! EVERYWHERE!
When: Mid-September - Mid-October

[How's your ship doing, pardners? Is it still pretty damaged? Is it glitching out hardcore? Well, there is one place to land to take care of all that, and that's on a dusty old moon in front of a planet that no one wants to go to. On this moon, you'll find a civilization that looks a lot like one's stepped into a wild west movie, hardened cowpolk and mutant horses and all. Will you become a vigilante, hunting bounties and stopping gangs from doing their dirty work? Will you go exploring planetside, with a cowboy hat and a stalk of wheat in your mouth to complete the look? Good luck with that; there is no wheat. This town ain't big enough for all you flooters, but make it so! For the ratings!

In other words, it's a planet mingle! Get 'er done!]

[September Planet info here]

Comments

[redactions]

[ Because she's touchy, and because they're different people, in the end. There's many roads anyone can walk down but especially her. ]

[ The fact remains that he misses Nat. He misses her friendship, her kindness, and the comfort and purpose he felt when he fought beside her. ]

Fill in people's expectations. I know a little of that.

[tothefly]

[She could have been anyone. She'd been a lot of those people, but it had almost always been her choice. Maybe that's why she'd been so touchy. Because he saw her as someone she hadn't chosen to become. Now...now it's easier. She is who she wants to be, and that other woman isn't in any way a threat to that. Her sense of self is strong. She isn't the woman he left behind in his world, but that doesn't mean he can't matter to this one, as well. He's been a steady voice, when she's needed the sound. The least she can do is be the same in return.]

That why you always try to play the hero, Captain?

[Put on a good face for everyone, a brave face. Don't let anyone see the aches inside, if you can help it. She knows something about that.]

[redactions]

No one's playing.

[ It's easier to think of it like that: putting on the role and doing the performance. But truthfully, he's so accustomed to war he can't be good for anything else. In the world it's the only thing that makes sense, that lets him see where he can do good: except he's not so sure about that anymore. And SHIELD turns out to be run by HYDRA anyway. ]

[ No, no one is playing. They all end up being, in the end. ]

[tothefly]

Everyone's playing. Some way or another, everyone's playing.

[Everyone has their part. The fact that some of them become who, what they play is incidental. Or maybe it's the point. She's never quite been sure.]

Doesn't mean it's the only role you're good for.

[redactions]

[ It's never the differences that hurt, and always the similarities. Haven't you thought about doing something else? Nat asked, once, except she didn't ask, she made a statement that demanded a reply. She always did that. ]

It's the only role that matters.

[tothefly]

[She can't help that. Can't help the similarities, or the differences. Easier to accept that now, now that the knee-jerk reactions of self-identity have passed. She knows who she is. She isn't the woman he knew back home. But she is the woman he knows here, and she can be...well, whatever that means. An ear. A voice. A partner. Maybe a friend. Maybe.]

The hero matters, but not the man? That's idealistic of you.

[redactions]

Is it?

[ He swirls the liquid in the glass. ]

Is it idealistic to be what other people need?

[tothefly]

Mm. Idealistic and presumptuous. Arrogant, even.

I should know.

[Wryness. A little bitter humor, a joke aimed at herself that he won't miss.]

[redactions]

[ At this, he laughs, soft but genuine. ]

You would know. The Widow's always been what's needed. In this day and age... it always feels like they need good soldiers.

[tothefly]

[She allows herself a little smile in return, a reward for the laugh. She's always what's needed, because she's made herself what's necessary. A certain set of skills. It's all she's been for a long time now.]

World's full of soldiers, Barnes. Always seems to be running short on good men, though.

[He's a good man. He could be that, instead of a hero.]

[redactions]

[ There's a pause, as some unknown emotion flickers on his face. It could be homesickness, or grief. ]

Heard the story about the boy who cried wolf?

[tothefly]

[It's a look that's there and gone, but that doesn't mean it's unnoticed. She always notices. Not something that needs commenting on, though. They all have their secret sorrows. So she sips her drink, nodding more with eyes than chin.]

Once or twice. As I remember, he eventually got it right.

[redactions]

The moral of the story is that lying is bad. [ a pause, and quietly, ] I s'pose if you're the one bein' lied to, sure. But they get it right once. Lying can help you survive. And if you lie about something often enough, it might become true.

[ He's not saying she's lying, about him being a good man... well not saying directly. But. ]

[tothefly]

I don't think the truth is that clear-cut. People aren't that simple. Why should facts be any different?

[Is she lying if she calls him a good man? Or would the lie be to say that he isn't? Maybe they're both lies. Maybe they're both true.]

Guess it all depends on what you want to be true.

[redactions]

[ Jim meets her gaze, unflinching. ]

The truth is a matter of circumstance. So is being good. So what do you want me to be?

[tothefly]

[It's a question that's got a thousand layers to it. Fortunately, the answer is easy. She doesn't blink.]

James Barnes. Whoever you think that is. A partner, maybe.

[A friend, she doesn't say. She never does.]

[redactions]

[ She never says friend. She never asks, she never bends, she never lets anyone see her bleed. There was a time in his life it did better to pretend Steve was indestructible — he always pulled through every illness, didn't he? Natasha's the same. There's so much of Steve in her, and she doesn't even know. ]

[ He can't pretend when he knows how the vulnerabilities show themselves. The glass gets set down, and Jim doesn't say anything for a while. It looks like he won't, until, ]

I wish Nat was here, just so you two could meet. You'd like each other, I think.

[ A soft smile. ]

Is that strange?

[tothefly]

[Like Steve? She'd never agree. Steve Rogers is something she lost all chance at being years ago. Decades. But she's made her peace with that. She's comfortable with silence. So is he, usually, and for that she's willing to let this end there. He's still got more to say, though, and what that something is actually gets a quiet laugh.]

It's bad luck to meet your doppelganger, you know. Something about a fight to the death. It's part of the rules.

[redactions]

[ But it's true. She and Steve — not the same colour, maybe, but the same intensity. Both with a will far stronger than their bodies could ever withstand, but they keep up. Both never run from a fight, though Natasha chooses hers more carefully, and both never hesitate to take on something larger than themselves, knowing they'll make themselves strong enough. Both with their hearts in high places that only one with a sure aim can reach. Steve is infinite. Natasha is colossal. ]

[ They are both the bravest people he's ever met, and he often wishes for an ounce of that bravery, but he fears the man it would make him. ]

[ Simply, ]

We make our own luck.

[tothefly]

[Intensity. Dedication. Will. Those are three things she might agree to sharing with Steve Rogers. It's why they worked so well together, after all. Up to a point. Somehow, she thinks maybe this version of Captain America might have understood her decisions a few months back a little better than her own Captain America had. Then again, that might have made two of them wrong. Useless to wonder, and yet she does, a little.]

[Shrugging infinitesimally, she lifts her glass in a salute to him.]

Here's to luck, then. Whatever we make it.

[And here's to them. Whatever they make it.]