#vaguely leverage / a-team au because why not

[innytoes]

I don't know if you still accept prompts but: willex + conman falling in love for real AU?

When Alex made it back to the van, his backpack full of the contents of Covington's safe (bonds, diamonds, some gaudy watches, incriminating paperwork, and something Alex was pretty damn sure was a vial of arsenic), he urged Bobby to drive.

Bobby did without comment, but Alex wasn't as lucky with his other two partners in crime.

"Um, what the fuck," Luke said.

"Oh my god it's so nice to finally meet you!" Reggie beamed.

"Hi," Jay said, a little overwhelmed. He was clutching his skateboard to his chest like it was a security blanket. It was the only thing he'd brought with him.

"I can explain," Alex said, trying to ward off Luke's glares.

Except, could he really? His job had been to infiltrate Covington's operation, and to slowly snoop around without being noticed. It wasn't too hard, Covington didn't have time for the lowly accountants who did the legal side of his business. Or, well, semi-legal. Alex was pretty sure at least half the deals that guy struck bent some kind of rule.

Not that he understood most of what was happening on his screen. Reggie seemed to enjoy himself, though, taking over his computer from the van and doing all the actual work while Alex snooped around and ingratiated himself with the right people. He seemed to have done well for himself, given that after only six months Aaron Miller had earned himself a performance bonus.

It was a shame he'd never be able to cash that paycheck.

He hadn't meant to fall in love with the very pretty intern that also seemed to never be at his desk. The one who actually vouched for him to the security staff when he was on a floor he shouldn't have been on. Sure, Jay had thought he snuck up there to steal some of the fancy lunch the C-suite had catered, but still. They swiped a bunch of fancy salmon and sandwiches and pastries and went up to the roof - another place they were not supposed to be - and talked.

And talked. And talked. And flirted. And talked. Over the months Alex had been with the company, he learned that Jay wasn't just an intern, he was Covington's... well, ward, for lack of better term. Not quite a son. Not quite a servant. But definitely under his control in the worst way, being groomed to take over the company, or at least act as a figurehead while Caleb really ran things from the shadows.

"This is Jay, he's the love of my life," he finally said, and Reggie squee'd happily. Luke just stared at him. "He helped me crack Covington's safe. And he's coming with us."

"That's all well and good," Bobby said. "But we don't have a fake passport for your new beau, or an exit plan for five people."

"Actually, we do have that first one," Reggie said, not looking guilty at all. Of course the hacker had been listening in to Alex' earbud all day while working. "You look like a Willie to me," he told Jay, handing over an excellent forgery.

"I like it," Jay, or now Willie said, looking at the passport. Alex didn't fail to notice that Willie had the same fake last name as the one that was in Alex' go-bag. "And speaking of ways to get out of the country, um, I stole the keys to Caleb's yacht?"

"The yacht has a tracker in it," Luke said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, his regular one does," Willie agreed. "But not his super secret evil villain yacht that he uses to do illegal stuff in international waters."

Even Luke looked impressed at that one.

"I knew rich people did weird stuff like that," Reggie muttered to himself as Bobby made a U-turn to head to the marina instead.

"Well," Luke said thoughtfully. "Welcome aboard, Willie. Or whatever you want to be called from now on, we'll get Flynn to make you a new one the next time we're in London."

His boyfriend smiled. "I think I'll stick with Willie."

[votederpycausemufins]

All my knowledge is of hermitcraft and the stuff people have written for the Hermit!Tommy Au but I kept having this idea and needed to write it. I also think i got a bit out of character halfway through because it was supposed to be short, but i vibed with it too much so now it’s long and maybe not 100% accurate but it’s still angst followed by fluff.

also @petrichormeraki wanted me to tag them when i posted this.

Tommy had been with the Hermits for a while now. He hadn’t really kept track of when he first arrived, but it had at least been a few months. Otherwise, time was a mess. The Hermits has all but legally adopted him and all the joy that came from them caring for him made time seem to fly by.

Doc was fun to be around because while Tommy was perfectly fine never going back to the SMP, the way the man acted gave Tommy a small bit of familiarity in a good way to his past life.

He likes hanging out with False, mainly for sparring. Never anything deadly, but even if there wasn’t a need for Tommy to constantly look over his shoulder, it was good to keep from getting too rusty.

He doesn’t really hang out with Zedaph as much as Zedaph hangs out with him. Normally the Hermit would come out of the blue with something new for Tommy to try. Flicking levers over and over for something that would normally be as simple as using a furnace just became fun for Tommy, especially if he had energy pent up.

Xisuma is someone Tommy doesn’t run into much, but the fact that he doesn’t is something Tommy finds comfort in. Even as the server admin, the man is very down to Earth. Nothing like Dream ever was.

And then there’s Grian. Tommy got along with all the Hermits fine and of course there were some he preferred over others, but Grian took the cake for him. When he first showed up, Grian was the one to give him a place to stay at his old hobbit hole. Professor Beaks had been left there and still used to the SMP and scared for his life, Tommy hid the pet bird as leverage for his own safety. When Grian found out, he mostly shrugged it off, but the tens of chickens in the hobbit hole the next day was proof of retaliation.

Tommy didn’t understand the underwhelming response at first, but responded in kind, using the eggs from the chickens Grian had left to egg the Hermit’s base. When the builder nearly broke the door to the hobbit hole, Tommy grabbed his axe, ready to fight for his life, but was taken aback by the cheerful look on Grian’s face.

After that, Grian had practically taken Tommy under his wing. He showed Tommy how to build more effectively with cobble, eventually managing to get the teen to have some variety. Grian also brought Tommy along on his various chaotic endeavors, leaving behind chickens, mycelium, and possibly some missing doors.

The two chaotic red wearing Brits got along so well that they sometimes spent entire weeks together. Because of that, Tommy was all too aware that the Hermits participated in MCC as well.

It made sense. A few of the Hermits vaguely recognised him when he showed up in Hermitcraft and a few of them looked familiar to Tommy. That had made him feel a little safer since now these people weren’t complete strangers, but it did complicate things. Every so often, the portal to MCC would open and the Hermits participating would go through. The closest Tommy would get to the portal was just before the Hermits left, occasionally giving a ‘Good luck Grine!’ or something similar to Grian as he went through. But after that Tommy stayed as far away as he could manage.

The portal there led to MCC. And from there, there was a portal that led to the SMP. If Tommy could get to Hermitcraft, others could too. And that idea was terrifying, no matter who it was. Dream was a worst case scenario, but even if it was Tubbo. Tubbo had exiled him, and even if they were still on good terms after that, Tommy could have visited at some other MCC, but he didn’t, and that idea likely wouldn’t go over well, especially since otherwise, people probably thought he was dead and Tommy didn’t care to correct them.

But compared to all those other times, today was very different. Today Tommy wasn’t at the sidelines to help send off the other Hermits, he was one of the ones being sent off. They had taken every precaution. Mumbo had rebuilt his Spookification chamber for Tommy with some alterations, specifically removing the firework method of alteration. The teen was also dressed for being on a team with Grian as the Cyan Creepers, so his familiar red and white shirt was missing. But under Tommy’s costume, he still kept the chain necklace holding his compass. He refused to part with it, though made sure he would be hard to access to keep from glancing, knowing at the championships, it wouldn’t be spinning wildly anymore.

With a comforting pat on the back from Grian, he and the other Hermits walked through the portal. The crowd of people that were on the side almost immediately overwhelmed Tommy, making him think that it was a bad idea all over again, but the sight of the two other team members for the Cyan Creepers reassured them, especially as they lined up for the cameras for some fun and silly times. Then once the games began, he was too focused on winning to think of much else.

Before long, the championships were over. They had come in fifth, which was a bit disappointing at first, but on the other hand, it was still pretty good and kept the spotlight off of him. When dodgebolt began, Tommy stood next to Grian, but with a crowd of people, a good game, and no perfect place to sit, the both of them wandered for a better vantage point.

At one point, Tommy managed to push his way right up to the edge of the viewing ledge. It was the perfect place for a while until the action moved, causing everyone to decide it was the perfect place. Enough people moved nearby that Tommy was worried about falling into the pit below, and he almost did before someone pulled him back.

Tommy was ready to thank whichever Hermit or even other player helped him but the words died in his throat when he faced the person who grabbed him. He knew that mask and neon green color. And there was no reason for him to help Tommy unless-

“I finally found you!” Dream spoke. He raised his voice to be heard over the crowd, but not too much to draw the attention of others. Tommy froze as he definitely heard the words. But there was no way for Dream to know, he didn’t look at all like normal.

“I-I’m sorry.” Tommy tried not to stutter, hoping just the situation of being grabbed would excuse it. “But I don’t think I’m who you’re looking for. I’m new here. Unless you’re greeting me for being new.” It was something he prepared before in his mind after Grian brought up the possibility, but it felt sloppy putting it to use.

“Oh don’t lie Tommy. I know it’s you. I guess you got lost, but it’s okay, you can come back now. I got rid of the exile for you. Aren’t you glad?”

Tommy was glad for the mask that covered Dream’s face. He wasn’t sure he wanted to see Dream’s actual expression. “How did you-” He started to speak, but Dream cut him off, poking Tommy’s chest, right where the compass was.

“Weren’t you paying attention to the teams? Tubbo got put with me. And between games he just happened to glance at his own compass. And wouldn’t you know it, it led me right here.” Dream held up the compass that belonged to Tubbo. It looked damaged, and it was recent. Tubbo likely didn’t want to give the tyrant admin the compass, but lost it to Dream anyway.

“Give that back to Tubbo!” Tommy shouted at Dream, trying to snatch it from him.

“Feisty now, aren’t you? We can take care of that when you come back. I’ll also give it back to him if you come with me.”

Tommy froze. There was no way he was going back, but what could he do? Everyone was focused on dodgebolt, and he didn’t want his appearance to have caused more trouble for Tubbo.

Tommy glanced at the crowd one last time before reluctantly nodding. Dream grabbed his hand in a painful clench and dragged him out of the crowd towards the SMP’s portal to leave. However, just before reaching it, Dream stopped. Tommy, who had been looking back at the crowd, hoping someone would see what was going on, turned towards the portal to see Grian standing in front of it.

“Heya, where do you think you’re going. MCC isn’t over yet. Dodgebolt it still going on.”

Tommy expected Dream to just push past Grian or even give some sort of retort, but the actual reply was shocking. “Uh, n-no, just… have to head back early. Th-the game delays made things run over. A-and we’ve got to get b-back for… something else. Don’t w-want to be late for that.”

Dream’s words made Tommy so shocked he forgot to breathe. Dream was scared, no he was terrified. And he was terrified… of Grian. Tommy looked back at the Hermit who stood unflinching in front of them.

“Really? I could have sworn that you were here when I arrived, and that kid wasn’t. And he definitely came from a different portal. I know since I was keeping my eye out for my teammates. So why’s he going with you?”

“I uh…” Dream struggled, struggled, to give an answer, letting Grian continue. “That’s what I thought. C’mon kid, let’s go back to the crowd. You can stay with me until it’s over then I’ll help you find your portal back.”

And Grian took Tommy away without any retaliation from Dream. Tommy was left in awe. Grian wasn’t even an admin in Hermitcraft but Dream was terrified of him. It was amazing! But at the same time, it made Tommy spiral a bit.

When everyone returned, Grian had made sure Dream left before the Hermits and Tommy did so Dream couldn’t watch Tommy leave. Tommy stuck to False’s side as they walked through the portal, Grian being the last to come through as he continued to act as a guard. When he tried to comfort Tommy after his run-in with Dream, he understood when the teen responded he just wanted to go home. The championships were exhausting enough without a scare like that.

The next day, Tommy hung out with False. And then Zedaph, and then Doc. Grian noticed immediately, but didn’t pay much mind to it. He noticed since Tommy had spent a full week only hanging out with him, so the sudden absence of the boy was noticeable, but it made sense that he would want to hang out with the others.

After that, Grian didn’t pay too much attention to the lack of Tommy until he ran into him while stocking the barge. Tommy had been buying something at the store when Grian flew in. He nearly dropped his diamonds in trying to leave in such a hurry that it finally concerned Grian. The builder started visiting other Hermits Tommy tended to visit and ask about him. No one really noticed much other than Tommy dodging any questions about him possibly going to hang out with Grian.

Grian decided to leave it alone, and he was definitely going to, but after another run in with Tommy, he threw that decision out the window. Grian normally wouldn’t have done this, but after trying multiple times to just talk to Tommy and being unsuccessful, the builder had to essentially corner the teen.

Immediately, Grian regretted it. Tommy was trembling, obviously scared, holding a sword in his hand. He carefully tried to point out that Tommy didn’t need to have his sword out, but instead of just putting it away, Tommy just threw it on the ground, also throwing down his other gear. Grian had heard of Tommy doing this before with the other Hermits, so he immediately recognised what was going on and dived to grab the gear. It scared Tommy more, but Grian wanted to make sure nothing ended up destroyed.

“Tommy, calm down, I just want to talk. Did I do something wrong? I mean, obviously I must have, you look scared out of your mind every time I’m around you. But I can’t think or anything I did and I don’t want this to keep happening. So can I know what’s going on?”

Tommy didn’t speak for a while. He just looked defeated and terrified. Grian called in some of the other Hermits to come help Tommy calm down, though at first it didn’t help. But over time, Tommy finally did stop looking so terrified and they moved to somewhere he would feel less cornered. It took more coaxing after that, but finally, Tommy explained himself.

“He’s scared of you. Dream is… actually scared of you.”

“Yeah, I’ve killed him once or twice. Plus my full name is Lord Grian Dreamslayer, so it’s kind of in the name.” The builder tried to say it as a joke, but it didn’t seem to lighten the mood.”

“He’s the admin and he’s scared of you. And you… I’ve been hanging out with you.”

Grian nodded. “Well yeah, we do fit together well. ...Did he say something at MCC to make you think I didn’t like you?”

Tommy shook his head. “N-No. You’re right, you’re fun to be around. But dream likes… liked messing with me. And tried to train me. And I hang out with you more than I had with him, and I’m more like you. I-If you’re somehow more powerful than him-!” The rest of the words stopped in Tommy’s throat, choking him up. Stress was nearby and gave Tommy a careful hug for comfort, which helped him a little.

Grian waited a little bit for the tension to calm slightly before he spoke. “I don’t know exactly what Dream has done to you. You’ve told us a lot, but you obviously haven’t told us everything, and telling us isn’t the same as experiencing it. But let me tell you that I’m not going to do what he’s done to you. I remember how you were the first day we found you. And I see how you are now- well, how you were a few weeks ago- and I’m happy. Happy because you’ve been happy. You’ve been safe and cared for here and it shows. I don’t want to force you to be anything, I want you to be you. Sure, I’m powerful enough to kill Dream, but I’m not going to use that power on you. I’m only going to use it around you if it’s to keep him away from you.

“And! And! It’s just because of how your server is. Here we can go to the end. We don’t have a set amount of lives. We build massive structures and sell totems for a single diamond each. We fight Withers for fun and make farms with them. We farm just about anything you can think of. And Tommy.” Grian paused, making sure Tommy was paying attention. “You may be from somewhere far off that none of us old Hermits have seen, but now you’re here. And new home or not, that makes you a Hermit too. Sure you can be like me. Or you can be like False or Doc or Scar or Mumbo. But so far, you’ve been pretty you. And that you is a Hermit.”

Tommy took a few moments to process it, but the message seemed to get through to him. With that, Grian stood up with a smile. “Now I get that you probably don’t want to hang around me much right now. It makes sense. Maybe hang out with some other Hermits and learn some new stuff to get your mind off of things. Plus, I also did some talking around looking for you, and got you this.”

Tommy’s eyes practically sparkled as Grian placed down some music discs. He greedily grabbed the treasures and stuffed them in his inventory, looking up just to see Grian flying off. Taking on Grian’s idea, Tommy decided to go with Cleo and try to wrap his head around those armor stands again. While he wasn’t a pro, he did manage to make one scene of the hermits all holding weapons and surrounding an armor stand in lime leather armor. Grian was right. He was a Hermit. And he wasn’t going back. At least, not permanently, he thought, clutching his compass. Maybe, there would even be another Hermit like him.

[hmslusitania]

I was scrolling through your blog and got a wonderful idea. Hear me out. The fire fam. But in a leverage plot. They are all criminals playing Robin Hood and evening the score for the little guy. Idk I just love it and both shows have given me all the found family I could ever desire. But just think, instead of joining the 118, they’ve all had moments where they had to make that choice of what direction to go. And instead of being LAFD they turn to crime. And still find each other. Because yes.

So, Anon, my dearest. This is a screenshot of the table of contents in my "Potential AU Ideas" document. Which I created back on March 9th (I started watching the show on March 1st). You may note that the very first entry is, in fact, a Leverage AU.

I am incredibly unlikely to write it at any point because I am 100% sure I would just do an absolute hatchet job with the plots because I am nowhere near as clever as John Rogers et al, so you have given me an excuse to talk about what the details would be:

To start, we have our Mastermind, Bobby, who used to definitely be on the side of right and good, but disaster struck his family, and you know how that building they lived in was 0% up to code, disconnected sprinklers, faulty alarms, highly flammable materials? Well, the company he worked for insured that building, and do you know who faced zero charges and even made money off this tragedy?

So anyway, he is invited to crime, and would necessarily pick up his crew of the following:

Hen Wilson, an extremely talented hacker

of note, her rival hacker in the other team is Karen. They met back in the 90s in a hacker forum and it takes them several jobs as rivals to realise they're in love, it's great

Karen steals Christmas as a way to flirt with Hen at some point (and donates it all, obviously, because she's Karen)

Eddie Diaz, retrieval specialist.

He's also just like...inexplicably good at basically any physical skill? Need him to play baseball for a job? Check. Need him to be a dance instructor? Check. Need him to be a music star? Check. They have found exactly one (1) thing Eddie can't do and it's cook, but fortunately Bobby's got them covered on that

also, Lena is of course the rival hitter. I don't know why, but the scene in the Last Dam Job where the goon is like "Who are you?" "Well, I'm not Eliot" except with Lena saying it has been absolutely stuck in my head since I first had this passing thought of an au so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Chimney, thief

yes his name is just Chimney. No, no other information is available and even Hen can't find it when she goes looking.

Rival thief, appearing both in the Two Live Crews Job, the Inside Man Job, and the Last Dam Job is his little brother instead of his father figure, Albert.

yes this is at least 45% because of John Harlan Kim's role in the Librarians

ANYWAY

They get super duper burned on that first job as a crew and so they need someone new. At which point, Bobby announces that what they really need is Buck. "What's a buck" everyone else asks, and they go to a crap theatre in a dark corner of Chicago where our dear sweet Buckles is just absolutely blundering his entire way through Hamlet. "This is the worst thing I've ever seen," Eddie says, because of course he does.

The story comes out that when Bobby was in his insurance hunter days, he had repeated run-ins with this kid, who had clearly spent way too much of his life deeply unsupervised and turned to art theft on a lark, and Bobby had ended up a sort of surrogate father figure to him (which is why Hamlet instead of the Scottish play because y'know avenge your father rather than encourage your husband to the dark side) and eventually somewhat maybe talked him out of crime! Which leads to the first encounter of the crew as:

Buck: Bobby?!

Bobby: Hey Buck. How've you been?

Buck: Good! Good, I'm acting now instead of grifting, and it's going pretty well actually! You'd be proud of me!

Bobby: I am

Buck: So what are you up to these days?

Bobby: Crime! Want to help?

Buck: oh thank god

ANYWAY (again)

That makes the last addition to their highly effective crew:

Buck, grifter

When Buck has to lay low for a while on account of having to fake his death because of the Freddie Costas thing, he sends another grifter in his place, secretly

he is...a bit miffed when he gets back to find his sister and Chimney have fallen in love, but hey, it means Maddie ends up staying with the Leverage crew on a permanent basis so it's kinda a fifty-fifty scenario

it takes him an embarrassingly short period of time to fall in love with Eddie, which is convenient since it takes Eddie an even more embarrassingly short length of time to fall in love with him. They're just. they're gross. They're absolutely gross.

And where is Athena?

Obviously, obviously, with all her Lawful-Alignment tendencies, Athena has to be the insurance agent-then Interpol agent who keeps having far too amicable run-ins with them. Because she and Bobby used to work together of course, because of course they did. Perhaps they also are somewhat in love? Possibly? Who's to say.

(I've been flipflopping on who would be Maggie for the purpose of this au and I think it might have to be Michael? Bobby gets him into crime -- in frickin' 9-1-1 canon, let alone in an AU -- after he and Athena divorce and it's all so weird between the three of them, but you know, they do all manage to stay friendly despite *gestures vaguely* everything)

So! Yeah! If I felt I had the intelligence to actually write Leverage-style scenarios, this is how I would do it! If you've made it this far, thank you for indulging me.

also, I did sort of write a ficlet on this theme once back when we were all doing the mashup prompts

[copperpieceharlot]

Bud I’m sorry to swing into your inbox uninvited like this but my soul is having an OOTS renaissance thanks to your content in the tag and did you say Leverage AU

haha holy SHIT this got Long. but yes. i’ve been. Thinking. (also literally Never feel like you have to apologize for sending me messages. i was Hoping someone would ask me about this. now i have an Excuse to share EVERYTHING ive written abt it :3)

Obviously, Roy is the leader/brains of the outfit. He grew up having some Strong Opinions abt what’s Legal versus what’s Right due to tragic backstory involving the death of his little brother which was definitely SOMEONE’S fault for negligence but since there technically wasn’t any illegal behavior, there were no consequences for it. Also he’s still angry at his dad bc he thinks his dad is also partly culpable (and also also just a dick). He’s the Moral Backbone of the team (alongside Durkon, more on that later) in basically the same way Nate was in og Leverage. He’s actually not the best at figuring out what people want (that’s Haley and, shockingly, occasionally Elan), but once he has that info, he is the absolute best at figuring out the ideal plan of attack to use in any given case.

Haley is still a thief. I mean she maps to Parker almost PERFECTLY. Her dad was a thief & a conman, her mom wasn’t but knew about it and mostly accepted it, but she died tragically in a mugging gone wrong or smth, which made Ian crank the paranoia WAY up and taught Haley to do the same in the name of “safety”. Let’s keep the “Ian is in Trouble and Haley needs money, Fast” which is why she signs on to the first job in the first place. She’s less acrobatic than Parker, tending towards finding (or making) weak spots in security, but she can still make a tumble check when she needs to.

Elan is the grifter who is somehow an Idiot but also not???? It baffles everyone. When he’s playing a part for a con, he’s FLAWLESS, but then the rest of the time he’s just. No Thoughts Head Empty. He probably gets lured in initially because he’s decided to try his hand at being part of a full team, rather than the two-man cons he’s been running that invariably end w his partner conning him as well and stealing half of his take. Also he likes the idea of being Crime Friends. He’s that tweet where it’s like, Roy: “after the heist is over, we split up and never communicate again” / Elan: [about to unveil his Crime Buddies Forever Friendship Quilt Puppets]: “never?”

Vaarsuvius is the hacker/gadget person. They have a Vaguely Snobby Yet Unidentifiable accent, dyed(?) purple hair (nobody has ever seen their roots) and nobody knows who they “really” are or where they came from, but they’re good at what they do so everyone just accepts the mystery. They probably got suckered into the team by their initial employer (who I’ll get to Eventually, lol) framing it as a challenge to their intellect, like, “oh, I see, you’re not smart enough to make this team work for you...” to which they were like Fucking Watch Me and also melted his computer. Anyways. They are joined (digitally) by their Intrepid Friend And Co-Conspirator (his words, not theirs), a fellow hacker known only as Blackwing, or, on certain forums, Blackwing_Bird. (In the first season, V only occasionally references him when saying they’re “calling in extra help” or smth for a particularly complex hack job. He starts showing up a little more in s2 and eventually by the start of s4 is a regular & established presence, but only appears as actions in a computer interface or output.) Elan is convinced he’s an AI, Belkar doesn’t think he actually exists, Haley pretends she doesn’t think he exists, and Durkon and Roy try not to think about it too hard, as long as B and V still get the job done.

Belkar is the hitter. He is on the team bc their initial employer got him out of jail for it. He doesn’t have a tragic backstory, he just likes doing violent crimes. As the series progresses, he grows some empathy & stuff, but really only for people who actually deserve it. Assholes still get decked. It’s all very touching. (Also he has dwarfism caused by achondroplasia. It doesn’t actually bother him and is useful in fights bc his opponents frequently have no fucking clue how to approach him, but he likes Pretending to take offense at stupid things just to see how far he can go with it.)

Aaaand last but not least, Durkon is the least involved member of the team. He’s actually a career criminal and Roy’s mentor, and wasn’t a member of the initial team that [redacted, I’ll tell you later, PROMISE] put together for a couple of reasons, the main one being that he’s Officially retired in order to spend more time with his family, which consists of his mom, his friend (not girlfriend) Hilgya, baby Kudzu, and a truly stunning number of aunts, uncles, and cousins. Roy frequently calls or visits him for advice and he Occasionally shows up to help out on local jobs, but generally he avoids doing crime if he can (as part of a deal with Hilgya, who is also a career criminal; basically, they’ve both cut back on the crime in order to provide a more stable home environment for Kudzu. But sometimes, you gotta do a little crime, and in those cases, Sigdi enjoys spending time w her grandson.)

NOW. THE BIG REVEAL YOU’VE BEEN WAITING FOR. Who got the team together in the first place?!

The answer: Lord Shojo (or whatever Normal Person Name you want to assign him). Now this is where it gets tricky: he had them do a thing that they thought was good, THEN they thought it was BAD, but then when they confronted him he revealed that it Appearing to be bad was actually a test of character and would they consider working as basically internal investigators for him? But then he had a heart attack, so, rip. But THEN it turned out that he’d left them a bunch of money anyway and they were all feeling kind of Inspired so they formed the Order of the Stick, LLC (which, no, i am not coming up with a new name, actually, because I just don’t care. someone else can come up w a justification for that name, tho, i’m sure it’s possible). Also Miko was there and was unhappy abt their actions, and also their general existence.

Moving on. Villains!

Redcloak is the Sterling replacement, because that DEEPLY amuses me.

Xykon is a season-long main villain, probably one that Redcloak finds himself working for but then “teams up with” (read: blackmails) the Order to bring him down bc even Redcloak finds Xykon distasteful. That’s season 3, let’s say.

Tarquin is another season villain, say season 2. Nale probably shows up pretty early in s1, actually, as another recurring antagonist like Sterling but uh. Less good at it. Anyways the s2 final 3 eps deal with them (accidentally) discovering that Tarquin runs some Evil Empire Company, then trying to outplay him and take him down. Idk if Nale still dies in this version tbh.

Tsukiko is a one-off s1 villain who returns briefly in s4 alongside Miko, who has gone well and truly off the rails.

Season 1 finale has to do w Roy finally getting Vengeance for his little brother.

The vampire squad is the s4 finale villain who do smth terrible to Durkon and then get the Mother Of All Revenge served up to them by the Order.

I envision the show as being 5 seasons (like og Leverage) but I’m not going to sketch out s5 because I think it should be based off whatever happens in the current story arc, possibly involving some legacy of the OotSquiggle.

Other stuff!

The Order of the Squiggle is a legendary criminal team from the 60s who stole a BUNCH of famous shit & then proceeded to legendarily implode. This has no bearing on the plot I’ve sketched out, I just think it’s fun.

The Sapphire Guard members should probably be reworked as FBI. I don’t care about most of them but I do think that Lien and O-Chul could be like, FBI agents who Choose to look the other way while the Order does their very-much-not-legal-but-still-fair Justice Crime, and maybe even help them out on occasion.

So, the Final season-by-season outline, based on everything I’ve written so far:

s1 e1: getting the team together, doing a con for Shojo, then at the end he dies and the gang is like “dang what now?" and intend to split up except then they Don’t.

mid-s1: Nale shows up and tries to trick the Order, but then gets beat like a drum.

late s1: Tsukiko is an underling of the Villain Of The Week, winds up in police custody. But She’ll Be Back.

s1 finale: Roy’s Vengeance: The Vengeaning. also we meet Redcloak as an antagonist.

s2 e1: the truth abt Haley’s father comes out

early s2: The Two Live Crews Job but it’s the Order vs the Linear Guild and the Linear Guild ARE all bad guys.

mid-s2: Redcloak returns. ugh.

late s2: the sapphire guard FBI makes its first appearance, hello O-Chul and Lien.

s2 pre-finale: once again they’re in conflict w Nale over smth, he spends the whole episodes making Cryptic Remarks, they basically beat him (like a drum!) but then the stinger at the end is that Tarquin reveals himself and Elan is like “Dad?!”, roll credits.

s2 finale, part 1: Elan is hanging out w Tarquin bc he’s DEEP in Denial, the Rest of the team tries to take Tarquin down, but it doesn’t work.

s2 finale, part 2: Elan finally gets a clue and they manage to beat Tarquin. still haven’t decided if Nale dies or not, but I’m leaning towards yes. also they rescue Haley’s dad.

s3 e1: fuck dude idk.

early s3: Redcloak shows up, AGAIN, everyone groans. he has blackmail on them, he wants them to take Xykon down.

mid s3: The Rashomon Job but it’s about stealing the Talisman of Dorukan and it turns out that Nale was there too (“oh!” Elan says. “I was wondering why I looked so weird in all those mirrors! But it wasn’t my reflection, it was Nale’s!” “Sweetie, that wasn’t Nale’s reflection,” says Haley. “Huh,” says Elan, “so the mirrors were broken?”, cue eye rolling from everyone else.), and the Successful thief was Hilgya, who’d nabbed it from the owner before it even went on display.

s3 finale: they beat Xykon, actually factually, because he deserves to get his ass Thoroughly kicked, even if only in AU form. Lien and O-Chul are there, so are some other less helpful FBI people. There’s a bit where O-Chul Exact Wordses his way out of telling his superiors about the Order’s less legal activities without technically lying. King shit.

s4 e1: doesn’t really matter. maybe smth to do w some legacy of Tarquin’s company to set up the drama w Malack & Durkon later.

early s4: Durkon gets SENT TO PRISON. Malack approaches the Order abt this because sure they have Different Ethics but they’re still Friends. (Roy is surprised and a little hurt that he’s never heard of Malack, but he ignores that in favor of Let’s Get Whatever Fuckers Did This To Our Friend.)

immediately after that: Miko and Tsukiko return as a Team, preventing the Order from working on the Durkon situation

mid s4: Redcloak makes another unexpected & unwelcome appearance but he’s maybe a little less of a dick? the Order collaborates with Malack & his Crime Buddies (hello, Vector Legion) to pull one over on him tho, because “less of a dick” does not mean “a pleasant or decent person”, and also he was mean abt Durkon being in jail, so he totally deserved it. he still gets whatever he wanted tho, just takes a blow to his pride. also prevents the Order from helping Durkon. they’re having a LOT of setbacks wonder why that could be, not to make sure the season fills its whole length or anything, no sirree

s4 finale: something something taking down the organization, headed by Hel (yes that’s her real name), which framed Durkon for their Big Crime. Durkon goes free and Extra Firmly retires, For Good, He Swears, but says he “met someone new” who might be an asset.

s5 e1: minrah joins the team! and the episode is set in like, somewhere really snowy. that’s all i got.

the rest of s5: don’t know, don’t care, it’s open-ended until the comic finishes up.

[pixiedane]

Fic Writer Review

Thank you for the tag, @ussjellyfish ! I don't know whom to tag so I will just say to all of you: TAG, you're it (scroll to the end to copy paste the questions).

how many works do you have on AO3?

187

what’s your total AO3 word count?

373,260

how many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

The count is 74, but they're not wholly individual (lots of "all media types" for example). I have pseuds for Star Wars (68 works), Star Trek (63 works), and Marvel (18 works). There are 38 works in other fandoms including Leverage, Killjoys, Harry Potter, The Hobbit, House MD, Game of Thrones, Once Upon a Time, Law and Order, Peter Pan, Willow...

16 more questions beneath the cut.

what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

512 kudos, Let's Go Steal a Family (Leverage), 2044 words | The Leverage team decide they don't need to settle down in order to start a family.

This was written for the "Leverage-a-thing-a-thon" run in August 2015 (making this fic almost exactly six years old). It's about found family in the most literal sense.

415 kudos, catch a glimpse of sunlight (Star Wars), 2324 words + a fanvid | What if Anakin listened to Padmé more than Palpatine and Obi-Wan listened to Anakin more than Yoda? tldr; galaxy saved

Created for the 2016 Star Wars Rarepairs exchange, a canon divergent au where Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Padmé work together to take down the Chancellor and raise the twins as a triad.

253 kudos, and a softness came from the starlight and filled me full to the bone. (Star Wars), 726 words | Luke wants to know about his mother.

Written for PadMay 2018, for the prompt "How should Padmé be remembered?". Wow, I'm surprised this is in the top five given it's a tiny ficlet in a giant fandom written for a challenge I made up myself. But I'm pleased! Padmé deserves to be remembered, that's why I started PadMay.

247 kudos, Serendipity (Star Wars), 1914 words | That time Padmé accidentally walked in on the wrong naked Jedi.

Another ObiAniDala AU written for the Star Wars Rarepairs Exchange, 2018 in this case. Two years earlier I'd made a random photo manip of Natalie Portman and Ewan Mcgregor drinking tea and it eventually inspired the fic.

221 kudos, Your Beating Heart Tonight (Star Wars), 3121 words | Padmé develops feelings for her other Jedi protector.

And another written for the Star Wars Rarepairs Exchange in 2016! And also another AU based in a storm of emotions between Anakin, Padmé, and Obi-Wan. I have a specialty.

All five of these are about family first and foremost. Three and a half feature polyamory. Three and a half are canon divergent AUs. None breaks 3200 words. All were written for an event/exchange.

do you respond to comments, why or why not?

For the most part. Sometimes I don't right away and it becomes awkward. And I generally don't respond to negative comments because who needs that.

what’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Probably Abduction, a mirror universe story vaguely inspired by The Handmaid's Tale. My author's note: "It is not a happy story for anyone and implies the extreme emotional abuse of a child, as well as the coercion and torture of adults."

do you write crossovers? if so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

I love crossovers! I've completed a few and have fifty more in wip folders. The most ambitious is War of Stars, a Star Wars/Game of Thrones fusion with 26,480 words, thirty chapters, and five different povs (Cersei, Anakin, Daenerys, Ahsoka, and Boba). Niche, but I am very proud of how it worked out.

I've also blended Star Wars with Mad Max, Kelvin Star Trek, Star Trek Discovery, Deep Space Nine, Sleeping Beauty, and Black Widow.

have you ever received hate on a fic?

I've had a few mean comments but they're basically "I don't like this pairing and I want you to feel bad about writing it" and I won't.

do you write smut? if so what kind?

No. Just not my thing.

have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I am aware of.

have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, I've had a few translated into Russian, which just adds to the headcanon that I'm secretly Black Widow.

have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, back in the LiveJournal days I wrote many thousands of words with @vasnormandy. I am slowly posting those stories to AO3 under my Marvel pseud Amelia Danvers, my OC and main character.

what’s your all time favorite ship?

An impossible question because I multi-ship like my life depends on it. Anakin/Padmé is my most prolific ship followed by Rey/Ben, Kat/Lorca, and Carol Danvers/Peter Parker (the parents of Amelia above). But I've written alternate ships for all of the above.

You can read more about my shipping interests here.

what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Oof. I have a lot of WIPs that I would like to finish but it's hard to get back to.

what are your writing strengths?

Dialogue. Introspection. I'm good at writing a specific point of view. Characters addressing their issues. I like to pull at threads so I've built up those skills. I love mixing and mashing fandoms and pairings. Complex relationships and the discussion thereof.

what are your writing weaknesses?

Action, like sex scenes or fight scenes, and anything plot heavy. I'm more interested in character and it shows in my writing.

I am also terrible at follow through and finishing things. It's why so much of my fic is written for challenges with external deadlines.

what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I'm not fluent in any other languages and I wouldn't want to do it without extensive research.

what was the first fandom you wrote for?

Either Star Trek (TNG, mainly the adventures of Beverly Crusher - as a preteen, at the Academy, as a single mom, and because I'm me I also gave her a Romulan lover) or Star Wars (the adventures of Han and Leia's daughter who was ME but also Jaina Solo before Jaina Solo existed because she was a twin who wanted to be a pilot more than a Jedi). These stories were written on notebook paper in colored pen and I'd do dramatic readings in the backyard, in costume, with only the trees (all of whom I'd named, mostly after heroines in books, like Elizabeth, Jane, Anne, Alice, Mary, etc.) as the audience.

what’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

Well, the one I imagine as something more is Pas De Deux, my Jedi Dance Academy AU. I can picture the senes in my mind and I really enjoyed the adaptation process, melding two things I love into one. The characters and events are recognizable, but also very different and that's something I enjoy.

Questions for anyone who wants to complete it:

Fic Writer Review

how many works do you have on AO3?

what’s your total AO3 word count?

how many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

do you respond to comments, why or why not?

what’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

do you write crossovers? if so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

have you ever received hate on a fic?

do you write smut? if so what kind?

have you ever had a fic stolen?

have you ever had a fic translated?

have you ever co-written a fic before?

what’s your all time favorite ship?

what’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

what are your writing strengths?

what are your writing weaknesses?

what are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

what was the first fandom you wrote for?

what’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

[lessinkmoregraphite]

Artificial AU prologue part 1

I have no patience and want to share stuff I do, so. Have the first segment of my most recent post-Forces au, aka Artificial AU. It’ll probably be on ao3 eventually, maybe with some small edits, but for now have this mess.

The first clear thought Infinite had was surprise that he was able to have a thought. The (nope) experience he'd had before the world went dark should have killed him, he shouldn't be able to think anything.

But here he is. Thinking. Huh.

He tried to pry his eyes open, found them sticky with sleep and heavy with fatigue, and gave up. Instead he ran a physical assessment of his body - overall aches, especially bad at his wrists, ankles, and chest, but none of that was shocking (nono not a pun this time). What was more confusing was the slight resistance when he managed to shift one of his arms - bandages, he guessed, based on the feeling when he bent his wrist. Most of the way up to his elbow, too - not a sh- surprise. The others were probably just as bad.

Consciousness was already slipping through his grasp, but he had just enough time to wonder who would bother to bandage him up before he slipped back into cool darkness.

 The next time, he was a little less foggy; enough to be alarmed and try to sit up. Which did not go well, as his chest screamed in protest and he froze halfway up with his mouth hanging open in a silent scream.

Hands pressed to his shoulder and back, gently but efficiently pulling him to lay back down. For the first time, he noticed how soft the pillow was. It probably wasn't really that soft, but somehow it was the most heavenly thing ever in that moment.

He shoved the thought away and forced his eyes open, muzzle wrinkling in distaste at the gummy feel of them. He could just make out a blurry red and yellow blob in front of him, but no features past that.

Dry lips opened, his voice emerging in a creak rather than words. Immediately, a straw was pressed to his lips, and he slurped greedily at the liquid offered to him until it was pulled away. He frowned, but didn't protest, instead croaking out something like a question - the words were slurred, but still words.

"Don't worry," came the response, quiet but much clearer than his own voice. "You're safe. Rest."

And while a part of him immediately balked at the idea of listening to someone telling him what to do, he was helpless to resist the darkness returning to him.

 The time after that, he woke up feeling almost lucid. His body still ached, and his thoughts were a little too fuzzy to be considered normal, but he could think enough to pry his eyes open and look around.

It looked like a random bedroom, except too clean. Like it hadn't been used until now. Plain white walls and off-white carpet, a few shelves on one wall, a dresser and desk on another. The bed he was on looked like it had been dragged out from the corner to the middle of the room, so there was space on all sides. It made his fur prickle slightly but there wasn't much he could do about it.

His gaze finally fell to the floor, on the one bright spot in the room - a figure that appeared to be doing a plank. He could make out green boots and red fur, but the rest was covered by a frankly hideous mustard-colored jacket.

He spent a good few minutes just staring, trying to process why anyone would willingly wear that color (especially when it basically made them look like an off color stoplight). His pause to gape lasted long enough that the figure finished the plank and rolled over, brightening and jumping up upon seeing him.

The wolf scurried over to the bedside, pausing a beat too long before speaking. "Do you need anything?"

"To stop looking at that horrible thing masquerading as clothing."

"It's warm," he said, not looking offended in the least. "And big. Are you hungry?"

...Yes. But he wasn't eager to acknowledge that, even if it was pretty obvious that this person had been looking after him already. Especially since at a second glance, he had a vague recollection of where he'd seen him before.

Not that it seemed to matter much, since the wolf had already headed toward a box of something set against the wall, rummaging around inside until he came up with a pouch of squeeze applesauce.

"Here," he said, coming over to set the pouch on the edge of the bed. "Let me know if you need help."

Infinite scowled at him, then reached for the pouch and began fiddling with the screw top. Much to his chagrin, it turned out to be less of an absurd suggestion than he'd first thought; he could barely get the top open even with the ridiculous wings on it lending leverage. He slurped the food up angrily while glaring at nothing in particular.

The wolf stared at him in silence while he ate, expression oddly blank. Infinite finished the pouch quickly and pulled it away to scowl. "What?"

"Want another?"

"...Sure."

They repeated the process, up to and including the weird staring. This time, when Infinite finished, the wolf had a different question. "Should I still call you Infinite?"

He stiffened, suddenly on guard. Some part of him had wondered if this idiot just didn't realize who he was, and that's why he offered some sort of care, but if he knew...

"Call me whatever you want," he finally said. There was a beat of silence before he added, "Why the hell are you helping me?"

The wolf blinked. "Aren't you supposed to help people when they get hurt?"

Infinite's scowl deepened. What kind of answer - whatever. It's not like he was in any shape to refuse freely given help, much as it galled him to admit it.

"I'm Gadget," the wolf said, before Infinite could reply.

"That's a weird name." The response came on autopilot, not really the truth but the first thing that came to mind.

Gadget shrugged. "Probably. I picked it."

"So... it's a nickname?"

"Uh... don't think so?"

Infinite groaned and stared at the ceiling. What the actual hell. "Whatever. When should I expect the resistance to come throw me in a cell?"

There was a long silence. Infinite blinked and glanced over, finding Gadget rubbing at the back of his neck with a guarded look. "...Oi."

"They won't be," Gadget mumbled, his voice suddenly... distant, for lack of a better word. "I'm not with the resistance anymore."

There was another paused as that processed. Infinite scoffed and rolled his eyes. "What, did they kick their star rookie out after defeating the big bad?"

"No. I left before they could."

Yet another pause as Infinite failed to find words. He'd been being sarcastic, because really why should he believe this (apparently former) Resistance member had left their ranks and then just happened to end up taking care of him? It was a little too convenient. But from what little he'd seen, Gadget didn't seem like the sort to fake his emotions - he could see every thought running through the idiot's head in glorious technicolor - yet here he was, apparently on the verge of tears over... something. Something about leaving the Resistance.

Before he could pry more information out of him, Gadget perked up with a seemingly genuine smile. "Not important though. Are you still hungry? Thirsty? It's been a while since you woke up last time."

Infinite shut his questions back, accepting the offer of more food and water instead. He'd get his answers eventually; it's not like he hadn't worked to subtly get information from people before. Whatever Gadget was hiding, he'd find it.

For now, he'd work to regain his strength. The rest could wait just a little longer.

Gadget sat on the dresser, staring out the little window. The idyllic forest scene felt weird, considering that he knew they were still in Eggman's base, but it was certainly a better view than broken machinery.

Today had been the most lucid Infinite had been in the dozen or so times he'd woken so far, but he still hadn't pushed for more information. Not that Gadget was complaining. It was just... strange.

Still, the chance to sort things out a bit more was welcome. He'd barely had a chance to figure out how to respond to everything himself, much less how to bring it up with someone else.

There was a reason he'd run from the Resistance before they could find out. He didn't know how to talk about these things.

Gadget caught himself rubbing at the back of his neck again and pulled his hand away, stuffing both hands in the opposite jacket sleeves. That was becoming a habit. His first Resistance team had warned him about that kind of habit, and he didn't want to deal with breaking one.

He also didn't want to deal with leaving the Resistance at all, but... he doubted they'd react well when they learned what he was. He sure hadn't. It was easier to just... vanish, completely avoiding the consequences.

Finding Infinite had been an accident. He'd come here to find answers (to look at that lab that felt so dreadfully familiar); instead he'd found the jackal passed out in a room that he didn't want to think about too much, burns on his limbs and chest and vitals shaky. He'd jumped to help on instinct; after all, he hadn't been lying about helping people.

Well. Lying by omission, perhaps. He'd heard about that sort of lying. Because yes, he'd saved Infinite because he was once told that helping people was the right thing to do. But he also did it because if anyone could relate to him, could make him feel a little less alone, it might be Infinite.

After all. Even if Gadget was just a prototype, they'd been made for the same purpose.

[amandaoftherosemire]

For She Had Eyes...

Fandom: Marvel Avengers AU

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

Characters: Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes, Natasha Romanoff, Sam Wilson, Unnamed OFC!Hallway Blonde

Author: @amandaoftherosemire​

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 5,146

Format: Two-part series

Warning: Smut, 18+ only, language, unintentional voyeurism, female masturbation, mild angst, embarrassment.

Summary: After accidentally catching Steve in an intimate moment, you can’t stop thinking about it.

A/N: This was inspired by a piece of fanart that I saw that I can’t find now to save my damn life. It was of Steve and Sharon against a wall, mostly clothed, him in a tux and her in a red dress, and I loved it. (If anyone knows what I’m talking about, please let me know so I can credit the artist.)

However, I personally hate how the fandom has treated Sharon Carter at times, so I tend not to vilify her if I can help it. To be clear, Hallway Blonde is NOT Sharon Carter.

I only split this into two parts because of the word count. It was one of those stories that showed up in my brain and wouldn’t shut up until I got it out of there and out of the way. I hope y’all like it!

For She Had Eyes

You didn’t mean to do it. You weren’t trying to peep. But jeez, if he didn’t want anyone to see, then why the hell was he in one of the corridors? Not that you were complaining. You were, but about the fact that you had to stop watching. Really. You had to. In a second.

You'd been heading back to your rooms from the communal kitchen after you’d woken up starving and embarked on an after-midnight foraging expedition. With the slice of pie and the soda you’d acquired, you were quietly padding back to your rooms when the gasping breaths and soft slap of flesh on flesh alerted you to someone else’s presence and their probable current activity.

Expecting Bucky or even Sam, you’d put your training to use and snuck toward the sound rather than away in the hopes of witnessing something you could leverage against them later. They were fun guys, but you needed any ammunition you could get in the unending friendly battle. Catching them in the act of either getting laid or making do could be excellent ammunition.

Which may be why you'd frozen when you peeked around the corner to one of the corridors in the private areas to spy Steve there with some blonde you only vaguely recognized pinned against the wall.

Your eyes widened, but you didn't move, greedily drinking in the sight of Steve, mostly dressed, as he pounded silently into the woman panting in his arms. You knew you should leave, as quietly as possible, respecting Steve's privacy. You stayed, however, for far longer than you were proud of, imprinting the image of Steve in the throes of passion on your retinas.

Though the light was dim, there was more than enough for you to see that Steve Rogers was fucking beautiful lost in pleasure.

His high cheekbones were flushed gorgeous pink, sharp jaw clenched, cheek muscle twitching. His long fingers dug into the woman’s thighs to hold her up and against the wall, in place for his thrusting hips. You could see the muscles of his thighs and ass flexing as he slammed harder into her, driving muffled gasps of pleasure from her lips.

You were grateful for that, as her sounds would hopefully mask your speeding breathing and racing heart. With one last, too long look, drawn by Steve's speeding thrusts, you drug your eyes and self away. You retreated as silently as you had come, praying neither of them had noticed your presence.

Once you thought you were far enough away, you took off running as best you could to your rooms, taking the long way around to avoid Steve and his companion at all costs. Back behind the closed door of your rooms, you dropped the pie and soda you still carried on your coffee table and ran to your bedroom.

In the privacy of your bed, you let your body rule. Sliding your hand between your thighs, you let yourself imagine being in the blonde’s place, your flesh between Steve’s teeth, your arms around his neck, your hands in his hair. As you began to rub circles into your clit, you envisioned Steve’s hands digging into the flesh of your thighs, holding you up and open for the slam of his hips against yours, driving his cock into you with the same relentless rhythm you’d just witnessed. Between your own fevered imaginings and the heated scene seared into your memory, you were coming in no time flat.

With a shuddering moan, you climaxed imagining Steve’s eyes on yours as he fucked you like a madman against a wall.

A while later, despite your physical satisfaction, you stared at the ceiling in horror.

How were you going to face him tomorrow?

You decided not to. Face him, that is. You opted instead to avoid any kind of social setting that day, pretending general surliness to keep everyone, but most especially Steve, at arm’s length.

You skipped breakfast entirely, not wanting to have to make small talk with anyone when you knew you’d be too busy remembering the line of Steve’s jaw as it clenched in passion. You waited until you knew much of the team would be in the gym before you joined them. To make sure you could avoid any interactions, you’d put on your leave-me-alone aura.

When you'd first joined the team, you'd made it clear that there would be days that you needed to be left alone. Those days were signified by the enormous gray hoodie enveloping your torso. Today you wore it over workout gear. You'd pulled the hood up, slid sunglasses onto your nose, and put earbuds into your ears before you'd walked through the door.

Every eye in the room turned toward you, recognized the hoodie and slid away as you crossed toward the outside door. Everyone knew you jogged by yourself on gray hoodie days. Since you studiously did not look at him as you walked out, you didn't see that Steve's eyes stayed on you, his gaze darkening as you left.

Steve's mood, already dark and mean, blackened viciously. With a snarl, he turned on the punching bag Bucky was holding for him. Bucky merely lifted a brow, easily reading Steve's moods. He could always tell when Steve had let his ex-girlfriend get her hooks into him again.

Steve was cursing himself. He'd known better than to let her drag him back in, even for a night, but the craving for you had been riding him hard when she'd texted. He'd been watching you take turns tossing popcorn and catching it in your mouth with Bucky while you debated movie choices with Sam and his heart had been sighing romantically at how sweet and beautiful he thought you were.

He also thought you firmly off-limits. Not only were you a member of his team, and that was no small matter, any change in dynamic possibly detrimental to the safety of everyone, you'd also never given him any indication you'd be receptive. You joked and teased him, but you did that with literally everyone; you were generally the friendly sort.

You also occasionally flirted with him, but it was delicate, almost innocent. There seemed to be more heat behind your flirting with Sam or Bucky. Still, the three of you were the sort of friends that gave each other endless shit, so there didn't seem to be anything to your flirting with them, either. Sam and Bucky always included Steve in the endless shit-giving, too, but you and he had never gotten to that point.

He wished he knew how to talk to you, how to become your friend even if he couldn't tell you he was half in love with you. Every time he tried, however, he ended up feeling too shy to open up for real. You'd always been open and encouraging, but he could tell his shyness looked like rejection to you. It left Captain America perpetually between you.

He'd been lamenting exactly that when she'd texted him, trying to draw him back into her sphere where she could punish him for not loving her enough. Most of the time he was able to resist, but he was feeling particularly sad and lonely. Watching you sit across the room from him, happy and within reach, yet somehow still a million miles away was both temptation and torment. Torn apart by it, he'd been willing to take the punishment to forget what he couldn't have, if only for a moment.

Until he'd been inside her, wishing she was you, and his heightened senses told him they were no longer alone. His inexplicable ability to recognize you by sound and scent alone had set him off and he'd come helplessly, with stuttering hips. He knew he'd heard someone's heart besides hers and his own, and he'd prayed it hadn't really been you who'd caught him in the corridor, that it had only been his own fevered imagination and desperate need that made him think he'd caught the edge of your scent.

He'd been in a foul mood thanks to both the worry of that and the ugly scene he'd endured at her hands. He'd already damned himself for answering her text at all, let alone allowing things to go so far, when, seconds after his climax, she'd murmured in his ear, her voice full of venom, "Thinking of her, again, were we?"

She'd been talking about Peggy; she didn’t know about you. They’d broken up before you’d joined the team, so it had been easy to hide his feelings for you from her, too aware she'd use it against him at the earliest opportunity, the way she did with Peggy. She'd never forgive him for not loving her the way she wanted. She couldn't seem to stop hurting them both because of it.

Then you'd walked in and out without looking at him and he'd known for certain. You'd walked in on him fucking his ex and now you couldn't meet his eye. His already foul mood shifted to something black and ugly as his fists pounded into the bag in frustration.

Outside, you breathed a sigh of relief. You'd made it past the first hurdle. If you could get through this day without humiliating yourself, you'd consider yourself home free. You were sure you could deal with this with just a little more time and distance. You just needed to put Steve back in the No-Sex box where you’d put all the hot people you worked with every day.

You were trying to ignore the fact that just the sight of Steve out of the corner of your eye had your memory flitting back to the sight of his fingers digging deliciously into flesh.

You put the image out of your mind and took two deep breaths as you started to stretch. A nice long run, a cold shower, and something other than last night's pie to eat and you could handle this.

"Y/N?"

You shrieked and jerked in response to the sound of Steve saying your name, hitting your head on the engine you were currently under while you worked on it.

"H-h-h-h-hi Steve!" Deeply grateful for the prototype engine that currently hid everything from your hips up, most thankfully your face, you rolled your eyes at the stuttering giggle. You despised the clear sign of the girlish crush you’d developed overnight, but in your defense, you hadn't been expecting anyone to come talk to you on a gray hoodie day, least of all Steve. He was kind and friendly, but he didn't seem to have much to say to you.

You'd tried to accept it, accept that not everyone was going to click with you, but you really liked Steve. His friendship with Sam and Bucky told you how warm and funny he could be with people he liked and his camaraderie with Natasha made it clear he could be friends with women, and the best of friends, no less. You couldn't help a little bit of hurt feelings that he stayed resolutely apart no matter how you tried to welcome him in. You now realized it was that little burn of resentment that had allowed you to ignore how attracted you were until you’d been confronted with his base sexuality.

Altogether, you'd been blindsided by the sound of Steve's voice, especially as you'd been belting along with the stereo where your phone was blasting your garage playlist. You liked fast and loud when you worked with your hands. Not expecting visitors, you hadn’t been bothering with the leave-me-alone attitude, singing happily as you tinkered. “Volume down fifty percent,” you said, and the music immediately dropped to a murmur.

You realized when he stayed silent that he was probably waiting for you to slide out from under the engine. Fat fucking chance. "Sorry, Steve. I literally have my hands full right now." The lie tripped lightly off your tongue, easier when you didn't have to look at him, but your discomfort was still coming through in your voice, loud and clear to anyone who knew you well. You hoped if he heard it, he didn't recognize it. "But go ahead and talk to me. What's up?"

Steve was both grateful and disappointed that he wasn't looking at your face. He was almost certain, based on your reaction, that you were the person who'd caught him last night, but he was not at all certain anymore that you were upset by it. You sounded… embarrassed? Ashamed?

He felt a rush of chagrin at the thought and spoke with less care than he had planned. "Were you in the hallway late last night?" As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he winced in horror. He hadn't meant to ask you that at all, let alone that baldly.

"NO!" You shouted the word, the sound strangled, and so clearly a lie, you merely let your head fall back with a thump as you tried to salvage it anyway. "Why do you ask?" you squeaked.

You turned your head until you were looking at Steve's boots when you heard what sounded like a snort from him. You'd never heard that sound from him before, at least not thanks to you, and it had you smiling despite the situation. "You're as bad a liar as I am," he said, his voice rich and warm and so appealing it almost made you slide on your creeper out from where you were wedged to peer into his face.

You resisted, however, too guilty to look at him straight on. You'd stood watching for far too long last night to have the moral high ground in this conversation. You were terrified he'd noticed, the shame of it miserably crawling up your neck and over your scalp. When he fell silent, you started to squirm with it.

Steve opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, unsure how to go on. He wanted to apologize, but now it seemed you’d rather not talk about it. He also didn't know how to apologize. How could he tell you that he was in the hallway because he couldn't stand to have his ex in his space again? He opened his mouth, still not certain what he was about to say, but painfully aware that he’d been silent for far too long when you’d asked him a question.

Before he could speak, however, the silence had worn you down, and you sang like a canary, the words coming out in a rush of guilt-laden confession.

“Look, I know I might have stood there too long, but I was expecting the chance to ruin Bucky’s night or something and I was really surprised when it was you. Can we just pretend it never happened?” The final question came out on a choked high-pitched squeal that shamed you, but the humiliation was so intense, the guilt so over-whelming, you could only close your eyes and hope Steve took pity on you.

“How--” Steve stopped when his voice croaked a little to clear his throat and try again. He was embarrassed, confused, and sick at the thought that you might have seen the fight between him and his ex, heard the things she'd said to him. “How long did you stand there?”

The silence dragged on long enough that Steve actually felt his knees dissolve as his stomach threatened to revolt.

Meanwhile, you were laying, your head pillowed on the little cushion at the head of your creeper, your body limp as you stared in utter horror at the shiny metal you'd been working on without seeing it. You closed your eyes as your stomach churned.

Steve may have suspected that you'd stumbled upon him last night, but his words made clear that he had had no idea what you'd done. How could you possibly explain? There was no way to tell him you'd stood dumbstruck, watching him fuck someone, without giving away that you'd been mesmerized by the sight of him given over to lust, to passion. He'd just been so fucking beautiful.

But he hadn't come in here to confront you and you'd just sold yourself out. You'd never wanted a hole to open up and swallow you the way you did in this never-ending moment. You didn't want to answer, but the silence had stretched to the breaking point and if one of you didn't say something, you were pretty sure you were going to go stark raving mad.

"Okay," you said, your voice carrying a defensive tone and you were grateful all over again that Steve couldn't see your face. "I'm not a pervert or anything. I wasn't watching on purpose."

Steve's knees almost buckled in relief as he finally understood that you were embarrassed, rather than angry and upset, or possibly worse, judging him. "I shouldn't have been in the hallway." Steve rushed to reassure, not wanting you to think he was here because he was angry. "I'm sorry I embarrassed you."

You figured it was a good thing that you were kind of wedged under Tony's latest prototype. You were, apparently, entirely too susceptible to Steve. You could hear the genuine remorse and worry in his voice and it made you want to shimmy out there and cuddle him. A complete puddle, you responded as thoughtlessly as he when he rushed to reassure, your breath signaling your desire to astute ears.

"I wasn't mad, Steve," you half-laughed, the image of his neck muscles, taut with lust, flitting across your mind’s eye. "Let's just forget it." You slid over enough that you could reach out and give a thumbs up.

Steve laughed when your hand came into view, the tone in your voice making his heart beat faster, though he couldn’t put his finger on why. "Thanks, y/n," he replied, his voice warm with the affection he always felt for you but had never known how to express. He was almost glad that this had happened. The Captain seemed to have faded. He didn't know if it was because he could set it aside or because you could stop seeing it. Either way, he was beginning to feel like your friend.

"So, we're cool, right?" You said it hopefully, praying he'd let you off the hook.

Steve laughed out loud, and the sound was so pretty and warm you could hardly stand to stay still. You wanted so badly to see his face lit up with laughter you inspired. You stayed in place, however, still too terrified that he'd see your almost desperate lust for him if he could see your face right now. You needed a little more distance between yourself and the memory of the way the muscles in his thighs flexed and released as he thrust--

"We're cool." Steve was smiling at the thumb you were making dance in response, utterly charmed by you. He was trying to think of something else to say, wanting to stretch this time out longer, but nothing was coming to mind. With nothing else, "Thanks, again." He cringed. "I'll let you get back to work, then."

"I'll see you later." You said it warmly, catching a hint of the discomfort and seeking to alleviate it even if you didn't understand its cause. You had this newfound overwhelming urge to make Steve happy. You wished it wasn't partly because you really wanted to replace Hallway Blonde.

Steve turned and started to walk out, a smile on his face in response to the quiet humming noises you were making absently as the clink of your tools against metal started up again. He was halfway to the door when he realized that you'd never actually answered the question.

You were starting to hum along with the music as you got back to tinkering when Steve's voice rang out. "But… how long did you watch?"

"What?!" Blindsided, convinced you were home free, you had absolutely no defense or guile and the word was so drenched in pained guilt there was no way Steve didn't hear it.

"You did watch," he pointed out, turning back around with new determination, the guilt in your voice clear to him, but yet unexplained. "But I asked how long, and you didn't answer."

"Of course I did." Your voice was raspy and painfully unconvincing. If you'd been the slightest bit prepared for any of this, maybe you wouldn’t be fucking it up so hard. You cleared your throat and continued. "Not, like, a pervy amount of time, but a… justifiably surprised amount of time. I didn’t have a stopwatch on me.” You tried really hard to sound vaguely irritated and a little offended that you had to explain, and you mostly succeeded.

Steve stood next to the engine, looking down at your legs, jiggling in apparent anxiety. He was considering his options. He didn't want to get overly physically pushy and drag you out from under there so that he could look at you, but he also really wanted to see your face. He felt like he needed to understand what was going on underneath this conversation more than he needed anything else.

Steve lay down on the ground so that he could see you where you lay, one arm limp at your side, a socket wrench in your hand, while the other arm was up, your palm across your forehead in dismay. His mouth began to spread in a smile at how utterly adorable he thought you were, even when you'd been obviously lying to avoid having to look at him.

"Hands full, huh?"

"Fuck me!” The expletive burst from your mouth in an explosion, both startled and horrified at being caught. You whipped your head to the side to see Steve laying on his stomach on the floor next to you, his cheek pillowed on his crossed wrists, pretty face smiling sweetly at you.

Too susceptible by half, you turned your face back to the engine in front of you. You were afraid that pretty smile could get you to do anything.

“Will you please come out here so I can see your face when I’m talking to you?” Steve asked it kindly, aware that you were hiding because something embarrassed you. He wanted to ease that embarrassment, show you that you didn’t have to be embarrassed with him. He was too familiar with the sensation to want it to happen to anyone else, least of all you.

“I don’t want to.”

Steve’s lips twitched and he had to stifle his laughter at the petulant tone and cadence to your words. He didn’t move from his spot on the floor. If all he could get was the sight of your profile from under one of Tony’s massive prototypes, it was better than nothing. “Why not?”

“Because I’m humiliated.” You spoke slowly and deliberately, annoyed and anxious because the conversation that you’d thought you’d escaped unscathed had turned around on you. It didn’t help that you could see Steve smiling at you out of the corner of your eye and you were having a hell of a time not crawling out from under the engine and all over him. “The fuck you think?”

As you spoke, Steve could hear your heart start to race but it didn’t have the pounding rhythm of fear. If he wasn’t also afraid that he was merely engaged in wishful thinking, he’d wonder if it was arousal. Once he started considering the possibility, your behavior made more sense, but he couldn’t be sure he wasn’t deluding himself, desperate for you to want him with the same need he had for you, the same need he constantly had to bury beneath the Captain America façade.

“I shouldn’t ask how long you watched, should I?” He could hardly believe he was saying this, knew doing so could change  the dynamic between the two of you as well as the rest of the team, but he wanted you more than he wanted his next breath and the idea that you could want him too was irresistible. “I should ask why you watched,” he continued, his voice lowering with the first hints of desire.

Your wrench fell the ground where you dropped it when you shoved your creeper out from under the engine as you lost your temper. To be fair, the anger was more frustration and panic, than anything else. The shivers of embarrassment running up your spine and over your scalp, easily distracted you from the desire coloring Steve’s voice.

“Oh my god!” You shouted it as you came to your feet. Steve had already leapt to his feet when you burst into motion. You faced him, eyes narrowed, hands on hips. “Because you’re sexy as hell and it was hot, okay? Are you happy now?” Steve’s jaw dropped at the bald statement combined with the hostile tone to your voice.

Gesturing wildly, you continued to rant. “When I realized how I was violating your privacy I turned around and walked away but I’ve felt guilty ever since.” You sneered and the tone did not match the words of your next sentiment by any stretch. “So I’m sorry." With a scoff of irritation, you turned and walked out on a long stride of anger. “Fuck you.”

Once far away from your garage and Steve, you sagged against the wall in horrified dismay.

Did you just yell at Steve that watching him fuck got you hot?

Were you out of your damn mind?

Steve sat in the window seat in his bedroom. He’d picked these rooms because of the wide, deep bench next to tinted glass where he could look out at the woods behind the compound but not feel as he often did, as though he were on display, a fish in a bowl. These moments of peace, alone with his sketchbook in his designated quiet place, sometimes felt like the glue holding him together.

In these moments, he most often sketched you. Today was no exception.

He'd spent the last half hour trying to get right the exact curve of your eyebrows as you'd shouted at him before storming out of your garage. He never wanted to forget the look on your face, as he'd fallen a little more in love with you that day.

Steve had never had the luxury of self-delusion. He'd been born fragile and small to a world both mean and cold. He'd found cruelty far more often than kindness at the hands of others, until a man of rare vision and compassion had seen more deeply and offered him a chance to do more than the body he'd been born into would allow. He'd leapt at the chance, simply because he needed to right the wrongs he saw in the world and no one would let him any other way.

After the serum, however, he'd learned that the eyes stayed cruel even as the blows became pats, the raised fists handshakes, the sneering disdain simpering flattery. He'd learned quickly to see who meant their kindnesses, their compassion, and who sought his company because of his appearance or name. He rarely made mistakes these days, though his most recent was fresh.

Today, your eyebrows had twisted in distress even as your mouth went mobile in fury, the quiver of your voice so slight only his highly sensitive ears could have heard it. The humiliated, guilty misery had been all over you the moment he'd been allowed to see you and his heart had stumbled.

Where another would look at you and see the oil smeared across your cheek, Steve saw in the agitated motion the compassion that fueled the anxiety and humiliation all over you. The tone of your voice revealed the kindness that inspired such guilt; the shine of your eyes gave away the integrity that caused such misery. In short, he'd been attracted to the surface of you, the funny and bright, but the sweet heart beneath had him captivated.

Steve couldn't deny that the attraction was not silent in this contemplation. His brain kept replaying your voice saying that you thought him sexy. He couldn't stop thinking about the implicit admission in your bald statement. You'd wanted to watch.

You'd wanted to watch him.

The thought alone had had him half hard all day. He wanted to show you. He wanted to show you everything.

He couldn't help the fear, however. He was afraid to tell you that, to admit that he'd developed feelings for you that were anything but professional. He worried that to do so would alter a dynamic that worked, that kept all of you safe. He was also terrified that your interest was merely physical and to admit to anything deeper would do nothing but invite your pity.

All his old insecurities rose up to choke him at the same moment he heard his ex's text tone.

I'm sorry, baby. I just get so jealous. Let me make it up to you.

He thought of her pretty perfect lips sneering in fury and something perilously close to hate, then of your dancing thumb and your shamefaced flight. Everything inside him softened in tenderness at your sweetness, your genuine warmth. Reminded that he had a right to kindness and compassion, his heart hardened against the blonde viper that was once again trying to get her fangs into him.

No. All we do is hurt each other. I'm not doing this anymore.

As soon as he hit send, he felt lighter. He wondered if he should leave you alone for a little while before he tried to talk to you again. Because he would absolutely be talking to you again. He needed to know if you felt anything like the electricity that raced over him every time he saw you.

Not doing this anymore? Who the fuck do you think you are?

She hadn't always been like this. Or at least she hid it better at the beginning, until he'd fallen in love with the woman he thought she was. Over time, however, there emerged cruel jealousy from underneath the funny charm that had captivated him. Even in the beginning, however, he couldn't imagine her reacting to anything the way you had. She lacked the empathy.

Steve couldn't help but compare you. You didn’t just compare favorably, there seemed to be no comparison. Most important, your reaction to what had happened told him what kind of heart you had. He had no defense against kindness, strength, and compassion. Whether it was wise or not, he needed to find out if there was anything there. 

He finally listened to Natasha and blocked her number.

Steve went back to his sketch, smiling at the memory of how you’d looked shouting compliments at him, wondering when you’d let him talk to you again.

 … And Chose Me here

Permanent taglist:

@hellzzzbelle​ @suz-123​ @marvel-lucy​ @cheekygeek05​ @lbouvet​ @rishlo​ @diinofayce​ @bibliophile1773​ @thatawkwardlittlefangirl​ @miraclesoflove​ @nerdy-bookworm-1998​ @destiel-is--endgame​ @irritated-bisexual​ @peaceinourtime82​ @badassbaker​ @walkingtravesty97​ @fashionworld12​

[notdeadjack]

annual rec list 2020

13 fandoms represented:

Part 1: 55 fics total

Leverage: 13 fics Star Wars: 3 fics  Star Trek: 2 fics  Haikyuu!!: 13 fics   Teen Wolf: 3 fics Jurassic Park: 1 fic The Witcher: 1 fic  Merlin: 3 fics  Borderlands: 2 fics  She-Ra and the Princesses of Power: 2 fics Naruto: 8 fics  Dorohedoro: 3 fics 

Part 2:

Boku no Hero Academia: 211 fics here

If the read more breaks, I am truly sorry oTL

List split into two bc tumblr called me out on reading too many fics and wouldn’t let me post all of them at once boo

-

Leverage

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/799639    your body is a war zone but you are not a ruin by postcardmystery    2k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, 

“Make me a sandwich,” Parker says, so he does.

“Cut the damn wire,” says Hardison, so he does.

“Jump,” says Parker, says Hardison, and he never needs to ask, “How high?”

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/12475840    Well Worn, Well Loved by BabylonsFall    3k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, fluff, sharing clothes, 

You would think, given everyone’s space issues this wouldn’t be a thing. But it was. And none of them were complaining.

(Everyone steals each others clothes. They're all surprisingly okay with it.)

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/6363724    Hotel Heart by Laughsalot3412    45k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, canon-AU, psychic abilities, mind rape, 

He had a sniper rifle scoping the girl’s bright eyes and the guy’s smile.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/1407967    The Safe and Sound Job by flutterflap    15k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, injury, h/c, 

Eliot Spencer doesn't do hospitals.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3861028    like a map of a place you've never been by bydaybreak    24k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, pining, slow burn, fake/pretend relationship, 

He knows it’d be so fucking easy, if he’d let himself. Because he’s easy for them, has been since that first job, since the day he hauled Hardison’s ass out of a building about to explode. It’d be so easy.

So he won’t.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3928687    the warmth of your doorways by gyzym    3k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, 

Don't let me in with no intention to keep me.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/1357111    Old Dog by thingswithwings   16k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, service submission, bdsm, mild puppy play, 

Eliot's their hitter, and taking on any physical threats to the team is his job, but there's something beyond professionalism – even beyond the obvious fact that Eliot relishes the fight itself – in the way he puts his body between Parker or Alec and any potential threat. Alec has a good view of Eliot's back on a lot of jobs, and he reads something in the tight line of Eliot's shoulder, in the slow turn of his foot as he steps into a fighting stance.

Something possessive.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/8823406    Motion Parallax by Laughsalot3412    8k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, outsider pov, 

So, apparently Amy’s boss was part of a criminal gang.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/9071065    Wash the sorrow from off my skin by Keiya    2k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, soulmates, 

He lays on his bed and knows without a doubt that his soulmates can read Fucking Genius on their skin, or maybe just Genius, but Fucking gives a ring to it.

Because he is, baby, he is.  

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/2854310    Love (By Any Other Name) by ChouetteAnanas41    5k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, 

Eliot fell in love on a Tuesday.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3928888    Pancakes by saavik13     7k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, mentions of rape and child abuse, h/c, 

Parker can't ever ask a simple question.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3556844    No Time Like the Present by waterbird13    22k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, past Moreau/Eliot, violence, murder, child murder, 

Eliot's past with Damien Moreau is even more complicated than most people know about, and of course that would come up again when dealing with his incredibly complicated present feelings for Parker and Hardison. Eliot isn't a hundred percent sure how love works, but he's pretty positive it exists only to bite him in the ass.  

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/4542576    Guard Your Eggshell Heart by letsgostealafandom    14k, Alec/Parker/Eliot, praise kink, 

Parker had a theory, and her theory was this: it made Eliot really happy when they noticed the things he did for them. It made Eliot happy when they made sure he knew they noticed the things he did for them. And when Eliot thought they didn't notice, it made him- not unhappy, but something worse, something like he knew that was all he could expect from anyone and he'd resigned himself to it a while back. Once she'd noticed it, she couldn't stop, and the realization of how often they took Eliot for granted made her stomach twist uncomfortably.

.

-

Star Wars

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/5783371    This is Called Falling by Cartopathy    24k, Finn/Poe, h/c, 

Poe stood and he walked, remembering suddenly his only friend on the planet was gone and there was little hope of finding a town, much less hospitality.

And yet he walked in hope.

There was a stormtrooper—he needed to find the stormtrooper. ________________________________

“Was Poe important to you? You were close in the Resistance?” Rey asked.

Finn cleared his throat. “Yes, because I’m in the Resistance and he was in the Resistance so we've known each other for a while. He was important to me, yes.”

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/18546007    Stop Your Fear by gloss    12k, Finn/Poe, sex pollen, dub-con, public sex, pining, 

Imprisoned by space pirates, Finn and Poe get to know each other better. When Finn gets whammied with sex pollen, Poe helps him out, not entirely unselfishly.

Afterward, they try to clean up the mess and take care of each other.

please note: sex is entirely consensual, but within a compromised situation. Dub-con, not non con.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/6904006    Against Disaster by gloss    29k, Finn/Poe, pining, PTSD, 

Not that he loved Finn. There was no way he could love someone he'd spoken to for all of ten minutes, no matter how lifechanging those minutes proved to be.

He loved the feeling of it all. The thrill, the novelty, the rush. Everything he'd shared with Finn had been more exciting than the rest of his life put together, and his life had been far from sedate.

That's what he told himself, anyway.

__ Poe's a disaster and Finn's still got a lot of brainwashing to work through.

.

-

.

Star Trek 

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/849107   Treasures by yeaka    17k, Kirk/Spock, AU, pon farr, soul bond, 

Sometimes the other Vulcans wonder how Spock managed to obtain such an exotic bondmate, and sometimes Spock wonders himself.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/11697684    Echolocation by Darksknight    8k, Kirk/Spock, 

Kirk and Spock don’t realize that they’ve bonded right away. The rest of the crew is a different story.

.

-

.

Haikyuu!!

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21762448    discovering the smile of one kageyama tobio by Emlee_J    8k, Hinata/Kageyama, fluff, 

Kageyama blinks once before a grin of his own spreads over his face. Shouyou’s breath halts in his lungs at the sight, and he wills for time to stop, just so he can drink it in. He sees it sometimes, when they’re playing - Kageyama’s fierce smile when they pull a combo off just right, when they show their opponents how possible the impossible can really be. But then there’s another serve, another rally, and the moment is gone.

'Shame', Shouyou thinks to himself, as he lets his eyes roam over Kageyama’s stupidly happy face, taking in the creases that are from joy rather than frowning, for a change. 'It’s a really nice smile.'

-

In which it's their third, and final, year in high school and Hinata has only one goal: to make Kageyama smile outside of volleyball.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/5479973    75% Useless Pining by ravelqueen   4k, Nishinoya/Asahi, pining, hair kink, 

People often ask Asahi why he keeps his hair long. He gives them a different reason every time, from being too lazy to cut it, over saying he thinks it looks nice on him, to just ducking his head and hoping they'll move on.

The actual reason is pettier and smaller and has nothing to do with his fashion sense and everything to do with Nishinoya.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/2330126    Exception to the rule by Mysecretfanmoments   2k, Sugawara/Daichi, 

In which Sugawara Koushi just so happens to belong to the .001% of guys Daichi might conceivably fall for, and it takes a confused third party for Daichi to realize it.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/21580309    Just Another by Mooifyourecows    103k, Sugawara/Daichi, drama, humour, childhood friends, flip-flopping,

Everything is changing. But in the midst of exams, plans for the future, nationals, and a tumultuous new fracture to his family life, at least Sawamura Daichi can always count on his friendship with Sugawara Koushi to stay the same.

Or so he thought.

-

(RN: some of the best flirting i’ve ever read. also, Sugawara’s family? A++)

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/2940728    boys by buu    5k, Sugawara/Daichi, 

Before, if Suga had been asked to pick a type, he would have hummed and thought it over, maybe said something vague like “nice eyes” or “nice legs” or “a good personality”. Now, he can only think “Daichi”.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3189353   Perfectionism by Mysecretfanmoments    2k, Sugawara/Daichi, practise kissing, accidental boners, 

“I just wish it was something you could practice before you have to… perform.” He narrows his eyes, imagining it. “Like a CPR class.”

Suga raises an eyebrow. “You want to practice it. Beforehand.”

“Yeah. Are you offering?”

((Daichi doesn't like to be bad at things--kissing included--and Suga is willing to help him practice.))

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/6411370    Jealousy by surveycorpsjean    7k, Sugawara/Daichi, jealousy, 

It’s so horrid- it feels like sludge in Suga’s stomach, like poison in his veins, like an itch behind his skin.

It burns, it stings. He hates it, he hates it more than anything, but he can’t help it.

He’s hopelessly in love.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/7496004    Hinata Shouyou's Fucking Face by Esselle    17k, Hinata/Kageyama, 

'Kageyama doesn't know why Hinata's face rubs him the wrong way—it just does. So one day, in an attempt to pinpoint exactly what it is that makes Hinata's Shouyou's fucking face so fucking annoying, he begins to catalogue all the things that really tick him off.

This proves to be startlingly revelatory.'

--

A thought-provoking study and critical analysis of Hinata Shouyou's stupid face, by Kageyama Tobio.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/1831732    need a friend you can fuck, i can be that by readbetweenthelions    5k, Nishinoya/Tanaka, friends with benefits, 

noya and tanaka are just really good friends who have a bit of good, not-exactly-clean friendly sex sometimes. here's the first time it happens.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/3332642    it's fine by lokh    2k, Nishinoya/Tanaka, phone sex, just dudes being bros, 

have you ever wanted to jack off but you're in the middle of talking to someone and you can't exactly tell them that you've gotta jack off so you either sit through it awkwardly or make an excuse to leave? imagine that they found out and tell you that it's fine if you just jack off mid-conversation. now imagine that it's not you and it's tanaka and noya. that's the whole plot.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/5103794   find out what we're made of by sweggscellent    2k, Nishinoya/Tanaka, first kiss, frottage, 

It’s weird, noticing things about your best friend when your best friend is literally the goofiest person on the planet, but Noya does; the swell of his powerful calves, the line of his back when his tee shirts cling to it with sweat, the strangely graceful determination on his face when they’re up against a particularly strong team. It almost makes Noya uncomfortable.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/6205864   Rule 4 by mean_whale    15k, Nishinoya/Tanaka, friends with benefits, friends to lovers, 

Nishinoya and Tanaka are tricked into watching gay porn, and curiosity gets the better of them.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/5979136    Roundabout by Shaples    12k, Nishinoya/Tanaka, past asanoya, post-canon, emotional h/c, 

“Actually I, uh. I was thinking I might stick around. Like, long term? I mean, if you haven’t already found someone to rent the other room, and you still. You know. Want to live together.”

Tanaka’s eyes widened in surprise. “I thought that you and Asahi were-”

“Yeah,” Noya said. “We aren’t.”

“Oh,” he said. And when Noya didn’t look up from the label on his beer bottle, Tanaka breathed out, “Shit.”

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/13344624    And They Were Roommates by Hella_Queer    7k, Hinata/Kageyama, first time, trans character, 

“I can like...eat you out if you want.”

Silence surrounds them. This was it. Three years of friendship down the tubes. Kageyama would move out, or demand he move out, and he'd be forever branded as the Pervert Roommate. No one would talk to him ever again. His life was over!

“Okay.”

“Whaaaaa?!”

.

-

Teen Wolf

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/22812937    Five Times Derek Heard Something He Wished He Hadn’t, and the One Time He Did by isthatbloodonhisshirt (wasterella)   14k, Stiles/Derek, 5+1, pining, 

“This place is hell,” Derek decided. “This place is absolutely hell.”

How was it possible he’d gone so many years of his life without hearing anything nearly as over the top as he had just visiting Stiles at school? This had to be some kind of record for the most disgusting things he’d ever overheard.

--

(I mean really, the title says it all lol)

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/27872045    Can You Feel A Whole New Part of Your World? by isthatbloodonhisshirt (wasterella)    53k, Stiles/Derek, AU, neighbours, fluff, 

“Can you hear me singing in the shower?” Stiles blurted out, because he had to know, now. If one of his neighbours had slid that note under his door, then it meant Parrish as another neighbour could hear him, too! He had to know if this was all a huge joke and one person had walked by and overheard him and decided to fuck with him.

Or if everyone could hear him and he now had to leave the country.

Parrish gave him a weird look at the question, but answered anyway, making Stiles’ plans to leave the country speed up in his mind.

“Of course I can. You’re actually not bad. Though you have been singing a lot of Frozen lately, getting kind of tired of the soundtrack.”

“Oh my God!” Stiles shouted in his face.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/6156885    you're never too much of an old dog to teach a duckling a new trick by driedupwishes    2k, gen, light angst, 

“Y’know, it’d be real neat if someone gave me a gun,” Stiles says.

And Chris does.

.

-

Jurassic Park

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/5199038   5 Times the Raptors Tried to Kill Miriam, and 1 Time They Didn’t by JulisCaesar   22k, OCs, gen, blood, science, freaking dinosaurs heck yeah!

Miriam thought the job working for InGen sounded perfect. Tropical island, good pay, first dibs on publications… At least, she thought so until she found out that she was the only behaviorist on staff. Once the eggs hatched, it became all she could do to keep up–with the dinosaurs, the science, and her health.

.

-

The Witcher

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/22247587   swallow my breath and take what is mine by anacaoris    6k, Jaskier/Geralt, first time, sugar baby!geralt, 

“It began with the baths.

It had been so easy to dismiss at first. Some attempted to win him over with kindness-with-a-catch when in need of something, a bed for the night, a pouch of coin, a good drink to lower the cost.”

Jaskier likes to take care of Geralt. Geralt very quickly takes notice.

.

-

Merlin (BBC)

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/7287    In Want of a Wife by syllic    43k, Merlin/Arthur, 

When Merlin first hears that Arthur has been betrothed, his ribs pull inwards with an odd little hitch, and he only allows himself a second—which he needs in order to coordinate spinning in place without falling on his face—before he’s running to Arthur’s chambers.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/2193282   The Frog Prince by Clea2011     58k, Merlin/Arthur, canon AU, disability, 

Canon era AU. A teenage Arthur is hit by a mutation spell intended for Uther. Unable to speak and hidden away by his father because of his appearance, Arthur is left lonely and isolated. A few years later Gaius takes on a new apprentice, someone who can understand Arthur and see through the enchantment. Someone with magic.

But breaking the spell was never going to be easy.

.   

https://archiveofourown.org/works/835089    Such a Life, a Heart, a Mind as Thine by dreamlittleyo    42k, Merlin/Arthur, sex pollen, first time, non-con, soul bond, guilt, 

In which Arthur inadvertently triggers an ancient magic, but he does not face the consequences alone.

.

-

.

Borderlands

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/8628043   How They Met Themselves by Wheat From Chaff (wheatfromchaff)    205k, Timothy/Rhys, slow burn, past abuse, 

Rhys wants to change Pandora. He wants to make things better, build things up. He wants, more than anything, to prove Jack wrong.

Tim just wants to get paid.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/9951275    you'll find me buried by Wheat From Chaff (wheatfromchaff)    7k, Jack/Timothy, fight club, hate sex, dub-con, 

It's not every day you face yourself in the ring.

.

-

.

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/16748245    tooth for a tooth by nowweareunstoppable    3k, Adora/Catra, exploration, first time, biting, 

Now, though, Adora was on top of her, and her chest heaved in a way that was decidedly not sleepy. She pleaded with Catra with her eyes, then her words, “Please, I just-” before cutting off, not knowing what to even ask for.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/19767655    More than Words by SimonKilnsworth    5k, Kyle/Rogelio, first time, 

Rogelio gets woken up in the night as Kyle struggles with his feelings. 

.   

-

.

Naruto

.

https://archiveofourown.org/series/37259    Ten Years Gone series by 100demons    80k, gen, time-travel, 

Thirty year old Kakashi was supposed to have been killed by Pein during the Invasion. Instead, he wakes up in the body of his twenty year old self.

(It gets a lot more complicated.)

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/25538635    Better It Be You by cricket_aria    4k, Kakashi/Sakura, dodging arranged marriage, 

When Sakura's parents realize that she would be ill-trained for any job in the civilian world should she ever be too badly injured to remain a ninja they decide to try to arrange a marriage for her with one of the members of a major clan, so that at least if that day comes she'll still have value within the ninja community. Too bad they didn't discuss it with her first.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/14143890   the chosen fruit by theformerone    51k, Sakura/Shikamaru, AU, honey pot, sex work, exhibitionism, implied non-con, kidnapping, drama, politics, 

Sakura is a rōnin, but she's good enough with a blade to find work. She's trusted at Fukiage because she's a nameless woman who can't afford to bite any hand that feeds her.

Shikamaru's awful attitude makes him a favorite in the teahouse. He makes his money on his back but his real trade is information. There is rot in Fire Country. Shikamaru sees it, and he is going to burn it at the roots.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/16304705     Being Over-Prepared is Impossible (and other mottos) by Pleasedial123   gen, 40k, canon-AU, BAMF!team 7, 

In one world, Kakashi awoke, felt grieved at being assigned a team he sees his own in, and he let that grief make him a lazy teacher. He saw himself in Sasuke, Obito in Naruto, and Rin in Sakura. He woke, saw himself in them, and took a large step back, regretting accepting them as his new team. In another world he was quite hands off, merely a watcher because it was so very painful to watch. He saw himself and all his mistakes in this new team of his.

In this world, Kakashi awoke, saw the similarities, and instantly panicked. He suddenly realized what he had done, passing a team. Kakashi was left scrambling not to repeat old mistakes and regrets. This team would not suffer the fate of his team.

In this world, simply put, Kakashi became a teacher. This is the starting of a new Team seven.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/13690269     there to welcome you home by theformerone    1k, Sakura/Neji/Shikamaru, fluff, 

Sakura gives birth to their daughter in the bathtub in the main house on the Nara compound.

Neji comes home and nearly has a stroke.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/14902124    brown eyes steal me by theformerone   10k, Kiba/Shikamaru, canon-au, arranged marriage, mutual pining, 

"You planted a -,"

"I planted a tree, Ino, I know, I was there."

"Kousa," she says, finishing as if he never interrupted. "Not very original, but cute. You think that'll be what you name your firstborn?" 

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/18913750    gonna give you all my love, boy by theformerone    2k, Sakura/Shikamaru, first time,

Shikamaru is a (maybe ace?) virgin. Sakura is not either of those things. It still all works out. Sexually, speaking.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/18756313    Consideration: Or, The Smart Kids Get (It) Together by cairn    12k, Sakura/Shikamaru, friends to lovers, 

Noun: Consideration 1. Careful thought, typically over a period of time. 2. A fact or a motive taken into account in deciding or judging something. 3. Law: (in a contractual agreement) anything given or promised or forborne by one party in exchange for the promise or undertaking of another.

"You want to give yourself cancer?" she had asked.

"Good afternoon, Sakura," he'd drawled back. "So nice to see you so unexpectedly."

.

-

.

Dorohedoro

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/25767034    I Am Intrinsically No Good by Medegela    2k, Noi/Shin, accidental voyeurism, sexual tension, masturbation, 

They had recently renewed their partnership for the third time and things he faintly noticed and always dismissed before were amplified. He knew now that she also enjoyed watching him, he knew that the same kind of release ran through her when she saw him, and he was sure of that because of the contract.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/12192696    Secondhand Smoke by dirtbag    -1k, Noi/Shin, unresolved romantic tension, magical shotgunning, 

They sure do this a lot, for something that's so endlessly frustrating.

.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/12387897    Love Is a Verb by dirtbag    4k, Noi/Shin, pegging, 

Shin can’t figure out why Noi is so insistent on being careful with him tonight when he’s pretty sure he’s come out of her bedroom mildly concussed before.

.

[satonthelotuspier]

Day 3 of Wangxian Week 2020.

Prompt Palette is Rebirth - Mememtos - Celebrity AU.

When Lan Wangji broke up with Wei Wuxian it destroyed him; he'd thought they were in love and happy together.

Two years later a gala event they're both required to attend throws them back together. It was Lan Wangji's choice to break up, so why does he suddenly want to talk to Wei Wuxian after all this time?

A Second Chance

Jiang Yanli placed a hand over the top of his as he paused to look at the picture of Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji smiling into the camera in front of the Parthenon in Athens. He should cry at the chasm of emptiness that opened up inside him at the feeling of loss, but he didn’t have any tears left at this point.

He put the picture in the cardboard box, along with the rest, and all the stupid little trinkets and mementos that reminded him of Lan Wangji, and their life together, before Lan Wangji had broken all ties with Wei Wuxian.

One of the most cutting things about it was, as they were both celebrities, in the public eye, their relationship had been secret, known only to a few close friends, family and work colleagues.

And so Wei Wuxian was expected to work tomorrow; he had a recording session, and he would have to look and sound like he was perfectly normal, like his world hadn’t collapsed around him and left him lost and confused.

“You don’t have to deal with this now, A-Xian, we can leave it until it’s a little less fresh if you want”

“No, jiejie, I want them gone, I want them out of here tonight. Tomorrow is a fresh start. A rebirth, new me, no more Lan Wangji, he can go to hell”

He slammed the lid on the cardboard box, then checked his phone, “Jiang Cheng should be here soon, lets tape this up so he can go throw it at Lan Wangji tomorrow” Wei Wuxian was raw and hurting, and still at that point he didn’t care what he said about the other, Lan Wangji was only lucky he hadn’t felt the need to call him or drive over there and give him his entire mind, never mind a piece of it.

Better, in case he said something that couldn’t be taken back. Not that it mattered now.

His horrible week didn’t get any better when the pictures of Jiang Cheng punching Lan Wangji in the face were splashed all over every news and gossip tabloid and website in the country.

Wei Wuxian thought he should have felt some spark of satisfaction at Jiang Cheng putting Lan Wangji on his ass in defence of him, but he didn’t.

It didn’t help that Lan Xichen, trying to restrain Jiang Cheng, had accidentally broken Jiang Cheng’s arm which had resulted in a ridiculously long, nerve wracking operation for he and Jiang Yanli to sit through, on his already frazzled nerves.

Jiang Cheng received the dressing down of his life once he came around from the anaesthesia. Wei Wuxian had never heard their jiejie so angry and cutting, either before or since.

2 Years Later

“Wei Wuxian is forced to attend to promote his new collaboration album with MianMian, Lan-xiansheng, perhaps you should consider advising your client to give this event a miss”

Wei Wuxian rolled his eyes, and leaned back in his chair as Jiang Cheng’s face flushed in temper and he unconsciously reached up to rub at his right forearm while he listened to whatever was said to him.

“That is, of course, your client’s prerogative, Lan-xiansheng. I see. Well, please inform him of the situation. If your client still sees it as necessary to attend we would appreciate it if you would provide us notice via email” there were no pleasantries as Jiang Cheng hung up the call and tossed his earpiece onto the desk in front of him, frustration evident in the move.

“Asshole”

“Flirting with Xichen-ge again, I see”

“Flirting? With the man who snapped my fucking arm like a twig?” Jiang Cheng demanded in irritation.

“In fairness you did punch his brother, and he explained it was an accident; he was only trying to restrain you. He even sent you a fruit basket and flowers to apologise”

The former of which Jiang Cheng had given away to charity, and the latter to their jiejie, but still…

Teasing Jiang Cheng took his mind off of the very real problem of possibly having to meet up with his ex at the charity gala evening, which was why he did it. And it was fun, besides.

“It was a spiral fracture, Wei Wuxian, it took eight months to heal, like flowers and a fruit basket make up for that. It fucking hurt”

His complaint made, he dropped the subject, and, knowing Wei Wuxian had taken in all the information he needed from his half of the conversion with Lan Xichen, he changed it to discussions of some fan signings they had arranged next week with co-artist MianMian.

***

As the event grew closer things became frantic. Jiang Cheng told him that he’d been informed Lan Wangji would definitely be attending. So now was the perfect time to prove he’d moved on, he told himself, that Lan Wangji was nothing to him more than an ex boyfriend.

Despite these words he didn’t feel hopeful he was up to the task, however.

Then a tabloid ran with an article speculating that he and MianMian were in a secret relationship. It genuinely wasn’t the first, nor would it be the last of it’s kind linking him romantically with someone but it caused a frenzy and he and Jiang Cheng were busy enacting damage control with MianMian and her management team.

A few weeks later, another article was run in another tabloid claiming through rigorous investigative journalism it had been found out that a celebrity reporter at a rival paper had been blackmailing and harassing celebrities with threats of exposure. Wei Wuxian had never liked Su She and it was easy for him to believe it was the truth; he had never come across as particularly ethical, but that paper claimed initially that the accusations were false; pure mud-slinging.

The thing about mud-slinging was, if enough was thrown, some of it stuck. The melee culminated in the resignation and disgrace of Su She, as the other papers were suddenly full of stories of celebrities who claimed to have been blackmailed and bullied.

***

With all the fuss he hadn’t had that much time to dwell on his imminent meeting with Lan Wangji. Nor had he really had time to mentally prepare himself.

The night of the gala, therefore, he felt like he was on the back foot and unprepared.

He didn’t know what to expect nor how he was going to react to what did occur.

The feeling only intensified when, calling an acknowledgement at the knock on his dressing room door, it turned out to be the man he dreaded encountering.

The other came in and closed the door behind him, his elegantly handsome face was expressionless, but he wavered in front of it like he didn’t know what his reception would be.

Wei Wuxian could help him with that.

“Lan Zhan, I thought our management teams had agreed that we would keep a respectful distance. This is hardly that”

“Wei Ying…” the tiniest look of consternation crossed his face, before it disappeared. “Your team wanted that, I never agreed. Can we please talk?”

What could Lan Wangji possibly think there was left to talk about at this stage? The only way to find out was of course to agree, but having Lan Wangji here was proving he wasn’t as over him, and what he had done, as Wei Wuxian hoped. It hurt. It still hurt. It was silly, two years later he should have moved on from this, stopped giving Lan Wangji this power to hurt him.

“I’m not sure what you think there is left to talk about, Lan Zhan” he said tiredly, closing his eyes and rubbing at them with a finger and thumb.

“The truth. The things I didn’t tell you”

At those words Wei Wuxian’s eyes snapped open; what did he mean? He looked back at the other, the only way to find out of course was to let him talk. He waved vaguely for the other to sit, Lan Wangji followed his gesture and perched on the nearby stool.

“You saw the news about Su She, the reporter, recently?” he asked, knowing Wei Wuxian couldn’t really have avoided it.

“Yes”

He nodded as Wei Wuxian agreed. “We were being blackmailed, Wei Ying. I broke off with you to protect you. Su She threatened to smear everything over his grubby little tabloid, it could have destroyed our careers”

“If you paid why would you break up with me? And is your career really that important to you? How the fuck is that protecting me?” as far as excuses went it turned Wei Wuxian’s temper up to eleven.

“Wei Ying, my career meant nothing to me, I was protecting yours. I broke up with you so Su She wouldn’t have any future leverage, no reason to leave me alone and come after you. Blackmailers don’t stop” that soothed his temper a little, but still…

“Who the hell were you to decide my career was more important to me than the man I loved? We could have gone anywhere, done anything. I wouldn’t have cared about it. Typical Lan arrogance, assuming you had the right to make that decision alone”

That seemed to shake Lan Wangji a little, “I only wanted to protect you”

“Well, it didn’t work, you ripped my heart out. But thanks, I guess?”

“I’m sorry, Wei Ying, but I did it because I love you” he almost missed the present tense of the admission in his anger. What was he to make of that? What did he even want to make of that?

They were silent while Wei Wuxian pondered.

“Are you really seeing MianMian?” the question was low, tentative, unlike Lan Wangji, and Wei Wuxian looked at him, caught the gaze of those pale amber eyes. There was a cruel part of himself that wanted to say yes, claim they were now a thing, try to hurt Lan Wangji. But he didn’t listen to it.

“No, its one of those stupid, fake, tabloid ‘they’re spending so much time together’ pieces of fiction. We’ve just released a collaboration, of course we’re spending a lot of time together now we have to do the promo”

Lan Wangji nodded his acceptance of Wei Wuxian’s words. Was that a flash of relief in his eyes?

“Do you hate me, Wei Ying?” well that question came out of the blue. He was caught off guard by Lan Wangji’s unusual directness.

“I don’t know” was the only honest answer he could give, again, ignoring that voice that told him to hurt the other and just say yes. “I thought I did, I think I should. I’m not sure. I don’t know”

“Then please give me a second chance, Wei Ying. I’ll earn your love again” Lan Wangji leaned forward suddenly, pressing a short, almost-chaste kiss again Wei Wuxian’s lips. Should he punch him? Push him away? Enjoy it?

Lan Wangji pulled back before he could decide; he was confused, and oh but he had missed those lips on his.

His voice was still sharp, “Do you think one kiss is going to make up for everything, Lan Zhan?” he demanded. He had been hurt, destroyed, and here was the other begging for a second chance. A chance he was beginning to think he dearly wanted to allow him.

“No, Wei Ying, but I have to start somewhere”

[obaewankenope]

Modern day Mummy AU with Eliot Spencer as Rick and Evie’s grandson. The team are in Egypt for an unrelated op, when a Medjai takes one look at Eliot and just goes, “Oh, shit. An O’Connell in Egypt is a recipe for disaster.”

I love this prompt so much, you have no idea!

.

"I hate sand, guys," Hardison said for the fourth damned time in as many minutes. Eliot had been counting. "It's hell on my equipment."

"We know," Eliot drawled, rolling his eyes even as he continued unpacking Hardison's precious equipment.

"I like sand."

Eliot and Hardison both looked at Parker. She frowned. "What?"

Eliot shook his head. "Nothin." Twenty-pounds of crazy.

"Listen up guys!" Nate's voice echoed in the tent they were setting up shop in. In the middle of the desert. "We haven't got much time to get this off the ground!"

They weren't really in the middle of the desert, but anything more than a klik from civilisation might as well have been the middle of nowhere for Hardison. The guy had already complained about how much work he was going to have to do to rearrange satellites for a good connection out here.

Three. Times.

"Nate! We're in Egypt!" Sophie — voice of reason that she was — exclaimed, following behind Nate as their mastermind wandered into the tent already planning the rest of the con. "Gibson isn't going to disappear tonight! We have time. Breathe. Live a little."

Ford wasn't impressed with her plea. Eliot sighed.

"We have less than twenty-four hours before Gibson is selling that diamond he killed innocent people for." Nate bit out, staring at Sophie with that look he got whenever he was trying to emphasise the whole 'do-gooder' thing they had going on. "If we're not ready than Shanier's widow gets nothing and the man who killed her husband walks away with ten-million-dollars."

Eliot placed the case containing some of Hardison's more sensitive equipment down with a silent sigh. Ford was right, obviously, but still.

The guy needed to lighten up a little.

"Why are we camped outside of the city anyway?" Parker asked, missing the tension in the tent entirely and causing everyone to instinctively relax in her unique way of failing to read the room.

It was pleasantly surprising every time she derailed the tension with an honest question like that.

"Because someone—" Nate shot a look at Sophie "—is known in every high end hotel in Cairo and renting rooms in one of the less high end ones isn't possible thanks to him."

Okay, so Eliot might have a bit of history with Cairo.

And the rest of Egypt too.

"Yeah man, why are you known by so many rug sellers in this place?" Hardison asked, looking up from his precious laptop he'd been all but clinging to the entire time. "Like, how many of them have you beaten up for them to know your face and name no matter what?"

Eliot shrugged. "Not that many," he answered vaguely, busying himself with unpacking the equipment from Hardison's cases of tech.

"Maybe they hold a grudge here for like, a really long time?" Parker jumped up on one of the fold-out tables they had set up, her legs swinging over the side in such a childish gesture that Eliot paused to watch her. "Cairo museum still remembers me."

"That's because you stole a priceless artefact without tripping their alarms four times." Hardison pointed out.

"Oh yeah." Parker beamed.

"Listen, it's late, it's going to be dark soon. And I don't know about any of you, but I'm still feeling tired from our flight from Athens." Sophie sidled up to stand beside Nate, closer than normal. It got the guy to look at her and focus on her so Eliot figured, whatever, let her try and butter him up with her charms.

Ford was more than a match for Sophie Devereaux.

"Okay fine." Nate finally sighed in defeat. "We get some rest tonight, but tomorrow we hit the ground running," he said, looking around the tent at them all and everyone nodded in agreement. "Right."

Of course, to get some rest meant setting everything up before they crawled into their sleeping bags. A job that was, unsurprisingly, Eliot's. He was quicker at it than the rest of them anyway. For several reasons.

None of which he'd ever tell his team.

Ever.

* * *

"Eliot! My friend!"

Eliot sighed. He really needed to stop doing that; saying he'd never do something because he always, always ended up doing it. It was like he was asking the universe to contradict him every time.

"Friends of yours?" Ford gave Eliot his best I'm-not-impressed-with-this look.

Eliot smiled. Sort of. It was more of a grimace. An awkward one.

"Of a sort," he muttered, glancing at the Leverage team and then at the group of six black-robed figures sat on horses that had appeared at their tent in the dawn light.

"Long time no see, Penre." Eliot gave the group of riders an awkward wave, shaking his head a little to move his hair out of his face.

Penre Bay gave Eliot a knowing grin.

"Last I heard of an O'Connell in Egypt, my grandfather asked why Allah hadn't let him die before another disaster plagued us!" Penre laughed at the murderous look Eliot threw him. "Come friend! Have you not missed me?"

"O'Connell?" Hardison cut in, before Eliot could tell Penre how much he hadn't missed him. "I thought your real name was Spencer?"

Eliot looked at the hacker. "Spencer is my mothers maiden name." He shrugged. "Less problems that way."

"Less prob— dude! You're an O'Connell!" Hardison did a double-take, waving a hand at Eliot. "You're treasure hunter royalty my man!"

Penre laughed.

Damn but Hardison didn't even know the half of it. Royalty. Literally.

Even through reincarnation it counted.

"I suppose they did not know of your family, my friend?" Penre asked innocently and Eliot glared at the Medjai.

"Ya think."

"Ah, my apologies," he said, not looking at all apologetic. If anything, Penre's smile grew. "But I believe your people may need our assistance."

Eliot groaned. "Now what?"

Penre's smile dropped and he became serious. "The creature," he said gravely, "the man you are after is attempting to wake it."

"Fuck."

Penre nodded. "My sentiments also, my friend."

Eliot shook his head. "I'm gonna need some guns."

"Guns? You?" Ford looked at Eliot, frowning in confusion and annoyance at everything. The mastermind always did hate not being in control. "You hate guns and what— what is this about some— some creature? Eliot explain."

"Aw man," Eliot shook his head again, "you're not gonna believe a word of what I say until you see it for yourselves."

And maybe not even then, he thought.

Every time he came to Egypt, every damned time, something always happened. His grandfather and grandmother had definitely left a long shadow of chaos in this country. It was like the sands remembered Carnahan and O'Connell blood and pitched a damned fit any time one of them dared step foot in Egypt.

Eliot sighed again. Maybe it did.

"I really wish we hadn't taken this job," he muttered to himself as the Medjai climbed out of their saddles and joined the Leverage team in the tent to talk strategy.

Ford definitely wasn't pleased about the added variables — heck, neither was Eliot! — but the ex-insurance investigator took it with more grace than he would have a year ago. Thankfully.

Still, that didn't mean their case would end well. Idiots were a never-ending supply and all it took was one fool with just enough knowledge to bring hell on earth; again.

Just once Eliot would like to visit Egypt without his family history causing problems.

Keep dreaming Eliot, he thought, keep on dreaming.

[innytoes]

AU Ask Meme: urban fantasy or dealer's choice, Leverage Team (or OT3)!

I have already done some headcanons for this, but here are some more.

-Nana's house always had the best sidewalk-chalk sigils in front of it. You don't leave foster care at Nana's without knowing some basic protection spells at the very least.

-Hardison weaves in protection spells into everything he makes for his team. He has asked Parker to steal Eliot’s hair ties so carefully weave in some extra special ones for him. (He did the same for her ‘going thieving’ beanie, but with her permission because Parker won’t make a big awkward deal about it like Eliot would.)

-Breanna can see through her drones’ eyes.

-Our Mister Wilson is 100% a protection spell Sophie uses.

-Why is Eliot on a nickname basis with several powerful demons? Because being on a first name basis is fucking dangerous, stop asking dumb questions, Harry.

(-Because he worked for a lot of powerful people who also summoned demons to do their dirty work.)

-Yes it is still kind of weird for everyone to see a hulking spike-covered creature of the void that smells vaguely like sulfur call Eliot 'Slugger'.

-Yes it's even worse to see Parker try and strike up a conversation with a demon. Especially when she gets mightily offended it doesn't know what chocolate is and insists it tries some.

-Yes there is now a subset of demons addicted to chocolate across the Void.

send me an au (and/or pairing) and i’ll give you 5+ headcanons about it

[in-tua-deep]

Pride and prejudice AU. I’m so sad thinking about little Five who feels neglected by his family and along comes this woman who seems kind and genuinely interested in him which he isn’t used to. And then suddenly everything is twisted and the nice woman who said she cared is trying to take him from his siblings and she is revealing her true self and she is just as awful as his dad and not afraid to threaten him as long as she gets what she wants! 😭

(for more p&p au check here or yeet yourself into my whole p&p au tag ;3c)

sdafgFGSHD mood tbh though in this au five is ?? actually a child and much younger than his siblings so he’s just. the odd man out for a lot of things - especially because the majority of his siblings are Official Adults and even though he considers himself, personally, to be more mature than most of them put together he’s still a minor so one of them gets legal control over his life until he’s of age

and for an angry, independent, generally ignored kid that’s a big old change - especially if you consider his siblings haven’t lived at home since he was small and visit infrequently, because they disliked reginald more than they cared about keeping in contact with Five

(Ben and Vanya are the only ones who write regular letters to him, Luther was around the most until he got ‘banished’ to take care of Reginald’s other property in the middle of nowhere that i’m calling the Lunar Manor because it’s a pride and prejudice version of the moon)

so Five is this,, really lonely and isolated kid with way too much free time on his hands but he had Dolores - and back then he didn’t

back in the days of the Handler’s original plot, Five could see the writing on the wall. Maybe Ben was already disowned, Klaus was making noise about following after Ben, Diego was looking shifty, Allison was courting with Patrick with the expectation of a proposal imminent, and Vanya had auditioned for some pretentious music school. And none of his siblings were particularly prepared for or happy to deal with a seven-or-eight year old getting about underfoot

Five was feeling abandoned by the people he had grown to rely on, he probably asked one of his siblings to take him with them and they denied him, he was feeling ignored and lonely and he had exactly no friends or anybody really to speak with. And that’s when the Handler swooped in, when he was at his most vulnerable

everyone else was so wrapped up in their own drama and preparations that no one noticed Reginald’s ex-business partner taking the time out of her day to visit an old friend and have long and in depth conversations with this young and very vulnerable child

and she listens to him! she doesn’t scold him about being underfoot. her eyes don’t glaze over when he enthuses about his equations or other things he’s learned. she treats him exactly as he’s always wanted to be treated, as all children want to be treated, like he’s an equal with worthy things to say. 

no brush offs. no yelling at him to get out of their rooms. no million other casual ways his family made him feel like he wasn’t important to them (after all, half of them were leaving. Leaving him). 

so it’s honestly not a surprise that when the Handler invited Five to go with her, he thought about the fact that soon enough the house would be empty except for Luther (who always told on him anyway) and hey, if all his siblings got to leave then why couldn’t he? Anyway, the Handler already said his dad had approved and really she was much nicer than his dad anyway, so. 

(there’s a part of him that is a little pleased to beat all his siblings to the punch in leaving the house - except for Ben of course but that doesn’t count because it was involuntary. part of him thinks about how he’s going to cheerfully write his siblings and inquire after their plans whilst out of reginald’s house and then regaling them with his own adventures out on his own like a proper grown-up)

except he gets cold feet, because he loves his family really. Not Reginald, but his siblings and grace and some of the other staff. but in the carriage, he asks questions and starts hearing answers he doesn’t like. for the first time, he disagrees with the handler and gets absolutely shut down by her and suddenly it’s like being trapped in a carriage with reginald who could never allow anyone but himself to have the last word, or even an opinion. she says something wrong, and Five suddenly wants out

and he gets out. he shimmies his way out of a carriage window, drops onto the road and narrowly avoids getting run over by a carriage wheel and before the Handler can yell for the driver to stop he’s already haring across the field and into some woods

but he meets Dolores, which honestly makes everything almost worth it

after that, Five is different. His siblings want to help, but they get busy. The preparations they were making aren’t exactly things that can be put on hold. They are moving out, and all the traumatized baby brother in the world can’t make them stay. It doesn’t help that Five continually insists that he’s fine and that he won’t make such a stupid mistake again

They don’t know how to help him, they aren’t really in a position to help him either, and so for the most part they just. don’t. they worry about him, sure, but they still leave. one by one, until with Luther being all but banished from the grounds, Five is the last little soldier left standing

it’s fortunate then that Five no longer gives a single fuck what Reginald think of him and goes off to play with Dolores, who becomes his rock in this world of isolation he’s been plunged into (and there are days upon end that go by with him only talking to her, weeks where he doesn’t murmur a word aloud and his hands do all the talking for him until he almost forgets how to speak when his father barks orders at him)

it’s even more fortunate that Five is a little escape artist, because Reginald is nothing if not controlling and Five sneaking out to play isn’t exactly on the approved list of activities. On the bright side, his dad never did find out about the stolen acid that may or may not have been used on the base of the bars of his window, just enough to shift and few bars to allow him to squirm through before popping them back into place. He also never found Five’s backup lockpicks. Or the helpful copy of the front door key that had had to be replaced the previous year for going mysterious “missing”

and it helps that Dolores is lonely, too. Her brother has gone off to be a soldier, and though he writes to her with great frequency and visits when he can, she can’t help but worry about him. 

when his siblings return it’s to a familiar face but not much else. Five has grown in their absence, become more unruly and more independent with a wild streak that not even Reginald could stamp out. With none of his siblings around to use as leverage against him, Five just sort of did whatever he pleased. Reginald could do whatever he wished to Five, of course. Five could take whatever punishments his father dreamed up, because he had a light at the end of the tunnel: Dolores

Five mutters to himself with his hands, flicking through signs as quickly as his mind flashes through ideas. He doesn’t stop and ask for permission. He sneaks around. He had bars on his bedroom window now, which is certainly a development since they left. The first rule about Friends Club is you don’t talk about Friends Club or else you arm your father with ammunition against you, so even with Reginald dead Five is still pretty shifty about exactly where he spends his time and who Dolores is - admittedly more out of habit than anything else

and then, to pile on top of all this

the Handler comes back

and with Reginald dead, his siblings displaying their inability to take care of a goldfish let along an actual human child, and with the Handler getting Eudora on her side - well. With the Handler being such a dear friend of good old Reggie and wanting what was best for his young son and oh goodness, she’s just not sure his siblings will be able to handle him as he’s clearly acting out in his grief. 

Eudora doesn’t know, his siblings want to keep the matter in-family, Dolores suspects, and Five keeping his mouth firmly shut since he’s not exactly fond of parading about his biggest mistakes, and it all adds up to. well. a lot of misunderstanding and miscommunication

which is what pride and prejudice is all about wheyyy

Diego sees Patch teaming up with Enemy Number One, Patch sees a concerned friend of the deceased worrying after the little brother that the rest of the family doesn’t seem to know what to do with, Dolores sees her friend behaving weirdly and not wanting to be in the same mile radius of this woman, Five sees his nightmare come to drag him away from everything he cares about, and no one fucking talks to each other oh my god

until of course, one untimely marriage proposal that is rejected and the response letter rebuffing several of the accusations made against one party up to and including detailing the Hargreeves issues with the Handler in a reasonable amount of detail

(because Diego would keep his mouth shut on pain of death if anybody tried to force it out of him, but is more than willing to spill his guts to prove someone wrong)

(and then Dolores manages to get her hands on the letter, reads about what was done, and finally figures out why her best friend in the world looks like he’s seen a ghost every time the Handler is even vaguely alluded to in conversation. And hey, if this inspires Dolors to go on an ass kicking mission that worries her entire family and ends up making Diego look brilliant in the eyes of Patch when all is said and done - well hey, running off to get married Lydia Bennett style was never going to go down the same way was it)

Pride and Prejudice is a delightful comedy of errors, missteps, and miscommunication all rolled up into one delightful story made brilliant by the fact that the male character actually took criticisms to heart and worked to prove himself better, not by advertising his efforts in front of the person he wishes to admire him but instead working anonymously and endeavoring to be the sort of person worthy of her respect and love in the end of things while she is willing to concede that she, too, made errors in her own leaps of judgement and learns that not everything is always quite how it appears to be at first glance

look

i went through an entire pride and prejudice phase in highschool and y’all can pry this au out of my cold dead hands

[sher-soc-the-famder]

OK YOU GAYS: I was super inspired by @ironwoman359‘s Leverage AU, (seriously guys check it out I love it so much) and wanted to do one of my own! Leverage is probably one of my favorite TV shows so putting that together with Sanders sides? 👀 Perfection

Virgil is a tired, bitter man; he’s chased after the worst of humanity for those who don’t deserve his help for far too long. He’s done, he’s out of the game.

Not to mention the fact that he lost Kai-- to the disease his son fought his entire life, no less-- and with his death any sort of joy he found in the world fled as well.

So perhaps it’s no surprise that when offered a chance at revenge, a chance to get back at the men who let his child die, he takes it

But goddamn, the people he has to work with stomp on every single one of his buttons, gets on the last of his nerves, and are probably the most talented yet stupid people he’ll ever know

God, he needs a drink to deal with them all

There’s Logan, brilliantly smart, give the man a lock or security system and he’ll slip through it like a ghost. No one’s ever matched the man’s intelligence. Or his inability to understand other people. And he’s smart enough not to bind during a heist, which is a plus

Best thief that money can buy, though he hears the man prefers to be paid in books(??)

Roman, god, Roman’s even worse. Arrogant, loud, flirting with everyone on the job instead of actually hacking into the tech they need. Virgil’s almost tempted to kick him off the team if he hadn’t already seen Roman’s work. The man’s got something to prove to the world, and Virgil’s not convinced it’s because of his skin color

His pirated theater is impressive though, and all of his coding seems like a work of art even to Virgil’s amateur eyes

Patton at least, is vaguely reasonable though the man’s ever present smile creeps Virgil out. No one should look that cheerful when breaking someone’s arm. Not to mention he keeps insisting on talking about Virgil’s feelings which no thanks

He does good work though. Steady, reliable, never taken a job with kids. Virgil might almost trust him

Their job is simple: steal the plans back, and Virgil’s mind is already racing with everything that could go wrong. And what he can do about it. 

Roman- “Plan E? How many plans do you have? Do you have a Plan M?”

“Yeah, Roman dies in Plan M.”

Logan- “I like Plan M.” “Hey!”

Aside from a bump or two working together it all goes well. At least Virgil thought so until he got a call from their employer. 

Fun fact: Almost dying, not fun. Being betrayed by their employer: even less fun. Being stuck with these three jokers: The worst

They need someone else if they want to get back at them, and get their money (Logan’s very insistent there was a book he was going to buy with that money) and Virgil knows just the man

The other three don’t seem all that impressed with Thomas, which to be fair, Thomas’s own anxiety makes it hard to act well on stage. It’ll be fine (or it won’t be, whatever) they’d learn

Learn they do, and maybe Virgil learns a little bit (a lot) too along the way. Because yeah sure, the world’s full of horrible people, but maybe they can do something about that. And maybe not every criminal is a bad person. Maybe a couple of them could be family

(After all, sometimes the bad guys make the best good guys)

Future LMP and Virgil/Thomas because why not? XD

[dcforts]

since I’m so excited about this project, I thought I could share the prompts i’ve written for the drarry career fan fair. The prompting post is still OPEN here if you want to contribute. The claiming starts on June 23th!

Career Theme: Harry opens a shelter for muggleborn wizards and witches that ran away from home or were rejected by their muggle families Secondary Theme: Book Fair - The Philosophy of the Mundane: Why the Muggles Prefer Not to Know by Professor Mordicus Egg (Dust & Mildewe, 1963) or Home Life and Social Habits of British Muggles by Wilhelm Wigworthy (Little Red Books, 1987) Era: EWE Additions: Humor Scenario: Draco wants to foster or help with the shelter some way. Harry is suspicious that he wants to use it only to rehabilitate the Malfoy name and not because he really cares. Tries to get rid of him. Fails. Maximum Rating: Up to the writer 

Career Theme: Harry is a Metal-Charmer Secondary Theme: Pet Fair: Animagus Era: EWE - Canon AU Additions: Living together. After years spent in his animagus form, Draco now human still has quirks and habits from that time. Scenario: Right after the war, to avoid prison, Draco takes his animagus form and goes into hiding for years. Now he's back and he goes looking for Harry. He eavesdropped dangerous information that involves Harry's job and a threat to the wizarding world. He will exchange them if Harry will help him get his freedom. Harry accepts. Maximum Rating: Up to the writer. Career Theme: Harry is Hagrid's helper - Draco is part of the team that is repairing Hogwarts Secondary Theme: fantastic creatures Era: EWE Additions: Everyone is worried about Harry. Draco is drammatically and eccessively disgusted by Harry's choice of living. Meaningful talks. Scenario: After the war, to keep a low profile and in search of some peace and quiet Harry decides to stay with Hagrid for a while and help out. He meets Draco on the school grounds but doesn't engage. Draco (he would deny it) seeks him out. Maximum Rating: up to you 

Career Theme: Draco is in the fashion industry Secondary Theme: C1. Clothing Era: EWE Additions: Draco is sick of everyone wearing muggle clothing. Scenario: Draco has a wizard clothing line coming out. He sends promotional baskets to the most prominent figures of the wizarding world, including Harry who has every intention of throwing his away. Only he accidentally wears one of the items for a quick run out and gets papped in it. It makes the newspapers. Maximum Rating: up to you 

Career Theme: Harry is a farmer - Draco works for the Office of Misinformation Secondary Theme: from Pottermore C.16. The Sacred Twenty Eight. "(...)supposed indicators of pure-blood status(...) dislike or fear of pigs and those who tend them (the pig is often considered a particularly non-magical animal and is notoriously difficult to charm). Era: EWE Additions: Harry keeps the piglet in the house cause it's still very young (and cute). Scenario: Harry has a little farm but he mixes a muggle and a wizarding lifestyle, techniques and creatures, and this can bring troubles. Reprimands from the Ministry come almost every other week. One day, One Big Thing happens so the Office of Misinformation has to get involved. Draco has to figure out how to fix things and he has no intention of messing it up and every intention of being a pain in Harry Potter's ass. If only he didn't have to deal with his stupid piglet that follows him around and scares him to death. Maximum Rating: up to you 

Career Theme: Draco is a Custodian - Harry is an Obliviator expert/Curse-Breaker/whatever fits. Secondary Theme:  Books: A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot or Travel (to the magical places) Era: EWE Additions: Clever!Draco. (optional) each Custodian only knows about the one place they guard. they are rarely in contact with each other and with more or less concealed identities (they only vaguely suspect who are the others) Scenario: After the International Statute of Secrecy of 1692 to hide from muggles, wizards (only UK or the whole world) created an intricated network of powerful charms, wards and concealment enchantments. The knowledge regarding it and the ancient magic connected to it are secretly passed on from generation to generation in the oldest wizarding families and one member of each inherits the role of Custodian to guard a magical place where all these lines of magic intersect (can be a forest, a house etc) to make sure every enchantment is still functioning, strong, secret and protected or the entire network collapses. Someone starts targeting these Custodians or magical places threatening to expose the whole wizarding world to the muggles. Draco can be the one who spots the pattern or is among those who've been attacked (up to you). Harry is called for his expertise. They need to catch the perp and find a way to reverse the attacks or restore what has been damaged before its too late. Maximum Rating: up to the claimer Career Theme: Harry is a Owl trainer Secondary Theme: Pottermore E.6 Owls Era: EWE Additions: Embarassing situations. Scenario: Harry is a Owl trainer in training and he loves the job but there has to be something wrong with him cause the owls he sends for a "test-run" they all end up wherever Draco Malfoy is at the time. Maximum Rating: up to you Career Theme: Harry teaches DADA/Duelling on a summer camp Secondary Theme: Travel Fair if it applies or Pottermore: F.2 Five Curses and Counter-Curses Era: EWE Additions: Banters. Pining. Sexual tension. Scenario: It's a camp for kids that want to keep practising magic outside of school. It can be that is organized in collaboration with Hogwarts or something detached from it that accepts kids from all the wizarding schools and it can be just Harry's or with other subjects and activities, but (optional) we get to know the small group of kids that Harry's got always around. Anyway, the camp is built in the vicinity of Draco's summer villa. They haven't seen each other for a long time and Harry, unaware of the houseowner, knocks on his door one day for a silly reason/little problem they're having at the camp and ends up asking him to join him for a duel, to show the kids how it's done, leveraging on childhood rivarly and scores to settle. Draco gets way more involved than he imagined. (this part is optional) But he is perhaps a bit lonely and maybe he doesn't mind that much having his spotless villa invaded by muddy kids once or twice or get a bit muddy himself. Maximum Rating: I'd say P-13 and up but really it's up to the claimer. 

Career Theme: Harry: founder of a nonprofit organization for werewolves + Poster boy Secondary Theme: Pottermore. E.10 Werewolves Era: EWE Additions: The agreement is that part of the money of the sales is donated to the organization/ The campaign is massive/ It'd be nice to have a catchy silly slogan. Scenario: In order to raise funds for his organization that plans to open a safe space for werewolves, Harry gives in and gets involved in a massive advertising campaign for a product (can be hair/teeth related or something like that of your choice). So now his face is everywhere. On giant posters down the street, on the flyers sent with the mail everyday, even on the damn labels of the damn packaging, and an annoying jingle plays every hour on the wireless, with Harry's awkward voice at the end saying his stupid line. Harry hates it but Draco Malfoy, a lifetime buyer of the product in question, hates it even more. He places his usual order for the month and the letter he receives back informs him that he's the lucky winner of a meet and greet with Harry Potter, an exclusive look at the space they're building and a year's supply of said product. He is only going to go for the supply. Maximum Rating: up to the claimer

Career Theme: Draco works at the International Magical Trading Standards Body Office or any other office in the Department of International Magical Cooperation that deals with trading/exchange of goods. Secondary Theme: Travel Fair - wizarding communities around the world, better if it's remote places Era: EWE Additions: Oblivious!Harry. Slow burn. Scenario: Harry travels the wizarding world for his need to feel free and finally learn all the things he doesn't know about the magical world. He gives to all of his closest friends a clock like the one the Weasley have, so they know where he is at any time. Draco is a collegue and/or a friend to one or more of Harry's friends and he's (still) a bit obsessed with Harry. He uses every excuse to go and sneak a look at the clock (he thinks: inconspicuously, but everyone knows). He and Harry have met after the war and are civil with each other but Draco still feels a distance between them. Harry seems unreachable and Draco chases him using his job as an excuse, like asking him if he can collect info that may be valuable to whatever he is working on and things like that. They may correspond but it's only work related (much to Draco's dismayal). It's those times in which Harry comes back for a visit or for the holidays that really give Draco the chance to get them a little bit closer every time. And even if he doesn't think it works, they do affect Harry. Maximum Rating: up to you

Career Theme: Harry is a parseltongue interpreter Secondary Theme: Pet Fair - Snake Era: EWE - AU in which Harry is still a Parselmouth Additions: I'd like for snake that stays with Harry to be a proper character, maybe it's a sarcastic/snarky type. He/she and Harry fight like siblings. Scenario: After that one time Harry was called at a trial to act as an interpreter for a snake that had witnessed a crime, snakes won't leave him alone. Harry is visited by all sorts of species (muggle and magical) that bring their problems to him. They ask him to solve disputes acting as a mediator with the humans. Obviously they don't have the concept of work hours or private life so everytime they want something they just show up at his house. He has been trying to at least teach them how to respect a queue. One of them ends up staying with him, working with him (?), and becoming his friend. Enters Draco Malfoy. Years earlier he has encountered an incredibly rare and reclusive type and he’s been trying ever since to catch it or breed it (for their magical properties or to get their parts for potions/cures - depends on Draco’s job), but nothing works. Maybe, he could just ask them to cooperate. He only has to talk Harry into helping him. Maximum Rating: up to you 

Career Theme: Draco collects and repairs ancient or rare enchanted objects. Secondary Theme: Pottermore: D.10. Sorting Hat. Era: EWE Additions: The Four Founders are a key element of the story. Time travel could be an option if you want. Scenario: The Sorting Hat is malfunctioning. It won't stop talking and doesn't seem to make any sense. Draco is called to Hogwarts to figure out what's wrong with it. In his ramblings a name keeps coming up: Harry Potter. Maximum Rating: up to you

Career Theme: Harry: Monster Hunter Secondary Theme: Travel fair Era: EWE Additions: Humor. Scenario: Draco organizes a relaxing weekend all to himself in a muggle luxury resort and he finds himself involved in a search party for some muggle kid who got lost. While looking around, guess who he runs into (in the forest/jungle/beach/snow)? Harry Potter, on the trail of a legendary monster. So maybe the two things are connected? Great, now he's on a monster hunt. Did I mention he's terrified? Maximum Rating: up to you 

Career Theme: Draco is a dealer of magical artifacts (mostly illicit/off the books dealings) while for fun, under a pen name, works for a magazine as an unusual critic. Basically he writes irreverent negative reviews on anything or anyone he wants (he wrote three articles on Harry since he started and one on Neville that was also technically about Harry). Secondary Theme:  Book: Secrets of the Darkest Art Era: EWE - in which the authorities do not touch Malfoy Manor Additions: Distrustful!Harry, Sharp!Draco. Flirty!Draco Scenario: Harry is cleaning out Grimmauld Place. Incidentally Draco is cleaning out the Manor at the same time. They both hire the same "discreet" company to storage some of their dark magical artifacts for temporary safekeeping while they do that. They both unknowingly register it under "Black" (Draco is self conscious about his name after the war, and some of the items were in fact owned by the Black family). Only, the place gets robbed. More precisely, everything under the name "Black" gets robbed. They don't want the authorities involved, especially given the nature of some of said objects so they have to figure it out themselves before the most dangerous items end up in the wrong hands. Who did it? Who between them is the real target? Maybe someone discovered the real identity behind Draco's reviews and is out to get him (maybe it's those dark wizards he sold something to all those months ago through the black market - but better not tell Potter that, unless it's absolutely necessary). (optional) Even if it seems that all of this is Draco's fault, at the end is not (or not only). Maximum Rating: up to you 

[perfectlyrose]

Up In Flames (3/10)

Summary: In the year since they decided to become a team, John Smith and Rose Tyler have made quite the names for themselves as Team TARDIS, bank robbers extraordinaire. Newspapers the world over run headlines about The Doctor and the Bad Wolf and their latest heists. They’re practically unstoppable.

Then their world spins to a halt with a phone call. Jack’s in trouble again and a formidable enemy from John’s past has emerged from the shadows to try and destroy the bank robbing couple once and for all. Will they be able to survive this new threat intact or will the life they’ve been building together go up in flames?

A sequel to Watch it Burn, a Nine/Rose bank robbers AU

Word Count: 2748

Rating: Teen

Note: so it looks like my terrible updating skills that plagued Watch it Burn have migrated with me to this story. sorry for being gone for two months.

also welcome Clara and Amy to the story! :D

Read here: tumblr // ao3 // tsp // ff

John finished making his tea and took it to the desk where he’d set up his laptop. He may not know exactly how to take down the Master while keeping Rose safe and Jack from being killed but the only way to possibly accomplish it was to try.

He opened his laptop and navigated to one of the chat rooms on the deep web that he knew Clara frequented. He sent up a virtual flare that he hoped she would see and then started the waiting game. John half-listened to what he was fairly sure was Rose’s third phone call and third different accent as he took his first sip of tea. He grimaced and barely managed to swallow the liquid. This was why he and Rose always found a flat to stay in where they could easily set up a kettle. Making tea in the microwave was barbaric.

He was halfway through his cup regardless when Clara messaged him back with a link to a secure private chat.

John quickly explained that he needed help with a hack because the target was familiar with his methods. He kept it as vague as he could on the details but made sure to tell Clara that this was a risky job if she took it. The target was likely to try and backhack her at some point and there was also the threat of him physically tracking her down and trying to do her harm.

Clara flippantly wrote back that her girlfriend was a soldier and would take anyone out that tried to hurt her and then asked when they were starting.

He let her know that he wasn’t ready quite yet and was without his normal secure equipment and then started filling her in on the basics of his plan, including the fact that he would be distracting the target while she slipped in and got whatever information she could lay her digital hands on.

Clara made sure to clarify a few things and then gave him a method of contacting her directly so he could let her know when he was ready to start.

John thanked her and logged off.

He shut his laptop and walked over to the bed that Rose was lying on, still talking on the phone and typing notes on her laptop. He quickly shed his leather jacket, tossing it on the end of the bed before crawling onto it and leaning against the pile of pillows by the headboard.

Rose glanced over at him with a raised eyebrow, asking a question without ever pausing her conversation. He just offered a small smile in return and then closed his eyes, willing himself to relax.

A few minutes later, Rose wrapped up her conversation and hung up her mobile. He listened as she set her phone on the nightstand and finished typing a few things before her laptop closed with a soft click. The bed shifted as she leaned over to set the laptop on the floor and then there was a soft weight on his chest.

John cracked an eye open to look down at the blonde who was resting her head on his shoulder. She curled in closer, draping an arm over his chest and pressing against his side as she let out a soft sigh.

“We’re going to pull this off,” she said, words slightly muffled by his jumper. “We always make it work.”

“I know,” he answered, hoping that he sounded sure enough to convince her that he really meant the words.

She leveraged herself up so she would be looking him in the eye if his eyes were open. “Hey, look at me.”

John reluctantly opened his eyes.

“I mean it. We can do this.”

The hacker swallowed hard, tried to swallow the ball of fear that had seemed to be living in his throat since Jack called and didn’t succeed. Maybe he needed to spit it out instead. Rose would understand.

She always understood.

“I’m scared, Rose,” he admitted. The ball of fear didn’t dissipate because he’d spoken of it aloud. It remained lodged in back of his throat, making it hard to breathe.

She settled back on his chest, knowing that it was easier to talk when they weren’t looking at each other. “I am too. This guy who has Jack is terrifying.”

You have no idea, John thought, a desperate laugh almost escaping his throat. Out loud he just made an affirmative noise.

Rose pressed a kiss to his collarbone through his jumper. “We’ll make it through this and get back to robbing banks.”

This time he did huff out a laugh. “Bank robbing seems like child’s play compared to this.”

“Pretty much is,” Rose agreed. “It’s not like the coppers have even gotten close to us yet.”

John leaned down and dropped a kiss to the crown of her head before wrapping an arm around her and pulling her closer, holding on to her tighter than normal.

He wasn’t telling her, but he was terrified that taking on Koschei would lead to him losing her, one way or another. Either his old partner would get his hands on her and take her out just to watch him suffer or he would be forced to reveal some of the past he had worked so hard to put behind him and he was positive that Rose would turn from him in disgust and disappointment if she ever found out the whole truth.

Rose tightened her grip when John did, trying to silently tell him that she was with him, that she wasn’t going anywhere. She wasn’t sure what had him this unsettled and worried but she was going to do her best to soothe him and let him tell her in his own time.

She had to be confident that he would tell her whatever she needed to know.

She had to hope that he would trust her enough to share everything else.

They stayed wrapped up in each other for a few more minutes, taking and giving what comfort they could. Rose pulled away first.

“I promised Amy I’d call her in a few,” she said apologetically before leaning in for a quick kiss.

“That’s the ginger grifter, right?” he asked once she’d pulled away.

“The tall one,” Rose clarified since she was friends with a couple of people that fit his description. “She’s not really in the game anymore since her fiancé is more or less on the straight and narrow but she’s still got her ear to the ground.”

“I should probably start getting things ready for the hack with Clara,” he admitted. “Got distracted earlier.”

“But she said she’d help?” Rose asked.

“Forgot I hadn’t told you. She’s definitely willing to help. I’m supposed to contact her when I’m ready to go.”

“Sounds good. Let me know when you’re about to start too. I’ll pack up our things and be ready to leave.”

John nodded and looked like he was about to say something else but the loud ring of Rose’s mobile cut him off before he could start.

Rose looked at it and rolled her eyes with fond exasperation. “It’s Amy, must’ve thought I forgot that I was going to call her. Go do your hacker thing.”

John could only shake his head slightly, smile quirking the corners of his mouth upwards. It never failed to amuse him that Rose knew so much about every aspect of committing a crime and could put together an intricate plan for breaking the most difficult targets without breaking a sweat but could never get a handle on what it was he did with computers.

She tended to call it magic. He tended to tease her about being computer illiterate, a claim she always refuted hotly, telling him that she was as perfectly capable of using a computer as the next person and he shouldn’t judge her by his hacker standards.

He rolled off the bed and headed back to his laptop as Rose answered her call.

“Hey Ames, I didn’t forget about you.” Rose said immediately, smiling as she settled back on the pile of pillows against the headboard.

“I’d be offended if I thought you’d forgotten about me! Just thought you might’ve gotten distracted and I’m bored since Rory’s out of town this week.” Amy’s Scottish voice rolled over Rose like a balm. It had been too long since she’d talked to her friend.

“I was talking to John but I was about to call you.”

“You do tend to get distracted by him but since he makes you happy, I’ll let it slide,” she said.

“Generous of you,” Rose retorted dryly.

“I know. So, what’s going on? Been awhile since I’ve heard from you. Still off traveling the world and stealing things?”

“It’s a good combination,” Rose said. “And yeah, we’re in America right now.” She hadn’t told Amy that she and John were the bank robbers who had been making headlines, just that they were traveling.

“Isn’t it like really early in the morning over there?” Amy asked.

“Earlier than I usually like to be awake.”

“Guess this isn’t a social call then.”

“You’d already guessed that, Amy,” Rose said with a sigh.

“I had, but I’ve always been a better conman than you,” she teased gently.

“That’s because you refused to teach me all of your tricks!”

“Had to keep something to myself! Needed to stay in business!”

“Of course,” Rose said, smile audible in her voice.

“But really, Rose. What’s going on? You’re dancing around the point and that’s never good.”

Rose sighed again. “In a bit of trouble, Ames.”

She snorted. “Aren’t you always?”

“Not like this. This is bad and it involves me and John.”

“Right. So, I’m assuming you called to ask for help so what do you need?” Amy immediately switched to being all business.

“Is there anythin’ weird going down in London right now? Anything that seems off?” Rose asked.

“I haven’t heard anything. Just the normal weirdness of the city and its resident criminals.” She paused. “Is there anything specific I should be on the lookout for?”

Rose chewed on her bottom lip as silence stretched over the connection.

“Rose?”

“Sorry, was just thinking. But yeah, if you hear anything about someone calling himself ‘The Master’ or Koschei or Harold Saxon, let me know and keep an eye on it. Might have ties to the Agency but I can’t be sure.”

“Master, Koschei, Saxon. Got it. Don’t think I’ve run across any of those names, though there was a Harry Saxon running for Parliament last year I think. I don’t think he won the seat and I haven’t heard anything about him since.”

“Still good info though. Gives me somewhere to start digging.”

“What else do you need? I know I’m an excellent source of criminal gossip most days but you have other connected acquaintances you can get this stuff from,” Amy said.

“I need you to get some things from John’s flat,” Rose admitted. “There’s a good chance that it’s being watched so we can’t go ourselves.”

John turned away from his laptop to make eye contact and nod in agreement, letting her know that he agreed with her plan.

“That mean you’re coming back to London finally?”

“More like being forced back to London, but yeah.”

“Good, it’s been too long since I’ve seen you. I mean, not good that you’re being somehow forced back here but you know what I mean.”

Rose cracked a smile, picturing the pacing and gesticulating that was undoubtedly accompanying Amy’s words. “I know what you mean. So, you’ll get stuff from the flat for us?”

“Of course! What do you need?”

Rose rattled off a list of her equipment and where in the flat it was as soon as Amy told her she had paper to make a list. By the time she was done with that, John handed her a list of his own that he’d scribbled down on the hotel notepad for her to relay to Amy.

“Got all of that?” Rose asked when she came to the last item.

“Think so! Will it all fit in a duffel bag?”

“Should.”

“Perfect. Do you know when you’re going to be back so we can meet up and I can give you your stuff?”

Rose glanced over at John but he had his headphones on and was laser-focused on his laptop which meant he was preparing for the hack.

“Don’t know for sure but definitely within forty-eight hours,” she said.

“I’ll go over there tonight then. Do you have door codes for the building?”

“Yeah, and there’s a security system in the flat itself.” Rose gave her the necessary codes and instructions for disabling the flat security

“Sounds like a bit of overkill,” Amy said.

“It is but John’s a security nut.”

“Most hackers are.”

Rose hummed in agreement.

“And how are you doing, Rose?” Amy asked, voice uncommonly gentle for her. “Are you okay?”

“I was doing brilliantly until last night or this morning or whenever we got the bad news,” Rose admitted. “Having the time of my life travelling with John and breaking laws in multiple countries.”

“That’s my girl.”

Rose laughed weakly.

“Is there anything you can tell me?” Amy pressed. She knew her friend well and she knew Rose didn’t fare well when she bottled everything up and let it fester.

“Not a lot,” she said apologetically.

She paused and then just let words spill from her mouth. “I’m just so worried. This Master guy has John more tense than I’ve ever seen him and he’s closing off in ways that he hasn’t in months. I’m worried that we won’t get a win here with what we’re trying to do and I’m worried that we won’t make it through in one piece even if we do.”

“Rose, the two of you are solid. You’ll get through this,” Amy assured her.

“What if we don’t?” Rose exhaled roughly, a bad facsimile of a laugh. “I feel silly for worrying about this when there’s so much danger lurking around but I can’t help it. I’m worried about John and what this is doing to him and what it might do to us and --” she broke off with a frustrated noise.

“Rose, take a deep breath for me.”

She did as she was instructed and let Amy calm her down over the phone.

When Amy continued, it was with her signature blend of kindness and bluntness that made her one of Rose’s closest friends. “Now listen to me. You’re being stupid but not for the reasons you think. It’s completely okay to be worrying about John and your relationship. I’d be worried about your relationship if you weren’t, honestly! But you’ve got to talk to him about it.”

“It’s not that easy…”

“It is that easy. You love him. He loves you. Talk about it.”

“Amy…”

“Nope, don’t want to hear it. Tell him you’re worried and why and maybe he’ll start talking more too. You don’t get to complain about him being all bottled up when you’re the exact same way. Two way street there.”

Rose groaned. “I hate it when you make sense.”

“Lucky for us I don’t do it very often.”

Rose looked over at John again, just in time to see him take his headphones off. “I’m about to start. Clara’s ready.”

She nodded and he turned back to his screen, slipping headphones back on again.

“Okay Ames, I’ve got to go. I’ll let you know when and where to meet us as soon as I know, okay?”

“Sounds good. Take care of yourself, Rose, okay?”

“You don’t have to mother me. I’ll be fine.”

“You need so much mothering. Make sure to eat some vegetables. Maybe have some stress-relief sex with that hacker of yours.”

Rose groaned. “I’m hanging up now.”

“I’ll see you soon!”

“Yep! See ya soon.”

Rose rang off and stared at the ceiling for a moment, composing herself. She took a deep breath and then swung her legs over the side of the bed and starting gathering the few things they had unpacked during their short stay.

By the time John said thanks and goodbye to Clara and powered off his laptop, Rose was by the door and ready to go. When the door swung shut behind them, there was no trace in the anonymous hotel room that they had ever been there at all.

[innytoes]

I am not writing the Leverage HS AU

Moar random thoughts on The Leverage OT3 Highschool AU. 

-They all get insecure sometimes. Hardison wonders why two gorgeous Cool people would want to hang out with a skinny geek who still has braces. Sure, he can hack himself a ticket to the Oscars, but he can’t actually brag about that to his highschool girlfriend or boyfriend. (When Parker finds out she is SO EXCITED he’s also a thief.)

-Parker is worried that Hardison and Eliot are going to get sick of how weird she is and dump her. She has some abandonment issues, okay? (She stole Sophie’s files and that’s what they said, she should know.) 

-Everyone thinks Eliot is super confident and cool and Popular, but he secretly worries because neither Hardison or Parker care about sports, and he’s not a literal genius like they seem to be, and they seem to be so much more at ease communicating with each other. Hell, Parker even joined Hardison’s Dungeons and Dragons game. How can he compete with that?

-Even though it’s probably modern times they go on old-timey dates like to the arcade and the roller rink because of the AESTHETIC and because it’s hot to see Parker defeat DDR while doing flips and handstands.

-That time all three of them crammed into a photobooth. Hardison has the photo’s stuck to his screen. Parker keeps them in a special secret stash. Eliot has them hidden in his least favourite subject’s book so he can peek at them and be inspired to Try Harder. He will never admit it.

-Their group text is a mess it is long serious conversations and memes and funny gifs and Parker’s Unique sense of Capitalisation and Eliot shouting at autocorrect because his fingers are too big and also because Hardison swiped his phone and made it so ‘we are not watching star wars again’ automatically turns in to ‘i would love to watch star wars again’.

-I’ve been thinking how the whole Damien Moreau thing would work in a HS AU and I decided that Eliot went to a different middle school maybe in another town and Damien was like, the football captain (do middle schools do football I have a very vague understanding of US school systems) or at least this Popular Dude and Eliot totally had crush on him and Moreau was a shithead bully and peer-pressured Eliot into being a shithead bully too and it is his DEEP SHAMEFUL PAST he feels so bad there is no redeeming what he did but now at his new school he uses his popularity for Good and Beware the Jock Who Picks On People, Eliot Will Crush Them.

-Which of course one day means they have a playoff against Moreau’s team and Eliot is trying to not let anyone know about his Dark Past or that he’s still kind of scared of Damien and then Moreau picks on Hardison because it’s clear he’s Eliot’s weak spot and since there is no con to keep cool about Eliot just beats the shit out of him and probably gets suspended for a while but it was worth it.

-He has a mandatory session with Sophie who already knows all about it because Parker came in and re-enacted the whole thing with sound effects. And she just shrugs like: sounds like he deserved it. Want to talk about your feelings? Or shoes. 

-Neither Parker or Hardison is going to college, that’s pretty clear. Parker and Sophie probably already have like, a summer crime spree planned for when she ‘graduates’. (I can totally see Sophie hanging around specifically until ‘her kids’ graduate.) 

-Hardison is dithering between staying with Nana for the summer while ‘working’ (pretending to go to work and hacking) and helping out around the house, and freeing up more space so she can help other kids. He probably settles on getting an apartment near Nana and getting dragged along Parker and Sophie’s Crime Spree. (And WTF THE GUIDANCE COUNSELOR WAS A CRIMINAL? This is what public school gets you!) He sends Nana postcards from Europe and puts money in her accounts and opens college funds for his foster siblings and screams a lot because Parker has decided that because he is a Thief he should also JUMP OFF BUILDINGS WHY. 

-Eliot joins the army, because he wants to Help People and Serve His Country and he’s not built for what Parker and Hardison do okay, even if he gets it and they never steal from people who can’t afford to lose it. He gets through bootcamp, does some things he’s proud of, does some things he’s not proud of, probably gets picked for some kind of Black Ops. He sends letters and e-mails and has skype sessions with Hardison and Parker when he can. They send him completely unhelpful care packages (gummy frogs and stolen diamonds and sometimes the damn wetwipes he asked for.) Once the stuff he’s not proud of starts outweighing the stuff he is proud of (not to mention the whole ‘hey Eliot fake your death so you can do even shadier shit for us’ pressure begins), he Gets Out. 

-He probably shows up at the little chateau Sophie grifted for her and ‘the kids’ while they work on their next crime(s). It’s raining, it’s just after midnight, it’s a full moon, there’s thunder just as they open the door, because Eliot is Very Dramatic. 

-They all live happily ever after.