driftfleet | everybody's starstruck in june.

Entry tags:

everybody's starstruck in june.

Who: starstruck crew & visitors
Broadcast: n/a
Action: aboard the ship
When: june

[ another month; another mingle. but there are changes in the air! the starstruck has some fresh crew to boast of, as well as a spiffing new lounge. things have been difficult, lately -- the common area might make for a great place to decompress and socialize with your fellow starstruckers.

after all, it seems the captain's gone and requisitioned max's record player. for the first week in june, it'll be returned again and again to the new lounge. good luck hiding it from her, rockatanksy.

ready steady go! ]

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[ her nod is slow -- understanding. she knows the argument steve's trying to make: that because it's more recent for sam, sam feels it more than he does. it's not true; she so often catches sight of the weight on his shoulders. it's a kind of vulnerability she's not interested in sharing with others. that much, at least, is locked up behind peggy's better judgment. ]

I don't think it's a bone he's willing to drop. Fair warning. [ sam will come after steve, next -- to discuss or digest or divulge. peggy can't be certain. but she can give him a heads up; she'd hate for him to be blindsided. ]

Never thought it was.

[ he does smile a bit around the words. sam wouldn't have been sam if he could drop things like these. steve has every reason to suspect sam has been worried about him since the day they've met. he never saw him only as a miracle, the man who stayed alive in the ice but he noted the effects of war and trauma as only another soldier could.

sam found solace in the VA, he knew steve never found his. ]

he's stubborn. it used to be a pattern in my team.

[ until they broke apart, that is. ]

Birds of a feather. [ she answers. ] Or so they say.

[ peggy can't stomach the thought of working with much of an official team; she tolerates the incidental one which has sprung up around her work back home. and even then, she'd never cope if they were ever half as stubborn as herself. she can't do what steve does -- put her faith so easily in the human element. it's tricky.

she's better at it when she's around him, however. ]

[ -- oddly enough, he starts to laugh, low and quiet and very much despite of himself. ]

You should tell him that, you know. Have I ever told you what his code name is?

[ oh, he'd hate it. steve has to do it now. he still remembers his annoyance in the middle of their arrest, bird costume? come on. ]

You haven't. [ peggy's smile pops into existence the moment he laughs. ] Someone else has. But you should, all the same. I want to hear you say it.

[ god, how ridiculous. ]

Falcon. It's not the same without seeing his gear. it sure is something.

[ steve is rather fond of the wings, really. sam saved him from many tight spots with those. ]

I don't know if it's worse than Captain America but.

[ he shrugs. it's not his title anymore, is it? without his gear, it seems sam wouldn't have to claim his own title if he won't want to. ]

It's not. [ worse. peggy's brutally honest on that front. she's got a great deal of fondness for steve, but the 'title' had long since been soured. ] Falcon is downright decent by comparison, I'm afraid.

Yeah, I figured as much.

[ he nods, accepting her judgement as true without too much of a fuss. it seems that the title has been ruined for both him and her but at very least they're on the same page. ]

I'm glad you've talked, he's a good guy.

He certainly seems that. [ a good guy. ] If a bit nosy. It's no surprise he wanted aboard the ship -- he asked me himself. That was a nice touch.

Must have been. He volunteered himself to my team back in the day, too.

[ it fits sam, always so proactive, placing himself where he thinks his help is needed. they so direly needed his help back then but steve needed him as a friend too.

he never told him but sam hardly ever needed to be told. ]

[ and as lovely as that proactive nature must be, peggy takes a wicked delight in what she reveals next: ]

I said he needed Buck's permission. First.

[ -- she's been using the nickname, or a variation on it, more often lately. ]

He must have been happy to hear that.

[ sam helped steve a lot with bucky but the two of them seem to prefer a sort of bickering to actually being friends. steve can't really blame sam, seeing how determined bucky was to kill them at first and well, after meeting zemo. they don't hate each other and steve suspects there's a measure of respect beneath all the bite and the sass.

but there is a lot of sass. ]

He made his peace with it, I assume. [ then, behaving as though it's a simple confession, she adds: ] I don't poach from the Heron. Any other ship is fair game but -- not his.

Yeah.

[ which means I've noticed or maybe I understand. ]

He lost a lot of them lately.

[ which, he assumes, is exactly why peggy makes such an exception for the heron. steve is worried about bucky more than not, especially as of late. they see each other, they talk, but there is a sense of loss that steve knows all too well.

it'll take time and a lot of it. ]

[ well, in for a pound? ]

So did you.

[ in for a penny. ]

[ a pause, he considers his options and chooses a safe route, ]

seems like everyone did lately. I'm kinda glad Hank and Raven left together.

[ the same is true for pietro and wanda. sometimes it's kinder not that he thinks atroma are very big on kindness. ]

Their whole team seemed to have vanished at once.

[ charles and erik, too. ]

Do you think it's a coincidence?

[ -- to witness great swathes, whole chunks of a social architecture, be wiped out? peggy has a few painful losses she's nursing. but, for her part, she's not mentioned a single one. at best, she might have looked a little melancholic when she finished the last piece of shortbread from the last batch stefan had brought her.

she'd rather let the world believe herself unmoved by these losses. she'd learned how to wear grief with dignity. hide it under grace. ]

No. Nothing is. I don't know why they do what they do but none of it is accidental.

[ it's not the first nor the last time he'd catch himself being grateful that through it all, despite it all, she's still here. He reaches over, takes her hand in his. An anchor, a reason to breath a little more easily. ]

[ for once, her eyes duck his. instead? she focuses on their hands. joined; twined. peggy shakes her head. ]

Do you ever worry that -- maybe -- they know who we are before we're taken? [ peggy gives her head a little shake, as if she can't quite articulate the problem. ] That they have some knowledge of us before we arrive. Know who we know, who we miss, who we'd long to see...

[ -- did they take him because they'd already taken her? was that part of their design? ]

Peggy.

[ he doesn't try and coax her to look at him. He runs his thumb over her knuckles, tries to see what she's trying to articulate. Whatever it is, it's bothering her. ]

If that's why I'm here, I'm still grateful for that.

[ grateful is much the same word she'd use. nevertheless, she wonders whether that makes them a bit complacent -- too willingly to see the gift horse, see its mouth, and obediently avert their eyes. ]

I'll save my gratitude for the day we're taken at the same time. [ maudlin, maybe. she'd not intended to indulge her own darkness but! here she is. doing just that. ] Should we be so lucky.

If we can't.

[ he hates talking about it, hates it so very much but at perhaps it's one of those things that must be said once before they're pushed out of the way. ]

If we won't be, I hope it's you.

[ who leaves first. He said his most difficult of goodbyes already. It'll be a bit easier releasing her to go live a long life than carrying her at the end of her days. ]

[ peggy isn't easily given to tears. and nor is she, now. but there's a wealth of emotion captured in her expression and she's acutely aware of the public space they're sharing. she gives her head a little shake. ]

No -- God, no. Let's not have this argument.

[ the one where she replies she hopes it's him, instead. ]

I know.

[ what she will say and how none of them shall change their minds, not about this. He brings her palm to his lips, presses a kiss there ]

Go on choose another one.

[ another song. A finer distraction. ]

[ she glances at the record player. and then at the gulf between them. peggy's cheeks puff; her mouth puckers. with a shake of her head, she throws a certain level of caution to the wind. it's been an exhausting week on so many levels. everything with the atroma; new crew; max describing to her how he's prepared to die.

peggy needs a win. she craves a win. ]

Doesn't break any rules if we dance, does it?

[ there's just enough space between the mismatched furniture, she thinks. ]

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