#probably not even remotely correct but it’s fun to think about

[unapprovedtrash]

Wild Tears of The Kingdom theory but it’s been floating around in my head all day.

This is long and probably all over the place but please bare with me.

So I’m sure by now most of you have already seen the official artwork for Ganondorf and noticed that he had one of the tear shaped Gems on his forehead.

Except this one is red, you might even say it looks corrupted.

But we’ll get back to that, because I wanna talk about the hero on the tapestry in botw for a hot second.

So I know we’ve all already talked about how the hero in the tapestry isn’t Link, doesn’t even look remotely like Link, with the red hair and beard, but you know who does have red hair and a beard, oh yeah, Ganondorf.

Also, in the opening of the tapestry he isn’t called “The Hero” which is what we always call Link, he’s called “a warrior wielding the soul of a hero”

So here’s where it gets crazy, well, crazier. What if for some reason Link wasn’t around for Calamity Ganon 10,000 years ago and Hylia, (or I guess it would technically be Fi?) was forced to chose someone else to battle The Calamity. A strong warrior, like someone from the Gerudo, like maybe….Ganondorf? And perhaps the “soul of a hero” refers to the master sword.

So let’s say I’m right and Ganondorf somehow ended up being the hero from 10,000 years ago, then what happened, why does he want to destroy us now?

Well, here’s where we pick up where I left off on the tear gem because I have a second theory inside of this one. Maybe, because he wasn’t the true hero, because he wasn’t LINK, he somehow got corrupted by malace during the battle, and they ended up having to seal him away somewhere deep underground. And the reason he’s so angry now isn’t just because of his malace corrupted soul, but because they betrayed him, they forced this role upon him, this destiny he never asked for and then when he needed help instead of trying to save him they locked him away, abandoned him after everything he had sacrificed for them.

I saw a post on tumble where someone mentioned they wanted to be able to save Ganondorf, which got me wondering if we can purify his little gem thing, but yeah that’s pretty much it.

Also, in not related to this theory, but I noticed the Zelda on the tapestry seems to have a dark skin tone, which makes me wonder if this is the Zelda from 10,000 years ago.

#botw sequel #tears of the kingdom #probably not even remotely correct but it’s fun to think about #it would put a completely different spin on the story #wacky theories that kinda sound like they could be canon but at the same time sound like a crack theory #please excuse the fact that this said mural and not tapestry cause i couldn’t think of the right word

[parkerflix]

—love countdown

min ho x gn!reader

genre: the lightest angst, fluff

wc: 2.2k

synopsis: minho’s party brought to light a few things.

a/n: thank you for all the love on part 1 ! As of right now there are no plans for a part 3 but if something comes to me it’s possible!

The days after the interaction with Minho, you avoided him at all costs. You still hung out around their dorm, but always checked with someone if he was there. Both you and Kitty had an eventful chuseok and were always asking for advice and to rant to Q.

Today was the same as the other days, you invited your brother and kitty out for coffee.

“Kitty, I love you but can we please talk about something else?” Q said, sipping on his coffee. She let out a huff and turned to you.

“So, what’s going on between you & Minho?” she said slyly, giving you a knowing glance.

“There is nothing going on between me and him. I’d prefer to not talk about it.”

Both Q and Kitty could immediately tell that something had happened, but you were too stubborn to say anything.

Feeling the air grow stale, Q brought up something he had hoped would lift your spirits.

“Have you guys decided what you’re wearing to Minho’s party?”

You glared at him, he was so oblivious sometimes.

“No, I’m not going.”

“Me either, he hates me plus Dae’s going to be there.”

Q sighed.

“Come on, you really wanna spend a Friday night inside?”

You and Kitty glanced at each other before nodding your heads.

“I think it’s a perfect day for a movie night don’t you think Kitty?”

“Why you’re absolutely correct, Yn! We should look at our watchlists and make a spinner for it!”

“That sounds like a great idea!”

Q just watched the two of you act this out, half amused.

“Are you guys really going to let Minho, Dae & Yuri ruin your fun?”

“It’s Minho’s party, he probably doesn’t even want me there.”

“You never know if you don’t go. Please?” Q held your hand and you rolled your eyes.

You hated when he acted all cute, he knew that you’d eventually cave and say yes.

“Fine. But only if you help me look for an outfit.”

“Deal. I’ll text Florian to come with us. Kitty?”

Kitty smiled at the two of you, a look of determination crossing her features.

“I’m going too. I’ll prove to Dae I’m over him!”

Both you and Q stared at each other, knowing that was far from Kitty’s truth.

—

Minho’s date with Lulu had gone just okay. She was great, but his mind seemed to be somewhere else the entire night. He couldn’t get it out of his mind the way you stared at him, and the way he almost kissed you.

If you guys had kissed how would you have reacted? He wasn’t sure if you even remotely felt how he did. Hell, he wasn’t even sure how he felt about you. He had always just seen you as annoying, but deep down he knew he saw other things in you. It frustrated the hell out of him feeling this way, and with you acting all strange afterwards, it made him more frustrated.

He had thrown himself into the planning of the party, not even knowing if you had decided to go.

He had gone to Q, pretty much asking him in a roundabout way if you were going with him.

Q had just said some skeptical things, and didn’t clarify anything for Minho. He sighed, and shook his head, trying to figure out the last finishing touches of his outfit.

—

The music was blaring from the speakers and you were already regretting this. Out of the two of you, Q seemed to be the more extroverted one. You enjoyed going out from time to time, but you also loved your space. The music was so loud that you could hear it from outside. The bouncer was letting everyone in from a list, and you weren’t even sure if you were on there.

Did Minho even want you at his party?

You and Kitty finally made your way inside, looking for Q and Florian. Kitty looked stunning, and she really seemed to glow with confidence. You felt comfortable in your outfit, having had Florian and Q have the last say so.

Your shoes were slightly uncomfortable, since they were brand new. You cursed yourself for choosing the new ones instead of your trusty going out shoes, but everyone argued that they matched better.

Minho was sitting with Dae at the bar, happy his friend showed up. They were chatting away, when he saw two people pass by him, both standing out. He excused himself from Dae & walked in their direction, stopping in his tracks when it saw it was Kitty and you.

Kitty looked great and he was surprised she could clean up nicely, but you. You made him speechless. You looked amazing, and also so relaxed. He saw you laugh at something Kitty had said, and he saw the way your eyes lit up when Q found you both.

He wanted to go up and sweep you away from everyone, to tell you how great you looked and how happy he was that you were there.

You had been eyeing the entire club, finally making eye contact with Minho.

Both of you felt as if time stopped for a moment, just the two of you staring at each other, a sense of yearning in the air. You quickly looked away, a faint heat felt on your cheeks.

You reached up and touched your cheek, catching the attention of Florian. He smirked at you, knowing that if he looked in the direction you were staring at a few seconds ago, he would see Minho.

Florian and Q escorted the two of you to the bar, getting you both mocktails. You knew underage drinking was frowned upon heavily in Korea, but had done it in the comfort of your dorm before.

Kitty thought that your drinks had alcohol, slightly surprised when Q told her that they were alcohol-free. Florian quickly remedied that, pulling a flask out and pouring some clear alcohol in all of your drinks.

You all clinked your glasses together, your heart feeling lighter with the presence of the people around you.

—

An hour had gone by, and you had lost track of where Kitty had gone. She could very obviously not hold her liquor, and at this moment neither could you. You found yourself in the lounge, your eyes focused on your cosmopolitan.

You knew you were possibly drunk, but you didn’t really care. The past hour was pretty much spent babysitting Kitty, making sure that she stayed away from Dae, who much to your surprise showed up. You knew this wasn’t his scene, and when you saw Yuri in the crowd dancing with her friends, put two and two together. They came on a “date”, but at least seemed to be having fun together.

Q and Florian had snuck away somewhere wanting some alone time. The very thought of your brother having alone time with his boyfriend made you wanna gag. They were super cute together, and you really were happy that he was happy. You couldn’t help but be jealous, you wanted that.

You sighed, not noticing someone sat next to you.

“Tired?”

You turned to the owner of the voice, seeing one of your classmates sitting next to you.

Jace was an expat like you, coming from England. He was a year older than you, but shared the same chemistry class with you. He was Alex’s TA, and you would strike up conversations with him about topics whenever he looked super bored.

You smiled at him, nodding.

“Tired. Don’t you just hate it when you’re the only one who’s like, alone? alone… a, lone… that’s a funny word.”

Jace had an amused look on his face, letting out a laugh. It was so obvious you were tipsy, the slight slurring of your words making him laugh.

“I do hate it sometimes, but sometimes you just gotta think there’s someone out there for you.”

You leaned in close to his face, evidently unaware of all the personal space bubble rules you were breaking.

“Do you think there’s someone out there for me?”

Jace’s eyes scanned your face trying to figure out what he should say.

“I think so.”

You hummed, nodding your head. You pulled back from his personal space, content with his answer.

Jace held your hand that was next to his, intertwining your fingers together.

“Has anyone told you that you look stunning tonight?”

You gave him a lopsided grin.

“Only tonight? You don’t think I look stunning in our very attractive uniforms?”

He laughed, and shook his head.

“You look good everyday.”

“You’re such a charmer.”

“Is there anything wrong in me telling the person I like that they’re attractive?”

You felt your heart stop for a moment, at his very sudden confession.

“Jace, I didn’t know-“

He smiled at you, gently squeezing your hand.

“I didn’t expect you to. Plus I figured I didn’t have a chance with Minho interested in you as well.”

Minho. You had tried so hard not to think about him all day, and the mention of his name made your stomach turn.

“Minho does not like me, and there’s nothing going on between us.”

That last part of the sentence made your heart ache, but you were too far gone to want to notice it. Minho was someone who you wanted, but didn’t want you. As much as that hurt, you had someone in front of you who did like you.

Jace brushed some of your stray hairs behind your ear, and his hand hovered over your face.

“Would it be alright if I kissed you?”

“Okay.” you whispered to him.

You both inched closer, nearly kissing when a clearing of the throat made the two of you jump.

You both turned your heads and saw Minho standing there.

He had a very neutral look on his face, but his eyes were telling a different story.

“Oh hey, man. What’s up?” Jace said, the slight annoyance in his tone noticeable.

Minho had a tight lipped smile at the two of you.

“If you’ll excuse me, I have to take Yn to their brother. It’s very urgent.”

You got up, albeit a bit wobbly, and gave Jace a sympathetic look.

“I’m sorry, maybe we’ll catch up later?”

“Yeah no worries, go see what happened. You know where to find me.”

Minho rolled his eyes, his jaw clenched.

You made your way over to him, and Minho took you by the hand and led you away.

—

It took you all of two seconds to realize Minho had lied to both you and Jace about Q needing you.

“Minho, where are we going?”

You were met with silence.

You both finally made it to a secluded area of the club, which you assumed was the VIP lounge.

Minho finally dropped your hand and ran his hand over his face. He stepped away from you, clearly trying to create some space between the two of you.

“Minho?”

He sighed and looked at you, clearly annoyed.

“What were you doing before I got there?”

“I was talking with Jace.”

He let out a humorless laugh.

“If that’s talking, I must be the president of Korea.”

You didn’t understand where this was coming from.

“What does it matter to you? My business is my business.”

“It matters.”

“You’re deflecting. What does it matter that I was talking with a guy?”

“Because.”

You were getting frustrated with him now, the alcohol in your system making it too difficult to have any sort of conversation without showing your true feelings.

“Minho, we’re talking in circles. My love life, my friendships don’t pertain to you. I can talk to whoever I want to talk to. Obviously since you can’t tell me why it matters to you then it doesn’t mean anything.”

You blinked and before you knew it, his arm was wrapped around your waist, pulling you flush to his chest.

“Minho?”

He stared into your eyes, hesitant on what he would say.

“It matters because I like you.”

Before you could say anything, he leaned down and pressed a soft kiss onto your lips.

When he broke apart from you, he rested his forehead on yours.

“Who you talk to matters to me, because I like you.”

“Minho… I like you too.”

He smiled and kissed you again, making your heart swell with happiness. He peppered your face with kisses, and you laughed, not ever having seen this softer side of him.

—

Some time had passed, you both migrated to the couch.

“So.”

“So what?”

“Can I take you on a date?”

You nodded and kissed his cheek.

“I’d like that very much.”

The music outside of the room stopped, and the both of you looked at each other confused. You checked your phone, and saw that Q had texted you that Professor Lee and Principal Han had found out about the party and were currently breaking up the party.

You quickly got up and grabbed Minho’s hand, sprinting to the doors, as quick as you could.

A bunch of your classmates were also running, and Minho caught on pretty quickly to what was happening. You both ran out of the club, making it a few blocks away from it until you both ran out of breath.

You guys had made it to a nearby night market, and you texted Q that you were alright.

Minho grabbed your phone out of your hands, and put it in his suit pocket.

You looked at him confused and he just smiled at you.

“So, how about that date?”

taglist! @lavnderluv @nellyboosworld @callsignwidow @srslyfngrl @rueluvsharry @n1niunwo0 @valenftcrush @mimihiraijeon @huang-the-geek @saintomie @tocupid @rockinggirl06

name in bold means i was unable to tag you!

#xo kitty fanfic #xo kitty drabble #xo kitty #xo kitty fan fiction #min ho x gn!reader #min ho x reader #minho x reader #lee sangheon x reader #lee sangheon #paris writes

[thats-godscomma]

Since rewatching Psych, I've been thinking about how weird and arbitrary Shawn's interests are. Sure, late 2000's writing had something to do with it, and maybe a bit of Henry and Gus's influence, but hearing Shawn be so vocal about how he hates certain popular things or (more importantly) refuses to give them a chance BUT at the same time knowing so many pop culture references, it got me thinking.

What if the reason Shawn has so many pop culture references on hand is because of his eidetic memory, and he doesn't actually have as much of an interest in pop culture? Throughout the show, he actively avoids getting roped into big interests and franchises (see: comic books, soap operas, etc.) despite the fact that he genuinely seems excited once he's part of it. In fact, we don't get to see a lot of Shawn's interests at all unless it's based on an idea.

Take being a bounty hunter, for example. According to him, he's obsessed with the idea, but he doesn't make many references to an actual bounty hunter show or franchise. Instead, he just remembers the one bounty hunter he saw as a child and maybe references a movie or two. Because once he remembers something, he's never going to forget it, or at least not for a very long time.

That's why he thinks in references. Everything is a reference if you have a good enough memory. Everything reminds you of something. If Shawn hears someone make a Spock reference, it's in his repertoire forever. But he wouldn't be caught dead watching the shows or movies because that's just too much information. Why on earth would he endure that?

Of course, it also intertwines with his ADHD. He has bouts of energy and trouble focusing. He can't sit still to save his life, and he hyperfixates...or he would if his memory didn't make him averse to it. So if he doesn't want to hyperfixate on an information-based interest, then what does he hyperfixate on? Physical activities. Instead of learning about his favorite daredevil, he tries to be one himself. When he learns about oil rigs, he doesn't get a book from the library. He tries to find oil in his backyard.

This is also where he and Henry differ regarding Shawn's "potential." Henry is correct when he talks about Shawn's "wasted" potential, but he doesn't understand the toil of having this eidetic memory and ADHD. Here's what I think happened: Henry probably noticed Shawn's stellar memory at a young age, realized he has a gift, spoke with his wife about her eidetic memory, learned that you need to challenge your child's eidetic memory at a young age or it'll go away, started the hat game to make it fun and exciting, but then Shawn's ADHD appeared. Suddenly, it made him much harder to raise (because let's be real, Shawn was not an easy child.) Henry didn't know what he was doing anymore, and since it was the 80's, he didn't have the resources to properly understand his kid's behavior, so he tried to find a common interest, and started training Shawn to be a detective "because kids love cop shows." But Shawn struggled to stay attached to one single interest, and when he grew up, he stopped trying to articulate his problems because his mom (the only person who remotely understood his struggles) left, and he blamed his dad for it.

And academics? Those are a joke because what is the point of studying if he already remembers everything? Until, of course, he needs to apply it to a problem-solving test or writing an essay. Suddenly, he's memorizing a math teacher's answer sheet and copying Gus's report.

Yes, Shawn could have been a great cop. He could be an amazing scientist or anything really. He could have been a national spelling bee champion like Gus wanted to be. Even 15 years later, Shawn remembered exactly what word Gus messed up, how to spell the word, and what letter he made Gus slip up, but he didn't want to be on that stage with Gus because that requires so much learning. And so much time. And so much memorizing. And he refuses to sit still for that long when he knows that overloading his head is going to give him migraines.

Also his "I've heard it both ways" probably comes from the fact that people with eidetic memory can still make lots of mistakes if they don't actively commit something to memory. If Shawn only overhears something, he'll still naturally try to fill in the gaps like everyone else, but because he's so confident in his memory, he just believes what he remembers to be true, leading him to repeat incorrect information with confidence. That could also be why some of his references are incorrect due to mixed-up homophones.

Anyway, this post was supposed to be about how Shawn is just a walking movie reference because his memory won't let him forget quotes, but then I fell into a rabbit hole of the negative effects of having an eidetic memory as a child, and I am very passionate about how Henry actually tried his best, and people need to stop calling him a horrible parent. Love y'all. Let me know what you think.

#i just care a lot about the real-life consequences of having an eidetic memory combined with ADHD #psych #psych tv #psych usa #shawn spencer #henry spencer #burton guster #eidetic memory #long post

[inbarfink]

So when I wrote down that Big Undertale Meta Post about how Sans probably doesn’t remember RESETs at all and why that’s cool - I got a lot of responses to the tune of ‘that’s probably canon but I’m still gonna enjoy Sans Remember fics because of the angst’. And, well... first I want to emphasize that those are very good and correct responses! Like ‘I acknowledge might or might not be in the text but I am also gonna explore alternative ideas Because I Enjoy Them’ is a Good Damn Position to have! Transformative Fandom is Transformative on purpose! Engage with the text and it’s various analyses but don’t let it chain your creativity or fun!

It’s just that… all of the people saying that they prefer Sans Remembering ‘for the Angst’ make me think that maybe folks are kinda ignoring the incredible angst potential of Sans NOT remembering.

My original post focused on how cool it is that Sans manages to be so on-top-of-things even though he doesn’t remember anything - but let’s not ignore the fact that this situation is also grim as shit.

Through some mysterious super-science or whatever, Sans has managed to discover that his timeline is being RESET and altered constantly (before the Player came along, Flowey had already managed to basically 100% the entire Underground) and he has no memory of what's going on and what exactly is being altered. 

He knows he might’ve gone through the same day over and over and over again thousand times but he’s simply not aware of it. It’s all the helplessness and lack of forward momentum of a classic timeloop and none of the benefits of memorizing occurrences or acquiring extra information. That’s exactly the thing that drove him into his depressive spiral.

That line always strikes me. It’s like… Sans suspects that without the meddling of capricious immortal time gods, he’d be a much happier and motivated person. But he doesn’t know for sure, because he can’t remember how he was in some distant ‘original timeline’. He is essentially fighting to avenge a version of himself that might not even be real.

Like, yes, it is very impressive and badass how well Sans trained himself to notice every tiny little hint that might indicate that a RESET happened - but it’s impressive because the deck is stacked so heavily against him. And it is very impressive and badass how Sans managed to turn his weaknesses into strengths during his Boss Battle - but it’s impressive because these are usually huge weaknesses. Trying to work to solve a timeloop that you can only infer is going on through context clues is quite a hopeless and desperate mission!

Another bit in the Sans fight that I often think about is his unique reaction if you kill him and then RESET to Fight him again.

With how skilled he is at reading expressions, Sans probably knows what that ‘weird expression’ means, he knows the Player killed him once before and is here to try again. And yet he still goes along with the same attack plan he has, the one he knows killed him in that previous timeline. Why? Because he doesn’t know where the flaw in his plan was exactly, he can’t even begin to guess. So he has no choice but to go along with the plan he knows did kill him, because that’s the only thing he has. 

You know, the thing about Sans, is that he always plays his cards very close to his chest. It’s very hard to tell what exactly he’s thinking. That’s probably why so many people do believe he remembers RESET. If any non-Flowey character remembered RESETs, only Sans would be remotely able to hide it so well. But for me? It makes me wonder how much of his Troll who Knows Too Much persona is a bit of an act as well. 

You know, Sans’ deduction requires some keen observational skills - does he ever second-guess his conclusions? Living on constant high-alert that something has been reversed or that someone knows something they shouldn’t requires fostering a lot of paranoia, and that can’t be healthy for him. Is he ever overcome with doubt on whatever something was really an indication of a timeline RESET or not? How does he feel when he realizes something horrible happened on a previous timeline (for example, his brother dying) but he doesn’t know about the context to feel sure that he can stop it from happening again? 

I also think about it in terms of his relationship to Papyrus in general. Sans tends to hide so many things from Papyrus, especially in timelines where the Player is particularly kill-happy...

In part it’s about his perception that Papyrus’ kindness and pacifism is born from naïveté and thus the only way to preserve it is to hide the cruelty and harshness of the world from him (Undyne also does that). But also, with the paranoia and helplessness Sans lives in every day - is it any wonder that he might believe that ignorance is bliss?

I do truly think it’s beautiful how fandom can experiment with cool non-canon ideas! There are probably so many great emotional angsty ideas tied up to Sans remembering RESETs! I just feel it’ll be a shame if people ignore just how dire and depressing Sans’ canon situation also is!

#undertale #ut #utdr #sans #sans undertale #sans ut #undertale analysis

[skatesnstuff]

three years | m. tkachuk

summary: it’s early july 2022 in sunny florida. ophelia hughes is finishing up work before heading down to michigan to spend the summer with her family and friends. but news of a trade deal with the calgary flames puts her world in a blender.

a.n. the first instalment of the hughessister x chucky!! this is gonna have absolutely no background at first but it’ll make since as you read. please be kind, and like and reblog if you like it <3

the florida sun was something ophelia would never get used to.

it slid inside her office at amerant bank arena, making it shine with sunlight. her skin shone with it like a golden goddess, warming it and reminding her of early morning sunrise walks with her youngest brother, luke. her hand moves to correct another photo as her mind wanders to her plans for the next two months: boat rides, tan lines, tiny bikinis, stolen kisses, watermelon running down the corners of mouths, her mother's home cooking.

a knock at her office door brings her out of her daydream. she turns her head to see who's there.

stan, their director of marketing, stands at the door with a small smile on his face.

"hey, phe. i just wanted to talk to you quick before you left for the next couple of months."

her smile falters a little and he's quick to put a reassuring hand to her shoulder.

"it's nothing bad, ophelia, i promise. it's about a trade. i need you to let the social media girls know we need a goodbye post for huby and weegs. they got traded this morning, it was just announced. would you send some photos to them?"

she nods. "yeah of course. do you need anything from me regarding the new guy?"

he shakes his head. "no, cerie can take care of it while you're away. he won't be here until later this week anyways and i want you to have some time with your family. have fun this summer, ophelia."

she smiles, wishing him the same as he leaves. she realizes she never even thought to ask who the new guy was.

cerie comes barreling through the door just as ophelia thinks she can go back to her actual job. “did you fucking hear? we traded jonny and weegs? for that guy? are we stupid?”

cerie was the other full time photographer for the panthers, and ophelia’s best friend in the whole world. they’d joined the team six months apart, after stan had realized the workload was too much for one person at a time. and cerie had just moved to florida from france and barely ever went home to her estranged family, so she was the perfect choice for when they needed a cover in the summer.

“hold on i’m confused. stan said the trade was good, you say it’s bad. who’d we get?” cerie opens her mouth to probably scream the name, but is cut of by a sharp three knocks on the door.

“come in!”

she’s expecting it to be sam or carter, those two were always on her ass about taking better photos. she didn’t have the heart to tell them it was because they were both extremely nonphotogenic. but it’s not either of those people.

“hi, sorry to interrupt, i was told to come see the senior photographer before she left.”

the voice knocks the air out of ophelia as she registers who it is, eyes widening. he realizes a split second later when he finally gets a good look at her.

“phe?”

she sets her jaw, staying seated and gazing up at the boy who had turned into a man since they last spoke three years ago. three years since that awful night in michigan, the fight, his departure from what she thought was the rest of her life. and now matthew tkachuk was standing in her office in sunny florida, a place she thought was a fresh start away from her parents and her brothers (mostly).

“hi, matthew.”

“you’re the senior photographer? how is it even remotely possible that i didn’t know that?”

she scoffs. “well, you were never really good at paying attention, especially to me. why did you need to see me?”

he looks stunned at her tone. she’s all business, he realizes. “i’m supposed to let you know i’m going back home until august and then i need my headshots done. i’ll be back on the 8th.”

“i won’t be here. cerie will do your headshots, and then i’ll proof them and upload them when i’m back on the 20th. anything else?”

he shakes his head, but he doesn't leave. "i'm going back to the lake house. first time in three years."

she finally looks over from her computer again. "good. your mom misses you."

he nods, a small smile on his face as he walks out the door and shuts it behind him. ophelia turns to her best friend, lets out a snort at the look on her face.

"stop looking at me like that, cerie."

"you know matthew tkachuk? what is wrong with you that you never thought to mention that before?"

ophelia shrugs, going back to the last photo she has to edit before she heads to the airport. "we kind of grew up together. we haven't spoken in over three years, though. had kind of a falling out just after i graduated from university."

cerie sits down beside her. "oh my god, phe. are you okay? and he's coming down to the lake house? how is that gonna go?"

phe clicks out of her computer, running her hands over her face with a groan. "it's gonna go like it always goes. his mom will yell at him for not being around a lot in the last three summers, his dad will make me tell him everything that the panthers are up to these days, and brady and taryn will simultaneously smack their brother and squeeze the living life out of me. matty being there won't be any different from the last time he was there three years ago."

"matty, huh?"

oh boy. "shut up."

"i'm just saying! the way you talk about him makes it seem like you guys were a little more than childhood best friends."

ophelia groans again and flips her off. "fuck off, cerie. i don't like to talk about it. what happened between us was embarassing and i would really rather not repeat it."

cerie's hands go up in surrender. "alright, alright. but you will tell me later, fleur. i know you will. now go to the airport, see your family, have some fun!! tell your brothers and your parents i said bonjour."

the two best friends hug tightly. "oh, i'm gonna miss you, cer. but i'm not telling you if quinn is single."

"ophelia-"

"no! no dating my brothers. they don't need your kind of crazy."

"bitch!" "asshole."

the laughter of both women could be heard from where matthew was still standing outside the office, waiting for ophelia to be done.

"matthew? why are you still out here?"

he shrugs, pushing off the wall he was leaning against. "i wanted to wait and see if you needed a ride to the airport."

her head cocks to the side. he had been less than caring when they were kids. three years had definitely changed something in him. "that would be nice actually. my bags are just in the closet over there."

he smiles and nods, carrying the bags when she grabs them. she could get used to this.

"holy shit, is this your car?"

he sold his truck, apparently, and replaced it with a fucking ferrari. of course he did.

"i was told when you move to florida you buy a fancy car."

"i don't know. i bought a jeep."

his laugh is contagious as they climb into his car, and when ophelia looks at him from his passenger seat she almost forgets everything he said the night they last spoke.

this was going to be an interesting summer.

a.n. this is a very special moment; the first (of hopefully many) fics of the hughessisterxmatthewtkachuk au!!! i am really proud of this one, it's one of the longest i've written thus far and i hope everyone loves it as much as i do. like and reblog as always, and stay safe in our dangerous world, lovlies <3, lily :)

taglist: @hockey-racing-fubol

#hockey #hockey imagines #nhl imagines #matthew tkachuk #hughes sister #jack hughes #quinn hughes #luke hughes #florida panthers

[sgiandubh]

It's all fake, anyway

Oh, my. The last two or three video snippets in Marina del Rey. The revolt. The pearl-clutching. The hate.

Again, you know nothing, Jon Snow. It's all about the medium being the message, again: carefully calibrated snippets of information, destined to a captive, deeply divided and (how can I put that without sounding offending, I wonder) unexperimented (yes, that's decent enough) audience.

During the last 24 hours, we've got the Marina del Rey gin promo & MPC teambuilding (hardly an orgy, btw) and C's MUA (or is it hairdresser? irrelevant) hinting on Instagram about a photoshoot at a gin distillery in a #beautifullocation, somewhere on Earth, presumably in Scotland - given her last IG follow. No further details, of course. Very probably a (late-) latergram, too, when she finally got the green light to publish it. Implying nothing, but leaving a boulevard bandwidth for people to infer whatever suits their own narrative. Expect FMN news soon? I highly doubt that and stand corrected: the last photoshoot (with McSideburns, in London) was on May 3rd, when she needed to somehow show the world the Two of Them were continents apart. Identical modus operandi. And always, always via tertiary players.

As for the Marina del Rey teambuilding, if you think that is 'S living his life' you are: a) living in a remote mountain/island area or under a rock; b) an impenitent Mordorian with an agenda to boot or c) incredibly incompetent with the way of the world (or at least, that world). Allow me to translate?

It is alcohol promo, duckies, disguised as teambuilding. The intended message is aimed at a younger, non-OL related audience (as I already warned you) and it roughly goes like this:

'we are a fun loving, no nonsense, start-up business in the spirits industry. Because we don't have a huge advertising budget, we're testing the waters with a cheap, reality-TV snippet to better evaluate the number of social media clicks and new followers and help gauge & calibrate the next step'.

Was it poorly executed? Yeah, you could say that, but then what to do, in a very restrictive, highly regulated tobacco & spirits advertising market, hum? Is it my cup of tea? I don't drink, therefore this type of message touches one ball without really moving the other.

Yes. Start-up business: if we take into account the COVID logistic delay, I believe we're still in that three-years frame. And this detail is essential in order to put context around a very forgettable snippet. Selling a brand-new, more democratic product. Selling it clumsily, in an effort to build relevance, because even bad advertising is, ultimately, good advertising. But make no mistake: it's nothing more than that and it is all they can do, in the current context.

This brings to mind another aspect of the charade, namely the fact that after the Remarkable Week-end (and with the exception of some carefully scripted 'slips'), released and available information progressively became (at least) two-tiered.

First tier: information carefully calibrated for immediate release and general consumption, primarily but not exclusively by the fandom. This includes: spirits shilling, innuendos galore, look-here-not-there latergrams. It also entails less direct interaction with the fans on socials and delegating the media management to secondary players (often called to the rescue, too).

Second tier: public information with a limited availability (you have to take the plunge and pay), for sleuths able and willing to go the extra mile. They paint a very different landscape. And draw two copycat timelines of people who are investing, buying and selling property and overall branching out of their primary source of income with a plan.

I am not a photo sleuth. But with a little bit of time on my hands, I am a decent paperwork analyst. Accounting is not my forte, but legal and business is. I saw what I needed to see and it holds.

So before you start screeching (bad idea, right?), remember this (credit given to @dillon7fan, thanks):

Not really: it is doctored make believe. Bless your heart, honest guy.

Next stop, Tehran. Yes, you read that correctly.

This evening or tomorrow, at the latest. Because context is everything and this fandom severely fails at this.

#fandom #BoozeWars

[infiniteko]

https://www.tumblr.com/infiniteko/740550010507280384/these-non-dualists-seems-to-be-so-bitter-and-for

completely agree with you!

this is why it always makes me laugh when people accuse others of “acting from ego” simply because they critiqued someone or said anything remotely ‘negative’?? ego is just a thought (unreal). it is just this illusory sense of “me, mine”, this sense of being an individual body-mind… so if that’s the case, ‘we’ are technically all “acting from ego”. we all appear to have different livelihoods, interests, preferences, hobbies, relationships, etc…

for as long as you (THAT) choose to express yourself as a person, why not make it fun!!😋 you (THAT) created 7 billion people so you can entertain yourself with disagreements and debates and difference of opinion. the beauty of it is that, ultimately, it is still all just THAT.

no one who truly knows that every thing is all the same “ ” wishes genuine harm or unhappiness on another person. everyone i have met who follows this ‘way of life’, myself included, are all the most chill, laid back, lazy mfs you could meet😭. we have no energy for sincere hatred, and there would be no one to hate but yourself anyway lol.

sending you guys (infiniteko) and anyone reading this lots of love & prosperity 🤍 you’re here to enjoy the dream, so enjoy it & don’t take it too seriously :)

Literally.👍🏻

Criticism ≠ Bullying

Criticizing posts does not mean Bullying the Writer of them, even if it were multiple posts.

Just like how Anons & I criticized people who offer Coachings with the same exact words that are for free on the internet. We criticized Sammy 1-2 days ago or that Scarlet person. Is that bullying them? If they were to delete their socials, did we bully them out of here too? Why would they care about our opinion of them? They're doing fine with that they're posting

Like you said, If one knows everything's "THAT", criticism will not phase you because it is "THAT". Only if you take it personal, it will. We've been criticized by anonymous (& not-anon) people, do we care? It's still THAT. I'm critizing myself. You (THAT) have a problem with yourself (THAT). They're us, we're you. You can say whatever you want to, everyone's fine here.

There was this Msperfect777 person here (is the name correct?) and one Anon pointed out that K once replied to an older post that was limited and MsP.777 wasn't insulted by it. She deleted the apps but that was because her work here is done, just like realitywarpingg did

I've already told Anons to directly show me which part of what I said was "bullying her".

If you like her stuff, go like her stuff. She has 10x as many followers as we do. If she wanted to she could've sent them after us so fast.

Put your thinking caps on for a minute, with her seeming range and success, why would she deactived because of 1 senseless seeming opinion if she knows what she knows. Her likes are idk, probably in the low-mid-hundreds, she has more supporters than criticizers. Why would she care.

#ask

[madwheelerz]

Most Hip and Horrific

Mike almost burst into laughter when Max tosses the mirror up to his face. He knows what she's doing, but-

"You think I'm a vampire?" He asked, brow raised.

Max shrugged, sliding into place next to him and looking at the mirror, or he assumed at least he couldn't really tell because of her glasses.

"Worth a shot," She murmured, "leave no stone unturned and all that,"

"Look," Mike started as the rounded up to his locker, "since I've gotten to this school," he opened the locker, "people have assumed I'm a witch,"

Max snickered.

"A ghost, a cupid-" Max was full on laughing now.

"Well, now you can add vampire to your growing list, Wheeler,"

Mike rolled his eyes. It's no surprise though, he was in a school of monsters after all and none of his fellow students had managed to figure out what type of monster he was. Some of them had come to the conclusion that he was human and simply attending for fun.

"None of those is even remotely correct,"

"Well unless you're human-"

"Nope, no way Mayfield that's for you guys to figure out," He grabed his books and shut the locker.

"You're enjoying this way too much," Max said as the snakes on her head started wriggling in annoyance.

Mike shrugged.

The class was filled with chatter when the two of them arrived. The only two seats that were available were probably the worst in the class. They were directly in the instructor's line of sight and Mike groaned.

"Again, seriously?" He asked.

Max opted to ignore him and make her way to her seat. This was going to be a boring class. Mike reluctantly followed suit.

"Well class…" Mike took the opportunity to scan the class as his, mildly ancient, instructor droned in. El, who was clearly not paying attention to the class, waved at him. One of her hands, cleanly detached at the stitches, is in the process of giving the other a manicure.

Mike half expects the hand to start doing a dance when that's over with, but at least El was entertained. He smiled at her and then at Will, sitting next to her.

Just as Mike was about to reluctantly turn his attention to the board, several students, including Max, got up. She came back with a heater and some beakers.

"You're getting the rest of the supplies," Max offers.

Mike groaned as the second wave of students began to go up. He goes with them. El, clearly of the correct opinion that he hadn't been paying attention, stops next to him in line.

"Here," She said, offering him the hand that had been doing her manicure.

"Oh, thanks El," Mike gently took the hand from her as their turn at the supplies came up. El smiled and waved, with her still attached hand, before heading off to grab her own supplies one-handed.

Mike briefly wondered if he should offer to help her, but just as the debate in his hand began El had already started heading back to her seat with her supplies gathered in one arm.

Mike shook his head and gently placed the hand El had given him down so that it could gather the supplies for him. His instructor either didn't notice or couldn't be bothered to care because nothing was said.

Gathering up the supplies, Mike made his way back to his seat. Max groaned and got started working on their experiment, which Mike still didn't know, while Mike leaned as far back from the fire as possible.

"Ohhhhhh, poor Max getting stuck with all the work," Dustin teased.

Right. Dustin and Lucas were right behind them.

"I'll dump this on you when I'm done," Max said flatly.

"Please don't. Suzie would hate that-" Dustin started, hooves tapping nervously.

"What are we making again?" Mike asked, leaning back in his chair slightly.

"Wow, you really zoned out there," Lucas snickered.

"Maybe," Mike conceded.

"It's a glow potion genius. Makes you glow and stuff," Max answered gruffly, completely concentrated on mixing the potion.

Mike didn't justify that with an answer.

*

Max made Mike drink the potion. He and half of his classmates were glowing brightly like fireflies.

"This sucks," Mike groaned. Max snickered next to him.

"Well I made it, which means-"

"I have to drink it," Mike finished, "yeah, yeah, I'm aware of our agreement Mayfield,"

Mike was absolutely being annoying by calling Max by her last name so he wasn't exactly surprised that she aimed a kick at his leg.

"Ow, seriously?"

"Yeah, seriously," She mocked.

Mike rolled his eyes. "Where are we heading anyway,"

"The pool. El wanted to watch the fear squad race against the swim team,"

El wanting to watch the fear quad made sense, Mike was pretty sure she wanted to join. What didn't make sense was why the fear squad would want to race the swim team.

Mike paused, "Why-"

"I don't know,"

That tracked.

Mike shrugged and followed Max to the pool where the fear squad was, predictably, being dominated by the swim team. His eyes scanned the room looking for an signs of El or their other friends and upon finding none, his eyes settled down on the race between the fear squad and swim team.

"They're not very good at this are they?" Mike asked flatly as one of the fearleaders made a very poor attempt to hasten their swimming.

"They're swimming against sea monsters,"

"Exactly," Although he might've said that, Mike was pretty sure that a majority of the poor swimming he was witnessing was at least partially due to a lack of skill. If you asked him it all seemed very unsafe, but with all the swim team members around it was unlikely anything would happen.

"Does El want to join the swim team too or something?" Mike asked. It wasn't uncommon, although it wasn't necessarily common either. Max snorted and as though saying her name summoned the young frankenmonster, El seemingly materialized from behind the bleachers and waved. As she started making her way over, the rest of the party followed suit.

Lucas was so focused on his phone that Mike was surprised he didn't trip. Distantly, Mike took a moment to marvel at the fact that he could even use a phone.

"Hey! Pharaoh eyes on the prize!" Just as the words left Max, Lucas nearly tripped over some discarded piece of swim gear. Oh. There it is. That's what Lucas got for not focusing.

He put the phone away. El giggled and Max grinned. Dustin and Will both seemed exasperated and Mike? Mike laughed.

"Seriously man," Lucas chided when the party arrived.

"You should've seen your face," Mike said between bouts of laughter. Lucas had seemed so out of it when he'd nearly fallen. It was hilarious.

Lucas continued to sulk. "She looks like she's gonna win," El said, pointing at one of the swimmers.

Mike takes a break from laughing to observe the race with El.

"Really? I think she's more likely to win," Mike said, pointing at another swimmer.

The two of them go back and forth with their bets until the end of the race. The girl Mike had pointed out won.

The teams pack up and leave. It goes well for about five minutes until Walsh shows up. The party is just about ready to leave too, the swim team has already left along with ninety percent of the fear squad.

"Well, well, well look what we have here the little odd squad,"

Mike could feel irritation welling up inside him already.

"You know it's no wonder you lot seem so drawn to each other, your basically normals disguised as monsters," Walsh sneered.

"I could show you what a normie is right now," Max mumbled under her breath, fingers twitching as though she was getting ready to remove her sunglasses.

"What was that?"

"I said, I'll show you what a normie is right now!" Max snapped.

"A normie," Walsh started, "acts exactly like your little friend," he walked towards El at this and snatched her bracelet, "here," at this he tossed El's bracelet into the pool.

Mike felt his anger rise.

"At least she's got a personality on her," Mike snapped.

For some reason that must have been Walsh's breaking point because the next thing Mike knows his lungs are full of water, meaning that Walsh had pushed him in.

The freak out that ensued above the pool was epic.

"What the hell Walsh?!" Max screamed, the only thing between her and turning Waldh into stone being Lucas's hold on her.

"You drowned him?" El asked, hesitantly.

Will looked between freaked out and ready to attack while Dustin seemed like he was trying to figure out what he'd just witnessed.

It looked like Walsh had managed to drown Mike which was illegal and would definitely get him expelled. Someone had rushed off and apparently gotten a teacher seeing as Ms. Kelly had wandered in with a student trailing after her.

"What is going on?" She asked, tone leaving no room for anything that wasn't an answer.

"Troy drowned Wheeler!" A student shouted.

The face that Ms. Kelly made was interesting, it was something between rage and complete disbelief.

"Troy Walsh drowned Michael Wheeler?" She repeated slowly, as though she was trying to see if the words would fit.

"Yes," the student stated, although they didn't sound like they were sure anymore.

"Well," Ms. Kelly started as the water started shifting around behind her, "I'd be surprised if Walsh-"

Mike popped up behind her at that, but he didn't look quite like the Mike that the party was used to. For one, he had scales, fins, and gills.

"-managed to drown a sea monster," Ms. Kelly finished as Mike raised a webbed hand, showcasing El's bracelet.

"Found your bracelet," Mike said, with a grin.

#mike wheeler #gen fic #madz's writes #don't trust me to do anything lmao #i sure took my sweet time #but hey #it's still mermay #it's still mermayyyy #and he's not really a mermaid #but it works

[darlingsart]

im curious how would Pyrrhus fit into your au? love your ocs BTW

Hi! First off, I’m glad you’re enjoying my OCs! 🥹❤️

I’m assuming you’re talking about ‘A Peaceful Life AU’ so please correct me if it’s for my other AU! (which is whole other answer in and of itself lmao).

So Pyrrhus doesn’t exist in this AU since Achilles never went to Skyros BUT I think if Thetis had taken him there (so like an AU of this AU?) she would’ve pushed him to get knocked up probably by some aristocrat to try and keep him out of the war as long as possible like “you can’t wield a weapon in this state so you can’t go even if they do manage to find you here”.

I think Achilles would be heartbroken about having some other man’s child, and would be really bitter about the whole thing in the first few months. When Patroclus finally gets to him, he’s shocked, hurt, frustrated with the entire situation, just a whirlwind of emotions at first, with a similar reaction from the book. But I think he’d come around to the idea of the baby pretty quickly, definitely before Achilles does. And one day he’d tell Achilles that he’d love the baby like his own, that they could run away someplace and raise it together.

Fast forward a few months and Pyrrhus is born and Pat and Achilles are living in a cottage in some nearby remote little village raising him together. Then of course their kids come soon after and grow up all together. With Pyrrhus’ personality, I think he’d have an interesting dynamic with my OCs. I can definitely see him and Max butting heads a lot because they’re both stubborn and Pyrrhus is a bit of a hothead. With Hyacinth I think they’d bicker too, lots of poking fun at each other but I think Pyrrhus is one of those kids that WILL break another kid’s nose for bothering his siblings. And for some reason I think he’d get along with Alexios the most!

This is so different from my AU but I’m ngl just typing all of this out made me want to write a little one shot SO bad so I think I might lol

#asks #A Peaceful Life AU #a divergence of a divergence if you will

[sabakos]

Hm, on one hand your post irritates me because I did pretty poorly in my STEM degree but unequivocally Learned Things, but on the other hand I would have definitely Learned More Things if I didn't have to come up with thousands of dollars every year for tuition and transportation. Don't you think failing everyone who gets a C- or less is a bit extreme?

This might have been specific to my experience or to physics rather than all of STEM, but the people who were getting a C- weren't getting a 70% on all of their exams, everything in upper level classes was necessarily graded on a curve. Which is the correct way to do it imo, it's hard to design an exam so that people who "know" the material all score exactly in the 70-100% range on the exam. Usually this is accomplished by erring on the side of challenging the students more rather than less, where 50% or so of the material on the exam is something you expect anyone would know, and the remainder is more challenging and requires an actual synthesis and understanding of the material, and often this gets you a nice distribution. But sometimes the professor messes up and they need to salvage an exam that was accidentally too challenging, where the class average was in the 60s. I even had an E&M exam that was so hard the professor refused to tell us anything beyond "none of you got a passing grade so I'm not counting it." So despite the appearance of numerical data, evaluation is a lot less of an exact science than one might expect!

But to illustrate the point, we had the opposite problem happen once with a newer professor, he accidentally screwed up and made the (take home!) midterm so easy in senior-level Intro to Quantum Mechanics that the median score was 100. This was, admittedly, complicated by the fact that due to our program's research specialties in AMO meant that at least a handful of us already knew everything there was to learn in that class before we took it. But despite this median score, which was achieved by more than just the kids who already knew the material, the lower mode of people still scored poorly! So there wasn't really much to do other than make the final nigh-impossible, which meant that all of those C and D kids failed to graduate on time anyway and had to "retake" quantum the next year when the curve would be more forgiving. I'm skeptical from having talked to and worked with many of them that they actually learned anything beyond intro physics.

However, I am probably being somewhat unfair in ways I don't realize due to, quite frankly, immense privilege. I came into college with two years worth of credit from AP exams and still took a full courseload and graduated in four, not only summa cum laude, but #2 in my class, despite basically taking no freshman and barely any sophomore-level classes to pad my GPA with. I thrived on the stress and conflict of test-taking and laughed (while still crying) about take-home exams that could and did take an entire weekend. I took the Putnam exam "for fun" my sophomore year and got a 10, beating all the math majors who took it that year. I was an obnoxious asshole about all of this, which I should probably regret more than I do. But by all accounts this means I'm the entirely wrong person to know what causes people to struggle with exams even if they do know the material. Throw sharp and heavy things at me, I probably deserve it.

But despite all that... I still feel that I didn't learn all of the physics as well as I probably should have? Many of those curves were strongly weighted in my favor because I happened to be the first or second highest score, which meant I got basically the same final grade in a class whether I slacked off a bit or not. And yeah, I think part of it is that Physics is really hard, and a four-year undergrad program with rigidly scheduled exams is not going to be remotely accessible or accommodating to anyone with a severe disability or extenuating life circumstances.

But when it's the same kids every semester who are barely passing, I think that at some point you have to say that even if the system *is* fundamentally broken and unfair, it's both of those things in a way where the people it's failed really haven't learned anything and so shouldn't receive a degree saying they have? Possibly they often don't even know what they don't know? I think that most physics classes form roughly discrete packets of curriculum, but as someone who has written and scored exams, I don't think 70% on an exam doesn't imply that even close to 70% of the knowledge was mastered. I'm not sure that any exam I took was ever that comprehensive, and I don't think that "learned some things" rather than nothing is really enough to cut it.

#no reblogs because *much* of this post could be used against me even with context #hate me more: i was rarely sober for most of this time period had a boyfriend just as obnoxious as me and maintained an active social life

[kyoxyukiforever]

The Science of A/B/O

Part 1 - The Basics

Part 1 (The Basics), Part 2 (Heats and Ruts), Part 3 (Scents and Pheromones), Part 4 (Mating)

Warning: sex ed that no one asked for and all that that implies

I cannot believe I'm doing this.

I've kind of been fascinated by the whole alpha/beta/omega concept in fanfiction for a while. I've read a lot of it. I like how it allows authors to explore themes of sexism, sexualization, and r*pe culture through a fantastical lens, making those topics less triggering as they are seen in a distant and unrealistic universe instead of our own.

And yeah, sometimes it can be really hot.

So I thought I'd take a look at the actual science behind this whole thing, and share the results here in case anyone is... even remotely interested. Obviously, there is no correct way for A/B/O to work. This is all in good fun and you can take or leave the information here as you like.

So, first off!

WHAT ARE ALPHAS, BETAS, AND OMEGAS?

The whole concept of A/B/O is based on the social hierarchy found in wolf packs. Bear in mind that this is JUST a social hierarchy, there are no obvious biological differences between alphas, betas, and omegas, at least as far as wolves are concerned. Instead, the difference is, for the most part, social. This whole theory has actually been challenged in recent years as to it's accuracy, but here are the basics of the theory, whether they be accurate or not:

In a wolf pack, there are two alphas: the alpha male and the alpha female. These two are a mated pair, and the reason is because they carry the best genetics. An example: the alphas in the pack will have larger paws or healthier coats, which will give their pups an advantage in life.

Betas are the second in command: "deputies" for the alphas.

Omegas are the wolves in the pack with the weakest genetics. If these wolves are caught trying to mate (with each other or other wolves in the pack) the alphas and betas will attack them, preventing them from reproducing.

Not all wolves in a pack fall under these three labels. Barbara Zimmermann, a professor at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences suggests that "[...]there may be several rank levels, beta, gamma and so on."

But WHO CARES! This clearly isn't what A/B/O is in our fantastical, fictional context. The only thing that really applies is the order of social standing these words suggest: with alphas at the top of the pecking order and omegas at the bottom, with betas being somewhere in between.

Well, that leaves us with the tropes of the A/B/O genre, so let's get into it.

Every individual has two sexes: the primary and secondary sex. The primary sex being male/female, the secondary sex being alpha/beta/omega. (I actually think these terms would be switched: the A/B/O sex seems to matter a lot more than the m/f sex, both socially and biologically.) These sexes can combine in any available way: alpha males, alpha females, beta males, beta females, omega males, omega females.

In most versions of the A/B/O mythos, betas are sort of just... people, like we are. No noticeable differences in anatomy, physiology, or behavior.

Things only get different when we hit alphas and omegas. The biggest difference seems to be reproductive: alphas, both male and female, can impregnate someone, and omegas, male or female, can become pregnant and give birth.

Now, I've seen versions of A/B/O where male omegas and/or female alphas cannot reproduce at all, and are seen as useless as a result. This is well and good narratively, but there is no evolutionary advantage to this, and a genetic mutation resulting in a largely sterile population wouldn't last long from an evolutionary standpoint. But, again, it probably doesn't matter that much if you just want to write about two guys doing anal without all the prep work.

However, a mutation that encourages more frequent, more urgent reproduction? That definitely has an evolutionary advantage. Scientifically, the emergence of alphas and omegas in the human species was likely a result of dwindling populations. So, somewhere in the distant history of your A/B/O fic, that might have been a thing. How long ago did it happen? Who knows! It could have been before our ancestors even evolved into homo sapiens - some genetic mutations stick around so long we don't even think of them as mutations anymore - Type O is the most common blood type, but it's actually recessive!

So, scientifically, what does that mean for alphas and omegas in our hypothetical universe? Well, alphas and omegas can actually be explained (to an extent) by combining two real genetic traits: intersexuality and the replacement of menstrual cycles with estrous cycles.

Let's start off with...

INTERSEXUALITY

Now, the term 'intersexual' is a bit misleading, because it's not actually a sexuality. It's actually an umbrella term for individuals who are born with any number or combination of sex characteristics that "do not fit typical binary notions of male or female bodies." Or, put less eloquently, when people are born with both male and female sexual or reproductive organs/chromosomes.

This mutation actually wouldn't apply to all alphas and omegas: just female alphas and male omegas. In order for a male omega to be capable of conceiving and carrying a baby to term, he would have to have ovaries, fallopian tubes, a uterus and an opening through which sperm can enter that system. Now, since you may be wondering: is it even remotely possible for that opening to be in or attached to the anal canal?

Unfortunately... no. There IS a condition known as rectovaginal fistula, where there is a connection between a person's rectum and vagina, but this condition is HORRIFYING and causes more health problems than I can list here. It requires intense treatments, medication, and surgery. All around just a terrible condition to have.

So, a male omega would have to have a vagina, in our little thought experiment. He could, however, still have a penis. During prenatal development, the ambisexual genital tubercle forms into either a penis or a clitoris. In fact, when female to male transgender individuals have what is referred to as 'bottom surgery,' their surgeon will simply use existing erectile tissue that makes up the clitoris (only a small portion of which is ever visible externally) to create a penis. Basically, the penis does not in any way hinder a male omega's ability to get pregnant.

As far as penis size goes, we can assume that it wouldn't be comparable to beta or alpha penises, simply because there would be no biological need for the omega penis to be of a certain length. The reason penises are the size and shape they are is to get sperm as close to the egg as possible. Think of the omega penis like nipples on men: for pleasure and decoration only. There's room for variation here - the author could decide that male omega genitals are indistinguishable from the genitals of female omegas and betas or that they might have what trans men on testosterone refer to as bottom growth.

And omegas wouldn't have testicles either, simply because during prenatal development, the gonads become either ovaries or testes. Since they need ovaries, they can't have testes.

As for female alphas, their genitals would have to be virtually indistinguishable from the genitals of a male alpha. Could they have a penis and a vagina like omega males, with their testes simply hidden inside their bodies like ovaries are hidden? Again, no. A vagina that leads nowhere is... possible, I suppose, but because it serves no purpose beyond pleasure and decoration, it likely wouldn't be wide or deep enough to fit much inside of it.

As for internal testes, that's a solid no. Have you ever wondered why the testicles are outside of the body, in what is a much more vulnerable position? It's because sperm require a very specific temperature to survive, and the inside of the human body is too hot. So, if you want alpha females to be able to reproduce in your fic, they also have to have balls, tragically.

This next part actually kind of allows you to pick and choose, which is cool. Let's talk about...

HORMONES AND LACTATION

First off, it's important to say that men do actually have all the necessary equipment to lactate: nipples, mammary glands, and pituitary glands. The only reason they don't lactate is because their prolactin levels aren't high enough. When a woman becomes pregnant, her body produces more prolactin, allowing her to lactate, but lactation can occur without a pregnancy. This is called galactorrhea: its most common causes in real life are medications and hypothyroidism, and it occurs in both males and females.

But, in our little experiment, we could posit that prolactin levels might rise in a female alpha in response to being around a pregnant mate, friend, or family member. It's been shown that a man's body can have several physiological reactions when their partner is pregnant, one of which is called couvade, or "sympathetic pregnancy," so it's not as much of a stretch as you might think.

So this actually leaves the writer with some choices: do male omegas lactate, or do female alphas lactate to pick up the slack? Maybe they BOTH lactate. Possibilities! Granted, we have yet to observe in nature a species that requires two different parents to birth and nurse their offspring, but with our posited mutation causing males to be able to become pregnant, I certainly wouldn't rule it out.

Earlier, I said that scientifically speaking, a female alpha's genitalia would be virtually indistinguishable from a male alpha's. If that's the case, how do we tell the difference between female and male alphas? At time of birth, you couldn't, unless a doctor performed a hormone test on the infant in question.

As the alpha grew older, however, puberty would reveal all! We can assume that a male alpha would be dealing with a lot of testosterone, both during and after puberty. This would result in a more masculine frame and a deeper voice. A male alpha would also have more androgens than a female alpha, creating what we typically think of as a masculine hair growth pattern.

A female alpha might have a more balanced quantity of estrogen and testosterone. In real life, healthy testosterone levels are much higher in men than in women, but healthy estrogen levels in men and women actually overlap. This means that a premenopausal woman might have less estrogen than a man of the same age, and there would be no obvious masculine features in the woman as a result.

What does this mean for alpha females? Well, it means that the alpha female could conceivably have a feminine frame, carrying fat in her hips and thighs and developing breasts as she went through puberty. Her voice wouldn't have to drop to the point of sounding masculine, and she could still have a healthy sperm count. She also wouldn't have to have a masculine hair growth pattern - she simply has fewer androgens. Her testosterone levels would be higher than the average beta woman, but that just means she might be taller, more muscular, and perhaps a little (or a lot) more aggressive.

As for omegas, a similar principle applies. A female omega would likely have normal estrogen and testosterone levels for a woman, unless she were in heat (more on that later). A male omega would, again, have a more even balance. That means enough testosterone to have a masculine voice and build, and enough estrogen to have a healthy ovulation cycle. The only time this becomes a problem is during pregnancy. Testosterone levels would naturally taper off while pregnant, due to the threat testosterone poses to a healthy fetus. When transgender men become pregnant, it is essential that they go off their hormone treatments in order to avoid deformities in their children.

This tapering off of testosterone levels could have all kinds of side effects. A pregnant male omega might experience weight redistribution, mood swings, and loss of hair on their chest, face, etc., but that doesn't sound too far off from what any normal person experiences during pregnancy.

Another thing that can vary depending on the author is chest/breast growth. It depends on a lot of things. Increased estrogen levels do cause chest/breast growth, as we've observed in transgender women who are on hormones, but that chest/breast growth is often not nearly as substantial as those women might expect or hope for. In 2017, a study showed that trans women saw an average increase in chest circumference of 3.1 inches after a year on hormones, with most of that growth occurring in the first six months. That is not a lot. A male omega would still be a solid member of the itty bitty titty committee after a pregnancy.

Something that might increase the chest circumference further is the chest wall displacement that occurs during pregnancy. This is when the lungs, ribcage, and diaphragm move up and out to accommodate the baby. This wouldn't make the breasts themselves bigger, though. The thing that might change this is prolactin, that hormone I mentioned earlier that causes lactation. Well, it also causes chest/breast growth. So, depending on if you want your male omega to lactate or not, your male omega could see significantly more chest/breast growth. Regardless, the growth a male omega would see during pregnancy would eventually go away, either after the pregnancy is over or once he stops breast/chest-feeding.

Now for the moment we've all been waiting for...

HEATS AND RUTS

Part 1 (The Basics), Part 2 (Heats and Ruts), Part 3 (Scents and Pheromones), Part 4 (Mating), Part 5 (Genetics and Presenting)

#a/b/o science #alpha/beta/omega dynamics #alpha/beta/omega #a/b/o #omegaverse #alpha beta omega #alpha #beta #omega #alpha/beta/omega verse #a/b/o verse #a/b/o headcanon #mpreg #male pregnancy #tw mpreg #pregnancy #tw pregnancy

[destinysbounty]

Yall remember that time in Skybound when Nadakhan turned Lloyd into an old man? Yeah, fun times. But I wanna talk about that for a hot sec actually

Now, for a moment let's ignore the obvious horror of Lloyd being aged up again, and this time losing not just his childhood but his entire life - right now I think there's one subtle detail from that scene that doesn't get addressed very often

Lloyd telling Jay how to defeat Nadakhan and then helping him and Nya escape became a very important plot point in the long run. It introduced the fact that Jay's final wish is the thing that will defeat Nadakhan, and a lot of Jay and Nya's actions thereafter were based on this information.

That in itself is not the thing I wanna talk about. Well, not exactly. To be specific, I want to talk about Lloyd's word choice.

"I see beyond the now."

This arguably wasn't just a matter of Lloyd using his Magically Enhanced Wisdom to figure out how to defeat Nadakhan. This may seem like a bit of a stretch, but the way he speaks in this scene seems to suggest he actually saw the future.

Lloyd had only wished for wisdom (and got age as consequence). And yet, somehow, it almost seems like he acquired some kind of foresight ability as well.

Yes, it's possible that this comes with the territory of being "wise like Wu", which is what he'd wished for - but while Wu does have very limited foresight, which mostly relies on smoke visions and vague premonitions regarding destiny, I don't think we've ever seen Wu get this precise. It's hard to explain, but old!Lloyd's foresight seems different than that. More specific, more accurate, almost.

So I guess my question is....did Lloyd somehow tap into a latent sixth sense when he became older? Was it his new Magic Wisdom that allowed him realize this potential within himself and then tap into it? Does this mean that Lloyd, the Lloyd from our timeline, has a sixth sense and will eventually rediscover it in time?

Come to think of it, he's not the only character with that type of cryptic foresight. Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure the only other characters who even remotely have a sixth sense of any kind are Wu, Mystake ("for your time of need, tea to go"), and Zane (literally how he's introduced). You could also make the case for the First Spinjitzu Master, considering the magic ice in his tomb and also all the forethought that would be required to leave behind a message on Wu's staff and lay himself to rest with the Realm Crystal in hand.

So....maybe it's an age thing? Maybe Seer abilities are only unlocked later in life? Like, it only happened when Lloyd got older, and that's the only notable and canonical similarity between all these characters. I mean, Zane isn't that old, but he's been around since at least the Serpentine War so given what little we know I'd say that counts. Maybe you don't have to be old as dirt, necessarily, but at the very least it's a power that only awakens later in life (if you have the potential for it within you, that is).

Unfortunately time travel means none of that ever happened, so until Skybound gets addressed we'll probably never have answers to those questions.

#that being said can you imagine lloyd and zane bonding over having a sixth sense? #and zane teaching lloyd how to deal with visions/premonitions? #that would be fun #ninjago #ninjago skybound #ns6 #lloyd garmadon #jay walker #lloyd ninjago #jay ninjago #wu ninjago #destiny post

[donnerpartyofone]

It's good that there's an active, public discussion of the apparent effects of being too online, like everybody generally knows about the hazards of misinformation, radicalization, anonymous bullying (or becoming a bully because you feel safer doing it from the other side of a screen than you would in real life), exaggerated tribal senses of Us vs Them, etc. But I think one thing that we don't talk about as much, that's become really insidious, is this kind of toxic know-it-allism. This might fly under the radar a little more because it doesn't have to involve hostility--actually a lot of people who act like this think they're really being helpful. But there's been this loss of agnosticism and a loss of just knowing your own limits that I experience as really pervasive.

I guess social media appears as a certain kind of opportunity to different people, like for some people it's a chance to experience connection, for others it's a chance to pick fights, or a chance to be popular even if you're not in real life, or it's a way to acquire knowledge, or to express yourself creatively, or it's about escapism, or whatever--I think there's probably a Main Thing that social media represents for different individuals. But I think a lot of people's basic know-it-all inclinations have become extremely activated by social media, and they mainly see it as a chance to go around educating or correcting people, with this attitude like they're spreading enlightenment and doing us all a big favor. And it often turns out they don't REALLY know what they're talking about, it's just a matter of applied cliches and hot (or luke warm) takes they absorbed from Reddit and they've been going around with the unchecked impression that that's the same thing as knowledge, or--I see this one a lot--they're kind of aping a certain style of critical rhetoric that looks and sounds and probably feels like actual thought, but it isn't really, it's just posturing and imitation that feels good to the person doing it.

People who do this don't usually seem to know they're being obnoxious and that they're not as smart as they think they are--I mean that's a given, because self-awareness is specifically the antidote for believing that you know more than you really do--and I think probably a lot of these people have been victimized by the feeling that clicking a lot of links online is the same thing as being educated. But I witness this all the time because I have a pretty agnostic mindset in a lot of ways, I believe that ambivalence and ambiguities are the stuff of life and you never percieve or apprehend as much as you think you do, so I write in a musing, speculative tone that seems to get the know-it-alls VERY excited, like they've detected a question mark and they think this is their big chance to swoop in and rescue some grateful person from the maw of ignorance. It happens a lot that I innocently post something I wonder about, and suddenly I have more than one person delivering this explanatory monolog to me as if I'm the dumbest most helpless person alive and they're like scooping me up and putting me back in the nest so I don't get lost and now they get to feel great about themselves.

(And let's be honest, people will also do this if there is no question mark in the post, and also if you already made it clear IN the post what your conclusions are, like in that case people are still happy to repeat back to you what you just said with this air like they're the one who thought of it.)

But I have to say that even setting aside how condescending this is, that quality of extreme, unquestioning certainty is just extraordinarily unattractive, that total lack of humility or reflectiveness is not remotely as impressive as people seem to think it is--it usually makes you seem LESS intelligent, and also it just makes social media less fun. Like I'm trying not to let it affect how I choose to amuse myself, but more and more it happens that I post something and I think, oh god, I know exactly how the know-it-alls are going to respond to this, this is going to make some stranger talk to me like they're my fucking dad, and then they do, and I just have to silently manage my annoyance because engagement is the worst possible reaction.

Anyway this reminds me of an experience I had at work like 15 years ago when I foolishly repeated something Tom Waits said about how the internet has depleted people's sense of wonder, like the feeling of having continuous and instantaneous access to (what feels like) information is reducing the amount of time that you experience curiosity and use your imagination to try to grapple with a question. And this fucking hippie-dippy coworker of mine who named himself after Langston Hughes and who claimed to be a shaman, and who eventually turned into one of our more evil businessmen, came at me with that soulless smile of his and tried to explain how in fact constantly acquiring (what you assume are) facts on the internet IS the same thing as wonder. And I totally took the bait and said you know, think about what happens in your mind when you are wondering (v) about something, the sense of wonder (n) comes from that, it's the opposite of feeling resolved and unsurprised and like you have no more questions. You can be AMAZED by information, but that's obviously not the same thing as the condition of wonder that I am very clearly describing. But of course he just kept like insisting that looking up shit on Wikipedia and getting immediate (allegedly) factual answers for everything is the same as wonder, I guess because he thinks of wonder as a positive emotion and he gets positive feelings when things become unmysterious. But it started to become clear that it didn't really matter to him who was right, because what I was saying about our diminishing experiences of curiosity, mystery, and imaginative problem-solving isn't actually dependent on the proper definition of the specific word "wonder"; this guy just loved how upset I was getting and he was feeding off it like a vampire, and he finally left for the day about as happy as I've ever seen him. The vibe was so ugly that once he was gone everybody came over to me and said ARE YOU OK?? and took me out for drinks. And I mean whatever, that guy's a fucking parasite and it didn't really matter what we were talking about as long as he felt like he hurt me, but his general malignancy is probably still connected in some way to that unattractive quality of extreme and delusional certainty that so many people are laboring under these days.

[residentdormouse]

Springing into a Word Search

Alright, I have been sitting on this so long, that I got tagged in another set of words in the meantime. Bad Mouse. Must get my writing routine back....

Anyway, thank you @mrsmungus for keeping my tiny writer gears grinding. Although, this is probably my worst showing yet. Not a Spring girl, I'm afraid. Probably not great seeing as my blorbos is all about painting. It's pretty, I suppose....

My Words: Growth, Flower, Fresh, Dawn, Easter, Break, Clean, Rainbow, Blossom/Bloom/Bud, Hayfever (or sneeze, or allergies)

I will as well leave this as an OPEN TAG because I don't know how many would want to join our constant word search absurdity. If you even remotely think, 'hey that might be fun', please do not hesitate to join, and tag me so I don't miss it!

Your Words: Swim, Beach, Sand, Waves, Float, Heat, Vacation, Rest, Relax, Calm

As always, excerpts below the cut.

Growth: Dammit - you got me. Not one mention. Touché.

Flower: (From Diving)

The larger space was a welcome change from the harsh area they had just been in, and Glen welcomed the sight coming from the large picture window on the side wall. Well maintained pebble walkways led around a quaint garden area. A few trees, shrubs, a couple black iron benches, and tinges of pinks, yellows, and oranges popped out from the various flowers planted around the walkways. Crystal clear water fell in a continuous flow from the center fountain, with a few brightly colored fish in the small pond below. He found himself gravitating closer to the scene, as the others could be heard pacing about or taking seats in the numerous open couches scattered around the space.

Fresh: (We got fresh blood, fresh starts, fresh milk, and a fresh hell. Haven't done a Harold section in a while, so Fresh start it is.)

“Okay, so I'm just gonna jump in cause I don't have much finesse with all this and I don't use my words as well as Glen. And you don’t have to say anything. I’ll sit here and babble like an idiot; you can jump in if you want.” Deep breath. “We're about to get to Boulder. You can choose who you want to be now. And correct me if I’m wrong, but right now, you don't seem like somebody who's very happy. So you can keep on carrying pain from a life you don't have anymore, and I’ll stop bothering. But if we're choosing, maybe you can choose to leave that pain here. Right here. When we hit Boulder, you have your fresh start. You can be the guy who holds up his end of deals, and writes stories, and has fun. Or whoever else you want to be." Gaze still locked on the fire, she tapped his foot with hers, trying to pull his attention. "It's your call, but you have that choice..."

Dawn: (Only one Dawn, and its not great. Can you tell I'm not a morning person?)

The night remained clear from threats and capped off the rain day break as a needed detour. Susan and Dayna were able to enjoy the small comfort of sleeping in an actual bed, safe within their room walls. Harold started in on one of the blank books he picked up, filling the journal pages by candlelight. Hayden and Glen found comfort with each other, while he shared stories into the night. And Fran found the walls quiet enough to chance a visit next door with Stu. By the end of dawn the next morning, everything was packed and ready to move on. One step closer to Boulder.

Easter: Once again, you got me. Guess who's least favorite season is Spring...

Break: (Hey! I finally got one from Close to the Vale!)

Humor remained in his expression, most likely resulting from her momentary stupor, but she held his gaze for as long as she could, only breaking away to glance downward when the sliver of self consciousness took hold. Even still, her smile remained. Despite her downcast focus, she was still able to catch the way his eyebrows raised in amusement before he turned back towards the counter. Holding out a packet in the air, he proceeded to move along the worn down surface until he hit an opening.

Clean: (Not the segment you thought you would get for this word, is it?)

"C'mon, everybody needs a little break here and there!" But that’s what Teddy failed to realize; this wasn't a break. Not to him. What Teddy was proposing was entering a social battle that required constant vigilance. Anticipate the moves, blend into the background when possible, and strike out only with a sure bet. Practiced movements and rehearsed repertoire. Break? Exhausting is what it was, and Harold certainly didn't have the energy to put up a front for that long. Not after a full day of clean up. The thought of the daily activities only ushered in a wave of fresh memories. Sensory recall he wished he could will away. Smells that would threaten to up heave anything he managed to put down. Decomposition. It lingered in his nostrils and he could almost taste it. That’s all that was there for him. Death. Disgust… All things he would put up with to position himself where he needed to. A place to get the most leverage when the time came.

Rainbow: (Only two of these, and I'm pretty certain I used the other one on our last Tumblr takeover. Guess we're having a Harold day now...)

"He knows, by the way. So there's that. Knew before I got there. Maybe I shouldn't have confirmed it, but what the fuck, y'know? I'm not gonna blatantly lie to his face..." Knowing her well enough to predict that she would look to follow after his couple puffs, Glen held the pen out to her voluntarily. There was no hesitation to take it. "That said, don't think she was off base with the concern. Something's not right with him." "What makes you say that?" No humor to it, no jokes, just inquiry. "He wants to quote, show the world who it's playing against, unquote, or something like that. However he said it, though, it didn't sound like something one does with rainbows and butterflies." "No, it doesn't." "So, I repeat. When did this all get so fucked…"

Blossom/Bloom/Bud: (Don't have any blossoms or blooms, but we got weed by god. Knew I'd find a 'bud'.)

Despite being quick, or at least thinking he was, it wasn’t fast enough. As he rounded the corner, he spotted Benny laying down on the floor. A few more steps and he could confirm there was no longer a rise and fall to his chest. A few steps further and the gap between them closed. Once he set down his bag, Glen closed the man’s eyes. The small container of buds was then placed in his hands, much like one would place the more common type of flower. Sure, it did nothing for him at this point, and there was nobody left here to know what was done, but it made him feel better. Humanity could die out, but it didn't mean he had to lose himself or his ways along with it. Not until that time came for him as well. As he stepped back out into the daylight, he took a deep breath of the fresh air, savoring the aroma that lacked the lingering stench of death.

Hayfever/Sneeze/Allergies: Holy fuck dude, you got me again. I think this is the worst I've ever done at one of these...

[mediocre-daydreams]

(prologue) wild heart | bucky barnes x reader

a bird in flight

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

summary: hopping from town to town, you’ve been trying to escape the bad luck which haunts you. when you arrive in nyc; suddenly, your curse becomes a curiosity of tony stark, and you are inducted into the avengers. for a small town girl, your first introduction makes a big impact on bucky. literally.

warnings: swearing (there will probably be swearing in every chapter i can’t resist myself)

w/c: 1.5k

rhiannon rings like a bell through the night

and wouldn’t you love to love her?

takes to the sky like a bird in flight

and who will be her lover?

“-and who’s that?” you point out absentmindedly to wanda, who’s delighting in giving you a tour of the new compound.

“oh, him? that’s bucky.” she nudges you with her shoulder as you pass by the gym, taking a few extra seconds to peer through the glass doors at the man dancing gracefully in a sparring match with who you presume to be captain america. captain fucking america, you think. it’s all setting in now. i’m ogling a hundred year old man who just so happens to be the figurehead of a more progressive america work out while getting a tour of the avenger’s compound by who may just be the most powerful woman in the world. what next, am i gonna be besties with tony stark? or start talking to animals?

you could’ve predicted none of this. for the entirety of your life, (up until now, obviously), you hadn’t been remotely associated with the avengers. you had never met one, or become a fan (with the exception of black widow, who you secretly harbored a crush for throughout your late teenage years), or even considered applying to be a SHIELD agent when they began re-releasing training applications. when you first left your childhood home, a small town comprised of farmers, local craftspeople, and sprawling hills, you never saw yourself in a big city. you’d grown up in the opposite. as much as home was beautiful, you’d always been an outcast; “bad luck,” is what people considered you. it wasn’t your fault, or your intention, or even something you’d been consciously aware of, but in a town as small as yours, people began connecting the dots when they realized the only constant between the freak fires, car accidents, injuries, and even missing pets was you. anywhere you went, tragedy struck.

so you left, sick of the blame and accusations for things you were absolutely certain you had no involvement in. you’d hopped towns for almost 6 years before coming to new york, where people went for new beginnings. but the townspeople were correct, weren’t they? there was no way that many accidents could be coincidental. you wouldn’t be able to find a new beginning or escape from your past when the cause of all your struggles (and everyone else’s) had always been you.

“bucky? what kind of name is bucky?” you snorted. maybe that was a little unladylike, but you’d given up on first impressions long ago after realizing everybody would eventually come to the same conclusion about you in the end.

“it’s short for buchanan, which is his middle name. he and steve? they used to be best friends before, well, everything.” wanda waved her hands around as if her nonsensical gestures would fill in the gaps. you got the point. “bucky’s real name is james barnes; you’ve probably heard of him or seen at least seen him in a footnote or something—he was a sergeant in WWII, howling commandos, yada yada,” wanda rambled.

“i… didn’t know that, actually,” you confessed. wanda looked surprised. “i grew up in a small town—i mean really small town—and we didn’t really do that standardized education thing. it was more like trade school, so i’m a little behind on my WWII fun facts, but what i can tell you is how many inches deep you should bury strawberry seeds for maximum growth.”

wanda giggled. “you know, i’ve never met anyone like you. i guess we don’t have a lot of small town folk in the compound, and if so, nothing quite like what your hometown sounds like. it’s… refreshing. and i’ve been begging steve to start a garden with me—he’s got a fantastic eye for color, i think he’d be a great florist—but nobody’s interested. maybe you’ll finally be my big break!”

you smiled. “y’know, i’d love that. if i’m honest, i’m… nervous about all this. i still don’t really understand why or what or how or when,” you waved your arms around just like wanda had a few minutes ago, “this all happened. one minute i’m looking for roommates in canada and now tony stark wants to meet me? i’m-” you sighed. “is it okay if we go up to see him now? i don’t even know if i’ll be staying here, wanda. i really don’t know much about this at all. but i would love to see the rest of the compound after, once i find out what this is all about. and if i’m… staying. god, that’s insane, isn’t it?”

wanda opened her mouth to answer, but instead, her eyes caught sight of something behind you. perhaps a bit too late, you turned and realized the door to the gym was opening with you right in the path of impact. the man with the tousled hair, who you had just learned was bucky, was distracted as he dug through his gym bag for a water bottle, and hadn’t bothered to look up as he reached for the door. you could see captain ameri— no, steve— grab his friend’s arm, but a second too late. the door swung open and you were shoved against the side of the wall as the air was knocked out of you.

“fuck,” you muttered, feeling around your body to make sure you hadn’t splintered into pieces and crumbled into dust at the strength of a super-soldier flinging a door onto you.

“holy- i’m so sorry!” to his credit, bucky was quick to abandon his water bottle search and rushed to your side, grabbing your arms with less force than you’d expected from a man who was just trying to beat up captain america, to inspect for bruises or cuts.

“aha,” you panted, having not quite caught your breath or processed the situation. “yeah, no worries! i’m totally fine. uh, it happens to the best of us?”

bucky looked up at you strangely, and suddenly, you caught the gaze of the most startling blue eyes you’d ever seen. his furrowed brows and the crease between them loosened slightly as you tried giving him a reassuring smile. you put your hand on his shoulder, squeezing as if to silently say, “i promise.” his empty, dazed stare goaded a small laugh out of you. bucky swore your laugh was the most wonderful thing he’d ever heard. it wasn’t like bells—the delicate, silver, christmassy ones that men always seemed to love describing girls’ laughs as. no, your laugh was like the bicycle bell his sister, rebecca, used to ring as she rushed past the neighborhood, delivering newspapers. your laugh was like the church bells he’d fallen asleep to in his old brooklyn apartment, on nights when steve was running a fever and he’d look to the sky and pray to the stars that his best friend would be alright. your laugh was like the ship’s bell that pulled him away from his family during the draft, like a new beginning he wasn’t sure if he really wanted but regardless, had no choice in the matter.

unbeknownst to either of you, wanda and steve were exchanging similarly strange looks. “are you seeing this?” wanda mouthed to steve, who nodded, wide eyed. bucky was never one to accept physical touch, especially not from people who he’d just met. he was even wary of steve’s touch. but he didn’t give any sign of moving or indicate discomfort; he didn’t even flinch.

bucky made no effort to move, captivated by the mysterious, smiling stranger he had just assaulted with a door. there was something about you that made his stomach churn. there was something about you that screamed trouble.

“alright, we should probably get going,” wanda announced, grabbing your hand and tugging you to your feet. whatever silent interaction you’d just exchanged with bucky was broken immediately as you both scrambled to stand. from the new position, you finally saw how much taller the two super soldiers were. just over 6 feet, steve and bucky towered over you and wanda. but unlike steve’s welcoming, sunshiney presence, bucky seemed cold and brooding. you didn’t even want to meet their eyes, a little embarrassed to be looking up at them.

“right, yeah, that’s a good idea.” you turned to wanda instead, hoping you could get away from never interacting with the pair ever again after that mortifying introduction. wanda waved goodbye to the supersoldiers cheerfully as you trudged a few steps behind her. bucky watched as you stepped into the elevator, not even realizing he’d done so. steve elbowed bucky teasingly.

“she’s a real bird, isn’t she?” steve laughed at bucky’s rare display of infatuation. “have you got a crush? wondering what it’s like to love her, huh?”

“i- i don’t love her! i literally just met her.”

“i never said you loved her, buck. just saying it looks like you’d want to.”

“shut up, punk.”

❀。• *₊°。 ❀°。❀。• *₊°。 ❀°。

lyric explanation:

rhiannon rings like a bell through the night, and wouldn’t you love to love her?

rhiannon draws attention like a bell’s ring through a quiet night, and one cannot help but fall in love.

takes to the sky like a bird in flight, and who will be her lover?

rhiannon was the goddess of birds; thus, she takes off freely of her own will. however, her flightiness and free spirit prevents her from settling down with one lover.

❀。• *₊°。 ❀°。❀。• *₊°。 ❀°。

comment to be added to my taglist!

series masterlist | main masterlist

#Bucky Barnes #Bucky angst #james buchanan barnes #bucky fic #bucky imagine #bucky barnes x reader #bucky fluff #marvel reader insert #bucky barnes x y/n #bucky barnes x you

[levans44]

Damage Control - Chapter 11

“Package for you, babe.”

Robin’s voice interrupts her little mid-day nap, one that she always takes advantage of during these rare quiet moments around the office.

“Huh?”  

She wipes a small bit of drool from the corner of her mouth as her gaze follows Robin’s finger, which was pointing to the receptionist desk at the front. A manilla folder rests on the marble counter.

"Yeah, been sitting there all afternoon."

She saunters over, waving at Amy sat behind the desk before retrieving the file. On her way back, she frowns, turning the folder over in her hand. Who could have sent her this?

“What is that?” Robin peers over curiously. Then, a devilish grin.

“Another gift from lover boy?”

“No, I don’t think it’s from Harry…”

Eyebrows furrowed, she slowly undos the white string, opening the folder to see a small sticky note stuck to the top of a thick pile of paper.

I added in some details myself, just in case. Hope this helps.

- Best, Steve

After their little lunch date the other day, she had completely forgotten about his SHIELD files. Thankfully, he hadn’t.

The corners of her mouth raise involuntarily as she reads over his note, handwriting surprisingly neat. Straight lines and serious, yet rounded out at the edges, just like him.

“So… who’s it from?”

She slams the file closed a little too quickly, but thankfully her friend doesn’t seem to notice.

“Nothing, just uh… some files Anne needs me to type up.”

“Ugh, boring.” Robin rolls her eyes before reaching for the coat and bag hung from her chair.

“Well, I’m gonna head out. You wanna go grab a drink with me and John?”

“No, I uh…. I’m good, thanks. Should get some of these done before signing off.” She lifts up the file and Robin nods.

“All right, have fun.”

She smiles, waving as Robin makes her way to the elevator.

Though she’s itching to read the file right then and there, she manages to wait until she’s sure that Robin has left before packing up her stuff, gently sliding the folder into her bag before heading out of her office.

“Night, Amy.” She waves on her way to the elevator, before the receptionist’s words stop her dead in her tracks.

“He dropped that off himself, ya know.”

“... what?” She turns, frozen on the spot.

“Yup! Just around noon.” Amy has a bright smile on her face as she nods eagerly.

"Don’t worry though! Most everyone was out for lunch so no one was around to see him.” She quickly adds at the look of remote horror on her face.

She nods slowly, letting out a slow breath.

“… You mean… Ste—” she quickly corrects herself. “—the Captain was here to…”

“Yep.” Amy nods, still obliviously happy.

“Listen, Amy I… I would really appreciate it if you could just keep this a secret between us for a while.”

Amy nods knowingly, miming zipping her mouth and throwing away an invisible key.

“No need to ask.”

She smiles, giving the receptionist a nod. ”Thanks, Ames.”

“‘Course! Have a good weekend.”

“Yeah, you… you too.”

The whole walk back to her apartment, she’s sort of in a daze. Her pace is three times faster than normal, and she holds her bag close to her chest like it’s the most treasured thing in the world. Once she gets home, she takes a lightening shower before heading straight for the fridge, throwing a few containers of leftovers in the microwave. She burns half her hand off trying to dump her hasty dinner onto a plate, before heading straight for her bedroom.

She plops down the plate at her desk, brushing it off to the side as she fishes inside her bag for the file.

She carefully reopens the folder, reading over Steve's note for the third time before carefully sliding the sticky note off the top file. Placing it on the side, next to her dinner, she returns her attention to the stack of paper in front of her.

She holds it up to her desk lamp with a strange reverence, like it should be an artifact displayed at the Smithsonian. Hell, this was probably even better than an artifact.

A never-before-seen copy of Captain America’s personal files, with added hand-written details from the super soldier himself. She tries not to think about how journalists and enemies alike would kill to get their hands on it as her eyes read over the first file—a SHIELD agent review of Steve Rogers.

Some of the information wasn’t new, while others she had learned during the brief time she had gotten to know Steve.

She runs the pad of her index finger across the records on his education.

Auburndale Art School, Brooklyn, NY.

1937-38

Only a year of instruction.

She clears her throat, blinking rapidly as she moves on, turning the page.

The first detail she spots on the next page, to her surprise, makes her laugh out loud.

A faded SHIELD review of pre-serum Steve Rogers contained details about his old weight and height that present-day Steve was quick to edit out. Two black scribbles over the numbers, filled out in dark pencil, with the disgruntled and not-at-all-official label ‘REDACTED’ written next to them. She shakes her head, smiling, always a little surprised at the reminder that Steve Rogers wasn’t always the buff, 6-foot-5 giant she knows him to be now.

She turns the page once again to discover that the rest of his files, unfortunately, aren’t as lighthearted.

The next few sections, though heavily redacted (officially, this time), provided details on Sergeant Buchanan Barnes, exclusively referred to as the ‘Winter Soldier.’ Steve had crossed out any and all parts that used this alias, replacing them with the name BUCKY, scribbled in all caps. Those particular markings looked dated, much older than the notes he had made on the previous page. She figured he had reviewed these files immediately upon SHIELD’s discovery of the Winter Soldier, and made those notes back then. She shook her head, unable to fathom the conflict he must have felt—to resent oneself for the death of their best friend, only to find out they were alive and under HYDRA’s control the entire time.

Between the sections crossed out in pitch black ink, she carefully reads over the details of Steve’s past relationship with Barnes, and is briefly reminded of the polarizing versions of the man during the past two encounters she’s had with him. The small but warm smile he had given her the night of that party, then the cold judgement in his eyes as she walked into the cafe during her meeting with Sam. She knows that, despite SHIELD’s efforts to integrate Agent Barnes into the organization, despite years of training and therapy, many of her coworkers still viewed him as no more than a ticking time bomb. She feels a tinge of guilt at all the times she had concurred with their concerns.

The report flows chronologically to Steve’s ‘fugitive-era,’ when the entire organization had been shook to its very core upon his disappearance, her department included. When everything had changed overnight. She still remembers the speculations running rampant throughout the office after Fury’s alleged assassination, each day bringing a new update about the Captain’s whereabouts.

A dangerous and violent individual, an enemy against SHIELD, Alexandre Pierce had said. All his lies thoroughly shattered in that Helicarrier launch room, when she had sat behind a control panel in the back as a low-level agent for Damage Control alongside Anne. The suffocating fear as Rumlow holds a gun up to an agent’s head. Then, Steve’s voice booming through the overhead speakers, and the air around her transforms. A roomful of SHIELD agents heeding to the mans’ every word, no uncertainty to be found.

Wouldn’t be the first time I broke the rules.

Sure, that was one way to put it all right.

As she continues reading, she leaves small sticky tabs on the side of the file on the details she feels are of particular importance. Soon enough, the short stack of files are littered with a colorful array of tabs, running up and down in all shades of the rainbow.

Not all pages are as report-worthy, of course, though that didn’t make them any less interesting. Those were the pages full of Steve’s doodles, in all pencil, no color. The subjects of his sketches, she’s come to learn, weren’t particularly unique—random patterns on skyscrapers, a steam train, or even just clouds moving across the sky. Yet his portrayal of the most intimate of details were absolutely breathtaking. She honestly believes he could’ve made a good living as an artist, and wonders just what would have been if he had finished his time at art school.

Then, she comes across a series of briefings, under a heading that sends tight knots in her stomach: The Snap.

She’s instantly reminded of the chaos. How her division had shut down completely during the blip—ironically enough, there had simply been too much damage to be controlled.

Depressed, jumping around from job to job with no real anchor or motivation, the snap was undoubtedly the worst period of her life. She didn’t find enough strength in her to help herself, let alone other people. The constant fear and grief around her was suffocating, and she shuddered just at the thought of the years she’d stayed holed up from the dark, empty world outside of her home.

Everyone had lost their families, their friends, their heroes—the Avengers had virtually disbanded since half of its members had disappeared. Those that survived went underground. For good reason, too—most people who had survived the Snap blamed the Avengers for all of their suffering, herself included.

But not Steve.

Turns out, Steve had spent most his time volunteering, leading grief counseling sessions.

She didn’t know that.

She purses her lip, narrowed eyes flitting across the page as she reads over a small  description of Steve’s activity during the Blip.

The Brooklyn Support Group was a support group for survivors of the Snap in New York City. Steve Rogers, as leading counselor for the group, frequently held sessions for family members and relatives of the Vanished. He worked with various local organizations to provide food, shelter, and other essentials to those in need.

Her eyes lift up from the page, strange feeling in her stomach as she lets out a small breath she didn’t know she was holding in.

All this time she thought he had gone into hiding like the rest of the Avengers. Like the rest of the world. Like she had.

Yet he surprises her once again, as he had at the Met exhibit. With every passing page, she realizes she hadn’t really known the first thing about this man.

Every time his enemies had sought to diminish him, when his own organization had turned its back on him, when the entire world had grown resentful of him, he had never lost his footing. Planted himself like a tree and stood his ground.

She finally reaches the last page, featuring a side-by-side of two images: a photo of Steve, taken during a USO tour show, and another one of his hand-drawn sketches.

Clipped to the side is a sketch of a monkey in the Captain America uniform, holding an umbrella in one hand and a shield in the other. Riding a unicycle, balanced precariously over a tight wire. A crowd of people huddles beneath it, looking up.

Her eyes shift over to the photo of Steve, looking strangely younger during his USO tour days, though the serum would have substantially slowed down the effects of aging after he emerged from the ice. Flashing his pearly-whites at the camera as he stands triumphantly over a knocked-out Hitler, hands on his hips, he looked like a youthful, boyish version of the Captain America she knows now.

Nervous glint in his eyes as he flashes a bashful smile at his screaming fans, a little clumsy and awkward in his giant frame, as if still unaccustomed to his new physique. Blue-eyed and fresh-faced, cute angel wings decorating the sides of his cowl.

She peers a little closer, though, and notices the tight lines around his flawless smile. Rigid outlines of his shoulders as the heavy shield hangs from his forearm. He hunches over a little, as if weighed down by the giant white star on his chest, plastered bright and center on his tight uniform.

She takes one look at Steve’s photo, once at his sketch, then closes the file.

Damage Control Masterlist

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