#guys whilst also shooting and killing as many people as he legally can (it's a lot). along the way he half heartedly scolds a super racist

[softyoongiionly]

Fear and Dumplings: Chapter Seventeen

Confronting your fears for a final grade sounds unappealing but, with Yoongi as your partner, things might not be so bad.

Summary: You’re in your final semester at University when your Abnormal Psychology professor assigns you a partnered project surrounding your greatest fears. Lucky for you, your partner just so happens to be a cute boy named Min Yoongi.

Pairing: Min Yoongi x Reader

Genre: Underground Rapper! Yoongi, Soft!!! Yoongi, Fluff!!!, College! Yoongi, Sub! Yoongi

Word Count: 9.1k

A/N: Hi friends! Here is a new chapter for you. I know it’s been a super duper long time since I’ve updated this series but, I plan on wrapping up the current timeline (wink wink) within the first half of the year! Special shoutout to my amazing friend @bulletproofbirdy​ who I love so so much. Without her big genius brain, I would literally not be able to get through any of my wip. Another huge shoutout to @gldnrecs​ @kithtaehyung​ @yoonia​ and @randombtsprincessa​ for being my lil hype team. I love you! Also, thank you to everyone over at @bangtansorciere​. I am so grateful to have met so many lovely new friends this year! okiii bye. I hope you like it!

NOTE: all bolded words indicate when characters are speaking Korean

Warnings for this Chapter: ok here we go…(TRIGGER WARNING)

moderate angst, drug use (marijuana), mentions of anxiety, brief allusions to physical abuse, very brief allusions to drug addiction, alcohol 

Chapter Seventeen: Daegu and Dirty Laundry

No thoughts, head empty (and in Yoongi’s lap)

The two of you are in his living room, bags packed by the front door, awaiting the cab to take you to the airport.  

In a few short hours, you were leaving on a plane to Daegu to visit Yoongi’s older brother and, you can tell by the way he’s shuffled around all morning that he’s anxious.  

Thankfully, Hoseok and Namjoon woke up with him, knowing that emotions would be high and well- offered to get him high.

“This is a really good indica strain hyung,” Hoseok assures him as he hands over a zip-lock bag, “I rolled a joint with this last night and passed out in like 30 minutes.”

Yoongi, dressed in an all-black sweat outfit, accepts the bag into the palm of his hand, before grabbing the pipe that’s resting on the couch cushion beside him.

“Did you get it from that same guy?” Yoongi asks, his voice heavy beneath the obvious tension he’s feeling.

Despite his attempts to remain casual, you know him well enough to feel how nervous he is. He’s practically vibrating beneath you but, you know that pointing this out will only make it worse so instead, you merely rub the outside of his thigh whilst he packs his pipe. 

“Yeah, Jin’s friend-” Hoseok responds before nodding to Namjoon, “He’s honestly killing it right now. Jin told me he’s made like 5 grand already.”

Namjoon raises his brows, “Really? Damn, that’s impressive, I’ve never heard of anyone taking off that fast.”

“Jin has a lot of contacts-” Yoongi offers, adjusting the bud once more before grabbing his lighter, “it probably helped him get started. Plus, I think a lot of people around here have been looking for a good plug. Whatever he’s doing is working though, the high from last night was pretty good.”

At Yoongi’s comment, Hoseok’s lip melt into a salacious smirk as he raises his brows and jerks his chin towards you, “Are you sure it had nothing to do with that one over there?” He teases, “Yah, what are you so quiet for? You haven’t given me shit all morning...”

His comment makes you giggle but Yoongi cuts in before you’re able to respond.

“She’s tired, leave her alone.” He scolds but his lips twitch at the sound of your laughter.

Hoseok snickers as you finally decide to sit up. You can feel Yoongi’s eyes on you even as he lifts the pipe to his mouth. Tucking yourself into the side of the couch, you finally decide to add to the conversation.

“Is the guy you pick up named Yugyeom by chance?” The sleepiness in your tone is more obvious than you were expecting and, it makes Yoongi smile to himself whilst he lights his pipe.

Namjoon nods, “Yeah, it is. Do you know him?”

Yoongi’s attention is on you even as he inhales his first hit, the nerves in his body standing at attention, waiting to be soothed.  

“He was in my human sexuality class.” You remember, with a grin on your lips, “That’s actually where I met Jin too. I just had a feeling that it was him because, he literally always came to class high. Plus, him and Jin were like inseparable.”

Namjoon winces, “Of all the people to get stuck learning about sex with. I’m sorry...”

This makes you laugh, as your mind journey’s back to all the days you spent trying not to make a scene as Jin made sexual puns in the middle of a serious lecture.  

“It definitely kept things interesting...” You offer, “I’m glad to hear that Yugyeom is thriving on his own. He mentioned his dad wanted him to join the family business but, I could never picture that man in a suit.”

Hoseok chuckles before his face tightens with intrigue, “Oof that makes one of us. He would look fine as hell in a suit.”

Namjoon grins, nudging Hoseok with his foot, “You got a thing for him?”

For the first time, you see a hint of shyness overcoming Hoseok’s demeanor but he shrugs it off, trying to appear casual, “I mean- I don’t know about all that. I’m just saying that he would look good in a suit.”

“You’d both look good in suits- together...” You offer, grinning at him, “Maybe in a private venue somewhere...”

Hoseok rolls his eyes but the smile creeping onto his lips is unmistakable, “Shut up- you guys are fucking wild. All I said is that he was hot...”

Giggling, you shrug your shoulders before nodding over to Yoongi, “Yeah well that’s how it starts-” You warn, “Then the next thing you know, you’re sitting on the subway, simping over a selfie he sends you.”

Yoongi’s soft lips immediately turn up in a small smile, the shy boy in him peeking out. At first, he says nothing as he merely passes the pipe to Namjoon, who mirrors a similar expression.

Hoseok is back to his normal mischief, feeling relieved that the heat is off him for the time being.  

“Are you saying you’d marry Yoongi then?”

He expects you to be flustered by this question but, the answer is simple.  

“This man?” You raise your brows as you point to Yoongi, “You’re asking me if I would marry this man right here? Hoseok- I would wife this man up so quickly, it would give you whiplash.”

Your comment causes the three of them to laugh and, to add to the shifting vibe of the room, you feel Yoongi wrap his arm around you in an effort to pull you into his side.

“You can’t say shit like that right in front of them, they don’t need to see me soft...” He mumbles shyly in your ear before kissing your cheek, his heart singing with validation.

“Hyung, you act like we don’t already know who whipped you are for this girl.” Hoseok laughs, eagerly accepting the pipe from a coughing Namjoon.

Yoongi ignores him with his arm still around you, checking his phone with the other hand, “The cab should be here soon, do you need anything before we go?”

“Hyung, you’re gonna leave your piece here right? Cause we kinda need it-”  

Namjoon eyes him suspiciously, “What happened to your bong?”

Hoseok cringes, “I may have accidentally dropped it off the rooftop...”

Namjoon’s eyes blow wide open, “What the fuck were you doing on the rooftop to begin with?”

“I wanted to vibe! The bud was good and, I wanted to listen to the J. Cole album and get in my feelings hyung, get off my dick-” He laughs, playfully defensive.

“Hey that’s J Cole song-” You point out giggling at the double meaning, the exhaustion from earlier finding you once again.

“Exactly, I’m glad you caught that-” Hoseok winks at you before Yoongi finally responds.

“I’m not going to take my pipe through international security. Pot isn’t legal in Korea so, I wouldn’t be smoking while we were there anyway.”  

“Oh shit that’s right-” Namjoon remembers, “I really need to keep up with what’s been going on back home, I heard they were opening the discussion about it recently but, I haven’t kept up with it.”

Hoseok interjects, “What about your brother? He probably has connections.”

Yoongi shrugs, “He might but, I'm not going to worry about it.” He glances at his phone again before turning it towards you, “Our car is here, you ready to go?”

You offer him a small smile as you nod, your cheek tingling still as he places another kiss to it.

He stands up first before holding his hand out to you. Eagerly, you lace your fingers with his and, hoist yourself off the couch.

“Alright you two-” Namjoon stands too, brushing his hands over the front of his hoodie, “Try and send us updates when you can yeah?” He shoots a look towards Yoongi that is filled with an emotion that breaches casual concern.  

Yoongi understands perfectly, offering Namjoon a solemn nod in return as he pats his shoulder, “Yeah I will. I’ll text you when we land...”

Moments later, the two of you are in the back of the cab. Yoongi takes the middle seat so he can be close to you, his fingers are interlaced tightly with your own despite the fact that his hand is already sweating.  

He’s anxious.  

You can feel it and, you’re faced with two options.

Address it

Distract him  

It’s not an easy choice but, you figure this weekend will already be filled with heightened emotions so, you’re not sure if you should breach this topic so early. At the same time though, you don’t want to act like nothing’s wrong and dismiss what he’s clearly feeling.  

So, you land somewhere in the middle.  

Yoongi’s jaw is loaded with tension as you reach over and turn his face towards yours. He doesn’t register what you’re doing at first but he is in tune with your touch as always so, he doesn’t question it.    

Leaning in, you tuck your lips between his own, whilst your free hand comes up to encase the side of his face. You feel him relax beneath your kiss, a sigh leaving his nose as he kisses you back slowly.  

You pull away, pecking at his lips a few times, your thumb rubbing over his cheek.

“It’s going to be ok.” You murmur softly for the sake of his privacy, “We’re going to get through this.”

Yoongi’s eyes open just enough to show you the sheer amount of trust present in them.  

He believes everything that comes out of your mouth and, despite the anxiety that’s raging inside of him, he knows you’re right.  

Pressing his cheek against your hand, a soft smirk graces his lips as he resists the urge to pour his heart out to you for the millionth time.

“I wish it was socially acceptable for you to kiss me like that every time I feel like this...”

You giggle, pecking his lips again for good measure, “It would make our psych presentation really interesting that’s for sure.”

He chuckles, his face adorably smushed against your hand, “I keep forgetting that we have to do that. I don’t even remember the last time we worked on it...”

“Me neither.” You say at first before your eyes light up with realization, “Oh my god wait- the last time was when we watched that horrible spider movie at my apartment! Ugh no wonder I couldn’t remember, I’m pretty sure I've blocked those images from my mind as a coping mechanism.”

Yoongi’s face lights up along with you, “Oh shit, that’s right-” He laughs, “Did we even finish our lists?”

The two of you share another round of laughter, caught up in the ridiculous realization that you had lowkey abandoned your final project.  

You lean over to pull your phone out of your purse, “Here let me check-” Scrolling through your notes app, you find the project tab before allowing your eyes to wander over it, “It looks like I still have deep water and you technically still have night clubs and horror movies. But I mean- you did perform in a night club recently so I feel like that should count.”  

He nods thoughtfully before his face lights up with realization once more, “Oh yeah, I already wrote about that in the research journal, I forget to tell you. That was definitely more of a direct confrontation than I was planning.” He chuckles, “We did sit on the beach and read terrifying facts about the depth of the ocean for mine, would that be enough for you to write about?”  

The two of you have maneuvered so that you’re tucked into Yoongi’s side again, his arm draping comfortably around your shoulders.

“You still have horror movies left though so, I feel like I should maybe confront one more directly too. Besides, I have a feeling that I’ll be able to distract myself in the water if you’re there-” You mumble suggestively, which causes him to smirk as he leans his head back against the seat.

“Oh yeah?” He jerks his head towards you “How so?”

Resting your face on his chest, you smile to yourself and think of a response that’s appropriate for a perfect stranger aka your cab driver, to hear.

“Cause if something touches my feet in the water, I could simply latch myself to your back for safety purposes.” You explain matter of factly.

“If something touched your foot while we were in the water, I’d swim away so fucking fast- I don’t think you’d have time to latch on.” He explains through his laughter

Scoffing, you smack your hand against his chest as you sit up fully, wiggling out of his grip, “So you’d just leave me to die???” You accuse, “Also, last time I checked- you weren’t an Olympic swimmer, what makes you think you’d just zoom out of there???”

Yoongi’s cackling at this point, his hand on his stomach, his previously tense features now smoothed out beneath his amusement, “I’m not saying I would leave you necessarily-”

“Necessarily!” You point out, laughter erupting from your lips as you pinch his side, “After everything we’ve been through, you’re really just gonna let a sea monster eat me!?”

His eyes widen, as his laughter increases, “A sea monster?! Who said anything about a sea monster? Where did they come in????”

“I said something touched my foot???? Obviously that means there is a sea monster, lurking in the depths, trying to eat me and you-” You poke his sternum, “You just said you would leave me to die!”

Yoongi’s face is reddened with the force of his own laughter, his hand subconsciously coming up to cover your own. With his eyes tearing up and his mouth parted to make way for his giggling, you can’t help but admire how beautiful he is.  

Especially when he’s laughing...

He wipes his eyes with his free hand, still chuckling lightly to himself even as he brings your hand to his mouth, “Alright, alright- let's be clear- I would never leave you to die.” He promises, still smirking as he kisses the back of your hand, “Realistically, I’d probably panic and jump on YOUR back.”

With narrowed eyes, you wiggle the fingers he has pressed to his lips, “Well I don’t know how that would work out because, I’d probably you know- swim away so fucking fast that I don’t know if you’d have time to latch on...”

Yoongi snickers as you imitate his voice but, rather than retaliate he simply tugs you by the hand his currently holding and, kisses you.  

It’s soft and sweet- lasting only for a few seconds until he’s pulling away.

“Thank you for coming with me.” He says suddenly, the volume of his voice decreasing significantly.

And as usual, you know that he wants to say way more than he does. But you’re perfectly fine with that.

Yoongi’s subtly is a specific brand and, you’ve grown to love how the little things he does allows him to pack so much emotion into a simple phrase.  

You feel lucky to love such a special person.  

“Of course.” You return his simplicity, pecking his lips once more before settling back in your original position.  

The airport was a blur.  

You’re thankful it passes quickly because, the process of getting through security makes you anxious.  

Yoongi ushers you into your seat before taking both of your bags and, storing them in the overhead compartment. You can’t help but smile as he turns to help an older woman with her luggage as well.

He smiles ( :] ) at her, bowing his head slightly as she thanks him. Yoongi offers her a tiny wave and takes his seat beside you, not noticing the way you smile fondly at him.  

When he takes his seat beside you, the two of you settle into a comfortable silence. Once the flight crew permits it, Yoongi takes his laptop out and begins toying around with one of his songs. You pull your headphones out as well and find one of your favorite playlists. Leaning back against the seat, your eyes eventually begin to droop until you can no longer keep them open.  

The next thing you know, you’re being woken up by someone gently patting your thigh.  

“Sleepy girl...” Yoongi croons in Korean, the sound of his voice alone making you smile, “We’re landing soon.”

Slightly disoriented, you blink your eyes a few times before you’re finally able to focus on your boyfriend’s face.  

You slump against him, rubbing your cheek against the material of his hoodie. He chuckles softly, his arm sliding out from underneath you in order to drape across your shoulders.  

“I’m sorry I fell asleep.” You mumble

He chuckles again, nodding with a false sense of consideration, “Ah yes, you missed so much. Two hours ago, the flight attendant came by and asked if we wanted anything to drink. It was a wild ride...”

Giggling sleepily, you shake your head at his sarcasm before pointing at his laptop.  

“Were you working on your composition project?”

He bites his bottom lip and shakes his head, a bashful expression on his face “No, it was just a song I’ve been working on for a while now.”  

He leaves it at that and, due to the signal from the flight crew, Yoongi begins putting his stuff away as the rest of the cabin prepares for landing.  

“Are we taking the train?” You mumble, still fighting off the remnants of your nap.

Yoongi purses his lips, his eyes narrowed in concentration whilst he scrolls through his phone.

“No, I have a cab waiting for us.” He responds, “It says it’s already here. So, when you get out of customs, just meet me right outside. It should just be a straight shot from immigration.”

You nod and rest your head back against his shoulder, “Okay.”

He puts his phone away, allowing his hand to find yours. Intertwining your fingers, he takes a deep breath- his mind clearly elsewhere. You squeeze his hand to acknowledge this but, the two of you don’t comment on it.  

There is no need.  

With the tightening of your grip, so much has already been said.  

Less than a half hour later, the two of you are once again seated in the back of the cab.  

“It’s probably going to rain a lot while we’re here.” Yoongi explains, his voice low and slow, “This is Daegu’s rainy season. I’ve been checking the weather periodically and it looks like there might be a storm coming but, it doesn’t look too severe.”

You look at the window after his comment, noticing that the sky is overflowing with heavy clouds, swollen and gray with the promise of rain.  

“We’re approaching monsoon season, we call it uh- jangma.” He tells you and his explanation makes you smile.  

Despite the circumstances, you’re very honored and excited to be in Yoongi’s hometown. You know the memories he associates with this place are complex but, there is a shift in his tone now and, he sounds eager to teach you about this place: the place he called home for so long.  

And you’d gladly listen for hours.

“Jangma-” You repeat, trying to get the pronunciation right, causing him to refocus his attention back on you. He smiles softly and nods,

“Good job.”  

Your heart skips a beat at his approval as you return his smile, “Is there gonna be thunder?”  

Yoongi chuckles, “Do you want there to be thunder?”

You nod eagerly, “I love storms. When I was little, I would just sit at the window and watch them go by. I’m pretty sure our neighbors thought I was crazy. But I don’t know- I've always had a thing for bad weather...”

He smirks, glancing out the window and then back at you, “That explains a lot.”

Giggling, you cock your head, “What do you mean?”

Yoongi gestures to himself, his now playful gaze looking at you expectantly. You laugh at his insinuation,

“I see the resemblance.” You concede, gently patting his cheek, “You’re not nearly as gloomy as you think you are though.”

“To you-” He retorts, “You always forget that...”

“Pleaaaase.” You disagree, “You’re soft for other people too, don’t lie. I’ve seen the way you deal with Namjoon and Hobi...”

He shakes his head, “Yeah but things are still different with you, I don’t think you realize that.”

You nudge yourself underneath his arm once more, cuddling up with him as best as you can in the back of a cab.

“I know you’re especially-” You emphasize the word, “soft for me. I’m just saying that you come across more approachable than you think you do.”

Yoongi smirks to himself, seemingly understanding something that you don’t.  

“Soft is an understatement.” He retorts, turning to kiss the top of your head.

“Whateverrrr.” You tease him, your eyes trailing down to focus on his hands, “I’m still right.”

He chuckles, his figure shaking lightly beneath you, “You usually are.”

The cab pulls off of the highway, and it’s then that you begin to notice the way the scenery around you shifts from a middle class/ metropolitan vibe to something much much...fancier.  

Through the winding streets, the cab begins taking the two of you up a pretty steep hill before turning onto a street full of ridiculously nice houses.  

White marble, giant glass windows, and driveways filled to the brim with luxury vehicles zip by as the car turns down another street. Similar in theme but greater in size, the new street had much larger houses on more sizeable plots of land- likely designed to give the owners privacy amongst their neighbors.  

You can feel Yoongi’s eyes on you then and, you know very well that he’s observing your reaction.

He knows that even though he told you his brother was wealthy that, that phrase alone wouldn’t be enough to properly convey what that entailed.  

“This neighborhood is really beautiful,” You observe softly, eyes still glued to the window, “The architecture is so different than anything I’ve ever seen.”

And of course, this makes Yoongi smile.  

Because of course, you aren’t making a fuss about the degree of luxury before you. You’re finding the beauty in what otherwise is a very stressful situation.  

Finally, the cab pulls into a driveway right behind a black Tesla before putting the car in park.  

He and Yoongi exchange a few words in Korean as Yoongi hands him a small wad of money.  

“Thank you.” You murmur to the cab driver with a slight bow of your head to which he responds with a tight smile and a similar bow.  

You and Yoongi unload your bags from the trunk and as he is reaching for your hand, the front door of the house swings open.  

A man a few inches taller than Yoongi steps out. His black hair is neatly arranged in a middle part and he’s dressed in a beige turtleneck and white slacks. As he comes closer, the resemblance between the two of them is staggering.  

“Hello!” He calls with a warm smile, his voice bright, “Welcome! Come on in, the rain is supposed to pick back up soon.”

His expression only glows as he spots his younger brother. He looks excited to see him but, his movements are apprehensive.  

The unspoken tension is already present and, you can feel Yoongi almost freeze up as he draws near. Subtly, you coax him along offering his brother a warm smile as the two of you approach the landing just in front of his door.  

Normally, you don’t get nervous when meeting new people but, this situation is laced with so much complexity- you aren’t sure how to act.

Thankfully Yoongi finally speaks, “Good to see you hyung. Thank you for having us on such short notice.” His tone is almost unrecognizable as he gestures to you, “This is my girlfriend Y/N. Y/N-” He gestures back to his brother, “This is my older brother Geum-jae hyung.”

Bowing your head slightly, you smile once more, “It’s very nice to meet you, thank you for having me.”

Geum-jae nods, eyeing you softly as his lips press into a tight line, “It’s so nice to meet you Y/N. I promise you, the pleasure is all mine.”

Yoongi motions for you to step in front of him so, you follow his lead and trail behind his brother through the doorway.  

Geum-jae's home resembles a marble statue. It’s clean, beautiful and, elegant- but lifeless. Geum-jae has artwork of various styles all over his walls, crisp white couches, sleek granite countertops and, stainless-steel appliances however, there is not one bit of evidence that anyone even lives here. The house feels empty despite the amount of effort put into its appearance.  

It makes you sad.  

“You have a beautiful home.”  

Your voice echoes off the dead weight of the walls, the paintings themselves seeming to arch a brow at your comment. Geum-jae however, smiles and nods graciously,

“Thank you. I just moved in not too long ago so, there is a lot I want to do. I definitely could have used this one’s expertise-” He nods to Yoongi, “He was always really good at that kind of stuff...”

Your boyfriend smirks, his eyes taking in his surroundings but failing to really focus on anything; he was too wound up, “You could have. I would have charged you though...”

Geum-jae chuckles and you see him glance at Yoongi fondly for a split second before he quickly reverts to his casual demeanor.  

“I put you guys on the second floor facing the skyline-” He gestures to the ivory staircase, “I’m sure you want some time to freshen up and relax so, please take all the time you need. I’m having BBQ brought over tonight but, if you’re hungry- feel free to help yourself to whatever is in the kitchen.”

Yoongi allows you to step in front of him whilst taking the suitcase from your hands. The two men follow behind you as Geum-jae continues laying out the plans for the evening,  

“I have a few virtual meetings to attend that I wasn’t able to move around but, I will be free as of 7 this evening. Until then, please make yourselves at home. I am really-” He seems to take a deep breath for emphasis, “really happy to have you here.”

“Thank you hyung.” Yoongi smiles slightly once the three of you reach the outside of the guest room, “Good luck with your meetings. Let me know if you need help with dinner.”

Geum-jae responds with a tight nod, “Will do. I’ll be in my office so, feel free to explore.” As he pushes open the door for you, he allows his own pained expression to meet yours, “I’m honored to meet you Y/N. Thank you for coming all this way with my brother.”

“Well-” You squeeze Yoongi’s hand gently, “He’s lucky I like him so much...”

Cheeks flushed, Yoongi rolls his eyes and shakes his head, but his lips are practically puckered against the smile he’s trying to stifle.  

“That’s fair.” Geum-jae chuckles, “Let me know if you two need anything. I’ll just be downstairs...”

With that, Yoongi pushes open the door and allows you to step inside before following behind you.

“Wow.” You whisper to yourself as you take in the scene before you.

The walls are painted a soft gray and surrounding only three sides of the bedroom. The fourth wall is made entirely of glass and given that the house rests upon a hill, you’re able to make out the skyline of the inner city. A giant four poster bed sits in the middle of the room, covered completely in a white duvet and three rows of pillows. Dark gray curtains sit on either side of the massive window as various muted colors accent the room in the form of a dresser, two nightstands and, a set of couches at the end of the bed.  

Yoongi is silent behind you as he sets the bags down at the entrance of the room. He pushes the door shut and allows his eyes to move over the space for a moment.  

It's nice, he thinks, but he can’t find himself to be very impressed.  

He knows where this money comes from and, even though his brother is out of the crime sector now, it still feels strange to acknowledge his wealth.  

Noticing his silence, you turn towards him, eyes tracing over the features of his face to assess his mood.

With a slight and subconscious pout, he looks at you, his body seemingly full of a breath he wants to take.  

“Do you want to lay down for a bit? I know you didn’t sleep on the plane.”  

At your offer, he seems to deflate slightly, lips turning up at the corners, “I think I want to shower first...”

Immediately, you nod with an encouraging smile, “Yeah go shower babe, I’ll just-”

He interrupts you, sticking his hand out and flexing his fingers in a grabbing motion, “Come with me.”

His offer makes you giggle, “You want me to shower with you?”

Yoongi closes the distance between you, using his grabby hands to lock onto your hips, “No, I meant like come with me as in come watch me...yes I want you to shower with me.”

Your laughter heightens as you pinch his side, causing him to recoil before chuckling.

“You’re such a punk today...” You scold.

Yoongi simply chuckles warmly as he kisses the side of your head, the tone of his voice lowering significantly, “That usually means something to you doesn’t it?”

It does.  

It usually means he’s having trouble vocalizing his needs and, he’s in need of attention. And the type of attention is usually a specific brand.  

And it usually comes with a little bit of pain.  

However, you don’t think it’s a good idea to indulge that side of Yoongi’s desires at the moment because, his emotions aren’t fully organized. You know the talk with his brother is causing him a lot of stress and, as much as you liked to wreck his body right now- you know it’s best to wait until later.  

That doesn’t mean you can’t take care of him though...

“Come on-” You urge him, grabbing his hand and practically running towards the bathroom, “Let's get you clean, king.”

He laughs, stumbling into the bathroom which is just as nice and similarly colored as the room.

“I’m a king now?”

His question goes over your head as you notice the ridiculously oversized bathtub in the center of the room. Biting your lip, you turn towards him and point at it.

“Do you want to take a bath instead? The shower looks amazing and all but- this thing literally looks like a jacuzzi.”

Yoongi eyes it curiously, his teeth finding his bottom lip, looking a little apprehensive, “How would you want to sit in it though? I kinda uh- I kinda thought maybe we could stand under the water for a bit together, like last time...”

He wants you to hold him.

He’s not going to say it but, he needs it.  

Like really bad.

You can see his nerves creeping into his posture so, you decide to act quickly before he somehow convinces himself that he’s being too needy.  

Looking around the room, you spot a few things that could aid in his relaxation: candles, bubble bath, a neatly folded pile of fluffy gray towels...

“I’ll show you.” You assure him, “Close your eyes really quick- no peeking. I have a plan...”

Yoongi looks at you, suspicious all over his face, “I’m scared.”

Giggling, you raise your brows for emphasize, “Oh you should be-”

He can’t help but smirk at your tone despite the anticipation swimming in his gut. He trusts you though so, instead of arguing- he shuts his eyes.  

Shuffling around the bathroom, you set things up in record time, turning the water on, pouring the rose scented bubble bath beneath the stream, and lighting a few candles along the ivory counter. Yoongi maintains his smirk the entire time, folding his arms across his chest, stifling his desire to make a snarky comment.  

“Alright,” You sigh, dusting your hands off, “Ta daaaaa.”

Yoongi opens his eyes, blinking a few times before taking in the scene in front of him. It changes his smirk into a grin really quickly as his cat-like eyes flit over to you.

“Are you planning on sacrificing me?” He quips, nodding to the candles.

Snorting, you roll your eyes, “If you keep talking shit, I just might-” You threaten, laughter forming on the tail end of your sentence, “Get naked...”

Yoongi snickers, his face full of satisfaction as his finger tuck beneath his hoodie to tug it over his head. The two of you undress in a small bout of silence and attempt to sneak glances at one another’s naked form.  

“I’m going to get in first and then you’re going to sit in front of me, between my legs...” You explain, trying not to shiver as the cool air of the bathroom begins to grow uncomfortable.

His brows raise, “Between your legs?” He confirms, “Say no more...”

Once again, your eyes are rolling but this time, there is a smile on your lips as you move to take your spot beneath the warmth of the water. Yoongi has to take a deep breath as he watches you, his emotions brewing dangerously beneath the surface at the sight of the woman he loves.  

He still doesn’t fully understand it.  

He is still meet with endless confusion when he starts to think about why you’ve chosen to be with him but, he knows better now than to question it.  

You have your reasons, he thinks, and he has a million of his own.  

Looking up from beneath the mountain of bubbles, you pat the top of them, looking at him expectantly, “Come here.”

He grabs the hand that you extend towards him, balancing himself on it whilst he steps into the tub. Modestly, he turns his body away from you for a second so he’s able to bend down before pivoting beneath the water and settling against your chest. The bathtub is big enough for the water to go past his shoulders and, he feels his entire body relax once he feels your body against his.  

“Comfy?” You check, draping your arms across his chest.  

Yoongi nods, his head leaning back and resting against your left shoulder. Once it lands there, you turn and kiss his temple which then prompts one of his hands to reach up rest on yours. Silently, you place a few more kisses against his hairline, allowing him to decompress however he wants to, not wanting to pressure him into talking about anything.  

And he doesn’t, at least not for a while.  

The only sounds between the two of you are the dribbling of water from the faucet and the low whisper of breathing. Every so often, you kiss his temple, just so he knows that he isn’t alone.

“Seeing my brother is really difficult.” He mumbles, eyes still closed, hand still on top of yours, “Even just seeing his face- it brings back a lot of memories.”

You nod, “I can imagine- especially since it’s been so long.”

Yoongi sighs, his eyes fluttering open and honing in on the ceiling, “I haven’t seen him since I was 18. He came to Sejin’s place just before I moved in with Namjoon. He tried to talk to me to let me know that he was leaving the business but, I barely said anything. I was too angry at him.”

Using your free hand, you rub softly at his chest under the water, silently encouraging him to continue.  

“He never helped me when my father would-” He takes a deep breath through his nose, his throat bobbing as he swallows on the exhale, “the time I told you about, when my father hit me...that wasn’t the only time. It happened often towards the end.”

Your eyes shut momentarily, the pain of Yoongi being harmed stinging your heart like a shot.  

“I’m so sorry.” You whisper, kissing his temple again.

Yoongi’s face turns slightly into your lips, his hand squeezing over yours, “Don’t be. It was a long time ago. I held onto my disappointment in him for a while until I realized something: the only reason my father every laid his hands on me and not Geum-jae hyung was because, I stood up to him.”

“Geum-jae hyung never did and, I think he still carries that regret to this day. I can see it all over his face...” His voice is so low now that it barely makes it above a whisper, his eyes seemingly elsewhere. “Is it wrong that I feel like- like I didn’t just come here to save Sejin’s studio?”

You shake your head, “Not at all...”

He swallows again and takes another deep breath through his nose, “It’s hard you know- during winter break especially; everyone would leave campus and go home for the holidays...and I never knew where to go. For the first two years at school, I spent Christmas alone until Namjoon’s mom finally called me and told me that if I didn’t come back with him, that she was going to make him sleep outside.” He chuckles, smirking slightly at the memory.

Your heart fills with despair then. You didn’t piece it together that Yoongi would have stayed behind during the holiday season. There was so much to unpack from the tragedy that he’s endured; it didn’t even cross your mind.  

“Namjoon’s mom was right to threaten you-” You affirm but then you shake your head, “I don’t think there could be a wrong reason to come here. You deserve to have whatever kind of closure or healing that you need.”  

“I wish I knew what I needed...” He admits, licking his lips before turning towards you, his brown eyes holding all the emotions he can’t vocalize, “I wish everything was as easy as this.”

Following suit, you turn your head so that you’re facing him, “So do I. But I’ll always be here through all the not-so-easy stuff.”

Yoongi smiles then, soft and sweet, delivering a kiss to match. He relaxes into you, brushing his tongue along the inside of your lip just for a moment before pulling away.

“I love you Y/N.”  

“I love you too Yoongi.”  

Eventually, you both got out of the bathtub and into the shower so, that you were able to get clean properly. After a few hours of catching up on missed calls/texts and relaxing, Yoongi gets a text from his brother saying that dinner would be ready in 15 minutes.  

Geum-jae had the finest BBQ in the city delivered and prepared right in his dining room. Banchan lined the center of the table, slabs of meat were grilled one right after the other until the three of you tapped out.  

It passed easier than you thought it would. Yoongi and Geum-jae relaxed in the face of a meal, the conversation flowing effortlessly between them as if no time had passed. It was a touching sight to see and, you hoped that it meant their discussion would come out easier.  

You take your leave after you help clean up, thanking Geum-jae for the incredible food and, letting Yoongi know that you’d be up in the room checking on something for school if he needed anything.  

Which was a total lie but, you needed an excuse to leave them alone for a bit.  

Yoongi feels his heartbeat pick up a bit as he watches you leave the room, the realization of what was coming finally hitting him.  

“Hyung-” He wants to rip the band aid off. “Is it alright if we talk for a moment?”

Geum-jae raises his brows at the switch in languages and nods immediately, gesturing to the table, “Of course. Can we sit here? Or would you rather talk in the living room?”

Yoongi shakes his head, “Here is fine.” He sits back down in his original seat and, rubs his palms against his jeans.

Geum-jae takes a seat across from him, gazing expectantly at his younger brother, “What did you want to talk about?”

Despite Yoongi’s anxiety, he understands that being to the point would be the most effective way to communicate. He wasn’t sure if any past issues would come up but, right now his concern was on Sejin.  

“I know that I told you I needed your help with something but-” Yoongi begins, “It isn’t me who needs your help exactly...it’s Sejin.”

Geum-jae purses his lips, his hands coming out to clasp rest on the table, “Is he alright?”

“The landlord for the studio he runs is increasing his rent again and, he doesn’t have the money to keep it open...” Yoongi’s explanation gets a little rushed as he gets more and more nervous, “I have some money in savings to help out with rent for the next few months but, it’s not enough to keep it open long term and-”

Geum-jae cuts him off, “Tell Sejin to call me. I will send a team to his location to sort everything out. It wouldn’t be a bad building to purchase but if Sejin is willing- then maybe he can look at other properties and I’ll have the money wired over to him.”

Yoongi can’t hide the shock on his face, “Wait- are you serious?”

“Of course. Sejin is one of my dearest friends. I owe him a lot for what he’s done over the years.”

In this moment, regret washes over Geum-jae's face, his eyes reaching out to Yoongi’s in hopes that he understands what he’s alluding to.  

And obviously, he does.  

“Why didn’t you just call me?” Geum-jae continues, tilting his head to get a better look at Yoongi’s expression, trying to read him, “I’ve always told you that if you ever needed anything-”

“I haven’t talked to you in 8 years hyung, I wasn’t just going to call and ask you for a favor.”  

Geum-jae nods, his face tightening with solemnity, “I understand.” A brief moment of silence passes between the two of them before a sigh comes from Geum-jae, “There is so much I want to say to you Yoongi, I don’t even know where to begin...”

Yoongi stays quiet.  

He doesn’t know either.  

He just knows that the only way to get rid of the heaviness in his chest is to talk about it.  

“I suppose I could start with an apology.” Geum-jae concludes, shaking his head as a light scoff leaves his lips, “I could never find the words to express how much regret and shame I feel inside. I could never explain how sorry I am for not protecting you, for not being a better example, for not having a backbone, for being selfish...I was blinded by greed. I couldn’t see what was in front of me.”

Yoongi swallows back his emotion, dreading the way his eyes begin to sting.  

Geum-jae continues, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment, “I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness. I just want to apologize and tell you that, even though I played no part in the man you’ve become, I am incredibly honored to call you my brother.”

It isn’t easy but, Yoongi manages to contain the tears that desperately want to fall from his eyes. His chest tightens as he hears his brother’s words. He wades through all the bitterness he feels towards him, allowing himself to feel the full force of his approval.  

“I forgave you a long time ago.” Yoongi swallows, avoiding direct eye contact with him, “I just wish I understood your actions. You were my hyung, I thought you would have protected me and-” Yoongi blinks away the tears as quickly as he can, “and I still haven’t been able to accept the fact that you didn’t...”

Geum-jae shakes his head, “I wanted to protect you. I just didn’t know how- I was scared of him too. You had more courage than I did. It doesn’t excuse my actions but, it’s the truth.”

Suddenly, he reaches out and places his hand overtop of Yoongi’s, a pleading expression on his face, “That’s why you got out. That’s why you have a life. You have friends, you’re about to graduate university and, you have Y/N...” Geum-jae's voice breaks at the end, “Because of your strength, you finally found happiness.”

Yoongi looks at his hand, observing the evidence of his life present on his skin. Scars, burns, callouses, needle marks...

“Are you saying that you haven’t?” He asks, still not meeting his brother’s eyes.

“I’m not even close.”

Finally, the two meet each other's gaze. For a moment, they just stare, glistening eyes to glistening eyes. Overcome with years of repressed emotions, fueled by the desperate need to try and break the cycle, they wordlessly convey an unspoken emptiness.  

They have missed each other so much.  

“I am here now.” Geum-jae promises, the first tear dangerously close to falling, “Hyung is here if you’ll have him. I want to be in your life but, I understand if you want nothing to do with me.”

Yoongi blinks now, and the tears land upon his cheeks, “You’re my hyung...” And it really is a desperate proclamation, “...you’ll always be my hyung...”

The chair screeches against the tile, causing Yoongi to jump in his seat until he realizes what his brother is doing. Rounding the table, stands to the side of Yoongi with open arms and his own tears atop his cheeks.

He eyes him for only a few seconds before standing up suddenly and accepting Geum-jae into his arms. The two of them seem to collapse against one another. Yoongi breaks down and sobs in the arms of his older brother.  

Just as he would have when they were young.

When times were hard and he could take shelter behind the one person who made him feel safe, the first person who ever showed him love.  

“I’m so sorry Yoongi-ah.”  

His words cause Yoongi to squeeze his eyes shut as he nods against the expensive fabric of his brother’s dress shirt, “I know.” He sniffles and pats his back, “I know you are.”

Meanwhile...

You’ve been upstairs, straightening up the bedroom and trying to pass the time without worrying excessively about your boyfriend’s well-being.  

Which turns out to be impossible...

Cleaning around the room/bathroom only takes you about 20 minutes before your flopping onto the massive bed and, pulling out your phone. Scrolling through Tik Tok, you hope for a substantial distraction and, lucky for you- one arrives.  

But, it isn’t on Tik Tok...

Jungkook: So you know Jimin right...  

The text from Jungkook confuses you as you’re pretty sure it's like the middle of the night back home and, it’s not like him to text you outside of the group chat.

You: I have heard of him yes

You: Isn’t he like your boyfriend or something?

Jungkook: ha ha

Jungkook: about that

Jungkook: what if he wasn’t my boyfriend anymore?

Your eyes widen and, you immediately sit up in bed and hover anxiously over your phone.

You: !!! WHAT DO YOU MEAN

Jungkook: shhhhhh don’t yell

Jungkook: my future fiance is sleeping...

You’re about ready to get on a flight back home to kick his ass before your vision focuses on the word he’s just sent.

You: excuse me  

You: YOU’RE WHAT ???????????

Jungkook: …

Jungkook: What did I just tell you smh

You: *whispers* WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT JUNGKOOK

Jungkook: -____-

Jungkook: can I call  

You: ?????? Obviously!!!!

Seconds later, Jungkook’s name illuminates your screen.

“Good evening,” He begins calmly, “I’m having a panic attack...”

You giggle, “What’s going on????”

“Well you see- I am in love with Park Jimin and I fear it may be terminal.”

“Terminal huh? Is that how you describe a lifelong partnership with your one true love?”

“...yes.”

“Jungkook,” You urge him through your laughter, “What is going on?”

You hear him sigh, “I think I’m going to ask Jimin to marry me.”

Squealing, you jump up on your knees, “Wait seriously?! Jungkook!”

“Yah! Don’t yell at me! This is all your fault!”  

“My fault??? How is this my fault?”

“Well technically I guess- it's Yoongi’s fault because, he’s the one that convinced me to get in touch with my feelings or whatever- either way, I am STILL the victim. And now I want to be with him forever and it’s disgusting...”

You flop back against the pillows and laugh again, “If Jimin knew this was how you were telling people you were proposing, he would kill you.”

He doesn’t hesitate, “He’s going to kill me either way Y/N...it’s bad- the other day, he sent me a selfie and, I had heart palpitations for like 15 minutes.”

“If your man doesn’t give you heart palpitations then, that isn’t your man.” You conclude.

“Y/N...” Jungkook whines now, sounding very much like the boy you met back in middle school.

“Jungkook...” You whine back causing him to finally chuckle on the other end of the line.

“I’m scared...”

“I know but, you and Jimin are so perfect for each other, there is no way that this wouldn’t work out.”

“More perfect than you and Yoongi?” He teases, reverting back to being a little shit.

And his question makes you scoff, “Oh sweetheart- obviously not. But second place isn’t bad!”

He laughs now and it’s the full bellied sound that you love hearing.  

“You really think we’re perfect together?”

Despite his inability to see you, you smile at his need for validation,

“Duh. You two are literally soulmates.”

Jungkook is quiet on the other line but when he speaks again, you can hear the giddiness in his voice, “Ok so...will you help me then???”

Back downstairs, Yoongi and Geum-jae are sat at the bar in front of the window that faces his backyard. As he predicted, the rain came back in full force and is now propelling itself against the clean glass. After their emotional encounter in the dining room, Geum-jae suggested that they have a drink together and relax for a moment.  

He had poured each of them a glass of wine, ensuring not to fill his glass up too much.  

“Your girlfriend is a wonderful woman; you made a good choice.”

At the mention of you, Yoongi’s lips twitch, his eyes watching the droplets of water chaotically race down the window, “Thank you. But, it was her who chose me, I’m still working out exactly why.”  

Geum-jae chuckles, “I see you’re still selling yourself short ah? Did you two meet at school?”

Yoongi smirks, “Yeah, we met 6 months ago in my psychology class. She was my partner on our final project.”

“Ah.” He nods, “Things blossomed that way then?”

Yoongi’s heart throbs a bit as his brain begins its recollection of his time with you.  

So much has happened during your relationship, he forgets that he hasn’t known you all his life.

It certainly feels like he has.  

“Yeah.”

Geum-jae chuckles, “You’re so reserved about her.”

Yoongi knows what he means. In the Min family, you always say things as they are. You don’t sugarcoat your sentiments and you definitely don’t play coy.  

“I can’t help it-” He admits, and he can feel the heat on his cheeks now, “I find it difficult to talk about her...”

His brother bites his bottom lip, unable to help how endeared he is, “Can I ask why?”

Yoongi leans his cheek against the palm of his hand, still focusing on the rain, “It’s overwhelming.”

Geum-jae seems to understand but he chuckles anyway, “Do you plan on marrying her?”

His question hangs in the air for a moment. Yoongi’s brain once again travels elsewhere, and he is bombarded with images of you walking down the aisle. He has to take a deep breath as he forces the thoughts out of his head; he’s cried enough this evening.

“I would marry her tomorrow.”  

Geum-jae's laughter increases now but now it bubbles over his lips in an excited fashion.

“Yahhhh! Look at that eh?” He congratulates him, “It’s safe to say you’re off the market for good then? Because I have a few of my friends who have been asking about you.”

This finally makes Yoongi laugh as he turns towards him, “That’s flattering.” He means it too but, he speaks the next set of words with all of the conviction he can muster, “There is no one else for me though.”  

Geum-jae grins proudly and with a raise to his brows, he lifts his glass, “Well, let’s drink to that then.”

The clinking of crystal signifies so much. For now though, Yoongi allows it to represent the future and, all of the possibilities it may bring.  

[dcjokerhs]

So I've finally watched CA:CW.

And I hated it.

So I got the DVD copy of CA:CW so I could watch it with Subs and figure out what everyone else in the Fandom is screaming about beyond that last, iconic fight WHICH TURNS OUT TO BE NOT THST ICONIC 'CAUSE IT'S JUST A BLEND OF CHILDHOOD TRAUMA, PTSD, RAGE AND MISCOMMUNICATION ALLLLLLL WRAPPED INTO ONE, MASSIVE BATTLE-BURRITO!!

Let's start from the beginning, shall we?

We're shown the book, shown Bucky being put under, shown The Incident.

Cool: Bucky's innocent. Nice to know.

We have Lagos, we have a fight. That explosion seemed to me like it would take out more of the people on the ground had it gone off there, but we can't exactly see who's in that building, right? Can't see those casualties beyond Ross' Damned Photos.

But that Entire Thing was a set up! We are told Three Times that Crossbones had this planned, that he KNEW they'd be there. That's most likely why the guys dumped their gear, made of weapons and other handy stuff, because not only can you escape looking like a Civ, but now the Civs could mistake the attacks by the Avengers for "the payload" as attacks against Other Civs. That would stir up more unrest.

So they get home, America is five hours behind, so whilst Steve stews in PTSD brought on by Crossbones mentioning Bucky and Wanda listens to the TV saying a Wakandan Embassy had been in that building (hmm, how "coincidental", how "Convenient for Ross"?) We have Tony doing his talk at the University. Where he uses BARF, mind-bending technology to help people with Childhood Trauma, PTSD and any other memory-related problems. But then he's both slapped with Pepper Not Being There and Mrs Spencer and her Dead Son. When Tony is obviously not listening to the teacher wanting to get more money and the PA who's trying to apologize for the prompter problem, when There's Something Off.

He arrives back With Ross. We have no idea how long he's been speaking with him, and during Ross' Entire Speech he occasionally glances round, but looks mostly at Tony, as shown by a shot from over Steve's shoulder, where Tony is sitting.

The Guilt-Images are for all of the Avengers, but Ross probably knows by now as There Is No Lawyer or Third-party with Little to No Bias for a New Freaking Law that Directly Affects them.

Natasha asks "and if we don't sign?" And Ross says "You Retire", he is claiming this supposedly-democratic law not even in play yet as Already Firm Law.

Then Tony says "I have an electromagnetic headache" whilst visibly shaken and furious.

This being not long after his last use of New Technology that Uses Multiple Memories to form a moving 3D image. After he's seen one picture of a boy, heard one Mention on their name and Then Recites It Back To The Others.

I'm seeing a lot of coincidences and, you know what they say about those, right?

So all Tony can think about is Responsibility and his fears, he moves and speaks with fury whilst making coffee, a common stress-relief. He's locked up in his head with Anxiety and PTSD thumping on his brain.

So all Tony hears is his own fears being spoken aloud by the others, Vision doesn't even help by saying that world-threatening crime increased with Tony's appearance as Iron Man.

But Steve is hearing Tony and Rhodey basically backing up Ross. He hears them resoundly saying "these Accords won't give you a choice, these Accords Will Cage Us", like the ice encaged him, like Fury tried controlling them with HYDRA puppeteering them.

It's the same conversation, they're all just hearing different things.

Oh.

Then Steve gets a text saying Peggy's dead and he runs off without a word, because everything is Too Much and he just lost his last link to the past, the last person who remembers him not as Captain America, but as Titchy Squirt Steven Grant Rogers.

But Bucky's alive.

And he's Steve's last chance.

Else his PTSD and Imposter Syndrome is gunna screw him over.

Oh, and Sharon, who also said (for 18 seconds) a quote from Peggy about sticking it to the man, tells him they've been told, right after The Incident, to shoot on sight.

So he goes after him, activating Bucky's PTSD because he's a Prisoner of War, then destroying a tunnel and being made a criminal, before getting arrested and told No One is getting a Lawyer, which goes against Basic Constitutional Rights.

And what does he see when marched in, but Natasha acting like a worker drone because she's a spy and Tony walking down towards them like he's one of the leaders for the entire thing, calling someone on the phone "Sir".

And we can all think of Guy Number One for that, right?

I had to pause the movie again at this point because none of these Idiots communicate properly. They both run with thick prides and biases, like humans do, and screw up everything as they go.

Tony and Steve talk and they set eachother off about three times more, each. Tony shows the pens that started America into WW2, Steve asks about Pepper, Tony says about his Dad and Steve says "I met him", Tony says "I know, he told me a billion times and I gated you back then for it but now I just think you're kinda cool for your abilities" and then says about keeping Wanda in the compound, to which Steve yells at Tony (and believe me: when your dad just yells at you and someone he believes in yells at you, that's A Big Fucking Trigger Right There.)

So Tony leaves to cool off.

Then Sharon comes in, hands Steve the live feed of Bucky and Steve realises this all was another set up by the guy who then sets the Winter Soldier loose again.

Neither Steve nor Tony help Bucky with his PTSD and Steve is still determined to not be alone, to follow his "no man left behind" ideal but this time centered around the key comfort against his PTSD and Imposter Syndrome, who is Bucky. Even if Bucky's already unable to remember him well...

Until he does, after they Almost Drown again.

Yey! More Triggers!

So now Steve is terrified and suggests they go to Tony, but Sam says "No. Accords" and Steve's like "Yup, hecc we're going in the Buggy."

Cue Tony being told he has 36 hours.

Cue Peter once again speaking about Blame On The Witness and triggering Tony's self-guilt.

Cue The Next Fight Scene.

Cue Rhodey getting hurt by Steve's Team and Vision.

Steve and Bucky, meanwhile, stew in their own and eachother's PTSD, Imposter Syndrome and good old fashioned Guilt.

As Zemo escapes and gets to Sokovia as Tony finds out about Zemo.

Tony sets off Bucky and Steve again, they find Zemo as Bucky has Mega PTSD Material around him on All Sides, Tony has his Childhood Trauma brought up with the video of them dying Just After He Said To His Dad That He Loves Him (still don't agree with that, don't forgive your family for being abusive just because they're dead. Especially if they were never caught and tried for that crud.)

So Tony fights running on Fury and Trauma and Betrayal as Steve and Bucky fight based on Pure Fear, PTSD and not as much Imposter Syndrome as before but Steve just wants His Anchor and Bucky just wants to Live.

But the last few times Tony was Betrayed, he was almost killed.

That whole fight shouldn't have happened and it's Seriously Messed Up that it Did. My feelings were reflected in T'Challa's face as he sees that fight happen.

Then Tony is Abandoned, Again. No one trusts him anymore but for Rhodey and Some Kid in Queens.

And Steve loses Bucky, Again, because Bucky doesn't want to be a danger to anyone until he's fixed.

And that just, pardon my language, Pisses me the Hell Off.

Team Cap? Team Iron?

Fuck that, Neither Side was Right. Both were Wrong on So Many Levels, None of that was honestly the least bit legal and I was Horrified that Ross got away with What He Did because, at No Point, did they ask for the Avengers to say their side of things, at No Point did they say "you can ask questions about this set of Laws before they're put in place"-

WHEN LAWS LIKE THE DISCRIMINATION ACTS AND ARTICLE 13 WERE ANNOUNCED, MEDIA OUTLETS BROADCASTED TO EVERYONE ABOUT THE LAWS THAT WERE BEING ARRANGED AND DID THIS HAPPEN FOR THE ACCORDS?

NO! NO IT BLOODY DIDN'T!!

EVEN THOUGH IT WAS APPARENTLY A PLANET WIDE NEGOTIATION!!!

NONE OF THE NEWS OUTLETS EVEN MENTIONED IT WHEN IT WAS BROUGHT TO THE AVENGERS!! OTHERWISE MRS SPENCER WOULDN'T HAVE GONE TO SHOVE HER SON'S PICTURE INTO TONY'S CHEST!!!

WHAT!!! THE FUCK??!!

[klauscotic]

klaus hargreeves x reader • part 1

🌟authors note: this plot line is a little bit of my own creation, besides what happens in the t.v show. this one is also based on a fem. reader! i am going to start a gender neutral mini series very soon!

👻summary: klaus and y/n never saw each other as siblings, even though they grew up together. they saw each other as friends, lovers. but when the hargreeve children left the umbrella academy, klaus and y/n never saw each other again. but when reginald hargreeve’s death pops up unexpected, the children, now adults, meet again. and klaus and y/n meet again...

🔅word count: 1923

16 years. that’s how long it had been. 16 long fucking years.16 years since i had seen the one i loved and cared for the most. 16 years since i had seen my siblings. 16 years since i had seen him. dad. father. reginald. the man that bought me for my powers. i never called him dad. i simply didn’t want to. then there was grace. mum. machine. although she was a metal creation, she was more of a parent that he would ever be. although she was a metal production, at least she showed parental affection, unlike reginald hargreeves. even though he programed her to act human, she was still as blunt as ever, but that wouldn’t stop her loving side seep through her cogs and wires. after all, she helped out like the mother i never had, and for that i was grateful.

but now, we are gathered at the umbrella academy, because ‘dad’ was dead. and we were all as skeptical as the next superstitious dude that walks down the street. i sat next to allison and diego. who, by the way, weren’t pleased at being called back to the house to hold a family meeting about the man that raised us without being there. 

“so, we’re here again. home sweet home.” mumbled luther. who had grown much taller since last time i had seen him. 16 years ago...

“yep.” i muttered back, not wanting to be there at all. however, someone was keeping me from leaving. someone out of the six of us that i didn’t call my sibling. instead once called my lover. klaus... 

i never saw klaus as my sibling, and he didn’t see me as one either. which was technically true, considering we were raised to treat each other that way. we weren’t related in anyway. but that didn't stop reginald from disliking our relationship. me and klaus were joined to the hip as youngsters. wherever one went, the other would follow, and vice versa. he would protect me with his life and i would do the same, especially on missions. and then there was the love. when we became late teenagers, we told each other. and that’s when reginald found out. he didn’t do anything, he would just make the odd comment about how we shouldn’t show it outside and how it looked weird. but that didn’t phase me and klaus. because we were young and in love. but i can’t say that the feelings remain the same for klaus after 16 years of not seeing each other. the day we all left, i don’t know what happened. we all just suddenly lost contact with each other. i missed klaus terribly. i missed his laugh, his smile, his hair, his wacky clothes. i just missed him in total. 

 “so, dad? he’s gone.” allison spoke. 

“yeah no shit, that’s why we’re here.” i replied sharply. i heard klaus snicker from behind me, pouring himself a drink from the bar, as he wore those wacky clothes that i missed oh-so-much. 

“y/n? really? on a day like this and you’re already using your crappy humour!” luther sighed, his eyebrows knitted together. disappointed. 

i shrugged and smirked. 

“sorry.” i said sarcastically. it went quiet. 

klaus walked away from the bar behind us and pranced his way to the center of attention, holding a cigarette.

“put that out, you know dad didn’t like smoking.” luther told klaus. klaus grunted in disapproval.

“dad’s not here.” he spoke through the cigarette in his mouth. then no one spoke.

“is that my skirt?” allison broke the silence. 

klaus looked down at the leather skirt that swayed beneath his knees.

“well, i looked through your closet, and although it’s a bit dated, i put it on and it’s a bit breathey... on the bits.” he responded, he wavered his hand over his crotch, with the cigarette in between his fingers. and a glass of, what i imagine, whisky. klaus then sat close to me, not leaving any space between us. after that, i zoned out completely. all i did was stare at klaus and his beautiful eyes. they held so much emotion, yet he showed little of it. and he stared back. until luther interrupted. 

“dad’s dead, but i don’t think it was a heart attack. he sounded strange the last time i spoke to him” luther let out.

“quelle suprise!” klaus gargled his whisky, making it shoot from the corners of his mouth. getting some whisky on my cheek. i wiped it off and giggled a little bit.

“stange how?” allison asked.

“he said to look out and that i shouldn’t trust many people from then on.”

“listen, dad was a bitter old man. who died of heart failure.” said diego, getting up from the arm-chair he was sat in.

“yeah, i thought the coroner’s report said that?” vanya questioned.

“but i don't think it was.” luther then looked at klaus. and from what i can gather, he was gonna ask him to speak to reginald about his death. “look, i know you don’t like it, but i need you to contact dad.”

“i can’t just call dad from the afterlife and be like ‘hey dad, can you stop playing tennis with hitler for a moment and take a quick call?’“ klaus said. waving his hands in the air. which were occupied with his whisky and cigarette. 

“why? i thought that was your thing?” luther said.

“yeah - but i'm not in the right frame of mind!” klaus chuckled.

“you’re high!” allison shouted.

“yeah! yeah! i am, and i don’t know how you’re not... listening to all this nonsense!” klaus argued. 

“well sober up now! this is important!” luther said.

“listen you guys - he was found without his monocle.” he said, finally in a calm manner. 

“who gives a shit about a stupid monocle?” diego piped up.

“exactly, which means his death must have been personal, someone who held a grudge. someone wanted dad dead.” luther said.

“where are you going with this?” klaus said, taking a puff from his cigarette.

“isn’t it obvious klaus - he think one of us killed dad.” diego replied.

luther looks at me.

he thinks i did it! what a prick. i thought. 

ah yes! me, number 8. the last of the hargreeve children. i hated my name, so much so, that i found my birth certificate in reginald’s desk draw, and had him legally change my surname back to its original state. but that’s all thanks to my powers really. if i didn’t have my powers, he wouldn’t have let me change my surname. my ‘siblings’ and klaus all knew i hated reginald. not just because he bought us from our original parents for our powers, but because even after that, he never treated us like children. but more like experiments. for the love of fuck, he made a robot as a mum for us, he was that incapable of taking care of us. but i never showed any sign of hatred in front of grace. she was too kind, even though she was made of metal, at least she treated us all with motherly affection. so, my powers. i could inflict pain on whoever i wanted, make them see their worst nightmares so vividly that they would turn mad. however, i could also heal and love. i could make someone see a beautifully crafted dream and heal their pain within seconds. my powers were what klaus would call ‘bipolar’. whenever one of the hargreeve siblings were having a nightmare or had hurt themselves, i would help. i remember the time that klaus had woke up from a nightmare a few months before we all parted ways. he had had a dream about me being taken away from him, as well as the others. he woke up in a cold sweat. luckily, as he was dreaming, i heard him thrash around in his bed, pleading for it to stop whilst whispering our names through his gritted teeth, breathing paced quickly. when he woke up, i was beside him, hugging him. soothing the emotional pain that wreaked his mind. as he hugged back, my powers enveloped him and soon he fell back asleep. that was the end of that...

“what we all know she has a passion for being rude to dad, and we all know that she hated him!” luther shrugged. 

i couldn’t believe my ears. my own ‘sibling’ accused me of murdering reginald. i got up from off the sofa and walked up close to luther.

“you’d fucking love that wouldn’t you, pegging the blame on the one that hated “dad” so much, that they lost all emotions and cold-bloodedly killed him!” i shouted at luther, air-quoting the word ‘dad’. 

“you think i would stoop so low as to kill a man?” i asked, shrugging my shoulders. 

luther peered at me from under his eye lids. i wasn’t scared of him. and he knew it. in a way, i could probably cause more damage to him than he could to me. 

“well, if you weren’t such a brat to him, i wouldn’t have speculated anything in the first place.” he replied, eyes thin. 

allison had her head in her hand, angry that luther was accusing me of such a thing. even she knew i would never go that far as to kill someone without a reason. i would only ever harm someone if needed. to be frank, i only ever used my healing abilities after i left the umbrella academy. but i would use my pain-giving powers from time to time. all whilst this was happening, klaus looked at me pained. he knew i would never hurt reginald. no matter how much i disliked the man. 

“you know, even after 16 years, you’re still the biggest dick i’ve come across. i honestly thought that reginald sending you to the moon for a while, would somehow take away that bitter persona you hold tightly onto.” i seethed. pointing at his heart. 

“shut up.” he breathed out. 

my eyes turned dark. one thing reginald learnt from me. never piss me off... i looked to the sofa that diego was sat on. diego looked just as sorry as klaus did. but klaus didn’t show his emotions in the way diego did. i then looked back to luther.

“no.” i said. i then returned to my place of the sofa next to allison and klaus. he continued to stand in the middle of the living room, looking like the mighty beast he was. however, that ‘mighty beast’ didn’t faze me at all. 

“alright guys, that’s enough. we have been here for little under 12 hours and we are already at each others damn throats.” diego stepped in. “as for you luther, you’re seriously suggesting that y/n killed dad. are you nuts?” he then left.

luther went quiet again.

“you’re crazy man - you’re crazy!” klaus shouted, standing up from the sofa.

then vanya left. 

“wait - i’m not finished” luther ejected, but no one cared enough to listen. 

“i’ll be right back, me and y/n are just off to murder mum.” klaus said, still puffing on the cigarette. he stood there holding out his hand for me to take. i got up from off the sofa and took his hand. we then walked out of the living area. 

“that’s not what i meant!” luther shouted out to klaus and i. 

we were too enveloped in each other, that we didn’t hear what luther said, neither did we care.

part 2 out now!

[tonystarktogo]

An Unwise Murder (An Inconvenient Survival)

Summary: “Someone within SHIELD sold out an Avenger. That was their first mistake.” When Avenger Steve Rogers is declared killed in action, everyone expects his best friend and fellow agent Bucky Barnes to go on a rampage. It’s the quirky mechanic with a sharp tongue and a secret talent for less-than-legal hacking that throws the whole agency for a loop. Featuring: A dead Steve (but when is Steve ever dead), a very pissed off, fucked-up secret agent Bucky (so basically your usual Bucky), and a very civilian Tony (who is exactly as harmless as you’d expect Tony Stark to be).

Read on AO3

Here is, as promised, the first part of the Double-0-Bucky/Hacker-Tony fic! To most of you, this part will probably be familiar already, but we have to start at the beginning *shrugs* and don’t worry, the next part will follow soon. Enjoy!

Part I 

Funerals aren’t meant to be a pleasant event, so Bucky doesn’t bother to put on a show.

His face could be carved in stone for all the emotion it conveys, and his muscles are tense, coiled, trembling faintly with the desire to grab his gun and pull the damn trigger.

Bucky isn’t sure if he’d stop shooting once he starts though. Not with how many tempting targets currently surround him. Not with how it would finally shut Pierce the fuck up. People tend to talk a lot less after you’ve emptied a magazine or two into them  — and Bucky has always been a man who appreciates silence.

Fuck, Bucky doesn’t even know what he’s here for. He doesn’t attend mandatory events. It simply isn’t done. The few weeks of the year that Bucky spends in his own country, he wastes drinking and sleeping around, often both at the same time. What’s to stop him from walking straight out of this impersonally sterile room filled with people he doesn’t trust, and go back to his favourite rundown bar to knock back vodka until he can’t feel the cold on his skin anymore?

Oh right. His best friend just got himself killed in action. The lucky bastard.

On a fucking nightmare of a mission in France of all places. If it had been Russia or Iran or North Korea or even just Sokovia (and really, it takes skill to be wanted by all four sides of the conflict), Bucky could have dealt with it.

But France? Bucky takes that as a personal offence.

Avengers don’t get killed in France. Avengers get killed the way they kill: brutal and messy, with no one left behind who’d bother to avenge them. Because justice is a fairy tale, and every act of peace is built on the actions of someone smart enough to wash the blood off their hands before they step in front of a camera.

At least the acknowledgements are short and free of false sentimentality. A whole lot of bullshit, sure, but it’s not like there is another choice. Not when the truth amounts to Steve Rogers died on a mission we weren’t authorised to give, in a country he wasn’t supposed to be in, over intel that we won’t admit exist.

Bucky doesn’t laugh. Barely huffs a a breath, but the people on both sides of him twitch tellingly.

Like all Avengers, Bucky has sought out the back of the room, where he can keep his back to the wall at all times, has a clear view on all available exists and a good excuse to keep an eye on the crowd of mourners.

The thought that one of them — multiple ones, possibly — are faking their sorrow makes Bucky clench his fingers against the urge to start an interrogation right now, Avenger style.

“Don’t kill anyone you might need to sign you off on field work again,” Barton mutters to his left, the words barely audible.

Bucky forces the tense muscles in his shoulders to relax, adopts an at-ease position that won’t fool the other Avengers, but at least won’t traumatise the attending techies and lawyers. The psych department always makes such a fuss when you break their precious, civilian employees.

There’s no point in fooling his colleagues though — if the Avengers can even be called that. It’s not like he meets them for brunch or goes out drinking with them in his downtime. They’re the elite of a internationally operating spy organisation for a reason, and it’s certainly not their ability to play well with others.

Just hours after having one of their own killed in a SHIELD-issued safehouse, all the Avengers are on edge. More so than usual. That the entire op smells like foul play all the way across the Atlantic does about as much to deescalate the situation as throwing a hand grenade into a room filled with weaponized uranium.

Someone inside SHIELD sold out an Avenger.

That was their first mistake. Their second was taking Steve out without killing Bucky as well.

There’s a shift in Bucky’s peripheral vision. Natasha Romanoff, codenamed Black Widow, looks as affected of recent events as she always does: not at all.

Is she the traitor? Bucky wonders as he tilts his head ever so slightly in acknowledgement. The rivalry between Black Widow and Steve is no secret. It isn’t a friendly one either, not that any of the Avengers are the sort of person one might associate the word “friendly” with. She betrayed the Red Room at eighteen. What offer would it take for her to turn on a fellow agent? An Avenger at that? Is she tense because she expects me to do this country a favour by killing Pierce or is she afraid to be found out?

The service lasts barely twenty minutes — unsurprising, considering how much isn’t said, can’t be said, because living within the specter of the highest security clearance makes for a shoddy eulogy — but to Bucky it feels like forever.

It doesn’t help that half the people around him are waiting for him to fly off the handle in either grief or blind rage. Blind rage admittedly being the more likely outcome.

It doesn’t help that the other half undoubtedly suspects him to be the traitor — who better to kill Steve Rogers than his best friend, after all? Especially when Avengers so clearly don’t have best friends — though Bucky can’t fault them for the sensible assumption.

He’d suspect himself too. The black hole that is four years of being held as a POW on his résumé hasn’t left him with what one might call a solid standing within the agency. Or a stable life in general.

Bucky has simply been lucky that Avengers don’t have much use for stability as it is. (Also, Steve was planning a revolt, should they stop attempting to recover Bucky. Not that anyone likes to acknowledge that. Pierce’s secretary still pales every time she catches sight of one of them.)

He’s been lucky that he’s too useful to be killed.

That might change now — Steve Rogers’ death changes a lot of things — but if it comes to that, Bucky will make damn sure to take the traitor with him. Another outcome isn’t acceptable.

And Bucky is very, very good at getting what he wants.

But first, he needs to find someone clean — meaning unaffiliated with SHIELD in any way — who can take a look at the USB flash drive he’s found in one of his dead drops two days after Pierce declared Steve KIA.

Fuck, but the first thing Bucky is gonna do when he sees Steve again is punch him in the fucking face.

*

Tony has always had an interesting way of making friends.

For example, Tony meets his best friend Pepper during a hostage situation when he’s sixteen. He’s never before seen a girl throw high heels at a guy’s head with such a deadly accuracy. Suffice to say Tony likes her immediately — and promises to buy her all the shoes she needs to knock stupid people down, naturally.

They keep in touch afterwards, and it’s the start of something great.

He meets his brother in all but blood much the same way, only Tony barely remembers that one because those kidnappers were smart enough to drug him before trying anything funny. Luckily, Tony has Rhodey for the straight thinking part — or at least he does after that episode.

On another, memorable occasion, Tony befriended one of his kidnappers.

In his defence: they were some pretty alright people, for being criminals holding him for ransom. No unnecessary threats or bodily harm, and they actually gave him drug-free food too. Also, you have no idea how mind-numbingly boring being kidnapped is. Well, not the getting kidnapped part but the staying-kidnapped-whilst-your-kidnappers-fail-to-get-their-money part.

Sadly, some people still believe that Stark Industries will pay for the disowned heir Tony Stark’s safe return. And usually they don’t react too well to being proven wrong. That time being one of those rare exceptions. In no small part thanks to a certain member of the crew whose identity Tony will protect until the day he dies. Or something.

Never mind.

The point is, Tony is used to meeting cool people under very hazardous, extraordinary circumstances.

Which is why — as he will later explain to a very exasperated Rhodey and an even more distrustful Pepper — when Tony locks up his garage at 7.40 pm after a long day of changing oils and busted tires, only to suddenly find himself face to face with a hooded stranger — after he’s already locked the doors, though he won’t share that part with his friends — he doesn’t panic.

He greets the guy — there’s a twenty percent chance Tony knows him, okay, hiding their faces as they track him down isn’t exactly a rarity — like a civilised person instead.

“Hi there,” Tony says with his best customer smile. “How may I help you?”

The guy — who definitely has more upper body strength than Tony, not that he notices or anything — doesn’t so much as twitch. He just stands there, body turned towards Tony, face shadowed by his hood. Tony really should have switched out the broken light bulb ages ago, maybe then he wouldn’t have to squint at his visitor like a sceptical squirrel, trying to make out the guy’s features.

“Anthony Stark?” the guy asks after a moment, voice low and rumbling, like gathering clouds on the far end of the horizon, as a violent storm approaches.

It’s that specific, unfairly nice sound that decides it: Tony definitely doesn’t know this guy. There’s no way he would have forgotten a voice like that.

Tony lets his smile brighten a little because if he’s about to be kidnapped — is it that time of the month already? Tony wouldn’t know, his last calendar sorta had a small accident involving a fire and DUM-E using up all the fire extinguisher on Tony rather than the actual fire. It was a pretty sweet, protective gesture, actually. Tony may or may not have teared up, just a little, but that didn’t change that half his equipment had to be replaced — then he’d like to start their working relationship on a good note. The kidnapping attempts tend to have less violent endings that way.

Additionally, Tony really doesn’t want to start a fight in his garage. This is his work place — which is basically holy, ask anyone. His cars are in here. They are not acceptable collateral damage, no matter what Pepper says.

“Do you know a Steve Rogers?” is mystery guy’s next question.

Which is a damn shame because it takes all of Tony’s not inconsiderable self-control to not tense at that particular inquiry. Steve Rogers.

God fucking damn it.

Tony forces the memories, the reflexive questions — a bloodied, broken body, screams of pain, narrowed, blue eyes glaring at him even as strong hands push him out of the line of fire — down immediately, takes care to keep his expression calm and clueless instead. He’s got lots of practice doing that. It’s just like being confronted with an obnoxious reporter who won’t stop bothering him with stupid questions about why he denies his father’s legacy. Bloodthirsty reporters, bloodthirsty assassins, it’s really just more of the same.

Tony has been handling shit like this since he was nine. If mystery guy expects him to trip up and give up even a single piece of information the easy way, he’s got another thing coming. Tony Stark doesn’t do easy.

Especially not when it concerns people he almost considers tolerable. Those gems are hard enough to find as it is — well, among the boring, totally legal working crowd at least — Tony will protect them with all he has. Not that he wouldn’t do the same for people he doesn’t like, he just wouldn’t be as happy about it.

Mystery guy is in for a surprise.

“Rogers?” Tony furrows his eyebrows in confusion. “That doesn’t ring a bell.” Close enough to the truth to count.

Then, the grin slides completely off Tony’s face and his eyes narrow in open suspicion. “Not that it matters. I don’t make a habit of handing out contact information to strangers who can’t be bothered to introduce themselves. Client privileges, I’m sure you understand.”

And yeah, some sarcasm may slip into those words, but can you blame Tony? He’s been working for almost ten hours in that special place reserved in hell for customer service, and, frankly, Tony is done with the world for the day. That he’s most likely dealing with what’s either a very diligent mercenary or a very strange kidnapper does little to lighten his mood.

Both options are far less appealing than mystery guy’s sexy voice initially indicated. Tony feels a little cheated.

“Oh, I understand,” mystery guy murmurs ominously.

When Tony squints, he can literally see the shadows behind the guy blacken. On an unrelated note, he really needs to stop binge-watching those horror flicks. Clearly it’s messing with his mind.

Not that this keeps Tony from bristling at Mystery Guy’s threatening tone — if anything, it has Tony reflexively square his shoulders because he does not fold.

Mystery guy snorts, and Tony has the fleeting impression that the stranger has the gall to be amused by him. He kind of wants to deck the guy just for that.

“I can see why he liked you.”

Something in those words freezes Tony into place long before his brain has puzzled through their meaning. By the time his mind catches up to the past tense that refers to a person it should absolutely not refer to, mystery guy has already taken a few steps towards the only functioning light bulb in Tony’s garage and slips his hoodie back.

The bleak light reveals a pale, handsome face with a strong jaw and icy, blue eyes. Absently, Tony approves of the way the hoodie has messed up Mystery Guy’s wild hair into something untameable and unfairly attractive, but it’s kind of hard to melt into a puddle of appreciative goo when you’ve just learned of the death of a friend.

Or well, acquaintance maybe. Rhodey always reminds Tony that he can’t just go around, adopting friends left and right just because he wants to. And with Steve it’s hard to say. The guy is almost impossible to read.

Still, it’s Steve they’re talking about. And whatever mess he’s gotten himself involved in, Tony doesn’t doubt for a moment that Steve thought he was doing it for the right reasons. He’s annoyingly self-righteous like that. It sucks even more when you listen to him rant and realize he’s got a point, not that Tony will ever admit such a thing to his face.

Which will be hard to do if Steve is actually—

Tony presses his lips together and defiantly stares up at Mystery Guy. Who is, in fact, taller than him. There really is no justice in the world.

“Who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want?” is what Tony settles on to summarize the maelstrom of confusing emotions wrecking chaos inside him.

The man takes a threatening step closer. Of course, it’s not that hard to come across as threatening when you’re half a head taller and made of muscles and steel. Still. The guy could at least try to keep his looming on the downlow.

Not that Tony does him the courtesy of giving up an inch. This is his garage, damn it. No one makes Tony feel afraid in his own home.

Mystery Guy growls and there is a lethal coldness in his eyes that Tony doesn’t think a human should be able to portray.

“I was Steve’s best friend. And you’re going to find the people who killed him so that I can return the favor.”

Thoughts? 

[omegangrins]

The Hateful 8: Chris Mannix was made the Sheriff of Red Rock by his siblings so they could kill him from a distance.

Tl;dr: Due to his intelligence, mouth, and aspirations, Chris Mannix "was" appointed Sheriff of Red Rock via a sham election organized by his siblings so they could kill him anonymously from a distance.

I love the ambiguous nature of Walton Goggin's character Chris Mannix in The Hateful Eight. A man who joined his father and family to ransack towns in order to inspire fear for the Confederacy, dying by the side of the type of person he hated most. All whilst claiming to be a lawman. And it's always made me wonder if he was telling the truth or.... not really actually. I always thought he was telling the truth. Cause he never lies throughout the whole movie. In fact, he catches several people in lies (Marquis, Gage, Daisy). There are even several times where he refers to himself as a Sheriff believing that he will live to carry out his threats. He's either an excellent actor with his own side game in this movie, or he truly believes what he says is true.

Here's where things get subjective and I don't have a lot of information on (Part of why I'm putting it out to the world.). There's a line by John Ruth where he says that Chris is Erskine Mannix's youngest boy. Now here's where you can imply a few things. We know he's not an only child definitely not one of two sibling, or Ruth would refer to Chris as "the other one" or some such. And he says youngest boy so we can infer that Erskine had daughters. Meaning that if this is a regular Carolinan family from the 1800's, they would have as many kids as possible. Low ball estimate of 2 girls and 4 boys. But enough of them to dislike the little one.

Now let's look at Chris. If he's the youngest of the family then one could infer that he's had the hard life. Almost a runt in the litter type. But he's a man who values dignity and true leadership. Both traits of honest men. Then if we take what he says about being Sheriff to be true, he also never tells a lie, makes a deception, or attempts to hurt/kill anyone preemptively (at least any one that hadn't already tried to kill him 😄). He even realizes his tongue is getting him into stupid trouble on the stagecoach so he shuts down the conversation and apologizes for his getting riled up. Clearly a man that understands the rules of society and is happy to play by them. Yet still an honest man nonetheless.

His honesty can even be seen in his dissemination of other people's lies. It takes him less than 15 minutes after learning of Marquis' letter to realize it was a fake, and he didn't even have to read it. All he did was add up the pieces of Major Marquis Warren he knew. Joe Gage he more or less guessed/used instinct. But, he figured out that all of what Daisy Domergue said was bullshit the same way he figured out Warren's letter was shit: character context clues. So, he's great at spotting lies. This will come in later with the family bit.

This is what makes me think about this the most though. He always refers to himself as the new Sheriff of Red Rock. Not just in greetings but in negotiation stances and regular interactions. When Mannix meets John Ruth and Co. and Ruth asks for his badge, Chris tells them that if they're bounty hunters, it's him they're taking their dead bounties to. And when John Ruth refuses to let him board without manacles, Mannix tells O.B. that he will be legally obliged to inform the Marshal at Red Rock that Ruth left the new Sheriff to freeze without assisting him. A similar thing happens when they reach the Haberdashery. When Marquis draws his weapon on Sanford E. Smithers, and Oswaldo Mobray's reminds him that he'll hang in Red Rock if he does. Mannix steps next to Smithers and reaffirms that he will make sure that Marquis will hang, seeing that he is the new Sheriff and all. In fact, one of the first things that Chris does is interact with the person he believes to be Red Rock's new hangman. Going so far as to ask if he can see the hanging papers for the man who shot the Sheriff that Chris is replacing. He even cordially chats up with Oswaldo, reasoning they'll be working together soon.

And finally, near his deathbed, with no one to care, he declares his "first and final act, as the Sheriff of Red Rock" is to have Domergue hanged. A rather strange moment to commit to a lie, if it were one. Especially considering Marquis lets him read the faux Lincoln letter minutes letter. Sure seems like the perfect opportunity to confess all of one's lies and yet Chris stays quiet. So we can assume that he meant what he said. Or at least, he thought it was true....

This is where the Mannix family comes back into play. We learn during bits of dialogue throughout the movie that Erskine Mannix led a team of Confederate rebels known as Erskine's Marauders during and after the Civil War. It can be implied that the entire Mannix family was apart of this, since it's said their numbers reached around 400. So of course Erskine's kids would hop on this hate train. Chris says as much when talking about fighting under his father's command. Erskine Mannix held the Marauders together after the war with nothing but his command and respect. In fact, it's one of the things Chris most admired about his father. You can tell he looked up to his daddy.

Now I get into the extrapolating subjective era. Remember what I said about the number of kids? Call it 6 kids for Erskine with Chris being the youngest but probably smartest. Several characters also bring up that Erskine died recently. So this leaves a power vacuum. It's probably one of those situations like in the stagecoach where he can run his mouth a bit too much, or like he does with Ruth and Warren, use legal leverage to gain an upper hand. (If this was Game of Thrones, Chris would be a Tyrion type character. Good natured, hated, but bloody good at playing the game.). He's a player that needed to be shut up. I'd wager there came a time after/before Erskine died where Chris wanted more power in the family. He started to exert influence and amass bits of power, becoming more politically dangerous. Sort of like Fredo.

Seeing this, his brothers and sisters decide to hatch a simple scheme to kill him one of three ways. First, they pay a man to kill the Sheriff in Red Rock (I imagine as Marauders they would have plenty of cash. Look at Chris, he ain't dressed in rags.) and bribe public officials to rig the election so Chris becomes Sheriff. They do this in order to make it seem authentic to the already established sharp-eyed Chris Mannix. With the hard part done, next comes the killing. The first death they set up in Red Rock along with the previous bribing. All it takes is finding someone else *also* willing to kill the Sheriff. That way when Chris comes to town, he suffers the same fate as the Sheriff before him. Second way is by horse. This is closer to conjecture but Chris doesn't seem to have the attachment to his horse that Marquis did. Meaning either that it wasn't his horse, it was but he didn't care, or that no one asked him so that's something about him we'll never know. What it could mean though, is that he was given a lame horse without his knowledge. Third thing is the blizzard. It's a long distance from Wyoming to Red Rock. And a blizzard that large would have signs that would be spottable even back then. So he was sent into a white hell on a lame horse heading to an eventual bullet. Sounds like a plan that we're not seeing all the pieces of. So if his family was planning to get rid of him and his overly smart and mouthy ways, they had set up several opportunities to have it done.

Final weird thing to think about. There is a complaint that The Hateful Eight title doesn't work numerically with the characters we are given and their backstories. To that I would add that it does. I think O.B. and Mannix are the two odd "good" guys out, either with integrity or by not trying to actively hurt anyone in the story. Everyone of the main characters tries to kill other people in cold blood, and only O.B. and Mannix shoot no one, or wait until they are shot at. And if you include his telling the truth to himself that he is Sheriff, then he and O.B. are the only "pure of heart" ones.

In the end, Chris was telling the truth and also unknowingly lying. True that he'd been made Sheriff, and a lie that he would stay that way for long. He's the best of both worlds. The greyest of grey characters.

[lawlilight]

Netflix Death Note: My Thoughts

So the long awaited American adaptation of Death Note arrived on Netflix on Friday the 25th of August, and it’s clear to see that the reviews are certainly mixed.

Let’s just jump right in and get down to the many faults with this adaptation.

Note* This isn’t all doom and gloom, as I think there is definitely some room for appraisal. There will be many spoilers ahead but who cares, right?

Light Turner (Light Yagami):

Light is essentially a bit of a loser, taking crap from bullies and even from L. As we know from the anime, Light isn’t hesitant on throwing in a good ol’ punch to the face. Yet in this adaptation, Light seems to just accept any grief that he is presented with. In addition to this, Light appears to be a bit of a loner, as we never see him socialising with any friends. Now in the anime, whilst it wasn’t common for Light to have the boys around for a few games of Mario Kart, he was still acknowledged around school to “hang out” with other students, but he of course declined because he’s a busy bee with a rotten world to cleanse

Another point to mention regarding Netflix Light is how careless he is. At many moments throughout the movie, Light can be seen shouting about the Death Note whilst in loud conversation with Mia (Misa Amane) and he even has his Death Note out on his lap during gym class. Whereas we all know that anime Light would never do something like that. He understood the importance of keeping the Death Note hidden from absolutely everyone, and wouldn’t dare openly talk about it in public. Because why would he be so careless? He wouldn’t. This links in to Lights intelligence, or so to say, craftiness.

Netflix Light doesn’t appear to be the brains of the operation, except at a few key points towards the end of the movie. throughout the anime, Light had his head screwed on from the start, and he allowed absolutely nothing to get in his way. He also wouldn’t sacrifice the Death Note for anyone or anything (except when Sayu, but of course he had a plan to wind up getting the Death Note back) In the Netflix adaptation, it is more Mia who has true intentions for the Death Note, and it appears that Light doesn’t really have everything set in stone, as he did in the anime. I’ll elaborate more on that when I discuss Mia’s character.

A crucial key aspect to mention is that at no point did Light proclaim “I am the God of the new world”, which is severely disappointing,as anime Light genuinely believed that he was Justice, but Netflix Light just wants to be a do-gooder and be rid of the bad guys. Netflix Light also never has a psychotic moment of ranting to Ryuk, himself, or anyone for that matter. Anime Light is iconic for having random outbursts of craziness, as all great characters do, but Netflix Light is pretty chill throughout the movie, with the exception of the moments in which he thought he was about to get caught out. I just believe that it would’ve been more enjoyable for Netflix Light to have been portrayed as the Evil Genius that we know him as.

Now onto Mia Sutton (Misa Amane):

In complete contrast to Anime Misa, a cute blonde model with a slight sinister streak, Mia Sutton is a dark haired edgy cheerleader who smokes (see? bad habits = bad movie) In a weird way, from watching Mia, I got the feeling that she was more suited to be Light Yagami than what Netflix Light was. Let me explain: At the beginning of the movie, Mia is the typical semi-popular good looking cheerleader. However, the look on her face is like a constant expression of boredom, similar to anime Light at the beginning. When Mia discovers the power of Lights Death Note, she is the one who is more keen on changing the world, as though it was her all along who has been “bored” of how things have been working out in the legal system, and as though she is the one with the real desire to be rid of all criminals in the world. This includes the lives of innocents who stand in her way.

The key difference between Mia and Misa is that Mia’s drive to use the Death Note is for her own personal desire, and she is very willing to throw Light under the bus, as revealed when she wrote his name in the notebook and promised to burn it so long as he gave her ownership of it. Whereas Misa on the other hand done everything under Lights instruction, and wouldn’t dare step out of line. This can be said to be because Misa was infatuated with Light, therefore her use of the Death Note was to assist him. If anything, Mia is more problematic to Light, despite being clever, that what Misa was.

This adaptation really spun things around for Misa’s character, as it conveyed Mia as intelligent, and only looking out for herself. I suppose this is only considered a fault if you prefer the original Misa.

Furthermore, the relationship between Light and Mia is also in stark contrast to Light and Misa. Netflix Light appears to be genuinely in love with Mia, and it actually seems that he is more interested in her than what she is with him, as we can assume she is only in it for the Death Note. Anime Light has zero romantic attraction to Misa, and only kept her safe as he was under threat from Rem. If it wasn’t for that, Light would’ve disposed of Misa in a heartbeat in order to make matters less problematic for himself. And yes, whilst we can say “but Netflix Light wrote Mia’s name in the Death Note” I don’t believe that was his intention from the start. I think he genuinely loved Mia, but upon realising that she was going behind his back and eventually holding his life against him, he had to fight back.

Another cringe detail on Mia and Lights relationship is how edgy and quirky they are. Their relationship is portrayed as slightly darker than anime Light and Misa. For example, they “make out” whilst writing names in the notebook. Honestly, how twisted does one have to be to get in the mood whilst killing people? In addition to their edge & quirk, Netflix Light has a “normal people scare me” picture in his locker, next to a picture of the two of them, Light and Mia. C'mon guys, only the edgiest of teens own American Horror Story merchandise. Having said that, I do see a slight resemblance between Netflix Light and Mia to Evan Peters and Emma Roberts… Oh, not to mention their edgy homecoming pictures. Choking? Very edgy indeed.

Now onto L:

Whilst my thoughts on L may be bias, as he is my favourite character in the anime and the movie, I am able to acknowledge his faults. Let’s start with his irrationality. For the beginning of the movie, Netflix L appeared to walk in similar footsteps to that of anime L, with some minor changes such as the way in which he addressed Kira during a press release, and confronted Light in a cafe of sorts. However, the calm and collected demeanour suddenly shifts after Watari’s disappearance, when L begins to panic. Instead of taking a rational approach, as anime L would, Netflix L decides to let his emotions get the better of him, and carries out a series of irrational behaviours: starting with almost assaulting Light at his house, before being stopped by a poorly portrayed Soichiro Yagami (but more on that later), then onto stealing a police car and, whilst being armed with a gun, recklessly chases after Light, and then attempts to shoot him. As we have witnessed in the anime, L isn’t keen on moving around much, so this adaptation was probably a bit too quick and fast to suit anime L. Another mistake Netflix L makes is announcing to a bystander that he is a detective and Light is Kira, and that’s why he’s pointing a gun at him. Of course, L is ultimately struck down by this bystander, allowing Light to escape. What was disappointing about this was that anime L would’ve known that virtually anyone could be a Kira supporter, and would’ve done anything to protect who they thought was Kira, so the real rational minded L wouldn’t have made that announcement. To be fair, the real rational minded L wouldn’t have been having a physical showdown with Kira in the back alley of a restaurant in the first place.

My final kick at Netflix L is that he’s a bit of a crybaby, very much unlike anime L. Throughout the movie, Netflix L is shown to be very passionate about justice and all that business, but he seems a little /too/ passionate. He is even seen to be crying at the end of the movie, which we know is very uncommon for the original L. This can be perceived to make L look weak, and sort of as though he’s lost the “war”.

In conclusion to Netflix L, this adaptation managed to maintain his quirks and mannerisms, however I do believe that he was made to be more emotional, which I guess is a good thing as we get to see that he is a real human.

Ok so here’s a lil list of various other flaws that aren’t necessarily worth making a big rant about:

•Watari’s name is Watari, and not an alias. This made it easy for Light (well technically Mia) to kill him.

•Wammy’s house has a different name, and it’s also dead. The orphanage has been abandoned and it just looks sad.

•The guy who played the guy who’s supposed to be Soichiro Yagami (cba learning the names) was not the best at all. His performance was so dry and pretty much annoying. The real daddy yagami wouldn’t stand for this.

•There is no Mello, Near, Matt, or any of the task force.

•Lights mum is dead and there isn’t a little sister who can’t do quadratic equations.

•Everything seems to move a bit too fast in the film, so I think that if you weren’t familiar with Death Note, then you’d probably be confused as to what’s happening.

•Ryuk isn’t that thing in the corner that laughs maniacally and makes the odd quip. Instead, he’s quite keen on making Light give up the Death Note, as he can see the trouble it’s causing. Anime Ryuk is preferable as he thrived off the chaos, which made his character more appealing.

There are most likely many more but I feel like I’ve dug deep enough.

I have to admit, the soundtrack for the Netflix adaptation was actually really good

[casualarsonist]

Nostalgia Killer - Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

I used to have a podcast, and this was a segment on it. I’m going to be extensively shitting on Uncharted 2, so this seems like the best banner under which to do that - at least this way you’ll know what you’re in for.

Before booting up Uncharted 2 (the remastered edition) I’d had delightful premonitions of what I was going to write here, largely based on my memories of my last two or three playthroughs of the game. I was keen to witness the visual upgrades of the PS4 version, of course, but I was also looking forward to talking about Among Thieves’ wholesale gameplay improvements over its predecessor, the improvements that solidified its place as one of the greatest adventure games in video game history. So I started the game up and worked my way through the iconic opening section as Nate wakes up in a crashed train dangling precariously over a cliff edge…and after I’d finished it I put the controller down and didn’t come back to it for six full months.

Something had changed. Not within the game itself - the remastered edition is exactly the same as the original, 1080p upgrade aside. And despite the accuracy of H. Bomberguy’s life-ruining video accusing the series of being completely devoid of freedom, offering little more than a collection of expensively animated tunnels that one is relentlessly forced down, it wasn’t this revelation that had shaken me either. No, something had changed in me - perhaps in my expectations, or in a misremembered idea of the game’s qualities, but this was not the enjoyable experience I recalled. Finishing Uncharted 2 this time around was a chore, and my nostalgic review became an article, and my rose-tinted memory darkened to a crimson scorn. Here I come kiddies, ready to shit on your memories again. This is Nostalgia Killer.

                                                                    ***

For the uninitiated, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is a 2008 third-person action-adventure game, and the second of Nathan Drake’s grand Playstation 3 adventures. To Naughty Dog’s credit, they worked hard to tighten up and polish a lot of the ideas and mechanics of the first game (reviewed here) with more enjoyable gunplay, more lifelike animation, and more varied and detailed environments. The narrative improvements are marked, and they’ve been particularly ambitious when it comes to the interactions between characters both in cutscenes and otherwise. But while the game succeeds in being a refinement in all these areas, there are still some serious growing pains evident in its design, especially ten years on from its release. I’ve said of Uncharted 4 that if you’ve played one Uncharted game, you’ve played them all, and it was here in Uncharted 2 where that adage begins, where all the familiar beats and tropes would be defined and repeated ad nauseam. Sadly, this isn’t a trend only visibly when viewing the series as a whole, but glaringly obvious within this game alone.

The story follows Drake as he’s dragged ‘back in’ to a life of roguish non-legal adventuring by a pair of shifty old colleagues - Harry Flynn and Chloe Frazer. Coaxed by the thrill of uncovering the location of Marco Polo’s lost fleet and the treasure it carried, Drake and Flynn infiltrate a Turkish museum to steal an artefact containing a map leading to their next location. Flynn double-crosses Drake in a stunning twist (sarcasm), and after serving three months in a Turkish prison, Drake is freed with the help of Chloe and his old friend Sully. Chloe reveals that she is a mole within the army of Serbian mercenary Zoran Lazarević - the man who hired Flynn, who subsequently hired Drake, to find the treasure. The two groups then cross paths back and forth for the next six hours as Drake invariably discovers the next clue to the location of the treasure, and the bad guys invariably show up immediately after to take it away from him.

And while I can understand what they’re trying to do with the format - that is, to make an interactive Indiana Jones film - it’s not long at all before the formula gets tired and very predictable, not the least because the first two acts are essentially one plot point repeated over and over again. See, the thing that Indiana Jones films had going for them was the fact that they’re only a couple of hours long, and one can pretty easily fill a couple of hours with exciting content, even if your bag of tricks is relative small. But when you scale the length of your film up to the equivalent of a quarter of a day whilst retaining the same limited bag of action movie cliches, soon you need to start repeating yourself - a tactic that offers diminishing returns when you’re relying not on depth of story or character to engage people, but on a short-lived dopamine rush inspired by seeing someone hanging off the edge of something precarious. Indiana Jones only fell of a bridge once, not once every ten minutes, and given the Uncharted series’ three types of gameplay (cover-based shooting, climbing, and ‘puzzles’), there simply aren’t enough ideas to sustain a six-hour run-time. Running and gunning - ON A TRAIN; running and gunning - UP A MOUNTAIN; running and gunning - IN A COLLAPSING BUILDING. It’s the same thing Call of Duty has done to death (running and gunning - IN THE FUTURE), and the reason why no-one buys those games for the single player any more. Change the location as many times as you want, but if the people and the situations in your story just repeat themselves again and again and again, you’re not building a game that someone can come back to repeatedly and get the same level of enjoyment out of.

But then again, perhaps that means that they’ve gotten it exactly right - the Transformers films aren’t made to be watched twenty times, they’re designed for maximum impact the first time around - and the first time round, Uncharted 2 is a blast. It’s also accessible, undemanding, and easy to pick up and play at pretty much any time. But much like the Transformers films, the bright lights and flashy colours are designed to distract you from the overwhelming emptiness at the game’s core. Who is this Serbian war criminal? Why do you care? Why is he seeking the Cintamani stone?Because ‘power’. How is it that his group keeps finding Drake at the exact point that he locates the next clue? Stop asking questions. And why do all these bad guys keep threatening to kill people and never actually do it? I said stop asking questions! And just how the fuck did he get hundreds of troops and weapons and vehicles and a fucking tank up to the peak of a forgotten, remote mountain buried deep in the Himala-AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!! Again, one can overlook this kind of narrative short-changing if you’re watching a dumb ninety minute film, but if you’re paying £50 on launch for a six-to-ten hour game, the sheen really starts to wear off when the boards you’re climbing up crumble from beneath you for the 400th time.

But hell, you say, this is just the Uncharted we know and love, right? Sure, it doesn’t have a lot going on, but what it does, it does really well. I imagine that just as many people will feel justified in loving the series for these reasons as much as I feel justified in complaining about them. But I can’t imagine anyone looking back fondly on that level with the tank that will one-shot kill you, or the bit in the mountain temple with the snipers and rocket launchers that will one-shot kill you, or when you’re on the train and have to fight the helicopter and the armoured shotgun troops that will one-shot kill you, or the final boss battle where you run around in circles so he doesn’t one-shot kill you. Because what you forget when you haven’t played the game for a while is that it’s filled with the most horrendous and incongruent difficulty spikes. Enemies take anywhere between one and a dozen hits to kill depending on when the game decides it’s going to change the rules, and while some times eliminating everyone you see will allow you to progress, other times hordes of belligerents will then suddenly spawn from nowhere just because. I’d say that it was dreadfully archaic design that comes from the days when monsters would literally wait in a closet until you stepped on a specific floor texture, except that even Doom kept its enemy health consistent.

I know that it’s ‘action movie logic’, but there’s something uniquely frustrating in Uncharted 2′s design when you’ve just spent fifteen minutes getting fucked over and over again by a handful of enemies, only to be blowing them away by the dozen five minutes later with the exact same weapon you’ve been using all along. Noticing the change just adds insult to injury, and all the while the game autosaves every minute because the developers know that if they made you restart from the beginning every time you died you’d throw your console into oncoming traffic

Which is a shame, because while it is indeed a far more polished release, Uncharted 2 still exhibits the same bad design habits that plague the first Uncharted game - design habits that I know Naughty Dog can leave, behind because I just replayed The Last Of Us, and that game is fucking superb. It still contains a lot of the cover-based shooting gameplay of Uncharted, but there’s something about the balance in difficulty, as well as the variation in weapons and enemy types that makes all the difference in the world - when the developers decide they need to change the pace they don’t change the rules of the game, instead they change the scenario, and this means that while each new set of circumstances might present a greater and greater challenge to the player, your skills at playing the game can improve to meet them as you become more acquainted with the game’s internal rulebook. You’re not coddled for hours before being thrown into an intentionally unwinnable battle, then coddled again, then punished, then coddled, etc, etc. The end result here is that Uncharted 2 often feels cheap in how it tries to challenge and thrill the player, and I can’t go and put myself back in the mindset of a person playing it for the first time in order to understand why it’s seen as something so perfect.

If you still love playing Uncharted 2, I’m not here to convince you that you’re wrong. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what the purpose of writing this article is at all, other than to document the fact that I went back and played one of the most lauded video games in history expecting to write the glowing follow-up review to the first game that I’d promised to do so long ago, and found that without the initial thrill, and contemporary comparisons to make, a lot of its lustre is stripped away. Uncharted 2 is fine, and it’s certainly a hugely influential work, but it’s actually pretty fucking annoying in retrospect. And the fact that you can forget that so easily is perhaps the game’s greatest achievement.