01. arrival

[tothefly]

WHO: Natasha Romanoff
WHERE: South Village Fountain, Inn, Town Hall, aroundish.
WHEN: afternoon of Oct. 16th, the few days after
OPEN TO: OTA
WARNINGS: none yet, will header in comments if anything pops up

Fountain arrival: open to first two

They had been in Wakanda. She's sure they had been in Wakanda. Barnes had just gone back into cryo while they waited for test results, something to undo what HYDRA had done to his mind for all those years. Steve had been with him. Natasha had been...she'd been...

She hadn't been underwater, and now there's water all around her, and she's choking on it as instinct kicks in and she propels herself to the surface, all thoughts of where she'd been and how she'd gotten here lost for the moment in the rush for oxygen and survival. There's the surface, and she breaks through with a gasp and a choked cough, and every limb feels so heavy she could just sink right back below the surface, but there's an edge right there--is she in a pool? It doesn't matter, she hauls herself to the edge and then out, sliding to the ground and waiting for breathing to feel a little less like a foreign concept. This is definitely not Wakanda, she thinks, and she is definitely not where she went to sleep the night before. There's a lump behind her back--a backpack?--and she immediately pulls it around, going through the contents looking for answers and finding nothing but more questions.

If T'Challa had wanted her out of the country, he could have just offered her a ride, she thinks, vaguely ironic. It's fine. It's fine. She'll take a moment here to catch her breath--just a second--and then she'll be on the move again. She's woken up in worse places before.

Inn: OTA

It hadn't taken long after that first conversation for her to start feeling the itch to move, the exposure in the open space highlighted by the chill of damp clothing. The inn had been the obvious answer, and the bathroom upstairs had afforded her a better look at herself and the contents of her pack before drying off and changing into a fresh set of scrubs. The color seems to mean something, if what she's seen so far is any indication, but what exactly it's supposed to mean still evades her. At least she's always looked good in black. After a quick change, Natasha makes her way back downstairs. She isn't in Wakanda, she isn't anywhere anyone seems to have heard of, but that doesn't mean anything. Time for a little recon of her own, she thinks, and starts her exploration in the front room downstairs. It doesn't take long before she finds the village census and public records. There's a lot of information to unpack here, but she keeps finding herself going back to the same pages, over and over. How is her name in this book, if she's never been here before? There have to be answers somewhere.

Open locations: OTA

It doesn't take long for Natasha to start trying to familiarize herself with her location. Even if she's stuck here, that doesn't mean she has to stay blind. You're likely to run into her over the course of the next few days in any number of places, both public areas and maybe a few less-public. Empty houses are also a safe bet, as she tries to find a place to set up a home base, as it were, and frequently the inn, as she keeps returning to study the public records and census. No information is bad information, right? Anyway, before she goes looking for this bunker she keeps hearing about, she wants to have a better idea of what to expect out there, which means approaching people (more often than not the ones she doesn't recognize) to ask questions and hear about other peoples' experiences with the uncomfortably-named 'Observers.'

why is it always me

[championofsnark]

WHO: Marian Hawke
WHERE: South Village Fountain + Elsewhere
WHEN: 10/20 and then later
OPEN TO: Open to all!
WARNINGS: Probably some swearing.

Next to the fountain

It's one thing to say you're fine with being left in the Fade, and another thing when you're left in the Fade and about to die. Hawke had been fighting so long, and she'd keep fighting there too, but her luck was out. She knew it in her heart. And she accepted it, in a roundabout 'might as well' kind of way. She gripped her knives, took in a deep breath, and prepared for the end, and then ... she was drowning. It was a shock, yeah, cause you'd think nightmares would torment her with other ways of dying than something like that, but she struggled to the top and sucked in deep breaths. She climbed out of the fountain and dropped to the ground beside it, hands shaking and empty. Dressed in yellow, which was not her color at all, but she could barely make sense of how that happened, without all of her armor on.

This wasn't the Fade, she knew that much. It could be very, very tricky, but it never felt real enough. This was harshly real. Her lungs hurt and her body ached. Dark hair was matted to her forehead at the moment, and she sat up, immediately regretting it. "Damn," she murmured, simply sitting there for a time. "I had to kill so many people to get those knives." Hawke let herself have some laughs over that, which turned into some tears.

Later in the week, around the village

Hawke is known for her adaptability, so once she'd gotten to the inn and given the general directions, she'd simply shrugged and crashed in one of the empty rooms at the inn. Really, this was so much better than what she'd been used to lately. She wasn't sleeping in any ditches (so far), there was actual food so she hadn't starved yet, and no one tried to kill her, which was really just very polite of them. Her sticky fingers led her to immediately check out these 'open' items people spoke of, but none of it was armor, which was a real shame. She felt nearly naked in her normal people clothing. That being said, she kept on the bright yellow clothes she came in with. They seemed cheery.

Hawke will spend her first week exploring. She'll be very easy to spot ouside the inn, sharpening a knife she "borrowed" and then using that knife to carve what was the beginnings of arrows from sticks she gathered into a pile. Or just walking around learning the lay of the land, sneaking down into the bunker to investigate, and/or actually going right back to the fountain she climbed out of and eating some kind of fruit, apparently waiting. Anyone who greets her will find an eager and friendly newcomer!