#and every video ive seen of her is her throwing her entire body at or off something lol

[pumpumdemsugah]

Women doing dumb shit together 🤝

[wyn-n-tonic]

Golden, Like Daylight -- Part IV

Word Count: 1,925 Warnings: PTSD. Drug use. Ben Affleck. Panic attacks. Bullet wounds. Smut (not explicit but it's there). A/N: Your kind words mean literally everything to me and I have been sobbing between the warmth shown to me over this series and also how much I love Francisco Morales and want the absolute best for him.

MASTERLIST | PART: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX

Gif by: @uuuhshiny

Luna hasn’t stopped wailing since Sunday, the one and only day Frankie said he wouldn’t be able to call.

It’s Thursday and both their lungs are close to giving out.

One Morales woman hyperventilating herself into fitful sleeps, the other only sobbing through held breaths in stolen lonely moments of peace and quiet.

Kristyn had taken up residence in the spare room, making sure Leah slept and ate. She was the one who cashed in Leah’s sick days with the school, forging a bullshit sick note when she went into work.

Leah is currently distraught because her husband might be dead in South America, we don’t know.

That’s what the first one said, dashed out on the keyboard in a petty moment of frustration. She might be the only one of Leah’s sisters who didn't want to lob his fucking head off every time she shed a tear but it didn’t mean she never wanted to do it.

Patient is suffering from a prolonged migraine and intensive nausea. Follow up appointment scheduled for next Thursday at 9am.

That should fucking do it but she’ll have to start checking off the vacation days soon. Dip into family leave for Luna.

Alexa held her on that first Monday, talking her through the panic in a puddle of spilled coffee. The paper cup splashing across their knees in the hallway as concern emanated from the AP Lit room at their backs.

Somewhere at the base of the Andes, her husband was being pried out of a crashed helicopter by the only other men she’d ever truly loved. William was shot, Benny was reckless. She felt it all in her body as she was driven home, helped into the shower, held in her bed but not by the arms she craved.

“He's coming home,” Deana brought dinner that night, her big sister cutting into her steak like she was a child at risk of choking again, “he will do anything he can to make sure of that.”

“What if he doesn’t, D?” Leah’s taken on the stare, everything and nothing all at once, “what if he doesn’t come home this time?”

“I promise you, Lee, okay?” She reaches out to push aside hair damp with tears, “I've never seen a man so in love.”

“Yeah…” she’s quiet, “he promised me too.”

And she told him to stop making promises because he doesn’t keep them.

I think you put a baby in me, Francisco Morales.

The tears well over her eyes, spilling onto already salt stained cheeks.

He made love to her like it was the last time he would ever see her, the last chance he would ever get. He poured his entire being into her, drunk off the feel of their bodies together. She could feel him in the hollow of her ribs, an aching that called out for the comfort of his beating heart against hers again.

Would that be so bad?

She sobbed out, startling Luna’s own ragged cries again, afraid that she would never know warmth against her cold hands again.

—————

“Hey,” they're huddled against the onslaught beneath a barely-there cliff, labored breathing in tandem, “you still with me?”

Frankie’s panic attack came on slowly, a rolling storm in the distance the moment the helo crashed in the valley.

Bad landing.

His fight or flight response has his lungs in a vice grip but he still manages a laugh, “I think I should be the one asking you that.”

“You know it’s gonna take a lot more than a stray bullet to fuck me off,” he’s smiling but Frankie knows how much blood he’s lost, how long it takes for a wound like that to clot without medical intervention.

It’s true, it’ll take a lot more than a stray bullet to take William Miller but that was before, when they had back up. Out here, though? Surrounded by his brothers in arms? Having done what he just did?

Francisco Morales has never felt more alone.

“Fish,” William hits his knee against his, “where are you?”

His eyes refocus on the tepid water pounding all around him, the world coming back as he takes a deep breath, “are you afraid, Will?”

“You gotta be more specific, Frank, I’m terrified of everything.”

He’s quiet when he speaks, “me too,” barely above the downpour.

He sees Will nod in his peripheral, “I know.”

“Will, I’m afraid I’ll never see them again,” and when he chokes, he realizes he’s been crying.

“No, you can’t think like that.”

“I know, but I can’t stop it either, like…” trailing off, he lifts his face to the pressure of the water; it’s the sweetest thing he’s felt in days, “what if this is the last shower I ever take?”

“Fish…” Will reaches for him but he’s cut short.

“No, listen to me. If anything happens to me out he—“

“Nothing is going to fucking hap—"

“Shut up and let me finish,” his rage and sadness is burning hot through him, it takes everything within his being not to choke on air as he speaks again. “If anything happens to me out here, Will, take care of my girls. Please.”

The blond nods his head, heavy with exhaustion and pain, “until the very end of my life, Frankie.”

The relief that spreads through his body is better than any drug he ever tried, he feels himself slipping into an upright sleep, his heart at peace for the first time since he left his bed.

“But,” Will’s voice catches him on the edge of consciousness, “I would also face down the end of my life to make sure you see them again, do you understand me? If the only thing standing between you and a bullet is me, don’t fight. Leave me there and run like hell. You’re going back to your family.”

“But if I don’t make it…”

“Fish,” Will's laugh is drenched in the space between them, “are you saying it’s your last will and testament for me to marry your wife?”

“Fuck off,” his words are clipped, strained, “and don’t call me Fish.”

—————

They still, eyes up to the screen of the baby monitor as they hold their breath for another sound from Luna’s room. The baby settles back into silence, her small chest rising and falling on the grainy feed.

He remembers Leah opening the military grade surveillance equipment at the baby shower, the shake of her laughter as she held onto Benny’s shoulder to anchor herself to the chair.

“Should we check on her?” It’s small, a rushed question of a concerned mother.

“I said a baby monitor, Benjamin, not a prison security camera.”

“Absolutely not,” Ben grabs her hand, “This is better than any of that shit you’ll find at Target. Video means there’s no wondering either, you can just look up and assess the situation, more rest. That’s important, you’ll need to savor the little that you get.”

He pushes a lock of hair from her face, damp with the tears of the day and the sweat of the night, “no, baby, we don’t want to disturb her.”

“Yeah,” Will chimes in, his beer bottle held loosely in his hands, “Frankie should’ve been training you on sleep deprivation this whole time, you’re spec ops yourself now.”

“But what if she wakes up?”

“Well…” the corner of his mouth lifts to close the fan at the corner of his eyes, “it’s a good thing she can’t see us through that thing, right?”

“Francisc—“ the irritation of his name is finished in a heady moan lured from her body by another slow drag of his hips.

The crook of his nose slots against hers as he finds her lips again, the warmth of the room around them is nothing compared to their mouths on each other. Bathing in shared heat, her fingers entwine into the curls at the crown of his head, the other hand palm up to his chest. And as the beating of his heart races towards her burning touch, he submerges himself once again.

His firm grip holds the hinge in her leg, fingers digging into the sensitive skin that fills her lungs with fits of laughter and light. He braces himself against the bed, the aching in his forearm dulled by the soft, breathless whimpers intoxicating his entire being.

His voice is washed out when he finds it, “mi sol,” lips dragging across her own, “mis estrellas.”

Her eyes find his, heavy with admiration and trust. “Francisco,” she is drunk and drowning in the love of this man, “finish me.”

He shifts to cradle her jaw and as he trails his other hand up her thigh, he sinks within her once more. Finding his release against her own, he is convinced they’ll never be able to fully untangle again.

He presses a kiss to her nose.

My sun.

Her forehead.

My stars.

Her lips.

My whole sky.

—————

I think you put a baby in me, Francisco Morales.

He snaps back to reality, Santi and Tom’s voices echoing all around them.

His head is hot, he’s pushing past Will with concern set so deeply in his eyes he fears he’ll break right there.

Would that be so bad?

“Fucking bullshit!” Tom’s face is red, Santi having finally said what all of them are thinking.

He feels the weight of Leah in every fiber of his being, slotted perfectly against his body.

“We're all on the hook for this, are we not?”

I should’ve said no.

“God damn this fucking horse! Stop it!”

All those years blinded by loyalty to authority, Frankie never talked back to his leader but the man in front of him isn’t a leader. He’s a whiny child who’s lost his toys and Frankie hates him.

Biting back what he wants to say, he holds his hand up in a show of camaraderie, “Relax.” His finger quirks up as if he’s scolding a tantrum, “Relax. We’re not picking at the fucking scab right now, okay?”

Tom stares him down, like he’s weighing an argument against him too but Frankie’s done. He meets the taller man’s gaze, this man he would’ve died for.

“One foot in front of the other. Come on.”

This man he almost has died for.

“Let's go. Jesus fucking Christ.”

His true allegiances don’t lie to this man anymore or the gun at his hip. Not the money or the mules. He left that splintered fantasy about twenty feet back.

He’d throw this man over if it meant going home right now.

The money too.

None of it is worth a goddamn thing to him if it means he’ll never see the way that the light bounces off the gold in Leah Morales’ eyes ever again.

The same honeyed flakes in the brown of his daughter’s bright gaze.

I think you put a baby in me, Francisco Morales.

He made love to her like it was the last time he would ever see her, the last chance he would ever get. He wanted to pour his entire being into that woman, ensure that he would live on if lost to the Colombian jungle off a narco's bullet.

Would that be so bad?

He was scared but, truly, would it be so bad?

But it would be because he could truly leave her with nothing. No money, no husband, no father to her babies.

He lost count of the days he hadn’t called.

He makes his way up the mountain, following Tom’s bitching, wishing it was Leah leading him home instead.

TAG LIST: @justanotherblonde23 | @greeneyedblondie44 | @icanbeyourjedi | @princess76179 | @bbuckysbeardd | @notcookiebelle | @knivesareout | @empress-palpat1ne​

[444piscesprincess]

childhood friends to lovers/growing up together sterek fic reclist

uhh this kinda got a lil angsty but i recommend you pick a growing up together fic and listen to this song i promise you will not regret it 

https://open.spotify.com/track/5Dz8nrwQlPLE68WaTEIqY5?si=aogjMc1aToSALmAlfQOR7A 

anyways as usual check tags please!!

(click on the title for the fic)

you know you're on my mind

bibliosexual

Summary:

If there’s one thing Derek’s learned in life, it’s that crushing on someone who lives on an entire other fucking continent is probably a bad idea.

(hs!au + texting!au + childhood friends to lovers the ULTIMATE fluff fic)

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart)   (series)

yodasyoyo

Summary:

Stiles is six years old when he first hears Derek's voice in his head.

Or what happens if you have a soulmate bond, in a universe where soulmate bonds don't exist?

Up Down Lock Unlock

isthatbloodonhisshirt (wasterella)

Summary:

“Why are you going into grandma Ito’s apartment?” he asked.

Derek turned to him, key sliding into the lock. “What do you mean?” He tried to turn it, but the key wasn’t budging. Maybe the lock was sticking again, it’d been doing that the past few days.

Stiles was staring at him like Derek was stupid.

Derek did not appreciate sass from a ten year old.

“That’s grandma Ito’s place.”

“No,” Derek said calmly, pulling the key out and then shoving it back in, wiggling it a little when it continued to refuse to unlock the door. “This is my place.”

“I think you’re on the wrong floor then, because that apartment belongs to grandma Ito.”

(time travel counts as childhood friends right?)

the difference between going back and going home

thepsychicclam

Summary:

Stiles and Derek were inseparable growing up, but then college, jobs, and life happened. When Stiles comes back to Beacon Hills a decade later, he doesn't expect to reconnect with Derek, and he sure doesn't expect to fall in love with him.

It's Such a Gas When You Bring Up the Past

orphan_account

Summary:

Stiles finds a box of old photo albums that dredge up the sweet, the funny, the adorable, and the mildly heartwrenching parts of his and Derek's past.

(mainly a friends fic but its too cute to not include)

It's Always Been You

charlesdk

Summary:

Stiles' love life was practically non-existing, always had been. He was always terrible at picking up clues when people hit on him (it had happened, Erica had been witness to it and had been the one to let him know it was happening in the first place) because he never expected anyone to do so.

He wasn't the most desirable guy around, he knew that. He was loud, extremely nerdy, never knew when to stop talking, not exactly much of a looker if you asked him, the list was endless.

Point was, he never did know when someone was flirting with him. Which was probably how he ended up in the fight that would change his life for the better.

Lead You Home Again

GotTheSilver

Summary:

The first time Derek meets Stiles, the kid’s brown eyes are wide, and he’s staring up at him with a mischievous grin as he tugs at the arm of Derek’s first ever Batman figure like he’s trying to separate it from Batman’s body.

An alternate take on Teen Wolf, wherein Stiles and Derek are childhood friends, and things unfold from there.

Kingdom By The Sea

kilaem

Summary:

Lydia grabs his arm and pulls him down in the seat next to her. “When the hell did you find time to bag a guy like Hale?”

“We’re friends,” Stiles feels his face heat up, and then the team are running out and Derek sees him and smiles. His blush gets worse.

“Oh really?”

“Our moms were friends, okay? We’ve been in diapers together.”

“I thought you two hated each other.”

Those That Bump In The Night

bleep0bleep

Summary:

A boy’s head appears upside down, hanging off the bed. “Is anyone there?” he calls out curiously, looking right at Derek’s eyes. Caught, then. The protocol for being deliberately seen by a child is just to look as strange and fearsome as possible. No one would believe them, anyways. But Derek is tired, and he’s been running and scared, and now he just kind of flickers, curling out a tendril of dark smoke, hoping that he’s a little bit scary. No such luck. The boy’s eyes widen. “Oooh, are you the bogeyman?” “Bogeyperson,” Derek says, before he can help himself.

~

When Stiles was a boy, he had an imaginary friend named Derek. Ten years later, Derek comes back, and is very, very real.

Five Times Derek and Stiles Kissed For Practice (And One Time They Didn't)

mikkimouse

Summary:

In which Derek and Stiles grow up together and practice kissing, roughly in that order.

216 + 1: Words To Say Instead of I Love You

briggs

Summary:

Derek and Stiles have been best friends for fourteen years. They have their differences, sure, but it's never been a question for them. Their friendship has been the most solid thing in their lives -- until suddenly it isn't anymore.

Funny how just a few choice words can throw fourteen years of friendship off-balance.

OR

a collection of "Bro, That's Gay" one-shots that actually ended up turning into a concrete storyline.

hope is the thing with feathers (part of a series)

ShanaStoryteller

Summary:

Stiles is ten when he saves the Hales from their burning home and Derek from a wolfsbane bullet, and this establishes a pattern that seem to continue indefinitely.

"Then he's facing a burning home, and he wraps the hood of his sweatshirt around his mouth before he pushes the door open and steps inside. There's Mr. Hale asleep - he hopes asleep - on the couch, next to - Stiles thinks that's his brother but there are so many Hales, who can keep track. He rushes over and starts shaking him, can see the rise and fall of the man's chest so he knows he's alive, but he's not waking up. He shoves away his hood so he can shout, "Mr. Hale! You have to get up, there's a fire! Mr. Hale, get up!" Nothing, he's not even twitching, both of them taking in deep even breaths like they're having the most peaceful of rests, and Stiles is going to cry. "Wake up, wake up, wake up!" There's a moment, where all Stiles can hear is the blood rushing in his ears and not the roar of the flames or the creak of wood, then with a violent, silent pop it's all back and both of the men are gasping awake, eyes open and jumping to their feet. "

(one of my favourite fics like EVER)

it came from the trees

whatshouldntbe

Summary:

“Don’t worry, Scott caught me up on everything,” Kira assures with a bubbly smile via video-chat. “You and Derek, huh? I probably should have seen that coming. I always thought it might be Cora, but Derek was the one that looked at you how I used to look at you.”

Stiles goes a little pink. “It’s still kinda new but, yeah. I really like him. He’s...” Beautiful. Patient. Smart. Painfully honest. Sweet.“...a total dork.”

Kira laughs and laughs. When she gets herself together, she replies, “Yeah, those little hearts and stars in your eyes definitely say different."

or

Stiles moves from the shiny, fast-paced lifestyle of Los Angeles to the foggy, sleepy town of Beacon Hills so his dad can become the new sheriff. Newly fifteen, he does his best to finish out his freshman year of high school (by staying under the radar) when he suddenly becomes the Beyoncé of the Supernatural community. And, without much prompting on his part, he ends up catching the eye of one of the most prominent Werewolf families in all of North America. It literally all starts with a stuffed animal(s).

(oh god this fic is the literal best even though its abandoned it ends at okay-ish place. this is one of the best hale family characterisations ive ever read. if you squint it can be a childhood friends to lovers fic but im including it anyway bc its amazing)

Promises aren't Meant to be Broken

paradis

Summary:

“Thanks for saving me,” Stiles blurts out, staring up at Laura, wide eyed.

Laura grins. “I like you,” she says, “we’ll be friends.”

(more laura and stiles besties centric but totally worth a read)

The Things We See

MelodramaticSalad

Summary:

Stiles grew up in the life of knowing that there was always more to life than what others saw with a first glance. Even as a child he saw things that no one else seemed to and always had a fascination with the unusual.

Some considered him an unusual child, but Claudia welcomed every single quirk her son displayed. His mother had a few special talents of her own and thrilled her to see it in her son as well. She'd raised Stiles to always keep his mind open and as grew and started to display his powers, she began to teach him how to use them. She even taught Stiles about werewolves at a young age, his infatuation with them growing once he had learned the truth about her closest friend.

Stiles spent nearly every possible moment that he could roaming the Hale house, following after the middle child most of the time. Derek was three years older than Stiles, but the bond they developed with each other was something their mothers considered out of a story book. Like Derek, Stiles was sensitive to his emotions, but unlike Derek, Stiles didn't need a scent to figure it out. He could feel it.

take me back

matildajones

Summary:

“I dare you to kiss me,” Stiles taunts, and he’s not expecting the way Derek says a naughty word under his breath and then leans forward.

Stiles yelps. He just dodges Derek’s mouth before he’s laughing wildly and running through the trees, calling out a series of ew ew ew as Derek chases him back home.

[five-rivers]

Recipe (For Disaster?)

A holiday truce fic for @wastefulreverie !  I was your replacement gifter.  I’m sorry it took so long to get this done.  Your prompts kind of ran away with me.  Or I ran away with them?  I hope you enjoy!

.

.

.

Recipe (For Disaster?)

.

Before he opened his eyes, Danny knew he had died.

It had hurt. It had hurt a lot.

It still hurt.

His muscles (or whatever had replaced them) spasmed, grinding his skin into the harsh tile floor. Something else moved inside him, something cold, powerful, and lighter than air. It bubbled and roiled, twisted and turned, settling into his burnt and burning bones.

(Still, he was behind himself, in the portal, pressing that button, and screaming screaming screaming forever and ever two worlds straining through his brain and it hurt.)

He twitched, pressing his face into the floor, the rough edge of the tile and the grout abrading his cheek. A gust of air, a wheeze, just shy of being a whistle, escaped his throat.

(Why was he breathing if he was dead?)

He forced himself up onto his hands and knees. The tiles seemed to sting, biting into his flesh, his skin sticking to the inside of his gloves.

(Burning and tingling, outlines of lightning creeping along his skin. No.)

Slowly, he opened his eyes. The light against them made them feel like they were cooking.

(Like in the portal. Stop. Stop.)

His hands wavered into view, rippling beyond his tears, which dripped to the ground from the tip of his nose. They looked wrong. Why did they look wrong?

The gloves- They were white. A weird, silvery white that glistened and shone. His knees and elbows were gray-black, but somehow still glowed. His tears were glowing.

He knew he had died, knew he was dead, but seeing it was something different. He shuddered, and climbed to his feet. To his feet, and then farther. He floated, an inch above the floor. A squeak escaped his lips, and he dropped. More than an inch. He had fallen more than halfway through the floor before he managed to curl up on the floor again. His limbs flickered. Was that his eyes playing tricks, or..?

Once more, he stood up, this time successfully, and stumbled to the deep lab sink in the corner of the basement. There was a mirror hung above it. A dirty, tarnished mirror, but still. He needed to know what he looked like.

He gripped the edge of the sink and looked into the mirror. An alien face looked back. Instead of blue eyes, he looked into great green disks, the same color as the portal swirling behind him. Instead of black, his hair was the same moonlight white as his gloves. His skin was burnt tan, rather than milky. His freckles, usually almost unnoticeable, were a dim green. Shaking, he reached for the reflection.

That was really h-

Light.

Bright and blinding.

Almost as bright as the inside of the portal as it turned on.

(Almost as bright as the light that had killed him.)

He doubled over and vomited into the sink. Huh. He hadn't known ghosts could do that. Shouldn't his stomach be back with his body, if it hadn't been entirely vaporized by the portal?

Was- Was he dying again? He remembered his parents talking about how ghosts needed ectoplasm to survive. Should he have gone to the portal instead of the mirror?

Dazed, he looked up into the mirror. Blue eyes looked back at him through a fringe of dark hair, his skin was almost paper white and slick with sweat. His pulse throbbed visibly in the arteries of his throat.

... what.

He was-? Was that-? He didn't understand.

(Was he alive?)

Part of him wanted to drop to the ground, but he was afraid that if he did that, he wouldn't get back up. He shuffled around the sink, and slid against the wall until he reached a counter, and used that to prop himself up the rest of the way to the stairs. He crawled up them on his hands and knees, ignoring how burnt and melted his left glove was.

At the door, he rested. He put his forehead against the cool metal door, and breathed. In, out, in, out. With his right hand, he felt up the door, searching for the doorknob. As soon as he found it, he twisted it, not thinking about the consequences, and the door swung out under his weight, dumping him onto the kitchen floor.

He curled and wheezed.

"Danny?!"

.

Danny fiddled with the IV in his arm. Maddie took his hand with both of hers, and pulled it away.

"Alright, Danny," said Maddie, "tell us exactly what happened."

They were in Danny's room, which had been stuffed full of various ectoplasm-run and ghost-related medical machinery. His parents had stripped him of his hazmat and clothes, and gone over him with every scanner they had available, before finally putting him to bed in his pajamas.

There hadn't, as much as they searched, as ragged and burned as his clothing had been, been a single mark on him, inside or out. His temperature had been weirdly low, he was dehydrated, and he couldn't stop shaking, couldn't stop the pictures that flashed through his mind every time he blinked, afterimages of his death using his eyelids as a projector screen, but there wasn't a scratch, or burn, or bruise anywhere to be found.

Danny's eyes flicked from his mother to his father, one sitting by his bed, the other looming awkwardly in a corner, unable to find a safe place to sit.

"You're not in trouble," said Maddie, reassuringly. She had done so several times. "We just want to know what happened, so we can help you, and figure out what's going on."

Danny bit his lip. "I- Um. You and Dad, you were upset. You were really, really upset. When the portal didn't work, I mean, and I- Sometimes, sometimes when you're working on things, you miss things." He tilted his head to the side, finding the wall near his bed suddenly very fascinating. "Like, obvious things. Like- Like not plugging things in, or missing some wiring, or, you know... Forgetting about, you know, a button... on the inside of the portal... I thought I'd check." He trailed off.

"Oh, honey," said Maddie. "You hit it?"

"Not on purpose!" protested Danny. "I put on my suit, and looked around- I wasn't going to touch anything!- but I tripped over something on the ground. And it- It turned on. It turned on and it-" Tears started to prick at his eyes. "It turned on, and it... hurt. It hurt a lot and I-" How to describe what he had felt? What he had seen? The way he had been sure, absolutely sure, he had died? How, for a split second, he thought he had heard someone else screaming with him? "Then I was on the floor in front of the portal. And I got up, and I went to the mirror, and I realize I had- I had snow-white hair and glowing green eyes, and my skin was all weird, and I- Before I got to the mirror there were weird things happening." He bunched up his sheets in his free hand and rubbed them between his fingers.

"Weird things like what?" prompted Maddie, after he fell silent.

"Like... For a second I couldn't see my hands, even though I was looking at them. Then I kind of... I floated? Like, I flew. When I got back to the ground, I almost fell through the floor like- like I was in a video game with the collision turned off!" He bit his lip. "I thought I was dead," he admitted, quietly. "I thought I was a ghost."

"No way, Danny-boy!" boomed Jack. "You're a Fenton! Fenton's don't become ghosts! Besides, you're definitely alive now!"

"Jack's right," said Maddie, patting Danny's hand. "After all, you can't be alive and a ghost at the same time. I'm sure it was just a side effect of being exposed to so much ectoplasm all at once. A temporary thing." She sighed. "We'll look into it. Just focus on feeling better, alright, Danny? And then, maybe, we'll do a refresher on lab safety." She made a face. "You'll probably have to be decontaminated, too, but that can wait. It's a good thing school doesn't start for another month."

"Okay," said Danny, already dreading whatever decontamination entailed.

"Okay," repeated Maddie. "Jack, will you stay here? I want to go down and check on the portal, make sure it doesn't-"

Something inside Danny went deeply, impossibly cold. He arched back, grasping at his chest as whatever had come to life inside it pulsed and grew, rippling and buzzing as it intersected his skin, light throwing his room into stark contrast.

It stopped. Danny was wearing gloves. White gloves, over black sleeves. He looked up at his parents, flinched back at their shocked expressions, and kept going, floating into the corner of the ceiling above his bed.

"Mom?" he said, hugging himself, confused and alarmed. "Dad?" His voice broke. Where was the IV? Had he pulled it out of his arm as he levitated?

"Danny?" said Jack, oddly hushed.

Danny nodded convulsively. "What's happening to me?" he asked, desperate. The portal had done this, so they had to know, didn't they? They had built the thing, pouring their lives into it.

(Danny was honestly surprised his mother and father hadn't left to check on the portal earlier.)

Jack stepped up to the bed, and reached for Danny, gently taking him by the elbow and pulling him down to the bed. "It'll be alright, Danny. We're Fentons! We'll figure this out!"

.

Jack and Maddie frowned at the latest machine readout as Danny perched on his stool and fiddled with one of the wires attached to him. Jazz was sitting angrily in the corner of the room, her arms crossed. She'd been in denial about this whole thing, thinking Danny had finally succumbed to their parents' particular brand of insanity, until Danny had accidentally... transformed in front of her. Now she was just permanently angry at Jack and Maddie.

"Well?" said Danny. He'd been living with this thing for almost a month and he'd gotten better at preventing himself from changing, but he didn't want to be like this forever. He especially didn't want to be like this at school. Middle school was hard enough without a condition that turned him into a ghost once a day. "What is it? Can you fix me?"

Maddie pursed her lips, and shook her head. She looked at Danny, then walked to him, pulling out a (significantly shorter) stool to sit on so she would be at eye-level with him.

"Danny," she said, then paused for much longer than was comfortable. "Danny, I'm sorry. We can't do anything. Not yet."

"Why not?" asked Danny, trying not to hyperventilate.

"Simply speaking," said Maddie, "we don't have the tools to separate you from... whatever this is." She briefly touched Danny's glowing knee. "We're still not sure what's causing this and..." she trailed off.

"And what?" asked Danny, rather more harshly than he had planned.

"We aren't sure," she said, looking back at Jack, who shrugged, "but we think it might be keeping you alive. Some of the blood tests we did, when we filtered out the ectoplasm in the samples..." She looked pale. "There were a few promising trials, but after a while..."

"They disintegrated!" said Jack.

"Oh," said Danny, sagging. "So I would-?"

"We don't know that," said Maddie, quickly, "but we'd rather be safe than sorry, and it doesn't seem to be doing you any harm, now. In fact, your body seems to have adapted to it quite well, all things considered. It's just inconvenient."

"But we can help! We've got all sorts of things we can invent! Just you wait, Danny-boy!"

Maddie sighed. "If only we had more data on ghosts, then maybe-"

Jazz snorted. "Typical! Even after this, all you care about are your inventions and ghosts!" She stormed up the stair, slamming the door hard behind her.

"Oh, dear," said Maddie.

"Why don't- Why don't you go talk to her?" suggested Danny. He would be lying if he said he wasn't enjoying the extra attention he was getting from his parents, lately, even if he hated the reason for it. He understood how Jazz felt right now.

Maddie went upstairs.

"Well, Dan-o, don't you worry," said Jack, jauntily. "We Fenton men eat inconvenience for breakfast! Why, when I was a boy..." Jack rambled on, barely pausing for breath.

Feeling somewhat guilty, Danny tuned him out. He had heard all the stories before, and they rarely made sense. Instead, he turned inwards.

He was stuck like this, stuck as a freak. Could he even be called human anymore? Maybe when he looked normal, when he looked like himself, but in this ghost form? Not a chance. He had tried to distract himself with the idea that he had cool 'powers,' but he barely had any control over them.

What if his parents never figured out how to fix him? What if he was like this forever?

He would never be able to be an astronaut. Not with all the weird physical things that had shown up in his body over the last couple of weeks. Not with his low temperature, weird heartbeat, and contaminated blood.

A chill went through Danny's body, and he shivered, exhaling vapor. He tensed. Before, he'd been feeling sorry for himself, but he'd also felt... secure? Safe? Whatever. Now he felt on-edge. Something was wrong. Or about to be wrong.

He slipped off the stool, feet hitting the ground without a sound. Barely thinking about it, he phased off the wires and his hazmat suit reformed around his body. Something was wrong. Something was dangerous, a danger, a threat. His eyes roved over the inventions piled against the walls, the beakers of ectoplasmic sludge, whatever Jack was fiddling with, and finally landed on the portal.

Danny narrowed his eyes, and stepped forward, only to leap back as an over-sized, sucker-covered tentacle burst through the portal, and latched, perfectly silent, onto the wall and ceiling above. It flexed as Danny watched it, pulling from the portal a translucent, glowing, green octopus. A second one dragged itself out a moment later, and they floated in front of the portal, as if in water, malevolent red eyes scanning the lab.

Danny stayed still, holding his breath, hoping they'd go back to the Ghost Zone. Each octopus was bigger than him!

Jack kept talking.

The octopuses glare fell on him. Their tentacles reached out.

No.

.

"Tell me what happened again," said Maddie, as she cleaned a tiny cut over Danny's eyebrow.

"A couple of ghost octopuses came through the portal and tried to attack Dad, so I fought them and threw them back into the Ghost Zone."

"And you didn't notice this at all, Jack?" The question was delivered in a tone halfway between exasperation and real anger.

"Not until I looked up and saw Danny standing by the portal."

Standing was a far too generous term for what he'd been doing at the end of the fight, but Danny didn't dispute it.

"We'll have to pull the lab camera footage," said Maddie "But, you're alright, Danny?"

He nodded. Surprisingly, he felt better than he had in a long while, as if using his powers had taken a weight off his shoulders.

"Okay," said Maddie. "We'll need to make some doors for that." She frowned at the portal. "It isn't actually supposed to let anything in."

"It isn't?" asked Danny, surprised.

Maddie shook her head. "It was supposed to be a window, not a door." She put the swab aside, and stuck a band-aid over the cut. "Now, if you get any odd bruising, or start to feel odd, tell us right away."

.

After all the scrutiny at home, going to school was a relief. Sort of. At least it was a change. Every day, Jack and Maddie loaded Danny down with all sorts of things that were supposed to prevent his powers from surfacing and a cellphone with strict instructions to call and come home if anything unexpected happened.

For the first week, nothing did. It was school as usual. Banal, boring, and a little harder than middle school, but still. On the upside, he finally got to hang out with his friends again. Danny had been isolated from Sam and Tucker throughout his recovery from his 'illness.'

(Actually, if he thought about it, it kind of was an illness, wasn't it?)

But the second week, when Sam proudly revealed that she had convinced the school board to do a 'vegetarian' week? When she was, consequently, attacked by a ghostly lunch lady? One that interrupted their onslaught to ask if they wanted cookies?

Yeah, that was unexpected.

Sadly, Danny was too busy trying to keep her from killing Sam to call his parents, who would probably have done a much better job at containing the ghost. Well, at least his mom would have. Danny wasn't so sure about his dad. He had seen Jack practice with the ectoweapons before, after all.

So, he fought the ghost. He punched, he kicked, he threw random objects, and, finding all of that generally ineffective, he grabbed his friends and ran. Well. Flew.

Then he passed out.

.

"You understand that you can't tell anyone," said Maddie to Sam and Tucker, some time later. They and the Fentons, including Jazz and Danny, were seated around the kitchen table, three boxes of pizza stacked between them.

"Well, yeah," said Tucker. From his slightly glazed look, Danny guessed that he was still processing the situation. "It'd be, like, in a comic book or something, right? There'd be people wanting to study you. And, you know, cut you u-"

"Tucker! What is wrong with you?" demanded Sam, giving him a shove. "You can't just say that!"

Danny made a face. "Well, I don't think anyone is going to, like, dissect me or anything, but, yeah, basically." He shrugged. His parents had talked a lot about hunting ghosts before, but now they rarely brought the subject up. At least in those terms.

"Don't worry, Danny, we can keep secrets," promised Sam. "You know that."

Tucker nodded in agreement. "But, like, how does this all work? How did this happen? And those powers? Those were wicked man."

"It's a bit of a long story," said Danny. It wasn't. He just didn't want to talk about his maybe-maybe-not-death. "But what are we going to do about the lunch lady ghost? What if she comes back?"

"We talked to your school and asked them if we could do a sweep!" said Jack. "But they didn't believe us about the ghost!"

Maddie picked at her lip. "I think the best thing to do right would be to return the menu to the way it was. That would probably appease the ghost, at least temporarily-"

"What!" exclaimed Sam. "No way! I campaigned for vegetarian week all summer! We can't adopt a policy of appeasement! When will it end?"

"Well, I think that's a great idea, Mrs F," said Tucker. "The old menu is much better than this one, anyway."

Sam whirled on him. "Say that to my face, meat-eater!"

"Alright. I will. Your food sucks and tastes like dirt! Also, it made a ghost try to kill us!"

"You're just narrow minded!"

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah!"

.

When Danny arrived at school the next day, he didn't know what was worse, that his friends had both somehow whipped up utterly insane protests in front of the school overnight, or that his parents had decided to camp out in front of the school in the 'Ghost Assault Vehicle' (actually a heavily modified and armored RV, and a hazard to all other road traffic) all day, in case the ghost was still there and still angry.

A few minutes later he decided that, no, the worst part was how each of his friends were pressuring him to choose their side or face an unspecified doom.

Actually, no. The worst part was that Tucker's protesters had brought a lot of real meat that the lunch lady ghost could use to make a giant meat monster.

This sucked. A lot. But what could Danny do but fight?

.

Danny put the cap on the thermos, breathing hard, and stared at the invention. That had been... bizarre, at best. But what was his life except bizarre, at this point?

His friends came running up to him, followed shortly by his parents.

"Danny!" said Sam. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah!" said Danny, meaning it. "I'm fine. Better than fine! I-" he looked down at the thermos, turning it over in his hands. It gave him an odd satisfaction, knowing he had stopped the ghost from causing any more damage, stopped her from hurting anyone, stopped her from hurting his friends. He looked back up at his friends and family, at the other people still running around behind them. He had protected them. "I feel pretty good, actually. Exhausted, but good."

"Really?" said Maddie. "You've just used your... abilities more than you ever have before. We don't know how that will affect you."

Danny felt his good mood wilt somewhat. "It's just," he said, trying to rally, "I feel like I finally know why this happened to me. Why I got these powers. I mean, imagine if you got the portal opened without," he gestured to himself, hoping to get the point across, even though he was in human form, "this. How would this have worked out?"

Jack and Maddie exchanged a glance, and Danny could practically see what they were thinking. None of their weapons or techniques, bar the thermos after Danny had done... Well, Danny wasn't quite sure what he had done with it to make it work, but it had, and it was the only thing that had been really effective against the lunch lady. If Danny hadn't been here, hadn't had his powers, this could have been bad.

Danny glanced at the red smears of raw meat scattered across the school's front lawn. Really bad.

"We probably would have worked something out," said Maddie, but Danny could tell she was dubious. "I think we ought to go back home and give you a checkup."

"Mom," groaned Danny, "I'm fine."

"I still want to check. Would you two like a ride home, or..?"

Sam snorted. "Honestly, they're probably not even going to cancel school."

"Yeah," said Tucker. "I mean, what are they going to say, that they were attacked by a giant meat monster? Please."

.

"Hey, Mom?" asked Danny, as he ate breakfast the next morning. "Do you think ghost cookies are, like, a thing? I mean, what would they even be like?"

"Ghost cookies?" repeated Maddie. "Where did you even get that idea?"

Danny shrugged. "I don't know. Something that ghost said the other day. Never mind, it's not important."

"If you say so, sweetie."

.

"Jack," said Maddie, after Danny had left. "Have you noticed that Danny seems a bit depressed, ever since the accident?"

"Depressed? No! Quieter that usual, but not depressed!" Jack looked down. "But I'm not really the most observant person, I guess! Why would he be depressed?"

"Jack, really. Wouldn't you be depressed?"

The length of time it took Jack to respond was unusual, and showed that he was really thinking about the question. "I guess I would be. I'd be scared, too, not knowing what's going on." He paused. "I'm really glad he didn't get ecto-acne, though, like Vladdie! That would have been really hard."

"I think it's because of how well his body adapted to the ectoplasm," she said, then shook her head, pulling herself out of scientist mode. She sat down on the couch next to Jack. "I don't think we've been very helpful, either."

"What do you mean?" asked Jack. "We've been doing our best to help!"

"Emotionally, I mean," said Maddie. "You remember all the things we've said about ghosts. About how ghosts are evil. About what we wanted to do to ghosts."

"But Danny knows we'd never do that to him! And he's not a ghost!"

"Yes, but he's still... Some of our tests... I guess the best way to put it is that he's a sort of hybrid, and remembering what we've said, it must be disheartening." She paused. "Jazz gave me some papers on internalized racism, and some of it made me wonder. We haven't really taken any of it back, and it isn't like we ever had any empirical evidence for it! Just anecdotes, from your ancestors."

"All the ghosts we've seen so far have been bad!" protested Jack.

"Not Danny," said Maddie, "and based on our original theories, what happened to him shouldn't be possible. Based on Danny's description, the lunch lady ghost was more complex than we thought a ghost could be, too. We need to get rid of our assumptions, Jack, and we need to make sure Danny knows we aren't making those assumptions anymore."

Jack picked up one of the pillows on the couch, and began to fiddle with the embroidery. "I guess," said Jack. "But if he's really depressed, do you think it's going to be enough?"

"No," said Maddie. She slouched into the couch, almost sinking into the gap between the cushions. "I was thinking about something he said yesterday, and it occurred to me, maybe we're being too negative about this."

"It is a negative thing!"

"Yes, but it could be something he's stuck with for the rest of his life! We don't know if we can ever fix this, if we can ever remove this, and if we can't... Maybe we should focus on some of the positive aspects of this." She put her hand to her head. "I just- I don't know how to do that. I don't know how to make him feel better about this, after I shot him down, yesterday."

"You didn't shoot him down," said Jack, confused. "Neither of us hit him at all!"

"Metaphorically speaking," said Maddie. "I brushed off what he said about getting his powers for a reason. I ignored him."

"Well," said Jack, "when I was first diagnosed with autism, my mom made me my favorite fudge, and that made me feel better about it! Fudge always makes things better!" He frowned, and scratched his cheek. "I don't know if it will help Danny, though. This isn't really the same thing."

Maybe... Or maybe the two situations were more alike than they seemed at first glance. Maddie struggled up out of the gap between the couch cushions. "There was something he said, earlier, before he left."

"About his powers?"

"No," said Maddie. "Jack, do you think it would be possible for us to make cookies with ectoplasm?"

.

Maddie would admit that she was not the best cook in the world. In fact, cookies were the only food item she had consistent success with. Everything else had a slight tendency to come to life, explode, catch on fire, disintegrate, turn to mush, or somehow become so ectocontaminated as to be inedible. Or just be bad.

But now she was purposefully trying to contaminate a batch of cookies with ectoplasm, in a way that would make them edible and nutritious to him. In a way that would show him that she and Jack weren't against him, his new situation, and his ghost powers. In a way that would let them reconnect. In a way that would show Danny that they accepted him, that they would always accept him.

It was a lot to put on a batch of cookies. Especially when she wasn't sure they were even possible.

She poured over Danny's latest test results, picking at her lower lip. She didn't want to introduce anything harmful into Danny's system. That was the first priority, above appearance, taste, or any other condition.

Purified ectoplasm would probably be a safe choice to start with.

.

It had taken more time than Maddie had expected to actually get a cookie that worked as a cookie. Two months, to be exact. Two months in which her poor baby had been repeatedly beaten up by ghosts. Her little cookie project was pushed back by more necessary tasks. Such as setting up protections for Amity Park that wouldn't affect Danny and battling violent ghosts.

On a more and honestly shocking positive note, Danny had befriended one of the ghosts. A little gray ghost that haunted the school. If Danny hadn't already scrapped Jack and Maddie's theories regarding the morality of ghosts, this ghost would have done it.

In any case, here, now, in this first week of November, Maddie had a batch of fragrant and faintly-glowing cookies. They were rather plain. Maddie had wanted to limit the number of variables in the cookies, the number of things the ectoplasm could react poorly to.

But they wouldn't be a success until Danny tasted them.

She sat down at the table, exhausted. She could only imagine how Danny felt. She knew he snuck out at night to fight ghosts that their scanners missed but his 'ghost sense' picked up, and that on top of all the fights he had during the day and all his schoolwork.

The cookies sat delectably on the counter. She dearly wished she could do more to help him than make cookies. Yes, she was doing other things, but they didn't seem like enough. Not nearly enough.

Especially after all the trouble she and Jack had given him during their anniversary, and the trouble he had gotten into in the Ghost Zone of all places. With the Ghost Law. Or at least a ghost that claimed to be the law and attempted to arrest Danny. Maddie was still wrapping her head around the idea that ghosts had a society complex enough to support such a thing or a lie about such a thing, as the case may be.

She rested her elbows on the table, and put her head in her hands. Here she was, making herself depressed, right after her big victory. Or before her hopeful victory, she corrected herself.

The front door swung open and Maddie looked up.

"Wow, that smells good!" said Danny. "What are you making, Mom?"

She heard a thump, probably his backpack, but not the two that usually followed it as Sam and Tucker came in.

"Cookies," said Maddie, standing. "Are Sam and Tucker not with you?"

"No, they had to go home today," he said. "Apparently their families are missing them." He walked into the kitchen, rubbing his shoulder.

"Are you alright?" asked Maddie. "Was there a fight?"

"Nah, I just banged into the corner of the lockers at school. It's been pretty quiet today." He quickly rapped on one of the cabinets. "Knock on wood, right." His brow furrowed. "Are those cookies glowing?"

"Yes, I put some ectoplasm in them. I'd been thinking about it since you mentioned them."

"Really? But that was months ago." He sat down at the counter, and poked at one of the cookies. There was an odd expression on his face. "Can I- Can I try one?"

"I made them for you, sweetie. Just- Only one for now. I don't know how they taste, and they should be safe, but..."

Danny's lips quirked up, but something wavered in his eyes. Maddie's heart dropped. Did he think that she was using him as a guinea pig?

"I get it, you don't know how I'll react. Better safe than sorry, and all that. I had wondered, though, seeing all that ghost food in Walker's prison..." He picked up a cookie, and nibbled at it. He took a larger bite. Another one. His chin trembled.

"Is it not good?" asked Maddie.

"No," said Danny, his voice cracking. "It's good. It's really good." A tear tickled down his cheek. He sniffed and took another bite of his cookie. He hiccuped.

"Danny..?"

"I'm okay!" he said around the cookie in his mouth. "I'm okay. I just- Just-" He shook his head. "I'm sorry."

Maddie rubbed Danny's back. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"It's just- You made this for me. And it's not- It's not a weapon. It's a ghost thing, but it's not a weapon, and-"

"Oh, sweetie," said Maddie. "I'm so sorry that you thought that we..." she trailed off, not knowing what to say, even if it was what she had been afraid of.

"It's just- Ghost cookies." He laughed a little, and shoved the rest of the cookie into his mouth. "It's good," he said, slightly muffled. "Are you sure I can't have another one?"

"Maybe in a couple of hours? You don't want to ruin your dinner."

Danny laughed.

[hongjoongslut]

VIP Access

a/n: this is my first attempt at this so im very sorry if it sucks :( 

Pairing: Boyfriend!Kim Hongjoong × Girlfriend!Reader

Word Count: 2.05k

Warnings: smut, choking, y/n having anxiety and getting a little insecure but hongjoong reassures her :)

enjoy!

Seeing how many fans Ateez attracted did not shock you. You usually stayed in the apartment due to your major social anxiety. This fansign was different, it was scheduled on your anniversary with the one and only Kim Hongjoong. "I know you have some bad anxiety but please baby? I'll make it up to you" he pleaded for you to go, ending with a wink. You let out a slight giggle before sighing heavily. "Okay honey, I'll go, but dont expec-" he immediately grabbed you and hugged you, lifting you off the ground. "Yes yes yes!!! Finally I can show everyone how truly amazing you are". He sets you down, noticing how red your face has turned. He just giggles and leaves to go shower. Tomorrow would be a big day, for both of you. 

"why does this signing have to be in the asscrack of dawn" you let out after grunting at his alarm. "Honey, it's at 10. Its 8:00 right now" he laughs at your sleepy state. "fine I'll get up now but I'm sleeping for the rest of the week after it's done" He shook your hand. "Deal, love".

It was not your event so you didnt have to dress very fancy. You did, however, want to look nice since this is a first time. 

"Babyyyy its 9:00, how far are you from being done?" he sang through the apartment. You walked out shortly after his little tune. You went with a nice short sleeve shirt that accentuated your chest, some black ripped jeans and your favorite black and white Vans. 

"How can you look so gorgeous wearing literally anything, y/n?" he walked towards you, smiling. "I'm the gorgeous one here? Look at yourself." He was wearing a stunning black suit with a sash over the front of it, very reminiscent of his Wonderland era. "I'm only wearing it since we just passed the year anniversary for the music video release, you know how I usually look when I go to these things." you smile and wrap your arms around his neck. "I love you no matter what you wear, but this is definitely a sexy look on you" he smirks and softly places his lips on yours. You move your hand to rub the back of his head, causing him to jump back. "you know where that gets you and we do not have the time to do all of that right now princess" you smirk. "I didn't do anything joongie. I was just caressing your head." Both of you knew what you were trying to do and surprisingly, he fell right into it. He smashed his lips onto yours, instantly colliding his tongue with yours. His hands held your hips tightly, likely leaving bruises. He breaks the moment, you whimpering at the loss of him. "c-can I try something y/n?? we've never done it before but I think you'll like it.." you tilt your head and slightly laugh. "joongie dont ever break a kiss for that. just do it, but if you hear our safe word then stop." you start the kiss this time, to gain the contact back and to see what he had planned. You could feel his right hand creep up from your hip, wrapping around your back to pull you closer, if that was possible. His hand rubbed your back for a moment before it sped to your throat. He applied no pressure yet, making sure you were okay with it. you smile into the kiss and moaned a little. The heat was stopped once again when his phone went off. "Shit, Mingi's here to pick us up." he walked with your hand entwined with his but pausing right before opening the front door. "but we will continue this later darling."

You have never seen so many people in one place before. Your heartbeat raced as you walked by all the screaming fans. Your body was on autopilot, just trying to find a quiet place to calm down. Once inside at their booth, you slightly calmed down. "I'm sorry our anniversary started out with a fansign, but this event ends at 12. After this, we can do whatever you want to do". he kissed your hand, rubbing the spot with his finger. 

It's been about an hour and a half and you haven't spoke much except when spoken to, whether by a fan or joongie. You can tell he was concerned about you but he didnt have enough time to help you entirely at the moment. He would squeeze your hand every once in a while, just to show he loves you. 

"Are you good y/n?" San asked after finishing one final picture with a fan. "Yes I'm okay San, I'm just very tired. I didnt get much sleep last night" he nodded and left to help clean up. The manager gave you and joongie permission to leave since it was a special day for you both. The ride home was loud and crazy. Mingi and Hongjoong laughing and smiling at everything they saw today. "baby, what's wrong? you've been off ever since they opened the doors. is it your anxiety?" 

You nod slightly and lean on his shoulder, not wanting to go into depth about it. he rubbed your shoulder until you guys arrived home. You both said your goodbyes to Mingi and walked into your safe space. "I know how your anxiety gets after big events so I will give you space, love. I'm gonna be in our room unfancing my appearance. Come find me or yell when you're ready" he kissed your head and left the living room.

You hated hiding stuff from him. It was your anxiety today, but for a different reason. you saw so many beautiful girls and you constantly questioned why he chose you. you weren't exactly in perfect shape, stretch marks covering your chest, stomach and thighs. He hasn't seen you like this often, but he did rarely catch it. Sometimes when you're walking and you're wearing jeans, you pull them up to hide some of your stomach. You had these thoughts everyday and it only got worse today. tears pricked your eyes, begging to be released. you gave in, letting them fall freely. you started sobbing, trying to keep as quiet as possible. you lay down on the couch and cry into the leather. you let out a loud sob, not realizing at first. Hongjoong ran into the room, grabbing your shoulders. you were so lost in pain, you didn't initially hear him. 

"Baby what's wrong? what happened? are you okay?" he is firing these questions at you and your mind finally breaks. you quickly sit up, staring at him through blurred vision. "you saw all of those girls, joongie! what's so special about me? im not talented like they are. im not in shape. i don't see why you chose me instead of one of the million girls you saw today!" your voice cracks and you crumble into his arms. "Y/n, why didn't you mention this sooner?" all you could reply was sobs. he sat with you, rubbing your back until your breathing evened out. "So you want to know why i chose you?" you nod lightly. "I first fell for your looks. You do not need to compare yourself to anyone's shape baby. I love you for you. Then I got to know you, I fell in love with your personality. Baby you're so amazing, everything you do makes me fall in love more." you look up and start smiling. He grabs your chin and kissed your forehead. "Another thing," he lowered his head to meet your eyes. "none of those girls have a pussy that can make me feel as good as yours does." your face turned a red shade. "no one in this world can make me weak in my knees just from wearing a shirt, jeans and Vans. you are everything I want, and much more than I deserve" he kissed you, not knowing the heat his words just caused. you broke the kiss to straddle him, not letting him ask anything before kissing him again. You held his cheeks, savoring each and every inch of his tongue. He pushed you away, catching his breath. "what was all that about baby?" you could start to feel his hard on through your jeans. "you wanna show me a reason not to be insecure? You said you'd make it up to me if I went and our little 'event' before the signing would be continued when we got home. But if you dont want to, that's fi-" his hand wrapped around your neck, adding pressure to it. "princess, ive been thinking about fucking you ever since you decided to tease me earlier." he then realized his hand was squeezing and pulled it away instantly. "im sorry baby are you okay i didnt realize I was doin-" you put your finger on his mouth. You stood to take off your jeans and shirt, letting him enjoy the view. "if you wanna show me I dont need to be insecure, then mark me. fuck me until i cannot remember how to speak. once again, if you dont hear that safe word, then keep going." he sat with his jaw dropped. he swiftly stood up to remove his tshirt and his boxers. you unclip your bra and take off your panties, throwing them away from you. he grabbed your hips and picked you up with no struggle. He carried you to your shared bedroom and set you on the sheets. he attacks your neck, making you moan right on contact. his free hand slips down to your pussy, feeling your juices leak around his fingertips. He lifts his hand and licks them clean. "so much already baby...god you taste so fucking good." his lips leave your neck to kiss your chest, leaving more hickeys. "all of this beauty...all for me." you moan as he attacks your nipple. "fuck that feels amazing.." he hums before giving the other fair treatment. he kissed slowly down your stomach, rubbing the sides. "one of my favorite parts of you.." you start to smile before it turns into a moan. he dives into your pussy, lapping inside of you and rubbing your sensitive nub. "fuck hongjoong, just fuck me already, please." he leaves a light kiss on your clit before kissing your lips roughly. he teases your entrance with his head, making you grunt impatiently. he enters you slowly, watching your head slowly lean back as he fills you. "fuck y/n, how are you still so tight..." he grunts as he slowly sets a pace. he fills you so perfectly, you could cum right there. "f-faster baby, pl-please" he rammed his hips into yours, hearing nothing but your screams and skin slapping. "see, nobody can sound as-as pretty as you do when you moan" you smile momentarily before grabbing his hand and placing it on your throat. "god I love you...i love you so fucking much" he squeezes your throat, a high pitch moan escaping at the sensation. "I'm s-so close joongi-e." he kisses you, swallowing your moans as they come out. "Also princess, remember no girl gets to be fucked so good by me, you have VIP access..." With that sentence, you saw stars, your juices coating his twitching cock. "fuck princess!" you feel your walls being painted with his cum. He pulls out, viewing your marked and fucked out figure.  He hands you a tshirt and clean underwear to change into while he goes to the kitchen. while he was gone, you walked up to your mirror, staring at your body. he walked behind you, hugging you tightly. "look how beautiful you look in my clothes...even after being fucked" he giggled and you let out a slight smile. "come on beauty, let's get to bed. i know you want to sleep in tomorrow." you jumped on the bed, laughing as hongjoong followed. "i promise baby, you'll always have me."

THE END

[seriouslyblacklikemysoul]

An Ephemeral Eternity in Seven Parts - Steve Rogers x Reader.

MASTERLIST Warnings: Gifs aren’t mine. My English. Word Count~ 3.3k.

Part I Part II Part III Part IV

PART V

How ephemeral life was? How was it that its fleeting beauty meant more as her life came to an end? Why hadn't she stopped to look around her before? Why had she been troubled with thoughts of suicide? Why did people come to value their lives just before they die? She felt so small in such a huge universe, she never liked being a pone to someone's game. But there she was; she would be their downfall. He had expected her to flee - he had planned everything so no one could ever leave. For the first time, she thought of herself as stupid enough not to have seen through. She hadn't question herself, she hadn't used her powers, she had listened to her mind and it turned out to be the stupidest of things. Never again, she thought but chuckled lightly. It wasn't going to be a next time. She wasn't worried she was going to die - maybe the opposite, really. She was worried about them. She knew they would all come, she knew what he wanted to see - an empire fall, he had said. All the years with Madam B. and HYDRA seemed to offer nothing now. She had already given up. If there was one thing she could wish for, that would be for her father not to over-react when he would found out. But she knew that it was just wishful thinking.  " If it's any comfort, they died in their sleep. Did you really think I wanted more of you?" Zemo's cold voice pierced through the speaker and her entire body tried to stop the chills. They were here already. They didn't realize it was a trap, she thought.  "What the hell?" Bucky said confused but she tried to get his attention with a muffled scream. He turned his head towards the direction but saw nothing. It was too dark.  "I'm grateful to them, though. They brought you here... Well, she plays a huge part too" his arrogant voice informed them while he appeared in the control room and illuminated one of the capsules with her inside, tied and muffled. Three pair of eyes were staring at her in terror. Steve hurled his shield to Zemo but it flied back. Tony tried to blast the capsule but it remained perfectly untouched.  "Please, Captain. The Soviets built this chamber to withstand the launch blast of UR-100 rockets" he remarked, making her blood boil and little by little regaining fragments of her powers. She needed time to recover from whatever he had injected her with. "I'm betting I could beat that" Tony said without taking his eyes off of his daughter. "Oh, I'm sure you could, Mr. Stark. Given time. But then you'd never know why you came" he went on, stalling them on purpose. She had to break free before he played the damn video. Concentrating every bit of her power to one sole thing - she had to break the capsule if she wanted to help them. She heard the video playing and she realized it would be now or never. For better or for worse, it was now. They heard the explosion and saw a purple color piercing through the room. The moment she got out, it was already too late. Tony lunged towards Bucky but Steve stopped him. She run towards them hoping she could help, but she just made it worst.  "Dad, stop" she tried to calm him down. He seemed happy she was okay but he was too lost in his own little world. He looked at Steve, with tears glistening in his eyes.  "Did you know?" he simply asked. How was she gonna tell him she knew too? "I didn't know it was him" Steve tried to smooth things over but he wasn't having it. Steve moved towards her, something that aggravated Tony even more.   "Don't bullshit me, Rogers! Did you know?" he demanded again. She whispered a no but she wasn't heard.  "Yes" Steve answered truthfully with remorse in his eyes. Tony stepped back, his chin was jutting upwards twitchy. He reengaged the Iron Man helmet and punched Steve to the floor while deflecting gunfire from Bucky, disarming him. He grabbed Bucky and flied him across the chamber. "Tony stop, stop. He wasn't himself" she was screaming but her words meant nothing. An angry answer came back to hunt her. "You are not my daughter" he said coldly as he slammed Bucky onto the floor and proceed to jump on his arms. Steve's shield hit him and she used her powers to put some space between him and Bucky by pushing him away. A blast from Tony sent her flying across the room, hitting her head and causing her to remain down.  

Steve barged him backwards, Tony shouldered him to the floor and shackled his ankles. Bucky punched Tony, who just lifted him and slammed him against a machine. Tony raised a fist but Bucky twisted it. She got up, trying to regain her strength and decided to wait, just a moment. She had hoped that they would behave like grown up men, not like children, but no one was stopping. She didn't know if someone was to blame, but Tony wasn't making things easier. Neither was Steve. Bucky pushed them both from the walkway,  while Steve jumped into them to deflect their fall. Bucky landed on a platform while Tony and Steve landed on the concrete floor besides an opening in the wall where snow drifted in from outside. She followed them, using her powers to mild the fall.  "This isn't gonna change what happened" a bloody and messy Steve offered for the last time.  "I don't care. He killed my mom" Tony answered as if he was ten.  "What about my mom, huh? And what about my dad, Tony? What about me?" she asked him, out of the blue, distracting all of them with her wounded appearance but fierce eyes and jolts of power rushing through her veins, creating lightings in her fingertips. Steve looked at her as if she was God. One look like that could ruin or rescue, depending on which fairy tales they read, but she had never believed in them. Eyes like those could never lie, he thought, so when he looked at her, he saw all the devastation he would cause in her name, and all the inevitability of their demise, and all the people who chose peace over passion. To hell with peace. She felt like a hurricane or a lightning strike. Love should leave no survivors. He made a silent promise to her. If they got out of there alive, if they ever saw each other again, he wouldn't let her go. She saw that in a single glance.  "You chose your side when you slept with him" he simply barked at her and she felt all the anger in the world building up in her.  "You don't get to talk to her like that" Steve threatened him. They traded punches but Tony ended up pinning Steve down. Bucky picked up the shield and leaped down to help while he told her to get out. Tony managed to zap Steve who was thrown back into the wall and blow away Bucky's metal arm. Tony raised his left palm ready to fire but Bucky grabbed his leg and Tony spun, kicking him in the face. Steve grabbed Tony  and lifted him over his head, throwing him down, punching him and bashed his mask off with his shield before striking down hard on the suit's core. Tony looked horrified and glowered fearfully at Steve who panted for breath. Both had blood spattered across their faces.  She couldn't stand it anymore. Every time she tried to push them apart, a blast sent her down. She took a deep breath and let out a cry of anger and agony, releasing every bit of her powers as Steve was sent flying away from Tony, with the concrete walls cracking from her powers. They looked at her in terror and awe. Steve's shield was stuck in the center of the Iron Man Suit. Looking at her, as if he was asking permission, Steve took hold of the shield, gripping the edge and pulling it free. She stepped closer to Bucky who was there, bloodied but conscious. She mouthed an apology but he was just looking at her, never wanting an apology from her. There was nothing she could do about it anymore. She knew things wouldn't be the same. But she had things to say before each took their separate ways. 

"You are all children, punching and throwing down one another because you cannot use your minds. How mature and heroic you guys are... Guess what Tony...  you're not the only who lost a mother but you don't see us running around looking for revenge now do you? I am sick of this. You have disappointed me and let me down with your stupid decisions. You were right, I am not your daughter, Tony. And Steve, I am not your girl. You had to fight for that, not fight my father. And Bucky, I am sorry" she poured her final thoughts and left them trying to understand how was it that she had become the wiser of them all. 

With nothing but an idea, she walked away, never even daring to look back to what she might have lost. Her mind was empty but her heart was squeezing in a painful way that made her want to get rid of it all together. But she knew that they needed time and she was wiling to remove herself form the game if that meant they would come to terms with the past. She also knew, deep down, that they didn't have the time they needed but she chose not to say anything. Her powers were sensing a greater threat but her mind was always trying to help the situation already before her. She had to be the one to step back because no one else would. And it was too much watching her family fight one another. She felt the desperation sinking in. The darkness and the cold taking over. No one would tell her fairytale. Of how girls can be dangerous and still win. This world, she thought, is only capable of digesting the stories where girls are sweet and kind and reject all sin. Maybe it was terrifying, a tale about a woman who knew exactly what she was doing when she invited the wild in, a story of a powerful individual knowing when to retreat and when to attack. She smiled at the thought of Steve promising her a future just with his eyes. But the universe never promised her this would be easy. She knew it because she was the hero of her story. And heroes were meant to be forged golden from the blaze. She would rise again from the shards her family left of her. She would take on her demons and kill them. She would break all the chains that had been brutally placed on her. And she would do show while showing everyone else that she was the person they thought she would never be. She wouldn't  give up on herself, ever again. She was made out of steel. 

It had been months. She hadn't received any calls from Tony, not that she expected to. She kind of hoped that Steve would reach out but it hadn't happened. It was easy for her to hide in plain sight and nothing was quite new. Last month a weird looking guy had offered her to help her tame her powers. Ironically enough his name was Strange. She had nothing to lose and so she had agreed. It wasn't that bad, he was so tense all the time but other than, she didn't mind. He provided her with anything she needed and she was free most of the time to go outside Sanctum Sanctorum. She had to be honest; having the time-stone keeper to teach her how to master her powers had been helpful, showing her there were more to it than she believed. She had understood the origins of the powers, found out that she was just a host to them but somehow those ancient forces of nature liked her enough to let her use them. She understood Wanda's powers as well. 

She was strolling around the streets with a beer in her hand, trying not to think about them; it was just before midnight and the night was cold but she didn't really care. Why was it that difficult not to think of him? Why were his eyes constantly messing up her mind?  "Damn you, Rogers" she whispered to herself, but destiny had another plan. "You're right" a soft but ragged voice came behind, making her forget everything she ever learnt. She just froze, believing she would never hear that voice again. She didn't turn. "I am so sorry. Please, come back" his voice was softer and more broken this time as she finally turned to face him. It might have been dark but she would find his eyes even without her sight. He was different. It had cost him a lot.  "I like the beard" she commented shortly after. He offered her a small smile but his eyes were burning with one question while taking her figure in. She had changed to. She nodded to him to follow her as she disappeared into an abandoned building, one that she had found out it existed when she was looking for any relatives from  her mother’s side. He did, without asking why.  It was an old, aristocratic mansion, with elegant and delicate furniture. Everything seemed to be in place, like nothing had been moved in ages. She saw his puzzled eyes and smiled. How easy was to fall for him again? She climbed the huge, marble staircase to the attic. They didn't talk, not even a word but his eyes hadn't left her. He felt like they were invading, something she noticed.  "Don't worry, no one is gonna come here. You can sit wherever you like" she offered as she plopped down the bed. He carefully sat down too, so close to her, he could smell her perfume.  "We are not supposed to be here, are we?" he asked while he was still taking in his surroundings. Everything felt as if the owners were about to return from a walk in the park. She looked deep in his eyes. He was her Steve. She took a sip from her beer, offering the bottle to him. He gladly drunk.  "Well, the grandmother died a while ago, the mother was murdered and the daughter is right in front of you. So technically, I am exactly where I am supposed to be" she honestly told him, tired of hiding herself from the one person she wanted to talk to for hours. He was left looking at her in complete amazement. She chuckled at his perplexed expression and before she could think about it too much, she reach out and caressed his beard with her slender fingers. It was the luck of breath and the electricity that caused her heart to beat a bit too loud and his eyes to travel to her lips before settling on her eyes.  "Walking away was one of the hardest things I have ever done, Steve. How can I ever come back?" she finally told him, her hand still cupping his cheek. He glanced at her and all it took was one god-damn look for them to feel even more desperate the burning need. He gave in - her eyes were too intense for him, too honest.  "In my dreams, I am kissing you and you're whispering 'where have you been?' and if I try to answer you disappear. I know that it will be hard for you to come back. I know that what I am asking is selfish and by asking you to come back with me you would be against Tony. I never got the chance to apologize for the overwhelming amount of pressure I placed upon your arms which caused you to act like you did when Bucky found you. I am sorry for every scar I have caused" he rambled on and on. She knew he was stressed and she also knew that it wasn't his fault. They were so close, his breath falling hot upon her face, his new, darker look made her weak at the knees, all the time she spent trying to get over him meant absolutely nothing now that he was in front of her. He let down the bottle and played with strand of her hair. It was longer. "You know that I nearly missed every word you said?" she whispered, leaning in just a bit. She wasn't doing anything on purpose. His breath became deeper.  "And why is that?" he questioned, already knowing the answer, as he too leaned towards her. She knew it probably was stupid but she didn't really control herself that moment.  "I was wondering if it has change" she faintly said, out of breath with her heart hammering in her chest, loud enough for him to hear. His eyes were roaming her face, trying to carve every detail in his mind. She was still the person he first fell in love with, only stronger. Her eyes held secrets he knew that hurt her. He couldn't muster the strength to ask her 'what', he just mouthed it. His hand was already wrapped around her waist, bringer closer to him, heat and power radiating from her body.  "The way you kiss me" she replied before their lips collided into a battle of agony and lust. It had changed, she thought. They were more desperate, more needy, more angry, more passionate, more fierce. There was a burning anticipation in his tongue that slipped through hers and went right to her heart. They craved each other more than before and it took her by surprise how gentle but strong he was. To hell with peace, she thought.  His hands roamed her body, slowly undressing her - before he removed every piece of clothing, he looked at her for permission. It had been a long time since that night. He didn't want to rush things, he wanted to treat her exactly as she deserved but she wasn't having it. There was a burning need to feel him, to be with him, to hold him and love him. Her bones craved him. He hadn't planned it; he wasn't even sure she would talk to him. Seeing her for the first time in months was too much. She wore darkness and gold and she looked like the Goddess of the Underworld, like Persephone, with roses in her hair and magic in her veins. She was nor a God, neither a monster; she had indeed told him the truth that day, she was a monstrous God. With every kiss and every bite, every scratch that left behind a map to their bodies, the night gave its place to another morning, which for a while at least, was peaceful. Right before they fell asleep, she whispered five small words that would never leave his heart. Ever. And he said four in return but she was already asleep. "I think I love you". "I know I do".

Taglist: @accio-rogers @coffee-with-orion @moli1497 @stydia-4-ever @smilexcaptainx

[robinskalechip]

home - chapter three

robin buckley x reader

a/n: i’ve been getting some really good feedback from the first two chapters, thank you guys so much!

warnings: smoking, language

not my gif!

chapter three - a family reunion

steve and robin had just finished closing up the video store and took the short three minute car ride to larry johnson’s town favorite diner. robin and steve were laughing amongst themselves and bantering along until they heard a voice.

“do suppose linda will remember me?”

the two turned to see sofia, cigarette in mouth, only a couple of yards away, walking towards them. steve smiled at her and began to speak but her attention was on robin who was still looking at her with the most gentle of smiles.

“i hope she remembers you, she always gave us discounts when you tagged along. ive had to pay full price for almost three years because of you” he walked past, ignoring the two girls he was with. steve harrington had one thing on his mind and one thing only. a royale with cheese. hehe pulp fiction reference the girls broke their eye contact to then walk behind him, sofia taking the cigarette out of her mouth to throw it to the ground and put it out whilst holding the door open for robin and quickly following her to be met with upmost nostalgia.

an older woman, probably in her early 50s, began to yell from behind the counter.

“IS THAT WHO I THINK IT IS? I MUST HAVE SKIPPED AHEAD AND GONE STRAIGHT TO CRAZY!”

sofia moved past the two, lightly touching robin’s arm, causing a chill to radiate throughout her body. sofia was smiling as she walked to the woman and embraced her in a long hug. the woman released her but not before she could cup her face in her hands to see her face more clearly, despite the pain that was radiating through sofia’s body due to having to bend her spine in order to oblige. but she didn’t mind. this woman was her family.

“AH CUORE MIO italian for my heart WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN”

sofia smiled as she replied, “nella città che non dorme mai in the city that never sleeps ”

“i’m so sorry about your mother, have you seen her yet?”

the woman’s back was facing robin, as they had turned when hugging, and she had a full view of sofia’s face. she saw her smile fall, taking her heart along with it as sofia responsed to the salt and pepper haired woman with a sense of dread.

“no not yet. marco is there every time i drive by the hospital. i’m trying to though i promise”

“sei troppo buono per questo mondo, figlia mia you are too good for this world my daughter, but you also need to eat, sit sit i’ll bring out your favorite”

sofia smiled as she realigned her spine, walking behind steve as he hopped into the booth next to robin. robin was a bit disappointed steve sat next to her instead of the other side but at least she had to best view in the house.

sofia fell into the other side of the booth putting one knee to her chest and the other stretched over the seat what a lesbian as the older woman returned with a strawberry milkshake in hand and a smile.

she placed the cold beverage onto the table to then ask robin and steve what they would like to drink. steve snapped out of his staring contest with the milkshake to answer, “ill have one of those.” he paused for emphasis, “exactly one of those” he then winked at her.

robin chuckled and said “can i get the same but in vanilla”

sofia smiled at the woman as she moved the shake away from steve’s reaching capability, “thanks linda”

linda kept her eye on steve as he frowned at sofia’s action, “royale with cheese and extra ketchup?” steve shook his head eagerly. “and for you my dear?” robin liked linda. she saw her around town often but never came into the diner as much to be considered a regular like steve. “i’ll take one of your smoked turkeys with everything but the onions please” she didn’t even have to ask sofia, even if she brought out the wrong thing, she’d still eat it no matter what

“coming right up”

sofia was still eyeing steve eyeing her shake, “OH MY GOD JUST TAKE A SIP” and said as she slide the cold beverage towards him to which he eagerly sipped from the side of the glass and threw his head back in the most dramatic yet unironic way possible

“oh my god i forgot how amazing their shakes were. i came here all the time during summer but i was so damn tired of ice cream, i didn’t even think about ordering one”

sofia smiled as she took back the milkshake, “yeah dustin filled me in on everything i missed” she was now fiddling with the straw and paused to look at steve for emphasis, “and i mean everything. i can’t believe he’s got a girlfriend”

steve laughed thinking about the events of the summer, “yeah none of us thought she was actually real, but im happy for him, i also need to pee, be back in a sec” he hoped out of the seat, nearly hitting robin

sophia placed the milkshake down and met robin’s eyes, “wanna try it? i know it looks like a plain strawberry shake but there’s actually a secret in there”. she jokingly looked around before motioning for robin to come closer as she whispered, “there’s also bits of peach”

she leaned back into her original position and raised her eyebrows briefly showing she meant business

robin smiled as she took the glass and took a sip, “mm never thought about that combination, i like it a lot actually, w-what?”

sofia was laughing as robin talked, “its okay its okay, i got it” she leaned towards robin once again, this time putting her thumb on robin’s upper lip, wiping off the cream that had escaped. the two looked at each other’s eyes during the moment, until sofia’s eyes fell to her lips, robin’s doing the same before she abruptly returned back to her seat, followed by steve hopping back to his place and linda following only a few seconds later. if they had been in that position just a few seconds longer..

linda placed the three plates on the table as sofia reached into her jacket pocket, taking out her wallet until she was stopped by the woman, “la famiglia non paga the family doesn’t pay”

she began to walk away as sofia gave her a warm smile and robin began to speak, “i’m confused. you said hadn’t seen your mother yet, but linda calls you her daughter”

sofia smiled, “she’s my godmother and my mother’s best friend. she’s practically my mother though. i’ve known her my entire life”

steve was already stuffing his face with the burger, mouth already jam packed, “i like sofia’s mom better than my own mom right now”

robin felt warm, but not in the physical, heated kind of way. she felt melting as sofia’s words, “that’s sweet”

“she and my mother grew up together when they were being raised in italy. ma says she wouldn’t have survived mentally if it weren’t for her”

sofia didn’t look up as she spoke but she could feel robin’s eyes on her. and she didn’t mind it.

the three ate while steve caught sofia up on all of his latest strike outs and the crazy nights she missed out on and the whole nancy thing that repulsed both robin and sofia, despite nancy being another one of her old childhood friends. sofia asked robin about her life and her interests and the two asking sofia about her life in new york.

once the three of them had finished, they all got up to leave, sofia yelling at linda on her way out, “CI VEDIAMO PRESTO MAMMA ill see you soon mom” to which linda gave her a big smile and waved to then quickly return to the table she was taking care of

as the three exited the diner, sofia asked “do you need a ride?”

robin felt a bit taken back and wanted to say yes more than anything. she would definitely not mind being in a car with sofia, even if it was for just a few short minutes to her house

“you dont have to really, my bike is in steve’s trunk and im only like five minutes away”

sofia chuckled as she walked to steve’s car and opened the trunk, retrieving robin’s bike and carrying it to her car, “get in freckles, you’re on my way. see ya harrington.”

robin turned to steve who winked at her and turned to leave, “have fun”

robin turned back to see the messy haired girl closing her trunk and getting into her car. once robin got into the vehicle, sophia turned the radio on and asked for the address.

how soon is now by the smiths was playing and robin was reminded of the way she felt earlier that morning, when she first saw sofia at school can you tell i like the smiths

the two were silent as robin looked out of the window, but it was the most comfortable silence she had ever been in. she felt at peace. despite her and sofia both resting their arms of the glove compartment, their hands only about a centimeter apart. she was felt calm; safe.

robin’s thoughts were interrupted when she felt the car stop and she turned to sofia, “thanks for the ride” as she unbuckled. sofia stopped robin as she was about to get out of the car.

“can i ask you something”

robin saw the same look on her face as when she was talking to linda about her mom. robin nodded.

sofia breathed in before speaking, adjusting her body to face robin, “i know dustin told me you and him didn’t spend that much time together but..will..how was he?”

she looked anxious for the answer

“he was okay, steve told me about everything he had to go through so i imagine he isn’t the same boy you knew but there’s probably still parts of him in there. just like any of us when we go through some shit, its takes some, it leaves some”

sofia leaned back in her seat, now feeling the guilt build in her stomach

“i should have been here.”

robin was quick to reassure her, “you didn’t know it was going to happen. i don’t know why you left but i know it was something that none of us could have stopped. everything happens for a reason”

sofia chuckled, “what a clique; the beautiful teen philosopher who doodles on her converses and reads sad love stories with injustice undertones and wears an unsettling yet attractive amount of jewelry” her smile grew more and more as she spoke to then turn to robin who was slightly blushing and smiling back

“i won’t keep you captivate much longer but can i ask you one more question?”

robin nodded again, still looking into her eyes, smiling

“you and harrington?”

robin cut that shit off Q U I C K

“OH GOD NO NO NO he’s like my brother ew no i could never.” she realized how dramatic she sounded and laughed at sofia laughing at her. “i’m sorry. to answer your question, no. harrington and i, not a thing. he’s uhh not my type”

sofia felt better with that last statement leaving robin’s mouth. she scooted closer, but her arm on the arm rest and bringing her face close to her face, almost being able to feel her breathe.

robin was taken back mentally but didn’t move a muscle, she whispered “what are you doing”

robin jumped at the sound of the door opening a tease

“i’m just getting the door for you like the good mannered person i was raised to be”, we said with a smile and moved her face a centimeter closer. robin was almost certain she was going to kiss her until she whispered again “good night freckles”

robin got out of the car and walked to her door completely flustered but still managed to turn her head to give sofia a smile. she was, in fact, so flustered that completely forgot her bike in sofia’s car trunk, but she didn’t even care.

next chapter

[anhed-nia]

I LOVE RAVENOUS MORE THAN YOU DO

RAVENOUS is one of my favorite movies of all time. It may not be the prettiest, or the deepest, or the most refined movie or all time, but it is a true original, and one that insinuated itself into my mental DNA from the moment I saw it. It arrived on home video around the time that I was about to leave for college, so it makes a certain amount of sense that it would have such a lasting impact on the rest of my adult life. I was initially attracted to the its excessive violence, its salt-in-the-wound humor, and its style of rustic perversion to which I was well-disposed since THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE first ruined my life as a teenager. But, there is more to RAVENOUS than these broad strokes descriptors, and looking back, it is easy to see how this unusual film catalyzed my ability to read films, and at the risk of being dramatic, my ability to understand myself.

(why does this movie only have awful posters?)

RAVENOUS is the only horror movie I can think of that takes place during the Mexican-American war, an unconventional setting that is the first sign of how truly odd this movie will be. Guy Pearce plays John Boyd, a soldier who is being celebrated for turning the tide of a major battle. The reality is that he survived the fray by hiding under a pile of his countrymen's corpses, bathing in their blood and viscera, until an unexplainable burst of rage drove him to capture the Mexican commanders, garnering him the undeserved mantle of hero. General Slauson (John Spencer) has Boyd's number, though, and ships the coward off to the impossibly remote mountain outpost of Fort Spencer, a sort of depot for undesirables like himself. No sooner has Boyd resigned himself to his fate, than the group's stasis is destroyed by the arrival of a wandering frontiersman (the incomparable Robert Carlyle) who claims to have escaped from a Donner Party-like tragedy. Naturally, their ingratiating guest turns out to be the villain at the heart of his own story, and worse yet, a carrier of the supernatural wendigo virus that rewards cannibalism with virtual immortality. The whole situation quickly devolves into a Darwian competition to sort out the predators from the provisions, seasoned liberally with analogies to Manifest Destiny and American consumerism.

Writer Ted Griffin's prismatic metaphors could be pretty clunky on their own, with cheeky comparisons between cannibalism and communion, and handy food-related quotations from founding father Benjamin Franklin. Happily, Antonia Bird's distinctive directorial style prevents RAVENOUS from degenerating into a broad-side-of-the-barn satire of American history. Griffin's overly familiar arguments act as stabilizing road signs, as the viewer navigates the otherwise hostile and alien territory explored by Bird. In the broadest sense, RAVENOUS is a movie about bodies out of control: cravings and terrors that annihilate one's self-control, that erode one's dignity, that blend repulsion and eroticism into a noxious but irresistible brew. The body wages war on the personality, the morals, the institutional rank and decoration; it wages war on other bodies, and ultimately on itself. Griffin the cultural critic has his place here, but it is Antonia Bird's unique understanding of frailty and hysteria that makes this movie so affecting.

RAVENOUS begins with a gloriously shocking opener that joins pornographic closeups of the celebratory steak served at Boyd's promotional dinner, with Boyd vomiting violently outside of the dining hall. The body is turned inside out right away in this movie, and this stunt is immediately followed by a similarly disorienting trick turned by the film's main theme. The experimental score, a collaboration between the great Michael Nyman and Damon Albarn from Blur, establishes its power with a composition that is written in 6/7 time, creating a rhythm that is very difficult to follow for the average ear. Thus the viewer is first nauseated by the imagery, then disoriented by the sound, and it is in this unsettled state that one remains for the rest of the film.

There are a number of such bizarre formal techniques to discuss, and they are well matched by Bird's management of her cast. Even for a horror film, RAVENOUS is an extremely physical movie. The terminally guilty Boyd seems to be on the verge of literal implosion; the squirrelly and barely verbal religious fanatic Toffler (Jeremy Davies) scrambles around breathlessly at a pace that puts him in danger of killing himself (which he finally nearly does); the only "real" soldier in the bunch, the nightmarishly aryan Private Reich (Neal McDonough), is first seen screaming half-submerged in a frigid mountain stream, suggesting that even the the conventional trappings of heroism are purely pathological here. Other characters are chronically drunk or high, struggling just to stay awake or walk a straight line. The radical loss of identity in which the organism transforms from a sentient being, into stew in a cauldron, almost seems like a natural eventuality of the abjection and loss of control suffered by everyone at Fort Spencer.

This moral and physical degeneracy, that is the status quo with Boyd and his cohorts, eventually contaminates the mind as well. When I first saw RAVENOUS, I was entirely ignorant of real artistry in film, and whether I knew it or not, my malnourished brain was in dire need of deviance from Hollywood norms of beauty and power. At that time, I was mainly accustomed to two approaches to human behavior in films: First, the James Bond model, in which characters only behave as if they have perfect foresight and complete control of their emotions and deliberation even in the face of catastrophe. I use "James Bond" as the most recognizable face of this hyperrationalism, but this approach pervades most mainstream films involving any kind of peril. How many times have you, the reader, had to sit through a screening in which some know-it-all picks apart the decisions and reactions of every character, as if it were reasonable to expect any person on either side of the screen to behave with robotic pragmatism regardless of their circumstances? But people do expect this from fictional protagonists on the whole. The second approach that I want to identify is mainly relegated to slasher movies; According to this model, characters are permitted to make the stupidest possible choices at every juncture, because the audience has a preexisting assumption that these victims will be sacrificed on the altar of our prudish morals, or simply for the vicarious enjoyment of the power wielded by a Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers. What we rarely see in the mainstream, outside of the comedy genre, is shock, mania, hysteria, the loss of one's faculties that comes when one experiences a violent divorce from accepted reality.

Other than the aforementioned TEXAS CHAIN SAW, RAVENOUS was the first movie I had ever seen that addressed the neurological reality of trauma. Boyd's uncontrollable vomiting at the very beginning of the film is just a taste of Antonia Bird's mastery of this subject. She has ample opportunity to address this with her cast when the interloping cannibal "survivor" Colqhoun, first leads the unsuspecting Fort Spencer crew to the cave where he says the "real" cannibal is hiding out. Upon their arrival, Colqhoun throws himself into an alarming fugue state, apparently reliving the trauma of the nightmare from which he fled. He pants and gasps, smirks and grimaces, claws at the air and at the earth, as if to bury himself, effectively scaring the shit out of everybody. After he reveals his true intentions and massacres most of the crew before chasing Boyd and Reich off the edge of a cliff, another interesting neurological event transpires. At the bottom of the hole into which they have plummeted, with Reich's last spasm of life, he clamps his fingers around Boyd's throat  until his maniacal laughter turns into a death rattle. An even finer example comes after Boyd has returned to camp, having shamefully mended his wounds by dining on Reich's corpse as per the wendigo myth. Still recuperating, Boyd greets the arriving officers who are escorting the Fort's replacement commander--who turns out to be Colqhoun, now dressed neatly as the "Colonel Ives" on whom he blamed the cannibalistic murders of his fellow frontiersman. At the sight of this shocking enemy, Boyd pivots wildly and slams face first into the nearest wall, crumbling like a swatted insect on the floor and shaking uncontrollably.

These are some of the principle moments that won RAVENOUS my heart, and that really let me know what I was searching for in films. In fact, this movie was so formative for me that it led to a sort of impromptu ritual of breaking with my childhood. As with all cultists, my desperation to rope in everybody I knew intensified along with my obsession. I couldn't imagine that anybody would reject this beautiful and fabulously unusual work of art. I pulled a lot of wins, but I was in for a rude awakening where it should have counted. I refer to my "best friend" and "high school sweetheart" of about ten years, a guy who dominated my cultural life for almost as long as we were pals, since he was slightly smarter and had slightly better taste than our high school peers, but very little interest in having his mind expanded, as I eventually realized. When I showed him my new favorite movie of all time, I was brutally disappointed by his scoffing at every scene that I considered to be the movie's crowning accomplishments. He scrunched up his face and rejected Reich's murderous dying breath as "stupid" and "fucked up" and "making no sense". Today I'm not sure how hard I tried to explain that, look, we're talking about a character who is on the brink of death, whose final moments were in especially ugly combat, and who is really extremely brain damaged; more to the point, he really hates Boyd, the coward, and may have tried to kill him at some point even if he were fully possessed of his faculties. I mean, we're finally seeing something psychiatrically real here...aren't we? I got the same snotty dismissal from my viewing companion when Boyd went into shock at the sight of Ives--shock, a real acknowledged medical condition--and really during any scene that he considered too awkward and bizarre to be "cool" and heroic. It was at that very moment that I knew we wouldn't be friends for much longer, and we actually fell out of touch a few years later.

With that personal digression out of the way, though, I'd like to return to the cave (don't I always?) to discuss how Antonia Bird, her DP Anthony B. Richmond, and her editorial team work together to keep the audience in more or less the same state of discomfort and disorientation as the characters. RAVENOUS was also the first movie that taught me how to interpret the visual grammar of film, since I watched it so often that, eventually, I couldn't miss what was going on. Bird and co. have a way of distorting and compressing space that prevents the viewer from ever really knowing where you are. When the crew arrives at the low, carbon black mouth of the cave, there is a sense that it couldn't possibly be as deep as Colqhoun's story suggests (and in practical reality, it isn't). When Boyd and Reich creep inside, the tunnel plunges promptly into a weird homey sublevel where Colqhoun had been subsisting on his fellow travelers. This is sort of weird, but not as weird as what happens outside. When Colqhoun plunges into his fugue state, we see in it a sweaty, spittle-flecked closeup. His behavior spooks Toffler, who in his own closeup cowers against his commanding officer Colonel Hart (Jeffrey Jones, playing essentially the same character as in Deadwood). Colqhoun appears to stalk closer and closer to the camera, but how close is he to Toffler and Hart? We have no idea, until he circles back to the pit he just dug and then lunges through the air to plant a knife in Hart's abdomen, gutting him. Then, when Boyd and Reich give chase, there is a moment where Reich stares into the camera, giving Boyd an order. Boyd looks shyly into the camera before glancing off, suggesting that he flinches away from Reich's hateful gaze--but in the next shot, we see that Boyd is actually behind Reich, looking in a completely different direction. Part of me suspects that Bird and her crew were making the most of the small and somewhat sparse-looking patch of woods that they had for this scene, but it gets more interesting later on. As Colquhoun-now-Ives surreptitiously prepares a human stew back at camp, the permanently drunk Major Knox (Stephen Spinella, who seems determined to turn RAVENOUS into a balls-out comedy) shouts down the hysterical Boyd--all in closeup, so where are they? As it turns out, Ives is in one building, Knox stands in a passageway outside the door, and Boyd sits shackled in a separate building in the distant background. Finally, in Boyd's epic showdown with Ives, there is a fascinating moment in which Boyd saunters into the room, gazing staunchly ahead, ready to kill. Cut to Ives standing in front of a roaring fire, spinning neatly to face his adversary--but when we cut back to Boyd, we see that he is completely alone in the space. Shortly, Ives plunges through the ceiling behind him; they were never even on the same floor. RAVENOUS consistently leaves the viewer as disoriented and untethered as its characters are emotionally.

This battle itself harkens back to the movie's crucial focus on the often degrading and humiliating experience of piloting a human body. In both the James Bond and slasher movie models of movie behavior that I previously discussed, a climactic showdown should be fast-paced, furious, with impressive feats of athleticism by the combatants. Not so in RAVENOUS. The final scene is accompanied by an eight-and-a-half minute minimalist trudge through hell by Nyman and Albarn that never threatens to raise your blood pressure with stings or arias. The music perfectly matches this sluggish fight between two men whose bodies have been repeatedly destroyed and recreated. Their weapons are a letter opener, a meat cleaver, a pretty substantial log, and finally, a massive bear trap. The conflict is no clash of the titans, no beautiful realization of the full potential of male aggression. It is gruesome, tragic, and in some way, romantic.

I would be remiss if I failed to dig in to the eroticism of this movie. Like all vampire movies, there is a virgin and a seducer, a victim who calls their lack of worldliness dignity, and a predator who sees chastity as a shameful waste of life. RAVENOUS is one of at least three movies that Antonia Bird made about the unique relationships between men in traditionally male situations. Her heist movie FACE has been compared to HEAT, though I am really thinking of the incendiary drama PRIEST. In this, her impressive directorial debut, a young man of the cloth struggles with the disturbing intrusion of sex into his chaste life, be it in the lives of deviant clergyman, or abused child parishioners, or in his own struggle with homosexuality. Robert Carlyle plays the unhappy lover left out in the cold, drifting down the street on a skateboard like a hovering ghost, trying to convince the eponymous character that love is greater than its stingy biblical proscription. While there are no literal love scenes in RAVENOUS, it takes place in a similar world, made up almost only of men--men who are brothers in arms, who look after each other's souls and bodies, and who even consume each other's bodies, who gain strength from one another by breaking the ultimate taboo. The closing image, of Boyd and Ives pinned chest to chest by the bear trap, bleeding to death in each other's arms, remains for me one of the tenderest images in all of horror cinema.

I would like to close by asserting that Bird's deft exploration of male sensitivity is nowhere more powerful than in her direction of David Arquette, the unlikely shining star of RAVENOUS. The often intolerably wacky comedic actor plays Private Cleaves, an absolute reject from society who (barely) functions as the help around Fort Spencer. He and George (Joseph Runningfox), one of two Native American appendages to the crew, are consistently high out of their minds, which may make them look like fools, but it also designates them as being the most wisely in touch with the genuinely hopelessness of their situation. When George is slaughtered by Colqhoun, Cleaves is left all alone tending the Fort, and he has a few scenes of powerful vulnerability before his inevitable demise. In between two key plot beats, we find Cleaves and George's sister Martha (the quietly wonderful Sheila Tousey) standing together in the snowy yard, observing the new commanding officer's arrival. What should be a forgettably dry piece of exposition concludes with Cleaves instinctively turning to Martha and stroking her hair, which causes both of them to dissolve in tears. In an adjacent scene, Boyd watches through the window as the agonizingly bereaved Cleaves chops wood in the yard, alone. Cleaves, certainly intoxicated, weaves and sweats, giggling in an unnervingly forced manner to try to resurrect the perpetual good time that he once enjoyed with his murdered best friend. The scene dissolves into a fantasy in which Boyd gives in to his mounting cannibalistic urges and eviscerates Cleaves--throughout which Cleaves laughs and laughs with escalating insanity. It is difficult to convey the raw force of the sequence in words, so I will just say this: Early this year, I dared to point out that among the many strange virtues of STARSHIP TROOPERS is the fact that terminal screwball Jake Busey is so warm, so funny, and so emotionally available in that movie that it almost throws off the deliberately boneheaded artificiality of the entire rest of the cast. So, I would just like to conclude that, if your movie involves somebody from EIGHT LEGGED FREAKS or Shasta McNasty, and you get that person to provide you with one of the most sensitive performances in the whole show, you're probably doing something right.

[heelturntoo]

Tread Lightly, She is Near

Summary: Tim spends his first night as a real Robin

Next you're going to tell me how simple it all is."

"Well, yeah. It's pretty basic math."

On his first night living in Wayne Manor, Tim lies, unable to sleep, staring up at the roof of his bedroom.

He had stayed in The Cave, curled under the weight of his cloak, until four AM, pretending to work as he monitored Batman from the cave and then watched him go through his warm down and debrief. The truth is he hasn’t retained more than a half-dozen data points all night about the villains he had been tasked to study.

When even Batman was ready to finish up for the night, he had asked to stay down in the cave a little longer, to more fully accustom himself to the computer’s system.  But Batman had been stern. “We sleep when we can. That’s as important a part of the job as any other if we want to maximise operation at peak capacity.” He had said, not unkindly and sent Tim to go change.

It was easier to be Robin. As Robin, he felt tougher, safer. He could keep the pain at arm’s length. It was all harder to deal with when he was just Tim. The pain felt sharper, more immediate. 

At the foot of the stairs, Bruce, now in sweats, had reached out and, when Tim gave a tiny nod, placed his hand on his shoulder. “You’re doing very well.”

“T-thank you.”

Bruce had walked him to the door of the guest room – no, not the guest room any longer – his room now, Alfred had said, for as long as he needed it, but hadn’t come inside. “I’m just down the hall. You know where to find me?”

“Yes.”

“Good night.”

It’s a nice room, if impersonal. His duffel bag and boxes of belongings still sit on the floor. Alfred had wanted to unpack them, but Tim had asked him not to, preferring to do it himself.

There had been a tray sitting on the table by his window when he came in; a glass of milk and a sandwich. Alfred had gone to bed as soon as Bruce had jumped out of the car and proved himself not in need of stitching up. That was, apparently, his custom, but he had left the snack for Tim before retiring. Tim just hadn’t been able to summon up an appetite.

Now he is lying in bed, staring straight at the ceiling, willing himself to sleep.

Bruce will be disappointed with him if he doesn’t sleep.

He has been released from school this week, in deference to his father’s illness and his mother’s death.  The funeral will be Thursday. There was no family to help organise the fine details of the memorial, so his father’s lawyer had looked after the legal side, and Alfred had looked after the personal details.  Alfred is good at that sort of thing. Tim is beginning to realise that Alfred is good at everything.

So, it doesn’t actually matter if he doesn’t get any sleep. It’s okay if he wastes the rest of the night thrashing, or lying, gazing up at the roof. He doesn’t actually have anywhere to be.

Except, if he does not sleep now, he won’t be sharp come tonight and there is no excuse for that.

Nightwing had promised to come over later today too and play video games with him. Tim had told him thank you, but that his aerial work was still weak and could they practice that instead, please?  They had compromised on Dick taking him to the track and showing him how to do pin turns on the bike as long as Dick could take him out for burgers after.

He tries shutting his eyes.  Whenever he does, he sees his mother’s body on the slab in the mortuary when he had been taken by Bruce to legally identify it - her. He hears the beep of the respirator doing his Dad’s breathing for him. When he thinks about those things, his stomach bucks and his breathing quickens. All the control, the mastery over fear he had maintained during their kidnapping, is slipping through his fingers like smoke. To his mortification, he realises he is crying.

He buries his head in his pillow and bites down on it, trying to stop himself from making a noise. God, please let Bruce not have heard that. Please.

After a while of quiet sniffling, he throws the covers off himself, pulls the throw from the end of the bed and wraps it around himself like it is Robin’s cap. He discretely wipes his eyes on the corner. Then he slips out of his room.

The mahogany panelling makes everything in the manor’s upstairs corridor seem darker, but dawn is starting to slide through the eastern window, enough to see by. Alfred had told them that the floorboards are designed to squeak, a nightingale floor to act as an extra layer of security if someone dangerous makes it as far as the manor. He hasn’t learned the trick to walking silently across it yet, but he does the best he can. He reaches the top of the stairs, wonders about the likelihood of being able to get into the cave without Bruce or Alfred being alerted and decides it is not very likely. He keeps walking.

Eventually, he comes to a door and eases it open.

The room is spotless. Alfred wouldn’t abide dust. There is a copy of The Big Sleep thrown down on the bedspread, as if the room’s occupant has just left for a moment and will be right back. But things are too tidy, and the air is thick, undisturbed. After less than a year, the room is already turning from a bedroom into a museum.

He walks a circuit of it once, afraid to touch anything in case it would be seen as an intrusion. It’s just an ordinary room, books,  a sleek laptop closed on the desk  and a closet full of clothes that will never be worn again. There is a big bay window, east facing with a window seat set beneath it. Outside, the woodlands are a riot of autumn colours, red and gold and deep green. Silver mists gird the lawns. Beyond the forest, the city lies, handsome and unthreatening at this distance, like a lounging apex predator.

Wrapping his blanket-cape around him he sits down, curling into the deep pillows of the window seat.

Ives had called yesterday, and the day before that and there had been a card sent over signed by all the kids in his homeroom. People know how to do these things properly in Gotham. He has signed a couple himself in the past. One for Cecily when her sister had been hit by joker venom. One for Mark after the fire that had killed his dad.

There had been one for Jason too, or for Bruce and Alfred. It had been passed diligently around the classroom and Tim had felt unable to sign it. Anything he could have written would have felt too much like a lie.

“What was he like?” He had asked Dick about Jason once, and Dick had squirmed and said, “You’re nothing like him,” and quickly changed the subject.

But lately, Tim has realised that Dick didn’t really know Jason at all. They had been legally foster brothers for almost three years, but Dick had managed it so their lives were kept carefully separate. Tim thinks about it from time to time, when Dick’s helping him with his rapelling or teaching him capoeira or they are just sitting on the couch, scoffing popcorn and playing videogames. He wonders if Dick’s doing this because he enjoys Tim’s company or because of an obligation to the dead boy for whom he didn’t have room in his life.

It occurs to him sometimes that even though he only knew him through a lens, he might have known Jason better than anyone alive except for Bruce, Alfred and maybe Barbara. That this is true, that this will always be true and that there is no way for him to fix it, sits like a small stone in the pit of his stomach.

He has missed his chance. He will never know Jason better than he does now.

Just like he will never know Mom.

He blows on the glass and traces geometric shapes with his finger. Up and down. He tries his breathing again, tries to put all the raw, broiling emotions back on the high shelf, not gone but... removed.

When every window pane has a hexagon or a tetrahedral drawn on it he instead switches to tracing the loops and eyes of the window seat’s wooden panelling.

...And sees the knot.

It’s an imperfection in the wood just where the wood panels become window frame. Close enough to the window to be well camouflaged, but not so close it will interfere with the sensors. You would have to be sitting precisely where he is sitting even to notice it.

There is something squeezed inside.

After a minute and a couple of wooden splinters beneath his fingernails to get it out. It’s a piece of ordinary copybook paper, rolled up like a cigarette. He can see the faint blue copy lines.

He unrolls it and holds it up to the light. On the side facing him is just the letter “R”, simple and un-stylised. He turns it over. On it, in neat cursive script are five lines of text.

He reads it. He reads it again. He reads it a third time. He rolls it back up into a cigarette.

He is crying again. He’s not sure why. He longs absurdly, pathetically for his mother, as if she had ever been the sort to hold him and rock him to sleep.

Outside, sunshine is starting to line the distant skyscrapers in gold. He presses his head against the window. The glass is cold against his cheek.

The next thing he knows, there comes a gentle knock on the door and he realises he has fallen asleep. “Master Timothy?”

He lurches up, remembering where he is, remembering what a violation it is to be in here, let alone sleep here.

Alfred looks around the edge of the door and seems entirely unsurprised. “Ah, there you are. When you weren’t in your room I began to worry.”

“AlfredImsosorry. Ididntmeantobeinhere. Ididntmeanto –”

Alfred waves this away. “Calm down, lad. It’s alright. I just came to see did you want your breakfast and when I couldn’t find you I was worried.”

“You were?” Tim is confused.

Alfred crosses the room and joins him at the window. Tim expects him to sit, but Alfred is not the sort of person who sits. “Shall we say, it would not be the first time a grieving young man left this house to go do something... impetuous.”

“You mean Jason?” He glances around the room as if the ghost will be sitting cross-legged on the bed or over at the desk.

“Not exclusively, no. Grief is, I’m afraid, this family’s constant companion.”

Tim realises that ‘this family’ includes Tim himself and doesn’t quite know how he feels about this.

“At least,” Alfred’s eyes sparkle a little, “You are not dangling from the chandeliers.”

Tim smiles a watery smile. “I could dangle from some chandeliers. Would it make me feel better?”

Alfred returns his smile. “Perhaps. It often worked wonders on Master Dick.”

“And Jason? What worked for him?”

Alfred would never do anything so gauche as to flinch, but there is a definite loosening of his hold of his sang froid. “The roots of his pain had grown rather deeper. He was alone for a long time before he came to us. I sometimes wonder...” He trails off

“Bruce says he was angry.”

“Often, yes.”

“Bruce says that it made him reckless, that that’s what got him killed.”

Tim realises he was mistaken in his assessment, because this time Alfred does flinch. “Ah,” he says, “Yes.”

“Alfred?”

“Yes?”

“I want to be Robin but... I don’t want to die.” His face burns with shame at saying it and he wants to bury his head in his hands.

But Alfred smiles and says, “I am glad to hear it. I don’t want you to die either.” He hesitates and then says in a kind tone. “Do you want to stop being Robin.”

“No!” It comes out much louder then he meant and the depth of emotion, of alarm that it might be taken away from him, surprises him. He never wanted to be Robin, not truly. He’s an understudy and when the time comes he will step aside. But now, just now, having Robin, having this life makes him braver. When he feels better, when the pain faids, it won’t be hard to give it up. “No thank you, I mean.  I still want to be Robin. I just have worries, sometimes.”

He shoots Alfred a nervous glance. “You won’t tell Bruce?”

“On my honour.”

“Thanks.”

“Perhaps you would like to come help me prepare breakfast in the kitchen?” says Alfred. “I could certainly use the company.”

“And Bruce doesn’t like people in this room?” he guesses aloud.

This time Alfred makes a show of irritation. “Well, you know him. Something of a hoarder. Cards and pennies and dinosaurs. “ And glass cases, neither of them say. “He likes when things  remain as they were.”

Tim’s hand must have tightened on the roll of paper, because the movement attracts Alfred’s attention. “What do you have there?”

“Nothing.” Tim crumples the note he found in the knothole up in his hand. “Just a message someone sent me.”  He looks around the room again. “Alfred, were we anything alike?  Jason and I?”

“What did Master Bruce tell you?”

“He said we were nothing alike.”

Alfred nods. “Then I suppose it must be so.”

**

EARLIER PART HERE

[itsallavengers]

More Superfamily

For @superhusbandswithasideoffamily <3

As it happened, the fact that their newly adopted son turned out to be enhanced came as a complete surprise to Tony and Steve.

They’d had him two months and three days. A three year old that both Tony and Steve had fallen in love with the moment they’d set eyes on him. He was small and skinny and had the hugest eyes Tony thought he’d ever seen, and a laugh that made his heart want to melt. Although pretty shy at first, when Steve had happened to hit on the right question (’so what’s your favourite thing to do?’), the boy turned out to be passionate and excited and very, very fucking smart.

Yeah. It was a pretty easy decision, in the end.

Signing all the papers and going though all the checks (although- seriously, they were superheroes, did they really need to go through the ‘do you have murderous urges?’ questions?) was totally, utterly worth it to see the look on Peter Parker’s face when he was told he’d get to have a new home with them.

And hell- him coming back with them had probably been one of the happiest days of Tony’s life. For the first time in his life, he had a proper, honest-to-God family. Tony was man enough to admit he’d shed a tear or two.

At least he wasn’t like Steve though. That man took one look at Tony holding Peter at the threshold of the tower and burst straight into tears. (Natasha was going to delete the video of him going up to Steve seconds after and then doing exactly the same thing. He would make sure that footage was never seen by anyone else’s eyes again.)

So yes. Happiness all around. They had a son. They had a son who could speak better than Clint in the mornings and owned a smile that made even Natasha swoon. Generally speaking, Tony was pretty sure he hadn’t stopped smiling for nearly three months. Steve was no better- damn guy looked constantly as if he was about to burst into song.

Of course- because they were superheroes and that was just their life- something had to surprise them out of the blue.

(Read more, mobile users!)

“No, Patrice, there is no way-” Tony sighed as she cut him off yet again, her harried voice carrying down the line and making the headache worse with every note. 

“No! We can’t afford to pull out of the convention this late, it’s a huge...yes, yes, I am fully aware of the- what? That’s ridiculous and you know it, I can’t just-”

Throwing an approximation of his cab fare over to the driver (give or take a hundred) Tony slipped out of the door, grabbing his suitcase as he went and praying the coffee shop just underneath the Avengers tower would be open. He could really do with a caffeine IV- maybe that could be his next big design, parents everywhere would crawl over one another for something like that.

“Look, you can’t change anything, Patrice, the deal is already done,” Tony stopped to button up his coat against the wind, and looked up to the tower where his husband and son were waiting for him. Oh, how he wished his goddamn PR manager would get off the phone so that he could-

He stopped. Squinted his eyes a little. 

Hm. That seemed remarkably like a human figure at the window of...

Tony’s blood ran cold as he went through the floor-plans in his head and realised that was Peter’s room. His heart stopped completely as he jerked forward, ready to override the call and scream for JARVIS through the phone- but then he stopped a moment before the words could leave his mouth, confusion mounting as he managed to pick out the reds and blues of what definitely looked like... Peter’s onezie?

Patrice was still yapping through the line, but Tony had shut her off long ago, stepping forward a few steps and working Peter’s name silently in his mouth as he realised that yes, that was indeed his son hanging from the 89th floor of his tower building.

“Patrice?” He said calmly, “I’m gonna have to call you back.”

The call ended swiftly, and yeah- that was when the screaming began.

“Steve?” Tony connected through to Steve’s cellphone through the line in his suit, which was currently hovering a couple of hundred feet in the air and holding his squirming son firmly between two metal arms, “can I ask you something?”

“Mm hmm,” Steve murmured, and he sounded sleepy- Tony almost felt sorry for him, because he was about to get a rather rude awakening.

He shuffled Peter in his arms a bit, whilst the boy just poked curiously at the mechanisms in Tony’s neck and then hummed in pleasure when Tony knocked up the heated plates on the outside of his suit so that his tiny troublesome child wouldn’t freeze to death whilst hanging in the air. “Why did I just have to tell JARVIS to send my armour through the 2nd story windows so that I could suit up and collect our child from the window of the 89th floor as fast as possible? Why did that happen?”

There was silence down the other line, and then a quiet shuffling noise. “Huh?��

“Peter,” Tony said instead, turning his head down to his son and jigging him a little, “do you want to tell Papa what you were just doing seventeen seconds ago?”

“I was climbing!” Peter said enthusiastically, beaming up at Tony as he leaned in close to his ear, as if he could talk to Steve through there, “I looked outta the window an’ there were loads of birds flying in a flock an’ I wanted to see ‘em so I went outta the window and watched ‘em properly!” 

Another silence. Longer, this time. And then a very sudden, very fast burst of static. Steve was undoubtedly sprinting to Peter’s room, which meant Tony had about 1.2 seconds until the inevitable-

Ah. There it was. 

Not even bothering with the handle- simply yanking the door straight off it’s hinges, Steve bolted into the room with wide, searching eyes. Of course, he saw Tony and Peter just outside the window, hovering patiently. Peter even waved a little when he saw his Papa staring at him.

Steve, bless him, just sort of stood there. Like he didn’t quite know what to do. Although- in all fairness, neither had Tony. There were currently a lot of very confused onlookers beneath him stepping on a lot of very expensive glass.

“So- our child sticks to walls, Steve,” he said helpfully through the speaker, and then gestured to the window just above Steve’s head, “can you let us in please?”

Numbly, Steve pulled the window. Off. He stared at the pane of glass in his hands for a few moments before calmly placing it against the wall.

Tucking Peter in so he didn’t bump his head, Tony crawled through the gap Steve had made for him. Once on solid ground again, he instantly dismantled the suit so that he was holding Peter in his own two arms, clutching the boy tightly into his chest.

When Steve continued to say absolutely jack-all, Tony spoke again. “According to JARVIS, the change in environment, diet and state of living may have triggered some sort of genetic awakening in our son’s body. We’re thinking the X gene, but that has yet to be decided,” he said, nodding. 

“I think I’m having a heart attack.” Steve said, nodding back.

“Yeah, well, you weren’t the one who stepped out of the cab and saw him hanging there.”

“Oh God.”

“Oh God indeed.”

“He was out there-”

“Yep.”

“Just....hanging-”

“Yep.”

“No harness or grip or-”

“Nope.”

Steve stopped. He nodded, raised his eyebrows, and then fainted.

When Steve woke up a few minutes later to Peter bouncing on his chest and Tony sat, cross-legged, with his head in his lap, the first thing he did was swear.

“Child,” Tony pointed to Peter, “you didn’t hear that.”

Steve’s eyes drifted down to the small boy smiling down at him. “Why’d you faint?” He asked curiously. “Fainting usually happens ‘cause of a lack of oxygen to the brain, but your lung capacity is a lot bigger than mine or daddy’s, isn’t it? I was scared- but it’s alright, Daddy told me you’d wake up soon, and you did!”

Steve could help but smile, looking more than a little overwhelmed as his large hands gripped Peter’s shoulder gently. “I’m fine, Peter,” he said.

“Just remember to breathe, maybe,” Tony said, patting his cheek as Steve slowly sat back up, Peter still in his arms.

“So,” Steve said eventually, “In the ‘Good Parent’ chart, where do you think ‘falling asleep on the couch and letting your three year old son climb out of a window on the 89th floor’ would rank?”

“In all fairness, the window in question was about 6 feet above Peter’s head. At the time, neither of us were aware of his apparent rock-climbing skills. I think you can be let off. It’s Peter we have the problem with, here,” Tony rubbed his head in his hand and winced. God, his head hurt.

Peter had been happily fiddling with Steve’s shirtsleeve up until that point, but at those words, he froze up. His eyes widened a little, and he turned to Tony with something like fear on his face. “Daddy? What did I... did I do something bad? Why am I a problem?”

“No, no, baby, not like that! I didn’t- you’re not a problem at all. You’re- you’re perfect, alright?” Tony said hurriedly, hands going out and framing Peter’s worried little face, “you’re just... it turns out you’re a little different than what we thought. You know sticking to things isn’t...average child development?”

Peter’s head cocked a little to the side. “Well, yeah,” he shrugged, “but I can! I didn’t even know I could until I tried it just then! And you can fly- Papa can break really hard things that no one else can. Uncle Bruce turns green and goes massive when he’s angry. I just thought...” he shrugged, looking down and shuffling a little bit, “I just thought it meant I properly belong in your family now.”

“Hey, Petey,” Steve frowned, stroking a hand through Peter’s hair, “you’d belong here whether you had superpowers or not, you know that right? We love you no matter what you are.”

“But- as a general rule, please please please do not ever do that again,” Tony added, shutting his eyes and shuddering, “you nearly gave me and Papa joint heart attacks. Just...stay on the ground for now, okay? Can you promise us that?”

Peter bit his lip. “But I like being up high! And I don’t ever fall, look!” And before either of them even knew what was happening, Peter was wriggling from Steve’s arms and scampering to- no, wait, up- the wall, onto the ceiling, where he just....dangled. Like some sort of child-shaped fruit or- or- 

God, Tony needed a nap.

They both jumped to their feet instantly, arms out, shrieks of horror barely contained as Peter let his arms swing happily, held on by the tips of his toes. Tony had no idea how he was doing that- like some sort of adhesive on his skin or something- but whatever it was, it was fucking terrifying to see for the first time in your three year old son.

“Peter, get down!” Steve said loudly, face paling as he turned to Tony, “he was doing that out of the window?” He hissed incredulously.

Tony tapped at his chest. “I lost 30 years of my life. I will never get them back.”

They didn’t have a chance to say anything else. Steve was too busy grabbing Peter as he leaped off into his arms with a giggle. A strangled sort of noise came out of Steve’s mouth, and Tony stepped forward, ready to grab Peter if Steve fainted again- but he managed to stay upright, just staring at their son with a sort of overwhelmed horror on his face.

“We should probably get him checked out by Bruce. Or Xavier,” Steve said in the end.

Tony nodded, leaning against his shoulder a little, Peter’s hand dropped on his hair, and he felt little fingers tugging at the knots. “Probably.”

Steve sighed, sagging a little. His spare arm wrapped around Tony’s waist and tugged him in. “But not tonight. I think we’ve had enough tonight. Let’s... tomorrow.”

Tony just nodded. “Seconded.”

“Thirded!” Peter called out from Steve’s chest, frowning a little, “I wanna nap.”

Steve looked at the gaping hole where the pane of glass used to be, and blushed a little. “Okay- our room,” he said in the end. 

When Steve moved, his arm tugged Tony along with him, and together they all walked back out of Peter’s room, still slightly shell-shocked.

“Hey Steve,” Clint called out from the couch as they passed through the living room, “do I wanna know why you hightailed it out of the room like the devil was grabbing your ass?”

“My son is adhesive,” Steve answered, and Tony nodded his agreement.

Clint looked at them all for a few seconds, before blinking a few times and turning back to the TV. “Yep,” he said, mostly to himself, “shouldn’t have asked.”

By the time they’d reached their room,  Peter’s eyes were already fluttering shut against Steve’s shoulder. They gently put him down in the middle of the bed, and then stood there and watched him silently.

“How are we going to deal with this?” Steve asked in the end.

Tony just shrugged. “Same way we deal with everything else that’s fucking weird around here. Just run with it. Because we’re superheroes and all, in my opinion, slightly unhinged.”

Steve spared one last glance at their now peacefully dozing son, and then unfolded his arms. “Let’s sleep,” he declared.

“Ah, yes, perfect,” Tony started slipping down into the bed immediately, toeing off his shoes as he went, “the best solution to all problems. I love the way you think, darling.”

Steve didn’t say anything- just slipped back under the covers and reached out for Tony across Peter’s head. His hand pressed around the nape of Tony’s neck and squeezed, pulling him in a little to place a kiss against his forehead. “At least he’s not still jumping around on the outside of the tower” he said, thumb stroking across Tony’s cheekbone.

Tony gave a thumbs up. “Oh, how blessed we are, our son was only dangling hundreds of feet above ground for a few minutes, rather than ten,” he said wryly, letting his head drop into Steve’s throat.

Wordlessly, Steve’s gentle fingers came up and pressed against the sides of Tony’s temples, rubbing softly and relieving the pressure in the way only he knew how to do. Tony gave a soft noise of pleasure, and Steve peppered feather-light lips across his face as his fingers worked. “Just sleep” he heard Steve say, “we can deal with this in the morning.” 

Tony laughed again and glanced down at Peter, curled up in the middle of them and looking peaceful as ever. His hand absently brushed across the boy’s face before he could help himself, but luckily Peter didn’t wake- just sniffed a little and scratched his nose. 

“I’m the luckiest man on the whole damn planet,” Tony breathed quietly, looking up to Steve.

He smiled softly, thumb tracing Tony’s lip for a moment before shutting his eyes. “You’ll have t’fight me for that title,” he murmured.

Tony’s head was still throbbing a little, and his heart probably wouldn’t go back to a normal rate for at least a week after that scare- but he didn’t care. It was all going to be so, so worth it. It already was. He had Steve. He had Peter, He really didn’t need anything else. Take away everything else and he’d still be the happiest man alive. 

Even if his husband was over ninety years old and his son appeared to share traits with glue. It was fine. Just another day in the life.

Tony wouldn’t trade it for the universe.

He smiled, and fell asleep with one hand entwined with Steve’s and one wrapped around his son’s waist.

[wordsysayswords]

sooooooooo if you're still taking fluff week prompts, remember that fic you did of Tucker high on good meds and Wash having to deal with it? How about the reverse of that, Wash getting the good stuff and Tucker getting the joy (or horror) of seeing a Freelancer high on pain meds

I had a blast with this prompt - thank you!  Originally, I struggled to turn it into a fluff piece, given angst is my default setting. But the appearance of loopy Washington in season 15 got the ball rolling, and it was tons of fun.

The Better Stuff

Sequel to The Good Stuff

“He doesn’t need to stay here so long as someone’s watching him, right? We already share a room–he can go if I keep an eye on him, right?”Grey flips through her notes. “Given this is one of Agent Washington’s less dramatic visits to my infirmary, I think that can be arranged.”

Or, the tables have turned and Tucker finds himself looking after a very loopy Wash for the evening.

Read on Ao3

Tucker feels like the designated driver at a house party.

“Wash, I swear to God.”

The Freelancer is laid up in a hospital bed wearing only his undersuit. Bandages peek out from the collar and Tucker’s willing to bet they continue down to wrap around his chest. The asshole takes broken ribs like a paper cut. Tucker’s got an arm spread over the Freelancer’s shoulders, unsure how to best pin him to the bed without fucking up his ribs any further.

“I don’t need to be here,” Wash insists. His voice is clipped, clearly forcing himself to articulate each word. Anyone else with the amount of drugs Wash has in his system would be slurring and struggling to form a complete thought.

“Yeah, you keep saying that,” Tucker grumbles, trying to avoid tangling Wash’s IV line while the man struggles to sit up. “But you can’t even fucking walk –that was not an invitation to try.”

Wash manages to swing his legs over the side of the bed and is halfway to his feet when he suddenly lists sideways. Tucker lunges, grabbing for the man’s waist. Somehow, he keeps them both from crashing to the floor.

“Seriously, dude–”

Wash furrows his brow. “Don’t need to be here,” he says, but this time it’s a little less sure.

“Yeah, sure,” Tucker huffs, lowering the Freelancer until they’re both sitting on the edge of the bed. “Whatever you say, Wash.”

“Agent Washington,” Grey’s sing-songy voice has both men looking up. She’s standing in the door, hand on one hip and in the other a clipboard. Smiling, she cocks her head. “What are you doing out of bed?”

Moments like these: faced with her too cheery smile and a voice that says she already knows the answer to the question she’s asking but is daring you to lie; make Tucker think back to the time they’d had her ‘negotiate’ with a captured pirate.

“I’m fine,” Wash tells her with an air of authority, but the effect is lost since he’s glaring somewhere high over her head.

Grey taps the clipboard. “Your charts would disagree, silly.”

She sets the materials aside to check the bandages on Wash’s neck. Tucker doesn’t miss the way she keeps her hands in the Freelancer’s line of sight as she reaches for him. How she waits several long moments for his eyes to focus on her before she touches him. Wash’s movements are stiff and his entire body tense as he turns his head, exposing his neck to Grey. Tucker’s sitting close enough to hear the way the man’s breathing hitches when her hands travel too close to the back of his neck.

“Well,” Grey chirps as she replaces the gauze. “Everything does appear in to be in order. Though, I would prefer to keep you under observation for the evening.”

Wash is already shaking his head. “I…I’m fine,” he struggles to form the words, dropping his head to his hands. “I just…back to my room…”

“Agent Washington, observation typically requires someone to do the observing.”

The Freelancer doesn’t look up, just runs his hands through his hair until it’s sticking every which direction. “Can’t be here,” Wash maintains.

Grey and Tucker share a look. The doctor leans down closer to Washington.

“Wash,” Grey prods, voice gentle, “you say you can’t be in the infirmary?”

Again, Wash shakes his head. His hands become fists in his hair as he mumbles.

“What was that, Wash?”

The Freelancer groans. “Ng…don’t. I don’t want to be here. It’s too…clean? Or-or…sharp? I don’…I don’ kno…” He trails off into unintelligible murmurs.

And just like that the room is suffocating under the weight everything unsaid: the reasons Wash can’t handle hospitals or hovering medical staff. But Tucker knows. And Grey knows. And Wash knows that they know.

“I’ll watch him,” Tucker says all at once because his mouth can outpace his brain any day of the week.

Grey’s eyes flick towards him. “I can have a chair brought in. Or a cot.”

“No, I mean,” Tucker drags a hand down his face and glances over at Wash who hasn’t moved from his hunched position. “He doesn’t need to stay here so long as someone’s watching him, right? We already share a room–he can go if I keep an eye on him, right?”

Grey flips through her notes. “Given this is one of Agent Washington’s less dramatic visits to my infirmary, I think that can be arranged.”

Tucker’s getting serious flashbacks to college. Or the idealized version of college he’s seen on TV, given being at war with an alien race throws a serious wrench in day to day life. It’s hard to enjoy beer pong and wet t-shirt contests with the threat of the planet being blasted out of the sky constantly hanging over your head.

So far, Tucker thinks, dealing with a heavily medicated person isn’t much different than dealing with a drunk one. Grey pulls him aside to discuss the details of watching Wash, most of which boil down to don’t let him do anything stupid. In this case, though, there’s more concern about him wandering into the training room and pushing himself until he punctures a fucking lung than there is about him falling asleep in public and getting dicks drawn on his face.

“That’s a high dose he’s on,” Grey tells Tucker as he shuffles out the door with a steadying grip on Wash’s arm. “He’ll fall asleep soon.”

The sim trooper nods. Wash is too fascinated by the light fixtures to add anything.

Just like putting a sleepy, drunk person to bed, Tucker thinks. Piece of cake.

The barracks are a lot farther from the infirmary than Tucker remembers. The fact that he’s basically dragging a jacked sack of potatoes doesn’t help.

Wash relaxes almost immediately after leaving the medical ward, which is a good thing because that means he’s no longer tensed to punch anyone who touches him without warning. Unfortunately, that also means Wash’s shaky grip on coherency is gone.

“’was the name…of–of the conste–constellation,” Wash slurs, waving his hand vaguely.

“Wash, we are inside and that is an exit sign.” Tucker grips the Freelancer’s waist and bicep, keeping Wash at his side even as the man lists back and forth. The halls are deserted, which is a blessing because that means they don’t have an audience. Wash would probably use Tucker as target practice for fucking grenades if anyone got a video of the Freelancer stoned out of his mind. But no onlookers also means no one to offer assistance. Tucker regrets not calling Caboose to carry the agent.

Wash flaps a hand that nearly swats Tucker across the face. “Bu’ ‘was it called.”

Tucker sucks in a breath through his nose and lets it out. “The exit.”

“Oh,” Wash says with genuine surprise. “tha–tha’s…neat…” He trails off and Tucker gets the distinct sense Wash doesn’t remember what he was even talking about.

“Super neat,” Tucker agrees, deadpan. “Come on, we’re close–”

Before Tucker can finish the thought, the Freelancer wobbles and Tucker finds himself dragged sideways.

“Shit, shit, shit, fuck, Wash!” Tucker’s heart catches in his throat as they stumble because the last thing Washington needs to another head injury. Wash collapses against the wall with his shoulder but stays standing. Tucker is immediately in front of him, tentative hands fluttering before Wash’s bowed head.

“Wash? Wash, what’s wrong?”

The Freelancer rolls his head up until he’s pressing his temple against the cool cement. He squints at Tucker accusingly. “Tell tha floor ta… quit moving.”

A laugh bubbles up Tucker’s throat in relief. He fights a smile. “I’ll get right on that. But first, you think you can walk to the room? We’re like two doors down the hall.”

“Yesss,” Wash says with all the authority he can muster, which isn’t much considering he’s slurring like he just downed the contents of an entire bar. “Ye…ah, I can walk.”

He straightens up, pushes off the wall, and topples head first into Tucker’s arms.

“Whoa, okay, shit,” Tucker wraps his arms around Wash’s chest, somehow managing to support the Freelancer sagging against him.

Wash mumbles something from where his face is buried in Tucker’s shoulder.

“Yeah, yeah, okay buddy,” Tucker murmurs back mindlessly against the man’s hair. “Here, Wash. Can you get your arm–like this?”

It’s slow going but Tucker gets Wash’s arm over one shoulder. The Freelancer’s head flops against his own shoulder, bleary gaze turned to Tucker.

“’orry,” the Freelancer sighs.

“Don’t worry about it. Grey’s got you on the good stuff. Heck, maybe even better stuff than she gave me that one time.”

Wash stares at the floor and doesn’t respond. Tucker feels his shirt tighten and looks over to find Wash fisting the material of his t-shirt where the man’s arm is slung over Tucker’s shoulder. A glance down reveals Wash’s other hand wound up in the edge of his shirt and it doesn’t look like he’ll be letting go anytime soon.

Wash murmurs indistinctly.

Tucker leans in closer. “What’d you say?”

“…don’t,” Wash lets his head droop. “Don’ wanta go ta infur-mary.”

“What–no, no, no, we’re not–Wash, look at me.” It takes several long seconds but Wash’s cloudy eyes find Tucker’s. “We are not going to the infirmary. We are going back to our room and going to bed. No infirmary. Okay? You hear me?”

Wash nods.

With a bit of prodding, Tucker gets Wash moving again. They’ve barely made it a dozen steps when,

“…ther’ yet?”

Tucker rolls his eyes. “Geez, everyone’s always rushing to get into bed with me.”

Wash lets out a wheeze and Tucker stops dead in his tracks, grip on the Freelancer tightening before it hits him that Wash is snickering. Actually snickering. It’s not a dry laugh. There’s no rolling eyes. He’s really laughing at Tucker’s joke.

Tucker’s face lights up.

“What, you don’t believe me?” Tucker scoffs. “I’m highly valued commodity. Or is it come-odity?”

Wash rolls back his head and laughs like Tucker’s weak pun is the funniest thing he’s ever heard, and Tucker almost walks straight into their door. A giggle of surprise escapes him as he stares wide-eyed at Wash. Wash looks over at him and starts laughing all over again. Just like that, they’re both cackling like idiots, laughter bouncing up and down the hallway.

As Tucker gasps for breath, he hears a door open.

“Do you cock bites know what time it is?”

The blue soldier looks up to find an unhappy Grif standing in a doorway just up the hall, arms folded across his chest.

Simmons’ head pops out behind him. “Grif, it’s only like 7 pm – Jesus, are you two okay?”

Tucker’s still got Wash slumped against him, and the Freelancer’s not doing a great job of supporting his own body weight. Wash’s head hangs as he wheezes around quiet giggles.

Tucker nods, voice still breathless. “Oh. Yeah, yeah. We’re fine.”

“M’lungs broke,” Wash says helpfully.

“No, Wash.” Tucker looks back to the Reds. “Broken ribs,” he explains, pawing for the doorknob.

Wash notices the two soldiers for the first time. He waves and gives them a grin so stupid Tucker wishes he had a camera. “Heeey.”

Simmons’ eyebrows edge towards his hairline, while Grif’s jaw drops.

“Is he drunk?” Grif gaps.

“Yes, pleas’,” slurs Wash, as he slumps further against Tucker.

“Nah,” Tucker grunts, trying to hip check the door. “Just high off his ass on painkillers.”

Tucker fumbles for the knob again, but it’s impossible to get the door open with the weight of a Freelancer pinning him to the door frame. Goddamnit, he doesn’t want to sit Wash down. The man’s so far gone it’s going to suck getting him back on his feet.

“Here, I got it.”

Tucker looks up to find Grif standing in front of him. Without waiting for a response, the orange soldier swings the door wide open for them.

“Oh,” Tucker blinks, “thanks–”

Suddenly, Simmons is there, ducking his head under Wash’s free arm and taking the literal weight off Tucker’s shoulders. With his help, Tucker hauls Wash inside.

“Which bed’s his?” Simmons asks.

Tucker kicks some laundry under the nearest bed, taking a tangle of unmade sheets with it. “You get three guesses.”

Simmons just huffs and heads for the neatly made cot in the corner of the room. There they carefully lower Wash to sit. The Freelancer wilts like a puppet with its strings cut.

Simmons stands back. Behind him, Tucker sees Grif leaning against the door. The maroon soldier rubs at his arm. “Do you guys need anything?”

Tucker glances back at Wash who’s staring at his shoes, doing a pretty good impression of a zombie.

“I think we’re okay,” Tucker tells them, scratching the back of his neck. “Uh, thanks.”

Simmons nods and Grif rolls his eyes. The reds leave, and Tucker thinks he hears the orange soldier make a comment about ‘how the tables have turned’ before the door closes.

Tucker turns his attention back to Wash and leans down toward him.

“You still with me?”

Wash starts, lifting his head and blinking. “Wha–what?” He manages to look alarmed even with his eyes drooping.

Tucker chuckles and waves a hand to get the Freelancer’s attention. “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he puts a light hand on Wash’s shoulder. “Just checking you were awake.”

“Awake,” Wash echoes, nodding. “I can stay ‘wake.”

“Not really the point of the happy drugs, but at least we can get you changed.”

Luckily, Wash is still coherent enough to lose the undersuit and put on some sweatpants and a t-shirt. Tucker keeps him upright and prods him along whenever he starts to stare off into space. Finally, Wash sinks onto the bed and flops back with a sigh.

Tucker snorts. “Sorry, dude, gotta check your bandages. Grey’s orders. In case you pulled something on the way here.”

Wash makes a disgruntled noise, digging the heels of his palms into his eyes. With a sigh, he tries to sit up. Tries being the optimal word. The Freelancer doesn’t even make it off the mattress. Smirking, Tucker sits down beside him, presses a hand to his back, and helps him the rest of the way.

“Alright, real quick,” Tucker reassures, lifting the hem of the man’s shirt to check the bandages wrapping around the side of his chest. He probably should have thought to do this when Wash had his shirt off, but too late now. Satisfied, Tucker moves on to the man’s neck and shoulder. He tugs gently at the collar of Wash’s shirt. “Okay, now, Wash, can you turn your–”

Before Tucker even finishes speaking, Wash tilts his head.

The teal soldier doesn’t move. He’s too awestruck at the sight of Wash freely exposing his neck to him without flinching, without even tensing.

Tucker realizes his mouth is hanging open. Snapping it shut, he swallows and tries to speak around the tight feeling in his chest. “Ah, y-yeah. Okay. Yeah, like that.”

The teal soldier checks the bandages with feather light touches, waiting for Wash to react to hands so close to his implants. Instead, when Tucker brushes his chest against the man’s shoulder, Wash leans into the contact. Tucker’s hands stutter.

“Who are you and what have you done with Wash?” Tucker mutters as he finishes with the bandages.

Wash looks up at him, blinking hard in a desperate attempt to keep his eyes open.

“What? Wha–I’m ‘wake.” He says a bit too quickly.

Tucker snorts with laughter. “Yeah, dude, that’s the problem. You should be sleeping this off.”

He’s not sure what compels him to do it, but Tucker tussles the Freelancer’s hair. He’s also not sure what he expects to happen, but he certainly didn’t expect Wash to press into his hand. Slumping further into Tucker, Wash drops his head, burying his face in Tucker’s shoulder.

The teal soldier goes stone still. For several long moments, there’s no sound but the brush of Wash’s breath against the fabric of Tucker’s shirt. Tucker swallows, hardly daring to breathe himself and break the spell.

Tucker’s long since grown used to giving Wash space in moments of weakness (hover just close enough to help if he asks, but he doesn’t). Wash pulls away from offered hands, help. Tucker hasn’t yet decided if the man’s trying to prove something or punishing himself. So, he’s entranced by the way Wash leans into him, openly drinking in the support in a way Tucker’s never seen.

What’s he supposed to do? Hug him? Or will feeling restrained freak him out? Tucker tests the waters, running a lagged hand through Wash’s hair. It earns him a sigh and, if it’s possible, Wash relaxes even further into him.

Dropping his head to the Freelancer’s ear, Tucker whispers, “Alright, Wash. We’re gonna lie down now, can you do that?”

The only response is an indistinct hum, but Wash goes obediently as Tucker guides him down.

Once there, Wash curls up, buries his face in a pillow and doesn’t move.

Tucker stands up and pulls at the blanket underneath the Freelancer. “Come on, buddy. Otherwise, you’ll be freezing your ass off later.”

Wash shifts a bit, though his movements are slow and uncoordinated. Tucker maneuvers the blanket out and spreads it over him. Wash remains boneless, his face still hidden in his pillow.

Tucker smiles to himself. Ready to settle into a few hours of Freelancer babysitting duty, he turns, reaching for a nearby desk chair.

There’s a tug of resistance as he takes a step away from the bed. Tucker looks back down to find Wash has flung an arm out from the bed and managed to hook Tucker’s belt loop, his aim accurate as ever despite his drugged-up state.

“Don’ leave,” the agent slurs, his half-lidded eyes peering out over the edge of the pillow.

Tucker puts on a smile and ignores the tightening in his chest. “I’m not leaving–I’m just getting a chair.”

Wash shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut tight.

“Don’ leave,” he says again, voice trailing off, “pleas…don’ leave.”

Heart in his throat, Tucker sits back down on the edge of the bed, beside Wash’s pillow.

“Wash,” he says, waiting until the Freelancer’s unfocused gaze is back on him before continuing, “I’m not leaving. I swear, I’m not leaving.”

Wash rolls his head, bumping his forehead lightly to Tucker’s hip.

“Warm,” Wash says.

Tucker raises an eyebrow. “What?”

“You’re warm.” It’s the most coherent he’s sounded in hours. “Don’ leave.”

This whole evening has been one big display of trust from Wash to him, so Tucker’s not exactly jumping to crawl into bed with the Freelancer drugged out of his mind–even with the most innocent intentions. So, he does what he does best: distracts with humor.

Tucker flashes a cheeky grin. “I know, right? I’m one hot piece of ass.”

And just like that, the stoic leader of blue team is giggling like a child. Fucking giggling.

“Oh, come on.” Tucker teases, giving the man a shove. “I am!”

Wash snickers behind a hand, smiling as he closes his eyes.

“Yeah.” He says. “I know.”

“It’s like, a scientifically proven fact–whatthefuck. Did you just agree with me?”

Eyes still closed, the Freelancer sighs as he presses back into the pillow.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Tucker says, leaning in closer. “You don’t get to drop shit like that then fall asleep on me. Wash, you fuck, get back here.”

Wash’s eyes flutter open and he lifts his head. “What? What? I’m here. I’m ‘wake.”

Tucker snorts. “Yeah, I believe you were just saying something about how hot I am?”

Wash curls a bit closer to where Tucker is seated on the edge of the bed.

“You’re warm,” he tells Tucker, closing his eyes again.

Tucker rolls his eyes. “So I hear.”

When Wash doesn’t respond for several long moments, Tucker goes to stand. And again, he’s tugged back by the agent, who this time has a fistful of the teal soldier’s t-shirt.

“Don’ leave,” he groans.

“Jesus, you’re clingy when you’re high. Alright, here.”

Tucker takes a seat at the head of the bed, reclining back against the metal railing (his back is going to hate him tomorrow). He stretches his legs out atop the blankets and scoots in as far as he dares. He’s teetering on the edge, doing his best to give the Freelancer a bit of personal space. Not that that’s an option on the tiny cot. Wash doesn’t seem to mind though. He leans into the sim trooper, apparently content to leech off the heat even with the layers of blankets between them.

“Happy now?” Tucker asks, looking down at the man. But Wash doesn’t answer, just nudges his head against the teal soldier’s side. Eyes closed and breathing even–Tucker doubts he even heard him, until,

“Yea…” the Freelancer breathes, so soft Tucker almost misses it. “’anks, Tuc-ker.”

The bars at the head of the bed dig into his spine and there’s nowhere to rest his head. But even with Wash finally sleeping soundly, Tucker doesn’t move to get up. Instead, he stares down at the top of the agent’s head where his hair is already sticking a thousand different directions. And with a hesitant hand, he runs his fingers through the mess of locks. He thinks he hears Wash’s breathing change, but he can’t be sure.

Tucker’s got several long hours ahead of him, but he isn’t thinking of that. He’s wondering about the morning. Wash likely won’t remember tonight. Tucker’s wondering if he should slip away before Wash wakes up, letting his friend continue unaware that the teal soldier knows just how deep the Freelancer’s trust in him runs. Or Tucker could stay, wait for Wash to open his eyes and for his shields to come back up.

And maybe, just maybe, those walls won’t be so high this time around.

[dorothyliker420]

huuhhoOh my GOD slrprfrsrfl(more lip licking noises)ooooh my GOd whoaoaohah. *huffing* a completeed chorus 2! HOLY SHIT oh my gohd

(silky made me this image as per request ily silky)

WELL HERE WE GO!!!!!!! A COMPLETED CHORUS CHAPTER 2!!!!!!!! CLOCKING IN AT 20,588 FUCKING WORDS AND 45 PAGES IN GOOGLE DOCS! lets see how many bs words I can add to that count am I right ladies

because of, I dont know, any italicization or bolding in the text itself was lost when I copy/pasted it to here so I guess the Experience isnt as Deep BUT ITS ALL GOOD ANYWAY because only I get to type in bold. thats how you know its me and not a rabble, but I also italicized lines that I really wanted to talk about

ill put all the Canon Real Text in an indent tho happy reading,

A Long Awaited Duet ---------------------------------***********************---------------------------------

The new canon is that in between those dashes is a really terrible swear word that the author censored with asterisks. only he knows it and he’ll unleash it when you criticize his fic

Pacing quickly around her room in a long, frustrated circle, Lisette’s worries were quickly drawing to a boiling point.

lisette’s circles make me long and frustrated am I right fellow dudes

Typically, she was a very easy-going person, the kind of girl who’d shrug off most concerns and instead focus on keeping a positive outlook. However, after spending her entire morning going through the motions, feeling trapped in a listless, uneasy funk, even she couldn’t help but be affected. It was almost noon already and still she couldn’t move her thoughts past yesterday’s tea party, to the look she’d seen weathered across Alto’s face.

Lisette is right to be threatened and uneasy. this is like the scene in the opening where the village is getting crystallized and its too late for rosa and shes like SAVE YOURSELF except instead its sexification

She hadn’t had the courage to say anything at the time, but it had haunted her thoughts ever since. Making it worse, when she’d attempted to find her mother to ask her for her advice, she hadn’t been able to find her anywhere, so she’d wound up simply spending the previous night with Marie.

the ghosts of the last chapter vaguely implying alto is too horney to sleep in the same bed as marie have returned and im frightened

“He’s… he’s still on edge, isn’t he?”

It wasn’t right. The fighting was over and peace had been won, but even when he should have been relaxing with his friends, Alto was still wearing the same guarded, strained expression. It was the same heart-breaking look she’d seen from her friend all throughout their battles, at all the times she’d stood at his die, watching him make the most difficult decisions of his life.

STOOD AT HIS DIE

She didn’t think any of the others had noticed. Perhaps she was the only one that would even be able to recognise the difference, after all, she was the only one who’d known him before all this. Back in Mithra he hadn’t been anything like that, he’d smiled freely and his gaze had was always carefree, to the point of being cheeky. Their entire lives had changed ever since she became a Witch and he followed to become her Knight… but she’d always hoped all this time that it could still return to how it was when everything was finally over.

“No,” she corrected herself, her body sagging with a deep sigh. There wasn’t any point lying to herself about this, “I’m not that naïve, I always knew it wouldn’t be that easy…”

“gee” said lisette out loud to herself with no one else around, “I am lisette from the video game stella glow. I am five foot four and my blood type is

Because, she knew Alto. And she knew, for him, that it had never been about the battles. He didn’t fear fighting, he would recklessly throw himself into danger without even a second’s thought if it meant he could help someone. As she’d told him so many times, his overwhelming compassion was both his best and worst trait. He was courageous to the point of stupidity, all he cared about was protecting the people important to him, keeping the people he loved safe and happy, as best he could. That was all the fighting had ever meant to him. And that was why she’d always known it couldn’t possibly be that easy for him.

im giving this alto analysis a 2 alto is a liberal degenerate who really loves hunting and also u dont know anything about him jl “AWOOOGAA” davenport if u tell me about him again ill kill you

Crying out in annoyance, Lisette slumped across the room and threw herself onto her bed, sinking deep into the large, soft mattress as if to try let it absorb a fraction of her worries.

I cannot shake the feeling he was thinkin bout her tiddies when he wrote this

‘Alto’s still fighting, even now,’ she knew that. It was a truth she’d struggled to deal with for days now, ‘The war isn’t over for him yet, because he’s still pushing himself to try find a way to keep every one of us happy.’

fuckin dumb ass horny ass bitch. mediocre ass, pathetic ass, money grubbing, fucking stupid bitch ass you dont put apostrophes around thoughts its ugly as shit

It was a painful thought, the elephant in the room and something she hated thinking about. But somehow, not thinking about it, pretending to simply ignore had become even worse.

does lisette know what an elephant is. does that expression exist. this is third person limited so its kind of weird to use that kind of anachronism

After all, if Alto was still fighting, then she wanted to fight alongside him! She was his family, his comrade, his first Witch and even his (prospective) girlfriend,

I had to cut this off because it was next level dumbshit literally anyone is his prospective girlfriend with that state of their relationship. im his prospective girlfriend 

there wasn’t a single part of her that wanted to do anything less than to support him with all her might. He was a part of her soul. He was the man she loved and someone who she would never allow herself to be separated from, she’d known those feelings for absolute certainty ever since the moment she’d woken up from death’s door and travelled around the world to stand at his side. Just thinking about him wracking himself with worries and her not helping him was terrifying!

1. 

2. that last sentence is the worst written thing in, if not human existence, then the century

And, she spared a glance over at the mirror she’d been avoiding looking at all day, even aside from that, could she really say she was any different? Was she truly able to smile like before, only because their fighting was over?

hackles raised at the prospect of mirror kink

Lisette gave a dry laugh, reaching out and squeezing the small stuffed pig Popo had given her, pressing it against her considerable chest. 

1. the pig is kinda cute like maybe but who tf is vending these smutfic items. who is crawling around in the back alleys selling cursed objects that make people horny as fuck. did ewan make a deal with the devil to sell all his twilight-zone-monkey-paw shit from his brief sponsorship with baddragon

2. die

3. lisette’s chest is CONSIDERABLE all right. it makes me CONSIDER ending it all

For all their outward appearances, in this, at least, she doubted it was any different from any of the others, no doubt that was why everything had seemed so off lately, “We’re all just stuck in limbo, aren’t we?”

this is the longest string of indirect pronouns ever like whomst??? and what an eerie sentence to end a section on. though u kno what stay in limbo

---------------------------------***********************---------------------------------

those dashes are containing the massive power of the cuss word. if even one of them falters or breaks formation the sheer obscenity would vaporize us all

Unfortunately for Lisette, her self-examination came with no easy answers or steps forward. Even though she’d accepted that being stuck in place as they were was only making things worse for all of them and particularly for Alto, there was no obvious solution she could latch onto, to change things.

this literally picks up? exactly where the previous section ended? like. with information that flows from the previous paragraph. if youre going to make that fucking big then why is it functionally useless

However, now more than ever, she was a determined woman and slowly -as the time passed and the morning faded away into early afternoon- slowly, her resolve held out and she was able to fearlessly consider even the truths she’d previously tried so hard to avoid.

why is this the ugliest formatting ive ever seen have you ever heard of an em dash or, a comma. also im losing shit at Determination Resolve Holding Out Shes Never Done This wasnt this like the sole bad point of her tunings

She knew she loved Alto, that he was the only man who’d ever made her feel complete 

But, she also knew that the other Witches felt just the same, she forced herself to accept the fact that he was just as important to them as he was to her.

ok nvm im not done being pissed at The Only Man like yeah lisette its called comphet im rewriting this so that lisette realizes shes a lesbian and also that whole Complete Her thing is all of whats wrong with lisettes arc like all of it this is what men do

It was something they’d all consciously avoided discussing, something that none of them seemed to know how to deal with. Her companions, the other Witches, were all as close as family to her, she loved them all dearly… And yet, they were all competing, in their own way, for the same man.

alto is three years old

She was sure they must feel just as awkward about that as her, there was a reason why even the ever impulsive Popo or the harsh-blunt Sakuya 

tell u whats harshing my blunt........this fic ((takes a weed puff

had never said anything and why, no matter how much they talked and how much they shared, this single topic was never once addressed directly, they’d all been working on the same process as her- that it was too strange a situation and too difficult a conversation to deal with, that the best thing to do was simply wait till after the war when Alto would be able to reciprocate their feelings, and then there the problem would solve itself. Well… The war was over. And they were all still tiptoeing around each other’s hearts, all waiting for the same response from the same man. “We must all seem so silly.”

tf were they supposed to do to address it? like lets just accept the gross situation but was they supposed to so call everyone to a room lisette spins around in a big chair and says We’re Here To Discuss The Het or maybe this happens

She could just imagine how ridiculous this situation must appear from the outside; five best friends all in love with the same man, all waiting for him to respond to their feelings and all marooned in the same silent stand-off, walking on eggshells while pretending everything was fine. No doubt her mother found it hilarious.

thats the worst line ive ever seen in my life. oedipus rex has nothing on this bitch

that aside like accepting them all as comphets for the moment. literally never interacted on a regular basis with another boy their age. except hilda I guess but it doesnt matter this is so dumb! yall is a bunch of trauma victims you cant just jump directly into the boinking

“Grrr! This is all your fault Alto! Stupid! Since when did you get so popular anyway!? You weren’t like that in Mithra! You’re just… you’re just too dependable… You mean so much to all of us, we can’t help but love you…”

deadass u told me this was dialogue from the anime where the tiddies bounced when the girl blinked? id believe it

He was their conductor. They all loved him. They all wanted to be with him. They were all waiting for him to favour only them…

dont like how its treated that its an absolute that witches will just fall for their conductor thats like sayin no one is safe around bi ppl. reach perhaps but its the same dumbass ideas

Perhaps that was the worst part of all. The more she thought about it, the more she was starting to realise just what an impossible situation their feelings and expectations had put Alto into. She knew better than anyone just how much he cared for each of them, she’d healed the scars on his body time and again that showed just how far he’d go to protect any of them… And yet, without ever really thinking how, they were all still asking him to then choose between them, to decide which of his Witches he loved the most.

but also I just had the revelation that author does not know what romantic love is like, at all, and the smoke cleared I am enlightened and theres nothing I dont understand

And, she couldn’t help him at all, could barely even support him in what must be an incredibly painful choice for him. All she could do was leave it to him, and trust that when he did choose, that he felt the same way about her as she did about him and they would finally be together. As for the rest… She didn’t know… The thought of him choosing one of the others over her was almost too painful, to terrifying to consider, but the knowledge that her friends would have to go through that was no less terrible…

tired of u demonizing r*mantic love. fuck its th most exhilarating experience of my life. that and having a baby shark sit in my hands. dont give all these Oh No People Get Hurt to justify just fuckin whoever u want

That was the mire they were all stuck in. That was why Alto was still looking so stressed and why none of them had been able to move forwards. There wasn’t anything any of them could do and there was no way to make everyone happy. She frowned bitterly. ‘…Would… Would it even make us happy?’

me, who had never been as happy as I am prior to being in love: hell yeah bitch dis go hard as hell flocka

It was a strange thing to consider, something she’d never once thought before this very moment- she’d thought for so long she was waiting for Alto to return her feelings, she’d wanted so long to be with him and to be together forever. But, would she really be happy like that? Could she truly be happy being with the man she loved at the expense of watching the companions she held dear, the friends she’d bled and cried together with, becoming heartbroken? Mordi, Popo, Sakuya, and especially Hilda, after all they’d been through, after how important she knew Alto was to each of them… Her heart clenched in her chest just imagining it!

if this is a question then ur not in romantic love idiot! shut up

But… That was how it had to be, wasn’t it? They’d all been foolish enough to fall for the same man, there was only one Alto. No.

dumps the big ass mess of gl***ng pr**e poly edits here but im not saving it to my computer so u gotta imagine it

Lisette propped herself up on the bed, a previously unfathomable conclusion quickly becoming clear to her. No. She couldn’t accept that. And Alto surely wouldn’t accept that. He’d never accepted that they couldn’t stop the Eclipse. He hadn’t accepted that they couldn’t fight against God. And, at the end of everything, he’d refused to accept that Mother Qualia had to be their enemy. A solution that put the entire burden on Alto and led to all her friends being heartbroken? How could she ever accept that!? How could she ever have thought something like that would make her happy!? That wasn’t how they worked! They were the Tuning Knights, humans that had defeated God and saved Marie! They would never accept such a lukewarm compromise.

fucking................mormons..................................

‘Well now,’ she laughed, ‘If I really think about it, the solution is pretty obvious, isn’t it?’ It was reckless and crazy, nothing at all like anything she’d ever imagined herself doing… But then, didn’t that just make it the same as everything else they’d done?

this isnt even how polyamory works!!!!!!!! sorry im not being funny I just really value r*mant*c love and listen NO ONE would just sit down and think “yes clearly the healthiest thing for the person my heart is devoted to is to juggle 6 relationships”

“Yup! I’m not gonna accept anything like that!” ultimately, all that mattered was the same conclusion she’d come to, ever since she’d returned to life. She already knew what she wanted, she just had to make it happen, “Alto, I’m by your side. Always. I’ll support you!”

hi im lisette and this is my boyfriend alto! we’re queering heterosexuality by having him fuck a ton of girls at once! swipe right if you want to hop on that dick. no gays allowed

---------------------------------***********************---------------------------------

me: this is bad content

jldavenport: h*mg*n*n*l*b*ng*s*gl*m

me: vaporized in silhouette against the wall from the sheer power

Finishing off a long day of meetings, reports and training, clad in his usual attire (sans the armour,

oh shit its sans thearmour!!!! gonna have a bad time that being said makes sense that hes european the gross fuck

thankfully for him) and returning from the dormitory baths with a relieved sigh, Alto scarcely had time to close the door to his room behind him before he was suddenly jolted from his thoughts by an excited knocking. “Eh? Lisette?”

the phrase “dormitory baths” pisses me the fuck off where do you get off jldavenport. probably all over your keyboard but stop saying shit like that this isnt your canon bitch

A late-night visit from his orange haired friend wasn’t especially unusual, but to see her standing around in her Witches outfit 

epithets, especially those that refer to hair color, are awful and amateurish but because he still doesnt know this apparently: Redhead. Is. A. Fucking. Word. 

in her Witches outfit

that wasnt good enough to warrant that large of an image but like that movie fucked me up so bad lets see what scars me worse the mouse scene or this fic

at this time of night certainly was. And even stranger than that, she was wearing the original outfit, the one she’d worn since the first time she’d awakened to her powers in Mithra, rather than the more dazzling Goddess robes she’d gained after he’d finally tuned her heart, ‘I suppose it’s probably easier to sit around in this one?’ If he had to wear something as flashy as any of the dresses the girls wore, he was sure he’d spent half his time worrying about ripping it.

honestly content notwithstanding this reads like an instructional on what NOT to do when writing. you write like this? dont. its very entry level like I cant say that I necessarily write better but do what I say not what I do

throwing the goddess thing out there is like him saying LOOK!!!! A FACT i KNOW ABOUT THE ACTUAL CANON!!!!!! HAHA

Despite standing staring at him from the hallway, with her face flushed and eyes not quite meeting his, she still hadn’t said anything, “Er, Lisette? Is something wrong?”

knocking on someones door and forgetting why ur there is a neurodivergent feel lisette has adhd now and theres nothing you can do about it

“Ah!” she jumped before finally shaking herself off and responding with a slight anxiousness, anxiety. see me after class “No, no not really. I just… I’ve had a lot of mind and I thought it’d be better if we could talk a bit? Do… Do you mind if we spend the night together, again?”

lisette u were literally talking to urself five minutes ago abt havin him fuck everyone and now ur all anime blushus. bitch

He swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. She wanted to share his bed again? Spend the night holding hands like back then? Stopping himself short of giving her an answer, Alto suddenly realised just how imploringly she was looking up at him.

they literally used this exact Mouth Suddenly Dry thing last chapter do ppl who enjoy this fic actually like that r smthn. they get wet 4 the dry

“Huh, it’s not like you to actually ask…” He teased softly. Usually Lisette was far more insistent about this sort of thing, he’d normally expect her to simply march into his room and seat herself on his bed. He only realised as she spoke that for her to act like this, for whatever reason she was acting like this, it must be important to her that he did accept her request 

ugly sentence. ugly, ugly sentence. ew. im actually so bored by this sentence im ceasing work on this for the night good bye

She didn’t want to force it on him. Still… He couldn’t help but hesitate. It was stupid, he knew, but he’d felt awkward spending time alone with any of the girls since after the war, lest any of them get the wrong idea.

“get the wrong idea” DONT FUCKING WRITE ALTO LIKE THIS I AM IMMORTAL MY SKIN IS ADAMANTINE YOU SHALL FALL BEFORE ME

A moment passed and still Lisette didn’t say anything; clenching her hands nervously below her wait -and unintentionally pushing her impressive bust out even further towards him- 

the commissioner, apparently upon seeing stella glow:

she silently awaited his response. Blushing a little under her low gaze, Alto realised it was getting harder and harder to remember the days when he’d seen her just like a sister.

this proves its inhuman and disgusting because it gave me visceral flashbacks to fire emblem fates so lemme post some of my fave incest quotes from that, starting with the ones it made me astral project into

2.

did that last one haunt u because for a split second you imagined a world where lisette said them? good bc that shit keeps me up at night. im tired of cropping these quotes out so like we’re done my point has been made

In the end though, he couldn’t possibly deny her. Not for no reason, and not when she looked at him like that, “Yeah, of course Lisette. That sounds fun.”

the begging thing from the last chapter hit me full force in memory and I honestly hope it comes back bc ive got a dynamite joke locked and loaded

Breaking out into a bright smile, the Water Witch sagged in relief, taking him by surprise as she reached out to take his hand in hers, letting her body fall soft and warm against him as she did so. Her breath tickled hot across his collar and Alto’s heart jumped in shock!

DONT EVER USE EXCLAMATION POINTS LIKE THIS im serious. it is about as ugly, 2007-fanfic-net-core you can get. 

Her hands felt smooth and gentle, wrapped warm around his… 

HIS WHAT

he’d felt that before, it was pleasant, although not anything new. But feeling her head falling lovingly to his shoulder like this and having her entire body now laying against his… His mouth went dry, 

Wet 4 The Dry Confirmed

he could even feel her breasts pushing large and heavy against his own chest! ‘Woah… S-So soft… They’re even bigger than Rosa’s, aren’t they?’

can you believe this was written completely unironically? like, people find this hot? if it didnt deplete the experience of reading this fic id replace every line referencing boobs with a comment from nicki minaj’s instagram

For just a split second, no matter how much of a gentleman he was, standing there like that, it was impossible for him not to compare the mother and daughter.

WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY SON

“Li-Lisette?” he choked out, desperately reigning in his thoughts before they rampaged down a dangerous direction. “Mmm, Alto, hehe, I’m glad,” she giggled happily, skipping back and beaming up at him as she tugged on his hands, leading him off, “Even just being like this with you, I feel better already!”

ok I have NO idea what movement theyre doing. shes like, skipping and then she comes back and takes his hands and idk probably his dick or something

Absolutely caught up in her rhythm, they were halfway down the hall before Alto finally realised she’d pulled him completely out of his room!

heres a coded message just for katt: e*****t w** d****** **m!the narration means he was aware she was pulling him so like where the fuck did he think he was going if not outside his room

“Uh, h-hey, Lisette? We’re going somewhere? I thought you wanted to go to sleep?” “That’s right,” she nodded simply, giving up and tugging him and instead falling into step beside him, “But your bed’s too small for it to be comfortable, so we’re gonna use my room instead!” Alto almost dug his heels in from sheer indignation! 

im sorry. im sorry I had to cut this up but come on. come the fuck on. indignation. like she made a point and alto is all “insolent female requesting things of me” have you not met alto. authot is from r/incels

She’d come all this way to see him, just to drag him back to her room!? How self-indulgent could she be!? And, it wasn’t as if his bed back in Mithra had been any larger and she’d never complained before. Eventually, he just sighed and followed her lead, it wasn’t worth getting worked up over. If it would make her happier, then that was fine. It might be nice to spend a night in someone else’s room for a change too.

Walking hand in hand through the halls like this was fairly embarrassing, thankfully it seemed that it was late enough that no-one else was around. He really, really didn’t want to suddenly run into Rusty like this, let alone Giselle, or Sakuya… Supressing a shudder, Alto hurried on.

“let alone giselle” wh???? I am so baffled by this. obviously rusty or sakuya would give him shit but whats giselle gonna do??? is alto being bullied by a robot?????? I want giselle to appear and smash alto’s frosting into the ground

“I won’t hesitate, bitch,” said Giselle, pointing her laser at altos dick and shattering it into one million individual pieces

Unlike the tiny spare room he’d been assigned so long ago now, Lisette, as a Witch, had been housed in the premium quarters on the other side of their dormitory. 

stop. stop saying dormitory. this is not a college

Luckily in this case, unlike the Palace, the building wasn’t overly large so it was only a short trip to her room. They arrived a few minutes later, just as his heart was beginning to settle down.

…

what happened to the long ass aterisks break. oh god the swear word is coming isnt it

Unfortunately, the moment Lisette opened the door and they stepped inside, Alto’s breath was one again caught violently in his throat, “H-Hilda!?” And indeed, kneeling serenely atop a small cushion in the middle of the large room, the Time Witch was sipping calmly from her usual green ceramic tea-cup, as if there was nothing strange about her presence here at all.

I dont like how shes sitting on a pillow in the center of the room that sounds ritualisitic

(bangs pink cup on the ground) She Sits On The Sacrificial Fuck Pillow ((group of hooded figures behind me start chanting “Fuck Pillow! Fuck Pillow!”

Watching as she settled the drink aside, perfectly in synch with the sound of Lisette locking the door behind her, Alto’s mouth went dry.

theres so much wrong with the syntax and shit but im pushing that all aside to say how fucking difficult it is to sync sound like that even on purpose so yeah theyre def doing a cult sacrifice to the original sex god, elcrest

A moment of silence reigned and somewhere in the back of his currently panicking mind, the bewildered Conductor couldn’t help but notice that Hilda too was wearing her standard Witches’ outfit, the same form fitting black dress 

“dress” very generous for mr boob grower

and wide sweeping hat she’d become associated with for so many years. However, in her case, this wasn’t much of a surprise. As far as he’d seen from the White-Haired woman, she didn’t seem to actually own any normal, casual attire and, while he knew she deeply adored he beautiful white dress she’d unlocked when he’d purified her lonely heart, he also knew that even she couldn’t help but feel rather self-conscious, wearing something that was practically a wedding dress as an everyday outfit, he hadn’t seen Hilda’s Goddess Robes since the end of the final battle.

I literally cannot read any part of this paragraph except the capitalization of White-Haired and Goddess Robes this was either written in the 1700s or modern day by me dissociating in a target bathroom this is so funny if the fic gets any funnier ill die

“Alto? I’m surprised. Isn’t it a bit late for you to be visiting a woman’s bedroom?”

horny dont got business hours babe

“Ah, H-Hilda! It’s, it’s not what you’re thinking, I, Lisette!? Wha-” “Relax Alto,” the Water Witch giggled softly as she stepped forward, taking his hand again, but this time wrapping herself around his arm, “She’s just teasing you.” “Wha… Abuh?”

this is harem anime/fire emblem dialogue right down to the “Abuh?” actually thats the defining thing you hear someone say that youre in a straight anime and you need to run for your fucking life

“My apologies,” Hilda nodded, offering him a small smile in recompense as she matched Lisette’s movements, taking hold of his other hand, her pale face burning bright red as her soft fingers entwined with his, “I just, got a little flustered seeing you so suddenly… I… I wasn’t sure what to say.”

ok first of all you cannot write hilda in any realm of possibility but also like this is yet another thing to not trust men for: emphasizing the whiteness of a womans skin. he is a racist, plain and simple

Her hand squeezed nervously around his and Alto realised just how easily he could feel her racing heart through the light fabric of her dress when she pulled his arm against herself. Not that Lisette was any different, he couldn’t possibly believe in the confidant front she was showing after knowing her as long as he had, not when he could feel her entire body trembling against him.

hilda is like two ft tall howd she even reach his arm. also like there isnt even any fabric boy u raw touchin her 

His mouth opened and closed, but he couldn’t think what to say, he wasn’t mentally prepared for any of this! He’d gone from expecting to go to sleep, to being visited by Lisette, to being dragged through the halls, and now he was being sprung with some surprise meeting!? And both of them were clinging to him like never before! 

this is in character alto not wanting to have a threesome so he can go nap

He couldn’t possibly keep up. Before he even realised it, he’d been pulled all the way over to Lisette’s bed and was sitting with a girl wrapped around either of his arms.

what a problem! what a terrible day for him! what are the odds of this happening!

“What… What’s going on?” “Something good.” Hilda answered in her own cryptic fashion, her voice almost breathless and her blazing red cheeks half hidden behind his cloak as she shyly slid in right next to him.

it is most certainly not good ma’am

“That’s right,” Lisette agreed, happily snuggling up against him as she squeezed herself around his other arm, “We’re gonna help you come to a decision!”

we’re gonna make u C*M...............to a decision ;)

Alto blinked, “Eh?”

petition for this to turn out like the friends episode where ross got kicked out of a threesome with his wife and another woman bc they were lesbians so he left and made a sandwich

conveniently the fic decides to break here anyway so thats all you get for now. I’ll finish the other parts later (im expecting like maybe five because of the gargantuan size of this travesty) and link them direct from here 

Part 2 here! (coming soon)

[reminiscent-bells]

best-ofs, 2017

putting in a break here, this is real long

best book I read: The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood

It seems trite to pick this in a year where every Tom, Dick, and Harry was comparing the Trump administration to Atwood’s novel and when Amazon was putting on a big-budget adaptation (which, for the record, I have not seen). The effect that this had on me, though, cannot be understated. Sad, wry, and all-too-familiar in places, this is a masterpiece that deserves to be up there with 1984 and the rest of the great nightmares.

honorable mention: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, David Mitchell

I’m not much of a historical fiction person, but this masterfully wrought story of a Dutch clerk and a Japanese midwife in early-1800s Japan is well worth your time.

best comic: Batman, Volume 1: I Am Gotham, Tom King, Mikel Janin, et al.

King and his collaborators’ work on Batman since DC’s most recent relaunch seems to be on a trajectory to match or even surpass the Grant Morrison era in the pre-New 52 era, a reshuffling of the core cast that will pay huge dividends down the line (if DC actually makes a wise long-term decision for once, which, who knows). Despite his tendency to learn a little too hard on certain stylistic tics, I think King might be the best writer working in superhero comics today.

honorable mention: Detective Comics, Volume 1: Rise of the Batmen, James Tynion IV, Eddy Barrows, et al.

Yes, two Batman titles in one year is a bit of a cheat, but this is so fun that it’s hard to pick something else. Tynion turned up on a panel discussion on the great comics podcast Jay and Miles X-Plain the X-Men where he was introduced as the writer of “DC’s new X-Men title, Detective Comics”, which is exactly what this is - a team of misfits and outcasts cobbled together by a reticent, demanding mentor...who in this case is Batman. This is easy to miss out on with all the fireworks over King’s work, but give it a shot.

best comic (non-2017): MIND MGMT, Volume 2: The Futurist, Matt Kindt

Kindt’s work on the beginning of his psychic-X-Files saga MIND MGMT was good, but the second collection reveals it as a ship-in-a-bottle in the middle of a much weirder, wilder museum - there are few volume 2s that build on the success of the first as much as this one does.

honorable mention: BPRD, Volume 3: Plague of Frogs, Mike Mignola, Guy Davis, et al.

The first few collections of this series, following Hellboy’s teammates after he quits the secret BPRD organization, kind of flounder, but Davis and Mignola really hit their stride here with this sequel to an earlier Hellboy story that grows into a hybridization of Mignola’s earlier work and a Stephen King novel.

best movie: Blade Runner 2049

This also feels like kind of a cheat given my love for the original, but there was simply no other movie that had my gears turning after I walked out of the theater like this one did. The plot elements of this, of course, have been speculated on endlessly since Ridley Scott released the Final Cut of the original film, but My Guy Dennis Villeneuve manages to introduce enough new elements and uncertainty in the mix to keep you guessing - I found myself continually questioning what I really knew about anything that had happened or was happening. It was always going to be impossible to make a movie as good as Blade Runner, but Villeneuve came closer than anyone could dare.

honorable mention: Star Wars: The Last Jedi

I have my misgivings about the Finn and Poe portions of this, which feel like they mishandled the two more than a little, but the Rey/Luke Skywalker storyline is, as a whole, a barn-burner, building on both Rey and Luke’s characters in extremely satisfying ways. It was easy to imagine where they might go from Rey and Luke on the island at the end of The Force Awakens, but I don’t know if I imagined they’d go here, which is what makes this so great.

best album: I See You, The xx

I gave this a pretty casual listen on Spotify when it came out as I was kind of a marginal xx fan - I enjoyed their first album but didn’t really care for Coexist. I was totally blown away and listened to it all the way through several times (this is something I rarely, if ever, do with big pop/pop-ish releases). Virtually every track on here except for the extremely forgettable closer is perfectly performed and produced, from the playful, somewhat taunting “Dangerous” to the self-doubt-as-anthem “On Hold”. Should go down as their best album to date.

honorable mentions: Piety of Ashes, The Flashbulb / Sleep Well, Beast, The National

I couldn’t decide between these two, so here’s a twofer for you. Benn Jordan’s style as The Flashbulb has shifted along a spectrum of sweet spots between acoustic music and electronic music, and he seems to have somehow found the sweetest one yet in Piety of Ashes, which alternates between intimate material you might have expected on Arboreal or Love as a Dark Hallway (”Starlight”, “Goodbye Bastion”) and big, broad electronic pieces that feel like Jordan uncovered something he could always do that was just off-camera (”Hypothesis”, “As Water”).

When I first heard Sleep Well, Beast my comment to a coworker was “I only like some of it now, but I think I’ll like it more as time goes on”. This was a rare example of me actually showing some predictive ability, because this has really grown on me with time (maybe its intent as commentary on life in the Trump world as something to do with this). Highlights are the sad, sweet “Nobody Else Will Be There”, also-sad-and-sweet, but in a different way “Carin at the Liquor Store”, and the driving dark heart of the entire thing, “The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness”, which has been a constant play for me this fall/winter.

best TV show: Twin Peaks/Twin Peaks: The Return

A triumph for David Lynch and Mark Frost in every sense of the word. The era of “prestige TV” feels like a cheap trick by HBO, AMC, et al. to get us to watch the same old stuff with a slightly higher budget after 18 hours(!!!!!) in, around, and beyond (and I mean beyond) Lynch’s little town in the Pacific Northwest. Kyle MacLachlan deserves about 400 awards for his triple (quadruple?) role here.

honorable mention: Mr. Robot

I think Sam Esmail failed to stick the landing again (I wasn’t a fan of season 2), but the earlier parts of this season are maybe the highest highs the show has ever hit - Elliott and Mr. Robot fighting over his body in the bowels of the ECorp fortress from the end of season 2, Darlene struggling to extricate herself from the FBI, and the terrifying-yet-awe-inspiring scene of Angela laying out her plans to Mr. Robot as New York comes back to life at the end of the first episode. This isn’t always the best show, but boy, can it ever be good.

best video game: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

This is to video games as Lynch’s third season of Twin Peaks was to television: a throwing of the gauntlet to every competitor to dare and match this. Where other games would put physics puzzles in their own little sandboxes, BOTW applies its physics to just about everything and lets you see how far your tools can take you. Where other games would put everything on the map in perfectly zoomable, filterable control for you, BOTW challenges you to build the map yourself and actually get out there and explore. I’ve gone back to this in the harder Master Mode with the release of the last DLC, and there’s still nothing that can touch this. This is destined to be a touchstone for decades to come.

honorable mentions: The Talos Principle/Batman: The Telltale Series

The Talos Principle is everything I wanted The Witness to be that The Witness wasn’t: thoughtful without being heavy, clever without being impossible (well, mostly not impossible, there are a few of those puzzles I don’t think I could have cracked on my own). The writing is sharp as a tack, featuring a variety of philosophical discussions between your character and a whip-smart AI. A really excellent puzzler.

Batman: The Telltale Series marks yet another appearance of the Batman on this list, but what an appearance! Telltale throws out several sacred cows of the Batman behemoth, but instead of making something malformed and uninteresting, it feels like the freshest Batman has been in ages. I eagerly await every new episode of this, because I never know where they will go next.

best podcast: Important If True

This is yet another “feels like I cheated” entry, but the Idle Thumbs guys’ work on Important If True deserves to be recognized. They could have simply recycled the Robot News segments from Idle Thumbs for this, but instead they went for something much wilder, taking people’s advice on what wishes to ask for from a genie, going through breakdown procedures for old Chuck E. Cheese competitor restaurants, and speculating on a Jessica Fletcher vs. Jaws matchup (as in the shark). The most wildly funny podcast going now. Recommended episodes: “Fight Garbage With Garbage”, “Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins”, “A Wish Upon a Star”

honorable mention: Waypoint Radio

With the Idle Thumbs guys winding down to a monthly schedule (sorta), Vice’s Waypoint staff’s podcast has readily stepped into the hole left behind by the Thumbs for regular doses of industry coverage. It’s great to see Danielle Riendeau and Rob Zacny getting more exposure outside of the Thumbs ecosystem, and Austin Walker, Patrick Klepek, and Danika Harrod are this sort of perfect perpetual motion machine at the heart of everything. Recommended episodes: “The Orange Casket”, “R.I.P. A.I.M.”, “Someone Explain To Me The Alien Alloys Before I F'ing Explode”

[jennyquill]

some kara/lena headcannons + ramblings

ok this is just for me and for funsies ive got a lot of thoughts and not a lot of people to share them with but we might as well start somewhere. 

it’s really long fam

Who’s the cuddler: definitely both? kara really likes closeness in general and lena is an absolute sucker for cuddles and + homegirl’s probs really touched starved too so they probably have major cuddling sessions where nothing really happens they just want to be as close as possible to each other. i’ve also seen some headcannons where kara’s basically a human furnace and i can see lena getting *lovingly* frustrated at her girlfriend’s ridiculous body heat but also consider: lena luthor being a cuddle slut and absolutely adoring kara’s eternal warmth

Who’s the big spoon/little spoon: kara likes to default to big spoon but doesn’t mind when lena takes the reigns. they’re probably switch in this.

Fav. non sexual activity: this is a huge fanon thing and i totally am on the bandwagon for it: lazy sundays. just. an entire day where sluggish, hedonistic desires are met and they close themselves off to the world um yes pls this is very kara/lena. also music. i like the idea of them being well-read in the music world and just going to concerts ranging from mahler to andrew bird to nicki minaj and selena gomez and probably some other hipster bands. sharing each other’s spotify’s and sending each other youtube links of cool obscure bands they find. kara discovering someone’s bandcamp and lena anonymously donating to their page. lena loving the opera and introducing kara to verdi. lena having a guilty pleasure for 21 pilots or smth and kara being ???? ok let’s jam. i just really! love! music! and! kara/lena!! (omg kara teaching lena advanced music theory??? maybe lena was semi trained in her youth but never really went past building chords and one afternoon kara just takes her aside and teaches her part writing and its weird ass rules and lena catching on in an instant bc all music theory is an extension of math and logic. them writing songs together im???)

Who uses all the hot water: KARA her apartment may be big and spacious but that don’t mean her water heater is up to date

Most trivial thing they fight over: shoes. they’re like, a half shoe size a part even though lena’s smaller and maybe with certain styles kara can fit in some of lena’s nice loafers or lena lowkey uses this one specific pair of black heels of kara’s and this leads to the pettiest arguments of “those are my shoes and today is my day no you cannot wear them.” also kara accidentally putting things in hard to reach places bc she’s still getting used to living with someone who can’t just fly up to get the pans on top of the fridge.

Who does the most cleaning: they’re both pretty good at keeping things neat. lena’s not used to kara’s ‘throw this here and pick it up later’ system but they work things out. lena’s also really bad at keeping track of how fast her messes pile up and even though she always cleans after herself sometimes kara comes home and there’s just trails of paper and books and like five computers running and she’s like babe ur home office took over the house. also what’s that saying that really intelligent people are the messiest or smth? smth like “an empty desk is an empty brain” idk. i’m just thinking that even though lena presents herself nicely and clearly has a grip on herself just think about her home office being a small battlefield of stacks and files and prototypes. also lena with a messy closet is pretty believable like she may know how to match her clothes but that doesn’t necessarily mean her closet is in pristine condition idk i present to you: kara, organized closet by color and design and lena, these are my yoga pants and they’re hanging next to my 200$ suit

Who controls Netflix queue: kara is queen of netflix and all things to watch. lena doesn’t know how she manages to afford netflix and amazon prime at the same time but then again she also doesn’t know how kara affords her apartment in the first place.

Who calls the landlord when the heat doesn’t work: lena gets it done faster; kara doesn’t even notice the temperature has dropped 20 degrees until lena puts on her winter coat

Who leaves their stuff around: kara’s constantly dropping her clothes in the most random places bc supergirl reasons. lena finds her tights and button up in the bathroom at the beginning of the week and by the end of the week she’s found her shoes in the potted plant, her pants on the kitchen island, and various shirts smashed between things ranging from the stereo set to the fridge. lena’s one of those people who can always remember where they’ve left their stuff even if they’ve left it in a maze

Who remembers to buy the milk: kara’s shopping lists aren’t always practical but she does remember to buy the milk

Who remembers anniversaries: both. at the start of their relationship ena’s afraid to make it a big deal bc fear of rejection and commitment but kara rubs those fears away by being the most supportive girlfriend. also kara having her own reservations about commitment. kara knowing that relationships ask a lot out of people, that both have to work to make it happen. kara trying, despite her previous relationships to go forward and build something strong for lena and her. kara forging on, ignoring the demon in her head telling her that she can’t have it all, that she’ll never be able to find balance, that no one will truly take her for who she is. lena recognizing and soothing these fears, destroying these fears by staying steadfastly by kara’s side and saying fuck it and falling hard and fast for the girl of steel. lena being a dramatic gay and showering kara with expensive gifts and bringing her as her date to exclusive parties. kara bringing lena gifts from the sea and pretty rocks from mountains that humans can’t climb, kara finding the quiet corners of the world and bringing lena there and they build their world from each other’s strength and their secrets bonding them and told through trust. lena and kara in love and a super and a luthor defying the odds because they can and because they will.

Who cooks normally: i love the headcannons of kara being the cook bc hello it’s kara and this girl’s first love on earth (besides alex) was probably food. but i also like the idea of them both being hopeless in the kitchen? like. imagine them both trying to save money and taking cooking classes or watching baking videos online. going to the library and trying out a different recipe each week. lena making a pinterest of all the breakfast items she wants to try on lazy sundays. together, learning how to cook and messing up and getting distracted by each other so their meals turn out just a little bit burnt. kara trying to make homemade icecream. kara eating half the ingredients before lena has a chance to put the roast in the oven. them making thanksgiving dinner and it’s kind of horrible but mostly alright and eliza makes them promise to let her help them out for christmas dinner. kara and lena slowly learning to cook and turning out to be kitchen moms with a wicked way with the cookbook.

How often they fight: god just they can either have the best arguments or the worst ones. they’re both really good communicators though and they’re respectful and sure things get heated and complicated but they live by the “don’t go to bed angry” rule and it really helps. lena can close herself off, be a little dramatic, maybe be a bit reckless when it comes to her self care and kara’s got a huge heart but she’s also terribly headstrong and sometimes their respective stubbornness blinds them. kara can be extra and make rash decisions. but at the end of the day they talk things through and their similar backgrounds help them reach understandings.

What they do when they’re away from each other: kara can visit lena wherever she is in the world but she’s also got her own job and while she’d gladly visit lena everynight lena knows better than to ask her to, knows that space can be good. if lena’s gone for extended periods of time they’ll arrange call times and kara visits when she can so long distance isn’t a main concern between the two of them. supergirl duties take kara away at really random and sometimes inopportune times but lena’s a patient soul and kara always makes sure she’s communicating to lena, making lena a priority but also lena knows that supergirl is The priority and she loves her hero girlfriend. also distance makes the heart grow fonder so imagine maybe their busy schedules overlapping and them not being able to be together for two weeks to a month and both are just going crazy like. kara wanting to rush off to her girlfriend every chance that she gets but lena’s on the other side of the world and up to her neck in corporate shenanigans so when they finally are able to orbit each other again it’s like a supernova and it’s handsy and desperate but also really nice and they just kinda hold each other for awhile and take their time regrouping after the initial homecoming. also kara/lena + reunion sex. bonus points if the next day is a lazy sunday.

Nicknames: idk? i don’t really see them having nicknames unless it’s the teasing miss luthor/miss danvers. they have pet names tho. lots of babes and darlings and sweethearts.

Who is most likely to pay for dinner: lena.

Who steals the covers at night: kara likes the comfort of being in buried in covers even though she really doesn't need them. lena’s a sheet goblin and probably lowkey hogs the bed. not the kara minds bc that girl sleeps like a log in one place.

What they would get each other for gifts: kinda already answered this but also wanted to add that idk where i saw this and i wish i could find it and link it but i read a really good one somewhere where somebody was like “lena gets kara lingerie and it’s an experience” and um yes??? if someone knows what this is pls tell me and i’ll link it/give proper credit im sorry. also! kara getting lena really practical things or gifts from around the world. lena going full out billionaire baby on kara and just the two of them being high end fashion, high end living, high end everything. but also enjoying the other spectrum of comfort and maybe for kara’s birthday they go on a road trip and stay in crappy motels and eat greasy diner food and have the quintessential american experience and it’s cathartic and slow and totally theirs.

Who kissed who first: i love the idea of kara making the first move and a surprised but delighted lena being like yesss.

Who makes the first move: kara’s the one to make all the first moves i’ve decided this. lena’s always just a lil hesitant, always thinking in strategies and kara’s the one to be like ok let’s do this when and where do we meet and they just progress from there.

Who remembers things: lena’s google calendar gives onlookers heart attacks on the spot. kara balances her duties pretty well but sometimes she can slip up and something will go over her head but she’s always responsive and owns up to her actions. they remember big days and lena’s always the one to follow up on dates or plans and kara’s the one that reminds lena to eat or rest or just take some time to herself.

Who started the relationship: their lunch dates turn to dinner dates that turn to hang out sessions until they’re three months down the road in a muddle of uncharted intimacy and one day alex goes “hey where’s ur gf” and kara’s like ??? oh lena. oh. well she’s probably running late bc i know she had a meeting or smth. and alex is like. ah. and kara’s like. ah? and alex is like “u didn’t question that lena’s ur gf? gay.” and kara’s like “omg” and then shenanigans ensue and long story short they’re dating.

Who curses more: lena luthor is a very attractive curser and kara doesn’t know what to do with this information. also. kara cursing in high stress situations or when something takes her by surprise. bed cursing. also kara whispering ‘fuck’ bc of smth and lena doing the side eye emoji.

What they would do if the other was hurt: lena’s become accustomed to seeing supergirl get whipped around on the tv screen but her heart rate still speeds up everytime kara gets hurt. they learn to trust one another and just build this really lovely relationship where the worst has already happened to them so they know that together they can get through anything. lena staying by kara in her sunbed. lena taking care of her helpless gf when her powers blow out. lena being a shoulder to cry on, lena understanding when kara needs someone to understand what kara doesn’t understand. kara doing the same for lena. kara protecting lena to her last breath. kara defending lena until her voice is hoarse. kara bringing lena food. them giving each other backrubs out of comfort or out of need. both of them being just as protective as the other with just as much concern and love and care and tenderness.

Who is the dirty talker: im blushin thinking about this. lena being the vocal one but also kara being really responsive to her? yes. someone fic this. someone probably already did.

Any headcanons? i’m really into kara and lena going to galas/parties and dressing up idk it’s just the aesthetic that gets me. also the music headcannon. i want kara who sings around her apartment or whenever she’s comfortable or when she’s doing work just singing all these songs and some lena recognizes and others are hymn songs from krypton or songs from her childhood. kara being a theatre nerd and geeking out to lena and lena lowkey understanding all of kara’s references. lena knowing piano and kara knowing like twelve different instruments. idk where that huge “kara loves music and learns to control her powers through it” post is but yeah im all for this mmhmm.

i’d also like to add: cello player kara. strings are a hard discipline to learn and you have to have the right amount of pressure and speed to pull the sound out of these types of instruments. also, the cello is low and kara would probably have perfect intonation with the low rumble of the strings, the orchestra, and her super hearing. kara having an extensive knowledge of baroque music and string quartets and being a nerd and analyzing bach chorales. also choir kid kara! being a voice within many and listening to the counterpoint and changing harmony. kara danvers, not a sports kid in high school, but a fine arts kid. going silly and goofy in the drama club, painting in the art club, being in two orchestras and a band on the side. trying out the glee club (ha) and being put in the top choir bc she’s strangely and inexplicably fast at learning the languages and parts. kara forming her own string quartet with her buddies. kara being in the pep band. KARA BEING IN THE MARCHING BAND. DORKY KARA WITH GLASSES AND A HUGE TROMBONE. MAYBE A TRUMPET IDK. OMG KARA DANVERS, BASSOON PLAYER EXTRAORDINAIRE. kara slaying it at karaoke so hard that she’s not allowed back until she learns that karaoke is for fuNSIES and not for taLENTED PEOple kar a stoppppPPP. kara being That Kid that makes all the statewide festivals and competitions. kara not being in it for the glory but for the discipline, the physical balance and strain it takes her to master her craft and this makes her stand out but not in a bad way but in an inspiring way. kara rising to the top bc she practices for herself, because music is an escape like it is for a lot of kids, but especially for her.

also: kara applying her music theory knowledge from krypton to western styles of music???? im??? is it like atonal music or do they have notes that the human ear can’t pick up? what are the scales like/modes?? i don’t read the comics and i have no knowledge on the superman lore but if someone knows pleaSE SHARE. kara likes atonal music bc it’s fun to follow. kara missing krypton’s instruments and subconsciously choosing her earth instruments based on what she remembers from krypton, what feels familiar. kara liking certain pop songs on the radio because the modes are similar to a hymn she heard when she was little. kara getting lost in the dazzle of theatre bc the storylines about going home and finding one’s true self hit something deep within her. kara and music. kara and the fine arts, finding a different type of strength.

also one last thing for all you music nerds out there: don’t think about how ungodly fast she’d be at part writing and finding errors. or how she’d ace all the aural skills parts of theory exams. kara gets a music minor in college in theory and composition and it’s a breeze ok ok im done this was too much fun omg.