the world has changed and none of us can go back

[revlon]

WHO: Peggy Carter (revlon & Leo Fitz (retravel).
WHERE: On the train to New Tokyo.
WHEN: October 8th, morning.
WHAT: Waking up after some wild dreamscape adventures.
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Descriptions of death and gore likely.

[ When Peggy Carter fell asleep on the train to New Tokyo, she was alone. Travel is difficult, complicated, and strictly monitored in this world so the car she'd picked for herself (the last car) had been sparsely populated to begin with — no one for several rows, and her own seat tucked in the back end where she could keep an eye on the exit with ease. There were other displaced scattered on this train, of course, twenty-one of them and all on the journey to assist a city half a world away and utterly devastated by a monster attack. Not everyone from their number had signed up for the trip and with such a quick turn around, Peggy hadn't expected them to. But it was necessary; and, quite frankly, she'd wanted to see the world. Or what was left of it.

But halfway through the trip, she'd gotten inexplicably exhausted. Her first time in days to have a moment to herself, perhaps. The rhythmic rocking of the train lulling her into a doze. Whatever the case, the moment she'd sat back down with her tea, she was out like a light, chin dropped to her chest and tea untouched on the table between her and the empty seats across. And she dreams. It's a kaleidoscope of shifting landscapes, some wearily familiar (a desolate, snowy battlefield; a bunker) and others utterly foreign (spaceships, endless deserts, an underwater ghost town) — it feels like days, weeks, lived in a world where time doesn't matter and neither does space. Familiar faces, searing emotions, loss, terror, pain, hope. Solidarity. People she'd left behind (at home, at New Amsterdam), people she'd only glimpsed in passing, people who were meant to be dead. It feels so real. Indistinguishable from the waking world, almost. But dreams are just dreams — aren't they?

Aren't they?

When Peggy Carter fell asleep on the train to New Tokyo, she was alone. But when she slowly drifts awake, she isn't, slumped against the passenger next to her. (There was no passenger next to her. She'd made certain, as a woman who values privacy.) It's not like waking from a nap; the drowsiness is deeper rooted, harder to shake, like coming out of sedation. The world returns in soft focus and she is, at first, acutely aware of the creased fabric under her cheek — someone's shoulder, their shirt. And then her brain catches up with the rest of her body as white-hot pain burns into her shoulder like she'd been shot and she straightens with a jolt (ribs, head, back, one massive throbbing bruise; chest, a pinpoint at her heart) and doubles over in her seat with a strangled sound, left hand grappling for her right shoulder. ]

God, [ she chokes out, as she drags in a ragged breath to manage the pain, checks her trembling fingers: no blood. But the person next to her is awake too, and the cold shock she feels when she looks over at them is almost enough to numb the pain of a phantom gunshot. His name rides on a breathless exhale. ] Fitz?

[ Fitz, who she'd left behind in New Amsterdam to handle Morningstar business. Fitz, who was definitely not on the passenger manifest when she looked over it mere hours ago. Fitz, who she'd just — dreamt about? That can't be. Is this real? Or not? ]

Comments

[retravel]

[ The last thing Fitz recalls is his eyes drooping as he worked, multitool falling out of his hand at the kitchen counter, cool metal against his forehead. Then, it's a pool of swirling memories. Peggy in the snow, sand, ash — the sterile world of the Framework — the blue dust of Maveth and the red of Mars — Jemma with her hand on his, no Ophelia, no, Caroline, no, no, no — pain, nothing but pain. Burning from the inside out, shooting through his stomach and chest like a thousand tiny bullets. Fitz doesn't see Peggy, barely registering the weight shifting off his shoulder, with his eyes screwed shut.

Somewhere faraway, he hears his name (you have to remember your name) but it's a fleeting thing, drowned out by agony alighting every nerve in his body. Fitz thought he knew pain (from drowning and suffocating, feeling your brain cells blink out one after the other; from being tortured by enemy agents and former friends, pushed to the brink of consciousness), but this is indescribably worse than any earthly pang. Contradictory injuries, crashing into him all at once. Losing blood, feeling his arm bent back, hitting the ground, radiation spreading with inhuman acceleration. Can't even scream, mouth open and hoarse, breath stuttering.

For a moment, his vision greys out, one hand shooting out to latch onto the table with shaky fingers. Then, he's slack, heart rate plummeting, head lolling. Thirty seconds out, and nearly as far gone as he was when Peggy saved him from unending sleep. Doesn't know where he is or why everything hurts, but there's a warm presence at his side, for him to turn his cheek into.

Maybe it's the familiar scent, amber and rose. Often nearby, even though she'd been far away when he crashed. ]

[revlon]

[ He can't hear her. (This isn't the first time, but it isn't like the last time, either.) She's saying his name, asking if he's all right, asking him to look at her, to focus, to breathe — they've done this before, haven't they? Another time, another place? But as pale as he's gone, as much as he's shaking, something is wrong, and that jerks her back to the present and grounds her despite the white-hot poker twisting into her shoulder, how battered she feels. She's been shot before. She survived. So she wrestles that pain to the back of her mind and focuses on the man in front of her as he crumples in his seat like a —

A marionette with cut strings. Ash, not glass and steel, on their knees. No, no; focus, Carter. They've been here before.

Peggy sucks in a steadying breath and turns in her seat, pressing two fingers to his throat to check for a pulse: weak, but there. She presses a palm to his cool cheek, ignoring the agonising pang in her shoulder when she does it — not real, this is real — and rests her other hand over his. Alone, in the back of the train, there is no one to see the empathy bond glow between them. The dreamscape and the real world blur and overlap here; so while they almost never utilised the bond before now to her knowledge, she also knows that isn't true anymore. They have done this before. Countless times. ]

Fitz. [ Soft, coaxing. The pain he feels races through their connection like lightning, threatens to swamp her steady calm and burning concern; she squeezes her eyes shut to cope with it, inhaling sharply. Nausea jolts through her, her lips press together, but she doesn't let go. She takes on some of the burden, if she can. ] Come on, mate, don't do this to me.

[retravel]

[ It's like a record skipping. Her hand on his cheek, the lilt of his name, don't uttered again and again. Don't stop me. Don't do that. Don't do this to me. Feels like he's stuck in a loop, whirring round and round. Back to her, always. He remembers how she'd dropped off her bag at the SHIELD flat (no point in paying for a motel while she's away, not on her salary), and he hadn't known how to say goodbye, not really. A touch at her shoulder, a promise to crack on with Morningstar.

That's all.

But things have changed overnight, over hours, days, weeks. The Framework all over again, with jumbled memories spilling everywhere, at once seamless and conflicting. Her hands provide relief, empathetic touch conducting the pain. In time, they dilute the scorch of radiation and implosion, attenuating from blistering to molten. This is now. A wounded noise escapes his throat, as he finally pinpoints the nuance of his various injuries. Stabbing in his arm, aching in his ribs, faint pricks at his hand: Each matches an individual recollection, crisper by the second. ]

Peggy. [ not Carter, hasn't been Carter for a while. He fists a hand in the bottom of her blouse, unsure where else to find purchase, and lets his head fall, forehead against hers. ] Trying not to. [ He should apologise, tell her she doesn't have to do this, that she should save herself the anguish, but he's not too proud to accept help when he needs it most (and he may very well pass out, if she lets go). ] Need, uh, ah — [ he winces. ] — a minute.

[ 'Cause it's as if he never slept, instead tumbling between waking nightmares. Mustering focus, he counts it out. One and two and three and four... Just a minute with her, sharing his hurt. By the end of his self-imposed window of time, the worst of it wanes (simmering beneath his skin). Eventually, he tips back, leaning against the wall of the traincar to give them both space, though their hands remain linked. Eyes glazed, he traces spotty patterns in the metal above.

"Evening, passengers, we're just over six hours out of New Amsterdam, and it's looking like the change of weather won't slow us down. We'll be starting our dinner service shortly, so please head to the dining car for a taste of New Tokyo before you arrive!" ]

I'm not supposed to be here. [ There's work to be done in New Amsterdam, when they're founding a new chapter of an underground resistance. ] But I think I dreamed of you.

[ Precise, despite everything. ]

[revlon]

[ Peggy, he says, not Carter, and it's like static skating across her skin. She wonders, when did that change? (A while ago. Right?) She's never experienced anything so disorienting, memories conflicting and contradicting yet falling into place like they've been there all along. But time is fixed. Fitz had told her that, standing in his kitchen — and again, storming through the desert. If that's the case, why does she remember fighting monsters in New Amsterdam, why does she feel as though she's known Leo Fitz for much longer than the handful of months that make up their reality?

This reality. Not the war, not the Framework, not some murky purgatory. And how did they get here, when they said goodbye hours and hundreds of miles ago? She doesn't know. The only thing she knows with utmost certainty is that regardless of how he got here, Fitz is real (of course he is; he's been at her side since the forest, the wasteland, the underworld. Colleagues; yes, and partners; yes, and friends), this train is real, and whatever else she remembers must be real, too. Including the pain. Somehow. So she holds on with a white-knuckled grip and endures an agony she hasn't felt since Whitney Frost tried to swallow her whole with Zero Matter.

He asks for a minute and she gives it to him without hesitation, breath quick and eyes squeezed shut against the impossible burning. ]

You're all right, [ mumbled to him, to herself. ] Just breathe.

[ And when he leans away, she watches him go, her concern dulling the sharp edge of pain in the bond. She barely registers the announcement, trying to get her thoughts in order, wondering if she should get help. But then he says I dreamed of you and suddenly it all clicks into place; the bond goes silent with recognition. That's it. Whatever it is; truth, an answer. ]

You did? That's — [ Funny. But it's not. She breaks off, brows knitting through the swirling memories, the pain threatening to cloud them. Peggy studies him like she's trying to place him in the narrative; then slowly, softly, ] You know, I think... I did too. Of you. How did you —

[ Know? Get here? A beat. A breath; she wets her lips, trying to make sense of this. ]

Did you portal here?

[retravel]

[ You're all right, she says, and he isn't convinced of that, but he has to be, in the end. Can't falter, when so many rely on him (when it's his job to save them, as Robin foretold). ]

No. [ though he'd been jumping through lights and time and space. ] They wouldn't let me.

[ Those boys, Riku and the other, ah — Sora. They'd said it had to be done a certain way, with their strange keys, as symbolic and nonsensical as the spear that doomed him. A door is a door is a door. Why had he listened? When Enoch had tried to slow him, he'd slammed him against hardwood and held a gun to his head. The puzzle shifts. Because of Peggy, of course, one of the few he listens to, even if he doesn't always heed her advice.

Still not enough. Doesn't explain the agony. ]

I don't know what happened. [ A long exhale. That's something he never says 'cause it's admitting a level of helplessness he refuses to abide. ] I was with them, [ Markus and Riku ] but we [ he and Peggy ] were all over the place before that.

[ Fitz tips his head forward, regarding her as he becomes more alert. ]

Not just in New Amsterdam. [ a slight shake of his head, features scrunching. ] Beyond it, before it.

[ In her memories, in his own. ]

[revlon]

[ The words are vague, as disjointed as her memories — even with the time they've spent together, working together, there are moments she understands what Fitz is trying to tell her and other times when he loses her. But she's somewhere in between now, anchored to him with hands and wildly beating (glowing) heart, like the bond can lend any sort of clarity to what they're experiencing. She tries to dig for calm in the tumult, thread it between them like titanium.

Focus. Let everything fall into place, don't try to make sense of whether or not they should be there. They simply are. ]

Before this, [ she murmurs, eyes searching his. Before the train. Before New Amsterdam, before 2511. This is after, we were before. Try again, Carter: ] Before now. But that's impossible, we only just got here. We weren't even... [ Her brows knit, closing her eyes to focus, shut out the whisper-hum of the train whizzing underwater. London, but not London. No, the bunker beneath London in 1944. ] We were in the desert, weren't we, [ it almost sounds like a question, her eyes drift open. ] And the war. Not just my war.

[ Which is an impossibility in of itself, but she remembers him in uniform, stark against the snowy trees. Another world war — the quiet grief of that memory seeps into the bond next, and her right hand releases him to check her pockets for a phantom magazine article, proof. But just as suddenly, she stops with a sharp inhale, pain biting into her shoulder with the lift of her elbow. ]

Bloody hell.

[retravel]

Yeah, yes.

[ She chases his thoughts, her own words nipping at their heels. Yes, before now, in the desert, amid the war. Wars of their world and this one. Christ, they've stumbled on something big — something more. Together, they learned of the sacrifice of America and the eradication of the androids. And with others, Fitz found portals so like the ones at his fingertips and in his dreams (in Dick's dreams, too, impossible yet true).

And he's about to say as much, pushing through his pain with vital curiosity and determination, when she stills. No, no, no. Immediately, he snaps forward. His free hand hovers over her shoulder, conflicted over a wish to inspect and a fear of causing further pain. ]

Easy, Peggy. [ Take it easy or easy, I've got you. Alert eyes find her, utterly focused on seeking out the cause of her pain. ] What happened? Are you alright?

[revlon]

[ Easy, Peggy, he says, and she finds it difficult to take the words to heart. He's finding his bearing with more ease than she is, everything still a jumble and raw like an exposed nerve even if the clarity comes in increments; the pain helps, cutting through the noise, a singular point of focus in comparison to the all-over ache rippling over from Fitz's side of the bond.

The one at her shoulder feels familiar, like a nail struck through bone and muscle, and her hand is shaking as it comes to a rest at her thigh and curls into a fist. Strange, that she can remember blood trickling down her arm when there's none now. ]

No — I mean, yes, I'm fine, it's not real, it just feels — [ Feels real, is real. She swallows. ] Feels like he shot me.

[ In a bunker made of brick? No, there was a doorway to one in a far-flung planet. No, a spaceship; two of them, massacres in both, and — she digs into her pocket anyway: there's nothing. No crinkle of glossy magazine paper. But why would there be? Paper hasn't existed for decades. Peggy groans, more frustrated than in pain now, and she tips her temple against the headrest of her seat, eyes squeezing shut. ]

That doesn't make sense. [ It's faintly said. It sounds mad. ] I'm not making sense.

[retravel]

[ His focus narrows to her face, then her shoulder, seeking answers and blood both. Feels real, is real.

Just not in the way humans expect. ]

He shot you. [ echoed back, a shock of anger through the bond. What? No, who? Don't, can't. If he thinks about it, he'll lash out. A click, and he shuts down the line of inquiry. ]

S'okay. You are — you are making sense, Peggy. I'm with you. [ grip tightening, calm returning. ] We were somewhere else, okay. [ and he only says what comes next because he's been in another world before now, (one of his own making, in fact) the Framework. This has to be like that. A world like their own but slightly off. Uncanny. ] A reality like this one, but not quite. You travelled through time and space to be here, yeah? Doing it again isn't so strange.

[ oh, but it is. ]

[revlon]

[ He wasn't in his right mind, she thinks but doesn't say, feeling the heat of his anger flare through the bond. She doesn't know Johnny Jaqobis as well as she knows Fitz, but she knows him well enough to think that. But none of them were in their right minds, were they? Not entirely, not always, lapsing in and out of awareness. Even she wasn't as lucid as she is now (although that's still questionable) — but just like before, Fitz brings her focus back to centre.

It's still a feat, though. He talks about travelling, but not in the sense of physical space. Traversing realities. That's a lot to process; it's simply said, but the implications are overwhelming. Her eyes flutter open again to look at him, unfocused at first then narrowing as if trying to find the joke.

She doesn't. ]

It bloody well is, [ she says lowly. They're not alone in this car, but the nearest passengers are several rows away. ] Are you suggesting we slipped between the cracks and lived half a life someplace else that mucked with — what, our memories? None of us could tell up from down, Fitz. How does any of that make sense?

[retravel]

[ a hushed counter, offered without hesitation. ]

Not our memories, our reality.

[ there's a difference, however slight. ]

We jumped across different points in spacetime, some from our memories and some from others. [ he swallows, then, hand fisting in the jacket in his lap. ] That place, with the woman — [ Ophelia, he ought to say her name, but he's afraid of what might happen when he does. ] I've been there in life, Peggy, but those ruins... They had to be of this world, right?

[ Time is fixed, and everything slots into place with terrifying precision. ]

It doesn't make sense yet.

[ It will. It has to. Cosmos, not chaos. ]

[revlon]

[ When she first arrived, Fitz explained the nature of the multiverse to her. He laid it out at his kitchen counter along with introducing the idea of time being fixed (later revisited in the ruins he mentions now), the possibility of skipping across spacetime and reality, the tenuous presence they have in the here and now. Peggy Carter is a smart woman and she's made a life of grappling with the unexplainable but Fitz is years ahead of her in understanding the nuance and theory of it all.

God knows she is trying her very level best to keep up with 2511, to remain unfazed, but she has been thrust into the future, tossed through portals, killed monsters, and can turn into solid titanium and survive a gunshot to the head. It doesn't make sense yet but she wants it to make sense now. She's never done well with being one step behind let alone ten.

Impatience and frustration pulse through the bond and although she'd like nothing more than to keep borrowing the calm that bleeds from his touch, she releases his hand (distantly, her palm stings from another memory) to rub at her shoulder instead. ]

That doesn't explain this, [ she hisses, meaning her throbbing shoulder, his unseen agony. ] If someone was in our heads, I could understand it. [ It makes her skin crawl, but she's understand it. ] But you're here somehow, so clearly that's not all it was. That's —

[ She cuts herself off, straightening gingerly, looking around again: two mugs of cold tea on the table (one with lipstick on the rim), two bags in the overhead rack. The jacket across his lap like a blanket. Peggy wets her lips, gaze darting as she thinks. ]

It's like you've always been on this train with me. Us. But I said goodbye to you. [ There's a beat, her expression flickers like she's doubting her own memories. ] Didn't I?