[Video]

[usavatar]

[He examines the monitor with the passing familiarity of someone who knows how this works, but isn't entirely used to it and doesn't particularly like it. Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, solemn.]

Thank you, first of all, to the people who helped me out of the water and into the city. I hope some of you see this. If there's anything I can do to repay you for that, please don't hesitate to ask. My name is Steve. Steve Rogers. I'm a captain in the United States Army, from Earth, or Midgard, I guess, if you're familiar with that name. This… Well, I'm not sure what to make of it all, but I'm curious to know if anyone is trying or has tried to get to their homes from here.

Are there people from Earth here? Or other worlds. Anyone at all, really, who'd be willing to tell me more about what we're into.

I'm more than willing to meet wherever you feel most comfortable.

[A pause, a nod, and he turns off the feed.]

Comments

video;

[littlecousin]

[Blond pointy-eared young woman with weird eyebrows squinting uncertainly at the screen.]

...Cap?

[Why are you...not you?]

video;

[usavatar]

Miss. [Um. Hello there. He tilts his head to try and get a better look at her and promptly remembers why he dislikes video communication.] I'm sorry, have we met?

video;

[littlecousin]

[Well. It has been a long time, and a lot has happened...]

Do--do you remember Namor, at least?

video;

[usavatar]

[Mystified is him.] No, I'm afraid not. I've never met anyone named Namor. What's your name?

video;

[littlecousin]

[No. Cap is a constant, the only human Namor ever speaks of with untainted respect, sometimes the sole reason he hasn't given up on the surface entirely. Cap can't not remember Namor.

She'd been managing before, in the face of everything, simply by not thinking about it. And now she can't. It takes Nita a second of obvious devastation before she pulls things together by sheer force of will.]

...Namorita Prentiss.

[She's not sure if she should just hang up.]

video;

[usavatar]

Wait. [Instinct prompts him to say it. He looks away from the console, toward the window, where he can see gargoyles on the opposite building vomiting multicolored flames over the street.] Where are you?

[Because no one gets a look like hers unless they've been through some recent personal hell, and he's not about to leave it at 'I'm not the man you know'.]

video;

[littlecousin]

Water. 3A.

[Even though she's also not sure she wants him dropping in, answering Cap is automatic.]

video; > perma-action;

[usavatar]

[It takes him a while to find her location, given the fact that he has no idea where he's going, and he gets comparatively little help from the kedan in the Fire Sector. The woman's warning against their unfriendliness is on his mind until he hits the first blues and turquoises that delineate what must be the Water Sector, and from there he only gets turned around twice trying to follow directions.

So here is one (1) off-brand Captain America at Nita's door.]

perma-action;

[littlecousin]

[After Cap hangs up, Nita paces for a while, seriously considering going to hide out at Favrielle's. It's taking him forever, especially by the standards of someone who's used to flying everywhere, and all she can think about is everything.

With a splash, Nita dives into the pool, letting herself settle to the bottom in a sad little ball. It's no big deal. She'll hear him at the door, and a wet face hides tears. The wall she built inside herself to keep the much-too-recent past at bay is dangerously close to breaking, and it's taking everything she has not to crumble.

Wrapped in her misery, she doesn't notice Steve knocking.]

[usavatar]

[When no one answers, he tries to see if there's another entrance he might have missed - and in the process discovers a walkway to the pool. With the girl from the video feed on the bottom.

It takes a breath for him to shed his jacket and shoes as he races for the edge and into a dive. Because boyscout.]

I CAN SWIM. GO GET HIM!

[littlecousin]

[The splash breaks her reverie and she looks up, startled, to see Cap swimming toward her with an intense expression on his face. It doesn't occur to her that this Cap, not knowing Namor, also doesn't know she can breathe underwater, so she stands and frowns up at him, concerned.]

Cap? What's wrong?

[Atlanteans can talk underwater because comics.]

REAL MOVIE HERO

[usavatar]

[Well that inspires a flounder and an attempt to get to the surface as quickly as possible, because NOT AS PLANNED OR EXPECTED.]

[littlecousin]

[Oops. Well, he can't explain what's going on while he's down here, and if there are hordes of anti-foreigner kedan rampaging through the sector, it ought to become immediately obvious once she breaks the surface.

Nita swims up behind Cap and hooks her arms underneath his, lifting him smoothly out of the water into into the air. She sets him on the pool deck and darts around to hover in front of him with one of those quick, no-motions-lost maneuvers experienced fliers tend to use.]

Is everything okay?

[Since there do not appear to be barbarians at the gates.]

[usavatar]

[He coughs, recovering more from the sudden jolt from the water and the sight of her flying under her own power than anything.

Once he trusts himself to speak without choking:] I. Thought you were drowning.

[SHEEPISH? YES A BIT.]

[littlecousin]

[Since there will be no SPRINGING INTO BATTLE, Nita lands, looking up at Cap.]

But I'm Atlant--oh. Right. You don't know me.

[And all the melancholy momentarily banished by Cap's dramatic arrival comes flooding back.]

[usavatar]

[--Adkjsdj he is dripping wet and she can fly and breathe under water and he needs a bit of mental calibration for a sec, Nita, before the guilt at her change in mood sets in. Which it does, in short order.]

Ma'am- [A pause, because that particular word choice probably drove home the fact that he's a stranger. Gently:] I'm sorry I'm not the man you know. But I would like to know you, if... [a gesture toward the chairs at the side of the pool.] If that's something you're comfortable with.

[littlecousin]

[Cap just called her "ma'am." She cannot even deal with that, and swallows hard before forcing out a shaky...]

...Sure.

[Nita sits sideways on one of the lounge chairs, hunched up on herself, a posture that would signal something's off with anyone, but is practically catastrophic on her.]