#Yeah we gotta focus on the investigation but holy shit dude have you seen a doctor or psychiatrist yet? Did you drink water and eat too????

[solazu1]

Some more Jay and Tim from my role swap Au, wooden beetles :33

[bombshellbois]

Lessons in Babysitting

For @hoegrove and her amazing Double Trouble AU (if you haven’t seen it yet, please go pour over the entire thing because it’s hilarious)

Steve doesn’t know what he’s expecting when Billy’s Camaro pulls up outside the house that afternoon. He’s not expecting anything, really. Billy shows up all the time unannounced, and Steve has no problem with that. Billy does better at stuff where he doesn’t need permission because every form of authority offends him, including basic manners. Steve just pulls an extra Coke from the fridge and braces himself to deal with Billy pouting when he gets told there won’t be any sex or making out until the kids leave. In all fairness, he told him already that they would be over here this afternoon to play their nerd game while the Wheeler basement is drying out from a recent leak.

The lock pops and the door gets shoved open.

“Holy shit, we’re in key territory already??” Billy asks as he’s shoved inside. Steve thinks at first that he got a haircut. And a tan. And... younger? Steve is trying to piece together what he can pin that on (really good night’s sleep?) when another Billy lumbers in behind.... Billy. His Billy lumbers in. Long haired and a little weary, tan tamed by the Indiana seasons.

“Don’t touch my stuff,” Billy says, slapping Billy... not-Steve’s-Billy’s hand away when he reaches for the keys.

“You didn’t tell me we were at the key stage with our boyfriend, dude!”

“He’s my boyfriend.” Billy slams the door shut. “And quit calling me dude.”

“What... the hell is going on?” Steve asks faintly, approaching his boyfriend and the cheerful doppelgänger slowly.

“Hi!” Not-Steve’s-Billy says, taking Steve’s Coke and drinking from it. The open one.

“I put my mouth on that,” Steve protests belatedly while his brain is trying to come up with a way to process what he’s seeing. Chastising bad manners and poor health practices seems like... under-reacting.

“Yeah, but we’re dating, so it’s just indirect kissing.” Not-Steve’s-Billy waggles his eyebrows at Steve and it immediately makes Steve think of Dustin trying to act charming.

“...Yeah, don’t do that.”

“I’ve got a good idea where else you could put your mou—” Not-Steve’s-Billy gets cut off when Billy grabs the back of his jacket and hauls him out of the kitchen and to the basement door, shoving him inside. He slams the door shut and flips the lock. Mercifully, there are no sounds of a body falling down the stairs. Just rapid knocking from the other side.

“Hey! What’s your damage, dude??”

Billy ignores the yelling and comes back into the kitchen. He grabs Steve’s shoulders and pulls him close, knocking their foreheads together gently.

“Okay. So. We need to talk.”

“You think?” Steve says, raising his eyebrows. “What the hell, Billy?”

***

It takes 2 beers to get the full story out of Billy. Steve doesn’t necessarily like encouraging drinking at 3 in the afternoon, but his boyfriend just locked a younger version of himself in the basement. It seems like a definite moment to allow extremes.

Not that the full story is in any way clear. Something about sleep walking (which Billy should have told Steve about but didn’t, of course) and the Upside Down and another gate that probably almost definitely closed and isn’t a big deal. It’s a lot of really bad things to hear but in a really vague and unhelpful format. Nothing he could, for instance, take to Hopper as a thing to be investigated.

Steve kind of wants a beer himself.

“And so now he’s here. And he won’t get it through his thick skull that he doesn’t get to share all of my stuff. Including my boyfriend.” Billy tips back his head and takes a long drink of a third beer. Steve sets a hand on the bottle and makes him lower it back down when the air bubbles start glugging to the top with concerning speed.

“Should we... try to get him back to his mom or something?” he asks.

Billy slams the bottle down on the table. “Sure, Steve. Lemme just go see if there’s a fucking receipt stapled to the back of his shirt so I can return him. How hard can it be to get to another dimension? Oh wait, the only one we ever manage to get to is full of fucking nightmares.”

Steve leans his elbow on the table and rests his chin on the heel of his hand, waiting out the storm. Fine, it was a stupid question. The dramatics are a bit much, though. “Okay. Maybe we focus on something shorter term,” he says.

Billy scrubs a hand over his face, wiping away the withering glare and replacing it with something more tired. Something that looks like no sleep and too much beer too quickly too early in the day. “Christ. Sorry, I’m being a dick.”

“You are,” Steve agrees, standing and clearing the empty bottles. “But it sounds like it’s been a rough day.”

Billy catches Steve’s collar and pulls him closer, kissing his forehead. “Thanks, pretty boy. Look, just... give me a few babysitting tips and I’ll get out of your hair before your nerds get here. I dunno what the hell to actually do with him.”

Steve is about to tell Billy that he’s not leaving unless he’s letting his younger self drive (which- ha! Not even Steve gets to drive the Camaro. Or sit in the driver’s seat), but he pauses and frowns. “Before... they’re already here, Billy.”

Billy blinks and pulls his mouth off the lip of his bottle. The suction releases with a ‘pop.’ “What? Why’s it so quiet? Where the hell are they?”

“In... the basement?” Steve raises his eyebrows. “Where else would they play their game? It has to feel like a dungeon or something.” Dustin explained it once, using words like ‘atmosphere’ and ‘aesthetics’ and ‘acoustics.’ It all boils down, Steve thinks, to needing no windows so they can’t tell when they’ve been playing for four hours.

Billy looks at the clock. “How long has he been down there with them?”

“An hour, maybe? Did you seriously mean to lock that poor kid in the basement alone??”

“Oh don’t do that hands-on-the-hips thing at me, Harrington,” Billy huffs, scrambling to his feet and sprinting for the basement door. Steve follows after him, catching up just as Billy unlocks the door and hurries down the steps, grabbing the back of his collar to keep him from stumbling on the way down.

Not-Steve’s-Billy is sprawled nearly sideways on one folding chair, another pulled over for the express purpose of propping one leg on. Mike is standing across the rickety card table from him, where their map and shit are spread out, holding a book out with the pages facing Billy. He’s pointing at a drawing.

“Do you see the scaling? You don’t even come up to his knee!” Mike jabs a finger at the page. “You’re tiny!”

Not-Steve’s-Billy shrugs. “So?”

“So this thing can kill you by existing near you,” Lucas adds. “It’s pure evil.”

“Still wanna flirt with it.”

“You can’t flirt with a Nightwalker!” Mike insists. “It’s a giant, evil, undead demon!”

“Uh, I have...” Not-Steve’s-Billy picks up a piece of paper in front of him. “...charisma points that say I can. So lemme try and get into this thing’s pants.”

Mike blusters. “It doesn’t have pants!”

“I mean, technically it’s not against the rules,” Dustin admits, ever the diplomat. “Mr. Clarke always says you have to think outside the box if your problems don’t fit in the box.”

“The Nightwalker can’t speak,” Will protests. “It won’t understand you, and also Mike said it’s a guy!”

Not-Steve’s-Billy pats Will’s back. “Don’t you worry, kid. We’ve got body language and that’s all we need.” He holds his hand out. “Dice.”

“Don’t let him, Mike,” Lucas begs, sounding vaguely terrified. “What if he makes a good throw? I don’t wanna know what he does with the Nightwalker!”

“What the fuck?” Billy stalks over and grabs the die Dustin was handing over. “I leave you alone for an hour and you turn into a nerd?”

“Hey! My character has gotten laid twice already.” Not-Steve’s-Billy taps his paper. “He’s a...” He pauses and looks at Will. “Wiseman. What the hell am I again?”

Will sighs. “A bard. You wanted a guitar.”

Not-Steve’s-Billy bumps his shoulder to Will’s in thanks and smirks up at Billy. “My bard is getting every kind of action over here. This is so not a nerd game.”

“Shit.” Steve scrubs his hair back. “You guys already took sex ed, right?” Please let there be nothing Steve suddenly has to explain. He’s not ready for that. When he gets four slightly-numb nods in return, it feels like he can breathe again.

“You can’t just add sex and think it removes the nerd overtones.” Billy tosses the die aside. “Move your ass, we’re going.”

Lucas makes a shrill sound that Steve bets the other guys will mimic for Max for a long time. “A 20! He rolled a 20!” He clasps his hands over his ears. “Don’t tell me what a 20 means!”

“Wait, is that good?” Not-Steve’s-Billy looks around the table. “Do I get to fuck the Night-thing?”

“Okay, thanks for being so nice to Billy’s... friend, gotta go, you kids play nice,” Steve calls over his shoulder as he and Billy drag Not-Steve’s-Billy up the stairs and out of the basement.

“Wiseman!” Not-Steve’s-Billy calls back down the stairs. “Wiseman, save my stats for me!”

The basement door shuts. It’s quiet. Dustin dutifully reaches over and pushes the die, flipping the upturned number to a 3.

Mike sits down, still clutching his book. “Okay,” he says slowly. “The Nightwalker devoured his soul. And we never speak of him again.”

[master-sass-blast]

Children of the Gods -Part One.

OOOOOOOOOOOOH BABY I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS ONE!!!! THIS HAS BEEN MY LITTLE PET PROJECT FOR OVER A YEAR!!!!

Summary: There's a new force to be reckoned with on the horizon, a force that goes by the name of Allison Ricci. Having lost her family, she's out for blood and vengeance --specifically, Frank Castle's. And, having taken Karen Page hostage, it seems like she's liable to get it. By teaming up with Frank to save Karen, can you and your friends and family stop Allison's quest for revenge? ...Only one way to find out.

Rating: T for moderate violence, gun violence, and mention of death.

Pairing(s): Piotr Rasputin x Reader, Nathan Summers x Wade Wilson, and Frank Castle x Karen Page.

Set after Hunter and Hunted.

Taglist: @marvel-is-perfection, @chromecutie, @super-darkcloudstudent, @girl-obsessed-with-things, @starman-canos-thorsus-jock

You eye the abandoned looking warehouse with grim determination. “You’re sure about this?”

“Dead sure,” Nathan says as he checks his gun over. “She’ll be here.”

Your Dad-in-every-way-but-biological and Wade had called in a request to have the X-Force help them with a mission earlier today: rescuing a kidnapped person, retrieving a potentially violent mutation for rehabilitation, nothing too out of the ordinary.

It wasn’t until you, Piotr, Ellie, Yukio, and Russell (the newest X-Men trainee cleared for field work) had gotten on the jet –Neena was hitching a ride with Wade—that Nathan had sent you the rest of the details: that the kidnapped person was Karen Page, the potentially violent mutant was a “victim” of Frank’s punishing sprees, and that Frank was also present to rescue his girlfriend.

Because, you know, nothing’s ever easy.

“You’ve got five seconds to get moving, Summers, or I’m gonna blow this place open,” Frank growls, clad in black and his spray painted tack vest and looking angrier than you’ve ever seen him.

“Patience,” Nathan fires back. “We can’t rush this.”

“I’m gonna rush a few bullets up your ass if you don’t hurry the fuck up.”

“If it counts for anything,” Neena says, eyeing the warehouse uneasily, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this one.”

“Easy, Kenobi,” Wade says as he holsters his pistols. “Or would you be Han Solo?”

“I’ve always seen myself as a Leia.”

Wade nods. “Who wouldn’t want to be Carrie Fisher.”

“Wilson, shut your fucking trap or I will shut it for you—”

“Hey.” You step between Frank and Wade before Frank can slug your adoptive brother. “Give my dad two minutes. He’s probably just making sure we aren’t walking into any traps or massive amounts of back up. Karen’ll be fine. Hell, she’s probably already found a way to free herself.”

“Won’t be any back up,” Nathan says as he scans the warehouse. “The target’s name is Allison Ricci, daughter of Andrew Ricci. His recent death—”

“Courtesy of Captain S-and-M here,” Wade interjects, gesturing over at Frank.

“—means that she doesn’t have access to the money that hires extra muscle, considering Mr. Ricci’s accounts were frozen upon his death for criminal investigation.”

“Then what the fuck are we waiting for?” Frank hisses.

“Is there even point in my saying ‘language?’” Piotr asks in a resigned, albeit pointed, tone.

“Probably fucking not,” Ellie says while she taps at her phone.

You bite back a laugh while Piotr merely shoots his mentee a look.

“We’re waiting,” Nathan interjects, regaining control over the conversation, “for me to locate where Allison and Karen are. The less time we waste on this, the better.”

“We’re already wasting time, Summers,” Frank snarls, stomping away from the group. “Fuck it, I’m going in by myself—”

“They’re in a storage room on the West side,” Nathan pipes up. “There’s a bay door there used for unloads. We’ll use that one.”

You quickly follow after Frank as he books it over to the West side of the warehouse, flying low over the ground to keep up with him. “Try to not rush into this. Dad didn’t say anything about Allison’s mutation, which means we don’t know what we’re up against.”

“Don’t tell me what to fucking do.” Frank tries a regular door next to the massive bay door on the West side of the warehouse, then rears back to kick it open when it winds up being locked.

“Holy fuck!” You dive between Frank and the door before he can hurt himself. “Dude! Chill the fuck out for, like, two seconds.” You focus your powers on the doorknob, and within five seconds the lock clicks and the door swings open.

Frank brushes past you brusquely, gun sights aimed on the empty hallway. He scans the space, then advances down the hall when he deems it safe.

You cast a glance over your shoulder to make sure that everyone else is following along, then head in after Frank.

Two steps past the door and you can hear Karen talking to someone else –someone with a higher pitched, noticeably feminine voice.

“That’s gotta be Allison,” you whisper to Frank, who nods back before closing in on the loading bay.

You fly after him –so as not to make added noise—and brace yourself for any number of possible threats: guns, grenades, an arsenal of pointy objects…

But what you see in the loading bay is nothing like what you expected.

Karen is there, yes, sitting on a folding chair and looking pretty good, all things considered. However, the only other person in the dusty concrete and metal room is a young girl with a severe, thin face, dark eyes with darker undereye bags, and dark brown curly hair. The girl –presumably Allison, if Nate’s intel is anything to go by—has a pistol in her hand, aimed at Karen’s head. She looks like she hasn’t slept in a few days, possibly longer.

You blink, stunned. She can’t be older than thirteen.

Frank seems to be taken aback by the sight of the girl as well. He freezes in the shadows for a moment, then lowers his gun a tick before stepping into the light. “Karen.”

The girl’s eyes widen when she sees Frank, and her face contorts with rage as he walks towards them. “You! You fucking bastard—” She presses the muzzle of her gun against Karen’s temple, which makes Karen grimace. “Don’t come one step closer, or I’ll paint the floor with her brains.”

“Easy, kid,” Frank says, much calmer than he would normally address anyone threatening to hurt Karen, which you suspect has everything to do with the fact that he’s facing down an actual kid. “No one has to get hurt.”

“People are already hurt, shithead!” the girl fires back, teeth clenched. “One more won’t make any fucking difference.”

“Hey, hey.” You quickly step between Frank and the girl, hands outstretched. “Let’s just take a deep breath, okay? You must be Allison, right?”

“Who the fuck are you? Are you with him? Stay the fuck away from me, or I’ll—”

“I’m not with him,” you interject quickly, doing your best to be soothing. “My name is Y/N, and I’m with the X-Men. I’m here to help you. Are you Allison? I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“No, you haven’t,” Allison fires back, face screwed up in a defiant sneer. “And the only way you can help me is by killing him.”

“No can do, babyface.” Wade skips into the room, borderline irreverent. “The Mutant Boyscouts are pretty big on the whole ‘no killing’ thing. Also, you’re so tiny! You’re practically a fetus! Nate, you didn’t mention we were picking up a literal infant, you inconsiderate dickhole. I would’ve brought the baby clothes from the last time I got my legs ripped off!”

“Sorry, sweetheart, I’ll make sure to mention it next time,” Nathan says, eyes focused on Allison. “Put the gun down, Allison. Enough people have been hurt already.”

“The only person hurt here has been me!” Allison shrieks, erratically aiming her gun at Karen’s head, Nate, Frank, you, then back to Karen. “Stay back! I’ll fucking do it!”

Russell steps forward, looking decidedly nervous but simultaneously determined. “Look, I know you’re hurt. I know you’re scared. I’ve been where you are; I’ve wanted the same kind of vengeance. So take it from someone who knows, it doesn’t help anything. Only innocent people wind up getting hurt instead.”

“You don’t know jack shit,” Allison hisses, eyes narrowed into slits.

“Put the gun down, Allison,” Russell persists, hands shaking but shoulders squared. “The X-Men are good people. They helped me, and they can help you. It doesn’t have to end like this.”

“Oh, this isn’t about ‘have to,’” Allison spits out, voice hoarse and gravelly. “This is about going to. And ‘this’ is going to end with her brains all over this fucking floor!”

“Hey, hey, hey!” Frank shouts, drawing Allison’s attention to him. “I’m the one you’re mad at, okay. Me! Not her. You’re angry at me, and I understand that, but you don’t have to take it out on her.” He nods at Karen. “She didn’t have anything to do this.”

“Did my mom have anything to do with your murder spree? Huh? Did my brothers have anything to do with it? No, no. I wake up, and I find my mom’s and my dad’s and my brother’s brains and blood everywhere, and I find their faces and bodies obliterated by your fucking bullets, and I see your skull fucking spraypainted on the dining room wall, and… no. No! You have to understand, Castle! You have to understand what it’s like to lose everything you ever loved!”

“Isn’t his whole backstory technically about understanding just that?” Wade mutters.

“Shut up!” Allison screams. “All of you!” She cocks the gun, then presses the muzzle against Karen’s temple, holding the other side of the woman’s head to keep her from flinching away. “This conversation is done!”

Karen closes her eyes, lips pursed and brow furrowed but otherwise remarkably calm.

“Hey!” Frank shouts, holding his hand out. “Put that gun down!”

“Yeah, for fuck’s sake, you’re gonna shoot your own hand off if you do it like that!” Wade adds.

The look Frank shoots your brother is nothing short of murderous.

“What? I’m not wrong.”

Fortunately, before Allison can kill Karen or Frank can –temporarily—kill Wade, the loading bay door rolls open, heaved up by none other than your husband.

The ruckus distracts Allison, which gives Nathan the opportunity to yank the gun out of her hand and knock her away from Karen via telekinesis.

Karen practically dives away from Allison as soon as the gun’s away from her head, quickly darting away from her captor and towards Frank.

Frank quickly latches onto Karen and shoves her behind him, effectively acting as a standing shield between her and everyone else. “You okay?”

Karen nods, gaze still fixed on Allison—

Who looks like someone kicked her puppy and stole her ice cream. If the context were different, the expression of frustration on the teen’s face would be adorable.

“God, she’s like some type of… murder baby,” Wade stage whispers. “Cute, yet deadly. Like an ocelot.”

“That is enough of violence and aggression,” your husband says as Yukio and Ellie step out from behind him. “Please. Come with us quietly, and we can help you—”

“I don’t want your fucking help!” Allison snarls as she scrambles her feet, quickly backing away from everyone. “You’re helping him!” She points an accusatory finger at Frank. “He fucking murdered my family!”

Piotr grimaces before quickly regaining his composure. “I assure you, that is not case.” He takes a step towards Allison, hands held up reassuringly. “If you would just come with us—”

Allison bares her teeth in a vicious snarl –and then her eyes start glowing blue. “Stay the fuck away from me!”

“Uh, what do you do when the baby starts glowing?” Wade asks, head whipping between you and Allison.

Before you can answer –or react to Allison’s sudden light display—the thirteen year-old unleashes a blast of energy from her hands, whipping it like a softball straight at your husband’s chest.

Piotr rockets through the bay door with a guttural yell, ripping the sheet of metal off its tracks with a horrific, deafening screech. He bounces across the concrete parking lot, groaning and grunting as he goes.

“Holy shit!” Russell shrieks.

“Uh, Houston?” Wade babbles nervously, drawing his katanas while Allison’s eyes start letting off wisps of blue smoke. “I think we have an angry baby Kryptonian on our hands –shit!”

You duck as Allison shoots a bolt of energy from her eyes, taking a chunk out of the concrete wall behind all of you. “Fuck! Allison, calm down; let us—”

Allison shrieks, then whips another blast of energy at all of you before aiming a beam of energy from her eyes at Karen.

You wind up with Frank and Karen as you all try to stay away from the scorching stream of energy. Concrete chunks fall off walls and rain down from the ceiling, and you shove Frank and Karen out of the way from a truck-sized piece before sending a gust of wind at Allison –only hard enough to knock her off balance. “Allison! Stop! That’s enough.”

Allison responds by gritting her teeth –then screaming before slamming her fists against the ground.

Blue light shoots along the floor and up the walls –and then the building starts to crumble.

“Let’s go!” Frank shouts, partially hunched over Karen to protect her. “This shithole’s coming down!”

You direct Russell, Ellie, and Yukio out the broken bay door –with some help for your husband, who’d gotten up in time to hold part of the collapsing wall up—then turn back to Allison. “Allison! Come on! We need to go!”

By way of response, Allison merely sends more pulses of energy into the ground, speeding up the collapse of the warehouse by ten. “I’m taking you fuckers with me!”

“Kid, we need to go!” Nate yanks on your arm, forcing you to follow him, Wade, Neena, Frank, and Karen out through the steadily collapsing bay door. “Come on!”

Piotr ducks away from the warehouse as the rest of you dart out, then quickly hunches over you and the teens, shielding you all from any flying chunks of rock or rebar.

The warehouse shakes, groans, then collapses with a gut-clenching crunching noises, spewing dust and shards of glass into the air.

You peer over your husband’s steel shoulder when the worst of the cacophony finally settles. “Shit.”

“Did she…” Russell looks up at you, eyes wide. “Could she… is it even…”

You grimace.

The color drains from Russell’s face, and he gulps. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Try to find some grass to upchuck in!” Wade shouts as Russell darts away from everyone. “It’s less likely to splatter against your face if you don’t puke on asphalt!”

“Shut up, dipshit,” Ellie grumbles as she brushes dust and dirt off her uniform. She stands, eyes the wreckage of the warehouse, then shoots a concerned look at her mentor. “Did she… really take herself out?”

Piotr sighs heavily. “Loss can do strange things to people. She was already heavily agitated when we reached her. There likely was nothing we could do.”

You wrap an arm around Ellie’s and Yukio’s shoulders, then glance over in Frank and Karen’s direction.

Surprisingly enough, Karen seems to be the one holding Frank up right now, even though she was the one that was abducted and had a gun held to her head.

But, then, perhaps it isn’t surprising at all. Wade’s told you chapter and verse about how Frank does not like hurting innocents. If he’d thought he was facing off with an adult –someone fully brought into the Ricci crime family—and found himself staring at a teenager instead…

A teenager that appears to have just committed suicide after losing her family to a Punisher spree…

Yeah. This whole situation is fucked.

Neena grimaces, gaze still fixed on the warehouse as she hands newly returned Russell a water bottle. “I don’t know. This doesn’t feel done just yet.”

“Seems done to me,” Frank murmurs hoarsely, looking somewhat shell-shocked.

“We should probably leave,” Wade says, slowly sheathing his katanas. “Don’t wanna be caught near a collapsed building with a dead kid’s body in it.”

Everyone slowly makes to leave, heading towards respective vehicles—

Except Nathan, who is fixated on an electronic readout mounted to his techno-organic arm. He’s frowning, flipping through various future records and completely oblivious to everyone else.

“Nate-y-kins,” Wade says in a sing-songy voice. “We’re leaving. Vamoosing. Gettin’ a move on, pardner. Come on, Gramps, it’s toaster strudel time.”

You brow furrows when Nathan doesn’t respond; he always responds to Wade, and you also know for a fact that Wade just busted out two nicknames that Nate isn’t particularly fond of in front of everyone else. “Dad? You okay?”

“Yeah…” he mutters, still distracted as he keeps flipping through electronic files. “Just… checking…”

“What’s the earliest onset age of dementia for robotic geezers?” Wade stage whispers to you, which gets a few giggles out of Yukio and Russell.

“Neena’s right,” Nate pipes up, silencing Yukio’s and Russell’s laughter. “Something’s wrong. There’s no death date for Allison in her records.”

“Maybe the Matrix is taking its sweet time to update,” Wade suggests, rolling his eyes. “She dropped a building on herself, Cabes. Only person who can come back from that is me.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Nathan mutters, redrawing his gun as he starts towards the warehouse. “We need to recover Allison’s body and confirm her death.”

Before he can so much as take another step, though, there’s a brief flash of light around Karen’s feet –and then Allison pops halfway out of the ground, grabs Karen’s legs, and starts yanking her under.

Karen lets out a startled shriek and flails desperately for the closest handhold. “Frank!”

Frank lets out a desperate howl of Karen’s name, diving for her and catching her. He hooks his arms under her armpits and hugs her close, holding her up so everything above her hips is still above ground.

Allison snarls. “Let go!”

Frank catches a bolt of energy to the chest and goes sailing backwards with a grunt, knocking into you and Wade and taking the two of you down to the asphalt with him.

“Oh, god,” Wade groans. “This is not how I wanted to get Frank Castle on top of me. Dude! What did you eat for breakfast? Despair and cement?”

Nathan’s the next closest, since he’s the only one that can fend off Allison’s blasts of energy with his telekinesis. He manages to grab Karen’s arm before her shoulders disappear underground. He clasps something around her wrist, says something in her ear—

And then he releases his grip, and both Karen and Allison disappear underground.

The scream that Frank lets out is heart wrenching, somewhere between a wounded animal and the sound of grief incarnate.

“Why did you let her go?” he seethes, advancing on Nathan in a storm of rage. “I’m gonna fucking rip your limbs off, Summers; I’m gonna—”

“We weren’t going to get her out of the transportation spell without ripping her limbs apart,” Nathan spits out, quickly backing away from Frank while raising a telekinetic shield. “I put a tracking device on her wrist so we can follow her wherever Allison takes her.”

Frank’s hand shakes as he points at Nathan. “If –if anything happens to her… I swear to God, if anything happens to Karen—”

“They’re at Spring Heights Memorial Park,” Nate says once the display on his techno-organic arm pings. “And Karen’s still alive.”

“What direction?” you ask, extending a hand to Frank. “I’ll fly the two of us there. The rest of you can catch up.”

“Northeast, ten miles.”

You nod, then loop your arm around Frank’s waist. The two of you get a running start, then take off into the night sky.

You just hope you make it there in time.

***

 The Spring Heights Memorial Park is dark, completely abandoned, by the time you and Frank reach it –but you can hear Karen arguing with Allison as soon as you land at the cemetery’s entrance.

Frank bolts towards the sound of Karen’s voice, weaving through the rows of headstones and plaques with the ease of someone who makes running around in the dark a regular habit.

(You, a person who does not make running around in the dark a regular habit, opt to fly to avoid tripping and faceplanting onto one of the headstones.)

“I understand that you’re hurting, but that doesn’t give you the right to hurt others—”

“You’re dating the fucking Punisher! All he does is hurt people because he got hurt!”

You follow Frank around another tree, then practically run right over Karen and Allison.

(Well, Frank does. You don’t because… you’re flying… yeah.)

Karen has Allison’s gun –she must have wrestled it off of her at some point—and is aiming it at the ground, gaze locked on Allison. Allison looks like she fell and hadn’t thought to get back up yet, and looks somewhat startled by the entire situation.

“Easy, easy,” Frank says when Allison’s face screws up at the sight of him. “You stay right where I can see you.”

“Or what?” Allison challenges, sneering. “You’re gonna shoot me? You’re gonna fucking shoot a thirteen year-old girl?” She scoffs when Frank’s face twitches. “Yeah, didn’t think so. Fucking coward.”

“Here.” You pick up Karen and hover above the ground, well out of Allison’s reach. “That’s that handled.”

There’s the sound of the jet thrumming overhead, then a gentle thump as it lands at the entrance of the cemetery.

“Myshka?”

“Over here, honey,” you reply, projecting your voice so they can hear you.

“To the left!” Wade announces. “Bibbity-bobbity –ah fuck! My fucking shin! Owie! Fucking headstone, getting in my fucking way –ah shit! Branch to the eye! Oh, God, that smarts.”

“Here.” Neena’s voice echoes through the Memorial Park. “I brought a flashlight.”

“Oh, that was lucky of y… dammit! Fucking lazy writing!”

“Get a fucking move on, Wilson!” Frank shouts.

“Suck my cock!”

Allison’s lip curls derisively. “You work with that nutjob?”

“He’s sharper than he looks,” you bite out, somewhat offended on Wade’s behalf.

Nate reaches your little group first, gun already aimed and ready. He stops a few feet away from Allison, eyes locked on her. “Piotr’s outside. He wasn’t sure he wouldn’t break the headstones.”

You can’t help but smile, just a little. That’s my baby.

“Enough’s enough, Allison,” he continues, slowly inching towards the young teen while Wade, Neena, and the trainees catch up. “You’re outnumbered and outgunned. Stand down.”

“Fuck you,” Allison growls before flinging her hands towards the ground.

And then the dead start crawling out of their graves.

“Jesus fucking yellow penguins!” Wade shrieks, whipping out a pistol and shooting at the rotting corpses. “Castle! You were a zombie killing cop in another life. Do something!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Frank shouts back, bludgeoning one of the skeletal bodies off him with the butt of his shotgun before shooting it in the head. “Don’t answer that! I don’t want to know.”

“Just shoot them, Shane! Nathan! Why the fuck didn’t you tell me we were dealing with a class five Necromancer?”

“I didn’t know!” Nate shouts back.

“Unlikely! You’re so sleeping on the couch tonight, buster!”

Your head whips back and forth as you try to keep up with all the action –but there’s not much you can do while you’re holding on to Karen. “I need to pass you off for the moment. Piotr!”

Fortunately, your husband’s already close by, having been drawn over by the sound of gunfire. “What is going on –bozhe moi.”

“It’s a bootleg version of the rapture. Here.” You float over the fence and hand Karen to him. “Keep her off the ground. I’m going to get the trainees out.” You quickly lift Ellie, Yukio, and Russell out of the cemetery, then turn around and quickly analyze the fray.

The sheer amount of reanimated corpses is overwhelming –and, worse still, shooting them doesn’t seem to do anything other than slow them down.

They stop working when they’re too broken apart, you realize when Frank shatters a particularly ancient looking skeleton with an onslaught of gunfire –and that gives you an idea.

You stretch your arms outward, creating a shockwave of air that sends the unsteady skeletons flying across the cemetery, bashing into headstones and breaking apart until they’re just rattling bones on the ground.

You grin, triumphant –then grimace when you realize that, while you’ve stopped the undead army, you’ve also spread countless remains across the park. “Oops. That’ll be a lawsuit.”

“Not if we don’t get caught,” Wade points out.

Off to the side, Allison collapses to the ground, panting and covered in sweat. Her eyes revert back to their normal color, and she looks like she’s two seconds away from passing out.

“You about done throwing your tantrum now?” Nate asks.

Allison glares up at him and bares her teeth in a vicious snarl. “Fuck. You.”

And then she tips her head towards the black sky, lets out a guttural scream, and unleashes a shockwave of blue energy.

You recoil, throwing your arms up to brace yourself –but it washes over you harmlessly, less of an attack and more of a smokescreen.

And, when your eyes adjust and you see part of the ground fusing back together, the way it did at the warehouse after Allison took Karen a second time, you realize that’s exactly what it was.

“She’s most likely done for tonight,” Nathan reassures Frank when the black clad vigilante starts scanning the immediate area for the next sign of danger. “She was tired at the end of it. Wouldn’t have had enough left in her for another attack.”

“She’s still out there,” Frank says.

“And that’s a problem for another day,” Nathan fires back, heading towards the Memorial Park’s entrance. “We need to get out of here before the cops show up.”

***

 “Her name is Allison Ricci, daughter of Andrew Ricci—”

“Yeah, we know that, skip to the part where she can literally raise the dead!” Wade snaps.

“For the last time: I found out about that when you did!” Nathan fires back.

The lot of you –meaning Wade, Nate, Neena, Frank, Karen, your husband, and you—are gathered at yours and Piotr’s house, post being examined and released by Hank and his team. You’re all sat around the dining room table, in various states of irritation, frustration, and exhaustion.

The last one chiefly goes to Karen –who, after being kidnapped twice and having a gun held to her head, has earned a good nap and a glass of wine (the latter of which you procured for her as soon as she stepped into your home).

As for the other two…

Wade and Frank are arguably the angriest, mostly at Nathan for seemingly having withheld information about Allison and the mission.

You, Neena and Piotr are also irritated, largely for the same reasons –though Piotr is especially pissed that Nate would bring trainees on a mission this dangerous.

All in all, it adds up to your dad having a lot of digging out to do.

“In my time, she’s an agent of Bishop, one of Apocalypse’s henchmen,” Nathan continues quickly, before Wade or Frank can start arguing with him. “I only recognized her name due to her father’s obituary. She preferred staying distant from all of it, staying unseen –which is why I didn’t know about her full set of powers to begin with, and also why I thought it would be okay to bring along Russell, Negasonic, and Yukio. The information just wasn’t there.”

“This isn’t the first time you’ve come up short on a mission,” Frank points out, tone lethal. “You could’ve told us –fuck, you could’ve told us she’s just a kid, Summers. That would’ve been good to know.”

“You weren’t in the headspace to listen to anything I had to say, Castle,” Nathan fires back through gritted teeth. “You threatened to snap my neck if I didn’t step to at your fucking pace. I’m not going to waste the time talking if you’re so single minded—”

“The two of you can settle your issues later,” you interject. “Right now, we still need to know what we’re dealing with when it comes to Allison.”

Nathan sighs heavily, scrubs his face with one hand. “I was hoping we’d be able to pull with her what we did with Russell. Get her the help and support she needed, change the course of the future. But, since her official kill count hasn’t changed by much, I seriously doubt we didn’t pull that off tonight.”

“‘Hasn’t changed by much?’” Neena repeats, arms crossed over her chest and brows spiking towards her hairline. “What the hell does that mean?”

Nate’s mouth twists into a deep grimace. “Technically… Karen was supposed to die tonight.”

Frank’s face goes pale, and Karen takes another long sip of wine while she holds Frank’s hand.

“About a year later, she would’ve taken out Frank, too. Obviously we managed to save Karen tonight, and considering that Allison’s down two listed kills and there’s no… imminently listed death dates for Karen and Frank –no, I’m not telling you,” Nathan quickly says, shooting a stern look at Frank. “Last thing you need to know is either of your death dates. Anyway, since she’s down two kills and the dates aren’t anywhere in the near future, I’m willing to wager we’ve managed to take you two off her list. The rest of it though…”

“How many does she have left?” Piotr asks, hesitant.

“A little over fifteen thousand,” Nathan sighs heavily.

Shock ripples through the room, evident on everyone’s faces.

“Holy shit,” Frank breathes, face going slack with surprise and horror.

“How is that even possible?” Karen asks, brow furrowed.

Wade shrugs. “Give me enough explosives and I could probably do it.”

“Shut it, Wilson.”

“She asked!”

“You saw her in action tonight,” Nathan interjects, sitting back in his seat. “She’s only going to get stronger as she goes. And once she’s in Bishop’s keep, she’s going to have even more means and opportunities to kill. Not to mention that the number on file is comprised only of officially listed kills. In reality, it’s undoubtedly higher.”

“So, essentially, we’re trying to flip a teenager with comparative lethal abilities of a bomb, whose parents were just killed by him,” Neena says, pointing at Frank.

“We did it with Russell—”

“Russell was an orphan, looking for a family and someone to care about him, and had a strong connection to Wade,” Neena states, staring Nathan down from across the table. “Allison lost her whole family execution style, is trying to cope and grieve on her own, and is clearly more than a little unhinged if tonight’s anything to go by. These are two entirely different ball games.”

“We cannot let child become mass murderer,” Piotr speaks up, conviction strong in his voice and on his face. “She deserves better future.”

Silence hangs in the room as everyone arrives at the same conclusion at their own pace.

Neena sighs heavily. “This barely worked with Russell. And you—” she points at Wade “—had to get shot twice for it to work. He’s—” she jerks her thumb at Nate “—out of time jumping charges, and I seriously doubt that shooting him—” she nods at Frank “—is gonna have the same effect with Allison.”

“We’ll find something,” Karen says, properly joining the conversation for the first time that night.

Neena raises an eyebrow at her. “What makes you so sure?”

“Because we have to,” Karen says quietly. “It’s fifteen thousand plus people that need us to.”

There’s a beat of silence, and then Neena sighs heavily. “Alright. Count me in. We’re gonna need all the luck we can get with this.”

“We’ll help as we can, too,” you say, pointing between yourself and Piotr. “But I’m not sure how much the X-Men will be able to assist since the Punisher’s tangled up in this.”

“I will contact my mother,” Piotr adds. “She may be able to help with this.”

Nathan nods, then looks over at Wade. “What about you?”

“I’m with you in all of this, Cabes. Always.” Wade leans over, gently kisses his partner’s cheek, then stands with a groan. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, the Wade-mobile needs to make a pit stop.”

“You could’ve just said ‘excuse me,’” Neena calls out as Wade heads towards the bathroom.

“Hey! It could’ve been worse! I could’ve said that I’m gonna take the mother of all piss breaks –which, as it so happens, I am!”

You all groan, a mix of annoyance and disgust.

“I’m also gonna take a shit!”

“I think we get the picture, handsome,” Nathan says with a roll of his eyes. “Just –please use the restroom and stop telling us about it.” He waits to make sure that Wade isn’t going to keep talking –or, worse still, narrate his “pit stop” experience—then sighs and looks at everyone else again. “Thank you. Everyone. Allison is a key component in Apocalypse’s upper ranks in the future. If we can flip her to our side, we’ll put a major dent in his abilities to take over the universe.”

“Fucking Christ,” Frank grumbles, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Just –this kid. Is she gonna keep coming after Karen and me?”

“Possibly. I’ll keep my ear to the ground, and if I hear anything, I’ll let you know,” Nathan promises.

“You’ll let me know everything,” Frank amends, jabbing an accusatory finger in your dad’s direction. “No more of this vague bullshit –or it’s going to be my gun up your ass.”

“Ooh, kinky!” Wade shouts from the bathroom. “Can I get in on that?”

Nathan shakes his head at the same time Frank grimaces, and then he nods at Frank. “Everything I know. You have my word.”

“Your word doesn’t really mean shit right now, Summers,” Frank growls, shoving his chair back as he stands. “Come on,” he says to Karen, voice considerably softer and more caring. “Let’s get you home.”

“You’re coming home, too,” Karen insists.

“Yeah,” Frank agrees, putting his hand on the small of Karen’s back as he escorts her out of the dining room. “I’m going home, too.”

“I will get door,” Piotr murmurs, quickly following after them to escort them out the front door.

Neena stretches, rolls her neck, then sighs. “I’m beat. Think Xavier will mind if I crash in one of the empty rooms?”

You shake your head. “He won’t care. You’re welcome here for breakfast in the morning.”

She grins. “Sounds good.” She hugs you gently, presses a sisterly kiss against the top of your head, then heads out the front door.

You watch her go, then circle around the table and sit down next to your dad. “You can’t keep holding back essential information.”

“I’m not trying to,” Nathan says tiredly, rubbing his temples. “There just genuinely wasn’t much to go on tonight. Plus, telling people information about the future is dangerous. It can alter the course of things irreparably, change the outcome of millions of lives on a catastrophic level. I’m just… I’m trying to figure out the balance of it all. What I can and can’t share.”

“You’ll get it figured out,” you reassure him. “I know you will.”

A ghost of a smile tugs at Nathan’s lips, and he slings an arm around your shoulders. “Thanks, kid.”

***

 “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” You blink at the darkness, then roll onto your side and wriggle across your and your husband’s massive bed until you’re nestled up against his side. “Are you alright?”

“Da.” Piotr wraps one of his massive, muscular arms around you, hugs you against his side, and kisses the top of your head. “Tonight was just… intense. I wish young ones did not have to go through.”

“We’ll know better for next time,” you reassure him. “And Dad legitimately didn’t know all of what was up with Allison. He didn’t mean to get the teens involved.”

Piotr huffs. “Ya znayu.”

“But?”

“I just… Cable is reckless.”

You purse your lips; you know he’s annoyed since he’s using Nathan’s code name. “He doesn’t mean to be.”

“Perhaps, but he forgets we are not all soldiers. That we do not all operate as he does. He is good person –good for you and Wade—and good trainer, but not always good leader. Not for… not for everyone.”

“Not for everyone,” you agree. “But he’s amazing for Wade, you have to admit.”

“I would not deny,” Piotr says, fingers playing absently with your hair. “Cable balances Wade, and verse vice-a. But he is too reckless for X-Men.”

“Which is why he’s not an X-Man—”

“Not my meaning. He may be too reckless to work with,” Piotr clarifies. “We have to meet certain standards to keep licensing to run school, work with children, act as enforcers against mutant criminals. If Cable jeopardizes that…”

“One step at a time,” you remind your husband when his voice trails off. “Nathan takes what we do here seriously. If he sees himself jeopardizing that, he’ll be the first to bring it up, and he’ll be the one to step away so we can keep doing what we do. You know that.”

Piotr sighs. “That much is true.” He tucks you closer to him, then kisses your forehead. “You should rest, myshka. Sleep is very important.”

“I was,” you tease him, smile evident in your voice. “But I had to soothe my husband’s woes first.”

Piotr chuckles, then presses a kiss against the top of your head. “Spokoynoy nochi i sladkikh snov, lyubov' moya.”

“Love you too, sweetheart. Rest well.”

[nancywheelxr]

Steve having a panic attack in front of the kids and Dusin being the only one who know what to do :)

They’re back in the woods again because of course they're back in the woods.

Of course.

Where else would they be on goddamn Spring Break? Where the fuck else, really, other than chasing some freaking Upside Down leak creature in the goddamn woods again like it’s 1984 part 2. It’s great, really. Nowhere else Steve would rather be, ‘course not.

Seriously, the woods? Again? Come on, Steve’s pretty sure he’s had nightmares that started exactly like this before– the smell of grass and moss after a thunderstorm, the crunch of leaves under his feet, the sun setting behind them and casting long shadows all around, the heavy weight of the bat on his hand, slick with sweat and mud, the prickling heat of feeling watched from the dark. 

He shudders.

“So, anyway, I’m just saying this isn’t normal,” Mike is still babbling a few paces in front of him. He hasn’t stopped talking since they left his house, but Steve is blaming it on Eleven and Will visiting. Which would be cute and adorable and Steve would have been totally behind it if catching up hadn’t devolved into investigating some freaky cattle murders or whatever in the outskirts of town, which had in turn, somehow, devolved into going into the woods at night like a bunch of morons who are so definitely gonna get murdered. “Cows don’t just drop dead like that, they were bleeding black, it’s weird.”

“I know, I know, and I agree, but it could be some weird disease,” Dustin counters like a mini scientist or something, like he knows what he’s talking and is being totally reasonable, like this whole thing is totally reasonable. “We could be on the verge of a new plague!”

“Oh my god,” Max huffs, stomping a little, “will you two just shut up? It’s been two hours–”

Something creaks somewhere behind them and Steve goes cold. 

It’s just a rabbit. Well. It’s gotta be just a rabbit. Or a deer. It’s fine. Everything’s fine. It’s not like there’s a whole ass tunnel system underneath where some alien monsters from another reality had lived or anything. It’s fine. 

Look, the kids are fine, they haven’t even noticed the noise, what with all the arguing around like crazy people. Okay, yeah, that’s actually not good, they’re definitely too distracted for someone who’s hunting monsters, this can’t be safe– well, nothing about this is safe, he guesses– and apparently, it falls on Steve to keep them alive again and to be honest, that didn’t go too well last time and it involved way too many close calls, Steve is a terrible babysitter, oh my god, they’re so going to get themselves killed and Mrs.Byers and is going to bring him back just to kill him again for getting her son killed, holy shit, this is by far the worst idea they’ve ever had–

Steve coughs, choking on nothing except the way his throat closes up, lungs constricting painfully on his chest by an impossible lack of oxygen, and he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, why the fuck can’t he breathe? His heart is beating too fast on his ribcage like it’s trying to burst out of there, leave him bleeding on the forest floor to whatever horror movie creature is out there this time, and Steve still can’t breathe, and he can’t think right, his thoughts are looping and jumbling together, but he has a distant, sort of detached realization that he should probably not do this, whatever this is, in front of the kids, so he stumbles to the side, bat falling to the ground, and then stumbles some more until he has to lean on a tree to keep himself upright.

It feels like the world is pressing down on him, the responsibility of keeping the kids safe bearing down on him and his total, obvious inability to get his shit together playing out right there, in front of everyone, because come on, no one else is this fucked up, no one else is still having goddamn nightmares; Nancy has a job in that newspaper and her five year plan seems to be going just fine, and Jonathan is doing great in whatever shithole town he’s living in now, and they both look like collected, proper adults who don’t go around having meltdowns in the middle of the woods– everyone is moving on, bouncing back from the fucked up shit that seems to keep raining down in this town, except for Steve, who’s still knee deep on the shit and doesn’t know how to shake it off him, how to wake up in the morning and pretend he hasn’t seen that thing’s face open up like a fucking flower and show him way too many rows of sharp, bloodstained teeth– 

“Steve?” It’s Will that asks because Will is still a kind of quiet, sweet kid that pays attention to everything around him, and Steve really hopes the kid doesn’t try to touch him because he’s not sure it wouldn’t burn his skin. “What– are you okay?”

“ ‘m fine,” he says, or, he thinks he says it, the word might have come out a bit garbled and slurred, “just– I need. Minute,” he waves a hand, one finger up, “just a minute.”

He hears the leaves and twigs snapping as Will runs off back to his friends and he would have breathed in relief if he could, you know, breathe at all, but his lungs are still not working quite right and his vision is starting to swim, the dirty green and dark brown of the world around him are swirling, tilting off focus and shit, Steve thinks he might be dying after all–

“Holy shit,” Lucas says suddenly, and holy shit alright, Steve hasn’t even heard him approaching, but he hears his freaked out tone perfectly, “are you dying– oh my god, is he like, sick?”

“Oh, fuck,” Max swears, and Steve must be going delirious because he feels a very strong urge to tell her to watch her fucking language, “Dustin was right, we’re all gonna be sick, what do we do? Is he gonna die like the cows? Are we gonna down like the cows?”

“Wait!” Mike rushes, “El, what if he’s really sick, we shouldn’t get too close–”

“But we need to help him,” El, god bless her, argues and Steve can just see her little frown and oh my god, Mrs. Byers would totally kill him if he gets her hurt, “he’s a friend, Mike.”

“He’s not sick,” Dustin huffs, “we would have noticed if he was sick before! It’s just a panic attack, look!”

Panic attack? Yeah, that sounds about right, and Steve would be happy to have a name to pin on his shitty meltdown if he weren't, you know, still feeling like a balloon about to burst.

“What do we do?” Max says, voice rising with her own panic, “what do we do, Dustin? IS IT SERIOUS?”

“OH MY GOD, IS HE STILL GOING TO DIE?”

“YOU GUYS, HE’S STILL RIGHT THERE!”

“SHOULD WE CALL 911?”

“AND SAY WHAT, HEY CAN YOU COME PICK US UP, WE’RE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FREAKING WOODS!”

“DO YOU HAVE A BETTER IDEA, SHITHEAD?”

“THAT DOESN’T MAKE YOUR IDEA GOOD! HOW WOULD WE EVEN CALL 911?”

“EVERYONE SHUT UP,” it’s Dustin that yells above everyone else’s yelling and for once, they all fall silent. Steve is still hyperventilating by the tree, but he thinks the bickering is the most normal thing they did all day. “NOT HELPING! Give the man, some space, Jesus!”

There’s shuffling and Steve figures the kids have left to give him some illusion of privacy to do his thing and quit being a pussy, but Dustin seems to have stayed behind. “Steve? It’s okay, dude,” he speaks like Steve is a wounded animal– actually, like Steve is his freaking demodog from last year, “just– hang in there, okay? We’re like, less than twenty minutes from your car. Well, maybe twenty-five, Mike is being a whiny little bitch about it and Max keeps making fun of him, so. But, it’s gonna be super fine, we will be back to the Wheeler’s in time for dinner, I’m pretty sure–”

Dustin keeps talking, and maybe it’s embarrassing, but it, it helps. It’s something to focus on other than the freaky noises coming from deeper into the woods, and Steve thinks he can breathe a little bit now. His chest doesn’t hurt anymore. Dustin keeps talking and Steve keeps breathing and maybe it’s going to be okay, they’re all still alive. Steve fell apart like some shitty ass castle of cards and still, no one died. That’s something.

That’s– he can work with that.

It takes another good ten minutes, but eventually, his legs stop shaking and his grip on the tree relaxes; there are cuts and scratches on the palm of that hand, but it’s fine, it’s cool, he looks at the blood there and thinks I’m here, I’m alive, I’m surviving. 

“Shut the hell up,” he says, kinda hoarse and totally exhausted, and Dustin grins, all bright and happy, and as they made their unsteady way back to the others, Steve ruffles his hair. Thanks.

“You look like crap, man,” you’re welcome.

The forest is still a dark scary place and Steve is still scared shitless someone is going to die on his watch, and it’s not okay, nothing is okay, but for now, he’s still alive, he’s still there, and he can keep breathing, keep surviving and that’s– for now, that can be enough.