#platform decay

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The specific process by which Google enshittified its search

I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me SATURDAY (Apr 27) in MARIN COUNTY, then Winnipeg (May 2), Calgary (May 3), Vancouver (May 4), and beyond!

All digital businesses have the technical capacity to enshittify: the ability to change the underlying functions of the business from moment to moment and user to user, allowing for the rapid transfer of value between business customers, end users and shareholders:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/24/naming-names/#prabhakar-raghavan

Which raises an important question: why do companies enshittify at a specific moment, after refraining from enshittifying before? After all, a company always has the potential to benefit by treating its business customers and end users worse, by giving them a worse deal. If you charge more for your product and pay your suppliers less, that leaves more money on the table for your investors.

Of course, it's not that simple. While cheating, price-gouging, and degrading your product can produce gains, these tactics also threaten losses. You might lose customers to a rival, or get punished by a regulator, or face mass resignations from your employees who really believe in your product.

Companies choose not to enshittify their products…until they choose to do so. One theory to explain this is that companies are engaged in a process of continuous assessment, gathering data about their competitive risks, their regulators' mettle, their employees' boldness. When these assessments indicate that the conditions are favorable to enshittification, the CEO walks over to the big "enshittification" lever on the wall and yanks it all the way to MAX.

Some companies have certainly done this – and paid the price. Think of Myspace or Yahoo: companies that made themselves worse by reducing quality and gouging on price (be it measured in dollars or attention – that is, ads) before sinking into obscure senescence. These companies made a bet that they could get richer while getting worse, and they were wrong, and they lost out.

But this model doesn't explain the Great Enshittening, in which all the tech companies are enshittifying at the same time. Maybe all these companies are subscribing to the same business newsletter (or, more likely, buying advice from the same management consultancy) (cough McKinsey cough) that is a kind of industry-wide starter pistol for enshittification.

I think it's something else. I think the main job of a CEO is to show up for work every morning and yank on the enshittification lever as hard as you can, in hopes that you can eke out some incremental gains in your company's cost-basis and/or income by shifting value away from your suppliers and customers to yourself.

We get good digital services when the enshittification lever doesn't budge – when it is constrained: by competition, by regulation, by interoperable mods and hacks that undo enshittification (like alternative clients and ad-blockers) and by workers who have bargaining power thanks to a tight labor market or a powerful union:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/09/lead-me-not-into-temptation/#chamberlain

When Google ordered its staff to build a secret Chinese search engine that would censor search results and rat out dissidents to the Chinese secret police, googlers revolted and refused, and the project died:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragonfly_(search_engine)

When Google tried to win a US government contract to build AI for drones used to target and murder civilians far from the battlefield, googlers revolted and refused, and the project died:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/01/technology/google-pentagon-project-maven.html

What's happened since – what's behind all the tech companies enshittifying all at once – is that tech worker power has been smashed, especially at Google, where 12,000 workers were fired just months after a $80b stock buyback that would have paid their wages for the next 27 years. Likewise, competition has receded from tech bosses' worries, thanks to lax antitrust enforcement that saw most credible competitors merged into behemoths, or neutralized with predatory pricing schemes. Lax enforcement of other policies – privacy, labor and consumer protection – loosened up the enshittification lever even more. And the expansion of IP rights, which criminalize most kinds of reverse engineering and aftermarket modification, means that interoperability no longer applies friction to the enshittification lever.

Now that every tech boss has an enshittification lever that moves very freely, they can show up for work, yank the enshittification lever, and it goes all the way to MAX. When googlers protested the company's complicity in the genocide in Gaza, Google didn't kill the project – it mass-fired the workers:

https://medium.com/@notechforapartheid/statement-from-google-workers-with-the-no-tech-for-apartheid-campaign-on-googles-indiscriminate-28ba4c9b7ce8

Enshittification is a macroeconomic phenomenon, determined by the regulatory environment for competition, privacy, labor, consumer protection and IP. But enshittification is also a microeconomic phenomenon, the result of innumerable boardroom and product-planning fights within companies in which would-be enshittifiers try to do things that make the company's products and services shittier wrestle with rivals who want to keep things as they are, or make them better, whether out of principle or fear of the consequences.

Those microeconomic wrestling-matches are where we find enshittification's heroes and villains – the people who fight for the user or stand up for a fair deal, versus the people who want to cheat and wreck to make things better for the company and win bonuses and promotions for themselves:

https://locusmag.com/2023/11/commentary-by-cory-doctorow-dont-be-evil/

These microeconomic struggles are usually obscure, because companies are secretive institutions and our glimpses into their deliberations are normally limited to the odd leaked memo, whistleblower tell-all, or spectacular worker revolt. But when a company gets dragged into court, a new window opens into the company's internal operations. That's especially true when the plaintiff is the US government.

Which brings me back to Google, the poster-child for enshittification, a company that revolutionized the internet a quarter of a century ago with a search-engine that was so good that it felt like magic, which has decayed so badly and so rapidly that whole sections of the internet are disappearing from view for the 90% of users who rely on the search engine as their gateway to the internet.

Google is being sued by the DOJ's Antitrust Division, and that means we are getting a very deep look into the company, as its internal emails and memos come to light:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/03/not-feeling-lucky/#fundamental-laws-of-economics

Google is a tech company, and tech companies have literary cultures – they run on email and other forms of written communication, even for casual speech, which is more likely to take place in a chat program than at a water-cooler. This means that tech companies have giant databases full of confessions to every crime they've ever committed:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/03/big-tech-cant-stop-telling-on-itself/

Large pieces of Google's database-of-crimes are now on display – so much, in fact, that it's hard for anyone to parse through it all and understand what it means. But some people are trying, and coming up with gold. One of those successful prospectors is Ed Zitron, who has produced a staggering account of the precise moment at which Google search tipped over into enshittification, which names the executives at the very heart of the rot:

https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/

Zitron tells the story of a boardroom struggle over search quality, in which Ben Gomes – a long-tenured googler who helped define the company during its best years – lost a fight with Prabhakar Raghavan, a computer scientist turned manager whose tactic for increasing the number of search queries (and thus the number of ads the company could show to searchers) was to decrease the quality of search. That way, searchers would have to spend more time on Google before they found what they were looking for.

Zitron contrasts the background of these two figures. Gomes, the hero, worked at Google for 19 years, solving fantastically hard technical scaling problems and eventually becoming the company's "search czar." Raghavan, the villain, "failed upwards" through his career, including a stint as Yahoo's head of search from 2005-12, a presiding over the collapse of Yahoo's search business. Under Raghavan's leadership, Yahoo's search market-share fell from 30.4% to 14%, and in the end, Yahoo jettisoned its search altogether and replaced it with Bing.

For Zitron, the memos show how Raghavan engineered the ouster of Gomes, with help from the company CEO, the ex-McKinseyite Sundar Pichai. It was a triumph for enshittification, a deliberate decision to make the product worse in order to make it more profitable, under the (correct) belief that the company's exclusivity deals to provide search everywhere from Iphones and Samsungs to Mozilla would mean that the business would face no consequences for doing so.

It a picture of a company that isn't just too big to fail – it's (as FTC Chair Lina Khan put it on The Daily Show) too big to care:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oaDTiWaYfcM

Zitron's done excellent sleuthing through the court exhibits here, and his writeup is incandescently brilliant. But there's one point I quibble with him on. Zitron writes that "It’s because the people running the tech industry are no longer those that built it."

I think that gets it backwards. I think that there were always enshittifiers in the C-suites of these companies. When Page and Brin brought in the war criminal Eric Schmidt to run the company, he surely started every day with a ritual, ferocious tug at that enshittification lever. The difference wasn't who was in the C-suite – the difference was how freely the lever moved.

On Saturday, I wrote:

The platforms used to treat us well and now treat us badly. That's not because they were setting a patient trap, luring us in with good treatment in the expectation of locking us in and turning on us. Tech bosses do not have the executive function to lie in wait for years and years.

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/22/kargo-kult-kaptialism/#dont-buy-it

Someone on Hacker News called that "silly," adding that "tech bosses do in fact have the executive function to lie in wait for years and years. That's literally the business model of most startups":

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40114339

That's not quite right, though. The business-model of the startup is to yank on the enshittification lever every day. Tech bosses don't lie in wait for the perfect moment to claw away all the value from their employees, users, business customers, and suppliers – they're always trying to get that value. It's only when they become too big to care that they succeed. That's the definition of being too big to care.

In antitrust circles, they sometimes say that "the process is the punishment." No matter what happens to the DOJ's case against Google, its internal workers have been made visible to the public. The secrecy surrounding the Google trial when it was underway meant that a lot of this stuff flew under the radar when it first appeared. But as Zitron's work shows, there is plenty of treasure to be found in that trove of documents that is now permanently in the public domain.

When future scholars study the enshittocene, they will look to accounts like Zitron's to mark the turning points from the old, good internet to the enshitternet. Let's hope those future scholars have a new, good internet on which to publish their findings.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/24/naming-names/#prabhakar-raghavan

[petiolata]

Duolingo recently sacked most of their translators to replace them with AI, and kept on a few who now just check the AI content for errors.

I knew Duolingo was aiming to be the poster child of good apps turned to shit by greedy soulless stockholders but this takes the cake.

[river-taxbird]

Discord was always too good to last.

I did a project on Discord and it's CEO, Jason Cirton, for a business leadership class in uni in like April. During my investigation, I basically discovered that Discord was unsustainable and had recently completed a hard pivot when the Discord Store failed. The plan was to run at a loss until the Discord Store could bring in revenue to make a profit, but you and I know that was obviously never going to happen. Steam closed that door. So after that they tried to increase monetization through other channels like Nitro. Due to the fact it's unprofitable, I basically knew it was going to enter the platform decay stage of trying to innovate and increase its monetization in preparation for going public or getting acquired. The company's culture was clearly changing. I could see the enshittification process beginning.

What I did NOT predict when I did that project is how quickly it would happen. More news started coming out basically as soon as I had finished, and it has been a rapid and steep decline since around then. There's so many more ads and needless changes and integration of the latest techbro buzzwords. Others have documented it much better than me. Basically I knew it was coming, but it has happened so much faster than I ever expected.

[gaasubap]

Platform decay

(Ugh.... can't copy paste title and description on mobile.....)

[type40capsule]

Enshittification

Enshittification, also known as platform decay, is a way to describe the pattern of decreasing quality of online platforms that act as two-sided markets. Examples of alleged enshittification have included Google Search, Amazon, Facebook, Reddit, TikTok, and Twitter. Enshittification can be seen as a form of rent-seeking.

Read more...

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Translated into Gallifreyan by the Gallifreyan translator.

[lavender-w4ters]

decided to look at the #enshittification tag on tumblr, and apparently it’s a great way to feel desolate and hate capitalism. i need a detox in the form of wholesome content now

for those who don’t know what enshittification is:

short answer- it’s how every platform gets more and more greedy as it gets bigger and slowly makes the user experience worse and worse in favor of squeezing more and more money out of everyone, until they go too far and collapse. very useful term.

long answer- read the wikipedia article, or better yet, cory doctorow’s post coining the term. it’s a long post, but it’s worth your time imo!

[kellykline]

people putting their discords in the authors notes makes me sick

[malkaviian]

i hate the weird spot i have been when it comes about writing for the past months

[shellcrush]

temporarily broke my fav carabiner charm bc i bent the keyring but i cant fix it bc i cut my nails too short this is so.

[dopaminx]

Posting things here instead of Twitter where people I interact with on a daily basis can see is like ranting to your collection of stuffed animals.

But also the stuffed animals are alive and can respond and provide their own input

[halcyone-of-the-sea]

How To Adapt To Fire (III)

AU MASTERLIST || THE FINAL PART

PAIRING: Fireman!John 'Soap' MacTavish x F!Journalist!Reader

WORDCOUNT: 4.4k

WARNINGS: Fire(s), intended harm, death/gore, murder, crime, corruption, arsonist mystery plot, protective!Johnny, flirting, intense banter, attempted murder, burns, needles, injuries, one dirty joke, etc.

*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*

Running, the wind whips past your face with the force of a hurricane. 

The screams echoed over the abandoned neighborhood, leaking and rising as the illumination of a burning body sent slashing shadows along the remnants of houses. Flailing arms and sizzling flesh. It followed you as your feet slapped the concrete, satchel still at your side and your breath echoing in your ears. 

You don’t know where Duncan is—and you dare not look behind you as you dart into someone’s lawn, bee-lining away from Kurt’s now-silent inferno of burnt hair and cooking meat. Grass that grows up to your knees is shoved aside, broken down to the earth as your panting breath is too loud in your ears. It’s all you can hear now, which may be the worst part.

“Holy fuck,” your hiss under your breath, sweat dripping down your neck. Your hands were skinned in your little fall off the steps, but the sting as you slap your palm to the side of one of the houses is lost to you—pain doesn’t matter when adrenaline takes over. “Holy fuck.”

Your fingers drip crimson along the siding, but you’re gone again with ragged inhales, snapping eyes wide. You need to try and circle back for the car, you tell yourself. Patting your pockets for the hard pressure of your keys, you dash past a trash can and sigh when you feel them still there. 

And then you hear the whistling. 

It’s over the air, and in a skid of shoes, you halt and listen intently—a bird in the eyes of a fox. Lungs heaving, your head jerks around as a tune wafts up and pierces your ears. The sound echoes over the houses, flying across fallen roofs and peeling paint. You’re frozen, night corralling you in. 

“Who does this dude think he is?” You ask, a deep fear in your heart and an eerie feeling up your spine. 

It was getting closer. 

Heart stuttering, your legs take you up the back steps of a house to your left, hand snapping to the rusted handle and shoulder ramming into it. It gives way on the second shove, slamming into the far wall before you hit the ground and push on once more, the air gone from your body.

If Duncan can murder his own cousin in the way he had…what could he do to you?

Feet shuffling, your head moves quickly, taking in the decaying living room and joint kitchen—falling stairs that you instantly choose to run up, hands burning. 

Your only hope was the car; you needed to get to a vantage point, find out where Duncan was, and try to avoid him. It wasn’t any different than what you’d seen on TV…right? 

The wooden floor creaks like brittle bones, and you move across it while the scent of fire is still in your nose—gasoline and dead eyes. Your eyes go from one open door to another, beds covered with moth-eaten sheets. From outside of a broken window, you see shadows along the street; whistling. 

You choose a room at random and slink inside, hands already jerking into your satchel and pushing aside the active recorder—reaching for your phone. 

Looking between the window and the device, your dripping fingers slash through contacts until you can find the only one you think to call immediately. 

Smashing down on the green button, your phone is right at your ear as your heartbeat pulses like a drum. As it sits there, you gaze outside, panting with blood smearing along your flesh. You can’t stop thinking about Kurt—how you’d seen a man get burnt alive in front of you as if it were nothing. You’d heard and witnessed a lot of things and had been in more courtrooms than you can count…but nothing would ever top seeing the whites of a man’s eyes as his body erupted into flames. 

“Okay, okay,” the phone quivers, clothes ruffled. You hiss softly, not willing to make more noise than you have to. “C’mon, MacTavish.”

A long shadow looms in the streetlight and you drop to the floor swiftly, knees slamming the wood, just as the click on the line pushes through.

“Dearie,” the Scot’s teasing voice is a godsend. “Didn’t expect you to call so soon. Not that I—”

“I fucked up,” you breathe, and the fireman’s audible snapping of his mouth would have been comedic in any other situation. “I really fucked up, and I think I need a little intervention here before I literally go up in the flames of my ambition.”

You’re talking so fast you doubt he can even understand you, but you continue as your forehead peaks above the window frame. 

Duncan is at the house next to where you’re hiding. Standing out front with a gas can in his hand and a matchbox in the other. You watch with horrified eyes as he walks to the front porch, pours the accelerant, and steps back to light a match. 

“Oh,” you growl through a hurried gasp. “So now he decides to change M.O.”

The neighbor's home alights. 

He’s trying to corner you.

Johnny’s panicked voice wafts through. “What in the hell are you talking about?”

“Listen,” you watch the fire spread, hands spasming. “I was going to wait for you, alright. J-just then I decided to not do that and I—”

“What the fuck!” There’s fast movement on the other side of the line, seemingly paper and pencils hitting the floor as fast feet slam the ground. 

“It’s not my fault I’m a stubborn bitch!” You snap, moving your free hand to the back of your neck and rubbing along the sweat there, smearing crimson. “I can’t get back to the car right now and Duncan is lighting the entire neighborhood on fire to try and catch me. I have all of it on the recorder, and I can’t lose the evidence for the inevitable court case.”

Johnny’s voice is so serious and hard, you know you’ve never seen a side like this from him before. It’s nearly a growl. “I don’t give a shit about fucking evidence. Where are you?”

You rattle off Kurt’s address from memory, face streaked with light from the fire. It was going to spread to this house. The wood is like free food just waiting for it willingly; you have to move before it catches. With the condition of the home, it would only be kindling for a larger blaze ready to overtake the street. 

Johnny’s voice is heavy. “Stay where you are and—”

Your laugh is grim, and you move out of the room rapidly as the boom of falling wood makes the ground shake. Breath nothing more than a shaky jump in your nose, you push out, “Not an option.”

“What do you mean ‘not an option’ what the hell is going on over there?! I swear, I told you not to go without me!” 

“Bring the fire trucks! All of them!” You shout and hang up swiftly as Johnny’s loud call of your name is silenced. 

You’re halfway down the stairs when the back door you’d previously busted through creaks on its hinges. 

Above fire, above the pattering of your pulse, your eyes are stuck-still. Stationary. Stiff. 

Duncan stares at you—and you stare at him. 

It’s like time utterly stops, hit in the face by a metal pipe before its teeth get knocked to the ground in a clatter of white enamel. Shell-shocked. 

Your phone rings again—Johnny, no doubt, but when it does, Duncan pounces.

He tosses the gas canister to the ground, followed by a quick match as you curse and race back upstairs. The whoosh of flames bursts into existence as hard boots follow after you, hot on your heels. 

“Shit!” You yell, calling out a firm and fearful, “Duncan!” 

A hand swipes at your shirt collar before you duck and pivot, shifting to brace your feet and ram your shoulder backward. The man takes the force right to the chest and shouts, tilting on the steps with a flailing arm, fingers that card through the air. 

But you’re not quick enough in the rabid getaway. 

A hand latches onto your wrist, and then you’re being yanked down with him into the awaiting arms of the burning fire.

—

Johnny’s whole heart is more active than when he and you were stuck in the sheets together—arousal is nothing compared to the fear he feels. 

The man’s legs carry him quickly into the engine room, grabbing gear and sending out the alarm. Already calls were coming in from dispatch, worried civilians who had said they’d seen what appeared to be twin fires off into the more abandoned parts of the left-to-rot suburbs. 

His panic extends to the next country it’s so far-reaching. Your call—your voice—the things you’d told him and, worse, what you hadn’t. 

Why did you have to be so stubborn?

He needs to get to you, and he can’t breathe properly until he does.

It doesn’t take the firemen long to get into the trucks—the red demons rocketing out of the station with every blaring alarm at their disposal, and at every bump, Johnny’s stiff eyes glare openly at his lap. The others dare not say anything to him; they all know that look.

A man on the edge of a fraying line. Stuck on the knife—waiting for the final twist. 

With all of the gear, MacTavish could be compared to someone heading straight into war, and with the following wail of police sirens, maybe war was where he was always meant to be. Johnny fidgets, his fingers clenching and unclenching above the meat of his thighs, helmet on his head nothing but a weight of reminder. He was there to stop fires—he was there to put them out. 

But even God knew that the second his boots hit the ground, and the rest of the firemen were grabbing the hoses, he would be running into that inferno without a second glance backward. 

Johnny was born and bred from fire, and at the very end of it, the flames would take him back.  

Not yet, he’d say. Not until she’s safe. 

The Scot grabs the face-piece at his feet, fixes it over his visage, and listens to his own rabid breath echo back to him. It was louder than any other sound he’d ever heard.

The shaking of his fingers is a traitorous beast.

—

Dragging an arm over the ground, the first thing you do is cough through black smoke. 

Mind delirious, you blink rapidly, stinging eyes unwilling to stay open for long simply due to the spike of irritation—instinctual tears blurring the few moments of clarity to be offered.

You choke on nothing and burn through all of it. 

Flopping, you force your body up onto its hands and knees, the world tilting even then as palms drag and fingers dig. The second your tears slap your knuckles, a leg to your ribs is kicking you back down. 

Yelling in pain, you sprawl to your spine, body bouncing as the sound of fire eating away drywall and dead wood sizzle in your eardrums. Your skin is sweltering, and you can’t stop the flood of sweat dripping off your flesh—it nearly hurts.

Head shaking, wet hands grasp at your wrists forcing them back. 

“You could have left,” Duncan hisses above the waves of spreading fire. If you wanted to live, you had to get out now. The very bones of this house are threatening to buckle like the spine of an old man—visible rafters beginning to cave. Splintering wood. Creaking. “You could have stayed out of it!”

You yell, legs kicking out with the strength you can muster above the carbon monoxide coursing through your blood. Your muscles need oxygen. You need to breathe.

Your lungs are too tight.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Cursing, your body lashes, Duncan and yourself battling along the burning ground as the roof across the room caves in, sending ashes and a large tsunami of orange rolling ever upwards and a shockwave that gives a sliver of an opportunity. 

The both of you hiss, arms moving up to protect your faces. 

Your clothes are ruined—ripped; torn. You don’t even care about any of it. There’s a ferality to you now, a bleeding fear that far drowns even the blood of your skinned hands. As you’re trying to stand again, Duncan tries to barrel into you. 

“I warned you to stop looking into it!” He rages. “Look what you made me do! I killed Kurt because of you!”

You grapple for your satchel, his shadow nearly on top of you before your arms flex and spring like the trigger of a pistol. Swinging the bag back, you send it in an arch with your hands gripping the tough material. The heavy thump and grunt resonates quickly as you hack again, sirens just beginning in the distance totally lost to you. 

“Maybe,” you speak on smoke-tight airways—a heavy wheeze as the fire licks your arms. You shout, almost dropping your bag. “You shouldn't fucking kill people!” 

Your hands grasp the satchel once more, lifting and striking down as Duncan yowls, finally grabbing it and tearing it out of your hands. He wraps his arms around your waist and sends you both directly into the heart of the blaze with an animalistic shove.

Crashing, the immediate flush of fire is so hot that it’s cold—like you’re plunged into ice, even as you feel your skin sizzle. Yet, the resounding scream is nothing compared to the roar of rage as an axe is taken to the last standing wall of the house. 

You fight with Duncan all the while the heat overtakes you, clawing and yelling; nothing more than a banshee of snapping teeth and hatred. The man forces you down, the warmth cooking the skin of your back one patch of flesh and fabric at a time. 

Fingers curl your throat as you dig your thumbs into your aggressor's eyes, choking; wheezing. Black begins to settle in front of your hazy vision, seconds leaning into longer glimpses of moving shadows and growing pain—a pain that adrenaline can only do so much against. And then, just before Duncan’s blood can drip down to your face, his eyes leaking and red, he’s ripped off in a flurry of fast hands and muffled calls. 

An oxygen mask flashes across your dying field of view, and a helmet—a fireproof jacket. Wide, panicked cobalt eyes. And yelling…so much yelling. All of it is stuck behind material that makes it sound like there are voices hidden underwater. 

Hands skimming your shoulders, dragging you out quickly as your bloody fingers grasp in dying panic—fading senses. There are others too, three inside of this house all frantically moving. Ducan is being restrained as well as he’s able to be, dragged back with two sets of hands—one on his shoulders the other on his legs like a child. 

You, on the contrary, get taken up in a fast set of arms more bulky than they are not, shoving you into a heavy chest until your face is hidden into a neck protected by a high collar. 

“Pencils!” Your body burns, and your face contorts as your focus can finally bleed into it. 

Shaking—quivering, your ears are ringing and the rushing feet below you jostle your form. 

Finally making it outside, it’s not a moment later that the entire house falls into itself, a tomb of fire and near death—lost to all but ash. Sirens are suddenly louder; shrill voices. 

Johnny’s hurried voice, and the sound of a mask being ripped off of his face. “Medic!” 

You pant, mouth opening but no words coming out beyond a sharp gasp for fresh air. Something is fitted over your face before you’re lying down on a cot, and your fingers reach but meet air. Head craning up, you blink just in time to see it as the EMTs begin jogging over to their ambulance. Johnny moves and grabs his helmet and throws it to the ground, barking something so loud that you’re broken mind can pick it up.

“Give the fucker to me!” The accent makes it all the more violent, and as your oxygen mask is strapped to your head, you stare owlishly, visage awash with blood and tears. You don’t even want to look down at yourself, and in this haze, you’re not even sure you’d be able to. 

But you can see the rabid events unfolding like your very own TV show. 

Firemen try to grapple Johnny back, but it’s useless to try and stop a brick wall. The Scot shoves one away before his gloved fingers snatch a restrained Duncan, and throws him up on his charred legs.

Senselessly, the arsonist smiles—it’s a distant, psychotic thing. 

“You know the journalist—” A fist is sent hurtling into his face.

Falling back, Duncan cries out as his nose breaks in multiple places; shattering like glass under the force of a steel hammer. 

“Get over ‘ere.” Johnny’s voice is raspy; guttural. You cough and the EMTs connect an IV to your arm, quickly nearing the ambulance as they try to coax you to lay back down. “Bastard! I’ll fucking kill you!”

Bending above Duncan’s body, MacTavish gets in two more sharp blows before he’s torn away with yells and orders—shoved with appeasing pats to his arms and desperate pleas to hold out. 

The police rush over, restraining Duncan and forcing his unconscious body to the side. Blood stains the ground, and the fires continue to blaze—others in the background trying to push it back. 

Chest heaving, your throat is raw, but even so, as the EMTs can’t stop you from weakly peeling back the oxygen mask, you call hoarsely, “Johnny!”

You’re loaded into the ambulance just as his eyes snap over, his chest rising and flailing through all of that gear still visible. Calming words find your ears as the medics move the oxygen back over your nose and mouth, holding it so you can’t take it off again. 

The back door is about to be slammed shut before the familiar square face bullies itself in. 

“Sir, you can’t—!”

“Drive,” the fireman shuffles into the seat directly across from you as large, damp, rags are set over your flesh in quick succession as you hiss, eyes flinching shut. Johnny grunts at the EMT who blinks quickly before he twitches at the sound of your pain; jaw clenching. “...Before I get into that seat myself.” 

The engine rumbles to life, and Johnny’s the one who takes your hand into his and drops his tone—moving closer. It takes a moment for his worry to be shoved behind a lens of surety, not for himself, but for you. 

The uncertainty in your eyes made him want to storm backward and show Duncan what fists can do when that’s all you have to rely on instead of cowardice. Fire was a tool of a weakling, and no man was weaker than one who tried to murder someone like you and your bright intellect. But there was no use thinking about it now.

“Oh, Hen,” Johnny’s voice cracks, eyes glancing you up and down quickly as the EMTs do their work. You wouldn’t be awake much longer—if you managed to fight the pain, they’d put you to sleep for your own safety. 

The burns were…they weren’t good.

“Hey, now,” the fireman eases, forcing a small smile and capturing your ash-smeared cheek. He doesn’t care about the state of his gear—the heavy oxygen tank on his back—all he needs is to hold you; even as little as this. “You just let those boys do their jobs, yeah? They’ll have you back up in no time at all, Pencils. Breathe for me, Dearie.” 

Your fast breaths stutter and the scrape of your vocal cords makes Johnny flinch, his eyelids pulling in as a grimace shifts the lines of his face. 

The man fights with himself to snap at the others and make them tell the driver to push the gas harder. He knows they’re going as fast as they’re able.

You try to speak, but Johnny shuts it down with a firm shake of his head. Seeing the packages of sterile bandages being unpacked with rapid hands, knowing the sting that will follow as they’re placed on leaking skin, the Scot moves closer and lightly shields your vision of it.

“No, c’mon now, don’t speak.” An unsteady smirk. “I know I take your breath away, but let's just wait until you’re at the hospital for all of that, eh?”

At the jerky glare coming off of you, a sliver of his panic leaves him.

Johnny tries a weak chuckle before it falls flat. 

Your eyes pick up on the agony before the black at the sides of your vision sweeps in—taking you away as the first press of wrappings along your back make themselves known. His hand stays firm at your cheek; thumb moving over the skin until that’s all you can focus on anymore. 

His touch. Not the fire’s—not Duncan’s. His. The same man that held you close and watched your back. Who had run into a burning house for your safety even if that was his job to do so. 

Johnny seems to be thinking the same because before your head goes limp against the cot, the familiar drawl sings you to sleep.

“…I would have searched that house for you until it fucking took me with it.”

—

The voice recordings from your charred satchel were in police custody, just as Duncan was. 

Along with the thick bindings that had taken home along your back and the upper part of your shoulders, there were others. Your voice was still a crackling mess—as if the fire had left behind a remnant of itself there, an ever-bending and shifting shard directly in your throat. Not even water could get rid of the itch, but you’d been told it would get better. 

All things considered, it could have been worse. 

There was a shit load to do—to explain. Duncan's involvement as well as the deceased Kurts, whose face still haunts you even now; it probably always will. 

Johnny’s shadow flashes in front of yours and you blink quickly, clearing your head. A pause emanates, and the man’s brows tighten. 

“What?” You try to clear your throat and grimace, the hospital bed uncomfortable for you. You’d much rather prefer Johnny’s. 

“I asked you if you’d want any more blankets, Bonnie,” the Scot’s head tilts. He hums. “More medicine? Feeling alright?” 

“So doting,” you huff, fingers rubbing at your neck before Soap sighs and stands from the side chair he’d been in. “No, I’m…fine.”

“My job.” Johnny grunts and his hand pushes away your own, fingers finding the spot that itches internally and carefully massaging until you’re like putty in his hands. In fact, you nearly purr before you sag into him, eyelids drooping. There’s a smug glance tossed your way. “And I don’t mean to brag, but I think I’m doin’ pretty good.”

Your lips pull, vision slipping upward. “Careful, people will think I got married over the span of three days.”

Johnny blinks, “Didn’t we?”

Your face burns. “No, MacTavish we did not. Hot-head. All the fumes go straight to your head, I swear.” All the talking was only aggravating your voice, but for the life of you, you can’t stop. 

Johnny rolls his eyes, skull tilting. A bead of serious talk leeks in as his fingers shift from your throat to your head, tips stimulating your scalp which you hum approvingly to. “What’s the plan?”

You think for a moment, letting the man come and lay a firm kiss on your temple. Your heart knows he intends to stay with you through all of this—already he’d been out on paid leave about the whole ‘attacking a restrained man’ fiasco. The bastard deserved it, Johnny had growled to you yesterday as he helped you drink water. You had to agree. 

“Sleep,” your answer is soft and simple. There was no use fretting about the whims of a far-off tomorrow. The future is a fickle creature, ever changing shape to fit the image it wants to play with like a doll at the nearest moment—there was never a pen in your pocket that was trying to jot down its profile; to understand it. Johnny was here, the bed was warm, and his hands were kind. 

That was all you needed.

Cobalt eyes stare for a moment at your response, before the Scot chuckles. “...Well, I can’t fight you there.”

Your hand lightly snares his wrist, and you pull him to you, letting his body melt back onto the bed until you can rest your temple on his shoulder and sigh out your tension. Johnny’s arm curls carefully to rest on your lower back, as delicate as glass. 

It’s a while before he speaks again. 

“You really did worry me,” he whispers, staring into the ceiling and trying to make images out of the shadows on the ceiling. “If I hadn’t gotten there…”

“You did,” you utter, eyes half-closed and fingers rubbing at his stomach. He shivers. “One-way road, Johnny. Stop that.”

“Doesn't make me feel any better when you’re stuck in here for two more weeks.” A smile pulls your face and he glances down, feeling it against his shirt. “...What are you smiling about?”

You hide it into his chest and he shakes his head in exasperation, scoffing.

“I swear, I’m the only one who cares about your safety and then I get mocked for it.”

“M’not mocking you,” your muffled voice grumbles out. “You’re just pouting.”

Johnny grunts, rolling his eyes. “Course.”

“Proving my point.”

“Next time I leave,” Soap’s lips are atop your head, muttering. “I’ll be tying you to the bed and watching you through the camera.”

A thin trail of jumpy laughter echoes out into the halls of the hospital, and your response is just as quick as it always is—as it always would be through Hell and high water. This wasn’t an ideal situation, and there would be more trials to come both literally and metaphorically, but Johnny made for a good rock through all of it. 

He certainly was a better informant than you intended him to be. 

“Ooo, Mr. MacTavish,” a loud groan, laced with a fond, almost worshiped, adoration. “I didn’t know you could be so risqué.” 

TAGS:

@sheviro-blog, @ivebeentrashsince2001, @mrshesh, @berryjuicyy, @romantic-homicide, @kmi-02, @neelehksttr, @littlemisstrouble, @copperchromewriting, @coelhho-brannco, @pumpkinwitchcrusade, @fictional-men-have-my-heart, @sleepyqueerenergy, @cumikering, @everything-was-dark, @marmie-noir, @anna-banana27, @iamcautiouslyoptimistic, @irenelunarsworld, @rvjaa, @sarcanti, @aeneanc, @not-so-closeted-lesbian, @mutuallimbenclosure, @emily-who-killed-a-man, @gildedpoenies, @glitterypirateduck, @writeforfandoms, @kohsk3nico, @peteymcskeet, @caramlizedtomatoes, @yoursweetobsession, @quesowakanda, @chthonian-spectre, @so-no-feint, @ray-rook, @extracrunchymilk, @doggydale, @frazie99, @develised, @1-800-no-users-left, @nuncubus, @aldis-nuts, @clear-your-mind-and-dream, @noonanaz, @cosmicpro, @stinkaton, @waves-against-a-cliff, @idocarealot

[decvyed]

MASC4MASC COLLECTION FEAT. SATANSHUBBY & SIIK

Hey everyone, for this drop, I teamed up @squaresverse & @siik-manic to put together a collection of staple pieces suitable for any occasion. My part includes a hoodie & embroidered shorts with colourways inspired by Chrome Hearts. As usual, I have included an in game version as well as a blender version with 4K texture maps. We hope you enjoy this collection and look forward to seeing your characters in it! 🙏🏾✨ SATANSHUBBY's PART • SIIK's PART This drop includes the following: Chrome Hearts Oversized Hoodie 12 Swatches - Male Frame - Top Category - Specular Map for Shine Chrome Hearts Embroidered Shorts 10 Swatches - Male Frame - Bottom Category - Specular Map for Shine MASC4MASC Collection (Blender Only) 4K Texture Maps - Male Frame - Rigged Chrome Hearts Oversized Hoodie (Sample) 3 Swatches - Male Frame - Top Category - Specular Map for Shine New Mesh • Med-High Poly • HQ Textures • BG Compatible • Teens to Elders • All LODs • Custom Thumbnail • Disallowed for Random Base Mesh Credit: Wolves Studios Base Body Credit: @magic-bot Render Credit: @necromancerltd DOWNLOAD TOU:

Conversions are not allowed regardless of the gaming platform

Do not reupload

Do not claim as your own

Do not edit or recolour the mesh

Alternate Link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/100931275 Thank you for supporting DECAYED. Feel free to tag us in your posts on Instagram, we love to see you in our content.🙏🏾💫 You can also see our previous releases on our Pinterest Board 🌟

[mitchipedia]

Reddit is speedrunning enshittification.

Hypothesis: The owners of the company are no longer interested in keeping the business going, and are just trying to maximize financial return by selling off every possible asset.

In Reddit’s case, the upcoming IPO isn’t the beginning of a new chapter in the business. It’s the end of the business.

The most financially valuable part of Reddit is its fat corpus of content, built by volunteers over many years, suddenly made valuable for training AI. Now, Reddit’s corporate owners want to sell access to that corpus. That is Reddit’s new business. It’s not a long-term business, because the corpus will decay in value over time. But it’s enough for the owners to cash out.

I’m inspired in this thinking by yesterday’s edition of Rusty Foster’s “Today in Tabs.”. I don’t think he’s making this exact point, but he’s putting all the dots down, without necessarily connecting them.

John Gruber at Daring Fireball notes that OpenAI already scooped up Reddit’s corpus of data when the APIs were free. The data has no value anymore.

Reddit already gave all its data to large companies for free. Huffman is trying to charge now for horses that were let out of the barn years ago. And he obviously doesn’t care about Apollo or other third-party Reddit clients, or what these moves do to Reddit’s reputation as a platform vendor. He’s just trapped in a fantasy where investors are going to somehow see Reddit as a player in the current moment of AI hype.

Also, on Ryan Broderick’s Garbage Day: “Platforms Don’t Really Make Sense Anymore”:

We tolerated large platforms, that were never all that good to begin with, because they were convenient and useful and part of a larger interconnected network of tools and apps and systems that made the digital world safer and more dynamic. So you’d think, if they were actively deciding to stop being part of that larger system and no longer interested in making the internet, as a whole, function better, they would, at the very least, try and be more convenient! But instead we’ve ended up in a situation where all the local stores are gone, Main Street is deserted, and the large Walmarts on the edge of town are being set on fire and left to rot.

[yonderly-alamort]

yeah but, yandere therapist?! 😳

i'm sorry this may sound horrible but, the way he would play with my mind??,, i'm in love 😩 (send requests here!)

・✶ ｡ﾟ𝐘𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐏𝐈𝐒𝐓 ;

cw: nonprofessional relationship, patient favoritism, isolation, manipulation, gaslighting, etc.

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who has been almost enraptured by you since your first session, the feeling intensifying with each consultation to the point of making cancellations with the excuse of helping you, although deep down he only cared about spending as much time as possible by your side.

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who always puts all his attention on you when speaking to him and asking for advice. however, when you talk about the problems in your relationship with your partner he always ends up convincing you that the only solution is to end it, in order to end up being his, of course.

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who, breaking the professional relationship rule outside the cabinet, has told you so many times: "angel, don't cry... they clearly didn't love you as much as i do; i'll help you over the heartbreak" or "i know you loved them, darling, but can't you see that you're better with me?"

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who even if it's not even in an official relation with you still tries to control everything around u, arriving to the point of isolating you. at first you were kinda weirded out (of course) but he said it was everything for your sake.

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who is actually very aware of his decaying and perturbing mental state. and also of the health of yours because of his job. but that's pretty much favorable for him, yk, so he can mold your mind as he likes <3

𖣠 YANDERE THERAPIST! who takes advantage of that and whenever you try and go against him doesn't even get mad for your bratty attitude, but loves loves loves turning the tables and make your thoughts switch confusedly. the only thing he has to do is say a few words and your reality will magically change, isn't that amazing?

"you must have misunderstood everything babe, 'cause that's not how i remember it, you know?"

© yonderly alamort 2022. please do not modify, translate, or repost my works on any platform without my permission.

[moonriesblog]

i drew all of this after watching the new season like immediately

idk if it’s just me but i think it would be pretty “funny” if Callum used dark magic again and went all decay-ish idk what to call it yk how Viren looked, anyway i was gonna make this be Callum and Rayla but i decided to make it be Ezran because i feel like we don’t have enough of Callum and Ezran being worried abt each other like siblings and just doing sibling stuff anymore

ignore how inconsistent the color is

please don’t repost my art on any other platforms and don’t trace it thank you

[missmonsters2]

Cuts of Your Silhouette (18+)

Pairing: Soft!Dark!Wanda Maximoff x Fem!Reader

Summary: Wanda can no longer go to the universe where she'd be most happy but she'll use all the power she's accumulated so far to go the universe where she's most loved. What she finds in this universe is unexpected but in the end, Wanda cannot help but covet it no matter what.

Warnings: 18+ ONLY. soft!dark!Wanda. dubcon. explicit smut. Fingering. Oral. choking. overstimulation. strap-on use (cum filled). dirty talk. obsessive behaviour. domestic fluff. angst. MoM spoilers

You do NOT have permission to repost or translate my work on any other platforms (even with credit)

Note: Innocent moots, don't look at me 👀 This is me acknowledging MoM but only in the fact that Wanda is so hot and deserves to be happy in her own unhinged way LOL

miláčik - honey/darling

Count: 7.2k

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

The universe where I'm most loved.

Wanda chants this only thing in her head, cautious hope blooming where there was only decay. 

Earth-838 was no longer an option, thanks to Strange's incessant determination to stop her from becoming happy.

That universe was closed off to her, but it was okay. If Wanda couldn't have the universe where she was most happy, she could make do with where she was most loved. 

Wanda has just enough of America's power to make one trip, and she needs to make it count before Strange could come and ruin everything again.

The universe where I'm most loved.

A part of Wanda feels like she's missing something important from this universe she's abandoning. It almost feels as if something is resisting her from going to the universe where she's most loved, but Wanda forces her body to traverse. 

Enough. 

Wanda has had enough of the grief and misery this universe brought. She has always loved more and loved harder than everyone else in her life. For once, Wanda wants to be the person who is loved beyond imaginable measures. 

And this new universe will give that to her. 

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

White quartz. 

It's the first thing Wanda notices. The kitchen island is huge, stretching and covering the middle of the kitchen, and she immediately falls in love with it. 

Wanda misses cooking real meals, a part of her that was subdued over time, with the lack of time and survival at the forefront. But this kitchen looked well-used while spotless. 

The smell of freshly baked cookies invades Wanda's nose, and she almost feels flustered at how homey it makes her feel. 

Looking up, Wanda turns her head and is shocked by her own reflection. Her hair is still a bright auburn, falling just a couple of inches below her shoulder with some natural waves as if she hadn't bothered straightening or fully curling it. 

"Mom, mom, mom!"

The sudden voices and thudding footsteps through the door startle Wanda. She looks to where the front door opened, and two tiny bodies come barreling through towards her.

The arms thrown around her waist almost knock the wind out of her, but the tears sting her eyes because—

"Billy, Tommy," Wanda trembles. 

"Mom, mom! Did you make the cookies?"

"Are they done?" 

"Can we have ice cream with it right now?" 

Wanda needs to swallow down the overwhelming emotion that knots in her throat before she can answer. 

Of course, Wanda thought. Where she was most loved—it'd be where her boys were. Whatever had occurred in this universe to cause Wanda to not be the happiest—it didn't matter because her boys were here, and as long as they were here, she could be the most loved.

"Sur—"

"Wanda Maximoff, you better not be giving in and spoiling the boys' appetite before dinner."

The new voice makes Wanda freeze. It's not familiar, raising Wanda's hackles as she holds the boys closer to her. She looks to the door again, and when you come through...Wanda's at a loss for words.

There's no universe where she's seen you.

You're struggling to hold all the grocery bags in your arms as you peer over to the trio. 

"Did you boys just abandon me with all the bags for cookies?" You cock your brows at them, meant to look displeased, but Wanda and the boys could see the tiny smirk of amusement on your lips. 

The boys giggle before they move out of Wanda's hold towards you. There's a moment where Wanda wants to grab them back to her again, but when she sees them running towards you and taking some of the bags to lessen your load, Wanda can't help but stare.

"Sorry, mum," Billy gives you a boyish smile, trying to take another bag from you to help.

"But we could smell the cookies from outside!" Tommy cackles but still helps you out as well. 

Wanda feels her heart stop.

Mum?

The boys were referring to you as mum?

How could you be—

Now that one of your hands is free, Wanda watches as you ruffle the boys' hair one at a time before kissing the crown of their head.

"I'll forgive this once because I know mom's cookies are the best in the world and if I had been faster...I would've left you two in the dust," you start laughing as the boy screams indignations with squealing laughter. 

You're still laughing as the three of you make it back to the kitchen, placing all the bags on the counter. 

"Why don't you two run up and finish your homework? We'll give you a call when dinner is ready." You look at the boys.

"But the cookies—"

"—Are for after dinner," you cut them off with a look that has the boys sighing as they look at each other and give you and Wanda a kiss on the cheek before running off. 

Anxiety fills Wanda the second she's alone with you. It makes her want to raise her hands, preparing to fight you because who could you be that would make you mum to her boys? Who were you to intrude in on her happiness and the world where she was most loved?

Was this a universe where Vision existed and they divorced? Were you their stepmother?

You turn your face to her, and Wanda's hackles rise like the hair on the back of her neck. You reach out, grabbing her apron and pulling her towards you. Wanda's about to unleash the full force of her magic on you but is stopped short when she feels warm lips against her own.

It's hot—needy and desperate almost. 

Her hand falls against your shoulder and grips at your shirt, and the kiss is broken.

"Hi, darling," you pant just mere inches away from her lips. "I really, really like when you look like this."

The way you say it almost sounds like a whine, and Wanda's lip twitches at it.

"Oh?" is the only thing Wanda can say.

You hum, peppering kisses against her jaw and down her neck, and the sensation is almost too overwhelming. On the one hand, this body feels accustomed to the physical affections, but Wanda is not.

"I missed you all day," you sigh. "Can't believe you're just being all pretty here all the time and I miss hours of it. Should I work from home tomorrow?"

Wanda swallows. Your lips keep peppering kisses, and Wanda almost has whiplash how the needy kisses turn into tender ones, brushing over the tip of her nose and eyelids. 

Something hot stings behind Wanda's eyes. 

"Can you?" Wanda manages to say. She doesn't know what to say otherwise. It's daunting to know she knows nothing about her life here—she knows nothing about you. 

"I don't have any meetings tomorrow," you stand straighter, your eyes drifting up in thought. "Maybe I should take the day off," you muse. "It's been a while since we did something fun with just the two of us."

Wanda doesn't know what to say. She just looks at you, wary and confused. You don't seem to notice her expression too much, taking her silence as agreement to what you suggested. 

You turn to look through the groceries. "What do you want to eat for dinner tonight? I bought a variety of things since you said you weren't sure what you're craving."

Wanda weighs her options and choices. She needs to integrate herself into this life and ensure you don't suspect anything.

"Is there something you're craving?" Wanda asks you in a friendly tone. 

You hum slowly in thought. "Oh, how about those meatballs you made last month? Those were so good, I've been dreaming about them." You start to put away the groceries other than what ingredients you'll need. You mull over what sides to have.

You're mumbling about what's easier to make, and it becomes clear to Wanda you'll be staying to cook with her, and although it's foreign, Wanda finds it endearing. 

Once you finish deciding, you turn to smile impishly at her, and Wanda quirks her brow at it. Despite not knowing you, she somehow feels like she knows that look on you.

"Want to split a cookie? We have to be super quiet, though. I'm pretty sure the boys have a secret power of knowing when we're eating cookies without them."

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

It becomes clear throughout the evening that while, yes, her boys love her, they're not the reason why this variant of Wanda is the most loved in the universe.

It's you—you're the reason. 

The evening puts Wanda on edge for different reasons. She looks at the ring on her left hand, trying to not fiddle with it again. You helped her put it back on when the two of you were done cooking, seemingly knowing where she always placed it.

She was married, Wanda deliberated, to a woman. It was odd, Wanda had never considered it, but she found that she was at ease with it.

You make her laugh, you look at her with so much love, and Wanda feels suffocated by it. She feels smothered in every way she has ever wanted to be, and she could drown in your love and the way you look at her and the boys. 

They're not yours; it's obvious. You've stepped up into a role you never had to, yet you did. For her, yes, but because you love the two boys as if they're your own. 

You always find a way to touch her, as if you can't be close enough. It's your legs pressed against hers underneath the table, almost tangled together. It's your hand on top of hers at the diner table or on her thigh.

It's all subconscious, Wanda knows. She knows because she looks into your head on a surface level. Things float about and tease deep inside, and Wanda must refrain from breaking into your mind piece by piece. There'd be time for that later. 

"Alright, what should we do tonight? Movies? Games?" You ask as you gather the plates with Tommy to place into the dishwasher. Wanda's eyes trail after you, staring at your form in scrutiny before Billy tugs at her arm. 

"What do you want to do, mom?" He asks her, and Wanda knows he's asking her because he can tell she's been out of sorts, and it makes her heart swell.

"Oh, anything you want to do, sweetheart," Wanda wraps her arm around Billy, placing his head against her collarbone as she strokes his hair and kisses his forehead.

"Movie!" Tommy is screaming from the kitchen as he runs back in with you trailing behind with the cookies and ice cream.

"Do you mind grabbing plates, darling?" You ask Wanda, kissing the crown of her head as you pass by her and set the things down in your arms.

Wanda is about to get up, but you place your hand on her arm.

"Use your powers," you tilt your head in confusion as to why she was getting up.

Wanda is surprised you so openly encourage her to use her powers, but she likes it. Four plates float from the kitchen to the dining table and set themselves down gently. 

"Alright, how many cookie ice cream sandwiches do we want?" You look at the boys.

"Ten!" The boys shout simultaneously as they look at each other, smiling.

You snort, and Wanda finds herself laughing.

"Ambitious," you smirk, "but let's start with two and go from there."

"Mom," Tommy whines as he looks at Wanda like he knows she'll be more likely to cave in. "Tell mum to make it three."

The look Tommy gives her makes Wanda tender. This is everything she wanted, this was everything she deserved, and she'd do anything for her boys.

Wanda looks at you and shrugs. "It can't hurt to have one more."

You point the ice cream scoop at her but grab more cookies. "When either the ice cream melts by the time they get to the third one, or they get too full, you will regret this, Maximoff."

You're still grinning, and the boys are chatting animatedly, and Wanda is surprised to find she wants this moment to last, even with you in it.

The boys grab their plates and take off carefully to the sofa and begin looking for a movie to watch. You diligently make a cookie ice cream sandwich for Wanda.

"Let's go," you say as you pass her the dessert.

"Not going to make yourself one?" Wanda asked as you went to put the ice cream back in the freezer.

You return, pecking her quickly on the lips, and then promptly take a bite out of the dessert you just made Wanda.

"Someone's going to have to eat the third one the boys won't finish," you say after chewing.

"And if they finish it?" Wanda challenges.

You grin at her innocently. "If it seems like they're on track to eating the third one, I'll share with my generous wife."

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

The boys don't finish the third ice cream cookie sandwich as you predicted, and you look entirely too smug at her when you're eating the soggy dessert. Of course, you generously shared the dessert with Wanda, who tried to refuse, but it was futile. 

The night was peaceful, and Wanda almost hadn't wanted it to end. You spent the evening curled into her, almost purring as she ran her fingers through your hair, scratching your scalp. You fit perfectly against her, warm and alive.

Wanda doesn't know what to think, and she merely goes with the flow, keeping you close as you clearly so want. She strokes the softness of the skin of your arm while you play with the fingers of her other hand.

When you do this, Wanda can't help but think about how you don't know. You don't know her corrupted fingers, blackened by the results of her desperation to be happy. 

"I think it's time for bed, boys," you say suddenly, and Wanda looks over to find the boys half-falling asleep on the couch.

"No, I'm not sleepy," Tommy argues, trying to open his eyes, but they stay half-lidded.

Billy doesn't seem to agree but doesn't speak up either, curling into Wanda's side.

"Bedtime, Tommy," Wanda gives him a look to which he frowns but agrees as he gets up with Billy, and they make their way upstairs.

"I'm going to clean up," you tell Wanda.

"Do you want help?" She offers, but you shake your head.

"No, why don't you start tucking the boys in and I'll be there soon?"

Wanda nods, hesitating for a moment before she leans over and kisses the corner of your mouth, and walks off. She can hear the sounds of dishes clanking as she makes her way up the stairs. Taking her time, she looks around. The hallway is filled with photos of you and her together, and there were photos of all four of them.

But one particular photo made her pause, heart dropping into her stomach as she stared at it.

A photo with Vision with the kids. 

Vision—he was in this universe as well? Had he died? She stares at the photo, finding that the kids don't look much younger—a year at the most.

Wanda stands at the photo longer than she thinks until she can hear someone calling her.

"Mom?"

It's Billy and Tommy, stepping out of the washroom as they've finished brushing their teeth.

"Hey, all ready for bed?" Wanda smiles at them, and they nod. She follows them to their room as they both jump into their bed, only a couple of feet away from each other. 

The scene is all too familiar, and her chest aches. She tucks them in, kissing each of their foreheads as she sits on the edge of Tommy's bed. At this point, you enter the room.

Tommy smiles at you as you grin back at him, walking over to him and kissing his forehead. He rolls his eyes but doesn't say anything.

You then walk over to Billy's bed, sitting on the edge and kissing his forehead.

"Did you have fun tonight?" You ask softly, and the boys nod. "And you finished your homework?"

The boys roll their eyes in union but nod nonetheless.

"Angels, the lot of you are," you tease, and they giggle. 

"Goodnight," you and Wanda bid. "See you in the morning."

"Goodnight," they say together.

"Love you," Billy says sleepily as his eyes close, and Tommy mumbles something similar. 

With that, you stand up, holding your hand out for Wanda. She looks at her kids one more time, chanting to herself that she will see them in the morning, that this isn't a dream and she won't wake to the nightmare. 

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

"Were you okay today?" You ask softly. "You were kind of quiet."

The two of you were lying in bed together. You have curled into Wanda again. Your face rested against her chest, arm around her as you rubbed her back.

It's soothing, Wanda thought. It almost made her bitter that she hadn't felt like this in a long time. 

Wanda felt you shift and looked down to see you peering up at her. 

"Of course," Wanda reassures you. "Am I always so rambunctious?"

"Sometimes," you grin, teasing her, and Wanda pinches your side, making you try to wriggle away from her. She holds you tighter, preventing you from moving too far away from her. 

When things settle down, and you wriggle to move back close against her, Wanda stares at you pensively. 

"Do you love me?" She asks.

The question surprises you as you look back up at her. You study her face as if you were looking for answers.

"You haven't asked that since just before our wedding," you comment and that surprises Wanda. Because, at the very least, she knows the two of you have been married for a couple of years. 

This variant of her was so sure you loved her that she hadn't questioned it for years?

It was almost laughable to Wanda. Something jealous brews inside her, simmering just beneath the surface. 

Wanda doesn't say anything, and she thinks you might not either, or you'll say something so predictable and empty like, "of course I do."

But you simply press your face into her chest, reaching to grab her hand and drag it to your cheek.

"Look," you tell her, and Wanda freezes.

Privacy was always an issue for the people around Wanda. They always worried about whether or not she was listening to them, even if unintentionally. 

Now with how her powers had grown, it was a given that people automatically assumed she was breaking into your head. Don't get it wrong, Wanda had. Anything to get the results she wanted, she broke every unspoken rule to get it. 

But here you were, freely offering Wanda access. Here you were, being vulnerable to her with all the trust. 

And Wanda didn't hesitate. 

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

You sleep soundly on your side with your back facing Wanda, and she stares at the back of your head. 

She should kill you, Wanda thinks, make it look like an accident. 

The boys would be sad, but she could help them get it over time, couldn't she?

Seeing into your mind was too much. It was too much to see how lucky this variant of this Wanda was. Sure, she had lost many people to Thanos. She had even lost Vision last year to another villain threatening earth. 

But the loss only makes Wanda laugh bitterly because she had already split with Vision years prior, agreeing to amicable joint custody with the boys. 

All because she fell in love with you. 

But could she blame this variant? Wanda watched everything play like a long sitcom about how you loved her. 

This variant had been as miserable as she, had lost just as much as Wanda had, but she had you. 

It was unfair, Wanda thought distantly. Why had you not been in her universe? Or if you were, why did they not meet? Why was she once again the only Wanda to be alone?

This variant loved you tenderly—desperately. She kissed and made love to you like you'd break if she was too rough. 

And Wanda hates that variant for it. To love something so much that she was capable of treasuring it. 

Wanda scoots closer to you, pressing against you as she wraps her arm around you, pulling you flush against her. She presses a kiss against your shoulder and bites into it.

You whimper.

Wanda resolves that all of this is hers now.

This life, the boys, and you. 

Everything belongs to her.

And the first thing Wanda wants to know is if you will break if she's too rough. 

Wanda's hand slides against your thigh, gripping the inner of it roughly before she moves back up and yanks your panties down.

The sharpness of her touch wakes you.

"Wanda?" Your voice is groggy as you startle. "What are you doing?"

"Touching you," Wanda replies simply, her hand slipping between your folds, rubbing your length slowly, stroking your clit in circles when she comes up.

You moan lowly, your hips moving with her hand as she sucks and nips at your neck. It isn't long until Wanda's fingers are slick from you.

"You got so wet quickly, miláčik," Wanda husks in your ear. "You must want me to fuck you badly."

Your breath hitches at the way Wanda talks to you. The two of you engage in dirty talk often, but not like this.

Wanda guides your leg over her hip before she resumes stroking your pussy until you're dripping and thrusting your hips desperately against her fingers for more.

Wanda's other hand is under you, wrapped around your torso and underneath your shirt as she gropes your chest roughly. Her index finger rolls your hardened nipple back and forth, and she can hear your labored breathing.

Your neck is littered with hickeys, dark and bruising. Wanda isn't even close to being done with you, and you look so ruined already. Wanda wants to see you completely undone. She wants to break you down to nothing so she can build you back up to be hers. 

"Wanda..." you keen, gripping the bed sheet on the side, trying to not cry at how bad you want more. Something feels different, but you can't put your finger on it. Honestly, you could barely even think about it with how your body was trembling.

"Use your words, miláčik," Wanda bites at your earlobe. "Tell me what you want—how ready your body is."

You feel close already with how diligent Wanda had been paying attention to your clit, but you just want—

"Please, please, please," you barely get out. "I want you inside, I wanna feel you...I want to cum."

Wanda mutters about how you're such a good girl and thrusts three fingers inside you until she's all the way in, stroking your walls.

"Oh, fuck, yes," you moan, gripping the bedsheets tighter as your leg tenses against Wanda's hip. 

How you feel on Wanda's fingers has her biting your shoulder again, almost hard enough to leave imprints. You whimper at the pain, but Wanda doesn't let up.

Her other hand abandons your chest and moves out of your shirt up to your neck, grasping it. You feel so delicate against her, and Wanda almost understands why this variant was adamant about being gentle. 

"Wanda—" you say, almost a little alarmed, but Wanda hushes you.

"You're gonna cum just like this," she hisses in your ear, squeezing your throat a little tighter. She licks the shell of your ear, and her voice is throaty when she says, "I missed you, too. You wouldn't even believe how long I've been waiting for you."

Wanda can feel herself dripping for you, but she wants to feel you come over her fingers. She keeps her thrusts inside you, curling her fingers as she strokes that spot inside you that makes you tremble. 

"Wanda—"

"Go on and cum, miláčik," Wanda moves her fingers a little faster, keeping the pressure steady as it finally mounts over, and you come with a long groan.

You feel lightheaded and exhausted as Wanda strokes you through the remnants of the hardest orgasm you've ever had.

Going limp against her body, Wanda releases your throat as she pulls her fingers out of you, earning a hum from you. She sucks the mess you made on her fingers, licking the length of her fingers one by one.

You're panting, trying to regain control of your breathing, and Wanda moves and pushes you to lie on your back. She grips the end of your t-shirt, dragging it up and over your head. She stares at your naked form unabashed, appreciating it for a moment before completely undressing herself. 

Wanda adjusts her body over yours, legs straddling your thigh. You feel Wanda lower herself, her wetness spreading over your thigh as she rides it slowly. 

The low guttural moan Wanda lets out sparks something in your stomach. She looks at you, her eyes glowing red for just a moment. 

"It's good you're taking the day off tomorrow."

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

"Just like that," Wanda moans, grinding her hips more firmly.

Your hair is gripped tightly, hair threading through Wanda's fingers as she uses it as leverage to thrust her hips into your face. Wanda looks down, only able to see a little less than half your face as she's sitting on it while you eat her out. 

Your hands are hooked over Wanda's thigh, securing and occasionally massaging her thighs and hips. Your tongue dips inside her, and Wanda grunts. Her thighs tighten around your head. 

Wanda allows you to drag it out a little longer before she pulls at your hair in a warning, and you quickly fasten your lips around her clit, sucking and keeping the pressure steady until Wanda lets out a high keen, thrusting her hips with reckless abandon as she comes messily over your face. 

You don't complain about how she might be suffocating you, and when Wanda slows her hips, coming down from her high, she looks to the side. The curtains are still closed, but she can tell it's nearing noon. 

Wanda had woken up early to drop the kids off at school while you slept on obliviously. When she came back, she only let you sleep a little longer before waking you by peppering kisses up and down your neck, pressing her body into yours as she lay on top of you. 

Wanda's been working your body since, and she's lost count of how many times she's made you orgasm. Similarly, she's lost count for herself as well. 

Climbing off your face carefully, she watches you use your fingers to clean your face, licking her slick off your fingers. The sight of you exhausted but clearly having enjoyed yourself has Wanda leaving more hickeys down your body. You're littered with them, all marked up by her, and she revels in it. 

"Wanda..." you whine, trying to move your body away, but she holds you still. "I can't anymore."

But Wanda doesn't listen, kissing her way up your body until she's face to face with you. She captures your lips in a messy kiss, licking the inside of your mouth and the teeth pulling at your bottom lip. She can taste herself with the taste of you, and it's all Wanda wants. 

"One more," Wanda tells you, caressing your arms until she reaches your hands, pushes them against the mattress, and holds them down. 

"Wanda, I really can't—" you shake your head. "We've been going at it for hours...I'm too sensitive now."

"Feels better that way," Wanda mutters, barely even listening to you. Her body feels addicted to you. Everything in her tells her to take it, to make you give everything to her. You're hers now; you're always going to be hers. 

You try to reason with Wanda, unsure what's gotten into her. The last time the two of you had this much sex was around the time you were on your honeymoon. 

But even then, whatever was happening now was different. Wanda was always a little desperate. It was just who she was after everything she's experienced. As desperate as she was, though, Wanda was also always careful. 

That carefulness seemed to fly out of the window since last night. Wanda was fucking you with reckless abandon, determined to take everything and more. 

You feel a pressure between your legs, something thick and slick pressing into you. Wanda groans, her forehead dropping against yours. You look down, but the only thing you catch is something red attached to Wanda disappearing into you. 

"Wanda—" your breath hitches, feeling the stretch as Wanda moves inside you. "Oh, god, Wanda, it's too much," your hands strain against Wanda's as she laces them together, bringing them over your head and pinned down.

"Just perfect," Wanda mutters, and you can feel her lips ghosting yours. "Feels good, feels so fucking good inside you."

You know then that Wanda used her power to create some kind of strap-on connected to the nerves of her clit. You can feel Wanda's hardened nipples rubbing over yours as she thrusts slowly into you. 

When she's all the way in, Wanda pauses, taking a deep breath. You were trembling from how sensitive you felt; it was on the edge of being painful.

But then Wanda moves, and you let out a string of incoherent pleas. She barely moves out before she's thrusting back in. She strokes the same spot inside you over and over until tears run down your face.

"One more," Wanda breathes into your mouth. "One more, give me just one more."

"I can't—" you huff. 

"Yes, you can," Wanda cuts you off. Her thrusts get harder but remain the same on moving slightly out before thrusting relentlessly back in. The rough sensation brings you closer and closer to the edge, and Wanda can feel you pulsating as you get near your end.

 She drops your hand, and they immediately go to her back, your nails dragging down. Your roughness makes her moan, and Wanda sinks her head into your neck.

"Fuck, I want to come inside you," Wanda mutters. She wants to coat the inside of you. She wants to own you in there too. Wanda wants it all. "I think you'd like that, wouldn't you, miláčik?"

You don't answer, and Wanda grips your face as she lifts her head to stare down at you. Her thrusts are getting messy as you are nearing the climax. 

"Wouldn't you like it?" Wanda asks you again, more roughly this time. "Tell me you want me inside you like that right now, miláčik."

It's like an unspoken threat that if you don't, Wanda won't let you off until you do.

"Yes," you immediately whimper. "Yes, yes, I want you to come inside me."

Wanda looks satisfied as she brings her thumb to stroke your clit until she's roughly ripping your last orgasm out of your over-wrought body. 

The moan you let out is soundless as Wanda groans in the back of her throat, and you feel something warm gush inside you. The thrusting doesn't stop as Wanda rides out the waves until you stop pulsating around her. 

Your chest heaves just as hers does, trying to calm your breathing. You pray that Wanda finally takes mercy on you and keeps her promise that it was just one more. 

You feel the strap-on disappearing until it's just Wanda resting between your legs. She kisses you softly now, and you almost breathe loudly in relief as you return her tender kisses with your own.

Despite how rough Wanda treated you, your gentle kisses are what sways her completely into you. Gentle, rough—you truly love Wanda as she is. 

"I love you," Wanda mumbles against your lips. "Always love me."

You stroke her head, finally regaining your breath.

"Have I ever not?"

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

The next few weeks for Wanda are complete bliss. Even though you're somewhat wary around her, you still touch her the same.

This life was perfect, Wanda knows. This was the wonderful little family Wanda had ever wanted. 

Weekdays are filled with domestic heaven, while the weekends are filled with various activities.

Wanda wants this forever, which is why the headaches and glitches she's been experiencing as of late are concerning. 

The spell isn't fully complete, and Wanda curses that she should've fought harder to kill America when she had the chance. They were looking for her, Wanda was sure, and they were getting closer. 

On top of that, she could feel her variant fighting to break loose. 

'Get out,' Wanda could hear her variant in her head. 'Get out! This isn't yours. None of this is! She isn't yours.'

'She's mine and I would never hurt her or the boys,' Wanda would repeatedly say to temper down her variant.

"Are you feeling okay?" 

Wanda snaps her head to look at you, unaware you had approached her.

"Yes," Wanda nods. "Just a headache."

You place your hand over her forehead and frown. "You are a little warm. Maybe you should go lie down. I can finish cleaning and cook tonight."

Wanda nods, and you peck her lips as she makes her way up to her bedroom and locks the door shut. All alone now, her hands returned to their true state, darkened fingers as if decaying. Wanda conjures The Darkhold, flipping through the pages.

There had to be a solution to stay here forever. 

There had to be something to keep Strange and America away from her. 

But before Wanda can search deeper, she hears wreckage downstairs and your scream. 

Wanda immediately transports herself downstairs using her magic and is enraged at the sight.

They found her. 

Strange and America stood in her living room with a portal open, posing to fight her when they saw her. 

"Wanda, you need to stop this," Strange tries to reason with her again, but she tilts her head at him with a condescending smile.

"Stop what? Living my life here? You're the one intruding, and you need to leave. I'm past mercy, Strange."

"This isn't your life!" Strange yells at her. "Let the variant of you go."

"Silence!" Wanda yells at him.

"Oh? Scared your girlfriend's going to find out?" America said with bravado, but Wanda can see her wariness underneath as she eyes you from the side.

You were cautious but silent.

Wanda begins to conjure the red wisps in her hand. "She's my wife." Thrusting her hands out, she releases her magic, and a fight ensues.

Strange is still trying to reason with her, but Wanda doesn't want to hear it anymore.

"You were a fool to bring the girl here," Wanda sneers at him when she gains the upper hand and has Strange subdued and America in her grasp.

The young girl is choking in Wanda's grip, and she sees it as a chance to finally get the power she needs to make this universe hers permanently.

"Wanda, stop!" 

The voice makes Wanda freeze. She turns her head and finds you staring at her with a horrified expression. 

The look of absolute fear makes Wanda feel like she's been punched in the gut.

"What are you doing?" You urge her. "Let her go, she's a kid!"

"No, no, no," Wanda tells you softly, trying to show you that she'd never hurt you. "She's a threat—to me, to you, to us and our life."

"This isn't your life," America chokes before she looks at you. "This isn't your Wanda!"

"Be QUIET," Wanda snarls at America, tightening her grip that makes America choke. 

"Wanda, stop it!" You yell at her, your eyes welling up with tears. "You're hurting people!"

The words make Wanda feel like she's crumbling. She drops America, letting the girl fall onto the floor on her back, hearing the wind knock out of the young girl's lungs. 

Wanda looks at you; betrayal is written all over her face.

"Why are you treating me like I'm the villain?" Wanda whispers, her eyes becoming hot with tears. "You said you loved me. How can you love me and think I hurt people?"

You take a careful step towards her. "Look around, Wanda," you say softly.

"I would never—" But the words fall short on Wanda's lips. "I'm not a monster," is all she can say quietly as she drops to her knees.

"I know you're not," you say softly as you kneel in front of her and cup her face gently. "Just like I know you're not my Wanda."

Wanda immediately looks into your eyes, surprised.

You give her a wry smile. "You think I don't know my own wife? I've known since the first night."

"When—"

"When you asked if I loved you and I let you look into my mind," you give her a sad smile. "My Wanda never takes the opportunity. She is adamant about never looking into my mind and I never offer because of it. She prefers talking honestly, even if it's harder and painful."

Wanda's crying, tears welling and overflowing freely.

"Then why—" Wanda sobs.

"Wanda had her own theories about the multiverse. She was always worried it would happen, but I think every version of her should be loved."

You wiped her tears, but new ones would just fall. "You seemed sad," you tell her truthfully. "Even though I knew it wouldn't be forever by me, I wanted you to know you are loved too."

Wanda's face contorts in pain, lips trembling as she shakes her head. 

"You're not a monster," you tell her again sternly. "You're a person who has done bad things out of grief but that doesn't always make you a bad person."

Wanda feels you kiss her cheek, and it's bitter.

"Do the right thing, Wanda," you encourage her. "It's time to go home."

"Is it home if you're not there?" Wanda tries to refute, and you give her a look.

"Am I dead?"

"...I don't know."

"Then look for me there," you drop your hands and move to hold Wanda's. "That variant of me might be waiting for you too."

It's silent for a moment, and America stands in the background, unsure, with Strange beside her.

"We'll be okay, Wanda," you tell her softly. "We are loved, and you will be too."

Wanda looks at you one last time before releasing the body she's held hostage, and America closes the portal to this universe. 

The scene of the home she's grown used to fades into her lonely throne. It's like a hole has grown in her chest, connecting all the missing parts of her until she's empty. 

America and Strange stand in the distance, unsure what their next move is if they have to continue fighting her. 

"You need to leave," Wanda calmly states.

"What?"

"I opened The Darkhold, and I'm the one who needs to close it so it can never tempt anyone again," Wanda stares at her blackened fingertips. "You need to leave because this place is going to collapse."

As if on cue, the temple began shaking and crumbling. Debris fell from the ceiling, and Strange and America looked at Wanda, who didn't spare them a glance. 

"I'm sorry, Wanda," Strange apologizes, and she knows it's for losing what was never hers in the beginning. With that, he takes America and flies off with her. 

The temple crumbles, and Wanda doesn't move, determined to see its end. Even if you can't witness it, she wants to prove to you that she is a good person. 

Wanda lets out a tiny smile, knowing that you probably believed she already followed through.

⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷⋆⊶⊷⊶⊷⊶⊷

-A Year and 6 months later-

Wanda sips her coffee, breathing in the fresh air. She looks down at her hair and finds it strange to see brown instead of auburn. It's been too long since she's seen the real color of her hair, and she wonders if it looks good. 

The day is bright and sunny, and Wanda revels in how the sun feels on her skin. 

"Would you like another one?"

Wanda looks at the waitress with a smile and shakes her head. She's here every day and usually has two cups leisurely. 

But not today.

"No, thank you," Wanda answers politely and pulls out some cash, giving her usual waitress a generous tip. 

The waitress thanks her and leaves. Wanda stays a second longer, waiting and taking in the view. 

There's a loud car door slamming, and a woman gets out and moves to the sidewalk.

"For the last time," an exasperated voice groans. "It's over! How many times do I have to say it? Stop following me! You can’t just show up here because you know I walk through here every day."

"How can it be over? Everything has been going well for the last year! What changed?"

Wanda watches you groan.

"I don't know! I just don't see a future with you," you tap your foot impatiently. "Now stop following me around, I have shit to do and you're constantly making me late. Just—stop."

You turn to leave, but the woman grabs your arm, and Wanda stands up, pulling her hat closer to her head as she crosses the street. 

Each step feels like she's getting closer to your silhouette, and the thin veil separating the two of you slowly disappears.

Wanda pushes and pushes against the veil until—

"You're hurting her."

The two of you look over to Wanda, and you stare at her for a long moment.

"Stay out of this," the woman glares at Wanda. "It's none of your business."

"It is my business," Wanda says simply. "I'm a good person."

"Are you trying to say I'm not?" The woman snaps.

"Yes, if you keep holding her arm hostage."

The woman immediately drops your arm, and you rub the spot she held, moving away.

"Leave," Wanda glares, and the woman is about to say something else, but the flash of Wanda's red eyes startles her, and she's quick to turn and walk back to her car.

The two of you watch the car drive away, and Wanda turns back to you, and you stare at her curiously.

"Have we met before?" You blink with a tilt of your head.

Wanda smiles. "Maybe in another universe."

You snort. "Smooth," you grin at her. "Thanks for that by the way."

You introduce yourself, and Wanda takes your hand.

Something electric passes through your arm, and you lick your lips.

"I'm Wanda."

You keep holding her hand, pensively looking at the woman before you.

"Can I treat you to a cookie ice cream sandwich as thanks? There's a great place nearby that does the best cookies," you gush.

Wanda nods but grins at you. "Sure, but I can make better ones."

"Really?" You look skeptical. "That's a bold statement."

"I've been told my cookies are the best in the world."

You laugh with a shake of your head as you let go of Wanda's hand and walk with her trailing beside you.

"I'll hold you to that."