"...la tendance à la criminalité qui apparaît chez les adolescents correspond aussi à ce besoin."
("...the tendency to crime appears in adolescents compares to also this need)."
-Simone Weil (Conditions premiéres d'un travail non servile, 1942)
Paris is a universe unto itself. With its grand boulevards, archaic galleries; streets of old cafes lying as neighbors to modern, opulent storefronts of renowned fashion brands - it is both art starving to protect itself and the future, feeding the city with new ideas and cultures. London had its charms, its own echoes of Victorian lifestyle built into the stones of its buildings - but Diana found the city to be too fast, too crowded and much, much too forgetful for her tastes. And while she is a hypocrite to judge London for its effervescent memories, she cannot help it. Paris had a way with time - made it more precious - fleeting.
Sitting on the veranda of a cafe, Diana breathes in deeply. The waft of a fading morning mist mixing in with the aroma of her expresso - she takes comfort in the peace, however borrowed it was. With a leather satchel leaning against her leg, reminding her of what is to come, she takes solace in the morning hours. Tries to imprint the purgatory of waking eyes and rushing feet in her mind lest she lose the very foundation of which beckoned her to carry out her other work.
"Ça va?" Diana glances up at the comley man greeting her.
"Bien, l'addition s'il vous plâit," she asks in reply. All too sudden, her solace is intruded upon by a stranger. A familiar stranger, but a stranger nevertheless to her traveling mind. Sitting up straighter in her seat, she smiles back at the waiter. She has breathed in enough of the moment and the warmth of the rising sun is calling her back to the library. She nods at the waiter returns with her bill.
"Ç'est triste que vous partez si tôt," the waiter comments, idly standing by. Diana knows the man and merely gives a hum in reply. While she is a traditional patron of the cafe, having spent her rising hours with the staff and their confections, she has found that her duties infringed upon her routine. She had been expecting someone, maybe her coworkers, to comment on her shorter shifts - or even her friends to loudly observe her distancing, but she had least expected that the servers of her favorite haunt would notice first.
"Le devoir m'apelle*," she softy excuses herself as she stands up. She nods at the waiter, waves at one of the bakers manning the register, and departs for the library. Joining the crowd in the metro, Diana reflects on how she used to struggle with acclimating herself with the crowd. After her time with her Steve, she found that social instrinicasies were easy to adapt to, but actually fitting in or belonging - she carefully evades the exodus of citizens from the metal cars - to this day, she wonders if she had ever truly experienced either words.
Yet, ironically, she thinks, arriving at her destination, despite feeling self-ostracized, here she is devoutly working to protect the very people she could not understand or become. Carefully locating an isolated corner of the quiet building, Diana lifts up her satchel and unloads her belongings of carefully organized documents and laptop. Lifting the latter open, her frequency to do library enables a quick connection to the local internet and she opens up the results of her automated search engine. Words such as Sokovia, Wolfgang von Strucker, Loki, shadows, Greece, and experiments load themselves onto her screen. Tying her hair back into a knot, Diana dismisses the time and begins working through her searches.
At the end of it, she spots the hour - half-past twelve, and turns off her laptop. Frowning, she rubs at the corner of her eyes as she stares at the adjacent notebook littered with facts and flowcharts that all call her to do the next sane thing: investigate. Diana did not want to do it. She did not want to entrench herself into that world of heroes and good and justice and -
Heroes, she can't help but scoff as she continues to stare at her meticulous notes. Had she ever thought of herself as one? She knows the answer like the back of her own hand. Slowly, very slowly, she begins to put away her papers and computer. Rising from her seat, she nods at one of the matronly librarians and heads back home. It is in the presence of her dark apartment that she learns about the gray area between heroes and villains.
Sliding open one of her closet doors, she begins to pack clothes into a carry-on suitcase. She does not want to become a part of that world, his world - but she knows what she owes and her mistakes need to be rectified. Too long had she lulled herself into a false sense of security, ignored headlining news of worships and shadows and Chaos and turned the television off. She did not think the entity would grow, would destroy and corrupt - but here, at last, its influence prevailed in the world - in a small section of earth - Sokovia.
The country is impoverished; the gap between the wealthy and poor is stark with the presence of dilapidated buildings and high-rising skyscrapers. So few of the latter are scattered about the main city, but still they stood - monuments of vices and money. Diana makes temporary housing in a hotel not too grand and finds her first trail in its adjacent bar. There are locals milling about, but not at the capacity that would be befitting a typical city pub.
Walking inside, Diana knows that even with her monochromatic colors, she stands out. She has never fit in, and she carries the attention with poise. Sauntering towards the bar, she steals a stool for herself, careful of the cracked leather creaking under her weight as she orders for a virgin drink. The bartender is respectful, if not discrete, and merely turns around to work on her order. As he does this, Diana does not bother to throw a precursory look around before an occupant sidles into the seat beside her. "So we've a stranger in town," the man says, unabashedly looking at her top to bottom.
Diana stomachs the look and nods, casting a misleading gaze at her worn sneakers. "Just passing through," she replies easily.
"A backpacker, eh?" The lithe woman stares at the man at this offered identity. Thankful for the dim lighting of the bar, she suspects he is ignorant to her rising suspicions but still schools herself to smile back. "You got me," she easily agrees with a laugh.
"Your drink." Diana thanks the bartender and takes a sip of the cool margarita. The man next to her follows her lead and calls out for his own special order.
"Or maybe a fan?" he continues, once satisfied that the other man has heard his request. He scratches at the stubble building up on his chin. "Just two days ago, we had the Avengers pay homage to our great city," he laughed. "Wouldn't be surprised to learn if they have a mob of fans following them like they are those American celebrities. What are they called, Borysko? Cards?"
Diana watches the man cajole the bartender, Borysko, into an angrument about famous American stars. So easy. The man is good, she can give him that, but again she has decades over him. She knows his cards - knows the hand he is using in this game, and pushes herself off the seat. The stranger, the real stranger, puts out a hand to stop her. Diana conveniently chooses to spill her drink on his arm.
"Oh! Oh, I'm so sorry," she begins to tumble out apologies. Quickly, she reaches for the napkins piled in a container on the bar and presses close to the man, dabbing profusely on the affronted areas. In the dark light and pedestrian eye, nothing seems amiss. But Diana's hand on the man's arm is tighter than it should be, and her lips move fast and unseen by his ear. "I know who you are, who you are working for, and what you are trying to do," she bluffs, no malice interwoven in her words. She says one more apology aloud. "Room 203." And with that, she steps away, a careful blush dotting her cheeks as she drops the cash for her drink onto the counter and darts out of the pub.
When she returns to her room, she knows she has little time to act. Only a handful of minutes ellipse before a knock resonates throughout the quiet room, and Diana carefully opens the door. The man is fast, as soon as the door opens, he charges in, arms out and steady to support a gun. The barrel faces her, but Diana has long been underestimated and she quickly pushes it to the side as he lets out a retaliating shot. The bullet grazes nothing but plaster as she flips the man's arm behind him, pulling on it hard until his bone pops out of his shoulder socket and the gun drops. Satisfied, Diana lets go as she kicks the weapon away - dodges when the man throws a spinning punch at her, and runs herself against his abdomen. In retrospect, tackling him may have been one of the more unadvised things to do, but she is successful enough as the man howls in pain, having landed awkwardly on his dislodged shoulder.
He spits out what she assumes to be flowery choice words, as she springs off of him in time to evade a kick. She sees the gun first before he does and dives for it.
"You only have one choice." She levels it at his head.
The man grins at her.
"Heil hydra."
Diana does not stay in the room that night. She does not find sleep at all. Again, she is reminded of the necessities of false alias and leaves the country shrouded in darkness. The next time she gets on a plane, it is not back to Paris with its picturesque streets and concerned waiters; the city would have to hold off on brewing her favorite coffee. Her next flight would take her away from that, because America awaits her and Diana hopes she can answer its call long before it asks for it. Taking one glance outside the plane's window, she lets out a sigh. She trades the pilfered information from Sokovia with an estranged body, and she hopes that it is the only death that would arise from this.
*Translations:
Waiter: How are you?
Diana: Good, and the check/bill please.
Waiter: It's sad to see you leave so early.
Diana: Duty calls.
Author's note: French, my French is kinda 't used it in a while but figured I couldn't do too bad with small conversations. The transition is also rough too but... Anyway! This officially marks the start of a new arc - Age of Ultron. Where, oh where will Diana's and Steve's relationship go? Don't ask me. I don't know. None of them have made a move yet from the pages I've been able to write ahead of time.
