sixthiterationlogs | Look out to the future, but it tells you nothing

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Look out to the future, but it tells you nothing

WHO: Tony Stark
WHERE: Tube Room in the Bunker, Inn, Forge
WHEN: September 3rd onward
OPEN TO: Initially Bucky Barnes, then Everyone
WARNINGS: Descriptions of Dissolving, Canon typical Violence, Language, Blood, etc.

Tubular Trauma - [Closed to Bucky Barnes]

Oblivion isn't as comforting as Tony thought it might be. That drifting, aching sort of silence that seeps in like ice to strangle all sensation and thought? Normally didn't include quite this much pressure. Like the armor locked up dead around him, but with a single terrifying exception he's never had water between his skin and the circuitry. It makes drifting awake less of a vague meandering towards consciousness and more of a snapped, panicked shot of adrenaline to the base of his spine. Because this? This isn't Titan. It's not stale air stinking of ozone and ash it's a tube.

Full of fucking water. Whatever's just beyond is a bit beyond his capacity to grasp seeing as the first detail that sinks in isn't that he's in soaked scrubs, floating in a tube. It's the slow coil of red swirling in the water from his left side and- that? That's going to be a problem. The patch job didn't hold through whatever the ever loving fuck brought him here- why being fully submerged makes this easier, he doesn't know. Too confused to panic, he'll think- as soon as he gets out. Though trying to scrabble for a seam in the tube is A) useless and B) slow going with one hand, the other pressed tight against his wound, for all the good it does in keeping the exit wound from bleeding.

Protip: It doesn't.

Got an Inn

Adjustment after a shock is- well. It's a thing. A shock to his system, a shock to the senses, emotional fatigue, whatever. The finely tuned engine that is his brain keeps trying and failing to roll over, the dull click click click of failing spark plug echos in his teeth. Failure's one thing. It wasn't an option, and they'd failed and that- he'll. Cope. Somehow. Not much of an option. He'd given himself a moment, maybe ten to breathe and think and wonder and he'd- woken up here. In scrubs (his stylists would kill him, Pepper would kill him) and they're not there, he knows they aren't there, but he can't help but keep picking at his nails. Digging out bits of ash and soot that don't exist anywhere but in his memory along with the still palpable crumpling of an adolescent arachnid that-

Yeah, no. Not thinking about that.

Heels of his hands pressed to his eyes Tony tries to just. Breathe. Eat the damn lunch he'd come to get and figure out a step two. Or. Shit, at this point? He'd take a step one. Maybe another soak in the hotspring so his ribs and torso stop feeling quite so delicate; he's been over this whole thing for years Revisiting this particular sharp edged vulnerability? Not his idea of fun.

Rebuilding, Rebranding, Reforging

The best part about waking up here, Tony decides, is the built in ability to figure out what the 'best' option is for him, outlined in a shade of blue so damn familiar it aches a little. As long as he's stressed out of his mind- which is all day, every day, since he was fucking twelve- and without direction (which is every hour since the snap) the universe which screwed him over so spectacularly through circumstance and poor cosmic shuffling throws him a bone. A glowing line not entirely unlike a flight path that guides him from wherever his latest round of trying not to rattle apart while left alone with his own sharply spiraling thoughts that circle 'we're fucked we're fucked we're fucked' on a nigh infinite loop was (usually somewhere not too open, usually with his back pressed so hard to a wall it's hard to breathe but he needs to know he can see everything that's coming at him or not) to...a pretty well dead forge. It's antiquated like the rest of the village. Clean, empty, quaint.

Dead coals, unused tools, and just getting everything cleared out to the point of use would take a day, finding ore or iron would take gifts or mining but- he can start doing something. Here's the best place for him and it's true, he can feel that garrote of tension fit to strangle start to go loose at the idea of a project. It's direction. It's something productive, something he can lay his hands on and...tinker. Bandage around his ribs or no, Orders for bedrest or no (he has them, he's ignoring them, some shit doesn't change), Tony busies himself with getting the forge cleaned up and organized, rough charcoal sketches dusted on the wall as he plans the first of many projects that still...won't be enough. Not to keep him busy. Not to keep him sane. But for now? it's as good a place to start as any. First order of business: Stockpiling iron to work. Which...that'll take some doing, won't it?

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Having toured (and developed some tech for) a handful of distilleries in his time, the formation thereof was vaguely familiar, as was the smell. Wallowing in guilt of course the first thought is- I need a fucking drink. But drinks? Not to be had. Why the the fuck have a westworld bullshit old timey settlement and not have actual liquor? He feels cheated, in what small part of him isn't locked tight in existential dread can feel anything else. So the aroma, the set up? Familiar enough to have him wandering.

It's- not pretty, but it doesn't have to be. It just needs to function. Of course Tony probably doesn't look like someone anyone should be giving booze, bruises under his eyes, skin pale from bloodloss, a little wavery on his feet from the aforementioned blood loss, but the first crackle of genuine humor gives some spark of life to his eyes. "Huh. This your rig?"

He's seen- worse, actually. He's made worse to prove a point to Rhodey back in college. "Not half bad."

"That's what I strive for. 'Not half bad.' What all my report cards used to say, back in the day." A Midwestern accent. With a particular edge of sarcasm that had been fine-tuned and carefully honed over the years.

Sam looked up at the new guy. She knew he was a new guy, without really knowing. Which made zero sense, but then again, neither did being stuck in an Edwardian clown rodeo with a bunch of batshit strangers who made Kindred look calm and rational.

She had to take her sanity in small doses.

Anyway, when you didn't talk to anyone, you noticed things more. Sam had the faces of all the underwear models memorized. And this was definitely a new one.

"You," she said, grabbing a beaker from the end of the set-up, "must be looking for the neon sign that says 'Exit' right about now? Or am I wrong?"

"Well you know what they say. Shoot for mediocrity, get neither accolades or condemnation." Not that it'd ever been an option for him, but he's always been able to see the appeal. Curiosity, the first genuine flicker of it he's felt in a bit, has him peering at her set up, the piping, the braces, the amount of space it takes. "Ever think of setting up somewhere more permanent?"

It's easier to focus on the details than it is the bullshit everything that's been today. Or the past few days. Weeks? Years. If he starts dragging shit to think about now without the distraction of mils and miles of wok ahead back home? He'll lose his shit. Better to start a new project now before that has a chance to happen. Going quietly mad is't exactly his style.

"Fresh from the tube." He swivels his head to her, shrugging. "...yes and no."

"A permanent set-up would mean moving shop to one of the abandoned houses," she said. "This is a much better location."

Which was blithe, but true.

Less obvious was the fact that Sam knew herself far too well. Especially in light of her recent behavior, she got the feeling that if she ever relocated out of the Inn, she would never see another soul the rest of her life. She had a talent for isolating herself. And that way lay madness. A Ventrue had to be careful about silly things like sanity.

She slid the beaker down the countertop to the dude. "I wouldn't recommend inhaling," she warned him. "Unless you what to melt your nose hair. I'm pretty sure this stuff could double as one hell of a silverware polish." Which, of course, pretty much never prevented anyone from drinking it.

Her golden contribution to society.

"Or an expansion of the inn." The building's structure was sound, putting together an added annex just behind or alongside the kitchen wouldn't be difficult. "Make it easier to customize the space than having to work around what exists."

He's already flitting through what he knows is on hand RE construction, the space she's taken, the space she might want or need to up production and- that's all pretty well and good but better equipment wouldn't hurt either. Still. It's a project. Tony drums his nails against his chest, head cocked as he runs the numbers. "Might take a month."

Which pains him on so many levels, but life here? Is apparently slow. He'll have to adjust. Having something to drink? Makes it easier. A shrug and a dip of his head and he's downing it-

The burn's strong, there's not much by way of flavor but he manages to get it down with a grimace. "Not the worst backyard hooch I've had."

"Not the worst," Sam said. "Another thing I strive for."

He didn't lack ambition. Sam could say that for him. But he still had that new-arrival smell on him. He hadn't learned the way this place liked to play with ambitions. And every other positive emotion left. It squeezed them all like a sponge, until they were completely dried out inside.

Then again, Sam had more or less arrived that way.

"If we're talking home improvement projects," she said, shaking a few synthetic curls behind her shoulder, "what this clown rodeo really needs is a fucking shower. I tried messing around with a few ideas awhile back, but I'm a scientist, not an engineer." And a biologist at that, not a physicist.

"Four out of ten, which is pretty close to average." His scale is somewhat skewed as the worst he's had? Fucking terrible, near lethal. The best? Euphoric. So anywhere middling is sort of...relative to one another. He downs another mouthful, sucking air in through his teeth afterward. "Ngh. Reminds me of college."

Speaking of:

"Engineers can be scientists, scientists can be engineers." It's all theory and application in the varying disciplines anyway. Nothing too difficult in the long run as long as someone's wiling to apply themselves and absorb as much as possible. Or at the very least throw themselves against the wall until it started to make sense. "Suppose it's your lucky day. I am an engineer. What'd you think of, why wasn't it feasible?"

Well. He was opinionated. And a go-getter. She'd give him that.

Actually, he kind of reminded her of Max, although she hoped in a somewhat less homicide-y sort of way. There were certain things you never forgot. And seeing death robots? Pretty high on that list.

Her nose wrinkled a little at the memory.

"Okay," she said, "before I waste my last two wishes, let's back up a little here, Mister Engineer. Maybe you could start by telling me who you are?"

And as an afterthought:

"I'm Sam. Resident dumpster fire." A pause. "And vampire."

If he was a hunter--which she supposed he could be--he was welcome to try shit.

"Mm? Tony Stark." And he hopes, really hopes, that means fuck and all to her. It's becoming something of a relief to have his name met with blank stares. Zero expectations, zero pressure. He puts enough on himself as it is. "A shower is pretty basic compared to most of what I usually do, so."

Sam? Sam the-

He does turn enough to squint at her properly, now. Eyes flicking from her face to her mouth (no visible fangs) to- wasn't it somewhat sunny outside? What is and isn't true here. "...A vampire. That makes hooch."

For a long, lingering moment he lets the concept roll around in the back of his head before shrugging. "Fuck it. Not the strangest thing in my world and wow- that says something."

It was Tony’s lucky day. Or as lucky as you could get here, anyway. The name did mean fuck all to her. But it wasn’t what she was thinking about at the moment. “Wow,” she said. “What, exactly does it take to make a superlative with you? I’m just not the worst and not the strangest.” It shouldn’t have bothered her. But Sam was somewhat used to always being the smartest person in the room.

Well. Better to be annoyed by that than all of the things spinning out of her control in this shit show.

She sighed. “Let’s get one thing out of the way. Yes, I drink blood. No, I don’t want yours. Yes, it’s hard to survive on the all-squirrel diet. No, I don’t sparkle.”

A pause.

“And since I can see you looking...”

Sam let the Beast come out.

Kindred weren’t like vampires in the movies. No dark veins. No black eyes. No lumps or bumps or bulges. Aside from the appearance of her fangs, nothing changed about Sam. Not physically. Where the difference really lived was intangible. A feeling. Like an invisible neon sign screaming the word PREDATOR was hanging over her. An air. An aura, if you believed in that shit.

"I had a wild and shitty day before popping down here and the past...ten years? Have been an exercise in the weird. You're not exactly playing on a level field RE my bullshit frame of reference. I will say you're the first and prettiest vampire I've ever met." Low bar but, hey, no reason not to throw her a bone. As much as the scientist in him is horrifically curious? You don't just go around asking people how their bodies work or their personal histories just because they're a little weird. Or a lot weird.

Or undead.

Okay he really wants to ask but bites back his questions, some answers are offered over anyway and then she-

Changes.

It's a fundamental switch flipped in the back of his mind, a lizard brain awareness that he's in an enclosed space not only with someone stronger, but something infinitely more deadly. Fight or flight kicks in for all that Tony knows better to not listen to that bullshit instinct and he shifts his weight, standing his ground by sheer, stubborn force of will. "That-"

Fuck.

"Neat party trick." His voice is mostly steady. He'll take that as a win.

Sam didn't have her brother's gift for reading people, but she figured she'd gotten the point across. And she considered it a point of personal pride that she didn't immediately respond with, 'Oh, it kills at parties.' The pun--worthwhile thought it might be--would have given him a wrong impression. And she really was trying not to be a total monster.

It didn't look good on her. A little too much like her bio parents.

Gross.

Anyway, in a blink, it was all gone. Her teeth were all tooth-shaped again and that predatory air vanished, dissolved like the mist in her still.

"I guess there are weirder things than me here," she said.

But not many.

It passes, she's her again and he's able to, a little, banish the prickling along his spine that reminded him so much of Wanda. At least this one? Doesn't hate him for shit beyond his control. This one probably won't fuck with his head.

Odds are middling, but better than back home. He'll take it.

Little by little his shoulders unwind and he's able to slouch comfortably against the counter again, breathing slow and even to settle himself down. "Warn me next time? I've got a heart condition."

She shook her head. "Won't be a next time. Like I said, I don't want your blood. I'm pretty much off chewing on my neighbors." Give or take the fact that she'd chewed on Fucky Barnes. But that wasn't going to happen again.

Like. Ever.

As a peace offering, of sorts, she stood up and crossed the room, her combat boots thunking, to her notebook, on the far countertop. "The problem isn't with the design," she said, flipping open to the page where she'd sketched out a few potential ways to turn the miserable bathtubs into showers. "It's the pressure. Most of the normal ways to build up water pressure aren't feasible."

She wasn't a physicist, but she was a dabbler. You kind of had to be in the Ordo Dracul, it turned out.

Very slowly, in case he backed away, she approached him, holding out the pictures for him to see.

The issue isn't with the approach- hell it isn't even an issue. Tony's hands are slung in his pockets, head tilted to the side as he squints down at her sketches. "I don't like to be handed things."

A beat.

"It's a- peeve."

A thing? A quirk. When you're a rich genius you can get away with a few quirks and it's not at all due to having horrible photographs shoved into his grip, or someone shaking his hand and hauling him off balance on purpose, or any other variation of the same except for where it really honestly is. "You try gravity? Holding tank above the rig, let physics do the work for you? Basic shit but it'd get you started until we figure out something better."

He didn't like being...handed things?

Sam was so knocked off balance by that she couldn't even come up with a suitably snarky response. A phobia, fear of germs, something like that, she might have been able to understand. But...handed things? How did you survive in the world without giving and taking shit?

She set down her notebook and folded her arms. Half in irritation, and half to keep herself from trying to hand him anything again.

Who the fuck was this man?

"Gravity would work," she said. "But moving the tank is problematic. The plumbing of the whole town is...ancient. We're talking actual lead pipes. A number of which are pretty much cheese graters at this point."

Without an assistant on hand or- well- anything? Tony picks it up from the counter top, scanning her sketches. Hand to hand? Not a thing for him. Picking something up afterward? Apparently okay.

Don't ask him to explain his mind, if he knew how it worked he'd have fixed the fucking thing decades ago.

"Any cases of heavy metal poisoning? IF the pipes are lead. Because that's an issue we should be getting ahead of."

"You'd have to ask the med team," she said. "But my guess is no. Between their ability to manipulate our health and our DNA, I think they'd prefer to come up with way more creative ways to kill us."

A sadly typical refrain in her life. Unlife. Whatever.

She watched him as he looked through her sketches, a little confused by the rules. But whatever.

The sketches themselves were pretty sound, in terms of physics. The biggest problem she'd run into was a lack of equipment. After all, she wasn't exactly used to this Edwardian scavenging. When she needed something back home, she could scavenge some perfectly lovely 21st century shit.

Beyond the schematics, the book was filled with detailed drawings of double helixes, police sketches of some of the inmates of the asylum, and a list that was topped with the words 'Same world (?)' followed by names:

~~Bucky Barnes~~ Fucky Darns
Sexy British Lady
Second-Rate Guy
Dad Jokes
Danny
Claire
Mayor Hotdog

Edited 2018-09-06 12:25 (UTC)

"That is not near as comforting as it ought to be." Not bad on the designs, but some fabrication would need to happen to make it work- that's what he's good for. The rest is fascinating enough that he doesn't check his urge to snoop. Which is well and good and enlightening up until 'sexy British Lady'.

His reaction is knee jerk and visceral, a sudden full body shudder. "Oh dear lord I never want to think that about Peggy again. Ever. Names. Names you can use their names."

Which means trying to decipher these codenames. Fucky Darns gets a crackle of a laugh, Dad Jokes... "You wanna try describing a few of these, I can fill in the blanks. Confirm or deny."

Sam hadn't meant to be comforting. Not really her brand. But before she could make a joke about it, her eyebrows went straight up to her hairline (her real hairline) with the implications of the rest of it.

"Wait...you're one of them too?"

What the actual fuck? Their oppressive Overlords continued to pull person after person from one single corner of the multiverse, yet Sam remained the only representative of hers? Not that she was complaining, exactly. She wouldn't wish this place on her friends, and she wouldn't wish her enemies on this place. But it just made no sense whatsoever.

She shook her head a little bit. "Logic is dead. And who the hell is Peggy?"

"Logic is absolute. Interpretations of facts can be varied." But logic is like math. It follows guidelines and questions, the lifeblood in fractal fragments guiding someone to a scientifically, morally, or ethically sound decision that, once made, most people tend to stick to for better or worse. Come hell or high water. Island like this? It might be both.

"Tony Stark, engineer, also from the world of Fucky Barns and Mayor Hotdog- that one's got me stumped though." A beat, longer, more drawn out. "...please don't make me say it. She's like family to me and it's weird, very uncomfortable.."

Kindred didn't get headaches, as a rule. But Sam felt a phantom one coming on. "I don't...talk to a lot of people," she muttered, squeezing her brow bone between her thumb and finger. "I make up names for the ones I don't know." She decided 'Sexy British Lady' was the mysterious Peggy and decided to let the matter drop. She supposed she could have asked some of them a long time ago.

Sam was just a stubborn shit.

"Our Overlords play favorites," she said, twisting her interpretation of the facts in the first way that came to mind. "There are a lot of test subjects from you world. The world of Fucky and Hotdog."

She didn't know his actual name either. When she'd asked about why 'Hotdog,' he'd just said that was his name.

Fucking liar.

"I'm getting that." A beat. "Not knocking it. People are exhausting."

Being an exhausted and equally exhausting person himself? Tony would know. Making up nicknames was also something tony understood fairly well having done the same all his damn life but, incredulity more than actual offence prompted the question. He knew why he did it (to be annoying, make a power play, couldn't be bothered to remember) but another perspective on a similar pattern of behavior? Couldn't hurt. That the answer ws 'people are ugh' tickles him a little.

"Our Overlords are assholes." He corrected, snorting quietly. "Dumping me in a village with no tech and a bunch of people I don't really want anything to do with? Yeah. Wouldn't call that favoritism so much as putting a bunch of dramatic fuckers prone to starting shit together and waiting for someone to blow up."

Which- no thanks. Been there, done that, not dealing with it again.

Okay, there was a story happening that Sam didn't know. And she wasn't entirely sure if that was for the better or not. She'd asked dear old Fucky a lot of questions about his world, but only gotten clipped, reserved answers, for the most part. Except when it came to that night when he punched the hole in her wall.

There was a pattern, she supposed. Danny liked punching walls too.

Why the fuck was everyone from that world so damn angry? Their world hadn't been destroyed, after all. Not like hers.

"I'm used to people like that," she said, grabbing one of her beakers and refilling his glass of vodka. "Except I can usually interpret the endgame. This Skinner Box is unreal doesn't follow the rules from home."

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Look out to the future, but it tells you nothing

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