fleetwide video + action »

[mucked]

Who: a newly canon-updated peggy carter and YOU.
Broadcast: fleetwide video
Action: ss starstruck for crewmate and any visitors.
When: beginning today, but feel free to forward date something if you like.

VIDEO (FLEETWIDE)

[ stern-faced, peggy appears upon the network. ] Does 'zero matter' mean anything to anyone? Pointed, I know, and a bit a long shot...but -- if there's anywhere I might find some resource or knowledge about such matters, then the fleet is my best hope. Otherworldly mysteries are not well within my wheelhouse.

[ there are other questions she could ask -- but no, zero matter might be the safest inquiry out of a great many others. and even then, it's barely safe at all. but it must be asked, for now she feels most preoccupied with the work conducted back home. the fleet is almost a secondary thought -- a distant, archaic priority. ]

Alternatively -- [ she sighs. until now, she hasn't been agent cater within the fleet, much preferring to be the more social and civilian version of herself. ] -- I wouldn't mind hearing a bit more about worlds. Different worlds, universes, what have you. I know none have been successful in creating a rift between this place and any other but -- surely, such rifts must exist elsewhere.

ACTION (STARSTRUCK)

[ long story short: peggy carter took a nasty spill inside one of the sr shuttles, and is now back on her feet after being out cold for nearly a day. on the surface, it seems like nothing's the matter. not seriously so, at least. but as she goes about her ship duties, there's a glassy-eyed quality to her gaze. it takes her a little too long to remember someone's name -- as though she's reaching back by weeks or maybe months to recall details she'd been living every day.

find her in the kitchen, where she's preparing one of her two or three or sometimes four daily cups of tea. or find her in the cargo bay where she's trying to use the recreational equipment. she quickly gives up on the punching bag because although she no longer has stitches holding her guts together, there persists a tight ache in the flesh. she settles for the treadmill.

wherever else she might be encountered, her crankiness is persistent. ordinarily patient with her crew, peggy's kindness has been thinning out all week. she appears tightly wound and disengaged. ]

Comments

[theroadwarrior]

... That so.

[Peggy is too nice, too many morals, and it will be shocking if that doesn't kill her someday soon. If the world doesn't cripple her ideals, anyway; from what she said, war and violence is just a breath away, easily. But Max just watches and listens, a thoughtful sort of look to him like he is dissecting everything she says word by word. Studying the response for obvious lies, or inaccuracies, or hesitation. He doesn't often focus on words, on sound. So rusty.

Hrmph.]

We all have a use.

But -- Hrm. It's good to choose it.

Yourself.

[isn't it?]

[mucked]

[ she nods. ]

And good, too, to know our value. [ it's not a sin all on its own to quantify yourself and what you bring to the world. ] The one we make for ourselves, and not the one the world forces around our necks.

[theroadwarrior]

[Huh. He glances at the dog — Rock. Old huffy creature, not particularly playful but quiet and observant and healing. To know your value, is that it? Max isn't sure at all what his value is. He supposes he's good at fixing things. Piloting a shuttle. But it's a role others could easily fill, if he were gone. At the very least, he can see how something is valued, even if you can replace it. But that's what his life has been, his core way of moving along: you don't need me anymore. Here in the Fleet, he doesn't have some big feat to accomplish. There's no base under siege, or people fleeing from a violent oppressor. There aren't kids who want to find another, more wonderful world that he can help them to.

Previsions are stocked. His small tasks are relatively in order... He can either provide transport, or give someone blood. But what is he thinking? He should just be worried about what he can do for himself. Survival is key, the basic element. He has to remind himself that he's merely bunked in the same area. Forced, to a degree. He wouldn't be here if he had a choice, right? He doesn't like to think about it too much. He could leave whenever he'd like, if not for the Atroma.

Right?

But what's in it for Peggy? To apply value to Max? He supposes his survival skills, what little is sane and logical and useful. Keeping knowledge close is smart, and he has no doubts about Peggy's intelligence. It's no wonder she puts effort towards talking to him, even as he is. Max can see the potential.

He does not at all consider any possibly that Peggy genuinely enjoys his company.

That's never been a consideration for anyone in his life.]

Hmm... Then my value today is keeping injured crew restful.

[He motions to her and the dog, without thinking much about the gesture.]

[mucked]

And what a fine job you've done.

[ her answer is equal measures praise and problem. peggy doesn't like being grounded -- that much is clearly obvious. also obvious is the fact that not many could have persuaded her to sit back down, but perhaps there's something about her own desire not to push max away that makes it more palatable to obey when he bids her stay put. as much as she'd rather roam away and sink her fingers into other questions with other answers, she puts far more value on -- on what? keeping him near. keeping in his good books. nurturing this odd lop-sided sort of association. ]

I suppose it's only fair of you to return the favour. After all, after you'd gone swimming... [ she trails off. almost smiling. ]

[theroadwarrior]

[Ah. He glances away, thoughtful. He remembers, alright. He remembers little hands grabbing, pulling, trying to usher him into the depths. He remember Glory, grabbing for his ankle. They always want him to join them, and he can't blame them, because they are gone and he is here — and there's an unfairness there that can't be easily measured.]

Dragging me down... Mm.

[He mumbles the rather cryptic (or perhaps not) comment, but then seems to snap back to Peggy, giving her his exasperated attention.]

... I don't swim often. Earth's dried up. Y'can pump water out of the earth...

[He knows how to swim, though. From his distant youth.]

[mucked]

Drought, [ she guesses. or perhaps something worse. honestly, it's a horror to think about. but as much as she wants to push it from her mind, she won't do him and his experiences the disservice of playing naive. ] Well, it's not as though I swim all that often either. Although just about a week ago I did have an altercation in Howard Stark's pool that --

I suppose it's not really a week ago. Bloody hell.

[theroadwarrior]

[Max mostly just observed her with raised eyebrows.

She must've really been put through the mental wringer. Lucky her, she's with the person who is so utterly used to that happening to himself, he doesn't make any fuss out of it. The Wives and Furiosa didn't much either, but it's not uncommon for people to go crazy in his world; really, if you avoided some semblance of insanity you were lucky.]

Hmm. Have tried to find the ocean.

No luck yet. Mostly salt. [He shakes his head.] Useless.

[mucked]

Australia, didn't you say? [ -- something like that. she could remember talk of that continent, at least. ] Big place. Perhaps...

[ but she trails off. what max deserves isn't platitudes. not empty hopeful words. peggy shakes her head. ] We have weapons, now, that could likely do that to the world. Dry it up. Waste it.

[ she looks apologetic. ] I'd hoped I might remember you, actually. If I went home. A -- [ cautionary tale ] -- beacon. A sign.

[ silence, then. perhaps it's too much to tell a person. ]

[theroadwarrior]

[He nods quietly.]

A warning sign.

[His words from before, the tattoo on his back. He was adamant about his place in the world, being a cautionary tale for an altogether different reason. For madness, he meant, but Peggy's use of him suffices plentifully, too.]

Hn.

... don't let it hurt s'much as you think it should. You're just one person. Can't expect to hold the world when it's pushing for death.

[For all of Max caring under the surface, it's not that he's hypocritical all the time; he cares for himself, ignores a lot in his world. If a city falls, it falls. He watches from afar. He leaves them in his rear view mirror. He's mercy-killed, but he's rarely gone out of his way to help save someone's life --

There are some exceptions.

But that's the point.

Care for what you can.

Stuff the rest.]

[mucked]

[ -- how thoroughly bizarre that she should find in max some tenuous similarity to edwin jarvis, of all men. perhaps their messages are to cross purposes, but his words resonate. there is not a man or woman, no matter how fit he or she may be, who is capable of carrying the entire world on their shoulders -- and yet, it's what she does. time and time again.

even now. ]

Someone must. [ and captain america's gone. ]

[theroadwarrior]

[He looks pessimistic at the answer, to be sure.]

Someone will try.

But... doesn't matter, if everyone else doesn't.

[He just knows. Knows one person trying to change things won't do anything. She's going to run herself into the ground for a world that doesn't care.

Max gave up on people twenty years ago.]

[mucked]

[ she sees the chasm -- the space, between them, where hope dies and determination gets bent into a far different shape. once upon a time she might have fallen into that same chasm, but... ]

I met a soldier, years back. We'd been in the war a while and...America was just joining in. This fellow, he wanted so badly to fight back against the bullies elsewhere in the world. [ a little almost-smile as she invokes that word. bullies. ] But he wasn't like your average soldier. He was -- shorter, he had asthma. [ she taps where her lungs might be. ] And one day he pointed out every spot in New York where he'd been beaten bloody by his own bullies. I asked him whether he had some sort of aversion to running away.

[ ice pack and all, she sat a little straighter. how could she not? the story was suffused with deep respect and utter appreciation. ] He told me that if you start running -- it'll never stop.

[ she makes her point in the negative spaces. captain america taught her about how important it was to take a stand and to push back. and, in the wake of that lesson, she also learned the power in one person's example. others follow until all at once you have a whole slew of individuals pushing back against that world. he'd inspired her; doesn't she have a duty to inspire others, back home? to carry on captain america's legacy as best she could. ]

[theroadwarrior]

[He told me that if you start running -- it'll never stop.

In one of those rare occasions, Max shifts uncomfortably at that. Running is... All he's ever done. Part of it is because he thinks it is the only way to keep his mind sane (does it?). But part of it is genuinely because he has no choice whatsoever. The hot breaths of painted faces in humid, terrible caverns reminds him what it means, to not run fast enough.

He looks up grimly.]

... I wouldn't understand that. If you don't run, you die. You're lanced. Popped. Shredded. Most people, they -- they are crazy. Unreliable. Like zombies.

[He leans back.]

Your hero... Don't think he could co-exist, in my world. Don't think he'd want to.

[She is -- her hero is -- partly right, though. Max runs from everything. Living and dead, bad... And good. He runs. It's how he lives when so many don't.]

[mucked]

From all I've heard of your world? [ a tut. a shake of her head. ] Likely not. He barely held on to ours -- and in many ways, I imagine he didn't. But he inspired generations all the same. I wouldn't be half the person I am today were it not for him.

Perhaps you won't be taking any foolhardy stands back in the Wasteland, but -- here, there's a lot more room for heroes. Don't you think?

[theroadwarrior]

[He is quiet for a long, pregnant moment. Heroes...? Such a ridiculous word. Sounds too good, leaves a sickly sweet taste about it. Fairytale dredge. A relic of a past nobody remembers that well.]

I don't know.

[He's utterly unsure.]

Leave me out of -- heroics.

Don't want one.

[mucked]

It comes in all sorts of measures. [ she eyes rock, in the corner. ] I'll bet he's glad you had a measure of it -- no matter how it came about, you stopped and took him in.

[ being an old hurt dog's hero is a fine step. ]

[theroadwarrior]

[He shakes his head.]

Would've left him if someone else hit him.

[If he's honest. He likes dogs — they've been his greatest companionship before, at one point, with Dog 1.0 leading the charge. But he's also reliable in how he uses his time and resources. An older dog with a severe leg wound... It's not practical. It's not going to benefit him with his limitations to care for the animal (but this isn't the desert, Max).]

Would've probably shot him. Quick way to go.

[And then ate him.

... If he's at home, anyway. But that's a small detail.]

[mucked]

But you didn't. You made a choice. [ ... ] Time will tell whether it was a good one or not.

[theroadwarrior]

[A sigh.]

Right. Time.

[The thing he keeps track of the least of anything.

Well... He's got nowhere to go (yet). Might as well agree and see.]