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#well that got out of hand
spelldaggered · 1 year
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storm
fandom: mcu pairing: tony & peter words: 2091 warnings: headaches/migraines
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The city rain was merciless that night, unrelenting and painfully cold, the kind of rain that soaked a person in seconds and left them frozen to the bone. The raindrops were loud too, hammering on rooftops, on the sidewalk, on the cars sat in hours-long jams, their honking and revving combining with the rain and the general sounds of the city to create an overwhelming evening in NYC.
Tony was losing his mind. Peter was losing his bearings.
It had been a stupid argument that drove Peter to storm out of the Avengers campus, an uncharacteristic move that in Tony's opinion, only added to the point he was making. Peter was sick, nothing major, just rundown and overworked from trying to juggle his final year of high school and the pressures of keeping a watchful eye over his town each night. When he'd shown up to work with Tony that night, it had been pretty damn obvious he should have been in bed, not hunched over a workshop counter playing with something that could wait.
Well, obvious to Tony at least, which must have been obvious indeed, given Tony's own penchant for overlooking his health in favour of doing something more interesting than recovering.
Peter wasn't Tony though. Peter was Peter, and Peter was a kid, despite his increased protests at that statement since he'd turned eighteen, and Tony had a responsibility as his mentor to make sure he wasn't about to collapse on the spot. That, and he also just cared about the idiot.
So when Peter had walked through the door looking a couple degrees shy of alive, Tony had laughed at him, and told him to turn straight back around and go home; Happy might even still have the car running. The laughter, it turned out, was the mistake. because Peter, tired and unwell, was not in the mood for jokes, and missed the light humour in Tony's words.
Instead, he heard 'go home' and the less kind 'you look like shit', and had decided after a week of working himself to the bone, that that wasn't going to cut it. It was the first time Peter had ever argued back with Tony, the first time he'd ever raised his voice, and that alone was enough to stun Tony into a rare moment of silence, which Peter reacted to with a scoff, a roll of his eyes, and a dramatic storming out.
And eighteen his ass, Tony thought the terrible teen years were meant to be behind them.
He’d sat there for a moment, considering what the hell had just happened, and then, just in case Peter wasn't finished having his little tantrum, followed the kid out of the workshop to ensure he wasn't wreaking havoc across the rest of the building. There was no sign of Peter though, only a very confused looking Happy walking towards him.
"What the hell just happened? I only dropped him off ten minutes ago, now he's walking back out the front doors? What, my driving not good enough now?"
"Your driving's fine, Hap, as careful and slow as usual. We just had an argument."
"An argument? With him? The kid?"
Tony nodded. "Yeah. Y'know, it turns out he can really yell when he wants to. The acoustics in my new workshop... very impressive."
"So you sent him home?"
“I advised him to go home. Like I advised him to find you for a lift. Does he even realise how far it is from here to the city?"
"Well he looked pretty determined when I passed him. He’ll be outside by now."
Tony looked out of the nearest window at the miserable weather. "Great. Come on, let's go find him."
"You're coming with us?" Happy asked, making his way back to the car he'd left only minutes ago.
"i've spent too many years with Pepper, I know better than to leave an argument unresolved."
Happy looked sadly out of the window again as they walked. “I just had the car valeted."
Tony had been expecting to catch up with Peter somewhere along the main drive into the campus, probably looking damp, and almost certainly looking slightly ridiculous. He hadn't banked on Peter being nowhere to be seen. With a couple of choice words after realising Peter must have started running, Tony instructed Happy to carry on driving back to May's apartment. They were bound to run into him at some point along the way; kid could run, but he wasn't that fast.
Except, as it turned out, Peter was pretty fast apparently. Either that, or he'd taken a different route back into the city, and since he wasn't wearing the suit - Tony had checked - they couldn't track him. Undeterred in that moment, Tony had suggested to Happy that they carry on driving, occasionally taking a slightly different route, and just cruise round the city until they spotted him.
That had been an hour ago, and Tony had severely underestimated how busy the city would be, and how hard it was to find a single person among crowds of people through windows smudged with raindrops.
"You want to turn back and get the suit?" Happy shouted to him from the front seat, trying to make himself heard against the rain while Tony had the window down and his head poking out of it.
"Not yet," Tony yelled back; wandering the city as Iron Man brought with it an entirely different set of complications.
"Okay, but we haven't moved in fifteen minutes now, boss."
Tony ran a hand over his face, a mixture of stress, annoyance, but mostly concern. "Okay, i'm going to look for him on foot."
"You sure?" Happy asked, glancing up at the dark grey clouds above that suggested the rain was going nowhere for the minute.
"I gotta find him, Hap," Tony said by way of answer, already halfway out the door. "Keep your phone on, and call me if May rings again."
Happy gave him a nod and then Tony was off, slamming the door behind him and immediately drenched from the sheets of rain coming down.
"Where the hell are you, Peter?" he muttered, shoving his hands in his pockets and turning his collar up against the weather, which did absolutely nothing, before pressing on to start roaming the city's streets, checking all of Peter's usual hangouts.
Peter, meanwhile, had regretted his rash decision to storm off approximately five minutes after doing so, by which time he was already halfway home, having channelled much of his anger into a sprint that would put athletes to shame. Deciding to press on, he was starting to realise that Tony had very much been correct in his assessment of Peter's physical state, and he'd perhaps even underestimated just how lousy Peter felt.
The week had been a tough one, just the latest in a fairly long run of tough weeks, and Peter had been so sure that a night spent working with Tony on something non-school, non-superhero-related was just what he needed. The rejection, which his rational brain knew wasn't a rejection, but his sick, overly-sensitive self took as such, stung more than it should have, and although his outburst was foolish, he couldn't help but feel it wasn't entirely unjustified.
Thoughts of their argument were long gone by now though, after an hour spent stumbling around in the rain. Peter had been certain he was on the right track home, but after a while, nothing seemed as familiar as before, the bright lights around him not the ones he recognised. His phone had died, which was less than ideal, so he'd done his best to keep walking until he found somewhere he knew, and could right himself, but that moment never came.
Instead the rain just kept falling, and he grew colder and colder, and the slight headache he'd had before upgraded itself to a fully-fledged migraine. The lights around him were suddenly too much, blurring together and making it difficult to see straight, and his heightened hearing was proving overwhelming against the shouts of the crowd, the constant traffic, and the ever-present rain splashing on the streets.
The first crack of lighting across the sky had him flinching, a stabbing pain behind his eyes that made everything go black for a second, and the thunder not far behind had him covering his ears in pain. He thought he might have yelled out, but the sound was lost amongst the evening traffic, and it was busy enough that no-one noticed a stray kid staggering to one side, completely disoriented, eyes screwed shut against the world and his own head.
He carried on, hands clamped to his ears, eyes barely open and unable to see where he was going anywhere. He'd given up on even making it home by now, he was just aiming for somewhere he could sit down and wait out the rain and this headache. May was going to be furious, and Tony probably more so, but those were problems for later. For now he'd just try and stay upright, he thought to himself, two seconds before walking straight into someone.
"Sorry," he mumbled, not even looking up to apologise, but the hands that had caught him steadied him, and stayed attached to his upper arms.
Distantly, Peter realised the person he'd run into was talking to him, and he frowned, not sure how to convey that he wasn't able to manage any sort of conversation, and hoping he'd not done something stupid. The world was spinning, despite someone holding him fast in position, and Peter suddenly wasn't feeling very confident in his ability to stay upright.
Tony surveyed Peter, took in the way he was listing to one side, the sickly white pallor of his skin, and the clear pain etched in the frowning lines of his face, and panicked. It was clear Peter had no idea it was Tony who was holding him - which threw up all sorts of secondary concerns about stranger danger - and Tony wasn't about to terrify him by manhandling him away without identifying himself.
Realising he had no choice, and wincing before he’d even done it, Tony gently, carefully peeled one of Peter’s hands away from his ear, just long enough for him to whisper something someone with super-hearing would still be able to pick out amongst the chaos.
“It’s me, kid. I’ve got you.”
It took a moment for the words to register, but Peter slowly opened one eye just slightly, clearly recognised the vague, blurry outline of a very wet, very worried Tony Stark, and visibly sagged with relief. Tony, alert enough to realise Peter was spent, quickly lunged to grab him properly, and then with nothing else for it, lifted Peter up into his arms, the boy immediately turning his head into Tony’s chest to block out even more of the light, a hand weakly holding on to Tony’s coat.
“It’s okay, Peter, you’re safe now. I’ve got you, kid. Let’s find Happy.”
Whether Peter could hear him or not, Tony kept up his reassuring murmurings as they ducked into a side street and waited another few minutes for Happy to tear round the corner, careering up on to the sidewalk in his hurry to get to them.
“He okay?” Happy yelled as he raced out of the car to open the door for Tony to slide into, still holding Peter.
“I think so,” Tony shouted back, trying to clamber into the car as carefully as possible without jostling Peter around too much.
There was visible relief in Peter’s face when the door slammed shut and the noise grew considerably quieter, just the still calm of the back of Tony’s car, warm from the heaters Happy had left running.
“M’sorry, Mr Stark,” Peter mumbled, still pressed into Tony’s side.
“Forget about it,” Tony said, stroking his hair a little, and finally allowing himself to lean back into the chair as it sunk in that Peter was here, safe, and not collapsed in a heap somewhere in the city like he’d been fearing for the last hour or so. “You’re safe now, kiddo.”
Peter managed a small smile at that, and then relaxed a little, and Tony suspected he was about to pass out. And he was okay with that. When he awoke, he’d be back at campus, in a warm bed, with strict orders to rest, and no doubt Tony, May and Happy fussing over him for the next week. He was allowed to sleep for now.
“Thanks, dad.”
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skinsharpenedteeth · 11 months
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Omg pleeeeeeeaaaase write more Malex I'm begging you!!!!
man... i wanna write anything right now. any ship. any fandom that i'm interested in. anything.
i'll be real. my dad died in late february after a five year battle with alzheimers. my mom was his primary caretaker but my brother and i also helped out a lot to give her breaks. his death, while abstractly expected, was actually pretty sudden.
in late march, i was in a tornado. my house was hit in a tornado. my neighborhood was decimated by a tornado. i was on the phone with my mom the entire time. i'm on vacation rn in italy and there was a thunderstorm yesterday and all i could wildly think was "do they have tornadoes in italy?!" bc that was traumatic af.
And as an unmarried almost 40 yr old woman, i have moved back in with my mother for the foreseeable future.
like... i haven't written since january? and i haven't posted since i think nov or dec of last year. the ideas are there but i just... can't yet. trauma is weird. grief is weird. death is weird. societal expectations are weird and unrealistic, but prevalent and suffocating nonetheless.
i hope someday i'll be able to write for all the fandoms i love. i'd love to finish Undisclosed Desires. I'd love to finish my ABO VegasPete series. I'd love to start some untamed fics. I'd love to write more LitA and Bed Friends and BetweenUs. but like... i'm not there right now. Hopefully before the end of the year i'll be back there.
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welcometogrouchland · 1 month
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[ID in ALT] I've made posts before about Talia/Dick co-parenting Damian moments (will never happen but let me dream) and this came to me in a vision. Took me ages to finish for some reason 😭 and then even longer to post
#dc comics#dc#damian wayne#dick grayson#talia al ghul#batfamily#dc robin#nightwing#anyway. yes im a self-indulgent ''dick as damians secret third parent'' truther#like i DO think it's way more complex and nuanced than the schmoopy affectionate fan portrayal of it#they're brothers they're father and son they're partners they're the dynamic duo except only in past tense etc etc#but consider! I'm not immune to schmoopy affection in fanworks. it compells me despite itself#anyway it's technically not that crazy when it comes to dick and damian. they hug! often! at least they did#it's not as big a leap to these types of scenarios#also talia ''somewhat absent for complex reasons on both her and damians part but very loving and loved by her son'' al ghul#you will always be famous to me#son of the demon origin...bwahhh#anyway. someone made a comic kind of like this/like a post i made abt this topic#but way funnier bc dick and talia starting trying to beat each other up#so go look at that as well#anyway. it's been a somewhat difficult few weeks so I'm. desperately trying to take it easy#i got some reading with me (first vol of kevin smiths GA run that i found second hand and jaimes BB run vol 2!)#so we'll see how far i get through those. considering there's demons in my head telling me to re-read things (LET ME OUT!!!)#when i finish GA and BB i do plan on rereading robin 2021. as a treat to myself#it's a run I've really warmed up to as time went on#I'm keeping up w/ the current b&r run even though it is. admittedly very slow w/ some weird dialogue#i read it for the damian content more than anything. also nikas back so that's neat :]#idk I have a feeling that after absolute power shakes out we might get some more creative team switch ups#so if anyone at dc is interested in taking over the reigns on b&r...that could be very neat#(it's me they should hire me. please DC i have ideas listen to my red hood pitch PLEASE-)
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pherredraws · 7 months
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hug! that! captain!
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isjasz · 3 months
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The Promised Neverland manga spoilers!
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[Day 201]
Everyone blame cherrysherin2 (go check out this art that made me absolutely lose it) I take no responsibility
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chickpeamcb · 3 months
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hi and welcome to dungeons drive-ins & dives
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flowercrowngods · 5 months
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who did this to you. part 2
🤍🌷 read part 1 here pre-s4, steve whump, protective (but scared) eddie
This is not happening. None of this is happening, he’s… He’s dreaming. He’s high. High as a kite somewhere where reality doesn’t matter, where it can’t fucking reach him and he’s— He’s not panicking behind the wheel with Steve Fucking Harrington bleeding against the passenger side window. 
It’s not happening. 
Because if it were happening, Eddie would simply throw up. He’d leave his van on the side of the road and run the fuck away. Away from Harrington and his trouble, away from his rattling breath that’s so loud and unsteady, Eddie doesn’t even dare to turn on any sort of music, even though he’s itching for it, his hands clenching and unclenching around the wheel until his knuckles go white. 
“Shit, shit, shit,” he mumbles under his breath, barely aware of his surroundings at all, his eyes flitting from Harrington to the red stain against the window, back to the road and then down to the white-knuckled grip and the speckles of dried blood that is decidedly not his. 
Lost in his panic and disbelief, Eddie almost runs a red light. 
It’s harsh, the way he hits the brakes, and the sound Harrington makes is pathetic enough that Eddie feels like maybe this might actually be happening. 
“Sorry,” he breathes, his voice no better than Steve’s — and he’s not the one with a concussion, a broken rib, and that… fucking fear. Of something. Or someone. 
Who’s hurting you, Steve? 
Jus’ everyone, sometimes. God you don’t… You don’t even know.
He doesn’t even know. He doesn’t wanna know. All he wants is for Harrington to stop fucking bleeding, to keep his eyes wide open and— 
“Ed,” the boy says, wheezes, and it sounds like he wanted to say his full name, but had to swallow first. Blood, Eddie thinks. Don’t let it be blood. “Think I’m… ‘M gonna throw up.” 
“Please don’t throw up,” Eddie says before he can stop himself, hating how small his voice sounds, how urgent — like that’s the thing to be urgent about. God, he’s such an ass, but he… If Harrington throws up, Eddie will lose it. He knows he will. 
He chances a glance over at Steve, who has somehow managed to get his right arm tangled with the handle at the door, keeping himself upright and safe from Eddie’s rather frantic driving style. His head is drooping, moving this way and that against the red-stained glass, and he blinks unseeingly as blood begins to trickle down from his nose and temple again. 
He’s making himself small, and Eddie wants to pull him upright and tell him to stay like that, tell him to stop looking so terrible, so horrible, so… 
So much like Eddie’s fucking problem. 
He hates it. Hates everything about that vision. Boys like Harrington shouldn’t look like this, shouldn’t hold themselves like this, shouldn’t… Shouldn’t have no one but Eddie to take them somewhere safe. 
It’s just not tight. 
“Don’ wanna throw up,” Steve says at last, the pause too long for Eddie’s liking, and he sounds so solemn about it, yet so helpless, and Eddie kinda wants to scream. Wants Harrington to scream. Anything to stay awake and maybe not ruin his car. Anything to not fucking die in it. 
“Tell me something,” he says then, because he knows he has to keep Harrington awake and speaking. Just for another ten, fifteen minutes, he tells himself. “Anything, yeah? Tell me anything. Gotta keep you awake there, you hear me? Sounds great, right, staying awake?” 
He’s rambling and he knows it, desperation shining through his words and the god-awful way his voice breaks a little. This is not about him, he knows it isn’t, but still he wants to punch himself, wants to pinch himself and stay fucking calm. 
But who could stay calm in a situation like this? The silence is filled with the horrible wheezing and rattling of Harrington’s breath barely audible over the engine, and Eddie has to look over several times to make sure he’s still there, still with him, still alive. His panic spikes each time. 
He’s just about to reach over and shake him a little, snap in front of his face to get him back, when—
“I don’t know what.” 
It’s quiet, that voice, breathy and tiny and almost invisible, and Eddie wants to scream again. 
Tell me why you’re so scared. Tell me why your old buddy did this to you. Hagan would never touch you, so why did he now? Tell me what happened to Hargrove. Tell me why you sound so fucking small. 
“Tell me about your…” He fumbles for a moment, taking a sharp left and pretending not to hear the choked-off whimper. Focusing on good things. On normal things. “Your favourite person.” 
Eddie cringes at himself the moment the words leave his mouth. Your favourite person? Really, Munson? He scrambles to find something better, something cooler, or maybe something easier like asking his favourite fucking colour, but the overthinking really doesn’t mix well with the already panicked state of his mind. And Eddie just blanks. 
Beside him, though, Harrington sits up a little straighter, smearing more blood against his window in the process that Eddie pretends not to feel nauseous about. 
God, he never did like blood. 
“You wan’ me to tell you ‘bout Rob?” 
“Sure, yeah,” Eddie says, a little too loud, a little too shrill, actually running a red light this time because he doesn’t want to brake again and hurt the boy some more. There’s no one around anyway. This is Hawkins. Fucking dead-end of a town. It doesn’t need red lights, or boys who look like Harrington. “Rob. Tell me ‘bout him, what’s he like? Favourite colour, all that shit.” 
“Her.” 
Eddie blinks, looking over to find Harrington looking at him — or trying to, his eyes still drooping and empty. But it’s a good sign. People don’t die when they look at you, right? 
“What?” 
“Her,” Harrington says again. “An’ blue. Deep ‘n’ dark blue. She’ll say something corny when, when you ask her, jus’ to fuck with you. Sunset gold or rose, jus’ to mess with… But is blue.”
Eddie doesn’t really listen, doesn’t really process what Steve is saying, already thinking of the next question just to keep him talking. But then he continues on his own. 
“Mornin’ blue dep— de… makes her sad, though. So only dark blue. Says it’s why we’re friends. You’re so blue, Stevie. Got half’a my clothes, still, she does. All the blues.” 
That's... really fucking endearing, actually. 
And he says it with a half-smile, too, bloody and pathetic as it is. Like it’s a secret that only the two of them are in on, only Steve and Robin. It’s kind of sweet. 
Not for the first time today does Eddie find himself wondering, Who the hell are you, Steve Harrington?
He exhales through his nose, ignoring the way he’s started to shake with all that panic that’s been sitting inside him for a little too long now with no way to let it out. 
“Not much longer,” he mumbles under his breath again, or maybe he just thinks very hard. Maybe he doesn’t know where he is at all. It’s like he blanks every few seconds, too busy thinking and trying not to.
Before he can tell Harrington to talk some more about that girlfriend of his, there’s a pained, confused little whine that forcefully tears Eddie’s eyes from the street for a moment only to meet hazel eyes widened in confusion. 
“Wh— Where… Where’re we going?” 
Oh no. 
“Why’m I in y—“ 
“You’re safe,” Eddie interrupts him, speaking slowly because suddenly his tongue is too big for his mouth, and not entirely sure if he’s reassuring Harrington or himself. “You’re hurt, okay? It’s bad, but it wasn’t me. I’m taking you to… to someone. My uncle Wayne, he’s— He knows about that kinda stuff. You were telling me about Rob. Remember her, Blue? How about you tell me some more, hm?” 
Eddie’s voice is unsteady with worry and fear and panic, and he’s doing a piss-poor job at hiding it. The thing is, he’s going to cry. He’s actually, absolutely, no-doubt-about-it going to scream and cry and punch a fucking hole into something when this day is over, when his van is no longer bloody, and when Steve Harrington won’t have reason to look at him any longer. 
Oh, how he wants to skip forward. Past the nausea, past the fear, past everything that’s happening right now. Maybe past the insomnia that will come with a day like this, too. 
Past all of it. 
Or better yet, travel back in time and never get to that fucking boat house. 
But he can’t. So he breathes. 
At first, through the ringing in his ears and the racing of his own heart so loud and so forceful he’s shaking with it, he worries that Steve’s gone silent again, that he’s gonna ask again, ask what happened, ask where he is, ask all the questions that make Eddie feel like he’s been doused in ice water because they’re questions that only get asked in stupid movies where terrible things happen to people. 
But then he hears him mumbling something. Numbers. 
“What’cha mumbling there, Blue?” 
“‘S her number,” Steve says, his voice slurring again, worse than before, and Eddie hits the gas a little harder. “‘S jus’ her number. Robbie’s number.” 
And he mumbles again. Over and over and over, until Eddie couldn’t forget it if he wanted to, ingrained into the frayed edges of his mind now. 
He lets him ramble, lets him repeat the number until the words slur together and he can’t separate a four from a nine anymore. Each time Harrington hesitates, each time he stumbles over the words or forgets a digit, Eddie wants to punch the wheel. 
He doesn’t. He only grips it tighter and counts down the turns he takes, the streets he passes, the fucking trees that are familiar, before, finally, the trailer park comes into view. 
The sob Eddie lets out when, with shaking, trembling hands he pulls up to his home to find his uncle having a smoke outside is deafening to his ears after the quiet weakness of Harrington’s voice. 
It startles him, makes him stop his rambles and sit up straighter when Eddie finally kills the engine. For a moment, without the steady, rolling hum, the car is filled with the small, tiny whines Steve makes on each exhale. Like it hurts to even breathe. 
“Wha’s wrong?” He asks, but Eddie can’t really hear him. Can’t turn to him, can’t— “Eddie?” 
He’s out of the car before he can take hold of another thought, stumbling out of his open door on legs that feel numb and heavy. The urge to cry is back again, the burning in his eyes only getting worse when Wayne takes in the dried blood on his clothes and hands with careful, calculated worry.
“Ed?” 
“I didn’t know what— where—- I’m… Wayne, I’m sorry.” 
“Slow down, kid,” Wayne says, raising his hands as if to calm a spooked deer. Like Eddie is the one who needs his help. And he is. He really, really is, and he shouldn’t be, because this isn’t about him, but—
Wayne grabs him by the shoulders to keep him still, and only now does Eddie realise he’s shaking again, restlessly moving his weight from one leg to the other. His uncle steadies him, gently pressing down on his shoulders to ground him, and Eddie nearly sobs again. 
“Ed. Are you in trouble?” 
“No,” Eddie scrambles to say, becoming aware of what this looks like, hiding his hands behind his back on instinct, like that’ll make Harrington’s blood disappear. “‘S not my blood, I didn’t do anything, I swear! I swear. It’s, uh. I just found him. In the boathouse, I found him, and he was… God, he looked so bad, okay, but he didn’t want the hospital, and he was, like, so scared of something, and we don’t even talk, we don’t even look at each other, but I just… I didn’t know what to do, and you know something about concussions and people who were beat to shit and, again, I’m—“ 
“Eddie,” Wayne says, his voice so calm but so assertive that Eddie shuts up immediately, gladly handing over to controls to his uncle now. “Who’s the kid?” 
He nods towards Eddie’s van, where Harrington looks to be halfway unbuckled, but his eyes are closed and his face smushed against the door again, like he just gave up.  
“Shit,” Eddie says, adrenaline and panic slowly falling from him with Wayne’s hand on his shoulder. He sags into his uncle and rubs at his face. “It’s Steve. Uh, Steve Harrington, I mean.” 
“Okay,” Wayne says, and he’s so calm. So calm. Eddie feels like he’s about to fall apart, and Wayne is the only one keeping him together, with that’d steady, warm hand on his shoulder. “And you promise me he didn’t give you trouble? Or anyone else who’ll come finish what they started?” 
Eddie shakes his head profusely, getting a little dizzy with it. “I promise I’m not in trouble. He said Hagan did this to him, was alone when I found him. No trouble, Wayne, I swear, I’m not like that, you know I’m not.”
“Okay,” Wayne says again, and Eddie wants to weep. “I know you’re not like that, but some people are, y’know? You did good, son. You did good. Now help me get him out of that car.” 
It takes his uncle tugging him towards the van for Eddie to kick back into motion, nearly falling over his feet turning back around. It’s only Wayne’s “Easy” murmured under his breath that keeps the ground from opening up and swallowing him whole. 
He climbs in on the driver’s side while Wayne rounds the car and gets to Harrington’s side. 
“Hey there, Blue,” Eddie says, his voice shaking and the nickname slipping again — but it’s easier to call him that than his real name, it’s easier to pretend it’s literally anyone else in here with him, bleeding against his door. 
It’s easier to pretend it’s not Harrington’s breath rattling the way it does, easier to pretend those pained groans so high in their cadence they can only count as whines don’t come from Hawkins High’s Golden Boy who graduated a few months ago and was supposed to be done with bullshit like this. 
“Come on, up you get,” he tells him, not daring to raise his voice too much. 
He looks so frail. Like he’s already broken. Or like he’s trying not to. Like he’s holding on. 
Eddie pretends not to think that the hand he places on Steve’s cheek to gently pry him from the window is not the only thing keeping that boy together right now. 
Harrington groans, whines, wheezes, but opens his eyes to meet Eddie’s. Jesus, we’re they this blown before? Or this swollen?
“Hey,” Eddie says, just to say something. Just so he won’t have to hold the boy’s face in silence, just so he won’t have to focus on all the blood. Just so he won’t have to hear more questions that people aren’t supposed to ask. 
Steve opens his mouth, his breath coming out a little sharper, like he wants to say Hi rather than Where am I? or When will it stop hurting? Like he wants to say How can I help you help me? 
Somehow, Eddie manages a smile. 
Wayne chooses that moment to open the door — just unclicking it, not pulling yet; giving Eddie enough time to support Harrington, make sure he doesn’t fall.
“Careful,” he whispers, though whether it’s for Wayne, for Steve, or for himself, he can’t quite tell. Maybe it’s a plea to the rest of the world, and to anyone else who will listen. 
Steve is still staring at him. That’s probably not a good sign. He leans back a little, turning Steve’s head to make him follow him. Slowly, of course. Gently. Eddie can’t remember ever having touched something like it was going to break if only he looked at it wrong, but somehow he’s hyper-aware of it now. 
Because Harrington is staring at him. Entirely too still, like he has no strength, no coordination to do anything but stare. And yet Eddie is the one who, now that the adrenaline has fallen from him, now that he can let someone else take over, now that Harrington doesn’t need him anymore, finds himself unable to look away. 
Because Steve is just a boy. And so is Eddie, who can feel Steve’s breath against his wrist. And maybe, out of the two of them, Eddie is the fragile one. The one about to break. 
“Blue, you with me?”
Steve nods. Doesn’t speak again. Doesn’t move. Eddie swallows, briefly looking back down at Wayne to see if he’s ready. His uncle nods, ready to catch Harrington should he go down, and Eddie turns back to the boy who’s smeared with his own blood.
“I’m gonna take off your seatbelt now, yeah?” he tells him, not entirely recognising his voice anymore. “That man out there, that is Wayne. My uncle. He’s safe. He’ll take care of you, okay?” 
“Safe,” Steve breathes, and that shouldn’t be the one thing he focuses on. It shouldn’t sound so unsure. So insecure. So hopeful, so relieved, so— Fucking earnest. 
Swallowing all these thoughts, all this desperation and all those questions, Eddie reaches over Steve, one hand still supporting his head and feeling the overheated skin of Harrington’s cheek against his palm, the hint of stubble and the crust of dried blood. As if in slow motion, not daring to make a wrong move and hurt him more than he already does, Eddie frees him the rest of the way, letting the seatbelt slide into its hold behind his shoulder. 
“Careful,” he says again, just to say anything, but he is careful, and his hold on Steve is steady. 
“‘M careful. Not gonna break, Eddie.” 
“I know.” But maybe I will. 
“Good. ‘Cause… Don’ wanna break.” 
Eddie smiles, despite everything. “You’re not gonna break, Blue. Wayne’ll catch you.” 
Harrington loses his focus then, his eyes glazing over, but the small smile on his lips widens. “Blue. ‘S nice.” 
Yeah, Eddie thinks. He kinda is. 
Somehow, miraculously, they get Harrington out of the van and into the trailer. He throws up halfway to the doorstep, and Eddie curses under his breath while Wayne talks quietly, asking him yes and no questions that Eddie can’t really hear through the ringing in his ears — a strange mix of fear and relief, a panic not quite over, but soothed by his uncle’s familiar voice; even if it’s not directed at him.
“Don’t worry about it, kid, the next rain’ll take care of that. Stop apologising.” 
It throws him then, rather suddenly and violently, watching Wayne supporting Harrington, watching the blood smeared boy with the swelling, angry red bruises in his face. Somehow it’s different, seeing him in his home. 
This was always a safe space. Always void of everything terrible. 
And now there’s a broken boy on his doorstep who’s not Eddie. 
He remembers the fear, the panic, the plea for no hospital, Eddie. Can’t go there.
Why not? You need a doctor—
Monsters. Only monsters there.
It paralyses him and he stays where he is, holding the door with an arm that’s heavy like lead, standing on legs that begin to go numb again. He watches, but not really, as Wayne sits Harrington down on the living room couch, between magazines and brochures and some of Eddie’s calculus notes from last night that he was searching for a sketch of a monster he was so certain he’d drawn in the margins a few weeks back. 
Now there’s blood on his calculus notes. And Eddie is helplessly keeping the door open as though he’s going to run away any second now. Letting in more trouble to join Harrington on his couch. 
He should… He should close the door. Help. Run. Disappear. 
“Ed,” Wayne calls, snapping him out of his stupor. “The first aid kit, please. A bottle of water. A clean, wet cloth. A blanket, too.” 
Wayne talks him through it, takes it one step at a time, has Eddie bring him one after the other like he knows how much he’s keeping his nephew together by keeping him on the brink of usefulness.
Soon, Wayne has everything he needs, taking care of Harrington and his wounds, keeping him awake and talking so much better than Eddie did, even making him smile here and there, hiding his wince when the motion pulls on his split lip or the huffed breath sends a jolt of pain through his rib that Eddie is absolutely certain must be broken with the way he holds himself — with the way he lets Wayne hold him up. 
Wayne is doing his thing and Eddie is hiding, gripping the kitchen counter like a vice, staring both unseeingly and hyper-vigilantly as exhaustion washes over him, dragging him under and draining him of more than adrenaline. He slumps against the cupboard behind him, rubbing at his face like that’ll make it all go away. 
It’s not right. It’s not. This is Eddie’s home, it’s supposed to be safe, it’s not… 
He breaks away, ripping his hands from the counter and all but stumbling outside, heaving a deep breath and giving in to the urge to cry. Tears spring to his eyes and he wipes them away angrily, because it’s dumb, it’s so stupid, it’s absolutely fucking insane that he should be so worked up when Harrington talked about dying earlier. 
These things don’t happen. They don’t! 
“Stop fucking crying,” Eddie grumbles, sniffling and wiping away more tears as he closes his eyes against the afternoon sun. “Get a grip, Munson, Jesus Christ, there’s no reason to cry you big fuckin’ baby.” 
Nobody’s there to contradict him. Nobody’s there to make it worse. So he lets his eyes sting for a while, lets his lips wobble, his jaw clenched shut, the balls of his hands pressing into his eyes, breathing deliberately. 
In. Hold. Out. Hold. 
He doesn’t even scream. Doesn’t punch the still bloody side of his van, doesn’t run into the woods and disappear into the void. 
He simply breathes. Tries not to think about boys dying in mall fires, and even less so about boys beaten and abandoned in boat houses.
Doesn’t think about fucking Hawkins in Bumfuck-Indiana and the cursed way it has, driving its people mad. 
Doesn’t think about, They said my brain is hurt, Eddie. Doesn’t think about the Monsters Harrington mentioned. Doesn’t think about Blue, doesn’t think about I’m tired, Eddie. Don’t wanna hurt anymore. 
Doesn’t think about blue, blue, blue. 
He’s shaking when he comes back inside. He’s shaking when Harrington meets his eyes, looking a little clearer now, the blood washed away and everything bandaged a lot better than Eddie managed. He’a bundled in Eddie’s blanket. It’s wrong. It’s so, so wrong. 
Eddie can’t move, and neither does Steve. 
“Steve,” Wayne says, waiting until those eyes tear themselves away from Eddie and back to him, though Eddie sees them fill with such trepidation, he almost asks what’s wrong. “I won’t hear a no on this, and I won’t let you go home. I’m taking you to the hospital. Especially if you tell me your head was hurt like this before, more times than one.” 
“Three,” Blue breathes, a little dazed still. Not magically healed, not even from Wayne. Another thing that doesn’t feel right. 
“Three times,” Wayne says, nodding, like he’s encouraging Steve to continue. 
“But I don’t want a hospital.” Again with that tiny fucking voice. Like the Monsters are hiding under hospital beds. 
“I know, son,” Wayne sighs, tugging the blanket a little tighter around Steve, and Eddie’s eyes begin to sting again when he notices the tone Wayne uses. When he realises. When he remembers. 
”I want my mom.“ 
”I know, son. But she’s not coming. Your mama is gone, Ed, and this is your home now. Think we can make that work, hm? You and I?” 
Eddie had never felt so lost as he did then, clutching his blanket to his chest, burying his face in the wet fabric even as this man — his uncle — tugs it tighter around him. Like he is fine with Eddie wanting to hide as long as he doesn’t run away. 
He had shrugged, then, even though we wanted to shake his head, tell him no, tell him he wanted his mama. 
”I’m scared, uncle Wayne.” 
And Wayne had smiled a little, and nodded. “Then we do it scared, Eddie.”
Actually, Eddie feels like he never stopped doing it scared. 
And now there is Steve, who Eddie never believed knew what being scared felt like. It’s dumb, of course, because even Harrington is just a boy, but he was always untouchable to Eddie. They never talked. They never existed in the same space together, not in a good way and not in a bad way. Their worlds just never aligned, never collided, never coexisted. 
And now… 
“I’ll tell you what’s going to happen, okay? There’s a doctor, Doctor Clarke. Like— Yeah, like your science teacher, remember him? ‘S got a brother who’s just as much of a genius, and just as kind. He’ll take a look at you, yeah? Make sure your brain isn’t too hurt, clean your wounds, give you something for the pain. He won’t, uh. He won’t hurt you, kid. Whatever’s got you so scared, Dr Clarke will be nice to you. Especially when I’m there with ya, I’m an old pal of his. And I will be. Won’t let you outta my sight until you’re well enough to run away from me, you hear me, kid?” 
Eddie’s hands are hurting, his fingertips raw from where he’s been biting his nails while Wayne talks Blue through what’s going to happen — and he wonders, with the way Steve’s eyes are glued to Wayne, if he ever had anyone talking him through shit like this. 
“Okay,” Harrington breathes at last, still sounding way too small. “But. I’m…” 
“Scared anyway?” Wayne offers. Steve nods. You’re so blue, Stevie. “Then we do it scared anyway.”
And they do. Wayne goes to get the car so Steve won’t have to walk too far, leaving Eddie alone with him for a brief moment. 
He watches, from his place in the kitchen, how Steve’s face falls into a look of utter exhaustion and tiredness; the adrenaline washing from him just the same. Eddie wants to reach out. Wants to say something, break the spell of tension and silence and I know we don’t talk, but I’m glad you’re doing a little better. I’m glad you’ll go see a doctor. I’m glad you haven’t died, I guess. Do you really think you will? Are you really so scared of that? 
But Eddie keeps biting his nails, and Steve keeps his eyes closed, blanket around his shoulders. And they don’t talk. 
“Thank you.” 
Eddie perks up, not entirely sure he didn’t imagine the words — but Harrington moved slightly, his eyes still closed but his face now turned towards Eddie. 
“For, uh. This.” 
“I didn’t do shit, Blue,” Eddie says. “That was all Wayne. All I did was freak out, I promise.” 
Harrington shakes his head, though, slowly. “Mh-mm.” 
Eddie’s mouth snaps shut, because there is no room for discussion here. They don’t talk. And he doesn’t want the bubble to burst with insecurity and sourness. 
“Thank you,” he says again, and he sounds final about it. It makes Eddie wonder what he’s like, really like, when he doesn’t consist of pain and nausea and disorientation. 
He has a feeling that, despite everything, despite Monsters under hospital beds and torture in boathouses and mall fires that kill teenagers, Blue Harrington might be someone good to talk to. Compassionate as shit, even when all he wants to do is pass out. 
“You’re welcome,” Eddie rasps, pretending that his eyes don’t sting.
He wraps his arms around his chest like he’s hugging himself, or like he’s holding himself back. From reaching out, from asking, from telling, from talking. 
Unwittingly, even with his eyes closed, Steve mirrors him, and Eddie wonders if he, too, it holding himself back, or just curling in on himself some more even though it must hurt, feeling so small. 
Maybe that’s what fear of death does to a nineteen year-old. It’s so fucked up. Eddie wants to scream again. 
Outside, he hears a car door fall shut just before Wayne reappears in the door, giving Eddie some kind of meaningful look that he wouldn’t mind deciphering on any other day, but today he fears he needs words. 
“I don’t know how long this’ll take. Will you be okay, Ed?” 
“Will I be— Yes! I’m not the one with the concussion, man, of course I’ll be—“ 
It’s a bluff, comes too fast, and Wayne sees right through it before Eddie even realises it, and he steps closer. A warm hand on his shoulder. His eyes stinging again. 
“You did good, kid. Everything will be fine. But it might take a while. It’s fine if you need to go somewhere, just… Don’t drive. Call Jeff if you need someone, just. Don’t do anything stupid. And don’t get behind the wheel. Deal?” 
Eddie swallows hard, hit by another desperate, aching wave of I wanna go back in time and skip this day. A wave of tired exhaustion and wondering, aimlessly, just who the fuck Steve Harrington really is. 
“Deal,” he says, and Wayne pulls him into a hug. 
Eddie follows them outside then, trailing behind them like a lost little puppy, helping Harrington into Wayne’s car. His movements are still slugged and a little disoriented, so Eddie decides to lean in again and fasten his seatbelt. 
“Careful,” he mumbles, allowing the boy a moment’s warning, a moment to adjust before the weight settles on his chest. 
Dejá-vù hits him and makes him pause, with Harrington staring at him again. 
“I’m careful,” he says, the corners of his mouth tugging into a little smile.
More lucid than earlier, and Eddie thinks it that which takes his breath away for a moment. 
“Not gonna break, Eddie.” 
“I know,” he says, still not moving back, instead reaching up to tighten the blanket around his shoulders even though the seatbelt is already there to hold it in place. “You’re not gonna break, Blue.” 
The smile on those lips is genuine now, gentle enough to not be ruined by the blood crusting them. 
“Thanks. Again.” And then, when Eddie finally pulls away to close the door and tell Wayne to drive safely, “I really do like that name.”
It soothes the urge to scream.
Eddie closes the door as gently as he can — which isn’t much, because the car is old and not exactly smooth. 
“I’ll see you later,” he tells Wayne. Promises. To stay out of trouble, to stick around, to not run away for a while again, to stay out of his car. 
Wayne nods, a faint smile on his lips. 
“Later, Ed.” 
And then they’re gone, and Eddie is untethered again. Wonders, for a few seconds every now and then if it really happened, if this is real. 
But it did. And it is. 
And after sitting on the steps for a while, having a smoke and staring at where Wayne’s car disappeared ten, twenty, forty minutes ago, Eddie heads inside. 
He has a phone call to make.
🤍🌷 tagging: @theshippirate22 @mentallyundone @ledleaf @imfinereallyy @itsall-taken @simply-shin @romanticdestruction @temptingfatetakingnames @stevesbipanic @steddie-island @estrellami-1 @jackiemonroe5512 @emofratboy @writing-kiki @steviesummer @devondespresso @swimmingbirdrunningrock @dodger-chan @tellatoast @inkjette @weirdandabsurd42 (a thousand percent sure i missed some but oh well such is the 3am disease)
addendum 22 jan 24: onwards to part 3
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mimimar · 5 days
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finally completed my comic based on the song ivy by taylor swift!✿ please zoom in to read the text and see the details~
✿.✿.✿
you can get the digital zine pdf here! it includes extras like character profiles, costume design, more art of willow and ivy, zine-exclusive sketches and an illustrated guide to the symbolism of all the flowers in this comic.
you can also get prints of individual pages here!
✿.✿.✿
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bonchobrick · 1 year
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Dead on Main au where Jason is of course Danny’s Fright Knight and like all knights do he has a weapon—except it’s his gun.
The batfam + justice league + everyone (except ghosts duh) don’t know that his normal average everyday gun is actually like a super powerful spiritual soul shooter that is, yaknow, capable of blasting someone into an alternate dimension where their greatest fears become real.
So imagine there’s like a big battle where a ghastly ghoul reigns terror on Gotham. The world sends their best hero’s—wizards and occultists are notably high highest in demand—to stop the ghost but, nothing works. All of the weapons and spells and chants fail.
But,
As the fights worsens and the heros scream for people to flee suddenly--
Loud squeaking footsteps echo across the ground. Jason yawns strolling into the battle zone in a ghostbusters t-shirt plaid pants bunny slippers--he strolls up in pajamas--as if annoyed at being woken up and cocks his fucking normal 'i could buy you at walmart' gun at the ghost.
His brothers screech at him yelling ”Are you insane” and to "get the hell out of here" in fear and panic because their idiot brother is trying to kill a real life ghost with a damn gun.
But then Jason shoots the ghost and it works.
The ghost fizzles down with a cry into just a little blob.
The young man then spends 30 minutes lecturing the spirit saying things like “you’re glad I’m not calling the big guy” and “you know our highness would not be happy learning what you’ve been doing” before taking out a thermos of all things and sucking the ghost into it.
Jason then sighs and walks away as if he hadn’t just defeated a hell raising ghost with a gun people can buy off a corner pawn store and a soup container.
Immediately the bat family swarms him with questions
Dick grabs him by his shoulders tense with worry, “Are you okay?”
“Um yeah—“ Jason tries to reply squirming in his hold
Damian cuts him off, “How the hell did your gun a physical weapon hurt that ghastly demonic spirit!”
“Uh that ghost is actually pretty chill you guys just pissed him off." Jason replies plain
They stare at him with a look saying 'you did not call a ghost that has been decimating gotham chill' probably because he did just that.
Tim is the first to break out of the disbelief stupor as he very inteligently says, "What?"
Jason responds easily with a confused quirk in his brow, "Second, my gun affects entities of all sorts, perks to my job and all that."
"How did being a vigilante and also probably crime boss give you a gun that could do that?" Dick asks
Jason sends him a look saying "are you an idiot" as he replies, "Yea, sure, kicking petty thieves and druggies got me my all powerful spirit weapon--No you dumbass, it's from being the bodyguard of the King of the Infinite Realms! How the hell did you guys not think of that!”
Tim breathes in, then breathes out, then breathes in again and screams, "Why the HELL WOULD WE THINK OF THAT JAY?!"
"The--" Batman, suddenly beside them, chokes, "Bodyguard of T-the what."
Jason blinks at his family then his eyes widen, "Oh shit."
"What?!" His family screech in panic
"Oh fuck," Jason says with a growing hysteric smile, "Danny's gonna have a big ol' fucking laugh with this."
"Brother who is Danny!" Damian demands for an answer
Jason coughs into his palm, "Oh yeah you guys really dont dont know. So I may have forgotten to explain some... things."
Bruce levels him with a stare that says "you think?"
Jason chuckles nervously, "So y'know how I'm half dead?"
pause
Damian very eloquently responds for the suddenly dying screaming combusting members of his family, "...sure."
"Well I met the King of the afterlife which is like the Ruler of Everything and he was really cute--" Jason says distant in his own world
"Theres a afterlife?" Superman asks casually appearing beside the emotionally wrecked family
"Yea its pretty cool. So I start flirting a bit with the guy and we hit it off, I now im his zombie ghost knight boyfriend lover for all time. Oh and i got this sickass gun." Jason says with a happy grin
"That is a pretty sick gun." John Constantine nods
"I know right?" Jason chirps
"You wouldn't mind if I inspected--" John reaches his hand
Jason slaps it away, "Not a chance you soul whore. Y'know your basically the tax evasionist of the Ghost Zone right?"
John only sighs and leaves
"But yea so I'm like the ghost world equivalent to married with the king and became his knight and thats how I was able to stop that ghost guy." Jason reiterates as if explaining a simple question, "Y'guys get that?"
Tim is on the ground trying to decide whether; sobbing hysterically, interogating jason to find out all the things he doesn't want to know or sleeping would be a better use of his time.
Dick has decided to blame himself and has started to draft a reddit post in the middle of the street starting with "I (23 m) have a younger brother (19 m), who I used to resent but really regret now, he died and came back and doesn't even tell me about what goes on in his life anymore. How do I fix our--"
Damian is just staring at the gun and... Jason pushes it deeper in his holster and shifts to the side, better to be safe than sorry with this thieving shit.
As Jason adjusts his weaponry he hears Bruce sob in the background, "He didn't even invite me to the wedding! Am I that horrible of a father!"
Wonder Woman pats his shoulder reasuringly whilst the rest of the League seem to be trying to calm him down
Jason looks around tiredly at the mess he had created and decides fuck it
"Alright I'm heading out for the night, you guys get home safe!" He yells and without caring to listen to anyone and everyone voicing their confusion he zips open a green portal and stumbles in
He crashes down on an unbelievably comfortable bed
Danny blinks blearily before sending the young man a sleepy smile, "Hey Jay, what kept you up so long?"
Jason slipping under the blankets with a yawn says, "You would not believe the night I just had."
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Edit: UMM HII The fic is out now here!! you guys are awesome I'll post the new chapter 2 in a hot sec after editting ^^
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raycatzdraws · 3 months
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ribbonwood
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date night! Barnaby planned. well. "planned"
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junotter · 9 months
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All the jokes about Ken and horses are good but I just wanna say it's such a good parallel to how actual young men get swept into misogyny and the patriarchy.
Like they're told to believe it means men get to be cool and manly and have this power but with that comes extremely rigid commands of what they can be as a man and a cycle of self hatred for never matching those gender roles perfectly. Patriarchy tells men that if they just do exactly what is expected of them, then they get all the "cool stuff" that comes with. That doesn't work though when there's only a small group that actually gets that power, but men will keep trying to fit into those roles in hopes that they can.
In the end there are no horses or the myth men are told, it's just endless cycles of self hatred and ingroup fighting.
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courfee · 1 year
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oh, your love is sunlight
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brother-emperors · 8 months
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TRY AGAIN LATER
it's like. well. its several things.
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(Plutarch's Crassus, trans. Warner)
and also this
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(ibid.)
that compliment sounds like an insult, baby.
anyway, there's a fun kind of eroticism in being given everything, in taking things that aren't yours without any real consequence, in climbing towards becoming a Roman Alexander, only for one man to deny you, over and over and over again, at every turn. Sulla tried, Crassus did it better. who would put a butcher in their place? who else knows you well enough to do it? who else can match you step for step like this? doesn't it feel like a kind of intimacy, a kind of—
it's also about the 'even sulla kissed my sword/so you want me on my knees too?' innuendo was too good to pass up. that was actually the first line I wrote, I figured out the rest of this to justify making a comic with it
and finally! the sword line is referencing/playing off of Lucan's Pharsalia a little bit because it fucks hard
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(Lucan's Pharsalia, trans. Jane Wilson Joyce)
EDIT: oh, and that's a public domain anatomical illustration of a heart. you know how it is with love and hate.
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reineydraws · 4 months
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wanted: marine hunter takanome mihawk
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butterfilledpockets · 9 months
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the dude-dles
(some warmup doodles of the B.E.N.T)
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↓full page ↓
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this shitheads own the only hammer capable of shattering my art block
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