#it emotionally devastates me every time but also gives me a bit of hope that i can actually not fail

[lightningmcqueenstan]

currently listening to you’re on your own kid to make me feel better and the line “yeah you can face this” 🙃🙃

[artknifeandglue]

as shattered stars shine: DVD commentary (part 1/12)

Home, sick, and desperately need to do something other than write, so I'm going to yell semi-coherently about as shattered stars shine, a story that seized my brain in end-April last year and refused to leave until I wrote the whole damn thing.

Will do it chapter by chapter, but post might be long, so cut.

“I’ll risk my life, I’ll give my life to you. After all, you gave me time, didn’t you? If all my desires could come true, if I could attain them, I want to see you I make my wish upon the stars” … If life would only return to you, if it could reach you, I don’t care what happens to me” -Mephisto by Queen Bee

I describe this fic as a Gift of the Magi meets Faust, which it pretty much is. Many thanks to Queen Bee for an emotionally devastating song. Now on to the writing process and commentary! (Note: I’m not going to put the whole fic here because that’d defeat the purpose of uploading it, and also because I feel really weird about posting the full 60k words here. Instead, I’ve taken quotes from it and put them here.)

Meteor showers, Eggsy knows, aren’t actually as rare as people think. Thirty of them in a year works out to one meteor shower somewhere every five weeks.

Quite literally the first line - this was the very first thing I wrote, and it stayed in all the way until the final draft (with some tiny revisions!). Originally, the second line had a throwaway comment about a primary school teacher having given him this bit of information. Also, this damn line alone kicked off a whole lot of reading about meteor showers. Many thanks to the International Meteor Organisation for their assistance.

Deep brown eyes flicker up towards Eggsy, and for a moment he feels as though they might in their intensity reveal his every secret, every corner of his soul. It should be intimidating, Eggsy knows. It should be frightening. Yet a shiver of excitement starts at the back of his neck and darts down his spine, leaves his hands tingling with something almost like the thrill of his escape, but better. How much richer, Eggsy thinks, how much warmer this feeling is, this business of feeling alive.

Kingsman’s story is that of Eggsy starting a new life as an agent, but his new life doesn’t start the moment he enters Kingsman – it starts when he goes to meet Harry Hart. Also relevant: this particular story’s themes of a second chance at life, at being alive.

“About two weeks and many hopeful glimpses up at the Galahad office window later, Eggsy takes a look in the mirror and accepts that yeah, okay, he might be just a little bit in love with Harry Hart…

Which, you know, writing on the wall and all that. Eggsy’s bi, not stupid.”

He’s a clever one, and he’s got his priorities in order. What else is there to say? They’re in looooove.

“…and yet all Eggsy finds himself needing is that rare fleeting moment in which Harry passes by, a stray comet crossing his path.”

Sticking the shooting-star metaphor (though comets aren’t meteors) in various places because I can. Also, though, Harry is the vehicle through which Eggsy’s hope for a better life comes true.

“Everything else, Eggsy thinks, can wait until after then. Later, he tells himself as he lies awake at night, the curve of Harry’s lips on his mind, the leap of his heart in his chest unaddressed. There will be time later…

Then a grenade goes off in a lecture hall, and then Eggsy finds himself right back at the beginning, out of time and alone.”

As seen in the lyrics, time is a recurring theme in this fic: Eggsy runs out of time to confess, Harry runs out of time to apologise, and then Eggsy runs out of his soul-traded time when he gets shot. The Deal with the Devil comes in precisely because of this – Eggsy isn’t willing to accept that he’s run out of time, and later, neither is Harry.

“Two-thirds into a twenty-kilometre night run, Eggsy glares at the stars sparkling in the night and reminds them you don’t do shit…

Until they do.”

Cosmic coincidence or intentional tempting of Eggsy? A little from Column A, a little from Column B. He’s still holding on to the last vestiges of the idealistic notion of wishing upon a star, and having the stars actually grant one (1) wish would push him a little more in that direction, while also setting him up for greater disappointment and resentment later!

“Above him, as though in answer, the flickering light of the stars winks back, hopeful and glimmering, like a promise from a benevolent universe.”

Personification! There’s an excellent reason why the stars seem almost alive and sentient, at least in this fic.

Bring him back, he demands, the words part spite and part despair. Above him, brilliant and blazing, meteors rocket to their deaths and fizzle out one by one, taking with them the emptiness of his rage. I’ll trade you anything if you bring him back.

So my favourite work is The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the corruption/perversion of beauty is something I personally enjoy exploring. How can we take a bunch of beautiful things (the night sky, a meteor shower, the stars) and attribute to them a sort of tragedy/terror in their beauty? Dunno. I like to think I’ve done it somewhat well over this fic.  

In the armchair where Chester King had sat and handed him a gun, someone sits nursing a glass of scotch. “Hello, Eggsy. Care for a drink?”

Why is Arthur’s office also the Devil’s office? Jokes about Chester King being the literal Devil aside, I think having Eggsy constantly revisit the place where it all started going wrong – dare I say his own personal hell? – is fitting. What better way to convince a man to sell his soul than to bring him back to the beginning of the end and show him you can fix this for a small, small price?

But there is one truth achingly, excruciatingly familiar to him, one thing he knows not by training but by a lifetime of hanging in there by the skin of his teeth: second chances don’t come often, not to people like him. Second chances don’t ever come back, and some of them don’t come at all unless bought for with blood the way Dad did seventeen years ago. Seventeen years of snatching tomorrows from the hands of an uncaring universe, and now a second chance — both his and Harry’s — sits in front of him in that stupid armchair, empty crystal glass in hand, waiting.

A central motivation for Eggsy in this fic is seizing an opportunity when it presents itself. His canon backstory makes it clear that opportunities have been in short supply all his life, and I think he’d be acutely aware of this fact. Coupled with grief and love, it makes him all the more likely to accept Mephistopheles’ deal.

It’s like being dunked into ice water, like being turned inside out and torn apart, scattered in a million pieces across space and time unending.

The stranger throws his empty glass onto the hearth, where it shatters into sparkling fragments upon the logs that shimmer and gleam like stars. The flame hisses, roars and leaps out of the fireplace, licking at Eggsy’s calves like a promise, a premonition, burning—

Star references! But also, flames of hell foreshadowing.

Eggsy jolts awake to find sunrays spilling through the window into a house he has no memory of going home to, sunlight warm against his legs where he must have kicked the covers off in restless sleep. It is morning. He is in his bed, alone.

If the stars at night are a dark and terrifying force in the story, surely morning is a positive one? Except the sun is a star too. Hehe.

…an effort that Roxy lays waste to when she bursts into his office at half past noon and slaps his laptop shut just to tell him about Merlin’s latest phone call. A frazzled lady calling in to the Kingsman main line with only the words Oxfords, not brogues to identify her, begging to speak to literally anybody. A previously unidentified person has just woken up in the mortuary of a hospital and demanded that they call this number, but he won’t say anything about who he is or what’s happened to him, and can someone please come get him?

Roxy doesn’t appear all that much in the fic, chiefly because this is meant to revolve around Hartwin and how we get to a point where they’d both sell their souls for the other person, but I love her and want to write more of her. The phone call line was second to be written (after the first line of the fic) and has stayed exactly as it was in previous drafts.

In the half-hour of pre-takeoff preparations, mind trapped between an English manor he has already left behind and a Kentucky hospital he won’t arrive at for eighteen more hours, he wastes the minutes away mindlessly flicking through several social media apps, their content a passing torrent of information that slips past his consciousness and away into the unknown. Celebrity is pregnant. Jamal’s got a new jacket. Bitcoin. Celebrity is dating other celebrity. Meteor shower peaks tomorrow. Ryan’s found a hundred quid on the pavement. Something about cryptocurrency. Personality test about a horse or a lightbulb. Celebrity affair. Celebrity divorce. AI. Bitcoin, again.

Research I didn’t think I’d need to do but ended up exploring: flight times from place to place, but also social media trends and topics in 2015-2016.

Before Eggsy leaves, he fishes out the worn Kingsman medal from his pocket and presses it into Harry’s palm. It sits like a talisman in his grip, fingers curled loosely around it. On some level, Eggsy thinks, it is. It did save him at least once, so what’s a second time?

Lee’s medal! I like to think it signifies different things to Harry and Eggsy – for Eggsy, it’s his second chance, a symbol of hope; for Harry, it’s the sign of one of his greatest failures, a symbol of guilt. Therein lies the duality of this fic and of Harry and Eggsy’s motivations for selling their souls. (More on Harry’s in the commentary on later chapters.)

That night, he dreams of the rooftop again, of sitting under an ink-black sky full of stars. They flicker and wink at him, parties to a secret between him and the universe.

At the end of the chapter, all is well! Sort of. Not entirely.

[rebelsofshield]

Favorite moment in each Star Wars movie?

I've been loving these questions lately! Not sure if you're all the same anon or multiple folks, but regardless, I really appreciate them.

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

I mean, how can it not be the Duel of the Fates? The music! The ridiculous but fun as hell acrobatic choreography! The drama! I love the Prequel Trilogy when it feels the most operatic and that's definitely the case here.

Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones

Attack of the Clone is my least favorite live action Star Wars film. I think it has some great ideas, but it was rough in 2002 and visually it looks uglier with each passing year. That being said, I still find the arena battle on Geonosis to be fun as hell. There's just something special about throwing these Jedi, droids, flying termite people, giant alien monsters, Mandalorian bounty hunters, and eventually drop ships of clone troopers up against each other in a dusty coliseum that scratches a very special fantasy action itch.

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

Ian McDiarmid's delightfully evil performance in Revenge of the Sith is one of my favorite things in all of Star Wars and his triumphant speech that fully transforms the Republic into the fascist Galactic Empire is incredible. Add in John Williams's tragic choral score and Padme Amidala's tearful admittance of democracy's defeat at the hands of authoritarianism and you have movie magic and what might be my favorite moment from the Prequel Trilogy.

Solo: A Star Wars Story

I have the least opinions about Solo: A Star Wars Story of any Star Wars film. It's a solidly fine film that does little to impress or offend for most of its run time. The one area where I really feel the movie spark to life though is the first meeting between Donald Glover's Lando Calrissian and Alden Ehnrenreich's Han Solo over a game of Sabacc. Both actors bring such a fun spark to these characters that feels original but still connected to the long shadow of their original counterparts. It's also the best directed sequence in the film and maybe the only moment that leans into the space crime comedy that Solo seemed desperate to achieve.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

This is maybe an odd choice, but I love the first scene of Rogue One. I find most of this spin off film to be a little bit impersonal and sterile until we get to the big explosive (and admittedly fun) finale, but the opening confrontation between Orson Krennic and Galen Erso is really great. Gareth Edwards shoots it all with a grounded naturalism that feels tense and eerie in a way Star Wars films rarely are and Madds Mikkelson and Ben Mendehlson have such strong, dramatic chemistry. It's a moment that communicates so much about the relationship between these two men with so little and is really the storytelling high point of the film.

Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

It's honestly a testament to how great the last half hour of A New Hope is that despite the fact that I've seen this movie likely more than any other movie in existence, I still find myself on the edge of my seat. Even thinking about the final stretch of Luke flying his X-Wing down the Empire's trench while Vader gains ever closer and closer still gives me chills. I cannot imagine the cheers that must have erupted in theaters across the world in the summer of 1977 when Han makes his surprise last minute rescue. It's just incredible film making on every level and I don't know if it'll ever be surpassed.

Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

Picking a favorite moment in The Empire Strikes Back is such a hard task, but I keep finding myself going back to the brilliant confrontation between Luke and Vader in Cloud City. Not only is it a beautifully shot and choreographed lightsaber duel, but it contains some of the most influential and emotionally devastating character beats in the saga. It's another instance of absolutely peak Star Wars.

Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

Even with the beyond silly "NO!" dubbed over in the recent releases of Return of the Jedi, Vader's final rejection of Palpatine to rescue his son is still one of the moments of saga that can move me to tears despite having seen it dozens of times. There's just such incredible catharsis in this final reconciliation between father and son and it closes the best arc of the Original Trilogy off in such satisfying faction.

Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens

I wholeheartedly think that the first thirty minutes or so of The Force Awakens are absolutely masterful filmmaking and arguably the best work of JJ Abrams's directorial career. While the opening battle sequence does a wonderful job of introducing some of the movie's cast, it's really Rey's mostly wordless introduction that felt instantly spellbinding and still wows me to this day. In several gorgeous minutes we learn so much about this lonely woman who scavengers to survive in the wreckage of classic franchise iconography (one of the Sequel Trilogy's many beautifully meta moments) and John Williams's crafts what is easily one of the best Star Wars themes of all time with a tinkling of wonder and mystery.

Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi

Like The Empire Strikes Back, picking a single moment that's my favorite in The Last Jedi is incredibly difficult. While there are undeniably rough patches, The Last Jedi has an abundance of absolutely iconic Star Wars scenes. I mean: Paige Tico's sacrifice; the throne room confrontation with Kylo, Rey, and Snoke; Luke and Yoda's discussion about the meaning of the legacy of the Jedi; the Holdo maneuver, Leia and Luke's reunion, the ending shot of Broom Boy. There's so many beats that I find myself wowed by over half a decade after the movie first premiered. But, my favorite has to be Kylo and Luke's Kurosawa inspired duel on the salt plains of Crait. I love the tense, minimalist choreography and stellar performances by Adam Driver and Mark Hamill, but I love the ending reveal the most. It completes Luke's wonderfully complex character arc in truly beautiful fashion.

Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker

It's absolutely the Force Flash Duel. Little competition. Yes, this movie is a mess and it fails to meet imost of its emotional, thematic, or mythological goals, but I think the evolution of Rey and Kylo's connection in the Force expanding into a confrontation that literally spills across space and time is such a smart and inventive idea and to me it feels like the most creatively successful moment in the film. Also it's the only time in the whole trilogy that we see Kylo duel with his mask on? Which feels important even if I'm not sure why.

[mermaidenisaacs]

Hey okay so I'm sending this ask cause I read all of the stuff you posted about su*cide and d*pression and God it just hurt me so much. It made me really glad though to see that you called up a suicide hotline and a nutritionist. i cannot even explain in words how happy and proud that made me....like you! are! so! fucking! strong!

Secondly, I am going to be completely honest and say that I do not know how you are feeling because i have never actually been in your position. All I do know is that I love you, many people love you, you deserve to live, and that things will get better. i understand that it seems like they won't but they will!! I know you know this but so many people have been in the same place as you, and things have gotten better for them JUST like they will for you. You are a beautiful person (I just know it), even if you don't meet the "societal beauty standards" (which I feel like most people don't?), your beauty honestly shines through your posts and your writing in a way that's amazing. You seem like such a real and down to earth person and God the world would lose so much if you decided to end your life.

Also omg, the fact that you decided to call a nutritionist/suicide hotline just tells my how strong you are lovely! Getting help isn't a sign of weakness AT ALL, all it shows to me is sm strength.

Obviously you deserve to live for yourself firstly, but i know it helps to know that there would be people who'd be so devastated if you kill*d yourself and trust me i KNOW there are people in your life who love you and would be so depressed if you went. One person is your father most likely? i don't know much about him but i do know he brought you a cake on your birthday....i don't even have the words to type out how he'd feel if you left him...or your brother, or any other family members, even work colleagues. Trust me, you play a bigger role in people's lives than you think. Every person who's read your stories (like me), has a connection to you, a connection so so much deeper than you think.

I also think you have so much to give to and take from this world. You deserve to travel, have a family (if you want), find someone (or a pet) you really really love, and do so many other things. I know you said it feels like you'll never get these things, but I'm gonna be 100% honest and say that don't get ahead of yourself. Our minds love to manipulate us, and i just know yours is lying to you when it says that you won't get the things you desire. The future is SO unpredictable and I know things will get better for you, permanently better. With the strength you have that is so so so possible.

I was reading your posts last night and I actually started tearing up (keep in mind I am not the most emotionally expressive person?), and i knew that that just shows how much of an awesome person you are. If you believe in signs (or even if you don't), I just spent thirty minutes writing this whole thing (I am so sleep deprived boo I genuinely stayed up to write this because i want you to live that fucking much) with hope that maybe, just maybe, it would help in pushing you to want to be alive a bit more (or a lot more). I don't know you at all, I don't even know your name, but I can tell (someone probably living half way across the world from you), that you deserve to live. if that isn't a sign then I don't know what is. You seem like such a lovely person, who is so fucking talented, and so strong, and the worst thing would be if you decided to deprive yourself of the chance of things getting better.

p.s im sorry if I said anything insensitive in this since i don't know 100% how you feel, thanks for reading till here if you did. obviously you can answer this privately if you don't wanna put it on ur page aha (or not answer at all if you didn't wanna, but ig i would appreciate if you did, just so i knew you read it, thanks so much)

i love you <33

thank you so much for taking the time to write this to me. your kind words mean so much to me. i am happy to report that i am doing better these days! i'm on the right meds, i'm back in therapy, i'm moving away from a toxic roommate situation, and yeah overall just moving on from an unpleasant season of life i think.

you're right. the future is completely unpredictable and our minds are so good at lying to us. i read every word of this and i will try to remember your kind words in my dark moments and cherish the fact that a total stranger connected with me to tell me so many beautiful and uplifting things. just from that fact alone, i know you're a deeply caring person and you deserve every bit of the good you put out into the world :) <3

[slasherslxt333]

I love your passion for the things you love and the smile you get when you talk about them

I love the way you work so hard to provide for yourself and everyone else despite how exhausted you are emotionally and physically

you do everything in your power to strive and keep going

and you never complain about how tired you feel inside

you keep fighting and you keep going every step that knocks you down you fight 100x harder

and no one ever gives you enough credit for simply waking up in the morning to do it all over again

you are beyond special and important and your light that you have is so bright and nourishing

It’s beautiful

you have no idea how magnificent of a human being you are

Through every trial and error you hurt but you bounce right back and get yourself on track

and I can’t imagine how many people would be devastated if that light from your eyes and your heart ever went out

God that’s such a blessing I’ve never met anyone with a soul like yours

it’s precious and devine

and I absolutely adore any and every bit of time you spend on this earth

whether it’s forever or just a short time

you spread your greatness and resilience and you provide a space for me you create a hope where I always feel comfortable and secure and in between that space I also feel that it’s never really going to end but if it ever did i know I’ll be with you again you communicate in ways that never make me question even in the silence and the look on your face it’s the truth love is a blessing

to you despite my flaws they’re just perfect imperfections and I’ve never ever been able to find a human that knows me quite like you

That treats me like the rarest of gems that never expects anything from me other than to wake up with a smile on my face and just breathe you always appreciate me and don’t take advantage of my forgiveness or anything i do you’re gentle and sweet but you’re so overprotective and it makes me feel so safe emotionally i can trust you with absolutely anything and I can tell you absolutely everything and you never once pass judgment you correct me and still accept me i could pour my soul to you and I know with absolute certainty that you would never ever betray that and hurt me ever I’ve been so in love with you for what seems like forever no matter how many times I try to tell myself I’m crazy or tell myself it’s not real I can’t because I always come back to you and feel everything all over again I’m hopelessly in love with you and I can’t lie anymore you’re the one I’m waiting for to share my morning coffee and my midnight drives to wake up the morning or just watch the sunrise to spend every evening dancing in the kitchen and go on last minute road trips just so I can buy milkshakes and sit in the parking lot of McDonald’s at 2am to know you even more you’re what I’ve been looking for you’re my Friday nights on the couch watching sitcoms your my Sunday morning Pj’s on pancakes in the afternoon you’re my Tuesday night shopping partner that says i take forever just to decide to get one thing your my Monday morning babe you get up so early don’t forget to fill tank and bring yourself back home to me i need to be safe

you’re so stubborn and indecisive but you know just what you want and you know that I’m just the same and you love me that way

you see me at worst and bring me to my best you build me up and i keep you focused

I never have to fall that far because you’re there to take my hand

and the only thing I have to do when I’m with you is just breath and it feels like a warm beach day with toes in the sand

and even on the worst days you leave that little note for me that’s always on the nightstand telling me

“you love me and nothing will ever change even when I’m brat you say and i always want my way you’ve loved me since the day we met and you are here to stay “

and i can’t wait for that to be reality because the only tragedy is i haven’t met you yet… I’m still counting all the days, patiently waiting for you come my way and i don’t care how long it takes because i know when you get here everyday that i have you will be my favorite memory because only then will i know for sure that i am… lucky

By princess mandicorn

[muffysisthecarbs]

I had a really devastating realization last night, a realization that has hit me in little waves for the past few years but the wave finally knocked me over. I have no one. I have no one in my life that fulfills my emotional needs. No family, no friends, no lover. I have family, I have two friends, but still connection is so far away. No one takes me in and wraps me in love. I'm so lonely. I used to have four friends but two of them decided to stop being my friends.

The first friend was a really complicated situation. August 2021 I had a talk/confrontation with her about her spending habits and how irresponsible and doomer she had gotten in the years following her autism diagnosis. We talked for three hours, I cried, she argued me and I argued her back, she went home and apart from a few texts we didn't speak again until May 2022. We spoke a bit, facetimed a bit, hung out twice. The second time ended in another argument about Don't Worry Darling that turned into meditation of if bigotry is inherent or learned. I felt that she was wrong to say that it was inherent and after an hour of that we stopped talking and she left. We have texted a few times since then but it's been a month. The friendship isn't the same.

The second friend is an even more complicated situation. A flirtation that turned into a friendship that turned into a relationship that turned into a really horrible break up that turned into a split of 8 months that turned into a really strong, loving friendship. In August 2022, my friend was going on a trip to see their partner in Georgia. The morning of the trip I texted them "gee wiz! I sure do hope your plane doesn't crash 🥺... 😐" which isn't super out of character cause we can be very morbid. they responded "what's actually wrong with you? I hate you." I said "I'm a katya" and then they never responded. For a week they were in Atlanta and I was texting them every day, little random things like how I usually do but they weren't answering. I figured it was cause they were on a trip with their boyfriend and it was their first time visiting their boyfriend. When the week passed and my friend was back in our home state they still weren't answering me. I finally realized what was happening; they were upset and I was being given the silent treatment. I was hurt and very annoyed. My friend has a very short temper and is a "hangry" person, so there have been many times when I get lashed out because of their annoyance at a person/situation/ or have been given attitude because of them being hungry. I always let it slide because that's just an aspect of their personality that I understand. Outside of our breakup we did have one major conflict that was mostly my fault partially their fault, we moved on from it but this new conflict has emotionally mirrored the previous conflict. I accidentally did something that upset them and they responded but shutting me out. In this new case, after three weeks of silent treatment and me texting them sporadically (not about the conflict but random texts) they finally answered saying that I had really upset them. I responded saying that I know they’re upset and I’m very hurt that they easily decided that instead of telling me they decided to give me the silent treatment. They are also a very confrontational person (meaning that when issues arise they are quick to address them) so them just deciding to stop speaking to me and moving on so easily is INCREDIBLY painful for me. They apologized, I apologized, and we moved on. However, after a few weeks a daily texts and FaceTime called and hanging out once (with everything feeling back to normal) the silent treatment started again. Two weeks of silent treatment they finally spoke up (in response to a random text from me) saying that they’re not upset that I knew they were upset and I didn’t say anything. Now that PISSED ME OFF because the last time we had conflict I had to be the one to initiate the make up even tho they had hurt me immensely. So again instead of telling me they were upset they reverted to the silent treatment. We had a short but very intense conversation through text that ended in them saying that they have a hard time holding me accountable, I asked why and if there was anything I've done in the past to make them feeling like that, and they said no "it's not based on a pattern of behavior" and that pissed me off and I esentially said well do you wanna be my friend or not? and they said they needed more time, I said "okay im gonna unfollow you on everything" and since that day in late September we haven't spoken.

So for the past two months I've been very uneasy and scared. Where are all my friends going? Simultaneously for literally no reason all my other internet acquaintances have all stopped talking to me. I text and text and I get ignored. No one is talking to me. I only have Dana and Adrian left and I worry those day are numbered too. I can feel them getting tired of me, outgrowing me. Is this what my life is destined to be? Am I a stepping stone to better things? Aminah (friend 1) stopped talking to me and then immediately got into nursing school, met a boy, has been going out, and seems happy. I don't know anything really about Christian's life (friend 2) but last I knew they were also happy and thriving in a new fulfilling romantic relationship. Am I destined to always be left behind? I don't wanna sound like those horrible men who say that all their exes were crazy, ignoring the fact that he was the common denominator. I've been talking about this in therapy and I don't know what I do to everyone. Daniel Wilson and I used to be close I think. We would at least talk every once in a while and facetime but now he's been leaving all my texts on read for weeks. I didn't do anything to him. Amin never talks to me pretty much. Sebastian ignores all my texts. What did I do? I have two friends and neither of them like me very much. Last night I texted my friend Dana cause I was very sad and I told her I was sad and she just read them and never answered. She called me this morning and she asked "do you even care that takeoff died?" and honestly no I don't so I said that and she said I was being a hater. I didn't have anything to say and she was the one that called me so we kinda just sat in silence and then she hung up. I just don't know what I do or what I am so warrant this behavior. Why did i get the silent treatment? Why is no one talking to me? Why do I have friends that only want me when I'm okay? Why am I meant to feel shame for who I am and for my feelings? Why am I always guilty but no one is guilty when they hurt me? Why do I have to bend to everyone's will but no one can even text me back when I feel sad? Why doesn't anyone tell me they love me? Why doesn't anyone love me? I'm surrounded by people and no one even cares about me. No one actually likes me. No one is interested in making sure I feel fulfilled in our relationship. No one wants to hug me, no one wants to scratch my head, no one wants to talk on the phone, no one wants to see me. I'm so lonely and I'm so alone. but if I want to kill myself then suddenly everyone loves me! Love doesn't only matter when times are hard, love matters on a random Tuesday when someone you care about feels sad. I don't have any love in my life. Maybe that's why I wanna die so bad, because I'm not experiencing pure honest love. Dana and Adrian don't love me, Christian and Aminah obviously don't love me, my family doesn't love me, they don't even know me enough to love me. I really am all alone in this horrible little world.

[wallflowerimagines]

How would the Lords handle their crush rejecting them? The reason can range from just not returning their feelings to having feelings for someone else to having feelings for one of their SIBLINGS

Ooooooooh. Time for Angst.

Alcina Dimitrescu

Ah.

Alcina doesn't settle for second best, unfortunately.

She's going to try and convince you of how wrong you are, and use every trick in her arsenal. Making you jealous, degrading your choice in perspective partner, showering you in affection, she's not above any of it. Hell, she might even play matchmaker for your crush.

To a certain extent, as long as she can convince you not to choose your crush, she's happy. You don't even have to pick her at the end of the day, she just wants to make sure they are out of your life.

IF it's another Lord, though...

I'm going to be a thousand percent honest, if she likes you and you reject her for a stranger, it would go way better than if you rejected her for a sibling.

She's not Mother Miranda's favorite, and now she's not your favorite either, and it hurts.

She's not going to try and win you over if you chose another Lord. Depending on how close you were beforehand she might even cut you out of her life entirely. If she sees you in public, she'll either ignore you or be so icily civil that it feels like she's disemboweling you with her words.

If the two of you were close friends, there might be a chance for reconciliation, but it's not likely. You would have to put in an obscene amount of effort, and it would still take years before she's even willing to entertain the idea.

(You need to prove that she's still special to you. She needs to feel appreciated, and that her love for you wasn't a waste. If you can manage to do all that, your relationship can recover and your friendship will thrive.)

She's also worse to the sibling who got picked over her, Especially if it's Heisenberg. Their petty squabbling actually turns into heated arguments with Intent To Harm, and she will not hesitate to kill him if he steps on her toes.

Donna Beneviento

Inconsolable.

For Donna to make herself vulnerable enough to confess to you, pour her heart out, and still be rejected?

It hurts. It hurts so much.

She spent all this time and effort trying to be brave, trying to build up just enough courage to make you see how she felt, and it didn't work. You don't love her. It feels like she made a running jump into the void and nobody was there to catch her.

Was it something she did? Was it something she said? Was it Angie? Her scar? Her mutation? Donna wants to know why.

And when she finds out it's someone else? ...She doesn't know how to feel.

Do they know how you take your tea? Donna does! Donna knows your favorite color, and song, and what your dream job is! It's almost like she's bargaining with you. You two are perfect together, she just knows it! Does this stranger even care about you at all?

Eventually, once you start to console her, she settles down a bit. Okay. You don't love her romantically. But you have to promise her that you'll stay in her life, that's the only way she'll accept this.

(She can't lose anyone else)

It doesn't matter if your crush is a stranger or another Lord, Donna watches them like a hawk. She's a little more lenient with her Siblings, of course, but her standards for the relationship are even higher than yours. They have to pass all these small 'tests' to prove that they're worthy of your affection.

If you don't get anything and everything you ask for, your partner is going to have to deal with Donna. If they so much as make you cry, Angie and the rest of Donna's porcelain family are going to shred them to pieces. No questions, no excuses.

Her feelings will probably change to something more familial rather than romantic (she love you too much for you guys to just be friends), but Donna will never stop being crazy protective over you.

Salvatore Moreau

Surprisingly, he has the best initial reaction.

As much as he hoped--As much as he dreamed--that you would love him back, he knew it was never going to happen.

Salvatore is aware that he's a monster, and Beauty and the Beast is just a story. People like you don't fall for things like him, and it's just a fact of life.

He's still devastated, don't get me wrong. But if you reject him because you have feelings for someone else already?

He's a little more understanding.

He would still want to be friends. No matter who you fall for, he wants to be in your life, even if he made the mistake of revealing to you how disgusting his feelings are. If you want him as a friend, he'll be there for you, no questions asked.

If you confess to your crush and it goes well? He's so genuinely happy for you! You deserve every happiness the world has to offer, and your crush would be a fool not to see how much of a gem you are.

He'll also want to know about your relationship, to the point where it's a little bit voyeuristic. But he honestly can't help himself. It's like a movie with his favorite person as the romantic lead, and he can't bring himself to look away.

Just... Don't tell him about your first kiss with your new partner. It's something he built up quite a bit in his head, and he really wanted to experience that with you. He'd spend long nights fantasizing about what your lips might feel like against his, and to hear you gush about that experience with someone else will break his heart all over again.

Moreau would also be happier with the Situation if you told him you were in love with one of his siblings. That means you're part of his family! You're not going to leave the Village! You're going to stick around, and he will still get to see you all the time!

Salvatore isn't going to pine after you until the day he dies--but it's pretty damn close. He's fairly emotionally mature about things like romance, but feelings can't just be turned on and off with the push of a button. Just because you are taken doesn't mean he still doesn't have feelings for you, after all, but he promises you he's going to work through it. Still, please, give him time.

Karl Heisenberg

Magnet Man is ready to murder.

You're HIS crush friend. You're supposed to like him! You guys have so much in common already, why would you spend time with someone else when you could be spending time with Your Friend Heisenberg??

(why don't you like him like he likes you?)

I've said it before, but Heisenberg is bad at processing emotions. He does not know what his own feelings are 99% of the time, and the rest of the time he does not want to acknowledge it. When he finds out you have a crush and it's not him? He practically throws a tantrum. It's frustrating for him too, because he's not even sure why he's so angry.

Especially because you make a point of saying that you still value your friendship with him. He's irreplaceable to you, but only platonically.

And he likes you as a friend. So much. The fact that you want to stick around after he word vomited his tangle of platonic-romantic feelings at you just proves you two are great friends. So why is he STILL so fucking pissed?

He will play the Needy Best Friend card to keep your attention on him as long as possible. Any minor inconvenience he might have is an emergency of the highest caliber, and you HAVE to help him. A part of him hopes the extended exposure will convince you to choose him.

Meanwhile, if your crush is some stranger (and he thinks he can get away with it without hurting you) that person is straight up dead. All tattoos and other identiying marks are removed so you aren't suspicious, and the corpse is used as Lycan fodder. No evidence, no proof, no problem.

If You like one of His Siblings? He does a little more soul searching. He does want you to be happy, and as much as he argues with them, his siblings are just as much Victims of Mother Miranda as he is. They do deserve happy lives (if only to spite that bitch, or at least that's how he rationalizes it to himself).

He'll... probably get over it. Maybe. Someday. But in the meantime, as long as you stick around and promise to spend time with him, it will sting way less.

[writingquestionsanswered]

Heyy :]

I hope you're having an amazing day, because Im certainly in a dilemma for quite a while now. Do you have any tips on writing happy scenes? Not how to actually write them once they happen, but how to MAKE them happen.

When I first started my book, it was very lighthearted, but in the last years it became too dark & full of pain. It's not like I won't keep the sad scenes, it's just that it's not fun reading a book with very few lighthearted scenes inbetween a bunch of pain. It's just hard for me to come up with many nice scenes.

Thank you alot in advance! Your advice is very helpful and I hope it can help me once again :>

Have a nice day!

Incorporating Lightheartedness Into Sad Story

Grief and misery are exhausting enough in real life, most of us don't want to consume a story that offers nothing but grief and misery. That's why it's so important to incorporate a little happiness in your story wherever you can, in whatever way you can. There are a few different ways you can do this.

1) Create Hope - Even the most miserable moments can be more bearable if you can see "a light at the end of the tunnel," so it's important to give the characters something hopeful to strive toward, and to show periodic glimpses of that hopeful thing being in reach.

2) Embrace the Little Things - At the end of the day, we're simple creatures and the "little things"... the beauty and joy that can be found in the every day... are so often the fuel that give us life. The smell of a book, the taste of a ripe strawberry, watching children play, cool rainfall after a sweltering day, a crisp starry night, laughing with friends, seeing two people in love... find ways to incorporate little things like these into little happy moments to break up the monotony of grief and misery.

3) Find Beauty in the Surrounding World - This is an extension of the above, but it's more about the environment. The world around us can be so beautiful if we take a moment to see the beauty. It's the single yellow wild flower that blooms in the smoking ruins of a palace devastated by an evil wizard, the double rainbow that paints the sky after a massive thunderstorm, cricket and frog song mingling in the swamp in the dark hours after a battle, a sky riddled with stars after saying goodbye to a friend lost in combat.

4) Work in the "Everyday" - Even in the midst of a drawn out war between two kingdoms, there's downtime between battles, and during that downtime, "everyday" stuff has to happen. The horses need to be fed and watered, food needs to be prepared, weapons and armor need to be polished, wounds need to be mended, people need to bathe and go to the bathroom, tents and shelters need to be put up, cook fires need to be built... you get the idea. When you show your characters engaging in the business of everyday life in the midst of whatever turmoil they're experiencing, you bring the volume of the chaos down--for just a moment--so that your characters and reader can catch their breath. It's a reminder that life goes on, that no matter how bad it gets, the laundry still needs to be done and the plants still need to be watered. It can also serve as a reminder for the "status quo" the characters are physically and/or emotionally fighting for.

5) Weave in Some Humor - There's no better way to break the tension of a dark moment than to add a little well-timed levity. A witty comeback, a sarcastic comment, a joke, a little bit of slapstick... whatever works. This can be tricky if you don't feel like you're good at humor in real life, but watch some funny movies or some funny movie clips on YouTube and try to recreate that in some moment in your story. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is exceptionally good at this, in my opinion.

Have fun with your story!

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[brynnasaurus]

It was a wonderful year for TV, folks! Much to discuss! Let's get right to it!

The Top Ten

1. Succession - I do not think there is a singular TV GOAT - the field is just too vast and varied to really pick one as the greatest. But there is a GOAT pantheon: that exclusive clubhouse that holds the Sopranos and the I Love Lucys and the Breaking Bads (the exact makeup of my personal GOAT Pantheon can be a conversation for another day lol). Succession has entered the pantheon. *flips over a desk, Tom Wambsgans style* I LOVE THIS SHOWWWWWW

2. For All Mankind - as far as I can tell, no one watches this show and I'm telling y'all: YOU ARE MISSING OUT. Truly one of the best season finales I think I've ever seen? I think I legitimately stopped breathing at one point? This is like Halt and Catch Fire in that it's hard to outright recommend because season one is a bit slow and it takes time for you to see what they're doing, but man, once they really get going in season two, this show is out-of-this-world (hehehe sorry).

3. We Are Lady Parts - this show is just so much FUN. It's badass. It's hilarious. I hope there are 390 more seasons of it. Single-handedly worth the Peacock subscription.

4. It's a Sin - what made this show so extraordinarily special was that for as emotionally devastating as it is (and hooooo boy is it devastating!!!) it also was full of laughter and joy and love. A beautiful, beautiful show.

5. Reservation Dogs - I don't even know how to properly explain this show other than that it's surprising and funny and touching and goofy and just plain excellent.

6. The White Lotus - As an Enlightened fan, it was so nice this year to see people actually watching and discussing a Mike White show. What a time to be alive! It certainly wasn't flawless, but it sure was wickedly fun to watch.

7. Dickinson - *me, every time someone I know gets Apple TV in order to watch Ted Lasso* "Ok, that's great, Ted's great, but the secret comedy MVP of Apple TV is Dickinson so please go watch that ASAP"

8. What We Do In The Shadows - still firing on all comedic cylinders. But then they had to go and make me EMOTIONAL? Over COLIN ROBINSON?!?!?!

9. The Great - GIVE NICHOLAS HOULT AN EMMY, YOU COWARDS

10. The Other Two - I'm admittedly a sucker for showbiz satire but this one is truly great. It is so, so silly and it makes me laugh so much.

Other Assorted Shout-Outs

WTF (complimentary): Evil - This show is BANANAS. It's the Catholic X-Files but instead of 'are aliens real' it's 'is the devil real' and the answer is yes and Michael Emerson works for him. It's the best kind of batshit.

WTF (derogatory): The Morning Show - look, I like to keep this list positive, but I just have to mention this show because I truly do not remember the last time I witnessed such a car crash (heh) of a show when SO MANY insanely talented people are involved. What even was this?!?! How did this happen?!?! I mean, it makes The Newsroom (THE NEWSROOM!) look GOOD in comparison!! I can't even!!!!!!

Arguably not TV, but I watched them on my TV so they get mentions: Bo Burnham: Inside, The Beatles: Get Back - Mind-blowing, both of them.

Honorable Mentions

Only Murders in the Building, Hacks, How To with John Wilson, Starstruck, Yellowjackets, Sex Education, The Chair, Ted Lasso

Previous Years

[phykios]

honesty and promise me, part 10 [co-written with @darkmagyk] [read on ao3]

“If you don’t talk to me, I’m not going to leave you my keys.”

Annabeth looks at Piper from behind the loom, glaring through the threads. “Then you won’t come back to ten bolts of fabric.”

In fairness, it was sort of an empty threat. Piper has all the good stuff: the surger, the embroidery machine, the industrial sewing machines, plus a million sources for fabric that aren’t Annabeth’s stress weaving. Annabeth only has her own shitty sewing machine at home that she’d gotten for Christmas when she was fourteen.

Also, Piper wouldn’t actually lock her out. She needs those fabrics.

“Why don’t you just not go?” Annabeth says. “If you stay, I promise to tell you all the gritty details.” She’s joking, but the second she says it, she’s hit with a strange wave of desperation.

She wants to tell Piper all the gritty details. How she had giggled and smoozed and looked so pretty on Luke’s arm, tattoos and undercut and everything else so carefully concealed. She never wanted to tell Thalia the gritty details. The dirty ones, sure, particularly when the dirty things didn’t involve Thalia’s beloved younger cousin. But she had spent two years, two hard painful years, hiding vast swaths of herself from Thalia.

She thought of the night of the gala, of Thalia telling her family she knew Luke from college. NYU. They’d been actors together.

Annabeth hadn’t been the only one hiding things.

It had stung, in all sorts of ways.

Piper stares, narrowing her eyes. “How dare you tempt me into giving up my creative retreat for gossip.”

Annabeth shrugs. “It’s one or the other.”

The glare at each other, stubborn as all hell.

Piper throws up her hands. “Fine. Just make my fabric and call Leo if you’re having another crisis.”

The truth is, she will tell Piper. Eventually. She knows she will. It will probably be in eight months, when she gets back, when hopefully the shame of her false life and the devastation of losing Percy has lessened, but she will tell her. But eight months is a long time. “I do have other friends, you know.”

“Then call Luke. Or Thalia.”

It takes absolutely everything Annabeth has not to wince at the names.

She would never have told Thalia. Not really. Even things like this, even if it hadn’t involved her. Thalia wasn’t… good at relationship stuff. Not like Piper. And she never knew all of Annabeth’s romantic history--not like Piper did, anyway.

And it wasn’t just romantic relationships.

Annabeth might have been able to share her pain, and share her pain with Thalia, but it had, in many ways, only been a surface level thing. Thalia saw her pain after Annabeth’s mom had rescinded her approval of her life, but she'd taken Annabeth’s silence as the end of the matter, and responded to it by acting out, and arguably drinking too much.

But they never talked about her mother. They never talked about Thalia’s, either, and if there was something Annabeth learned from Hazel’s gala beyond how unfairly handsome Percy was going to look in thirty years, it was that there was a lot going on there.

It is a little hurtful on reflection. Making her feel less close to Thalia, but also less guilty about what she never said. And less willing to accept her reactions.

Her emotions have been all over the place the last few weeks.

Piper notices, because of course Piper notices, but she is an angel, and has known her for a long time, so she doesn’t badger her too much. She also doesn’t mention that Annabeth’s measurements all seem to be off. Not even to say something about beauty at every size or her well publicized efforts for diverse bodies in fashion.

But it was still nice to spend time with her. It felt like the old days, staying up too late making the next thing in fashion, and then passing out together, surrounded by bobbins and bagels, Gossip Girl playing on TV.

It did make Piper’s impending departure that much harder, though.

Two weeks into November, she meets Piper and Leo for dinner, and then sees Piper off to JFK for her eight-month creativity retreat in Oklahoma. “You know, like how you decided you couldn’t have a doorman for creative reasons,” she’d said with a raised eyebrow when Annabeth had questioned the move. Piper likes to treat the last two years of Annabeth’s life like some sort of creative exercise. Her dad had done that too, once, when she bothered to answer his call.

Not that she’s not doing anything other than helping Piper pick stitches, and sewing hemlines Piper is too important to deal with herself. She wishes that earlier estimation had been true.

Since the gala she’s been living on Uber Eats at Piper’s, unless she gets bullied home, in which case it's the same but less varied selection with more meat, so the night out with Piper and Leo the night before Piper’s flight feels like a radical departure from the norm. Even though they just go to dinner.

Which does not stop her from feeling hungover the next morning.

“You had half a glass of wine last night,” Leo points out from the door of her bathroom.

“I remember,” she agrees when it lets up for a moment.

“If you get me sick,” he says, “I’m sending you the doctor's bill.”

“Fair,” she chokes out.

Leo doesn’t hug her goodbye, but he does tell her he hopes she gets better before heading back to Boston.

Annabeth, hugging porcelain, wishes she could go with him.

She was very seriously considering it a few days later. Magnus would take pity on her and Alex was always fun to hang out with. Plus, they’d probably think she was too pathetic to be called on her shit. She only did not make plans to go up to Boston because on Wednesday Luke texted her: Already a shit week, brunch this weekend? And she knew if she ran off to Boston, she wouldn’t leave Magnus and Alex’s guest room until they forced the issue.

But it would be nice to talk to someone in New York City who doesn’t hate her guts, she thought.

So, on Sunday morning, she throws up the wonton soup she’d ordered in for dinner the night before, gurgles some mouthwash, uses the expensive concealer to hide the dark circles, and over does the mascara in hopes that she mostly looks awake.

“You look terrible,” are the first words Luke says to her.

“You have no idea how to talk to women,” she says, slumping down across from him.

“I do,” Luke says, “I just know not to bother with you.” But he frowns at her, taking her in. She’s broken out a Chanel jacket, but she isn’t sure when she last washed these jeans. A real winning combo, her.

“But really,” Luke says, “you look miserable. Is it about what happened on Halloween?”

She shrugs. It isn’t not that. Percy’s words still circle through her head, his sad, defeated face as he bemoaned the, how did he put it? All the rich girls who fucked him to make a point. Made all the worse because she believes them. Probably not the same points as those princesses, but… probably not as different as she would like.

She wonders if Europe is full of very wealthy aristocratic women who are all secretly and shamefully still in love with Percy Jackson. And Frank Zhang.

It makes her feel hollow and nauseous all at once.

But she’s been feeling nauseous for weeks now, so at least it's not a new feeling. If it keeps up, she’s going to have to go to the doctor soon.

She hates going to the doctor. It feels like cheating when she just goes and pays and knows other people can’t. She had once lied to Thalia about getting money for a side gig, and then given her two hundred bucks for a trip to the clinic. Now that Annabeth has spent many hours in his cousin’s apartment, and has heard Nico talk about his yearly income on top of the money his dad gives him, she’s not sure how it came down to her.

“Not really,” Annabeth says, “I mean, I still feel just as terrible, but that’s mostly the problem. I feel sick.”

“It's been three weeks.” Luke looks genuinely concerned. “What’s going on?”

“I’m exhausted and nauseous all the time,” she says, groaning at the thought. She was okay right at this moment, but she knew it could come back at the drop of a hat.

Luke frowned at her. “That’s all?”

“Isn’t that enough?”

“I mean…” He looked at her, his eyes gazing lower, to her body. Luke had never really come on to her in any kind of real way. But she’s not sure he’s ever looked at her with less lust than he does right at that moment.

It is calculating. She’s gained some weight, she knows. But if Luke points it out, she’s going to kick him in the nuts with her steel toed boots. Or maybe make him explain himself and his relationship with Thalia.

“Annabeth,” Luke says, his voice lower, a frown on his face, “please don’t freak out.”

She can feel her heart pick up, just a bit. “That’s a terrible place to start.”

“Have you been feeling… emotionally volatile lately? Having a lot of mood swings?”

She frowns. She’d maybe been crying a little more than normal at sentimental hulu ads, but she always has a soft touch for that kind of thing, and she’s going through some stuff. “I don’t think you should ask a woman that.”

“You are really not going to like my next question, then.” He leans close and says, “Are your… breasts tender?”

“You’re right, I don’t like that question,” Annabeth says, crossing her arms over her chest. Even though they are. “I don’t know why you thought that, and how you knew.”

Luke looks at her with such pity, she feels like she’s suddenly eighteen years old again, and crying on his couch at the end of freshman year about the greatest heartbreak of her life. (It had moved to second place. Lucky it. The boy in that bar had only been theoretical, mostly.)

Luke reaches out, grasping one of her hands, and for a second, Annabeth is sure he is going to tell her that she’s dying.

“Have you considered you might be pregnant?”

She yanks her hand away. “I can’t be pregnant,” she says. “I haven’t had sex in weeks.”

“Have you had your period since then?” Luke asks.

“Not that it's any of your business,” she says, “but I haven’t had one in years.” They do talk about sex sometimes, but periods had long been off the Luke table.

Luke grimaces. “Well, you’ve been sexually active recently…”

“It’s been more than a month!”

“When did you start getting morning sickness?” Luke asks “You were throwing up at Halloween.”

“That wasn’t in the morning,” she snaps, “and I feel fine now.”

“You know morning sickness doesn’t just happen in the morning,” Luke says. “And with the rest of your symptoms, well--”

She shakes her head, glaring at Luke. His judgement would have been better than his patient mansplaining. “You think I don’t use birth control?”

Luke shrugs a little. “I mean… you’re… not great at things like daily medication. That’s what happened last time. And if a condom broke or you didn’t use one…”

Last time. Oh, last time. Last time had been the worst four hours of her life, in between realizing that she hadn’t been remembering her birth control pills every day, that her period was a few days late, and that she’d definitely been having unprotected sex with that boy in Luke’s cohort who was probably too old for her. Last time had been her having a panic attack on Luke’s Cambridge apartment couch while a very reluctant Leo was sent to buy a pregnancy test or twelve, and Piper reassuring her via speaker phone that it would be ok, while Luke rubbed her back and reminded her to breathe.

“I do remember what happened last time,” she says. “That’s why I got an IUD. Which, if you don’t know, from all your girlfriends' pregnancy scares, has the same failure rate as permanent sterilization, less than one percent. So…” So it would be okay. She couldn’t be pregnant. That’s why it had been okay for Percy and Annabeth to start fucking without a condom.

“When was the last time you got a new one?”

“August.” She says, thinking back. She was almost sure. “I remember because it was before the Eta thing--Leo called me to tell me about the ceremony while I was at the gyno.”

“So you were distracted and being a bad patient when they were trying to put it in?”

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck.

But she won’t give Luke, of all people, the satisfaction. “They are professionals. They should know what they’re doing, even if I was on the phone.”

Luke gives her his most disappointed dad face. It is worse than Annabeth’s own father. “You’re the one who always tells me I need to not make people’s jobs harder by being a bad client,” he quietly reminds her.

She fucking hates him.

But despite herself, she pulls out her phone, and begins googling misplaced IUDs and pregnancy.  

They haven’t even ordered yet, but Luke is already standing up, probably based on the look on her face as she manages to fight through the dyslexia and figure out what it says. “Come on,” he says, helping her out of her chair, even though she’s not an invalid. She just might be pregnant.

She pushes that thought away as she follows Luke into a cab and then up to his apartment. He makes her some tea and hands her a banana while he goes to get her a pregnancy test, because Luke’s not quite shameless enough to have one at home. She waits for him in a living room straight out of American Psycho and reads up on IUD pregnancy complications online. Which she probably should not have done.

By the time Luke gets back, she is crying again. He’s gotten her 3 tests, which is very considerate of him, as she’s going to need them.

Walking into the bathroom, she’s shaking hard enough that she needs to brace herself on the wall. He lets her use the nice one off his bedroom, though it's not like she needs the jacuzzi tub.

When she’s done peeing, she sets a timer on her phone and sits on Luke’s bed. He tries to speak to her several times. She doesn’t respond.

It isn’t the longest ten minutes of her life, because the truth is, she knows.

She already knows.

When the alarm goes off, she shrugs off Luke’s arm and silently walks back into the bathroom.

Luke got a digital readout, because what else was he going to do. And so she looks at the little screen and just barely processes the word pregnant.

She doesn’t need to take the other tests. She doesn’t need confirmation or to be convinced.

She reaches down and pressed on her lower abdomen, lifting her shirt. She had noticed a slight change. But she’d also changed a lot of her daily routine lately, had eaten a lot more ice cream. Right now, she can’t see any kind of bump, not really, but she can see a shift. Something flat gone fuller.

Annabeth is pregnant.

Annabeth is pregnant with Percy’s baby.

Percy’s baby.

She bursts into tears all over again.

An eternity later, there is a knock on the door.

“Annabeth,” Luke calls, “can I come in?”

She manages to choke out a yes.

Luke finds her sitting on the edge of the tub. He looked at the test still sitting on the counter.

“Let me make a call,” he says, sitting next to her, resting a hand on her arm. “I know a doctor. He can get you a pill or maybe even see you if you need it. Probably today or tomorrow. We can get this all taken care of and then I’ll buy you ice cream and we can watch Legally Blonde, and you can complain about how it doesn’t accurately reflect the admissions process.”

Normally Annabeth would pre-complain, and point out that given Elle’s GPA, LSAT, and extracurricular activities, she would have been a shoe in for her program, and the movie was dismissive of her prior academic achievement. But she’s too busy parsing what Luke is saying.

He squeezes her hand in support. “It's going to be okay,” he says, sweetly.

“No.” She says. But not because it won’t be okay. “No, I’m not going to have an abortion.”

“It's okay,” Luke promises. “I would never judge you. And no one else would ever have to know. This isn’t something you have to do.”

“I know that,” Annabeth says. “I don’t have to do anything.” She detangles her hand from Luke’s and rests it on her stomach, where her uterus waits under her skin. “I want to do this.”

Luke looks at her hand. “Poseidon Olympianides’ son?” he asks. “That’s the father?”

She nods.

Blowing out a breath through his teeth, he sighs. “Well, you’ll be able to get some good child support out of him at least. That family is loaded.”

“Don’t say that,” she nearly screams, and Luke actually jerks back a little. “He doesn’t have any money. He’s his dad’s bastard kid,” she says, feeling a little bad about revealing his family history, but knowing that the word would spark something in Luke. “I don’t know if I’m even going to tell him.”

It feels like something cheap and shallow, trapping a man with a lie, then a baby.

She’s still crying and tentatively, Luke reaches out and wraps his arms around her, pulls her to him.

“Come on,” he says, pulling her up. “You still need ice cream and a movie.”

Annabeth cries. And she doesn’t fight him, but it feels so strange. Half way through her Caramel Sutra and the Legally Blonde proshot, she realizes what’s different.

For the first time since Percy walked out of her apartment without a good-bye kiss, Annabeth Chase is happy.

She’s pregnant with Percy Jackson’s baby.

She’s going to have Percy Jackson’s baby.

She’s not sure if she’s ever heard anything as wonderful in her entire life.

And if she’s going to be worthy of it, worthy of her baby, then she’s going to have to get her shit together.

[scullymurphy]

Hey Scully! I absolutely love the new chapter even though it caused me immense pain (ouch) and I was wondering if you could give us a bit more insight into how the characters are feeling? It was all so beautifully done in the chapter but I can never get enough! I wanna know what Theo is thinking right now! Thanks <33

OMG you just opened the floodgates. Read on only if you are feeling like consuming a full-on essay this fine night!

I have been thinking about what Theo is thinking a *lot* -- like having whole long daydreams about it, lol. And I have been so hoping someone would ask me. So, THANK YOU, sweet anon!! And below are some brain ideas. [WARNING: MASSIVE FALLING DARK SPOILERS BELOW]

Number one thing is that Theo is really fucking torn.

On one hand, he has this person who was his only person for most of his life. The most important thing in the WORLD to him by far. The person he absolutely 1000% thought he would spend his life with. And he feels such tremendous guilt and pain over messing up that relationship (I recommend going back and reading Chapter 24 of Bending Light if you want a refresher). And every day that he sees Daphne and it's not like it used to be is a knife twist in his heart -- for which he totally blames himself.

On the other hand, he has a person to whom he is insanely sexually attracted (and has been for a long time), with whom he has the *best* time -- like their personalities just spark, is someone to whom he has confided his deepest shit and feels so safe with, is in all ways the person he would choose if the other person didn't exist AND is also in an emotionally fragile state.

He's on a knife edge because he loves them both, y'all.

(Even if he doesn't quite put that label on it yet.)

So I think on a night like the Christmas exchange, he is aware that something has shifted inside of him due to Daphne's change in status. He can't help that. And even though he's not rushing off to be in a relationship with Daphne (and she's absolutely not expecting that -- she's just brokenhearted and asking for support from her old friend), he knows that he's going to need to be there for her in a way that will make him less available to Hermione. And he knows that if something grows from that, he's probably going to need to at least try with Daphne.

And he feels terrible about how unfair that is to Hermione.

So he's really fighting his attraction and desire for her -- you see moments that night where it breaks through, but he holds himself back -- because he thinks it's possible there's going to be a time when he'll have to pull back. And he doesn't want Hermione to look back and feel used. He also just doesn't want to do that to her, because he loves her and honors her as a person so much.

As he says in the chapter, he's afraid he's making the biggest mistake of his life. He really, really has no idea what he should do. But he wants to be careful with Hermione no matter what. Because if he lost her friendship at this point, it would be as devastating as what happened with Daphne.

Fate is going to intervene a little with these two (I WILL SAY NO MORE) but this is where Theo's head stands right now. I really do ache for him. 😭😭😭😭

[theonewiththefanfics]

Come Back To Me (one-shot)

Synopsis: Bucky Barnes has gone through hell and back to reach his happiness, and his happiness came in the form of the love of his life. But what happens when she’s ripped away? What happens when she comes back and can no longer be happy herself? How does he get her back

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x f!Reader

Genre: AAAAANNNNNGGGGGSSSTTT, sooooo much angst. Lil bit of fluff as well (also, we’re gonna pretend like Endgame didn’t really happen, and WandaVision wasn’t as emotionally devastating), smut

Warnings: extreme sadness, depression, refusal to eat, unprotected sex, allusion to ra*e, but not the act. if there is anything else, please let me know and message me :) (MINIMALLY EDITED)

Word count: 9301 (it gon be a ride)

Bucky’s been scared many times in his life before. He wouldn’t admit that out loud, but most of the time, even as the Winter Soldier, he was terrified. Afraid to fail and of the consequences that would follow, afraid to succeed and have another person’s blood on his hands, afraid to look in the mirror, for the face staring back at him wasn’t quite his own, and even afraid to sleep in the dark, terrified the spirits of his victims would come out for revenge. But he’s never been as scared as he was in that moment, pointing a gun at the head of the love of his life, while she did the same, only without any clue as to who Bucky was.

           His mind was still processing how they’d gotten in that position, and it refused to accept it, because nothing, not a single thing had clued him in on how that day could turn south so quickly.

           It had started off as usual with Bucky’s flesh hand sliding down Y/N’s naked spine, as she had her face pressed against his toned chest, small snores escaping into the air, while a small dribble of drool trickled down the corner of her mouth.

           Bucky couldn’t help the smile lifting up his lips. It was moments like those, he believed in good things. 5 AM, the New York sky dark and without a trace of morning light probably until 8 AM, with his favourite person in the world pressed up against his side, soaking up his warmth, leeching it off without any shame after having been satisfied (or at least he hoped so) by his tongue, fingers and, well, other things as well.

           Y/N shifted a bit, trailing her palm up to his abs and settling in the middle of his chest to feel his strong heartbeat. Bucky laid his palm over hers. Even in her sleep, she didn’t hesitate to entwine their fingers and bring them under her chin, closer to her, as if she needed him next to her at all times.

           He felt bad, he truly did, as he squeezed Y/N’s side, making her frown. “You gotta wake up, dollface. We gotta get ready.”

           “Dunantdo,” she mumbled, and if Bucky hadn’t been there to take care of her drunken ass more times than he could count, he wouldn’t have been able to decipher her slurred words as “don’t want to.”

           “I know.” He chuckled. “And believe me, there’s nothing in this world I’d wanna do more than lay here with you… well maybe go down on you a few more times at some point as well, but the mission won’t happen on its own.”

           Bucky felt her chest rumble against his, as she laughed. “Oh, I wouldn’t mind you going down on me, mission and all.” Her words were clearer, but still laced with sleep, and muffled by his skin while he felt her calves run against his as she stretched out.

           “I know you don’t. The missing hair chunks on my head prove that.”

           “Hey!” she slapped his chest but soothing it immediately blearily looking at him with a pout. “I didn’t pull that hard!”

           “I’m not complaining, sweetheart.” He pressed a kiss against the top of her head. “In fact, if you ever stop doing that, I will make sure you regret it, but unfortunately we don’t have time for a rendezvous. Jet’s gonna be ready in an hour.”

           Finally, after having accepted the fact she won’t get any more sleep, Y/N lifted herself to rest on her elbow right next to Bucky’s ribs and opened her Y/E/C sleep-filled eyes to look into his cerulean ones. “We can still squeeze in a quickie if we hop into the shower together.”

           “We can,” Bucky hummed, metal fingers lifting up to cup her cheek and place a strand of unruly hair behind her ear. “But you know a quickie for us is never quick.”

           Y/N let out a scoff and pushed away from their fluffy duvet, making her shiver as she placed her feet on the cold floor. “And whose fault is that? You’re the one with the super-soldier stamina.”

           “And you,” he pinched her ass making her squeal before giving him the middle finger and taking the red Henley she’d so happily taken off his body the night before only to put it on herself, “are the completely irresistible one. Can you blame me for wanting to spend eternity between those two legs in every way possible?”

           The smile she threw him over her shoulder was nothing short of wicked, but instead of joining him in the warm embrace of the bed, Y/N made her way to the bathroom. “Keep talking, Mr Charmer. Might just get you what you want.”

           Bucky was happy about having super speed as well with how quickly he hopped out of the bed and pressed her against the cold tile wall.

           ***

           Much to Steve’s annoyance, although they were barely fifteen minutes late, Bucky and Y/N were late, and when he saw the smug grins both of them sported, he genuinely thought his eyes would get stuck at the back of his head with the hard roll he gave to them.

           “As a new policy,” he started, flipping over the mission file, “I’m putting you two on a celibate streak.”

           Y/N raised an eyebrow, plopping down on one of the metal benches as the Quinjet lifted in the air. “Really, Steve? Do you truly want to deal with Bucky like that? Cause I know, I don’t.”

           “Well, your fondueing is disrupting the schedule.”

           “Oh relax,” Nat butted in, throwing Y/N a chocolate bar, given how no one had had time to eat proper breakfast. “It’s not like the HYDRA base was going to suddenly disappear.” 

           “It could’ve,” the blond super soldier countered.

           Nat rolled her eyes, not bothering to hide the smile she had on her face. “Which is why we have an inside man, who as of three minutes ago has confirmed – they’re still there. And by the looks of it, not even trying to run.”

           Bucky’s arm slung around Y/N’s shoulder and pulled her closer. “See? Everything’s still on track. Besides, from what I heard from Sam, he’s loving the whole under-cover thing so we were doing him a favour.”

           Tony had gotten out of the pilot’s seat and joined in on everyone discussing Y/N’s and Bucky’s sex life, so that was her cue to switch the comms in her ear from ‘communication’ setting to the ‘music’ setting, leaning against Bucky’s side and closing her eyes, cashing in on those lost sleep minutes she’d spent in the shower with her lover. 

           When they had about forty minutes left in the air, Bucky once more woke Y/N up as she’d fallen asleep while Steve and Tony went over the last briefing. 

“Bucky and I will take the South-side entrance,” Steve said, pointing at the holographic map Tony had pulled up. “Y/N, Nat and Wanda you take the East, and go as easy as you can, Red.” Steve nudged his chin towards Wanda who nodded. “Just because you can bend reality doesn’t mean you can bend your health. That’s where the main intel storage unit. Get as much as you can and get out. Tony will take the air and wait until Sam joins before blowing everything up. Clint, Bruce and Thor have all checked in, and are already in their positions on the ground as blitz attack. Once F.R.I.D.A.Y has confirmed everyone’s location away from the blast zone Tony will detonate the bombs Sam has set up inside. Got it?”

Affirmative nods came from everyone on board, as they went to do final checks on their gear and equipment.

“Be careful out there, alright?” Bucky mumbled against Y/N’s neck as she double and triple checked her ammunition count, strapping a sword to her back as well, just in case. Her obsession with Medieval fantasy shows giving her a reason to make Tony pay for her lessons. 

           “We’re gonna be fine,” Y/N gently patted Bucky’s cheek before giving him a peck on the cheek as he wrapped two strong hands around her waist. “We always are.”

           But where typically she was right (most of the time), it was in that instance where she couldn’t be further from the truth if she’d tried. 

           Despite having Sam on the inside and him having gone through great lengths to make the infiltration as easy as possible, getting inside the building had been suspiciously easy, and that had set off everyone’s alarm bells, but knowing how important gathering the information was, they pressed on, keeping the thought that it could be a trap at the back of their minds at all times. 

           Thor, Bruce and Clint had started their ground attack two minutes before the rest had joined, with Vision guiding and disabling every system possible from back at the tower, so Tony and F.R.I.D.A.Y could put all of their focus on retaliating against the helacarriers coming their way. 

           “Cap, we’re in,” Natasha announced, ducking through the door, as Wanda covered her six, and Y/N lead the way in front, bullet shells flying out from her rifle. 

           Their comms crackled with echoes of gunfire outside as Tony lead them through the place right until they got to the main room where the whole system mainframe resided in.

           “Five-minute countdown commenced,” Y/N said it out loud to inform the rest of their team, as she stood behind Wanda, who’d created a red shield of magic, keeping the assault away and them inside the room.

           Five minutes until they had to get out of the building because in eight minutes time Tony and Vision, having infiltrated HYDRA’s system would blow everything to bits. If that failed, Wanda was there to provide a safety dome for the three of them, but it was just as a failsafe. Even though she now had full control of her powers, understood them better than ever, taking in a blast that will level a whole ass building was still a lot and there was no guarantee bricks and beams wouldn’t just settle right over them to then fall on top the women, she was still recuperating from a rival witch attack and it had taken out a bit more energy from her than usual.

           “How’s it looking over on your end, Vis?” Wanda asked through the comms, connecting back to the rest of the team in the tower.

           “The files are coming in, but too slowly,” his smooth voice invaded everyone’s earpieces. “And unfortunately F.R.I.D.A.Y’s mainframe won’t allow for a faster download, as she needs to scan everything for viruses.”

           “Should’ve used a flash-drive,” Y/N mumbled under her breath as she watched the HYDRA agents line outside the room, creating a two-level firing squad basically. 

           “Last time we did that, the files corrupted the drive and then erased themselves,” Tony butted in, then groaned as something hard hit him. “And no one needs to hear you complain about losing the six seasons of Brooklyn Nine-Nine again.”

           Y/N just rolled her eyes and steadied her rifle against her shoulder once Nat gave the go-sign. Then something beeped through everyone’s comms. The three-minute countdown before the whole building went down.

           “We’re barely at seventy-six percent,” Nat’s tone was calm, but the frustration didn’t go unnoticed by others.

           “Plan B then.” Wanda changed her stance a bit, but not by much as to not arouse any suspicion from the agents. If they could be taken out by the blast instead of her it’d be less energy used on her part.

           “Are you sure?” Sam finally butted in, having gotten in contact with Bucky who’d given him a comm linked just with their interface. “We can try and delay the blast,” Sam said right as Bucky commanded him to do so.

           “No,” Wanda stated. There were already at the two-minute mark. “Get out. We’ll take cover once the files are ours.”

           “Y/N,” she heard her lover start, but she just shook her head, even though he couldn’t see it. 

           “Wanda’s right. Just be here to pull us out from the rubble. I have no want to climb through the wreckage.”

           A deep, long, exasperated sigh echoed in her ears, and it made her smile. “You know, sometimes I really hate you.”

           “Love you too, hot stuff.”

           A chorus of gags followed shortly after their little display of affection, and even though they were nowhere near one another they rolled their eyes almost at the exact same time, as Vision told Wanda to stay safe.

           “You owe me a foot massage, Vis.”

           “Gross.” Y/N chuckled.

           Wanda just threw her a smirk. “Imagine how we all feel about you and Bucky.”

           “Okay, we’re down to sixty seconds!” Tony said, making Y/N nervously glance back at Nat. 

           The assassin just shook her head. “Eighty-seven percent.”

           She gritted her teeth. If the building went out before they got the files they’d be stuck with just what they had. “F.R.I.D.A.Y, please speed up a bit, the place is about to get blown to bits.”

           “Rerouting the files to a different server,” the A.I. was immediately on it. “Will have to do the scan later.”

           “Thirty seconds, guys!” Steve shouted as whoever was still near the base scrambled to get out.

           Nat’s head whipped back to the computer screen. “Almost there.”

           But the whole thing seemed to have made the HYDRA agents realise something was amiss, yet it was too late for them. As Sam counted off the last five seconds, Natasha rushed to the other two women, grabbing them by their waists and crouching down while Wanda created a red dome of magic, explosions shaking the whole house.

           For a second the rumbling felt more like someone shaking you awake from a deep sleep until the walls of the room exploded, raining fire, brick and metal down on them. 

           That would’ve been fine if not for the fact that the floor underneath them decided to disappear as well, an array of curses coming from their mouths as Wanda immediately rounded out the shield while the rest of their teammates kept nagging them to respond.

           “Y/N, I swear to everything you hold dear, I will kill you myself if you die,” Bucky pretty much screamed, while she groaned as the sudden shift in balance had made her hit herself in the ribs with the rifle.

           She gritted her teeth, as Wanda used more of her powers to stabilise them. “We’re fine,” she responded. “No need to bring in the cavalry yet.”

           A deep sigh from what seemed like everyone echoed in her earpiece, and when Wanda was sure there’d be no second shockwaves from the blast or no debris that could fall right on top of them where she’d need to take her focus away, she flew the three women out of the ruined building and onto the grassy knoll where the team stood waiting. 

           Bucky was instantly next to Y/N, pulling her into his body and her lips against his once Wanda released her from the energy bubble. 

           “God, you’re disgusting,” Sam mumbled, and it was followed by a small yelp when someone hit him in the side.

           Y/N threw him a mischievous grin when she pulled away. “Don’t be a Bitter Betty. The offer to set you up still stands.”

           Sam cackled, as everyone had now regrouped and together were marching away to where the jet sat disguised between the trees. “Hard pass. You’re a worse matchmaker than Steve.”

           “Hey! Amelia was an amazing girl.”

           “She is except for the fact that she’s not interested in men.”

           Steve’s cheeks reddened up a bit, as Tony gave him a sympathetic pat. “ ‘S not my business to ask what people’s sexuality is. And blame yourself. You’re the one who’s called Sam.”

           “Oh, don’t you even –“ but his words were cut off midway as gunfire rained down on them from the sky.

           Instantly Wanda threw up a shield once more, Bucky going to cover Y/N with his body, but HYDRA opening fire from the top had left their sides unprotected, and a well-aimed shot from a bazooka ripped everyone apart. 

           The blast was minimised thanks to Wanda and her quickly directing a part of her magic to contain it, but the missile still threw them away.

           Y/N’s head was ringing, and she wasn’t sure if it was because of the loud noise of the blast, because of her having hit her head against a tree trunk, or because of all the screams from her teammates, yet she had zero time to recuperate as an agent rushed towards her, knives ready for a kill.

           The first one embedded itself inside the tree, and barely not inside her head, as she moved to the side in the last minute, but a small sting still crept along the side of her head where he’d managed to split the skin.

           She was up and rolling away, grabbing one of her own knives from the side of her leg, finally unsheathing her sword. There was no time to put more clips in her guns.

           The first agent was quick work for Y/N, I mean he only three more knives left, and he’d been one of the unlucky ones to stand next to the building when it went off, so the shrapnel had ripped a piece of his Kevlar open giving her the perfect place to put her sword in, but the next ten were not as easy.

           She was worn out, tired from having experienced two explosions and some of the agents were new backup, which meant they had more strength and energy, but she wasn’t going to let them get the best of her. 

           At the back of her mind, Y/N heard everyone chiming in as to where they were, how many people were after them if they needed backup, but mostly Y/N heard Bucky’s calls that he was coming to get her, even though she hadn’t requested help, she was too busy dodging bullets and knives to even respond. 

           She was human, she needed help, she wanted help, but then something odd occurred to her – most, from what she’d heard through the comms, were fighting maybe four to five people at a time, with the exception of Wanda, Tony, Thor and Hulk who had tanks and cars going after them, while Y/N had a group of twenty to twenty-five people to manage.

           It was an ambush, it dawned on her.

           She wanted to scream at herself ‘No shit, the whole thing is an ambush’, but it was an ambush of Y/N specifically, which was odd given how she was pretty much one of the few who had no direct ties to HYDRA, but that one moment of confusion was enough for someone to land a slice to the side where her own suit had a hole in it. 

           “Oh, we don’t want you,” a voice went through her comms that she didn’t recognise. It was muffled as if someone was whispering through someone else’s mic. “But we’ll hurt you more than ever.”

           An unsettling quiet settled around before she clearly recognised Bucky breathing out a ‘no’ and then a panicked ‘Y/N!’ rip through his throat. Her head whipped to see one of the most frightening sights of her life that will forever be ingrained in her mind.

           Bucky was laying on the ground, completely paralysed without the ability to even flex a muscle, blue eyes turned towards her in terror and helplessness as he watched while nine more agents stormed towards her.

           She was capable, of course. He’d even experienced how capable the girl was on his own skin, and it had left his super-soldier skin bruised and battered for a few days. But right now, she was tired, she had zero ammo left, all of her knives were embedded in the heads or chests of other assailants and somewhere along the way her sword had snapped in half, leaving her with a jagged piece of steel, which was also protruding out from someone’s chest. Y/N had nothing, but her punches and kicks left. And even she knew there was no way she’d last long enough to get back to the jet in one piece.

           So, gathering whatever strength remained in her body, Y/N retaliated on last time. She heard people shouting that they were coming for her, and for a moment she truly believed so when a red ball of magic hit a group of seven agents knocking them down, but when Y/N’s eyes flitted to where it’d come from, she saw the agents subdue Wanda, as they'd somehow managed to put an electroshock collar around her neck. She fell to her knees gasping in pain.

           All of it, Y/N realised, every single thing that had happened had been a distraction. They’d split them apart, and the Avengers had most likely helped HYDRA accomplish their goal when the bomb went off. 

           For a moment she wondered why’d they’d want to take her, why not take their ‘weapons’ back, but just as quickly came the realisation of their words.

           Someone grabbed her by the ankle, yanking her down. 

           Y/N saw stars behind her eyelids, and her teeth clanked together. She was lucky her tongue hadn’t been between them. 

           Bucky screamed as if someone was ripping his heart from his chest.

           A gun hit her on the head.

           And then everything went black.

***

                      Bucky was going insane. He’d trade having his brain being put through the meatgrinder for seventy years once again if that meant Y/N was back with him, but the empty space in his bed, the unused shampoo and conditioner bottles, the dirty cup in the sink told him otherwise. She was gone, and he couldn’t do anything about it. 

           For two weeks he was basically a zombie, barely eating and functioning, spending most of his time by the interrogation room’s computer, following up on dead-end leads and any breadcrumb he could find, yet every single time he thought he’d gotten something as if life was mocking him, it turned into dust, just like his hope slowly was. 

           There was pretty much no one else but him, Sam and Wanda left in the tower, as the rest had split off into teams to go and search every left-over HYDRA base in the world. The only reason he wasn’t out there was because Steve had benched him.

“You’re compromised,” he’d said. Bucky couldn’t say he wasn’t.

Sam had stayed behind because during his last raid he’d gotten hit by some gas, rendering him pretty much useless for half a week, and no one felt comfortable enough to ask him to put his life on the line before a full recovery.

And Wanda… well, Wanda wasn’t taking the whole thing too great either, but she was still functioning, so she was just waiting for the jet to come in and fly her out to Serbia with Vision for a potential lead on Y/N.

Defeated for the night, he grabbed the coffee cup that once had been filled and trudged his way to the kitchen area. God, fucking hell, how much did it hurt to even breathe. 

           Just as he was about to pour himself another cup of the burning black liquid, all of his senses went haywire, and he spun around to look at the hallway of the living room. He instantly recognised the shadow standing in the middle of it, how the shape curved and sloped in such a familiar way. How could he not, when that shadow belonged to the woman, he intended to spend the rest of his life with, when his hands had memorised each and every way she was formed.

           “Dollface?” his voice cracked at the end, but when she entered the light, instead of warmth filling his heart at the relief of her being back, ice-cold fear rushed through him at the sight of the black muzzle across her nose and mouth, not to even mention the HYDRA symbol in the middle of the chest of her tactical suit. 

           The first shot rang out right after he blinked, giving him barely enough time to dodge it, but Y/N was already on the move rushing towards him and kicking her leg out so that her knee would connect with Bucky’s chin. 

           A sickening crunch echoed through the room, as his head met the marble floor, bright lights flashing behind his eyes. He could even feel his teeth vibrate from the impact. It was this second which he used to somewhat regain a sense of place, that Y/N used to straddle him down, hand going behind her back to pull out a gun, but Bucky knew her. He knew her moves and how she left her left side open.

           When his forehead connected to Y/N’s nose, he almost vomited at the feeling of bone-crunching against his skin, but it gave him enough time to deliver a blow to her side, disarming her before grabbing her bicep and pulling her arm behind her back, his own metal appendage wrapping around her shoulders and pulling her flush against him. 

           “Come on, sweetheart!” he was pleading, but his grip unyielding to her struggles. “Fight this. I know you can.”

           But to his horror, HYDRA had dug their nails into her mind deeper than he ever thought was possible, as she smashed the back of her head against his nose once more, red blood spilling everywhere.

           He staggered back, palm cradling his face, but he still had one free to block the fist that was coming in his direction. This caught her off guard for a millisecond, but not long enough for Bucky to do anything, as she smashed her foot against his knee, bringing him down, yet he’d expected it, using the position to his advantage and grabbing Y/N behind the legs, yanking her towards him, and making her back hit hard against the floor, dizzying and knocking the air out of the woman.

           It took him three seconds to slide over to the gun she’d discarded and to stand up, and it took three seconds for her to flip herself up and aim the gun that’d still been strapped to her thigh.

           Both of them were shaking, but both for different reasons. Bucky was shaking because he was making the love of his life look down the barrel of a gun, while she was shaking because the only thought on her mind was about if she didn’t finish the mission, the consequences would be more horrible than anything HYDRA had done to her before.

           “I don’t want to hurt you! Please snap out of it!” he hollered but didn’t lower his weapon. It went against all of his instincts to be in that position, even when the two sparred, Bucky, to Y/N’s annoyance who was hoping for a real fight, pulled his punches. It was unnatural for him to even consider harming her.

           She cocked her gun, didn’t even hesitate. 

           “Sorry, can’t do that. You’re my mission.”

           Bucky took in one last breath.

           It hitched in his throat.

           He blinked away the tears pooling at his bottom lashes.

He’d never pull the trigger. 

           She steadied her aim.

           Bucky closed his eyes.

           But the bullet never came. At least not for him.

The yelp of pain made him open his eyes just to see Y/N’s body jerk to the side and drop to her knee, hand clutching at her shoulder, with Sam behind her, his own gun aimed at her with a little stream of smoke coming out of the barrel. 

Yet the second her shock passed Y/N swiftly turned to Sam, gun in her usable palm when her body seized up, and she fell to the ground unconscious. 

           Bucky was panting, as he looked to see Redwing, two blue lights on each side dying out, as it deactivated the tasers. It took him a second to realize what had happened, but then he was by Y/N’s side, pulling her body up to cradle against his own.

           “What the hell, Sam?!” Bucky yelled, hovering his left hand over Y/N’s mouth. When the metal fogged over, his whole frame literally shuddered in relief, as he went on to the next job – stopping the bleeding before her breathing stopped.

           “She was gonna put a bullet between your eyes!”

           “You didn’t have to shoot her!”

           “Oh, I’m sorry,” Sam mocked, dropping to his knees and shredding apart a kitchen towel to press against the wound. “Would you have rather had your brains splattered against the floor?”

           “You had Redwing taser her! That was enough!”

           “If I hadn’t shot her, Redwing wouldn’t have been able to taser her.”

           He hated the fact wounding Y/N had been a necessary step in subduing her. No, Bucky told himself, not her. Not his Y/N, but whoever HYDRA had placed in her mind.

           As gently as possible, he scooped up her body and with Sam in tow made his way to the med bay.

           F.R.I.D.A.Y had alerted the medical staff of the situation, so they were ready when Bucky came in. Instantly two nurses took his girl from his arms and laid her down on a gurney, Helen Cho stepping up with surgical gloves.

           “A through and through in the shoulder,” she remarked more for the medical records than anyone else. “She’ll have a few painful weeks of recovery, but nothing fatal.”

           Bucky nodded in acknowledgement, but still, he didn’t let anyone touch Y/N without him being beside her. As Helen patched up her shoulder and strapped her down on the cell bed, he was still there beside her, both hands clutching onto her palm, not moving an inch away.

           A little while after Helen had left, he felt a presence hovering behind him, and Sam stepped into the room, leaning against the wall, brown eyes looking over Y/N.

           “How is she?”

           Bucky sighed, rubbing his thumb over her knuckles. They were cracked and on the verge of bleeding despite the regenerative cream, Dr Cho had applied. “Asleep,” he mumbled. “So that’s better, I guess. Gives her time to heal.”

           He heard Sam shuffle around a bit, and then he entered Bucky’s peripheral as he sat down on a chair next to the bed.“It took them thirty years to break you, yet it took them two weeks to break her…” Sam said biting on his lip, and the statement made anger course through Bucky’s veins.

           “Are you seriously calling her fucking weak?” He snapped looking at his fellow Avenger. “You have no idea what kind of torture they pu-“

           “I’m not calling her weak,” Sam interrupted. “Y/N is one of the strongest people out there. What I’m saying is – back then it took them years to break a person… now it took them barely fourteen days… what else have they ‘improved’ on?”

           The thought of Y/N having her mind ripped apart and then put back together as if she was some ragdoll made bile rise in Bucky’s throat, and it didn’t settle when he thought of how far that horrid machine had come since he’d been in one. 

           But as much as Bucky wanted revenge, as much as he wanted to destroy HYDRA, to make sure what happened to Y/N never happens again to anyone else, let alone if what Sam implied was true, he couldn’t leave her, not when she would need a familiar face the most. 

           He gulped, closing his eyes and tightening his grip on her hand to steady himself. Just the thought of her in all that pain made him go to the edge of breaking apart. “She’s gonna be alright, isn’t she?” If there was one thing Bucky appreciated from Sam it was his honesty.

           “In the long run most likely. You’d be the proof of that…” Sam sighed. “But first, we gotta make sure she doesn’t shut people out.”

           But that was most definitely easier said than done, given how the second Y/N woke up, which was about a day later after being knocked-out cold when she realised what had happened, it was not like a wall had magically appeared between her and anyone from the team, but a fucking fortress surrounded by an impenetrable mountainous barrier, and she was the only citizen in that mind castle. And Bucky was the first one behind the door.

           It broke his heart to see Y/N pretty much shut down. She refused to eat, barely drank the water provided, and couldn’t sleep one bit, yet what hurt most was she absolutely rejected even the thought of going back to their shared room, and instead stayed in her barren cell, white walls, with a thin blanket and a paper-like pillow. It got so bad they had to put her on an IV drip so she wouldn’t waste away. But it didn’t matter to her. She was like a ragdoll.

           It was about five days later when she said her first words. Y/N had her head in her hands, matted Y/H/C strands spilling between her fingers, as her nails dug deeper into her skull. That’s the position she’d been sitting in for the past five hours, not even bothering to lift her eyes as a paper plate with a meal, a single plastic spoon next to it and a paper cup of water was slid through the opening at the bottom of her cell door. She wasn’t hungry anyway. In fact, what she really wanted was to disappear from the surface of the earth, for the ground to open and be swallowed by molten lava or have a sharknado crash in and get eaten by a great white.

           “How’re you feeling?” Sam asked arms crossed as he leaned against the entrance to the door. He’d been asking that since the first time she opened her eyes, but never received a response, so when the scoff she let out was almost inaudible, but he still picked up on it, he straightened out. “Just peachy,” Y/N mumbled. “Absolutely fantastic. Ten out of ten would recommend.”

           “Y/N…”

           He really didn’t have anything to say. I mean what could you possibly say… but he had to at least try, given how miserable Bucky was. He’d heard him sob so loud through two closed doors and a running shower, that he had to do something.

           Sam swallowed hard before entering the room and cautiously, keeping as much space as possible between the two, sat down next to Y/N. He wasn’t afraid of her. He could never be. But he knew she needed to let him closer on her own terms. “You can’t keep going like this. You can’t keep everything in. If you don’t wanna talk to the shrink, it’s fine, but at least talk to someone else…”

           “I am talking to you.”

           “Yes, but you know who I mean.”

“How am I supposed to even look at him?” Her head shot up, and tears threatened to spill down her face. “How am I supposed to talk to him? To touch him, knowing I almost killed him.”

“It wasn’t you.”

“But it was!” The words were a hiss. “It was me. I understood everything I was doing, I knew who he was, I knew what we were to one another, yet…” she choked in the middle of the sentence, not wanting to say the truth. “I wasn’t going to hesitate. I was going to kill him. If you hadn’t gotten involved, one more second and Bucky would’ve been dead. Because of me.”

“HYDRA messed with your brain,” Sam stated. “I know that everyone knows that and Bucky most of all. Why do you think he couldn’t pull the trigger?”

“Because he’s an idiot.”

“No, because he’s been in the exact same situation.”

She bit her lip. All her brain was doing was screaming that Sam was right, to listen to him, he knew what he was talking about, but the guilt, the absolutely corrosive horror at herself for what she was going to do wouldn’t let common sense come through. “I just.” Y/N choked and then cleared her throat. “Just tell him I don’t want to see him. I – I can’t see him.”

Sam did know heartbreak. He’d felt it when his first girlfriend had broken up with him, he’d felt it in the army when his friends lost limbs and lives, and now he felt it looking at two of the people he’d grown closest to struggle to find one another and themselves.

He cleared his throat standing up and wiping hind palms down his thighs. “Wanda is also – “

But Y/N didn’t let him finish the sentence. “No.” She shook her head. “No one. Please.” She tucked her face against her knees. “I just wanna be alone.”

And so he left her alone. In fact, everyone did so. 

For a whole month, the usually lively tower was a glass structure of sombre and pain. Everyone was hurting. Wanda had retreated to her room, sitcoms on the rerun, Vision always by her side as she tried to manage the sadness of one of her dearest friends going through such a tough time and the guilt of not being able to help Y/N, to save her from that pain. Nat and Clint along with Tony had locked themselves in one of the lower levels of the tower analysing the data she’d gathered. They needed to occupy themselves with something, otherwise, they’d be overcome by their own thoughts and they were too dark to manage at that moment. Bruce and Thor had relegated themselves to the lab doing experiment after experiment, trying to find out how HYDRA had managed to do such damage to Y/N. 

Steve, however… Steve was doing quite bad. He felt probably the most amount of guilt than the rest of his teammates. He’d taken up the role of the leader, he was supposed to make sure everyone stayed safe. Yes, they were the most skilled people in the world, but they trusted him to make the best calls. And him not having taken into account a blitz attack from HYDRA after their blitz attack had broken two of his friends because Bucky was doing just as bad as Y/N, if not even worse.

He wouldn’t sleep, he couldn’t; Steve heard his cries each night until, at twelve of one AM, they’d cease, and he’d make his way to the cells. Steve had told Y/N a week after she’d been brought back that there was no reason for her to stay in there. She’d just sat on the bed, arms around her knees and staring at the wall. She didn’t go back to her room. 

But each night Bucky would sit by the glass doors and look at the frame of the love of his life, curled underneath a white duvet, a single pillow underneath her head (Y/N loved pillows, she couldn’t sleep without at least four of them) body in a foetal position. She looked so broken. She was. And because of that, so was he.

It was about three AM at night, when his routine was shaken up by none other than Y/N. Typically she’d sleep through the night not even stirring, slipping into the cot at nine PM and then waking up at six AM when Helen came in to switch her IV. She was eating now, but still too little for it to be enough. 

However, that night she was stirred awake by the feeling of someone watching her, not the camera that was always on but by human eyes.

That was the first time she’d seen Bucky since having woken up and regaining control of her body.

Her breath hitched when their eyes met, and his whole body straightened out. Y/N remained under the covers, while Bucky sat by the doors still. His palm pressed against the glass.

“Hi, doll.”

Two words, but that was enough for the dam to break. Tears spilt down her face, and without a second to spare Bucky had rushed inside and laid down next to her, strong arms weaving around her shaking body, as his own pain merged with hers.

All Y/N could manage to say was ‘I’m so sorry,' and it became a mantra she repeated in Bucky’s chest, hoping that somehow the words would find their way and settle beneath his skin so he could understand with his whole being how much she meant them. 

           “Please.” He was close to sobbing by that point, hand moving to cup her cheek. “Please let me help.”

“I can’t, Bucky! I can’t!” Y/N was close to complete hysterics by this point. “Every time I even think about you, I remember the emptiness, the absolute numbness that was in me, when I pointed a gun at your face, and I meant to kill you! I was going to pull the trigger, if not for Sam… So,” she gulped looking down at the ground, at their feet. “Tell me how the hell am I supposed to let you anywhere near me when I’m terrified of myself.”

           The grip he had on her face, was tight, strong and sure. “Because it wasn’t you. I know what it’s like to have your brain scrambled around and rearranged with false truths and present them as real… but the thing is – they’re not. And you taught me that. You were the one who made me realise it, dollface. Now let me do the same for you.”

           “I can’t even look at myself in the mirror because every time I do, I see that – that monster staring back at me.”

           “Reflections are deceiving,” Bucky whispered, pressing his forehead against hers. “Mirrors can’t and will never show the truth. It’s a twisted, flipped and made-up version of us, and we can’t allow ourselves to believe it. It’s not us.”

           And despite the pain, despite the guilt and anxiousness, Y/N chuckled, letting out a small sound of happiness for the first time in a while. “When did you get so wise, Gandalf?”

           She could feel the relief that flooded Bucky’s body slowly seep into her own. “Well, re-reading ‘The Hobbit’ helped… but more so you. You taught me that. You made me realise the man that haunts my nightmares might have my face, but it’s not me. He’s not me and I’m not him.”

           “Will you…” Her voice shook as she said the words as if there was a possibility, he could say no. “Will you help me?”

           “You never, ever have to ask for help. I’m always here for you. Whatever you need, I’m always here. I’m so sorry, so sorry you had to go through that.”

      ��    And for the first time in six weeks did Bucky get to hug Y/N. Feeling her body melt into his almost made him have a breakdown of his own, as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, and grabbed onto him like her life depended on the tightness of her grip.

           Six weeks, almost two months without Y/N in every imaginable way had almost broken Bucky to a point of no return. Had they gone longer periods of time without seeing one another? Sure, but this was different. When the person you love is right there, but more unreachable than when they’re thousands of miles away, that’s a different kind of pain. 

           She didn’t release her grip form him, as Bucky shifted and sat up, her legs moving to lace around his waist on instinct. With one hand underneath her thighs the other going to take off the IV bag from the stand, he stood up and moved through the tower, finally retreating to his room, where he took off a photo frame from the wall and hung up the medical supply while gently laying Y/N down between his sheets.

           She’d been in that position many times before in different states of undress, in different emotional states as well, but not once had she been alone there. And neither would she be alone now. 

           It was the first night Bucky slept without waking up, and when he did Y/N’s head was resting on his chest. He held her a bit tighter then.

***

           The road to recovery was slow. 

           It started with her spending her days and nights in Bucky’s room, no longer isolating herself from him. It turned to late-night talks where they just chatted about miscellaneous things, and if she felt comfortable enough, then about every heavy thing pressing on her heart. Then she ventured off to her own room, and once evening slipped inside the room of who was her neighbour. She slept next to Wanda that night.

           The next night, she and Wanda sneaked inside Nat’s bedroom, and just hung out a bit, painting their nails. When Y/N went to sleep next to Bucky, she felt as light as the light-yellow colour adorning her fingers.

           On the morning of the eleventh day of her recovery, she woke up earlier and made everyone breakfast, putting some extra chocolate chips in Sam’s pancakes. He deserved it for all the trouble he’d gone through. The smile on his lips and the kiss on her head from him meant more than any thank you he could say. 

           But it was about a month down the line, after evenings where she’d joined in on the movie nights and had discussed the gathered intelligence from other missions as well as the tactics agents should employ when Y/N took her biggest step yet.

           Bucky was laying on his bed ‘The Two Towers’ between his fingers, the metal appendage flipping the pages as gently as if they were made from butterfly wings, when Y/N came out of the bathroom, hair wet and dripping onto her nightshirt. Well, it was actually one of Bucky’s shirts, but at this point, every piece of clothing he owned belonged to her as well. Besides, in his humble opinion, she wore them better than he ever could. 

           “Buck?”

           “Yeah?” he hummed, flipping to another page.

           “Buck I – “ she took in a breath. “I want to have sex.”

           “What? Ow!” The book had slipped from his hands and the edge hit his eyebrow, making Y/N hiss, and instantly come over to try and soothe the hurt part.

           “I mean – “ Bucky stuttered much like his heart. “I’d love to. Gosh, dollface, you know I’d do anything you ever wanted me. Tell me to spend forever between your legs, and I will, but… Please don’t feel like we have to. You’re still healing, and –“

           “I want to,” Y/N was quick to quench his doubt, running a gentle finger over his brow. “I do. I – I need to feel you. I need to feel… I need to feel whole, and I haven’t in so long.”

           His hand cupped her cheek. “You are whole. You don’t need me to complete you. You don’t need anyone to complete you.”

           “I –“ She huffed, struggling to form the thought running through her brain into words. “I – I know that. At least I think so. But… but there is this part inside me, I can’t seem to heal myself, this crack that no matter how hard I try to mend just won’t do. And that’s because that part can only be filled by love. And yours is the strongest one I have in my life.”

           A tear slipped down his cheek. “Oh, doll…”

           Her legs slowly shifted so they were straddling him as Bucky leaned up in a sitting position, palms dropping to her hips and sliding underneath her PJs to touch the soft skin of her back.

           His nose skimmed against hers, and Y/N sighed at the feeling. She’d slept like that – nose to nose curled up next to Bucky – for close to a month and a half now, but the anticipation of the kiss turned her into a bundle of nerves. 

           “One word,” he breathed against her skin, pressing a kiss to her collarbone before looking deeply into her eyes. “One word and we stop.”

           And even though she wanted to say there was no doubt in her mind about doing it, she nodded. He needed the reassurance just as much as she did that if something happened, he’d be there for her.

           When Bucky’s lips met hers, it was just like the first kiss they’d shared. A bit tentative, unsure, yet filled with so much restrained passion and pure love it was overwhelming, and Y/N’s eyes immediately filled with tears.

           “Darling, let’s just not do this,” Bucky said noticing the clear pearls dripping down her cheeks, but she shook her head.

           “I just missed you so much. I missed letting you love me.”

           “Well, it’s a good thing people don’t need permission to love. I never stopped. I can’t imagine ever not loving you.”

           His mouth was on hers once again. Bucky let Y/N lead the whole time. He didn’t deny himself from exploring her body, from feeling every crook, dip, and crevice of her form, but she was always in control.

           When her shirt dropped to the floor, she was the one who started lifting it up.

           When she laid down to pull Bucky on top, she was the one who flipped them over and pulled him on top.

           Her hands skimmed the band of his boxers, and Bucky unconsciously ground against Y/N’s clothed core at the feeling, both letting out moans of relief at the friction.

           “Can you take ‘em off?” she breathed, as Bucky left beautiful marks on her neck and chest so they could bloom through the night and could be greeted by them in the morning. 

           “You sure?”

           She nodded. “Please.”

           They did it together. Y/N linked her fingers behind the fabric and pulled it down his legs while he shimmied out from the boxers and kicked it to the floor. 

           “Can I take yours off?”

           As sure as she was about everything that was going on, there was still some hesitancy in her body, and he immediately sensed it, pulling a little bit away. “Y/N…”

           When her hands went to wrap around his wrists where they rested against her hips, horror washed over Bucky like a cold shower. “Did they…?”

           “No!” Y/N was immediate to answer. “No, they didn’t… but… they said after they were done with me after they turned me into their puppet… after they’d make me hurt you, you’d never want to touch me. That, in your last moments, you’d only have hate in your heart for me, and I’d have to live with that for the rest of my life.”

           He gently put a finger underneath her chin and lifted her head. “Even when I was staring down that barrel, all I could think about was how much I love you. How I’d give my life for you even if you were the one taking it. I could never hate you.”

           A violent sob ripped through her chest. “I don’t deserve you.”

           “You deserve the world, and I’ll try to give as much of it to you as I can.”

           She couldn’t take much more of his confessions because Y/N’s chest was already as full as it could be of love, so instead, she pulled Bucky back down for a passion-filled kiss, while shimmying out from her own underwear.

           “Condom?”

           “No,” Y/N shook her head. “Not this time. Need to feel you as you are.”

           “You sure?”

           She nodded. “Helen put me back on the pill about a month ago.”

           Bucky shuddered, nodding. “Alright. Okay. But I need to make sure I don’t hurt you first.”

           Y/N was about to say he could never hurt her, when two of his fingers slipped along her folds, cutting her words off in favour of the groan of pleasure.

           “Gotta take care of my girl the right way.”

           A moan seeped into Bucky’s skin when he pushed a cold metal digit into her tight entrance. His arm had the added feature to feel things if he wanted or switch it off when he didn’t want to, which was a nice thing, especially during missions (he’d forgotten to do so one time and when a bullet bounced off, it wasn’t like a bee bumping against glass, hot pain had rippled through his whole arm, so it was a good idea on Shuri’s part), but this time it was on, and the absolutely exquisite pressure and warmth that squeezed around his digits was enough to make him grind against the mattress to alleviate his own growing pressure.

           “Bucky, please,” Y/N practically mewled, eyes screwed shut, nails digging into his skin, making him groan in pleasure. He’d forgotten how delicious the sounds were and how close to the edge just the feeling of her nails marking half-moons into his back could bring him. 

           “Fuck,” he swore leaning up to kiss her once more, while he increased the speed of which his fingers were going in and out of her, while his thumb rubbed circles around her clit, and when he hotly breathed against her neck to ‘soak him all down to his elbows’ Y/N’s eyes rolled to the back of her head and she arched up from the bed as an orgasm shattered her world.

           Gently he coaxed her through the orgasm while muttering praises against her mouth.

           “You’re so beautiful,” Bucky sighed leaning to rest on his elbows. “So fucking gorgeous.”

           Y/N smiled, stroking his cheek. “You’re beautiful too, Bucky. More than you’ll ever know or will let yourself believe me.”

           The crooked smirk which he threw her reminded the one from Steve’s tales of him and his skirt-chasing days. “Guess you’ll have to convince me.”

           “With pleasure.”

           Her hand snaked down to where he’d been running the tip of his cock between her folds, before gently pressing him down so he could easily slide inside. When he was sheeted a moan of satisfaction came from both of them.

           It was like homecoming. Like curling up in a warm bed on a cold winter’s night. It was just right.

           “God, I could stay like this forever.” Bucky tucked a strand of hair behind Y/N’s ear.

           “We have forever and then some.”

           A look she could not figure out crossed his face. It was like absolute joy mixed with fear and terror. “You promise?”

           Y/N kissed him, trying to pour all of her love into the single act. “With everything I have in me.”

           He took that as the cue that he could move and experimentally rolled his hips towards hers. Bit by bit he picked up the pace, breaths turning into pants broken up by moans, sweat beading along his skin, a small burn appearing in his knees, but even that discomfort couldn’t overshadow the heavenly pleasure rippling through his veins.

           She’d always been the epitome of beauty and love, that’s how completely Bucky had fallen for her, and he could only hope he was the same for her. 

           “Bucky,” she choked out. “So close.”

           “Yeah?” His vision was starting to go white at the edges.

           “Mhm – ohh!” The confirmation turned into a squeal when he hit just that right spot, he concentrated all his thrusts to match it, and soon enough both of them were falling over the edge, clinging onto the other as if they were the last lifeline that existed for them.

           “Hey,” Bucky cooed, opening his eyes and seeing how furrowed Y/N’s brow was, how hard she was fighting to resurface. “Come back to me. Come back, doll.”

           Slowly, Y/N’s breathing evened out, her trembling became small shudders from the aftershock of the pleasure, and her lids fluttered, gaze meeting his.

           She’d come back.

           She’d always come back to her home.

           To Bucky.

Tags (crossed out wouldn’t take):

Bucky tag list: @thunderous-flower @who-cares-rn @projectxhappiness @callmebucky-doll @coal000 @killuaenthusiast @courtneychicken @sophiealiice @raquelbc2003 @watch-out-for-thorns @potentially-kinetic @thatonegirljessy99 @proxinge @bbkenna @buckysclub @ulired @fangirlofeverythingbasically @mrsalh32611 @horrorx570ximagines @the-nargles-made-me-do-it @pooslie @itsisabelanotisabella @httpmcrvel @purplebananatragedy @pxrrishly @parker-barnes-af @skulliebythesea​ @california-grown​ @stevehesaidabadlanguageword @belongsto-prachi​ @hello-i-am-insane​ @its-nott-my-problem @emmalbg @hopeinahotbox

Everything tags: @lumelgy @palaiasaurus64 @supernaturalbaesduh @breezy1415 @crazy--me @thatawkwardlittlefangirl @sea040561 @staryeyedgirl @deathbyarabbit @s-c-a-r-e-d-po-t-t-e-r @reblogger-not-a-blogger @m-a-t-91 @dalilx @i-need-a-hero-i-need-a-loki @maladaptive-ninja-returns @averyrogers83 @in-the-end-im-still-trash @gallifreyansass @dewy-biitch​ @avxgers​ @unlikelygalaxygiver​ @magicwithaknife @ollyoxenfrees​ @bnhvrdy​ @tvwhoresblog @celebsimagines @thatkindofgurl​ @sj-thefan​ @teenwolflover28 @lestersglitterglue​ @im-squished​

Marvel tags: @nerissa98​ @happyseagrill​ @asguardiansoftheavengers​ @crazybutconfidentaf​ @wishingforahome​ @pizzarollpatrol​ @desir-ae​

A/N: My Bucky boiiiii! I’m back! hope y’all like this rollercoaster :)

P.S. if you see yourself on my tag list and you’re crossed out means the tag didn’t work. if you still wanna be on the tag list please message me your new url and what was your old one so I can change it (if it’s not the change of the url then I genuinely dunno what could be the problem)

P.S.S. my tags are always open. 

P.S.S.S. please don’t repost my works on other platforms without specific written permission and don’t plagiarise them 

[honeybunnybeez]

Duuuude. Sfw alphabet for Eret or Bad??? Or even Fundy. All very underrated and I need see much content for them -⚰️

SFW alphabet:

C!BadBoyHalo:

♡Reader is Gender Neutral!

A = Affection (How affectionate are they? How do they show affection?)

Bad is pretty affectionate when it comes to you, almost never leaving your side if he can.

He's very affectionate physically and verbally, clinging to you and giving you kisses while calling you sickly sweet pet names and praising you. Despite what he's supposed to be, he's incredibly adorable and hard to resist.

B = Best friend (What would they be like as a best friend? How would the friendship start?)

The friendship starts after you're introduced to him thanks to Skeppy, who you met first around the server and clicked well with. After getting to know you better and seeing you get along great with Skeppy, he easily accepts you as one of his close friends.

As a best friend he's kinda clingy, often wanting to see you and knowing what you're up to. He also likes to make sure you're okay and comes to visit you often, making sure no one messes with you.

C = Cuddles (Do they like to cuddle? How would they cuddle?)

Cuddles are his jam and given the opportunity you two would probably never leave the bed for the whole day. He doesn't have a set cuddling style, though one thing stays the same and it's that he wraps his arms around you pretty tight.

D = Domestic (Do they want to settle down? How are they at cooking and cleaning?)

He does seem like the type to want to settle down. It sounds like a very nice thing to do once everything in the server calms down, well, if it ever does calm down.

Domestic life wise, he's pretty decent at it! His best chore is cooking, he makes a pretty good meal when he cooks.

E = Ending (If they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?)

Depending on the situation and what led up to it, I think it'd end on good terms but he would get very emotional while doing so. He would be crying while apologizing and explaining why he feels like a romantic relationship wouldn't work as to not hurt you too severely. He still wants you to be in his life as his best friend though so you two do keep in close contact if you're okay with that.

F = Fiance(e) (How do they feel about commitment? How quick would they want to get married?)

He is rather loyal and commited to the ones he loves so I think he would get married. Maybe after being together for 6 months or a year would be when he pops the question.

G = Gentle (How gentle are they, both physically and emotionally?)

He is very physically and emotionally gentle with you, not wanting to hurt you in any way.

Sure he does tackle hug you in his human form but in his demon form with his tall height he makes sure to treat you like glass if he ever handles or holds you.

Emotionally he doesn't ever want to say mean things to you. He always apologizes profusely (almost crying himself) if you ever get truly upset with something he teased you about.

H = Hugs (Do they like hugs? How often do they do it? What are their hugs like?)

Loves hugs, the moment he sees you he's running up to give you a big old hug. Hug him back, please. Please, (y/n). Hug him back, he wants you to.

I = I love you (How fast do they say the L-word?)

He used to say it quite often back when you two were friends, so there's no exact way to tell when the I love you's started to be genuine.

J = Jealousy (How jealous do they get? What do they do when they’re jealous?)

Lord above, we've seen this man be jealous. He's super jealous when you start to spend more time with others. Can and will blow up your communicator asking you where you are and who you're with. Sometimes Skeppy joins in too half jokingly. If you're with Quackity you bet your ass you're getting dragged somewhere far away from the man.

K = Kisses (What are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?)

Loves giving you surprise kisses and half expects you to return the gesture. ESKIMO KISSES! All the eskimo kisses, he loves them. He love giving and receiving eskimo kisses from you so much.

L = Little ones (How are they around children?)

Oh he adores kids quite a bit. Innocent, active and still full of life, he thinks they're precious. Though he can't really handle the spoiled ones, the ones who scream and throw really bad tantrums when they don't get what they want in the supermarket.

I don't think he's capable of having his own kids with his partner (being a demon and all) but he'd like to adopt one or two if you're into that idea. He's had experience raising Sapnap (and he doesn't hate bad's guts as far as I remember) so he's sure he can handle it.

M = Morning (How are mornings spent with them?)

Before you wake up he likes to stare at your peaceful face while you rest. At first you did get a bit surprised when you wake up to see a pair of dimly glowing eyes staring back at you so closely. Now, you just instinctively reach out to give him morning kisses when you wake up.

N = Night (How are nights spent with them?)

He holds you in his arms while you slowly drift off to sleep. Sometimes he hums a soft happy tune while playing with your hair as your eyes grow heavy.

O = Open (When would they start revealing things about themselves? Do they say everything all at once or wait a while to reveal things slowly?)

Skeppy totally tells you a few of Bad's secrets before you two started dating, only very minor ones though. Other than that, he's a pretty open book and if there was a secret he has he spills pretty easily when you say his name in a dissapointed tone.

P = Patience (How easily angered are they?)

Unless you insult him or swear like a sailor on purpose to annoy him, he has a good bit of patience with you and your shenanigans. If you're best friends with Skeppy then you're bound to get into a little bit of trouble.

Q = Quizzes (How much would they remember about you? Do they remember every little detail you mention in passing, or do they kind of forget everything?)

He remembers things about you quite well. Such as what you like to eat, what your favourite ore is, your schedule, etc.

R = Remember (What is their favorite moment in your relationship?)

He loves you and he loves his best friend Skeppy too. He enjoys every moment you guys are all together but his favourite moment was when you three all hung out with one another watching the sunset on the roof of your home. It was all so unsually calm during those few minutes. You 3 totally held hands, just saying.

S = Security (How protective are they? How would they protect you? How would they like to be protected?)

He knows you can hold your own but even so he does get pretty defensive when others try to threaten you. Will stab a person for you if they really hurt you, no hesitation.

T = Try (How much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?)

He puts in a lot of effort to make you and everyone happy! It doesn't always feel like a chore when he's trying to find something you like or helping you around here and there. Anniversaries with him are simple but they're very sweet and memorable.

U = Ugly (What would be some bad habits of theirs?)

Oh boy, his clinginess and jealousy does tend to be a bit of a problem. You have to remind him that you need personal time too. He always pouts when you say that and often times you do give in because of it. Though, if you really do need to be somewhere without him, promise to spend your next free day with him and he'll happily agree.

V = Vanity (How concerned are they with their looks?)

Not very concerned, he's aware that he looks a lot different than others but he doesn't think it matters when almost everyone in the server is a different kind of human or hybrid. Everyone's different and that's normal, he thinks.

W = Whole (Would they feel incomplete without you?)

Sure we know that Skeppy is his whole heart both metaphorically and literally in a sense, but he would be devastated if anything were to happen to you. He would feel like a part of him is missing and it would frustrate and upset him to no end knowing that the missing piece could never be found again.

X = Xtra (A random headcanon for them.)

In his 9'6 form he will carry you around in his arms like a doll just to tease you. He think you look adorable as you whine and tell him that you aren't a toy to haul around.

Y = Yuck (What are some things they wouldn’t like, either in general or in a partner?)

He wouldn't like someone who takes advantage of him or does things he doesn't like consistently on purpose. Like, teasing him is fine, he does that too, but don't do what he doesn't like on purpose everytime you see him. He just thinks that's disrespectful even if you were just teasing.

Z = Zzz (What is a sleep habits of theirs?)

When he sleep he's absolutely wrapped around you. Laying by your side, arms and legs wrapped around your torso and waist respectively. You are his pillow now and you're being held hostage until he's decided he's satisfied.

A/N: Hey ⚰! Thank you for the request! I have to admit it was a little hard not to make it reference poly!c!skephalo because of how often its referenced that Bad and Skeppy are close to one another. (Someone please give me an excuse to remake this with poly!c!skephalo-) Anyways, I hope you all enjoyed reading this!

(Requests are open and anon is on!)

[downtonabbeyrevisited]

Season Two Episode Two

Following a typically chaotic opener, Episode Two of Season Two strikes a far more sombre tone. The arrival of Henry Lang as Robert’s valet brings the first of this episode’s three plot points that address the impact of WW1 on the mental health of its soldiers. There is nothing funny to say about either shell-shock or suicidal ideation both of which are vast, complex issues that, for my money, Downton Abbey isn’t the vehicle explore in (because they require more time and depth than the pace of the plot in Season Two affords) and it certainly isn’t my place to make light of them in this rather irreverent corner of the internet. So I’m going to have a go at treading a fine line here. Forgive me if I stumble. 

Lang is clearly in the grips of something awful and yet in an attempt to avoid the indignity of having maids in the dining room, he is bumped up to footman duty. He struggles throughout, culminating in him depositing his cargo on Edith’s dress. Mrs O’Brein has firmly taken Lang under her wing, recognising that he is struggling and offers him assurance and comfort that she has never gifted to Thomas. 

Across the Village, Lieutenant Edward Courtenay is in the hospital having been blinded by gas. The use of gas (both chlorine and mustard) had a devastating impact on soldiers in WW1 but was also the root of the development of Zyklon B. Frtiz Haber, a German Jewish chemist, enabled chlorine gas to be used a weapon in WW1 and his research was later developed into the Zyklon process which was used by the Nazis to murder millions, including his own family. This is only one of a dizzying number of appalling ironies to be found in the World Wars but as I said last episode, I’m not a military historian so I’m going to leave it there. Edward had plans to return to the country after his graduation from Oxford to pursue the simple life (although one gets the feeling that his idea of the pursuit of a simple life will still be one that is very well upholstered). Thomas has taken it upon himself to read Edward’s letters to him and  together with Sybil is helping him to adjust to living life with a different set of parameters. But growing pressure on the hospital’s limited capacity means that he is to be transferred elsewhere. All three voice their dissent at varying volumes to Major Clarkson who falls back on the very real backlog of wounded men. After Edward has died, Major Clarkson, Isobel and Sybil talk about a renewed need for the Abbey to become a convalescent home, an idea that has been bubbling under the surface for a while now. Meanwhile, Thomas has been left on his own to process both Edward’s death and the implications of witnessing a lack of support given by his own physician to those with depression.  

The usually reliably jovial Mrs Patmore also has a more somber episode with her pursuit for the truth about the death of her nephew Archie. Robert finds that he has been shot for cowardice. Not only does this mean that her family is in mourning but they will now have to navigate the stigma and undue shame that came with having a relative die in this way. So entrenched in British life was the derision levelled at those who were shot for cowardice or desertion that it was only in 2006 that pardons were offered by Britain for 309 of those that were executed by firing squad during WW1. I know I said I’d leave it there with the military history, but that felt like an important bit of context. 

We are now in 1917 and Matthew is still in the same trench that he was in 1916 (a detail I hadn’t actually noticed until I got the screen cap for this) so it looks like his strategy of downing tools mid-fight and continuously popping back to Blighty for important plot developments isn’t really paying dividends. Perhaps the addition of William to the ranks will help him? William certainly seems to think so and if the speed at which he moves through the various stages of his ‘relationship’ with Daisy is any indication of his tactical prowess, the British Front will not only be well within Germany’s borders but will be breathing down Russia’s neck in a fortnight. In any other episode, this would certainly get the award for oddest relationship dynamic but Sir Richard Carlisle exists. 

Sir Richard makes his debut at Downton, having been introduced in name only in the previous episode. He and Mary met at Cliveden which is a regular haunt of mine, giving me hope that one day I too will from a strategic alliance with a newspaper magnate. He may know how to talk his way around a boardroom but he is lacking in the sartorial department. Whilst Sir Richard manages to avoid catching fire in his tweed, Lavinia is not free from the heat as he threatens her with his connection to her uncle. He may not know much about navigating the niceties of Downton, but at least he has cottoned on to the fact that any major disagreement should occur under a specific tree. Whilst Mary’s signature move is weeping into her gloves, Sir Richard’s is grabbing women by the forearm. A female friend of mine told me that one of her favourite things about the pandemic and the compulsion to keep 2m away from anyone (and not just emotionally) is that she has not been ’steered’ by a male hand on her lower back since 2019. It turns out that she can enter and exit rooms just fine on her own and I get the impression that Lavinia could get the gist of Sir Richard’s rage without the vice like grip of a man probably about twice her age. 

Twinned with the ’tree of emotional conflict’, the ‘platform of romantic uncertainty’ provides the backdrop for Sir Richard’s proposal of marriage to Mary which is a declaration that really feels like it should come with a series of well-formatted charts. Mary’s heart, however, is still very much with Cousin Matthew. After being counselled by Carson in a type of conversation I cannot imagine her ever having with her father, she is on the verge of coming clean with Matthew. But in the second round of Lavinia vs. Mary, Lavinia declares that she ‘could not go on living’ without Matthew and Mary winds her neck in. 

Also having a romantic entanglement this episode is Edith. Drake, previously of dropsy fame, has lost his farm hands and Edith turns up to offer her help in a wildly unsuitable trouser and heeled boot combo. But she soon gets down to it by pulling up a tree stump and flirting in a barn whilst a rather lovely border collie looks on (I’m currently trying to talk myself out of getting a border collie and this incident has done nothing to help things). After showing Drake that she can drink from a bottle like literally every single other human on the planet, the two share a kiss and some highly awkward dialogue that only slightly resembles ‘Carry on Downton’. 

Whilst Edith is more than happy to crack on in a barn, Mr Molesley is much more backwards about coming forwards. Apparently having predicted the creation of ‘The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society’, he figures that a book is the perfect kindling for romance when you exist in a glossy depiction of the past. Sadly neither Elizabeth nor her German garden can lure Anna from Bates who is fast shaping up to be schrodinger’s boyfriend. Anna proceeds to make some odd analogy where she compares Mr Bates to her moon-based child, revealing a rather unhealthy amount of codependency in that particular relationship. 

Romantic declaration of the moment 

Again, it feels like anyone but Sybil and Branson should get this but I am an agent of chaos and here we are. Branson defends Sybil’s will to work and has ample opportunity to see her shine in her chosen field. The admission that she will not be returning to her old life is a little chink of light that Branson basks in. 

Expressive eyebrow of the week 

I nominate Carson’s entire face when he realises that he has taken on too much and goes an impressive shade of red. As Carson frets about spoons, sauce, and something I can’t quite fathom, he starts to resemble a man who is re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic. Carson’s battle to get a cork out of a bottle and knocking into chairs is a warm up to his rather dramatic collapse which is accompanied by a pretty disturbing groan. Sybil springs to action and he is soon efficiently ensconced in his own quarters. 

Wait, what? 

“I got a lot done on the train” Clearly Richard was on a train that was unencumbered with the wifi issues that plague the Pendolino.  

“It takes a good deal more than that to shock me.” Mary’s shock-o-meter is a pretty odd instrument. It is unresponsive to corpses of diplomats but goes into absolute meltdown at the notion that she might have to live in a cottage. 

“Let's hope my reputation will survive it.” I’ve not checked (and I categorically never will) but I would put money on the fact that someone has created a rarepair out of this. 

“How can Matthew have chosen that little blonde piece?” Is Lavinia blonde? Women’s hair is not really my forte but I would have thought she was more akin to Tim Minchin than 1998 Justin Timberlake. 

“I believe in this war. I believe in what we are fighting for.” William seems to have a better grip on what all of this is about than I ever did in high school history. The ‘A’ that eluded me is heading his way. 

“I thought he might've died for love of you.” How I love snipey Thomas. It’s good to have him back. To borrow a quote from Bottas (another man who is currently living a life in which his destiny is his own demise) ‘traditions’. 

“Fold it in, don’t slap it” The more season two goes on, the more I think that Moira is just an amalgamation of some choice elements of Julian’s kingdom. 

[maddiewritesstucky]

Silver Steve & Bucky’s First Date 💕

To @possibleplatypus because you asked so nicely, and for everyone who screamed in the tags about wanting more of this (and particularly for the anon who set me off about this in the first place) have some HCs about Silver Steve and Bucky’s first date 💜

Steve wants to date Bucky. Straight off the bat, after that first day at the cafe, Steve knows there’s a spark there that’s worth exploring. And when Bucky messages him after, it becomes pretty apparent that it’s mutual

When they start talking about plans to meet up again, Steve’s immediate reaction is wanting to invite Bucky over to his place. He wants to cook dinner for Bucky, to provide an act of care for him, to show him on some subconscious level that he’s a good provider. He wants to do that, but he also knows that’s a little intense at this stage

What Steve ends up doing is asking Bucky out to lunch. There’s a park that’s not too far away from where they first met, local for them both, and it has a cute cafe that overlooks a pond and there’s trees all around. That’s where he and Bucky have their first date.

It’s every bit as effortless as their first meeting, except now there’s this burgeoning warmth between them because they both have that shared understanding that they’re here because they felt a something, and it’s new and hopeful and filled with possibility.

Bucky had been thinking pretty much nonstop about Steve since their first meeting, to the point where he’d started second guessing if he was being a bit rose-tinted about how good that first interaction had been. But spending time with Steve now, he realises that the reality of Steve is actually even better

Steve is funny, in a way that doesn’t rely on poking fun at anyone’s expense. He’s clever and quick and uses words that give Bucky the impression that he’s probably very dangerous to play scrabble with.

He asks the kind of questions that spark meaningful conversation, which is deeply helpful because Bucky’s nowhere near as collected and self-assured as Steve is. He hopes he doesn’t seem quite as crush-stricken as he is, but he’s never been very good at masking his emotions

And god, Steve is sunk on the blush that never fully recedes from Bucky’s cheeks the whole time they’re together, does everything he can to make Bucky smile just to see it flare up again

It’s clear that Bucky’s a little enamoured, and Steve tries very hard to keep everything dialled in to first date level because it’s the emotionally mature thing to do, but his own heart is running away on itself a little too if he’s honest

There’s an inherent goodness about Bucky that’s very hard to look past. He seems to have absolutely no poker face and its pretty clear that what Steve’s seeing and hearing is all Bucky, through and through.

And Bucky is an interesting guy - smart and passionate and a little unintentionally awkward in the most endearing way possible. He so obviously has a lot of love to give, and Steve badly wants to be one of the people who’s lucky enough to be on the receiving end of that

It feels very much like a beginning, that first date. They have lunch, and then they walk through the park and sit by the pond, and do another lap of the park because neither of them is really ready to stop being in the others presence yet

Which...can we talk about physical presence here? Because for all there is this mental/emotional gravity between them, the actual physical pull of each other is undeniable

Multiple times, Steve has to stop himself reaching out to touch Bucky while they sit, while they walk. It’s like a humming in the palm of his hand and the tips of his fingers that longs to connect with Bucky’s skin, just once, just to know if it’s as soft and warm as it looks

Bucky’s left his hair down today and when the breeze catches it, Steve can smell just the faintest hints of sweet coconut and he has to try really hard to be subtle about breathing it in

There’s a physical grace about Bucky too, in the way he carries himself that makes it impossible not to notice his body. He’s a little smaller than Steve, a little shorter and more lithe. Steve can’t stop thinking about how it’d feel to test out just how perfect Bucky would fit in his arms

It’s no easier for Bucky. There’s a lot of Steve to look at, he’s built strong and tall and powerful, which just makes his air of gentleness all the more beautiful

Bucky finds his eyes drawn over and over to Steve’s hands, because Steve can’t seem to talk without them getting involved, and they’re so big. It’s hard not to imagine the way they’d feel on his body, cupping his face or stroking down his back or running through his hair

It’s a little bit devastating, how handsome Steve is. There are smile lines around his eyes and Bucky can see exactly how they got there because Steve smiles a lot, and he smiles big and open and genuine.

His silver-specked beard only accentuates the cut of his jaw, and there’s a freckle just above the line of his beard growth on one side that Bucky wants to kiss, and his eyes are the warmest shade of blue Bucky’s ever seen

Steve doesn’t touch him on that first date, save for a hand on the small of his back and a chaste peck on the cheek when they part ways. But you can bet it’s all either of them can think about for the rest of the day afterwards.

Maybe the rest of the week. And into the next one. Until they see each other again...

...And now I have to throw myself back into the gdocs to write more about their physical intimacy because I am a woman possessed. Thanks. I blame all of you.

[emeralddoeadeer]

Hey I’m back to give you a virtual hug/ maybe yell a bit because I’m a bit broken after chapter 14. At this point it’s genuinely a toss up between this and the 10 minute version of All Too Well as to what’s made me more emotional this weekend, but between the both of them I’m emotionally wrung out!

The optimist in me hopes the end of this chapter can be a clean slate and they can move forward now that everything’s out in the open, so I loved how after how devastating the rest of the chapter was the ending was kind of hopeful in that way. But it’s going to take me some time to get to feeling that I think, because I’m mostly just still processing the rest of it!

I have no idea how you’re able to convey the depth and complexity of feelings that everyone has about everything that’s happening - not just Lily and James but also the difficulties for Remus and Sirius being stuck in the middle, wanting to help Lily but then worrying about being bad friends to James, and Marlene having to balance the person she’s built a really successful working relationship with separately with the person she knows as ‘Lily’s James’ (loved that from the first chapter) - but it’s so well done and just makes the whole thing that much more heartbreaking. I hope things start to look up for them soon though, I genuinely don’t know if I can take this level of angst..

As always, thank you so much for sharing your writing - I always feel kind of vulnerable sharing art with people because it’s so personal and yours so I just wanted to let you know (again - tbh it’s probably going to be after every update now) how much I appreciate it and love your work. It’s genuinely the fic I go back to the most and constantly check for updates for and I’m constantly in awe of how you’re able to keep writing so beautifully whilst managing to deal with all of the shit that just happens in life at the same time. I hope you have a great week!

You're too kind to me @chasingshadows-catchinglight I'm just here smashing the keyboard and hoping the words make sense when they land on the page.

Blown away by your support 💖

This was a necessary evil, hopefully, the pain has eased.

I hope you have a truly great week!