left from my dreaming was a feeling of unnameable dread [NOW CLOSED]

[zymasoldat]

WHO: Bucky Barnes
WHERE: The Inn, Around the Village & Outskirts
WHEN: Mision Report: December 16th
OPEN TO: OTA
WARNINGS: Nothing yet.
STATUS: Closed to new threads

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i) inn
For now, Bucky lives at the inn. And, with the weather being as it is, it's also where he spends much of his time. He helps out where he can, wherever Kate will let him, and when he's not, he's practicing the little, essential skills that he's had to re-learn to accommodate his condition. At least tying his boots isn't a frustrating ordeal anymore. He can manage pretty quickly.

Right now, he's downstairs, by the fireplace, trying to tie slip knots and snares one-handed, using his shoelace for practice. The problem? There's a cat who just loves to pounce on the shoelace. Or attack Bucky's ankle. Or flop on top of any surface he's trying to use.

It's really tough to get much done with a cute little tailless tabby distracting him. And, if you walk in at just the right moment, you might see the former assassin smiling and playing with Miss Hoppity.

ii) around the village
To say that Bucky's been feeling frustrated with his role in the village is a definite understatement. For all that he hates what HYDRA did to him, it's been a part of him for so long. The metal arm, the strength, the durability, they were all included in his definition of normal. With the absence of his robot arm and the dampening of his abilities, he's been feeling off-balance. Rudderless.

It's not a new feeling, if he's being honest. The question of what kind of life he'd ever be able to make for himself has been hanging over his head ever since he broke free from HYDRA's conditioning. What can an assassin who no longer wants to kill even do? But at least back home, living off the grid, he still had his strength and both of his arms. Made it easy to get by with jobs that paid under the table. He quickly learned how fulfilling it was to do good, hard work that amounted to something more than a trail of grief and broken, lifeless bodies. Work with his hands, mostly.

The problem being that now? He's only got one. And it's making it tough to figure out what he can do without feeling like a burden. So, when the weather permits, he likes to leave the inn and check out the rest of the village, see if he can lend a hand (don't laugh) to anyone, try to find some niche he can fill and really be an asset to the village.

'Asset.' Poor choice of words.

iii) beyond the village
At first, Bucky didn't venture out of the village as a rule. He wasn't assured enough in his ability to deal with the threats the wilderness might pose to go on any expeditions or hunting trips. He's still not, really. But, over time, he's started to test the waters a little. Always during the day, always following the river, and never going too far from the village. He's not sure what he's after with these little trips. Mostly, he just wants to see the area for himself, get a better feel for it.

It's always possible he'll run into somebody else along the way.

Comments

[3ofswords]

"Kira," he answers, nodding to the voiced question. He finally puts his hands to the cold earth and pushes himself up, brittle-limbed and coming up to the man's chin. He wipes his hands on his coat before offering his right to shake.

Handshakes were normal, normalizing, and his mother had made him practice them with his extra senses assessing before the point of contact--to brace himself against what he might pick up through the touch. Right now, he's trying to figure out how recent the loss of Bucky's arm was, and ready to take a winter-ache wave of hurt, when their hands touch.

Less than a month, and through the magic healing fountain. He thinks it won't be too bad, but he hadn't been running around Manhattan, collecting impressions of different people like some fucked up geo-caching game.

[zymasoldat]

Now that they're both standing at their full heights, the reminder of a long-gone version of Steve Rogers hits him again, making him remember a time when he played the role of protector. The recollection is enough to leave a trace of a smile on his face as he shakes Kira's hand.

His arm's an old injury, and what remains of his enhanced durability keeps the ache in his shoulder diminished, so Bucky's cold fingers and the rough callouses on his hand (not just from the manual labor he'd been doing in the two years since freeing himself from HYDRA, but also from his decades spent as their 'Fist,' handling guns and knives and other weapons) are likely to leave more of an impression than any lingering pain from the loss of his arm.

"Did you get a chance to look around the village much before setting out?" he asks, once he pulls his hand back and into his pocket.

[3ofswords]

There isn't the ache he expected, when their hands touch--there's warmth, nostalgia that travels through the gut, and Kira can't say what for. It would be a bit much to joke about the man going overboard on smoothing the callouses out of his other hand, so he smiles up instead and mirrors his posture after. Hands in pockets, wishing he had more to wrap his fingers around than his own thumbs.

"Went back to the fountain," he admits, the smile twisting, waning: "They let me sleep at the inn, but I wanted to see this first. Someone said both ends just lead to some kind of canyon wall."