Event | Satellite | Salvage & Repairs

[ironwood]

Characters: Any and all!
Date: May 22 - 26, 2013
Location: Keeliai, turtleside, ARSHEPHELIOS cluster remains
Situation: The fires are put out and repairs around the city have begun. With life preserved, eyes turn now to what exactly crashed down into the ocean.
Warnings/Rating: Please put CW in your subject lines

Satellite Crash Event

Crash Landing | Salvage Party | Shocking Spectres

Questions | Keeliai | Repairs | Salvage | Other | Oceanside | Shellside | ARSHEPHELIOS-side | Coralside


The majority of fires are reported as under control and repair crews start forming up to bring Keeliai back to her pre-scorched splendour. This is all well and good, but there remains a cluster of debris that crashed into the ocean drawing the attention of salvagers and Foreigners alike. Boats and teams form up and head up to scour the ocean, where the cluster rests upon an expansive and ancient coral formation and can be reached within ten metres of the surface.

Comments

[usavatar]

'Buller man'? [He draws one knee up and rests his cup on it.]

[depicted]

The Bullingdon club of Oxford. Loud, brash, and drunk.

[usavatar]

[A pause.] To be fair, you have the last two.

[depicted]

[He gets about as offended as an insulted cat.] I am not brash or drunk.

[He's just reckless in a charming way and often less than sober]

[usavatar]

You're always brash, and you're getting to drunk. [Steve smiles down at his cup. There's something about Dorian's indignation that's incredibly sweet, in its own way. The fact that even after living so long he can still get his hackles up over teasing.]

[depicted]

[Dorian feels the need to refute with a creative reinterpretation of his state of being.] Charmingly reckless and not always sober, thanks. And what about you? You're not exactly the picture of caution yourself.

[usavatar]

No, I'm not. [To the constant frustration of Bucky, and then Peggy.] Did you know I tried enlistment four times before Dr. Erskine took me? Well, no, you didn't, because I didn't tell you.

[depicted]

[Dorian laughs and drinks more.] Four times, before Dr. Erskine? [That means he was scrawny.] You must've terrified everyone you knew.

[usavatar]

Just Bucky. [He shifts and resettles against the wall, drinking down a portion of his cup before he rests it back on his knee.] He was after me to give it up after the second time. What made you go to London?

[He almost says 'there were safer places', but that's half an answer on its own.]

[depicted]

I just didn't leave. My portrait was safe, so I was. [So he believed, anyway. He leans sideways against the barrel, head tilting, and the way he sits there makes him look much like a pretty doll left there by its owner.] But you didn't listen to Bucky.

[usavatar]

[A tiny salute with his cup.] Never. It's his own fault. He taught me to box, to help me get ready.

[Steve gives Dorian a long, steady look, thinking how fragile he looks and how much of a lie that fragility is. How hard Dorian works to make it a lie.] But there were other places. Nicer places, without the same risks or shortages.

[depicted]

I can't believe that. You'd have enlisted whether he taught you or not, wouldn't you have?

[The delicacy of his features isn't reflected in his wry voice.] As for staying, I'm a sentimentalist. The sublime pleasure of watching a city burn down is easy to find on a global scale, but how rare it is in my own home town.

[He frowns as he catches that look.] You're not drunk enough.

[usavatar]

I would have. Sometimes I wonder if he would have enlisted if I hadn't pushed. But he knew how much it meant to me, so he tried to help however he could. Even when he thought helping meant trying to distract me away from trying again.

['How rare it is in my own home town', Steve thinks, turning the words over as he remembers the way one of those leviathans cut through a Manhattan high rise like butter, and the way that memory slides into another battlefield, and another. He doesn't catch Dorian's last words.] Hmm?

[depicted]

It's good to be loved. [It's sweet, really, that kind of friendship. It's unflagging and admirable. It's so typical of Steve to have it.]

And I said you need to drink more.

[usavatar]

You're loved. [Just in case that needed clarification. He examines his cup before holding it out.] And trusted.

[depicted]

You are definitely not yet drunk enough. [Dorian takes the cup and refills it. Go get drunk so you can stop having feelings!

Wait, that's not how it usually works...]

[usavatar]

Because I'm being honest? [He's undoubtedly amused, levels of intoxication aside.] Here: You're loved, and trusted, and I'm glad to know you. You... make it easier to feel less lonely when I'm with people. You're capable of kindness you don't let yourself show, because you've had a hundred years of thinking the only true self you have is that portrait. You don't have to live down to it, is what I'm trying to say. Live up to yourself.

[depicted]

[it's not like Dorian isn't used to being praised. It's sort of something he gets a lot. And people have been wrong about him, often, and praised his kindness and his goodness. But somehow, when Steve does it, it's just different.

So he drinks.] Enough of the Dorian Gray analysis; you can save that for your term paper. What about you? You aren't quite yourself right now, are you?

[usavatar]

[Well fine if you're just going to call him on it. He dips into his cup.] No. I'm drunk.

[depicted]

Don't try to con a better con, Steve. You were acting a little strange before we got down here.

[usavatar]

I'm not trying to con you. [The fight, such as it is, dwindles as he eyes his reflection wobbling in the cup. He sets it down very gently on the floor between his knees and rests his head against the wall, looking up at the roof of shell where it's beginning to glow.] I didn't think I was being obvious.

[depicted]

[Dorian leans back again, watching Steve.] You weren't. I just have experience.

[He isn't going to push Steve into talking. But he's going to give him the opportunity.]

[usavatar]

[He taps his cup against the floor, listening to the oddness of the sound. There's nothing that makes a noise quite like the turtle's shell, he's found - no metal or wood or stone.]

Did you know Stephanie Brown?

[depicted]

[Steve doesn't have to say it. Dorian instantly understands.] We went out for drinks once. She seemed like a good kid.

[usavatar]

She's the best. [A tiny smile, and he remembers the last time he got well and truly drunk - and how Steph found him then, when they only knew each other a little.] Smart, fast, tough - she could make you think she was fearless, no matter how scared she felt. And the way she cares about people.

[He almost takes another drink, but sets the cup down again instead.] I would have taken her back with us, if we could figure out how to do it. I would have done it in a heartbeat. The world she came from didn't deserve her. Doesn't. But I've got no choice but to hope that's where she is.