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rosyfingereddawnn · 3 years

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That’s The Way (Chapter 3)

Pairing: Jimmy Page x Reader

Word count: 3.7k

Warning(s): smut/nsfw, cheating, cursing, angst, Y/N being a badass :)

Author’s notes: We’ll be honest...this chapter is a lot to handle 😂 which is amazing since it’s only Chapter 3 of many! We suggest taking a break throughout, because you’re gonna need it 😂 So much happens that your mind may actually explode from the drama. By the way, Jimmy is introduced in the next chapter so yay! As usual, please enjoy, happy reading, and send us messages if you have theories, comments, music recommendations for the playlist, or if you want to be added to the tag list :)

Chapters: 1 | 2

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Paul took Y/N out to dinner that week, and they had a wonderful time together. It seemed that every conversation they had together brought them closer and closer, and Y/N was in pure bliss. From that point forward, the two became inseparable.

Y/N’s parents, however, were not super pleased that Y/N was seeing Paul, especially because they had warned her about the romantically-unattached musician’s mannerisms and habits not that long ago. They just decided to act like they liked Paul, so he wouldn’t get suspicious or feel bad.

Two members of The Yardbirds in particular (and I’m sure, dear reader, that you know who they are by now) were hit with pangs of jealousy whenever they saw Y/N constantly attached to Paul’s arm. And, to make matters worse, it was under any circumstance imaginable: parties, interviews, photoshoots, meetings, airports, train stations, hotels...the list goes on. Yes, they did spend plenty of time apart, but attraction can make a man think irrationally. Even though they were specifically and strictly told to keep their mouths shut, it was very tempting to just say the truth and end their misery. A part of Chris and Jim felt happy to see her happy, but another, traitorous side of them felt exponentially bad for her. They knew that she was being used by Paul as arm-candy, and they knew that she, of all people, did not deserve that.

But that’s the name of the game, unfortunately.

~~~~~~~~

18 February 1966

The Yardbirds were scheduled to perform on an episode of Ready, Steady, Go! that night, and Y/N decided to go and be a part of the live audience. She felt an obligation to support Paul and the band, since they were all friends (and a boyfriend, of course) now.

Before the show, Jim, Jeff, and Keith were all sitting on the stage, discussing the logistics of the rehearsals that would start soon. Y/N stood in front of the already-prepared stage and chatted with them.

“So what are you guys going to do on our days off next week?” Jeff asked.

“Spend time with my family,” Keith replied, adjusting his sunglasses.

“Not sure yet, haven’t figured it out,” Jim added.

“How ‘bout you, Miss Y/N?” Jeff nodded towards her with a smile. She answered with a soft giggle.

“I’m probably going golfing with my brother and a couple mates.”

“You golf?” Jim asked. She seemed to be getting more and more perfect by the day.

“Mmhmm,” Y/N nodded enthusiastically, “I’m bloody awful at it, but it’s fun, and I can hang out with my brother, so it’s a win-win.”

“You never told us you had siblings,” Keith smirked, tilting to the side and crossing his arms.

“Oh yeah, I have three. There’s Tommy, my older brother; Charlie, my younger brother; and Lillian, my little sister,” Y/N said.

“Wow, full house,” Jeff remarked, “I have a sister, Annetta, who I think you’d get along with quite well. I’ll have to introduce you to her soon.”

“Oh, that’d be great! I’d love to meet another Beck,” Y/N replied playfully. Jeff just laughed and shook his head.

“It’s a shame that I can’t spend time with Paul this week. He said he was busy, but he didn’t explain why,” Y/N sighed, “whatever. It’s probably legitimate, so I don’t mind. We’ve been hanging out too much anyway.” She laughed at the last part.

“He’s probably just going home to his wife,” Jim replied, thoughtlessly.

At that instant, everyone’s eyes widened, eyebrows raised, and lips downturned into a shocked, panicked frown.

“He’s...what?” Y/N asked quietly, sounding like she was about to shatter into a thousand tiny pieces.

Y/N noticed that Keith and Jeff were glaring at Jim, who was clearly embarrassed at what he had revealed. He hid his eyes with his hand.

When Jeff finally found it in him to turn away from Jim, he deeply exhaled. He then reached out his hands to touch Y/N’s shoulders in an attempt to comfort her.

“Look, Y/N, you weren’t supposed to find out this way, and I’m so sorry we didn’t tell you sooner,” Jeff began, “but he is indeed married. I honestly don’t know why he wanted to pursue you, and I warned him against it because of how much we care about you, but he did it anyway.”

Tears streamed down Y/N’s face and her bottom lip started to quiver. “I can’t believe this,” she whispered, “he made it seem like I was the only one…that he was really in love with me...”

Jeff hated seeing his friend cry because of something he could have prevented. But, Y/N was somehow still beautiful when she cried.

“I’m so sorry, Y/N,” Jeff consoled gently, getting off the stage to hug her, “here, let’s take you backstage to calm you down a little.”

Y/N refused Jeff’s kind offer with a shake of the head. Through her blurry, teary-eyed vision, she just plastered on a smile, and wiped the wetness from her eyes.

“Ew,” her voice cracked, “why am I crying? That’s so gross of me, I’m so sorry. I’m definitely making you guys uncomfortable.”

The three musicians’ eyes widened at Y/N’s sudden burst of emotional strength.

“Y/N, you just found out you were Sam’s side chick, and you don’t care?” Jeff inquired, genuinely confused as to what was going on with Y/N’s emotions.

“It’s okay to be sad, love. And utterly fuming with anger. I must admit, this situation wouldn’t be as dire if it were someone else, but it’s you,” Keith added. Jim just sat in silence. He didn’t know what to say. His message destroyed Y/N’s heart and her innocence.

“I am sad, but if this ‘thing’ went on any longer, I’d probably be even more devastated. You saved me from a lot more unnecessary heartbreak, so thank you, Jim,” Y/N said. Her tone sounded completely numb.

“How are you gonna tell Sam?” Keith asked Y/N.

She exhaled deeply. “I don’t know. It wouldn’t be fair of me to lash out on him before being on national television.”

“How can you care about fairness? Don’t you realize what this man has done to you?” Jeff asked, anger interlaced in his voice.

“Yes, Jeff. I do,” Y/N replied stoically, “And I’ll be fine, really. Let’s just forget about it, okay? I’m just lucky to be here, watching you perform. What song are you playing again?” Y/N tried to change the subject, but on the inside she was in deep agony and pain. She poured all of this time and emotion and her body into this cute musician boy, just to realize she didn’t matter.

“‘Shapes of Thi—’” Keith began quietly.

Jeff cut him off. “Y/N, I seriously refuse to believe you’re okay. Please, just let me help y—” he started.

“Jeff! I’m fine! Seriously,” Y/N raised her voice a little, annoyed at the nagging.

“But you seem—” Jim began, barely perceptible.

“Oh my God, Jim, I’m fine!” Y/N shouted. “I don’t care. It’s done, it’s over.”

The three men sat in silence after Y/N’s sudden outburst of anger, which was very out of character for her. She quickly realized what she had done.

“I’m so sorry for lashing out on you guys. That was uncalled for, it’s not your fault. I’m gonna go to the loo, excuse me,” she said quickly, walking out of the scene before anyone could call after her.

~~~~~~~~

Y/N stayed in the bathroom for all of rehearsals, and she finally reemerged right before the broadcast was about to start, looking as fresh as she did when she got there. It was as if the news was never even brought to her attention.

She refused to make eye contact with Paul through the entire performance, even though it was apparent that he tried to get her attention with his eyes. Chris was just confused that she wouldn’t even dare to glance at Paul. Just a little trouble in paradise that he didn’t know about maybe?

After the show and when the band went offstage, Jeff went back into the crowd to check on Y/N and brought her backstage.

“You have to confront him,” Jeff pleaded.

“I don’t want to,” Y/N whined.

“You have to, or else he’ll bloody win! You don’t want that, and I sure as hell don’t want that for you either! He is the one at fault. You have every right to fuck him up for it.”

Jeff’s little speech gave her an impulsive boost of confidence.

“Fine. I’ll do it. Get everyone out of the room, though,” Y/N stated firmly, beginning to march down the hallway behind Jeff.

Momentarily, Jeff went into the room and rounded up Keith, Jim, and Chris, and filed them down the hallway into another room orderly.

As Y/N was about to enter the room, Jeff whispered in her ear, “Good luck, kid. Knock ‘em dead.” Y/N smiled at Jeff before entering the room and closing the door behind her.

~~~~~~~~

Paul warmly smiled at Y/N as she entered the room.

“Hello, love,” he said gently, “how did you enjoy the show?”

Y/N painted on the most genuine smile she could force. “It was...almost perfect.”

Paul’s eyebrow quirked as he smiled in a confused way. “Why almost?”

“I don’t think rehearsals went as well as I had planned,” Y/N replied smoothly.

“Why? Did something bad happen to you? You’re speaking in riddles, dear.”

“Oh, I apologize,” Y/N snickered, “it’s actually so funny that you bring up riddles, because that seemed to be the exact problem at hand.”

“What does that mean? Did someone tell you something you couldn’t figure out?” Paul chuckled, “You’re confusing me.”

“I figured out that you would be going home to your wife next week.”

All the colour from Paul’s face was drained in a millisecond, and his originally jovial expression was gone. It was as if someone punched him in the gut.

“Who...who told you?” he asked, panicked.

Y/N was taken aback. “I find out I’m your side-chick and you have the audacity to ask who told me? Not an ‘I’m so sorry that I lied to you and broke your heart, Y/N’?”

Paul huffed. “And you expect me to just keep my composure when someone of your gravity walks into the room for the first time? I really am sorry, Y/N, I truly, truly am, but—”

Y/N’s calm and quiet demeanor had left the building at that point. She was mad. Really mad.

“But what? You tell me how in love you are with me, and how I’m your one and only forever, just to realize that I didn’t matter? I’m going to be eighteen years old in March. Eighteen. What do I know about love? Nothing, absolutely nothing. And you chose to take full advantage of my emotional vulnerability.”

“But you did matter. You’re so special to me, Y/N. Don’t you understand that?”

“Don’t you understand that you have a wife? You never loved me. I was never special to you. I was just another fling. But you won’t admit it to yourself.”

“The life of a travelling musician is extremely difficult, Y/N, and you don’t get that,” Paul said severely.

“And that shouldn’t be used as an excuse. You know what? We’re done. Whatever this ‘thing’ is, is over. I wish you the best,” Y/N concluded as she walked out the door and sternly shut it.

The nightmare was over and Y/N was a free agent.

Before she could debrief about her experience with any of the other Yardbirds, Y/N left the venue, caught the first taxi home, ran up into her room, and cried herself to sleep.

~~~~~~~~

22 April 1966

Y/N found recovery time and solace in those two months without Paul. She didn’t go to any Yardbirds gigs, but she sporadically met up with Jeff, Keith, Jim, and Chris at a pub or restaurant to catch up over a meal and drinks. Chris had recently mentioned to her that they were playing in London on the 22nd, and if she felt comfortable, she could attend for free and get backstage to hang out.

Y/N said she’d have to think about it, but she’d definitely consider it.

She had realized over the course of two months that she was not truly in love with Paul. Yes, she fancied him, but she must’ve mistaken the feeling of being genuinely in love with the person for being in love with the situation. Y/N concluded that this relationship was the equivalent of living out one’s childhood dreams of a romance with their schoolgirl crush.

She decided that she was retired from dating for a long time, especially because of how this shitshow ended, but a miniscule piece of her wondered when and how she’d meet her other half.

In the afternoon on the day of the show, which was to be played at the Wimbledon Palais, Y/N made the reckless decision to take a trip down to the Yardbirds’ hotel, but not for the reason you might expect.

Y/N never got the chance to thank Jim McCarty for coming clean about Paul’s infidelity to his wife by “dating” her, and to formally apologize for ripping him at the Ready, Steady, Go! rehearsals. She felt bad for being so dismissive of him, because he was always so nice to her and apparently seemed to care more about her wellbeing than Paul ever did.

Y/N stood on the platform of the train station anxiously, meticulously scheming in her mind about what she would say to Jim to truly and genuinely express her gratitude. She thought about how the encounter would go all the way to London, and all the way on her walk to the hotel.

When she arrived at the hotel, she greeted the concierge, and took the elevator to what she believed to be the Yardbirds’ floor. She took an educated guess as to which room Jim’s would be, just by what she had seen in past times. Y/N took a deep breath before knocking on the door.

When the door opened, she realized that in her best interest, her guess was correct.

“Hi,” she greeted breathily, her fingers interlaced together in front of her timidly.

“Hi,” Jim smiled. After a short moment of awkward silence, he continued, “Um, what are you doing here? Not that it’s a bad thing, which it’s not, but…” he trailed off.

“I just wanted to tell you something that I think needed to be said in-person,” Y/N said quickly.

Jim raised his eyebrows in surprised delight. “Oh, okay.” He moved out of the way of the doorframe so Y/N could enter the room, then shut the door gently behind her. “Welcome to my humble abode,” he chuckled, “make yourself at home.”

Y/N smiled and thanked him graciously, but shyly, as she sat down at a small couch at the edge of the bed. Jim was quick to follow her actions.

Y/N took a deep breath before beginning, “I just wanted to thank you for informing me about Paul in February. I know, it’s been a really long time since then… but I’ve needed some time to myself to think and refocus and recuperate, y’know?”

Jim just laughed. “You came all the way here to thank me? That’s so nice of you. You didn’t need to do that.”

Y/N grinned. “I don’t know, I felt this obligation for some reason. And in addition, I wanted to apologize for lashing out at you as well. I was just shell-shocked, I guess, and I unfairly took it out on you and Jeff.”

“If I forgave you then, I’ll still forgive you now,” Jim smiled, “don’t sweat it. In all honesty, I was surprised at how well you took the news.”

“I just wanted to be as calm and composed as possible,” Y/N blushed, “but obviously I didn’t get very far, did I?” Jim laughed at Y/N’s little jab at herself.

“Well, you’re so quiet, at least you showed a piece of your inner self that night,” Jim teased. Y/N just beamed at him.

“You know, since I owe you, now… I guess I just need to live a little, y’know? I have this introverted shell I need to break out of someday, and I might as well start now,” Y/N offered with a chuckle. “So, with that being said, let me do something for you. Anything you want.”

“Oh no, that’s too much. You didn’t even cause me any grief,” Jim retaliated playfully, “thank you, Y/N, but I think you’re overthinking this whole situation.”

“Please,” she continued with a pleading voice, “I feel awful, and plus, if it makes you feel better, you’ll be helping me clear my conscience. Jim, I’ll do anything you want, no matter how crazy… I’ll take you jet-skiing, I’ll ride on a bike in a bikini when the temperature is below freezing, I’ll clean your kitchen… anything you want me to do, I will do.”

Jim grinned at the bizarre options Y/N gave him before contemplating her invocation for a moment. Anything, huh?

“Kiss me.”

“You said you'd do anything, no matter how crazy, yes?” Y/N didn't get a chance to finish, as Jim interrupted her with a hand at her wrist, and a flinty look in his eyes, that gazed right into hers.

“I did.”

“Well,” Jim continued, stepping ever-closer to the young woman in front of him. She looked just as beautiful as she always had, if not more. Jim was convinced she was perfect, and wanted to protect her. To treat her right, the way she deserved. “You could get on your knees, in front of me.”

Kneeling down on the carpeted floor, Y/N looked up at him through her eyelashes, and the glint in her eyes made his knees weak. She looked almost shy, and he couldn't help but send a comforting smile her way.

“Have you done this before, Y/N?”

She shook her head at this, and looked down, almost embarrassed. Jim, heart pounding in his chest in anticipation, reached out a hand to lift her head. Her eyes held trust, and a hint of nervousness, but her lips quirk up in a smile, her cheeks flushing.

“I’ll walk you through it, love.” The sound of a belt clinking to the floor reached Y/N’s ears, zipper following suit, and she couldn’t help the way she almost thrummed with anticipation. Her parents had warned her against exactly this type of thing. Musicians were, according to her parents, a fickle breed, who only wanted her for her looks and body. It hurt to think of it now, when Jim was being nothing but a gentleman to her. She wanted to break out of her shell, and maybe this was the way to do it.

Y/N looks to Jim and sees him exposed, fully hard now, and her cheeks erupt into shades of rosy pink. He was big, much bigger than she would have expected, and she smiled up at him.

“Okay, love. Open your mouth.” Y/N opened her mouth, sinking it over his tip, which elicits a strained moan, full of pleasure. His hand landed in Y/N’s hair, fingers clenching gently around the tresses. The light tug Y/N felt only spurred her on.

“That’s incredible, princess. Now, try and circle your tongue. You’re doing so well.”

Y/N did as she’s told, and it’s like a spell was put over the man. He craned his head back, neck bared, as soft whimpers fell past his lips. Growing more confident, knowing now what he liked, she let her teeth rake over him lightly, which worked more moans from him, almost breathless in his euphoria.

With a murmured “fuck,” he comes, Y/N’s name the only thing on his lips. She slowly released him from her mouth, wiping her lips with the back of her hand as she stood. Jim, leaning up against the wall, was in bliss, heaving breaths and ruffling Y/N’s hair as she approached.

“That was… you're perfect, princess. Absolutely perfect.”

Y/N laughs, smile nearly splitting her cheeks, and she pressed even closer, pressing her lips to his in a soft, content embrace. She could taste the sweat on his lips, and she couldn't help but think that she could definitely get used to this feeling.

Jim revelled in the feel of her soft lips against his, and he was struck by the thought that this is exactly where he’s supposed to be. He’s where he wants to be, beside Y/N.

————

Taglist: @blood-on-blood @reincarnated70sbaby

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cross-d-a · 3 years

Note

I want to know ALL about Wu Xie embarrassing time traveler!Li Cu!!! ✨✨ I'm also v intrigued by Nie Huisang death death death

(Also, Cross you have so many wips; I read in awe. And to think I thought I had a lot of star wars fix-it ideas! I only have anything at all written down for two of them!)

(this refers to the WIP tag game I completed a few days ago!)

Wu Xie being EMBARRASSING & Li Cu Time Travel:

I’ve got a series of interconnected oneshots planned where Li Cu just- accidentally hops back in time to every drama/book and helps out the Iron Triangle. and it’s more like LI CU embarrassing WU XIE haha

I thought it’d be HILARIOUS if Li Cu got to see how Wu Xie (UR MY DAD BOOGIE WOOGIE WOOGIE) is so YOUNG and STUPID and EMBARRASSING when he’s young!! Wu Xie making (ACTUALLY) innocent doe eyes at an emo Xiao Ge?? GROSS. Wu Xie accidentally (DELIBERATELY?) setting off multiple traps in a tomb?? Li Cu is 10000/10 going to RECORD THIS on his phone and bring it BACK to the future and make fun of Wu Xie FOREVER. Also!!! There are SO MANY SNAKES in Ultimate Note!! And?? Conveniently?? Li Cu has a lil’ snake buddy?? MAYBE HE COULD HELP???

I basically want Li Cu being the Actual Competent One and the baby Iron Triangle floundering. Mostly Wu Xie. I want Wu Xie floundering. I also want Wu Xie SO EMBARRASSED when Li Cu hops back to his own time.

li cu: DAD UR AN IDIOT

wu xie: i DONT WANT TO RELIVE IT PLS AND THANK

li cu: nO!! U ARE GOING TO SUFFER!! UR SO STUPID u set off FIVE TRAPS

wu xie: i hate you

li cu: no u don’t u just told me u loved and appreciated me for saving ur life like ten minutes ago. there were tears in your eyes. actually they were streaming down ur face. u might have been hugging my leg and sobbing

wu xie: tHAT WAS SIXTEEN YEARS AGO FOR ME OK i am an OLD MAN

Nie Huaisang death death death:

I think it’s hilarious that you picked out one of the resurrective immortality fics considering we were JUST talking about the old guard hahaha. This one I actually have a good chunk written so far, so here is a long snippet near the beginning. Context is that Nie Huaisang’s mother is VERY pregnant and she’s riding through the mountains to visit her family before she gives birth. WARNINGS for gore (kinda??) and child death and just- DEATH in general:

There are beasts in the mountains. Ravenous, born of fury and blood, more ragged spirit than flesh. Their claws are jagged and broken and their maws drip with sizzling saliva. They have roamed the mountains for years and years, and have only grown more enraged, voracious.

The Nie Clan have always harnessed the butchery of their past. Binding rage and ruin to themselves, channeling it through their hearts and into their swords until they are one and the same. Until it feeds upon their flesh and their spirit, gnawing on their bones, carving out a little space for itself between brittle ribs. Until, one bloody piece at a time, it consumes them whole.

The Nie Clan’s power is also the source of their doom, and these beasts who roam and know only hate hate hate are Nie-furen’s doom, as well.

They descend upon the Nie in the dead of night, a roiling mass of snapping teeth and furious howls. There is blood, screaming, desperate flashes of Dao magic and heavy blades. But there are too many and it is not enough.

But the mighty Phoenix of the West has always been filled with unmatched fury and she is full of new life and about to burst. She will not let her child die here today. Not before he can breathe sweet fresh air and keen that first high cry. Not before his father can cradle him in his arms and his older brother can plant a kiss on his forehead.

That rage within her swells. It devours her spirit and bleeds out her eyes as she screams screams screams- a raging beacon of power and brutality and every ancestor’s grief.

She slaughters everything in her path.

When she comes to, she is soaked in blood and there is pain in her belly and an ache behind her eyes and in every breath- but she is alive. She lies amidst the ruins of her people and the lingering darkness of vanquished spirits and Shan Xifeng—

She goes into labour.

It is long and hard, lasting through the night into the bloody dawn and beyond. She manages to crawl to the edge of their encampment but no further. She twists into a curl of agony and cries into the clouded sky.

Her son is born on the cusp of evening, just as the sun slides behind dark, ragged peaks. He is born soft and warm and silent.

Shan Xifeng cradles him in quaking hands. Cups his cheek to her breast. His tiny head is blood-streaked like his mother. Blood-streaked like her friends and family around her.

It is an irony that on one of the most important days of her life, she is surrounded by her loved ones and yet they are all dead.

“Little one,” she murmurs, and tilts his limp head. “Little one, please.”

But he is silent as the dead around her and that grief swells again in her breast. It gnaws on her ribs and scrabbles at her throat and she is shaking shaking shaking.

“No,” she spits. “No! He has done nothing wrong! Nothing! Does he not deserve his first breath? His first cry? Does he not deserve the family that awaits him?!”

She screams into the sky and tastes blood between her teeth. “Take me instead! I beg of you! Please let him live! I would give my life! Every single one of them, so that he may live!”

Her sword quakes along with that dark raging thing within her and she clutches her dead son close.

Then—

The faint, elegant curve of a fan in the corner of her eye. The shift of cloth, the echo of a breath. The glimmering of ethereal gold and silver, like someone has spun the stars and sun above into delicate thread.

Summoned, like a beast to blood.

“All of them?”

Shan Xifeng knows better than to face an unknowable thing and so she bows as low as her broken body will allow. She stares into the bloodied dirt and breathes in dust and rasps, “Yes.”

“Hm.” A flicker of a stretching smile, coy, with a hint of sharp teeth. She does not see the fathomless dark behind those stark white teeth, a gaping void of ravenous benevolence. It is hidden behind the flare of the fan. “Do you understand what you ask for?”

“I do,” she says without hesitation.

The grin widens, lips scarlet and dark against bone-white skin. “Then I shall grant your wish.”

A shift of cloth, then a cool hand cups Nie-furen’s cheek, guiding her up. Her eyes flicker open and she sees what no mortal has ever seen, and then that fan whispers against her cheek and blood-red lips press against hers and the last thing she feels is her golden core trembling spasming dying as life is pulled from her breath- all the lives she has ever lived, the one she lives now, and every life she could have ever lived.

Shan Xifeng falls into the bloodied dirt beneath, still clutching her dead son to her breast. And then there is no one left living in that small clearing.

Pale, bony fingers trace a delicate line through the blood that lingers upon her cheek. It is still wet and useful. Stained fingers press against scarlet lips and the life held between stark white teeth is breathed anew into that blood.

Carefully, bone-thin fingers trace a deliberate character upon the newborn child’s left cheek. The blood shines, brilliant and devastating, before fading back into a gruesome name across pale skin. Slowly, the child begins to twitch, brows wrinkling in displeasure, before a high keening wail escapes tiny lips as the child take its first breath.

“Your mother does not know what she’s doomed you to.”

A day later, travelers upon the road hear a faint keening noise not far from their wagon. When they find the clearing, they gag and retch. When they find the weak, whining child clutched in his dead mother’s arms, they shake their heads and then stare at the crest emblazoned upon the woman’s clothes.

Two days after that, the child is delivered to Nie-zongzhu’s disbelieving arms.

“No,” he says, violent spirit quaking deep within him. “No. It- it is not true.”

The traveler ducks his head and clasps his hands in a bow. “I’m sorry, Zongzhu. We were not able to take the bodies with us. You’ll have to send someone to check, but…it was the crest of your house. And…” he hesitates, then nods to his companion who stumbles up and offers a sword.

Not just any sword. A dao.

Shan Xifeng’s dao.

Feng.

“No,” Nie-zongzhu cries, falling to his knees.

“I-I’m so sorry,” the traveler stutters. “I am so, so sorry, Nie-zongzhu.”

Nie-zongzhu sobs, clutching his newborn child to his chest. “Little one,” he weeps. “Oh, little one. At least life is kind enough to have spared you.”

“Yong,” the traveler blurts.

Nie-zongzhu stares uncomprehendingly, tears running hot down his cheeks.

“It- it was written upon his cheek in- in blood. I- I think that is what his mother named him. She must have done it with her dying breath. She must have wanted you to know. He did not enter this world nameless.”

“Yong,” Nie-zongzhu echoes, trembling. “It- it is a good name, for my brave little boy.” He cups his son’s cheek and sobs. “Brave like- like his mother,” he murmurs, voice thin and quaking. “She named you well.”

And perhaps it is bravery that made Shan Xifeng give up the chance to ever be reborn. Perhaps it is bravery that saved her son’s life.

But it was all a mother’s wretched love, and Shan Xifeng did not write the character for brave upon her son’s cheek.

No, it was not Yong for bravery, but Yong for eternal.

And it is not his mother who wrote it.

Perhaps it is bravery that saved her son, but is the curse of eternity really a kindness?

No, no Shan Xifeng did not truly understand what she asked for.

But Nie Yong soon would.

The next section starts with:

The second time Nie Yong dies, he doesn’t even realize it.

He is four years old.

and the third section starts with:

The third time Nie Yong dies, his Adie kills him.

He is nine years old.

It’s basically an Angst Fest with a happy ending bc...I just need a happy ending Always. I just REALLY love resurrective immortality and I love making my favourite characters Suffer :)

I hope these were fun and satisfying to read!!

♪(ﾟ▽^*)ﾉ⌒☆

(also omg NO it’s a CURSE!!! I WISH I could just finish SOMETHING!! ANYTHING!! OMG!!! I am so envious you’ve managed to restrain yourself to a few!! Also!! I am SUPER excited to find out more about your fix-its!!! :D)

#tag game #my fic #cross talks #wip tag game #ask game

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kenzieam · 3 years

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About Last Night - Chapter One

@jewels2876 @moonbeambucky @jeremyrennerfanxxxx123 @iammarylastar@captstefanbrandt @badassbaker @pinknerdpanda

I know I’m forgetting people, sorry. If you want in, hit me.

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Rating: M

Warnings: Language, general nuttiness, smut, major angst, drama

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FEEDBACK IS LIFE, Y’ALL!

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Lev wakes up the morning after a wild night at the Compound and realizes she hasn’t spent the night alone. The fact that the man unconscious beside her is her most trusted teammate is besides the point, he’s also her best friend and

NOW WHAT THE FUCK DOES SHE DO???

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What the hell?

Where am I?

Lev groaned as she opened her eyes and immediately regretted it, closing them with a wince. It had been a long time since she’d felt like this, but even this was different from her average battle wounds and training injuries. She felt almost…

Hungover.

What the everlasting fuck?

Since becoming the newest HYDRA experiment enhanced by serum to be discovered and released from imprisonment, Lev had not suffered so pedestrian a sensation as being hungover. Her body simply did not get sick from excessive alcohol anymore, something that had been both a blessing and curse since the Avengers had found her half-alive and more than three-quarters feral in that underground bunker a few years ago.

What the hell had changed?

Wait…. Loki.

The golden god Thor and his emo brother were here, at the compound and last night, while starting innocently enough, had devolved quite quickly into a hazy mess. At least Tony had perfected that concussion shield thingy he’d been bragging about that could contain most of the lightning bolts Thor tended to throw when pickled.

All Lev could remember was Loki pouring the drinks, a strange, secret little smile on his aristocratic face and Lev hadn’t found it in herself to question her growing vertigo.

Christ, if she’d gotten drunk then Steve and Bucky had too and even Thor for that matter, for the only thing that Lev knew of that could induce drunkenness in a serum-enhanced man or god-like creature was Asgardian Mead, a hearty supply of which the trickster god was more than capable of conjuring with his seemingly unlimited magic.

Shit.

What the hell did I do last night?

A new sensation hit her then, bringing with it a queasy realization.

Oh God. Not what but WHO?

A tender ache between her legs, and a thick stickiness. She’d had sex, a lot of it with someone genetically gifted in the size department and hadn’t bothered with a condom.

Oh, holy Jesus.

Was the other person still here? As her senses returned Lev recognized her own room and bed, thank god, but the identity of her partner remained fuzzy.

Muscular arms, bracing on either side of my head, supernatural, soulful eyes boring into me as he thrusts, each driving snap of his hips bringing me closer and closer to ecstasy. Oh god, the beautiful, primal sounds he made-

Lev turned her head, squinting, the pounding behind her eyes a jackhammer of agony.

When she found Loki…. She wouldn’t stop kicking his ass until HER foot was sore.

Her bed mate lay face down, arms shoved underneath the pillow his head rested on, face turned away, his breaths heavy and regular, still deeply asleep.

For the moment Lev’s breakdown was hers and hers alone.

The sheets were tangled and low, exposing a perfect ass and there was only one man in the compound who possessed that behind, that level of raw musculature and that soft chocolate-brown hair currently splayed across her other pillow.

She didn’t even need to see his most distinguishing feature.

She had just woken up after a night of wild, drunken sex with none other than her best friend and teammate, James Buchanan Barnes.

No.

NO.

She needed to get the hell out of here, before Bucky woke up too and started asking questions that she had no answer for, like ‘what happened?’ and ‘what do we do now?’. Rusty machinery screeched and grated in her head as she moved, made moderately better by squeezing her eyes shut as tight as she could but that only ensured she stubbed her toe on the doorframe, biting back a hiss of pain but it was too late, her surprise lover was inhaling sharply, stretching with a groan like he was waking up and Lev cursed under her breath, slamming the bathroom door shut and locking it.

Christ.

How did you continue to work with and train with a man who’d been inside you? How could you grapple and spar on the training mats when your body remembered the way his weight felt on you another time? Remembered the groans and curses that had fallen from his sinful lips, the way those lips had tasted?

Oh god.

Spinning the shower to its hottest setting, Lev escaped under the spray, desperately scrubbing at her skin to erase any trace of her actions, any hint of Bucky’s mark. She winced as she felt his seed dripping from her, trickling thickly down her thighs. Bruce figured that between the serum and years of cryofreeze that Bucky was effectively sterile, but what if he was wrong? Shit, Lev needed to hightail it down to medical for some type of enhanced morning after pill.

Goddammit.

She’d been so careful!

Three years with the team and she’d never done shit like this before!

The worst thing was she couldn’t stay under the spray forever, while Tony’s plumbing was too good to do anything plebeian like run out of hot water, she just couldn’t hide here all day, she couldn’t live the rest of her life in her goddamn bathroom.

But surely, she’d been in here long enough for Bucky to leave.

Wrapping herself in towels, Lev cracked the door and peeked out into her quarters.

Shit, double SHIT!

Bucky sat on the edge of the bed, waiting and as he raised his head, their eyes locked.

He smiled at her, something sparkling in his eyes and Lev frowned in confusion. How the hell was he smiling and looking so fresh and not hungover. Didn’t his head throb too? Didn’t he feel like he’d been run over by a truck?

His smile faltered then disappeared, forehead creasing, something vulnerable falling over his face. Lev turned and marched to her dresser; it was infinitely easier to speak when she didn’t have to look at him.

“Lev…. About last night-”

“It was a mistake.” She replied curtly, ripping open a drawer.

“A mistake?”

“We were drunk,” she continued, slamming that drawer, yanking open another. “It’s nobody’s fault, except maybe Loki’s, and I’m going to kill him when I find him. Just forget about what happened, it’ll never happen again.” Lev forced the words, managing to sound almost breezy then turned to face Bucky again.

He was watching her with sad, wounded eyes, forehead furrowed in confusion and hurt. Seeing her gaze land back on him he forced a blank face and stood abruptly, his nod so brusque it was almost a jerk.

“Right.” He turned sharply, striding to the door then paused, his fingers curling against the wood. He was breathing heavily and when he glanced over at Lev one more time he finally looked hungover, his eyes red-rimmed and filled with confused pain.

A pang hit Lev, this was a wounded look she’d had only seen on his face during his lowest and most traumatized flashbacks to HYDRA, when the nightmares woke him up screaming in the dark and he struggled for hours later to sort through the tangles, piece together what was reality and what was only a anguished memory.

It looked like something he’d held close and dear and necessary had been ripped from him, but that made no sense. They’d made a mistake, gotten drunk and done something they shouldn’t have, Lev was just laying it all out to get it out of the way, so they could move past this and hopefully continue on as friends.

Shit, she would never forgive herself if her own weaknesses, her own stupidity last night by continuing to party had wrecked her best and most important friendship.

Bucky had been the first one to reach her, the first one to crack through the feral shell that had kept her isolated from the team. He had been the one to see and touch the damaged girl underneath, share his misery and experience in a way that let her see she wasn’t alone, that there was a way out of the darkness and she would forever be grateful to him for that kindness; for cracking open his own chest to show her the devastation inside, to teach her that within her own abyss was the strength she needed to beat what HYDRA had done, the skills and grit to let go of the horrors and pain, because he struggled with the same thing, every fucking day, and still managed to get out of bed and face it.

If she’d lost that by giving into some alcohol-fueled lust, she would hate herself more deeply and viciously than she ever had before.

“Bucky, wait.” She called, immediately cursing her tongue, for what could she say right now that wouldn’t mortify them any further?

He paused, eyes focused on the floor, still breathing heavily. He sniffled once. “Yeah?” There was a note in his voice Lev rarely heard from him, a low type of vulnerable plaintiveness, like when he’d been torn awake by a night terror and was now clinging to Lev, begging her to talk him back to the here and now.

Her nerve failed her, she was going to ask if he wanted to train later but it was a blatant attempt to force normalcy, and an embarrassing one at that. And she didn’t feel good, she wanted to burrow under a blanket until this festering hangover slunk away, not sweat and exert herself down in the gym. “N- nothing.”

For a beat, his eyes met hers again and he looked like a betrayed little boy, confused and bewildered by the turn of events, by someone he’d trusted ripping the rug out from under him.

It made no sense, for him to look at her that way, unless he blamed her for the mess that they were in, blamed her for getting shitfaced and losing control and that’s exactly what she’d been trying to avoid by dismissing their night together, letting him know right away that it was a mistake they could both let go of, that she was just as willing to forget it as he was…. so why did he look so anguished?

Her head hurt too much right now to think about it any further. The longer Bucky stood there, the more she felt this strange, inexplicable crawling guilt and shame and she couldn’t find the words to take that look off his face.

Without another word, Bucky left, the sound of the door closing a thunderclap in the dead air and Lev collapsed to sit on the bed, a wave of unexplained misery washing over her.

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Despite her efforts, blessed oblivion would not come and Lev lingered for the next few hours with a nameless dread, a sense that something had gone horribly awry but with no idea of exactly what.

Yes, she’d made a horrible mistake by sleeping with Bucky, but she’d cleared that up, right? Laid it out and Bucky had agreed, hadn’t he? He’d looked absolutely horrible when they’d talked, but they were both hungover.

He didn’t want to mess up their relationship anymore than she did and bringing feelings into it would definitely wreck their friendship. Love had a habit of doing that, love was what had driven her mother insane, love for a man who didn’t love her back, who enjoyed playing with her mind and body but ultimately skipped out when she started to become too much work and in retaliation, her mother had slashed her wrists. Her last screams, even as a teenaged Lev, who’d discovered her and worked feverishly to stop the rivers of blood streaming from her mother’s forearms, were aimed at her lover, the words ‘Is this what you wanted?! Is this what you wanted?! Are you happy now?!’ echoing in Lev’s nightmares for years to come.

Her father had taken her in after that, the man who’d watched passively from a distance as his ex-wife tore herself apart for the man she’d left him for but the damage had been done. Before her mother’s blood had even dried on her skin she’d vowed to never let something so evil and poisonous as love to infect her, ever.

Friendships were dangerous enough, but there was something about love, the total giving of your mind, body and soul that Lev could no longer risk, the chance that your own psyche would become so linked to the other that to separate meant death for the one who’d been foolish enough to go all in in the first place.

And shit, she’d had a good friendship with Bucky, he’d maintained a distance with her, unseen by everyone else, who considered them joined at the hip, but enough to keep Lev’s boundaries, her set demarcations of what she would… and could accept.

He’d never tried anything so stupid like kiss her or ask her out on a date; when they held hands it was with easy camaraderie, a causal affection and the times Lev caught herself gazing covertly at him, wondering what his lips tasted like were just signs of her own weakness, a brittleness inherited from her damaged mother, a deficient gene in her DNA.

And then she’d had to get drunk and fuck him.

Fuck.

A knock at the door pulled her from her thoughts and, for a breathless second, she both wished it was Bucky and anyone but Bucky.

“Come in?”

The door opened and Steve poked his head in. Although he looked a little green around the gills as well, the lines in his forehead were of worry. “Hey, haven’t seen you all day…. You alright?”

Lev grimaced, debating whether to spill her acrid guts or not. “Hungover, you?”

Steve groaned, dropping his head. “I’m never drinking again.”

“I’m never letting Loki pour my drinks again.” Lev clarified and Steve shot a finger gun at her without raising his head.

“Buck in here?” The blonde continued and Lev’s skin prickled.

“No. Why?”

If Steve noticed that her answer was too fast, he gave no sign and, sick as he was, he probably hadn’t anyway. “Haven’t seen him all day and you two looked pretty tight last night.” A little grin pulled at his lips as he invited himself into the room, shutting the door behind him. Lev scooted over with a grumble and he collapsed on the bed beside her, jostling her and making her stomach roil queasily.

“Don’t,” she mumbled, grabbing her head.

“Sorry,” he mumbled back then exhaled, seeming to centre himself before continuing. “Yeah, you two were getting a little cozy, did anything happen?”

“No!”

Steve raised a brow and Lev hurtled forwards.

“I mean, no, of course not. We’re friends, Steve.”

“Hmmm.”

“What?”

“The way he was looking at you last night says different.”

“Oh, fuck off, Rogers!”

“Language.”

“Fuck that!”

Steve snorted, shaking his head. “Alright, whatever. You know you can talk to me though, right? Anything that’s bugging you, I’m here.”

Whoa. This wasn’t the first time Steve had played big brother, but Lev could not handle that shit now.

“Steve, I’m fine. Bucky and I are fine, I’m just sick as a dog from that little Nordic prick last night fucking with our drinks. Buck’s probably crawled in a hole somewhere feeling the same damn thing.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah, probably.” He stood with a huff. “I’ll let you sleep it off.”

“’Kay, thanks.” Lev replied, watching as he left, grateful he hadn’t pushed.

Steve nodded in return, opening the door, and stepping outside. Bucky was further down the hall and seeing Steve, stopped his approach to Lev’s door. His eyes widened, darkening with something like betrayal, and then he was storming away.

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Lev dropped the weight with a bang, exhaling heavily and pushing a chunk of sweaty hair off her forehead. Where the hell was Bucky? They always worked out together, encouraging and competing in a friendly manner to push each other higher and further but, for the last week, the former assassin had been MIA.

For the first few days Lev had been able to shrug it off as a lingering hangover, but Bucky had continued to avoid her in the gym and, to be honest…. everywhere. She was lucky now to catch fleeting glimpses of the man she used to spend hours with a day, just a free random encounters in the common room, with the big man disappearing before she could open her mouth to speak to him, to ask what was going on.

But she knew what was up.

Damn her, now she saw, and she hated her previous blindness.

This past week’s famine had clarified her thoughts, and her hunger. She missed Bucky, and not just as a friend. Something had shifted in her that last night, as Bucky had moved so sinuously inside her, holding her like his most cherished gift, or maybe had even broken free before that but she hadn’t had the guts to face it and… she missed him.

She missed his smile, his warmth, his presence, the way he seemed to sense her impending anxieties and could calm them, distract her and draw her away from that hateful, swirling abyss inside her. Without his guidance this last seven days, she was struggling, close to drowning at times.

And it was so much more than that.

She’d known the reason behind his smile that morning, the sparkle in his eyes, because the same joy and hope had embraced her heart, warmed her soul.

And scared the shit out of her.

So, she’d deflected, ducked, jabbed and redirected. Plunged into a near maniacal rebuttal, a deliberately obtuse rambling about mistakes, and forgetting; not letting this lapse tear their friendship apart.

But it hadn’t torn anything apart, it had opened up new facets inside her, thrown open doors she’d slammed years ago and she’d never been more terrified, for even as her heart had called for him that morning, the echoes of her mother’s crazed screams had played a gruesome melody in the back of her mind.

You couldn’t fall in love. It was dangerous, it was self-destructive.

And yet she’d gone and done just that, shared a magical night with her best friend and fallen hard, opening the door to what had honestly been knocking from the start, masquerading as close friendship but just biding its time, waiting to fully ensnare her heart.

She didn’t know what to do. Her sabotage had worked, Bucky hadn’t tried to pursue anything, and she wished with everything she had to take it all back.

She was such a fucking idiot and if she’d wrecked her chances with Bucky forever, she deserved the misery, but god did it hurt.

Tonight, she would talk to him tonight. Corner him in the common room and make him listen to her, force him to pay attention to her apology and then beg for his forgiveness. It was the perfect opportunity, tonight was the night the team all sat down to dinner together, one big happy family and he wouldn’t be able to hide from her.

She hadn’t let herself realize before how empty her heart was, hadn’t turned to face the ghost that had stalked her ever since it had climbed from her mother’s corpse and the void threatened to suffocate her now that she’d allowed herself to see it.

With new purpose, Lev set the weight back and hurried up the stairs to her quarters.

Bucky didn’t show until it was time to sit down and eat. Lev heard his voice from inside the kitchen and hurried out with the dish in her hand, ready to throw it on the table and pull him away so she could bare her heart and confess the truth, but ended up almost dropping the plate instead.

He was not alone.

She clung to him almost nervously, or maybe star-struck, watching the assorted teammates moving around and looking like normal people, bantering and laughing and bickering like they weren’t Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. Lev immediately resented her hand on Bucky’s chest, her hip bumped against his, her head resting in that little cradle of his shoulder, feeling the comforting weight of his arm around her.

Bucky’s new friend was blonde and tall and gorgeous, and Lev instantly felt like a troll compared to her. A supermodel standing next to a ragamuffin, a brat with a wild mane and weird violet eyes daring to share the same air with haute couture.

Bucky’s eyes drifted to hers and, for the briefest moment, he looked uncomfortable, maybe even…. sad, then his face changed, going expressionless in a way Lev had never seen before, dismissing her like so much garbage and she stumbled, managing to set the dish down without breaking it.

Blood rushed through her ears as everyone gathered, as her teammates commented on the newest guest, smiling and offering their hands when Bucky introduced them, no one seeming to notice Lev, pale and adrift among them.

She offered a nod and shaky smile when Bucky, almost as an afterthought, finally introduced her as well to Lilly, his girlfriend. Was it Lev’s imagination, or was his voice almost defiant, bordering on savage when he addressed her? Almost a ‘choke on this’ tinge in his tone?

There was a brief silence, a few nervous clearings of throats, telling Lev she hadn’t invented his truculence, but then the moment had passed, the team diving back in, sparing any further discomfort and Lev faded into the background, taking a seat not far enough away from the new couple, struggling to maintain at least the semblance of self-possession as the dinner commenced.

Lev forced herself to choke down her food as she listened to her teammates around her, talking and laughing and asking Lilly question after question, ‘how had she met Bucky?’, ‘what did she do for a job?’, ‘ had she sucked Bucky’s cock yet?’.

Okay, no one had asked the last one, but it floated nastily through Lev’s mind as her shock began to give way to anger.

What the fuck?

A week after spending the night with her he was bringing some new girl around? He’d moved on? The possibility terrified Lev and with it came indignance and rage.

What the hell was he doing? Her mind growled, and she forced her hand to let go of the fork in her hand before she bent it.

Moving on, her inner voice replied, the one that liked to whisper from the darkest corners of her mind about how useless and pathetic she was, just like you wanted him to.

But I didn’t! Not really….

Too late, sugar. He’s found someone else.

No. NO.

And there’s nothing you can do about it, her mind sneered.

#au bucky barnes #bucky #bucky barnes #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes angst #au bucky #au bucky barnes fanfic #au bucky barnes fanfiction #au bucky barnes angst #bucky and lev #bucky and levi #bucky barnes drama #bucky the morning after #bucky mixed signals

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dr-m-r-ma · 4 years

Text

//mermaid//

Genre: angst, drama Rating: PG

She first heard the whimpers. As if he was trying to hold it back, but he couldn’t. Leaning her head first, before walking closer, she tried to listen more deeply. Was he in pain? Was he devastated? Was he okay?

Her eyes trailed down at the light leaking through the door cracked open, and she quietly tip-toed her way there. When she reached the front of the door, her eyes caught on the back of his figure. Her hands quickly covering her mouth, making sure no sound escapes, her heart broke at the sight of his figure.

He was hunched over, curled up at the edge of the bed. His large frame shuddered every few seconds, and he continued to whimper. She could see that his hands were forcing the sounds back to his throat, not even realizing that she mirrored him.

And that was the last straw. She couldn’t stand watching him from afar -- she had to do something, anything, to get him out of the agony.

“호석아...” (Translation: “Hoseok...”) she whispered, as she approached him.

Wonho flinched at the sound of her voice and quickly tried to wipe away his tears. Before he could plaster on a fake smile, she pulled his shoulders in, letting his head rest against her stomach. As she stroked the back of his head, he quietly said, “또 그 악몽이었어.” (Translation: “It was that nightmare again.”)

“...” Continuing to stroke the back of his head, she stayed quiet. She knew which nightmare Wonho was talking about, but it hurt her to know she couldn’t do anything to keep him from dreaming that nightmare again.

“그 악몽을 꿀 때마다... 목소리가 안 나와... 그 악몽에서도 내가 있는 힘껏 소리를 질러도 아무도 내말을 안 들어.” (Translation: “Every time I have that nightmare... my voice won’t come out... Even in that nightmare, no one listens to me even if I scream as hard as I can.”) He cried, his tears wetting the cotton against her stomach, as he clenched the sides of her shirt. His voice cracked, as he murmured, “내 목소리로 안 닿아.” (Translation: “I can’t reach [people] with my voice.”)

His hair was drenched at this point, from the tears, the anguish, the heartbroken soul inside of him. Her hands reached lower to his back, now patting it softly, like handling a child. She whispered, “이젠 아니잖아. 다시 제 자리로 돌아왔잖아 -- 내일을 향해서 살면, 악몽을 안 꾸게될거야.” (Translation: “That’s not how it is anymore. You’re back where you were -- if you live for tomorrow, you won’t have nightmares.”)

They were words she said often to him. As a matter of fact, she said it every time he woke from that same nightmare, sweating and panting. As if he had run a few miles in his sleep. Or chased after something precious. Possibly the dream he wanted to dream, surrounded by all the people he loved, glowing in warmth.

And that’s how she continued to lull Wonho back to sleep.

For every nightmare he had, she hummed his solo song to him, making sure he remembered the love that brought him back.

For every nightmare he had, she made sure he would have a better dream right after.

For every nightmare he had, she made sure he would forget how distant his voice became.

“Don’t you hear”

A/N: 《 mermaid - yeeun (ft. rohann) 》 may add music to my blog (the music from this series) but it will only be available for desktop users... and i’m not sure how many people use tumblr... not on the mobile app (lol)

#monsta x angst #monsta x wonho #wonho scenarios #wonho #wonho angst #mx angst #monsta x scenarios #monsta x reactions #mx scenarios #playlist fic

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hadarlaskey · 4 years

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10 years on, Denis Villeneuve’s Incendies still haunts me

Be 15. Be depressed. Be hunched over the family computer, stunned into silence as you try to digest what you’ve just spent the last two hours watching. Do all that and you’ll have a pretty faithful reenactment of the first time I watched Denis Villenueve’s Incendies. A decade on, Denis Villenueve’s mysterious wartime drama continues to haunt me.

The fact that this film (whose title roughly translates as “scorched”) is hard to forget won’t come as a surprise to anyone familiar with Villeneuve’s work. Yet while he has recently earned a seat at the industry’s top table, helming Blade Runner 2049 and Dune, back in 2010 he was still building his reputation through arthouse films like Maelström and the ultraviolent Polytechnique.

Simply put, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. But from the moment Radiohead’s ‘You and Whose Army?’ trills over the opening sequence of a young boy having his head shaved – shooting daggers through the screen into my tender teenage soul – I was hooked.

Based on a play by Lebanese-Canadian playwright Wajdi Mouawad, Incendies follows a pair of Canadian twins, Jeanne and Simon (Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin and Maxim Gaudette), who make a life-altering discovery following the death of their mother, Nawal (Lubna Azabal). Told through a series of flashbacks, Nawal’s journey through a country torn apart by a bloody and violent civil war is interposed with that of her children as they try to piece together the fragments of their mother’s life while tracking down a brother they never knew and a father they had believed to be dead.

These multiple strands of time are neatly interwoven across the contrasting landscapes of suburban Canada and an unnamed Middle Eastern country. Although Villenueve has described his film as a “total fiction” with no historical grounding, the violence that erupts around Nawal so closely mirrors the Lebanese conflict from 1975 to 1990 that it’s impossible not to draw comparisons.

One scene involving a massacre on a bus stands out as particularly harrowing – a devastating echo to a real-life event that involved the murder of numerous Palestinian refugees in the Ain el-Rammaneh district of east Beirut in 1975. The remnants of this bus were displayed in 2011 at the Umam Documentation and Research Center in Beirut as a reminder of the nation’s collective trauma. It was seeing these very real, very tragic events – presented through Villenueve’s lens of heightened hyperreality – that opened my eyes to the injustice surrounding me, and my ears to the anticipatory murmurs of an Arab Spring poised to erupt.

I was born and raised in the United Arab Emirates and first watched Incendies while I was still living there. The Middle East was, and remains to this day, a region divided by in-fighting and political unrest. As a teenager, I knew that there was violence surrounding me, wars and disputes that I would gloss over in the Gulf News en route to the culture section, but I never appreciated the extent or proximity of the destruction.

The way that Incendies’ plot unfolds, and the way in which the twins are positioned as foreign outsiders, forced to come face-to-face with Arab culture, mirrored my own uncomfortable re-assessment of the world I lived in. The brutal and arid landscape that Villenueve depicted bore no similarities to the Disneyfied bubble of the UAE that I was familiar with; it was dangerous, angry, bitterly divided. And just as Jeanne and Simon are made to come to terms with their mother’s painful past, I was forced to face up to the privilege of my ignorance. As an expat, I was afforded the luxury of living in the Mashriq without ever having to consider the politics of the region, free to simply fuck off somewhere else if things ever became too volatile.

I still feel a sense of shame returning to Incendies all these years later. Like pressing a bruise, there’s a delicious agony that comes with putting yourself through something you know is only going to cause you pain.

Watching the film today, I get the sense that I’m bearing witness to something raw and unvarnished – a director teetering towards greatness yet never quite grasping it with both his hands. Villeneuve doesn’t pull his punches and while not every jab hits precisely, and some moments do cross the picket line from Greek tragedy to Victorian melodrama, there’s enough haymakers scattered throughout to make it a film worth revisiting.

Incendies lays the groundwork for Villeneuve’s mainstream success, setting up the familiar skittles of anguish, grief and human suffering that he has knocked down over and over again. But none of his subsequent efforts have grabbed me by the throat and left me gasping for breath in quite the same way that Incendies did all those years ago. I’m not sure that another film ever will.

The post 10 years on, Denis Villeneuve’s Incendies still haunts me appeared first on Little White Lies.

source https://lwlies.com/articles/incendies-denis-villeneuve-10-years-on/

#movie

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inevitably-johnlocked · 5 years

Note

Hi steph. Do you have a fic rec list of novel- long fics? Ta

AHHHH Nonny you’re in luck! As I’ve been sorting, I’ve been separating them into word length too, LOL. And seeing as it’s National Novel Writing Month, I think this is a great time to give our fandom writers love and appreciation for their novel-length works!

So I Googled how long a basic novel is, and according to this site, it’s between 40k and 90k. Hmm, well, I have them sorted in 25K chunks, so I’ll start at 50K to 100K, since it works seeing as NaNo’s writing goal is 50K :D).

I really hope you enjoy! :D Love all you authors so very much, and I look forward to this year’s submissions!

NOVEL LENGTH FICS (50 - 100 K WORDS)

Triage by scullyseviltwin (E, 51,612 w. || Character Injury, Introspection) – Sherlock’s mind goes exceedingly, devastatingly quiet and gray-blank. When he speaks it’s through a thick haze, it’s through molasses, he’s so disconnected from the words that it may as well be the unconscious shooter speaking.

In the Dark Hours by hubblegleeflower (E, 51,639 w. || Friends to Lovers, Unreliable Narrator, Closeted Bi John, Angst, Miscommunications, Slow Burn, First Time, John’s Blog / Epistolary) – John, wounded and silent, drifts back to Baker Street for healing...and then goes home again. He visits, gets more upbeat, chattier, smiles, jokes... and still goes home again. Sherlock wants him to move back in - it just makes sense - but John shows no signs of doing so. This is the story of how John and Sherlock learn to say what needs to be said when they're both so very, very rubbish at talking.

The Homecoming Series by sussexbound (M, 51,744 w. across 12 stories, WIP || Domestics, PTSD, Love Confessions, Hurt/Comfort, Cuddling, Jealousy, Family Issues, Cuddling) – Sometimes home is all you need. After three years of horror, betrayals, and crushing loss, John and Sherlock find their way back home to one another, and together find new footing in a world that has changed forever.

Spare Change by Ermerness (E, 51,966 w. || Rich Holmeses AU || First Kiss / Time, Holmes Family, Virgin Sherlock, Anal, First Meetings) – The Holmes family is one of the richest and most powerful in England. Sherlock spends his time flying around the world on the family's private jet drinking a lot and shopping at expensive boutiques as a way of trying to alleviate his endless boredom. His mother decides it's time he settles down with someone powerful, wealthy and well connected. John Watson happens to be none of those things.

Coventry by standbygo (E, 52,020 w. || Dollhouse AU, First Time/Kiss, BAMF John, Slow Burn, Falling in Love, Case Fic) – “Let me get this straight,” John said, wondering when his life had become a science fiction film. “Some guy orders up a personality, a person, to his specifications, and they program this into a real live person, who has consented to do this, and she goes to this person and acts as his wife, or lawyer, or Royal Marine, or Navy Seal or what have you, and she has all the skills, all the knowledge, everything? Then you say the magic words, and she follows you back to The House, and they erase it all until her next appointment?”

Lost Without My Blogger by starrysummernights (E, 52,155 w. || Rev. Reich, PTSD, Hurt / Comfort, Fluff / Angst, Psychological Torture, Reunion Fic, Friends to Lovers) – John is abducted and declared dead. How will Sherlock cope without his blogger? How will he react when John comes back from the "dead?" Drama and angst with a healthy dose of romance. Part 1 of I'd Be Lost Without My Blogger

John Watson's Twelve Days of Christmas by earlgreytea68 (M, 53,464 w. || Christmas, Holmes Family, Fake Relationship, Alternate First Meeting, Falling in Love, Fluff and Angst, Hardcore Pining) – It's the holiday season. John Watson needs money. Sherlock Holmes needs something else.

Fan Mail by scullyseviltwin (E, 53,942 w. || Stalking, Obsessive Fans, Angst) – “WatsonChick143 has been rather maniacal in her commenting as of late... she’s left comments on everything you’ve posted John, something so obvious can’t have escaped even your attention."

Albion and the Woodsman by Glenmore (E, 54,437 w. || Post S3 || Parentlock, Pining Sherlock, Angst, Family, Drug Use, Depression, Sherlock POV) – Sherlock and John are devastated after Mary Morstan makes her final moves. Sherlock relapses at the crack house, John walks around the world ... and a lot happens in between. Parentlock, in the good way.

Guilty Secrets by Ellipsical (E, 55,086 w. || Drumsticks, First Time, Love Confession, Self-Sexual-Discovery) – John has a prostate exam and discovers something surprising about himself. Experimentation follows. Sherlock wants to help. They're in love. You know the drill.

Wars We Fought, Things We're Not by blueink3 (M, 55,204 w. || Parentlock, Fluff & Angst, Kidnapping, Whump, Post-TAB, UST, Slow Burn, Couple for a Case) – Five months after John's world has fallen apart, Mycroft sends the consulting detective and his doctor on a case that neither is prepared for.

The Great Sex Olympics of 221B by XistentialAngst (E, 58,611 w. || First Time/Kiss, Experiments / Sexual Experimentations, Multi Pairings) – John Watson thinks Sherlock Holmes should admit that he, Watson, is more of an expert on sex than Sherlock is. But Sherlock refuses to concede the point. He comes up with an experiment plan that will resolve the issue. The results will determine who wins the prize. But sometimes even the best thought-out scientific study has unexpected consequences.

Bridging the Ravine by SilentAuror (E, 58,887 w. || Post S4, Couple For a Case, Bed-Sharing, First Times, Confessions, Awkwardness, Sex Trafficking) – Sherlock and John go undercover at Ravine Valley, a therapy centre for same-sex male couples in an investigation into a possible human trafficking ring. As they pose as a couple and fake their way through the therapy sessions for the sake of the case, it quickly becomes difficult to avoid discussing their very real issues. Set roughly six nine months after series 4.

The Book of Silence by SilentAuror (E, 60,056 w. || S4 Fix It / Post S4, Virgin Sherlock, Rosie / Parentlock, Domesticity, Fluff, Praise Kink, Sex Toys, First Person POV) – As spring blooms in London, John and Sherlock begin to take new cases and cautiously negotiate this new phase of life with John living at Baker Street again. Despite how well it's all going, John struggles to forgive himself for the way he treated Sherlock following Mary’s death as well as trying to figure out how to finally put his long-time feelings for Sherlock into words. Part 1 of The Book of Silence/Rosa Felicia

Scars by SilentAuror (E, 60,493 w. || Rape / Non-Con / Abuse, Gaslighting, Manipulation, Dub Con Elements, Homophobia, Angst With Happy Ending, Mary is Not Nice) – S3 rewrite, showing Mary’s manipulation of John as he realizes his love for Sherlock. Mary is not having it.

The Progress of Sherlock Holmes by ivyblossom (E, 62,006 w || Sherlock POV, Pining, Angst, Slow Burn, Infidelity, Sherlock Learns About Himself, Happy Ending) – Sherlock struggles with his feelings for John, makes a mistake, and learns just how important he and John are to each other. Non-BBC Mary / John, but it’s a *complicated* relationship.

An Experiment in Empathy by belovedmuerto (T, 62,397 w. across 13 stories || Empath AU || Psychic John, Psychic-by-Proxy Sherlock, Empathy, Psychic Bond, Romance / Bromance) – In which John is an empath, Sherlock is Sherlock, and an epic bromance happens. In the aftermath of The Great Game, John creates an unexpected bond between himself and Sherlock. Now they have to learn how to deal with it. John is better at this than Sherlock is.

Perdition’s Flames by i_ship_an_armada (E, 63,435 w. || Treklock AU, Est. Rel, Genetic Engineering, Angst & Fluff, BAMF!John) – Sherlock would do anything to save him. Risk anything. Give anything. His money, his life. His soul. What he does, though, is change both of their destinies forever. Genetic re-engineering is the only option left. It turns out researchers underestimated the life expectancy and potential abilities of genetically re-engineered subjects. The British government and what would eventually become the United Federation of Planets, however, had not. Part 1 of PF Universe

Bedtime Universe by Liketheriver (M, 65,173 w. across 2 stories || Hurt/Comfort, Romance, Angst, Humour, Case Fic) – John's POV during Season 2 and beyond when Sherlock takes up semi-permanent residence in his bed. A collection of codas and missing scenes wrapped up into one long fic and topped with a bow that takes the story beyond Reichenbach and into happy territory once more.

Watches 'Verse by bendingsignpost (E, 66,905 w. across 2 works || Magical Realism, Reality Distortion, Angst, Partial MCD, BAMF John) – First, he is shot in Afghanistan. Second, he wakes to a phone call in Chelmsford, Essex. Third is pain, fourth is normalcy, fifth is agony and sixth is confusion. By the eighth, he's lost track. (John-centric AU) Part 1 of Watches 'Verse

You Have Drawn Red From My Hands by J_Baillier (T, 67,085 w. || Three Garridebs, Heavy John Whump, Hurt / Comfort, Pining, Heavy Angst, Case Fic/Adventure, Slow Burn, Sick Fic, Injury, Guilt & Depression, Just Talk Already Please, Medical Realism, PTSD) – John getting injured leads Sherlock on a path of guilt and revelations.

Electric Pink Hand Grenade by BeautifulFiction (E, 67,718 w. || First Time / Kiss, Seizures, Headaches) – "If Sherlock's brain is a hard drive, then these attacks are an electro-magnetic pulse." Sherlock Holmes does not do anything by half, not even a migraine. It falls to John to witness one of the greatest minds he has ever known tear itself apart, and he must do his best to help Sherlock pick up the pieces.

The Green Blade by verityburns (T, 72,929 w. || Casefic, Bromance) – As a serial killer hits the headlines, the police are out of their depth and the next victim is out of time. With faith in Sherlock Holmes at an all time low, this is a case which will push loyalties to the limit...

Darkling, I Listen by You_Light_The_Sky (T, 73,254 w. || Fairy Tale AU || Loosely Based on Beauty and the Beast, Magical Realism, Suicidal Themes, Romance, Creepiness, Adventure) – No one who enters old London ever comes out. They say that the beast devours them. When his sister disappears, John ventures into the dead zone beyond the wall, and finds a brilliant madman under a terrible curse... Part 1 of Darkling I Listen + Extras, Deleted Scenes

The Moonlight and the Frost by CaitlinFairchild (E, 77,289 w. || Case Fic, Post-HLV, Self Harm, Virgin Sherlock, First Time, Oral/Anal/Rimming, Romance, Angst, Mary is Not Nice) – John has to somehow rebuild his life in the wake of Mary's betrayal and Sherlock's deceptions.

A Cure For Boredom by emmagrant01 (E, 81,665 w. || Dirty Talk, Threesomes, Light Dom/Sub, Sex Club, Experiments, Anal, Mildly Dubious Consent) – They'd never talked about sex in the year they'd known each other. Well, that wasn't quite correct: Sherlock had never said a word about sex; John had bemoaned his personal dearth of it on many occasions.

Secrets and Revelations by Hisstah (E, 83,535 w. || Sentinel / Guides AU, Omegaverse, Aventure, Violence, Anal / Oral, Omega!John / Alpha!Sherlock, Case Fic, Politics, Mild DubCon) – Dr John Watson has some major secrets that he's kept from his flatmate, Alpha Sentinel Sherlock Holmes. Now the Sentinel Tower is after him. Can John stay out of their hands until he can reveal his secrets to Sherlock? Part 1 of Secrets and Revelations

Uphill by scullyseviltwin (E, 84,945 w. || Olympics AU || Sherlock POV, Skier!Sherlock / Medic!John, Rivalry, 2014 Olympics, Happy Ending) – Sherlock Holmes is striving for gold in this, his fourth and final Olympics as a downhill Alpine racer.

Not Broken, Just Bent by Schmiezi (E, 87,585 w. || Pining, Love Confessions, Torture, Hurt/Comfort, Heavy Angst, Villain!Mary, Suicidal Ideations, Main Character Death, Sherlock POV, Eventual Happy Ending) – "For a second, I allow myself to remember teaching John how to waltz. There is a special room in my mind palace for it. A big one, with a proper parquet dance floor. For a second, I go there. I remember holding him, closer than the World Dance Council asks for, excusing it with the fact that we are training for a wedding, not for a competition. For a second, I feel his hand on mine again, smell his sweat, hear the song we used. For a second, I allow myself to love him deeply. For a second, only a second, that love reflects on my face." Fix-it for S3, starting at the end of TSoT. Evil Mary.

Bleed Me Out by antietamfalls (E, 87,987 w. || Vampire AU || Bonding, Vampire Sherlock, Fluff & Angst, H/C, John Whump, Magical Realism) – John isn’t exactly surprised to discover that Sherlock isn't human. His vampirism doesn't pose a problem, even when their relationship gradually grows into something more. That is, until a deadly revelation about John’s blood sends their lives spinning dangerously out of control.

A Case of Identity by jkay1980 (T, 91,009 w. || Fake Relationship, Post-TRF, Case Fic) – John and Sherlock have succeeded in rebuilding their friendship after Sherlock’s fake suicide, but an unusual case puts their relationship to the test. They pretend to be engaged and attend a marriage counseling workshop. Under the pretext of the case, Sherlock turns out to be a master of seduction, and John finally learns he might like Sherlock more than he thought. Slowly, John discovers that he loves Sherlock not only in a friendly, brotherly way, but both men have to fight their own demons before they can think of taking their relationship to a new level… [[I love this fic. It’s a really great long-fic!]]

The Stars Move Still by BeautifulFiction (E, 96,022 w. || Magical Realism, Demons, Slash to Pre-Slash, AU, Happy Ending) – "What could I want so desperately that would make me sell my soul? What could possibly compel me to surrender the part of myself that makes me who I am: the source of my magic, my self-control, everything?"

#steph replies #johnlock fic recs #my fic recs #novel length fics #long fics #Anonymous #50 to 100k #long post #nanowrimo

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eternityunicorn · 5 years

Text

Love Me Apocalyptic: Part Ten - Finale +18

Author: eternityunicorn

Genre: Romance/Drama/AU

Pairing: Elijah Mikaelson x OC

Warnings: Violence, Smut (*Smut chapters marked +18)

Summary: AU of an AU - Elijah Mikaelson and Eternity had been lovers centuries ago. Betrayed, he had thought that he would never see her again. However, in present time, she has returned with a purpose, intertwining their paths once more. Elijah hates Eternity for the past, but finds his addiction to her is still as profound as it had been before and he cannot fight it, leaving him in a complicated relationship with his former lady - in an apocalyptic love.

NOTE: OC and original elements are from my up and coming novel series!

AUTHOR’S COMMENTARY: This chapter is an AU of TO Season 4, Episode 13. It is also the last chapter! Thank you to everyone who has been reading! I promise to carry on with ‘Wicked Game’ and ‘Cosmic Reset’, now that I have completed this fic. I also have been working on my new fic ‘Domestic Bliss’, though I’m still not sure when I’ll debut it. I’ll keep those interested posted on that. For now, please enjoy this last installment of ‘Love Me Apocalyptic’!

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Five years had passed by since Eternity helped defeat the prophecy against the Mikaelson family. Every day of her absence was agony for Elijah. It reminded him so much of when they had parted ways that century and half ago. It had gutted him then, making him feel as if half of him had been torn from him, as if the ethereal woman he had loved so completely had taken part of his heart with her. His feelings were the same now.

At first, he had been able to distract himself with recovering Rebekah’s body and helping Niklaus dismantle Lucien’s rather clever operation. They made sure that every trace of that lunatic’s experiments and discoveries had been destroyed.

For good measure, Elijah went after the Strix, particularly Aya, of whom had carried on trying to break the sire bonds to no success. He killed her and the witch coven that had been behind the attempt, save for Davina Claire, whom had only wanted to resurrect his little brother Kol, an endeavor of which she eventually succeeded in.

As for the Strix themselves, Elijah took command of them for a while, but eventually had made the decision to disband the group instead. The rotten poison that had been Tristan de Martel had infected the group too deeply to reeducate them into following a different direction. Therefore, the Original used his pull as their sire to scatter them to the winds, releasing them from their loyalty to the Strix and to him, with the threat that if they carried on violent ways of the Strix operation, he’d find them and kill every single on

Soon, peace had fallen upon the Mikealson family and the pain of loss Elijah felt could not be ignored. Eternity’s ghost haunted him everywhere he turned. He attempted to distract himself by devoting a lot of time to teaching his young niece Hope the piano and the works of Shakespeare, but even that wasn’t enough to keep him completely sane.

Speaking of his niece, Hope Mikaelson had grown into a beautiful little girl. She learned something from everyone. She learned magic with Freya and Kol, painting from Niklaus, and dancing and fencing from Rebekah. They all taught her how to play, taking time to play games with the young girl that she would normally participate in with friends her own age. Elijah’s brother refused to let the child out of his sight, as the threat of the Hollow was very real and Eternity had yet to return to them. Therefore, the Mikaelson family took up the slack, trying to provide the child with as much childhood fun as possible to fill the void.

Eternity....

As the years passed, Elijah waited for the ethereal beauty to return, with the promise to confess his love for Eternity as well as apologize for his behavior, the moment she came back, before he lost her forever. He couldn’t let that happen. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he didn’t do everything in his power to keep her with him. He knew now that the past didn’t matter and he wouldn’t let it rule him any longer.

Then one day, the Hollow appeared.

The vengeful spirit came after Hope, infiltrating her little body and taking over. Eternity remained a no show and that lead the Mikaelsons to desperation. Vincent Griffin, one of the more powerful witches of New Orleans, had answer for them: he could divide the evil Hollow into four of the Originals, sending them away to different corners of the globe for the rest of their immortalities. It wasn’t a perfect plan, as the Mikaelsons had strong bonds that always forced them back together eventually, but it would save Hope. Therefore, Elijah, Niklaus, Kol, and Rebekah had all agreed to it.

The four Originals stood together, standing on four sides of an unconscious Hope, whom was had chains upon her wrists to suppress the Hollow and was being held by Hayley. They were ready to preform this ritual of Vincent’s, prepared to be separated forever.

“Hayley, when I tell you to, I want you to take the manacles off,” Vincent instructed. “Hold onto Hope. Do not let her go. Everybody else, when this spell is over, you got to get away from each other, and you have to stay away from Hope.”

“Just what is going on here?” Called Eternity suddenly.

All eyes turned to where she stood in the distance behind Elijah. All the Mikaelsons were relieved to see her, standing there like the saving grace they had been hoping for.

“So, the time has come at last,” The ethereal beauty said. “It seems I arrived right on time, before you lot did something incredibly stupid.”

Elijah was overjoyed to see her. He couldn’t believe his eyes, at first, though, none of them could. She hadn’t forsaken them, after all. She had come to fulfill her promise just in the nick of time.

“It’s about bloody time,” Niklaus chastised her. “You have a nasty habit of waiting until the last second to show up. We were about to split up the family, thinking that you had abandoned us and that we had no choice.”

“Well, I am here now,” replied Eternity. “Therefore, there is no longer a need for you to scatter.”

“Just who the hell is this?” Vincent asked, having yet to meet Eternity.

The immortal queen turned to him and smiled politely, “I am the one who is to destroy the Hollow. My name is Eternity. Now...show me your enemy.”

The witch stepped away with his hands up in surrender, while Elijah moved aside to reveal Hayley holding the sleeping Hope.

Eternity saw the little girl being held by her worried mother and approached swiftly, coming to kneel beside the female hybrid. “Do not worry anymore, Hayley,” she spoke softly to her. “I am here to save your daughter and rid this world of the Hollow, once and for all.”

“How?” Hayley asked in a small, shaky voice.

“I will extract the Hollow from Hope and then I will simply erase it from existence,” she answered as if removing something as powerful as the Hollow from existence was an easy task, when it sounded extremely difficult. “It will be over quickly and I swear no harm will come to your daughter in the process. She will be alright. I promise.”

“That easy, huh?” The worried mother tried to smile.

Eternity reached over and put a comforting hand upon Hayley’s shoulder, “It is that easy. Please, place the child on the ground and we shall begin.”

Hayley did as she requested and gently laid her daughter on the ground. Then she stepped back to stand by Niklaus, whom put a comforting arm around her.

The procedure was quick. The ethereal woman put her fore and middle fingers together on Hope’s forehead, then closed her eyes in concentration. Almost immediately did the bright blue orb of the Hollow’s spirt rise out of the little girl’s body. With her other hand, Eternity reached for the orb, wrapping her hand around it and then squeezing it tightly in her fist.

“Be gone,” she growled and in an instance, the vengeful spirit vanished.

Everyone looked around them to see if the Hollow was truly gone, especially with how it seemed too easy for the immortal queen to snuff it out of existence so anticlimactically. When it was obvious that the creature was gone for good, they all let out sighs of relief.

Then Hope woke and smiled at her family, bringing joy to everyone around her.

Elijah was greatly relieved to see his niece healed, but none were not quite as much as the little girl’s parents, whom fell to their knees beside their child and embraced her tightly. The crisis was over and his family would remain in tact. It was all thanks to Eternity.

Speaking of which, the older Original looked down to smile at the immortal queen, but found that she was no longer among them. It seemed as though she had vanished, just as the Hollow had in her hand. He looked around, but didn’t find a trace of her. Immediately, the feeling of devastating heartbreak welled up in him and he suddenly found it impossible to breathe.

Had she truly gone? Out of his life just like that?

It would seem so.

Elijah tried to focus on the happy moment of victory, but found it had turned sour for him. Of course, he was so very glad that his niece was alive and well, no longer plagued by the evil of the Hollow, but it was still tainted with his bitter heartbreak.

He soon retired to his study, needing a drink...or ten. He was certain he was going to become the first vampire alcoholic in history, because he was going to need a lot of it to quell the emptiness he felt. He poured himself a bourbon quickly and sipped at it, finding it hard to swallow through the lump that formed in his throat.

Then as he stood before the fireplace, watching the flames as his mind reeled, Elijah heard her voice say, “Ah, there you are.”

His head turned sharply in disbelief to see Eternity standing in the doorway. He gazed at her, finding his words dying on his lips before he could speak them. He felt relief and anger and such incredible joy seeing that she hadn’t left after all well up inside him, until he felt as if he might burst with the mixture of emotions.

“I was only stopping by to tell you that I’m leaving...for good,” she told him, as she leaned against the door jamb. “My promise is fulfilled. The Hollow is defeated and your niece is safe once more. It is time I move on - it is time for us to move on. I will love again one day, as I know you will. I wish you nothing but happiness, Mr. Mikealson.”

Elijah shook his head, tears welling up in his eyes.

No, she couldn’t leave! He wouldn’t let her!

In that spilt second of hearing her parting words, he dropped the glass in his hand upon the two hundred year old carpet, effectively staining it with bourbon, and was across the room in a few short strides. He reached for her and kissed her soundly, clutching the back of her head as he did so.

“You’re not going anywhere, Sweetheart,” he murmured to her with his forehead pressed against hers firmly. “You are going to stay right here with me, because I refuse to go another day without you by my side. These past years with your absence have only cemented just how much I need you - just how much I love you.”

As they pulled apart, Eternity’s eyes sparked with joy and her lips spread into a wide, loving smile.

“The past doesn’t matter anymore. Just stay with me,” Elijah practically pleaded with her. “Stay with me...always and forever.”

“I was hoping you were going to say that,” she grinned, just as she leapt into his arms with her legs wrapped securely around his waist and kissed him breathlessly. “I love you, Elijah Mikaelson.”

“I love you, Sweetheart,” he responded, before the moment took him and he sped away to his bedroom, shutting them up inside.

He turned and pressed her against the door, kissing her fervently. He was feeling frenzied in his happiness. Therefore, he didn’t waste any time in disrobing her. As he had in the past, he used his vampire strength and tore the flimsy white dress from her body, tossing the pieces aside. Then he pulled Eternity from the door and carried her over to the large bed, dropping her down upon the soft surface gracefully.

Elijah took a moment to admire her naked form, finding only perfection in it. In an instant he was hovering over her with his mouth immediately attached itself to her neck, nipping and suckling at the skin there.

Soon, his lips began a journey downward. One at a time, he suckled at her breasts, taking a peak into his mouth while kneading the other in his palm. Then moving along, he trailed his mouth over her ribs and her stomach, her hips and finally the mound between her parted thighs.

Eternity sighed when she felt his mouth there and her back arched slightly in anticipation.

He took a moment to grin devilishly up at her, before he pressed his tongue against her clit, lapping and suckling at it until the ethereal beauty was nearly bent in two and gasping his name on repeat. Her hand reached down to threat through his hair and pressing him closer to her still.

With a cruel chuckle, Elijah pulled away completely, rising to stand by the bed above her. He licked his lips, tasting her delicious flavor, just as he growled playfully, “I’m going to enjoy making you scream for me, Sweetheart.”

In an unexpected move, he suddenly found himself pinned to the bed by Eternity with her straddling his hips and her hands holding his to the mattress in a firm, unbreakable hold. It was her turn to grin devilishly at him and to growl playfully.

“Oh, my love, it is long over due for you to be the one made to scream,” she murmured, as she kissed his lips hotly, her tongue darting inside his mouth to taste the mix of him and her.

Abruptly, the Original found his clothes vanished from his body, feeling the soft fabric of the bedspread against his skin instead of that of his suit. He pulled his mouth away from hers to stare at her in surprise, to which she responded only with a coy smile. Then he was attacked with her mouth latched onto his throat, biting and suckling at the skin, before moving on down his broad chest, his ribs, and stomach, just as he had done to her.

Elijah groaned in anticipation as Eternity moved closer to his hardened length, waiting and wanting to feel her wonderful mouth around him. However, the sensation never came. He was being denied.

“I’ll enjoy your cock in my mouth another time, I think,” the little minx told him as she smiled evilly and moved back up his body until her center was positioned over his hardness.

He could do nothing, as he was held down by her powerful psychic binds. He was completely at her mercy. Yet, he couldn’t say he minded. At least, not much, aside from his slight irritation over her denying him the pleasure of her mouth.

Elijah’s annoyance evaporated quickly as he felt her take him into her body, sinking down on him until he was buried to the hilt. He groaned at the sensation of her warm wetness encasing him. His eyes closed as she began to move over him, moving at a rapid pace right away.

He ached to touch her, to reach for her, to caress her skin as she moved. He also felt the urge to take control away from her, to grab her hips and control her movements.

Yet, the Original was powerless. He could only watch Eternity desperate and feel whatever she was willing to allow him to feel. Even so, in his growing madness, he growled at her and fought uselessly against the invisible restraints she had placed upon him.

The ethereal beauty was a cruel lover indeed. She bounced up and down, taking him higher and higher in pleasure, until he was just about to fall over the edge. Then she stopped, smirked wickedly down at him as he groaned in agonizing disappointment, only to begin again. She did this over and over again, riding him hard and fast until he neared completion and at that moment, abruptly stop.

It was long before Elijah was truly desperate, mad with his need to come. “Please...please,” he begged her, not caring how undignified it was. “I’m so close, Sweetheart. I need - I need....”

Eternity grinned at the way he trailed off and finally took pity on him. She let go of her cruel teasing and rode him, as hard and fast as she could muster, until they fell over the edge together.

The Original’s climax was powerful. He arched and screamed in abandon as he spilled into her. The pleasure that washed over him was intense. It was incredible and it left him feeling weak beneath his lady - and she was his.

At last, the sated ethereal beauty let him go and he was free to move.

Immediately, Elijah grabbed her hips and rolled her beneath him, while his still hard cock remained inside her. He grinned wickedly at her, while she giggled playfully. He pinned her hands on either side of her head by lacing their fingers together, as he hovered over her. As he stared down at her sweet face, he knew that he never wanted to be parted from her again. He no longer cared about the past nor was he worried that she might once more betray him. She had already proven that she wouldn’t by saving his family on more than one occasion.

As he began to move inside her slowly, he kissed her lips tenderly and murmured, “Marry me, Eternity.”

She blinked at him rapidly in surprise, before she broke out in a wide, tender grin, “Yes, of course!”

Elijah smiled at her answer and kissed her more passionately. All the while, he carried on taking her slowly, unhurriedly. He showed her his love now without holding back, without being afraid. Nothing made him happier in that moment. Everything was perfect.

Soon, it would be more so as he would eventually be calling Eternity his wife. Then they would have all of their immortalities to spend together - in a love that was anything, but apocalyptic.

The End

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Tag List: @elejah-wonderland @missnmikealson @dendrite-lover @xanderling @elejahforever @inmylifeilovedthemall @elizamonet @freshsuitcasewinnereagle @lolelijahishot @loulouisa @mikaelsonwetdreams @x-memi12 @hawaiianohana31 @elijahandkollover @teekillerin @iamaquarius2

#elijah mikaelson #daniel gillies #original character #elijah x eternity #klaus mikaelson #hayley marshall #hope mikaelson #romance #drama #alternate universe #the originals fanfiction #the originals #the vampire diaries #the vampire diaries fanfiction

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legisaskerator · 5 years

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vent vent vent

buckle up bastards this is gonna be long as FUCK

holy fucking shit my life yhas been so goddamn hard recently and i’m not handling it well

first and foremost on my mind at this second is the fact that i am in so much fucking pain right now i do not know what to do. my EDS is acting up really really badly and i’m super bedridden right now. i took my last vicodin and i have no idea when i can get more, or how, and i have like nothing to help. i had to leave class today to weep in the fuckin bathroom because i can barely walk and even sitting up is a struggle. if i felt this sort of pain three years ago i would have likely considered doing something VERY rash to stop it and i’m amazed i’m still, almost functioning. i can barely think i’m in agony i want it to end

i’m so scared this is just the next turn that eds is taking. i know i wont ever get better but fuck, i dont want to need a mobility aid yet. i’m only fucking 22 i have to be a teacher!!! how can i fucking teach if i cant write on a board?? or maneuver around classrooms? how will i ever get a job? or even just. live in the house of my dreams. i wish there was some help for me because i am tired of ehlers danlos running my life. i am scared for my future. i cant imagine who i will become if this level of pain becomes my “normal”. someone move me to mass so i can get legal weed to try to numb myself

on the same path of injury, my mother recently injured herself very badly and was hospitalized for a little w hile. ended up needing surgery to put rods and screws and plates in her leg/ankle, and as a result, she’s not functioning for the next 12 weeks. i’m doing my best to help out aroudn the house and i’m filling in for her at work. she does advertising for a newspaper and brings the papers to subscribing businesses,, which i’m taking over now. at least i like driving?

i love my mom and i will do anythign to help her, but god it’s such a load on my shoulders. i’m upset and frustrated because i’m strugtgling to balance my life around this sudden responsibility. it’s definitely not her i’m upset about, it’s not like she did this purposefully??? she needs the help and i am willing to give it. but i am also allowed to feel these emotions. i am upset at the /situation/. her boyf and my sister are barely helping and they’re neglectful and distant. i’m the only emotionally present one in the family and also (aside from mom) am the only nurturing, caring one in the household. i keep her from having panic attacks, i keep her anxiety down, i’m warm and i try so goddamn hard to make sure shes ok. but it’s exhausting. i’m keeping my family together it feels like, everythings crashing down and i’m the only “sane” one. which is sad because ive been a depressed wreck for weeks and have been working on scraping myself off the fucking pavement, trying to get out of the spiral. i’m scared that my mom relies so much on me. she tells me everything, things i don’t want to hear. relationship troubles primarily. i know i give great advice and am ~wise beyond my years~ (thanks trauma) but, that’s what her therapist is for. i’ve told her i wish she would, tell me less, because as her daughter it’s uncomfortable, and she always overreacts like “oh i’ll never tel you anything again if it’s so terrible then” and i end up feeling fucking awful, and it’s a nightmare. but if things keep going the way they are in their relationship (i’m not gonna spill deets because, privacy still) we might lose our house!!! and everything we’ve finally worked for!!

so i feel like, if i can’t fix this problem, it’ll be my fault our lives come crashing down.

i know that’s ridiculous. it’s not my job.

but it still feels like it

i never feel like i’m doing enough. just in life in general. i’m not good enough i’m not working hard enough i just am not enough. i was very saturated with child prodigy shit when i was younger and that fucked up my psyche so much. it’s still thrown at me by my father, americas got talent and movies where the protag is a ~genius~. i hate it. ill never be that and i know that’s what my dad wants of me. i’m not the next bill gates i just want to be a teacher and live my life!!!! i don’t want to start a band and get famous!!!! i dont want to run a business!! i don’t want to revolutionize the world!! just let me please! follow my heart!!!!!! i can’t fucking stand it when he tries to tell me what to do with my life it makes me want to scream and wail and sjafkl; fd fjasfg;akldf

i can’t do this, man.

i’m so alone. i’m sick of the slut life. i’ve been hoeing around for a year and it’s taking a massive toll on my self esteem and sanity. i’s a terrible coping mechanism and i’m very very not healthy about it. i only have sex when i’m heavily under the influence of something and use it as a way of getting attention, which is, awful. i often forgo protection because it’s ~inconvenient~ and the second a guy protests, i’ll cave because i ~live to please~ and don’t want to start shit. i can’t keep doing this. hooking up is the only time people ever touch me. i just want a fuckign hug sometimes

i keep seeing so many posts like “you can’t love another if you don’t love yoursel!” and “people aren’t your medicine” but what if??? they can be to an extent?? part of being uber depressed is self-isolation and i’m so, sick of it. i need some fucking comfort because right now i am suffering through my life alone and it’s so difficult. it’s not as easy as just, settling though. i’m picky with my lovers because?? i deserve someone good? everyone that’s been coming through my life like, has a fatal flaw that i just can’t do. like long term compatability is risked for me with that shit.like, too introverted, too emotionally distant, people who just aren’t smart, i can’t do it?? i just want someone who’s going to comfort me when i need it, who i can have a healthy debate with, and someone who respects my life choices and things i do.

i’ve been talking to one guy recently who, i was hoping maybe could have been a potential. he’s super nice and considerate/respectful, hes HELLA smart, adores a bunch of the same stuff i’m into, we talk really well together, i feel comfortabgle around him, gotta say he’s hot as fuck too...and he just wants friends with benefits. I respect that. i was in a similar spot literally last semester, there was a pretty great guy but i just wasn’t in the right space for a relationship. so friends with benefits. i don’t blame this new guy for not wanting a relationship he has every right!! but oh god it hurts a little. i worry that it’s me, that i’m just a good pussy for him, or a convenient lay who’s down to clown like 99% of the time. he’s been talking to me less recently and i’m worried that he’s...done with me. idk if that’s true or if i’m just reading into it but i’m in a VERY vulnerable place right now in my life, and i really need someone by my side for it. i need the support and warmth.

i wish my warmth would comfort me. i wish i could turn my nurturing attitude around and help myself. i wish i didn’t need smoene else for comfort. i’m a fuckin libra tho i live for romance

this guys’ great though. i hope he sticks around at least for a little bit longer. i want to learn more bout lovecraft.

my sluttiness is my biggest qualm with myself right now. it’s definitely a huge problem in my life, it’s actively causing me problems. my one friend (because, i have only one fucking friend i can actually talk to. that’s it i hAVE ONE i’m so goddamn l,onely) has been like, coaching me through making better decisions? i’m very impulsive and he’s got great advice and is quick to be like “then don’t” and shit. i’m trying really hard to make sure i dont use him as a therapist though, that’s unfair to him. i’m respectful and all that shit don’t worry bout htat. he’s a huge help to me and has been my absolute rock through college, idk where i’d be without him. he also introduced me to his friend group, who are all really amazing people? they welcomed me with open arms and no ones ever done that before. i’m always super outcasted cause i’m weird and i wont hide it because it’s ME goddamnit! but these people, they’re weird too, they’re freaks and outcasts and, while they’ve all been very close friends since they were wee tots, they still welcomed me in. they still wanted me to be part of them. i’m getting to know all of them still, but i’ve got hope that, maybe i’ve got some lifelong friends now. at the very least, i’m sure i’ve got one.

onto phase 4 of my fuckin monologue i guess, topic SHIFT

my thesis is a mess and it’s due in three weeks, i’ve barely gotten anything done because my teacher is awful and i’m worried i’m gonna fail the course

which would be SUPER bad because, i’ve had this teacher too many times and we do not get along, she loathes my existence, and i really just need to get out. shes partly the reason i need an extra fucking year at school and i always DREAD going to her class. it’s humiliating and discouraging to spend three hours every monday there. no one else likes this professor, they’re only here becuase the school loooooves the researchers and writers. complaints dont matter. all of my other classes are fine but this one has been probably the worst, most emotionally devastating class i’ve ever taken

i don’t even get to write about a topic i want. i was forced to write about the play i was in, instead of Monty Python like i wanted (it’s a fucking comedy class!!!!!) the play is about SCHOOL SHOOTINGS (we won some national awards teehee it’s an outstanding play). yes it’s a “black comedy” but not really? it’s a drama with comedic moments? and i KNOW THIS cause i’ve been studying comedy with this professor for like three cumulative years at this point. i’m struggling beacuse there’s zero research, zero information, and has to be over 20 pages long??? like fuck? i’m so fucked

anyway thanks for coming to my TED talk. i’ve been wanting to make a vent post for like weeks but i haven’t had the time or energy and , i really needed to just....get this out. i feel a little better having all the words down. there’s still so much else going wrong in my life that i could talk about, all the car troubles, my other classes, dorm shit, but, it doesn’t matter in the light of these issues. i can get through this. i just gotta keep fighting.

oh and if anyones like, worried, i’m not suicidal, i’m not going to do that, there’s no chance of that hpapening. i’m in a very bad place but i’m never gonig back there if i can fucking help it

#personal #vent #tw whatever idk sensitive materail or something #i just gotta breathe

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everythingsouthasian · 6 years

Text

My two cents on Bin Roye the drama Pt. I

*********SPOILERS GALORE*********

This interesting review of Bin Roye the movie (it was a lot more than just the movie, some great insights on South Asian films and filmmaking, go have a read!) triggered this post, so please bear with me.

It’s been a while since I saw both the movie (a really crap print) and the drama. I started out by watching the drama and then the movie and both had their pros and cons. I haven’t had the fortune of reading the novel so I’ll have to work with the Hum TV crew’s interpretations.

Now, for the main article, the author of the post says:

There is a juicy concept at the film’s core - the love of your life chooses to marry someone over you, but then through a twist of fate is left with no choice but to end up with you regardless. Do you rejoice, finally fulfilling your lifelong desires, or do you admit to yourself that you are second best, a charity case, a logistical necessity?

Yes, the movie does, to a large extent, purport this. But if one were to carefully watch the drama and then the movie, the said “juicy concept” will essentially change altogether. From the drama, it is unequivocally clear that it is all about Saba Shafiq, our bratty and mischievous heroine, who gets embroiled in miseries of her own making. Everything that is said, felt, and reasoned is from her point of view. She is the driving force, the pilot, the hero in this adventure. As much as people want to make it all about Irtiza (Humayun Saeed fans), it isn’t. If it were his narrative, then the end product would be more boring than as it currently stands.

The film’s core focuses on Saba and her obsession with Irtiza. “Aapki mohobbat mere liye saza ban gayi (my love for you became the curse of my life),” she claimed in the climax scene. As her cousin and best friend since childhood who, to some extent, misled her with actions and words that lie in the grey area of care and love, Irtiza is not necessarily the villain on the show, but he is one to her. In their childhood, such adulation on Saba’s part to Irtiza can be attributed to childishness; but with age, when it only seemed to heighten, layers of complexity get introduced, not only to these feelings but also to the sanity of the person it affects.

Saba’s life revolves around Irtiza’s. She learns to make coffee, just like the one her mother makes that Irtiza loves, and cook and do all things homely just so she can get married and be the acquiescent wife to the person she loves with all her heart, i.e., Irtiza.

(x)

“Jo mera hai, bas wo mera hi rahe (what’s mine should remain mine),” is what she wishes for in Eid. Irtiza then leaves her to go to study in the US where he meets her elder sister, Saman, whom he develops feelings for that are different from those he harbours for Saba. Even at this point, the narrative only glosses over Irtiza’s characterisation, not offering any reasoning for his choices or decisions. What’s shown of him is in context to Saba -- he cares for her in a way he doesn’t care for anyone else, she is still his best friend who gets to know first of his feelings for Saman, etc. Saba starts hating her elder sister for stealing Irtiza from her, for taking away a piece of her heart.

Here’s where her obsession begins to take shape:

“Aur har wo cheez jo use pasand hai, woh main apnaa chuki hoon. Tum meri jaisi mohobbat toh karke dikhao usse (The things he [Irtiza] likes, I’ve already accepted with all my heart. Try loving him the way I do).”

For Saba, her time after Saman relocates to Pakistan is a hellhole, a ticking time bomb, acquainting with brand new feelings of jealousy bordering in on malice, all of which are alien to the naïve her. And evidently, she hates to realise this side of hers.

(x)

And this is partially why she distances herself from Saman. Saba doesn’t WANT to feel this way for her sister. But her obsession with this idea of love for Irtiza is evoking the worst in her. “Amma, iss dil ka kya karoon mein, jo koi baat nahi sunta, baghawat karne ko kehta hai (Grandma, what do I do of a love that refuses to see sense and only wishes to rebel)?”

This pent up negativity reaches a crescendo when she curses her sister with death so that she can be reunited with her love, Irtiza (Mahira SLAYS in this sequence).

(x)

This scene captures the essence of the movie -- the rock bottom people can hit for love -- Saba, the amiable, naïve, and straightforward girl demands God to take her sister away so that she can be happy, she can be with the person that was always supposed to be hers, all this confession in front of her grandmother!

Saba’s life goes downhill from here. She builds a fort around herself so high that even an eagle would find it challenging to pass. She turns hostile to people who love her because she is miffed with her life and her circumstances. The love of her life has moved on but she is stuck in the past. In order to regain some semblance of routine in her life, she enrols in college and even reestablishing ties with her sister, who now lives in the US with her husband, but she still bears a grudge toward Irtiza. He on the other hand is unable to fathom the 360 degree change in his best friend’s attitude. Try as he might to coax reasons out of her for it he meets with stern rebuttals. Saman and Irtiza even try to set her up with one of his best friends’ brother, who falls for her, but she voices out her disapproval strongly time and time again without providing concrete reasons. This leaves the entire family distressed.

#bin roye #mahira khan #humayun saeed #pakistani drama #pakistani movie #meta #rants

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kenzieam · 6 years

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Surrender to the Call - Chapter Four (Bucky X Lev)

Rating: M (language, violence, mentions of torture and abuse, eventual smut, angst)

Genre: Drama/Angst

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**Potential Triggers, please read with caution**

*******************************************************************************************

Bucky and Shuri work to bring Lev back but, when she wakes up, can she deal with all the bad shit she did as HYDRA’s pawn?

*******************************************************************************************

Shuri glanced up as Bucky entered the room and smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. If front of her, frozen and unconscious, was Levi, face twisted in a final rictus of terror, her scar standing out a harsh purple against her pale skin. A large holographic display hovered in the air in front of the princess and she frowned at the intricate web before her, playing with her bottom lip.

Bucky had awakened not long ago, compelled to check Shuri’s progress even though it twisted an agonizing knife through his heart to see Lev, especially with her ghastly final expression, her plea of ‘please’ still fresh in his ears.

“Sleep well?” Shuri asked, concentrating on the image of Lev’s mind and consciousness in front of her.

Bucky rubbed the back of his neck. “How long was I out?”

“Almost 2 days.” Shuri flicked a look at him. “You obviously needed the rest.”

There was no use denying it and, even if he did, Shuri was too smart to be fooled, and too good a friend. “It’s been rough.”

Shuri nodded, turning her eyes back to the display. She knew the whole story.

“It is deeper this time.” Shuri murmured and Bucky moved closer to look. “The tendrils of influence, they’re deeper and stronger. Parts of her brain have been altered, the impulse control centre shrunk, the area of aggression nurtured and grown. I read the full report from Dr. Banner. He believes they used cognitive subversion and I must agree.”

“What does that mean?”

“If I had to guess, she was restrained and made to watch multiple images of violence and depravity, and pumped full of steroids and adrenaline at the same time, essentially rewiring her brain. I’ve read reports of this type of torture, it’s quite effective, and devastating to the subject.”

“Can you fix it?”

Shuri paused. “I don’t know.”

Bucky swallowed hard and moved to turn away to hide his sudden tears but Shuri gently rested her hand on his shoulder. “I will try my best.”

Bucky nodded, not able to speak.

“Is it possible to obtain records of her treatment?” Shuri asked hesitantly, biting her bottom lip as Bucky turned back to look at her incredulously. “I have no desire to learn the degree of misery Levi suffered, but if I knew exactly how and what they did, I may be more successful at reversing it.”

It made sense but Bucky had no desire to read the reports himself, it would be his final undoing to know the details; the end result was enough to break his heart. “I’ll see if Bruce or the team can get them.”

“They are trying to take down HYDRA now?”

“Yes. When we recovered Lev, the government team managed to grab an agent too. I don’t know what they did to him, but they seem to think his information’s credible.”

“Perhaps,” Shuri offered tentatively. “If this results in HYDRA’s fall, Lev’s capture and corruption will have had some value.”

Bucky wiped at his eyes. “I’d rather have Lev whole and with me, even if it meant HYDRA was still out there.”

Shuri nodded silently. After a moment her hand rested gently on Bucky’s forearm, his skin hot, the muscles beneath rock-hard. “This will take time, go out and clear your head, Lev will need you when she wakes.”

********************************************************************************************* The warm sun on his face was indeed relaxing and, as Bucky leaned back against the rock behind him, he did feel his mind beginning to clear. It hurt, the way your hand will ache if you’ve been gripping something hard for a long time then released it; his very being hurt right now. Bucky hadn’t felt this way in a long time, not since he’d first begun to reawaken and remember, relive the horrors HYDRA put him through and the lives he took.

Lev would be in similar agony... if she woke up. Shuri didn’t sound very confident

Maybe, even if they were taken down, HYDRA did win after all.

The tears came hot and sudden, feeling like blood as they streamed down his face. He’d given his entire heart and soul over to Lev, she owned him, she had the power to break him. He should have stayed away, stayed unattached, preserved himself; not fallen so desperately in love; for what was life, except for suffering, at least for Bucky? He should have known this wasn’t his life to have, fate would snatch it away sooner or later.

For a time, his anguish took hold, and the sun had moved across the sky before he was in control again, slumped back against the rock, weak with exertion and emotion.

He couldn’t leave. No matter what happened. Even through the worst of his agony, when he could hardly draw breath between sobs, that thought had glowed bright in the back of his mind. Lev needed him, regardless of his pain, regardless of his regrets, Lev needed him to be there when she woke up. His words to Steve came back to him, how he‘d wished Lev were dead to save her from the sorrow and pain that awaited her when she awoke, and he knew he hadn’t truly meant them. He was too selfish, too attached, too fused to Lev to separate. He would help her crawl through her hell, be there for her on the other side because that the only option. It was too painful to leave her.

A fresh ache started low in his abdomen. His body craved release, craved the warmth of Lev against him, the feel of him inside her. Once they’d begun being intimate, they’d never stopped. Both were serum-enhanced and insatiable, it was not unusual for one to take the hand of the other when they were home in the Tower, and tug them quietly to their quarters, ignoring the hooting and laughing of their teammates behind them, the teasing that ‘this is the third time today!’. The first few days after a mission were always shot to hell, neither one emerging from their room except to grab food, then back inside. It made the others roll their eyes and tease Bucky and Lev about their ‘sex den’, but they couldn’t help it; they were addicts, each other’s favourite drug.

Yet, despite his anxious need, there would be no relief. Taking care of himself in the shower barely took the edge off and, even if he wasn’t completely abhorred at the thought of being with another, his body failed to respond to anyone else but Levi.

Groaning, Bucky scrubbed his hands over his eyes, then pushed to his feet. He needed to exercise, go for a run, hard and fast, exhaust his body to try and temper his mind, then maybe he’d be strong enough to check on Lev again.

*******************************************************************************************

Shuri was indeed as good as her word to Steve, and had devoted her entire time to Lev, barely taking time out to rest or eat. She ignored both T’Challa and Bucky when they tried to pull her away, flapping her hand dismissively at them, stubbornly focusing on the display of Lev’s brain. She’d ran infinite scenarios, trying to figure out the best way to untangle HYDRA’s corruption, but so far, every simulation resulted in something vital to Lev’s personality being stripped as well.

Shuri was getting frustrated. As one of the most brilliant people on the planet, she wasn’t used to being unsuccessful at a task she was putting her full attentions to and that in turn made her even more stubborn.

At both royal sibling’s urging, Bucky was reclaiming himself, taking time to decompress and relax, reflect and think on everything like he had when Shuri had first helped him, and later when Lev had been brought here as a scared, reflexively violent girl, damaged by HYDRA’s mistakes and left to fade away and die in Siberia.

She’d awakened a woman, able to shrug off those chains and grow into a valuable member of the team. No one else, not even Bucky, could get Steve to laugh the way Lev could, no one else could tease the same delighted grin from Bucky or shut Sam down so effectively that even he enjoyed it.

Bucky missed her. He wanted her back.

There had been nothing but radio silence from the team so far, eight days of nothing. Even Bucky’s relay 0f Shuri’s request had been unanswered, and while this unnerved Bucky, he knew the team was too busy to drop a line. They needed to be successful this time; Bucky, Lev, the whole team couldn’t continue on with the spectre of HYDRA still out there, waiting to swoop in and steal Lev or even him, away again; HYDRA needed to be put down like the rabid dog it was.

A loud rush in the sky grabbed his attention and Bucky looked up from the rodent family he’d been sitting with. He and Lev had sat out here often before, befriending the gerbil-like critters and the little buggers seemed to have remembered him, tentatively sniffing at his large fingers before allowing him to stroke their tiny backs, scurrying along his legs and up his shoulders to tug at his hair and sniff along his jaw.

With a jolt, Bucky recognized the quinjet as it hissed past and he stood, gently disentangling and setting down the little creatures before turning and sprinting back towards the palace. It had to be Steve, returning with word of the mission, hopefully with files that could help Shuri with Lev.

It was indeed the blond captain, talking with T’Challa when Bucky sprinted up, the sweat gleaming on his skin more from anxiety over what Steve was about to say then from the exertion of the run and stopped short when he saw his friend.

Steve looked like he’d been put through the ringer. Fading bruises and cuts marred his face and the tense way he held his shoulder spoke to an injury his enhanced body hadn’t yet been able to heal fully. Regardless, upon seeing Bucky, Steve strode towards him and pulled his oldest friend into a crushing bear hug. Pulling away slightly, he slapped his hands onto Bucky’s shoulders.

“We did it.”

Bucky let out a breath he didn’t realized he’d been holding. “HYDRA?”

“All but dead. We cut off the head, Buck. We did it. What’s left is just crumbs.”

Bucky’s heart jolted painfully. This seemed like a dream. “Everyone okay?”

Now Steve’s eyes darkened. “Mostly.”

“Who?”

“Wanda, Sam.... Clint. They’re not dead but Bruce is going to be busy in the medical lab for a while. Tony got busted up pretty bad but his suit took most of the force, he’s walking around like he just got in a car wreck, but at least he’s walking. Nat’s far from 100 % but her, Bruce and Tony are holding down the fort okay.”

“What about the government guys?”

Steve winced. “Not so lucky. What’s left of the teams are being organized to track and kill the last few HYDRA hold-outs.”

“So... it’s really over?”

Steve shrugged, looking exhausted. “I really hope so, but who knows? HYDRA was huge and they lasted so long because they were secret. But we definitely dealt them a critical blow.” He jumped slightly, as if remembering something, and slapped his hands against his chest, resembling a man looking for his missing pack of smokes. Triumphantly, he dug into his front breast pocket and brandished a small thumb drive, holding it out towards the two men. Bucky backed away instinctively, having a pretty good idea what it was.

T’Challa reached out and accepted it.

“I got your request.” Steve glanced at Bucky before looking back at the King. “That’s what we found regarding Lev. I couldn’t look at it, but Bruce glanced at it and said it all fits his theories.” His voice darkened with grief and sadness.

Bucky felt his gorge rising and swallowed hard.

“There’s more.” Steve looked hesitant.

“Just say it, punk.”

“There’s some old files on there. Either we missed them the first time or they weren’t there but....” He took a deep breath. “It looks like Lev wasn’t meant to be your hunter if you went rogue. She was to be your replacement.”

Bucky jerked in shock. What?

“I’m guessing if her cryofreeze hadn’t gone wrong she would have become HYDRA’s new Winter Soldier.”

This was unexpected. Would HYDRA have just left him in cryofreeze to eventually fade away, like Lev? Or would they have released him one last time, just for Lev to track and kill?

T’Challa spoke up, breaking the gloomy silence. “Come, you must be exhausted, Captain. There is a room ready for you.”

Steve hesitated, but accepted at Bucky’s slight nod. “Yeah, okay. Thanks.”

Bucky held out his hand. “I’ll take the drive to Shuri, if you want.”

T’Challa nodded, handing over the drive then turning to Steve, gesturing him to follow.

Bucky watched them leave, then strode away.

Shuri glanced up from the table she was slumped at and rubbed her eyes. Her expression brightened as her gaze fell on the drive in Bucky’s hand. She yanked a small laptop towards her and held out her hand. Bucky hesitated after giving it to her.

“Are you staying?” Shuri asked, sounding surprised.

It was morbid, it would be heartbreaking, but Bucky felt compelled to stay and witness at least part of Levi’s torment; she’d lived it, his pain would never compare to hers, it seemed the least he could do. He nodded and Shuri seemed to understand.

The first parts that came up on the screen were written reports and Shuri scanned them quickly, nodding and mumbling to herself, making notes on a small tablet beside her.

“Just like we speculated, cognitive subversion.” She continued to read and make notes. “I’ve been talking with Dr. Banner and, based on what we were assuming was done, were going to try a direct reversal, in essence, a cognitive affirmation. Show Lev clips of calming, peaceful footage and inject endorphin stimulants, other ‘feel good’ hormones, try to reverse the damage; shrink her overgrown aggression centre, grow the impulse control area again. These reports only confirm that is the best way to try.” Her fingers hovered over the touch pad, a video file had appeared and was waiting to play. After a pause, she tapped the pad.

A grainy video came up but Bucky had no problem recognizing Lev and his breath hitched in his throat. Lev was twisting in a chair as much as her restraints allowed, the memory suppressor attached to her head. Her devastated, garbled scream came through the speakers and stabbed straight into his heart.

“Bucky! Buc-” Lev cried, her voice breaking.

Shuri closed the video, sniffling. A second video came up and her fingers shook slightly as she tapped the pad again.

Lev was unmoving and blank faced now, secured in perhaps the same chair. Her head was strapped tightly and strange, painful looking devices held her eyes open a la Clockwork Orange. At least four IV lines ran into the crooks of her bruised arms, pumping the steroids and adrenaline into her veins. Her hair had already been shaved, the scar through her eye still bleeding fresh. Screams and bangs sounded over the speakers, light playing over Lev’s cadaverous face. A monotonous voice droned in Russian and Bucky’s fists clenched unconsciously as he listened.

“What is he saying?” Shuri whispered.

“You belong to HYDRA. Your mind is HYDRA. You are death and pain. You live only to kill and maim...” he broke off with a trembling exhale, fighting to keep his voice steady. “Kill or be killed. No mercy, no pity. You will slaughter all who stand in your way. You are alone, there is no one to save you. You are death, you are death, you are death. And then it just repeats.”

“Oh, Lev.” Shuri’s voice held near bottomless sorrow. She wiped at her eyes before hitting the pad and pulling the drive free. She tossed it aside with a shudder.

Bucky took a deep breath, fighting with everything he had to not break down. Shuri’s hand rested briefly on his, then pulled away. She stood suddenly, channeling her horror into action.

“I will reverse this.” She vowed. Seemingly renewed with fresh energy, she turned away and almost leapt from her chair.

Bucky watched for a few moments but Shuri was completely focused on her work and he slunk away quietly. He found himself wandering outside again but, rather than returning to the rock formation and gerbil family, he decided to collapse not far from the palace. A convenient rock provided a seat back and for the longest time, Bucky had no energy or drive to do anything. The sun moved across the sky, shadows playing across his face, voices and laughter of Wakandian’s nearby drifted on the wind to his ears, but he stayed motionless, mind churning, trying to chew the newest information about Lev’s treatment into swallowable chunks, but they would never be palatable.

He was encouraged by Shuri’s newfound confidence, and if there was anyone smart enough on Earth to help Lev, it would be her, but the footage of Lev’s torture played across his mind’s eye on a devastating loop. Eyes forced open, face bleeding, while death and chaos played out in front of her; the disembodied Russian voice, hooking it’s claws deep into her mind.

No doubt the President will want to see the footage for herself, but it would definitely clear Lev of any guilt for her actions. There was no way she could be held accountable for what she did now. As hard as the footage was to see, and the reports to read, they would guarantee Lev’s clemency.

But, what then?

Shuri reversed the damage, removed HYDRA’s corruption and Levi woke up, then what happened? Lev’s guilt at her actions, involuntary as they were, would still eat away at her. Nearly a thousand people dead, millions more disrupted as their country burned and staggered, how did you recover from that? Bucky would do all he could to help, would love and support her unflinchingly, but how much was too much? Maybe it would be better, for Lev at least, if she simply-

“Buck?”

Bucky startled, muscles creaking and popping after hours of immobility. Steve stood a few feet away, looking tired but still much more refreshed than before. He sat at Bucky’s side with a groan.

“T’Challa says you’ve been out here for hours.”

Bucky nodded, not looking towards Steve. He cleared his throat. “Shuri and I, we.... reviewed some of that drive you brought.”

“Bucky, you shouldn’t have-”

“I needed to.” Bucky interrupted, voice strengthening. “Levi lived that; the least I could do was witness it.”

“Was it as bad as we thought?”

“Worse. I don’t know if you can come back from that.”

“Lev can.”

“She’s not bulletproof, punk. She’s only human.”

“And she’s strong, and she has you, and me, and the whole team behind her.”

“Will that be enough?”

“It has to be.” Steve replied quietly. “You’re not the only one who misses her, who wants her back. She’s like a sister to me. Shit, we’re a family, she is my sister.”

Bucky was silent for long moment. “I don’t know, if Shuri removes all that... shit from her mind, what Levi will want. If she’ll stay here for a while, go back to the Tower-”

“Hide out in Bucharest and try to buy plums?” Steve teased gently.

Bucky smirked wryly, reaching over to punch the punk’s shoulder. “Wherever she goes though, I’ll be with her and... if she decides to leave the team, I won’t be staying either.”

Steve nodded silently. In truth, he’d been expecting this. It wouldn’t surprise him at all if Lev just dropped everything and disappeared, started living completely off the grid and away from civilization. The brief image of a small cabin, wood smoke trailing from the chimney and Lev emerging from the front door, holding a tin cup of steaming coffee as the sun glittered through the trees hit him then.

Whatever Levi decided, she deserved peace and tranquility after all this. And Bucky deserved it too.

The men went quiet and reflective then, lost in their own thoughts. Finally, Steve cleared his throat and broke the silence. “I’ve got to head back. Bruce and Nat need help. I just came to bring the drive and check in.”

Bucky nodded absently, his attention still elsewhere when Steve stood, despite himself reflexively standing as well. Only Steve’s hand slapping his shoulder pulled him fully out of his own head.

“Get some sleep, jerk.”

*******************************************************************************************

Shuri’s message had been cautiously optimistic and Bucky’s heart pounded in his chest as he entered the lab. Shuri looked up and smiled widely.

“I was just about to bring her out of freeze. T’Challa’s on his way too.” Even as she spoke, the King entered, Okoye silent at his side.

“Did it work?” Bucky asked hesitantly, hating the faint quiver in his voice. Shuri had been working non-stop for the last ten days, stopping only to sleep and eat.

“I’ve removed all traces of HYDRA’s indoctrination and managed to restore Lev’s brain to her pre-corruption state. But... I can’t do anything about how she’ll feel when she wakes up. I’ve just taken away her killer attitude.” Shuri’s confident tone faltered slightly. T’Challa rested his hand on her shoulder.

“You have done well, better than anyone else could. It is up to Levka now.”

Shuri bit her lip, eyes flicking to Bucky’s as her fingers flew over the controls. With a whoosh of air, the cryofreeze was reversed and the containment cylinder retracted.

Lev blinked, her twisted expression jerking, her teeth clacked together. Her eyes fell closed again and she sagged against the restraints. Bucky leapt towards her, catching her upper arms and T’Challa was there as well when the restraints retracted, helping Bucky catch Lev’s limp body. Okoye watched on high alert as they guided Lev towards the nearby gurney and laid her down. Shuri was there instantly with a thick blanket, pulling it up to Lev’s chin as her teeth started to reflexively chatter with residual cold. The siblings stepped back, giving Bucky some privacy, but Okoye stayed alert and T’Challa was tensed to react as well if Lev woke up swinging, literally or figuratively.

“Levi?” Bucky murmured, leaning close. His fingertips burned as they stroked along her cheek, jolts shooting up his arm. It had been so long since he’d touched her. “Baby, are you there?”

Her eyelids fluttered, and Bucky caught the faintest whisper from her chapped lips. “Bucky?”

“I’m here, baby. I’m not going anywhere.”

Her lids fluttered again and Bucky finally got to see her beautiful amethyst eyes, unfocused for a breath before locking on Bucky’s. Gone was the hard, razor’s edge of violence darkening her iris's to bruises, left was confusion and the beginnings of relief.

“Bucky.” Her voice was stronger and her hands lifted weakly, brushing against his broad shoulders. Bucky wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close and she half-crumpled, half-snuggled against him, her body beginning to shudder. Bucky’s body trembled in answer and tears started to course down his cheeks.

“I missed you baby, so much.” He choked. His lips brushed her forehead, groaning at the sensation. Lev whimpered and clawed weakly closer, nuzzling into his throat. Bucky closed his eyes in bliss, a bone-deep peace coiling through him, fuck, he’d missed this, he’d missed her.

“Bucky, I...” Lev stuttered and Bucky felt her go rigid in his arms. “Oh god, Bucky. What have I done?”

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky and lev #bucky and nika

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arts-dance · 4 years

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What Makes Guernica Picasso’s Most Influential Painting

Casey Lesser - Jun 12, 2017

Eighty years ago, Pablo Picasso received a commission that would forever change his career. The Spanish Republic—then in the throes of the Spanish Civil War, against future dictator Francisco Franco—had asked Picasso, among several other prominent artists, to create a painting for its pavilion at the Paris International Exposition of 1937. The work he made was Guernica, the now-legendary, mural-sized painting inspired by the bombing of a small Basque town, which now resides at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid. While numerous works by Picasso have been crowned masterpieces—like Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907), which is said to have set Western abstract art in motion—Guernica stands alone in the artist’s prolific oeuvre. Why has this painting, in particular, struck a chord with generations of viewers?

The Artistic Experimentations That Led to Guernica

In an exhibition currently open at the Reina Sofía to mark the 80th anniversary of the creation and display of Guernica, titled “Pity and Terror: Picasso’s Path to Guernica,” curators Timothy James Clark and Anne M. Wagner delve into the artist’s production during the decade prior to the work’s inception. These earlier preoccupations include the artist’s interior scenes and depictions of women from the mid-1920s and ’30s, two themes in Picasso’s work that would ultimately surface in Guernica. In the mid-’20s, around the time that Picasso became involved with

Surrealism

, he was painting interiors with still lifes, featuring objects like musical instruments and fruits. And initially, these works conveyed pleasure. But, as Wagner explains, the interior space soon became claustrophobic. “Its pleasure seemed to be charred and burnt up,” she says. “It became a theater for drama.” This shift occurred amid the tumultuous World War I recovery efforts in the U.S. and Europe, the years preceding the devastating stock market crash of 1929. During this period, Picasso and the Surrealists were examining the dark spaces of the human psyche. “Picasso knew very well that being a human involved terror, tragedy, excess, and violence,” Wagner notes, “and he believed very much that the psyche is a place in which one plays out the unconscious mind.”

The Three Dancers (1925), a large painting now in the Tate

’s collection, is a prime example of Picasso’s work of this era. (Wagner notes that, later in life, Picasso considered it to be his greatest work.) “It’s a wild picture, full of a kind of excess,” Wagner says. “For Picasso, what’s now inside the room is not so much still life objects, but it’s the bodies of women, now treated in an immensely complex and defamiliarizing way.”Notorious for his relationships with women, Picasso portrayed his lovers with affection in private works, but these depictions diverged markedly from his public paintings of women. “For his public art, he was considering how women’s bodies could be monumental or architectural,” says Wagner, “how they could be traps or machines; how they could be the index of a different kind of reality, and how they could also be monstrous.” In the years leading up to Guernica, paintings and sketches evidence the artist’s ruminations on the symbolism that could be conveyed through manipulation of the female body—experimentations that find their resolution in Guernica.Despite reports of the great speed with which Picasso created Guernica, it didn’t come out of nowhere. It is the result of years of artistic production, as well as the artist’s personal investment in the fraught politics of Spain, where his family was still living.

Picasso Receives the Commission

While the German and Soviet pavilions at the Paris International Exposition of 1937 were giant architectural displays of authority and power, the Spanish Republic, less than a year into the Civil War and in need of financial support, opted for a modest, efficient structure, and filled it with world-class art.

Known for its reverence toward artists and intellectuals, the Republic tapped creatives at the forefront of the ’30s avant garde, like

Joan Miró and Alexander Calder

. Picasso received the commission for a mural-sized painting in January 1937. While artworks created for the Republican pavilion were intended to serve as political vehicles (commissioned by an anti-fascist regime), Picasso’s original plan for his work was, at least at face value, decidedly apolitical. According to Wagner, the artist was at a loss as to what he should paint. Initial sketches for the work depict a painter in his studio, facing a nude model who reclines on a sofa. It was tragedy that led him to change course.

The Bombing of Guernica and the Painting of Guernica

On April 26, 1937, Franco ordered the Nazi Condor Legion (loaned to Franco by Germany) to drop bombs over the small town of Guernica. It was a market day; civilians, predominantly women and children, were convened outdoors in public squares. As the first place where democracy was established in Spain’s Basque region, the town was a symbolic target. The brutal bombing, which killed hundreds of people (the number is contested, and reports vary between 200 and 1,700) and injured as many as 900 others, was the first instance in the Spanish Civil War in which a defenseless city was attacked.“One of the things you can immediately glean from the whole spectrum of imagery around the Spanish Civil War was that there was a very public awareness of what was happening to civilian bodies—women and children,” Wagner notes. Indeed, the Spanish Civil War was the first war of its kind to have a press photography corps on the front lines, and like countless others, Picasso opened his morning paper in Paris on April 27th to find devastating images of the destruction of Guernica.Though Picasso was already a known leftist—he had created a pair of etchings, titled the Dream and Lie of Franco (1937), which were reproduced and sold in order to raise funds for the Republic—the bombing struck him with particular force. And on May 1st, he took to his studio on Rue des grands Augustins, and began new sketches for the commission. By mid-June, the work was finished; the Surrealist artist Dora Maar captured the various iterations the composition went through in a series of photographs. In July, Picasso delivered the finished work to the Republican pavilion, where it quickly became the centerpiece, flanked by Calder’s Mercury Fountain (1937) and Miro’s The Reaper (1937).

A Picture of Human Tragedy

Pablo Picasso Guernica , 1937 Museo Reina Sofía

Guernica portrays a frenzied tangle of six human figures (four women, a man, and a child), a horse, and a bull; the action transpires within a claustrophobic, low-ceilinged interior, below an overhead lamp that appears to burst with light. While, as Wagner points out, hints of Picasso’s original composition (the interior of an artist’s studio) remain, the scene can clearly be read as the emotional and physical aftermath of war and violence.While Picasso never made explicit to the public the symbolism behind each of Guernica’s figures and objects (“It’s up to the public to see what it wants to see,” he once said), much of it can be taken at face value. At the same time, art historians have, for decades, split hairs over the intentions behind nearly every brushstroke. Most direct, perhaps, are the contorted expressions of the women, suffering physical agony and mental anguish. “You can see that the kinds of deformation are Picasso’s devices to register pain and suffering,” Wagner explains. The artist conveys their desperation through sharp, pointed tongues; and sorrow through tear-shaped eyes. On the far left, one woman wails towards the sky while cradling a limp, lifeless child in her arms; another roars, her arms shooting upward as she’s consumed in flames; another emerges from an open window, wielding a torch. This third woman is at times interpreted as a sign of hope. Each woman is portrayed through amorphous shapes and jutting angles, their bodies at once cobbled together and falling apart. On the floor, a figure who has been identified as a soldier, lies in pieces—perhaps a personification of the fledgling Republic. His dismembered arms are criss-crossed with gashes. One hand forms a tight fist—a symbol of the Republic—around a broken sword.The overhead lamp has been read as symbolic of a bomb, though others have taken its form (shaped like an eye, with the light bulb as its iris) as a nod to the eye of god.The bull and horse have drawn varying interpretations. Most trace back to the animals’ roles in the traditional Spanish bullfight, where horses can become collateral damage, and the bull is wounded to the point of death. In contrast, though, some have theorized that the bull, which lacks the emotional and physical expression of the rest of the figures, is an emblem of Franco or fascism. Still others believe the bull is representative of Spanish heritage—a stoic and unwavering witness to the tragedy.

Picasso’s visual language, however, transcends the particulars of a single Spanish tragedy to become universal. “It’s grand and intense and specific—you know what’s happening is about pain and death. But it’s not the case that you would say ‘Aha, that’s Spain,’” Wagner notes. “It has great applicability because it seems to be appropriate to so many different contexts.”

The current show at the Reina Sofía is titled after the disparate emotions that the painting conjures: pity and terror. “It makes you feel some of the tragedy of human existence,” says Wagner. “If you can feel simultaneously terror and pity for that plight, you’ve had that full throated, full-minded engagement with that experience.”

Guernica in the Public Imagination

Following the close of the Paris Expo, Guernica went on tour in Europe. After the war ended, as Franco took power and the Republic folded, the painting continued to travel, and helped to raise funds for Spanish Republican refugees who had fled the country. It featured in the 1939 Picasso survey exhibition at the

Museum of Modern Art

in New York, and Picasso would stipulate that MoMA act as Guernica’s guardian. Between 1939 and ’52, Guernica traveled to art institutions across the U.S.; thereafter, it was exhibited in Brazil and throughout western Europe—until 1958, when it was returned to MoMA and deemed no longer fit to travel. Decades of transport, including stretching and restretching the canvas on many occasions, had left the painting in a precarious physical state. It remained in New York until 1981.

Photo by C. Elle, via Flickr.

It was during this time span that Guernica took on a life beyond the canvas. It became a stand-in for Dresden, Berlin, Hiroshima, synonymous with places where defenseless civilians came under attack. And in step, it began to take on particular resonance for anti-war protestors. “We take it for granted that Guernica is symbol of modern warfare,” Wagner says, adding that in curating the 80th anniversary exhibition, they came across images showing reproductions of Picasso’s masterpiece being carried in protests all over the world, from Calcutta to Ramallah to South Carolina. In turn, as with many great works of art, contemporary artists began to respond to Guernica in their own work, appropriating its imagery to respond to themes of war and violence.

The Legacy of Guernica

While Picasso was still alive, he understood the political potency of Guernica. As early as 1939, when World War II broke out, he was surveilled by Nazis, due at least in part to Guernica’s resounding message. It’s said that a Nazi soldier once visited Picasso’s Paris studio, pointed to a reproduction of Guernica on the wall, and asked the artist, “Did you do that?” Picasso responded: “No, you did.”“He had to stand up for this painting,” Wagner explains. “It became something whose fate he had to be very concerned about. He knew that he had done something unique and grand and important, and he knew just like he knew his name was Pablo that it could not go back to Spain.” To ensure the painting’s safety, he had a legal document drawn up that stipulated it should not enter Spain until democracy had been established there.

In 1981, six years after Franco died, and eight years after Picasso died, Guernica finally returned to Spain. Still a polarizing force for the nation, which was recovering from nearly four decades of dictatorship, it was shown under bulletproof glass. The glass was removed in 1995, but Guernica’s raw political might has not wavered. In 2003, for example, controversy stirred when a tapestry reproduction of Guernica at the United Nations in New York was covered up by a blue curtain. It would have been the backdrop for Colin Powell as he gave a speech proposing U.S. involvement in the war in Iraq. (There are conflicting reports as to the reason for the cover-up, with some U.N. officials claiming reporters found the painting visually distracting on camera.)Wagner notes that Picasso made significant political works following Guernica, though none would achieve the same exposure and resonance. Guernica became a marker of humanity, the message of which is still understood by people all over the world. Wagner may put it best: “It was a tremendous circumstance for Picasso and the history of art, Republican art, protest art, and humankind.”

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-guernica-picassos-influential-painting

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tonystarktogo · 7 years

Text

Sooooo. If @ifdragonscouldtalk and @thecitylightshow are to be believed my last headcanon was very angsty. Which is funny because that was supposed to be the fluffy part of the ‘verse. So. Let me introduce you to Civil War: The Futures Passed Version.

(Yes, there be angst. I’m serious, this particular loop doesn’t have a happy ending. Also I haven’t worked it all out so a lot of the details will be glossed over.)

Imagine Tony waking up maybe eight years in the past, right before he first encounters the Avengers. And it’s okay, this is great actually, it worked and he’s got so much time to save Steve’s life now and this is Good. Except Tony forgot how they started out. Tony forgot what they used to be--five messed-up people who didn’t trust themselves nor each other and it’s. It’s hard.

It’s hard to face Phil whom he mourned at least four times, only for the bastard to pop up alive at an opportune moment. It’s hard to watch Natasha’s--he’d forgotten how much he missed her, forgotten how much losing her had hurt--badly hidden derision when she looks at him.

Meeting Steve, the man he’s spent the past year and a half mourning, his best friend, who bled out in Tony’s arms, exchanging the same callous words--it’s devastating.

It was the first time too, in a way, but back then Steve was the personification of his daddy issues, not--well.

And somehow, even though Tony isn’t trying to change anything yet, knows they’ll survive the alien invasion, he does. He can’t control it. Can’t stop looking at these people who have been his family for more than half a decade, yet look at him like he’s a stranger. He keeps slipping, keeps being caught on the wrong foot, keeps saying the wrong things.

The jokes the Steve he knows would’ve laughed about, but this one doesn’t. The bickering Clint would’ve gladly joined in but this one doesn’t. The comments that cause Natasha to glower, the amused twitch around her lips missing. The touches and gestures that come so naturally to Tony but Bruce flinches away from as though struck. Meeting Thor hurts the least, perhaps because Tony didn’t lose him, perhaps because Thor is too occupied with his brother’s drama to pay them much attention of any kind.

Rationally Tony knows that these aren’t the same people he left in the future but that doesn’t soothe the sting.

And it doesn’t--doesn’t get better.

The easy camaraderie Tony remembers so clearly doesn’t come. He tries, he tries so fucking hard, but all he seems to do is push them further away. So he stops pushing, stops reaching out, except that doesn’t bring them closer and Tony. Tony doesn’t know what to with this. With these people he knows, he loves, but apparently not enough to know how to move past this.

He tries to accept it. Tells himself that maybe they will never be the team he remembers, maybe that’s a sacrifice he’ll have to make, but at least they’re still a team when disaster strikes. At least Steve is still alive, will undoubtedly find Bucky soon--Tony’s been looking but HYDRA is smart and so far he hasn’t found a single trail to the Winter Soldier’s location--and Tony is gonna keep him that way.

Maybe they won’t be friends like they used to be, but Steve is alive, and Bucky is alive, and they’ll save Bucky again, and it will be alright. It’ll be worth it.

Project Insight happens then, catastrophe after catastrophe, and is over before Tony even realises it. Realises how much he’s miscalculated, how much he’s still relying on bonds that have never been formed. It had never occurred to him that Steve wouldn’t call him at all.

It’s fine. He tries to help from the shadows instead, keeps JARVIS on the lookout, and it turns out to be a good thing, maybe, no matter how much it hurts. Because the one time he gets involved personally again, he almost destroys the world. Ultron should have been the solution he’d been looking for, a last resort to ensure Steve’s survival--not that Tony could tell him that, could he, not that Steve would understand that his nightmare had been made of memories.

Instead Ultron tries to destroy them and Tony loses JARVIS and Wanda loses her brother. Wanda who had almost ruined Bucky once, in a future no one but Tony remembers--Wanda who had despised him, Wanda who had understood, in the end, when it had been too late already--is welcomed with open arms into a team that remained out of Tony’s reach and.

He’s glad he doesn’t have to stick around and witness it. Or so he tells himself.

He codes FRIDAY in JARVIS’ place, works on the politicians who more and more call for stricter regulations. Dreams of better times, of lips pressed against his nape when he wakes up, of arms around his shoulders and friendly smiles.

Most of the time though, he dreams of blood.

It takes FRIDAY almost ten minutes longer than it did JARVIS to calm him down.

And somehow. Tony doesn’t know what he did wrong. Where he went wrong. But it doesn’t. It doesn’t get better. He’s trapped on a slippery slope that keeps pulling him down and down and down.

He should be working harder, doing more but it’s. It’s hard to get out of bed sometimes. Hard to remember what’s real and what’s not. What used to be real and what not. Hard to face the world when he’s sober.

Hard.

The Accords shouldn’t have surprised Tony--don’t, really, except he should have stopped them, shouldn’t he, had plenty of opportunity he wasted wallowing, and Tony doesn’t remember if loathing always tasted like Steve’s blood on his lips but it probably doesn’t matter.

James still isn’t here, is what Tony remembers thinking the clearest during that meeting with his not-team, he’s supposed to be here by now.

At this point the thought is a dull pain instead of the piercing agony it used to be, because at some point. At some point Tony gave up on that future. Gave up on his future. It’s Steve’s survival that matters, was always about him, wasn’t it, and even that thread loses its meaning with every passing day.

In another show of his own damn arrogance and blinded idiocy, Tony assumes that it can’t get worse. It can’t.

Turns out nothing in the past two years of horrors has prepared him for fighting James. Not the Winter Soldier--he’d used to do that a lot, back in the beginning--but James. James and Steve and half the team that used to be his but never was.

And it’s only when they’re standing in that damned, abandoned bunker in Siberia that Tony realises the irony of it all. Only when he faces off against two super soldiers that used to be the most important people in his world, used to be his world period, that he remembers that day, remembers Steve screaming that he’d rather die than chose between his two closest friends, remembers Bucky’s (in that moment he had been Bucky, in that moment Bucky died) scream. Maybe it was always meant to be like this, maybe not choosing was always gonna tear Steve apart, maybe choosing was always gonna kill one of them.

Tony is almost glad he won’t have to live with the knowledge for long.

But then he sees the tape. And he doesn’t see Zemo’s satisfied smile. Doesn’t see the Winter Soldier murdering his parents. He sees James, shaken after another endless night filled with screaming, refusing to let him close. He sees himself offering to talk about it, again and again, only to be rebuffed.

And Tony doesn’t want to believe it. Doesn’t want to believe that all this time, all those years, James knew and Steve knew and they kept it from him. So he asks.

“Yes.” A single word that causes every belief Tony held about his friendship with Steve, the one that used to be at least, to crumble.

“I remember all of them.” A single sentence that renders everything Tony trusted and held dear meaningless.

They leave him there in the end. And Tony hates them. Hates them for betraying him. Hates them for ruining the one thing he’d always thought they couldn’t touch. Hates them, because even now, the only thought that keeps echoing in his head is, at least they’re alive.

He doesn’t try to fight the cold when it lures him to sleep. Eagerly sinks into the darkness.

Grateful. To be done.

But the Loop, once initiated, can not be so easily broken.

(Perhaps the worst part is that Bucky is lying in this ‘verse. He doesn’t remember killing the Starks, never did.)

Yeah I did it. Not sure it’s really worse than CW or if this even makes any sense since it’s mostly just single scenes in my head that I tried to string together but whatever.

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ourshineeshrine · 7 years

Text

My Number One Fan

Chapter 25 Pairing: JongKey Word Count: 4.177 Summary: Kibum goes to the same, run-down bar every week to watch the man of his affections sing his heart out with a mere guitar for company. He wasn’t expecting the coffee, nor the beautiful personality within the singer. And he definitely wasn’t expecting to fall in love.

A/N: I was pretty quick this time, huh? ;) Anyway, this chapter is a bit of necessary filler I guess, but a lot more drama is happening in the next chapter! I feel like I'm on a roll now, so expect an update pretty soon :) Hope you enjoy <3

The week leading up to Thursday had been uneventful at best, awkward and depressing silences being the only thing which seemed to fill the school hours each day. Judging by the gloomy mood which seemed to engulf every hallway, each student seemed to have their own issues going on at that moment, and that idea was the only thing which kept Kibum from skipping all together. It was comforting somehow, to see that Minho and Taemin were just as troubled as he was, and when they sat down in the dance studio that lunchtime, Minho decided it was finally time to say something aloud.

“Kibum, not to be a pain but…are you okay? You’ve been pretty down lately.” questioned Minho softly, voice shaking at the knowledge that Taemin was seated literally right beside him. The younger male stared at the ground intensely as though he hadn’t heard Minho’s query, but his rigid posture suggested otherwise. After all, they were both awfully concerned at how Kibum had been acting the past week. They would have spoken up beforehand, but with soccer practice on Minho’s behalf, and dance practice for Kibum and Taemin, it was safe to say that neither boy had really had the chance.

The oldest of the three picked at his nails absentmindedly, head making a motion in between that of a nod and shake. “I don’t know…” responded Kibum. “Not really.”

Taemin frowned. “What happened? Is Jonghyun being a jerk? ‘Cause if he is, I’ll deck him in the schnozz for you.”

“If you’re going to deck anyone in the…schnozz? Then it ought to be me, Taem. I’ve been a real jerk.” mumbled Kibum, burying his face into his palms and tugging midly at his strands of hair. It was only lunchtime, yet he could already feel a budding migraine forming at the back of his head.

Minho and Taemin glanced at each other, confused, but the shared look was short lived and within mere milliseconds the boys were back with rosy cheeks and shifty eyes, not knowing quite where to look without seeming weird. “Don’t tell me you dumped him, Kibum…” spoke Taemin, horrified.

“No! No way, never!” denied Kibum, shaking his head profusely only to groan immediately after at the onslaught of pain caused by the small action. He took a deep breath to steady his thoughts. “My dad just…grounded me…and I’m not allowed to see Jonghyun anymore unless it’s at my house, and I don’t want to bring Jonghyun to my house because my dad will probably murder him but I miss him so much yet I can’t do anything about it and so I’ve been ignoring him and I feel so awful about it and I’m actually about to cry right now but I’m struggling to hold in my tears, and—“

“Kibum, Kibum. Calm down. Take a breath, you’re ranting.”

The boy in question paused, exhaling deeply and blinking a few times to hold back tears. “Sorry, guys…I guess I’m just feeling a little dodgy today. Don’t mind me.”

Minho leant forward to wrap Kibum in a tight hug and smiled sympathetically. “Stop apologizing, Kibum. What if we all catch up together at your house? Your dad won’t be able to ‘kill Jonghyun’ then, right? And besides, why does he hate him so much? I can’t picture Jonghyun doing anything that bad.”

A loud laugh which lacked any humour escaped Kibum’s throat, and he regarded his friends with a raised brow. “It doesn’t take much to anger my father…but unfortunately for Jonghyun, we practically did the worst thing possible.”

Taemin frowned in curiosity. “Did you set his car on fire? That got me into a lot of trouble once.”

The two older boys struggled to contain their concernedness, merely shooting each other an expression which seemed to scream: ‘what the fuck?’ Kibum stifled a snort, sobering up in an attempt to answer Taemin’s question seriously.

“No, Taemin. We did not set his car on fire, and I’m not even going to ask why you did. We just…well…held hands? I guess.”

Minho coughed loudly, choking on his sandwich. “Y-You…Held hands? Are you fucking with me, Kibum?”

Kibum smiled grimly. “Afraid not. Oh and to answer your suggestion from before: I don’t know. There’s always just this aura surrounding my father that screams ‘I hate your guts, rodent’, and I don’t really wanna expose Jonghyun to that.”

“Yeah but...you realise Jonghyun’s going to be really worried right? Like, I don’t wanna sound rude but…it’s kinda selfish if you don’t tell him about what your dad said. I bet he’s worried sick.”

Humming, Kibum’s gaze returned to his lap. “Yeah…maybe. We’ll see. But what’s new in your lives?”

The soccer player frowned at the change of topic, and became even more uncomfortable when he considered just what was new in his life.

Taemin and I made out on the weekend. It didn’t mean anything but now we can’t even look each other in the eyes. Nothing much, really.

He inwardly shuddered, and one glance at Taemin told Minho that the younger boy was thinking exactly the same thing. “Oh, y’know…” he finally managed to choke out. “Soccer.”

“Dancing. Homework. Setting cars on fire. Just the usual.” added Taemin, trying as hard as possible to look everywhere except at his best friend.

Kibum nodded sceptically. “Right, well…That’s certainly interesting. But Taemin, I think we need to have a little chat about your pyromaniac tendencies. They’re slightly concerning me.”

Jonghyun gave his guitar a gentle testing strum before promptly sighing loudly and placing it back on its stand. It was futile. No matter what he did, whether it be play video games, watch a movie or sing, nothing could get his mind off Kibum. Or, more accurately in this circumstance, the lack thereof. Reaching for his phone upon the nightstand, Jonghyun practically screamed in agony at his non-existent text messages, reading once again the one that Kibum had sent to him four days prior.

‘I’m home safe. Goodnight, Jjong x

Your Number One Fan’

Pouting, Jonghyun threw his phone onto the bed and slumped out of the room, feet trudging along the carpeted floor dejectedly. The faint scent of pasta could be smelled from almost every room in the house, therefore it came as no surprise when Jonghyun entered the kitchen and found Roo drooling over the delicious food his mum seemed to be cooking. “Smells good, mum.” he commented with a smile, but something about the tone of his voice told the other house occupants that Jonghyun wasn’t feeling quite one hundred percent.

Seodam worried her lip between teeth as she took in Jonghyun’s weary appearance, the dark streaks beneath his eyes implying that the male hadn’t slept properly in several days. She clicked the television off and called Roo over, giggling in delight as the small puppy fumbled over and attempted to claw her way up onto Seodam’s lap.

“Well aren’t you a little cutie?” she cooed incoherently, eyes raising in sisterly concern upon hearing the loud collapse of Jonghyun onto the nearby sofa. Seodam frowned, searching her mind for something to cheer her younger brother up. “Hey, Jonghyun. Written any songs recently?”

The singer’s head lifted marginally, and almost pathetically, he shook his head to gesture that no, he hadn’t. The frown creases in Seodam’s forehead deepened, lifting Roo into her lap unconsciously as she studied Jonghyun’s drooping figure. “Why not?”

Jonghyun shrugged. “Dunno…No motivation.”

The answer was short and simple – perhaps a little more so than Seodam’s liking. Quirking an eyebrow, she tutted with fake indignation and shook her head. “Probably because you haven’t caught up with Kibum lately, you poo.” Jonghyun tensed, and the medical student concluded that she’d hit the nail over the head. So Kibum was the root of her brother’s problems. Sex problems, maybe? Judging by how melancholy Jonghyun had been the last few days, most likely not. “What’s up, huh? Is he on holidays or something?”

Seodam knew her brother was sensitive. In fact, anyone who had ever met Jonghyun knew that he was sensitive. However, despite that knowledge, it still didn’t prepare the young woman for the sudden distortion of Jonghyun’s face, baring his teeth unattractively and screwing up his face with a loud sob. Seodam’s head shot to their mother who looked on with wide, apprehensive eyes, nonetheless turning away reluctantly after Seodam wordlessly gestured that she’d take care of it. Seodam hurried over to Jonghyun’s sofa with Roo and sat the small puppy gently in Jonghyun’s lap, smiling affectionately as the bundle of fur began to lick away Jonghyun’s onslaught of tears. “Hey now, buddy.” she spoke softly, wrapping her brother in a warm, tight hug. “What happened, ‘Hyun-ah?”

Sniffling and coughing in an attempt to suppress his loud cries, Jonghyun held Roo tightly and began to speak. His words came slurred and inaudible, causing Seodam to strain her ears in attempts to gather something out of what Jonghyun began to ramble on about. “K-Kib’m ha’n’t s-spoke to me in days, and he w-won’t reply to my mess’ges, and I dunno wha’ I did wrong!” he began, blowing his nose into a tissue which seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. “W-What if somethin’ happened to ‘im? He p-probably hates me. A-And on Sunday,” Jonghyun’s voice seemed to break here, and while half of Seodam thought that the image before her was beyond hilarious, the other half felt her heart break at just how devastated Jonghyun was reacting to the whole ordeal. Whether he would admit it or not, Jonghyun was in love, something which Seodam hoped would treat Jonghyun the way he deserved to be treated. “On Sunday, h-he didn’t even lemme touch him!”

Roo danced all over Jonghyun, licking his face furiously and nudging their faces together in what Seodam liked to believe was an attempt to cheer the boy up. She wrapped the three of them in a tight group hug and soothingly sifted her hands through Jonghyun’s thick, blonde locks. Comfortable silence was a perfect substitute for a meaningless bout of words, something simple which Seodam knew Jonghyun would appreciate. “Shh, Jonghyun. Calm down. Shh.” she soothed, carefully adjusting Roo so that she wasn’t suffocating her brother to death. “I think you should go talk to Kibum. Ask him what’s wrong.”

Jonghyun shook his head vigorously and swiped at his eyes. “I don’t think surprising him in p-person will turn out well, Seodam. He’s obviously staying away from me for a reason. I think I’m just going to leave it for now.”

The young woman frowned slightly, but figured that there was no use arguing when Jonghyun was in a state such as this one. Sooner or later he’d come around to his senses, and maybe she’d have another go of talking to her stubborn brother then. “Okay, Jonghyun, but just keep this in mind. There’s always two sides to a story, m’kay? Don’t place the blame all on yourself.”

Jonghyun, still bundled up with Roo and an abundance of cushions, nodded minimally. “Thanks, Seodam.” His fists lifted to rub his eyes forcefully, carefully lifting Roo of his lap in order to stretch. “I think I’m going to go to the supermarket for a bit. Get out of the house and clear my mind.”

His mother peeked at her son from her position by the stove, smiling softly at what she deemed her baby boy. “Take care, Jonghyun. Don’t buy too many sweets, and watch out for strangers.”

Snorting, Jonghyun rolled his eyes affectionately. “I’m twenty-one, mum. I’ll be fine.” He gave Roo a quick scratch behind the ears, cooing. “See you, Roo. Jonghyun-ah will be home soon.”

Upon arriving at the nearby supermarket, Jonghyun immediately made his way to the ramen isle, sliding multiple different packets into his shopping basket. He liked to call it a necessity – something he ate when hungry, depressed or tired. Ramen was similar to medicine, Jonghyun liked to believe. A cure for everything, no matter how big or small. Multiple packs of teabags were also deposited into the basket, and for some reason that day, Jonghyun paused by the cosmetic section, eyeing the boxes of hair dye which lined the shelf.

In deep thought, he ran a hand through his blonde locks, knowing quite well that his roots were probably beginning to show. It was a pretty big decision. Usually something which Jonghyun would spend days upon days contemplating. But this time around the singer was feeling a little bit more impulsive, making move to grab a box of dark brown hair dye and place it with the rest of his groceries.

He didn’t get far. Before his fingers could even make contact with the box, Jonghyun heard the sound of a mess being made behind him followed by the aggravated sigh of a woman. Turning around marginally, his eyes fell upon a pile of dropped groceries on the floor, a middle aged woman wearily bending down to pick them back up. Having completely forgotten about the box of hair dye, Jonghyun rushed forward to help the woman, lifting the heavier items and placing them delicately in the lady’s trolley. “Are you alright, ma’am?” he asked softly, before promptly freezing in his tracks as the woman looked up.

It was Kibum’s mother.

Jonghyun’s eyes widened in astonishment, and he unconsciously took a small step backwards. “M-Mrs Kim! Nice to see you again. Are you okay?”

The woman seemed equally as surprised, but nonetheless nodded softly and offered Jonghyun a small smile. “I’m fine, Jonghyun. Just carrying a little more than I can handle, I think. And it’s nice to see you too.” She studied the boy in front of her intently, taking notice of his red-rimmed eyes and cautious demeanour. A concerned frown threatened to dress her face, and Kibum’s mother was suddenly hit with the realization of just how kind and generous the boy in front of her was.

She knew that Jonghyun wasn’t a high school student. She knew that something about his relationship with Kibum was being concealed. She knew how her husband felt about him. But even so, she also knew just how happy he made Kibum, and before she could overthink it, felt herself grabbing his arm as he made move to leave. “Wait, Jonghyun!”

Jonghyun jolted in surprise, yet still paused to listen with a patient smile upon his lips.

“Look, Jonghyun…I know you’re not a high school student. B-But before you move to run away, I just want to tell you that no matter how you met my son, I don’t care.” She took a deep breath, adrenaline flooding her veins as she went against everything that her husband tried so hard to enforce. Jonghyun was frozen with disbelief, hands shaking faintly as she confronted what Kibum had tried so hard to hide. But before he could fret too much about it, Kibum’s mother continued, something which was equally as confusing to the both of them. “And I really shouldn’t be telling you this but, if you want to meet with Kibum, then I suggest coming to his school on Wednesday in two weeks time. We have parent teacher interviews. Oh and…if it means anything? He um, misses you a lot, Jonghyun. Hasn’t stopped moping since he got grounded on Sunday.”

A lot was going through Jonghyun’s brain at that particular moment, such as ‘why on earth is she being so nice to me?’, however the only thing he could manage to choke out was: “H-He’s grounded?”

Shocked that Jonghyun didn’t know about Kibum’s grounding, Kibum’s mother blanched before simply nodding sadly. “Unfortunately. And it was nice chatting to you, but I have a lot of housework to get through today. Don’t tell Kibum I said anything, alright? See you, Jonghyun.”

And she was off, leaving Jonghyun to simply stand there with his shopping basket in complete and utter confusion. There was a lot of new information to think about, including the opportunity to see Kibum in two weeks, but the singer couldn’t help but want to see Kibum a lot sooner than that. He sighed deeply one last time and took off, making sure to grab that lone box of brown hair dye on the way out.

Kibum and Taemin sat by the oval the following lunchtime, watching on with neutral eyes as Minho and the other players trained for their upcoming match. “I’ll never understand this game…” Kibum had muttered, Taemin mechanically nodding on in agreement. That wasn’t quite true. After Taemin had befriended Minho, he’d actually learned a lot about soccer, going to watch Minho on multiple weekends and having to listen to the times where Minho would ramble on about his interest at lunchtimes. And honestly, now that Taemin had figured out his feelings for the older boy, he definitely wasn’t complaining, taking appreciation in the way the sun perfectly reflected against Minho’s tall, sculpted body.

The two hadn’t spoken about the kiss since the day it happened, and while Taemin felt as though he should have been completely content with that, another part of him itched to speak up. Minho had looked as though he enjoyed it at the time. And he was the one who had suggested it in the first place. But with this onslaught of awkward glances and the inability to hold eye contact, Taemin couldn’t help but wonder what was really going through his best friend’s mind.

“Hey, Kibum?” he spoke, licking his lips nervously as the older boy looked his way.

“Hm?”

Taemin diverted his gaze to the ground and tried to make his speech sound as hypothetical as possible. “What would you do if just say…someone asked to kiss you one day, and then after you kissed, never brought it up again? Theoretically, of course.”

Confused by the random question, Kibum frowned, raising his brows at Taemin curiously. “Well that came out of nowhere.”

“I know, I know.” laughed Taemin good-naturedly, though practically sweating on the inside. “But c’mon, isn’t that weird?”

“Hypothetically speaking, they probably just wanted to kiss you without getting embarrassed or rejected because of it. Who did you kiss, Taemin?”

Colour shot to Taemin’s cheeks and ears, shaking his head desperately and waving his hands before his face. “I said theoretically, you moron! I didn’t kiss anyone.”

A sharp slap came to the back of his head, eliciting Taemin to yelp in surprise. “What the fuck! Are you mental?!”

“Are you? Do you think I’m fucking stupid? Who wanted to kiss you, Taemin? Because I swear to God, if they maimed you in any way whatsoever, I will stick their head in the doorframe and slam it shut on their neck.”

Taemin shuffled back in fear. “As if I’m telling you now! You’ll bloody kill him!”

Jaw dropping in an unflattering manner, Kibum struggled to form a coherent sentence. “H-Him?!” he screeched. “It wasn’t…Tell me…Not Kai…Please.”

The younger of the two sat in stunned silence, not knowing quite what to respond with. But apparently, silence was the wrong answer, the lack of response in Kibum’s vocabulary apparently being synonymous to ‘yes, it’s Kai.’

“That motherfucker…” Kibum seethed. “After all he did to you. Why would you even consent to kiss someone like that?! Excuse me while I go and murder him, Taem.”

“No, no, no! Stop standing up, you idiot.” Taemin called as Kibum stood to brush off his jeans. But Kibum was having none of it, looking off towards the courtyard where he was certain to spot Taemin’s old friend. Taemin watched in horror as Kibum’s eyes lit up and an almost sadistic smile etched upon his face, feet already moving towards the oval fence.

Panicking, Taemin looked towards the soccer players, sighing in relief when he realised that none of them were paying attention to his and Kibum’s little argument. He figured that nothing else would get the stubborn Kibum to come back, so bracing himself for an onslaught of questions, Taemin called out just loud enough for his fellow dancer to hear. “It wasn’t Kai! Kibum, wait! It was Minho!”

And just like that, Kibum was pausing in his tracks like a deer caught in headlights, slowly turning his head to study Taemin with wide eyes. He gestured to Minho with his head in question as though clarifying it was that Minho he was referring to, and upon Taemin’s sheepish nod, Kibum was practically running back to their spot beneath the tree. “Are you serious, Taemin?!” he exclaimed in a hushed whisper, a mixture of excitement and concern seeping into his tone.

“Do you really think I’d make this up?! It happened last Sunday…And I would have told you before now but it’s all a bit confusing, to be honest. But now that you know who it is…it’s obvious that your reason is wrong.”

Kibum rolled his eyes at Taemin’s naivety. “Ah, Taemin. You pure, pure little boy. The fact that it’s Minho doesn’t change anything! Why else would he suggest that you kiss, huh? He could’ve gone and kissed anybody…Literally, anybody. But he kissed you, Taem. And now he’s not talking to you because he probably thinks that you hated it.”

“Nope…He knows I didn’t hate it.” Taemin groaned, collapsing against the ground in embarrassment. “I practically—moaned! And as soon as I did he was out of there like The Flash, Kibum. If anyone hated it, it was him! I ruined everything, to be honest.”

With a disappointed sigh, Kibum shrugged his shoulders. “I mean…he could be embarrassed for you. But that’s awfully pessimistic, so just forget I said that. I reckon you should just go and talk to him, Taem. Confront him about the kiss. If you want your friendship to go back to normal, then it’s what needs to be done.”

Taemin hummed impartially, glazed eyes watching as the man in question scored a fairly difficult goal. “We’ll see.”

“Ugh, stop being all sad about it. You’re putting a damper on my already damp mood. Instead of worrying about how he feels now, just focus on the actual kiss. You actually got to kiss him, Taemin! So now you gotta spill, m’kay? C’mon, how was it?!”

Kibum’s optimistic pestering impelled a small, ecstatic smile to grow on Taemin’s face, and it was clear to see just how smitten he was by his best friend. “Alright well this is what happened…”

Eventually the school day had come to an uneventful end, a tired yet genuine grin of relief colouring Minho’s face as he made his way towards the student carpark. He spun his keys around his forefinger in boredom, and upon noticing Taemin waiting under his usual shady tree, quickened his pace. He was so preoccupied with the blush residing on his face and the desire to avoid the younger male, that Minho barely even noticed Amber making her way up to him with a confident stroll, jumping in shock as she appeared beside him.

“How’s it goin’, Minho?” the tomboy spoke radiantly, giving Minho a friendly nudge in the ribs. “Sorry for giving you a scare.”

“Oh yeah, y’know…the usual. About to head home. What’s up?” Minho responded, all of a sudden feeling awfully uncomfortable in Amber’s presence.

She smiled and scratched the back of neck blushingly. “I was just gonna ask if you wanted to hang out on Sunday or something…if you want to?”

Flustered, Minho could merely stare openly at Amber in astonishment. This was the opportunity he had been waiting for. And with barely any exertion of effort whatsoever it was being passed over to him on a silver platter. A week ago, Minho would have been giving the enthusiastic response of ‘sure!’ within just a few seconds – no doubt about it. But now, as he reflected on his feelings and what he wanted to say in response, the only thing that Minho’s mind could provide him with was the recollection of how Taemin’s lips felt against his; the heat which had pooled to his stomach upon hearing the younger boy’s contended sighs. Minho tried to snap out of it. Tried to remember that short-lived kiss he’d experienced with Amber just weeks ago. But alas, came up with nothing – the insignificant memory having already been pushed to the very corners of his mind.

So it came as a surprise to even Minho himself when without a second thought, he heard his mouth spout of some jargon about how he was sorry because already had plans for that Sunday. Amber grinned good-naturedly, like she always did, and took off happily without another complaint.

Minho didn’t have any plans that Sunday. In fact, Minho didn’t have any plans for the entire weekend, nor the ones following. Yet nevertheless, after having the option presented to him, Minho found that despite how nice it had seemed at the time to date someone like Amber, he actually didn’t want to at all. Instead, all Minho could think about was Taemin - his best friend, his escape, and as it now appeared, the boy of his affections.

#jongkey #fanfiction #jonghyun #key #my number one fan #filler i guess #chapter 25 #jongkey fanfiction

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