InsaneJournal

Who: Tandy Bowen & Sam Wilson
Where: Near the Tower and inside it
When: Backdated to Saturday
What: Tandy reveals her power and Sam makes a suggestion
Status: Closed | Completed Gdoc
Warnings: None

There had been a lot of people coming and going lately and Sam was making an effort to meet all of the new arrivals. With Steve here, he didn’t need to take up the shield, nor did he have much of a desire to, however, he knew that at some point it might become necessary and he wanted to be on good terms with everyone just in case. As such, he was out running some errands when he spotted one of the newer arrivals, a younger girl named Tandy, carrying an armload of shopping bags. She appeared to be on her way back to the Tower, so he jogged over, figuring he could offer his assistance and also get to know her a little better. Thus far, he hadn’t been able to figure out what her connection was to the rest of their group, which made her something of an anomaly. Sure, Strange probably knew the answer, but the wizard kind of freaked him out. “Hey, Tandy,” he said, coming up behind the blonde. *** Tandy had gone out almost every day, and while she hadn’t done too much shopping, she had started to try and get to know where things were in the city. Now, though, she had decided to actually go out and get some stuff - mainly a few articles of clothing and a couple books, but even those few items had meant several bags to carry, and she wasn’t paying a lot of attention to her surroundings as she made her way back to the Tower, turning on a mostly empty street. When she heard an unfamiliar voice call out her name, the teenager spun in surprise, dropping one of the bags as her powers automatically flared to life in the form of a bright white dagger in her hand. She was already lifting it defensively when she saw the man - and realized he looked familiar. “You’re - Sam?” *** “Woah, hey, I come in peace,” Sam said, holding his hands up in front of himself when she whirled around with some kind of weapon in her hand. “Yeah, Sam Wilson. Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you. I was just going to offer to help you carry your bags back to the Tower.” He stared at the object in her hand. It was unlike anything he’d ever seen before and he also had no idea where it came from. “What is that?” he asked, nodding towards her hand. *** “You didn’t scare me,” she replied as she lowered her hand slowly. “You just surprised me.” At his question, Tandy didn’t bother looking down as the light winked out of existence and she reached down to grab the bag off the sidewalk. It would be pretty lame of her to try and shrug it off entirely, so instead she just gave Sam a half shrug with one shoulder. “A dagger. Haven’t you seen a blade before?” She asked innocently, though she was still a little tense. *** If Sam didn’t have a lot of questions already, he would have more after seeing the dagger vanish just as abruptly as it seemed to have appeared. He bent down to pick up her bag, holding out his hand offering to take more of the load from her. “I’ve seen plenty of blades,” he said. “Never any that glowed. Or appeared and disappeared seemingly out of nowhere.” His tone was conversational, not judgmental or overly questioning. He knew that Tandy probably didn’t have much reason to trust him, or any of them really, but he was curious. *** Tandy hesitated for a few seconds, then slowly passed over another of her bags as she studied him. If he was an Avenger, she probably could trust him with this kind of thing - and it was still weird to know that she was rubbing elbows with them, more or less. Still, trust for her was hard to come by and she didn’t yet know how much she wanted to say out loud. “It’s...a power. That I have,” Tandy said at last, though it was a little reluctant yet. “I can make daggers, and a sword. And throw balls of light.” That was safe enough to tell him - the fact that she could go into someone’s mind and see or steal their hopes? She could keep that to herself. “I don’t really know what it is.” *** “Interesting,” Sam said as they continued walking towards the Tower. “It’s too bad Wanda isn’t still around. Sounds vaguely similar to what she can do.” Maybe that was Tandy’s connection to them? Maybe she was in danger of being grabbed and sent to Genosha but somehow found her way to them beforehand. It was something to consider and maybe he’d run it by Strange and Tony to see what they thought. As far as he knew, Wanda couldn’t make bladed weapons, but she could create balls of energy and otherwise manipulate it. “How long have you been able to do that?” he asked. *** Tandy shrugged at his mention of one of the other Avengers, because honestly? She knew very little about most of them, only what she’d caught from news reports and stuff. The attack on Manhattan had only been five years earlier, from her perspective, and they were still relatively unknown even if they were considered heroes - or felons, depending on the news source. “About nine months or so?” She hesitated, then looked over at Sam while they walked. “Something happened to me when I was just a kid, and then eight years later...they suddenly manifested.” It had actually happened after she and Tyrone had touched hands, but while she might tell Sam - or the others - about herself, she wasn’t willing to talk about her best friend quite as much without his consent. *** Sam sensed that she wasn’t sharing everything and he understood why so he wasn’t going to push too hard. “Does it cause you any pain or other problems?” he asked. The whole superpower thing was a bit out of his realm of expertise, but there were plenty of other people that could probably help her out if she needed it. “Have you met Carol yet? If not, you should,” he added. “She’s got a bunch of powers.” *** “Nope, none at all.” From what little she’d gathered about the people from Genosha, what she and Ty had was very different from their abilities. Hers weren’t genetic, but she and Tyrone had somehow both gotten this instead of something worse...like what Andre ended up with. “No, I don’t think so. Was she in that Genosha place?” She asked curiously as she looked over at him. *** That was something at least. Sam was definitely curious about what happened to her as a child to give her those abilities, but he wasn’t a science person so he wasn’t going to ask too many questions about it. “Ah, no, she was born on Earth, but got kidnapped by a bunch of aliens and ended up with superpowers,” he explained, realizing that it sounded pretty ridiculous. “She can probably explain better than I can. You should look her up though.” *** “Maybe I will,” she said slowly, as they reached the tower, but then looked at Sam again instead of walking inside. There were too many cameras in there and honestly? Friday kind of creeped her out. “Mine aren’t from aliens, I don’t think. I mean - they came from underground. Here on Earth.” *** “From underground?” Sam repeated. It sounded like she got hers accidentally somehow, instead of deliberately like Wanda, which meant they were probably dealing with something unrelated to HYDRA. Maybe it was closer to what the Genosha people had. The genetics people would probably be able to figure that out. He pushed open the door and held it for her. “If you want to know more about them, we can probably ask the science people. Once they’re done sorting out Bruce and Steve’s current issue. But you should also think about learning how to fight. Carol might be able to teach you.” Sam figured he shouldn’t offer since she was a young girl and some people might get the wrong idea. *** “Yeah,” she said quietly. It wasn’t anywhere close to the full story, but that much was accurate as far as she knew. As she stepped into the tower, Tandy frowned at Sam. “The science people? Like...who?” The only one she really knew was a scientist was Bruce though she knew that Tony Stark was an engineer and genius, even if she didn’t know him personally. “I can fight some. I know how to throw daggers, at least,” she told him. “But I can maybe talk to her, I guess.” Talking couldn’t hurt, at least. *** Sam headed over to the private elevator bank, nodding at the guard who was on duty so that Tandy didn’t have to worry about showing ID or anything. “Banner, Hope, Shuri, those new doctors, Xavier and Kinross,” he rattled off the names. As the elevator rose, he gave her a smile. “I know this has to be a lot for you,” he said. “But if you need anything, please don’t hesitate to ask. We all got into this Avengers thing so we could help people.” *** Following after him, Tandy shifted her bags a little as she took in the names, but made a face once they were inside and he went on. “I don’t want to turn into someone’s science experiment, or be dissected or whatever. How do I know they wouldn’t try that?” She asked as she studied him. “We have the Avengers at home, but...it’s not like they’re always around when they’re needed. But I guess half of them are fugitives now, back there.” Still, they would’ve been a big help in a lot of ways. *** It was a fair question, especially with the whole Genosha thing going on, so Sam didn’t blame her for asking. “I trust Bruce with my life,” he said. “And he’s trusting the others with his.” He knew that wasn’t really a good answer and probably wouldn’t help Tandy feel better about things, but it was the best he could do. “There’s no rush to do anything,” he said. “Take your time, get comfortable, get to know us. That’s all I can really tell you. Unless you’re hiding some psychic powers, there’s no way to know for certain.” *** Tandy wasn’t so sure she was ready to put her life in someone else’s hands unless those hands were Tyrone’s, but if they were the Avengers...they could be trusted, right? They were supposed to be heroes. “Nope, no psychic powers,” she replied, though even the mention made her tempted to see if she could see his hopes; that would tell her if she could trust him, and as the elevator opened, she reached out to take her bag back. As their hands touched, her power flickered to life in her palm, out of his sight. *** Sam handed her bags back with a smile, unaware that she was able to see anything in his mind. At the moment, his number one hope was that the science folks would be able to reverse whatever was done to Steve and Bruce to take away their serum-induced abilities, particularly Steve since Sam had a lot of concerns about his friend’s ill health. Far beneath the surface, where even he wasn’t consciously aware of it, lurked a hope for a future with Carol. “Well, if there is anything I can do, please let me know,” he said. “We really do want to help you, Tandy.” *** While virtually only a second passed in realtime, in his mind Tandy studied his hopes, and wondered about whatever it was that had happened to Steve and Bruce. She hadn’t really heard about that, but it interested her enough that she considered possibly trying to get close to them to find out for herself at some point. The sweeter hope below, with a blonde woman she didn’t recognize, actually did more to make her trust him than the other. When she took the bag, Tandy flashed him a faint smile. “I will. And thanks...maybe I will talk to them,” she added, then slipped out of the elevator to head to her room.