#and in which talking really is the answer. eventually.

[rexhya]

katsuki can't handle when you're flirty with him.

it hot in the common room, or maybe that's just him, his bicep is touching your shoulder and it's making him loose focus more than he'd like to admit.

the movie thats playing is blurred in his vison, it's not a scary movie in fact it's the complete opposite and everytime you giggle in his ear he grips the pillow over him harder, it's the cutest shit he's ever fucking heard and it hurts so good.

whats worse is when you're just near him talking odd his ear but he can't even hear what you're saying because your presence completely overwhelms him.

"hey kat? are you listening to me?" you frown a bit and your pout practically explodes his heart.

"yeah i'm fuckin listening, keep talking." pretty, he wants to add but doesnt because he can't even tell if you really like him or if your teasing him.

the last straw is at momo's massive party that you attend and that he surpisingly attends as well, you guys are next to the counter sipping on punch when some asshole knocks your drink all over his shirt, you panic and immediately begin to help him, eventually dragging him to the bathroom which thankfully gives him enough space between you and him that he won't combust everytime you wipe down on him.

it's mostly silent, almost to much so and then you say it, "so...do you like. ya' know, have you dated anyone before?"

his brain is running a million miles per second and he doesn't even get the chance to answer before a blonde haired idiot slams open the door to tell him their blowing out the birthday candles.

denki's knowing smirk doesnt help either.

safe to say when he goes hole that night he's searched up every youtube video and every reddit discussion as to know weather or not someone likes you.

you on the other hand are screaming over the fact he may, never like you. i mean you've tried everything! only time would tell.

[afroslacks]

Hiii idk if you’re still taking requests but I was wondering if you could do something where Micheal during an interview for Sinners he accidentally lets it out that when building smokes character that he had to draw from his own experiences in fatherhood. Which shocks the public because no one knew he was married let alone had a kid.

So he decided to put out at one of the premieres with his wife (reader) and nearly one year old baby (baby was born during filming in 2024)

Sorry if that doesn’t make sense🥹

Sinner’s press tour is up and running. The cast has been everywhere for the last couple of days. Michael, Wunmi, and Hailee are seated across from a female journalist who just entered the building. The journalist sits down with a warm smile on her face and white flashcards in her hands.

“Hello everyone, you all look so good today!” she says warmly, hoping to make everyone feel comfortable.

Michael is seated in the middle between both actresses, nodding his head while adjusting his chain and the special watch that has a message engraved from you. He always wears the watch because it brings him comfort on days like this—days when he’s extremely busy and wishes he could be with you and your baby girl, who was born recently.

“Thank you, we’re happy to be here,” he replies with a beautiful smile, gesturing toward the journalist.

“Truly,” Wunmi adds softly, nudging Michael’s shoulder as a subtle signal of gratitude for actively engaging—even though she knows his mind is at home.

Hailee sits there smiling as she rocks back and forth with her legs crossed in her chair. The journalist clears her throat.

“Now that we’ve got pleasantries out of the way, let’s get started, shall we?”

All three actors agree silently.

The journalist asks, “So Michael, since you’re playing two different characters in this film, how were you able to differentiate the twins, specifically in their relationships with Annie and Mary? Because the relationships are completely separate from one another.”

Michael nods as he takes in her question, preparing his response.

“That’s a good question. Stack is the more impulsive, hot-headed twin, so you can imagine his relationships with women being the same. He’s seen as a womanizer—breaking women’s hearts and moving on. But it’s also seen as a front, because Mary is the woman he wants. He has to act a certain way to deny himself his desire for her. When they do get together, you can definitely feel the tension and passion between them.”

After the first half of his answer, he clears his throat before continuing.

“Smoke, on the other hand, is the calmer twin. He typically keeps to himself. The trauma they experienced impacted him a lot more, so he retreats emotionally. I wouldn’t consider him much of a womanizer, because the only woman who stole his heart is Annie. Their relationship is deeper—they have history, and he’s the father of her child. He welcomed fatherhood. I’m the same way—”

His eyes go wide, and he shuts his mouth the moment he realizes his mistake.

The journalist furrows her brows. “I’m sorry? What do you mean you feel the same?” she asks.

Michael mentally rolls his eyes, realizing he now has to talk his way out of the mess he just created.

Wunmi quickly steps in. “What he means is, since he eventually wants to become a dad, he’s ready for the idea of fatherhood. Right, Michael?” She turns to him, giving him a flawless save.

He perks up, smiling at the interviewers. “Of course! My bad, I’m just really tired right now, so the words are coming out a mess,” he explains.

The journalist glances between the cast members, unsure if they’re being honest. After a moment, she lets it go, understanding that people make mistakes.

“Oh, okay. For a second, I thought you were a father.”

Wunmi, Michael, and Hailee nervously laugh, trying to steer attention away from Michael’s slip-up.

One hour later, after the interview is posted, Michael’s words start circulating online.

You’re sitting at your mansion on the couch, watching television while fiddling with the large diamond on your finger. The baby sleeps quietly in the crib next to you. Your best friend sends you a link to the clip with a message that says: "Check it out."

Pressing the link, you watch the clip. You scoff, shaking your head.

“I know this nigga didn’t just open his mouth,” you mutter, typing a message to your husband telling him to call you as soon as he’s free.

You and Michael have been together for five years total—dating for two and married for three. You recently had your baby after waiting a while to enjoy each other’s company. You met at a work event and immediately hit it off, but decided to keep your romance out of the public eye so you could enjoy your relationship in peace. You both agreed to hold off on telling the public for as long as possible.

But… that might not be an option anymore.

As you sit on the couch, you scroll through the comments—and people are not letting that slip slide at all:

I knew he had a family. That’s why we don’t see him much.

Michael, let me find out you’re married. I’m gonna find your wife.

Oh no, I’m not sharing my man.

Hello, I’m the wife he has a secret family with. So y’all can back off—thank ya!

It don’t matter if you’re married—we can still make it work, baby.

Whoever he’s with is lucky. They get Smoke AND Stack.

Where is the wife? I’m trying to find her.

That’s just a few of the comments. You take a deep breath to calm your beating heart.

Your phone lights up with “Hubby” flashing on the screen. Swiping green, his face appears.

“Hey, baby,” he greets nervously, noticing your scowl.

“Don’t ‘hey baby’ me. Michael, what the hell was that?” you ask, stepping into a quiet area of the house so the baby can keep sleeping.

“I’m sorry—I slipped up. I stopped myself as soon as I said it,” he apologizes, hating to see anything other than happiness and pleasure on your beautiful face.

You roll your eyes so hard they might fall out and hit the floor.

“You better do damage control. We agreed to keep this private.” The threat is crystal clear in your tone.

After a few moments of silence, he mutters, “Or… you could come with me to one of the premieres?”

You pause. Silence fills the air.

“Michael, are you serious right now?” you ask, brows furrowed.

He scoffs. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“We agreed to be private to protect ourselves from the public. And now you want to throw that out?” You clarify to process what he’s saying.

“I know, baby. But I don’t wanna hide forever. I want to let the world know I’m taken and happy—so they’ll back off. We don’t have to be super public. Just let them know one good time, then keep it moving,” Michael confesses, hoping you’ll agree.

You sigh deeply. “Fine. But the baby can’t come—it’s too loud, and I don’t feel comfortable showing her.”

“Thank you, baby. I love you,” he says, smiling.

“I love you too, punk.”

[phantasm-ae]

I want my boy Gaz some recognition 😭😭😭😭

Maybe the team will get to meet her🤨🤨🤨🤨

(okay but like imagine... Gaz having a wife similar to Price's and Ghost's wife like she is all sweet, loving, and caring... And then boom! She's Carrying Gaz like it's nothing! Like she has that Texas Cottage core vibe (is that even a thing?) like girl is sunshine and strength)

omg omg omg... im so sorry it took so long anon RAAAA. But! I have an ideaa hehehhe. Soo yk Rick and Morty?? Hehehhe well…

cw: chaotic afab reader x kyle ‘gaz’ garrick, slightly mad scientist afab reader, fluff

HEADCANON: The team meets Gaz’s bird. And well…. She was probably more than they’d expected

PAIRING: Kyle ‘Gaz’ Garrick x afab reader

Kyle has been dating her for months.

Wildly intelligent and hilariously blunt. Slightly feral lass who wears chaos like perfume and can talk about planetary physics and frogs in the same breath.

The kind who corrects documentaries mid-sentence, and once told Kyle after snooping through his documents, about how his missile trajectory calculations were “embarrassingly phallic,” and sincerely meant it.

And Kyle? Well... He’s absolutely gone for her.

Has been since day one when she marched up to him after attending a childhood friend’s lecture, shoved a melting popsicle in his hand, and said:

"If you had to save the world with only one mathematical constant, which one would you choose? Don’t think — answer!"

Caught between her unblinking stare and a rapidly dripping sticky mango mixture near his cargos, Kyle had only blinked twice and mumbled, “...Pi?”

“Coward,” she said, then grinned like she’d just met her new favorite problem.

That was it. Done. Hooked. Doomed, even.

And well Kyle?

Kyle, awestruck, bemused, and surprised — fingers and wrist sticky with artificial sugar and syrup. The gossamer and sweet liquid staining his newly acquired cargos — could only smile back and nod almost knowingly.

The 141 meet her months later though, during one of those rare in-between missions when there's time for drinks and dinner and recharging before the next chaos hits. But here he was. Fucking sweating and itching through and through.

Well it wasn’t like he never expected all their paths to cross eventually. He always knew she’d meet them. Meet this.

Introduce herself to this part of his life soon enough and not as an accessory or a passing visitor. But as something inevitable. Like gravity. Like sunrise. Something meant to be embedded into every bit of narrative she could sew herself into.

Because if Kyle was ever honest, she knew she wasn’t the kind of person you could keep in a separate drawer. No, never. Would never even think of ever shucking her away on some pent up flat or four-cornered bedroom. Pretty little bird kept and fed well with jewels and soft perches? No. That wasn’t her.

That was never going to be her.

Never.

She was storm and thesis, claws and questions, and Kyle -- sweet, brilliant Kyle -- knew it from the moment she walked into his life like a living paradox, equal parts catastrophe and charm. She didn’t visit chapters. She rewrote them. Annotated margins. Circled themes. Demanded footnotes.

So yes, he always knew.

She overflows. Gushes. Deluged. Trickles sweetly and syrupy into the vestiges of the gloomy part of his existence. Will spill into everything and into him. And Kyle, hopelessly, stupidly gone for her, will never really try to stop it.

So if he was being honest, some part of him had always imagined this moment -- her walking into the same room as the lads, sharp-tongued and starlit, leaving a trail of sparks in her wake. Not if. But more on when.

And now it was when.

But Christ was he still bloody nervous, aye?

Collar too hot and cap a bit too tight on his forehead, palms vaguely clammy like he was back in basic waiting to be called for his first ever inspection all over again. Which was stupid, because this wasn’t a mission. Wasn’t even a bloody op.

It was just.... her -- meeting the rest of his team.

And yet, Kyle was still internally combusting like she was a ticking biochemical warhead that could either charm the lads or annihilate the entirety of Price's backyard.

He glanced sideways at the entrance. No sign of her yet. Okay. Okay. That was fine.

Soap, across from him, was already two pints in and mid-rant about the correct ranking of fast food crisps, while Ghost sat with his arms crossed and offered the occasional low grunt of disagreement. Slow blinking in boredom and lazying around near some of Mrs. Price's potted plants.

Price nursed a whiskey like it was an old grudge and pretended not to be listening, albeit trying to stifle the slight quirk of his lip every time Soap seemed to look even more chauved and disgruntled at Ghost's lack of interest at the importance of learning the difference between Cheese-flavored crisps and barbecued ones. The younger bloke almost fuming at the disinterested and blased remarks he received from his superior. Snobbish over Ghost not knowing the based characteristics on Vinegar vs Vinegar-coated.

“She’s gonna love you lot,” Kyle muttered, more to himself than anyone else.

“Still don’t get why you’re sweatin’ bullets, mate,” Price replies after sidling up next to Gaz after Soap started yelling at Ghost over the massive and weighty bastard choosing Walkers over Pringles, shaking his head with an amused grin. “You said she’s a wee genius, yeah? She'll be fine aye?"

“She's just.... odd” Kyle said after swallowing

Price’s eyebrows drooped a bit reassuringly. Boonie hat tilted, expression something between humoured and understanding -- the same look he gives rookies before a live op. “Odd’s never been a problem with us, son. You seen Soap’s sock drawer?”

“Ah sort them by how often I wear ‘em, obviously” Soap called out from the booth, clearly listening now after a huff. Stomping back to grab another pint. “It’s practical warfare.”

“Freak behaviour,” Ghost muttered behind his own drink.

Kyle exhaled a nervous laugh, glancing again at the door. “I just mean… she’s different. Proper brilliant, but she says things like ‘Diogenes walked so Newton could run,’ and she means it. Like, genuinely. She once argued with Siri and won.”

“She sounds like a bloody delight,” Price replied dryly, then gave him a nudge with his elbow. “C’mon. You think any of us are normal?”

Kyle looked down at his hands, a little calloused, a little sweaty. “She just means a lot. Don’t want her thinkin’ she’s gotta tone herself down for anyone. She deserves better than that”

Price’s voice lowered, sincere. “Then don’t let her. The team’ll love her for exactly who she is. Just like you already do.”

Kyle was about to respond -- probably with something sarcastic and choked-up -- when the door creaked open.

She walks through the gate carrying a box labeled “Absolutely Not Explosives (Maybe Snacks)”, wearing a bright-green button down with her usual tenured slacks and folded manila envelopes tucked in one pocket. Windblown, wide-eyed, her glasses sliding down her nose, and grinning like she just stepped out of a fever dream and into someone else’s backyard. Armed and saddled with that same barefoot-in-a-storm kind of confidence that had ruined him from day one.

“Hi!” she calls out.

And it’s not just a greeting -- it’s an announcement. A declaration of entry. Like Archimedes, entropy, and the snack box had all been waiting for this exact moment to collide.

Kyle’s heart stuttered once, then promptly gave up any hope of ever functioning normally again.

She beelined for him as usual like a woman on a mission, but halfway there.... she noticed the fire pit --

-- specifically, the way it was constructed.

Oh shit, not again.

She veered without hesitation, knelt next to it, squinting like she was analyzing a nuclear core, and muttered, “Someone built this using a Fibonacci spiral as emotional support.”

“Fuck's Fibonacci?”, Soap whispered loudly, nudging Ghost with his elbow. “This Gaz's lass then, aye?”

Ghost gave her a slow once-over. Head tilting a bit at her mismatched flats and patched pockets. “Bird looks like she drinks Red Bull and argues with God.”

Before Kyle could respond -- or run, depending on the emotional weather -- she reaches into the sleeve of her coat and yanks out a... suspicious-looking metal rod.

No one spoke.

Then -- click -- a blade folded out. But not like a normal blade. No, this looked like a half-melted Swiss Army knife made love to a soldering iron. Wires dangling at the bits of shorn metal. Clinking and sinewy it was. A button at the side of the make-shift handle blinking blue rapidly.

Yep. Something definitely hissed, Price concludes as he minutely flinches for the first time at the sight of something so foreign and obtuse near his wife's petunias.

Ghost tensed, gaze locked like he was trying to identify what kind of improvised weapon she’d just birthed into existence, while Soap -- daft numpty -- only leaned forward in fascination.

“What the fuck is that?” Price asked, calm but also not calm, the way a father might ask why there’s a raccoon in the dishwasher.

She didn’t look up. “Thermodynamic calibrator-slash-ultralight torch. Built it from scrap and spite. Give me a sec.”

Then she jammed it into the soil like she was performing surgery on the lawn. A sharp hum buzzed through the air. One of the lawn lights flickered. She squinted at the fire pit, adjusted a dial, then jammed the device again into the soil near the base. The fire pit roared to life, its flame suddenly tall and balanced, licking upward in a soft golden spiral. It was mesmerizing, a near-perfect bloom of heat and symmetry.

The men collectively leaned back.

“Hell's bells” Soap muttered.

She stood, smacked some dirt off her knees, and grinned with both pride and a worrying amount of glee. “There,” she said, adjusting a final dial before stepping back. “Now it distributes heat evenly -- low flicker rate, too, in case anyone here’s prone to headaches or, you know… prefers not to feel like they’re being interrogated by the sun.”

Her tone was light, but her eyes flicked briefly toward Ghost -- casual, gentle, like it was just an offhand observation. But Kyle caught it. The way she noticed things most didn’t. The way she chose to.

Soap leaned back slowly, a grin now stretching across his face like a man watching the birth of a new religion.

“I like her", Soap grinned.

Kyle was already up on his feet, rubbing the back of his neck. “Uh, love… you gonna say hi properly, or you planning to interrogate more of the landscaping?”

She stood up straighter now, poised and readied, like nothing was odd once more, turning with an inviting and warmy grin, holding the box up proudly with a small and enthusiastic wave. Almost like she didn't just reconstruct a fire pit with a weaponized calculator and a god complex. “Hi! Sorry, got distracted. The heat ratios were offensive. Also, I brought snacks!”

She shook the box once for emphasis. It jangled. The sound was deeply suspicious.

Ghost, once relaxed and a bit.... touched alarmed that someone picked up on his discomfort with flickering light without him saying a word, now sat a little straighter at that. Eyes sharp once again. Cautious and perched. Shoulders just barely tensed under his hoodie as something absolutely squeaked when she juggled the looming cardboard in her wry hands repeatedly.

Price side-eyed the box like it had a timer.

Soap was still smiling like he’d just found a new hobby. Gait shifting to approach her closer. Reading the “Absolutely Not Explosives" label aloud. “Tha's either a bloody threat or a right good promise.”

“Depends on who opens it,” she replied cheerfully, then smiled open and inviting, adjusting her grip to shake Soap's outstretched palm. Shoving the box right after to Kyle's chest. Price humming in amusement at the sight 'oof' Kyle breathes at the weight and mounty thing now in his grasp. A misguided care package from a mad scientist at that. He was sure of it.

Making him stagger a step back, having to catch it again with both hands as it tilted precariously to one side. Something clinked. Something else sloshed. Something definitely clicked.

Price hummed, one brow rising as he took another sip of whiskey. “She always gift-wrap danger?”

“Only on the holidays,” Kyle muttered, staring down at the box like it was about to start reciting code.

Meanwhile, she was already gripping Soap’s hand with a firm shake, her grin bright, chaotic energy radiating off her like a short-circuited sunbeam.

At his sergeant's words, Price shakes his head in hilarity and interest, a slight lift from his beard for a surprised smile before stepping forward himself and offering his own hand. “You must be the chaos professor.”

She blinked at his hand at that, his words making her pause but grin proudly, grasping his sinewy fingers firmly as well in return. “I’m not a professor. Yet. But I am a Doctor of Applied Theoretical Physics, with a minor in Quantum Physics”

“You’ll fit right in,” he replied, clearly entertained. “I’m John.”

“Captain John Price,” she said then, squinting. Almost like something just pieced itself together in her head. A corner of her glasses slightly blinking green and blue. However, light and subtle -- just a shimmer beneath the lens as if scanning data only she could see.

She tilted her head. “Ohhh. You’re the John Price. Task Force 141. SAS. Operation Kingfisher, the oil rig interception, three confirmed HVTs neutralized in twenty-one minutes. That John.”

Price raised a brow, his grip still firm in her handshake. “That’s a very specific résumé you’re rattling off.”

She grinned, shrugging. “I like to research my boyfriend’s coworkers. Helps me know what kind of cookies to bake and what kinds of extraction plans to draft in case things go horribly wrong. And can I just say for the record, that you truly have a ridiculously symmetrical face.”

Price chuckled low in his throat, that rare and gravelly sound of a man both flattered and bewildered. “Symmetrical, huh?”

She nodded, eyes narrowed with faux scrutiny. “Yep. It’s giving ‘military recruitment poster.’ Like someone made you in a lab to sell patriotism and protein powder.”

Soap let out a loud bark of laughter. “Och, she's clocked you dead-on, Cap"

Kyle was standing off to the side now, box still in his arms, looking like he was debating whether to set it down gently or hurl it into the bushes before something in it decided to hatch. “Please don’t feed her ego,” he called over. “It’s already got its own gravitational field.”

She shot him a wink at his response. “That’s rich coming from the man who cried at my thesis defense.”

“That’s -- I had a cold,” Kyle protested, cheeks already pinking.

“She presented using live fluid simulations and built a metaphor about dark energy and love,” he added for the others, like that would somehow make it less devastating.

Ghost muttered into his glass, “Startin' to think you didn’t pull her… bird drafted you.”

“She did,” Kyle said, deadpan. “I was conscripted.”

Price shook his head, that amused smile now tugging higher under his beard. “Well, Doc, welcome to the madness.”

She glanced at the squad -- all casually observing her like she was both a field report and an open flame -- and clapped her hands once, bright and fearless.

“Excellent,” she said. “Then I’ll make tea after this. Also, about that fire pit--”

Soap looked delighted. “Aye, that wee disaster? That wis me, cheers.”

She gave him a mock-somber nod. Almost cringing at Soap's enthusiasm as if it physically hurt her to try and school someone for something pointless and small at the end of the day. “I admire the conviction, Johnny. But the stones.... were holding a grudge.”

Ghost tilted his head. “Fuck do stones hold a grudge for?”

She looked at him over her glasses. “Vibrations. Like people. Only less dramatic.”

Soap leaned over to Price, muttering, “This one’s a unit. A proper mad scientist.”

Price snorted. “And you love it.”

“You know I do.”

Finally, Kyle placed the suspicious box on the table with the care of someone setting down a baby rattlesnake. “Alright, so are we opening this or performing a ritual?”

She lit up. “Both.”

Something beeped.

Ghost stiffened.

Soap leaned closer.

Price calmly took another sip of his whiskey like he was very used to seeing strange things unfold in his garden.

And Kyle?

He just grinned, wide and resigned, as she started peeling back the tape with the flair of someone revealing buried treasure. Because this was her. All of her.

Spilling and overflowing for sure. All light, wit, and kinetic mess. Sharp edges wrapped in cellophane, brilliance hidden beneath layers of glitter and chaos and a worrying understanding of black-market circuit boards. Solar flare in the shape of his other half is what it is.

But somehow. Bloody somehow.

Still. Will. And is --

-- utterly Kyle's.

“Alright,” she said brightly, flipping the box open now with a flourish, “Let’s play snack roulette!”

Revealing the inside of the malty cardboard now filled with neatly organized rows of tiny vacuum-sealed parcels, each labelled with suspicious enthusiasm:

Nutritionally Suspicious Brownies

Possibly Radioactive Jam -- Only Kyle's

Chili Lemon Cry-Biscuits

Emotionally Unstable Muffins

Entropy Taffy

Soap leaned in with glee. “Christ, ye name yer snacks like they’ve got emotional issues”

“They kind of are,” she replied, plucking out the Cry-Biscuits and casually tossing one to Ghost, who caught it one-handed with all the enthusiasm of a man expecting to be poisoned. He sniffed it once, then gave her a look.

“Why’s it humming.”

“Because it’s fresh,” she said simply, then added, “And also maybe reacting to trace particles in the air. The spice is… volatile.”

Ghost stared. “You trying to kill us bird?”

“If I was, you'd already be carbon scoring,” she chirped.

Soap popped one of the taffies into his mouth with a crunch. Immediately blinked. “Holy shite. I can taste colors!”

masterlist

[loversrocktvgirl2]

my mini multiverse of madness…

Yes And Apples (Bucky x Reader)

word count: 2.0k+

masterlist

a/n - ugh this is the most comfy bucky fic i’ve ever written, like can this man please just show up in my life and cuddle me i need that shit

You’re Sam Wilson’s childhood best friend. You’re like a random companion that is somehow in his life always, neither of you are sure how. But now that Bucky’s friends with Sam and his roommate, he’s around you a lot. Problem is? He’s catching feelings.

You have a small studio apartment not too far away from the apartment Sam and Bucky share. You also run a local business where you sell books, movies, vinyl, coffee and beer. Unfortunately, your studio apartment is directly above the business building, so from a security standpoint, it’s really not all that safe. Hence, you kind of end up in Sam and Bucky’s apartment a lot, especially if you’re nervous. 

Thankfully, they’ve got a nice apartment, so you don’t feel too bad about sleeping on their pullout couch a few nights a week. Sam prefers it that way (he has to worry about you less) and only the Lord knows Bucky does too. They both worry about you. If Bucky can’t sleep (which is frequent, because insomnia), he’ll go outside and watch an episode of a show with you, enjoying the quiet comfort of your presence. He fell asleep there once, and Sam saw you two, distanced enough that he could tell you weren’t snuggling, but close enough to tell that you had been intentionally spending time together. He teased Bucky about it for a week.  

The unfortunate aspect is that if Bucky so much as lays a finger on you, Sam will find out and possibly kill him. But he still tucks you in on the couch, does the dishes after you make dinner, and stops by your store on his lunch breaks occasionally to “drop off” something, which usually just leads to him asking if you’re staying at him and Sam’s apartment tonight and if he should get you anything while you’re at the store (the answer is always “yes” and “apples”).

Eventually, Sam brought up to Bucky gently about moving into a bigger apartment so that they could get a guest bedroom for you in case you wanted to stay there, to which Bucky replied, “well, why don’t we just buy one of those cute little southern suburban houses and ask her to move in?” Sam was shocked that Bucky was so okay with it, but he wasn’t complaining. Bucky knew from you talking that you loved any house that looked like it could have been in Steel Magnolias. 

So, Bucky went house-shopping with you and Sam after you agreed to move in, and y’all bought the house together and took separate rooms. The house was cheap because of the area it was in, but it was only ten minutes from your business and close enough to the Avengers Tower that Sam and Bucky could get to work easily. Sam likes the house a lot, but he’s also got his own room at the tower, so he often stays there, too. Bucky has a room at the tower, just like Sam, but he never leaves you alone in the house at night. He could never. You’re amazing and he never wants to miss out on a second with you, and he doesn’t like the idea of you sleeping in an otherwise empty house.

You come back home at 10:12 pm. You always leave the store at 10. Bucky is sitting on the couch when you get back. “Hey, Buck, how’s it going?” you ask casually, walking over to the couch and kissing the top of his head. 

Bucky’s heart beats a little faster at the action, but he plays it off, acting nonchalant. “Not bad. Have you eaten dinner yet?”

“Nope,” you inform, putting your tote bag on the barstool chair. 

Bucky gives you a look. “Honey.”

“I was busy, I wasn’t gonna eat,” you shrug. 

Bucky sighs. “Figured as much. You’re eating. C’mon.” He walks over to the kitchen and pulls out a container of eggs. You sigh and join him. Bucky knows what your favorite bagel sandwich is. In fact, there are sliced up bagels in the freezer precisely for that reason. He’s gonna eat too—super soldier appetite, and also, he knows you’d rather not eat by yourself—so he microwaves two bagels, two sausage patties, and mixes some cinnamon and granulated sugar together. You make the scrambled eggs—two eggs each, a little milk, salt, pepper, and maple syrup. Yes, maple syrup in the eggs. Trust me. 

Bucky butters the bagels and puts the cinnamon sugar on it. He puts sausage patties on both sandwiches, and you put on the eggs. He carries the plates to the table, where he’s already got napkins waiting. The two of you sit down together, and you take a bite out of your sandwich. “Damn, I was hungry,” you mutter. 

Bucky shakes his head. “You gotta take care of yourself, sweetheart.”

There is no dramatic moment. Bucky’s never told you that he likes you, and you’ve never told him whether or not you like him. But, you do live together, more than Sam lives with you, too. And late one night, past one am, you tiptoe into his bedroom. Bucky is still somewhat awake, lying silently in bed. “Is something wrong?” He mumbles the question, voice groggy.

“I can’t sleep,” you reply softly.

Bucky nods and raises his arm to lift up his blanket, silently inviting you in. You climb into his bed beside him and fall asleep with his arm draped around you.

In the morning, Bucky pretends to stay asleep until you wake up, not wanting you to wake up in an empty bed. It makes him a little late for work, and Tony teases him about his unusual tardiness, but Bucky will withstand any amount of teasing if it’s for you. Sam doesn’t know why Bucky’s late, and Bucky doesn’t tell him.

About a week later, it happens again. You tiptoe quietly into Bucky’s bedroom, he asks you if you’re alright, and you end up sleeping in his bed again. The next night, you don’t bother asking, and just climb right on in. Bucky likes having you so close, and the action becomes normalized to him for a while, that you come in late at night and sleep in his room. 

Until, that is, when Bucky sees you charging your Apple watch on his nightstand, leaving your pillow on your side of his bed, and leaving your sweatshirt on the chair. You’re basically moving into his room. To be honest, neither of you really knows how it happened, you just understand that this is now where you go to bed. And Bucky is realizing that you have moved yourself in. And that he likes that you did. 

Bucky goes to your store the next day. After you finish up with a customer, he walks up to the desk and says, “Hey, I was wondering if you wanna watch a movie tonight. Oh, and if you need anything when I’m at the grocery store.”

“Yes to movie, and apples,” you smile. “Is Sam staying at the Tower tonight, do we know?”

Bucky shrugs. “Why?”

“Just seeing if we have to factor in his movie preferences. You can just grab a DVD from here,” you gesture toward the rack of DVDs in your store. 

“You got anything you feel like?” Bucky asks. 

“Whatever you pick sounds good.” 

Bucky lingers in front of the movie rack longer than he probably needs to. He reads the backs of three different rom-coms before settling on one that Sam would 100% roll his eyes at, but that he knows you secretly love. He tucks it under his arm, grabs a couple of your favorite chocolate bars from the little snack stand by the register, and gives you a look like he's getting away with something.

“You’re gonna make me cry-watch You’ve Got Mail again, aren’t you?” you say, leaning on the counter.

Bucky shrugs. “If you do, I’ll pretend not to notice.”

You grin at him, warm and unguarded, and Bucky has to take a second to process it before he answers. “You’ve Got Mail it is.”

Later, back at the house, you sit curled up on your usual corner of the couch with your legs tucked under you, munching on apple slices while Bucky fiddles with the remote. Sam’s already texted the group chat to say he’s crashing at the Tower tonight. (“Don’t wait up. Also, don’t steal my Oreos again.”) You and Bucky both ignore the last part.

About halfway through the movie, you shift closer. Bucky doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe, until your head finds its way to his shoulder and your hand settles gently on his knee.

“I like this,” you murmur, voice a little drowsy.

“The movie?” he asks.

You shake your head. “No. This.”

He swallows hard. “Yeah. Me too.”

He doesn’t say more. He doesn’t have to. Your presence is comfort enough. Later, when you both climb into his bed without a word, like it’s the most natural thing in the world, Bucky knows one thing for sure:

You’ve moved in. Not just into his room.

But into him.

You crawl into bed with Bucky again that night. It’s the same as always now, and you fall asleep pretty easily. 

Sam unexpectedly comes back home—after a very late night at the Tower, he decided that he would rather sleep in his room back here with you two. He pops his head into Bucky’s room to let him know he’s home. “Hey, Buck, I— what.” 

Sam stops and stares. You’re tucked into Bucky’s side with your head half on your pillow and half on his chest. Sam looks around the room and sees your Apple watch charger, your phone charger, your sweatshirt, sunglasses, even your lemonade sitting on a coaster on the nightstand. Bucky is still awake and wide eyed now, unsure how he’s going to explain this to Sam. 

“Are y’all dating?” Sam asks accusingly, keeping his voice down enough so as not to wake you. 

“I don’t think so…?” Bucky replies. 

Sam rolls his eyes. “This looks like she lives in here.”

“Yeah, well… she kinda does.” 

Sam snorts. “You should tell her, Buck.”

“Yeah, I know.”

It’s raining the next morning, and the world feels quieter than usual—slowed down and softened by the overcast sky. You’re sitting at the kitchen table in one of Bucky’s T-shirts, legs curled up under you, sipping coffee and reading a worn paperback. Bucky’s at the stove, flipping pancakes, because you’d sleepily mumbled something about them before crawling out of bed, and he takes your cravings very seriously.

He watches you from the corner of his eye. You're home here—completely, comfortably home. And maybe Sam's right. Maybe you do deserve to know that this isn’t just about pancakes and movie nights and Apple watch chargers. Maybe you deserve more than "almost."

“Hey,” Bucky says softly, setting a plate down in front of you.

You glance up and smile. “Hi.”

He doesn’t sit right away. Just stands beside your chair for a second, rubbing the back of his neck. “Can I say something kinda stupid?”

You raise a brow. “Always.”

He takes a deep breath. “I think… I think I’ve been accidentally dating you. For a while. Without ever telling you.”

You blink. “Accidentally?”

Bucky shrugs, sheepish. “I mean. You live in my room. You fall asleep next to me every night. You make your eggs weird and I still like ’em. I think that counts for something.”

You set your book down slowly, eyes soft. “So what are you saying?”

“I’m saying,” he starts, then stops, trying again with a quiet laugh, “I wanna stop pretending I don’t love every second of being yours. And if you want that too… I’d really like to officially call this something.”

You smile at him then, a little shy, but your heart is already wide open.

You reach for your fork, poke a bite of pancake, and say, “Okay.”

“Okay?” Bucky echoes.

You nod. “Yes.”

He looks at you for a moment, like he’s trying to memorize every inch of this one, quiet, perfect moment. Then, he grins. “Okay. Yes.”

You chew your bite of pancake, then pause, tilting your head at him with a mock-serious expression.

“But I do have one condition.”

Bucky leans on the table, eyebrows raised. “Yeah?”

You point at your plate. “Keep making me breakfast. And when you ask if I need anything…”

His smile deepens, eyes crinkling. “Lemme guess. Apples?”

You grin. “Yes. And apples.”

taglist @spaceycat @vidanand @xo-cench @raikan624 @yeehawgiddyup13 @wpdarlingpan @puer-aurea

[penelopehere]

How Rumi’s Parents Met HCs

a/n: Ryu is the name of Rumi’s mum

I personally believe her parents met when Ryu was by herself, patrolling the city when she spotted a demon lurking in an alleyway

Naturally she went to investigate, attacking instantly when she got close enough

However the demon didn’t fight back, merely defending itself and then disappearing as soon as it could

At first she thought it was strange, but just brushed it off as she went back to patrolling

However, when she spotted the same demon a couple days later, the exact same thing happened

She attacked, and he disappeared in an instant

This simultaneously confused and annoyed her, with Ryu now going out of her way to find that specific demon

She told her team about the unusual situation, but was reassured that he was nothing the hunters couldn’t handle

Regardless, Ryu still went out to get answers

It was weeks until she managed to corner the demon, pinning him against the wall with her blade to his throat 

She asked why he was in the human world, growing more frustrated as he remained quiet for a few moments

He then said if she was going to kill him that she should just get it over with, which threw Ryu off long enough for him to slip away and disappear

From there a pattern would emerge, with the two of them frequently crossing paths when Ryu was patrolling alone

Unbeknownst to her, the demon was actually seeking her out, wanting to talk more

She’d basically interrogate him about his life as a demon, trying to find his intentions for not attacking her

However, from these questions she’d learn he wasn’t loyal to Gwi-Ma, trying to escape his voice

While Ryu was sceptical at first, the two of them grew closer, with her even answering the demons questions about her

That’s when she realised she genuinely cared about the demon

Not knowing how to handle these feelings, she instantly went out of her way to not see him

Eventually she began seeing him everywhere; in the crowd during concerts, in the corner of her eye when she was on patrol, sometimes even outside her house

However, he’d manage to get Ryu by herself, asking why she’d just leave him and that if she wanted to end things she should say it to his face

They’d definitely argue, saying that whatever they had shouldn’t even have happened since they were so different

The demon would eventually leave, promising not to find her again if she really felt that way

Months would pass, with Ryu missing him more and more

Even the other members would notice, but she’d just say she was stressed about maintaining the Honmoon

She’d try and find the demon again when she was on patrol, with no success

Eventually, when she was alone, she’d start talking to herself; asking him to come back

The moment those words left her mouth, he’d appear; neither of them talking when they locked eyes

From there the two would confess their feelings for one another, despite the two being a demon and hunter, allowing for their relationship to properly start

She wanted to tell Celine, but anytime she brought up the topic of demons, she saw the anger and resentment in her eyes

So instead they kept their relationship a secret, dating for years as Ryu made sure the other hunters never found him

At some point they would get married, merely exchanging rings as a symbol of their union rather than doing anything official

However, when she fell pregnant, she knew she would have to come clean

I believe this caused a falling out with the hunters, with Ryu disappearing since she knew they would never accept her new lifestyle

She continued to hunt demons for as long as she could, doing it from the shadows so her former group couldn’t find her

Her husband would help her during this, using his demon abilities to his advantage and fully taking over when Ryu became too pregnant though

When Rumi was finally born, neither one of her parents knew how to raise such a unique child

At first they were cautious, meticulously noting down her demon attributes and any behaviours they thought were abnormal

However, they very quickly grew not to care about her differences and focused on making sure she was happy

Rumi lived a rather sheltered life with her parents, staying home most of the time until around the age of three

At this point I believe Gwi-Ma heard of a rogue demon that was helping a hunter, sending all his underlings to capture them

Their family remained hidden for a while, however the demons managed to track down the area and they lived in

Not wanting to leave the humans of their city in danger, and knowing that no matter where they went Gwi-Ma would find them, they tried coming up with a plan to defeat him

However, Rumi’s father knew that this was practically impossible, and decided to face the overlord alone

He quietly said goodbye to his family, leaving them in the middle of the night

Ryu knew exactly why he had gone when she realised he was missing, not knowing how to go after him while also protecting Rumi

Eventually, she’d run into Celine who had heard about the concentrated number of demons in the area

Seeing Rumi with her demon markings, everything clicked into place and Celine was horrified

Instead of explaining herself, Ryu pleaded with her to understand that Rumi was still her daughter

This managed to convince Celine to take care of the child while Ryu went to go look for her husband

I believe they would only reunite at the final battle, with demons trying to drag her husband back to the demon world

In the process, civilians were being killed as well, Gwi-Ma managing to slowly make his way topside because of the influx of souls

Here Ryu would do her best to protect everyone while saving her husband, the two of them reuniting amidst all the chaos

This would catch Gwi-Ma’s attention, with him directing all his resources towards capturing the hunter and her demon husband

The pair would manoeuvre around the city, trying to draw the mob away from the public

In the end though, they knew what they had to do

Charging to Gwi-Ma, they lured all of the demons back into his flames in an attempt to push him back in the underworld

This worked, however, at the cost of Ryu and her husband’s life

Celine witnessed the carnage, unable to stop Ryu’s sacrifice since she was taking care of Rumi and trying to direct all the civilians to safety

Celine blamed Ryu’s demon husband on all this, vowing to never let another corrupt those she loved

Therefore, despite being half demon herself, she raised Rumi to hide and despise her demon side

[juletheghoul]

Is there ever a time where marcus and girl ever go out just the two of themselves? like a stay on the country side, while their daughter is watched back home. (sometimes ya just gotta get a break from duties and taking care of a kid)

i’d feel like they’d both take their time enjoying the quiet time to relax (and very possibly engage in other “Activities”) cough cough.

they both deserve it, but they deserve everything in my book tbh LMAO.

OUUUUU you’re really onto something with this one 👀

Warnings; Marcus eating pussy because he’s a king, fingering, pov sex (18+), slight dirty talk, worrying about Diana, night out with the hubby, Marcus being perfect

Word count: 1.4K 😏

Masterlist series masterlist

-

The moon is so bright it shines in his hair. Your fingers slip through it and he hums happily. Your other hand holds onto him tightly.

Silently he guides the horse you both ride through the open air, the night is quiet but for the sounds of the horse breathing, the click of its hooves, the insects chirping. You press your face into his shoulder, breathe in the comforting smell of him, smile when you catch the scent of your daughter's hair in his robes. You worry about her for a moment, hope she won’t cry when you aren’t there to tend to her in the morning.

“She is fine, I promise you.” He speaks softly over his shoulder and you frown, had you spoken out loud?

“I did not say–” He laughs low, knowingly.

“You did not have to, I felt you tense up. There is only one thing that would make you worry and that is Diana. I promise you my love, she is well cared for, and we will be back before midday.” He pulls your hand up from where it sits at his sternum and presses a kiss to it.

“Are you a mindreader now then? An oracle in the shape of a General?” You tease him, rubbing his heart through his robes.

“I am attuned to my wife.” You can hear the smile in his voice. You press your lips to his neck, and give in to the trust you have for him, and the people in your house.

He turns off the road, and guides the horse through a copse of trees, following a path he must know by heart until you reach a small clearing. A tent, much like the one you inhabited during his battle, sits alone.

“Marcus, when did you do this?” He helps you down, smiling wide at the look of shock on your face as he ties the horse to a tree.

“I had a few of my men tend to it earlier. Come.” He holds your hand, guiding you towards it.

The inside is even more impressive than the surprise when he hurries to light the candles, a plush bedroll big enough for two, woven carpets, a table with two chairs, wine and food to last through the night and well into the morning.

“Do you like it?” He moves to stand behind you at the mouth of the tent, arms wrapping around your waist to press you close.

“Yes, it’s perfect.”

“You have been so busy tending to Diana, and to me in truth. I thought that tonight, I could tend to you.” His lips press to your neck, his tongue tastes your skin and for a moment you’re lost in the feeling of it. Until he presses one last kiss, and moves away.

“Come, my Sun, let us eat.” He pulls the chair out for you, and you follow.

-

The meal is eaten leisurely. Conversation flows like water, natural and free. You make a jest, and he laughs a deep laugh, the sound of which fills you with light. He pours for you, despite your assurances that you can pour for yourself, he waves it away, stands and caters to you.

The candles burn down to nothing while you talk about anything and everything that comes to mind. Diana, the house, meetings and gatherings he must attend, festivities you must host. You speak of your years together, your years alone. He asks questions about your time before him for the hundredth time, and you answer them. You ask questions about his life as a soldier, and he answers with candor.

The conversation eventually slows to a lull, a sweet, comfortable quiet between the two of you, filled with sly smiles, and hungry eyes.

“It feels strange to be so relaxed.” You confess as he takes your hand in his, presses it to his mouth.

“It does, feels quite nice though. I am happy to have you all to myself once more.” He rises, pulling you up to embrace him.

“Are you now? Am I too often called away from you?” Your fingers stroke his hair, he will need a cut soon.

“Yes, far too often. You know the love I have for our little blessing but she is far too greedy with you.” You laugh, pressing yourself closer.

“I think you may now know how I have felt all these years.” The look on his face makes you laugh all the harder, mock outrage, playful shock. “Do not play coy Marcus, wars and delegations and tours of Rome. I have had to content myself alone for many a moon’s turn.”

He hangs his head in a pantomime of shame.

“You are right, of course. As always.” His lips descend, landing soft upon your shoulder. “This is for us both, then.” His fingers tip your chin up, and then his mouth is on yours.

It takes him an instant to divest you of your robes.

It’s a passionate scramble onto his bed roll, full of kisses, and excited laughter. He bites his lip, lifts your leg to kiss the inside of your knee. He trails his lips up your inner thigh, up towards where you ache for him.

“I have longed for the taste of you, but we never seem to have enough time.” He settles, keeps your legs open with the breadth of his shoulders, your heart races. It never fails to shock you, the sight of his mouth descending onto your sex.

“Gods above.” His tongue makes you dizzy, swirling, tasting, probing, stroking you into a frenzy. He hums while he feasts, wide licks over the whole of you, enjoying you, savouring you like he does a fine wine.

“Yes, yes, there, Gods, just there–” He presses closer, suctions his lips around the pearl of you and strokes. The pleasure climbs so quickly, so steadily that your words of encouragement shift to an incomprehensible babble. It only spurs him on.

Fingers circle around your opening and then two breach, thick and all-consuming. He pets at the spot only he’s ever found, firmly, devastatingly until your whole body clenches, suspended in ecstasy. He’s smiling when you come back into your body, licking his fingers as though you’re the finest delicacy.

Your limbs are heavy, a bone deep relaxation, a pink haze in the shape of him.

“You cannot know how much I love seeing you like this. Naked, wet, drunk on what I do to you.”

“On your tongue, and those deft fingers.” You pull him up, taste yourself in his mouth.

“And my cock.” You feel it then, the blunt tip of him rubbing against the sensitive mess he has made of your sex.

“Oh yes, how could I forget–” You gasp, a sharp intake of breath when he slips inside. It does not seem to matter how many times he’s taken you, or how wet you are, the heavy weight of him always makes your mind blank. That filling stretch, the one you know you’ll feel in the morning always makes you forget how to speak.

“Does that feel good?” He pants out the words, sweat beading on his brow with the effort of fucking into you.

“Yes, so good, harder.” You wrap your arms tighter around his neck and he obeys, buries his face into your neck and snaps his hips hard enough to make you gasp and whimper with each stroke. It’s too good to speak, too good to think of anything except the feeling of him. His cock hits almost too deep, but there is nothing in this world that would ever make you ask him to stop.

His moans in your ear, the unabashed way he sings his pleasure only makes it better, only makes you wetter and another climax creeps through your limbs.

You know he’s close when the groans turn into sharp pants, hot enough against your skin to raise goosebumps. Your fingers dip into his mouth and he sucks them with a filthy groan before you slip them between your bodies and swirl them around your clit.

The slip of his spit, the knowledge that you are alone here in this tent shoves you into a second, more intense climax, and it brings him down with you. The warm jet of his gift deep inside makes you glow, makes you preen under his love-glazed eyes, makes you laugh with the joy of his embrace.

“God’s above.” He laughs, watching himself pull out of you. He rolls over, pulls you into his arms where you both catch your breath.

“Indeed.” You hum, tracing patterns onto his chest. “Gratitude my love, for planning this.” You push his hair out of his face, admire the lines and the scars and the softness in his eyes you’ve only ever seen directed at you, or Diana.

“I do not want your gratitude, only your love.” He smiles, pressing his mouth to yours.

-

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[norriszn]

with The Nortrell Primer coming up soon (it's coming up soon i prommy), i wanted to start sharing a few things i've pieced together, a few things that didn't quite add up at the time, especially during that twitch stream from about 3 years ago, when lando was live answering some questions from subs/viewers with max, cause i didn't know all the stuff i know now ofc.

and when i say "a few things" i really mean a lot of things but they all lead back to the same thing: the day max saw his best friend for the first time. which, for the record, wasn't the first time they spoke and it wasn't the first time they officially met.

it was just the first time max saw lando like really saw him and, for some reason, remembered.

LANDO'S TWITCH STREAM | lando and max talking about karting days

april 14th 2022

as many as you know, they both began karting early, on separate countries but with the same goal. they didn't end up on the same team (ricky flynn motorsport) until 2012, and it wasn't until 2013 that they finally competed against each other in the same class (kf-junior) during the WSK euro series.

in this clip, they talk about how they got started in karting, which eventually leads to max sharing the story of the first time he saw lando on track.

full transcript:

max: "what made you get into karting?" erm, i went to the singapore f1 race in 2008. loved it, loved the sound. and then i tried karting after school once and just fell in love with it... lando: awww max... and kept going back every day. and then i just started racing. i'm not going to go into that story really. it's take ages. i just liked it when i tried it. and then i kept doing it. lando: i did mine... we went to a car race after school on friday, mate. max: yeah? lando: and then my dad went round asking different people if they have any spare suits and boots. and i think we've still got the suits and boots that i got. it was like a blue suit and i mean, at the time, right, i must, it's 2007. so i must have had like a kids 13 size shoe, mate. kids 12, maybe not even that. max: kids 12. lando: kids 12 or something, and these are like size 3, size 4 shoes, which are way too big for me. imagine me in a bambino, right? (the bambino karting class is for kids aged 6–8, using smaller, lighter karts made just for them) how small i was within a size 4 shoe! max: i first saw you -we didn't know each other at this point- but i remember watching, i don't know why i was at pfi (as in pf international circuit). you were just driving around in this little comer (as in comer cadet), like tiny, mate. and i just remember watching for a few laps. lando: yeah, you're watching me, yeah? max: yeah, someone said "that kid... he's just won or something" so i was like oh. lando: oh, really? max: yeah, it was... you had the...that... your first helmet with that black and orange one on. lando: i'm not going to lie i never won a race in cadets. max: i don't know, they said you've... i don't know... you were first(?) [inaudible for me] lando: i think they just said i was goated. max: yeah, probably chatting to the team boss, picking you up. lando: i was probably like 5 years old. max: you were erm... lando: i must have been what? max: you had the black and orange lid on. lando: yeah, so i must have been 8, 9. max: yeah. lando: but i mean, i was freaking tiny at 9 years old. max: you're whizzing round, mate. you're so small. their friend: max, you've been following borris around since he was 9. max: yeah. lando: he's just an absolute fanboy, really. max: i'm day one fan, mate. their friend: watch his fanboy. he's a hidden fan girl. he's a double agent in disguise. max: (to his friend) you're the fan girl, mate. you've recently discovered discord and gets in every day. lando: he's freaking every day waiting on discord for us to join, mate.

okay, now let's set aside how they got into karting for a second and just focus on what max said. because it's kind of wild. he knew lando before even really knowing him. max didn't know who he was, but he remembered him. remembered the way he drove. remembered the way someone told him that lando won and remembered how tiny he was.

max remembered him long before they became anything to each other.

and of course, lando, being very lando, laughed it off and said "you were watching me, yeah?" in that confident way he does when he's just trying to wind max up... but because he's also so lando, you could practically hear his brain gears turning mid stream, and, as always, once his brain starts going, his mouth doesn't exactly wait for permission to follow.

that's when he said two things that stuck with me:

first, that he never won a race in cadets, as in comer cadets class.

and second, that he was probably around nine years old at the time.

and that's what made me revisit all of this. i remember watching that stream and thinking: there's no way max is making that up. no way someone just randomly told him a random kid (lando was random kid abck then) had won when he hadn't. like… who lies to a kid's face like that? (who would lie to this face? not me)

so i went back. i started digging because earlier this year (big 2025), when the 2019 rookies (george, lando, alex) started "closing up" in the formula (n)one standings again, i remembered they used to race in the same karting series: the super one series (s1 to f1). and that little spark sent me down the rabbit hole, and eventually, i ended up writing a big post about it in april but i finally posted like a week ago (this one right here).

and here's what i realised: lando norris is an unreliable narrator.

i don't blame him tho... memories from that age blur, results get mixed up, wins feel smaller in hindsight. but still. lando... let me hold your hands (The Big Paws) when i say this... you were the comer cadet 'o' plate winner in 2010.

there is literal footage. there is photo evidence.

lando norris wins comer cadet 'o' plate 2010

via tvkc on fb reposting 4motor yt vid

earlier this year, adam norris posted what looked like a karting memory (note)book on ig and the front cover was a photo of little lando norris, small enough to look like he barely fit in the frame, holding a massive trophy. that pic as far as i can tell, was taken the day he won the comer cadet ‘o’ plate, at none other than pf international circuit, the very same place max said he saw lando for the first time.

age 10, "karting is what i love doing an my ambition is to win the formula 1 world championship" via adam_norris_pure_electric on ig (this pic is not part of adam ig feed anymore btw :/)

so far, everything lines up pretty well... that race lando won was in june 6th 2010, which means both he and max would've been 10 years old, not 9 like lando said in the stream.

so… was it that exact date, that exact circuit, where max first saw lando? ermmm, well, max said lando was wearing a black and orange helmet. and while lando was wearing a helmet that looked similar, it wasn't exactly black and orange on that day.

he did have a black and orange lid back in 2009 when he was racing in comer cadets (yes, he raced in comer cadets back in 2008, 2009 and 2010).

and how do i know lando did wear that black and orange helmet? because there’s a book — published over fifteen years ago by none other than jane eyes and steve illott, callum illott’s parents.

now, if you're reading this (and i'm not just screaming into the void), you might be asking: why would callum’s parents publish a book? well, simple — callum was also racing in the comer cadet class in 2009.

jane and steve put together that book — and a few others — filled with photos from every round of the championship, each with little captions underneath.

and this particular book was focused on lando and his older brother, oliver. and in those photos (which i'll include below), you can clearly see lando in 2009, wearing — you guessed it — a black and orange helmet.

comer cadet season 2009 by jane eyes and steveilott via blurb books uk

if you're wondering how i even found this book: i stumbled across it years ago just by googling “lando norris karting 2009 cadets” but it came back to me this year when adam posted a pic of a page of it back in february.

@.lando @.olivernorris1 Good photo jane_eyes_ilott via adam_norris_pure_electric on threads

(adam's name is a recurrent name in this post. lando might joke that max was his og fan but truthfully? one of his biggest fans has always been his dad. kudos to adam.)

in that post, adam tagged callum's mum, which makes it pretty likely that he was flipping through that exact same book.

let's keep going.

lando that year he didn't win a single race, didn't take the 'o' plate, and finished 14th in the championship standings.

and here's the key part: in 2009, max was still living in malaysia. we know this because on november 22nd, 2009, max raced in the red white sangari invitational kart prix, where he finished 5th. so he couldn’t have seen lando racing in the uk that year.

so... is max an unreliable narrator too? maybe. or maybe he just remembered the helmet a little differently. it's far more likely he saw the chrome and orange helmet lando wore in 2010 and remembered it as black and orange. they were similar enough, especially in motion. it happens.

taking all that into account: the dates, the location, the helmet, the timelines... i feel pretty confident saying NOW that in june 6th in 2010, at pf international circuit, max saw a tiny little boy who would eventually become his best friend :') smol frens !!!!

that was the moment. that was the origin story.

and lando doesn't even remember it lmao.

incredible.

oh, and if you want to make all of this even more insane, check the 2010 MSA drivers entry list. you'll find norris siblings names, and yes callum illott (he raced that year too!)but keep scrolling and you'll spot a slighthy familiar name: edward jones.

super one msa series 2010 entries (26.2.10) via super one british kart series news

now, if you're asking yourself who's edward jones???? just click here (that's ed's ig carrousel from last year, you can see lando, max and tom as well <3 because those are his friends and ed is a racing driver now btw)

it's actually insane to think about that maybe max didn't just see lando for the first time that day. he might've seen ed too, one of his closest friends.

alexa, play invisible string by t swift!

that's all. bye.

WAIT. one more thing:

please don’t take this to twitter. i've done my best to stick to what's public: things max has said himself, karting pages pdfs and published books. nothing way too personal.

the last thing i want is for anyone to make max/lando/ed uncomfortable or start harassing them with questions.

if i see this out of context on that hellsite i will cry and i will delete everything and then i will relocate to the moon. bye <3

[booniebaby141]

Birds of Ratite

Ghost X Soap

After extensive research, I’ve come to the conclusion that Simon Riley would have a hyperfixation about birds, specifically cassowaries because “They’re like fucking dinosaurs Johnny, be grateful they can’t fly, they can kick hard enough to break bones.”

Johnny will gladly listen to Simon talk about them for hours on end. I like to think when Simon runs out of Dad jokes to tell him during missions, he just rattles off fact after fact. Johnny can’t really complain, he does the EXACT same shit to Simon all the time; any time he gets first kit haul, he will prattle on about all the explosives, chemical compounds, and ammunition he got for the next demolition.

They will gladly listen to each other yap, especially in high stress situations, where it could mean the difference between life or death…

~~~

“Bravo 7-1 to Watcher, just outside the safe house 2 Klicks North of the drop zone. Ghost is in critical condition! Knife wound to the abdomen, need medevac NOW!”

“Copy that 7-1, sending help your way.”

“Fuck, c’mon stay with me Sir.”

The two had collapsed just outside the safe house, falling to the grassy field before leaning against the safe house wall. Soap looked around aimlessly and desperately, watching as the sun peaked just over the horizon, illuminating his face, and his hands, now covered in the blood of his best friend as he kept a firm hold over the wound to prevent further bleeding.

Ghost almost wanted to laugh at the situation, being stabbed with his own knife by an opposing soldier was definitely not on his Task Force bingo card. It had been driven deep into his stomach before being yanked out as Soap flanked the man, dropping him to the ground while he still had a solid grip on the knife. The cut was deep and Ghost was starting to get delirious from the blood loss, he’d pass out soon enough if they didn’t get help quickly.

“Sir? Stay with me... Help’s coming L.T.”

“Johnny?”

“Ghost? I’m right here mate.”

He began to pull at the seams of his mask, trying to take it off in his weakened state when Soaps hands stopped him. It was an old promise they’d made to each other if they found themselves in a near death situation. They wanted to die seeing each others faces, their real faces.

“Simon no, stop. I’m not gonna let that happen, you’re gonna be fine. Quick, umm… How high can a cassowary jump?”

“What Johnny? Why?”

“Just answer the question, Sir.”

Ghost huffed raggedly but eventually wheezed out a struggled “7 feet.”

Soap nodded with a weak smile. “Aye, what’s the scientific name for them?” He continued to ask Ghost questions and keep him somewhat lucid.

Ghost realized what Soap was doing now, and he thought hard to try and stay awake until medevac arrived. “It’s *cough* it-it’s Casuar- *cough* casuarius johnsonii.”

They could hear the chopper approaching, Ghost rolled his head against the safe house wall, landing on Soaps shoulder as darkness seeped in through the corners of his vision. “It’s cold Johnny…”

Soap propped him back up, getting in front of him and running his hands up and down the length of his arms in an attempt to warm him up some. “They’re landing now Simon, just a bit longer aye? Quick, tell me where they live.”

“Wha? Johnny?” Ghost slurred out, struggling to keep himself awake but he knew he had to, for his sake, and Johnnys.

“The cassowaries L.T, where do they live?”

“N-new *cough* New Guinea, and Aus-Australia.”

“Aye? Well I’m gonna take you there when this is all over, so you stay awake you big, broody, bastard.”

That got a slight chuckle from Ghost, which quickly turned to a fit of coughing and sputtering as the pain sharpened in his abdomen and the blood seemed to pour out at an even faster rate. Soap kept his hands placed firmly on the wound, watching as Ghosts head rolled to the side again and he grew quiet, uncharacteristically so even for him. He was so cold, so tired. In his half delirious state, the warmth of Johnnys hands gave him enough illusion of safety to start drifting asleep.

“Ghost? Ghost?! Come on wake up Sir! Their wheels are down. Wake up you bastard! Come on, tell me their wingspan, what colours are they, anything Sir!”

The last thing Ghost remembered hearing before passing out was the frantic, panicked shouting of his teammate and the warmth of his skin, followed by the hurried thudding of boots on the ground as a medical team was pulling over a stretcher with Price in tow. He hears a faint conversation, something whispered, something upsetting, before being pulled up to the stretcher and feeling the last bit of consciousness being pulled from him.

The warmth never left however.

He wakes up in a hospital bed, Johnny’s hand clasped around his. He looks like shit, like he hadn’t left Ghosts side for a second to clean himself up. Still bloodied and stained, yet here he was watching over his lieutenant like a hawk.

“You made it L.T.”

“You fucking made it.”

Ghost didn’t have time to reply before strong arms were wrapped around his chest in embrace. He winced slightly as Johnnys weight pressed down on the bandaged stab wound, but eventually settled in a soothing silence as he held Johnny closer. He pretended not to hear the sniffles coming from his sergeant.

“I made it Johnny.”

The two remained that way for a while, Ghost looked around his hospital room to see the array of things left by his team. There were several cards surrounding a large bouquet of roses, hydrangeas, morning glories, and marigolds; all the colors of a cassowary’s feathers. There were some bottles of bourbon left by the Vaqueros, even Nik had brought a little mug with birds painted on by Soap. Inside the mug, Ghost noticed two slips of paper.

“What’s in the mug Johnny?” He asked suspiciously, to which Soap chuckled before briefly letting go of Ghost to grab the tickets.

“I told you, you make it through this, I’m taking you to see them. Once you’re given the all clear from medical, we’re going…”

Ghost looked in awe at the two tickets, round trip to Australia with accommodations and a visit to the Taronga Conservation.

“Fucking hell, Johnny…”

“Ahh, don’t give me all the credit, Gaz helped me find the place and Price gave us the leave and got us a hotel. But I planned the rest. Got even more surprises in sto-”

Soap was cut off as Ghost pulled up his balaclava slightly to give him a kiss. Soap leaned into it, returning his initial embrace and kissing him right back, soft and gentle; what they both needed after such a close encounter with death. Talk of the trip could wait. For now, they simply needed each other.

“8 to 10 feet Johnny.”

“What Sir?”

“I never answered your question before, their wingspan is 8 to 10 feet.”

“Hah, guess we’re gonna see then aye L.T.”

“I guess we are.”

2 Weeks Later

“Watch out for the magpies Johnny, they’re even worse than Canadian Geese. Hey look up, a Masked Lapwing! And it’s a black shouldered subspecies, you usually only find them in New Zealand. Did you know that the only species of bird who can do…”

Soap listened with a smile although he did lose track at times as Ghost listed off every bird he saw in the conservation and had at least 3 facts for each one of them. Still, it was good to see him back up and about, and back to his usual self. Although it was a side of him rarely seen, Soap felt honoured he felt comfortable enough to show it to him. Both men nearly cried when they finally got to visit the cassowaries. Simon nearly cried because he finally got to meet his favourite bird in person, and Johnny because he finally got to watch Simon meet his favourite bird in person.

~~~

Just a silly Ghoap idea I had from a TikTok I saw on cassowaries. What else would they yap about? I just know Ghost and Soap are the AuDHD dream team of hyperfixation.

[beef-brisket]

As she stood in the mirror, she smoothed her dressier her stomach, smiling as her blue dress showed off her small bump. She was finally 6 months pregnant, and loving every moment.

The last few weeks had been draining, in a few days, they were going to travel to Earth and see Sera. They weren't bringing the twins, just in case Sera acted... badly.

Adele walked out of the room and made her way to Lucifer's office. When she walked in, she saw Lucifer on the phone. But he wasn't talking talking to anyone. Eventually, the king sighed and lowered his phone, pressing the hang up button.

That's when she saw who the call was with.

Adele: Charlie? Are you two talking again?

She sounded hopeful, which didn't make Lucifer feel any better.

Lucifer: No... she still isn't answering... I've... really fucked up, I think.

Adele rubbed Lucifer's arm: We shouldn't have told them... I didn't realise it would effect them so much... I'm sorry, Lu. I... this isn't what I wanted.

Lucifer smiled softly down at her before kissing Adele's forehead: Don't worry, love. It's not your fault... besides! We have an important day coming up! And I have a feeling your mother will give me a run for my money, hm?

Adele smiled, but she still felt horrible about how Charlie and Vaggie was feeling: Yeah, I'm sure she will... and... the sins are looking after the twins?

Lucifer: Sins? Oh, no, just two sins and a imp!

Adele: Uh... huh?

Lucifer smiled: Ozzie, Bee and some imp called... Rollipolli?

Adam: Wow... that's... a name, alright.

✨Worship✨

@beef-brisket

Adele was putting the finishing touches on her makeup, everything had to be perfect. She was wearing a black mini skirt, a black thin crop top, fish net stockings, a push up bra and crotchless lace panties.

She was ready, she's been preparing for this moment for years and now it was finally going to happen.

Adele was going to summon the devil, marry him, and have all of his babies. She worshiped him for years much to her mother's disappointment. Adele even saved herself for him and stopped taking her birth control to be sure that she would get pregnant.

Adele: There, all finished.

Looking around her room, that was normally a mess but she even cleaned it up.

She grabbed this book that she got from this shady looking guy outside a Walmart parking lot, he said that it would summon the devil to her guaranteed. He also said there was a spell to bond him to her.

Adele sat down on the bed and took a deep breath, she needed to calm down before this happened. First impressions matter!

-

Down in Hell, Lucifer was reading over the papers that his lawyer gave him for the divorce proceedings for him and Lilith.

Ten thousand years down the drain.

Groaning he slapped the paper down, he didn't want to deal with this or that woman right now.

He needed a distraction.

[alexanderwales]

Not the asker from before, just saw that you were open to questions about web serial preferences.

I'm particularly curious about your opinions on the Wildbow serials; you called Worm out as a prior hyperfixation, but I saw on the chart that you'd checked out early re: the author's other stories.

Did you just not find them interesting? Do you think there's something about what made Worm compelling that was absent in the others? I've always been curious about why Worm in particular was such an explosive success, but it's hard to discuss because the Worm and Wildbow fanbases almost feel like distinct entities sometimes. People talk past each other.

I really enjoyed Worm, yeah, and spent a fair amount of time on the discord, the subreddit, spot-reading, fact-checking, doing analysis, stuff like that. It was ages ago: I read Worm as it was coming out.

As for why I didn't stick with the others ... it's complicated.

I think Wildbow is, for my tastes, actively bad at pacing. This showed in Worm, then showed a lot more in Pact. Part of the issue is that the stories (to the extent I've read them) begin to have this monotone feel to them, like each chapter has the same "energy" as the last, which is often anxious, angry, stressful, cornered, etc. Over the course of, say, half a million words, I tend to get fatigued. So Pact ended up being something that I dropped relatively early, before the Toronto arc.

Ward was just ... not what I wanted. The premise is that the world has ended and they're reconstructing society on an entirely different alternate Earth, and then this felt like it was largely background, and I didn't enjoy the therapy stuff, and the worldbuilding seemed so lazy to me, which was not at all the case in Worm. I wrote some fanfic, fairly early on, which was my attempt to express the things that I wished it was about, and to come to grips with the fact that it wasn't about the things I wanted it to be about. Still, I used to wait up until midnight for new chapters to drop, so I could read them and discuss with people, and eventually the chapter were coming later and later, and they'd come when I was tired, and that's how I fell off, because I also wasn't having that great a time with it. I didn't care about Victoria, who had too much baggage and uninteresting thoughts. One of the things I remember sticking out to me is that she focused a lot on clothes and appearances, giving much more detailed descriptions of them, and I thought that this was something that Wildbow was doing to differentiate her from other protagonists, and also that I did not really give a shit about Victoria's interest in clothing. I keep wanting to go back to it and finish it, just for the sake of completion, so it's not technically dropped by my standards, and I never hit a point where I thought "okay, I'm done with this, I'm not finishing this". I've been spoiled on a fair amount of what happens after the point I stopped reading the updates (I'm not spoiler averse), and nothing really made me think that it would be a good fit for me. Still, a very decent chance that I come back to it and binge the stuff I haven't read in a handful of weeks.

Twig ... people kept telling me that it was good, and I think I tried three times to get into it. I have no idea how far I actually got, but I gave it a fair shake, maybe ... four arcs? I think biopunk is also not a favored genre for me, and the characters didn't grip me very much, and it felt a bit like a "monster of the week" thing except that there was just so much word count, and not in a good way.

I hear people praising Claw, and Seek, and I think "okay, maybe I should check those out", but it's very possible that after Worm I was just too familiar with Wildbow as an author and thought that there was some ... redundancy to reading more? Especially millions of words more?

I've always been curious about why Worm in particular was such an explosive success

I think there are a few reasons for this, but this answer is already getting pretty long, so I'll be brief: Worm came along very early on, did things with the superhero genre that people hadn't seen much of before, had a particular ethos when it came to powers, munchkinry, and characters, and for all that I would argue it had "bad pacing" it did contain a pretty steady progression from idea to idea, and most of them worked. It also had a lot of structure that helped the fanfic scene explode, in a way other works didn't. I think most people who have read Worm could write a dozen half-decent "Worm-style" heroes without much trouble, but the same can't be said of any of Wildbow's other works (at least, to my admittedly incomplete knowledge). It's a combination of a lot of things, and I don't think most of them are repeatable by Wildbow or anyone else.

[im-addicted-2u]

PREVIEW; how do you talk to a star? | f.w.

fred weasley x reader

warnings: no use of y/n, non-gryffindor reader (house unspecified), model student reader, potentially inaccurate portrayal of ootp because it’s been about eight years since i read it, INCOMPLETE! w.c. 736 author's note: i wanted to prove that i'm still writing since this fic has been taking me awhile...here's a short preview of my next post! inspired by a certain blog i won't tag until the final post.

That weekend, the Valentine’s Day Hogsmeade trip took place on the 17th. You went alone, solely for the fact that the only person you’d really want to go with wasn’t in your good books at the moment—and you’re too scared to ask him anyway. Still, your feet wandered to Zonko’s as if seeking him out; no dice.

With a roll of your eyes at your antics, you instead retreated to Honeydukes, something more up your alley. The scent of chocolate hits your nostrils and the warm atmosphere soothes your chilly face. The February winter wasn’t nearly as bad as January’s, but the respite of a cozy chocolate shop was always welcome. You meandered in the aisles with the grace of a dancer, knowing its selection well enough to pick up your favorites with your eyes closed.

You were eying a collection of fruity dark chocolate bars when a hand slid up your back. Instinctually, you tensed and just about uttered a hex, but stopped once a familiar freckled face appeared in your vision.

“I would try the raspberry one. It speaks to me,” said Fred, his hand still on your back, and even through your thick winter coat, you felt the bruising heat of his skin.

“What are you doing here?” You attempted to sound annoyed, but only came across intrigued, much to Fred’s evident delight as he smiled back at you.

“I figured I’d find you around things like you.” His words were met with your blank stare, and he snorted. “Sweet. C’mon, that one was obvious.”

Oh. You looked back at the candy bars, which seemed even more enticing now that you were avoiding looking at Fred. You grabbed the raspberry bar and clasped it with both hands, the force of which would eventually snap it if you didn’t let up.

“Are you messing with me?” you accused him, the effect dampened by your raging blush.

“Messing with you? Oh, I’d never.” Fred pulled you into his side, arm thrown once again haphazardly over your shoulders.

“See, now you’re just lying straight to my face,” you replied.

“Lying to you? Oh, I’d never.” He sent a smirk your way that you reply to with an eye roll.

The Fred of your imagination was far more charming, but even the lightest of teasing that he’s given you so far is enough to fluster you, so perhaps that version of Fred would truly make you combust.

“Where’s your other half?” you asked. 

“Date. Angelina,” Fred answered shortly, picking up a chocolate bar with key lime pie filling and pulling a face. “So you’re stuck with me for the next couple of hours.”

“I’ll try not to enjoy myself too much,” you said dryly, attempting to move down the aisle only for Fred to tug you back into him. His warmth invaded your skin;  he smelled like something homey, a clean blanket and a fire winding down to embers. He could tell you weren’t really fighting.

He gave your arm a squeeze, winked when you looked over, and replied, “Trust me, I intend for you to enjoy yourself plenty. We’re starting at Honeydukes, then we’ll head to Zonko’s, take a walk, grab some butterbeer. I made the plan as soon as I saw you.”

You raised an eyebrow, looking up at him from beneath your lashes. You never thought in your wildest dreams that this would be happening. That Fred Weasley would hold you close in a chocolate shop and talk about the two of you alone together for hours.

“That sounds like a date.”

Fred shrugged. “Could be. I’m showing you more of life, remember? Every girl needs a good date.”

You scoffed. “What if I’ve been on a date already?”

Fred hummed, but the mischievous twinkle in his eye proved he wasn’t really thinking about it. He prepared a million answers before you even asked the question. “A good date?”

“Sure.”

“You may have had dates already, but I intend to be your best date,” said Fred.

“Oh yeah?” You pretended not to swoon, but you think he saw it in your eyes, because he pulled you a little closer, rested his head atop yours, as if you were the only two people in the world.

If his head wasn’t above yours, if you’d maybe inclined your head up a little, you would’ve seen the soft, genuine smile on Fred’s face as he replied, “Yeah.”

[ginneke]

Pairing: Link/Revali

Rating: T (mild innuendo, mild swearing.)

Status: COMPLETE

--

Link was in a romcom gone wrong.

Now Revali is trying - and failing - at the mystery genre. (Pity him.)

[sysig]

Go play pretend on your own (Patreon)

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

Just want to say: a, I admire very much that you've figured out a healthy way to work on your fics that allows you to have fun with it. And also b, am very excited to hear that you are getting there with pez! It has fully given me brain rot ever since I read it last year, there is just such a lack of content for the highly specific trope of using time travel as a device to explore extremely unhealthy levels of self loathing.

I just adore everything you're doing in it. Neither midoriya is anywhere approaching okay for any portion of the fic and I love rereading and mining into all the subtle characterization pointing to that. It's a bit like nhtycth in that some really goofy funny stuff is often hiding some really fucking worrying things, but the fact that characters DO do that stuff—that todoroki uses his teaspoon's worth of extremely stunted social skills to bludgeon his friend's door open and help him, that a rpf shipping war is an actual source of drama despite how goofy the sentiment seems on the surface, that about half of what jon says is deeply worrying and the other half is extremely funny and there's a lot of overlap between the two—really lifts the tension and brightens the universe. It's sort of similar to what you did with gerry, in that endless misery isn't nearly as painful as the ups and downs of a life that, when you step back and zoom out, has something deeply and horribly wrong with it.

(jon sort of reminds me of spider-man in that he uses human to deal with trauma and stress, except I don't think he at any point realizes how fucking funny he is. He's just there, in a home depot, gnashing his teeth because he's got so many bodies to dispose of and this cashier sure is taking her time.)

I really, really, really have had trouble finding fics that take everything midoriya has dealt with to task. It's a hell of a thing to live 14 years as a disabled minority, have it heavily shape your existence, and then one day you wake up and you realize you're...not that, or at least, nobody will ever acknowledge you as that again. You've lost all claim to it. Those experiences that shaped who you are? Dust in the wind. 14 years of pain and life might as well be buried in the ground for all the good they do you. Nobody's going to cut you any slack or quarter, you've gotta simply work harder, be better. And now when you do that you get the results you wanted, so that's fine, then. That's good. There was something wrong with the you before, and there's something right with the you now, and if the transition is a little rough, well that doesn't matter, you're the same as everyone else now, so it's your own job to fill in whatever gaps you need to.

I really can't get over how mentally fucked it must be for midoriya to run into quirkless people, run across quirkless issues, and be silently caught between, incapable of speaking his mind and too scared to do so anyway around those he can trust.

Also I should mention, I'm just very excited for bakugou to get back from the gym. He's been there like a year I hope he's getting a good workout in.

Me realizing that it’s been a year since pez dispenser debris:

I feel like there’s just this very specific type of grief that Izuku has to grapple with in the span of pez dispenser debris that I’m just obsessed with. He’s sort of silently mourning who he could have been, when 1) he has to present like there’s nothing lost to maintain his secret and 2) the entire world is constantly inundating him with the message that there was nothing lost.

Like. I don’t want to get too deep into it because it risks spoiling things and I do have major plans to continue it (I’ve loved this story for so many years before I ever even hit publish), but the emotion that Izuku’s feeling right now is so much more complex than “I hate who I used to be and want him to stop existing” or “I just want to keep my secrets.” And I think the way he interacts with Mirio is the biggest evidence of that.

Izuku’s placed himself at the very center of the Quirklessness debate with his support of Mirio. He fights for Quirkless heroes, very publicly, to the point where he’s not even graduated yet but considered to be one of the most prominent voices on the matter. If you took a poll of Quirkless people as to which hero would be most supportive of them pursing their own career in heroics, Izuku would be right at the top of the list. When it comes to Quirklessness itself, he’s nothing but supportive.

But he didn’t tell Mirio the truth of his own Quirklessness.

Out of everyone, Mirio’s the one everyone expects to know, despite him being a relatively newer relationship compared to someone like Iida or Uraraka or Todoroki. And I tried to imply that he’s sort of the one who knows the most about Izuku out of everyone save All Might.

Like, we’ll get into how much exactly Mirio knows soon, so I won’t divulge what, if anything, Izuku has told him. But we know that Mirio knows, weirdly enough, that Izuku is deeply fucking haunted. He knows that boy has many violent ghosts in his bones. He finds it hilarious and will tell their realtor about it. Izuku told him about the discontent spirits who died in a violent passion and live on inside of him before he told him about his Quirklessness.

And I just feel like one of those things is a little bit easier to discuss than the other.

Izuku has decided to keep his own Quirklessness quiet in a way that surpasses secrecy about One for All. If it was just about OfA, he could tell people he didn’t get his quirk until the entrance exam, and it wouldn’t even be a lie. He’s purposefully obscuring his own past as Quirkless even as he takes a forefront of the Quirkless hero debate with his open support of Mirio.

And the fact that he’s at the forefront of this debate in and of itself requires a difficult dichotomy. He is the world’s most vocal proponent for the first Quirkless hero. He is a known figure in the Quirkless community now.

He isn’t considered one of them anymore. He’s an outsider coming in.

It must be such a strange, odd sort of grief to come to the people you were home amongst for most of your life and be greeted as a stranger. To return home, and to be welcomed in for the first time, and to not even be able to tell people that you’ve lived here all your life and don’t need a tour.

It’s a sort of death of self, I think. And I think Izuku never expected to have to grapple with his own ghost.

[thatonefatgumsimp]

I NEED HELP (DND Stuff, might be a dumb question idk-)

So genuine question for DND side of tumblr, but- I've been thinking recently...

And are the things next to the dragonborn colors in the player handbook, like, types of damage that are less effective, their magical girl power, or both?

Cuz I never really thought about that before and I have absolutely no idea-

[iydiamartinx]

UNEXPECTED GUESTS I

jason x reader, platonic!damian wayne

divider by: @cafekitsune & @thecutestgrotto & @omi-resources word count: 835 synopsis: Jason’s secret relationship is discovered by Damian—who keeps showing up uninvited. Jason’s patience is tested, popcorn is made, but at least Damian brought cinnamon rolls. a/n: this one went off the rails slightly and the rest of the upcoming parts are equally as unhinged (at least compared to what I usually write).

Compared to your apartment, Jason’s place was practically Fort Knox. You and he had been dating long enough that you’d practically moved in—and you knew his secret identity. Still, you’d never met his family, something Jason was adamant about keeping that way. You knew of them, of course, but hadn’t expected to meet them anytime soon.

Which was why you definitely weren’t expecting a ten-year-old ninja to break in.

You had just stepped out of the shower when you heard it—the quiet thud. At first, you thought it might’ve been Jason returning from patrol early. But then came the faint creak of the window opening.

Jason never used the window.

Cautiously, you stepped into the living room, still in a robe, hair dripping. And froze.

There, near the kitchen counter, stood a boy. Arms crossed. Hood down. Eyes sharp as blades.

“You’re not his roommate,” he said flatly.

You blinked. Your shoulders slowly relaxed. While you’d never met Damian Wayne personally, you’d seen enough pictures—and heard Jason complain just enough about the “demon child”—to recognize him instantly.

“…And you’re not the pizza guy,” you replied, equally dry, one brow raised. “So I guess we’re both surprised.”

He didn’t smile. Didn’t even blink. Just stared, like he was trying to unearth your darkest secrets with sheer willpower.

“Who are you?” he demanded, stepping forward.

“His girlfriend,” you said, calmly. And waited for the explosion.

There was no point in hiding it. You figured that now that you’d met Damian, it was only a matter of time before the rest of the Bat-family found out. Honestly, you were surprised they hadn’t already—weren’t they supposed to be the world’s greatest detectives?

It didn’t take long.

“I knew it,” the boy hissed. “He’s been acting suspicious for weeks. Staying out longer. Not snapping at everyone. There was even a smile—a smile—on his face during training.”

He circled you slowly, hands behind his back like a miniature detective—or a very judgmental cat. “I assumed he was hiding something. Drugs. Maybe a dog. But you… you’re worse.”

Your lips twitched. “A dog would’ve been worse, to be honest. He’s not exactly home on time for walkies.”

He ignored your joke. “How do I know you’re not a threat? An assassin. A spy. Someone sent to manipulate him.”

You raised your hands in mock surrender. “You think I’m seducing Jason Todd for intel?” You snorted. “Believe me, no one’s paying me for this kind of emotional labor.”

His lips twitched—just barely. Not a smile. Not quite. But something close.

Still, he didn’t back down. “What do you know about him?”

“Enough to stay,” you answered simply, dropping onto the couch and toweling off your hair. “Enough to know he sleeps better when I’m here. Eats better. Talks more. Still leaves his laundry everywhere, but that’s apparently not fixable.”

Damian stood frozen, like he was running your answer through a thousand internal filters.

Eventually, he moved to sit—perching like a hawk on the armrest across from you, expression still wary but less… militant.

“So you know what he does,” Damian said stiffly.

“It’s how we met,” you replied, reaching for the remote. “He was horrible at keeping the whole alter ego a secret.”

“Are you trained?” he asked next.

“To deal with him? Yes.” You shot him a grin. “To fight? Not really. But I have excellent aim with a frying pan.”

For the first time, a snort escaped him—quick and unintentional. And then: “I suppose you’re tolerable.”

“That’s the nicest thing anyone under five feet has said to me.”

Damian frowned. “I’m ten.”

“Still under five feet.”

He huffed but stayed where he was, and after a moment, reached for the coffee table and grabbed the half-finished puzzle you’d been working on. Without asking, he began fitting pieces into place with alarming precision.

An hour later, Jason came home through the fire escape, expecting silence—or maybe the sound of you watching reruns, bundled up in one of his old shirts.

What he didn’t expect was the sight of you and his youngest brother sitting side by side on the floor, surrounded by puzzle pieces and popcorn, mid-argument about whether Red Hood could beat a grizzly bear in a fight on pure strength alone.

He stopped in the doorway and stared.

Damian glanced up. “You’re late.”

Jason blinked. “You broke in.”

“He made popcorn,” you said helpfully, tossing a piece into your mouth.

Jason pointed between the two of you. “What the hell is happening?”

“She’s tolerable,” Damian said, as if that answered everything.

Jason groaned. “I leave for two hours…”

“And you almost lost your popcorn privileges for keeping me hidden,” you added, smirking at him. “Apparently, I’m a national security threat.”

Jason pinched the bridge of his nose, muttering something about Wayne surveillance equipment and upgrading the locks to keep out demons.

But secretly?

He didn’t mind the sight of the two people he cared about most, sitting there together and getting along.

He’d just never admit it out loud.

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