#gcroinya

@gcroinya​ || prompts for emotionally stunted idiots || accepting!

“ do i trust you?  absolutely not.  next question.  ”

“Fair enough..”

Seance can’t stop himself from smiling after he bows his head to concede to her answer. He’s given her no reason to. She’s not Tony. The only AVENGER that has absolutely any ties to him that come from a past where he wasn’t someone so vocal in his discontent with how they “do things”. She’s part of them and doesn’t barely know him from Adam. Only what she’s seen or heard or been told. So, it’s safe to assume she’d trust him as far as she can throw him. Well, probably less--considering the circumstances on WHO she is.

Honestly, he never thought his opinion about the world’s SUPERHEROES was ever going to matter. A handful of people that protested the growing damage and body count under the pretense of being saved. That was. Until Sokovia and the spiral that kept getting bigger and bigger, larger and larger and somehow--who he was ended up making him one of the more well known people who stood with the government, with the idea that there needed to be something done. That wreaking havoc on the planet while ‘saving it’ is sort of negating what you’re setting out to do. 

Was he comfortable with the attention? No. He’s, typically, a recluse himself. Content to have his small circle and that’s it. Save when he’s pulled into the public eye for his career purposes. 

He prefers the clack, clack, clack of typewriter keys and the tap, tap, tap of a keyboard than most conversations. In the long run? He’s sure in most of their eyes? Quite the opposite is how he’s presented. Seeing as how he’s been around--and his thoughts and opinions on things other than spooky, grisly, or terrifying words on books suddenly began to become just as important as the words he strings together to make a living.

Dark eyes comb her features. She’s beautiful. Deadly, he knows. But beautiful and he can see how just about anyone would be lured in by that. For a chance to touch something so perfect and so forbidden. They are often thought of like that. Super Human. Untouchable. Flickering flames that burn the world as well as save the cold, hungry and rescue the lost. So, he brushes his hands against the fabric of black dress pants. Adjusts the crimson scarf around the turtleneck collar of a light tan woolen turtleneck he’s wearing and presses his lips together in quiet contemplation that pulls his attention towards the boats docked in the Allegheny River below.

@gcroinya​ ;; nonverbal starters (still accepting) 57﹕ Natasha winks at Steve. (Wink wonk, Steve-io)

     The evening mist lay thick obscuring the high tops of buildings and the tenants within, the ghostly crawl of anonymity winding its way down brick and glass to settle among the street lights. Illuminated in the dulcet glow, a stark contrast of void among the angelic light. Undefinable features re-form seamlessly as the figure breaches, hugs the left walkway, ducks and vanishes among the shadows through the brush. A lone window shrouded by overgrown branches affords him a moment to slip the knife between panes, turn the latch and lift. He’s inside in a moment, tucked away into a corner.

     He is not alone. In the overcast of obstructed light a pair of legs donning the length of an old couch neglected and in disrepair but functional enough for them. Behind the mask his lips draw tight, breath held. Was that her stirring? Waiting for him to return to confirm the kill? The silence deafening tells him she’s awake and aware, waiting for his move first. He will not make it.

     Broad shoulders tense as they fall back against the staccato wall, muscles aching for a decent hot shower to which his eyes flicker for a moment. The fine droplets of blood clinging to him reek of the bitter sweet acidity of copper. Most have dried by now, flaking at the subtlest touch. A fine display of the finality of man. It makes his face itch.

     He’s dead. The posture iterates as if the smell of death alone does not deliver the message. The Winter Soldier has not yet left him, the job remains in the steadiness of his hand, the bleak void in his voice, the ice in his fixed gaze. She is something foreign, not yet a part of his protocol. To be kept separate. Informed but not close. 

Whether she comes as a friend or a foe, he doesn’t know.  But he does know that he has one shot if he chooses to take it.  He knows her skill.  Knows her history.  As she does his own.   He also knows he has one bullet left and a twinge in his shoulder from where part of his armor has shattered and is digging into the sensitive flesh.  Were he to have feeling in those fingertips, he’s sure they would be uncomfortably known. But his gun never waves from where it is pointed at her head. “Took me a long time to find you, widow.”

@gcroinya​​ || 100 nonverbal prompts || accepting!

∗ 52﹕ sender  takes  a  punch meant  for  receiver . (is this love????) -- it has to be!

There’s asphalt underneath one knee and the too soft, too yielding feeling of a struggling chest underneath another. Vibranium fingers clutch a heaving throat. They do not forgive or budge against the choking and gagging that has muscles fluttering against his palm like the frantic wings of a jarred butterfly running out of air. Unfeeling eyes stare down at reddened, bulging ones and there’s only one thought in his head..

He should never have hit her..

How it got that far was beyond them both. A simple outing of seeing one another again. In the city that he loved. The city that birthed him and Steve’s friendship. That brought countless memories from childhood til now. That lured those of them to battle for, to live and breathe (his face is turning blue) for, and be willing to DIE for---had him slowly letting down a guard that was a mistake to let slip when it’s changed so much. Regardless of how he resists seeing it. New York City has become more brutal than back alley bullying and desperate men sticking ya up for cash to feed themselves or their families. Than organized crime you avoided by keeping your nose down and hoping you didn’t cross the wrong person at the docks. 

They were picked at random by this idiot and a few of his friends. What gets him? That one refused to run when his buddies all did? The sound of a broken wrist snapping and his friend screaming into the air was enough to have ‘em hightailing it out of here. Except this fool. Who pulled off a miracle in the last second. Landing a punch meant for him on her.

He’s kicking now, frantic fingers clawing at metal that will not stop. Slack muscles in an unfeeling face watch as the life starts to drain. But then there’s a hand on his shoulder and it’s gotta be hers and the only movement he makes is his lips. Does she want him to let go? Pluck him out of the dark that put him here to begin with? Save him from some existential guilt that will follow when he’s come back into himself and become James Buchanan Barnes?

𝐓𝐑𝐀𝐈𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆 - 𝐁𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐓

the red room did not teach the widows and wolf spiders ballet for performance.  the goal of their ballet training was to teach them the grace they would need in the field.  when the headmistress received access to the winter soldier as an asset to training her widows, she decided it best to not only train him in the art of their specific brand of espionage, but fill his erased mind with another new skill.

she taught him ballet.

his first dance partner was natalia romanova.  his very last was yelena belova.  the intimate setting in which he worked with both of these widows has created the last memories       (  and desperate need for amends  )           that have brought them both back into his life.  they trained in dance, and they trained in the arts of the fight.  all of these skills are deeply intertwined.

     There was something to be said to the art of hiding in plain sight. Two perfectly ordinary looking people sitting on a perfectly ordinary bench, no one person paying them any mind. He recognized, of course, that this was not a revelation to his current companion, one who had spent years learning all the tools of the proverbial trade. 

     They were like ghosts-- In every sense of the word. For those (blessed? accursed?) few who have died and come back, what other word was there? A brave new world, equal parts familiar and wholly foreign.

     A frown seems to be permanently affixed to his features, though whether it was due to a troubled mood or the default setting of the form he had taken was left up for debate. He was not privy to the details of her return-- everyone had their secrets, her most of all. All he knew was that here they were, living, despite it all. 

     “ I do not think myself ready to come back.” His voice is quiet, unsure, a far cry from the man he once was. (Was he the same man? The answer, as ever, eluded him so.) “ I have---personal matters to figure out.” A family-- found and lost and found again. The most intricate puzzle.