#bc we were recapping the same info over and over and over from different perspectives it felt like

[illogicalvulcans]

finally finished the og mistborn trilogy. im free

[guardiandae]

Meta/Commentary Part 1: A Little ‘XO’ Wouldn’t Go Amiss

(Spoilers below)

Wade finally learned his roomie's real name on day two, when the proposed nickname of 'Priscilla' was rejected via stabbing.

"Y'know- I usually know a guy's name before I let him penetrate me," Wade joked, gritting through the pain.

"My name is Nathan Summers. You can call me Nate. Or you can shut your whore mouth."

I’m gonna say this right now so when I finally finish the sequel of this fic, nobody can cry foul or anything or pretend that I didn’t plan everything all along from the very start of this journey: There’s a reason why Nate stabbed Wade and it’s not just to be an edgelord. This fic starts written in Wade’s POV and then switches to Nate’s, and there is so much more info revealed from Nate’s perspective that changes how interactions are colored. In the sequel, it’s not written in that style but eventually you will understand Nate’s POV and be able to look back on this (and other moments) and be like, Ah. I spent a few months just agonizing over this fic planning. The levels of depth going on here, you don’t know.

Also it’s hilarious because, the movie never really establishes Cable’s real name so hi, it’s Nathan Summers. Scott Summers’ (Cyclops)’s son, but like... older than him because future and time traveling hijinks or whatever. This is only important because like, daddy issues.

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technically they were even sleeping together, even if Nate slept in the only bedroom because he'd called dibs and Wade slept on the couch in a pile of fast food wrappers.

Denial.

Living with Nate was weird after living with Vanessa for so long. No more kisses -- not like he wanted any.

Denial!

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Usually when Wade got home, Nate was never there.  Hours later when Nate did come back, he'd just go to bed. Other times, Wade was hired for jobs that took days of travel to complete. There was little interaction between them and they barely saw each other, so Wade took to leaving little notes behind.

[Went to get milk. And also to put a cap in someone's ass. He's a bad guy though, so don't worry. I'll be home late. xoxo] [Forgot the milk. Also didn't cap the guy so I didn't get paid. Can you pick some up while you're out? xoxo]

So much info in one little spot. Nate only sees them as roommates, as a living arrangement and tenuous partnership to serve as an end to both of their needs. Nate has a place to live, and his only responsibility, as we learn in his POV, is to pay the rent on Wade’s behalf, with Wade’s money, because Wade is a disaster and his memory is getting worse. Not only is Wade just an annoying person who can’t take anything seriously, in his incorrect opinion, but there’s that level of guilt for feeling like a freeloader when Nate is the kind of person who’s had to fight just to survive his entire life. Wade’s little notes are so sweet, but to Nate, 1. weird 2. is this a joke? 3. stop reminding me of how much you care and meanwhile i can barely bring myself to write a note back, aaaaaa

I need to remember to revive the note-leaving between them in the sequel. It’s too cute, I can’t stand it.

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Mercenary jobs had become harder to come by, and then work dried up. It was almost like nobody wanted to pay a guy to kill people anymore. As if there could ever be a shortage of people in the world who needed to die. But when one door closes, another opens -- everywhere he went, he suddenly saw slews of missing persons flyers. Wade had never noticed how many there were before, but he took it as a sign. He'd always wanted to try his hand at being a P.I. and Wade hadn't realized that the market was booming with families desperate to find loved ones. He offered his services as a private dick to several different people, but every single case was unsolvable. It was like they'd just vanished into thin air, but he knew that wasn't possible. It was frustrating to realize he was such a lousy dick.

Spoilers, but this is when the Thanos snap happens, and Wade is completely oblivious. Could someone who can be so devastatingly observant really be so obtuse? Or is his mind just protecting itself from such an incomprehensible reality that everyone else is suddenly saddled with? These are things Nate wonders later as well. Even I don’t know for sure. (I haven’t watched End Game and there’s still more plotline to tackle during the Snap, don’t @ me about how Marvel did it, I don’t know and I don’t care, I have my own plans)  (By the way, characters will either be snapped or inexplicably alive, and that’s not a plot hole, that’s the joke. Welcome to Marvel, the writers never fucking make sense and I don’t have to either, YEET)

[Someone tried to sell a metal arm on the black market????!! It better be Bucky's and not yours. Not like I care.] [It was Bucky's.]

Rip Buckkyyyyyy lmaooo

But also, cryyyy because Nate is busy trying to help deal with absolute fucking chaos and he didn’t really stop to consider whether Wade would be wondering what happened to him. Ow. Yeah, I think Wade definitely subconsciously registered what happened and is in total denial of reality. It’s better that way. Nobody fucking tell him.

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There was nothing that he hated more than being ignored. Might as well just talk to himself. Which he did a lot of lately.

Foreshadowing.

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All of the warmth left his body at once, leaving him a little breathless and dizzy. He was vaguely aware of Nate looking at him, but it was less of a 'you're home' and more of a ' why are you here?'

This whole area of the fic hurts so good because I’m gay and I love drama.

Wade coming home, literally bleeding to death on the inside and in shock because, once again, everything went to shit for him, story of his life. And he sees Nate just there, dressed down, relaxed, and has this little flash of domestic happiness because he so desperately wishes that the domestic happiness was real and that Nate actually was waiting for him and happy to see him come home, and the hard snap back to reality where Nate doesn’t even like him is soooo fucking painful lol end me. And on top of that, he misread Nate’s concern as hate/disgust for him bc that’s what he’s used to, and then he passes out on the floor and wakes up with Nate over him because I’m gay and I love drama!!!!

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"Wade, you died for a second," Nate told him. Wade couldn't quite tell if Nate was concerned for him or just annoyed. "I had to pull a piece of metal pipe from your chest. Can you tell me what happened?"

"I got a… pipe in my chest," Wade said, pausing for breath. His lungs felt wet and heavy. He should've left the pipe in.

"Very illuminating," Nate deadpanned, letting go. "Anything else I should know?"

This moment where Nate is so very fucking concerned for Wade, but then Wade cracks a weak joke, because that’s how he copes, and Nate is like, wow, fuck it, so much for being worried about you.

[[SCREAMS IN GAY.]]

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These thoughts didn't feel like his own, even though they had his voice. His mind was always scattered, full of thoughts that flowed nonstop like a babbling brook. Sometimes it took a lot of conscious effort to reign himself in and make sense of his own head. But these just popped out of nowhere, in bold print, in boxes that were separate from everything else.

"Am I going nuts?" he wondered aloud, whispering to himself, because honestly, he was a little afraid of his own head right now.

(A little late to be asking that.)

And this is when the ‘boxes’ manifest for Wade. But in this fic, the voices that manifest in his head are his own intrusive, negative thoughts. The depression, the loneliness, the self-hatred, the belief and fear that Nate hates him too.

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I’m gonna recap vs a full copy and paste because the next bit is long:

-Wade is coughing up blood clots from his lungs in the morning, or trying to. -Nate is disgusted but also sympathetic and offers to help Wade out. -A really layered conversation occurs.

“Maybe if I drown myself in the bathtub, the blood clots will rinse out. What d'you think?"

Wade’s exhausted. Joking, but also dead serious. Nate is concerned about Wade making such a dark joke, but he also can tell that Wade really is struggling.

“I’ll help you.”

“Really?” Wade is relieved Nate wants to help him, at first, but then remembers he just said he wanted to drown himself in a bathtub, and becomes disheartened again because he remembers Nate doesn’t like him. “Oh. Yeah.”

From Wade’s point of view: Nate just offered to help Wade kill himself, because of course someone would get a kick out of drowning him, he’s annoying, yadda yadda.

From Nate’s point of view: Wade isn’t okay and he offered to help him with his problem, because he sounds desperate and Nate doesn’t think that jokes will help Wade with his mental state, nor will the drowning actually do anything to solve the problem (the blood clots festering in his lungs).

"I bet you'd love to hold me down and watch me struggle," he said, still thinking about the drowning idea. Then, in a flirtatious tone, "I'll make it good for you, baby. Just promise me we'll do it face to face."

From Wade’s POV: He’s making a joke about Nate drowning him, but also making a sex joke to make it funny, to mock Nate if he really does want to drown Wade, so maybe he wouldn’t do it, or maybe it’d be weird and interesting.

From Nate’s POV: Wade is flirting with him, and his humor and still really dark and Nate really shouldn’t laugh at it or encourage that kind of thing.

From Wade’s POV, seeing Nate trying not smile: ah holy fuck he really wants to drown me.

"I don't want to watch you struggle," Nate said. If he did, he'd just leave Wade alone to keep coughing up blood.

"Ah. Consensual," Wade nodded. "Okay, well, I'd be open to some over-the-clothes stuff, and whatever happens while I'm still dead doesn't count."

Nate couldn't help but laugh. "I don't think we're having the same conversation."

Wade is continuing the joke, because from his POV he’s like, whelp, this might as well be what happens.

But they really aren’t having the same conversation. There’s more like, four different conversations happening at once. Wade’s very sincere idea of drowning himself as a solution to his problems, and Wade joking about Nate drowning him as a sexual innuendo.  Nate interpreting Wade’s dark humor as a shitty attempt at flirting that he neither wants to encourage nor outright shoot down, and Nate offering to give Wade a better solution to fix his actual problem.

And Nate’s solution is to use his telekinesis to just... remove all the shit from Wade’s lungs. But he didn’t communicate that idea with Wade before just doing it, even if he did ask permission, so that’s pretty shitty and hence why we had to add the ‘Nonconsensual Telekinetic Heimlich Maneuver’ tag. smh

"That was dubious at best and now we have to add a warning in the tags," Wade sighed. "Non-consensual telekinetic Heimlich maneuver…. This is problematic now. People aren't gonna click on this."

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This is a good spot to stop for now and continue in another post.