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lily-drake · 1 year

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The Demon’s Queen

Chapter Ten

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The plane ride to Paris was uneventful. It was just himself and Tim, and both were trying to find any clues from their laptops. The sound keys being hit filled the plane until Tim let out a loud sigh of frustration.

“No luck either?”

Bruce asked casually as he turned to face his youngest son.

“No. I’ve been reviewing different security cams for the past three hours and I haven’t found a single thing except how crazy some of the Akuma Attacks were.”

Tim paused for a long moment, his brows furrowed and lips turned down letting his features show how concerned and unsettled he was.

“Some of them were really bad B. Like even worse than the things we’ve seen in Gotham.”

That last comment made Bruce’s lips turn down into a grim frown. To imagine it was only these two kids for so many years without any help. If he had known about the whole situation, he would have been more than happy to lend his support in whatever way they needed. Now, it was too late, and one of the kids was in trouble that could have been avoided if they had known sooner.

“We’ll figure this out Tim. Wayne Enterprises will help the people there in whatever way we’re able to. And Batman and Red Robin will find and bring a hero back home.”

He said gently as he looked his son in the eyes. Tim gave a firm nod, before he turned back to his laptop, continuing whatever it was he was doing with a renewed vigor. Bruce would figure this out, nothing would stop him from finding this child and helping her back home no matter how long it took.

__________

Damian was born in the shadows, and while some use that metaphorically, for Damin, it was literal. So when he decided to hide in them, they welcomed him like they were the oldest of friends. Damian watched from the shadows as Marinette trained, she had been with the League for a little over a month now, and she was making great progress in that short amount of time. He was sure that she would be just as skilled as his mother in the near future. Speaking of his mother, she was to return from her mission today. He should go, wait for Talia at the entrance, but for some reason he just wanted to watch her movements.

Her face was pinched with both frustration and what appeared to be some sort of self loathing. Her body language showed that she was more open to the critique of Hadid, like she trusted him more than the others here as her body showed she had more of her guard up with them.

He watched as she landed a hit, moving away in one swift movement to avoid Hadid’s counter.

“That move was perfect…that is if your definition of perfect is a ballerina that trips over her own feet.”

A frown marred her lips as she deepened her stance slightly, angling her feet till they were at the proper angle before she attacked again, this time with more force than the last, though this time she was quickly blocked and thrown to the floor.

“Good try, though I’m sure your great-grandmother could have landed that.”

It went on like this for what felt like hours, but as the fighting got faster and harsher, so did the words spoken. Despite that, Hadid never seemed to lose the calm connectedness that was his voice, never did he sound of breath, or exhausted. But there was a gleam in his eyes that seemed to grow, a cruel smile on his lips. Gentle touches that were quickly turned against her, but he never stopped it. Despite the feelings warring in his chest as he observed the anguish that continued to grow in her body language and demeanor, he never stopped it. This was exactly the type of training that he endured, and if she was to become one of his generals she would need to learn that this was the way of The League of Assassins.

“So this is the reason you didn’t greet me MyDemon.”

Damian didn’t jump nor did he flinch, though he wanted to.

“I apologize Mother. I was observing how the training of one of my future generals is going.”

He said as he turned towards his mother, bowing on one knee. He may be the Demon’s Head, but his mother was the reason he was here in the first place, and he would not dishonor her. Talia rested her hand against his hair, the smallest of smiles on her lips before she looked up at watched the match before her.

“The girl?”

She asked softly, removing her hand from his head, a single that he could stand with her.

“Yes.”

Talia hummed as they both stood quietly in the shadows just watching as the girl fought and seemingly failed at every turn.

“She is very skilled, where did she come from?”

“I took her from France. She was the past Ladybug Miraculous holder and apparently the Grad Guardian of the Miraculous Box of Life.”

Not much shocked Talia, but that was news to her. She had thought that all of the monks had died and with the destruction of their temple, the loss of all of the Miraculous and their creatures.

“That girl is the Grand Guardian? She looks far too young according to their customs.”

“The Guardian before her was forced to pass over ownership to her because a villain that was in possession of two of the Miraculous, had captured the past Guardian. I checked, he is of no use to us as he remembers nothing. It is all in my report if you wish to read it, Mother.”

“Yes, I think I will. What did you say her name was again?”

“Marinette.”

“No last name.”

“It is unimportant now, but I believe it was Dupain-Cheng.”

“Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, that name does not set off any alarms. Only time will tell.”

“Indeed.”

“I wish to introduce myself.”

“Of course, Mother.”

And with that, they both emerged from the shadows of the room, putting a pause to the training session.

“My Demon, My Liege.”

Hadid said with a deep bow, but Marinette didn’t bend, simply glaring at him as she panted for breath. She glanced over at Talia, eyes scrunched with slight confusion before they widened slightly in understanding. She was still far too easy to read, hopefully one day they could train her out of that (part of him never wanted her to lose that, he liked being able to read her emotions).

“Marinette, this is my Mother, Talia al Ghul.”

Marinette stood up straight, looking Talia in the eyes with her lips turned down to show her displeasure at the situation. Talia stared back, never wavering. Manyhad tried to stand up mto Talia, none had succeeded, but that didn’t stop this girl from trying. Neither would back down, Talia could tell that much. There was a fire behind her eyes, one that would be very hard to extinguish. She wondered if it was like this before she came here, wondered if it had dimmed at all since she started her training here. The silence seemed to grow as the two just stared at each other, one out of defiance the other with curious examination. A small smirk creeped onto Talia’s lips as she finally broke eye contact first to look at her son.

“I would like her to dine with us tonight, make sure she has something suitable to wear.”

“Of course Mother.”

Damian replied with a short bow as Talia left the room without another word.

He could feel Marinette’s eyes burning into him, if he looked he knew there would be some sort of glare on her face. It didn’t now, he still had time to convince her that The LEague was better for her than anywhere else. His spies had told him that the Bat still hadn’t found anything yet, that they were not suspected. But Damian knew that wouldn’t last much longer. His father was known as “The World’s Greatest Detective” after all. Not to mention the amount of resources he had with the Justice League who were also a part of this case. He was glad that Grandfather had lined the insides of the wall with lead so that no kryptonian could hear what went on here. Without glancing at her he too left the training room. He would get her when it was time, for now he would need to discuss important matters with his mother as well as her last mission.

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aizawas-upper-left-wisdom-tooth · 9 months

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Idea for a fanfic. This could be of any fandom. The fic takes place in a world that has something significantly different from our world. (Ie-. Pokemon, LOTR, DC, MARVEL, ect.) And it's a fandom that the fanfic author is a real nerd about so they know a bunch of details about the story and interworking of the world and characters.

Then enters our MC. MC could be a self insert/YN/OC does not matter, but they are originally from our world and universe. Then they somehow get transported(or my personal favorite, reborn) into the fandoms world. The catch??? They are not a fan of the media that they are now a part of. Here's my example of what spurred this idea.

MC is reborn, they remembered dying then they were trapped for a while in a tight room and they feel different from before. One day it's too tight and they break free! Only to discover they are some weird bird monster thing they don't recognize??? and now they're stuck in the nest while growing up??? When they finally learn how to fly they're ecstatic at finally being able to see the world and any of the creatures outside because they haven't seen anything other than their mother and maybe siblings since hatching. They spread their wings and are doing dips and dives and are so happy to finally be rid of the nest and- is that a fucking Jiggly Puff??????!!!!!

Turns out they're like a Ho-Oh or something and what they know of Pokemon is only the base random tidbits from existing on the internet and hearing people talk about it at school. Now they have to deal with random cults, gangs, and scientists going after them because they're super rare and practically a god or something! Bonus if they decide to be like some random quite kids Pokemon who has no interest in fighting, or some sweet old lady who's only other Pokemon is a Magikarp who keeps almost drowning??? despite being a literal fish???? and now they're attached to the old lady and don't want her to be heartbroken about this dumbass fish that won't fish properly?????

But this could be for any fandom at any point in that fandoms time! They could be any character! Imagine them as Harry Potter but they haven't watched the movies much less read the books! Maybe when they were like 12, but they were 48 when they died!!! and that was a lifetime ago and now they have to deal with Voldemort and the Dursleys??? Horcrux?? There was something about a Sword or Gryffindor?? Was that one of them?????

Or ending up in DC comics and deciding they want to fight crime so who better than Batman to train them!? Nevermind how I know your secret identity Bruce! Whos this guy? Your son Damian? I thought his name was Dick? Where's Batgirl? What do you mean which one????

Bonus points if they're actually a convincing liar and most of the freakouts are in their heads where we get a front row seat to the panic and pure "fake it till you make it" attitude with small povs of other characters thinking to themselves about how "it's so amazing this 7year old is so competent!"

Or the exact opposite, where they were a full adult who just got spat out in this new universe and everyone around them is like "What do you mean you didn't know Aliens were real?? Superman literally just saved you last week? What do you mean what does that have to do with Aliens?? Superman is an Alien!!!! How did you not know this?????

IDK, but tag me/lmk if anyone goes anywhere with this because I love this idea of someone having just random tidbits of mixed (and sometimes wildly inaccurate) information from their previous life/world about this new world and the story lines in it!

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applerubyy · 3 years

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Ciao Adios

Summary: When you find your boyfriend cheating on you yo decide to expose him in the pettiest way you can think of.

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader (some Loki x Reader if you squint)

Word Count: 4k

Warnings: Cheating and cursing (I think that’s it?)

A/N: Hi! So this is my first time writing and posting anything here so if its terrible please tell me nicely :). This is some AU where everyone lives and all is happy ok? Also english is not my first language so I apologize in advance for any grammar or spelling mistakes. Anyway, if it turns out that some of you like it I think I’d be willing to do a part 2 if you like. Hope you enjoy it! <3. Btw, the gif is not mine so credit to whoever made it.

Crack. That’s the sound of your heart breaking, ripped to pieces in just a few seconds. And no, you were not exaggerating. Seeing your boyfriend kissing someone else while taking off their clothes would do that to a person. And in his office of all places.

How did you not see that coming? They had a lot in common and they did spend a lot of time together but you were just so naïve thinking that he was the most trust-worthy person ever that you looked the other way and believed him when he told you she was “just a friend”.

Just a friend my ass you thought as you calmly walked to your room. No running, that would draw attention to you and you didn’t need that. No crying either, because once you started you wouldn’t be able to stop. Walking down the hallway and taking the elevator to your floor feels like it takes forever.

Time is funny that way. It has that annoying tendency to slow down or speed up at the worst times. Like when you were in college and the clock seemed to literally stop, you would look at the time and it was 10:20 am and check again after what felt like half an hour for it to be 10:25 am. Or like when you are having fun with your friends at a club and you see it’s 12:30 but when you look again a few minutes later it’s 2:40. Right now it feels like the former, time seems to have slowed down. Maybe Dr. Strange did something to it? No, that’s stupid, he wouldn’t play with time that way.

Finally the elevator pings open and you rush to your room. Well, it’s not only your room anymore. You share it with him and everything is a reminder of what you just saw. The art supplies on the desk by the window, the famous shield leaning against the wall near the door, the messy bed where you sleep together every night …

And every single thing brings tears to your eyes until finally, the dam breaks and you let the tears fall down. You bring your hand to your mouth to muffle a sob that brings you to your knees. Crying is the only thing you can do right now because your brain is stuck on a loop. All you can see is Steve kissing her, unbuttoning her shirt with one hand while the other grabbed her ass. And all you can hear are their moans, Sharon’s whimper when he touched her and his groan as he did so.

And now you are full on crying and choking on air because that scene keeps replaying itself over and over no matter how much you want it to stop. And you do, Gosh you do because there is so much your heart can take and this is too much. It shatters you in more ways than one. It makes you question everything you thought you knew about him, about her, about your relationship and about yourself.

You remember the first time you met him. You were already in college and looking for an internship. Luckily you happened to be the niece of the one and only Pepper Potts. And who wouldn’t want to work near Earth's mightiest heroes? You sure did. You were studying journalism and communications in New York and working with the Avengers was the ultimate dream, one that was about to come true.

Your first day was uneventful, it consisted mainly of coffee runs, delivering files and passing messages along. That was until your third coffee run where you ran straight into a wall, well actually it wasn’t a wall but it felt like it. The coffee spilled everywhere, on your clothes and his, and you were going to fall on your butt if it wasn’t for him grabbing your arms to steady you. Imagine your surprise when you looked up to see Captain America himself.

And that’s the moment your love story started. It seemed like something straight out of a romantic comedy and you loved it. It started with flirting, a date and then another, him asking you to be his girlfriend and finally asking you to move in once you graduated. It felt like a fairytale.

Tony wasn't very happy about you and the Capsicle but he saw how happy you were so he tried to be happy too. Tony was your uncle even if you didn’t share any blood. Growing up you would visit your aunty Pepper in New York and he was always around, you even stayed at his house when Pepper and him had to work. So, you two became really close even before he became Iron Man and started dating your aunt.

The same thing happened with Rhody. Your close relationship with Tony meant you were close to him too, seeing as he was one of the most important people in his life. Rhody treated you like his niece and was the only one he didn’t make fun of which you took as the ultimate compliment.

So those three you knew before you started working at the compound and before Steve. But once you started working there you met the rest of the Avengers. Being Pepper and Tony's niece and Steve's girlfriend meant they all wanted to get to know you.

You met Bruce Banner, the Hulk, and you became really close. But that was thanks to his close relation with Tony and all the time you spent with him working on his social media presence to make sure people saw him as more than just the green monster who smashes things. After a while of working there they promoted you and now you manage the Avengers social media.

Nat and Wanda became your best friends from the moment you met. You just clicked and hung out as much as possible, being the only girls on the team meant they were really happy to have another female added to the mix. As for Vision, he liked you because Wanda did, simple as that.

Bucky and Sam were the funniest people ever, their constant bickering always brought a smile to your face and they welcomed you with open arms. Happy that their friend had finally found someone to be with.

Thor and Clint were like the fun uncles you got to see every once in a while. The God of Thunder was like an excited puppy and would hug you till you couldn’t breath every time he came to Earth and Clint would joke around with you and FaceTime you when he was with his kids because they loved you (“best babysitter ever” that called you).

You met Peter when he started working for your uncle. He was a sweet kid and your love of memes, vines and pop culture made you instant friends. He would ask you for advice on girls and tell you science jokes.

But we all know not all fairytales have a happy ending and this one definitely didn’t. You’re feeling so many things at once. There’s anger, sadness, jealousy and something else you can’t put your finger on. You keep crying and are unable to move from your kneeling position on the floor. Checking the clock you realize you’ve been on the floor crying for an hour so you stand up.

Taking a shower seems like the best thing to do, your head is pounding and your face is all puffy. As you shower it hits you, that other feeling swirling around is inevitability. In a way you always thought he was too good for you, you always thought he would eventually get tired of you and trade you for someone else.

It just hurt too much that it was her, the woman he shared so much with. The niece of Peggy Carter, his first love. An agent of S. H. I. E. L. D. Someone who risked their life for the world like he did. Someone prettier. Someone better than you.

Yeah, you were definitely on a self-pity party. But you needed to be miserable for a while, to cry it all out, to hurt so that you could move on to the next stage of grief: anger. And when that came, there was no stopping you.

You weren’t a mean person, or a petty one. You gave everyone countless opportunities and forgave way too easily so you never really got angry. But when you did, when you said enough is enough, yeah, you better watch out. That could be the meanest bitch you ever met and she had no mercy.

So you got out of the shower, dried yourself and started getting ready. Tony was throwing yet another party about who knows what and you were not missing it. You liked parties, they were the perfect excuse for wearing pretty dresses and putting on make up. And tonight you were going all out.

Your inner bitch was concocting a plan and you were going with it.

You hear the door open and prepare yourself to put on the best acting of your life. You take a deep breath and in the sweetest voice you can muster say: “Steve is that you babe?”

“Yeah doll it’s me” you hear him say. A few second later he pops into the bedroom and gives you a peck on the lips as you continue with your makeup.

“How was your day?” Steve asks as he takes off his clothes, probably to take a shower. “I missed you today, i went by your office but you weren’t there” he says with a small frown between his eyes. You could stare at his blue eyes forever but snap out of it when you remember what he did.

“Oh not much, i left work earlier to get ready for tonight” you answer. Shit your work. You really did leave like that, but after tonight hopefully they’ll understand. “You should start getting ready, the party starts in thirty minutes”.

He smiles at you and tells you he’s going to take a quick shower before getting dressed. He goes to the bathroom and you feel like breaking the mirror but instead take a few deep breaths and remind yourself he’s getting what he deserves later on. With that in mind you finish applying you makeup and smile at yourself, you look good. Moving on to your hair you decide to do some loose waves and that’s it, you really don’t know how to make those complicated updos.

Steve gets out of the shower and starts putting on his suit. Men really do have it easier you think to yourself when you see all the work you had to do and he just showers and that’s it.

You take your dress out of the closet and admire it. It really is beautiful. It has a deep plunging neckline that shows a lot of cleavage and is skin tight with a slit on one side. The fact that it is silver with sequins makes it even better. Pepper helped you pick this dress.

You put on the dress and admire yourself in the mirror. You look good. Behind you, you hear a whistle and turn around to see Steve watching you lust in his eyes. He comes closer and grabs you by the waist, pulling you to him.

“You look stunning” he says as he wets his bottom lip. “I can’t wait to take it off of you when we get back”. Lying cheating bastard.

“Can't wait” you lie as you wrap your arms around his neck and kiss him. This is just a kiss goodbye you tell yourself. One last kiss before he’s out of your life and probably runs to her. Tears threaten to fill your eyes but you hold them down. Not now.

You break the kiss when the need to breathe is too strong. Grabbing his hand you start walking towards the door and say: “Come on, we’re already late”.

——————————————————————————

The party had already started once you walk in and in true Tony fashion it is elegant and extravagant. Everyone is there: S. H. I. E. L. D. agents, the Avengers themselves, politicians and a few famous people.

You and Steve walk to the bar and order drinks. A whiskey for him and a strawberry daiquiri for you, yes you are that basic but hey, it tastes awesome. He offers you his arm and with drinks in your hands you start looking for your friends. A lot of people stop you on the way, nobody wants to miss an opportunity to talk to Captain America.

One thing, or rather on person, catches your attention: Loki. He’s sitting on one of the cushions alone with a drink in his hand. It’s weird to see him there. Sure, he was redeeming himself for what he did in 2012 and Thor said he was doing better but he rarely left Asgard (he “hated mortals”) and when he did come to Earth it wasn’t for a party.

As if he could feel you staring he turns his head and locks his eyes with yours. You weren’t going to lie, he was gorgeous. He was incredibly tall, had those charming green eyes and was actually funny (but you’d never admit that to anyone). But you were in love with Steve and never saw him as anything more than Thor's hot brother. And everyone in the Avengers was hot so that’s not saying much.

You turn away from him and see Nat and Wanda on the dance floor and you tell Steve you’ll see him later and to go find his friends. He’ll need them after tonight you think to yourself. You greet the girls and start dancing with them, for a moment forgetting about what you saw today and putting Loki out of your mind.

The three of you decided to take a break and order some more drinks. Once at the bar Wanda orders for you and when your drinks arrive you go back to the dance floor. You spend the next few hours dancing, talking to your friends and pretending that nothing's wrong. Talking to Steve and pretending that nothing's wrong. Hugging Steve and pretending that nothing's wrong. Kissing Steve and pretending that nothing's wrong.

The fact that Sharon is at the party doesn’t help at all. When you see her talking or touching him you feel like you’re gonna lose it but you remain strong. You remind yourself of your plan and try to keep them out of your mind.

There’s a small stage at the far end of the room and you see your uncle Tony step on it and grab the microphone.

“Hello everyone and thank you for coming to another one of my amazing parties. I hope you are having a good time and taking advantage of the free bar over there” he points to the other side of the room and continues, “Now for what we have all been waiting for: karaoke! And yes, i want everyone to sing something because that’s the whole point of this. I'm looking at you Manchurian Candidate, you’re singing”.

With that he gets off the stage and passes the mic to Sam who decided to sing a Marvin Gaye song. He’s pretty good actually but you can’t fully concentrate on him because your mind is going a thousand miles an hour for what it’s going to happen later.

More people go up and sing their songs and you applaud when they’re done. Nobody is talking much, they're all too busy either laughing at the others performance, drinking or actually listening to the songs. You’re sitting with Steve to your right, Bruce to your left and the rest of the Avengers nearby. You’re your own little group.

It’s finally your turn and as you walk to the stage you can hear your friends whistling and cheering you on. Once you’re up on the stage you choose the song and start singing.

Ask you once, ask you twice now

There's lipstick on your collar

You say she's just a friend now

Then why don't we call her?

So you wanna go home with someone

To do all the things you used to do to me

I swear, I know you do

Used to take me out in your fancy car

And make out in the rain

And when I ring you up

Don't know where you are

'Til I hear her say your name

Used to sing along when you played guitar

That's a distant memory

Hope she treats you better than you treated me, ha

As you continue singing you get more and more confident and take the mic. You walk off the little stage and over to your friends while dancing and you can see them smiling, clapping and having fun. They have no idea how much i mean all of this you think. You look at Steve and he’s completely oblivious. Good, you want to take him by surprise. You arrive at your little circle of friends and start singing the chorus.

I'm onto you, yeah you

I'm not your number one

I saw you with her

Kissing and having fun

If you're giving her all of your money and time

I'm not gonna sit here wasting mine on you, yeah, you

Ciao adios, I'm done

You keep dancing and go back to back with Wanda who’s also singing along. You then turn to Nat and she grabs your hand and makes you do a little spin.

After three, after four times

Why did I bother?

Tell me how many more times

Does it take to get smarter?

Don't need to deny the hurt and the lies

And all of the things you did to me

I swear, I know you did

And now you take her out in your fancy car

And make out in the rain

And when she rings you up

She know where you are

But I know differently

Now she sings along when you play guitar

Making brand new memories

Hope you treat her better than you treated me

You go up to Tony and he starts dancing around you busting out some dad moves. You laugh and keep on singing and dancing.

I'm onto you, yeah you

I'm not your number one

I saw you with her

Kissing and having fun

If you're giving her all of your money and time

I'm not gonna sit here wasting mine on you, yeah, you

Ciao adios, I'm done (I'm done)

Ciao adios, I'm done (no, no, no, no)

Ciao adios, I'm done

If you're giving her all of your money and time

I'm not gonna sit here wasting mine on you, yeah, you

Ciao adios, I'm done

And now you take her out in your fancy car

And make out in the rain

And when she rings you up

She know where you are

But I know differently

Now she sings along when you play guitar

Making brand new memories

Hope you treat her better than you treated me

You walk back to the stage as you sing and step up. You put the mic back into place and sing the last part of the song.

I'm onto you, yeah you

I'm not your number one

I saw you with her (with her)

Kissing and having fun (and fun)

If you're giving her all of your money and time

I'm not gonna sit here wasting mine on you, yeah, you

Ciao adios, I'm done (I'm done)

Ciao adios, I'm done (you get on with your life, I'll get on with my life)

Ciao adios, I'm done

If you're giving her all of your money and time

I'm not gonna sit here wasting mine on you, yeah, you

Ciao adios, I'm done

When you’re done people are clapping and cheering and you look to your friends to see them all smiling. You look at everyone and make a little mock bow and when you straighten you see Loki sitting on the same couch as before. But this time he’s looking at you and he’s laughing, not smiling and cheering but actually laughing.

You look back at your friends and say “Thank you, thank you” with a smile on your face. You continue , “I wanted to dedicate this song to my boyfriend Steve” you point at him.

“In case it wasn’t clear enough, i wanted to tell you that i saw you with Sharon”. You could hear a pin drop. No one was talking and all eyes were on you. This is what you wanted, to humiliate him as much as he did you. And what better way to do it than publicly? Oh but you weren’t done.

You could see Steve's face going pale and nobody knew where to look, if at you or at him. Tony look ready to murder him as did Rhody, Pepper, Peter and Bruce. Thor, Clint and Vision looked shocked. But Bucky, Sam, Nat and Wanda looked guilty.

Your heart breaks a little more when you realize they knew. You can’t really blame Bucky and Sam for not telling you, they were Steve's friends after all. But you thought the girls were your friends, that they would have told you. Apparently you overestimated that friendship.

You keep on smiling and continue “So… I’m breaking up with you. Hope she was a good fuck and wasn’t uncomfortable with the fact that you were once in love with her aunt”. You do a dramatic pause and make a little disgusted face. “Anyway, if I’m lucky i´ll never see you again. Have a great life!”

And with that, you walk off the stage and make your way to your friends. Steve is rooted to the spot and his face is red with embarrassment. You walk up to him, look him straight in the eye and give him an evil smile. He gulps and opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something and then closes it. He does is two more times and still nothing comes out.

You turn to your group and look at Wand and Nat, who can’t seem to be able to look you in the eye. You sigh and say: “Who want enemies when they can have you as their best friends right?”. They look up then and start talking. Telling you how sorry they are and to please forgive them. You raise your hand to silence them and they do.

You go to your aunt and uncle who look like there should be smoke coming out of their ears and say: “I’m gonna stay in a hotel for the night, can’t stand to be here anymore”. Tony scrunches his eyebrows and look at you like you’re crazy.

“Hell no. You’re staying here. We can find him another room to sleep in but you’re not leaving. If anyone’s leaving is Mr. Star-spangled over there” he practically screams the last part as he points at Steve.

You take a deep breath and hug him. It takes him by surprise but he puts his arms around you. “I appreciate it uncle Tony but i can’t stay at the compound, it just hurts too much” you say as you let go. Turning to your aunt you hug her as well and say: “Thank you for everything but I quit”.

The moment those words leave your mouth everyone starts talking at the same time telling you how crazy you are and to think about it. You just smile at them and tell them you already made up your mind. “I'm gonna go pack a bag and ask Happy to take me to a hotel nearby. Please make sure he doesn’t follow” you say as you point to a still red-faced Captain America.

With that you turn around and leave. The room is silent for a few seconds before you hear your friends all screaming at Steve. You look around for a second and notice that Loki is staring at you with a smirk on his face. When you look him in the eye he raises his glass at you ant takes a sip.

You give him a small smile and walk through the doors towards the elevator.

#steve rogers x reader #captain america x reader #steve rogers imagine #captain america imagine #avengers #avengers imagine #loki x reader #loki imagine #tony stark #steve rogers x y/n #captain america x y/n #steve rogers fanfiction

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spooderboyandtincan · 3 years

Text

You're Gonna Miss Me When I'm Gone

Chapter 2

There’s a spider on the ceiling.

Peter can barely make out its eight gangly legs through a blur of tears. He feels some sort of bond with it- not only because of the DNA they share- but because they’re both alone. Then again, the spider has probably spent its entire life in this room, and Peter’s only been here- on a whole different continent- for a good couple of hours.

Maybe it’s just the jet lag. According to literally anyone who’s known him at all- he gets adorably grumpy when he hasn’t gotten his beauty sleep (Tony’s words, not his.)

Who does he think he’s kidding? He’s homesick, he’s alone, and he really, really misses Tony. Misses him as in the his heart is literally being torn apart sort of missing. He wishes he’d considered how his severe separation anxiety might play a part in this when he’d still had a choice.

Peter chokes on a whine- the one that forces its way out of his throat until he’s full on sobbing and gasping for breath.

He scrambles for his phone on the nightstand. He needs Tony, he needs him, like a fish needs water. He fumbles with the lock screen and desperately taps on Tony’s icon (a picture of Tony holding a proudly displaying a mug that reads “Number 1 Iron Dad.”) It rings once, twice-

“Pete? How’s it going, kiddie?” Tony’s voice, so gentle, so full of love and concern- he already knows something’s wrong, of course, because his Dad Senses are off the charts- makes the tear in his heart rip open.

“Tony,” he sobs. “Tony. I don’t- I can’t, I can’t do this. I wanna go home, Tony.”

“Whoa, hey, it’s okay Petey, breathe for me okay?” He can hear, just barely over his sobs, that Tony is pacing, can hear that his breathing is just a bit too fast, and Peter feels awful for freaking him out, but just can’t stop crying.

“‘M so sorry,” he wails, “‘M so sorry. I-I wanna go home, I want you Tony.” He grasps his pillow tightly and buries his face in it, trying to stifle his sobs, pretending that Tony is there, wrapping his arms around him, kissing his hair, rocking them back and forth.

“I know, baby, I know,” Tony croons, “Everything’s gonna be okay, we’re okay. Right now I just need you to take a deep breath, buddy- in, two-three, out, two-three, okay?” Tony demonstrates for him, taking exaggerated inhales and exhales, which are probably benefiting him as much as they are Peter. “You’ve got this, Pete, I know you do.”

“I miss you, Tony,” Peter whispers after a few seconds of shaky breathing. “I wanna go home.” He feels so immature, begging Tony to fly across the Atlantic in the dead of night just because he’s a little homesick.

Tony, however, seems to consider his request very seriously. “Do you want me to fly out? I could be there in a few hours.”

Peter almost laughs, imagining Tony arriving to the hotel at daybreak, dressed only in sweatpants and a stained AC/DC t-shirt. It’s actually not a bad idea- Tony could act as a chaperone, they could explore the city together, make another precious memory.

“Yeah, um, that-that would be great, Tony,” he sniffs, wiping the wetness of his cheeks. “A-are you sure? I don’t wanna, like, make you, there’s probably Iron, um, Iron Man things, I don’t-”

“Pete, listen to me,” Tony interrupts, voice again so impossibly gentle. “Nothing- nothing- is more important to me than you, understand? I’m here for you. Always”

Peter smiles wetly, relaxing back into the covers, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “I know. Tony?”

“Yeah, bud?

“Can-can you, um, talk? Please?”

“‘Course I can, Pete. What about?” Tony says fondly. The idea that his voice can bring such comfort to this sweet kid makes him feel all… schmoopy.

“Anything. I just… wanna hear your voice, s’all.” He tugs the covers up and curls into a ball, resting the phone on the pillow next to his ear.

“I’ve got you, bud,” Tony says. I miss you too. “Oh, you’ve gotta know what DUM-E did today….”

Peter feels himself relaxing as Tony talks about his day. It’s not just the words that soothe him, but the familiar sound of his warm voice that’s full of such love and affection. His thoughts begin to wander as he drifts into a barely conscious haze, but the voice remains steady and present in his mind.

Tony is quick to notice that Peter is on the precipice of slumber and wakefulness, and is just as quick to provide the last bit of reassurance Peter needs to fall asleep. “Sweet dreams, buddy. I love you,” he murmurs.

Just before Peter slips away, he finds himself slurring, “Love you too.”

Tony stays on the call for a solid ten minutes after Peter conks out, listening to the steady whoosh of his breathing against the speaker. Before he finally makes himself hang up, he whispers a quiet, “‘Night, Petey. I’ll be there before you know it.” Tony leaves for the airport at daybreak, not able to spend another second in that horribly empty penthouse. The absence of Peter’s presence is tremendously obvious, and Tony finds himself desperately trying not to imagine the unimaginable.

~~~~~

With a pilot on-call 24-7, and without the hassles of a public airport, he’ll be back with Peter around early afternoon.

Thank god.

He steps out of the Cadillac, barely noticing the blistering wind and the tiny snowflakes biting at his cheeks in his haste to board the plane. He greets the pilot- Allison, he thinks- with a nod, but she gestures to stop when he moves towards the stairs.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Stark!” she says over the howling wind. “We just can’t fly in this weather!”

To hell with that, Tony thinks. “When’s it letting up?”

“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Stark,” Allison says apologetically. “Not for a few days at least.”

Tony activates the suit with a simple tap of his watch, the nanobots rushing over him within seconds. Allison gasps and jumps back, gaping as he rockets into the air.

He’s been flying for a good 50 seconds before a neon red warning lights up the HUD.

“Boss,” F.R.I.D.A.Y says, tone filled with caution. “The wind is blowing at a speed of 78 mph. I must advise that you return to the ground immediately, or you run the risk of losing control of the suit.”

Tony curses loudly. Just his luck, really. “How high is the risk?”

“89%, boss.”

“So, not all that bad,” he chuckles.

Then, F.R.I.D.A.Y reminds him how devastated Peter would be if anything happened to him.

Tony returns to his car on foot and pulls out his phone to call Peter.

~~~~~

Peter basks in the sunlight outside of a bustling café, sipping from a cup of hot chocolate. He’s ordered a chocolate croissant, and added the tasteless protein powder Tony and Bruce had synthesized to keep up with his spidey metabolism to his mug. Despite the jet lag, he’s eager to explore the city and it’s merits, his enthusiasm only growing knowing that Tony will be here within a few hours.

Feeling pleasantly full, Peter leans back in his chair- it’s an armchair, on a stool, and it’s driving him nuts, he loves it- and beams at Ned, who lounges next to him in an identical chair. “Dude,” he says.

“Dude,” Ned agrees.

Peter is grinning, Ned is grinning, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping, life is sweet-

Peter’s phone rings.

His first thought is that Tony’s plane has crashed.

His second is one of relief when he realizes it’s Tony who’s calling him.

His third is that his plane has crashed, and Tony’s calling him, mortally wounded, to say goodbye.

Ned stares at him, taking in the panicked look on his face, and mouths You good? Peter shakes his head and scrabbles for his phone.

“Pete?” Tony says as soon as he’s answered. He sounds fine, at least. “Hiya.”

“Are you okay?” Peter asks first, because he knows that even if Tony sounds like he’s fine, that doesn’t mean he is.

“Yeah. Yeah, Petey, I’m just fine, I promise,” Tony assures him. Peter relaxes in his chair, flashing Ned a quick thumbs up, because knows Tony would never lie to him, especially not if he was hurt. “How’re you doin’?”

Peter’s face lights up. “Oh, great! There are like, dogs everywhere here, even in the restaurants, and I saw this German Shepherd eating like- dog ice cream or something? And I got this super good chocolate croissant where we’re having breakfast. Y’know, I really thought the jet lag would be super bad but I’m not like, tired at all yet!”

“Aw, buddy, that’s great, I’m glad you’re havin’ a good time,” Tony says, voice dripping with fondness. “You’re drinking enough water, staying hydrated and all that, right?”

“Yup! Are you?”

Tony scoffs. “‘Course I am. Hafta set a good example n’ shi- stuff.” Peter snorts. He knows Tony does his best not to curse around his- and he quotes- “young, unsullied ears" but he ends up failing quite a lot.

“Which reminds me bud, how’s Ted?” Peter’s best friend’s health has pretty much no correlation with cursing, which makes the teen think that Tony has a specific reason for asking about him. He decides not to bring it up though.

“It’s Ned,” he sighs in mock frustration. And he’s good, he’s right next to me! I guess I didn’t tell you yesterday, but the hotel guy put us into two different rooms ‘cause they had extra or something and we didn’t realize ‘til we got to our rooms.” He sighs again then, for real, his good mood evaporating.

Tony’s Dad Senses pick up on it instantaneously. “Not ideal, huh?” he says gently, which earns him a small laugh from the kid. “D’you want me to talk to them?”

Peter nods sheepishly, then realizes Tony can’t see him. “Yeah. Thank you,” he says in a small voice, embarrassed that the genius is going to all this trouble just because he’s a little lonely. “Are you gonna be here soon?” he asks then, because he misses Tony, misses him just like he knows Tony is missing him.

Tony clears his throat. When he speaks, the guilt in his voice could rip him in half. “About that, buddy, well- Jesus, Pete, I’m so sorry. The, uh, the wind is too dangerous for me to fly over, and it’s not letting up ‘til around Monday. I’m so sorry, kiddo.”

Peter’s heart sinks. “Oh,” he says numbly.

He hears Tony lurch up. “Hey, Petey- shit, I’m so sorry, buddy. I- you know what, fuck it, I’ll fly over anyway, I-”

“No! No, I’m okay, I’m fine!” Peter says, wincing silently at the forced cheeriness in his voice, and knowing that Tony has seen right through.

“Hey, hey, buddy, it’s okay, I’ll be perfectly safe-”

“You can’t,” Peter pleads, desperate to keep Tony safe. “Please, Tony, you can’t, you’ll crash, or-”

“Whoa, Petey, deep breaths,” Tony interrupts, voice gentle. “I’m right here, I’m fine, you hear me?” He waits for Peter’s breathing to resume a steady rate, then says, “Bub, I won’t fly over if it’s not safe, I promise.”

Peter sighs. He’s relieved beyond belief that Tony is keeping both feet on the ground where he’ll be safe- he better be- but he misses the billionaire more than ever.

“And hey, who knows, maybe the wind’ll let up in a few hours!” Tony chuckles. Sobering a little, he says, “If the weather is on schedule, I’ll be there on Monday, 6 am, sharp.”

Peter prays he will. “I miss you, Tony,” he mumbles- he feels childish, knowing that he’s just begged the man to stay in New York, and now is just making him more miserable knowing that he’s miserable.

“I miss you too, Petey,” the genius murmurs back, voice filled with sorrow.

“Peter!” The phone nearly flies out of Peter’s hand as Mr. Harrington taps on his shoulder. He gasps a little, and though his teacher doesn’t seem to notice, Tony sure does, his gentle voice turning harsh with barley contained panic. “Who was that, Pete? Are you okay?”

“Um-” he tries.

“Come on, now! The bus is almost here, I can see it around the corner!” Mr. Harrington says loudly, and abruptly struts off, frantically waving down the bus that is already stopping.

“Peter!” Tony exclaims.

“I’m fine, I’m fine, it was just Mr. Harrington,” he rushes to reassure him. Tony breathes out a heavy sigh of relief. “Uh, the bus is here, I- I have to go.” He hurries to catch up with his best friend.

“I love you,” Tony says. “I love you so much, Pete, stay out of trouble, be safe.”

He doesn’t want to say goodbye. Neither of them do.

“I love you, Tony,” says Peter. “I’ll be safe, don’t worry about me!”

And with that, the call ends.

#wip #chapter 2 #peter parker #tony stark #protective tony stark #worried tony stark #anxious peter parker #irondad #spiderson #roger harrington #ned leeds #anxiety #anxious thoughts #spider-man #iron man #st*rkers dni

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sunshineandaisies · 3 years

Text

Pikachu Problems

Words: ~1.9k

Pairing: Peter Parker x Avenger!Reader

Warnings: language, very minor sexual suggestions

Note: I am currently sick- thus, this was created. Also watched a bunch of Teen Wolf while writing this, so took inspiration from Kira’s thunder kitsune powers for the reader’s powers.

It had started off as just sniffles – an occasional sneeze here and a blown nose there – but within the course of a few days, what you had hoped was just allergies had turned into a full-blown, misery-inducing cold.

Maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad if it were a normal cold, but because normal wasn’t in your vocabulary, you had been placed on quarantine to stop your sneezing and coughing from taking down an entire electrical grid in the city. Instead, you were irritating Tony every ten minutes as the lights flickered within Stark Tower and F.R.I.D.A.Y. updated him on the power outages throughout the building that your sneezing and coughing was causing.

“Kid, I’m gonna need you to stop shorting the power in the lab,” he had told you over the intercom after your latest coughing fit had caused a slight blackout within that part of the building. “Do we need to get some lightning rods for you or something? Maybe pad your room in rubber? I’ll take any suggestions, kid. Anything that’ll help keep you from frying the equipment in my lab.”

If you hadn’t been absolutely miserable, his growing frustration may have been funny.

Your quarantine only made you more miserable. You hadn’t been to school in days – hell, you’d barely left your room. Your meals were brought to you, your supply of tissues restocked every other day when Bucky or Bruce would leave a plastic bag from the drug store outside of your door, and your communication with others was done solely through the intercom or with F.R.I.D.A.Y. serving as a messenger.

To make matters worse, on the third day of you quarantine a particularly powerful sneeze had shorted all the electronics in your room. F.R.I.D.A.Y. had been unable to access your room for three hours while Tony repaired the damage, your laptop had to be completely wiped in order to assess the damage, and your phone – well, your phone was fried.

That’s probably why, on the sixth day of your quarantine, a friendly neighborhood Spider-Boy showed up at Stark Tower, rambling on and on about unanswered texts and awkward voicemails – that you definitely needed to listen to once Tony sorted out your phone situation – and ‘why the hell weren’t you in school all week’.

“C’mon, Mr. Stark. Let me in to see her,” you heard Peter begging through the intercom after he had finally managed to track Tony down after trying and failing to get F.R.I.D.A.Y. to open the door to your bedroom for nearly thirty minutes. “I just wanna make sure she’s feeling okay.”

“Kid, the last thing we need is a fried spider,” was Tony’s response, making you roll your eyes.

“I won’t hurt him,” you defended, your throat sore and scratchy from days upon days of feeling like you would cough up a lung. “I just want some cuddles, and I don’t see anyone else lining up at my door to cuddle me.” You sneezed, and the lights in your room flickered. You hoped your sneezed hadn’t affected the electricity anywhere else or you’d never convince Tony to let Peter into your room. “Please, Tony,” you pleaded. “I just want to see Peter.”

“Please, Mr. Stark,” Peter joined your pleading, and you knew that with the combined efforts of the two of you, he’d crack eventually. “She won’t hurt me. I know she won’t.”

You heard the older man groan over the intercom, and after another second, the lock on your door disengaged. “Thank you, Tony!” you exclaimed at the same time as Peter happily shouted, “You’re the best, Mr. Stark.”

“Don’t make me regret this,” Tony warned, sounding just as exasperated as you imagined he was. You smiled widely despite knowing that neither Tony nor Peter could see you. Tony Stark was good at many things but being able to tell his protégé and his ward no when they both pressed hard enough was not one of those things.

Within ten minutes, Peter was at your door. He had a fuzzy blanket draped over his shoulders, a steaming bowl of soup in his hands, and his laptop tucked under one arm while a fresh box of tissues was tucked under the other. He beamed at you when you opened the door, but his smile quickly faded as he took in your appearance. “You, uh- you look like-”

“Shit?” you guessed, hating how nasally your voice sounded. You tried to laugh when you saw his cheeks tinge pink as he shrugged, but your attempt at laughing quickly turned into a coughing fit. The lights flickered again, and Peter’s eyed you skeptically.

“Is this why you haven’t been answering my texts and calls all week?” he asked, though you assumed he already knew the answer to that question. You cocked your head to the side and raised a brow at him, moving to the side to let him into your room and past you. “You killed your phone, didn’t you?”

“Can you kill something that was never alive to begin with?” you asked rhetorically. You crawled onto your bed and crossed your legs, waiting for Peter to join you. “Did I fry my phone and make it completely unusable? Yes. Did I kill it? No.”

“Sounds like you killed it,” he quipped with a teasing grin. “Here. Pepper made this for you.” He handed you the bowl of soup, and you happily took it from him, inhaling the steam that rose off the liquid and letting it warm your throat and sinuses. You sighed in relief as you felt it soothing the inflammation that made it difficult to breath and speak. The sound didn’t escape Peter’s attention, and he smiled softly at you before settling a hand on your bare knee. “Better?”

“I will be,” you reassured and returned his smile. You let him mother hen you as you ate the soup in quiet. He made sure you had enough water, made sure that you weren’t feeling feverish, made sure that a box of tissues was within your reach, made sure that you were comfortable – ‘Peter, you really don’t need to fluff my pillows again’ – and made sure that you had taken the recommended dose of cough syrup throughout the day.

Finally – finally! – he joined you on the bed after pulling the now empty bowl from your hands and setting it on the bedside table. “Someone asked for cuddles?” he questioned sheepishly – and oh so adorably – as he settled in the spot beside you.

“I believe that someone is me,” you returned. You moved closer to him, but something in the back of your mind made you stop. “Are you sure?”

His face twisted in confusion and his brow furrowed tightly. “Sure about what?”

“That I won’t hurt you.” Right on cue, you coughed, causing the lights to flicker once again. “I can’t control it, Peter. I could hurt you, and if that happens, I don’t know what I-”

Your train of thought was interrupted by a warm hand on your cheek and soft brown eyes boring into yours. “Y/N, I literally trust you with my life. Out there and in here.” His thumb trailed over your cheekbone, his touch igniting your sense. You really wished you weren’t sick. If you were healthy, you’d definitely pounce and show him your appreciation for him and his trust.

“Aren’t you worried about getting sick?”

He shrugged. “Seems like it’s nothing more than a cold, but your powers are making it, like, ten times worse for you.” His hand dropped away from your face, but his arms opened, inviting you into his embrace. “C’mere, pretty girl.”

“Pretty girl? Didn’t you say I looked like shit earlier?”

“In my defense, I never actually said that. You just assumed that that was what I was going to say.” You scooted closer to Peter and slumped into his arms, sighing at the contact after going days without. “But you’re always a pretty girl. Even if you’re sick and look like shit.”

You swatted at his shoulder and laughed, but another coughing fit soon took over. The lights flickered overhead and a mechanically buzzing in the walls could be heard for a few seconds before the room grew silent once more. Once you were sure that the need to cough had died down, you relaxed against Peter. “Can we take a nap? Please?”

“Yeah, of course.” He guided your bodies down to the mattress, settling your heads atop your pillow and pulling the blanket over your bodies. “You’ll tell me if you need anything?”

“Definitely,” you murmured against the skin of his neck, your eyes drooping shut. “Missed you.”

“Missed you, too, pretty girl,” you heard Peter respond before you finally let your exhausted body rest.

When you woke up a few hours later, your body shaking from your latest coughing fit, the New York skyline was lit up with different shades of pinks and reds and oranges as the sun sank below the horizon. Peter bolted awake beside you, a comforting hand on your back to rub soothing circles over the fabric of your t-shirt.

Again, the lights flickered, and the mechanical buzzing sound returned, even louder than before. This time, though, the lights grew brighter and brighter before your bedroom was eventually plunged into darkness.

“Peter,” you whispered, your voice hoarse. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” he reassured quickly. “I’m fine, but, uh-” He held up his phone, the screen remaining completely black as he pressed the home button over and over again. “I think you killed my phone.”

You groaned and flopped back against your mattress, covering your face with your hands. “I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to-”

You were interrupted by Tony’s voice over the intercom, sounding just as irritated as you imagined he was. “Okay, Pikachu.” You rolled your eyes at the nickname. “Not sure how you managed to do it, but F.R.I.D.A.Y. can’t access anything on your floor. The locks, the lights, the elevator. All of it. Until I can figure out how to fix this, you’re not going anywhere. That means you, too, Spiderling.”

“But Aunt May said to-” The distinct click of the intercom disconnecting sounded, and Peter slumped against the mattress beside you, pressing his face into your neck. “I guess I’m stuck here.”

“You won’t hear me complaining,” you quipped.

You felt him smile against your neck while his arm wound itself around your waist. “I’m not complaining,” he defended. He pressed his lips to your neck in a soft kiss, and you sighed happily, fingers twining in his messy hair. To prove his point, he pressed kisses along the column of your neck, across your jaw and cheeks, and finally firmly against your lips. “I’m definitely okay with being stuck in my girlfriend’s bedroom. Even if she’s sick and unintentionally causing blackouts in the building.”

You smiled against his lips as he settled himself between your legs, and you whispered, “Whoever said giving you a perfectly good reason to stay the night was unintentional?”

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friggsdc · 3 years

Text

Title: little delinquent pt ii

part i | part ii | part iii

Warnings: Female!reader (bat!sis), mostly family fluff, AU, hurt/comfort, language

word count: 4000~

It had Bruce and Dick sharing a look for a moment before the latter spoke up, “It’s not like I’m against continuing to expand the family, but…” he eyed the child you held nervously, “please don’t start bringing home every child you find…” he tilted his head, “he’s bad enough.” Bruce settled a light glare at his first son (that definitely wasn’t what Bruce was thinking), though Dick was stilled by the way your eyes narrowed at him instead.

“His name is Terrence,” that was all you said, brushing past as they were suddenly on guard at the inherited Wayne-scowl on your face.

a/n: still no jaybird lmao I’m sorry, but I brought in mamabat duke, because he’s the best at being a mamabat without smothering you like your other siblings. Steph too because she’s your sweet bean partner in crime u v u)9 For my sanity, Metropolis is in Deleware across the bay from Jersey (tho Gotham is still north of Atlantic City).

He wasn’t certain if he should be proud or upset at how quickly you’d turned Tim against him, the two of you now working in unison, playing ‘keep away from big papa Bruce.’ No matter when he tried to approach you, something always seemed to happen or come up, and it was actually starting to get on his nerves. Worse was Damian seemed to be joining in, his rebellious nature being nurtured by the influence of both Tim and yourself.

He knew it would be difficult to deal with you and your ability to hide anything, just like you could hide yourself, but… Now he had to deal with more than just you, and Tim wasn’t going to make it any easier for him. Oh no, this was going to be a headache with you two. And Damian… He couldn’t trust that his son wouldn’t give away anything he did to you, his loyalties giving out to the growing childish nature he was developing. Bruce was again at a loss, should he be happy Damian was acting his age, or upset that he was more interested in working with the ‘opposition?.’

“It’s not a mission,” Damian had commented, so it was “fair game.”

He rested his head in his hands, fingers lightly massaging his temples as his elbows supported him, propping him up on the ornate desk in his study. Fucking hell, he had to outsmart both the tech sleuth and the stealth agent of the family. Information was literally their game. Rather than giving into the growing frustration in his stomach, he stood up, now a bat on a mission as he quickly headed down to the cave. He thanked his moody bat heart that it was just two of his kids (he wasn’t certain of Damian yet, the wild card), and not… more…

The League computers would definitely come in handy right about now.

He was gonna go full fucking vigilante detective bat mode on his kids.

Again.

He groaned.

[bigR] Dad took off for the League, bet you can guess why.

Flipping your personal phone closed with a light snort, you refocused your attention on buckling the toddler into the hand-me-down car seat. You’d definitely have to get him a new one on your shopping trip, you just hoped Duke’s car could fit everything…

Damian was securing his sword between him and the kid before he crawled in, closing the door and putting on his safety belt. You grinned at him as he avoided your smile, looking away instead, “hurry up.” Shaking your head, you leaned in to rub your nose against Terrence’s own, his chubby fingers coming up to grab at your face, hair, clothes, ears, and earrings ohgodstop. Having cooed at him enough, and having been assaulted by his little nails, scratches now on your chin, you leaned back and out of his reach, closing the door softly.

“Are you sure it’s okay to shirk off for the day? You’re the one usually patrolling at this time…” you headed to the passenger side, “Big guy said it was fine, besides…” Duke smiled and nodded his head towards the car with a wink, “wouldn’t want to leave you alone with a bunch of kids.” It’s not like he was wrong, but you were skilled enough to handle your brother and… son… ah… that was going to get some getting used to. A smile and spread on your face with a light laugh as you climbed in, settling, and closed the door behind you, “ready to get going?” Damian glared at you before refocusing his attention on Terrence, ignoring your obviously dumb question, “Pennyworth mentioned Todd having finally gotten back before I left.”

Duke had started up the car and checked over everything before heading down the manor drive, now officially on the road. Meanwhile, you hummed happily, “guess I’ll have to go see him when we get back.” Damian made a face, “gross.” You rolled your eyes in amusement, “you knew what my reaction was gonna be.”

The two were ridiculous in how they treated each other, honestly.

“It’s still gross.”

The ride down the ocean side drive was calming, the windows lowered to let the cool ocean breeze in. Damian was back to his “poking the toddler’s nose” game, having gotten used to the sound of a baby, and no longer acting like it wasn’t his fault when he made the toddler laugh.

Meanwhile,

“So, who made you the baby-sitter?” Duke kept his eyes on the road, the ever-responsible budding adult that he was, “Bruce, actually.” He grinned at the way you looked at him, catching sight from the corner of his eye, “surprising, I know. Woulda thunk Tim’d have asked, huh?”

Nodding, you leaned back, “well, I mean, yeah. He’s been pretty upset since the other day, he won’t leave Terrence and I alone at the manor. He’s been staying over...” You might have felt bad for lying to Duke, but the truth was that you were lying to everyone but Tim at this point. Not that it was the first time you’d lied to them. You told the truth so often that they took you at your word, never catching on when you did fib, but you were pretty certain this would blow up in your face.

They’d catch you eventually.

This wasn’t one of those easy to digest lies either, that was the complicated part. It terrified you how they’d react once they learned the truth.

Then…

Before that happened, you made the silent determination that you’d make your… son a part of the family. They won’t be able to decide anything for him then, they’d be in too deep, you’d make certain.

Yeah, you could be a little… manipulative sometimes.

Probably something you got from your father.

“What’s up?”

“Oh, sorry, nothing. My mind was just wandering,” Duke frowned a little, flipping on his blinker while coming to a slow crawl, “not believing you.”

Turning your head to him, your grin was a bit scary, “okay, so, I was just thinking about if your car can fit everything I’m going to want to buy.” It was enough to distract him, a groan finding its way out as he pulled into the ticketing line for the ferry.

“If..??”

Now, to really drive it home, you pulled something from your purse and waved it at him, “Is… is that…” he eyed it nervously. “Yes, yes it is, dear brother.” His ears burned as he turned his eyes from you, hand now outstretched in your direction.

“You’re paying the ferry, then…” he muttered.

You put your dad’s credit card on his palm,

“Rich little daddy’s girl.”

This time the snort came from the back seat, “I have one as well, Thomas. You need only ask father.”

Duke sputtered and refused to acknowledge either of you till after having crossed the Deleware Bay.

Rich kids. Honestly.

Metropolis always amazed you, honestly, the bright skies overhead and the amount of people without a care in the world was enviable. Still, it just wasn’t… home. By now you’d developed some serious Stockholm for the cesspit that is Gotham. Even so, you preferred to go shopping here, their selection of high-quality stores mixed with less people recognizing you, and your family, were boons.

As you stared up at the towering high rise in front of you, Damian having disappeared inside minutes before, there was one other reason for coming to Metropolis…

“You’re always so slow! I told you to hurry up!!”

“Who’s slow?! You’re the slow one!!”

“Boys, please—”

The loud sound of twin crashes echo’d out the opened lobby door, the two boys in question bounding out with plenty of energy and two very red chins. “That… looks painful…” you smiled, walking over to check Damian’s face for actual injury.

“Tt, I’m fine.” He smacked your hand away, glaring at the super next to him, rubbing his own, already healing chin. “Hey Jon, enjoying Metropolis?” The bright-eyed boy, sans cape, grinned at you from ear to ear, “There’s so much to do here!” he almost lifted off the ground in his excitement, “but I miss the farm.” A chuckle came from the entrance to the building, deep and warm and just as kind as the child now sticking his tongue out at your youngest brother. On the man’s broad shoulder was an overnight bag, and a sheepish smile on his face as if he felt guilty.

He probably did, the two boys were a handful.

Duke was leaning against the roof of the car with a huge dopey smile on his face, waving at the man approaching, “Hello, you must be the chaperone, Duke Thomas?” your newest brother nodded enthusiastically, almost at a loss for words, “Yup! I-I mean y-yes, it’s nice to meet you, sir!” Clark only chuckled, far too used to such formalities, “Clark is fine, our families are… close, after all.” He watched the boys pull at each other’s faces in mock battle.

“Ah, Clark! It’s been a while!” the older male smiled as he stopped a few feet from you and the car, hands resting on his hips, “Miss Wayne.” Near immediately, his eyes shifted to the backseat of the car and he leaned against the door, looking in.

“Bruce has another kid? He looks like how I always imagined him to look as a kid, suspiciously innocent,” you froze, and he would have laughed at the thought of Bruce with more secret kids, but he straightened. Looking at you in concern instead, he started, “I know he’s not… the most affectionate father, but…” you quickly shook your head, attempting damage control. “It… no, he’s not dad’s…” You laughed nervously at the look on his face, his hand raising to point at you as his mouth opened and closed a few times, trying to process.

“Yup. He’s… His name is Terrence, and he’s… my… son…” your tone turned warm and kind, and your eyes settled on the babe in the car with all the grace of a mother, just like Lois when Jon had been born, the older super nodded thoughtfully. “I’m glad it’s you, then. If anyone in that family can raise a good kid, it’ll be you.” The two of you shared an understanding smile, though yours was accompanied by a twitch or two, swearing he enjoyed his little joke, before he turned his head painfully in surprise, as if an enemy had suddenly appeared.

Following his sight, you had to laugh at the dark glare on Damian’s face directed at Clark, “well, I think it’s time I take my leave, then.” He scratched the back of his head, avoiding the kid’s gaze. He wanted to inquire more about the new addition to the family, but it would have to wait. Jon gave his dad a huge hug, getting his hair ruffled in the process as Clark waved at Duke, chucking the overnight bag into the car.

With a last good-bye to you, he turned high-tail and ran, as if he were almost eager to get away. Watching him jog slowly inside the building, you almost swore his steps were far lighter than his build, “probably prefers to float…” looking away, you missed him trip.

“Alright, c’mon you two. Get in.” when you’d opened the door, the two boys stared in horror, “I’m not sitting in the middle.” Damian ground out before Jon pushed him with more force than Damian could resist, “HE’S YOUR BROTHER!!! YOU SIT IN THE MIDDLE!”

“STUPID! HE’S MY NEPHEW!”

“Still, you sit next to him…” Jon pouted, and combined with your stare, Damian crawled in with a grumble, “Stupid super.” Jon ignored him without issue, and you’d have to ask Damian about it later, curious as to why his best friend was so used to his insults like it was a common occurrence? Then he climbed in after, shutting the door behind him.

“Nerves of steel, that one,” you mumbled, getting back in the car as Duke laughed lightly, starting the car up before heading a bit further into the city. After a few minutes and a few stop lights, Duke gave in to the side-glances you kept giving him, having caught them from the corner of his own eyes, “what now?” The growing devious grin on your face had him on edge, “speaking of nerves of steel…” a shiver hit the back of his neck, “please don’t.” His begging stopped nothing, “fanboy,” but of course you would, and he did his best to pay attention to the road, “don’t make me ignore you all day.”

“I thought it was cute though? Haha, Izzy would be jealous.”

“It’s… I mean, he was…” his ears were burning, especially at the mention of Isabella’s name, and he pouted worse than Jon had.

“I know, but still. You know you’ve met him before, right?” Duke looked like he wanted to disappear in his seat, “just… in costume…” you hummed in amusement.

It didn’t take long for Duke to pull into the parking lot at one of the high-end furniture stores, resting his head on the steering wheel for a moment after parking. The two boys were already out of the car, bickering and racing into the store, “you have no taste! It’s all dark! You can’t put a baby in a depressing room!”

“YOU WANT TO BLIND HIM WITH BRIGHT COLORS!”

“YOU WANT TO SCARE HIM WITH DOOM AND GLOOM!”

The two were practically racing at this point, shoving each other back and forth, though Jon often made Damian stumble through raw strength, and Damian often made Jon trip through dirty tricks.

“Aaaaand there they go.” You were already out of the car as you said it, heading to the driver’s backside door. Duke stepped out before stilling, his face falling at the straps in your hand, outstretched towards him, “you have got to be kidding.”

“Nope, you’re the babysitter today, Papa Duke.”

He took the child carrier from you, strapping the pack on with a depressed aura of resignation, “this so doesn’t look cool.” You snickered as you transferred Terrence over to the pack on Duke’s front, “yeah, but people won’t mess with a big guy like you. Besides, I can handle Damian better than you, can you take care of our son?” you teased him.

“Yeah, I can take care of… him…” Duke eyed the child looking around at everything he could, taking in every sight with silent baby contemplation skills, thumb in his mouth.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell Izzy about us,” you thought for a moment as he ignored your comments, switching tactics. Eyeing him before patting him on the shoulder, you began heading after the two boys, “when you get back, tell Izzy you think she looks like a piece of candy.”

He had a confused look as he followed after you, catching up in a speed walk, “what’s that supposed to mean?”

Not only did his ears turn red, but his entire face and neck burned hot at the suggestive smile on your face, “Oh… wait, w-why out of nowhere though?!”

“You forget, I live with nothing but men. Harper’s not around often and Steph is the only female I see on a regular basis.”

“Get some friends,” he groaned.

“That’s what family is for.”

Ugh.

Shopping actually went a lot better than expected, and you were able to get a new car seat at the behest of Damian, “no way you’re using a hand-me-down,” he all but threatened. There were some smaller things you could easily fit into the car, a few boxes, one for a mobile, one for a few bed sets, a giant pregnancy pillow -- regardless that you weren’t pregnant, you wanted the giant horseshoe pillow. Jon was jealous of it, now wanting one of his own, as you picked up some non-essentials.

The bigger things would have to be shipped, a crib for a few months till he was big enough, small bed with side bars so he wouldn’t fall out when ready to swap out the crib. They even had a huge rocking chair! It was probably one of the most comfortable things you had ever sat in, its ability to “rock” you back and forth on its slides without losing much momentum was heaven.

And you could curl up in it.

Somewhere in all the chaos, just as expected, you’d gone and lost both the boys. Or, well, more like they lost you. Duke was still dutiful with Terrence, and he was also really amazing at looking at details and knowing what item was better than the next. Sure, you’d been taught the same skills, but you were preoccupied with Damian and Jon (until you weren’t).

“Hum… hey, I’m gonna go check out next door, okay?” Duke turned to you from the different curtains in his hand, having taken to looking at a few general things for the room; curtains, bookshelves, a desk or two.

Unlike your father and most of your family, you had far more free time to do these small things yourself, never needing to hire an assistant to do all the work. You only needed some help with moving things, of course. It was something you’d picked up from both Alfred and the Kents, the equally uneasy and comforting feeling of being humble.

“Sure, which one?”

“The clothing store, I think there’s a dedicated kid store a bit further down the mall strip, I’ll probably make my way towards that.” Duke pouted, “leaving me alone with the kids?”

“Just one.” To emphasis your point, Terrence decided to start pulling on the same curtain as Duke, though Duke swatted his hands away quickly. A one-sided glaring contest began as the kid kept his frown on Duke, not looking away.

Duke looked around ignoring him, “that’s… true…”

“Thanks Papa Duke!” you gave him a hug, burying your face in Terrence’s and pelting him with kisses, pulling back only when his laughter echoed around the three of you. Duke refused to look at you as you cooed at the child strapped to his chest, awkward, “I hate you.”

“You love me.”

He snorted and went back to picking out curtains, “and don’t you forget it.”

“You have my card still, right?” He nodded, not even bothering to ask if you needed it. He knew you didn’t carry paper notes around, having seen you use your phone to pay for things physically too often.

Taking that as your cue, you turned to leave, “text if you need anything, and keep an eye out for the boys, I’ll… look, too,” and a moment later you were outside the store, stretching in the sun with a big breath of fresh air. Dang you loved Gotham, but also? Dang you loved Metropolis, too.

[steph] hey, herd u like

[steph] have a baby now???!

[steph] ;)))))

The buzzing of your personal phone caught your attention,

[you] tim? also, switching over for a bit.

You switched recipients,

[you] ready.

Turning the phone off and flipping it closed, you began walking in the opposite direction that Duke had been told, popping the back of the case off and pulling out the battery.

You’d asked Tim to redirect a dummy signal for your phone, keeping it within a five-foot radius of Duke for the next forty minutes or so. He’d given you the thumbs up, your telling him everything when you got back being his payment for helping.

He was very curious as to why you were breaking in to the LexCorp building.

The rather fast-paced walk (almost a light jog) to the building wasn’t that long, you’d made certain the stores you chose were close on purpose. Taking out your business phone, you opened it to another text as you started up a rather… illegal app. Your phone’d been rooted from the moment you had it, and it was hooked up to a very specific closed network.

This outing was one of the only chances you’d get, having lucked out with the more lenient Duke, as your other siblings were far more vigilant. Damian meanwhile was distracted by Jon, the two acting more like brawling siblings than best friends. Though Damian preferred the term rivals, but Jon was just happy to have a close friend he could be himself with.

[splr] he couldn’t contain himself

[splr] was vibin’ like flash lol

There were very few people who had access to this phone, and unfortunately for Tim, it was a hazard for both of you to have any kind of connection to him on your work phone. Stephanie however was one of the very few people who got to have that privilege.

[you] remind me to thank him for stealing my thundr

The family had the Bat-computer, Batman had the League’s Womb mainframe, the Robins had their Nest, and you? You had access to something older, reborn too many times, and set up and now maintained by some genius mastermind you’d never heard of.

It was a mostly defunct information network by this point.

You’d met some really interesting people when you used to tail your father, and through repeated encounters, you’d met even more interesting uh... “friends.” Eventually you weren’t stalking your dad, instead, you were learning to do what you did best: Spy-games and recon.

And you’d impressed the wrong people.

But you didn’t mind, you liked the constant link to “their” information hubs.

[splr] lol

[splr] coffee tmrrw?

The Society’s Networks.

You knew your dad suspected some of your activities, but he never approached you about them. Probably because Batman enjoyed your access to these networks often when they were online, having come to you on multiple occasions to see if you could help with his detective work.

You were playing double agent, compiling what you could from the chatter picked up from specific phones hooked into the closed channels. Sure, they weren’t always active and so sometimes you had to go with information from recon, but you did what you could, your bias for your bats, and birds, too strong. For your family.

[you] the same-same

[splr] c u tmrw then ;)

[splr] don’t forget the kid lol

Not that you’d ever shown him, if Batman knew what kind of information the Society had in their databases, well… you were pretty certain the world would burn.

He once said it was best he didn’t know, something about helping to keep a balance between the good and the bad, causing both sides to stay in check.

The database’s app held all kinds of information, and as you downloaded the LexCorp building plans (sans recent modifications), you stared at the towering complex in front of you. Before you went further, you made certain the matrix encryption program was running, after all, “no reason to let anyone know I’m here.”

“Done this tons of times, can totally do this again,” but LexCorp was terrifying, Lex Luthor was terrifying, almost as much as Wayne Enterprises. Here’s to hoping your dad’s technology and Tim’s brain were smarter than anything Lex could cook up.

Besides, wasn’t he under house arrest right now?

It did nothing to calm your nerves.

“Nerves of steel, totally.”

You had to be fast.

#tim drake x reader #dick grayson x reader #jason todd x reader #stephanie brown x reader #duke thomas x reader #bat!sis

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yourmcu · 4 years

Text

Wish You Were Here (i)

Pairings: Tony Stark x daughter!reader, Avengers x Stark!reader

Summary:

an Infinity War/Endgame AU where Tony Stark’s daughter (you) is one of half the population that vanishes in the snap, Tony finds out later on when he arrives back to Earth, devastated, then you come back like the others to help fight Thanos.

Word count: 2,030

A/n: (moved to the end of the fic!)

Warnings: angst, death, swearing, a lil soft!Nat in the beginning bc I love her, mentions of anxiety/anxiety

read on ao3!

Part 2

gif not mine! credits to the owner^^

You wanted to help in whatever was happening, you weren’t quite sure still, but it had something to do with the infinity stones and how you guys needed to find them before some guy named Thanos does.

It took a lot of convincing for Steve, Natasha and Rhodey (they were the ones more protective over you) to let you come, especially with Tony not around to scold you since he was in space.

“I’m coming with you guys whether you like it or not - no, I know what you’re gonna say, I can handle myself. I’m sixteen! Did you know Peter’s in space right now with Dad? Outer freaking space. You’re not the only one who has a suit, Rhodey-”

The argument ended with, “if something happens and I-” you dragged your thumb across your neck, “then it’s on me. None of you are to blame. Can we go now?”

So they didn’t have any other choice. You went to Wakanda with them to get the mind stone out of Vision and intend to destroy it afterwards.

Things got a *bit* out of hand though, there was an army of creatures - they’re from space, you assumed, working for Thanos - trying to get the stone. You fought alongside Sam and Rhodey, sometimes even fighting with Bruce who was using the Hulkbuster. You also helped the Wakanda tribes when they got overpowered by the creatures.

Even Thor came back to fight and he brought a raccoon and a tree with him.

The battle was going really messy, until - “Everyone on my position. We got incoming.”

You fly to where Cap and the team are, and there he is coming out of what appears to be a cloudy, blue grayish portal, Thanos himself.

“Cap, that’s him.” Bruce says as he hides you behind the Hulkbuster to shield you. He slowly walks over to the purple titan before saying, “stay down, [Y/N], alright?”

Did all of them suddenly forget that you, if not more, are stubborn like your father?

Because when all of them attack, you fly behind Thanos when he's distracted and wrap both your metal covered arms around his neck in stupid attempts to strangle him. He effortlessly uses his gauntlet to throw you back to the ground, knocking you out.

He eventually got all the stones, snapped his fingers when Thor failed to kill him, and left.

“What did you do?!”

“Where did he go? Thor, where did he go?”

“What’s happening?” You get off the ground as Bucky turns to dust. You look around and saw the air filled with the same dust, just from different people.

What the hell did that snap do?

People are vanishing, disappearing, are they dying? Why are they dying? You’re pretty sure you're panicking. Your lips start to quiver and you feel your chest tighten, making it hard for you to breathe.

Natasha notices right away. She's the one who could help you with your anxiety attacks besides Tony. She comes to you and places her hands on your shoulders, looking you in the eye. “Hey, it’s going to be okay, you’re fine, just breathe with me,”

You watch Wanda, one of your best friends, turn to dust too which did not help in the slightest. What’s worse is when Natasha holds your hands to calm you down,

They start turning into dust particles.

“No no no no no no,” you grow weak, holding onto her. “Nat, I’m scared - I don’t - I don’t know what to-”

“Y/N, just breathe like we practiced, okay?”

You try copying her breathing but it’s no use. It doesn’t change the fact that you’re still fading away. You look at her, tears threatening to fall out of your eyes, “I’m so sorry.” She has no choice but to hug you tightly until you get dusted completely.

The Avengers just lost a kid. Not just any kid, for them you were special. You always supported the team no matter what. They couldn’t even imagine what Tony’s reaction would be.

When Natasha told Pepper of course she didn’t take it well.

You were Tony’s own flesh and blood (and some one night stand chic that we won’t mention anymore starting now), but Pepper helped raised you when Tony first took you in and treated you like her own. Sometimes you even called her ‘mom’.

She was so relieved when a spaceship came by the compound to drop Tony off - he looked weak and skinny - she didn’t know how to break the awful news to him while he was in that condition.

“I lost the kid,” he meant Peter. What he doesn’t know was that he actually lost two.

“It’s been twenty-three days since Thanos came to Earth.”

Bruce and Natasha keep looking over one another as images of the people they lost in the snap took turns popping up as holograms. Rhodey feels tense and keeps tapping his foot - nervous of what his best friend’s gonna do once he sees-

Tony abruptly stands up from his wheelchair. “Stop. Stop there.” (“Tony, you need to sit down,”) “No.” He stumbles over to a particular hologram, the one with his daughter’s face.

Y/N Stark.

The room is awfully quiet. Despite you telling them that it isn’t going to be any of their faults if something happens to you, they still feel responsible for you.

“Was anyone going to tell me?” He speaks softly. Too soft and calm for all of them that they remain glued to where they're standing, avoiding eye contact. He clenches his fists and sends a look to everyone in the room. “You better not be shitting me I already lost Parker and I - I can’t - I can’t lose her. I can’t.”

“Tony,” Natasha says. “We couldn’t do anything to stop it.”

It's like being stabbed with his own blade all over again. She tells him everything that happened, how you got dusted like Peter, and Tony just stares blankly at your photo, looking very pale.

Tony takes a deep breath and pushes his glasses further up his nose, holding in tears. Good thing his glasses cover it up. He mutters ‘okay’ over and over as he takes a seat back in his wheelchair. Steve hesitates to continue the discussion but Tony encourages him to go on, even though he feels like he was literally dying inside.

His mood definitely went downhill from there - Tony's furious with himself. Furious with them, with Steve, that he takes it out on the super soldier. By the end of it he's on the floor, passed out.

“Dad, come in, it’s [Y/N]. Everything alright out there?”

“Oh y’know, typical day in the city - pair of aliens came to visit again.” Tony sounded breathless.

You paused briefly. “...what? W-well, do you need help? I can help, and Peter’s probably on his way there - he just made a lame excuse and hung up on me so, I figured he sensed something was wrong.”

“Yeah. Stay where you are and when things get worse, find Pepper and get to safety.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“Nope. Deadass serious. Stay out of this one.”

Tony opens his eyes and takes in his surroundings. He's transferred to a bed with the same wires poking his arm. He dreamt of his last conversation with you - before and while he was dragged to space.

“Hey, I’m still here, you know,” you cut him off while he was arguing with Strange.

“[Y/N]? How is this still connected?”

“I made the earpiece set myself - I guess it has really long range, huh?”

“You’re a nerd.” Tony cracked a small smile.

“Hi [Y/N]!” Peter shouted from a distance.

“Peter? You’re in space too? I’m so jeal-”

The line completely went out, guess the range wasn’t that long.

“Tony?” Pepper says gently. “You shouldn’t be up - it’s only been an hour since you passed out.”

He looks at her for a moment then returns his attention to the wall, eyes bloodshot. “Have I been a good father to her? ‘Cause I feel like she deserved more. Way more.”

“Of course, she loved you! Tony, [Y/N] loved you as much as you love her,” Pepper reassures, running a hand through his hair. “I know you’re upset but you really should be getting bed rest right now.”

He sniffles and gave a small nod, “okay.”

He closes his eyes again when she left the room and sigh, mumbling “goddammit kid,” before letting the tears flow down. Tony rarely cries. Barely cries. He usually keeps those stupid emotions in but this - the fact that his little girl is gone, it's too much for him. He realized never fully showed how much you meant to him and he regrets it.

Can't help but think that it should've been me Either way, I still wish you were here.

Fast forward to five years later: Tony now lived at a lakeside cabin with Pepper and their daughter, Morgan.

Moving on was better than to be sad and depressed for the rest of his life. That’s what you wanted for him anyway, to be happy.

So that’s exactly what Tony did.

He spent time with his family, made new suits which he enjoyed to do, living his life peacefully. That doesn’t mean he forgot about you. Sure the last few years were hard, he missed you every single day, but he had to face and accept it.

Tony moved your stuff from the compound and into a vacant room in the cabin. Sometimes he’d look through your crazy inventions, your journals that were filled with ideas for future gadgets and he hung up framed photos of you and him (some with Pepper) on the walls.

He told Morgan all about you. How awesome you were, how you were energetic and enthusiastic in everything you do, and how the both of you would be best friends if you two met.

“I wanna meet her,” Morgan says, looking at pictures of you.

Tony smiles sadly and looks at the photo of you and him. It was at your school’s science fair and your invention won first place (he remembered laughing at all the science teachers’ shocked faces because of your advanced gadget, way advanced than the grade you were in). Both of you looked really happy.

If a picture is all that I have, I can picture the times that we won't get back If I picture it now it don't seem so bad Either way, I still wish you were here.

“Someday, maybe.” He replies, giving her a warm smile.

Steve, Natasha and a new guy Scott visited him one day. They basically told him bringing back everyone who died in the snap was possible, hinting time travel.

Tony was torn. He didn’t want to risk losing what he had now, but bringing everyone back... that was something. Everyone in the universe that vanished, the other Avengers, the guardians he met in space, Strange, Peter, you.

That same night he thought about you, and Peter when he stumbled upon a picture of both of them. That same night, he figured out time travel.

“Hey legacy,” he chuckles a bit, remembering how you always frowned or pouted whenever he called you that. He likes that nickname on you though. “I... uh, this is just a little video. For you. Sure you won’t see this but... I like to pretend I could still talk to you. I miss you, a lot.”

“It’s been five years, hun. Morgan, your sister... you have no idea how much she talks about you. She wants to meet you someday,” he looks at the camera. “I know I can’t tell her the real reason why you’re not here with us, not yet, but anyway, ‘couple of old pals came to visit me. They want to try to get everyone back, that includes you.”

Tony sighs, looking away. “As of now I don’t know if we’re ever gonna pull off something like this. I figured it out, just a couple minutes ago actually. Time travel. It’s dangerous, very risky...”

“But we’ll see. We’ll figure something out. I hope to see you soon, [Y/N]. I love you.”

----

so I’ve cut this lil idea into two parts - I’ll probs post part 2 soon right after this one - if everyone likes it of course :)

oh, and I listened to this song by Neck Deep while writing this, which is where I got the title too, you can listen here. (I also put in some lyrics from the song to the story, just because it fits well hehe)

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monster-bcrn · 3 years

Text

SPOOKY’S 100 FOLLOWER SHOUTOUT!

Okay for real this is the fastest growing blog I’ve ever had hehehe. Never expected Grundy to get this popular this quickly!

Freaking love this zombaby and I’m so glad y’all love him too! As promised, gonna shout out some fantabulous bloggos that helped get Grundy to where he is today. XD

@akasupergirl/ @azombieme (I FREAKING ADORE GRUNDY AND KARA AND LIV. I swear Grundy’s loyal to Kara like he was to Shayera and Jade and Liv is totally his baby sister and is gonna protect her from.....everything. :P

Even pigeons, because they’re legion.)

@thecatgoddessbast (A blast from the past! Glad to see you again after I rampaged and caused chaos as a certain deranged pincushion of a mushroom way back in the time before present. XD

Now I get to do that as a zombie. :D Win/win!)

@starcityvigilante (OLLIE. FFFFFF-okay for real I’m HYPED to plot wacky ideas with you. Grundy has a MASSIVE grudge against Green Arrow and I’m like......*push these two together* you both get along right now.)

@folcire (We literally just started talking and I’m loving your Ivy already! Can’t wait to see how Grundy grows to see her the more he talks to her because they’re both sassy plant people that way. XD)

@themartlans (FFFFFF-J’ONN. Everyone’s favorite green uncle :D I freaking adore him and I HATE how the most he ever interacted with Grundy was him being tossed into the bay. >_<

They really need to talk more, and MAN! That Injustice verse of yours is SICK. Definitely hyped for making Grundy into an insurgent and a good zombie instead of Supes’ lapdog.

( Look at this face....LOOK AT IT.)

@blackwingsbluedings (One of the best Dick Grayson’s out there and definitely loving seeing Grundy be less smash and more “......hug?” They both need hugs I swear.)

@marvelousdamsels (We haven’t talked much but I adore your muses and I just hope Grundy doesn’t come off as too weird or clingy.......wait.......that’s......literally Grundy.....

:D)

@theirfirstexperiment (GRUNDY ON A RAMPAGE YOOOOOO! Better run fast. XD)

@amazonexile/ @gothamprens/ @captainstevertrevor ( Freaking love your muses and I love seeing Diana and Bruce actually WANT to help Grundy. It’s too easy just beating on Grundy and I love seeing them actually bother to try to get to the gentler side of the Hulk’s crazy cousin. XD)

@justiceebound / @nighttfight ( *slams fist on the table* YOU ARE AWESOME! Your Shayera is awesome, your Bruce is a national treasure and I can’t wait to throw Grundy at Supes and Diana, because these guys need a big reconciliation thing after all the chaos from literal years of slugging it out.

And I LOVE it. >:D)

@ofamazonia

@theamazondiana (Both of you are AWESOME Wonder Women and MAN I love plotting ideas. I’m tired of seeing Diana being turned into too much of a warrior while negating her role as a peace-maker and y’all NAIL her kindness and wisdom and need to give everyone a chance. Freaking LOVE IT!)

@raininginkyxto (LOL I always love imagining Grundy in Marvel and now poor Weasel is kind of stuck with him. XD Man, if the Hulks meet Grundy then that poor bar is going to really get smashed.....)

@notatomo (GIANT. Man I loved that movie as a kid and I LOVE the subsequent giant robot and tiny kid works inspired from it (example being the CRIMINALLY under-appreciated Sentinel series by UDON.) Can’t wait to see what happens when Grundy talks more to someone bigger than him. XD)

@liminalstctic (GRUNDY HEARTS TINY GIRL. XD Yeah he’s trying his hardest to help her. ;A;)

@dolceclavier

@gobsnacc

@adrenalinesaint

@ninelivesruined

@yellowskinnedwackyman (CREEPER! I’ll forever ADORE these two butts because they’re team Tree Lobsters.)

@collidingxworlds/ @thecursedhellblazer (I. Love. Your. Constantine. I swear I have so much fun writing Grundy trying to get drunk (and failing) and learning to cuss up a storm while still being a mad lad ready to throw down with mega-zombies to protect his tiny friend.

DC, make this friendship canon or so help me Grodd...)

@chaosmultiverse (I love your Klarion so much! He’s so much fun! XD And Teekl for the epic win!)

@raichoose (Herbert West and Solomon Grundy? THAT aIN’T GOOD! D:>)

@gctjinxd (Freaking LOVE your Jinx! LOL how she manipulates Freeze and how Grundy isn’t even REMOTELY phased by her powers. Like he is TOUGH. Even bad luck won’t stop him.)

@killcrcroc (BIG BAD KILLER CROC! I love your Waylon and I adore how he has a collection of watches and that awesome suit. XD Croc definitely deserves more love since he’s much smarter than he looks, and tough enough to even get Grundy to back down in a serious fight.)

@babydxhl (Baby Doll is criminally underappreciated and I love how she’s the opposite to Grundy. She looks child-like but is very crafty, mature and knows how to get what she wants, while Grundy is physically strong and big enough to bully his way into anything he wants, but is very simple and child-like and would rather watch the birds. XD)

@theednygma (An awesome Ed Nygma and I love how Grundy is so unsure of everything yet still goes along for the ride as a support. XD)

@sleightlyoffhand (BUNNY MAN! Okay the idea of Josiah monching on carrots in Grundy’s pocket makes me smile so much. XD)

@thanagrian (BIRD-NOSE! Honestly every time I think of Grundy and Shayera I get the feels big time. These two definitely deserved more than just two episides to give them a unique friendship.

(I love that STAR Labs mission so much in Injustice. XD)

@the-arkham-librarian ( I love Eliza so much! She’s crafty, stubborn, sweet and kind and just cares about everyone so much when few don’t. Grundy grew so attached to her I swear she’s like his little sister at this point. XD And he’s totes the best uncle along with Eddie.)

@fatherdamned ( I LOVE YOUR RIDDLER OMG! He’s so snarky but man he is SO DAMN FUN to write with! Grundy is there for his green friend, no matter what!)

@fartemis-crockpot

( I freaking LOVE Artemis and Grundy, especially in the Injustice Society stuff. Yeah Grundy’s been a butt before but he genuinely likes and cares about her and the rest of the team and I’m like....

Look at these bunch of a-holes. Yeah they’re a family and even if they’re bad.....they’ve got each other. And that’s what counts. C:)

@powerhours/ @lastofmars (Green dad? Green dad. I love your J’onn so much and I’m like *throws Grundy at green dad* Here give this disaster some love. XD)

@gothamdad (YET ANOTHER AWESOME BATMAN. :D)

@redsleuthed (TIM! I love Tim and I swear these two should talk more because Grundy doesn’t WANT to fight and I think just letting someone hear him out would help him immensely.

Plus that stuff with Freeze? Poetic cinema.)

@themusespace

@12thlevel (On this blog we stan socially awkward green boi with angery grandpa genius mastermind. XD)

@pluckyingenue

@seekthedarknesswithin (SHADE! I love Shade in Justice League where he constantly throws Shade at everyone so you can imagine how excited I was to see Shade on Tumblr! We haven’t done much but man.....even Grundy was excited to see an old friend from the Injustice Society/ Injustice Gang.)

@youstolemycoat (Okay, hands down, Nick Necro is so much fun to plot with. His Robin verse is so fun too and poor Grundy tries to help but a certain birdy won’t let him. XD)

@ufotm (Tiny alien baby. :3)

@thetrigonborn

@kitfreeman

@partcfyouruniverse/ @diamondcladclown ( An awesome mun and my goodness her Harley is EPIC! I love the metas about Harley too and you just GET HER. And that????? Is the sign of an excellent writer and mun.)

@bigbadkillercroc ( I love your Croc and the brotherly bond he has with Grundy! It’s so refreshing to see these two bonding instead of Grundy tearing off Waylon’s face like he did in the Solomon Grundy mini-series. :C)

@blizzardmuses (I LOVE YOUR MUSES OMG. Your Batgirl?????? I ADORE HER. I love Freeze as a member of the Birds of Prey and I love tossing Grundy at your muses because the guy needs love and an excuse to smash.....and I really love both lol.)

@starfirechan (You’re Starfire is so freaking CUTE! I love how she and Grundy get along so well since they’re kind of two misfits that aren’t very well-versed in city life. XD)

@gotham-crusader/ @maximummuses (One of the best Batman and Damian Wayne RPers out there! I have a lot of fun with our threads and even if they fizzle out there is so much heart to them that they’re some of my absolute favorites no matter what muse I put on. C:)

@teufortsquidman (PRAWN! Okay, a giant mega-zombie and an Eldritch abomination? Yeah they’re gonna be good pals lol. XD)

@tragedybcrn (Hands down one of the BEST Batman RPers I’ve talked to and plotted with. I love how Bruce helps Freeze and even Grundy try to be better than just crooks. Grundy though has had so many bad experiences that he can’t trust anyone anymore unless there is some SERIOUS help. But he’ll learn to at least try to trust Batman.....because Batman was genuinely nice to him.)

@krygothite ( I freaking LOVE your Bane! We haven’t written much but FFFFF0yeah he’s epic. XD And Grundy is kind of nervous about bringing Bane to Slaughter Swamp because Bane is tough but not kaiju-sized gators and snakes tough....

Or....maybe he is.....let’s test him. >:D)

@batvvmn

@redwinefangs (VAmpire Batman? Vampire Batman. We have an epic trifecta of vampire Bats, Freezy-wolf and zombaby Grundy and I LOVE it. These three are so much fun to plit ideas around. XD)

@bclaur

@stcrshnes

@titanicscionofthestars ( I freaking LOVE Sara! All across my blogs I love her and the way you write her! And I swear her reaction to Grundy being impaled????? MY HEART. ;A;)

@jcinthedance (JERVIS! Okat for real I love the image of Hatter and Grundy just enjoying a tea party at the asylum and being weird dorks. XD)

@adventurepunks (I absolutelky LOVE your Zatanna! She’s so fun and I’d love to plot more with her! :D)

@shesquiinnsane

@laughter-in-white (YOU????? Are??? Like the BEST Joker. Hands down. Your Croptop J is so much fun to plot with and he’s funny and being dramatic for Bats. And Grundy is like ‘yeah he’s crazy but he’s my crazy.’)

@yourfavoritesidekick

@smartvulpix (* glomps on you for being epic*)

@thehouseofivo (Your Freeze and Julian are AWESOME! Love throwing my guys at them both lol)

@lil-miss-romano

@sweet-tea-solly

@slauhter

@occultsleuth

@wiisectrpillar

@wonderlandcarpenter

@gunborn

#Rave to the Grave (Out of Character)#TOOK ME HOUIRS BUT I DID IT #Even if I didn't mention you you are STILL VALID #Love you all!

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greytoiletpaper · 4 years

Text

Out on Allen Street, it’s 7 in the Morning

Set in the same-ish street-siblings universe as First Contact by @cryptids-and-muses and @a-sketchy-character @streetsiblings (they’re still awesome). Now, the pieces start falling into place or smth lmao :))

Drizzle | Deluge | AO3

Chapter 3: Squall

Did they get rid of her?

He dreads to think of it, but there’s nothing else he seems to be able to pick out from what information he gathers. Three years after he died, Cass (who hated killing, would never do it even for the worst of the worst) had nearly murdered the Joker. She almost finished the job until Batman saved the madman and subdued her. After that,

Nothing.

Not a single report on Batgirl. Nor a photo of Cassandra Todd. Only two traces he could find. One a significantly sullen Wonder Woman (he and Cass had liked her, and she, them). The other an interview of Bruce, repeating that she’d gone to ‘travel the world’.

Jason knows a lie when he hears one.

“It’s – It’s like she just disappeared,” He’s gripping his head, rocking back and forth while Rose smooths out his hair. “He cut her out of the family and then what?”

He remembers a promise, a vow Bruce had made with him. It had meant the world to Jason.

Bruce had broken that vow. Torn it apart and stomped all over it.

Rose watches him as he breaks down with no judgement in her gaze, just holds him close as his world crumbles around him again.

There’s a child in Nandra Parbat, and Jason has to train him.

“This is my son, Damian,” Talia had said to him, showing him some new kid as if he hadn’t just killed three assassins in the space of a minute. He would have said as much if she didn’t immediately order him to be the kid’s new teacher.

Looking at him now, all Jason can see is a small girl with a crooked smile mouthing his name. He blinks, and he’s met with a scowl and sapphire eyes (eyes just like Br-).

“Mother has requested you to be my instructor,” The kid repeats and lord, his voice is nasal. Jason chooses to stare at the kid, who fidgets. If he looks close enough, he could swear Damian’s scowl looks almost precisely like-.

“Is he mute, Mother? I do not see how an invalid could assist me,” He can tell by the way Rose’s head shoots up and glares at Damian whose side she would choose if this escalates. A flare of anger rises in Jason’s chest; his eyes start to flash a sharp emerald. Still, he pushes it down and diverts it to strengthening his stare, dominating the room.

He can’t read people the same way Cass can, but Jason could swear that the kid’s composure cracks at his uncertainty.

“Wanna repeat that for me?” Jason’s voice is low and even. He can tell the kid recognises the threat in his tone. To his credit, Damian hesitates before he honest to god tts, like every single other haughty, uptight rich boy.

“Regardless, habibi, you will treat your new instructors with respect,” Talia speaks, gesturing to him and Rose. “The quality of your instructors was incredibly subpar, and you have them to blame for killing the previous masters beforehand.”

“I do not think that a lowly thug and his harlot-,” Jason’s arm shoots out in an instant, clasping his hand over Damian’s mouth and clenching. Indignant fury flares in the boy’s eyes as Damian tries to slap Jason away. It does nothing, unsurprisingly.

“So long as you are under my tutelage, you will never speak that way to any woman. That is no way to speak to anyone, regardless of what they do for a living,” Somehow, the kid actually listens, the flinty look in his eye lessening somewhat. “I bet your own mother had to pull a fuck ton of strings just to make sure this meeting even happened in the first place.”

Jason glances up to Talia, expecting a reprimand. What surprises him is how genuine the approval she emits is. It hits him that he has literally confirmed to training Damian. He coughs.

“You should know,” Talia pipes up. “His full name is Damian Wayne-Al Ghul.”

Jason stares at the ceiling and curses the rain as it tap-dances with the universe, mocking him.

“All right, then, I’ll go to hell.”

Cassandra shakes herself from the nerves and rings the doorbell. The last time she had been here, she had kissed Alfred on the cheek and let him drive her all the way to the airport. That was only two months ago. Two months away from Gotham, away from Batgirl, away from-.

Bruce. He’s standing in the foyer, his gaze cold, but his body… his body seems unsure. She doesn’t know what to make of it. She half expects him to turn her away, but he moves to the side. He opens his mouth.

“Cassandra!” Steph darts from behind Bruce’s body, all flailing limbs and mismatched socks. “You’re here!”

“Yes.”

The girl grins, periwinkle eyes dazzling (They’re from the same cloth, just not the proper stitching) as she drags Cassandra away.

“So… how’s life in Hong Kong?”

“Peachy,” Cass answers honestly.

“Think of any names for your new identity?” Steph gesticulates to nothing, but her body language is focused on questions. So, she doesn’t give the girl any. They walk a little more until Steph decides to fill in the silence again.

“Tim’s dad found out about the vigilante business,” Cass nods as Steph talks. “Wants him to quit being Robin and Bruce doesn’t seem to know what to do about it.”

“His problem.”

“Well, duh. It’s just that….” Steph rubs her arm shyly, the same way she always does when she’s afraid of what she will say next. “When I was growing up, with my villain dad and addict Mom, I always imagined that Batman and Robin would save me. I’m here now, and….”

“You want to be Robin.” Cassandra deadpans, even as Steph whirls to gape at her. Really, it’s not like she wasn’t obvious. “Why not go for it?”

Silence for a moment. “Because I’m afraid.”

Cassandra looks at the blonde sharply. Stephanie Brown? Intimidated-by-Batman-and-joined-vigilantism-anyway Stephanie Brown was afraid? She doesn’t know what to think. That is until the dots connect in her head.

“You’re afraid that you won’t be able to help as much as you want to,” Steph scuffs the carpet glumly.

“With Mr. Anal-retentiveness-to-the-9’s? Yeah, that’d probably happen,” Steph sound so defeated and desperate that Cass curses because apparently, fate chose now to be when Steph is truly like Jason.

“Then don’t wear it,” Steph’s scuffing gets a little stronger. “I, for one, think you’d be a really good Batgirl.”

Steph makes an incredible impression as a fish and stares at Cass, barely wheezing as she gawks. “But Bruce -.”

“Bruce doesn’t have autonomy over Batgirl,” Cass smiles sweetly, echoing Barbara. “It’s your uniform now, and no one can take that from you but yourself.��

Her friend squeals loudly and squeezes Cass, gushing her gratitude over and over. Cass hugs her back, pretending it’s Jay she’s holding in her arms, giving the assurance of family she failed to keep.

He’s only trained with Damian for a few months, yet he’s seen more than he really should from the boy. His younger brother (the kid’s only a child, it doesn’t matter what Jason’s previous misgivings are) has been raised in the League of Assassins since birth. He can already use a sword with deadly efficiency at eleven years old. His attitude's as ruthless and condescending as every other assassin in the compound.

However, what is an exploitable weakness for Damian is the fact he’s only just started puberty. Most easily demonstrated when Rose makes a suggestive pose before tackling the boy and pinning him in place. Jason whistles because he’s fond of her, an asshole like that. Rose flips the bird at Jason and sticks out her tongue, now lounging casually on Damian’s squirming body.

It’s cute, the scene, but Jason knows how wrong it is. As long as Damian is with the League of Assassins, he won’t live normally. To find his own love, his own family. Even as the child wrestles with Rose and yells at him to help, it won’t ever be enough.

He’s not projecting.

He’s not.

He’s going to concoct a plan.

Ravi, Damian’s caretaker, has that air about him that Jason has only ever seen come from Alfred. So, he guesses trusting Ravi with this is more than okay. The man may be blind, but with him, they manage to smuggle Damian through the channels of the League, avoiding everyone who could threaten their goal.

“If I may ask, Mister Todd,” Ravi says as they reach the last legs. Jason nods. “Why are you doing this? To what gain is rescuing this child for you?”

“I don’t do this because I want to gain something,” Jason replies immediately. “No child deserves to grow up in this place. He deserves to have as good a childhood as he can get.”

Ravi stares patiently, hearing what’s unsaid.

“Sound reasoning,” Talia’s voice echoes around them. Everyone tenses. The woman steps out from behind the pillar ahead of them, alone. “And where, may a mother ask, are you taking my son?”

The woman’s voice lacks her usual veneer, sounding so genuinely earnest that he can’t help but blurt out: “Gotham.”

“Gotham,” Talia repeats, her forehead pinched. “With him?” With Batman? Jason bristles. “Might I remind you; he left your death unavenged and replaced you in mere months.”

“Fuck that,” Jason snarls. Ever since he came out of the Pit, madness clings to the edges of his mind whenever he thinks of how Bruce replaced him. This time, it only flickers. “What I want doesn’t matter when Damian needs his father figure. I’m – I’m not stopping him from having that.”

“So, you no longer wish to kill him,” Talia states. He sighs.

“I guess not,” Jason frowns, considering her presence. “Want to take him to Bruce?”

If Talia is surprised, she doesn’t show it, only beckoning for Damian to follow her. As the kid moves, Jason realises this might be the last time he’ll see Damian on the same side of the fence. He grabs the kid’s shoulder, who oddly doesn’t resist.

“Look, Damian,” Jason starts as his younger brother stares up at him. “Doing right is right, and wrong is wrong. A body ain’t got no business doing wrong when he ain’t ignorant and knows better.

“Living with your father, it’s rules like that he follows like gospel. He’ll love you; I know he will, but with him it’s always on the condition that you adhere to his principles. Can you promise something for me?”

Damian nods, soaking every word in.

“I need you to keep an open mind with what he says, but I don’t want you to follow them like gospel the way he does. You’re more than his soldier, you’re my brother, you’re his son.”

The kid nods again, shifting on his feet.

“And – And look after yourself, okay? And -,” The words that come out of his mouth feel like hot coals, but he has to say them. “And if somehow Cass is there, can you look after her too? For me?”

“Of course,” Damian answers softly before throwing his arms around Jason’s waist. “I will find your ukht, ahki, and make sure she is well cared for.”

Jason smiles. It's a broken, weary-looking thing.

“And Todd?” Jason raises his eyebrows. “You should confess to Wilson about your ridiculous affection. It is sickening to watch you two dancing around one another every lesson.”

Jason can’t help it; he laughs and lets his little brother go, his tears like raindrops.

Cass leaves the fresh hydrangeas on the headstone. It stares back at her, its date (four years) seeming to mock her from beyond the grave. Literally, Jay says in her head, which has her biting back the laugh that builds in her throat.

Bruce’s son had come in a few days ago, obviously an assassin child, yet he’s still… subdued, somehow. She knows the boy is there, at her brother’s grave, and that he follows her all the way to the manor. Even then, Cassandra lets it go. He probably took all his cues from Bruce anyway.

It’s when she’s sitting at the new memorial for Jason, a small statue of an apple with a plaque underneath, that Damian approaches her.

“Cain.”

“It’s Todd.”

Something crosses the boy’s face. She can’t tell what it is.

“Todd,” Damian says, his eyebrows pinching like a mini Bruce. “What is this?”

“It’s Jason’s memorial,” Cassandra traces the words on the plaque, a quote, one whose meaning she had struggled with a lifetime ago. She gestures to the book in her hands. “I read to it, every time I’m here.”

Damian looks like he’s about to say something about that, but he withholds it. Instead, he sits down with her, his head upturned, not unlike a bird.

“What was he like?” The boy asks, the words seeming to grit out his teeth.

“He was amazing, and we loved him so much,” Dick speaks up, out of nowhere, cutting Cass off before she can even begin. “I had a few issues with him, but I promise that I’ll be as good a brother to you as he was to us.”

Cassandra snorts, and Dick’s smile falls off his face.

“Cassandra, come on, I was just-.”

“You weren’t even a good brother to me or – or him.” She says quietly, because why is he even speaking now? “Why are you trying now? Why not before?”

“Like I said, I had a lot of issues with -.”

“I don’t care, Dickface.” Does it hurt to say Jason’s old nickname for the boy? Yes. Does she draw satisfaction at how much he flinches? Also, yes.

Barbara chooses then to speak up.

“I don’t think that’s fair for you to say, Cass.”

She freezes. The fact that even Damian, who hardly knows her, does the same with the others means they know how huge an error they’ve made.

“Don’t call me that,” Cassandra snaps, voice desolate and lethal, thoughts squalling and refusing to calm down even as she buries her head in the book in her hands.

Barbara sighs and calls Dick away to discuss the mysterious hacker that’s been pulling information from them. Damian, seeming to recognise her desire to be alone, follows him. Good. Cassandra’s mind falls in and out of a lull as her eyes try to refocus. So, she caresses the edge of the apple reverently. In its reflection, tears run down her cheeks. She can’t feel them.

“The information breaches just keep searching for Batgirl,” Barbara says, snapping Cassandra from her stupor. She pulls up a list; every entry confirms Barbara’s statements. Every entry, that is, except for one that catches her eye. The text flashes brightly, making her head spin, and she can’t look away because printed in the bright neon text is-.

There’s a memory, one she’s locked in the far recesses of her mind, where things like the Joker and David and all her other demons live. She remembers Faizul asking who her mother is.

David smirks, a savage thing he does whenever he’s about to order her to do something (murder, as it turned out, then) and says:

Sandra Wu-San | Lady Shiva

The words blare in her mind, bouncing round and round and blocking out all sounds in the cave. It certainly explains a lot; only Shiva can read the body like a novel. Plus, Cassandra isn’t sure that assassin skills are genetic but having two master assassins as biological parents should factor somewhere. It also opens a new avenue of thought. Why? Why did she give her up and never look back? Why did she leave her with her monster of a father? Cassandra craves needs answers, and she needs them now.

Staring up at the name printed on the screen, Jason once asked himself the same questions.

While the others discuss what to do, Cassandra has already listed Shiva’s last known locations and activities. They don’t notice she’s going to leave until she revs the engine of her bike. She sees them open their mouths, but over the sound of the motor, their voices fail to reach her.

All except, somehow, for Alfred and if there is anyone in this family Cass will listen to; it’s the one Jay loved the most.

“If you do pursue her, Miss Cassandra,” The butler has never been unkind to her, yet she can’t help but feel like he’s trying to keep her in place. “I am not sure if you will find what you are looking for.”

She leaves anyway, soaring underneath the tresses of Gotham as they settle around her, the mist obscuring everything but her path forward.

“Damian probably landed in Gotham last week,” Rose says casually. Too casually, she realises. Jace side-eyes her and snorts in response. Damn him and his ability to pick apart what she’s asking. Four years constantly in one another’s presence would do that to people with his life experience. Yet, as much as Jason can read her, she can’t say she can do the same for him.

Something about him seems fragile, like plaster covering a beautiful and distracting collage. Rose wants to dig past that plaster, through the collage and see the mind that is Jason Todd.

She has seen him at his highest and lowest points and always makes sure to stay by his side, as she does now. He’s her best friend; he might not know it, but he’s kept her sane (reassurances her father will not find her come to mind) just as much as she’s done for him.

“What do you think of the new Batgirl?” This time, she means to be conversational. When they stumbled across the profile of Cass’ successor, Jace had shaken his head and laid out half-heartedly into a punching bag.

“I don’t hate her, if that’s what you’re thinking,” That response was… not unexpected. But, when she raises her hickory eyes, Jason has his head raised to the sky. “I looked into her, and – and she’s like us.”

Oh.

“Girl’s from the Narrows. Didn’t live on the streets, but from her background, her home life definitely wasn’t that great growing up either.”

His hand is trembling, so Rose grabs it and tries to keep him steady with all the power in her.

“She’s going to do Batgirl proud,” Jason says shakily. “I think you’d agree.”

They stand there, leaning on each other, tranquillity settling around them as Jace lets his tears flow. It occurs to Rose that she never let his hand go. She doesn’t plan to. The feeling makes her feel warm inside, and as much as she wants to go further, she also doesn’t want to push her best friend away.

In the distance, the outline of a jet approaches the runway they’re on. It is time.

“You ready?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I said yes.”

“Fair enough.”

“Hey,” Rose looks up at him, waiting for him to continue. “If anything goes wrong, I want you to stay out of sight of the others and get away from Gotham.”

Rose growls. “No way, there is no fucking way I’d leave you alone with them.” She steps closer, jabbing her finger on his chest. “I didn’t train with you for the past four years for it all to be thrown away just because Batman is an asshole. My dad’s just as bad, remember?

“You’re stuck with me no matter what Jace. Deal with it.”

He gives her a wry smirk that has her heart fluttering as much as her returning grin is sharp. Even as the plane touches down, she realises that he hasn't let her hand go, and neither has she.

In the next week, Red Hood and Ravager will carve their way through the deeper bowels of Gotham’s stomach, a bag of heads linking their iron fists.

For now, Rose breathes in the moist air as a drizzle begins.

Mad Dog, Cassandra muses, is a morbid reminder of what she might have become if she stayed with David. He doesn’t have her abilities, but he has more physical strength in spades; his movements are so strange, so unpredictable, that it’s not like it matters.

A deft swipe narrowly misses her throat, and Cassandra cuffs the man in the jaw with her knee, knocking him back.

She had definitely found Shiva. Tracked her all the way to some subset of the League of Assassins. The woman had only gazed coolly at her and set Mad Dog on her.

True to his name, the assassin growls and leaps at her, fury behind each of his strikes. Cassandra dodges one of these, the fist cratering the cement wall, and gets socked in the chest for her trouble. The force of the impact sends her flying metres away.

Getting up from the blow is a chore, and she can feel the agony her body is in, feels the blood run down her mouth as she rises. Her fist is shaking; her stance is uneven. Mad Dog notices, and he grins like David, drawing a jagged sword from his sheath and charges.

Cassandra darts past the assassin. She knows she can win this. Even though his movements are swift and deadly, she manages to outpace him. His sword strikes aim to draw blood as he swipes at her, but she’s still managed to weave her way around them, causing sparks to fly into the air. When he tries to hit her, she still uses his momentum against him and knocks him down.

Yet, Cassandra can feel herself getting slower now; her arms are still shaking. She dodges another strike, but it’s a feint, and Mad Dog grabs her by the hair and slams her onto the ground. Hazily, she watches his wicked grin widen as the assassin raises his arms and prepares his blade.

As Mad Dog is about to drive it into Cass’ chest, she thinks (This is it. It’s all over. It is time.) of a boy in an alleyway, an apple in his hand and a smile on his lips.

She closes her eyes and listens to the sprinkling outside.

“Do you think we were unfair to them?” Dick seems to ask to open air, but Bruce knows when his sons want a genuine response. “Like, that we didn’t give them enough credit for what they could do. And because of that, they’ve never had anyone but each other?”

Dick slumps. It looks so wrong on him that Bruce wraps his arms around him, especially careful (As a real father would. An insidious voice in his brain sneers). “Do you think, that if maybe we treated them so much better...” His boy is crying now, usually joyous lapis eyes cold and red-rimmed. “That they’d still be here?”

Bruce only grunts because not one of his answers is what Dick wants to hear.

On a slab of stone, the petals on the hydrangeas wilt, droplets dappling their edges.

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66 notes · View notes

greekgeek21 · 3 years

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Percy Jackson and the Avengers: Convergence - the avengers are humbled

Welcome back! I know it's been awhile but I hope I didn't lose too many of you. I just wanted to say thank you for all of the support I've been getting on all platforms. Honestly, I did not expect this story to take off the way it did.

Now that that's over, I'm gonna clarify something for SOME PEOPLE. I started writing this last October, which means that I have absolutely no interest in going back over already-edited work just to change a minor detail some people seem to find maddening. This chapter, I can say for certain, was written during December, so I don't always remember what happened. Okay?

This chapter is kinda just one big fluffy piece but I love it so no hate pls.

Now please remember to comment, like, follow me, and reblog!

- you author

Ω ♆ Ω

"Okay! Assignments...Annabeth and Piper, go with Widow, Frank with Hawkeye, Hazel and Leo with Tony, and Jason and Percy with Bruce and I. Everyone okay with that?" Steve said.

"Yep."

"Got it, Cap."

"This should be fun..."

The heroes separated into their groups and stood, waiting for more orders from Captain America.

"As I said before, this is just to further evaluate and document your abilities. It shouldn't take long. That's it, get to work," He ordered, turning and walking towards the sparring pads with Jason, Percy, and Dr. Banner.

They were back on the training floor for the evaluations, after an uneventful lunch break. Well, unless you count Frank's disgust with the attempt at proper Chinese food as eventful.

Ω ♆ Ω

Despite them being on the sparring mats, Percy and Jason would not be sparring. Even to someone who doesn't know the full extent of the sons of the Poseidon and Zeus' relationship, it's pretty obvious that they should not be allowed to fight each other. Their personalities are almost exact opposites; Carefree vs Serious.

"Just show us something we haven't seen from you before, and then we'll build from there," Bruce told the teens.

Percy and Jason looked at each other expectantly, waiting for the other to begin. Their powers were similar in the way that they could get out of hand quickly. Neither of them wanted to be the reason that the tower lost power or got flooded. Zeus knows it would be a mess to clean up.

After a whole two minutes of waiting for them to get started, Steve let out a sigh, "Oh, for God's sake! Jason, you go."

"Umm...let's see here," Jason muttered under his breath, looking around the room for inspiration, "Oh! I got it!"

He positioned himself a couple of feet away from a practice dummy and held his hands together in front of him. Taking a deep breath and imagining his goal, he let sparks fly around his hands. He let them grow for a couple of seconds before slowly starting to separate his hands. While doing this, he made sure a line of electricity was stable between his hands. He kept separating his hands until he couldn't anymore, and then he slowly released his grip on the line from his left hand. He made sure to keep feeding the lightning rod so that it held form.

Meanwhile, on the sidelines, Percy, Steve, and Bruce were all watching with equal amounts of shock. Percy had never seen or known Jason could do this, and Steve and Bruce were completely new to all of this. Then, Jason proceeded to shock them further.

He made the line of electricity into a whip. He made a lighting whip.

Percy was so proud of his friend's imagination. It was almost enough to make a grown demigod cry...

Jason readied his whip and struck the practice dummy, slicing it completely in half. Then, he turned to his group, smiling and making the lightning dissipate. It should've been illegal how easy he made it look, in Percy's opinion.

"Dude! That was awesome! I didn't know you could do that!" Percy exclaimed, slapping the son of Zeus on the back with a proud, blinding smile.

No matter what it seemed like sometimes, Percy was the big brother of the Seven.

"Yeah! That was pretty good, son," Steve said, nodding his head in appreciation, "Now we only need to get that process sped-up and it will be an amazing asset in a fight."

"This means you could do so much more with your abilities, including maybe providing infinite power, which we have been searching for for decades! You kids are truly lucky to have these powers," Bruce rattled off.

Percy whispered to Steve, "Does he get like this a lot?"

Steve nodded, "Yeah. I tend to tune-out the sciency rambling and just focus on stuff I can understand. He had Tony if he needs to bounce ideas off of someone, anyway."

"Got it," Percy said, "I guess this means I'm next?"

He had thought about this a lot during lunch, and had decided to go into the exercise with the comfort and ease he had possessed using his powers before Tartarus, and see where he got from there. Like Annabeth said, it was all in his head. He just needed to believe that he had control, and he would get it.

Simple, in theory.

"Yep. I want you to copy Jason, but with water," Steve said.

He gave more specific instructions to Percy because he felt like he needed that. He was a leader, and leaders need to notice and know what their troops need. Percy needed specifics because he was cautious with using his powers, and he wanted to know exactly what was needed of him before going in. That way there is no possibility of him losing control.

Once again, only in theory.

"Okay, Percy... you got this," Percy muttered to himself, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet and cracking his neck.

He shook his hands out once before readying himself in a slightly-more relaxed version of Jason's stance. But this time, he did not hold his hands together. Instead, he reached his hands out towards the bucket of water the Avengers had brought to the sparring mats earlier. Taking a deep breath, he felt the barely-there familiar tug in his gut before a tendril of water was rising from the bucket and reaching towards his outstretched hands. Percy willed it to wrap around his arms and hands, and then he slowly put his hands together like he had seen Jason do (he wasn't quite sure how he planned to make the whip yet, so this seemed like the best bet). Taking another deep breath, he started separating his hands, but keeping a solid tendril of water stretched between them.

He tried to move slightly faster than his cousin did, just because of the ever present, unconscious competitiveness ingrained between them.

Finally, he let go with his left hand and let the water form into a whip in his right. It kept shape, but was more flexible than the rod had been. Percy turned to the other practice dummy and whipped it twice, forming two straight slices right through the rubber.

Everyone in their group stood in shock, including Percy after he had deposited the water back in the bucket. He hadn't known he could use a whip.

Must be another natural demigod thing, he thought. Most weaponry came easy to him (except archery, of course).

It took a moment for them to recollect themselves, but Steve shook himself out of his stupor first, "That was...impressive, Percy. I didn't know you had such control over your powers."

The demigod in question shrugged modestly, "Yeah. I didn't really either, to be completely honest."

Jason surged forward and hung an arm around his friend, "Stop being so modest, Kelphead! That was amazing!"

Sure, Jason had done the same thing, but he hadn't gone through literal Hell and come back scarred forever, emotionally and physically. But mentioning that topic wasn't wise, so he stuck with just congratulating his older cousin.

"What else do you want us to do?" Percy asked Steve and Bruce, trying to move the attention off of him.

"Well...I guess just do a couple more small things with your powers and then we can be done. I think you've proved your point of not being newbies," he answered.

Percy and Jason smiled at each other once, then nodded at the Captain.

Ω ♆ Ω

"Okay, Frank, let's see what you got! Any special skills besides turning into animals?" Clint asked.

Frank shifted from foot to foot, "Well, I'm pretty good at archery, I guess. Better than my swordsmanship, anyways."

Clint smirked, "You guess? If you're going to be on this team, you need to be completely sure of your skills. So let's see what you can do."

Frank had grabbed his bow and magical quiver during lunch because he figured he would need it for something during this exercise, so he only had to sling the bow over his shoulder to be ready. The quiver was designed by Leo to never run out of celestial bronze and imperial gold arrows. The celestial bronze ones were normal, and the imperial gold were exploding. A combination of both metals would shoot out hardening foam (also designed by Leo) to stop monsters. Or in this case, people.

He set himself up on the first line on the archery range, and let the arrow fly. It hit the bullseye dead-on. Frank turned to look at Clint to find him raising his eyebrows in appreciation.

"Good. But I'm not impressed until I see you do that from a longer distance and on the move, so let's work our way up there, huh? I'm interested in seeing if we can finally have another good archer on this team," Clint said.

Frank smiled, "I've been doing this practically my whole life, so I'd hope I was pretty good by now. Plus, I've been in battle before, shooting on the move."

There was the newfound confidence that still baffled a certain son of Poseidon after a whole year. You go into the deepest parts of Hades with a shy Canadian Baby Man, and then miraculously you make it out and the kid is taller, buffer, and much more confident.

"Sounds interesting... Any war stories you care to share with the class?" Clint asked, intrigued.

Frank's happy expression steeled over, "I think I'd rather keep those to myself, thank you. Maybe another time."

Clint nodded, but you could see he wasn't going to let that go. Frank had made a mistake saying he had seen battle before. It was pretty obvious that the teens had, but he had just confirmed it, therefore furthering the Avengers' curiosity.

So, basically, he had screwed them over further and faster.

With a great sigh, Frank went aimed and shot another arrow, choosing to ignore the awkwardness that had formed between the two archers.

Ω ♆ Ω

Leo and Hazel were... unsure how to react to Tony's exercise, to say the least. They got over to their part of the room and their eyes immediately tunneled-in on the giant block of metal in the center. Nothing special about it besides the fact that it was black, and about four feet tall, and four feet wide. They weren't sure what to make of it.

Tony was beaming next to them, which was a sure sign of nothing good. It was pretty maniacal, too.

"Mr. Stark... what exactly are we doing with this?" Hazel asked.

Somehow, Stark's grin managed to widen even more before he answered with, "Oh, you know, a simple thing, really. I want to see something unique from both of you, so I brought this out of storage. I designed it years ago, not knowing what the hell I would be using it for, but it turns out my genius brain was just preparing me for this moment where I would evidently be training a bunch of teenagers... but anyway! This will mold to any specifications that I need it to, kinda like the LMDs. Just tell me what you're planning to do, and I'll program it to follow your needs."

Hazel raised her eyebrows at Tony's complete disregard for modesty. The others were not kidding when they said he was an arrogant mortal. She was even considering going all "I am your superior because of my divine blood" on him, but then she remembered that that would make her a huge hypocrite.

Leo, on the other hand, was starstruck. He was convinced that he could never come up with even half the stuff Tony invented. He was a true genius in every right. A role model of many Hephestus kids.

"So... who's going first?" Tony asked.

"I'll go!" Leo exclaimed, like an eager child vying for their father's attention.

"Great! That's the spirit! What're you gonna do?"

Leo thought about it, and then the perfect idea came to mind. It wasn't really using his usual extravagant and fiery powers, but it wasn't any less impressive. He wanted to impress Mr. Stark, and this was the way to do it.

"Make it the hardest safe to crack in the world," he answered, a, well, fire lighting up his eyes.

Tony was intrigued, that's for sure. It was pretty obvious what the kid was planning on attempting, but it would be just that: an attempt. Nobody could crack this safe. It was designed by himself personally to house some of his most secret projects for the Avengers. He was literally the only one in the world that even knew of its existence. There was no way Leo could pull off cracking that type of safe without years of preparation.

But, he still programmed the block to make itself into the safe. If anything, it would show these teens how not to underestimate Tony Stark.

"Okay, kid. Good luck," he said, and then whispered, "You're gonna need it."

Leo didn't comment on Tony's quieter remark, but he did smile wider at the prospect of a real challenge. Sure, he could come off as a little overconfident sometimes, but he really was smart and powerful when he tried. He just wasn't a serious child of Athena, he was a fun son of Hephaestus, and he would act as such.

Still, when the block turned into something he had never seen before, he took a deep breath, focused his mind on the task at hand, and got to work.

Tony was smiling wide over his shoulder, interested in seeing how far the kid could get, but little did he know, Leo had this under control. To someone who didn't know him, what he was doing would seem weird, but he was actually just listening to the machine. Yes, listening to it.

He had his ear pressed up against the safe, both hands pressed flat against it next to his head. Leo was already learning the mechanisms of it, and in no time, he would be able to tell the safe to open itself without even lifting a finger.

He was almost vibrating with excitement over how Tony would react. It was sure to be a show.

Sure enough, a little less than a minute later, there was a series of soft clicking heard before the light on the pad flashed green and the door was open.

Of course, it was empty, but Tony was still in shock. A sixteen year old kid had beaten his strongest security system besides JARVIS. It wasn't possible. There was no way that Leo had just cracked his safe.

"No. Not possible," he insisted, turning with wide eyes to stare at the demigod, who had a proud grin on his face.

"Yep, it is. I just did it. Were you not watching?" Leo said, channeling his inner-Percy for sass.

Tony so wanted to protest more, but he knew it was futile. Plus, having someone almost as smart as him around might be some fun. Bruce was always worrying whenever they worked together, and Leo gave off way different vibes.

"I was watching, still working on believing, though," Tony said, "That was some pretty cool shit there, kid. Care to tell me what it was?"

Leo said, "I just talked to the safe. It was a little harder to crack than some of the other ones I've done before, but I got through to it eventually. It was pretty strong. Good work on that design."

"Thank you... I guess," Tony said.

Tony couldn't remember telling Leo who had created the safe, but he figured he would get the same answer as before if he asked. Believing these kids' powers was a little difficult, especially when all of them defied the laws of any science. Tony was starting to think that they were Asgardians, with how they fought and everything.

"Well, let's move onto Hazel. We don't have all day," he said, turning to the daughter of Pluto, who had stayed to the side during Leo's entire turn, "What are you gonna do? It's gonna be pretty hard to follow up on that performance."

Hazel had had time to figure it out while she was waiting, so she answered right away, "I won't be needing the box for my turn. I just need you."

Tony gave her an incredulous look, "What do you need me for?"

"Just tell me a metal. Any metal in the world, and I'll bring it here," she answered.

Okay, Tony was done. There was NO WAY that was possible, and he knew it. He wasn't stupid. These kids were messing with him now.

"Seriously?! I'm not falling for that! You can't do that!" he exclaimed.

Hazel just gave him a knowing smile, "I get that a lot. But I always seem to prove those people wrong..."

Tony sighed, "Okay, sure. Let's do... Vibranium."

He kept a straight face on the outside, but on the inside he was smiling like a maniac. Vibranium could only be found in Wakanda, and they barely had any left. There was no way she could get it all the way here, even if there was any left.

Hazel nodded and closed her eyes, letting her powers search for the precious metal. She had heard of it before from some people in the Underworld. Apparently, it could only be found in a small country in Africa, so she had to widen her search.

It didn't take long to find some, but that was only because what she found was Steve's shield. She hadn't known that it was made of vibranium, and stored that knowledge away for future use. Then, she kept looking.

Soon, she found some and told a very small piece to come to her. You couldn't ask her how it reached all the way up through the tower, but she always just concluded that it was magic. It's the simplest solution.

When she opened her eyes, a content smile on her face, she looked up at Tony with expectation of a shocked outburst, only to find him looking expectantly at her. So he hadn't figured out what she had done yet, apparently.

"Look down," she instructed.

And Tony did. Only to find that a small rock of Vibranium was poking up from the floor. At first, he wasn't sure how to react, but then, he reached down to touch it, trying to make sure what he was seeing was actually true. But before he could put one finger on it, Hazel shoved him away.

"Don't pick it up! It's cursed, you idiot!" she yelled, but then her own face slacked in shock.

She hadn't meant to say that last part. It was the truth, but her powers could definitely be linked back to the gods. She was not going to be the one to let the secret slip. That was going to be Percy or Leo, if anyone.

"That's amazing," Tony breathed, openly staring in shock at the metal.

But before another second had passed, the rock popped back through the floor and was gone as quickly as it had come.

When Tony looked up at Hazel in question, all he got was a shrug in response. It wasn't safe to keep the metals lying around.

Tony physically shook the shock out of him, and said, "Alright. That was pretty impressive, I'll admit, both of you. We can be done for the day. I'm gonna go check out what some of the others are doing."

"Yeah, I'll do that too," Hazel said, turning to Leo. "What about you? What are you gonna do?"

"I think I'll try to help JARVIS find the bad guys," he responded. "I'm getting nervous just waiting for them to blow something else up."

While Tony was walking away, he yelled to Leo, "Don't break anything! Everything here costs more than everything you own!"

Leo wasn't so sure about that, considering the amount of celestial bronze he owned, but he didn't comment on it.

Ω ♆ Ω

Annabeth and Piper were hard to find an exercise for. Neither of them had very obvious superpowers (one didn't have one at all), in Natasha's opinion. She wanted to see how much the others would have to protect them if it came down to a fight of powers. Sure, she didn't have any abilities, but she had also been training how to make up for that almost her whole life.

So, if anyone could find a weakness in these two girls, it would be her, and Natasha was determined to find it.

"Okay girls, this shouldn't take too long. You're only throwing knives at moving targets. The trick is, you won't know when the targets will pop up. You'll be standing in the middle and holographic targets will form around you at random times, always speeding up. If you're as good as you say you are, you can handle this no problem," Natasha said, eyes piercing into Piper and Annabeth.

"Yeah, we got this," Annabeth shot back, standing proud. "I'll go first."

Natasha was not making it unknown that she didn't trust the demigods, and Annabeth was not going to let that continue. Only the "kids" knew what was really going on, so the adults needed to get in line with their way of doing things before somebody got killed. These people that they were hunting had already killed many people, so they knew they were capable of it. This makeshift group needed to be a well-oiled machine by the time they found the bad guys.

"Okay, just step into that square on the ground, and it'll begin. Piper and I will be stepping out of the range," Natasha said, grabbing Piper's arm and dragging her back about seven yards, "Let's begin!"

It seemingly came out of nowhere, the target. Annabeth had barely been able to grab some of the knives from the table next to her before it formed. It was an orange color, and very pixelated. As soon as she shot the arrow right through the bullseye, it exploded in a shower of orange pixels. She barely had time to let that sink in before another one popped up. They seemed to be stopping the knives, but as soon as they deformed, the weapons just dropped to the ground.

It was rapidly speeding up, but it was nothing to being overrun with monsters trying to kill you. Soon enough, the targets started moving, so she had to adjust her stance to hit them where they would be, not where they were.

It was exhilarating. She hadn't had this much of an adrenaline rush in a year!

Her five minutes of throwing seemed to end all-too-quickly. Soon, the targets stopped popping up, and Natasha was walking towards her with an almost-impressed look on her face.

"Not bad, Chase," she conceded.

"Thanks," Annabeth responded, going and helping Piper pick up the knives lying around their area.

When she got to her, her friend looked up, "That was pretty good, Annabeth. I don't know how I'm supposed to follow that, though."

Annabeth rolled her eyes, "Oh, shut up. I could've done better. And you'll do great, Pipes. I trained you, right?"

She had a light twinkle in her eyes that always came when she was joking around (and that wasn't often). Piper had been trying her very best to see it out as much as possible after Tartarus. Percy and Annabeth put on a strong front, but the Seven could all see they were still recovering, and probably would always be. Nobody just jumped right back into things after something as traumatic as that trip through Hell.

But Piper didn't let it be known how proud she was of Annabeth for making a joke; that would only stop the fun right in its tracks.

"Thanks," Piper said, picking up the last knife before replacing Annabeth in her previous spot in the square.

In her opinion, she wasn't doing as good as Annabeth, or making it look as easy, but it wasn't too difficult. She had been practicing all the time on her fighting skills, and she especially focused on daggers. Knives were balanced a bit differently, but it was the same concept. She just had to compensate for the loss of weight.

Soon enough, Piper found the flow and could slightly anticipate when the next target would pop up.

Annabeth knew Piper would be fine doing this exercise. Sure, it got the blood flowing, but it wasn't the hardest thing they had done. They had fought in actual wars.

Before Piper had known what happened, the targets stopped showing up, and the five minutes were up. She was breathing a little heavily, but a giant grin was taking up her face.

"Not bad, either," Natasha complemented, "You will probably be able to take care of yourselves in a fight."

"Probably?" Annabeth glared.

Natasha returned the glare, "Probably."

Annabeth wanted to say more, but a shout from Leo, who had just sprinted back into the room, interrupted her.

"Guys! Guys! We got a hit!" he screamed, eyes wild with excitement.

Ω ♆ Ω

Everyone but Hazel and Tony stared at Leo in confusion and concern. They didn't know that he had gone to work with JARVIS on tracking the bombers.

Tony ran up to Leo, "What? Where?"

"In Las Vegas," Leo answered.

The rest of the heroes had all formed a group around Leo. Percy and Annabeth had naturally gravitated next to each other. At Leo's answer, they clasped hands and shared a look. They knew why Las Vegas was chosen: The Lotus Hotel and Casino. Flashbacks to zebras and old games flashed through their minds.

"What would they want in Las Vegas?" Steve asked.

"Who cares?! We're going to Vegas baby!" Tony exclaimed, pumping his fist. "JARVIS? Prepare the jet."

Tony was the only one who hadn't noticed the oldest demigods' reaction towards

Las Vegas. He didn't realize how bad this could really be. The demigods didn't have the time to make sure the Avengers didn't get stuck in the casino, if that's where they were going (which it probably was).

"Um, care to share what's bothering you two?" Steve asked Percy and Annabeth.

"We've been to Vegas before. If we're going where we think we might be going, this could be bad. You need to listen to us exactly, okay? It's important," Percy answered.

Tony gave him a confused look. "What are you talking about, kid? We'll be fine. I don't need a teeanger telling me how to do what I'm best at."

Annabeth glared at the billionaire, "And what is that; what you're good at? Because I thought it was being lazy and never taking anything seriously."

"Annabeth, just let it go. We'll just have to watch him closer." Percy said, resting a hand on his girlfriend's shoulder.

With one last glare at Tony, and a warning look to the other Avengers, Annabeth stormed out of the training room, heading back up to her room to prepare without another word. Mortals were so stubborn, she thought, especially when you're trying to protect them. It's literally their birthright to protect mortals, and they never let them!

Storming into her room, Annabeth grabbed a duffle bag and started stuffing supplies into it: weapons, spare clothes, ambrosia and nectar, armor, and a couple other things. She was so distracted by her anger that she didn't see the shadows fluctuating in the corner, or the black snout poking out.

She didn't see it until it was too late.

Ω ♆ Ω

"Are you going to tell us what that was all about back there?" Jason asked Percy as the rest of the demigods were walking back to their rooms.

Percy sighed, exhausted with the day but knowing it was not even close to being over, "Las Vegas is where Annabeth, Grover and I went during our first quest together. We got stuck in the Lotus Hotel and Casino. It's the home of the Lotus-eaters. They trap you in there and you don't feel time passing. We were in there for a week without realizing it. It's dangerous, man."

Piper and Jason shared a worried look, and Piper said, "So... we need to keep a close eye on the mortals on this mission, right?"

"A very close eye," Percy nodded.

When Percy reached Annabeth's door, he decided to go check on her. "Go get your stuff. Let's meet in the living room."

"Okay, Aquaman," Leo said, dashing into his soot-stained room.

Percy wasn't sure what he was expecting to find, maybe Annabeth crying, screaming, or angrily throwing things into a bag (that's the most likely), but he was NOT prepared for nothing. Literally nothing; the room was empty. There was an open duffle on the bed, along with a couple of weapons lying around it, but no Annabeth.

He wasn't getting worried yet, though. She could just be in the bathroom. That was a viable option. He would not allow himself to freak out yet. At least not until he checked the bathroom...

... And the bathroom was empty! Now he allowed himself to freak out. He started storming around the room, tossing things around looking for a clue as to where she went, anything!

"Annabeth! Wise girl!" he called, though he knew it was fruitless.

In their lives, nothing was ever as easy as simply calling for someone and they came back. Annabeth was missing, and he had no idea how to find her.

Unless someone was stupid enough to leave a trail of shadows, that is. Looking in the corner, Percy saw that the shadows in the right corner were moving around unnaturally, a lot like what happened after they were used for shadow travel. He had spent enough time around Nico to understand what it looked like.

So this meant that someone with access to shadow traveling took her, and that wasn't a long list. It was probably a hellhound that took her! Oh, were they going to pay.

Percy could feel his powers slipping, and the walls were giving scary creaks. No matter how much he wanted to just explode, he knew that he had to take a deep breath and focus on recentering himself. He would be no help to Annabeth if he wasn't in control. Some part of his brain was telling him that maybe letting off a little steam WOULD help get his powers under control, but no, he promised Annabeth. And Percy refused to break that promise if he could.

"JARVIS!" he yelled, already rushing out the door, "Call everyone to the living room! Now!"

"Right away, sir," JARVIS responded.

Percy ended up just running to the living room, not wasting any time being careful. Annabeth was missing, and he needed to find her and get her back NOW.

His emotions were running high, so he could sense all the water and liquids around him (it was a lot), and it was becoming distracting.

When he got there, only Steve, Clint, and Natasha were waiting so far. Though Hazel and Frank walked in right after him, probably having heard him scream before JARVIS had even called everyone.

"What's going on?" Steve asked, concern filling his eyes.

Percy paced and said, "Wait until everyone else is here. Then I'll tell you."

His mind kept flashing pictures of all his and Annabeth's enemies. Years and years of fighting monsters and wars were playing on his brain. There were so many possible people, even if it probably was the current gang that they were searching for. He didn't want to let himself believe that mortals could be so messed-up that they worked with monsters, monsters that they couldn't even begin to understand. It was so far-fetched, and yet it was his life!

As these thoughts were going through his head, the rest of the team had finally made it in. They were all sporting confused and concerned glances. Natasha seemed to have figured out that one of them was missing, and that it wasn't normal for that person and Percy to be separated. Annabeth was missing.

"Percy, man. Stop pacing and tell us what's wrong," Jason laid a hand on his friend's shoulder.

Percy's eyes got a little misty as he told them, "Annabeth is missing. Taken. She's gone, and I don't know where to find her."

Hazel gasped.

Nothing was right with this. Percy without Annabeth was wrong. So wrong. They needed to be reunited soon, and quickly.

Percy started pacing again, absentmindedly twirling Riptide around his fingers. He had decided that it was best to start in Las Vegas and go from there. There was a good chance that it was the gang who had taken her, and that they were holding her there. It was his only idea.

The others had just been sharing worried looks and a few whispered thoughts before Tony suddenly jumped up, holding his phone like it might explode.

"Guys, I think I know who has her..." he said, making a few hand gestures before his phone screen was projected in front of them.

It was a picture. Of Annabeth.

She was hanging from celestial bronze chains, with a leather gag in her mouth, and shackles on her ankles. Her hair was a matted mess, and she was unconscious. Even so, Percy could see that she had a black eye, probably from struggling. She wouldn't go without a fight, that's for sure. But still, this was not the Annabeth they knew. The Annabeth they knew was a strong force to be reckoned with. This...person was not her.

Percy let out an almost animalistic growl at the sight. They were going to pay, whoever had taken her. All of them.

"It has a note," Tony said, throwing up another picture.

It said:

We are The Truth Seekers. We have your blonde bitch, and she will be dead in the next 24 hours unless you reveal yourselves. The world deserves to know! It is our right to know the monstrosities that go unseen, right beneath our noses! 24 hours, or she's dead. We're at the Lotus Hotel and Casino, another one of the hidden monstrosities in our world. Tell the truth!

Percy was going to kill them. He didn't care if they were mortals, they were going to die. They hurt Annabeth, he hurts back. Worse.

"We need to suit-up, and then we can get going and rescue her. But first, we need a plan," Steve started to speak, but before he could, the world flooded in.

Screw control, Percy thought.

He let the pipes and burst and break the windows. Standing on the very edge of the empty window seal, he let out the loudest taxi whistle the Avengers had ever heard. Waiting only a second for a black blur to show up on the horizon, Percy jumped.

Ω ♆ Ω

other chapters :)

#pjo #the avengers #mcu #avengers #percy jackson and the olympians #heroes of olympus #crossover #fanfiction #fanfic #wattpad #webnovel #inkitt #this is a big fluffy piece don't judge

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seasonsgredence · 4 years

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Colin Farrell on life and parenting in a time of COVID

How much has fatherhood changed you?

It changed me. I mean it changes me every day. I don’t know what I am doing most of the time, slash all of the time. But I adore my boys, I love them very much. And I just hope I am not f****** them up too much to be honest with you.

I think if all of us can be a little, can f*** our children up a little less than maybe we were f***** up by our parents, if that can be the bar for success, when then eventually we will continue to move in the right direction, the direction of healing and the ability to self-govern with kindness and decency and consideration.

But yeah, my kids are masters. With the love I have for them and the concerns that I have for them and the hopes that I am treating them decently, they bring up a lot of stuff, a lot of fear and a lot of self-judgment, because it’s by far the most important thing of course that I have in my life.

This whole acting and stuff and movies, don’t get me wrong, I get meaning. I am one of the fortunate people on this earth who gets a certain amount of meaning from my work and self-indulgently I get off on what I do sometimes and even when I am uncomfortable in it, it has meaning for me.

But being a dad to those two boys is by a long shot the most difficult and the most rewarding and the most meaningful and the most consequential thing that I will ever do. And time is going fast. It’s moving quickly. I don’t know about you, do you find yourself going back into old photos and videos through your phone at this time? Do you find yourself being nostalgic, I would imagine a lot of us are. Yeah, I have done that a lot in my bed, like three o’clock last night and this morning in bed I was looking over videos of both of my boys when they were four and eight and now they are ten and sixteen and it’s just all going so quickly.

So as I said, in the vacuum that I have been fortunate enough to live in — which is the vacuum that involves a home, a fridge and freezer full of food, and a few dollars in the bank and everyone in my life that is very close to me healthy — I have found this an incredibly rewarding time because it has allowed me and family to spend time together that we wouldn’t have had if I was still in London shooting “Batman.”

Having said that, of course I would give that up readily, the time I have had, that gift, I would give it up for all the lives that had been lost to be back on the planet and for people not to have experienced the degree of pain. But we have been dealing with what we have been dealt. And it’s an incredibly difficult time and an incredibly complicated time with struggle and pain and loss, but I would hope those of us who can really just move forward with a greater degree of patience and a greater degree of consideration for each other.

What do you most about normal life these days?

One thing I noticed in the first, because I came back from London, I was doing something there, and I came back and went straight into two weeks here. And I was two weeks alone in this house. I don’t have a partner, my two children were with their moms. And so I was alone here for two weeks.

And I just remember after about nine or 10 days, feeling the absence of touch in my life. And that was the most significant moment I had in relation to the awareness of something that was lacking that I was very used to having, just touch.

And I literally mean handshake with the barista in the coffee shop down the road, a hug with a friend, a high five, knuckle bump, whatever it may be, I had had, and it’s only 10 days. But because of the degree of enforcement or the degree of imposition, like this has been imposed upon everyone and none of us have had a choice, solitude is not as chosen for those who are living in solitude now as it may be. It’s something that is an affliction.

So because of that, my point being, I have probably gone a week before in my life without touching anyone, perhaps, maybe not, but because of what was happening in the world and because of my awareness of why I was living without touch. It became something very extreme and something that I felt that I was really missing and really lacking. And just, what does touch represent? It just represents tenderness, it represents human interaction and it represents a sense of community.

And so that was the thing that I missed and I just realized how grateful I am and I would like to hold onto it as much as I can and how grateful I am to be able to go down to the shop and get a coffee. And the idea of going to a cinema, and I know there are bigger things at play with the world, but the idea of actually going to a movie theater, standing in line at the concessions and getting popcorn and a soft drink with my kids or a friend or on my own — It’s like another world that I can’t even, just the idea of it, there are so many simple banal things that we get to experience in our lives every day that we don’t, as often happens, the lack of having them exposes the magic or the worth that they provide us.

But touch definitely is something that I miss; being able to shake a hand or give a friend a hug, just that. And that is why I imagine, I have friends who are older than me that have mothers and fathers who are way up in years who haven’t been able to see their mothers or fathers and haven’t been able to touch them and have waved through windows and that’s been heartbreaking to see. And we’ve seen those images all over the internet and it’s been a very tricky time for so many.

What did you learn about yourself during this period of reflection?

Yeah, that I can be, I don’t think I learned this, I think I probably knew this, but I can be grumpy blech, but I probably maybe possibly, one hundred percent, identify my worth with external things in my life more than I would like to.

I find that because the routine or the work that I had done or was doing, all that has been taken from my life, has allowed me to identify how much I see my worth with acting or with doing, with being active. And now, you see it online. Everyone is trying to figure out what to do. Somebody is learning a new language. Somebody is picking up an instrument. Some people are doing this, that or the other. Some people can’t get out of bed. Some people are eating too much. Some people are exercising loads.

I find myself having to lean into just my thoughts, my imaginations, my fears again, hopes, all these things that I have used life to distract myself at times, not all the time. But the busyness of life that I have used at time, understandably as we all do, to distract myself from other kind of internal agitations, those internal agitations have had a chance to come rearing to the fore.

And yeah, like many people, if I am not doing, doing, doing, I find it hard to sit in the consideration that my life has worth. And of course it does and I believe everyone’s life, just by virtue of having breath in the body, everyone’s life has worth, human life has worth, animal life has worth, planet life has worth, life has worth.

But sometimes with this kind of at times toxic awareness that we have, toxic consciousness that at times we have, that is so kind of imbued with an ability to judge the self harshly, sometimes we do and sometimes I lean into the “external forces” as markers for my own self-worth.

And these are things that can be taken away from you anytime, so my worth is reliant on those things. My worth is reliant on delusion or those which can be removed from my existence at any moment. So by not getting work again and say that it all goes away tomorrow, then I am going to be like shit, I have no worth, and that’s not, I don’t even believe that and a relationship with myself feels like that might be true.

Can you talk about how it felt getting into the Penguin costume in “The Batman” movie?

It’s all exciting. To be a part of that universe and just there are certain words that are part of my internal lexicon: Gotham City, Penguin, Joker, Batman, Bruce Wayne, Harvey Dent, all these things.

Tim Burton’s Batman was kind of my, no, I watched the Adam West TV show growing up actually as well. So Batman as a kid, yes very much, not in comic book form but the TV show I watched ardently when I was a child. And then in my teens I saw Burton’s version and loved it.

And then obviously I was a huge fan of what Chris Nolan did with that world and how he brought it back to life and gave it an immediacy and a contemporary significance. So just to be part of, again that folklore, that mythology, is again really cool.

I had only started it and I can’t wait to get back. The creation of it, the aesthetic of the character, has been fun and I really am so excited to get back and explore it. And I haven’t got that much to do. I have a certain amount in the film. I am not all over it by any means. But there are a couple of some tasty scenes I have in it and my creation and I can’t wait to get back. Yeah, I totally feel like it is something that I have not had the opportunity to explore before. It feels original and fun. But I am only at the start of the journey so I can’t wait to get back and really get into it.

[x]

#colin farrell

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ravenforce · 5 years

Text

Begin Again Pt. 1

Pairing: Natasha Romanoff x OC!Daughter x Surprise!Character

Word Count: 1827

Warning/s: Nothing? Except this will be a multi-chapter because this part is long AF, as per usual. LOL.

A/N: Hey loves, I’m sorry for being MIA for a long time. I bled my heart and soul in this fic, and I guess I’m not really ready to end this journey. This fic is an alternative ending to See You in A minute, meaning Stardust didn’t happen. I hope you’ll like it. If you haven’t read the whole installation, I’ll put the links below. xx

Series: See You In A Minute | I’ll Never Love Again | Stardust

Alt. Ending: Begin Again Pt. 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

It’s quiet hilarious to see a room full of super powered being clamouring to have little Asya on their arms, cooing soft words of love and affirmation to the little miracle that is your daughter but it’s also reassuring. Seeing the Avengers, literally assembled for your daughter’s birth grounds Natasha in a way that she hasn’t felt in a long time since you passed. Seeing her family around your daughter gives her the strength and confidence that she can, indeed, do this because she’s not alone, not really.

***

Raising Asya as a single mother was overwhelming for Natasha. She wasn’t ready, not really. She thinks its infinitely better if you were there waking up at the middle of the night to a wailing child after putting her down only half an hour ago.

There were so many days where she imagines you in Tony’s place, offering to take over Asya so she can catch more than a few minutes of sleep. There were so many days where she wishes it’s you that’s making your daughter laugh instead of Thor. There were so many nights after she put Asya down to sleep where she breaks down and cries because she misses you.

She misses your light, your warmth, your arms around her, your steadfast belief in her ability to be good and your constant reassurance that she’s enough. She misses your undying support that even though she can do everything she puts her mind into, she doesn’t have to because she has you. You stood by her, you fought alongside her, you loved her, you carried half of her burden and God does she wish to have you back in her arms if only the world’s a wish-granting machine.

But Natasha knew a long time ago that the world is cruel. So she allowed herself to break down at nights but come morning, Natasha resolves to be the best version of herself to be the mother Asya deserves.

***

Three

Toddlers are a handful, except Asya’s not like any other kid who yells and wails and pulls a tantrum to get what they want. No, Asya is very diplomatic. Ever since she learned her words, Asya has been a very good communicator since.

How she’s talking way too straight for a three years old was beyond all of them. Except for Tony and the pediatrician and child psychologist Bruce brought in, with Natasha’s approval of course, believe that Asya may be speaking straighter than most kids her age because of the stimulus around her. Asya lives with three adults and an eleven-year-old, no one talks to her like she’s a baby. So she doesn’t talk like one either.

At three, Asya and Natasha have developed a very close bond. Even though they live and share common spaces with the Starks, she’s closest to her mother. She loves following Nat around, and Nat doesn’t complain about it. She’s a brilliant, radiant child and Nat loves being with her because Asya, amidst not meeting you, carries on so much of you in her; not just your eyes, and it makes Nat feel like she has her best friend back.

***

Nat and Asya have established a fairly good routine by now. Every morning, Nat takes her on her morning hike around the property where they sweat and soak up some sun. Asya loves hiking with Nat, where halfway she asked her mother to give her a piggyback ride. Nat doesn’t complain, Asya practically weights anything. Asya also uses this time to ask Nat questions about anything and everything under the sun. Sometimes she makes Nat tell her stories about you and Nat talks her head off until they get back to the house.

After hiking, they would shower and then have some breakfast, mostly with the Starks. Nat's lucky that Asya’s not a picky eater. Breakfast is always a joy, the Starks loves Asya especially Morgan who treats her like a baby sister. Sometimes, Peter would swing by to catch up with Iron Dad, and his adoptive siblings.

***

After breakfast, everyone breaks off to do their stuff. Nat goes to S.H.I.E.L.D three times a week to help Deputy Director Hill on things. It has been a careful deliberation and discussion with her family before everyone agreed that not being coop up in the house is good for Nat. Tony only agreed after Nat promises that she'll do solely HQ work, no mission of any kind whatsoever.

Nat brings Asya along with her. At first, Nat was hesitant but Asya knows how to behave especially when she’s in public. She stays at her mother’s side or Auntie Maria when Nat has to step away for a minute.

After Asya’s first visit, S.H.I.E.L.D gave her an official ID that allows her to enter the premises. On her second visit, Maria gave her a tailored S.H.I.E.L.D uniform with ‘Romanova-Y/L/N' embroidered on it, which she insisted on wearing every time they go to work. Asya strutting around the HQ in her uniform gave her power over all agents on duty, Director Fury included. Nat rolls her eyes lovingly every time Asya bats her long eyelashes to get everyone to scram and procure whatever she wants.

“She is truly both yours and Y/N's daughter,” Maria commented after sitting next to Nat on the command center and watching Asya interact with the other agents.

“I’m scared that she’s this good at three,” Nat said chuckling.

***

Maria never asks Nat to stay in the HQ all day, and in the event does she does, Maria always takes them to dinner. Nat and Maria maintained a very professional relationship between them in the past but without you and before Asya, Nat became more reclusive which worried her family. So Maria took a chance at friendship the moment she heard about Asya. Nat was surprised when Maria herself, without Nick, came down with flowers to congratulate her. They’ve become really good friends since then.

If Nat's dismissed from HQ early, Nat always brings Asya to Stardust Diner – your favorite - either before or after they go to a museums, library and/or the aquarium. Asya’s sense of wonder came from you, which only makes Nat fall in love with your little miracle more.

***

At night, a part of their nightly rituals is either Nat reading one of your books or showing her the scrapbook the team made to Asya. It’s a collection of photos with you that they’re able to unearth on their camera rolls. Most of them are hilarious, especially those photos of you goofing around with the boys. Some of them are downright sweet, like the photo of you and Wanda cuddling one movie night or the photo of you on Thor's back when you sprained your ankle after a recon mission. Looking at the photos always reminds Nat that she’s not grieving alone, the whole team, the whole family lost you too.

Sometimes it’ll be overwhelming for Nat, and Asya - bless her attentiveness and empathy - would close the scrapbook herself and cuddle her mother. On nights like this, Asya always ends up sleeping over in Nat’s room.

“It’s okay mama, I miss mom too,” Asya would murmur half asleep as she lay on Nat’s chest.

Even though it still hurts, Asya’s presence never fails to soothe her aching heart and soul. With Asya secure in her arms, Nat still sleeps with some semblance of peace.

***

Five

Life will keep moving forward whether you get on it or not but life was put on hold one morning after everyone received Thor’s request for an emergency meeting at HQ. The tension in the room is so thick, one can cut it with a plastic spoon. Tony’s pacing the room, Carol’s bouncing her leg on her seat, even Bucky’s tapping his fingers on the table.

“Relax. I’m sure it’s nothing,” Nat tried to assure the team.

“I don’t know how to relax. The last time we were all in the same room the world was ending,” Tony whispered through gritted teeth. Pepper put a hand on his shoulder and he instantly stopped moving and sighed.

“Maybe I should go check on Thor?” Carol asked as she rises from her chair, unable to sit still any longer. She’s nervous too, Tony’s right the last time they were all gathered together they lost you and Vision.

Just as Carol changed into her Captain Marvel uniform, an alarm sounded in the room; signaling Thor’s spaceship landing in the compound. Their collective hearts hammered as strong as the engines of the spacecraft.

“Finally,” Scott sighed.

***

It took a couple of more minutes before the engines died down. By the time, its entrance opened the whole team has gathered at its mouth. Director Fury and Deputy Director Hill are standing a little further, watching the whole scene.

“What’s happening Nick?” Maria asked.

Nick just shook his head. “Wait for it,” he said.

Rocket was the first to board off, he is still salty as per usual. Everyone gave him high fives. When he got to Nat and Asya, he smiled. Asya ruffled his head, everyone’s shock Rocket didn’t make a fuss.

“You’re in for a surprise, kid,” he said as he handed Asya a space rock. Asya and Morgan's growing a collection, most of them are from Carol. Asya thanked his furry little uncle before turning her attention to the rock.

Before Nat could say anything, Loki and Thor walked out of ship together. Nat tried to read the Asgardians but they’re not giving themselves away. The moment Thor set foot on dirt, there’s a cacophony of greetings and questions.

“Woah! Woah! Take a breathe people, there is no threat,” Thor said.

“If there’s no threat then why haul everyone here? Even T'Challa left Wakanda for this,” Sam said a little frustrated.

Before Thor can say anything else, everyone turned at the sound of another footstep inside the ship. When the person whose said footsteps belong to emerged, every single one of them lost their breath and their tether to earth and sanity.

***

Stepping off the spaceship was none other than you.

Taglist: @natthisback @5aftermidnight

#raven writes #avengers imagine #marvel imagine #mcu imagine #natasha romanoff imagine #black widow imagine #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanov x reader #natasha romanova x reader #black widow x reader #natasha romanoff x you #natasha romanov x you #natasha romanova x you #black widow x you #natasha romanoff x oc #natasha romanoff x oc!daughter #natasha romanoff x daughter

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wetookanoath · 5 years

Text

Supernatural Season 6 | The Haunting of Loey Lane.

Shane and his Shaggy cosplay are everything I need to know to be asured this episode will be iconic. And look a thim go. I love him.

I am way too distracted by Ryan’s buttons being open, I’m sorry, I cannot fuction now.

“Oh, no voice this time?” Okay, but Shane’s smile is... fjnfiwsmdikr. Why is this man like this? Anyway... Ryan’s laugh and the way he just, turns on Host Mood again, holy shit.

The way Ryan is narrating this episode is even more precious when you look at the credits and see that he himself wrote this episode. “From guru to booru”, I fucking hate you, Shane. Ryan’s face, tho. That look between done and fond, same.

“I was very respectful”, honey you were high in medicine, shut up.

Weekend At Ghoul HQ, starring Ryan Bergara and real size doll Shane. “I believe you believe” it’s the creepiest shit, stop that.

Growing up in a haunted farmhouse? Same. Oh gosh, jokes aside, I’m gonna say this right now... I’m not going to discuss in public whatever I believe in what may happen in this episode or not. I’ve been realizing slowly that I don’t feel comfortable talking about these things online because believing has a lot to do with faith to me, and faith is part of my life in a way that is too important to me. That said, watch me make fun of my own faith all the time and discuss whatever else you guys wanna talk about with me regarding the show, the boys, etc.

Loey saying she has never been scared of ghosts it’s exactly how I feel about the paranormal and the supernatural in general. I mean, I don’t claim having any kinds of powers or touch, or what have you. But god, I would be so happy and enchanted by seeing a supernatural being right in front of me. And whatever may scare me sometime, it’s always human doing, it’s always natural, tangible, there. And even then, I do like being scared. So there’s that, I guess.

“Are we Bruce Willis in this situation?” how the hell did that came from what they were talking about, lmao. Another Willis mention this season, Mr. Die Hard will end up becoming part of the inside jokes in this fandom at some point.

“I love a little stirring” Shane looks so excited about doing Some Bullshit in this episode, and I saw how chaotic he was in his solo, I can’t wait to see it by myself. LMAO, this bit is both funny and kind of adorable. Also, witches AU.

“Why would you come to us uf you want us to fix it?” An excellent question I don’t understand either, to be honest. The show is not about actually hunting enthities or debunking shit, so this is... come on. I think we know what it is, lmao. But it’s fine, I like this House Call shit.

No ofense, but using a 100 hundred years old Ouija board as a decoration is like a horror movie plot where white people are white people about it. I love it.

*Rubs eyes and sighs deeply*

... What is Shane doing with his tongue? I, I, I don’t like that... Not a fan... Put that tongue back in your mouth, Shane. I don’t like this bit.

Shane calling Ryan a, like, passionate paranormal investigator and the bitch immediatelly saying he is insane is my aesthetic and also yet again, a great summary of the show.

“This is the part where you learn how truly boring it is to be a ghost hunter”, lmao. Talking about these parts, I love the colors we get from the cameras each time, I can’t wait to make the edit for this episode.

Oh man, it must be something to see these two grown ass men saying and doing stupid shit to get ghosts to listen to them and do something But also, Shane slowly walking towards Ryan to film a super close-up of his eyes, OKAY. They are so stupid.

That... that is a werid thing, Shane is right. Oh man, this is giving me flashbacks to that serial killer dude in The X Files that was obssessed with women’s hair/cleaning them up for burials.

Okay, that thing Shane just did with his mouth knocked me out for a bit. Imma head out. “That sounds demonic”, this better not be the season’s demon investigation. And oh look, what’s a supernatural season without Shane giving hints of him being a demon? It makes it funnier how he never really talks about it anywhere. Like he obviously knows aboutt he fandom’s joke, and I’m sure he keeps doing shit like this to feed it, but it all becomes even better when he just... never says shit about it. It’s always Ryan the one who answers when asked about it.

Cats do tend to get spook at everything and look up for no reason at all, every time my cats do that and one of nieces or nephew is around and asks about it, I always go “oh, he is just seeing the ghost that lives here” and then their mothers want to kill me.

Yeah, you don’t... do that. Horror movie 101. Don’t ever give permission to shit to enter. “Hey, can I come in?” “No, bitch, go away” is always the answer lol.

Guuurrrrllll...

This bitch ass thingy in her home really is there because of her. If there’s something in there, it’s not the place, it’s her. Also bitch ass demons as always listening to Shane is everything.

I.. like how Shane looks in that blue lighting. “Oh, you know what? Not bad, not bad”, why is he like this.

Ryan’s metaphores are excellent, imagine him giving talks to his future children by using weird ass metaphore and the kids just... staring at him.

“I’ll take you home with me, I don’t care” LMAO, imagine this idiot walking into his apartment, “Hey Sara? I got a demon, can we keep him?” “No” “Too late, I told him he is staying!”

“Assert my dominance” the smile? Awwww. The awkward moves of his hand, fjnvidnfir, Ryan is so fucking cute, makes me cry.

... What is Shane doing? I love how they just leave Shane’s whatever there while Ryan talks to Loey, fkjdniednfirnfgirt. Do that more often. Love that hair, also. Long hair is the best hair.

Shane literally saying he will use all the power he has gotten by defeating demons it’s such a powerful prompt. He is giving us the power to create shit, use it well, demon Shane writers and fanartists. “Alakazam! Big bang boom, hope you like hell, you loser.”, I fucking love this dork.

“What does that mean? You guys have inside jokes?” “Yeah, we bonded” JFNIERDNFIRF SHANE.

Loey is me and Shane is my brother, this is how we usually talk when one of us is saying some bullshit kfdndiofmkirg

“What’s your name? Come on, what’s your name? I know that gives away your power”, Ryan out there getting advice on demon hunting by The Conjuring 2 is the biggest mood. No, but for real-- there’s actually plenty of myths and cultures that believe the way to defeat some sort of evil is by knowing its name. It’s really interesting, the kind of power we really do give to names.

Not really a fan of this. Man, I really hope this is not the season’s demon investigation.

Ryan Steven Bergara Stop Saying You Are Annoying Or Ugly Or Whatever Negative Shit You Are Always Saying About Yourself Challenge.

This is such a “So... you come here often?” type of situation, djnfisndief, I love this. And we are back at the ‘I hate Shane’ bit again, I really stan a twelve years old. The fond voice with which Shane says “I mean, you are having fun”, awwwwwww. Cuties.

Shane looks hella cute doing his fornite dance, I hate him.

Did that shit just laugh after scaring this poor woman? JFNFIENFIERNIGF

Christ almighty, Ryan looks so fucking small at Shane’s side, what the hell? Also, this is so... damn adorable. Shane trying to teach Ryan how to do the dance, it’s hella cute. Oooohhmmmygoodddddd, I’mmmmm meltinnngggggggggg... Ryan’s little dance, djnfienf he is such a bad dancer, I love him so much.

This poor woman is having a breakdown in there and these two bitches are just being... whatever the hell they are doing, lmao. “You are suggesting a ghost farted in my face?” “Yeah” AHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Ryan suggesting the demon is asking her out for a drink and looking at Shane while doing so, jfniednfir what the fuck is that. This demon suitor just doesn’t know how to ask her out on a date, lmao.

“Our job here is done!” and Loey’s reaction, dkjnfeinfir same.

Get haunted for the aesthetic, why not? Interesting episode.

#buzzfeed unsolved #ryan bergara #shane madej #loey lane #bfu #supernatural #ss6 #loey lane ep #text #your local nerd talking.txt #mine #text*#ss6*#ss6text*#long post //#commentary #commentary*

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why-this-kolaveri-machi · 4 years

Text

we’re partners in this.

so titans 2.12 was mostly about (awkwardly) moving pieces around to get them in place for a grand finale. it was great! but also awkward. but great! let’s talk about it, if you don’t mind:

SPOILERS ahead.

1. i apologise for going off on a tangent right off the bat, but i just had this weird bit of insight about this show’s universe and it’s kind of hilarious. so you know those clickbaity articles about titans fucking up its worldbuilding by having its characters be so blase about protecting their superhero identities? (screenrant and cbr have inundated my newsfeed. oh good lord the pain. the agony.) maybe that’s just how It’s Meant To Be. batman and robin have been around for at least a decade and a half; the big bat’s likely been around for longer. the justice league is a sophisticated organisation with connections, representation and influence on worldly affairs. no doubt there has been countless battles and alien invasions--to the point where superheroes have become so ingrained in public life that their identities are semi-public knowledge but Nobody Gives A Shit. it’s like asking folks about their local legislators--people are aware that they exist and perform a Function in society and that a minimal amount of research would reveal who they are, but most aren’t keen on/interested in doing that. as a result, keeping up a secret identity isn’t the priority it used to be. and That’s Fine! the titans universe is its own beast with its own internal mechanics and as long as it’s internally consistent, let it deviate from its comic origins as much as it wants to.

oh typical emmram, i can hear you say. scrambling for explanations to excuse careless writing and plot holes. well, dear Strawman I Just Made Up, you may be partially right--there was a time when i would’ve waved my ‘the author is dead’ flag, but (i like to think) i’ve matured since then. but also: have you considered that plot holes aren’t really plot holes if you can successfully use what’s been established about a story’s universe to explain them away and that it’s significantly more fun?

with this background in mind, i can appreciate more than ever that titans plays out more like an intense, soapy family drama (with perhaps higher stakes than your average soap). this was never a show about a bunch of disparate heroes coming together and finding purpose in order to defeat a common enemy. this was always about a bunch of kids who grew up in a world where vigilantism and superheroing and magic and alien invasions are just an accepted part of life, and the deeply dysfunctional ways they keep coming together and pinballing away, over and over again. there’s no point where each of the characters have definitely Gotten Over Their Issues so they can all gather together to defeat the big bad; it’s why this late in the game we can have rachel looking for people to connect to and relate with that aren’t a series of adults who claim to protect her but only keep her in the dark; hank at the bottom of a self-destructive spiral; dick barely picking himself up from rock bottom, and kory falling apart at the seams.

so anyway, that’s it on this edition of Emmram Tries To Give A Grand Unifying Theory of Titans; let’s move on to the actual episode.

2. rose’s story could’ve been so good, you guys. actually you know what, scratch that (she types, on a computer while having 20+ years’ experience in knowing how to use the backspace key), it’s a great story that got muddled in the process of the show trying to tell a number of great stories all at once. this season has been inexorably building up to dick grayson becoming nightwing, using his unreliable narration to build up suspense as we see him battle personal hangups and the fallout from literal decades of trauma to gain a sense of equilibrium and a renewal of purpose (it can be argued that even now, on the cusp of actually putting on that dang costume, he hasn’t really learned anything--but i’ll get to that later). if this is the main story that this season is trying to tell, then taking two gigantic detours for episode-long flashbacks and building up to jericho’s death as much as they did makes perfect sense. it also makes sense to set slade up as a foil to dick, in that they are both caught up in their heads and make self-absorbed decisions to protect their ‘children’ but dick comes through with the realisation that that’s a crock of bullshit.

but that’s not the case, is it? there are so many things going on at once but they’re all orbiting around this throughline of ‘dick becoming nightwing’ and so we only get the barest glimpses of some relatively complex character motivations and development going on with the others.

2.25. in this episode’s flashback (we’re still getting flashbacks! in literally the penultimate episode of the season! god i have never wanted to take a red pen to anything more) we come to a number of weighty realisations: the extent of rose’s powers, her feelings of otherness, her desire to connect with her father so that she doesn’t feel alone in her otherness, how desperate she is to connect with him--so much so that she’s willing to throw away her entire life and undergo physical mutilation in service of his revenge plan--and how...learning exactly how her brother died and... being with jason??? made her change her mind??? ok that last one’s a bit muddled, but i’ll try and make sense of it.

as far as i can see, there are four big turning points in rose’s story so far:

a) that moment in the car when slade invites rose to join him and reveals that he’s basically been funding her ‘normal’ middle class life till that point. i can imagine how destabilising that realisation might be to rose, and why she might think going along with slade, no matter how weird and how abrupt, is how she’s going to live a life true to who she is

b) but imagine actually being taken in by the titans, being given shelter and support and succour by a group that her father had described as ruthless and manipulative. i can imagine her still being on board with slade’s plan, but maybe the reason she didn’t do all that she could’ve possibly done while at the tower to sabotage the titans might be because she’s actually interacting with these people, and while they might be a Hot Mess, they aren’t actively cruel or vindictive. i wish the show had woven in more scenes of rose interacting with the others, of her learning intimate things about their pasts, of her bonding with the younger titans’ struggle with their own ‘freakish’ natures. rose hardly seems to have any presence at all after her intro episode, and that’s a pity.

c) dick’s confession about what actually happened with slade and jericho. it’s more complicated than she was lead to believe--her father was actually complicit in her brother’s death. it’s a very confusing moment for rose, who’s already (probably) feeling the first stirrings of guilt, unsure, really, about her devotion to the father and brother that she’s known only for a little longer than the titans themselves, and slowly coming to the sick realisation that slade used her as a pawn in his game against the titans.

d) jason latching onto rose is understandable--he saw her as the only person making the effort to connect with him when he was feeling vulnerable and rejected by almost everybody else. jason practically bleeds a need for connection and acceptance. i don’t think rose anticipated that jason would come with her, or be as attached to her as he is--but she sees in him a sensitive and struggling soul baring his heart to her, and in herself the kind of deception and secrecy that she’d originally wanted to rebel against. so she finally comes clean with him, and thinks they should help the titans against her father.

i mean. i might be making some assumptions (actually i’m making a lot of assumptions, to be fair), but i’m just trying to work with what the show’s given us, which is... not insubstantial, but haphazard enough that it’s easy to forget that rose exists sometimes.

3. i fell asleep right after watching this episode for the first time, and apparently at some point before actually sleeping i appear to have had some kind of Great Insight about it because in the notes app on my phone i typed in “dick bruce concept of justice” with no further explanation.

i’ve spent the better part of this evening trying to retrace my train of thought, and i think it went like this: essentially, i was curious that dick was so broken up about jericho dying that he banished himself to a five year long lonely journey to seek penance that ended with him voluntarily getting himself arrested, but didn’t seem all that cut up about zucco dying or basically ordering the deaths of the scientists at the asylum in 1.07. betraying jericho and the older titans’ trust in him is a far greater burden on him than being responsible for the death of people who have wronged him or hurt the people he loves. but this is also a man who has internalised batman’s mission and ethos for the better part of his life, so he can’t actually come out and admit that. instead the two things come together to form one conclusion: he killed jericho, and he must be punished for it.

(i also imagine locking himself away in prison was a result of growing up under the influence of batman--who responded to trauma by embarking on rigorous, brutal, solitary journey of penance and extreme self-discipline. batman doesn’t ask for help. batman goes to the batcave and rides it out.)

so when dick finally breaks himself out of jail, it isn’t because he’s come to a great realisation about his self-destructive behaviour (although he’s aware of it on some subconscious level); it’s because he realised the thing he was punishing himself for didn’t actually happen. he hasn’t really learnt a lesson. to be fair, he would need some pretty intensive therapy to untangle the things running through his head, so it seems quite believable that this is the way he gets back on his feet in time to be nightwing.

4. i know people think that the conversation between rachel and kory was awkward, and uh, it kinda was a little bit, but it makes sense that they can talk like that to each other. rachel wants to protect dick but feels confident enough with kory to lash out at her; kory is unafraid to be vulnerable or sad around rachel which just feeds into the trust that rachel has in kory. i don’t know, i thought that conversation was a nice way to both re-establish this dynamic and give some insight into what kory’s feeling.

5. god, mercy graves--a family woman!--tenderly wiping the blood off gar’s chin after having turned him into her own personal killing machine is just... so unsettling on so many levels.

5.5. it continues to KILL me that gar had so much faith in the titans right up to the very moment he had his fucking skull opened up and his brains messed with against his will: an undeserving loyalty to a family who took his easygoing acceptance of their shitty treatment of him at face value and essentially threw him to the wolves. how do you even start recovering from this? i feel like we’ve gone past the point where a few heart-to-hearts could help.

6. man, hank spiralling the way he did was too brutal to be anything but deeply uncomfortable. i’m sure the teenager who bought hank’s suit from him was supposed to inspire hank and remind him of his place and purpose as a titan, but it came off as kind of a cruel joke. hank has been putting his body out on the firing line over and over and over again, and his lesson is to be told that he isn’t putting himself out there enough? yikes.

7. stu and lily and their collective disdain for dick grayson’s drama are my new favourite characters on the show and deserve their own damn spin-off. MAKE IT HAPPEN DC

#titans #titans spoilers #meta #rose wilson #dick grayson #koriand'r #jason todd #rachel roth #hank hall #garfield logan

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