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miraculouslbcnreactions · 2 months

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Hello. I've been binge reading your meta post an I loves all of it. I have one question, though I don't know if you had the same question or not. If you had I'm sorry feel free to ignore this but if you hadn't, this is my question. Many people said Adrien as sentimonster is a good plot and the other said it's also good metaphor for abuse children. But what do you think about the senti plot? Is it necessary? And what do you think the writer is trying to achieve with the plot if Adrien doesn't even allowed to know about what he is?

Thank you! I'm glad that you've been enjoying my rambles! I don't think I've touched on those aspects of the sentiplot, so here goes!

Is it Necessary/What's The Goal?

I don't think that the sentiplot is even remotely necessary. My two cents is that it reads like something that was added relatively last-minute in order to add some cheap drama to draw the plot out because they didn't have enough content to organically fill seven seasons. Part of the reason that I'm comfortable saying that is because we've seen the writers do this type of move many times before. I don't wanna get too into the weeds on this, but a good example is the love triangles with Luka and Kagami.

Luka and Kagami are never treated as real alternate love interests. They're just road blocks on the love square highway that allow for seasons three to end on a cliff hanger. The fact that season four opens on two episodes meant to reassure the audience that Lukanette and Adrigami are doomed to fail is proof of this. No one is actually supposed to ship those ships. There's no Team Luka vs Team Adrien. It's just cheap drama.

The other reason that I feel comfortable calling the sentiplot cheap shoehorned drama is because the sentiplot has no teeth. A big reason why I refused to believe that it was going to be a thing was because it's an extremely serious plot that has no place in a Y-7 show. The wielder of raw destruction can have his free will overwritten at any time! The show has made jewelry theft a common teenage past time! This is bad!

And yet, once it's introduced, it goes nowhere. Gabe gives the most lackluster commands humanly possible and Nathalie undoes every one of them before they have a chance to meaningfully impact the plot. The biggest fallout of the sentiplot was that the Adrienette kiss got delayed a bit. How terrifying.

If the sentiplot had the weight it deserved, then it would have destroyed Adrientte in a big, dramatic fashion. Gabriel would have commanded Adrien to date Kagami and Tomoe would have done the same for Kagami re Adrien. But that's too serious, so we don't even get Gabe telling Adrien to break up with Marinette. He just tells Adrien to not see her and Marinette never has any clue that something went wrong there because Nathalie undoes the command two minutes later.

The Sentiplot's and Emilie

You may have read the previous section and thought, "But wait, doesn't the sentiplot give an explanation for why Emilie used the peacock? Didn't we need that?"

No, we didn't. Felix's little play and Gabe's memory of the night they used the peacock both heavily imply that no one knew that the peacock would kill you. It's why Felix exists! His father did not willingly give his life to have a kid and neither did Emilie. It was an unknown side effect.

Imo, it would have actually been better if Emilie hadn't used the peacock for such obviously selfish reasons. I mean, is anyone really saying, "Oh no, the rich lady used forbidden magic (and possibly killed some people?) to get a designer baby, then faced unexpected consequences! How awful for her! She didn't deserve that!"

Wouldn't it have been a far more interesting and complex story if Emilie used the peacock because she wanted to help someone else? If she was an unambiguously good person who suffered for doing the right thing or even just a morally gray thing? Wouldn't that make Gabriel's quest feel more righteous and less like a temper tantrum by a rich, entitled white guy who used his wealth in a morally dubious manner and paid for it?

The Sentiplot as an Abuse Metephor

I don't think that the writers meant for the sentiplot to be an abuse metaphor. In fact, I sincerely hope they didn't because it's a terrible one! Or, at least, a depressing one.

Abuse - especially childhood abuse - is something that sticks with us. A lot of victims will be forever scared by what they went through. But just because they bare scares doesn't mean that they're trapped by their abuse and can never break free. This is true even if the abuse caused mental health issues like PTSD or CPTSD, conditions that can never be cured because you know what they can be? Controlled and mitigated to the point where the victim is no longer ruled by their condition.

There's also the fact that abuse victims - especially child abuse victims - can and often do reach a point where their abusers no longer have any power over them. I have personally seen a child abuse victim go thought the process of realizing that their parent is just another adult now. All the power that the parent once held is gone. The child doesn't depend on them for food and shelter anymore. If the abuse starts up again, then the child can just get up and walk away.

That's not true for a sentimonster. Sentimonsters don't grow up and get more agency/power. At any point, their abuser can get ahold of their amok and override their free will, taking away the sentimonster's freedom even if the sentimonster is on another continent! There is no means of true escape.

No abuse victim will ever be that powerless. Abuse victims can escape abuse and they do have true free will. Sentimonsters will always be sentimonsters.

Is the Sentiplot Good?

No. It's too serious for a kids show. In fact, now that it's canon, here's my two cents: all of the sentikids are massive liabilities to the team who need to give up their miraculouses immediately because they can never be truly trusted. Felix has shown us time and time again how easy it is to steal an amok and replace it with a fake, so we must always assume that the sentikids are compromised because to assume otherwise is to invite the miraculouses to fall into the wrong hands. It's just not worth the risk to trust a senti.

Along the same lines, the love square should never be canon unless Marinette gives up Guardianship because Adrien is a liability to the safety of the miraculouses even if he didn't wield on himself. The only way to get around this issue is to use the wish to make the sentikids human, but Gabe failed to even do that one kindness for his son, so here we are. Season six will either drive this point home by having Lila use the amoks to mess with Adrien or it will drop the sentiplot forever, proving just how cheap and poorly thought out it was.

Other issues I think I've already addressed in other posts, but that are still a problem that make the plot bad:

a sentimonster's creator defines the sentimonster's worth, thus there being no issue with Felix making sentimonsters and then killing them or the heroes destroying them, but it would somehow be wrong if we did the same thing to any of the sentikids

any command you give a sentimonster can be overwritten and sentimonsters can't resist even if they know they're being controlled, so there's truly no hope to free them

giving your leading lady anxiety issues and a boyfriend whose free will is constantly in jeopardy is cruel and unusual punishment

an insane number of lore issues like why is it impossible to destroy other sentimonsters, but Adrien can be destroyed in akuma fights? Cataclysms are pure destruction! It makes no sense that akumas can do what a cataclysm can't. And is Adrien able to die a natural death? What happens to his amok when he does? Will his children be able to be controlled by his amok too since they're part of him?

the lore around Gabe & Emilie finding the miraculous makes no sense and should not be possible. That's another rant, though.

#senti salt #ml writing salt #ml writing critical #ml season 5 salt #adrien deserves better #this plot is only suited to an angsty or bittersweet ending #I don't know how you can hope for a happy ending when Adrien is forever a slave

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tgmsunmontue · 3 months

Text

It's all academic darlin' EPILOGUE

~39k+ Hangster AU. IceMav established in background.

Bradley is a professor but living his best life with IceMav parents. Jake is a pilot. Maverick sort-of tries (and fails) to play matchmaker, so he tries again. Touch of epistolary and sprinkling of one-sided unknown/mistaken-identity.

PART 1 PART 2 PART 3 PART 4 PART 5 PART 6 PART 7 PART 8 PART 9 PART 10

This is a very fluffy feel-good epilogue. Didn't quite manage to shoehorn in more of Bradley lecturing and Jake being in there, or as much epistolary as I would like. ENJOY! (~4.5k long)

EPILOGUE

Bradley was meant to fly last night, but he’d ended up being kept back with something drastic in the lab, so he’d missed his take-off timeslot. Instead it’s fucking ass o’clock and Jake is watching the little six-seater come in to land and he’s pretty sure the swooping in his stomach is because the man he’s pretty sure he loves is inside that plane. It’s been a week of revelations and he can hardly believe it’s only been a week. He watches as Bradley follows the directions of the ground crew before he’s walking toward him, bag slung over his should and he looks great. His legs and ass are gorgeous, but he’s walking with a little jump in his step like he’s immensely happy and Jake’s pretty confident that he’s the reason.

There aren’t any words, just soft-slow smiles and Bradley has dropped his bag, is pushing Jake against his rental car, hands on his ass as he presses himself against Jake’s front and then kisses him for a solid three minutes, maybe five, and it feels so good to be touching him again, to have him there after just talking to him on the phone in spare moments during the week when they’d both been free.

“Hi there sailor...”

“You are such a dork.”

“Guilty as charged. What are you going to do about it?”

“Suffer, apparently. Come on, we can go back to bed…”

“Really now? When I went to all this effort to look good to meet your family?”

Jake doesn’t mention how his hair is squished from wearing the headset in the plane, his shirt rumpled and buttoned incorrectly. He looks like a wet dream come to life and Jake wouldn’t want him any other way. He throws Bradley’s bag in the backseat, shoves him toward the passenger side and starts the drive back to the house they’re staying at.

“Adam and Michelle are your brother and sister. Adam’s married to Kelly, they’ve got three year old twins. Michelle is married to Lachlan and they have the five year old, three year old and the baby…”

“Yep.”

“I’m not going to remember this right.”

“You’ll be fine, it’s not like they’re going to quiz you. Also my sister is going to go so easy on you, pretty sure she’d given up hopes on me finding anyone. Bachelor for life.”

“Yeah, when you’re so ineligible and everything…” Bradley snorts.

“Maybe I was just waiting for perfection to come along,” Jake replies and catches the immediate flush to Bradley’s face at the compliment.

Of course his sister is awake when they arrive, his eight month old niece, Emily, passed out on her shoulder and she looks half asleep herself. His industrial strength earplugs have come in handy this week, but parents can’t ignore their screaming offspring.

“Oh hi, Bradley. It’s nice to meet you…”

“Hi, you must be Michelle.”

“Here, let me take her so you can go back to bed…” Jake offers.

“The other two will be awake in less than an hour –”

“All the more reason to try and get some sleep now. She’s teething,” Jake says to Bradley, taking Emily from his sister’s unresisting arms and giving her a gentle push toward her own bedroom. Emily doesn’t even stir in his arms.

“Nice to meet you Bradley, maybe I can have a proper conversation when I’m actually awake,” Michelle says, ambling off and only bumping into one wall as she goes. He shifts slightly, makes his hold on Emily a little more secure and one he can maintain for longer.

“Do you want kids?” Bradley asks, voice quiet and somber and Jake meets his eye, suddenly terrified he might answer this wrong. This isn’t something they’ve ever discussed.

“No. Uh. Sorry, is that a deal breaker?”

“No, it’s definitely not a deal breaker,” Bradley says, and if Jake was going to put money on something he’s say he looked a little relieved. “You just look good like that.”

“Bradshaw, I look good all the time. I though we’d already established that fact.”

“We had, this was just one I hadn’t been expecting.”

“Well, I’m more than happy playing the cool uncle. And helping my brother and sister out. No desire to add any mini-mes to the world.”

“You’d make very cute babies…”

“Bradshaw, our babies would be too hot for the world, it’s a good thing they’ll never come to fruition. You want to hold her? She’s dead to the world…”

“Yeah, sure thing…”

Surprising him Bradley scoops Emily from him with easy confidence and Jake knows he doesn’t have nieces and nephews, or cousins, or…

“Plenty of my friends have kids. I’m also the go-to cool uncle,” Bradley says, clearly seeing the surprised expression on Jake’s face.

“Our powers combined…”

“And people think I’m the geeky one,” Bradley mutters, but he’s grinning at Jake. His stomach-heart-brain are on that three-seater roller coaster again and he can’t hold it back.

“I love you.”

He feels like he might throw up, suddenly nervous he’s said it too soon, or Bradley will run. That something bad will happen. It doesn’t. Bradley gives him a slow smile, it grows wider and wider, his eyes crinkling, his hand reaches up to cup Jake’s jaw and he’s pulling him close, his lips brushing over Jake’s and the kiss is gentle but firm, feels full of meaning somehow.

“I love you too.”

Okay then.

… … …

“Bradley, nice to meet you. Haven’t heard much about you of course, he saves all the good gossip for Michelle.”

“Hey! Michelle and I both like – oh crap… hi kids.”

Bradley snorts into his coffee, stares up at the ceiling for a brief second in the hope it’ll stop him from bursting into laughter. This has to be Adam and his wife Kelly, each of them holding a toddler.

“Were you being gross again?”

“When isn’t he gross?”

“Hey! I take offence to all of this! It’s slander!”

“I had to watch your teenage years. You were gross,” Michelle says, looking more awake than this morning.

“Oh! Do you have photos?” Bradley asks, and Jake squawks with alarm.

Michelle does indeed have photos and later Bradley enjoys looking through them, although he can see that Jake wasn’t exactly brimming with the confidence and happiness he has an adult. Knows a little more now how his parents don’t talk to Jake; effectively disowned when he came out. The fact that his brother and sister walked away as well tells him that there’s probably even more to it but he’s not going to pry. Jake will tell him if he wants to. He’s smiling down at the photo of Jake on his USNA graduation day, his brother and sister on either side of him when he feels Michelle settle down beside him on the sofa, Emily in her arms.

“Thank you.”

“What for?” Bradley asks, a bit confused.

“For giving my brother what he deserves.”

“Oh. Easiest thing I’ve ever done.”

She smiles and gives him a one-armed hug before passing him Emily.

… … …

“You look like a natural holding that baby…” Mav says over the phone and Bradley frowns before spying Jake over in the doorway, phone in hand and grinning at him. Traitor.

“Jake’s sending you photos.”

“Hangman appreciates my desire for grandchildren.”

“Hangman knows how to direct your obsession toward something actually feasible. I think Ice is lucky you couldn’t knock him up. Jesus Mav.”

“I like kids okay? They’re cool. Anyway, he could’ve knocked me up. We’re equals like that.”

“Ugh. I don’t need to know.”

… … …

Jake hasn’t felt this happy, this settled, since he can remember. Maybe when he was a kid and didn’t have any worries in the world. Now he has his family, Bradley, a formal screening process to begin for the test pilot position and everything feels so good. So right. He doesn’t even have an impending sense that something bad has to happen to balance it out. He simply feels secure and content and it’s heady.

… … …

“Hey, you think you could ask Michelle and Adam whether they’d mind a couple more visitors this weekend?”

“Did you want to bring friends?” Jake asks, because there is a spare bedroom, but depending on who Bradley wants to bring might mean they don’t have the space. They have the house until Sunday, but they’ve got long drives ahead of them so will be leaving early.

“No. Mav and Ice want to come. I don’t have labs this Friday and I can rearrange someone to take my lectures…”

Jake grins at the idea that Bradley’s family wants to meet his, that Bradley is rearranging his work to help that happen. He knows this isn’t normal but it’s also not usual for his family to all be in one place.

“You want to come a day earlier? Yeah, that’d be great.”

“Earlier and with extra people.”

“It’s fine. We’d nearly out-number the kids and be able to let the parents have a date night or something…”

“Or something huh? You angling for more nieces and nephews?”

“No! But they might like to have some time together without their kids there. They’ll probably just sleep if their conversations are anything to go on.”

… … …

He watches the plane come in and just waits, the feeling far more familiar now and he’s hopefully going to be watching Bradley fly into and out of his life regularly and he wouldn’t want it any other way, except maybe living together but one step at a time. He watches and then laughs, realizing that Bradley didn’t fly this time, is stalking toward him from where the plane is being towed into a hangar with a slightly annoyed look on his face and Jake kisses him, glad to see it wipes the annoyance clear off.

“He didn’t let you fly huh?”

“Of course not. You think I’m allowed to fly when he’s in the plane? He’s far too much of a control freak for that. I don’t want to know what he promised Ice, because there wasn’t even the hint of an argument this time. By the way, Ice is the same with cars. It’s a whole thing. You’ll get it as well.”

Sure enough Jake is hip-checked out of the way as soon as they’ve exchanged quick hellos and hugs. Jake sure isn’t saying no to sitting in the back with Bradley, but he’s not going to not be an annoying shit about it, tosses a wink at Bradley and links their hands together; waits until they’ve been driving for a minute before speaking.

“Are we there yet? I’m hungry… Bradley’s breathing too close to me.”

“I need to use the bathroom!” Bradley adds in, realizing what game Jake is now playing, and he’s laughing.

“You two are such shits. Can you not act your age?”

“We’ll start acting our ages when you two do the same…” Bradley says, laughing.

… … …

“Adam, nice to meet you again. Much nicer circumstances this time around.”

“Pete, good to see you. And yeah, definitely much better. Can I get you a drink?”

Bradley looks between them, a little confused as to when their paths could have crossed.

“When did you guys meet?”

“At the hospital, after Jake’s accident.”

He remembers Jake mentioning an accident, hadn’t realized it had maybe been serious enough to require family to fly across the country. He’s going to need to ask Jake later, is suddenly filled with the worry that something might happen and he won’t know about it until well after the fact. Hates the idea for so many reasons but it’s definitely the idea of not knowing which is the worst. He needs to add Jake to his own emergency contact info so he’s not left in the dark either.

Ice is using his text-to-voice app to talk with Michelle and Lachlan, before Mav drags Adam over to introduce him as well and Bradley feels like he can maybe leave them to it and drop the bags in their room.

“This is a little surreal… my nephews are trying to climb the legs of the COMPACFLT so they can play with the device he’s holding,” Jake says, coming up behind him and wrapping his hands around Bradley’s waist.

“Ice loves kids, but usually kids are scared of him because he can looks so serious and he can’t talk very well to reassure them now, but he won’t mind…”

“Oh, I know he won’t mind. He puts up with you and Mav, and now me… he has the patience of a saint.”

“The patience maybe, but nothing else is saint like and we all know it.”

… … …

Bradley watches as Mav settles himself on the ground, pushing some of the blocks to the side. He remembers Mav playing with him a lot when he was a kid, remembers him bringing him presents, nearly always toy planes, but they’d changed, once his dad had died. He’d gone from being excited about the presents Mav bought to simply being happy to see Mav. And okay, he doesn’t want kids but he does feel a little sad that Mav’s not going to be a grandfather.

Except… except he can. Mav and Ice both are his dad in every sense that is important, and he knows Mav loves Jake. Their little family unit of three can easily grow to encompass Jake and his siblings and their families over time. Especially given that their own parents are not in the picture and likely never will be.

“I’m still not having kids Mav, but I’m pretty sure if you wanted to step into the role of grandfather for Jake’s nieces and nephews there’s a couple of positions available for you and Ice. If you wanted them.”

Mav nods once, simple acknowledgment that he’s heard him, but Bradley doesn’t miss the dampness in his eyes.

… … …

He’s made himself comfortable in Bradley’s apartment as much as he can. Has permission to use his office while he’s on campus during the day and Jake lets himself lounge around and get comfortable. He pours himself a coffee and takes the mug and re-examines the bookshelves, wonders if any of the texts might prove useful to what he’s reading for the test pilot position.

He’s not really paying attention to anything when he hears a quick knock on the door, before the door is opening and he freezes, sense of déjà vu so strong he has to double check he’s actually fully dressed this time. He is thankfully but he’s wondering how many people have fucking keys to Bradley’s apartment.

“Oh my god! You’re not Bradley.”

“Ah, no. Uh…”

“Oh! You’re the boyfriend! Jacob right?”

“Jake. Yeah.”

“Kezia. Nice to meet you.”

“Uh. And you…”

“Bradley didn’t warn you I was coming over?”

“No.”

“Typical. I’m here to make sure his indoor plants don’t die. I’m his plant person.”

“Plant person?” Jake asks, a little confused, but he vaguely remembers something Bradley said, about how he couldn’t keep plants alive and maybe that’s why he has a plant person…? His phone rings then and he pulls it out, sees Bradley’s face on screen and accepts the call.

“Hi.”

“Hi. I forgot to tell you –”

“She’s already here.”

“Shit. Sorry.”

“It’s fine…” Jake says, but Kezia is moving closer, clearly aware that he’s talking to Bradley.

“Nice work Bradshaw!”

“Fuck’s sake…” Bradley mutters and Jake grins, but knows he’s also maybe blushing a little. “I was a little distracted this morning okay, then I was running late.”

“Got distracted huh? Wonder what caused that?”

“Yeah, you’d have no idea huh?”

“None at all. You go do your teaching shit, I’m going to make Kezia a cup of coffee…? Tea? And ask all about your ineptitude with house plants.”

“He’s useless,” Kezia says loudly, but she’s already heading to the kitchen to make herself a hot drink of some description and Jake thinks he’ll get on fine with her too.

… … …

“Hey kid! I bought you something!”

“Uh, you didn’t have to do that Mav…”

“Oh no, I did.”

Jake opens it and inside the cardboard box is a muzzle, and he looks

“Are you making a comment about their sex life?” Ice asks, and Jake snorts, glad he can follow the most of the signing now. Wonders if Tom would be so risky with his conversations if more people understood what he was saying.

“No! Well. I guess I am actually.”

“Well, hate to break it to you Mav, but that mark wasn’t left by me.”

“What? What do you mean?” Mav asks, suddenly concerned and Jake will never get sick of being able to wind him up knowing that he’ll think it’s funny at the end of the day.

“It’s a rope burn…”

“What!” Mav flushes red and Jake keeps his expression deadpan.

“Your fault for asking about their sex life,” Ice says, his expression delighted.

“I wasn’t!”

“You mean you didn’t want me to wear this in the bedroom?” Jake asks, holding up the muzzle.

“I meant it as a joke…!”

“Ah… what the hell did I just walk into?” Bradley asks, looking between them. Ice is laughing so much he has tears at the corner of his eyes, breath coming in rough gasps.

“Mav bought us a sex toy.”

“No I didn’t!”

“A muzzle for me because of that new mark on your neck…”

“A rope did this…”

“I don’t need to know!” Mav exclaims, and Jake wonders if he can start turning purple with how red his face is.

“From climbing Mav. Fucking hell. A rope got caught on a hold and scraped over my neck and gave me friction burn.”

Jake has joined Ice in laughing, the expression in Mav’s face caught between relieved and embarrassed and Bradley just looking resigned.

… … …

A YEAR LATER

He’s finished his test-pilot training, managed to maintain a long-distance relationship with Bradley in San Diego and himself in fucking Maryland. Now though he’s enroute to Fallon, beginning as an advanced Top Gun instructor in five weeks. First though he has five weeks uninterrupted with Bradley and a piece of land he bought that he has plans for, sitting adjacent to the same piece of land that belongs to Tom. He’s meeting Bradley there, his family coming for two weeks of camping and he can’t wait to have them all in the same place.

Once he lands in Fallon he immediately rings Bradley, and he’s going to have to reward him for this phone lasting almost nine months when he sees him. The last one had survived over a year, which had been a record when it had slid off the wing of Bradley’s plane and crashed onto the airstrip. Something that’s happened before apparently. Mav has shared a spreadsheet with him for sole purpose of roasting Bradley and he can’t wait to be closer to them all again.

“Hi…”

“Hi. God it’s good to hear your voice.”

“Well, we’re lucky we don’t have to deal with grossly different time zones anymore. Are you going to come up this weekend?”

“Ah… Yeah. I guess I’ll be this weekend. Although my plans for my romantic weekend away are being crashed by Ice and Mav. They heard about the work you want to do and want to help.”

“Bit presumptuous of you thinking it was going to be romantic…”

“I said my romantic weekend, not our romantic weekend. If you’re good you can watch…”

“Really now?”

“I guess you can touch if you really want to.”

“Trust me, I’m going to want to. Been too long.”

“We’ve gotten very good at phone sex though.”

“We have. Still prefer you in person.”

“Of course you do. Anyway, do you need me to pick you up or you got a car organized?”

“I thought you were still at home?”

“Not so much…”

Then Bradley’s walking around the corner of the building where he’s clearly been watching from and Jake drops everything and is kissing him, desperate to remind himself of the planes of his face and body and he pulls back suddenly.

“What the fuck happened to your moustache?”

“It’s called shaving?”

“I thought we were meant to consult each other on major life decisions?”

“I slipped with the clippers and took one third off. Trust me, this was the better option. I’ll grow it back. Not having one makes Emily cry when I video call…”

“Fuck I love you.”

Bradley smiles, kisses him breathless and Jake doesn’t need to hear the words anymore to know he feels the same.

… … …

Bradley’s nervous, because this isn’t the only surprise he has up his sleeve. He knows Jake has plans for their summer, building a cabin similar to Ice’s but a bit away on his own piece of land. Somewhere his family can come and stay, a place for him to call home. Except… he hadn’t particularly wanted to spend their five weeks building, and laying foundations and priming. Mav had fortunately jumped at the chance for a larger project, and between them they’ve laid the foundation, erected the walls, paid to have the roof and outer walls all installed by professionals.

It’s a much bigger place than the three-bedroom cabin belonging to Ice and Mav. Once finished it’ll easily host Jake’s siblings and all his nieces and nephews, at least while they’re small. He just hasn’t exactly told Jake that he and Mav have been working on it, sometimes under the careful supervision of Ice. Some rooms he’s gone ahead and finished off, getting professionals in again to do the bathrooms and kitchen, glad he hadn’t had to live in the building while it was being built and finished.

Jake’s bedroom, their bedroom, has been left untouched. Needs paint and drapes and light fixtures. He wants to do that room with Jake, hopes that gesture will help Jake accept that he hasn’t been involved with the rest of the build. He drives past the entrance to Ice and Mav’s cabin and Jake makes a little sound, glances back before realizing that maybe Bradley is taking them to his piece of land first. As far as Jake knows there’s the concrete foundation that he organized to be laid several months ago. That not what awaits him when he turns down the rough drive.

“Holy shit…”

“Yep,” Bradley says, agreeing, because it does look impressive. Two stories with wide wrap-around porch, finished so it blends into surrounding forest. It’s much bigger than the original plans Jake had made, but Bradley had taken them and still based all the decisions on them. The internal fixtures are all still the ones that Jake had chosen and he’s still nervous that Jake is going to be upset. He stops the car and gets out, follows as Jake stands there and stares around.

“What… what happened? Did you do this?”

“Yeah. Me and Mav. With help from quite a few professionals. Been a busy few months.”

“Holy shit Bradley.”

“I mean, happy belated anniversary and congratulations on finishing test pilot training?”

Jake lets out a little sound that may be a half-hiccup half-sob and Bradley is pretty sure he likes it. He wraps his arms around him, hugs him tight and presses a kiss to his cheek.

“I love you… so much.”

… … …

“You sure about this?” Javy asks as Jakes stares down at the display case.

“You know, I’ve never felt more certain about anything more in my life. I can’t imagine a better relationship than what we have, except getting to call him my husband, so… yeah. I’m sure.”

“Good for you man. So happy for you.”

… … …

He’s an hour overdue his usual second cup. His morning lecture having a student stop him afterwards with a question, and then an online meeting stopping him from just nipping into the breakroom like usual, so it’s much quieter when he walks into breakroom and does a double take.

What the fuck.

Hanging from the ceiling vents are mobiles of fucking origami roosters. Lining the windowsills, the edges of the coffee machines, the little tables and benches, lips of the whiteboard where the markers usually sit, the arms of the chairs (at least the ones that actually have arms, it’s a pretty eclectic mix of chairs). Everywhere he looks there are just more and more hiding and he wonders how many students got involved with this. There have to be thousands. There are a few people sitting, seemingly unconcerned they’re surrounded by origami roosters and can’t really move without standing on them or knocking them over. Then he spies Michael in the corner, phone held up and no doubt filming. He stalks over, culprit identified.

“Dude. What the fuck?”

“Not my idea actually. I just helped implement it. What do you think?”

“I mean… points for literal creativity but why?”

“Jake. Being a sappy romantic.”

“Jake made these?” Bradley asks, looking around.

“Only some of them, but definitely that mobile over there. It’s for your cabin apparently,” Michael says, expression dry, but Bradley doesn’t care. He’s flushed with warmth knowing that Jake has somehow managed to pull a prank like this off, gotten his friends and work colleagues and likely his students all secretly folding origami roosters…

“Man he’s an asshole…”

“An asshole that loves you. Bradley Bradshaw, will you marry me?”

He spins around and Jake is there, down on one knee by the shitty coffee machine that never works, there’s a crowd of people now, standing and watching and he gapes in surprise. Jake is meant to be in Fallon, not here. But he’s not… he’s here. Proposing to him.

“No! I was going to propose this weekend!”

“Not the answer I wanted to hear Bradshaw. You’re just too slow…”

“I’m just the right speed when I need to be and you know it.”

Jake smirks and nods his head slightly in agreement, stands up and moves toward Bradley, wrapping his arm not holding a ring around his waist.

“You still haven’t answered me darlin’…”

“Yes you asshole, of course I’ll marry you.”

… … …

Jake stares at the email in front of him and feels an intense flood of déjà vu. He’s emailing a guy about his research into materials for the new plane he’s going to be involved in testing and he’s asked a difficult question apparently.

Thanks, I’ll check with my supervisor and get back to you. He’s got a lot more experience than I do in this area.

It’s a highly confidential project. He’s signed a lot of forms which he painstakingly read. He cannot talk to anyone about the project unless they’re already in the know and while he suspects that this is exactly the field that Bradley consults on he can’t fucking ask without giving it all away.

… … …

“Hi there…”

“Hi. What’s got you in such a good mood?”

“Well, just got reminded how smart my fiancé is.”

“Yeah?”

“Mmm… test pilot, consulting with the US Department of Defense Research and Engineering group…”

“Has it been you I’ve been emailing again? I’d swear it’s not you, but he said he had to check with his supervisor…”

“Yeah. I’m his supervisor. Mentor really. He’s doing his post-doctorate. He forwarded me your emails and it just got me all nostalgic…”

“You mean it made you horny.”

“That too.”

… … …

Bradley is giving a public lecture, a taster for the University Open Day because he’s apparently always a hit with the crowds. It’s not long, only fifteen minutes and is meant to touch on the different engineering disciplines and their applications. He spies Jake about halfway through and stumbles, his words just failing as his brain stalls at the sight of his fiancé.

“So, when it comes to materials science, often when you know the properties of each material, when you add them together they form something stronger, something better, because they’re added together. Working together. So in this case one plus one is not two. One plus one is greater than two.”

The grin Jake gives him is blinding.

#Hangster #Top Gun Maverick fanfiction #Sereshaw #rooster x hangman #It's all academic darlin'

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