#major spoilers in the tags so stop reading if needed but um

[gemsgamegems]

It's always "I love you" and never--

idk what else I can say that's coherent enough for a review.

I love this game.

I LOVE. This. Game.

I have to go back and get the other endings.

But like...fuck.

FUCKING SHIT 😫😫😫😭

[sfb123]

Sapere Aude - Part 13

Book: The Royal Heir

Pairing: King Liam Rys x Queen Riley Brooks

All characters belong to Pixelberry.

Catch Up Here

If you’re new to Sapere Aude, please click the link above to start from the beginning. There’s so much going on right now that you’ll be way too confused to start from this point. Plus, there are some major bombshells that won’t be as fun if you read this and get a bunch of spoilers.

Series Description: I developed a theory of what I think will happen in TRH Book 4, and I was encouraged by some very lovely people to turn my theory into a fic, so here it is. Basically, Riley is recruited to join the Via Imperii, this series will follow her as she joins them to try and bring them down from the inside, and all of the drama and bombshells she learns along the way. Sapere Aude is Latin for “dare to know” it seemed like an appropriate title.

Rating: PG-13 Adult language, discussions of death, conspiracy, blackmail, and other adult themes.

Trigger Warning: There is a brief moment of physical abuse, it’s not much, but I definitely wanted to mention it and give a fair warning. 

Warning: The Royal Heir Book 3 Spoilers all over the place.

Disclaimer: I have no current affiliation with any other Via Imperii themed stories. Any claims that I have pre-read anything are false.

Word Count: 2,383

A/N: I know you’ve all been on the edge of your seats wondering what was going to happen, the answer is a lot. This is a pretty big chapter. I hope you enjoy!

Thanks to my pre-reading babes, @jessiembruno & @txemrn. And to @twinkleallnight for my lovely moodboard! 

Tags: Listed below, hit me up to be added or removed.

“Um...actually, it’s about the queen. Your majesty, you need to come with me, and we need to send some additional guards along with us.”

Liam’s face paled at Thomas’s words. “Where is my wife, Thomas?” He kept his voice quiet, so that he wouldn’t upset his daughter but his tone was stern and authoritative. 

“I believe she is at the old Fierro estate, and time may be of the essence.” 

“Li, go. We’re all here, we can take care of Eleanor.” Drake chimed in. 

Liam nodded. “Bastien, please send as many guards as you can immediately, and prepare the car for us. Thomas, go with him and tell him everything you know so that we can fill the team in.” Both men bowed and quickly exited the room. Liam walked over to Eleanor, sitting in the chair next to her. “Eleanor, I need to step out and pick up mommy, ok? Your auntie and uncles will be here to play with you until we get back.”

“Can I come with you?” She asked hopefully.

Liam took a deep breath before answering her. “I’m sorry princess, but I need to go by myself. But you have a very important job here. Since Valtoria is your home, you need to host our guests. Being a hostess is something you will need to do a lot when you become queen, so this will be wonderful practice. Do you think you’re up for it?”

She nodded her head rapidly. “Yes daddy, I will be the best hostess!”

“Good. Now go with Uncle Drake, and mommy and I will see you when we get home.” He pulled her into a hug, kissing her cheek as they pulled apart. 

Eleanor ran to Drake, taking his hand and pulling him toward the door. “C’mon Uncle Drake, I’m the hostess.” Drake chuckled before looking back at Liam and giving him a reassuring nod.

Liam waited a few moments to make sure that Drake and Eleanor were out of his path before rushing out of the room and toward the front entrance. The car was waiting for him, Bastien holding the back door open for Liam to enter. He jumped in and Bastien shut the door behind him, quickly jumping into the driver's seat. The SUV’s wheels squealed as it rushed toward the gates.

“How far out are the guards?” Liam asked. 

“We had a team training not too far from the estate, they should be arriving shortly. They have been briefed.” Bastien replied, looking at Liam through the rearview mirror. 

“Excellent. Would someone care to brief me now? Where is my wife?” Liam commanded. 

Bastien looked over at Thomas, who was seated next to him. “Thomas, please explain to his majesty the current situation.”

Thomas took a deep breath, his hands nervously balling into fists. “Of course. You see sir, there is an organization, the Via-”

Liam pinched the bridge of his nose, interrupting Thomas. “Thomas, please spare me. I know about the Via Imperii, Riley has been telling me about the meetings, the plans, everything.”

“Everything?” There was a slight crack in Thomas’s voice as he looked back at Liam. If she had told him everything, Liam knew who he was.

“Yes Thomas, everything, including our relationship. Right now, that is the last thing I am concerned with. I need you to tell me what they are doing to Riley, and what we need to do to get her out.”

“Unfortunately, I do not know much. I’m sure you were made aware of the conflict between her majesty and Lord Neville. Well it appears that he and Mara have lured her to the estate under the guise of a meeting with our chapter president. I don’t know what they are planning to do from there.” 

Liam’s jaw clenched as he ran a hand through his hair. “Bastien, remind me again why we didn’t dismiss Mara after her charge, the queen, my wife, was kidnapped at our wedding? It seems like grounds for termination to me.”

“She went through a thorough re-training process, and passed all of the associated tests. It was determined that she was able to adequately perform her duties.” Bastien replied. 

“Adequate is not acceptable for protecting the life of a Queen. We need exceptional as the bare minimum. She should have never been cleared to return to such a high profile duty. We will be having a meeting immediately to review protocol and standards.” The mixture of concern and rage swirling inside of Liam was becoming overwhelming, he was having trouble thinking straight. He turned to look out the window, taking deep breaths to regain some level of composure. 

***

“Since rational discussion is not going to be an option here, I guess we’re going to have to go to plan b, elimination.” Neville said to Mara as they sat across from each other, Riley tied to the chair at the head of the table. 

Riley laughed. “Sure, elimination. I bet that will work out great for you. It’s super easy to just make a reigning queen disappear.”

“We have been successful in doing it with two out of the last four queens. What do you think makes you so special?” Neville turned his attention to Riley, genuinely curious to know her reasons. 

“Well first of all, Eleanor was in on the plan, so she doesn’t count, so it’s actually one out of four. And second, I’m sure Liam and the rest of the guards, the loyal ones,” she looked poignantly at Mara, “are on their way. I’ve been gone long enough that Liam has definitely already had them ping the location of my phone.”

Mara pulled a phone out of her pocket and waved it in front of Riley with a smug grin on her face. “It has been powered off since I pulled it from your pocket as you were getting into the car.” She placed it on the table and slid it toward Riley.

“Any more smart remarks?” Neville asked, standing from his seat. He approached Riley, taking her face in his hand and leaning in close. “The fairytale is over Riley, and the ending isn’t quite as happy as you thought.”

Riley could feel her nerves starting to take over. Yes, Liam would be missing her right now, but how was he going to find her? She felt her heart rate increase, trying to keep her composure. She had been through this before. For as much as she hated Anton, she had to give him credit, he was much better at this than Neville was. If she could survive that, she could figure out a way out of this. 

She thought back to that night at the abandoned castle, she needed to channel that version of herself again. And she certainly couldn’t let Neville know he was getting to her. “What happened? You couldn’t find a woman to kiss you out of being a frog faced asshole? Or you did and it just didn’t work?”

“That’s enough!” the back of Neville’s hand abruptly met with Riley’s face, the force of the impact almost knocking the chair over. She moved her jaw back and forth several times, trying to assess the damage as best she could with her hands tied behind her back. “Mara, do we have anything to gag her with?” 

Before she could answer, there was a knock at the door. Neville and Mara looked at each other in confusion, nobody else knew about the plan. “Well?” Neville raised his hands in frustration. “You’re the security guard, go assess the damn threat!”

Mara jumped to her feet and opened the door to find Eleanor on the other side. “Ah Mara, I heard you and Queen Riley had stopped by, I’m so glad I was able to catch you.” She didn’t wait for Mara to respond before brushing past her and entering the room. “Lord Neville, I didn’t know you would be using one of our meeting rooms today. You didn’t clear it through the proper channels. What have we got here?” Eleanor walked straight past Neville and went right to Riley. She took in her appearance, noticing a red mark on her cheek and a small trail of blood running down her face. Her eyes were watering, but she hadn’t shed a single tear. Eleanor was impressed by the strength she was showing under these circumstances. She gave Riley a subtle wink before taking a seat and motioning for Mara and Neville to do the same. “Now, should we talk about where you plan to take things from here, considering you clearly haven’t thought this scheme all the way through?” 

“We’re going to do what this organization has done for years, eliminate the threat. Maybe we will be more successful in the king’s next social season, and get a cooperative queen in place.” Neville replied.

Riley took a shaky breath, but the idea of her being taken away from her family was too much for her to bear. The tears she had been holding back broke free, and she began sobbing. Eleanor walked back over to Riley and knelt down in front of her. “It’s alright dear, you aren’t going anywhere.” She placed a comforting hand on her shoulder before standing and turning her attention back to her captors. “Are you insane? Do you have any idea how much time and careful planning goes into enacting an elimination plan? You can’t just decide to kill the queen and expect that everything will go off without a hitch!”

As if on cue, the door burst open and several members of the King’s Guard entered with their weapons drawn. Mara immediately drew her weapon and aimed it at Neville. “Hands in the air, Lord Vancoeur.”

“Drop the weapon Mara.” One of the guards commanded.

Mara continued acting as if she was assisting in the rescue efforts, ignoring the guard’s warning. “I’m glad you guys got here, I was having trouble calling for backup to save the -”

A loud pop filled the room, Riley flinched, keeping her eyes closed for a moment. When she opened them, she saw Mara laying on the ground in a pool of blood as two guards rushed Neville and took him into custody. Two more pulled Eleanor away from Riley and forced her hands behind her back. “Stop!” Riley ordered, causing both guards to look up. “She is not a part of this, she was here rescuing me. Let her go.” The guards complied, and Eleanor went back to Riley’s side, quickly undoing the fastenings that bound her to the chair. As soon as she was free, Riley stood and rubbed each of her wrists before raising a hand to her face, gently placing it on the spot that Neville had hit, and moved her jaw back and forth a couple more times. She looked at Eleanor, her eyes welling up again. “You...you saved me.”

“Of course, dear. I told you I wouldn’t let them take you away from your family.” Riley wrapped her arms around Eleanor and pulled her into a hug. Eleanor could hear her hitched breathing and knew she had begun to cry. “It’s ok Riley, you’re safe now. Let’s go get you cleaned up.”

***

Liam was lost in his thoughts, watching the scenery go by as they neared the estate. The sound of Thomas’s phone ringing took him out of his thoughts. He quickly moved his attention to the front of the car, listening intently to Thomas’s answers to the person on the other end. They were simple, one word answers, and he was unable to read any kind of emotion in his voice. “Well?” Liam said, before Thomas had even fully moved the phone away from his ear. “Is Riley ok?” The seconds it took to get his response felt like an eternity for Liam. 

“Yes your majesty, Riley is safe. Lord Vancoeur has been taken into custody, and Mara was killed. Queen Riley is safe and awaiting our arrival.” 

Liam breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back in his seat. He was glad she was safe, but he needed to get there. He needed to see it for himself, to hold her, to kiss her. He needed to get her home where he could protect her. 

The car pulled up to the front of the estate, and before it could come to a complete stop, Liam had jumped out and ran to the door. He burst into the estate frantically sticking his head into every doorway looking for her. Finally, he approached a large sitting area with a fireplace running, and there she was, silently watching the flames dance. “Riley? Love?”

Riley blinked a couple of times before turning and meeting Liam’s gaze. “Liam…” her voice was barely above a whisper as she slowly stood to greet him. 

He rushed to her, immediately pulling her into his arms. He held her tightly as he kissed the top of her head. He pulled back, taking her face in his hands. The pressure of his touch on her still tender cheek made her wince in pain. Liam removed his hands and examined her face. “Riley, who did this to you?” He tried to keep calm, not wanting to cause her any more stress or pain.

“Stupid fucking Neville. I made some frog prince joke and he decided to heckle me with the back of his hand.” 

Liam clenched his jaw, and took a deep breath. He would deal with Neville, but for now, he needed to be with his wife. “Riley, I am so sorry that you had to go through this. I should never have let you do this. It could have been so much worse.”

She placed her hand on his cheek, he noticed the marks on her wrist from the restraints, and turned his head to kiss them softly. “But it’s not, because Eleanor, your mother, saved me.”

“My...why would she do that?”

“Because I couldn’t let you lose her.” A lump formed in Liam’s throat at the sound of the voice behind him. He hadn’t heard it in years, but he had never forgotten it. He turned around and as soon as they locked eyes, he felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him. “Hello, Liam.”

Permatag:

@anjanettexcordonia @athena-penrose @bbrandy2002 @chemist-ana​ @choicesficwriterscreations​ @choiceskatie @cordonia-gothqueen @cordoniaqueensworld @emkay512 @gabesmommie1130 @gkittylove99 @hopelessromanticmonie @iaminlovewithtrr @jessiembruno @kat-tia801 @khoicesbyk @kingliam2019 @lucy-268 @marshmallowsaremyfavorite @mile9213 @mom2000aggie @pixie88 @queenrileyrose @secretaryunpaid @sweatyrysconnoisseur @tessa-liam @theroyalheirshadowhunter @twinkleallnight @txemrn

Sapere Aude:

@burnsoslow @busywoman @gardeningourmet @ofpixelsandscribbles @tinkie1973

Liam x Riley:

@jared2612

Liam:

@amandablink @yourmajesty09

[linskywords]

criminal-minds-fanfiction wrote a bunch of questions for authors that you’re supposed to let people ask you, buuuut I felt like answering all of them instead of doing my actual job this afternoon. 😄 Here we go:

1) How old were you when you first starting writing fanfiction?

Like 25 maybe? I started writing about a year after I started reading it. I had a fanfiction-deprived adolescence, y’all.

2) What fandoms do you write for and do you have a particular favourite if you write for more than one?

The hockey boys pulled me in years ago and they haven’t let me go. I do sometimes write other things: I almost always participate in Yuletide, and I’ve actually written a bunch of Animorphs fic under a different name (ask me if you want to see it!). Mostly hockey RPF, though.

3) Do you prefer writing OC’s or reader inserts? Explain your answer.

Haha neither. Well, I guess OC’s, if I had to choose -- I don’t read or write reader inserts. But I tend to keep OC’s for original fiction.

4) What is your favourite genre to write for?

I was very confused about fic having genres before I realized this was probably referring to the genre of the canon works. Um...sports. :D

5) If you had to choose a favourite out of all of your multi chaptered stories, which would it be and why?

Don’t make me choose my favorite child. Um, probably the first wolfverse story -- I don’t know if it’s the best one, but I’m very grateful to it for starting the ‘verse!

6) If you had to delete one of your stories and never speak of it again, which would it be and why?

None of them, if that’s an option. If I really had to choose...probably the Kirk/Spock fic I never finished even after uploading it to AO3 and promising to finish it this time. I still want to finish it!! But it would be the first to go.

7) When is your preferred time to write?

I don’t have a strong preference. Afternoon/evening. I like having multi-hour blocks, and I use the Forest app to keep me off my phone while I do it.

8) Where do you take your inspiration from?

Plot bunnies come from all over the place: random thoughts, memes, real-life conversations, suggestions from other fandom people. I tend to have a pretty strong “THIS IS A STORY I WANT TO WRITE” response when something grabs me the right way.

9) In your xxx fic, what’s your favourite scene that you wrote?

Haha this is probably why I’m not supposed to just answer all of these in order. XD I’ll answer for my current WIP: the scene where Geno kisses Sid for the first time. So soft. So angsty. 😈 (My own story has cursed me to love Geno. I am doomed.)

10) In your xxx fic, why did you decide to end it like that? Did you have an alternative ending in mind?

In general: I know how my stories are going to end when they start. Sometimes it does evolve a bit as I write. One thing I’d like to play with is including more of the main characters being together at the end of the story, instead of ending it at the moment when they get together; the latter makes sense from a tension perspective, but I’ve been finding when I read lately that I want more of the happy times at the end, so I’m going to try to move in that direction.

11) Have you ever amended a story due to criticisms you’ve received after posting it?

Only for typos, I think.

12) Who is your favourite character to write for? Why?

Ooooh. Either Patrick Kane or Jonathan Toews. There’s something so compelling to me about Patrick’s fanon voice. And every love interest in every original story I try to write is Jonny.

13) Who is your least favourite character to write for? Why?

I...don’t really write about characters I don’t like? I wish Auston Matthews would shave his mustache.

14) How did you come up with the title for the xxx? - You can ask about multiple stories.

About fifty percent of the titles I come up with are desperate scrambles because I’ve got nothing. The other fifty percent I have a perfect song lyric for from the start.

15) If you write OC’s, how do you decide on their names?

I only write OC’s in original fiction, but: I’ve been phonebanking lately, and I’ve been writing down all the good names I come across. The best so far is someone with the last name Quackenboss.

16) How did you come up with the idea for xxx?

MAGIC.

17) Post a line from a WIP that you’re working on.

Oh...oh no. Um.

“It doesn’t matter what he was thinking about. His knot popped; that’s the important thing.”

Some of you can probably guess what that’s about. :)

18) Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Mostly on my computer. I have a lot of beginnings of stories I haven’t finished yet; many of them I’ll probably go back to. I tend not to post things until I’m done or close to done with them. (That one Star Trek fic being an exception. Mea culpa.)

19) Are there any stories that you’ve written that you’d really love to do a sequel to?

YES. The 1988 timer one and the 1988 story where Patrick’s a girl who sneaks onto the Blackhawks in disguise. I’d love to do a Bennguin version of both of those.

20) Are there any stories that you wished you’d ended differently?

Hm. Some of them I think I rushed a little. More Than I Could Ever Promise, I think it needs a good old-fashioned battle scene in the mountains at the end to really round out the plot.

21) Tell me about another writer(s) who you admire? What is it about them that you admire?

Have I mentioned astolat? What, only two or three hundred times? I should mention her again, then. Give me that woman’s ability to plot. Inject it into my veins.

22) Do you have a story that you look back on and cringe when you reread it?

Haha. I often have slightly cringy moments in my old stories. You Made My Life an Adventure, I definitely didn’t really know what I was doing yet...

23) Do you prefer listening to music when you’re writing or do you need silence?

I usually listen to music.

24) How do you feel about writing smutty scenes?

Turned on.

25) Have you ever cried whilst writing a story?

Yes. The sequel to My Heart Forgets to Beat.

26) Which part of your xxx fic was the hardest to write?

The Sid/Geno wolfverse story I’m working on now is maybe the hardest thing I’ve ever written. The language barrier is such a new challenge for me.

27) Do you make a general outline for your stories or do you just go with the flow?

I don’t formally outline, but I tend to have a sense of the major plot beats. One reason I love writing fic is that the plot and world tend to be straightforward enough for that. I have a lot more trouble doing that with original fiction.

28) What is something you wished you’d known before you started posting fanfiction?

This will radically reduce the amount of time I spend writing original fiction.

29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like?

Like You Have a Secret I think is less read than some of the others because it’s het, but I really love it. Similarly, some of my stories that are inspired by other works (Tangled, Doctor Who, The Giver) tend to be read less because people think they need to know the source material, when really I deviate from the source material so much it’s not important.

30) In contrast to 29 is there a story which gets lots of love which you kinda eye roll at?

Huh. Probably not. I’m definitely surprised when some stories take off -- Kinda Narrows It Down I wrote pretty quickly, on a whim, and I was surprised by the extent to which it resonated with people. Turns out lots of people think Tyler was coming out in that tweet. XD

31) Send me a fic recommendation and I’ll post it for my followers to see! (The asker is to send the rec not the answerer)

Ooh. Ignoring the terms of this question, but: I just read this TK/Patty story and loooved it. It’s a different take on werewolves than the one I use in wolfverse, and it’s super compelling:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/24029188

32) Are any of your characters based on real people?

Hahahahahaha. (I mean...less so than you might think.)

33) What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten?

I absolutely love it when people write screaming flaily responses to my fic. Also anytime anyone says that they’ve been having a tough time and my story was exactly what they needed. Maybe my favorite was the responses to More Than I Could Ever Promise that told me it read like a novel; that meant a lot to me right then.

34) What’s the harshest criticism you’ve gotten?

Fandom is amazing; people almost never give me concrit. I did have someone ask once if I randomly chose when to stop writing and just ended my stories there. I was pretty offended, since of course that’s not true at all, but I can see where they were coming from: my stories tend to wrap up after the characters get together, and sometimes there’s a lot of potential story left to tell at that point. But stories have to end sometime.

35) Do you share your story ideas with anyone else or do you keep them close to your chest?

I tend to share them! I find other people’s enthusiasm to be strongly motivating, and sometimes people have awesome suggestions I wouldn’t have thought of.

36) Can you give us a spoiler for one of your WIP’s?

Well, I only have the one. XD Sid...is about to have an important conversation with Mario.

37) What’s the funniest story you’ve written?

Ooh, I’m not sure I’m the write person to answer! No idea, really. My recent TK/Patty is probably pretty funny. Or maybe Quality Time, where Patrick doesn’t understand why he keeps losing track of time when he’s cuddling with Jonny. Anything with a super dumb protagonist, probably.

38) If you could collab with any other writer on here, who would it be? (Perhaps this question will inspire some collabs!) If you’re shy, don’t tag the blog, just name it.

Wow, I have no idea. I’ve never really written a story with someone, so I’m not sure how that would work. I want to say astolat again but honestly I’d be too intimidated.

...no, I’m gonna say astolat. Even if I made a fool of myself I think I would learn a ton.

39) Do you prefer first, second or third person?

Third. For some original stuff I like first person, but third feels right for the hockey boys.

40) Do people know you write fanfiction?

My close friends do. Most of my friends have the vague idea I write fic, but they don’t know my username or anything.

41) What’s you favourite minor character you’ve written?

Patrick Sharp. No question.

42) Song fic - What made you decide to use the song xxx for xxx.

I will legit listen to a new album with a doc open to write down promising lyrics. Titles are HARD, y’all.

43) Has anyone ever guessed the plot twist of one of your fics before you posted it?

I think people guessed where the Tangled fic was going. Though I also liked the guesses that it would be about Patrick’s mullet. XD I don’t really mind when people guess twists -- in the kind of story I write, it’s more about the experience of reading it than about surprise!

44) What is the last line you wrote?

“His parents have always been very respectful of any choices Sid’s wanted to make. They haven’t pried into his private life when he’s tried to set boundaries. But they’re wolves, and they know him a lot better than Jordy does. Sid isn’t going to be able to keep it a secret from them what he’s going through.”

...no guarantee it survives in that form. :D

45) What spurs you on during the writing process?

Getting the story out of my head and into reality! Spoon out that lake, baby.

I also do love the prospect of posting it for people to enjoy and respond to. It’s one of the reasons I find fic so much more rewarding than original fiction, where the timeline to a readership is so much longer.

46) I really loved your xxx fic. If you were ever to do a sequel, what do you think might happen in it?

Things, probably.

47) Here’s a fic title - insert a made up title. What would this story be about?

This exercise might be going off the rails a bit. (If anyone does want to pose this to me, feel free!)

48) What’s your favourite trope to write?

Ooh. Mutual pining. Friends to lovers. Werewolves. :D

49) Can you remember the first fic you read? What was it about?

The first fic I ever, ever read was a random Kirk/Spock one I found through google, and I was like “OMG IS THIS WHAT AROUSAL FEELS LIKE”

50) If you could write only angst, fluff or smut for the rest of your writing life, which would it be and why?

Oh man. Angst, as long as it can have a happy ending. But it just wouldn’t be the same without the smut.

[jinmukangwrites]

Whumptober Day 28

Mugged

Ao3

Summary: It's a simple get together, and for once everything was fine.

Warnings: GRAPHIC MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH AND GRAPHIC INJURY. DO NOT READ IF THIS KIND OF VIOLENCE BOTHERS YOU, WHETHER ITS DIRECTED TO A CHILD OR AN ADULT. SPOILERS FOR DEATH IS IN TAGS.

-o-o-o-o-

 "You have something on your face," Dick teases, smiling and leaning his elbows forward onto the 24 hour diner table. In the booth across from him, Damian scowls and wipes a smidge of strawberry ice cream from his cheek then elbows to his side to hit the laughing Tim straight into his gut. 

Jason snorts and takes a spoonful of his own ice cream, which is raspberry flavored with little chocolate chips. 

The time outside is very late. So late that when the four of them walked inside the diner after a long, team up for patrol, one of the workers actually glared at them. Which is valid. If Jason worked at one of these places when it was reaching the buttcrack of dawn, then watched as four annoyingly loud and too awake people barged in, he'd probably glare too. 

Maybe they should have came inside in their costumes instead of getting dressed first into their normal clothes. One of the waitresses literally has a Nightwing pin on her vest. They could have probably gotten the ice cream and fries for free. 

Oh well. The ice cream here is worth a little glaring and a few bucks. 

"So I was thinking-" Dick says through a mouthful of ice cream. He's already dipping another fry into his chocolate mint shake, so Jason gets the feeling that whatever Dick says for the next twenty minutes will be through food- "that after this, we can go to a Redbox and pick up a movie."

"What movie?" Tim asks.

Dick hums. "One that Cass hasn't seen yet."

Jason scoffs. "She hasn't seen a lot of movies. You're going to have to be more specific."

"Then what about a movie Duke hasn't seen," Tim asks, scraping the bottom of his shake with his spoon. "That way we can kill two birds with one stone."

"I hate that metaphor," Jason stands up from the booth with his empty shake cup and equally empty bag of fries. 

Dick glares at him with a face that says yes Jason, we all know you died. 

Jason smirks and throws his trash away. 

As they all walk out of the diner, Jason hears one of the workers mumble finally, and he's not even that mad about it. He hopes their shifts end soon and they can go home and watch anime or something. Working night shifts like that in Gotham isn't something to scoff at.

Dick pulls out his phone while Tim runs ahead to take the lead. Jason walks behind the group as Damian falls into step besides Dick and looks over at his phone screen to see what he's typing. "Where's the closest Redbox?" Dick mumbles to himself and Jason rolls his eyes. 

He's serious about the Redbox thing? "You do know we can just buy whatever movie we want with B's card. We don't need a Redbox."

"It's for the experience, Jay," Dick argues back, scrolling on his phone through Google. "Everyone goes to Redbox to get random movies they don't actually want to own."

"Alright, alright," Jason huffs, smirking a little. 

And okay, he'll admit it. Tonight has actually been… a little fun. Even if Dick had to threaten to go skiing without him next winter if he didn't join them for patrol. And while yes, Jason could just go skiing alone or force Roy to come along… and while yes, Dick would have gone skiing with him regardless of the threat and if Jason went through with it… he still found it enjoyable to just pretend to be a family with these idiots for the night. He almost wishes the others could have joined, but with Duke and Cass being busy on their own sibling bonding mission for the night where no one else were allowed they were forced to be just the four of them tonight. 

Dick will have to work with Cass to better schedule sibling get togethers'. Just imagining the shenanigans and trash taking about Bruce they could be doing if it were all six of them has him staunching down a grin. 

Even better if Steph joined as well. 

Jason follows along as Dick picks up speed to pass Tim—whos balancing on the curb of the street like an actual five year old—and lead them towards the nearest Redbox. 

"We should get Princess Bride," Tim suggests as they walk past an alleyway. "I don't think Duke's seen that."

"He has no excuse to have not seen Princess Bride," Damian huffs. "It was one of the first movies Richard showed me."

"And one of the first I showed Cass, too," Dick adds, turning to flash a lopsided grin. "So we need to think of another one."

"What about that new movie?" Tim suggests. 

Jason lifts an eyebrow. "What new movie?"

"You know," Tim replies, "the- the new movie. With that guy from Voltron. Where they go on the bridges and fight the monkeys?" 

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"It's-" Tim growls, sounding frustrated with himself. Jason finds him amusing. "You know. That one movie."

"Timothy has no idea what he's talking about."

"I'm sorry I don't spend all day watching movies all the time. Oh! Dwayne the Rock Johnson was there!"

"… Are you talking about Jumanji 2?" Dick asks and Tim snaps his fingers. 

"Jumanji 2!" 

They turn a corner, then immediately all stop when they spot the entire road blocked off by orange coned and giant signs telling you to detour. In the middle of the blocked off road is a giant, dangerous looking hole in the ground leading towards the sewers. 

Huh. Jason's almost forgotten one of Two-Face's thugs had thrown a very powerful grenade of some sort last night. 

"Damn. Google hasn't updated this?" Dick sighs and begins tapping on his phone. 

"Crap like this happens all the time in Gotham," Tim sighs while stuffing his hands in his pockets, "you really think they're gonna catch everything?"

Dick's mouth turns into a frown, then he looks up at the building rooftops around them as if wondering how difficult it would be to climb up and parkour towards the nearest Redbox in civilian attire. He sighs, probably settling on it not being difficult, but potentially compromising of their identities ifanyone saw. 

He looks back at the phone. Then turns towards the alleyway they have just passed. 

"… We can cut through the alley," he suggests. 

Jason immediately scoffs while Tim walks towards them, shaking his head. 

"Um no? We shouldn't? Have you forgot what city we're in?" 

Dick gives an unimpressed look at Tim before sighing. "We'll have to go all the way around the block to get to the Redbox. That's like, another twenty minutes. Besides, we just finished patrol. Gotham's at its safest around now."

"We're going to get in there and then get shanked by some rando," Tim argues. 

Damian watches the two of them argue with narrowed eyes. When Damian opens his mouth, Jason decides it's his turn to step in. He grabs Dick by the back of his jacket and then behind to walk towards the mouth of the alleyway. He has his guns on him still, concealed under the belt of his jeans. If anyone is stupid enough to try and try to assult them in the alleyway, all Jason needs to do is pull out his guns and they'll go running for the hills. 

Gotham isn't filled with fighters. Gotham is filled with rats that only prey on those with smaller claws than them. 

"I'm not spendin' another hour out here to get a monkey bridge movie," Jason huffs, stopping in front of the mouth of the alleyway. "Now let's go."

"Fine," Tim mumbles, following behind as Dick takes the lead inside the alley. "But if we all get killed don't blame me."

"Dying isn't that bad, actually," Jason says, and Dick turns around and shoots that glare again. 

Damian huffs and trails behind Dick, but he watches the shadows like how a kid shouldn't. Thirteen years old and he's already seen the worst the world has to offer. Jason, once again, takes the back, fully aware of the weight hanging off his hip. The alleyway is long, and dark, and definitely not as surveillanced as it should be, but they continue anyways. So far, all there is to see is closed doors here and there that would lead into various shops and such if they weren't boarded up. Trash cans, litter, bags, and boxes of various contents dot the entirety of the alleyway. 

Otherwise, it looks pretty empty. 

Jason sighs. It should be fine. Gotham is always quiet around these early morning hours after Batman and his army of sidekicks have just combed through its streets. Criminals are back in there nests, shivering and praying they're not found tonight. Hours like these are usually the safest to go out for a after midnight stroll, or a very early morning jog. It's like a limbo. Where Gotham can actually feel like a normal city for once.

Of course, it's right when Jason let's his guard down that something goes wrong. 

Because something always goes wrong. 

Because some criminals are rats. But there's others who are like moths, too dumb to go back inside and persistent enough to jump at anything shiny enough to catch their attention.

A man, practically rags, skin, and bones jumps our from behind a dumpster, his hands already lifted in front of him with a gun in his grasp. Immediately, everyone pauses in their tracks. Jason goes to grab his own gun like he planned, but the man points his weapon at Jason with shaking, obviously trigger happy hands. 

"No one move!" The man shouts, trembling like a nervous mut. Jason holds off grabbing his guns for the moment, knowing that if he makes any sudden or threatening moves the man will fire. 

Dick, like the idiot he is, immediately steps in front of Damian. Damian growls, but doesn't make a move to fight that show of protection yet. Dick slowly raises his hands in surrender. "Take whatever you want," he says slowly. Evenly. 

Tim shifts behind Dick and glances at Jason, questioning in his eyes. 

"Give me your money- all of it," the man demands, and Jason can practically hear the body of his weapon tremble in his shaking hands. "No one will get hurt if ya give me all your money."

"Okay, okay," Dick says gently. Like he's soothing the mugger. Dick carefully lowers his arms to his pockets and uses smooth motions to bring out his wallet, which is probably only filled a debit card he can easily cancel, his driver's license which is definitely expired, and not even four dollars of cash. Jason only knows what's in Dick's wallet because Dick's his main victim for him to practice pickpocketing on. He holds out his Superman patterned wallet but the man keep his gun up and trained. 

"All of you," he wheezes. "All of you, give me your fuckin' money."

Tim snaps into movement with shaking hands, pulling out his wallet while Damian makes to do the same. Why the kid has a wallet with actual cash, Jason will never know. Something about Bruce wanting Damian to feel independent… like how he bought a lock for Jason's bedroom door that only Jason had the key for, just to make him feel like he had control while small and scared and barely eleven years old. 

The gun moves back to Jason, and Jason realizes he's been focusing too much on the wrong things. He lifts his hands and clears his throat. 

"I don't have anything," he says, because it's true. He doesn't carry his wallet while on patrol, nor does he stash personal belongings with his changes of clothes after patrol. Then, there's also the added fact that this guy is definitely one more nerve shot from firing his weapon. Him seeing a glock on Jason's belt might be the thing that pushes him over the edge. 

"I don't believe you," the man growls, taking a step forward and aiming directly at Jason now. 

And of course this is happening. Of course Jason's being mugged when he doesn't have any change on him. 

"Jason…" Tim hissed and Jason throws him a sideways glare. 

"I'm telling you, man, I don't have anything."

"Show me," the man snarls, jerking his pistol dangerously. "Show me your pockets."

And shit. This is what Jason was worried about. 

"Okay," he says, softening his voice, "alright. Just... I'm carrying okay? But I'm not gonna-"

"YOU HAVE A GUN?!" The man screeches, and Jason winces. Great. He was trying to warn the guy. There's no way Jason can show all of his pockets and his gun go unnoticed. It's grip is hanging out of his jeans waistband, black as night and clear as day. 

Jason lifts his hands immediately in surrender, watching the man wearily as his already panicked breaths become more labored. The tendons in his paper thin wrists are twitching. 

Jason's record for drawing and shooting a gun with accuracy is a little less than two seconds. Even with his hands up like this. 

But this man already has the gun aimed and finger on the trigger. 

"Let's calm down," Dick tries, "we have money, just take it and we can all-"

"You have a gun-" the man practically froths. 

And that is when Jason knew the sound of gunfire will be heard in this alleyway tonight. Jason can see the resolution in the man's eyes to shoot a moment before it happens. Jason doesn't have time to dodge or pull his own weapons. He will try to anyway. 

He goes to dodge, drops his hands to his waistline, and the enemies gun explodes. 

There's normally a moment of nothing between the time you've been shot and the time you realize you've been shot. But it doesn't happen this time. 

What happens is that Jason suddenly blinks on the grimy floor, his gun having skid across the cement from the force of his fall. 

He… he was pushed. 

"RICHARD!"

Jason looks up just in time to watch Damian run for the collapsing Dick Grayson… just to be violently knocked to the side by the sound of another bullet launching from the chamber. 

Jason doesn't watch or look anymore. He just scrambles to his gun, turns, aims, and fires.

The man chokes on blood as the bullet rips through his chest. 

And Jason thinks that this should be the end of it. This should be when he can get to his feet and look his brother's all in the eye one at a time. And- and he doesn't know. Go home? Call Gordon? Plead self defense?

However, when he stands up, he finds only Tim standing, his hands leaving his face from protecting himself moments before. 

Dick's on the ground writhing from pooling red in the center of his gut. 

Damian… Damian…

Jason thinks he's going to get sick. 

The damage a 9mil can do to a head at this close of range…

He doesn't look. He can't look. Not yet. He rushes towards Dick and ignored Damian's b- he-

He ignores Damian. He ignores Damian and slams his hands down onto Dick's stomach. 

Guilt twists in his gut like something he's never felt before. Rage. Helplessness. Disbelief. It's all he can do to force his limbs to press down as Dick jolts from agony beneath him. "Stay- stay still-" Jason snarls. His chest hurts so badly. His ears are ringing. 

His fault his fault his fault his fault-

"D-" Dick babbles, blood coating his teeth and dripping from the corners of his mouth. "No- n-"

Dick's not paying attention to anything. It's then, Jason realizes he's not struggling because of his own pain.

He's struggling because his kid is laying across from him in a puddle of blood, a hole in his skull. 

"No-" Dick twitches. Practically sobs. "M'suh- sorry- D'mi…"

"It's okay, just-" it's not okay, but Jason continues- "just focus on me, kay? Just- Tim, hospital?"

"Working on it."

Jason presses harder onto Dick's stomach. Dick sobs and his eyelashes flutter. 

He almost wants to tell Tim to stop. 

The ambulance isn't going to make it in time.

He knows this because he can hear Dick's protests begin to die down. He knows because he can see Dick's hand twitching towards Damian's limp one. He knows because he can feel the final shudder through his frame before his normally clear blue eyes cloud over. 

Jason… doesn't know what to do now. It's like his entire world just… stops. 

And he wants to scream. He wants to throw something. He wants to go back in time and shake Dick by the shoulders until he fixes this. 

He can't... he can't go back to a world where Dick and Damian aren't apart of it. 

Especially not if it's all. His. Fucking. Fault. 

"-we need help- my brother's been shot-"

And Jason clutches his fists in Dick's sopping wet, blood-soaked shirt and turns to find Tim kneeling against Damian, blood painting his fingertips. 

He wants to scream that there's no use of an ambulance. There's no point. 

But then Tim meets his eyes, tears trailing down in tracks, then looks down at Damian. 

It takes a second for Jason to see it. But Damian's chest moves. 

Damian's still alive. 

He's still alive. 

Jason forces himself to leave Dick so he can scramble over to Damian and get a closer, desperate look. Tim rattles off the details of their location the the details of the mugging while Jason just... Hovers. Holding his red stained hands above his- his baby brother. 

He doesn't want to touch Damian. He doesn't want to break him more.

So he sits there and counts every breath the kid stubbornly makes even with a bullet in his skull. 

He sits there until Tim hangs up the call and sits besides him. He sits there until a loud ambulance accompanied by at least three cop cars pull up and then a shock blanket is wrapped around his shoulders. He stays there until Damian is loaded into a gurney. Until he's left there, kneeling, not even realizing he's holding Tim's hand, until a female cop with sad brown eyes kneels down in front of him and tells him Bruce is on his way with Cass and Duke. 

He nods, and stands up, keeping Tim besides him even though he's caused this. 

He looks to his side to see Dick already covered by by a tarp. He can see red bleeding out from under it. 

Slender arms wrap around his waste, and it takes him a moment to realize Tim is clutching to him. 

Jason's... The big brother again. The big brother. 

He- he should…

He wraps his arms around Tim and let's his own tears finally fall.

[naturallytom]

Five Stages of Grief (Peter Parker): Acceptance

a/n: this fic contains major endgame spoilers. do not read if you haven’t seen the movie. i’ll be posting moodboards over on @spxcxrrxid so don’t check those out unless you’ve seen the movie either. i won’t be tagging people (besides mutuals who i know have seen the movie) because of spoilers!

warnings: lots and lots of angst, again; major endgame spoilers, mentions of IW spoilers

tags to blacklist (if you haven’t already)!: a4 spoilers, avengers: endgame, a4, endgame, endgame spoilers, avengers endgame, avengers spoilers, marvel spoilers, mcu spoilers

denial II anger II bargaining II depression II acceptance

_______________________________________________________________________

Every once in a while Peter would feel okay. Not happy, but not as bad as he usually feels. Today was one of those days. The small rain cloud that hung over Peter’s head for so long was finally gone and he felt like the emoji with the cloud and the sun peeking out from behind it was following him now.

He was still down in the dumps but there was a little hint of sunshine peeking out from within. He started hanging out with Ned and MJ more, started reaching out to the Avengers more.

Everyone was more than supportive, always offering for him to stop by. Peter appreciated it, but he didn’t feel ready to see them or the compound yet. Again, they were completely understanding about it. Each and every one of them gave them his number (if he didn’t have it already) and told him to give them a call if he ever needed anything. Ever.

He would always smile and thank them, promising to give them a call. Especially Happy, Pepper and Morgan, who he promised to visit.

Ned and MJ were happy that their friend was beginning to hang out with them again. May was happy to see her nephew getting back into a normal routine.

If he was being honest, Peter was trying to get back to a normal routine, but it was still hard. He still missed Tony and he still couldn’t look at the suit. So he focused his activities around school and his school friends rather than the Avengers and Spiderman activities.

His suit was buried in the back of his closet, dust probably covering it. May kept suggesting he bring it out again, but Peter just couldn’t do it. It was too hard for him and May understood that. She also understood that Peter wasn’t able to just stop being Spiderman and he’d put the suit on again eventually, so she told him to keep it and even suggested trying it on to make sure it still fit him.

She was sitting in the kitchen, looking up recipes for dinner that night when Peter approached her.

“May?” Peter asked, stepping into the kitchen.

“Yeah sweetheart? Everything okay?” She responded, looking up, a look of concern in her eyes.

“I-I think it’s time. For me to um, see Pepper and Happy and Morgan.” He muttered. “Okay. Okay, yeah. Do you need a ride?” She asked.

“Can, um, can you come with me?” He asked, keeping his gaze on the floor. May smiled and nodded.

“Yeah. Yeah of course. Let’s go.” She responded softly, getting her keys.

The two of them drove in silence, but instead of sad music filling the car, an upbeat pop song played on the radio. Both May and Peter had small smiles on their faces, until they pulled up to the Stark house. Peter’s face immediately dropped. The memories of the funeral, Tony’s death, it all became too much. He could feel the pit of nerves in his stomach expanding.

“May, I-I don’t know if I can do this.” Peter whimpered, looking at his aunt with tears in his eyes.

“Peter, honey, it’s okay. You can do this. I believe in you and I’ll be here with you the whole time. But we can go home if you really want to.” She assured him, resting a hand on his thigh.

Peter thought for a minute. “Okay.” He sighed. “Let’s do this.”

May smiled and rubbed his thigh gently. “That’s my boy.”

The pair walked to the front door, May knocking when they arrived.

They were greeted by Pepper and Morgan, who both smiled when they saw who was there.

“Hey you guys! Come on in!” Pepper told them, gesturing inside. “Morgan hi!”

“Hi.” The little girl spoke, nearly hiding behind her mom’s legs.

“Hey sweetie, how are you” May spoke, bending down to talk to her.

“May are you okay with her for a minute?” Pepper asked, May nodding right away in response.

“Peter, c’mon.” Pepper whispered to Peter, gesturing with her head, Peter following her. “How are you holding up, kid?” She asked once they were in the kitchen, away from the others.

Peter shrugged. “I dunno. ‘M alright, I guess.” Pepper smiled sadly, rubbing Peter’s shoulder gently.

“You meant so much to him. He really did love you.” She told him. “I really loved him too. I miss him a lot.” Peter responded. “Me too, kid. You ready to go play with Morgan? I know she’d love to play with you more.” Peter nodded eagerly, Pepper smiling.

Peter and May spent the afternoon playing with Morgan and talking with Pepper. Peter began to feel really, genuinely happy. By the time it was time for them to go, Peter had felt the happiest he had been in a long time.

So when he got home, he went to his closet, and got the suit that was buried in the back of it. His eyes scanned over the familiar red and blue suit, and he sighed. Stepping into it, he felt tears fill his eyes, though he ignored them.

He pushed the tears aside, put the mask on and went to his window.

And for the first time in a while, he swung around the city of New York as a friendly neighborhood Spiderman.

_______________________________________________________________________

[jq37]

sis have you seen the new fantasy high ro and if so pls share your blessed thoughts with us

*dishing with demon spoilers*

Siobhan casting ray of sickness on the DM and, later, Adaine having to quickly clarify that she didn’t cast ray of sickness on Kristen when she was existential crisis barfing. 

No one can say “lunch lad” without breaking composure immediately. 

Riz trying to confer with the rat. AND THEN IT WORKED LATER. WHAT.

“Mr. The Insatiable”

“You were the angel of eating the right amount of food?”

I love Gorthalax. He’s so well spoken and awkward but also really frank and earnest. That whole conversation was gold.

Everyone trying to hardline veto Kristen becoming a warlock. Also I checked and warlocks don’t have healing spells which, for this mishap prone group, is, uh, not good. 

“Is he my dad?” is becoming my favorite running joke.

Oh thank Sol, Gorgug went to heaven. Sucky orc heaven, but I knew he was a good boy.

If there are multiple heavens and hells, which one do you go to if you don’t actively worship a specific god?

“Your dad is a demon.” “Uh, your dad is a pirate and we’re not rude about that.” “Um, actually, he’s a privateer” “MMM.”

I love that it took them like a solid 5 minutes to make the connection from, “The portal needs a direct connection to Sol” to “Maybe they were trying to make Kristen the portal” because that conversation was all over the place. 

Gorgug acting like for even a second he knew what perditional condradoxy meant. 

Why is this show so rat focussed? 

Adaine, who has only ever eaten fancy food up until a month ago: Only being able to grant ice cream wishes is a bad thing????

Ally going all shocked disbelief when Fig wanted to disguise herself as a pre-med student as if they weren’t just suggesting Kristen join  TERRORIST ORGANIZATION. 

That being said, WHAT? FIG WHAT?

“Roll opposed athletics to medically fight the sand demon”

GUN DOCTOR RIZ

And then it just turns into an episode of GREY’S FREAKING ANATOMY (which is a show that must be amazing in a setting like this btw. Like, how do you jump the shark in a world where ice cream genies are a thing?)

This is Fig’s second fake job now that I think about it. She also rolled really well to be a fake bouncer. Wait, Jawbone works at their school now so he has to know she was lying, right?

Anyway, that was peak bard. 

Man, Brennan is such a good DM. I don’t think I ever would have let that nonsense sequence happen in my game but it was so freaking good. 

Adaine using mage hand to rig heads or tails with Fabian and Gorgug. She’s my favorite.  

Fabian, the same day they had a huge battle with MIDDLE SCHOOL KIDS: We dont fight children. Don’t you though?

“No I never get what I want.”/”I often get what I want and I’m very satisfied” Tag yourself. 

Adaine being proud of figuring out the bus system. I feel like I wrote that. Also, I just moved to NY and same girl.

Jawbone being a great counselor is 100% funnier than him being an incompetent one like I would have assumed.

Good on Adaine for doing an arcana check on her gift because that whole sequence threw up trap alarm bells in my head. (Did they even tell Gorthalax about the tin flower? And I feel like he should hate rubies at this point, not be giving his daughter a Ruby guitar pick).

Oh, btw, I loved all the stuff with Fig and her dad. Emily roleplayed that so sincerely (when she wasn’t messing around). I especially liked the part before he left when she was lie, “Why didn’t you have someone come get me?”

THE INITIALS T.B. ON THE FRONT. The realization dawning on Murph’s face was incredible. 

“Huge bird tits” EMILY. MIDDLE NAME. AXFORD. STOP DESCRIBING SEXY ANIMALS.

This group is so bad at tag team lying. From a meta game standpoint, they players are super good at RPing but they choose to RP people who are just so bad at improv. Especially Emily. What an agent of chaos. 

Adaine just cutting through the nonsense and casting friend on Skarnk.

 Was Brennan a psych major or something? I feel like we keep getting taken on these journeys through the human (you know what I mean) mind. (That whole sequence with Shellford was so depressing).

It must be so weird to live in a world where at 14 year old can potentially know a spell that lets the read your thoughts.

OK so Kristen. My question is, did Brennan and the group know how far Ally was gonna go with her? Because the entire group always seems hysterically caught off guard by every crazy thing that comes out of Ally’s mouth, but like as themselves, not just as their characters. 

Man I hope Ally’s childhood wasn’t as dramatic as Kristen’s.

Kristen: Do you guys mind spitting up? Famous last words, girl.

“Praise Helio, we’ve got to go.”

Emily goading Ally into making another truly terrible speech.

Gorgug insisting on always standing in front of everyone.

DAYBREAK. I knew that guy was a dick but I didn’t think he was actively end the world evil. So that’s gonna be wild.  

[peeterparkr]

Promises. pt. 1 p.p.

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD

IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED INFINITY WAR DON’T READ THIS

GO AND WATCH THE MOVIE

AND THEN READ THIS

I’VE WARNED YOU

part 1/ part 2 / part 3/  part 4

anon asked: I’m still sobbing after IW, are you taking requests? Would you write a Stark!reader x Peter in which she goes up with them (tony and peter) to space?

pairing: stark!reader x Peter Parker

word count: 4.2k

warnings: it’s INFINITY WAR SO SPOILERS, AND OKAY THIS WILL BE SAD, swearing, this is short but I need to process everything and this will be  series because I’m still deciding where exactly I will try to go with this, oh and it turned out to be shit so sorry. 

MASTERLIST

wanna join the tag list?  

TAG LIST 

Comments are greatly appreciated

tags: @spidergirlwanab @dracxnic-archangel @purepeterparker @dorisagent101 @hollandharrison @peters-vlogs @daughter-of-the-fandoms @fame-works-quicker  @starsholland

 If you looked ‘Stubborn’ up, the first thing that’d appear would be your picture. Your father said it was your middle name. Y/N Stubborn Stark. It had a ring to it.

But it wasn’t like you were the only one carrying that name, for you knew you had got your name singlehandedly from him, you would even erase his actual name just to make the perfect acronym for him: Anthony Stubborn Stark, better known to you as ASS.

You loved your father, though. Even if you had kept secrets from him, you wouldn’t doubt twice to save up his ass. It had come to you that whenever he was proud of you, it had rather become a rather pleasant outcome.

When you looked up to the sky from the compound, you knew your father would be near the rounded cosmic flying spaceship, it was landing in New York. Sure, Tony Stark had to be there. It wasn’t unknown to you that whenever problems were fired: your father would be up there, fighting chaos. Sometimes he was the chaos.

So as you saw the circle getting closer to the ground, a part of you wanted to fight down, finally prove your father you were as capable as he was to fight. You wouldn’t understand why he wouldn’t let you fight, after all, you had grown up with some of the Avengers and you had learned some technique by yourself. You were young, passionate and just as smart as he was, even smarter, you’d say.

“You are a teenager,” he would answer. So was Peter and Peter had a suit. Peter Parker. Your relationship with Parker had become an envious love-hate snapping from both of you. Unintentionally peeking with a bit of flirty, quirky and mellow encounters. A bit of tease, a bit of a flirt, and just, overall a dancing rollercoaster.

You were friends, friends who sometimes couldn’t stand each other, and friends who sometimes crossed a few lines. Yeah, you had a crush on him, and sometimes the teasing between each other led to an ‘almost kissing’ situation, but it would always end up in a roasting each other contest.

However, Peter faced the same struggle as you did every day, trying to convince your father that you were both more than he thought of you both.

Tony Stark gave you your own merit, and when it had come to the new nanotechnology he was developing,  you had helped him up building the new suits, deep inside you knew Tony knew about the features you had included for yourself. Tony was aware he couldn’t stop your eager excitement and your love for adventure and science, so as the years went by he turned a blind eye to make sure you had your fun.  

Even though your stomach was fighting to stay inside yourself, you toned it down, knowing that this was your chance to prove yourself, to finally convince your father you could be the one to help him. The opportunity had puffed, and you were bound to believe the audacity beneath wouldn’t fail you.

You snuck into his lab, and found the other nanosuit, you knew you’d be taking risks, but something about this didn’t feel right, a part of you knew you could lose him, and certainly, you didn’t want to be the one to blame if anything happened to your father. It was a sentiment you couldn’t fight off.

You suited up, as you flew your way to New York, adrenaline busting you up. Catastrophes had their own way to swallow you down, making every inch of you radiate with energy. But this time, you were scared, because as you were approaching, the air didn’t seem like another fight that someone could easily brush away.

“Hey, Friday, call Peter Parker,” you implored as you were approaching the city.

“Hey, aah, Hey y/n!” He answered as you heard him struggle, as you realized that he probably was already there. But you saw the flying spaceship going back into air.“I’m kinda busy right now…”

“You near the flying donut?” You asked him and he kept yelling. “Peter.”

“Yeee-yes, y/n, this is way-”

“Hey, I’m on my way, any heads up?” You asked.

“What in this world do you mean you’re in your way?” You heard your father’s voice as you whispered some cuss words.

“Mr. Stark… I’m… I’m going up, I could use a little help” Peter Parker was saying, and you felt your whole body tense up, shuddering.

“I meant I’m on my way,” you snapped. “Peter, what do you need-”

“Y/N! Go home,” Your dad ordered and you were cussing, trying to fly higher. He ordered to release something, but you weren’t truly listening as you were busting higher and higher, closer to the spaceship.

“Miss Stark your father has ordered me to send you home,” Friday answered.

“Ignore that, we’re closer to the spaceship than to the ground anyway,” you ordered and you watched how another suit was flying by. It was your father. You weren’t sure why you were following up the spaceship, but Tony was following so you thought you’d follow his path. A thing which wasn’t as smart, after you gave it a second thought.

“Y/N!” You heard Peter whisper.

“Peter?”

“Y/N get your ass back home!” Tony ordered and you were both flying to the circled spaceship. You focused and saw the red and blue glued to the center.

“Friday. Is that-?” you asked and the AI confirmed it. “Peter, don’t tell me you’re up there,” you begged, as you were seeing your father flying after the spaceship.

“He is, and he is running out of air,” the AI added as the suit was dragging you down. “Your dad ordered me to send you home.”  

“Friday, I want you to erase all of my father’s orders and send me up there or else we’re losing them both,” You ordered Friday as the suit powered up, and you saw Peter Parker, gripping for his life. “This is code red.” Friday got you and impulsed the suit higher.

“I’m...I’m running out of air,” Peter’s voice came like daggers to you, you weren’t aware of what was happening. Until it hit you, you were flying into space. This wasn’t how you had figured out you’d prove yourself. A capsule of sorts flew beside you, you managed to catch Peter as he had let go of the spaceship. You were seeing a knocked out Peter on your hands, but the capsule that had followed you up released and took Peter out of your grasp, and suited him up with the Iron Spider armor you and your father had designed for him. You suddenly felt a relief cover you up, as you landed beside Peter. He glanced at you and realized your suit was smaller, and with more golden assets than your father.

“This smells like a new car,” he said, still taking a glance at his own new suit. “Y/N, is that you?”

You besieged him and wrapped your arms around him, thanking every possible deity you could think of to keep him safe. He hugged you back.

“You could’ve died, asshole,” you said and he held you tighter.

“Okay, you could’ve both died so go home, now, Friday send them both lovebirds home,” Tony answered and both you and Peter were dragged back into the earth as a parachute opened up from Peter’s suit to bring you to the ground.

“Oh c’mon!” Peter complained as you gripped tighter to him.

“Cut the connection with my father, Friday,” you ordered and as you burned the parachute off, and flew back to the spaceship.

“You’re an idiot, Parker,” you said as you glanced at him.

“I missed you too, Stark,” he said as you both climbed up around the spaceship. “Thanks for -um, catching me.”

“I should’ve let you fall,” you joked and he didn’t answer straight away, so you felt guilt running through your veins. “Are you okay?” you asked him, concerned.

“We’re both headed to space and I stopped breathing for a bit, but yes, I’m okay,” he answered and cleared his throat. “What about you?”

“I’m fine,I really thought I could’ve lost you,” you said. “So, what’s up?” You asked him. “Illustrate me in all of this shit.”

“Okay, so, this hit up New York, Bruce Banner is back, there were two guys fighting us, we got rid of one, but the other one, he looked like Voldemort, managed to fly away with this wizard.”

“Wizard,” you repeated his word. “Wizard?”

“Yes, he’s got this cool cloak and he’s protecting this stone of sorts”

“So, we’re basically reviving the Harry Potter franchise, great,” you said as you were both looking for a door, and entered into the spaceship as quiet as possible, you both took a glance as you saw your father. “I have a bad feeling about this,” you said.

“That’s Star Wars, idiot, not Harry Potter but okay,” Peter teased and you could sense his smirk from down his mask.

“I’m not quoting anything, I actually-” You were interrupted.

“Mr. Stark is receiving a call from Ms. Potts, want me to connect you, too?” Friday asked.

“Oh, no, no, I’m already going to be grounded in my entire life for being up here,” you gushed.

“So, did you come up here to save me?” Peter asked teasingly.

“To save up the world, actually, dumbass,” you chided.

“You were scared of losing me,” he mocked with pride, and you took off your mask just so he could see you glaring at him, he just stared back.

“Okay, I feel stupid, I just winked at you, but the mask…” he cleared his throat and a small smile spread across your face as your own mask came back on, and you entered deeper into the spaceship, stopping as you saw the supposed wizard being held up in the air with what you thought it was needles surrounding him and pointing it up, as the Voldemort-faced alien was trying to get information out of him. “That’s Voldemort?” you asked Peter as he nodded, sticking to the ceiling. “What does he want this stone for?” You asked.

“I don’t know,” Peter answered. “Look, I really think your dad needs to know we’re here so he doesn’t blow this up,” confided Peter

“Miss, I’m losing my connect-” Friday shut down and you felt your shuddering body tell you this was way worse than you thought. Somehow this battle hadn’t even started but you felt like you were losing already. You got closer to Tony, as you watched as the iron man was looking up from another floor the wizard and as the red cape touched his shoulder. He pointed his hand at the cape.

“You’re really loyal, huh” Tony said.

“you first,” you demanded Peter in a whisper and he shot a web and slid down over to Tony.

“Speaking about loyalty, Mr. Stark,” he said.

Tony scowled, as he watched Peter take off his mask.

“I told you to go home,” Tony retorted.

“Yeah, dad about that,” you chipped in, your father watched as you took as well your mask.

“What in the world are you doing here, Y/N?” His voice indicated more fear than anger.

“Look, I just… being honest, Peter’s parachute got tangled up with this, and well, we were already here, and I don’t want you to face this alone.”

“Y/N, why would you do this? This is a one-way ticket, and I can't believe you stole a suit and risked your effing life for this.”

“You’re risking it too,” you complained. “I’m sorry but I can’t afford to lose you.”

“No, y/n, you’re being irrational-”

“You really think I didn’t give it a second thought?” You argued back, as Peter watched you both.“I’m here and I’ll do anything to impede any of you two dying,” your words were clear, and strong.

“And if you’re the one to die?” Tony scowled.

“I’m pretty sure neither of you would let me,” you snapped and Tony blinked, defeated.

“You had one job Parker,” Tony looked at him. “Stay close to the ground.”

“I’m sorry Mr. Stark but I can’t be friendly neighborhood Spiderman if there isn’t any neighborhood.”

That hit you right, but Tony scowled watching him.

“Look, I don’t know what I’m saying, and that made no sense, but y/n and I  really know what we’re doing, you got that.”

“No, you don’t, you’re two teenagers.”

“And you’re most likely suffering from senile dementia,” you snapped. And Tony, sighed, defeated.

“Well, if we’re doing this, then, any ideas?” You three stepped in front, kneeling down to see the wizard, and the alien.

“Let’s kill his Horcruxes,” you whispered to Peter, and he snorted back a laugh. Tony glared at you. “Sorry, I know, no times for jokes.”

“Okay, have you guys seen this really old movie-” Peter started and you got his idea right away.

“Alien,” you and Peter said at the unison and he smiled at you, nodding. Tony scowled and sighed.

“I can’t believe I’ll be stuck in space with two teenagers,” he muttered under his breath. You watched as the living cloak was standing between you all.

“Y/N Stark,” you offered your hand and the cloak rose aside to shake your hand and you smiled at. Peter tried copying your introducing moment but failed completely as the cape was quick to fly away from him.

“Okay,”  Peter sighed, and you chuckled patting him on the back.

You wrapped up the plan, and before you could count on it, you flew down.

“I think you should let him go, Voldemort,” You said as the alien turned around to see you.

“You’re not…”

“Oh, I know,” you laughed.

“You can’t save up your friend,” the alien’s words were like venom. Tony flew his way over to you, as you were both pointing your hand at him.

“Being honest, I don’t even know him,” you answered.

“And he’s not my friend, this is more like doing the political and correct thing, you know a kind of courtesy,” Tony followed you up.

“Even if there’s two of you, your suits won’t be able to defeat my power,” the alien smirked as he rose his right hand, ready to attack you both.

“Good thing we’re film nerds,” you said as you blasted a hole open the side-wall, as the alien was dislodged through it, but the Wizard was also pulled, so Peter was quick to shoot a web at him, and try to stop him from going into space. Peter was hanging from a web, and you saw how he was dragged into the hole. Your heart stops, but the suit is quick to pull up the mechanical arms, to help Peter.

“Damn, what are those?” he yelled and you were quick to fly down and help him with the Wizard as your father closed the gap in the spaceship. You both landed on the floor, leaving the Wizard to walk. Both Peter and you stayed behind.

“Who are you?” the wizard complained with a frown, as both you and Peter.

Your head showed and you watched the guy.

“Y/N Stark,” The wizard called you before you could even say it.

“I’m Peter by the way,” he walked up offering a hand, which was rejected by the wizard as he glared at him.

“Doctor Strange,” the wizard answered and you frowned.

“Oh, we’re using our made up names, then… I’m Spider-Man,” Peter puffed up his chest.

“What in this world are you doing here?” Doctor Strange glared at Tony. “You brought two teenagers? That was your plan.”

“We just saved you, you could say thank you,” you pointed out.

“You know, you should’ve disappeared when I told you to,” Tony crossed his arms. “Bet you’re regretting that now.”

The Doctor didn’t answer. “You can bring us down to earth, then?” He asked.

Now, it was your father’s time not to answer.

“No, this guy, Thanos, he’s been in my head for 6 years, ever since New York I’ve been thinking about him, he’s the one to send Loki, and I’m sorry, but there’s another infinity stone right there, and I’m sure, I prefer bringing the fight to him rather than have him destroy earth.”

You and Peter glanced at each other unsure of what was going on.

“You prefer risking your daughter,” Doctor Strange said, and Peter snuggled closer to you. “So you say you want to bring the battle to him?”

You felt cold. Thanos, you didn’t know anything about that name, but it felt like bad news.

“I say, let’s stop him before he comes to the world,” Tony said. “I’m not risking her, I know she can take care of herself.”

“Okay, so she’s your daughter,” Strange pointed at you. “And he is your… protege? Or are you his mentor?”

“No,” Peter scowled.

“Ah, so the young Stark brings her boyfriend,” Strange concluded and both Peter, Tony and you were quick to correct him.

“THEY ARE NOT DATING.”

“HE IS NOT MY BOYFRIEND.”

“I THINK WE ARE NOT EVEN FRIENDS.”

Strange rolled his eyes but then turned to Tony.

“I just want you to know, Stark, when it comes to the kid, your daughter, you or the stone, I won’t hesitate on saving the stone.”

The three of you stayed quiet.

“So we’re just… going into space?” You addled as you watched Tony walking over to Peter.

He patted him in on both shoulders, as a knight.

“Kid, you’re an Avenger now,” Tony said as Peter’s face lit up and smiled, he turned to you proud of himself and you stepped up to your father. You cleared your throat.

Tony raised an eyebrow at you.

“Oh, yeah,” he walked over to you, placing his hand on your shoulder and you closed your eyes smiling, you had waited all your life for this. “You’re grounded,” Tony said as he walked away.

You scowled and threw your hands up in the air, as Peter burst out laughing. You glared at him and hit him on his shoulder. He smirked as you were taking off the armor, slowly disappearing. He watched you impressed.

“That’s an amazing armor, too bad you’re not an Avenger,” he teased as you crossed your arms and walked away, watching the space. “Oh c’mon, don’t be mad.”

You weren’t mad, you were afraid and disappointed. You were terrified, and excited. You were confused and zoning out.

Tony and Strange were backing up, discussing something. Fear was read across your father’s face and you knew it was partly because you were here, but it definitely had everything else with that Thanos guy.

“Y/N,” Peter said standing next to you.

“Peter,” you frowned as you watched him.

“We are in space,” he stated as he looked out. It looked so beautiful, and so unexpectedly scary. The stars were amazing, everything that you had dreamed of. You nodded as you watched it.

“It’s beautiful,” you said as it was taking your breath away, Peter smiled and he turned to you.

“You know what else is beautiful?” He asked and you felt your stomach shrink, and your skin to flutter.

“What?” You asked him, not sure if you were ready to take a step up with Peter.

“Being an official Avenger,” he smirked as he laughed jumping off. You scowled and pushed him away. “Oh,” he wiped off a fake tear. “This is going to be fun.”

“Aren’t you scared?” you asked, turning to him, stepping over so you’d be inches apart. He gulped and looked down at you.

“No… this is fun,” he babbled. “I mean, we can do this, right?”

“I guess we can, but, we’re stuck in this flying donut with a stranger, whose name is actually Strange, my dad has that look and I’m not sure, we don’t even know what stone they’re talking about.”

“I think we should go ask,” you said and turned around.

“Hey, y/n, wait,” he took you by your arm and you looked up at Peter. “I know that we haven’t been on the best of terms lately, but, really, thank you for catching me.”

“Anytime,” you smiled, as you both made your way to Tony and Strange. “So who will we fight?”

“His name is Thanos,” Strange started watching you. “He is looking for the 6 infinity stones, he already has 2 of them, or that’s what we know, .”

“Infinity stones,” you raised an eyebrow.

“There are 6 of them, the power stone, the reality stone, the mind stone, the space stone, the soul stone and the time stone,” The doctor said pointing at his chest. “If he gets his hand on all of them, he will destroy half the universe. Already having two makes him the most powerful being in the galaxy.”

“And we are going to just go and fight him? Basically, hand him this stone?” You scowled. “Why don’t we just destroy it before he can even touch it? You know, let’s just toss it in space, or blow it up!”

Tony nodded and the Doctor rolled his eyes. “You can’t deny family.”

“But why? I mean, she’s right,” Peter intruded.

“We swore to protect it,” Strange hissed with venom and you and Peter scowled.

“Where are the other stones?” you asked.

“Vision has the mind stone,” your father exhorted. “I guess Banner will take care of that one.”

“Which ones does he have?” asked Peter as he reached over for your arm.

“Space and power stone,” Strange answered. Or maybe he could have more. Your hand reached for Peter and you squeezed him. His hand was as cold as yours as if you were just getting the whole scenario and fear was taking control of you.

“What’s the plan?” your voice came out deeper than expected.

“Now, can we just… the adults are talking here, please,” Tony said.

“But dad-”

“Yeah, I don’t want to speak to you right now, please, go and kiss Parker or whatever you guys do,” Tony said. “I need to figure out a way in which we can defeat him.”

You didn’t answer and felt how your blood was burning up in rage. You knew your father was angered at you, but not talking to you even when you were about to face probably the scariest and most dangerous thing that you could face was a risk you weren’t willing to take.

You were about to snap at him, but Peter placed his arms around you and pulled you away. Taking you back to the window like surface.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” he marveled.

“Peter,” you glanced up at him. “Promise me something.”

He glanced down at you.

“We will live, for each other, at least,” you strained.

“I promise.”

“Peter, you don’t understand,” you said. 

“No, I do.” 

“No, Peter, I really mean it, I… I really don’t know where we are going, and I’m stuck here with you.”

He chuckled and looked down. “I guess I am scared too.”

“We can’t let my father die, either,” you said. “I can’t lose him.”

He hugged you, tightly, and for the first time in your life, his hug wasn’t teasing it wasn’t anything near from your other hugs, it was a knowing hug.

“You won’t, I promise,” he assured you. But you knew Peter didn’t mean his promise, because there were certain promises you couldn’t take if you weren’t able to make them. This was one of them. “But promise me something then.”

You looked up letting him go.

“I won’t lose you either.”

You didn’t want to answer, you didn’t want promises you couldn’t keep. And you knew, that when it came to save Peter or your father, you had to take risks.

“Y/N, promise me,” he placed his hands on your shoulders and looked at you straight in the eye.

“I promise, Parker,” you alleged. “You worry about me?” You tried to tone down the conversation with a smirk.

“Oh, please, don’t,” he blushed as he looked away, letting you go. “I just want you alive so I can kill you myself.”

“Sounds like a plan,” you smirked.

“And we both know you worry more about me,” he asserted, as you laughed sarcastically.

“Please Parker, I couldn’t care less about you,” you snorted and he threw his head back with a sneaky grin.

He cleared his throat.

“Promise me we will live for each other,” he mocked you, pitching his voice higher. “I won’t lose you, either.”

“Come on, my voice doesn’t sound like that, my voice is even deeper than yours.”

“Is not!” He objected.

“You know, never mind, I want an alien to eat you up,” you joked, denying every feeling of fear that had you powering up.

[hornyliverpudlianputz]

RULES: Choose any three fandoms (in random order) and answer the questions, then tag 10 people.

I was tagged by @dramaticmusicality​ (Thank you love, I had an absolutely insane start to my week so this is very delayed.)

Three fandoms:

* The Monkees

* Star Trek: The Original Series

* M*A*S*H

[side note, I happened to pick 3 fandoms that all have extra stuff so for simplicity I will only be discussing the respective TV shows for each. That means Monkees show characters only, none of the later TOS movies, and neither the movie nor the book of M*A*S*H.]

The first character you loved:

* Hmmm I think it might actually have been Davy, because I’m a bit of an anglophile (I’m not proud of it). That changed pretty quickly to Mike though.

* I think Spock. The first couple episodes were weird. Either Spock or McCoy.

* Oh gosh. Radar. So much. But the first three seasons are wacky so.

The character you never expected to love so much:

* Peter. I kinda expected to hate him because he was the dumb one, but then he actually had very clever lines that were just dumb because he read the room wrong and he had the smile of an angle so like. Yeah.

* I guess Scotty? He just kinda...snuck in there when I wasn’t paying attention and then it was like omg who is this guy who loves the ship more than people?

* Major Houlihan. Margaret was a top tier bitch early on, especially in the first 3 seasons, but as the show progressed she got a hell of a lot of development and by the end she’s great. I might actually do a rant post about her at some point because seriously, she kicked down some pretty stiff barriers.

The character you relate to the most:

* Personally it’s Mike. But realistically if you were to ask my friends who I was most like, it would be Micky. I’m a massive introvert who doesn’t know how to do things by half so when I’m around people I’m super “on” which means crazy energy, I never shut up, and I sing whatever is in my head. Also my hair. And my fashion sense lol. (I quite like a lot of his season 2 looks. Confidence is key.)

* Spock. Logic is awesome. Also he gives off very strong ace vibes.

* Father Mulcahy. Partially because I read him as ace (are you sensing a theme?) but also because he functions as the “bartender character” that the other characters all take their problems to and that happens to me a lot. (I’m told I’m a good listener.)

The character you’d slap:

* Mr. Babbit. Stop trying to throw the guys out! Also Davy occasionally.

* Chekov. He is adorable but he can be a really creepy horndog sometimes. And he’s a little shit too.

* Early Hawkeye. He’s a real dick. Funny, but a dick. Realistically though it would be Frank Burns, obviously.

Three favorite characters (in order of preference):

* Mike, Peter, Micky/Davy (I can’t leave one guy out! Also these are very slim margins, each of the guys have their own appeal to me.)

* Spock, McCoy, Uhura

* Father Mulcahy, Margaret, Klinger

A character you liked at first, but don’t anymore:

* Argh. Davy I guess. It’s not that I don’t like him anymore it’s just that I like Mike more now.

* Um. Eh? Chekov? Idk? His character kinda changes to suit whatever he needed to be in that episode so, sometimes he’s really obnoxious and sometimes he’s fine.

* Kinda Col. Blake? Just, he’s such an incompetent commander and that really bothers me if I think about it too much. A sweet guy but because of the comedy style of the show in the first three seasons he was a real dope.

Three OTPs:

* Gosh ummm...I don’t really ship any of the guys. They’re children!  Fuck it, Mike and Princess Gwen. They were made for each other.

* Ughhhh I don’t ship these people either argh! There is a lot of subtext between the main trio (Kirk, Spock, McCoy) so I guess OT3? If I had to choose?

* [Spoilers!] Klinger and his eventual wife, Soon-Lee. They were cute. And he stayed in Korea for her! Awww!

I tag @annaofwonderland​, @shorty-blackwell​, @nezclaw​, @ewok-sith-lord​, @faerievampireelf, @little-niggah-sugar, and @monkees-world​ if y’all wanna. (no pressure!) Also if anyone else wants to jump on this train, go for it!

[astolat]

Star Wars The Last Jedi

Okay I have tagged this post with everything I can think of that anyone might have used to filter but I am also going to put my longer comments and major spoilers under a cut. 

Things this movie did right for me:

- Made all of Snoke, Kylo Ren, and General Hux into plausible and interesting villains

- Rey’s story and answering the question of her parentage

- Luke’s story for the most part

- Leia being awesome

- Finn generally being awesome although this was 99% John Boyega just inhabiting that character with extremely little help from the script

- The con man/bad guy/codebreaker by Benicio Del Toro 

- General propulsiveness -- it was long and there were a lot of fight scenes but it didn’t lose me

- The really cool new salt planet

- Having many things go wrong instead of right 

- Most of what it said about/did with the Force although I think they somewhat still erred on the side of giving it too many concrete rules instead of sticking to emotional/fairytale logic. 

- Ironing uniforms

Things this movie did wrong for me: 

- Fundamentally, I did not come out of this with a sense of Star Wars-ian wonder and joy the way I did out of The Force Awakens. There are a lot of things I could point to as an explanation (see the below list) but ultimately it just didn’t have a certain kind of magic that for me Star Wars, Empire, parts of Return of the Jedi, and TFA all achieve. 

- The long podracing-esque interlude on casino planet which bailed tension and suspense out of the story with a giant bucket.

- Poe doing incredibly stupid fucking things due to the equivalent of one of those bad romance novels where all sorts of misunderstandings could have been avoided if only the characters sat down and talked for literally 30 seconds, and then to compound it, getting totally let off scot-free by the narrative for said stupid fucking things

- Not enough Luke (There was a lot! But it was still not enough.)

- Phasma vs Finn was underwhelming and I wanted whelming

- The very ending which just sort of...trailed off in multiple ways

- It mostly failed for me at setting up Rose who I really wanted to love except my concluding feeling was I want her sister and not her

SPOILERS GALORE below the cut

So for me the really great chunk of this movie was the Kylo Ren and Rey interaction both before and in the throne room. I loved them communicating, fighting together, and I loved him both killing Snoke but ultimately choosing the Dark Side and yet still wanting Rey with him and her rejecting him. That was the core of the movie for me and they landed it. 

Also, on a meta level, I LOVED and think it is genius that they totally used the trailer (where we see her take his hand) to create suspense in that moment. I also give them a lot of credit for creating suspense in that moment by having several things before then, that in other SW movies would have gone well, go badly. It let me think they might be going in the direction of Rey falling and Finn has to save her -- which actually I wouldn’t have hated, although I like what they actually did more. 

The piece I came away wanting the most though that they didn’t give me is, I really did want to see Luke do something fucking amazing. I wanted him to DESTROY the AT-ATs -- like if anyone has read Dark Empire from Dark Horse, I wanted that opening scene so much. I didn’t want to see him using the Force as basically sleight of hand, and the one line where Kylo says to Rey “you can’t be doing this force projection, it would kill you” was not enough to magnify that act to the level of power that I really wanted to see from Luke before his death. 

It would actually have been fine if they didn’t then have that act exhaust and kill him. But they did, so it just sort of left me dissatisfied. Also I cannot BELIEVE they showed us the X-Wing underwater and did not pay that off with Luke raising it up, that is like the GUN ON THE MANTELPIECE, come ON. The beautiful visual of ending his story with him looking at the sunset didn’t fix it. His death just didn’t feel earned to me by the story, and I really wanted it to be earned. It ended up feeling like “well we’ve got to get Luke offstage before movie #3 so everyone stops paying attention to him” which, IDK, I just left feeling like I want more Luke and now have built-in disappointment for movie #3 because I know in advance I won’t have him. 

That said, I’m mostly okay with what they did with Luke’s story also. My main problem was that the story they built around the Jedi stories just didn’t make me care. This is perennially the problem for me, and the way Empire and ROTJ fixed it is by having Han and Leia together, but here, I still loved Finn, but they failed to sell me on Rose. I wanted to be sold, but they didn’t give her character enough air. Fridging her sister failed to give her backstory the way fridging always fails for me, and the sort of comic-relief-jokey way they introduced her and Finn failed for me too. 

And then second of all, they failed to sell me on the whole story they gave her and Finn and Poe. They don’t even try to make the Alliance make sense, why is Poe even talking to the vice admiral, why does Rose go from someone who works on pipes in the back and doesn’t talk to people to being a pilot and the chief engineer, why is Poe suddenly committing mutiny instead of discussing his idea with the vice admiral, and WHY WHY WHY are Finn and Rose zooming off to another planet for an interlude of what feels like a week while the Resistance cruiser is being chased down by the First Order in what feels like hours. 

It just felt completely stupid and aggressively pointless and unsuspenseful (since clearly no matter what else they WERE going to get off this other planet and back in time) and then finally they get back and then the narrative did do one interesting thing, which is they got actually caught, except then this incredibly stupid mutiny operation of theirs literally gets the entire resistance except for a tiny number of people who can fit into the Falcon all slaughtered. 

And we’re apparently supposed to come away from this thinking well, Poe has sure learned an important and valuable lesson about not committing mutiny, um, how about NO, how about you take the guy responsible for this and court martial him and shove him out an airlock instead of having Leia and the vice admiral he totally undercut standing over him talking lovingly about how he’s such a troublemaker and they like him ha ha ha. The movie really just totally destroyed the character for me with this. 

Anyway, to get back to a happier note, in the last movie Snoke was literally a noneity, Kylo was mostly pathetic, and Hux was generic. One thing this movie did great was make all of them compelling. I found Snoke very viscerally awful in that throne room scene, and I was incredibly satisfied when Kylo killed him. They showed me Kylo being sympathetic and conflicted and then still deliberately choosing the dark in a believable way, and I am really happy that this kind of character is now the actual emperor. And then Hux actually had real emotions here and I felt like I saw them as Kylo Ren humiliates him and he’s sitting there seething in the background. 

So the central villains, except for Phasma who was basically wasted, all came out well in a way that I feel like you really NEED in a Star Wars movie and I feel like I really care about Rey defeating Kylo and that has been powerfully set up for the final movie. 

I just really need a better story for Finn, I need to care more about Rose, and they need to do some heavy lifting to fix Poe for me. AND I NEED MORE LUKE. :’( 

Anyway those are my longwinded thoughts! 

[redheadedwhat]

Visitation pt III

Thanks to everyone that has been reading/replying/reblogging/etc both here and on Ao3! It really means a lot to me. And a super extra special thanks to @kijilinn for beta-ing and helping me out so much. In case you need a refresher: Part I and Part II. And here’s the last chapter: Part IV.

Title: Visitation

Pairing: Negan x OFC

Rating: SFW (Major Negan language in this chapter. Cursing, discussions of sex and violence.) 

*Spoilers for TWD comics post All Out War*

A few days later Tallulah was finally headed to her first visit with Negan. She was escorted to his basement cell by Rick and Michonne, both of whom were carrying guns, and was surprised to see two more armed guards already down there. Apparently, they weren’t taking any chances. “To what do I owe the fucking pleasure, Rick?” Negan asked with a grin. Tallulah was still hidden in the shadows behind Rick, so she got to see Negan before he saw her.

“You’ve got a visitor.” Rick told him coldly. He still felt a bit iffy about this, but after a lot of discussion and debate it had been decided that there would be no harm in letting Negan get supervised visits with Tallulah and their eventual child as long as he behaved himself. As much as Negan could possibly behave himself. That didn’t mean Rick trusted the guy. Hence the armed guards that would be in attendance even though Negan wouldn’t even be exiting his cell. Tallulah knew that was her cue to step into the light and get this visit on the road, but she was surprisingly nervous. She hadn’t seen him in months and now here she was, about to give him life-changing and personal news in front of an audience of his enemies. He was not going to like that. He was a loud mouth, but he liked to keep personal shit personal especially anything that could be perceived as a weakness and used against him. Taking a deep breath she stepped into his line of sight. “Lulu!” Negan greeted her, surprised, but not unhappy. “Did you come to fucking visit me?” “Hi, Negan.” She smiled, stepping closer to his cell. She decided to give him a few moments to notice that she was pregnant before saying anything, knowing that his eyes always lingered on her breasts for a good while before taking in the rest of her. “Holy shit!” There it was. “You look like you swallowed a fucking basketball!” he laughed. “And you look like the Brawny paper towel guy, but you don’t see me making fun of you, do you, Grizzly Adams?” She replied tartly. Of course he’d make a fucking joke. “I’m just fucking with you, darlin’, don’t get your panties in a bunch.” He smiled at her somewhat apologetically. “You look good, really. Who’s the lucky fucker?” Tallulah was taken aback slightly. Did he really just ask her that? He noticed her confusion, “What? I’m happy for you! I’m glad you were able to move on and while I’m sure your new man is nowhere near as fucking badass as me, he’s probably alright in his own way.” “Negan, you’ve only been gone for five months.” She said simply. “Yeah, so?” He shrugged. “I’m seven months pregnant.” She pointed out. Negans eyes widened. “Oh.” “Yeah. Oh.” Tallulah shook her head. How could he be so dense? “Fuck no.” he suddenly exclaimed, almost looking like a trapped rat. “That ain’t mine.” “What?!” Tallulah gasped as Rick stepped forward to intervene. “You’re denying that this is your child?” Rick asked. “Fuck yes I am!” Negan responded forcefully. “There is no possible fucking way that I’m the father!” Rick was confused to say the least. “Wasn’t Tallulah one of your wives?” “Yeah, she was.” Negan confirmed, crossing his arms over his broad chest defensively. “And the two of you were, um…” Rick searched for the least embarrassing way to put it. He so did not want to be having this conversation. “Intimate?” Negan smirked a bit while he watched Rick squirm. He may have been in a shitty situation, but seeing Rick so uncomfortable made it all a little better. “Yeah, we fucked.” he shot a wink over at one of the female guards who also looked extremely uncomfortable. “But I also fucked the rest of my wives and none of them turned up here fucking pregnant. Besides, I was always careful.” “Oh like fuck you were!” Tallulah exclaimed, marching up to the bars now more pissed than hurt. “Have you forgotten all the times you’d conveniently forget to put on a condom until I was too distracted to care? Not to mention that every time I did bring it up I’d get, ‘Aw come on Lulu, I’ll remember next time’ or ‘Sorry baby, my dicks too hard for me to think straight’?” Negan couldn’t really deny that, so he decided to deflect instead. “Ok, so what? Did any of the other fucking wives get pregnant? No. If I’m dropping fucking loads into half a dozen women, I would have gotten more than one knocked up.” “How very eloquent.” Rick muttered, stepping closer to Michonne. He really didn’t want to be here anymore. “Sure, let’s talk about the other wives shall we?” Tallulah countered, a wild glint in her eyes that made Negan a bit nervous. “You do know that women talk, don’t you? Compare notes?” she was right in front of him now, staring him down without fear. “I know for a fact that you were usually a pain in the ass about contraception with most of the other girls. Amber told me that you went so far as to wrap your dick in saran wrap once when you ran out of condoms.” “That’s just because I knew that bitch was cheating on me!” Negan exclaimed. “AHA!” Tallulah stood before him with her hands on her hips, her smile triumphant. “So you wouldn’t have sex with her without protection because you knew she cheated, but you constantly had unprotected sex with me, meaning you knew I wasn’t fucking around on you.” She kind of had him there, not that he was going to admit it. “It’s not fuckin mine, Tallulah! Stop trying to pin this shit on me!” “What possible reason could I have for lying to you?” she asked incredulously. “There’s no such thing as child support anymore and even if there were, you’re in fucking prison! You aren’t the big bad leader of The Sanctuary right now. I’m not going to get any perks. I won’t even get any help with childcare! How is pinning my pregnancy on a man that’s imprisoned for life going to help me out at all?” Tallulah knew she’d said the wrong thing the moment the words left her mouth. She also immediately understood why Negan was acting the way he was. He wasn’t the nicest guy in the world and he loved to portray himself as a vicious motherfucker, but he did actually care about people and he secretly loved to be needed. Having a woman out in the world carrying his child all by herself while he was locked away and unable to do anything to help or protect her must be a huge fucking blow to his ego. It’s probably one of his worst nightmares, actually. And she had just ripped open that wound for a room full of people. Great job, Tallulah. Negan looked pretty pissed and maybe even a bit hurt, but he didn’t want to act out on it in front of their current audience. “Just go back to the Sanctuary, Tallulah.” he gritted out. “I can’t.” She replied softly. She may have understood his motivations and even felt a bit bad, but she wasn’t going to back down. “They don’t want me there. No matter where I go, there’s going to be someone that knows me and knows whose baby this is.” “Allegedly.” Negan grunted. “Well I’m sorry Negan, I tried to call Maury so we could get a paternity test, but it turns out that his schedule is chock full of eating peoples faces.” Negan reluctantly chuckled, apparently finished with the yelling for now. “This is not the place for you, Lulu. The people fucking hate me here. You are not gonna have an easy time making fucking friends.” “So? I’m in reality-tv villain mode. I am not here to make friends.” She smiled, walking up to the cell and putting one hand on the bars while the other rested on her belly. She felt a little better now that he was showing a bit of concern for her. “This is not America’s Next Top Best Friend.” “I forgot how fucking weird you are.” Negan shook his head and walked up to place his hand on top of hers on the cell bars. “I missed that about you.” “I miss that about you, too.” She told him, looking into his eyes and allowing herself to have this little moment. She had been telling the truth when she told Rick that she and Negan weren’t in love, but they were fond of one another. “So,” Rick coughed, once again feeling extremely uncomfortable, “You’re admitting this child is yours?” “Fuck no.” Negan responded immediately, dropping his hand and moving back from the bars. “Oh for fucks sake, Negan!” Tallulah exclaimed. “What do I have to do to make you admit that this baby is yours?!” “I don’t fucking know!” he groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Maybe if the kid fucking looks like me or acts like me or some shit?” “So unless this baby comes out wearing a leather jacket and trying to bash the doctors brains in with its umbilical cord, you won’t admit that you’re the father?” Negan only shrugged, completely done with this conversation for now. Tallulah sighed and looked back at Rick to let him know that she was ready to leave. “Fine, but this isn’t over.” Rick escorted her back upstairs with Michonne taking the rear. Before Michonne reached the staircase she turned to look at Negan in his cell. “You’re an even bigger asshole than I thought.” Michonne told him. “Yeah,” he grumbled, sinking down onto his cot. “I know.”

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Once again, feel free to send me comments/questions/critiques! This is the first story I’ve written in awhile and I’d love some feedback.

@blueco16 is the first person to ask to be tagged for this fic! Thank you so much! 

@negans-network

[tweakerwolf]

Boyfriend to Death question: is everything to know about the characters in-game or are there tidbits of backstory info about the guys in outside sources (creator blogs)? —A person who is missing 5-7 endings for everyone, is stuck because already got the easier endings, and is kind of ashamed of having to use a walkthrough even though it saves me from wasting hours of trial-and-error.

Edit: So I rambled on a bit there…. I’m putting it under a read more XD just so that way not everyone has to scroll past it hahaha. There’s no spoilers (since I normally put spoilers under a read more), it’s just a few paragraphs so it’s on the longer side of a reply.

Um…. hmmm…. I want to say that everything you need to know is in game for both the first and the second. I technically follow Sano and Akira (characters from the first game) but I didn’t do that until AFTER I completed the first game. So I knew nothing about any of the men. I recognized Strade from Gato’s comic, but BTD!Strade is an AU Strade and it has nothing to really do with the comic. Demon!Rire is also from a HUGE AU that Darqx came up with about one of their other comics/stories but I knew absolute nothing about that AU at all. Or even the original story. I can’t say if that made the first game harder for me or not, I haven’t thought about it! But I do remember EP saying that they had to really change Sano around (personality-wise) in order to really include him in the game. So I feel like it’s safe to say that the game is an AU of their characters in general.

The same holds true for the second game as well (I’m assuming you’re asking about the second game but maybe you are only on the first?? But still, this is more evidence that the game is mostly just a fun AU of their characters). I know nothing about Lawrence, as far as I can tell he’s a new character of Gato’s?? I haven’t seen reference of him anywhere before but I could’ve easily missed something. I know Cain already existed but I knew very VERY little about him, just some tidbits on EP’s blogs, nothing that gave me a lot of background on him. And I didn’t even think about his background when I was playing, I just focused on what the game was telling me. Vincent I also knew nothing about, other than he was a werewolf. Technically speaking, if you know Ren’s backstory then his path makes A LOT more sense, BUT…. how he acted in the past doesn’t fully give away how he acts in the second game. Ren has evolved in a way, and it keeps the player guessing!

Honestly I think it’s just the game itself. There are a majority of endings that are easy to find (on average, of course individuals are going to have different play styles). There are the ones that are strictly dialogue based, you piss them off and then you’re dead! It’ll happen the same way every time! But then there are others that are a little bit harder. They require a certain heart level with the guy. Easier when you’ve died a few times and you are starting to understand what the character likes and dislikes.Then there are the ones that require a very specific path of dialogue to be followed. Require not only a certain heart level, but also a certain sanity level too! One missed dialogue choice can keep the ending hidden from you and it’s frustrating!!! Personally I think there’s no reason to be ashamed in needing a guide or two, the characters are complex and the choices are complex. Even if you are getting the same dialogue choices over and over, the combination that you select them truly matter in the hard-to-get endings.

I’m sure once you find those hard endings, it’ll make more sense. There was never a point when I was playing either game where I KNEW what to click because of some outside-of-game tidbit. There are easter eggs of course though! You recognize them referencing a character, or some artwork on their wall! But those kinds of references have mostly just been extra; exciting things to be like ‘I know that!’. I’m not sure if the game designers did that as a way to be fair (since obviously some players are going to be more knowledgeable about their works), or if they just didn’t want to make the game too easy. Honestly if I had to guess, I’m sure it’s the second XD They didn’t want people to have the guys figured out so they didn’t use too many aspects of their background/personality that were well known.

If you’re ashamed of using a guide but at the same time I totally understand how trial and error can take up hours of time!!! I say, try following a guide a little bit at a time. Don’t read the WHOLE thing and then find the ending. Read down the dialogue until you come to something you haven’t clicked before. Stop there. Play the game up to where you read (save) and then try to figure out the rest of the ending from there!  So if you’re reading a guide and it’s like Pick up _____ and you’re like we can pick that up??? Obviously you’ve never gone down that path before so try it :) That way MOST of the figuring out is still coming from you, maybe you won’t feel as bad about using a guide :)

ALSO, I’ve been giving out hints :D Feel free to use those hints. If the hints are really BIG, the ask will be tagged as spoilers. Try reading the basic hints first and then if you’re still stuck, try the “spoilers” edition of the hints. Or, feel free to ask me :) If you have a specific ending you want to get (obviously you’d have to ask by number since you wouldn’t have the title of it lol) but don’t want to be totally spoiled, I can give hints on how to get it… to the best of my ability. Hints are a lot more fun since it lets YOU find the endings yourself, with just a push in the right direction :)