#we're trauma buddies <3

[utterentropy]

Someone illustrate this

[lepusrufus]

At this point I'm not doing neither a good nor evil play

I'm doing an "if you touch a single hair physically or metaphorically on my companions heads you can taste my eldrich blast fucker" play

[shaunashipman]

Eddie was definitely more queercoded than Buck. He is written as a repressed gay man in comphet relationships. Buck's queercoding mostly consisted of one-off jokes while Eddie's has been baked into all of his romantic storylines. Also no one is saying he's gay because he treats women poorly. The reason he inadvertently hurts his partners is because he is trying to force himself into relationships that will never work. Calling that homophobic is laughable because so many gay men have dated women as beards which obviously ends up hurting the women. It's just a fact. It's honestly homophobic the way so many bucktommy shippers are obsessed with eddie being straight even when a multitude of gay people see themselves in him. Or does the gay male perspective only matter when in concerns tommy lol

ok, I wasn't even going to get into this. idc if you see eddie is queer, that's your prerogative. but you brought this into my inbox.

to start with, there are plenty of bucktommy shippers who also think eddie is gay. and the ones who don't are not obsessed with eddie being straight, we're just tired of it being touted as the only possible reading and if you don't get that then you're stupid. kind of like how they are with buddie

also buck's queercoding has not been one-off jokes, y'all just seem to think that queercoding that isn't angsty is being played for jokes.

but let's get into the queercoding of eddie

"baked into all his romantic storylines" all 3 of them? that gigantic number? let's go through them.

shannon. yes, only married because they got pregnant. but they got pregnant through having sex, which eddie was shown, multiple times, to enjoy having with shannon, a woman. she left him (not going deeply into her reasons, I've talked about what I think of shannn and her leaving) and eddie's response was to devote himself to being a father, then moved across country to the same place she was, implicitly because he wanted to make up with her, but couldn't work up the courage until forced. when he did contact her, his initial refusal to let her see chris was both because he didn't yet trust her again with chris and because he didn't trust her with himself. while deciding whether or not to let her see chris, they were fucking like bunnies. again, that eddie was shown very much to enjoy, to the point that it is explicitly something he fantasized about in s7. after he let her see chris again, we didn't see as much of them, but what we did see was the actions of a normal couple. then she said she thought she was pregnant and he re-proposed. could it be that eddie simply felt trapped again? sure. but if that were the case he could have simply not began a relationship with her again to start with. he had the excuse ready baked in of "we need to focus on chris". then she turned out not to be pregnant, asked for a divorce and died, and he's spent the last 5-15 years mourning and pining for her.

ana. initially met as a teacher at chris' school who eddie had an immediate crush on. didn't go anywhere that season because she was chris' teacher. when they met again eddie's only hesitance to date her was framed as trauma from shannon divorcing him and dying. then we get to s5 and his panic attack. which most took as being about the "ready-made family". I took as, the shop worker called ana chris' mom, chris' mom died, ana could die, cue panic attack. the only part of this relationship that I can remotely see as being indicative of sexual repression is how the break up went, which could also just be a result of his slow breakdown which had already been cooking for several months.

marisol. who eddie perused after he got out of the date his tía set up, talked to some people and decided he was ready to date again. then we didn't really see them again until the nun episode. also the point where so many ignored the majority of the ep just because eddie was talking about religion. also basically the only time religion has come up for eddie in more than passing, despite religious repression supposedly playing a large role in his queercoding. again, a relationship where eddie is shown to enthusiastically enjoy sex with women. his sudden hesitance to have sex with marisol was completely about her having been a nun, which if anything is about the madonna/whore complex, not about eddie's sexuality. and then eddie fucks up the relationship due to the shannon!doppler, because he's still in love with shannon NOT because he's closeted.

so where is the plethora of queercoding in all his relationships? and if all his relationships are comphet, but he's never shown an attraction to men (and he hasn't, not objectively, because him "looking" at buck is not attraction) why is him being gay the only option? what about asexual? or aromantic? or even bisexual, since as I've pointed out, he clearly enjoys sex with women.

also his poor treatment of the women he dates can very easily be traced to him growing up in a very patriarchal household, where dad works to the detriment of not knowing his kids, mom's job is to take care of the kids, and he as the only boy was delegated to the "man of the house" at a very young age. an extremely common family dynamic, and one that despite working on in other aspects, eddie clearly still ascribes to in some way, by how he's continuously looking for a wife and a mother, not a partner. could be that he's gay, could be that he was raised in a misogynistic world.

If you see him as gay, great, good for you. but to insist that that's the only correct view is wrong. and since you ended with an "lol" showing how seriously you take this, I'm gonna end with this

ryan, the one who plays eddie, has said multiple times now that eddie is heterosexual. and before you start, oliver at no point ever referred to buck as straight before the bisexual arc so 🤷‍♀️

[sukifoof]

loveless flowey is so sooo important to me. as an autistic loveless aro with ptsd the idea of post pacifist flowey being able to accept himself as who he has become instead of feeling that his existence is somehow wrong is so touching. he should be allowed to be okay with being flowey. like the whole... Thing. is that what loveless aros feel and think is consistently deemed as something inhuman, and it's extremely isolating (please read this if ur confused on lovelessness <3). flowey thinks he can't possibly ever understand or be the same as everyone else because of his trauma and lovelessness and it's understandable, especially in a world that claims monsters are literally made of compassion and love etc

flowey clearly cares about those around him from the way we've seen him interact with others, but it's not really something he can personally view as "love". he struggles to understand himself and the way he feels about who he used to be-- the "old" him who "could" love. the idea of loving anyone is so tied to the past that he already views as separate from who he's become, that he can't really understand what love is even Supposed to feel like anymore.

i really want him to be okay with who he is now even if it means not ever being able to feel the way he did before his trauma, because that's the reality of it. we can't just make the way we feel go away. flowey is constantly punishing himself for the way he feels and him saying that he did the right thing even if things didn't turn out perfect is suuuuch a huge step. he has to make amends with himself and allow himself to just. live without punishing himself just for existing

i could talk at length about how a lot of his actions during his resets were likely a result of subconscious self destructive behaviors and control issues due to trauma BUT that's not what this is about i just think. loveless flowey. being able to say he's loveless and not viewing it as a shameful thing that somehow makes him less than anyone else. is so So important. it's like buddy u just understand the world differently because u have trauma u gotta work through and thats okay

pretty much i just wish that lovelessness wasn't something thats looked down on just because we don't feel what we're "supposed" to feel in the way others feel it or whatever allo people say. some people are aro some people loveless some people are aplatonic and we shouldn't condemn anyone for it because it's not something that Should be condemned. it's just how some people are and i adore the idea of flowey just allowing himself to Be

[mellon1998]

On the subject of Kipperlilly Copperkettle...

It's okay if you like her, it's okay if you want her to be redeemed. It's okay to wish she had been revived and redeemed and grown as a character. Some of you may relate to her, may know people who were once like her, and it can be daunting to see yourself in a character and see them not get the chance to grow. After all, you got that chance, people you know like her got that chance. We all look back on parts of ourselves we've moved past (maybe even are still working on) and are glad to be past them. We're glad people loved us through those parts of ourselves.

I need you all to understand something though: You chose to change. People like Kipperlilly cannot grow or change until they choose to. Kipperlilly doesn't want to change, she does not recognize the flaws in herself. She may be aware of her anger issues, but she doesn't see her want for power as wrong. She doesn't see her desire for recognition she didn't earn as wrong. She doesn't see the issues of romanticizing trauma and hating people you don't even know and who have done nothing to you. She doesn't see a need to change her ways. Unless and until she does she will not change, no matter what anyone else may do or say.

More than anything, we see this in the fact that she chose Porter. We don't know the series of events that took place, but Brennan made it very clear that she chose him of her own freewill. She chose his side, she chose to force her decision on her party, she chose to kill Lucy and Buddy, she chose to end the world to gain power. She chose to end the world to get revenge on people who, at that point, had never even spoken to her. Up until the final fight, the worst thing they ever did to Kipperlilly was trade quips and call her four dogs.

The truly sad part? She probably never will. I've known many people like Kipperlilly who still, after years and years, refuse to recognize their own flaws. Refuse to seek help. They are given chance after chance, people choosing every single day to love them through their flaws, and they refuse to change.

Kipperlilly is addicted to power, we see this in so many ways. We see this in how she so very clearly tried her utmost to be the leader of the High 5 Heroes seemingly unprompted, as evidenced by 3 (maybe 4) of the other 5 not liking her. People don't tend to be chill about someone forcing their way into the position of leader. Especially in small groups. We see this in how she saw grinding would, at least in the early days, be more efficient for leveling than adventuring. She wanted the power, not the skills and experience. We see this in her bid for class president. She questioned if Kristen actually had any interest in improving the school, if Kristen cared. Did you care about the students or making the school better, Kipperlilly? We saw no evidence of that. The only things she wanted to do was make things better and easier specifically for herself.

It sucks. She is a kid, she isn't pure evil. Even in the world of dnd with devils and demons, nobody is pure evil. She could be more, she could grow as a person. She could use her eye for efficiency but learn to also take the necessity of practical application into account to help her party improve. She could use her abilities to hide and blend in to potentially do really good work to make the world better. She could have been more, but she didn't want to. It's unfortunate, but it's true. She didn't want to change.

Yes, she did go to therapy with Jawbone, but we don't know why. We know it was for anger issues, but we don't know that it was her choice to go. Her parents or the school could have forced her to. Even then, based on the notes, it doesn't sound like she was really interested in using therapy to help her grow as a person. She just used it to vent, which can be a part of therapy but it's not everything.

At the end of the day, she made her choices. None of which were to grow as a person.

[thatwordybirb]

The tale of All for One and One for All - a story of legacy, of inheritance, of heirs to hope and hatred. We know the version where a child raised in loveless luxury breaks when his cursed quirk kills his family, is raised in the shadows and molded to be a monster - but what if he was found by the world's greatest hero and raised with love by a rat that walks like a man bearing similar scars? We know the version where a quirkless young man, beaten but never broken, wants nothing more than to be a hero despite the discrimination he faces, his determination at long last rewarded one day - but what if that reward never came, his shattered dreams twisted by the world's greatest villain into a crusade that sets the world aflame? A role-swap AU that puts Tenko in the hands of All Might and Nezu and Izuku in the hands of All For One that explores trauma, recovery, family, and how many of the ills in society can't be solved by just one man in a cape.

Alright, first second chapter to anything I've posted in a lot of years, we're doing this! Once again, y'all can praise my lovely buddy Raz for the art!

So, in the middle of writing chapter 4, I decided "I'm gonna write down what music I listened to while writing each chapter, and share it in the Chapter Notes when this finally goes live for whoever might be interested in that sort of thing." You may note that 2 is not the same number as 4. For this chapter and chapter 3, will just share a song I strongly associate with this story, because hey, why not? Today's is DNA (The Keys) by Walk The Moon! I'd go so far as to call it a fitting themesong for My Hero Academia in general, but that's probably just me!

Thanks for reading; stay safe out there~!

[balkanradfem]

So I like the Barbie movie enough to do an analysis of their feminist statements and try to get to the root of the problem! They did give us a long list of expectations women worldwide are dealing with, now let's see why they're dealing with it.

1. "We have to always be extraordinary, but somehow, we're always doing it wrong. You have to be thin, but not too thin, and you can never say you want to be thin, you have to say you want to be healthy."

This issue happens because women in practice, culture, and their real-life circumstances are still effectively living as the second class citizens, and they're viewed as servants for males, and male toys. It does not benefit us to be expected to be extraordinary, and it does not benefit us to be thin. So who benefits from it?

It's a feature of a male fantasy. Male wants to posses a woman who is trained to please him in every possible way, but she also needs to be unique and different from all other women, so he feels like he has something special. Every woman already is unique and individual, but he doesn't notice such things as personality, he needs her to be special in a way that he and his male buddies will notice! So she has to be extraordinary in something that males appreciate, but also if she is better than them at it, then they no longer feel the ease of being superior, so she's doing it wrong.

Women's ideal being thin is also a male fantasy, they've managed to pavlov themselves into finding thin women the only kind of woman that is attractive, thus the requirement on women is to be thin, even when it damages our health. Men love causing trauma to women, but to see women actually visibly struggling with it, putting it into words, saying it hurts us, that makes them uncomfortable! So they shame the language, until we phrase it as something that doesn't relate to them, or that makes it seem like it's for our own good. 'Being thin for health' makes it seem like the required starvation is for our own good, and healthy, in fact.

This could not possibly happen if we were not existing in service of the other half of population. If we were respected and valuable human beings, what is bad for us would not be represented to us as an ideal.

2. "You have to have money, but can't ask for money, because that's crass. You have to be boss, but can't be mean. You have to lead, but you can't squash other people's ideas."

These are double standards that men put up for us. Even though women are paid less, own less, are globally more impoverished and have a harder time gaining money, that is no longer enough for us to completely depend on men for money; they hate this. So as a revenge for us managing to earn a bit of our own money, we now can't ask them for any, we are supposed to 'have our own', and still depend for them, but in fear, reluctant to ask or to demand. Notice how it isn't crass for a man to ask for money, it's almost expected, but for a woman, it's shameful.

Women in lead will be criticized, called out, scrutinized and humiliated like no male leader ever would be; this is to make it harder for women to feel in control and comfortable in leading positions. Male leader is supposed to step all over ideas he doesn't find useful, hell he can even squash it and take credit for it later, but if a woman doesn't acknowledge a stupid idea, she is immediately told off for 'not being a good enough leader'. Even when she's doing exactly what she's supposed to do. It's a hypocritical little game to ensure only men can comfortably lead.

3. "You're supposed to love being a mother, but don't talk about your kids all the damn time. You have to be a career woman, but also always be looking out for other people."

This is a feature of "women existing for male convenience" problem. We are supposed to be naturally loving of raising kids, because it's convenient for males to just have their children raised for them without having to do much about it, and if this is not provided to them, then women are evil for not 'loving being a mother' when it's convenient for men that women are super into that and willing to do it for free, forever, without complaining or talking about it, because men don't like to know that it's an actual effort, they feel more comfortable feeling it's a silly little chore that deserves no thought whatsoever.

Women having careers is something men have been making difficult in any way possible, because it means women are not reliant on them for resources within capitalism, but they were not able to completely prevent us having jobs, so now they're just trying to get as much use of it as possible. If women earn money, they will leech off of that money. If women have careers, well then those women should prove that they're just as convenient, nurturing, always available, running at every beck and call, and act as if they still only exist to serve and please men. If women fail to do this, they'll again be accused of being selfish, horrible people, bad mothers, bad community members, and so on and so forth. Men of course, can ignore the entire world and do their job badly, and have a violence problem, and be addicted to p*rn, and it's fine. They're not bad people regardless of how little compassion they have for anyone who isn't them.

4. "You have to answer for men's bad behavior, which is insane. But if you point that out, you're accused of complaining. You're supposed to stay pretty for men, but not so pretty that you tempt them too much or that you threaten other women because you're supposed to be a part of the sisterhood."

This is an example of psychological abuse; victims are most often told they're responsible for their abuser's actions, as if they would in any situation be able to control or influence them, which they can't. But, putting that responsibility on women will make women hyperfocus on their own behaviour, on prevention of abuse, prevention of violence, which means they will go a long way trying to please men, tiptoe around them, give them insane amount of attention and care, in hope or preventing the escalation of their behaviour - and this is exactly what men want, this is what the abuse was for. To gain that devotion and attention, with the threat of violence. If women understood perfectly that men are responsible for their own behaviour, their way forward would be to hold men accountable, to lock them up and never look back. It's only in the world where women are victims of severe psychological abuse that we try to please men into not committing acts of violence. And it never works, because men love violence, and will turn to violence at every corner, even more easily and smugly knowing they can simply blame a woman for not working hard enough to prevent it.

Men expecting women to be pretty but then punishing them for being pretty is also an act of abuse; women's exterior is being judged as if our appearance is both a statement and a crime. Men can look whatever they naturally look like, and it's not a provocation, temptation, lack of solidarity or anything worth criticizing; but any way that a woman looks can be scrutinized and a ground for moral callout. The reality is that women also just look like the way they look like, and there's nothing wrong with it. There is zero moral problems with women looking pretty or not pretty. There isn't even a problem with tempting males because males are responsible for their own actions and not toddlers who have no power to resist impulses. This is a tactics for making women responsible for male behaviour - the way she looks is responsible for what I want to do to her. Complete nonsense, they just found a way to blame her for his own behaviour.

Calling women out for not being 'a part of the sisterhood' based on their appearance is very poorly concealed tactic to turn women against each other, to distract them from seeing that men are the root of the problem. Men don't turn on each other based on appearance, and it doesn't make sense for women to be assumed to do it either; in women-only communities, it doesn't matter what women look like. Whatever women look like is never a threat or an attack on other women, men are trying to play on female insecurity and frame other women as a threat to that insecurity - when the only threat all along was men, creating ideals and standards of beauty that don't correspond to reality or nature.

5. "Always be grateful, but never forget that the system is rigged, so find a way to acknowledge that, but also, always be grateful. You have to never get old."

The waves of feminism have forced the public consciousness to acknowledge that the system is rigged, but the pressure to do something about it falls completely on women, even though men created the system, rigged it, are keeping it rigged, are using violence to enforce it, and are benefiting from it. And it's convenient to them if women do nothing else but acknowledge it's rigged and stay grateful they're still allowed to live within, we're supposed to be threatened by the fact that we can easily be killed if we step out of line.

Men are threatened by older women because mature women have experience, they are no longer easily manipulated or cheated out of their gain, they will not bow down and please men like young, inexperienced women can be tricked into doing. So they convince those young women, that being old is shameful and ugly for women. They want women to stay young and susceptible, like children that they can control and not allow any agency or free will. This ensures we stay focused on being scared of time, aging and our own bodies and nature, but not of the predators who are taking our lives as a service for themselves.

6. "Never be rude, never show off, never be selfish, never fall down, never fail, never show fear. Never get out of line, it's too hard, it's too contradictory and nobody gives you a medal or says "thank you". And it turns out, in fact, that not only are you doing everything wrong, but also everything is your fault."

These are lists of standards that are only applied to women, men are allowed to do all of these things and to be catered to while they're doing it. This behaviour is presented as bad only when women are doing it; if men do it, it's considered neutral, normal, intrinsic to human nature. Women being selfish inconveniences men, who are looking to exploit female selflessness. Women showing off and being proud would cut into their time showing off, they want that attention for themselves. Women getting out of line is inconvenient, since men have drawn those lines for women (those lines don't exist for men). Women showing fear makes it difficult for male predators to corner them down and have them act complacent; men don't want to see proof of victimizing women, except in private, except when they can get off on it. Never in public, never when women could potentially escape or reach for help, then it's sexist of women to be afraid.

Women getting medals, acknowledgment or gratitude again, cuts into male parade of getting all the acknowledgment, gratitude and medals, for them it doesn't make sense that they should share attention or credit with what they consider to be the 'servant class'. Men have deluded themselves into thinking they deserve more credit than women do, they don't consider us smart or capable, because they can easily oppress us, so how smart can we be? But also, they expect and demand us to be as smart and capable as necessary to resolve all of their issues, to make their life easy and pleasant and undemanding. We are forced to deal with issues they won't even look at, we often solve problems or create solution they wouldn't be able to produce, and this is when they simply take credit and convince themselves that they knew better all along. It's a 'male-delusion rules reality' kind of world for women.

After doing the biggest bulk of work on earth, creating and raising the entire human race, doing daily unpaid labour, putting up with violence, threats and constant degradation from men, after not having our interests represented by the law, education, government, economy or any other institution with any power, after spending a piece of our life being groomed and then having to spend another undoing the grooming, we are still told that everything is our fault, and that we're doing everything wrong.

This is abuse, and somebody is doing it. We are not put thru all of this for vague reasons, or for arbitrary reasons, someone is benefiting from all of it. While we're raising children, who lazes around and attaches their last names to our kids? When we're doing daily unpaid labour, who doesn't do their part? Who is staring at us while we're walking down the street, who fails to represent or even acknowledge our interests, and even our human rights? Who does the grooming, and who enables them to do it? Where do they get resources from it, who allows it to go on unchecked? How come young girls and women are regarded as such low value that we allow them to live unprotected around predators who will absolutely attempt to violate them in as many ways they can? Who fails to prevent, or arrest, or punish them?

It's not just a system of patriarchy, it'a a system of men, doing this every single day of their life. We can point the finger at the root of the problem. We have a common enemy, and they're working damn hard to keep us from realizing it.

[samcat71470558]

K, but consider this.

Goose Echo had a friend. Like, a brother friend. That died in an accident. Delta. Like. When Goose died in Top Gun but it's Mav instead.

969 words <3

tw/death, drowning (not really descriptive), grief(..? Kinda..?)

I swear these guys are such blanc slates according to the wiki yk I had to give 'em some trauma 😔/j

-------

Echo hated the empty feeling in his tanks when he was alone. Bravo was out, doing god knows what, Delta (Mav) has other things on his head, and he's stuck on board the ship. His engines ached for a little action. Suddenly a bang sounds through the hall, followed by a scream. Delta!

"...Delta?!"

Echo's engines flared up with fear. Delta never, never screams like that, unless he's in real trouble.

"Delta!"

He rolls forwards, cautious for any debris or gas or whatever could cause his best friend to scream. Glass cracks under his lading gear. "...N-no..." His movements get more frantic, every corner he passes feeling like a clump of ice drops in his tanks. It's quiet...

He rounds another corner, and...

"BOO!" Delta jumps out, wings folded with his wingflaps up. He's grinning like an idiot, his red-blue helmet shining in the dim light. "HAH! Oh man, Echo... You should've seen the look on your fa-ha-haace... Wooooh..." He snickers, putting his wings and flaps back down when he sees the annoyance in Echo's face. "Sorry, sorry... I just... y'know, I had to. But you gotta admit, that was good, huh?" Echo groans, angrily swatting Delta with his wing. "...Bastard... I thought you were in real trouble."

He sighs, and gives Delta the Disappointed Dad™ stare. Not that he's his dad, he just likes doing it.

"I'll be on deck if you need me, scrubbing window-washer fluid out of my eyes."

Delta just snickers, and starts cleaning again.

«»

"Okay, so lemme get this straight. You two figures are going to do what?!" Bravo never heard so much bullshit in one sentence. First, Echo and Delta were gonna do the most dangerous stunt he'd ever heard of. And they were gonna do it in opposite directions, at the same time. This could only end in chaos.

Echo snorts, flapping his flaps up.

"Come on, you gotta stop being so ice cold to these ideas, man! Come on, join in! Delta knows what he's doin'."

Delta, who's standing a little away, does in fact not know what he's doing. "Come on Echo! Let him sulk, we're gonna have some real fun!"

And Echo believed him.

«»

It went so well, and then...

"DELTA!" Jet wash, the most dangerous thing in aviation. When Echo and Delta passed each other at the top of their loops, Delta flew straight through Echo's. His engines splutter, his eyes wide as he loses altitude. "ECHO!" He tries everything to get out, to just climb, gain altitude, gain his engines back... There's tears dripping down the sides of his face (not from fear, but from the fact that he's plummeting to the ground at mach 11045 or something), teeth gritted in concentration. Bravo tries snatching him out of the sky, but in the process he almost takes himself down too. At the last moment he has to disengage, letting Delta splash into the icy ocean below. For a second they see his terrified face below the surface, before he sinks into the deep, dark blue. And Echo can't stop the soft whine his engine makes.

«»

The funeral is short, but even that's too much for Echo. He blames himself. It was his jet wash, after all. That must make him guilty, right?

He got send to the mainland for a few days, getting a court reading where they explain neatly how this wasn't his fault, since a jet wash is invisible, and he didn't intent to down Delta, and blah, blah... Echo'd stopped listening after they said he wasn't guilty.

But still, he felt incredibly, incredibly guilty.

"...I should've gone down, not him..."

He barely left his room for a week after coming back to the carrier, his head hurting from the many sleepless nights he'd spent in his quarters.

"...It's just... not fair, y'know?"

"Yeah, I know, buddy."

Only Bravo could coax him out of his room sometimes, getting him some fuel and talking for a bit. But he knew it too; the old Echo was gone. Replaced with a shivering wreck of a plane that was almost too scared to even fly...

Until that faithful day when he did. Bravo finally managed to convince Echo to go out flying with him, promising to not even go near his rear to avoid the jet wash. It was stupid, but anything to get his best friend back was worth a shot.

They loaded onto the catapults, and took off. The second Echo got airborne he sunk down, landing gear out as if trying to land on the water. His eyes lock onto the ocean, seeing the face of Delta sinking down slowly into the blue...

"...B-Bravo..? I... I'm gonna go back..." Bravo whirled around, spotting his friend slowly moving back to the carrier. "No. Echo..." He quickly caught up, giving Echo his recreation of the other jet's famous Disappointed Dad™. "Come on, one lap. You agreed to one lap around the perimeter. It's just 83 kilometres..." Echo sighed, regret and desire swirling in his tanks until he got nauseous. He did agree to one lap...

He sighed, then pulled up. "Fine. One lap."

«»

Once Echo got up to speed, the doubt slowly started to melt away like snow in the sun. Hell, he even found a smile tugging his mouth as he sped up more and more, overtaking Bravo at Mach 1. In less than four minutes he'd cleared the lap, engines roaring for the second. "Keep up, slow coach!" Bravo growled, engines flaring up as he caught up to Echo again. "There he is! There's my stupid idiot Echo!"

«»

After the race, the ice clump in Echo's tanks melted slightly. He still felt chilly and alone, but knowing Bravo had his tail fins really made everything a lot better for him.

[auncyen]

It still fascinates me that Akiren canonically is reluctant to tell the others about "Igor" and ultimately does not. You have a dialogue option to try explaining where the Metanav comes from when Makoto questions it, but Akiren shuts it down with something about it being too hard to explain if you try going that route. Again, Akiren does know how he and the others get the Metanav; Yaldabaoth tells him he gave it to him and will give it to potential accomplices in the future. While Akiren knows about this and also that "Igor" keeps alluding to future ruin, every other Phantom Thief is in the dark. And this is fascinating because without the blinders of "oh Igor's been good every previous entry, he's just cryptic", Yaldabaoth-as-Igor comes off as an extremely shady adult in an entry all about shitty adults manipulating and abusing kids, and Akiren is put in a weird spot where it is natural that it'd feel difficult for him to tell his friends about his connection to "Igor", which seems like a real good spot to get manipulated in.

I 100% believe that the only reason Akiren doesn't actually end up getting played for a fool with this set up is because he has main character privileges. Like, I can't speak for p1/p2, but 3-5, the main character is kind of a power trip. You make friends with a bunch of people, you can romance any girl (rip if you wanna romance boys outside p3p), you are The Special One.

Please imagine if Akiren wasn't the main character and it was either Ryuji or Ann (hell, while we're doing hypotheticals, let's say the game would let you pick which one you wanted to play as). Ryuji/Ann is the PoV character, but Akiren still starts as the nominal leader because he seems to have a better clue what he's doing then, and first-time players are like "wow, he's pretty cool, why aren't we playing as him" until you start getting PoV cuts to him interacting with Yaldabaoth and it's like.......not spelled out that "Igor" is bad news, but also it definitely seems like something isn't right, and again, this is the game of shitty adults manipulating kids. So you already know Akiren's background isn't great, he's not in the best spot, and now there are just these little hints that huh ok maybe your cool friendly leader is. doing something weird. hey buddy are you going to tell us about this weird guy??? No???? Not until a mid-game upset where the PT discover what they've been doing has been manipulating public cognition in a bad way they might have avoided if they'd just known to have the slightest suspicion about this old man most of them are just now hearing about and Akiren is having a meltdown out of guilt and shame because he didn't explain anything partially because it'd be hard but also because what if people didn't believe him, he acts cool but has trauma from his arrest and his hometown doubting him and he 100% avoided doing or saying anything that might make him anything less than the perfect trustworthy confidant for all his friends (which, guess how a few teammates would be reacting, so between that and Akiren having a meltdown, now Ryuji/Ann is the official leader! Yay, you're actually playing the leader now! Isn't that great? ...Yippee????)

and then on ng+ you just spend early game circling Akiren at his hangout spot yelling "TELL US YOU DUMBASS WE'LL STILL LOVE YOU AND IT'LL SAVE A LOT OF PAIN" but alas the plot is written.

anyway yes I still believe they set up Akiren so perfectly to be manipulated not just as part of the Phantom Thieves but as an individual, because of his own personal vulnerabilities, and that it would 100% have happened if he was not protag.

[lover-of-mine]

I love hearing/reading your thoughts on all things 911 and Buddie … soooooooo …

What are your thoughts on the episode titles so far?

I think 8x03 No Place Like Home could see Bobby back at the 118. That or they really do the someone bumps their head and we get an AU type universe. Like the coma dream, minus the coma haha.

Hello baby 🩷

Okay, so, buzzkill, obviously the bees they've been hitting and Gerrard killing the vibe. Since we know the perfume launch is the pool emergency, I'm thinking about the sol de janeiro drama with the body butter that attracted spiders (unclear if it actually attracted spiders but it does make it for a nice plot for a drama) I'm assuming the perfume will attract bees and create problems, and as someone who unfortunately keeps attracting bugs, my perfumes are all fruit based, it's an actual problem lol, I hope I'm not right about that one because I hate calls with bugs lol, and the bees of it all is just a misdirect, like the blimp in s6, and we're going to get another major plotline probably more personal, like the Athena one following the blimp (fingers crossed for queer Eddie, but I like the madney wedding reception theories people have going around, let the Han throw a party, and I have henren theories), and no place like home, it feels too obvious but all cliffhanger points involve someone coming home, Henren getting Mara back, Chris wanting to come back, and Bobby getting the 118 back, so I'm betting we're getting at least 2 out of the 3, I don't see Gerrard lasting past the opening arc, so Bobby coming back, Mara going home, and maybe Chris giving some indication he wants to come home (I've been living in a buddie land where Eddie is questioning his relationship with Buck throughout the opening arc, since Eddie's queer arc makes more sense being about Buck, where they're having a moment, and Chris calls and says he wants to come back and Eddie kind of freezes, but Buck is moving around getting his keys and rushing to get out and he reaches the door before he notices Eddie is still in the same spot staring at his phone and Buck just goes "are you coming with me to go get him or are you just to stay there?" kinda teasing and Eddie is just staring at him like he's seeing him clearly for the first time before following him and the episode ends and we get something like 704 for Eddie's queer realization just because the show likes to mirror the 2 of them during 804, also because Buck is the only one who doesn't have a clear hook set up from s7 outside the Eddie and Chris of it all, so putting him in the resolution makes sense).

I keep going back to the 119 as a call to a set not an alternative reality, but I can see it being the thing with episode 2, because I'm more intrigued about the way we got the titles for episodes 1 and 3, but not for episode 2 and I don't know if you saw the way I was talking about the way s7 is structurally s2, there's even direct parallels visually from the scene with Gerrard to the scene where Bobby comes back in s2, so I keep going back to an arc that's going to work like the tsunami but follow s5 blackout rules, since s7 also has a lot of triggers that are similar to s4. Both sink or swim and desperate times have a certain intensity that I can see them trying to recreate and an alternative reality/coma dream/hallucination could be a way to add some that in. BUT there's the kid going missing aspect, and the council woman plot makes me 👀 at Denny. Because he's the only one of the kids who didn't have a major "I'm in serious danger" plot yet, May tried to kill herself and she also has the mayday plot, Chris was in the tsunami, Harry was kidnapped and closed into a wall, and I'm ignoring Jee because they wouldn't do that to a toddler. While he had the Eva plot, we know Eva wouldn't actually hurt him and he was unharmed during the lab explosion and with his father, and considering the amount of trauma they keep dumping on Chris and everything about Harry, they're not above hurting the kids and this is a situation that could bring Denny into the middle of the mess and the Mara storyline has a lot of opening to put henren in a similar position Buck was during the tsunami and Athena was during the blackout.

So, so far I'm thinking: Eddie questioning his relationship with Buck leading to a feeling realization because I don't think they'll make Eddie gay, I think they're just gonna have him acknowledge he's in love with Buck, Bobby and Athena dealing with the house burning down and getting Bobby back to the 118, Henren trying to get Mara back and maybe something happening to Denny to further that, and parallel to that, the Mara plot triggering a Madney second kid plot. I'm also thinking maybe they can use madneys backyard in the same way they used to use the Grant Nash one and have madney throwing a party. Is it a wedding reception? Is it celebrate Bobby coming back? The adoption going through? Who knows. And getting a parallel to May's graduation party where Madney leaves because Maddie figures out she might be pregnant with Buck and Eddie leaving to go get Chris in a similar vision like the one described up there.

[ladyshinga]

idk y'all we're all so deeply traumatized 24/7 since 2020(if not longer) i'm actually NOT shocked that the fun vampire man from video game who is a walking embodiment of what trauma does to people... ended up pretty popular. like idk about y'all but his appeal to me is exactly that. like yah buddy. i too have become prickly these last couple of years from trauma. let's play out a story where we can watch (and help) you heal <3

[sevensoulmates]

i wonder if people would be okay with eddie being bisexual. shannon as the only woman he fell in love with and buck as the only man eddie fell in love with. bisexual people also suffer from catholic guilt (i'm bi, latina and my family is catholic), but i don't think 9-1-1 would give us bi4bi romance. i just hope that, if eddie is bi, fans don't get mad and say things like 'it doesn't make sense'

Oh goodness, now we're getting into some iffy territory here. So, WARNING, if you follow my blog, you may already know that I personally headcanon Eddie as a repressed gay man, and not bisexual. And I have very specific reasons for that. HOWEVER, if the show DID want to go with Eddie also being bisexual, I would 100% accept that, because you're right bisexual people 100% also experience catholic guilt and comphet as well. All of that could definitely fit into the bisexual experience too. It would also make sense to the story...to a certain degree. So here's my warning again, I'm going to dive into my headcanon here, so be warned this is just MY opinion and is not indicative of all queer experiences real, fictional or otherwise.

Here's my reasons why I feel the story aligns closer to repressed gay than bisexual for Eddie. I simply don't believe that Eddie really ever was in love with Shannon. Loved her as his best friend, yes. Deeply loved her as the mother of his child? Yes. Loved her as a person? Yes. In deep romantic love with her? No. Nothing I've seen from their relationship, not the sex, not their "sweet" moments, or the vulnerable moments, nothing has ever made me ever believe they were in love love. I totally realize that that's my personal opinion and other people see it differently, I understand that, and I respect other people's personal opinions on the matter. This is not a knock against Shannon as a character, but just my individual feelings on their relationship. This was my opinion back when season 3 was still airing and I saw the show for the first time, and it's still my opinion now.

However, back in season 3/4 I actually still believed Eddie could be bi, for sure. And I would've been absolutely THRILLED with a bi4bi story from Buddie.

After all, just because Eddie wasn't in love with Shannon didn't mean he couldn't fall in love with another woman (or man), right? But then came Ana Flores....and then Vanessa...and then came Marisol....and the pattern kept going and I simply COULD NOT justify any of his behavior as actually really being attracted to/wanting/loving ANY of these women.

I understand that plenty of heterosexual and bisexual men also have this kind of avoidant-attachment relationship style, and that it could also stem from trauma, the way he grew up, patriarchy, etc, but the way he FORCES himself to be in a relationship with these women. The way he NEVER allows a genuine bond with a woman to just grow naturally and always has to force it to start, and then desperately cut it off when he's finally reached his limit, truly feels like he's torturing himself. And I'm so sorry, but I feel like if you were a person who genuinely wanted to be with a woman or a man, or anyone, in any capacity, you would not be torturing yourself over being with them.

Especially when I look at him in comparison to Buck, a canon bisexual man. I never once doubted that Buck actually loved Abby. I never once doubted that Buck was actually trying in his relationships with Ali, Taylor, and Natalia. When he was interested in these women it didn't feel forced. Unhealthy? Sure. Not the right fit for him? Absolutely. But forced? Like he was only doing it because he thought he had to? Never. Sure, maybe Buck held on longer than he should've because he didn't want to lose them, but that's because he still wanted their love even if it wasn't healthy for him.

I don't see any of that with Eddie. Shannon, and Eddie's relationship with her, has always felt like a crutch for Eddie, like an excuse, before she came back, when she was present, and long LONG after she died. So the argument that "well Ana and Marisol just aren't Shannon" will never work for me.

I also think Eddie being demisexual would be a better fit narratively at this point than bisexual as well. But then again, there's overlap and it's all very subjective and yeah--just a lot of queer theory to get into that I'm not an expert on, so I'm just gonna reiterate again. This is just my opinion.

If the show really wanted Eddie to be bisexual, and stated it as such, I would be fine with it, and I would accept it graciously and happily. But I do honestly feel like it wouldn't really fit well into the story they've been telling. At this point in time, with everything that we know, and everything we've seen, the only thing that I believe truly fits with the narrative is that Eddie's a repressed gay man and/or demisexual.

But if real-life bisexual people see themselves in Eddie, that will ALWAYS be valid, regardless of what the show says in regards to his sexuality. Fuck, they'll probably just leave him unlabeled regardless, in which case, any and all headcanons are valid.

This is a nuanced topic, and I do admit that IN REAL LIFE (remember I'm just discussing FICTIONAL characters here based purely on what a NARRATIVE has shown us which is all we can truly take as fact) someone in Eddie's position could for sure be bisexual and have this exact same experience.

I just think in my personal subjective opinion that with all we've seen in canon thus far, it would feel most organic to the story (and doesn't make Eddie look like a fucking asshole who chooses not to care at all about the women he's dating) if he realized he was a repressed gay man.

[tip-top-cloud-surfer]

What is L-O-V-E? - Hangman

Pairing: Hangman / Bradshaw!Fem!OC (Lena) (Ex-Wife!OC)

Word Count: 4.2k

Warnings: Divorce and Separation; Angst; References to Child Custody Agreements; One Sided Feelings; Toxic/Conflictual Dynamics; References to Goose and Carole; Female Bradshaw OC and Named Son OC

This work, all of my works, and my entire blog is 18+ Only!

Summary: Lena Bradshaw (formerly Seresin) struggles once again to keep the peace between her ex-husband Jake and her older brother Bradley for her son's sake. And the uranium facility mission only seems to heighten the stakes of it all.

A.N. Everyone's a little toxic here. Just so we're clear.

Part 2 Part 3

Master List

Lena Bradshaw was not the best when it came to dealing with conflict.

If she were to see a therapist, they probably would have blamed that on the fact that she was an orphan before she was even a teenager and didn’t remember her biological father. Childhood trauma and all that. But either way, she was horrible at dealing with conflict.

Especially in her personal life.

There was the fight between Bradley and Maverick over the Naval Academy. Then there were the fights between Bradley and her now ex-husband Jake. And then, of course, there was her divorce. She simultaneously was both too compromising and too difficult at the same time.

But regardless, Lena had one main priority in her life now. And that was her son, Nickie. Nicholas Jacob Seresin-Bradshaw. The ‘Bradshaw’ got added on after the divorce.

Nickie was on the cusp of turning four now and quickly growing more curious about the world around him. And that raised a lot of maternal anxiety in Lena. Especially when it came to Nickie’s fascination with aviation. Particularly naval aviation. She shouldn’t have been surprised. Every single important male figure in Nickie’s life was a naval aviator. But it still scared her.

“Look at all the planes, Mommy!” Nickie shouted, causing Lena to snap out of her thoughts.

“I know, there’s a lot of them,” she agreed softly.

Lena turned back to the road and changed lanes, heading for the San Diego International Airport to pick up her brother. Bradley called her yesterday to tell her that he was returning to Top Gun for some mission and Lena was sure that her blood pressure hadn’t returned to a normal level since then.

“Is Uncle Roos on one of those planes?” Nickie questioned excitedly, pressing his face to the window.

“He should have landed by now.”

Lena pulled out her phone and pressed on Bradley’s contact. Nickie peeled his face off of the window, leaving marks where his nose and forehead were leaned up against it.

“Are you calling him?”

“Yes, because your uncle never tells me where he is,” Lena replied dryly.

She was also waiting for a text or call from her ex-husband, but so far it was radio silence. That wasn’t necessarily odd, however. After one of Jake’s deployments got extended last minute and Nickie was inconsolable when Lena broke the news to him, Jake didn’t call her until he was actually standing on American soil.

But if Bradley got the call back to Top Gun for some big mission, Lena had to assume that Jake would also be returning to Miramar. Lena didn’t want to wade into the rivalry between her brother and her ex-husband, but Jake was the better pilot.

Don’t tell Bradley that she said that. Ever.

“Hello, this is your captain speaking,” Rooster answered the call in a mock-pilot voice. Lena rolled her eyes as Nickie giggled from the backseat.

“Where am I picking you up again?” she asked, glancing at the sidewalk.

“Aw, you’re no fun,” Rooster jokingly whined.

“Hi, Uncle Roos!” Nickie shouted from the backseat.

“Hey, buddy! How are you?” Bradley asked, reverting back to his normal voice.

“Good! There’s lots of planes here!”

“There are,” Rooster agreed.

“Look, if you want the free ride and meal that I promised, you do have to tell me where you are so that I can pick you up,” Lena sighed, driving slowly through the terminal.

“I’m down at the end. Right past the last set of speed bumps before you get to the next airline.”

“Okay, then we’ll see you in a few seconds.”

“No, no, Mommy, you’re supposed to say, ‘copy that’,” Nickie corrected her.

“You tell her, Nickie!”

“Goodbye,” Lena stressed, ending the call.

She plopped her phone into the cupholder and looked through the crowded mess on the sidewalk. Lena slowly rolled over the last set of speed bumps before Nickie began to eagerly bounce in his seat and press his hands against the window.

“There he is!”

“Still dressed like its 1986,” Lena mumbled under her breath.

Rooster waved comedically to Nickie as he followed Lena’s car, causing Nickie to laugh and wave back to him just as dramatically. Lena slowed the car down before putting it into park. Rooster walked around to the back, opened the trunk, and placed his duffel bag down.

“Uncle Roos!” Nickie called excitedly.

“Is that Nickie? Nah, you’re too big to be Nickie,” Rooster teased his nephew.

“It’s me!” Nickie huffed as Rooster walked around the car.

“Thanks for picking me up, Sis. You’re too kind,” Rooster joked, sliding into the passenger seat.

“I know, I am,” Lena replied with a small smile.

She leaned over and tugged her brother into a tight hug that Bradley happily returned. It had been a solid eight months since the Bradshaw siblings were in the same city. And even though Bradley called and emailed her whenever he could, it was nice to have her brother sitting beside her again.

“How was your flight?” Lena asked, turning to pull out of the airport.

“Not too bad. Long. But now I get to hang out with my favorite nephew all day!” Rooster replied, spinning around to face Nickie.

“I’m your only nephew!”

“Still counts!”

“Seatbelt,” Lena stated, smacking Rooster on the arm. “Even fighter pilots need to wear their seatbelts.”

“Yeah, Uncle Roos!”

Lena drove them away from the airport, chatting casually with Rooster about his most recent deployment and any other life updates. But Nickie quickly butted into the conversation and informed Uncle Rooster all about his life. Rooster listened along intently, adding commentary where necessary, and genuinely making Nickie feel heard.

After all, Nickie was Rooster’s godson. Jake was more than a little annoyed about it at the time, but Rooster was Nickie’s godfather. And Rooster absolutely adored Nickie. He hated the fact that Nickie’s dad was Jake, but he wouldn’t hesitate to spend any time with Nickie. Ever.

“And Daddy promised to take me to a football game soon!” Nickie yelled out excitedly, missing how Rooster’s expression changed.

“Did you get that in writing?” Rooster asked Nickie dryly.

Lena immediately smacked Rooster on the arm, causing him to huff and rub the tender skin. Nickie was a little confused about the shift in the atmosphere, but he just laughed off the interaction between his mom and his uncle. Lena shot her brother a look before turning back to the road.

“Do not talk bad about J-A-K-E in front of Nickie,” she stated, leaving no room for argument.

The only time that Lena ever saw her brother turn purple with rage, minus the paper pulling situation, was when she told him about her and Jake. Rooster spouted off just about every bad word that he ever heard about Jake, told Lena that she was making the biggest mistake of her life, and swore up and down that Jake was just going to break her heart.

Rooster quieted down about his distaste for Jake around the time that Nickie was born and they both used Nickie as a buffer between them when they were forced to be around each other. But Lena just wished that they would just bury the hatchet already. And she definitely would not tolerate either of them talking bad about the other in front of Nickie.

Absolutely not.

“I’m just saying—”

“—And you’re going to stop saying whatever it is,” Lena interjected, shooting her brother a sharp glare. “He apologized for that and he made it up. So, drop it.”

“I’m just saying that he’s an A-S-S-H-O—”

“—Brad, I know, okay?” Lena huffed, getting a little aggravated with her brother. “I left him for a reason. But don’t talk bad about him in front of your nephew. He’s still part of our lives whether you like it or not. So, don’t talk about him like that. Got it?”

“Fine,” Rooster replied, dropping the discussion. He turned back to Nickie with a new and slightly forced smile. “We can toss a ball around in the backyard when we get to your house, Nickie.”

“Yay!”

Lena pulled up to her and Nickie’s home a few minutes later. The house that actually used to belong to Maverick and was the house that she and Bradley lived in after their mom passed. When Lena called Maverick crying about her divorce, he gifted her the house. Unprompted and despite the fact that Lena told him that it was too much.

Maverick called it a fresh start. And, so, Lena took it.

“I’ll race you inside,” Rooster told Nickie, who hurriedly tugged at his car seat.

“There’s a child lock on his door,” Lena sighed, causing Rooster to glance back at her.

“Well, then I’ll get you out and then we’ll race, Nickie.”

Rooster pulled Nickie out of his car seat and set him on the ground. But Nickie wasn’t going to wait for anyone and took off for the house. Rooster was right behind him, which caused Nickie to squeal. Lena smiled to herself and slid out of the car. Lena walked up after them and unlocked the door.

“The baseball stuff is in that closet. Do not trek dirt into my house, Bradley.”

“Copy that,” Rooster replied, barely listening, as Nickie ran over to his toy closet.

Nickie and Rooster headed outside to toss a baseball around while Lena started on lunch. She was in the middle of pulling out ingredients for sandwiches when her phone started to buzz. Noting the contact, Lena let out a sigh and answered the call.

“Hello?”

“Are you at work?” Jake asked as Lena moved around her kitchen.

“No, I took the day off. My brother is in town.”

“Did he get called back to Top Gun?” Jake immediately questioned, unable to hide his distaste.

“Yes, why?”

“I got called up too. And so did Javy.”

Lena paused for a moment, staring out the window. If the Navy already called in Jake, Bradley, and Javy, she had to assume that something big was happening. And by ‘big’ she meant dangerous. And Lena preferred to stay away from the danger zone. Very far away from the danger zone.

“So, are you coming to Miramar soon then?” Lena asked, refocusing on the phone call.

“I’m driving down from Lemoore now. It says that I’m about four hours away.” There was a beat of silence before Jake asked, “Am I allowed to come over since the chicken is there?”

“Jake,” Lena pleaded quietly, “he’s still Nickie’s uncle. We haven’t seen him in nearly a year.”

“Well, I’m Nickie’s dad.”

“I’m aware,” Lena sighed, leaning on the countertop. “And Nickie knows that too.” Lena glanced out the window before turning back to her call. “Bradley isn’t staying for dinner. He should be gone by the time that you get here.”

“Thank you.”

“Did you want me to tell Nickie that you’re coming here?”

“No, I’ll surprise him.”

“Okay. Text me when you get to Miramar.”

“I will. Bye.”

“Bye, Jake.”

Setting her phone down on the countertop, Lena held her head in her hands and took a breath.

She didn’t plan on getting divorced. She didn’t want to get divorced. She tried to make it work. She tried to get them into counseling, she tried to communicate how she was feeling and what she needed from their relationship, and she reminded herself over and over again about how miserable her mom was as a single mom.

But she wasn’t her mom. She wasn’t strong like her mom. She didn’t lose Jake like Carole lost Goose. She lost Jake while he was standing right there in front of her. The fantasy that she had in her head shattered and there were too many pieces to pick up and put back together.

And even though her ex-mother-in-law accused her of enjoying the divorce, Lena didn’t take any pleasure in it. But she tried and she failed. And she tried again and she failed. And there were only so many times that she could try before she lost it. So, she got divorced.

Turning back to the bread, Lena simply focused on making lunch. She eventually set the plates down on the table and walked over to the sliding door. Pushing it open, she stuck her head outside.

“Lunch is ready. But leave your dirty shoes on the steps,” she called, shooting a look at Rooster.

“Copy that, Mommy!” Nickie shouted happily.

They all sat around the table, enjoying lunch and catching up. Taking a sip from her drink, Lena turned to her brother.

“So, what time are you leaving?”

“Before dinner time. I should see who else got the call up. And they’ll all be at the Hard Deck.”

“Say ‘hi’ to Penny for me,” Lena replied, wiping at Nickie’s face.

“I will,” Rooster promised.

“I like Penny,” Nickie announced, pushing his vegetables around on his plate. “She gave me a pop-sickle. And let me ring the bell!”

“I’ve always wanted to ring the bell,” Rooster told Nickie, as if he were sharing top-secret government information. “What was it like?”

“Really loud! Mommy didn’t like it.”

Rooster laughed as Lena shook her head at the memory. She distinctly recalled dragging Nickie away from the bell because he wouldn’t let go. Luckily, it was just Penny, Jimmy, and Amelia in the bar at the time. But poor Theo the dog had to run for cover.

“Because you did it when I was standing right next to the bell, Nickie. And you wouldn’t let go,” Lena reminded her son, poking his cheek.

“‘Cause it was fun!”

“Mhmm,” Lena teased her son. Glancing down at his plate, she sighed and set down her utensils. “Nickie, can you try eating some of the vegetables?”

“I don’t want broccoli. It’s gross!”

“What about the carrots then?” Lena tried to negotiate. “If you eat two carrots, we’ll have some ice cream. How about that?”

“Ice cream?” Nickie repeated, perking up instantly.

“Now that sounds like an even trade to me,” Rooster agreed, earning a thankful nod from Lena.

“I think so. Here, we’ll all eat one together.”

Lena and Rooster picked up a carrot each and Nickie begrudgingly followed along. And even though he looked like he hated his life while he chewed on the carrots, Nickie still ate two of them without too much protest. Quickly hopping up when he was done, Nickie turned to his mom.

“Ice cream!”

Lena shot her son a look, earning a sheepish smile in return that definitely came from his dad’s side of the family.

“Please,” Nickie added on at the end.

After Nickie scarfed down a scoop of ice cream, they headed outside. Nickie happily ran around the driveway. Sometimes he would toss a ball to Rooster and sometimes he would shoot it at the small basketball hoop, but Nickie happily entertained himself while on his sugar high. And that left Lena and Rooster some space to catch up on topics that Lena didn’t want Nickie to hear.

“So, is he coming?” Rooster asked, causing Lena to sigh.

“Yes, he’s coming,” she confirmed quietly. “Don’t tell Nickie. He wants to surprise him.”

“Do you need me to leave?”

“No, I told him to come around dinner. He’ll text me when he’s close and ready,” Lena replied, fiddling with her necklace. “But please don’t antagonize him if you see him.”

“It’s usually the other way around.”

“Just please don’t try and make things worse,” Lena sighed, turning to her brother.

“I’m always on my best behavior.”

Lena let out an incredulous laugh that immediately had Rooster rolling his eyes. It was the godawful laugh that Lena always used when he was being an asshole to piss him off even more. He hated it. And he knew that Hangman hated it too. And Bradley guessed that their mom Carole and Maverick hated it as well because it always made them go ghost white when they heard it.

“Oh, you kill me, you really do,” Lena sighed, wiping fake tears away.

~~~~~

Jake knew that as soon as Rooster started up the piano routine, he was going to leave.

He studied the competition, caught up with Javy, and had a nice cold beer for the first time in five months. So, when the chord to the jukebox was pulled, Jake left the Hard Deck.

Hell, if he had it his way, he would have already been with Lena and Nickie, but Jake didn’t get his way.

He didn’t get his way when he was served with divorce papers. He didn’t get his way when Lena moved with Nickie down to San Diego. He didn’t get his way when Lena was awarded primary custody by the courts because he was active-duty.

Jake Seresin just didn’t get his way when it came to Lena Bradshaw.

If Jake had it his way, he would still be married to Lena, living in Lemoore in the house that he handpicked for them, and the damn chicken would mind his fucking business. He would see Nickie every day that he was in the States. Maybe they would have even had a second or third kid by now.

But Jake didn’t get his way.

Pulling up to Lena’s house, Jake headed for the side door. It was unlocked and Jake let himself inside the house. he took a few steps until he saw Lena cooking dinner in the kitchen. She glanced up and smiled when she spotted him.

“Nickie, sweetie, can you come in here for me?” Lena called, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

Nickie walked into Jake’s view from the family room, where he was probably playing with his toys or watching cartoons. Nickie held the coyote plushie—even though Jake was a hundred percent sure that it was actually a wolf—that Javy got him to his chest as he walked over to the kitchen, completely unaware of Jake’s presence.

“Hey, who’s that?” Lena asked Nickie, pointing in Jake’s direction.

Nickie turned around, following his mom’s finger. But when he spotted Jake, his dad who he hadn’t seen in nearly five months, Nickie let out a little delighted gasp and ran over. Jake bent down and caught Nickie as he flung himself forward.

“Daddy!” Nickie yelled out.

“Hey, little man,” Jake called, scooping Nickie up into a tight hug.

Jake held his son to his chest and pressed a kiss to the top of his head. Rocking his son back and forth, Jake tried to keep a lid on his own emotions.

“I missed you.”

“I missed you too, Daddy.”

“God, you’re getting so big,” Jake murmured, mostly to himself, as he brushed Nickie’s hair back.

“Bigger than you!” Nickie stated, sitting up straighter.

“Someday, maybe,” Jake agreed with a light chuckle. “Are you being a good boy for Mommy?”

Nickie nodded quickly with a small, mischievous grin. It was the grin that always popped up when Nickie got caught doing something that he wasn’t supposed to do. It also usually resulted in Lena turning to Jake with an exasperated ‘he gets that from your side of the family’ expression.

“Most of the time,” Lena joked, standing a few steps away.

Jake straightened up a bit more and nodded to his ex-wife with a small smile. He tried to not let his eyes linger on her bare left ring finger and turned to meet her gaze. And even though it had been about seven years since he met Lena Bradshaw—though she was still Lena Seresin in his mind—he still got that same warm feeling crawling up his neck whenever he saw her.

“Lena,” Jake greeted her softly.

“It’s good to see you, Jake,” she returned quietly. “We were just about to eat. Are you hungry?”

“I could definitely eat,” Jake agreed with a nod. “Thanks.”

“Of course.”

“Are you staying all night, Daddy?” Nickie called, redirecting Jake’s attention.

“I don’t think so, Nick,” Jake replied, fixing Nickie’s shirt for him.

“Aw,” Nickie complained, causing both Lena and Jake to wince. “Why not?”

“I’ve got training tomorrow morning. Super early,” Jake explained, not even completely lying.

“Can he stay another night, Mommy?” Nickie asked Lena, causing her to freeze for a moment.

“Yeah, he can stay another night,” she agreed, nodding along. “But let’s eat dinner first, okay?”

They sat around the table as a family. It was times like those that Jake sometimes forgot that they weren’t married anymore. This house wasn’t his home. It wasn’t their home. And well, Jake could never dwell on those feelings anyways. Not without whiskey on hand, anyways. Jake helped Nickie cut the bigger piece of chicken into little bits while Lena placed a scoop of vegetables on Nickie’s plate.

“How was the Hard Deck?” Lena asked, turning to her ex.

“It was fine. Scoped out the competition. Played a little pool. Made an early exit,” Jake replied, causing Lena to nod along. “Maverick got thrown out.”

Lena picked her head up sharply at the news and Nickie started to bounce in his seat at the mention of his great uncle. Though more often than not, Nickie called Maverick something along the lines of ‘Grandpa Mav’ because Maverick was the closest figure to a grandfather that Nickie had. Jake’s parents stopped visiting after the divorce, after all.

“Maverick is in town?” Lena asked Jake quietly.

“He didn’t tell you?” Jake returned, raising an eyebrow.

“No, he didn’t,” Lena stated, shaking her head. “And he got thrown out?”

“He left his phone on the bar and couldn’t pay his tab.”

“I told him not to go there,” Lena sighed, shaking her head.

“And your brother was there too,” Jake replied, causing Lena to reluctantly meet his gaze.

“How was that?” she asked quietly, glancing down at her plate.

“It was how it normally goes,” Jake muttered, causing Lena to wince.

“Daddy, can we watch a movie together? Please!” Nickie asked, grabbing Jake’s arm.

“Yeah, we can watch a movie, Nick. But we have to finish eating first, okay?”

“Okay!”

Jake asked Nickie about how things were going at daycare. Nickie happily told his dad everything that was going on in his life and held onto every single word that Jake spoke about aviation. Lena glanced between her son and Jake, easily picking out the similarities between them. After all, Nickie was quickly growing to look like his dad’s twin.

They eventually cleaned up and Jake settled on the couch with Nickie, who picked out a movie for them to watch. Lena gave them their space and went back to her office to catch up on some work. Lena poked her head out once to remind Jake about Nickie’s bedtime, but Jake was already giving Nickie a bath, so she just went back to work.

Jake came and knocked on the door to her office when it was time to put Nickie to bed. They walked into Nickie’s bedroom together like the divorce was just some bad dream that they already forgot about. Lena pulled back the blankets on Nickie’s bed and stepped aside for Jake.

“Alright, time for bed, Nickie.”

Jake laid Nickie down on his bed and pulled up Nickie’s blankets over him. Tucking Nickie into bed for the night, Jake handed Nickie his coyote plushie and ruffled Nickie’s still wet hair.

“Are you coming back, Daddy?” Nickie asked, causing Jake to nod quickly.

“Yeah, I’m coming back. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay,” Nickie replied, immediately perking up.

“I love you, Nickie.”

“Love you too, Daddy.”

Nickie sat up and wrapped his little arms around Jake’s neck to hug him. Jake quickly hugged Nickie back and pressed a kiss to Nickie’s head. After holding onto Nickie for a bit longer, Jake reluctantly released his son and stepped aside. Lena walked over, pressed a kiss to Nickie’s head, and told him that she loved him before she and Jake headed out of Nickie’s bedroom.

Carefully shutting the door, Lena waited a moment before she turned to Jake.

“I’m working tomorrow, so if you get out before four, you can pick him up if you want. Just text me,” Lena offered as she and Jake walked towards the door.

“I will if we get out,” Jake replied immediately.

“Do you still have the car seat your truck?”

“Never took it out,” Jake assured her, grabbing his wallet and keys.

“Okay,” she agreed softly, nodding along. Wrapping her arms around herself, Lena nodded to him before stepping to the side. “Goodnight, Jake.”

“Night,” he whispered back, reaching for the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow,” she returned quietly.

Jake nodded to her one last time before taking his leave and heading over to his car. Lena closed the door behind him and locked it for the night. Watching Jake’s truck drive off into the night, Lena sighed and leaned on the door, resting her head against the wood.

“Talk to me, Mom,” she murmured, glancing up at the ceiling with a conflicted expression. “What do I do?”

Part 2 Part 3

[ghostsbimbo]

the boys & hearing a song from your phone on shuffle a/n: nsfw songs ahead <3 ur welcome. tw: some songs contain heavy subjects such as rape.

simon "ghost" riley - good lookin' by dixon dallas

He's bouncing off my booty cheeks, I love the way he rides I can hardly breathe when he's pumping deep inside I kiss him on his neck and then he kisses on my bussy Call him "Daddy" while I holler Man, that boy so damn good looking (looking, looking)

He has a thousand yard stare as you try to contain your laughter at the song. you love this song, and the artist in general. You originally found him when he was just doing rap, his name being iamjakehill. you completely embraced both the pop punk (ur pretty) project & the country project of his. and now, you're showing your lieutenant one of his very gay masterpieces, despite the artist being a very straight man.

könig - dana dan by bloodywood

Not all men, yes, all men Need all men for what we're solvin' Can't be what it's been but we're evolvin' You see for yourself now get involved in Talking all in, do more, boy, it's a war Chainsaw to the dead weight, leave it raw Bloody galore as we clean out the core Yeah, we do it for her, so we kick in the door

he definitely looked up the lyrics, meaning behind the song, and translation as soon as it was over, and with that he found a new band to listen to. listen, the dude may basically be a war criminal [ they all fuckin are, lets admit it ] but he sure as hell would fucking destroy a rapist as soon as he had the opportunity. all of them would.

john price - i threw glass at my friend's eyes and now I'm on probation by destroy boys

But fuck you! You're so old, dude! Like seriously, what do you think you're doing? Your hands are so big and you're so tall, wow! You know, I kinda wish I had let you do that one thing that one time But in retrospect, it would've been a bad idea 'cause You don't care about me like I care about you so I feel bad

man, this dude felt this song was a personal attack on him. yes, y'all had an age gap, but you needed to assure him he was perfectly fine, and you just liked the song because of trauma prior to meeting him. being a kid/teenager with unmonitered internet access really fucked you up, buddy.

keegan p. russ - chokehold by sleep token [ cover by will ramos ]

So show me that which I cannot see Even if it hurts me Even if I can't sleep Oh, and though we act out of our holy duty to be constantly awake

to say he loved the dudes voice would be an understatement, and then to figure out it was a cover of a song and he heard the original? the man was offended you kept will ramos, his band lorna shore, and the band sleep token from him. his phone would end up being filled with both bands discography.

kyle "gaz" garrick - to the hellfire by lorna shore

Accept this descent into the night Releasing your grasp to induce separation Plunged into the shadows Lost in sensation, we're free falling down into the everblack Can you feel it? These pins and needles

He got scared. He also wondered how you could understand what the guy was saying the whole time. He got VERY confused when the pig squeals started - confused enough to ask if they had a pig in studio. You laughed and explained that no, the vocalist that was screaming - Will - did it all himself. It then lead to you info dumping on the genre of music as a whole.

johnny "soap" mactavish - pisces by JINJER

No promises I ever give Don't rely on me and I won't deceive The beginning or the end you can't tell When I wave my fin and shake my tail I grew in different normality With unblamable morality Hooks and nets are there for me But I'm skittish

The soft voice is what got to him, his eyes going wide when he heard the screaming. He didn't believe you at first when you told him the woman singing was also the one screaming, too. - "No fuckin' way is that a bonnie doin' that." - so you pulled up the song on youtube, and then also pulled up a few live videos of the band, too. He believed you after a few videos, and may have gotten a little jealous when you said she causes you to have a MAJOR gay panic. You also state you wish you had the same amount of talent as her, especially with the screaming.

[real-fire-emblem-takes]

i wish i knew how to make a fire emblem bc... game ideasce. waugh.

brief summary: emotionally detached lesbian leader of a mercenary group saves a sweet peppy manakete woman (who does look like shes 20 and not 11) and ends up getting hauled into her adopted unadopted father's capitalistic quest to conquer all the (lycian alliance like) other nations on his continent. manakete woman is like hey um this is fucked up why are you lostening to this guy and the leader is like well i have mysterious reasons. they do a few war crimes before they realize Why : evil cult of guys who wanna revive a fell dragon are working in the distant Hugeass Empire to do just that and need manaketes to do this... but they scared them all off by existing so theyre trying to bribe people to do it. the warring alliance are too busy at war to do that, the nation of knockoff laguz are too busy giving a shit about other shapeshifters, and the other less defined nations dont have the manpower to capture a fuckimg dragon. the merc leader realizes this and as she has become a little gay but mostly besties w her manakete friend, she begins working against her father unfather to stop this shit from happening. she unconquers the other nations in the alliance but given she and her band defeated and killed the leaders of the nations they have no leader and given her band is now the strongest... people just start following the merc leader anyway. it helps that most of the leaders of the allied nations were assholes making the commonfolk do battle for their personal gain, and the merc leader does her own battling. merc leader lesbian is crowned the first queen of this new united kingdom (against her will) and is bullied into marrying Someone bc thats how royalty works and she chooses someone from her merc band Of Course.

20 year timeskip.

the new nation has become a safe haven for manaketes and all sorts of outcasts as Her Gay Highness has worked tirelessly to make sure the people who made her queen dont regret it because she has thinly veiled anxiety issues about her worth as a person. thanks guy (the lord who made her conquer in the first place) who adopted this war orphan from the streets and then unadopted her when his wife finally bore him a child. oh speaking of children given its been 20 years, characters who youve paired can have kids. but you gotta pair em before the timeskip, and only two characters always have a kid and thats the merc leader and the manakete girl best friend (gay). hey remember that huge fuckoff empire to the east? Yeah theyve launched a fullscale war against the laguz nation to just force them to hand over any manaketes after the evil cult installed a 14 year old puppet emperor. the laguz nation goes Ah Fuck Ah Shit Ah Fuck and asks their good buddies the combined kingdom to help them which they Do. but by the time they get there, the losses are extreme and the king of the laguz nation is dying. the ex merc leader helps his successor into her role and the two women go "oh yeah we're going to fucking destroy the evil empire" and then they do. The war is hard and sucks but eventually they fight their way to the evil cult. a few things happen : 1 the manakete who the ex merc leader has been besties with for 20 years is the DAUGHTER of the fell dragon the cult is trying to resurrect. the merc leader freaks out, and because of her trauma about people she loved abandoning her, kicks the manakete woman out of the band and Also Take Your Damn Kid. and your spouse unless the spouse is the merc leader in which case a truly heartwrenching cutscene plays. 2 : the cult members immediately find snd capture the manakete woman and are preparing to kill her kid and use the blood of the fell dragon to revive it. the merc leader hears about this and decides the final battle has to start Now to save them because holy shit that was a mistake obviously theyre not working together. 3 : yknow who WAS working w the cult? all the nobles who hate the merc leaders unnoble blood. so the cult know theyre there. whoops. they fight the cult but just barely lose, and fhe manakete woman's kid is Slain. the fell dragon rises, not bc of the blood, but bc the fell dragons only daughter got So Pissed. turns out the fell dragon isnt actually that cruel, not in life anyway, but given how he was revived by anger snd not by true love he comes back Wrong and the cult descend on him and tear him apart and eat his flesh & use his bones as weapons. oh they dont worship him they want to use him to kill all shapeshifters and anyone who works against them forever. they can, however, use this pissed off manakete by casting a spell on her and having her fight her former friends. Huge fuckoff battle. It ends w the lesbian merc leader slaying the leader of the cult and, agonizingly, the friend she saved forever ago. the manakete returns to normal once the mortal blow is dealt, and thanks the mercenary leader for saving her once again, and begs her to remain a peaceful and kind leader for the rest of her life. she dies. the merc leader is Only Anguish. the world is saved at what cost?

epilogue : the merc leader rules until she dies, ensuring that the still-combined nations of the west, the newly managed empire of the east, and the reconstructed laguz kingdom to the south are all on good terms and recovering well from the war. manaketes establish their own nation after being given land from each nation where they meet to own for themselves. the leader of it is revealed to be the manakete bestie's other child she had borne RIGHT before the war began who she had only implied existed in her supports w her eldest child and a few others. merc leader leaves behind a vast and tumultuous legacy, but her child rises to keep her ideals alive and make sure nobody can accuse her of having no worth. she chose peace and love and thats what is important at the end of the day.

various paired endings. if the merc leader and manakete bestie got married (the canon route but w/e), the merc leader never remarried and vowed to see her wife in anime chess heaven. its very gay. end credits.

oh i forgot to mention. there is an avatar character who can marry anyone who likes that gender as every character now has a canon sexuality. the avatar character is the m/cs childhood friend who does nothing in the story but is Kind Of Cool. goodnight

👀 love the concept

[canonicallyobserving911]

“I’m still in love with you but... I needed to learn how to love myself too!”

Fanonwriter2023 on AO3

Where CANON and FANON collide!

Season 7 FANON Speculation: Buddie Multi-Chapter Fanfic - Hiatus Reading: “I’m still in love with you but... I needed to learn how to love myself too!”

Chapter 17 is now available on AO3.

This is an EPIC LOVE STORY!

“I’m still in love with you but... I needed to learn how to love myself too!”

Currently 17 chapters completed: 631.3K Words; Rated: Mature

One chapter will be posted at a time.

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Here's an emotionally charged snippet from Chapter 17 of one of Buck's and Eddie's conversations.

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As the urgency Eddie’s been feeling in his heart resurfaces, he lifts his arm and puts his hand on the back of Buck’s neck to deepen the kiss so he can hear that beautiful high-pitched noise he loves to hear.  He gets an instance reaction and as their tongues continue to tangle, they lick into each other’s mouths while moaning and gasping.

He uses his other hand to cup Buck’s cheek and they keep kissing until they need to come up for air.

After they pull back, Buck meets his eyes and he sees so much love and pure unadulterated intimacy in them that it takes his breath away.

They’re not kissing anymore but they may as well be because their lips are only millimeters apart.  That’s when he notices the look in Buck’s eyes change and to him it looks like they’re filled with worry and fear.  He’s about to ask him what’s wrong but Buck’s speaks first.

His voice is just above a whisper when he pleads, “Please, don’t ever leave me!”

“NEVER!  Always and forever, remember?”  He whispers back.

“I’ll always be yours and you’ll always be mine.”

“I love you with everything I am and with everything I have… I’ll never leave you and we're going to be together, ALWAYS AND FOREVER!”

And that’s all it takes for Buck to lean back in and kiss him again.  Except this time, it’s different because there’s a hint of trepidation in it and to him it feels like something’s going to happen that might try to take them away from each other again.

The feeling causes him to pull back, gently reposition them so that Buck’s on his back then he moves on top of him.  He settles his body so that his legs are in between Buck’s as they maintain eye contact.

He searches those ocean blue eyes he loves so much then whispers, “Tell me what’s wrong”.

“I—I don’t…”  He trails off and looks down.

What is Buck going to say next and how will Eddie respond to it? 👀

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This is an EPIC LOVE STORY!

Fic Summary: Months after Buck and Eddie were hit by the same lightning strike; they’re still struggling with the aftermath of it.  But before they make their love confessions, they’ll spend time getting to know themselves as individuals first. Eddie learns to enjoy the simple things in life as he participates in activities on his own and with new friends while Buck learns the rest of the 31-year-old deep dark family secret about his conception and birth. Their journey to forever is still a work in progress but once they finally admit they’re in love with each other, everything that follows their love confessions will be cataclysmic.

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Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1 - Eddie makes a new friend while Buck receives devastating news regarding the sperm donation he made for Connor and Kameron.

Chapter 2 - Buck does a lot of research to learn more about the abnormalities found in his red blood cells and Eddie starts a new therapy journey that’s all about him and not the traumas he’s experienced.

Chapter 3 - After more than a month, Buck and Eddie finally spend time together outside of work but it doesn’t end well and they part with a lot of uncertainty regarding their places in each other’s lives.

Chapter 4 - Eddie has a few realizations about his life which causes him to consider moving back to El Paso, TX while Buck continues to be reminded of his past which causes him to take an impromptu road trip across America.

Chapter 5 - Both Buck and Eddie have difficult conversations with their parents and Buck finally learns the truth behind the reason why his mother despised him while Eddie finally tells his mother about the way she tries to control him.

Chapter 6 - More than two weeks after Buck pushed Eddie away after suggesting they needed a break; Eddie decides to try again. Eddie’s there for Buck when he’s at his worst just like Buck was there for him when he was at his worst and he won’t let Buck give up.

Chapter 7 - After Buck’s mental breakdown, Eddie has his back the same way Buck had his when he had his own breakdown more than a year ago.  They share several vulnerable and emotionally intimate moments with one another and they begin to realize their small, sweet and caring gestures matter just as much if not more than any grand gesture ever could because these are the foundations of a long-lasting love relationship.

Chapter 8 - Buck, Eddie and Chris all have their own therapists and during their sessions, they reflect on their pasts while they’re in the present so they can prepare for their future together as a family.

Chapter 9 - Buck and Eddie are there for each other when Buck has to testify as a witness during the trial.  But by the end of it, they’ll both realize their individual and shared traumas are going to keep resurfacing until they talk about them, deal with the fact that they’re in love with one another and face the fact that they can’t live without each other.

Chapter 10 - As Buck and Eddie finally begin to confront their past traumas, they realize how much they need each other to fill in the gaps of their memories.  Additionally, the universe screams at them for what appears to be the one hundredth time so Buck can realize he doesn’t have to ‘find it’ because he already ‘made it’ and Eddie’s reminded tomorrow isn’t promised and he doesn’t have to die alone if he doesn’t want to.

Chapter 11 - A “virga” or dry thunderstorm is in the forecast but once the rain starts, the thunderstorm happening outside won’t be able to match the storm brewing inside between Buck and Eddie.  It’s the universe’s final scream and when the tumultuous winds begin to blow, they’ll have one last chance to hold onto everything they’ve built over the last six years or they’ll lose it all forever.

Chapter 12 - Buck and Eddie have always shared a deep physical attraction and an emotional intimacy that’s unmatched but now that they’re in a relationship, they’re learning how to navigate the romantic intimacy they’ve been waiting for six years to explore. The love they have for each other is a once in a lifetime, soulmate, love of their lives type of love that transcends space and time.

Chapter 13 - While navigating the newness of their romantic relationship, Buck and Eddie take advantage of every moment they spend together. As their individual lives, people from their pasts, time constraints and the possibility of losing each other again make attempts to interrupt and interfere with their journey to forever, they love, care for, support and hold onto each other even tighter to withstand it all.

Chapter 14 - Buck and Eddie can see the lights at the end of the tunnels regarding the results of Buck’s Cancer Screening along with everything else they’re dealing with. But are the lights they see exits to the tunnels or are they headlights on different runaway trains that are speeding towards them in an effort to interrupt their forever?

Chapter 15 - Buck and Eddie have known they were exactly who the other one wanted in a partner since they met six years ago when they agreed to have each other’s backs. They’re in a romantic relationship, they’re both preparing to ask the other one to spend forever with them and by the end of the seventh week into their relationship, together they will plan their most important and greatest adventure for their future.

Chapter 16 - As Buck and Eddie begin to prepare for their marriage ceremony that will take place in Rome, Italy in December 2023, they start planning their first international adventure as a romantic couple. Even though Chris is still the only person they’ve told about their relationship, several people who know them have already witnessed the love they share and as the days continue, others will witness it too.

Chapter 17 - As Buck and Eddie get closer to departing Los Angeles for their international adventure, a moment in time will remind them; life is fragile, tomorrow isn’t promised and every second of everyday should be cherished because everything can change in an instant. The result of that realization will cause them to hold onto each other even more.

Chapter 18 - Will be posted soon.

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Read chapters 1-17 are available on AO3.

Continue reading on AO3