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fortheloveoffanfic · 1 year

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The Holiday Arrangement

Andy Barber x Reader

Author's Note: I have not been even remotely good at getting back to all the love and engagement that this has received, both in the replies and reblogs, but its so appreciated and they've made writing and posting this fic so much more fun! Summary: When co-parenting during the holidays becomes difficult to navigate, Y/n brings a proposal to her ex-husband, Andy; spend Christmas together- for the sake of their daughter. Their already complicated arrangement becomes even more messy new memories dredge up buried feelings. Masterlists Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter Summary: When a trip to see Santa Claus at the mall goes awry, it puts things into perspective for Andy. Warnings- Angst

The next Monday With just three weeks until Christmas, school out and countless people already on vacation, the only mall in the heart of Newton was packed. It didn’t help that Santa was supposed to be there either. They’d done everything right; woken up at seven, left home at eight and had gotten to the mall by nine- before it was even open- and still, it had taken them more than an hour to get a parking spot. It would have appeared that everyone else had the same idea- get there early to beat the crowd.

By the time they’d secured a spot, at least fifteen minutes away from the main entrance, Y/n could tell that Andy was a little miffed- he’d always been a little too impatient to deal with traffic. Though, despite his obvious irritation, he’d kept his cool, never wanting to show his frustration in front of their daughter, who’d been practically bouncing off walls since she’d awoken that morning. To say she was excited about seeing Santa would have been an incredible understatement.

“Can we go see him now?” Were Grace’s first words the minute the trio set foot in the mall, and she looked almost comical as she jumped up and down excitedly while all bundled up in a black parka with forest animal drawings all about it and the faux-fur lined hood pulled over her dark head, almost entirely covering her face.

“We have to line up first,” Y/n explained, dropping to her knees in front of Grace so she could help her take off her purple gloves and unzip the coat to reveal her cute, warm but picture ready outfit underneath; her favorite blue sweater with a woolen owl stitched onto the front and thick leggings. “Then you can see Santa. Got it?”

“Got it!” Grace cheered, still brimming with enthusiasm. Upon standing, Andy took one of Grace’s hands while Y/n took the other, both of them leading her to the escalators that would take them to the upstairs atrium, where Santa was supposed to be.

There was already a line when they got there, with about twenty other kids in front of Grace waiting their turn, and out of the corner of her eyes, Y/n noted the drop of defeat in Andy’s shoulders; each kid had been allotted ten minutes to tell Santa what they wanted and to take a couple pictures which meant that if every child used up their time to the very minute, they’d be looking at least a two hour and forty minute wait. For a man who’s patience was a little as Andrew Barber’s, that was two hours and twenty minutes too many.

“You can walk around or go get coffee or something if the wait is too long,” Y/n offered after about fifteen minutes.

“And miss taking a picture of my little bunny on Santa’s lap? No way,” he chuckled, tapping the pad of his pointer finger to Grace’s nose, making her giggle and grab at his hand. His words prompted a broad grin from Y/n that was hard to fight; a year ago, he wouldn’t have even joined them at the mall, especially if he knew he’d be standing in line for almost three hours so his sudden change of heart was a welcome surprise. She didn’t think Andy noticed the warmth that had gathered in her eyes at his simple profession, and not wanting to chance him seeing it, she turned away for a minute, fixing her gaze on a clothing store to her left.

After ten minutes had passed and they’d only moved one place ahead when Andy’s phone rang loudly, the sound rising above the Christmas carols wafting from the speakers fitted to the ceiling. Glancing at the screen, he grimaced before flashing Y/n and Grace an apologetic look. “Its my boss. I’ll be five minutes- ten tops,” he promised,” letting Grace’s hand in favor of gesturing with his open palm.

“Daddy,” Grace protested with a pout as he started stepping away.

“I’ll be right back,” he offered again, swiping to answer the call, leaving them both standing in line as he started walking a little way up the pathway, probably in search of somewhere quiet to handle whatever his boss wanted him to.

Y/n knew that she shouldn’t have been upset, he’d been completely present up until then and it wasn’t like he could control when his boss called anyway, but she couldn’t help but feel like the phone call was just the beginng. Grace’s doe-eyed look of disappointment didn’t help either. “Daddy’s gonna be right back,” she gave her daughter’s hand a little squeeze. Grace didn’t respond, instead nodding stiffly before starting to pick at the hem of her sweater.

Sighing as they took a step up when the rest of the line did, Y/n fixed her eyes on the direction that Andy had disappeared off to, practically willing him to reappear. The longer he took, the more she worried that the phone call wouldn’t be the end of interruption. She was so preoccupied with manifesting Andy’s reappearance that she hadn’t even noticed the person behind her trying to call her attention until they tapped her shoulder.

“Huh-oh my God,” she grinned upon turning slightly to see who it was. “Peter, hey.” They worked at different departments at the same company; she worked in finance while he was in accounting. Their paths crossed often though, and after word of her divorce had spread among her friends group at work, she had noticed Peter discreetly trying to get closer. He wasn’t very forward with his advances, and while Y/n did think he was sweet and attractive she was grateful for his restraint; she didn’t think she was ready to date yet anyway.

“I didn’t know you had kids,” she glanced at the children he’d brought with him; a little boy about Grace’s age and a toddler on his hip.

“I don’t,” he ducked his head bashfully, allowing a loose, dark curl to fall over his brow, “They’re my sister’s,” he lifted his head again, “This is Jack,” he introduced the boy, “And Mae. She had to work,” he began while Y/n reached out for the little girl’s hand “And their dad’s…..you know,” he shrugged indifferently and the look on his face was enough to tell her that the children’s after, for whatever reason, was out of the picture.

“I see you’re here with my favorite coworker,” setting the younger girl down for a minute, Peter crouched so he could have a couple words with Grace, who he’d first met at their office’s ‘take your child to work day’ earlier that year, another time when he’d come over to fix the kitchen sink and finally a couple other times after he’d driven Y/n home when her car was down- it went without saying that he and Grace were pretty acquainted.

“So,” he leaned in conspiringly, “What’re you gonna ask Santa for?”

“I can’t tell you,” Grace giggled, former mood forgotten, “Its a secret.”

“Oh come on,” he enticed dramatically, “I won’t tell,” he winked.

Slapping her hands to her mouth to hide a broad grin, Grace shook her head, barely containing the loud laughter that slipped past her small fingers. In return, Peter chuckled, “This one’s good at keeping secrets,” he declared as he stood again, picking Mae up so he could resume his hold on Jack’s hand. “This line’s crazy, huh?”

“Yeah,” Y/n agreed, “We’ve been here for about forty minutes,” she sighed, “My feet already killing me,” she chortled quietly, glancing down at her feet clad in swede, heeled boots- probably not the best choice for the day.

Peter laughed too, “Maybe we can grab cocoa after these three get their Santa time?” He suggested, quickly adding, “So you can rest your feet and we can catch up,” even if it had actually only been two days since they’d last seen each other, “They already seem to be getting along,” he threw a glance and Grace and Jack, who’d started playing amongst themselves.

Her smile slipped for a second, Y/n didn’t think Andy would want to join her work friend for cocoa and they’d already planned to take Grace for pizza and then walk around for a bit after lunch anyway, and she was actually quite excited about their plans. “Actually-”

“Hey, sorry I took so long,” before she could turn Peter down, Andy returned, seeming a little frazzled and giving off the impression that he was in a hurry.

“Its fine,” she glanced at him as he touched the top of Grace’s head while looking between her and Peter. “Uh, Andy, you remember Peter?” When he furrowed his brows, she explained further, “From work, you met him at the bar-b-que-”

“Right!” He remembered suddenly, “Peter the accountant,” he put out his hand for a quick, polite shake.

“And you’re Andrew the ex,” he joked lightly, though it didn’t seem to go over well with Andy, who clenched his jaw while retracting his hand. As he did, Andy’s phone beeped and he checked it quickly, letting out what she could only interpret as a frustrated sigh.

“Everything okay?” Y/n probed as he slipped his phone back into his pocket.

“Yeah, no, I just uh…..that was Lynn,” he cleared his throat and the look on his face made her anticipate his next words, “She wants me down at the office.”

Y/n scoffed, trying to keep her cool and maintain appearances in front of her friend, “Right now?”

Andy gestured defeatedly, dropping his arms at his side, “She says one of the legal assistants just got their hands on some surveillance footage and she wants me to go take a look at it.”

“And then do what?” Y/n huffed a dry chuckle, “The courts aren’t open till January.”

Realizing that anything further would lead to an argument in public, Y/n shook her head, “Just go,” she turned away, panning her hardened gaze to the floor more to her right.

She heard Andy sigh heavily, “I’m sorry,” he offered heavily as she blinked away unshed emotion, “I’ll be back for pictures,” he sounded earnest, but Y/n wasn’t prepared to hold her breath waiting for his return. “I gotta go, Bunny,” he offered Grace softly, and through her periphery, she saw him kissing their daughter’s forehead.

“But daddy, you can’t leave yet,” she protested, reaching for his hand. It broke her heart that he was doing it again; letting them down in favor of work. “We haven’t even seen Santa.”

When Y/n focused her attention on Grace and Andy again, he was bending to ruffle her hair as he promised, “I’ll be back before you do.”

“Promise?” She asked, big eyes hopeful.

Briefly, their eyes met, and Y/n hoped the edge in her gaze was enough to stop him from saying what he was going to. “I…..I’ll do my best,” he smiled tightly, giving her another kiss, that time on the cheek. “I’m really sorry,” he mouthed to Y/n before leaving again.

After he was gone, she and Peter stood in awkward silence, and she didn’t have to look at him to know that he was feeling bad for them. Anyone who’d heard the urgency in Andy's voice could tell that he wasn’t going to be back soon, besides it did seem to be a running theme with his work; one thing led to another, and then another. “Y/n, I-”

“You know what?” She straightened her back and shoulders, blinking quickly to clear her vision, “We’d love to get cocoa after this.”

That evening Just as Andy was turning off the stove, he heard a car pull up in front, and grabbing a dish towel off the counter, he hurried over to the living room window, getting to it just in time to see everything unfold. Peter getting out of the driver’s side of a silver Lexus, heading to the back door that faced the house just as Y/n got out of the front passenger seat. She’d texted him a couple hours earlier, when he was just about to leave the office, at first it was just a couple pictures of Grace with Santa Claus but afterwards she’d sent a short message letting him know that Peter would drive them home and she’d meet him there.

The guilt that had washed over him in that moment had been utterly overwhelming.

After Peter had helped Grace out of the car and the doors had been shut, he and Y/n hugged for a little longer than friends usually did and Andy felt a surge of jealousy join his mountain of guilt. It felt like he was watching his replacement move in on his family. Even after Peter had gotten into his car again, it lingered on the curb until Y/n opened the front door, letting Grace in first.

The sound of their footsteps beckoned Andy to the mouth of the hall, where he caught them wiping their feet off on the mat and Y/n helping Grace out of her parka, which was adorned with flecks of white. “Daddy!” She beamed and the minute Y/n took her hat off, Grace bounded towards him, seemingly unbothered by his failure to get back to the mall.

Y/n however was visibly pissed.

Feigning a groan, he lifted Grace off her feet, planting a big kiss on her cheek. His heart swoll a little when she held his face against hers for a moment, and in response, Andy hugged her a little tighter. “How was the mall Bunny?”

“It was great! I got to tell Santa what I wanted, we took pictures then we got cocoa,” and just when he thought she was done, Grace continued exuberantly, “And then we went to the arcade and Peter won me a snowman!”

The mention of him made Andy’s expression falter and he felt a pang in his chest; what kind of man took another someone else's family to the arcade?

The kind that stepped up when a father put everything else before his kid and the woman he claimed to love.

“Yeah?” Grace nodded, asking her mother for her snowman as the three of them entered the kitchen. From a large, brown shopping bag, Y/n produced a stuffed snowman, back bowler hat and red and green scarf making him look like the embodiment of a seasonal tune.

“His name is Fred Frosty!” She declared, offering the toy to Andy.

“Cool, how’d you come up with that?”

“Peter helped,” of course he did. Internally, Andy rolled his eyes; was the man determined to prove himself a better fit?

“Why don’t you go introduce Fred to Mr. Bear?” Y/n suggested when Andy finally set Grace down, and with a vigorous nod, Grace made a beeline for the staircase. As their little one disappeared out of earshot, Y/n moved over to the counter that separated the kitchen from the dining room, setting down her handbag and two shopping bags.

“So Peter,” he broke the silence, letting jealousy get the better of him. He didn’t think it could be helped though; he screws up once and suddenly there’s another man there to fill his shoes.

“Don’t even start with that,” Y/n warned pointedly.

Andy scoffed, “Start with what?”

“‘So Peter’,” she mocked, “You,” she pointed angrily, “Were the one that said he’d be back before pictures. We spent 2 hours in line- I let Peter’s niece and nephew go before us, hoping you’d show up. But then suddenly it's over, another hour is gone and I don’t get as much as a text from you.”

Swallowing thickly, he ran a hand through his hair, “I got caught up-”

“Like you always do,” Y/n interrupted, “Its always work before us- before her.”

“That is not true,” he argued firmly, “Grace is always my first priority, you know that.”

Shaking her head, Y/n licked her lips, “She wasn’t today-”

“If I’d left that footage today, it would have gone to Neal- he would have gotten that case and my promotion,” Andy cut her off, “It’s just one day, she isn’t even upset,” even if he was, that was not the point. “She’s not even gonna remember that I wasn’t there.”

“Exactly, Andy; she’s not going to remember that you weren’t there, because she’s been going to see Santa every year since she was born and you’ve never been there. She’s not going to remember because to her this is normal. But every time you skip out on us for work, that’s another memory that you’re not a part of.” Tugging off her scarf, she made her way to the living room, draping the thick, plaid strip of fabric over the back of the recliner before starting to peel off her long, leather coat, briefly exposing the woolen inside as she did. “And you’re lucky right now you’re still this big hero in her mind,” she gestured widely with the maroon garment held in one hand, “To her, you can do no wrong and as long as you’re around more often than not, you can keep being that for her,” draping the coat over her scarf, Y/n paused, “But when one day, when she grows up and realizes that your job always comes first it is going to break her heart. She’s gonna look back at the pictures from today and remember that you said you’d come back but didn’t,” her voice broke at the end as fury turned to hurt.

At a loss for words as everything she said hit him, Andy half sat against the back of the sofa, hands shoved into his pockets, shoulders hunched forward a little and eyes fixed on the polished hardwood. He hadn’t thought of it like that; Grace was okay now, but one day she might find out that he broke his promises and let his work come first.

Maybe he was everything the divorce papers had made him out to be- the realization hit him like a ton of bricks.

He didn’t know how to talk about his feelings, he didn’t even know how to focus on his family while he was on vacation.

“You’re right,” he elicited softly, hanging his head, “God, you’re so right.” Clasping his fingers together in front of himself, he moistened his lips and shook his head. “Its all my fault, just like you’ve been saying,” he huffed. He’d spent so long telling himself that he didn’t know where it had all gone wrong, that he had done everything he could to keep their marriage together, but the truth was that he hadn’t. Leaving them at the mall wasn’t an isolated incident; for Y/n’s birthday the year before. he'd been late to her party and then on their last Thanksgiving together, he’d let her and Grace go to her parents’ without him. He’d pushed Y/n away every time she got too close and guarded himself against her efforts to help him open up.

The click of her heels on the floor was the only indication of Y/n stepping closer that Andy registered. “You’re a good man, Andy,” she offered, tone as gentle as she reached over to place her smaller hand over his clasped ones, giving his fingers an affectionate squeeze, “I know that, I just want Grace to know that too.”

Andy sighed again, shifting his hands so Y/n’s would be sandwiched between his. “I screwed everything up, Y/n,” he wallowed, finally lifting his head. Unintentionally, their eyes met, hers were a little dim but Andy couldn’t tell if it was with sympathy or something else, but he did know that he hoped she could see the remorse in his. “I’m sorry that I wasn’t the man you two deserved,” he elicited a heavy breath, “I’m sorry that drove you away.”

Y/n frowned and quickly glanced down at their joined hands, though she made no move to separate them. “Its not too late,” she smiled sadly, matching his gaze once more. Her words linger for a moment, sparking an ember of hope in the center of his chest- until she doused it. “For Grace,” she stuttered, “Its not too late for Grace. You know? She still thinks you’re…..a kind, intelligent, compassionate man. Even if you don’t know how to show it.”

He mulled over her words for a minute, “She thinks that?” Y/n nodded and he hesitated before asking, “What else does she think?”

Y/n thought on his question for a moment, “She thinks…..that- she knows that another man isn’t gonna love her the way you do. She knows that….she’s not gonna love another man the way she loves you.”

“Grace?” He probed, knitting his brows.

“Grace,” Y/n reaffirmed, clearing her throat and hastily pulling her hand away. Rubbing her palms anxiously on the sides of her jeans, she explained, clearly flustered, “Cause um….no one loves a little girl like her daddy. And to her you’re irreplaceable,” then, apparently finding her explanation lacking, Y/n added, “Because you’re her father.”

Smiling tightly, he nodded, “I got it.” His heart dropped when Y/n turned away to head upstairs and get Grace ready for dinner; of course it would always mean the world to him that Grace looked up at him, but for a split second, he’d thought that there was still hope for him and Y/n. But she’d made sure to draw a hard line, making it exceedingly clear that any chance of their reconciliation had been taken off the table when they signed the papers.

Tagging: @royalwritersoftheuniverses @patzammit @funfickgirl22 @talesofadragon @what-is-your-plan-today @pono-pura-vida @mdpplgtz03 @shipheart @marvelmenwhore @itschrismasevans @findthebeautyinbreakdowns @bemysugarbean @wintasssoldier @elrw24 @imyourbratzdoll @chasingsnowintheshadows @whiskeytangofoxtrot555 @sarahdonald87

#chris evans #chris evans x you #chris evans x reader #andy barber #andy barber x reader #andy barber x you #cevans #the holiday arrangement

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fineimfaith · 9 months

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okay so i finally finished making my hpma oc

my handwriting's abysmal i'm so sorry 😭

anyways some more info on her:

- she's a beater for quidditch

- her dad's gonçalo flores (a famous chaser)

- (that little detail wasn't fully intentional btw, i realized they had the same surname after i named her and thought why not - he can be her dad)

- that little black streak in her hair is natural --- some dark wizard tried to kill her when she was a baby for a little fun. he used the killing curse ofc, but her uncle jumped in the way and took the hit. a little bit of it still got to her and she was sick for weeks. the doctors had to use some special medicine that, in the end, DID heal her, but also discolored her hair a little

- all she remembers from that is the sickness

- she has a chipped tooth

- her dad's brazilian and her mom's irish. they'd been in a long-distance relationship for two years before gonçalo flew to ireland and they got married. fallon was born nine months after, on december 8th

- she'd be irish-brazilian, but she usually tells people she's irish because she looks the part and 'cause she was born in dublin

- she's usually seen hanging around the freys and cassandra, but she also talks to daniel in potions and ivy in charms/dada

- she likes drawing but sticks to comics with stick figures. sometimes she talks to lottie for a bit of art advice - which is probably her asking the artsy girl if she should put clothes on her stick figures or not

- cassandra is genuinely sick of her, but also isn't, as fallon is "much more competent than a certain set of twins"

- speaking of the twins, fischer constantly dares her to do extremely dangerous things knowing full well she'd do them, and also knowing that she'd probably get herself killed or injured in the process. however, colby and cassandra are usually able to stop her (colby chews out his brother while cass chews out fallon)

- the only times they weren't able to save her are when fischer dared her to have an airborne snowball fight (she fell off her broom and broke her leg), and when fischer dared her to jump off a literal cliff (a hippogriff she'd befriended in care for magical creatures saved her)

- it's a miracle fallon is still alive tbh

- and fischer, too

- you have no idea how angry colby was after that cliff incident

- anyway cassandra and fallon are those two best friends where one pretends they hate the other and the other sees right through it

- colby and fallon usually meet up in the hogwarts library after curfew and read together. fallon provides insight on his poems while colby gives her advice for her little stick-figures

- the advice:

- "you should give them clothes"

- "make mine stab fischer"

- "is that a scarf? it doesn't look like one at all"

- the insight:

- "why are there so many big words?"

- "your handwriting's so messy it's giving me a migraine"

- "change that line right there. why? 'cause my glasses are not cute"

- she has glasses btw

- i mean you probably saw that in the picture but still

- anyway, she tugs on the ends of her scarf when she's happy or excited

- she doesn't just dislike fire, it's one of her biggest fears

- she has a pet barred owl named flingshot

- she calls him flingy for short

- at home she has a pet black cat named loony

-loony's probably older than hogwarts itself but she still loves him to death

- fallon's an avid scorpion lover (she's thought they were cool ever since she was five)

- (why? because a particularly venomous one stung her while she and her mom were visiting her dad in brazil. as she was in her hospital bed she said they were awesome and asked her parents if they could keep the one that stung her as a pet)

- (they said no ofc)

- speaking of her parents, she loves both of them dearly but she's closer to her mom 'cause her dad's usually off playing quidditch in brazil

- they owl each other at least once a week though

- fallon's an only child. not a spoiled one, rather one that would have siblings if she hadn't nearly given her parents heart attacks every other day

- especially after the cliff

- like, her father actually fainted after she heard the news

- her mom, however, owled her saying that she was glad she (fallon) was alive, but to be more careful and to not scare her father like that again

- yeah fallon's mom is pretty used to her shenanigans... she still gets worried, though. just not as worried as fallon's dad, who gets terrified whenever his "little princess" scrapes her knee

okay that's about it

there's probably more but i can't remember anything else soo yeah

anyways bye :)

#hpma #hpma oc #oc #fischer frey #colby frey #frey twins #cassandra vole #daniel page #ivy warrington #lottie turner #gonçalo flores #harry potter magic awakened

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arctimon · 3 years

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The Beta Team That Never Was - Fanfiction Corner (BH6 Edition)

So all of this Peni Parker comic talk actually got me thinking about the process of her being included in my fanfiction.

I wish I could tell you it was a long and arduous process, but...

OK, maybe some of it was hard. But when you have a virtually endless supply of Marvel characters that you can use for possible teammates for Big Hero 6, you have to go with your gut.

We all know that the team will be Robbie, Aspen, Peni, Doreen (eventually), and Kate. But there were six other candidates that could have been in the mix as well.

And five of them have their emblems here:

These were made before I actually knew how to make hero emblems properly.

Some of them you might recognize. Some you may not. But we’re going to go through them all, from left to right.

And to start...it’s really hard to draw tiny hearts.

1.) Riri Williams/Ironheart - Ironically enough, it was around the time that Hiro started chasing Sirque around the town in “Portal Enemy” that I started brainstorming her. A teenage genius, stuck as to what to make, sees “Captain Cutie” and the chase on the news and gets brainstorming.

Thus, the Power Armor is born.

And she gets so excited that she bolts off to San Fransokyo to show her idol what she’s created.

And then, as per the Big Hero 6 Fanfiction Clause states...shenanigans ensue.

It was an interesting possibility, but the thought of Ironheart was really late into me doing the backstories of the people that I had chosen, so she was pushed aside. I don’t personally see me revisiting her in the future, but who knows?

2.) Nadia Van Dyne/The Wasp - Back when Karmi had first been pulled out of SFIT, there was a young woman who wanted to recruit her into a special organization. It was one that brought together the greatest female minds in their fields, and Karmi was on said recruitment list.

The organization?

Genius In action Research Labs, or G.I.R.L. for short. And it was led by the Wasp’s daughter, Nadia Pym (later changed to Nadia Van Dyne).

Plot-wise, this was probably the person that I got the farthest with, since the story would’ve been more of a focus on Karmi than anyone else. Also, the idea of writing someone with Bipolar Disorder (which Nadia was confirmed to have in her latest solo run) was intriguing if nothing else.

Unfortunately, it sort of dried up from there. A lack of a central conflict, uncertainty as to how many of the other girls (Taina, Priya, Shay, and Ying) to have, and how to handle her actual powers stopped it cold.

But seriously, how do you write in the ability to shrink to microscopic size? That’s not really a thing, even in a world as futuristic as San Fransokyo.

3.) America Chavez/Ms. America - The mere idea of a Superman-esque Latina teenager was enticing, especially because America, in her relatively short comic history, was with the Ultimates and the West Coast Avengers (meaning there was a possible Kate/Hawkeye angle). Making start-shaped portals was the Silent Sparrow angle, and the all-around badass, headstrong attitude would be the counter to Honey Lemon’s more nurturing personality.

But being from an alternate universe (which has very recently been retconned in the comics in part because she will be appearing in the MCU and Doctor Strange 2), no real villain to play off of, and becoming possibly way too overpowered for the BH6 universe, she was scrapped.

It’s quite a shame. I really like her in the comics that she’s in. Perhaps there will be an opportunity for her somewhere down the line...

4.) Alison Blaire/Dazzler - A pop star with light-based powers?

Or better yet, a struggling artist with acoustikinesis?

Her power to convert sound into light was what originally drew me to her. Something that could be made into a technological ability, unique enough to put a (pardon the pun) spotlight on it.

An actual blonde instead of whatever HL’s hair color is.

Heck, she even has a half-sister named Lois that could have been the antagonist (death tough, destruction waves, and the like).

But she quickly got lost in the fold. Better ideas (like Kate and Doreen) got more of my brainstorming, and she was eventually given up on.

But funnily enough...

It’s almost like she’s already in the show.

(See, for the people who may be new, one of the many Marvel theories that I’ve touched upon is that High Voltage is actually this universe’s version of Dazzler. Juniper is Alison and Barb is...well...Barbara London, Alison’s mom).

Hey, @baymaksu totally agrees with me kinda sort of.

5.) Cindy Moon/Silk - I knew right from the get-go that I wanted a Spider-person on the beta team. I also knew that I didn’t want Peter.

No offense to Peter Parker. He’s fine. But there’s a billion other Spiders out there, and I wanted someone out of the normal vein of Peter, as well as even Miles and Gwen.

And in came Cindy.

Locked away in The Bunker because of her spider powers manifesting, she was eventually released by Peter and thus began her entrance into the main Marvel world.

Her “unique ability” is her improved Spider-Sense, which Peter has said is even better than his own. That, plus her other powers, brought her the closest out of anyone to being a member of the Big Hero 6 Beta Team.

As we all know, however, Peni ended up getting the spot over Cindy (for the family angle with Hiro and the giant robot that she pilots). On the other hand, Cindy would later make her debut in the stinger of the last chapter of Along Came The S.P.I.D.E.R., along with Miles, Anya, and Joey.

Unlike Riri, Nadia, America, and Alison, Cindy and the rest of Peni’s little Spider Society are going to be showing up in future stories. And if I can get everything in order, they will be starring in their own story set in the Big Hero 6 universe.

Finally, I have no emblem for them, but the honorable mention goes to...

6.) Lunella Lafayette/Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur - Yes, there was a point in time where I was seriously considering putting a nine-year-old super genius and a giant red T-rex into my stories.

Ignoring the giant...”red flag” here, the reason why Luna never made it is the same reason why I haven’t put Rishi in anything yet. It’s because I don’t really know what to do with supergeniuses that young. Hiro is at least a teenager and thus has teenager-y problems to fall back on (like puberty and Karmi and all that jazz), but a nine-year-old? That’s a little too extreme for me.

When I was nine, I was busy playing with sticks in my backyard with my brother, not solving unsolvable puzzles from Bruce Banner.

...All that, and the giant dinosaur.

But hey, at least Disney is jumping on the MG/DD train. That’s good to see.

Crossover potential, perhaps?

P.S. - As I was finishing putting this post together, it occurred to me that I may get this possible question in the comments, so I’m going to head it off at the pass.

“You know that all of your possible superheroes are girls, right?”

First of all...sexist.

Second of all...true.

That was about 90% on accident. The actual team (Robbie, Aspen, Peni, Doreen, and Kate) has only one guy on it (two if you count Eli, three if you count Tippy-Toe).

I don’t really have a good explanation for that. I like all superheroes, but I think that the girl and woman superheroes need some spotlight, you know? I could have pulled people like Namor or Miles or the male Hawkeye into the mix, but to be honest, I find the characters I chose more interesting than a lot of the guy characters I was contemplating.

Of course, nothing is stopping any of you from using those characters in your stories. Be my guest, not that you really need my permission or anything.

But you can’t take Aspen. Aspen is mine. (Spoiler: Aspen is not mine.)

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ladyloveandjustice · 4 years

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Belated Spring 2020 Anime Overview: My Next Life as Villainess

For the Spring 2020 anime season, I mostly watched continuations of shows I was already into. The one new show I did pick up was My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!

My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! follows Katerina Claes, a spoiled young noble girl deviously scheming to win the heart of a prince- oh wait, never mind, she hit her head and remembered her past life! Turns out she’s an eighteen year old Japanese otaku chick who died and got reincarnated as the villainess in her favorite otome game.

If you don’t feel like reading the wiki article, an otome game is basically a female- targeted dating sim where you play as a blank slate main character and date a bunch of pretty boys (and sometimes girls, but usually only if you go outside the mainstream ones), unlocking their backstories and collecting all the romantic endings.

Having played this game, Katarina is well aware that the Villainess character- who constantly tries to interfere with the game’s heroine and whichever boy she’s pursuing- is either exiled or killed in all of the games endings. And now she IS that villainess, living in the world of the game and all its characters! Does that mean she’s doomed to a horrible fate? What’s a girl to do?

Well, if you’re Katarina, what you do is be supportive and kind to the people around you and in doing so accidentally get every single character in the game to fall in love with you. And yes, this includes all the boys the heroine is supposed to date, the other female romantic rivals the heroine is faced with and the game’s heroine herself.

That’s right, we finally got us some bisexual romantic comedy hijinx last anime season, my friends! My Next Life as a Villainess was the delightful little show I really escaped into during these anxious pandemic times . All these girls casually falling in love with Katarina without it being treated as ‘weird’ was what particularly drew me to this show and warmed my gay little heart to see. It was honestly the perfect fluffy, low stress watch during these high stress times.

Anime has long been oversaturated with ‘harem’ stories- where a usually unwitting protagonist somehow gets a bevy of beauties in love with them- but it’s still unfortunately really unusual to see bisexual harems, especially ones with a girl at the center, so right away there’s a big draw to this story that helps it stick out from the rest. (And worry not, the story is largely focused on Katarina having fun with these pals-who-are-not-so-secretly-in-love-with-her, rather than having a ton the dubious shenanigans you see in more sexually charged tales.)

Harem protoganists also famously tend to have the personality of potatoes, being so painfully bland it’s unclear why so many people would fall in love with them in the first place. But that definitely not the case for Katarina. She’s brash, ridiculous, kind and INCREDIBLY dense, and that for a pretty dynamic combination in this setting! She does genuinely come off as a fun person to be around. Unlike a lot of modern isekai shows, she doesn’t stumble into having incredible magic powers or skills, so her compassion is genuinely her greatest strength and what saves the day and wins hearts time and time again.

Katarina’s five brain cells doing their weekly check-in

(The moment she won my heart was when she responded to a tragic Frozen style situation with her friend locking himself away from people because he believed his magic was dangerous by taking an axe to his door. My kinda girl!)

The premise also allows for some plausible built-in reasons for the characters to take such special notice of Katarina- having been raised in a different world, she isn’t beholden to all the social rules, class divisions and noble family drama all the other kids in this very specific midevial-esque fantasy world are so embroiled in. This combined with her naturally earnest, accepting and straightfoward nature means she’s able to cross boundaries and reach out to them in a way they aren’t accustomed to. She was significant in each character’s life because she genuinely was the first to show them acceptance and affection without pretense, if only because she isn’t even aware there was supposed to be a pretense.

Katarina’s focus on trying not to die and her fear she’s going to meet the same fate as the villainess in the game also at least gives some kind of a basis to her comical obliviousness to everyone being in love with her. She assumes that everyone has to be into Maria (the heroine) and terrified of her because that’s how the game GOES okay, that’s CANON! Of course, this logic stretches thin as time goes on and it would be abundantly clear to most people that things have diverged greatly from the game’s storyline, but the show makes it clear that Katarina’s determined, one track mind is as much a gift as a curse.

Her bullheadedness when it comes to picking up how everyone REALLY feels about her is an intentional gag on the show’s part and even her love interests are well aware of what a colossal dumbass she is and not afraid to point it out!

My Next Life as a Villainess isn’t without its flaws, and the personalities/backstories of some of the ‘love interests’ Katarina gathers may be a stumbling block on some- mostly the male ones. Geordo, “the black hearted prince” has a bit of the “ possessive shoujo bad boy” archetype about him, and though he’s far from the worst that genre of love interest has to offer (there’s not much bad he can get up to due to Katarina’s obliviousness, the lighthearted nature of the show, and his rivals constantly getting in his way), the way he refuses to break Katarina and his engagement off despite her repeatedly asking him to, as well as some of his lines here and there, are definitely NOT cute.

Keith is Katarina’s adopted brother, but clearly has a thing for her too. On one hand, they only first met when they were nine and he fell for her pretty immediately. On the other hand, he still refers to her as “sister” constantly which is kinda eesh.

The other two guys are all right- Nicol’s big thing is he’s inexpressive and doesn’t talk much which, considering show doesn’t spend much time inside his head, doesn’t make him a very interesting character in the ensemble (maybe he comes across better in the novels) but there’s nothing wrong with him. Alan is undoubtedly the Best Boy in my book. He’s another common trope- rambunctious and competitive with Katarina but clearly soft for her- but he’s done well and they have a lot of cute moments together.

I find the girl love interests to be a much more interesting group overall, though this may be my obvious bias talking. Sophia has the strongest connection to Katarina, their backstories being intertwined in a surprising and touching way (I’m told in the novels her affection for Katarina was treated as more platonic, but the anime definitely plays it up as having romantic elements). Maria’s original role as the game’s heroine puts her in the most interesting position (and would make her the most narratively satisfying choice of love interest, if the show was actually interested in choosing). And while Mary is comically tenacious in her pursuit of Katarina, she’s doesn’t ever act ‘sinister’ or overstep boundaries in the way Geordo does, her “scheming” only really amounting to straightforwardly asking if Katarina wants to ditch her fiance and run away with her.

As I mentioned, one thing that really contributes to My Next Life as a Villainess being a relaxing watch is that the queer characters are treated with casual acceptance. Mary in particular isn’t subtle about her crush on Katarina, but nobody bats an eye at her and she’s completely open and comfortable with herself too. The observing maid notes that the girls are in love with Katarina with the same bland affect as when she notes she notes the guys are. And while the social practices of the nobles are pretty heteronormative- girls are always engaged in arranged marriages to guys, the guys are expected to dance with the girls (something Mary complains about!)- there’s apparently a booming queer romance novel industry that inspires our young wlw.

Katarina, having grown up in a different world, seems to be the one most prone to heteronormativity of her group. She never really considers that a girl would ever fall in love with her, but is also never hostile to the idea. It’s telling that when Mary very clearly indicates her desired romantic partner would be a girl, Katarina’s the only one that gets tripped up and has to walk back her assumption that Mary would be talking about a guy.

Mary LAYING DOWN THE LAW

Also, Katarina has SEVERAL “she’s so cute! My heart is beating faster!” moments with the other girls, on par in frequency with her moments with the guys. This strongly hints she’s an oblivious bisexual disaster.

So, My Next Life as Villainess is a fun, frothy watch and the rare positive example of silly wish-fufillment that’s inclusive to a wlw audience. But is the actual plot good, or remotely complex? The answer to that is no, the plot is fairly predictable and one definitely shouldn’t got into this story expecting a deep examination of the nature of fate or anything like that.There’s no real explanation of big reason as to why why Katarina was reborn into this game world and so on.

The antagonist that does eventually emerge plays off otome game tropes a bit, but ultimately isn’t that interesting or built up all that well. . The attempts at drama the show makes towards the end fall a little flat, especially since it tends to rely on very-late-in-the-game-exposition-dumps (dark magic isn’t even MENTIONED as existing in this world until like, the second to last episode where it becomes relevant and we get a vague infodump explaining its mechanics). The conflict honestly almost feels shoehorned in and the climax is pretty standard and doesn’t really utilize the big cast of characters all that well

But in the end, that’s okay! The show makes it abundantly clear from the beginning it’s not here to be Deep, but to be some silly fun. And it really fulfills that purpose well, from it’s catchy, peppy theme tune to its consistently warm tone. It MAY get repetitive at times for some, and I do have some quibbles- like how I found the childhood segments to be some of the shows best material and wish we could have stayed in that section for a bit instead of rushing through it, how I wish Katarina had kept her cute little scar, etc- but overall, it was definitely the soothing balm I needed during a very rough time and I absolutely recommend it if you’re looking for a chill, feel-good watch.

And hey, a second season’s supposed to be on the way too, so there’s something to potentially look forward to!

#my next life as a villainess #my next life as a villianess all routes lead to doom #destruction flag otome #otome gemu no hametsu furagu shika nai akuyaku reijo ni tensei shiteshimatta #anime overview #katarina claes #catarina claes #my reviews #spring 2020 anime

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frecklystars · 3 years

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hi hi!! i want to ask, how did you start self shipping? like, seriously started drawing art of yourself and fo's and really began indulging in it? and um, do new fos just kind of happen? the reason i'm asking is that i want to try it out, but i don't know where to start or how to start or anything ><

Hello, hello! :D

Good news!! There are no rules!! There's no "set" way of approaching self shipping! It's all your own world and your own pace!

Everyone is different! There's a lot of people in this community who only started recently because they thought it looked fun. Some people have done it since they were little, others have self shipped for a few years. For me, personally, I've been self shipping ever since I could hold a pencil. I think the first time I ever drew me befriending a fictional character was when I drew myself as a mermaid holding hands with Spongebob and jellyfishing. I think I was like... three or four years old. And when I was nine, I started getting more serious about it, making traditional comics, and then I was twelve when I started doing a lot of digital artwork... you get the idea, it's been a long time for me!! I didn't start blogging about it until 2018, though :]

New F/Os just kinda happen, yeah! For me, at least. It's like a new falling star that just randomly lands in your pocket and you think "oh heck yeah, score!!" Again, it's different for everyone. I have over 300 F/Os from the last decade. Sometimes I see a character and I'm immediately thinking "oh! you! I love you! I wanna draw myself with you ASAP!! I wanna write a thousand fics about us together!! I love you I love you I love youuu!!!" and then there are other characters that took me a few days or even a few weeks to really warm up to the idea. A few characters I'll look at for a couple seconds, think "oh yeah, you, I want you", draw them w/ me once or twice, and then I'll throw them onto my ever-expanding F/O pile and literally never make content of them ever again.

And I even have some F/Os from media that I've known for years, but I didn't even consider them as a F/O until wayyyy later on. F/Os are random, it just kinda happens. The heart wants what the heart wants. You'll know 'em when you see 'em!!

If you don't know where/how to start, I can recommend a few things:

Self shipping isn't reserved for just romantic interactions! There's lots of platonic and even familial ships out there. You can start by finding a character you'd want to be friends with, and seeing where it goes from there!

Know your self insert. You don't have to make anything complicated or do any intense world-building. Nothing is really "necessary" to make a self insert. My SBTMsona has almost zero info on her, I just... draw myself in a poofy jellyfish dress, and bam, there she is! Do I know where she lives? Do I know how she meets everyone in Bikini Bottom? Absolutely not, my head is empty, I have no thoughts. My TFP self insert, however, is suuuuper detailed and I've jumped through rings of fire for the last two years just to get her to perfectly fit into my transformers stories. Everyone approaches things differently, you just do what feels right for you! :D

Drawing is my main go-to when it comes to creating content. Whether you identify as an artist or not, if you're comfortable with it, try experimenting with a doodle, even if it's just a small scribble on a little sticky-note page.

On the same note as doodling, if you're stuck on what to draw, you can always take a screenshot of your F/O (if they're in a TV show/movie/video game/webcomic) and draw yourself standing next to them in that scene. It's a fun warm-up exercise, and it gets the creative juices flowing - you get to imagine what you'd do if you were a part of the scene! How you'd interact with your favorite characters, what you'd say, how they'd react to you; it's really fun and I highly recommend it.

Writing is fun too!! I don't write as often as I draw, but I still love doing it. You can write a small paragraph of you and your F/O(s) together! You can take a scene that your F/O is canonically in, and rewrite the scene, word for word, while inserting yourself into it and seeing how it feels.

You can make moodboards of your F/O!! You can make gifsets of your favorite scenes, or (if they're from a book series) one of those web-string aesthetic posts of all of your favorite quotes!

You can make a playlist of songs that remind you of them, songs that have their vibe, songs you think they'd listen/dance to... songs that you think would even remind them of you!!

If you need more ideas, if you search up the tag "F/O imagines" or "self ship imagines" in the tumblr search bar, there's thouuuusands of "imagine your F/O" scenarios in there that you can work with!

If you're comfortable with it, you can also make your own self shipping blog, and reblog content of your F/Os, or post your own thoughts about them! I have a tag on my blog, #love notes, I have it reserved for times when I wanna take screenshots of my F/Os and gush about how much I love them. It's like your own personal space to freely explore self shipping. You're not obligated to create content of you and your ships, and you don't have to share any info or talk about them unless if you absolutely want to! you're free to do whatever you want :D

Some people take self shipping into these great big levels, where they rewrite the entire universe to fit themselves into it (woo, I've done this). Others don't really indulge that way, rather they simply draw/write themselves with the F/O and say "yeah, I love this character, this is us holding hands", with no additional work (I have also done this). Some people don't make content at all, they just like to daydream and yearn (which I have totally done), and that's cool too!!

Another thing! OCs!! Lots of people feel more comfortable making OCs to ship with their F/Os, instead of shipping themselves. That's also an option! There's also a lot of ppl out there who don't have any F/Os from any canon media, but rather they just make their own OCs to self ship with, which is totally cool and valid!!

I'm sorry this got so long slkdfdsf but yes, I hope any of this helped!! The most important thing is to remember to have fun!! Self shipping is all about making yourself happy, and allowing yourself to feel loved by the characters you adore 🥰💖💕

#i hope this answered your questions :D #im sorry i didnt proofread any of this i regurgitated my thots and hit post #asks #anonymous #self insert asks

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dana-chan-the-control-brain · 3 years

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Hey, do you have anymore thoughts on Membrane's parents? I know we only got a brief glimpse of them, but they're so interesting yet there's so little fan content about them. That, or I'm looking in the wrong place haha.

Ps. If I am looking in the wrong tags or place could you please direct me to the right ones?

Ah, I talked a little bit about Membrane’s parents here during my first ramblings of the quarterly and I did talk a little about that headcanon here but I might as well repeat it again.

Like I do find it interesting, the idea that his parents are scientists. Like Membrane tried following in his parents’ footsteps and unintentionally put that pressure onto Dib as he grew up... but for me personally, there’s just a lot of reasons this doesn’t make sense.

Like Why is adult Professor Membrane the brand and face of Membrane Labs and Membrane Enterprises when it was apparently a company he inherited from his parents? Of course, it could be that Membrane did make Membrane Labs himself and his parents were just scientists and Membrane Labs wasn’t really founded, but that makes less sense.

I always kinda viewed Membrane as someone who appreciated the value and effort of hard work ethic and built everything from the ground up with his bare hands and became the World Famous Man of Science all his own and it was his Legacy. Kinda like Scroodge McDuck and his fortune. Making Membrane inherit a company from his parents kinda loses a bit for me for him as a character.

Why did his Parents give him socks for Christmas and claim it was from Santa? They know what Uranium238 is. I’m certain of that. It could have been a Christmas Story situation like “you’ll shoot your eye out kid” but Santa is the one who gives their kids the “cool gifts” I thought every parents knew that. It’s just one of those unspoken rules...... but like... to give him socks...

Like were they really that cruel? It’s kinda hard to say... But it does kinda paint a bad image that they did have 100% the capabilities to give him what he wanted for Christmas... and they never bothered to explain to Membrane WHY he was given socks.

LIKE LOOK, THESE TWO FUCKS LEAVE MEMBRANE IN THE DARK FOR YEARS ABOUT THE TRUTH OF SANTA CLAUS JUST CAUSE THEY DON’T WANT TO ADMIT THEY FUCKED UP, EVEN WHEN HE PROBABLY WENT TO FAR:

I can only assume that these two science parents are dead, just from how Membrane regards them when he holds that photoframe...(and the fact that we never see them) but honestly, they were probably still around when he was a teenager and still dedicating a portion of his life to destroying santa...

I know Membrane is as thick-headed and stubborn as Dib, so maybe they tried to explain it to him, and Membrane didn’t listen, or his parents suck at explaining things... but like.... come on... it’s your direct responsibility for unleashing this childhood santa trauma/rage.... You owe it to Membrane to be direct with him...

But then again, Dib never listens when his Dad tries to explain what he thinks about Aliens, Cause Membrane doesn’t Not believe in aliens. He in fact says so in the show.

So perhaps they were and he just didn’t listen... there’s that...

Why is this family so obsessed with seeking the truth, but don’t listen to anyone’s opinions who are different from their own.... sigh this family.

But in any point, they could have at least said why they can’t give him Uranium238... but if they do, it’s off-screen and no further context is provided to the audience...

It just makes sense for me that either Membrane’s family is poor, or they didn’t know what Uranium238 is... Making his Parents be scientists as well just throws a whole bunch of questions about just.... everything about this situation. It really makes me ask:

“Did his parents not give it to him because it was dangerous?”

“Or did they give him socks cause they were that unaware of what their son wanted?”

“Did they just give him socks cause they were that cruel as Membrane didn’t want to believe?”

“If so, why socks? Why not a rocket ship or a science playset or baking volcano kit or something?”

It just raises a whole lot more questions.

A more simple explanation that gets rid of those questionable morale questions is that his Parents were poor from a humble upbringing and could only afford him socks for Christmas. It’s a more logical and simple explanation and it’s far more cleaner than having his parents be scientists in this.

Another thing that bothers me is Membrane’s “childhood home” in general. Look at this place:

This huge place, with a giant rocket ship, dressed to the nines in Christmas decorations.

It also very clearly shows the interior.

We see the living room couch, and multiple Christmas trees and this huge rocketship/missle thing front and center.

And if we compare it to Membrane’s childhood home in the Invader Zim episode this is supposed to be taking place in:

Now I know that the Invader Zim show has a darker color palate than the comics and even the Netflix movie, but I’m not talking about colors here...

A smaller tree that practically touches the ceiling, Fluorescent overhead lighting, something that looks like a couch or a side table with noticeable stains on it... garland pinned to the walls with a lower ceiling...

This looks NOTHING at all like how Membrane’s “childhood home” is like in the comics...

This is obviously not a wealthy home, or the home of a respected enterprise as shown in the comics.

Now, I know this franchise has a thing for inconsistencies. Canon is basically non-canon. There is no continuity, and there is no continuous timeline of events... but to model Professor Membrane’s childhood home so vastly different from this brief flash in the show, that’s a pretty big one...

So me and @paketdimensioncomic made a theory that can kind of coincide with our fics...

We think that

SUPER PERFECT SCIENTIST PARENTS..... are what Membrane wishes his parents were probably like.

And that he lied to the press about his humble origins and upbringing. He didn’t want them to know that he grew up poor because it would be something constantly brought into question everytime he posed everything... He didn’t want his parents talked about in the media at all, especially if they were passed by the time he became successful.

So... I think Membrane’s scientist parents are an elaborate lie. He told the press. I mean, He is a scientist, he always wanted to be a scientist, he is good at being a scientist and both of his parents were scientists...

I mean... He didn’t seem too concerned about the photo of his supposed parents.. he even threw it to the wall when his son called:

RIP parents.... he hardly knew you.

Do I think the Membrane Science Grandparents have a cool design and I want to see more fan content on them? Absolutely! Go nuts!

Do I think that Membrane’s parents being scientists makes little to no sense and was just kinda made for the sake of a dumb joke without giving too much thought about how it would lessen Membrane as a character if he were just leaching off his parent's success this whole time? And does it poke a lot of holes in the idea of why his parents gave him socks as santa at all? Absolutely.

I think it’s far more likely that Membrane built up this backstory of “I was always a scientist since birth” to the press and has more fake photoshopped photos around the house to show the press when the topic of his parents actually come up.

Basically, the fandom has been around for a long time you can do what you want with Membrane parent theories because as far as I’m concerned, I always appreciated the vibe of “Poor upbringing Membrane who learned the value of hard work and unintentionally became a workaholic because of it and really put too much value in work to the point he’s unintentionally neglectful towards his own offspring the same as his father was to him”

Rather then.... “Science parents go brrr”

But again, just my headcanon.

And I always love people drawing the science parents.

But @esthyradler‘s Farmer Membrane Parents are definitely my favorites.

#Invader Zim #Invader Zim Quarterly #Professor Membrane #Membrane's Parents #danachan's rants #danachan's headcanons

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ladydarklord · 3 years

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The Mighty Boosh on the business of being silly

The Times, November 15 2008

What began as a cult cocktail of daft poems, surreal characters and fantastical storylines has turned into the comedy juggernaut that is the Mighty Boosh. Janice Turner hangs out with creators Noel Fielding, Julian Barratt and the extended Boosh family to discuss the serious business of being silly

In the thin drizzle of a Monday night in Sheffield, a crowd of young women are waiting for the Mighty Boosh or, more precisely, one half of it. Big-boned Yorkshire lasses, jacketless and unshivering despite the autumn nip, they look ready to devour the object of their desire, the fey, androgynous Noel Fielding, if he puts a lamé boot outside the stage door. “Ooh, I do love a man in eyeliner,” sighs Natalie from Rotherham. She’ll be throwing sickies at work to see the Boosh show 13 times on their tour, plus attend the Boosh after-show parties and Boosh book signings. “My life is dead dull without them,” she says.

Nearby, mobiles primed, a pair of sixth-formers trade favourite Boosh lines. “What is your name?” asks Jessica. “I go by many names, sir,” Victoria replies portentously. A prison warden called Davena survives long days with high-security villains intoning, “It’s an outrage!” in the gravelly voice of Boosh character Tony Harrison, a being whose head is a testicle.

Apart from Fielding, what they all love most about the Boosh is that half their mates don’t get it. They see a bloke in a gorilla suit, a shaman called Naboo, silly rhymes about soup, stories involving shipwrecked men seducing coconuts “and they’re like, ‘This is bloody rubbish,’” says Jessica. “So you feel special because you do get it. You’re part of a club.”

Except the Mighty Boosh club is now more like a movement. What began as an Edinburgh fringe show starring Fielding and his partner Julian Barratt and later became an obscure BBC3 series has grown into a box-set flogging, mega-merchandising, 80-date touring Boosh inc. There was a Boosh festival last summer, now talk of a Boosh movie and Boosh in America. An impasse seems to have been reached: either the Boosh will expand globally or, like other mass comedy cults before it – Vic and Bob, Newman and Baddiel – slowly begin to deflate.

But for the moment, the fans still wait in the rain for heroes who’ve already left the building. I find the Boosh gang gathered in their hotel bar, high on post-gig adrenalin. Barratt, blokishly handsome with his ring-master moustache, if a tad paunchy these days, blends in with the crew. But Fielding is never truly “off”. All day he has been channelling A Clockwork Orange in thick black eyeliner (now smudged into panda rings) and a bowler hat, which he wears with polka-dot leggings, gold boots and a long, neon-green fur-collared PVC trenchcoat. He has, as those women outside put it, “something about him”: a carefully-wrought rock-god danger mixed with an amiable sweetness. Sexy yet approachable. Which is why, perched on a barstool, is a great slab of security called Danny.

“He stops people getting in our faces,” says Fielding. “He does massive stars like P. Diddy and Madonna and he says that considering how we’re viewed in the media as a cult phenomenon, we get much more attention in the street than, say, Girls Aloud. Danny says we’re on the same level as Russell Brand, who can’t walk from the door to the car without ten people speaking to him.”

This barometer of fame appears to fascinate and thrill Fielding. Although he complains he can’t eat dinner with his girlfriend (Dee Plume from the band Robots in Disguise) unmolested, he parties hard and publicly with paparazzi-magnets like Courtney Love and Amy Winehouse. He claims he’s tried wearing a baseball cap but fans still recognise him. Hearing this, Julian Barratt smiles wryly: “Noel is never going to dress down.”

It is clear on meeting them that their Boosh characters Vince Noir (Fielding), the narcissistic extrovert, and Howard Moon (Barratt), the serious, socially awkward jazz obsessive, are comic exaggerations of their own personalities. At the afternoon photo shoot, Fielding breaks free of the hair and make-up lady, sprays most of a can of Elnett on to his Bolan feather-cut and teases it to his satisfaction. Very Vince. “It is an art-life crossover,” says Barratt.

At 40, five years older than Fielding, Barratt exhibits the profound weariness of a man trying to balance a five-month national tour with new-fatherhood. After every Saturday night show he returns home to his 18-month-old twins, Arthur and Walter, and his partner Julia Davis (the creator-star of Nighty Night) and today he was up at 5am pushing a pram on Hampstead Heath before taking the train north to rejoin the Boosh. “I go back so the boys remember who I am. But it’s harder to leave them every time,” he says. “It is totally schizophrenic, totally opposite mental states: all this self-obsession and then them.”

About two nights a week on tour, Fielding doesn’t go to bed, parties through the night and performs the next evening having not slept at all. Barratt often retreats to his room to plough through box sets of The Wire. “It’s a bit gritty, but that is in itself an escape, because what we do is so fantastical.”

But mostly it is hard to resist the instant party provided by a large cast, crew and band. Indeed, drinking with them, it appears Fielding and Barratt are but the most famous members of a close collective of artists, musicians and old mates. Fielding’s brother Michael, who previously worked in a bowling alley, plays Naboo the shaman. “He is late every single day,” complains Noel. “He’s mad and useless, but I’m quite protective of him, quite parental.” Michael is always arguing with Bollo the gorilla, aka Fielding’s best mate, Dave Brown, a graphic artist relieved to remove his costume – “It’s so hot in there I fear I may never father children” – to design the Boosh book. One of the lighting crew worked as male nanny to Barratt’s twins and was in Michael’s class at school: “The first time I met you,” he says to Noel, “you gave me a dead arm.” “You were 9,” Fielding replies. “And you were messing with my stuff.”

This gang aren’t hangers-on but the wellspring of the Boosh’s originality and its strange, homespun, degree-show aesthetic: a character called Mr Susan is made out of chamois leathers, the Hitcher has a giant Polo Mint for an eye. When they need a tour poster they ignore the promoter’s suggestions and call in their old mate, Nige.

Fielding and Barratt met ten years ago at a comedy night in a North London pub. The former had just left Croydon Art College, the latter had dropped out of an American Studies degree at Reading to try stand-up, although he was so terrified at his first gig that he ran off stage and had to be dragged back by the compere.

While superficially different, their childhoods have a common theme: both had artistic, bohemian parents who exercised benign neglect. Fielding’s folks were only 17 when he was born: “They were just kids really. Hippies. Though more into Black Sabbath and Led Zep. There were lots of parties and crazy times. They loved dressing up. And there was a big gap between me and my brother – about nine years – so I was an only child for a long time, hanging out with them, lots of weird stuff going on.

“The great thing about my mum and dad is they let me do anything I wanted as a kid as long as I wasn’t misbehaving. I could eat and go to bed when I liked. I used to spend a lot of time drawing and painting and reading. In my own world, I guess.”

Growing up in Mitcham, South London, his father was a postmaster, while his mother now works for the Home Office. Work was merely the means to fund a good time. “When your dad is into David Bowie, how do you rebel against that? You can’t really. They come to all the gigs. They’ve been in America for the past three weeks. I’m ringing my mum really excited because we’re hanging out with Jim Sheridan, who directed In the Name of the Father, and the Edge from U2, and she said, ‘We’re hanging with Jack White,’ whom they met through a friend of mine. Trumped again!”

Barratt’s father was a Leeds art teacher, his mother an artist later turned businesswoman. “Dad was a bit more strict and academic. Mum would let me do anything I wanted, didn’t mind whether I went to school.” Through his father he became obsessed with Monty Python, went to jazz and Spike Milligan gigs, learnt about sex from his dad’s leatherbound volumes of Penthouse.

Barratt joined bands and assumed he would become a musician (he does all the Boosh’s musical arrangements); Fielding hoped to become an artist (he designed the Boosh book cover and throughout our interview sketches obsessively). Instead they threw their talents into comedy. Barratt: “It is a great means of getting your ideas over instantly.” Fielding: “Yes, it is quite punk in that way.”

Their 1998 Edinburgh Fringe show called The Mighty Boosh was named, obscurely, after a friend’s description of Michael Fielding’s huge childhood Afro: “A mighty bush.” While their double-act banter has an old-fashioned dynamic, redolent of Morecambe and Wise, the show threw in weird characters and a fantasy storyline in which they played a pair of zookeepers. They are very serious about their influences. “Magritte, Rousseau...” says Fielding. “I like Rousseau’s made-up worlds: his jungle has all the things you’d want in a jungle, even though he’d never been in one so it was an imaginary place.”

Eclectic, weird and, crucially, unprepared to compromise their aesthetic sensibilities, it was 2004 before, championed by Steve Coogan’s Baby Cow production company, their first series aired on BBC3. Through repeats and DVD sales the second series, in which the pair have left the zoo and are living above Naboo’s shop, found a bigger audience. Last year the first episode of series three had one million viewers. But perhaps the Boosh’s true breakthrough into mainstream came in June when George Bush visited Belfast and a child presented him with a plant labelled “The Mighty Bush”. Assuming it was a tribute to his greatness, the president proudly displayed it for the cameras, while the rest of Britain tittered.

A Boosh audience these days is quite a mix. In Sheffield the front row is rammed with teenage indie girls, heavy on the eyeliner, who fancy Fielding. But there are children, too: my own sons can recite whole “crimps” (the Boosh’s silly, very English version of rap) word for word. And there are older, respectable types who, when I interview them, all apologise for having such boring jobs. They’re accountants, IT workers, human resources officers and civil servants. But probe deeper and you find ten years ago they excelled at art A level or played in a band, and now puzzle how their lives turned out so square. For them, the Boosh embody their former dreams. And their DIY comedy, shambolic air, the slightly crap costumes, the melding of fantasy with the everyday, feels like something they could still knock up at home.

Indeed, many fans come to gigs in costume. At the Mighty Boosh Festival 15,000 people came dressed up to watch bands and absurdity in a Kent field. And in Sheffield I meet a father-and-son combo dressed as Howard Moon and Bob Fossil – general manager of the zoo – plus a gang of thirty-something parents elaborately attired as Crack Fox, Spirit of Jazz, a granny called Nanageddon, and Amy Housemouse. “I love the Boosh because it’s total escapism,” says Laura Hargreaves, an employment manager dressed as an Electro Fairy. “It’s not all perfect and people these days worry too much that things aren’t perfect. It’s just pure fun.”

But how to retain that appealingly amateur art-school quality now that the Boosh is a mega comedy brand? Noel Fielding is adamant that they haven’t grown cynical, that The Mighty Book of Boosh was a long-term project, not a money-spinner chucked out for Christmas: “There is a lot of heart in what we do,” he says. Barratt adds: “It’s been hard this year to do everything we’ve wanted, to a standard we’re proud of... Which is why we’re worn to shreds.”

Comedy is most powerful in intimate spaces, but the Boosh show, with its huge set, requires major venues. “We’ve lost money every day on the tour,” says Fielding. “The crew and the props and what it costs to take them on the road – it’s ridiculous. Small gigs would lose millions of pounds.”

The live show is a kind of Mighty Boosh panto, with old favourites – Bob Fossil, Bollo, Tony Harrison, etc – coming on to cheers of recognition. But it lacks the escapism to the perfectly conceived world of the TV show. They have told the BBC they don’t want a fourth series: they want a movie. They would also, as with Little Britain USA, like a crack at the States, where they run on BBC America. Clearly the Boosh needs to keep evolving or it will die.

Already other artists are telling Fielding and Barratt to make their money now: “They say this is our time, which is quite frightening.” I recall Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer, who dominated the Nineties with Big Night Out and Shooting Stars. “Yes, they were massive,” says Fielding. “A number one record...” And now Reeves presents Brainiac. “If you have longer-term goals, it’s not scary,” says Barratt. “To me, I’m heading somewhere else – to direct, make films, write stuff – and at the moment it’s all gone mental. I’m sort of enjoying this as an outsider. It was Noel who had this desire to reach more people.”

Indeed, the old cliché that comedy is the new rock’n’roll is closest to being realised in Noel Fielding. Watching him perform the thrash metal numbers in the Boosh live show, he is half ironic comic performer, half frustrated rock god. His heroes weren’t comics but androgynous musicians: Jagger, Bowie, Syd Barrett. (Although he liked Peter Cook’s style and looks.)

“I like clothes and make-up, I like the transformation,” he says. Does it puzzle him that women find this so sexually attractive? “I was reading a book the other day about the New York Dolls and David Johansen was saying that none of them were gay or even bisexual, and that when they started dressing in stilettos and leather pants, women got it straight away with no explanation. But a lot of men had problems. It’s one of those strange things. A man will go, ‘You f***ing queer.’ And you just think, ‘Well, your girlfriend fancies me.’”

The Boosh stopped signing autographs outside stage doors when it started taking two hours a night. At recent book signings up to 1,500 people have shown up, some sleeping overnight in the queue. And on this tour, the Boosh took control of the after-show parties, once run as money-spinners by the promoters, and now show up in person to do DJ slots. I ask if they like to meet their fans, and they laugh nervously.

Fielding: “We have to be behind a fence.”

Barratt: “They try to rip your clothes off your body.”

Fielding: “The other day my girlfriend gave me this ring. And, doing the rock numbers at the end, I held out my hands and the crowd just ripped it off.”

Barratt: “I see it as a thing which is going to go away. A moment when people are really excited about you. And it can’t last.”

He recalls a man in York grabbing him for a photo, saying, “I’d love to be you, it must be so amazing.” And Barratt says he thought, “Yes, it is. But all the while I was trying to duck into this doorway to avoid the next person.” He’s trying to enjoy the Boosh’s moment, knows it will pass, but all the same?

In the hotel bar, a young woman fan has dodged past Danny and comes brazenly over to Fielding. Head cocked attentively like a glossy bird, he chats, signs various items, submits to photos, speaks to her mate on her phone. The rest of the Boosh crew eye her steelily. They know how it will end. “You have five minutes then you go,” hisses one. “I feel really stupid now,” says the girl. It is hard not to squirm at the awful obeisance of fandom. But still she milks the encounter, demands Fielding come outside to meet her friend. When he demurs she is outraged, and Danny intercedes. Fielding returns to his seat slightly unsettled. “What more does she want?” he mutters, reaching for his wine glass. “A skin sample?”

#I hadn't seen this one before so I thought I'd share #noel will never dress down #ah yes the patient boyfriend Julian Barratt

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ordinaryschmuck · 3 years

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My Favorite Moments from It All Started with a Jacket (Chapters 1-10)

Now that I have written ten chapters of It All Started with a Jacket (how the hell are y’all still reading it), I thought I comemorate the occasion by sharing my favorite moments from each chapter. More specifically, every moment that was the most fun for me to write. This can range from moments that made me laugh at my own dumb jokes, or moments that I felt proud of for how well they turned out. Either way, this list is gonna be long. Like, rrrreeeaaallllllyyy lllooonnng. So you might want to strap in before clicking ‘Keep reading.’

Chapter 1

Amity and the car horn

"Oh no, you don't!" Luz sprinted over to Amity's car, to which her rival had already gotten in, and locked the doors. Just as Amity started the engine, Luz was already there, beating her hand against the window.

"If you think I'm too afraid to break a car window, you've got another thing--"

HOOONK!

"...You've got another--"

HOOOOOONK!

"You've got--"

Amity raised her hand above the car horn again with her eyebrow raised and her grin amused. She was essentially challenging Luz to finish that sentence.

"..."

"...You'vegotanotherthingcoming--"

HOOOOOOOOOONK!

"THAT TEARS IT!"

Amity sniffing Luz’s jacket (the main reason why I wrote this in the first place)

Amity set the hanger back where she found it and slowly lifted Luz's jacket up to her face. For a while, she did nothing, choosing instead to just stare at it. And then, she briefly took a small sniff.

'Well, that was a mistake,' was all she could think as intoxicating smells of pinecones and lemons started overtaking her senses. Almost immediately, Amity grabbed the jacket with both hands and shoved her face into it, inhaling more of the scent. After letting out a euphoric sigh, Amity looked at it again, shrugged, and put it back on.

Amity’s apology

"I said that I'm sorry." Amity continued, "Not just for the jacket, but for everything. The insults, the name-calling, and especially the fighting. I'm sorry for all of it."

"...Are you dying?"

"Wha--No!" now Amity turned to face Luz, "Why is that the first thing that came to your mind?"

"I don't know, man," Luz shrugged, "This just seems like some sort of final repentance type of shit. Like when Tom needed Jerry to sign him off to take the escalator to heaven."

"Who the hell is Tom and Jerry?"

"The greatest comic duo of all time, that's who!" Luz genuinely seemed insulted that Amity didn't know, to which she rolled her eyes in response.

Luz’s reaction

Luz opened the door and was about to leave. But then:

"I saw the bi flag."

After Amity spoke, Luz froze in her place. One foot was out the door, and her face was already turned away from Amity's, so she couldn't gauge an expression. So Amity took her chance to go on.

"It's hidden in a spot a person could barely notice, so there's no way that it came with the flag already sewn it," she explained, "Even if you bought the jacket from someone else, you could have easily torn it out. I've seen you done worse. But you kept it in, which makes me think that maybe...That maybe you're bisexual."

Luz didn't say anything.

She didn't do anything.

Instead, she stayed frozen in place, and Amity still couldn't tell what was going on in the human's mind at the moment. Not that she ever could. Eventually, Luz slowly and stiffly sat back in the passenger seat and slammed the car door shut. Her eyes were tight shut, and breathing was ragged, and Amity thought Luz was seething. But then Amity recognized what Luz was doing. She had done the same thing many times when forced to talk with her mother.

Luz was forcing herself not to cry.

Luz’s rant

"...Did you not tell anybody?" was all Amity could ask.

"...I told Willow," Luz confessed, "She has gay dads, so I thought: 'Hey, she gets it.' Other than that, nobody else knows. Except for you."

"Not even your mom?"

"Especially not her! She's super religious! If I came out to her, then I might as well pack a suitcase and get ready to live on the streets!"

"Why?"

"Because humans are not like witches," Luz looked back at Amity, clapping her hands for emphasis, "For humans, what matters in life is the color of your skin, the people you like, and the gender you're given at birth. Go against any of that, and you're screwed!"

"That's awful."

"That's life!" Luz stated, her eyes glistening, "And I had to put up with that bullshit for all of it! I had to deal with dumb gringas in the locker room who might think that I was a pervert just because I liked girls. I had to deal with pretending to be interested in one gender and hide a part of myself that people think I should be ashamed of! I had to deal with the fear that the one person I trust the most might throw me to the curb because of something that shouldn't even matter!"

Luz paused to wipe tears that had leaked out from her eyes.

"I had to deal with all of that," she went on, "Because that's just what humans are like. I wish we were like witches. I really do. But we're not, and the sad part is, we might never will."

Chapter 2

Luz is a prick

Luz kicked a discarded beer can down the sidewalk. Only to just as quickly picking it up and ditching it in a recycling bin that someone left out on the curb for trash day. Luz may be a rebel, but she isn't a lazy prick.

"And what the hell does me being bi have anything to do with it?"

"Bi what?"

Luz stopped both her walk and her ramblings after hearing that voice. Looking to her left, Luz saw a woman carrying her groceries to her house. That woman is Mrs. Kranstien, a white, middle-aged gossip who's part of Luz's mom's church group. Also known as the last person Luz wanted to find out that she's bisexual.

"Uh, bilingual," Luz brushed it off, seeming like she isn't panicking right now. Which she is. "Significa que hablo dos idiomas. What else could I mean?"

"Well, you don't have to be so rude about it," Mrs. Kranstien harrumphed, "It is not becoming of a young lady."

"Y no tienes que meter la nariz donde no pertenece," Luz shrugged, "Pero, ¿quién soy yo para juzgar?"

"...What does that mean?"

"It means you're absolutely right, and I am so sorry for being so rude," Luz turned on her heel and kept walking, "Adios, gringa!"

"Is 'gringa' a compliment!" Mrs. Kranstien called out as Luz walked away.

"Sure is! Make sure to say it to your friends when you have the chance!"

Ok, maybe she is a little bit of a prick.

Luz’s indecision

"Should I do this?"

Luz gently rubbed the blade of the knife.

"...Yeah. Yeah, I definitely should."

She lowered the blade over a thread sewn in but stopped a tenth of a millimeter away from it.

"But it's not even noticeable."

Luz raised the knife away.

"Although Blight did notice it."

And lowered it back down again.

"But that's because she was wearing it. It's not like mom could ever wear this."

"But what if it's laundry day and she takes the jacket without you knowing?"

"I mean, that could happen, but she would have to actively search for it."

"Is that really worth the risk, though?"

Luz started twirling the knife in her fingers at this point. The bi flag still remained intact, with not a single thread being taken out. Most days, Luz would barely notice it, and she's the one who always wears her jacket. Now, more than ever, the bright colors of the flag seemed incredibly noticeable.

"No," Luz shook her head, "It's not worth the risk."

She lowered the knife again and even got the blade under a thread. But before she could do anything remotely similar to removing the string, she hesitated. Again.

"...But it's also who I am," Luz sighed, pocketing her knife and putting the jacket back on.

"It's a part of me," Luz lightly beat the back of her head against the wall, "Taking it off isn't going to change anything, and it especially won't make me any less bi."

Chapter 3

Nerds being nerds

Amity nearly spat out her slushie.

"You read The Good Witch Azura?" Luz rolled her eyes at the question.

"Alright, listen," she started, "Before you make fun of me for it, you should know--"

"I love Azura."

"--It's not the cutesy kids' book that people think...it...is..." Luz looked shocked as she faced Amity's wide grin, "What did you just say?"

"It was my favorite book series growing up," Amity explained, "It still is, today."

"...No shit."

"Yeah! In fact, when I was nine, I wished I could have been just like Azura herself."

"Same!" Luz's smile became just as wide, "The grand adventures? The ability to just get along with everybody she meets? That was the shit for when I just a little tater tot."

"For me, it was how powerful her magic is," Amity confessed, "I could only dream of being as talented as she is."

Chapter 4

Snowball fight

And that's when something cold hit her in the back of the head.

Turning around to find the culprit, Amity saw none other than Luz hiding her laughter behind a hand.

"Did you just do what I think you did?!" Amity asked incredulously.

"Hey, we may be cool now...but I'm gonna take a shot when I see it. Alright?"

Amity glared at that, drawing a spell circle soon after. At the circle's completion, two dozen snowballs began to rise in the air around them, and Luz's face became pale to the sight.

"...On second thought," Luz nervously smiled as she raised her hands in surrender, "Parlay?"

"..."

Amity pointed her finger at Luz, and all of the snowballs immediately knocked the human onto her back.

"I don't think so," Amity quipped, walking over and offering a hand to her friend.

“Drug” deal

"Is that a bad thing?"

"...Eh, probably not," Luz shrugged, "I got the goods in my backpack, by the way. You want me to give it to you now, or wait until after school?"

"t sounds like you have drugs in your backpack with the way you said that."

"Who says that I don't?"

Amity let out a light laugh. Luz didn't even seem shocked anymore.

"I'll wait until after school," Amity said when they got to the double doors, "The last thing I need is the wrong person to find out that I like...you know what."

"Got it," Luz nodded only to then lean closer to whisper, "I'll see then for the transfer. And if you get caught, I was never there."

"Ok, now I got to ask: Are you actually planning to give me drugs after school."

"Of course not!"

Luz winked.

"Drugs are bad, especially for our age."

She winked again.

"I wouldn't ever dream of doing something so vile."

And again.

"...I hate you."

"What else is new?"

"Just give me the book after school, doofus!" Amity said between chuckles.

"Yes. Of course. 'The book.'"

Luz winked for the fourth time, and Amity just pulled the human's beanie over her face in response. The two then laughed as they went their separate ways.

Amity’s jealousy

"Hey, is it ok if I ask you a favor?"

"Depends," Luz blew into her hands for extra warmth, "What's the favor?"

"Well...Skara invited me to a party she's throwing next Friday. And I was wondering if you could come with me."

"Which one is Skara again," Luz asked, "I know she's one of Boscha's lackeys, but I can't remember. Is she the tall and skinny one, the small and cute one, or the hot yet nerdy looking one?"

If she wasn't wearing gloves right now, Amity would wager that her knuckles went white with how tightly her hands gripped the steering wheel.

"You think Cat is hot?"

"Eh. Objectively, yeah," Luz shrugged, "Also, I didn't know her name was Cat. Should probably make a note of that."

"She also has a boyfriend," Amity said a little too quick, "And she's straight as a board. So go ahead and...unnote that. Just take that note and...throw it in a river somewhere."

"...Ok? Weirdo."

"Anyways, Skara is the short and--" Amity steeled herself before saying, "Cute one."

Luz helping Skara

She eventually found herself in a hall that led to bedrooms, only to see Skara sprinting around and picking up discarded beer cans and red solo cups and tossing them into a trash bag. She then opened a random door, squeaked, and slammed it shut, leaning against it while pressing her palms into her eyes.

"Why do that in my parents' bedroom!?" she cried to no one in particular.

Usually, Luz wouldn't give a shit about any of Boscha's lackeys. And yet, something compelled her to walk over.

"Are they making out or doing something worse," she asked, which caused Skara to look up in surprise.

"...What...What are you doing here?"

"Don't question it," Luz nodded to the door, "In there. Are they just making out?"

"...Yes, but it's still--"

Luz pounded on the door, making Skara jump.

"Hey!" she shouted, "That's not your bed, assholes! If you want privacy, then go to the back of your car like decent human beings!"

"We're not humans!"

"Not the point!"

For a while, nothing happened. Then finally, two boys walked out of the room, hand in hand with their clothes ruffled, and started shuffling their way down the hall. Skara just stood where she was, not knowing what to say or do.

"Hey," Luz snapped her fingers to get Skara's attention, "If a person starts acting like a prick, be an even bigger prick. Someone's going to eventually back down, so don't let it be you. They'll get the point, then. Oh, and by the way..."

She pulled the photo out of her jacket's pocket and tossed it to Skara, who then fumbled with the thing before catching it.

"Someone tried to steal that," Luz told her, "I don't know where it belongs so, there you go."

Luz then began to head in the direction of the stairs.

"Thank you."

The broken tone of voice made Luz freeze for a second, turning over her shoulder to see Skara looking at the human, her eyes full of gratitude and amazement.

"...Don't mention it," was all Luz said before walking down the hall to find the stairs.

Literally, everything that Drunk Amity does. But here’s the top five:

#5-Snuggle time

"I hate my life," Luz muttered, shuffling over. She pulled the covers up and slowly got into the bed. But once she did, Amity didn't waste a second wrapping her entire body around Luz's. Like a koala bear, clinging to a tree.

"...Do you mind?" Luz's voice cracked.

"What? I'm sleeping on my side."

"Yeah, but I'd prefer it if you slept on a side that wouldn't result in me getting puked on."

"But how will we snuggle?"

"Oh my god," Luz sighed, "You're not gonna back down from this, are you?"

"Mm-mm."

"...tell you what. If you flip onto your other side, I'll--I can't believe I'm saying this--I'll...spoon...you."

Amity gasped, her eyes practically glittering with stars as she looked up at Luz.

"That's even better," she whispered, untangling herself from Luz's body so she can flip onto her other side, already getting into a position to receive comfort. Luz, slowly and reluctantly, turned over to wrap an arm around Amity, pressing their bodies together.

'This is probably punishment for...every shitty thing I've done in my life," she thought to herself.

#4-Drink it!

"Drink it!"

"No!"

"Drink it."

"No!"

"Drink it!"

"Noooo!" Amity flopped face down onto her pillow as if she was a five-year-old. The bunny-print pajamas that Luz changed her into didn't help, either (it was the minor victories). With one hand, Luz started messaging her temple out of annoyance, while the other hand gripped tight onto a glass of water.

"Amity, if you're gonna lay down like a baby, then lay on your side," she explained, "If you face down, or up, then you'll just drown in your own vomit. And is that how you wanna go out?"

Amity flipped onto her side with a harrumph.

"That's what I thought," Luz held the glass up to Amity again, "Now drink this water."

"I don't wanna," the witch wined, "It doesn't have flavor. It's boring. Give something less boring."

#3-Amity’s love for Emira

"Who are you talking to?"

"Your sister."

"Oh! Hey, Luz," Amity started tapping Luz on the shoulder, "Luz, Luz, Luz, Luz--"

"What?"

"Tell her--Listen--Tell...Emira that she is the worst...and that I don't like her. It's an--Look--It's an inside joke between us. She'll understand it when you tell her."

"...Will do."

"Oh! And Luz,"

"What?" This time, Luz was starting to get aggravated.

"Emira--Don't tell her this part--But Emira is, like, the most important person to me. And Ed too. Sometimes. Because they've both always been there for me when our parents are being bigger dicks than they are. I just don't--Hey--I don't tell them that because then they'll make fun of me for it. So don't-- Shh! Don't tell her."

"...You got all that, right?" Luz asked into the scroll.

"Sure did. What the hell did she drink?"

#2-Tossing cookies

Amity's face suddenly paled. Luz couldn't figure what was wrong at first, at least until she saw Amity lurch.

"Oh, shit," Luz then guided Amity over to the nearest potted plant, "Shit shit shit shit--"

Once at the plant, Amity bent over and...lost her lunch.

"...Are you o--"

And then her breakfast.

"...Are--"

And finally tossed one last cookie for good measure.

"...You good?"

"Yeah," Amity looked up at her victim, which was already starting to wilt, "...This my mom's favorite plant..."

She then slapped it.

"Fuck you, plant!"

And #1...

The good news is that Luz finally found her.

The bad news is that Amity was standing on top of a table as everyone stared at her.

"I am the lesbian queen of the universe!" she shouted, "Y'all can bow down and kiss my ass!"

"Get it, girl!"

"You bet I'll get it, whoever you are! Seriously, who said that?" she called back, turning in a circle to find the source of the voice. However, because of Amity's drunken state, she soon tripped on her own feet and fell off the table. Luckily, Luz was quick to realize that wearing heels and being drunk was a bad combination, so she had already run over to the table, ready to catch Amity.

The green-haired witch landed in Luz's arms, bridal princess style. Luz then set her down, but Amity still wrapped her arms around the human's neck.

"You're my hero," Amity said wistfully.

"Yeah, I'm a real knight in shining--" But Luz didn't get a chance to finish her snarky remark. Because Amity leaned in to plant a wet, sloppy kiss onto Luz's cheek. This caused the human to go still and red-faced, her brain ceasing to function as Amity pulled away with a Mwah!

And on the topic of kisses

Luz remained still for a minute or two, ultimately thinking 'screw it,' and kissed Amity's cheek. It was about a millisecond, maybe even half of that, but it did not stop Luz's face from heating up.

"There. Happy now?"

"Nope," Amity faced Luz with a drunken smile, "Because now it's my turn."

"Wait, no- Mmph!" But it was too late. Because the second after Amity spoke, she leaned in to kiss Luz's cheek, giving Luz no time to even turn her head. Which resulted in Amity giving Luz another wet and sloppy kiss, not on her cheek, but right on her lips.

And perhaps it was just as long as Luz's kiss. Probably even a second longer. But for her, it felt as though time had come to a standstill as Amity's lips were pressed against Luz's. But regardless, Luz didn't pull away. She didn't even shove Amity off, despite having every reason to. In fact, when Amity finally pulled away from the kiss, Luz had this strange desire buried deep within her brain, yet she was still aware of it.

Because despite how weird it would be and how Amity's breath will absolutely taste awful, Luz felt a strange desire to kiss her friend again.

Chapter 6

The morning after

Curious, Amity looked over her shoulder to see the culprit.

'Oh, it's just Luz," she thought, slowly turning back over.

...

Amity's eyes popped open.

She whipped her head back to look over her shoulder, which was a mistake because the sudden rush made her hangover say, 'screw you,' and leave Amity with a ton of pain. Once it slowly wore off (or, at least, became a bit more bearable), Amity got a good look at the person behind her. And what she saw both warmed her heart, as well as stopped it.

Luz. Sleeping in Amity's bed. Pressed up against the witch and peacefully smiling as she dreamed.

This left a myriad of thoughts in Amity's head.

'Luz is in my bed.'

'Luz is in my bed, and she's spooning me.'

'...I need to wake her.'

But just as she was about to wake her friend, Luz, in her sleep, then shuffled herself further against Amity. Her sleepy smile had grown wider.

'...And I am dead. I am dead, have ascended the stars, and this now my life for eternity.'

Huge misunderstanding

Luz remained still, glancing between Amity's eyes and her lips. Ultimately, she closed the distance between them and kissed her.

And kissed her again.

And again.

It felt so amazing, with each kiss sending a wave of euphoric energy through Luz's body. It was everything she didn't know she wanted.

"Luz?" Amity gasped.

"Hm?"

"Are you awake right now?"

"Mm-hm," Luz mumbled as she continued to kiss Amity's sweet, soft, hairy--

'Hairy?'

***

Luz peaked open her eyes, and instead of seeing Amity's face, all she saw was bright green. Remembering where she was, Luz's eyes became wide once she took in the fact of what she just did.

"mmBAAAAAAAH!" Luz shrieked, pushing herself to the other end of the bed. Unfortunately, she pushed a little too far and ended up falling off the bed entirely, face-planting onto the floor.

Luz’s hairball

It was Luz's turn to get up as she walked over to the pile of her clothes on the desk.

"Just let me change first and--" She coughed, "--And I--"

Suddenly Luz was coughing severely, her face going red from lack of air.

"Luz?"

"What's wrong?!"

While coughing, Luz pointed at her throat.

"She's choking!" Viney deduced, "Hang on, I got this!"

She ran over and went behind Luz. Placing the thumb side of her fist over the human's abdomen and placing a hand over said fist, Viney began performing the Heimlich maneuver. After a few thrusts, Luz finally coughed out what was obstructing her throat. Once she could breathe again, she got a look at what nearly killed her. Only to see a clump of wet, green hair on the floor.

"...Is that--"

"Anyways, I'm gonna go ahead and change!" Luz squeaked quickly, grabbing her clothes off the desk and dashing into the closet. Viney and Emira looked over at Amity, who, red as a tomato, pulled the covers over her head.

Amity explaining why she likes Luz...which goes on for a good chunk of the chapter and it would be ludicrous for me to paste it onto here. But trust me. It’s a great moment

Chapter 7

Pastor Benson’s sermon and Luz’s prayor

"I think I can speak for all of us when I say that the world is constantly changing," Pastor Benson began his sermon. "For every day, new lifestyles and ways of loving others are introduced and integrated into our society. Just the other day, I was given a chance to experience this first hand."

That caught Luz's interest for a moment.

"You see, my nephew gathered the whole family, everybody that he trusted, and did something none of us could have ever expected. He told us all that he was a homosexual."

Immediately everybody started murmuring with each other. And Luz had to admit, she was more than curious to see where Benson was going with this.

"I know, I know," he silenced the crowd, "I was surprised too. And as he continued, both he and his boyfriend, which was another shock to find out, started telling us all about what it means to be what they are. They explained what they considered the basics, answered questions, and soon enough, Micheal's parents stood up to give him a hug, and everyone else took turns letting him know that he is loved."

Now Luz was really interested.

"Later, I took Micheal aside so I can have a heart to heart with him," Pastor Benson pressed on, "I said to him that he is my nephew and that I will always love him. And no matter what, God will love him too, like all of his children."

For the first time in her life, Luz hung onto every word that a pastor said.

"But sin is still a sin, and I said that it's not too late to save his soul."

'There it is,' Luz thought, slumping into her seat and hoping that her mom didn't notice her reaction. Pastor Benson continued his sermon, but Luz mentally checked out, not caring about what he has to say next. It didn't matter if Benson told the secrets to the universe or the meaning of life. Because of what he said, Luz tuned him out for the next few minutes, stirring in a pissed-off mood she genuinely tried to keep out of church.

"--Now, I would ask you all to join me in prayer before we bring this congregation to a close," Luz heard Pastor Benson say fifteen minutes later. Everyone then simultaneously lowered their heads to pray, with Luz right along with them.

'Dear God,' she prayed, 'If you could be so kind, could you send down an angel or your son or something to tell all these homophobes that being gay isn't a sin. And the only reason why people think that's true is that some dickhead mistranslated a line somewhere. A translation, by the way, that was meant to tell people that pedophilia is awful. Something that some of your own pastors should learn from time to time.

'Because if you could send someone down to get the record straight, I, and many others, would really appreciate it...also sorry for swearing while during prayer. That wasn't cool of me. Bless my mom, and praise be to you.'

Camila and Claire

"If you ask me, that was crossing way over the line."

Camila looked over to her friend Claire, who stood with her as they waited in line at a makeshift buffet table to grab breakfast.

"Are you talking about Pastor Benson or his nephew?" Camila couldn't help but ask.

"Oh, absolutely, it's Benson," Claire whispered so as not to draw attention amongst the chatter, "I mean, here you have a kid who was in a safe space and just wanted to be accepted, only to have your uncle basically say you're going to hell. The man might as well have punched poor Micheal in the gut."

"Aye, I am so happy that you said that," Camila grabbed two plates for herself and Luz, who sat at a table for them. "I understand that he's a person of the lord, but that's taking belief a little too far. I believe in God, and I love him with my whole heart, but I would never say anything like that to Luz. If she was gay, that is."

"I'm right there with you," Claire nodded as she piled food onto her own two plates, "I have five kids. Two of them moved out with relationships of their own. But if my other three ever come to me and say that they're gay, then the last thing I'd do is make them feel ashamed of it."

"Right? I always make it clear to Luz that she can tell me anything. Especially if it's something like that."

Mrs. Kranstien calling Camila a gringa

"As I said, keep an eye on her. For both of your sakes," the gossiper said as she turned to walk in her own direction, "Adios, gringa."

Camila did a double-take.

'Did she just...No,' she shook her head, 'No. She couldn't have.'

Amity’s reaction

"...So we're just going to be spending some time waiting...alone...in a big house with nobody else around?"

"...Basically, yeah," Luz shrugged, "See you then. Oh! By the way, and I know it goes without saying, but try to do something that hides those ears. Because the last thing I need to do is explain why my new friend looks like an elf from Lord of the Rings."

With that, Luz hung up, leaving Amity to sit still as a statue at her desk. Eventually, she slowly dragged her diary over, picked up a pencil, and began to calmly write.

So Luz, literally right now, just asked me to come over to hang out at her house, completely unsupervised, as we wait to have dinner with her mom. Current mood: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Chapter 8

Boscha’s rage

"You little jackass!"

Luz turned away from her locker to see Boscha stomping over. It was the end of the school day, and Luz was already beyond stressed about having Amity over to her house. The last thing that anyone needs, least of all her, is to deal with Boscha's bullshit.

"Little?" Luz said with an annoyed tilt to her head. "Bitch, I am absolutely taller than you!"

"Not the point!" Boscha yelled once she finally got up to Luz, "Because here's the thing: You draw on my face, I'll be annoyed. You rip my scroll in half, I'll be pissed off. But make people think I have a crush on FUCKING, Matt!? That is something I should kill you for!"

"...I didn't draw on your face."

"YOU--" But Boscha stopped herself to take a deep, calming breath before looking back at Luz with murder in her eyes, "That slimy, greasy, weasely little weasel has been hitting on me ALL DAY! And it's all because of you posting on social media that I like him. I mean, what the FUCK did I do to deserve that?!"

"...Do you really want me to answer that?"

Misunderstanding

"Hey."

Hesitantly, Amity glanced over at Luz again. Who had put her full attention into the girl in front of her.

"Do you wanna make out?"

"WHAT?!"

Luz jumped at Amity's screech.

"...I said, ‘do you want take out?’" she repeated, lifting up her phone, "My mom just said she's going to be a while and isn't in a cooking mood. So she wants to know if you're cool if she picks up some chimichurri sandwiches on the way home."

"Oh. Oh! Yeah, that's fine," Amity could feel her face grow hotter by the second.

"Ok?" Luz texted a reply to her mom, "...What did you think I said, anyway?"

"..."

"It must have been something bad to make you react as if I called you the c-word."

"...So this movie is interesting!" Suddenly, all Amity's attention went to the tee-vee, "My favorite character would have to be that, uh, that girl with the...dyed hair and...giant hammer--What did you say this movie is called again?"

Luz opened her mouth to say something, but a small ping! from her phone distracted her for a bit.

"My mom wants to know if you have any allergies," she said.

"I do not."

"Got it," Luz sent her reply, "Now, as for what you thought I said--"

"Table it for later."

'So I can have time to think of a proper excuse.'

"...Alright."

Luz went back to watching the movie for another minute, looked at her wrist for some reason, and then stared right back at Amity.

"It's now later."

"Luz--"

"Look, if it's something embarrassing, don't worry about it," Luz waved off her friend's concern, "Your brain just misinterpreted what I said. It's no big deal. I'm just wondering what you thought I asked that got you all hot and bothered."

'She called me hot--FOCUS!'

"You really won't judge?" Amity asked for clarification.

"Can't be any more embarrassing than what I did on Saturday."

'I guess that's true.'

"Well," Amity nervously fiddled with the hem of her dress, "I thought that...that you asked if...I wanted to...make...out..."

She glanced over, and, sure enough, a blush was beginning to form on Luz's cheeks.

"...Oh," the human said.

"But it's like you said!" Amity quickly exclaimed, "My brain just misinterpreted the words! It's not like you would ever ask me to do that, right?"

"...Of course not."

"...You hesitated?"

"Hm?"

"I said that you would never ask me to do that, and you hesitated when saying no. Why did you hesitate?"

"I didn't hesitate."

"Yes, you did."

"Pretty sure I didn't."

"Well, I'm definitely sure that you did."

"Well, if I did, then that's because, um..."

"...Because, um, what?"

"..."

"...So this movie, huh?" Luz looked back at the screen, "It's, uh, Scott Pilgrim, by the way. Just to answer your question...from earlier...about what movie this is..."

And thus came the thickest, most awkward silence between them. Understandably enough, Luz now had no problems with sitting as far away from Amity as possible.

"...How long until your mom gets home, again?"

"Should be another two hours."

"Damn it."

"Yeah."

Baby pictures

"Actually, I do have a photo of that day in an album somewhere," Camila added, "I could go find it and prove to you how innocent Luz was."

Now Luz's face went pale as Amity's brightened with glee.

"No, she doesn't!"

"Yes, I do!"

The poor human glared at the rich girl.

"No. You don't."

"Yes. I do."

"Right then," Camila finished her sandwich and got out of her seat, "You two sit tight. I'm going to go find that album."

Once her mother was out of the room, Luz scooched over to Amity with murder in her eyes.

"I would like to point out that you still owe me, like, five more favors from what happened last Friday," she whispered-growled, "So I would like to cash in one of them for you to not look at my baby pictures."

"And I would like to point out that you saw me at my lowest last Friday," Amity said with a smarmy smile, "Which means I'm at least owed some middle ground."

"...I hate you."

"Sure you do."

Gravity Falls reference

'There's that weird feeling again,' she thought as a tingling sensation formed throughout her gut. It wasn't the first time that day when Luz felt this.

She felt it when seeing Amity's human ears, when Amity admitted that she always wanted to be friendly, and especially when Amity thought Luz wanted to make out.

'...Wait...do I--'

Luz shook her head.

"No, no, no no no," she said to herself, "There's no way. There's just no way! I'm sure this is just some...indirect way of Boscha's words getting to your brain."

Luz turned around to go back inside.

"By tomorrow, you'll laugh about how ridiculous a thought like that is."

At Midnight.

Ever since turning in at nine, Luz could not for the life of her go to sleep.

Why?

Because her head was filled with nothing but thoughts of golden eyes, wild green hair, and a smirk that became all the more attractive, the more she thought about it.

"...Goddammit."

Chapter 9

Skara’s advice

"In that case, as her best friend, I have to tell that she will destroy you."

"Whatever."

"And as her best friend, I probably shouldn't tell you to go for any of her weak spots."

"..." Luz shared a curious look with Gus and Willow, who shrugged. "What weak spots?"

"Well, as her best friend, I shouldn't tell you that Boscha suffered a lot of injuries from playing grudgby," Skara explained, "Like the fact that her right arm hasn't healed right and she prefers punching with her left. Or the fact that she's still recovering from breaking her left leg and that if you kick the back of it hard enough, she'll crumble."

"...It's too bad that you didn't say any of that," Luz played along, "Because that would all be incredibly useful. And I would have to ask why you would tell me that in the first place."

"Hypothetically speaking, if I did tell you all of that--which I didn't--it would probably be because I'm still a little mad that she destroyed my house for the sake of getting Amity back. And that I'm just as sick as you are that Boscha wastes so much time trying to win back a girl that is clearly not interested."

"In that case, I really hate that you didn't tell me any of that stuff. Because then I would have thanked you for the advice."

"And I would have said, 'You're welcome,'" Skara looked left, right, and hugged Luz for a fraction of a second to then scamper off to who knows where.

The first hit

"Uh-huh...I don't know what that means, so here's a question: What happens when I break that oath?"

"Oh, trust me, you won't break it. Now, are you ready to eat dirt, human?"

"Born ready," Luz said, regaining her confidence, "In fact, you can have the first punch."

Boscha raised an eyebrow.

"Really? You sure you want that?"

"Of course. That is unless you're too scared of breaking a nail--"

SMACK!

The entire stadium went 'Ooooh,' due to Boscha sucker-punching Luz so hard that the human immediately went down and into the dirt. Needless to say, Luz was very much awake now.

"JESUS CHRIST!" She shouted as she slowly stood up, nursing the now bruising cheek that Boscha hit. "What the shit do they feed you rich girls?! Also, what happened to no hitting the face?! That was my face! You said no hitting the face!"

"Oh, no, I meant my face," Boscha reiterated, "My face is off-limits. Yours is free real estate."

Adrenaline rush

While Boscha was distracted by that, Luz looked over at her own friends.

Willow scowled with her fists clenched, looking like she was about ready to jump in to kick Boscha's ass for Luz.

Gus was cheering for Luz to get up. At least, she thinks that's what he was doing. A sudden ringing in Luz's ear currently made it hard to decipher what anybody was saying if they weren't close enough.

And then there was Amity, who held Luz's jacket tight to her heart, eyes wide and complexion pale.

That's when it hit Luz: If she loses, she'll be forced by some magic bullshit to never see Amity again. All these weeks of getting close and building...whatever the hell their relationship is building towards would have been for nothing. Worse yet, Amity will be left with Boscha, who would treat the green-haired witch with as much dignity and respect as Boscha treats her friends.

It was the mix of fear and anger from that thought that gave Luz just enough adrenaline she needed to turn towards Boscha and kicked her hard in the left leg.

Goodnight

"Cool. Hey, mom?"

"Yes, mija?"

"If a person asks you to have lunch with them, just the two of you, what would you think that means?"

"I assume that means a person wants to date you."

"Cool. Anyways, I'm gonna go to bed now. Goodnight."

"You’re what?"

THWUMP!

Startled by the noise, Camila turned around to see that Luz had fallen face-first onto the living room floor.

"...Luz?"

"Hm?" Luz mumbled.

"Are you ok?"

"Mm-hm."

Chapter 10

Earmuffs

"Hi, Luz! Question: Me being a male cheerleader. Yay or nay?"

"I think it's absolutely a 'yay,' but we can talk about that later," Luz said as she sat down, "For right now: Earmuffs."

"Aw, what?" Gus whined, "C'mon!"

"No complaining. Earmuffs."

"But I'm younger than you two by two years. I can totally handle grown-up talk."

"Earmuffs!"

Gus groaned, reluctantly covering his ears, closing his eyes, and humming to himself to further block out any noise.

Assumptions

"I don't give a shit that you're dating her." Willow said plainly.

"You see--Wha-wha-wha-wha-What? What? I'm sorry, what? Just...Fucking what?!" Luz exclaimed, completely caught off guard.

"Hey, don't get me wrong," Willow continued, "I would much rather see you date almost anybody else in this school. But if--for whatever reason--Amity is the person you really want to be with, I won't say anything about it. The heart wants what the heart wants. Who am I to judge?"

"...We're not dating."

Willow blinked.

"You're not?"

"No."

"...You're not?!"

Spray Bottle

Then suddenly, bits of water started spritzing onto her face. Looking over, Amity saw that it was because Viney was using a spray bottle on her.

"Bad," she said between spritzes, "Bad Blight."

"What the hell?!" Amity hissed, "Why do you even have that?!"

"I take Beast Keeping," Viney explained as she pocketed her spray bottle, "It comes in handy, so I just keep it on me at all times. Now, back to your dumbassery..."

"Hey, try to look at this from my point of view, alright?" the younger witch growled, "You never had to deal with Luz and her dumb smirk or her...cute round ears and those...those gorgeous brown eyes that are so warm and soft and make you feel all ooey-gooey like a warm chocolate cookie and--"

Viney started spritzing Amity again.

"GAH! Sorry," Amity said, snapping out of it.

And that’s about it. Thank you all so much for reading this story for this long, and a very special thank you to @drabbles-of-writing for letting me write this story in the first place. Now if you don’t excuse me, I’ve got school shit to work on.

#the owl house #beta lumity #it all started with a jacket #cw: swearing

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raimispiderman · 3 years

Photo

From the booklet which comes with the Spider-Man Trilogy Limited Edition Collection blu-ray!

This talks about the making of Spider-Man 3, here’s the bit about the first Spider-Man movie and here’s the bit about Spider-Man 2.

Click for a transcript:

OLD FRIENDS… AND NEW FACES

“The heart of the Spider-Man films has always been the depth of the characters and their interconnected lives. Peter’s love of Mary Jane Watson and his friendship with Harry Osborn have always been the richest parts of our stories,” said director Sam Raimi.

In Spider-Man 3, Peter Parker faces his biggest challenge to date – and the greatest battle of all is the battle within himself.

“We wanted to explore the darker side of Peter’s character,” said producer Laura Ziskin. “When his suit turns black, it enhances and emphasizes characteristics that are already in the host. In this case, it makes him stronger and quicker, but also more prideful and aggressive.”

“When I read the script I was really excited about the different direction we were going with Peter Parker and the other characters and storylines,” said Tobey Maguire, who returned to the role of Peter Parker. “We are covering a lot of new ground here, with a fresh take on the story while maintaining the continuity of the characters from the previous two films.”

In Spider-Man 3, Spider-Man takes on two classic villains: Sandman, who first made his appearance in the fourth issue of “The Amazing Spider-Man” and Venom, one of the comic book’s most memorable villains.

“Marvel comic books – and especially the Spider-Man books – have always had a great bunch of villains to choose from,” noted Raimi. “So many great Marvel artists and writers developed these characters. It was a very easy task to pick up these wonderful tales and images and develop our story from them.”

Thomas Haden Church played Flint Marko, a man haunted by the mistakes of his past, who is caught in a physics experiment gone wrong. “I consider it an honor, really,” said Church, an Academy Award nominee for his role in Sideway, on joining the franchise. “The Spider-Man films stand tall in the pantheon of superhero movies. Many are called, few are chosen, and I’m proud to be one of the few.”

“Flint Marko becomes Sandman when he stumbles into a radioactive test site where they’re performing a molecular fusion experiment and he accidentally becomes fused with sand,” Church added. “As a result, he can change his shape and adapt to his environment. He can be 10, 30, 80 feet tall. He can form giant sand fists, hammers, a mace. He can shift into a sand tornado, or sift into sand. He is as malevolent and menacing as any villain can be.”

Church spent over a year preparing for the role, with a physical training and diet regimen which led to his gaining about 20 pounds of muscle before shooting began. “In the comic book, Sandman was a bulky-muscled guy – he looked like a guy out of the WWF,” said the actor, “For the movie, we decided on a leaner look – street hardened, like Terry Malloy in On the Waterfront.”

Topher Grace joined the cast as Eddie Brock, a character in some ways similar to Peter Parker, who transforms into Venom – Spider-Man’s arch-nemesis. “When I was first talking about the movie, Sam asked me if I knew what ‘arch-nemesis’ meant. I thought it meant a huge villain, but Sam pointed out that it really means a villain who has the same powers and abilities as the hero, but uses them for evil,” said Grace. “Sam has gone to great lengths to make this character Spider-Man’s equal and opposite. You might say that Eddie is the guy that Peter would have been if he didn’t have the good fortune of having Aunt May and Uncle Ben to bring him up.”

Grace, a self-described “skinny guy,” put on about 15 to 20 pounds for the role, working out during the several months before shooting began. During pre-production, Grace was subjected to body scans and motion capture data analysis for use by the costume and visual effects departments.

“They were doing a scan of my body, and someone mentioned that the scan would be really helpful for making my action figure. My action figure!” recalled Grace. “It hadn’t even occurred to me that I would become an action figure! It was very exciting.”

“The Spider-Man books have probably the greatest rogues’ gallery of any superhero comic – there are so many memorable villains throughout the books,” said executive producer and Marvel’s president of production Kevin Feige. “With the villains in Spider-Man 3, we wanted to continue the tradition – following the Green Goblin and Doc Ock – of presenting villains that not only provide spectacle and a physical challenge to Spider-Man’s abilities, but characters that are multi-layered and conflicted.”

“At the beginning of Spider-Man 3, we find Peter Parker pretty much where we left him at the end of the second Spider-Man story,” said director Sam Raimi. “He is coming to terms with what it means to be a hero and the sacrifices he has to make to do the right thing. Peter has never had anyone look up to him as someone they admire. Certainly, he’s never had anyone cheer for him before. This has an unexpected effect on Peter: it stirs up his prideful self. This is the beginning of a movement toward his dark side in this film.”

That dark side is brought to the forefront when he comes into contact with a black substance that attaches itself to Peter’s Spider-Man suit. When the substance turns his suit black, he finds he has greater strength and agility than ever before… but also the substance brings out his pride and his vengefulness. “In the climax, Peter has to put aside his prideful self. He must put aside his desire for vengeance,” Raimi continues. “He has to learn that we are all sinners and that none of us can hold ourselves above another. In this story, he has to learn forgiveness.”

Another fan favorite, Gwen Stacy, made her film debut in Spider-Man 3. Well known to fans of the comic books, Gwen made her first appearance in December 1965 “The Amazing Spider-Man #31” and quickly became Peter Parker’s first love. Bryce Dallas Howard took on the role. Despite the differences between the comic book and screen versions of her character, Howard was able to use the comic book as inspiration in bringing Gwen Stacy to life. “There was a very deep relationship built into the comic books – that became my foundation,” said the actress. “This a person who, had things been different, could have been a good mate for him. Because her father is a police captain, she’s accustomed to someone leaving and putting his life in jeopardy every day and loving him unconditionally. I was able to build on that, to play the character that was written in the comic book.”

“It’s wonderful to bring new actors into the series because, although you have an existing set of rules and storylines you want to adhere to, at the same time you need to shake it up, bringing new voices and energies to the film that we haven’t experiences before, “noted Raimi. “It gives the audience a new experience, with the characters they love, but with a new energy dynamic, with those new faces on screen with them.”

“In terms of logistics and scope, Spider-Man 3 is by far the largest of the three films,” said Ziskin. “Sam has really upped the ante for this film, in terms of action sequences and visual effects involving Sandman and Venom, so it is a gigantic endeavor, with over 1,000 people working towards that goal.”

During production, Raimi relied on key members of his filmmaking team to bring to life before the cameras as much of Peter Parker’s story as possible. “Whenever it’s safe and practical, I like to capture the action in camera,” said Raimi. “Visual effects are an amazing tool for action that human beings can’t do – but if a human being can do it, let’s do it.”

The talented team of stuntmen was ready, but so was the cast. Bryce Dallas Howard, especially, surprised the filmmakers by being game for anything they could throw at her. At one point, the actress found herself hanging from a harness.

After performing several portions of the sequence on soundstages in Los Angeles, Howard was eager to get in the harness again to fly with Spider-Man over Sixth Avenue. “What’s so great about movies is you get to really experience these crazy, crazy stunts, things that you would never emerge from alive in real life,” says Howard. “I knew I would be 100% safe because Sam and the stunt team really protect the actors. So I tried to do as many things as possible, because it’s really fun and a great adrenaline rush!”

Thomas Haden Church was also up to the challenge – in fact, even more so. Whether it was being yanked five feet in the air so he could do a face-plant in the mud, or being chased (and caught) by dogs, or dangling off the side of a set, or falling onto train tracks, or having his face smashed into a pane of Plexiglas, the actor found himself bruised and battered repeatedly, but was ready for anything. According to producer Grant Curtis, “It wasn’t intentional, but it seemed sometimes like if any actor was required to get beat up in any way, Thomas was always drawing that short straw.”

Two members of the production team that played key roles in ensuring that these action sequences were both as safe and as spectacular as possible were special effects supervisor John R. Frazier (who previously served in the same capacity on the first two Spider-Man films) and second unit director Dan Bradley (a veteran of Spider-Man 2). “Working with Sam is like going back to school,” said Frazier. “You have that moment where you say, ‘Oh, this is going to be really, really hard, but a lot of fun.’ It’s not unusual for me to be on a movie like Spider-Man 3 for nine months, from the beginning planning stages through production.”

One scene that highlights their work is the Subway Drain portion of an elaborate fight sequence between Spider-Man and Sandman. Raimi worked closely with Frazier, Bradley and visual effects supervisor Scott Stokdyk on the sequence, in which Sandman is blasted by the force of a burst water pipe and, quite literally, goes down the drain. Sam wanted Sandman to melt away, in essence, during this sequence.

“This is the largest water gag for one shot I’ve ever done for a film,” recalled Frazier, who had previously supervised the special effects for Poseidon. “We used 50,000 gallons of water, shooting out of a pipe which blasted the rear of the set fifty feet away. When you see this sequence, the water appears to be a six-foot-thick column of water; however, we made the center of the pipe hollow, and used a restrictor plate to control the size of the column of water. The water is recirculated using pumps, which are able to pump 3,000 gallons a minute. We can fill both tanks in about five minutes, so that we are ready for another take.”

The sequence was covered using eight cameras, according to Stokdyk. “This sequence is where Spider-Man discovers Sandman’s weakness – water. We had to put a CG Sandman in here because the velocity of the water is too great to have Thomas Haden Church or a stuntman perform portions of the sequence. Water is a huge challenge for visual effects, especially on a large scale, so our goal here was to seamlessly integrate the elements for the sequence between practical and CG.”

Bradley and Frazier’s work is also on display in an action sequence during a bank heist, in which a security guard (played by none other than producer Grant Curtis) falls victim to Sandman’s wreath. “As a producer, Grant is uniquely qualified for guarding money,” laughed Bradley, “so Sam typecast him and invited him to spend a lot of time on set being buried underneath tons of sand as one of the armored car guards.”

Apprehensive as he might have been about performing the stunt, Curtis says that it would have been pointless to argue. “I’ve worked with Sam for ten years, so I know that once a decision’s been made, he’s going to get his way,” he said.

The sequence begins spectacularly, when Sandman smashes into the top of the armored call with his fist – which, in reality, Frazier’s team made of polyurethane foam. It was eight feet tall, six feet wide, and weighed over 500 pounds. Then, debris – sand – came flying at Curtis. “On the first take, I anticipated the crash and reacted too early,” he remembered. After an adjustment, he nailed the second take.

At the end of the sequence, the guard is buried in sand. To film the scene, the armored car was lifted and tilted at a 50-degree angle so that the sand could be dumped in and fill the car but with a fraction of the pressure on Curtis. The producer soon found himself beneath 4,000 pounds of ground corncob – the filmmakers’ ingenious substitute for sand.

The idea of using ground corncob as a double for sand did not come immediately to the filmmakers. The first man charged with investigating what kind of sand would make Sandman or solving any number of other costuming challenges, Acheson’s motto was: when in doubt, go back to the original text. “We derive our inspiration, as always, from the comic,” he said. “Sandman is one of those remarkable characters who can change shape, dissolve, disappear, grow, or become mud or concrete. We designed various stages and different scales of Sandman’s evolution, working with wonderful sculptors to create maquettes, small statues of Sandman in his various appearances.”

As much as Sandman required each of the departments to step up their game, so, too, did Venom – Spider-Man’s equal and opposite. Acheson and his team created various stages of Venom’s look, working with Raimi to create a tension in the sculpting of the suit. “It was important to Sam and to James that we keep the suit really sharp and aggressive, as with the tendrils that crawl across Venom’s face at points,” said head specialty costumer Shownee Smith, whose company Frontline Design worked under Acheson’s direction to manufacture the specialty costumes for the film.

For scenes where Brock transitions into Venom, Grace spent an hour being placed into the suit, which added between 120 and 140 pounds to his weight. The actor then spent an additional four and a half hours in makeup for the addition of appliances, including special sets of teeth worn by Grace to give the character the illusion of a larger, more menacing mouth. The filmmakers also attached monofilament to the skin on Grace’s face so that they could pull and distort the character as he makes his transformation.

“At one point while shooting the transition scenes, I thought, ‘What have I signed up for?!’” Grace laughed. “I had black goo poured all over me, wires attached to my face that people with fishing poles were pulling up, and other people below me were pulling down… When you see my character in pain, well, there wasn’t a whole lot of acting required.”

Also interacting with each of the departments was production designer J. Michael Riva, the member of the team responsible for bringing Raimi’s stylish vision to life. Riva was especially proud of his work in cresting the construction site that serves as the arena for the film’s final battle. “Making a construction site doesn’t sound very difficult, but if you have only eight weeks to design and build, it’s practically impossible,” he said. “We used over 20 tons of steel, 100 welders, and 200 carpenters working around the clock, seven days a week to get it done! But we all did it.”

The set took six weeks to complete, using tons of steel from a cancelled building project. A construction elevator, complete with operator, transported cast and crew to the various levels of the elaborate set. For the extensive lighting and electrical needs required for the sequence, a labyrinth of connections was designed and installed 80 feet above the stage floor, using over four miles of electrical cable. By the time the set was ready for shooting, Stage 27 was outfitted with approximately 21,000 amps, enough power to service over 200 homes.

“The great thing about a construction site is that it’s a very dangerous place. First, besides the implied height of the set, you have a lot of steel and rebar lying around at such a site. You can always rely on Sam to see opportunities and come up with an effective way to use these set elements to enhance the danger in a scene,” said Riva. “Second, it was an open structure, pretending to be 50 stories high, open on all sides. It offered Sam a jungle gym of possibilities to web up and down, to do a chase all over the face of the steel structure. The higher they go fighting their way up the building, the more the danger and tensions increase. It’s a long way to fall if you’re not Spider-Man!”

For visual effects supervisor Scott Stokdyk – the man charged with bringing the visual effects to the screen – those words were the beginning of a two-year process to develop the technology that would make Spider-Man 3 the most visually stunning film in the series so far. “When we began the pre-production process, the computer programs had not yet been developed which could achieve the look of Sandman and his capabilities that Sam wanted to see,” recalled producer Grant Curtis. “However, Scott Stokdyk and his team created new technology to manipulate every piece of sand on our character. The existing technology allowed management of thousands of particles at once – but to animate Sandman the way Sam wanted to, we would have to be able to render billions of particles. In the end, the new software they wrote required ten man-years to code.”

Stokdyk says that he and his team prepared for the challenge by first observing how sand moves in the real world. “One of the first things we did was to organize a sand shoot with Sam and Bill Pope, the difrector ofg photographer,” Stokdyk continued. “We shot footage of sand every way we would need it – thrown up, thrown against blue screen, over black screen. John Frazier, the special effects supervisor, shot it out of an aero can at a stuntman. Anything we could imagine sand doing in the film, we shot.”

“There’s a character the, emoting, but it’s just a pile of sand,” said Stotdyk. “If we’ve pulled together enough grains of sand to make feel something, then we’ve pulled it off.”

In the end, the artists were all extremely proud of their creation. “Sony Pictures Imageworks delivered on Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2, but for Spider-Man 3 it changed the industry standard,” said Curtis.

Sandman, of course, was not the only character that posed a considerable challenge for Spencer Cook; animating the black-suited Spider-Man required subtle changed to reflect the character’s more aggressive personality, “He’ll move a little quicker here and there, hunch his shoulders a little more, put his elbows up a little higher when he’s stuck to a wall. We tried to find poses that the classic Spider-Man would not do – where the red-suited Spider-Man was graceful and elegant in his motions, black-suited Spider-Man is more blunt, rough, and reckless.”

In creating Venom, Stokdyk notes that the character has at least three different stages. First, of course, is the initial transformation, in which Topher Grace’s skin is pulled away from his body and tendrils of goo cross his face until they completely envelop him. “As he gets angrier, he turns into more of a monster, more of a beast,” Stokdyk noted. First, he becomes a kind of double for Spider-Man, played by Grace. By the very end of the film, he becomes an entirely CG character – the classic Venom from the comic books, with a menacing, unhinged jaw and a full mouth of very sharp teeth. “Everything is alive on ‘comic-book Venom,’” Stokdyk continued. “The challenge was to make a character that was monsterous, very detailed, very kinetic – but not delicate. Despite all the detail, he’s still menacing.

Stokdyk was also determined to break new ground in terms of live-action integration with the visual effects. The supervisor was on hand during production so that he could be ready to take the ball as soon as the scenes were filmed. “It was important to Sam and me to incorporate as much live-action into the CG as possible,” he said. “The typical reason a shot is animated is because a person can’t do all of it. We wanted to find a way to have an actor or stunt person do part of the action, and synthesize the rest. The goal was to find a balance between keeping the shot real and making it exciting and cinematic.”

One dramatic example of this idea comes early in the film, as Peter Parker finds himself ambushed by the New Goblin – his friend, Harry Osborn. “It was Sam’s idea to show Peter fighting as Peter not as Spider-Man,” said producer Avi Arad. “It’s a terrific amount, because it brings home what a personal battle this is for Peter when you can see his face.”

Tobey Maguire and James Franco completed much of the aerial stunt sequence themselves, doing wire work suspended high above the stage floor. “Tobey is really handy with stunt situations, and he picks it up really quickly,” said stunt coordinator Scott Rogers. “James is also terrific – he’s got a great attitude. Both actors are used to the type of physicality required for their roles, and they excelled.”

For Stokdyk, achieving such great heights would not have been possible without the contribution from his team at Sony Pictures Imageworks, assembling, in the end, between 200 and 250 people to complete more than 900 effects shots. “You live and die by your team,” said Stokdyk. “They were always ready to respond, always on their toes. That’s bit of the process of working with Sam, you have to be flexible and ready to deliver.”

“When developing this third installment, we asked ourselves, ‘What does this young man still have to learn?’” said director Sam Raimi. “We placed him in situations where he’d be forced to confront his absences of character – obstacles that, in previous stories, he might not have been able to surmount. In this way, he would either be defeated or grow into the heroic person who might be capable of overcoming these obstacles. As the depth of our characters grow, they become richer human beings and can achieve more than in the previous films.”

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fatbottombucky · 4 years

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Thank You’s Go A Long Way *Steve Rogers x Reader*

@moonlight-mindfulness Requested: Steve working with a reader with intrusive thoughts (the depression/PTSD kind) and just giving her all the warmth and attention she needs whenever she feels bad, but also Reader being badass and just super sassy to him whenever she is in good spirits. I also just always like self care or someone helping the other w self care in fanfic. In case you want a steamy scene you could write her "Thank you" to him that evening 👀😏

Pairing: Steve Rogers x [F]Reader

Ratings: [+18] MATURE CONTENT

Warnings: Rough days and thoughts. Depression can be a bitch, tad angsty due to that. MAJOR F L U F F! Male Oral Receiving, cause lol

Notes: This... is way longer than I planned. Also, I haven’t written for Steve in a hot second. So, if this terrible... I apologise. - Rosalie

Requests are still open; men and female requests welcomed. I do want some female marvel character requests, got a lot of dudes, so c’mon...

24 HOURS EARLIER

“Oh, this was a bad idea,” Steve muttered into your ear over the loud gun shots being fired in your direction.

You don’t answer, so he looks towards you to see your cheeky smile. It almost makes him think this is perfectly fine, almost. You peek around the table you’re both behind, you almost get your head blown off and you have the audacity to laugh.

This is exciting to you, exhilarating even and that’s always confused Steve, but he feeds off of your energy. You have this thrill seeking attitude towards missions. It’s both a gift and a cruse for him, because his reckless nature combined with your thrill seeking: it’s a deadly combo.

But you are both always trying to outdo one another, it’s a sick challenge.

“So, what’s the plan?”

He looks down at you with raised eyebrows, wide eyes and a gobsmacked face, he’s meant to have a plan? For the shit you caused? The shit-eating grin you grace him with makes his heart flutter, but he’s not letting you off that easily.

“You’re Captain America,” you state obviously, “so man with a plan, let’s get outta here.”

He shakes his head dramatically, licking his lips as he looks over the table. There’s a drastic difference in bodies in this room, this whole operation was meant to be shutting down this organisation- collecting information too. Only it was shit from the get-go, for some reason instead of calling for back-up you both went further down in the bunker.

Now you’re both stuck.

“Still want to get that intel?” He asks you and you frown, tilting your head slightly, “I can hold them off, there’s a door just there,” he nods to behind you, “there’s a computer in there. You should be able to hack into them and get some kind of intel we can use.”

You begin to shake your head, “no way. There’s like thirteen of them, Steven. You’re gonna get seriously hurt.”

“Not if you’re quick, I’ve calculated the probability and it’s doable,” you roll your eyes, “better me than you, okay? We either go back empty handed or we get some type of information on these assholes.”

You only nod once at him, turning towards the door and deeply breathing. You look over your shoulder and cheekily smile at him, adding a wink for extra flare.

4 HOURS EARLIER

“Will you quit squirming?” You scold the man-child before you, he huffs loudly and sulks as you clean his shoulder.

He winces when you press the cloth to the wound, “It stings.”

“Yeah, well that’s what happens when you get shot!” You exclaim and shake your head when he pouts.

The Quinjet’s sink is covered in Steve’s blood and bloody gauzes, Steve watches as you use the small medkit to patch up his wound. Your eyebrows are knitted together, tongue poking out in concentration.

The gunshot no longer hurts or stings, his body already healing it for him. It looked worse than it felt, he knew that, but that didn’t stop you from worrying about him. Honestly, it was a lucky shot and a fluke he even got hit.

“Done.” You begin to close the sewing kit and smile at him, ruffling his golden hair.

“Thank you,” he grabs your wrist and kisses it tenderly, it causes you to scrunch your nose and make a gagging noise at his tenderness. “You’re so fucking mean,” he playfully pinches your side, you flip him off before heading out of the small bathroom and back to the cockpit.

PRESENT TIME

Your mind raced over yesterday’s events. How you managed to remain calm at the fact Steve got shot was a surprise, especially since your hands are shaking now. The same hands that masterfully sewed the bullet wound shut. Stopped the bleeding and cleaned him up.

This is your normal. Why the hell are you crying now? Getting shot on a mission is basically a normal date night for you both...

A soft knock is sounded through your apartment, you make no move to get out of bed, even when whoever it is knocks a couple more times. If they’re someone important or it’s serious they’d have a key... it seems they do.

The front door creeks open, keys are thrown into the glass bowl with all your change and keychains. Shoes are toed off, a jacket is being hung up on the hooks and then soft padding of footsteps are echoing towards your bedroom.

Door is pushed open, a tall figure is illuminated from the hallway lights. A sigh escapes you, it’s only Steve, your boyfriend, so it’s all okay. He’s fine, he doesn’t look angry even.

“You look snug,” He comments softly as he crawls onto your bed, laying over your covers and manoeuvring himself to laying beside you and facing you.

You’re silent in response, staring at your hands that are pulling threads at your blanket. Steve doesn’t speak again, choosing to remain quiet but he lifts a hand to tentatively play with your hair- you look at him and he gives a questioning glance, you shrug softly and he continues.

His fingers rub your scalp softly in circular motions, smiling when you scoot a little closer towards him. You don’t often let people touch your hair/head(head if you have a shaved head like me), but when you do it’s comforting and relaxing; could almost make you fall asleep.

“How is your shoulder?” your voice is barley above a whisper.

“Perfectly healed,” you nod once, “hey,” somehow his voice is even softer than before, “wanna do face-masks and eat chocolate?”

You raised an eyebrow, you felt really lethargic but nod. Steve leans over and kisses you softly before getting off of the bed, he switches on the fairy lights twirled around your headboard. You watch as he walks towards the bathroom and rummaging around in your cabinets.

It’s a full two minutes before he returns and puts the masks in his back pocket, he extends a hand out to you causing you to shake your head slightly. You didn’t want to leave the bed, you wanted to stay in bed.

“We have to leave the bed, Y/N,” you sigh and sit up, he chuckles when you make grabby hands for him- no way are you going to walk. He lifts you up effortlessly in his arms, “the bed is where monsters lie and you can’t listen to those.”

He sits you on the sofa and then settles beside you, silent as he crosses his legs and opens the packet of face-mask. A bag of snacks are on the coffee table. Between sitting up and looking through the contents of food the Netflix theme startles you, you faintly smile as he searches for Brooklyn Nine Nine.

He tells you that he’s going to put your face-mask on for you, your heart swells as he gently pats the cold paste around your face.

“You’re so beautiful,” he tells you sincerely.

Normally you’d roll your eyes at his cheesiness, but you don’t have it in you.

“Even with a cucumber mask on making me look like Shrek?”

He nods sweetly, “You’re the Fiona to my Shrek,” as you put his on for him. “Sam is Donkey,” he mutters faintly and you giggle.

“Who is Buck?”

“Puss in Boots,” you frown and huff a laugh, “he’s always been the cool cat and the one ladies fawn after.”

You smile softly, “but Shrek gets the princess. Not always about looks, Steven.” He nods with a shy grin, a blush forming on his cheeks at your implication.

Sitting in silence and watching Brooklyn Nine Nine with snacks, you couldn’t ask for a better distraction. Steve keeps a hand on your thigh, softly drawing patterns on your skin. Everything about this is perfect.

After twenty minutes Steve helps wash your mask off in the kitchen sink, laughing when you wipe your wet face on his shirt.

“I didn’t bring spare clothes with me,” he whines.

“I have shirts I stole from you in my room,” he gasps in mock shock at you, following you back to the bedroom where you show him your stash of his clothing.

It’s almost comical at how many shirts and joggers you have of his. Not that he minds, of course. You wearing his clothes is a favourite of his, he loves seeing you randomly in his stuff. *** After almost a whole season worth of Brooklyn Nine Nine you’re both back in your bed, facing one another and talking aimlessly into the darkness.

“Thank you.”

“Hey,” he wraps an arm over your body and pulls you towards him, “I love you. I’m not going to let you suffer in silence, especially not alone. So if you need to lay in bed in silence all day, then we’ll do it together. But I know how the mind works, twists thing and being in bed can be damaging too. Those monsters lie to you, so I couldn’t let it keep talking.”

You lean forward and press your lips to his gently, a surprise grunt rises from the back of his throat. Your hand settles on his jaw, stroking lightly as you deepen the kiss.

After a few minutes of making-out you push on Steve’s shoulder forcing him to settle on his back, you slyly smile as you lay over him and push the covers down as you travel down his body too.

“Y/N,” his breathless voice has you smirking, “you don’t have to.”

Judging by his breathy voice and obvious reaction to the potential possibility has you curving an eyebrow, his shoulder shrug in response and you chuckle.

“It’s a thank you,” you pull his briefs down, “you’ve been so good to me today, treated me so nicely.”

Before he can respond you lick a broad strip up his length, a guttural groan leaves his lips loudly. You smile proudly before getting back to work, lapping at the tip teasingly before taking him into your throat. You can’t fit all of him in your mouth, a slight gagging sound emits from you when he lifts his hips up to meet your mouth.

You pull back up, gasping slightly and working him with your hand. Licking at his length as you sped up your hand movements, smiling when he moans your name loudly, hand finding the back of your head; a silent plea for your mouth to replace your hand.

Accepting that you take him down again, bobbing your head and hallowing your cheeks. “Fuck,” he grunts rather loudly, “stop!” He whines and you slowly pull off him, your tongue staying on the tip as you watch him clam down. “Can we-Do you wanna?”

You climb up his body, hand still wrapped around his cock, “You don’t think my thank you was enough?” The question is paired with a coy smile.

“More than enough, but I wanna express my gratitude for looking after me yesterday.”

Please leave a nice comment/ like, maybe reblog? Any communication would be awesome :) I had my BETA help with the oral scene because... never sucked a dick lmao bye *peace sign* Let me know what you think! - Rosalie

#steve rogers #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers smut #steve rogers x y/n #steve rogers x you #steve rogers imagines #steve rogers one shot #steve rogers x female reader #captain america imagines #captain america x reader

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arctimon · 3 years

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Mischief...Managed?

So tomorrow, June 9th, the six-episode series Loki is going to start. Taking place with the alternate continuity Loki that cropped up during Avengers: Endgame, it will follow him as he worked with the Time Variance Authority (TVA, and an actual comic thing as I found out today) as they try to preserve the timeline that I’m sure he’s going to screw up unintentionally. It’s the same length as Falcon and the Winter Soldier (six episodes), but a second second is apparently in pre-production, so it looks like they already plan on getting more out to us for Phase 4. Loki has grown into one of the most popular characters (antagonist or otherwise) in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so it would make a ton of sense for Marvel to keep him in the spotlight with his own series.

He has also been a character that I’ve taken a passing interest in for the sake of (you guessed it) his visit to Fanfiction Land (TM). But of course, you guys can see the problem, right?

He’s a god. And I’ve been able to get away with putting Avengers and side characters from Marvel into my stories, but this isn’t just some normal character. You’re crossing a pretty big line once someone like Loki gets thrown into the picture.

And I think the gods are interesting characters, just like normal human ones.

The conundrum is how you make them a part of the story without being the story, if that makes any sense. God are...well...gods. And even having one of them in a universe like Big Hero 6 would throw off the status quo. This is a verse where, barring Boss Awesome, didn’t really have superheroes, much less people living in Rainbow Land lording over the people of the universe doing whatever they do.

So I had to draw a little inspiration from San Francisco proper. And that led me to discovering this: The Yggdrasil Urban Wildlife Rescue.

Yggdrasil is a volunteer-led rescue facility in the Oakland-San Francisco area that services, treats, and cares for injured wildlife. They also deal with a lot of squirrels.

Now, who do we know that loves squirrels?

Not the person that dressed up as them or anything. So here’s the Big Hero 6 rub of it: Doreen is Karmi’s friend that she first meets working at Gramercy, Chef Bolton’s restaurant. They meet, they become friends (mostly because Doreen forces her to be), and things progress. After cameoing in Honey Lemon’s e-mail in Part Time (Chapter 5, “Honey Lemon and Fred Are In The Market”), she makes her first actual appearance during Hiro and Karmi’s “friend excursion” in Overnight (Chapter 6, “Candlelit”). Doreen also happens to be the only member of the Beta Team that hasn’t gotten their story yet.

But she will...because it’s going to involve her place of employment:

Time to make a quick stop to her boss's office.

“Mr. Laufeyson! Mr. Laufeyson!”

The tall, lanky man sighed loudly as he turned his chair away from the screen and toward the newcomer. “What is it, dear child? Can't you see I'm busy?” “I know. I just wanted to ask if I can take my break right now.” Doreen clapped her paws together. “My friends are here and I want to give them a tour and allofthecoolfancythingsbeingavolunteerhere-” “What have I said about speaking haphazardly in here?” “...That if I don't breathe, my brain will turn to mush?” “Exactly.” The man slicked back his hair and motioned at the crowds of people on the cameras. “It appears that you have done your rounds, so I don't see why you cannot-”

“Thanks, boss!” Doreen leaned over and gave him a quick bear hug. “I won't go far. I'm going to go meet them in Jotunheim at Mount Winterfire.”

As she hightailed it out the door, the man smoothed out his shirt, returning his gaze back to his work. “That girl is a handful and then some. I do not know how you were able to tolerate her, brother...”

It’s a good thing that he had a regular name that can be reliably used, huh?

For those of you who may be confused by what Doreen is saying, Yggdrasill is the World Tree, connecting the Ten Realms (or Nine Worlds in Norse Mythology) together into one big happy family. I thought it would be nice to make the Realms into areas of the Refuge. For example, Jotunheim has all of the concessions and restaurants. Niffleheim has all of the burrowing creatures. And so on and so forth. The Marvel Wiki has two pictures that I draw inspiration from for the Big Hero 6 version of the Refuge:

It sort of goes into the image that I want; a giant, sprawling lobby with exhibits and rooms, all surrounding by the largest tree anyone has ever seen. It’s not the real Yggdrasil, but that won’t stop certain villains from wanting to claim it as their own. Roots Of Your Labor (the title of Doreen’s story) will start after the set of one-shots that I’m doing right now. I want to get all of those out because the last of them (Artifact) will also touch on some subjects in Doreen’s story, but I’m not going to touch on that just yet. Now...if I could only draw buildings. Or giant trees. (By the way, just like Granville mentions in my stories, the real Yggdrasil is funded entirely on charitable donations, so if you would like to donate, you can go here, if you would like.)

#big hero 6 #big hero 6 the series #doreen green #squirrel girl #yggdrasil #yggdrasil urban wildlife refuge #yumr #mr. laufeyson #loki #donation #big hero 6 fanfiction #karmi #the best of friends

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sanderssidesfanfiction · 3 years

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If There’s a Place I Could Be - Chapter Seventy One

If There’s a Place I Could Be Tag

January 10th, 1997

Remy was looking at the test his latest table-mate had given him and he frowned. “What’s so bad about it?” he asked.

“It’s a ninety seven!” she exclaimed.

“Yeah, so? I barely got a seventy two,” Remy said with a shrug. “It’s okay to not get everything perfect, or even close to perfect. All that matters is that you pass.”

“Figures you’d see it that way,” she scoffed. “You don’t care about grades at all. Do you even know where you’re going to college?”

“Don’t know, don’t care, Cindy,” Remy said. “I’m fifteen. I don’t have to care yet.”

She scoffed again and stormed off as the bell rang and Remy rolled his eyes. Another potential friendship avoided. Good. He had been worried he wouldn’t be able to shake this one. And perfectionists rubbed him a very particular wrong way that was not pleasant.

September 5th, 2002

Remy was working in the kitchen when Emile came up from behind him for a hug. “Hey, love,” Emile said.

“Mm, hi, mio amore,” Remy said. “Decided you’re finally ready for lunch?”

“Yeah. I was just doing some drawing earlier to fulfill the art class requirement I’ve been putting off, but the drawings are done for now. I just want to eat,” Emile said with a laugh.

“What were you drawing?” Remy asked.

“You,” Emile said. “Like, it wasn’t realistic figure drawings because I wasn’t looking at you, but I was working in different cartoon styles, and I figured I may as well draw one of the people I know best.”

Remy turned a slight red even as he continued to work. “Do I get to see these drawings eventually?”

“Yeah, if you want,” Emile said. “So long as you don’t tell me that my imitations of my favorite cartoon styles suck.”

“I would never say that,” Remy said. “You’re a pretty good drawer, actually. Maybe not make-a-living-off-it good, but definitely a your-art-shows-lots-of-care good.”

“Really?” Emile asked, and he looked surprised.

Remy paused in his work and faced Emile fully. “Yeah, Emile. You’re really good at art.” Emile frowned, and Remy mirrored the action. “Is there any reason that you wouldn’t think that?” Had he just found one of Emile’s insecurities?

“I mean, I guess not, it’s just...” Emile shrugged. “There’s a lot of things wrong with it. It’s like when I get a question wrong on a test. I know it’s wrong, but I can’t fix it.”

Remy squinted and walked past Emile, to the card table, where his sketchbook was still open. “Emile, your drawings look fine.”

“Fine, sure. But they’re not exactly good,” Emile said, walking over and pointing. “See, the eyes are slightly off compared to the She-Ra style, and in the Looney Tunes style I can’t get the hands and the fingers properly. And these are just the sketches I’m okay with other people seeing.”

Remy stared at Emile, then at the drawings, then Emile. “Emile, I’m not a cartoon expert like you are, but I know enough about art style differences from comics to understand this was just done by a different artist. It’s not wrong, it’s just a slight difference, like what can happen when more than one animator works on a project. The difference is that in animation, the frames go by so fast that it’s usually imperceptible.”

“No, it’s not the same style if it doesn’t look exactly the same. Otherwise it’s just an imitation,” Emile said.

“Okay...correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought you were just going for an imitation,” Remy said.

“I mean, yeah, but I realized how close I was and wanted it to be in the genuine style...and I couldn’t get it,” Emile mumbled the last part, turning away.

“What do you mean, honey? You definitely got it right,” Remy said.

“But I didn’t,” Emile argued.

Remy blinked. “Okay, maybe it’s not perfect, but—”

“—See?! You just said yourself that I didn’t get it!” Emile exclaimed.

Remy paused. Took a breath. Let it out slowly. “That’s not what I said,” he said calmly. Forcing away the irritation at being interrupted and the annoyance that Emile was apparently not listening to him. “I said you didn’t have it perfect. Not having it perfect doesn’t mean you don’t have it.”

“Yes it does!” Emile exclaimed with a huff.

The irritation faded away and was replaced with a blooming bud of concern. “No, it doesn’t, Emile...why would you think that?”

Emile laughed incredulously. “Do you really not know?”

“No,” Remy said. “I really don’t.”

“When I was in kindergarten the first time around, I was ‘the stupid one.’ I know you’ve heard this before, but listen. When it clicked and I finally knew how to read, I went to the top of my class in just about everything. Suddenly, school was impossibly easy. And everything I did was just considered perfect, perfect, perfect. That’s all it could be, that’s all it can be. I’m not allowed to fail. Because if I fail, then I’m just that stupid five-year-old who couldn’t even spell his own name. And suddenly everyone starts questioning me, saying they thought I was smart, I was supposed to understand this, and isn’t it easy? Why am I struggling?! I just need to push through until I understand, but I’m not even allowed to ask for help, because oh, that’s just for the stupid kids, Emile, and you’re not stupid! If something isn’t perfect, then it’s a problem. And I’m not supposed to have any more problems. Not after that.”

Remy didn’t know what to say. “Christ, Emile,” he breathed. “That’s terrible.”

Emile laughed and shook his head. “Not particularly,” he said, even as he was starting to cry. “Just the burden of being the smart kid, I guess. You have to keep up the appearance even if you have no idea what you’re doing. Because otherwise all the teachers see is that dumb kid who couldn’t tell the difference between an ‘o’ and a ‘v.’”

“I thought only your teen years were traumatic, but Christ. That’s just...I don’t have any words. I was never really ‘the smart kid,’ I never had to deal with that, but...wow, so many things make sense now,” Remy said. He shook his head. “Not the point, not the point. Okay. Emile, I’m going to tell you something, and I want you to listen to me when I say it, okay?”

Emile took off his glasses, wiping away his tears, and he nodded. “I’m listening.”

Remy grabbed Emile’s cheeks and brought their foreheads together. “You have my explicit permission to fail.”

“You...what?” Emile asked.

“You have my permission to fail. Okay? If you don’t get everything perfect, you’re not stupid in my eyes. If your graduating GPA is three point nine, I won’t focus on the one class you got a ‘B’ in. I’ll focus on the fact that all your other classes you aced with all ‘A’s! That’s freaking amazing! I would never be able to do that! If you get one thing wrong, if you ‘fail’ in your eyes, that’s okay. No one can be perfect all the time. It’s okay to need help. It’s not just for people who are struggling. This operates on the same principles as therapy. Therapy is not just for people who are drowning in their own emotions, it’s also to teach those people how to swim, or to find a boat. The same is true if you have to ask a professor a question, or enlist the skills of a tutor. You’re not stupid for doing those things, you’re learning more so you don’t make the same mistakes in the future.” Remy kissed Emile. “You’re not stupid, Emile, and you never have been stupid. ‘Stupid’ as a concept is just...well, it’s stupid. It makes no sense. And getting one or two questions wrong on a test doesn’t mean you’re stupid. It means you got all the other questions right, and you get to learn from those mistakes.”

Emile blinked. “What if I get all the questions wrong?” he asked, voice small.

“You’re still not stupid. You just need to stress less and maybe study harder next time. But I doubt that would happen, okay? You’re Emile freaking Thomas, and you can do anything you set your mind to. Don’t sell yourself short,” Remy said, giving Emile a crooked grin at the end.

Emile slowly removed Remy’s hands from his face and stared at the floor. “Honey, I appreciate the sentiment, but...I can’t just stop this. I’ve been doing it for fifteen years.”

“I know you can’t just stop it at will, honey, that’s not what I’m asking of you,” Remy said. “I’m asking you to go a little easier on yourself. You don’t have to be perfect. If you get everything right, more power to you, but beat yourself up a little less if you make a mistake. If you do nothing else, at least remind yourself that you have my permission to fail? That no one will hate you or think that you’re stupid if you mess up?”

“I...” Emile trailed off, actually considering Remy’s words, which Remy counted as a win. “Yeah, okay.”

“Yeah?” Remy asked.

“Yeah, I’ll try,” Emile said, not looking Remy in the eye, but his tone sounded hopeful. “It would be nice to not feel like everything has to be perfect, I think.”

“You’ll either find it incredibly liberating or incredibly terrifying, I think. Possibly both,” Remy said drily.

Emile snorted. “I’m willing to bet you’re right,” he said with a nod. “I’ve never really considered what it would be like to be allowed to fail. Even when we moved out of the college dorms, I didn’t think about the possibility of failing and not managing our money correctly, because failure just wasn’t an option. And I guess it saved us issues with rent and food and the like, but I’m willing to bet it did a number on my mental health too. Just a hunch.”

Remy laughed. “Honey, you’ve worked yourself sick before because you’re so focused on helping friends and going to work and keeping that perfect GPA. I know for a fact that it’s done a number on you not only mentally, but physically.”

“Okay, I see your point,” Emile said with a slightly sheepish smile. “That was me going a little overboard.”

“More than a little,” Remy said with a snort. “That in and of itself was a bit of a failure. Failure to take care of yourself.”

Emile went oddly quiet, before he softly went, “Oh.”

“Oh?” Remy asked.

“I have failed in the past, then,” Emile said. “And you didn’t change how you treated me. I mean, you might have called me stupid for pushing myself too far and getting myself sick, but you didn’t...treat me like I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“That’s because you do know what you’re doing,” Remy said. “Making one or two mistakes, or outright failing doesn’t mean you don’t know anything. It means you might need things explained to you in a different way, or just explained period, but you know way more than most people, Emile. I would argue you’re smarter than most twenty one year olds I’ve met. At least, academically. Street smarts are another story.”

“Look, that was one time I got lost on the way home from McDonald’s!” Emile defended. “That doesn’t mean I don’t have street smarts!”

Remy burst out laughing. “No, that means that you have no sense of direction, and no street smarts.”

“This coming from the guy who purposefully picked a fight with a guy who was buddies with linebackers from the football team,” Emile snorted. “That’s not exactly prime ‘street smarts’ either, mister.”

“Okay, okay, so we’re both dumbasses coming to street smarts! I still know more than you on that front!” Remy exclaimed.

“Oh, you wish!” Emile declared, “I’d bet actual money that I have more street smarts than you.”

“A fool and his money are soon parted,” Remy said with a wicked grin. “But fine. If you’re so certain, let’s get an impartial party to determine this. Next time we see Bernie, we’ll ask him. But be prepared to lose whatever money you’re betting!”

“We have joint bank accounts in all but name anyway,” Emile said with a shrug. “We regularly buy stuff for each other. What difference does it make if that money is in my account or yours?”

“You have a point,” Remy hummed. “Okay. How about we bet food? If you win, we get the stuff to bake cupcakes. If I win, we get the stuff for brownies. And the loser has to help bake the sweets that we’ll be eating for the next two weeks or so.”

“Oh, you are so on!” Emile exclaimed.

Remy grinned. Emile was hopefully going to go a little easier on himself, and Remy was going to get to eat brownies next week! This was great!

#if there's a place i could be #sanders sides fanfiction #remile #emile picani #ts sleep

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mcchipisfried · 4 years

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DEArtfest Day 14 - Enemies to Lovers

Calling out @octopunkmedia for today’s prompt!!

I’m kidding I did write something but this was my basic reaction to reading the prompt. Also I will be making a drawing AND writing something for two other prompts so look forward to that...

(one might be an actual piece and not just a comic...)

Gavin sat at his desk, his coffee cup empty because he refused to be in the same room with an android for longer than two seconds. His day started as well as any other day did for Gavin Reed, with him waking up feeling like shit, drinking one cup of coffee at home, then another once he came into work, barely being able to stay awake while also having his new android partner quietly looming over his shoulder, tablet in hand, every so often glancing at him with what only could be described as a very displeased frown.

“Hey fuck face, could you fuck off to the next recycling bin and do your job there instead of leaning over me like some kind of fucking bodyguard?” Gavin said, turning to look at the android behind him, and watched as his frown seemed to deepen, probably in more displeasure towards Gavin’s words.

“Detective Reed, I believe for our partnership to function properly we must become at least comfortable with each other being in the same room. As for my presence, I was simply reviewing my scanners and noticed that your vitals are, simply put, terrible and it is my belief that you should go home before-”

“Oh so the fucking android is worried about my health now? Pretty ironic considering what you were made for. Why don’t you just fuck off and mind your own fucking business. Go one, wait somewhere else like the good little android you are and wait for someone to give you your next orders.” Gavin said, interrupting the android. Turning back around and facing his computer, ignoring the dirty looks he got from Tina and Chris as the RK900 promptly turned to walk towards the break room.

The RK900 sat at one of the tables in the break room and continued to look through the previous scans he had done of the Detective. They showed he was low on energy, yet had an accelerated heartbeat, most likely due to his over consumption of caffeine. He pushed his scans aside and instead focused on the tablet in front of him as he continued to silently work. If the Detective wouldn't cooperate with him in the future then he saw their partnership only ending with one of them physically hurting the other.

Before long, he looked up as Officer Chen came into the break room, asking if she could sit next to him. He nodded and focused on her presence as it was obvious she had come to talk to him.

“I’m sorry about Gavin. I know he can be pretty harsh but he’s not so bad once you get to know him a little, and even then he’s still kind of an ass-”

“I am sorry to interrupt you Officer Chen, but I am not interested in your apologies on behalf of the Detective.” Nines said. Looking back down at his tablet, he continued.

“He is an insufferable man child who insists on holding my designed purpose over my head as if my deviancy means nothing. I understand his prejudice stems from his own insecurities and interactions with Connor but it is still infuriating to be treated like this.” The RK900′s LED swirled, from yellow to a deep red. He felt the officer reach over to put her hand on his shoulder, smiling at him in understanding. He realized how rude he sounded and nodded at her, his LED returning to its yellow color.

“I won’t be returning his threats in any way but I will not let him continue to berate me as if i was still a slave to my programming. The only positive about this situation is the fact that this partnership will end once Lieutenant Anderson and Connor return. I might not have a purpose, I’m still trying to figure that out for myself, but I do know that I don’t want to hurt anyone ever again. I want to protect androids and humans, including Detective Reed.” He looked at the officer next to him, a silent understanding between them.

“Well,” Officer Chen stood from the table and started to turn to walk out of the break room. “I just hope Gavin doesn’t try to do anything stupid. He’s all bark, hardly any bite. Just...don’t kill him, alright? He’s an asshole but he’s the only asshole I can stand in this place.” she said to the RK900 before making her way out of the break room.

“I’ll try not too.” The android said going back to look at his tablet before looking up once more to see Detective Reed stopping in his tracks as he saw the RK900 sitting in the break room.

“Fuck this shit.” The detective said, before turning back to return to his desk.

“These are going to be some very long months” the android thought as he looked back down at his tablet, finally alone to work in peace.

“Nines, I’m gonna need you to fuck off right now before I decide to switch you out for Connor.” Gavin said, obviously joking as he continued to chew on his last slice of pizza. He had managed to eat a whole box of some of the best fucking pizza in all of Detroit because fuck it if he gets fat, not like he’s really interested in getting laid any time soon. In fact he could go the rest of his life without getting laid so long as it kept Nines pestering him like a mother hen, with a concerned look on his face. He liked having Nines pay attention to him. He didn’t know why, but he assumed it was because it had become a lot easier to get under his skin since their partnership began. By not taking care of himself he got to see some very interesting expressions from Nines besides his usual cocky smirk and neutral face.

“Detective, I know you seem to find yourself quite charming in many ways but I highly doubt Connor would want to spend more than two minutes as your partner, no matter how nice he is.” Nines said, clearly amused by Gavin's assumption that he’d ever be able to actually get rid of Nines. He had become quite attached to the Detective over the past few months as partners, even if he still found him to be irritating, especially in the way he handled his personal health, he would never be able to picture himself being partnered up with anyone other than Gavin.

“I can already see that you’re desperately trying to be like the Lieutenant by gaining some weight, although he has lost a lot of his previous weight and is in fact quite healthy. Might even say a bit attractive, in a roguish kind of way if that's something people are into.” Nines smirked as he saw Gavin scowl at this and slam the pizza box that was on the table shut.

“Excuse me? Tin Can I would NEVER let myself go to the point of even looking remotely like Hank? And attractive?? Something must be wrong with your fucking eyes if you think Hank fucking Anderson is attractive in any way, shape, or form because I am ten times more attractive than he is!” Gavin sputtered out, clearly set off by Nines’ comment.

“Tell me Detective, does the possibility of me finding anyone attractive bother you?” Nines asked, clearly enjoying the reactions he was getting out of Gavin now that he had distracted him enough to take the slice of pizza and throw it into the trash.

Gavin hardly took notice, now riled up by Nines’ question.

“Listen here Tin Can, I don’t know what the fuck you’re insinuating but the only reason I even care is because I am obviously more attractive than Hank fucking Anderson so don’t go thinking you can get away with saying dumb shit like that. I refuse to be partnered up with an android with clearly faulty eyesight.”

Gavin and Nines continued to argue, jumping from topic to topic, not noticing the two officers who looked on from the other side of the break room, whispering among themselves and wondering if Detective Reed and Nines were actually friends or not. Their continued eavesdropping into the Detective and Nines’ conversation did nothing to answer their questions.

Gavin opened his eyes as he felt the sunlight that filtered in from his window beginning to warm his face. He groaned and closed his eyes, feeling the side of his bed for a body but only found cold sheets. That’s when he noticed the smell of coffee and a much lighter smell that mingled beautifully with the smell of coffee. Eggs. His stomach growled and urged him to follow the heavenly smells that were obviously coming from the kitchen.

Once he made his way out of the bedroom he found Nines, at the stove making breakfast. Making him breakfast. His heart squeezed inside his chest at the image before him. He smiled lazily and made his way over, hugging Nines from behind and looking over his shoulder to see exactly what he was making.

“Good morning, Gavin.”

“Morning Tin Can, whatcha making?” Gavin asked, as he began to smell something sweet emanating from the kitchen table.

“I thought since we made that Red Ice bust a couple days ago, that it would be nice to treat ourselves this morning. I made you breakfast that I had hoped I’d be able to bring you to bed and later I was hoping you’d join me in going to the library. They have just started accepting androids for library cards and I’d like to get one for myself.” Nines said, before turning around and kissing Gavin on the cheek.

“Holy shit what did I do to deserve you? And you can totally serve me breakfast in bed, just let me go back so I can lay down. Also I love you, but I refuse to leave my bed today until after 3 PM.” Gavin said, as he sauntered back to the bedroom to wait for his breakfast. In bed.

Nines chuckled and went back to cooking, drastically reducing the amount of sugar in Gavin’s coffee and making sure to bring some fruit for Gavin to eat. They were definitely treating themselves today but he was still going to force Gavin to have a balanced breakfast even if it killed him.

That’s it! Probably one of my my longer ones but I really enjoyed writing this one.

#fanfic #detroit evolution #reed900 #enemies to lovers #deartfest

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bustin-a-hazelnut · 3 years

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RAIN's ARC 4 Predictions - Part 2

So, here’s the second half of my theories on what awaits us in RAIN’s finale. I made sure to keep this one shorter & less detailed, because most of them are pretty vague & self-explanatory, and long paragraphs of this would simply be a drag to read through. No survival percentages either, as I don’t expect many casualties on the “team good” side.

Team RAIN

To start off, I fully expect our guys to win the day, eliminate the Braith threat & stay together as a team of young hunters, ready to face off against new challenges (but am not adverse to the idea of a final, that isn't a traditionally "happy ending").

Robin’s big struggle is bound to be facing & defeating Kamala.

Her fears of loosing more people could cause some disagreements (particularly with Marron), but I expect those to be resolved & for them to stay happily together.

Robin’s newly realized main motivation of being kind & doing good could very well drive her to reach out to some of the more “redeemable” Braiths & offer them a chance to give up on Kamala’s masterplan & start anew.

There’s gonna be more focus on Irving, now that his family is involved.

His & Nyssa’s “archnemesis” among the Braiths is Viola (much like Kamala is Robin’s), so it’s nice to see them face off against her.

Romance between the two of them will continue gradually developing (plz give me some precious lovebird moments ; _ ; )

Nyssa has a talk with her mom about Pitch ahead of her.

I don’t expect her to show any interest in seeing him again, though.

When it comes to Akane, I sorta draw a blank, but I fully expect her storyline to be heavily associated with William (I’m not holding out my hopes for a classic romance with a happily ever after, but the chemistry between the two is undeniable).

The Lincoln Clan

While on the subject of Willl, he’s the one I have quite a bad feeling about – the way I see it, he could very well become one of the arc’s casualties. Not many in-comic clues for this that I can think of, but his overall troubled personality, complicated bond with Akane, lack of positive connections to other characters – it just gives me this sense of danger looming over him (needless to say, I don’t want anything like this to occur, but a theory is a theory).

My precious daughter Lilliana is bound to finally open up about her struggles & get a fucking friend.

Seriously, I have very little idea of whom it’ll be or how it’ll happen, but it has to. I’ve waited since reading the first comic pages that featured her, & I believe I’m not about to be disappointed.

The only certain thing I know I am hyped about is her facing Artemis once she is rescued.

There is also her majorly unnoticed connection with Pitch, but I’ll leave that for his section of the post.

Tobin is probably about to come out any moment now, and I firmly believe, that when it comes to Braiths, her & Viorel will get a heart to heart, and she could very well get a proposition of a lifetime from them. Of course, they could be using it to manipulate her, and uncovering their plot/outsmarting them could be a chance for her to shine. I’m not sure how it’ll work in the plot technically, but these two interacting is too good an opportunity to pass up.

I expect Artemis to wake up from her coma – she needs to learn about Tobin, and also finally be confronted with Lilli's storm of emotions & realize how badly she’s fucked up with her girl (and, y’know, work on fixing it).

However, the damage she suffered will probably prevent her from fighting ever again.

I am not sure how, but Roderick will regain his courage & play his part in bringing the Braiths down. I won’t say he’ll survive for sure (the idea of Maylis as a lord seems to be favoured by some), but at the same time, killing many more members of Robin’s family feels like too much.

I’ll group Marron here, since she is basically Robin’s family at this point – it would be nice to see her gain more independence & not just stay “the love interest”. She embarked on that path already when she stood up to Sterling, and should definitely go further in that direction: take more initiative, express opinions, that don’t necessarily correlate well with Robin’s – altogether, be her own person more than just "main hero's girl".

The rest of them

The remaining free members of the Crazy Bunch (Bianca & Rufus iirc) will probably get tracked down – if Kamala can spare any manpower to silence them. It’s also possible for her to just forget about them, since they aren’t likely to confront officials about the Braith threat, and if her plan is successful, they’re going down with the rest of humanity regardless. I like the idea of them sharing the Braith money & just laying low & enjoying themselves offscreen, while the final battle breaks out.

Beyond learning more about him from Maera, Pitch isn’t likely to play a role in the plot again. I have very little hope for him making another appearance, but if that could possibly be, Lilliana has to be the reason it does (since Nyssa’s already had enough of that man for a lifetime).

I don’t think many people paid attention to it, but there was clearly some sort of semi-bond between Lilli & Pitch – probably due to them both being the clan’s outcasts. Even though he’s about to be dragged away, it’d be nice for her to seek him out & go absolutely apeshit into his face about betraying her family (and lowkey betraying her personally).

Though it’s unlikely, I would love to see more between these two – they’ve known each other for years, Pitch might as well have trained Lilli in combat, and it would be nice if he displayed any kind of emotion at realizing she fucking cared whether he’d be around or not.

“The Wishing Well” bar we’ve been teased for the first post is likely to be the place where Jin-Shi, Nyssa & Irv look for Raleigh.

I’m not sure how he’ll influence the plot surrounding Irving’s family & Viola, but once he learns what happened to Otso, I expect him to help our heroes track him down to get more info from him, consecutively causing them to stumble upon Tahlia & Gardner (as already stated, definite plot points aren’t my strongest suit, but this is how I believe they could all come together).

Please wrap my man Otso in a fucking blanket & let him have a heart to heart with Raleigh & regenerate his eyes in peace you people, I am fucking telling you-

I’ve left team JNPR for dessert, namely, because of Jin-Shi Pan – I don’t really have any guesses when it comes to Nanako, Petra or Isambard.

For now, she’ll likely busy herself helping Irving & Nyssa deal with Viola & her welcome party. But there’s a mystery regarding her, that’s been mentioned, but never elaborated upon – her lost friend, Ninety Nine, whom Nyssa promised to help in searching for.

In any other case, I’d say, we are being teased a dlc/spin-off of the main story. It might just be a part of her past, that isn’t going to come up again. But once again, I just have this hunch, that we weren’t told that for nothing. Perhaps a clue will be found somewhere down the line; perhaps some new character will surprise us with their connection to Jin. I don’t know, and this is admittedly the weakest theory on the list, but it’s here nonetheless.

And this is it for my arc 4 predictions. Gotta say, I’m proud of myself for meeting my deadline & finishing it before the first post of the arc. All of my thoughts on it have already been stated, so without further ado, I wish everyone a very exciting part of our beloved comic by @neopoliitan!

#robin lincoln #nyssa noirette #akane amaranth #irving hawthorne #william lincoln #lilliana lincoln #tobin lincoln #roderick lincoln #artemis lincoln #marron armona #rufus bayardo #bianca alpin #pitch sirius #raleigh radcliff #otso umber #jin shi pan

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