#i doubt you are unremarkable sorry to say

[feminist-pussycat]

No, these look exactly like each other.

#shoutout to the tif and yaoi #it's always yaoi #i doubt you are unremarkable sorry to say

[peaches2217]

There’s a door on the right wall of Peach and Mario’s bedroom, just a few meters from the entryway. It’s an entirely unremarkable door, really; it matches the doors to both the private chambers and the restroom, white with gold trimmings and a polished brass doorknob. Such a door normally wouldn’t give Peach any pause whatsoever.

There is, however, one strange thing about this door in particular: it wasn’t there this morning.

She repeatedly looks from the door to her husband, who’s casually unlacing his boots by the dresser. The door to her husband, who’s rummaging through the third drawer down. The door back to her husband, who’s unhooking his overalls and kicking them onto the plush carpet floor. If he’s aware of this anomaly in an otherwise familiar setting, he’s not showing it.

“Mario.”

Mario hums lazily, not even looking at her as he pulls on his softest, most worn nightshirt, its red cotton faded and fraying. Peach is almost certain she’s dreaming right now. She was so certain she had been awake just minutes ago, laughing with friends and family over dinner, cheerfully accompanying her husband to bed after a long and eventful day of baby shopping with her best friend (though it's still a bit early to be buying any clothes, she’d tried saying a few times, statements that Daisy had immediately brushed off). But everything suddenly feels far too… off.

“What is that?” she finally chances, gesturing to the alien door. Mario finishes peeling off his socks and gloves before looking to where she’s gesturing, regarding it with all the mundanity he might regard any other door.

“It’s a door,” he answers easily, giving her a patented I have no clue what you’re getting at but I love you and cherish the words that come from your mouth anyway grin.

Peach sucks in an uneasy breath. Maybe this is that Pregnancy Brain thing she’s read about? Perhaps her memories are being rearranged, her senses tricked? Toadessa did warn her that she might become increasingly forgetful as the months progressed. It’s a more logical explanation than any other she can conjure up. If something were truly amiss, then surely Mario would notice too. Right?

“I… don’t remember it being there this morning,” she confesses, a blush creeping into her cheeks. She remembers, or at least thinks she remembers, that there was once a small storage unit just behind that door, filled with old broken halberds and spears and other assorted equipment that was too valuable to trash but too broken to repair. Yes, she remembers it now with greater confidence; she had been terrified of that dark, cluttered room, unable to sleep for fear of whatever monsters might be lurking within, and so Toadsworth had ordered it sealed when she was age seven or so.

Or maybe he hadn’t?

Mario chuckles, and though the corners of his eyes crease in good humor and his smile is filled with warmth, her face burns hotter still. “Fog’s already setting in, huh?” He taps a finger to his temple to hammer home what he’s implying, and though Peach knows his words hold no malice, the teasing still fans an unpleasant flame in her chest; she can’t help but cross arms in front of her and huff, half in hopes of exhaling that flame, half to make her displeasure known.

Suddenly Mario’s face reads a bit less amused and a bit more ashamed, and that just makes her feel even worse.

“No,” he croons, approaching her with his hands loosely extended, “tesoro mio, I’m so sorry. That was mean.” His tone doesn’t quite match his words. He’s clearly sorry to have provoked such a reaction, Peach doesn’t doubt his sincerity there, but there’s nevertheless a smile tugging at the corners of his lips, like there’s still something terribly amusing about her predicament.

So this is the thanks I get for carrying your child, she considers pouting, but something in Mario’s eyes sparkles so brightly that she feels her annoyance melting away, like an icicle brought into the sunlight. Damn him. She sighs and unfolds her arms to take his hands; for her silent pardon, he brings her knuckles to his lips and kisses them one by one, and suddenly she’s overcome with the urge to giggle like a lovestruck schoolgirl.

She resists, if only to spite him one last time, then she lets the grudge slide from her shoulders.

“You know,” Mario says once he’s done with his ministrations, his thumbs rubbing little circles into the backs of her hands, “I don’t have any right to poke fun. I don’t even remember what’s behind that door, either.”

Peach blinks. No, okay, now she knows she’s dreaming. This entire scenario is making less and less sense by the moment.

But before she can pinch herself awake, Mario’s guiding her towards the unfamiliar door, letting go of her hands and drifting behind her. Almost like he’s pushing her forward, she feels.

“Maybe we should check it out,” he suggests all too innocently, and if not for the way he lingers behind her, she might not find the suggestion too strange. But Mario always insists on taking the lead any time there’s unfamiliar terrain to be trekked. He would never let her be the first in the line of fire, no matter how mundane said terrain might appear on the surface, especially not in her present condition.

Unless, of course, he knows what she's stepping into.

Staring at the white and gold door, reason begins to resettle in Peach’s head. How had he known she was referring specifically to the door itself? If she were to gesture to the bathroom door and say "What is that?", he wouldn’t say “That’s a door,” he would say “That’s the bathroom.” 

She’s not dreaming, nor is she going crazy. There is definitely something going on. Some sort of conspiracy that he’s in on and she’s not.

Unaccustomed to being left in the dark by her own husband, she grasps the doorknob, takes a breath, opens the door… and gasps.

The room behind the door is, in fact, the room she remembers, or is at least roughly the same size. But where she remembers dingy hardwood, there’s now carpet, luxuriously plush like the carpet in the bedroom. The sterile gray walls that once spooked her are now a soft and lovely blue, decorated with empty floating shelves and cheerful paintings of Biddybuds and Fire Flowers and scenes from familiar mushroom forests.

There's no trace of the broken weapons that once littered the room. There's instead a dresser flush to the wall, and a tall table of some sort, and a small chest in the opposite corner... and in the center of the room, on a round and ornate rug, are two pieces of furniture on smooth, curved rockers. One is a chair, adult human-sized; the other is much smaller, a horizontal hollow contained within smooth, round bars. A crib.

“Oh yeah,” Mario chimes in somewhere behind her, “now I remember! I knew there was a reason I asked Daisy to keep you out of the castle today.”

His words slowly sink in as Peach approaches the rocking chair, reaching out to brush her fingers over the dark red wood. Cedar. The whole room is filled with the dry and resinous aroma of fresh cedar, a scent she typically associates with the workshop in the castle's western wing. The workshop where Mario tinkers with metal and wood whenever he tires of royal monotony and needs to keep his hands occupied.

The workshop that's been suspiciously locked every time she's approached it the past couple of months, even when she could hear saws cutting through raw materials and the tap-tap-tap of chisels in experienced hands within.

All pretense is gone. When she turns back to Mario, she finds him bristling with pride, that teasing smile wider than before.

"You did this?" She looks back to the chair, fastened with fluffy pink silk cushions, and the crib, a matching cushion tied to its bars and emblazoned with the royal mushroom emblem on its headboard, an emblem that's been carved into the chest a few steps away as well. Something in her throat feels impossibly tight. "All of this?"

Mario finally leaves the doorway, his hand brushing against her back as he steps past her. "Well, not all of it, no. Just the furniture." He taps his right foot a few times against the statement rug beneath their feet. "Weeg handled the layout and the decorations and the swatches and all that fancy stuff. He's got a better eye for that sorta thing! Then he helped me get everything moved in and set up and the door re-installed while you and Daisy were out shopping. Of course Toadsworth's the one who told me about this little room in the first place, so he helped us get it unsealed, and Daisy—" He laughs now, scratching the back of his neck. “Actually, she wasn’t even part of it originally! She just barged in one day — I had the door locked, Peachy, but she just waltzed right on in! I don’t know if she had a key or if she just forced it open with her bare hands — and she said the only way she’d keep quiet was if she got to be involved and take credit for her part in the whole ordeal, so that’s how that happened, and—”

His face grows darker as he prattles on, until at last he’s forced to take in a sharp gasp, his color returning to normal as oxygen once more fills his lungs. “But! The rest of it! Yeah, that was all me! Looky here—” His fingers curl around the bars of the crib, giving it a few demonstrative rocks. “Remember that night you called me into the bathroom and I thought you were hurt and I panicked but actually you were just excited because you could finally see a little baby bump in the mirror? I couldn’t sleep at all that night because suddenly it all felt so real, so I spent the whole next day making this! 

“And then I thought, ‘Well, we’ve got a place for them to sleep, but where are we gonna change their diapers? And where are we gonna put all the diapers and wipes and all that good stuff anyway?’ And that’s how I got started on that one!” He darts now to the table against the wall, gesticulating around it with the enthusiasm of a used kart salesman. “Perfect little platform, plenty of storage space, I’ve been thinking about making a mobile to put over it too in case she gets fussy, because the last thing we need is a dirty diaper and a fussy baby, right? And then—”

And this continues on for a good few minutes, Mario darting around the room to show off each hand-crafted piece of their new nursery. The dresser to store non-diapers, things like blankets and onesies and a few changes of clothes for both of them because babies are messy and ruined clothes are inevitable, and the chest to store everything else, like toys — he throws the lid open and shows Peach a few delicately carved wooden blocks and dolls, because what's a toy chest without any toys?

The information comes at Peach too quickly to absorb any of it, because an excitable Mario is a Mario at full steam that won’t stop for anything or anyone, so she blindly follows him, brushing her fingers against each piece’s cool cedar, examining the smooth-gliding drawers, dragging her thumb nail over the ridges in each toy she’s handed.

“And then the bookshelf! I’m… still working on that one.” He scratches his neck again with a nervous chuckle. “But I couldn’t wait any longer! Gimme a few days and it’ll go in that corner right over there. Weegee’s already got a whole library lined up for her, so we should have enough books to last us a while at least. And then I was thinking we could put some flowers and vases on the shelves, maybe? So they look sad and empty now, but pretty soon they’ll…”

Peach dutifully admires one such shelf on the wall, right next to a painting of a Fire Flower field in full bloom. Yes, a live Fire Flower on the adjacent shelf to compliment the painting. It’s certainly a good idea. She’s so caught up in the automatic thought process that, as soon as it runs its course, she turns to take on whatever bit of information Mario throws at her next, effortless and thoughtless.

Only then does she realize he’s gone silent.

“...You okay, Peachy?” Suddenly there’s no bravado in his voice. It’s softer, gentler, quieter. He closes their distance and takes her hands in his, warm and strong. “Sorry, I… I know this is a lot. Of course, if there’s any part of it you don’t like, you can tell me! You know I won’t take it personally. Well, not too personally.” He couples this statement with a playful wink.

Another automatic thought crosses Peach’s mind: how could she ever criticize any of this? He’s made an entire nursery with his own two hands for their child. She could never…

And for the first time since she opened that strange new door, it hits Peach. Not in words, but in images: Mario in his workshop, wiping sweat and sawdust from his forehead as he consults his blueprints, making certain his vision is coming to life exactly as he’s planned. Mario crammed into a booth at Tayce T.’s with his brother, thick brows knit in confusion as Luigi gives him a crash course on color theory and interior design. Mario in a football-style huddle with Peach’s steward and brother-in-law and best friend, giving everyone their roles sometime late last night or early this morning while she still lay blissfully unaware in bed.

Mario kneeling beside the completed crib, rocking it a few times with a peaceful smile, staring down at the plush pink cushion and imagining a little blonde or brunette bundle of blankets sleeping soundly within.

The stagnant tightness in Peach’s throat erupts in the form of a sob, a rush of raw hormones heightening her every emotion until it almost hurts, and once she starts, it’s impossible to stop.

“Ah— Peachy—!” She hears Mario offer a few uncertain words of comfort beneath her shrill breathing, and he starts to pull her in some equally uncertain direction (uncertain to her, anyway, because her tears are falling too hard and too fast to make out anything other than abstract shapes). She lets him guide her steps, until suddenly he hoists her into his arms and lowers both of them. He’s settled in the rocking chair, she realizes from the way they both jolt as he adjusts her in his lap.

Her belly is larger now than it was the night she called him into the bathroom, though not so large that she can’t wrap her arms around him and hold him tightly, burying her face into the crown of his head. Even his hair smells of cedar, a fine dust that tickles her nose, and laughter bubbles in her chest alongside the tears.

“You’re amazing,” she manages to choke out. Her Mario, her thoughtful Mario, her hard-working and mind-bendingly devoted Mario. He cradles her, his left hand against her outer thigh, his opposite arm supporting her back, his right hand stroking the side of her belly ever so gently.

“So,” he says into her chest, and she can feel him smile against her, “does this, uh, does this make up for the teasing earlier?”

Peach sniffles and laughs again, drawing him in closer. Even if she hasn’t forgiven him (which she has, she’d like to believe she’s not that petty), she supposes drenching his hair with tears and mucus is payback enough. Maybe they can shower together tonight. Maybe she can wash his hair, and he’ll press kisses to her sternum the whole time, like he always does.

Though for now, she’s equally content to remain right where she’s at, secure in his arms in this cozy little nursery, their baby nestled safely between their bodies. It’ll still be a few more months before this space is put to proper use, after all. What’s the rush?

#well! this was corny even for me #but I enjoyed writing it so you won't be hearing any apologies from me. 😆 #I love the thought that mario simply Cannot Shut Up when he’s excited so this is my propaganda as well #bonus points if you remember the post this was based off of! it was from december I think? #super mario bros #smb #mario #princess peach #mario x peach #mareach #peaches' fancy fics #tw pregnancy

[lizzie-is-here]

lonely is a man without love

part vii- choice

“hug me like the night holds the moon” - alexandra vasiliu

summary: fighting egyptian gods honestly isn’t that bad, especially when marc and steven look so good in their suits

wordcount: 2.1k

warnings: language, violence, honestly i think that’s it, not much fluff but i’ll make up for it in the last part i promise

a/n: thank y’all for being so patient with me, this isn’t the last part, there will be one more bc i want the moon boys to meet the avengers 😏 also wondering how oscar isaac feels knowing he’s played some of the hottest characters to exist bc my miguel obsession is concerning 💀 i hope y’all enjoy, love you all sm, have a great day 🫶🫶🫶

taglist: @thefictionalgemini @ravenz-hope @undiscl0sed-d3sir3s @iateall-your-cookies @disregardedplant @sunflowers-4 @yellowumbrelllaaaa @bagsy-not-it @local-mr-frog @thescarletredwitch @jupitersmoon167 @creamecafe @stevenknightmarc @theluciansystem @kingtwhiddleston @spider-biter @mxltifxnd0m @sgt-morgan @no-dont-be-suspicious @onzayhe @namorslit @i-cant-write-for-shit @vainillasmil157 @doublevirgogirl @boofy1998 @seninjakitey @khaleesihavilliard @gaypoetsblog @letmehavemyfictionalmen @bitchotine

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“That’s fucking disgusting,” you murmur to yourself as three bullets fall out of your slowly-healing wounds.

Coming back from the dead was remarkably unremarkable, you think. However, the sensation of ammunition leaving your body on its own was rather unpleasant.

Heaving strained sighs, you wring out your hair as you make sure the room is empty.

“Ok, Taweret, what now?” you ask.

You don’t expect your body to seize up, and for her voice to leave your throat as you uncontrollably spew words.

“There will be an opening in a nearby wall to where Khonshu’s ushabti is at the Chamber of the Gods. Do you see it?”

You gasp, coughing from the intrusion. A few yards away, the bricks open, revealing a shady tunnel with glowing hieroglyphs. You still don’t fuck with small, dark, magic tunnels. But, you suppose you don’t have much of an option.

“Alright. I’m going in.”

The tunnel opens up to a massive chamber, and you can see Harrow and his team at the entrance, confronting what seem to be more avatars. You sneak past in perfect silence, weaving through tunnels on an instinct you suspect is controlled by Taweret.

Finally, you reach a wall of lamps. In front of each one is a tiny statue. Scanning each one, your eyes land on one that seems newer than the others.

“Surprise,” you singsong. “I’d recognize that ugly face anywhere. Now what?”

The same uncomfortable sensation takes over your voice.

“Smash it on the ground, it’ll free him.”

You raise the ushabti above your head before hurling it with some personal spite. It shatters on the floor, and the fog that emanates from it rises into a form.

“I do not sense Marc Spector in this world,” he announces. “He died fighting, no doubt.”

You raise a brow. “Yeah, no shit. Doing your dirty work.”

“It’s far from over. If Marc is truly gone, I am in need of an Avatar. Would you protect the travelers of the night-“

You wave your hands, cutting him off. “Would you shut the fuck up? I’m already Taweret’s temporary Avatar. Go resurrect Marc before I get Wanda to curse you.”

The god disappears in a cloud of dust, and you hear his voice echo from the main chamber. You listen in silence before a loud beeping interrupts.

When you look down at your gauntlet, the small screen displays words that make you audibly groan.

“Shit, shit shit shit,” you hiss, hurrying to the main chamber while also desperately trying to hang up the call. “Not the time, Nat!”

As you turn a corner, you come face to face with a squad of Harrow’s followers, and in your panic, you press the wrong button.

“Hey (Y/N)!” a chorus of voices say. Team dinner, shit again.

“Sorry guys, kinda busy right now!” you shout back, shooting down three people as you whip out a baton.

Wanda’s voice calls out through the fight.

“I felt your heart stop, (Y/N), what’s going on?”

Grunting, you throw a man into the wall before hopping on a woman’s shoulders to fling her backward.

Sighing, you tap the gauntlet, projecting the call so you can see their worried faces gathered around the phone.

“No biggie, I died for a little bit, but I’m all good.”

At the instant outburst, you wince. Probably should’ve chosen different words.

“Маленький паучок, ты такой мертвый, когда вернешься домой [Little spider, you’re so dead when you get home]!”

You roll your eyes, brushing off the term of endearment. With the room cleared, you run out of the Chamber of the Gods, right out the front of the Great Pyramid. Left and right, Harrow’s followers are judging the souls of civilians. Great. More headaches for you.

“Shit, kid. You need me and Buck to come over there?”

“He’s right, I’ll kill whoever did it.”

Firing blasts of energy from the gauntlets, you start taking down as many fanatics as you can. You’d rather not shoot them, but it would be easier, you have to admit.

“Did you at least die in a cool way?”

“Yelena, not the time.”

“C’mon, Cap. Let her have her fun.”

“Don’t start with me, Tony.”

“Guys!” you yell over the arguing. “I’m fine. We might have a new recruit, too. If he gets revived.”

Yelena gapes at the phone.

“You died together? Wow, pretty serious.” She wiggles her eyebrows as you strike down a man trying to grab at you. “Have you two kissed yet?”

You blush. “…Yes.”

The loud reactions have you cringing, but the blonde assassin grins.

“Awww… That’s disgusting. But I’m happy for you!” She shoves the phone to a very worried Natasha.

The redhead sighs as the team goes back to lighthearted bickering.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asks.

You duck behind a corner, catching your breath. “Yeah, yeah Nat. I promise. I’ll be home soon, okay?”

She nods, and with one last goodbye, ends the call.

You slump against the wall you’re hidden behind, groaning and mumbling curses. When you peek out, you see a giant crocodile goddess swallowing souls.

“Oh, wonderful,” you sigh. “How the fuck am I supposed to fight that?”

“I have an idea!” Your voice says, once again not your own. “Plus, it comes with a rather fashionable outfit.”

Coughing as Taweret invades your senses, you shake your head. “Sorry, I don’t do those weird superhero costumes.”

“Please? It has wings- Ooh, and swords!”

“Ok, how about a compromise,” you suggest. “Just add the wings and swords to my suit?”

Apparently, the goddess is happy with that, because large metal wings form down your back, glinting silver in the candlelight. You can feel the handles of swords under them. When you wave an arm, the corresponding wing follows your movements.

“Oh…” you chuckle. “Sam’s gonna be SO jealous.”

Your moment of pure glee gets interrupted when a small white blur flies by, carrying a screaming man along.

“Ah. Glad to see you back, idiots,” you whisper to yourself, preparing to run over to where they fell. Instead, the wings boost you up onto the nearest building.

Taking a moment to balance yourself, you quickly adapt to the feeling of gliding on the metal wings and swoop in in time to kick Harrow’s ugly face before he strikes Marc.

Marc takes you in. The wings, the smirk on your face, the fact that you’re okay. He can’t help but be amazed.

When Harrow tries to strike again, you cross your arms, repelling the blast with the wings.

“Marc, are you-”

You get cut off by a tight hug and a kiss planted on your forehead.

“You’re alright,” he whispers, almost like he doesn't believe it. His hands hold you like you’ll disappear. He barely pauses before pulling you into a kiss, tension leaving his body as he sighs against your lips.

You smile. “I’m alright, it’s okay.”

In a flash, his suit changes, along with his voice.

“Wow, you look amazing. Where’d you get the wings?” Steven asks.

“Hi, Steven,” you chuckle as you turn. Harrow is finally standing up from where you knocked him on his ass, and dozens of his followers have gathered.

Steven perks up. “Hey, I’m really jazzed about showing you these new skillsets we have.”

It’s impossible to not grin at his antics. “Alright, let’s see it.”

You both break into a dead sprint, with you using the wings to boost you. The new swords fit perfectly in your hands, becoming deadly as you combine them with your baton training, twirling and twisting the blades as you slash through men.

When you turn around to check on Steven, you see Marc instead.

“It’s good to know you two are getting along now,” you chirp before charging forward, cutting down whoever you need to to get to the man at the center of it all.

You strike Harrow’s staff with both swords, tag-teaming him with Marc. You make a deadly combination. That is, until he slams the staff on the ground and sends you flying,

He holds you down, hand raised above you, before Steven tackles him away, leaving you to catch your breath.

The fight only escalates from there. Marc and Steven switch seamlessly, leaning into each others’ strengths. They fight Harrow to a standstill, holding him back from wrecking the world. Usual superhero stakes.

You, however, are preoccupied. Namely with ripping the doors off of vans and helping civilians.

A purple glow blooms behind you, and you can spot Marc holding back Harrow’s magic as you rush pedestrians away from the area.

Blocking bullets, you dive back into the fight as soon as you clear the area. But you don’t get far.

A stray blast of magic throws you to the ground. Hard. You groan as the tingling, nauseating feeling rushes over you. Your legs are too shaky to get up.

When you fight to raise your head, you see Marc. He took the brunt of the strike, evidenced by the crater he lays in. Harrow is stalking closer, raising his staff above him. When he brings it down, you can see the power leaving Marc’s body.

And you can’t have the first boyfriend (kind of? maybe?) you’ve ever had die before he even takes you out on a date.

The brick you hurl at Harrow hits his knee with careful precision, and he stumbles. With a vicious kick to his ribs, you knock him far enough away to help Marc up.

But it’s not Marc.

His suit may be the same, but the eyes are different. More tired. His posture is guarded, and the way he holds the crescent dagger is more offensive than defensive.

He says nothing as you head into the fray. Whoever he is, it’s the same alter that was on the roof in Cairo, and he’s ruthless.

Steven fights with blunt weapons. Marc fights with knives, but more on the defensive. Whoever this is… He fights like you.

You fight in tandem, whittling down Harrow’s strength until eventually, you break his staff over your knee and whoever’s controlling the body nearly kills him with the force he uses to take him down.

His eyes roll back, and Marc returns.

The fear in his eyes is enough to know that he has no clue what happened. He stands with your help, shakily surveying the area.

“That wasn’t you, was it, Steven?”

The other man fronts effortlessly, gripping your arm a bit tighter.

“Not a chance, mate,” he gasps.

“Whoever it was,” you say. “He’s been hiding all this time. And he’s definitely more violent than either of you.”

Far away, Ammit begins dragging an unconscious Khonshu away. You curse under your breath, watching the two giant gods disappear from your sight.

You turn to Marc. “Get Harrow. I know how we can stop Ammit.”

Dragging an unconscious man is easy work for him, and Marc tosses him onto an altar inside the Chamber of the Gods with little regard to further injuring him.

The chamber may be destroyed, but the magic still lingers. It’s residual energy, and takes a while to dissipate, you’ve learned. You’ve stumbled into Wanda’s red swirls and had horrible flashbacks for hours too many times to not learn your lesson.

“If you can imprison a god in a statue, why not a person? The power in this room should help us bind Ammit to Harrow’s body.” You glance up to the ceiling. “Taweret? Got a spell for us?”

Instead of losing control of your voice, you can hear her in your mind, merely guiding your actions.

You nod after a few seconds. “Ok. She says to take my hand, and we can start the spell.”

The strange sensation is back, and this time you’re chanting in Egyptian, hardly understanding the words as a lavender glow wraps around the room.

It circles the statues of the gods. For how destroyed the room is, they’re still intact. It completes the loop, leaving Marc’s hand and ending in yours.

A lavender haze streams from the ceiling, funneling into Harrow’s mouth as his eyes snap open.

“You can never contain me,” he says, voice overlapping with Ammit’s. “I’ll never stop.”

Khonshu appears next to you. You’ve grown used to it now, barely reacting.

“Finish it,” he growls. “And leave neither of them alive.

As Marc stands above Harrow, knife at the ready, your stomach twists.

“While he lives, so too does she.”

“I have to finish this,” Marc whispers to himself. “If not, I’ll never be free.”

You furrow your brow. “Marc. You are free. This is your choice.”

Khonshu cuts in. “The choice is vengeance. We cannot take the chance that Ammit finds a way out. She will kill again.”

“Now you sound just like her,” Marc says.

He drops the man on the altar, and your heart swells.

“If you want them dead, do it yourself.” You can’t control the smirk on your face as he stares the god dead in the eye.

Right before he speaks again, he glances at you for reassurance. You nod.

“Now, release us.”

#marvel #marvel x reader #x reader #moon knight system #moon knight tv #moon knight #marc spector moon knight #moon knight x reader #moon knight x fem!reader #marc spector x fem!reader #marc spector x reader #marc spector #steven grant x you #steven grant moon knight #steven grant x reader #steven grant x fem!reader #steven grant #moon knight system x reader

[klainepolls]

unexpected- day 2 of 7

by: @kurtsascot

day 1

POLL AT END RESOLVES COFFEE FIASCO

———

It’s Kurt Hummel.

Blaine doesn’t know much about Kurt, but he’d recognize him anywhere- He has spent the better part of his junior year pining for the guy, and their hypothetical love life has been an unrelenting rumination since last semester.

Granted, the admiration is embarrassingly one-sided. As a teaching assistant, Kurt rarely steered conversations away from the course material, and their one-on-one talks were wholeheartedly unremarkable. It’s unlikely that Blaine made a lasting impression- Kurt probably doesn’t even remember him.

It’s not like Blaine wanted his crush to be noticed last semester anyway. He didn’t want class to turn awkward or to make things weird or to make Kurt uncomfortable, so he forced himself to maintain some distance.

After finals, Blaine figured he’d never see Kurt again. NYU has so many majors and classes, and New York City is even more expansive- the odds of seeing Kurt, and of having the opportunity to spark up conversation, were slim. He could have graduated. Or moved. Blaine knew that. Logically.

But, Blaine’s human and evidently masochistic.

He’s been fantasizing. Despite his better judgement, Blaine’s imagined every scenario, every way he could hypothetically run into Kurt. He’s daydreamed about how to best introduce himself. He’s planned how he could, theoretically, convince Kurt to like him back. He knows what he would do. You know, conceptually.

It’s different in the moment.

Blaine’s infatuation had begun to ease over winter break and with the hubbub of a new semester. Seeing Kurt in person throws him right back into the thick of it.

It’s terrifying.

As the seconds tick by, Blaine’s all the more aware of how unprepared he is to talk to Kurt and propose something more.

He’s never been this close to Kurt. He’s close enough to pick up on the faint freckles on his nose, to see the individual strands of his hair, to feel his breath on his face-

The longer Blaine stares, the more incoherent he feels, and the more certain he is that he’s going to blow this.

He might have already blown it. Kurt is covered in his boiling coffee, after all.

…Shit.

“It’s fine,” Kurt says, shaking his head. He sounds a little annoyed, but not mad, and Blaine’s going to take that as a win. “Honestly, this is just my luck,” he mumbles, taking a step back, and Blaine resists the urge to chase his warmth. “I don’t need to be anywhere this early- I should’ve just slept in.”

Blaine waves his coffee soaked hands in front of his face. “No, No. This is my fault. Really. I wasn’t paying attention- I was running late.” His hands are still burning- Blaine pulls off his mittens, wincing as his reddened palms meet the cold January air, and then, tragically, he becomes all the more aware that Kurt has skin under his dress shirt, and that he’s probably in pain too. “Are you okay?”

A small smile. It doesn’t reach Kurt’s eyes. He’s holding back because of course he is- he doesn’t know Blaine. Not really. “It’s cold enough out here that getting drenched in your coffee is kind of nice,” Kurt says through a laugh that bubbles. “Thanks for asking.”

Kurt cranes his neck down and pulls his shirt away from his chest, inspecting the stain.

Coffee’s everywhere, and Blaine knows his designers- Kurt’s got on a Vivienne Westwood button down. He groans. “I’m sorry,” he uselessly repeats. “I’m not normally this distracted, I swear. Is it ruined?” He isn’t above buying Kurt a replacement, but he doubts that a replica is in his price range.

Kurt tsks, playfully offended. “Please. I’ve rescued clothes with far worse staining. It’ll be fine.”

Blaine’s worry melts away and he finds himself laughing and maybe smiling a bit too wide. “I didn’t mean to doubt you. My apologies.”

“You’re forgiven,” Kurt acquiesces and smiles back. He scrunches his nose and he points behind Blaine’s shoulder, into the coffee shop. “But, can I squeeze past? I am getting stickier by the second-“ He lets out a purposefully dramatic sigh. “I think I’m going to have to face my fears and brave a New York City public restroom.”

Blaine laughs again, but his smile falters, and he worries his lip between his teeth.

God. He doesn’t want this interaction to be over. He doesn’t want Kurt to leave. He needs more time.

As Kurt starts to step around him, Blaine blocks his path.

“Wait-”

#glee #glee polls #kurt hummel #blaine anderson #klaine #byo klaine fic event #klaine fanfiction #again all endings are happy!!!

[cow-with-a-fur-coat]

I wish I were like a dog. 

I wish I were like a dog. A dog that can love fully, a dog that can give itself with such devotion and ease. The foundation of this creature is loyalty, it’s renowned for its heart and soul of crystal. I wish I could give myself to someone the way I want to. I want someone to have me, I want to trust someone enough to have me. I want to love in the way a dog does, with eyes closed and throat bared without a fear to be had. I want to see the world plaintively with love for the earnest beauty in all that exists here. I want so terribly to devote myself to someone, to love so horribly in its purity, without the voice in my head saying “is this real? are they real? how long until it ends? how long until it ends? are you real? who are you? how long until it ends? and if it is to end, what is the point?” I am so wrong, I am so malformed, it is not the end that matters. I want to make someone feel loved, I want to make someone know without a doubt that they are human in all the ways the poets adore. And does a dog know that its love will die? Does a dog know that you will die? No, I don’t think it does, and if it did, I do not think it would care. A dog cares only for the love it has to share, for the fullness and trust it has to revel in, like sunbathing. I want to be warm, I want to be held and I want to hold. I want to be told I’m good, and to believe it. You’ve told me time and time again that I am good, but my claws are black at the quick and my eyes darken around the irises. I am not keen on accepting your affirmation, but I would die again and again to hear it just once more. Love, tell me I am good, and God, let me hear it. 

I want to be like a dog. 

I want to have a purpose in being. I want to be without disappointing. How a dog can lie on the floor and still be loved, how a dog can perform the most beautiful of tasks and still be loved. Love me at my mundane, I am sorry it rarely gets better than this. I want to be better, I want to run until my claws are worn down and my ribs heave, but I can’t. I have no energy to chase, and I fear the force of my own bite when I catch up to what I want so horribly. I want to be loved in the way a dog takes on the life of static to someone. I want to be background but always on the mind, to be considered but I cannot handle the guilt of being sacrificed for. I want to be carried and I want to carry. I want to bring birds to your doorstep, I want to sit with you while you watch birds in the backyard. I want to stare at the sky at your side and be unable to comprehend anything beyond how it feels to be near you. Near you and so, so far from everything else. I want to be loved like a dog, and I know this is too much to ask for. I want to be accepted at my mundane. I do not have much to me, the meat on my bones is sparse and unremarkable. Love me like you would a dog you see on a street corner. I don’t even need to be yours. Love me like a dog. 

I fear I am too much like a dog. 

What happens when I get scared? What happens when I get angry? What happens when I get sad? I feel kinship to a greyhound that is run to its final end, used up and goaded on for its perseverance, until its muscles tire and it cannot run any longer. A creature praised for its resilience suddenly becomes a burden. When it refuses to fight any longer, refuses to take hit after hit, there’s no use to it any longer. I just want to rest, I don’t want to fight, I want quiet. I can’t be resilient any longer, please don’t make me continue. I’m tired and my bones are giving out every time I hear the voices raise. Let me lie. Let me not be afraid of the dark. Let me run like a greyhound that was never praised for refusing to rest. Let me be free. For I fear what will happen when I wear down, when I feel the ache in my joints manifest into a white fire of rage. If I am a dog, I fear my teeth. If I am a dog, I fear what I will do when I am tired and scared and used up. I can run, I can run, I can chase. I want to take pliers to my gums, because I am running, and I won’t stop. I want to rest. But I am running and will keep doing so, and once I catch what I am chasing, I am terrified of the blood that will coat my fangs. I realize now that anger is just sadness with a bloody pelt. And I’ve ripped open the skin of others, and I am so terrified that I will again. If I could love like a dog I would not be this way. If I could be less like a hound and more like a dog, I would be okay. Surely now I would be put down, I would be carted off with nylon coiled around my throat like a viper and a needle in my leg like a warm embrace. I could die here, on the pavement, with my teeth lodged into someone’s wrist. I could die here, and only hope that someone would understand that I am not angry. I hate the blood and I hate my fangs and I wish my claws were long and unused. Please, love me like I were a dog, hold me while blood drips from my teeth, while I cry. This is not me, this is not my soul, this is not who I want you to have. Let me be a dog, let me be good, I beg. 

Let me be human. 

#ren rambles #writerblr #writing #dog motif

[slasherparty]

Josef with a smol shy/self-conscious reader, who totally accepts and supports him, and just loves him so much?? srry if that's too specific, feel free to ignore if it's too much!! love your blog, you're an amazing writer and your hcs give me life 💖💖💖❤❤💕💕💕

not too specific at all! i think josef would get along well with someone timid. he’s very soft-spoken when he needs to be (though i’d say he has the ability to be anything he needs to be to gain someone’s trust). also thank u for the compliment <3

josef 🐺 / shy reader:

you’re attracted to josef before you consciously realize it. even in the midst of his terrorizing, peachfuzz donned on his skull like the sentient persona it has become, all you can do is reach up to pet him like you would a pet you were fond of.

being accepted in earnest admittedly feels a little unnerving to josef. it’s unexplored territory for him, who’s usually on the other side of the psychological torment. to be so openly welcomed by someone is a terrifyingly foreign experience, but he is not one to scare easily. he’s the one who does the scaring around here. not you.

despite his vehemence, you spoil his games before they even have a chance to begin. this should annoy him. he wants to be frustrated so badly. the more he sees of your patience, your kindness, your infinite capacity for open-minded approval, the more his resolve wavers. the routine isn’t working like it should.

very well, then. this only means he has to find another way of getting to you. he needed a change of pace, anyway. time and time again he’s treated himself to the same flavor of prey. to hunt another type of animal would be refreshing.

it’s safe to say you won’t be going anywhere at this point. you know what you’re in for, but you don’t feel crushed by the weight of your fate. you only feel the magnifying pull of the person (the very terrifying person) you’re slowly getting to know.

josef notices the silent submission you’re giving him and takes his time observing you. it’s longer than he’s had for most of the others. it’s time he needs if he plans to approach this game in a new way.

he starts by being honest, as all good relationships do. he shows genuine interest in you and, with consent, asks as many personal questions as you’ll allow. now you’re under the microscope of intended affection.

this challenges your self-conscious nature, admittedly. you try not to be self deprecating when he asks things about your dreams, passions, interests, wishes for the future. you try not to reveal the surprisingly weak foundation surrounding your self-image when he asks if you were bullied growing up, what your home life is like, whether you think you’re smart or not, attractive or not.

flipping these questions back at josef does nothing, unremarkably. he’s pledged honesty, but even his truthful (and sometimes very embarrassing) answers don’t seem to waver him. he’s a masterclass in composure and you’re no match for him.

he notices, of course. the flush on your neck and cheeks when he scrutinizes you so closely, revealing your self-doubt, making you vulnerable in front of him. though the two of your are alone in these woods, in this giant cabin, his eyes are like spotlights. you adore him, hopelessly so, and that's why this vulnerability feels so scary. would he think less of you for your lack of confidence, when he can share his failures and inner demons so freely and without shame?

but like always, he surprises you. he uses the things you tell him against you, but in a very... doting way? he comments on your hair, how nice it looks today; he acknowledges your accomplishments, compliments you when you succeed in something; he brings you handmade gifts, some in your favorite color, some shaped like your favorite animal... it's clear he is intent on winning this game of Who Can Love Who the Best and Most Aggressively.

this is fine with you, of course. it's a game the two of you might be playing for all eternity.

sorry i kinda wrote a whole drabble? but i have so much to say about josef/aaron... he is such a fun lil guy <3

#josef creep #creep #creep movie #creep movies #creep 2 #mark duplass #slasher x reader #slasher imagines #slashers #horror #horror movies #slasher headcanons #slasher writer #horror writer #josef #aaron creep #creep 2017 #creep 2014

[jammie3132]

Fandom: Glee Pairing: Blaine Anderson & Sebastian Smythe Chapter Title: Back to November Chapter Summary: Blaine has no idea what’s going on and everyone keeps telling him it would be better if his memories returned organically. What happens if he never remembers? What happens if he does remember, but not what people want to hear? Chapter Note: I'm not making any more notes about chapters. This is taking a big turn. Think of the previous 6 chapters as set-up. And since this is like a separate fic, I eliminated my "only MCU canon before Endgame" rule. I will not tag which show/movie but still...spoilers. Warnings: Deaths (not by Snap) of canon Glee characters are hinted at but not confirmed 

REPOST 2/20/24: I accidently posted the rough draft 🤬

Hello, Blaine. My name is Sebastian. It’s nice to meet you.

He stared at the beautiful man…Sebastian. Something about him felt so familiar. It made him feel safe. “The little girl called me Daddy.”

“Yeah, I wish that didn’t happen.”

“Why?”

Sebastian chuckled and leaned into the door frame. He seemed to drop his guard (slightly) so he did the same. “I’m going to go make sure the kids’ lessons are ready.”

“I thought you said they were going to Kindergarten?”

“That’s what we call it…no, sorry. We were told, at least in the beginning, to let you try to regain your memories slowly, naturally.”

“Regain my memories?” Yes, he'd realized he had almost no memories from before he awoke, but how did Sebastian and whoever gave him that bullshit advice know he didn't?

“Tea or coffee?”

“Tea or coffee?” Was this a test? What if he said the wrong thing? Would it mean he’d have to wait even longer for someone to tell him what the fuck was going on? “Uh…I feel like I should say coffee, but I’d really like a cup of tea, Earl Grey with a little sugar and, this might sound strange, a splash of cinnamon.”

Something he said brought the beautiful smile back to Sebastian’s beautiful face. He must have answered correctly. “It doesn’t sound strange. One Earl Grey with a little sugar and a splash of cinnamon coming right up.”

Once he was alone, he got out of bed to survey his surroundings. The first thing he saw was a pair of glasses on the nightstand. He put them on and yes, these were definitely his.

The room was nice but plain. It felt more like an unoccupied dorm room than a bedroom in a home. White walls, hardwood floors and beige area rugs. No wall art, tchotchkes, or framed photos. The bedding didn’t have patterns, just grey sheets and a dark blue comforter with red trim. There was a full-length mirror in the corner, so he went to take a look. He was older than he anticipated. His hair was ridiculously curly and he was in need of a shave. The dark blue pajama pants he was wearing were unremarkable, but his t-shirt had Dalton printed across the front.

The shirt was the only thing that brought out any sort of recognition. Whatever Dalton turned out to be was irrelevant. To him, Dalton meant home.

Next to tackle was the dresser, but when he opened the top drawer, everything else came to a stop. There was only one item there. The only item since he woke up this morning that he recognized without an ounce of doubt.

The lightsaber Tony Stark made for him.

He climbed back into bed but sat up against the headboard, clutching his find. It was an anchor within the chaos of his situation. This Tony Stark guy was obviously important to him. So, why could he remember the lightsaber but not the man who made it for him?

He closed his eyes and tried to settle his mind.

“I’ve told you a thousand times, you can’t overthink everything.”

The voice embraced him with love, bringing out his first genuine smile of the day. “But I can sure try.”

Two gasps, one his own, had him opening his eyes. The sight of the person in the doorway confused him even more than why he gasped at what was said. “I know you…but I don’t know how.”

The woman plastered on a smile and set up the breakfast tray she’d been carrying. “It’s ok, Sweetie. Sebastian told me you wanted tea. I thought you might want some toast as well. There’s some…”

“Honey butter.” The woman's smile changed to resemble Sebastian’s when he answered the tea question.

Another test passed?

She sat beside him and gently brushed back his hair. It was if she’d been doing it for years. “Are you my mother?”

“Not biologically but over the past 6 years you and I have adopted each other as family. About 4 years ago you started calling me Mom. Maybe that’s what you’re remembering.”

“Maybe, but I don’t think I can do that, call you Mom, right now.”

The woman smiled again, easing their tension even further. “I understand, Sweetie. My name is Carole.”

(A younger) Carole stood next to a man in a baseball cap. The man reached out for a handshake. “Call me Burt, Kid. Kurt talks about you so much…”

“Dad! You said you wouldn’t embarrass me!”

Kurt? His first impression was one of fondness but then he was hit with feelings of animosity. No, animosity wasn’t enough. He might not remember this Kurt guy, but he really, really hated him. The memory troubled him so much he backed away to the other side of the bed, bringing his lightsaber, his only anchor to reality, with him. “How have we accepted each other as family when I hate your son?”

Carole chalked his statement up to his memories coming back in bits and pieces. At least they seemed to be coming back. That was progress. “You remembered Finn?”

“Kurt”

“Oh, that makes a lot more sense. Kurt isn’t my son. He was my stepson.”

He scooted back to his original spot, willing to once again try trusting the woman with the kind smile. “Was?”

“I was married to Kurt’s father until he died 6 years ago in a plane crash. Kurt disappeared at the same time, and we all thought he'd died as well. About a year and a half ago Kurt showed up out of nowhere. When he found out how my life moved forward, he said he would never forgive me. I haven’t heard from him since.”

“Was it because of me? Does he hate me, because I really, really hate him…although I don’t know why.”

“My relationship with you wasn’t the problem. He hated, probably still hates, the man I married and his son.”

“His son?”

“That would be me” Sebastian said from the end of the bed. Next to him was a distinguished-looking gentleman. Both men's eyes were darting back and forth between Carole and the lightsaber. She subtly shook her head as a signal to let it go for the time being.

He pretended he didn’t notice.

The distinguished-looking gentleman ended the awkwardness with his introduction. “And I’m the new husband, Sebastian’s dad, Xavier Smythe.”

Did he say… “Smythe? Your name is Xavier Smythe?”

“Yes. Do you remember me?”

His focus moved from father to son. What he found had him trying to catch his breath. The man from earlier was gone. The person at the end of the bed was a beautiful 16-year-old boy, dressed in a perfectly pressed school uniform.

And when she knows what She wants from her time And when she wakes up And makes up her mind

”Sebastian Smythe.” ”Are you a Freshman?”

Once a Warbler, always a Warbler. Right? He remembered November 8th, 2011 and November 8th, 2012…as well as every moment they shared in between. He remembered November 9th, 2012…waking up, realizing he’d been in love with Sebastian the entire time and minutes later Kurt telling him he was dead. He remembered every second of pain between that moment and November 8th, 2024…the day he traveled back in time. Everything hadn't returned, only his memories of Sebastian and the aftermath of the accident. It didn't matter. His beautiful boy, now beautiful man, was less than 10 feet in front of him.

“Bas”

Sebastian ran from the room. He was devastated but didn't want the others to know. "Guess I failed that test."

Xavier looked to Carole who told him Go, I’ve got this one. Once he was gone, Carole grabbed hold of his hand not grasping his lightsaber. “I’m so sorry, Sweetie. This must be so confusing. But when I came in and told you to stop overthinking…”

“I said But I can sure try. I don’t know why I said that.”

“Because that’s how my Blaine would always answer. That’s how Sebastian’s Blaine would always answer.”

Her Blaine? Sebastian’s Blaine?

He didn’t know what Carole was trying to say but he didn’t care. Something didn’t feel right. He pushed her away and went as far as he could while remaining in the same room “Get out.”

“Sweetie…”

“I’m not your Sweetie. I want to talk to Bas.”

Carole stood and sighed, a signal of surrender. All the goodwill she'd attempted to build was gone. “I’ll tell Seb, but don’t get your hopes up. There’s a change of clothes in the bathroom if you want a shower.” After she pointed out the proper door, she picked up the long-forgotten breakfast tray. “Please stay here for the time being.”

“You can’t keep me prisoner.”

“I…we’re not trying to. However, there are two small children in the house and all they know is something is going on with someone they love. They’re scared enough.”

With everything that happened between the time the children left his room, he’d forgotten them (couldn’t blame the memory loss for that one). “I’ll stay here…for now.”

“That’s all I ask.”

The shower helped. He didn’t want to say it made him feel like himself again because he didn’t know who the hell he was. More specifically, who these people expected him to be. Carole must have returned while he was in the shower because a new breakfast tray of tea and toast was neatly set up on the table next to the window. Although, this time she'd included some eggs and bacon. He appreciated the gesture. As he sat down to eat, he looked outside (why hadn’t he thought of that sooner?). He didn’t need a rush of memories to know he was at Dalton. But this Dalton wasn’t either of his Daltons.

There was more than one Dalton? Why would he believe that? The only Dalton he remembered was the one where he met Sebastian. He was too hungry to obsess about it now, so he turned his attention back to his breakfast. The food was so good, and he was so mentally fried, he didn’t hear someone enter the room.

”You don’t have face hair anymore. You always have face hair.”

”I shaved.”

“Oh, ok. I got this for you, Uncle Blaine.” Sammy, the little boy…not the dog he still had no answers about, was holding a quart of Stark Raving Mad ice cream. “It always makes you feel better.”

He cocked his eyebrow and tried not to smile. “Makes me feel better, huh? Is there a reason I need two spoons to eat it?” The little boy’s face fell, and his heart shattered into a thousand pieces. “Come here.” Sammy ran into his open arms and quickly settled on his lap. “Thank you, I ate my breakfast but I’m still hungry.”

“Grammy Carole says you’re always hungry” Sammy told him between shoveling spoons full of ice cream into his face. “Uncle Seb said you don’t remember us because you bumped your head. Is he right? You promised you’d never lie to me, but I guess you don’t member that.”

WTF? Blaine shifted the boy in his lap. First, the kid was heavier than he looked. His leg was falling asleep. And second, why had Sebastian told Sammy about his memory loss when Carole basically begged him to stay away from the kid and his sister? “Your Uncle Seb told you I bumped my head and lost my memories?”

“No” the boy admitted “I heard him tell Grampy X. He also said you were the other Blaine now, not his B. I don't know what that means.” That bit of information took him from frustrated to completely horrified. How could Sebastian be so reckless to say this where one of the kids could overhear him? His Bas was an impulsive brat (hello, eye surgery) but the things he did stemmed from being a child (teenagers, no matter what they believe, are children). This Sebastian was a late 20-something year old parent. He should know better!

The ice cream was gone (he might've gotten in 3 bites) and Sammy was beginning to doze off. It gave him an idea. “You heard right, I don’t have my memory and my head still kind of hurts. I was going to take a nap. Do you want to join me?"

Sammy wrapped his arms around Blaine’s neck, making it easier to be carried. Once they were settled, the boy began to wiggle and brought something up from underneath the sheet. “Where did you get this cool lightsaber…or you don’t remember?”

How could he have forgotten his lightsaber? Was he losing new memories every time he remembered something from the past? It wasn’t the time for panic…yet. “I found it in a drawer. Someone named Tony made it for me. I don’t remember him, but I know he loved me and always made me feel safe.”

“Like you love me and said you would do anything to keep me safe...when you remembered me.”

“Hey” He lifted the little boy’s chin, so he had to look at him. “I don’t care if I never remember anything else. I will always remember to make sure you and Susie are safe.”

Any tension in Sammy’s body melted as he snuggled even closer. “Uncle Blaine, I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For getting scared and thinking the bad space monster would take me away again because you forgot to keep me safe.”

“Take you away?”

“Pepper brought you to Dalton to recover in peace. No one’s looking for Iron Man in bum-fuck Ohio.”

It wasn’t the time for questions. Tony had been through hell. And even though it had been a month, his brain was still dealing with the reality of Infinity Stones and how an alien got ahold of them, snapped his fingers and turned half of all living beings in the universe to dust.

Oh no, no, no. Sammy had been Snapped by Thanos. Blaine rolled to his side and hugged him as tightly as possible. “Never be sorry for being scared. Let’s talk about that…” He didn’t have to finish. The little boy was already sound asleep, clutching the lightsaber. 

“What the hell were you thinking?”

*Blaine continued to love and be loved by Sammy...the hyperactive puppy* Me? You gave me the lightsaber and the rest of the technology I needed to do it!”

Tony walked around the basement of the Dalton he built, inspecting the time portal Blaine, Brittany and Bruce (technically Brittany and Bruce) built out of the material he sent. “I trusted Banner. He should've called off the whole thing knowing those substitute PYM Particles were compromised! And Barton?! I thought you were the little brother he never wanted. He and his whole fake SHIELD family loved you!”

“They do…did, whatever. And Bruce told me…ok, he tried. I still don’t get all the timey-whimey shit.”

“Which you should've before you TIME TRAVELED with defective particles! I understand not going back to Hank Pym for help. The guy has a Stark hate-boner so big I’m amazed he fathered a child.”

“Like yours for Steve Rogers?”

“Hold on…fine, point for the Bow-tied Wonder. But seriously, Banner let you use the damaged particles without seeing what Britt or that Princess in Wakanda could come up with? What about Strange? He was keeper of the Time Stone for fuck sake!”

“Then why didn’t the Avengers include them in the Time Heist?”

“Dr. Weirdo, Princess Kitty-Kat and our lovable but ditzy genius were dust at the time.”

“Don’t say it like that. It took forever for Britt to realize constantly singing Dust in the Wind wasn’t appropriate, especially in front of others who were Blipped.”

“Yet another reason I love that girl. And before you say Wong, we also thought he was dust…Snapped. We were wrong but not our fault. He’d snuck back to the Mystical Monastery of the Mountains and gone off-grid. Oh, and …THANOS DESTROYED THE STONES. Since we didn’t have any extra laying in a drawer somewhere, I, the most brilliant man who ever lived, had to solve time travel.”

“Yeah, I’d forgotten most of that. Not because of the memory loss, I think, but because it made my head hurt to listen to you and Bruce, or Bruce and Britt, talk about it.”

“Again…you didn’t understand and yet decided it was a good idea to TIME TRAVEL! I should tell MIT to take back your degree.”

“You’re dead.”

“Heroically departed, yet here I am…Iron Man.”

“Seriously?”

“How about*overdramatic superhero voice* I am...Dream Master and Gate Keeper to all your memories, so don’t piss me off?”

“I hate you.”

“You love me. And hey! What about Wanda? She’s a witch with super-sized magic courtesy of the mind stone. Did any of you supposedly brilliant idiots think of seeing what she could do to help?”

“Uh…after you left…”

“Heroically departed.”

“After you left, Wanda tried to get Vision’s body from the government to give him a funeral.”

“I don’t know if I’m more offended by the fact the government had Vision’s body and I didn’t know, or Elphaba wanted to put billions of dollars worth of Vibranium…”

“No, Wanda wanted to say goodbye with a funeral for the man?...person?...cybernetic being she loved. When she couldn’t get him back, she went a little Coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs.”

“How little?”

“Mind fucked an entire town, a small town, in New Jersey into believing they were characters in old sitcoms. Manifested a new Vision and a couple of kids. After the government caught on and all hell broke loose, she freed everyone, essentially killing her imaginary family. Last anyone saw of her, she flew off, no airplane necessary, to parts unknown with something called The Book of the Damned.”

For the first time ever, Tony Stark was speechless.

*Lengthy amount of (Dream) Time later* “And you questioned why I wanted Britt kept away from all that shit!?!”

“I didn’t question, per se…”

“Liar…and why didn’t Legolas do anything about the Wicked Witch of New Jersey?”

“Wanda told Clint, and Laura, she was going back to Sokovia to help with rebuilding what the Avengers and Ultron…”

“No need to elaborate. I was there…no comments.”

“So...that’s why they didn’t question her going no contact. It’s not their fault the government was stupid and for some reason didn’t bringing in the man who convinced Wanda to turn her back on Ultron, gave his son her dead brother’s name and freed her from your house arrest.”

"I said no comments!”

“I didn’t say a word about how you were responsible for Ultron, but if the title Avengers Dictator fits…”

“My bad. And while I want answers, you dream-summoned me to help you understand what the hell is happening in your pudding brain. That doesn’t mean I’ll stop yelling about the fact you never should have TIME TRAVELED with faulty particles in the first place! I’m gone for one itty-bitty year…”

*Blaine rose from where he’d been sitting the entire time and Sammy (the dog) ran off* “Tony…” “Ok, ok, I’ll drop it for now but be prepared to be chastised in future dreams.”

“I would expect nothing less from you.”

*Seconds later (because…Dream Time). Tony is now surrounded by all the computers he’d sent to Dalton over the years* “I figured out how badly you all fucked this up without me.”

“Can we postpone the I Told You Sos as well as the yelling?“

“You take the fun out of everything.”*Blaine answered by giving him a middle finger* “See? Was that so difficult?”

*Blaine answered with double middle fingers* “What did you find?”

“The faulty particles sent you to 2011 instead of 2012. Like with Rogers and his trip to finally get laid…”

“Oh, he’d already been laid.”

“...by Peggy Carter. And I’m still angry with you for not sharing your Stucky theories while I was around to use them to my advantage…in a fun way, at least a fun for me way. I would never use information like that against someone, especially after what happened to your platonic apocalypse partner.”

“My what?”

“That Dave guy?”

“Who?”

“Ok, your memory has improved to Swiss Cheese, but one thing at a time. Like I was saying, you went back to 2011 instead of 2012 and physically became that Blaine Anderson. During the Time Heist, we just had to avoid the Battle of New York Avengers.”

“That’s what I expected, hoped, would happen to me. Did you figure out why I physically became 2011 me?”

“No clue.”

“So, you can’t fix it?”

“To send you back to your original timeline? Not a chance. You wanted to be here, so…ta-da!”

“Not helpful.”

“If you want helpful, I can tell you when you are. It’s November 8th, 2024.”

“The day I left?”

“Makes sense. From what I understand, the Centurian lived decades with no memories of his 70 year side trip. Those memories took over when his two timelines intersected. He did eventually wind up with both sets of memories. My highly educated guess is you’ll eventually do the same.”

“I don’t have eventually. Right now, I have a scared little boy to take care of.”

“Yeah, Sammy. Do you realize you haven’t mentioned Sebastian once since you sought my wisdom? When I was alive you wouldn’t shut up about the guy.”

“Fuck you��

“You didn’t get the big Rom-Com reunion you wanted?”

“Not even close.”

“Did you ever consider the fact that for Sebastian, his Blaine essentially died when you woke up this morning? And you? While you saved Sebastian, Bas died November 8th, 2012. Is that something you’re prepared to accept? And what about Sam?”

“Sammy…”

“Not Sammy…Sam.”

I, I will be king And you, you will be queen Though nothing will drive them away We can be Heroes, just for one day We can be us, just for one day

I, I can remember (I remember) Standing, by the wall (by the wall) And the guns shot above our heads (Over our heads) And we kissed, As though nothing could fall (Nothing could fall)

And the shame was on the other side Oh we can beat them, for ever and ever Then we could be Heroes, Just for one day

“Last night there was a major accident on the highway. A big-rig blew a tire causing the truck to flip over. It smashed into several cars before landing on two. Blaine, Sam was in one of those cars…and, and Sebastian was in the other. They didn’t make it. I’m so sorry.”

"Sammy, the little boy…obviously not the dog, is Sam’s son, isn’t he?"

"Yes"

"But Sam…if I saved him, where is he? Why isn’t he with his son?”

“I can’t tell you what happened. That’s Blaine 2.0 territory. However, when you wake up, you can have some more of Bow’s memories. I can do that much."

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me. This is your dream.”

*Next thing Blaine knew he was hugging the man he considered his father. In this Dream State he could actually feel Tony’s arms around him* “I miss you so much.”

“Of course, you do. I’m awesome.” *Tony tightened his hold* “I love you, Blaine Anderson.”

“I love you too, Tony Stark.”

“Good, because I want you to do something for me.”

“Of course, you do. What?”

“Go back to your music.”

“But…”

“What was the first thing you thought of when you remembered Sam? *Blaine tries to move away but Tony won’t let him* “You remembered the two of you singing Heroes. It was good…really good. Not hard rock enough to be my theme song, but I would’ve put it on the list.”

“How do you know that?”

“I’m Dream Master and Gate Keeper to all your memories, Dumb Ass. Now, about you going back to music…”

“Tony…”

“If I didn’t burden you with hiding Brittany…”

“She wasn’t a burden.”

“Then hiding all my extra toys in the basement at Dalton…”

“That was a burden, a little one. But only when you came to Ohio and (air quotes) played science with my home. It would take days to get Saturday back to working correctly after you left.”

“I always thought if I didn’t uproot your life, you would’ve eventually found your way back to music. You were too good not to.”

“Tony…”

“Bow, just this one time, don’t overthink this and promise me you’ll try.”

*Sigh* “For you? I promise to try.”

Blaine felt movement next to him. It was enough to end his dream but not enough for him to move out of the comfort cocoon he was wrapped in. That was until he heard…

Come on, Big Guy. Time to go.

“Says who?” Blaine asked a startled Sebastian.

“Sammy shouldn’t be here.”

“And you shouldn’t have talked to your father about me without making sure you were alone.” He didn’t regret what he said, but maybe he didn’t have to say it like that.

“He overheard Dad and I…?” Sebastian didn’t need a verbal response. He’d seen that expression thousands of times. “Do you know how much he heard?”

“Enough to come to the conclusion my forgetting him meant the bad space monster was going to take him away again.” He motioned for not-his-Bas to go around to the other side of the bed and join them. Sebastian took the hint and laid down next to the sleeping boy, brushing his hair aside much like Carole had done with him earlier.

It finally dawned on him how much the other man loved this boy and had just been trying to protect him. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?” Sebastian asked, surprised by the apology.

“That I failed your test. That I’m not who you wanted me to be.”

If Sebastian was surprised before, he was now in full-on shock. “How do you know?”

“You didn’t hide it very well. That, and while I was sleeping, I came to a couple of realizations, like how you lost your husband.” He held up his left hand to show him rubbing the underside of his ring finger with his thumb. “I can’t stop doing this. It’s a muscle memory I have no control over. Susie said something about having a Daddy and a Papa, but this…” he held up his hand again “this is a habit developed over a long period of time.”

“B’s ring belonged to my grandfather. It was always a little big but with everything going on the past few years, getting it resized wasn’t happening. When we finally found someone to do it, B said no, the ring’s perfect the way it is. And you didn’t fail. We knew this would happen. I just hoped…”

Huh? We knew? “How? How the fuck…” Sebastian glared at him until he realized “Oh sh…cra…darn? Guess I need to learn to watch my language.”

“We have a curse jar. You don’t put money in because money doesn’t have any real value right now. The jar has pieces of paper with monthly jobs no one wants to do on them. B usually takes out 10 at the beginning of the month so he can space things out.”

He chuckled quietly, not wanting to wake up Sammy. Obviously, he and the other Blaine would have similarities since they were technically the same person. He never considered his swearing habit would be one of them. “He, your B, has or had…”

“A potty mouth? Yes, but it did get better after Susie’s first word was fuck.”

That was all it took for him to lose it. Whatever came out was somewhere between a laugh and a sob, the problem was it was loud. Sammy smiled waking to see the men he called Uncle on either side of him, until seconds later when sheer panic overtook the boy.

On the other side of the room, sparks had appeared out of nowhere. Fortunately, he remembered what this meant, but how to explain it to a traumatized child was a different story. “Sebastian, how did everyone Tha…the bad space monster took away come back?” he asked, hoping it was at least close to the version he knew. “The Sammy version.”

“Um…Avengers broke the space monster’s curse and everyone just reappeared. No one knows how.”

“What did the Avengers do next?”

“Uh…a big battle with the space monster. They think they’re going to lose when a bunch of people joined them…”

“Awesome! Sammy, I know people who were there when the Avengers fought the space monster. Everyone who joined them? They got there through a magic portal just like that one. Only heroes can go through them.” He tousled the less-scared little boy’s hair before getting out of bed and putting himself between Sebastian and Sammy, and whoever (or whatever) stepped out of the portal.

Not that he was going to stop a magical being or anything, but it felt like the right thing to do.

Any doubt was quashed when their visitor arrived. “Wong? What are you doing here? Wait, how did you get here? The Sorcerer Supreme is a master of time. Yes, I time traveled here but Sebastian and Sammy didn’t. Oh my God! Are we in an alternate universe?” He’s so excited his voice kept getting higher and faster. “I think I finally understand some that timey-whimey shit…stuff Tony, Bruce and Brittany yapped on and on about.”

“Brittany? You said you didn’t know my Mommy.”

He turned so fast he almost knocked himself over. “Brittany is your mommy?” For some reason what Sammy said both made perfect sense and blew his mind. Sadly, this had to wait. “Wong?”

“Sorry to burst your bubble, but you’re not even close. I thought you were some sort of genius like Stark since he sent you to MIT and then kept all his Iron Man stuff in your basement.”

“You went to MIT?”

He motioned to Sebastian he’d answer the question later. Maybe he should get the others to leave. No, a little late for that. “Wong, just tell me.”

“When I first met you, your Temporal Aura was off, more like wrong, but I was a little busy. Do you know why?”

“Testing me?"

"Yes"

Considering the man could turn him into a frog, he determined it wasn't time for snark. Sammy didn't need to see that. "The first time I met you, you and Pepper brought Morgan to me before the battle at the Avengers Compound.”

“Ok, just checking, you never know with time travel. At Stark’s funeral I pointed your Aura out to Strange and he agreed with me. You were on the wrong timeline.”

“The what now?”

“The wrong timeline. People don’t stay on the wrong timeline. Those things get taken care of.”

“Taken care of?” Well, that didn’t sound good.

“Let’s just say there are more beings affecting time than those possessing an Infinity Time Stone. Lasting almost 30 years in the wrong timeline only to return to the correct one without assistance from any form of timekeeper doesn’t happen…until you. It’s fascinating.”

“Fantastic isn’t the word I would use.” This conversation was getting more confusing (and terrifying) by the minute. “So, what does all of this mean? And please no timey/whimey or magicity/smagickity explanations?”

“It means I need to have a discussion with Strange but I can’t find him. He’s off universe. It’s so frustrating.” Wong waved his arms and another portal began to open. “Maybe you can help. What’s the name of Stark’s other lost boy?”

“Huh? Oh, you mean Spider-Man?”

“I know that. What’s his real name? His identity?”

“I don’t know. He wanted it to remain secret, unlike his mentor.”

“Someone must know.”

“Pepper?”

“None of Team Iron Man. Maybe this has something to do with why I can’t find Strange. Do me a favor…no more time jumping until I get this figured out.”

“I won’t know how.” 

Once he was sure Wong was gone, he turned back around. Sammy was bouncing with excitement. Sebastian…have you ever heard the expression If looks could kill? Neither was a good thing. Like his other self, he should probably get a head start on the curse jar because…FUCK!!!!!

#seblaine fic #blaine anderson #sebastian smythe #mcu inspired

[cognitosclowns]

ALRIGHT I know part 2 just released, but any theories for part 3?

OHOHO HELL YEAH >:) these may be a bit sporadic and out of order, a catastrophic amount of sillies, perhaps some hooliganism, etc, etc, y'all know the drill by now <3

[IJ part 2 spoilers, ofc]

Same cold open as always (in front of the whitehouse, etc) except this time its RON >:)

he MENTIONED being a huge conspiracy nut in college - considering he's most likely gonna remember elements of Reagan's script, I 100% believe he's gonna slip back into that.

WE GET A GIGI BACKSTORY EPISODE!!! Otherwise I will just start biting people

ok this is just a plea to the IJ writers BUT STILL

JUST,,, PLEASE </3 I want Gigi lore. Her character is delightful, and there's so much potential for interesting backstory. They've set up all these little threads [her working her whole life to get where she is but still being unsatisfied, 'I could get used to being unremarkable', feeling ignored] now I just want them to elaborate on them.

I might be biased bc I love Gigi to death but COME ON, IT FEELS LIKE SHE'S GETTING SHELVED SO MUCH!! I'm so glad she got to do more this season, esp w/ Reagan, but I'm yearning for lore

tldr. Give me a Gigi episode or give me death.

Air Bud (AB) and Alpha-Beta (AB). Can you see where I'm going with this can you see the wires crossing

I'm sorry but I need the silly robot man to get jealous of the team paying more attention to Air Bud than him.

I can picture it so vividly like a vision from an angry god just

'Of course we're a team! we've even got loveable non-human sidekick who grew beyond his original purpose, gained human traits, and became all the better for it!'

-haha, well, I wouldn't exactly describe myself as a side-'

'Air Bud :D'

'I beg your fucking pardon, Mister Hand?'

in short I need smb to offhandedly refer to Air Bud as AB, and watch this man have a cyberstroke from pure jealousy.

speaking of my favorite man,

ALRIGHT,,,, I DO KINDA REALLY WANT TAMIKO DATE 2.0,,,,,,,

I don't really ship them but the potential here is too powerful. I need to experience more of Whatever The Fuck Happens To AB's Mind When He Sees A MILF

Tell me it wouldn't be delightful to see this clown try and ask Tamiko on a proper date. Tell me that wouldn't be magical to witness. It'll be an absolute car crash and I pray the writers give it to us.

also because if (lets be honest, when) he gets rejected, his dramatic, self-pitying crywank moment is going to be. so good. Teenager sulking in their bedroom watching rom-coms and crying about how 'that was just like me and Tamiko 🥺🥺🥺' levels of pathetic. I know it in my heart of hearts. I physically can't wait.

I think overall I just want this man in situations. bad situations. bad not good situations where he will act both bad and not good <3

THE ROBES,,, UH,,,, HRM,,

*GESTURES VAGUELY* THERE'S SO MANY OPTIONS IDK YET GIVE ME A FEW MONTHS TO STRATEGIZE

They could be anything from aliens, to time travelers, to 4th dimensional beings, robots, clones, ghosts, Just Some Guys (tm), to all of the above in some hodgepodge fruitcake situation.

I will however say that,, at least half of what the Robes told Reagan was probably bullshit. The stuff about all catastrophes having meaning? Not buying it, there's smth up here.

[ALSO,, I'm 90% sure that season 2/part 3 is gonna be the start to an actual Longterm Overarching Plot, which the Robes will no doubt be involved in. Please Please Please, this show is already delightful, and a broader plot would just. *italian hand kiss*]

MISC SHIT, MOSTLY JUST HOPES AND DREAMS:

JRand prison moments. homoerotic prison escape. two bisexual men pressed into a dirt tunnel, who knows what might occur in the heat of passion etc, etc

GLENN CHARACTER ARC!!! We're getting little hints at it,,,, he's tried shrooms,, he's growing closer to the team,,, the bisexual arc is right around the corner for this man I can FEEL IT.

I think we might see Atlantis? We've been getting more stuff about them, and since we've covered pretty much all other Already Mentioned Funky Locations, I think that's gonna be the Big Travel Episode next season!!

BEACH EPISODE!! PLEASE GOD!!! Either combined w/ the above, or separate

[Also, shamefully, I'll admit,,,, I kinda want a musical episode. I have no excuse I just think it'd be so delightful. Please Once-More-With-Feeling, Guy-Who-Didnt-Like-Musicals these bitches Shion, I know you have the power.]

A deep-dive into Andre's psyche. SO many things have been brought up, and I hope they really go in on them. He's coping in 1000 different ways and I don't think a single one of them is good for him.

HM. okie this is getting rambly - I'll probably add more within the next few months as these episodes congeal in my brain, but for now, tysm for the ask!!!

#inside job #inside job spoilers #theories #cyberstroke. thats what I do when your mom- *gets shot*

[tickles-guruma]

Insecure

Yuri on ice/Lee Yuuri/Ler Viktor

A/N: I dreamed a dream with Victuuri and a tk fic occurred to me as soon as I woke up ajhshajjs anyway I hope you like it.

Summary : Yuuri didn't want to go to that ice rink.

∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆

Why? Why do I agree to come here? Thoughts like that went through Yuuri's head as she looked at the new little skating rink. Viktor had insisted on going to the opening of a small ice rink, Yuuri was hesitant at first due to the fact that the rink was small… Viktor could see all his mistakes now .

And he was not wrong. Viktor demanded a lot from him, his coach constantly scolded him for his mistakes, it was somewhat humiliating considering that they weren't the only ones there, there were a lot of people looking in his direction.

"For the last time Yuuri, it's not like that, do I have to go in to show you?" It took him a little while to remember that his skates weren't there "Yuuri I'll go get my skates, stay practicing" he said with a serious tone and he left.

Yuuri began to practice and fail repeatedly, he had started to get frustrated, also where was Viktor, he brought him here!

Yuuri longed to get out of there but Viktor wouldn't let him leave before he finished his practice perfectly. Nope! Yuuri was already a responsible adult, he didn't have to ask permission to leave! Well....

But maybe he could hide and then escape from the place without the Russian noticing, Yep, a totally mature decision!

After looking for a place to hide, he found a place that was quite large and unremarkable, Viktor would never find it.

When Viktor returned (after an eternity) the Japanese was nowhere to be found. Maybe he went looking for it and got lost? No, it couldn't be that, the place wasn't big, but then... where was Yuuri?

Viktor was giving up until "V-Viktor?" Yuuri looked up in horror to see his lover looking at him with weariness and doubt.

"Yuri? I've been looking for you for like half an hour, what are you doing here?! Viktor said with concern in his voice.

"I-I was looking for something and-"

"No Yuuri, don't lie to me" Viktor said as he pulled the Japanese out of hiding.

Yuuri fell silent, as his lover stared at him, a bunch of emotions building up and he felt his heart clench. "Viktor I..."

The Russian hugged Yuuri because it seemed that at any moment he would collapse, Viktor silently waited for his lover to explain the situation while stroking his hair.

When he calmed down a bit, he just spoke "Viktor...I just felt frustrated and humiliated and many other emotions combined and I couldn't handle everything. I'm sorry"

Viktor kissed his forehead and stayed for a while comforting the insecure Yuuri, running his fingers through his hair, behind his ears, on his sides and-

"nohohot thehe sidehes" Yuuri started laughing and squirming in Viktor's lap, not really trying to stop him.

"Awww Yuuri you're so cute~" Viktor said watching the Japanese squeal on his lap.

Viktor lowered to his hip and began to squeeze "Hahahahahaha okahahahay" Yuuri was laughing from the bottom of his heart, he felt so protected by his boyfriend turning so giggly in the warm embrace of the boy.

"Omg, Yuuri can't handle a little tickling?" Viktor teased as he clenched his hips.

"NOHOHOHOHOT THEHEHEREHE" Yuuri cried out as Viktor touched a particularly sensitive spot on his hip bone, driving him crazy.

"Is it really bad here?....too bad for you" said Viktor feigning sadness in his voice

Yuuri squirmed in an attempt to escape but nothing worked. Somehow it got worse when the Russian placed him on his back on the ground and leaned over his stomach.

"Nohoho plehahasehehe!" Yuuri tried to roll onto his back but it was too late.

"Oh don't tell me you can't have raspberries either~" After saying that, the Russian started blowing soft raspberries on his stomach and hips.

"NOHOHOHOT THAHAHAHAT AAHAHAHAHA"

Viktor began to notice how difficult it was for Yuuri to breathe properly and hugged him as he sprinkled soft kisses on his hundred.

"I love you Yuuri, please, the next time something bothers you, tell me" said the Russian hugging his beloved tighter

"I love you too Viktor"

The two left the place and decided to go eat the little one before returning home to talk about everything that had happened today in comfort.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~°

Okay, I'm obsessed with Yuri on ice....Victuuri gives me life (๑♡⌓♡๑)

#tickle #tickle blog #tickle sfw #tickle fluff #tickle community #tfb community #tickle fics #tickle fic

[minuy600]

The Future Of My Retro Reviews (don't worry, it's not over)

Considering it's been a bit since I last did an in-depth review of a 1970s game, I felt it was appropiate to share what my plans are of it, and the Kruidvat bootleg handheld as well.

The regular game reviews:

After i'm done with 1979, I plan on seperating my reviews to be per console and chronologically go through those seperately. So that means I can put the Atari 2600 reviews on standby and get those done in batches later. Not only that, with how creaky those games can be, i've decided to introduce Mini Reviews for the purpose of getting those over and done with.

They will still follow the same scoring scheme, however I won't need to go as much into detail per category. The games themselves will probably be described in a paragraph or two, which would go over the most important anomalies.

The arcade? I'm not sure about that one. There's a lot of stuff I DO want to play and cover, but also a lot that I don't, especially the more obscure shit by Atari. They're just not that interesting. i doubt I wanna quit those games for a while per say, however I may go the Mini Review route for the most unremarkable of the bunch.

And then there's the NES and Famicom. If you couldn't tell from my Kruidvat bootleg adventures, i'm starting to get super eager to playing through that library of games, which is of a far higher quality than the 2600 and can at *least* compare to the arcades, even in 1983 and 1984. There's a very good chance I will set up shop in Nintendo's history sooner rather than later.

1979 will be finished first though. That's the priority.

The Kruidvat bootleg:

This one is less complicated (sorry for confusing everyone, i'm bad with rambling in text).

I'll finish the bigger games that do not simply use the original mapper chip from the Famicom. After that, the rest of the games will be quickfired and i'll make funny quips about the most curious things I notice within a couple minutes of opening the game. Bay day bing bay day boam.

See ya soon for more adventures with games almost nobody gives a sh*t about!

#minuy600 #retro gaming #atari 2600 #arcade #1979 #atari #nintendo reviews #famicom #nintendo entertainment system

[storiedtreasures]

Jukebox Hero

a/n: Eddie’s an ace at collecting strays, so why not another of these fics?

summary: Starting your senior year at a new school was never going to be a good thing. But how bad can it get, honestly?

genre: slow burn, fluff, Eddie x f!reader

word count: ~4.4k

warnings: language, innuendo

 SEPTEMBER 1985

 I.  

 It’s a shock, no doubt. Eddie Munson runs into someone and they apologize to him? A first, that’s for sure. He laughs at the sheer absurdity as you ramble on.

 “Sorry, that was me. I wasn’t paying attention, didn’t clear the hallway.”

 Neither of you dropped anything or ended up with bruises, he’d honestly just clipped your backpack as he walked down the hall. He pardons you with a wave of his hand, and then actually takes a look at you. “Moore’s class, homeroom right?” he asks, fairly certain.

 “Right,” you nod.

 “New kid.” He says. He’s seen Pam Fanucci showing you off like a new Swatch she got for Christmas. He’s not sure why; you’re pretty plain as far as that crowd goes. No trendy clothes or swanky jewelry. Unremarkable hair-do. He’d have said forgettable or boring, but not to your face. Especially not now that you’ve groveled for bumping into him.

 You stifle a sigh, he thinks. “Yep. That’s me.”

 “How’s that going?” Eddie can’t help himself, it’s too easy.

 “Being the new kid?” you ask, eyebrows up so high he almost regrets it.

 “Yeah,” he pretends to be genuinely invested in your answer. You either see through the ruse or don’t care to answer, smiling in a way that hides your lips entirely. There’s a laugh he doesn’t entirely mean to let out but you seem grateful for the ease it creates.

 He’s staring past you at the Drama class door, closed with a sign on it frowning when you nod at it, questioning his gaze. “Was gonna talk to Birdie about something,” he explains, uncertain if you know the Drama teacher’s nickname by now.

 “They’re holding auditions right now. I’m waiting for a friend.” You inform, and he realizes his own evening now consists of waiting around for this to end.

 “Any idea when they’re over?” Eddie wonders if he rolled his eyes. Wayne’s been very vocal about him doing that lately. ‘Like you’re thirteen again, Eddie.’ He’ll say, throwing a hand up.

 “No, sorry. I don’t think Pam’s gone up yet and she wasn’t last so… a while?”

 Eddie clicks his tongue and nods, “Thanks anyway.” He makes it a few feet into the main hall, planning on waiting it out in his van when you call after him.

 “I like your-” you stop mid-sentence as he pivots to look at you. “Uh, jacket? Vest?” You’re squinting at his chest and he’s squinting back at you much the same.

“The back,” you clarify, “Dio?”  

“You like Dio?” You definitely didn’t look like the type.

 “Yeah,” you say, a little offended, “Well, I liked the Holy Diver song. That is Dio, right?”

 “It is.” He’s staring at you hard now, trying to figure out if you’re messing with him or maybe just trying to sound cool. “Just Holy Diver?” he quizzes, waiting to see if you’ve got a game.

 “Oh, um… I liked the other one,” Your eyes close as you hum under your breath, mentally chasing a name. “Rainbow in the Dark! I liked that one. I didn’t really see which-” You walk around him, trying to see the back of his jacket, he realizes.

 “Last in Line,” he tells you. “It’s from a concert in Chicago last year.”

 “Good?” you ask, and you look like you truly want to know.

 “Yeah, awesome actually.” He shrugs. “Last in Line’s probably as good as the Holy Diver album.” Eddie thinks it might be better but there’s a chance he’s biased. “You don’t look like the type,” He tells you. “You seem like more of a-”

 “I listen to a lot of radio,” you cut him off before he can put a finger on what he would’ve guessed you listened to. You’re eyeing the patches on his vest and he can see the wheels turning. He’s left wondering if you recognize the names or not. “I probably lean a little more towards the uh, light, kind of metal. Van Halen, Whitesnake.”

 “They’re not…terrible,” he concedes. Scratches his chin and adds, “Slide It In was pretty good, actually.”

 “I have that one.” You nod in agreement, smiling with one side of your mouth.

 Pam steps out into the hallway and frowns at him while she calls your name. “Can you hold my stuff for a minute?” You slip over and take the bag she holds out, the two of you exchanging words he can’t hear. Eddie has an instinct to just turn tail down the hall, leave the conversation where it landed. Pam’s back in the room, door clicking loudly behind her before he makes good on the instinct.

 “She’s up in a minute. Says there are like four people after her so maybe 20 minutes?” He doesn’t register what you’re saying at first. “Until they’re done.”

 “Got it.” He lets his eyebrows fall back into place. “Thanks. Clear the halls better next time, yeah?” He doesn’t know why he says it. Just comes out. He leaves you in the hall holding Pam’s bag with a haphazard salute and heads for his van to wait the next half hour out on his own.

 II.

 It’s about a week later in Moore’s class when he finds himself thinking of the Whitesnake album the two of you had talked about. At first Eddie’s not sure why but after staring aimlessly at the chalkboard it dawns on him that the poem the teacher’s going over has startlingly similar lines to one of the songs. Sugar coated and silver-tongued stand out in bold now that the thought’s occurred. Spit It Out, he thinks. The appeal of the album had been largely in the amount of innuendo that it squeezed in.

 You’re behind him a couple of seats. He’s been sentenced to a front row seat this semester, and probably deserved it. Still, he can turn in his seat just enough to see your face. It takes a minute for you to notice his gaze. Your eyes flit to the teacher before you raise your eyebrows at him. He smirks, laughs to himself looking at the blackboard again. If you haven’t caught it yet he’s not sure what he can mouth to make it clear.

 He's pretty sure you followed his gaze though. Eddie glances back just in time to see your eyes go a little big and your mouth twitch as you swallow a snicker. You manage to smooth your face back to indifference but he notices how you staunchly refuse to look his way again.

 He slows in the hallway outside the door as nonchalantly as possible, waiting for you to exit the class. You move past him but dawdle as well, only daring to look at him once you’re all the way out of the classroom. You close your eyes almost instantly, finally letting out the laugh you’d held back in class. “That song’s gonna be stuck in my head all day now, thanks.”

 “Worse ones to have trapped up there,” he teases.

 “Yeah, such a pious tune to accidentally sing in trig class. Day: ruined.” You’re down the hall before he can come up with something worse to say.

 When you walk toward his table in the cafeteria he manages to catch your eye, and you smile despite yourself. You circle your finger around a couple times by your head and mouth “still up there” over the crowd.

 There’s another brief exchange in the hall after fourth period. He thinks you’ve had to have forgotten it by now, which means he can trap it up there again if he plays his cards right. You walk by, books tight against your chest in an effort to make yourself as small as possible to get through the herd of students, and he leans away from the locker.

 Except you’re singing I roll my dice with a heart of ice at him before he has a chance to even hum a bar. Eddie snorts without thinking, folds easily – he hadn’t expected that from you. He’s disappointed in himself but he’d be lying to say it wasn’t the highlight of his day.

 Eddie isn’t about to start kidding himself this far into his high school career, though. It’s only a matter of time before one or all of the parent-approved friends you’ve got tell you how you should steer clear of him. The daggers Pam Fanucci had stared at him from the drama room threshold weren’t the sharpest in recent memory but they served as proof you weren’t far enough down the social ladder for him to make a habit of hanging out with.

 Didn’t mean he couldn’t try to ‘ruin’ your day one last time. The tape’s in his Chevy already. He’s only gotta put it in and fast forward about a song or two in on the second side. Gareth’s sitting shotgun, asking what they’re waiting for about five times before you exit the building, heading for the parking lot. He waits until you stop to talk to some girl whose name he doesn’t remember before cranking up the volume.

 It doesn’t take more than ten seconds to get the van backed out of the parking spot and pulled up alongside you. You’re looking at the sky and shaking your head, trying to say something through your laughter.

 “I can’t tell if you’re trying to help or hurt, honestly.”

 Eddie doesn’t say anything, just grins. He peels away and a few of the other cars slam on their brakes, clearing a path. All in all, not a terrible day.

 III.

 “Shouldn’t you be gone by now?” Eddie asks, as if he isn’t still hanging around the school parking lot at half past closing bell. You’ve set up camp on the brick wall, one leg tucked under and a particularly uninteresting looking book half-open in your lap.

 “Waiting on my ride.” You shrug.

 Eddie leans out his window a little to glance around at the cars left in the lot. Todd Douglass’ is not among them.

 “Which is…” he leads.

 “Todd is busy. Uh,” you falter. “Well, wherever he is-”

 “He has his hands full?” Eddie offers, smirking.

 You snort, smirk back. “Something like that. You know, it’s a party I wasn’t-”

 “Invited to?” He can’t help himself, doing his best not to actually wiggle his eyebrows.

 “Wasn’t interested in attending,” you correct. “A, um, need-to-not-know basis.”

 That’s funny, he thinks. You’re funny. He almost says so when something stops him. Reality, Eddie reasons.

 There’s a look on your face as Todd’s car, seemingly summoned by the small talk, revs onto the pavement in front of your perch. Eddie’s not sure if he sees it well enough to call it disappointment. Maybe it was annoyance. Either way, you don’t actually say goodbye but you do throw your chin in his direction as you pull open the back door of the Buick.

 IV.

 Douglass was less than reliable, he’d noticed that. Eddie dragged his feet on enough group projects to write essays on the subject but even he’d been appalled by Todd’s brazen dereliction of duty. You had been posted up on the wall yet again when he’d left, Gareth in tow for a ride home and a rundown of the next day’s setlist.

 But now you’re slumping down Melvald street, headphones on and hands shoved deep into your jacket pockets. He takes a chance, spins the wheel all the way around on the empty street and pulls up next to the sidewalk, slowing to keep pace with you. You drop the headphones to your neck and look at him like he’s strange, but Eddie’s used to that. From everyone, why not you too?

 “You turn down an invite to another party?” he jokes, double checking the room he has to the next stop sign. Still no traffic.

 “It’s not a terrible day and I had my Walkman,” you tap the mechanics around your neck and shrug. Eddie looks at the mist on his windshield. It’s not enough to turn on the wipers yet but the darkness looming overhead has already tempted his headlights on.

 “It’s raining,” he says to you, wondering if you’ll contradict him. Of course, you take the bait.

 “Drizzling.” you answer back. The windbreaker you’re wearing is definitely damp, Eddie can tell from the way it hangs off of your shoulders, tight to the top of your arms.

 “It’s only going to get worse. You want a ride?” He leans over and throws the metal pail in the passenger seat over his shoulder. You stop on the sidewalk, mouth open and one eye closed, ready to argue. Your impending refusal dies as loud clap of thunder breaks out. Eddie grins, daring you to tell him no now.

 “You sure?” you frown at him.

 He can’t reach all the way across the cab to open the door for you so instead he beckons you with a wave. “Come on.”

 The sky waits a moment while you tell him where you live, the apartments about 10 minutes up the road, and then opens up before he pulls away from the nearest stop sign. Eddie doesn’t say ‘told ya’ but his eyebrows do. You breathe out a sigh before saying “Thanks” and sounding like you mean it.

 “What’re you listening to?” he asks as you open up your backpack to shove your headphones in.

 “Something to make you think less of my taste, I’m sure.”

 “You can put it in if you want,” Eddie says, ejecting the tape currently in the stereo. “I won’t make fun of you.” The look you give him does nothing to hide your doubt. “Unless it’s like, really bad.” He pauses for effect and adds, “Sunglasses at Night bad. It’s not Sunglasses at Night, is it?”

 You open your mouth and close it again, a mischievous smile sliding across your face as you pull the tape out of your Walkman and shove it into the deck. He can’t see enough of it to even take a guess at its contents.

 He’s been listening to the same Slayer album for the last week, reasons a change of pace might do him some good. Your taste can’t be that bad, if previous conversations are anything to go off. He’s pleasantly surprised when the tape kicks in. Lou Gramm’s not hard to recognize.

 “This the one with Urgent on it?” Eddie knows the answer, but Foreigner’s not exactly metal and he likes letting you think he’s got discriminating taste.

 “Yeah. It’s next, actually.” Sure enough, the song kicks in almost immediately.

 “So, you only listen to songs you can’t sing in trig class?” he asks, undecided if he’s trying to rile you up or set you at ease.

 “Well, that’s what rock music is, isn’t it.” You shrug, leaning back a little.

 Eddie’s not convinced you’re actually touching the car seat yet but it’s something. “Is what, exactly?”

 “Something my mom’s always said,” you explain, another sly smile on display, “It’s not really rock and roll if it isn’t pissing off someone’s parents.”

 “I take it she’s not a fan of this album?” He’s trying to miss puddles when he asks and instead misses the look you shoot him.

 “No, she likes it. Never said she was one of the parents it was pissing off. All the Van Halen vinyl we own is hers.”

 “Why is your mom sounding cooler than you all of the sudden?” Eddie jokes as he rolls to a stop and glances over. You’re still too far forward in your seat to look comfortable.

 You purse your lips before answering, pretending to be offended, he thinks, as you stare up at the red light. “She probably is, truth be told.”

 “I’m not doubting it,” he agrees as he eases away on the change to green. It’s taking a lot of effort to be passenger-considerate but he thinks he’s pulling it off.

 “So, do you only like bands you can put on your vest?” you ask, and Eddie wonders if you had been pretending after all. It’s incredibly derisive. Could have cut him to the quick if he wasn’t made of metal already, as it were.

 “Jacket.” He corrects.

 “Jacket,” you placate. There’s no venom in your voice but Eddie’s an expert in anxiety, really wants to be certain.

 “I have favorites, but I listen to a lot. Helps to keep an ear to the ground.” When he looks over the pull between your eyebrow asks ‘why’.

 “Gotta keep up with the competition and all.” He waves a hand in the direction of the radio.

 “You a musician, I take it?” Your head hits the headrest for the first time and Eddie feels his shoulders drop two inches. Took long enough.

 “Guitarist.” He answers a little too proudly.

 “Any good?” There’s a smirk on your face that says you meant to crack him up.

 “Probably as good as all the other assholes who pick up a guitar in middle school.” He says, thinking it’s true. There’s a not-terrible lull in the conversation as the chorus of a new song plays. One about dark silhouettes at tables.

 “Hey for what it’s worth I didn’t mean it about your mom being cooler or whatever, that was a joke.”

 “I know. I mean, you’re not wrong. No one’s gonna look at me and think ‘she’s cool’. At all.”

 “No, you’re-” You dare him to disagree with a single look.

 “Okay, probably not. You do dress kind of…” Don’t say boring, he thinks. Struggles for a moment to come up with something else. “Safe.” He’s pleased with himself for that one.

 You don’t look hurt but you are rubbing your hands on jeans awkwardly. Shit.

 “My last few schools had dress codes. I didn’t have to worry about what other kids thought. Then we get here and I’m looking at all the clothes I have like, what am I an extra in a rerun of Welcome Back Kotter?”

 And not one of the ones with any lines, Eddie thinks but doesn’t say so. You look like you can see him keeping his snark to himself.

 “Pam calls it ‘retro’,” you muster your best impression of condescension. He thinks you’ve ended the conversation but you keep glancing over at him and pull your bottom lip all the way into your mouth like you’re waiting on him to say something.

 “I have absolutely nothing to add,” he assures you.

 You shake your head. At him or yourself, he doesn’t know. “Wanna hear the worst part?”

 Eddies eyebrows shoot up and he says “Yeah…” like it’s the dumbest question he’s heard.

 “Before we moved, I had, um,” You won’t look at him while you’re saying, pretending to be very interested in the windshield. “The uh… the Marcia Brady haircut.”

 Eddie tries not to laugh before you do but it’s really hard. Luckily you’re snickering almost as soon as he is. He gestures to your hair and says, “But you made it into the current decade! A little late it sounds like, but it looks good.” He bobs his head reassuringly. Maybe unconvincingly.

 You make a big show of rolling your eyes. “Thanks,” you groan, then point to the left. “It’s this one.” You’re already ejecting the tape to throw it back in your bag as he pulls into the complex.  

 He parks into the spot you point at, assuming your door is close. It’s not pouring or anything now but there’s no reason to make you walk a mile in this weather. You grab the door handle as his hand hits the box of tapes in the floorboard.

 “Hey, uh-” he says before you can get out, the thought only half formed. “I’ve got the Last in Line cassette if you wanted to listen to it. Borrow it.” Your hand falls back onto your backpack.

 “Sure, if you don’t mind. Actually,” you pull your bag up and onto your shoulder. “I have a few blank tapes – I can just make a copy if you wanted to wait.”

“Yeah, that’s cool.” He hands you the tape and watches as you hop out cautiously. Eddie often forgets how big of a drop it is himself. Wonders if he should’ve warned you before you got out. He rolls his window halfway down when you stop on the sidewalk in front of the van and cock your head at him.

 “You gonna wait in the car?”

 “I didn’t wanna impose,” he explains. And then the look is back on your face again: he’s strange.

 “You can come in? If you want, I mean.” Your shrug says it really isn’t a big deal one way or the other.

 Eddie’s left trying to remember the last time a girl from school invited him into her house and it’s… it’s been too long to count. Years, now. He turns the car off and jumps out onto the wet pavement with as much nonchalance as he can. “Yeah, alright.”

 Your apartment is on the second floor and not much to talk about. The living room, kitchen and dining room are all pretty much visible from the door. Couple of doors on the left, one on the right. The whole place is basically brown. Brown couch, wooden table with matching chairs, wood laminate cabinets and laminate countertops. Nicer than his trailer, at any rate. Cleaner, for sure. There’s a mauve monochromatic picture of fake flowers in a vase over the table but that’s the only thing on the white walls.

 You head into the living room immediately and find a tape to start copying the album. Your stereo setup isn’t half bad, if a little dated. There’s a console he’s pretty sure has a turntable in it on the opposite wall. You’re careful putting the cassettes in and rewinding them, tender even, ensuring both tapes are uninjured while recording.

 Eddie says no on instinct when you offer a drink. Almost too fast, he thinks. “Lotta music,” he says as a way of changing the subject, pointing to the tapes lining the shelves of the stereo cabinet. “Someone in the family a musician?”

 You laugh through your nose, “Not really. I can’t even clap on a beat. My mom’s never played music on anything but the radio as far as I know.”

 “Aw, everyone picks up an instrument at some point. Not everyone sticks with it, that’s the difference.”

 “Well, not everyone. We don’t even-” The words die on your lips as you stand in the middle of the living room. One minute you’re sucking your teeth and the next smiling ruefully at him. Eddie half-follows you to a closet, your finger up as if pressing pause on the conversation. You seem disappointed in its contents and motion for him to wait where he is, disappearing across the apartment and reemerging with a cheap gig bag.

 “You were saying?” he asks, pointing at the guitar in your hand. You set it down on the table, nodding begrudgingly.

 “Technically it’s my grandmother’s. Was. We got it when she passed. Pretty sure she bought it at a pawn shop.” Judging by the case, Eddie agrees. “Her and her sisters had this thing, I guess, where if one sister did something, the other two copied that one. And one of them started playing, like, the fiddle and so my grandmother decided to get a guitar and learn? I don’t think she ever did, but that had been the plan apparently.” It’s kind of nice, he thinks. He doesn’t have a sibling to one-up but the sentiment is easy to follow. You’re still talking which is also kind of nice, because he’s never heard you say this much.

 “Which is odd, because from what I gather she used to play the harmonica when she was young. Or when my mom was young, I don’t know which. So why not just go back to that instead of trying to learn a whole new instrument in your 60s or 70s but who knows.” You’re unzipping the cover and taking out the guitar to hand to him. It’s definitely an acoustic learner, but there’s no scuffs and all the strings are still on it. “Not sure why we haven’t pawned it. My mom’s not exactly attached to it, with the short provenance and all. I’m sure not gonna take it up.” He’s tempted to try and commiserate over lost grandparents but he’s not certain he knows you well enough. Not certain he wants you to know him that well.

 You’re poking through the case, unzipping the pockets and rifling through them. You pull an old skoal tin out of one and shake it. There’s something inside and Eddie’s kind of hoping for the worst but can’t picture a pawn shop that wouldn’t have found that before resale. You pry open the lid and scatter the contents on your dining table: a dozen or so guitar picks. Disappointing, but not without merit, he thinks as he picks up one with a familiar marbled finish. He keeps it in his hand without much consideration as he swipes through the pile of others. There’s a couple of Fender celluloids he’s pressing his finger on thoughtfully and you must notice his gaze.

 “You can take ‘em, if you want. I mean, it’s not like I need them.”

 “You sure?” Eddie asks, looking up from the table to be certain. You roll your eyes and pick up a couple of black plectrums, depositing them into the tin and shutting it.

 “Take your pick, man.” Your eyes close and it’s obvious you hadn’t meant to make the pun. “Just take any ones you want.” He grins and pockets about four in addition to the one glued to his palm upon first glance. You shovel the rest into the tin and back into the bag along with the guitar.

 The two of you pass the rest of the time with Eddie thumbing through the cassettes and a box of vinyl on the floor that hadn’t fit in the console cabinet. He pulls out a title, you tell him if it’s yours or your mother’s. There’s a couple of unexpected ones – that you have a Motörhead album at all, for one. That the AC/DC is ‘technically’ your mom’s. He notices you never mention a dad and considering his own personal experiences he gleans not to ask.

 It's not the worst way he’s passed an afternoon he thinks, getting up from the living room floor as you put the Dio cassette in its case and hand it back. Not that he’s dumb enough to hope to make a habit of this, of course.

#eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #eddie munson x you #st fic #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson x y/n #joseph quinn

[i-can-even-burn-salad]

Part 2

Fancy Boots

Warnings: None

Previous | Masterlist | Next

Following the two of them through the streets of Nimrisé was surreal at best. The woman had picked up a basket she had dropped when trying to run past him. In it Riordan had spotted a few blocks of soap and some colorful linens. She walked hand in hand with the man — the Nightmare — occasionally even greeting people they passed. 

It looked so fucking normal, it was ridiculous.

Even more ridiculous was the house in front of which they stopped. An unremarkable little thing, with whitened walls and a dark roof and a garden surrounding it. There were bushels of lavender lining the path leading to the door, next to which a large window made it almost seem like it could be a shop. Behind the window, he saw colorful things; hanging from the ceiling, standing on little shelves, catching the last of the evening’s light. 

The two walked around the house, past more flowers, most of which he didn’t know the names of. There were orderly fields of vegetables and some bushes, then they reached the back door, which wasn’t locked.

The man walked in first, while the woman turned towards Riordan, giving him one last glare — at the same time making sure he couldn’t follow too closely. Riordan raised his hands, palms outwards. He’d play nice. For now.

When he was finally allowed to enter, the interior of the house looked every bit as fucking normal as he had expected. The door had led him into a kitchen, the countertops filled with copper pots, wooden ladles, cutting boards, dried herbs and more. A polished wooden floor with colorful rugs matched the polished wooden table with a similar tablecloth. The man had sat down on the bench at the wall. Keeping the woman’s words in mind, Riordan walked to the chair furthest away from him, pulling it out.

“So… your name?” he asked as he sat down, still too baffled by everything to remember the tiniest bit of politeness.

“It’s Damien,” the man said.

Strange. That wasn’t the name the woman had called.

“And hers?” Riordan asked, casting a glance in the woman’s direction. She was leaning against the counter. The fact that she was standing next to a wooden block full of what probably were very large and very sharp knives surely was no coincidence.

“She can hear you.” The woman glared at him. Again. “Her name is Merridy. Would be nice if we knew yours, but I can just call you Asshole if you prefer that.”

“Look. I’m—” Wait. He wasn’t fucking sorry. It wasn’t him who was a wanted criminal. Riordan buried his face in his hand, taking a deep breath, gathering his thoughts. This was so not going as he had expected. “My name is Riordan,” he then said, each word carefully measured. “I assume you know who he is?”

Merridy didn’t reply, but Damien nodded mutely. Riordan couldn’t interpret the look on his face. 

“So you know what he’s done? That he has made himself quite a name among the rebels? That he was in the dungeon, about to be tried for attempted murder and treason, and escaped?”

“I—” Merridy started, and this time it was her who was interrupted.

“She does know,” Damien said, looking at her intently. 

Okay, no, there was no way to put this nicely. “Then what the fuck is this? What are you doing here?” he blurted out. “Living like… like that!” He gestured broadly, encompassing the whole room. At least he managed to stop himself from saying ‘like normal people’, because the chances that he’d get acquainted with one of the knives weren’t too bad. “How do you go from torturing people for the rebels to returning home to a wife and a nice home cooked meal?”

“It’s him who cooks.”

“What?” Riordan looked from her to Damien and back. She couldn’t be serious. Not that he doubted that the man could cook, but… really, that was her problem with what he had said?

“Listen, Riordan.” The way she said his name surely still sounded like Asshole. “I know what he has done. And I know how much it haunts him, how deeply he regrets it. If you think he needs to pay for what he’s done… he has.” There was a sudden sadness on her features she couldn’t fully hide, no matter how hard she tried to keep her angry glare up. “If you think he’s a danger, to anyone… he isn’t. All we want is to live in peace, live like that.” With her last words, she had imitated his earlier tone. “Are you going to let us?”

Fuck, he couldn’t answer that question. He knew he should return to Caldeia and report Damien. He could even say he wouldn’t, then do it anyway, hoping they’d still be here when the guards arrived. There was no way he’d be that much of an asshole, though. 

Still, knowing what he should do… the last time it had led to him doubting his whole line of work. Perhaps this time he could doubt it before anyone came to harm. If he was honest, between the three of them, Damien looked like the least dangerous one at this very moment. He still remembered how it had felt, leaving him in the dungeon. How wrong. It sure as fuck wouldn’t feel any better now. And Damien had paid for what he had done, at least with his hand. Even if it seemed to be still there, now resting on the table. The fingers were moving, mirroring the motions of the left hand. It was intriguing. There was time to figure it out later. Hopefully.

“I can’t promise that.” The way Merridy’s gaze darkened made him raise his hands in a defensive gesture. “I’m not gonna do anything just yet. But before I make such promises, I have to understand. I have to truly believe it. Sorry.”

Well fuck, now he had apologized after all. And for what? For making himself a traitor, too, by protecting both of them? It should feel wrong, but it didn’t.

“Would you like to come over for dinner tomorrow?” 

“Damien,” Merridy hissed. 

But Damien only sighed. “Might as well get it over with. Perhaps a nice steak can convince him to leave us alone.”

“I don’t eat meat,” Riordan said without thinking. He expected a comment, or at least an eyeroll, for making demands half a second after he had pretty much invited himself, but all he got was a slight nod. 

“You’re cooking, right?” When Damien didn’t reply, just furrowed his brows, Riordan gestured in Merridy’s direction. “She’d probably poison me, then bury me under the lavender bushes.”

Riordan thought he saw the hint of a smile on Damien’s face. “Not under the lavender. She likes it too much.”

The softness on his features as he looked in her direction. The tone of his voice when he spoke of her. The way he had tried to protect her. Riordan sighed. Back then, what he had done had felt wrong. Right now it felt right. He just hoped it wouldn’t turn out to be a mistake.

[ID: The banner shows the feet of two people wearing boots, sitting next to each other in the grass. The title fancy boots is written next to them in a fancy looking, curly font in a bright green to yellow gradient. All other images are purely ornamental lines. End ID.]

Tagging: @teamwhump​​  @dont-touch-my-soup​​ @whump-in-the-moonlight​​​

#Fancy Boots #Glass Shards #whump #fantasy whump #my writing

[sadnesslaughs]

Everyone on Earth wakes up with a number on their wrist indicating how many lives they’ve impacted. You, an unremarkable person working a mundane job, have a number exponentially higher than anyone else.

“So, Ian, how did you do it? What’s your secret to happiness? I heard Mr. Wilkins messaged you about a movie deal? Can you make a comment about that?” The heat from the studio lights was stinging my skin, making me squirm whenever the technician adjusted them. How did I end up here? I was just some guy that flipped pizzas, not the holder of happiness or whatever buzzwords they threw at me.

“Um. Sorry, what did you say?” I was lost, trying to unravel the questions he hurled at me. The interviewer holding a perfect white smile, one that didn’t cause a single dimple in his cheeks. Whoever did his plastic surgery had clearly earned their money.

“Haha. Oh, you radiate positivity. You’ve got me smiling.” He laughed and looked at the audience. Each member clapping and applauding, following the instructions of the teleprompter sitting by the edge of the stage. “Ok, let’s keep it simple. I won’t overload our star. How did you do it? How did you become the beacon of happiness?”

“Beacon of happiness? I’m not sure. I’m a pretty normal guy. I don’t do anything extraordinary. I pretty much only go to work and walk home. That’s my entire day.” I could tell nothing I was saying was impacting him. That number staying still on my wrist. I did glance at it between pauses, wondering if there was even a point to being on tv.

“Humble too. Come on. How do you do it?” He leaned forward in his chair, making me scoot back into mine. There was something unsettling about this. I tried to think of an excuse to give him. What answer would satisfy his curiosity? I pondered that before deciding to stick with honesty.

“Really. There’s nothing special about me. I can’t imagine I’ve improved any lives in any meaningful way. Not like others. There're tons of people that do great work and deserve this attention more. People that help others with depression, homelessness and other issues. Those people deserve this more.” I said, hoping that the answer had taken some of the pressure off.

“Oh, so you’re keeping it to yourself?” The hostility reached a peak as he sat on the edge of his seat, staring me down.

“No. I-“

“You what? Are you going to write a book about it or find a way to market yourself? I bet you have a manager in your ear telling you exactly what to say.” The crowd looked as confused as I did, not expecting the outburst. Some booed when the teleprompter told them too, while others shared the awkward silence that I held.

“I.. I should go.” I fidgeted with the microphone under my shirt, dropping it onto the floor as hurried out of the studio. As I passed one of his assistants, I got a tap on the shoulder.

“You should go back out there. It’s a bad look to walk out on a show. It will make you look guilty.” She said, trying to shoo me towards the studio. I stepped past her, shaking my head.

“No. I should go. Sorry.” I doubt she had my best interests at heart. Who knows what the footage would show tomorrow when they edited it? Would I even come across in a decent light? When I exited the building, I took a long breath, sucking in that fresh air I had been missing. What a disaster. I knew they would ask me about it, but I still hadn’t planned an answer. Should I have said something corny like be positive? Is that what he wanted to hear?

I began the walk home, wondering how I did it. What was my secret? Was there something about my pizza flipping that impacted people’s lives? Sure, pizza held a pretty big significance in a lot of lives, but enough to impact people?

“Excuse me, sir. Do you have the time?” A soft voice spoke up behind me. I turned around and smiled at the short older woman. A purple knitted scarf wrapped snugly around her neck, keeping her warm during her stroll.

“Of course. It’s a little past 3pm.” After saying that, I felt compelled to mention something that had caught my eye. “That’s a cute scarf. Did you make it?” Her eyes lit up after I asked. It was as if she had been waiting months for someone to ask that question.

“Yes. I made it a while ago. It was getting cold, so I thought I would save a few dollars and make my own. It’s a pretty color, isn’t it? I actual chose this color because it reminded me of the flowers my husband gave me on our first date.” She continued to tell me her little story, and I happily listened. I wasn’t in a rush and it was a charming tale of love at first sight. When she was done, we parted ways. My day already feeling a little better after that.

It wasn’t until I got home that I noticed the number on my wrist had ticked a little higher. To think such a small conversation had made an impact. Even an insignificant gesture can make someone’s life that little bit better. I wish I realized that before the interview.

#short stories #writing #writing prompt #story #writer

[charlesharrymackenzie]

Email Subject: PAYDAY

Dear Mr Harmse,

I am writing to you today with great rage.

Granted, it has been a secret rage, accumulating in my stomach like an unfartable fart. (I feel it coming, an atom bomb about to drop, but from the outside, I look like the non-plussed espresso-drinking artiste that I have worked so hard to project). 

How do these farts and rages come? They start as a small and unremarkable burden. As more time passes, a frightful reckoning commences: this is unlikely to be innocuous. Finally, you begin to fear for the very ozone itself. It has become a true Nietzschean horror. Even the most Über of mensch would begin to feel like a fucking piss ant when this thing lays waste. Even if no one around you is shaken to the core by the disaster that lives inside you, you are tragically embarrassed by your respiratory system. Sorry, anger.

In other words, I am writing about an offense committed against me that now lives inside of me, like a [insert country of conflict here] refugee, with an eye to rectifying the ethical loneliness I currently live with. I reside in this home, buried under a bottomless pit of angst and frustration. I'm afraid all the soil that was dug away to place me there is on your hands.

You are the wicked man responsible. I hope you have your testicles well-protected. Blunt as they may be, my words are not dull. There is a significant possibility that they will incisively dance out from behind your monitor and into the more compromised sections of your ejaculatory organ.

I am not sure if you remember, but we were friends. Once upon a time, as the Brothers Grimm would say. And just as it is with many of their tales, the romance foreshadows excellent tragedy. Mary Poppins gets Alzheimer's, Cinderella loses her uterus, and Black Panther doesn't get an Oscar for best picture.

Once upon a time, we were friends and had esoteric conversations about 'apex apes' in the broader pool of plebeian H. Sapiens. We discussed strange and mostly unknown things, like good writing and admirable journalism. But this is also where the spanner in our beautiful affair first appeared.

You see, I have no doubt that you remember our friendship. Fondly, one would hope. I certainly do. Or, instead, did. What you don't recall; and what I am pointing a long, erect, and forceful finger at; is the tremendous contempt you have encased me in. I feel like a helpless animal in your sick rodent theme park, running endlessly along on a hamster wheel while you watch in the distance brushing your long luscious locks in glee. For christ's sake, we all know that your hair is majestic. But the means do not justify the ends. I have half a mind to call PETA and tell them what you are doing to maintain your metrosexuality. I hope they bag you right there on the street, take you to some kind of warehouse, shave off all your headhair, and make you talk about GIRLS and CARS and other dalliances that sophisticated intellectuals such as yourself couldn't give a fuck about.

"But what," you scratch your deep intellect and think, "is he fucking on about?" Guess. It rhymes with Ferry Hiller. No? What if I told you he was a man who described his erection as "lead with wings"? No?

My fucking Henry Miller book. Where is it you cunt? I haven't slept with a woman since pre-school, and yet you suppose I am to just write; about passion, sex, the many iterations of the female body, and inducing clitoral orgasm by telepathically stroking the pineal gland; from what - memory??? Are you mad!?

I kid. The rant above was all a ruse. It's a less civil, albeit more entertaining, way of saying, "hello, how are you? What have you been up to?"

So: Hello. How are you? What have you been up to?

I await your reply. If you are currently in JHB, I will be coming up sometime in April.

Best,

Charles

(Yes, this is an actual email I sent. No, I was not actually angry)

#black panther #hunter s thompson #Letters #henry miller

[aceofshitposts]

Music swells over the ballroom, conversation and laughter filling in any spaces left between notes.

It's been a rather unremarkable evening so far. The same conversations over charitable donations, the company, how's Bruce, Tim? We haven't seen him in a while.

Tim's fairly sure that's on purpose. He could only lose the "random" drawing for who has to go to the party instead of patrol so many times before getting suspicious.

Regardless, Tim is left with his mind drifting as he twirls a girl, Amelia he thinks, in a fluffy pink dress around the room. She had been asking him to dance all night and at this point it was easier to give in than continue finding excuses not to. At least the box step was ingrained enough in his muscle memory he didn't have to worry about stepping on her crystal encrusted pumps.

"May I cut in?"

Oh thank God, Tim thinks, as Amelia's face seems to light up at the newcomer. Tim takes a step back as she curtsies, extending a hand and -

There's a hand on Tim's waist and another guiding him to turn around by his shoulder and he looks up to see -

"Thank you, miss," Jason says smoothly over Tim's shoulder, his smile all teeth. Tim barely keeps the bubble of laughter threatening to burst out under control.

"What are you doing here?" Tim asks as Jason begins to lead him around in a slightly clunky approximation of a waltz.

"Finished my route, thought you suffered alone long enough." Jason shrugs. "Sorry if I step on your toes."

Around them Tim can hear the whispers starting, no doubt because nobody can quite place the handsome stranger that just crashed the ball. Tim can't quite bring himself to care.

"Mmm, tell me you have a pumpkin carriage to whisk me away in?"

Jason barks out a laugh, loud and sudden enough that he stumbles the next move slightly.

"You know it, pretty bird, let's go."

#here have something sweet and purely jaytim after all the bruharley nonsense 😂 #jaytim #astrix writes

[magecrafts]

part 2 to gun smut?

i need to know why r is so fucky in the head 😭

a/n: yeah ok let's fuckin go. sorry to disappoint but this one does not actually include gunplay. and it's sorta plot heavy — i got a lil carried away. also please excuse any mistakes as it is long past my bedtime.

home of blood and bone.

RATING: E FOR EXPLICIT SEXUAL CONTENT (18+ ... MINORS DNI).

PART ONE ... PART TWO.

natasha x fem!reader ; natasha pries her way into your past, into your biology, and into your future. and you let her.

warnings: nsfw, semi-explicit violence, explicit smut, knifeplay, lil bit of blood.

i do take requests but please give this a read before doing so!

“How was the psych eval?”

Natasha Romanoff lingers in your doorway with a mug of coffee and a scowl.

“Thorough,” you tell her without looking up from your workbench. You’ve been toying with the grappling hook launch controls on your utility belt for the better part of an hour.

“Big man says you were difficult.”

You were not.

You’d make that clear if you cared, but you don’t. And if Tony Stark cared about your difficulties he’d pull you from the roster. Fact that you’ve got a seven am mission briefing the next day tells you everything you need to know.

A noncommittal noise falls from your lips to fill the silence.

Natasha steps into the room. The door clicks shut behind her. “Were you actually difficult?” Her tone softens. You don’t like that. “Or was it your charming brevity? I know talking’s not your favorite thing.”

In that moment you don’t like that she knows you and you really don't like that there isn’t a way to tell her as much without sounding like a grade-a asshole. Not that she would mind—you really doubt she would—but you’re still stuck on that pesky wanting to please her thing. It’s been seventy-two hours since the day in the jet and you still haven’t figured out a way to force her from your mind. And to think you used to be so good at pushing people away.

“Dunno, Nat,” you mumble, huffing. You push a torx driver a little too hard into a screw and the panel it secures sprouts a hairline crack. “Motherf—what more do you people want from me? I answered their questions.”

Natasha drops a tablet onto the workbench and taps the screen.

Security cam footage.

You grit your teeth and wish Natasha wasn’t over your shoulder, watching you watch this.

Conference room four.

An unremarkable woman in a pencil skirt sits across from you with a legal pad and a pen.

You’re stone-faced and still, hands clasped in your lap, looking right at her.

“Do you experience compulsive thoughts relating to the incident that took the lives of your parents?”

“No.”

“Do you suffer from nightmares about the incident that took the lives of your parents?”

“No.”

“Do you experience flashbacks to the incident? By this I mean—”

“I know what you mean. And no.”

“If something happens that reminds you of the incident, does it trigger an intense emotional response?”

Yes. Sometimes. But you’re careful not to show it.

“No.”

“Do you actively avoid things that remind you of the incident?”

“No.”

True. You tend to seek them out.

“Have you experienced generalized anxiety since the incident?”

“No.”

True enough.

“Trouble sleeping?”

“No.”

That one, at the very least, is only half a lie.

“Do you startle easily?”

“No.”

True.

“Do you feel that the—”

“Say the word incident one more time and I’m gonna flip my fucking lid. I don’t have PTSD.”

“What does that mean, ‘flip your lid?’”

“Get violent. I don’t know.”

“Are you stating that you intend to inflict violence upon me if I continue administering this evaluation?”

“No. I don’t—don’t hurt people who don’t deserve it.”

“Who does deserve it?”

Bullshit question.

She’s leading you.

It’s fine.

“Nobody at present,” you tell her.

“Who deserved it in the past?”

You shift in your seat, crossing your arms, trapping your hands between your elbows and ribs.

They already know. This lady, Tony, all of them. You don’t think there’s a single person on the compound who hasn’t read your file.

“Family.”

“Whose family?”

“Mine.”

“When you speak of your family do you include yourself?”

There it is.

You smile, mocking and sweet, and, “Obviously,” you say.

The video stops.

Natasha spins you around in your chair and clamps her hands on your shoulders. She’s the first person to touch your skin, your actual body, no barriers, since the day on the jet. All at once you wish you were wearing more than a tank top and wish she’d never stop touching you.

“By that logic,” she says, “your own logic, you deserve to be dead.”

“By the logic of all the world, actually,” you say, “yes. I should’ve been dead the day my family was. Don’t think it takes a professional to figure that out.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you use so many words at once.”

You roll your eyes.

“Look at me,” Natasha says next, and doesn’t speak again until you do. “I know you’re fucked up—so am I. It sort of comes with being one of us. And—”

“Your point?”

“Don’t be a jackass,” she says, laying a firm pat on your cheek that feels more like a slap than you were expecting. “I’m trying to tell you that the deaths of your parents are in the past. It’s done. But the idea that you’re walking around wishing you were dead, too? Not okay.”

“Right.”

“We need you.”

“That so?”

It’s true enough.

Tony wouldn’t have recruited you if you weren’t valuable, if you couldn’t do things nobody else could. You’re so ingrained in the operations of the Avengers that at this point, yeah, they probably do need you. Teams are reliant on their members, and whether you like it or not the Avengers are the only people who haven’t kicked you to the curb the moment they found out what exactly is in your past.

It isn’t until Natasha says, “Listen to me. It wasn’t your fault, and you shouldn’t torture yourself over it,” that you realize how wrong you are.

Your eyes narrow.

In less than a millisecond you make a weighted decision.

Your hands knock hers from your shoulders. You need space between the two of you if you’re going to let this conversation unfold. You don’t want her that close when you confide, you don’t think you could handle watching her recoil.

“What do you know about the deaths of my parents?”

Natasha furrows her brow, says, “They were shot point-blank by a HYDRA rogue after refusing to turn over their research on genetic engineering.”

You don’t know why you want to tell her.

You know it’ll ruin everything.

But if Natasha doesn't know, who else is in the dark?

You don’t want to spend your time around a team that doesn’t even know the fundamentals of your history. You want them to know exactly what you are, and if after that they still want you to stay? You will.

“I was never a rogue,” you tell her, gritting your teeth, “and I was never HYDRA.”

Natasha steps back. “You—?”

“And they didn’t refuse to turn over anything.” Your voice is thickening, getting rough around the edges. “I didn’t even ask for it, I’d already seen it all.”

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

It isn’t pity that she’s looking at you with but you can’t place whatever it is and that alone makes you want to put your head through a wall.

“I’m saying that I was an experiment. Bred in a lab to be the perfect, indestructible child. You had the Red Room, I had the house I grew up in.”

“But” — she’s pacing, never getting any closer to you than where she started — “you aren’t indestructible. I know you aren’t.”

“They made a mistake in my genetic code. I can bleed if I want to, I can feel pain under the right circumstances, but I’m not sure that I can die. And—”

It clicks so plainly on her face.

“You want to find out,” Natasha finishes for you. She comes to a stop, studying you from across the room, and you can see her putting the pieces together like you’re right there in her mind. “You didn’t kill your parents. You killed your captors.”

“You killed Dreykov.”

“…Touché.”

/

“You altered my file. Why?”

“I didn’t think you’d want to walk in here as the mommy and daddy killer. Was I wrong?”

He wasn’t.

Mostly.

But.

“I thought everyone knew.”

“I know,” Tony says, and to his credit he does manage to look apologetic. “And you thought they accepted you anyway. Which they do, still, by the way. Now that they actually know.”

No matter how deep you dig you can’t find it in yourself to be upset with him. He only did what believed was best. For you and for the team. You know more than most what a decision of that caliber feels like.

“Right,” is all you say.

You turn to go.

“You’re taking Romanoff with you,” Tony says before you make it out the door, “on the Evora job. And on all jobs from here on out.”

“I don’t need a babysitter, Stark.”

“Maybe not,” he says, “but good luck telling her that.”

/

Natasha’s behavior around you hasn’t changed.

You don’t know whether that’s because things are genuinely the same or because she wants you to think things are the same.

It’s hard to gauge whether it actually matters one way or the other.

“Guy calls himself Elemento.”

“Gross.”

“Yup,” Natasha says, “but he can bend the elements to his will.”

Your behavior around Natasha has changed, if only a little. You’re talking more. Mostly to fill the silences she leaves hanging in the air, the spats of quiet that make your head hurt.

“Bullets and martial arts won’t do much against that,” you say. “Offense a little intended.”

“Ouch.” She’s grinning. “You can’t be bent, however. I’m just backup.”

She’s right.

As usual.

You’re an experiment the elements can no longer touch. You put your ability to be altered to bed the day you shot your parents.

Elemento can’t bend you.

And he doesn’t.

His gift only works when he’s breathing.

You putting your hand through the skin of his throat and tearing out his windpipe takes care of that. The bullet between his eyes takes care of the rest.

Spilling Elemento’s blood across the white tile floor of his laboratory is the closest you’ve ever come to creating fine art. When it splashes across the front of your battle suit and freckles you in red you reckon it’s the most color you’ve worn since childhood.

Before his body hits the floor you’ve pulled his hard drive and crashed out through the nearest window.

It isn’t until you’ve got an arm around a rung of the rope ladder dangling from Natasha’s chopper that you realize you’re still holding onto the flesh you pulled from his neck.

You wait to ask your questions until Elemento and his ruined lab in Evora are six hours behind you and you’re mostly cleaned up, until Natasha’s found an itty-bitty hotel room to camp out in for the night.

“Why does Stark give me the messy assignments?”

“He trusts you,” Natasha says without looking up from a dime-store paperback she swiped from the front desk. “And you have considerably fewer morals about leaving loose ends.”

So that’s it.

“Right.”

You don’t say much for the rest of the day.

You just sit on the floor at the foot of the bed and think. Mostly about the fact that okay, yeah, you don’t think too much when it comes to killing the people Tony wants you to kill, and a little about the fact that Natasha doesn’t seem to mind the carnage. Whatever red she had in her ledger doesn’t keep her from letting you have your fun.

Funny word for what you do for the Avengers, that one. Fun.

You weren’t allowed much fun as a kid. Hell, you can barely call your upbringing a childhood.

Most of what you remember is being pricked for blood, being rolled under x-ray machines, withstanding test after test until your parents were satisfied with their creation. You remember asking to celebrate holidays, birthdays—anything—and being told no. You remember watching the neighborhood kids board the school bus every morning from your bedroom window and hating that you weren’t allowed to go to regular school with them. Most of those memories are laced with hate.

Makes sense that murder constitutes fun these days.

“Hey.”

You pull yourself out of your thoughts.

The window’s gone dark.

Natasha has the bedside lamp on, casting a dim yellow glow across the little room, and she’s right there with you, dangling her head off the end of the bed and peering at you with affectionate amusement.

“You’ve been in your head for hours,” she tells you. “It’s four am.”

“Oh.”

“Come to bed.”

You look down at your clothes: gray tactical pants splattered with blood, boots caked in dust and dirt, sweat-stained tank top clinging to your chest. Off in the corner your battle jacket lies crumpled in a heap.

“I should shower.”

You wait until the water’s scalding before stepping in.

When you get out your skin’s red and warm and in the foggy mirror you notice a gash along the length of your forearm. It doesn’t need stitches but you figure Natasha’s going to say something about it anyhow.

She does.

“That hurt?”

“No.”

“Did you clean it?”

“Are you always such a mom?”

“My sister would say yes.”

You dress in a spare tee and a pair of sweats with the gaudy Avengers logo on the hip.

There’s only one bed.

You crawl in and lay still on your back.

Natasha props herself up on an elbow and studies you.

“You said you can bleed when you want to, and feel pain under the right circumstances. What does that mean?”

“It means exactly what it sounds like it means.”

“Elaborate,” she says.

“Later.”

“Fine.”

She kills the lamp.

It takes her ten minutes to decide to slip a hand over your bicep and squeeze. Another five to tuck her leg up over your hip. When you don’t move she finds your hand and pulls it to her thigh, and, “Just—there,” she mumbles against your ear. You squeeze, she hums.

Eventually, you don’t know how long—you lost track of the minutes as soon as she invited you to touch her—Natasha’s lips find your skin. She leaves soft kisses along your jaw, slow and steady, until she finds your lips and licks into your mouth with a gentle curiosity that distracts you enough not to notice the hand slipping under your shirt until Natasaha’s nails bite into your skin.

For a moment you want to ask what this is, what the time on the jet was. You push the thought away as Natasha swings a leg over your hips, mounts you, and leans over to flick the lamp on.

“I want to try something,” she says, peeling your shirt off, grazing her fingertips over your sternum and down your stomach. Then she pulls a knife on you, a little folding one that snaps open with a satisfying click. The sound itself is enough to light a fire deep in your core.

You don’t nod. You don’t speak. You just smile, dreamy and expectant, because while it isn’t a loaded gun it does still excite you.

Natasha sets the blade at the base of your throat, and, “I want you to bleed,” she says, brows raising. “Can you do that for me?”

You can. Even though you can hear your heart thudding in your ears and you can feel the scorching tingle of arousal as it shoots down your spine, you can do it.

The knife follows the path her fingers took only moments ago: over your chest, between your breasts, along the divot between the muscles of your stomach. In its path little droplets of blood sprout before your eyes, painting you red for the second time that day. Natasha wipes the blade on the sheets and drags her fingers over the thin wound, smearing blood across your skin.

A moment passes in silence, you watching Natasha while she inspects the slice she put into you. In that moment your heart picks up, thundering against your ribcage, and you know she can feel it just as easily as she can see the heavy rise and fall of your chest.

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Rhetorical—she’s smirking. “No blood this time. I don’t even want to break your skin.”

You have to think about it for a moment, tunnel way back into the corners of your mind to find the switch that kills your pain receptors and fortifies the density of your skin, but you can do it. You’d only practiced finding and hitting that switch under the clinical observation of your parents a thousand times as a child. It used to take you hours—this time it takes only seconds.

When the blade slides over your skin this time, nothing happens. Not even a scratch.

“Like a butter knife against marble,” Natasha mumbles.

You can’t tell if she’s studying you as a whole or just the cut and the would-be one. At least she hasn’t said anything about the fact that you’ve fought by her side time and again and not once has she ever seen you refuse a wound. Surely it means something, to her or whichever psychologist Tony has on retainer this month, that you choose to let yourself get hurt when things come to blows, but you think it’s hardly the time to dwell on that.

The knife clatters onto the bedside table.

“Sorry,” she mutters, pressing her palm against your abdomen, grazing her nails over the firm muscles she finds there. “Although I’m absolutely certain you don’t need an apology. Still—not every day I hurt one of my own on purpose.”

“One of your own, huh?”

She rolls her eyes.

“I wouldn’t be here to keep an eye on you if I didn’t care.”

“You sure it isn’t just so you can get into my pants again?”

“All I have to do is smile at you to accomplish that.”

“Touché.”

Natasha smiles.

You prop yourself up on your elbows to meet her halfway as she ducks down to kiss you. The taste of her tongue is second only to the taste of her cunt, and you consider yourself lucky to know the taste of both.

Doesn’t take much more than a heavy hand of yours slipping down between her legs and cupping her through her little sleep shorts to convince Natasha to let you have her. You get her out of her bottoms and push your fingers through slick lips, pushing her wetness around with your fingertips before sinking into her in one fluid motion.

You almost ask her if it’s good, if it’s enough, but her eyes rolling skyward, her fingertips pressing into your skin, and her back arching as she rolls her hips against your hand tell you all you need to know. She’s warm and wet and tight around your fingers as you stroke her from the inside, practically coaxing her wetness out of her cunt and into the palm of your hand.

“Good?” You ask anyway because even with the pleasure written on her face you still value a verbal confirmation.

“Good,” Natasha says, nodding.

Before you can say anything else she slips an arm around your neck and rolls onto her back, pulling you right down on top of her with your hips nestled between her thighs and your hand trapped between your bodies.

“Better,” she says, smirking up at you. “Fuck me like this—like you mean it.”

“Easy,” you tell her, because it is, because you really do mean it.

You thrust your fingers into Natasha’s warm cunt while she mouths at your throat, sinking her teeth into the soft spot where she finds your pulse, sucking a bruise into your skin that you know will linger for days, and you don’t think you’ve ever been so eager to wear a mark before. And you’re still bleeding, smudges of blood on your chest staining Natasha’s shirt from where she presses up against you, but you don’t care, and you don’t think she does either.

Notching your hips against the back of your hand and using the steady grind to fuck your fingers into her helps, makes it feel a little like what you’d guess a biological male might feel in this situation, holding yourself above Natasha with an arm that’s starting to cramp while you push into her. You’d watch if you could, you reckon the sight of your fingers disappearing into her clenching hole is a mighty fine one, but she’s palming at your breasts, teasing your nipples, and her arms are in the way. You settle for slipping a third finger into her cunt, stretching her open, grunting happily as she keens into your ear and gushes around your fingers.

“I wish I had your stamina,” she mutters through a yawn, pushing her hands through your hair as you crawl down her body, settling on your belly between her legs. “You aren’t going to let me sleep yet, are you?”

You give your answer by burying your face in her cunt, licking through her lips, grazing your teeth over her sensitive clit, and drinking her in. She tastes better than you remember: heady and intense and entirely Natasha. You hum against her, prop one of her legs over your shoulder, and coast your hands along her thighs. She’s warm to the touch and warm against your tongue and if it weren’t nearing five o’clock in the morning you’d spend all the time in the world right here.

But because it is nearing five o’clock you spend maybe ten minutes between Natasha’s legs, licking into her leaking hole until she tenses and trembles and spills onto your tongue. By the time you wipe your mouth on the sheets and crawl up to her side she’s barely awake, but, “Thanks,” she mumbles, draping an arm across your middle and leaving a lingering kiss on your shoulder. “For not shutting me out.”

Natasha falls asleep tucked up against your side and by the time she’s snoring softly against your shoulder you’ve decided that, whatever the circumstances, whatever the mission, having someone tag along to babysit you isn’t the worst thing in the world at all when that person is Natasha.

And, for what it's worth, you're glad you haven't figured out how to push her away.

#natasha romanoff x reader #natasha x reader #black widow x reader #natasha romanoff x reader smut #black widow x reader smut #natasha romanoff imagine #black widow imagine #rating: e #natasha #!fic