BROTHERS
The river Weser ran between the Roman and Cheruscan forces. Arminius came to the bank and halted with his fellow chieftains:— "Had the Caesar come?" he inquired. On receiving the reply that he was in presence, he asked to be allowed to speak with his brother. That brother, Flavus by name, was serving in the army, a conspicuous figure both from his loyalty and from the loss of an eye through a wound received some few years before during Tiberius' term of command. Leave was granted, and Stertinius took him down to the river. Walking forward, he was greeted by Arminius; who, dismissing his own escort, demanded that the archers posted along our side of the stream should be also withdrawn. When these had retired, he asked his brother, whence the disfigurement of his face? On being told the place and battle, he inquired what reward he had received. Flavus mentioned his increased pay, the chain, the crown, and other military decorations; Arminius scoffed at the cheap rewards of servitude.
They now began to argue from their opposite points of view. Flavus insisted on "Roman greatness, the power of the Caesar; the heavy penalties for the vanquished; the mercy always waiting for him who submitted himself. Even Arminius' wife and child were not treated as enemies." His brother urged "the sacred call of their country; their ancestral liberty; the gods of their German hearths; and their mother, who prayed, with himself, that he would not choose the title of renegade and traitor to his kindred, to the kindred of his wife, to the whole of his race in fact, before that of their liberator." From this point they drifted, little by little, into recriminations; and not even the intervening river would have prevented a duel, had not Stertinius run up and laid a restraining hand on Flavus, who in the fullness of his anger was calling for his weapons and his horse. On the other side Arminius was visible, shouting threats and challenging to battle: for he kept interjecting much in Latin, as he had seen service in the Roman camp as a captain of native auxiliaries.
Tacitus Annals 2.10-11
there's a lot going on in there! Arminius switching to Latin is a detail that always makes me feel a deep kind of sadness, especially with how it's preceded by mention of their mother. I wonder what she thought of what became of her sons, on opposite sides of everything but still, inescapably, brothers. even when they want to kill each other. there sure are a lot of fucked up and unhappy brothers around. and Arminius asking about Flavus' injury............I also had a whole thing typed out about the horror of imperialism and colonization and the trauma of assimilation but I think this sets the tone better
Rome's Greatest Defeat: Massacre in the Teutoburg Forest, Adrian Murdoch
and also this, just for fun
(ibid)
this post is already a mile long, so lets add another mile to it: a little scene at the start of their conversation! tfw you go in for a hug and your younger brother who also ended up being taller starts roasting your hair style
bsky ⭐ pixiv ⭐ pillowfort ⭐ cohost ⭐ cara.app⭐ko-fi
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inspired by @flashyysins
Two days after Hawkins was almost split open, Robin saw a woman pacing in the hospital waiting room.
There were plenty of other people as well, sitting or standing or walking the length of the room in a similar pattern, but there was something about the woman that Robin noticed. It wasn't just that she was beautiful, which she was- it's that there was something familiar about her.
She was in blue jeans and an old-school Hawkins High Letterman jacket, light brown hair twisted up in a claw clip. Robin had never met her before, she'd remember that at the very least, but still.
Something about the angle of her nose or the gentle waves of her hair felt like something Robin had seen before, something she'd be able to find in a crowded room or across a street.
But Robin had somewhere to be, so she shook off the odd feeling, and followed the familiar path to Steve's room.
---
"Hey Stevie."
Steve's smile was tired, but he was looking more lively than when he'd passed out in the waiting room the other day, so she'd take it.
"Robbie, you left me hanging yesterday."
She snorted and dropped into one of the chairs by his bed, swinging her legs over the arm rest and cradling the bag she'd brought with her in her lap. "You're the one who fell asleep during visiting hours."
He rolled his eyes, and she happily noted the colour returning to his skin. "You should be exempt from visiting hours, you're like...essential to my recovery or something."
She laughed to hide the way those words curled soft and warm around her heart, eyes stinging until she blinked it away. The dumbass had almost over-worked himself to the point of no recovery. "'Exempt?' Someone's been reading a dictionary- did one of your children leave theirs behind?"
"Oh fuck you-"
They were interrupted by a knock on the door, and Robin was startled to see the woman from the waiting room hovering behind a nurse.
"You have a new visitor Mr Harrington."
Even knee-deep in confused intrigue, Robin couldn't help but dramatically mouth Mr Harrington over her own shoulder, pleased at the face he pulled in retaliation.
And then the door shut, and Steve looked up to find the woman-from-the-waiting room standing at the end of the bed.
Robin saw his brain grind to a halt at the sight of her.
It was silent (well, as much as it could be in a hospital room, what with all the beeping and whirring) as they took each other in, and Robin slowly brought her knees in closer to her chest like it would shield her from the vague awkwardness chewing at her.
And then-
"Fucking hell, Eve." The woman breathed out, white knuckling the bar at the end of his bed.
At the same time, Steve's face scrunched up as he demanded: "What are you doing here?"
"What do you mean 'what am I doing here'? You're in hospital!"
"I thought you were in New York!"
"Yeah and then I got a call from Hawkins General that my little brother was dying in a hospital bed! Thank you for keeping me as your emergency contact, by the way."
"Well-" Steve spluttered and then crossed his arms over his chest, wincing at the pressure on his injuries. "Obviously."
Several things clicked into place like undone locks. Steve had almost been too comfortable about "feminine" topics for as long as she'd been an active member of his life- and even slightly before.
(He'd once run out of Scoops to buy her pads when she'd started her period in the middle of a shift. At the time she'd figured he was just trying really hard to beat the still a douche-bag allegations.)
Then there were the sweaters that he wouldn't confess to the origin of, the jokes he'd make about Robin "not being the only woman in his life" that she'd thought were about Nancy Wheeler, the vehement denial that the rom-com collection in the theatre room were his.
And, while Robin hated to enforce gender stereotypes, he'd always had the kind of mean girl cattiness that was usually only forged in teenaged girls and merely rubbed off on others.
Of course Steve Harrington had a sister.
Now Robin understood why she'd seemed so familiar in the waiting room.
"What happened to you?"
Simultaneously, Robin and Steve shifted uncomfortably, meeting each others eyes and coming up blank on both ends.
Steve's sister swallowed, jaw clenched and lip quivering as she look back and forth between them. She seemed suddenly fragile, like Steve after a nightmare, or right before he'd collapsed in the waiting room after carrying Eddie inside.
Steve cracked first. "Lou-"
"Don't fucking lie to me, Stephen. This is the third time you've ended up in hospital since your senior year."
Steve blinked, startled. "How did you-"
"I'm your sister." She seethed, and Robin could see flickers of Steve with an axe in his hand in the arch of her shoulders. "You might have told the hospital not to call but I still have friends in this town. If that Hargrove asshole wasn't already dead-"
"Lou-"
"Don't-"
"It was a serial killer." Robin blurted, drawing Steve's sisters' attention to her. "I don't now if you heard about it, but someone was going around killing teenagers. It started with Chrissy Cunningham- she was a cheerleader? kind of cute in a preppy sort of way, but, um- she was killed in our friends living room and then he sort of got blamed for it because, I mean, it was pretty sketchy but he didn't do it! I promise, Eddie didn't- anyway, there was this whole witch hunt, and two more people died which just sort of made it worse for Eddie and a group of us were trying to, like, clear his name, you know? Because we knew he didn't do it and we didn't want him to get killed next, but then one of our other friends - this girl, Max, she's a riot - she was being targeted by the real killer so we came up with this...really stupid plan to catch the killer but everything went sort of tits up and Eddie and Steve both got, well-" She waved her hands at the bandage around Steve's throat and the bruising around his wrists from the vines. "And Max, she broke her elbow and her knee when she fell, and I think Dustin twisted his ankle? So now Max and Eddie and Steve are all in hospital and Dustin has these crutches that he doesn't want to use but, I mean, Steve always makes him because it's Steve, and we don't really know if Eddie's okay yet but no one's come to tell us he's not so we're still hopeful-"
"Robin."
Robin shut her mouth, and took a deep breath through her nose. Steve's sister was staring at her in the startled sort of awe that Robin was used to seeing when she got going. She had the lungs of a trumpet player, it wasn't hard for her to talk until she forgot where she'd started.
"You fought a serial killer?" Steve's sister - Lou? - asked, and Robin hysterically felt like she should offer up her seat.
Steve, bless him, only nodded. Lou stared, lips pressed into a thin line and nostrils flared slightly.
And then, quite abruptly, she was straightening her back and stepping around the bed to hold out a hand to Robin. "Louisa Harrington."
Robin blinked, and shook her hand. "Robin Buckley."
Louisa nodded, like that made sense, and smiled the same cupids-bow smile as her brother. "The best friend- it's good to meet the other half of my brothers brain. Clearly the better half, considering you aren't the one in the hospital bed."
Steve made an offended noise, and Robin grinned.
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it’s been long since I made a pro Tony Stark post but seeing someone try to blame the events of Civil War going south on him had me heated. look, I will admit that some of Tony’s actions in the movie where not okay at all like wanting to kill Bucky for killing his mother while under HYDRA’s influence but maybe Steve stans and a lot of pro team cap folks should realize that Steve’s actions also played a huge role in the movie as well.
for one, maybe Steve should have realized that 119 countries banding together to make a document, you feel is threatening your rights, is a serious matter. 119 countries is almost two-thirds of the countries in the UN and the world, if a great part of the world thinks you are doing more harm than good, maybe as a superhero, you should try to reason with them.
two, Steve chose to do nothing when he thought his rights were threatened by the accords. I do think there were some human rights violations in the accords that should not have been avoided, however, Steve chose to do nothing. anyone who has done a bit of activism know how ineffective that strategy is.
three, Steve’s actions were proving to the UN even more reasons why they felt the accords were necessary. interfering with law enforcement when they were out for Bucky who was potentially dangerous was a bad idea. sure, Bucky was his best friend and I don’t blame Steve for wanting to save him. however, let us remember that Bucky had killed people while he was the Winter Soldier and the Romanian government didn’t have the perspective we have and they had every reason to see him as a huge threat.
four, infantilizing Wanda by calling her a kid because Tony decided to put her on house arrest. and yes, I agree that Tony not telling Wanda was a very bad idea but let us not forget that the Avengers were still under public scrutiny after a disaster of a mission in Lagos and the accords. Wanda could have been attacked by outsiders who could have gone the Zemo route because a family member was in Lagos and that would have caused her to try to defend herself which could get twisted by the media and turn more of the public against her and the avengers as a whole. mind you, the Avengers were facing enough mistrust from the public.
also, Steve, calling a huge comfortable compound with a swimming pool an internment is a bit tonedeaf to those whose ancestors have been to actual interments. as someone who had an Asian American on his team, I’d expect he know better.
five, accords or not, maybe the Russian government has the right to know about a man controlling dangerously brainwashed men within their country. sure, it latter turned out to be a false alarm but considering the fact that this was a security threat which many countries would take seriously, Steve for some reason never considered the fact that the Russian government should be alerted to something like that. if this didn’t scream arrogance, I don’t know what else did.
six, resisting arrest and trashing public property while on international borders in the bid of resisting arrest would piss off the very people who are already pissed at you and your American passport would not bail you out of that one. even international passports come with a warning about their holders committing a crime in other countries. the fact that Steve acknowledged that his team could get arrested for that made it even worse.
this one is actually addressed to the whole of team cap, not just Steve, but seven, you cannot commit a crime on international soil with full knowledge that it is a crime and then blame somebody else for why you ended up in jail. sure, the rift and Thaddeus Ross are sketchy in nature but Scott and Clint blaming Tony for why they ended up there was funny to me because they made the informed decision to commit a crime.
eight, which is a major part being that it was the climax of Civil War, hmmm, maybe keeping the secret of the death of the parents of your rich teammate whose money was funding the search of their killer from him is a very bad idea. idk, man, I would be angry too if it were me. sure, wanting to kill Bucky was wrong but if we didn’t fault the Mayonnaise twins, T’Challa, Peter Parker and later Shuri for going after their parents’ (perceived, in T’Challa’s case) killers, maybe we could give Tony too some grace because brainwashed or not, I would have gone after Bucky too.
nine, the apology letter was the shittiest letter ever and I don’t blame Tony for not wanting to speak to Steve during the events of Infinity War. like how can you even write that type of letter to someone you offended and expect the relationship to still be intact?
there was one part I almost forgot but that quote that emboldened Steve is also dumb the more I look at it. oh yeah, plant yourself in front of the 119 countries you didn’t even bother to address at all and tell them “no, you move” is the ultimate height of hubris. when you are already on thin ice with the public? and Steve thought this was a good idea? yikes 😬
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