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dangermousie · 3 years

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Hello !

I was wondering whether you could rate and tell us of your top 5 favourite webnovels/cnovels of all time ?! (Sorry if this has already been answered lol😅)

Thank you, stay safe and have a nice day🖤

Awww, thank you and that is such a lovely ask!!!

From n1 to n5, here they are (they happen to be all danmei.)

1. The Husky and His White Cat Shizun (2ha) - my n1 forever and ever.

Taxian Jun, the horrific cultivation emperor of the world who razed cities and destroyed sects, is surrounded on his mountain. The righteous sects are terrified to confront him but tired of living, Taxian Jun consumes poison and dies by suicide at the age of 32. And opens his eyes as 16 year old Mo Ran, Mo Ran long before he became Taxian Jun, Mo Ran who is excited at a chance to save the one person he loved and lost. Oh, and to deal with his loathed shizun, the unapproachable and strict Chu Wanning, his past life’s biggest enemy.

I have no idea if it’s objectively the best on this list but it hits every trope I love, its bleak worldview (the world will change only incrementally but that’s enough, average person will not appreciate the sacrifice but it’s still worthwhile, and love is worth everything) mirrors mine, and the sheer complexity of the plot and cascade of plot twists each of which is insane and yet completely logical, is amazing (this is a rare novel where it’s even more fun to reread than read for the first time because you keep seeing all the hints and trail crumbs laid out that you did not see the first time.)

And the characters!!! I mean, this novel has multiple universes/timelines, a side trip to the Underworld AND the demon realm, a plot more twisted than a store’s worth of pretzels and yet the thing that hits me the most are the characters. Mo Ran is my favorite web novel character of all time and I love Chu Wanning so. All the secondary characters are wonderfully written (and some of them made me bawl) and they are all complex. My opinion of all of them changed many times over; the novel doesn’t make it easy to love some of them but then you do and it’s so worthwhile! That slow change is one of the delights of the novel - I started out disliking the unpleasant, superior Chu Wanning and cruel, callow Mo Ran and then I loved them so so hard and cried for them so so hard and was in awe of their heroism and sacrifice and selflessness and capacity to love.

Oh, and the fact that this novel does something almost impossible - it has its protagonist start out as so clearly irredeemable and then slowly and painfully and thoroughly redeems him (without ever letting the reader forget what it is he needs redemption for.)

Also, for a novel that made me cry so hard I felt ill, this book is just so damn funny with the most sarcastic sense of humor imaginable (the serious angst doesn’t even kick in until 90+ chapters!)

Anyway I should stop or I will write a dissertation. But this is the one web novel that I would put in my top 5 not just web novels but any novels in any shape or form. The plentiful trigger warnings are there for a reason so stay away if they are an issue, but if not, if anyone hasn’t read it yet, what are you doing with your life?!

2. Stains of Filth (Yuwu) - another novel by the author of 2ha. Clearly she just pushes all my buttons every time. This one is much shorter and has a plot that is twisty but less twisty than 2ha. Still, all that means is that intensity and the pain are more concentrated.

Aristocratic Mo Xi and former slave Gu Mang were both legendary generals of the empire and lovers. But Gu Mang betrayed the country and switched to the enemy. Now he is back as a peace offering by that country and Mo Xi has to deal with the fact that his feelings are as strong as ever.

This novel!!! So much pain and intensity!!! So many amazing plot twists and supporting characters. The same bleak world view, the same unjust society, the same protagonists doing right things despite the cost. Mo Xi’s intensity and inability to let go (he’s imprinted on Gu Mang and that’s it) is romantic, bone-shakingly intense, and tragic all at once. And oh Gu Mang! So many times I just wanted to reach into the book physically to protect him. The novel deals with unjust societies, memory versus personality, what it’s like to be good in a bad universe etc. And it both made me sob and giggle, repeatedly, and sold me on literally death-defying (but not honor-defying!) love.

Oh, and special shout out to the fact that like 2ha, you may start out hating some characters and end up a rabid fangirl (cough Murong Lian!)

3. Qiang Jin Jiu - a dense political tome that takes a while to get going but then it’s a runaway train.

In a fictional dynasty, Shen Zechuan, the only remaining son of a disgraced aristocratic family and Xiao Chiye, the younger son of a family of generals guarding the border join forces (and then something else) to get power and pull down the dysfunctional system.

This is so elegant and smart (a rare web novel I’d recommend to anyone who just loves solid period fiction) and you probably need a notebook to keep track of the politics and military strategy. These characters are very very smart not just because the author says so.

As to the characters, there is a large cast and I love many of them, but for me the novel is made by Shen Zechuan and Xiao Chiye. SZC is gorgeous and delicate and icy and can kill you before you have time to blink. Saddled with the sins of the family he had no pleasant interaction with, he claws his way out of hell (seeing the sinkhole he was trapped in, literally as well) to take down those who wronged him but also to amass power so all the tragedy and corruption won’t happen again and the whole rotten system comes crashing down. XCY is a military genius who is trapped as a hostage in the capital because the court doesn’t trust his family. He longs to return to the plains of home and to take his rightful place. The two men start out as bitter enemies, then reluctant and sniping allies, then as friends and eventually as one of the most gorgeous, tender, swoony OTPs.

Anyway this is one is a bona fide masterpiece, equal parts smart and emotionally intense.

4. Wu Chang Jie - are you an emotional vampire? I am and this novel is a banquet.

In a highly fantastical setting, we meet our protagonists - the sunny Xie Bian and the intense and surly Fan Wushe. Xie Bian is a human who assists his master in conveying souls to the underworld and making sure no mishaps happen. Bian is concentrated sunshine in human form and to meet him is to love him. When the novel opens, his drunk master brings back another human to be his shidi and assist with duties - said human is uncommunicative, intense and surly Wushe. Bian is excited to have a shidi but little does he know that a story dealing with the horrors of past lifetime is about to start.

Anyway, why WCJ? So many reasons. It has such a dark bleak worldview - this world is a horrifying system where powerful cannibalize each other’s cores for an impossible chance to ascend, where gods have sealed off their realm and all that’s left is neverending human misery and hell (the only way you’d see a deity is if they’d been sent down to suffer over and over and over), where even reincarnation doesn’t fix things and bad acts are often unpunished. And the novel then asks - is it worth being a good person in such a world? More, is it worth being a good person in such a world when nothing good has ever happened to you and you have been repeatedly betrayed due to your goodness? And the answer, on Bian’s part, is an uncompromising yes.

Ah yes, the other reason to love this novel - the protagonists and their fucked up fucked up relationship. Bian (who was Prince Ziheng in the past life) is so genuinely good. But he is that rare thing - good but not saintly, noble but not cloying. So much of the novel is his getting taken apart over and over and barely able to put himself back together every time but his soul is still as amazing as ever.

And then there is Wushe (who was Prince Zixiao in past life, Ziheng’s not-bio-related brother.) Wushe is not a good person. He is a monster. And he loves Bian/Ziheng more than his life and his soul and the entire world but he’s also the one who hurt him more than anyone else ever could and did it over and over. His love survived a literal century of torture in the worst kind of hell and refused the usual memory loss of new life. But it also humiliated and broke Ziheng down to his constituent parts.

One of the things that is so fascinating to me about this novel is the question of what can be forgiven/what should be forgiven/what kind of expiation is enough/can you ever love someone who you loved so much and then he hurt you so badly and is now repentant? And it never sweeps trauma under the rug or hand waves it away but deals with it head on.

If you want healthy relationships, you should stay far away from this novel but if intense insane ones with a feral barely human one capable of destroying the world leashed by love and guilt to the sane deeply good one is your bag, come right in.

There is also the world building and the fact that yes, the big fall out between Ziheng x Zixiao is based on not knowing all the facts but it’s not “why can’t you talk?! This is dumb!” But is totally in keeping with both events and their characters. It’s reasonable for Ziheng to do what he does and for Zixiao to misunderstand and decide Ziheng is now his biggest enemy (but still one he’s fixated on) and for Ziheng to never be able to clarify.

Anyway, once again this is trigger warning central so please heed those, but if they are no issue, this one is wonderful.

5. OK, this is hard and switches between Sha Po Lang, Heaven Official’s Blessing and The Golden Stage depending on my mood. So what the hell, I am gonna write about all of them.

Sha Po Lang - so smart and so much clever world building. There is enough politicking to satisfy a Qiang Jin Jiu fan, it’s steampunk, and our two protagonists - Gu Yun, the empire’s most powerful general, who’s loyal to the empire despite being badly wronged by it, and Chang Geng, a cursed prince with barbarian blood and horrifying childhood - are wonderful separately and together. This is a huge slow burn but it’s totally worth it! They fall in love with each other’s hearts and brains and ability as much as anything. (Yes, this is the one with the yifu thing. Gu Yun is made Chang Geng’s foster father when he rescues him and brings him back to the capital as a way to keep CG safe in imperial strife. They are 12 and 19 at the time so clearly it’s never a parental relationship.)

Heaven Official’s Blessing (TCGF) - I love it’s sprawling narrative and cast, I love its inventive setting and picaresque story. It’s hilarious and can make me cry. But the novel’s place on this list is due to Xie Lian who is part Kenshin part drama WWX part pure goodness wrapped in heartbreak and trauma wrapped in sunshine.

The Golden Stage - two smart and principled (yes, they both have principles different though they may be) men navigate their arranged marriage, their past friendship and their past break up, become a super couple (one of the healthiest danmei couples I’ve ever read and proves healthy doesn’t have to be boring), save the country and bring down the emperor or two and just generally this is my rainy day book.

I guess I didn’t write as much for the three n5 candidates as I did for 1-4 but my brain is beginning to curdle so...

#cnovel #heaven official's blessing #2ha #yuwu #sha po lang #qiang jin jiu #wu chang jie #the golden stage #tcgf #asks

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jeonronwoo · 3 years

Text

joyride → j.jh

pairings: frat boy!jaehyun x female!reader

wc: 1.5k

genre: fluff, humor, suggestive.

warnings: slight cursing.

summary: being stressed from the exams and wanting to study, your mischievous boyfriend had other plans in mind for you.

part of ficscafe’s scenario event.

scenario used: number 34. “when they go on road trips.”

song recommendation while reading: joyride by sonia ammar, 0 mile by nct 127, blue hour by txt.

you were studying for your upcoming finals, you were starting in five days and you had to make sure you would get a good grade and pass the tests because you won’t take your mother nagging you about your grades and comparing them to your friends’ grades and maybe take away your phone too.

you heard something like knocking, you took off your earphones and listened closely, you shrugged and was about to put the earphone back in your ear but the knocking sound came again, it was coming from the window.

furrowing your eyebrows, you opened the window and saw your boyfriend leaning against his car and when he saw you, he smiled, your eyes widened upon seeing him.

“jaehyun?! what the fuck are you doing here?” you exclaimed quietly and he just smirked at you.

“i tried calling you but your phone was turned off, come on, we’re going out.” he said and you stared down at him shocked.

“um, maybe you haven’t noticed but it’s past 10 now, and i’m studying, mom is gonna kill me if she knew i went out with you!” you hissed and he just stared at you.

“i’m not taking no for an answer, either you come down now or i’ll personally come and get you,” jaehyun said and you huffed knowing fully well that he was capable of doing so.

“fine! but we have to be quick,” you said and closed the window.

you looked through your wardrobe and grabbed a sweater pulling it over your head. you left your room and checked on your mom in her room to find that she was in a deep slumber, you sighed and quickly left through the front door.

you saw jaehyun waiting for you in front of his car, you walked over to him with a displeased look on your face, he laughed taking you in his arms.

“why do you look so angry?” he asked and you looked up at him and replied whining a little.

“why? i’m gonna fail this class because of you!”

jaehyun chuckled and kissed your forehead saying, “no you won’t, you’re too smart to fail.”

he opened the door of the passenger seat for you and you sat buckling up your seatbelt. jaehyun also jumped in the car seat and started the car as he gave you his phone.

“play some music for us.” he said and you grabbed the aux cord and connected it to the phone.

you looked for the playlist you made two days ago, it was a playlist filled with slow songs. you smiled when you shuffled the playlist and your favourite song played.

“where are we going?” you asked.

“nowhere, we will just keep driving around for a while. the weather is good tonight, and i know you’ve been stressing over exams, and because i’m a good boyfriend, i decided to take you on a small road trip.” jaehyun replied and you smiled and held his hand intertwining it with yours.

the next few moments were spent in silence, so jaehyun decided to break it by asking you a question which he knew you weren’t going to stop talking about.

“so tell me, what happened to aiden after he escaped from the thugs?”

he smiled when he saw how your eyes lit up when he brought the topic of the novel you were currently reading and started telling him all about what you read excitedly.

“he finally met ally! he felt so bad when he saw her and apologised for hitting her with the rock. he also knew what the dagger can do, he found out that it can transport him anywhere he wants in the kingdom just by jumping into a gap, he knew that claudius isn’t who he thought he was. also ally fell ill and he took care of her in nova’s hut. i stopped there.”

jaehyun heard you talking intently asking about some details which you happily explained to him. he smiled when he remembered what his friend johnny told him a few hours ago when he asked him to borrow his car but jaehyun refused, telling him that you were stressing over exams and he was taking you on a road trip.

“oh my god, you’re so whipped for her!”

jaehyun didn’t mind being told this, ever since he met you he knew that you would do this to him, he tried to stay away from you not wanting to get you involved with him but he found himself not being able to stay away from you and asked you out.

he was everything you looked for in your future partner, he was caring and loving towards you, he always made sure you were okay, and on nights when you call him crying because you fought with your mother, he would always be there for you making sure that nothing of her words get to you.

before you he was lost, he found his way back because of you, he wasn’t the same reckless hot-headed boy he was before you, he was a better version of himself, he changed to the best just for you.

“aren’t you such a bookworm?” he teased playfully and you just rolled your eyes.

“oh shut up, i know you secretly take peek sometimes!” you argued and he smiled playfully shaking his head.

“you have no proof.”

“whatever. can we get something to eat? i’m so hungry,” you said and he smiled nodding and drove to the nearest diner that would be open at this hour.

he parked the car in front of the diner and left to get the both of you some food. you smiled when you looked down at his lock screen which was a photo of the two of you together on your fourth date.

sometimes you wonder how you managed to have such a wonderful person as your boyfriend, he deserved someone better than you. but whenever you said that jaehyun would scold you assuring you that no one would be better for him other than you.

ten minutes passed with the soft music playing, you saw jaehyun coming back with the food, he got inside the car and you took the bags from him opening them taking a bite from your sandwich. jaehyun smiled and also started eating.

“how is the subject you’re studying?” he asked, you took a sip from your coke.

“eh, not bad, i managed to finish the characters. i guess i will be continuing later,” you replied. “i just hope that professor lee is going to give me a good grade, that little bitch doesn’t give anyone good grades except for her pets.” you rolled your eyes and jaehyun laughed.

“her husband is even worse.” jaehyun said and you nodded in agreement.

“i believe so too, what a lovely couple!” you said sarcastically.

your phone dinged and you saw a message from your sister telling you to return home because your mother was asking for you. your eyes widened and jaehyun looked at your phone groaning in annoyance.

“i hate your sister.”

“me too, but i have to. come on, finish eating quickly.” you said you took a big bite from your sandwich to finish it quickly.

after ten minutes, you two were finally done and finished the food. jaehyun started the car and drove you home.

once you reached your house, he stopped the car and you turned to look at him with a grateful smile.

“thank you so much love, i really needed this,” you said and hugged him tightly.

“of course baby, anything for you.” jaehyun said and pulled away kissing your cheek.

you got out of the car and stopped in front of his car, you looked up at him and stared deeply into his eyes. you have never felt so much love towards anyone like this before, and you couldn’t stop the eight letters that escaped you.

“i love you.”

jaehyun felt the air being knocked out of his lungs when he heard those words, he stared at you for a few seconds before grabbing your face kissing you on the lips.

you smiled into the kiss wrapping your arms around his neck bringing him even closer, it was a passionate kiss, nothing like any kiss you shared before. jaehyun’s hands held your waist massaging it. his tongue slipped inside your mouth and explored every inch of it, you gently tugged at his hair, causing him to release a soft groan.

finally, the two of you pulled away and jaehyun looked at you smiling fondly and whispered.

“i love you too.”

“y/n?!”

your eyes widened when you heard your mother’s voice and jaehyun looked at you and winked, running to his car driving away.

“y/n get inside the house now!” your mother demanded.

you were too lost in your mind to care about the scolding you were receiving from your mother, your mind was too occupied with the kiss you shared with jaehyun and how he also loves you like you love him.

#ficscafe #ficscafe scenario event #kdiner #nct #nct 127 #nct u #nct 127 imagines #nct 127 scenarios #nct 127 fics #nct 127 reactions #nct 127 jaehyun #jung jaehyun imagines #jung jaehyun scenarios #jung jaehyun fanfic #jaehyun imagines #jaehyun scenarios #jaehyun fanfic #jaehyun fluff

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kisskeiji · 2 years

Text

10. Wandering Romance.

Lost & Found.

WARNINGS: language, descriptions of anxiety.

You never were one to yell, it was unusual for you to burst the way you did at Iwaizumi the day before, the pain in your voice and the angry tears running down your cheeks haunted the trainer the whole ride home. Everyone was used to your calm resolve and monotone voice when you were angry, not even him, after all those years knowing you, was graced with the sight of you and your raw emotions more than once. Did he caused all that or did you became someone he didn’t know anymore?

Your words were like an endless loop in his head as he sat on the dusty couch, his body felt heavy, and he could only stare into space. It took a while for everything to sink in, the damage he did went deeper than he anticipated, it affected him too. And it didn’t matter how many times he tried to get his point across, you were not going to accept his apology, a simple ‘sorry’ wasn’t going to cut it for both of you. Being in each other’s lives would create another cycle of hurt and vengeance. He would be miserable as he watched you build your life with Atsumu, he couldn’t explain the origin of his envy and the ill intentions that bubbled up in the back of his mind.

Your happiness shouldn’t be the reason for his dreariness. He really was fucked up inside, as you said before.

He sighed, basking in the silence of his apartment for a few minutes when the sound of the door opening made him look to his side.

“What are you doing here?” Hanamaki asked, taking off his shoes. “Why are you back so early? I thought you weren’t coming back until next week.”

“Change of plans, I guess.” Iwaizumi said, closing his eyes.

“Are you okay?” His friend inquired, sitting by his side on the couch, he noticed Iwaizumi’s eyes fixed on the ceiling. “Do you want to talk about it?” Iwaizumi looked at the pink-haired man for a second.

“I saw Y/N. I wanted to talk to her and apologize, but I fucked up again.” He ran his hands over his face as the images of your angry face flashed through his memory. “If she didn’t hate me before, I’m sure she does now.” Hanamaki held back a giggle. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, it’s just… You can’t be that dense, dude. I know you, you’re smarter than that.”

“I’m not in the mood for your jokes, Makki, leave me alone.”

“No, no, let’s talk. Because you put us through your lies and their consequences, you hurt us all, caused one of our best friends to avoid us for over a year, you treat us like shit because you are bitter and angry.” Takahiro recounted. “And not happy with making your misery everyone’s problem, you insist on pushing this narrative to redeem your character as if no one knew how badly you fucked up.” He wanted to laugh, out of anger and frustration.

As much as Iwaizumi had fucked up, he was still his friend and seeing him slowly destroy himself hurted Makki just as much. “We told you many times not to bother her, and yet you went out of your way, flew all the way back, leaving your fucking job… just so you can sleep at night?”

“Yes, Makki, that’s exactly what I did. You’re so right, are you a mind reader or something?” Iwaizumi fired back sarcastically.

“Doesn’t take a mind reader to recognize a fucking idiot!”

“I’m done here.” The trainer got up and walked to his room.

“Sure, go hide in your room! See if you can get your head out of your ass while you’re at it.” There was no response after that. They were both done even when their word exchange was short-lived.

Hanamaki was sure he wasn’t the only one deeply hurt and tired of Iwaizumi´s antics. Matsukawa and Oikawa were too, and they didn’t even live in the same city. Truth to be told, he was far more worried about you since Iwaizumi admitted your encounter, of course, you were strong, but by the look of things and his friend’s behavior, you were probably distraught too.

One thing you appreciated about Makki and Mattsun was their bluntness. They always went straight to the point, it took them a while to go back to your old dynamic, but you did nonetheless. He sent you a text after thinking about it for a minute or two.

‘I’m sure you don’t want to talk about it right now, but if you want me to beat him up I can call Mattsun for backup.’

It read. You saw the notification as it lit up your screen and smiled a little. You replied with a quick thank you and left your phone on your nightstand. Surprisingly enough, you felt numb enough not to recall any of the previous events. The only sensation in your body was exhaustion, maybe from all the yelling or for finally getting rid of the weight you carried on your shoulders for almost two years. Maybe both. You took a shower after getting home and went straight to bed for a while to finish the work you brought home since you left early.

Evening turned into night and you forced yourself to have something small to eat even though you weren’t hungry, you knew Atsumu wouldn’t like it if you went to bed with an empty stomach. His voice resonated in your head, berating you for skipping meals. You debated yourself if it was a good idea to tell him about your ‘talk’ with Iwaizumi over the phone or if you should wait until he came back. You didn’t want to throw him off his game by worrying him even more.

‘That’s a problem for future me.’ You thought before turning the lights off so you could sleep.

By morning you felt much better, still tired, but better. Your limbs felt less heavy and your mind wasn’t as foggy, so you went ahead and started with your day as you normally would, you even had breakfast at home instead of the facility’s cafeteria. You were set on having a good day, and nothing was going to ruin it.

But that mindset only lasted for a few minutes, realization sunk in when you parked the car and took off your sunglasses. You sighed, looking at yourself in the rearview, you had enough of that a long time ago, so much had happened since you picked your pieces up, and the ones that were missing were already replaced with new and better ones.

You’d never understand Iwaizumi’s stubbornness to let go, his fixation with the past, and his obsession with fixing the unfixable. Maybe that’s what made you two fall apart, you always had one step into the future while he was stuck three steps in the past, holding grudges. Not a lot has changed since you were with him, and that’s why you were so reluctant to give him the forgiveness he craved so much.

While essentially you were the same person, the lessons you learned in your healing process molded you differently, especially with Atsumu in your life, you learned a very valuable lesson with him. If you can’t see someone in your future, then don’t entertain them in your present, and if someone got stuck in your past, it’s because they weren’t worthy of your future. Of course, he didn’t phrase it like that, it was probably more aggressive, but he got his point across, didn’t he?

The only thing left to do was to move on, hoping it’ll be easier this time.

You walked to your office calmly with your bag hanging under your arm and sunglasses on top of your head.

“Morning, girls.” You said as you entered your section, everyone greeted you back and went back to work. You focused on setting your belongings on your desk to start your day. Going through emails, checking your calendars, and crossing tasks from your ‘to-do list’ as you finished them. About two hours in and a few calls with magazine editors, your body craved some caffeine to keep going.

Yeah, you weren’t so proud of your codependence on caffeine, but your workload required at least two cups of coffee every day. “What happened to our coffee machine?” You asked when you noticed the appliance was missing from the corner you conditioned for your team.

“Inunaki-senshu dared the rookies to steal it.” One of your assistants explained.

“What?” There wasn’t a real explanation for it, the team seniors decided to do an extensive initiation ritual for some reason, it was funny at first, but the ritual was about to hit the month mark, and so far every department in the facility had already suffered from the ravages of the celebration. “Where’s Hideko?” You asked, maybe she could help you out, but apparently she hadn’t arrived yet. You huffed in frustration, taking your radio from your desk to ask if anyone knew where your department’s beloved coffee machine could be. A trail of negative responses made your frustration grow by the second, so you walked out of your office to get it back yourself.

“Inunaki Shion, you have five minutes to give my coffee machine back or I’m posting your birthday pictures on every front page across the country.” You announced through your radio, knowing the trainers and assistants had theirs on them, and that Inunaki had to be near one of them. You clicked the elevator button repeatedly, waiting for the doors to open.

A few staff members replied through their radios, revealing Inunaki’s whereabouts and possible hiding spots. “Here’s another dare for all the rookies, the first one to bring my machine back is not getting their bad shots on the official website.” You threatened as you looked up to see the small screen on top of the elevator signaling there was someone going up to the floor you were currently in. You were really trying to have a good day, but your team wasn’t making it any easier.

“What on earth is going on?” You heard Hideko’s voice from your radio. ‘Finally.’

“They stole my coffee machine and won’t give it back.” You pressed the button on the side of your radio to reply.

“ I’ll be up in a second, but what if I told you I have something better than your coffee machine?”

“Doubt it.” You waited for the particular beep the radio did after every message.

The doors opened but you were still looking up. “What are you looking at?” That voice was familiar, it was the one that wished you good night every day. You immediately looked straight ahead to see your boyfriend standing right in front of you. He dropped his bags before you could say anything, his hands cupped your face gently as he brought you closer to him with a bright smile. “Cat got your tongue?”

“What are you doing here?” You asked, placing your hands on his forearms for stability, he pecked your lips before replying.

“I missed you.”

“But the tournament!”

“I took care of it, don’t worry about it, okay?” He reassured you.

“Miya, you better get your bags before I let go of these doors,” Hideko said, making your boyfriend roll his eyes, you were glad his back was facing her because otherwise, he wouldn’t hear the end of it. He had to let go of you for a second to get his things. “So? Better than your coffee machine, right?” You nodded at her question, smiling. “I’ll go get it back anyway, and I’ll stop that damned initiation Inunaki has going on.”

“Please do before they terrorize the janitors.” You said, making your boss laugh. Once Atsumu finished gathering his things, she got back into the elevator, but with the intention of going down this time. As soon as the door closed, you felt Atsumu’s arms circle around your figure lovingly.

“Let’s go to my office, or do you want to go home first? But you’ll have to stay at my place for a few days, there’s nothing to eat at yours, I had to empty it all out. You should’ve told me, I could’ve at least cleaned a little, it’s probably all dusted.” You were letting all of your thoughts out without noticing. Atsumu kissed your temple and laughed a little. “I’ll give you my keys, so you can go rest at my house.”

“That sounds great, baby, but I was hoping we could talk first, you know?” He said, pulling away and turning you around to look at you. You both knew what he was referring to, but he still tried his best to explain his impromptu arrival. “I came after him, I booked a flight as soon as I could and came straight here to see if you were okay.”

You stared at him, still trying to process what he said. “I’ll tell you all about it, just not here.” He looked around the corridor. Taking his hand on yours, you guided him to your office and closed the door behind you. He settled his bags on the small couch as you sat on your chair, then he walked to your desk. It suddenly felt as if you were being interrogated, concern filled Atsumu’s eyes, the same ones you were trying to avoid as you tried to put into words what happened the day before. He placed his hands on the edge of your desk and leaned a little.

“It’s just me.” Atsumu said, making you look up.

“I know.” You tried to smile. “You go first.” He nodded.

“The night before the opening, he asked me to talk to him and I agreed because I know much this weighs on you even when you don’t say it out loud. I thought that maybe coming to some sort of resolve would help you, but then he started talking, and I swear I never wanted to punch someone so bad in my life.” He said, shaking his head at the memory, you smirked in agreement. “He said a bunch of nonsense, and I had to ground him, I told him he was pathetic and I left.”

“The next morning we were told he had a family emergency and he left. Omi and I thought it was odd so we went to Oikawa. It was great to finally meet him, by the way.” He interrupted himself for a second. “Anyway, he got worried and called Iwaizumi’s mom to see if everything was okay, turns out she was okay and I left right after because I knew he would come after you.” You stared at him for a second, feeling terrible for the situation you put him in.

“He was here yesterday.” You said.

“You talked to him?” You nodded at his question.

“We talked, and I got very angry.” You inhaled before continuing. “He started avoiding details I found along the way through people, and I was so, so mad at him, he was still lying after all this time.” Your throat itched with discomfort, eyes threatening to spill a few tears. “I really wanted to forgive him, you know? But he makes it so hard, and I’m tired of being the bigger person.”

“It would’ve been worse if you forgave him. He’d be the same person, and he’d keep on hurting everyone in his life.” Your boyfriend explained. “You don’t have to forgive him.”

“But I do.” You confessed. “Look, he wasn’t always like this, I’ve known him since we were kids, something’s wrong with him, but fixing it, it’s not up to me.” Atsumu walked around your desk and sat slightly on it before resting one of his hands on your cheek. “I feel like shit, like I’m living in spite of him.”

“And what if you are?”

“It was never my intention.” You stated simply. Giving yourself a minute to breathe in.

You never wanted to hurt anyone with your actions, albeit you did in the end, it was inevitable. You couldn’t describe what was going through your body and mind in that very moment, or the day before when you found yourself letting go of all the anger harbored inside of you, that being honest, you weren’t even aware of its existence, at least not as anger. You never wanted to hurt anyone, you weren’t supposed to, given the decisions you took, you thought it was the best for everyone. For him.

You were told time and time again that you were walking on eggshells, that you were too considerate, too enabling, too forgiving; but the people who judged you never understood that you accommodated for yourself rather than Iwaizumi. Because to bear with a messy breakup would’ve been your last straw, and you knew it. You knew it by the way things played the day before, even after years of working on yourself, your words shot to kill, and killing they did, you were sure of it.

Atsumu said your name softly, running his thumb freely on your cheek. “You are not living in spite of him, you’re just living.” He said. “Whatever the fuck is going through his mind is not your problem, if he wants to keep playing the victim like he has before, there´s nothing you can do about it. No matter how many ways you come up with to explain yourself, he’s always gonna be the saint on his side of the story, the difference is that the people who love you know your character.”

“We know you, and we know there’s truth in what you say, and that there never was malice in what you did.” He was now crouching to be at the same level as you. “You care so much about what he feels to this day, but do you ever stop and wonder if he ever cares about what you feel?” You remained silent. He didn’t.

Hajime could only repeat how sorry he was, and it wasn’t hard to deduce his actions were ridden by self-indulgence. You shook your head, still looking at Atsumu. “Are you hurting right now?”

“What’s with all of these questions?” You tried to laugh it off not wanting to cry at work, again. “Don’t look at me like that…” Your voice pleaded, looking away, he called your name once again. “What happened to princess?”

“Stop avoiding my question.”

“I don’t know, Atsumu. I don’t know what I’m feeling.” You confessed. Atsumu took your hand, tugging slightly to make you stand up, once you did, his left hand traveled to the back of your head, leading you to his chest as you embraced his torso pulling him closer. You sighed in relief to avoid crying, your body aching for your boyfriend’s warmth, hoping for things to fall into place once you were in his arms, at least for a few seconds, because as puzzling as your thoughts could be, Atsumu seemed to understand you better than yourself at times. “I really don’t want to cry at work, Tsumu.” You said, making him laugh a little.

“Sorry.” He kissed your temple. “I love you.” He admitted after a second of silence, you inhaled deeply, taking his scent in, a mixture of fresh laundry and the familiar smell of his deodorant that lingered permanently on him welcomed you, and assured you that you didn’t have to grieve by yourself.

“I love you more.” Your words came out a bit muffled, you planted a small kiss on his chest as a thank you, he reciprocated by kissing the top of your head, basking in the intimacy of the moment, you never noticed when the door opened.

“Sorry to interrupt this beautiful moment, but I found your coffee machine.” You heard Hideko say, curiosity making you break the embrace to look at your boss. She stepped aside to let one of the rookies in, he had orange hair and if you remembered correctly, his name was Hinata.

“Please, Y/N-san, don’t kill us. It was a dare, I swear, they forced us!” He held the appliance from the bottom, desperately explaining himself.

“Shoyo-kun!” Atsumu exclaimed before you could say anything.

“Miya-san?” Hinata went from frightened to confused in a matter of seconds.

“You know each other?” Hideko asked, just as surprised as Hinata when Atsumu walked up to him to shake his hand. Atsumu explained how they met each other in high school and the rivalry between their schools. You smiled at the sight of a happy Atsumu, noticing the awkward position Hinata was standing, still holding the coffee machine, you said:

“You can leave the machine outside, Hinata, I’ll put it back later.” He smiled before walking out of your office. Atsumu looked at you with a small smile. “Go catch up with him, I’ll be here.” He followed Hinata after you said that, leaving you and Hideko alone.

“Do you want to go get Inunaki?” You shook your head, telling her you’d talk with him later, she shrugged and closed the door, now you were by yourself.

For some reason the air felt sharper in your lungs, you wanted to blame it on the air conditioner but you knew that pain well enough to know it was your own body fighting the panic building inside you. Shivering for a moment, you breathed slowly, pulling yourself back together, you still had to endure the rest of the day before coming undone.

‘Suck it up.’

Atsumu entertained himself by practicing with the rookies while he waited for you, he refused to go home without you and even tried to lure you out of your office a few times but you told him repeatedly you couldn’t leave early. By the end of the day, he trailed not so patiently behind you as you turned the lights off and locked the doors. You rolled your eyes when he ran to his car with open arms, latching onto the hood, mumbling how much he missed it, he snatched the key from your hand and drove all the way to your house, asking if you took proper care of the engine and if you used the right kind of fuel. He was getting on your nerves, but you’d be lying if you said you didn’t miss his endless rambling.

You helped him carry his bags to your building, discussing what you wanted to order for dinner and instructing him to take a shower before doing anything else because he was clearly tired. He went straight to your room as soon as you were inside your apartment, you heard him rummaging through your closet, looking for the clothes he left there, yelling something about you stealing his favorite hoodie.

Soft music played across your kitchen and living room from the speaker on your counter, you sighed, taking the duffel bag with Atsumu’s dirty clothes to wash them while you waited for your turn to shower. He came out of the shower minutes later, looking more relaxed and cozy. You were almost envious of how comfortable he looked, he pecked your lips before you entered the bathroom and made his way to your living room to rest on the couch. He made sure to put in the order for your food before he let himself drift into a peaceful slumber, his phone on his chest along with his intertwined fingers. He woke up to the feeling of your lips on his forehead and the little water droplets that tingled his chin, he smiled at your proximity and fixed his position on the couch so you could sit beside him.

“We need to change the music or I’ll fall asleep.” He said, running his hand on the bare skin of your legs that rested on top of his. Before you could reply, his phone buzzed announcing an incoming message. It was his brother. “Look at them.” He showed you his screen, displaying a picture of Osamu and Suna in front of the Eiffel Tower. You smiled, trying to ignore the guilt slowly bubbling in your gut.

“You should’ve stayed.” You whispered, playing with the back of his hair. Your friends were probably having a great time, sightseeing and discovering another country, and Atsumu felt forced to leave the adventure behind to be with you.

“Alone, in the city of love?” He asked, looking at you. “Without the love of my life? No, thank you.” You laughed and hid your face from him. “I’m serious! Besides, I missed you like crazy.” His lips pressed against your temple reassuringly. “We can go together for our anniversary.”

“You mean it?”

“Of course I do, I want to travel the world with you.” You kissed his jaw lovingly, feeling your heart heavy in your chest as if it was about to burst.

“Thank you for coming back, you have no idea how much I needed you.” You admitted.

“Almost as much as I needed you.” Adoration pooled in his eyes, and you were sure that you two could keep professing sweet declarations of love if his phone hadn’t buzzed time and time again with pictures and messages from Osamu and Suna. “Are they ever going to shut up?” Atsumu groaned, looking at the screen. The photos were beautiful, Aran and Hana showed in a few of them.

Atsumu told you the team played two matches that day and won both, so most of the team went out to celebrate and rest, the next match was days away. The blonde was more than fed up with his brother spamming his phone, so he dragged you to the kitchen to take pictures mocking the ones Osamu and Suna sent. You laughed at his commitment to striking the same poses as his brother at the same time that he fixed your limbs to imitate the middle blocker.

“‘Tsumu, what are we even doing?” You asked him, amusement in your voice as he inspected the pictures to choose the best one.

“Wait and see.” You saw him opening an editing app when the doorbell rang, and you had to get the food. He was entertained enough to leave you alone to serve dinner and the table, by the time you were done, he showed you the edited photo of you with a stock photo of the same location of one of the pictures Osamu sent as the background. You snorted at your boyfriend’s editing skills, he paid you no mind as he sent the picture to his brother. “That will do it.”

“Do what exactly, ‘Tsumu?” You raised an eyebrow.

“You ask too many questions.” He clicked his tongue before eating the first bite of his meal.

“You love it.” You teased, taking a step closer to his figure.

“That I do.” He admitted, kissing the corner of your lips.

Atsumu spent the rest of the night listening and chasing you around, unable to keep his hands to himself, and it wasn’t like you were complaining. You missed his playful touches and the feeling of his lips on yours.

It wasn’t until you were in bed, secure in his arms and already dozing off that the blonde realized how tired he was, his body slowly melting into your warmth. He heard a soft ‘I love you’ slipping past your lips and he smiled to himself.

Atsumu was grateful because he was able to experience love with you. He never knew he was looking for love until he found you, so he came to the conclusion that he wasn’t looking for love, he was simply looking for you. He knew it was cheesy, but he was convinced you were tied together by some sort of force that drew you to each other. After all the bruises your heart took, you made your way to him and he couldn’t be happier.

He always thought that he was hard to hold on to, that not everyone was up for the challenge of dealing with him and his mistakes, but you showed him how tender love could be, that being taken care of is not necessarily a bad thing, and you loved him as if it was easy, never a burden or too much. You saw right through him like no one else, not even his brother. Never bothered to hear what other people said about him, he was simply Atsumu.

Your Atsumu.

And he’ll continue to be yours for as long as he was able to.

Oikawa always wondered how you two became friends. You were so different, yet you complimented each other perfectly. You were rational and he was visceral, you brought balance to his life while he provided you with adrenaline. Always finding comfort in each other’s words, because apparently, you were both always right. He also blamed himself for the situation you were in, he had for months now.

He was there when you met Iwaizumi, he noticed you liked the other even before you realized, and did everything in his power to get the two of you together because if he was honest, the pining was almost painful to watch. He relished the feeling of seeing his two best friends happy together, and at some point he started picturing himself as Iwaizumi’s best man at your wedding, giving the best speech ever and making the two of you cry. He never thought he’d see you and Hajime grow apart, at least not the way you did.

Now, as he waited for Iwaizumi to pick up the phone for the third time in ten minutes, he pondered if he should go off on his best friend for being so stupid or if he should offer a listening ear because he knew his friend was hurting too. It was useless, Iwaizumi never picked up, so he decided to give him some time before trying to call again.

The airport was crowded, as usual, the humidity inside of it had his nose running a little and his eyes were teary and puffy from the lack of sleep. Coming back to Japan unannounced wasn’t his fashion at all, he always thought he’d never come back, but there he was, waiting for Atsumu to pick him up at the Osaka airport.

“You know she’s going to kill us, right?” The blonde said as soon as he got out of his car to greet him.

“Not before she cries.” They laughed, and Oikawa placed his suitcase on Atsumu’s car trunk.

“I can’t believe you didn’t make it to the finals! I was hoping to see your team against mine.”

“Oh, come on, your team was gone well before mine.” Oikawa defended himself. Both Japan and Argentina were out of the tournament exactly one week after it started, giving your best friend time to book a flight to see you as a surprise that would hopefully cheer you up, Atsumu had told him you were fine but it looked like something was bothering you and no matter how hard your boyfriend tried, you wouldn’t budge, you were just keeping it to yourself.

“Don’t get me started, I’m still mad at them.” Atsumu huffed, and Oikawa grinned. The rest of the drive was filled with volleyball talk, as expected from both setters. Atsumu made his way to his apartment where you were currently spending your day off, he had to come up with an excuse to leave his place, he didn’t remember exactly what he said, something about a supermarket run for some items you forgot the day before when you accompanied and helped him restock his pantry after his absence. You were too tired to argue, so you let him go without a question.

The airport was quite far from Atsumu’s house, so he had to drive a little faster than usual, making Oikawa grip onto the handles above the car door every time he took a harsh turn. The brunette was too distracted wondering how did Atsumu got his license when it seemed like he was driving with his feet, that he took a few seconds to realize the car came to a full stop, the sound of the engine slowly turning off made him aware of his arrival to Atsumu’s apartment complex. “We’re here.” Your boyfriend announced.

“You stay here,” Atsumu instructed, making Oikawa stand with his back glued to the wall beside the door. “Just wait.”

Atsumu opened the door and made his way in, resisting the habit of calling your name whenever he made it home. Instead, he waited for you to call out for him.

“You’re back.” You came out of his room, hair messy and subtle marks from the pillows on your cheek. He smiled, you slept well. “What did you forget?” You asked.

“What?”

“You said you forgot to buy something.” You replied, confused by Atsumu’s answer. “What was it?” You asked again, stopping briefly by his side to kiss his cheek hello.

“Uh… protein powder, for my shakes.” He lied, making you frown, you ordered his protein online, even asked him what flavor he wanted, you knew he was up to something but decided not to push further into it, until you looked around and spotted his empty hands. No bag, no container, nothing.

“So, where is it?” Atsumu’s eyes widened at your question. What an awful liar he was…

“In the car! I left it there, I had to use the bathroom really badly. Can you go get it, please?” He didn’t wait for an answer, he was already gone into his room. You rolled your eyes, grabbing his car keys that he previously left on the kitchen counter.

You opened the door as you slid into your sandals, when you looked up to step out, you caught a glimpse of a silhouette from the side of your eye, instinctively jerking your head and taking a step back inside after recognizing the person standing at the door.

“What the hell!” You yelled, immediately covering your mouth. Oikawa smiled at you.

“At least pretend you’re happy to see me.” He joked, stepping closer to you with arms wide open. You embraced him despite the state of shock you were in. Your best friend was right there in front of you, after six long years of being apart, he was there. You could barely comprehend what was going on.

“What are you doing here?” You asked, pushing your body away from him but never breaking the hug. His brown eyes stared into yours, tears welling upon them, your eyes felt wet too.

“Came to see you, dummy. What else?” You hugged him again, tighter this time, as if he was an illusion that could vanish in a matter of seconds.

“How long are you staying? Where are you staying? Do you even have a place to stay? Actually, you can stay here, Atsumu has a guest room I can ask him…” You kept your worried rambling going, words were hard to make out since you were basically glued to your best friend’s chest.

“I don’t think he can answer while you squeeze the life out of him.” Said Atsumu, who was back in the living room, you turned around.

“You.” Your finger was pointed at him. “You are a terrible liar.” Atsumu laughed as you freed Oikawa from your embrace, just to hug the blonde just as tight, if not harder. “Tell me I’m not dreaming, please tell me this is not a dream.” You cried, feeling his large hand running up and down your back soothingly.

“You’re not dreaming,” Atsumu assured. “Oikawa is very much here.”

“I hate you both.” You sobbed even harder after looking at them, making them laugh. You kept crying for a while, even as you helped Oikawa with his bags. Once you calmed down, you sat with them in the kitchen, talking for hours and letting your boyfriend and best friend get to know each other better, heart swelling with joy as they talked.

It was an odd sight, almost inconceivable, you never thought you’d get the chance to see two of the people you loved the most laugh and joke with ease. An instant understanding, something that almost never happened due to their tendencies to push people away, happened between the two, and that made you happy, to be understood was all they ever needed. Stories from your childhood, family dramas, and old memories you swore to secrecy made their way into the conversation, making you laugh so hard it made your abdomen hurt and your throat felt a little sore from the non-stop talking, and still, there were so many things you had yet to talk about.

Late at night, after all of you had enjoyed dinner, Atsumu excused himself since he was feeling tired, leaving you and Oikawa alone in comfortable silence. “Are you going straight to Miyagi, or are you stopping in Tokyo before going home?” You had asked. He understood the reason behind the question.

“We don’t have to talk about this right now…”

“Why not?” You interrupted him. “I’m not a baby, I can face my problems.” Oikawa 's gaze softened.

“That’s not what I meant. All I’m saying is that we’re having a good time, let’s keep it that way.” Your shoulders fell down, weird, you never felt them stiffen.

“You’re right, sorry, it’s just…” You paused. “I know we had put you in the middle of all of this, and that he’s your best friend too. Deep down, I regret the way I spoke to him the other day. A part of me wonders if he’s okay, but on the other hand, I don’t want to know anything about him for as long as I live.” You sighed, looking at your best friend in the eye. “I don’t know what to do, Toruu.”

His hand squeezed your shoulder. “Maybe you do need closure, and you’ve been denying yourself from it.”

“But…” You tried to refute.

“All of this.” He gestured with his finger. “This new life, new love, new you, is not closure.” The same finger touched your chest, right above your heart. “You feel like you can’t go on because the chapter is not really closed. It doesn’t matter how many times you reinvent yourself, rebuild your life, and run away, as long as you keep denying yourself from letting it all out, the chapter will keep going, and the story will repeat itself.” You stared in silence.

“What else is left to let out?” You asked sincerely. “I yelled at him and damned his existence.”

“I believe you’re the only one who can answer that.”

“I hate when you’re right.” You grumbled. “But I really don’t want to see him, I don’t think I can. How am I going to tell him the things I want to say.?”

“A letter, perhaps?” He suggested. “You were always better at expressing your feelings when writing, so write him a letter.” You thanked him for the advice, it was certainly more comforting to receive it face to face than through your phone screen. You hugged your best friend one more time before calling it a night and going to sleep.

You laid in bed, thinking about what you could possibly say to start off the letter. You couldn’t address Iwaizumi as “dear” since he was no longer dear to you. Should you refer to him as Iwaizumi or Hajime or both? Should you address him at all? Maybe just his name on the outside of the envelope would suffice. Regardless of all of that, what were you supposed to say exactly?

Was it an apology or a complaint?

A truce?

A request?

A restriction order sounded tempting, but that’d take longer. You tossed and turned for a little while before falling asleep with an arm around Atsumu’s chest, listening to his heartbeat. You had a little time to think about it, so once again, future you will have to deal with that. For now, you were going to sleep.

“Princess?” You heard Atsumu call from outside of the kitchen. “Are you ready? We need to drive Oikawa to the train station.”

“Almost done.” You said, briefly looking away from the piece of paper on the table in front of you. Oikawa stayed for five days, and at the end of every single one of them, you were left thinking about the letter you had yet to write. Crumbled pieces of paper could be found in the trash can, the result of the many times you rewrote your words. You even asked Atsumu if it was a good idea, he only shrugged and kept to himself, not wanting to interfere with your decision, though he agreed with what your best friend said nights before.

After numerous drafts, you settled for your final version just minutes before leaving to send Oikawa on his way to Tokyo. The letter was folded twice, and protected by an envelope in your purse now, as you drove to the station, but now you weren’t thinking about the letter but the fact that you had to say goodbye to your best friend, not knowing when you’d be able to see him again. A knot formed at the bottom of your throat, threatening to come out as a choked sob.

“Thank you so much for coming.” You said before embracing Toruu one last time, he did the same to you.

“Promise you’ll visit me.” He pressed his cheek on the top of your head. You nodded and pulled away from his arm to let Atsumu say his goodbyes. Taking the envelope from your bag, you held it tightly in your hands before handing it to Oikawa.

“Give this to him.” You asked though it sounded more like a plea. Oikawa took it from your hands and nodded to then press a kiss on your temple and board the train. Atsumu and you waved goodbye through the window and waited until the vehicle was gone completely. He placed his arm on top of your shoulders as you placed yours around his waist, walking to the exit.

“I’m proud of you,” Atsumu said out of nowhere, giving him a toothless smile, you hugged him a little tighter. He made a full stop to stand in front of you, his hands firmly on both of your shoulders. Hazel eyes stared into yours with nothing but love. You asked him why, and he kissed your forehead to say: “Because you won.”

“This is not a volleyball game, ‘Tsumu.” You chuckled, him along with you.

“You’re right, it’s a fight.” You looked at him, even more puzzled than before. “You won against your fears, maybe you don’t see it as a victory right now, but you will, with time.”

Light. Atsumu was light. Amidst the darkness of your lowest moments, he shined bright from the minute you met him because he showed you the path to true happiness. You knew you loved him, the way your body reacted to him, and how his presence was enough to make your heart beat faster than usual gave it away, but at that moment, in the middle of the sidewalk outside the train station, you knew happiness was right by his side. Atsumu was the heaven that awaited you after the hell of a journey you had to go through to get to him.

“I think I won way before this.” You admitted, making him raise a brow.

“And why is that?” He asked, amused.

“Because you’re here with me.” He smiled at your response, you knew he was about to call you a sap, so you rushed to say the following words: “I don’t know what comes after this, but whatever it is, I want you by my side.” You took his hand in yours and kissed his palm.

“I’ll be with you every step of the way, I promise.” You pulled him in for a kiss. Lips meeting carefully, your hands finding their place on the back of his head as he leaned down to kiss you passionately. For a moment you thanked the fact that the streets were empty, you were pulling quite a show with that movie-like kiss.

“You’re the love of my life too.” You said when you forcibly broke apart to breathe, Atsumu looked at you confused. “The other day, you said I was the love of your life.” You explained. “You are mine, too.” Atsumu kissed you again as soon as he heard those words, you had no time to predict his movements so you could only let out a small gasp before breaking into a fit of laughter as he hugged you with all he had.

“Let 's go home, baby.” He said, and you walked hand in hand to his car, the weight on your shoulders wasn't quite gone but it was lighter, you were somehow free now, and you had Atsumu by your side, so you knew things were going to be alright.

Iwaizumi waited at the train station, Oikawa announced his arrival the day before so he could pick him up. It took him by surprise, he expected his best friend to fly back to Argentina, furious and planning to never speak to him again, but when the setter called he felt relieved. Though Oikawa wasn’t completely in his corner, he needed his friend.

The train stopped before him, people rushed to get off of it, carrying bags and long faces from the trip. Oikawa stood out easily with his height, and as soon as Iwaizumi spotted him, he practically ran to him to hug and greet him. “It’s good to see you, Iwa-chan.” Oikawa said teasingly.

“You idiot, I missed you so much.” He smiled.

They took a cab to Hajime’s place, exchanging commentaries about the tournament and how Oikawa planned to get better for the next one, and also how he got along with his teammates. Despite the fact they chatted daily, there was a lot to talk about, things that were worth mentioning twice, details that were left out, and stuff that may not seem like a big deal on the phone. It was like a breath of fresh air for Iwaizumi.

“Where’s your bathroom, I’m dying to take a shower.” Oikawa exclaimed as soon as he got into the apartment.

“Right there.” Iwaizumi pointed to the second door in the hallway. “Left one is hot.” He passed Oikawa his bag and saw him scramble his hands in it to get a clean change of clothes and his bag of toiletries, but instead of heading straight to the shower, he passed Iwaizumi an envelope. “What 's this?”

“A letter.” The setter shrugged.

“From who?” He asked again, but Oikawa was already walking away. “Oi! Who is it from?” He was growing curious about the contents of the letter, but couldn’t help to doubt his best friend a little, was it a prank?

“Just read it,” Oikawa said and closed the bathroom door behind him.

Iwaizumi huffed in annoyance, making his way to the couch to read the mysterious letter. It wasn’t addressed to anyone, just a white surface, a little damaged on its corners from being kept inside a bag for several hours. Taking a deep breath, he opened it and took the folded piece of paper out. He was able to make out the ink transfer on the back of it, from where the pen was pressed harder in the writing, not wanting to wait anymore, he unfolded the rest of it and gasped at the sight of your handwriting all over the paper.

His eyes wandered from left to right taking in the words, and his throat tightened the more he read. Something was making it impossible to breathe in that very moment, it was guilt. Guilt made his fingers barely hold the letter as his hands trembled, he was almost nauseous, and could almost swear your perfume lingered on the piece of paper on his hands. Your words imprinted were like a collection of all of his mistakes, listed one by one, not explicitly written, but surely reminding him you were always the level-headed, the kind-hearted, and always right.

There was no hatred, or forgiveness, just faith. He read it once, twice, and many times more, and cried quietly for a good ten minutes, clutching the paper to his chest. For once he was glad Oikawa always took forever in the bathroom. “Thank you.” He said to no one, he was alone in that room, yet he looked at the letter, eyes focusing on your signature. “I promise.”

The letter read:

To: Iwaizumi Hajime.

I’ve been thinking about how to start this letter for the past few days, but we are past pleasantries and greetings, aren’t we?

Hajime, the way I spoke to you the last time we saw each other was far from how I wanted to handle this situation, and while I feel guilty for my behavior, I don’t regret a thing I said, perhaps I could’ve used other words, but something about all of this made it impossible to keep my cool. I have an idea of what it is, but it’s difficult to put it into words, but I will try. You kept saying you never wanted to hurt me, that it was never your intention, and maybe some of that is true, but you not wanting to hurt me wasn’t for my sake. It was for yours. Because hurting me meant you would get hurt in the end, too. It took me some time to realize that, so don’t worry if it takes a while to sink in.

You’re unaware, and painfully so, of how much damage you did to me and everyone who got caught into this, because you are stuck feeling sorry for yourself. Admitting you fucked up is not enough, you have to face the consequences, and most of the time said consequences are not going to be pleasant, let alone easy to face.

Maybe you resent me for not forgiving you right away, and believe me, I wanted to, but the fact that you expected me to do it angered me. It made me realize you were not sorry for what you did to me, but for what it represented to you and you only. Forgiving you now would mean absolutely nothing, if nothing within you has changed in two years other than you becoming absolutely unbearable to everyone around you, and it will become a vicious cycle that will keep on hurting you and everyone else who dares to step into your life.

It also hurted me that you ever doubted how much I loved you just because you held some kind of grudge against me. I never meant to be better than you, I wanted to be better together. The bestest version of ourselves, together, and I worked very hard to show you that but you could never see it. Thinking about it, you cheating only made things end faster, because failure was bound to happen if you ever thought I never loved you as much as I did then.

I don’t want that for you. I don’t want your next relationship to fail, I don’t want you to lose all your friends. I don’t want you to be alone, but I can’t forgive you if you don’t forgive yourself and grow out of whatever is holding you back. There’s good in you, Hajime, I know it because I knew you, years before there was an us, we were friends, and I saw you grow up to be a good man, don’t disappoint our fourteen year old selves. This is not an ultimatum, but promise me you are going to work on yourself and try to be happy, not for me, but for your sake, so the next time we see each other we can start again, as friends, and do things right this time. Learn not to live out of spite, Hajime, I swear it’s the best you can do.

Live happily, and I hope to see you better next time we find each other.

With hope at last,

Y/N L/N.

The end.

(a/n: first i want to wish a happy valentines day to all of you. <3 and second of all, that's a wrap! i'm never writing a fic again. just kidding, who knows (i do). also notice how i quoted my beloved will herondale, the loml fr. i want to thank all of you for the endless support and for bearing with my inconsistent ass for the past year, literally love all of you and i appreciate your love for this story that started as a silly fake scenario in my head while i was high on pain meds lmaooo. this project was challenging considering i'm not a native english speaker, and while i'm fluent in it i still struggle with a few things, writing in english is not the same as writing in spanish, but i've seen improvement on my skills, which i'm proud of! i'd be editing the first chapters in the following weeks, and i've been working on the epilogue, so this is not the last thing you'll see of me and l&f. stay safe and drink water!)

masterlist

TAGLIST (closed): @aonenthusiast @wiseeggspickleslime @koushisun @airheadpillar @sunflwrsandprettyskies @bbkiyoomi @daphnxy @shephard17895 @avatarkyoshithewarrior @for-rebloggery @vv-bee999-vv @fi16ns @asdfghjkl7things @glassykaashi @strawhatshepard @hawkssnugget @msby-kei @toobsessedsstuff @a-moon-fairy @cuteissei @ramblingsofagoofyperson @pinoyrella @kiyoomisimp

#atsumu fluff #atsumu x you #atsumu x reader #hq atsumu #atsumu scenarios #hq imagines #hq fluff #hq anime #hq angst #hq x reader #iwaizumi angst #iwaizumi scenarios #hq iwaizumi #iwaizumi headcanons #iwaizumi x reader #msby atsumu #msby black jackal #msby bj #msby fluff

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milkandsnails · 3 years

Text

victor after a mild inconvenience

---

EDIT (mini essay incoming): Looking back, this was likely seen as me poking fun at Victor's character himself for his obvious health problems, which wasn't my intention, and now ashames me deeply. If you knew me back when I posted about the novel, you'd likely recall how I objected greatly to opinions that reduced Victor to a mere monster or the only reprehensible character. I didn't enjoy the sense of schadenfreude that some people appeared to have regarding his severe mental and physical struggles. It was in part because, as a troubled 16-17 year old with their own mental and physical issues, I saw parts of my own pain and loneliness in his isolation and fixation on work over all else.

I will explain my flawed reasoning when making this post. I created it focused on the idea of his fainting and sickness as a general literary device Shelley continously used— à la the archaic trope of characters swooning excessively— to show a heightened response to situations of horror. The idea I was getting at is referenced here:

Unlike a straight faint, the literary swoon is never just a medical matter – it’s often the product of overwhelming feeling or the return of something repressed. Swooning has long been used by writers to dramatise moments of crisis, ecstasy and confusion, and the failure of language to express these extremes.

I was (poorly) making light of this as a frequent literary trope, not the actual character himself. A good deal of this is down to the fact we were simply taught this was the way to interpret his illness in our English Lit class at the time— as a device actively chosen by the author to heighten the Gothic themes of horror, in a way detatching these symptoms from the true constitution of the person who suffered them. His sickness, in this light, therfore was more equated to a literary method, rather than being rightfully rooted back into his actual character.

But teaching can still have questionable ideas or limited outlooks, so I should have reflected properly on what we were taught and come to my own conclusion.

This interpretation absolutely doesn't work when considering the post and my awful wording, and I deeply apologise. Even if this is a Gothic device Shelley used at points, and that some of Victor's illness could be attributed to natural reactions to hardship (such as at the beginning when meeting Walton), Victor still also shows signs of chronic health issues under a modern and understanding lens, more than any other character, so my original idea becomes invalid regardless.

I'm well aware of the way comments on Victor's health swerve into ableism, having been upset myself by terrible takes regarding his need for care during times of sickness— and the exaggerated, sarcastic tone used for this caption can easily be viewed that same way. Even if I had just broadened my joke to involve literary characters in general, who are otherwise able-bodied and healthy, rather than singling out Victor, it would have been clearer what my aim was. But nowadays, I would simply never make this sort of comment anyway.

So again, I'm sincerely sorry. This was almost 2 years ago; and 17-year-old me, despite not being a great deal younger, was a lot less mature and mindful at times! As someone who struggled mentally and had already developed my own chronic condition at that age, it was even more negligent of me to spread further bad-taste content about Victor's implied illness, unintentional as this interpretation was. I hope anyone who by chance sees this can accept my apology.

#silk scribbles

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pokesaurio · 3 years

Text

I find it hard to believe that New Amsterdam has such little fanfiction. It’s a great show! So I decided to write something for the Leyren ship (which I would usually never do) to fix this! Hope you enjoy :)

Summary: How the Dam Fam finds out about Lauren’s new roommate.

Helen:

“So, naturally, you offered her to live with you” said Helen sarcastically, incredulous at Lauren’s out of character decision.

“Well, yes, she has become my friend after all, and I couldn’t let her alone in the streets”, replied Lauren matter-of-factly.

“Hmm. And how’s it going?” Helen rose an eyebrow suspiciously.

“It’s...” Lauren let out a small sigh, “It’s effortless, really. I feel like she’s always been there”. The “which scares me” was left unsaid.

Helen patiently waited until Lauren disclosed more, knowing her friend usually needed more time to open up.

“Well, except for the massive tree in the middle of the living room. Which I don’t dislike, but...”

“What?!” This got Helen’s attention. Since when was Bloom known to decorate her apartments, let alone let another person do so... with living things?!

“Well, she bought a tree, said it reminded her of home. But apparently it was smaller in the picture, so now I have a full-blown tree in my living room. And I think I like it” that last part she muttered softly.

Helen let out a small, genuine smile, amused but also proud of her friend. “That looks like progress. You haven’t yet snapped her head off for touching your space, so I’d say that’s a point for Lauren’s intimate relationships”.

“Pfft. It’s not very intimate if I still don’t know about her. I have tried to learn what she likes, but she still won’t really tell me about herself. It’s a little frustrating really” Lauren let out an adorable pout.

“Well, give her time. She is living in a stranger’s house after all, in a new country and with probably no other connections or friendships here. I can’t imagine she trusts people easily” said Helen patiently.

“Ladies and gentlemen, Mama Bear is at it again. Free advice for all!” Lauren laughed.

Helen snorted. “Well, it’s taken me nowhere with Mina. Still don’t know how this motherly figure thing works, sadly” she stated defeatedly.

“Oh, come on! You’re doing great! She’s slowly respecting her school timetable and your curfews more, right? And she hasn’t put a massive tree in your living room. That has to count for something” said Lauren, pointing her finger at Helen as she walked towards her ED. “You’ve got this!” and she gave Helen her best thumbs up and exaggerated smile.

Casey:

Lauren haphazardly threw her stuff into her backpack and went for the door, ready to call it a day and head back home.

“Lauren, you’re rushing out” Casey said suspiciously as he entered the locker room. “I assume this means you’re gonna continue smuggling your friend here? Cause if it does, you should know you are risking even more than before. If they catch you again...”

“No, Casey, it’s not like that” Lauren stated. “Don’t worry, she won’t be coming back here”.

“So that means... you let her go? Do you know where she is?” said Casey, now concerned about Leyla’s wellbeing.

“She’s actually... living with me?” said Lauren, the last part coming out in a rush and higher pitch.

“What?” asked Casey, wide-eyed. “Lauren, she- what?”

“Yeah, I couldn’t leave her on the streets, and I figured since I’m never home it couldn’t hurt to give her my spare room” justified Lauren to what seemed like Casey and herself.

“Okay, Lauren, I don’t know what’s gotten into you, you are risking a lot for this stranger. Please be careful” said Casey, though not unkindly. He was just worried about his friend.

“But that’s just it, Casey. She’s not a stranger, not anymore, and I would have done the same for any one of you. I protect my people” said Lauren, now sounding much more convinced.

“Well, if you’re happy with your decision, I can only congratulate you. You finally have a friend outside of work!” he added with a smile, teasing Lauren.

Lauren swatted his arm playfully. “I forgot, Mr Popular here knows most of New York. And I might have one friend, but it’s a hard one” she said, giving him the finger.

“Okay, okay!” Casey laughed, raising his arms defensively. “You win. But Lauren” he said softly “I am happy for you. Just wanted to make sure you knew what you were doing”.

“Thanks” said Lauren with a smile, squeezing his arm lightly as she left.

Lauren:

She did know what she was doing. Right. Right? It wasn’t like Leyla was a random stranger, not anymore, and she liked her enough that living together had been smooth sailing so far. So why did she find herself overthinking everything when it came to Leyla?

“Get your shit together, Lauren” she chanted to herself. She was driving home, her palms sweating slightly, but still excited to get there. She had been rushing out a lot lately. The memory of Leyla’s soft smile as she held her hand, fingers interlocking and fitting perfectly as they stared at the tree and Lauren’s want, need to be close, oh so close, a compass searching North. She couldn’t wait to get home to Leyla’s sarcasm, Leyla’s dinners, Leyla’s subtle presence in her apartment and life that made it theirs.

Without noticing, Lauren had been smiling like an idiot for at least half an hour, and she had arrived to her portal. She got out of the car and went for the stairs, taking twice at a time. But as she opened the door, a wave of disappointment washed over her. Leyla wasn’t home, had probably had to take a DriverTime client, and suddenly the apartment felt empty and cold again. Lauren couldn’t understand how she had lived like this for so long before.

But then a thought sprung to mind. Leyla had waited for her every day for the past week, staying up and meeting her with a fabulous home-cooked dinner after work. The least she could do was reciprocate, so Lauren got ready to prepare a mindblowing meal or die trying. Cooking had never been her strong suit, but she figured it couldn’t be too hard.

She remembered Leyla mentioning she deeply missed Pakistani cuisine, and how she had been disgusted by Lauren suggesting she try a Pakistani restaurant around the corner. “You Americans think you can serve a random dish and rebrand an entire culture. That place is not Pakistani”, she had stated. So Lauren had asked, and she had learned, how Nihari reminded her of late night dinners at home and Lassi was her all-time favourite beverage. And so she had a single thought in mind; today she was making the best Pakistani dinner for Leyla.

As she set out to spice the assortion of different meets, she re-entered her previous reverie. She knew Leyla would love this, even if Lauren was probably going to ruin the recipe and tarnish the Pakistani name. But Leyla would smile sweetly, as she did every time Lauren remembered a small detail about her and did her best to make her feel like home, and she would be grateful. Lauren could not wait until she came back, excited to see that look on her face that said “no one’s ever cared for me like this, and I’m glad you’re the first one”.

Slow-cooking the meat into a stew proved difficult, and mixing the yoghurt, water, spices and fruit for the Lassi had Lauren seriously questioning her cooking skills. But all in all, after about an hour she decided she had done a pretty good job. She set out to dress the table, going as far as opening a good red wine and placing a candle. She didn’t want to overdo it, but thought Leyla would decidedly not mind and find her efforts cute. Lauren was struck by the inclusion of “cute” into her vocabulary, could not remember when she had cared about someone’s reaction this much, and decided damn Leyla and her faint smiles had softened her. She couldn’t bring herself to care, though.

And just like clockwork, as soon as Lauren set the last plate with the fine-looking Nihari on the table, Leyla entered the apartment.

“Honey, I’m home!” she shouted jokingly in her beautiful accent.

“Hey! How was work? Any frat boys I should beat up?” said Lauren smiling.

“No frat boys, thankfully. Just an old lady telling me about her grandson. I must have seen like 30 photos of him, and let me tell you, no one can convince me babies are cute. They’re bald!” Leyla proclaimed, dignified.

Lauren snorted. “Of course you would befriend a grandma and have her show you her family. It must be your cranky charm” replied Lauren teasingly.

“You would be surprised. I cause sensation amongst octogenarians” said Leyla amusedly. As she caught the smell of cooked meat, she looked at Lauren, surprised. “You cooked? You? Is MY tree burnt down?” she joked.

“I’ll let you know, OUR tree is intact and very much still alive. And don’t you dare take away my custody, I love him like my own son too!” said Lauren in mock dignification. “I did cook, and I hope you like it” she continued, now softly. She met Leyla’s eye, hope and wonder sparkling bilaterally.

Leyla approached the table, repressing a squeel of excitement at the site of her favourite foods. “Lauren! You shouldn’t have! How did you even-?” and as she turned around to look at Lauren, the intensity in her eyes stunned her. The amount of care and adoration was palpable there, and it was enough to overwhelm her.

“Thank you”, she said in a small voice.

“I thought you deserved something special. You know, for cooking horrible meals every day” Leyla approached her slowly, still with eyes locked in an intense duel. “You would think as a doctor my main threat of illness would come from my patients, but you make a hard run for it” another step closer. “And besides, knowing my cooking skills it’s probably very bad. So we’re even” she continued rambling. Leyla finally took the final step towards Lauren, cupping her cheek and forcing her to shut up.

“You talk too much”, she said, resting on her tiptoes slightly to reach for her cheek and place a soft kiss there. “Thank you, truly”.

Lauren stood there, transfixed and unable to utter words. “Y-Yeah. It’s... nothing, really” she managed to muster.

Leyla tried to fight off a smile at Lauren’s awkwardness. During the course of her stay at Lauren’s- their- apatment, she had been quick to discover that she could turn Lauren, the hard-assed doctor and witty friend, into a rambling mess with well placed silences and touches. And naturally, she had immediately taken a liking to doing so as often as possible.

She turned around and sat at the table, staring down at her food and trying not to show her satisfaction at the amount of time it took Lauren to recompose herself and sit with her. She let Lauren pour some wine for herself, seeing as she didn’t look too enthused with the Lassi, and tried the Nihari. And, oh god, it certainly wasn’t like the one she enjoyed back home, but Lauren had undoubtedly achieved something here. Leyla couldn’t stop a moan from escaping her lips.

Lauren sat across from her, lips parted, staring at her like she was the only thing in the world. Her eyes slowly trailed to her lips, and Leyla thought she might burst if she didn’t break the moment soon. “Lauren, it’s- it’s perfect” said Leyla, and she meant it. It might not be like the one back home, but Lauren had managed to capture a new flavour, to redefine the very meaning home. She could get used to this.

Lauren looked back up at her, smile back in place. “Really? That’s new” she said, satisfied and proud of her achievement.

As they ate in silence, Lauren realised two things. One, she was definitely falling in love with Leyla Shinwari. And two, while Leyla had been her roommate for a few weeks already, it was only now that she felt like they were actually _living_ together... building a home.

Iggy:

“Hey, Iggs! I haven’t caught up with you in a while! How’s everything going?” asked Lauren as she entered Iggy’s office, taking the sofa and sprawling out on it.

Iggy stopped flicking through his charts, immediately knowing something was up. He could tell Lauren was properly glowing, but knew he would have to let this play out if he wanted to get any information out of his friend.

“Lauren! It’s great to see you. I’ve been great. I went to see a nutritionist, and I’ve been trying to join some virtual support groups for people with eating disorders. I still have a long road ahead of me, and I have to put in the work, but thanks for calling me out on my bullshit. Truly” he said sincerely.

Lauren perked up even more, rising to her feet and reaching around Iggy’s desk to hug him. “Iggy! That’s great! I’m so glad to hear it, and I’m so proud of you. And hey, you called me out on my bullshit when I was using, so it was only fair I did the same” she smiled.

Iggy returned her smile, glad to see that both of them were making amends and working to improve their lives.

He rose up to start walking to his next consult, not wanting this conversation to end but really needing to get there on time. After Lauren followed him along, curiosity finally got the best of him. “Okay, I have to ask... What’s gotten into you? You look like you just got to perform one of your supper cool surgeries or something. Anything new?” he asked.

“Well, I’m doing well” she said as they strolled down New Amsterdam’s corridors. Iggy waited patiently, letting Lauren open up at her own speed. “And... and I got a roommate!”

Iggy frowned, perplexed. He knew Lauren, knew how much she valued her space and how closed-off she could be, so he couldn’t fathom why getting a roommate would be something she’d want to do, let alone be the cause of her exuberant joy. “Wha... How?” he asked.

“Well, it’s a long story, really. She came in with a patient, and kind of guessed what was wrong with her, but it turned out it wasn’t a guess, cause she’s really a doctor, but obviously I didn’t know that” she started rambling, with Iggy finding it hard to follow along.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down” he said, though he was glad to see Lauren so excited about something.

“Yeah, sorry. Basically, she pulled off a successful needle decompression in my ED, which I now admit was pretty cool, I called security, she had no place to stay, used the hospital closet for a while... And now she’s living with me” finished Lauren, looking way too satisfied by her explanation.

“She... You... What?!” asked Iggy, dumbfounded.

“Yeah... She’s kind of a lot. In the good way” said Lauren, and it was clear to Iggy by now that she was positively smitten. At this new information, he changed tactics.

“Wow, Lauren, that’s a huge step! I’m happy for you, and so proud. I’d love to meet her sometime” he said.

“Yeah! That’d be great! I’m sure you’d love her, once you get past her cranky façade. You two would totally get along” replied Lauren excitedly.

Iggy knew how possessive Lauren was of her space, knew how much it meant for her to have friends meet even if she may not do it consciously. The fact that she was agreeing to let him meet her meant he was right; Lauren was smitten beyond recognition.

“Great! And what’s it like, living with this...” he trailed off, hoping to get a name out of Lauren for once.

“Leyla! It’s great. Yesterday I cooked her some Pakistani dinner, cause she missed it from back home, and then we watched a comedy and watered our big-ass tree. Don’t ask. It’s like she’s lived with me all along” she finished bashfully.

And Iggy had to assume Lauren knew how this sounded, how many lesbian stereotypes she was ticking off. So he replied, amusedly, “Tell me, Lauren, does this Leyla know you two are dating?” he said, a mischiveous twinkle in his eye.

Lauren stopped abruptly in the corridor, a horrified look on her face. Iggy repressed a laugh, was thrilled by Lauren’s new baby-gay side. He turned around to look at her, saw her mouth opening and closing like a goldfish as she searched for a reply, but continued walking backwards. “Wait... do you?” he asked, now enjoying Lauren’s alarmed look. He turned around a corner, leaving a dumbfounded Lauren behind, and shouted, “Good luck!”

#leyren #lauren bloom #leyla shinwari #lauren x leyla #manifesting bi bloom #five stars #bloomwari

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hafanforever · 3 years

Photo

It’s Good to Be Bad

I’ve described in previous analyses that I have a strong affinity for villains in fiction, including those by Disney. But like any fan of Disney, there are villains that I love and ones that I deeply detest with every bone in my body. So for my last analysis of the year, I will discuss my five most favorite and five least favorite Disney animated villains, though I also want to list a couple of other characters as honorable mentions to explain why I like or hate them.

The reasons I have for liking my favorite villains are simple, if not somewhat shallow, because I don’t exactly have deep reasons for liking them. Regardless of how evil, sadistic, cruel, and ruthless they are, I like them primarily because they are funny or charismatic. But it’s so much easier for me to list why I hate my least favorite villains, which is largely attributed the kinds of traits they display (most of which I cannot stand in people), their motives for being evil, and how they carry out their evil deeds while showing their evil natures.

This essay has turned into a longer one than I anticipated, so I am adding the “Keep reading” feature. Before I begin, I want to thank my dear buddy and soul sis @minervadeannabond for coming up with this title. Here is yet again another analysis of mine for you to enjoy, sis! 😁😄😉❤️

Most Favorites

Scar - Since The Lion King was the very first Disney film I ever saw in theaters as a child, and the first one I remember well from my childhood, many of my favorites Disney things come from it, including Scar being my #1 favorite Disney villain. Yes, he is a sadistic, tyrannical, narcissistic, cold-blooded murderer, but I think it is because of his cunning, smooth, elegant, charismatic nature and how pivotal he is to the story, particularly with how much he turns out to be a dark reflection of Simba, is why I love him so much. Furthermore, his song “Be Prepared” is my favorite villain song and among my favorite Disney songs of all, further showing how much The Lion King has given me Disney favorites since I was a child. 😁

Hades - Another one I remember well from my childhood, Hades is undoubtedly one of the funniest villains from the Disney animated canon. Although he is as cruel, evil, ruthless, and sadistic as any Disney villain, Hades is also so fast-talking, sleazy, sarcastic, cheeky, and hilarious that it makes it hard for me to take him seriously as a menacing villain. And while he constantly goes into fiery rages and blows his hot-headed top when furious, these help make Hades far more a comical, rather than scary, figure. Heck, when I was a kid, I always laughed, rather than got scared, whenever he unleashed one of his temper tantrums (except when he blows up at Meg with “I OWN YOU!!!”). And James Woods’s performance, especially since he ad-libbed many lines, helps make Hades such an unforgettable and memorable, if not lovable, character. So yeah, Hades’s wisecracking, talkative personality made him a memorable villain for me as a child, and I’ve loved him for it ever since. 😆😂

Ursula - Much like Hades, Ursula is sleazy, scheming, and cunning, yet wisecracking and comical at the same time. Besides her dry sense of humor, Ursula’s eccentricity, flamboyance, and elegance have always been the traits that drew me to her, and Pat Carrolll’s performance of the character is pure excellence. 😉

Maleficent - Despite being an incarnation of pure evil, including with her self-proclaimed title as The Mistress of All Evil, to me, Maleficent is by far the coolest, most badass Disney animated villain of all! 😆👍🏻 Yes, she curses Aurora with no true motive whatsoever, and she’s sadistic, ruthless, blasphemous, and murderous, but her display of her ill temper and dark magic just makes her totally awesome, most especially when she zaps her minions for their stupidity and incompetence upon learning they were only looking for a baby during their 16-year search for Aurora. 😁

Ratigan - Again, Disney has an evil, murderous, sadistic villain in Ratigan, but I love him because he is very collected, calculating, sophisticated, and charismatic, not to mention Vincent Price delivers such a great vocal performance as the character. 😉 What I also love about Ratigan is the moment when he undergoes what is known as a villainous breakdown, which is when a villain snaps and goes utterly crazy. During the film, Ratigan has some moments of losing his cool, but just as quickly manages to become calm and regain his composure. However, upon seeing Basil and Olivia escape from him inside Big Ben, along with Basil having having foiled his earlier scheme to kill the queen and take over England, Ratigan finally snaps, turning from a formal, sophisticated, composed rat to a highly feral, aggressive, savage one. It is the moment when Ratigan reveals the monster within and looks like a true rat, with an aggressive expression, hunched back, elongated claws, and running on all fours. The fact that Ratigan’s breakdown juxtaposes what kind of rat he was for the majority of the film is why his villainous breakdown is my favorite of any Disney villain.

Most Hated

Gaston - I have stated this before in “Bride and Prejudice”, but I pick Gaston as my #1 choice as my least favorite Disney animated villain. And it’s not just because of his extreme vanity, egotism, chauvinism, and arrogance, which are the very traits I hate in people, but because of his inferior, sexist, misogynistic views of women. Gaston is THE walking definition of toxic masculinity, the fictional example of the worst kind of man, the epitome of what men should NEVER be! 😡😡😡 He thinks men are the superior gender and that women are inferior to men, with their only purposes being to serve men and be their sex objects. And since I am a feminist who believes in gender equality, I dislike men who have low, sexist opinions of women, and Gaston fits the profile of what I think is the worst example of such a man. I could go on and on explaining just why I loathe this monster of a man with all my heart, but you can just read the aforementioned analysis to find out more.

Lady Tremaine - If it weren’t for Gaston being my #1 pick because of his extreme sexism and misogyny, I would pick Lady Tremaine. She comes such a close second because her motivations for abusing, oppressing, and being so cruel to Cinderella are petty and stupid, ESPECIALLY because Cinderella never even did anything to deserve such treatment from her in the first place! 😠😡 Lady Tremaine hates Cinderella and is very jealous of her purely because Cinderella so much better-looking and kinder than her own daughters and herself. So they abuse her and make her their servant to make her miserable and unattractive so that they can look better than her instead. Additionally, Lady Tremaine has a deep-rooted obsession to be above Cinderella at all costs that she resorts to lying, manipulation, trickery, and cheating in order to stay above. I particularly loathe it when she manipulates her daughters into tearing up Cinderella’s dress just so that she can appear fair and keep her word regarding her side of the bargain (she says ”if you can find something suitable to wear”, and once it’s wrecked, it’s no longer suitable) while simultaneously making sure she doesn’t have to keep her promise since she never wants Cinderella to go in the first place. All that being said, do these sound like justifiable excuses for hating a completely innocent woman? I DON’T THINK SO!!! 😡😡😡

Claude Frollo - Now if weren’t for BOTH Gaston and Lady Tremaine coming first, Claude Frollo would come on top as well! 😡😡😡 Frollo is without a doubt in my mind the most evil villain in the Disney animated canon. Unlike most Disney villains, he is COMPLETELY devoid of any likable or redeemable traits, making me have nothing but feelings of pure hatred for him. Ruthless, cruel, blasphemous, racist, and evil to his core, Frollo holds a deep-seated hatred for the gypsies and seeks to eradicate them from Paris, making him not only murderous, but genocidal, especially since he seeks to kill them simply out of his own racism, supremacy, and superiority. Throughout the years in his quest to eliminate the gypsies, Frollo murders Quasimodo’s mother by violently kicking her, causing her to fall and hit her head on the stone steps of Notre Dame, then tries to burn Esmeralda at the stake, declaring that she must be killed because she has been practicing witchcraft. After killing the mother, Frollo even attempts to drown baby Quasimodo simply because of his deformity. What makes Frollo even more evil besides doing his deeds is that he is a judge with control over the city, yet he proves himself to be corrupt and hypocritical by violating the laws to accomplish his dark, sinister deeds. Perhaps what makes Frollo the most evil villain of all is that he is in complete denial about how evil he really is. He has a delusional belief that he is a good, religious man doing God’s work by trying to purge the world of evil, when all he really does is twist his “faith” and hypocritically use it for his own evil purposes. What’s worse is that Frollo never once takes an ounce of responsibility for his crimes; he makes excuses to justify his actions, painting himself as guiltless and his victims as the only ones at fault. So with Frollo being such a blasphemous, hypocritical, racist, genocidal, murderous, corrupt judge who never believes he is doing anything wrong and always lays blame on the victims of his misdeeds, I can’t say there is a single thing about him that I like, and I’m happy he met his death in a fiery blaze! 😡🔥

Mother Gothel - A character I see as being an amalgam of Gaston, Lady Tremaine, and Frollo, the reasons why I hate all three of these villains are also found in Gothel: vanity, narcissism, oppression, mental abuse, trickery, manipulation, dishonesty, hypocrisy, and flat-out cruelty. First of all, Gothel’s vanity, narcissism, and obsession with her own beauty makes her extremely insufferable and annoying, not to mention the fact that she hoarded the flower to herself for hundreds of years just to stay alive shows how incredibly selfish and possessive she is. And due to her selfishness, she kidnaps Rapunzel, hides her in a tower, lies to her about the outside world, and continually mentally abuses, manipulates, oppresses, mocks, and belittles her just to ensure that Rapunzel will never leave the tower and the flower’s magic in her hair will keep her (Gothel) alive and young forever. On par with her narcissism, Gothel is shown to be a very spoiled, childish, immature woman who seeks to always have things her way and throws tantrums or other emotional outbursts when she doesn’t get her way or what she wants, especially the very moment she wants it. Furthermore, Gothel possesses a martyr, or victim, complex, which is shown perfectly when victimizes herself and places all the blame on Rapunzel whenever any sort of conflict befalls their lives and relationship, especially when they argue. So with all these flaws in mind, like Gaston, Lady Tremaine, and Frollo, I can’t find any good reason to like Gothel at all. “Mother Knows Best”? More like “Gothel Knows Worst”! 😠😡

Governor Ratcliffe - I said above that I hate Gaston because of his bigoted, low views of women, and prejudice is the main reason why I hate Governor Ratcliffe. However, his prejudice is in the form of racism, the kind of bigotry that I hate the most. Ratcliffe displays this attitude towards the Native Americans, considering them savages and seeing himself as better than them all because of his race, which makes him a white supremacist. Besides his supremacy and superiority regarding his race, Ratcliffe is intensely greedy and selfish since he wants to keep any riches found for himself and believes that the Virginia land and anything he finds on it is his for the taking. In relation to his bigotry, he is also quite delusional and self-righteous, which makes him believe that any theory he has is right and he refuses to believe otherwise or listen to reason. For example, Ratcliffe dismisses Wiggins’ correct assumptions on why the Indians attacked the settlers and John’s claim that there is no gold in the lands after Pocahontas tells him this. The hatred I hold for Ratcliffe is significantly less than the other four listed here, but the reasons I gave are virtually like those I gave for Frollo, so I’m confident with Ratcliffe and his place on my list.

Bonus Mentions

Hans - Hans is a villain that I place in the middle between my most loved and most hated villains, because I love him for WHAT he is as a villain while I simultaneously hate him for WHO he is as a character. I have said it to friends and some of my other analyses before, but one of the reasons why I love Frozen is because it took many of the traditional fairy tale elements and tropes used in their preceding films, and turned them upside down. So rather than having another prince as the heroic male lead in this film, Frozen twisted that trope around by making him the villain instead. And when Hans finally reveals his true nature, you realize that he has fooled not only Anna and the other characters who interacted with him, but first-time viewers as well! So while I love Hans for being a villain who keeps his true nature under wraps for the majority of the film and almost gets away with his crimes because of it, I also hate him because of how cold, cruel, callous, ruthless, and sadistic he really is. When he reveals his true nature and explains his plan to Anna, he mocks her intelligence, naïveté, and desperation for love while explaining just how easy it was for him to deceive and manipulate her into being a pawn in his plan to take over Arendelle. Throughout the whole scene, Hans smiles wickedly and sadistically, clearly showing the delight he is getting from tormenting Anna and watching her suffer while he explains his scheme and extinguishes all light sources to accelerate her death. It’s also easy to see his sadism when he announces his plan to murder Elsa, and that he will get even greater joy out of carrying out the act itself (which we see when Hans smiles widely while swinging his sword over Elsa’s head as he tries to kill her on the fjord).

Chi-Fu - While he is not a true villain, and not even evil at all, Chi-Fu is a very detestable character, one whose guts I hate completely because he has the same traits that make me hate Gaston: arrogance, conceit, egotism, bigotry, superiority, and misogyny. Prejudice against women is a main theme in Mulan, and Chi-Fu is the one man whose prejudiced opinions never change. While Shang and Mulan’s fellow soldiers initially hold views that women are beneath men, they learn to change them after Mulan proves herself a capable warrior in the army (even after her disguise is revealed), most especially when she helps save China from Shan Yu’s reign of terror. Despite the majority of his bigotry being aimed at women, Chi-Fu is also detestable because he shows it towards nearly everyone else, except the Emperor. As the second-in-command to the Emperor, Chi-Fu sees himself superior to almost everyone else around him, which enhances his pompous, elitist, arrogant attitude. Because of all these antagonistic traits, I loathe Chi-Fu while I don’t hate Shan Yu at all, even though the latter is truly pure evil and genocidal! 😠😡 It just goes to show that some people who are neither necessarily good nor bad can be even more contemptible that the most malevolent, murderous people.

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Text

Stark Spangled Banner

Ch40: I Went For The Head

Intro: The Avengers track Thanos down and confront him for a final time, but it doesn’t go according to plan, and leaves them facing the horrible fact that there is simply nothing they can do to set anything right.

Warnings: Bad Language words. And a helluva load of angst.

Pairing: Steve Rogers x OFC Katie Stark

A/N: Please heed the warnings… thanks to @angrybirdcr for this edit- the first one of Katie in the Supernova suit...

Disclaimer: This is a pure work of fiction and classified as 18+. Please respect this and do not read if you are underage. I do not own any characters in this series bar Katie Stark and the other OCs. By reading beyond this point you understand and accept the terms of this disclaimer.

Chapter 39 Part 2

Stark Spangled Banner Masterlist // Main Masterlist

“Can I have a cheeseburger yet?” Tony grumbled.

“Probably best to start with something a little less greasy.” Bruce stated, checking the drips attached to Tony’s arm. “It will play havoc with your stomach.”

“Porridge?” Pepper suggested.

“What?” Tony pulled a face “For real?”

“Good idea.” Bruce ignored Tony as he continued to check the readings on the monitor besides the bed. “With honey, it will help your energy levels”

“And then a cheeseburger later? “ Tony persisted.

“What is this obsession you two have with cheeseburgers?” Bruce looked at him, then to Katie as Tony shrugged.

“But seriously…” he began and Pepper cut him off

“No, Tony!”

“I’m gonna go get that porridge before this turns into a full scale domestic.” Katie grinned.

“’ll have it in the living room.” Tony sat up a little more.

“No, you won’t.” Katie looked at him at the same time Pepper protested but Tony cut them both off.

“Yes I will.” He shot back, “We need to talk, de brief, plan.” “Steve, tell him it can wait.” Katie looked round at her husband, who had up until that point been observing silently from the side of the room. He made the mistake of hesitating, just for a split second, and she glared at him.

“Honey…” He began and she held her hand up.

“Don’t wanna hear it.” “Look, Tony’s right.” Steve tried to explain but she shook her head.

“No, no he is not. Bruce, help me out here please!” She looked to the Doctor for help who sighed as he shook his head.

“What’s the point? He’ll do it anyway.” Bruce’s voice was resigned. “I’ll fetch a chair.” “I don’t believe this.” Katie groaned and ran her hands over her face as Pepper and Tony were now full on arguing. She looked at Steve and he visibly recoiled at the look of pure anger on her face “If anything happens to him I swear to God, Steve, I will kill you!”

Steve knew Tony should be resting, he really did, but the Billionaire had been adamant earlier that they needed to do something, and fast. And they’d been on tenterhooks for over three weeks now. Steve was itching to see if Tony knew something that could help. Simply put, he didn’t want to wait any longer.

Half an hour or so later they reconvened in the conference room, Katie still extremely pissed off. Tony was sat at the table, perched in a wheelchair with an IV bag connected to his arm, hung from a pole behind him, the remnants of a bowl of porridge were in front of him. He was busy looking at the pictures of those that were lost flashing on the holographic screens all around the table as Natasha was talking, his chin resting in his hand as he concentrated. Katie shot Steve another angry glare and he sighed, looking back at Natasha as she spoke.

“World governments are in pieces. The parts that are still working, are trying to take a census. And it looks like he did-” Natasha paused as she swallowed, “he did exactly what he said he was going to do. Thanos wiped out fifty percent of all living creatures.”

“Where is he now?” Tony asked looking right at Steve as he lifted his head from his hand.

Steve sighed before he spoke. “We don’t know.” He opened his hand, allowing it to dall to his side. “He just- opened a portal and walked through.” He leaned back against the back of an arm chair, his arms folded across his chest.

Tony sighed and looked around the room, frowning as he glanced over to where Thor was sat on a bench outside, deep in thought as his hands wringed together. Katie knew the sight of Tony looking so ill last night when he had seen him, had knocked the god further back into his dark mood, the one she’d tried, and so far failed, to coax him out of.

Tony gestured to the God “What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s pissed. He thinks he’s failed.” Rocket sighed from his spot sitting on the floor against a wall. “Which, of course, he did, but you know, there’s a lot of that going around, ain’t there?”

Tony leaned forward in his chair, mouth agape at the talking raccoon, “Honestly until this exact second, I thought you were a Build-a-Bear.

Katie grinned, the familiar Tony Stark sass coming back out to play was music to her ears.

“Maybe I am.” Rocket answered, and Steve steered the conversation back.

“We’ve been hunting Thanos for three weeks now. Deep space scans, and satellites, and we got nothin’.” He took a deep breath, almost afraid to ask the next question. “Tony, you fought him-”

Tony furrowed his brow, cutting Steve off, “Who told you that? I didn’t fight him. No, he wiped my face with a planet while the Bleecker Street magician gave away the stone. That’s what happened. There was no fight. Because he’s unbeatable.”

“Okay,” Steve softly cut in. “Did he give you any clues? Any coordinates, anything?”

Tony blew air out loudly through his lips as he gave a sarcastic salute to Steve. Steve narrowed his eyes and accross from him Katie let out a silent groan, and glanced at Natasha who gave a loud sigh.

“You know, I saw this coming a few years back. I had a vision, you remember that Kiddo?” Tony looked at Katie as she took a deep breath. “But, I didn’t want to believe it. I thought I was dreaming.”

"Tony, I’m going to need you to focus-” Steve started as he stood, taking a step closer to Tony.

”And I needed you. As in past tense.” Tony tilted his head and looked up at Steve, dropping his hand from where it had been rubbing against his lip. “That trumps what you need. It’s too late buddy, sorry.”

Tony’s words echoed round Steve’s head and it felt like he’d been punched in the gut. Tony was right, he’d let them down, he’d let them all down. He tried his best to keep his face from falling as he breathed deeply and he saw Katie watching him intently, her face expressionless.

“Ok, that’s enough.” She started, moving towards Tony but he shook his head, and waved her away.

"You know what I need?” He asked, his voice rising in volume and Steve’s attention turned to him as he stood, throwing his hand down and sending the remnants of his bowl of porridge flying across the table. “I need a shave. And I believe I even remember telling all of yous, alive or otherwise-” he began to rip his IV out of his arm as Katie stepped forward at the same time Rhodey did.

“Tony, Tony, Tony, stop!” Rhodey said gently, as Tony ignored him and continued.

“-that what we needed was a suit of armour around the world.” He snapped voice raising as his breathing increased without the IV bag feeding him nutrient any longer. “Remember that? Whether it impacted our precious freedoms or not, that’s what we needed.”

Precious freedoms…Steve’s face fell further as he took in Tony’s word, his brother-in-law still blamed him. He took a deep breath and looked at him. “Well that didn’t work out, did it?” he finally said, his voice full of sadness, tone soft.

But Tony was just getting started, and he paid Steve’s remorse no attention as he continued. “I said we’d lose. You said, ‘We’ll do that together too.’” He mocked in a deep voice. “Well, guess what Cap? We lost, and you weren’t there. But that’s what we do, right?” Tony looked around. “Our best work after the fact? We’re the A-vengers? We’re the A-vengers, not the Pre-vengers?” he questioned rhetorically to Katie as she moved to stand in front of him, placing herself in between her brother and her husband.

“Okay, you made your point Tone, just sit down.” Her hand gently pressed to the middle of his chest.

“She’s right.” Rhodey looked at him, taking hold of his shoulder.

Tony ignored both of them completely, instead he turned to Carol and pointed at her. “She is fantastic by the way. We need you, you’re new blood. We’re a bunch of tired old mills.” he gestured around, shrugging off Rhodey’s grasp, and gently pushing Katie to one side as he stepped right up to Steve pointing a finger in his face. Steve swallowed and looked down at Tony as Katie hesitated behind him, ready to intervene if Tony did anything stupid.

“I got nothing for you Cap. I’ve got no coordinates, no clues, no strategies, no options. Zero, zip, nada. No trust, liar.” His whispered the last word.

Another punch to the gut. Steve took a deep breath, his chest falling. It was true, he had no defence or response.

“Tony, that’s not fair.” Katie began, glancing at Steve who looked like he had just been slapped. As she did, Tony reached up and ripped the arc reactor off his chest and shoved it into Steve’s hand. Steve looked down at it in utter incredulity.

“Here, take this. You find him, and you put that on.” Tony then turned to Katie. “And you, seeing as you follow him everywhere, you hide.”

Before the last word was fully out, Tony stumbled, tilting forward and Katie caught him, dropping to her knees keeping his weight supported as best she could, as Steve and Rhodey also crouched down.

“I’m fine. I…” Tony’s protest was cut off as he collapsed, out could.

“Get him into the medic bay.” Bruce instructed immediately, as Steve effortlessly picked him up and followed Bruce out of the room, Rhodey close behind. Katie hurried after them, with Pepper, as Steve gently lay him down on the bed before he stepped from the room as Bruce began hooking him back up to the drips.

“I told you!” Katie followed him out, blazing with anger. “I told you he wasn’t up to this. When are you going to realise you don’t always know better?”

“I’m sorry.” Steve gulped and looked down at his hands, before he took a deep breath, his chest shaking. “And for the record, I realised that a long time ago.”

He looked utterly dejected, and Katie felt the anger in her system ebbing away, and she let out a sigh.

“Steve, I’m sorry, I didn’t…”

“Don’t.” Steve shook his head, his eyes dropping to the floor. “Don’t say you didn’t mean it, because you did. Just like Tony meant what he said before.”

“He was lashing out.” Katie gently lay her hand on Steve’s arm. “He feels guilty. And probably hasn’t had the chance to process and think about it like we have.”

“Thing is you’re right, and he’s right. I am a liar.” Steve sighed and shook his head, raising his eyebrows as he continued to look at his feet. “I did say we would fight together, and when it came to it, we didn’t, because I couldn’t swallow my damned pride over the Accords.” “Hey.” Katie’s voice dropped as she reached up to turn his face to look at her. “Those accords, that entire situation was complicated, Steve. It was never as simple as just swallowing your pride.” “Yeah it was.” He shrugged, shooting another sad glance in Tony’s direction as Rhodey came out of the room, leaving Bruce to bustle about and check the IVs.

“Bruce gave him a sedative. He’s probably going to be out for the rest of the day.” Rhodey informed them. Steve nodded but his attention flew to Carol when she spoke.

“You guys take care of him, and I’ll bring him a Zorien Elixer when I come back.” She stated before walking away.

“Where are you going?” Natasha questioned, her tone laced with confusion.

“To kill Thanos.” Carol said simply as she kept walking away. Steve and Katie turned to each other, then looked at Natasha before they all followed her down the few steps back towards the conference room.

Natasha reached her first, “Hey, you know we usually work as a team here, and between you and I, morals a little fragile.”

“We realize up there is more your territory, but this is our fight too,” Steve added, as Rhodey chipped in.

“Do you even know where he is?”

“I know people who might.” Carol replied

“Don’t bother.” A different voice came from the doorframe behind Carol, and they all whipped around to face Nebula. “I can tell you where Thanos is.”

Katie exchanged a glance with Nat, then Steve, and they followed the blue woman to the common room where Rocket was waiting. Rhodey arrived shortly after with Bruce, who looked around questioningly.

“Nebula had an idea and we ran some scans.” Rocket hopped up onto the table as Nebula began talk, bending over the keyboard at the holograph.

“Thanos spent a lot of time trying to perfect me. And when he worked, he talked about his great plan. Even disassembled I wanted to please him. I’d ask ‘where would we go once he’s plan is complete?’ his answer was always the same, 'To the Garden.”

She finished typing in some coordinates.

“That’s cute.” Rhodey scoffed. “Thanos has a retirement plan.”

“So where is he?” Steve asked, not hiding the edge in his voice.

“When Thanos snapped his fingers, Earth became ground zero for a power source of ridiculously cosmic proportions, no one’s ever seen anything like it.” Rocket explained pulling up a hologram of Earth, then a simulation of the power source he was talking about swept over the simulation before the hologram morphed into another planet, “Until two days ago, on this planet.”

“Thanos is there.” Nebula said, matter of factly.

“He used the stones again.” Katie breathed, her mouth going dry as she leaning forward to get a closer look.

“Hey, hey, hey, we’d be going in shorthanded, you know?” Bruce stuttered.

Rhodey joined in. “He’s still got the stones, so-”

“So let’s go get him. And use them to get everyone back.” Carol shrugged, as she looked around.

“Just like that?” Bruce questioned.

“Yeah. Just like that.” Steve replied nodding as did Carol. He was done waiting now, it was time to act. This was the best chance they were going to have.

Katie looked at the holograph before looking up to Natasha.

“I mean, even if there’s a small chance that we can undo this, we owe it to everyone who’s not in this room to try.” Nat argued, her voice almost breaking at the words.

“If we do this, how do we know it’s going to end any differently than it did before?” Katie asked, looking around.

“Because before you didn’t have me” Carol stated simply, her hands on her hips.

Steve almost smiled at the look on Katie’s face, her eyebrows disappearing into her hair they’d shot up so fast. But it wasn’t his wife who replied, it was Rhodey.

“Hey new girl, everybody in this room is about that superhero life. And if you don’t mind my asking, where the hell have you been all this time?” His tone was clipped.

“There are a lot of other planets in the universe,” Carol shot back before she sighed, her tone softening, “Unfortunately they didn’t have you guys.”

Katie glanced at Nat, then Steve who raised his eyebrows in a “fair enough” gesture a small smile flickered across his face. But, before anyone had time to comment, there was the sound of a chair scraping against the floor as Thor stood from the table he’d been eating at and stomped toward Carol, making Katie jump as she’d completely forgotten he was there.

He came to a stop in front of the woman, staring at her for a beat before lifting his hand. His axe flew past her, mere inches from her head, whipping her hair around her face. Not even a flinch. Instead she looked up at Thor appraisingly, her mouth twisting into a small smile.

Thor pondered for a moment, both hands resting on the top of his axe. Eventually he nodded and turned to Katie. “I like this one, Little Stark.”

Katie gave a huff of a laugh before she looked at Steve.He was staring at the alien planet on the hologram before him, jaw twitching. This was it, their chance to bring everyone back. They had to go for it, they had to. The instruction the team was waiting for came in the form of a low growl, the steely Captain America determination emanating from every word Steve spoke as he glanced up.

“Let’s go get this son of a bitch.”

*****

“Alright, now, who here hasn’t been to space?” Rocket asked.

Katie raised her hand and in front of her Natasha did the same as did Steve and Rhodey. Thor looked round, grinning.

“You better not throw up on my ship.” Rocket warned, turning back to the front.

“Approaching the jump in three-“ Nebula said loudly.

Katie clamped her right hand into the side of her seat, reaching her left across the space between them to grab Steve’s hand.

"Two.”

He laced his fingers into hers as he turned his head to look at her, giving her a soft smile.

“One.”

The pure force of the ship’s speed pushed Steve back against his seat as they shot through space, and his eyes widened. It was stunning, the stars and galaxies whirred past in a flash of purples, pinks, silvers and then the ship slowed to a stop.

Rocket opened the hatch and Carol headed out, turning back to the ship as she floated in front in the air outside.

“I’ll head down for recon.” Her voice came over the speakers and she turned and flew away.

Katie unbuckled her seatbelt and stood, stretching her legs before she turned and headed towards where Thor was sat, eyes focussed on a spot on the chair in front of him.

“You okay?” She asked, sitting down next to him. He turned his head to face her and took a deep breath.

“I’m going to kill him.” He said simply before he looked towards the front of the ship. Katie glanced up at Steve who was watching her, turning his compass over in his hand. He gave a small smile before turning to Natasha as she looked up from the tablet she was poking around on and spoke to him as he glanced down and opened it, looking at the photo of him and Katie inside. That day seemed like an age ago, happy, carefree their faces looked back at him, cross eyed and grinning into the camera.

“This is gonna work Steve.” Nat said, confidently.

“I know it is.” Steve replied simply, snapping his compass shut as he looked up at his friend, before he glanced back at Katie who had her head led on Thor’s shoulder. This was their last chance, the hope they’d been clinging onto, not only to bring everyone else back but the precious thing that had been taken from them. And if it didn’t work…well he didn’t even want to think about that. “Because I don’t know what we’re gonna do if it doesn’t.” He finished eventually.

Natasha gave him a small squeeze before they both glanced up as a bright light filled the ship. Carol had returned.

“No satellites. No ships. No armies.” She spoke incredulously as she hovered outside. “No ground defences of any kind. It’s just him.”

Nebula spoke as she stared straight ahead at the planet “And that’s enough.”

Rocket piloted the ship, following Carol, and landed at the bottom of a hill, a small hut perched on top of it. Steve stood up, turning to everyone and he noticed Thor’s eyes were flashing with lightning as he grit his teeth together.

“Think he’s in there?” Katie asked, squinting up at the hut. Nebula nodded.

“Alright team, just as we planned.” Steve instructed. Katie took a deep breath and walked down the ramp, glancing around. It looked just like a farm. Rhodey, even though the comment had been sarcastic, had hit the nail on the head. He’d killed countless people and then fucking retired to a farm.

“Are you ready?” Rocket asked.

Katie nodded and twisted her bracelet, the nano-tech of her replacement suit flowing over her. She leaned her arm down to allow the raccoon to climb up onto her shoulder and at the same time she saw Thor’s hand gripped round the handle of his axe, as Bruce picked up Natasha in the Hulk buster.

One by one those who could fly, crashed into the hut, surrounding Thanos on all four sides, taking him completely by surprise. Carol gripped him in a choke hold, and before he could so much as retaliate, Thor took a swipe at his hand, cutting it clean off taking the Infinity Gauntlet with it, as Thanos let out a scream of pain.

Katie stood in front of Thanos, her repulsors raised as she heard Steve and Natasha head up the steps into the hut. She turned to watch as Rocket jumped off her shoulder, kneeled and rolled over the severed gloved hand, where he recoiling instantly, clanking up.

Katie felt her stomach clench. The stones were gone.

“Where are they?” Steve bit, drawing level with Katie as he stared at Thanos.

Thanos’ breathing was laboured, almost as if he was struggling to draw oxygen, and Carol tightened her grip around his neck.

“Answer the question.” She growled.

Thanos shifted uncomfortably. “The universe required correction.” he grit out between deep breaths “After that, the stones served no purpose beyond temptation.”

“You murdered trillions!” Bruce yelled as he kicked Thanos against the wall of his shack.

“You should be grateful.”

Bruce punched Thanos again, and Katie moved forward to look down at him, and when she spoke her voice was shaky.

“Where are the stones?” She demanded, retracting her helmet.

“The stones are gone. Reduced to atoms.”

"You used them two days ago?” Katie bit back, not wanting to believe what he was saying, desperate for him to be lying.

“I used the stones to destroy the stones.” Thanos looked down at his arm which was horrifically burnt right up to his neck. “It nearly killed me. But the work is done, it always will be.”

She glanced at Steve, whose face had slipped ever so slightly. The Captain took a deep breath, his eyes locking onto hers which were now filling with tears as the magnitude of the situation sunk in. The stones were gone, and without him, there was nothing they could do.

“I am inevitable.” Thanos breathed out, and at his words a dark hopelessness flooded Steve’s system as Rhodey began to desperately stutter.

“We’ve got to tear this place apart! He…he..has to be lying,”

But as Steve turned to look Thanos, he could tell instantly he wasn’t.

“My father is many things.” Nebula said softly, stepping forward as she looked down sadly. “A liar is not one of them.”

“Ah, thank you, daughter.” Thanos looked at her and praised, “Perhaps I treated you too harshly.”

At that point, Thor gave a growl and swung his axe aggressively and with a single swipe, he took off the Titan’s head, and Steve could do nothing but look down at the headless body, his chest heaving.

“What?” Rocket gasped, “What did you do?”

Thor was silent before he looked round the room and his eyes locked with Katie’s “I went for the head.” He answered simply before he turned and left.

“Thor?” Katie called out shakily stumbling after her friend. “Thor? Where are you going?”

“It is over. There is nothing more we can do.” His voice cracked as he turned to face her, placing his hand on her shoulder as he looked her square in the face. “I bid you farewell Little Stark.” With that he dropped a soft kiss onto her cheek and stared straight into her face, his eyes full of tears. “You have a big heart, full with fire. Never let that fire go out.”

And with that he held his axe high above his head. The Bi-Frost engulfed him and in seconds he was gone.

Katie’s legs gave way and she collapsed to the floor, numb. Thor was right, it was over. And there was nothing they could do about it. She jumped slightly as a hand dropped to her shoulder and she spun to see Steve, his eyes shining with his own tears, face giving away the devastation he felt inside as he knelt besides her, pulling her to him.

This was it, the absolute end of any hope they had.

****

Thump.

The pummelling noise his fists were making on the punching bags was like a mantra in Steve’s mind. With every blow he was landing, a different person and how he had failed them flashed in front of his eyes.

Katie, their baby, Bucky, Sam, Wanda, Tony…

This had always been his standard way of coping. When the pressures of his new life got to be too much, and he couldn’t sleep or cope, he would take out his anger on a punch bag or by running, but as the years had gone he had started to do it less and less, until he had pretty much stopped altogether.

In fact, he hadn’t done this really in any real anger, since Katie had gone missing, but then he hadn’t felt as angry and as useless as he did right now since then.

He pulled back his right fist and gave a particularly violent punch, scattering sand from the bag all over the floor. That one had hurt. He stopped, glanced down at his fist and grimaced. His knuckles were split wide open.

“Steve?”

He heard Katie’s voice and he took a deep breath, grabbing the bag in front of him with his hand as he pressed his forehead against it, the bag gently spilling its contents onto the floor.

“Stevie?” She repeated, stepping close and saw that her Soldier was trembling from head to toe, his T-shirt soaked with sweat as it clung to his body, his hair plastered to his forehead. For a moment he didn’t speak, until he took a deep breath, and Katie almost didn’t hear him his response was that quiet.

“It’s my fault.”

Katie took a deep breath, blinking back her tears. Steve had been stoic since they had returned to the compound almost four weeks ago. But now, here he was stood before her, completely undone, his every part of his soul was dripping with guilt.

“We failed, remember?” Her voice shook at little as she took a step towards him, reaching out for his arm, but he jerked away, glancing at his hands which were trembling, blood dropping from his split knuckles to the floor.

He continued to look down, avoiding her gaze and gave a derisive snort. “Appropriate huh, blood on my hands. What kind of father would I have ever made?”

Before Katie could stop herself she’d slapped him across the face, hard enough to whip his head around to the side. His eyes widened slightly, the shock of the blow worse than the actual slap itself, but still he couldn’t bring himself to look at her.

"Don’t.” She managed to say, stumbling over her words as her voice cracked. “Steven Grant Rogers, don’t you fucking dare!”

Steve shuddered as her words bounced off the walls of the gym and he finally looked at his wife. Katie’s anger drained away instantly and she reached up, cupping his face and smoothing the cheek she had slapped.

“Steve,” she looked straight into his eyes, “Tony always told me as a kid that as long as you can tell yourself honestly you did the best you could, then there is nothing else left for you to do. And we did the best we could.” She took a huge shuddering breath. “Yes, it wasn’t good enough but that is not on you, okay?” Her hands tightened their hold on his face as her own tears fell in time with his. “You’ve led us through thick and thin, been there, taken countless hits for us. The Avenger’s couldn’t have asked for a better Captain and I…” her voice cracked again as Steve stepped into her embrace and she whispered her last sentence into his ear, “I couldn’t wish for a better husband to be by my side.”

Steve buried his face in his wife’s hair, breathing in her familiar smell as the damn broke inside him and he simply cried until he had no more tears left to shed, Katie doing the same as she pressed her faced into his chest, her hands tightly fisting in his damp shirt.

“I don’t deserve you.” He croaked eventually. And he didn’t. She was so brave, strong and pure hearted. What had he ever done to be worthy of that?

“Yes, you do.” She sniffed, looking up at him. “You’re a good man Steve, and you’re my man. I love you more and more with each day that goes by.”

She slid her hands up to his cheeks again and he closed his eyes, breathing deeply, relishing her touch, allowing it to calm him the way it always did. Eventually, her hands moved down to take his, and she pressed a soft kiss to the ring on his left hand.

“Til the end of the line.” She whispered, before she leaned up and wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him close once more, her hands gently brushing through his hair as she soothed him softly, her lips brushing his cheek.

They stood there for a little while, neither speaking, Steve simply seeking out the comfort she was offering before she stepped back into his eye-line and reached up once more, brushing the tears off his cheek.

“Come on, Soldier.” She leaned up to press a soft kiss to his lips. “You need to rest.”

Steve didn’t argue, he was exhausted. Her fingers of her right hand tangled with his left, gently so as to not aggravate his bruised and battered hands, and he allowed her to lead him from the room.

**** Chapter 41 Part 1

**Original Posting**

#stark spangled banner #steve rogers #Katie Stark #steve rogers x ofc #steve rogers x original female character #mcu #mcu fanfic #steve rogers fanfiction #steve rogers fic #chris evans #chris evans characters

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yukichouji · 3 years

Note

I got some more asks for Theron, if you'd like to do them ^^

How does your character behave around people they like? And around people they dislike?

What is their least favourite or most embarrassing moment from their childhood?

What is your OC's voice like (pitch, strength, tempo and rhythm of speeck, pronounciation, accents, etc.)?

What does your OC like to ridicule and/or what do they find stupid?

Feel free to omit, reinterpret or in general answer as you like ^^

Hey :D Thank you so much for your ask! I am truely sorry it took me so long to answer alskdjflsad Life got in the way of the fun things for a bit, alas. But here we finally are! :)

How does your character behave around people they like? And around people they dislike?

Around people he likes Theron is pretty chill. He likes to crack jokes, poke fun at his friends (though not in a malicious way, just a bit annoying at times, perhaps xD) and really lean into his quick, sarcastic humor. Though he can and will be serious if the situation calls for it. He cares deeply about his friends and by the way he treats them that is easy enough to see. He's a warm, friendly kind of guy.

As for people he doesn't like, he'll be pretty much the exact opposite. Except for the sarcasm, that one's a constant. But, if he doesn't like someone they'll definitely know that as well. He gets cold and hostile even, depending on how big his dislike. He'll be mouthy and difficult and have a hard time reining himself in if he has to work together with the person he dislikes for some reason. Doesn't always make things easy, but it's his way of looking out for himself and making sure people with ill intent stay very far away from him and know what they'll be getting into should they try anything.

What is their least favourite or most embarrassing moment from their childhood?

Oh, my xD Well, he knew pretty early on that he wanted to be a hunter and the kids in his clan got these little training bows and arrows to practice with, you know the kind I mean? Ones that will hit dummies but that won't cause any real damage if you accidentally hit something you're not supposed to unless the aim is really unfortunate. And little Theron was not happy with those. Because how dare anyone treat him like a child. He got himself so worked up about it when he was about 8 that he talked Tamlen into sneaking into their clan's craftman's shop and stealing one of the grownup bows and some arrows to prove to everyone that they were strong enough to handle it. They didn't use the training dummies for their little experiment because that would have gotten them spottet right away, but isntead Theron had this wild idea that they were going to sneak out into the woods and bring backs some game to prove themselves. Not only did he completely fail to draw the bow they'd swept, it being way too big for him, but he also managed to get both himself and Tamlen so completely lost it took the clan two entire days to find the two kids huddled in a cave miles away from camp to escape the rain and the cold. Tamlen got sick because of it, down for a whole week with a fever and everything and Theron got the scolding of a lifetime. The whole clan was so very angry with him because they had been worried out of their minds. He was pretty bitter about the unfairness of it all, but as he grew older and less resentful he eventually understood how stupid he'd been then and what all could have gone horribly, horribly wrong. Tamlen and him were incredibly lucky to not have come across anything or anyone hostile those two days, otherwise they'd both have been dead or much, much worse for sure. He still feels bad for having done something so stupid and endangering Tamlen in the process just because the boy with no parents felt a need to prove something.

What is your OC's voice like (pitch, strength, tempo and rhythm of speeck, pronounciation, accents, etc.)?

Ok, I'm not sure how good I am going to be at describing this one (english is not my first language and I am struggling a bit here xD) but I will try!

On a scale from really low to really high his voice is probably somwhere around the middle, leaning slightly towards high? And a bit nasal, but not in a way that's horribly anoying or weird. He likes to talk quickly, so much so that he consciously has to slow himself down sometimes. It's like his mouth is racing to keep up with his brain and that's moving too damn fast. His voice is firm and sure, usually, a bit brash even. But it can change a lot when he really gets serious about something and isn't deflecting through jokes. It gets lower and slower then and his intonation gets calmer as well. His accent is Ferelden (because that's where he grew up) but mixed with that typically dalish accent? I am bad at pinpointing accents in general so I can't really say what real world accents those are derived from.

I hope that made some sort of sense xD

What does your OC like to ridicule and/or what do they find stupid?

One of the things Theron finds stupid is when people complicate things overly much. Like, when there is a simple solution for a problem he won't have a lot of patience for someone moaning about propriety or tradition or whatnot. He's a guy, who likes a direct approach best. Which is also why he dislikes it when people talk around an issue instead of just saying straight what they mean/want/the problem is. He will also mercilessly poke fun at someone if they overestimate themselves, boast about their prowess and then fail at the task they set out to do. Though the way he makes fun of that will depend on whether he likes the person in question or not. If he likes the person it will very much be good natured, if he doesn't his words are going to be chosen to make the other feel it. All of that definitely means that he has absolutely no patience for politics and the delicacies of high society's machinations. It just doesn't make sense to him and probably never will.

#oc ask meme #theron mahariel #again thank you so much for your ask #I had a blast doing these :)#<3

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dumb-hat · 3 years

Text

Character Sheet - Evander Winsome

—————- Link to blank template!

Rules: Things in brackets are meant only as guidelines, to be erased and your answers written in place of. Things separated by | are for bolding and italicising.

Tagged by: No one! I saw this reblogged by @mooglemeet, so I went ahead and grabbed it directly from @bluespiritfire. Link to the blank template is up above! Tagging: No one specific/anyone who wants to. Feel free to tag me back so I can see it!

Name: Evander Winsome Age: 26 Pronouns: He/him Birthdate: 12th Sun of the 5th Umbral Moon

~~PLACE OF ORIGIN~~ Race: Hyur From the First: Interracial heritage:

Hometown/city: Limsa Lominsa Current residence/popular haunt:Ul’dah

~~APPEARANCE~~

Favourite/commonly used clothes:

Any difficulties with magical/physical disciplines? Nothing in particular

~~RELATIONSHIPS~~ Parents/Legal Guardian/Parental Figure: mother | father | aunt and/or uncle | grandparents | adoptive | foster | mentor | family friend/godparents | other Siblings: One older brother; deceased Children: None that he knows of Romantic: single | unrequited | crushing | dating | engaged | married | divorced/separated | widow/widower | recently split | it’s complicated (I mean, not to him. To him, it makes total sense. Well, most of it does.) | other (…) Friends: Evander tends to befriend and trust people fairly easily, though it can take him a bit to really open up. Once you’ve hit that point, you’ve likely got a friend for life. Rivals/Enemies: To the best of his knowledge, he’s left these all behind somewhere or other, thanks largely to his restless need to wander. That said, there’s surely a few lurking in the past and there’s always room for more, of course!

Any special gestures of affection they have with people in their life? He’ll often make complaining noises about paying for drinks and dinner, but he’ll do it every time and would be slightly hurt if people didn’t let him.

How are they dealing with the most prominent of the above? How does it affect their in day-to-day life, if at all? Poorly, typically.

~~ODDS AND ENDS~~ Notable Weapons He doesn’t have any particular bond with any of his weapons, really. He sees them as tools, and ones that he uses only reluctantly. He sometimes enjoys tinkering with the ones he builds, but that’s more of a hobby than anything.

Notable Mounts He has various vehicles and machines he likes to fuss over and drive around, but he’s particularly fond of his SDS Fenrir.

In addition to his chocobo—a particularly stubborn beast named Doreen—he’s also fond of his battlesheep, Doctor One and a colossal crab he’s dubbed St. Barnabus.

Notable Minion/s Besides Doctor One and St. Barnabas, Evander is especially fond of various clockworks, automata, wind-ups and models that he’s put together. His favorite is a drone modeled after a Magitek bit that he’s named Valencia.

Keepsakes/Mementos

A pendant in the shape of a swan, a few too many flasks

Chronic Illnesses or Disabilities Evander lives with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. I’ve written about it a few places, most notably at length here and in brief here. How do they deal with these? Depends on the day, really. This isn’t really a thing he has a name for, so it’s not a thing he can easily address. He’s got a sloppily slapped together set coping mechanisms that work about half the time, if he’s lucky. Other than that, he mostly hopes for good days full of things he can convince himself he’s interested in.

Education Level He likes it when people underestimate him, so he’s not always quick to admit to the formal Ishgardian education afforded to him by the family that took him in when he left Limsa Lominsa. He’ll often try to pass it off as eclectic, self-driven studies... Which, admittedly, also played a big part in shaping him.

Habits There’s a lot of excess in his life. He drinks too much. He eats too much. He stays up too late, too long, and then sleeps too late, too long. He’s almost always got a flask or four on his person, and he often finds that he’s picking up the dinner or drink tab wherever he goes.

Other Nothing immediately springs to mind, but I’m sure there’s like a dozen things I should put here. This thing has been sitting in my drafts for god-knows-how-long, so I’m just glad to finally get it out there.

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robin-the-enby · 3 years

Note

Hii congratulations for your 400 followers!! Could I please get a ship with a male Marvel character?🥺 I’m Italian (sorry for my english btw) my pronouns are she/her and I’m bisexual. I’m an ESFJ and a Gemini. I have green eyes and dyed cherry red hair. I dress with black clothes and I wear black eyeshadow or eyeliner. I’m the sweet mom friend of the group, always there for everyone and my friends say that I’m really good at comforting people. I’m very optimistic, I always try to see the good in everything and I often put other’s needs before my own, I would do everything for the people I care about and sometimes I’ve been told that I’m too kind for my own good. I have a sarcastic humor and I love making others laugh, people say that I should be more serious and that I shouldn’t joke around so much. I don’t like when people tell me what to do and I’m not afraid to stand up for myself or for someone else. I absolutely love listening to music ( Mother Mother are my favs!), it helps me relax, after a bad day when I get home I put on music and dance. I also love watching horror movies even though it’s impossible to scare me. I really hope I did this right, have a great day :)

I'm kind of worried that you meant to send this to another person, because I'm nowhere near 400 followers, but thank you still <3 I am excited for this one, because it's the first thing I'm writing for Marvel! Also, your English is just fine ;) That said, I match you with:

Tony Stark

You two would be the sweetest couple, istg

We all know that Tony, despite the playboy front he hides behind, feels and cares deeply.

Emotions can be hard to handle, so he would appreciate you being there for him so much, you have no idea.

He's not used to having someone be there for him, making sure he's alright and taken care of, so he's very grateful for everything you do for him.

He's a realist, but he'd find your optimism (in good measure) endearing, with the right encouragements and assuring words, you manage to lift up his spirits when he's feeling blue.

He would look after you as much as you look after him. You make sure he's alright, physically and mentally and he makes sure nobody is taking advantage of your kind and giving nature.

You both share sarcastic humor and so playful banter is something that can be frequently heard in your home.

But if you join forces...Gods have mercy on anyone who decides to cross your path with ill intentions. You two are capable to shred that person to bits, with style nontheless!

You can joke around him as much as you want, Tony is definitely the type of person that is frequently told that he should be more serious.

Tony would absolutely love your independence and would support you whenever you'd stand up for someone or yourself.

Your love for music is also something you two share. Your music taste might not be the same, but Tony would love to take you on a concert of your favourite band, either for your birthday, anniversary or just for a date, because he's extra like that.

If he ever caught you dancing, he would just watch with an amused smile, before complimenting your moves and continuing on his merry way.

He himself is not too into dancing, not that he can't, he just nods his head to the rhythm, mouthing the lyrics. If you're really sneaky, you could catch him playing an air guitar/air drums. Tony probably will not even get embarassed, just winks at you and continues his bass solo XD

I can also see you with: Basically anyone - I had a hard time choosing tbh, because your caring personality would go well with anyone (that's, like, the whole deal with ESFJs, isn't it XD). Steve is the mom friend, but also need someone to remind him to take it easy, because he goes hard on himself, he would love to dance with you, your indpendence and the way you want everyone to be ok. Bucky is also a lot like Steve, he was actually the one I thought about putting as a main, but Tony won. I think I don't have to tell you about how that man would appreciate someone to be there for him, he'd love your sass and, like Steve, would love to dance with you and watch you stand up for what you think is right. There are many others, Bruce, Thor, Loki, T'challa, everyone would appreciate you for being there for them and if you don't think you could be in a romantic relationship with them, you would still make the greatest friend <3

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mirkwoodshewolf · 4 years

Text

Falling for you; Tom Holland x reader

*Author’s note*

And here we go with another fic this time I’m posting up a Tom Holland fic. So the premise of this is that you reader are the daughter of RDJ and have been chosen to be apart of Spider-man: Far from home. I won’t spoil anything else but that’s basic characteristics for you the reader. And like I said this isn’t the end. I’ll be posting some more fics coming up in the next little while.

Warnings: FLUFF, teasing dad!RDJ, injuries (falling off a wire).

Taglist:

@waddles03

@psychosupernatural

@plethora-of-things

@ixchel-9275

@dancingcoolcat

@jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels

___________________________________________________________

It was like any other day on set. But being the daughter of the one and only Robert Downey Jr. the studio will treat you like royalty, even though I don't want to go to the extreme. And how did I manage to join the cast, well funny story actually for the next Spiderman movie Far from home Director Jon Watts wanted to introduce Peter Parker's new love interest, Carmen Dela Cruz otherwise known as "The Jaguar".

Much like the Black Panther character for speed and stamina, the Snow Leopard was introduced in Spiderman issue 312 number 2, a Latina character from Guatemala, she comes to America hoping to make a better life and save her family from a war that is going on so that they can make a better living in America.

She takes the mantle of "The Jaguar" when she was just 16 years old cause according to the comics, she was beaten and assaulted one night and left for dead but the spirit of the Jaguar warrior came to her and granted her the power and strength of all the jaguar warriors that came before her. She used her powers to get revenge on the gang that assaulted her and has vowed to protect any woman who is threated by assault. She's a protector of women and vows to never let anyone go through from what she went through.

She's teamed up with the Avengers in the past as well as Spiderman but you can see her majorly through the Black Panther comics as being a cat warrior herself, she looks up to T'Challa as a proud mentor and guide.

Now you may be thinking "AHH why another white-washing a character like this?" Well not true, cause you see my mom is actually from Guatemala herself, before my dad met his current wife Susan, after the divorce with his first wife, he met my mom and she ended up pregnant after a one night stand. But even after my birth, I've been constantly taken back and forth between both my parents even though they continued on with their lives and married different people.

But once I became 18, I permanently decided to stay near my dad's while I still visited with my mama. Now I have done acting in school and in college but this was my first breakout and my dad recommended me the part thinking I would be good at it.

So having seen Kevin and growing up with him ever since the beginning he and Jon both gave me a shot and after 2 callbacks, I got the part for Carmen and this would be her big debut onto the screen, as well as my own.

I was currently going over my new lines when I bumped into someone and that someone turned out to be none other than Tom Holland.

"Oh sorry (y/n)." He said.

"No, no it was my fault. Hey, did you get the new re-write of the script?"

"Yeah Jon just gave it to me actually, do you maybe want to go over some lines before we start filming?"

"Sure." We got together along the side and I said, "Can we go over pg.24 I'm having a hard time with that scene."

"Okay pg. 24 it is." We both opened our scripts to pg.24 and Peter first began his line. "What made you change your mind?"

"The same reason why I told you not to get involved with Mysterio in the first place. Maldito you Americans never listen to since or reason, particularly you white boys." I said in Carmen's thicker accent.

"You know, I think it's because you can't resist me. I mean twice in a row we've met you've saved me and always talked to me, even though you said this would be the last time you would."

"Don't be a fool, I'd never fall for someone as reckless as you, Spiderman. Anyone who listens to Stark is automatically a fool to me."

"Don't speak ill of Mr. Stark he is—he was the greatest man to ever live. He—he died a hero."

"I know he did, as did Captain Rogers." For this movie, Carmen always looked up to Steve Rogers as a child because he always knew what was best and he knew to never give up on a fight. He was her hero, even though she never got to meet him.

"Then tell me the real reason why you came and found me?" I turned towards Tom and seeing him so close to me, knowing that our character would eventually be together, but not by the end of this movie, I felt my heart flutter almost chanting out his name as I looked deeply into his eyes. I breathed heavily in character and turned away muttering incoherently in Spanish as it said in the script. "Carmen,"

He took my wrist and a shot of electricity shot up my arm. I turned back towards Tom and seeing him stand so close to me almost made me go weak at the knees. We stared into each other's eyes and just when Tom began to lean forward over a megaphone we both heard my dad's voice.

"Alright you two lovebirds on the set now!" I tensed up and turned towards my dad and flipped him the bird. "Don't you point that finger at me young lady or you're grounded!"

"I'm 20 years old dad you can't tell me nothing!" I cried back out to him. I turned towards Tom and said, "Well we better get to costume and makeup."

"Yeah guess we should." He said solemnly. We stood there in silence before he cried out as he took on ahead, "Race you!"

"Hey no fair you got a head start!"

Filming proceeded as planned, I was now being strapped onto some wires for the last big fight scene with Mysterio.

"You all good?" asked the stunt director.

"Yeah I'm all good. I can do this stunt Erik don't worry about it."

"Okay, but I'll have Stacey on standby should you need her." I nodded and saluted to my stunt double Stacey and Jon then told me how things were gonna go.

"Alright so Tom's already been swung into the crates, you come up from the top of the warehouse and meet up to Jake. All you need to do right now is just grab onto him, don't begin any of the fighting sequences yet, we'll work on that on the levitation bars."

"You got it Jon" I gave him a thumbs up.

"Alright you're all set." Aaron my wire guy said.

"Thanks dude."

"Alright clear the set please!" Jon said into his megaphone. I crouched down on my marker and waited for rolling and then action. "Quiet on the set please!" I took a couple of deep breaths and got into Carmen's mindset as I stared at Jake who was on wires just ahead of me. "And action!" The crates moved around which was my cue to jump out and just before I reached Jake, I let out the Jaguar Warrior cry but on my first take I totally missed Jake by like three feet.

The entire crew was laughing as were me and Jake.

"That was terrible!" I cried out. "Can that please be in the blooper reel!?" I laughed out.

"Reset let's go again!" Jon called out. I was then guided back to my cue point and I set myself down on the catwalk and went back to my marker. "Rolling, take 2! And.....action!" Th crates moved again and this time I jumped from a different angle and let out the Jaguar cry again and this time I managed to grip onto Jake. "Cut! Okay that was great! Let's just get one more for safety!". I released Jake and I was guided back to my catwalk.

But as I got there I noticed that one of the wires seemed a bit loose one me, with Jon starting from the top for a final take, I tried to hurry and tighten the wire as best I could and quickly got to my marker.

"Places please! And.....action!" The scene repeated itself and as I leapt out on cue, suddenly the wire snapped and I was dangling by one wire.

"Okay not good! Not good!"

"Cut! Get the mats under her now! Hang on (y/n)!" I looked towards Jake who was trying to come over towards me and he reached out telling me to take his hand. Just before I could grab it, my second wire snapped and I fell over 10 feet from the air and landed on the mat beneath me.

I let out a groan and soon I heard voices surrounding me and I heard emergency services telling everyone to back up and give them some room. I felt this sudden pain in my arm as I let out a scream of pure agony.

"We know sweetheart, we know but you have to lie still for us" one of them said as they began to examine me. "Broken shoulder, we have to get her to the hospital, get the gurney in here!" I was then set up on a gurney as I screamed and moaned in pain.

I was wheeled across the set and to an ambulance vehicle and I heard one of the men say.

"Now Ms. Downey, I'm gonna give you a sedative, it should help dull the pain and help you sleep. You'll be alright, we're taking you to the hospital now." Next thing I knew my vision was going fuzzy and then I went out like a light.

When I woke up, I found myself in the hospital with a sling over my arm and my shoulder bandaged.

"You're awake," I turned to my right and saw Tom standing before me, as well as Harrison and Zendaya.

"How you feeling chic?" asked Zendaya.

"A little funny, so what do I got?"

"You broke both your shoulder and your wrist in the fall plus a mild concussion. The doctors said you're lucky to be alive, most people falling from that height usually end up in a coma if not dead or multiple broken body parts."

"Gee thanks Harry" I said sarcastically.

"Good to know the Downey sarcasm is still intact." Zendaya praised.

"Hey guys could you give us a moment along please?" Tom asked. Zendaya and Harrison both looked at each other with a know it all grin before Zen said.

"Sure, fine."

"Don't have too much fun you two." I flipped them off as they left my room leaving Tom and I alone.

"How are you feeling?" he asked me.

"A bit in pain, but I've had worse, once I broke my leg when I was just 9 years old doing a risky bicycle stunt that my friends dared me to do. Boy dad was so pissed he never let me ride a bike again for 6 months."

"You serious?"

"Yeah." When I looked back up at Tom, I noticed that his eyes now held such worry and fear as he said.

"When you fell I—I was so worried that you'd....that you were gonna be.... I even tried to ride with you to the hospital but they wouldn't let me. God never before did I wish I really was Spiderman I—"

"Shhh it's okay Tom. It wasn't your fault. I should've spoken up and had the wiring guys tighten my wire before anything. If it's anyone's fault, it's mine." I then felt Tom take my free hand in his and I looked right back into his eyes again.

And damn that heartrate monitor because it was starting to spike up and I let out a groan of embarrassment to which Tom softly chuckled and he said.

"If it helps you feel better, my heart would probably be doing the exact same thing." I looked at him and he continued, "When I first met you I—I thought you were the prettiest girl I've ever seen, I know the press always says that it's me and Zendaya but truthfully I hope and pray that once Far from home comes out that they'll start to say you and me. God I hope I didn't freak you out or ruin this friendship because I—" I stopped him with a kiss.

He placed his hands on my cheeks as the kiss got a little deeper before I finally separated from him.

"You're so much like Peter, you ramble on too much." He chuckled nervously and he said.

"So....when you're released do you—wanna go out for coffee or something?"

"Coffee sounds wonderful, Parker." I teased using Carmen's accent as I said Parker.

"Cara mia Carmen." He leaned in and kissed me once more. Just before anything could go further we both heard my dad's voice say.

"Alright you two, don't be sucking each other's faces off!" We separated from each other and we both cleared our throats in embarrassment.

"Really dad?"

"Hey! Be thankful that once you two lovebirds got together I was gonna allow hand holding and little pecks but after my virgin eyes have been tainted with what I had just seen I may not allow any PDA at all." I shook my head at him and I turned my attention back to Tom and he smiled down at me as he took my hand in his and gave my knuckles a kiss.

Man I wish my release would come faster, I really could use that coffee right about now.

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herwonderland7 · 3 years

Text

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏𝟓 》 Slowly

summary 》 Aera wasn’t aware that as days passed, her body started to weaken and paralyzed as days went by, knowing that she was really running out of time.

characters 》 Gae Aera, Grandma Kim, The White Queen (Aerina), Lim Jaebeom, Mark Tuan, Jackson Wang, Park Jinyoung, Choi Youngjae, Bambam, Kim Yugyeom

warnings/author’s note 》 mentioned of being paralyzed, basically Aera is slowly weakening.

genre 》 fantasy, got7!as!werewolves

‘Aera, listen to me. You have to lay down for now. I’m afraid to tell you that your body is slowly weakening. I see that each part of your body will be paralyzed, as days pass.’

The princess is afraid that she might get attached to her loved ones when she is slowly dying, knowing that both would be heartbroken when the time comes.

“...That’s the last one,”

Aera tightly ties the string onto the scroll, handing it towards Grandma Kim, but this time, she grabbed a hold onto the elderly’s hand - eyes gazing onto the elderly.

“This is specifically for Jaebeom and the others. It’s best if you could give them after I had my last breath here,” said Aera softly, her eyes watching her surroundings although they were in Aera’s study room.

Days passed after the parade, and the ceremony was successful as the citizens took a liking for Jaebeom’s pack - they even liked them more after finding out that they were the ones who saved King Morian’s long lost citizen.

Just like how she predicted that day, Aera didn’t have the availability to spend time with the others, and sadly, she could tell that her friendship with Jaebeom was beginning to drift away - since both of them weren’t on talking terms and the rest found out the true reason.

But they didn’t know who Aera’s heart belonged to, since she didn’t mention any names - except for Youngjae, he knew but he decided to keep it quiet.

“So, I heard words regarding you and the alpha,” Grandma Kim mentioned and Aera quickly groaned, knowing what the elderly was about to say next.

“I’m impressed! You’re the first girl to reject an alpha!”

Aera turned towards the eldery who was chuckling to herself in amusement, with a slight glare.

“Do you want me to write it down in the book of prophecy that I’m the first girl to reject an alpha?” Aera sarcastically offered, seeing Grandma Kim chuckling more. The elderly find this amusing, hearing rumors that the princess rejected the alpha. Grandma Kim had actually seen this coming.

“You knew this was going to happen didn’t you?” Aera questioned towards the elderly, seeing that Grandma Kim slowly went towards her.

“Aera, everything has been written in the book of prophecy. That’s already your destiny,”

“...which includes me dying on a bed..” Aera muttered to herself before sighing loudly.

Grandma Kim and Aera had taken a peek on the book of prophecy early in the morning and it seems the day where she is going to die has already been written.

“The book doesn’t even state which day it is. Isn’t it weird?”

“Well I think it is best if we do not know the exact day. There’s a saying we should live our days as if the next day is our last,” Grandma Kim advised and Aera smiled softly to the elderly words.

She knew she was going to miss the elderly’s sentimental words and teasing ones - but she would dearly miss the White Queen. The Queen is her biological mother after-all.

Grabbing a scroll that was meant for the White Queen, Aera turned towards Grandma Kim.

“Do you know where the White Queen currently is?”

Aera was told that The White Queen was having her walk-abouts with the generals. She was about to call the Queen when she decided to lay herself low - after seeing Jaebeom and the others with the White Queen.

It seems they were having a serious discussion, seeing Bambam and Yugyeom having their eyes downcast while listening to Jinyoung basically talking to the Queen.

I wonder what they are talking about.

Not wanting to disturb them, Aera turned her back.

“Oh! Princess Aera! Good timing for you to be here!”

〖 AERA’S POV 〗

Oh no.

I slowly turned towards them, with me hiding the scroll in my layered dress.

Smiling sheepishly to my own mother who was having the biggest smile on her face, my eyes wavered towards the others who were smiling softly at me - except for Jaebeom who was avoiding my eye contact.

“R-right.. So.. what’s going on?”

“I had a serious discussion with Jaebeom and his pack that I had given them an official job in the royal house,” The Queen said while smiling towards the others.

Judging from the others, it seems they were happy about what the Queen had told them which I can’t help but frown sheepishly.

“What’s the job then?”

“Protector of Morian’s castle!” The White Queen said happily and as soon as I heard her answer, my smile immediately faded.

“....Which means they have to move to Morian?”

“My dear Aera, their hometown is Morian.”

I nodded slowly as my eyes moved towards each one of them, reading their thoughts.

All of them were relieved to go home, it seems they were more comfortable in Morian rather than here - according to Yugyeom.

I know it is selfish of me if I wanted them to stay forever in Aerina’s castle - a place which is different than their hometown.

“So when are the 7 of you going back home?” I asked the 7 of them, as they avoided my eyes - not wanting to answer.

“Tomorrow,” Jaebeom answered simply and I frowned at his words.

How could he say it so easily?

“Pardon me? How could you….” I frowned deeply and there was a soft sigh coming from the Queen, seeing the exchange of words between me and Jaebeom.

“Tomorrow, princess.” said Jinyoung this time, slightly loud and I tilted my head towards my mother - kind of sad that why didn’t they tell me earlier, at the same time I can’t blame them.

“I’ll note that.” I smiled slightly towards Jinyoung, before turning my back towards them - leaving them in taken-aback to see me walking away.

〖 YUGYEOM’S POV 〗

“Did you see the princess’s face?” Bambam whispered towards me as we were leaving our rooms.

“Of course,” I answered softly.

The White Queen had given us official jobs which were being the protector of Morian’s castle, but what the queen didn’t mention to the princess was that we were also the protector of Morian Kingdom.

It’s a tough job but I am happy that we were given a job in the royal castle, which means we could see the princess easily!

But it seems Aera wasn’t too happy of us working in the royal castle.

“But why does she look… unhappy?” asked Bambam as he was frowning.

“..I don’t know.. Maybe she doesn’t want us to leave her all alone in Aerina’s castle…?” I assumed, and Bambam’s expression turned sad, realizing that we had to leave the princess.

Smiling slightly with positiveness, I pat his back as an encouragement. “I’m sure she understands. It’s the only way to protect both kingdoms, Bam.”

Bambam nodded with a smile, and we were about to go down the stairs when a group of maidens were running towards a certain direction. We were about to go down when they suddenly stopped us.

“Sir Bambam! Sir Yugyeom! Here you are! We were looking everywhere for you!” One of the maidens called us, and I looked towards Bambam in confusion.

“Why are you ladies rushing for? Did something happen?” asked Bambam, his voice sounded worried - seeing as they looked rushed.

“It’s Princess Aera! She fainted in the middle of horse-riding!”

My eyes went wide after hearing the servant’s response, turning towards Bambam who looked taken-aback.

“Take us to her!” With my answer, Bambam and I, along with the maidens guided us to where Aera was.

〖 BAMBAM’S POV 〗

As soon as Yugyeom and I arrived at the hallway where Aera’s room was located, there were already some figures walking out of her room, with deep frowns on their face.

Somehow, I grew anxious since the deep frowns were coming from Jackson and Jinyoung, but what got me having cold sweats were seeing the pale expression from Jackson himself.

I didn’t even realise that Yugyeom and I were just a few steps away from the both of them.

“What happened to the princess?!” Yugyeom was the first one to question both of the older ones, as they looked from me to Yugyeom.

“..I don’t know what to say..” Jinyoung muttered to himself, as he turned towards Jackson, wanting him to say whatever was going on.

“I don’t even know what the heck is going on till Grandma Kim said the princess has fallen ill and what’s worse is that there were no cures to treat it!” Jackson rambled in anger and annoyance.

I gulped while turning towards Yugyeom, whose eyes were widened twice after hearing Jackson’s words.

“Where are the others? Do they know about this?” I asked, thinking that the others must be informed about this - even if one doesn’t want to know, they had to know.

Aera is our childhood friend, and a future crowned princess to my kingdom and Aerina’s kingdom.

“Youngjae is currently in the garden, finding plants to cure Aera while Mark is searching for Jaebeom in Morian, to let the alpha know as soon as possible regarding this.” Jinyoung informed us and I let out a sigh.

“Can we—

Before I could even ask, Yugyeom already knocked on the door before pushing the door open to see Grandma Kim and the Queen on both sides of the princess’s side.

My eyes fell towards a pale body on the bed, and my eyes immediately went foggy with tears.

“Grandma!? What’s going on? What’s happening?” Yugyeom was already running to his grandma’s side, not caring to bow to the older ones as his eyes attached to the princess, who looked peacefully sleeping.

“My dear, I need you to calm down—

“How can I calm down, Grandma?! The princess doesn’t look well!” Yugyeom yelled slightly, his voice sounded shaky.

As his best friend, my hands already reached for his shoulder - gesturing him to calm down before the presence of the Queen and his own grandmother.

Looking towards Grandma Kim then towards the Queen, I can’t help but frown a little.

Why do they look calm?

“What’s going on, your majesty? Why does the princess look so pale?”

“Aera has never been this pale in our years we have spent with her. Is there something wrong with her, Grandma Kim!?”

More voices were heard in Aera’s head, and to her, the voices sounded annoyed and concerned. Her head began spinning and she could feel herself frowning to the pain she felt.

Couldn’t bear the feeling, Aera’s eyes started to flicker open, her vision starting to focus - then to see a few figures on both of her sides.

Aera slightly groaned as she moved, seeing all heads snapping towards her.

The first person she saw was Jackson, as she then sees Jinyoung, Bambam and Yugyeom with the White Queen and Grandma Kim.

“Princess!” Jackson came rushing towards Aera’s side, sitting on her bed while reaching out for her pale hands. Aera smiled softly, seeing how worried Jackson was. She could only grip onto his hand slightly, feeling her energy getting weaker.

“I’m not dead yet, you know.”

“Don’t say that!” answered Yugyeom a little loudly, making Aera turn towards the taller one. His eyes were watery while his nose was red, indicating that he may have cried.

〖 AERA’S POV 〗

I knew what had happened before I passed out.

I was, as usual, horse-riding and one moment, I felt the same throbbing pain on my chest, the same feeling I felt in Morian - and that’s when I fell into darkness.

This time, I felt twice as painful as before.

“What’s going to happen to me now?” I asked, turning towards Grandma Kim, who was somehow staring at me.

The elderly turned towards the Queen, as she gave a nod towards the elder one.

“You will need to rest more, your highness. Which means bare minimum of movement.”

“What!?” I yelled while frowning.

There was no way I would be staying in bed for almost every time.

I still have so much to do, so much to write on the scrolls for the future - knowing I would be gone anytime.

I can’t be sitting still.

“But—

‘Aera, listen to me. You have to lay down for now. I’m afraid to tell you that your body is slowly weakening. I see that each part of your body will be paralyzed, as days pass.’

My eyes slowly widen, hearing Grandma Kim’s voice of thoughts while trying to move my legs, which unfortunately, and to my horror, I can’t even move my legs.

My eyes started to get watery in fear, turning towards the Queen as her eyes were already clouded with tears.

‘I can’t move my legs! Don’t do this to me! I have so much to do, Grandma! Help me!’ My thought of voice came out as a scream, without knowing that I let out a whimper, which caused the others to be taken-aback.

Only Grandma Kim, and my mother could hear my honest thoughts, as they could look at me with the saddest eyes I have ever seen.

This is it.

“Aera, princess. Look at me, hey.” Jackson called me out, making me break eye contact with my mother. His hands were cupping both of my cheeks, forcing me to directly look at me.

“You can get through this. We will take care of you, we will stay here until you are better, right guys?” Jackson pleaded to me, turning towards the others who were nodding, supporting Jackson’s answer.

Chuckling while sobbing, I shake my head slowly while holding onto his hands, staring into his eyes that had so much hope.

Not knowing that I was staring at him, my eyes filled with hope that wasn’t even real. Jackson and the others were trying hard to read me, since I had blocked others to read me deep - and I was too into gazing towards Jackson, that the door busted open.

To reveal Mark and Jaebeom, they looked like in a rush as they were breathing rather heavily.

My eyes somehow met with Jaebeom, his eyes went wide and for a second, I could see his eyes went teary but he immediately hid it with him clenching his jaw, seeing what Jackson is doing.

“Aera!” Mark called me, his voice filled with worry while running towards me.

Instead of him, Jaebeom exited the room and I could already feel his jealousy even when he was just outside.

“I’ll talk to him and—

“No. You don’t have to, Jackson. Leave him be. He’ll come around,” My hands are already grabbing for Jackson as he was about to leave.

‘Stay, Jackson. Stay with me, please.’

Jackson’s head snapped towards me, his eyes widened slowly as he heard my voice of thoughts - which sounded desperate and rushed.

Cursing to myself, I had just accidentally let out my honest thoughts in vulnerable moments.

I really need to work out on that, or I would be in trouble.

“Okay, lovebirds. Do in mind that we are in the same room, and Mark just got here! Give him some love!” Bambam broke my thoughts, complaining about me and Jackson - as I turned towards Mark who was slightly pouting towards me, causing myself to giggle.

‘I don’t have much time with them and I’m already worried that I might get attached to them, just like how they are attached to me,’

𝒑𝒓𝒆𝒗𝒊𝒐𝒖𝒔 𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒑𝒕𝒆𝒓 ⇿ 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫

𝒎𝒂𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒍𝒊𝒔𝒕

#got7 scenarios #got7 imagines #got7 wolf #got7 wolf au #got7 wolf scenarios #got7 wolf imagines #got7 fantasy #got7 mark #got7 jaebeom #got7 jackson #got7 jinyoung #got7 youngjae #got7 bambam #got7 yugyeom

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