You've lost your way [open]

[tookthewheel]

Who| MCU!Bucky Barnes and OTA
What| Bucky got into a dumb fight with his counterpart, broke a rollercoaster and is now moping around the arena trying to deal with that, his scattered mind alongside the dangers of the arena and other tributes.
Where| Various locations
When| During the 2nd Hell-rena
Warnings/Notes| Amnesia and potential references to trauma as standard with this guy. Also possible violence and body horror for the setting

Prompt A: Hell-rena at the Lake

Even at his full strength the fight with his mirror image has left him filthy, battered, bloody and aching.

The world turned to madness; it's falling apart, moving constantly round and round. He could see the buildings moving from the amusement park as he dragged himself at first and then stumbled up, making painfully slow progress away from the scene of the battle with dogged determination. The Soldier forces his protesting limbs to carry him just that little bit more to collapse by the lake and shifts his back up against a tree, grimacing as he does.

It's a poor choice to sit here, there's not much cover but he needs to stay still just for a short while and collect himself as much as he's currently capable of. If he can only have a few minutes to breath in this stifling heat and let his augmented body do what it was made to do maybe he'll survive a little longer in this hell. He uses what strength is left in him to tug off the torn hoody and give himself some relief from the temperature, quickly draping the cloth over his metal arm after so the shine of it won't give his presence immediately away to anyone nearby.

Prompt B: Hell arena, specify your own location/time

He's beginning to feel the very real effects of hunger setting in now. The Soldier's not been eating the food from the orchard (he'd been warned of its effects on his first day), only risking drinking the water sparingly because while he can push on without food for a while dehydration will kill him in days and the heat is absolute and oppressive, but if he doesn't find safe food soon he'll be in real trouble. Not just that, he's still has the lingering wounds from his fight with his other self to slow him down, the few days with his abilities in place have helped to heal the worst of it but not nearly all.

There was one thing he paid attention to in the aftermath of that fight though, his hair is now hacked short to the nape of his neck. It's still far from neat but it presents less of a vulnerability now.

Having lost his previous weapons he's taken the time to re-equip himself with newly scavenged ones. Glass shards and a rusted pair of garden shears with the blades broken apart to form two primitive long knives. He's hidden the weapons as best he can under his clothing as he walks through the arena, searching for any possibly chance to gain more supplies.



[[ooc: Feel free to reply in brackets if prose isn't your thing!]]

Comments

Prompt A (I'm so sorry for the length omg)

[metalicarus]

Albert was gone.

They'd run into Enjolras and Venus and whatever had been in that damn food had made him and his partner lash out against their allies. And then Enjolras had tossed himself and the German over the edge, leaving Jet to come back to his senses and take care of a dying Venus. He'd watched them all die and now he was alone.

Felicity was still out here somewhere, but he feared running into her again in case whatever that chemical had been wasn't out of his system yet. He'd received clean food and clean water from some sponsor, but he'd been very sparing with it, not wanting to run out and need to switch back to the arena's food.

Honestly, there was a part of him that wished he hadn't been sent rations at all. That contemplated going back to that cliff and joining Albert and Enjolras.

But his own sense of self-preservation kept him walking aimlessly.

With the arena back in it's hellish and decaying state, he tried to stay aware of his surroundings since the creatures here only got more vicious, but he didn't exactly bother trying to be stealthy. His cybernetics were back and with most of his body metal or synthetic, he didn't feel overly threatened.

Even without the fog, he might not have noticed the man leaning against a tree across the lake from him, it was only by virtue of his cybernetic eyes that alerted him to the man's presence that Jet knew he was there. He contemplated just leaving, Jet wasn't interested in hurting him and the guy was clearly in no shape to come after him, but something made him pause. Maybe it was the fact this was the very same lake where he and his partner had murdered that one guy during their aggression-filled haze. He felt badly for that and a part of him wondered if he could make up for it by helping this guy out a little.

But was that really smart? There weren't that many of them left at this point, chances were high that they'd end up needing to face each other eventually.

But he couldn't just walk by. Not now.

He moved slowly towards where the guy was sitting, his knife tucked into his pocket, Al's crowbar and Jet's metal pipe strapped to his back with the make-shift rope the German had made. He wasn't unarmed, but none of his weapons were in-hand either.

As an extra precaution, he stopped about ten feet away, close enough to talk, but far enough away to retreat if need be. Too bad he couldn't just fly away now, not with his jets still messed up.

"You look pretty banged up, there. I'd like to help. If you'll let me, anyway."

It's good! c:

[tookthewheel]

From his hunched posture, head bowed, someone might have been forgiven for thinking he had passed out or fallen asleep. Not so.

The moment Jet came close his head snapped up, blue eyes surprisingly alert and sharp staring out of a face covered with dried blood from a gash on his forehead that's barely started to scab over at this point. The Soldier won't sleep, he can't sleep (but blackness is waiting, creeping on the edge of his vision with a nagging need), it's not safe to.

Help? His eyes narrow at the offer. Why would someone want to help him, aren't they all here to kill each other? The Soldier doesn't answer for now but he's watching warily, waiting to see what Jet does.

[metalicarus]

Blue eyes zoomed and focused on the man, able to pick up his subtle movements that told Jet he was tense, clearly wary. And who the hell wouldn't be? Jet wouldn't trust himself in this guy's position.

He held his hands out to show there was nothing in them. "Look, I don't have much, but I know how to patch a guy up. As soon as I'm done, I'll leave you alone if you'd like."

Military training had taught him that much and while all he really had was some spare cloth, it would be enough to help this guy out at least.

"Would it help if I put my weapons down before coming over?" It would suck, but the New Yorker could handle himself pretty well without them, plus he was a cyborg right now and that made up for any lack of weapons.

[tookthewheel]

His eyes narrowed.

He reluctantly acknowledges that he could use the help, he's badly injured in a hot zone where it's not just other humans but the creatures that are out to get him. Caution however is still a necessity, he's not ready for another brush with death quite so soon after the last one.

"Yes." he says roughly, keeping his gaze on Jet. To the offer of help, to the promise the other would leave after and to the disarming before he came near. The arm is hidden and out of sight under his hoody, so if this does turn out to be a trick he still has one weapon left in his retinue.

Maybe somewhere someone is cheering his acceptance as progress.

[metalicarus]

Jet nods half to himself and half to the other guy as he takes removes all his weapons and places them on the ground. He hesitated, nearly leaving the pack with his rations behind before deciding to keep it on his shoulder.

He didn't move slowly or even all that cautiously over to the man, just kept his pace even and easy, only pausing to dip one end of the curtain-rope into the lake. Once he was close enough, he knelt down and held the sodden end of the curtain up.

"Just so we're clear, don't try anything while I'm trying to help you out, okay? The sooner I'm done, the sooner we won't have to be so keyed up.

Sorry, this is gonna sting."

He gave Bucky a once-over and reached out to press the damp fabric to the laceration on his forehead; it was already starting to close up, but cleaning it up a bit would probably help.

"Where else are you hurt?"

[tookthewheel]

The Soldier tenses as he approaches, his eyes run a full scan up and down Jet. He's clearly ready to fight at any moment, his chest heaving in the heat and from barely restrained adrenaline.

After what he's been through any normal man would have passed out by now -- no, any normal man would have died when the rollercoaster went down. What Hydra did to him is the only thing keeping him alive.

Strangely when Jet touches the gash with the cloth he goes oddly -- compliant. He doesn't relax but there's a practiced stillness in the way he sits, accepting the ministration as much as he had from the scientists. Old habits are going to die hard.

"Right hand, broken small and ring finger. Left leg, suspect torn ligaments." he reels off in a bland monotone, "Multiple lacerations, heavy bruising to all areas. Blunt trauma sustained to head." That last one had split the skin when it happened, judging by his hair is matted on one side. It itches now when he thinks about it.

[metalicarus]

Jet listens as he continues to clean the wound on Bucky's forehead, wincing a bit to himself at the laundry list of injuries. A list like that wouldn't be too surprising for himself or any of the other zero-zero-cyborgs, but they weren't human. Then again, maybe this guy wasn't either, who knew.

He gave a bit of a smile to try and lighten the mood, as ineffective as it probably was. "You're kind've a mess, pal. There's probably not much I can do for your brusing or your leg, but I can help out with the rest."

Once the cut he'd been tending to was cleaned up, he pulled the rest of the curtains into their individual parts and stood up. "I'll be right back, don't go anywhere."

He didn't go far, just a bit into the trees to find some sticks he could use as a splint. He ended up tearing a few from a nearby tree before he returned and sat at his 'patient's' right side. He hesitated a moment, knowing his own inexperience at setting bones was going to make this more difficult than it ought to be, but there wasn't really any way of avoiding it.

He took the broken right hand between both of his own and lightly began feeling along it for the breaks. Anything that felt off got moved around back to it's rightful placement, splinted and a shred of fabric wrapped tightly around it to hold it there.

"My name's Jet. What's yours?"

[tookthewheel]

"I don't have a name."

He supplies this after a moment of thinking. You have no name. except perhaps he did, perhaps it was only waiting for him to take it back. But the Soldier shied from doing so still, he could not connect to the idea of that man to feel like it should be his to wear.

Throughout the ministrations he's sat stiff but still, not wincing from any pain that he feels, not letting on how much it bothers him as he is touched. This sort of touch he knows and it is never done with his comfort in mind.

[metalicarus]

"Really?" Jet gave him an incredulous look before pulling away again. "Everyone should have a name, it's who you are. Or, well, you can make it who you are. Hold on."

Jet got up and went back to his pack to pull out Albert's pitcher and collected more water before heading back.

"I mean, I chose my name. When they name I'd been given didn't fit me anymore, I got a new one. You can do that sometimes and it'll end up meaning a lot more to you than any name anyone else could give you. Just a thought."

Jet used his fingers, the water, and a new piece of fabric to work the blood and gunk out of the other man's hair so he could clean and wrap the nasty looking cut on his head.

[tookthewheel]

He watches every step Jet takes, listening because there is little else to do but listen in this situation. It's a different turn of events to have someone talk at him rather than over his head, fixing him like he was a broken piece of machinery.

"I think I had one once." the Soldier murmurs. "Not anymore."

Because he wasn't a person, he was a weapon. Weapons didn't have names.

[metalicarus]

He worked quietly until Bucky's head had been tended to then sat back on his heels to look at him.

"That should last you a bit. I can take care of the other cuts if you want, but you'll need to strip a bit so I can get at them."

He wanted to help as much as he could, but he could feel the tension radiating off Bucky even as he seemed calm. It made Jet feel bad for him, it reminded him a little too much of those early days in Black Ghost when the scientists would work on him or Albert, repairing their cybernetics like they were machines and not people. Jet could remember being tense on those days when all he wanted to do was snap and shove their tools down their throats, but he'd sit idly by as they poked and prodded and re-calibrated and generally ignored him, only taking care of the bleeding parts after the cybernetics were fixed.

That mental analogy alone made him want to tend to this guy even more while also wanting to run as far away from him as possible.

[tookthewheel]

"No." he replies without shaking his head, thankfully, right now that would probably only make him dizzy. "I'll heal."

The bones of his fingers are set, that's an important thing, they'll heal straight and save him having to break them again later. He can't afford to be slowed down like that.

The Soldier shifts against the tree, finds himself still in pain but perhaps lessened enough to move now.

[metalicarus]

Jet nodded and stood slowly, stretching a moment to work out his tense muscles.

"Alright, your choice."

Jet gave Bucky a half-hearted salute and turned went to retrieve his supplies where he'd left them. Once he'd re-situated everything, he looked back to the other man. "Hey...good luck, pal. And think about that name thing, okay? You should find me after this thing and tell me what you picked so I know what to call you."

[tookthewheel]

By this time the Soldier has managed to get back onto his feet, his head is feeling clearer already and the pain, though acute, is more manageable. He thinks he can carry on to a more secure location now.

He's not sure what to make of the wish of fortune but does give a nod of acknowledgement that he's heard it. This man, Jet, he should have killed the Soldier when he had the chance but he didn't, it's enough to conjure what good will he's capable of right now.

The name... name's seems so much more important than he had ever thought. It seems a simple request though, and so he gives an affirmation, "Yes."

It's unlikely they will meet again before it happens anyway, one or both of them might be dead soon.