#Cache Control

[beescake]

Sorry for the spam (^o^;) I just really like your blog

no need to apologize ayy!

in this corner we welcome all forms of enjoyment, regardless of whether you're a

happy to have yall here w me,

headin into homestuck 2024 :^)

[falloutconfessions]

"To be honest the Boomers in Fo:NV always irked me. Mostly because there were things that just didn't make sense about them. Like because they never left their Air Force Base headquarters, how could they actually 'see' things that there was no possible way for them to see. Example: How Jack could somehow see Janet from miles away and many structures and landscape blocking the view from the Air Force Base or even know that she worked for a company called the Crimson Caravan when they blew up anyone who got within Howitzer range? 

I once Noclipped my way up to the top of their destroyed air traffic control tower and found out I could see two things. Jack and Shit And then jack went back inside the workshop."

Fallout Confessions

[nenoname]

ford is still so funny for burying the journal filled with curses in an elementary school

[accidentcache]

dee pls come get ur man he wont leave me alone im scared

I SAW THIS LMAOFJFNF just visualize him doing this over tomura while he’s having a crash out in the middle of the mall

[floramuniverse]

Bring a burst of holiday joy to your celebrations with our Cute Santa and Snowflakes Theme - Christmas Party Invitation Card! Sized perfectly at 5x7 inches, this card is designed to make your festive season even more magical and memorable. Imagine a delightful scene where a jolly Santa and twinkling snowflakes come together, setting the perfect tone for your holiday gathering.

Whether you're hosting a cozy family get-together, a fun friends' Christmas party, or a cheerful office event, this invitation adds a special touch to your seasonal greetings. The design is charmingly whimsical, with Santa spreading joy and snowflakes adding a frosty sparkle, creating a winter wonderland on each card. 🎄✨

Plus, it's editable and printable, making it easy for you to customize with all your party details. You can print it right at home or at your favorite local print shop, ensuring convenience and saving you time during this busy season. This invitation card combines style and ease, making it the cutest way to invite your guests to a memorable Christmas party!

[unholylevitation]

oh my GOD. I picked a Night Orchid and was like 'oh, Shadowheart said this was her favorite!!' and clicked on her and THEY LET TAV GIVE IT TO HER.

I hope my drow is endlessly thankful for the Game I'm bestowing upon her. Especially since her other wife is not pleased about this underdark shit.

[woted2]

El Engaño de la Caché Web: Un Análisis Detallado y Relevante para la Ciberseguridad

La caché web es una herramienta fundamental para mejorar el rendimiento de las aplicaciones web y reducir la latencia al almacenar recursos comunes en el navegador o en servidores intermedios. Sin embargo, esta característica esencial también puede ser explotada por atacantes, transformándola en una amenaza subestimada en el panorama de la ciberseguridad. En este artículo, exploraremos cómo…

[techdriveplay]

How to Get the Most Out of Your Smart TV

In the modern era, entertainment technology has revolutionised the way we consume media, and smart TVs have become a cornerstone of this transformation. They offer a wealth of features and capabilities far beyond traditional television sets. To truly maximise their potential, it’s essential to understand how to get the most out of your smart TV. This guide will explore tips, tricks, and best…

[jcmarchi]

BlueHost Review – The Best WordPress Host Yet?

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/bluehost-review-the-best-wordpress-host-yet/

BlueHost Review – The Best WordPress Host Yet?

If only one web host had the bragging rights for being the best WordPress host on the market, it’d be BlueHost. Whether you are a webmaster or are looking to migrate your existing website to a new provider, you have definitely heard of BlueHost. 

Many of the websites I have managed including my personal ones have been hosted on BlueHost and I will share my personal thoughts on my experience with them. 

In the rest of this BlueHost review, we’ll go in-depth into the core features you get with the host’s plans, how affordable their packages are, how easy it is to use their platform for your website’s management, how responsive their support is – all the good stuff!

So if you are considering BlueHost, this is the only guide you’ll need.

BlueHost Review – The Host’s History

BlueHost is just a little over 2 decades old and was found in 2003. Since then, the company has grown into an empire currently powering over 2 million domains around the globe. BlueHost has impressive accolades to their name – they are the longest running number 1 WordPress.org recommended host. Their hosting plans are WordPress-heavy with everything you need to create, manage, and promote your website.

The host provides a variety of hosting packages – shared hosting, VPS hosting, cloud hosting, dedicated hosting, WordPress and WooCommerce hosting. BlueHost also provides emails, a domain registration engine, and marketing tools and services that you can pay for as addons. On every hosting package you go for on BlueHost, you get a free SSL, free domain name registration, access to live chat with their agents, free CDN and free WP themes. Aside from their most basic shared plan, you also get Malware Scanning and daily backups to powerful SSD drives.

BlueHost caches customer websites across a network of servers in 6 locations around the world. Nearly 13,000 people have reviewed BlueHost on TrustPilot and they score a pretty impressive 4.1.

BlueHost Pros and Cons

BlueHost is recommended directly by WordPress

They provide hosting plans for every website need

Their plans are pretty affordable

Website essentials are provided for free

They have vast complementary services

BlueHost is incredibly easy to use for beginners

Excellent uptime

Their servers get slow sometimes

Not privately owned

Many out-of-the-box addons are only free for the first year

BlueHost Rating – How I Score The Host

We’ve discussed BlueHost’s rating on TrustPilot. However, what’s my personal take? Considering the host’s prices, features, real-life performance, user friendliness, customer support convenience, how will I rate each core consideration on a scale of 1-5. It makes sense to actually take a dive into some of the host’s core features and see how well they score. 

And if you think about it, given that there are thousands of hosting providers on the market, having a ‘standardized’ rating of each host enables you to compare different providers fairly. 

So if you want a simple outline out all that BlueHost has to offer and how I’ll score them, let’s take a look. Note that these scores are based on my personal opinion and experience with the host and may change as the host improves on their offerings:

Quality My rating Why I gave this score Features and specs 5.0 Virtually every kind of hosting, free SSL, domain, email, CDN & WP themes, and third-party marketing tools built-in make BlueHost an absolute beast.  Pricing 4.8 With BlueHost’s shared plans starting at $2.95/month, the host is really affordable. However, I’d give them a 4.8 because, after the first year, the subscription prices quadruple. Performance stats  4.7 BlueHost is known for their 100% uptime guarantee. With each of their plans providing SSD storage, you are also guaranteed high-speed website data delivery. However, after several speeds, the average server response time was around 400 ms which is great but not the fastest. Ease of use 4.9 BlueHost uses the modern cPanel for your website’s backend and a visually appealing design on the frontend that’s also incredibly intuitive for even hosting newbies. However, many hosts also now offer custom control panels that are even easier to use than cPanel. Customer support guarantee 5.0 BlueHost offers an excellent customer support guarantee – you can reach their agents via phone and live chat, and you can learn how to use their products as well as other WordPress specific answers on their Academy page, knowledgebase, and blog.

BlueHost Hosting Plans & Pricing – 2024

BlueHost offers shared hosting, VPS hosting, cloud hosting, dedicated servers, WordPress hosting, WooCommerce hosting, and cloud hosting for WordPress. For every plan you subscribe to, you are protected by a 30-day money back guarantee to give you enough time to decide if it meets your need

And when you decide to commit to a particular plan, BlueHost accepts payment via card – Visa, Mastercard, DISCOVER, American Express – and Paypal. 

BlueHost’s shared hosting plans

BASIC

Storage space – 10 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 1 website

Features – Free CDN, SSL, domain, and email, custom WP themes

Price – $2.95/month

CHOICE PLUS

Storage space – 40 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 3 websites

Features – Everything in BASIC plus daily backups, domain privacy, malware scans

Price – $5.45/month

ONLINE STORE

Storage space – 40 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 3 websites

Features – CHOICE PLUS plus eCommerce specific features

Price – $9.95/month 

CLOUD

Storage space – 225 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 50 websites

Features – Unmetered bandwidth, priority support, WAF, caching, DDoS protection

Price – $29.99/month

BlueHost recommends their CHOICE PLUS shared hosting plan for new customers. You can host 3 websites with 40 GB of SSD storage, charged at $5.45/month for the first year.

Who this is for:

BlueHost’s shared hosting plans are best suited for new websites that are not yet pulling in a lot of traffic. New websites or websites that are only meant to serve content to a few target personas fit this bill nicely – think portfolio websites, parked pages, landing pages, etc. However, BlueHost actually integrates a cloud plan CLOUD to allow upgrade seamlessly should your resource demand increase.

BlueHost’s VPS hosting plans

STANDARD

Memory – 2GB RAM

Number of CPUs – 2 core CPU

Bandwidth – Unmetered bandwidth

Price – $31.99/month

ENHANCED

Memory – 4GB RAM

Number of CPUs – 2 core CPU

Bandwidth – Unmetered bandwidth

Price – $41.99/month

ULTIMATE

Memory – 8GB RAM

Number of CPUs – 4 core CPU

Bandwidth – Unmetered bandwidth

Price – $71.99/month

As usual, BlueHost recommends their intermediate ENHANCED VPS hosting plan to webmasters. For just $10/month extra on their STANDARD plan, you get double the RAM and 45 GB of extra storage.

Who needs BlueHost’s VPS hosting?

BlueHost’s VPS plans are excellent for you if your website is growing and you are maxing out your shared resources. VPS hosting gives you more resources and also gives you a dedicated virtual engine, even though you are still sharing the same physical server with other websites. VPS hosting plans are great for blog websites, growing eCommerce stores, and websites that handle sensitive user data. 

BlueHost’s cloud hosting plans

CLOUD 1

Number of websites – 1 website

Storage space – 10 GB SSD storage

Computing power – 2vCPU computing power

Price – $29.99/month

CLOUD 10

Number of websites – 10 websites

Storage space – 125 GB SSD storage 

Computing power – 20vCPU computing power

Price – $49.99/month

CLOUD 25

Number of websites – 25 websites

Storage space – 175 GB SSD storage

Computing power – 75vCPU computing power

Price – $89.99/month

CLOUD 50

Number of websites – 50 websites

Storage space – 225 GB SSD storage

Computing power – 150vCPU computing power

Price – $109.99/month

Who needs BlueHost’s cloud hosting plans?

Fun fact: BlueHost just launched their cloud hosting plans!

BlueHost’s cloud hosting plans cater to websites that experience sudden spikes in traffic and need resources on demand. Like the idea of paying for only the resources you use? Then these plans are for you. Ecommerce websites selling seasonal products and web apps find cloud hosting plans invaluable.

BlueHost’s dedicated hosting plans

STANDARD

Cores/thread – 4 cores/8 threads

Memory – 8GB RAM

Storage – 1 Terabyte HDD storage

Price – $91.98/month

ENHANCED

Cores/thread – 8 cores/16 threads

Memory – 16 GB RAM

Storage – 2 Terabyte HDD storage

Price – $121.88/month

PREMIUM

Cores/thread – 8 cores/ 16 threads

Memory – 30 GB RAM

Storage – 2 Terabyte HDD storage

Price – $141.99/month

BlueHost recommends their intermediate ENHANCED dedicated hosting plan. A dedicated server with 16 GB of RAM, 2 Terabytes of storage, and unmetered bandwidth, for $121.88/month. 

Who is BlueHost’s dedicated hosting for?

BlueHost’s dedicated hosting plans give you a whole server to yourself. All of the server’s resources – storage, bandwidth, storage, memory – are yours. BlueHost’s dedicated hosting plans make the most sense if your website receives tons of traffic and you need the most security – your website doesn’t share these resources with any other website. 

You can choose a managed dedicated hosting plan or if you have an IT team that can manage your dedicated servers, you can request complete control over your website’s servers.

BlueHost’s WordPress hosting plans

BASIC

Storage space – 10 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 1 website

Features – Free CDN, SSL, domain, and email, custom WP themes

Price – $2.95/month

CHOICE PLUS

Storage space – 40 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 3 websites

Features – Everything in BASIC plus daily backups, domain privacy, malware scans

Price – $5.45/month

ONLINE STORE

Storage space – 40 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 3 websites

Features – CHOICE PLUS plus eCommerce specific features

Price – $9.95/month 

CLOUD

Storage space – 225 GB SSD storage

Number of websites – 50 websites

Features – Unmetered bandwidth, priority support, WAF, caching, DDoS protection

Price – $29.99/month

BlueHost’s WordPress plans exactly mirror their shared hosting plans albeit with WordPress-heavy features optimized to accelerate creating and managing your WordPress website. They recommend their CHOICE PLUS plan that accommodates 3 websites, gives you 40 GB of SSD storage, daily backups, and malware scanning.

Who is BlueHost’s WordPress hosting for?

Plan to build your website on WordPress or you currently have one? BlueHost’s plans offer affordable hosting with WordPress essentials for your website. You get custom WordPress themes, the BlueHost WONDERSUITE – an AI-powered website setup stack, WordPress pre-installed, WordPress-tailored support, and so much more!

BlueHost’s WooCommerce hosting plans

ONLINE STORE

Storage – 40 GB SSD storage

Ecommerce features – Store website, analytics, Yoast SEO, YITH integration, daily backups for WordPress and Jetpack, online payments enablement

Price – $9.95/month

ONLINE STORE + MARKETPLACE

Storage – 100 GB storage

Ecommerce features – All in ONLINE STORE plus multi-channel selling through third-party platforms – Ebay, Amazon, eBay, etc.

Price – $12.95/month

BlueHost’s WooCommerce hosting plans are billed annually or triannually. 

Who needs BlueHost’s WooCommerce hosting plans?

BlueHost’s WooCommerce hosting plans build upon their WordPress plans and give you eCommerce functionality. Plan to build an eCommerce store or migrate your store from another platform, then these plans are for you. You can choose the ONLINE STORE if you only plan to use your website as your point of sale. If you plan to harness other Ecommerce platforms, then the ONLINE STORE + MARKETPLACE is just the one for you.

BlueHost’s Features

Let’s take an overarching overview of the features that BlueHost offers across most of its plans:

SSD storage

Free domain, SSL, WP Themes, and professional email

Free CDN

Unmetered bandwidth

BlueHost WonderSuite website builder

1-click WordPress acceleration and WordPress built-in

BlueHost offers most of the features typical of a leading provider, however, they stand out because they are first a WordPress host – their shared hosting plans are actually all WordPress plans.

BlueHost Performance Tests

To test BlueHost’s performance, we will perform real tests on websites hosted by the provider to determine their average server response speed, performance score, and uptime. 

The quicker the server response is, the more quickly any website hosted on them will load whenever a user tries to visit that website. Pages that load under 2 seconds have a bounce rate of 9% but that figure shoots to 38% once the load time is more than 3 seconds.

So it’s incredibly important that you choose a host with very quick server response times as this contributes to your overall website load time. Another important factor to consider is the web host’s uptime or reliability.

The uptime simply measures the amount of time your web host’s servers are running – and in turn, your website is available online. The industry standard for uptime is 99.9%. 

Here were the results of the tests I carried out on BlueHost:

To measure the web host’s server speeds, I considered the time to first byte (TTFB) and after several tests, the average TTFB was 490 ms. This is a decent score but other hosts like SiteGround have more impressive figures.

The overall performance of the website was 99% which is excellent.

To test BlueHost’s uptime, I used Uptime Robot to investigate the website’s availability over the past month:

BlueHost’s servers have a 100% uptime and their websites have been available for the same portion of the time.

BlueHost’s Customer Support

What support portals are available on BlueHost? And how easy would it be to reach an agent when you have inquiries to make or errors to troubleshoot? Let’s see.

BlueHost has a thriving support hub where you can get in touch with their agents 24/7 via:

Phone

BlueHost has phone lines for it sales department, customer support, and international phone lines for customers calling from abroad.

Live chat

I was quite impressed because for many hosts you need to be a paying customer first before you can reach out to their support agents. On BlueHost, you can chat with an agent live to make inquiries about their services or seek support. 

I tested BlueHost’s live chat to see how quickly I would get the help I wanted. When you initiate the chat, you are first attended to by a chatbot that asks for what category the inquiry you want to make falls under:

Next, you are asked to provide your name and are redirected to speak with a human agent. In this test, the agent connected with me in less than 20 seconds which is impressive:

I asked a couple of questions and they seemed very knowledgeable in the technical details about BlueHost’s plans:

Overall, I was satisfied with their live chat support and you’d find it invaluable as a customer.

WordPress Academy

It’s only natural that WordPress’s number 1 host has an academy page dedicated to WordPress tutorials. BlueHost’s academy page has 14 lessons and you can take them for free even without creating an account with BlueHost. You only need to fill in your email address.

Knowledgebase

BlueHost’s search engine enabled knowledgebase contains resources and information on managing your account, email, their different packages, DNS, WordPress, domain names, and so much more.

BlueHost Blog

And finally, the BlueHost blog with informative articles on generic industry topics every website owner will find useful irrespective of your industry.

BlueHost’s Security Features

There are bad actors everywhere, more so online. BlueHost gives you a host of security features out-of-the-box to protect your brand and your website from cyberattacks and malware.

On even the most basic plans, you get a free SSL certificate to give your website the ‘HTTPS’ badge of trust. You also get a free CDN built-in to cache your website content across their network of servers and improve your website performance.

For their higher-tier shared hosting plans, your website is backed up daily to protect your data. BlueHost also gives you access to their built-in malware scanner and domain privacy free for the first year. Domain privacy protects your personal information from being shown publicly on the WHOIS database.

BlueHost’s premium hosting plans also give you DDoS protection and a web application firewall(WAF). You can also buy security software as addons to all your plans on BlueHost including CodeGuard Basic and SiteLock Essentials both billed at $2.99/month each.

BlueHost’s Website Builder – WonderSuite

BlueHost’s website builder, WonderSuite is powered by AI to simplify designing your website. WonderSuite encapsulates several AI-powered products including:

WonderStart

BlueHost’s WonderStart simplifies creating your website by asking you a number of specific questions right from the beginning, instead of having to fill them at each stage.

The AI powered tool then finds the right themes and fills in your details automatically.

WonderTheme

WonderTheme generates website samples based on the business niche, themes and font you choose in WonderStart so you know exactly what your website’s final look will be.

WonderBlocks

WonderBlocks is BlueHost’s drag-n-drop website design interface that allows you customize the themes and webpages in a few clicks. Fill in the content blocks with page essentials like a contact form and photo gallery.

WonderCart

WonderCart is BlueHost’s website design tool for eCommerce websites. With WonderCart, you can customize your eComm website pages and your checkout pages to drive more sales and conversions.

BlueHost’s User-Friendliness

BlueHost is known as one of the easiest web hosts to use, especially for new webmasters. Let’s take a look at how to create an account with the host, what its control panel looks like, and how to setup WordPress on BlueHost:

How to register an account on BlueHost

Like with any other host, to register an account with BlueHost, you simply buy one of their hosting plans:

Step 1

Navigate to one of their hosting plans and click on “Select”. You’ll be redirected to the domain page.

Step 2

On the domain setup page, you can put in your domain name if you have or specify a new one you’d like to register in BlueHost’s domain search engine on the left.

If you don’t want to setup a domain yet, you can just click on “I’ll create my domain later”

Step 3

On the checkout page, fill in your account creation details:

Next, your billing schedule from the dropdown – month, annually, or a 3-year plan:

Choose any additional services you want as addons, fill in your payment details, and click ‘Submit’. And that’s it!

Once your payment is confirmed, you will have your BlueHost account created.

BlueHost’s modern control panel

Managing your account and website backend on BlueHost is fairly easy and the host features a modern cPanel to help you do just that.

To access your CPanel, from your main dashboard, simply click on ‘Hosting’ and cPanel. You will then be redirected to the login page.

BlueHost’s cPanel allows you to set up new email accounts, organize your website files, access your DNS settings, manage your database, configure your security settings, and so much more.

How to install WordPress on BlueHost

BlueHost comes with WordPress built in and only requires a few clicks to install the software and assign it to your website.

Step 1

To install WordPress on BlueHost, from your dashboard, click on ‘Hosting’ and then ‘Add site’ to set up a new website on your account.

Step 2

Click on ‘Install WordPress’ and click ‘Continue’. You’ll then be directed to fill in your site title. However, you can also click ‘skip for now’ to move right on to the next step.

Step 3

Enter your domain name or use a temporary domain name and click ‘Continue’. WordPress will now begin to install. 

Finally, click ‘Login to WordPress’.

BlueHost makes it incredibly easy to access your WordPress website. Once set up, you won’t need to login to your WordPress portal anymore but can directly access your website from your hosting dashboard.

What are some of BlueHost’s complementary services?

BlueHost offers some of the most comprehensive complementary services on the market. Some of them include:

Website design services

Digital marketing services

Professional email setup

Access to third-party suites like Google Workspace

Premium WordPress services

BlueHost’s complementary services help consolidate all your website’s needs in one place. You can use one provider to purchase a domain name, get hosting, design your website, get professional email addresses, get marketing services, etc.

Conclusion: Do We Recommend BlueHost?

We put BlueHost through its paces to see if its packages are worth considering. BlueHost is easily one of the best hosting providers on the market – they not only provide hosting plans but a truckload of complementary services that simplify setting up and managing your website.

If you plan to create a website using WordPress, BlueHost is indeed the best host for you. When you check out their WordPress-specific features and WonderSuite website builder, you’ll see why they have retained the title of WordPress no. 1 recommended host.

My only criticism of BlueHost would be they can do better in terms of performance and server response time.

Visit BlueHost →

[literaryvein-reblogs]

commonly confused words

accept: to receive except: with the exclusion of

advice: recommendation (noun) advise: to recommend (verb)

adverse: unfavorable averse: opposed to

affect: to influence (verb); emotional response (noun) effect: result (noun); to cause (verb)

aisle: space between rows isle: island

allude: to make indirect reference to elude: to avoid

allusion: indirect reference illusion: false idea, misleading appearance

already: by this time all ready: fully prepared

altar: sacred platform or place alter: to change

altogether: thoroughly all together: everyone/everything in one place

a lot: a quantity; many of something allot: to divide or portion out

angel: supernatural being, good person angle: shape made by joining two straight lines

are: plural form of "to be" our: plural form of "my"

accent: pronunciation common to a region ascent: the act of rising or climbing assent: consent, agreement

assistance: help assistants: helpers

bare: nude, unadorned bear: to carry; an animal

beside: close to; next to besides: except for; in addition

boar: a wild male pig bore: to drill a hole through

board: piece of wood bored: uninterested

born: brought into life borne: past participle of "to bear" (carry)

breath: air taken in (noun) breathe: to take in air (verb)

brake: device for stopping break: destroy; make into pieces

buy: to purchase by: next to; through the agency of

canvas: heavy cloth canvass: to take a survey; a survey

capital: major city capitol: government building

choose: to pick chose: past tense of "to choose"

clothes: garments close: to shut; near cloths: pieces of fabric

coarse: rough course: path; series of lectures

complement: something that completes compliment: praise, flattery

conscience: sense of morality conscious: awake, aware

corps: regulated group corpse: dead body

council: governing body counsel: advice; to give advice

dairy: place where milk products are processed diary: personal journal

descent: downward movement dissent: disagreement

dessert: final, sweet course in a meal desert: to abandon; dry, sandy area

device: a plan; a tool or utensil devise: to create

discreet: modest, prudent behavior discrete: a separate thing, distinct

do: a verb indicating performance or execution of a task dew: water droplets condensed from air due: as a result of

dominant: commanding, controlling dominate: to control

die: to lose life; one of a pair of dice dye: to change or add color

dyeing: changing or adding color dying: losing life

elicit: to draw out illicit: illegal, forbidden

eminent: prominent imminent: about to happen

envelop: to surround (verb) envelope: container for a letter (noun)

everyday: routine, commonplace, ordinary (adj.) every day: each day, succession (adj. + noun)

fair: just, honest; a carnival; light skinned fare: money for transportation; food

farther: at a greater (measurable) distance further: in greater (non-measurable) depth

formally: conventionally, with ceremony formerly: previously

forth: forward fourth: number four in a list

gorilla: animal in ape family guerrilla: soldier specializing in surprise attacks

hear: to sense sound by ear here: in this place

heard: past tense of "to hear" herd: group of animals

hoard: a hidden fund or supply, a cache horde: a large group or crowd, swarm

hole: opening whole: complete; an entire thing

human: relating to the species homo sapiens humane: compassionate

its: possessive form of "it" it's: contraction for "it is"

knew: past tense of "know" new: fresh, not yet old

know: to comprehend no: negative

later: after a time latter: second one of two things

lead: heavy metal substance; to guide led: past tense of "to lead"

lessen: to decrease lesson: something learned and/or taught

lightning: storm-related electricity lightening: making lighter

loose: unbound, not tightly fastened lose: to misplace

maybe: perhaps (adv.) may be: might be (verb)

meat: animal flesh meet: to encounter mete: to measure; to distribute

medal: a flat disk stamped with a design meddle: to interfere, intrude metal: a hard organic substance mettle: courage, spirit, energy

miner: a worker in a mine minor: underage person (noun); less important (adj.)

moral: distinguishing right from wrong; lesson of a fable or story morale: attitude or outlook usually of a group

passed: past tense of "to pass" past: at a previous time

patience: putting up with annoyances patients: people under medical care

peace: absence of war piece: part of a whole; musical arrangement

peak: point, pinnacle, maximum peek: to peer through or look furtively pique: fit of resentment, feeling of wounded vanity

pedal: the foot lever of a bicycle or car petal: a flower segment peddle: to sell

personal: intimate; owned by a person personnel: employees

plain: simple, unadorned plane: to shave wood; aircraft (noun)

precede: to come before proceed: to continue

presence: attendance; being at hand presents: gifts

principal: foremost (adj.); administrator of a school (noun) principle: moral conviction, basic truth

quiet: silent, calm quite: very

rain: water drops falling; to fall like rain reign: to rule rein: strap to control an animal (noun); to guide or control (verb)

raise: to lift up raze: to tear down

rational: having reason or understanding rationale: principles of opinion, beliefs

respectfully: with respect respectively: in that order

reverend: title given to clergy; deserving respect reverent: worshipful

right: correct; opposite of left rite: ritual or ceremony write: to put words on paper

road: path rode: past tense of "to ride"

scene: place of an action; segment of a play seen: viewed; past participle of "to see"

sense: perception, understanding since: measurement of past time; because

sight: scene, view, picture site: place, location cite: to document or quote (verb)

stationary: standing still stationery: writing paper

straight: unbending strait: narrow or confining; a waterway

taught: past tense of "to teach" taut: tight

than: used to introduce second element; compared to then: at that time; next

their: possessive form of "they" there: in that place they’re: contraction for "they are"

through: finished; into and out of threw: past tense of "to throw" thorough: complete

to: toward too: also; very (used to show emphasis) two: number following one

track: course, road tract: pamphlet; plot of ground

waist: midsection of the body waste: discarded material; to squander

waive: forgo, renounce wave: flutter, move back and forth

weak: not strong week: seven days

weather: climatic condition whether: if wether: a neutered male sheep

where: in which place were: past tense of "to be"

which: one of a group witch: female sorcerer

whose: possessive for "of who" who’s: contraction for "who is"

your: possessive for "of you" you’re: contraction for "you are" yore: time long past

commonly confused words part 2 ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

[judgeitbyitscover]

Southern Reach series (10th Anniversary Editions) by Jeff VanderMeer

Cover art by Pablo Delcan

MacMillan, 2014-2024

Annihilation (2014)

Area X has been cut off from the rest of the world for decades. Nature has reclaimed the last vestiges of human civilization. The first expedition returned with reports of a pristine, Edenic landscape; the second expedition ended in mass suicide, the third in a hail of gunfire as its members turned on one another. The members of the eleventh expedition returned as shadows of their former selves, and within weeks, all had died of cancer. In Annihilation, the first volume of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach Trilogy, we join the twelfth expedition.

The group is made up of four women: an anthropologist; a surveyor; a psychologist, the de facto leader; and our narrator, a biologist. Their mission is to map the terrain, record all observations of their surroundings and of one another, and, above all, avoid being contaminated by Area X itself.

They arrive expecting the unexpected, and Area X delivers—but it’s the surprises that came across the border with them and the secrets the expedition members are keeping from one another that change everything

Authority (2014)

After thirty years, the only human engagement with Area X—a seemingly malevolent landscape surrounded by an invisible border and mysteriously wiped clean of all signs of civilization—has been a series of expeditions overseen by a government agency so secret it has almost been forgotten: the Southern Reach. Following the tumultuous twelfth expedition chronicled in Annihilation, the agency is in complete disarray.

John Rodríguez (aka "Control") is the Southern Reach's newly appointed head. Working with a distrustful but desperate team, a series of frustrating interrogations, a cache of hidden notes, and hours of profoundly troubling video footage, Control begins to penetrate the secrets of Area X. But with each discovery he must confront disturbing truths about himself and the agency he's pledged to serve.

In Authority, the second volume of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy, Area X's most disturbing questions are answered . . . but the answers are far from reassuring.

Acceptance (2014)

It is winter in Area X, the mysterious wilderness that has defied explanation for thirty years, rebuffing expedition after expedition, refusing to reveal its secrets. As Area X expands, the agency tasked with investigating and overseeing it—the Southern Reach—has collapsed on itself in confusion. Now one last, desperate team crosses the border, determined to reach a remote island that may hold the answers they've been seeking. If they fail, the outer world is in peril.

Meanwhile, Acceptance tunnels ever deeper into the circumstances surrounding the creation of Area X—what initiated this unnatural upheaval? Among the many who have tried, who has gotten close to understanding Area X—and who may have been corrupted by it?

In this last installment of Jeff VanderMeer's Southern Reach trilogy, the mysteries of Area X may be solved, but their consequences and implications are no less profound—or terrifying.

Absolution (2024)

When the Southern Reach Trilogy was first published a decade ago, it was an instant sensation, celebrated in a front-page New York Times story before publication, hailed by Stephen King and many others. Each volume climbed the bestsellers list; awards were won; the books made the rare transition from paperback original to hardcover; the movie adaptation became a cult classic. All told, the trilogy has sold more than a million copies and has secured its place in the pantheon of twenty-first-century literature.

And yet for all this, for Jeff VanderMeer there was never full closure to the story of Area X. There were a few mysteries that had gone unsolved, some key points of view never aired. There were stories left to tell. There remained questions about who had been complicit in creating the conditions for Area X to take hold; the story of the first mission into the Forgotten Coast—before Area X was called Area X—had never been fully told; and what if someone had foreseen the world after Acceptance? How crazy would they seem?

Structured in three parts, each recounting a new expedition, there are some long-awaited answers here, to be sure, but also more questions, and profound new surprises. Absolution is a brilliant, beautiful, and ever-terrifying plunge into unique and fertile literary territory. It is the final word on one of the most provocative and popular speculative fiction series of our time

[buckysleftbicep]

for better or for worse (7) 𐙚 b.b

pairing: new avenger!bucky barnes x fem!reader (fake marriage au)

warnings: nsfw, 18+, minors, dni, heavy angst, bucky breaking down, flashbacks, fluff if you squint

summary: you and bucky are forced to play newlyweds at a luxury honeymoon resort. he’s controlling, you’re reckless, and now you’re sharing a bed. the problem? it’s getting harder to play pretend. and you’re not sure either of you will survive what comes next.

word count: 6k

author's note: hi sweethearts! wow, i actually finished this series! thank you all so, so much for your love and support, gosh, it means the world to me, and if i could thank you guys with a huge hug, i would 💓. this series means a lot to me, i have so many different ways to end it, i think i had 3, and this is one of them 🫶🏻 thank you all so much for staying and for finishing this series with me 💌 love you guys and stay safe out there!

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The hospital room was quiet, save for the soft, rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor and the occasional hiss of the oxygen line. Pale morning light filtered through the half-drawn blinds, slicing the space into uneven golden strips that barely touched the corners.

The air smelled faintly of antiseptic and wilted flowers, a bouquet someone had left two days ago already beginning to droop in its plastic vase.

The door creaked open without ceremony.

Yelena stepped in, her hair a little messier than usual and two steaming cups of coffee in hand.

She looked like she hadn’t slept in a couple of days either—the kind of exhaustion that sat behind the eyes, silent and weighty—but she carried it better than most. She always did.

She didn’t say anything at first, just walked in slowly, boots soft against the linoleum, eyes flicking toward the only occupied bed.

Bucky was already awake.

Curled awkwardly in a too-small hospital-issued foldable cot, the sheet tangled around his legs like it had been kicked off in a restless sleep. If you could even call it that.

He sat hunched forward, forearms resting on his knees, head bowed as his fingers toyed with the worn edge of a medical bracelet still looped around his wrist from when he’d refused to leave the ER that night.

He looked up when he heard her—or maybe just sensed her presence—and Yelena caught the full brunt of what the last five days had done to him.

His eyes were bruised with fatigue, red-rimmed and glassy. The stubble across his jaw had darkened into something more permanent. His hair was a mess—not the charming, tousled kind, but the kind born of sleepless nights and fingers dragged through it too many times out of pure frustration.

The navy blue t-shirt clung to his frame like it had been slept in. The sweatpants sagged slightly at the hips. He didn’t look like a soldier, he looked like a man desperately holding himself together by a thread.

“We found him,” Yelena said softly, breaking the silence as she approached. “Raskovic.”

Bucky didn’t react right away. Just blinked up at her, like he had to translate the words in his head before they could settle.

“And?” His voice was low, rough—not from sleep, but from disuse.

She sighed, offering him one of the coffees. “We haven’t gotten much. He’s not talking. Won’t give up the rest of the weapons cache.”

He took the cup without meeting her eyes, fingers curling tightly around the warmth like it was the only thing grounding him. He didn’t drink it, didn’t speak. Just let the silence fall again, heavier this time.

Yelena studied him for a moment—really studied him.

The way he hadn’t moved from that chair for nearly five days.

The way the cot hadn’t even been laid flat most nights.

The way he looked at you every hour, on the hour, as if just by watching hard enough, he could will your eyes to open.

“You should rest,” she said gently, crouching beside him. “Bucky… it’s been five days. You need to—”

“No.” He cut her off, firm but not sharp. Just final. Like the decision had already been carved into stone. “I’m staying. The doctors said… they said she could wake up any moment.” His voice cracked, just slightly. “I need to be the first face she sees.”

Yelena swallowed. There wasn’t anything she could say to that.

Not really.

Not when she’d watched him refuse to leave even once, not even to shower. Not when John, Alexei, and even Bob had tried every tactic short of physically dragging him out, and still—still—he hadn’t budged. 

He’d brushed his teeth in the tiny public restroom by the elevators. Bought protein bars and shitty vending machine sandwiches. Sat by your bed, hour after hour, whispering things he didn’t think anyone could hear.

There was nothing she could say. So she just nodded, gently, and gave his shoulder a squeeze.

The door clicked shut behind Yelena, leaving the room in its usual hush—the kind of quiet that wrapped itself around your throat and refused to let go. Too still. Too loud. The kind of silence that didn’t soothe, but suffocated. 

Outside, the world was slowly waking—nurses exchanging shifts, machines humming behind closed doors—but in here, time had collapsed into a slow, dragging ache.

The fluorescent lights buzzed faintly overhead, sterile and cold, casting a pale sheen over the metal railings and tile floor. Even they seemed to dim beneath the heaviness in the air. Like the room itself knew how close it had come to losing you.

Bucky turned toward you.

He moved like it hurt. Like his limbs had forgotten how to function under the weight of what they’d carried for the last five days. His gaze dropped to your hand—pale and unmoving, the skin bruised beneath the tape and gauze, fingers limp where they lay curled near your hip. 

The IV line trailed upward to the bag above your head, slow and methodical, like it had all the time in the world.

But he didn’t.

The sheet had been drawn neatly to your waist, the corners folded with practiced care. But Bucky had seen beneath it. He’d memorised the cuts, the dressings, the angry bruises blooming along your ribs.

He’d scrubbed your blood from his hands in the emergency room sink, over and over, until they were raw. Until there was nothing left but the ghost of your voice in his head.

He reached out—slowly, carefully, like one wrong move might shatter you all over again—and wrapped his fingers around yours.

The contrast was stark: his calloused, battered hands, and yours, soft and still. He held on like it was the only thing keeping him tethered to the present.

“Sweetheart,” he breathed, his voice barely there—cracked and raw, like it had been scraped against too many sleepless nights. “I know you can hear me. Please…”

His eyes squeezed shut as he leaned forward, letting his forehead rest against the back of your hand. The contact was fragile, gentle. His breath hitched against your skin.

“Please wake up,” he whispered.

It wasn’t just a plea.

It was a surrender.

The words hung in the air, splintered and fraying at the edges—the way a man breaks when there’s no one left to see it. When the fight runs out, and all that’s left is the ache.

His lips brushed your knuckles, soft and lingering, like he could pour everything he hadn’t said into that single touch. Like if he kissed you gently enough, it might undo what the world had done to you.

His hand trembled around yours, chest rising in short, unsteady bursts. He’d spent the last five days holding it together—barely—and the cracks were beginning to show.

A single tear slid down his cheek, tracing the edge of his jaw like it had every right to be there.

“Don’t go breaking my heart now, doll,” he whispered.

And it wasn’t just tenderness in his voice. It was fear. Bone-deep, marrow-carving fear.

Because Bucky Barnes had spent the last five days living in a world where nothing he did was enough—where holding your hand, begging, waiting, breaking, hadn’t been enough to undo the sight of you going still in his arms. Of blood on concrete. Of your eyes fluttering closed while he screamed.

He had faced war, torture, brainwashing—hell itself—and nothing had ever scared him like this.

He didn’t know how to live in a world where you didn’t come back.

He didn’t want to.

The memory came like a tide—slow and gentle—washing over Bucky where he sat now, curled at your bedside, hand still laced with yours.

It had been quiet then, too. Not like the sterile hush of a hospital, but something warm. Alive. The kind of quiet that settled into your bones without asking permission, that made everything else—pain, history, guilt—feel far away for just a moment.

The dock creaked beneath his feet as Sam’s boat rocked gently with the tide, tethered but still breathing with the water. The sky had melted into soft amber, streaks of orange and pink dripping into the still, dark ocean like brushstrokes on silk. 

The air was thick with the scent of salt and sugar—someone onshore frying something sweet, maybe beignets or funnel cake—and the breeze tasted like summer. Warm, lazy, golden. 

Somewhere behind him, Sam and Sarah laughed over an engine that refused to start, and AJ’s voice rang out, high and playful, a child’s joy unburdened by the weight of the world.

The sounds of a family.

You sat beside him on the edge of the boat’s stairs, knees pulled up, paper plate balanced in your lap. The hem of your shirt fluttered in the breeze. Your bare feet tapped gently against the wood, relaxed, alive. Like you belonged there.

You nudged the plate toward him without looking.

“Cake,” you said simply.

He took it from you, fingers brushing yours—a soft, accidental touch that lingered longer than it should’ve. He muttered a quiet, almost bashful, “Thanks,” eyes still cast toward the horizon.

But he didn’t eat it. Just sat there, the plate warm in his lap, staring out like the ocean might give him an answer if he looked long enough. The world had gone quiet in his chest for the first time in days, and it scared him more than he let on.

Peace wasn’t something he knew how to hold. Not really.

Then, quietly—almost as if he didn’t mean to say it out loud—“You think I deserve this?”

You turned to him, brows drawing in slightly. “Deserve what?”

His eyes were still on the water, unmoving. But his voice—that voice—was steady. Careful.

“Peace.”

It was such a simple word. But the weight it carried in his mouth was enormous. Like it didn’t belong to him. Like saying it out loud might make it vanish. Like wanting peace made him weak.

You didn’t speak right away.

Just watched him in the dying light—how it hit the high points of his face, turned his lashes gold, softened the lines etched deep into his forehead. How his jaw clenched, how his shoulders never fully relaxed.

There was a quiet awe to him then, even in stillness. Even in pain. Like he didn’t know what to do with a moment that didn’t come with gunfire or consequences.

You smiled, slow and sad. “You do, James.”

He looked at you then—really looked—and it almost hurt, the way your voice curled around his name like it was something worth holding.

“After everything,” you went on gently, “you deserve so much more than what the world gave you.”

His jaw tensed, fingers curling slightly around the paper plate, untouched cake still resting there. Like he needed to hold onto something just to stay grounded.

“But there’s so many people I—” he started, voice strained, barely above a whisper.

You didn’t let him finish.

Your hand found his, warm and certain, sliding over his knuckles like an anchor. You didn’t grip too hard. You didn’t need to.

“It wasn’t you,” you said. “You never had a choice. None of it was your fault.”

The wind tugged at your hair. The sky kept burning gold. Somewhere in the distance, a bell rang from a ship docking further down the bay.

But here, on the steps of Sam’s old boat, time had frozen—like the world was giving him permission to stop running. Just for a second.

And for the first time in a very long time, something shifted in him.

Something cracked open. A softness he hadn’t known how to hold. A thought he hadn’t dared entertain—that maybe he could want something. Someone.

That maybe he didn’t have to be alone.

The memory faded, slow and reluctant, like a sunset slipping beneath the water. And when it was gone, Bucky was still there—seated at your bedside in the dim hush of the hospital room, your hand in his, the air too still.

The beeping of the monitor was steady, but too steady. Not fast enough to mean you were waking. Not flat enough to mean you were gone.

That in-between rhythm—it was driving him insane. Mocking him. Reminding him that you were here but not really. Close, but still too far.

He looked at you like he was trying to memorise everything all over again. Your lashes against your cheek. The way the corner of your mouth dipped slightly, always slightly, when you slept. The small, near-faded scar on your temple from a mission gone wrong in Marrakesh. Every inch of you mapped onto him like a language only he could read.

And still… nothing.

His throat bobbed as he swallowed, thick and tight. He hadn’t spoken in a while—not really. Not since Yelena left, not since the memory of your voice had come back to him, soft and alive and warm in the golden light. 

Now it felt like if he opened his mouth, the entire dam might break.

So when he finally did, it came out hoarse. Barely a whisper.

“Please don’t take her away from me.”

It cracked in the middle, fractured down the middle of his chest like a fault line giving way.

“Please,” he said again, quieter now. “I don’t care about anything else.”

His eyes stayed on you, like he was afraid you might vanish if he blinked. His fingers tightened faintly around yours.

“Just…” he breathed, voice shaking, “just let her stay. I-I’ll do anything.”

He wasn’t praying. Not really, no, Bucky didn’t believe in that anymore. Hadn’t in decades. Maybe never did. 

But he said it anyway—like if he could just get the words out, the universe might hear him.

Might show him mercy, just this once.

Might understand that you were the only good thing left in him.

That without you, everything else didn’t matter.

That if he lost you, there would be nothing left to come back to.

And so he sat there, forehead pressed to your hand again, tears slipping quietly down his face—no sobbing, no shaking, just the steady, exhausted grief of a man begging the world not to take the one person he didn’t know how to live without.

The first thing you registered was the light—too bright, too sharp, cutting through the darkness behind your eyelids like glass.

You blinked, once, twice, and the world came back slowly. Fuzzy around the edges.

The air felt sterile and cold, too clean. The scent of antiseptic curled at the edge of your senses, familiar in a way that made your stomach twist.

Then came the pain.

A dull, biting throb that pulsed hot through your leg—enough to steal the breath from your lungs. You winced, the movement sending a shock up your thigh. Your body felt heavy, as if the last week had settled into your bones like lead. It took effort to tilt your head, but you did, wincing as your vision swam.

And then you saw him.

Bucky was slumped beside you in a narrow hospital chair, legs sprawled out awkwardly, one arm still draped across the edge of your bed. His fingers were locked around yours—loosely, like he’d fallen asleep holding on and never let go.

His head was bowed, chin resting against his chest, and for a split second you thought he might have finally passed out from exhaustion. His hair was a mess, strands flattened on one side, sticking up on the other.

There were shadows under his eyes so deep they looked like bruises. His jaw was rough with days-old stubble, his shirt wrinkled and clinging to him in tired lines.

He looked wrecked.

But beautiful.

In that devastating, unguarded way he never let you see when he was awake. Like every sharp edge had been sanded down by worry, like grief had made room for something gentler.

Your chest tightened.

And just like that, it all came rushing back—the warehouse, the blood, the sting of your own scream. The panic in his voice when he found you. The way he’d cradled you against his chest, whispering your name like he could pull you back to the earth with nothing but his breath.

You stared at him now, barely breathing.

Because for all the bruises, for all the exhaustion written into every line of his body, he was still here.

Still holding on.

Like he’d never stopped.

You blinked hard against the prick of tears and let your fingers shift, just slightly, in his hand.

A small squeeze. Barely there.

But it was enough.

He stirred beside you, slow and groggy, like the weight of the last five days was still holding him under.

At first, he didn’t move. Just shifted slightly in the chair, the hand around yours twitching like his body already knew something had changed. Then his head lifted, eyes blinking open, blearily searching the room in that half-conscious fog where dreams hadn’t quite let go yet.

And then he saw you.

Really saw you—awake, breathing, eyes on him.

His breath caught in his throat. His entire body froze.

“Hey,” you whispered, voice rough and thin, barely more than air.

For a second, he didn’t speak. Couldn’t. The emotion hit too fast—like it had been waiting just behind his ribs for this exact second to shatter him. His lips parted, a breath escaped, and then—

“Sweetheart.”

It came out like a promise. Like a prayer finally answered. He moved forward, hand cradling your face, thumb trembling where it brushed beneath your eye, over your cheek, as if he needed to touch every inch of you to believe this was real.

You could feel him shaking.

Not violently. Just enough to know that this had broken him in ways you hadn’t seen. That he had fallen apart in the quiet, in the waiting. And now that you were back, he didn’t know how to hold all of it.

His thumb traced down your jaw, reverent. Like you were something fragile, something rare.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, voice raw. He didn’t let go of your face.

You swallowed, the ache still sharp in your throat. Everything still hur—your leg, your ribs, your eyes—but somehow, right now, it didn’t matter.

You mustered a small, crooked smile. “Think I’m okay. Didn’t Steve used to say ‘break a leg’ before missions?”

Bucky huffed a laugh, a sound that cracked as much as it warmed. His eyes shone—too glassy, too full—but he let the joke carry him for a second. Let it be a tether.

He shook his head, the corners of his mouth lifting in something soft, something cracked wide open.

“You’re unbelievable,” he murmured, pressing his forehead gently to yours.

And for the first time in days, he allowed himself to finally breathe easy.

His forehead was still resting against yours when the silence stretched again—not heavy this time, but fragile. Like something delicate was settling between you, something you both felt but hadn’t dared speak aloud.

It trembled between your shared breath, suspended in that sliver of space where everything had changed and nothing had yet been said.

Bucky pulled back just enough to see your face, his hand still cupping your cheek like he couldn’t bring himself to let go—like if he did, you might disappear again, slip through his fingers like smoke.

“I was scared,” he said quietly, his voice low and stripped raw. “That I’d lose you.”

The confession wasn’t loud. It wasn’t dramatic. But it cracked something open between you, split wide and aching. His voice held no armor. No deflection. Just truth—and the unbearable weight of it.

You opened your mouth, not to argue, not really. But he shook his head once, gently, eyes never leaving yours.

“Let me finish.”

His chest rose, then fell—one deep breath, then another, like he was trying to steady himself before the dam broke. Like every word cost him something he’d never learned how to give.

“I know I’m not easy,” he began. “I’m rigid. Controlling. I hold onto things too tight, like if I let go, everything might fall apart. I ruin things before I ever deserve them. Before I even let myself hope.”

He blinked down at you, and his expression was ruined—not because he was falling apart, but because he was letting you see it.

Every crack. Every fear. Every piece of him that had been stitched together over years of surviving, now trembling in the quiet between you. 

He wasn’t hiding behind protocol or mission strategy or the weight of being Bucky Barnes. Not here. Not now.

“But you…”

His voice caught, just for a moment. He swallowed hard and tried again, slower, like the words had to be dug up from somewhere deep.

“You changed everything. And I didn’t see it at first. Or maybe I didn’t want to. But somewhere along the way, I stopped pretending. I stopped keeping you at arm’s length. And now—” his thumb brushed your cheek again, barely there, “now I can’t imagine anything without you in it.”

He paused, breath uneven, like he was standing in front of a door he didn’t know how to open—afraid of what might be waiting on the other side.

His jaw tensed, like he was bracing himself for impact.

“I can’t lose you. If I do… I’ll have nothing left.”

And he meant it. It wasn’t a plea. It wasn’t a line. It was a quiet, soul-deep truth. One that had been building inside him long before the blood and the gunfire and the scream that had torn from his throat when he thought he’d already lost you.

He exhaled slowly, like he had to push the words past the fear.

“You’re everything to me,” he said, softer this time. “And I love you. I don’t expect you to feel the same. I just—if there’s still a part of you that wants this… if you’ll still have me…”

His voice broke, just barely, a hitch so small most people wouldn’t have noticed. But you did.

“I’m yours.”

He looked at you then, like he was standing on the edge of something sharp and bottomless. Like your silence might be the thing that finally shattered him. Like he would take whatever answer you gave—even if it gutted him—because loving you had never been about control.

Because this wasn’t a man trained to ask for things.

And still—he asked for you.

For a moment, he said nothing. Just looked at you like he wasn’t sure he’d heard right—like the words had landed too softly to be real, like they’d slipped through his defenses before he could catch them. 

The weight of everything he’d just laid bare sat heavy in the space between you, and it was clear from the flicker in his eyes that it had taken everything he had to give it to you. Now, he didn’t know how to breathe, didn’t know how to hope.

Then, softly, almost like it hurt: “Say something. Please.”

His voice was barely above a whisper—fragile and trembling, held together by nothing but hope and fear and the quiet kind of love that never asked for anything, but still wanted everything. 

There was no demand in it. Just raw need. The sound of a man standing at the edge, waiting to see if he’d be pulled back or left to fall.

Your heart ached with the honesty of it. With the way he sat there, waiting—not as a soldier, not as a weapon, not as someone who’d been trained to endure the worst the world could throw at him.

But as a man. Just a man. One who had finally admitted what he wanted, and was terrified that it wouldn’t be enough. That he wouldn’t be enough.

You reached out, fingers brushing the edge of his jaw, and he went still beneath your touch—completely still, like something inside him was holding its breath.

Your thumb swiped gently at the tear trailing down his cheek—a small, quiet thank-you for every part of him he had given you without expecting anything in return. For the courage it took to let himself be seen.

“I love you too,” you whispered.

His eyes shut like the words had cracked something wide open—like they’d found every broken part inside him and flooded it with light. His shoulders slumped, not with defeat, but with release, like the tension he’d been carrying since the moment he found you on that warehouse floor had finally let go.

And when he moved, it wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t frantic. It was careful, gentle, like he didn’t want to scare the moment away.

He leaned in, forehead pressing gently to yours, and his breath ghosted across your lips—warm, uneven, shaky.

His hands came up to frame your face, fingertips brushing just beneath your ears, thumbs trembling faintly against your skin. And there was something in his expression that looked a lot like awe—like he couldn’t believe he got to have this. Got to have you.

You felt your gaze drift down—just slightly—and caught the glint of silver on his hand.

The thin band still wrapped around the fourth finger of his right hand.

The one from the mission.

“You’re still wearing it?” you asked, your voice barely more than a breath.

He let out a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sigh—like it startled him, that he still had laughter in him at all. “Yeah,” he said. “I don’t think I’ll ever take it off.”

There was something unshakable in the way he said it—not possessive, not forced. Just steady. Like this had never been a tactic or a disguise to him. Like it had always been more. Like somewhere along the way, without even meaning to, he’d decided that the ring was already real.

Then, carefully, he reached into the pocket of his sweatpants, slow, almost tentative, like even now he was afraid the moment might vanish if he moved too fast. You watched as he pulled out the second ring, slim and silver and achingly familiar. The one he’d never gotten to put on you.

Until now.

He looked up at you again, and this time his smile was smaller. Shyer. A little nervous in the way only he could be, all confidence stripped away, leaving behind something earnest and boyish and real.

“You never let me put it on, remember?”

You met his gaze, and for a heartbeat, you didn’t speak. Just looked at him, this man who had nearly shattered in front of you, who had stayed by your side through blood and silence and pain, who had chosen you even when it wasn’t easy.

And without a word, you extended your hand, left palm facing him, fingers slightly curled, offering it to him like it meant something.

Because it did.

“Now’s your chance,” you murmured.

He didn’t speak. Didn’t try to make it grand. He just took your hand like it was made of glass, something precious, something that had almost been taken from him, and slid the ring onto your finger with a gentleness that made your chest ache. 

His touch was steady now, but his eyes… his eyes told the truth. They shimmered with a kind of wonder, like he couldn’t believe he got to do this. That you were letting him.

When the band settled into place, his lips found the center of your palm, pressing there softly, not rushed, just sure.

Like a vow made without words.

And for the first time, it didn’t feel like pretending.

It felt like home.

One week later, the compound felt like a strange mix of familiar and surreal. The sterile hallways and reinforced doors hadn’t changed, but everything else had. Or maybe it was just you.

You were home. Bruised, still limping, a dull ache riding your spine every time you moved too fast, but alive. Healing. Whole enough to smile when someone cracked a joke. Stable enough to tease John back. Present enough to notice the warmth of the sunlight pouring in through the glass atrium instead of the pain it lit up in your leg.

The team had been insufferable, in the way that only people who loved you could be.

Bob made soup. Every day. Different flavours, each one weirder than the last, like he was trying to test the boundaries of what counted as comfort food. 

The last one had contained turmeric, coconut milk, and what he swore up and down were healing enzymes. You hadn't asked. You just nodded, thanked him, the smile on his face grew brighter. 

Alexei had taken it upon himself to be your personal chauffeur. The man had nearly gotten into a shouting match with a medbot over who was allowed to push your wheelchair. He’d won. Somehow. 

And ever since, he wheeled you around like a race car driver, dramatic turns, Russian commentary, occasional sound effects, and all. “Turn three, is hairpin! Hold on!” he’d shout gleefully.

John yelled at the medbots on your behalf. Loudly. Colourfully. "Come on!" he'd barked after the fifth proximity alert went off near your bed, like the bots had something personal against you. 

The medbot responded with a passive-aggressive buzz. John flipped it off. The medbot flipped the switch back, in its own, uncanny little way. You were pretty sure it had been programmed just for him.

And Bucky?

He stayed close, but not hovering. A hand always offered before you asked. A look always checking, just in case.

He’d been quieter these days, not distant, just steady. Like now that he’d said it, now that you’d both said it, he didn’t have to force anything. 

He could just… be. With you. No more waiting, no more pretending. Just the quiet certainty of someone who had chosen you every day, even when you couldn’t see it.

You were curled up on the couch in the common room, a blanket across your lap and a hot pack on your hip when Yelena dropped down beside you. She handed you a cup of orange juice—cold, freshly poured.

She didn’t say anything at first. Just sat close, shoulder brushing yours.

Then she nudged you gently, her gaze tilted your way, curious. A little soft at the edges, like maybe she'd been waiting for the right moment to ask.

“How’s you and Bucky?”

You looked down instinctively, your fingers brushing the ring now resting on your left hand. 

“I never thought I could find happiness,” you said after a moment, voice quieter than you intended. “Not really. Not like this. But with him… it feels real.”

Yelena’s eyes softened. She reached over and squeezed your hand.

“You deserve it,” she said simply. “You both do.”

You let your head rest against her shoulder, the blanket shifting slightly as you moved. Your chest felt warm, not from the heating pad, but from the way she said it. 

After a beat, Yelena added, deadpan, “Val says she’ll pay for your honeymoon.”

You wrinkled your nose. “No thank you.”

She smirked. “You don’t want a government-sponsored vacation? With gps tracking and an optional mission brief?”

“I’d rather eat more of Bob’s soup.”

Behind you, from the kitchen, Bob yelled, “Hey!” You didn’t even turn around.

Laughter spilled into the room, light and easy, stretching out across the space like sunlight through glass.

And for the first time in a long, long time, you let yourself sink into it.

A few weeks had passed, and life had begun to stitch itself into something that resembled normal. Not the kind of normal you'd known before, not pre-mission, but something quieter. Softer. A version of normal that fit into slow mornings and shared looks across rooms. 

It was healing, in its own strange way. A patchwork of bruises and blooming, of awkward firsts and familiar silences.

You still limped some days. Bucky still flinched at sudden noises.

But there was laughter now. There was warmth.

So when Bucky told you to meet him at the compound garage at 7 p.m, and added, almost shyly, “Dress nice” —you didn’t question it. Not out loud, anyway. 

You just raised an eyebrow, and he gave you that look. The one that meant, Trust me.

You tried to pry it out of John first. Predictable. Blunt-force obvious. And somehow, somehow, the man managed to keep his mouth shut. Not even a hint.

“He made me swear,” he said with smugness. “I’m not breaking that.”

You stared at him. “Seriously? As if that ever stopped you.” You quipped, jokingly.

John just grinned. “You think I want to be the reason he throws me through a wall?”

Alexei was no better. He distracted you for a good hour with a wild, mostly unverifiable story about his glory days involving a Russian circus, a helicopter, and what may have been a tiger. 

You weren’t sure if the entire thing was real or if he’d just been buying time, but he kept looking at the clock like it owed him something.

“Do not worry,” he said, patting your shoulder. “Is worth it.”

And then it was seven.

You made your way down the corridor, heels tapping softly against the concrete, nerves low in your belly even though you didn’t have a reason to be nervous. 

The garage doors were half-open. The light inside was warm, glowing.

You stepped through.

And your breath caught.

There he was.

Bucky stood just a few feet away, dressed in dark jeans and a crisp button-down, sleeves rolled to the elbows. His hair was neatly pushed back, the kind of effort he only made back when he was a congressman and that, that had been after you told him he can’t walk into the capitol with his hair in a mess. 

You both argued over that, sort of, but when you saw him on your television, hair slicked back, you had smiled. 

In his hand was a bouquet, mismatched wildflowers, soft pinks and whites and sprigs of green,like he hadn’t just picked the nicest flowers and wrapped them himself, but the ones that looked most like you.

And behind him, tucked into the far corner of the garage, was a small table for two. White tablecloth. Candles flickering inside glass jars. A few strands of string lights hung above it, casting the scene in a golden, dreamlike glow. 

A single speaker sat nearby, humming something low and instrumental, a soft jazz tune you vaguely recognized, the kind that filled a room without asking too much of it.

“What’s all this?” you asked, your voice catching slightly on the edges. You felt breathless. Not from shock, but from the tenderness of it all.

He gave a shrug, casual, but not careless. There was a nervous twitch to it, like he wasn’t quite sure how you were going to react. Like part of him still expected this to be too much. Or not enough.

“I figured…” He glanced away, then back at you. “I never got to take you on a real date. I wanted to do it right this time.”

You stared at him for a second longer, because it hit you all at once—the candles, the table, the flowers, him.

Every moment that had led to this one. Every choice, every ache, every time he could have walked away and didn’t. 

The man who'd stormed into a warehouse for you, who had stayed awake five nights just to be the first thing you saw—he was here. In jeans. With wildflowers. 

You stepped forward, eyes still on his, and took the flowers from his hand. Your fingers brushed his, and he didn’t move away. If anything, he leaned in, just slightly, like he was anchoring himself in the contact.

“You didn’t have to,” you said, a grin tugging at your mouth despite the lump rising in your throat.

“I wanted to,” he said simply.

There was a beat of silence, the kind that stretched warm between two people who no longer needed to rush. Who had already survived the worst and come out of it not just intact, but better. 

Then his head tilted, the corner of his mouth tugging up into that familiar, crooked smirk that always made your heart skip a beat.

“So… Mrs. Barnes,” he said, voice low, teasing, soft. “You free tonight?”

Your smile bloomed, wide and stupid and completely uncontained—the kind of smile that reached your eyes, your lungs, your bones. The kind that had once felt impossible and now came easy, like breathing.

“For you, Always.”

a/n: oh my gosh, we are at the end!!! ❤️ i am so grateful for each and everyone of you for taking the time to read this series, for your support, kind words that really motivated me to keep this series going 💌.

taglist: @hughjackmanadict @vxllys @f1padfoot @mortallydistinguishedwolf @midnightvitality @starglory @benbarnesprettygurl @biggestfangirl @lexavalon52 @harrietandcats @cjand10 @loganficsonly @kqliie @kitkatyap @buckyslefttooth @its-in-the-woods @yessebastianstanus @buckysgirl27 @lokisgirlie @furiousprincesskingdom @keira-kaz2y5 @amatiswayland @emilyswortwellen @samanthaw16 @bobscucumber @rrosiitas @alicetesser @morphoportis @polkadot-567 @w-h0re @c3iiaaaaa @mouseratface@biaswreckedbybuckybarnes@that-daughter-of-hephaestus

[kakashixhatakesxwhore]

Random NSFW headcanon please? (If you do nsfw...)

alrighty roo, buckaroo, lets discuss kinkage - thank you so much for the request

Random Kinks They Deffo Have

They: Iruka, Kakashi, and Itachi (with additions of Sasuke and Shikamaru) (f!Reader)

Warnings: whew! Swearing, explicit smut, power play, somno/free use, auralism, names of authority, praise kink, spit/blood/cum play, idk just please be 18

Notes: This one is for the freaks, obvi Boruto!Sasuke and Boruto!Shikamaru, I'm begging for everyone's thoughts and opinions - be prepared for Shikamaru's to be nasty

Masterlist💿

Iruka

Power Play

He just fucking loves when you take control

Anything you tell him to do, Iruka will do compulsively, and he's absolutely twitching when you tell him how good he is for doing so

All! About! Your! Pleasure!

Iruka's favourite encounters would be when he's not allowed to touch you, though, funnily enough

You're riding him, and all he can do is watch your sultry smile and feel your pussy hugging him tight - he wants to feel you, to run his hands all over your body - but he can't - or else you'll slow down to a halt and sometimes even pull him out, just to give him a beration of sorts

Now, that said, Iruka does not fuck with demeaning talk - you better love on this motherfucker, he's trying his goddamn best for you, and if you should negate that, it would allow a dark cloud to form over Iruka's mind

You don't want that, right? Exactly. So you keep it sweet, you give him stupid, little commands then fan the flames of his ego when he completes the command in spades

Lowk gets boyfriend-brain when he's with you, so kinda does need to be told what to do

Iruka is a sweetheart!!! He's always going what he can for you, all the time, even if you don't explicitly ask him to every time

Kakashi

Free Use/Somnophilia

When you said you would be okay with giving it a trial run, Kakashi was elated, and fucked you four seperate times that night, and began again before you woke up in the morning

He fucks you slow, almost trying not to wake you up, but the stretch is unmistakable

"Good morning, pretty lady. Have any good dreams?" He would ask, noticing your quickened breath, making you instantly relax into the situation

You love it - you stop sleeping in any amount of pant, just so Kakashi could have you as he pleased

When you got home, he would be pressing you against the door, when you try to start chopping vegetables for dinner, he would bend you over then pop you up on the counter when he just couldn't get enough

Kakashi's condition is that everything spontaneous happens within your shared, lovely, little home

He might sneak you away occasionally while the two of you are out, finding a small cache in the forest, but Kakashi would be asking for permission, assurance, consent at every step of the way - public is just different, but he's not entirely opposed

Kakashi just can't believe he's got you, and every time he looks at you, he needs to have you

Itachi

Auralism

He needs to hear you; the way your voice quakes, the way your nails rake across the skin of his back

Itachi's favourite sound though, is the harmony of your bodies meeting, skin smacking skin, squelches and a slick plunging sound, filling the room

Yeiff - let alone fucking outside - my god - Itachi wants your encounter to be so loud that the whole world knows what's going on

With his shit eyeslight, Itachi would prefer to close his eyes while fucking you, letting your beautifully wanton sounds paint a picture in his mind

In a perfect world, he would totally love to get tied up with a blindfold on - just to be at the mercy of your light touch and the intoxicating sound of your pleasure - Itachi would break the binding eventually, desperate to have his hands on you, needing to fuck you hard enough to hear the smacking and sloshing

Itachi is also the primo dirty talker, insisting you reply to him through your stinted pants, sharp gasps and breathy moans

His whole arousal around the subject of sound is cranked up to ten the second the two of you are in public - your little yips when he squeezes your ass, or the biting 'Itachi' that slips out of your mouth when he corners you to cop a feel

Oh, he fucks with names, you can call him whatever the fuck you want, so long as he's the one you're screaming about - but he likes it when you speak to him with more authoritarian honorifics (sir, daddy, lord)

Sasuke

Praise

Ooh, tell him he's hitting the spot and Sasuke would lose it, only trying to hit the exact same spot again

If you're ever out, singing his tune to another party, about anything, and Sasuke catches wind, he's taking you home immediately to prove he can provide more than you bargained for

Y'all, lets be real, and acknowledge that sweet Sasuke craves praise in any and all capacities, but most fervently in the four walls of your bedroom

Again and again, it doesn't matter how many times you tell him, he wants to hear it again

"Sasuke, your cock is so fucking big," you gasped as he slid in slowly.

"Louder. Tell the neighbours."

Loves, loves, loves to be able to hear the affect he's having on your body, every wave of pleasure, every jolt from your orgasm

Even if it's visibly clear that he's got you like putty in his palm, Sasuke will demand that you tell him how good he is, how deep he can reach, how much your pussy loved him

You're a blabbering mess, and it strokes Sasuke's ego to no end that he can bring you to this point, absolutely drunk with pleasure

Shikamaru

Spit/Blood/Cum Play

Anything Shikamaru can ingest that comes from your body (not excretions, sickos), he will

It's insane when you two hit the trifecta - Shikamaru cumming all over a patch of knicks on your stomach then spitting on the pile of liquid, he would mix it all together with his index finger, on top of you, before he would lean down and lick it all up, shoving the finger covered in the rose-tinted mixture into your mouth

Mm mm mm, and your cum, my good Christ, does he ever love your cum

Nothing brings Shikamaru so much joy as pulling his fingers out of you, being coated in a shiny slick

There's also something about the way your face screws up every time he brings a kunai into the bedroom - Shikamaru goes weak in the knees when he sees your crimson blood, glinting on the tip of the knife, losing it even further when you lick it off without hestitation

He's going to cum on your face, just to see you try to open those pretty eyelashes of yours, beads of white weighing them down

Shikamaru had no clue he was into fluids, until you randomly asked him, one day, to spit in your mouth - it's been a done deal since then, spitting just comes with the territory eventually

He always loved seeing your body get painted with his cum, but it's a whole different ball game to watch you play with it, to watch you lick it all up without wasting a drop like you used to do (honestly, Shikamaru can't even remember why he used to wipe his cum off of you)

[melinoelabs]

Dear Sirs.

SCP-682's powers are metatextual. He's unkillable because the story says he is nearly unkillable and no solution would be satisfying. His nickname is 'the very hard to destroy reptile' for rigour's sake. You don't have to be Grant Morrison to put this together.

The solution is to alter the narrative so that there is a means of killing him that is satisfying. Unfortunately, only full-on apocalypse scenarios or the use of SCP-682 as a jobber for an even worse threat would fill that criteria.

So unless you want to unleash something even more tiresome, like the Black Moon or the Scarlet King or the Yellow Submarine or whatever other color-coded doomsday monster you have on tap, you're just wasting jumpsuit filling doing anything at all.

The easy alternative is to simply stop trying to kill him.

Just focus on holding him in the most boring, routine ways possible, rendering him increasingly less interesting and thus reducing the time between stories focused on him and thus, the resulting breaches and disasters.

Or you can do what we did. If you aren't chicken.

Ours wasn't a rotted lizard. It was a sort of mummified horse the size of a 1996 Volkswagen Harlequin, and it was a she, but otherwise same deal. Regeneration. Vat of acid. Mass casualties. Violent opposition to the use of breath mints. Endemic to all life. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.

We figured out the how it worked, and we speed-ran the whole concept, hurling that vile beast through a veritable plinko-fall of thousands of extermination tests and controlled rampages until there was literally nothing left to do with the 'More-Than-One-Way-to-Fail-to-Kill-a Horse'.

And we trust the populace enough to not lie to them for 'their own good'. Because its funny? Sure. Profitable? Absolutely (don't worry, shareholders!)! But never for 'their own good.'

So we turned those experiments into a 17 season reality television program hosted by Greg Kinnear and force-fed them to a sludge-hungry populace.

There were 'More-Than-One-Way-to-Fail-to-Kill-a Horse' calendars, coffee mugs, t-shirts, two different animated spin-offs running at the same time for some reason, four movies starring Chris Pratt as the voice of the horse, an ongoing sketch on Late Night with Conan O'Brien, 'More-Than-One-Way-to-Fail-to-Kill-a Horse' "acid bath" sour candy flavored yogurt in a tube, a series of increasingly inadequately playtested gameboy cartridges, a 27-issue limited series from Image comics, and adorable plush mummified murder-horse plushes with little suction cups on their red-felt hooves so they can stare balefully out the back of your station wagon at that ASSHOLE Kevin in his souped up Trans AM who does not understand the concept of a safe following distance, and you JUST want to run him off the road with the magno-lifters and recreate the scene from Lost Highway with Robert Loggia, but "you can't use the magno-lifters for revenge" because it's "against OSHA regulations" and "technically assault!"

And once the first shipment of 'More-Than-One-Way-to-Fail-to-Kill-a Horse' Funko Pops hit store shelves, the creature's cultural cache cratered so hard that it became a parody of itself so predictable it's "containment" is now a Universal Studios attraction with two failed executions and a containment breach each night, with double shows on Saturdays.

Now, it was a rocky ride getting there, especially for Utah (projections say you'll get those House seats back in two, maybe three, generations at most, don't you worry!) but we've proven that even if it isn't killable, you can, in fact, beat a dead horse.

Hope this helps.

Humbert, Outreach Liaison Melinoë Laboratories "Hoc non veniet ad nos mordax"

[accidentcache]

hiiii dee ily,,,can i get a 💌 👉👈

i’m gonna say right off the bat i think it’s funny as hell when other mutuals of mine say they’re afraid to moot with you bc they’re scared of me 😭 IVE CLAIMED OWNERSHIP CONSENSUALLY

but no i love how truly easy it is to talk to you. since that fated day you came off anon and came to yap more about our shared mutual interest you’re just so sweet (also mean as fuck when you want to be, also love that) and i get extreme cuteness aggression whenever talking about you to anyone else

uwu

[butwhyduh]

I love stories where it points out how deadly all the robins are.

Yeah Jason’s guns kill with amazing accuracy but he’s literally assassin trained with multiple teachers around the world in hand to hand combat.

Tim might be a tech genius but he’s also trained by Lady Shiva. He welds the bow staff like an extension of his arms. He has the least amount of pre Robin training but can keep up with the others.

Damian is trained by the league of assassins and he can use a sword non-deadly which is amazing control. That’s before he learned how to be robin.

Dick tho, everyone sleeps on. He’s learned flexibility and balance that none of the other bats could even dream of. He’s learned from multiple combat artists. He can go through a weapon cache and use anything he grabs. The bow staff, escrima sticks, throwing stars. He literally wears no armor because he’s amazing at not even getting touched by his opponent.

I think it’s great when they point out how hard they work to not kill their opponents.