So I've been stress-binging ghost hunting shows, which resulted in...this.
Ao3 link for the full fic
I attached a snippet below the read more line. The actual fic does have ghost hunting in it, but it's mostly a hurt/comfort fic about body image issues and smut.
Eddie takes him to a food truck and they spend their meal laughing and defending their meal s from seagulls. The fight over food gets them so hyped up they go axe throwing. Steve should have said good-bye after that because he has an early shift tomorrow, but he asks Eddie to have dinner instead. They decide to be spontaneous (that's been serving them well so far) and just walk into the first place they find. It's one of those places that take forever to deliver barely edible, overpriced food. But Steve would happily eat freezer-burned burgers for the rest of his life if he can share them with Eddie.
Unfortunately, Steve can only ignore the owners' pointed throat-clearing so many times. "We should leave right?" He asks Eddie.
"Yeah...but we can hang out again soon right?" Eddie asks.
Right, hang out. Steve steps out with Eddie, ready to say good-bye. Steve feels a sudden rush of resentment. Would the next 'hang out' feel like this? Does Eddie mean it? Was today his last chance? It's not like there was anyone else at that restaurant and it's not even that late yet. Why couldn't they stay just a little longer?
Eddie wiggles his eyebrows. Shit. Did he say that out loud?
"I bet it's a front for...ghosts, and we were messing up all their decors with our...aliveness."
"Interesting theory, but I've seen ghosts before," Steve riffs back. "That has to be a mob front."
"Wait, no scratch that." Eddie clutches at Steve. "You've seen ghosts?"
Steve wets his lips, feeling like he was caught in a lie, even though he wasn't...lying, not exactly. "Well, ok, so it was just one ghost. When I was ten...you know that abandoned factory?"
"Yes?"
"One of my friends growing up convinced me to do some urban exploration. So, be me. I'm ten. I'm petrified. And I'm like maybe ten minutes in when I see this giant face staring at me."
"Like Wizard of Oz?"
"No, like...the Cheshire Cat, but human."
"Ugh, nightmarish," Eddie says with a theatrical shudder.
"Yeah, I just ran out of there. Didn't look back to see if the ghost had something to say, didn't look back to confirm if the face was actually there, I just...ran," Steve says, wishing the story could have been more exciting. "And honestly, now that I'm actually thinking about it, I'm not sure I even saw anything. Could have been a trick of the light. But I do remember feeling something, a presence."
"If you don't feel ready to go home yet," Eddie says, hands hovering over Steve, "you know...we could find out."
"What? Go for an impromptu ghost hunt?"
"So I have a friend, Dustin, who's really into electronics. And he's been getting so frustrated with all these ghost hunting shows because they don't bother to sanitize their readings, don't ask me what that means by the way, he starts ranting then I can't get any questions in. Anyway!" Eddie pauses for breath. "He came up with this great idea for how we might reliably pick up paranormal electrical signals."
"So why doesn't he test them himself?" Steve asks. "That factory's pretty famous, and there's other sites."
Eddie looks around exaggeratedly and beckons Steve closer. Steve leans in so Eddie can whisper, trying not to shiver at the sensation of plush lips almost touching his ear. "He saw a centipede and ran screaming out of there."
Steve snorts and vigorously nods as Eddie swears him to secrecy. He keeps nodding as Eddie proposes breaking an entering. He feels like he's in a fever dream as he's whisked away to Eddie's house, meets Dustin who goes over the whole plan and gizmos in excruciating details, then gets into Eddie's van to get to the factory, leaving his car and presumably escape route, behind at Eddie's place.
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I really don't know how to explain to people that supporting gender liberation (liberation for trans people, liberation for gnc people, liberation from all oppressive gender roles) means you have to be able to see someone you think is cis "crossdressing" and be cool about it. You have to be able to see someone presenting in a way that doesn't make sense to you and not interrogate them about their identity. You have to be able to hear someone express a gender identity you don't understand and go "Huh! Neat," and go about your business. If you truly want gender liberation for all then you have to stop trying to exert control over other people's genders, period.
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No shade to OP as a person but believe me, this is a sign that something is DEEPLY fucking broken. Like they announced ONE new IP out of like eight films. I genuinely think within the decade they're just gonna stop making original films all together. That's what they learned from Elemental and Wish, just don't make anything new if you can help it.
Like they've unironically turned into what people pretend Dreamworks is, a sequel mill. The real downside is that Dreamworks actually knows how to make a good sequel, Disney never really figured that one out, bar a couple of outliers, and I have no faith in them pulling any of these off. Absolutely soul-crushingly pathetic. Thank god other animation studios exist.
This is the saddest shit I've ever seen, truly.
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i cannot stress this enough: if your reasoning for clowning on the mcu is "they overwork their cg artists and animators" i 1000% guarantee that a show or movie you have been stanning for years also abused their artists and you just haven't heard about it because the production companies aren't in the spotlight like mcu productions are. that cartoon for kids? that incredibly animated movie? that non-marvel superhero movie? i've seen people declare their hatred for the way the mcu treats their workers and then turn around and gush about a show that i know for a fact was hell for the artists attached
and no this is NOT me saying "this means you should stop hating on the mcu uwu" it's me saying you gotta be aware that this shit is an INDUSTRY WIDE PROBLEM. you CANNOT "fix" it by refusing to watch mcu movies and feeling good about it. you have to be aware that it's EVERYWHERE. why do you think so many animation and vfx productions are sourced in canada? in india and the phillipines? we are not unionized.
i know it's hard to face the idea that your favourite show might have been made unethically especially when you've spent so much time hating the mcu for doing the same thing. you don't have to start hating your favourite show. just like...be aware. don't be smarmy about it. don't claim without research that a beautifully animated movie Must mean the animators were not working 16 hour days and weekends. i do think we can fix this 👍 but we can't fix it if 90% of us don't even realize what the problem really is
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ppl are too quick to point to laios' disability as the reason his friends think he's a freak sometimes. so many instances of laios getting yelled at are, in my eyes, a case of "this guy had to emotionally mature very early in order to be there for his little sister" combined with "much older friends who never had to learn to manage their own emotions to the same degree"
a lot of the time he's right about needing to be more direct/deal with things in a way that may seem scary/needing to put your gut reaction aside. he tries not to make his friends uncomfortable and he puts up with a lot because he's trying to keep the peace, but he also pushes the others out of their comfort zones purposefully to try to get them to think more constructively. everyone else in the party is prone to acting on their gut instincts and avoiding uncomfortable situations even when facing them head-on is very much necessary. part of what makes laios such a great leader is the fact that he knows from experience how to put his own feelings aside to help someone else grow.
yes, he does make a lot of social blunders by accident and he does struggle to connect with others, but not all of his positive influence on others is accidental or "despite" making people uncomfortable. a lot of the time, I think it's clear he knows exactly what he's doing and he's trying to help the people around him process emotions in a healthy way as they all go through some truly harrowing shit. all the main characters support each other as well as they can with their unique emotional skillsets. laios' skillset just happens to be "gently talk child into eating her vegetables"
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