farsickness | 001. Longing

001. Longing

WHO: Bucky Barnes & You
WHEN: 1 April
WHAT: Arriving
WHERE: Edge of the forest, Gazin
WARNINGS: An Intro thread, which is its own warning.

the forest

Plenty of things have prepared Bucky for situations like this. Both in the war and later, as HYDRA's asset, he'd been dropped into the middle of the woods and given little more than his own innate sense of direction and the stars overhead to guide him to his target or back to civilization, whichever the case may be. These woods, though, shouldn't be here.

He's been running. He's good at running. He's been running for a year, maybe more, but the land beneath his boots now isn't the land he's used to. He'd been weaving his way through city streets the last time and now he's here with a chunk of memory blank in between. Had he been conditioned? He tries to remember if he'd been activated, racks his brain to see if there's any target he'd taken out or any mission he'd accomplished, and he comes up with nothing. It's disconcerting. At least when he's under, he remembers everything even if he wishes he hadn't. The not knowing sometimes is worse the bloody memories he carries along with him of murders he'd committed as a hostage in his own mind.

He picks a direction and starts walking, deciding to stick with it until he comes out into some sort of field. Forests end, eventually, and he's good enough in the woods to survive a long hike. He keeps his tread soft and when a branch snaps, he goes stock still and slowly turns his head to see if he's been spotted.

gazin

It's a long walk until civilization but Bucky eventually finds it in the form of a small village that seems like it's been lifted from some sort of fairy tale. There's no internet, no phones, no electricity but there's what seems like a bar that has food and drink. He's aware he has literally nothing to trade with and nothing of value but he goes to the bar anyway and asks the barkeep if he can trade labor for food; he's got the strength to do anything the man wants but he's going to need food if he's going to be capable of doing it. It's a good enough prospect, apparently, because a few minutes later Bucky has dark beer and some sort of meat pie in front of him.

He's picked a table sort of in the back and while he can't hide in the shadows completely, he's far enough back that no one is behind him and he can see the door and the rest of the room from where he is. He doesn't have a knife and the food had only come with a stubby one. Bucky pockets it anyway, choosing a weapon over no weapon.

He doesn't have a glove to cover his left hand and he tries to obscure it, tries to keep candlelight from glinting on the bright metal.

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While the plates have always been able to sense pressure, Bucky is surprised to see that now it feels like she's actually touching his arm the same as it'd feel on the right. He looks down at her hand, astounded, and then looks back up with a surprised look.

"I never...I don't know how you do this," Bucky says, trying to find the words. "But I never thought I'd have it back. It feels like it's back. It feels like me again. What can I do for you? You have to need something."

"This is enough," she says gently, smiling as she tapped a forefinger against his arm meaningfully.

She would probably need a nap really soon.

Her green eyes were filled with something softly jubilant and her smile all but glowed or that might have been her wings which shone as her wingtips brushed out to touch his cheeks.

"You're welcome here any time you wish and you may come and go as you wish. Magic has its price but that I'm going to pay in a little while. But this moment is enough and I am so very pleased with it."

"Me too. I'm going to find a way to repay you, though. I don't like leaving debts laying around," Bucky says.

It's legitimate. He's never been fond of charity and he's always worked for everything he has. He has to figure out what she could possibly need so he can get it for her in exchange for this wonderful gift.

"As you wish. Debt incurred can be paid with company and friendship if you like" she said. "But honestly, my friend. Stick around." Her eyes caught his just for a moment before she lowered them. Then she cupped his cheek, her thumb brushing his cheekbone for a scant moment.

"You're always welcome in my home."

Bucky doesn't normally let people touch him and he's a little shocked at her doing it but he doesn't stiffen. It's all right, for now, and he doesn't think Merlan has bad intentions. He hopes not, anyway.

"If I wake up to this arm choking me to death, I know who to blame," he teases, though his voice is a little tight. "It's not going to do that, is it?"

"Mm. Your arm is yours," she says gently, letting her fingers fall away. "All we have done is change its appearance and hook it back up to you properly." She does lean forward to whisper teasingly, "Don't choke yourself or I'll have to come rescue you."

Her clear hazel green eyes find his as she smiles.

"Be at peace. Nothing in this space will harm you."

"I'm not planning on choking myself."

It's a little awkward to be in anyone's space and not be there to kill them so Bucky has to sit with that for a moment and just breathe. It's not unpleasant by any means but it is new and that's something he's going to have to just learn how to do again.

"Better be safe. Otherwise I might get eaten by a dragon or something outside."

"No on plans on choking themselves," Merlan says, laughing. "I'm a mage and one who is particularly picky about selecting defendable wards. They loop back into themselves and are tied to the earth. The geothermal places on this planet aren't going to wear out any time soon. The warding I've used makes this place practically invisible to most animals. So, yes, it's safe."

Her head tilts a fraction.

"Don't worry about dragons, they stick to themselves as long as no one provokes them. I'd rather avoid the creepy bog ladies, so just try not to go into the swamp armed lightly. Just be careful and take a sword or something. Most of the time, I take what I need for breakfasts or dinners, the forest provides well, and the only encounters I've had, really, were brief. I slipped away rather than provoke them."

"Swords? All I have is a knife and this arm," Bucky says, lifting it up to emphasize his point. "I'd have guns except I wandered into this place without them and that's not like me. Not like me at all."

His body is fluid with guns, one with the stock as he draws and shoots. Being without one feels foreign even if he can be just as deadly with a knife.

"I have swords and smithy. I'm not sure I could make a gun. I mean..." she scratches her head, thinking. "I know what one looks like and the internal mechanisms, but...I'd have to first kick around moulding and then making bullets. But the gunpowder would need to be made first..." Ew. What a hassle. She wrinkles her nose a bit.

"I could teach you sword fighting. You might take to it. Elsewise, I could always make you a crossbow. At least they're easy." Merlan dislikes guns, honestly, even though she's used them before.

"Might be easier than inventing a gun from scratch. I've used knives so swords can't be that far off," Bucky says. "And I guess crossbows are point and shoot, yeah?"

If this place only lets him have medieval weapons, he's going to learn how to use medieval weapons. He isn't going to leave himself without protection and he's not going to let anyone else be unprotected either. For all her talk about magic, Merlan might need more than that and he doesn't know who all else is here either.

"I might be muscles but there's a brain here, I promise." Maybe it's Swiss cheese but it's there.

"Pretty much point and shoot, yeah," she says with a nod. "I like longbows myself but I always enjoy the kind of challenges that make other people back away slowly, you know? I helped a guy with a basilisk trying to eat him for lunch once. I don't like killing them but sometimes it's the way things turn out. If it's gonna be death one way or another, I have to make sure the one that lives is the one on two legs, so to speak. Once they're off safely, the creature, if it can be used, comes back with me. If not? I bury it so it can nourish the earth the best it can. Basilisks are corrosive poison, so...good for etching, I guess."

She opens her mouth again and frowns.

"I've gone off-topic. Must be a mage thing..."

Then she blinks and inches closer to him in a sort of butt-hop before examining him frankly. Putting on her best Dorothy voice, she said sweetly.

"The Tin Man had a heart and the Cowardly Lion had courage, so that means the Scarecrow always had a brain." She nudged his shoulder playfully. "You're smarter than most," Merlan said with a wink.

Bucky isn't sure how to feel about the familiarity but he remembers Wizard of Oz. He's seen it a couple times, even, and it'd been one of the first things he'd wanted to see after he'd come back to himself. It'd been something he got to see in theaters.

"I think I'm the Tin Man. I've got the arm to go with it," he says dryly. "And jury's out on whether or not I'm a good guy. Tin Man is probably the better choice."

"You can choose to be anything you want to be, here," she says, leaning back a little to give him space. "What you make of yourself here is all that really matters. I mean, I'm working full-time at a forge and selling pretty cool magic charms. Sometimes I hunt shit that's terrorizing people, you know? I mean, it's sorta what I did before I got here in Australia but totally different all at once."

Merlan grins at him.

"Right now, no one can tell you've a tin arm, right? It feels warm and real, so," she half shrugs. "Be who you want to be, live the life you want to live. Rest, fight things if you want, or not if you don't. You get to do the things you want to do right now."

Her voice is soft and her smile is, too.

"You're free, here."

The idea of not having to be in a fight constantly is appealing. It feels a bit like hiding but what was he doing in Bucharest? He was hiding from everyone to keep from being brought in by HYDRA and to keep from being attacked by every government that wanted him dead. This is like Bucharest, only he truly can't be found.

Her words settle him a bit. He can just be a person here. He can find who he is here, whoever that ends up being.

"You're not wrong about that."

"It's kinda fabulous," Merlan says with a laugh. "Nothing to fight if you don't want to and plenty of others are out there fighting things that need to be either chased off or put down for being too aggressive." She shrugged a little. "I could just train war horses and tinger with metal for the rest of my life and it would be fine. Hell, maybe I will. It's been hard but gratifying work so far. Might take in some people who want to work the land, some as well. Or people who want to help with the horses or building cabins."

She looked thoughtful.

"The clearing has enough trees that can be cleared and used for building that the forest won't lack for it."

"Might be better if I just build my own place then," Bucky says. "I can get my time alone and it won't be so...hard to be out with people all the time. I mostly like to be alone."

He hasn't minded this conversation but there's days he doesn't want to talk at all and he needs that place to escape to.

"Kinda what I was getting at," she said with a smile. "I doubt many'll be around here, anyway. I mean, so far it's just me and Thunder. Wherever you do build, I can stretch the wards over you no problem."

Merlan tilted her head just a little. Her massive clearing is at least a few acres, long enough away to build a few homes with an acreage of land easily and with some more land cleared, more distance between.

"I need my alone time, too. Even if it seems like all I do is talk." She'd done it before, just closed everything up, took Thunder, and rode out. Or just gone to ground. "Plenty of space to lay out an aversion spell so no one'll wander your way."

"If you could do that, I'd be grateful. I know you can fix everything with magic but if you need something hauled around, I can do that for you."

Bucky feels bad taking and taking without return, especially on a first meeting. Merlan is far too kind to him and he's not used to this sort of kindness. He hasn't seen a lot of it in his life.

"Ah," she says with the softest of laughs. "Magic cannot fix everything, though it helps. It took me about a month to build my house on my own. I had, very dear, help to build the forge, but most of the things I've done have been done by hand and a light assist of magic. That said, building you a place to life would be lovely. And probably more efficient since I've built more than one thing myself already."

She pauses to reflect for a moment.

"I'm just pleased there were tools I could make for the occasion. It's not so different from drawing machine plans, anyway. Honestly? I'm happy to do it just for the sake of keeping busy. The less time I have to think, the better it is. We'll both be hauling wood, iron for nails I have plenty of bars and old armour for smelting as well as casts and moulds. In the meantime, I've a guest room if you want to stay there. It's quiet and no one will bother you."

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001. Longing

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