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abitohoney · 1 year

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Hustle - CH3: Preparations

AO3 link

CH1 || CH2 || CH3 || CH4 || CH5

Sevika x female reader

Rating: Explicit, MDNI, NSFW

Tags: Sevika/Reader, Ran & Reader, Established Relationship, assassin reader, Fluff, Smut, Porn with Feelings, Porn With Plot, horny idiots in love, Dom/sub, Dom Sevika, sub Reader, Humor, Banter, Choking, Spanking, Teasing, Light Sadism, Begging, Strap-Ons, Lesbian Sex, Aftercare, Gambling, Smoking, lack of understanding card games, totally winging this shit, Canon-Typical Violence, Blood, Praise Kink, Vaginal Fingering, Semi-Public Sex, Rough Sex, Hair-pulling, reader is not the most graceful creature, but Sevika adores reader all the more for it, Jealousy, Marking, Orgasm Delay, Cunnilingus, Multiple Orgasms, Hurt/Comfort, a Yordle OC that we will likely never see again but I had entirely too much fun writing, 69 (Sex Position)

Word Count: 7.6k

Summary: Looking to make your nights with Sevika a bit more… exciting, you suggest making use of your shared talent for playing cards. Together, the two of you take the Undercity, and even Topside, by storm. And what’s more exciting than the thrill of winning, or watching your opponents whine and gripe in defeat, or earning far more coin than the two of you could possibly spend? The release of pent-up sexual desire that seems to come with each and every win, that’s what.

AN: This is already in process over on AO3.

It was barely morning when you trudged towards the kitchen behind the bar of the Last Drop. Though it was far earlier than your usual time to rise, you slowly pushed open the door to reveal your long-running table mate.

Ran.

They sat at the small table in the center of the room, their chair facing the door. Their usual bowl of bland– you honestly still weren’t what exactly it was– Cereal without milk? Whatever it was it looked tasteless, but Ran seemed content with it, so who were you to say anything?

Ran lifted their head and nodded towards you in a silent greeting.

You nodded back, a bit too tired yet to say anything yourself. Dragging yourself to the refrigerator, you rummaged through the rather sad selection until you came across something that looked mostly palatable.

After grabbing a glass of an equally palatable drink, you made your way to the seat across from Ran. “So, do you have a plan to get us into the tournament topside?”

Last you two had spoken, Ran had told you they’d handle the logistics of getting you and Sevika in, but you weren’t entirely sure what that would involve. Not just anyone was allowed in.

Stirring the food in their bowl, Ran gave a small nod. “Fake identities already entered in the match. Meet at the Promenade tonight for new clothes.”

Well, that was a mouthful for Ran.

Eyes wide in excitement, you replied, “This is going to be wild.” You took a large bite of your breakfast, mind roaming over the possibilities this tournament could open. You might actually be able to pull this off with Sevika. Get yourselves enough coin to buy her an improved arm. Your thoughts came to a halt as Ran’s nonchalant words reached your ears.

“Can’t fuck on those tables though.”

You nearly spat your mouthful of food, choking and sputtering while heat spread up your neck and through your cheeks like wildfire.

Clearing your throat and taking a long sip of your drink, you hesitantly met Ran’s eyes- or rather eye- their fringed black hair obscuring the other.

Their dark lips curled into the tiniest smirk, amused by your antics as always. If you didn’t know any better you’d say Ran and Sevika both colluded in how to make you blush profusely. That or they had a bet to see who could do it the best.

“I- I know that,” you stammered. “How did- how did you know we-?” You couldn’t quite say it, but judging by how Ran’s dark brow raised, they weren’t going to let you off that easily.

Great.

“How did you know we fucked on the table?” you forced out, cheeks somehow burning even hotter.

The corner of their mouth tugged higher. “Didn’t. Just assumed.”

Of course.

“You know we do things other than just fuck,” you pointed out before taking another sip of your drink.

Their brow raised higher.

“Sometimes we just sit together and drink, work on our weapons, play cards, banter…” You trailed off, not willing to admit how all of that almost always inevitably led to fucking. “We also cuddle,” you blurted out.

Oh boy did that send their brow soaring high. You could have sworn you even heard Ran release a little snort of a laugh.

“What?!” you asked incredulously. “Just cause we fuck nasty doesn’t mean we don’t take care of each other afterward! Besides, aren’t you the one who slipped the aftercare book into Sevika’s room way back when?”

Busying themselves with a bite of their… ‘breakfast’, Ran said nothing, but you could only imagine the things running through their head. Nothing good, no doubt.

Sevika would NOT be happy if she ever found out what you’d said.

Your mind wandered to some of her recent punishments. Her pinning your hands behind your back while she smacked your bottom side repeatedly, following each one with the sweetest, most tender, soothing touch that made the space between your legs heat and grow wet.

“She takes good care of me after every wonderful, wild…” you trailed off, searching for a proper description in the memory banks.

“Mind-blowing?” Ran quipped.

You sighed. “Yes. Mind-blowing. After every mind-blowing romp, she is so incredibly caring and tender, even when we continue the banter. She cleans me up, kisses me softly, holds me close, caresses me…” You trailed off, your mind wandering again and allowing you to say far too much.

Sevika would definitely make you pay if she ever found out you’d blurted all that out.

“Do NOT tell her I told you that,” you demanded, leaning across the table with narrowed eyes honed in on Ran’s less than innocent smirking face.

Although Ran lifted both metal and flesh hands in defense, you doubted you could fully trust them to keep their mouth shut. For as little as they spoke, they loved to take every opportunity they could to tease and torment you. And you’d just laid a rather lovely opportunity on a silver platter just for them.

You sat back in your chair with a huff. You needed to change the subject before you said more shit you’d regret.

“Have you seen Sevika this morning? She was gone before I got up.”

“Basement. Working out,” Ran replied, a knowing smirk on their face.

Damnit.

Your nerves were alight as you descended the dark stairs that led to the basement of the Last Drop. Per Ran’s claim Sevika was down there, working out, and likely dressed in her typical training clothing. That was exactly why you dreaded walking through that door.

Sure enough, as you pushed open the heavy door, you found Sevika in just what you expected. Her top half was dressed in a white wrap that technically only covered her chest- just barely at that- leaving that impossibly fit tummy and abs of hers exposed even more than usual. Her bottom half donned only a pair of tight black shorts that accentuated the tops of her muscular thighs and ass. And good god the amount of beautiful, rich brown skin glistening with sweat after spending Janna knows how much time punching the bag hanging from the ceiling beam.

She had her fists drawn up, the side with her human arm facing you, and that bulging bicep right in your line of sight.

Fuck.

You’d come down there to tell her of the upcoming plans to prepare for taking on the fools topside, but clearly this was going to head in an entirely different direction. Unless you could somehow distract yourself.

Then Sevika turned to find you standing just past the threshold, blatantly staring at her. And sure as shit, those lips of hers curled into an annoyingly cocky, sexy smirk.

Damn her.

“Come down for a sparring session?” she taunted while grabbing a towel to wipe her face off.

“No. I-”

“Afraid to get your ass handed to you?” she interrupted. She tossed the towel over her shoulder and turned to face you, mischievous eyes following your movement as you headed for the mat in the middle of the room.

Don’t take the bait.

“No. I came here to work out and talk to you,” you said, taking a seat on the mat and pulling your knees up. Before she could make another attempt to goad you, you added, “Mind holding my feet for me?”

Lying on your back, you crossed your arms across your chest. You were about to start doing sit-ups, presumably without assistance despite your request, when you caught a pair of large boots entering your periphery.

Sevika stopped beside your head, towering over you while you lay flat and peered up at her in anticipation of some biting remark.

“Well?” she asked impatiently, watching you from down her pronounced nose.

“Well what?” You furrowed your brows, legitimately not sure what she was getting at.

“What did you want to talk to me about?”

Oh.

“I realize this is asking a lot of you,” you started sarcastically, “but could you hold my feet for me while we talk?”

“Can’t even do sit-ups by yourself?” she snorted, “Pathetic.”

Don’t take the bait.

You were going to have to repeat that mantra several times to make it through the conversation. She was definitely trying to get you riled up. But you needed to focus. You had important matters to discuss. Banter and the subsequent mind-blowing sex that would surely follow would have to wait.

So you gave her your best puppy-dog eyes and pleaded, “Please Sevika, just while we talk.”

She huffed a derisive laugh, but moved to kneel at your feet. Of course she wouldn’t let you get off that easily though. The moment she placed her hands on your feet, she pressed down much harder than necessary.

“Thank. You,” you ground out through clenched teeth, trying to ignore the urge to scold her for practically smashing your poor feet.

You sat up, taking the exercise slow at first so you could speak. Your view switched from the dimly lit bulb hanging from the ceiling to the stoic face of Sevika, then back again.

“So, I was talking to Ran about what we could do now that we’ve cleaned out most of the Undercity.”

As you sat back up, Sevika’s expression had changed- a single brow quirked in intrigue.

“I actually know of a fancy place topside that holds a big tournament every month. My father used to play there when I was little.”

That time, when you sat up, her lips had tugged upward at one corner.

Here we go.

“Have you ever not been little?” she sneered.

Don’t take the bait.

Ignoring the insult, you continued, “And this tournament has more than just the fancy pants of Piltover playing. It draws in wealthy tourists from all over Runeterra. Just a treasure trove of filthy rich idiots with nothing better to do than gamble their money away.”

Her brow raised even higher, clearly very interested in where this was going.

“Ran already got us some fake identities and entered us in the tournament. Wants us both to meet up with them tonight to get some clothes from a shop on the Promenade level to help fit in I guess.”

You sat back up to find a nasty grimace on Sevika’s face. You paused for a second. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m not wearing a fucking dress,” she growled, baring her teeth.

Oh.

You made absolutely no attempt to hold back your roaring laughter.

“What’s so fucking funny, princess?”

Lying back down against the mat, you took a moment to catch your breath. “Don’t worry. I’m sure Ran will get you a suit instead,” you assured her as you sat back up.

She eyed you suspiciously, but you brushed it off.

“Besides, would it really be that bad? To wear a dress?” you asked, closing your eyes as you tried to picture what that might look like. In all honesty, you thought she’d be beautiful in literally anything. She had the handsome sharp edges that make a suit look good, but also the lovely curves that a dress could accentuate beautifully.

“So you’re going to wear a dress?” she sneered.

You stopped mid sit up.

Fuck.

You had not even considered that to be a possibility. And you didn’t need to open your eyes to see the smirk on her face.

“Ran could get you a pretty little pink one just like the one you wore in the picture when you were little,” she taunted.

That picture. That fucking picture. The bane of your existence and yet it was Sevika’s most prized possession. The picture of you, as a child, wearing a pink, frilly, princess dress for Halloween when you had wanted the black assassin costume instead. The picture Ran had stolen from your place to tease you with. That then Sevika stole to tease you with. That now sat on the bedside table on Sevika’s side of the bed. That you suspected she liked for more than just taunting you with.

“What’s the matter, baby? Don’t you wanna relive your Piltie Princess dreams?” she jeered.

Eyes open, you sat fully upright and glared at her.

Don’t. Take. The. Bait.

You smiled at her– a shit-eating sort of grin. “Maybe we can get you your own pink dress.” You looked up towards the ceiling as if envisioning something. “I can just picture it now. Pretty, pink, Piltie Sevy.”

Shit.

You took the bait.

Smile wiped clean from your face, your eyes dropped to meet Sevika’s. You knew your worry was ever present on your face. You expected her to eat that up, but to your surprise, she let out a hearty chuckle.

Wait. What’s happening?

“Real cute, baby,” she chuckled.

Then, without warning, her expression took an extreme turn– from what you thought was genuine good-natured amusement to full-on evil sneer. “I’m going to make you eat those words.”

And here we go.

But oh! You had an idea. A distraction. With a coy smile, you replied, “I’d rather eat you.”

Now that worked wonders. Her brow raised, smirk faltering for just a moment.

Still grinning, you leaned forward between your knees and gave her nose a quick kiss before lying back down. And when you sat back up, she still wore the same expression. So, you gave her a quick peck on the lips before doing another rep.

You repeated those motions several times. Placing a chaste kiss to a different part of her face each time. And each time you came back up, you found her looking more and more annoyed. At least until your smile started to grow dopier and dopier. Until finally, her lips twitched at the corner, and you knew you’d won.

Or at least you thought you had.

The next time you leaned in, she met you halfway. The startled gasp that left your throat was muffled by the soft press of her lips. Lips that you could feel curl into a smug smile against your own.

Without breaking the kiss, she started to slowly lean over you, forcing you to lean back. All the heat in your body seemed to flood between your thighs as she crawled over you and forced you to spread your legs wider to allow her hips between them. Your upper body dropped lower and lower until your head hit the mat.

Her large, solid body pressed on top of yours, pinning you beneath her and sending your mind reeling. Her tongue teased along the crease of your lips and you immediately parted them, granting her access. She chose to tease instead, gently sucking on your bottom lip while she slipped her human hand beneath your shirt to run across your abs.

You wrapped your arms around her neck in an attempt to pull her mouth closer. The only thing you got in return was teeth nipping at your lip before she pulled her mouth away from yours. Your startled protest died in your throat the moment you felt her fingers dip lower to tease along your waistband.

Breath already coming out hot and heavy, your impatience got the better of you. Though she made it clear you were to let her decide where this was going, you attempted to chase those luscious lips, only to be denied once again.

“Hands above your head,” she growled.

Despite your whimper, you obeyed, raising your arms to rest along the mat. Cool metal pressed firmly against your wrists, rendering your upper half immobile.

“Sev-” you whined when the hand at your waist left to slip beneath your shirt.

Ignoring your pleading eyes, she roughly pulled your top and sports bra up over your chest, the band pressing uncomfortably into the tops of your breasts.

“Sevika, that- that’s kinda uncomf-”

Your retort was cut short by Sevika’s threatening gaze on you. Her metal hand moved to the base of your throat, fingers wrapping around and applying just enough pressure to hush you.

“Be a good girl for me and I’ll make it worth it.”

There was no arguing with that. Not when those dangerous fingers held your neck so possessively. Not when you could see the lust in her eyes and hear it in her husky voice. And you trusted her. With everything. Mind, heart, and body. So you gave her a small nod and watched her lips curl into a tiny smirk before she brought them to your exposed chest.

With her large fingers firmly gripping one breast, Sevika wrapped her lips around the supple flesh and sucked, drawing a soft mewl from your parted lips.

Instinctively, your hips bucked towards her.

“So needy,” she rasped, her breath cool as it drifted over your wet skin.

You shivered beneath her, a chill running down your spine.

“You’re not cold are you, baby?” she husked against your other breast before sucking another mark to match the first.

You were anything but cold pinned beneath her warm, sweaty body, subjected to her heated touch. Every fiber in your body felt as if it could combust at any moment. You were already starting to break a sweat, but it had nothing to do with your workout.

“No- I-” your words halted, brain emptying the moment you peered down past her augmented arm to meet her fiery gaze.

And then you realized your mistake. Far too late. At some point, your hands had wandered from their designated place above your head and found purchase in her silky dark hair.

Stormy gray eyes trained on you, there was no way to break away as you watched her slowly trail the tip of her tongue just outside your hardening peak. She paused for an agonizing moment, her parted lips a mere hairsbreadth away from the sensitive nub.

Unsure of her intentions, you held your breath in anticipation.

Without warning, she bit down. Hard.

A short, sharp intake of breath further filled your lungs, pushing your chest towards those deliciously cruel teeth of hers. And then all that breath left your body in a shuddering moan as she soothed the sore flesh with soft lips and a wet tongue.

You moved your hands to the mat at your sides, nails digging into the forgiving material while her human hand started to descend down your stomach again.

Thankfully, this time she skipped the teasing and immediately slipped her fingers beneath the waistbands of your pants and underwear. The tip of her middle finger slid ever so slowly through your wet slit and your eyes fluttered shut, a soft moan escaping your parted lips.

"Always so wet for me," she hummed in appreciation, dragging that finger through once more before circling your clit.

Pleasure radiated from that tiny bundle of nerves. Yet every muscle in your body ached for more. You released a shaky breath, her name a pleading whisper.

"Do you ever get this wet without me?" She asked curiously as she spread more of your arousal around your entrance.

Even with your eyes shut, you could feel the heat of her gaze on your face, watching how it contorted with every little touch. Enjoying every little hitch of breath, lick of lips, and pinch of brows.

"On- Only when I- when I think about- you," you stammered, each word more difficult than the last as she started to slowly sink her finger inside you.

“Yea?” she purred, running the side of her nose along yours while curling her finger and dragging it slowly back out.

You nodded, careful not to move too much. Warm breath fanned across your dry lips. Your tongue instinctively slipped out to wet them, barely ghosting over her own. Anticipating a reprimand for touching without permission, you swallowed hard, throat bobbing against the firm press of her metal hand.

“How often do you think about me?” She pulled her finger completely out, only to hush your whine of protest by slipping two fingers inside.

All the fucking time.

“I-” whatever words you had ready faded away as she started pumping those thick digits in and out at a torturously slow pace. But you knew she’d stop if you didn’t answer. So you said the only thing you could come up with. The truth.

“All the time,” you mewled.

She chuckled softly, her lips still hovering tauntingly close to yours. “Down so bad, huh?”

She had no idea.

“Do you touch yourself when you do?”

You nodded, a breathy, “Yes,” escaping as she pushed in deeper, knuckles bottoming out.

“Like this?” she breathed and curled her fingers.

You swallowed hard again, struggling to remain composed as she worked you up. Metal fingers tightened at the base of your throat, a silent warning to give her an answer. “Yes,” you managed to whimper.

“Hmm,” she hummed, brushing her lips along yours.

Your nails dug deeper into the mat.

“How many?”

What?

Each metal digit pressed tighter into your skin, one after the next as she ground out the words, “How. Many. Fingers?”

“Three.”

“Greedy little cunt,” she chuckled darkly, but when she drew her fingers back, she slipped another in. “Like this?”

“Oh fuck,” you groaned, pleasure causing your vision to blur for a moment. “No. Yours- yours are so much bigger,” you whined as she slowly sank deeper, stretching you close to your limit.

“But you can take it, can’t you?”

You’d done it before, yet every single time feels as if you’re walking that fine line between pleasure and pain. But that’s exactly how you both like it. So, through the haze of your pleasure, you gave her a strained, “Yes,” just as she bottomed out those three thick digits.

“That’s my girl,” she husked. She finally pressed her lips to yours, swallowing your subsequent moan.

Your hands almost flew up instinctually to pull her closer, but you caught yourself just in time, allowing them to collapse back against the mat.

Her kiss likened the passion of her fucking. Tongue and fingers delved with the same rhythm and intensity– straight and fast in, curled and slow out. You tried at first to match her motions, bucking your hips towards her hand and swiping your tongue along hers each time she entered.

It didn’t take long though for her pace to increase to the point you found yourself too overcome with pleasure to keep up.

When she abruptly broke the kiss, strands of saliva clung between your open mouths before breaking and falling against your chin.

Your chest heaved as you struggled to catch your breath, head spinning and reeling from the lack of oxygen and the rush of pleasure. With your body burning so hot, you barely felt the sweat that had gathered along your hairline drip down along the side of your face. Every inch of your lower half ached, the knot in your stomach pulling tighter and tighter. Any attempt to bite back the moans quickly began to fade.

She worked you quicker- harder- the palm of her hand pressing and dragging along your swollen clit with each thrust. Her face hovered just over yours, stormy gray eyes reveling in how your face contorted in bliss.

You let yourself go completely, all restraint gone as you let your body take over. Nothing but a flurry of moans, gasps, mewls, and her name spilling past your open mouth.

“That’s it, baby. Let me hear all those pretty sounds you make,” she huffed before pressing her face into the crook of your neck to kiss, bite, and suck it.

Just a few more blissful strokes of those fingers, palm dragging over your clit, and you felt time suddenly slow. Pleasure rushed over your body in waves. A series of curse words pouring from your slack mouth.

But even as you felt the waves settle into a pleasant dull ache Sevika didn’t stop. She only sped up, the overstimulation abruptly ripping you from your high.

“Sev, wait,” you pleaded, so short of breath you could hardly speak the words.

“C’mon, baby. Give me another one,” she panted against your neck.

You were about to tell her it was too much when you realized her body was rocking against yours. Rolling your head to the side you peered down to find her grinding against the palm of her metal hand. You hadn’t even realized she’d moved it from your neck.

Oh fuck that’s hot.

But you wanted to help her. You wanted to get her off. She’d already done you so well, how could you not want to return the favor?

“Sevika, please,” you begged, “I want to touch you. Please let me help you.”

She ignored your plea, only sped up the pace of her thrusting, both hips and fingers.

"I just- I just want to make you feel good. Please," you nearly cried out, attempting to squirm away from her relentless fingers. You could see her body tremble, struggling to maintain all the motions as her body became overwhelmed with pleasure. The fingers inside you slowed, but she continued to grind against her hand.

Sev, please,” you whispered one last time. When she didn’t reply, you decided to chance it. Slowly- deliberately- you drug your blunt nails down the length of her abs, relishing in how her muscles quaked and a deep, satisfied groan pulled from her chest. Her breath was hot and uneven against your neck where her kisses dwindled to just a press of wet lips.

Excitement and the haze of your orgasm still clouding your mind, you fumbled in your attempt to slip your fingers beneath her tight training shorts. And she was no help, her thrusts getting wilder, more erratic. She was close. But you had to be the one to finish her off. You all but ripped the waist of her shorts with how hard you pulled it back to allow your other hand inside.

“Let me,” you huffed, pushing her metal hand aside before immediately slipping your fingers beneath her underwear.

“Fuck,” you moaned as your fingers slipped through the thick patch of hair and between her wet folds. “You’re so wet.”

She sank her teeth into the soft flesh between your neck and shoulder, hard enough it would surely leave yet another mark.

You released a soft whimper and wasted no time toying with her as she did with you. You immediately slipped two fingers knuckle deep in her warm, wet cunt. The feeling of her clenching around your fingers- her own faltering their assault on you- nearly sent you over the edge again right then and there. And then came the long, deep groan from her parted lips.

Gods was it heavenly to make her feel so good.

She moved her metal hand to grip your hip, sharp talons sinking deep enough to puncture skin. Warm droplets of blood dripped down your side, but it only drove you closer to your peak.

With each thrust of your fingers, she bucked her hips, but they quickly became more erratic as you worked her up.

Each grunt, puff of hot air, and curse that fell from Sevika’s mouth made your body tense further and further. You were already so close again, but you wanted her to finish first. You wanted to be as aware as possible to watch- to feel - her fall apart from your touch.

Her hips faltered, no longer meeting your pace.

“I- fuck,” she huffed. “Baby I’m gonna…” her groan turned into a sharp intake of breath.

Fuck.

She clenched around your fingers and her body froze, tensing entirely. Then all at once, she released her breath and all that tension rushed from her body as her muscles spasmed.

The feeling of her walls pressing against your fingers and the warm wetness that spilled onto your hand was enough to bring you to your second release. Your body trembled and quaked beneath hers even as she collapsed onto you, completely spent.

Somehow, the both of you managed to ride through your highs despite neither of you being able to move your hands. You didn’t care how fucking heavy her body was on yours as the two of you attempted to catch your breath. Nor did you care that your arm was sandwiched between your bodies. Nor how the smell of sweat and sex permeated the already damp air of the basement. You were feeling too good, and you knew Sevika was too.

After your breaths returned to a steady rate, Sevika propped herself up on her augmented arm. She peered down at you with hazy gray eyes, lips curling into a small smirk when she caught your fucked-out smile.

Strands of hair that had fallen from her half ponytail clung to her sweaty face. And good god even her cheeks looked flushed.

Beautiful.

You reached your free hand up to tuck a few strands of hair behind her ear. “Feeling good?” you asked softly.

She merely smirked at you, which you took as a yes but not willing to give you the ego stroke. You, however, had no problem stroking hers.

“I’m feeling great,” you sighed. “Although my hand is kinda cramping,” you laughed softly and wiggled your fingers inside her.

“Fuck,” she cursed, eyes screwing shut tight.

“Sorry,” you lied with a failed attempt to disguise your laugh. Serves her right. She was always the one to overstimulate you.

Her eyes narrowed at you, but you knew she wasn’t mad.

“Pull out on three?” you asked.

You took her lack of reply as a yes.

“One.”

God, you hated this part.

“Two.”

Always so stimulating yet disappointing at the loss.

“Thr–aahh!!”

Sevika pulled her fingers out before you could finish, pulling with them a startled cry from you.

“Fuckng hell Sevika!” you snapped.

Then she was the one to chuckle, body shaking against yours.

So you pulled your fingers out without warning, being sure to drag them over her clit as you did.

She hissed, face contorting again at the overstimulation.

“So sorry-” you barely managed to finish your tauntingly fake apology when she stuffed her fingers into your mouth. You moaned, obligingly lapping your own wetness from her fingers.

Her smirk returned as she pulled her fingers back out and watched you slip your own in to lick off her wetness as well.

“If I wasn’t so fucking spent I’d give you more than just a taste,” she said huskily.

You shuddered beneath her, arousal blooming at the thought of that. “Maybe tonight?” you suggested.

“If you’re a good girl,” she replied before bringing her lips to yours.

As you returned the kiss, you were pretty sure she’d give you more than a taste even if you were bad.

That night, you nervously followed Ran- with Sevika not too far behind you- to the rickety elevator that would take the three of you to the Promenade level. Admittedly, you had no idea what Ran would pick out for either of you, but knowing their history of other things they’d selected for you in the past, it was not going to at all be something within your typical style. And very revealing. At least for you. The only positive to those thoughts was that they may do the same for Sevika. And good god would you love to see Sevika in something even more delicious to the eyes than her current attire.

The ride up was quiet, save for the occasional rattling and clanging of the elevator. You shifted from foot to foot, eyes darting from the iron door to Ran’s chill and suspiciously smug expression, to Sevika’s scowl, and back to the door again. It dawned on you, just how odd you three must look, with your contrasting expressions and clothing style. Ran with their goth/emo, Sevika with her– you weren’t even sure what to call her style. Badass. Mean. Is mean a style? Teasing. That damn strip of tummy exposed just asking- no, begging- to be touched and tasted. Whatever her style was, it wasn’t like Ran’s, or yours. Yours was plain, dark, all black. Meant to blend in because, well, assassin. You weren’t looking to draw attention.

But something told you that would change with whatever Ran picked out for you tonight.

The lift came to a jolting stop, knocking you from your thoughts but ratcheting up your anxiety. And as the three of you approached the shop, that gut-wrenching feeling only continued to grow. The shop was larger than you expected. Almost the entirety of the front was nothing but windows displaying all manner of suits and dresses. Anything from tiny, skimpy, sorry excuses for clothing, to dresses with skirts so large you were certain sitting down would be an impossibility. And in just as wide an array of colors and fabrics. From dark black leather to frilly light pinks. The latter made you visibly cringe.

You were about to follow Ran through the large glass door when they stopped and turned to you.

“Her first,” they nodded to Sevika behind you.

“We can’t both go in?” you asked incredulously.

“Can’t see until the tournament.”

Was Ran fucking nuts? This was supposed to be for a card tournament, not a damn wedding.

That last thought caused a different disturbance in your stomach. One you’d rather not address.

“Okay,” you replied, less than thrilled with the idea of having to wait and stew even longer. With a dramatic sigh, you found a small spot without a window and leaned against it, watching as Sevika reluctantly followed Ran inside. At least you weren’t alone in this torture. Sevika looked far beyond displeased.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

You’re not sure how long you were standing there, attempting to preoccupy yourself with the dagger Sevika had gifted you some months ago. You were running your thumb absentmindedly over the initials carved into it- your initials- when you heard the door open. Sevika stepped out carrying a large bag and appearing even more annoyed than when she had entered.

Great.

And then she just strode past you without so much as a glance.

“Aren’t you going to wait for me?” you asked.

“No. I have more important things to do,” she replied and kept walking, at least until Ran opened their big mouth.

“Prepare for mind-blowing sex and cuddling?”

For as little as Ran spoke, they sure seemed to pick the most awkward things to say and at the worst times. Not only that, they said the most blasphemous things with the cool, calm composure of someone speaking of the weather.

Wide-eyed, you watched Sevika stop dead in her tracks and slowly turn to Ran’s smirking face. Then, as her gaze drifted to your suspiciously nervous expression, her eyes narrowed dangerously.

Shit.

You gave her an awkward, apologetic smile and shrugged your shoulders. Judging by the way she was clearly clenching her teeth behind her closed mouth, it was not very well received.

You were going to pay dearly for your slip.

With one more threatening glance between you and Ran, Sevika silently turned and stomped off towards the lift.

Then it was your turn to get mad. You spun on your heels, brows downturned as you all but threw the dagger in your clenched fist at Ran.

Ran simply grinned, waving their metal fingers at you teasingly. “Your turn, princess.”

You decided to just ignore the pet name, despite that only further fueling your suspicions that Ran and Sevika were colluding in your destruction. And by destruction, you meant getting you as flustered as possible.

Pushing off the wall you followed Ran into the store.

It was, as you expected, beyond anything you’d been exposed to in your time in the Undercity. In your younger years in Piltover, you had been dragged along by your mother to several stores similar to this, and unfortunately, it was something you would have rather left in the past.

Dresses of all manner lined the walls and center of the store. Gaudy colors and flashy sequins damn near blinded you, even though the lighting was only slightly better than in the depths of the Undercity. And each rack and mannequin you passed made your insides drop lower and lower in your stomach.

Good god please at least pick something black.

Ran stopped at a rack holding several variations of dresses, each and every one in various shades of pink. You were about to protest, mouth open and brows furrowed, when you spotted the curl of dark lips painting Ran’s face.

They were fucking with you.

Your mouth snapped shut and you blew a huff of breath from your nose.

Ass.

Ran continued on, slowly perusing every rack, trailing their flesh fingers along the various materials. Occasionally, they’d stop at a rack with something they knew damn well you’d hate, but it didn’t take long for you to become numb to their game and brush it off.

Then, thank the gods, they stopped at a display full of black dresses. While they thumbed through several, you moved to the opposite side, deciding to join in the search now that you were at least in your color choice. Most of them were not to your taste. Too flashy, revealing, or frilly. But when you came across one made of a simple material, similar to your typical attire and with decent coverage, you finally felt your hopes rise.

“What about this one?” you asked, holding the dress up for Ran to see.

Their gaze drifted between your hopeful smile and the plain dress in your hand.

Ran slowly shook their head.

Damnit.

“Why not?” you whined. “It’s a decent dress!”

“Not for this place,” Ran murmured and returned to their search.

As much as you hated to admit it, you knew they were right. You remember how your mother and father dressed when attending these types of events. They were anything but plain. So you shoved the dress back on the rack and decided to go check out other parts of the store to keep your mind off the inevitable destruction of your comfort.

While browsing the less flashy suits, your mind began to wander.

What would Sevika be wearing?

You know for a fact she’d never agree to a dress. It would have to be a suit. But what kind? What color? Would she wear a tie? A jacket? Anything revealing? As you ran your hands along the silky fabric of a white button-up blouse, your eyes drifted close. You could picture her in it, beautiful rich brown skin contrasting against the crisp white. Maybe a few buttons undone, leaving you with a tease of her cleavage. Sleeves rolled up to reveal her bicep. Probably not the latter. She’d likely be hiding that prosthetic. What about her hair? Would it be worn down, those silky dark strands framing her beautiful face?

The sudden hair-raising feeling of being watched had your eyes flying open. You damn near jumped out of your skin when you found yourself face-to-face with Ran.

“Fuck Ran. Don’t sneak up on me like that!” you chided.

All you received in return was a teasing smirk. And then your eyes fell to the item in their hand.

There was no way it was a dress.

It looked like a pile of black silk, no straps.

Reluctantly, you took it from Ran and held it out in front of you. A few gold pieces with dark red gems stood out against the black material, which you assumed were what actually held the bits of material together.

You met Ran’s gaze again with a worried expression, eyes pleading with them that this was not truly what they’d selected. But a nod towards the dressing room confirmed what you dreaded.

With slumped shoulders, you headed to the dressing room, Ran following in tow and likely entirely too amused by your lack of enthusiasm.

Once inside a booth, you took your time stripping down before removing the ‘dress’ from its hanger and inspecting it for how to put it on.

There was no way you were figuring it out alone.

You glanced down at your body, clad only in a bra and panties.

Fucking hell.

“Ran,” you whispered, poking your head out from behind the curtain, “I have no fucking clue how to put this on!”

You hid further behind the curtain, nervously watching as Ran stepped inside with you wearing a knowing smirk. Heat rose up your neck and flooded your cheeks when their gaze raked over your near-nude body. Thank god they weren’t much for talking, as they said nothing, only let the corner of their mouth tug higher.

Ran helped you into the dress without any issue, to the point it made you wonder how many times they’d done something like this. But what plagued your mind more than that was how they let their fingertips, both flesh and metal, ghost along your exposed skin, leaving behind an obvious trail of goosebumps. The touches could have arguably been accidental considering how they needed to adjust, smooth, and clasp certain sections. However, the amused upward pull of lips you saw reflecting back at you in the mirror pointed to more than just pure accident.

When they patted your shoulder, indicating they were done, you finally let your attention move to your own reflection.

As it turned out, the gold pieces were actually the bones of the dress so to speak. One wrapped around the base of your neck like a choker, a dark red gem in the center where two pieces of black fabric attached on either side. The other ends of the fabric connected to the top of another gold piece, adorned with matching red gems and crisscrossed around the top of your waist and at the lowest part of your hips. It left the center of your chest very exposed, and cut real low around the back to reveal even more skin. More black fabric fell from the bottom half of that gold crisscross, cascading all the way to the floor. It had two slits- if you could even call them that considering how they were just entirely separate pieces, one for the front and one for the back- that left almost the entirety of your legs exposed. There was no way you were going to be able to pull off such a dress while wearing a bra OR panties.

Holy fucking shit.

You may have worn skimpier things for Sevika, but those were in the privacy of the bedroom. This was going to be in public, in front of gobs of strangers.

Your eyes drifted back up to Ran’s reflection. They looked more than happy with their selection. Oddly enough, that gave you quite the confidence boost, but…

What will Sevika think?

You slowly turned, glancing over your shoulder to admire your backside in the mirror. The back of the dress was longer than the front, trailing several inches along the floor behind you. The fabric had to be silk given how it cascaded so softly along your curves. It screamed luxury. Something you weren’t accustomed to. Silco paid you well, but not that well. And you grew up with fairly wealthy parents in Piltover, but thankfully were left out of a majority of those fancy events. This was so… different. You felt so…

Pretty.

A smile graced your face, startling you from your own reverie. You spun around completely to face Ran. “What is this going to set me back?”

“Still need to get you accessories and shoes, princess.”

Great.

After helping you out of the dress, Ran found matching gold and red gemmed bracelets and bands for your arm, just above your bicep, as well as a set of earrings.

Then came the shoes.

Ran almost immediately found a pair of matching stilettos, heels high enough that you were certain you’d be as tall as Sevika. You’d also likely suffer a concussion from such a high fall, which would assuredly happen if you tried to walk in them.

“What about these?” you asked, holding up a pair of tall, leather black boots with wide, flat heels. You should have known better to even ask, but you had to try something. When Ran shook their head, you attempted to plead with them, “Can’t we at least compromise? Find me something that doesn’t force me to walk on my damn tip-toes?”

They seemed to take pity on you, setting the stilettos back and returning to the selection. When they came back with a less hazardous-looking pair of black heels with matching gold and dark red accents, you released a heavy sigh.

“Fine.”

You were going to regret that.

The purchase of all the items ended up costing you a hefty amount of the Undercity tournament earnings you had split with Sevika. But if things went as planned Topside, it wouldn’t matter. You two would be swimming in money. Or at least have enough to do something really nice. And you wanted more than anything to get something special for Sevika.

As you and Ran exited, they pulled several items from their pocket and handed them to you. The first; a small piece of paper folded in half. You flipped it open to find Ran had written a name along the top that you did not recognize, as well as a list of facts. A summarized history of what you presumed to be your fake identity’s background. Folding it back up, you stuffed it into your bag to fully read later.

“Did Sevika get one too?”

Ran nodded and handed you the second item; a gold ring with what you assumed to be a signet for your fake identity.

Wow, Ran had really gone all out.

“My place. Saturday night,” Ran instructed.

You sucked in a deep breath, trying to calm your nerves. This was really going to happen.

“Got it.”

CH4>>

#arcane #sevika #arcane sevika #sevika x reader #arcane sevika x reader #fanfic #honey writes #ran #arcane ran

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95jezzica · 2 months

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Additional Scion Jobs

Long title: Additional Classes & Jobs I think would suit/have suited the Scions. 👀 (And no, I'm not gonna cheat and put Scholar on all of them, although in some case it would actually fit).

[Sorry in advance, the European FFXIV servers went down and they didn't bother to get them up again before the planned maintenance in a few hours, SO this accidentally became a long one post of thoughts, so I'm putting it below 'Read More']. 😂

So. Additional Classes & Jobs I think would have suited the Scions.

Minfilia Warde: White Mage. 🌟 I always wished for her to get something more to fight back with - and White Mage would fit her with the themes of seeking peace, harmony and wanting to support her friends. Seeing as Minfillia spends most of ARR stuck back in the HQ overseeing their operations it'd also make sense to make her a Healer who can take care of her returning comrades once they come back from their missions. Minor spoilers for HW/Shadowbringers, but her being White Mage could also further explain her connections and deeds later on in the game. Though there's a lot of memes about White Mage being a "green DPS" I think she'd be more focused on the healing part.

Tataru Taru: I was about to jokingly say Machinist to give her a gun, but jokes aside I'd give her the class/job Botanist. 🌼 Tataru not being a fighter but still wanting to help is kind of a plot-point within the game, and so I shall abide by the rules. (Though I suppose her being an Arcanist can still be considered canon considering the blue quests in Stormblood?). At any rate I think she'd fit well as a Botanist. Not only would it give her a way to Sneak around, but it'd also help her Gather the resources she or her friends need. As her only listed canon class is Weaver on the wiki, I'm also tempted to add Leatherworker and Culinarian into the list, seeing as we do have some moments where she already works on these even if they're not listed as canon classes (yet?).

Y'shtola "Master of Destruction" Rhul: Summoner. 🔥 No one can deny Y'Shtola is a master of magic. With Conjurer & Black Mage already under her belt it should come to no surprise I think she would continue with a similar line of study, and because of this I think she'd be perfect as Summoner. We COULD technically argue Arcanist/Summoner is semi-canon considering her past studies, but since it's not listed as one of her canon classes/jobs I shall not count it as one either, because the job is too perfect for her to ignore. Additionally I could see her pick up Blue Mage for the challenge it'd give her, even if it wouldn't be a main-job she'd use in world-deciding battles.

Lyse Hext: Dancer (and/or Monk?). 💃🏽 I was admittedly surprised Lyse's only canon listed class/job on the Wiki is Pugilist, and I honestly can't remember if Lyse ever got to upgrade to Monk, but I could have sworn she got the Dancer? Maybe I'm remembering it wrong, but either way I think she'd fit well with the Dancer job. She has always been light on her feet and being Dancer would also give her a ranged class to complement Pugilist/Monk, which is very close-ranged.

Papalymo Totolymo: I'd say Sage, after much consideration. 🛡 He was a difficult one to decide on though, but in the end I think it's the one who would make the most sense for him given the lore of Sage being a Sharlayan job difficult to master. It's also canon Papalymo studied the arcane for most of his life, so it'd make sense to give him something related to magic outside of him being a Thaumaturge. That, and I don't feel like he'd fit as a Scholar (the job), Astrologian, Summoner, Red Mage or Pictomancer. I could give a maybe to White Mage, but that's a MAYbe.

Thancred Waters: 🔫 Machinist was obviously my first thought, because hey, canon Gunbreaker already - but given his past as both Gladiator & Rogue he also has a lot of potential as Dark Knight and/or Viper, all which I feel would fit him well. Since he's already a tank with Gunbreaker I'd say Thancred getting Machinist and Viper would be the most useful for him though, and would let him use his experience at the same time as giving him better DPS stats. 🔪

Urianger Augurelt: Scholar, to the surprise of absolutely no one. 😂 xD Listen, if any of the scions deserves the Scholar job, it's him - and it'd be especially fitting for Shadowbringers and give additional reason(s) as to how and why he was able to get along so well with the fae. 🍄 Perhaps a little more surprising is instead that I think he'd also do well as a Reaper. Urianger has proven again and again he does what's necessary to save those he cares about, even at the risk of earning their scorn, and since he's already a canon Astrologian with Scholar added to the list from me Reaper is a good way to balance him out a bit to not only be focused on the healing jobs. 👻 Especially since there's already so many Scions who are Thaumaturge and/or Black Mages and I can't really imagine him taking on a job as a tank. Even with his character development I wouldn't say he enjoys being the center of attention.

Alphinaud Leveilleur: I so badly want to give him a DPS job, but tbh I don't think he'd really fit as any of them? As previous Arcanist and nowadays Scholar/Sage I could simply give him Summoner and be done with it, but it'd be kind of ironic to see him running around summoning a mini-Bahamut. If hard-pressed I'd give him Pictomancer instead, which would be a fun nod to Shadowbringers/Endwalkers as well, but it doesn't feel like a perfect fit either. 🖌 Tbh the perfect job for him would be a tank focused on magic with magical shields and the likes, and to this day I badly wish FFXIV will introduce one in the future. Sadly I think it might be difficult for them to make it different enough from Sage, so Idk if I'll ever get my wish come true.

Alisaie Leveilleur: Gunbreaker. 🔫 / "Jezzica, WHY!???" / Okay, so admittedly part of it is because it'd be hilarious to see her run around with a big gun, but given her personality a job as a tank would actually suit her very well and make her tanky enough to actually continue to stand in the aoe without moving. 🔫 Alisaie is not the healer in a battle, but doesn't mind helping out with healing outside of it. She's loud, honest, and loves being in the middle of it all. Additionally Alisaie has always been the most outspoken about how everyone is relying too much on you (the WoL). Her being a tank fits her personality really well, and quite frankly I think she would quickly become a Dark Knight if you (the WoL) ever died within the game. Given the fact Alisaie is already a Red Mage she also has potential as a Viper, but at the current time I still think Gunbreaker would fit her the best as an additional class/job.

Krile Baldesion: Another difficult one, but I'd probably give her Dancer based on vibes alone from the DT-trailer(s) and her already being a canon healer and Pictomancer. 💃🏽 She's a difficult one though, because I haven't spent as much time with her in the game yet.

Estinien "Wyrmblood" Varlineau: Defeating dragons was his entire life for so long that I think he'd struggle to be anything but a Dragoon even if he has another purpose now. 🐲 The fact that he was basically raised by the former Azure Dragoon after being orphaned wouldn't have made it easier to introduce Estinien to another job either. 🐉 Part of me wanted to put Estinien's additional job as a Dark Knight ⚔ , but tbh he's more of a "attack is the best defense" kind of guy, and he's more driven by attacking the problem than defending those behind him. 🪓 He could potentially fit well as a Warrior, but then he'd probably be a "one-man army" kind of Warrior who forgets to turn on his stance. 😂 Anyway, in all likelyhood I think Estinien would aim for another DPS if he had to add another job, and amongst those I think Reaper might actually be the best fit. Purely physically he could do a good job as Pugilist as well, but I have a hard time imagining him go around unlocking chakra(s) and/or later upgrading to Monk. x)

G'Raha Tia: 🐱 Jack of All Trades, Master of None, is yet always better than Master of One. With that said I think we can all agree that adding Summoner to his list of already many jobs is too perfect to ignore. 😂 With Archer/Black Mage/Paladin/White Mage already under his belt we probably shouldn't add more to his big list after that though. 😂 xD

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lehdenlaulu · 2 years

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lestat and armand for the ship meme if you havent gotten em already because OBVIOUSLY!

Yasssss. I counted on you. 😆

Okay, these might be a little obvious, but here goes:

who’s the cuddler:

I feel like both of them are. And while Louis and Daniel for example accept their clinginess without complaint, I feel like with each other – once they got over themselves – it would be like... limbs tangled, fingers entwined or threaded into hair, faces nuzzled into crooks of necks, as close as physically possible. A whole-ass vampire Gordian knot. You know?

who makes the bed:

Armand. Lestat, bless his black little heart, is 100% a slob.

who wakes up first:

Hmm. Armand. He probably stays snuggled into Lestat for a good while, though.

who has the weird taste in music:

C'mon, anything weird is Armand's domain. Lestat loves music and gamely tries to be as adventurous as possible, but Armand still manages to hyperfixate on some obscure Peruvian doom metal that is played almost entirely on pan flutes or something and Lestat has to admit defeat.

who is more protective:

ARMAND. I mean, it's not that Lestat doesn't have sometimes even somewhat patronizingly protective feelings towards Armand, but... Canonically, not only is he Lestat's own personal guardian devil (come on, he even met Daniel because he trespassed on Lestat's resting place), he'll happily tear the head off anyone who even looks at any of his loved ones wrong, and probably use their skulls as decoration as well. Maybe eat their soul for good measure, you never know with him.

who sings in the shower:

Lestat. Obviously.

who cries during movies:

Lestat is a world-famous champion weeper, but I bet there's something completely unexpected that will get Armand misty-eyed. Or not so unexpected. Maybe he has cried once or twice while watching Blade Runner. Maybe he can relate.

who spends the most while out shopping:

Hmm. I feel like Lestat, an extravagant extrovert, enjoys the act of shopping more, but Armand is just as good if not better at burning money on things (and then abandoning them or forgetting they exist).

who kisses more roughly:

Huh. I don't think there's a clear-cut answer to this one. Their canonical kisses are all, IIRC, rather tender, sweet, or casual. I think Armand might get a bit more bitey, but not exactly rough, not with Lestat. 🤔

who is more dominate:

Again, there's no simple answer because their power dynamic is overall particularly complicated, nor do I think you can really separate the (semi-)sexual power dynamics from their overall power dynamics.

I mean, Armand is canonically a switch, and I always got the vibe from Lestat that he's probably too when it comes down to it. And then there's that whole aspect of odd mutual... deference, I could say, that has elements of worship. And I mean... Lestat looks a lot like Marius, which I'm sure initially absolutely messed with Armand's head, especially in those circumstances, so there's that. And Lestat on the other hand will probably always be a little bit in awe of Armand, in all meanings of the word. So I'll just say that it would probably take some time for them to find a balance that works for both of them.

my rating of the ship from 1-10:

Honestly, can I even give them anything but 10? I don't know if they were originally my 'favourite ship', as I think my teenage self sort of went "right, these guys don't operate by any traditional human relationship conventions so 'shipping' something would be a bit silly" (okay I did have a soft spot for Marius and Pandora, but I digress). But I'm sure I always found them fascinating. Because... come on. All hyperbole aside, who is doing it like them?? Two centuries plus of drama, devotion, and... defenestrations? I could say so much more and pull so many quotes, but let's just leave it with: "Does anyone else know the size of your soul?"

#Lestat x Armand #Armand x Lestat #Armand #Lestat de Lioncourt #does anyone else know the size of your soul?#The Vampire Chronicles #Darna talks TVC #q and a #defeateddetectives #ship meme #TVC headcanons #headcanons

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zonkutonshorrifyingpeenie · 2 months

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20 Questions For Fic Writers

tagged in by the lovely @borealopelta thanks bb! <3 <3

How many works do you have on AO3?

What's your total AO3 word count?

23,958

What fandoms do you write for?

i've primarily written for powerwolf with my extremely-specific-furry-au, but I've also written for AFK arena, fnaf, and there's a couple bakugan ones that I want to try and get back to working on as well, or indeed, working on writing in general ;A;

Top five fics by kudos?

Light's On - fnaf sb - 81 kudos

Reunions Sacrifice - afk arena - 60 kudos

A Were's First - powerwolf - 25 kudos

It's 3am... - powerwolf - 16 kudos

Charles' Nightmare - powerwolf - 11 kudos

Do you respond to comments?

If I actively remember to, yes.

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Definitely A Were's Last, which was almost exclusively written to induce tears in... two people at most lol

sometimes you just gotta write non-canon no-point angst shit ya feel?

What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Honestly, I haven't written many if any explictly happy fic endings, they seem to lean more melancholic most of the time which definitely doesn't say anything about my mental state what are you talking about

but, Sleeping On Your Alpha Can Be Something That's Very Personal, Actually and It's 3am... would probably count as at least my least sad fic ends

Do you get hate on fics?

Thankfully no. but some of my fic-connected posting has certainly garnered some strangely passionate responses.

Do you write smut?

Yep

Craziest crossover?

None of my fics are crossovers

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not to my knowledge, and if they're desperate enough to steal from me, I think I'd feel sorry for them

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Not explictly, no. The closest I've gotten to anything like co-writing has been like... a couple of discord fic-lore convos that turned into semi-writings and also all that rp shit i did over a decade ago.

All time favorite ship

I don't exactly have a metric for rating any of my ships above the other, they all grab me by the throat in differing ways

though, by genre at least, i do gravitate towards gay old men, so, take that as you will

What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Buddy I could just list my entire writing folder here and I doubt I would actually be exaggerating T-T

The mental illness has gripped me far too hard the last few years...

But, there's always hope, right?

What are your writing strengths?

environment descriptions and turn-of-phrase, I suppose. I like to think I'm fairly ok at getting a general vibe across in the... 12 paragraphs before i get to even a speck of dialogue lol

Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

My monolingual ass could never. I'd be too afraid of fucking it up

First fandom you wrote in?

the first thing i remember writing for was fuckn like... an mmo game. i think it was the Sacred one when that was around... i think??

but that was purely written in random linebook when i was a child and didn't understand the concept of fanfiction yet

the first thing i POSTED anywhere was probably bakugan or homestuck. I genuinely can't recall exact order, but I do know for certain fact that I worked on this one bakugan fic for far FAR too long during highschool recess and lunch breaks

Favorite fic you've written?

In terms of published, definitely AWF, my beloved domestic furry au that is definitely not semi-dead-in-the-water-it's-fine ignore my tears

unpublished, there's certainly a few that I'm having a very pleasant and fun time with writing, even if the going is very slow.

If you were forced to write only one genre for the rest of your life (like James Patterson lol) what would you want it to be?

Probably Fantasy or Mythology, lot of wiggle-room within that, and I tend to lean more fantastical in my worlds and such anyhow.

I'm gonna tag in @deerfests I reckon! And open-invite ofr anyone else that wants to hop in as well!

#haretalks #tag games #harewrites #this took a hot minute cause my laptop keyboard is a right piece of work and stopped having functioning shift keys :))))#also depression but we won't get into that lol

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quaranmine · 2 years

Note

if anything, i think the fanon-but-not-fanon should be the ones referred to as characters. canon tends to be an agalmation of jokes and genuine reactions and character choices. character choices that are often inconsistent with previous ones. and by nature of canon not taking itself too seriously there is often some lack of character depth. the fandom tends to be the ones who tend to create the consistences, fill out characters, etc. we're the ones who, essentially, make them part of a story.

you know, I think this is an interesting analysis of it. you're right that the fandom does a lot of the heavy lifting for creating the characters as fully rounded. the mcyt fandom has always been in an interesting postion because we do have characters and roleplay, so we're not writing about real people. but the real people's personalities very often inform their characters to a signficant degree. so for a series like hermitcraft, i'd say a lot of the episodes exist in a limbo between real life and roleplay. you have the CC doing timelapses and explaining their plans to the audience, and then having fun and laughing with their friends. then you have the plot/roleplay aspects influencing the series. within the fandom, we take those two aspects and fuse them into a more realistic character. you say character choices often contradict themselves, and i think it's a lot to do with our interpretations of what a realistic character might do in a situation, versus what the CC thinks would be the most fun direction to take the story in. i feel like it's difficult to get this kind of division with other forms of media--most other characters are a lot further divorced from the people who play them and create them.

i think a good example of this is the end of third life, honestly. the actual scene of grian killing scar in the cactus ring has them laughing. it's the end of the series and they're having fun recording. but in order for it to make narrative sense, the fandom has sort of grabbed hold of that and given it a much more heavy weight. because in the context of the story, it's a tragedy. it undeniably is. but we're doing like half of the work to make it like that. because when we write, we write from the perspective of characters who live within the world and are actually experiencing it. the CCs give us the storyline and do some of the acting, but above all they are having fun with their friends and that's partly why it's entertaining. it is one of the things that makes the series fun, because it can pretty much be as serious/not serious as you want it to be. personally i like to occasionally dip back into the inherent ridiculousness of mcyt for comedy in my fanfic, just to make sure i dont stray too far from my source ;)

however, series like dsmp definitely have much more defined characters. i should know, given i helped archive like 4000 analyses of these characters last year lol. the dsmp also does not take itself too seriously, which is why for a long time the fandom argued over the idea of whether or not "semi-lore" existed. big things often happened in goofy or laidback streams, and people would argue about whether it seriously counted or not towards the overall characterization. this was difficult. this definitely contradicted itself many times between whatever the CC thought was funny to do versus the very real implication of "hey, if the character actually did that in the storyline that's really messed up..." *cue endless discourse* but over all the dsmp has very significantly defined characters compared to hermitcraft, which is much more nebulous. i think a lot of the difference comes from the fact that it has planned Serious Plot and planned Serious Themes whereas hermitcraft plot is "funny with a side of serious occasionally." i've said it's easier to write dsmp angst because we've SEEN how characters on there deal with heartbreak, whereas in hermitcraft angst we're forced to make assumptions on their behavior in these situations based on our prior knowledge of them.

i dont really know how to end this but it was interesting to think about!

#quara asks #quara analysis #yep this baby's getting the analysis tag lol

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fragilecapric0rnn · 2 years

Text

I posted 4,202 times in 2022

That's 4,182 more posts than 2021!

125 posts created (3%)

4,077 posts reblogged (97%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@gothbat99

@greenlikethesea

@gingerbreadmunson

@hotcocoaharrington

@gullbones

I tagged 2,123 of my posts in 2022

Only 49% of my posts had no tags

#stranger things - 323 posts

#steddie - 297 posts

#fanart - 130 posts

#steve harrington - 84 posts

#eddie munson - 65 posts

#fic - 62 posts

#sen writes - 54 posts

#writing - 45 posts

#steddie fic rec - 41 posts

#steddie fic - 40 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#obviously so i can send them a quick lil ‘ur story ruined me thank you’ message but to also rb their posts abt it/rec their fics on my blog

My Top Posts in 2022:

you can take your heart from your chest to use as a compass when you are lost

The Steddie Missed Connections AU || Chapters: 6/6 || Complete

Thanksgiving 2009.

Steve, who is about to host the brood of children (who somehow aren't children anymore) in a cabin for the long weekend, after a semi-bad week, all while batting off Dustin's attempts at playing matchmaker and dodging phone calls from his mother. And at some point some strange man on the internet broadcasts his worst public moment for the other Craigslist freaks to see.

What could go wrong? Or right?

Steve is finding his life to be very different than he thought it would be. He’s also finding that maybe that’s okay.

59 notes - Posted November 1, 2022

It’s Fanfic Writer Appreciation Day and there happen to be some writers that I appreciate and want to show my love to them for sharing their talents with us!

(Steddie Edition bc they are on the mind 24/7)

The Steddie brainrot has led me to reading a TON of fic. So, I am finally making a rec list of all of the fics that have not been able to leave my brain since they walked into my life.

As I was compiling this list I noticed a running theme and that is that these are all future fics and what can I say? I’m just a simple girl who’s a sucker for Steve/Eddie in the 90s/early 2000s. I think it has something to do with my love for romcoms from this era and thinking of them as older just makes me want to fall to the floor.

So here they are, in no particular order:

1. the most remarkable thing about you standing in the doorway is that it’s you by @greatunironic;

Sixteen years after the world didn't end for the last time, Max Mayfield showed up on Steve’s doorstep and said, “You gonna walk me down the aisle in May or what?”

Or, it’s 2002 and Steve Harrington attends a wedding, a funeral, and a birth. (Word Count: 34,990)

The way that this fic bore into my soul, I seriously can’t think about it for too long without getting emotional. This one feels like a given considering the fact that I am now getting TikToks my fyp of people out of context referring to this fic, which is how I stumbled upon a recommendation of it. If you haven’t read it yet, PLEASE DO. It’s a national treasure at this point.

2. Let us Dwell in Fair Ithilien and There Make a Garden series by @sparklyslug and @greenlikethesea (Word Count: 61,151) (Description from Three Weddings and a Funeral)

Steve Harrington falls in love and gets married. Not in that order. Some other stuff happens along the way too. But those are the two big things. That first one especially.

(Or: celebrations of life)

This series, much like aforementioned most remarkable thing, is set mostly in the future with the gang as adults, and Steve and Eddie dancing around their feelings for each other for nearly 15 years. That is a gross oversimplification in my opinion because it is honestly so much more than that! Like, it’s set in the future, but there is time jumping, and references to previous parts of the series, its just it’s own universe within the ST universe! Ugh, I got flustered trying to put coherent thoughts to how much I fucking love this series and the way that these two have crafted am entirely new canon for me to latch onto. Go read this. Like right now. I also suggest reading it in the writers’ suggested hard mode!

3. Keep It for Me by @stereobone;

It's 1993, and Steve is attending Lucas and Max's wedding. It's 1993, and no one has seen Eddie Munson in seven years. (Word Count: 9,741)

For one thing, the little NorCal girl in me was foaming at the mouth at the thought of a chunk of the party living in The Bay Area as adults. This one has the meeting again years later element, which is just so good! This also has writer!Eddie which made my heart burst, and the pining and reunification of it all. Again, I have a hard time putting words to how much this fic has nestled its way into my heart! Repeat: GO READ IT!!!

4. alone again, or by @pizzaqueen;

It’s 1991 and Steve is still in Hawkins, still living with his mother, still single, and still working at Family Video. At least he’s the manager now, for whatever that’s worth. But he’s stuck here while Robin and Dustin and everyone else have moved away. Moved on.

Well, everyone except for Eddie.

They're best friends, spend most of their time together, and it's nice to have a friend like that. But Steve is still looking for love with a capital "L". At least, he thinks he is. (Word Count: 20,765)

This one is definitely different than the ones I talked about above. But, this one is still fucking fantastic! More of a coming-of-age vibe in a we’re twenty somethings and life looks a lot different than we thought it would and I think thats okay kind of way. Which spoke to me in a way that I also kind of need right now as a twenty something who feels just like that :’) Also love the character of Steve’s mom, which is something we don’t see a lot of, Steve having a supportive parent, and it is very sweetly written. This fic felt like a popsicle on a warm day. READ! IT!

Again, happy Fanfic Writer Appreciation Day! Let’s keep showing our favorite writers love every day of the year!

107 notes - Posted August 21, 2022

Steddie Fic Rec #2

Like most, the Steddie brainrot is still very much active. I’ve also discovered that I love making rec lists, so here is another! There’s not much cohesion to these ones other than the fact that I just really enjoyed them, so you should enjoy them too!

In order by word count:

Up the Punks by @sparklyslug

Steve has good intentions, but does not realize that punks and metalheads are natural enemies

Explicit. Completed. (Word Count: 5,505)

Oh, sparklyslug, how you’ve managed to steal my heart with your Steve and Eddie in only five thousand-ish words. As if I could expect anything less from ½ of the brains behind the Fair Ithilien series, it makes perfect sense for their solo work to be fantastic!

This fic is perfect if you’re looking for something short, sweet, and hilarious. Like the dialogue and characterization is just so *chefs kiss* I could basically see the interactions very clearly in my head and it’s just too good too perfect.

the boys of summer by steveharringtoned

(Steve knows Eddie’s alive. Wayne’s the only one who believes him. So they team up to save him.)

Not Rated. Completed. (Word Count: 19,926)

A very creative fix-it fic and like a very interesting and creative way in which Eddie is saved. I am honestly such a sucker for Uncle Wayne being included in the plot of fics, especially in the context of him being like ok sure there’s another dimension being hidden by the government, so how the hell do we save my boy. And Steve. He is just so stupidly brave and the characterization of him and his grief in this fic is just so good and different than what we typically see in fics from his POV. The dude is hurting and sometimes being hurt can be ugly and the way the writer shows that is just sooooo gooooood.

all the missing girls are hanging out without us by @greatunironic

“Here is a riddle: the answer is one.” Eddie Munson lives, and dies, and lives again.

Mature. Completed. (Word Count: 20,761)

Another instance in which greatunironic does THAT. I have seen people call this a kind of feminist take on the ways in which the D*ffer Bros treat their women characters as plot devices and dispose of them at ease for the sake of the plot, and I couldn’t agree more. I don’t want to give too much away in this, but I will say this: Eddie’s characterization in this is SO GOOD. He spends the first chunk convincing himself that he’s tripping balls and if that isn’t an Eddie mood than idk what is.

Quick note: the Steddie in this fic is more implied and is not the central focus of this fic.

Not Exactly Napa Valley by @twiceasfar

The fake relationship AU that literally no one asked for. Featuring Steve and Robin as platonic soulmates, a destination wedding to a winery, and a thrilling quest to piss off Steve’s parents.

Robin lets out an exasperated sigh. “Eddie would be the perfect date for the wedding!”

Steve freezes.

“Whose wedding?” Eddie asks.

Mature. Completed. (Word Count: 28,900)

This fic reminded my how much I love the fake dating trope. I always find it interesting to see everybody’s different takes on what Steve’s parents are like, and how we just all agree that they’re awful. Despite that, this fic was very fluffy and had me blushing and giggling like a child. The buildup was so good and the pace was perfect and I honestly love this fic so much.

The Spaces In Between by @indibdraws

Steve Harrington, ex-lifeguard and babysitter extraordinaire, happens to be blessed with knowledge of first aid. Eddie is the recipient of this aid, and as he recovers he must learn to live with the fact that he owes his life to a prom-king with a 12 step haircare routine. This would be easier if he didn’t find said prom king so uncomfortably attractive.

And if the world would stop ending for five minutes.

Geez.

Explicit. Not Complete. (Word Count: 80,210)

Typically, I try not to read fics that are unfinished, but this one ended up on my dashboard 5 times in the span of an hour and my impulse control is bad and THANK GOD IT IS BECAUSE HOLY HELL. THIS FIC. This writer should be in the writer’s room for s5 and it is honestly a crime that they aren’t. Like yes, this is a Steve/Eddie fic, but it is also SO much more. The use of canon to create an ending that was satisfying to the store and gave the characters their justice. I cannot explain how much this fic has ended up imbedding its way into my heart and soul. As soon as it's completed, I'm going to reread it again and again and even when s5 premieres I am probably going to prefer this over canon until the day that I die.

See the full post

150 notes - Posted September 3, 2022

How it feels when I see new photos of Joe Keery

332 notes - Posted December 1, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

LISTEN. I was ready to ride the Steve Becomes A Teacher train all the way home. It’s in my fics, it’s in my planned fics. But but but LISTEN.

Steve becoming a first responder?

A little bit post-S4, Steve is driving home to Hawkins after moving to Indy/Chicago/a major city that’s still within reasonable driving distance for him to come see the kids. Eddie is in the passenger seat and they’re zooming down the highway, one of those picture perfect moments where they’re singing along to a Madonna song, that Eddie was complaining about just moments ago.

Steve, always striving to be the safest driver on the road, mostly because he is almost always transporting precious cargo in the form of his loved ones, isn’t the one who sees it at first. It isn’t until Eddie loudly gasps and points out a pretty horrific car accident unfolding before their eyes in the next lane over.

Steve pulls off to the side, a fair distance behind wreck. One of the cars is turned completely around in the other direction, the front smashed in. The other cars are also damaged, but the passengers are getting out. No one has gotten out of the turned around car.

Without a word, without questions from either of them, the two get out of the Beamer. Eddie goes up to the other cars, a woman who’s crying her eyes out and a young family all looking spooked out of their minds, but all seemingly alright. All of this is happening in Steve’s peripheral because he is now sprinting toward the car that no one has gotten out of. He sees the shape of the driver, head laid back on the headrest, unconscious.

“Don’t move her!” “We need to wait for help!” Bystanders yell at him. Steve doesn’t respond, the driver door now open, as he checks the girl, who looks so young that mental images of one of his kids being in her place flash across his brain, tug at his heart.

“Eddie!” He yells past the lump in his throat, but it looks like his boyfriend was already reading his mind, as he runs over with the first aid kit that’s always stationed in the trunk of his car.

He finds her pulse as Eddie settles beside him. He’s checking for broken bones as the girl comes to. He’s telling her to sit back and that everything is okay as Eddie is yelling at the crowd forming around them to back up, he knows what he’s doing.

Steve gets the flashlight out of the kit, shining it in her eyes, asking her what her name is, what day it is, who the president is, she hesitates to answer but answers all the questions.

Eddie isn’t sure if this first aid knowledge is from all the times Steve’s been assessed after all the Upside Down shit or if it’s because of his own research, though he realizes as watches Steve keep the girl calm and gently keep her from moving around at all, it’s both.

Eddie continues to watch when the ambulance gets to the scene. He watches Steve tell the EMTs that the girl is concussed and has no other visible injuries. He watches as they assess her themselves and as they ask Steve if he’s off duty, motioning to his extensive first aid kit. Steve just says he’s had his fair share of emergencies and he knows what he’s doing.

After the ambulance leaves, Steve and Eddie walking back to their car, even though traffic is backed up all the way to their apartment it seems, Eddie can’t stop thinking about how easily Steve fit into the “hero” role. How, sure, it’s residual Savior Of The World shit, but can’t it also be more now that the world is saved?

When they’re back on the road, hours later, and close to home, Eddie asks,

“Have you ever thought about becoming a paramedic?”

Steve doesn’t say anything. But he’s thinking. No, he hasn’t thought about it. But maybe he should start thinking about it.

738 notes - Posted October 25, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#pretty good for someone who started posting regularly again in June #nothing surprising to see here akdjk #all ive done is read fic post abt the fic i like and write some of my own #also my fic recs!!! love that my favs are in my top 5 posts <3

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ottisbuns · 2 years

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uhhhh toh, raeda, and thennnnnn caleb

Ok wow this was a lot and ended up taking a hot minute, but anyways

001 | The Owl House:

Favorite character: Luz Noceda, I am a basic "Main Character Enjoyer" bitch like that

Least Favorite character: This is hard because all of the characters are so good in their intended role, but if I had to pick the one that I dislike the most as like, a person? Tibbles. The only thing worse than a Genocidal Maniac Tyrant is a capitalist.

5 Favorite ships (canon or non-canon): Help me I have too many ships I like. I am a serial multi/poly crackshipper. Saying Lumity and Raeda feel like cheating, so I will be giving my top five crackships/rarepairs, in no particular order. Camilraedarius, Skara/Luz, Emira/Viney, Skara/Viney and Skara/Boscha.

Character I find most attractive: Probably Emira, for reasons that will become evident soon.

Character I would marry: Oh this is a tough one... most characters are either significantly older or significantly younger than me so picking one feels weird... Hooty will treat me right, I just know it.

Character I would be best friends with: Luz. We could bond over being neurodivergent and enjoying fanfiction and shipping.

a random thought: Emira's hair gives me gender envy

An unpopular opinion: The entire show should be replaced with Lumity screentime Honestly my opinions are pretty basic, and I'm also really bad at knowing what opinions are unpopular, but the one opinion I could see getting me crucified is that I don't have that strong an opinion on Huntlow? I see its value as a ship, but I don't have strong personal feelings on it.

My Canon OTP: LUMITY. They're the whole reason I even got into this show.

My Non-canon OTP OT5: Ok, listen, hear me out here because I'm about to sound completely insane, but Luz/Amity/Willow/Skara/Boscha. I realize this doesn't make me seem less insane but I had to get it off my chest. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Most Badass Character: Amity, her fight scenes are amazing.

Most Epic Villain: Kikimora Belos told her to go find a hole to die in, and she did. Truly the most henchperson of all time.

Pairing I am not a fan of: Picking from actually semi-prevalent ships, probably Boschlow? I'll still devour fanfiction about it given the option, but especially in canon I don't think it works.

Character I feel the writers screwed up (in one way or another): The Writers? None. Disney by shortening the show? The Covenheads.

Favourite Friendship: Luz and Hunter, though they're more like siblings so does it still count?

Character I most identify with: S3 Luz

Character I wish I could be: EMIRA GIVE ME YOUR HAIR I WANT IT

002 | Raeda:

When I started shipping them: I have very few memories of my early time in the fandom, which was quite late, so basically for as long as I can remember

My thoughts: That one screenshot of Raine bridal carrying Eda with That Expression™... yeah...

What makes me happy about them: How they were so in sync even as kids and stuck together for so long until...

What makes me sad about them: ...they were torn apart by the curse.

Things done in fanfic that annoys me: I know a lot of them were written before we even knew Raine existed, but Camileda fanfiction where Raine isn't acknowledged still bothers me.

Things I look for in fanfic: Established Raeda is always fun in AUs, bonus points if it's Camilraeda and they are all raising Luz, Vee and King.

My wishlist: NOW KISS

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: Frequently bought together DO NOT SEPARATE! but I guess if I have to then Camila for Eda and I guess I could see Darius for Raine?

My happily ever after for them: They get married and help take care of Luz and Hunter with Camila.

003 | Caleb:

How I feel about this character: He wife guyed too close to the sun and it's still haunting the narrative. Iconic.

Any/all the people I ship romantically with this character: His wife Evelyn, duh.

My favorite non-romantic relationship for this character: His connection to Hunter, if you can call that a relationship.

My unpopular opinion about this character: I'm not super interested in like a flashback to his time in Connecticut to be honest, I'd enjoy seeing more of his time and relationship with Evelyn, but his time in Gravesfield isn't that compelling to me

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: One thing I think could have some really neat potential is if he somehow could have a heart-to-heart with Hunter. I think that could be fascinating.

Favorite friendship for this character: I mean, there aren't exactly a lot of options but I think he and Luz could be great friends.

My crossover ship: Caleb X Not Dying

#the owl house #I am not tagging all the characters mentioned here #no way #smokestarrules #I don't get to talk about The Owl House nearly as much as I'd want to because none of my friends outside of Tumblr are into it #and on Tumblr I am but a humble reblogger with no original posts so I only really interact with the community through tags and replies #so I have a lot of pent up energy

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morkiiimoo · 2 months

Text

20 Questions for Fic Writers

I was tagged by @kanonavi <3

How many fics do you have on AO3?

I believe it’s about 27, though I have orphaned a couple of fics over time. I would estimate I orphaned about 3-4, so around 30!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

472,154

3. What fandoms do you write for?

A couple! I’ve written the most for my beloved Umbrella Academy and I have two current wips for Persona 3 and Umbrella Academy. But I have written fics for Bungo Stray Dogs and Boku No Hero before.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

BSD: Watch the Show - 2,285

come and pick me up - 2,083

going the distance - 615

i love you (even if you drive me crazy) - 537

that’s my name - 488

It doesn’t surprise me that BSD Watch the Show is in the top of these, but im pleasantly surprised by the amount that come and pick me up has considering I wrote it in like 5 days in a manic binge.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes! It’s kinda fun. But people have been really mean to me before about BSD: Watch the Show because I didn’t finish it, so… I’m happy with the amount of comments I get now, usually on sfns or one of the TUA fics.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I guess… medicine of the soul? It was going to end happily, but it was def the angstiest one. I also never finished it lmao. last hope was also going to end sadly but that’s cause it was a canon-compliant piece and you know… canon sucks.

7. What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Any TUA fic honestly. I hate making those poor kids suffer any more than usual, so I would say that come and pick me up is the happiest ending for me. I love the dance scene at the end and I’m still really proud of that fic.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Yes lol. Mostly begging for me to update BSD: Watch the Show. I have gotten grammar corrections too, but those are mostly helpful, honestly.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes. But I haven’t posted it. It’s been mostly fluffy though.

10. Do you write crossovers? If so, what's the craziest one you've ever written?

I wrote a fusion AU! It was of TUA and The Boys. I never finished that one either but I was really proud of it.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope!

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nah! I’m surprised that someone hasn’t asked for like… BSD: Watch the Show though.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yep! Talk the Stars is the one I am writing with my lovely friend, Navi. I’m very proud of it and excited for the future!

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

So many… but Shin Soukoku (BSD) will always be my favorite. I love them to death and miss them so bad, but the manga is killing me. I also like Xiaoven (Xiao x Venti) from Genshin and Akishinji (Persona 3).

15. What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I have two! I’m currently writing a Persona 3 x Persona 5 semi-crossover called start fresh next semester that I’m so proud of and so excited about. And I have a TUA fanfiction that follows Number Five (again) that I want to put out before the new season primeres!

16. What are your writing strengths?

I’ve been told that I have this weird ability to create a world with my words? In the sense that I can come up with silly references on the fly to make it seem like characters have a life outside of the fic? Which I think is kinda fun.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Grammar! I’m terrible at remembering proper grammar and just write what sounds correct in my head and then don’t read through it myself before I post it which leads to grammar and spelling errors. I just get too excited.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

It’s cute! I think providing translations is important, and having one or two words is helpful. In the TUA fandom / fanfic, Klaus canonically knows German and says words in it frequently and Allison knows seven languages. In Genshin, they’re all from different countries so I try to sneak words in there sometimes.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

I believe Boku No Hero?

20. Favorite fic you've written?

start fresh next semester and come and pick me up. I’m so proud of both of them and I’m happy to see people like / still like them.

I have no one to tag but yayyyyy

#tag game

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writerlyhabits · 3 years

Text

Courting

Pairing: Din Djarin x reader

Words: 5.3k

Based on this request

A/N: As you can tell by the word count, I went ham on this prompt, I seriously love it so much. @deceiverofgodss and I worked on this probably too much for both of our own good, but I am so in love with what we created and I hope you like it too! Lots of fluff, actual decent angst this time (not my usual bullshit), a fun dive into both canon and fanon Mandalorian culture, and just lots of fun 😊

Warnings: canon level violence–use and mention of weapons & combat, angst, Mandalorian lore, I made a Mandalorian specifically for this, semi-established relationship? I explain it, I tied it into the plotline of the show even, the child is a contributing member this time (kinda), idk this is the longest fic I’ve written so I feel like I’m forgetting something

Seeing a Mandalorian covert was an interesting experience to say the least, and an experience not hardly any other non-Mandalorians like yourself would share. It was like an entire civilization, though on a much smaller scale, hidden beneath the surface of the planet above. Din had received a heavily obscured and ambiguous message from who he believed was the armorer, his assumption coming to be true as she welcomed his little clan into the covert, offering protection for you and the child as well as information before the three of you had to continue on your search for the Jedi.

While Din had busied himself with information gathering, as well as doing what he could to provide for the tribe, you had taken to putting your own set of skills to use. You and the child would often entertain and watch after the Mandalorian children and foundlings that ran around the tunnels of the covert, telling stories of your adventures with your Mandalorian that seemed to inspire them, many a Mandalorian parent thanking you for it. You offered your limited medical help, helping with anything from minor scrapes, knife wounds, and brushes of blaster fire. As well as, with the experience you’d gained working on the Razor Crests’ constant repairs, being able to offer some mechanical support in the rare cases needed.

Overall, you proved to be a favorite among the Mandalorians, and even though you took it very modestly, Din couldn’t help but feel his pride being inflated. He’d had a handful of Mandos tell him about how perfectly suited you were to be a Mandalorian Riduur, and it took a lot for him to ignore his body’s response.

The child loved the attention, and quite honestly, you didn’t mind it either. The women were welcoming and taught you different styles of fighting, the children were sweet, and there was one Mando in particular with green markings on his shoulder who would often give you gifts. Just little things, but it was a nice gesture, and made you feel like you fit in amongst the beskar clad warriors.

“What did you tell them about me this time?” Din asked as he made his way into the little cove you three had occupied in the covert, pushing the drapery meant for privacy aside. “The foundlings were all over me when I walked through.” You giggled at the thought.

“We told them about the Mudhorn today, they wanted to know how you earned your signet,” you told him fondly, the child wriggling out of your grasp to descend onto the bed that took up most of the space in your little cut-out of a room. “They seem to idolize you.”

“That’s because you keep fluffing up the stories you tell them, mesh’la,” he sighed as he deposited his rifle in the corner beside the bed, and you couldn’t help but smile at him. There was an unspoken connection between the two of you that just lit your entire being on fire. Especially when he called you sweet names like that. You didn’t technically know what it meant, but you figured it had to be a term of endearment by the way he said it.

“Any luck with the…” You trailed off, asking him about the Jedi, but trying not to get the kid’s hopes up. The two of you had noticed his ears perking up at any mention of it, and after a while with nothing new, Din suggested the two of you keep things low-profile around him.

“Same as always,” he admitted, and you could hear frustration creeping into his voice. “We’re running out of options, and I don’t even know where I would start if we can’t find anything.”

“I’m sure something will come up,” you tried to reassure him. “Why don’t you come sit down, you’ve had a rough few days,” you offered. He tilted his helmet at you in just the right way, and you knew he was looking at you as fondly as you were him. He turned his focus to the troublemaker fumbling around the large bed.

“What have you got little one?” he asked affectionately, picking the child up and examining the object he had been trying to put in his mouth. It was a miniature carving of what looked like a Nexu, complete with four eyes, a wide mouth, and a long two-tipped tail. “Another Nexu, huh?” You chuckled softly, the sound making his soul light up. While your time here in the covert had been stressful in terms of the search for Jedi, Din had enjoyed these moments with his little family, finding absolute bliss in the comfort they allowed.

“Mmhmm, it also came with this,” you offered, bringing him out of his daze as you held a dagger delicately in your hands. He’d almost let it slip as he looked up at your smiling face, doing a double-take as he took a closer look at the weapon, a silver blade fixed to a hilt of beskar. Din gently set the child back down on the bed, his visor trained on the dagger in your hands.

“Who gave you that?” He asked abruptly, his shift in attitude catching you off guard.

“You remember that Mandalorian with the green designs on his shoulder? I think he goes by Tairoh.”

“Has he given you anything else?” Your eyebrows were furrowed in confusion, hinted with concern.

“All of these were from him. He has something for me almost every time I see him,” you admitted cautiously, referring to the assortment of trinkets and toys amongst the pile of your things, most of which were variations of the exact same thing. The fucking Nexu. He’d heard that Mando tell too many stories about the ugly animals before, he should have known it was a signet.

Tairoh was much taller, bigger, stronger, and younger than Din was. He was good with the foundlings, had a soft spot for them. As a fighter, he was reckless, never thinking before he leaped, yet every action he took was one for his tribe. He was a prime example of a Mandalorian warrior, and it made an uneasy feeling start to settle in the pit of Din’s stomach.

“Dank farrik… I thought you got those from the foundlings,” he grumbled, looking seemingly anywhere but you. Which didn’t help make you feel any better about whatever was going on.

“Why, what’s wrong?” you tried. Din just kind of let out a heavy breath as he hesitated a few moments. “Should… should I not have taken them? Should I give the blade back?”

“No no, you should keep it… it’s a beautiful weapon, it suits you.” Din tried to be genuine, but it wasn’t working, his comment coming out passive and cold. In all fairness, it was well crafted and would fit your fighting style well. But it was wrong.

“Alright… then what is it? Why are you upset?”

“I’m not upset,” he lied. You simply raised an eyebrow at him, seeing right through his act. He huffed in frustration. “I’m not upset, not at you.” That was all he said before he flung the drapery “door” open and stormed off through the tunnels of the covert, leaving you and the child alone again.

“Yeah, that was a great talk. Glad we cleared that up,” you muttered sarcastically to the empty space where Din was standing a few moments before, the child simply looking up at you with wide eyes. You had half a mind to take the Nexu out of his mouth, but you didn’t need both of your boys throwing fits, one was plenty.

...

“Why did you make the blade?”

“I have made a handful of blades in the last few days, you’ll have to be more specific.” The Armorer had her back to him as she worked in the large circular room, her voice calm and collected like it always was. It was starting to piss him off.

“The blade Tairoh gave to her. A courting gift, when she’s mine.” He was seething, his words hot on his tongue.

“Not by Mandalorian customs,” The Armorer answered with a lilt in her voice. Din froze.

“She’s not Mandalorian, she doesn’t understand.”

“That does not stop the others from being able to try. She does not carry your signet, she wears no ring, pendant, or other signifiers. While she may have a bond with you and your foundling, she has no true tie to your clan.”

How could someone be so right and so wrong at the same time? You did belong to his clan, you made it a clan of three. You were always there to have his back, you cared for his foundling as if he were your own. Maker, after everything you had been through together, he was as much your child as he was Din’s. He thought of all your lingering glances, your gentle touches, warm smiles. The way your eyes lit up at the sight of him, the way you looked at him as if he had put the galaxy in your hands.

But he hadn’t given you his signet. Despite having thought about it more times than he could count, you had nothing that bore his mudhorn. So while by common standards you were his, to the Mandalorians… there was still room for doubt, for interference, for competition.

And yet, he had such a personal knowledge of you, he felt like there hadn’t been a need for such a bold claim, such a strong statement of possession. He knew your facial expressions and what each subtle change reflected, as you knew every tilt of his helmet. He knew which meals and snacks disappeared quicker, he knew how softly you would sing in the ‘fresher, which sleeping positions you found the most comfortable during cold nights on the Crest. He knew you as intimately as you knew him. Wasn’t that the point? Wasn’t that enough?

“She possesses the Mandokar, the virtue of a true Mandalorian. She has an aggressive passion, tenacity, loyalty, and a clear lust for life. He will help strengthen this in her, and together they will raise strong warriors.”

Din could physically feel his heart shatter. Just the thought of you with another man, another Mandalorian, having children that were not his own… it was never something you had discussed, but in that moment Din knew it was everything he wanted.

“This is the way,” the armorer tried. For the first time in a long time, he did not reply. He turned and stormed out of the room, his cape swishing behind him as he sped off with one thing in mind.

You.

…

“I don’t understand, do you not like it?” Tairoh asked.

“No, it’s a lovely weapon, it really is,” you started, the kid in his satchel on your hip while you held the knife out to him with both hands. You had no way to know whether this was right or not, but after sitting in your room racking your brain for an answer with nothing else to go off of but Din’s reaction, this was the best solution you could think of.

“My Mandalorian did not react the way I expected him to when I brought this back.” You tried to choose your words gently, terrified of accidentally offending him by some part of his culture you didn’t understand, unaware that Tairoh knew exactly why it had set Din off. That he had almost anticipated it, though your clear statement of ‘my Mandalorian’ threw him off. “I clearly don’t understand what this means, and I think it might be best if I returned it to you.”

“He didn’t explain it to you?” Tairoh questioned, his hands remaining on his hips as he towered over you, still not taking the knife out of your hands like you wanted so badly for him to.

“Neither did you,” came the modulated voice you were so familiar with, and you could feel the kid’s ears perk up at the sound. You peeked behind the hulking Mando in front of you to see your favorite wall of beskar storming down the hall of the covert, beelining towards the three of you. Tairoh turned to face him, his size quickly becoming evident as his bulky frame towered even over Din, who you were used to feeling small standing next to.

“Did you think she knew?” You could hear the anger in his voice, hot and boiling over the edge. “Or did you disregard that she had no idea what you were doing?”

“Being so close to someone with such a strong Mandokar, it’s a wonder you haven’t gotten farther than I have.” How they can have a whole conversation and still not say a damn word about what the hell was going on was almost impressive. It’s like they were doing it on purpose. They had stepped dangerously close to each other, and the tension of the situation was so thick you could have cut it with the blade that was, unfortunately, still in your hand.

“You don’t know her like I do,” Din sneered, his voice quiet but unwavering. You had to ignore the shocks it sent through your body.

“Maybe I don’t, not yet. But I’ll know her better.”

You couldn't even interject before Din had launched at Tairoh. You watch in shock as Din’s shining silver vambrace became a blur until his gloved fist collided with the other helmet, his opponent only flinching a little. In that brief pause where they both processed what was happening, you felt like your heart was stuck in your throat. A green armored hand shoots out to grab Din behind the neck, and he moves to swing the other one at his helmet. You watch, almost in slow motion, as Din managed to duck himself down and out of the way, headbutting the much larger Mandalorian in the gut. You’re almost impressed by your own reaction time considering how distracted you are, quick to move out of the way as he plows Tairoh into the wall behind you.

You glance around at the others gathered around the covert, and no one is even batting an eye. Well, figuratively. There’s only one helmet turning anywhere near your direction, and his body language just looks bored. The child at your hip, on the other hand, seemed to be having a great time, cooing and cheering in his own little way, being far too used to watching his father beat the shit out of people for his own good.

Tairoh kicks Din off of him, sending the silver-clad Mando stumbling backward, your attention brought back to where it should be. Pushing himself off the wall, he sauntered over to Din, grabbing him by the collar and hoisting him into the air. Din scrambles a little bit, his legs swinging as he tried hitting Tairoh anywhere he could reach, but nothing seemed to make any progress.

After a few moments, you started to get even more nervous than you already were, watching as nothing happened, Din struggling and Tairoh seeming to stand victorious. What he was winning was lost to you, but he seemed pretty comfortable with his accomplishment, bringing his other hand up to prop up against his hip. Almost as soon as he got comfortable, Din’s legs shot up to hook around his opponent’s upper body, catching him off guard. He ignites his jetpack, causing Tairoh to stumble backward with the offset, dropping Din to the floor with a metallic thud.

This was what was getting people’s attention, you figured, watching as a crowd of Mandalorians had started to congregate in the nearby halls when the combatants started pulling out their fancy toys. You’d seen a couple of Mandos brawl through the covert during your stay, it was like sibling rivalries, they fought over anything and everything. But it was usually just with their fists, and the occasional vibroblade if they got fired up. They didn’t pull out their jetpacks or other impressive weapons, like your Beskar clad dumbass was doing right now.

Din was quick to his feet, or at least to one of them as he scrambled up from the floor and onto one knee, throwing the grappling line out from his vambrace to wrap around Tairoh’s legs and send him to the ground. The larger Mandalorian plants his feet and grounds himself, and reached out to start pulling the line, and Din with it. You watched almost in awe as Din’s strength was tested, holding his own against his hulking opponent until his boots betrayed him, sliding against the floor. You can hear his struggle, grunting and groaning as he used all his strength to stop from being pulled in, and combined with the sight of his broad stance ... it was certainly having an effect on you.

There was a soft clink of metal, Din having found his footing in a grate on the floor, wrapping the line around his fist and pulling it taught. You didn’t know who drew their weapon first, but in a flash, both of the armored men in front of you were throwing fire at each other, blasts meeting in the middle and canceling the other out. The air was not only hot, but it was thick with rising tension, and you knew it was only a matter of moments before one of them launched to further attack the other, and your stomach was tying itself in a knot as the other Mandos around you egged them on.

You physically flinched as a clang reverberated through the halls, turning to see the Armorer at the end of the corridor, her forging hammer in hand, likely having collided it with Beskar to produce the sound. The flamethrowers were disengaged, and a crowd of ‘T’ shaped visors turned to look at her, even from their positions on the floor.

“Enough,” her calm voice came through. “We cannot let our personal battles overpower the strength of our tribe. While strength is life by the Canons of Honor, for the strong have the right to rule... loyalty is life, for without one’s clan one has no purpose. Do not let your flames burn down that bond, nor our newfound covert, crucial in our continued survival.” There was a pause as they all absorbed her words, and you could see as the two in front of you started to let go, releasing the cable for Din to reign it back in.

“Our secrecy is our survival, our survival is our strength. This is the way,” She finished. There was an echo of voices, ‘this is the way’ resounding through the crowd that had gathered as they reiterated the aphorism the way they often did. You looked to Din at that moment, still unsure whether answering or not answering was more offensive, only to find his visor already pointed at you.

As the crowd dispersed, Din offered a hand to help Tairoh off the floor, and they gave each other a silent nod before turning to you. The latter gave you a similar nod before walking in the other direction, leaving you, the child, and Din to yourselves as he made his way to your side. The child started squirming in his satchel on your hip as he tried to get to his father.

“What the hell is going on?!” you questioned him in a harsh whisper, handing him the wiggling green swamp rat. Din let out a deep sigh, holding the kid close to his chest with one arm, his other slotting at the small of your back to gently lead you forward.

“Let’s head back to our quarters, I’ll explain there.”

…

The walk back had been a quiet one, aside from the Child’s happy gurgling, while Din was racking his brain to figure out where he was going to start and you silently waited for him. You passed a handful of other Mandos on your way, and you figured word must have traveled quickly by the way their visors lingered on your party.

Peeling the curtain back to let Din walk in before you, you tossed the satchel and unwanted dagger onto the large bed and propped your hands on your hips, waiting for his explanation. He almost looked sheepish as he set the child down in his pod, begrudgingly handing him the Nexu toy that he had taken a liking to.

“He was courting you,” Din started, always quick to the point when he decided to give you any explanation. Your eyebrows shot up in confusion. “All the gifts he was giving you, they were courting gifts. He wanted… he wanted to marry you.” He had to take a shaky breath to manage the last statement, and your heart ached.

“Din…” you sighed, dropping your hands to try and get closer to him.

“You couldn't have known, and… and I should have told you, I just...” You placed a hand on his arm as you came up to him, his body responding almost instinctively as his hands found your waist to hold you against him. One gloved hand came up to cup your cheek, his thumb gently caressing your soft skin. “I just didn’t want to lose you,” he whispered. You almost laughed at him, unable to hide your grin.

“What made you think that would ever happen?”

“Do you realize how many Mandalorians would have been happy to make you their partner?” he said, almost shocking you with how steady his voice was, like he’d thought about this many times before this. “You have a lot of key Mandalorian qualities, and many of them have told me directly that they’d be honored if they got the chance to court you.”

You just kind of looked at him with wide eyes, barely processing the words coming out of his mouth. You had started as an outsider, doing what you could to prove your value, let them know they could trust you… and apparently, you had accomplished much more than just fitting in.

“What stopped them?” You asked, almost amused at the absurdity of all of this.

“Me.” The conviction in his voice sent chills down your spine. “They understood that you’re mine, that you’re with me, under my protection.”

“They’re damn right,” you smiled, placing your hands on the broad expanse of his chest plate.

“But you do not wear my signet,” he continued, not sounding quite as amused as you did, and your smile fell. “By Mandalorian standards, I have no claim over you. Tairoh saw that, and took his chance.” His hand fell from your cheek, but didn’t go far as it resided at your waist. “He is much bigger, stronger, younger than I am… he would have provided well for you.”

You finally got a glimpse into what was going on inside that bucket on his head, and you were not successful in holding in your laughter this time.

“What’s funny?” He sounded irritated, securely holding you in place as your laughter had you leaning back in his arms.

“You’re dumb,” you replied, earning a huff in response. You righted yourself, trying to contain your giggles as you looked back up into his visor. “Do you think I care about any of that?” His helmet tilted the slightest bit, and you knew he was listening intently. “I didn’t choose you because you could provide for me, or because you were Mandalorian. Apparently, I could have my pick of the lot.” That comment made him give you an amused exhale, and you dreamed about the smile that accompanied it.

“I want you, Din Djarin. I want you just as you are, beskar helmet or no,” you admitted softly, hoping to soothe his nerves, and help him realize just how far you would go for him. “But dank farrik, you have got to start telling me things. We could have avoided all of this if you had just told me what was going on,” you poked at him, and you got to hear one of the rarest and most beautiful sounds– the deep, belly laugh of your favorite Mandalorian.

“That takes the fun out of it, mesh’la,” he smiled. Your hands flew to cradle his neck in between your hands, sitting just under his helmet and pulling down ever so slightly to get him closer to you.

“You can start by telling me what that word means, you’ve been calling me that forever!” Din’s helmet tilted to the side, far more prominent this time, and it made your cheeks grow hot. You knew he was about to say something absolutely adorable, or something that would make your sides hurt with laughter. Always a gamble with him.

“It means beautiful,” he muttered, and your heart swelled.

You remembered the very first time he’d ever called you that. It had taken you completely off guard and had probably been the only time you could have asked what it meant and actually have gotten an answer, at least before he got stubborn and made it something secret he could get away with as he pleased.

It had been on Sorgan, in the weeks spent laying low in the quiet backwater village, well after the initial battle that had brought you there. Din had been standing on the porch of the little hut they had graciously provided for the three of you to stay in, standing with his thumbs hooked into his belt, his back to the door as he waited for you.

I want to show you something, you had told him, and you could hear his smile when he couldn’t resist you. You remember what it felt like as his visor gazed up and down your body as you modeled the blue, apron-shaped piece you had woven yourself. It had taken weeks and immeasurable amounts of patience learning from the villagers, and you would never wear it again once you left the planet, but you were proud of yourself.

It looks great, mesh’la, you did well. It had made you light up like a plasma charge, the intimacy in his voice made you melt.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me that?” you asked the Mando in your arms, enamored with the man who had been calling you beautiful for almost as long as he’d known you. He dropped his head down to meet yours in a Mandalorian custom you did recognize– from legends and stories before you had your own to interrogate– the Keldabe Kiss.

“Because I’m dumb.”

…

Weeks had passed at the covert, and you welcomed the growth that came with it. The child had gotten over his fussy-ness when being left with other Mandos, happy to play with new friends and other foundlings while you and Din were away. In this time, you continued doing what you could to help around the covert and did more training with the Mandalorians you had grown close to, helping you hone in on a fighting style that suited you best in both preference and build. As for Din, he’d been much more talkative since the fight and had been more than happy to indulge you in any mando’a translation you asked of him, even going as far as to give you some of his own. It was nice, having a little routine. It was almost domestic.

But that kind of domesticity just didn’t fit your party’s lifestyle, and soon enough you were on the move again. You were to meet an informant, Gor Koresh, who frequented an underground fighting pit and had a lead on the location of other Mandalorians. With nothing to go off of in the covert’s position, this was your best option. And while you had enjoyed your time at the covert, you were itching for something new.

You settled yourselves back into the Razor Crest, the child already having forgotten about his missing Nexu toys – a crime Din refused to answer for – when he was reunited with the beloved ball topper from the cockpit. The other Mandalorians had been gracious enough to help stock up your supplies, and ensure the ship was prepared to travel. Tairoh had been one of those people, heavy lifting where it was needed, but gave you nothing more than another silent nod. It would have been the opportune moment to return the blade back to him, had you not misplaced it before leaving the covert, even though it remained in one spot since it had been in your possession. Though you couldn’t lie, there was an incredible lack of remorse for the missing object on your part, and you were sure that one person would be relieved.

“How far do you think you came in your training?” Din had asked, turning the pilot’s chair to face you now that he had set a course through lightspeed.

“I’m doing much better since what you taught me on Sorgan, I could hold my own,” you answered proudly. “Why?”

“I’m half expecting trouble with this informant, but I want you to come with me.” There was something different about his tone. You knew he was grinning, you could hear it, but you couldn’t for the life of you figure out why.

“Yeah? You and me against a bunch of underground fighters?” You teased, knowing full well that it was an image he’d enjoy.

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” he chuckled. He hesitated for a moment, almost unsure of himself as he fidgeted with his glove. “Do you want to fight me? Show me what you’ve learned?”

“If you’ve got something I can use,” you replied, shrugging your shoulders. You turned to look down at the hull below as you explained, “I got pretty good with hand to hand, but I’m used to using their blades. Yours look a bit bigger, and I lost the one from…” Your words were caught in your throat when you turned back around to face him.

He was still sitting in the pilot’s chair, and though his posture was relaxed you could tell all of his muscles were at attention. In his hands was a sleek dagger, much like the ones you were used to. The blade was attached to a beskar hilt that had intricate designs, and a very distinct image of a mudhorn.

“Is that…”

“I had it crafted before we left,” he answered as your question trailed off. “I hope you don’t mind, but I reused the beskar from your last blade, and had it made into something better.” You let out a laugh at his implication, some of the tension released from your body.

“Din, does this mean you’re courting me?” you teased, raising an eyebrow at him. He gave an airy chuckle as he let go of a breath he seemed to be holding.

“I figured it wouldn’t hurt to make it count by Mandalorian customs as well. We would be recognized as a clan of three.” You stood from the co-pilot’s chair to stand between his legs, and he leaned up from his position to look at you properly, a gloved hand caressing the side of your leg as he held you there. “It’s yours if you’ll have it, mesh’la.”

You gently took the blade from his hands, beaming at him while you examined it. Another hand came up to your other side, pulling you down into his lap to hold you close.

“What do you think?” You gave it a brief moment of feigned contemplation.

“I think I’m gonna kick your ass with it when we land.” You felt his body rumble with the chuckle that came from deep within his core, his hand moving to cup your cheek.

“Save it for the fighters my love.”

...

Taglist: @janebby

Din Djarin: @spideysimpossiblegirl @cats-are-a-girls-bestfriend

#din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin #din djarin fluff #the mandalorian x reader #the mandalorian #the mandalorian x you #anonymous request #anonymous #thanks for requesting shit from me #i love this a lot #i hope you do too #I ignored too much homework time for this

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shanastoryteller · 3 years

Text

on one hand i’ve been wanting to talk about this for a while, and on the other hand i’ve been avoiding it for the massive potential it has to go from us having a conversation to devolving into the most annoying discourse possible

but i got another comment that just broke the camel’s back so i’m going to talk about it anyway

a lot of things i see people are saying are “wrong” in untamed fanfic are actually just translation preferences and just because someone chooses to translate something differently than you doesn’t make it wrong

first, before we get into what i’m talking about, we have to talk about what translations are and the motivation behind them

translations are taking something from one language and making it understandable and consumable in a different language

this can be as big as the differences between chinese and english or as small as the differences between british english and american english, which are considered different enough that books published in both places will have words and phrases translated to make them more digestible to the population it’s being marketed towards

there are few different ways someone can translate something

there’s a direct translation, which is just finding the closest applicable word and plopping it in there like a smarter google translate

there’s translating to preserve the intention and cultural significance behind a word/phrase as closely as can be replicated in the foreign language

there’s translating to convey the vibe/feeling as closely as can be replicated in the foreign language

there’s not translating at all, which doesn’t technically count, by definition, but is brought up often enough that we’ll talk about it

there’s an infinite number of ways this applies, but for simplicity’s sake, and because it’s the one people keep bringing up to me, we’re going to go with jiujiu / maternal uncle

because i don’t speak chinese, my first job is to gain some level of understanding about what this word really means in the original language and the way it’s used. only once you understand that can you make a semi-educated choice on how to translate something (since most of us aren’t fluent in the language or culture, semi educated is about as good as it gets, but for smaller words like these i think it’s easy enough to get most of the needed context). so we need to start off with: maternal uncle, respectful, people don’t use names to differentiate between uncles like we do in english, using first names and/or birth names is either intimate or disrespectful depending on circumstance

now, the simplest way to translate this is just as uncle. in english, referring to someone just as uncle is a little unusual, but common enough that this works as a good translation all around. if one wants to translate the maternal aspect of it, then “uncle lastname” works pretty well. the issue with that is that naming convention only ever happens in english maybe with grand uncles or “uncles” that fall more under shushu than jiujiu, so if i was translating it then that’s something i would avoid, because i wouldn’t want the readers to think that the characters have a less close relationship because o this, but it’s something that’s easy enough to do without distorting the original meaning so i think it also works

if the character only has one uncle

but we are, specifically, talking about jin ling here

so if he’s talking about both jiang cheng and wei wuxian in the same scene, and referring to them both as uncle, how do we differentiate them?

uncle wei and uncle jiang work here, because they’re both maternal uncles but they have different last names, which is really just us getting lucky in this situation. but it presents the problem we have earlier.

to an english ear, that creates distance between jin ling and jc/wwx. if i want to show them as being close to an english speaking audience, that’s not a translation i personally want to use

the most obvious solution is to then have jin ling refer to them way most english speaking people would refer to their uncles (that’s not just straight up having him call them by the their names, which is what i actually think is most common. i only refer to my uncle as uncle when i’m talking ABOUT him to someone else) which is “uncle first name”

however first names also present a problem in untamed because of courtesy names and because courtesy names are used ahistorically and inconsistently in canon

wei wuxian uses jiang cheng’s birth name but jc doesn’t use wwx’s. wwx is basically the same age and lower in rank than jc, so it would make sense for jc to call him wei ying in turn, but he just ... doesn’t. same for jiang yanli. she’s arguably the one wwx is closest to and has the most positive relationship with through out the show and she’s older than him. it would make a lot of sense for her to call him wei ying, or even a-ying to mirror the way she calls jc a-cheng rather than calling wwx a-xian. lan xichen calls lan wangji by his courtesy name rather than birth name, and i’m pretty sure lan qiren does the same to both his nephews, which doesn’t really make sense to me in world

i think the real purpose here was to give wwx and lwj names that they only call each other for special intimacy reasons rather than to create a consistent more in the untamed universe

however, going with that and jin ling obviously being so much younger and wanting to retain at least some of the respectfulness that would be inherent in the original language, i do think that uncle wuxian and uncle wanyin are good translations

u n l e s s

see the thing is that jin ling refers to wwx as “wei ying” before he knows him as a way to be disrespectful to him because he believes that he killed his parents. i personally like the symmetry in him shifting to calling him that in a positive manner to make up for him calling him that in a negative manner, which isn’t something that can really work in chinese, but can work in english

as for jiang cheng, probably because the story is told from wwx’s pov even in the show, we’re used to seeing his birth name rather than his courtesy name, and honestly no one uses his courtesy name unless he’s being a bitch. because of this, the use of wanyin creates a cognitive sense of distance that the often used wuxian just doesn’t. so if someone uses his birth name for that reason, i think that makes sense too. so i think uncle ying and uncle cheng can also work

there is, of course, just using jiujiu and trusting context to take care of the rest, but that’s less a translation choice than it is just choosing not to translate

i’ve done different things in different works with different contexts. in rotten work specifically, i had jin ling refer to jc as just “uncle” because i imagine that’s what he’s been doing for 16 years with no other maternal uncle, and because he’s the uncle he’s closest too among all of them, and i wanted to reflect that. i have jl refer to wwx as “uncle ying” a little bit because of the reasons above, but also a way to stake a claim on him to everyone and to demonstrate that they have a close relationship before the really have one as a way to partially shield wwx and to goad those around him (plus a bonus plot reason that doesn’t get revealed until the final chapter)

my point here is that there’s a lot reasons why someone could choose to translate something one way versus another. i used this one thing as an example, but this same thought process applies to lots of things

you do not have to agree with everyone’s translation choices, or like them, or think them appropriate. but translation is by its very nature imperfect and there’s a lot of different potential reasoning behind people’s choices and i really don’t think there’s one perfect way to translate something and that all other ways are wrong

#this is your grandma talking #if you disagree we're going to do it nicely and have a normal fucking conversation #or you're getting blocked #i am not getting into a bitchy fight about translation opinions

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army-of-mai-lovers · 4 years

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in which I get progressively angrier at the various tropes of atla fandom misogyny

tbh I think it would serve all of us to have a larger conversation about the specific ways misogyny manifests in this fandom, because I’ve seen a lot of people who characterize themselves as feminists, many of whom are women themselves, discuss the female characters of atla/lok in misogynistic ways, and people don’t talk about it enough.

disclaimer before I start: I’m not a woman, I’m an afab nonbinary person who is semi-closeted and thus often read as a woman. I’m speaking to things that I’ve seen that have made me uncomfy, but if any women (esp women existing along other axes of oppression, e.g. trans women, women of color, disabled women, etc) want to add onto this post, please do!

“This female character is a total badass but I’m not even a little bit interested in exploring her as a human being.”

I’ve seen a lot of people say of various female characters in atla/lok, “I love her! She’s such a badass!” now, this statement on its own isn’t misogynistic, but it represents a pretty pervasive form of misogyny that I’ve seen leveled in large part toward the canon female love interests of one or both of the members of a popular gay ship (*cough* zukka *cough*) I’m going to use Suki as an example of this because I see it with her most often, but it can honestly be applied to nearly every female character in atla/lok. Basically, people will say that they stan Suki, but when it comes time to engage with her as an actual character, they refuse to do it. I’ve seen meta after meta about Zuko’s redemption arc, but I so rarely see people engage with Suki on any level beyond “look at this cool fight scene!” and yeah, I love a cool Suki fight scene as much as anybody else, but I’m also interested in meta and headcanons and fics about who she is as a person, when she isn’t an accessory to Sokka’s development or doing something cool. of course, the material for this kind of engagement with Suki is scant considering she doesn’t have a canon backstory (yet) (don’t let me down Faith Erin Hicks counting on you girl) but with the way I’ve seen people in this fandom expand upon canon to flesh out male characters, I know y’all have it in you to do more with Suki, and with all the female characters, than you currently do. frankly, the most engagement I’ve seen with Suki in mainstream fandom is justifying either zukki (which again, is characterizing her in relation to male characters, one of whom she barely interacts with in canon) or one of the Suki wlw pairings. which brings me to--

“I conveniently ship this female character whose canon love interest is one of the members of my favorite non-canon ship with another female character! gay rights!”

now, I will admit, two of my favorite atla ships are yueki and mailee, and so I totally understand being interested in these characters’ dynamics, even if, as is the case with yueki, they’ve never interacted canonically. however, it becomes a problem for me when these ships are always in the background of a zukka fic. at some point, it becomes obvious that you like this ship because it gets either Zuko or Sokka’s female love interests out of the way, not because you actually think the characters would mesh well together. It’s bad form to dislike a female character because she gets in the way of your gay ship, so instead, you find another girl to pair her off with and call it a day. to be clear, I’m not saying that everybody who ships either mailee or yueki (or tysuki or maisuki or yumai or whatever other wlw rarepair involving Zuko or Sokka’s canon love interests) is nefariously trying to sideline a female character while acting publicly as if she’s is one of their faves--far from it--but it is noteworthy to me how difficult it is to find content that centers wlw ships, while it’s incredibly easy to find content that centers zukka in which mailee and/or yueki plays a background role.

also, notice how little traction wlw Katara ships gain in this fandom. when’s the last time you saw yuetara on your dash? there’s no reason for wlw Katara ships to gain traction in a fandom that is so focused on Zuko and Sokka getting together, bc she doesn’t present an immediate obstacle to that goal (at least, not an obstacle that can be overcome by pairing her up with a woman). if you are primarily interested in Zuko and Sokka’s relationship, and your queer readings of other female characters are motivated by a desire to get them out of the way for zukka, then Katara’s canon m/f relationship isn’t a threat to you, and thus, there’s no reason to read her as potentially queer. Or even, really, to think about her at all.

“Katara’s here but she’s not actually going to do anything, because deep down, I’m not interested in her as a person.”

the show has an enormous amount of textual evidence to support the claim that Sokka and Katara are integral parts of each other’s lives. so, she typically makes some kind of appearance in zukka content. sometimes, her presence in the story is as an actual character with layers and nuance, someone whom Sokka cares about and who cares about Sokka in return, but also has her own life and goals outside of her brother (or other male characters, for that matter.) sometimes, however, she’s just there because halfway through writing the author remembered that Sokka actually has a sister who’s a huge part of the show they’re writing fanfiction for, and then they proceed to show her having a meetcute with Aang or helping Sokka through an emotional problem, without expressing wants or desires outside of those characters. I’m honestly really surprised that I haven’t seen more people calling out the fact that so much of Katara’s personality in fanon revolves around her connections to men? she’s Aang’s girlfriend, she’s Sokka’s sister, she’s Zuko’s bestie. never mind that in canon she spends an enormous amount of time fighting against (anachronistic, Westernized) sexism to establish herself as a person in her own right, outside of these connections. and that in canon she has such interesting complex relationships with other female characters (e.g. Toph, Kanna, Hama, Korra if you want to write lok content) or that there are a plethora of characters with whom she could have interesting relationships with in fanon (Mai, Suki, Ty Lee, Yue, Smellerbee, and if you want to write lok content, Kya II, Lin, Asami, Senna, etc). to me, the lack of fandom material exploring Katara’s relationships with other women or with herself speak to a profound indifference to Katara as a character. I’m not saying you have to like Katara or include her in everything you write, but I am asking you to consider why you don’t find her interesting outside of her relationships with men.

“I hate Katara because she talks about her mother dying too often.”

this is something I’ve seen addressed by people far more qualified than I to address it, but I want to mention it here in part because when I asked people which fandom tropes they wanted me to talk about, this came up often, but also because I find it really disgusting that this is a thing that needs to be addressed at all. Y’all see a little girl who watched her mother be killed by the forces of an imperialist nation and say that she talks about it too much??? That is a formational, foundational event in a child’s life. Of course she’s going to talk about it. I’ve seen people say that she doesn’t talk about it that often, or that she only talks about it to connect with other victims of fn imperialism e.g. Jet and Haru, but frankly, she could speak about it every episode for no plot-significant reason whatsoever and I would still be angry to see people say she talks about it too much. And before you even bring up the Sokka comparison, people deal with grief in different ways. Sokka repressed a lot of his grief/channeled it into being the “man” of his village because he knew that they would come for Katara next if he gave them the opportunity. he probably would talk about his mother more if a) he didn’t feel massive guilt at not being able to remember what she looked like, and b) he was allowed to be a child processing the loss of his mother instead of having to become a tiny adult when Hakoda had to leave to help fight the fn. And this gets into an intersection with fandom racism, in that white fans (esp white American fans) are incapable of relating to the structural trauma that both Sokka and Katara experience and thus can’t see the ways in which structural trauma colors every single aspect of both of their characters, leading them to flatten nuance and to have some really bad takes. And you know what, speaking of bad fandom takes--

“Shitting on Mai because she gets in the way of my favorite Zuko ship is actually totally okay because she’s ~abusive~”

y’all WHAT.

ok listen, I get not liking maiko. I didn’t like it when I first got into fandom, and later I realized that while bryke cannot write romance to save their lives, fans who like maiko sure can, so I changed my tune. but if you still don’t like it, that’s fine. no skin off my back.

what IS skin off my back is taking instances in which Mai had justified anger toward Zuko, and turning it into “Mai abused Zuko.” do you not realize how ridiculous you sound? this is another thing where I get so angry about it that I don’t know how useful my analysis is actually going to be, but I’ll do my best. numerous people have noted how analysis of Mai and Zuko’s breakup in “The Beach” or Mai being justifiably angry with him at Boiling Rock or her asking for FUCKING FRUIT in “Nightmares and Daydreams” that says that all of these events were her trying to gain control over him is....ahhh...lacking in reading comprehension, but I’d like to go a step further and talk about why y’all are so intent on taking down a girl who doesn’t show emotion in normative ways. obviously, there’s a “Zuko can do no wrong” aspect to Mai criticism (which is super weird considering how his whole arc is about how he can do lots of wrong and he has to atone for the wrong that he’s done--but that’s a separate post.) But I also see slandering Mai for not expressing her emotions normatively and not putting up with Zuko’s shit and slandering Katara for “talking about her mother too often” as two sides of the same coin. In both cases, a female character expresses emotions that make you, the viewer, uncomfortable, and so instead of attempting to understand where those emotions may have come from and why they might be manifesting the way they are, y’all just throw the whole character away. this is another instance of people in the fandom being fundamentally disinterested in engaging with the female characters of atla in a real way, except instead of shallowly “stanning” Mai, y’all hate her. so we get to this point where female characters are flattened into one of two things: perfect queens who can do no wrong, or bitches. and that’s not who they are. that’s not who anyone is. but while we as a fandom are pretty good at understanding b1 Zuko’s actions as layered and multifaceted even though he’s essentially an asshole then, few are willing to lend the same grace to any female character, least of all Mai.

and what’s funny is sometimes this trope will intersect with “I conveniently ship this female character whose canon love interest is one of the members of my favorite non-canon ship with another female character! gay rights!”, so you’ll have someone actively calling Mai toxic/problematic/abusive, and at the same time ship her with Ty Lee? make it make sense! but then again, maybe that’s happening because y’all are fundamentally disinterested in Ty Lee as a character too.

“I love Ty Lee so much that I’m going to treat her like an infantilized hypersexual airhead!”

there are so many things happening in y’alls characterization of Ty Lee that I struggled to synthesize it into one quippy section header. on one hand, you have the hypersexualization, and on the other hand, you have the infantilization, which just makes the hypersexualization that much worse.

(of course, sexualizing or hypersexualizing ANY atla character is really not the move, considering that these are child characters in a children’s show, but then again, that’s a separate post.)

now, I understand how, from a very, very surface reading of the text, you could come to the conclusion that Ty Lee is an uncomplicated bimbo. if you grew up on Western media the way I did, you’ll know that Ty Lee has a lot of the character traits we associate with bimbos: the form-fitting pink crop top, the general conventional attractiveness, the ditzy dialogue. but if you think about it for more than three seconds, you’ll understand that Ty Lee has spent her whole life walking a tightrope, trying to please Azula and the rest of the royal family while also staying true to herself. Ty Lee and Azula’s relationship is a really complex and interesting topic that I don’t really have time to explore at the moment given how long this post is, but I’d argue that Ty Lee’s constant, vocal adulation is at least partially a product of learning to survive at court at an early age. Like Mai, she has been forced to regulate her emotions as a member of fn nobility, but unlike Mai, she also has six sisters who look exactly like her, so she has a motivation to be more peppy and more affectionate to stand out.

fandom does not do the work to understand Ty Lee. as is a theme with this post, fandom is actively disinterested in investigating female characters beyond a very surface level reading of them. Thus, fandom takes Ty Lee’s surface level qualities--her love of the color pink, her revealing standard outfit, and the fact that once she found a boy attractive and also once a lot of boys found her attractive--and they stretch this into “Ty Lee is basically Karen Smith from Mean Girls.” thus, Ty Lee is painted as a bimbo, or more specifically, as not smart, uncritically adoring of Azula (did y’all forget all the non-zukka bits of Boiling Rock?), and attractive to the point of hypersexualization. I saw somebody make a post that was like “I wish mailee was more popular but I’m also glad it isn’t because otherwise people would write it as Mai having to put up with her dumb gf” and honestly I have to agree!! this is one instance in which I’m glad that fandom doesn’t discuss one of my favorite characters that often because I hate the fanon interpretation of Ty Lee, I think it’s rooted in misogyny (particularly misogyny against East Asian women, which often takes the form of fetishizing them and viewing them only through a Western white male gaze)

(side note: here at army-of-mai-lovers, we stan bimbos. bimbos are fucking awesome. I personally don’t read Ty Lee as a bimbo, but if that’s you, that’s fucking awesome. keep doing what you’re doing, queen <3 or king or monarch, it’s 2021, anyone can be a bimbo, bitches <3)

“Toph can and will destroy everyone here with her bare hands because she’s a meathead who likes to murder people and that’s it!”

Toph is, and always has been, one of my favorite ATLA characters. My very first fic in fandom was about her, and she appears prominently in a lot of my other work as well. One thing that I am always struck by with Toph is how big a heart she has. She’s independent, yes, snarky, yes, but she cares about people--even the family that forced her to make herself smaller because they didn’t believe that their blind daughter could be powerful and strong. Her storyline is powerful and emotionally resonant, her bending is cool precisely because it’s based in a “wait and listen” approach instead of just smashing things indiscriminately, she’s great disabled rep, and overall one of the best characters in the show.

And in fandom, she gets flattened into “snarky murder child.”

So where does this come from? Well, as we all know, Toph was originally conceived of as a male character, and retained a lot of androgyny (or as the kids call it, Gender) when she was rewritten as a female character. There are a lot of cultural ideas about androgynous/butch women being violent, and people in fandom seem to connect that larger cultural narrative with some of Toph’s more violent moments in the show to create the meathead murder child trope, erasing her canon emotionality, softness, heart, and femininity in the process.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t write or characterize Toph as being violent or snarky at all ever, because yeah, Toph definitely did do Earth Rumbles a lot before joining the gaang, and yeah, Toph is definitely a sarcastic person who makes fun of her friends a lot. What I am saying is that people take these traits, sans the emotional logic, marry them to their conception of androgynous/butch women as violent/unemotional/uncaring, and thus create a caricature of Toph that is not at all up to snuff. When I see Toph as a side character in a fic (because yeah, Toph never gets to be a main character, because why would a fandom obsessed with one male character in particular ever make Toph a protagonist in her own right?) she’s making fun of people, killing people, pranking people, etc, etc. She’s never talking to people about her emotions, or palling around with her found family, or showing that she cares about her friends. Everything about her relationship with her parents, her disability, her relationship to Gender, and her love of her friends is shoved aside to focus on a version of Toph that is mean and uncaring because people have gotten it into their heads that androgynous/butch women are mean and uncaring.

again, we see a female character who does not emote normatively or in a way that makes you, the viewer, comfortable, and so you warp her character until she’s completely unrecognizable and flat. and for what?

Azula

no, I didn’t come up with a snappy name for this section, mainly because fanon interpretations of Azula and my own feelings toward the character are...complicated. I know there were some people who wanted me to write about Azula and the intersection of misogyny and ableism in fanon interpretations of her character, but I don’t think I can deliver on that because I personally am in a period of transition with how I see Azula. that is to say, while I still like her and believe that she can be redeemed, there is a lot of merit to disliking her. the whole point of this post is that the female characters of ATLA are complex people whom the fandom flattens into stereotypes that don’t hold up to scrutiny, or dislike for reasons that don’t make sense. Azula, however, is a different case. the rise of Azula defenders and Azula stans has led to this sentiment that Azula is a 14 y/o abuse victim who shouldn’t be held accountable for her actions. it seems to me that people are reacting to a long, horrible legacy of male ATLA fans armchair diagnosing Azula with various personality disorders (and suggesting that people with those personality disorders are inherently monstrous and unlovable which ahhhh....yikes) and then saying that those personality disorders make her unlovable, which is quite obviously bad. and hey, I get loving a character that everyone else hates and maybe getting so swept up in that love that you forget that your fave is complicated and has made some unsavory choices. it sucks that fanon takes these well-written, complex villains/antiheroes and turns them into monsters with no critical thought whatsoever. but the attitude among Azula stans that her redemption shouldn’t be hard, that her being a child excuses all of the bad things that she’s done, that she is owed redemption....all of that rubs me the wrong way. I might make another post about this in the future that discusses this in more depth, but as it stands now: while I understand that there is a legacy of misogynistic, ableist, unnuanced takes on Azula, the backlash to that does not take into account the people she hurt or the fact that in ATLA she does not make the choice to pursue redemption. and yes, Zuko had help in making that choice that Azula didn’t, and yes, Azula is a victim of abuse, but in a show about children who have gone through untold horrors and still work to better the lives of the people around them, that is not enough for me to uncritically stan her.

Conclusion

misogyny in this fandom runs rampant. while there are some tropes of fandom misogyny that are well-documented and have been debunked numerous times, there are other, subtler forms of misogyny that as far as I know have gone completely unchecked.

what I find so interesting about misogyny in atla fandom is that it’s clear that it’s perpetrated by people who are aware of fandom misogyny who are actively trying not to be misogynistic. when I first joined atla fandom last summer, memes about how zukka fandom was better than every other fandom because they didn’t hate the female characters who got in the way of their gay ship were extremely prevalent, and there was this sense that *this* fandom was going to model respectful, fun, feminist online fandom. not all of the topes I’ve outlined are exclusive to or even largely utilized in zukka fandom, but a lot of them are. I’ve been in and out of fandom since I was eleven years old, and most of the fandom spaces I’ve been in have been majority-female, and all of them have been incredibly misogynistic. and I always want to know why. why, in these communities created in large part by women, in large part for women, does misogyny run wild? what I realize now is that there’s never going to be a one-size fits all answer to that question. what’s true for 1D fandom on Wattpad in 2012 is absolutely not true for atla fandom on tumblr in 2021. the answers that I’ve cobbled together for previous fandoms don’t work here.

so, why is atla fandom like this? why did the dream of a feminist fandom almost entirely focused on the romantic relationship between two male characters fall apart? honestly, I think the notion that zukka fandom ever was this way was horrifically ignorant to begin with. from my very first moment in the fandom, I was seeing racism, widespread sexualization of minors, and yes, misogyny. these aspects of the fandom weren’t talked about as much as the crocverse or other, much more fun aspects. further, atla (specifically zukka) fandom misogyny often doesn’t look like the fandom misogyny we’ve become familiar with from like, Sherlock fandom or what have you. for the most part, people don’t actively hate Suki, they just “stan” without actually caring about her. they hate Mai because they believe in treating male victims of abuse equally. they’re not characterizing Toph poorly, they’re writing her as a “strong woman.” in short, people are misogynistic, and then invoke a shallow, incomplete interpretation of feminist theory to shield themselves from accusations of misogyny. it’s not unlike the way some people will invoke a shallow, incomplete interpretation of critical race theory to shield themselves from accusations of racism, or how they’ll talk about “freedom of speech” and “the suppression of women’s sexuality” to justify sexualizing minors. the performance of feminism and antiracism is what’s important, not the actual practice.

if you’ve made it this far, first off, hi, thanks so much for reading, I know this was a lot. second, I would seriously encourage you to be aware of these fandom tropes and to call them out when you see them. elevate the voices of fans who do the work of bringing the female characters of atla to life. invest in the wlw ships in this fandom. drop a kudos and a comment on a rangshi fic (please, drop a kudos and a comment on a rangshi fic). read some yuetara. let’s all be honest about where we are now, and try to do better in the future. I believe in us.

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letsboldlygomotherfuckers · 3 years

Note

If you had to suggest one gay fanfic to someone who has never really read fanfic much, what do you think it would be?

oh man uh like i would definitely suggest reading one for a fandom youre already in so this is quite a hard question to answer with just one single fic? so here are the absolute top ones I'd recommend as a first for a couple of the fandoms im in

ok so Leave No Soul Behind by whochick is like, my ultimate favourite star trek fic. I read it years and years ago and used to recommend it to literally anyone who would listen. It's an AU but the kind where it's very much set within the canon universe but putting the characters on a completely different path. honestly you can read this as its own standalone novel without even having watched any star trek it's SO GOOD damn i need to reread this. like if i had to pick one single fic to recommend i think id go with this one but idk if you watch star trek so ill drop a few others too

also gonna shoutout Veritas by theproblematique as another star trek fic that i've reread time and time again over the years and its a great one to go for if youre not at all into au

The Student Prince by fayjay otherwise known as THEE merlin fic, again i know people who have never seen bbc merlin who have read this and loved it. another au this time a modern day university au which i dont normally go with but its kind of a semi reincarnation au i think? I dont remember the details on that but merlin has his powers and his destiny is tied to arthur (who is still a prince i think? its been years since i read it lol) in a way thats still pretty close to the show so the dynamic really hits

Thirty Eight Days And Counting by thecommodore_squid i couldnt find this for a sec and thought it had been deleted anyway this one is for you if youre a stucky stan and also like fake dating (i think like 90% of the fics i read in my stucky days were either fake dating or everyone knows theyre dating but them lmao)

literally anything I post for supernatural will be controversial bc theres so much required reading lmao so I'm just gonna drop Diamond Star Halo by Jad (who also wrote one of my favourite unfinished star trek fics jad if youre out there-) and The Girlfriend Experience by rageprufrock (this is literally porn but plotty and so good) and run

I know this like literally didnt answer your question about what one single fic i would recommend but thats way too open ended a question like there are so many variables. let me know ur pairings and ill come back with a specific for u ok

also a note that most of these are au which is weird because ive never really been one for aus but i do think when an au hits just right it can go so fucking hard and turn out to be a glorious standalone novel that sticks with you for years which i think is why its easier to recommend these over canon style fics bc those rely a bit more on me knowing what you like lol

#i hope this helps in any way lol please do let me know if u read one and liked it?? or pls come back and give me a crumb of information so #i can give you something i think youd love #ask #anon #fanfic #holding myself back from recommending really niche ones lmao

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anika-ann · 4 years

Text

My Timid Hello, My Clumsy Goodbye (S.R.)

Type: one-shot, canon semi-compliant?

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Barton!reader Word count: 8900 (...sorry)

Summary: You’re spending the evening and the night before your wedding with the two most important men of your life.

When the sun rises again, you’ll say your ‘I do’ in a close circle of friends and family. It’s not a goodbye to your old life and it’s not a hello to some enormous change; but you will no longer be a Barton. You will be a Rogers. Why not reminisce a bit?

Warnings: mention of an abandoned baby, blood and injuries, alcohol, implied possibly rougher sex (nothing graphic) ...mature?, language, so much sappiness... let me know if I missed any

A/N: For what-is-your-backupplan-today 10th anniversary of CA:TFA challenge. Prompts in bold. Thank you for coming up with this wonderful theme and hosting this challenge! Long live CA:TFA!

A/N: Throughout the fic, you’ll find snippets of lyrics from SYML’s "Everything All At Once”. Honestly, the song has a completely different meaning to me, but tearing it out of context works for this story just fine :) When you’re done reading, I recommend the music video. It friggin’ broke me in the worst and best ways. Enjoy!

This is my hello This is my clumsy goodbye I'm putting my glass down I wanna remember tonight

Tony rented an island for you. Clint nearly passed out learning about it and grumbled for days about having a hard time to top that, which, no arguing, was understandable.

It was an incredibly extravagant thing to do, throwing around money that could have been used for a much more honourable cause, but you couldn’t complain. One should not look a gifted horse into mouth – and so you didn’t.

Because Tony Stark renting an island was his premature wedding gift. The fact that your brother bitched about not being able to top that, well, that was his problem. You were certain that deep down, he knew you didn’t need any fancy gifts like that.

Then again, Tony’s gift might have been epically overpriced, but not exactly unthoughtful; along with a private island came a private jet and you being literally flied under radar so no single paparazzi knew where you and America’s golden boy Steve Rogers would seal the deal with your ‘I do.’ So, you were everything but ungrateful to your friend that he succeeded at pulling off such covert operation; and frankly, this place was nothing short of wonderful.

The golden sand was pleasantly warm under your toes as you as you and Clint walked towards the two single beach chairs facing the ocean. Wearing bikini under the baggy t-shirt and a pair of shorts, sunglasses on top of your head, because why would you deprive yourself the gorgeous view of the sun beginning to set down, you followed your brother – not in blood but in every other sense – to the seats, allured by the view, the serenity and the cold sixpack in his hand.

You had already had a traditional bachelorette party with your girls – with the team, with your family. Natasha, Wanda, Pepper, Sharon and Maria. The night had been the perfect blend of what was considered typically feminine, dress up, fanciness and wine and gossip, and a fun night out with shots, dancing, karaoke and pool. That particular night sadly was interrupted shortly by an annoying photographer, but he soon understood it was not very clever to annoy three and a half Avengers or the CEO of Stark Industries for that matter.

Clint however… Clint deserved a special evening with you. With the rest of the team in various state of chilling out, scattered around the luxurious small houses and gorgeous beaches, you two were left the privacy such moment required.

Even if the special moment consisted of simple talking and drinking beer while watching the sun set, a symbolic end of one phase of your life – a phase that was undeniably tied to the famous and yet barely known archer, one of the seven defenders who rushed into the Battle of New York to save the Earth.

One of the seven had been your brother, having previously been controlled by the monster who brought an army from outer space; there was no questioning whether you would join the fight or not, no matter how you preferred the latter part of your field medic job title to the former.

Another of these brave people, as it turned out, was your future husband. A man you had met for the first time that day, but whom you didn’t hesitate to push back down when he got hit by a freaking alien weapon and stood up, wanting to shake it off as if it was nothing. Your medical training told you not to let him; and your stubbornness had been just a touch stronger than his that day.

Apparently, Steve found you always standing your ground to be one of your most endearing qualities.

What a fancy way to express it instead of simply calling you a stubborn pain in his ass.

“You’re lost in your head, Twinkie,” Clint hummed, playfully nudging your ribs with an elbow, bringing you back to the present.

Your nose automatically scrunched at the childhood nickname.

“You gotta stop calling me that, Bobo,” you retorted, a grin spreading on your face as it was his turn to grimace.

You knew it was nothing but an act and that he in fact loved that nickname, because it held so much sentiment, so many memories… as did his endearment for you.

Bobo had been your first word or so Clint always claimed. Obviously, you wouldn’t remember.

You wouldn’t remember your parents, having been only two days old when your mother left you with a damn circus which was in your hometown at the time. You couldn’t recall how you wouldn’t stop crying until you heard a seven-year-old Clint humming a lullaby for you, with silly replacements of lyrics that always made you laugh later on when you could understand them.

How he started calling you Twinkie, because he was a sugar addict and apparently, you were sweet and small and he liked you; so much that he soon appointed himself to be your brother, your bro, your Bobo.

Once you were older and learned that your involuntary nickname for him also meant ‘crazy’ in Spanish, you were sold to that Bobo endearment forever.

Including the night before your wedding.

“You keep zoning out on me, Kid. Getting cold feet?” Clint hummed, casually handing you a can of beer, opening it up for you.

You automatically reached out and took a sip, eyes fixed on the warm colour on the horizon. What a ridiculous question… but kind and caring, with a hidden promise of getting you out of here if you just asked. Your amazing, protective, crazy brother.

You couldn’t but smile widely, glancing at him from the corner of your eye.

“You offering to kidnap the bride, Clint? I’d like to see you try. You were always better at trapeze than at being an escape artist.”

Clint scoffed. “Please. These are amateurs. I bet I could pull it off.”

That drew a laugh from you.

“Are you calling the Avengers amateurs? Better yet, are you calling your wife an amateur?” you teased him, watching his face lose colour when he realized that he did exactly that. You leaned over and patted his thigh. “Don’t worry, Bobo. I won’t tell Nat.”

Clint visibly relaxed, but a shadow of worry twisting his expression.

“Seriously though. Where’s your head at, Kid?”

You just shrugged, smile resting on your lips as you wondered if you ever felt so relaxed. It went along well with the reminiscing of the past and despite the fact that tomorrow was a big day and you should probably be nervous, you weren’t. Not in the slightest, more like the opposite. You were giddy even; it dawned to you that nothing in your life had ever felt so right.

No moment in your life offered you such serenity to your heart, your shoulders free of any weight, body light as air.

“Just taking a trip down the memory lane. Thinking about how lucky I was to be dropped at your circus of all circuses of the world,” you grinned at Clint, your tone remaining completely serious.

Because you were being serious – words couldn’t express how grateful for everything that led to this moment you were. How grateful you were to your brother for watching over you, making sure you would always see the light of a new day, guiding you when you found yourself in a dark.

Clint didn’t react beside his fingers twitching and you knew he was giving you the chance to say what you needed to say.

“About how you taught me pretty much everything I know. About how while I might not be the best person in the world, my brother, who is the best brother ever, made me into a decent person and I owe him everything I am. And how I should probably feel guilty for tying myself to another guy who just swept in and whisked away your little sister.”

Clint stared at you, gulping as his eyes gradually filled with tears. You found yourself in a very cheesy moment, bordering on absurd and it was almost too much to handle – but Clint took a deep breath, cleared his throat and swallowed his tears.

“Well, that bastard did steal my greatest life achievement with way too little effort,” he remarked, voice cracking slightly, the image of him causing your eyes to burn as well even if his words made you both tear up and burst out laughing.

“Dammit, Clint, stop making me laugh and cry at the same time…”

“You started it!” he pointed his index finger at you accusingly, taking a large sip of his beer to drown his sentiment. “But for the record, you should not feel guilty. It’s not like you’re leaving me.”

“I know, but-“

“And if you were, you’d be leaving me in good hands.”

“That’s true, Natasha does have a grip on you and might keep you outta trouble-“

“She’s the one who gets me into trouble half of the time!” Clint cried out in protest and you would have argued if it wasn’t the truth.

But before he had met her, Clint was able to make up his own trouble just fine – he was more than half of a reason why while doing a bit of trapeze yourself, you also grew interested in medical care. Because who else than the little sister should treat her big brother’s wounds when he got too crazy?

“In all seriousness, I’m proud of you, Twinkie,” he said sincerely, one corner of his lips raised in a lopsided smile. “You’re entirely entitled to have your own life and if there’s one guy in this whole damn world I’m willing to trust to have you… well, I guess it’s that big blond dumbass.”

“He can be a bit dumb of ass occasionally, can’t he?” you mused lovingly. “I guess it’s right what they say… we do pick our partners similar to our parents, maybe not only in looks. I didn’t really have a dad, I had you, so…”

Clint sighed, smile widening, before it slipped from his face as he caught up on the not-so-hidden insult.

“Hey!”

You couldn’t but laugh at his shocked expression, accidently spilling a splosh of beer on the sand.

“Just… maybe make sure that even married, you still find time to hang out with your big dumb of ass brother every once in a while?” Clint suggested, sounding surprisingly vulnerable.

Your whole demander softened, a little pang of guilt stinging in your heart as he took your words too seriously – and at his worry.

“Clint… I will always find time for my amazing brother.”

“Well, you’re marrying a pretty amazing guy too, so, you know, I understand the dilemma…”

You snorted when he seemed to genuinely fawn over your future husband, shaking your head before downing the rest of your drink.

“As amazing as Steve might be – and gosh, he is, don’t get me started – you still own a pretty big chunk of my heart.”

“Good. You are a Barton at heart,” Clint hummed, pretending that a few tears didn’t roll down his cheeks, leaning towards you as his expression once again grew serious.

Your chest tightened. Oh no. He was gonna say something to make you cry too – as if you already weren’t at verge of crying, emotions bubbling under the surface.

“Clint-“ you warned him silently, but he spoke up anyway and you gulped, bracing yourself.

“Just… whatever happens tomorrow, you must promise me one thing. That you will stay who you are. Not a perfect housewife, but a good woman.”

That was not what you were prepared for, as touching as the sentiment was.

You burst out laughing, head thrown back, hands clutching at your stomach as it actually hurt with the sudden clench. Tears did spring from your eyes, a perfect blend of touched and infinitely amused at your brother’s words.

“Har, har, that’s what I get from trying to speak from heart…” Clint muttered grumpily and you willed yourself to calm your hitching breaths as you looked at him, the pout of his mouth causing you to cackle again.

“Sorry, sorry. It’s just… I am moved, I really am. Thank you. But me? A perfect housewife? And you realize I’m marrying Steve Rogers, right? The epitome of a good man? He would probably threaten to sock me in a jaw if I tried to change into something I’m not just for his sake and actually sock me in my jaw if I turned into a bad woman.”

Clint’s eyebrows jumped, a smirk appearing on his face. “That’s a lot of punching.”

“My thoughts exactly,” you agreed, reaching for another can, pausing when a thought occurred to you. “Just so we’re clear, I might turn into a bit of a housewife when we have kids, alright? And I want to be a good wife, a good partner to Steve, which is what I’m trying to do even now.”

“I mean, yeah, sure, wouldn’t expect anything less. But… just promise me you’ll stay you and that you’ll keep giving him a run for his money, keep him on his toes a bit,” Clint shrugged with a grin, drawing another chuckle from you.

You saw his point – and you fully intended to keep Steve on his toes. You had a good reason to believe that your future husband enjoyed when you did.

“Oh Clinton… I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

He nodded contentedly, picking up another beer and raising it for a toast, his can clinking with yours.

“Cheers to that!”

A comfortable silence settled between the two of you then, a quiet joy wrapped in one moment; the sun ending its quest, the warm breeze in your hair, the waves whispering of a journey you were about to take off to. And all that with a wordless comforting presence of your family, ready to offer you a shelter if a storm rocked your boat and the wind caused you to lose course.

As your mind wandered, you had to laugh at yourself – it was almost as if you were raised by pirates and not circus performers. Perhaps it was the little bit of free cheeky spirit these life journeys had in common what brought the metaphor to your mind. It was a bit like working with the Avengers too, always on a road, adrenaline in your veins even as you mostly stayed on the jet, ready to assist them… yet here you were pondering that maybe, you were yearning for settling down a bit more.

“Cap wouldn’t punch you anyway, right?” Clint remarked, breaking the silence and you blinked yourself back into reality, taking a moment to figure out what he was talking about.

Oh. Right. Steve punching you if you changed yourself significantly for his benefit.

You smiled softly, heart swelling in affection when the answer to that question appeared obvious.

“No, he wouldn’t.”

“Good. He’d try once and I’d put an arrow straight between his eyes,” Clint promised darkly, almost causing you to choke at the sudden violent note. He quickly fixed it with a ramble, lightening the atmosphere yet again. “Minus training of course. He’s allowed to try in order to improve your hand-to-hand. Not that he would ever land a hand on you anyway. Always so soft on you…” he grinned, seemingly alright with that attitude if not slightly calling the big strong supersoldier out.

Oh you could be cheeky too alright if that was what your brother wanted.

“That you know of.”

A confused huh was the only reaction you got – that and a puzzled look.

“He’s always soft on me,” you repeated Clint’s words, turning to him, lips slowly spreading in a wicked smirk. “That you know of.”

Clint’s brows furrowed for a short moment and then his features twisted in a disgusted grimace, face growing a tint crimson.

“Gross!” he complained, more blood rushing to his cheeks. “You know what, I changed my mind. We’re leaving. You’re not marrying him. I’m kidnapping the bride and never returning her, locking her somewhere far far away-“

You snorted at his indignation, your grin undoubtedly battling the one of the Cheshire cat.

“No will do, Bobo. I’m marrying Steve and you can’t stop me.”

This time, Clint didn’t even protest, eyes misted over, nose still scrunched at the mental image, lamenting as the night slowly settled over the paradise-like island.

“Oh god, please help, I can’t unsee it, can’t unhear it--- ew-”

Your laughter was carried away by the breeze as Clint seemed to be unable to look at you.

You swung your beer around, thinking that yes – nothing quite ever felt so right as being here in this moment. Relaxing with your brother, teasing him relentlessly and counting down hours to when you’d say ‘I do’ to the only man who in your eyes ever battled the mantle of the best man in the universe.

In one unending moment You fall within my reach I'm close enough to whisper Hold on to me Hold on to me

You weren’t sure what time it was when you snuck into the beach house, one of few, which had been wisely chosen to be occupied by you and Steve only. You attempted to be quiet and liked to think you succeeded, in your even barely tipsy state, but your effort turned out to be in vain as you found Steve perched against headboard of your bed; reading a book, thin white t-shirt and sleep shorts on display as the soft sheet had been kicked away, scrunched up by his feet.

He was gorgeous – he was gorgeous and yours, a momentary picture perfect of peace, appearing to feel just as light as you did and somehow the dullness of the moment, just him relaxing in bed with a good read as you came home… it was more alluring than one would think.

Steve looked up from the book when you wavered in the doorway, soft lopsided smile spreading on his face.

God, that smile. It might be over two years since you saw it for the first time, but it could still make you weak in your knees.

And somehow, it was now even more charming now than the day you met, more tender than just before you kissed for the first time, sweeter than when he proposed.

“Hey sweetheart,” he greeted you, appreciative gaze roaming your figure and the little too much skin on display – something you regretted when the warm sunrays had bid you goodbye, raising goosebumps. And Steve, the attentive man he was, noticed, his smile earning a teasing edge. “You look a bit cold in there.”

You resisted the urge to stick your tongue out.

“And you look pretty cosy in there. Thought you’d be either asleep or with Bucky.”

Steve shrugged, not letting go of his unfinished chapter just yet, knowing you had a routine to go through before joining him.

“Maybe I missed you. Maybe Bucky is an old man and needs his sleep.”

You chuckled, not rising to the bait – you knew what would follow if you dared to say Steve was just as old. Not that you would complain about Steve trying to convince you about the opposite. You could never.

“Well, I bet he still made you a promise of breaking a bone of mine or two if I ever hurt you. He’ll find energy for that, centenarian or not,” you hummed nonchalantly as you bounced off the doorframe, heading to the bathroom and leaving Steve puzzled by your remark.

“How did you know?” he called out after you, endearingly confused.

“That’s what big brothers do, love!”

Short silence was your answer as you reached for your toothbrush and begun your nighty ritual.

Steve must have figure out what did it mean for him, considering you had a protective brother of your own, because a moment later, his half-amused “noted!” reached your ears.

You chuckled and shook your head, smile spread on your face which you didn’t think could be erased as long as you were in this paradise – free of worry, full of joy. And why wouldn’t you be? You were about to marry one of the smartest, kindest, sassiest and most beautiful men that ever walked the Earth. What was not to love?

You couldn’t but let your mind wander again; if you had only known the day you met, right from that moment, that you’d end up here…. well. It felt a little surreal, knowing that by this time tomorrow, you’d be Steve’s wife; then again, Steve’s life story was surreal enough on its own.

Who would have thought that the stubborn handsome man in the ridiculous suit and you, equally stubborn about you at least checking on the wound upon half-dragging him to a quiet corner in a middle of a battlefield, would grow so close?

It hadn’t been simple. Steve wasn’t the most open guy and while friendly enough, he wasn’t exactly offering his heart on his sleeve, not to strangers. But it hadn’t been too hard, once you were meeting on regular basis. Piece by piece he revealed his true colours and soon after he did… you started falling; hard and fast.

Not necessarily swooning, not on the outside at least; you were a professional, after all. The safety and the well-being of the team was your priority.

It was just too bad – or the best thing, you supposed – that Steve had the same goal as you with one significant difference; as far as he was concerned, the responsibility to look after his team sometimes excluded him.

Oh, was he wrong about that.

And boy, did you let him know you thought so. You still kept proving him wrong to this day and was planning on nurturing his own acknowledgement of his self-worth till your last breath…

“Get your ass in here, Steve!” you called out after him, slowly losing patience as you had tried asking politely the previous two times with no result but being dismissed.

The change of tone and language made his head snap to you from where he was talking to Sam, an offended scowl on his face.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me, Captain. Don’t be a stubborn jerk and get your ass in here so I can clean your cuts.”

A few months ago, you wouldn’t have been able to talk to him like that; to the great legend, Captain America. At least you certainly wouldn’t have called him his first name and maybe, just maybe, you’d be a little less crass. But now? He might be Captain America still, a hero who deserved all the good things for the sacrifices he made for the world’s safety, but first and foremost, he was just Steve to you.

A colleague, a teammate, a friend. You might not be a part of the team per se, not the way Clint, Natasha or Steve were, but you still belonged. And you were all friends.

Friends irritated each other sometimes and frankly, Steve was often battling with Tony for the mantle of the most infuriating one.

Friends also needed to call each other out on their bullshit by any means necessary when the time was right and now the time was as good as any.

Usually, Steve slipped through your fingers, because he was a supersoldier and the others weren’t, so their injuries took precedence; today, it was only Natasha, Sam and Steve, and the captain was the only one whom you hadn’t checked yet. And you knew there were things to check, the trickle of blood from his eyebrow probably the least of your concerns.

“I wouldn’t argue with her, Steve. She can be pretty stubborn. Clint wouldn’t stop complaining about it,” Natasha supported you from the pilot seat and you fought yourself so you wouldn’t grin at her in victory – it would only irritated Steve further. “She’s almost as bull-headed as you are.”

At that, your smile would have slipped. But honestly, she wasn’t wrong.

“Don’t I know it,” Steve grunted, sparing Sam another glance and when the Falcon himself beckoned to you as well, wordlessly asking Steve to get himself checked up.

The captain sighed irately, but made his way back to the separate and well-lit space of your examination room.

He didn’t try to hide his annoyance – in fact, he squared his shoulders and his steps sounded a bit loud for anyone to believe it was a coincidence. Also, the scowl of exasperation never left his otherwise handsome face.

“This is completely unnecessary. A stupid waste of time,” he hissed as he walked past you and you took a deep calming breath, exchanging an eyeroll with Sam before you disappeared from sight.

“Captain. I respect you and your position, but you say one more time that my job here is unnecessary and stupid, you’ll be looking for a new medic,” you retorted as he stripped the upper part of his uniform angrily, revealing his white-tank-top-clad torso.

Well, at least the fabric used to be white – now a blood stain the size of both of your palms was seeping into the material at Steve’s right side, gushing from what definitely appeared to be a knife wound.

You were gonna murder him one of those days... unless he got killed himself first.

“Seriously?!”

“It’s just a graze-” he started to argue but you cut him off when you tore the fabric away. He winced as some of the dried blood had acted as a glue, having stuck the cloth into the wound, and now was violently ripped off.

“Tr to insinuate again that I’m incompetent at recognizing what’s just a graze, Steve. I dare you. This is a cut wide and deep enough for stitches! Haven’t you had the serum, you could have been bleeding out to death on this table!”

“But I do have it-“

“Or for fuck’s SAKE, stop being a baby and let me treat the bloody gash in your right mesogastric area! The serum accelerates your healing, but it doesn’t make you invincible OR immortal as far as I know--- Jesus fucking Christ-!”

He bristled, taking a deep breath to fight back, but he never got the chance, because you started working and the words died in his throat. Surprisingly, inspecting the damage, poking around a knife wound that might have already begin to seal itself thanks to Erskine’s formula but had not been just a graze hurt and coincidentally, it pulled the rug from under his feet.

To his credit, Steve barely even hissed at the pain.

“Just so you know, I’ll be using the disinfection that stings worse,” you noted, voice dripping venom, because you were genuinely done with Steve’s bullshit.

You lied through your teeth though. You wouldn’t. No matter how infuriating Steve was and how difficult he made your life – causing you to fall for his stupid martyr ass and pine after him among other things – you would never purposely hurt him.

And he must have sensed that, because your remark didn’t earn you a murderous glare or a retort – much to your surprise.

In fact, Steve fell entirely quiet, watching you work without protest, not even objecting when you applied enough local anaesthetic to knock out an elephant and sewed the tissue together so it healed easier. He let you inspect the rest of his torso and bandage his ribs, vigorously shaking his head when you asked him if he was injured anywhere below the waist.

He observed you as you kept an eye on his face for any minute sign of pain he’d be hiding, but all you could see were his irises, startlingly bright blue, pools of honesty and something you had trouble decoding. He seemed… humbled almost. It silenced the anger inside you, the flames of rage – and fear for his well-being, if you were being honest with yourself – turning into a barely smouldering pile of ash.

When you moved on to his head, gently pushing away the strands which obscured the gash on his eyebrow, his eyelids slid shut. You knew how unpleasant facial injuries were, especially around one’s eyes and so you took care to be extra careful as you cleaned the wound and the area surrounding it, most definitely not using the stingy disinfectant.

Not that Steve could get an infection as far as you knew. It was more force of a habit than anything else… and it made you feel better. He had this idiotic mask of an invincible hero he put up sometimes and it drove you insane, because you knew he was only human, a beautiful kind soul, but god, could he be an ass.

“Almost done,” you whispered soothingly when you noticed his jaw tightening as you had to apply a bit more pressure to get a tiny piece of gravel from the cut. You certainly didn’t want that to stay under the newly healing skin.

The moment you retreated with the bloody gauze, Steve’s eyes were back on you, wide and regretful.

“I’m sorry,” he offered quietly, a genuine apology that sounded almost absurd after you two were hissing at each other like damn hellcats. “I didn’t mean to--- I’m sorry for being rude and ungrateful. Thank you for taking care of my injuries.”

One glance into those deep irises and benign hesitant smile and you were done for. How could you stay mad at him? Well, you were still mad at him for the absolute disregard of his own health, but… well. You also understood he felt like he needed to stay strong for the team and put them first and how he actually was in pain.

Pretty much everyone was a pain in the ass when in pain.

You sighed as you searched for few band-aid strips to cover the cut.

“It’s alright, Steve. I’m used to old men being grumpy and not meaning things they say when they are,” you offered lightly and he hung his head with a chuckle, clearly not taking the old man remark personally – and understanding you were referring to your brother.

His smile was wider when he looked up again. “You shouldn’t have to be used to it.”

You shrugged, carefully slipping two fingers under his chin to angle his face so you could stick the strips over the wound.

“Well, I deserve it sometimes. I don’t mean to… to be overbearing and make you feel like you’re incompetent or something,” you added hesitantly, worrying your teeth over your lower lip as the tone you’d been handling him with caught up with you. Perhaps you could have been nicer.

You smoothened the stripes of band-aid, gulping as you felt Steve’s gaze boring into your face while you continued.

“I know you’re not incompetent. You’re very capable, you’re the best. It’s just… I still--- worry- for all of you. For the full-time Earth’s mightiest heroes. Silly, huh?” you muttered self-depreciatingly and when your eyes met, you were startled by the intensity he watched you with as you laid your fears bare in front of him, leaving you vulnerable. You swiftly looked away and dropped your hands. “Here, almost as good as new.”

A lump grew in your throat as you stripped your gloves, tossing them into the bin. Did you reveal too much? Didn’t it sound silly indeed as you said it out loud? Yes, you were all friendly with each other, but you were supposed to be a professional, focused on your task, not getting distracted by-

-by Steve gently grasping your wrist, causing your heart to skip a startled beat. Definitely not getting weak in the knees when you shot him a surprised glance and he just… brought your hand to his face, lips briefly skimming over your knuckles.

Jesus Christ, Lord have mercy with me.

“Don’t you ever apologize for caring. Don’t stop caring. Silly is the last thing I’d call it.”

Your cheeks felt like set on fire, stomach fluttering as well as your heart. You could feel the ghost of Steve’s lips on your skin, sending your heartrate sky-high, causing your head to spin a bit, your body hot all over.

Did he really—did he just-? And did it mean that… did it mean anything at all?

He let go of your hand, thumb brushing over your knuckles, but held your gaze adamantly as he gave you a sad smile and rose to his feet, clearly ready to leave.

You, on the hand, stood there frozen, mind racing.

Why had he done that? Was he really just trying to express gratitude and say sorry for his previous behaviour? Because that was not the way it was supposed to be done, because such tenderness left you entirely bewildered. Was he trying to tell you he was somehow interested in something more than friendship? Was he just high from the anaesthetic, mind you, local one that was not supposed to mess with his brain? Was there any sign of a head injury you missed?

“Thank you, again,” he whispered softly, moving to sidestep you and your hand instinctively shot out, latching onto his forearm… gently.

You gulped, heart stuttering when he glanced at you, puzzled.

One part of you wanted to sink into the floor in embarrassment at your unwitting reaction. Another part of you observed him so closely that you would swear that there was another emotion in his eyes and it was neither apology nor gratitude. You wistfully hoped for longing, the same longing you felt when you were near him, sometimes distant and barely there, other times so acute it hurt.

With your stomach somersaulting in doubt, you willed yourself to raise your free hand slowly, purposely giving him a chance – Lord, please, don’t let him take it – to stop you before your palm settled on his cheek.

You were certain you experienced a small cardiac arrest when Steve not only didn’t avoid the touch, but actually leaned into it, gaze fixed on your face, eyes brighter and softer than you ever remembered seeing. Your gaze flickered to his mouth deliberately, throat turning dry. Too daring? He kissed you knuckles, surely you could reciprocate some affection?

Swallowing against your dry throat, you leaned in before you could change your mind and dropped the briefest peck to his lips, causing his eyelids to flutter shut.

Oh no. Oh no no no no, you totally crossed a line-

You went to retreat your hands from him, but the second you moved, his eyes were snapping open, hand covering yours on his face to keep it there, the other cradling your face and then there was a warm and soft sensation on your own lips as he seized them with his.

Your mind went completely blank save two single thoughts: Steve is kissing me. I really like that.

A small sound escaped you, a blend of surprise and contentment, breaking you from your trance and turning you into an actual participant of the pleasant and entirely unexpected activity.

You drew in a small breath, head spinning from the scent of Steve’s shampoo, disinfectant, sweat and something you couldn’t quite put your finger on and not caring.

He tasted faintly of blood, but otherwise was nothing but sweet as his lips caressed yours, gently tugging at your lower lip and then the upper, the lightest graze of teeth and tease of tongue, finger pressing into your jaw to pull you closer, thumb stroking your cheek.

You whimpered involuntarily when his lips parted from yours, soothing as they returned for a short peck, to drop a brief kiss to the corner of your mouth, to brush your cheek.

Your name was a breathy whisper between the two of you, barely audible as all you could hear was your heartbeat pulsing frantically in your ears, growing aware of your fingers clutching at Steve’s still unzipped armour and nearly sinking in his hair, his hot breath tickling your skin.

You didn’t dare to open your eyes – what if you dreamed it up? What if you looked at him and saw regret – it didn’t feel like he would be regretting it, but… still. Insecurity tugged at your mind as it slowly cleared from the literally breath-taking kiss.

Steve repeated your name with urgency that was unheard of, the single word sounding almost as a plea.

“Please say something.”

Oh.

You blinked your eyes open, surprised to be met with his searching gaze, a minute furrow of his brows. It seemed you weren’t the only one whose mind was being the worst of one’s enemies.

Perhaps your brain was being stupid. Perhaps you both wanted this. Perhaps you felt exactly the same.

As you forced yourself to move, fingers actually slipping into his hair to caress his nape, Steve inhaled shakily, shoulders slumping. The tinniest of smiles tugged at his mouth, tempting red and minutely swollen from the kiss; you had to resist the urge to just taste it again.

Instead, you licked your lips only, savouring the previous sensations, smiling unwittingly.

“That’s… uhm, that’s a really creative new way of driving me crazy.”

Steve’s eyebrows rose along with one corner of his mouth, relief written all over his face.

“Oh? There are other ways in which I’m driving you crazy? Because I couldn’t tell...”

You narrowed your eyes, but you didn’t think he bought you unconvincing act of being irritated with him at such remark.

“Don’t push it, Captain,” you warned him, but your treacherous mouth kept curling up in a smile, your body still buzzing with aftershocks of the kiss.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Uh-huh… s-sure,” you stuttered briefly as his thumb caressed your cheek, bright smiling eyes watching only inches from your face – and yet it felt like he was too far.

“You’re driving me crazy too, you know,” he noted in a breathy voice, causing you to gulp as his gaze flickered to your mouth, clearly implying how you do so… among other ways… like your stubbornness practically matching his.

“Oh really? I do? I couldn’t tell…”

He chuckled, his hand slipping to your nape, soft tickle of his fingers making you squirm.

“I’m gonna kiss you again now if that’s okay,” he whispered, not waiting for your permission and erasing the distance between your lips again.

Still, you whispered your approval to his mouth.

“So okay…”

Long moments later when Sam called out to warn you that you’d be landing soon, you said yes to the grumpy old man’s request to let him treat you dinner.

Oh if you only knew by then how far you’d come…

Lost in thought, goofy smile on your face, you exited the bathroom, ready to snuggle your future husband… and to fully take the opportunity to make love, last night before you officially became his and he became yours.

You had a brief second to register that the bed was empty, your heart skipping a started and disappointed beat. The second you stepped out though, you were literally swept off your feet.

A yelp erupted from your throat as you found yourself with no ground under your feet and high in the air, one of Steve’s arms under your knees, the other under your back. Your hands frantically gripped at the nearest firm point, Steve’s shoulder and arm as you finally realized what the hell happened and was met with a cheeky grin and sparkling blue of his eyes.

That traitor was waiting just by the door to ambush you! Why?

You slapped his very much bare shoulder playfully, hissing a curse, not unaware of the heat radiating of him and seeping into your skin.

“You jerk! You almost gave me a heart attack!” you complained, but he didn’t even have the decency to look apologetic.

“Sorry, sweetheart.”

“No, you’re not.”

Steve grinned wider, shrugging and pulling you closer to his torso, nuzzling your temple and dropping a placatory kiss there.

“Still looking a little cold.”

“No, I look like this because you scared me,” you emphasized, vainly trying to resist the seduction; a mixture of playfulness, sweetness and blatant display of strength as he still held you with ease. It was hard not to be temped. “And you look like you’re awfully warm, parading here without a shirt.”

“Well, I’d call us even since you’re parading around in these absolutely sinful shorts. Makes me hot. I can warm you up,” he mumbled to your skin, lips moving to your ear, causing you to shudder.

How was it so easy for him to make you all hot and bothered? You guessed that at least, as he said, it made you even... it wasn’t difficult to get him riled up either.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“Driving you crazy?” Steve offered, sounding awfully delighted at the idea and you only melted into him further at the reminiscence of your first kiss and what followed.

“Always,” you confirmed, deadly serious, but you couldn’t help the smile tugging at the corners of your lips or the mewl that escaped you when his teeth grazed the shell of your ear, warm breath tickling the sensitive skin of your neck.

“But you love it.”

“Uh-huh…”

“I can live with that with that then,” he said, stalking to the bed determinately. “Now let me drive you so crazy you can barely speak and the only sound you’re making is whimpering my name.”

He all but tossed you on the bed, a yelp of his name in fact erupting from your throat, followed by a fit of giggles that only died when his mouth seized yours, his lips only leaving when heading south to indeed drive you crazy.

And yes; you loved it.

And you loved him too.

In one unending moment I fall within your reach My song a sweet surrender Hold on to me Hold on to me

Before the girls could steal you from him, Steve decided – with your enthusiastic agreement – that you should once again try how it felt to make some morning lovin’ outside marriage. With the ceremony planned for the late afternoon, you had plenty of time; and needless to say, it was bliss. Then again, you believed that marital sex with Steve would be just as delightfully pleasant, thank you very much.

Then, it was a whirlwind – make up, hair, dress, a tear or two spilled when you saw the result in the mirror.

More tears spilled when you glanced out of the window and saw the tastefully and modestly decorated arch, the path created by few scattered rose petals, the male part of your almost family sans Clint in the suits, effectively hiding Steve from you; and you from his just in case, because no one wanted any bad luck.

Your staring was interrupted when your brother went to pick you up to lead you down the aisle.

Upon entering the room and setting his gaze on you, he promptly looked away with a sniffle. It both warmed your heart and made you laugh as did his remark.

“Nope, not giving you to him. In fact, I’m never giving you to anyone. No one will ever be worthy, so I’m keeping you.”

“Hush, Clinton, you’ll still have me,” Natasha winked at him as he took a deep calming breath before carefully eyeing you again.

Clearly, it hadn’t done the job, because few tears still found their way down his cheeks.

“You’re a knock-out, sis,” he sputtered hastily, but no less honestly – clearly moved to tears.

And yet… you snorted at his choice of words and he rolled his eyes, quick to compliment your beauty instead.

You wouldn’t have it any other way though, even appreciating his first remark more for it came from the bottom of his heart rather than from what convention required.

Embracing you carefully in fear he would mess up the work of art his wife and other girls created, he held you in his arms for a moment, as you retuned the hug, clutching at his suit with a little too force. From the corner of your eye, you noticed the bridesmaids clearing the room.

“It’s not like I’m leaving you, Bobo,” you hummed with a smile, throwing his own words from last night at him.

And you weren’t leaving him; your heart swelled with love for your brother, your father figure, your long-life friend.

With sniffle, he let go of you and looked you up and down, proud smile spreading on his lips.

“It’s okay. If you are, I have the best spy in the world for a wife, we’ll drag your ass back home.”

You just slapped his chest playfully and took a deep breath – it was time. Clint grasped your hand firmly then, elbows interlocking, and went to step out just a moment after the bridesmaids left to join the groomsmen.

Well-aware everyone was going to stare and that Steve awaited you at the end of the aisle to marry you, your legs were shaking minutely as the magnitude of the event finally dawned to you.

“Getting second thoughts now?” Clint teased you, eliciting a chuckle from you and shake of your head.

What a question.

“No. Just… please don’t let me fall,” you muttered to him, entirely serious and grateful for your choice of footwear – simple flats hidden by the long flowing skirt of your dress. Better chance of not spraining your ankle on your wedding day.

“Never.”

Clint squeezed your hand under his warm palm and you took a deep breath, stepping into the doorway. Soft melody welcomed you, your very own wedding march Bruce was playing on a mouth organ – something you had previously had no idea he was capable of.

Looking up from your skirt, you feasted your eyes on the company and the beautiful scenery for only a regretfully short moment, grateful for Sam’s Redwing programmed to record and take photos.

Your gaze instinctively searched the small crowd instead, until it fell under the arch where three men stood.

One of them was Sam himself, having obtained a licence so he could be your wedding registrar; he looked positively dashing. So did Bucky, who patted his best friend dressed in his old-fashioned green captain uniform on the shoulder, his smirk visible even from tens feet away as he stepped back.

Naturally, your gaze lingered on Steve, your feet acting of their own accord and following your brother’s lead.

Gosh, your future husband was the most handsome and absolutely hottest specimen to ever walk the Earth. Hair combed neatly to one side and in his old army uniform, he truly looked like the gentleman from another era he was and yet, he undeniably belonged exactly where he was. His eyes were bright and blue just like the sky, lips slightly parting before curling up into a brilliant smile which somehow still carried the tenderness he treated you with when he felt particularly affectionate.

He must have uttered something under his breath, because Bucky pressed his lips together as if he was holding back laugh. The absolutely best best man, ladies and gentleman.

Your found yourself smiling just as widely, a stray tear tickling the corner of your eye and you had to fight the sudden urge to ditch Clint in order to gather your skirts and run the rest of the way just to jump into Steve’s arms.

But in reality, there was no rush – here, on the damn island Tony rented, there was so much time that one short walk meant nothing in comparison.

“Alright, maybe I’ll give you to him,” Clint whispered, making you bite the inside of your cheek so you would cackle.

Leave it to your brother he would find Steve Rogers so fine he’d be willing to give you out just to have him become a part of your family.

One corner of Steve’s lips twitched in amusement – supersoldier hearing didn’t miss the remark then. Good. Then Bucky heard it too and you had a witness just in case Clint would change his mind. Again.

Finally, with your heart almost in your throat, you reached the end of the aisle, Clint gently putting your hand into Steve’s… without letting go.

“You be nice to her, Cap. And I mean really nice, you hear? Or else-“

“Hush,” you hissed good-naturedly in your brother’s direction, winking at him before you returned your gaze to Steve. “Hey there, handsome.”

Steve chuckled under his breath when Clint stepped back. He returned the greeting with soft ‘hey there, beautiful’ and then proceeded to lift your joined hands, brushing your knuckles with his lips – just like the day you shared your first kiss.

Well now you truly found yourself on the verge of crying. And Lord, you wanted to kiss him so much-

Sam cleared his throat loudly, casting you both a meaningful look as if he could read your mind and wanted to remind you that there were a few things to go through before that could happen.

Ugh. Formalities. Just let me kiss him…

Steve licked his lips – the audacity! – and turned, lightly tugging at your hand so you both faced your friend who held a little leather book open, beckoning towards the guests: Bucky and Natasha, the best man and the best woman, Clint, Bruce, Tony, Vision, Wanda, Sharon, Pepper. Just your closest friends and family.

Sam cleared his throat again.

“Alright. We all know why we gathered here today. To get these two amazing people married, so they could officially become a special team within our team.”

You grinned, peripherally noticing Steve eyeing you as well. Team indeed.

“This is the part where I would ask all of you, bride and groom included, to speak up now if you’re aware of anything standing in the way of this wedlock or to remain silent forever. But frankly, if you have something to say, right now is the perfect time to keep it to yourself. Just let these lovebirds get married…”

Muffled laughter and giggles erupted from your group. Honestly, you wouldn’t say it better. You noticed Clint shifting and Natasha forcefully holding his hand down; you bit down on your lip so you wouldn’t laugh and sent her a grateful smile instead. The best maid of honour ever.

“Good, that’s what I wanted to hear, folks. We have the rings, correct? Great. Just so you know, these two saps asked me to read one vow which they are making to each other, because they didn’t trust themselves to say theirs individually without bursting into tears. So now it’s left to me to cry instead. Thanks for that.”

Your cheeks were honestly starting to hurt from smiling so wide, but tears prickled in your eyes acutely just at the thought of the vow you agreed on. You spent countless hours thinking about what you wanted to say and realized that your vow would be too long and that you would in fact start crying and that you could never name all the things you loved Steve for. It had been a relief to find out that Steve shared the sentiment and the deal was made.

Natasha and Bucky dutifully laid the rings on the pillow Wanda’s powers held levitating by your and Steve’s side – not without Bucky finding a split second to compliment your appearance and earning a brief smirk from Steve.

“I know,” Steve uttered and you wondered if there was a dare going around as to who would make you burst out laughing first.

This was your wedding dammit. You could be at least a bit a lady and remain collected.

Hardly.

“With this ring,” Sam started, breathing in and out and you knew you already lost, first tear rolling down your cheek as you gazed into Steve’s inviting eyes, “I give myself to you without giving up myself. With this ring, I surrender to you for I have faith you understand the value of wielding such power and for I deem you worthy of it. With this ring, I promise to love you, to respect you and to support you to be your best self as I trust you to do the same for me, for us.”

You blinked away the waterfalls, reaching almost blindly for Steve’s ring and with fingers trembling – with giddiness, not nerves – you somehow succeeded at slipping it on his left ring finger.

“I do,” you whispered, your voice cracking even in such simple sentence and the watery smile Steve graced you with made your ribcage feel too small for your swelling heart.

Fingers equally clumsy, he slipped a ring on you as well, shoulders squaring as if in pride.

“I do,” he said firmly, the damp path down his left cheek only adding severity to his vow.

“You may-- uhm, okay, you may kiss the bride, your wife--- I mean, Mrs. Rogers. You may kiss the groom, your husband…” Sam mumbled under his breath until he didn’t, because Steve pulled you in for a kiss the same moment Sam said the first ‘may’ and incidentally, the same moment you practically threw yourself at Steve.

Laughter and whistles erupted from the group of your friends as Steve bend you back dramatically, the determined press of his lips to yours not at all disrupted by the change of angle, claiming your mouth in ways that made you shudder and stirred flames in your belly.

Years and years later, you’d recall that kiss and realized an amazing thing; how it felt just like your first kiss, your last one, and every single one in between.

With you still practically horizontal, Steve’s crinkling eyes met yours, delighted smile on his kiss-swollen lips.

“I love you, Mrs. Rogers,” he hummed, adding a cheeky grin. “You’re stuck with me now.”

“The horror,” you muttered back teasingly, pulling at his nape, demanding another kiss, your own declaration whispered to his mouth. “I love you too, Mr. Rogers.”

And you did. Gosh, you did.

S.R. masterlist

(divider by firefly-graphics)

Well. This turned out SO DIFFERENTLY than I anticipated and SO MUCH LONGER. If you feel like leaving feedback, I’ll be grateful. If not, well. *shurgs*

Excuse me while I go and continue dreaming of ONE fictional man. Ugh. Anyway.

Thank you for reading!

And once again, thanks to WIYBUPT for hosting and for just being awesome in general :)

#catfa 10th anniversary challenge #fanfiction #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers imagine #steve rogers fluff #barton reader #barton reader fic #captain america x reader #captain america x you #captain america imagine #steve rogers #captain america #steve rogers fafiction #steve rogers fanfic #my timid hello my clumsy goodbye #anika ann

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