[ OPEN ] i know some places and i've seen some faces

[falcony]

WHO: sam wilson and anyone/everyone.
WHAT: captain america cookout.
WHERE: sam's horizon domain
WHEN: third saturday of september (aka, about 3 weeks after the jailbreak)
NOTES: see below!

HELLO ALL AND WELCOME TO SAM'S CAPTAIN AMERICA COOKOUT!!!!

Over the last week or so, Sam has been going out of his way to contact as many people as he knows to invite them to a cookout at his place in the Horizon. He knows that after the jailbreak, a lot of people were separated, and this was his first thought on how to bring people together. The purpose behind it is simply because Sam thinks that the one thing all of them have in common, opinion on the Singularity and their situations aside, is that they were all brought here and can actually access the Horizon. He sees merit and use in coming together when they can, especially in ways that don't involve the politics of the land they're now living in. So, what better way to do that than around food?

The long and short of it is - this is a peace meal. Leave your issues at the door. Sam has very few rules and there is very little he will give in terms of what this cookout will entail, but three things he will make very clear:

1.) There will be no fighting at his home. You want to duke it out? Take it somewhere else. There will not be warnings or second chances. Don't be an ass.
2.) There is no meeting or serious reason for this cookout. Literally, he just wants people to come together who may no longer be able to see each other due to the travel constraints. It's meant to be fun. Come have fun. (he knows y'all know what that is, even when some of you pretend you don't). Bring food if you want to! There is also a kitchen (if you know what that is) and places to crash. Hope you like seafood!
3.) Anyone who can come into the Horizon is welcome. He'd love it if everyone came, so spread the word.

The cookout itself is set up out front, with picnic tables and chairs and fire pits and lights abound. There are tables set up near grilles if anyone wants to do any actual cooking outside, and a table (probably multiple) set up with sides and napkins and utensils. There are a variety of different places to go and sit and hang out while you're eating. Anything and everything you can want is available - food, drinks, yard games, music playing from out in the trees that will remain consistent unless someone tries to find the speakers and hijack the playlists, etc. If you can't find something outside, you're more than welcome to check the house.

All throughout the party, too, there will be a new friend. Red, as Sam fondly calls him, is a blood-red hunting hawk with silver in between the feathers. He can be found circling around Sam quite often, or perched on his shoulders, but also if you are out and about you can often see him checking up on anyone and everyone. He's a very curious little bird, and also pretty sassy, if you want to interact with him.



If you haven't, or have, been to Sam's domain before, feel free to take a look around. Anywhere is open (save for one locked bedroom) so everyone has open access, but most of the cookout itself will be located in the front yard.

OOC: This is mean to be an OPEN LOG, so leave your TLs or closed threads below! This party will last basically as long as people want it to, but the idea is for it to be an afternoon into the evening. Y'all have free reign save for destroying Sam's home, but if you have any questions, hit me up on plurk (disarmingly or disco (dai#3757). Sam's TL is below, and he will be bouncing around like the good host he is, but lets get a little party started.

Comments

[falcony]

[ geralt's not the only one noticing the ease - it's something sam picks up on, even now, even if he appears to be easy with so many others, too. what's different here is noticing how geralt seems to relax into it, how at some point, between now and that first conversation after the tunnels, that this can be as simple as two people, two friends, and that can be that.

( it feels good. feels solid. feels like sam isn't just passing time in a strange place, but is connecting, is feeling whole, rather than waiting. )

the look he gives sam is one that really, truthfully, sam expects. and because of that, sam just lets himself grin, knowing that he's being cryptic and that it's a little unfair and yes, okay, geralt should have questions. but in a game of questions chicken? sam will always win. ( and, actually, he appreciates not having to get too far into this. the news reports, the videos - they've been enough for him tonight, he thinks. ) ]

Huh. [ sam considers that answer, and then upon seeing geralt tip back his beer, decides that they should actually go and grab those. he pushes off the wall, motioning towards the kitchen as he walks, a kind of sign for geralt to follow if he chooses to do so. ] That makes sense, given the job description. [ thankfully, no one else seems to be holed away in the kitchen, so as they step inside, sam goes right for the fridge - grabbing two more bottles before stepping back to the counter again. the deja vu that settles over him is overwhelming, but sam lets the feeling rise and then fall as he reaches for an opener. ]

Okay, so better question. How old was the oldest Witcher you knew? Or heard of?

[gynvael]

[ Geralt ends up following, right into that kitchen that's starting to feel familiar despite all of its strange edges. Geralt no longer blinks at the fridge as Sam calls it, nor the stuff arrayed inside he doesn't completely recognize. He settles on a stool instead. Same one he'd sat on the last time they were in here.

Though it escapes him that Sam's reaching for a tool to pop the cap. Geralt takes one of the bottles Sam's set down and simply pops the top on his own, thumb underneath, without thinking twice. His expression is a bit distant for a moment—lingering on how much he wants to say about Vesemir. Not that he's interested in hiding it. More that there's a lot. A long history. A complicated history. ]

Bit shy of two hundred. [ The bottle dangles between his fingers. Away from the people outside, it's easier to talk. Or maybe he's just remembering how it'd felt, chatting with Sam about...the girl. And that boat. ] He's still around. Taught me everything I know.

[ An instructor, he usually says, but he's decided not to downplay it with Sam. There's something wistful in the way he explains. Vesemir's known him his whole life. More and more, he's wanted to talk to him—about Ciri, about this world—and he's not certain he ever can again. ]

[falcony]

[ sam feels good, and that is the prevailing feeling - he is in his home, he has his (and other) people around him, there's no immediate danger looming outside his door. it's not that he's completely ignorant of the truth of their situation, but rather sam finds that there have been more moments, during this night, that he doesn't feel he has to actively worry. it also means he is not, necessarily, actively noticing every detail, every moment. he will have brief seconds of clarity, of noticing his own relaxed nature, of easy seconds passed between people who used to be strangers. but it also means this just feels familiar - that geralt isn't completely at odds with the technology of the kitchen, that out of the corner of his eye sam sees geralt settle onto a stool and sam finds himself thinking that's his spot.

he does, however, get caught up on the way that geralt just pops open the bottle of beer, and it stops sam on his search for an opener. his eyes go from the bottle, to geralt, then back to the second bottle before holding it out for the witcher to take and do the same to.

sam whistles, impressed, at the answer. he can tell there is a weight to the man geralt is speaking about, but he decides specifically not to pry. chooses, instead, to let geralt feel comfortable with offering what he wants to offer. the wistfulness and distance say all that sam really needs to know, right now, and he nods. ]

He sounds a hell of a guy. [ and sam's eyes linger on geralt, just for a moment longer. like he's giving him the space to say more, if he wants to, but also is picking up on anything left in those words. like the feeling geralt is more used to pushing off the question than answering as he had. ] Almost two hundred. Damn. [ and then, with a raised brow to geralt. ] Sounds like you're the young one, here.

[gynvael]

[ There's a second where Geralt blinks at the bottle Sam holds out. Then another before he understands—oh. Hmm. He pops the cap on that one, too, before giving it back. It does, now that he's consciously aware of it, take more force than an average stopper to open. (Why has Sam got his ale in bottles he can't open on his own?) ]

He lived through more than most. [ Literally, in a sense. Geralt doesn't touch on it. He's told Sam a few details here and there—mostly to do with how he was created, what he was trained to do—but not that. Not about that night. Besides, he wasn't...there. To witness any of it. He'd only returned in the aftermath.

It'd taken a few days, for the snow to bury the corpses.

He takes a drink. Gives a huff, amusement not reaching his eyes all the way. ] Perhaps if I make it another hundred or two, I can give retirement some thought.

[ He isn't serious. Even Vesemir isn't retired, technically, though it occasionally feels he has. He knows the old man lingers about the keep more and more. Nostalgia or simply misses it. Misses how it was. Geralt isn't certain. He hasn't asked. ]

[falcony]

[ listen - it's carbonated and refrigerated and there's a tool that makes it work. when sam decides he wants some warm ale, he'll ask geralt. for now, he's just being lazy, and if geralt can pop a freaking bottle top with his thumb, sam's not going to waste time figuring out where his bottle opener ended up. so as geralt pops it open and hands it back, sam takes a drink of it.

he is feeling good - comfortable, tipsy but not yet drunk. it's the kind of comfortable he likes most, while in this house. while with others. he leans against the counter and crosses his arms across his chest, propping the bottle in his elbow as he tilts his head from side to side, thoughtful. ]

So he's a survivor? [ because that is the word that comes to mind, first more than anything else. from what he's known of witchers, of their jobs and their dealings. the hints that geralt has dropped of his childhood, how they were created. the understanding that they did not pass away, but instead died because they couldn't keep ahead. if this man, this mentor, was nearly two hundred, it was not because he simply wanted to retire. or at least, sam did not think so.

he is watching geralt, as he huffs. as the amusement hangs somewhere short of his eyes. ]

Do you actually want to be around that long? [ the question is heavier, than the previous questions he's posited. and maybe it's out of place. but sam chances it all the same, waiting for any sign that he's overstepped and that he may need to step back in and shift the conversation again. ] Three hundred years is a hell of a long time to be alive, retirement or no. [ and then, if geralt is too quiet for too long, sam will sort of shift, sort of shrug. it's a lot for him to assume, and from what he knows of geralt, it's not like geralt expects to be around that long anyway. a joke, maybe, but sam had seen the distance there. the thoughts he is starting to think maybe geralt has in abundance, without speaking aloud. ]

Extended aging is nice and all, but it sounds kind of lonely. It's probably a good thing your teacher- or whoever- has you around to give him a hard time in his old age. [ and then they're back - back to lighter, to sam's small smile. to a kind of partial joke, partial truth, wrapped up in the quiet sounds of night in the kitchen, distant chatter from the tv still being on, the people still outside. ]

[gynvael]

[ One day, Geralt will ask Sam about half this stuff, but today is not that day. He settles in instead, finding a sort of familiarity with the hum of what Kay has tried her best to explain about the TV and the buzz of conversation just outside the front door.

He does look at Sam at that choice of words: abrupt, off-guard, like he wasn't expecting that exactly. Survivor, as though it's significant, as though it's a title or a mark earned. They've all survived some shit, have they not? Out there, back home. His childhood was drenched in blood and bodies strewn, same as Vesemir, same as what's left of them at Kaer Morhen, but he's never borne the illusion that their experiences are unique. He knows, too well, what humans did to the elves. That Witchers are not the only children discarded by their mothers. Not the only children molded for some purpose or other beyond their choosing.

It's this, rather than Sam's next question, that has Geralt pausing too long. It feels like Sam's recognized a facet of him that isn't real (except it is; it is, and he simply doesn't want to think of that way) but he can't find the words to explain why it leaves him uneasy. Or why it even fucking matters. When Sam shrugs, Geralt meets it with a vague tip of bottle in return. ]

If I get ever there, I'll let you know. [ He doesn't expect he will, so. A moot discussion. He's ended up alone before. He's spent decades alone. Not much difference, to do it for however many more he'll have in front of him.

Geralt catches Sam's smile, the lightness that Sam's extending. Part of him tries to grasp it, but he can't quite manage as well as he wants, even as he responds in kind: joking, a bit, and yet not because Sam has become that. Someone Geralt thinks is maybe good he's got around. Hard time included. ] Is that what you're here to do with me?