d-day ✯ spam

[withtheoldbreed]

[Open Spam for the Deck]

[It happens quickly. One minute, Gene's sitting in the rocky Peleliu hills, hearing Burgie's voice over and over in his head - Sniper got the Skipper, Ack Ack's dead - watching someone pull the wool blanket over the Skipper's head, and the next, he's here. Standing on the deck of a ship, looking out at a seemingly endless horizon of stars. He remembers the conversation, the promise that this could be fixed, a wrong could be righted, and he remembers agreeing, but he blinks, and suddenly, the hills, the crackle of gunfire, the solemn footsteps, his buddies are all gone.

He's alone. For the first time in well over a year, he's alone, and that hits him like a ton of bricks.

It's cold, is the next thing he realizes. At least, it's colder than the hundred and fifteen degree temperatures he's been forced to cope with for the last month, and he shivers involuntarily. He's still holding his helmet in one hand, his rifle in the other. His pack and sidearm and filthy fatigue green dungarees he's been wearing since they landed on that fucking beach have all come along too, along with the dirt and dried blood. Sometimes, it feels like he'd do anything for a shower, even a cold one with salt water.

He's filthy, exhausted, and he's staring out at an ocean of stars. Everything hurts - the scrapes and sores on his face, arms, feet, his feet in general, but his chest, too, even if that's a different kind of pain entirely - but for a moment, he's utterly distracted, staring. What is this? What kind of ship had he volunteered for?

For the hundredth time since he got on the LVT, Eugene Sledge wonders what the hell he was thinking when he volunteered for any of this.]

[ooc: multiples & fuzzy time are all welcomed. c8]

Comments

[spam]

[routemistress]

[Iris is on her way back from testing out the new Enclosure with her dogs when she sees him. Her first thought is Dillon?

But she's gotten close to Dillon, and although the man shares Dillon's topology, it's clearly not him: the body language, the facial expression, the clothes are different and the dogs are earpricking in their alertly friendly Stranger?? mode.

She keeps them closely at heel and goes to investigate the newcomer.]

Evening, my love. Quite a view, isn't it?

[spam obvs~]

[punched_hitler]

[Steve is just coming down from checking out the new "room" that appears to have taken the place of both the CTS and CES; naturally, he's in uniform, with the shield strapped to his back, but he's pulling the helmet off as he heads down to the deck - it wasn't really necessary, but he'd figured (for once in his life) better safe than sorry.

He plans to stop for a couple minutes on deck - it's chilly, now, and he might just like the fact that weather like this doesn't bother him so much anymore, but that's when he catches sight of the figure standing, alone and looking a little bewildered, just down the deck.

He approaches, gets a better look, and starts to say,]

Dillon - ? [But no. That's not Dillon. It looks like Dillon, but there's no way Dillon would be wearing Marine dungarees and looking like he just stepped off a battlefield. Dillon's strange, but he's not that strange.

Plus, the look in this guy's eyes is very different.

The craziest thing is, maybe, the way the guy looks is so familiar - Steve saw the newsreels, and he did plenty of research when he "woke up," that it's almost comforting, even though this guy is clearly lost. And clearly new.]

Hey, Marine.

[mistconduct]

Hey, Dill Pickles! Catch!

[All of a sudden, a Nerf football comes rocketing at Gene's head]

[anewlanguage]

[Cain is investigating, making sure everyone is more or less stable before he heads out. It says a lot about the type of boat this is that when he sees that scraped up, muddy, bloody kid he doesn't necessarily assume it means the kid's eggs are scrambled.]

You'd be amazed how much better you feel when you've washed it off.

[Meaning the blood more than the grime.]

[americasdirtiest]

[Mickey's not good at immediately discriminating between facetwins yet, and his first assumption is that it's Dillon. A very dirty, bloody Dillon, for some reason, but Dillon all the same.]

Hey.

[It's exceedingly, cautiously neutral. The last time he and Dillon spoke, they had sort of come to a silent mutual accord, but he does not really want to tip his hand one way or the other right now.

Until he spots the rifle and his eyes brighten.]

Shit -- where's everyone getting their hands on all these M-fucking-ones? 'Zat from Barnes?

spam; after someone else presumably gets him to the infirmary!!

[freezerburns]

[The smell of blood and dirt and sweat are unmistakable. Isaac doesn't really close his heightened senses off like Scott does, and he catches the scent strongly as he's heading up from his room on Level Five. When he steps out of the stairwell it's easy enough to see who the scent's coming from: the muddy, bloody, exhausted-looking guy with the military pack and rifle who looks - under the grime - like Dillon (not that Isaac really knows him but he's never looked like this) but also like absolute hell. Getting a little closer - speeding up because wow, dude, what the hell happened to you? - the scent gets more complicated, notes of gunpowder and grief and fresh antiseptic and bandages and raw wounds underneath.]

Whoa, dude, are you okay?

[adelphoktonos]

[Helena, of course, recognises his face as Dillon's. The thing is, she also recognises the rifle and the uniform as one she's seen pictures of in books about World War II (she tried to find out more about Bucky's war after he'd first told her about it, explained about it and, although she's not exactly a scholar, she has learned a little). She's used to the idea of Barge twins by now - not that people sharing a face sits entirely comfortably with her - and she knows this isn't Dillon.

She sidles up and regards him from under the furred hood of her cold-weather military jacket, hands stuck in her pockets. (There's a silence before she actually speaks that he might recognise as not so different from the pause that usually comes before Snafu talks.)]

Who are you?

[semifreakingnormal]

[He doesn't see Gene until he stumbles on the infirmary. Scott was just about to leave, might have bumped into Dillon's look-alike if he'd been a few minutes faster. As it is, he's close when the - army? navy? he has no clue, still - when the other young man enters the infirmary, and for a second, his heart rate ratchets. How could Dillon get this hurt, who could have done it, how could Scott not have known--

And a second after that, the smell of death floods his nose and he can't breathe. He's staring at Gene, but all he sees is black, some cramped corner of Peter's - of Venom's room, and all he can smell is his own death, like he smelled as his legs gave out from under him, as Isaac and Erica tore into him--

He blinks, twice, thrice, and reaches out.]

Did you - just get here?

[He's not Dillon. Scott can smell the difference, under all that - under everything else.]