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foxgloveprincess · 10 months

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Summary: When problems arise, the group always works together.

Word Count: 1,597

Attic Wives Anonymous Masterlist

Warnings: Dark, Lots of Implied References to Dark Themes/Actions, Kidnapping, Death/Murder, Stalking/Surveillance, Possessiveness, Banter, Cursing, Callous Regard for Life. Minors do not interact (18+).

A/N: I’m loving tying these chapters in to connect the other stories in this universe. Next stories I’ll be working on are Lloyd’s introduction and a second chapter for Andy and maybe Jake. Hope you enjoy it. Let me know what you think!

I love feedback, so go ahead and reblog if you want. However, I give no permission to copy, translate, rewrite or post my work on any third party website or app. Seeing my work posted anywhere beside my blog, my library blog, or my AO3 account (FoxglovePrincess) means it’s been stolen/plagiarized.

I don’t do tag lists, so follow @foxglovefics to sign up for notifications on my fics.

This is not Beta’d, so all mistakes are my own.

Please DO NOT click ‘Keep Reading’ if you are not 18+ years of age or if you are uncomfortable with the pairing, themes, dynamics, or warnings. You are responsible for your own media consumption. Thank you!

“Fuck!” Andy storms into the meeting hall, carding his fingers through his hair. “Fuck.” He slumps into the seat set up for him and runs his hand over his face. “She’s sick.”

“Your happy little housewife?” Lloyd asks, crossing his arms over his chest. “Color me surprised.”

“Have you contacted the doctor yet?” Ari asks, cutting a sharp look toward the mercenary before returning his attention to the Andy.

“He can’t see her til Saturday,” he sniffs, standing up to pace back and forth outside the circle. His hand covers his mouth as he does, attempting to hide his worry, his weakness.

“Your girl isn’t going to die from a couple days in bed,” Robert snarks with a roll of his eyes.

Andy drops his hand and glares at the blasé remark. “Watch your mouth.”

Lloyd snaps a few times, drawing attention, excitement shining in his eyes. “Now’s your chance,” he enthuses with a smile and tilt of his brow. “The perfect time to move your girl outta that shitty basement and up into the cozy attic.” He gestures with his hands and shakes his head with mirth. “She’s weak and vulnerable right now. You show her you’re not a complete bastard and just want to take care of her—I’m telling you, it’ll be perfect.”

“I already offered to take her up there,” Andy growls, and resumes pacing. “She spat in my face.”

Lloyd snorts, waving through the air as he says, “Wait, wait, wait. You gave her a choice?”

“Of course I gave her a choice,” Andy snaps back. His voice drops, under his breath he sneers, “I’m not a monster.”

Lloyd cackles and clutches at his chest. “That’s exactly what you are, goody two-shoes.”

Robert grunts in agreement. Ari remains silent but fold his arms across his chest and cooly meets the attorney’s eye.

“Roll with it,” Robert advises, “the sooner you accept that you’re no longer squeaky clean, the more you can shape your life into what you want.”

The doors opposite each other in the meeting room both burst open. Jake enters one, Ransom the other—both hurried and bordering on frantic.

“Guys, I need help,” Jake says as Ransom blurts, “I’m in deep shit.”

The rest of the group turn toward one or the other, confused by their behavior. Andy’s hands raise in a gesture of affronted incredulity. Ari’s raise to silence them all.

“Wait a minute, one at a time,” the older man bids. The two exchange a terse glance before nodding toward the de facto leader of the group. “What’s wrong?” he asks with a wave toward Jake’s direction.

The young man’s hands fidget, fingers flexing and arms crossing. “It’s her agent,” he replies, a sharp bite in his tone, “she needs to stay the fuck away from my angel.”

“What?” Robert asks, a lecherous glint in his eye, “she making a move?”

Jake’s head shakes, brow furrowed in his displeasure. “She’s trying to push her into a PR relationship.” He pauses and faces the group, vulnerable before them and desperation bright behind his glasses. “I haven’t been able to find it in the emails yet, but I know it’s there. My baby would never do this to me.” He meets the eye of every other member of the group, pleading without words. “I gotta get her away from that.”

Lloyd’s brow quirks. Ari’s furrows in thought. Andy pulls out his chair to take a begrudging seat. Ransom continues to stand—waiting for attention to return to his dilemma.

“Is that right?” Lloyd asks, resting his fingers over his lips and breathing deeply. His lips quirk at scent lingering at the tips. Though his tone remains dubious, he leans forward in interest. “Seems your only choice is to grab her. You ready?”

“I am,” Jake agrees with a quick nod. “But even if I weren’t, I couldn’t leave her like that.”

Lloyd’s hand falls away to reveal a smirk before he glances to the other two experienced members of the group. Ari nods. Robert shrugs. At the exchange, Ransom rolls his eyes, his foot beginning to tap in impatience.

“It’ll be tricky for you with her celebrity,” Ari intones, still thoughtful as he leans back and crosses his arms. “Too many people might notice her disappearance.” His head tilts toward the mercenary in the group. “You think you could figure it out?”

Lloyd’s shoulders lift in an enthusiastic shrug. “If I call in a favor or two. Could play it off like how I got my sweet li’l girl,” he muses with excitement. “Or you wanna handle this Freezy?”

“Fuck that,” the man in question grunts, voice gritty with annoyance. He pulls out a cigarette and rests it on his bottom lip while searching his pockets. “You deal with that shit.” The click of the lighter concludes his refusal with a beat of finality.

“Oooh,” Lloyd drawls, hands rubbing together. His eye gleam and mischief radiates from his every pore. “This is gonna be fun.” He leans back, brandishing his phone and begins tapping happily on the screen. The light of it highlights his features and his macabre glee at his task.

Jake takes the empty seat beside him and observes over his shoulder. A point and mutter of suggestion exchanged between the two as they work together. All thought of the group forgotten.

“Now,” Robert says with a snap of his fingers toward Ransom’s looming figure, “can we make this quick? My princess got hit by the crimson tide and I need to get in there. The fuck is up with you?”

Ransom startles out of his thoughts, stepping forward and gripping the back of his chair. “I found her,” he snarls—his ire either directed at the hitman’s testy temperament or his own predicament without clear target.

“You did?” Ari asks without an attempt at concealing his skepticism.

“Yeah, I did,” Ransom replies with insulted emphasis.

Lloyd’s head pops up from his phone, curiosity sparkling despite Jake’s perturbation at the pause. “What number was she on your list?”

Ransom’s fingers squeeze the plastic of the chair. It creaks under his grip and the legs flex dangerously. His head dips and he mumbles. No one catches a word.

Andy leans forward, trying to decipher the man’s quiet response without success and asks, “What was that?”

Ransom looks up with a fierce glare. His jaw ticks as he grits out, “She wasn’t on my list.”

No one makes a comment until Lloyd crows with laughter. He grips his peck and doubles over, too pleased by the revelation. Robert smirks and pushes his glasses up his nose. Ransom rolls his eyes and skirts around the chair to sit.

“I’m glad you’re settling down,” Ari says with a firm pat to Ransom’s shoulder.

He huffs in response and leans back in his seat, letting his legs spread wide. “Unfortunately, she works for my grandad and that old bastard will definitely suspect me when she disappears, but I need her.”

“Serves you right,” Lloyd says with a snicker and elbow to the tech genius beside him. Jake shifts and only briefly lifts his gaze from his device. “Now you gotta be just as love sick as the rest of us.”

Ransom hisses and sneers, but the mercenary’s already back to his task.

“That it?” Robert puffs smoke toward him with the question.

The trust fund baby grimaces. “Yes,” he bites.

“Thank fuck. I can do that easy.” The hitman stands and shrugs on his jacket. “I’ll text you in a couple weeks. Just make sure when I do, you get witnesses—preferably your grampa himself. You’ll be in the clear and go home to a sweet li’l thing in your attic.” He taps off the ash from his cigarette and cocks his head. “Just like I did with Mr. Hero over there for his hellcat.” He chuckles at Andy’s glare and straightens.

“That’s not gonna cut it,” Ransom barks back. “Harlan’s way too cunning. He’ll know.” He gestures to his temple and stands back up, stepping firmly toward the hitman. “It can’t just be a smash and grab. We’ll need to plan this out step by step—a long game.”

“Fine. Do it your way, prick,” Robert grunts with a glare, nudging his chair back from the circle. “Now, can I get home?”

The men exchange looks. Jake stands, phone tucked to his side. A wave of his hand prompts Lloyd to follow. Lloyd looks up and shrugs, grabbing his own jacket from his chair.

“If we don’t have any other business, I suppose.”

With a muttered, “great,” Robert spins on his heel and charges off without any further notice.

Ransom grumbles and glances around in agitation, hesitating only a second before dashing after the hitman’s quickly retreating figure. The door closes behind them with a clunk. Jake follows, a skip in his step while Lloyd brings his phone to his ear and greets the voice on the line. A flash of a wink sent over his shoulder toward the oldest member of the group before he bursts out the door.

Ari hums, deep and low, and turns toward Andy. The man’s jaw ticks with frustration. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair. Shame hangs heavy on his shoulders, a sense of failure. Ari can smell it in the air. He smooths his hands over his thighs and waits for the D.A. to acknowledge him. Andy turns almost immediately, eager to hear any word of advice.

“I think it’s time I step in,” Ari declares leaving no room for argument.

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levmada · 8 months

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the beginning scene in s3 where Erwin first wakes up from his coma. his and Levi’s interaction is so interesting and well done in how it speaks about their relationship is actually MASTERFULLY done.

as soon as Erwin wakes up and they start discussing what the evacuation of Wall Rose has done to Sina and the underground, Levi consoles him and says he wouldnt blame him if he wanted more rest after this news.

but Erwin says no, that he’s tired of sleeping.

Levi AGAIN tries to consoles him about his arm, but Erwin rejects his compassion. how he's such a monster, really his right arm means nothing, and he still has a debt to pay for his sins when he dies and ends up in hell

Pyxis takes this very lightly and asks erwin if he can come visit and bring some alcohol. this annoys Levi lol

Pyxis then laments that his own captain took away all his alcohol and jokes about how well she takes care of him.

Erwin praises him for having such an excellent aide looking after him.

and in the next panel Levi is visibly exhasperated.

Hange explains their theory that humans are titans based on what they learned from ragako village. Hange and Levi, but especially Levi, are rightfully horrified by this. he looks crestfallen and pretends that he doesn’t understand their conclusion at first

then, Levi catches Erwin smiling, which shocks him. Erwin is vague about what he’s smiling about and why. he’s super dismissive.

but right away Levi asks "is that the real reason youre in the Survey Corps?"

he's instantly figured out Erwin’s real intentions based on this small interaction… it’s a testament to how connected they are, even though Erwin refuses to accept that.

Erwin tells him to ease off. "my arm was eaten. i’m physically and emotionally exhausted. don’t you have some pity for me?"

Levi smirks and says that he is pitiful. but here, he’s referring to the reason Erwin smiled, and how blasé he is about the news that horrified himself and Hange. Levi knows that he’s selfish for being happy beyond any other feeling at the news, while at the same time, Erwin JUST expressed the most pathetic self-pity speech about deserving to suffer in hell.

yeah, he really is pitiful. does that evidently change Levi’s feelings in this scene? his actions later? absolutely not. (but i won’t get into that now.)

Erwin wants to know where Historia and Eren are at. Hange explains, and Erwin proposes a plan about finding out more about Historia’s family, and deploying Eren’s hardening ability to take back Wall Maria.

but Levi mocks him by repeating Erwin’s excuse from earlier to not open up.

"your arm was eaten. you’re physically and emotionally exhausted. i felt bad for you (i pitied you)."

despite all he learned about Erwin just now, he jokes around, his loyalty doesn’t sway. but he also took Erwin’s comment about Pyxis having such an excellent assistant and tries (in classic Levi roundabout fashion) to make Erwin notice and believe that he cares, and that it’s okay to be honest with him about his intentions. Erwin can’t see what is right in front of him, and that’s another reason why he’s pitiful.

it seems here that Levi’s feelings are one-sided, but as i’ve discussed before in previous posts, Erwin is such a slave to his dream and consumed by his guilt that he can’t possibly register consciously that Levi feels all of these soft sentiments about him.

because after all, they need to make everyone’s sacrifices worth something. it was Erwin’s plan that got many CIVILIANS in Stohess District killed. Erwin during the battle where he lost his arm, is seen looking around lost as his comrades are eaten around him. he says he’s replaceable.

but for no logical reason, he didn’t get grabbed, so i think he’s going to go into the uprising much too greedy and amibitious to be smart because he’s waiting for his turn. like he’s daring fate to kill him already. a part of him maybe wants him to fail, for all this to cost him his life...

#aot is a fucking masterpiece good bye #eruri #aot eruri #aot meta #aot manga #attack on titan manga #erwin smith #levi ackerman #eruri snk

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rewordthis · 6 months

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Episode 17

Right, ok, let me be salty for a moment at Gege for making me believe that Sukuna is a heartless fiend that has absolutely zero care in the world.

He was so freaking excited to see Uraume, man! Did you hear him properly? Did you? I never expected his blasé ass to be so damn happy from literally the bottom of his heart about anyone and anything other than bloodshed!!!

And then he goes off to save Megumi because he has business for him. Like… can you please not be so all over the place, King? I know that you need Megumi for your agenda and that was the sole reason you performed RCT on him, but now I am curious why you wanted him. Is it because he’d make a good candidate for something? Because you only realised halfway into the battle that Makora was able to adjust to your CT. And pal, was I looking at a Sukuna that truly loved the fact that someone (something) was able to see his technique. See him. I’m 100% sure he’d drag the battle a bit more just for kicks if it didn’t have an immediate effect on Megumi’s life. And that was actually terribly honest of him, saying that if Megumi had indeed summoned Makora back in the detention centre then he’d really have bid farewell to this world. Hahaha I sure love him, for that aspect of his character. He’s not afraid to admit his opponents worth or his worthlessness (caused explicitly by his meat-suit) so far for that matter… 😎

Ah, but you see… I am very, very , very curious as to how he’d react in case Uraume gets killed. Bonus points if Gege has the balls to do it in front of his eyes. 😈

And Megumi. Megumi saying sorry to Yuuji because he was going to sacrifice himself to perform the ritual… 🫠 Why are you like this, child? I love the little details that come up in his character. And the fact that Megumi and Nanami share the same MBTI type is just… pfff~ the cherry on top, ok? Because why did I ever made Nanami in one of my WIPs say the same thing? Why? Why are we so predictable, Gege?! 😩

Also, now that I think about it, what did Sukuna do with Haruta? 😗 He said that it was a good thing he saved him, but I got the sense he was referring to his CT. Could it be that Sukuna hacked his technique, too? Like he did with Jogo? Hmmm… didn’t seem like he did in that very moment but maybe at some point? 🧐 And on that note, I’m also contemplating the way he spoke that incantation during his battle with Jogo. I always thought that the box was a means of censoring but in the anime he really mouthed ‘hako’ aka box. Well, considering how accurately an anime can replicate the way something is pronounced that is… after that, the kanji for ‘fuuga’ is the kanji that means ‘to open’, but is also used in other meanings as well like ‘starting’ etc. However, and you can totally call me stupid or paranoid, the first thing that I remembered the minute I heard it was the name of Maya from Saint Beasts. ‘Fuuga no Maya’ had the power to manipulate and control ghosts, which considering how interconnected and vague almost all of those meanings are, could potentially also mean that Sukuna commands the ‘spirit’, or like I had mentioned in a previous post the subconscious that is ‘jujutsu energy’ to open up to him. Well, this is a stretch, but somehow it feels very possible?

By the way, Yuuji’s eyes burning red when he changed back made me think that he’d go full berserk mode but baby boy seems to have had so much rage in him that he just snapped and decided that that’s it; he needs to die and take Sukuna along in Hell. He must definitely believe he can’t handle this beast any longer. Because those black-hole orbs just weren’t Yuuji’s eyes anymore ok?! He’s gone crazy right now. He’s checked out and that is the one thing Gojo tried to tell him he should not do! Jujutsu sorcerers need to keep levelheaded, Todo said the same thing, in order to be able to summon their full strength when they’re fighting. Please, Gege don’t make my kid lose himself any more than this. Don’t drop on him all Hell, all at once! Give him a moment to breathe. Let him meet up with someone that will calm him down enough to realise that he should not waste his energy without a care.

Megumi despite all odds is safely at Shoko’s hands…

Nobara as far as we know is ok…

Nanami should fucking go back and receive treatment because I don’t know what that man is trying to do by going down there in this state… I mean, you know there are special grades in the station, love! You know you can’t really compete with them if you already faced such an awful ‘defeat’ by one that didn’t even stick around to finish you off. Where are you going?! Why are you going? But you’re going because you care, huh? Because you want to make sure everyone is alright. To protect them…. Because one way or another, you believe that the only one who can save everyone is Gojo and you need to help him out because you are the one qualified enough that’s left to help. Stupid! Have you never realised that Gojo trust you to be the first after him?! That he considers you second only to him?! Have you only ever looked at him through those stupid glasses, idiot? He trusted you his students! His biggest secret when he needed someone to take care of Yuuji — the resurrected vessel of Sukuna — the boy that every single higher up wanted dead by all means. He believed you to be his ally. His little minion! He trusted you with the future of the jujutsu world, even if you considered him just a self-centred and indifferent individual, he still wouldn’t want the world he loved and thrived into to be destroyed! He trusted you… because you were you! Why are you acting like you have a fucking death wish?! Why are you doing that?! Don’t you care how much disappointment you’ll feed him? Or maybe that’s your revenge, for being the kouhai that gets teased all the time… Tsk tsk tsk. You got too caught up in your sense of duty, Nanami and that’s not going to end well(yes, I know. It’s been splattered on my feed for a year now…). I hate you. Actually, I hate that you’re so… proper on your everything. Be a little more disobedient, damn it! Why are you a little sarcastic prick only with Gojo but never to anyone else? I bet if he’d told you to “go down to that platform”, you’d first come up with a snarky comment and then go because he’d force you to… Jeez~ 😑

Why my 57 heart… 🥺

#ryomen sukuna #nanami kento #itadori yuuji #fushiguro megumi #jujutsu kaisen #jjk #fandom talk #episode rant

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oh-stars · 3 months

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love your work and everything you do, so excited for the month of march fics coming up !!!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ a fic a day is incredible and idk how you do it honestly 🙏🙏🙏 does this mean that hold is on hiatus for now ?

Oh thank you!!!

It was so fun doing @steddielovemonth so I'm excited to tackle Stobin Month! I don't write enough fics about them and them alone so it's been fun so far.

Hold is on a temporary hiatus. I'm aiming to get the next chapter out in April. Right now, I have so much going on, but I start a new job next week so my writing time is cutting down drastically. So I'm not able to tap into the headspace I need to write hold.

I added an update to the authors note for the last chapter, but to reiterate here: I AM NOT giving up on this story!! It's a passion project for me, but since it doesn't have a timeline or any outside pressure other than wanting to get the next chapter to you all, it has to be the first to go. I need to focus on my posting challenge, my STRBB fics, and my exchange fic (and I have a few big bangs I plan on signing up for!!) so I'll be shifting gears a little.

If I wasn't at such a pivotal moment in hold, I think I'd be able to continue writing as normal. But I have an Eddie scene and an Eleven scene to write for the next chapter that are heavier, so I need to do them the right way and not just knock it out.

Thank you all for the support and understanding!!! I'm having so much fun and feeling really fulfilled with my current writing load, so the patience about the hold situation is very appreciated!! That being said... Here's a teaser (under the cut) for the next chapter to hold everyone over (no pun intended) until I can post it:

“Hey, hey,” Steve coos, coming to a halt at the edge of her crib. He picks her up without hesitation, sending a sharp pain up his left arm as he cuddles her close. It doesn’t matter, he could care less about his pain as long as she’s okay. “You’re okay,” he says, “Daddy’s got you.”

“Steve!” Robin huffs as she comes up beside them. “You shouldn’t be picking her up.” Whatever look he gives her must tell her everything she needs to know. She sighs and runs a hand over Charlotte’s wild dark hair. “I can hand her to you so you don’t hurt your hand,” she says softly, “let me help.”

He presses his lips to Charlotte’s head and sways in place, shushing her. Charlotte, not Robin of course. “I know,” he tells Robin then goes back to talking to Charlotte. “We woke you up before you were ready, huh? I’m sorry, sweetpea.” He adjusts his hold on her to check her diaper, nose wrinkling. “Sure you want to help?” he asks Robin.

“I think I can handle a dirty diaper.”

Charlotte’s cries have stopped, but there are big tears on her cheeks and her bottom lip is pouted out as she looks up at Steve. He’d do anything for that face.

Steve has to look away, eyes going to the bare, white ceiling as the fury comes back to him all at once. He blinks his own tears out of his eyes, all of the emotions hitting him like a goddamn train. “She left her,” Steve breathes out. “She fucking left her, Rob.”

“She was so blasé about it too,” Robin punches out, walking away. She’s opening the drawers to grab something, closing them with force but not slamming.

“What’s that mean?” he asks, dropping another kiss to Charlotte’s head. He drifts over to the chair they stashed in here during the move, an extra from the set his mom gave him, and sits so Charlotte’s laying against his chest. The movement emphasizes the pain and settles his heart all at once, but Charlotte’s sniffles and little noises make it worth it.

Robin takes a moment, putting together the outfit for Charlotte. “Does she not have any dresses?”

Steve’s brow furrows as he thinks about it. “I think she’s grown out of a few. I don’t know.”

“I’m all for giving the bird to gender stereotypes and letting her wear boy clothes,” Robin says as she holds up the basketball onesie that doesn’t fit Charlotte anymore but Steve can’t part with, “but I don’t see any onesies with snaps that fit her and pants are going to be a nightmare for the foreseeable future.”

Shit.

Steve groans and adjusts Charlotte so her cast is more comfortable against him. “I didn’t even think about that.”

“When would you have had the time?” Robin asks, closing the drawer. She’s out of the room before Steve can answer her.

#ohstars fic #steddie #steve harrington #robin buckley #hold on to me #single dad steve

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socraticcryptid · 5 months

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The other day I reblogged a post about waitstaff not respecting dietary requirements, and I didn't want to add to it because it's long enough already, but it got me thinking about disability and how it changes how you relate to the world.

I have a few health conditions. One of them is a potentially life-threatening food allergy (I carry an epipen and keep a spare one at home). This allergen is in a lot of foods, but it's thankfully relatively easy to avoid, particularly because I know the kinds of foods it's in, and also because it's an allergy that people generally respect.

This allergy has a minimal effect on my day-to-day life. My other health conditions have a much larger impact on my lifestyle. But my allergy has nonetheless shaped the way that I relate to food and my body. I always think about it when people suggest places to eat. I avoid foods that I've had close calls with in the past, or foods that sometimes contain the allergen. I'm wary of homemade food at potlucks and as gifts. I read the ingredients on everything, not only food but also things like toothpaste and soap, even when I know that there's basically no chance of my allergen being present. If I eat something risky then for the next twenty minutes I'm constantly checking my arms for hives and my lips for swelling.

There's something very strange about the idea that my body considers this food to be such a threat that it enacts a policy of mutually assured destruction. An assassin could kill me with something that is harmless to most other people. Every time I eat something new I'm scared that my body will decide it's a threat too.

Not everyone is as cautious as I am. But this sort of experience, and constant fear of your body turning on itself, applies to so many people. I have a friend who's severely allergic to nuts, dairy, legumes, and eggs. She rarely eats at restaurants and could never go vegetarian because she would struggle to get enough protein. Coeliacs and diabetics have to be constantly careful of what they're eating or risk permanent damage to their bodies. People with severe intolerances, or food-triggered migraines, or heart conditions impacted by caffeine, or any of the other food-related health conditions have similar experiences.

So much of life is centred around food (for good reason - I love food!), and yet so many people who don't have food-related health conditions just don't understand it, and sometimes even those who do their best don't always get it right. I check the ingredients on everything, even if a friend tells me that it's safe, because sometimes they're wrong. An honest mistake, but one that I can't afford.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I guess I just wanted to say that, if I discover that someone I know is blasé about food allergies, I don't bother talking with them about my other health conditions. If they can't even respect life-threatening food allergies then how could I possibly trust them with anything else? They haven't made the effort to understand how disabilities can completely shape the way that you experience the world. They wouldn't understand the concept of having limited spoons or executive dysfunction. They probably don't respect religious dietary requirements either, or sensory issues with food. I wouldn't trust them to understand microaggressions, or structural racism, or the complexities of gender, unless they happen to experience those themselves.

It's like the 'I don't know how to tell you that you should care about other people' meme, but instead, it's 'I don't know how to tell you that you should put yourself in someone else's shoes every once in a while'. Maybe that would make the world a better place.

#food #tw food #allergies #food allergy #disability #socraticcryptid #apologies for the long post but i couldn't stop thinking about it #long post

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ethtyn · 1 year

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etho's limlife #5 pov liveblog

oh good. bdubs is just. here.

not the boogeyman. so my initial supposition was incorrect [squints]

uhmmm the group screenie moment with bdubs halfway up a ladder to look shorter 😭 goodbye.

"i'm washed up at pvp, i don't know the answers to these questions anymore" WAAAAAAH

"the BITES lawncare service" HELP LOL

this post

WHERE THE FUCK ARE THE BAD BOYS. WHAT ARE THEY DOING IN ALL OF THIS.

"if they ask me why we did it, i have no clue, to be honest (laughs)" GHGNFNF. (from between gritted teeth, affectionately) i can't stand you.

SCREAM i am dying at Etho crouching in the water elevator listening to jimmy monologue to his commenters. "wait, where are you??" PLEASE.

...shrieker in the TIES base. 🫵🏻 Cleo.

"why does everybody call me a traitor?!" "you put a shrieker in our base!" "(laughs) oh, yeah, Mom told me to do that." SEE. CLEO.

"i love it when we're pranked by people who don't know how things work" pfffft damn tango go off

obsessed w Etho apparently immediately sniffing out the bad boys in TIES' base. "this is just embarrassing at this point" to hysterical laughter from the BBs. j'adore.

"Jimmy. you're a BAD BOY." "i'm a very bad boy." 🥴🥴🥴

tell me the bad boys are not wearing priest skins. like i'm sure they're supposed to look like regular suits but THEY LOOK LIKE PRIESTS i'm. this is. hm

deviation for. this post

"i would be here all the time if it was allowed!" "you're allowed. you could be a Clocker." IMMEDIATELY LOOKS AT BDUBS. "i could, couldn't i" in the softest voice. i am ripping up my pillow with my teeth.

SORRY. BDUBS PLACING TNT AND CLEO AND SCAR JUMPING AWAY WHILE ETHO'S JUST LIKE "this is nice 😌". IM CLAWING AT MY OWN FACE.

"i especially like that Cleo's been quiet. that's my favourite part of this whole supper." first of all it's dinner not supper you Canadian fuck (/aff), SECONDABLE you are. really going hard on the "not afraid of Cleo anymore" exposure therapy today sir. i love it keep going

KIDS DO YOU WANT TO GO PLAY CATCH RIGHT NOW. SITS DOWN AND WATCHES INTENTLY. HI ANON I AM THINKING OF YOUR OUT OF CONTEXT SPOILERS RN.

fucking JCNCKFNCKDNCKF. insults Cleo, fails to find the button to the iron door, gets slapped for his troubles. I AM EATING SO GOOD RN

bro i. my mouth is open. jaw is flapping. this is some roleplay all right. also i love being right, there are TNT minecarts involved which means this is going to end Horribly.

IM SCREAMING. I WATCHED THAT BACK LIKE FIVE TIMES. there are literal tears in my eyes that was funnier than i possibly could ever have anticipated. AND ALSO BOTH OF THEM DIED IM FUCKING CACKLING.

i feel like i can HEAR Etho wondering if he'll need to edit out Scar's "banging" comment LMFAO

aaddhdnckfkg Joel's "ETHO?! disgusting" after Scar tattled on him in chat HELLO?

??????????? Scar crits him like. at least twice when they go back inside and Etho's just. so blasé about it. "he's going through his angsty teenage phase, i should leave" and Scar LETS HIM. the dynamics here are confusing me. i need to watch Scar's video. (i will confess to not keeping up with the Clockers since the first couple of episodes since Bdubs isn't uploading 😔)

Grian's "WHAT?!" after Etho admitted he didn't know why he blew up the bridge made me go into a coughing fit i laughed so hard. don't smoke, kids /srs

"i still have your sword, so if you ever need something from me—" sicko ha ha yessss dot jpeg. GIVE ME GRITHOOOOOO

bdubs crouching in a corner pointing a crossbow at Etho with his shield up and Etho is Still having a casual conversation. WHAT ARE THE DYNAMICS HERE?!

sorry, are you telling me. that Scott heard Etho say "uhhhh....yep" LIKE THAT in response to his question about whether that spot was how you access the farm loot and STILL WENT DOWN THERE? i'm also shocked that Martyn wasn't like "what do you mean, "tell them""

GODDAMMIT. who triggered it. i wanted to see that dynamic shift so bad.

KCNCMFMFM he is SO BAD at lying. it was a good decision to interrogate Jimmy first to confirm the Mean Gills' findings bc i don't think that man can tell when someone is lying to him Ever.

the unconvincing "whaaaat"s when Etho then goes to Joel & Grian 😭😭😭😭😭😭

OH GOD THAT FISHING ROD SNAG SCARED ME TOO. their little giggles 😭

NOT THE RED HOT PANTS, SKIZZ

uhm. episode conclusion: Etho is the Disneyland Dad™.

#vse liveblogs #liveblog: etho's ll2 pov #vonswayenthusiast.txt #🚦smp #limited life spoilers

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mizkit · 3 months

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new blog post: living 'on the road system'

new blog post on https://mizkit.com/living-on-the-road-system/

living 'on the road system'

In one of the chat rooms I frequent, Snowqueen, a fellow chatter, experienced a small earthquake in a not-very-usual earthquake zone, and found it very disquieting. She does live in a Cold Place, so as she said, “I don’t know how people live in earthquake zones but I guess I live in a place where the cold could freeze your eyeballs so apparently you just get used to things.”

Well. I mean. I grew up in an earthquake zone where the cold froze your eyeballs! All at the same time! But, indeed, it never bothered me at all, because people can get used to anything, even being hanged, as the Irishman said.

However, having shared this piece of information about myself, Snowqueen was Quite of the opinion that living in an earthquake zone where the cold froze your eyeballs should Not Be Allowed, in much the same way that having to take three exams in one day was Not Allowed because nobody could write three giant essays in one day. But I–having, you know, grown up with it and thinking very little of it overall–also added, “The best bit, though, was when the volcano was also going off.”

At this point, a third party in the chat room, Hummingrose, said, “WHERE exactly did you grow up again?!?!?!” and Snowqueen was like, “Never mind, you’ve moved into supervillain origin story territory, it’s allowed again,” while I was typing out the story of the volcano:

This being in the Ancient Days of Yore, I had called JC Penney to place a catalog order and the woman I was speaking to, who was very clearly reading off a computer screen, began brightly and trailed off into audible bafflement and horror: “And I need to tell you that your order may be delayed be…because of…because of volcanic activity in the area?!?!?!?!?!!?”

At that point the volcano had been going off for over a week and was blasé to us, so I was like “oh yeah it’s about 40 miles away and dumping ash all over us, it’s fine,” while the poor woman on the other end was having palpitations. :D

So I said I grew up in Kenai, Alaska, and Hummingrose immediately looked it up, ofc, because nobody knows where Kenai is, and having looked it up, said, “I’m looking at the map and is it as way out in the middle of nowhere as it seems?”

Me: I mean, it’s on the road system. Me, after a few seconds of thinking about that: …which I guess is not an answer that most people have to give about the places they grew up, so…

Fourth party, Jillheather: ‘on the road system’

Me: WELL! It IS!

Kenai is, yes, remote by most people’s standards, I guess. It’s about 160 miles from Anchorage, which is the largest city in Alaska, by which is not very big by, er, most people’s standards. Under 300K ppl. But I remember in college hearing a woman saying she was from a small town of about 40K, which is considerably larger than any Alaskan town EXCEPT Anchorage, and I never really recovered from that. Like. That’s not a small town. :)

Anyway, so my two favorite earthquakes were the one when I was about eleven that struck on a Saturday night right around midnight and Kept. Going. long enough for me and my sister to both wake up at the jolt, wait, then get out of bed and go upstairs to see if everybody else was up to see how long the earthquake was.

They were, so we all stood around in the living room counting it. It lasted about 80 seconds, I think, and then since we were all up, we all watched Saturday Night Live, which happened to be the William Shatner episode, which, weirdly, was the only episode I ever saw any of until I was nearly thirty. Every time I’d happen to see it, it’d be a rerun of that. Like three, four times. Which is neither here nor there, but there it is. :)

The other really good one, my husband and I were in the dining room and he swung his coat on and I thought he’d smacked the dining room light because it suddenly started swinging dramatically, and I was like “ack!” and he was like “what?!” and then we realized that oh, we were having quite a big quake!

But mostly earthquakes are a thing we go “hnh, that was probably about a 4.3” about and then check to see if we’re right, or if the epicenter was either Very Close or Very Far. Usually we’re right.

So that’s what it’s like growing up ‘on the road system’ in my part of the world. :)

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she-waves-at-cats · 1 year

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So I relate to absolutely everything in yr "quiet and hardworking" post, except the quiet part cos i talk more the more anxious i am but that's besides the point. What I am interested in is the reading eyebrow twitches because mine twitch A LOT and go all over the place without my awareness. Even if i try to, and feel like, im keeping my face as still as possible. I hate it and it makes me even more nervous cos nobody elses does. I am not diagnosed autistic, if anything i have the opposite problem of reading facial expressions [reading them "too well"/too much into them] but the ADHD doctor diagnosed me with ADHD after about 5 minutes cos he said he could tell by "how alive my face was". It makes me very nervous that my face is doing much more than other people's and Ive gotten paranoid that's why people dont seem to like me. Cos my face is saying things im not aware of and that might be interpreted completely wrong. It feels like yr supposed to have a blasé pokerface and I have the face of a meth addict. Naturally.[I'm not medicated for ADHD]

So im curious as to what you read from people's eyebrows? Do you prefer people with "talking eyebrows" & a face that's alive or does it make you nervous? How do you feel about greyhounds an other dogs with that type of eyebrows?

In short, facial activity (or neurotype) doesn't matter as much as whether your expressions match your true feelings. Some people just don't understand the ways and reasons we express ourselves and if you fight your expressions, that reads as false. This will turn away those who might want to be your friends. But then there are people and situations where we just don't fit in no matter how hard we try, and for those occasions i think it's good to mask. I'm biased here because a poker face is easy for me. Easier than "toning down". But being permanently masked is a miserable life. You don't get rejected but you don't get to experience anything good.

Hey, thanks for asking and helping me think about this. From here on out, it's a stream of consciousness. It's a long post, but you can take heart in knowing that I deleted most of my first draft.

First of all, I think it needs to be said that I haven't been diagnosed with autism or adhd, but at 35 I don't need to be. I've had enough of talking to psychiatrists in my 20s, getting traumatised by them and labeled with mental illnesses that didn't fit me on the basis of my masked behaviour in an artificial situation. Once I allowed myself to accept autism as the cause for my lifelong struggle, it all just fell into place. I was instantly healed of depression, for one.

I wish I was that sort of autistic who doesn't notice and doesn't care about social stuff. Life would be so much more manageable. Alas, I crave friendship and love. In an autistic way. Being loved is my special interest.

The eyebrow twitch was a metaphor mostly. It's about being consciously on the lookout for signs someone's tired or unhappy with me. I think we have the same problem of reading too much into other people's expressions, but it's the right thing to do if you don't want to risk being excluded.

Of course it's all part of a larger picture: what they say, how they phrase it, how they have acted around me historically etc. A single eyebrow movement is nothing, but on a person who has expressed contempt of me before, it's the first sign they're about to say something nasty. Maybe I can stop them if I stop speaking now.

Outside of my close friend circle, people rarely give status updates like "i liked when you did x earlier", "I'm tired of this topic, let's talk about my interest now", or even "I like you". You're supposed to just figure it out from small clues, and if you fail, you suffer consequences. In my experience.

What type of face I prefer? It depends. My two best friends have extremely lively faces, 100 expressions a minute. My husband is not very expressive unless he's actively laughing at a joke. None of these people try to force or fake expressions that don't fit their emotional state. When they emote at me, they are just being themselves, not trying to get me to do something or become something through subtle pressure. They are welcome to look me in the eye because they look with love and acceptance. All these people are great at asking rather than assuming things. And when I tell them something that is true about me, they believe my words.

My own face? I don't know. I think I've always appeared mostly sad and bland. I taught myself to express appropriate emotions, so much that people accepted me even if they instinctively didn't trust me. Now I know for most of my life I was deeply unhappy, so my true expression would've been a scream. Now that I'm no longer depressed, the amount of joy i take in simple things… makes me mask my expressions as well. Grinning like a maniac at a flower or bird or a chain of associations in my mind wouldn't get me any friends either.

I've always preferred to just not be watched. Keep my joys and sorrows private inside my mind or at least inside my house.

I also don't mind looking at faces per se, except when people look straight back at me. When they're busy doing something and telling me about it, or talking to others, I enjoy watching their expressions. It freaks me out when a film character breaks the fourth wall, but I'll allow that if it's really funny. I like looking at photos of others and myself where we're living our lives rather than posing, because faces just look nicer when the eyes are not pointed straight at me.

It's funny you ask about dogs. Being around a dog can be really tiring because they make me feel so observed. I can see the dog making judgements about me, deciding how to react to my words and actions. Their constant alertness to humans makes me self-conscious. The way they mirror expressions is unsettling. It's hard to believe that a creature can genuinely always want to be together and do what i ask it to.

Multiple dogs watching my every move? That would be just like retail. I'm not putting myself through that for less than fair minimum wage.

It's easier to relate to less social animals. Fish, birds, snails even. You don't feel judged by a snail. My cat is easy to care for, because he is very clear about what he wants when he wants something, letting me know with sounds, eye contact and movements, but when he doesn't need me, he does his own thing. We are aware of each other but with no demands.

This is also true about the people who are easiest to interact with. We parallel-play in the same room, text each other our random thoughts rather than demand instant attention. We talk without necessarily looking at each other.

I appreciate not being drawn into a game of just emoting at each other for no external reason, but if someone wants to share something big with me, or ask me for something I can give them, I'm there for them. If a year or two have passed since we last talked, that makes no difference. And if their face is easy to read, that's just a bonus.

#long post

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shyficwriter · 3 years

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Temporary Home: Chapter 14

Guardians of the Galaxy fanfic | Reader x Guardians (With Yondu and Kraglin!)

Summary: The guardians keep trying to include you in various activities to keep your mind off what's troubling you since you won't talk about it. However, one of these activities turns out to have a, shall we say... slightly less than desired outcome.

Previous Chapter here | Next Chapter Here Or click here to: Start From Beginning

Author’s Note: Thank you to @quillsandtypos, @theambracer88, @mcugiggles, @marvelouslyfluffy and all the anons who participated in my questionnaire post! As you probably guessed, I'll be using the answers (and any future ones, if anyone else still wants to play) to complete some fluffy scenes in the story! Also, for my records this chapter ends on day 23 of the Guardians living with reader. Enjoy!

Word Count: 4,683

Rocket, though he finally had a way to repair the device, had decided to wait a bit before actually doing so. Hell, he had waited this long, certain that his smuggling had been in vain once he found one of the parts had broken on... ahem, "departure," so what was another day or two? It was obvious they were going to be here awhile anyway, so he wasn't too rushed.

One might wonder, how was Rocket able to smuggle anything if SHIELD had searched him, already having found and confiscated contraband he had hidden in his "back pocket?"

Well, Rocket wasn't an idiot. He knew of other ways to smuggle goods on his person. Or, in his person, rather. That being said, maybe to say he wasn't an idiot might be giving him a bit too much credit... Swallowing the pieces of a small data pad might not have been exactly the safest thing to do, though he had given himself a pat on the back for rightfully assuming the Terran's wouldn't think to put him through a body scanner.

He had been damned lucky that nothing had gotten lodged or had punctured any of his innards on the way through, but hey, it worked, didn't it?

Well, mostly.

As said, a part had broken on "departure," which he of course blamed on Gamora and Mantis for rushing him in the bathroom that first day. If that bug-eyed chick didn't have such a tiny bladder then he could have allowed for a more "graceful landing."

No matter, he now had a way to fix it thanks to you. This had admittedly softened his attitude towards you the tiniest bit, though he wasn't going to admit it, nor was he going to completely let his guard down. Use of your workshop was probably just another bribe to win his favor, after all. Just like the bed. He was definitely going to take advantage of it, don't get him wrong. He wasn't just not going to use the tools available to him. Just like he wasn't going to just not sleep in the bed you built him. It was better than sleeping in the crib, though he had been grateful the crib had been left in the room when you left the bed. He had been hiding the pieces of the smuggled device under the crib's mattress -the only good use he saw for it, other than the fact that Groot actually slept pretty well in it- because boy, if the others had found out he had smuggled that in, they would have been pissed. Hence, why he wasn't in too big a hurry to fix it just yet.

Perhaps it couldn't hurt to maybe fix that broken stool in the shed for you, though. Just for a warm up, not because he thought he owed you anything, of course.

***

The evening of the check-in you had found yourself with nothing to do and back in the thoughts that had plagued you since the couple came, and you once again considered pouring yourself a glass or two of whiskey.

Yondu had been leaning against the counter enjoying a snack when he saw you retrieve the bottle from the fridge. Remembering the previous night he raised an eyebrow at you. The last thing he wanted was to witness a repeat, but thought he'd still keep an eye on you. Cut you off again before/if you started to look a little too "weepy." He had doubts that you even remembered what you'd done the previous night, and this was confirmed when he made a lighthearted comment about, "Ya goin' to take it easy tonight, or will I be needin' to cut you off again?" and you raised an eyebrow at him before saying, "What? You didn'- Oh right- I think I do remember you taking my drink now that you mention it," as you set the bottle on the table and went to retrieve a glass from the cupboard.

You now sported a slight blush and, pausing your actions, asked, "I um, didn't say or do anything embarrassing to have warranted that, did I?"

Yondu looked you right in the eye, and lied. "Nope. It was just clear ya had a bit much. Figured I'd save yer wimpy Terran liver." He laughed at your slight pout and added, "Ya just whined at me fer takin' yer drink and then fell asleep. Nuttin' too excitin'."

Yondu could see the relief on your face and it solidified his lack of regret of not telling you. Sure, he might have wanted to crack the mystery to see why you were the way you were, but not like that. He hadn't expected the previous night's display, and if anything, it made him feel like he should back off. Yes, it prompted more burning questions, but even he knew there were some things you just didn't pry into.

Around that time Peter and Kraglin came into the kitchen, messing about and horse-playing. You considered telling them to break it up, but then decided you didn't actually care enough as long as they weren't about to break anything... or anyone. You were about to make your standard polite offer of a drink when suddenly a rip was heard and Peter whined out, "Aw man! You ripped my favorite shirt!"

Sure enough, their rough-housing had managed to rip the seam along the left-shoulder of Peter's dark blue shirt, leaving a sizable hole of a couple inches long that revealed another white shirt underneath.

You rolled your eyes and told him where he could find the sewing kit.

Peter looked at you sheepishly and said, "I don't know how to sew."

You sighed and said, "I guess I'm not doing anything..." and you began to walk towards him and the exit of the kitchen, abandoning the bottle of whiskey on the table without having poured a drink.

Peter took off his ripped shirt and in a surprised voice said, "Oh!- Thanks-" starting to hand you the shirt as you walked past.

You didn't take the shirt, just looked at him as a laugh escaped your throat. "I didn't say I'd do it for you. I meant I'll teach you." With that you cocked your head towards the door and headed out towards the sitting room.

As you walked away you shook your head and muttered something Peter couldn't hear but assumed was an insult as he blushed both from embarrassment at his mistake and from hearing Yondu and Kraglin now laughing at him. He wordlessly followed, not wishing to make more of a fool of himself.

Watching Peter leave, inspiration struck Yondu. It might be overstepping, and might have been a long shot, but it was worth a try. He nudged Kraglin in the arm to get his attention. "Ya remember last night? How things got a little too..." he searched for the right word.

Kraglin finished for him, "Sad? Yeah. I remember." He caught sight of the bottle on the table. "She back at it tonight?" He and Yondu hadn't discussed what happened when he had returned to the kitchen after walking you to your room. It had gone unsaid that you were in a bad way.

"She was gonna," Yondu answered, "but then you two came in and gave her something to distract herself. Might not hurt to keep doing that for a bit."

"Ya wanna keep her busy?" Kraglin asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Better than watchin' her drown herself in a bottle," Yondu replied flippantly with a shrug, but Kraglin could see through his blasé attitude.

He was slightly surprised, but not completely opposed to Yondu's suggestion. You had been drinking a lot the past few days. It didn't take a genius to see that something was obviously wrong, and he knew better that drinking like that only made sad feelings worse. If this had been the Eclector, and you part of the crew, he or Yondu would have cut you off well before now once they saw the pit you were digging. You just don't let sad people drink themselves into a stupor. It's bad form. But this wasn't the ship, and you weren't crew, and they couldn't stop you. They were in your house. They've barely known you for three weeks. He knew they couldn't just order you around, but if a little bit of distraction kept him from seeing you looking that sad again and kept you from hiding in the bottom of a bottle, he was for it.

Yondu spoke again, more or less repeating Kraglin's thoughts back at him. "I know we're on her turf, but someone's gotta do somethin'. It's bad form to just let h- to just to let a person drown like that. She needs to get her mind off what's been troubling her."

Kraglin examined the former captain's features. There was something else there. An emotion behind his eyes the first mate was familiar with after years of faithful service. Cap'n might not always be the best at admitting his softer feelings, but Kraglin knew. He could see it.

It was a look similar to the one he wore after he finished telling Rocket just how alike they were, right before they went to fight Ego. It was the same look in his eyes he had shortly after Peter came aboard the Eclector as a boy and it was decided he wasn't going to be delivered to Ego. One Kraglin even thought he recognized being on the receiving end of when he was a younger lad on the crew.

Kraglin smiled, a soft mix of understanding and sadness. "Sir," he said gently.

Yondu grunted in response and glanced at him.

"First, I do agree with ya, we should help keep her mind off it, but I just gotta say this too." He sighed before continuing. He knew Yondu wasn't going to like what he was about to say, but they were alone now, so he felt safe to say it. He knew if he said this in front of anyone else it'd a a surefire way to put Yondu dangerously close to whistling territory. "We can't be getting too attached, now."

Yondu glared at him. "Who said anythin' about-"

"Sir, all respect and all, but I think I can say I know ya better than anyone else here." Kraglin said, having cut Yondu off with a slight chuckle. "I can see it, I can tell when you're getting attached." His tone got slightly more serious, more comforting. "I don't think it'll be good for ya to get too attached, sir. We'll be leaving here eventually, and we know she ain't gonna be coming with us."

Yondu set his mouth in a firm line and stared Kraglin down hard but didn't say anything. He knew his first mate was right, but that didn't mean he had to admit it. Finally he answered with, "I ain't gettin' attached to nuttin' or nobody."

Kraglin sighed. If he knew anything else it was that Yondu could also be stubborn as hell. If he wanted to live in denial, well there wasn't a whole lot he could do about it. "Alright, sir," he said with a shake of his head. "I believe ya." He didn't, and his tone betrayed that, earning him a narrowed eyed look from Yondu, but they dropped the conversation, at least for now.

***

Showing Peter how to sew went fairly smoothly. He seemed to grasp the concept well enough, watching you sew the first third of the tear - not the easiest task with your brace on- and then repeating what you had shown him on the rest himself. He finished soon enough and thanked you before leaving the table.

However, almost immediately after that Kraglin showed up with something ripped and asked if you could teach him too. You sighed, and mildly scolded him about how come he couldn't have asked while you were showing Peter, but you agreed regardless. Again, it wasn't exactly the easiest task considering you only had a limited range of motion to move your arm, but you managed. After he finally seemed to get it (he asked a lot of questions, even if he understood, assuming it'd be helpful to keep you occupied for longer) you noticed it had gotten dark out, and you were tired anyway, and so when it looked like he had a handle on it you decided to just go to bed.

***

The next day it seemed like people just kept asking you to do things. Not like they were ordering you around, but more like asking you to do things with them, which they hadn't often done.

It wasn't all bad, but you had the feeling it wasn't just a coincidence that they were seemingly trying to keep you engaged in various tasks and activities after Maria had informed you that one of them had expressed concerns about your well-being. You didn't know if they were now acting on their own or if Fury or Agent Hill had suggested it, but either way you figured you'd just roll with it. If you made an effort maybe they'd be happy and drop it.

That morning, before you realized what was going on, Mantis came to you with a book on plants and asked you to help her identify different plants around the property. You had almost said no, perhaps another time, but then you saw the expectant look on her happy face and decided you had time to kill anyway, so what could it hurt?

It was about when you were asked by Mantis and Drax to join the others for a game of UNO that you started to suspect what was going on.

Before this, Peter had kept coming up to you wanting to show you funny videos he found, having recently discovered the YouTube app on the TV; Yondu had come to you with an archery book and tried making small-talk asking about Terran types of archery; and Gamora and Kraglin asked you to help ref while everyone sparred.

You had agreed to reffing, feeling a little better than you had been all those days you had refused and now therefore not seeing any reason not to.

It was a slight bummer though, needing to sit on the sidelines and watching others train, but you supposed watching them to see if they knew any cool 'space moves' couldn't hurt. Plus, watching how the raccoon was able to hold his own against human-sized opponents was always interesting. Groot sat with you, not being permitted to spar with the others (except for when Rocket would decide to pretend spar with him, just to make him happy) and he was adorable as he played with the grass, so it wasn't all bad.

After that everyone else was pretty much tired, but Groot came up to you with the car you had given him, holding it above his head. You raised an eyebrow and looked to Peter, who informed you that the little guy wanted you to push him on it. You did, because how could you possibly say no to that?

What was cute to Peter, however, was the fact that no one had prompted Groot to do that. He just genuinely wanted you to play with him.

After a while of playing with Groot is when Mantis and Drax had come to you about playing UNO. Now you were getting a hint of what they were doing, but you agreed to play a few games with them anyway. You even caught yourself actually starting to have fun.

Around suppertime Peter came up to you, asking if you could teach him how to cook something. He talked about how he thought it'd be fun to learn to cook more things from his home world, and also reminded you how you did say several times that he could 'help you cook later.'

You sighed and after some more prodding from Peter you finally agreed, asking him what he might like to learn how to cook.

Peter looked like a deer in the headlights before admitting that he didn't actually know. He didn't remember a whole lot of different Terran foods from when he was a kid, and he was now drawing a blank.

You nodded towards the kitchen and told him the two of you would figure it out.

After looking for a bit you decided on a vegetable stew, mostly because this had been unexpected and you hadn't pulled any meat from the freezer to thaw.

Peter was surprisingly not bad at it. He handled the knife safely, he cut the vegetables evenly, and he listened as you told him what to do and when. You wondered if he had some experience cooking before, but you didn't ask.

After dinner Gamora wouldn't take no for an answer on helping with the dishes, of course using your injury as an excuse. You sighed, but allowed it, agreeing to dry while she washed, still under the impression that if you just indulged them for a bit they'd eventually stop and start leaving you along again.

Just as you finished Peter came to the two of you asking if you wanted to see a new movie he found on Netflix.

Figuring it wouldn't hurt to make an effort, you agreed to watching a movie with them and followed into the sitting room, wondering what film he had picked out.

Turned out, he had chosen a horror movie. Candy Man.

You sighed. Obviously you weren't completely immune to jump scares, but you didn't really mind horror movies. You could even go as far to say that you enjoyed most of them. However, you were concerned about Mantis, who you could see sitting happily on the rug in front of the couch next to Rocket as you entered the room.

"Are you sure this movie is appropriate for everyone?" you ask Peter.

"What? You scARed?" Rocket taunted with a smirk, and it was then that you saw Groot on the rug as well, having been sitting in Rocket's lap.

You roll your eyes and explain that your concerns were for the wooden child and Mantis, as your time spent with them hadn't made you very confident that they would recieve a scary movie well. "I'm more concerned the movie's gonna give them nightmares," you explained as you took a seat at the end of the couch.

Gamora seemed to agree with you, but the two of you were outvoted. Rocket just rolled his eyes and snarked that he bet you were scared, and Mantis assured excitedly that she could watch it. Groot, even though you couldn't understand him, also seemed adamant. You had a feeling they didn't really know what they were getting into, but combined with the fact that Mantis was an adult, and Groot wasn't your child, and Peter was doing his best to convince you and Gamora that everything would be fine, you eventually gave in, stating, "Fine, but don't say I didn't warn you. She better not crawl into my bed tonight. I'll send her your way."

Peter just laughed and shook his head, not taking you seriously, before turning out the lights and taking a seat next to Gamora at the other end of the couch. Kraglin took the last available seat between you and Peter and Rocket smarted off again.

"If you're gonna get scared maybe Kraglin will hold your hand!" he laughed as Peter turned on the film.

You rolled your eyes at him and crossed your arms over your chest, refusing to look at Kraglin to give the rodent any satisfaction that he might have succeeded in embarrassing you. This, Kraglin was grateful for, because he was sort of an easy blusher, and he didn't want you to get the wrong idea. He just gave Rocket an unamused look, but he was also grateful the lights had been dimmed so that Yondu couldn't see him blushing and then tease him for it. Whether or not the former Ravager captain would actually believe Kraglin might have managed to develop feelings for you wouldn't matter. That fact that Kraglin had just told Yondu the previous night that he shouldn't be getting attached would be enough for him to jump on it and tease the hell out of him purely out of spite.

Despite the movie being old, it was still relatively new to you. You had heard about it, thought you remembered seeing a commercial or maybe a clip or two of it over the years, but this had been your first time actually watching it.

It was about halfway though and nothing terribly scary had happened yet. There was the flashback scene of a little boy having been mutilated that made you cringe, as any show that featured little kids being harmed always hit a sore spot, but it didn't really show much more than a bloody bathroom.

You were starting to think it probably wasn't going to be any real scary scenes, but then Candyman started to call the college lady's name, and it actually made you fight a shiver. You didn't know why, but creepy sounds were one of the few things from a film that could actually strike fear in your heart. Thankfully it didn't last long. You weren't looking forward to being teased for jumping or shivering at a movie that wasn't really even that scary.

At least it would mean that Mantis would be unlikely to crawl into your bed scared tonigh-

Candyman just shoved his hook through the college lady's medicine cabinet.

Half of everyone jumped, including you. Among those startled was Kraglin, and he shot you a glance that you purposely didn't return, not wanting to answer to any cocky smiles or teases accusing you of being scared.

A shot came on the screen centering on the baby Candyman took and you tensed, worried he was going to kill it, but you were relieved to see that he only let it suckle on his finger.

Kraglin felt you tense and then relax beside him, and he frowned, remembering the other night. He considered asking if you were alright, but then thought better of it and held his tongue, instead watching on as a scene played where the lady was now stuck in a mental hospital, having been believed to have killed her best friend and said baby from the previous scene.

Yondu didn't think he liked this movie, but he continued to watch in silence. He didn't want to see kids being hurt, and he had also tensed at the previous scene. Like you, he was sure that the bad guy was about to kill the baby. However, as he was sitting in his usual spot in the armchair, his tension went unnoticed.

Mantis let out a short scream when the lady summoned Candyman and he killed the psychiatrist. You sighed, realizing this wasn't looking good for her staying in her own bed tonight. Little did Peter know, you hadn't been kidding. If she tries to crawl in with you, you're sending her right to him, seeing as it would be his fault.

The lady was now exploring Candyman's lair, and you started to get a little tense at the creepy sounds of his breathing, and you mentally cursed whoever mixed the sound for this movie.

You got even more tense and fidgety when he opened his robe to reveal a ribcage full of bees. You only hoped no one noticed to tease you for it. Body horror was another thing that never failed to make you shudder.

Eventually the movie started to come to a close, a scene played where the lady's jerk ex-fiancé was having flashbacks to how good he had it with her now that she was dead, and you thought it was just going to end on a sad note.

That is, until he said her name, Helen, five times in the mirror (just like Candyman) and she came back and killed him with the Candyman's hook. Her sudden appearance made you startle slightly, and you heard more squeals from Mantis. You sighed again. Yep, she was definitely not going to sleep tonight.

The movie was finally over and Peter got up to turn on the lights. He turned to see you giving him a glare and he smiled. "What? Was it too scary for you?" he jeered.

You just pointed down to Groot. He had his head buried in Rocket's chest and was softly whimpering. "I told you that movie wasn't for kids."

Rocket scoffed at you and told you he would be fine, then turned it on you, saying how he felt you jump at least three times from where he was sitting.

You rolled your eyes and ignored him, turning to Peter and this time gesturing to Mantis, who still looked a bit shaken. "I meant what I said. She tries to crawl in bed with me, I'm sending her to you," you say, leaving to go to go get ready for bed, both because it was now late, and to avoid any inevitable further teasing from Rocket.

The others seemed to have much the same idea about bedtime, and a few of them followed you up the stairs.

You let Mantis shower first, hopeful that if you went after her that she might hopefully be asleep by the time you got out. However, when you finished your own shower, Peter had thought it'd be funny to jump-scare you as you exited the bathroom, grabbing your shoulders and shouting, "CANDYMAN'S GOTCHA!" which resulted in you jumping a mile with a noise you'd deny was a shriek before you turned to punch him in the arm scolding, "Damn you!"

He, along with Rocket, only responded by laughing their asses off at you. You thought you could also hear Drax's own booming laughter down the hall from his room, and you caught a glimpse of Yondu and Kraglin sharing amused glances and snickering from their shared room.

Your face getting warm at the fact that he had actually managed to get you pretty good, you then just storm off to your room, ignoring Rocket's teases that he bet that you'd be the one crawling into Mantis's bed tonight.

You shut the bedroom door behind you to see Mantis awake and clutching her bear for dear life. Whether she was just already awake due to nerves or you had woken her with your startled cry, you didn't know, but you flicked on your desk lamp for her, turned out your overhead light and crawled into bed without a word.

Sometime later, long enough for you to have drifted off into a decently sound enough sleep to be dreaming, you were startled awake by someone crawling into your bed.

Guess who. That's right. Mantis.

You groaned and turned to see she had already crawled halfway into your bed before you stopped her by rousing. "Mantis," you groaned, pointing towards the door, "go climb into Peter's bed. He's the one that chose the movie."

Mantis tucked her chin sheepishly and admitted she had already tried that, but his and Gamora's door had been locked.

You stared at the ceiling and sighed. Clever bastard.

You made a mental note to squirt lemon juice in his coffee in the morning before letting out another groan. "Ugh, fine. But just this once," you allowed, ignoring the fact that this would actually technically be the second time. You were also not actually quite as salty as you let on. If anything, you should maybe thank her for waking you from a bad dream involving the Candyman's ribcage full of bees, but you weren't going to tell her that.

She smiled gratefully and thanked you as she snuggled in.

You sighed quietly and Mantis fell asleep quickly. At least she didn't snore.

You spent the next bit before you fell asleep yourself contemplating different ways that you might be able to annoy Peter for sufficient payback.

#gotg #gotg fanfiction #guardians of the galaxy #x reader #yondu lives #scary movies #candyman #yondu udonta #kraglin obfonteri #rocket racoon and groot #mantis #peter quill #starlord

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ialwaysknewyouwerepunk · 3 years

Text

cherry - close reading

alright, this one’s different, for a bunch of reasons that i will be getting into after the lyrics. this might be the point where people who have very strong opinions on narratives surrounding stunts could get angry at me. that’s totally fine, as long as you keep it to yourself (hehe). i wanted these close readings to steer clear of that whole side of harry’s public persona, but i couldn’t write this post honestly doing so. i needed to get this off my chest and apparently i had a lot to say (i surprised myself, really).

so, this is actually a WARNING: do not proceed if you are a firm believer in hamille. that’s all (and i won’t be replying to anons about this)

fine line, track 5

title: from French: “chérie”, darling

Don't you call him “baby”

lovers calling one another “baby” ～ to be so lonely

We're not talking lately

Don't you call him what you used to call me

common theme: jealousy

I, I confess I can tell that you are at your best

the other is thriving now the relationship is over

I'm selfish so I'm hating it

self-deprecating, honest, jealous

I noticed that there's a piece of you in how I dress

Take it as a compliment

the relationship has left its traces

no bad blood after the split, pretty blasé

I, I just miss

I just miss your accent and your friends

Did you know I still talk to them?

miss little things, more the atmosphere and context of the relationship, no strong yearning for the person

Does he take you walking 'round his parents' gallery?

again, jealousy

gallery: repeat of word in sunflower, vol. 6, but with (possible, likely) different meaning

[Outro: french girlie]

Coucou ! Tu dors ? Oh, j'suis désolée...

Bah non... Nan, c'est pas important...

Ouais, on était à la plage, et maintenant on—

Parfait ! Allez !

(translation: yoohoo (ish?), you’re sleeping? oh, i’m sorry… oh no, it’s not important… yeah, we were at the beach, and now we… perfect! (“allez” literally means “go” but it’s kinda like “let’s go” and more of a stop word. hard to translate)

this is not a voicemail. a voicemail gives you a monologue, a short message by the person directed at the owner of the phone number they’re calling. this is an overheard phone call: we hear one side of the call

SYNTHESIS

Right, okay. I have to be honest: from the lyrics themselves, there’s not a lot of deep shit I’m getting. This is a simple love song about a lost love, written about the period right after a breakup. It’s full of pettiness, simple jealousy. There’s no bad blood and the “I” even seems pretty okay with it. He misses the person, and the missing is expressed through the little things, like their accent or style. The relationship is definitely over, since the other has moved on already, and the “I” is not asking them to come back. There is no yearning, loneliness or miserable missing like Harry sometimes likes to express (～ Falling, To Be So Lonely, MMITH, From the Dining Table…). What the “I” seems to miss most is the other person’s attention, presence.

Now, we all know that this has been painted as the song dedicated to Camille Rowe. It's shoved down our throats: her voice is on the track (though can we be sure it’s actually her?), the title is a play on a french pet name, she supposedly dated someone involved in galleries after Harry (idk the details leave me alone). Naturally, I’m in no position to say whether they ever actually had a relationship or not. I’d be very surprised, since I’ve only ever seen and heard Harry’s love and praise for dick, but that's whatever. If it is about a real relationship (of an entire year), then all I can conclude is that the relationship remained pretty surface-level and they managed to move on easily, unless Harry suddenly changed his entire style for expressing love when writing this. (And No, the other love songs on the album are not about this relationship. Don’t fuck around.)

I’ll say that I think this song was written for a purpose, crafted to fit that narrative. I have avoided the personal aspect, or the who is this actually about shit in previous posts as much as possible, because I wanted to focus on the lyrics and artistry only. In this case, this song, however pretty and cute it is, stands out on the album, to me, because of its simplicity and the absence of attachment to the rest of the story. Golden, Adore You, Falling, To Be So Lonely, Sunflower, Vol. 6 and Canyon Moon tell parts of the same love story. There’s depth, connection, care, and - especially - a long-term love that’s persisted. In my later posts on Sunflower, Vol. 6 and Canyon Moon, especially, it will become clear how I read them as being about a long-term relationship. Even the simple line in To Be So Lonely, “i was just a little boy,” should be enough for everyone to know that song is not about that one relationship with a french model in recent history.

Sure, Cherry can still be about something real; another relationship that took place during a break in Harry's long-term one. Again, I'd just be extremely surprised by our curly boy walking in a rainbow paradise in a strawberry lipstick state of mind. But even then, placing the song on the album like that, preceded and followed by songs about a love that's life-altering and successful, just feels off to me. The story would make a lot more sense to me if the song weren't there. That's of course my own experience of the album, and another interpretation is just as valid. Who knows, maybe I'm totally wrong - but there's no need to come tell me that 😇

Fine Line being branded during its publicity as an album about being sad/a breakup and having sex will always infuriate me, which I really shouldn't let happen, because I know Harry is just sitting there with that wide-ass grin on his face, safely hiding behind his wall of vague lies and half-truths. Literally only Watermelon Sugar is explicitly about sex and even Falling, arguably the most straightforwardly sad song, holds hope for their love to survive. Harry being that open about a relationship - naming her, putting her voice on the track (!!) - is also very out of character and simply reminds me of interviews during the 1d days, which is an extra reason for me to attach little or no truth to the entire narrative. He's still just as private about everything else in his life: he's offline, we only see photos of him when his team wants us to and when talking about any other song or inspiration he's as vague as can be. This is the only exception and it's a thorn in my eye. But, of course, the stunt worked perfectly and it was the perfect plan to distract the general public. “This is the narrative, this is what it's about, here you have all the answers, you can stop thinking now, no no no don't look at the other lyrics, it's fine shhhhhhh." Cherry is Harry's favorite song, his most vulnerable song, damn he really bares his soul in this one. And we definitely mustn't look into any other theme the album might be about, no no. Bad gp. And that the voicemail is not really a voicemail so the narrative of it being one Harry saved from their relationship doesn’t even hold up but we won’t get into that.

Alright, time for me to calm down. Let's just say there's one thing that will always always convince me that I've got it right: the Vogue interview, featuring its writer wondering if something went lost in translation when Harry invited him to a gay swimming pond, descriptions of Harry and Harry Lambert (his stylist) calling each other Sue and Susan, ending with Harry playing Cherry and Gemma saying, "he does his own stunts." No, this is not said about the kid bouncing on a trampoline for one of the shots. This is a reaction to his performance for the crew, and that's what the article decided to end with. Ok I’m calm once more

Typical that I wrote so much about a song that I initially thought was going to be a breeze, since I knew I wouldn’t be able to link it to the greater themes. Guess that’s what made me rant about it in the first place. This one was a muuuuuuch more stunty post than the others in this series, and that’s also because this song is not like the others. It doesn’t belong here and I treated it as such. Tune in tomorrow for our regular scheduled programming, with the one and only Falling.

Read my other lyric analyses here

#cherry #fine line analysis #stunts #vogue interview #harry #lyric analysis #this took a few years off my life not gonna lie #it just gets to me #and this is the only version of events that makes sense to me #i'm serious when i say i won't reply to negative anons #but any other feedback i'd happily read bc i'm obviously not all-knowing #this is mainly instinct yk #and based on my overall interpretation of harry's lyrics #lp #my posts

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chibinightowl · 3 years

Text

I’m trying to get in the habit of ficlets again to kickstart the muse for some other things. This was inspired by THIS post.

---

There’s a knock at the door. Again.

Jason looks up from his research and sighs. Seriously, this is the worst place to get any work done.

Shoving away from the desk, he pointedly stomps his way across the room and yanks open the front door to the cabin, scowling.

The cute little thing on the doorstep takes a step back, brown eyes wide.

“What do you want?” Jason all but growls.

“Um. I--I… I’m here to see the Witch of the Woods,” she manages to squeak out. Her knuckles are white around the handle of her cloth-covered basket.

Jason heaves another sigh and rolls his eyes to the heavens. “He lives over there,” he says, pointing to another house on the other side of the stream. “Would you guys get it right for once? He’s the Witch, I’m the Summoner. Now get lost.”

Just to prove his point, he yanks through the ether and then Dick is sprawling butt-naked across the path.

The pretty boy blinks, then grins up at him, as brilliant as the sun and actually shimmering with some sort of body glitter he uses regularly. “Hi, Jason!” he says with a cheerful wave, like he hadn’t just been dragged across the stream by the scruff of his neck

Jason ignores him, which is difficult to do as the Witch must have been in the middle of bathing and has just dropped a hand to conceal his groin. Looks like the village girl is about to get an eyeful. Or an education, he really doesn’t care which.

“Here’s another one for you,” he barks, taking a moment to tug through the ether again. A towel appears, which he drops unceremoniously on Dick’s head.

Then the door slams in their faces.

Inside, Jason hears the village girl ask with a giggle, “Is he always that grumpy?”

“Yeah. I keep inviting him over so we can get to know each other better, but he never takes me up on it. I wonder why?”

His sanity, that’s why.

---

The same thing happens the next day. And the next. And the next.

They just keep coming.

Jason is about ready to tear his hair out the next time he answers the damn door. “What the fuck do you want?”

“Are you the Summoner of the Woods?” a young man with bright blue eyes asks.

Okay, this is a change of pace.

Jason startles, not sure what to say.

“I hope you are. The girls in the village say the Witch is all sparkles and sunshine, and that doesn’t look like you at all.”

“What do I look like?” The question falls from his lips before he can stop it.

The young man smirks, slightly crooked. “Like the big bad wolf.”

Nice. The guy’s just earned a reprieve.

Jason leans against the doorframe and crosses his arms. “I am a Summoner, but considering I just moved here this last spring, I don’t think the rest of the title means very much.”

“Fair enough.” The man clears his throat and squares his shoulders. “I need your help and am willing to trade for your services.”

Oh, this is definitely new and interesting.

“I’m listening.”

“I’m looking for a particular soul.”

Eyes narrowing, Jason straightens. “I don’t raise the dead,” he snaps.

“No, I wouldn’t expect you to. That’s my job. I’m just trying to see if this person is actually dead.”

It’s said in such a blasé tone, like death is utterly normal for this guy.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t follow.” Jason is starting to wonder exactly who he’s dealing with here.

“My mother disappeared about six months ago,” the man replied. “She’s a Traveler, so it’s not like that’s anything new. Some rumors have reached me, however, indicating she might be dead. I’d like to find out if she’s really in the Otherworld first before I do anything.”

A Planes Traveler. Now there’s a challenge.

Jason lets out a slow breath as the implications of what he’s about to agree to sinks in. “You’re a Necromancer, aren’t you?”

The man nods. “I am. By nature, not by study,” he adds.

It’s a very important distinction that Jason appreciates.

“Lemme guess. Your childhood pets never managed to stay dead for long?”

“Yep.”

A quick scan of the man’s aura reveals none of the twisted darkness Jason’s encountered with Blood Mages before. Those people are sick fucks who prey on the desires and wishes of others. This guy—well, he’s not exactly sunshine and roses, but he’s centered and calm, despite the chill of the grave that blankets him.

“You just want me to see if your mother is actually dead, right? A soul summoning if she is?” Jason checks.

The man nods. “Correct.”

“A Planes Traveler won’t be easy to find.”

“I know and I will pay you, either in coin or in trade. Your choice.”

“Fine. We’ll discuss the fine details of payment inside.” Jason unblocks the door and holds it open for his visitor. “So who’re you and who am I looking for?”

“I’m Tim Drake. My mother is Janet Drake.”

Jason trips on the rug. He knows that name. It’s a well-known name, one that is spoken of with equal parts cursing and respect. Whirling around, he stares. “You’re telling me The Drake might be dead?”

Tim nods, looking far too relaxed for someone whose mother might be making friends with the Astrals right now. “I know, right? Kinda hard to believe anyone would have the stones to try, but all it takes is for someone to get lucky once.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” With a shake, Jason pulls himself together. This is not what he expected when he opened his front door.

In fact, his day just got that much better.

#chibinightowl writes #Jason Todd #Tim Drake #Dick Grayson #Another Magic AU!

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levihantrash · 3 years

Text

Priorities

For Levihan week Aug 2021 Day 2 prompt: confessions

Also based on a cute ass tumblr prompt by @sanothebreadpup <3 hope you like it!!

Summary: It’s been a while since Hange wanted to confess, but their to-do list was too goddamn long. Erwin suggested going to Levi for advice on managing prioritises. Instead, they asked Levi if he wanted to bake… for a titan.

note: no smut but lots of spicy poetic touching

cross-posted on ao3 🤪

-----

Hange wanted to confess. It had been months since they knew that their best friend status with Levi could potentially be tweaked to include just a bit more romance, and they knew they had to be the one to take that step. As much as Levi was quick-witted on the battlefield, he wasn’t quite the risk-taker in ordinary settings. In fact, Hange figured Levi would sip tea beside them until he was greying and would probably be as content with the arrangement.

Hange wanted to confess, but their to-do list was too goddamn long.

Out-of-the-blue, though characteristically charismatic, Erwin gave the soldiers a pep-talk on how they need to know what to prioritise (i.e., humanity's victory).

Inspired, though the speech’s intended audience was clearly for new recruits, Hange tried to prioritise their tasks. Within a day, they got overwhelmed, the list being more of a reason for delay than for action. Moblit, well-meaning as always, tried to get Hange to focus on one at a time but that was unthinkable to them. One at a time meant that the confession would never happen. There was too much to research. Too much at stake. Too much for one inconsequential confession.

Unknowingly, Erwin saw Hange wringing their hands, muttering to themselves in the dining hall.

“What’s wrong?”

“I just can’t prioritise the important stuff,” Hange grumbled. Perking up at the mention of priorities, Erwin advised Hange to seek Levi’s guidance.

“Levi only does one thing at a time once he sets his heart on it.”

Eager for a chance encounter with someone they technically already hung out with on most days, Hange asked Levi for help. More accurately, in perhaps the most roundabout manner, they asked Levi if he wanted to bake… for a titan.

“For research,” Hange said, almost convinced by their own performance.

“You can do that yourself,” Levi said reasonably.

While starting a task was horrendously difficult, Hange was not one to give up once they began on one.

“You’re the only one here who can bake.”

Eyes narrowed, arms folded, Levi was not buying the compliment. He had a pile of papers left to read. Hange’s whims could be settled by someone with more well-matched interests and time management.

“Go ask Petra.”

Hovering nearby with another paper for her captain to sign, Petra noticed Hauge's crestfallen face.

“It’s not about the baking being done but who Hange is doing the baking with,” Petra whispered, as discreetly as she could.

"I'm busy," Levi said, loud enough for Hange to hear, heedless of Petra’s input.

“Alright.” Hange sighed, internally fuming that they should’ve found a more legitimate excuse. Bluff out something like Erwin’s orders. Levi followed Erwin’s orders without question. Hange’s requests were dealt with more scepticism. Not that Hange had the best track record of requests.

In the end, Hange prepared the baking supplies, because even if titans couldn’t stomach cake, it was an experimental endeavour. Practically speaking, they could give some baked goods to the juniors. Maybe even gift some to Levi.

Stumbling into the kitchen with too many ingredients in hand, they found Levi leaning against the entrance looking positively sullen. Upon spotting Hange, his face morphed into a more acceptable, neutral expression, nodding towards them.

"I thought you were busy!"

Levi shrugged, grabbing some of the ingredients from their arms. "I was. Didn't you want to bake?"

“I guess?”

The sudden change of mind was too abrupt for Hange to wrap their head around. A hopeful glow had unfortunately begun growing in them. Levi was being exceptionally nice today. No doubt that he was usually nice. Just not will-bake-for-your-titans kind of nice.

"Erwin said that you are really good at prioritising tasks,” Hange said, slowly digging through the cabinets for the utensils.

"Huh. Let me guess—he wants you to learn from me."

Hange scratched their head absent-mindedly. "He did tell me to ask you."

"I'm not actually very good at sticking to a task,” Levi admitted, wondering where in hell Erwin got the idea that he was focused. If he were, the paperwork would have been submitted, instead of lying around, flapping aimlessly in the wind before Petra (and Oluo) offered their generous help. He refused—every time. Levi was simply good at keeping a blank face and reporting to Erwin that he needed more time, which Erwin must have mistaken as a sign of seriousness than a sign of procrastination.

“You are! You finished work before coming have, didn't you?”

Levi didn’t breathe out a word, silently pouring through the book of recipes.

"What do you want to bake?"

Hange didn’t mind his lack of response, pondering over his poor cover-up question. "Something easy. What about bread?"

"Bread isn’t easy."

Difficulties translated into the promise of adventure for Hange. Pumped up, Hange prodded at the picture of an unremarkable loaf of chocolate banana bread.

"Let's do it anyway!"

“Suit yourself.”

-----

The small touches were the ones that were hardest to ignore. Hange felt the accidental-deliberate brush of Levi’s elbow when he reached over to choose an ingredient. Other times, he guided their hand with the right amount of strength for stirring the batter. His fingers over their stirring hand were firm and reassuring.

“You’re stirring too fast,” Levi said patiently.

“You’re distracting me,” Hange replied half-heartedly.

“Oh, am I?” The fingers left Hange’s hand. Just as Hange was about to lament their moment of folly in allowing that to happen, the fingers reached out towards their face. Forcing in a breath, Hange felt Levi’s thumb rub out a chocolate stain at the side of their lip.

“How did the chocolate get there?” Levi murmured, more to himself than to them.

“I was snacking on some of the chocolate bits a while ago…” Hange said cheekily, licking the side of their lips only to realise that Levi’s thumb was still there. Their tongue brushed his finger, and in that contact, Hange was ready to collapse from self-generated sexual tension.

Though his eyes widened noticeably, Levi quickly resumed his blasé expression. Rubbing the rest of the stain out, he walked to the tap to wash his hands. There was some hesitation, before he hurriedly turned on the tap, letting the water run for two seconds over his hands before going back to his position next to Hange.

Unsure as to whether to be offended or pleased by the sight of Levi cleaning the evidence of their encounter with such carelessness, Hange busied themselves with breaking eggs and separating yolk. If it had been Levi with a finger lined with fudge, Hange would’ve licked it spotless. With permission, of course.

To pay him back in kind, Hange plotted their own routine of touch as well. The touches became bolder, starting innocently enough. From casually brushing away hair that was poking Levi’s eye, to going behind Levi who was busy slicing up bananas and placing both hands on the counter. Their arms were now on either side of him, conveniently taller than him so that their head could peer right over his shoulder. The cutting didn’t cease—it only got more rapid, the bananas becoming neat circles in a matter of seconds. Hange let out an impressed whistle, hands not leaving the counter.

“Stop distracting me.”

“Oh, am I?”

One drop of the knife, and a swift turn later, Levi found himself staring straight into Hange’s bright, beautiful, heavily eye-bagged orbs.

"Hange, do you know why I'm in the kitchen at 2am baking for some shit-brained monsters?"

“Titans don’t have—”

“Because I have priorities.” Levi interrupted, not allowing Hange to clarify what the physical anatomy of titan subjects entailed.

Hange blinked, maintaining an oblivious exterior. “Your priorities include titan research?”

“You know what I was going to say.”

“Somewhat. I want to hear you say it out loud, though.”

Grimacing, he concentrated his gaze on Hange’s collar instead. Skin flushed, collarbones peeking out mischievously. Bad idea.

“You little shit.”

Their laugh was quieter, milder than the ones they let out on other days. “My favourite little shit! So what are your priorities?”

“Wiping the blades. Cleaning the toilet. Dusting under the tables. Doing laundry. Having enough tea. Baking with a scientist who thinks—”

Hange pressed a gentle hand on his mouth. “I get it.”

“Which part do you get?” Levi asked, enjoying the fact that when he moved his lips, they grazed Hange’s palm. How would it be like to replace that hand with their mouth?

“That you like me.” Hange grinned, tugging Levi by the straps of his apron just a bit closer.

An unexpected flash of clumsiness made Levi knock down the bag of flour, spilling it onto the floor. The fall clouded up the vicinity in white dust. Gaining confidence with obscured vision, Hange held the back of Levi’s head, tracing his undercut, admiring how his immaculately combed hair had come undone. An attractively dishevelled mess. Hange was in no hurry. Yet.

Levi, in a spur of restlessness, looked up at Hange questioningly. Eyeing their faint smirk, he tilted his head sideways, watching carefully for any sign of reluctance. An impatient “are you going to kiss me or not” from Hange; a straightforward command was what he needed to hear. No time was wasted pulling Hange into an urgent, searing kiss. Backed against the counter, hands cupping Hange’s face, Levi devoured the sensation. The taste of sugar, fruit, flour, and chocolate clung onto the entwinement, as Hange breathily pressed up against him. Erwin had warned them both. Love in the military meant the threat of loss. The possibility of sorrow. As he felt the rumble of Hange’s satisfying groan beneath his lips sending an unprecedented warmth through his body, he was certain. He would have loved Hange whether he kissed them or not. Death would happen, whether or not Hange rubbed his waist in soothing, awe-inspiring strokes. Right now, he would die in absolute bliss.

To be honest, Hange would’ve been disappointed if they didn’t end up fucking, or at least, aggressively kissing eventually. Erwin’s advice was only a stronger reminder that Hange was never one to be conservative. They loved Levi, as a comrade, as a friend, as the person whom they would kill for, if it meant saving his life. Still, having Levi sneak a hand into the bareness of their back, sucking their neck with a hot tenderness that made their head spin, they knew that chastity and platonic hugging could not be the only option.

“We should’ve done this sooner,” Hange said, peeling away his jacket.

“Couldn’t tell when the right time was,” Levi said, starting on the buttons of Hange’s shirt.

The door creaked open.

“This is your idea of asking Levi for help?” Erwin said, a thick eyebrow raised as he surveyed the mess.

With some willpower, he stopped unbuttoning Hange’s shirt. Lightly pushing Hange away, Levi straightened up, less than pleased with the interruption.

“Erwin, you better have something worthwhile to say if you—”

“I’ll clean this up.” Erwin, fully recovered from his shock, was beaming.

“Huh?”

“It’s about time,” Erwin said, with the proud sincerity of an unwitting matchmaker, gesturing towards the door.

“We owe you one, Erwin!” Hange waved at him on the way out, while Levi cast him a grateful, wary glance. With his hand was secure on their back, and Hange’s arm wrapped around his shoulders, there was no care for an audience. Only the smell of baked goods and unfinished business fuelled their steps towards a private space. A place where they would end up in each other’s arms—spent, sweaty, and deliriously at peace.

#levihanweek2021 #lhw2021 #levihan #levi x hange #day 2 #levi ackerman #hange zoe #aot fanfiction #shingeki no kyojin #fanfiction #aot #my writing #hanji zoe #prompt

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variousqueerthings · 3 years

Text

Daniel LaRusso: A Queer Feminine Fairytale Analysis Part Two of Three

Part 1

Part 3

6. Sexual Awakenings part 1: Love, Obsession, & Size Differences

[Insert that post talking about the creators making sure that Daniel’s antagonists were much bigger than him so that the audience would sympathise, spawning 10000 size kink fics]

I’m sure this won’t awaken anything in Daniel

Corporate wants you to find the difference between these two pictures

The hallmark of feminine fairytales tends to be growing into womanhood, with all those symbolic sexual under/overtones, searching for a prince, encountering monsters (or evil stepmothers), on the surface tending to be quite passive/reactive, but actually being about young girls and women getting out of their environment and choosing to tussle with those deep, dark desires – monsters. They’ve got to function within the limitations of power that they have – escaping an abusive situation through marriage, chasing forbidden desires under the guise of duress, asking questions about sexuality through things like symbolic plucking (flowers) or consumption (fruit) or pricking (needles), etc.

Daniel isn’t striking out to find his fortune or win a girl or a kingdom Like A Man, he’s not a threat to Silver, who – like Jareth in Labyrinth – is in control for almost the whole of the narrative, he’s not actually able to do much more than react until he makes the decision to stop training, and even then he’s immediately ganged up on and assaulted, needing to be saved by Miyagi while he stands and watches, bloodied and bruised.

Daniel’s journey in the third movie is to be forced into an impossible situation, seduced by Silver, and then prove that whatever violence Silver did to him isn’t enough to destroy him. It is incredibly similar to Sarah’s in Labyrinth, who by the end declares: “you have no power over me,” and that’s her winning moment. Not strength, not wits, not a direct fight, (although Daniel does fight Barnes and gets beat up again – only winning in in the end by taking him by surprise, unlike in TKK1 or TKK2 where you could argue that he proves himself to be a capable physical opponent to Johnny and Chozen), but by declaring that whatever power was held over her is now void.

Daniel’s narrative isn’t satisfying in the same way, because the dynamic of Silver and Daniel only accidentally emulates this - it’s not an intention on the side of the film-makers.

When Miyagi tells Daniel that he has strong roots, when he tells him not to lose to fear and Daniel wins over Barnes (in an almost fairytale-esque set of events), on paper he’s defeated whatever hold Terry Silver has over him. In the film itself though, Daniel never defeats Silver (which will likely be confirmed once he returns in Season Four). Daniel cannot simply say “you have no power over me,” and see Silver shattered into glass shards.

The film is a contradiction: It wants to be a masculine sports film, but it exists in the same realm as Goblin Kings seducing young girls with the promise of: “Just fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave.” Unlike Sarah, Daniel doesn’t claim the power that’s been promised to him on his own terms. His subtextually sexual awakening is so corrupted that all he can do is pretend it never happened.

Still, Daniel proves in the film that his strength is not in his fists. It’s in his praying to the bonsai tree that’s healed despite a violent boy brutally tearing it in two.

These looks on Daniel and Silver though?

So why does Silver become obsessed with him? What’s up with all those red outfits (that he doesn’t wear in Cobra Kai)? What does the temptation reveal about Daniel? How does it recontextualise TKK1 and TKK2? Is Daniel bisexual? (yes).

Ah, beach-Daniel, in your red hoodie and your cut-off jorts. Iconic hot-girl summer vibes.

If you didn’t want me over-analysing this, you shouldn’t have put him in so many red outfits and then have this man leering at him like he wants to eat him alive.

Surface-level it’s not hard to read into a Dude Story: Masculine power fantasies are about strength in a very direct way. Fighting, control, suaveness – and if you’re not the most traditionally masculine of guys, asserting dominance through being a good lover or intelligent or overcoming that unmanliness in some way through beating the bully or convincing the hot girl to go out with you, levelling up in coolness. Being A Man. It’s not too dissimilar from Daniel’s arc in the first movie, if you watch it without taking later events into account, although Daniel is never interested in proving himself as a man, and more in making Miyagi proud. Still, he does win and gain respect, and arguably “get the girl,” although Ali’s interest in him was never dependent on the fight.

7. Sexual Awakenings Part 2: Sexual Assault, Liberation, and Queerness

Feminine power fantasies are often about sex. Metaphorically. More accurately it’s “owning sexuality.” Even more accurately: “Freedom.” They also inhabit a fluid space in which empowerment through monstrous desires and non-consent can happen at the same time. And on top of that, many of these “fantasies” are actually being written by men, so whose fantasy is it really? A lot of them are based in oral traditions so presumably they were originally from the mouths of women, even if modern iterations (starting with Grimm’s collections) are filtered through cis men’s perspectives.

All of that being acknowledged: In Angela Carter’s “The Company Of Wolves,” Red Riding Hood unambiguously sleeps with the wolf. Belle discovers her freedom from expectations and unsuitable suitors (and in some versions, evil stepsisters) by falling in love with a Beast (the original novel was written by a woman, the 18th century Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve). Jareth informs Sarah of his obsessive devotion to her in Labyrinth. To lean into horror for a moment – Buffy is stalked and eventually has relationships with both Angel and Spike, Lucy in Coppola’s Dracula (which I have mixed feelings about) is raped by the werewolf and Mina is stalked by Dracula, The Creature Of The Black Lagoon kidnaps Kay (the lead’s girlfriend) – subverted in both The Shape Of Water in which Eliza forms a consensual relationship with the amphibious sea-god and in the short-lived horror series Swamp Thing, in which the connection is purposefully framed as seductive…

and in The Karate Kid Part Three Daniel LaRusso punches a board until his hands bleed because an attractive, older man tells him to and in this moment he gives in to what he (thinks he) wants.

Not all of those examples are equal. Some are consensual, some are hinted as abusive and/or stalkery, all of them have large age gaps, and a few are outright non-consensual.

But they’re all fantasies.

They’re all power-fantasies.

Except for Daniel, because he’s a man and the idea that being obsessed (lusted) over by an older man who keeps you in his thrall, specifically because you tickle his fancy for whatever reason, because you’re beautiful, breakable, different – could in any way be considered empowering is a difficult concept to wrap your head around. It doesn’t contain that “but I’m a good girl, I’d never go off the path and pluck flowers if a bad wolf told me to, honest,” societal context or the social context of rape culture. It’s closest comparison is closeted (perhaps even unknown until that point) queer identity.

There have recently been some comparisons of Daniel LaRusso to Bruce Bechdel in Funhome (and everyone who says that Ralph Macchio ought to play him in the upcoming movie: you’re right and I’m just not going to enjoy it as much without him). I’ve written a post about Sam being the heir to his legacy and trauma, specifically as a queercoded man. It’s not dissimilar to the plot of Funhome in a lot of ways.

The other interesting source that’s been going around in connection with Daniel is the essay “The Rape of James Bond,” which discusses the use of sexual assault as a plot device for women and not for men: “About one in every 33 men [in the US] is raped. … [your statistically average, real life man] … doesn’t have a horde of enemies explicitly dedicated to destroying him. He doesn’t routinely get abducted, and tied up. Facing a megalomaniac psychopath gloating over causing him pain […] is not the average man’s average day at the office.” That last bit is just a descriptor of Terry Silver, (although I take issue at the blasé use of psychopath).

The two part youtube essay Sexual Assault of Men Played for Laughs posits that there is nothing more de-masculinising than the threat of sexual assault and therefore any narrative that features this “rightfully” must mock any man who has been a victim or who fears being a victim of sexual assault. It is feminising. There is nothing more humiliating – and therefore unheroic – than a man dealing with sexual assault.

So what do we feel when we see an attractive young man being put into a vulnerable position by an older man? A trope associated with female characters, a trope that is considered unpalatable for men (see reactions that happened when the hint of sexual assault was introduced in Skyfall).

Was it the fact that he was being threatened, or the fact that James’ next line is: “what makes you think this is my first time?”

Some thoughts added by @mimsyaf are around the idea of safety in how a lot of cis women might relate to this narrative through Daniel’s eyes. He’s not a woman, he has – societally – more power than a girl or woman would have, which makes this a different watch to, say, if Danielle were to go through the same narrative. Daniel doesn’t carry that baggage of rape culture, or of the male gaze that you might find in a similar scenario of Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Christine in Phantom of the Opera (and once more the age differences between these characters and the men who love/lust over them are substantial), which makes the narrative “safer” to engage with.

I agree with that, although as a transmasc person I also come at it differently. I specifically like to headcanon Daniel as a trans guy and find his fraught interactions with masculinity through his own non-toxic lens relatable, as well as the way other boys and men react to it – also I think Terry Silver is hot. I know there are people who write Terry Silver with female OCs, which is also a form of empowerment.

On the flipside putting Daniel in this space runs a risk of fetishising him as a queer youth who is either Innocent and Pure, or a bisexual stereotype that deserves to be assaulted for not being a real man. After all, Real Straight Men don’t run the risk of sexual assault.

Alas, the road to empowerment never did run smooth.

The comparisons between the way Daniel is treated by the text and how female characters are often treated in texts are undoubtedly there. Through Ralph Macchio and TIG’s casting and the direction and acting, but also within the text itself.

It might not be with the same purpose as Neo’s symbolically trans journey, but it puts the whole narrative that Daniel’s going through from TKK1 under a different light than if there had only been one movie that ended on a triumphant sports win and a girlfriend.

Johnny’s masculinity and the use of tears as liberation, now that’s a whole other analysis….

#daniel larusso #terry silver #the karate kid part three #the karate kid #cobra kai #ck #cobra kai meta #part two of three #we're going into labyrinth and james bond in this one fellas #(non-gendered fellas)

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seijorhi · 4 years

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hello, im always on the hunt for new funky fresh yandere!suga content! i really enjoyed the post you made for him, it's exactly up my alley! would it be possible to request a gender neutral reader finding out just how much suga's been stalking them after they left him? by stumbling on something they shouldnt see (could be a dark room, or a journal, whatever youd like) and have him walk in on them then?

Suga will always be my first Haikyuu love, so of course!

Sugawara Koushi x Reader

TW stalking

Red Handed

When you were a little kid, your mom told you a story.

It was about a handsome man with a blue beard, the woman who married him despite the warning signs, and a locked cellar that was never supposed to be opened. You were too young to hear it, but as horrifying as it was - it stuck with you.

Curiosity can be a dangerous thing.

But sometimes… sometimes you just can’t help yourself.

In your defence it wasn’t so much a wilful breaking of trust so much as it was an honest mistake. Sort of.

It’s not the first time you’ve found yourself pouring over textbooks and hastily scrawled notes with Suga, but it is the first time it’s been just the two of you - and the first time it’s been at his place instead of yours.

“I give up,” you moan, letting your head fall flat against your notebook. “I’m gonna fail this stupid exam, drop out of school and have to resort to finding some rich, attractive guy to marry and support me instead.”

You’ve been at it for hours, the two of you spread out on his couch, a mountain of snacks between the two of you. You have to give Suga credit for that - the man knows how to keep you motivated to stay but this, this was beyond your limit. It’s never a good sign when you reread the same sentence five times and still have no idea what it says.

A soft laugh sounds and there’s a hand rubbing soothingly at your back, “Aw c’mon, don’t be so dramatic. You got me, right?”

You lift your head slightly to find him smiling at you with that same fond exasperation, and almost without meaning to you find your frown softening. It’s true. Suga’s pretty much your lifeline at this point - not to mention the reason you’re actually doing pretty well in most of your classes this semester.

God only knew where he found the patience.

“What, you gonna marry me when they kick me out in disgrace?” you ask with a wry half grin, pushing yourself away from your notes. “Take care of my freeloading ass?”

Suga doesn’t say anything for a moment. You brace yourself for the lecture and/or pep-talk he’s given you a thousand and one times before, but when you glance up at him again, the look on his face isn’t the one you’re expecting.

He’s still smiling, but there’s something… odd about it.

It’s just a flash, a flicker of something fleeting in his eyes-

You blink, and whatever it is- was - it’s gone and Suga’s looking at you with the same expression he always wears whenever you start bemoaning your future and the possibility of failing.

Huh… your eyebrows draw together, the faintest hint of unease teasing at your gut. Just for a moment - a split second - you could have sworn that…

But no, you’re just tired. Your brain is absolutely fried after hours studying, whatever you thought you saw, you must have imagined. Because Suga’s your friend. A good friend, maybe the best one you’ve ever had. Still… you really shouldn’t tease him like that.

“Hey, you know I’m kidding, right?” you ask, nudging his shoulder playfully. “Anyway, I think I’m done. I can’t look at these stupid notes anymore - they’re making even less sense than when we started.”

Suga sighs, rolling his neck and flipping the cover of the textbook shut. “Well I suppose it is getting late. Are you hungry? I can order some take out if you want-”

You shake your head before he can finish, “Nah, can’t tonight. I have a date,” you say, shooting him a wink. “Next time though? When everyone’s free. I feel a little guilty stealing all of your time for a one on one session as it is.”

Suga stills for a moment, glancing up to find you smiling sheepishly back at him. “Oh, a date? With that guy from class?” he asks, busying himself in tidying up the notes spread out across the coffee table.

That guy from class. Yeah, the one you haven’t been able to shut up about for weeks. That one.

“Yeah. Nothing crazy, just dinner and a movie - still, I think it’ll be fun, y’know?” You were trying for a blasé tone, but somehow you think the slight dusting of pink on your cheeks kind of ruins it a little bit.

So maybe you were a little excited about it - it wasn’t a crime was it?

Suga gives a non-committal hum, but doesn’t say any more on the topic. Together it doesn’t take the two of you long to clean up, gather your notes and stash the snacks back away for the next study session.

You still have enough time to dart home, have a shower and get ready, but- “Hey, before I go, is it okay if I use your bathroom?” you ask a little shyly. You guys have been friends for months, and you definitely don’t want to come across as rude, but you can’t deny there’s still something slightly embarrassing at having to ask permission.

“Yeah, of course. Down the hallway, last door on the right.”

You nod, thanking him quietly.

It’s a simple mistake. At the end of the hallway, there are two identical doors, both closed over.

Last door on the… left? That’s what he said, right?

You twist the doorknob, easing the door open and within a split second you know that you’ve got the wrong door because this is definitely not a bathroom, but…

Curiosity pushes you forward.

It’s Suga’s bedroom. Your feet move like they have a mind of their own, drawing you in further into his room. You’ve never been to his place before, and you’ve definitely never been in his bedroom before, but you can’t deny that you’re curious. Surprisingly it’s not the mess that you’re expecting - the double bed neatly made and aside from a sweater tossed haphazardly across the back of a chair and a pair of jeans that hadn’t quite made it into the laundry hamper, there’s no dirty clothes littering the floor.

You know it’s rude to pry. You know that, but in that moment you can’t seem to help yourself. Suga won’t mind, really, and it was an honest mistake.

There’s an acoustic guitar in the corner (does he play it, you wonder) and a volleyball covered in signatures sitting on one of the shelves above his desk. Even now, you know that he loves the sport with his whole heart. You’ve never been to a game before, but part of you thinks you’d like to, Suga always makes it sound so exciting. You find a smile creeping across your face as you wander over to have a closer look - there’s photo’s everywhere, in frames, pinned to a cork board on the wall - him with his family, with his friends, even one of the two of you together… and is that a medal?

You’re startled out of your thoughts by your phone vibrating in your pocket.

It should have been a wake up call, a sign from the universe to snap out of whatever nosy spell you’d managed to find yourself under and get out of Sugawara’s bedroom before he comes in to find you blatantly invading his privacy. It should have been - except instead you reach for your phone and fumble.

You’re incredibly thankful for the carpeted floor because you can only watch in horror as your phone clatters to the ground and bounces (bounces!) under his bed.

“Shit!” you curse under your breath, dropping to your knees and resting your cheek against the mattress as you reach blindly into the dark space.

It takes a second of fumbling before your hand lands on something. It’s not your phone, you can tell that much right off the bat - it’s bigger, a box of some kind.

You should have left it.

Really, Sugawara’s a young, healthy guy like any other - you have an inkling of what could be inside the box. And it’s not like you want to see whatever spank bank material your friend has stashed away, you don’t, but…

But there’s a voice in your head that ignores all of that. A voice that whispers so delightfully, so eagerly, for you to just open it.

Open it, it whispers as you slide it out and set it down on the bed, settling yourself down beside it.

Open it, it whispers as you run your fingers along the wooden lid, sanded smooth except for the intricate carving in the centre. It’s strangely beautiful you think - not exactly the kind of box you can imagine filling with something so lewd.

Maybe it’s not what you think… maybe Suga has something else stashed away in this pretty little box. What else could it be? What does a guy like Sugawara Koushi have hidden away under his bed?

Open it, it whispers as your fingers find the edge and you slowly slide it open.

You immediately wish you hadn’t.

It’s you.

The photo’s a little blurry, taken from a distance and zoomed in, but it’s definitely you, lying in your bed, head thrown back with your eyes closed, bottom lip caught between your teeth-

The sheets obscure the rest, but from the flush on your cheeks and the arm disappearing between your spread legs, it’s obvious what you’re doing.

There’s more. You with your friends, laughing. You out with your ex, maybe a month or so before you’d broken up. You in your bedroom again, a white fluffy towel wrapped around you, your hair still wet from the shower.

You walking home from class, taken from behind.

You in your favourite cafe, sitting by the window with a steaming mug in hand, staring out with a soft smile.

You tucked up on the couch, eating dinner with the TV playing in the background.

You.

Every single photograph was of you, and every single one of them taken without your knowledge. Pictures of you from last year, long before you ever met Suga. How long has he been-

You can’t even bring yourself to finish the thought. You feel sick, violated, your hands trembling as you flick through the images. You don’t want to see any more, but you can’t seem to stop yourself. You at the park with your friends, walking their dogs and chatting aimlessly. You bending over to pick up something, the shot framing your ass in a way that seems almost… lewd.

When did he take these? H-how had you never noticed?

Oh god, some of these are from outside your home.

Your stomach churns, you might actually vomit…

“Got lost, baby?”

You jump at the sudden interruption, quickly snapping the lid shut and shoving the little box of horrors away from you like it’s poison, hurried excuses already on the tip of your tongue - but it’s too late for that.

One look at Sugawara, standing framed in the doorway, watching you with an eerily calm expression upon his face and you know that it doesn’t matter what you say. There’s no denying what you’ve seen.

No coming back from it.

His eyes drift to the box, the incriminating pictures spilled across his sheets and he sighs. “You know, I wanted to make this special for you. I wanted to do this right.” His hazel eyes flicker back to you as he steps inside his bedroom and shuts the door behind him. The soft click has never sounded so deafening. So final. “But you just couldn’t help yourself, could you? You just couldn’t keep your nose out of where it doesn’t belong.”

Your heart thumps painfully against your ribs, the sound so loud that you’re sure he has to be able to hear it too. It’s not nausea that seeps through your veins, keeping you frozen in place, but fear. Suga’s always been such a gentle presence in your life but there’s no trace of that person left as he closes the distance between the two of you.

It’s all been a lie, a carefully crafted facade designed to pull you in. Do you even know him at all?

“S-suga, what-”

“Shh,” he murmurs, placing a finger across your lips, a soft, delicate smile playing across his features. “Didn’t your parents ever tell you that curiosity killed the cat?” He pauses for a moment, watching with wicked delight as your face pales and you jerk away from his touch with a strangled gasp. “It’s okay, baby, there’s no need to look so worried. Don’t you know I’d forgive you anything?”

His lips crash against yours before you can even think to reply.

#yandere haikyuu #yandere suga #yandere suga x reader #yandere sugawara koushi #yandere sugawara x reader #yandere sugawara koushi x reader #yandere imagines #my writing #yandere hq #yandere fic #sugawara x reader #suga x reader

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wiypt-writes · 3 years

Text

Stark Spangled Banner

Ch35: Not A Perfect Soldier, But A Good Man.

Summary: Almost twelve moths post the vents in Siberia, the four friends are reunited with two familiar faces. Presented with an opportunity that they find too good to turn down, they find themselves back running missions off radar, one of which takes Steve to a dark place within himself, where he finds himself compromising his moral code.

And then his phone rings…

Warnings: Bad language, Smut! (NSFW, Under 18s) Bad Language words. Mentions of rape/sexual assault.

Pairing: Steve Rogers x OFC Katie Stark

A/N: Wonderful edit again from @angrybirdcr. And make sure you check out the related one shot- Vanilla, which takes place during this timeframe.

Disclaimer: This is a pure work of fiction and classified as 18+. Please respect this and do not read if you are underage. I do not own any characters in this series bar Katie Stark and the other OCs. By reading beyond this point you understand and accept the terms of this disclaimer.

Chapter 34

Stark Spangled Banner Masterlist // Main Masterlist

June 2017

“Well as far as birthdays on the run go guys, this one’s been the best one I’ve ever had!” Katie grinned as they climbed out of their 4x4 at the Safe house.

Steve and Sam exchanged a look over the roof of the car.

“What?” Katie asked, innocently.

“I can’t tell if that was sarcasm or…” Sam looked at Steve before he turned back to Katie pushing his sunglasses up onto the top of his head. “No, honestly guys I’ve had a great morning.” She smiled at them. “Breakfast was amazing, it was a nice walk round the castle, the sun is out and now we have a BBQ to get fired up!”

It was almost a year now since they’d been on the run. After a brief few months apart where Katie and Steve had been in Wakanda, Sam had been flitting round a few old friends and Wanda had been travelling with Vision, they had all reunited at the end of May, Wanda bringing with her some rather interesting news.

“I did find some stuff out.

Apparently Tony hasn’t spoken to Ross properly in months. When you guys broke out the raft, Ross called him for help and he put him on hold for hours.” Katie looked at Steve, both of them sharing a grin.

“It didn’t go down well. They had a huge bust up and apparently Tony told him to err, and I quote ‘go fuck himself’.” Wanda said, smiling slightly. Steve snorted as she continued. “Said he didn’t answer to SHIELD, the Government or anyone else.”

A pang of affection and guilt hit Katie’s chest. Even after everything her brother was still watching her back. She looked down at her food and blinked, the tears threatening to fall out of her eyes.

“He’s err, he and Pepper, they’re getting married.” Wanda hesitated and Katie took a deep breath.

“Wow, he finally did it.” She whispered, not looking up as she pushed a piece of carrot round her plate, swallowing thickly. “That’s…”

“How’s Rhodes?” Sam asked, changing the subject swiftly and Steve gave him a look of thanks across the table, as he gently reached over and wrapped his hand around the back of Katie’ s neck, giving it a gentle squeeze of affection before his thumb gently began to trace shapes on the soft skin just beneath her hair line. She looked at him and smiled.

“I’m okay.” She assured him “Honestly.”

Steve kept his hand were it was nonetheless as Wanda continued talking.

“Rhodey is good, the braces he has mean he can walk.” At that Sam looked down, Steve glanced at him. He knew he felt guilty about what had happened.

“And that’s it really.” Wanda shrugged. “Nothing else to report.”

“Glad to hear everyone’s doing good.” Katie nodded. “So you want to see Vision again?”

“I know it might seem odd, or even dangerous.” Wanda mused, “And we’re still at odds over the Sokovia Accords, but yeah, I do.” “Odds?” Steve asked. “What do you mean?”

“Well, he still seems to think that the Accords were right. So, we’ve kind of just agreed not to talk about them. But, even with that, well I just can’t be without him.”

“We love who we love.” Steve said wisely, “If we’re lucky they share our feelings as well as our lives.”

“Like you two you mean?” Sam snorted looking at Steve and Katie “You two are so in tune, sometimes I think you’re actually reading each, others minds.” “How do you know we’re not?” Katie grinned and Sam rolled his eyes.

“Like I said, lucky.” Steve shrugged, pressing a kiss to the side of Katie’s head as he moved his arm from around the back of her and carried on with his food.

“No one should keep you from him if that’s how you feel.” Katie looked at Wanda. “That’s the last thing we would ever want.”

“Yeah you go ahead.” Sam snarked, pulling Katie’s attention back to the here and now. “We’ll grab the bags, don’t worry about it.” “Thanks Sam, you’re a darling.” Katie grinned over her shoulder.

Sam sighed and shook his head. “A fucking liberty, that’s what this is! You wanna remind her of those ground rules, Steve.”

“You remind her.” Steve shot back as they watched the two women head unlock the door to the house.

“You scared of your Missus, Pal?”

“Yes.” Steve said simply and Sam laughed, before he turned and opened the trunk of the car.

In the house, Katie walked through the small porch and into the living room and immediately stilled. There was something wrong, something she couldn’t put her finger on. Holding an arm out to Wanda she stopped the younger girl and looked at her. Understanding straight away, Wanda’s familiar red tendrils began glowing from her hands. As Katie looked around, unable to shake the feeling that someone or something was there, her eyes fell on a bottle on the coffee table, a bottle that hadn’t been there when they left this morning.

Beluga gold line vodka.

Katie felt her lips curve into a smile “You can come out now.” She stated simply, not bothering to turn round. “You know, I thought spies were supposed to be subtle.”

“Who says I was trying to be?” A familiar voice drawled, causing Wanda to spin round, her mouth falling open in surprise as Natasha stepped out of the smaller living room at the far side of the house.

Katie turned and looked her friend over. “That why you cut all your hair off and dyed it blonde?”

“Changes is as good as the next.” Nat smirked.

“Good to see you Widow.” Katie beamed, striding over to her and pulling her into a hug.

“You too.” Natasha smiled, squeezing her back. “Happy birthday, Nova.”

Katie released her and Nat turned to Wanda, wrapping her up in a hug too. “I’m telling you man.” Sam’s voice filled the room as he and Steve walked into the house each carrying bags of groceries and snacks for their BBQ “She was putty in my hands. If he hadn’t turned up I’d have-MOTHER FUCKER!” He yelled, dropping the bags he was carrying as he spotted Natasha.

“Nice to see you too, Birdbrain.” She smiled before her face turned to Steve “Rogers.” “Nat?” He blinked in surprise, setting the bags he was carrying down a little more gently than Sam. “Dare I ask how you knew where to find us?” The corner of his mouth quirked up in a small, amused smile “Fury.” She shrugged. “Finished the loose ends I needed to tie up and had to make a swift exit, so he told me where you were. Thought I’d come and see how you were all getting along.” “We’re just peachy.” Sam smiled as he stepped forward opening his arms, “Come on not-so-red-anymore, bring it in.” She gave a huff and then stepped into his arms before she turned to Steve who smiled at her as he pulled her into a huge bear hug.

“I like this.” She leaned back, pulling at his beard and he jerked his head way out of her reach, arching an eyebrow at her. What was it with people and thinking they could just touch his face now he had a beard? That was something reserved for his wife and his wife only. Katie laughed, noticing his irritation as Natasha continued. “Hardly recognised you.” “Well that is the point.” He rolled his eyes.

“Are you sticking around?” Sam asked.

“Well I got nothing else to do.” Nat shrugged. Katie and Steve exchanged a grin, her blasé tone didn’t fool them. She looked tired and slightly shaken, so whatever mission she’d been working on had clearly been tough.

“Well in that case…” Katie picked up the bottle of vodka that was on the table. “How about we crack this open whilst the boys get the grill going?”

A couple of hours later they were full of BBQ meat, salads, potatoes, vodka, beer and juicy information. Whilst Natasha didn’t tell them much about what she had been up to in Russia, she did fill them in on what SHIELD was doing.

“They’re calling themselves the ‘In-Human Resistance’.” Natasha explained as she showed them a few photos of the growing Vigilante group on a tablet, a group that seemed to be fast gaining traction in America. “They staged an attack in LA and Miami recently. Both at the same time, co-ordinated.”

“They’re fighting registration with the Sokovia Accords?” Steve asked, taking a pull from his bottle of beer.

Natasha nodded.

“Those damned accords have already caused more trouble than they’re ever gonna solve.” Sam said shaking his head. “First the ‘Watchdogs’ emerge to fight In-Humans, now this group emerge to fight them back.”

“This was always going to happen. SHIELD monitored Enhanced beings and In-humans.” Katie shrugged. “And it worked without the need for any stupid laws.”

”Yeah, so now the plan is that SHIELD are going to go legit. Come out into the open again.”

At that Katie raised her eyebrows. “And Coulson?” “No.” Natasha said, “Coulson will be in the shadows, the public director is going to be a bloke called Jeffrey Mace. He seems a decent guy.” “You know him?” Katie asked.

“Met him briefly. He was at the Accord signings in Vienna as a journalist would you believe it?” “Well he will know how to work the PR angle.” Wanda spoke for the first time in a while and Katie looked at her. She was pushing a piece of potato round on her plate, absentmindedly, no doubt wondering what would happen to her if she ever was caught with all the new rules and hatred being pushed out towards Enhanced or In-humans.

“They’re calling him Patriot.” Natasha said, and she looked at Steve, smirking slightly “Brooklyn boy, just like you Cap. Volunteered for some experiment that would give him super human strength in the wake of the Vienna bombing.” Steve let out a groan “Have SHIELD not learnt anything?”

“You had a lucky escape.” Nat quipped “If you hadn’t been on the run, they’d have been asking you to lead them from the front. Coulson wanted an enhanced person to run in the public eye, drum up support, show the world that they’re not to be feared.” “Nothing more than bullshit, political games.” Sam scoffed, and Natasha raised her eyebrows in agreement.

“Which we, thankfully, are well out of.” Steve leaned back, although Katie could see the nerve ticking in his jaw.

“Are you? Thankful, I mean?” Nat asked and Steve looked at her, frowning. “You not missing being in the thick of it at all?” He didn’t answer. If truth be told he couldn’t, not really. Some days he missed the action, missed having a job to do as such. Whilst he’d helped out occasionally for a bit for cash at the harbour, casual labour and muscle when they needed it, it wasn’t nearly challenging enough.

“What are you saying Nat?” Katie asked. Natasha sighed and leaned back.

“Fury isn’t working as part of SHIELD at the moment, not directly anyway.” She looked at her. “He’s running a few jobs off radar. At the moment he’s currently tracking a few old arms dealers that seem to be back trading old SHIELD and Chitauri stuff. Turns out in the wake of the Avengers being disbanded they all started getting brave again.” “Who’d have thought it?” Katie snorted sarcastically as she chewed at her lip. Steve and her had held this very conversation in Wakanda, wondering how long it would be before the groups they had all but eradicated emerged again in the wake of their split.

“So is that why you’re here?” Steve eyed her suspiciously “Fury wants you to recruit us?” “No.” Nat shook her head, before she smiled at Steve. “He’s going to do that himself when he drops by tomorrow.”

*****

"Why don’t you ask one of the ‘registered heroes’ for help?” Steve raised his eyebrows at Fury as the man finished explaining what he wanted the group to work on.

Fury scoffed. “Whilst SHIELD is of course, in full cooperation with the Accords, this case isn’t exactly on their radar right now.”

“What you mean is, that if it becomes public knowledge that more Chitauri and SHIELD weapons are emerging it will damage what little reputation SHIELD have managed to claw back.” Katie folded her arms. “Because they shouldn’t have ever let it get to this because you should have gotten rid of it all in the first place.”

“Look, Nova.” Fury was quick to reply. "I don’t like this any more than you do, and yes, in hindsight there are a lot of things that SHIELD should have destroyed or shut down back in the day, but I wasn’t the only one making those calls. Pierce had a lot of sway.”

“So effectively you want us to protect SHIELD’s reputation?” Steve raised an eyebrow.

“Why should we do that?” Wanda asked, looking at Fury “Where were you when we needed you?”

“She has a point.” Sam looked at Fury “I mean, I don’t remember SHIELD jumping to our defence after we risked everything to get to Siberia.”

Fury looked at Steve who simply raised his eyebrows. Both he and Katie agreed with Sam, they had expected at least some help from the Director but it never came.

Or so they thought.

“Just who do you think it was that leaked to the press exactly what went down between you all?” Fury asked, leaning back in his chair. Katie felt her mouth curl up in a smile.

“That was you? Huh, I assumed it was Murdock.” “Well to assume makes an ass of you and me.” Fury quipped, looking at her. “Furthermore, thanks to me there’s currently a group of bounty-hunters sweating their asses off looking for you all in Cairo.”

Steve and Katie exchanged glances before they looked at Sam then Wanda.

“And I’ll continue to help leave false trails as I still believe in you all.” Fury looked at them each in turn “The Accords, this entire situation, yes, it’s a mess but I’m still hoping you guys care enough to want to keep fighting the good fight.”

Katie glanced at Natasha who had remained quiet through the entire discussion. She simply raised an eyebrow and gave a small smile.

“Think about it.” Fury stood up. “Romanoff knows how to contact me. When you’ve made your decision, let me know.”

He headed for the door before he turned back and looked at Katie.

“Oh, and Nova, that final trick you pulled, hacking into the CTU. It worked.”

Katie smiled and gave a small ‘huh’ of laughter and watched the man depart through the same door he’d arrived little over an hour previously.

“Okay, colour me intrigued, what did you hack the UN for?” Natasha looked at Katie and Steve tilted his head as his wife gave a coy smile.

“Technically it was Lawson. When he was digging up the information on the illegal arrests I had him wipe all the records of who accessed their evidence vault when all our gear got broken so Sharron didn’t get into trouble.”

Steve’s mouth quirked up into a small smile as he looked at his wife, once again unable to believe how downright clever she was.

“Wait.” Wanda said, frowning “Why did you do that?” “She’s a Carter.” Katie shrugged as if that was supposed to make sense. And it did to Steve and Natasha but as Sam and Wanda looked at her blankly she took a deep breath and explained “After everything Peggy did in the SSR, founding SHIELD, working with my dad, she deserves for her name and legacy to remain unsullied.”

She locked eyes with Steve who could do nothing but simply look at her, his face soft before he smiled “You really are amazing you know that?”

After an afternoon spent deliberating over Fury’s proposal, Steve told them all to sleep on it and they would make their final decision in the morning, but as he found out at three am, sleep was doing it’s very best to evade him completely.

“Something on your mind, Soldier?” Katie murmured sleepily as he turned over in bed for what felt like the tenth time in as many minutes. With a sigh he reached out and brushed her hair behind her ear.

“Sorry sweetheart, didn’t mean to wake you.” he said. “I just can’t get what Fury said outta my head.” “And even after I tried my best to make you forget as well.” she quipped and he smiled, leaning over to give her a soft kiss. She gave a soft hmmm of contentment before he pulled away and propped himself up on his elbow

"What do you think we should do?”

“Well, we could ignore it, keep laying low.” she elaborated, with a small yawn “But I know you. And whilst you’ve managed it for a year it hasn’t been easy, and don’t try and pretend you’ve been okay because I know you Steven.” He gave a small snort and looked at her as she continued “And now you know that there’s still stuff to mop up, you’re gonna find it even harder to walk away.”

"I would for you. You know that.”

“But is that what you really want?” she sighed. “Not particularly, no.” he answered honestly. “I want to help but, well, I’m no longer Captain America.”

"Meh, he was an asshole anyway.” she grinned and he gave a snort. “But you ARE Steve Rogers, the, and I quote your best friend here ‘dumbass little blonde punk that couldn’t run away from a fight.” Steve felt himself smile at Bucky’s words. “Long before the serum and the shield, you were standing up for the little guys, for what you thought was right. Okay, you were getting your ass kicked doing it, but still.”

She shrugged and Steve looked down at the silhouette of her face, and he knew she was right. He brought his hand up and with the back of his fingers gently brushed down her right cheek.

“And you’d be okay with it?” he asked.

“Well, neither of us left the Avengers because we wanted to. So until this blows over…” “If it blows over.” “Steven.” she spoke sternly, and he could tell by the tone of her voice she was glaring at him, even if he couldn’t see her face fully. She was still clinging to some hope that the entire situation would go away, whereas Steve was much more a realist about it all. “Until this blows over, then, maybe we could, or should keep fighting the good fight. Because that’s what we do best.”

“A band of vigilantes, huh?” He quirked an eyebrow. “Or if we’re getting paid are we mercenaries?”

“Pretty sure mercenaries don’t have ethics behind what they’re doing.” Katie snorted “No, we’ll be, erm, the ‘Nomad Law Enforcers’, NLE for short” she shrugged and he let out a laugh.

As his chuckles died down she gently reached up to stroke his face, his bearded cheek leaning into her touch.

“So, does that mean my new code name is Captain Badass?” He asked, his hand straying down to brush across her bare stomach. “No” She smiled, twitching at the touch “That’s a name only I get to say. Along with Stevie.” “Hate to break it to you, Darlin’ but Buck was calling me Stevie way before you were a twinkle in your pa’s eyes.” he said, his fingers now trailing the inside of her thigh. “Maybe so,” she snaked her arms round his neck and pulling his face down to hers, “but did he ever say it to you like I do, you know, in your ear as I’m about to c-”

“Err no.” he grinned, kissing her on the lips “That one’s all yours, doll.”

“Think you should make me say it now.” she quipped.

“As you wish, ma’am.” he smirked, rolling over on top of her, making her giggle before he cut her off by pressing his lips to hers in a fevered kiss.

The next morning around breakfast they informed the rest of the team what their decision was. Natasha shrugged and said she was in already anyway. Wanda agreed as she had nothing else to do but in the same breath Katie could tell she wasn’t entirely comfortable with the idea, so Steve told her that she could dip in and out and didn’t have to do anything she wasn’t happy about. When the only decision left was Sam’s, the man leaned back in his chair with a smirk and nodded. And whilst Steve thought the name Katie had come up with last night for their band of rag-tag heroes was ridiculous, it was ten times better than the offering Sam made.

“The Avengers Secret Society. ASS.” He grinned, draining his coffee mug. “Hell, I’m in. Where do I sign?”

******

Running the missions meant a lot of stealth and covert work, which in turn meant they had to leave the safe house they had called home for over a year for long periods, often months at a time. During those weeks they stayed either in motels or other safe houses which Fury or Natasha had access to in various places across the world as they intercepted various arms trades and took down both buyers and dealers alike. The rest of 2017 past them by in a blur now they were busy. Wanda dipped in and out, choosing sometimes to remain in the safe-house and others she would disappear to meet Vision but always kept them up to date on where she was so they could keep tracks on her. Katie was glad she was getting out and seeing the world, even if she did worry about her from time to time.

As far as lifestyles went, it was tough, hard going, but Katie could see Steve’s sparkle and drive was back in abundance. For the most the missions went without a hitch. Yes, they took knocks, broken noses, cut lips, bust ribs…but it came with the territory, and they all felt good to be back feeling like they were making a difference even if they were doing it unofficially from the shadows. And given that they were indeed vigilantes, they all removed any Avengers symbols from their suits to avoid Tony or the guys back at the compound being dragged into any further political row.

Katie and Natasha ditched their Avenger cat suits entirely, opting for leather cargo pants, jackets and combat vests whilst Sam acquired a new upper body suit for his now battered but sill functional wings. Steve had ripped the star on his uniform from his chest, which was down to a combination of wanting to stay off radar but also because of the fact that he simply wasn’t Captain America anymore, and therefore wasn’t comfortable bearing his insignia. It just didn’t feel right to be operating wearing the symbols once used when they were part of their old team. They were a painful reminder of just what it was that had brought them to this moment, how much they had lost and given up because they were not the Avengers anymore. And this also reflected in the way they operated. They were a lot less sympathetic with their fighting style and they did what they needed to do to get the job done, no more, no less- “Whatever it takes…” as Steve put it. And whilst the Captain still did his best to keep the casualties and fatalities to the minimum, that went completely out of the window one February morning in Jordan.

They were tracking a suspected group of ex- Hydra stragglers that were, according to Fury’s intelligence, operating a lab with the aim of using a piece of SHIELD technology to manufacture weapons. They’d staked the place out over the last three days or so, and from what they could gather it was a pretty amateur operation all in all, so they didn’t meet much resistance when they stormed the place. Sam and Natasha took one side of the building, Steve and Katie the other. It didn’t take them long to clear out and restrain the hostiles and they set about sweeping the place for any devices they needed to recover before Natasha made her way down to the lab to lay the bombs that would destroy it once everyone was clear.

Steve and Katie made their way down a smaller corridor of the back of the main room whilst Sam and Natasha started to pack up the items they had come for and they reached a fork at the end. Katie went left, Steve went right. He hit a dead end pretty quickly, there only being one more room and that was completely empty. Katie, however had three rooms to look in. The first two were empty, and the third one led off to another smaller room at the back. Scanning round, she assumed the room was clear and headed through into the smaller one, kicking the door open. There was nothing in there bar filing cabinets. Seeing as she was there, she started to pull them open to see if there was anything useful, but it was all older paper work, nothing of interest. Slamming the drawer shut she heard a noise behind her, the cock of a gun and then a voice which made her freeze.

“Back for more you little SHIELD slut?”

That voice took her right back to that painfully bright cell with the hard bed, and the even harder floor.

“You like that don’t you, yeah?” His face was contorted as he grunted whilst he pounded painfully, mercilessly into her over and over again, her wrists painfully held above her head, his weight pressing onto her battered and bruised body which he had played a major part in beating before having joined in the kicking and stamping with glee. “God, she’s so fuckin’ tight…”

She spun round to look at the man who had violated her numerous times, his face exactly the same, wearing the same predatory sneer. Her fists clenched at her side as she weighed up her options, she could probably take him now, even with the gun.

But she hesitated too long.

Her rapist smirked as he raised the gun, keeping it trained on her as he took half a step forward and automatically she moved backwards, her body pressing against the metal of the filing cabinet.

“What? Still no scream?” He chuckled. “You know, we used to have a competition, see which one of us would be the one that made you finally break. But, I gotta hand it to you, you never made a sound. Frankly, it kind of became a bit boring. I’ve had better lays from my palm.” It was then that Katie noticed a movement behind him and looked over his shoulder to see Steve stood in the doorway with a look on his face that Katie had never seen before. Unadulterated anger, rage and fury radiated from every single bit of his body as he stared at the back of the man’s head, his lips curling up into an ugly sneer, a flash of white teeth glinting in the dim white from beneath his beard. “Whatever happens tomorrow you must promise me one thing. That you will stay who you are. Not a perfect soldier, but a good man.”

Steve remembered those words like Dr Erskine had spoken them just yesterday. And for the most part he had lived by them, trying every day to be a man that people could look up to. Years of loss and grief and fighting had made it hard but he had never killed in cold blood and, if possible he always went for the non-fatal take downs. But now, as he heard the words the man in front of him said to his wife as she stood, pressed against the cabinet at the far wall, her chest heaving, eyes wide with a hatred so fierce but yet an unmistakable glimmer of fear underneath it all, he knew exactly who this guy was.

This was one of the animals that had violated her.

And he wanted to kill the fucker.

At the sight of her husband Katie instantly relaxed, she was safe. There was nothing the bastard in front of her could do to her, not whilst Steve was there. The man saw her change in posture, and frowned as she looked back at him and smirked slightly.

“You want a fight, it’s your lucky day, although I don’t fancy your chances much.”

She nodded behind her and the man wheeled round fast but he didn’t’ even get chance to point his gun at Steve before the Super Soldier’s fist connected hard with his face, knocking out his front teeth. He staggered backwards and Katie was waiting with a well- aimed leg swipe which sent him crashing to the floor. As he went to push himself up Steve brought his large, boot clad foot down and stomped with all his might on his left hand.

”They broke my fingers and took my rings…” Katie’s voice echoed around his mind as he stamped again, and again before he picked the HYDRA agent up by the collar and smashed his head straight onto the desk.

The man lay groaning in pain on the floor, spitting out blood as he pitifully begged for mercy and Steve allowed him to crawl a few feet away before he kicked him hard in the ribs, stalking him, toying with him, as a cat does with its prey. But like all cats, eventually Steve got bored and hauled him back up again. He spun the snivelling piece of shit round so his back was clamped to his chest, one large forearm over the guy’s throat, palm of the other hand clamped his forehead, pinning him in place and forcing him to look at Katie for no reason other than the fact he wanted her face to be the last thing the bastard’s shitty, Hydra supporting eyes ever looked at.

All the anger Steve felt at how they had abused his wife, his beautiful girl, speared red hot inside him as he remembered the state she’d been in when they’d picked her up. How long it had taken her to heal physically. And all those nights he had held her close after she woke from a nightmare. He’d sworn to himself he would die before he let anyone hurt her again.

“She told me you did to her.” Steve’s voice was steely, as he spoke into the man’s ear. “You abused her, tortured her, beat her and laughed about it. But now who’s laughing? Look how alive she is, how beautiful and strong she is. How she survived, which is more than you’re gonna do.”

At those words the man, who was groaning to himself began to struggle again, begging for his life. Steve merely tightened his grip.

“I want you to know that you dying is simply because of what you did to my wife. So fuck HYDRA and fuck you.” He snarled, and with a quick, savage twist of his arms, Katie heard the snap and the man grew limp, his neck broken in one, easy movement.

Steve tossed the dead man unceremoniously to the floor, his chest heaving as he looked down at the body on the floor. He’d just killed someone in cold blood. And he didn’t care one single bit.

Katie watched her husband as he looked down at the dead man, utter disgust on his face and she felt a ridiculous surge of affection for her soldier. She knew he’d grappled with the fact he had, in his opinion, failed to keep her safe and, no matter how many times she told him he was ridiculous, she would never convince him otherwise. He’d just abandoned all moral code he had, killing someone out of no reason but the desire for revenge because he loved her.

He loved her enough to kill someone that had hurt her. As she watched, Steve raised his head to look at her. "You okay?” He asked, his voice full of concern, not a shred of the anger or hatred it had been filled with before was left. She nodded.

“Come on.” He held out his hand. She stepped over the body on the floor, laced her fingers into his, but they hadn’t even reached the door of the outer room they’d walked through when she pulled on his arm and as he turned to face her, she grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him down to her, furiously kissing him, teeth clashing, beard scratching-fuck she loved the feel of that- as she emptied every single emotion she was feeling into his mouth. She pulled away and rest her head against his, desire flooding her system, some dark inner part of her had awoken at his merciless persona and he spotted it, a curious tilt of his head to the side told her so much. “Steve, if you don’t fuck me right now, I’m filing for divorce.” He arched an eyebrow “Divorces are messy, we can’t have that.” and the words were barely out of his mouth before he had spun her round, slamming her against the wall, kissing her hard again, groaning as she grasped his growing erection through his combat trousers.

“Right here?” He growled and she nodded eagerly, already fumbling with his utility belt. The clanging of buckles, zipping of trousers and the rustling of fabric filled the air as they both shed the minimum amount of clothing they needed to so that Katie could wrap her legs around Steve’s waist as he lifted her up by the back of her thighs, pressing her against the wall whilst he continued to kiss her neck, biting and sucking at any bit he could get to. He didn’t waste any time before he thrust up into her hard, making her cry out.

It was almost depraved, them fucking with a dead body in the room next to them, but neither of them cared, they were too caught up in a whirlwind of lust and emotions that enveloped them completely. Steve’s hips snapped back and forth with a pace and a vigour that was merciless as he pistoned in and out of her again and again. Her palms were scrabbling at the wall behind her trying to gain some traction and Steve quickly pushed further against her to give her more support so she could move her hands round his shoulders, where she clawed desperately at the material of his uniform as her head fell forward and her teeth nipped at his ear drawing a growl from his throat. Her hands moved into his long hair, where she pulled sharply back causing him to hiss and look up her and the pupils of her eyes were blown wide with a desire he would never tire of seeing. She pushed her hips down against him causing him to drive deeper and she let out an almost primal cry he had never, in their almost five years of being together, heard her make before. It simply revved him up even more, his rapid movements growing even more urgent.

“Fuck, Stevie,” she moaned, her head rolling back against the wall as her hands clamped onto his shoulders as she started to feel that snake in her belly moving. He felt the tell-tale flutter of her clamping around him and he continued his voracious pace until she cried out, a loud scream before she dropped her head to his shoulder, as she moaned his name, again and again whilst he pounded through her orgasm chasing his own.

“Shit, Katie! I’m…fuck!” his words tumbled into her hair as his movements became desperate and he came with such a force that he felt his knees buckling underneath him and even his super strength wasn’t enough to keep him upright, the absolute gratification he felt was just too much. He caught her as the pair of them collapsed to the dirty concrete floor, her on top of him, a tangle of clothing and limbs, chests heaving, sweat on both their brows as he held her to him, panting and shaking. Neither of them had any idea how long they stayed like that, but eventually Steve managed to gain enough control to sit them both upright, his wife on his lap has he gently brushed the tendrils of hair that had fallen over her face back, and looked at her, his lips gently greeting hers in a soft, tender kiss, a stark contrast to the violent ones they had shared moments before. She smiled at him, unadulterated love in her eyes as she moved her hands to brush his hair back before she leaned down and kissed him again, before her nose slide against his.

“I adore you.” She whispered softly, and he pulled her to him, nuzzling into her neck as he sighed.

“Feeling is mutual, Doll” He murmured, causing her to chuckle before they heard a noise in both their ears.

“Yeah, erm, you do realise your coms were on. That whole time.” Sam’s tone was laced with dismay. “Erm yep, so we errr, we heard everything.”

Steve felt himself grow cold and he let out a soft groan of utter embarrassment into Katie’s neck

“Most excitement Sammy’s had in years.” Natasha quipped

Katie on the other hand, instead of shrinking with humiliation, threw back her head and laughed, and when Steve looked up at her, unsure exactly what she found so funny about it all, he saw her just fucked pink flush, her eyes which were practically crinkled shut in mirth, her perfect teeth surrounding by those plump lips he could kiss all day, and that freckle spattered nose which was wrinkled as she continued to howl with amusement.

And right then he didn’t care what Sam and Natasha had heard, because frankly, seeing her like that was worth whatever digs and snarky comments that were going to get their way.

******

April 2018

“Huh…” Nat mused as they entered the dilapidated house, her and Katie pulling off their hoods and masks “Guess my old KGB contacts can pull through in a pinch.”

“We should move fast.” Steve looked at the door to the small, market stall lined street outside “Won’t take long for them to notice something is wrong.”

“I’ll keep watch.” Katie nodded, peering out through the crack in the door into the dusty, desert air as Natasha examined the gun she was holding.

“Definitely Chitauri. Although they’ve been heavily modified.”

Natasha effortlessly deactivated the weapons and they worked quickly and efficiently packing them into the crates ready to take them to the outskirts of the city to the drop point.

“You reckon we’ve earned a break after these ones?” Sam asked, as they began to load the heavy crates onto the back of the truck. Steve smiled as he looked at Sam. They’d been on back to back missions pretty much since New Year so far, the latest of which had brought Steve back to a very familiar market place in Yemen, one he had swore he would never come back to after the last time he’d run an op here. It was hot, dusty, and he had to admit to himself (because he would never admit it to anyone else) he was ready for a break.

“Yeah I think Wanda had the right idea.” Katie mumbled. She wasn’t feeling all that great if truth be told. She’d woken up a few days ago with a dodgy stomach after what she suspected was bad chicken, and it was taking her a while to shake it off.

They made the drop and headed back to the jet where Katie grabbed another bottle of water and sank into one of the chairs, almost draining it in one. After a few breaths, the queasiness she had been feeling all the drive back to the jet dissipated somewhat and she lay her head back, closing her eyes.

Steve passed his wife, his hand gently running over her hair as she leaned back to take a nap. He knew she wasn’t feeling great but she’d assured him it was nothing serious. Steve was pleased to note that she looked better than she had done a few days ago, there was more colour in her cheeks, so hopefully she was over the worst of it.

Sam got them airborne and set the coordinates for the Safe House, and Steve found himself looking forward to getting back after almost five weeks away. The jet was pretty much silent for a few hours, Steve at one point switching out with Sam to allow him to get some rest too. That last mission had been a hard one, but worth it.

“Have either of you heard from Wanda?” Natasha asked a little while later, as she looked up from the tablet she was poking about on.

Steve shook his head as did Sam. Natasha let out a growl. “She’s deactivated the tracker on her phone. I warned her about that last time.”

“She isn’t a prisoner Nat.” Steve raised his eyebrows, looking over at Katie who was still sleeping. “She knows the risks. She’s been doing it on and off for the last two years.”

“I get that, but we don’t know where she is.”

“Look, we should be back at the safe house in what, an hour or so? Let’s wait and see if she’s there.” Steve suggested. “If we don’t hear from her by the morning, then we’ll worry.”

Nat opened her mouth to argue back but Steve shot her his infamous captain glare, signalling the debate was over. She shrugged.

“On your head be it.” She said, nonchalantly before completely changing the subject. “Fury’s patched through a new target- another Terrorist Sect grouping for an attack he suspects.”

“Where is it this time?” Sam called from the cockpit.

“Columbia” Natasha answered.

“Alright,” Steve nodded. “We’ll take a proper look at it once we’re back at the Safe House”

At that point. Katie gave a soft murmur as she stretched out her limbs, opening one eye blearily, then the other. She blinked and Steve stood up, heading over to her.

“Hey, sleepy.” He smiled, dropping a soft kiss to her temple as he crouched down in front of her. “You sure you’re okay?”

Katie at her husband, his handsome face sported a few more lines than it had done this time two years ago, and the spectacular beard he had sported hid his jawline, but his eyes never changed, and here they were so full of concern and love over something so minor as an upset stomach that it almost made her laugh.

“Yeah, I’m fine.” She smiled. “I feel much better now.” Which she did. The funny feeling in her stomach and fuzziness in her head was well gone.

Before Steve could say anything else, Sam called his name and he glanced round as he straightened up and looked at the screen on the cockpit.

“Cap, I’m getting a report, some kind of ship”

“Where?” Steve asked as the pair of us turned to face him.

“Seems to be over the mainland UK of all places.” Sam frowned “It’s not much, but it’s big for sure. We’re not far out, fancy a slight detour on the way home, see what it is?”

Before he could answer, Nat strode to the middle of the jet, tablet in her hand.

“You need to see this.”

She swiped at the screen and the footage she was referring to appeared on the hologram display. Katie watched a familiar red and gold figure speeding through the air over the familiar back drop of down-town New York, tangling with, well, she wasn’t sure what the hell they were.

“Oh my God.” she muttered, as she read the tag line playing across the bottom of the news report- New York attacked.

The four of them paused as more footage showed the kid known as Spider-Man swinging through the air, and two other men, one with a long, crimson cloak, all facing off against two foes.

“When did this happen?” Steve asked eventually, looking at Nat

“15 minutes or so ago.”

Steve didn’t say anything, instead he moved to the locker at the back of the jet, and taking a deep breath, he pulled out his half of the pair of burner phones he had gotten from T’Challa almost two years ago. Stark’s technology still, after all these years, amazed him. An amplified booster on all the jets he owned made it possible to for a mobile phone to continue working whilst in the air. He glanced up at Katie, before flipping open the phone and then all four of them stopped dead as it began to ring before Steve had the chance to even dial.

“Stark?” His eyebrows furrowed slightly as he asked the question, even though there was no one else with that number…

“Steve, hi, it’s Bruce. It’s err, been a while.”

Steve paused his eyes widening at the surprise at hearing his onetime team mate. “Yeah, yeah it has,” was all he could say. “Listen, there’s not a lot of time to explain but something big, someone big to be exact, is coming, and they’re after Vision.” “Vision?” Steve paused, standing still where he had been pacing unknowingly.

“For the Stone.” Bruce continued. “He’s turned off his transponder so we can’t track him, but Tony…” Bruce took a deep voice and Steve glanced up at Katie who was watching him intently. “Tony went after the ship, Cap, he’s on the ship, heading out to space, but before it all started he was about to call you. He said that you might be able to find Vision. And we need to, we need to before they do. You got any idea where he is?”

Steve listened to Bruce’s rambles, a million and one questions were whirring round his head, but there was no time for that. If this was as big an issue as he said, they had to find Vision. And right now, he would hazard a guess that he was wherever that huge ship over the UK was.

“I don’t know for sure, but I have a pretty good idea.” He sighed.

“You need to get him before they do Steve, and I mean it. This is the biggest threat we’ve ever faced. This guy, well even Thor couldn’t stop him.”

Now that really did worry him, but again there was time to think about that later. “Leave it with us.” he said gently, before he closed the phone and stuck it into his pocket.

“What is it?” Katie asked, “Was that Tony?”

Ignoring her, Steve strode to the front of the jet and spoke to Sam. “That reading. Can you get a lock on it?”

“Piece of cake”

“Get us there, fast.” Steve instructed. Sam nodded to show he had understood.

Steve looked back at Natasha and Katie as his wife crossed her arms, waiting for an explanation, not impressed with being ignored.

“Whatever is on that Ship, chances are they’re looking for Vision.” Steve said simply “They want the stone in his head.”

“Wanda…” Nat muttered gently, as she hurried to the front of the jet.

Katie’s eyes however went back on the footage of the spinning space ship above the city they once called home.

“Steve.” She said eventually “Tell me please, how was he?”

“Sweetheart, it wasn’t Tony.” Steve replied, his voice low as he looked up at the cockpit. Natasha and Sam were busy flicking switches. “It was Banner”

“Banner?” she frowned “But what? I mean how?” “I don’t know but he said that Tony had go-…”

“We got it, Cap.” Sam interrupted. “Just over Edinburgh, I’ve locked in the route, we should be wheels down in ten.”

Steve nodded and then turned back to Katie as she carried on speaking.

“What about Tony?” she pressed.

Steve opened his mouth to answer but he stopped, his eyes falling onto the footage, still playing on the hollovision. Katie followed his gaze, the next line across the bottom answered her question.

Billionaire Tony Stark missing.

Katie couldn’t find any words to say. Instead she felt her breathing deepen and she swallowed thickly staring at the footage. Missing? Like, kidnapped? Missing in Action, missing presumed dead…a thousand and one thoughts began running through her head, all of them coming back to the last time they had seen one another, the harsh exchange of words and him telling her he was ashamed of her before she left him in that cold bunker in Siberia.

Steve’s hand dropped onto his wife’s shoulder as he noticed her lip was beginning to wobble.

“We get Vision and then we work on finding him.” He assured her gently, looking at Katie who looked up at him.

“We best hope we find him.” She swallowed again before she looked down at her hands. “Because if worst comes to worst and the last time we spoke to each other was when we parted on such bad terms, I’ll never forgive myself Steve.”

**** O/S: Vanilla

Chapter 36 Part 1

**Original Posting**

#stark spangled banner #steve rogers #Katie Stark #steve rogers x ofc #steve rogers x original female character #steve rogers fanfiction #mcu fanfic #mcu #chris evans #chris evans characters

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