MARCH 2015

[thecanopycrew]

Uncertain if this is a game for you? Curious to see how your character would act in it? Testing the waters? Then take them on this very first Home Tree Test Drive! directions ❀ Don't forget to read the Introduction , our Rules and the F.A.Q ❀ Post with your character with their name and canon in the subject line. ❀ Use the prompt(s) given here or make up your own! ❀ Both prose and comment spam format are welcome. ❀ Tag around! Make friends. Don't be afraid to discuss OOCly while tagging. ❀ The Test Drive Meme can be used for your application's first person sample. ❀ This meme is is considered as OOC and not part of the game's canon. prompt Welcome to the Faerie Feast! After your have gained your wings, you are met by a feast on the second floor with all that the forest can offer you. Tables and chairs are set up everywhere along the walkway between the houses, allowing the new visitors to meet and greet - or try to hide in the corners and eat berries all by themselves. Try your new wings to be the first to grab those delicious crumbs of walnut bread? Or say hi to your party lights, courtesy of some excited glow worms and flies that just want to be your best friends. Explore how your new gem works, try put your leaf clothes or decide to head further into the tree, seeing just what kind of place your have stumbled into. Maybe you will even get a glimpse of those hairy legs on the fourth floor?

Night Gem Wing Inspiration ❀ Day Gem Wing Inspiration

Comments

[dissemblance]

[He's not quiet.

The Winter Soldier moves with little more than the distilled intent of a killer. Nothing extraneous. No wasted movement, and silent. She has no idea if he could creep up on her or not, and she in no way would want to test that assessment in a practical scenario.

But this man has boots that echo on the floor, and a blue jacket she recognizes from old photographs and filmreels, and a museum exhibit she visited only once. It's the eyes, the hair, the accent (Brooklyn, not a trace of anything Russian) and - the hand, when her gaze falls to it. James Barnes. Threat assessment: unknown. For now.

She's tense, but no more so than your average woman would be at meeting a stranger, and he gets a crooked little smile. She's dressed in the tunic offered, rather than her catsuit. Which, while granting a considerable amount of utility, rather marked her as something other than a civilian. It's tucked into the backpack, folded up and wrapped with a leaf, in the knapsack at her side.]

Yeah. I'm-- kind of just waiting to wake up, you know?

[redactions]

[ Blissfully unaware of her thought process, he enters and sits opposite, on a sturdier branch that fits the wings. He's careful not to move with his back to her, harmless as she looks he's minutely wary of his surroundings. ]

You and me both, sweetheart. [ a beat ] James Barnes.

[dissemblance]

[She flashes him a brief smile at that sweetheart, mostly to hide her discomfort. It's eerie. No doubt the Soldier could be wiped and programmed with any number of extraneous personalities, but seeing him like this--

She wonders, not for the first time, how deep this rabbit hole goes.]

Tatiana Orlova. It's nice to meet you.

[She says it with a faint mispronunciation. Second generation Russian, American citizen. Let him decide what it means.]

Mind if I call you Jim?

[It's interesting, that he doesn't call himself Bucky. It means something, although she's as yet unsure of what.]

[redactions]

Pleasure's all mine, Tatiana.

[ The answering smile is a ghost of rakish, just worn at the edges, though he doesn't seem to notice. Dead's dead. Nothing to be done about here but wait. ]

You can call me whatever you want, long as it ain't Jimmy.

[dissemblance]

[She laughs, light and pleasant. Tatiana has none of the usual ghosts.]

Cross my heart. No Jimmy from me.

[She toes at the water, which is cooler than she likes, and then she glances back up at him.]

Bad form to ask where you're from? Because I was on a subway in the Bronx when I-- before I came here. You think there was an accident?

[redactions]

[ Now the smile reaches his eyes. A New Yorker. ]

Brooklyn, if ya hadn't already guessed. I haven't seen any other folks around.

[dissemblance]

The accent kind of gave it away, yeah.

[A flash of a smile. James Barnes liked baseball, and the rivalry between the Bronx and Brooklyn is a longstanding part of New York history. Conspiratorially,]

Don't worry, I'm not my grandfather. He's still bringing up the Yankees versus the Dodgers like it was yesterday, he'd be threatening you with his walker right about now.

[redactions]

[ He laughs, surprising himself with the intensity of it. ]

The old man'll just have to live with it, sorry t'say. [ a soft, pleased huff ] So what're you workin' as, if you don't mind me asking?

[dissemblance]

Um, right now? Moonlighting as a kidnap victim.

[A little wave, just the tips of her fingers.]

Back in the Bronx, I'm the director of an art gallery. Riverside?

[She says that hopefully, obviously wanting him to have heard of it. It gives the impression she's a lot more freaked out than she seems on the surface.]

[redactions]

[ He frowns. He's familiar with almost all of them, as well as the major supply stores, courtesy growing up with Steve. ]

Sorry, can't say I have. When did it open?

[dissemblance]

1993?

[She blinks at him and, as if it's only just dawned on her--]

Why do you ask?

[redactions]

[ He rests a palm flat on his thigh and looks away briefly, lips tightly pressed together. By the time he looks at her again he's back to normal. ]

World War Two - what happened?

[dissemblance]

[She debates how cluelessly she should play it, decides after a moment that Tatiana is the sort of woman who's sharp enough to pick up on the discrepancies. Moving through the art world of New York, after all, requires a certain command of one's attention to detail. So she allows her expression to soften slightly.]

You're from then, huh?

[Not all the sympathy is feigned. She's seen the weight of the war on Rogers' shoulders, and she can't imagine his best friend enduring differently.]

First of all-- the Allies won. Germany surrendered on May 8th, 1945. Japan followed suit in August.

[redactions]

[ In barely a week the war will be over. A fucking week. He damn well hopes it's because they got Zola. ]

Yeah. It's May, 1945. Almost there, huh?

[ A beat, then, ]

Do you know what happened to Captain Rogers?

[dissemblance]

[She says oh very softly.]

You're Bucky.

[Now, that sympathy is specific. She considers lying about it, but there are too many variables, too many ways her cover could be blown. To pretend she's from a world without Captain America paints her into a corner, and while she's certain she could get out of it if she really had to, the best lies are the ones that hold a kernel of truth.

There's no way this story won't hurt, and a woman who manages an art gallery doesn't have the benefit of knowing Rogers enough to gauge how his best friend might grieve for what she's about to say. But Tatiana, as it happens, still has enough tact to speak gingerly,]

He's alive.

[Start with the good news.]

Captain Rogers [Not 'America'. She knows Rogers hates the attention.] crashed. Um-- a few days before the war ended. He was lost for almost seventy years, but-- a couple years ago, we found him again. And he'd survived. The serum, you know? It must've kept him in suspended animation, at least that's the popular theory. I think he's working with the army again or something, that's -- the last I heard. Sorry. I wish I knew more.

[redactions]

That'd be me.

[ The cheer is forced; she commands all of his attention as she speaks, expression perfectly stoic. Out of sight, under the pretence of leaning forward, his fist is clenched, the knuckles white. That idiot. Gone only a little while and he crashes a damn plane - he never hated being dead and useless more than he does now. Well it seems the world moved on without him. His grief is for later. ]

Thanks.

[ He rubs his nose and pockets the gem, and then crosses the room to her, offers her his arm. ]

Sorry to have brought that up. How about we look around?

[dissemblance]

Hey, no-- you don't have anything to apologize for. That's your life, right there.

[Her brow furrows, and although she takes his hand, she stands mostly under her own power, and once she's standing she extricates her hand from his so she can rest it against his elbow, fingers squeezing in reassurance.

She's subtly feeling for the metal arm, but the flesh yields beneath her light touch. Not a sleeper agent, then. Gently,]

Do you need a minute?

[redactions]

[ An airy wave with his free hand. ]

No, thank you, I'm fine.

[ The brittleness in him is subsumed by a smile, outwardly the picture of composure. She probably knows he's dead, and is being polite, but there's no getting around that. ]

How about this, huh?

[dissemblance]

[Her attention flickers across his face, taking in more than she seems to at so quick a glance.]

Well-- I like your wings.

[She says that shyly, and Natasha puts the realization that if she's speaking to a dead man she may well be the same herself into Tatiana's earnest front.]

[redactions]

Yours are très magnifique.

[ He smiles loosely, appreciatively looking her over. She's very pretty. ]

[dissemblance]

[She laughs.]

Sorry, I speak about six words of French and I don't think they're fit for decent company. But I'll go out on a limb [that's a tree pun] and assume that means magnificent. In which case, thank you. I'm still getting used to them. Flying, you know. Little weird.

[redactions]

[ The smile turns wry. ]

Oh I'm decent company now, am I?

[dissemblance]

Until proven otherwise.

[She tips her head to one side, and that smile turns a bit flirtatious.]

But by all means, you're welcome to try.