7363/A Meeting of Very Different Minds

A Meeting of Very Different Minds
Date of Scene:	30 April 2019
Location:	Unknown
Synopsis:	A former assassin, his service dog, and an angel meet in a bar to drink. Karen Page is there and just a bit too oblivious for her own good. At first, anyway. OOC Note: Bucky player was spoofing by paging Karen with his poses, thus why they don't show on the log as his.
Cast of Characters:	Karen Page, Castiel, Winter Soldier

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Karen Page has posed:
There is no Asgardian mead to be had. So this is somewhat an exercise in frustration, Bucky drinking. Lili is giving him her best frown from her place on the floor by his boots. It's like Steve really did detach some part of his soul and possess a furry body to follow his friend around.

It's one of the few places he leaves the Triskelion to go, this bar. Got to pretend to be a real boy, sometimes. Two upended glasses betray the death of a pair of Four Horsemen, but he's not seriously working on a drunk. Not yet.


Seated at a table under the brightest lightbulb in the place, Karen is hunched over a pile of papers and a legal pad, jotting notes without looking while reading the papers in her non-pen hand. She stops writing, frowns faintly at something, flips through a few pages back and forth, then writes on the pages directly before adding more notes to her legal pad.

Sitting in front of her is a sadly neglected tumbler of whiskey. Neat.

Castiel has posed:
Josie's is one of the places Castiel haunts. Partly because they know him now and don't question his orders, and partly because (whether he'd admit it or not) he runs into people he's begun to know, and in his fashion care about. Witness: Bucky Barnes.

The angel arrives in his usual unceremonious way, and makes his order for an Apocalypse with a Boilermaker chaser, sitting beside the man and his dog. The woman scribbling away at her table given a raised brow of attention before he turns back to Bucky.

"I will have to catch up, I see. You are well?"

Karen Page has posed:
That question makes his brow furrow - apparently the answer requires some thought. "Yeah," he says, slowly. "I mean, as well as I can be." He turns that pale stare on the angel, already just a hair clouded with drink. "What did you....when you....when we were sparring. What did you to do me? I felt weird for days after." Because 'pain free' is so very rare it's 'weird'.

The dog looks at the angel, smiles, wags her tail. Then turns back to radiating Steve-like disapproval at Bucky. Human, when you do this, it makes you smell Bad.


Karen's eyes lift to watch Castiel for a moment as he passes, then her attention goes right back to her paperwork. She seems very intent on whatever she's doing, the overlarge purse on the chair next to her getting almost zero attention.

It might even be just asking for someone to try and snatch it.

Castiel has posed:
Castiel nods slowly over his first Horseman. "That." His voice a rough grumble of agreement. "You were hurt. We were done with the fighting so I healed you." Though he realizes the other man means more than that, mulling his next answer over his drink, throwing the amber liquid back and swallowing.

"Your body reads like a map of pain. There are things I can do for that, so I did them. I did not see a reason you should always suffer." His keen blue gaze falling upon Bucky. "Did I misjudge?"

He's not noticed Karen but for that initial assessment, but that purse is begging to be stolen. No doubt he'd notice that. He might even do something about it. He's just that kinda guy.

Karen Page has posed:
That's another question he has no swift, glib answer to. And to think, once upon a time, he had the smartest mouth in Brooklyn. The booze has lowered his defenses enough that the thoughts are all but visible in their passage - so much for that deadpan. He gazes on the middle distance, for a bit, before glancing back at the angel. "I.....honestly don't know yet. I accept that your intentions were good," he says. The bartender comes by, and he orders another Four Horsemen....earning himself a sotto voce comment that he might as well buy the four bottles and pour for himself.


Taking a last few notes, Karen finally tucks the papers into a manila folder and stacks it with the legal pad, dropping the pen on top before leaning back in her chair and closing her eyes as she tries to stretch the stiffness out of her neck.

And that's when a weaselly-looking man that's been loitering by the bar lunges across and snatches up her purse, instantly making a break for the door.

Karen gasps at the sudden movement so close, and then realizes what happened. "Shit!" She leaps out of her chair to chase after the man. Handicap: flats and a pencil skirt.

Castiel has posed:
That under breath suggestion that Bucky buy the bottles grabs Castiel's attention. "Wait, we can do that? Why have I not been informed that I may have bottles?" He seems both astounded and more than a little put out. All this time wasted on singular drinks and multiple orders when he could have merely demanded glasses and the botles!

As for Bucky, well, not only does Castiel think that plan would be a good idea as the other's defenses dropped would allow so much more honesty, but there are things the angel can do for alcohol poisoning, leaving it a fairly safe thing in the long run.

"My intentions were not to harm," the angel informs in a softer, gentler voice. "I am to take it that those pains are integral to your being?" He thinks he understands. The Stupid brothers have their secret pains as well, much as they try to hide them - things that hurt Castiel deeply to have to witness and be able to do little about but let them flounder through.

His mouth opens to say a thing when the weaselly looking man snaps up Karen's purse. Really a mistake given the crowd. Especially as Castiel needs no lead time to teleport out and block the thief's exit, ending up just outside the doorway, facing down the man, uttering a menacing, "You wish to return that to the lady. Do not make me ask again."

Karen Page has posed:
That reaction makes Bucky laugh. "Okay. We'll do that. All four bottles on ice, if you please." The bartender looks at him, half-incredulous, and he raps metal knuckles on the bar. "I mean it. Chop chop."

Barnes lifts a hand to wave away the idea. "No, you did no harm. I dunno about integral. Long-standing, I guess. I kind of....don't know what to do when they're not there." Booze-fuelled honesty ahoy.

And then... Doubly a mistake, considering there's a trained German Shepherd right there. Oh, she's not an attack dog, she's a service dog. But service dogs are trained to get things for their masters. Without hesitation, he snaps his fingers, indicates the purse. "Lili, get." Delighted to have work to do, she's off like a shot, weaving among the patrons to go get the purse.


The weaselly man bolts out the door and straight into Castiel, having been moving fast enough to bounce right off of the angel and end up on his backside on the sidewalk, Karen's purse dropped nearby where Lili can scoop it up to take back to Bucky.

Karen makes it out the door just in time to see the weaselly guy on the ground with Castiel standing over him, and Lili absconding with her purse. She looks from thief to angel to dog incredulously, long enough for the service dog to disappear back inside.

"Hey!" Following Lili back in, she's getting over the initial shock. "Goddammit, gimmie back my purse!" She's now chasing after Lili, looking she's about ready to have a full-on ginger temper.

Castiel has posed:
Castiel gives a short bark of a laugh when Bucky orders the bottles, giving the barkeep a nodding but stern look that says he approves of this ordering message. There will be no argument from Castiel about the alcohol (even if he's raked Dean over the coals about this very thing in the past).

Of course the theft puts a damper on his other idea, which was to feel out Bucky's actual thoughts about the pain blockers, and his situation, the angel acting reflexively to the matter. He could seek out Bucky anytime. The purse thief is a whole other matter.

Of course, once stopped, and sitting on his ass on the damp spring pavement, Castiel leans over the weasley man, uttering in his most authoratative rumble, "You want to be far away from here and never come back. Do not make me demonstrate what will happen if I see you again."

Karen Page has posed:
Lili's expression is bemused, as she looks back over her shoulder at Karen. I was told to get the thing. I got the thing. I'm a good dog. And yet, human is angry. So there's a questioning tilt to her eyebrow dots as she comes prancing up to Bucky with the purse in her mouth.

Bucky has this momentarily blank look, one that might as well say loud 'this went differently in my head'. But thoughts catch up, and he says to the Shepherd, "Lili, give." Obediently, she gives it to him, and he, in turn, offers it wordlessly to Karen. Only then does he realize the angel vanished, and he looks around in obvious confusion. "The guy, he was just here...." he says to her. Like maybe Castiel was *in* the purse.


The weaselly guy stares up at Castiel with wide eyes, then scrambles to his feet and bolts away, not even slowing down to cross the street at the end of the block and causing several cars to honk at him.

Karen stomps right on over to the dog's human, but then stops herself and takes a breath before accepting her purse back. "Thank you. I..." She frowns, because the trenchcoat guy walked past her a moemnt ago to sit over here, but he's standing outside stopping the purse thief... She looks from Bucky toward the door where she can still see Cas outside, then back at Bucky's table where the angel's drinks still sit. Then she goes to collect her paperwork and stuff it into her purse before scooping up her whiskey and tossing it back in one huge gulp.

"What the fuck, Karen," she wheezes to herself near-silently.

Castiel has posed:
"Just what I thought," Castiel says to himself, inwardly satisfied by a job well done.

He teleports back into his seat, and turns to Bucky, "As I was saying, why have we not ordered the bottles before. This is a much more sensible way to enjoy the alcohol."

Karen Page has posed:
"Sorry, ma'am, I hope she didn't get teeth marks all over it." The assassin is genuinely contrite. "Did you see where the other guy went?"

And then Cas reappears. Buck is startled into wheezing and clutching his chest, for a moment - then he thumps himself on the breastbone. All better. Lili is horrified, ears going back. "Because it's a lot of booze and most folks don't need multiple bottles to get tanked. Do you even get drunk, in that body?"


Karen also startles visibly when Castiel is very suddenly back in his chair and chatting as if he'd never been gone. But she KNOWS he was gone, that shot she just slammed is the ONLY alcohol she's had all day.

Setting the tumbler down, she walks back over to the table with the pair of men, the dog, and faaar too much liquor, her eyes narrowed shrewdly and laser-focused on Castiel. "Okay, you're going to tell me how you did that, right now."

She's mentally betting the answer will be either 'magic' or 'mutant'.

Castiel has posed:
Castiel looks *very* concerned as Bucky gasps, wheezes, and thumps himself on the chest. "Do you need me to intervene?" Because he can. Short of death, there isn't much Castiel can't heal. Bucky's question given serious thought once it's clear the man was only startled and not dying.

"I am only vaguely able to experience the depths of the human experience. While the body remembers the alcohol, and was fond of it, I do not truly experience the drunk. I have been able to allow myself the approximation of this, but it is in my nature to heal myself, and the vessel as I inhabit it. It is this reason I do not need to sleep, eat, or breathe." Or drink, as it happens. "I do enjoy the alcohol, though. And the pizza."

In fact, Castiel has found himself enjoying many things, on a much more purely human level than when he first arrived. It would seem that his exposure to humanity, and experiencing aspects of it, have created within him an appreciation and approximation of these things.

It will never, however, make him require the basics of human sustenance. That, it is true, his healing factor makes unecessary. As long as he has a portion of his Grace, there will always be that part of him that can not come close to human.

It's about here in his speil that Karen is *right* *there* *in* *his* *face*. Her words a punctuation of demand of him.

The angel furrowing his brows at her into a dishevelled mess of surprise. Girl has moxy. Or she's a fool. Not that the two things are terribly different in the end.

"I am an angel of the Lord, once of the Choir. I merely willed myself from here to there to stop him. You are the owner of that container. I trust that nothing was missing from it?"

Karen Page has posed:
It's made Buck go thoughtful again, as much as he can, with the adrenaline and the booze. "I don't know whether you're better off not having all the stuff to deal with....or if we have the advantage of you." There's something there in the blue eyes, distant and strange.

Whatever else he was going to stay, Karen diverts him from. He just shrugs, spreads his hands. Cas is telling the truth. The question is if she's smart enough to believe him.


Karen's angry-face is replaced by surprise and then incredulity. An ANGEL? Seriously? "I gotta admit, that's a new one." And then he asks about her purse and she blinks and ohs, promptly rummaging through it right there. "Uh, yeah, everything's here. So... seriously? You're an actual, honest-to-shit angel?" She looks Castiel up and down, taking in his generally disheveled appearance. "Matt'll never believe this," she mutters to herself before turning to Bucky. "So who're you? Aragorn?"

Castiel has posed:
Bucky's strange look for Castiel is met by one of the angel's own, his blue eyes gentled and compassionate. "I am not unaware of these things you call emotions. I find that the more I know you, the more I wish to understand these things. You are not what we were led to believe you were." And, indeed, he's thrown his lot in with humanity on the basis of hope that they were worth his Fall; that those very emotions that create the human experience were worth all he had given up.

As for Karen, that gentled look in his eyes grows amused, the blue sparkling. "Honest to shit," he repeats after her. "I am an angel of the Lord. Once of the Choir. I could demonstrate, but it has been impressed upon me that it is not the best thing to do in public quarters."

Karen Page has posed:
"I dunno, man.....humanity is pretty awful. You'd be smart to get out while the getting is good," he assures Cas.

Which thought is summarily dismissed by a wave of the gloved hand. "Nah, me, I'm nobody," he says, hastily. "Though I like those movies."


Karen looks at Castiel for a moment longer before claiming a chair at their table without asking. "No kidding? Matt is totally gonna lose it over this." She speaks of this Matt person with a fondness that has no romantic tones to it whatsoever.

"And you, Mr. Nobody, I know a lie when I hear one, and you lie like a cheap rug. If not Aragorn, then you're who? Jon Snow? No wait, don't tell me." She turns sideways in her chair to stare at Bucky intently, her arms wrapped around the purse kept in her lap. "I'm gonna figure you out."

Castiel has posed:
Castiel chooses not to protest Bucky's assertion of being nobody. He can not let the other lie, though. "I made my choice when I refused to apologize for the arrogance of saving one of you from your fate. I may only be stubborn, but I have watched you for eons now, and can not believe any longer that you are not worth this sacrifice."

And in the realms of what things cost, Bucky and Castiel have paid a like price. It is, ultimately, why the angel found himself drawn to this broken specimen of a man, and unbeknownst to Bucky, put him under his protection.

Karen's joining them is met only with a gesture to the barkeep for more glasses for her. Asking her, "This Matt. Would he be the blind one who wears his faith like a suit?"

Karen Page has posed:
That makes Buck rueful. "Nah. Those guys are the center of the story. I guess that makes me the third orc from the left, or somethin'. It's New York. Full of millions of little people, ya know?"

He eyes Cas but doesn't disagree....though the angel's question has him looking back quickly to Karrin. He doesn't repeat Cas's query, but he's clearly awaiting he answer.


Karen blinks and looks over at Castiel when he describes Matt almost perfectly. "Uh, yeah. You've met him? And he didn't have a complete meltdown? I'm so gonna ask him about you just to see his reaction."

She thanks the barkeep for the fresh glass and reaches for one of the bottles without bothering to see which it is. She pours herself just a little -- she DOES have to walk home, after all -- then holds it in one hand to peer at the two men over the rim.

"No way you're some extra, Mr. Nobody. I'm thinking more ... Samwise Gamgee, maybe. You look like you're missing somebody to follow."

Castiel has posed:
Castiel chuckles and tells Karen, "Ask him what I am. Or I could show you. However, I am told it is an extreme experience." Even if you aren't one of the faithful.

When she's done with the bottle, he takes it up and pours himself and Bucky another, letting his friend answer for himself to the woman. He has sympathy for Bucky. Karen is something of a spitfire.

Karen Page has posed:
The Soldier's lips twist. "Maybe I'm Boromir," he says, simply. "The guy who's gone before the end of the first movie. There's always someone who doesn't come back from the quest." He shrugs, faintly, but knocks back his drink. Almost visibly withdrawing, though he doesn't shrink away physically.


"Nope," Karen says with certainty before sipping at her drink. "You're here, aren't you? Besides, you don't look like Sean Bean." She glances at the slim watch on her wrist. "Oh, I gotta go. But, I'm gonna keep thinking about it, Mr. Nobody. I WILL figure you out sooner or later." She tosses back the rest of her drink then upends the glass on the table. "And thanks for the drink, Proginoskes. See you two around." She gets up and pulls a $20 from her purse to set on the table. Then she shoulders her bag, puts one hand on Bucky's shoulder as she steps past him, then (I know, shame) pauses to pat Lili briefly before she walks briskly out of the bar.