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mikavlcs · 11 months

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Young Blood

Pairing: Gwen Stacy x gn!reader

Summary: You’re new and Gwen’s forced to show you around. It doesn’t end up being as tedious as she was expecting.

Warnings: mild astv spoilers, my writing lol

Word count: 1.6k

Notes: listen, i know this will get like 20 notes, but i needed to do this okay. i love her sm. this also my first time writing anything marvel related...as i’m sure you can tell.

Masterlist

Gwen dug the heels of her palms into her eyes as she walked up the wall, unsuccessfully fighting off another exasperated groan.

She shouldn’t have been doing this. She should be off in another dimension fixing anomalies and fighting bad guys, not this. Anyone could greet new recruits, so why Miguel insisted on making her do it was an eternal mystery. She was honestly starting to think that he just liked annoying her.

Jessica offered her a sympathetic smile when delivering the news, but Gwen didn’t want sympathy, she wanted a mission.

Still, she followed orders, knowing that disobeying would only put her further down the mission list. Plus, with Pavitr and Hobie busy, what else was there to do?

She stepped up to the entrance and her eyes found you immediately. You were easy to spot. All newbies were. They all had the same awe-struck reaction to the compound which Gwen couldn’t blame them for, considering she had been there once herself.

Your mask was off, hanging limp in your hand while your eyes roamed the vast space with a wonder she felt only months prior. It brought a smile to her face.

“Insane right?” she prompted gently as she approached, drawing your eyes to her. “I had the same reaction. It’s not every day you get to see so many spider-people in one place.”

“I didn’t know there was this many. I thought I was the only one,” you admitted, astonishment clear in your voice.

Gwen chuckled. She knew the feeling well. “We all did, but there’s more of us than you can imagine.” She stuck out a hand. “I’m Gwen, by the way. I’m your appointed tour guide.”

You took her hand, gave it a firm shake. “I know, Jessica told me. Nice to meet you, Gwen.”

“Likewise. What Earth are you from?”

“Uh,” you trailed off briefly, tapping at your watch. “Earth-69.”

A snort escaped her before she could stop it. You looked up at her, wide-eyed, while she fought to contain herself.

“I’m sorry, I’m—it’s nothing. I’m actually from Earth-65. Never met anyone from the same sector.”

Brows raised, you remarked, “Well, there’s a first time for everything, right?”

“Yeah, I guess.” She took a look at your suit and, seeing the abundance of white expertly weaved in with the mixture of red and black, couldn’t help asking, “So, why white? Most of us use some combination of red and blue. Besides me, obviously.”

“I want my enemies to see me coming,” you replied, sending her a slightly off-kilter grin that made her unsure whether you were joking. She smirked.

“Foreboding. I like it.” She turned, signaling you to follow. “Now, come on. As you can see, we have a lot of ground to cover, and Miguel will want to brief you as soon as possible.”

You obeyed, following her as she led you around headquarters, showing you the ins and outs of every winding, overlapping corridor while informing you of the group’s purpose. Well, as much as she could without ruining Miguel’s big presentation.

About a third of the way in, she said, “I should probably start introducing you to the others.” Gwen looked around, spotting a few vaguely recognizable masked faces. She pointed to one with a large white spider on his chest.

“That’s Peter.”

He gave you a polite salute which you returned, giving him a compliment about his suit as well. A familiar plastic Lego figure came ambling down the way. Gwen pointed to him.

“That’s Peter.”

The Lego twisted his hooked handpiece in your direction. You gave him a startled wave in response, looking thoroughly perplexed. Next, a car came cruising along and she pointed at it.

“That’s also Peter.”

The car honked as it sped by. You didn’t even react this time. Up ahead, Gwen spotted Ben, sitting off to the side with his tightly curled up to his chest. She sighed, halfheartedly pointed in his direction.

“That’s—”

“—let me guess, Peter?” you cut in, shooting her an unimpressed look.

She laughed. “No, that’s Ben.”

You let out a quiet oh and gave him a concerned look. Ben roused at the sound of his name, looking at the both of you with an absolutely pitiful expression.

“I would greet you guys, but I’m in the middle of a very traumatic flashback,” he moaned, overblown sorrow tinging his words.

Your eyebrows knitted together, and you started to say something, but Gwen pushed you forward by your shoulders, throwing a bye, Ben! over her shoulder. “Trust me, it isn’t worth it,” she mumbled at the confused look you gave her.

She continued guiding you by your shoulders, ignoring the odd looks from passing spiders, until you stopped short suddenly, making her crash into your back.

You were frozen, mouth agape, and eyes locked on something across the way. “Is that a t-rex?”

Following your gaze, Gwen beamed and nodded. “Yep. That’s Spider-Rex.” You gaped.

“Hey Pter!” she yelled with a wave. A ground-shaking roar echoed through the compound in response, scaring more than a few spiders and making Gwen chuckle. After a few more moments of gawking, you unfroze and continued following her, though your eyes still trailed the dinosaur in the distance.

The rest of the tour went without a hitch, the only small stops being a break to pet Spider-Cat and a short introduction to Margo. Soon enough, she was leading you down the long, dark hall to Miguel’s sanctuary.

Miguel, seemingly sensing your guys’ incoming presence, activated his platform and let it start making its way down. Very, very slowly. He wasn’t even halfway down by the time you guys made it into the heart of his den. Gwen barely resisted facepalming. He did this with every newbie, and it got more embarrassing each time. She leaned over to you, suppressing a grimace at the bewildered look on your face.

“I know, it’s slow. He just really likes his dramatic entrances,” she explained away, watching Miguel’s platform descend from above ever so slowly.

You both stood there for minutes, until finally, the platform stopped, and Miguel turned to peer down on you with a look that would have made Gwen cower a few months ago, but now just made her want to heave a deep sigh.

“Miguel, this is the new recruit from Earth-69,” she announced, voice rising at the end with the remnants of a poorly contained laugh. You didn’t seem to catch it, but Miguel did. He gave her a look that told her to knock it off and she did. Hesitantly.

He stepped off the platform and approached, eyes solely on you. “I see. Welcome. We’re glad to have you, but unfortunately, your briefing will have to wait as something has come up.” He turned his gaze to Gwen then, and her posture straightened as she realized what he was about to say.

“Gwen, I’ve got a mission for you.”

“Yes! Finally,” Gwen replied. But he was giving her that look. Her excitement wavered, realization setting in. “Please, don’t say tha—”

“You’ll be needing a partner for this mission.”

Gwen groaned. She hated partner missions. Even when she got the opportunity to pair up with people she liked, she much preferred to go solo. She just worked better alone—always had and always would. She tried to plead with Miguel, “C’mon, Miguel, you know I’m—"

“This is non-negotiable, Gwen,” he cut her off with that annoyingly authoritative tone that she couldn’t stand. “Pick a partner and get going ASAP. I want this done as quickly as possible.”

He walked off then, likely to find Jessica, leaving Gwen to sulk. And she did for about thirty seconds before pulling herself together. When Miguel wanted something done, it needed to get done. She could sulk more later. For now, she shifted her focus to finding an apt partner.

Her go-to’s were off the table. Pavitr was off on his own solo mission and Hobie was off doing lord knew what. Probably something anarchy related. She would have to find someone else.

Jessica was always busy these days, and she was taking less and less missions as her due date neared anyway, so she was off the table. She wasn’t asking Ben because she valued her remaining sanity. Peter B was an option, but he’d want to bring his baby along and Gwen was not equipped to deal with that. But maybe Web-Slinger would work. Or one of the various Peters. Or…maybe someone new.

Her eyes drifted over to you, still at her side despite the tour being technically over. She sized you up, once, twice, then one more time for good measure. You could work, but she knew nothing about how you operated in the field. The entire time, you watched her with a raised brow, unafraid of her judgment.

She crossed her arms, leveled you with a careful look. “On a scale from 1-10, how would you rate your combat ability?”

“10/10, but I may be a bit biased,” you responded immediately, still maintaining eye contact.

Her chin jerked up, eyes narrowing. “Confident, okay. How about web-slinging ability?”

“9.5/10.”

“9.5?”

“I might’ve hit a bird last time,” you said with a small grimace, “but everything else was flawless. Promise.”

That was good enough for Gwen. She uncrossed her arms and stepped closer, giving you a sly smile.

“Well then, newbie, how would you like to go on your first mission?”

You were pulling on your mask before she could even finish, red fabric veiling your wide smirk. “Let’s do it.”

With a nod, she inputted the coordinates Miguel sent her and watched as a corresponding portal spawned with a brilliant burst of light and color. The sight never got old, no matter how many times she saw it. You stepped up to her side and she sent you a sideways glance, a smile creeping onto her face.

Partner missions sucked, but she had a feeling this one wouldn’t be so bad.

#i need this movie injected into my veins #gwen stacy #gwen stacy x reader #spider gwen #ghost spider #across the spiderverse #spiderman #marvel #this is kinda boring sorry. testing the waters #also idk what tags this should exist under #but who else has had hummingbird on repeat??

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celluloidbroomcloset · 5 months

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Narratively, Izzy’s arc only ends two ways - his redemption and death, or his full immersion as a villain. This is going off from what is discussed in this post by @areyoudoingthis, but I didn't want to start writing essays on someone else's post.

The problem of redeeming antagonists is that it’s often in the eleventh hour, and often not emotionally satisfying because it ignores or discards the violence (emotional, psychological, or physical) done by them earlier in order to give them a saving grace.

In the case of OFMD, Izzy suffers, and he suffers as a direct result of the choices he made and the consistent violence he inflicted on Ed and on others. He becomes beloved by the Kraken crew because they see him suffering along with them, and using what little influence he has to try to stop Ed from descending further. But that doesn’t erase what Izzy has done, which is born out by the attitudes of Stede’s crew and Izzy's continued isolation from them until the unicorn and even after.

Does Izzy bear the brunt of Ed’s direct physical violence? Yeah, he does. He's the only one that Ed physically harms (and the cutting off of toes and limbs seems to be a leaveover from Hornigold, as Ed performs the role of the monstrous father who tortured him). That suffering is part of the redemption narrative. It is one of the narrative conceits for Izzy to atone for his sins.

(Please note - I am talking about narrative conventions and how the show is using them, not making a moral judgment on characters' actions.)

Again, narratively, Izzy being the target makes sense. He has systematically tried to deny or eliminate every spark of happiness in Ed’s life. He has tried to have Stede killed multiple times, all of them either by Ed or in front of Ed. He has allied with a repressive regime, itself the biggest villain in the show, that wants all pirates dead or in chains. Failing all that, he has attacked Ed in the only safe space he has - Stede’s cabin - and told him that if he doesn’t turn into the caricatured monster of Blackbeard, then Izzy will KILL him.

He has zero claim on Ed’s mercy and Ed shows him none, not least because Ed's descent is exactly what Izzy insisted on from the very start. Ed, half mad with grief and self-loathing, directs his hostility at his jailer and at himself.

All of that sets up a redemption arc, but how much does Izzy touch on his own culpability? He tells Stede that Ed "took my leg because I dared to mention your fucking name," which is not true. Izzy blames the toxic atmosphere on the ship not on himself and not even on Ed, but on Stede. It is Ed's feelings about Stede - his namby-pamby, pining for his boyfriend feelings - that Izzy thinks have created this violence. And Ed shoots him for suggesting it. Izzy misses his role entirely, that Ed was in fact in the depths of grief but not a violent suicidal spiral when Stede left him.

It may be that Izzy does indeed recognize his role at this point, but he's not admitting it - the furthest he goes is to say that "we did this to him," but he never fully defines what that means, and in this case he's appealing to Stede to save the crew.

Later, when Stede reappears and Ed recovers, it is quite obvious that Ed himself is still angry and still hurt and still distrusting, but the mere mention of Stede's name or sight of Stede's face doesn't send him into a rage. Stede was the source of his grief, but Stede and Ed's feelings for him did not cause the toxic atmosphere on that ship.

Throughout, Izzy does indeed begin to find redemption. He accepts the crew's offering of love, and he begins to express himself outside of Ed and Blackbeard. He decides to move on from what Ed did to him (and he cannot really control if Ed decides to forgive him for his part). He offers sympathy to Stede, and support for their relationship. His suffering is part of that arc, and it is a function of Ed's arc - Ed cutting off the gangrenous limb to save himself. But we never see Izzy taking on the blame for his earlier behavior. Unlike Ed, we don't see him working through, or trying to work through, the pain he caused others and what that says about himself. Which makes sense - Izzy is a secondary character, not the lead. His healing matters less to the narrative than Ed's, and his characterization from the beginning is not of a man given to introspection or longing for something different. Him suddenly embracing Lucius or being really kind to Stede wouldn't make sense.

The only possible narrative conclusion here is for Izzy to die. He cannot continue to exist in the same space as Ed. His character cannot continue to interfere with Ed's healing and relationship with Stede. The show gives him peace and love, and it gives him an opportunity to tell Ed to let go (though, again, he cannot control Ed letting go, and he cannot and should not be the character who "gives" Ed his family - Ed already had that). It allows him to suffer so that he can indeed have redemption that doesn't happen in the eleventh hour, and an arc that feels moving and satisfying, in which Ed crying for him (Ed, who did not care when Izzy got thrown off the ship in Season 1) has resonance. But it was always going to end like this.

#ofmd #our flag means death #ofmd season 2 #izzy hands #edward teach #ed teach #stede bonnet #gif #ofmd meta #tw: abuse #sorry i wrote way more than i thought i would #i may be repeating myself or others #but this just all came out #as always thoughts are appreciated #though i will block rude people

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