#;brash mechanic

[princemick-archive]

UZJZIZJZIZZJ KYLE ARE U OKAY?? 😭😭😭

NO CASSY AM I EVER????

[sosagely]

there's such a dissonance between the public perception of kara && the private perception of her.

like, publicly? her reputation tends to precede her. she's known as a bitch, as unapproachable, as violent. and she doesn't do anything to persuade people to think differently. she's intimidating, with a resting bitch face and a sharp tongue. with people she doesn't know, she's blunt as hell. (which leads to a number of fights and incidents when she's younger, that she does somewhat grow out of.)

yet, when people stick around and make the effort to get to know her, almost all of the starts to fade. the layers peel away to reveal an incredibly goody little goober. she's sharp as a whip, and mischievous. she says stupid little jokes and makes herself crack up. she gives ger friends the dunbest nicknames. she's devoted like no one else: that girl would not hesitate to peel the shirt off her back if someone she loved needed it.

[k9wa]

⟁ 7:14 PM ft BOOTHILL.

⠀ — braiding his hair bc my brain is rotting and i miss him.

⚠︎ fluff, thats really it, mechanic!reader but its not really relevant, suggestive if you squint and cover one eye and hang upside down. gn reader, wc 860.

boothill's head was lulled back between a pair of soft, comfy thighs, eyes a content and lazy half lidded as he felt some familiar calloused and precise fingers detangling little pieces of his hair. the sun was almost down past the horizon, and the last few warm rays peeking out left the room hued a gentle orange colour, its two inhabitants bathing in it.. 

he felt a slight tug here and there as you worked your magic, taking the knots out of those long white locks with patient fingers.

“you have such pretty hair.”

you mused quietly, combing out another strand with your nails. boothill's lips tugged up lightly in a gentle smirk— a hint of pride washing over him. he was a bigger sucker for praise than he’d ever admit.

“well, it’s gotta look good if it’s gonna match th’rest of me.” he drawled, voice a low rumble filled with a certain ease that rarely surfaced— well, rarely with others, anyway. he received a playful tug of his hair in response.boothill leaned back a bit more, trying to catch a glimpse of your endearing focussed expression.

he was slowly melting against your deft fingertips, silently whirring internals mimicking the quiet purr of a cat as you twirled a piece around your finger. 

“can i braid it?” you asked simply, already sectioning out a few strands at the top. 

“do whatever you want, sugar.” he granted with a little shrug, smirk still playing on his lips. “reckon a braid’ll help keep it from flyin’ into my eyes so much.”

he felt the rhythmic crossing of each strand as you began to braid, every brush of your nails against his scalp sending a pleasant shiver right through his wires.

“y’know,” he opened, voice still that gravely tone you could never get enough of. “ain’t nobody else i’d sit still for like this.” he admitted, brashness taking a backseat to give way to a tenderness reserved for one person only.

“yeah?” you smiled a bit, continuing to braid. “just for me, huh?”

boothill couldn’t help but let out a scruff, throaty chuckle, vibrations running through his chest.“just for you, darlin’.” he echoed.

 “you’ve got a magic touch, i s’ppose,” his eyes shut briefly. “could get used to this.”

the melodic and methodic movements of your fingers were earnestly making him drowsy, a soothing lullaby that laced and weaved around him in the same patterns as his hair. 

“like being pampered?” you teased playfully, earning a chuckle from him.

“you just got a way of makin’ a man feel real special. that’s all.”

your fingers kept slowly crossing and twisting strands.

“you should let me curl it some day,” you suggested, amusing yourself with the thought of him dawning a bunch of puffy ringlets. “you’d look like ‘genti.”

boothill's low laughter echoed quietly in the room, a deep sound that harmonised with your own. 

“now that’d be somethin’ to see,” he admitted with a playful scoff. “ol’ boothill with curls bouncin’ around like some dandy.”

he shook his head as he pictured it, and you had to flick his cheek to remind him to look straight.

“i'd sport some curls if it meant i get to see you smilin’.”

you smiled fondly at that, taking a small hair tie and wrapping it around the tail of his braid.

“you’re sweeter than you let on.” you reached around to fix his bangs a little bit. 

“there.” you tilted his head up a bit to look at him, feigning shock. “well, ain’t you pretty?”

hearing his own southern drawl echoed back to him made the cowboy snort. “ain’t i just the belle of the ball now?”

boothill's hand instinctively reached back to feel your handiwork, prosthetic fingers tracing along the weaves of his hair.

“mighty fine job, sugar plum.” he commended, turning around to face you on his knees, hands sliding up your thighs until they met behind your back in a careful hug around your waist. he looked up at you— really looked at you, that mushy softness in him pushing out through the cracks you always left in his defences. 

“thanks, darlin’.” he said quietly, those red cruciform pupils locked in on your own. “means more’en you might know, you spendin’ your time fussin’ over me like this.”

the cyborg’s head fell comfortably down in your lsp, nuzzling into you.

“i think fussing over you is a full time job,” you teased lightly, a smile evident in your voice. “not that i mind.”

one of your hands traced the mechanical connections of his arm, all the way up until your fingers gave a gentle brush to his cheek.

boothill let out a breathy chuckle, some air fanning across your tummy. his fingers, a soothing and smooth cool metal, traced little shapes along your lower back.

“well, i reckon i oughta start payin’ you overtime for such dedication.” he quipped quietly, demeanour playful yet earnest as always.

“paying me to start might be better.” you gave a playful pinch to his cheek.  

“i got a few ideas for how i can pay ya,” he teased back, giving a little nip to your thigh.

⠀ MASTERLIST / GOT A REQUEST ?

[jennycalendar]

i think the thing about donna that decimates me personally, esp after coming off of rose and her incredibly loving mother and her adoring boyfriend, is the fact that it is so clear donna's had to develop this big, brash, loud personality as a defense mechanism against the rest of the world and ESPECIALLY her mom, who has so often seen her and been loud about seeing her as selfish and shallow. and even in this first episode we see how kind she is! like YES she cares about money and she wants things exactly the way that she wants them, but the reception hall gets torn up and her very first step is to check in on children that aren't even hers, then turn to the doctor and say "you're a doctor, there are people who are hurt, can't you help?" he picks his people carefully. they're always Like This.

[hana-no-seiiki]

This is generally such a stupid ask but I feel like it would be.. Chaotic? At the very least amusing

Anyways

Batfam x Nicole from Class of 09! Reader

Do what you want (etc make it romantic or platonic, doesn't matter)

Just the batfam (yandere ofc) dealing with a chick who loves to ruin lives for her amusement and sometimes for revenge

Istg she'll just bully them at any chance she gets

~ 🕒

I just binged watched Class of ‘09 and all its endings/choices for you non. I don’t think I can fully depict how brash wittiness of Nicole is but here I go! (I am so traumatized) Didn’t know that’s where “No I’m flirting with you flash me a tiddy bitch” came from no wonder Nicole sounded so familiar.

btw if people are interested in watching class of ‘09 just be warned it’s basically a VN version of Degrees of Lewdity but the mc is actually a minor (without the sex/r*pe mechanic though) and it depicts a lot of just… pedophilia, necrophilia, assault, su*c*de, school shootings, racism??, BE WARNED.

The following content above ^ might be mentioned in this fic but in passing. MASSIVE DDDNE WARNING.

I don’t think I’m comfortable writing stepcest/incest in this blog so despite how perfect it’ll be to make Bruce your step father considering Nicole’s mom has divorced like a hundred times…maybe ask me in @yoru-no-seiiki and I’ll be down for it.

THIS IS ADMITTEDLY TIM + DAMIAN CENTRIC

“Do you even care? Do the results of your actions mean anything to you?”

“Yeah when they affect me, sure.”

You were a bitch. There was no denying that. But you were a pretty one. One many would grovel to be under.

You were used to this, ever since you reached a certain age people just looked at you different, acted in a way that… made you think they were boring, utter losers.

One of those losers was Tim’s friend.

Like all the stupid, horny men in your life, you hung out with him once and he spilled everything there was that you could share.

To the entire campus, the internet, even the news.

And because you were pretty, you got off scot-free. Those morons didn’t even check to see what you’ve been doing the past decade.

Except Tim. Timothy Drake. You only knew that his dad was super rich, and as much as it was tempting to sink your teeth into him and get a load of that daddy’s money, you knew better.

He apparently didn’t.

You see there was one thing every batfam member couldn’t resist. Well, two things. The first was saving people.

The second? Fixing them.

When Tim first approached you he was confused.

You were quite the popular figure in Uni. He heard the rumors. He fully expected to be cussed out to hell and back.

But you were… nice. Agreeable at most really. Brash was an understatement. But you were witty. Your comebacks were swift and deadly.

The more he studied stalked you the more he realized that the two of you were the same.

Two bright people stuck with dull idiots.

And Tim? Tim interested you enough for you to not to completely drop him after the first week. That and most of your bullying probably wouldn’t bode well towards the son of a billionaire.

He was smart, even more so than that nerd friend of his that you destroyed the life of. But more importantly he actually had some tact, and was surprisingly packed underneath all those baggy clothes.

Tim had to admit he was kind of forgetting his entire purpose of ‘fixing’ you.

Until you manipulated yet another guy into jumping off a school building for you. Thankfully he survived because Red Robin happened to be there to apprehend him but still!

And what’s worse, you met up with him afterwards talking about how that Red Robin ruined all your plans of crippling a r*pist.

Wait, a r*pist?

Tim looks through your past victims once more. Admitted he only did a surface level job of studying them in comparison to his PhD level knowledge on everything about you specifically.

And…you were right. Every guy you’ve harassed was being pushy with you in the first place, if not people with authority a decade older.

Fuck.

Well now he had no excuse. He had to make you his.

Meanwhile…

“Ugh, Damian. Can’t you tell your brother to like, fuck off or something? I can feel my social standing totally plummet every second he’s around. How do you handle being related to him?” You groaned. You weren’t fucking stupid. You knew Tim was stalking and drooling all over you lately. You hated it. He was ruining your chances with your new victims.

“Jeez [Y/N]. And here I thought you were like, into him.” Jessica, your actual crush and best friend, commented as she filed her nails.

You being the emotional stunted adult you were only replied with an (admittedly softer) “Eat a sandpaper cock and die bitch.”

Damian stared at you, the words die before they crawl out of his mouth. His hands clenched underneath the lunch tables.

Guess he had another thing to steal from his brother this time.

[sunnylolli]

hi sorry but I CANNOT get the image of older England yelling at his younger self out of my mind. Please can you tell me if there's an au connected to this/we get to see any more of their interactions?

HELLO!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH ANON!!!! < :,)

This is a long one, but I'll try and keep it sensible in length!

The concept of Arthur and his younger self, started out initially being a subplot to my fanfiction Can I Stay For A Year Or Two? It was initially meant to be a subcurrent to Alfred's struggles, where we get an intimate insight into Arthur's own challenges and how his shortcomings in regards to being there for his sons, stems from a very long list of unhealthy coping mechanisms.

The thing is though, I am not good at structuring things, and I quickly realized that it was too much for me to juggle, so I ended up dropping it.

I do have art for it, though, that I've redrawn because I've had it collecting dust for 2 years now I think..Haha... Anyway

I have thought about making it into an au in and of itself, and maybe make it in relation to another drabble of mine, which is just Arthur sitting in a therapy-room talking to a therapist-

But the premise is Arthur, in an attempt to start curbing most of his problems and anger issues, digs into his childhood and slowly but surely, ties past traumas to several bad habits he has in current day.

However, stubborn and impatient as he is, the "healing journey" isn't going fast enough for him, and he tinkers in his basement with spell-work and potions, in an attempt to "expand" his mind a little,.It doesn't entirely go as planned, however, and he ends up with a semi-real version of himself as a child, appearing in his dreams and whenever he zones out for too long.

In his dreams, his "mindscape" of sorts is a rocky beach, with fog thick enough to obscure the rest of the surroundings. It's chilly, clammy and perpetually overcast and his "journey" most of the time is walking down the beach in hopes of eventually finding something that isn't water, rocks and seaweed.

His little self is non-too-annoying about making sure he knows they have to hurry and can't stop. They have to keep moving, always.

I've packed a bunch of symbolism and metaphors in it as well!:

In the mindscape, big Arthur has an effect on the weather, where little Arthur has a strong effect on the sea.

Little Arthur having an effect on the sea, represents the underlying emotions that big Arthur refuses to feel, or does not know how to handle. "A sea of emotions", essentially. Vast and deep and terrifying.

He's the very foundation of the troubles big Arthur is dealing with in modern day, meaning that if he's upset, that has a significant effect on what big Arthur is feeling. And since the sea ALSO has a very big effect on the weather, little Arthur will cause emotions within big Arthur, but big Arthur, no matter how stormy, will never be able to fully weather the depths in the same way.

Big Arthur having an effect on the weather, represents his rationale and his coping. It's prone to change very quickly, it's volatile and quick to go by. It's overthinking and overcomplicating things, to the point of it being a storm, a thought spiral (Watersprouts, hurricanes, tornados etc.) of sorts whenever he's upset.

When little Arthur's upset, big Arthur in the waking world, will be detached, stoic and unemotional. He'll be strictly logical, and will have trouble with any and all kinds of emotions aimed at him or asked of him. (Big Arthur's coping mechanisms stepping in to smother little Arthur)

Meanwhile, when big Arthur's upset, he's prone to outbursts, mood swings and an over-emotional approach to most things. He'll be quick to act without thinking and will say or do things that are thoughtless, brash and sometimes crossing the line. (Big Arthur's coping mechanisms are shut off, and Little Arthur shines through)

Tl;Dr

Arthur spellbinds himself to having a little version of himself in his head and does a literal "inner-child" healing journey, by literally talking and interacting with him!

[flawdchaos]

Opposites Do Attract

Gale ‘Buck’ Cleven x Reader

Word Count - 915

Based off of this request - Can I request a Buck x reader, where the reader is very extroverted, maybe even the opposite of Buck, but they fit so well together. They could be going out for drinks or her meeting the boys or something similar.

Anyone who met Buck Cleven and Y/N Y/L/N at Thorpe Abbotts shared a common thought - they were an unexpected pair. It had become all too common for the newcomers to assume Y/N was with Bucky with her loud, bubbly energy and it almost seemed brash for cool, calm, collected Buck to be with Ken Lemmons loudest female mechanic but damn, did it work. They had met one morning as Y/N was going over some last minute inspections on Buck’s plane for his daily missions.

“How’s she looking, ma’am?” his voice startled her, her head hitting against the plane’s metal.

“Good lord!” she exclaimed. “Give a girl a warning before you sneak up like that.” she complained, rubbing the back of her head. She fully stepped from under the plane's wings and caught a glimpse of the man behind the voice. Her eyes widened once she noticed a Major was standing before her awaiting her response. “Major Cleven” right hand flying to her forehead to salute “Plane is all ready, sir.”

“No need to salute, ma’am. Thank you for taking such good care of her. I put her through hell.” Buck spoke as he opened the plane’s hatch to stow his bag and she couldn’t stop the scoff that left her mouth. “I think that’s an understatement, sir.”

Most of the guys probably wouldn’t have taken this kind of attitude, per se, from a mechanic - let alone a woman- but he couldn’t care less. The sight of her almost made him want to laugh. There she stood, hip jutted out and hand secured atop it, eyes squinting up at him most likely awaiting some sort of angry remark but all he could do was shuffle the toothpick around in his mouth and nod in agreement. “I’ll be waiting to fix her right back up for ya later, Major.”

The couple had been sealed since. When Buck finally caved and spilled the beans about a woman to Bucky, he thought John was going to have a medical emergency right there in the mess hall.

“You have a woman and you just now think to bring it up?” Bucky said, astonished. “I didn’t want you to scare her away.” Buck quipped. If he only knew.

“Well.” Bucky clapped his hand on his friend's shoulder. “When am I gonna meet this mysterious young lady?” he urged, squeezing his hands down before an idea crossed his mind “Bring her to the pub tomorrow!”

______

If Buck could have taken a picture of the looks on the boys’ faces when he walked in with Y/N on his arm, he would have framed it and taken it with him on every flight he ventured out on. “Well I’ll be damned, Buck.” Bucky uttered, for once in his life he was almost speechless. Almost.

“I’d suggest you pick your jaw up off the floor, Major. I’d sure hate for you to swallow a bug.” She teased and the entire table erupted in laughter. Buck couldn’t help the small smile that broke out on his own face, a sense of pride soaring through his body. Bucky took a long swig of his drink before retorting. “Seems you’ve got yourself a jokester, Buck.” He nodded. “She’s a little more than that.”

“Wait, ain’t you the girl who works with Lemmons?” Blakely spoke, realization washing over the faces of a few of the men. “Yeah! You’re the girl who fixed my landing gear the other day.” Brady sat up, pointing at the girl standing firm besides Buck.

“You’re welcome by the way.” she waved her hand towards him. “Actually, everyone is welcome. You can thank me for getting you up in the air in the first place. Now I’m getting a drink. Keep the gossip to a minimum while I’m gone, now.” She turned, patting Buck on the chest. “You want something, baby?” looking up at her doe eyed boyfriend. “Just a Coke for me, honey.” She jokingly saluted, walking off towards the bar.

____

Buck had full confidence Y/N would fit in with his crew of men. Whether most of them had realized it before or not, she was the sole reason they were able to make it off the ground in the first place. He couldn’t help but say it almost made his heart swell with pride watching her interact with his friends. “Should I sing?” Bucky’s voice broke through his train of thought, hands tapping against his arm chair. There wasn’t time for him to protest before Y/N jumped up from her place on his lap. “Let’s go, Bucky!” Y/N’s laughed.

He couldn’t explain the feeling that was coursing through his body but as he watched his best friend - more so a brother at this point - and his newfound love sharing a laugh together over the less than perfect singing, he only grew more confident in his relationship. Many would describe Buck Cleven as a many of very little words but if anyone asked about Y/N, his Y/N, he didn’t think there were enough words in the dictionary to explain just how he felt.

Once the song stopped and the singing duo had left the stage, Buck watched as Y/N headed to the bar and Bucky made his way back to him.

“Buck, I gotta say -“ pausing to take a drink of his whisky. “You’ve found yourself a keeper. You two couldn’t be any more opposite but man, does it work.”

[itsdrawingmen]

We need to talk about Zen.

Every character in Mystic Messenger is a tragic one, and the Casual Story trio is often disregarded in that respect. But there is one character for whom I’ve hardly seen it explored at all. Maybe it’s because his route sucks such major ass, or because he’s honestly a bit of an asshole, misogynistic, homophobic, and ableist; or maybe it’s because his trauma is only briefly, fleetingly mentioned, as he and his friends refer to it, and then quickly brush it aside.

Zen Ryu, beautiful, stupid, and self-absorbed, is, on the surface, a perfect comic relief character, a beloved himbo, brash but well-intentioned. And I think this wonderful actor has been playing that role so well that he has fooled everyone, including the fandom.

Some character exploration and the uncropped art under the cut.

It’s no secret that Zen’s selfishness is nothing but a coping mechanism, masking a deep-set fear of inadequacy and paralysing self-doubt. It’s stated explicitly by Ray in Another Story, and it’s pretty evident from the way Zen is quick to worry there’s nothing more to him than his looks.

It’s obvious where he got it, considering how his mother treated him and his passions, and how his brother turned his back on him when he needed him the most. But there are more things I haven’t seen discussed anywhere, and I have a lot of thoughts and headcanons, and simply questions, so let’s start from the very beginning.

It’s made very clear in Zen’s route that his early life was… well, horrible. As early as kindergarten, he started getting singled out for his looks. Strangers kept staring at him and wanting to touch him, which bothered his mother.

Instead of getting on their child’s side, little Hyun’s parents tried to convince him he was ugly, to ‘humble’ him. It’s said that they just wanted him to be successful and to have a stable, secure life. Well, good intentions pave the road to hell, as it’s said. What they got as a result was a child who was harassed and stalked at school and in the streets with no one to confide in but his brother, who didn’t explicitly dismiss it, but still made light of it.

A little interesting point:

Make a note here of the ‘protection’ line, because I will get back to it later.

Anyway, whatever small support and understanding little Hyun’s brother provided him with, it wasn’t meant to last. Zen states that their parents treated them so differently they effectively separated them.

When he entered middle school and found passion for music, what his mother saw was her son turning to a precarious road and basically undermining his future. When she tried to convince him his dreams were stupid, Hyun’s brother took her side, leaving Hyun without the last person in his family who supported him. So little Hyun ran away from home, and thus began the story of Zen.

And here is where things get interesting. Zen left home when he was in middle school. A middle schooler in South Korea is anywhere between 12 and 15 years old. And a person living on their own must eat something and sleep somewhere. But here’s the catch: you can only rent if you are at least 19 (I’m assuming, Korean-19, so 18), and you can technically work part-time jobs starting at 13, but you need parental permission for that. And for any full-time job you must be 18. And this is the first big question with no easy answer: how did little Hyun survive after he left home? Where did he live, and what did he eat?

We can assume that for a while, he stayed with his friends, whom he for some reason tried to hide from his parents.

However, it would have been problematic for him to make it a long-term arrangement. If his friends were teenagers like him, their parents would be likely to tell his family where he was so that they would come collect their son. And if the friends were older and employed, it’s doubtful they would be well off enough to host a dependent long-term, unless there was something sinister going on. So the question remains: where did he live and what did he eat?

He mentions part-time jobs and extortion as sources of income, he worked night shifts to make ends meet, and there are also the mysterious 'bad things' that we will get back to later. But there are more variables here than just money.

Well, as far as I can tell, the answer to that is right here:

And now, I want you to stop for a moment and think about what this implies.

A child in his early teens (I like to assume 13-14), and a very pretty child at that, with a history of harassment that was never addressed, let alone stopped, finds himself on the street (at this point, we can presume: homeless and hungry). And he catches the eye of gangsters. Perhaps it’s my fresh experience watching ‘Banana Fish’ speaking (definitely not, I've had this conviction basically since I saw 'bad things' mentioned), but I want to really ask you: what do you think gangsters are likely to do with a beautiful and vulnerable young boy, besides use him for petty crimes Zen admits on the screens above? What 'bad things' could he have been forced to do to survive?

This admission by Zen himself doesn’t help my train of thoughts at all:

Of course, this is said in the context of exploitation at work, but given the gangs and the ‘bad things’, one can’t help but draw a connection.

Besides, this is where that screen I told you to take note of comes into play. Zen says that after middle school, he understood what his parents were trying to protect him from, essentially what dangers being pretty entailed. It couldn’t have been the usual harassment that he had been facing since kindergarten, he would have understood that by then. Another interesting point is that for someone with a gangster past, Zen is suspiciously gender nonconforming in his looks, and mellow in general demeanour. Yes, he’s rough around the edges, he’s homophobic, misogynistic, and foul-mouthed, but he isn’t really violent. Someone who used to fit in with gangs, especially as a youth, I would think, looks and acts differently. And this all takes me to a very grim conclusion: I firmly don’t believe that a good-looking and vulnerable child with no support network and with a history of harassment survived in gangs without being molested or sexually exploited once.

But let’s not delve into my headcanons and continue with the facts we have. These bits and pieces that come together to form a picture of Zen’s teenage years already paint a pretty morbid picture. But he made it big, became an actor, and left it all behind, and he’s happy in the canon timeline, right? Right?!

Wrong.

The most obvious thing is the contents of Zen’s fridge, which Jaehee points out when she goes to see him.

It’s referenced many times in the game, Zen lightheartedly says he often skips meals and in general eats pretty badly, and I think even V refers to it. And it’s easy to chalk it up to his insane diets and the expectations of his body and looks that he has to maintain to stay in the industry. Or, if you are a little like me and like to assume the worst, you can also attribute it to Zen’s borderline self-harming workaholism. But I think there’s a little bit more to it, and the key to it is actually where Zen lives.

I remember being a little confused as to why everyone was surprised that Zen lived in a semi-basement.

But I didn’t give it much thought, after all, semi-basements seem to be cheaper here as well, and Zen’s flat looked pretty nice on CGs (if extremely beige). And it wasn’t until recently when I was talking to a colleague about his friend sharing her experience in Korea that I learned that semi-basements were actually a signature dwelling of the poorest, and seemingly a clearly understandable trope for a Korean. Those semi-basement apartments are often at risk of flooding, which is apparently a well-known fact, and also why they’re supposed to be banned as residential quarters. And, of course, Zen is quick to tell everyone he likes that place with poor ventilation and little sunlight, because it’s Zen, after all. He has that working class mentality because he’s cool, and he likes underground apartments and old tech.

But it seems that the picture of his present life is also pretty grim. Now, I’m not in South Korea, and I know little about how theatre actors are paid there, but I can tell you what I know from several actor/actress friends here in Ukraine: theatre actors aren’t, unfortunately, paid shit. Even the ones you recognise and talk about, working in cool popular theatres, drop over half of their salary to rent a shitty apartment, and are left wondering what they’re going to eat. So it seems pretty likely to me that Zen’s empty fridge, old computer and mp3 player, daily subway commute, and semi-basement apartment all point to one simple fact: he’s simply poor.

And to make it worse, he seems to be extremely lonely.

I’m pretty sure he also mentions isolating himself when he’s feeling bad, but I can’t seem to find screenshots for that anywhere.

All that said, when the fandom looks at Zen, they see a self-absorbed himbo, the ‘don’t kill yourself you so sexy aha’ type of guy. And he is, and I think he’s hilarious, and I’m the first one to laugh at him tbh. But when I look at him for a little longer than a second, I see a young man who has been harassed to hell and back starting as early as kindergarten, who never graduated from school, who ran away from home in his early teens, worked multiple jobs, and still had to resort to crime to make ends meet. I see a young man who was once a vulnerable teen at the mercy of gangsters, who had to learn that all help comes with strings attached. And I see a young man struggling silently with poverty while maintaining a facade of a glamorous and charming actor.

And I think the charming actor has fooled everyone.

[darsynia]

Adversarial 1/? (Bucky/Mechanic!Reader)

MCU MASTERLIST | RO ROLL MASTERLIST | gif by @dailybuckybarnes

Summary: The textbooks all say that finding your soulmate feels like figuring out your place in the world, something you’ve always thought was utter bullshit, but--

…but your soulmate has a mechanical arm

Word Count/Warnings: 4,000 | explicit sex

As 2/7 of my birthday fics for @ronearoundblindly, adVERsarial is a Soulmate AU 'enemies to lovers' with a brash, outspoken f!reader. Stay tuned for more, and feel free to drop a comment if you'd like to be on the tag list!

Excerpt:

“Are you the lead mechanic? Stark said I could find them here.”

“I am, and I’ll be honest, I’m more than a little bummed out that those aren’t the words written all over my mitt, here,” you tell Captain America, holding up your (grime-covered, unreadable) left hand.

A ripple of… something tugs his eyebrow upward for a few seconds, and he smiles politely. “I get that a lot.”

You feel the burn of triumph in your chest and move in for the killing blow. “Oh really? I wish you’d kept a list, Rogers, because I’d love to meet more female mechanics.”

Adversarial

Your soulmate can go straight to hell.

First of all, your Words are written on your fucking hand, and it almost takes up the whole thing! Who the fuck thought that was okay?

Schools don’t let you cover your hands, did your jerkface soulmate ever think of that? No? Classic.

Oh, and then there are the bullies. So. Many. Bullies. Telling the new kids to come up and say the words to greet you was predictable, but exploiting teachers’ inherent laziness-- ‘but Mrs. DoNothing, I was just reading the words off her hand!’ --was icing on the shit sundae.

You graduated from that hellhole, moved as far away as possible, and got a job that would cover you in gunk so you wouldn’t have to think about your Words every single day.

Now it’s seven years later and your boss asks you to come along on his fancy-ass job at the Avenger Hideout in upstate New York. You’re sure you’ll be kicked to the curb when you meet Stark himself, though. The man is snark incarnate, and you can rarely pass up an opportunity to mouth off.

“‘Sit down and shut up if you want to stay alive,’” he quotes, right after the handshake. The smug look on his face is warranted, because working with the Avengers is one of the few times your soulmate words apply to regular life.

“Yeah I’ll stay standing if it’s all the same to you,” you smile, with too many teeth and everything. You usually choose something more spicy, but you really want this job. Besides, Stark’s soulmark words are well known, so you don’t have to speak to history here.

“As long as you keep your death wish to yourself like everyone else in the asylum, we’re cool. Welcome aboard.”

The Avengers Compound is pretty sweet, actually, and your coworkers don’t seem like the typical stooges. It takes almost a month to persuade them that you really do enjoy the dirtiest, toughest jobs, and after that everything is smooth, filthy sailing. It’s always a good day if you end it needing a long, hot shower and half a bottle of degreasing soap.

There’s an iPad mounted within floor-view for people to text you if they need something. It doubles as your personal DJ, so when the sound cuts out, you slide your ass out from underneath the Quinjet you were servicing to find a pair of boots standing next to it. As you rise gracefully (read: clamber) to your feet, their owner speaks.

“Are you the lead mechanic? Stark said I could find them here.”

“I am, and I’ll be honest, I’m more than a little bummed out that those aren’t the words written all over my mitt, here,” you tell Captain America, holding up your (grime-covered, unreadable) left hand.

A ripple of… something tugs his eyebrow upward for a few seconds, and he smiles politely. “I get that a lot.”

You feel the burn of triumph in your chest and move in for the killing blow. “Oh really? I wish you’d kept a list, Rogers, because I’d love to meet more female mechanics.”

Until this point, he’d been holding himself like the soldier that he is, with the same stiff courtesy you’d seen from his rare television appearances. That all falls away, now. Rogers clears his throat, hitting his fisted hand on his chest as though knocking loose his initial impression of you, then extends that hand out for you to shake.

Your eyebrows skyrocket at just how much grease he’ll end up with if he goes through it, but Captain America’s outstretched hand doesn’t waver.

It’s time for you to knock loose your first impression. You give him a respectful nod and grasp his hand firmly. The grip slips as you shake, but you don’t offer any apology, and Rogers doesn’t seem to need one, not even when there’s a squishing sound as you both disengage. You take pity on the man and snag him a blue towel from your workbench.

“So, what do you need that Stark couldn’t Lord it down here and ask for himself?”

The towel is doing nothing. “We’ve got a mission coming up that will involve some repair work mid-way. Refugee camp in the middle of a regional conflict, with aggressors who like to send self-destructive drones to ruin our day. Army thinks it’s cheaper if it’s us, and not them.” He gestures towards your large tool bag. “We’d like to get in, get fixed back up, and get out in a hurry, and Stark says you’re the…” he pauses.

“Say it.”

“‘Gremlin’ for the job,” he says, apologetically offering back the newly-soiled towel with his still-soiled hand.

“Sounds about right. Have his Jeeves give me the details, yeah?” You start whistling as you scooch back down to finish up the job you’d been working on when Rogers had come in. It takes a not-inconsiderable amount of time for him to walk back out, and you count that as a win.

They were… not kidding about the danger of the mission.

The trip out had been unpleasant as hell, gaining you some unwanted on-the-job experience with what it’s like being motion-sick under fire. As expected, the vehicle is hit by two diligent little destructo-bots, but you take care of the first one handily. Getting the second off and its damage mitigated is made more difficult by the urgency in the comms.

The team is on the way with the refugees in tow, and they want to take off as soon as they get back. Doing that with unknown damage is a terrible idea.

“All right, you heat-seeking little bot-barnacle, you ARE coming off, even if I have to pry off a panel of the ship to do it!” you snap, five minutes later. You're bluffing, since can’t even tell if the damned thing’s done any damage or if the sum total of its effect is ‘skewering the hull and sitting there smug as hell about it.’ The team is getting closer and closer, and the pounding of your heart is so loud you can hear it like a drumbeat in your ears.

They turn out to be footfalls, not your heartbeat.

A metal hand appears out of utterly nowhere and grabs the attack drone, ripping it out of the hull and throwing it with enough force to send it a half mile away. You’re left with your mouth hanging open as the owner of the hand (the arm. It’s an arm, and it’s the most gorgeous piece of machinery you’ve ever, ever seen) turns to face you. He’s wearing tactical gear and a sour expression, and every one of your blood vessels have converted themselves to gasoline at the very sight of him.

“That’s quite an arm you’ve got, soldier,” you quip.

His face twists into fierce fury as he points to the ramp leading into the Quinjet. “Sit down and shut up if you want to stay alive.”

For once in your life, you do what you’re told without complaint or combativeness. The phrase ‘internal combustion’ has never been so apt. The textbooks all say that finding your soulmate feels like figuring out your place in the world, something you’ve always thought was utter bullshit, but--

…but your soulmate has a mechanical arm.

The rest of the team shows up mere seconds later, and from there you’re caught up in the whirlwind of weight balancing, choosing what to ditch to fit every last person in the vehicle. For a few crazy minutes, it seems your grouchy soulmate might be left behind to fend for himself (you have no idea who he is, but you’re completely certain this man could wipe out the entire platoon that Rogers says is heading their way), but you and Stark figure out an overspeed hack that can work for just long enough to get somewhere safe.

You’re too busy keeping your ride in the air to think about anything else, and once you’re all back on solid ground, disembarking is a madhouse. You and Stark are the last two off the thing. He flips up his helmet and gives you one of his thousand-watt smiles.

“Great job today. Forgot to tell you Barnes was with us for this one.”

“Barnes?” you ask, distractedly running your calloused fingers over the rift where the perfect man had pulled out the drone. It looks like a patch might work, rather than having to get a piece machined. 

“James 'Bucky' Barnes. The Vodka Popsicle?” Stark comes over and makes a show of frowning at the way you’re just shrugging. “See, if you were fun, you’d be pretending you have no idea so you can milk me of all the good nicknames.”

The soulmate thing is burning a fuse in the back of your mind, and you don’t have enough left in your tank to banter. “I really don’t know, Motor Mouth. I just kept my head down and did my job.”

You smack the hull of the Quinjet and start toward the elevator bank, secretly pleased with your own stupid nickname. ‘Barnes’ sounds familiar, but you can’t place the name.

“Come on, CS, you had to have seen his arm!”

This stops you in your tracks so quickly you can almost hear the record scratch sound. Right at that moment, you realize where you heard the name Bucky Barnes: in your high school history class! This has to be fake, some stupid Superhero hazing or something.

You spin on your heel, about to accuse Stark of only remembering the name because he had a hot teacher that day, but at the very last minute you remember his father was a WWII war hero. Fine, you can go with 'snark overload' instead. “Friend of your dad’s, then? What happened? Time machine?”

“Fascist Russian trauma, actually,” he says, herding you into the elevator. “JARVIS, can you take over? I need to fly home to the Missus.”

“Wait, Stark--” He’s in the air before you can finish objecting.

One enlightening elevator ride later, you make your way to your workshop in a trance. This whole thing is a coincidence. It has to be. The man has gone through hell, vanquished hell, joined its army only to claw his way out... and his reward is what?

You?

“Took you long enough,” a voice says from the darkest corner of the space. You don’t have to guess who it is. There’s only one person it could be.

“That’s funny as hell in context, you know that?” Shit. Even to your own ears, you sound defensive. “Look,” you rush to add. “I picked this job to keep my Words to myself as much as possible, and I’ll keep doing that. I don’t want anything from you.”

You’re lying. You want a look at his arm like you want coffee in the morning, like you want air in your lungs after a brutal run. If he were anyone else you’d be planning a charm offensive, and you’re not what most people would describe as charming.

“One problem,” Barnes says, stepping out of the shadows with his flesh hand outstretched toward you. It’s so cinematic you forget he’s basically danger incarnate-- and then he makes contact.

Pleasure sizzles up from his grip on your wrist, skin to skin, soul to soul. It’s mind-numbing in the same way as the aftermath of an orgasm, so similar that you stumble a little bit when he lets go only seconds later. You’ve only read about Sensitivity or seen it depicted in movies, and neither did the full glory of it justice.

“Holy fuck,” you whisper. 

He doesn’t look affected at all. “Yeah. One hell of a weakness.” 

You go from shaken to pissed faster than the Quinjet hits cruise speed. “Get the fuck out, then! My workshop is invite only.”

“Is that right?” Barnes asks, insultingly unphased. Your arms are crossed, and he just glares right into your eyes and taps one perfectly articulated metal finger on the newly silver Words on your hand. “Stark’s AI updated our medical files. If you’re unconscious, this gets me into your hospital room. That’s invitation enough.”

Fucking great. “Well, either knock me out or fuck off, then, Barnes. I have work left to do.” Your gut is twisted metal right now, jagged and raw from disappointment and desperation. This man is a legend, a warrior with a marvel of machinery for an arm and a past that would make the devil blush. He doesn't want you, and he shouldn’t, he shouldn’t. With misery staining your heart black as old oil, you stalk over to the nearest workbench before he can tell how upset you are. 

“It’s not personal,” he says flatly.

Soulmate words are as personal as it gets, which means he’s saying it to fire you up. You won’t rise to the bait. Most people are uncomfortable with silence, but you use it as a weapon. The minutes tick by as you clean off the work table, with no other sound than the clink of metal on metal and the slide of heavy tools on the hard, solid surface. 

Soon, all that’s left is a bucket half full of sand. At least this is simple and easy to understand; a cheap, abundant material used for friction, stability, and sometimes even a mold to pour hot metal into. As you burn away your fury with your impossible soulmate staring silent holes into your back, you wonder whether you’re half as valuable to him as this.

“Look. I don’t want or need--”

You shove the bucket off the side of the work table and spin around, your next words practically exploding out of your chest. “You think I don’t know that? I get it. I’m nobody. Neither of us want--” He’s advancing on you and you hop up onto the surface of the workbench, primed to kick, scratch, and scream if he tries to melt your brain again with your goddamned soulmate connection. 

“Jesus. Just-- stay inside, will you?”

With those cryptic words, Bucky Barnes walks out.

You’re speechless, and the worst part is how much your body is craving the glorious, drugging feeling of his touch on your skin.

JARVIS calls out your name just as you force yourself to assess the sand mess you’ve tantrumed everywhere. Your ‘what?’ is as short and annoyed as you can make it.

I thought you ought to know that Sergeant Barnes spent his time after leaving the Quinjet checking on your safety. He requested I adjust the camera angle to more fully catch the doorway to your room, requested the visitor logs--

“Which you denied, yes? Yes?” you snap, gripping the broom handle like it’s your soulmate’s neck.

Of course. Despite his assertion, mutual consent is required for such things, barring a formal, legal relationship.

“For the record, it’s bullshit that it took until 1973 for that.”

I heartily agree. As I was saying, Sgt. Barnes took it upon himself to--

“Blah blah safety, you win the award for meddling, JARVIS, but what I really need from you is a magical ability to clean up this mess.”

Deepest apologies, but there is a purpose to this endeavor. The door to your suite did not meet Sgt. Barnes expectations, regarding your safety on-site.

“What the hell are you-- Wait.” You drop the broom and head out, speaking angrily up at the ceiling as you stalk down the hallway. “Tell me there’s still a door there, JARVIS.”

I’m afraid I cannot.

“Yeah, you should be afraid!” you hiss. “Tell me where he is or I’ll take a blowtorch to the wiring in the server room.”

Stark’s damned AI doesn’t even have the grace to sound concerned. 

I see why some say you have a fiery temper. Sgt. Barnes is in one of the basement sparring rooms. Shall I arrange for an elevator?

“I’ll walk, thanks.”

The bank of exercise rooms is open to everyone on campus, and the doors only close when there’s someone in there. That makes it easy to figure out where to knock.

The door swings open, and your mouth runs dry.

Barnes is sweaty, wearing only a black tank and tight pants, and the harsh hallway light glistens on the metal of his arm. You’re completely certain that touching it will feel just as good as the skin-to-skin contact earlier. You drift forward, captivated, and the door shuts behind you. The clicking sound brings you back to furious reality.

Through gritted teeth, you say, “You. Owe. Me. A. Door.”

He scoffs silently, looking you up and down as if gauging how little effort he’d have to expend against you in a fight. “Stark owes you a door. I just proved that.”

“What the fuck gives you the right--”

Barnes interrupts not with words, but with quick, jerky movements at his waist, unbuckling, unzipping, and shoving. He slaps the flat of his palm against the Words on his bare thigh and says, “This. Every single woman I came in contact with was in danger. You’re not secure here.” He strips the pants off completely and throws them into the corner of the room before advancing on you, somehow just as menacing in briefs and a tank. “Not until we get this out of our systems.”

He’s lithe as a cat, and you’re only able to stumble back a few inches and scrunch your eyes shut before he encircles your wrist with one hand. 

The cool metal is soothing despite being inexorable. You suck in a surprised breath and open your eyes just in time to watch the clever shit that is your soulmate dip his head to kiss you.

The pleasure is sudden and devastating. Your heart seizes up, stutters, and starts sending napalm through your veins as he walks you back against the wall and presses the full length of his body against yours. If each touch is a contact high, these kisses are full-throttle erotic warfare, with your brain offline and your hindbrain keening. You 'fight back' with everything you have, fingernails scratching at the back of his neck, teeth grazing his inner lip, all with your Words pulsing encouragement on the back of your hand.

If you’re not careful, this soulmate bond will acid-etch the narcotic joy of this moment right into your heart.

As if he can hear your thoughts, Barnes lets out a deep groan and pulls back to look you directly in the eyes. “This is a strategy, not a relationship.”

You’re touch-drunk, but you’re not in love. “Look, Deathsquad, I only want you for your arm.”

Barnes’ smile is like the sun coming up, damn him. “Fuck me enough to get past Sensitivity and I’ll let you have a whole afternoon with it.” As if to emphasize how much you’d both enjoy that plan, he slides his flesh hand past your waistband and grabs your ass, holding you steady for the twist of his hips.

Your smarts are offline, your lungs are at half capacity, your cunt is criminally empty, and you fully understand how people end up falling for stranger soulmates, if this is what Sensitivity does to a person. 

“Fine,” you snap, hoping to hell you sound less needy than you feel.

The two of you glare at each other for a charged second, and then there’s a race to strip the rest of your clothes off. Not even sixty whole seconds later you’re kneeling on a thick floor mat, more nervous and excited than you’ve ever been in your life, damn him. Barnes comes up behind to set a warm, drugging hand on your hip, and then it’s bliss, sexual rapture from the very first thrust.

“Fuck, that’s insane,” he rasps into your ear, his right hand coming down hard on the mat beside you as he curls over and into you. “Perfect,” Barnes breathes, the word almost a whine, like he’d tried to hold it back and couldn’t. 

You’re almost at white-out, already seconds away from the kind of orgasm that rearranges a girl’s blood chemistry, but you can’t let this one go. Arching your back and leaning to the side, you rock your hips in a cadence that unbalances the two of you just enough to force him to brace with his left, instead. You’re moaning insult-adjacent nonsense syllables now, but you gather enough willpower to clutch his metal hand with your marked one.

“Now it’s perfect,” you grit out.

Barnes’ sexy chuckle in your ear sends you into a black-out orgasm for the ages.

You wake up alone, which feels like a statement, but you notice when you roll over that you’re not sticky. The clothes you’d torn off and thrown in wild abandon are folded next to you, too. You scramble to put them on, stepping curiously into the shared adjoining bathroom to find a wet washcloth draped over the towel rack and a sticky note marked with a large B on the mirror.

“Don’t get sentimental on me, asshole,” you mutter as you snatch it off.

Crankshaft:  Don’t get sentimental on me.  Wednesday at 4? B

The words are printed, even the B, meaning that while you laid there naked and insensate, he’d gone and printed something out instead of just waking you up. On top of that outrage, someone’s told him your nickname, which for some stupid reason feels more intimate than anything that just happened. It’s something that’s just yours, not influenced by stupid-ass destiny genetics, and if he tries to use it verbally, you’ll… you’ll… You sigh. There’s not one thing you can do to influence this guy, except possibly make him angry that you exist at all.

One big Sensitivity-struck security risk, that’s what you are.

You’re about to crumple up the note when you see it’s got something else hand drawn on the back, a sequence of numbers and letters in a jagged sort of rectangle. The shape looks familiar, but you’re sated and stupid after however long without caffeine. You gather up your things and make the walk of shame back to your apartment, realizing when you’re almost there that the fucking door is probably still missing.

It’s not. There’s already a brand-new door there, and on it is another sticky note. This one’s just the hand drawn shape and accompanying symbols. You snatch it up and go inside, vindictively locking the door with both locks until you remember Barnes’ whole thing about safety.

With a sour feeling in your stomach from doing exactly what he’d want you to, you lay both notes down to examine the shapes, finally sketching them out on a third piece of paper.

The numbers and letters work out to be a room and floor number, probably for his rooms here at the compound

Combined, the shapes look just like the plating for his metal arm

You refuse to be taken in by this, even if it is right up your alley.

“JARVIS?”

At your service, Miss.

“Will you locate a small, neutral space for a… meeting between myself and Sgt. Barnes tomorrow at four, and let both of us know the location once you’re finished?” There’s no way in hell you’re doing anything that even hints at girlfriend behavior with this guy, so no bedrooms. What’s between you is literally just biology, nothing more.

If you insist.

“I do. And don’t use my nickname with him. He doesn’t deserve it.”

The singing in your veins makes a good opposing argument, but that’s just biology again, and you won’t be swayed by it. The only thing you’ll be swayed by is his marvel of arm engineering. Everything else is just window dressing to help get you through the absurd pleasure-bond shit that comes with soulmate biology.

You skip dinner and go to bed early, dreaming all night of the purr of Barnes’ muscles over and against you, the gravel-drag of his stubble on your skin, and the hum of an engine starting to rev.

to be continued...

[chaliceofthescales-if]

Sector 7, or Schai, depending on who you are. An otherwise barren dry desert on which nothing grows with a busy bustling tourist city as its main focus. A city of indulgence, excess, and sin, the shiny glittering lights hide the dark truth behind the City of Wonders. Many will do anything to get out of the gutter and different groups often take advantage of that. So when two strange people approach you, offering a lifetime's worth of payment for protecting someone and going to find a special cup that may or may not actually exist, who are you to say no?

Chalice of the Scales is the first book in the Turnwheel of the Twelve Saga. It will be a shorter smaller game with the total amount of words read during each play through being about 40k, which is about the size of a novella or 80 pages front and back in a real book. It's inspired by different sources including Dungeons and Dragons and JRPGs/RPGs. The focus will be mostly on storytelling and adventure, but romance will also play a rather big part. While it leans more towards storytelling, there will be a decent amount of stat-based gameplay/mechanics as well.

You play as a Sector 7 Bodyguard for Hire. That means you're poor as dirt. You're approached by two mysterious hooded figures who offer to pay you a lifetime's worth of money in exchange for you to protect your Charge and find the Chalice of the Scales. You, obviously, accept thinking it's an easy job. Turns out, it's anything but. Now you have to create a group to set out and the Scales' Relic, which hasn't been seen in over 1000 years, while also trying to make sure no one dies.

Genre: Adventure, Romance, Fantasy Post-Apocalyptic

Rating: 18+

Tracked Tag: #chalice of the scales

Status: In Development (Writing)

Demo || Romance Options || FAQ || Ask Guidelines || Tag Navigation || World Lore || Current Anonymous Survey Form || The Full Saga || Dev's Main Blog ||

Create and customize your bodyguard for hire. Choose their gender, pronouns, appearance, and personality and more.

Protect your Charge and make sure he isn't killed or kidnapped by the assassins after him while trying to find the lost Relic.

Explore Sector 7 of Astelle, also called Schai. Traverse dry barren deserts, smog filled cities, and the Great Divide on your quest.

Do research and follow leads to find out where the Chalice is located. Fight back against Relic Hunters and other groups to safely deliver the Chalice to its Warden.

Romance any of your 6 companions: Merlion - Your Charge, Astor - The Guardian, Elise - The Cleric, Bran - The Relic Hunter, Korone - The Navigator, or Starling - The Assassin.

Build your relationships with others in the group and find out their stories. A good relationship with someone may unlock different choices during gameplay.

One final question... Where is the Warden?

Merlion Corwell (he/him) - Your Charge. Two mysterious hooded people paid you quite well in advance to protect him and find the Relic. A fairly easy job, in hindsight. Now if only he would stop wandering off and getting into trouble.

Astor Wryth (he/him) - The Guardian. A real-life Guardian, like from the legends. Structured and well-put together, he's very adept with his abilities as a Guardian, but is very out of touch with his Warden.

Elise Fairthing (she/her) - The Cleric. A sweet and energetic Cleric who decided to join you on your quest after you crash her trip. She possesses a decent amount of knowledge and history about the Twelve.

Bran Noire (they/them) - The Relic Hunter. A shoddy Relic Hunter who let themself get captured by you. Rather irksome and arrogant, they're bold, loud, brash, and are, unfortunately, a fantastic shot.

Korone Noire (they/them) - The Navigator. A stoic and Machiavellian Navigator who knows the land of Schai like the back of their hand. Despite being quiet and thoughtful, they are somehow related to Bran.

Starling Rhise (she/her) - The Assassin. A woman once your enemy, now your (reluctant) ally. Calm and intelligent, she possesses an adventurous spirit and a grudge that won't go away anytime soon.

[milksnake-tea]

HIII YOUR BOOTHILL FIC WAS SO GOOD MUAH CHEFS KISS which is why I wanted to ask what your opinions are on character prompt no.6 (What do you think ___ is like in love?) for Boothill you write him SO WELL!!!!!!

AHHHH THANK YOU !!!!! IM GLAD U LIKED IT ESP BC I WAS RUNNING OFF THAT ONE VOICE LINE FOR HIM ,,,, HES SUCH A SILLY GOOBER ...... BUT ON GOD IS HE HARD TO WRITE FOR BC HOW DO MACHINES WORK :((((

6. What do you think Boothill is like in love?

It's so different from how he treats everyone else that it's actually sickening. Contrary to his rather brash and reckless personality, Boothill is a gentleman to you - delicately taking your hand in his and bringing your knuckles to his lips, always helping you down from any vehicle or stairs and holding the door open for you. Heck, he'd even carry you if you'd let him, hoisting you up into his arms like a bride and cackling when you hold onto him for dear life. This doesn't mean that he isn't the same Boothill we all know and love - nah, he still messes with you whenever he can, ruffling your hair and all that. But you'll notice, even as he pokes and prods at you, one mechanical hand is still held firmly at your hip, prepared to pull you into him in case danger ever comes knocking.

2k follower event if you want to participate !!!

[heartshapedbubble]

Hi! I hope your having a good day/night wherever you are 🫶

I was wondering if you could maybe write some friends to lovers head cannons with Ganji and Eli?

hello!! you too anon💖 (like. 5 months later but oh well :c )

this is such a cute prompt HEEHEE >W<

ganji gupta and eli clark friends to lovers hcs🏏🦉

ganji gupta🏏

he likes company but doesn't like initiating hangouts. he's a man of few words, most of them reserved for when there's really no other option other than to communicate verbally

whenever you two sit together he always gets a bit restless and fidgety. if you try to bring up the topic he'll just brush it off, saying it's nothing to worry about

he can't EVER discern if he likes somebody or if he's just anxious and it literally swallows him whole. thinking about verbalizing what he feels or physical closeness makes him feel a bit dizzy so he just pushes these thoughts to the back of his brain until they eventually resurface again

gets a tad distant, being a bit rude and brash as a defense mechanism

shows his care by being (over)protective, especially in matches. when he sees you in danger it's like he's seeing red, leaving hunters bruised from his aggressive swings. he says he's overprotective in general, that you're not special and that he treats you like he would anyone else, but it hurts to say that when he thinks the exact opposite

confess first. or, at least, hint at doing so. it's not gonna get to his head unless you say it first, directly, no buts or ifs - only then will he realize that hey, maybe i should stop denying myself romantic attraction?

your first few dates are a bit awkward. you two are a *thing* now, but he doesn't understand the new boundaries your relationship sets. is it really alright to hold your waist in front of everyone?

just give him some time until he gets comfortable, it takes time for him to drop the stoic persona

his first kisses are sloppy. he initiates them slowly and without much confidence, hands trembling as they bring you closer and he plants his warm lips against the corner of your mouth - he still doesn't dare to go lips-to-lips. they make for a good laugh afterwards, him nervously grinning at his own anxiety.

is almost shocked when you return the favor, maybe even more eagerly than him. slowly kiss his temples, rub the back of his head with care and he's paralyzed under your hands, his mind wandering away beneath your tender touches

his most cherished moments with you are spent in complete silence. the feeling of unconditional love contained within a comfortable silence is indispensable, and just the fact that he doesn't have to strain himself with small talk and expressing things he can't actually describe feels great

eli clark🦉

victory or loss, no matter his mood, whenever you call upon eli clark his head turns towards you in a second. his face is completely covered - save for his mouth and nose - but his lips are always curled into a soft smile

the cloaked seer enjoys solitude and spends most of his free time in it. he's softspoken, but always a tad gloomy and breathless

yet it doesn't take much to creep under his skin. a few kind words will quickly put him at ease and, encouraged by your own openness, he won't hesitate to be straightforward with you

spending so much time pondering and overthinking, he can't help but notice his feelings towards you. well, they might not be feelings by the traditional definition, but what other word can describe the tingles he feels when he hears your voice from behind, when you creep upon him? or the surge of heat in his abdomen while he's slowly making his way towards you, watching your expression change through brooke's eyes?

he confesses first. definetly. it'll take him a few days to devise a plan, to find the best spot and time to confess and phrase his thoughts, but it wouldn't take long during your friendship for it to happen. he's a bit of a romantic at heart and can easily get swayed by affection

most of his ways of expressing affection are through small PDA. tenderly holding your hand or your waist, rubbing your shoulders after a tense match or holding you from the back. he's a literal heat machine! has so much layers on and it feels really good to lay back against him in response. you can easily wrap the remaining fabric around yourself, too

only takes off his hood and blindfold a bit further into the relationship. he's so used to them masking his true appearance that taking them off in front of others makes him feel vulnerable

asks the WEIRDEST questions and says the most random stuff on dates. literally no filter. who knows where his mind actually goes while you talk to him?

likes when you get touchy with him :,) rub his hips (they're kinda sore and he often has to crack them like knuckles, it's hard to carry so many bags and pouches around his waist ok!!), mess with his hair, trace your fingers around his face, whisper him the dumbest things up-close into his ear, hell, even bite him if you want to! has insomnia anyways and any kind of stimulation helps him fall asleep. he just turns into a happy human blob

[tenderleavesbob]

Whumptober 6/31

No. 6: NOT REALISING THEY’RE INJURED Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms | Healed Wrong | “It’s not my blood.”

Against Legend’s better judgment, the team split up. In his opinion, it made sense for Hyrule, Time, and Wind to stay behind. The room was safe enough. The mysterious wall had proven to hide a treasure chest with a single red rupee, which Legend quietly slipped into Hyrule’s bag. It would be safe enough for Hyrule to heal Time’s wounds, and Wind was stubborn enough and brash enough to make sure Time rested and recovered. Legend was fine with that part.

It was Twilight skulking beside him that Legend disagreed with. Still in his lupine form, Twilight sniffed the ground and walls for any trace of the missing heroes. It almost made sense for Twilight with his superior tracking skills to search for them, but Twilight was distracted. This place had already proven it was dangerous. They couldn’t afford to be distracted.

Any more distracted, Legend thought. Sky was leading the way, a torch in his hands and a tight frown on his face. How could they not be distracted with one person wounded and two missing?

He knew he was distracted. Warriors, no matter how annoying he could be, was the team’s rock. Neither he nor Wild were familiar with dungeons, and now they were both alone without aid. Legend hated leaving Hyrule behind, despite knowing that he should be safe in that room with the other two heroes.

When Four spoke up, Legend wanted to throw up his hands and quit. “I don’t like this hallway,” he said. The shorter boy examined the walls with a critical eye. “The stones don’t look right. Have you noticed?”

Everyone paused. Twilight raised his nose and sniffed the air. For the first time since Warriors vanished, his whine transformed into a snarl. His thick fur bristled.

Everything blurred after that.

Sky shouted for them to run and the walls trembled. Stone exploded and creatures tore themselves away from the walls, looking like they came from the stone itself. Maybe they had.

Someone threw a bomb. Or maybe one of the monsters did. Legend didn’t know.

All he knew was that Four stumbled and fell, and he refused to lose another brother to this disaster. Something hit him from behind and Legend almost fell before scrambling forward. Sky was right. There was no room to fight here. They needed to run. Legend grabbed Four and threw him over his shoulder before sprinting forward. 

Legend wasn’t sure what happened after that. There was too much dust and shouting and Twilight howled and Four was wiggling too slowly and weakly on his shoulder. The hall seemed to stretch on too long, stone feet thundering behind him.

He couldn’t see Twilight. Twilight knew his wolf form couldn’t beat stone, right?

Where was Sky? Where was Sky?

The next room abruptly in front of him. Legend almost tripped running into it, then did stumble when Wolfie sprinted past, bumping his hip. Sky yelled something behind him. Just as Legend wheeled around, meeting Sky’s wide eyes, the door thunked shut. The hellish hallway and its monsters were safely on the other side.

Sky helped slide Four off Legend’s shoulder. He hissed sympathetically at the reddish bruise forming on Four’s cheek. Legend grimaced at the blood on his clothes.

Twilight started whining again. Legend wanted to tell him to shut up. His heart was pounding too loudly in his ears.

“You’re bleeding,��� Sky was saying over and over, trying to help Four undress.

In turn, Four kept smacking his hands away. “It’s not my blood!” he insisted. “I’m bruised but I’m okay! I promise!”

Twilight’s whines grew louder. To Legend’s frustration, Twilight bumped his hip again. “Twilight!” Legend snapped, looking down at him. “Will you --”

…oh.

Legend stared at his hip. Blood was smeared on Twilight’s snout. More blood stained Legend’s clothes.

“Sky,” he said slowly, “that’s not Four’s blood.”

Then Legend’s knees gave out.

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[hesbuckcompton-baby]

I'm Your Man - Robert 'Rosie' Rosenthal x OFC - Chapter 1

Masterlist |-| Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13 | Chapter 14 | Chapter 15 | Chapter 16 | Chapter 17 | Chapter 18 | Chapter 19

AO3

Summary: As Frankie reaches the end of her second week at Thorpe Abbotts Airfield, she begins to find her footing among the men of the 100th Bomb Group

Warnings: Excessive alcohol consumption, language

Word Count: 4k

Tags: @mads-weasley @xxluckystrike @curaheehee

The setting sun cast a golden blanket over Thorpe Abbotts airfield, basking everything in an idyllic, orange glow that was almost beautiful enough to distract from the heady stench of motor oil that lay thick on the air, permeating hair and clothes so thoroughly that anyone who spent even five minutes in the place would carry it with them for the rest of the day.

Frankie Bevan clamped a flashlight tight between her teeth, the narrow beam of light illuminating the underside of the B-17's gun turret as she surveyed it for any cracks or gaps in the glass that could compromise its integrity. The rest of the ground crew had called it a day almost two hours ago, but the Yanks always did prefer to work in the daylight. She was nearing the end of her third year in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force, and after so many nights spent running the airstrips in the darkness for the RAF, Frankie was well accustomed to toiling away into the night.

Thorpe Abbotts was new, and yet much the same. It was only her second week here, compensating for the Americans' manpower shortages. The job was always the same, no matter where she went or what planes she worked on - checks, fixes, refuelling, over and over again - but thus was the nature of a mechanic's job. What she was not yet quite used to was the Americans themselves. Loud and brash and self-assured, Frankie was sometimes glad they worked different hours.

Taking note of a few cracks in the glass panelling, she reached up to swipe the torch from her mouth, offering a satisfied nod as she completed her checks for the night. All that was left was to pin her list of concerns up on the board inside the mechanics' Nissen hut, and then it was off to the pub for her.

Once she changed out of her oil-stained coveralls, that was.

"They're working you like a dog down there on the strip," Georgina, one of Frankie's bunkmates, pointed out, flipping nonchalantly through a magazine as she lounged on her bed.

"Someone's gotta do it," She shrugged, kicking off her coveralls as she rummaged in the shared wardrobe for the correct service uniform. "Some of the mechanics they've brought over are practically kids, not sure I'd trust 'em to fix my plane if I was going up there."

"You'd better show 'em what for, then," George smiled, glancing over as Frankie finished buttoning up her blouse, reaching for the navy blue jacket.

"You coming for drinks?"

"Uh, nah - I'll go tomorrow. Sandra thinks we'll be starting early tomorrow so I wanna get a decent night's sleep."

"Ooh, luxury," Frankie teased, shimmying her shoulders as she made her way to the door of the hut. "Alright, see you later."

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The pub was crammed from door to door as she forced her way inside, the sound of chattering overpowering the music blaring from a radio in the corner. The American invasion of Thorpe Abbotts had well and truly been successful, scarcely a flash of RAF blue visible amongst the sea of khaki as Frankie burrowed her way through the crowds towards the bar.

"Pint of Guinness, please," She called over the din, the bartender offering a friendly nod of affirmation as she felt the crowd behind her push her body further into the edge of the bar.

"There y'are, love," The man nodded, placing the pint glass in front of her as she smiled her thanks, foam lining her top lip as she took her first sip. Frankie barely had time to wipe it away, turning to take a step back from the bar, before another body collided with hers. She gasped as the beer she had so looked forward to sloshed over the rim of the glass, pooling on the floor and staining the front of her uniform, as the other man's drink did the same.

"Woah, careful there!" The man cried, flicking a few stray droplets of spilt beer from his hand onto the floor. A deep frown creased her features as she peered up at him. The soldier was so tall that the tip of her head didn't quite pass his shoulder, and yet the irritation in her expression was so palpable that he took a full step back.

"Oh, that was my fault, was it?" Frankie tutted.

"Well, sweetheart, maybe if you'd been looking where you were going-"

"Maybe if you bloody Yanks gave us some room to breathe in here we wouldn't have a problem!"

There was an easy smile on the man's face that struck her as distinctly annoying. Discarding his now almost empty glass on the bar, the man put up his hands in surrender. "Alright, alright. Look. We're not gonna agree on this, so what d'ya say we settle this with a little friendly competition?"

She raised a brow. "What sort of competition?"

"Uh... how 'bout a drinking contest?"

Frankie let out a guffaw so forceful that the man's confident smile disappeared, and a few nearby airmen turned to watch the scene unfold. "Y'know what? Yeah. You're on."

With a nod, he turned away, marching towards the closest table. "Alright boys, gimme some space, I got a contest to win against half-pint over here."

She approached the table, sitting down opposite the soldier, smirking at his arrogance. The airmen he had kicked out of their seats were lingering to watch the spectacle unfold, and it was clear their bets were on her opponent.

"Now," He sighed, taking a seat. "In the spirit of good sportsmanship, I oughta introduce myself. John Egan," He said, reaching a hand across the table.

"Frances Bevan. Frankie," She nodded, shaking his hand.

Egan nodded. "So, normal rules apply. No spilling, no vomiting, gotta drain the glass. Still wanna do this?"

Frankie nodded firmly. "I'd never pass up such a wonderful opportunity to humble you Yanks," She grinned.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Egan was turning red, his smug smile long since vanished, the motion of his arm slowing as he reached for the next shot glass, glancing across at her with a slightly nauseated expression. The crowd surrounding them had long since grown since they had begun, although how long ago that was she couldn't quite remember. The huge pile of empty shot glasses in the centre of the table did nothing to jog her memory.

"Oh, come on, Egan, you've gotta do better than that," Frankie teased, reaching forward and downing her next shot. In fairness, she too was beginning to feel light-headed, but it never showed on her face, her demeanour as cool and collected as it had been when she first sat down.

"I thought... I thought this would be easy," John complained, grimacing as he brought the next glass to his lips. "You're so small, where are you storing all this liquor?"

"I'm British - pretty sure it's in our bloodstream," She teased. Egan's eyes narrowed as he weakly upturned the contents of his glass into his mouth, screwing up his face as the liquid ran down his throat.

"I really like her," John admitted, letting out a long sigh as he drew a hand over his eyes. A few of the airmen laughed, clapping him over the shoulders.

"I think we're done here," Frankie chuckled.

"You forfeit?" He asked hopefully.

"No, I'm saying you're about to. That or you're gonna throw up - either way, I win."

"Nuh-uh," Egan shook his head. "Not gonna happen," He fought to suppress a burp, and the room seemed to brace itself for the inevitable vomit that would follow, letting out a collective sigh of relief when he swallowed his nausea back down. "...Yeah. Ok."

She clapped, throwing up her hands in victory as a couple of the men standing behind her cheered. "Well, it's been a real pleasure doing business with you Major," Frankie chuckled, fighting through the splitting headache that was growing in her temples as she rose from her seat, offering him a hand to help him stand.

John batted her away, but stumbled as he got up, one of his friends pressing a firm hand on his back to keep him upright. She smiled. "I'll help you get him back since it's my fault. Gotta get back to the huts anyway."

The airman accepted, each of them slinging one of Egan's arms around their shoulders as he tilted haphazardly over to one side, struggling to prop himself up against her due to her height. Trailing towards the door, a few of the men let out celebratory whoops at her as she passed, praising her victory.

"Thanks for the night, gents - I'm here all war," Frankie called over her shoulders, a cheer erupting from the crowd as they dragged Egan sideways out of the door.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

It was growing difficult to see as they marched John back to the huts, the street lights growing more and more sparse the closer they got to the airfield. "You gotta teach me how to do that," He slurred, tilting his head down towards her, the smell of liquor thick on his breath.

"You gotta get more practice in - you Americans with your 'no alcohol until you're 21' rule never stood a chance, we've just been in the game longer."

"Ah," He nodded, pausing for a moment. "Hey, why'd you call yourself Frankie?"

"Because Frances is a terrible name," She scoffed.

"Can I call you Fran?"

"Only if you want to die."

"Fair enough."

As they reached the end of the row of men's huts, she shrugged his arm off of her shoulders, relinquishing custody of John to the other airman, who thanked her for her help.

"See ya 'round, Shortcake!" Egan called as they trailed away, grinning proudly to himself at the nickname. Frankie scoffed, rolling her eyes and massaging her temples as her headache steadily worsened.

"You look like shit," George whispered as she wandered back into their hut. She had rolled her hair up into pin curls, protected beneath a headscarf, and was reading a copy of Wuthering Heights in the dim light of her bedside lamp.

"Got into a drinking contest with one of the Americans," She shrugged, tossing her beer-stained blouse and jacket into a crumpled heap at the foot of her bed, a reminder to wash them tomorrow.

"Did you win?"

"Of course."

"Shh!" One of the other women hissed from the opposite end of the room, shrouded in the darkness. Frankie pulled a face at her scolding, dragging a brush through the knots in her dark brown hair as George stifled a laugh, discarding her book and turning off the light once her friend had changed and gotten into bed.

It was silent for a while as she lay beneath the blankets, staring up at what would have been the ceiling if not for the complete absence of light. Her alcohol-induced headache thrummed behind her eyes, a constant, dull pain keeping her from sleep.

"George?" She whispered.

"What?"

"Do you have an aspirin?"

The sound of quiet rummaging was audible in the stillness of the hut, and she struggled to suppress a laugh as she felt the tube smack her in the face, a result of Georgina tossing it blindly in the darkness.

"Thank you," She giggled, trying not to gag as she took the pills dry, lying back and waiting for the pain to subside as she thought back on the night's events.

I'm not that short.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The blinding morning sun was unwelcome the next day as Frankie made her way to the airfield from her hut, bike resting against her hip as she made a momentary stop to fix her hair for the day ahead, hair tie held between her teeth as she scooped it into a ponytail. Most of the women she shared the Nissen hut with had left over an hour ago, hurrying to the flight tower in anticipation of the arrival of yet more American pilots, but her job didn't begin until after the planes landed, so fortunately for her, she had been afforded a little more sleep, her headache now more or less dissipated.

A loud honking startled her, the hair tie slipping from her teeth and falling to the floor. As she bent to pick it up, a jeep rolled to a stop in front of her, the horn parping once more.

"Fuck's sake, what?" Frankie muttered, glancing up to see the cheery grin of Major John Egan smiling down at her.

"Mornin'."

"Are you even fit to drive after last night?"

"Fifty-fifty. Hop in, throw your bike in the back."

She frowned as she noticed the pile of bikes already forming in the back of the car, but stacked her on top all the same, sliding into the passenger seat beside him. "Starting a collection?"

"Won them in a bet, night before last. Got one for me and my buddy Buck, he's arriving today."

"Is that Major Cleven?" She asked.

"Sure is," John nodded as the engine roared to life, taking them sailing along the road towards the airstrip, the wind ruining her hair before she even had a chance to finish it.

"So..." He began, swerving slightly to dodge a few maintenance workers on bikes. "Where ya from, Frankie?"

"Stratford."

"I... do not know where that is."

"I didn't expect you to," She chuckled. "Grew up with my dad working his garage, that's what got me into it. Always preferred planes to cars, though."

"You and me both," John nodded, slowing as they neared the landing strip. Up ahead, the flight crew were beginning to disembark, and Frankie's eyes narrowed as she noticed one of the airmen carrying a large dog.

"If they let that dog shit in the plane, I'm not cleaning it up," She stated. "You've heard me say it, that's on the record now."

"Yes ma'am," Egan affirmed, pulling to a stop, a grin spreading across his face as he got close enough to recognise his friends.

As he clambered out of the car, stepping forward to greet his comrades, she climbed out of her seat, wandering around the back of the jeep to disentangle her bike from the pile, tugging it free as the sounds of wind and aeroplane engines overpowered the men's voices.

"Oh, and, uh - This is Frankie Bevan," John called, guiding Cleven towards her, speaking louder so that she could hear. She raised her hand in a somewhat awkward wave, almost dropping her bike on her foot as she hauled it off the back of the jeep. "Best damn mechanic we've got, she's holdin' us together, that's for sure."

"Ma'am," Cleven greeted her with a tilt of his cap.

"He's never seen me work," Frankie shook her head, stepping forward to shake Cleven's hand. "We only met yesterday, he's just being nice in the hopes I won't tell you about how I drank him under the table last night."

John scoffed. "That is not what-" She raised a brow and he stuttered. "Yeah, that - that did happen."

Cleven laughed, squeezing Egan's shoulder. "Well, I'm sure glad he's had someone to keep him humble before I got here. Thank you for your work, ma'am, I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot more of each other soon."

She nodded, grinning at Egan's embarrassment. "How was your flight?"

"Smooth sailin', not sure there'll be anything to fix up this time."

A soldier she had heard John greet as Demarco spoke up from where he was stood, scratching his dog's stomach. "The dog dropped a deuce in the cockpit."

Clicking her fingers, she pointed to Egan. "She's not doing that!" He called, craning his head over his shoulder as Demarco put his hands up in surrender.

"Well, that works wonders," Frankie chuckled, lifting her leg to straddle the seat of her bike. "Now, if all you gents have planned is standing around, I've got work to do."

"Bye Shortcake," John grinned as she pedalled the bicycle into motion, ringing the bell and offering up a middle finger as she left. He chuckled, feeling Cleven clap him over the shoulder again.

"She's interesting... nice," His friend began. "Bucky, I know you're sick of Marge tryna set you up, but she is definitely-"

"She's definitely my friend, Buck. Besides, I could never date a woman with a higher alcohol tolerance than me. That's just embarrassing."

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The wind whipped her hair this way and that as Frankie hammered at the pedals, gaining speed faster and faster with each second until the rolling fields beyond the airstrip were little more than a green blur. She'd always loved to cycle, preferably as fast as she possibly could. Her father used to say she should try racing, but his ambition curtailed rather when she got in trouble for almost taking out a couple of tourists outside Shakespeare's birthplace on her way home from school. Besides, she'd never quite had the discipline for sports.

Her breaks squeaked noisily as she rolled to a stop outside the mechanics' Nissen hut, stationed just beyond the main runway. They had been given a single hut for all of their operations, much to the chagrin of many. The back end was an orderly pile of spare parts - buckets of rivets, piles of sheet metal - but someone had supplied them with a table and chairs, and the recent addition of a gas stove and kettle had proved a huge hit.

Ken Lemmons was sat at the table as she wandered in, glancing at the corkboard by the door where she and the others posted notice of anything in need of urgent repair.

"A couple of the guys replaced the glass in the gun turrets earlier - thanks for the shout," Lemmons spoke up.

"Ah, good," Frankie nodded, taking a seat opposite him. As much as she bemoaned her younger, American co-workers, she had grown fond of Ken. He was sipping a cup of coffee, and by the look on his face, he was not enjoying it. She tossed the paper bag containing her lunch onto the table, retrieving a cucumber sandwich - meagre subsistence, and a sight that made the boy frown.

"I think I'd actually murder someone for some Hershey's right about now," He remarked, grimacing as he took another sip of coffee.

"Hey, we make do with what we've got," She shrugged, attempting to devour the sandwich before the cucumber could soak through the thin slices of bread. "I know one of the girls in the Land Army - I darn her jumpers in exchange for a bit of her extra cheese ration."

Lemmons chuckled, leaning back in his seat. "I miss good chocolate. I can't get used to... Cad-berry's?"

"Oh, that's sacrilege," She laughed, tossing a slice of cucumber at him, which stuck to the breast pocket of his coveralls. "If you'd come a couple years ago when they were still making Dairy Milk you'd've thought you'd died and gone to heaven."

"I'll believe it when I see it," He grinned, plucking the slice off of his clothes. There was a pause before he spoke again. "One of the fellas says they're actually taking off later."

Frankie nodded, lifting a hand to cover her mouth as she spoke around her food. "Oh yeah? This gonna be your first proper go at it?"

"Yeah..." Lemmons admitted, looking momentarily nervous. "You?"

She snorted back a laugh. "Nah. I've been in the WAAF nearly four years - moved around a bit, but whether it's Attlebridge or Docking or Thorpe Abbotts, it's all the same gig. You stick with me when the planes start coming back down and you'll be fine."

The corner of his mouth tilted upwards in a smile. "You're gonna babysit me?"

Frankie grinned, standing up to reach across the table and ruffle his curls. "With a cute little face like yours, who could help it?" She teased, laughing as he batted her away.

"Get off, I'm serious," Lemmons chuckled, but the smile never faded from his expression.

Ken's buddy hadn't been wrong, per se, but his fabled mission had come not hours, but days later, with a hammering knock on the door to her hut, the women stirring from their sleep in a wave of disgruntled moans.

"What time is it?" Frankie whined as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, resisting the urge to burrow her head beneath the pillow and block out the relentless knocking outside.

"Four thirty," George groaned, frowning vindictively at her watch as she put it on, as if time itself had caused her personal grievance.

"They're flying today, get ready!" A young male voice bellowed from the other side of the door, clearly too shy to bare his face to a room of half-dressed, irritated women.

"Fuck me, I'm coming," She muttered, brushing her hair with one hand as she buttoned up the front of her coveralls with the other.

"Spot me! How's my lipstick?" George called, and Frankie leant across the bed that separated them to wipe a stray smudge of red away with her thumb.

"All good."

"Right," Her bunkmate huffed. "I'll see you later, yeah?"

"See you later," Frankie affirmed.

"I'll join you for drinks this time if all goes well!" George called over her shoulder as she scurried towards the door.

"I'll hold you to that!" She replied, smiling as she laced up her boots.

The planes left and returned in mere hours, but the in-between had felt never-ending as the ground crew waited in tense anticipation to see how many would return and in what state. Frankie had sent Egan away to the flight tower after his nervous hovering had started to get on her nerves, and she had since spent the last half-hour sitting in the grass beside the runway making daisy chains with a few of the local children as a way to pass the time.

"Frankie! They're comin' in!" She heard Lemmons yell from across the airstrip. Hurriedly sending the children back to their parents as the sound of plane engines grew steadily louder overhead, she scrambled to her feet, grass stains streaking the knees of her coveralls as she jogged over, raising a hand to shield her eyes from the sun as the planes began to descend towards them.

"...10, 11, 12..." Frankie muttered, coming to the slow realisation that many of the men they'd sent away that morning had not returned. But that loss did not negate the importance of the work they had to do now. "Ok, let's go," She patted Lemmons on the shoulder, and they reached for the bikes they had discarded on the ground nearby, pedalling hard towards the landing strip.

From the second they arrived, she was surveying the damage, scanning the planes for the areas that would need the most attention. It was impossible to pick just one.

"There's a reason we go at night," She muttered, so softly no one else could hear over the din of shouts and dying engines. The mechanics weren't emergency staff, but she'd seen a fair few planes come in either on fire, half-collapsed or both over the years, enough to learn it was best to get in as soon as possible.

"Shit," Lemmons huffed beside her, staring up at a huge, jagged hole in the metal of one of the plane's wings.

"Send a couple of the boys back to the hut - tell them to bring a car back with all the sheet metal they can put in it. Oh - and get me a welder!" She called to him, and the young man began barking orders at the other mechanics, the crew erupting to life around the plane as they began to fix the mess that had returned.

"Frankie!" Egan's voice rang from down below as she climbed up onto the top of the plane, marking out the areas of the body that needed replacing. She looked down at him as he yelled again. "You need anything?"

"Nope, we're good here!" Frankie replied, holding up a thumbs-up in case the wind drowned out her voice. Looking down at the work to do below her, it was as if she could map out every fix in her mind, envision every action in order, play it out in her head until the beast was as good as new. She smiled to herself. "This is what I do."

[shewolf-sinclair]

I HATE when people dumb down Jason Todd “he’s impulsive/irrational/erratic/brash/dumb/the angry robin!”

WRONG

let me break it down for you fools because he’s actually like one of the most nuanced and complex characters to ever bless my presence (and he’s the best ((my fav)) robin argue with the wall) (tldr at the end but please read the post)

Starting out as robin they are ALL orphans. because that’s like bruce’s thing. BUT dick and tim had families before bruce adopted them. Jason did not. HE GREW UP ON THE STREETS. (+10 points for truama✨) which led him to grow up to be independent and resourceful. Bruce literally met him because he was trying to steal the bat mobiles tires with the intent of reverse engineering them to sell to the people of gotham because bullet proof tires in that kinda city would save lives source

As for being brash. Yeah. he is. he lacks people skills because HE GREW UP ON THE STREETS. yet he still knows how to sympathize with people and not be an ass ALL the time. he’s cocky sure but it’s a defensive mechanism after years of being treated like he doesn’t have value/having to prove himself. and damien is worse lets bsffr.

He’s impulsive. (likely adhd) Teenager. next question.

He’s the angriest robin! he only ever wants vengeance! WRONG. dick is angrier! he was so petty he left gotham and got a new identity just as a fuck you to bruce. any anger Jason has is not unmatched or outdone by other robins and he is rightfully angry he’s been dealt a crappy hand in life. he’s jealous of dick because bruce was ALWAYS comparing him and telling heroic stories of dicks feats. it’s hard not to push yourself to be as good as or better than the og and not to crack under said pressure.

He’s dumb! NOPE. he is as smart if not smarter than tim. He is BRILLIANT when he wants to be. (see above: resourceful) if you take titans (cw) as canon (why wouldn’t u its as canon as any other tv show??) he is a GENIUS. he taught himself chemistry so he could invent and mass produce drugs. he had a genius strategy to fuck with the titans; the puzzle of clues for which dick needed scarecrow, kory, gar, and conner to solve. Not to mention him finding doctor light earlier in the season. He leads the outlaws bc he is a natural leader and good at handling the details!!

He’s a villain! OKAY AND? SO WAS HARLEY BUT WE LUV HER !! DAMIEN WAS A TRAINED ASSASAIN! he puts so much effort into helping people (see above: resourceful) HE RISKED/LOST HIS LIFE FOR IT. HE IS FIERCELY LOYAL. even as red hood he obtains a strict moral code; no drugs to kids or by schools, don’t kill innocent uninvolved people(depends on which media you’re looking at). serve karma on a gold platter. unlawful but USUALLY NOT unethical. he also becomes a vigilante (and the JL for a bit) and does so much good! none of them are perfect ALL of the time. and considering the other DC villains, he’s not that evil.

strength?? no problem! he almost beat dick and bruce several times in the comics!! source

not to mention his proficiency for new things (see above: chemistry) his whole time as robin he uses bat tech. but redhood uses guns and knives. he just picked that up and was a skilled marksman immediately. (also truama response after nearly dying to death stroke)

so what hes kinda fucked in the head. aren’t they all? isn’t that… the point? it’s justified after everything he’s been through AND it makes hims a better character, more 3D more realistic and relatable.

also for the sake of this thesis partially disregard the wonderful work of art that is WFA it’s a fixit. for a reason. because the it was broken and needed fixing.

TLDR; you don’t have to like Jason Todd, or think he’s the best Robin, but you have to admit, he is a complex, layered, well written character. And stop mischaracterizing him and dumbing him down to this impulsive, angry, weak kid.

bonus: my Jason playlist

[spectoris]

FOR YOUR LOVE | KYLO REN

pairing: kylo ren x gn!reader

summary: kylo's motivations come to light

contains: rivals to lovers, canon typical violence, elements of dark romance, obsessive!kylo, slight ooc kylo (he rambles), implied jedi!reader

word count: 0.9k

a/n: sentence starter from nightprompts, inspired by the song "for your love" by maneskin

“For being someone you hate, I’m on your mind a lot.”

Your words come out through gritted teeth, more of a spit than a sentence. Every inch of your body exerts as much force it contains to hold off against the clash of colors before your squinted eyes. Heels dug into the dark soil, your frame remains stagnant despite Kylo’s imposing bruteness. The crackling red of his lightsaber fills most of your vision, swallowing the color of your blade completely whole. A hesitant gulp runs down your throat. You hate how you can feel the heat of the blades across your cheeks, even in the wintery air.

Kylo sees past your sarcastic facade; you assume he can despite the helmet that obscures his face. His breathing comes out slow but heavy, signaling his exhaustion. To credit yourself, you did put up a good fight. The large crack on the side of his helmet where part of his singed hair peeks through sits as a testament to your force. Still, you’ve strained yourself far past your limits. The adrenaline may have given you a boost before. Now you can hardly keep your legs from shaking.

Despite the close proximity of the two blades, neither of them seem to come any closer. Through your fatigue, you notice Kylo hasn’t moved. His saber may be pressed against yours, holding position, but that’s all there is to it. There’s a sudden stillness to the air, a stark contrast to the tremors of the Force surrounding you two as you fought moments before.

“You are.”

The words take a moment to settle in your ears. You blink blankly at Kylo, grip loosening around the hilt of your weapon. In the split second you let up, Kylo’s lightsaber swings to attack your legs. Instinctively, your saber comes down to block him. You notice it again, the sudden stillness, the fact that he let you defend yourself before his weapon fully came down.

“You are.”

The helmet makes Kylo’s voice come out mechanical, as if programmed by a droid. Yet you can hear the slightest hint of his own unobscured tone. Desperate, like the confession pains him. Kylo’s lightsaber reaches for your shoulder, once again slow enough for you to block. Rather than hold the position, Kylo continues to barrel his lightsaber at you. His relentless attacks drive you further back. Though each clash covers part of his speech, you still hear the words clearly.

“I hate you. I hate you. I can never escape you, no matter how far I go.”

You can’t suppress your scoff. “You, escape me? If I’m not mistaken, you’re the one who keeps coming for me. You’re the one with the army and the forces and the utter brashness to spend your resources on me, Supreme Leader.”

Your foot catches in the root of a tree, throwing you back. You brace yourself for the fall, but an invisible force keeps you upright. Looking forward, Kylo’s hand is outstretched. It quickly falls back to his side. You bring both of your hands back to the hilt of your lightsaber, holding the burning blade between the two of you. Kylo’s still burns, though he doesn’t wield it.

“Everything…All I do…is for you.”

A hot flash of anger replaces the icy chill in your spine. “What in Maker’s name are you talking about?”

“Everything! The armies, the droids, the battles—I did it all for you!” Kylo steps closer. Through the helmet, you sense his face twisted in half anger and agony. “I wanted, I needed you to rule beside me. Create an empire no one else in the galaxy could touch. You could’ve had anything you wanted. I would’ve given you everything you wanted.”

Kylo takes off his battered helmet. You want to tear your eyes away. It’d be easier to dismiss his claims as a possession of the dark side of the Force if you couldn’t sense the genuinity in his pleading eyes. The Supreme Leader has toppled out of his throne.

“Of all things,” you manage to utter, “you thought I’d want destruction?”

“Power,” Kylo spits, his typical curtness returning for a brief moment. “Even the purest of minds want power. The power to heal, the power to help.”

You shake your head no as Kylo takes more steps toward you. You push your lightsaber foward, forcing a bigger gap between you and Kylo. “I’d rather be thrown to the rancors than take anything from you.”

Kylo’s lightsaber is disarmed, now a hunk of metal in his hand. Yours continues to burn and crackle. Drive it through him. Silence him. End this now. Your hands tremble as Kylo’s wraps around them, disarming your lightsaber for you. The leather is warm to the touch, softer than you expected. You imagine your eyes to be like that of a porg’s—round, dark, and helpless. What remains of the space between you and Kylo is only a few inches that shrink with each passing second. Your nose picks up the scent of blood, fuel, and earth from his skin.

To deny the curiosity that nags at your brain is to deny the strange warmth that blooms across your skin. Both run rampant, and in Kylo’s presence only grow. The dark side of his Force coming in contact with your light side creates a dangerous thrum you feel in your veins. Both of you can sense its potential growing, and neither reject it.

“Why?” you whisper as Kylo’s forehead nearly grazes yours. “Why did you do it?”

His hand holds you steady by the nape of your neck. You gasp when he brings his lips close to your ear.

“For your love.”

a/n: this is a repost... anyway if you haven't listened to the song pls pls do it's so obsessively slutty every time i listen to it i go yes!!! this is kylo's song!!!