sixthiterationlogs | Defying Orders

Bodhi Rook projects a nonthreatening air wherever he goes. Few people could look less likely to kill anybody than the small man in blue and red robes carrying an armful of kindling and followed by a bouncy young dog. Aurora seemed so devoted to him that he felt he owed her better than the vague and general fondness he'd shown her most of her life to date, and bringing her along on his half-productive wanders seemed like a good way to bond.

He smiles politely at the stranger. Could be new, but then, he's not very good at keeping track of these things, and with two villages now, he's pretty much hopeless. "Morning?" he offers hesitantly, trying to gauge whether he should ready an ineffective explanation for what the hell's going on or just be ready to chat.

At the general greeting, Felicity feels a very quick jolt of 'this was stupid, Oliver's going to kill you' before she looks up into the sky, lowers her gaze to the man in front of her, and smiles with a quick nod of her head.

"Looks like it," she agrees, then her smile falters. "Like morning, I mean. Because you said--" She shakes her head and clears her throat. "Sorry, bad joke." Looking him over, she motions to his armful of wood and asks, "Busy?"

"Not... very?" It's a task that needs doing, but not a task on a particularly specific timeline. Bodhi's had months to get used to the level of technology here, the idea that if jobs aren't done by human hands they just don't happen and the consequences can be very unpleasant. Those months haven't been enough to get him to focus on doing chores by a timeline that'd make sense to most people. "I mean, um, nothing I couldn't put down..."

"Oh, no. No, I just--" She pauses because she feels like maybe she hinted at asking him to do something and she didn't mean to, so she flashes another smile and finishes lamely. "I didn't mean to interrupt."

There was a pause before she focused more on what he was carrying rather than just the fact that he was carrying it. "I'm just looking around. Firewood?"

"Needs a lot of keeping up," he says amiably, not the least bit offended. He's too socially awkward himself to every mind these things if there doesn't seem to be any ill intent. Nothing's ever straightforward in the valley. "And I'm pretty lousy at getting the oven going, so..." A lot of kindling was necessary, was all.

"Yeah, I've noticed that the technology around here is." She really was working on both the social awkwardness and the blunt way she had of saying things. Also the babbling. So, she stuck with, "Lacking."

There was clearly more to say on the subject, but she kept her mouth shut. She didn't want to alienate any possible allies she might have, or actual friends she might make, mostly because when (not if) Oliver found out she'd hied off to the village separate from the one he'd declared their base camp, she wanted to have something to show for it.

"I'm Felicity. Felicity Smoak. And for the record, I'm not sure I could get an oven going, either."

"You'd think it would get easier with practice, but maybe that, um, that could be for people who... already knew something about starting fires?" He shrugs sheepishly. "Bodhi Rook." He feels a bit dim for not thinking to introduce himself already--you are supposed to do that when you start talking--but it's a lapse he commits a lot. The number of introductions necessary in a small village constantly inundated with strangers you had to know for safety's sake just added up.

"I'm not really a camper," she tells him, hands up in a surrender motion. "Computers were more my thing, so ovens?"

He gets a shrug, then a nod with a smile when he finally introduces himself. She doesn't recognize the name from anything she's ever read on the regular or dark web, which doesn't mean a thing for someone who clearly isn't used to spending a lot of time in the woods. But, as he's admitted, neither has he, so Felicity isn't sure what the entire deal with the little village is.

"How long have you been here?"

"Um, more than half a year, I'm pretty sure? The calendars don't really... Long enough." He's not exactly one of the veterans, or at least he doesn't feel like one. But he's certainly had enough time and experience that he should be able to point newbies in the right direction. Or... in a specific direction. There isn't really a right one, but he can helpfully point at the inn or the hot spring, if someone's interested. "I'm also better at, well, computers, I guess, but I was a pilot, so... Not, um, not useful skills."

"What kind of pilot?" She's thinking fixed wing commercial airliners or maybe jets... he could be a fighter pilot with his body type, she thinks. "Because aren't pilots taught survival skills or something? Or is that just Army pilots."

She's half teasing, trying to make it a more light-hearted conversation, something she's not sure she has in her, to be honest. It's been a long few weeks and meeting new people is a good thing. It takes the stress off of feeling like she's in it along - or with one other person. Constantly watching their backs.

"And now you can almost light an oven. That's useful."

"Cargo," he says, hoping that puts paid to any hopeful speculation about him being able to do useful things. People's expectations should be kept very limited. Just for everybody's peace of mind. "I washed out of the combat track right away. And, um, if there's a way to use being really good at reading charts here, I... haven't found it."

Steve's feeling better, finally. Whatever he got hit with felt like something from Dr. Poison's hobby closet, but enough trips to the springs has made him feel well enough to finally be out again in the village, taking advantage of the mildly decent weather to continue mapping distances, marking buildings, and figuring out exactly where everything is.

That is, of course, when he's not busy making as much time as he can with Diana, seeing as he's more than slightly grateful for that. He glances up from his little self-made map when he notices the woman walking with purpose, unable to help the amused smile he tries to hide by ducking down his head. "Whatever direction you're going in, I pity whatever it is you're looking to find," he calls out to her, tucking away the pen behind his ear.

It's when she hits the edges of the village, as small as it is, that Felicity begins to feel misgivings about heading out on her own. Not because she's unsure about her capabilities, but because she hadn't even left a note about where she was going and, well, when Oliver gets back, he's probably going to kill her - if someone else doesn't do it first.

She doesn't startle when she hears a voice, not entertaining the possibility that a random person could be talking to her. As hard as she's trying to make it seem like she belongs, it's not until that voice makes the comment about pitying whatever it is she might be looking for, does she turn and realize that the man nearby is talking to her. And that's when the simple misgiving feeling jumps to a 'this was dumb' type thought.

"I haven't decided yet when I'm looking for," she admits, hating herself for giving it easily. "Any ideas on where to start?"

Steve gives her a welcome, open smile, because he doesn't want her to think that he's judging anything she's doing, but maybe he could use a little distraction himself, which is why he's so ready to call out and talk to someone else. "Depends on what you're looking for," he replies, seeing as he knows that it's not going to be as easy as offering the first piece of advice that comes to mind.

He gestures to the map in his hand, a rueful smile on his lips. "I'm still looking myself, actually," he says. "Not sure what I'm looking for."

Felicity would. Totally judge what she's doing, namely wearing white while hiking in the forest. Honestly, whoever decided on the clothes had a terrible sense of humor.

He has a map and though Felicity is much better with maps on computers, she can do okay with one on paper... she thinks. So, trying her best to hide her hesitancy, she steps a little closer, points to the map as a point of reference, and moves to his side to try and get a better look.

"Do you know where we are, at least? Or what the, uh." It's not a city or a town. "Village is called?"

"Unnamed or undecided or people are just deciding not to tell me," Steve replies to that question, wishing that he had a name to put at the top of the map. He's not sure why that point bugs him more than anything else, but maybe it's because things are named. They're named for familiarity and for use and not being able to use one sits wrong with him.

On the other hand, Steve also isn't ready to stage a coup just to name a village. "All I know is that wherever we are doesn't care about what year it was when we got here or whether we were alive or dead."

If she's being honest, Felicity doesn't care what it's called because it's not home and, as far as she can tell, it's not anywhere that she can think of that reminds her of anywhere close to home. With a name, and a good computer, she might be able to parse where they are in relation to home, but she has other matters to get through first.

Then he mentions years and being alive or dead and it's a quick reminder that she might not have been all that alive when she arrived, either.

"What do you mean, what year it was?" Her curiosity allows her to ask that first. She may or may not get to the dead part.

This is easy enough to prove, even if Steve already feels a little bad about the blunt way he's going to do this. "Okay, so, in a second, you tell me what year it was when you left here. Left, being a really generous word," he clarifies, because he's not even going to pretend that they all weren't kidnapped and dropped here for reasons they don't understand (or at least, reasons he doesn't understand yet).

"So? What year was it?" he asks, trying to give her an encouraging smile because of the disbelief he knows is likely coming next.

"Left here?" She furrows her brow, then looks over her shoulder like somehow 'Candid Camera' got renewed or Ashton's done a revival - not that she ever watched because she has no time for reality TV, okay - but when she looks back at him, he doesn't appear to be joking with her. "You mean left the place I came from and got here?"

Because she's not quite sure what he's getting at. "Let's say it was 2017." She almost adds, and I was probably at the gates of heaven.

"Yeah, then," he agrees, because he's fairly sure that it won't be the same. If it is, then Steve will get the chance to apologize, but as soon as she says it, he feels like he ought to be able to rest his case, seeing as it's pretty definitive. Extending his hand, he gives her a tight-lipped smile.

"I'm Steve Trevor," he introduces himself. "It was 1918 when I got here, and I still don't know how that works, because I shouldn't really be anywhere," he admits.

"Felicity Smoak," she returns absently as she holds out her hand, reflecting on what it is that he's admitted, not quite sure where he was going with it.

It seems impossible, given the way he looks and even the way he's dressed. The years just don't match and, even if they were caught in some kind of odd 'space-time' loop, she can't make her mind wrap around the entirety of what he's said. "You've been here ninety-nine years?" she finally asks, then adds, "What do you mean, you shouldn't be anywhere?"

"I've been here about two months," he says, because that's both somehow weirder and not as weird, in his opinion. "It was 1918 when I got here, but I've only been here for two months, and the moment before I got here, I was in a plane filled with highly sensitive explosive materials." That he'd just shot at, but he doesn't mention that part where he had willingly taken them out.

"Felicity," he says, warmly. "It's nice to meet you, even if you are a century ahead of me."

"Wait." She says it even as she's shaking his hand, noting that he's all kinds of friendly, warm, and acting like it's completely normal that he's a hundred years behind her in the Everything Race. "You're saying you arrived here when you should have been in an explosion?"

Her hand falls from their handshake as she shakes her head once to focus, speaking her next words absently as her mind wraps around it all. "Me, too."

"Explosion sounds generous for a description of what happened," he says evenly and frankly, a little like he's dissociated from the whole event and now he's thinking about it like it'd happened to someone else and not to him. Some days, that's the only way he can cope with it. He gives her a studious look, eyes narrowed, and then the exhalation of laughter is half-strangled, half-disbelieving.

"Wait, really?" he asks, catching up to himself. "An explosion?"

"Yeah, there was an island and we - my friends - were on it. We'd been kidnapped," she said with a huff of not-actual-laughter. "Just found out the entire thing was rigged with C-4, and I'm still not sure how he did it..." Shaking her head, she comes back to what she was saying and focuses on Steve. "I swear I heard it start to go and the next thing I know?"

Spreading her arms, she indicates the place they're now standing in. "Only, none of my friends are here. Well, none of the ones on the island, anyway." She frowns at him. "That's weird, right?"

"Yeah, that's weird," Steve agrees, trying to dig himself out of the past and all the plans and strategies he's been working on to try and make this thing fit in his head. He pinches the bridge of his nose, feeling way too out of his depths and flailing a little for it, shaking his head. "I mean, in my case, I blew everything on purpose for the greater good," he confesses.

"Same outcome, though. One hell of a bang," Steve says, staring at Felicity. "I mean, it's a pretty wild coincidence, but I've definitely met people who were here and not because they got blown up before they made it here."

Wanda was on a mission.

She was going to create traps and obstacles using whatever she was able to find in the inns storage closest. Her end goal was to block the breach and the potential of the pesky foxes from reaching the area where most of the people who had arrived here lived. Arado, a very large friendly puppy, padded along her side as she carried a large collection of snuggies to the canyon wall. It was a little hard to see over the pile and it had been a bark from Arado that had stopped her from running directly into Felicity.

"Sorry." She apologized, her accent thick as she tried to peer around the pile of snuggies. "Did I hit you?"

Arado sat next to Wanda obediently but he was looking up at Felicity with large puppy eyes that said 'please pet me'.

Russian?

The surrounding environment doesn't lend itself to a Eastern European landscape, not in general, but Felicity wouldn't have thought Lian Yu would have been lush and green, either, so she's not entirely sure that she's the best expert on where she might be. Russia, an island in the South China Sea... it's the middle of nowhere, definitely.

"No," she answers the question put to her, then focuses on the extremely obedient dog, holding out her hand cautiously, even as she focuses on the woman in front of her. "Do you... need help?"

Not exactly what she was planning on, but. Friends means not enemies, right?

Wanda wasn't Russian but it was as close as she was going to get. Her country was too small for most people to even know it existed and she was sure that on some worlds, it didn't exist.

Arado licked Felicities hand before nudging it for pets behind the ear. A woman in the military had trained him before he came into Clint and Wanda's care and some habits had stayed with him. In most cases this was a good thing because it meant that Wanda didn't have to worry about him running off when they were outside. Leashes weren't exactly common around here.

"Yeah." Wanda admitted as she waited for Felicity to take some of the blankets. She had greatly over estimated their bulk, and her ability to fold in a way that would stop them from spilling out of her arms. Blankets, Wanda could fold. Snuggies were weird and had sleeves… it was a nightmare.

"Are you new?" She asked, curiously. Wanda made a point to not look threatening. It lowered people's guards but it also made those who were new to this place more comfortable. Since they were all stuck here, she'd rather they get along.

Despite her background in computers and her tendency to be inside when everyone else is outside, Felicity much prefers dogs to cats, so it's no hardship for her to pet the dog as the dog in front of her would like. She brings her other hand into it, scritching behind both ears, down the neck, and under the chin, feeling a sudden swell of homesickness that hurts her chest.

Letting go of the puppy, she takes some of the bulk from Wanda, balancing them carefully. At the question, something she knows she's supposed to avoid, she answers anyway, because she's already tired of hiding.

"Yeah, been here a couple of weeks, but. There's another village? It's--" Felicity motions the way she came. "We're over there."

Wanda turned to look at where Felicity indicated before nodding her head. There were a few things about what Felicity said that contradicted each other, which made Wanda think that this poor girl had yet to be to the inn.

"Yes." She supplied before shifting the bulk in her arms and leading the way towards the breach, where she was setting traps for this fucking foxes. "Have you been to the inn? There is a bulletin board with collected information." Everyone was trying to figure out how they got here and how to get home. "Someone I knew from my world was here for over a year before he vanished. The information that's been shared is on that bulletin board." It was a fast way to see everything that's happened.

There were also meals every day at midday for those who weren't skilled in hunting or foraging for food. Everyone helped out, but Wanda had a feeling that this girl might not know about that. "I'm Wanda." She supplied in way of greeting.

"We- I," she decides to stress the singular (despite already tripping herself up once) because well, if something terrible happens to her, she doesn't want any weird psychos going after Oliver. "Decided to, uh. Stay over at the other side of the, um. The breach. There's a house there that I'm in." Then she stops. "The guy there, someone from home, he's kinda gruff about venturing out and meeting new people. So, no. We haven't to the inn. Or over here much at all." Another small pause. "He doesn't know I'm over here, he'll probably bluster about putting myself in danger..."

She trails off because if the woman in front of her is out to hurt her, well. At least Oliver'd be some kind of match for her. But she files away the knowledge about the bulletin board to tell Oliver later.

"I'm Felicity."

Wanda noticed the slip but didn't comment. If Felicity wanted to keep a secret a secret then Wanda wasn't going to pry. It wasn't in her nature considering how much she valued privacy.

"I'll keep it a secret." Wanda assured her. "I can understand his worry but no one here wishes you harm. It's the overseers who you should worry about." She continued to walk towards the breach with the snuggies in tow. "But we don't know who that is." There was a lot that they didn't know, which was why she wouldn't fault her friend for being so reserved.

"It's nice to meet you. Do you have have enough food where you are?" She might as well ask and send Felicity back with provisions if she needed it.

"Uh."

Looking around them, Felicity took a moment to appreciate the scenery again, then decided that, if Oliver didn't want her to find people to talk to, then he ought to do a better job of finding stuff to eat. "We have a few things, but it seems like things are kind of scarce. Oliver can hunt, but it's either a little slim or he's a little out of practice."

She gave Wanda a wry smile as they walked, then cleared her throat and asked as casually as she could manage. "You said overseers? But you don't know who. Does anyone know how to get in touch with them?"

Wanda listened and then nodded her head. She understood their difficulties, it was also why they had the support system that they did at the inn. "I help preserve game at the inn. There isn't an excess but we have a lot of people who lay out traps, hunt and fish for those who can't. There is a meal served there around noon each day." Not everyone knows how to hunt or fish and surviving meant working together.

"That's right." Her accent thickened momentarily. Wanda hated talking about them because she was pretty sure that they were always being watched. "I don't know. We've found pods and what look like observation areas but no answers." It's documented at the inn.

Where Oliver should really go and look if he doesn't want Felicity there.

Listening to Wanda describe how different people did different things, Felicity began to learn how people came together to make sure everyone survived. Very 'it takes a village', except in the literal sense and she looked around again, then up to the sky, realizing that it wasn't going to take very long before cold weather set in.

"Is that a skill you learned here or did you know how to do it before you got here?"

Her question is twofold: she wants to learn more about the woman next to her and also, maybe, learn to do something here as well.

She mentally filed the information about pods and observation areas for Oliver because she'd tell him she'd gone out, but not until she had something useful to tell him. The inn sounded like a good place to start: lots of information, food, and a group of people that worked together, not necessarily untrustworthy people, either.

When Wanda first arrived she was a lot more reserved around the others in the village. She had been lucky that both Sam and Clint had arrived before her and eased her into the situation with relative finesse. Not everyone had that luxury which was why Wanda was keen to offer food, answers and whatever else she could to those finding their way.

It was obvious to her that both Oliver and Felicity were finding their way.

"Here. The rules here are different. I couldn't do what I did before." So she's trained more of her body and skills and less of her powers which were taken away from her.

Wanda's pace quickened as they walked out of town and towards the Breach. It wasn't too far away but she didn't like being caught in the open with her hands full, even if they were full of snuggies.

"There are people willing to teach different skills: fishing, hunting..."

Keeping pace with her, Felicity listens to what she's saying - and what she's not saying. That there was something else that she did that's not useful here, much like Felicity.

It reminds Felicity of what Oliver's said about staying out of sight, about not trusting people, about making sure things are safe. It reminds her of being on Lian Yu and finding herself in positions that make her feel useless and unable to do anything to improve the situation.

"What'd you do before you got here?"

Felicity figures she'll start there, see how alike the two of them are before she starts asking where she can learn other skills. Maybe Wanda can teach her a thing or two.

Wanda wasn't the most talkative person but she spoke when she had something pertinent to say or in answer to a question. The closer that Wanda got to someone the more she would tease them or offer small observations or opinions. Given that she and Felicity have just met, she'll answer the question asked, offer useful information but generally leave the conversation at that.

She didn't know how to answer Felicities question. It wasn't as if her job as an Avenger was the sort of thing that you put on a resume.

"I was in between work." Which was technically true though it didn't exactly answer Felicity’s question. "Have you heard of the Avengers?" If the answer was yes then it would save Wanda a lot of explanation. "I worked with them."

Wanda peered over the mound of fabric in her arms and then alter their path slightly. After a few more yards, the bottom of the canyon wall came into view, where the thin path to the other town twisted through the rocks. Wanda was sure that she saw a flash of red move at the corner of her vision but she hoped that she was wrong. She was trying to stop the foxes from making their way into this side of the breach.

Oliver had actually been out hunting when he realized Felicity had left and he immediately knows where she's gone - the exact place he told her not to go. His wariness has bordered into paranoia and he knows that but after everything he's been through in the last ten years of his life, he finds it difficult to trust anyone and anything that isn't a known quantity.

In this place, only Felicity is a known. He can trust Felicity with his life (and he hopes she can trust him with hers) but he doesn't know the other people in this village and he isn't about to risk himself or Felicity to find out.

When he catches up to her along the main road, he grips her elbow sharply. "What did I tell you about coming out into the open like this? We have no idea where we are!"

The grab at her elbow is what shocks her more than anything else. The fact that he's angry? No. The fact that he came after her? Not so much. But that he's snatched her up like she's an errant three year old that he actually gets to yank around is something new for her and she feels her heart catch in her throat as she pulls her arm back from his grip. Or tries to.

When anger follows, she's not entirely prepared for it and it makes her blood pressure go up so fast, she feels almost faint. He's scared her in that five seconds more than anyone else she's met that day and she doesn't like it. He's always been her protector, even when she's not been his girlfriend, and this runs contrary to that.

"And we're never going to find out unless we ask," she tells him, feeling the prick of angry tears at her eyes and loathing herself for it. "Don't grab me like that again," she tells him, very obviously resisting the urge to rub her arm.

"I didn't mean to hurt you," Oliver says, dropping her arm. "But how can I protect you if you walk off like this into a place that we know nothing about? If it's a trap, how are we going to know until it's too late? I don't...we can talk to them."

He has to concede that point because Felicity's made a good one - how can he gather intelligence if he doesn't do anything to gather?

"But don't trust anyone. Only trust me."

At the same time that Felicity knew he hadn't meant to, she also knew that her own emotions were running high, which had caused her to react the way she had, so she gave in to the rubbing of her elbow and nodded her acceptance of his apology at the same time.

"We are trapped," she finally said, a little woodenly. "I don't think anyone here is secretly working for the other side. I've talked to a couple of them today." She gave a sigh, then looked up at him again. "And I do trust you, but I think we're going to have to give a little, too. They have an inn. With food."

Jax always has a little twinge of sympathy whenever someone shows up in the white scrubs because it's fucking impossible to keep them clean. The woman who's straggling through the village now, actually, has white scrubs that are more on the beige side than anything else because shit just doesn't get clean here the way it does back home.

Otherwise, though, she's a good looking blonde and he's got nothing against those. The village needs more of them, honestly, and her face is new. Even better. He draws up close and gives her a smile.

"So, you've been here long enough to dirty up those scrubs but you still look like you have no idea what the fuck's going on. How many days?"

For the first time that day, Felicity doesn't get the feeling that Oliver might kill her. She gets the feeling that Oliver might kill this guy. But it makes her smile, what he says, because he's not wrong and she can appreciate the way he just puts it out there. It's that smile, she knows, that's going to give her away and make her completely unable to lie.

"A little over two weeks," she answers honestly, then tilts her head. He's already told her how he knows, so she adds, "I'm Felicity. How long have you been here?"

"Couple months," Jax says. He looks her over and is glad, yet again, that this stupid place didn't give him the damn white scrubs. He'd lose his mind if that's all he had to wear; it's too much like prison. As it is, he has a real tshirt and a pair of jeans and hopefully this chick gets a box again soon.

"Jax, by the way. Figure I ought to reciprocate on the name exchange."

"Probably best if you want to appear like a nice guy," she agrees easily, then looks around for a moment before nodding in the general vicinity of his thighs. "No scrubs. How'd you do that?"

"Been here long enough to get a box from our mysterious jail wardens," Jax says. "I collect the shit from people who disappear, too, and I trade it. I have absolutely no useful Boy Scout shit to offer. I do have stuff people want."

It's how he's managed to survive this long. That, and, well, Moana. That kid can do anything.

Useful Boy Scout shit would be right up Oliver's particular alley, which meant that Felicity was going to be stuck being the useless one - something she absolutely loathed. No computers meant nothing to do at all except apparently gather wood and learn how to start fires. Neither one of which was something she was particularly keen to get started on, especially dressed in white.

"What do you mean, 'get a box'? Is it something that happens a lot?" Actually, there was one thing Felicity was good at, and that was nagging people for information.

Defying Orders

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Inn/Near Fountain

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