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the-fluff-piece · 9 months

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Sanji x reader modern day AU part 2:

I just want some f**ing coffee

Part 1: I just want some f**king...wine!

Part 3: I just want some f**ing sleep and comfort

Check out my other stuff:

My Masterlist - Short and Multichapter stories

Headcanon Masterlist

The date you were on the other night was disappointing - but the food was great! For some reason though, a chef from the restaurant took an interest in you. After crashing your date, he realised you were living right next to him all this time - and vows to court you until you're his! In this chapter, Sanji will bring your hungover ass some delicious breakfast and you'll get to know him (and his lips) a little better

Saturday morning. You woke up late, two glasses of wine really did knock you out, how pathetic. In uni, you could easily have double that and not even noticed. Sleepy and with a light headache, you check your phone - no message from Thomas. So he didn't like the date, either. No surprises there. Still stung.

You peeled out of your blanked for your morning ritual: a cigarette and coffee on the balcony. You caught your reflection in the mirror: yup, looking tired as fuck. Bags under your eyes, hair like a bird's nest and the general vibe of something that had existed for too long at the bottom of a handbag. Enough to scare the shit out of the judgy older lady from across the street when she would see you. It were the small things that made you happy.

You shuffled to your kitchen where you made a horrible discovery: Coffee was empty. Even scraping at the bottom of the tin can didn't produce enough for a cup, so you grumpily slipped into your fluffy robe, grabbed the pack of cigarettes and shuffled on to your small city balcony.

You lit one and watched the people on the street: an old lady with a cute dog, they were often walking by, so adorable. Joggers. Should do that, too. Sometimes. Not now. Woman on bike, looking fab. Damn, I should buy some of those workout pants, too. They look comfy! Hot blond guy with shopping bags, waving at someone. He looks like a snack. Cute cat yawning. Should get a fuckton of tho- wait a minute, you knew that guy. That was Sanji from yesterday.

Yet another cigarette became the victim of slack jawed staring between the two of you, sailing down to the street two stories below. Poor thing.

"Hey princess, I brought you coffee! On the house!" He shouted, grinning from ear to ear. "I got breakfast, too!" He had the inflection of someone luring an animal using treats. It worked well.

Your caffeine deprived brain couldn't fathom what was happening down there: the cook strolled towards the building and you lost sight of him. Shortly afterwards you heard a knock on your door. You ran inside to look through the peephole in the door.

What the fuck.

"Hey princess, I didn't know what you liked so I brought the classics!" his cheery voice could clearly be heard through the door and you saw his clear, blue eyes looking directly through the peephole in a fish-eye perspective.

"Can we maybe start at...WHY ARE YOU HERE? HOW?" You screamed at the door.

"I saw that you lived here, too! What a coincidence ! I just wanted to apologise for yesterday. Please let me make breakfast for you!" His muffled voice from behind the door sounded excited and way too cheery for this hour.

You listened to true crime, you were half sure that the guy was a crazy murderer, killing lonely women and possibly cooking them. But there was also a strong dependency on coffee and you were sure that you wouldn't make it to the supermarket in your state.

And it would be rude to refuse his offer. You removed the doorchain, unlocking the door. Sanji stood there with the widest, happiest grin you have ever seen, holding up a shopping bag full of groceries and with a duffle bag strapped around his shoulder. He was wearing fine pants and shoes and a very comfortable looking hoodie. The moment his eyes caught your sight they lit up with delight and a flow of barely discernible syllables bubbled from his mouth.

"There you are JUST LIKE I REMEMBER I will make you the best breakfast OF YOUR LIFE ❤❤❤" he mumbled like an old lady talking to her kitty cat. This weirdo was definitely not feeling dangerous enough to be a murderer. You stepped to the side. He moved past you into your apartment, looking around with open interest.

"How cozy! I love that chair - oh I know that book! Wow you have lots of plants, I somehow cannot keep them alive." He looked around like a tourist in the middle of a historic little town, slowly making his way towards your kitchenette.

"Uhm, it's not much, and it's not exactly cleaned up..." you apologised. Surely he was used to grade A equipment.

"It's fine, I have the same one, our apartments are quite similar." He explained, not showing the slightest sign of shock over your dirty little kitchen. "Besides, I brought some stuff." He sat the duffel bag down.

Humming to himself, he began unpacking and cleaning simultaneously like it was the most normal thing for him to operate in your kitchen. Dazzled, you fell into your comfy armchair and watched that tall, slender and overall handsome guy in your kitchen. He unpacked various ingredients and began rummaging through your cupboards, eventually finding a bowl and beginning to mix something. He even made a little show of flipping bottles around in his hand like a bartender or cracking eggs open with one hand. You felt a bit useless.

"Can I help...?" You asked, unsure of what you could even do.

"No, need. I'm cooking for you!" He turned around with a wink.

"Oh...ok." you said, getting up, feeling your headache again.

"I'm gonna...take shower" you decided and went to your small bath.

"Yes take your time! I'll call you when it's time to eat" he assured you.

Getting into the shower stall, your body slowly woke up. The hot water and flowery scent of your soap relaxed and refreshed you, soothed the ache in your head. Haven't had a man in here in...four years? And a handsome one at that. How strange. The realization of what was happening in your apartment at this moment was hitting differently now that you've awakened.

There is a hot guy. In my apartment. He's cooking breakfast for me.

Fuck, I look like shit. Fuckfuck! You decided to put as much effort into this as you dared. Quite frankly, you were out of practice. You washed your hair with the special expensive shampoo you once bought and never really used, you tried to peel and moisturize your face like you wanted to every day, and you put on a light perfume, that also just sat there for special occasions like today.

You snuck to your wardrobe in the bedroom. Outfit - what do you wear to a spontaneous breakfast with a guy who wears business casual on a saturday morning? A Blazer and blouse? The dress you wore to your sisters wedding? Standing in front of your wardrobe, you noticed that it was much too full but you still had nothing to wear.

You reminded yourself that he had already seen you at your (almost) worst, everything was an improvement. Deciding on a casual outfit, you grabbed a shirt and a pair of slacks and peaked into your living room/ kitchenette. Sanji had a towel over his shoulder, whistling as he cut a vanilla bean open. You came to stand next to him at the counter to look what he was doing. His sleeves were rolled up and he wore a black apron.

"Hey princess, there you are!" He greeted you as he took some cream out of the shopping bag and put it on the counter.

"Do you have to call me princess all the time?" You asked. "It's kind of making me uncomfortable."

"If you don't like it, I'll stop, mademoiselle" he told you with a wink. You rolled your eyes at him and he chuckled.

"Do you have something like a whisk?" he asked even though he already had a look around your kitchen.

You pointed to a cupboard above you.

"Thank you, mademoiselle" he said and smiled at you. As he moved to open it, you became once again aware of how tall he was. He reached over your head, getting extremely close and you caught the scent of his cologne.

He took out the kitchen utensil and began whisking the vanilla in a bowl together with sugar and the fresh vanilla. It was fascinating to watch his practiced movements and his joy while cooking.

He reached into his bag again and set a device made of metal on the counter, shaped like a bottle but with a few applications. You knew that thing from that one cooking show, but the name eluded you.

"Know what that is?" Sanji asked when he saw you staring.

"Of course" you say with your most confident voice, "that's a cream whipping thingy" you concluded.

He laughed from the bottom of his heart.

"Exactly! I'll have to tell my colleagues at the baratie about it's new name." He joked while he filled the device of unknown designation with the cream and screwed it shut.

"You know you can also use it for soup" he explained as he put it into your empty refrigerator.

"A whipped cream soup?" You asked and Sanji laughed again. His happiness was infectious.

"I'll show you another time." He promised as he started to prepare coffee beans with a small hand operated grinder. Another time? He was planning other times already?

"So, since you were on a date just yesterday I'm guessing you don't have a boyfriend? Or girlfriend?" He tried to ask casually, but his eyes were darting nervously as he spoke.

"No, I don't" you honestly answered and heard him exhale with relief.

"I bet the guys are all crazy about you!" He mused, watching your reaction. You snorted at that.

"Yeah, so crazy they're all running away" you commented, trying not to sound bitter and failing spectacularly. You added: "seriously, I think I am not made for dating. They all want to be 'just friends', guess I am that type of girl."

"Good to know that other men have no taste in women." He said happily. "Makes it easier for me" he continued. He cooked coffee now, pouring the hot water carefully over the powder. It smelled delicious. While the water turned into precious coffee he began setting the table. You were already reaching for the coffee pot like the junky you were when he caught your wrist. Even his hand felt soft.

"It's not done yet! I'll serve it to you when it's perfect to drink" he told you, turning your hand around in his and breathing the faintest kiss onto your wrist, causing you to blush violently.

"Just sit down while I add some finishing touches. You must be so hungry" he mused.

You wandered back to your comfy armchair on shaky legs, the tingle of his touch still fresh on your skin, looking at the beautiful cook working his magic in your tiny kitchen. When he began to set the table, you were still baffled by the variety and professional look of the foods.

There where beautifully decorated crepes with fruit and whipped cream, a steaming pot of delicious smelling coffee, bread slices surrounded by what looked like home made, savory spreads, fresh orange juice and some cooked eggs. It looked perfect and smelled like heaven. You took out your phone and made a picture to send it to your friend Chrissy to show off.

"Am I already making it to your Instagram? I feel honored" You heard him behind you as he peeked shamelessly into your phone, almost resting his chin on your shoulder.

"But let's not just look, let's eat." He waited behind a chair for you and pushed it to the table before he sat down himself, spinning the chair around and sitting down backwards, with his hands and head resting on top of the backrest.

You didn't know what you expected, but you were overwhelmed. "Uhm, why are you doing this again?" You asked insecurely - the best your ex ever managed was toast and marmalade.

"A beautiful lady deserves to be pampered" he answered in a serious tone. "Besides, I kind of lost my temper yesterday and crashed your date" he didn't seem sorry, in fact he grinned when he said it.

"So enjoy! I cooked up a luxury breakfast for you." His blue eyes sparkled with anticipation as you carefully loaded the crepe onto your plate, destroying the small masterpiece somewhat. You were normally not one to have breakfast, but the appetizing smell got you hungry.

The crepe was soft and warm, the cream tasted like vanilla with a hint of cinnamon. Its texture was perfect: creamy and fluffy, slightly buttery. It was perfectly balanced with the fresh, sour taste of the fruits. You could have moaned it was so good!

Ping

The constant ping of a cell phone was distracting you from the taste orgasm you were having. Opening your eyes, you saw Sanji, leaning on the backrest, staring at you with hooded eyes and an open mouth.

Ping

"Someone's messaging you I guess" you told him, ripping him from his trance.

"Oh, sorry! I should have turned that off." He took out the phone from his pocket and unlocked it. Being as nosy as he had been, you peeked at the screen - seeing the familiar design of a dating app.

Of course he was online dating. Every ping was a match, from the looks of it he got lots. Of course he was a player, the signs were all there, you just didn't want to see them. Suits, cooking, all that "princess" and "mademoiselle" bullshit. You scowled, hard. Years of training in the harsh world have made your scowl a powerful tool to broadcast your dissatisfaction to the world. Sanji understood immediately.

"No! It's not like that! I swear!" He held up his hands.

"I didn't say anything" you told him, surly.

"But you looked. Here, nothing is happening." He handed you his phone. What normal person does that?

You looked at his app, he had almost a thousand contacts, in this small town quite significant. Apparently, he was just matching every single woman he was shown, and most of them matched back. You navigated to the messages, he didn't protest. It really was sad.

He opened most conversations, all of them were a variation of "bonjour mademoiselle, I love you" and were read but ignored. The last messages were months old, he must have given up at some point. It was a strange display.

"You really thought this line would work? Just telling random women you love them right away?" You asked, unwilling to believe that someone would dedicate time and effort to this approach.

"It's no line!" He protested. "I love all women!" He said it as if this was a normal thing to say to a woman he currently was kind of flirting with.

"You won't get very far with that, this is too much too soon" you tried to explain.

"Why?" He asked seriously. "Love is good! Everyone wants to be loved!" He seemed very passionate about that.

"You don't just see someone and fall in love, that's not how it works, and it's not healthy" You were drawn into an obviously doomed debate but couldn't help it.

"No offense but, forcing yourself to date someone you don't like and doesn't respect you seems pretty far from love as well" he mused.

"Touche" you conceded, thinking about last night's disaster.

To your surprise, he blushed furiously and seemed strangely giddy all of a sudden.

"You are already jealous!" He said happily. "You want me so much that you are jealous, but don't be! The dating app didn't work because this" he pointed at himself and you" this is destiny!" He got up and swirled around like he was dancing, pouring you a fresh cup of coffee in the process.

"Just milk, no sugar" you reflexively said. He nodded and poured milk from a tiny carton into the cup. After the wine, the pasta, the dessert and the crepe, your expectations regarding this coffee were sky high.

You took a sip, Sanji almost leaned all the way over the table to savour your reaction.

It held up. The coffee tasted soft and just like freshly grounded beans always smelled. Like chocolate and nuts and warm summer mornings. You smiled as you remembered the delicious scent in the mornings of your childhood when the grownups drank their coffee while you had a whole day of playing ahead of you.

You heard a soft whimper from Sanji. He was staring at you with his mouth open.

"It's so nice to take care of someone who appreciates it." He said. "You're so sensual..." the last words were a husky whisper and his eyes fell shut. An unexpected kiss landed on your lips. It was nervous and hot and a little too wet, his eagerness getting the better of him. His little moustache tickled your face and you couldn't help but fondling that small goatee with your fingers. He kissed and touched you like a horny teenager, moaning as his tongue played around your mouth and his hands wandered over your body like he couldn't feel enough of you at once. His nimble, long fingers threaded through your hair.

It felt good, but it was too much. A guy with that kind of dating app approach was still a red flag. In a second, you could see your heart break when he left as soon as he got what he wanted. This was too easy, too perfect. Something was seriously wrong.

You pressed your hand against his muscular chest, but he didn't get the hint. He seemed to interpret it as you exploring him and he clutched your hand to himself, encouraging you to feel around more. It was seductive to just keep running your hand over his body, you could clearly feel his defined muscles under the soft fabric of his hoodie. But the doubt was too much for you to handle.

As his mouth broke away to kiss your hand, you managed to tell him: "Stop! Now!" He immediately let go and backed off, looking confused but still very much aroused. He was handsome with his lips red from a passionate kiss and his cheeks blushing. Too perfect.

"Did I hurt you? I am so sorry!" He wrung his hands and looked like a boy that had broken something expensive.

"No, it's just too fast. And I honestly don't know if I even want that right now." You explained.

He looked like you just stabbed him. Either he was the strangest, most naive man you ever met - or he was the best actor and most skilled asshole who would break your heart.

He turned away, looking hurt and small. But he was a grown man - he had to deal with rejection. You bet you weren't the first woman he startled. After a few seconds of hurt he seemed to get a hold of himself as he began to fidget with a zippo from his pocket.

"I am sorry I fell upon you like that. And kind of ruined the mood." He looked defeated, but composed. "I will be more controlled in the future. I am sorry!" He apologised with a smile that had to be forgiven immediately.

"Let's just be adults about this and forget it" you tried to somehow save the situation.

"No." He said decidedly.

"What?" You were confused.

"I'm never going to forget that. I don't want to act like I wasn't interested in you. I'll never ask for something in return when I cook for you, I promise. Please, let me cook for you in the future" he pleaded, absolutely losing you. What was his deal?

"So please, enjoy your breakfast" he said and sat down again to watch you. He explained all the foods to you in detail, making your head spin a little with all the information. He was almost like a podcast you could listen to while eating. Although your usual eating entertainment was Netflix. On the couch.

"So, after just now I hope it's not weird...but I brought the last classic for a fancy breakfast." He said a bit flustered.

"What is that? I am already stuffed..." You answered.

"Some champagne" He grinned.

"Did you really bring champagne?" You asked in disbelief.

"Just an open one from the Restaurant, we wouldn't sell that tonight anymore. But it's enough for two glasses and fresh enough." He explained, his relaxed smile back in place.

"Mhm, after yesterday I am a little hungover...just a sip?" You asked as he already poured two glasses.

You felt so tired and cozy, the table wasn't cutting it anymore. Actually, it has been ages since you used the small kitchen table - the couch was much more comfortable.

"Let's sit down here" you suggested and Sanji brought the glasses to your coffee table and sat down next to you with a wide grin and the bearing of someone who had just scored a win. He lay his arm on the headrest just above you and took one of the glasses.

"To destiny" He mumbled a toast.

"Destiny?" You giggled.

"Don't laugh! Do you think it's coincidence that you sit in my restaurant and an hour later I see that you live in my apartment building?" He said sternly.

"We live in a small town in a small building, we would have met sooner or later" you argued.

"Still destiny..." he mumbled with an adorable pout.

You touch your glass softly to his and say: "to daydrinking!"

He laughs. "To the good life" he returns the toast and you both drink.

The champagne is a bit too dry for your tastes, but surprisingly smooth. When was the last time you had a drink before noon? Probably some company event.

Looking at the handsome man on your couch, you deluded yourself into thinking you could have fun with him without attachment. Even in the moment the thought crossed your mind, it was as clear as the sparkling wine in your hand that you already liked him. He looked to inviting next to you, his outstretched arm creating the perfect space for you to rest your head. You leaned against him, feeling the soft fabric of his hoodie and his warmth once again. And it saved you from drowning in his eyes. He gasped a little when you touched him and began breathing really hard - good actor? Really naive? Doesn't matter now.

"Tell me something about yourself" you told him.

"Uhm mhm well I am a cook" he mumbled like his mouth was giving up.

"I know that" you told him. "What about family? Is this your family's restaurant?"

"Well kind of. More my stepfather. I don't really...it's complicated" he suddenly sounded like a normal person again. "But Zeff is really cool! And my colleagues at the restaurant are like my brothers." He told you about his stepfather, the restaurant and what kinds of menus he planned as you sipped your champagne. Between the hangover, a long week and a big breakfast - you were absolutely exhausted. Before you knew it, you drifted off to sleep, dreaming a pleasant dream about you and Sanji owning a small bistro somewhere nice and quiet.

When you woke up again, you were alone on the couch, afternoon sun bathed your living room in golden light, Sanji was gone. You lay outstretched under a blanket, the champagne was gone, too.

Fuck, now I fall asleep at a date? Is he mad at me?

The kitchenette is spotless, safe for the cream whipping thingy drying next to the sink. He cleaned up and left. Maybe you should bring him the thing? Or will he come and pick it up?

Undecided, you poured yourself the last cup of cold coffee. It tasted a little bland now, having lost its full aroma. You looked around your empty apartment and missed Sanji's cheery busyness already. Maybe you should just go and see where he lived. But you didn't even know his last name.

Years of online dating and unhealthy nosiness had given you the talent to find people by first name and extra info. You googled "Sanji" and "Baratie" and found an interesting newsarticle: "Success for charity" it said. "The local restaurant Baratie made a big leap for charity this weekend, inviting the children of the local community centre to cook delicious and healthy meals together. A win for the community and the children".

There was an adorable picture of Sanji, his arm around a cute little girl holding a plate of vegetables. The description read: "Sanji Vinsmoke showed the children that veggies can be tasty".

Bingo!

You would just stroll through the building and give him back his stuff and apologise for falling asleep on him. Like a normal, nice person. You were 99% sure that he didn't play games like "wait 3 days until you write" or something.

The halls of the building were narrow and long and it took you some time to find his name on one of the doors, it was on the opposite side of the building, no wonder you never bumped into him.

You pressed the doorbell, already anxious to see him again. Soft footsteps could be heard, the door opened. Your world crumbled a bit.

In front if you stood an absolute sexbomb of a woman. She wore Sanji's hoodie - the one you fell asleep on just earlier - and nothing else as it seemed. She had long, smooth legs, a perfect hourglass figure, full lips and the cutest face. Her pink hair was a perfect messy look. You stared. She looked annoyed.

"Yes?" She asked in a melodic voice.

"Uhm, is Sanji here?" You asked, trying to catch a glimpse of the flat behind her. She blocked your view.

"No, he is at work." Her answer was short and finite.

"I brought his cream whipping thing back" you stammered and indicated the device you were holding.

"Syphon" the woman stated.

"What?" You asked, confused.

"It's called a syphon. Thank you. Bye." The woman took the syphon out of your hand and closed the door, leaving you dumbstruck in the hallway.

_______

What is happening here? Who is the mystery lady? What's her relationship with Sanji? Is the writer of this story just messing with you to create a cheap cliffhanger?

Find out in the next installment of this Sanji modern day AU!

I AM SO SORRY IT TOOK FOREVER TO WRITE THIS. I was so unhappy and revised and revised and...you get the idea. It's still not perfect but I am content enough.

As always, please leave a comment if you want more or if you have a wish how it should continue. it's always a great motivator to me and I probably wouldn't have written part 2 if people hadn't asked for it

I am taking the freedom to tag previous commenters, I hope you don't mind

Also: please comment to be taken into the taglist for this story! I think I will write it for a while

@yeeeeezly

@roronoazorohater

@opalryst

@pastel9girlbunny000die

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@missallsundayyy

#one piece fanfiction #one piece x you #one piece sanji #black leg sanji #vinsmoke sanji x reader #vinsmoke sanji #op sanji #blackleg sanji #sanji #sanji modern au #one piece modern au #one piece au #one piece fanfic #the fluff piece

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shurisneakers · 3 years

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harmless (xiii)

Summary: Bucky volunteers to go stop a small time villain, but nothing can prepare him for what exactly he has to deal with. (Bucky x villain!reader)

Warnings: cursing, frustrated bucky, dramatic reader, smidge of angst, guns, little bit of violence, obnoxious flirting, and kidnapping lol

Word count: 6.2k

A/N: welcome to chaos week >:) this is the first of three updates coming out this week (if i can finish the last one in time). big thank you to my love @no-shit-sherl0ck for the kidnaped!reader idea, and that one anon who suggested the inator that’s used here. i know you wanted to see it in a zoo but i couldn’t really figure out a way to use that so i referenced it a bunch in previous chapters. oh and also @ginevranights for this specific imagery

Previous Part || Series Masterlist

Who the fuck kidnaps a villain in this day and age?

Saturday started normally enough.

Nat kicked Bucky’s ass in training, evening the score to 120 and 120. He blames it on the lack of sleep. She tells him that it’s his fault he stayed up late to binge watch 911 Lone Star.

He still thinks it was worth it.

The team’s sunshines and rainbows that morning. Someone had cooked up a batch of pancakes and fresh orange juice. Someone else burnt the bacon but left to feed his dog before anyone could complain.

Nat opened up the newspaper. Different sections went to different people until Bucky got stuck with the entertainment section. Fun, considering that he doesn’t even recognise half the names. He’d have to pretend to be interested until the next rotation.

He watches the orange juice levitate in front of him from the corner of his eye and just assumes that Wanda’s getting a refill even though she could have just asked him to pass it. He smells the next batch of bacon burning and figures that Clint is back.

Sam’s beside him, annoying him about how long it takes for him to read about which new celebrity relationship just ended and Bucky retaliates by reading even slower. Fuck you.

He’s on his second stack of pancakes absolutely drenched in maple syrup when the doors to the elevator open and Marie steps out, laptop in her hand.

An instant chorus of hello’s and invitations to have some charred bacon resound through the table. She politely declines them with a small smile, instead opening her laptop and placing it in front of Bucky without further ado.

He looks at her questioningly, slowly swallowing whatever was in his mouth.

“An email for you.” She tuts her head towards it. “It has a video attachment of your friend.”

Bucky has plans to not watch the video in front of everyone, given that the content could range anywhere from you reading out fanfiction about him to a deep-fake of him singing a Whitney Houston song.

Both of which you have done before and would do again, without any hesitation.

“Aren’t you gonna watch it?” Wanda asks from across the table.

He slowly shakes his head no, cutting his stack into smaller pieces.

“If what’s in it is real, it’s important,” Marie stresses.

“What’s in it?” he inquires instead, hoping that the team would stop staring at him. If Marie was implying strongly that he needed to watch then something was wrong.

“Just watch it, man.” Sam’s statement has everyone agreeing with him. Bucky can’t refuse now, and if the team makes fun of him for the next month about how he looks good belting Greatest Love of All, he’s going to personally assassinate you.

He clicks on the email, noticing it came from a throwaway address. Probably untraceable, if the cards are played right.

The video opens to grainy footage, which is stupid considering modern technological advancements. If this is one more of your stupid LARPing sessions, it could definitely wait till after lunch.

But, he instantly recognises your silhouette strapped to a chair and suddenly the room feels very cold around him. His hand automatically clutches onto a bead from the bracelet you gave him that still remained tied to his left arm more often than not.

“Speak,” someone commands off camera.

“About what?” You sound annoyed, exasperated even.

“Why you’re here.”

“I’m here because you have unaddressed feelings of childhood insecurity.”

“I warned you to take this seriously.”

Bucky’s eyes widen slightly but his body relaxes the minute he reads the situation.

The team’s crowded around him, he can feel it. His attention remains on the screen in front of him.

“Who even are you sending this to?” You don’t sound the least bit threatened. “My roommate’s not at home but my cat is and I don’t think she’d care.”

”You’ve made a complete joke out of villains everywhere. Fraternising with the enemies, the Avengers,” he spits the name with so much vitriol. “You’ve erased what it’s like to be truly evil. Turned us into a laughing stock.”

“If it takes one person to undermine your whole movement then maybe it wasn’t strong enough to begin with.” You look at someone outside the lens, face scrunching in distaste. “Also your costume’s ugly.”

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., can you trace this voice?” Bucky asks, receiving an immediate confirmation. “Figure out who it is.”

“On it.”

“Tell them. Tell them we are a serious threat and are to be feared.”

"No,” you say resolutely. “You’re an overgrown manchild. Go watch Teletubbies or something.”

“She does not give a shit,” Clint marvels at the situation, a piece of half eaten burnt toast between his fingers.

You didn’t. And if he knew you in the slightest, which he prided himself on at this point, you already had six different ways of getting out of there.

“She knows she’s going to be fine,” Bucky murmurs, returning back to take a bite of his pancakes. “She’s probably still there just to irritate him.”

He zeroes in on your wrist to see if the teleportation watch was still there but no, your wrists are bare. Guess you forgot.

“You have to.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s how a real villain does it.”

“A real villain- what are you, gatekeeping the villain community?” You scoff. “You sound like a fuckin’ incel.”

“Just send them a message,” the guy bellows, hitting a table.

“She’s going to frustrate them to death.” An accurate observation, Sam.

“Okay, jeez, fine.”

Bucky just knows that you rolled your eyes at that moment.

He had faith in you, or in your abilities at the very least. While every wisecrack could possibly inch you closer towards harm, you probably wouldn’t be making them unless you felt completely secure in your situation.

“Help, I’m totally kidnapped and in danger. Save me because I can’t do it myself. This man is too powerful and strong and sooo scary.”

“Do you think she has a strategy?”

“Definitely.”

“You’re not worried, James?” Wanda asks curiously. “I thought she was your friend.”

“She is my friend.” He reaches over to take the jug of orange from across the table. “That’s why I’m not worried.”

“Are you going to fight the Avengers?” you interrupt his endless tirade. “Because that’s a stupid plan. You get how that’s a stupid plan, right?”

“Let them come. I’m prepared.”

“With what? A stick you found outside? A Nerf gun? Man, you’ve tied my hands with fuckin’ zip ties, you can’t be serious-”

“Shut up,” he roared and the stand shakes slightly from where he stamps his feet. “Our army is enough.”

“Wow,” you exhale. “I wish I had your confidence, I really do. I want to study you under a microscope.”

“I have reinforcements.” It sounds like he turns to the camera to address it directly. “This is a warning. Your friends have an hour to find you or things are gonna turn ugly. This is what real evil looks like.”

“Evil dresses in a dollar store Speedo, apparently.” The man pays you no heed, instead picking up the camera. “Hey, sarge, if you’re watching this, don’t bother. I’m fine, it’s not even the real me-”

The camera cuts to black.

“When was this video sent?” Nat looks at Marie, eyebrows drawn together.

“About ten minutes ago.”

Bucky clicks out of the email, determined to get at least half his breakfast in him before he left to see what’s up with your situation. A notification pops up immediately.

[email protected] just sent you an email.

A video attachment.

“We got another one,” Bucky informs the team, drawing their attention back to the screen from the informal conversation that had erupted between them about what they could do.

This time, there’s a subject line included.

Attack on the Clone.

"Ain’t that a Star Wars movie?" he asks, craning his neck to look at Clint.

"That's Attack of the Clones," Sam corrects. "Probably autocorrect."

Bucky narrowed his eyes in suspicion at him, jaw sliding outward before falling back into place. Enough times had Sam called him Fucky in the group chat and gotten away with it for him not to be wary.

“Or a code,” Wanda suggests, too many crime thrillers read and podcasts listened in her spare time. She occasionally brought them over to Self Care Saturday, introducing him to the world of true crime as a bit of light content while they snacked on chocolate chip cookies he baked. “Like the Zodiac.”

“For what?” Bucky peers over at her.

“All I remember from that movie is them rolling around a field together,” Clint mutters. “Maybe that’s how you’re supposed to save her.”

“I’m not saving anyone. Look at her, she’s fine.” Is he the only one who saw it?

When he’s met with skeptical looks and no other useful suggestions, he presses play on the video.

This time it's clearer footage. It hardly takes him a second to ascertain where it was.

"That's her lair." It showed the pathway leading up to the flat concrete building, exactly where the intercom should be.

There was a black Sedan parked haphazardly outside, engine still on judging by the sound of the radio blasting an AC/DC song.

Within a few seconds, someone drags you from the entrance of the lair to the car, despite your very clear protests and opposition, shoving you inside before it takes off in full speed, tires screeching.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y., track the car from that video. Check all the CCTV and surveillance footage from around the area that you can find," Bucky commands, taking a sip of orange juice.

"Why would they send us that?" Clint pipes up. "They make their email untraceable but send us a video of the fuckin' abduction itself?"

"I don't know." Bucky shakes his head, setting his glass down. "She probably convinced them to."

It was an unusual scenario, he realised that. But his eyebrows lower in contemplation, his lip caged between his lip before a thought suddenly occurs to him. A laugh in disbelief almost escapes his throat ad he pushes it down with some freshly cut strawberries.

"And they listened?"

"I don't think you realise how annoying she can be." He knows, though. He knows. "Bet they regret it, though. I should tell them to keep her for a little longer."

"Voice recognition registers voice to someone named Chad, better known by his alias Soul Crusher. Surveillance footage places the car about thirty minutes away. Exact location sent to your phone GPS."

Soul Crusher. That was worse than Dr. Strange.

"I can make that fifteen." Bucky shrugs, setting down his fork and knife. If his hunch is right, the team didn’t really have to get involved. “See you guys later.”

“Do you want any of us coming with you?” Wanda gestures to the crowd at hand.

“I got it.” He pushes away from the table, depositing his plate in the sink, dropping an extra piece of bacon on the ground for Clint’s dog. “She’ll be alright.”

They watch him trail out of the room briskly, heading up to his room to change.

“Is it just me or is he too casual about this?” Clint continues staring long after he leaves.

“Both of them are weirdos.” Nat pulls open the newspaper again, going back to the sport’s section. “Who knows what goes in their heads.”

“Can confirm that not a lot goes on in his.”

Without Bucky to retaliate or grumble, a Steve walking into the room, sweaty and shiny after training becomes the new subject of jokes that morning.

For the first time in months, he’s had to bring a weapon or two along with him. Two revolvers and a couple of knives kept out of plain view. He wouldn’t need more than that anyway.

True to his word, it takes only fifteen minutes to get there, thirteen if he didn’t stop for the chain of ducks that crossed the street.

He’s also dressed in a little more leather than he usually reserves for your meetings. A jacket that brings to act as a windbreaker and tightly laced up combat boots make him look like he either stepped off a runway, or more menacing than usual depending on who was looking.

The GPS points him to an old warehouse near a more subdued part of the city. It was abandoned by the looks of it, and had been for a while judging by the lack of upkeep. Prime real estate.

He pulls off his helmet, hanging it on the handlebar along with his backpack before kicking the stand into place. The bike’s a few metres away just in case they decide to blow something up.

Bucky looks up at the warehouse, assessing the most damage he could do to it if at all it was needed. That thing could barely stand on its own, a grenade would absolutely decimate it. That wasn’t good news for you.

He sighs once before putting on his death glare, straightening out his shoulders into a stature that screams stone-cold, and pushes the door open, gun raised.

A mini-army of people ranging from their early twenties to late thirties stood guard at the entrance, all with rifles pointed at him. He counts fifteen, maybe eighteen.

“Oh, hell no,” a voice erupts from the back, followed by the sound of his gun being thrown to the ground. “No one told me that he was coming.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow, his death glare not shifting and Glock not lowering.

“I’m out.” The same guy raises his hands up to show he meant no harm, slowly brushing past Bucky as he squeezed out of the building.

“You got five seconds to leave before I shut this door,” Bucky gives the rest of them an ultimatum. Not like there was a point anyway. SHIELD was sending down some people to account for the one day rise in new morons.

They all looked at each other, swallowing thickly before raising their weapons.

“I hope he’s giving you good insurance.” The second he finishes his sentence they all cry out in what sounds like a fucking war chant, launching themselves at him.

______

“They’re here.” Someone presses his ear to the door as if the gunshots and screaming weren’t enough.

“Brilliant. We’re ready.” Chad picks up the knife, running his finger along the sharp end. You try to see if you can use your Twitter-ordained powers of manifestation for a paper cut.

“How much are you asking them for?” You put forth a query instead, when it disappointingly doesn’t work.

“Asking who for what?” Chad stops his dumb intimidation tactic for a second.

“You know,” you insist like it was obvious, “my ransom. How much did you ask them to pay?”

“We didn’t-” He looks around at the other people in the room for confirmation. “-we didn’t ask for any.”

“Because I’m invaluable?” Your head droops to the side in mock flattery. “Aw, you guys.”

“We didn’t think of it,” someone from the corner behind you speaks up, coming to the aid of their boss.

“Now that’s just rude.” You tut, shifting maybe an inch or two in your bounds to try and get more comfortable. “Leaving aside your lack of preparation, let’s just assume he bursts in here, desperate and ready to bargain. How much would you ask for?”

“Three million,” Chad says confidently, gathering a nod and sounds of agreement from everyone else.

“Are you serious?” Your jaw drops, a scoff escaping you. “That’s all?”

His self-assurance falters a little bit, you can see it under his 5 Minutes Craft mask.

“Three mill-” You stop mid-sentence. “With this wiring? Ridiculous. Make it ten, I demand it.”

“We’ll ask for fifteen mil,” Chad proposes, his teammates agreeing again, a little more delighted than last time.

“Ask for thirty, you coward,” you argued. “Thirty million and a jet.”

“You’re not worth that much.” The dipshit diagonal to you pipes up with his unwanted and, frankly, useless opinion.

“And you are?” You whip around the best you can. “Henchman number four?”

“Megedagik,” he informs, standing up a little taller now that he was given some importance. “It means ‘killer of many’.”

“Did you just say your name was Mega Dick?”

“Megedagik,” he corrects.

You stare at him hard before turning away. “Alright, other than Mega Dick here, does anyo-”

A knife lands right next to your feet, driven at least an inch into the ground. You look up at the guy you managed to piss off within four sentences, his face now a beet red.

“These are brand new, asshole,” you barked, shaking your shoes around. “You’re gonna pay if there’s even a scratch on it.”

“Permission to kill her?” Meg growls, casting a side eye at Chad.

The boss man looks at you thoughtfully, assessing the repercussions of what might happen. You raise an eyebrow.

“Slow and painful,” he settles.

A small smirk makes its way onto your face.

“Title of your sex tape,” you quip as the man in the corner storms towards you.

_____

It’s all a flurry, really. A bunch of inexperienced newcomers versus one of the most skilled assassins the world had ever seen? Ten minutes tops.

Bucky doesn’t do any serious damage. A couple of broken bones but only out of necessity, a lot of concussions, and maybe a bullet wound, or three, here and there.

Most of the time he spends thinking about things that have absolutely nothing to do with what was going on. He forgot to take his laundry out of the machine. There was a biscotti recipe he had been procrastinating on trying. His succulents needed watering but he could do that once he was back. Was he wearing his good combat pants or was it the pair that had a hole in the pocket?

His left hand thrust outwards to shove someone away while he stuck his right hand into his pocket to check if it had frayed away. The person he pushed slams into a wall with a loud groan and no, his pants didn’t have a hole in them.

He stops to take a breather, assess what was going on. There are bodies scattered all around, mostly writhing in pain from minor injuries. Someone very bravely stands up, hands posed in front of him in a regular fighting stance.

“You sure about this?” Bucky asks, reaching for one of the concealed knives he hadn’t had a chance of using yet. It twirls rather nimbly between his fingers for something so dangerous, the hilt finally landing in his palm for a sturdy grip.

The man takes one look at the knife before sitting right back down on the ground.

“Good choice,” his voice drops to an octave lower than his self-esteem. He’s tired of this old routine but it works like a neat little party trick, often getting him the result he wanted. “Where?”

A few fingers point down the hall to the only room whose door was closed.

He makes sure to step over everyone who was lying along the way, ears tuned in to even the smallest of noises just in case one of them decided to attack him from the back. It doesn’t come.

He doesn’t bother creeping down the hallway. With all the ruckus that just went on outside, he’s pretty sure it’s obvious that they had an intruder.

Bucky kicks in the large steel door with ease, given that it was barely hanging on its hinges. His gun’s raised, muscles tight, and senses on high alert for any immediate threats.

It lands with a large thud, reverberating through the room. He’s reminded of your first meeting with him.

There’s a chair in the middle of the room with a person tied to it by a mixture of rope and tape. Others found themselves slithering around on the floor in a similar fashion, trying to get out of their bondages.

“Hey, James,” you call out, drawing his attention to you. You were sitting atop a table, legs swinging back and forth without a care in the world, a blade in your hand.

“You okay?” He tucks the gun into his waistband when he realises that none of the henchmen are going to be going anywhere soon.

“All good.” You hop off the table with a little spring in your step. “Did you bring your bike? I need a ride back to the lair. I think I left the TV on when I was, you know, getting kidnapped.”

“You coulda teleported back home before all of this even happened.” Bucky does a quick assessment of your body to make sure there weren’t any bruises or anything of the sort. “Avoided the whole thing.”

“Don’t have the watch with me.” Odd, since he knows you consider it one of your essentials but it just fuels his theory further. “Besides, if I just quit before we started, they’d keep messing with me over and over again.”

“Do you want me to punch someone’s face in?” He glances around the room at the ones wiggling about on the floor like fucking worms. “I’d be happy to.”

“Nah, I got a few in myself.” You rotate your wrist, other hand still holding onto the knife. “You know what, maybe I’ll have another go.”

He simply makes a noise in acknowledgement before he places a hand on the hem of your shirt, gently reeling you back. “I think you fixed ‘em up real good. That’s enough for today.”

“Fine but only ‘cause you said so.” You huff, looking past him and at the weirdos on the ground. “You hear that? This man just saved your life. Say ‘thank you’.”

A muffled chorus of what sounded like appreciation echoed through the room. Bucky awkwardly looks around.

“Damn right.” You walk over to the guy in charge of the whole event, bending down to his level. “If you ever try to fuck with us again...”

You stare straight into his eyes, unblinking. You hold up the knife to his Adam’s apple. Chad doesn’t dare to move other than the thick swallow.

You raise your finger and flick him in the forehead. “Get a better costume.”

The corner of Bucky’s lip quirks upward.

“Let’s go, sarge,” you announce, standing upright again and making a motion to follow you. “D’you have an extra helmet I could use?”

“Yeah.” He had brought one along in his bag, assuming that you’d need one once he noticed the watch was missing in the footage.

“Yay.”

The only storage space on his bike was under his seat and it’s just enough for an extra revolver. Clint asked him if it was his way of flirting with someone, give ‘em a quick spin around the city and then show them his gun. If looks could kill, Clint would be 7 feet under.

“You sure you wanna ride it, though?” He cringes immediately when he realises what it sounds like, waiting for you to smack the innuendo in his face. “We could wait for SHIELD.”

“Don’t really have another choice, Bucky,” you say absentmindedly, strolling out the room as you tossed the knife behind you.

He frowns at your indifference but turns around for a second to look at Chad. The man in question looks back viciously, his grandeur from that morning basically deflated and left to die along with his reputation.

“Might wanna reconsider the name,” Bucky remarks, doing a quick sweep of the area once more. “Soul Crusher.”

He waits until both of you are outside the cell and the door is shut on the ringleader and his circus clowns, handlebar twisted out of place so that they don’t escape for the time being.

“One second,” he calls, touch gently lingering on your forearm to stop you without even thinking twice about it. A famously uncharacteristic move for him.

"Hm?” You don’t even look like you notice his action.

“You sure you’re good?” he asks seriously, actual concern slipping through the question. “Do you need medical assistance?”

“They couldn’t hurt me anyway.” There’s something strange about the way you say it, almost assuredly. “I’m good.”

“Okay,” he concedes, his hand darting back when he realises it was still on your arm. His eyebrows furrow when he realises how instinctively he had reached out in the first place. He didn’t touch anyone, ever.

“What are we gonna do about them?” you inquire, stepping over someone on the floor to get to the exit.

“Marie told Agent Hill. They’re sending someone over.”

“They’re sending SHIELD for these wannabes?” Someone groans in protest from somewhere and you elect to ignore them. “Ew.”

“Just to make sure confidential information isn’t compromised in any way.” There’s a large bang that comes from the room they just left. Maybe one of them shot their teammate by accident. They were more than capable of doing it.

“I would never,” you exacted a little more solemnly, pushing the door open with your elbow to let the sunlight flood in.

“I know.” He doesn’t realise how dark it was in the warehouse until he steps out into the noon sun. “I’m pretty sure this is more about the fact that you were abducted.”

“For me?” The smile doesn’t quite reach your eyes the way he kinda likes. Something definitely felt off. “I love being class favourite.”

He doesn’t reply, a small grunt as he twists the handle of the warehouse door upwards, effectively jamming it.

“Can I drive?” You bat your eyelashes at him innocently, disregarding the loud screaming that came from inside as those less injured probably regrouped for a last ditch attempt.

“No,” he doesn’t hesitate in replying, handing you a helmet and buckling his own securely.

“But I just got kidnapped,” you complained, watching him swing a leg over the bike and straddle it. Okay then.

“All the more reason for you not to drive right now.” He mentions for you to get on, squinting at the warehouse a few feet away.

“Fine, but next time I’m driving,” you grumble, climbing on the back.

“Do you even know how to?” His head is tilted to look at you from the corner of his eye, voice heavier on account of the obstruction on his face.

The door starts shaking violently and he knows for a fact that it won’t hold up for much longer. Some of those who he had knocked out probably had been shaken awake again for manpower.

“I can learn.” You take a pause, mischief seeping into your next words. “You can teach me.”

“No.” He didn’t exactly practice what was considered safe, law abiding driving. He just got from one point to another and that’s all he cared about.

“Then I’ll do it myself.” You sound determined. “I’m going to leave a note for us in the lair.”

“You do that.” He revs the engine when something solid hits the metal door. As guessed, their usage of props to push it down faster was coming into play. “Now, can you hold on to something? We need to go.”

If only those idiots just realised that the windows covered by newspapers were right there, ready to be broken.

“Only if you promise to let me drive next time,” you say defiantly, drawing this whole ordeal out.

“Whatever,” he urges. “I promise. Now can we go?”

“Wait for it...” There’s a devilish smile on your face. “One.”

There’s a loud creak as the door finally gives way.

“Two.” The same people you left tied up in the room burst out, almost stumbling over each other in the process.

“Three,” he completes it on his own, not waiting for you to finish because God knows how long you’d stretch it out just for the drama.

Your excited screech of laughter as he narrowly misses a rod that gets thrown at him like a fucking javelin temporarily distracts him from the brain freeze he gets when your arms wind around his waist to hold yourself in place.

There’s angry screaming and bullets that whiz past in an attempt to get him to stop but a swift turn around a corner, pulling the both of you out of their sight is enough to get rid of them.

“We should get a few weapons and go back,” you yell over the wind rushing by, barely audible.

“You do that in your own free time,” he shouts in response, yanking you through narrower lanes and less popular streets.

“Maybe I will, you bore.”

Still, you shut up for the rest of the ride, only grumbling when he stops the bike to tell you that no, you cannot let go just because you want to throw your hands in the air like in the movies.

You hop off when he finally pulls up on the street outside your lair, adrenaline still pumping through your veins. He waits patiently as you unbuckle the helmet, switching off the engine.

“You gonna drop me off at my door too, now?” You snicker, fingers pulling off the helmet.

He looks at you for a second before dropping the kickstand into place and dismounting from the motorcycle.

“I was kidding.” You laugh, handing him your headgear that he shoves into his backpack.

“You’re pretty capable of gettin’ abducted along the way.” An absurd notion, considering it’s a short path from the road to the door.

“Oh, how chivalrous.” You let him tag along anyway, for his peace of mind.

“My ma didn’t expect any less.” A couple of sharp lessons from Winifred Barnes and Bucky was nothing short of a damn angel.

You knock on the door three times, crossing your arms over your chest as you waited.

“Aren’t you the one with the key?” Bucky questions, one hand on his waist.

The door swung open in the middle of his sentence revealing... you.

Another you.

“Nah, she has it.” Ex-Kidnapped-You raises your head in acknowledgement at Doorway-You.

“Ah.” He fucking knew it. An unnatural sense of smugness blossoms in his chest.

“Hey,” the both of you said at the same time.

Doorway-You looked way more relaxed, a little less grimy and dishevelled but exactly the same.

“Buck, I see you met my other half,” the you from the doorway greets him. “Or other whole, actually.”

“Sure did.” He sends a glance at Ex-Kidnapped-You.

“You can go on in. Big first day, huh?” Doorway-You refers to the you beside him.

“You wouldn’t believe,” Ex-Kidnaped-You mutters, pushing past the entrance and disappearing inside.

“She gonna be okay?” His gaze trails after your clone.

“Oh yeah, just needs to recharge.” You turn around to make sure she’s fine. “She’s made of some pretty strong carbon, technically almost indestructible.”

No wonder ‘you’ said they couldn’t hurt you.

“Heya, sarge.” You draw his attention back to you. “Always good to see you.”

“Can’t really say the same about you.”

“Ever the emotional repressor, Mr Barnes. I like this little leather show you got going, did ya wear it just for me?”

He shifts his balance to his other foot, feet slightly wide apart. “Take it that the clone machine finally worked?”

“I was in the middle of celebrating.” You sigh, recalling the events of that morning. “Teleported home for a second to get some champagne and when I came back she was gone.”

“Irresponsible.” He tsks, head shaking in disappointment.

“Sorry I didn’t take amateur kidnappers into account for my risk factor analysis, Bucky,” you shoot back, pressing on his name for added annoyance. “Anyway, I did the responsible thing. I sent all the evidence I had to you guys.”

“Real clever.” Bucky looks at you in dry amusement. “Attack on the clone? Really?”

“Hey, always make time for a good pun.” You finger gun, lopsided grin on your face. “Did the team like it?”

“They thought it was a typo.” Or a code. He really had Wanda to thank for his big revelation. “Your video didn’t help either.”

“Don’t tell me they couldn’t make out it was me.” You laugh, crossing your arms over your chest.

He doesn’t reply, pursing his lip inwards in sympathy, but more so to conceal a smile.

The happiness drops from your face slowly, horror taking its place. “Don’t tell me they couldn’t make out it was me.”

“Good job, your machine worked,” he adds helpfully.

“C’mon, there were so many differences,” you whine, the success of your endeavour the last thing on your mind.

“That is your literal clone,” he points out, only to see you- clone you- walk into the giant box in the corner of the room, bright green light emanating from it like a xerox machine.

“How could they not tell the original apart from a copy?” You look genuinely offended. Insane. “Not even Sam?”

“Guess you’re not unique enough.” A rise and fall of his shoulders signify his attitude towards this whole thing. “Think I like your copy better, too, actually.”

“You’re so mean.” You puff in disbelief. “I’m a 100% original. How many mad scientist teachers do you know?”

“Two.”

“I don’t mean now, that’s not even the-” You poke at his rock hard chest. “You are so much more annoying than when I first met you.”

He thinks it’s good relationship development.

“I have to deal with you every weekend.” He watches your finger drop from his chest. “Picked it up along the way.”

“Boo hoo, talking like you don’t have deep, deep feelings for me.” You roll your eyes. “I see right through you, Bucky Barnes.”

“Can you see the part that couldn’t give less of a shit?” He gestures to himself. “It’s all of it.”

“You think you’re such a comedian, huh?” You narrow your eyebrows. “How did you know she was a fake then, huh?”

Busted.

“Probably ‘cause you didn’t talk as much today,” he dodges. “Actually had some peace of mind for a change.”

“You knew before you got there, you liar.” You push past his fabrications. “You figured it out before everyone else.”

“You literally put it in the title.”

“Yeah, but the rest of the team saw it too.”

“Rest of the team didn’t know you were building a goddamn clone machine for months.”

“You remembered that?” You pulled away, palm over your heart. “Oh, sarge, you paid attention to me.”

His nose twitches.

“You said it, like, eight hundred times.” He could use both his hands to count the number of references you had offhandedly made in the last three weeks alone.

“Why'd you go save me when you knew it wasn't real?” you continue to challenge relentlessly, knowing fully well that he was fibbing.

“Because you fuckin’ peer pressured me. Had the whole team around me when you sent your little video during breakfast.”

“Just admit it,” you coo, ignoring all his justifications. “You noticed it was fake me right away but showed up anyway because you’re wildly in love with me.”

“No,” he says stiffly.

“No as in you won’t admit it you have a crush on me, or no as in you didn’t know it was fake me?”

There was no winning this.

“Good day to you.” He pulls the motorcycle helmet on to hide the expression that plain as day screamed the former of your two options.

“Also,” you bring up indignantly, “she even got to ride the fucking bike and I’ve been asking to drive it for months now!”

“We-” he chooses his words carefully. “-compromised.”

“Oh, you did?” Your voice lowers at the newfound information, interest piqued. “I’m gonna hold you to that then, whatever it is.”

“Doesn’t count.”

“Absolutely does,” you huff. “A promise is legally binding. Blue’s Clues taught me that.”

“Bye, Y/N.”

“You’re my knight in leathery armour,” you swoon, switching sides immediately, “Kinda.”

“See you next week,” he says in farewell, determined to leave before you made it worse. “Try not to get killed by then.”

“Why, so you can do it yourself? Protective much?” You pull him back when he starts walking away, laughing slightly. “Wait a second, you weirdo.”

He sighs, staying put anyway, arms crossed impatiently over his chest.

You pull out the pen tucked behind your ear and slowly tap him twice on each shoulder in a makeshift knighting ceremony. “For your sacrifice.”

He rolls his eyes at the ludicrousness, tongue clicking against the roof of his mouth.

You ignore his lack of enthusiasm, pressing your fingertips to your lips in a small kiss and then to his nose, given that it was the only part of his face you had access to.

“That was for your bravery.” You grin brightly at him and he sure as hell is glad he’s wearing the stupid helmet because he can feel his cheeks light up a bright crimson.

“Thanks.” His voice sounds gruffer than a second ago. He clears his throat.

“Now you’re my knight in leathery armour,” you fawn, nearly falling over yourself dramatically. “Let’s ride into the sunset together. I love you.”

“You’re ridiculous,” he calls out over his shoulder, turning away to return to his bike. “I despise you.”

“But you don’t.”

He really didn’t.

also i managed to fuck my phone up really bad so all proceeds from my ko-fi go towards getting it fixed

Next part

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #mcu fic #bucky fic #bucky barnes fic #bucky fluff #bucky barnes fluff #bucky angst #bucky barnes angst #harmless fic #winter soldier x reader #Winter Soldier #bucky barnes #bucky

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galactic-magick · 3 years

Text

As Long As I’m With You: Agnes/Agatha Harkness x Reader

Request: Hi, can you please do where Agnes (a villain) saves fem reader's life because she has feelings for her? In the end they end up together // also took some ideas from this request

Summary: You’re accused of witchcraft in your village, and a mysterious beautiful witch comes to your aid.

Words: 2200+

Warnings: fem reader, Agatha is low key evil so she hurts some people, a swear word, reader has an angsty past

Author’s Notes: This can be read as either a standalone fic or as a prequel to my other fic “Spell Practice.” I took quite a lot of creative liberty with this, hopefully that’s alright. Also disclaimer I am in no way a history expert so even though this is set in like the 1500s-1600s it’s probably very inaccurate, but it’s fanfic so anything goes right?

Taglist: @nyx-aira @midnight-lestrange @thestrangeundoing @thegayances @sleep-deprived-athlete @dr-robotnik-said-hella @fallingfor-fics @p-nymph @thelanawinterrs @sunproud (if your tag didn’t work it might be bc your blog isn’t searchable so make sure that’s on so you’re notified of future fics!)

You had no idea how much your life would change when you left your house that day.

It started out with a simple run to the market and the garden to get what you needed for supper that night, a job that almost always falls to you. You don’t necessarily mind getting away from your family and talking to some people in town, but it’s clear that your family doesn’t want you in the house as much as possible either.

It’s gotten to the point where they’re just looking for a reason to get rid of you. You’re a disappointment, after all. You refuse to marry in order to help your family’s status, even though you’ve gotten a couple offers. You counter your parent’s rules and ideas every chance you get, no matter how much they tell you you’re crazy. They belittle you constantly, saying your dreams are worth nothing and you’ll have to be dependent on them forever if you never submit to the role in society you’re supposed to.

Obviously bullying you out of their lives wasn’t working, so they’ve moved on to spreading rumors about you and setting you up for crimes. None have worked yet, of course, but every day you fear they’ll get too close.

Until you get burned at the stake, though, they’ve given you basically every responsibility of the house. You do all the shopping, cooking, and farming, as well as taking care of your younger siblings. You wonder what they’d do without you, despite how much they seem to want you gone.

As you’re buying a few crops and eggs from your neighbors, you swear you see something move. You turn around and see a little boy floating in the air, screaming.

You drop everything in your arms and reach up to him, trying to grab him and help him down, but he keeps flailing, and his screams start to feel directed at you.

“Hey! It’s okay! Let me help you!” you hold your hand up, speaking as calmly as you can. “I’m not going to hurt you,”

“WITCH!” a man yells as he sees you. “SHE’S A WITCH!”

Everyone around turns and watches you.

“No! No! I’m not the one doing this! I’m trying to help!”

“Let him down and maybe we’ll wait to kill you til tomorrow!” someone else demands.

A couple people march towards you to grab you, and all you can think to do is start running.

You race out of the center of town into the trees, and about five men chase after you. You keep going until it feels like your legs are going to give out and you can barely breathe, but they keep coming.

“Please! Please stop! It wasn’t me I swear!” you cry. “I don’t know what was happening!”

“Shut up, girl,” one grunts. “Your father always said there was something wrong with you, makes sense that you’re a witch!”

“What’s so wrong about witches?” a female voice calls.

You and the men spin around, trying to figure out where it came from.

Before you can blink there’s purple smoke surrounding you, and the men are thrown against the trees. They’re knocked unconscious instantly, but you remain standing and untouched.

“Who are you?” you ask, your voice quivering.

“Don’t be afraid, my dear,” the smoke starts to fade and you can make out her silhouette, then eventually her face. “I’m here to help you,”

She’s beautiful. You’ve never seen someone that immediately feels so friendly, so different in all the best ways.

“It’s alright to stare, I know I’m quite a sight,” she laughs. “I’m Agatha,”

“I’m Y/N,”

“Ah, yes, I’m pretty sure I’ve heard of you,” she smiles. “Everyone in the village can barely stand you,”

“Thanks…?” you’re not sure how to respond, especially after all that just happened. “Wait, if you live in my village, why have I never seen you? And how come you’ve never gotten caught using magic?”

“Memory spells, of course,” she shrugs. “Now, let’s get you somewhere safe, alright?”

You nod, and she wraps an arm around you. She takes you deep into the forest until you reach a small house, the glimmer of the fire peering through the windows.

You settle down on a chair while she makes some tea and food. She offers you a blanket and hands you the cup and plate, sitting down across from you.

“So how long have you been practicing magic?” she asks.

“Oh…I…well actually I don’t know how to use any magic,”

“Really? Why were the witch hunters after you then?”

“I was set up, I think,” you say. “There was a little boy floating in the air, and since I was near him they thought it was me. But I wasn’t doing anything,”

“Well,” Agatha sips her tea. “Sometimes magic can manifest itself subconsciously. Maybe you were doing it but didn’t realize it. It’s quite common,”

“But…how would I have magical powers? I’ve never learned it from anywhere,”

“Some people are just born with the gift,” she grins.

You exhale, thinking over what she said. Could it be true? You’ve been a witch all your life without even knowing it?

That night, Agatha conjures another bed for you to sleep in. But even though she made it as comfortable as she possibly could, you can’t get a wink of sleep.

You lift off the blanket and wrap it tightly around you, getting up slowly and quietly. You walk outside and sit against a tree, looking up at the stars.

You’re sure your family has heard the news by now. Their disappointment of a daughter is finally gone, accused of witchcraft. It seems that the foreseeable future will be spent with Agatha, the only safe person you have.

You wonder just how much she already knows about you. She mentioned she’s heard people gossiping about you all the time in town, yet she still saved you after hearing all those negative things.

Why is that?

“Can’t sleep?”

You jump at her voice, and she chuckles a bit at your reaction.

“Sorry,” you sigh. “I just have a lot to think about from today, I guess,”

“No worries,” she sits down beside you. “So do I,”

“Agatha,” you say. “Why did you save me?”

“Us witches have to stick together. I saw you were in trouble, so I saved you,”

“But you knew, didn’t you? You’ve known I was a witch long before this, didn’t you?”

“I had my suspicions,” she agrees. “Whenever I heard people talk about you, I figured you weren’t like everyone else. But I didn’t know for sure until today,”

“I wish you had taken me before,” you huff, a few tears falling down your cheeks. “It’s been so bad, Agatha, feeling worthless just because you’re different, everyone hates you…”

She pulls you into her shoulder, letting you cry into it, “I know, dear, I know,”

It takes you a while to come to terms with your potential powers, but as soon as you’re ready Agatha begins to teach you how to use them. You spend your days studying her spell books and practicing simple spells, most of which you fail at.

She encourages you as much as possible, explaining to you that magic is not something you can learn overnight, sometimes not even over years. She tells you that she’s actually thousands of years old (a surprise to you due to her stunning looks) and she’s been practicing for much of that time, and there’s still some spells she hasn’t mastered.

Your impatience still gets the better of you most days, though. You can’t imagine waiting several centuries to get something to work, if you get it to work at all.

One day you’re sitting at the table, trying out a simple transfiguration spell. You wave your hand repeatedly at a potato, hoping to turn it into an apple. It doesn’t even wobble, not even a single spark, but you’ve been sitting here for hours and don’t want to give up just yet.

You nearly fall asleep from exhaustion when all of a sudden it happens. It works.

There’s an apple in front of you. Not a potato, an apple.

“Holy shit!” you scream. “Agatha! I did it!”

You run over to her and point at your small accomplishment.

“Look at you go, darling!” she smiles, hugging you. “At this rate you’ll be changing rocks into cats before you’re 200!”

You laugh, “Oh come on, this is literally just one of the beginner spells,”

“So what? That’s where everybody starts,”

You break out in giddy excitement again, jumping up and down a bit and looking back and forth just to make sure your creation is still there.

Without thinking, you kiss Agatha quickly on the lips.

She stares at you, mouth open.

Before you can apologize, she grabs your face and kisses you hard. She’s everything you’d imagined and more, soft and warm but with a spark you can’t ignore.

When you finally break apart, her hands linger, brushing across your features and in your hair, “I’ve been waiting to do that,”

Things change after that, but in only the best ways.

Agatha isn’t just your mentor anymore, the only friend who came to your aid.

She’s your everything now, a soulmate, your home.

You tell her all about your life, and she tells you all about hers. As she has significantly more stories to tell, you’ll fall asleep many nights to her whispering all the legends she lived through that no one else knows are true.

She makes you laugh every day, and makes sure you always know how much she cares about you. There’s only so much you can do in your hidden home in the woods, but with magic the possibilities are endless and she’s never short of romantic ideas.

Tonight you find yourself lying your head in her lap while she plays with your hair, close to the fire so you can watch the little shows she creates with the flames.

“What about love?” you ask.

“What about it?”

“Out of all the stories you’ve told me, you’ve never mentioned being in love before,”

“Well,” she sighs. “That’s because I haven’t been,”

“Why not?”

“It’s just never appealed to me,” she says. “Until I met you,”

“Oh,” you grin, looking up at her.

She leans down to kiss you, but you’re broken apart by a loud noise outside.

You shoot up, looking at Agatha in pure panic. Your heart races as the noise gets louder and louder, eventually leading to shouting and knocks at the door.

“WE FOUND YOU!” a booming voice yells.

“Aggie?” you whisper. Everything crumbles around you. Your perfect, happy life, now about to be stolen from you. You have no idea how they found you, if you are about to be dead, if you’ll be able to defend yourself at all.

She kisses you and stands up, “Stay here. I’ll take care of it,”

With a fling of her fingers the door flies open, and the torches the townspeople are holding are burnt out. She smirks, purple smoke covering the area as she goes through them one by one, some just throwing to the side and others suffering a painful death.

She turns their own weapons against them, their own people against them, and makes them regret everything they’ve ever done.

When she returns to you, you’re still in so much shock and panic you couldn’t tell exactly what she was doing.

“Did you…kill all of them?”

“They got what they deserved for threatening us,” she says nonchalantly. “But we’re not safe here anymore. It’s time to find somewhere new,”

“Okay,” you nod as she pulls you against her. “As long as I’m with you,”

“I’ll always protect you, even when you learn enough to protect yourself,” she kisses your forehead. “Always and forever,”

APPROXIMATELY FOUR CENTURIES LATER

“I’m back, darling!” Agatha calls, shutting the door behind her.

“How’d it go?” you run to her, grabbing her hands.

“Splendid, that poor Wanda already loves her new neighbor!”

“Wow,” you giggle. “You know I must say, this whole living in a sitcom thing isn’t that bad, you look gorgeous in that 50s dress,”

“Oh darling, somehow after all this time you still flatter me,” she pretends to fan herself. “I have to go back over real quick, alright? Gotta give her this spicy magazine,” she holds her hand up in the air and magically forms one in her grasp.

“Ah! Be sure to get some ideas to use on me when you get back,” she laugh.

“Oh I will honey,” she winks, kissing you before going out the door.

You settle on the couch, looking around at your home. Out of all the places you’ve moved to together, this was by far the weirdest. There’s no color, and everyone besides you and Agatha and Wanda are under some kind of mind control.

You never imagined that day all those years ago would bring you here, spending your life with a beautiful witch and being her partner in all things, even sinister ones. But you wouldn’t have it any other way, and you know this strange town will only bring you more opportunities to practice your magic and help Agatha with her plans.

#agatha harkness #wandavision #agatha harkness x reader #agnes x reader #wandavision spoilers #wandavision x reader

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sanderssideswriting · 3 years

Text

ship: prinxiety, background intrulogical

genre: fluff

warnings: swearing, like one sexual innuendo, very breif mention of murder (as a joke, this is fluff after all)

summary: Radio AU where Virgil runs the 11-1 am radio on his college and every night someone calls to complain about his music selections and request disney, and Virgil never plays disney.

Virgil sat in his swivel chair and put on the headphones “sup bitches I’m back and this time with like three monsters because finals are a bitch and sleep can suck my dick. The first song of the night is Lotta True Crime by Peneople Scott. Why? Because I say it is that’s why.” Virgil put the song on and worked on his final project as the songs played.

The phone rang and Virgil groaned and checked the number. This dick again. He picked up and put it on air since people seemed to love listening to him and disney guy argue.

“listen asshole if you want to listen to Disney so fucking badly then apply for a spot and stop calling me.”

there’s a laugh “how about you just play some disney then? if you do I’ll stop calling. Because your music taste sucks.”

Virgil rolls his eyes “bitch apply for an opening and have a disney hour. And let me listen to my music, because not everyone loves fucking disney.”

“Well many people do so why not play one song.”

Virgil snorts “first no, and second if I had to I’d make everyone regret it and play let it go.”

“Let it go is great!”

“bye bye Princey, stop calling”

Virgil hung up “and since Princey called you know what we’re playing? MCR because I know he hates it. So this one’s for you princey, up next after this ad because this place needs money. By the way if you’re not a broke bitch donate because this job is like kinda decent and I like making you all listen to the music I like. Blood by MCR is up next” Virgil played the ad and leaned back in his chair.

“Why do you take his calls if you know he’ll just be annoying?” Janus asks in class.

Virgil shrugs “since it started I get more listeners which is good for the station.”

“I think it’s funny, cause you two have cute pet names for each other, princey and emo nightmare” Remus says.

Virgil elbows him “they’re not pet names.”

“they are,” Janus says, moving so Virgil couldn’t elbow him.

Roman waits to dial the number, he had to admit he sort of enjoyed his and emo nightmare’s conversations, who refused to reveal his name or grade.

At first they’d been annoying and he’d genuinely complained about all the emo music and asking to play disney but it’d soon become a nightly ritual, that had very quickly ruined Roman’s sleep schedule.

He dialed the number “seriously, why all the emo music, emo nightmare?”

“you just answered your own question princey, why the obsession with disney songs princey? See? Sounds fucking stupid.”

Roman sighs dramatically “you wound me emo nightmare. But seriously what’ll it take to get you to play ONE disney song?”

“a hundred grand, that’s how much the station needs to keep running, do that and I’ll play ONE disney song.”

“four.”

“Three songs and a hundred and fifty grand, fifty grand per song. final offer. and I get to pick the songs.’

Roman nods “deal,”

“oh and, you have until the end of finals to get the money donated, and I’ll make the gofundme, not you.”

That’s like a month and a half away Roman thinks I’ll have enough time. “sure thing emo nightmare.”

Roman’s emo hung up. He smiles like an idiot.

“Why not ask him out? it’s clear you’re fond of him” Roman’s roommate Logan says from his side of the room.

“ask out a guy I don’t even know the name of? yeah sure” Roman snorts.

“what? Scared you’ll be rejected? I cannot believe I’m saying this, but Roman I am getting more dick then you have been ever since you started talking to your radio boy.” Logan says in an even tone.

Roman pretends to gag “you don’t need to tell me how much you and my brother have done it Logan, you two being together is enough for me to want to bleach my eyes.”

“you’re no better whenever you’re going out with someone, or even hooked up with a slightly above average guy.”

Remus barged in “Loooo I need help studying.”

Roman stood up “that’s my queue to leave.”

Remus watches Roman go “so what where you two talking about?”

“oh you know, he’s still calling the campus radio station to ask for disney songs” Logan says.

“Wait, Roman is Princey?” Remus asks, he starts laughing

“Yes? You didn’t know?”

Remus cackles “no! oh this is great! My best friend Virgil does the 11 to 1 radio, he’s Emo Nightmare and Roman is his Princey”

“We could set them up, Roam is so lovesick, I swear he’s head over heels for him and he hasn’t even met Virgil” Logan says.

Remus gasps “this is why I love you! Of course we’re going to set them up.”

Logan and Remus came up with a plan, they’d invite Roman and Virgil to a study session and then never showed up, leaving Virgil and Roman to wait.

Virgil puts on his headphones and starts loudly playing panic at the disco and reading over his shitty notes.

Someone taps him on the shoulder “hey can you turn the emo shit down, I’m trying to study and it’s really loud.”

Virgil turns it down a bit “that good?”

he nods “yeah, where you also ghosted for a study session?”

“Yeah I was, my best friend and his nerdy boyfriend where supposed to help me study, they probably forgot all about me.” Virgil says.

“Logan And Remus? Remus is my brother and Logan’s my roommate” Roman says.

“Yeah, well since we’re both here we could study together if you want” please say no please say no.

“Sounds good!” Roman says.

Fuck.

Virgil and Roman studied for awhile and Virgil very slowly started warming up to Roman. “ah shit I have to go, see you round I guess” Virgil says packing up his stuff, he wanted to have some alone time before his shift.

“ok Bye Virgil,” Roman says packing up, he had to go do his own thing, which would probably end up becoming a quick nap before his emo nightmare started his turn being the radio host.

Virgil sat in the chair “what up bitches, so far the goal has 10k, so no disney tonight, or ever because this is on a time crunch and 150k is a fuck ton of money for broke college students. And now onto Fuck you by Lily Allen. Why? Because she’s underrated and because I said so.” Virgil played the song.

Virgil got the call around 12:30 “you’re calling later then usual princey, and no, no disney tonight.”

“Oh I was just about to ask. And also I was asking how to find the gofundme.”

“It’s on the UCLA radio website, can’t miss it. Now let me do my fucking job” Virgil hung up and played MCR as was tradition.

What he didn’t know was Roman recorded the phone call and posted it everywhere he could anonymously and waited.

Virgil checked the go fund me in the morning “it has fifty k already?! What the fuck? Princey what did you do?”

Virgil waited for the nightly call “Hey what the fuck how is the goal at sixty k? How the fuck princey?”

He laughed “I asked the internet for help, I think most of it’s from tiktok, you’re going to have to play disney emo nightmare”

“fuck you princey and your stupid obsession with disney.”

“you have an obsession with my chemical romance and Brendon Urie”

“name three other artists I play on here then bitch.”

“Mother Mother, Lily Allen and as of late Derivakat” Roman says without hesitation.

Virgil was speechless for a second, then hung up. “fucking bitch, you guys know what time it is” he played Teenagers.

A week and a half passed and the funds had slowly been going up, and Virgil and Roman’s calls continued nightly as usual.

Virgil and Roman met up a few times to study for finals, sometimes with Remus and Logan, sometimes without.

the goal just barely missed the end of finals. Virgil smirked “No disney today, or ever because you people missed the goal byyyyy” Virgil checked the go fund me “three thousand dollars. I’d say better luck next time but there won’t be a next time.” he chuckled. The phone rang and Virgil picked up, knowing it was Princey.

“oooh too late princey no disney songs during my shift.”

“you might want to check the gofundme one last time my dear emo nightmare.”

Virgil refreshes the page “first of all, I’m not yours bitch second- what the fuck, how?” the goal had been met.

Roman laughs “play the disney emo. Play. The fucking. Disney.”

Virgil could tell he was gonna gloat so he hung up.

Virgil grumbles and gets the disney queued “ok fine the goal was met, so time for my suffering, I have queued Fixer Upper from Frozen because it’s a shitty song with a shitty message. Make a man out of you because I like Mulan and for everyone’s inconvenience I have How Far I’ll Go so have fun with that stuck in your head.”

Roman was a bit insulted when Emo nightmare hung up on him, so he called him back once the songs had ended “wasn’t so hard was it?”

“for you maybe, it was for me,” Virgil hung up and blocked the number.

Over the Summer both Virgil and Roman found themselves missing their talks. Roman so much so he applied for one of the newly opened spots for the next semester from 2-5 pm.

Virgil drove onto campus at 4, putting on campus radio and was met with disney. the song ended and the new host spoke “and I hope everyone liked that, up now is a short commercial break.”

Virgil nearly swerved off the road and pulled over and called the station.

Roman picked up. “Hey what the actual FUCK?” Virgil says as soon as he does.

Roman laughs “oh how the tables have turned Emo Nightmare”

“I hate you, I fucking hate you what the actual fuck princey”

he laughed more “You yourself said that working here is nice, and there was an opening, so I took it. You should be happy, I mean now I won’t brother you about playing disney.”

Virgil frowned “yeah yeah, whatever princey have fun with that.”

“oh I will emo nightmare, I absolutely will.” Roman hung up feeling happy in a way he hadn’t felt all summer.

Virgil unpacked his stuff in his new dorm, he was a little pissed but also excited. Maybe he and princey would finally meet face to face. Why am I excited about that? I hate him, at the least he annoyed me every day for months, but he did raise a bunch of money. Even if his disney obessed ass is super annoying.

Roman walked in at 6 “hey Virgil, I’m guessing you’re going to be my roommate?”

Virgil looked up from his laptop “I guess, don’t take my monsters from the fridge and we’ll be golden, or blast disney 24/7″

Roman chuckled “what do you have against disney?”

“Micky Mouse killed my parents in front of me after I said that Merida was my favorite princess.” Virgil said dryly.

Roman chuckled “that’s why I dedicated my life to the mouse.”

“That’s why I swore to get my revenge on the mouse.”

“I won’t blast disney 24/7 but you can’t blast your emo music.” Roman says

Virgil snorted “dude I have the worst anxiety I don’t even own a speaker. so you don’t blast your music, I won’t blast mine and we’ll be fine.”

“Deal,”

Roman called that night like always and Virgil was ready “aww Princey, did you miss me that much?”

“not really, but I’m still trying to get you to willingly play a disney song.”

Virgil rolled his eyes “you know what, it’s a new year, time for a new leaf, I’ll humor you princey and play a disney song.”

“wait really?”

Virgil queued up Mad At Disney “no.” he hung up and the song started.

Virgil and Roman went back to their usual routine of lowkey flirting with each other during Virgil’s shift, and sometimes during Roman’s.

They where getting along well as roomates but hadn’t figured out that they where each other’s Princey and emo nightmare.

Somehow he and Princey had gotten into an argument about if Cruella would be a good or bad movie. Roman had hope it would be, Virgil wasn’t so convinced.

“Princey, she is a completely evil character, she can’t be redeemable, she shouldn’t be. She wanted to make puppies into a coat, that’s fucked up. There’s no black and white she’s bad and that’s that.”

“Maybe if you gave the movie a chance!”

“fuck no! did you not hear what I just fucking said?”

“then how about we see it then we can see who’s right?”

“fine, I’m free at three this Satuday.” Virgil said, way too caught up in the moment.

“same, see you then emo nightmare, I’ll be by the doors waiting.”

“fine, but I’m going to be right.”

“then it’s a date!”

“I guess it is!” Virgil hung up.

he didn’t realize he’d said yes to going out on a date with a guy he didn’t even know until the next day.

The whole campus was freaking out about it since the station had blown up quite a bit because of Virgil and Roman’s nightly arguments.

Roman left early, he’d dressed up a bit, and had a disney shirt with a little crown logo on it, it wasn’t that obvious but he figured it’d be telling enough.

Virgil put on a bit more eyeliner then usual and fishnets under his ripped jeans but that was about it, he chose to be petty and waited until about 3:20 to go to the doors where Roman wait waiting.

Virgil walked passed him at first. Roman saw him “emo nightmare?”

Virgil stopped “are you fucking kidding me?” he got a few glares from parents. “You’re princey? my fucking roommate?”

“I did not plan that, but yeah I am, and you’re my emo nightmare.”

Virgil rolled his eyes “still not yours princey, come on the movies about to start.”

They exited the movie and Virgil grinned “I fucking told you it’d be bad, I told you!”

“yeah yeah, you did it was bad. Want to get some coffee?”

“sure, I’ll pay,” Virgil said casually.

Roman grinned “I’ll win you over one day my emo nightmare.”

“stop begging me to play disney music and maybe you will.”

#roman sanders #virgil sanders #sanders sides #thomas sanders #sander sides #prinxiety #roman x virgil #roman sanders x virgil sanders

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yuziyuanapologist · 3 years

Text

i got this as an ask several weeks ago, from the angst prompt list that i cant be bothered finding again, wangxian + “shit, are you bleeding?” unfortunately sometimes tumblr decides that i must pay for my crimes and deleted the ask instead of saving it as a draft. so. but i had the fic saved! so once more with feeling:

it’s here on ao3, 2.9k words, canon divergence from ep33, no big warnings but mostly-non-graphic injury description and also my personal vendetta against the lan clan’s rules.

big thank u to @goldencorecrunches for reading this over and generally being the best

It’s been a strange few days.

As Wei Wuxian wakes up from what feels like a dream, he finds himself somewhere he’s never been - yet somewhere familiar, all the same. The sound of soft notes - the song of clarity - floats through to his consciousness, he turns his head to the side, smiling gently at Lan Zhan, deep in concentration with his fingers on the strings.

It’s not the way he would have chosen, to come here to Gusu, but he could get used to it. He’s certainly grateful for it, brought here safe instead of dragged back to Lotus Pier - or, indeed, slaughtered where he stood.

Zidian gets no more pleasant, in a new body. Sixteen years away clearly has not mellowed his sh- his ex-shidi.

He has questions, though, as to why the sixteen years have worked in what seems like the opposite way on Lan Zhan. Wasn’t he desperate to scold Wei Wuxian before, wasn’t he desperate to - drag him back here to Gusu?

Well, he managed. But it - well, either it was never as bad as he thought it would be in his last life, or Lan Zhan’s intentions are more gentle now. Sweeter. He’s simply playing for Wei Wuxian, dressed all in white save for -

“Shit, are you bleeding?”

The notes come to a discordant halt as Wei Wuxian forces himself to sit. Lan Zhan straightens his shoulders - the shoulders that, down one side, are tainted with a stain of dark red.

His only answer - typical Lan Zhan - is “Mn.”

“Lan Zhan - wh-”

“Do not panic,” Lan Zhan says, even as Wei Wuxian hauls himself to standing, his legs buckling beneath him in protest. Lan Zhan stands in one fluid motion, and crosses the room to take Wei Wuxian’s arm, and lift him back to the bed.

Wei Wuxian protests half-heartedly, but only from sitting - he really is weak in this new body.

“It is nothing unexpected,” Lan Zhan says, quiet resignation filling his voice. “Stay.”

“Lan Zhan-“

But Lan Zhan has already crossed the room, moved behind the screen in the corner, and Wei Wuxian’s vision is fuzzy already from standing so quickly - he can’t protest, or follow - he can only wait.

It’s not long, a few minutes at most, that Wei Wuxian passes with his head in his hands, trying to fit this information in somewhere that makes sense - although, of course, he’s been gone sixteen years. It could be anything.

Lan Zhan emerges, and his robes are once again pure white, as if nothing had ever happened.

He settles back behind his guqin, and his fingers meet the strings once again, soft notes melting into the evening.

"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian speaks up, even though, despite the sixteen years since he's known him - he knows he will give no answer

As predicted, he gets only silence.

"Was it Zidian? Did Jiang Cheng-" he cuts himself off with a shake of his head. That's not how Zidian works, and he knows it. The only likely part of that story is Jiang Cheng, and perhaps - but Lan Zhan was so unconcerned, it can't be a recent injury. And it is nothing unexpected -

"Is it a curse?"

"You ought to have paid more attention in your lectures here."

Wei Wuxian scoffs. “I’ve been dead for sixteen years,” he reminds Lan Zhan. “Even if i had paid attention, would you really expect me to remember?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t respond beyond a slow blink, one that could disguise the edges of a smile - but it’s been sixteen years. It could just as easily be anything else.

After too long in silence, Wei Wuxian lets out a sigh. This isn’t how he wanted to begin to make amends, this isn’t who he would choose to be, on his second chance. Overbearing, insistent, prying. That was for Lan Zhan, that was for sixteen years ago. “Lan Zhan -”

“It does not matter,” Lan Zhan interrupts, and his voice falls to soft tones, evocative of tears that no one has shed. “You are here.”

Blood runs slowly into the water of the Cold Springs. Wei Wuxian watches, his mouth slack with worry. For all that Lan Zhan had acted as though it was nothing to concern himself with - and for all that he had then refused to speak more about it - this wound is deep. It cuts from the top of his shoulder blade, all the way down below the water, and the blood flows thick and steady.

There are other scars, too - long healed, but that might once have been just as deep.

“Lan Zhan -“

As soon as the words sound in the quiet air, Lan Zhan's tranquility is stopped - he flees the water and dresses before Wei Wuxian can even finish the sentence. But - on his way out of the water - he exposes a second wound across his lower back - shallower, than the first, the blood thin and only trickling from the wound - but still it bleeds.

Lan Zhan moves to face him on the bank of the stream, tying his robes closed. He blinks slow, and opens his mouth at the same time as Wei Wuxian. “Wei Y-”

“You said it wasn't anything to worry about,” Wei Wuxian says, barely even trying to keep the accusation out of his voice. “This is - this is -" he lets it rush out in a breath - there aren't words for what he means to say.

"It is nothing to worry about," Lan Zhan repeats, without meeting Wei Wuxian eyes. But there's a pallor to his skin, a weakness to his breath - he takes a step, and stumbles.

"Lan Zhan!"

"I am fine," says Lan Zhan. "My body will adjust."

"What do you mean? Can you not give me a straight answer?"

Lan Zhan's eyes drift shut. "I need to rest." He moves past Wei Wuxian and starts down the path.

Wei Wuxian is not so easily distracted. "You need a doctor, Lan Zhan," he tries to insist, reaching for Lan Zhan's arm, but he's shrugged off in an instant - and though it's weak, Wei Wuxian has almost no choice but to let go. He follows along, though, hand inches from Lan Zhan's arm in case he needs to hold him up.

A minute later, Lan Zhan replies in a low voice. "No doctor of the Cloud Recesses can help."

"What? What do you mean?"

But try as he might, he gets no further answer from Lan Zhan, until they're back in his jingshi and Lan Zhan settles cross legged on the floor, eyes falling shut and yet doing nothing to slow the red bloom on the back of his white robes.

"Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian tries again, but he is ignored. "Lan Zhan, at least -" a solution comes to him. "Do you have a needle and thread, then? Preferably silver, but I mean, I get that we can't all be Wen Qing," he laughs a little to himself, and feels the pull of guilt down at the bottom of his stomach. She's gone, says his chest. Sixteen years gone. And - that's enough time to be fine, says his head.

Lan Zhan doesn't reply.

"I will tear this room apart, Lan Zh-"

"It is against the rules."

"What, to have needle and thread?"

"To stitch the wound."

None of this adds up in the slightest. Wei Wuxian falls into sitting beside Lan Zhan so that he's facing him, leaning his weight on his hands.

And, not that he expected otherwise, but Lan Zhan does not look at him.

"Why -"

Lan Zhan lets out a breath, as close to a frustrated sigh as he has likely ever been.

"You have to know I'll keep asking, Lan Zhan," Wei Wuxian grins, shifting so that he can knock his shoulder into Lan Zhan's. "Just tell me."

"It is a punishment," says Lan Zhan. "The lesson has not been learnt, so the wound will not heal."

Wei Wuxian feels all traces of mirth vanish from his face.

"You mean," he swallows. "The section of the rules that I once asked about - the one that Zewu Jun assured me was about an outdated practice that hadn't been used for seventy years?"

A moment's silence. Then -

"Mn."

"What could you have possibly done - what could you still be -" he's incredulous, disbelieving, but the answer dawns on him before he finishes the sentence. "Oh." He exhales all of the energy, lets his anger become cold and sharp, a means to an end - a flavour of fury that feels, perhaps thankfully, a little less easy than it had been in the last life - but he still knows it well. "It's me, isn't it?"

Lan Zhan's eyes open, falling on Wei Wuxian, softened with worry, creased with pain, and yet truthful in silence.

"Lan Zhan, I can't -"

"Stay," Lan Zhan says - pleads. "My body will adjust."

Already, Wei Wuxian is shaking his head. "How can I -"

"I lost you, before," Lan Zhan says, voice shaking, strangled, almost inaudible. "It would hurt more - to lose you again."

It softens Wei Wuxian's anger, and yet fuels it. "Lan Zhan."

And yet, he knows where his talents lie. In mischief and craft, in deviance and trick.

"I'll make you a deal," he says, and though Lan Zhan's eyes have fallen shut again, there's a shift to his brow, a worry and a resignation. "I'll stay. If - you let me stitch you up."

Lan Zhan swallows. "It is against the rules," he says weakly.

One side of Wei Wuxian's mouth pulls up in disgust. "If you think I ever cared about that, you have the wrong measure of me."

He's awarded with the barest hint of a smile,but still no agreement. Coming to a decision, Wei Wuxian reaches into his robes for a blank talisman, and without casting anything onto it, he places it down on Lan Zhan's lap.

"Hostage situation," he smiles. "Freeze talisman. Lan Zhan, whatever will you do?"

Lan Zhan opens his eyes to glance down. "Wei Ying," he says. "This is blank."

"Mm, pretty sure you can't move, actually, so," Wei Wuxian tails off with a mischievous shrug. "Needle and thread? Or should I go?"

“Don’t go,” is the response, so quiet and desolate that Wei Wuxian almost caves - but this is for Lan Zhan’s own good. “The drawer behind the screen.”

Wei Wuxian smiles, hand to Lan Zhan’s forearm in thanks as he stands.

True to the request, Lan Zhan stays exactly as he is while Wei Wuxian digs around for everything he needs; needle and thread; a basin of water and cloth; bandages, too. He returns to kneel carefully behind Lan Zhan, and hesitates with his hand a finger’s breadth above his shoulder.

“Lan Zhan - can I -” He finds the edge of the robe with his fingers, brushing the skin of his neck.

There’s an almost imperceptible nod - and - a shudder? -as Lan Zhan reaches for the tie of his robes, and loosens it, enough to shrug the robe off his shoulder down to pool at his waist. Half-dried blood sticks the fabric of his undershirt to the wound, and Wei Wuxian tries not to wince along with Lan Zhan as he pulls just a little too roughly, murmuring an apology.

It’s not that he’s ever seen blood before, of course not - but it’s been a long time since he’s seen Lan Zhan in any pain, and it does not get any easier.

“Lan Zhan,” he keeps his voice low as if the volume will also cause pain, and lifts a damp cloth to the site of the wound, to ease the pull. “I know you said - you want me to stay - but -” He finally manages to tug the shirt away, exposing the wound for how deep it truly goes. “I’m not worth this.”

“You are.” It’s a tone that allows no arguments, a certainty that allows no doubt. All Wei Wuxian can do is believe it. Or - well - leave his rebuttal unsaid.

He shakes his head, for himself, since Lan Zhan won’t see it, and sets about cleaning the wound. The flow of blood is steady - not lethal, of course it couldn’t be, if a lesson is supposed to be learnt by the end, but it is enough that, no sooner than Wei Wuxian has wiped it away, more has taken its place, and soon enough he’s left with a blood-soaked cloth and a wound that still pours.

His hands have never been steady, but when sewing up his own wounds back in the Burial Mounds (“Just give me the needle, Wen Qing, I can do it myself”) it hadn’t mattered - because the only pain he was dealing with was his own, and he deserved it - he could barely feel it anyway. Here, now, with Lan Zhan soft before him, hands resting on his knees and shaking every time the wound is disturbed, he needs to be strong, stable, careful.

He lifts the needle. “Lan Zhan - it’ll hurt.”

He thinks, anyway. He thinks it used to hurt.

The only response he gets is a determined hum, the muscles below his fingers tensing.

“Okay,” he says, and sets to work. As he does, he desperately searches for something to distract Lan Zhan with - every time the needle goes in he tenses - slight enough to be unnoticeable, but clear enough that even Lan Zhan can’t hide it.

He could joke about it - well, if you won’t let me leave, this is the only option - or he could talk of something else - but all other subjects have evaded him since he’s been faced with this wound and the second, with the countless other scars, with the bare skin of Lan Zhan’s body, before him, slashed and destroyed for protecting -

“You didn’t only protect me,” he says quietly, distracting himself enough to run his finger over one of the other scars. “These other scars -” he reaches one unlike the others, threaded through with familiar black filaments. “There was one for each of us?”

Lan Zhan lowers his head, but does not respond. It’s close enough to a nod, and Wei Wuxian mimics the gesture, before returning to the task at hand - his eyes falling on the second wound, barely even bleeding, but unmistakably still open. He tries to fit it in, between everything else he knows - but finds no space for it. “And this one? Was there -”

He cuts himself off before he dares to hope. It will only lead to disappointment.

“It -” Lan Zhan exhales shakily. “It’s - different.”

Wei Wuxian can say nothing to the dismissal, knowing that Lan Zan will say no more, but narrows his eyes.

He’s close to finished, now, and the stitches seem to be holding so far. But - it’s not a permanent solution.

He lifts Lan Zhan's undershirt from the floor, and shakes his head at the bloodstain.

"Lan Zhan, where do you keep spare clothes?" he asks. "I'm done here, but you can't exactly put this back on."

"I will -" he starts to stand, but Wei Wuxian catches him by the waist, pulling him back down.

"Stay still," he instructs. "You're injured."

He - for some reason, he can't bring himself to let go of Lan Zhan, now, though he shows no signs of moving again. Instead, he keeps his hands where they are, not holding tight - not even holding, just - touching. His Lan Zhan.

He strokes his hands up and down Lan Zhan's bare skin, testing his limits, his eyes trained carefully on the wound - both to make sure he doesn't disturb, and simultaneously deep in thought about it. Lan Zhan's breath comes unsteady with hands on his skin, but not - if Wei Wuxian is correct - upset.

"It's been sixteen years," Wei Wuxian says absentmindedly. "And you still think I'm worth this."

"Yes," Lan Zhan says, with no trace of doubt. "You are."

Wei Wuxian can't help but let out a huff of laughter, letting his head fall forward to Lan Zhan's uninjured shoulder. "You're so -" he sighs out whatever it was that he was going to say - his mind can't summon the right words anyway.

With his eyes on his - admittedly imperfect - needlework, he conjures other questions.

“This discipline whip that they used,” he says, letting calculating anger control his thoughts but trying his hardest to keep his voice soft. “Where is it kept?”

He’s almost patient, waiting for Lan Zhan to respond, but when more seconds pass, he prompts “Lan Zhan?”

“Why do you ask?”

As if he doesn’t know. “Any talisman, however complex, can be reversed. Even on a spiritual tool.”

“It is against -”

“If you want me to stay,” replies Wei Wuxian. “Then I have to try.”

For a moment, he wonders if Lan Zhan will refuse him. If he will say, after all, that perhaps he has come to his senses, perhaps the rules are more important - but at long last, he sighs.

"The storeroom behind the library pavilion. It is guarded during the day, and warded in the night."

"Good thing I've broken your wards before, then," Wei Wuxian smiles, glancing out at the still bright sky. Later, then. He smiles to himself, and slides his hands forward, pulling Lan Zhan into an embrace - one that he could easily shake off, but doesn’t. In fact, his shoulders, tense as they had been, settle into relaxation, a breath of calm. “I suppose I should get you a shirt.”

Lan Zhan moves his hands to cover Wei Wuxian's, leaning his head back against Wei Wuxian’s shoulder and turning to bury his face into his neck. His eyes are shut - he’s almost smiling.

“Stay,” he murmurs.

Wei Wuxian can't help the quiet laugh that escapes him. "I already said I will, Lan Zhan."

#ah the classic: au with more potential than i have talent #the untamed #the untamed fic #wangxian fic #wangxian #im sorry anon i lost your ask #i hope u see this #mine #fic*

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mrslackles · 3 years

Note

what do you think are gg's biggest flaws?

Ooh, Anon! It’s like you’re in my head.

I’m busy making a video (that will probably never see the light of day) about this -- my distance from the show has really helped with some super objective clarity -- so I’ll use my notes from that to help me answer.

I’ll preface this by saying what I was most shocked by after putting down all the points was that Rio isn’t even mentioned until really far down??

Anyway, let's get into it.

These are Good Girls' greatest flaws in my opinion (and relative to season 1 -- while I think it had its flaws too, the list is far smaller and I think that's a separate post)

1. It didn't stick to its guns

What set this show apart from others in the 'Everyday person does crime (poorly)' genre was its comedic lightness, strong friendship element, relatability and emphasis on girl power.

a) By season 2, the lightness was already slowly disappearing to make way for season 3's darkness. (Quite literally; this show said sunlight scenes for WHO.) It also stopped being as fun. Remember how it genuinely used to be fun? I mean let's not forget The Best Scene Ever where Ruby shoots Big Mike by accident and we all laughed our asses off. (Compare and contrast to a similar-in-tone-and-context scene -- or even the whole episode -- like Boomer popping up behind them as Rio's package in season 3.) I think season 3 had some great lines and laughs, but in general, the fun element was completely missing for me.

b) As was the friendship. We already know Annie and Ruby basically became Beth's backup dancers in season 2, but at least then they still seemed to have some type of agency. In season 3, they rarely question Beth's (truly questionable) decisions, don't talk to her about shit like why she's still with her horrible husband and have very few true friendship moments as they did in season 1.

c) Which made it less relatable, but what also contributed was the major plot holes (it's less easy to relate when you're constantly having to remind yourself to suspend your disbelief). And, to be honest, their stupid actions. Just the most common-sense things weren't followed, like not taking your children to a crack den or not putting a hit out on a gang leader. It's frustrating watching a TV show -- where characters are supposed to learn things, have arcs and improve over time -- and feeling like you have more logical sense than all the main characters in every scene. (WHO would think a hitman was going to use a sniper rifle on people in broad daylight on the side of the road???)

d) You don't have to look any further than the title or the stans who shout "THE SHOW IS ABOUT THE GIRLS" -- or, hell, the first 10 seconds of the show where Sara is literally talking about the glass ceiling -- to know that the main characters being women is very important to the show. If not formally feminist, it was at least supposed to be empowering or feel like "girl power" (a term I hate, but we won't get into that now).

And I think it did it pretty well in season 1 -- it actually played on my favourite theme of the show, which is the world's perception of these women being what ultimately allows them to get away with so much. (Rife with opportunities for commentary about white privilege, but also a genius way to upend patriarchal beliefs.) But more and more it seemed like the show was asking you to accept empowerment as simply "these things are being done by women, yay".

And, well.

2. Its marketing

I'll keep this one short because I think we all know how messed up this situation is. Basically they're selling a show (every week!) that they're not making while ignoring all feedback on every social media platform. Which brings us to...

3. The marriage of Death

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times -- Beth's character development starts with getting rid of Dean. Her growth is stunted by him on multiple fronts and it's frustrating to viewers since she's constantly put forth as the main character. Not to mention how the audience, separately from Beth, was originally conditioned to see Dean as the scum of the earth (think of scenes like him crashing his car because he was perving on a woman jogging) so keeping them together is really... a choice. To actively root for this marriage (which seems like what the show wants, at least for the protracted moment) means either thinking Dean is a great person (which, as I said, we've only seen the opposite of) or believing he's all Beth deserves. Which leads me to...

4. Beth's (socio)path(y)

Is sociopath a 'good' word? Probably not. Have I seen dozens upon dozens of posts talking about whether Beth is one? Yes. And I see it from a huge variety of people -- from viewers who just binged the show last weekend to those who've been watching for years, the question keeps coming up. And I entirely blame the writing of the show that, by the way, I don't believe is deliberately creating Beth to get this reaction. I think she's written (and, to an extent, acted) in a way that is much too aloof and I'm not convinced it's meant to come off as cold and unfeeling as it does. Everything else leads me to believe that the audience is supposed to root for Beth, but it's just so difficult.

Beth does a lot of messed up shit that requires dialogue to sympathise with her and the inner workings of her mind, but in the later seasons Beth rarely gets to express herself verbally. And every time she does get to speak about her emotions, the dialogue is a pick-your-own-adventure between "She's in so much denial", "This person feels no emotions" and "I'll go find an analysis/fic later to explain this" (scenes like "Nothing" or "I was just bored"). Compare and contrast with some of the great scenes in season 1 where she emotes, like her paralysing shock after they first rob the store or admitting she enjoys crime, or (one of my favourites!) the one in the park where she's mimicking the other mothers beside her.

5. Brio

I said in the beginning that I was shocked Rio doesn't get mentioned until this point and that's because I've always felt like he was an integral part of the show. When people say the show is about the girls, they're truncating -- the show is about the girls getting into crime. That crime is represented by Rio over and over again -- they never bring in another criminal at his level (which is another one of its flaws, but that's also a different post); Rio is it.

And though I stand by Rio's importance, the truth is that Brio isn't as essential to the show, by which I mean that if all of the above were done well, it wouldn't be as sorely missed. In lieu of riveting plot, a fun friendship, character development and empowerment, most viewers have glommed onto Brio like a lifeboat (or ship, heh).

Unfortunately it's also what the show has most stubbornly refused to develop significantly.

It's honestly a toss-up for why I feel Brio is a flaw: is the flaw that they got together? That they never got together well enough? That the writing keeps bringing in these 'chemistry-filled' scenes that are ultimately filled with air?

I don't know. Maybe all of them; maybe just one, depending on the day.

6. Its criticism falls flat without intersectionality

This is a big one because Good Girls is *trying* to do something very clever. As mentioned previously, my favourite theme of the show is how the women's apparent innocence/vulnerability in the eyes of society is their biggest strength. The show plays with this and other interesting themes with varying levels of success, but ultimately they all fall a little flat when they don't feel intersectional.

When Ruby gets sidelined. When Turner, who sees and all but calls out by name Beth's privilege, is portrayed as the villain. When Rio is told he's gonna "pop a cap" in his young child's "ass". When the racist grandma becomes a sympathetic character whom we must later grieve. (And she really didn't have to be racist, now that I think about it? It was just that one line for laughs and that was it.) When, despite the real-world implications, Dean can loudly announce in a store that he's buying a gun to kill someone with and the show just glides past it. When Ruby has to grovel for forgiveness from Beth for trying to protect her husband and family from the system, with no acknowledgement from Beth about how their realities are different. When Rhea gets booted off the show as soon as she's done serving Beth's plot. When Rio gets treated like a prostitute for absolutely no reason. (Oh, and is accused of raping Beth and is literally spoken of as an animal and starts only existing in zero dim lighting as a one-dimensional stereotype... the list goes on.)

7. PR/The actors

I'll risk my life here to sprinkle this in because I do think it's a massive problem. The Manny/Christina of it all is just the tip of the iceberg (although wtf Good Girls? There's nothing you could do to get these two into an interview together??). The main actors do the bare minimum to promote the show and it's weird. I also think it's the height of unprofessionalism to keep characters on the show against the wishes of the majority of the audience just because you enjoy their actors (Boomer confirmed; Dean highly suspected). While, on the flip side of the coin, limiting a character's screentime because you aren't best buddies with them. Having less and less Rio when he's such a fan favourite is dumb; as is not including him in any series marketing material. It feels personal and that isn't how a TV show should be run.

8. The entire hair and wardrobe department needs a stern talking-to

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restingdomface · 4 years

Text

Lan Wangji makes extremely deadpan videos of his daily life with Wei Wuxian and their kids and nephews (and nieces if JC and JYL had more). This would include:

*shows a video of LWJ staring out the window for a solid thirty seconds, face entirely unchanged and somewhat disappointed, turns camera around to show Wei Wuxian and the kiddos putting mentos in soda bottles and trying to chuck them at each other, camera pans back to his face, still entirely devoid of emotion*

That one time Jin Ling got stuck up a tree and Wei Wuxian tried to get him down and also got stuck up there and now the other kids are looking for a ladder while LWJ just watches them from the patio, drinking tea. The kids finally give up and shamefully come to LWJ and ask him for help, he gets his husband and nephew down without a word.

The one where he buried 5yo A-Yuan in a pile of bunnies and got scolded by Lan Xichen for it because they might bite him if they get annoyed with him.

There is an entire compilation of rabbits that won’t leave him alone. Climb into his lap. Follow him with every step. Get excited when he comes outside. Hear a guqin and start looking for him. Just. He’s the rabbit whisperer. One of the black ones is just about always with him.

Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian interacting in any capacity is going to involve a lot of hitting each other and pushing each other over. Only-child kids think they hate each other, but people with siblings are all ‘no no, siblings are just Like That’. People think Yanli is all innocent till they realize she def only tells them to stop when she thinks they might actually get on each other’s nerves. She’s in the ‘boys will rough house and probably only have one collective braincell’ category.

People won’t stop asking him if he speaks so he vaguely makes mentions of having extremely low verbility. They ask if he does sign and he’s not really sure how (lol cause words hard) to explain to them that sign doesn’t really help when the issue is more of him not having much to say tbh. This is apparently the wrong thing to say because then people start being all ‘yeah I get you, I’m pretty dumb too, at least you’re pretty’ and he’s just sorta sitting there with this smacked fish look on his face while WWX can’t stop laughing next to him at the very idea of someone calling his husband slow. Wow. LWJ just sorta finally gets out that he has like two degrees and teaches giqun lessons and it’s amazing. The kids find out about it and can’t stop laughing for hours.

“Hey, why did you name your son ‘sorrow and longing’?” *commense 10 minute video of that time Wei Wuxian got arrested for something to do with a satanic ritual and that’s when LWJ ended up with custody of his adopted son for the next three years and he was in a really angsty mood tbh so it just kinda happened* not a single commenter expected that, even less so when he mentions that they weren’t even together at that point

Films what the viewers think is a prank at first, where he pours a dangerous amount of chili powder into a mug of hot chocolate (with a completely straight face) and then brings it to WWX who takes a drink and makes a dreamy little sigh and goes ‘you always know how to make it just like I want it’ and no one is sure how to react to this video. It’s like watching someone peel and eat a lemon.

You know that video of the girl with the deadpan voice saying she went downstairs to take a shower and there was something brown in the bottom of the tub but it turned out to be potatoes and she’s all ‘not a problem I was expecting, but a problem I can handle’? Okay so that’s how he talks in every video. WWX hands him a baby and he talks to them exactly like that. People ask if he’s good with kids and WWX is all ‘yeah, he’s not just a rabbit whisperer, he’s a baby whisperer too, he’s super great with kids’ *shows LWJ talking to a baby in That Voice while the baby looks at him in utter adoration*

“What’s it like growing up gay? Do you ever get shit for it?” LWJ.exe has stopped working, he has only met one straight couple the same age as him and they’re his sister in law. His brother has three boyfriends, one of which is his brother-in-law. He doesn’t know what a het-er-o-sexual is and he doesn’t want to. Pretty sure his uncle is acearo and hasn’t seen his parents in like 20 years.

LWJ: ‘I apologize for being so emotional in my last video.’ *viewers scrambled to find what video he meant because they ain’t ever seen that man emotional before but end up finding a video where Sizhui told him he loved him and called him papa and gave him a hug while WWX filmed, you can barely see LWJ’s left eye twitching and he pets Sizhui’s head for a moment* viewers are very confused on how this constitutes emotionalism.

Viewers ask to see his brother ‘you know, the one who apparently has three boyfriends’ and LWJ posts a video of LXC passed out on a couch with like three fully grown men all in various states of sliding off onto the floor while the teens play a game of ‘who can stack the most random objects on uncle’s bodies without them waking’ because apparently LWJ and WWX were gone for a weekend and the uncles were supposed to watch the kids (like, all ten of them probably, there’s probably a lot of kids) and it’s Sizhui filming the whole thing cause he’s the ‘good one’ and never does bad things. But he’s also like Auntie Yanli and is totally gonna egg them on from the sidelines.

WWX hands LWJ literally any food and LWJ will eat it all with a completely straight face but as soon as WWX is turned around LWJ is chugging a glass of milk with a look of death on his face. The kiddos straight up can’t stomach his cooking.

😭 someone asks why their hair is all so long and LWJ puts up a video of chatty adorable Sizhui braiding WWX’s hair while he tells him about his day at school. It’s. Too. Cute.

The never ending debate on if LWJ’s deadpan personality/speech is acting or not. No matter how much everyone assures them he’s really just Like That people just aren’t convinced.

Someone points out several times that in their house they have a room with a satanic symbol on the door. That’s just WWX’s home office it’s all good. This is treated as ‘lol WWX is so dramatic’ for like four whole weeks before LWJ posts a video of Sizhui standing outside the office looking nervous. ‘What’s wrong?’ He says. ‘Dad called me into his office.’ Sizhui replies. ‘WWX must be a very strict father,’ the viewers think. That’s not it. That’s not it at all tbh. That video got flagged on like four different platforms and kept getting removed for graphic images and half their viewers don’t. Want. To know. What happened. In that office. (WWX doesn’t even see what the big deal was, that goat was dead when he bought it shut up.)

The others do videos sometimes too lol. Videos include

Jin Ling’s compilation of ‘Mom, what’s for dinner’ and the answer is Always Lotus root and pork rib soup. Someone asks ‘lol she must make that often’ and JL is all ‘lol often, fairly sure she got same-food syndrome, it’s always soup’.

Lan Sizhui at like 17 years old: The one true secret I’ve never told my dads? My most shameful lie? Rabbits aren’t my favorite. My favorite is butterflies. *proceeds to cuddle a bun* I’m sorry Mister Bun, but you just aren’t nearly as pretty as butterflies.

Shaky video of someone sitting on the couch, pointed at NMJ: Brother, while you’re away on vacation with your boyfriends, I don’t plan on leaving this spot for even a minute. NMJ: Oh yeah? What’ll you do when you have to use the bathroom? NHS: Listen, I found a guy on Craig’s List who’s exact fetish is lazy young men who refuse to move and also diapers exist and he’ll be my slave for the week if I let him change me. NMJ: ...I’m taking you with me on vacation. NHS: Yay! NMJ: I’m also taking your phone away. NHS: -wait, no- NMJ: Too late.

Jin Ling: JiuJiu, I spilt soda on your Valentino white belt. Jiang Cheng: *incomprehensible sputtering* -soda on my Valentino white belt-!

Sizhui: *brings Jingyi a bowl of food* Here. Jingyi: Thank you! *takes a bite, face falls in terror, gives Sizhui a betrayed look* Sizhui: Dad’s worried I’m getting sick, he said this would clear my chest cold up. He didn’t consider what horrible things it would do to my bowels instead. Please eat it, he gets sad when I don’t finish what he makes. Jingyi: *glaring* Just dump it down the garbage disposal! Sizhui: *def has a fever if he didn’t think of that* Oh. Good idea.

LWJ: *swaying in place* WWX: This bitch drunk as hell. LWJ: I’m. Gonna comit. A crime. WWX: *crying a little* I love drunk hubby times. A full shot of vodka and he’s not gonna remember any of this. Hey kids, I’m taking Papa on a walk! Sizhui’s in charge!

Zizhen: *sitting quietly on the couch while LSZ, LJY and JL all argue behind him somewhere, covering his mouth with a slightly horrified look* Jingyi: I mean, that’s not fair at all! Who HASNT made out with their cousin at one point or another? Ling: ... Sizhui: You said you’d never bring that up again please shut up. Ling: ...!!!!!! Zizhen: Amazing.

That one time the kiddos hypnotized Jin Ling into thinking he was a kitten. The adults all thought it was really weird that he was finally going through the whole ‘pretending to be an animal’ phase at like ten, but then the kiddos fessed up to learning how to hypnotize and they aren’t sure how to fix it. WWX instigated a rule that no brainwashing is allowed outside his office from now on.

People ask how WWX and LWJ met and it’s told from the POV of Lan Qiren who progressively getting drunker as he tells the story of the terrible high school romance that he had to watch between bad boy WWX and his precious baby angel nephew that made him consider quitting and how no one believed them when they insisted they didn’t get together till after WWX got out of jail for the cow incident.

#the grandmaster of demonic cultivation #the untamed #mdzs #incorrect untamed quotes #incorrect mdzs #wei wuxian #lan wangji #wangxian #jiang cheng #lan sizhui #juniors #lan jingyi #lan juniors #jin ling #nie mingjue #nie huaisang #nie brothers #ouyang zizhen #lan qiren

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peggyrose19 · 3 years

Text

Picture Frames and Ocean Waves

Heeheehee we’re back with some St. Tweedle angst, part 1. This is not related to the newest chapter, although there will be something coming at some point related to that, don’t you worry :) Anyway, here’s Saint looking back on the day Luke left for university.

song for this fic: Castaway - 5SOS (i did say ages ago it had rk vibes)

characters by @lumosinlove. tagging @im-oknutzy-trash and @wonder-womans-ex my st. tweedle partners in crime.

Saint stared unseeingly out at the ocean. The waves crashed and melted into each other, the same grey-blue as the sky. It was cold out, what passed for winter fast approaching as September came to a close, but Saint didn’t notice the chill in the air. Nor did he particularly care. Luke’s house loomed behind him, empty save for the housekeeper, busy somewhere in the heart of it. His mom was somewhere; Saint didn’t particularly care. He cared far more about where Luke was, hundreds of miles away at university.

That last summer had crept up on them fast. Saint had always known he’d never be able to leave the island, at least not for long. And he’d always known Luke would never be able to stay. He had just never imagined it hurting quite so much.

“Hey, Tweedle,” Saint sang, pulling himself easily through Luke’s open window. He left it open a lot these days.

Luke didn’t look up from his laptop sitting before him on his bed. “Hey.”

Saint peered over his shoulder. “What’re you working on?”

“Nothing,” he replied tersely. “‘M waiting.”

“For?” Saint prompted. It was like pulling teeth with him sometimes.

“Decisions come out today. This is my first choice school.” He gestured to the screen, and Saint squinted at it.

“Oh.” Saint felt something welling up in him, some foreign feeling that choked the air from his lungs and made his heart constrict painfully. He decidedly did not like it.

“Yeah. Should be out in-” Luke glanced at the clock- “two minutes.”

“So why are you looking now?”

Luke glanced away from the screen to glare at Saint, who just smirked at him.

“I hate it when you make sense,” he grumbled. Saint grinned, and leaned down to press a quick kiss to Luke’s lips.

“Bet I can distract you for the next, hmmm 90 seconds,” he murmured. Luke looked as though he wanted to protest, but Saint cocked an eyebrow, and he seemed to give in, tilting his chin up again to catch Saint’s lips once more.

Saint had always loved kissing Luke. He was warm, comforting. Familiar. Even that first time, pushed against the wall in this very room, wrists pinned under Luke’s strong grip. Or the second time, being pelted with wind and rain in the middle of the ocean, torn apart by the storm too soon. They’d kissed many times since then, more than kissed, and yet it never got old for Saint, never lost the magic and comfort Luke brought.

“Mmph, gotta check,” Luke muttered against his lips, pulling Saint from his thoughts. Saint rolled his eyes, Luke already turned away. He raised a hand to his lips, the taste of Luke still on his tongue.

He watched lazily as Luke refreshed the page, logging in once more with a frustrated groan. But his fingers froze on the keyboard as it loaded and a letter popped up on the screen.

“I got in,” he breathed. “I got in.” He turned to Saint with wild eyes, a smile alighting his face, and Saint didn’t know what to do with that.

He tried for a smile. “Well, of course you did Tweedle.”

In the next moment, Saint found himself in Luke’s arms, falling awkwardly back against the mattress. Luke held him close, and as his body shook, Saint realized Luke was laughing.

“Why are you laughing?” Saint asked, pulling back as best he could to see Luke’s face. His eyes held more joy than Saint had never seen in them.

“Cause I fucking got in! I’m going to fucking university, Saint!”

“It means you’re leaving.”

That was the thing, wasn’t it? Luke was always going to leave, the island, his family, Saint. For a while, Saint had had a chance at keeping him. With his father in prison, Saint knew there was no chance of him leaving. But then he was released. And then arrested once more. And Luke had given up.

And Saint had lost his chance.

He wanted Luke back. He wanted him home and safe and in his arms, not off at some fucking university with strangers and a new city and not him. Of course, Saint would rather be caught dead than admit that.

He’d said it anyway. And then Luke had left.

The sun had long since set when Luke said goodbye. Saint stood beside him on the beach, watching the calm waves lap at the shore. He held tightly to Luke’s hand.

“I don’t want you to go,” Saint had whispered, words getting washed away by the breeze. But Luke heard him. He always did.

“I know.”

Saint hugged wryly. “You’re still going though. Aren’t you?”

“I have to, Saint. I can’t go back now, it’s too late. I leave in the morning.”

Saint squeezed his eyes shut, fighting down the fear and anger and pain that threatened to well up and spill out, refusing to show all the terrible weakness he always kept hidden.

But Luke always seemed to know, as he reached out to cup Saint’s cheek, warm and comforting. Saint turned into his hand, but said nothing, refusing to look at him. He knew he’d only find pity and sorrow in those eyes, and that would only make him break.

“Saint. Look at me.” Those nimble fingers lifted his chin until their eyes met. Saint immediately wanted to look away. “Don’t be mad at me. Please.”

“Why not?”

“Because, Saint! Not all of us can just stay on this fucking island! I get that you have some twisted need to stay here, but I can't. Okay? I am not you. I have to get out. And this is my way.”

Saint stared at Luke with wide eyes. He rarely snapped. Last time had been almost a year ago, at James’ house, right before that cursed storm had hit.

“Fine.”

And he turned and walked away.

When Saint looked back on it, he wished he hadn't left. He wished he’d stayed, or turned around as Luke called after him.

He wished a lot of things.

With a sigh, he turned his back on the familiar sea and walked across the Deveaux’s perfectly manicured lawn towards the house. He crept around back, to the familiar window always lit with golden light. Luke had left it open.

Saint eased the window open and climbed inside, flipping on the lamp on Luke’s bedside table. The room filled with light, reminding Saint of late summer nights spent lying on Luke’s bed together, sometimes reading, sometimes kissing.

With a sigh, he turned to Luke’s desk, and the scant few items left there. A lamp, a few pens and pencils, various knick-knacks, a few books, some photos. Saint’s gaze stopped on them. The top one was a picture Luke had taken back in February. It was of him, flipping off the camera with a smirk.

He remembered that day. The two of them had fallen asleep on the beach that night, woken at dawn by the sunlight. Saint had sand in his hair, blown to the side by the wind. Luke had smiled at him for a long moment, sun lighting up his eyes, before pulling out his nearly-dead phone and snapping a picture. But not before Saint flipped him off.

He hadn’t known Luke printed it out, wasn’t actually sure how he’d done it. There were others, of the beach, of the lacrosse fields, even one of the two of them together. He didn’t know why he’d left them there either. Or maybe he did.

Saint felt… lonely, without Luke. He had no anchor anymore, left adrift at sea, abandoned. He couldn’t help but compare Luke to his mom, leaving him behind with barely a backward glance, never giving him a second thought. It hurt, in a way he hated himself for, hated his mom and Luke and everyone else for. Not that they’d truly done anything wrong. Or maybe they had. Saint didn’t know anymore.

The morning Luke left, Saint waited for him at the docks. Boat was the only way off the island, with the airstrip long out of commission. Saint had watched Luke and his mom pull up, her car looking shiny and new as it always did. Luke had climbed out with barely a second glance, tugging his backpack and suitcase out of the trunk. Saint guessed one didn’t need much at university.

Luke didn’t see him, but that was intentional. Saint didn’t want to be seen. The night before seemed so far away, so different from the morning. He didn’t know how they’d gotten here, avoiding each other, hating each other. Well. Pretending to hate each other. Saint could never truly hate him.

With a sinking feeling in his chest, Saint watched Luke climb onto the boat and disappear below deck. He felt like a cliché movie character, waving their lover off to war or some shit, but he couldn’t bring himself to look away. Even with Luke out of sight, that pull stayed, long after the boat pulled away and became a small dot on the horizon.

He had turned away angrily, pretending the tears in his eyes were from the wind or the pollen.

His heart had cracked, the day Luke left. A part of it sailing off to some other country, some other continent. These days Saint couldn’t quite decide if he wanted it back or not. He wanted Luke back, more than he truly cared to consider. But he had given Luke a part of himself knowing full well what it might mean, what it might lead to. And he’d done it anyway, choosing to trust him in what may just have been the stupidest move in his life.

One day, he’d come back. As Saint sank into Luke’s desk chair, the picture in his hands, he could only hope that was true.

#hehe pain #angst #st. tweedle #luke x saint #memories #saint remembering luke leaving #you're going to be the death of me #castaway #lumosinlove #relic keel

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doorsclosingslowly · 3 years

Text

This Is the Time of Our Great Undoing

“Do you think Kaz could fuck someone in a full-body bondage suit?” Jesper whispers, more to distract Inej from what’s on the screen than anything else, but still—the idea won’t leave Kaz alone.

5.8k | modern AU | Kaz[/&]Jesper, part of a polycule

content note: despite the premise this is about cuddling, gambling addiction and existing during climate change

It starts the way most things used to start: with all of them piled onto ancient couches on the fifth floor of an otherwise empty building on the edge of Amsterdam, also called the Slat. These days, it’s harder and harder to get everyone together. Nina and Matthias are both in Rotterdam now, doing associate degrees that Kaz doesn’t care about. Wylan’s got room and board and a plan for the future and a social worker, and she already disapproves of Jesper as a bad influence so it’s not worth it, generally, for Wylan to come back to his old squat and hang out with the whole gang of ex- and current reprobates.

And Inej—fuck, Kaz wishes she was just a little less righteous, less concerned with how the world’s going to shit. She’s faced off against more cops now than he has, probably. Water cannons and charging horses and riot shields. She knows criminals all over the country, Europe, probably the world—but they’re the kind of criminals with morals and worthless targets, with bandanas and badly sewn patches, who will talk about Federici and sea levels and the Invisible Committee and use value if you don’t leave quickly enough. The kind that live on trees, as Inej’s going to do in a few days. The kind that don’t make any money. The kind that have even less of a chance of making it out of a job alive and free than Kaz does—and with the enemies she’s talking about, politicians, banks, Shell, he doesn’t even know if he’ll be able to extort her out of jail next time.

For now, though, they’re all together in the big room, watching some ancient movie on the massive 8k screen with mood lighting, etc, the works, that’s in the Slat courtesy of some MediaMarkt manager desperate enough to save her marriage to bribe Kaz into silence, but not so desperate she wouldn’t fuck two other women in the breakroom.

It’s impossible to know whose fault it is that they’re currently watching Pulp Fiction.

Kaz is inclined to blame Jesper, because most things are his fault in some way or another, and he’s supplying the login data for an old uni flatmate’s streaming accounts, which is where they found that film, front and centre, paid to rent until tomorrow. Who even pays for films? If that’s the calibre of people they send to university these days, it’s no wonder the planet’s going to the dogs. Jesper, though, swears he wanted to watch some goofy horror flick, so he’s splitting the blame with Nina and Matthias: Matthias, for growing up in a cult and having never heard of what’s apparently a film classic and mentioning that to Nina, who of course cooed over her boyfriend and insisted on it, even though actually none of them have watched it before either so it’s not like it’s an important cinematic milestone. Or just not b horror, crime, some weird arthouse thing with complicated morality… It’s weird and has crime but there is nothing to figure out, so Kaz is bored. It’s Inej’s fault, because instead of vetoing it she said yes, just because she has a heart-shaped soft spot for Nina. Wylan could have done his oh I’m still an innocent barely-two-years not a minor this looks bloody thing, and Kaz might not even have mocked him this time if he'd insisted on Jesper’s pick instead just so he could hide in Jesper’s arms for the most minor decapitations.

Jesper’s been talking through the whole film. Kaz got used to that a long time ago: the landing and failing of small non-sequitur jokes like rain against the window, whispered to Wylan who’s cuddled into his side on the left, or to Inej who’s burrowing under Jesper’s outstretched right arm. Sometimes Jesper thinks a quip will land better with Nina, so he shouts it over to the futon where she and Matthias are always just shy of engaging in heavy petting, and the really mean and bleak jokes he saves for when he’s made eye contact with Kaz.

Now, though: in this scene Mr Motorcycle and the gang boss are captured in a pawnshop and dragged into the basement, and Gang Boss gets raped. Inej’s hand is white-knuckled on Jesper’s arm, and Jesper’s talking non-stop. He’s talking about the flooding, and asking whether Inej thinks Doggerland will happen again but here, soon, you can never know when the scientists are so wrong about the speed of climate change, and apparently it all flooded in a day because something broke off Norway, and then he abruptly pivots to some demo where he bashed in a shop window and got new shoes, and then if she’s got dates for more street fights because then he’s in but please, don’t trick me into another book club, I don’t care about why the cops are bad I already know I just want to hit them—not topics Kaz would have chosen, exactly, but he’s rooted in his red leather armchair off to the side, not even able to hold her for comfort, not like Jes does now, and why didn’t they think to look up the content beforehand, why did they assume it was tame just because it’s an old film—and then, long after it’s over, Jesper idly asks, “Do you think Kaz could fuck someone in a full-body bondage suit?”

Wylan groans. Kaz wishes a sound existed that could express his own current emotion.

“You saw the guy, right?” Jesper turns over to Wylan, while still stroking Inej’s hair. “There was no skin on him. All leather. And that’s the trigger, so—might solve all our problems. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it before!”

“I don’t see a huge difference,” Nina snipes. “Kaz is already in all-black, with gloves. Though I guess, that hood would hide his atrocious haircut…”

“Stop being so mean to Kaz, Jesper,” Matthias mumbles. “Although he does deserve it.”

Kaz downs his entire glass of vodka. When he tops his drink up for the second time—he exed the first refill right in the kitchen—he brings the bottle and some maracuja juice over and refills Jesper’s, too, because Jesper’s been anxiously glancing over at him, every moment he thinks Kaz has turned his head away, since he shot his stupid mouth off and actually, it’s—Kaz isn’t thinking about it now but it just might—maybe it could work—well, he fills up the glass to stop Jesper from worrying himself into yet another mental crisis and also so he can bend over Jesper’s ear and whisper lovingly, “I’m going to make the leather for the suit out of your skin.”

“We should look for an Ed Gein film next!” Jesper laughs, much more brightly than the joke warrants, and Kaz refuses to interpret the look on his face.

By the time Kaz gets back to the Slat, on a day roughly three months later, it’s long past two in the morning. He’s in a foul mood: of course Haskell won’t even reimburse him for the taxi he had to take because he missed the last metro. Of course he just told Kaz to take a night bus. Haskell won’t even apologize for the last minute details he wants included in his casino’s tax returns. The old man’s not even mentally capable of understanding the extra work he caused. Yes, Kaz is good at filing taxes creatively, exactly tailored for the business to pay nothing whatsoever and meticulous enough to never arouse any suspicion, but that takes work. Things have to balance. Haskell thinks Kaz just has to press a button, and that he’s paying Kaz so he doesn’t have to press the button himself, and that it’s only worth it because he doesn’t want to sully his mind with ‘the Spreadsheet Program’. Which is also why he’s loaning Kaz out to a friend of his, which he just remembered to mention today, for that guy’s mattress store slash money laundering business, so that’s even more work for nowhere near enough money.

Sometimes, Kaz amuses himself with the idea of sneaking in small ‘mistakes’. Enough for even the stupidest tax official to unravel the whole sordid scheme and land Haskell in prison for tax fraud, whereupon he’ll also be discovered to be involved with drug smuggling, blackmail, murder, … none of which will ever trace back to Kaz. But the one time he was livid enough to try, nothing happened. He’ll never manage to plunge the true depths of stupidity of an average bureaucrat, apparently, and is thus doomed to failure.

And anyway, it’s good regular money for little work. Usually. He can’t really complain. Especially not to his friends, because three are going legit, Inej will just rant about the uselessness of defrauding the Belastingdienst for a few measly million euros a year when the world’s being set on fire every day, and Jesper’ll tell him to quit, again, because they live in a squat after all. It’s not like they’re paying rent. Jesper’s never heard of forethought, or gratitude. He doesn’t know how many of his bills Kaz has paid off.

Kaz’s leg aches after the climb to the third story. Two more to go. As usual, right at this point he remembers the joke Jesper made eight months ago about fooling someone into installing a stair lift, and as usual, he dismisses it in disgust after two more steps. Stomps harder on the next flight of stairs, with grim satisfaction at the shooting pains in his knee. He doesn’t need help. He doesn’t need to move to a house with a working lift, and he doesn’t need a stair lift, either. Fuck you, Jesper. I’m the actual functional adult with a job in this household. I don’t need a stair lift.

That’s what he would throw at Jesper’s head, but it’s nearly three o’clock, and Jesper’s probably out. Over at Wylan’s, if he knows what’s good for him, but given how evasive he’s been all week, how manic… Inej’s still camping high up in some forest to save the frogs or something, but no news there is supposed to be good news. If the cops had chucked her off a tree house, it would have been on tv. About everything else, he can worry after he’s slept.

He doesn’t bother with the lights in his room. The streetlight coming in through his open curtains is more than enough, and anyway, he found the empty tenement he turned into the Slat five years ago, fully moved down here three years ago when he met Jesper, and he knows every single thing in his room by heart. The antique dresser he made Jesper and Matthias carry up with the threat of cutting off a finger for every scratch it received is next to the door, the place where he leaves his gloves and wallet and phone and cane. The coat rack beside it, where the hangers for his suit are, then the hamper, and at the foot of his bed the long black linen nightgown that Jesper’s never, ever allowed to see, and—

There’s a black shape on top of his bedcovers, Kaz realizes when he’s pulled on his nightgown.

Kaz takes his cane back. He hasn’t made any new enemies recently as far as he’s aware—none who know his name—but he was careless, brutal, desperate when he was a lone kid getting by on the streets, and those victims had gangs, families, business partners. Just because no-one’s ever traced little Kazzie the bastard rabid dog back to the Slat-that-wasn’t-then doesn’t mean a thing. The fact that the friends he started collecting press-ganged him into doing more behind-the-scenes embezzlement and fewer turf wars because ‘they’re watching us, they have all our faces and fingers and DNA on file and cameras everywhere and did you hear about that informer having kids with the activist he spied on?’ or the more pragmatic, ‘If you don’t stop fucking up your leg on purpose I’m going to send you to a kink party you fucking masochist’…

None of it means safety, not really, and Kaz is glad he’s alone now. They’ve all moved on, and even Jes… well, if he’d been here tonight then the whole squat would be trashed because Jesper doesn’t come quietly. And now, if he comes back to find Kaz gone or his throat slit… Jesper’s going to fucking collapse. He’s been one phone call away from going hysteric all week. Who knows, though—he has Wylan now, and maybe it’ll be the push he needed, the path none of them could ever find, to get his life back on a solid track.

All of that is presupposing that Kaz loses, of course.

And he does not intend to.

The weird black ninja on Kaz’ bed hasn’t reacted yet. They’re curled into a foetal position and they’re snuffling, quietly, because they’re asleep.

Not even assassins dressed up as b movie henchmen expect the toll taken by Per Haskell’s technical naïveté and utter disrespect for Kaz’ work-life balance, apparently. He got back home so late he missed his own murder. Well, then. Kaz hasn’t tortured anyone in two years and he may be out of practice, but the films he’s been forced to watch in the meantime have, if anything, made him more creative. He’ll teach them not to underestimate the brutality of Kaz Brekker, even when he’s moved up a few rungs in the ladder of Amsterdam’s underworld and landed a desk job.

He’ll—but Kaz hasn’t had to stalk silently towards his prey in two years, either. He’s underestimated the extent to which his lame leg’s gotten worse.

Also, someone’s pulled a box out from under his bed.

Kaz stumbles, and in the split-second before he catches himself on the edge of the mattress he wonders—will they have a gun? I can still bash them in the head before they fire, I haven’t gone that soft—and then the would-be assassin stretches out their lanky body as they wake up.

With their arms raised over their head, Kaz can see the bright white light of the street lanterns outside reflect off the gleaming black PVC fabric they’re wearing. Sleek and skin-tight, no ornamentation except a few steel buttons glinting at the crotch, and a full-cover leather hood over their face adorned with one-euro-sized rivets at the jaw, the forehead, the bridge of the nose, the large buckle around the neck. More buckles, at the back of the head and hanging off the right side at eye-height. The open silver zipper at the mouth reflects the streetlight, too, as does the padlock that hangs off it.

Oh no. Kaz knows that mask. Not even shoving it all the way back to the furthest corner under his bed allowed him to forget the way it looks.

Oh no.

Jesper yawns loudly. “Morning, boss. Evening. One of those. I thought you were finishing work early?”

“Haskell had some last-minute revisions to his tax returns.” Kaz sighs. “Don’t cook tomorrow. I’ll be out late for the whole next week—don’t expect me before three am. New client. I need to create a whole year’s documentations from scratch.”

“Just fuck him over, boss. He doesn’t appreciate you, and you don’t need the money. We live in a fucking squat.”

Sweet, financially illiterate nuisance Jesper, who probably doesn’t even know what that awful mistake he’s dressed in right now cost. The thing he’s dressed in. Which was hidden under Kaz’ bed. In Kaz’ room. Which they are inside right now. “You broke into my room,” Kaz rasps. “Again.”

“You know, Kaz,” Jesper replies with poorly feigned innocence, ”this thing is a little big for you. Fits me pretty well, though.”

“I told you I don’t keep cash under my bed. I told you that, the last time you tried to steal from me to pay off your gambling debts. I like my room organized as it is, and so I don’t keep any money here. Not under the bed, not in the wardrobe. And you won’t find any of my actual caches, because I’m smarter than you.”

“You’ve lied to me before.”

“You’ve stolen from me before. Remember last year? Remember you made Inej cry? I though you were clean. I thought you promised Wylan, when you asked him out, that you were done gambling. Maybe we all had too much trust in you.”

Jesper pulls his PVC-clad shoulders up to his en-leathered ears: a ridiculous sight, and Kaz doesn’t know what’s worse. That a bondage sex slave could actually look this dejected and humiliated and alone, or that Jesper does. He’s almost ready to call off the assault. It took a while to figure out, but as usual Inej was probably right, because she’s been researching and discussing the mental health industrial complex in general, and the traumatizing nature of modern life, with her comrades. Even though Kaz is neither the kind of person to touch people with kid gloves, and nor does he like thinking of Jesper as someone who needs that kind of handling—when Jesper’s in a shame spiral this deep then any criticism will drive him even deeper into the arms of the next casino. So the adrenaline and dopamine can wipe out everything else, or to feed his self-loathing even more by being exactly the person he’s terrified people think he is—Jes couldn’t quite explain it himself during the Intervention, except that everything is too much sometimes, even more too much and faster than usual.

He’s a pitiful creature. Kaz almost has pity. Then, though—

“It’s not working, boss. I know why you’re reminding me I fucking relapsed, again, and tried to steal from my best friend, again, and that I’m going to beg you to lie to Wy, again, but I still haven’t forgotten I’m wearing a bondage suit that you’ve been keeping under your bed for—two months now, is it?”

It’s just one month, actually. The manufacture and shipping took six whole weeks.

Two can play that game. Kaz might be very slightly embarrassed, but Jesper’s relapsed into the combination of addiction, theft and deceit that destroyed his life three years ago, and nearly did so again, two-and-a-half years ago and one year ago. “Careful. I haven’t even yet agreed to lie to Wylan, Jesper. About your problem. That you promised you’d tell him about.”

“Also, I notice it fits me, not Inej. Not Nina. Not Matthias. Not even Haskell, I bet. Me. Almost like it was made for me.”

Kaz ignores his insinuations. The answer’s obvious, anyway: yes, he did take clothes from the main washing pile in Jesper’s room and measured them. Yes, he used the measurements when he ordered a bondage suit. Yes, that’s creepy. Yes, a decent person would have asked. No, he’s not sorry. Jesper knew who Kaz was when he moved in with him. And it’s not like Kaz is the one who’s really at fault here. If Jesper just stopped gambling, he’d never have found out.

“Even attempted theft is illegal, Jesper. Completed robbery is worse. I cover my tracks, but you… you should be careful what you say now. They’re still looking for whoever robbed that jeweller last year.”

“Inej’s gonna cut off your head if you try. It’s like you never read her hoodies. All cats are beautiful, et cetera, Kaz. Thirteen-twelve. Keep up.”

Sometimes, the only thing that keeps Kaz from tossing Jesper out of the Slat is that Inej hates landlords and landlord-adjacents just as much as the pigs. If only he’d known back when he let the drunk penniless fancy uni boy who jumped into a fight to defend Kaz from some thugs—a fight Kaz would have won regardless—if only he’d known, before he let Jesper crash on his floor for a night or two, where all of this would end. “I’ll never mention anything about tonight again if you don’t either. Forget it. It was a bad idea. A failed plan. That’s all.”

“Without even trying it?”

“I will zip your mouth shut,” Kaz rasps. “I’ll lock it. I’ll throw the key into the harbour. Fuck you.”

Jesper, though, somehow got even mouthier when he put the bondage suit on. Less respectful. This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. “Come on, Kaz,” he wheedles. “I put it on, right? So I’m fine with it, if you’re worried. Aren’t you curious? If our places had been reversed—well, if you’d found it in my room you’d have murdered me, so we’re not exactly identical, but still. Come on, sit down next to me. This is—PVC right? Good job choosing me. Inej would hate it. So much plastic.”

“It’s less like skin than leather.”

“Not complaining, Kaz. I have some juice with a straw over there to keep me hydrated in case I sweat like a pig, but I haven’t, yet. I can probably camp out in this for a few more hours.” He tries a patented Jesper I’m flirting in an over the top way to make you laugh which is my flirting style for when I’m genuinely worried about the reaction because this way I can pass off exasperation and mockery as the response I intended look, probably with fluttering eyes, but since Kaz can barely make them out through those open zippers and the rest of his face is a complete mystery, it falls flat. It looks ridiculous, though, so it also works, and Jesper has the nerve of complaining about Kaz’ eight-dimensional chess plans. He’s worse. He’s worse, and animated by Jesper’s ridiculous, familiar movements the bondage suit doesn’t look like a pathetic attempt anymore. Not like the desperation of an emotional cripple. It just looks like Jesper, with an extra layer on his skin. Jesper, probably making a duckface, purring, “Don’t you think I’m sexy?”

Kaz looks away. “Are you serious right now?”

“Of course,” Jesper replies instantly, as if there was never any reason to doubt him. As if he doesn’t blame Kaz for doubting, simultaneously. As if Kaz is allowed to try. To fail. To fuck up, risk hurting him. There is a reason why Kaz never even considered someone else for the suit. “Come on, get on the bed.”

“We have to talk with Inej first. And with Wylan.”

“One-track mind,” Jesper replies, and just like that Kaz is ready to murder him again. “We’re not fucking. We’re not doing more than normal, except maybe touch. We don’t even know yet whether this helps you. I’m not risking it. We’ll just try touching, and if you think it’s triggering, we stop. We’ve got all the time in the world to work up to more. Until this city sinks into the ocean and the grid collapses from heat, which might be tomorrow, so. Or the fascists win.”

“You’ve been listening to Inej.”

“I do try to keep up.”

“Well, stop. Or listen more carefully, until the end, when she gets to the doomerism is the opiate of the masses part.”

“Just get on the bed, Kaz.”

Kaz puts his bent good knee onto the mattress and pulls himself over to Jesper. The fabric of his linen smock rubs against his heated skin: not like corpses, not like that, not like Jordie and he won’t even think about him or this will be over but—it just feels like his own familiar coarse age-softened nightgown that Jesper hasn’t even made fun of yet, his thin nightgown that in a second will be one of only two layers between him and Jesper.

He rolls over so he can sit down next to Jesper, at first. Daringly, he leans an arm against his best—well, they’ll figure that out later.

“Okay?” Jesper asks. He has to crane his head a lot to look through the thin eye slits of his bondage mask at Kaz’ face, and even then he’s probably mostly seeing the gleaming teeth of the eyehole zippers. And still he leans forward forty-five degrees and twists his torso and neck so he can look up into Kaz’ face, carefully keeping the arm that’s touching Kaz as motionless as possible, because he’s being careful with Kaz. Kaz has told him a thousand times he hates being coddled. He’s not a poor little abused dog, he’s a vicious murderer who destroyed his leg and his ability to be close to people while he was murdering, that’s all he ever told Jesper. That lie. And yet—even if he’s only fooling himself because this scene is so patently ridiculous, and the psych ward he got sent to once for the crime of rough sleeping while underage would stamp every single thing about what they’re doing as deeply unhealthy, and he can’t see Jesper’s soft concerned expression under the hood… Whatever it is, Kaz feels warm all over. He feels good. Safe.

Jesper can tell, apparently. “Want to touch my chest? Or climb into my lap?”

Kaz moves over, carefully smoothing down his nightgown before he sits down on Jesper, angled so he can lean with his left arm pressed against Jesper’s chest. It’s safer, somehow, than giving him the back, but perhaps someday…

Jesper loosely wraps his arms around Kaz. They’re just there, barely touching, the hands lax on top of Kaz’ right knee. You can leave at any time, they say, I’ll let go as soon as you’re uncomfortable, and Kaz would have known that regardless. Jesper’s never usually this still, unless he’s lost in concentration: and Kaz, who’s seen how gambling can destroy someone’s life, how it is currently destroying someone’s life, would still bet everything he has ever owned that Jesper’s concentrating on every single aspect of Kaz’ body language right now.

It’s not necessary, though. Those hands are gleaming black PVC. They don’t look or feel anything like Kaz’ memories.

He drops his own naked right hand onto Jesper’s gloved one. Joins them. Anchors Jesper. “How much do you owe this time, Jes?”

A beat. Jesper’s face drops down towards Kaz’ lap. Trying to hide his shame, and he’s forgotten that he’s wearing a full bondage mask, that Kaz can barely make out his eyes through the slits of the zippers. If he’s trying to deny everything, Kaz will just beat it out of him. He’s done it before. A year ago, when it was bad, but Jesper promised he got it under control. But Jesper’s promises were never worth much, not for this. If they were, they’d never have met.

“Four grand.”

“To?”

“Tom Geels. One of Big Bol’s old friends—”

“So he put you up to—”

“I was already playing when he walked up to me, Kaz,” Jesper grinds out. Aware that he could save himself from at least a little of Kaz’ disappointment by casting Bollinger as the tempter. Simultaneously aware that Kaz promised to feed Bollinger to a marine propeller last year if he ever took Jesper gambling again. Noble, to try and save Bollinger’s life—or to save Kaz from committing another murder—not that either of them deserves his loyalty. “I’ll pay you back, Kaz. I’ll have the money. Give me—give me half a year, Da’s still sending me—sending me rent money, Christ, he’s—I’ll save it. No, you’ll get it straight as soon as I get it, and in six months, you’re paid back in full. I promise.”

“We’ll figure it out. I have some jobs I could use you on. Nothing big. Intimidation, mostly. Some breaking, some entering. Boring stuff, not even worth mentioning to Wylan I should think.”

“Thank you.” Jesper’s forgotten all his restraint. He’s kissing Kaz’ forehead, or rather kissing the inside of his mask that’s pressed against Kaz’ forehead. He’s wrapped Kaz tightly in his long bondage arms too, painfully twisting Kaz’ shoulder and elbow and wrist because Kaz is still holding onto his hand. It’s that welcome pain, and the texture of the bondage suit that Kaz still isn’t completely used to, that keeps him from breaking Jesper’s nose. Keeps him—he isn’t back in the North Sea. He isn’t with Jordie. He should be, but he isn’t, and even if it comes…

Inej taught him about grounding. None of them trust the system as far as they can throw it, so she didn’t send him to a shrink when they started dating, unlike he feared, but—she said they helped her, those grounding exercises she found on the internet, and so Kaz has been diligently practicing breathing techniques and focusing his awareness on details of the present moment. Five things he can see: well, it’s dark, but the way what little streetlight gets through reflects off the folds of the suit on Jesper’s bowed stomach is quite interesting. His own knees. His hand, still clutching Jesper’s. The cane, on the floor. The floor. Five things he can hear: early morning traffic, Jesper’s breath, Jesper trying not to sob out loud in relief or shame or a mixture of both, the rustling of fabric, the squeaking of fabric. Five things he can feel: The old ache of his leg, always. Jesper’s hand. Jesper’s thighs. The hard buttons at the flap over Jesper’s crotch, digging into his side.

Somehow, Jesper’s noticed his shift in focus. At least he’s stopped crying now. “You know, you could have just asked how big I am if you wanted a suit with a dick pouch,” he teases in a voice that almost manages to sound happy. “I wouldn’t even have been suspicious.”

“Just because you have no boundaries, Jes, doesn’t mean I have to sink down to meet you at your level.”

Jesper takes a big breath. To forestall the whole Who bought this bondage suit argument Kaz elbows him in the stomach, hard. Once Jesper’s done coughing—a wriggling movement against Kaz’ side that he’s never even felt before—he mumbles something else, though. “I texted Da my new number. He called last week. Wanted to know how I was doing,” and oh. That makes sense. That’s what did it. “Apparently I’m graduating in seven months, according to that fake schedule you made me so I could keep my lies straight. He wants to come to the graduation. He asked me whether I have a job lined up.”

“I could hire somebody to fake you a degree,” Kaz offers. This should be Inej’s job. She shouldn’t be off somewhere, saving grasshoppers. She should be here. She’s the one who tried to talk Jesper into coming clean to his father, last year. All Kaz knows, all he has ever done, is to keep digging, and it’s worked for him. So far. “It’s all the rage now I hear. Cheap, too. No-one will find out. Just don’t become a politician in Germany.”

Jesper sighs. The air kisses the back of Kaz’ neck. “I don’t even care anymore. I could have a degree, or not, it all doesn’t matter. Universities are a scam to regulate economic class relations anyway. I don’t know that I can keep lying forever, or get a job, just so I don’t have to tell Da I betrayed him. Because nothing matters anyway. We’re collectively throwing the future down the drain. It’s not like anyone needs another mechanical engineer when we hit four degrees. I don’t know what we need. I just know everything I know is pointless.”

“I’m sure Inej can hook you up, if you want to blow up a coal power plant.”

“But what about you, then? What would you do?”

“I could have you kidnapped,” Kaz says. That’s not what Jesper meant. Kaz refuses to think about what Jesper meant. “Fake your death. Colm will be so relieved when they find you that he won’t even care you failed all your studies so you could become a live-in human blow-up doll.”

“That’ll only keep Da happy for a year at most and you know it.”

“Well, then Colm’s just going to have to get used to it. Get used to you, like we did. Real, annoying, good-for-nothing directionless screw-up Jesper.”

Jesper rubs his leathered cheek against the crown of Kaz’ head. “Fuck you. Thanks.”

Kaz runs his fingers over the squeaky PVC on Jesper’s forearms, steeling himself before he whispers idly against Jesper’s neck, “If Inej’s right about the warming and the sea level over the next decades, it won’t just be refugees from the south we’re letting drown, people it’s easy to lock out. Maybe you’re right about the Doggerland thing, and we all get flooded.” He swallows. The words are high up in his throat, trying to spew out. “Then it won’t just be one stupid child with a stupid family going out boating in the North Sea when there’s a storm coming. Not just that one kid thrown out of a sinking boat nearly drowning and clinging to his brother’s corpse. Your blow-up doll skills will be in high demand if everyone else gets triggered by skin contact too.”

Jesper, miraculously, reveals a talent Kaz didn’t even know he possessed: he shuts up. He ghosts his gloved hands over Kaz’ shoulders, and then he starts carding his fingers through Kaz’ hair. Kaz can feel the static electricity building up, the crackles and the safety, and then he realizes his eyes have drifted shut. He realizes he doesn’t know how long Jesper’s been petting him.

“Take off your hood,” he mumbles.

“Kaz?”

“Take it off. Scuttle over so your head’s on the pillow.”

Jesper obeys, like Kaz always knew he would. He looks up at Kaz with something that might be confusion but might also be—trust and deep joy and more, something Kaz can’t quite admit anymore now he’s in his bed, and Kaz puts his head down on his chest. His legs will still fit, and this way, he has the squeaky PVC right where he needs it. Squeaky, rhythmically rising warm dry plastic under him. The exact opposite of a waterlogged corpse.

“I don’t have time to call you an ambulance when you get into a bondage suit erotic asphyxiation incident, just so you know. I have a full schedule for today, remember. I’ll be at Haskell’s until after midnight. I have to break Bollinger’s thumbs. My alarm is at seven. Turn it off and I’ll send you to Colm in bite-sized pieces,” Kaz rasps, and then, with a movement that no-one would call timid if they wanted to keep their tongue attached, wraps his arms around Jesper. “You’ve kept me awake for two hours, so be a good pillow. If I kick you off the bed while I’m dozing, remember. This is your fault.”

#jesper fahey #kaz brekker #kaz x jesper #dimtraces makes things #shadow and bone #shadow & bone

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babybatscreationsv2 · 3 years

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SpiderVerse: Predators ch25

Marvel | Starker

Peter Parker is barely keeping it together. Dealing with Gwen Stacy's death, Harry Osborn going MIA, and MJ refusing to take his calls, has the guy feeling seriously run down. Now to top it off, his uncle Ben is facing serious prison time. Fortunately or unfortunately, New York's own Kingpin of Crime, Tony Stark, has offered him a deal to save his uncle. On a positive note, this Kingpin guy is kind of hot. Is it wrong to sleep with a murderous criminal?

Rating: Explicit

Warnings under the cut

warnings: mentions of violence, mild degrading language

Peter was on edge. His every waking moment was like drowning in a pool of anxiety. Where was Murdock? Was Harry okay? Would Elsa betray them? And then there was Tony. Tony who could be so fragile when it came to their relationship. Peter didn't know much about his past, but he'd pick up on the abandonment issues. Tony didn't like it when it was away. But Peter had other things to worry about.

May was happy that he was home, though she seemed worried by the change. At least Peter could see that she was doing okay. She was clearly still in pain. Every time something reminded her of Ben she would sob and end up leaving the room to go cry. Sometimes, though, she laughed. The happy memories came almost as often as the reminders of loss. Peter wished he hadn't left. He should have been here with her suffering the same cycle of suffering and grief. He deserved it.

George Stacy had apparently been coming over once a week. He and May had their own sort of potluck night. They each prepared a dish and they ate together which was super awkward now that Peter was home.

Happy also went with May on her regular bingo night. Once a week, they went out for breakfast together. May's social life was far more impressive than his own. Too bad he had killed or driven off every friend he had. It just made him miss Tony more, but at the same time, Tony made him feel lonely. Tony added an extra element of secrecy to his life that took him from 'double-life' to 'triple-life'. Tony Stark was a villain in Spiderman's world. He wasn't much better in Peter Parker's. He wasn't sure who that made him when they were together. The Kingpin's pet? Spiderling? Whatever it was, it was a whole different mentality. Spiderman had a darkness that threatened to come out and kill, but Tony Stark called on a different darkness. One that he could say he liked even less. Yet, he'd gotten a taste for poison and it would kill him if he stopped now.

The only time Peter felt comfortable leaving May alone was when he knew she was with Happy. He didn't know the guy personally, but if he knew Tony, then he knew his life was on the line if he fucked up. Those are the moments that he stole away to soothe what anxiety he could. He went to visit Elsa.

It had been one week since Venom went into Harry's body. Whatever the creature was doing... well, it was doing something. Harry's skin was more normal and less lizard-y now. His legs were back to human proportions. There were a few patches of green skin left, but Peter had hope that a few more days should do it.

Elsa was a train-wreck. Her hair was tangled and stuffed into a bun on top of her head. She kept losing her glasses. Peter came in one day to find her stumbling into things. When he helped her find her glasses, she broke down crying. Apparently she hadn't needed them ever since she first bonded with Venom. The bruises on her shins from running into the coffee table were all reminders that it wasn't there looking out for her.

"It'll be over soon and you can have Venom back," Peter assured her. They sat together on the couch.

Elsa sniffled and nodded her head. "Just a little while longer. I know."

"Have they been able to communicate with you at all?"

Elsa nodded, then she laughed, the sound bursting out of her. "They said 'food'." Peter laughed, too. "I've been feeding them bits of chocolate. Not great sustenance for a human, but it's what Venom needs."

"You made a monster in a lab that only eats chocolate."

Elsa smiled fondly. "They're my monster."

Peter felt a prickling all the way down his spine. He went to the window and looked out. No sign of trouble. Then he heard screams and glass shattering.

"I gotta go."

"Take care, Spiderman."

Peter raced through the city. There was a pit in his stomach that only grew as he continued on. And then finally, he reached Stark Tower.

A crowd, no, an angry mob was gathered around the building. People threw rocks and bricks. Tower security held the doors, but Peter could see a paramedic kneeling over a woman on the floor. People were screaming, chanting. They said Stark had stolen from them, spread drugs through neighborhoods, killed their loved ones.

"What the hell is going on?"

A news van down on the ground was reporting on the scene. Spiderman swung down closer to listen in. The reporter posed in view of the fight to get through the doors. She spoke quickly into her microphone.

"Here at Stark Industries the crowd is growing increasingly violent as Tony Stark, CEO of Stark Industries, refuses to make an appearance. There has been no comment yet from anyone at SI and no information has come to light about the leak. Police are arriving now with a warrant for Mr. Stark's arrest, but will any of these outlandish claims prove true? The public seems to think so."

Peter swung around the block and climbed up to the top of the tower. The window into Tony's office opened at his touch and he slipped inside.

"Tony?" He wasn't in his office. Peter ran to the hidden apartment, but he wasn't there either. He dialed his cell phone and got no answer. The second time he tried the number had been disconnected.

Peter sat down on the bed. He put his head in his hands. He felt like he couldn't breathe. Everything felt so out of control. Tony was missing and in trouble. He didn't know where to find Murdock. He didn't know if Harry was going to be okay. And May, was May even safe?

Then he got a call over the Spiderman line.

"Spiderman?"

Peter lurched to his feet. "Tony? Are you okay? What's going on?"

"Fucking Felicia Hardy," he growled. "But don't worry about that, sweetheart. I wanted you to know that I'm safe. I need to lay low for a while."

"And then what?"

"We don't have any choice but to play it by ear. I have people working to make this all go away, but if it doesn't work out then I guess there will be no more Kingpin of New York."

"What does that mean?"

"It means throwing away everything I've built and finally retiring. Morocco seems nice."

"You can't leave."

"I might not have a choice." He paused. "Would you go with me, Peter?"

"I..." He stopped and thought. He would have to give it all up, too. Being Spiderman, trying to protect New York, trying to save people. Maybe he could be Spiderman in Morocco, but all of the work he had done would go waste when the villains took over. Maybe another hero would come to replace him. Maybe that would be for the best.

"It's okay. You can think about it. May could come too, you know. It might even be nice."

"I'll think about it. Stay safe."

"Don't worry about me, darling."

"Let me know of there's anything I can do."

"You're sweet, but I won't ask you to murder Felicia Hardy for me. Besides, I want the pleasure."

Peter let out a breath. "If I find her, I'm turning her in for art theft."

"Then it's a race to find her first. Good luck, dearest spiderling." Tony hung up the call.

Peter stood staring at his phone, unsure of what to do next. It didn't seem like there was anything he do to help Tony. He spent the rest of the day trying to get caught up on school, but it was almost impossible to concentrate. Then someone rang the doorbell.

Peter was up and running for the door in a flash. "I'll get it, May," he called.

"Thanks, Pete," she said from the couch. She was watching one of the many nearly identical crime dramas. He pulled the door open and was struck speechless.

Tony offered him a charming smile. "Peter, darling. I hope this isn't a bad time."

"I uh..." Peter blinked rapidly, processing what he was seeing. Tony Stark, his boyfriend, the Kingpin of New York, the wealthiest man on the Eastern Seaboard, was standing on the doorstep of the rickety little house his family only owned because his father's father's father bought after immigrating so many decades ago. The house could have fit in one of Tony's bathrooms which had less to do with the size of it and more because it was shit by comparison.

"Sorry, I didn't call. I had to disconnect everything I own including my car's GPS."

"Uh..." Peter continued to stare, but when Tony shifted anxiously he finally snapped out it, remembering the constant danger. "Come in."

He stepped aside and Tony entered. May looked over the back of the couch.

"Mr. Stark? It's good to see you again," she smiled, but her eyes cut to Peter. The 'what the fuck is going on' went unspoken. Especially since they had something of an unspoken agreement that May didn't trust Tony because Ben hadn't liked him and therefore only sort of approved and only then because Peter seemed happy.

"I'm sorry to bother you, Mrs. Parker. I needed a place to stay the night and Peter said it would be alright if I stayed here."

She looked at Tony then she looked at Peter. "Of course that's fine. Are you hungry? Can I get you anything?"

"No, thank you."

"Come on, Tony." Peter grabbed his hand and dragged the man upstairs but it was only once they were in his bedroom that he realized what a mistake that was. His walls were covered in posters for tech conventions, Stark Industries announcements, fan posters of other super heroes.

Tony smiled, looking around the room. "This is about what I imagined."

"Why are you here?"

"It's this or sleep in my car and I'd rather be here where I know you're safe."

"What's going on?"

Tony sighed. He sat down on Peter's bed and picked up a Rubik's cube from his nightstand. "Showed up at the safe house to find all of the windows broken and the police everywhere. Since there's a warrant and all, I thought I would avoid that mess."

"May is gonna lose her shit when she realizes you're wanted."

Tony shrugged. "She won't turn me in, though. You know she won't."

"No, but she won't be happy."

"Are you happy I'm here?" He looked at him with the saddest puppy dog eyes. Peter hadn't known he could make that face.

"I missed you."

Tony smiled and Peter couldn't help but smile back. He went to the bed and straddled Tony's lap, letting himself get drawn into a heated kiss.

Peter looked into his dark eyes. "How did all this happen?"

"Well you see," Tony began. "I emotionally blackmailed you and then-"

Peter rolled his eyes. "I meant your company being literally on fire."

"Felicia let the world know that maybe I'm involved with tax evasion, and corporate fraud, and also the drug trade. Everyone's a victim," he sighed.

"You do realize that a lot of people are dead because of you."

Tony shrugged. "A lot of people are employed because of me, too."

"That doesn't fix it."

"Some evils concern me more than others." He trailed his fingers down Peter's chest and set his hand down on his thigh. "I have other concerns at the moment." His fingers brushed over Peter's crotch, his cock instantly taking interest.

"Here?"

Tony smirked. "How many times have you laid in this bed jerking off while you looked at posters of me?"

Peter rolled his eyes. "Never. I never liked you that much."

Tony grinned. "Not even for an imagined hate fuck?"

"You think too much of yourself." Peter rolled his eyes, giving him a smile in return. Then he kissed those smirking lips. It felt like coming home. They stay tangled up and making out for a while. Then Peter pushed Tony back to lay in the bed. He stood up and went to lock the door.

He pulled his t-shirt over his head and slipped off his jeans. Tony watched him with hunger as he pulled off his underwear. He climbed back on top of him, kissing him, devouring each other's mouth.

Peter reached down and slowly pulled up Tony's shirt. He slipped down the bed and pressed kisses to his skin. He kissed the softening muscle of his abdomen and pressed his lips to the warm metal of the arch reactor then he kissed the hollow of his throat.

"My spider," Tony sighed. His hands rested on Peter's back. Peter sucked a bruise under his jaw. Tony hand slid up his back and grabbed a fist full of his hair. "My spider," he said again.

Peter licked his lips. He looked into those deep, dark, eyes and found hunger. "Show me," he challenged.

Tony stood, holding Peter in his arms. Then he threw him down on the bed. He pulled off his t-shirt and stood in only his jeans, scarred and strong chest so beautifully on display like a king or a god or Peter's own wet dream. Then he was on top of them, the both of them panting heavy. Peter gasped, whining quietly as Tony pressed kisses all over his body. He clamped a hand tight over his mouth to muffle the noises he made as Tony bit and sucked marks into his skin. On his thighs, his belly, his chest.

"Gotta keep quiet," Tony chuckled. "Your poor aunt will have a heart attack."

Peter grabbed him, pulling him up so their eyes were level. "Shut up and fuck me."

Tony grinned. "I think I've been a terrible influence on you." Peter reached up to the drawer beside his bed and offered Tony a bottle of lube. He took it with only the most devilish smile. He pressed a slick finger into Peter's hole, continuing on.

"You've become greedy, demanding," he pushed in a second finger. "Entitled even."

Peter's legs spread, trying to wrap around Tony's waist and pull him in.

"You're spoiled and rotten. Do you know that?" Tony teased.

"Tony," he panted as Tony fingered him. "Put your fucking dick in me," he demanded and the back of Tony's hand cracked against his face. Peter gasped, then moaned as pain exploded through his face.

Tony stared him down. "Is that what you need? Discipline?"

Peter shivered. His face was so dark, so vicious, like Peter was prey he couldn't wait to devour. "Please," he said.

Tony smirked. "If your aunt weren't home I'd put your right over my lap, sweetheart, until you're kicking and screaming. Give your bratty little ass a spanking."

"Please," Peter moaned.

"Another day, little spider. Now keep quiet for me." Tony reached down and unzipped his jeans. He pulled out his cock, pants just below his hips. Peter moaned as he pushed in, both hands covering his mouth as he tried to be quiet. Tony had found a quieter way of making it hurt, using just enough lube to push inside, but not quite enough. It burned as he pushed deep. Peter legs trembled and he clung to Tony's biceps. Peter whimpered quietly.

"That's a good boy," Tony purred. His eyes shined. The smile on his lips was dangerous.

He took his hands away to beg. "Tony, please," and he kissed him. Peter moaned and whined, sounds muffled by Tony's lips, as he fucked him slow and deep. His whole was body like a live wire, burning, vibrating with need. When Tony's hand wrapped around his cock his lips parted spilling soft whines into the air.

"Hush, little spider," Tony warned. "Wouldn't want Aunt May to know what a whore you are, would you? In here spreading your legs in your childhood bed, demanding to get fucked like a spoiled brat."

"Fuck," Peter groaned through clenched teeth.

"You can't help it can you?" He smirked. "You're too addicted to my cock."

"Yes." Tony tried to move faster and Peter grabbed his hip. "Not yet."

Tony kept moving slowly. He pressed kisses to Peter's neck that Peter answered with a string of kisses down his throat.

"Tony," Peter breathed his name against his skin. "I love you."

Tony answered him, lips brushing against his neck. "I love you, Peter."

"I thought you died, today."

"Never, baby. I'm unkillable."

Peter held his face and crushed their lips together, moaning as they kissed. Tony started to move faster, fucking him just as frantically. It burned. It hurt so good that it made his head spin. He felt his cock dripping onto his belly. His thighs squeezed Tony's hips, probably digging in bruises but he didn't have it in him to care. A hand wrapped around his throat and squeezed. Teeth bit into his bottom lip. He tasted blood and it only drove him higher. Another hand clamped around his mouth and he realized he was nearly screaming.

Tony kept fucking him while he came, gripping his hips when he finally quieted down and driving into him until he was spilling his own cum inside him. He laid down next to him, kissing him frantically until the fatigue set in.

Peter felt like crying. It was too much. Everything was too much, too overwhelming. At least Tony was here with him now. He could keep him safe as long as he was here in his arms.

#marvel #starker #spiderverse predators #kingpin!tony #dark!peter

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statticscribbles · 3 years

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Bond Break

Summary: a/b/o Jughead/Reader Request: Alpha jughead x omega ps! Reader one where he thinks he’s meant to be w/ Betty so he tries to reject the bond w/ the reader and he can’t stand it anymore when he sees her crying can they please do the foreheads touching thing You can’t count the number of times that Jughead had reassured himself by passing you by, by pulling you aside to remind you the bond you shared wasn’t meant to be; that it wasn’t meant to exist. You refused to show him how much it bothered you, well you tried as best you could. Mostly you tried to avoid him all together, having joined the Serpents left you in a tough situation; the rest of the Serpent’s knowing you and Jughead had bonded but they knew how desperate he was to be with Betty; how he was repeatedly trying to convince himself that being with a Beta was better. You knew it was because of what had happened to his dad; FP having had his bond broken when Gladys left; you knew Jughead had grown up with the worst aspect of being an Alpha, seeing what happened when an Omega left. The rest of the Serpents seemed more casual about talking about it and you’d find yourself worried you were complaining and repeating yourself; something Toni and Fangs reassured you that you weren’t doing. “Y/N; hey listen I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable so I’m just letting you know Betty and I are going out on a date night.” You don’t look up from the notes you’re copying. “This concerns me how?” “Well last time we went on a date night I guess you were watching a movie or something cause you were like super upset and anxious and I could feel it through the bond and it made the date suck.” “Well maybe thing about how I’m feeling?” “You said you were okay with it?” He frowns and you roll your eyes. “When you made me go back to my house after you realized we bonded and you called it, called us a mistake, a fling, something to get you through being broken up with Betty, I said I was okay with that; before I had realized we bonded.” You return to your book and he hesitates nodding you can almost feel him reaching out but that he pulls back. You can feel the bond flare slightly he’s upset with himself and feeling guilty; you idly wonder when he’s going on the date part of you wanting to mope and try to make him feel as horrible as possible but you know its better for you not to wallow in it. It’d be easier on everyone if you moved on like he was trying to do. You’d catch Jughead staring more often than not and you can tell that he and Betty are crackling once more. You’re not sure what is wrong this time but you can feel the prickle of annoyance, and disappointment fluttering through the bond you both share. It’s soft, quiet enough that you know it’s not your own emotions. You don’t bother seeking the source out. Jughead appears two hours later slumping over the seat and table you’re sitting at in Pop’s. “It doesn’t mean shit.” “You’ve said that at least two hundred times before. I know. As far as you’re concerned we have no bond.” “No Betty and I; it doesn’t mean shit.” “Why the change of heart?” “I can’t take the fucking misery you feel.” “Misery?” You furrow your brow at his comment; you’re trying to think back to when you’d felt misery strong enough for it to bleed through to him; the only moment you can think of is after you’d bonded and he’d practically forced you back to you house refusing to talk about it for two whole days. “Yeah it’s like its drowning me.” “That’s you.” “No it’s-“ He hesitates watching as you nod back to him. “I can barely feel it, but its there. Maybe if you didn’t hate me-“ “I don’t.” He cuts across you moving his hand towards yours. “I don’t hate you Y/N. I mean we bonded, it means we’re a match just-“ “You don’t want me then? Is that better?” “I do. I do want you. It’s the only think I can think about, being with you. Nothing about Betty is enough like you are.” “Then why all this?” He chew his lip. “You won’t want me.” “We bonded, it means we’re a a match.” You parrot his words from earlier and his lip twitches. “I know fundamentally we’re a match; but personality wise? Our interests?” “You never asked.” “Because you’re going to be disappointed; all I do when I’m not out dragging myself through police investigations or running the serpents is watch true crime shit or reread biographies about serial killers.” “Archie convinced me Hannibal Lecter was a docu-drama for almost a full year.” You smile and he laughs. “Archie managed to get one up on someone?” “He’s actually really smart; you’d know being his best friend.” You laugh and he nods. “Your shakes.” The waitress sets them down and you click your glasses together. “Mocha shake?” “It’s too hot for coffee right now.” You huff nodding to the same shake he pulls over. “It tastes good.” “And?” “It’s too hot for coffee.” You grin triumphantly and he laughs. “So did I hit the nail on the head with the serial killer stuff?” You grin pulling a book from your bag. “You should read this is you haven’t and-“ “I’ve read it twice already.” “Read it again. I’m half way through a third read so I beat you out.” He nods. “Listen Y/N.” You look up from the half shake you have. “I; I know I’ve been a huge dick; and I know everything with Betty has probably made you hate me but-“ He shifts on the seat, sliding next to you and nervously holding your hands in his. “I do want to try with you. If we bonded it must mean we’re supposed to be together for at least some length of time; and I want to. Please.” He adds on keeping his eyes glued to your clasped hands. You smile softly; moving your head to bump your forehead to his resting it against his as you semi-force him to look you in the eyes. “Well you’re my Alpha aren’t you? We did bond. It must mean something.” He nods pulling back frowning. “What?” You question confused when he hands you a handful of napkins. “You’re crying. Did I say something wrong?” You blink confused as you wipe at your now teary eyes. “I’m okay; it’s just nice to be wanted. It really hurt; when you’d ignore me.” “I know; I felt it.” He cringes looking nervously at you and you offer him a wry smile. “Hurt didn’t it?” “Yeah I didn’t think the bond would be so strong and make me feel like that.” “Or it could just be your guilt for being such a dick.” You snap and he scowls. “I deserve that.” “Oh you deserve a lot more.” He looks nervous for a moment before you return your forehead to his. “I don’t mind skipping all of that; if I get to be with you of course.” “Oh thank god.” You laugh when he sighs in relief.

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thegayhimbo · 3 years

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Bill Compton’s problematic relationship with Jessica Hamby.....

This is a post I’ve wanted to do for a long time because out of all the relationships on the show (aside from Sookie/Bill), this is one of the few that bothers me the most. It’s a relationship held up by fans to be this loving father-daughter dynamic. However, when I first saw the show, I was left cold by it, and never understood why people thought it was a meaningful relationship.

Having just finished my rewatch, I can understand why I felt like that: There are MULTIPLE MOMENTS on the show where Bill’s treatment of Jessica is neglectful at best and abusive at worst. Most of the time, Bill either treats Jessica as a burden or someone he can use, and he barely knows what’s going in her life unless Jessica brings it up to him. That’s also including that he’s lied to her, betrayed her, hurt her, refused to do his duty to her as a maker to her unless forced to (or unless he got some benefit out of it), kept secrets from her, and was NASTY to her at various moments during the show. It got to a point where I kept wondering if I was watching the same show as everyone else. It’s especially egregious since plenty of people talking about how this was one of the best relationships on the show (which it isn’t).

In this list, I’m going through all the instances where Bill’s treatment of Jessica ranges from neglectful to abusive. All of them span over the course of 7 seasons, so POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD! The reason I am doing this is to highlight the issues with this relationship, and why I think it’s problematic that the show (and fans) treat this as a good relationship when it’s anything but. Without further ado:

1.) After Jessica gets turned into a vampire, Bill makes a half-assed attempt to get her to drink True Blood instead of teaching her how to feed properly and safely from a human. When this doesn’t work, he dumps Jessica with Eric.

2.) Bill proceeds to leave Jessica with Eric for two weeks (and makes not attempt to ever pick her up) until Eric comes back with Jessica and tells Bill to start doing his job as a maker. One has to question if Bill would have ever picked Jessica up from Fangtasia if Eric hadn't come.

3.) From the end of season 1 till season 3, Bill consistently treated Jessica like she was a burden and an embarrassment to him, even though Jessica was a teenager who needed help and support and wasn’t familiar with being a vampire.

4.) Bill wastes Jessica's time teaching her how to recycle when he should have taught her how to feed from a human. He knows that she can't live off of True Blood, and that she's going to have to learn to feed safely so she isn't a danger to others. He fails to do this for her.

5.) At one point, Bill slut-shames Jessica for her attire, and it's played for laughs instead of Bill being called out for his misogynistic behavior.

6.) When Jessica is kissing Hoyt, Bill grabs Jessica and violently throws her across the room even though she wasn't feeding from Hoyt. There is no reason that, as her maker, he couldn't have ordered her to stop, or just restrained her without using physical violence.

7.) Bill keeps secrets from Jessica (like his mission from Queen Sophie Anne) that puts her in danger. He never establishes a contingency plan with her if she came into contact with a powerful vampire and either needed to defend herself, get away from them, or hide from them. The result is Franklin Mott (a serial rapist) shows up at her front door and her life is almost put in danger because of it.

8.) Jessica is forced to get her first job on her own to make money instead of getting any help from Bill.

9.) Bill was set to release Jessica in season 3 despite being a newborn and barely having an idea on how to feed from someone safely. She also had no training to protect herself from other vampires or humans who wanted to harm her. This is basically the equivalent of a parent throwing their kid out of the house. It’s not okay that Jessica has to BEG Bill to be a proper maker to her because he was doing a shit job at it.

10.) Bill drags Jessica into a dangerous situation against werewolves and a 3000 year old vampire who almost succeeds in killing her. Bill knew she wasn’t ready after only one training session, and Jessica’s life was endangered because of his carelessness.

11.) After the fight at Sookie’s house, the last we see of Jessica is her being chased away by a werewolf. Not only does Bill NOT bother to check to see if Jessica is okay afterwards, he proceeds to have gross unappealing sex with Sookie in the middle of her destroyed house. It’s all about him and what he wants in that moment, and it’s like he completely forgets Jessica.

12.) Bill doesn’t ever tell Jessica the real reasons for why Sookie broke up with him (i.e. that he allowed the Rattarays to beat the shit out of her) and lets Jessica believe that Sookie was at fault for the break-up and that she was a bad girlfriend to him.

13.) Bill tells Jessica that she’s required to be honest with Hoyt even though he isn’t honest with her.

14.) When Antonia breaks free from Bill’s prison and plans to cast a spell that will force vampires to walk into the sun, instead of sending Jessica out of Louisiana to keep her safe so that she wouldn’t be targeted by Antonia’s spell, Bill keeps her with him for some unexplained reason.

15.) Bill refuses to completely silver Jessica when Antonia is about to cast her spell. This results in Jessica breaking free, killing a guard, and almost walking into the sun before Jason saves her. His neglect in that moment almost got Jessica killed AGAIN.

16.) Even after Jessica almost gets killed, Bill STILL DOESN’T SEND HER AWAY despite the fact there’s a dangerous necromancer on the loose who could target her and possess her. He even drags Jessica to Moon Goddess Emporium against Antonia/Marnie, and puts her in danger because of his recklessness. Jessica almost gets killed because of this, but the show never calls out Bill for it.

17.) When Bill and Eric are forced to go on the run from the Authority after killing Nan Flanagan, Bill calls Jessica and lies to her about everything being fine and not to worry. He doesn't warn her that the Authority is coming after them. This is actually dangerous for Jessica because if the Authority had failed to capture Bill and Eric before they left the house, they might have gone after Jessica to capture, torture, and interrogate her on Bill's whereabouts. And even though that doesn't happen, the point is that it could have happened because Bill refused to warn her.

18.) When Bill comes back to see Jessica later in season 5, he lies to her about still being King (which doesn't bode well for Jessica if other vampires try to take advantage of her), he doesn't really bother to check on Jessica to see if she's doing okay and just assumes she is, and he isn't truthful with her about what's really going on: That there's a good chance he and Eric may get killed either bringing in Russell Edgington, or that the Authority may still have them executed for treason. Either way, he withholds this information from her instead of having Jessica prepare for the worst.

19.) When Bill becomes Chancellor in the Authority and joins up with the Sanguinistas, he sends the Authority guards to forcibly escort Jessica to HQ (while also commanding Jessica as her maker to go with them) and tries to force Jessica to convert to the Sanguinista ideology whether she likes it or not. Jessica even pointing out this is exactly how her biological family behaved towards her. He also tries to keep her locked up and isolated to convert her.

20.) When Jessica begs Bill to let her warn Jason and Sookie about Russell and Steve coming after them, Bill refuses to let her go warn them, and makes it clear that he doesn't care if they get captured, tortured, or killed because he just sees them as food at this point. It doesn’t matter to Bill that Jason and Sookie are her friends and are in danger.

21.) In an act of petty cruelty, Bill bullies Jessica into turning Jason into a vampire against his will by sending two Authority guards to make sure she goes through with this.

22.) When Jessica returns after refusing to turn Jason, and later stands up to Bill, he gets physically violent and SMACKS HER clear across the room before having her imprisoned. What makes this worse is that there is no moment later on where he apologizes to Jessica for being abusive towards her. It's glossed over by the show.

23.) Bill leaves Jessica to die at the Authority, and it’s only when he realizes she’s alive that he summons her in the most painful way possible (i.e. she’s puking up blood and feels like she’s going to die if she doesn’t answer Bill’s summons). He later indicates he knows this was hurting Jessica and doesn’t care.

24.) He deflects any responsibility for hitting Jessica and imprisoning her by claiming he’s not the same person that did that. Again, there is no moment on the show where he apologizes to her for his behavior.

25.) Once he manipulates Jessica into staying with him again, Bill/Billith makes Jessica responsible for his emotional well being and his “humanity.” In other words, he knows he’s going to be doing awful things in the future, and instead of owning up to that, he’s making Jessica responsible for being a good person. That is abusive.

26.) He later tasks Jessica with dressing up in a sexually provocative way to kidnap a professor against his will. Putting aside how he previously slut-shamed her for having revealing clothing, it’s pretty gross that he’s now having Jessica participate in his crimes.

27.) He has Jessica lure Andy’s faerie girls to his mansion l(ike one of those creepy Unsubs from Criminal Minds) and tasks Jessica with keeping an eye on them. He makes no attempts to ensure the faerie girls safety, especially since Jessica has a history of poor impulse control. Not even an “As your maker, I command you not to feed on these faerie girls.” And then he leaves her alone with them. Shock of all shockers, Jessica loses control and 3 out of 4 of the faerie girls are dead.

28.) When Jessica is high on faerie blood and consumed with guilt over killing the faerie girls, Bill coldly tells her to sleep it off. He makes no attempt to comfort her or make sure she doesn’t do something stupid (since she’s drunk on faerie blood and not in a rational state of mind), nor does he make any attempt to give his blood to the other faerie girls in a possible attempt to revive them. He doesn’t care. He just found out about Warlow, which means Jessica’s guilt and the deaths of the faerie girls mean nothing to him. The result is that Jessica runs off to Jason’s for comfort, and gets captured by the LAVTF and sent to Vamp Camp. All because of Bill’s neglect.

29.) At the end of season 6, Bill goes off to do a 6-month book tour while he leaves Jessica behind to deal with the guilt of killing Andy’s faerie kids. There is no moment where he expresses remorse for his role in their deaths, nor does he make any attempt to help Jessica heal over the trauma and guilt of what happened.

30.) In season 7, when Bill finds out that Jessica hasn’t been feeding because she still feels guilty over what happened, and that she’s also offering protection to Adylin, this is what he says to her:

“So you are protecting Adilyn? And she is not feeding you in exchange for that protection?”

Not only is Bill completely unaware of Jessica’s mental and emotional state right now (because he’s that neglectful of her), but he lacks self-awareness about WHY Jessica doesn’t want to feed from Adylin: She’s the one that lost control and drained Adylin’s sisters. This idea that Bill perpetrates that Jessica’s relationship with Adylin should be a transaction where she only protects her in exchange for something is so revealing about what kind of person Bill Compton is: Every relationship is a pragmatic transaction for him. Bill only cares about other people when it is convenient for him. And he couldn’t bother to help Jessica when she was struggling with remorse over her actions whereas he felt no guilt over what he did.

What. An. Asshole.

31.) At the end of season 7, Bill opts to kill himself without caring about how this going to affect Jessica emotionally. Keep in mind that in season 4, Jessica had Bill promise not to ever commit suicide again (after he supposedly tried to do so when Marnie ordered him and Eric to kill each other). And once again, Bill breaks that promise because it’s all about him and what he wants. What makes this even more repugnant is he frames this as a good thing for both him and Jessica.

32.) In his final act of being an asshole, Bill pressures Jessica into getting married to Hoyt even though he doesn’t have his memories and they still haven’t worked through the issues that caused their relationship to fall apart in the first place. When Jessica expresses concern about this (since this is all happening too fast), Bill uses the death of his biological daughter (i.e. the same one he refused to save in that season 5 flashback) to guilt-trip Jessica into doing this marriage so that she’ll be “spoken for.” He’s basically shoving his patriarchal (and misogynistic) beliefs onto Jessica.

There are probably other moments that I missed, but the overall gist I’ve gotten from this relationship is that it’s one-sided, and that Bill’s treatment of Jessica is not only awful, it’s emotionally (and in some cases, physically) abusive. There’s this fanon idea that’s gone around for many years that Bill was this wonderful maker and father-figure to Jessica, which is NOT supported by what’s shown.

What makes this problematic is that the show tried to frame this like it’s a relationship we’re suppose to root for. Personally, I’m left cold by it. I can think of many other platonic relationships on this show (Andy/Terry, Sookie/Jason, Tara/Lafayette, etc) that were either better written, more heartwearming, or had meaningful character development that lasted. Bill/Jessica was not one of those. It’s bad enough that Bill’s an awful character who continues to age like spoiled milk, but this relationship he has with Jessica.........................it makes my skin crawl.

Jessica deserved so much better than Bill. She deserved a maker who actually put effort into their relationship with her (and not when it was convenient for them), and Bill deserved to be called out for his treatment of Jessica during the show. I HATE this relationship, and it’s one more reason why Bill Compton is one of the WORST characters I have ever seen on a TV show.

#true blood #tgh opinions #bill compton #anti bill compton #jessica hamby #abusive relationships #bill was a terrible maker to jessica #....and he should be called out for it

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ato-matsuri · 3 years

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On Agartha

Been a while since I’ve written a long text post, most of all one about Fate. It honestly inspires a lot of rambling in me, after all. But I don’t think, this time, it’s due to its good writing, the emotions it makes me feel, or anything good. This, my friend, is about Agartha. I should probably prelude that this contains a metric shit ton of Agartha spoilers. If you haven’t seen Agartha, and you’re actually wanting to see the story -- scroll past. But, having played through Agartha completely and rested on the story for a bit, I think I want to repeat what everyone else has for ages lol.

Agartha, on paper, is incredible. A subterranean world built off fantastical story off fantastical story, made by a woman known for her ability to weave story after story, within stories, on the fly, and from a database of every possible Arabian Nights tale. Where the fear Scheherazade has due to Shahryar's endless abuse and fearmongering has stretched even to men as a whole due to literal years of having to survive Shahryar. Where the only leaders were queens, where the only rebellion force was a man so horrifically corrupt that he'd easily fall for the tricks she played. Her intent -- to reveal magecraft forever, removing any power magecraft has, saving her from ever having to fight and face kings -- and die -- ever again. That... sounds pretty good when I describe it that way, huh? Now if only it were executed with any modicum of sense.

From the beginning, Agartha's writing struck me as remarkably odd. It was like I was watching someone desperately try to emulate Nasu's writing style -- but had absolutely no idea what made Nasu's writing so good. Its exposition dumps, rather than being interesting, ended up being thoroughly boring -- as they focused on the mundane, like the fact that moss glows to light up the landscape -- instead of the magical implications of a world like Agartha even existing to begin with. Albeit, with the mystery of Agartha at that time, we can safely assume that there wasn't much to focus on, but then why spend so damned long talking about this stuff?

The worldbuilding, while passable, feels fairly flawed in execution. The idea of a world made the way Agartha was could've made for some interesting commentary about the way men treated (and still do treat) women in modern society, but Agartha not only misses the point, but tumbles head-over-ass into the uncanny valley and makes the whole thing sound like a continent-wide BDSM session. There's barely any actual subtle or well-done symbolism to showcase misogyny in this way -- and while hyperbole can serve a good point at times, the hyperbole combined with the strangely sexual writing of these segments makes it feel less like commentary and more like a badly-done doujin.

For example -- El Dorado was as simple as it gets. Men are slaves/breeding machines/whatever. The whole 'breeding machine' thing is played off extensively, even with Penth -- a minor at this stage, mind you -- comments on using the protagonists as such breeding machines. I'll come back to this later, because this serves as another point.

Ys was a fucking cool concept -- a world ruled entirely by rampant consumerism and chaos. Men, in this world, are still second-class citizens, pretty much the playthings of the women around them. I say that Ys is the best kingdom comparatively, as it was at least more bearable than its other kingdoms, but it still felt weirdly sexual in its writing tone. Of course, following tone, Dahut (who I'll get back to later) smashes men constantly, and is very keen on fucking Guda as well, following a trend. It's played for comedy, mostly, but it's still uncomfortable as all hell. Even so, I note it's more bearable because it's a very slightly more subtle take on the whole 'misogyny' allegory -- these people are using men for basically whatever they want, and tossing them away after. I'd compare it to a few true crime cases of people who murdered, or assaulted women for no good reason at all, purely out of a want that was either denied (for good reason), or that the want itself was to inflict harm. While the allegory still does feel unintentional here, it's at least slightly less unintentional. It was probably mostly just by accident due to Agartha's generally uncomfortable writing style, but the allegory here feels a little more potent when it's not so blatantly a BDSM fic.

I hate the Nightless City, despite it again being a cool concept. A 'utopia' where speaking out at all means death -- where men are in concept free citizens, but in practice fall victim to the law if they look at someone funny. Again, in concept, great allegory. The law does not treat men and women the same -- and while it differs depending on the case which is preferred, the vast majority of the time, women are pretty much shafted by the legal system (see Brock Turner), especially in very conservative areas. Cases can be made for both genders being shafted, of course -- but for the purpose of this allegory, picking out the prejudices of the legal system against gender is a fair critique. But, like everything else Agartha does, these neat ideas fall flat in practice.

They barely touch at all on the allegory, and nobody seems to even realize it in the cast, making me further believe the allegories aren't intentional at all. In due fact, it's as if the writer didn't even realize that this could be read as an allegory. The men's plights make some sense, as they were yoinked out of nowhere into a world that hates them. But the Servants and Guda don't think about it at all past the 'wow men are slaves that sucks' -- barely even considering that this could be an allegory the world's creator made due to their own horrific circumstances. They do point this out, but to my knowledge, it's very late -- when Scheherazade's called on her bluff, only then is it ever mentioned, and only in passing at that. If anything, the fact they point this out so close to the ending makes the ending itself that much more insulting. But before I get to the ending, I think there's something else about Agartha that sets the scene for just how awful it is -- and that's the way the characters are written, and the dialogue that comes of it. For this, I'll split it up into the characters who portray this the most. I'll even describe their personalities in Agartha's context.

Guda: Crouching pervert, hidden Mash stan. A few non-sequiturs of Guda complimenting Mash despite the mood being completely broken by it. Guda's incapable of taking a situation seriously in Agartha, even when the world's basically due to be changed forever. They keep cracking jokes, creeping on Astolfo/d'Eon, and other such things even when people are literally dying all around him. For that matter, I clearly recall the scene where -- for no real reason -- Guda just changes gears with Mash in tow, and starts trying to decipher d'Eon's gender. There's absolutely no real context to this, nor any reason for Guda to do this. Further noted is the fact Guda has worked with d'Eon before, and should've probably realized d'Eon's situation by this point. The Nasuverse has always been a bit, er, behind on gender norms and such, but it's so prevalent in any scene with d'Eon it hurts -- especially in that particular scene.

Astolfo: Oddly enough, the most tolerable person here (sans one other person). Agartha's refusal to take itself seriously works remarkably well for Astolfo. And while Astolfo isn't exactly written well here either, the fact that Astolfo's always been a bit loopy makes them seem, well, more in character. They're responsible for some of the funnier moments in Agartha, with their input composing approximately 3/4 of the, like, seven or eight funny moments in Agartha proper. Even so, Astolfo's appearance sometimes hurts Agartha as much as they help it, probably since Astolfo is a bit of the reason Agartha won't take itself seriously.

d'Eon: Deserved fucking better. The previously mentioned scene was the worst offender by far in my eyes, with it coming out of fucking nowhere. d'Eon's paired with Astolfo as a buddy and fighting partner, which itself could've made for good material -- instead, d'Eon is constantly dragged into Astolfo's fanservice-y gimmicks, and d'Eon themselves are pretty often creeped on by Guda. I'd go out on a limb to say that d'Eon's implied dislike of gendered clothing (see the maid outfit) made their scenes wearing such outfits far more uncomfortable, especially with how distinctly sexual the Agartha humour is. I just hated it.

Columbus: I can't fucking believe I'm saying this, but Columbus was the funniest character in Agartha. And I don't even think that was intentional. Something about how unabashedly horrible he was caught me completely off guard -- I thought he'd end up sort of like Napoleon at a glance, someone whose Spirit Origin was completely changed due to Europe's collective worship of the dude -- but holy FUCK was I wrong. Something about the hilariously cursed faces Columbus pulls, combined with his loud-and-proud irredeemable evilness, made him a blast to watch -- and an even bigger blast to beat the shit out of. His, uh, toothy grin still cracks me up even a few weeks after playing it.

Penthesilea: One of a very large amount of people who really deserved better. She barely ever shows up -- and when she does, she voices her desire to turn Guda and co. into a breeding machine/slave (recall she's like. 16?), and pretty much throws the whole 'reasonable-ish zerk' thing out the window instantly, because Agartha decided to forego decent writing in favour of 'funny berserker hates achilles haha brrrrrr,' therefore losing pretty much all the characterization they could've given her. The lack of 'alternate views' that show her in greater detail make this far worse, which I'll go into later.

Dahut: God, wasted potential out the asshole! A woman who made an entire world that fucked around and needlessly consumed stuff, she's the epitome of such a belief. But that's all she is. I'd be able to forgive this awful writing if Scheherazade, who 'implanted' Drake onto Dahut, was a bad writer -- but she's fucking Scheherazade! Dahut's a completely flat character, who constantly tries to bed (and kill) Guda, and generally likes the idea of needless consumption. That's literally it. Again, could be explained if Dahut had difficulty keeping control of Drake's body and conscience -- but this isn't explored either! She's just a walking, talking missed opportunity.

Wu: God, look at her design. Do I even need to say more?! She falls under the same problem that the other rulers do -- shallow characterization, no opportunities to flesh them out, etc.

Scheherazade: She could've been so fucking amazing. Scheherazade's story is one ripe with interpretations the Fate series so loves to utilize -- and on paper, her character is amazing. It'd only be natural for someone like Schez to be this deeply traumatized after so many days on death's door -- not many could really get through that okay. The incredible storyteller who fears death, kings, and unconsciously, men as a whole -- creating Agartha as a subtle way of ensuring none of them harm her while she prepares her ultimate plan of revealing magecraft to the entire world. However, as with the other Agartha characters, she becomes cripplingly one-note. Bringing her fear of death above all else, she comes off as an unreasonable asshole, constantly freaking out about death and preserving exclusively herself to a fault. While one could argue it's partially due to a Pillar's influence, Phenex doesn't seem to have a hold on her at all -- it's a basic alliance, and nothing more, as the ending shows us. It just leaves her as a one-note death avoider, with no other character traits at all. I'd go into further detail, but I'm saving that for later.

Fergus: God fucking damnit, man. A literal child version of Fergus, who the entire cast constantly expects to sexually harass every woman in sight. He's a one-note flanderization of Fergus, just without the one character trait Agartha gave Fergus. It just makes him... boring, a character whose only character trait is his refusal to hit a woman. Like... Come on. The fact the entire team is so sure this literal child will start trying to hit on women is just uncomfortable to witness, and the fact he slowly starts gaining these traits feels less like him 'meeting his fate' as Fergus, and more like Agartha wants an excuse to sexually harass more of the cast.

The Fucking Ending I'm giving this its own category, because of just how much of a punch to the face it was. In short -- the plan to reveal magecraft is revealed, more jokes are made, bla bla bla. Agartha can't keep a serious mood at all. ...But the final few scenes take it to a whole other extreme.

Wu Zetian comes out of nowhere despite being squashed by Megalos earlier, stuffing Phenex into a pit of her weird water shit, placing Phenex in a state of 'life and death.' Child Fergus then sac's his own Spirit Origin to summon Fergus inside himself(???), thus gaining the power of Caladbolg to weaken Phenex enough for the player to destroy. ...However, Child Fergus just summoned Fergus inside his own body. So, what happens when you put Agartha!Fergus, a one-note sexual harasser, into the body of a child? You get the final scene of Agartha. For some reason, I guess you need more help from others to take out Phenex. To this end, Fergus decides to convince Schez to join their side. I'd like you to recall that FGO!Scheherazade is implied to have the trauma of Shahryar's abuse, sexual and physical, burned into her memory -- not just the whole death thing. In every form of the story, Shahryar abuses her in such a fashion almost nightly. It's to the point where Schez' first line of defence, and much of her skills, are as much oriented around storytelling as they are charm and seduction (moreso the former than the latter, albeit), because her defence mechanism was that as much as it was storytelling, to keep her abuser happy. This is a part of why Agartha is the way it is -- to keep such men away from her. Hell, there's not a single King in sight, save technically Fergus, and Chaldea's d'Eon and Astolfo. Fergus knows this. Hell, he heard this being called out. He's well aware how terrified she is. So, what does he do?

SEXUALLY HARASS HER. He claims she has to live to have kids. That men and women have to live to have kids. He claims that she should live, because he'd smash her. ...Now, that's insulting enough -- moreso, that it's played dead serious. Nobody even as much as calls him on such a shitty persuasion tactic, and nobody even mentions how awful it is to sexually harass a woman who'd been sexually assaulted at best for the better part of almost three straight years. AND IT. FUCKING. WORKS.

SCHEHERAZADE. IS IMPLIED. TO BE INTO IT.

And because of this, she's swayed to join the heroes and seal Phenex away for good -- giggling about how Fergus' worldview was partially correct even as she fades away. The epilogue features Fergus, sexually harassing Scheherazade ON SIGHT -- calling out 'tits on my 12:00' or whatever, as Scheherazade darts off. However, Schez isn't avoiding him due to trauma. She's avoiding it because, while she's into it, she doesn't want to 'die' so fast. This fucking ending highlights among the biggest issues with this damned Singularity. Even Blavatsky coming out of fucking nowhere to Deus Ex Machina a grail and help into Guda's hands -- despite seemingly being slaughtered by Columbus in a (admittedly a bit funny) way to get the base of the Resistance -- means nothing to me compared to the blatant slaughter of two characters at once. Fergus is a total horndog even outside of Agartha's reach, but he even notes he respects his partners' consent, and doesn't overstep his bounds if he makes them uncomfortable. Scheherazade isn't exactly trusting in the slightest, least of all in Agartha - she barely even begins trusting Guda due to Guda treating her with actual respect. Even then, she isn't actively prostrating herself for Guda in that sense, very likely due to the fact that's more of a defence mechanism to her rather than something she'd enjoy, due to extreme trauma. Albeit, Fate writing does leave the possibility in the air for Guda specifically, but that's very likely just due to Guda being Guda and being careful to treat her properly and help her than anything else (and also the whole 'self insert harem' thing, I guess, but that's a hell of a lot easier to ignore esp in contrast to Agartha) And yet, we see that epilogue, that butchers both of them in one fell swoop so badly that I almost ended up hating both of them. Agartha's biggest problem is that it tried to be deep and intriguing, while having the writing quality of the goddamned Valentine's events. It picked all the right characters to have an incredibly intriguing storyline, and fell flat because the author decided that playing sexual harassment, d'Eon's everything, and even the most serious scenes for comedy was more important than telling a story even half as meaningful as the chapters before it. Lo and behold -- to my knowledge, Minase wrote it. Of course he did. He chose the best, the most interesting characters he could find, and made them so fucking one-note that the story lost all its charm in moments. He chose to emulate Nasu without understanding what made Nasu's writing so good. He chose to make Agartha a laugh fest despite simultaneously trying to make it 'deep.' He chose to fall head-over-ass over a possibly interesting allegory into misogyny and fall right into sexualizing it to the point of feeling like a femdom BDSM fic. And go figure the only character he did decently was Christopher fucking Columbus. I have a hatred for Agartha I can't reasonably place anywhere else. Prillya was just as shitty, but I ignored it, because Prillya itself wasn't great, so of course the crossover sucks too. Valentine's events written by him weren't great, but whatever, it's a Valentine's event. Septem, written by someone else, was similarly not great. But it wasn't insulting. It simply wasn't great, and had a lot of wasted potential. But its ending wasn't out of character to the point of being insulting. Its story didn't make incredible mythological and historical figures too infuriating to like anymore. It didn't almost ruin entire Fate characters for me. Not the way Agartha did. I should probably contextualize that Scheherazade is among my favourite mythological figures. I introduced myself to her through Magi (lmao) due to further research into the base stories -- as well as a favourite Magic: The Gathering card, Shahrazad, which forced you to play a game within your game, like how Arabian Nights featured stories within stories.

Even in Fate outside of Agartha, I liked her. Her design didn't make much sense to me considering her character, but whatever, I didn't need to think too hard of it. It's just a design, and despite my hatred of Penth's design, I still love Penth as a character, so I can handle Schez. But Agartha painted her in such a way that all the subtlety and interesting parts of Schez went completely out the window. No longer was there any hidden references to the aftereffects of her life beyond 'i dun wan die,' and there was hardly an ounce of sympathy or kindness in her bones at all. While her being an anti-hero made some sense, especially as she was only a normal person with far above-average storytelling prowess, there was a point when she stopped being a 'good, but terrified person' and started being a complete asshole. And Agartha was that time. If it weren't for her Interlude, which redeemed her considerably, and Ooku, which did wonders for her character despite being written by Minase (as I believe Nasu was overseeing him at that point), I very likely would've never gone for her at all, despite my love of the myth. In Conclusion This rant is just to say that Agartha is bad. Horrific. Insulting, even. At every step where it could've been good, it tumbled head-over-ass into the most insulting, uncomfortable shit you could imagine. It failed to take itself seriously, and paced itself like a comedy event, but simultaneously acted as if it expected its audience to take it seriously. Like a clown brigade deciding to take on Les Mis, it loses all of its punch when every few lines is interrupted by a jab at Fergus, sexual harassment, or something that comes close to being cool before suddenly turning into a badly-timed joke, or suddenly becoming laden with dialogue so sexual it feels straight out of a porno. It's aggravating, awful, and with only brief reprieves of bareable comedy in between long, long lengths of hellish text and awful characterization. The only good part was the gameplay -- which, laden with interesting mechanics not seen elsewhere, was legitimately fun. My take? Avoid all Agartha cutscenes and plot, and just play the gameplay. The gameplay's fun, and if enjoyed on its own, would probably make for a far better experience than observing the story surrounding it. But good gameplay doesn't make up for a horrible story, especially in a game where plot is as important as it is in F/GO. Agartha's a pile of shit in my eyes, but that's ultimately only my opinion, and nothing more. If others have an opinion counter to mine, that's completely fine -- and don't let this analysis ruin your fun with Agartha if you enjoyed its plot. To be frank, I'd be happy if you enjoyed it where I could not. And if you think my takes are misinformed, or if I missed a spot (or overreacted to a spot), that's what the reblogs and comments are for! I'm definitely not the kind of dude who has the final say in matters like this -- this is only what I picked up. Thank you for reading!

#fate grand order #fate #f/go #fate/grand order #mash kyrielight #agartha #agartha fgo #tldr i hated it lol #agartha spoilers #rape tw #rape cw

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sonickitty · 3 years

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The Emily artful and shanon situation coming out is why I have doubts about social media users around the globe in general and why I don't trust your average "queer-friendly, trans-friendly, anti-racist anarchist activist social media personality/creator". Because shit like this always comes out!

Your average centrist-lefty(just say you're r****wing) is very arrogant and nationalistic, still wants to maintain a "soft" hierarchy about how "only my local peeps can do as well as me, immigrants and everyone else from other countries have to do somewhat poorer than me to make it look fair - to ME!". Because if you cleared your racism but refuse to let go of your imperialism and anger to dominate, to make others less well off because you don't want to feel the pinch true equality brings or give up some privilege, they will always go back to being racist. It comes back eventually. Cite freedom of speech nonsense to give their threats and offensives a pass. Also they still think it's okay to use transphobic slurs, that r slur, and express their "discomfort" about trans people in a very vulgar manner.

So the average American doing progressiveness on social media seems like a big act, it just seems very feigned. Even with the ones further Left. And then it turned out that some gay men can be racist too, feminists can be man-hating/misandrist, some transpeople can be cis-misogynistic+anti-ciswomen, and anyone who is LGBTQ or disabled or something else can be a nazi too! It seems most people sound nice on social media because of likes and follows and they are seen by other users who are ready to cancel them once something screws up. But how do you genuinely act, and who are you mask-off when the public's not watching?

For example those bigots who attacked #BlackLivesMatter protesters and random Asians on the streets, and the Karens/other randoms in the news: you find their social media profiles, a few actually posted anti-racist and very leftwing stuff a few times but they certainly didn't mean it when they did their hate crime!

Not judging just questioning why should become a refugee in the US or look up to creators and influencers when people mask off do not match their online personalities

This response is going to get long, but I want to thank you for sending this. It's a really complex topic, and I appreciate the opportunity to process my own thoughts about it.

I just did a bit of Googling, but I'm still not very experienced on the details of Emily Artful & Shanon, as these aren't people I've followed or engaged with in the past. However, I think your question goes beyond that one incident and I'm going to respond as best I can, because internet interaction and social media personas are always on my mind.

I want to start out by saying you are right to doubt what you see online. While I can't fix the feeling of betrayal that comes when someone lets you down, I can provide my thought process for interacting with people online and keeping myself emotionally safe from those betrayals. This is my personal take. It's how I navigate the world and the internet, but that doesn't make it universal, and I'm sure I'm barely scratching the surface of what could be said on this topic.

Take 1: Everyone wears masks

I would say that most behavior you see on social media is an act. People are complex, and it's hard for us to show all of our selves at all times. I have different sides of myself that different friends see. Between friends, or in small, in-person circles, this usually doesn't do harm.

On the internet, people need to present a version of themselves that fits with their "brand" in order to market themselves and keep an audience. Audiences like stability; it can be hard to follow someone who posts different things all the time, or behaves in inconsistent ways. We want to be able to predict the kind of language and content we will see from the people we follow, and that impacts how we engage with celebrities, influencers, acquaintances, and friends. Sometimes we can't know who a person is behind their mask, and if we aren't their friend, we are not entitled to.

Take 2: Celebrities are not community

Following someone online is like petting someone else's dog. We get a taste of what that dog is like, and we get to enjoy the fun, friendly, cute parts of them without having to take them on walks or pick up their poop or pay their vet bills. Dogs are messy, people are messy. Relationships are very messy, and so is community.

Community is not a branded experience. It's not just the fun parts; it's the emotional and physical labor, the poop, the monetary support, the love, the playing, the barking, the cuddling. What we see online is a small, marketable version community and activism. Your community is the people you engage with, and the people who step up for you directly; not the people who post "Love is Love" on Twitter and call it a day.

Take 3: People are not safe spaces.

Safe spaces are created and maintained by people and communities to provide specific kinds of safety to specific groups. No group is going to be 100% for every single person in the world, and that's ok. Intersectionality takes practice, and Safe Spaces take effort. If one person tries to create a "safe space" without hearing other perspectives, they will only build a safe space for themselves, and people who are exactly like them.

No single individual can provide a safe space. Real life people are not a branded experience, and they are also not a safe experience. Safety can be limiting - a necessary, important, thoughtful and valuable limitation. Branded personas provide the illusion of safety because they are limited, but limitations don't automatically make something safe.

Take 4: Trust and Critical Thinking are not Mutually Exclusive

No matter how much you trust someone, you should still be aware of their strengths and weaknesses, and how that person's behavior will impact you. You might also be put in a position to place your trust in someone you're critical of - politicians, for example.

You can trust someone, love someone, like something, enjoy something, and still question it or be critical of it. This goes for celebrities, your favorite media, your best friend. Your best friend in the world might not be a safe space to you at all times, and that is okay. It's hard enough for us as human beings to be safe for ourselves. My brain doesn't always give me helpful thoughts; my body isn't always pain free. I am sometimes too busy making a safe space for myself in my own body to be a safe space for the people around me. But I trust them to know when my behavior is hurting them and I trust them to tell me, and they trust me to be kind and listen and adjust my behavior when it needs adjusting.

Concluding Thoughts:

It's very hard to be complex on the internet. We will water down our most important beliefs to make them likeable and shareable and rebloggable. Sometimes watered down messages help beliefs spread, or help people at all levels of understanding learn something new. Sometimes they turn important ideas into a catchy soundbite that people quote and recycle without thinking about the philosophy behind it. It's OK to be inspired by those messages, even if the poster is half-assing their activism. Imperfect people can still inspire us and help us grow; we just have to move beyond their words and develop our own perspectives.

You've said this very well: the "average American doing progressiveness on social media seems like a big act." That's correct. Americans hold a ton of influence in the world, especially white Americans, and it can be hard to get away from us, but our fame or influence doesn't make us trustworthy. You are entitled to your skepticism and critical thinking, no matter a person's nationality, sexual identity, gender, etc. Human beings can and will screw up. People will wear masks. People will put on acts, in person and online. You shouldn't automatically trust strangers to support you or uphold your beliefs because they probably won't.

You are not entitled to receive anything from strangers online, and they aren't entitled to receive anything from you. The only thing we owe each other is faith in our shared humanity. Be critical, be skeptical, voice your concerns, and do all of that knowing the cardboard cut-outs you see online are real people behind the screen.

About the Blogger: I am a millennial white American, and gay/queer nonbinary transman. I was raised on racism, cisheteronormativity, evangelical christianity and right-wing politics. I will spend the rest of my life unlearning that, and I expect myself to fuck up while doing that work (and definitely have before.) I am posting this with the distinct feeling that I am missing something, but I've been writing and editing this for like 3 hours and I really need dinner.

#social media #bigotry #celebrity #parasocial relationships #emily artful #internet #human behavior #online behaviour #criticism #fandom crit #internet crit #racism mention #sexism mention #homophobia mention #transphobia mention #long post #my blogging #hey nonny nonny

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jemej3m · 4 years

Text

trial (objection p.2)

i love htgawm connor is such a problem child

“So your father was already incapacitated when you murdered him,” Andrew deduced, leaning back in his chair. He spun the land-line’s coiled cord around his finger, looking over the ceiling sconces of his office. The place was definitely built at least half a century ago, and the remnants of its previous occupations were everywhere, from the covered-up fireman pole holes to the sound-proofed insulation.

“When I killed him out of self-defence, yes,” Neil returned. His portion of the conversation would always be under surveillance.

“Way to make my job harder, Wesninski.”

“What good would I be, otherwise?” he retorted. “Also, please don’t call me that. I’m figuring out a new last name. How does Neil Smith sound?”

“Dreadfully boring,” Andrew said. “Don’t say that word. I don’t like it.”

“Which one, exactly?”

Andrew grit his teeth. “Please.” It still sent shudders down his spine. “There’s no time for pleasantries.”

“Fine,” the man said. “Is that all you wanted to waste my time on? The position my father was found in, when I - when he died?”

“Considering that there are extremely graphic photos of his predicament for the jury to gawk at, yes. How is it self-defence if there’s no threat?”

“He wasn’t cuffed there: I was. The DNA evidence was tampered with to remove traces of the skin tissue that the cuffs had scraped away. Have you even looked at those photos? His wrists are clearly free. I thought you were talking about the eyes.”

“What about them?” Andrew hedged.

“They’re gouged out,” Neil muttered. “I hate that our eyes are - were - the same.”

“You did that whilst the two of you were fighting,” Andrew suggested. “Unless its clear you did it with a knife?”

“All I had was his cleaver,” Neil said. “I used the handle. That’d look like fingers, right?”

“Right,” Andrew agreed, just as Wymack appeared at his doorway.

“Could you keep the gruesome mutilation discussions off the worklines?” the old man demanded. “Matt just threw up into Dan’s paper-shredder.”

“I’ll have to call you back,” Andrew said, vastly unimpressed.

“I was going to say,” Neil said, sounding vaguely amused. “You have quite a stomach. Till next time, Andrew.”

“Bye, Neil.”

Wymack had his arms crossed when Andrew threw the phone back onto the receiver, his glower shrouded and unknowable.

Andrew gave it right back to him, refusing to stand as he mirrored Wymack’s stance. “What?”

“First you viciously reject the case,” he said. “Then you drive to see him. Now you’re calling him every day?”

“He’s in prison,” Andrew said. “I can’t just invite him over to interview him and gather evidence.”

“There is no valid reason for you to buddy up to Wesninski like this,” Wymack objected. “You barely speak to your clients unless they’re escapin’ juvie.”

“You’re asking no questions, so I’ll give no answers,” Andrew responded cheerfully. “Have a nice day, boss.”

Wymack pointed at him. “No murder talk on the worklines. Three strikes and you’re out, Andrew.”

Andrew swivelled back around in his chair, knowing true and well Wymack had warned him about upwards of 72 different infringements of people’s delicate psyche. He had a job to do: if someone got in his way, he wasn’t going to be nice about it.

Not for the first time, he wondered if Neil had a contraband mobile phone. It’d make his life a hell of a lot easier. For about twenty minutes he scrolled aimlessly through emails from desperate idiots convicted of white-collar crime, simultaneously considering how he might get a mobile phone to Neil next time he visited. He could go on the weekend, after Nicky’s godforsaken family night.

Oh, shit, Andrew thought, when he noticed he’d lost an hour of his day making plans to see Neil again.

Maybe Wymack was on to something.

“You do seem awfully invested,” Betsy suggested, leaning on the porch railing as Andrew smoked through a second cigarette. She’d come along to Nicky’s Friday night fiasco at his request, seeing as Aaron had Katelyn and Nicky had Erik. It seemed a little ridiculous to being his old therapist, who was much more of a mother than a therapist, but Andrew’d wanted to talk to her anyway and their schedules clashed too much to meet up for lunch.

“His case is simple,” Andrew objected, glaring at an owl that’d settled on the gangly tree in Nicky’s front yard. “He’s got physical evidence of his father’s cruelty, even though it’s been a decade. I’ve uncovered the DNA evidence tampering. Neil clearly acted out of self-defence. It’s open and shut, but no one’s going to want Wesninski’s child out on the streets.”

“Jury?” Betsy inquired.

“Jury,” Andrew confirmed sullenly. He fucking hated jury catering. When a case was on thin ice, it was up to selecting the perfectly biased (or prejudiced) people that’d think with their heart, not their head. Andrew was an excellent judge of character, but emotional evaluations were taxing and laborious.

“You’ll do great,” Betsy promised, smiling her all-knowing smile. “You always do.”

Andrew hummed gently, taking one final drag of his cigarette. Before he could chuck the butt into Nicky’s shrubbery, Betsy pinched it between her fingers and dropped it onto an ashtray atop a rickety windowsill.

“It’s an interesting story,” Betsy continued. “There’s every reason to be intrigued by it.”

Andrew just grunted.

“Though,” she remarked. “I figured that case between the young girls was even more perplexing and intricate, but you seem rather enamoured.”

“Shut up,” he mumbled.

“I’m sure I don’t have to remind you about professionalism,” she said airily.

“No,” he agreed. “You don’t.”

But - damn it all to hell - Neil was interesting. He was only a year younger than Andrew was, intelligent without seeming overbearing or arrogant, confident but reserved, a man of constraint taught by hardship but also a man of growth and reflection. Andrew was rambling and he knew it. Neil Wesninski was attractive, intriguing and completely out of Andrew’s reach. Even if he were just your average guy walking down the street, he wouldn’t look at Andrew twice.

Andrew was fine with that. He didn’t need someone chasing after him, just like he didn’t need emotional intimacy or empathy or gentleness. It was like those nerve-endings had been scoured till they were numb and useless. The pathways were still there, but they echoed a nothingness that he’d never really figured out.

Whatever. Whatever. Neil was just a challenging and well-paying case. That’s all he’d ever be.

He was getting existential and over-contemplative. Betsy knew this and smiled, letting him take her by the elbow inside for a cup of cocoa. It was late when the other four finished their game of Monopoly and Nicky finally permitted everyone to leave. Betsy let Andrew walk her to her car again, warmth crinkling her eyes.

“If you’re seeing your Neil tomorrow,” she said, with a wink. “Tell me all the juicy details.”

“You’re a leech,” Andrew declared, pushing her car-door shut. She waved out the scrolled-down window as she careened off, leaving Andrew to his quiet but volatile thoughts.

Your Neil, she’d said.

Now wasn’t that a confronting idea.

“Suppose you are a danger to society,” Andrew drawled. They were sat opposite one another at another metal table, handcuffs dangling off one of Neil’s wrists, his blunt key being fiddled with in the other hand. “Suppose you are just as marvellously unhinged as dear old Dad. What then?”

“Why bother entertaining the possibilities?” Neil cocked an eyebrow. “We both know I’m fine.”

“You are the furthest thing from ‘fine’,” Andrew retorted.

“You’re no paragon of mental health yourself,” Neil laughed, and Andrew wondered how the fuck he’d got himself here.

Two months ago he’d met Neil for the first time. In two weeks his trial would begin, in his lovely hometown of Baltimore, Maryland. It’d be less of a drive for Andrew, so he didn’t mind.

In two months, Andrew had found himself hanging onto every conversation. At first he clung on with apprehension. A wariness born out of unfamiliarity: he’d never been in the realm of wanting to associate with someone. Wanting someone’s company, their thoughts and opinions, their attention. It was ridiculous. Neil was a convicted murderer in a max-security prison.

Then again, Andrew was the one who knew that Neil was undeserving of that title best. At most it was manslaughter. In reality it was a blessing. Ridding the world of the Butcher, a renowned and horrifically twisted serial killer, was a service to the public rather than a hindrance.

And so Andrew had found himself in a strange position, between professionalism and exceptionalism. He almost couldn’t help it. He wanted to know what happened behind those ocean blues.

“Someone’s been bored again,” Andrew accused, lighting a cigarette. That was illegal but he didn’t give a fuck. Neil gazed at where it rested between his lips, conflicted.

He shrugged, caught out. “You’re an interesting person. Would it scare you to know we’re similar in more ways than one?”

Andrew let a small smirk twitch around his smoke. “You should be more scared than I should be.”

“Maybe I’ll go to law school when I’m out,” Neil leered, grinning. “Beat you at your own game.”

“You can try,” Andrew said. “You’ll lose.”

Neil hummed. His shackles jingled as he reached over the table for Andrew’s cigarette, his fingertips brushing over Andrew’s lips as he snatched it away. For a moment he watched the cherry’s glow, before letting it rest at the corner of his mouth.

Unimpressed, and also oddly flushed, Andrew glared.

“That sounds like a challenge,” Neil said, returning to the conversation like he hadn’t just stolen the cigarette out of Andrew’s mouth. Like Andrew hadn’t just let him. “If you get me out of this hell hole, I’ll prove you wrong.”

“And if you don’t?”

Neil grinned. “Then you lose anyway. Don’t worry: I won’t cry.”

“Good,” Andrew muttered, leaning back in his chair with his arms folded over his chest.

Neil filled the rest of their valuable time with inane chatter about the more twisted happenings within a male max prison: Andrew had heard of similar stories and worse, but seeing as Neil instigated most of the fights, he still found it rather entertaining to be told.

Before he knew it, their time was up. He stood, plucking the butt out from between Neil’s lips.

“Till next time,” Neil said, a forlorn look at the cigarette between Andrew’s fingers.

“I’ll text you about trial prep,” Andrew said, pointing at him. “Read it.”

Neil sighed. “Not like it’ll help me in any way. But fine. I’ll waste my limited credit and battery on the shitty flipper for court etiquet.”

“You’d better, you ungrateful shit. I got you that phone.”

Neil just winked and blew him a kiss. At Andrew’s scowl, he laughed.

The laugh haunted - no, teased - Andrew all the way out of the stupid prison complex, across the car park, even as he blasted music on the way home.

Andrew took one look at the woman who squirmed in her chair, leaning anxiously away from the middle-aged man next to her. It was instinctive and ingrained in her behaviours. An abusive father, then. Or, perhaps an abusive husband, if the twisting of her wedding ring was anything to go by.

“Accept,” Andrew declared.

“Do you have any qualms about gang violence?” the prosecution asked a balding man, lounging in his chair.

“It’s a toxic function of our society,” he answered.

The lawyer looked to the judge and smiled. “Accept, your honour.”

Fucking hell, Andrew thought. He glanced back over to the table, where Neil was cuffed to the iron loop. He didn’t smile, but simply tipped up his chin. An acknowledgement. Confidence in, well. Andrew.

Something in Andrew’s stomach settled. He turned back to the man that the prosecution had accepted. “So you have heard of the Wesninski case?”

“It was ten years ago,” he objected.

“What did you think of it?”

“It was well resolved,” he said.

“So you still garner some form of opinion against Wesninski?” Andrew eyed the Christian Society badge pinned to the strap of his messenger bag. “Surely your god would have some qualms with your inability to forgive,”

“Mr Minyard,” the judge insisted. “That’s enough.”

It didn’t matter. The man was already spitting mad, going bright-red in the face. He pointed at Neil and hissed “He’s a monster, just like his father. God should’ve had him killed!”

“Denied,” Andrew drawled. The man shuffled out of the jury box, frothing mad.

By the end of the selection process, Andrew was sure that at least half of those sitting in the box would think emotionally rather than pragmatically. He settled back at his desk, ignoring the prosecution lawyer’s filthy glares, and tapped his fingers on Neil’s file.

“I didn’t miss this,” Neil muttered, picking at the skin of his cuticles.

From Andrew’s pocket he drew out Neil’s favourite key, of which he’d swiped after they’d searched Neil from head to toe. The man looked at him with undeserved awe, taking the blunt key and spinning it between his fingers.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Shut up,” Andrew retorted.

The court was called to stand: Neil’s hearing had begun.

FUCKs sake i was gonna try do this in three parts but the trial will be a whole part and the post trial too..... dammit lol

next we find out: what does the prosecution have up their sleeve? how will neil’s testimony go? what chaos will andrew cause in the courtroom? whose key does neil continually trace?? will neil be inevitably driven to distraction by andrew’s dope-ass suit?

#andreil #lawyer!andrew #felon!neil #law au #law firm!foxes #andrew minyard #neil josten #david wymack #betsy dobson #all for the game #aftg #hope u like this disaster of a fic lol #can someone please tell me what to name this au #i cant call it the htgawm au #(how to get away with murder)#unless?#idek #jem writes

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