#How does it feel to be on that side of the gun!?

[lysarion]

━━━━━━ nine out of ten ⟢

♱    |    after your thirteenth successful mission with phainon, he tries to give back the handkerchief you lent him during your first mission, only to catch another stray and become a flustered mess.

𖤝 including  ⠀! ⠀phainon          ◟          𖤝 warnings ⠀! ⠀slight-ooc, no beta we die like cipher, phainon is a loser here /aff, kinda a part 2 of guns and handkerchiefs so yay

���      tags     ⚜     .  if you'd like to be tagged please send me an ask off-anon!!!

phainon does not drink. nine out of ten times during celebrations such as tonight, he’ll simply hold his glass at his side, swirling it here and there but never really drinking it. not that he can’t handle his alcohol, but more so he doesn’t like the bitter taste it leaves on his tongue and how it scalds his throat like he’s just swallowed lava. and yet, tonight he indulges in it, the drunk atmosphere of the lobby.

tonight marks your 13th successful mission as partners. it all started as a gag really. it was to no one’s surprise that phainon often finds himself fumbling whenever you’re in the vicinity. in the small clumsy ways of his grip slipping during training, or when he spaces out whenever he watches you spar with cipher or mydei —unabashedly entranced with the way you moved—and only snapping out of it when aglaea snaps a finger in front of his eyes. it was cute, you once said, endearingly so. best believe phainon flushed from the tip of his ears to the base of his neck at your comment. 

you were just so casual, in a sense that you treat everyone in measured familiarity that feels like a long lost companion. obviously, you have your own walls, so high no one dares to climb them — you hide your thoughts behind smiles of silk that will inevitably strangle those who try to get too close. phainon even now finds it hard to picture that you were an assassin the world wanted dead. the way you drink every alcoholic glass cipher passes in quiet passing, not showing the slightest sign of being at least a little tipsy, much to the girl’s chagrin. or the way you speak with aglaea in a code that he can’t really decode, a language you and her created for the sole purpose of only being understood by one person. 

phainon wanted to climb those walls out of sheer stubbornness.

“what’s bothering you on such a lovely night?”

your voice pierces through him like a lone bullet shot from miles away. phainon nearly trips over nothing despite being seated as you took the seat in front of him. with practiced ease, your lips curve to a relaxed smile. he notes how they look slightly tinted in a shade of pink with the fruity liquid that swirled in your grasp. 

phainon wanted to climb those walls you’ve spent years building because he thinks — in his little mind where images of your quiet care outweighs your brutality — that you’ll only ever allow him to do so.

“nothing much, really,” his reply comes out smooth, or at least he hopes it does. “i’m not much of a party person.”

you tilt your head in question, and then you smile like everything has suddenly clicked in your mind. “is that so?” 

phainon swallows as you settle comfortably in your seat. his mind swimming with conjectures on what discovery about him have you uncovered over one reply. he chuckles it off, but the sound feels forced and strained, unnatural and uncharacteristic from his usual boyish charisma he carried.

he leans his arms forward, leaving his drink to the side to collect each word that falls from your lips with each bubble that fizzled up. phainon takes a deep breath, his eyes strained solely on you as you bring your cup to your lips and down the drink in one go. even the way you exhale, the way you prop your arms on the table like him, push away your now empty cup and meet his gaze, it all felt like a test. 

in your own quiet little way, you’ve asked him, ‘do you really want to know?’

and in a fashion only phainon would reply, he calls over cipher to refill your cup. 

“the night is still long,” he says. phainon watches, letting his eyes shamelessly wander to the small scars that littered your hands, your painted nails to match aglaea, the charming little bracelet that faintly jingled with your every move because the triplets were reminded of you — phainon absorbs every little action as if they were a necessary piece to make up the full image of you. 

you smile, just a tad bit smaller than your usual one, but it does the job of conveying your message of entertaining phainon’s insatiable stubbornness.

in that moment, phainon remembers something in his pocket. “oh, that’s right!”

now it was your turn to watch him. how he fumbles with something in his pocket, halts in his movement as if debating in his mind to push through with his initial plans. when your eyes meet, phainon is the first to look away, the tips of his ears just a slight shade of red that could match the blinking lights of the lobby. 

“here, i almost forgot to give it back. you know, with how busy we are.” phainon hands over a handkerchief — your handkerchief from your very first mission together. 

when the piece of fabric is in between your fingers, you chuckle. of course phainon kept it — in pristine condition too. it smelled faintly of his favorite detergent mixed with the cologne he always wore. sweet with a musky afterthought. 

“you’ve taken good care of it,” you say, setting down your cup to capture his wrist in your hand. you don’t mention the slight jump of retaliation, nor do you meet his eyes. you’ve learned the hard way that phainon reads people like an open book. slowly, you uncurl each finger from his closed fist and hand back the handkerchief, “keep it. it’ll serve you more than me.”

“are you sure?” phainon questions. he can’t help it.

“i’m sure,” you readily replied. when you settle back in your seat, drink in hand, you let a bit of mischief twinkle in your eyes when your gaze finally finds him again. “it’ll save you the trouble of blindly walking around when you have blood splattered on your face in missions.”

“you still remember that?!” 

you chuckle at his mortified expression, “quite the memory that mission was. you were so confident that you’ll finish off everyone on your own, too. because of that, you failed to notice that they’ve called for backup. and just when you were about to be ambushed,” you hold up two fingers, a mock gun to point at phainon who now buried his face in his hands. “bang. i knock a bullet to the guy’s head. you complained about how blood got in your eyes and kept roughly wiping at them. but, you quickly gave up and just started walking around like a blind duck with your arms stretched forward. oh and you kept tripping over everything and—”

“okay, okay, i get it! no need to recount the entire mission. god that was embarrassing…”

phainon is a good agent. nine times out of ten, he’ll come back with only a slight wrinkle on his shirt. but on the rare occasions he tries to impress you, he’ll come back with flushed cheeks and the inability to look you in the eye. not that he can’t handle himself during a fight, but more so he can prove to you that he’s worth opening up to — that he’s worth your trust.

and right now, as your snickering behind your hand, phainon thinks embarrassing himself over, and over again is worth it.

© 𝓵ysarion 2025 — do not plagiarize, repost, or translate works without the knowledge or consent of the creator in other platforms or websites.

[zablife]

Johnny Davis NSFW Alphabet

A = Aftercare (what they're like after sex)

Johnny holds you close to his chest long after your ragged breathing has evened out, clutching your hand over his heart. Even before he professed his love for you, this simple act said it all. And tho he doesn't make flowery promises of devotion, you're touched by the little things he'll say in those hazy twilight moments before sleep. "Gonna paint the kitchen for ya this weekend," he'll mumble as he lights a cigarette. It's his way of letting you know he was listening when you mentioned it was peeling earlier this week.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner's)

Johnny loves your legs! Feeling them pressed up against him on the bike, intertwined with his beneath the sheets and esp when you lean against the pool table for a difficult shot with your miniskirt riding up.

He'd never be vain enough to confess his fave body part, but you suspect it might be his lovely blue green eyes bc of your numerous compliments. As a man of few words, he expresses himself thru a knowing look or intense gaze. If he thought about it, he'd agree bc he knows he can make you weak with a single glance.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

Johnny wants nothing more than to cum inside you, but he knows you aren't ready for kids so he always stops himself, pulling out in time to paint your stomach or backside. If you were really serious about the issue, you'd make him wear a rubber, but secretly you wouldn't mind an accident.

D = Dirty secret (pretty self-explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He wants to get you pregnant, claim you as his so every member of the Vandals will know you belong to him and him alone. Seeing you carry his child would be the most incredible honor he could imagine bc that would mean you'd fully committed to a life with him.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they're doing?)

It might surprise you to know Johnny is fairly inexperienced. He married young, prob straight out of high school, and has only slept with Betty. That's why he's excited to try new things with you!

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

Johnny is old school so missionary for sure! It's also due to his romantic side tho. There's nothing he enjoys more than fucking you slow and deep so he can watch your eyes grow glossy with tears before you profess your undying love for him.

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

Johnny is closer to Benny's silent, brooding than Corky's endless wisecracking normally so he’s decidedly serious in the bedroom. You do your best not to tease him about it, but sometimes his furrowed look of concentration makes you giggle. "Looks like you're doing long division, not fucking a pretty girl!" That usually makes him loosen up, offering you a throaty chuckle in reply.

H = Hair (how well-groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

Johnny is like your very own teddy bear, warm and furry. You enjoy running your hands through his chest hair when you make out and he would never deny you that pleasure. However, he's not the sort to shave himself smooth anyway. He barely takes the time to shave his face!

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

Johnny is def a romantic at heart! He likes eye contact, soft touches and lots of kissing. Foreplay with him can easily last an hour or more bc he loves to take his time.

J = Jack off (masturbation head canon)

Johnny became accustomed to jerking off in the shower during his marriage to Betty, knowing he had to take care of his own needs. He doesn’t resort to this very often now unless he’s away from you for an extended period time.

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

Johnny might not approve of knife or gun play, but he’s surprisingly open to using his brass knuckles to pleasure you after you show a keen interest in them.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

Johnny loves the peace and quiet of the countryside. Any chance he gets, he's driving out of the city and taking you with him to enjoy a languid fuck on a picnic blanket under a tall oak tree. But if he can't have that, the garage is a close second. Watching you bend over to retrieve his tools always gets him hard.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Seeing you in those cute little sundresses you wear to the Vandals picnics excites him more than anything. The first time you whispered in his ear that you weren't wearing underwear, his heart nearly stopped. He had to drag you away soon after to relieve the growing tightness in his pants.

N = No (something they wouldn't do, turn offs)

He would never agree to a threesome and he doesn't like public sex. He's far too protective of you and what you have.

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

At first, Johnny prefers receiving bc he doesn't have much experience giving. However, he's more than willing to take direction from you and becomes a quick study. The first time he tries to quit smoking, he becomes utterly insatiable in his oral fixation. There are some nights you can't escape his hunger, arm clamped down over your midsection intent on feeling your body quiver uncontrollably beneath him as he contents himself sucking on your swollen clit.

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.) 

Johnny is capable of both, tho he prefers to take his time with you. Slow and sensual is his fave so he can lavish you with plenty of attention. A romantic at heart, he likes to savor the connection between you.

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

If he can steal you away for a few minutes to feel the tight clutch of your cunt, he's there! That's why he insists on keeping a small office at the back of the bar. The other Vandals might take their girls in a stall or up against the bathroom sink, but you deserve the plush comfort of a sofa.

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

For someone who enjoys the thrill of racing motorbikes, Johnny is surprisingly risk averse when it comes to sexual pursuits. He adamantly declines public sex so as not to expose you to prying eyes and he doesn't approve of knife or gun play. He's seen too many friends die or get injured in fights to think of weapons as sex toys.

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

Johnny surprises you by lasting longer than any of your other boyfriends. He makes it his mission to please you even when you have difficulty reaching orgasm. Your passionate kisses and sweet little whimpers keep him rock hard for hours. And tho you might only go one round, it's more than enough!

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

Once you've had Johnny's cock, you realize no toy could compare. When you tell him this, his neck flushes red, even tho he knows it's true. But neither of you lack imagination. After using Johnny's bike to get off, he gets a new idea. He surprises you on laundry day, hoisting you atop the washing machine during the spin cycle to finger you until you're a panting mess collapsing into his chest.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

There is only one rule with Johnny and that is NO teasing!! He doesn't find it fun or playful, just frustrating. It also hits a nerve deep within him that somehow he's being made fun of and that he cannot abide. However, he won't tease you either. He delivers exactly what he promises and that's thrill enough for you!

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

Johnny isn't one to make noise during sex bc he loves listening to all your quiet whimpers and moans. It's an ego boost to know he's making you feel good. However, you're often left wondering if you do the same for him bc he barely speaks beyond a few words of gentle praise and his tell tale grunt just before he cums.

W = Wild card (a random head canon for the character)

His most treasured possessions are the dirty pictures you gave him on your anniversary. He went speechless at the sight of you clad in a sheer nightie, breasts pushed forward so your nipples stood out suggestively in shadow. The next pose was even better, you in the center of the bed on all fours, ass up and waiting for him with a come hither stare. Some men might tack them up in the garage to show off, but Johnny keeps them safely hidden in a drawer. Only bringing them out when you aren’t around to help satisfy his needs.

X = X-ray (let's see what's going on under those clothes)

Before you started dating, you swore his large hands and big boots were an indication of what he was hiding beneath his denim. After your first night together you felt fully vindicated in your theory! He knows he's big so he always takes his time preparing you, easing in slowly so the stretch isn't too painful.

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

When he was married, he felt certain his lack of sex drive was due to age and long hours at work. It was rare for him to initiate sex more than twice a month. But when he met you he realized that was all a lie he told himself. His desire for a woman has never been greater than after you got together and now he needs to feel you beneath him at least 3x a week.

Z = Zzz

Johnny succumbs to sleep rather quickly after sex, but only when he's certain you're taken care of. He'll often share a smoke with you, holding it to your waiting lips for you when you're too exhausted to do it yourself. And he never drifts off without a soft kiss to your forehead.

[nostarfights]

If I Ever Were To Lose You

Pairing: Bucky Barnes X fem!supersoldier!Reader

Summary: Seeing you get injured during a mission helps Bucky come to terms with his feelings for you.

Warnings: Mentions of violence, reader getting injured, blood, a concussion, stitches, a coma, guns, crying, kissing, friends to lovers trope, takes place during tfatws and a few uses of y/n.

Word Count: 2.4K

the photo below does not belong to me

Your breathing was quick but quiet as you and Bucky entered the warehouse Redwing had spotted Walker hiding in just a few hours ago, your hand placed on the gun holster on your hip, ready to grab your gun the second you needed it.

But even with Bucky there by your side and Sam waiting nearby just in case, you still had a bad feeling about this mission. Like something was going to go wrong, especially now that Walker was stronger due to the serum.

Your heart pounded more and more the closer you got to where Walker had been spotted hiding behind a pillar within the building. “Walker, we know you’re here. Just come with us and no one has to get hurt.” Bucky called out as you slowly withdrew your gun from its holster.

You’d given Walker enough chances to surrender, there was no point in trying to negotiate with him anymore. But Walker wasn’t in the mood for surrendering and he sure as hell wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

Not feeling the need to reply to Bucky, Walker left his hiding spot and headed right for Bucky. He then barreled into him with enough force to cause him to stumble back a few feet, using that chance to send punch after punch into Bucky’s face while he tried to regain his footing. It was shocking to you in this moment to see just how strong Walker had become, you’d never seen any enemy catch Bucky off guard like this for as long as you’d known him. 

But you weren’t going to just stand by and watch. So you quickly slid your gun back into its holster and ran over to where the two of them were fighting, immediately pulling Walker off of Bucky. “Give up, Walker. It’s over.” you sternly said through clenched teeth while you shoved him to the ground then cuffed his hands together.

And as you stood up and walked over to Bucky to make sure he was okay, you thought that you’d been right. That this long fight with Walker was over and you could finally put him away, but he soon proved you wrong. 

“You okay?” you’d started to say to Bucky as the sound of the cuffs breaking apart rang out, cutting you off as you both whipped your heads in Walker’s direction. He’d broken out of the cuffs and was now back on his feet, ready to fight again. But before he could get the chance to swing, you were on him again, sending punch after punch of your own into his face and body, knocking him back onto the ground. He stayed there for a minute, giving himself the chance to recover once more and in a blink of an eye he was back on his feet yet again. 

To see how much stronger he was currently compared to you and Bucky terrified you, would this fight ever end? “(y/n), watch out!” Bucky warned as Walker barreled towards you this time. He’d tried to stop Walker but it was too late and when his fist made contact with your chest, your body went flying for a few seconds before you hit the ground, your head roughly smacking against the concrete floor below you once you landed. 

And before you could even get the chance to get back up, Walker had pinned you to the ground by your shoulders and slid the knife he’d been hiding in his boot into your right side, causing you to scream out in pain. It’d be a lot easier for him to get away again if Bucky was distracted by your injuries.

In this moment, you couldn’t move even as Walker eased up on his grip on you, you were paralyzed with fear and pain and Bucky just watched, like a deer frozen in headlights. He’d never frozen up like this ever before and that scared him.

But before another thought could pop into his head, Bucky got a good look at you and began to feel as if he was seeing red. He was done going easy on Walker, he needed to pay for what he’d done. Bucky then placed his hands on Walker’s shoulders and ripped him off of you, giving him one final punch to the face that finally knocked him out, letting his now unconscious body fall to the floor below.

Bucky then rushed to your side right away and started to hold you in his bruised arms. You began to grow heavy as you laid there in Bucky’s arms, the handkerchief he’d retrieved from his pocket moments ago barely doing anything to stop or at least slow down your bleeding. It was no use.

“Stay with me, baby. Keep your eyes open for me please.” he begged as his voice broke, tears streaming down his face. “Bucky?” you weakly said as your eyes fluttered closed for the last time today and your blood began to stain the concrete. 

“No!” he screamed, his voice bouncing off of the walls of the nearly empty warehouse. Bucky quickly checked your heartbeat in the midst of his crying as he’d started to talk to Sam through the comms, it was shallow but still there. “Sam, we need help. (y/n)’s been stabbed, it’s not looking too good.” he quickly said, trying to hide the fact that he was crying. 

Upon his quick arrival just a few minutes later, Bucky gently scooped your limp body off of the ground and handed you over to Sam. “What the hell happened?” Sam muttered whilst a shock look took over his face and he took you from Bucky.

“I’ll tell you another time, just please, get her to the hospital. Promise me that you’ll keep her safe.” Bucky begged as Sam’s wings began to extend, his eyes bright red and his face covered in tears. “You have my word.” Sam said before he started to fly away, going as fast as his wings could possibly go before it was too late. 

Bucky wanted more than anything else in the world to go with you and Sam but he knew that it’d be for the best to have Sam take you to the hospital, even if it broke his heart to let you go while he went back to the tower alone, still sobbing. 

—-------------------------------------------

As soon as he made it back to the tower, Bucky felt himself sprinting to the part of the building that Tony had turned into a hospital years ago as if his body was on autopilot. All that mattered to him in this moment was making sure that you were okay. He’d become so caught up in his thoughts that he hadn’t even realized that he’d made it to the hospital and almost ran into a sad looking Sam who had just finished speaking with your doctor. 

“Bucky.” Sam softly said, immediately catching his attention as Sam placed a hand on his shoulder, stopping him from going any further. Bucky’s eyes teared up once more as he looked at his friend, “She’s going to be okay,” Sam started, pausing for a moment as he took a breath then began to deliver the bad news to Bucky, who currently felt like he could finally breathe again since you passed out, “But because of how hard her head hit the ground, the concussion she got caused her to fall into a coma. The doctor doesn’t know when she’ll wake up, it could be days or weeks.” Sam explained, trying his best to be strong for you and Bucky. 

Bucky’s heart dropped and even though he knew you were going to be okay, he was still riddled with fear and worry. He felt like he’d gotten the wind knocked out of him. He’d come so close to losing you and the fact that you were in a coma broke his heart.

As he continued to process everything he’d just been told, a wave of sadness hit him and Bucky collapsed into Sam’s arms while sobs violently shook his body. He wished he could’ve been better at protecting you. He could’ve prevented this but instead he froze up and let it happen, like an idiot. 

Sam helped Bucky back onto his feet, supporting him while he walked him to your room, tears pouring down his own face. It’d been years since he had seen Bucky this broken and he desperately hoped, for Bucky’s sake, that you’d pull through.

Once they made it into your room, Bucky could barely stand the second his eyes landed on your sleeping form, your skin was paler and there were bruises scattered across your arms and face, breaking Bucky’s heart even more. The emotional pain he was feeling as a result of today’s events had become too much. But before he could collapse again, Sam quickly pulled up a chair to your bedside and helped Bucky sit down. 

“I’m here for you if you need anything, Buck. Stay as long as you need.” Sam told Bucky as he stood next to him and Bucky quickly became a shell of a man the longer he stared at you. “Thanks.” Bucky quietly said through his tears and Sam started to leave the room, closing the door behind him to give the two of you some privacy. 

Bucky was silent as he began to hold your hand in both of his and pressed his forehead to it as he closed his eyes. He felt so guilty, he had always vowed to himself to protect you and he failed, he hoped you'd forgive him once you woke up.

And as he sat there with you, seeing you almost die finally made him see that he was in love with you and that was okay. He promised himself that he wouldn’t bury his feelings for you ever again. Life was too short for him to continue hiding the fact that he loved you more than anyone else. 

“Come back to me, baby. I love you.” he muttered against your skin. 

—-------------------------------------------

One Week Later

As you woke up, you began to feel confused and disoriented while you opened your eyes for the first time in seven days and the bright light above you in your hospital room caused your head to start to hurt.

“Where am I? Why does my hand feel so heavy?” you thought as you slowly looked around the room and you began to squint your eyes. A soft smile appeared on your face as you looked to your left and saw Bucky sitting next to your bed, his head resting on your joined hands while he slept. 

“Bucky?” you quietly said, still squinting due to the light. He looked tired, pale and there were bags under his eyes. You wondered how long he’d been there. He awoke abruptly, the sound of your voice calming him. You were okay, you’d come back to him. He could finally breathe again. “(y/n)!” he exclaimed as he began to gently hug you and tears welled up in his eyes.

“How long was I out for?” you quietly asked him as you looked into his tired eyes, the sight of this making you frown. “A week,” he told you, pausing before he spoke up again a moment later, “I missed you so much. I’ve been so worried but I’m glad you’re okay,” he continued before silence soon took over the room, “I’m so sorry this happened and that I wasn’t able to stop Walker.” he confessed as a few tears fell down his face, showing you just how guilty he’d been feeling for the past week.

Your frown became deeper as you reached up and wiped Bucky’s tears away, “Bucky, you have nothing to apologize for. I can handle myself.” you told him as he placed his hand over yours. Bucky let out a deep breath as he opened his mouth to speak, “I know,” he began as he nodded his head, “I’m just always terrified that I’m going to lose you every time we go on a mission. And even though I knew you were okay, seeing you like this broke my heart. I haven’t been able to leave your side this entire time.” he explained, prompting you to hold his hand and stroke the back of it with your thumb. “I’m okay, stop worrying.” you quietly said, making Bucky smile a little.  

Silence took over the room for the second time that day as both of your minds began to run rampant and you processed everything that had been said as well as the things Bucky had wanted to say. “I’m in love with you, sweetheart. I just wish I could've had the confidence to tell you before all of this happened.” Bucky simply said as he looked over into your eyes, his heart on his sleeve.

Hearing him say this caused your face to break out into a smile, you’d been waiting for what like forever to hear these words leave his mouth. “I love you too, James, I always have. I’ve just been waiting for you to tell me that you felt the same,” you said, the sound of your confession and his name falling from your lips causing his heart to warm, “But maybe now that I’m awake we can make up for lost time?” you suggested to him with a wink.

And in an instant, Bucky started to softly kiss you while he held your face in his large hands once more. “I love you so much, baby.” he muttered against your lips in between kisses, causing butterflies to appear in your stomach. 

“Bucky? Could you turn the lights off please? I have a headache.” you softly asked him once his lips pulled away from yours again a few seconds later. “Of course.” he answered with a soft smile as he stood up from his chair and crossed the room to turn the lights off. 

Upon returning to your bedside, he gently scooped you up and moved you over a little so that he could lay down with you. You then slowly rotated so that you were facing him on your non-injured side and snuggled into him, resting your head on his chest.

And although you had just woken up, being in a coma had caused you to feel exhausted and you soon started to get sleepy. “Rest, sweetheart.” Bucky murmured against your hair as he wrapped his arm around you. He’d ask you to be his another time, for now he’d just let you sleep.

NAVIGATION

send me a request!

[grapejuicebrat]

back to friends

It starts with a lie.

He says, “Hey.”

You say, “I’m good.”

And you both pretend that’s enough.

⸻

You haven’t seen Rafe Cameron since he slammed your car door on a Wednesday night in April and never opened it again.

Spring turned into summer without him.

You dyed your hair. You started wearing rings. You slept on the right side of your bed instead of the middle.

Your friends started saying things like “I’m so proud of you.”

But none of it mattered the second you saw him in that shitty gas station parking lot in OBX, leaning against his truck like heartbreak hadn’t ever touched him.

The same tousled hair. That smug, sideways smile.

And a bottle of Coke pressed to his bottom lip like it had taken your place.

⸻

“Didn’t think I’d see you here,” he says.

You want to say, I live here too, Rafe.

But instead you just shrug. “Didn’t think you looked at me anymore.”

He doesn’t flinch. He never does.

“We were better as friends,” he says. “Weren’t we?”

You snort. “We were never friends. We were a habit.”

His jaw ticks. He looks away.

You walk to your car. You don’t look back.

⸻

You last four days.

Four days of pretending you don’t still check if he views your stories.

Four days of lying to your best friend, saying, No, I’m over it. I swear.

Four days of trying to delete his playlist but stopping halfway through every time because some part of you still thinks maybe he’ll come back.

⸻

He texts you on the fifth day.

Rafe: You busy?

You: Do you care?

Rafe: Always did.

Stupid.

So stupid.

But you go anyway.

⸻

He’s sitting on the hood of his truck when you get there. The dock near Figure Eight where you first kissed. Where he told you he’d never felt like this before.

Now he looks up like nothing’s changed, like your history isn’t sitting in the passenger seat of your car with its arms crossed and a gun to your heart.

“I missed you,” he says, voice low.

“No, you didn’t,” you answer. “You missed how I made you feel.”

He exhales through his nose. Nods once. “You’re not wrong.”

You sit beside him.

It’s quiet.

It always was, with Rafe. Everything loud in the world — but never between you. The screaming happened in silence. The worst pain came without words.

“You look happy,” he says.

You blink. “Do I?”

“No,” he admits. “Not really.”

⸻

You talk for two hours.

About nothing. About everything.

He tells you Topper still can’t keep a girlfriend. That Sarah moved again. That he stopped drinking during the week.

You nod. Pretend you aren’t noticing how his hand keeps brushing yours.

And then he says it.

“Let’s just go back to friends.”

You freeze.

He looks at you like it’s a solution.

Like it’s a fix.

But friendship was never what broke.

It was the in-between. The almost.

The I love yous that never made it past his teeth.

So you say the cruelest thing you can muster in the softest voice:

“You don’t want to be my friend, Rafe.”

He stiffens.

You continue, “You want me close enough to keep, but not enough to lose. You want someone who will stay when you disappear. I was that. I’m not anymore.”

He doesn’t look at you. Not right away.

Then: “You really done?”

You nod, even though your throat closes around it.

He nods back.

And that’s it.

No kiss.

No fight.

No screaming or slamming doors.

Just two people pretending to rewind something that broke in the fast-forward.

⸻

You get in your car.

Drive away with your windows down.

The breeze doesn’t help.

Nothing does.

He texts you later that night.

Rafe: If we can’t go back to friends, do I lose you for good?

You type. Delete. Type again.

And finally, you send:

You already did.

[sunandflame]

Alber "King" MODERN AU: Government Experiment Survivor | Underground Fighter

Alber, who was taken from an orphanage at just 3 years old, labeled "unclaimed" and selected for a government experiment that erased his identity before it ever formed.

Alber, whose childhood was replaced with laboratories and locked rooms, trained like a weapon and shaped through years of genetic editing and violent physical conditioning.

Alber, whose body was designed to endure what others could not — with muscle density beyond normal, reinforced bones, suppressed empathy, and a nervous system that learned to silence pain before it could reach his brain.

Alber, the most successful prototype they ever created — silent, obedient, inhumanly resilient — until he disappeared at 17 during a transport blackout, killing two handlers and vanishing into smoke and silence.

Alber, who no longer existed in any system, who gave himself a new name — King — not as a title, but as a shield. A way to hide in plain sight while the government still hunted ghosts.

King, who stands at 2 meters tall — that’s 6 feet 7 inches of broad, quiet mass. A man built like a fortress, with a presence that fills any room he walks into, even when he says nothing at all.

King, who fights in illegal underground circuits, cash-only, off-grid, nameless — known only by bruised mouths and broken ribs.

King, whose reputation carries further than his voice ever has: undefeated, silent, merciless. A myth in the flesh. Rumors say he doesn’t feel pain. No one knows where he goes after the match ends.

King, who moves like he’s still being watched. Who fights with brutal efficiency — a fusion of military kill-strikes and raw street brawling. There is no waste in his motion, only intent.

King, whose back is carved with a massive black wings tattoo — spanning shoulder to hip, inked with precision and grief. A monument to what he was supposed to be, and what they tried to take.

King, who lives above a junkyard in an abandoned apartment, walls stained with oil and silence. A mattress on the floor. Taped-over mirrors. A punching bag swinging like a pendulum in a room that never changes.

King, who eats the same meals. Who trains every morning. Who fixes bikes and cars for cash and does side security at a bar where no one makes eye contact.

King, who doesn’t let anyone close. Who doesn’t speak unless it matters. Who makes every word feel like a loaded gun.

King, whose body is all survival but whose soul still flickers behind burned-out eyes. Who isn’t cruel — just disconnected. Emotionally shut down, because nothing inside him was ever allowed to grow.

King, who watches the door even when it’s locked. Who never sleeps through the night. Who wakes up mid-fight, fists clenched, breath caught in a memory that doesn’t belong to this world.

King, who carries phantom pain and names he doesn’t say out loud. Who remembers the screaming, the silence, the training rooms painted red.

You, who didn’t flinch when he walked in bloodied and silent. Who didn’t ask for explanations. Who didn’t treat him like a threat — or a myth.

You, who spoke to him gently. Who handed him a clean towel. Who called him by name like it wasn’t something stolen.

You, who kept showing up. Who never pried, never demanded. Who looked at him like he was human, not haunted.

He never thought he could want. Not anything real. Not softness. Not warmth. Not you.

He doesn’t know how to touch gently, but he learns. Slowly. With still hands and shallow breath. He learns to stay when everything in him says run.

He tries to keep you away. Puts up walls that don’t speak, closes doors that never truly lock. You find your way in anyway. And that’s what terrifies him most — not that you’ll leave. But that you’ll stay. And someone will find you. And someone will hurt you. And it will be because of him.

[jasina85]

Okay... Hunter the Reckoning 5th edition. I unfortunately have opinions not many people will be surprised about.

The game still feels like it has an identity crisis between wanting the player characters to be the everymen who said enough and started biting back against the supernatural and being very special with access to special powers. This was true in the legacy era with the Imbued and the Numina, it's still true with Edges. Now, having the characters be special - there's nothing inherently wrong with that, because special characters tend to make for natural protagonists, but it feels like the game can't decide if it wants everyman or special more and it ends up awkwardly reaching for both.

I've heard people say that just as VtM 5 took some mechanics for Chronicles' own Vampire the Requiem (which looking at both systems side-by-side is fairly obvious), so did HtR 5 do the same with Hunter the Vigil. I can't comment on it, as I've neither read through or played the Vigil, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was true. Speaking of Vampire though...

The attention to detail in places in this book is god-awful. The example presented for the Linguistics merit IS THE SAME LEBANESE VAMPIRE IN MEXICO CITY WORD-FOR-WORD. Seriously?! You couldn't even be bothered to rewrite that to fit the book it's in now? That just feels lazy.

Hunter Creeds... feel utterly pointless. The only mechanical difference between them is what you can use Desperation dice for and their fluff text all reads so similar for the most part that if you were to remove their names from text, I wouldn't be able to tell most of them apart. They feel like they only exist because the designers needed to shoehorn in some kind of character class system, because ttrpgs need to have those, right?

The Drives meanwhile are fine. Nothing much to say here, since they're primarily a narrative tool, rather than a mechanic one.

Edges! I'm very divided on these. The Asset and Aptitude Edges feel okay... until you realize that stuff like getting your hands on say... a car, a custom-made gun or explosive would fall under Allies/Contacts in other splats, but in here getting those is a special ability, implying you need that Edge to have any chance getting it. It feels very messy.

Endowment Edges on the other hand feel pretty fun! They're obviously supposed to be the choose-your-own-flavor Numina, and they feel like the best fit for representing True Faith, but you could flavor then as Hedge Sorcery or in some cases even Hypertech, as long as you accept most of these only work against the supernatural. It's not ideal, but it's probably the most fun part of this book.

Lastly, I want to talk about how HtR5 uses Chronicle Tenants. In short - it doesn't. Oh sure, it tells you to decide on them, but there's no actual mechanical consequence for breaking them. In Vampire, breaking a Chronicle Tenant usually means Stains on your Humanity, in Werewolf you have Harano... in Hunter you have nothing. Chronicle Tenants, at least to me, have always been half about setting a theme, half ideas to be challenged during play. Do you break one when doing so would be the right thing? Hunter leaves no such considerations, because when there's no consequence, does the choice even matter? Instead it treats them as closer to lines and veils for the players, which is just not what they're meant to be.

Oh, right, the orgs... meh? The returning ones like Arcanum and Saint Leopold are mostly the same as they were in legacy, only with questionable rewrites and squandered old plot threads. Also, who thought having an org who's name abbreviates to KKK was a good idea? No, they're not actually the Klan, but seriously? And yes, the choice for not letting players be a part of an org is still dumb.

I'll be honest, I'm not sure I'm going to read much more of Hunter 5. This has been a highly frustrating experience.

On one final note, I've said this before but god damn it, the actual art style of this book? The actual drawings in black and white punctuated with splashes of blaze orange? It is soooo good. I wish this was a consistent art style across the 5th edition World of Darkness with a different color for each gameline. It is simply just so striking.

[fru1t4fr0gs]

You and Me - Chapter 7

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Avenger!Reader

Summary: You enter the HYDRA bunker. Reunions are had. Revelations are made. Things go very poorly very quickly.

Warnings: 18+ Minors DNI: Violence, Blood, Swearing, Reader gets injured, Protective!Bucky, Angst (but with a happy ending), Reader is Tony Stark's biological kid (still a fully grown adult though, the timelines work because we say they work), no use of y/n, Please let me know if I forgot anything!

Author’s Note: We've reached the end of the CACW timeline! Don't worry, it's just the end of Part 1. I'm planning on running with this fic through TFATWS - maybe into Thunderbolts, who knows? Thank you guys for your feedback and love for this fic! As always, any comments are super appreciated!

-

The door creaks, filling the corridor with the sound of bending metal and snapping hinges, and Bucky is quick to push you behind him before he raises his gun towards the threat. You want to make some kind of comment about having your own gun, but you decide that now isn’t the time to push buttons.

But you don’t feel the hum. You don’t feel the prickling feeling of something wrong. For a moment, you think the serum might not be working, like maybe your body has adapted to it and built up some kind of tolerance, and then-

“You seem a little defensive.�� Tony Stark says, and your stomach flips with emotion. You peer over Bucky’s shoulder, words catching in your throat as he approaches. You’re not often one to be rendered speechless. Today is just chock-full of new experiences.

“At ease, soldier. I’m not here for you.” He says to Bucky, eyes quickly landing on you. You see his gaze soften, just a bit, and you have to force yourself to stay where you are.

He believes you. And finally, fucking finally, he’s on your side.

“Can you tell the Manchurian Candidate here to put the gun down?” He asks you, and you almost laugh with a strange mixture of fondness and relief. What a fucked up scene this is. What a truly ridiculous, fucked up scene. But then again, what about your life over the past few years, your relationships with these people, hasn’t been a little fucked up?

“C’mon, Bucky. Friend, not foe.” You rest your hand on Bucky’s arm, guiding the gun down. He hesitates, but lets you.

“Protective, is he?” Tony asks dryly, and you think you just might hear the smallest twinge of approval in his voice. Well hey, there’s a start. And that start, as much as you don’t want it to, makes your heart soar.

“Just a little.”

“Y’know, sometimes I wish I could ground you.”

“You’re a few years late for that. But I think trying to arrest me was pretty close.”

You think, for a moment, that Tony almost smiles.

“Does he always stare like that?”

It’s your turn to smile, then. “You have no idea.”

He shrugs, still holding his usual air of nonchalance. “Well, when this is all over you can have him over for dinner. I’m sure Pepper’s gonna love him.”

You know he’s joking, but you still almost cringe at the thought of the third degree he would face if put in the same room as Pepper Potts. Still, the mental image is kind of…nice. Like if this situation were just a little less insane, if everything wasn’t buried in so much chaos, you could actually bring Bucky home to your strange new version of a family. It would be awkward, yes. Very much so, considering everything. But maybe…

Maybe he’ll crack a smile, and hold your hand. Maybe he’ll make a joke, and Tony will laugh. He’ll bring flowers in that old-timey way he has, nervous and unsure how to introduce himself properly. Pepper will like the gesture, give him a little more leeway, and by the end of the night everything might just feel a little bit…normal. Nice. Like you’re not trying to save the world for once, but just..people.

Right now, without punches or insults being thrown, it almost feels like a possibility.

“What’s a Pepper?” Bucky asks you quietly as you all begin to make your way down the hall.

It’s hard to tamp down the laugh that bubbles up in your chest.

-

All feeling of relief is sucked from your body as you walk into the chamber. And there it is. The prickling under your skin. The sense of impending danger.

The supersoldiers are all dead.

Zemo killed them all.

His voice echoes over the speaker and when the light to the chamber clicks on, you know immediately that Steve’s shield isn’t going to penetrate it, but the clang still reverberates hopelessly through the room like the final note in a song.

You barely hear his words as he speaks to Steve. Your nerves are burning. Your mind is racing. You see the screen. The date on it. Why does that date seem so familiar?

“Something’s wrong.” You say quietly.

“Yeah, I think we’re past that.” Tony answers, but Bucky understands. He knows what the serum did to you better than anyone else, and you can feel him become impossibly more alert as he steps in front of you again, a wall blocking you from any potential threat.

And then his eyes fall on the screen, and he freezes.

“Buck?” You ask, trepidation lacing your tone. Tony sees it too, and frustration prickles at you because you still don’t know what it means and you’ve always hated not knowing things and-

“This, I admit I did not expect.” You hear Zemo’s voice like a toxin in your veins, the smugness in his tone making your fingers twitch with the urge to rip through the metal wall and connect your fist with his face. “The Winter Soldier. The death machine, finding something to care about. Someone to love him.” He’s looking at you, now, but you don’t give an inch. You glare back with fire in your eyes, fists clenched at your sides. There’s too much static in the air. Too much of the feeling that something is about to change. Something is about to go wrong. Very wrong.

“How does it feel, Winter Soldier, to know what’s coming?”

Bucky is looking at you. He looks afraid. Too afraid.

“What a sad irony that the unfeeling creature of HYDRA will lose everything, as well.”

The video begins to play, and the scattered puzzle pieces fall into place.

You never met your biological grandparents. Of course you didn’t. But you knew of them. You’ve heard stories. You knew about the crash that killed them.

Bucky’s eyes are blank as he approaches your injured grandfather. Howard Stark recognizes him. The confused “Sergeant Barnes?” sounds tinny over the old speaker in a way that makes you feel sick.

The metal arm, the one that has held you so gently, so delicately, so many times, slams into his face on the camera, killing him quickly. Efficiently. Mindlessly.

Your body turns to ice as you hear your grandmother’s weak voice call your grandfather’s name. You can’t peel your eyes from the screen as that metal hand wraps around her throat.

The video stops, and you’re not looking at the screen anymore. You’re looking at Bucky.

Shock is a strange thing. It’s cold. Still. It locks your limbs into place and squeezes your throat shut. It makes you feel wide awake and half asleep at the same time, mind empty but still humming with new information that you can’t put to good use.

It wasn’t Bucky. You know that. And it’s not just logic that locks that information into your racing thoughts. It’s instinct. It’s your soul intertwined with his, understanding the horrors he went through and the actions he couldn’t help. Couldn’t stop.

But it was still his face on the screen. His hands that committed the act. You never knew those people, but they made you. In so many ways, they were a part of you. And you just watched the love of your life snuff them out like ants beneath his boot.

Whatever look must be on your face is killing him. You can see it in his eyes. He looks like his heart is being ripped from his chest. Like no amount of HYDRA’s torture could ever compare to this.

It’s so fucked up that your first instinct is to go to him, to hold him. Your legs remain locked in place, however. You don’t move.

And then everything explodes.

The fighting begins, and you’re still frozen. You watch as Bucky looks towards the firing guns, begins to run towards you like he’s preparing to shield you from any stray fire, and then he’s knocked out of the way.

Suddenly, in what feels like the blink of an eye, Tony has Bucky pinned to a wall thirty feet above your head. You feel like you’re in a waking nightmare. Some kind of sick paralysis. You hear the sounds of metal crunching against skin. Hear the weak call of “Howard?” In your ears.

“Stop.” The word is quiet. Hoarse as it leaves your throat. You don’t know why you say it, the useless whispered plea.

“It wasn’t him!” Steve shouts, and you don’t know who he’s talking to, but the three words seem to finally break you from the ice.

It wasn’t him.

So many months. So many nightmares. So many whispered confessions in the dark of that apartment in Bucharest, his arms holding you in the beginning like he wouldn’t blame you if you broke free and ran out the door. And later, when you never did, holding you like you were the one thing keeping him tethered to this earth.

HYDRA would have done the same thing to you. Planned to. Would have, if you hadn’t broken out. And somehow, impossibly, you found the only person who was unlucky enough to understand it all even better than you.

Strangely enough, your mind wanders back to that night on the roof. At the first time you heard him laugh, low and quiet like he had forgotten how.

“I didn’t know you made that noise.”

“I haven’t in a long time.”

In another blink, you’re in the dingy kitchen of the apartment, looking into blue eyes that held so much vulnerability you didn’t know how you could possibly have ever seen him as anything more than just Bucky. How he could ever have been considered a weapon.

“You’re not trying to fix me.”

“You’re not broken.”

Tony reaches back, preparing to deliver a killing blow.

A small device locks onto his arm, briefly short circuiting the cannon and causing his suit to drop from the air. Bucky falls with him. When Tony looks up. You can’t see his face behind his mask, but you can sense the betrayal as his eyes fall on the little gun in your hands, the one you shot the device from.

Bucky looks at you. Tony looks at you. And the building begins to crumble.

Bucky moves first, knocking you out of the way before a large piece of metal falls where you were standing. He shields you from the impact as you fall to the concrete, but your injuries still shriek in protest.

A shot knocks him off of you, sends him rolling away, and he’s back on his feet in an instant in preparation to come grab you again. To get you both to safety.

“Go!” You shout, and he hesitates like he would rather die than leave you here. But you can’t go with him. You can’t weigh him down. He wont make it, and you probably won’t survive the crossfire.

He looks tortured when he realizes this, looking desperately to Steve. If the other super soldier weren’t here, you know he would stay. He would die trying to protect you. But you see the plea in his eyes, the unshakable trust that you’ll be safer with Captain America than with him. And he runs.

-

They’re too high up. You can’t see them. You can’t climb fast enough. You can’t do anything but watch as Tony tries to kill the man you love with a furious efficiency you’ve never seen before. He knocks the metal door shut, sends Bucky flying back down, and you can’t even find it in yourself to scream.

You search your belt for something - anything - to help. You come up empty. For the first time, you wish HYDRA had just finished that fucking serum. You feel useless.

And then they’re falling, and you’re so busy trying to watch what’s happening that you don’t see the piece of metal crashing down beside you. You don’t even feel the hum of warning. It hits your leg, hard, and you trip for the first time since you got the serum, stumbling too hard to move out of the way before another piece of debris collides with your side.

The pain is blinding. So much so that you don’t even realize you’ve been knocked down until you’re tumbling into the snow. Your healing injuries light your body on fire, new ones joining them as you collide with concrete and debris over and over until you’re finally landing somewhere near Steve.

Your body screams in agony, and you curl in on yourself. You hear Bucky shout your name through the ringing in your ears, and then he’s there, fighting again.

His hand digs into Tony’s chest, and a broken scream leaves your throat. It distracts him, just long enough, and you scream again as a shot fires.

He falls. His metal arm is gone.

You barely register what’s happening next, pain of all kinds ripping through you as you wheeze and try to blink through tears. Bucky, half conscious where he’s fallen, reaches for you.

Tony knocks Steve down, and begins making his way to Bucky again.

“Stop.” You choke, and you taste blood. “Stop.” His arm raises, gun aimed right at Bucky’s head. Your voice is raw, but loud and desperate as you cry out with the last of your strength. “Dad, stop!”

You don’t call him that. In fact, you’ve gone out of your way to not call him that. Despite the amount of times you know he’s wished, whether he’ll even admit it to himself, that you would.

He stops. Just for a moment. Just to look at you. A thousand emotions fill his eyes. Shock. Pain. Betrayal. You feel sick. He sees you on the ground, injured and bleeding, for what seems like the first time. The vengeance in his eyes fades. Guilt joins the betrayal. But the anger is still there, churning beneath the surface like a sickness.

Captain America knocks him down. You watch, vision blackening at the edges.

Tony Stark looks at you. You look at him. Something between the two of you, some bond you’ve built and nurtured so slowly, so carefully over the last few years, breaks.

Steve helps Bucky up. Bucky reaches for you. He tries to lift you with his one remaining arm, but you make a noise between a groan and a whimper at the unsteady movement. You feel like you’ve been hit by a train. Judging by the horrified look on Bucky’s bruised face, you look like it too.

You thought he was overprotective before. You have a feeling it’s gonna get a lot worse after this.

He looks helpless and pained as Steve lifts you, gently, and begins to carry you. Bucky limps alongside the two of you, eyes never leaving your face.

You hear Tony behind you. Hurt. Angry. Telling him he doesn’t deserve the shield.

Steve drops it. He doesn’t look back.

-

A few hours on the quinjet, and you no longer feel like you’re seconds away from death. Bucky’s already much farther along in the healing process than you, but you’re getting there. Slowly. Your body is stitching itself together at twice the rate of a normal human, and you’ve never been more grateful for the stupid serum.

“Point for superpowers.” You murmur. He looks at you, confused. You shake your head and lean more heavily into his side.

You’ll have to talk. A lot. About recent revelations, about everything else that happened back there, about where to go next. But no matter what, you know you love him. You know you’re not going anywhere. And neither is he. He knows it, too.

“You and me?” He murmurs quietly, like the words are a secret, pressing his lips against your temple.

You squeeze his hand, turning to look up at him, and offer a smile that holds all the love in your heart.

“You and me.”

Previous Chapter

Taglist: @vicmc624, @saucysasha2035, @iyskgd, @intothesoul

[nothing-leave-me-alone]

Starscream after killing whoever was in the way of him and his locked kid just to be hunted down like some kind of rabid animal is my roman empire now 💔💔💔 In all seriousness I feel like Megatron would not care for the *why* Starscream did it but on *how* to get rid of him

Megatron doesn't care one daaammmm about starscream at this point of the story. Lmao.

Things where going so good and starscream did what he does best with his plans, ruin them by running away.

At that point of the au megatron thinks things where settling down and suddenly got hit with like 4 mayor events and he desperately wanted to blame someone. Too bad he's in the habit of blaming starscream by default.

Megatron is initially just trying to catch starscream when he got out but when they discover he apparently had sparklings it kinda halts them all... For like 2 days.

Megatron quickly joins the "he's unfit to be a carrier" bandwagon most of the autobots are running on to justify to themselves hunting down a first time single carrier on the run with 5 kids.

Megatron tells himself it's what's best for the kids that they catch starscream and look after them themselves. He's in an echo chamber of the same opinion with the autobots all agreeing so he physically can't see why he's wrong.

By the time starscream kills in retaliation for his kids megatron takes it as the green light. just fully sees starscream as the problem. Even if it's clear starscream didn't even mean to.

Not that star wouldn't kill, but he acted on adrenaline that time, he was just cornered and angry.

It takes the terrans getting on his way multiple times to stop him whenever he gets his hands on starscream. Then he goes to badmouthing starscream to try and reason with them. (fails every time)

It still takes for dot to be apprehensive of letting megatron near her own kids for him to come to the realization. Aparently chasing a new parent around the forest with a gun and calling him and evil, spineless coward while his 5 kids play human shield isn't the best thing morally.

Just like in the show he sew saws between "we have to capture him he's a danger" to "we have to help them. starscream can be fixed"

Deep down he does want starscream back to his side, but on his own terms. Megatron wants starscream where he can watch him, keep the kids and him safe, but only as long as he behaves.

Starscream is just having the worst fucking time of his life to be honest. Megatron is a repeating figure on his nightmares along with GHOST. He's always on persuit and every noise sounds like a fusion cannon when you're scared enough.

Megatron sets starscreams health back a lot at the start of the au while only getting to actually hit him like 3 times.

[foggygauntlet]

I have tried to think why I cannot think of Gaston and lefou happily together, and I think it comes down to that Gaston is just a bad person who has so much power over lefou and lefou is practically defencesless against him, in both brains and strength. He manipulates and abuses lefous friendship (as well as the rest of the town) for his gain because they think he's cool. Also Gaston is just a terrible person, and lefou isn't really (at least, not to Gaston point). He shows some level of sympathy and humanity towards others sometimes, but his major flaw is idolising Gaston, so much that he will follow his with everything he does, which makes him more susceptible to manipulation (like the rest of the town). It's just really toxic and I feel icky thinking about it. (If all of Gaston haters are dead then so am I fyi) They are on just too different positions and there is such a big power difference and Gaston has and will take advantage of that. Also I can't for the life of me ever imagining Gaston being in love with anyone other than himself.

BUT believe it or not, stone and robotnik don't really have that much of a power difference (at least, not by the end of their relationship) and they are both truly evil (also side note it's also a different evil than Gaston. Like, Its genuinely funny with someone who does bad things that inconveniences the goverment or money related crimes or killing people in a goofy manner, not a misogynistic incel who cant take no for an answer) We just never get to see stones evil side because whenever he's always around robotnik he always making puppy dog eyes (Like when in the book he killed a customer who was slightly rude and impatient by breaking his neck at the mean bean lol) Sure, he does idolise robotnik, especially at the start, but he also has a genuine relationship with him, being with him for more that 8 years professionally before s1 and domestically living with him in s3, seeing robontik at his worst. Robotnik is genuine and authentic with stone in the crab as well, its not like they are trying to be someone for their gain. His idolisation never makes him susceptible to manipulation though he is just willingly like that and manipulates for his own advantage too (pre s2 comic he essentially tacticalky kills and fires a bunch of people and ruin their lives to makes himself the boss of this coffee shop so he can make a place for robotniks shit without any suspicion WHILST being a target of gun (I'm not sure if this is correct BUT I know that he uses a fake name and I'd to get the job and Its known that in the knuckles series that gun is trying to kill and erase anyone who has relations with robotnik but that's post s2 so idk) ALSO about the power imbalance, they both seem to be incredibly capable of defending themselves  mentally and physically. Like, in s1 robotnik essentially throws a large guy out a windows, and how stone was able to do all that shit whilst riding a motorbike in s3. Stone is canonically smarter than robotnik (at least iq wise) and is incredible at manipulating people also (take the pre s2 comic (I forgot what its called) for instance). Robotnik grew up in an orphanage ad a gifted child, he was (probably) praised alot as a child but simultaneously craves a family bond. (Side note here more of a hc than anything but gun def did some shit to robotnik after the shadow explosion, like idk maybe they monitored robotnik constantly as a child and used his smarts for their gain, but I don't really know. But they they call robotnik lab rat in s1 so take that and do with it as you please) Also nothing is forcing stone to stay with robontik, he litterally could've let him die and live a grand life or left him in s2 and robotnik wouldn't be able to come back. Stobotnik is essentially just two equally fucked up people being fucked up with each other.

I'm wondering...

[brionysea]

if stranger things 5 comes out and they're like 'omg! the upside down has been a product of someone's dark and twisted mind this whole time! it's... WILL!' I'll immediately lose interest

[hauntingblue]

making a collection

making another collection with a threatening aura

[little-klng]

Actually yknow what I don't mention this enough on here because I feel like a lot of my mutuals don't know this about me and some people might even have questions about how it works, but I actually work in an industry where I sell firearms very regularly

[cluescorner]

We need to bring back Gun Batman immediately where the FUCK is he

titans of tomorrow

aftermath:

[shaddy-bee]

Why is it all so hard.

[apatheticsunday]

Gotham TikTok

AKA "Danny moves to Gotham and records TikToks with absolutely deranged captions. He films Get Ready with Me in Gotham videos, fit checks, and even A Day in the Life of a Ghost in Gotham! Except everybody is freaking the fuck out in the comments" prompt idea!

No, you don't understand, I'm obsessed. Like, what if Danny's idea of "safe" is just... anything that doesn't actively try to kill him? So Metropolitians, Star City, and Central City citizens are literally biting their nails and sweating bullets every time he posts, because what if he gets merc'd by the "Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag" Red Hood?? And that's one of the nicer villains in Gotham. And Danny's just like wow, this place is niiiiiice, I haven't even been murdered yet!

Maybe Jazz took a 12-year-old Danny to Gotham to escape their parents. Gotham's cheap, dirty, and doesn't ask questions: it's the best place to go to disappear because damn near half the city's population are either super villains, hostages, dead, or vigilantes. She gets a job at an understaffed hospital as a clinical psych intern. She enrolls Danny for online schooling because she's scared a public high school would be too easy for their parents to track.

Which leaves Danny alone for hours. He makes a TikTok account called "Danny Phantom" because, c'mon, he's a kid. And, like most kids, he doesn't really comprehend the idea of a digital footprint or that his account is public, accessible by literally anybody.

He's also a little shit. So, the first TikTok he uploads is of a man getting carjacked, but the caption reads: love to see people helping each other. remember it's always okay to ask for help! it's okay, I don't know how to parallel park, either :)

And you just see this guy in a mask shove a businessman away from his car, gesturing with his gun, before getting into the driver's seat. Except the car is parallel parked so the carjacker just slowly inches back and forth between a Prius and a Honda until he can wedge himself out of the parking space. And then gets stuck in stand-still traffic. The TikTok goes viral. It's talked about on the Gotham news and Gothamites are losing their shit, pointing out the exact moment you can see the carjacker start to soundlessly cuss through the car's windshield or the way the businessman is just... standing on the side of the road, watching with a deadpan look.

Danny doesn't know about it being on the news, but he sees all the comments, likes, reposts, and feels something. He wonders if this is what Ember feels every time people listened to her music. So, he keeps posting. Usually, it's short three-second videos of a hilariously unexpected situation with an even more deranged caption. But then he's accidentally caught in the reflection of a store front while recording and doesn't know, posts it like he always does; only for this TikTok to go viral, too. Because "Danny Phantom" is a child??

He doesn't notice the shift in his comments, but the public opinion quickly changes from wow, Gothamites are just like that huh lol to what the FUCK, kid, get inside!!! anytime he posts.

Except Danny never gets hurt. Even in the most dangerous situations, when you'd think this kid is a goner for sure, he's just happily yapping in the background. He's so different from Gothamites because he lacks that dead-eyed, despair-inducing aura of someone who's lived in a hellmouth their whole lives. (A couple people post that Danny kind of reminds them of Golden Boy Brucie Wayne, all air-headed and unrealistically optimistic, and suddenly there's memes of "what happens when you've never gotten shot in Gotham" or "how i act when Commish Gordie accuses me of shoplifting again" with them side-by-side.)

And then Danny's posts go viral again and again. Danny doing a fit check with a blond-haired woman with a checkered outfit, she ruffles his hair and kisses him on the cheek. A picture of him wearing an old jean jacket with a bright red lipstick smear on his cheek is trending for weeks. Spoiler, fully suited up in an all-purple vigilante attire, and him shoving gas station hotdogs in their mouths. He even has videos of him clearly in Killer Croc's lair, with comments of are you in the sewers??? DANNY??? and he responds, no, i'm in mom & dad's basement :) (Waylon Jones is actually sitting behind him in one of the videos, intently watching a TV show on an iPad.)

Everybody adores Danny - Rogues, Gothamites, even the Bats. (There's at least six videos of Nightwing teaching Danny how to do backflips, handstands, and other acrobatic moves. Even the youngest Robin has been caught on camera quietly talking with Danny, a shocking lack of violence that left half the city's population suffering from cuteness aggression for the kids.)

So, yeah, Danny belongs to Gotham.

But the internet is widely accessible and Danny made it so, so easy to find him. Jazz obviously didn't know he was posting videos of himself publicly; she was too tired after back-to-back 12 hour shifts at the hospital that she hadn't even checked social media in months. Otherwise, she would've told him to be careful, to never show his face or post his real name on the internet. Then again, Jazz would never have expected all of Gotham (and Superman himself, totally endeared by the kid after Kon and Jon showed him a couple TikToks) would beat the absolute shit out of anybody going after Danny.

Imagine GIW's surprise when they track down Amity's former residential Ghost only to find an entire city frothing at the mouth to protect their Phantom.

[marvelstoriesepic]

Your Ghost Knows Me

Pairing: Avenger!Bucky x Avenger!Reader

Summary: On a mission to dismantle a Hydra base, Bucky’s activation codes are triggered. And what does he do without a kill order?

Word Count: 2.3k

Warnings: mind control; non-consensual behavior (not sexual but bodily autonomy themes); possessive behavior; gun violence (implied, not graphic); threats of violence; emotional manipulation (unintentional); PTSD; trauma responses; forced proximity; mentions of Bucky’s past; Hydra

Author’s Note: I'll never get tired of a possessive Winter Soldier!! Honestly, I should write about him more often. Anyway, this absolutely iconic request is from my sweet dear!! Thank you so much, and I hope you'll enjoy ♡

2k Drabble Challenge Masterlist | Masterlist

There is always something quiet about Bucky when he looks at you before the mission begins. Quiet in the way thunder is quiet just before the crack. As if he is holding something inside himself too loud for the world.

You always say his name and he would look at you like he’s afraid to blink.

You don’t think you’re supposed to notice the way he hovers at your side. You’re not supposed to feel his shadow, stitched to your steps. But you do. You always do. Because Bucky Barnes does not know how to stay subtle. Not with you. Not when he thinks you might not make it out of this alive.

Your mission is to break into an old Hydra base with heat still humming through the walls and ghosts still hanging from the rafters.

The team drops in like rain. Controlled chaos. Clint on the left flank. Sam from above. Steve on the right flank. Nat somewhere in the dark.

You are light-footed and fast and smart and alive. Bucky stays behind you. Always behind you. Watching your six. He never lets you fall.

And you get the proof of this for the thousandth time when he throws his arm out and grabs your vest to yank you back hard enough to make you gasp. Your heart stutters in your throat. You stumble, twist, spin - and crash into him.

There was a tripwire. You almost walked into it. And Bucky saw. He sees everything.

“You okay?” He breathes, voice low, not quite touching worry but brushing the edges of it.

“Yeah,” you whisper back. “Thanks.”

He nods. Says nothing. Keeps moving.

You press forward into the maze of concrete and metal that is the Hydra base, gun raised, heart playing the drum in your ribs.

Bucky slows.

You glance over at him. “What is it?”

He stares at a rusted door, barely ajar. A soft static pulses from within, like an old radio dying in slow motion. The sound crawls down your spine. Your skin prickles.

“Bucky,” you start, reaching for him. “Let’s move.”

But he’s already walking toward that door with narrowed eyes.

The room is dark. Cold. Frost is on the walls like a memory that won’t let go. A machine in the corner makes low noises. Wires twitch on the floor like veins ripped from a corpse. The air stinks of metal and mildew and something old. Something wrong.

And then it speaks. A voice, thick with static, seeps out of the machine. A voice you don’t understand. Not really. You can’t make out the words, but you know them. You know what they mean.

“Желание. Ржавый.”

You spin around, heart rushing up to your ears, calling his name, but it’s too late.

“Семнадцать. Рассвет.”

Bucky stands frozen.

Stone. Steel. Silence.

His face is slack. That haunted stillness takes over.

He isn’t gone. But he isn’t Bucky anymore.

“Печь.”

His eyes go distant. Flat. His face cracks into something you’ve only seen in nightmares. No fury. No fear. Just absence.

“Доброкачественный.”

“No,” you breathe. Your heart forgets how to beat. “Bucky,” you basically yell at him. Nobody even knew there were still functioning systems here. But they’d been waiting. Planning.

“Девять.”

“Bucky please snap out of this.” You know it’s useless. You don’t know why you say it.

“Возвращение на родину.“

Your hand trembles around the grip of your weapon as you force yourself to jump out of the shock your limbs are locked in. You raise your arm and aim. You pull the trigger. One.

“Один.”

Two.

“Грузовой вагон.”

Three.

Four times.

The machine sparks. Cracks. Screams. A dozen red lights blink and die like stars going out. The voice cuts out, perhaps wanting to give a command, a final breath of Russian strangled by silence. And it slams into the room like a body.

For a heartbeat, for a breath, you think it’s over.

You hope it’s over.

But his name dies on your tongue when you turn back to him.

Bucky doesn’t speak. He doesn’t blink. He doesn’t breathe like a man. He doesn’t look at you - he tracks you, the way a sniper does. As if you’re a piece of intel.

Sam’s voice crackles over the comms. “Hey. We heard something. Everything good over there?”

You can’t answer right away.

Your voice is lost.

Because Bucky Barnes is gone.

And the Winter Soldier is standing in his place.

It takes you a minute to explain your situation and you hear the tremor in Steve’s voice when he tells you they’re on their way.

You try to breathe around the panic growing like thorns in your chest.

You whisper his name, again and again, as if it’s a spell that might pull him back. But the Winter Soldier does not know your voice.

Does not know you.

And when Steve finally rounds the corner, face pale, shield up, Bucky growls.

Low. Subhuman. A warning without words.

“Woah, woah- easy,” Steve says, holding up a hand. He looks at you. “He’s- He’s not gone. We’ll fix this. We can bring him back.”

You don’t know how promising he tries to make this sound.

But Bucky shifts his body, in front of you.

He plants himself between you and everyone else, like a wall, like a weapon.

Like a threat.

No orders. No hesitation. Just instinct.

He scans Steve’s hands. Sam’s gun. Natasha’s eyes.

Every time someone even twitches in your direction, he angles his body tighter around you, metal hand flexing. His breathing is shallow. Sharp.

He has no words. No explanations. He doesn’t seem to need them.

You try to take a step forward, away from his back. He moves with you. You stop. So does he.

“Please,” you whisper. “Bucky. Come back.”

But he doesn’t flinch.

Not for the begging in your voice. Not for the heartbreak in your eyes.

But you know he doesn’t hear you. He only hears the ghosts in his blood. The machine in his brain. The purpose Hydra seared into his bones.

“Alright, this can’t-“ The moment Sam takes a step forward, Bucky moves.

He grabs you. Not roughly, not violently, but fully. As if the air between your bodies has never existed. As if he’s made of magnets and you’re the only thing that ever pulled him north.

His metal arm anchors around your waist, his other hand at your shoulder, your spine, your hip - everywhere, all at once. He places himself between you and the others again and makes sure to keep you there as if you are a holy thing. His breath is ragged. Feral.

“Bucky,” Steve tries. There is something pained in his tone. Also something warning. “Let her go.”

But he doesn’t listen.

Because there is nothing left to listen to.

No more commands. No more codes. No more voice in his ear.

So he seems to have written a new directive into his mind and that is you.

You are the mission now. You are the purpose, the protection, the last thing left when everything else burns.

His hand is wrapped around your wrist so tightly, it makes your breath hitch. But you don’t pull away. You can’t. There is something in his eyes. Something not Bucky but not nothing either.

Not the soldier.

Not the man.

Just this animal of loyalty. Of violence. Of need.

You try.

God, you try.

You speak to him in pieces. In whispers. In words coming from trembling lips and bruised hope.

“Bucky,” you plead.

Soft. Like maybe softness will do it. Like maybe he’ll come back to the sound of your voice wrapped in love instead of command.

But he doesn’t.

And he doesn’t let anyone near you.

Not Steve, who takes one careful step and ends up with a knife lodged in the floor in front of his foot.

Not Sam, who reaches out and gets a warning growl that raises the hairs on your arms.

Not Natasha, who tries to circle behind, quiet as a whisper - and is met with the barrel of Bucky’s gun aimed clean between her eyes.

You frantically call Bucky’s name.

“Hey- easy,” she says, voice low. “Nobody wants to harm your girl, Barnes.”

He doesn’t blink. He doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t care.

He tightens his grip on you, fingers locking around your arm like a shackle. You try to find a piece of Bucky still breathing in there.

But all you see is possession.

He steps back into the shadows, pulling you with him, shielding you with his body as if the world is trying to take you and he’s the last wall still standing.

No one sees you now.

Because he won’t let them.

He moves you behind crates. Walls. Corners. Shadows. Always putting something between you and them. Always hiding you. Not out of shame. Not out of fear.

Out of possession.

Out of protection.

Out of a command he gave himself.

You are a mission. A precious object. A singular order sculpted into the ruins of his memory.

You hear Steve’s heavy sigh. His quiet and deep voice. The pain in it. “We need to sedate him.”

The next thing you pick up is the click of a safety releasing.

Bucky’s gun is pointed and ready.

He would kill for you right now.

He would kill them.

All of them.

Within the blink of an eye.

For you.

“No,” you croak out, voice breaking. It feels wrong to call him Bucky. It feels wrong to call him Soldat. “Please don’t! Don’t do this!”

You don’t know if it’s something in your voice or something in your tense stance against his back, but he slowly lowers his gun, slowly turns his head to stare at you.

Empty.

Unreachable.

But somehow not cold.

And then his hand rises. Flesh fingers trace your jaw. So gently it nearly breaks you.

It’s not affection. It’s assessment.

He’s checking. For wounds. For weakness. For threats, you might be hiding beneath your skin.

You breathe as if forgetting how to.

You try to shift. Just a little. Just to look behind him. Just to meet Steve’s eyes, Sam’s, Natasha’s, Clint’s - who finally got his ass here as well.

But Bucky moves. Fast.

A hand around your chin. Tilting your face back toward him.

Eyes narrow. Jaw locks.

You know what it means.

He doesn’t want you to look at them.

He doesn’t want you to speak with them.

He doesn’t want you to think of them.

You are his now.

Because something in his mind burned the world down and left you standing in the wreckage, and he needs something to hold onto. Not just anything. Not just anyone. You.

You try again.

Whispers, again.

“I have to talk to them-”

He shakes his head. Once. Sharp. Final.

“No,” he growls. Not language. Not word. Just a sound scraped from somewhere too deep and too far gone.

You flinch and he feels it.

His grip grows stiff.

Your body goes still.

He doesn’t want to hurt you. But he doesn’t let you go.

You catch the glint of Steve’s shield out of the corner of your eye.

They haven’t moved in minutes.

They’re waiting.

They’re watching.

They don’t want to hurt him either. But they will if they have to.

“Don’t,” you murmur. “Don’t come closer. Don’t- don’t try to talk to me, he- he doesn’t want that.”

You hear Sam lower his weapon, just a hair. “We can’t leave you like this.”

You want to cry. You want to scream. You want to pull Bucky into your arms and shake him until something clicks and he remembers you. Remembers himself.

But the Winter Soldier only seems to be remembering his duty. Violence shaped into protection.

And right now, that protection looks like isolation.

You. Alone. Tucked behind crates and corners and silence and his broad shoulders.

You speak anyway. Because you have to. Because he’s in there somewhere. Because he might not hear the others, but maybe he can still hear you.

“Bucky,” you speak. Swallow. “They’re not the enemy.”

His hand twitches on your arm.

“They’re your friends.”

He tightens his grip.

“They’re my friends.”

He releases another deep and gravelly sound.

His body is tense, electric, fury held in the cage of his bones.

“Please,” you say. You hate the sound of your own voice now. You sound like you are shattering in slow motion. “You don’t have to protect me from them. You don’t- I’m not-”

You breathe out shakily.

Your lip trembles. Your eyes sting.

Because he’s looking at you as if he would kill the whole world to keep you safe. And he doesn’t even remember who you are.

You press your forehead to his chest. His body doesn’t move.

He’s breathing faster now. His pulse thrums under your cheek.

But he lets you stay there.

That has to be something.

Behind Bucky, someone whispers your name. Carefully. Cautiously. As though if they say it wrong you’ll be ripped out of this moment and Bucky will hunt them all down.

You lift your head.

Bucky sees it.

Sees the way your eyes pull toward Sam’s voice.

Sees the way you’re still trying to hold onto them. Still reaching.

He doesn’t like that.

He hates that.

His hand finds the back of your neck. He pulls you into him, hides your face in his chest. Your shoulders lock. His body shields you like a fortress of flesh and metal and confusion. As if your gaze is a window, and he is closing the shutters.

You are not theirs anymore.

And he will not let you be.