#agent iowa

[radiantrookie]

[joltning]

[agentcaboose]

rvb characters that deserved full villain arcs:

[sixsobbles]

I am back RvB fandom.

Freelancer time.

Watch me tag them all again. I'll post the A.I.s and the other 4 Freelancers I have soon.

My Insta because it has more characters/art on it. Posts every two weeks over there.

[january-summers]

Sometimes I think about whether or not Washington has ever accidentally called Caboose "Iowa."

Maybe that's the thing that finally made Caboose stop calling Wash "Church."

(Chucking the back end of this under the cut because it ended up a little shy of 1,000 words in total. Sorry this took off as I was typing. not beta'd, I die like CT: unfairly)

On one of those days before they got Epsilon back, when Wash was still walking around with cobalt armour, having one of his bad days where looking in the mirror is hard because he's not sure whose face should be looking back even though he knows, he knows he knows he's Washington.

(He can't explain it, it's like the way lightheadedness isn't really a dizzy spell. He doesn't lose his sense of identity, it just... gets a little crumpled.)

Caboose accidentally blows up one of their vehicles and Wash snorts.

"That's coming out of your paycheck, Iowa!" He calls out, and Tucker turns to him with his head cocked.

"The fuck is Iowa?"

"What?"

"'Iowa,'" Tucker repeats, "you just said 'that's coming out of your paycheck, Iowa.'"

Inside his helmet Wash closes his eyes, sighs, and whispers a heartfelt 'fuck.' Then, "A Freelancer, he was... a lot like Caboose. I just... forgot for a second."

Tucker just makes a 'huh' in response, and Wash feels tragically grateful the other man is dropping the issue.

But it happens again.

Not 'Iowa' this time though, but 'Mike.'

Wash is sitting in the base's main work area, because they have no office, or they do, technically but it's... uh... better not to talk about why it's not in use because they all agreed it was no one's fault.

He's filling out the paperwork, trying to figure out how anyone gets anything done with the UNSC requisition forms, he swears they weren't this convoluted or nonsensical before he was discharged.

Or maybe sim troopers get fucked up forms on purpose?

He'd taken his helmet off over an hour ago so he could rub the bridge of his nose and his temples in an effort to stave off the headache that's been coming for his brain. They don't have enough painkillers to waste on a headache if one of them gets seriously injured before the next shipment.

There's a movement of blue in his peripheral vision, a familiar dark blue, and a familiar voice saying "I brought you hot chocolate!"

"Thanks, Mike," Washington says not really paying attention.

"It's Michael," comes the reply, the correction. And Wash blinks and looks up at Caboose not Iowa.

"Right, Michael, sorry."

But Caboose doesn't seem upset, just hums in acknowledgement and wonders off. Wash is dazed as he watches him leave. He spots Tucker leaning against the wall slowly sipping from a mug, watching Wash.

Tucker gestures at Wash's mug with his own, "I wouldn't drink that if I were you, but if you're going to throw it out, don't do it where he'll see it. He'll throw a tantrum."

"Uhhhh, right." Wash goes back to his paperwork. Tucker stays where he is, so he's there ten minutes later when Wash's brain cycles information in the background. 'Beverage container in proximity: hydrate'

"SPFFFF! WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT!?!?!?" Tucker doesn't stop laughing the entire time Wash is gagging and trying to get the residue out of his mouth.

Wash doesn't always notice when he calls Caboose by the wrong name, and continues to be grateful no one calls him on it.

But Caboose gets quieter and quieter, not his speaking volume, but his entire personality. He's less and less present around Wash. So Wash goes looking.

Finds Caboose surrounded by bits and parts of machines, just sitting, a tool held loosely in one hand. Bio-signs indicate he's awake in Wash's HUD.

'Spaced out,' Wash assumes, and calls out. "Hey, Caboose."

Caboose startles, just a little flinch. "Yes, I am Caboose."

His voice is loud, his voice is often loud, but the way it's loud... Wash understands why he keeps confusing Caboose and Iowa.

"Mind if I sit?" Wash asks, and waits for the nod before settling himself. "I'm sorry I keep confusing you for Agent Iowa. I know you're not him, I'm not doing it on purpose, I swear."

Caboose doesn't answer, just sits and watches Wash quietly for several minutes.

"He was my friend," Wash ventures, and isn't rebuffed so he keeps talking. "You remind me a lot of him, you both wear the same blue, you're both very upbeat people, you're both-" 'brain damaged and loud and not always able to communicate the way I suspect you want to,' Wash doesn't say. "- my friends. He went away, a long time ago now, him and Ohio and Idaho. I never found out where they went, they were just... gone one day. We were supposed to eat lunch together, but they were all just gone."

Wash doesn't know how to explain what Epsilon did to him, how his memory, one of his greatest strengths had become his own enemy for a time. How somedays it still felt like it was trying to fight him. The echo Epsilon left behind.

He doesn't want to. It feels like an excuse for his own failings.

"I know you aren't Church," Caboose says suddenly instead. "But you are a good Church, not the Best Church, but a good Church. Except when you aren't. You are the best Agent Washingtub though."

Wash... thinks he gets what Caboose is saying, or what he hopes he's saying, because he'd been really concerned Caboose hadn't understood that Wash wasn't Church, he was just pretending to be for the time being.

"Thanks, Caboose. And you are the best very Caboose, ever. Of all time."

"I am," Caboose agrees. Readily. Happily.

Wash tries to be more mindful, and as the days pass, Caboose becomes more familiar than the memory of Iowa to him, and he calls his teammate by the wrong name less and less and then not at all.

He notices too, while Caboose doesn't stop calling him Church, sometimes Caboose calls him Agent Washingtub too. And then he starts calling him Washington.

Tucker starts to call him Wash. Stops watching him like he's about to snap and kill them.

It's nice.

Unlike the requisition forms.

[fishfingersalad]

Suddenly remembered that the triplets, or at least Idaho and Iowa, play dnd together, specifically with Idaho as dm. Like in canon they do that. That's so fun fr.

I think the triplets have a dnd campaign with CT and Wash <3. Their games were probably put on hold after CT and Wash were moved up to the top 10... And then I think the triplets started a new campaign with Sherry's group on the ice planet <3

[sypsart]

Beyond Page 39

[fischiee]

wash joining the project and wanting to be called david vs having his identity burned out of him and refusing to accept being called anything but his chosen name anymore

[funsizedcrow]

hello helloooo! rvb requestinggg

if you can, I’d love to see the triplets but if you’re looking to draw main cast only I request Tucker and Simmons getting banned from all hooters ever and Tucker is on his knees in anguish

i love the triplets <3 honestly surprised i havent really drawn them before. (I think I've drawn ohio once but thats it)

[teamnovaore]

Me, realizing Agent Washington and Agent Iowa have the same brain damage (cerebral hypoxia)

[skwistokwarrior]

i just realized that i never posted this so. heres the triplets <3

bonus: tiny sherry

[rvb-relationship-royale]

RvB Friendship Fray- Round One, Part Two, Poll Twenty-Three

[joltning]

[gorboble]

i dont think anything in rvb makes me as sad as watching The Triplets in season 14

project freelancer literally could have just discharged them, maybe put them in a normal military program, and replace them with more competent soldiers, but instead, they opted to leave them for dead in the middle of bumfuck nowhere at negative 30 degrees, all because they didn't care to go through paperwork or a more complex process that'd take a couple hours. not even an experiment or anything, just murder.

stuff like this makes me wish the Insurrectionists won

[toediet]

Do you think the Triplets survived Temple?

[january-summers]

conversely,

if Wash got a do-over regression time travel, like say, Genkins (s2g I thought this character was made up and his name was Gherkins before i got to the relevant season) in one last ditch effort to 'screw you' to the cast accidentally bumped Washington into a separate timeline (time travel works however I need it to work, shush) where he gets to redo his Freelancer days, and in a misguided attempt to 'save' the triplets starts training them and helping them develop the skills to not be dead last in everything but teamwork:

do you think Wash would accidentally call Iowa 'Caboose'?