+ Somewhere a Grandiose Carnival Was Going on in the Sky +

[vitaelamorte]

Who: Everyone!
Where: The grounds of the Mansion
When: March 9-16
Rating: PG-13 (warn if you go higher)
Summary: The Red Queen has thrown a carnival for everyone!
The Story:


From Friday, March 9, through Friday, March 16, the gardens and grounds of the Mansion will be a sprawling a carnival. The masked, unspeaking vendors will be selling trinkets and running free game booths. Carnival rides, exhibits, and foods represent all of the various cultures of those currently residing in the Mansion.


Of particular note, and perhaps incongruously, everything is decorated with red hearts.

Use this log for any and all of your carnival needs!

Comments

[mucked]

[ stockpiles, he says. all around the grounds. peggy resists the urge to raise her chin and glance around the carnival, to catch glimpses of the green-spaces beyond, and to wonder where these caches are kept. some voracious appetite for intel clamors to ask the question (waiting there in the back of her throat) but she swallows it down. not for courtesy and not for strategy, but simply because she reminds herself she ought to try and enjoy the conversation.

make it about work, after all, and they might find themselves once more in the middle of an infinity stone induced headache of a discussion.

so instead she nods at the canister. ]

Something incendiary, I imagine.

[beatupgrass]

Laser rifle. It's got one concentrated beam that can split a hole in a wall, and don't get me started on what it can do to a body. [He pulls it off his back and hits the catch as the canister expands into a nasty looking rifle.] 'S good for accuracy, but it don't pack much of a boom. I got plasma cannons for that.

[mucked]

-- Fret not. That's not a question I'm keen to ask.

[ what it can do to a body. not because it sounds utterly gross, although it does, but because she can well supply the image herself. much to the turn of her stomach. peggy watches the rifle with interest, however -- its expansion mechanism wasn't one she'd anticipated, and it's true that seeing it lights up a kind of fascination in her eye.

usually, she tries to hide it. but the hard truth is that she's someone with a keen interest in weaponry. ]

Is a plasma cannon exactly what it sounds like?

[beatupgrass]

Yup. [Honestly, he seems pretty gleeful to talk shop, himself. He figures if Rip's whole thing is anything to go by, she knows more about weapons than it looks like she does. It means he can brag without having to dumb it down.]

I modded it from some of the juiciest killware I could liberate from a confiscated weapons locker. This one, I just built from the ground up outta spare parts.

[mucked]

I'm handier shooting a piece than I am in building one.

[ understatement. she may try to follow the science but the truth is that's just about all she can do. the ssr has brains on staff to fill that need. and peggy, personally, has howard stark.

had. past tense. because he isn't here -- because she knows, too, his eventual fate. the thought alights in her mind for only a moment. rather, she turns her attention fully upon the rifle. if the context was different, if the place more appropriate, she might have begged a turn at firing it.

peggy quells that urge. ]

Did you build it here?

[beatupgrass]

Eh, not everyone can do both. It's a science and an art. [No trace of humility there, no sir. You crawl your way out of a lab setting and become a engineering genius and see how humble you are.

Hint: It's very difficult to be humble when the world wants you to fail. If he knew anything about the time period on Earth Peggy hails from, he'd realize they have a lot to commiserate on, but... women have always been considered equal in galactic society. It's the rampant specisism and classism and racism you have to watch out for.]

This one? Hell no. I brought it back with me when I went home last, but I got stuff strewn around here I've been workin' on. Along with bombs.

[He lowers his voice:] A lot of bombs.

[mucked]

[ good lord. ]

A controversial pastime with a crowd like this one.

[ her attention flickers back to the carnival. implying, perhaps, the greater population of wonderland. she had watched from the sidelines as plenty came out to tear tony stark apart for his iron legion, and those were ostensibly intended as peaceable machines. but an avowed and enthusiastic bomb-maker?

well. ]

Do you get much flak?

[beatupgrass]

I don't brag about it on the network like an idiot, and I don't blow up anything that anyone cares about. I've been here a long, long time, so it don't suit me to pick fights with people who don't understand the benefits of being prepared.

[Also he'd just ignore it if he did get flak. It's nothing he hasn't heard before.]

[mucked]

[ the sound of a hum passes her lips. near-laughter, but demure enough to pass for anything but. downplaying her agreement is just her own kind of doesn't suit me. as she grows more comfortable with the existence of the rifle sitting between them, with the idea of tech so advanced, her body language becomes more filtered. ]

I know an ego or two who could benefit from that very lesson. [ she smiles. ] Do you take requests or do you build only for yourself?

[ she doesn't have anything in mind right now. but it'll be damned good to know, won't it? ]

[beatupgrass]

I take requests. [He can read between the lines and there's a certain eagerness in his rusty red eyes. He's not the type of person who ought to be left idle, and the training room's new simulator will be ready within the next month.] I gotta keep busy or else I'll go crazy in this place.

[mucked]

[ spies can be naturally trustless creatures. in peggy's case, it's less to do with nature and far more to do with training: she yearns to compartmentalize all her technological connections. it's good to have more than the one shoulder to tap when the going gets rough.

rougher. ]

I know what you mean. [ she leans her hip against the carnival game's counter. her arms cross. ] My usual pastimes aren't in much demand, here. I've had to make my own kind of busy.

[beatupgrass]

By challenging idiots like Rip to shooting contests and takin' 'em for all they've got?

[It seems very appropriate that a raccoon face is very good at cheeky expressions, even if the grin is all sharp teeth.]

[mucked]

[ idiots like rip, he says, and peggy won't lift a finger to defend the man. it's not her way, she's not the sort, and she can already tell that rocket uses epithets like that one as casually as someone else might use any other adjective. nor does she see fit to explain the finer details of that particular shooting contest -- that rip had managed to goad her into a second round of shooting using their off hands. she'd lost that one, and his odd little broadcast had been a way to rub it in her face.

peggy won't do any of these things because it suits her much better to embrace the victory, to smile a toothy smile of her own, and nod along with rocket's verdict. she also won't do any of these things because (from the sounds of it) rip never betrayed that part of the story. ]

Oh, I could have taken him for more than his beard. [ mostly true. ] He should consider himself lucky I was feeling merciful, at the time. But seeing as I've yet to find a decent game of poker in my ten months, here, I find my wagers elsewhere.

[beatupgrass]

[Rocket's ears flick a bit. He had to pick up poker from various people over here, having mostly been accustomed to games like Skrull Hold-Em and their ilk. The problem for Peggy is she won't get a decent game out of him, because he's a terrible gambler, but he doesn't seem to be aware of this fact, personally.]

That a fact? [He turns his attention back to the newly set-up targets and takes a few more shots at them, the gun making a satisfying kzzwark, barely hiding the sound of the ping as laser hits target.] You clearly haven't played me yet.

[This is going to go terribly for Rocket.]

[mucked]

Rocket. [ will she ever get used to saying it like it's a name? though, on the topic, it's not as though rip is any more name-like. good god, what's the world(s) coming to? ] Are you challenging an accused hustler to a card game?

[ her brows lift up, mock innocent, as she takes measure of his bravado. ]

[beatupgrass]

[he shrugs. raccoons shouldn't be able to shrug.] Where'd the challenge be if I didn't?

[mucked]

Have it your way.

[ peggy cedes a hand or two. a game, maybe, at some point in the near future. ordinarily she might never agree -- but she's less interested in winning and more interested in better getting to know someone who shares her larger universe. and a poker game can be so revealing. ]

I'll pencil it into my agenda, shall I? One hastily won game, [ she plays up her own bravado -- for fun more than in earnest. ] I'm looking forward to it.

[beatupgrass]

Don't get too cocky. Maybe I'll teach you how to play Skrull Hold-Em, and we'll see who has the real advantage. [This is going to be delightful.

For Peggy.

But Rocket seems to believe it's going to be delightful for himself, too. Occasionally, he lacks self-awareness.]

[mucked]

Ah, see, that would be a rookie's mistake if I made it: playing a game against the person who'd just taught to me. [ but she doesn't sound all that put off by the prospect. what the devil is a skrull, anyway? ] However, poker is dreadful dull with only two. We'll need at least one other to take for all they're worth.

[ okay, so maybe she is a bit of a hustler. ]

[beatupgrass]

[Rocket's lips curl back, exposing his sharp teeth in a grin that's somehow more cheeky, than threatening.]

I could find someone or we could just agree on it bein' Rip.

[mucked]

[ you know? it still comes off a little threatening -- but only to the unadjusted mind. peggy clears her throat, takes a moment to acclimatize to the grin, and misses only a beat or two before: ]

That would be a wicked thing to do, wouldn't it? Deal a man into a card game without asking first. [ but she doesn't sound too too bothered. ] I'll see to the arrangements.

[ translation: leave 'dealing him in' to her. ]