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everythingne · 6 months

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marketing ploy ln4 - ch 6

Austria goes to shit. Great Britain follows.

piastri!oc x lando norris, bestfriends brother/fake dating

warnings/notes: inappropriate comments, lando being overprotective, arguments/cursing, mildly severe car accidents (guys its an f1 fic what we were expecting. gotta do the cliche for my first fic), vague descriptions of injury, a few sexual comments, this is SO LONG. like 5k-6k words?

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01 JULY, AUSTRIA.

I woke up with a bad feeling in my chest and an odd headache. My lone hotel room, to give Oscar and Lily some space since she was finally able to tag along again this season, felt so enclosing. Slowly pulling myself out of bed, I groaned and immediately went to get ready when I noticed the time. Luckily, it was only qualifiers today, so I didn't have much to do other than hide in my office and make sure no one's car was going to explode.

But god, on my worst day, everything has to go wrong.

First, Max's tires never got warmed. Something was broken, and I had to do so much boring bullshit paperwork. Then, Checo's brakes got sticky and we had to have him DNF. Then for some reason, half the fucking sensors hadn't even recorded anything so I couldn't even tell why they had gotten sticky. But I did feel a bit better (not at all) knowing it had also happened to a few other drivers so it wasn’t just us.

So I was having the greatest time, sarcasm fully intended. And then I completely missed seeing Oscar and Lily for lunch because I was in an emergency meeting. And by the time I got out of Red Bull's garage, it was nearing five at night and I hadn't had anything to eat or anything to drink after one water bottle and my headache still had gotten worse because of it.

And then got immediately swamped by reporters.

Luckily, I saved some class and patience and was able to make it through fine but by the time I got to McLaren's garage, I was about ready to snap at someone.

"Ollie!"

Thank god.

"Oscar." I hum as he wraps an arm around my shoulder, and then he makes a face as he notices just how exhausted I am.

"You guys had it rough today." He says and I just nod, rubbing at my jaw and rolling my neck as he steps back, leans over, and hands me a packet of some sort of assorted chocolates.

"I love you so much." I sigh as I open the packet and he laughs, dragging me further into the garage where everyone else is settled and just relaxing. McLaren had a really good day, both Lando and Oscar in Q1 and I can see everyone laughing and celebrating. A completely different feel from the tense garage at Red Bull. Lily gives me a tight hug when she sees me and urges me to come sit with her so we can catch up, we end up in a bit further and in a corner so we can have a bit of privacy. All is fine, and Lily is very quickly improving my mood as we giggle and share stories (and I happily answer all her questions about Lando and me) before we're approached by a guy I don't recognize.

"You guys need water?" He asks innocently, and though it's not extremely hot in Austria, I take one from his hands. Lily denies it, showing off the water bottle she's still drinking, and the guy seemingly just blips out.

"Weird." I hum, cracking open the water bottle and taking a sip of the cool liquid, "Never seen him before. Maybe he's new?"

"Or a volunteer?" Lily suggests and I shrug in response, eventually, Oscar comes over and wraps an arm around Lily's waist and she grins, popping a kiss on his cheek. Finally, the two of them were actually looking like a couple in public. Which, is probably what happens when two introverts start dating. I swear they didn't hold hands for months.

"Lando's being interviewed if you wanna wait for him for the media shit." Oscar pokes my hand and I pretend to flick the water bottle at him. The two of us make faces for a few seconds before I nod, taking another sip of my water bottle.

"Yeah, he and I are going out to eat again tonight. Andrea's idea." I sigh, looking over my shoulder where I can see Lando sitting with some people with a microphone in hand. I notice though it's not Sky, but rather ESPN, and I hum before turning back to Oscar and Lily and wishing them on their way. I pull out my phone, answering a few texts before someone walks up beside me. And it's the same guy from earlier.

"Oh. Hi." I say softly as he smiles at me, looking a little flustered for a second before he starts talking.

"Just wanted to say hello, I'm one of the mid-season hires. I'm an engineering assistant, Jordan." He held out his hand and I grinned, shaking his hand firmly.

"Olivia Piastri, Oscar's younger sister. I'm Red Bull's head analyst." I let go of his hand and Jordan nods, he wrings his hands before he continues talking and I feel the confidence he's trying to exhume here.

"Ah, I've seen a bit about you. Kinda hard to miss such a pretty face." Jordan grins, running a hand through his hair and tilting his head with a tiny grin.

Is he flirting with me? Is this guy daft?

"Well, thank you. But uhm--" I look around the garage, hoping to maybe signal another person in the garage to come over and get me out of this just terribly awkward situation. Lando's wrapping up his interview, handing back his microphone and laughing softly as he shakes hands with the reporters.

"Seriously, you're by far one of the most gorgeous girls I've seen." Jordan steps a bit closer and leans on the wall beside me with his body covering my view of the majority of the garage, "are you free tonight? I'd like to get to know you better."

I step back, putting myself back into the view of the garage as I try to keep my patience and shake my head no. I'd never had this issue before, how exactly does one stop unwanted advances? I'd never had to, I was never alone when these sorts of things happened to me.

So, I stammer, "Ah, I'm sorry, I have a boyfriend and.."

"Ay, is he here? Because I don't see anyone staking their claim on you." Jordan grins and I tighten my grip on the water bottle and click my tongue against my teeth. Okay, if he was gonna be like that I could be bitchy too. I glance back across the room one final time, making eye contact with Jon who gives me a sharp nod, but I don't see Lando anymore. Which... could be good or bad.

"He works for McLaren, and is a part of your team, so you might wanna... not... flirt with me?" I turn back to Jordan, make an uncomfortable grimace at him, and end up tightly crossing my arms over my uniform shirt, "So..."

"Yeah, who's your boyfriend then?" Jordan hums, looking over, "Jon?"

"Me," A hand slides across my waist, fingers digging into my skin harsh enough to likely leave bruises as I'm tugged back into Lando's chest. With one hand still firm on my waist, his other hand comes to my jaw so he can turn me to press a soft kiss to my lips before he leans back and whispers, "Hi, baby."

"Hi, Nori." I smile, turning back to Jordan who raises an eyebrow. And I can already tell this is going to be terrible because he hasn't exactly backed down. I see a reporter tilt their camera at us, and I grip Lando's wrist to tell him to back off. But Lando stays close, and my cheeks tint red as Jordan starts to speak.

"Got yourself a good-lookin' girl there, Lando." Jordan grins, winking at me and making my skin crawl. Lando's hands tighten on my waist, pulling me into him a bit more if that's even possible, and now I'm not even mad that he's doing this anymore. I wanted to be doing anything else than being here.

"Mhm. Olivia's my girl, don't you know? She's been my girlfriend for a while, so why dont'cha step back?" Lando smiles, but his threat is not hidden very well.

"Ay, it's all good Lando, I don't like to share my meals."

"Oh-kay!" I shout but Lando takes over, stepping around me to point at Jordan and get in his face. I see half the McLaren garage turn, and someone shouts to send the media out of the garage as the cameras scramble to try and take photos and videos of the altercation.

"If you know what's good for you--" Lando grits, eyes narrowing as Jordan smirks in his face. His confidence was a far cry from the scrawny guy who had walked up to me prior, Lando continues through his teeth, "You won't say anything like that again or I'll make sure you can't speak anymore."

"Sorry, man. Didn't realize this would piss you off so much," Jordan takes a step back, his smile making it known his apology was fake, and my tight grip on Lando's wrist makes it so he won't follow.

"Bye, Jordan," I say, voice soft but level. A sort of period to the end of whatever conversation Lando and Jordan had silently through their eyes before Jordan backed off and slipped into the crowd of McLaren officers off to the side. I keep my iron grip on Lando's wrist and he slowly turns around to look at me. At this point, my exhaustion and anger from the whole day is bubbling just under my skin. Unlike my twin, I was never good at completely holding myself back when I got like this.

"Lando." My tone comes out much colder than I'm expecting, and I grab his wrist again and forcefully tug him to my side as I hiss, "What the fuck was that?!"

"Did you hear what he said?"

"Yes! But was that worth threatening him?"

"What did you want me to do?" He said and when I peeked over his shoulder and saw everyone watching, I grabbed Lando by the collar and pulled him into Andrea's vacant office, slamming the door shut and pointing at him.

"I had it handled, okay?" I snap, "He was just being a jackass, you didn't have to threaten to make him unable to speak--Lando! Who the fuck says that?!"

"Did you have it handled? That was you having it handled?" Lando asks, incredulously, sitting on the edge of Andrea's desk as I stay at the door, using my heel to keep it closed just in case someone tried to push it open at any point since I knew the door didn't lock.

"You don't need to protect me like that, Lando, it's not your job!"

"It's not, I'm your boyfriend--" And the rest of what Lando says fizzles out in my head. Boyfriend. Boyfriend. The word that had been taunting me for weeks. Lando Norris, my boyfriend for the media. The boy who could never be mine. And something in my chest breaks, I can feel the tether finally snap, and I shout.

"No, you are not!" My volume surprises me, and I know McLaren can probably hear us immediately after saying it, so I drop my voice down to a hard snapping tone, "You aren't my boyfriend, Lando. You aren't! You can't be, no matter how much I love you, or you love me, or if we fall in love after all of this is over--you are not my boyfriend and you will never be because we can't be in love, Lando!"

"We can't? Who said that?!" He snaps back, "Do you think I've been doing all of this for media? For a fucking paycheck? God, no Ollie. I fell in love with you the first time Oscar brought you around! Do you think I agreed with this for a check? No, I agreed to that stupid contract because it's you! If it was anyone else I would've just walked the fuck out of that office, it's you I want, only you, only you, Olivia."

"But you know you can't have me, so why string me along like this? We can't be together, no matter what we want, we're gonna have to break up at some point! So why should we even try?"

"Who cares what they say? Zak, Andrea, Christian? You're gonna let them run your life?" Lando steps closer to me, taking my jaw into his gentle hold, voice so soft I feel my heart drum against my lungs, "We do what they say, sure, but once we've completed that contractual obligation... can they tell us we can't ever be this again? Be... us, again?"

"I can't do this Lando," I whisper, bringing my hands to my chest and he steps back. The space between us suddenly felt so vast, and something in me clicked and I knew something irreversible was going to be said. That maybe I had started the downfall here, and Lando's hurt expression tells me I have.

He can only whisper, "Why?"

"I just..." I stammer, making a vague gesture to the room. There's no way for me to express the thousands of thoughts that race through my head, a constant loop of some F1 circuit of emotional mess slamming into every reasonable thought and fizzling out reason.

"Because you're scared of being loved? You're scared of what will happen if you fall in love?" Lando accuses and I can't answer those questions, because I am. I'm so scared. But not because of Lando. Because of media. So I shout the next best option.

"I never wanted the attention! I didn't become a driver because I can't handle the media like you all can! And yet I end up here, and--" I go to keep talking and Lando holds up a hand, shouting over me,

"Okay, then back out! You clearly want nothing to do with me, or this, or everything that's happening, so go tell Christian you're done!"

Silence. I swallow thickly because no. I don't want to be done. I want to fight tooth and nail for everything in this relationship, but also, was this what was best? Should I back out now, before everything we've done catches up to us? A hubris that needs to be checked? I knew from the beginning I was going to burn, but not like this. Never did I think it would be like this.

"Olivia..." Lando whispers, and I feel something roll down my cheeks. I'm crying I realize. The world is blurry, my throat is dry, and I'm crying over a relationship I can now see we both want but... at least to me, we can never have.

Do I ask Christian..?

"No, Lando." I sigh, doting under my teary eyes, "This is why. This is why. We will end up here one day, and I can't do that. I... I'll talk to you later."

"Ollie, wait!"

I turn, leaving the office in a hurry. I shove through the McLaren workers who try to stop me and once I'm in the clear, I run. The Red Bull paddock isn't far and once I get there I can't breathe, shoving through people who now wear the same uniform as me. My office doesn't even feel safe, the flowers on my desk mocking me, and I grab them and in a fit of rage, I throw them across the room. It doesn't make the pain in my chest leave.

“Olivia!” Someone shouts and I turn, Christian just barely in the doorway. I shout, without thinking, without even pausing.

“I’m backing out! I’m done with that media stunt—!” And a hiccup breaks my sentence, “Get me out of it!”

“I—“

“—Now, Christian!”

The garage is silent after my scream, and poor Christian looks horrified as he nods, and shuts the door to my office. I let a shaky breath out as I realize what I’ve done is irreversible, but there’s so much pain in my whole heart I can’t tell if that’s what’s hurting me. I sink to my knees on the floor, a hand on my chest, a hand on the carpet, and I sob.

I don’t even know why I’m crying.

An arm is around my shoulder, a set of hands resting on my elbows as someone whispers to me. I don't even know who the people are when I look up, and the sight of both Max and Checo kneeling in front of me makes the tears double. At some point, Checo leaves, once I've calmed enough for Max to convince me to lay down with his jacket covering my legs as I hiccupped and slowed down my breathing with Max's hand applying solid pressure to my chest.

Charles and Daniel come back with Checo, who then leaves the room entirely, and I end up with my weird little mixed driver support group on the floor in my office.

Something so odd, something that should not be happening in any way, but yet here we are.

Somehow, one relationship shattering had made the other relationships in my life more clear. Relationships that had started casually and professionally, and ended up with me now having twenty or so brothers at this point.

Brothers.

Just like Oscar.

Max drops me at Oscar's hotel room a few hours later when he returns from his date with Lily. She ends up going off on her own, with a few of the other WAGs, to give Oscar and me privacy. I settle on the couch, sipping a water bottle as Oscar looks out the window. I hadn't told anyone else what Lando and I had argued about, Max had kinda picked up on it as had Charles, but they had given me a berth. A space to explain. When I didn't take the invitation, they didn't try and pull me in to say anything. Which I appreciated beyond words.

"What happened?" Comes the soft voice of my twin. I knew Oscar wouldn't have been like them though.

“I backed out,” I say, rubbing a hand along the fabric beneath me.

"What?" Oscar turns to face me, "You backed out?"

"Of the shit with Lando, I can't do it anymore. I can't have my emotions being toyed with like this anymore. And we both like each other but one day they're gonna come along and tell us we need to break up and we have to listen to them." I find a stray string in the couch stitching and begin picking it. My nails dig into them, making a slightly bigger hole. It feels like the way I'd ripped a hole into my own heart earlier.

"I had a feeling this was gonna happen." Oscar walks across the room to sit on the arm of the couch, looking over at me, "what happened?"

"I just had a shit day, and... and when this guy at McLaren started flirting excessively with me he got super overprotective and threatened the guy. Which... isn't the worst but he could've handled it better." I wave my hands, "But I had such a shit day I just blew up at him over it, and we fought, and he told me to back out if I couldn't handle it... and when I got back to Red Bull I just did it. I didn't even think and now I think I made a huge fuckin' mistake but I can't go back on it now."

"Could you talk to Christian? Ask him to wait?" Oscar hums, his hand coming up to card through my hair again and I melt into his touch as per usual.

"I dunno." I murmured, closing my eyes, "I just wanna sleep the rest of the day off."

"We can talk about it tomorrow after the race, okay?" He says, looking down at me before turning to look at his phone as it buzzes on the table. I look up at him and see his jaw tense, hand pausing on my head as he makes a face.

"Oh, Christ." He whispers, turning his phone to me. I climb up to sit next to him, eyes widening as I look over the post he shares and my stomach falls to my chest.

"This is not what Christian told me would happen," I whisper, Oscar's hand squeezing my upper arm in some sort of semblance of support. Of course, getting out of this mess with Lando wouldn't be easy.

Now I needed to talk to Christian. As soon as possible.

01 JULY, TWITTER ↴

written by Julia Sine, 01 July, 2024.

Cars aren't the only thing racing down the track in Austria this weekend, so are some hearts! In an exclusive interview after the qualifier today, multiple McLaren and Red Bull workers spoke with reporter Julia Sine about what might become the next 'it couple' after Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift.

"Lando and I first spoke about it in Bahrain. He said the two of them have been close since Oscar's rookie season last year and he was worried Olivia's job would be at stake if their relationship ever leaked to the public," Steve Atkins, McLaren's Head of Communications explained while standing in the paddock with Chief Executive Officer Zak Brown and Team Principal Andrea Stella, "I went and spoke with Christian Horner, the Team Principal of [Oracle Red Bull Racing] and we agreed that since they were on separate teams, and Olivia was an analyst and not an engineer, there was no conflict of interest. Olivia did sign an NDA, just to make sure she wasn't leaking race information to Lando but it was never brought to our attention if Olivia and Lando ended up dating."

"If the two of them are dating, which again I've had nothing clarified to me if they are or aren't, I'd imagine they've been keeping it private due to concerns with the media and fans."

"Olivia and Lando have a very unique connection, and we here at McLaren are all supportive of relations between teams. All our drivers are friends at the end of the day and we support [Lando and Oscar] being friends with any of the drivers outside of racing. However, I will say we have seen some tensions growing between our drivers and Red Bull." Andrea spoke with me and Zak right before leaving for a meeting, Zak agreed with Andrea, and he further stated, "A lot of the tension we've been seeing with Max and Lando on the track stems from this, in my opinion."

When I made my way to Red Bull to ask some more questions about the situation, I was only able to briefly speak with Alice McLoughlin, Red Bull's Head of Communications who said, "The relationships our staff members get into is not any of our business as long as it's not a conflict of interest or damaging to the staff member themselves. I have not been told if there is for certain a relationship, but if there is I wish both of them well but we will be waiting for their announcement before we decide anything.

read more online at popsugar.uk!

04 JULY, 2024 - MILTON KEYNES, UK.

My phone ringing breaks the three hour silence I've subjected myself to after my meeting with Christian and Ada. The meeting where I had said me wanting to back out of the contract was emotionally charged and said I no longer wanted to. Luckily, they hadn't started the process of backing me out of the contract yet, so it was pretty easy for me to stay.

Reaching over, I grab my phone and read the contact, pausing before lifting it to my ear, "Lando..?"

"Ollie, hey... uhm, how are you?" He sounds uncertain, almost like he wasn't sure if I was going to pick up. I can't blame him for thinking that, since our last conversation was that big fight.

"Tired." I admit, but don't say it's because I've lost sleep thinking I was going to lose him, "I'm working late again tonight."

"Oh, sorry... do you want me to call you later?" I hear what sounds like a gear shifting, and I briefly wonder if he's on his sim.

"No, I'm just uploading files. And your voice is honestly more welcome than the silence of a nearly empty Red Bull garage... why'd you call?" I turn to look out the windows at the slowly setting sun, watching as the world is beginning to be coated gold.

"I wanted to apologize for the whole thing with Jordan, I shouldn't have threatened him like that." Lando's words come out rushed and squishy, like he's holding out his heart and expecting me to step on it.

I like to imagine gently covering his heart, protecting it, as I speak softly, "No, no you're fine. I was having a shitty day and I took it out on you. I really should be the one apologizing, you didn't do anything wrong. You were protecting me. Thank you for that."

"Yeah, it's fine. I'd do it a thousand times." He says, then theres a long pause. It's not akward, if anything it allows me to feel the emotions roll through me-- embarrassment at my past behavior, nervousness for his call, and a sick sort of love building in my gut that I, for once, did not push away.

Finally, Lando whispers, "did you back out?"

"I was going to, but... I talked to Christian this morning when I was a bit more level headed and we agreed I'm gonna stay." I say, and I hear him sigh with relief. A small smile bubbles across my lips, letting the giddy feeling fill my body as I tap my toes along the floor and spin my chair.

"Can you come outside?" Lando's question catches me off guard.

"What?"

"Look out your window." He says, and I scramble up from my desk and walk to the big glass panes that cover my office, looking down into the mostly vacant parking lot and there he is.

"You are something else." I whisper, then look back at my computer. I could finish the work tomorrow, "I'll be down in ten."

I scramble to save my work, kicking off my work shoes for the actual nice YSL heels I'd worn in. Once they're secure on my feet, I touch up my makeup and spritz myself with perfume. The whole time I'm giggling to myself, smiling as I pack up my desk and then throw my belongings into my purse and find myself half running to the elevator. I hurry to text Oscar that I'll be back a bit later than expected as the floors ping, and when I hit the ground floor, I throw my phone in my bag without a care, clock out and scan out, and open the door to the cool night breeze rippling across my blushing, hot skin.

God, it was so good to let myself feel this raw emotions again.

Lando pushes himself off his car, hands still in his pockets, and I bee line to him. Luckily, he kinda gets the hint of what I'm asking, and his hands come to rest on my waist when I reach him.

I pause to put my purse on the hood of his car, and then grab his collar and pull his lips to mine.

He laughs into the kiss, our teeth briefly smashing before I right us and press in deep. His arms wrap around my waist and he tugs me closer, one hand sliding up the side of the dress shirt I wear before tangling its fingers in the hair at the base of my neck. When we pull back, briefly, I giggle as he peppers kisses to my hairline before pulling me back in.

"Fuck, I missed you." He whispers against my lips and I step back, just enough to see him--and he looks exhausted. My hands come to his face and he melts into my touch, almost like he's craving it.

"I missed you too." I murmur back, watching the way he holds his eyes shut. I can see the layers of stress physically peeling away from him and being swept away by the hand I raise to run through his curls and the other hand I slide down to apply that comforting firm pressure to the chest--right under his collarbones, and then his head falls to the crook of my neck. One innocent little peck placed on my collarbone that has me shiver.

We stand like that for a while. Two silent beings in the windy, cold, English night, and eventually I convince Lando to sit in his car when my thinly covered legs start to get cold. We end up just... driving. A silence enveloping us as I rest my head on his shoulder and he keeps that damn hand on my thigh. It's gonna be the death of me. He is going to be the death of me.

But, loving Lando Norris is a death I would welcome with open arms.

04 JULY -- INSTAGRAM ↴

OLIVIAPIASTRI MADE A NEW POST!

liked by oscarpiastri, landonorris, maxverstappen, and 145k others...

oliviapiastri: my pretty boy <3

landonorris: this mystery guy needs a haircut hes stealing my look >:(

⤷ oliviapiastri: you'll get over it

maxverstappen: i want u to know kelly shouted 'THANK GOD' when i showed her this post

oscarpiastri: OH SO THIS IS WHY YOU MISSED OUR FUCKING MOVIE NIGHT??

⤷ oscarpiastri: ANSWER ME HELLO?

⤷ oliviapiastri: BRO HOLD ON I AM DOING SOMEONE

⤷ opheliapiastri: OLIVIA????

⤷ oscarpiastri: HOLD THEFUCKON??? OLIVIA LOUISE RAY PIASTRI.

⤷ oaklynnpiastri: moment of silence for our mystery guy. oscar is approaching his location at rapid speeds.

⤷ landonorris: rip

⤷ oscarpiastri: shut.

⤷ oliviapiastri: @ oscarpiastri I MEANT SOMETYHIN. I MEANT TOT TYPE SOMETHING. DO NOT SHOW UP TO HIS HOUSE.

christianhorner: geri said 'good that little fucker didn't break her heart' and slammed the steak knife back into the knife holder.

⤷ oliviapiastri: OH MY GOD?? THANK U MOM?? @ gerihalliwell

⤷ gerihalliwell: of course :)! girls stick together!

09 JULY -- GREAT BRITAIN.

"Max, make sure you're giving space here. These turns can get tricky." I hear someone say in the radios, my hands fidgeting with my keychains as I watch the race on the screens, and then glance over to the sensors. All was running well, back tires a bit hot, but nothing we were concerned about.

"Ollie, tell your brothers best friend to get out of the way." Max frustratedly huffs and I laugh, leaning forward to speak into the comms.

"Logan is in P9, actually, not P1." I chime, luckily getting a soft chuckle from Max. We'd been doing exceptionally well this season as per usual, even if I had sort of stopped paying attention a bit. I did note the tensions between him and Lando were really high during this race. The two had been neck and neck since the beginning, and everytime they got a one-up on the other it just made them push harder. They had a pretty good gap between them and the rest of the racers, with Oscar holding his own in P3. It seemed like another weekend with those three on top, but at least watching this race was interesting.

The breaking sensors start flashing, indicating they're running too hot, so I chime, "Max, ease up on breaking. We might want to look into getting your tires swapped for mediums soon."

Max doesn't respond, but he does ease up on the breaking. Which makes me feel a bit better.

"Lando's coming in hot to the pit." Someone says, and I glance up over the computers and my eyebrows knit. He's driving weird. Like... almost as if he doesn't have control of steering. I see the safety car prepare for a possible departure and I stand, looking down at Max's sensors, and then someone shouting brings my attention back up.

"He can't stop!"

There was a moment where it felt like everything froze. My hands couldn’t find my mouth fast enough to hide my shock. Lando’s car slams probably two hundred kilometers into the barrier that leads into the pit lane and skids along the wall all the way inside the lane until it spins and slams into another one of the barriers. Red Bulls paddock is first in the pit this round, and I can see the smoke beginning to billow around Lando's car immediately once the car fully stops. People are shouting, McLaren engineers sort of straggling by the exit to the track as a yellow is waved, waiting for a command. I see Jon amongst them, shouting into his headset, and I hate the silence lets me hear his voice strain as he hollers,

"Lando! Lando, are you alright?"

I can't hear a response from the McLaren driver even if I strain my ears.

“Lando—come on.” I find myself saying, hearing Max and Checo on the radio asking for clarification of what happened, but also hearing someone say it was clear for people to go and get Lando out of a burning car. My headphones are yanked off my head and Christian’s hand firmly pushes me forward.

“Go.” Is all he has to say.

I’m running faster than I can carry myself, stumbling over numb legs as I sprint to the car. My hands scrape the concrete as I nearly fall, but I save myself the embarrassment of wiping out with a quick stumble and keep running. I can hear more people behind me as I climb up, holding onto the halo to stabilize myself.

“Lando!” I shout as I grab Lando’s helmet and slowly slide his head back as I start to detach him from his seat belts. Jon is there immediately, helping my shaky hands undo the devices. I keep looking at Lando's visor, trying to catch his eyes, but there’s no time to waste as I smell and hear the various engineers who'd run out trying to extinguish the car. I get one side of the belt off, starting to detach the hands device from the helmet by Jon's command when two hands grab my wrist.

Snapping my gaze up, I meet Lando’s eyes from where I’m sitting, one leg wrapped around the halo so I don’t fall, one hand on his neck as I hold the clasp to the hands device, the other on the back of the car as his eyes meet mine.

I’ve never seen Lando look so…terrified. His bright eyes are staring me down, pupils small and shaking as his grip tightens on me. I know my own eyes can’t look much different.

“Ollie?” He whispers and I shush him, detaching him from the car fully as I grab him by the shoulders.

“I got you, Nori. Jon and I got you.” I say softly, looking up to where other drivers are stopped on the track—standing up in their cars to get a better view, “get up so everyone knows you’re okay.”

Lando’s hands grab my shoulders, my hands sliding to his ribs as I slowly help him to his feet with Jon on standby. Medical and McLaren officials swarm around us, hands out and ready to help as I slowly unlatch my leg and slide off the side of the car. Lando’s weight on me is nearly crushing, but once we get him out he collapses even further into my arms in a cry of agony. Two hands find my back, medics reaching to grab Lando and I almost fight them in retaliation.

“Ollie!” someone shouts and I turn to see Jon running along to the medics side. I feel stuck, trying to swallow something that makes my eyes burn. Lando’s still got a vice grip on my wrist and when the medics try to separate us—it only tightens.

“Mr. Norris—“ The woman tries.

“Lando.” I finally find the courage to move forward, they’ve got him on a gurney now, trying to lay him back but he keeps fighting them. I can’t begin to understand why, “you’re okay. Let them take care of you.”

They tilt his visor up, and I gently lay him back, Jon reciting medical information over my head as they begin to assess his damage, still pulling us further away from the car which I note is now long extinguished. They stop us at McLaren's paddocks, Jon dipping inside to grab Lando's things as we wait for an ambulance to meet us here.

“Olivia.” I hear Lando’s muffled voice and I feel tears fill my eyes as I lean down, pressing my forehead to where his visor now lays and let out a shuttering sigh that makes my body ache just as much as my heart.

“You’ll be okay, Lando. But you have to let them help you.” I speak in a strained voice, feeling one of his hands come to wrap around my waist. I find his other hand and squeeze it, before that hand comes to rest under his helmet, “I’ll be there as soon as possible.”

“I don’t wanna go without you.” he whispers, my heart shattering into a thousand pieces at his soft plea for me to stay. But I know its useless.

"I'm so sorry, baby." The words feel forced out of my mouth with how much effort it takes it whisper them, "You gotta go. And I have to stay."

"Ollie, please..." He whispers, and I press a kiss to the spot on his helmet where his lips would be, then take his gloved hand on my waist and lift it to my lips and kiss his hidden knuckles. The barrier feels unfair, but I'm doing what I can.

"As soon as I can be, I will be by your side." I say as Jon reappears, the ambulance coming up screaming besides us.

"You promise?" Lando says under the sirens and the shouting and I nod.

"I swear on my life."

That's what ends up being enough, because Lando finally lets go of me after one more final kiss to the 'mouth' of his helmet. The medics and EMTs swarm us, carefully moving Lando who groans and gasps in pain. I can't imagine what injuries he might have as they slowly and carefully load him into the back of the ambulance. Jon speaks with Lando all the while, and right before the doors slam he turns to me and shouts,

"I've got him, Olivia!"

And all I can do is nod, blinking back tears as the doors shut. The second they're pulling away I find myself crying, full body shaking that wrecks me, and I manage to be pulled into the sanctuary of the Red Bull garage by Kylie and a few other employees before it can really be taken advantage of for media points.

But I know I'll keep on my promise. Especially when Christian tells me to just do one thing.

"Go."

taglist (thank you!)

@harrysdimple05 @charli123456789 @fangirl125reader @dark-night-sky-99 @starmanv @ophcelia @buendiabebeta

#f1 fanfic #formula 1 #ln4 fic #lando norris x oc #lando norris fic #f1 smau #ln4 smau #ln4 fanfic #lando norris smau #lando norris au #lando norris fanfic

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aq2003 · 4 months

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I find the decision to write the first Doctor as sort of cartoonishly bigoted in the episode with Twelve fascinating, because it shifts the blame for the racism, sexism etc present in early Doctor Who from the writers and producers to the *character*. It wasn’t the Doctor who wrote limited character arcs for female characters in comparison to male ones, and it wasn’t the Doctor who decided to use yellow-face for the characters in some episodes - that was the writers and production team. Y’know, real people. People whose legacy the current writers and producers of the show - who have also largely been white men, just like their predecessors - owe their jobs to.

And the persistent problem with continuing to sideline and tokenise the characters of some of the female companions and characters of colour in the service of centring the doctor as the (until recently) white male protagonist - that continued for most of the modern reboot in some form. Some of the elements of that were even new innovations under the modern writers (looking at you Moffat but you are not the only offender.) I mean, we’re talking about the portrayal of One as the past’s ambassador for sexism in iirc the exact same episode where Chris Chibnall reversed the previous episode’s ending of Bill surviving with Heather and re-buried the lesbians by sending Bill directly to the ‘your soul is canonically dead’ zone.

I absolutely can’t speak for the whole of the first Doctor’s tenure because I’ve only seen about 2/3 of his surviving episodes, but from the episodes I have seen, he didn’t even talk like that. There was a very big problem with that run of the show, but it was a different problem to the one the episode with One and Twelve is describing. One was weird as hell, but he was much less overtly hostile, wished much less bodily harm on minority groups and even dipped into less microaggressions and dogwhistles than most older white British people do now. That isn’t to say One’s behaviour in Old Who was something to aim for, it’s to say that a lot of the improvement in the attitude of white people in Britain over the last half-century has been performative at best, imaginary at worst, a lot of our dogwhistles are new and especially alarming for that reason - and it comforts white people to imagine that the racism and sexism of the past was overt and vulgar and unlike theirs, and that their bigotry by comparison is lesser and better and therefore doesn’t need further work; that now people affected by it just need to learn to live with it, because you’re lucky we’re not like our grandparents.

But that excuse doesn’t really work if (tw racism, anti-blackness, Islamophobia, death) some sects of British society talk more positively about drowning immigrants in the English Channel than they did 100 years ago, does it?

That excuse doesn’t work if your grandparents were actually quite a lot like you.

I live in the UK, about half the people I know watched the special with Twelve and One, and considering that vanishingly few modern viewers have seen or remember the first Doctor or any early Old Who, there was this odd awkward relief from most of the white people I watched the episode with, like they’d been absolved from Britain’s historical and current racism by the burning of an effigy. Like that bigotry coming from One’s mouth was a reassurance that this country’s bigotry had always been as cartoonish and ineffectual and easy to see as the lines Chris Chibnall and his colleagues wrote for One; that white people living in the UK now are fundamentally different than they were; and by watching Bill and One’s (still white) successor refuse his cartoonishly awful worldview, white Brits had somehow cleansed themselves and buried the past completely.

But the vast majority of the racism, bigotry, sexism in the original run of Doctor Who and still present in various forms in the show now did not actually take the form of nice clear, simple statements of bigoted beliefs from the characters’ mouths - it was in the writing. The way characters and especially cultures were portrayed. The yellow-face in one of Two’s story arcs really stuck in my mind, but the way Old Who handled nonwhite cultures in general was often horrific. The first Doctor was often perfectly polite, but women and characters of colour were sidelined and (even in instances when it was clearly accidental) dangerously misrepresented throughout the show in ways that persist well into the post-2000 reboot, because the sexism and racism wasn’t in the character.

The sexism and racism was in the writers’ room.

I don’t have any sentimental attachment to Old Who, I was born about a decade after it ended, but deflecting the cultural problems in the BBC that persist to this day onto one of the show’s characters, by having him express an easily-digestible form of bigotry much less dangerous and insidious than the one that was actually present in the early show, feels like a dangerous form of scapegoating.

Something I think would have meant much, much more would have been an apology *outside of the show* from the BBC and the show’s current writers for the wide variety of sincerely-held bigotries that were actually present in the first run of the show, and a public acknowledgement of the pervasive, insidious forms those bigotries actually often took in the show’s writing - and also an acknowledgement of the show’s continuing shortfalls in its handling of race and gender over the last twenty years - because that would have been much more productively challenging for viewers of the show (more or less the whole of the British public at some point in their lives) to have to consider. Which I have to assume is why they went down the reassuring ‘the first Doctor has died for our sins’ route instead.

This is just my two cents, I am also white and British so please take this perspective with a grain of salt.

Mm. I don’t know. This country loves letting ourselves off too easily, and the writing of One in that episode feels the like easiest and for that reason least effective way of reckoning with the way we were in the 1900s. Don’t worry everyone, at the turn of the millennium both the show and the country of Britain were reborn without sin!

this is such a good writeup anon. i don't have a lot to add - just that im asian-american and a lot of what you said aligns with rhetoric i've also seen in the states - that being this sense that racism is just something of the past rather than a fundamental, systemic issue that the country was built on. and yeah one thing that really struck me while watching twice upon a time was how one's bigotry was always framed as a joke. bill straight up says to twelve "i hope we laugh about it for 20 years" or whatever and it just reeks of "To Our White Audience: be not afraid. you're not racist like the 1st doctor who lived far into the past. see? the one black character knows we're not racist now. please give yourselves a pat on the back". and like, it's not funny to any people of color that might be watching. it's just prioritizing the comfort of white people. and it's pretty terrible that moffat (he wrote the episode, chibnall just wrote thirteen's first lines. but also i know chibnall took nuwho into its least progressive era so...) felt like he had a right to make light of this stuff when he has committed some pretty egregious crimes in his tenure himself

#doctor who #dr who #ty for sending this i wasnt aware of how.. white audiences reacted to the episode and now like #my suspicions abt it were def confirmed #12 era

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deathmetalunicorn1 · 6 months

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hello! can i ask a Leonidas and Apollo that is in a romantic ployrelationship with a male y/n that is king arthur himself,

note:this is a long one)if you don't know king Arthur here's some information:

King Arthur is a legendary king of Britain, and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain. In Welsh sources, Arthur is portrayed as a leader of the post-Roman Britons in battles against Anglo-Saxon invaders of Britain in the late 5th and early 6th centuries.

He was a warrior, a knight and a king who killed giants, witches and monsters and led a band of heroes on many daring adventures. He is known for his Knights of the Round Table and for uniting the peoples of his land. Even though his end was tragic, he is still known and celebrated all over the world today.

King Arthur's most famous weapon, sometimes conflated with the sword in the stone, is Excalibur. Excalibur is, in some versions of Arthur's story, the same as the sword in the stone. In others, he is given Excalibur by a mystical Lady in the Lake

and so for the real request:

so like y/n would be a calm and collective person that would never get pissed off even if you try too piss him off and is the type that does not care what there partner title is, or what they look like and just love's them for them.(and like Arthur is there real name and "y/n" is

there nickname/fake name?)

and that's why Leonidas and Apollo fell for them as y/n didn't care about what Apollo looked like and how he didn't care if Leonidas was strong or was a king and just Loved them for who they are.

both Apollo and Leonidas don't know that y/n is king Arthur himself,but they do know y/n is a king, and the reason why they don't know that? it's because y/n was very vague about it, like they just said they're a well known and great king but didn't pecifically say who. so Apollo and Leonidas just went with that y/n was some great leader/king.

and when Ragnarok came around y/n was worried about their 2 lovers but in this one it ends in a tie so y/n is very relieved at this,

and a little time skip! so it was too the end of Ragnarok when the god's surprised Brunhilde with a whole new round!

so Brunhilde only know's one more person…it was y/n or his real title… king Arthur.

at first y/n declined but after Brunhilde said who would he be fighting…let's call them gladiones who is another/different god of war and victory and a well known narcissistic god would be his opponent that's when y/n accepted immediately

(let's just say y/n absolutely despises gladiones, because of his arrogant, prideful and narcissistic behavior as well as gladiones threatening to attack his kingdom(Camelot) when he was alive back on earth…)

and coincidentally y/n's Valkyrie also hate's gladiones as much as he does so they work perfectly together!

let's go to when they introduce y/n or Arthur:

so like Leonidas and Apollo are in the stadium sitting and looking around for y/n as well as waiting for them,but they don't know that y/n is the next fighter,

so when gladiones was done getting introduce, all looked at the entrance for

Arthur or y/n

(keep in mind the gods and humans don't know who will be the next fighter)

they realize a cloaked figure was waking out all them realizing there was a rock that had a sword embedded into it, as everyone watched the cloak figure go to the rock holding the handle of the sword before taking out the sword from the rock as it flashed everyone with a bright light,

after the light vanished it revealed who was wearing the cloak and it was y/n! that's When heimdall introduce y/n as the legendary king himself king Arthur! and the sword that they pulled out of the rock was none other then the legendary sword itself…Excalibur!!(and of course would be his weapon his Valkyrie also made it that he can transform Excalibur to any divine weapon he wants.

and a dozen brave knights and the round table cheering for him)

and before heimdall could even say to Begin,both of them charged at each other weapons drawn with the intention of defeating the other as there wepon hit, it had created a little crater beneath them making shock waves go through the arena,

and so gladiones and y/n's fight would be the most "ON SIGHT" type fight in ragnarok as well as the longest ,and the first time Leonidas and Apollo seeing y/n or Arthur so pissed off…like y/n looking at gladiones with the most pissed look you can imagine a shadow covering his face as you can see the veins on the side of his face/on his forehead…the pure heated tension between the two being so thick that you can practically cut it with a butter knife…

and so, not only was, y/n and his Valkyrie beating down on gladiones physically but mentally too like:

when gladiones took a kneel and was seriously injured because of y/n's attack,and y/n's Valkyrie would say something like this:

"hm what's this? taking a kneel already!? have you accepted defeat that easily!"

(and would cheer if they manage to knock gladiones on his a$$ giving him a taste of his own medicine! or in short term imagine Geirölul and Leonidas interactions but more bloodlusted and more hatred and unlike Leonidas and Apollo that is one sided like one compliments the other while the other insults them, both of them hates each other as like beating down each other's with words and action with no mercy)

of course y/n would win, as gladiones was fading away, when he was about to say his last words,y/n stabbed Excalibur right in gladiones head making his head completely disintegrate, not giviqng him a chance to say anything, that's how much y/n hates gladiones, bro didn't give him a chance to say his last words.

and so how would Leonidas and Apollo react to his fight

and both him and his Valkyrie absolute hatred and bloodlust for gladiones.

(i hope this isn't too much for you to write and if you want you can just do the reaction's only :> )

(AND REMEMBER DON'T OVER WORK YOURSELF AND STAY HYDRATED & HAVE A GOOD DAY OR NIGHT ‼️‼️)

-You were known to be one of the greatest kings of all time- one who was loyal, hardworking, had the love of your people, and even in modern day the legend of King Arthur lives on.

-In Valhalla you were well liked and very respected, many still looking up to you as a king as you always made sure to help others.

-Those who didn’t know who you were thought you were weak for helping others, and some tried to attack you, wanting to put you in your place.

-They weren’t expecting to be fighting a legendary warrior- especially not King Arthur of all people!! You gave a speech, inspiring them afterwards, that just because you help others does not make you weak- it made you stronger, because you were willing to do what others wouldn’t.

-Not only getting their asses beat by just you, then to get called out on it on top of it did humble your attackers and when you visited the children you were helping a few days later- they told you how your attackers had been helping more, something you admired them for- praising them.

-Your strength and your qualities as a good leader caught the eyes of many, admirers who respected you and what you could do, but you’ve also had been approached many times romantically.

-You were always hesitant on entering another relationship, after you had been betrayed so cruelly by the woman you loved and by one of your most trusted friends and allies.

-However, there were two men who had caught your interest and managed to keep it, who were like cats and dogs with each other, but with you between them, they got along… most of the time, and to be honest, you had never been happier.

-You just never imagined that those you found your happiness with would be two other men, another legendary king like yourself, Leonidas of Sparta, and Apollo, Greek god of the sun.

-Apollo adored how you were much like Leonidas- you were unapologetically you- you didn’t care what others thought about you, you did what made you happy and what made you happy was helping others.

-Leonidas admired you for your strength, not just as a warrior, but as a king, because you knew when to fight and you knew when to talk and he could see how others admired you for the king you were.

-You found peace with them, they were your quiet place, where you could just relax, and they were the only ones to know your nickname, the one only those closest to you are allowed to know, Y/N.

-When Ragnarok was announced, Apollo and Leonidas were approached to fight for their respective sides.

-You watched your lovers beat the hell out of each other, pushing each other to their limits- as the three of you had promised one another, as you and Leonidas were on the opposite side of Apollo, that if any of you had been opponents, that they wouldn’t hold back.

-Their fight ended in a double knockout, and you remained by both of their sides as they were being patched up and tended to.

-When the gods decided, after humanity had won, to try and pull a fast one, demanding one more match, all or nothing, Brunnhilde knew exactly who to go to.

-As you approached the gates, your Valkyrie partner came up beside you, taking your hand as she became your Volundr, a shield, one in the shape of a lion’s head, as you both were silently fuming.

-Your opponent was a god of war, a cruel and violent man- one who wasn’t worthy of his power or his title, Gladiones and you both were ready to bash his face in, mainly because when he was announced as the final fighter for the gods, he had laughed cruelly at those who had fallen, and insulted your lovers- saying that they weren’t strong enough to win and it ended in a tie, which in his eyes was disgraceful.

-You remember him well when you were still alive, when he attempted to attack Camelot, wanting to test its strength and the strength of those inside- you beat him back, but you had lost so many friends that day. You swore never to forgive that bastard.

-Apollo and Leonidas were back on their feet, just a little banged up as the nurses were able to heal them up, curious about this last fight, while Apollo looked around, “Where is Y/N?”

-Leonidas, a bit cranky because he was told he can’t smoke yet, glanced around, “Not sure- he was there in the infirmary with us but now he’s no where to be seen.”

-Gladiones was announced first and so many people were booing- seeing the poor sportsmanship of the gods and Zeus was quickly feeling the anger, it made the gods look bad for wanting to try to pull out one last fight because they didn’t want to be seen as losers.

-Leonidas clicked his tongue, heat radiating off of him, as Gladiones was an even bigger bastard than Apollo, and Apollo had to agree- Gladiones was a poor excuse for a god.

-In the center of the arena, a hole opened and a rock rose on a lift, a sword imbedded as the door for humanity opened, a cloaked figure walking out, walking towards the sword, holding a lion’s head shield.

-You inhaled deeply, seeing the sword that you had held for so long, the sword that helped you become the king you were today.

-You grabbed the hilt of the sword, all eyes on you and as you pulled the sword from the stone, a bright light flash banged everyone and blew your cloak off.

-As the light faded, everyone was stunned to see you, to see King Arthur there, now holding Caliburn once again in your hand. (Excalibur is the sword from the Lady of the Lake, while Caliburn is the sword in the stone, however historians have sometimes melded the two into one sword- Excalibur, but in the original legend they were two very different swords.)

-Heimdall didn’t even have a chance to introduce you, but many knew your name, as Gladiones immediately charged for you and you inhaled deeply before charging, fury in your eyes and rage in your blood.

-Your blades met, causing a shockwave to create a shallow crater around the two of you, blowing Heimdall back, and creating a strong wind that blew many back head over heels.

-Leonidas grinned broadly, “Kick his ass Y/N!” and soon all of humanity was at your back, as well as Apollo and the gods who supported humanity, now wanting humanity to survive as they had shown their strength and willingness to fight.

-You didn’t hear their cheers, you were only focused on Gladiones, and your Valkyrie, who was holding the shield alongside you smirked darkly, “Let’s end this quickly, shall we my king?”

-You didn’t answer, instead immediately going on the attack, both you and Gladiones parrying each other’s blows, not giving an inch, war cries escaping your lips as you went harder and harder.

-Gladiones was quickly gritting his teeth, no longer parrying you and instead he had to focus on dodging and blocking your blows- as he was being pushed back.

-He wasn’t expecting you to take a leaf out of Leonidas’ book and you swung with your shield, bashing into his face.

-Your Valkyrie was all smiles, “Do it again!” and so you did- hitting him with your shield after he blocked your sword, knocking him back head over heels.

-You seemed brutal, but you knew that Gladiones was a cruel god who would take any opening- any hint at weakness or mercy and he would immediately attack, so you gave him none- as you knew that you would receive none from him.

-Apollo was staring with big sparkly eyes, watching you fight so seriously- you looked awesome!! Leonidas was cheering loudly alongside everyone else, cheering for you.

-Gladiones reeled after you surprised everyone by headbutting him, after he blocked both your sword and your shield, sending him to the ground.

-Unlike you, still going strong, Gladiones was on his last legs- he never imagined that you were this strong, this fierce- but you had a lot of drive in you. You were willing to do whatever it took to win- not for yourself, but for humanity.

-As Gladiones started to fade away and you were announced as the winner, Gladiones looked up at you, almost like he wanted to beg for mercy.

-You stunned all by drive the sword through his head, ending his suffering, as he was slowly dying. You didn’t let him utter a single word, ending his life quickly- the one mercy you were willing to give him.

-Everyone was cheering, seeing how hard you had fought- seeing you determination as you exhaled deeply, your shoulders sagging as your partner took back her form, leaping into your arms, cheering loudly, “You did it Y/N!”

-You couldn’t help but smile, patting the back of her head gently as you hugged her back as Zeus finally announced that humanity had earned their right for survival, and that as gods- they were going to do their jobs.

-You went backstage, smiling warmly as you heard the cheers still echoing throughout the arena. Your heard running footsteps and you grinned, opening your arms as Apollo leapt into your arms, “Y/N!”

-You hugged him close, and he felt you sag into him lightly, the tension leaving your body as Leonidas made it to you, putting his hand on the back of your head, “That was amazing Y/N! I knew you had it in you!”

-You celebrated with them, and with the rest of humanity, celebrating the survival of humanity and seeing the gods finally pulling their heads out of their asses and doing their jobs.

-You mourned those who fell in battle but celebrated those who survived- all by the sides of your lovers- you could finally relax.

#record of ragnarok #ror x reader #ror apollo #ror leonidas

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thisonesatellite · 3 months

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Praetorian CH 4/4

AO3

Rating: Mature Pairing: Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes Summary: Britain, 60 AD. A former Praetorian Guard (Steve) and a Pagan Witch (Bucky) are thrown together as enemies and end up marching into battle as much more than friends. Here then are legend, myth, magic, and historical fact, enemies that find common ground, small moments, big missions, epic battle, and a soft happy end, because love and connection will always conquer all.

OMG, PEOPLE.

WE MADE IT.

Yes, darlings, i mean 'we', because honestly, i owe all you lovely and supportive people, ALL OF YOU WHO EVEN GLANCED AT THIS EPIC INSANITY.

i owe you everything.

Also, you may want to strap in. It's time to do BATTLE.

One last time i have to thank @stuckyhistoricalfiction for making this event possible and the amazing @greekgeek24 for working with my timeline.

To @wistfulcynic , who literally saved this chapter from not one, but three, yes, THREE plot /character sinkholes, and subsequently suggested one crucial bit (adding the Steve-est line that ever steve-ed at a perfect key moment, which is something i still cannot believe i MISSED, i should be flogged,) and which resulted in three paragraphs that are now officially my favorite moment of the whole fic. Such is her magic and i am so lucky to have her.

Once more to @sparkagrace, @cable-knit-sweater, and @bittersweet-in-boston, as well as @fsbc-librarian, @actualalligator, @zenaidamacrouras1 and @late-to-the-party-81 for being the loveliest people and holding my hand whenever i need it most.

To my beloved @booksandabeer, who is the fabulous-est in a world full of fabulosity, and who has been waiting so patiently. Darling, i am so sorry i could not quite finish this for your birthday. Will you still take it, even if it's ridiculously late? 😘💖❣

And finally -- to every single one of you who has read this insanity and /or left a comment. YES. YOU, TOO.

THANK YOU ALL.

i love you very much. 💖💖💖

#stucky historical fiction #stuckyhistoricalfiction2023 #stucky fic #thisonesatellite #praetorian

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assortedseaglass · 10 months

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I have to get this off my chest.

And please, do not feel like this is a direct attack or telling off, it's not. I understand that some people on here aren't from Britain, or perhaps a little young to remember the political context of Britain in the early 2000s to early 2010s, or just don't know and that's okay.

In this fandom, I've seen use of the word "chav" a lot.

As someone who grew up in a poor area, from a working class family and attended a relatively poor comprehensive school, the word ch** is very offensive.

I can remember a ban on working-class people wearing certain types of clothes gathering in public places. I can remember the very controversial plan to implement The Mosquito to disperse young working-class kids, that was only prevented due to the European Convention of Human Rights stepping in. I can remember when designer sportswear became popular and the middle-classes started used the term "ch**-chic".

There are debates about where the word comes from. Some believe it is a Romani (a targeted group in Britain and Ireland) word, while others believe it means "council housed and violent".

The word ch** is a derogative term for the working class of Britain. Please stop calling Ewan's characters, or Ewan, a ch**. He's talked about growing up in Derby, where the norm was to go into industry or follow the family into the military, which in the UK are very common careers for the working class. He really wouldn't appreciate ch** being thrown around so casually.

This barely scrapes the depths of why it is a horrible word, but please, for the working-class, stop using it.

#ewan mitchell

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jiaotangkaobulei455 · 2 months

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🙏🇬🇧💖英门💖🇬🇧🙏 仙品，我吃💕 抱歉，朋友们缺席了/（Sorry for the absence, friends.）

#国拟 #ch #countryhumans #countryhumansuk #英吉利 #english #britain

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vulpixsworld · 2 months

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A snippet of my hellcheer WW2 au.

IDK when I will get this one finished. May take a while. But I thought I would show a little snippet of my new au. The title of it is called, Carry You (Home).

He moaned. His eyes were sealed shut. His head ached. It hurts like hell to open his eyes. The familiar heavy pounding he gets whenever he wakes up early in the morning with a huge hangover. Mostly from his uncle's liquor. He turned his head around, blindly grabbing something to hold onto. Ah, shit, he thought to himself. Shit. W-what the hell? What happened?

He moved his legs and immediately a sharp pain zaps down his right leg. He groaned, too weak and in pain to reach his leg. He slowly opened his eyes, but all he could see was nothing but blurry vision.

“Oh, shh, shh, shh, it’s okay. It’s okay. Don’t move.” Speaks an angelic voice.

He turned to find the voice. “W-what…”

“It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re alright. You’re safe. You’re safe.” She speaks again. Her soothing soft voice comforted him.

He tried to readjust his eyesight. He wants to see the woman. “W-who said that? Where am I?” He asked eagerly.

“Shh, shh. It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re safe back in London.”

“London?” The hell? The last thing he remembered, he was leaving London with his friends Steve and Billy and heading to France. Or was it Italy? Or, outside of Great Britain? He can’t remember shit. Not after the last couple of days of shooting, dodging, running, jumping, and crying. Fucking had one hell of a run. He ran more than he ever did back in high school. “W-why am I in London?” He asked as he continued looking around.

A soft giggle comes out of the unknown woman. He turned toward the direction of the voice. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be entertained by your confusion, it’s just that…” She sighs, “…You’re a lot better than the other soldiers I’ve treated.” Her voice at the end sounded sad. Trembled even.

His eyes soon focus on a blurry figure. So far, he sees a skinny figure with golden outline hair and a white and light blue cloud around her. Holy Shit, am I in heaven? He thought to himself. The angelic figure lightly touched his shoulder. He willingly lies back down on his back. He doesn’t take his blurry eyes off of the figure. “A-are you—”

“Shh, shh, try not to talk or move too much. You’re not dead, I promise.” Just then, his vision gets clear. Within seconds, he comes face-to-face with a beautiful young woman with strawberry blonde hair pulled in a high ponytail and a nurse outfit. Her hat nearly swallowed her upper head. Her cheeks were rosy red, and her blue eyes hypnotized him. He nearly gasped at the sight of her. His jaw dropped.

She giggled at him. Almost covered her crooked teeth. And just like that, Eddie recognized something about this girl. Holy shit. It can’t be. “C-Ch-Chrissy?”

#hellcheer #eddie x chrissy #edissy #fanfic #my fantasy #true love #hellcheer WW2 au #WW2 #stranger things #eddie munson #chrissy cunningham #nurse chrissy #Soldier Eddie

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eilwen · 10 months

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Visiting the Dragon's Nest District

Most cities and towns in No Man's Land have been similar in appearance, with a ship or a portion of a ship watching over its people. However, in Ryutsu, where many things happen, the ship is not the only structure that dominates the landscape.

I wanted to do a dive into the city, what inspired it (and speculate on some of the visuals) and what we can potentially understand about No Man's Land.

Some spoilers for Vol. 4 and 5. Also, this is long.

Even without the baos and wonton-fonts on signage, Ryutsu visually does not match with other cities in No Man's Land. It’s not just the citadel which can be seen from afar, but it’s also the crammed housing and confusing architecture. The tone of Vol. 4 shifts and leans towards neo-noir. As this arc's villains move into the city, Hoppered says: "This place is truly the bottom of the dark. [...] We'll walk into a place where the light does not enter." These lines may not be literal but it certainly brings ideas of seedy places. They move through pitch black and eventually…

The big showdown happens at the city's main feature: the Dragon’s Nest District - an area that brings up memories of the old Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong. No Man's Land is a sparsely populated planet, yet for whatever reason, people have sardined themselves into this city and into this district.

Kowloon Walled City had been called ‘City of Darkness’ and it was possible to move through the city without ever seeing daylight. It carries a bit of romantised nostalgia because of its weird part in Hong Kong colonial history, its uncontrolled and chaotic construction, and its lawlessness (though apparently the ungoverned city was tight-knit and communal). The city became a source of inspiration for a lot of media, but not many films were shot in the city itself. Those that I had seen tended to use the city as a 'cool film location' so apart from the examples below, there aren't many I know to recommend (happy to take suggestions for films I may have missed).

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Clip from Bloodsport (Arnold, 1988)

"No joke, man. It's a random piece of No Man's Land in the middle of a tourist paradise. It goes way back to the old lease agreement between Great Britain and China. Once you step out of the sunlight into the narrow corridors, it's time to protect your nuts, guys."

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Clip from Crime Story (Wong, 1993). This is the climax of the film, which featured actual explosions from Kowloon's demolition, according to its wiki page.

Off the top of my head, good fiction film substitutes (unrelated and unlike Trigun/Trimax) which more illustrate what life might have been like in these places, may be films like Wong Kar Wai's Fallen Angels (1995) and Chungking Express (1994) - though these films take place at the Chungking Mansions, Kowloon Walled City's more modern cousin. I thought of Wong's films because he treated the mansions as a character more than as a location. His films showed examples of immense density, globalisation, and a bit of that noir crime stuff within small and unusually intimate spaces. They also reflected Hong Kong's complicated anxiety as the city was approaching its handover from British to Chinese rule.

Panel from Vol. 4 Ch. 7; Screencap from Chungking Express (Wong, 1994).

To talk more about Hong Kong cinema itself would be much longer than a tumblr post but if Nightow is connected with Rodriguez's films via Desperado (1995), Rodriguez and his collaborative friend Tarantino are connected with Hong Kong films from those like John Woo and Ringo Lam. One example: Mexican standoffs are tropes used in various films, but we see them frequently enough in Tarantino's films and in Hong Kong action cinema that it becomes noteworthy.

Panel from Vol. 5 Ch. 3

Panel from Vol. 5 Ch. 5

Kowloon Walled City which was demolished in 1993, was visually ‘resurrected’ as Ryutsu's Dragon's Nest. Kowloon Walled City was not a city that just looked interesting. It was an agreement between China and Great Britain that was then kind of weirdly botched, thus leaving it pretty much ungoverned. Trimax Vol. 4 was released in 2000, three years after Hong Kong's handover from Britain to China. We don’t get Ryutsu’s history and with the multiple panels of silhouetted buildings against the night sky and hanging laundry in balconies, Ryutsu’s citadel falls into the 'cool manga location' category. Also, I should be clear: these chapters in Trimax are not an analysis or an allegory of Hong Kong's colonial history.

Panel from Vol. 4 Ch. 4; Photo of Kowloon Walled City's alleyway from wiki article.

At the same time, many eyes, including those outside of Great Britain and China, were on the news when the handover occurred. The point is not if Nightow was considering that historic moment or if he happened to be watching Hong Kong films when he was working on these chapters. Instead, I wonder if readers, when they picked up these volumes from the bookshelves, had thought about Hong Kong, Hong Kong’s movies, and Hong Kong’s past and uncertain future, as they were skimming through the pages. But you know… this is 2023 me thinking about 23 years ago. All of this is daydreaming.

I bring up Hong Kong's history and cinema because I wanted to see what I can envision and interpret about Ryutsu and thus about No Man's Land. If Hong Kong via cinema brings imaginations of transnationalism then Ryutsu via Vol. 4 and 5 could do the same for No Man's Land.

There is no literal ocean to divide cities and there are no named countries. There is a broad ‘Federal Government’, so I assume that means the government concerns itself with all settlements in the entire planet. If Ryutsu itself is No Man’s Land’s ‘Hong Kong’ (which opens another discussion of the use and/or misuse of Hong Kong in media - some other time), then despite No Man’s Land being an incredible dystopia, the elimination of borders is, very plainly, very interesting. I am leaning to this being a good thing, considering that one major problem in No Man’s Land tends to be ‘Humans vs. X’ (plants, worms, the planet’s environment etc.). Also, No Man’s Land is already very sparse. No spoilers for later volumes but I am curious about the planet’s future if the population demographic changes.

Panel from Vol. 4 Ch. 4. Western and Eastern hats in the same panel.

There are also thoughts about its class struggles. Vash says in Vol. 4 Ch. 4: "There are too many people here. I don't like it. The lower and upper class all cramped together." ... which really made me think about the conditions the upper class were living in. Kowloon Walled City was known to be unhygienic, dark and cramped and the wealthy did not live there, so how rough was it to live in Ryutsu when a rich person might still need to live in the citadel? I didn't interpret Vash's statement to mean 'citadel plus those outside of it' when the high stakes in these volumes were because of the high density and maze-like streets.

Panels from Vol. 4 Ch. 6; Ch. 7; Ch. 7.

The above panels remind me of establishing shots in gritty crime thrillers than the sci-fi western I had been reading up to this point.

Featured is the Juukei Building - a building that looks pulled from the 20th century. It is tall, drawn sometimes in narrow panels to emphasize its height and to show how small the characters are in the claustrophobic space as they navigate towards it. As characters move through the structure once inside, it becomes more difficult to tell where in the building they are or if they are somewhere adjacent. Combining historical and futuristic designs in Trigun/Trimax isn't new, but it's not often you see 20th century structures. Maybe wealthier residents lived in buildings like this, though the interiors of Juukei look like abandoned offices.

Panel from Vol. 5 Ch. 3.

Or maybe this was meant to be a mixed-use building? But it seems the entire building is abandoned anyway.... So I'm not sure where the upper class is supposed to live or how I should imagine the upper class to be.

Panel from Vol 5. Ch 6.

... After the end of the battle, once morning comes, we no longer see the citadel. The landscapes return to those reminiscent of American Southwestern deserts. Like we dipped into darkness then we returned to the light.

Anyone who knows about Kowloon Walled City would instantly recognise it in Trimax. The imitative Ryutsu Citadel could be read as a cool manga location where a massive shootout plus some serious revelations occur, but I personally am always interested in what else a location can do. It matters if you set a film in New York City versus a nameless location and how you visually convey that city because it can tell us about its people and helps us understand its characters. So to me, I thought it would be fun to look at certain locations in Trimax (with all of Nightow's free-form inconsistencies and confusions) and imagine or interpret what they can tell us about No Man's Land and by extension, the people in No Man's Land.

Other fun facts include: "[...] Japan, in particular, developed a keen interest towards Kowloon. Its demolition in 1993 was broadcast on national television."

#trigun maximum #trimax vol 4 #trimax vol 5 #trigunbookclub #kowloon walled city #hong kong #idle thoughts #this got out of control #also tumblr is a terrible platform for long-form rambling #absolute nightmare

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