◉ Video + Action

[vagabond_code]

Who: Clint "a Hawkeye" Barton and yous guys
Broadcast: Fleet-wide
Action: Marsiva
When: This evening

[Clint begins his broadcast with his hearing aids in, but the result is a series of false starts where it’s obvious from the wincing and the head-turning that he’s dealing with some sort of loud or high-pitched feedback. It isn’t long before he ditches them - rips them off and pockets them - and starts over again. lips it is, then ]

Alright this isn’t going to be a big thing - I just want to put my face out there.

[And he pauses, counting out the seconds for whoever might be looking to take a look at their beep-machines and catch sight of him.]

Oh, and to whoever brought us here, nice ship. Also, you’ve got some balls, kidnapping someone who carries one of these in his wallet:

[Casually, meaningfully, accidentally, he produces a blockbuster membership card, with the printed name Clinton F. Barton and a signature. When he catches his mistake he tosses the card down out of frame and the camera catches him thumbing through the inside of his wallet. Following that, the sound of him mumbling:]

Futzing Avengers ID, never around when you… [He trails off. The feed doesn’t.]

[A little later, sitting wherever there’s a seat to be claimed aboard the Marsiva, he’ll be found picking cards out of his wallet and tossing them down onto a table. Reorganizing, dismissing some, yet the cards that he doesn’t tuck back into their leathery hideaway are all landing corner-to-corner in a perfect even pile.

A little later, you might catch him sprawled out and napping. Because he naps. He’s a napper.]

Comments

[mucked]

For all of us.

[ not him, of course. but she can't imagine steve would appreciate being raised above the ranks like that -- he fought because his fellows fought, not because he wanted to fight more than they did. she admired the way he saw himself as their equals, long after he'd outstripped them in physicals and in other ways. ]

[vagabond_code]

Well, not exactly all of us.

[If she was going to be particular, she could bet he was going to be particular too.

Albeit not particular enough to mentioned that one time when he traveled back to the past with present-day Steve to break wartime-Steve out of a cell.]

[mucked]

So -- Clint Barton comma Avenger. What's your specialty? [ the word is pronounced in the single-most archly british way possible. spec-ial-ity. ] Because if it doesn't involve your powers of pedantry then I'm afraid you've been sorely misused.

[ just kidding! she knows it's arrows. jim's alterna-world post-incident report had been quite thorough. ]

[vagabond_code]

[So Clint Barton, come adventure! No, probably not. He made a weird expression and she kept on talking. Okay, okay, powers of infantry? Bend and tree? Eventually he just decided not to try, and instead stared at sideways her like this.]

[mucked]

[ wasn't she terribly clear? peggy believed herself to be (if nothing else) rather articulate. so she frowns at the device. ]

Is there some sort of interference with the broadcast? Can you hear me?

[ ordinarily, this might not have been her immediate assumption. but she's spent the last few months working elbow-deep (so to speak) with the comms arrays. questioning the feed is her go-to answer in moments like these -- and the feeds do tend to muck up when the conversation's being scrambled. ]

[vagabond_code]

[If she hadn't directly addressed his hearing he might have glossed over it. Sure, a comms issue, why not? But a dodge at this point would be tantamount to a lie.]

Yeah, no, now I can - except I'm not hearing you exactly. Look.

[And he showed her the little purple amplifiers. It was just quicker that way.]

[mucked]

Sorry -- [ she lets slip a rare apology. perhaps because she's caught off guard, and can now be seen squinting at her end of the video feed. ] What am I looking at?

[ 1946, my good man. have some sympathy. ]

[vagabond_code]

[Oh yeah, she was old. Which was difficult to keep in the front of his mind because -- she didn't look old.]

Hearing aids. For deaf people. They're like radios I guess, but since I got here all I hear is static. So far, so useless.

[From their conversation so far, he figured she could fill in the rest.]

[mucked]

[ deaf. well -- that changes things.

doesn't it? perhaps not. except it does affect how she approaches this conversation. already, she's considering how she might pick her words more carefully. peggy isn't all that upset to sacrifice wit for clarity. not when he's a proven(ish) ally to the future-cause.

a little more carefully: ] I didn't realize. [ she doesn't apologize for a second time. ] I'll go slower, if that helps.

[ the file didn't say anything about clint barton being deaf. ]

[vagabond_code]

Helps loads.

[Clipped, a little salty from having had to explain that at such length, but he supposes that if she didn't know what the hearing aids were in the first place then he should overlook her fast-talking slush-mouthiness. The problem was, along with that, he didn't like making people feel like he was a sympathy-case, either.]

[mucked]

Perfect.

[ but he needn't feel too put-out by his explanation in the end, because peggy clearly isn't looking to make a fuss over his hearing (or lack thereof). she acknowledges the adjustment to their conversation, but refuses to dwell on it. it's an approach common to how she handles acquaintanceships with strangers -- and being from a certain time and certain place, she's well-accustomed to men who aren't all that they used to be. after all, war rarely sent soldiers home in one piece. and hearing loss is rampant.

she raises her chin. makes certain her red-stained lips are more visible. she might not be deaf herself, but she can read lips. and so when she speaks, now, she does so while keeping in mind what she looks for when gleaning meaning from a moving mouth. she doesn't slow and she doesn't mollycoddle, she only gets clearer. ]

Do the letters S.S.R. mean anything to you? [ may as well come clean. ]

[vagabond_code]

No more than they would to the next guy.

[mucked]

[ deep breath, pegs. if anyone's worth being honest to, then it's the men and women who are eventual-colleagues of captain america. ]

Agent Peggy Carter. [ even so, she doesn't enjoy telling this truth. ] Strategic Scientific Reserve. New York office. But since coming here, I've been informed the agency evolves into something else.

[vagabond_code]

So you're a scientist.

[From "reserve" he assumed "state-funded". From "strategic" he figured "military."]

Who makes guns.

[mucked]

No. I'm an agent. [ ... ] Who shoots guns.

[ she may dabble in science from time to time, but it's never been her forte. ]

[vagabond_code]

But for the good guys, right?

[She name-dropped Captain America, but that didn't have trade the same way with Clint. He'd known plenty of people who had worked with Steve and then gone on to do terrible things.]

[mucked]

That depends on who claims to be the good guys.

[vagabond_code]

[Except that it wasn't about claiming to be good. It was about the things that you did.]

Okay, forget that. Just don't be a bad-guy and we'll get along alright.

[mucked]

[ just don't be a bad guy. in theory, it ought to be relatively simple. but in practice? ]

I'm told the S.S.R. evolves into S.H.I.E.L.D. -- one day, somewhere between 1946 and twenty-whenever.

[ it's not assurance, so much as a good-will gesture. she can't prove she's 'good', but she can describe a credential much quicker than he can fail to find one in his wallet. ]

I imagine her trying to talk around the thing in her mouth and it's funny.

[vagabond_code]

[He'd have to mull that one over later. For now he'd already extended his olive branch, so Peggy throwing hers in put him on the back foot a little, with nowhere to go. Except, perhaps, the are-we-even-from-the-same-world game.]

S.H.I.E.L.D has its own share of shady characters, like any other organization. This guy tell you that?

[mucked]

[ peggy smiles. ]

He did. Most emphatically.

[vagabond_code]

Y'do get good insurance.

[He added, to even things out a bit.]

[mucked]

[ that's...a bizarre sort of thing to keep in one's focus. peggy frowns. ] At least some things improve with time, then.

[ not that this tidbit was particularly helpful. ]

[vagabond_code]

Agent Peggy.

[He said, as if prompting his own recall. He did this out of habit, because of course, he couldn't hear himself any more than he could hear her.]

I ain't heard of you. Not by that name anyway.

[All things considered, this fact would be more surprising if he'd heard of her organization.]

[mucked]

[ darkly: ] I take that with some small and cold measure of relief, actually.

[ although it does surprise her. most of the people with whom she spoke from that far-flung decade in the future seemed to know her name. so why doesn't he? perhaps, as avengers go, he's not top dog. ]

It's not always my idea of a good time: being recognized by people on a one-way street.