Aim high and you won't shoot your foot off

[cisskabob]

WHO: Cissie AND YOU
WHAT: A chance to get to know each other a bit before the memory share event in August! c: Run into Cissie out and about, tag her with a marker, make conversation, eat her cooking.
WHERE: Around Dualis--in the dorms, at Home on the Range, the indoor archer range, in a coffee shop, pick your poisono
WHEN: End of July/Beginning of August
WARNINGS: N/A at the moment; will update if necessary


a) Out and About: Coffee Shops, Library, Around Town

Cissie's developed something of a routine, now that she's been in Dualis for a little over a month. She remains unsettled by the bombing and the strange messages from "the heart," but she hasn't gone digging too deep for information. That's more Tim's realm, and she knows there are a lot of people interested in looking into that. She's more focused on trying to get the lay of the land, and making sure she and the people she cares about can stay as safe as possible--which is difficult when your friends actively seek out danger like they need it to breathe.

On a typical day, she gets up and leaves the room early to get breakfast and a morning run in while giving Tim some quiet space to sleep, stopping for a coffee and maybe a pastry at one of the many, many coffee shops nearby. She spends quite a bit of time at the library, trying to learn what she can, before heading to her part time job.

b) Home on the Range

Cissie stumbled across the indoor archery range (appropriately named Home on the Range) by accident, but she couldn't have been more thrilled to find it. She missed the range and practicing in a familiar setting, while she was in the Village. She has a job here now, as a part-time instructor. She teaches lessons to kids and adults and everyone in between, both in groups or in private lessons, depending on what she's assigned. She finds that she really likes it, especially when it comes to the kids. Sometimes it's awkward when her client isn't entirely humanoid, but she's finding her way and her voice, and she can't help but remember Shaun Mason in Wonderland, who was the first person to tell her she should try teaching archery.

When Cissie isn't working, she still winds up spending a fair amount of her time there. It's been far too long since she was able to spend the daily hours practicing her archery that she used to, and now that she can, she's working hard to build her stamina back up and get back to her old normal. (Of course, her old normal was that of an Olympic gold medalist who has been training since the age of three, but it was still her normal.) Most of her practice time is spent on form and function, but occasionally, if no one else is in the gym, she can't help pulling some of her old tricks, just to make sure she still can. (Spoiler alert: she can.)

c) The Dorms: 5th Floor Kitchen or Lounge

One of the things Cissie actually liked about living in the Village was learning how to cook. She never had to, before. When she was little, her mother did all of the cooking (such as it was), and then she lived in boarding school with a cafeteria before landing in Wonderland, where food appeared by magic. The Village was horrible in a lot of ways, especially when it came to food, but she did start cooking, mainly out of necessity. The stoves and refrigerators and stores in Dualis are significantly better than what she had there, and Cissie doesn't want to stop learning now. She checks cookbooks out of the library and begins experimenting in the communal kitchen on the fifth floor of the dorms. It may not be anything particularly difficult or fancy, and it doesn't always come out right, but Cissie has managed to master a decent spaghetti and meatball dinner. Whatever she cooks, there's always more than enough to share and she's happy to do so, usually leaving the leftovers in the fridge with a note to "help yourself."

She can be found in the kitchen cooking more food than one nineteen year old can possibly eat, or attempting to bake a loaf of bread, or a tray of muffins, or she can be found in the lounge on the other end of the floor, reading in a sunny spot and taking notes on things she wants to try.

d) Free Choice!

Cissie is fairly social, so feel free to find her out and about wherever your character may run into her, if none of the above options work for you! (Also, she is participating in marker tag, so she likely has a good covering of marks on her person and may well have given your character some as well.)

Comments

B, of course

[pretendtoneedme]

"That's not bad." The voice behind Cissie might startle her, or not; Clint's well aware that archers tend to have very good perception, and Cissie's clearly one of the best he's seen. But he's got his own talents of moving around with such a soft step that he's basically a damn ninja, and he's been known in the past to take even other spies off guard with how he can pop up without them noticing. It's not something he tries to do, it's just something that happens at this point - and to be fair, it's something he's not taking any pains to mitigate in this city because he has absolutely no trust in why he (or anyone else) is here.

But he'd been out in the city, looking for Koenig Fitness and Recreation, the place he'd been told he was supposed to start working as a self-defense instructor in a couple of days, when he'd stumbled across Home on the Range, a place he completely hadn't been expecting. Back at home, archery was kind of a "fad" sport, though it was slowly getting more popular thanks to some prominent movies and even himself a little, so there weren't all that many places dedicated to simply practicing it. Those who used it for hunting tended to shoot in woods far away from other people, and he knew a fair number of gun ranges that had times set aside for archers, but only a few specifically for archery. The fact that there was a bows-only range in Dualis was a surprise, but one he'd been happy to see. Part of the deal he'd taken had been to not pick up a bow and shoot, but in practice it was kind of a moot point, and one that had never been enforced beyond a certain level. His own basic sets hadn't been taken away, and he'd been allowed to purchase ones for Cooper and Lila when they'd finally gotten old enough that he was willing to teach them. (Well, Laura had. Same thing.) His special, S.H.I.E.L.D.-grade equipment had been confiscated, but a normal bow and a standard arrow couldn't really do anything beyond shoot something, unlike Scott's Ant-Man suit, and Clint himself was the threat even without his weapons.

But a place here to keep his skills sharp was a blessing he hadn't expected, and Clint had immediately gone in and put down enough money for an hour's shooting and the equipment rental fee, no questions asked, despite the fact that it was the vast majority of the money in his possession. He'd get more soon enough; right now, he wanted to practice. The face of the woman behind the desk had been surprised verging on shocked when he'd asked for a compound bow with a draw weight of 200 pounds, but it had smoothed away quickly and she'd presented him with two to perform an arrowless, experimental draw on. The second felt better to him so he'd taken that one, she'd handed over a full quiver, and he'd gone up to the second floor, just in time to see Cissie performing what honestly looked like a weird (but somehow appropriate) cross between his and Nat's skillsets.

"You look pretty confident with what you're doing. Good to see someone who knows training's important." Clint's tone isn't in any way talking down, taking her less seriously because she's young and a girl; it's conversational, even lightly approving as he shrugs off his flannel shirt, leaning the bow against the wall so he can strap the quiver around his torso, slide the three-finger glove on his left hand, and then tie the arm guard onto his right forearm. The long sleeves would only get in the way, he's learned that well enough over the years. "A lot of people just wanna be elves or whatever now, they don't get that it's work to do something like that without a computer to help you."

[cisskabob]

Cissie is surprised by the voice, but only because she was focused and well into that zone where nothing really exists but her and the arrow and the target, where her muscles do what they have to without much conscious thought, and she can depend on her arrows hitting whatever target she aims for. Still, alarmed or not, she has the sense and control to know better than to react as if she's being threatened, even given their circumstances. (Maybe it's because of their circumstances that she's able to react calmly; she knows the club staff by now, and knows her surroundings here. She also knows she could defend herself here, of all places, better than anywhere else. She has a bow in her hands here.)

Cissie turns to see who is speaking to her, and she can tell he knows what he's doing just by the way he moves. He isn't someone here for beginner lessons, or even lessons at all. His shoulder muscles alone tell her that much. His compliment brings a smile, and she catches the approval in his tone; it makes her blush, hopefully not enough to show, given how hard she's been working and pushing her body.

She also can't help but laugh when he mentions elves. "Oh, man, tell me about it. I don't think people understand CGI and special effects. Like hobbits are real, right? You can even tell the actors in those movies aren't actually the ones shooting their bows!" She rolls her eyes, and grins a little sheepishly. "My friends kind of refuse to watch movies with me when there's archery. Especially if it's a Robin Hood story."

[pretendtoneedme]

"They're shooting the bows - they're just not shooting them at the targets the arrows hit." Which, really, is fair enough, since the actors are making a movie and they don't want anyone getting hurt from it. He knows enough to know that actors who take on those roles aren't given real arrows, rather blunt sticks or even nothing at all, with the computers putting in arrows later along the correct path. Even in the old days before the computer revolution they were mostly hollow sticks on invisible threads or, at best, foam-tipped sticks. Except for Kurosawa, but he and Mifune were just insane. "Safety and all that stuff, it's not like they wanna skewer a cameraman. But it still amazing they're shooting anything with their forms mostly being crap. Sorry I startled you, but I didn't wanna surprise you by walking up next to you when you had a live shot in your hands. Kind of a bad idea and all that."

Clint's knowledge of range protocol could only further cement Cissie's assessment that he isn't here for lessons or training, at least not the kind of training she's being paid to give. Instead of picking up the bow, he begins a series of stretches that should be intimately familiar to her, geared as they are towards loosening the shoulders and warming up the arm muscles: wrist flexors and wrist extensors, triceps stretches, and carefully but firmly pulling one arm across his body with the other to extend the muscles he'll need for shooting. He's not focused on a general body exercise at the moment, he'll have somewhere else pretty soon to do weightlifting and cardio, this place is specifically for archery. If he's going to pay to be here, he's going to use all of that time.

"I don't really have that problem, but I've got others of my own," he says as he stretches, working his muscle groups individually until he can feel that comfortable relaxation that indicates they're at the right stage, then moving on to the next (while ignoring her blush). "I've got a bad habit of yelling or laughing at stupid horror movies 'cause the people in them are so dumb. But that's more something everyone knows, so I guess more people are willing to put up with it, and me throwing things at the TV." Because of course he does. "Looks like you come here often, with that kind of skill."

[cisskabob]

Cissie waves off his apology with a smile, crossing the room to collect her arrows. It's clear he knows what he's doing and this isn't new for him, so she leaves him to it, but she giggles a bit when he mentions throwing things at the tv. If he's anything like her, he's long ago learned not to throw heavy objects at it; her aim is too good, and televisions are expensive. Returning to the other end of the gym, she offers a friendly smile before moving into her own set of cool down stretches.

"Well, kind of. I'm still pretty new around here--I've only been in the city for a little over a month, but it didn't take me long to find this place. I work here part time, though, and gym time is a perk. But yeah, my mom always liked to say I could draw a bow before I could read."

There were a lot of other things her mother liked to say about her and her archery, but that one was true and not one of the worse statements, so she doesn't mind sharing it. "I'm Cissie, by the way. Cissie King-Jones. You look pretty familiar with a bow yourself."

[pretendtoneedme]

To be fair, he's also been told to stop throwing things at the TV too many times to not have learned to stop by this point, unless it was a deliberate bad movie night. At least popcorn isn't going to break anything. Just make a mess.

"You're one of the hijacked?" It's his own private term for what's happened to them all; it seems appropriate, given the weird tech-focus that Dualis seems to have. Of course the Head had said that a lot of the people here were technically not native, but from what else had passed in that not-really-a-conversation he'd gotten the idea that the crop of recent "acquisitions" was a special case, prompted by finding a solution to that plague. Or at least that was the public line - he's been a spy way too damn long to not have serious doubts about everything he'd been told. "Guess I am, too - I've only been here about ten days. I didn't think this place had an archery range, but I also didn't look for the yellow pages or some kind of index."

Stretching accomplished, Clint reclaims the bow he'd rented and moves to the farthest distance line from the row of targets, almost to the wall, and brings it up into an excellent shooting form. His arm and shoulder align, his elbow's straight, and he pulls back the string to just past his eye, tilting his head just slightly to get a read on his chosen target even without an arrow nocked, getting used to the pull of this specific bow. "Clint, Clint Barton." With the number of people (kids) here who seemed to know him, at this point it wouldn't surprise him if Cissie was in that category, and if she did it would save him answering some questions. But if she wasn't, she definitely knew her stuff. "You could say that. I didn't start as early as it sounds like you did, but I've been doing it most of my life. Once it gets in your blood, it won't let you go." And knowing she's far out of the way and no one else is in the room, Clint draws an arrow from his quiver, nocks, aims, and fires, all in one smooth motion in less than two seconds. He is using this time he paid for, damnit.

[cisskabob]

"Hijacked?" Cissie repeats, turning the phrase over in her mind and considering their situation. Given the way she and Tim turned up in Dualis, having been separated from Stephanie unexpectedly the way they were, it made a certain amount of sense. "I guess you could say that. I like it--the term, I mean. Not--all this," she waves a hand, indicating the city itself. "Although it's not terrible. This place is pretty great," she says with a little grin.

She doesn't show any recognition at his name, but he didn't seem to recognize hers either. It's more common than not since she left home, so it doesn't surprise her like it once might have. It means she also doesn't think much about not recognizing Clint's name... at least until he starts shooting. Once he starts, his movements, his marksmanship, his aim have her full attention. She doesn't even realize she is practically holding her breath until he's shot a few arrows, and then she can't help herself.

"You're a professional," she exclaims, beaming at him.

[pretendtoneedme]

"'Hijacked' sounds the most right to me," Clint responds as he continues shooting. He's obviously not going at his top speed, because he doesn't need to in a session that's mostly just a warm-up and re-acclimation, but he's still very fast and very fluid in drawing and releasing his arrows. It's the kind of speed that only comes when one is very, very, very good at their job, and is undoubtedly one of the things that clues her in. Another being the fact that he can perform with that speed and precision while talking, and yet another being that he's marching the arrows in from the outer rim of the target in evenly-spaced steps, in a completely straight line. "We all got 'hijacked' out of our normal lives, or whatever we were doing before this, and dragged here against our wills. It's like a carjacking that way. Who knows what's at the end of this ride, though."

When he brings down the bow, he's shot ten of the arrows in his quiver, half of his ammo, and that line of arrows stretches from the edge of the target to the very center of the bullseye in a way that's almost eerie. Other people might do something similar when they're getting used to a weapon as their aim improves with each shot, but even then there's a variation in the spacing that just isn't visible on his row. And he knows that for someone of Cissie's level, he just gave himself away hard, but he still asks because he's interested to see how she responds. "What gave you that idea?"