I CAN'T IMAGINE THERE'S A WAY —

[retravel]

WHO: Fitz, SHIELD, and you!
WHERE: New Amsterdam's medium-est bar: Refraction
WHEN: 01 September
WHAT: Leo's turning 31 100
NOTES OR WARNINGS: TBA

[ On his actual birthday, Fitz celebrates with his two closest friends (the people who’ve kept him together, despite wobbles along the way). Bobbi and Daisy, however, know that when Fitz says I hate people and don’t want to celebrate in the middle of a secret war he means I hate being alone, even on days without symbolic meaning. Daisy and Bobbi send out the mass evite, and Bobbi uses her powers of persuasion to find a more upscale venue for a discounted rate. Due to the flipped schedules in the height of New Amsterdam’s summer, Fitz’s party happens in the morning (the new night for anyone working a 9-5 gig), sun rising high over the city as it begins.

Welcome to REFRACTION, a classy bar tens of floors off the ground, with a stellar view of the city, not far from the river. Beams of light weave across the back area of the venue, well-lit by various glowing fixtures. Something about the place has an old world flair, with its dark colour scheme and minimalist decor. Maybe today’s an acceptable excuse to dress smart, celebrate with a friend, and drink up:

— enjoy the food (which might have had British roots at one point, but it’s hard to tell given the variety of fusions on display in bite-size portions) and initial round of free fizz, compliments of the host (and the host’s super stem friends)
— buy drinks at the bar and get wankered (as the birthday boy will be, around the new midnight)
— people watch from the tables and sofas
— dance to NA’s top synth pop hits (coming through hidden speakers above and holograms of the singers at some tables, activated by the proximity of nearby implant viewers)
— try a piece of cake, reading Happy 100th Birthday, Fitz! and looking a bit like it came from the same space-themed, child's birthday do as the evite. If your piece of cake has a wee star inside it, it means you’re one of the lucky winners and get a freebie at the bar.

As a nice establishment, rowdiness will only get you tossed on your arse by the bouncers, so everybody be cool.

At one point, someone nudges Fitz forward to say something. Dressed in his finest blues, he cuts a smarter figure than the usual corporate cut-out. ]

Right. [ said in the tight voice of someone who is definitely on the verge of crushing the flute in his hand. ] I never know what to say, and I didn't have time to prepare because, ah. Surprise. [ he splays out his free hand. ] So I will just say that — that there's someone I wish was here, despite all the horrible happenings, but that I am so so grateful that you're all here despite them, too. It's not for — forever, but it's pretty nice. Right now. [ As another SHIELD agent said: We have what we have when we have it. That's it. ] Thank you. Cheers!

( if you don't think the SHIELD losers would have invited your character, please feel free to come up with a semi-plausible reason for attending. gatecrashing, plus ones, hearing the commotion and wanting to be nosy. all are welcome! )

Comments

[revlon]

[ Were she on assignment, her demeanour would be different, more effervescent; but as she's simply a friendly acquaintance of the birthday celebrant and his co-hosts, there's no need. So much of her being in New Amsterdam is overwhelming enough as it is that she's drawn to the fringes of this birthday soirée, content to observe the festivities rather than actively participate. (She isn't likely to admit it's also because of a distant melancholy that comes from being — homesick, for lack of a better word. There are no familiar faces here, nor would there be.) She'd been lingering by the windows, watching the dizzyingly tall spires of the city bake under a too-hot rising sun when she finishes the last slip of champagne in her glass and turns away to get a refill — and Markus' voice floats over from the nearest chair, asking her to wait a moment. ]

Sorry?

[ She turns to face him instead, sweeping her gaze over him once; it's polite, but discerning, as she tries to place the face and voice. A different party with brighter lights, louder music, more paint. Her eyes meet his, and — ah. ]

Well, you're considerably less colourful than when we last met. [ She smiles, close-lipped and subdued but no less warm. If there's any sheepishness for how she vanished on him at the Insomniacs' Ball, there's no trace of it in her bearing. ] Although I seem to recall your first words to me being, "You don't have to stand there." But now I suppose — I do?

[ She watches his hands, one sharp brow quirked. What on Earth is he doing? ]

[saviorexe]

[He recognized her immediately, of course. One of the newer faces, the woman with whom he had managed to win her temporary attentions at the ball, only to have her slide back into the turbulent waters made up of messy dancers not terribly long after. Slipped from his leash of concern and attempts to inform her, she had apparently found her way into good hands, anyway — which is a relief unto itself, and this sensation is exactly what he feels after mild surprise has carved a path out for it first.

That had been the initial reason for Markus' observations from where he sits, of course. But the second superseded it as quickly as it was realized; next to the window, framed as she is by the view of the city, she strikes a glorious figure. The morning sun, which would normally be called brackish and harsh, seems tempered through the glass, falling across her features in soft fractals and outlining her in a gentle corona to match.

She looks contemplative. So he lets her contemplate. Until the threat of her walking way (it’d be the second time, wouldn’t it?) rears itself, and he asks her to stay; the response he gets is humorously ironic, and he has to lift a subtle brow at it.]

I won’t force you to. Consider it a kindness, or just humoring an artist, otherwise.

[Here, Markus doesn’t have to strain his voice to be heard over the music. Here, he definitely is less colorful, more in his element when he’s not being jostled around by warm bodies guided to paroxysm with a thrumming beat.

Still, he drops a hand that draws painterly colors across an invisible canvas. ]

I didn’t expect to see you here. You must be a regular partygoer.

[revlon]

[ She laughs shortly at that, more an amused exhale than anything else. She wonders if he's joking. ]

That's me, [ she replies with a wry twist to her smile, ] just itching to cut a rug on any dance floor.

[ Far from it — at home she hardly ever went out to the dance halls, for lack of a partner (and a heart barely on the mend) and a schedule fit to bursting. And here, well. She barely recognises this noise as acceptable music to begin with so she doubts anyone here would be familiar with the Lindy, let alone a simple waltz.

Parties are exhausting affairs more often than not (or maybe that's her time with Howard Stark talking). But this is nice, all things considered. Much more sedate and intimate than the last one she unwittingly attended. And she can reintroduce herself to the people she did meet there under far better circumstances — much like now. ]

But I'll curb the impulse for the sake of your... invisible canvas, I presume? [ She vaguely understands the VR capabilities of the neural implant now. It actually makes her smile when she realises it. ] Believe it or not, I've had some experience with this.

[ Sitting for portraits. A different time, a different artist, a different medium. (The war, Captain Rogers, grease pencil to worn paper.) ]

[saviorexe]

[It was partly a joke, but who’s to say? He doesn’t know her well enough to assume that her experience at the ball was anything short of unpleasant. Maybe she enjoyed the display of shocking paint clinging to the fabric of clothes and hair and skin. Maybe she likes the way bass pumps through bones and rattles the teeth in one’s skull. Maybe there’s pleasure to be had in the stench of sweat and alcohol, all of it the utter opposite of Fitz’s birthday celebration.

Markus? He prefers this by far. There’s an ease to his shoulders that didn’t exist when she first saw him, and it's all sincerity — none of it an act tossed up as a ploy to earn comfortability and trust. There’s little need for that now.]

Sorry, Katherine, but I’ve reached my dancing quota for the foreseeable future. There’s a reason why I’m just sitting here, making odd gestures in the air, instead of cavorting with everyone else in time with the music.

[That was definitely a joke.]

Do inspriration-struck artists ask you to stand very still, very often?

[revlon]

[ Any observant individual (and Markus is certainly that, she'd noticed at the Ball) would be able to see his posture echoed in her own. She is a woman who had endured bullets and bombs for years without so much of a flinch after the shock wore off, but something about that party set every nerve on edge in a way no battlefield ever could. How foreign it was, perhaps, or how the bodies pressed in close while each beat of music was an ice pick through her mounting headache. Only Leopold Fitz knows she threw up from it all the second she made it to street level.

Yes, like Markus, she prefers this by miles. It's nice to get to know the others in their group and to see them all removed from such horrifying circumstances. This is about the most normal thing she's attended since arriving here. Cocktails and small talk feel like another life but one she doesn't mind shrugging on for an evening, just to see if it still fits. ]

Yes, all right, [ she chuckles to the first bit. A joke and one gently landed. His next question earns a soft inhale, more thoughtful than melancholy; time and distance has helped soothe this memory, so only fondness seeps into her reply. ] Just the one. And he never asked so much as hoped I wouldn't notice.

[ She'd felt Steve's gaze on her during lulls in meetings or during a meal around a campfire. That little notebook he carried around with sketches of the Commandos mixed in with the scenery of the European Theatre. And, sometimes, her own likeness. ]

By the way, my name isn't Katherine. It's Peggy. Peggy Carter, [ she clarifies, smile turning a touch sheepish now. ] Best you hear it from me than from one of our hosts.

[saviorexe]

[Just the one, she says, and someone who would try to do so without being noticed. Markus knows exactly the implications behind a statement like that, and it’s territory that he’s quite certain he shouldn’t delve into with abandon. Only circle quietly around, for he hardly knows her that well as of yet.]

Then I guess I’m the second. The official start of a trend; I’m sure you’ll pick up more eager artists along the way, with a profile like that.

[Easy charm, easy flattery. Something about Markus is always underlined with a quiet understanding, which makes even his throwaway comments oddly sincere.

Speaking of not knowing her that well, though—]

Peggy. [His grin goes a little lopsided, and his work is momentarily ignored in favor of engaging in the conversation fully.] Well, I’m glad to have eventually earned your real name; not that I can blame you for your caution during the ball. You put on a good show, I could barely keep up.

My name is still Markus, though.

[revlon]

[ Easy charm, easy flattery, and not the first time she's been subjected to either, but she laughs it off all the same. ]

That's kind, [ she interjects gently, before the conversation moves forward.

But now that it seems he's stopped working, she closes a bit of the distance between them so that they might speak more comfortably. The music is leagues softer here than at the Ball, but given that their first conversation was half-shouted across the din, this is the least she can do now. ]

A pleasure, Markus. [ She means that genuinely. ] I apologise for the deception. I hope you understand.

[saviorexe]

Of course I understand. [Markus, who certainly looks like the furthest thing from offended, only shifts his weight in his seat as she draws closer. Straighter, something about his body language very purposeful, very complete. An underlying trait harkening back to a body he no longer possesses, something more than mere habit.

The corner he’s chosen harbors a little table upon which he’s settled himself in a chair, and if she likes she can take her own seat — his gesture towards one is an open offer, indicating that she’s free to do so.]

My arrival wasn’t nearly as graceful. Yours, in comparison, was enviable in how quickly you adapted. How easily you could play the game. I was at such a disadvantage at the time, too disoriented from the shock of sensation.

[Of a completely new body.]

[revlon]

[ She does take the offered seat, smoothing out her dress as she does so, and setting her empty flute on the small table bridging the gap between them. His comment about sensation is curiously phrased, which makes her wonder what he could mean — the drugs, perhaps? It had been overwhelming for her, lights and music and dizzying heightened emotions from what she now understands as the bond.

She cocks her head a little. She needs to brush past the first bit, his keen observation of her skills, because it cuts too close to the truth. ]

I imagine all arrivals are a shock, [ she murmurs. ] But I only know about the accident from the first group. Were you part of that, or was it something else entirely?

[saviorexe]

[His verbiage was quite purposeful, not knowing how else to phrase it. From one body to another was more than just jarring, it was like having the core of himself ripped out and placed into a softer shell, with too-many nerve endings and not enough filters to beat back the assault of the world itself existing all around him.

Time's passed since then, and he's acclimated at a surprisingly decent pace. Some sensations are still too strange, bordering on overwrought (such as trying to navigate through a too-loud ball), but overall he can manage to get through the day without feeling that disturbing disconnect, that inherent wrongness of living in a body he doesn't belong in.

Maybe that alone is means enough to worry. But it's not a thought to linger on, not when Peggy expects an answer to her question.]

This isn't my body. [And a direct answer at that.

The art is minimized to the corner of his vision, giving this line of conversation the attention it requires. He doesn't know how much she's scoured the network, and won't assume she's picked up the details of his origin from that alone.] Back home, in Detroit, I was- I am an android. I was created, not born; fully synthetic, a body made up of parts and biocomponents working seamlessly and in tandem with each other.

[Blood that ran blue. A mind that relied upon quick-fire programming, working far more efficiently than anything his current skull houses.]

I don't know how it was managed, how it's even possible, but in this place, I'm human now. Or at least, I'm in a human body that looks exactly like my old one.

[revlon]

[ — oh. ]

Oh.

[ Oh, well, then. That's certainly far from what she expected. It shouldn't be, because she has been told and shown time and time again that this world is different from the one she knows — the advancements of technology, the abilities that have been sewn into them (her own still unknown), the very fact that they're here despite their disparate origins. Nothing is off the table.

But an android. The word is new to her but he explains it and there's no hiding the way her brows knit: processing, not perturbed. After a moment, Peggy shakes her head with a slow exhale, and murmurs, ]

Your shock certainly outweighs my own. [ Her red lips quirk in a slight smile, more kind than anything else. ] That's... incredible. Unsettling, to say the very least, I'm sure, but — what this place is capable of. How are you now? Have you adjusted?

[saviorexe]

[Judging the reaction on others' faces is often telling. It reveals a little about their own experiences, just how farfetched his transformation from RK200 to human actually seems. Thus far, it’s been about the usual standard: wide-eyes, surprised brows arching with the revelation, unsure how to empathize when trying to place themselves in Markus’ shoes. Some do better than others, and while this android is appreciative of shown empathy, it’s a shame that many are often as lost regarding the hows and whys as he is.

Still, always could be worse — always could be met with fear, or dismissiveness, or disgust. The humans here continually surprise him, treating him like nothing so different than themselves.

The questions she asks are simple, but the answers are hardly easy to match. He considers it for a moment, folding his hands on his lap.]

It’s been months, and I think I’ve adapted faster than I would’ve ever guessed. Like I said, sensation can still be overwhelming — all the light and sound at the ball, for instance — but I'm growing used to things like taste, touch, smell. Even pain, though I try to avoid that.

[Wry, joking... but also true as heck.]