Deck Eleven: Holodeck Two (Volga River, circa 1930s)

[fallaces_sunt]

This is not the smartest idea she's ever had. The library is open; she could be reading, reading just about anything she'd like. She could be in the gym working the edge off her tension. Hell, she could turn this holodeck into a gym that she's familiar with. Test out her ability to actually handle the fake reality with something safe and mundane.

That would be sensible.

Instead, Natasha is sitting on a low pier on the west bank of the Volga River, her slacks rolled up to her knees as she dangles her toes in the water and very carefully monitors her unease.

It's late spring, a vague point in the 1930s. The only people are those working on the occasional cargo ship as they travel up and down the broad expanse of the river, but there are plenty of birds. Location, just south enough from Volgograd that she can't see it.

This might not be the smartest idea she's ever had, but she knows better than to actually go to her hometown. And at least she's got a copy of the complete Sherlock Holmes stories to keep her company.

[OOC: As per normal Trek holodeck set-ups, anyone can walk in as long as they don't mind entering in mid-program.

Open until I say otherwise! :-) ]

Comments

[fallaces_sunt]

"What, oh!" Natasha huffs slightly. "I didn't mean setting anything in 1940s Brooklyn. I meant the holodeck in general."

She thinks of anything being set in Stalingrad - Stalingrad, not Volgograd - and her mouth flattens.

She thinks of leaving her meaning that unclear without meaning to, and her mouth flattens even more.

"Unless you think we're doing to be running into nefarious time-travellers, anyway."

[stark_spangled]

"Oh," Steve exclaims, mouth twisting into a self-deprecating smile. He laughs at himself, reaching back to rub the back of his neck in embarrassment. "No, I guess we probably don't need to worry about that. Then again, I wasn't expecting I'd be pulled into the 24th century, either."

He shakes his head a little, shucking off thoughts of home and broken sidewalk and the smell of pepperoni, his mother's laugh and Bucky's sharp smirk. He takes a breath and looks around again, this time trying to find the edges of the room.

"Yeah, I actually forgot where we were for a minute," he muses. "The, uh, 'programs' seem to expand the dimensions of the room. There's a lot of space to move around out here."

[fallaces_sunt]

"Mmm, or it just confuses our senses."

Pause. This is the kind of pause he may have come familiar with, the speculative devil-may-care one.




"What to try and find the edge of it?"

[stark_spangled]

He is familiar with it. Maybe not just because he's grown to understand his partner's peculiarities, but because he's already turning to ask his own question.

"Want to go for a run?" Their words overlap, and Steve breaks into a grin. "It's a nice day to take in the Russian countryside."

He gets to his feet and holds out his hand to help her up. "Anything I should know about? Have you programmed in surprise aliens or ninja attacks?"

OK, that's because he's grown to understand his partner's peculiarities.

[fallaces_sunt]

She accepts his hand more because he's a friend than anything else, and then jabs him in the arm.

"No ninjas. Or aliens. Or pirates. Just the occasional plane."

A plane which even the sound of it would tell him that they really, really aren't in their normal decade.





"About the planes...Before you ask, we're in a facsimile of 1936."

[stark_spangled]

He winces in mock pain, grabbing his arm where she jabs him. Even when she's not trying to do damage she's got a hell of a swing, but he's chuckling until her words sink in.

He finds he's not all that surprised. Something felt off about the scenery, but it's not until she tells him what it is that it all clicks.

"1936?" he repeats, looking across the river one more time. "Any particular reason?"

[fallaces_sunt]

"As I said.






I thought I'd test it with something I knew."

[stark_spangled]

He understands what she's implying. He's just going to take a minute to process it, and let her continue if she feels like it.

He dusts away dirt and splinters from pushing off the dock, digging through those unwavering eyes of hers for any intel she might be gracious enough to let a guy like Steve steal.

"And 1936 felt like just yesterday?" he asks.

[fallaces_sunt]

She smiles, the expression very faint. But underneath her almost cool neutrality, she's nervous - about his reaction, about trusting him this much.

And she's letting him pick it up.

"Some days it does. Mostly, it feels like it's been a very, very long time since I was a little girl."

[stark_spangled]

"Natasha."

It's the only thing he says for several seconds.

He's watching her, brow beetled. It makes him look severe, but right now he's just trying to come to grips with what she's just told him.

He doesn't ask her. He doesn't have to. He knows exactly what she's saying, and if she's half as good as she says she is, she knows he understands. There is one question she can't scoot by, however.

"How?"

[fallaces_sunt]

"Another variant on Erskine's formula. Soviet variant. Administered over the course of a couple years in the late fifties."

She sighs, and glances to the side for a long moment. Then she looks back at him.

"It's why I heal faster than you. And I don't age. Or, at least I haven't so far."

[stark_spangled]

His eyes grow sharp the second she mentions Erskine's name. He blinks at her, dragging the glare off his face with a heavy hand.

He always knew it could be a possibility, but it's almost like a personal slight knowing someone else has tried to continue Erskine's work. Besides his affection for the man, he knows firsthand how wrong things can go if the conditions aren't absolutely right.

But Natasha knows that, too.

"I had wondered," he says, quiet. "You took some pretty hard hits in New York."

He's really not sure what to say to her. He's upset. It's been two years and SHIELD still treats him like a backwater poster boy, just a friendly face to slap on all the questionable things they do. Nat's his partner, and partners should be able to trust each other. They should at least be able to talk to each other.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asks, some of that hurt bleeding through.

[fallaces_sunt]

Natasha regards him evenly.

"I am telling you," she says at last. "But I had to trust you first."

There is a faint emphasis on the second 'I'; Natasha had to trust him, not SHIELD.

There is a flicker of a smile. "You're still technically older than me."

[stark_spangled]

A micro-expression flits across Steve's face, shock and confusion and more of that hurt, before his face sets into a flat mask.

"We've been partners almost two years, and you're only now trusting me?" he says. He's got this way of sounding perfectly level and supremely disappointed at the same time. "There were times you could've said something, Nat."

He picks up on the teasing, but stubbornly holds his ground. The idea that Nat couldn't trust him with this before now makes him feel like a grade-A dunce. He really thought they were further along than that.

[fallaces_sunt]

"Two years, and you haven't got the memo that I have a hard time trusting people?"

She bites back her temper, or tries to.

"You know where I live. There are people I've worked with for years who don't know that much. But you do. "

[stark_spangled]

He sighs, casting back out over the water.







"How old?" There's a shift in his voice. It's still low, but now there's a hint of something like levity. "You said I'm still older than you, so how old are you?"

[fallaces_sunt]

"Eighty-six. Born January 11, 1928."

The only thing her ID is wrong about is the year.








This is the dangerous thing about truth, the way when she's being honest there is always the desire to say everything. She keeps the rest of it firmly behind her teeth: the other dangerous thing about truth is that when other people know, they actually know about it.

[stark_spangled]

He rubs the bridge of his nose, dragging his hand up and through his hair. It still feels strange at this length, which is an odd thought to be having right now, but he's just trying to latch onto something here.

"Who else knows?" he asks next. His personal feelings aside, he respects his partner's privacy. Even if it doesn't matter up here (blanket tactics: pretend like nobody knows anything, and everything is normal), when they do get back Steve wants to know who he has to watch himself around, and who else is in the know.

[fallaces_sunt]

"Clint." Automatic - of course he knows. Then her mouth moves a little, and she tilts her head slightly.

"It's rumour in the intelligence community. But those who know for sure, those people you're likely to talk to? Clint, Fury, Hill. Clint's team. There are other people, but..." she shrugs, a little. Chances are, he's never going to need to talk to her therapist.

Or people from the Red Room.

[stark_spangled]

Clint he expected. Fury, too. Even Hill doesn't surprise him, but she keeps on going.

"Is that all?" he asks, sarcasm dripping from his tone. It's not that she's provided him with a list of people who know, it's that it is a list of people she trusts more than him. Normally, that wouldn't even bother him -- yes, he knows she has trust issues, and it doesn't prevent them from working together -- but this? He's been a man out of time for two years, adjusting to life in a century he may not have otherwise seen. The jokes his team make about his age don't faze him, but was Natasha laughing with him, or at him? "Jeez, Natasha."

He turns, putting about three feet between them before he pulls to a stop. "You know, I get it. You're good at what you do. Secrets are part of the job. But--" He turns around. "--I could have used a friend."

[fallaces_sunt]

"Because it's all about you," she snaps. "And no, you don't get it! You keep walking around like you think the past was somehow better.

I survived what Stalin and the police did to my country. So excuse me if I don't want to reminisce about the good old days of living in a dictatorship!"

[stark_spangled]

"Is that what you think?" he counters, spreading his arms. He looks confused and offended, turning his head to one side and scoffing. My god, he is disappointed.

"I never said the past was better, Natasha. Jesus, I grew up in Brooklyn during a Depression. I've seen human beings beat each other to death fighting over the last loaf of bread." He takes a step closer, brow furrowed. "The 21st century is -- amazing. You can call someone halfway around the world, and you can even see their face while you talk to them. The place I live in is like a mansion compared to what I'm used to. I walk down Connecticut Avenue and there are 15 restaurants serving food I've never even heard of before. The cars, the computers, the neighborhoods all like Stark said they would be. But it isn't home. Don't act like you don't get that. People don't go back to 1936 because they want to forget."

He points an angry finger at the dock. "I know you had it tough. I had no idea how tough until this moment, and that's the point. Because I can take home whatever R&D throws at me and learn it backwards, cut my hair, buy new clothes, buy my furniture in flat boxes and put it together myself and call that home, but it's not home and you goddamn know it."

[fallaces_sunt]

Natasha glances away, and concentrating on trying to reign in her temper. "I've never said I was American. I've always, always said that I'm Russian. Never lied about that, not to you."

Now she looks back at him.

"And I thought you'd get that sometimes, immigrants don't want to talk about what they left. That they shouldn't have to."

[stark_spangled]

"I know that," he says, struggling to rein in his own temper. They're stuck out here in space, driving wedges between them will just make them weak. But she's right, even if he doesn't want to admit it; it is about him, and it's hard not feeling betrayed.

She keeps talking, and somehow her words shine a light through the haze. When he fought with the Allies, everyone had their own country and their own sense of pride. It's second nature to Steve, something he doesn't even think about. The word immigrant didn't cross his mind, because Natasha's roots are so much a part of who she is it's all he sees. A friend, an ally, and a Russian. But she's more, and he let himself forget that. She had a past before SHIELD, one he knows she's trying to make up for.

He bites his tongue, taking a proverbial step back. "You're right. Nat, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking about that."

He lets out a puff of air and drags his hand through his hair, feeling the adrenaline seep from his muscles, leaving them tense and achy. His jaw is set, two angry lines between his eyebrows, but he works to keep his voice level.

"I just," he begins, finding he doesn't know how to say the words. He looks down. "I thought I was alone."

[fallaces_sunt]

Natasha regards him for a long moment, keeping her thoughts off her face. Then her mouth curves, a little ruefully.

"I've never lost time like you have. I had to live through it like everyone else. And I don't remember as much as you'd want me to anyway. They took that from me. And no, don't ask, that is something I'm really not in the mood to explain right now."

To put it mildly.

"Steve, we grew up in two very different places. I would have been as lost in your New York as you would have in my Stalingrad."