#“Keep it simple” says my friend when I tell her about the Superhero AU

[analexthatexists]

THIS. TOOK. FOREVER.

BUT IT'S FINALLY FRICKING DONE.

Introducing my take on the Nightmare of this Superhero AU. This story and Nightmare’s design(s) are highly inspired by Spiderman villains, Resident Evil, and The Last of Us! Thanks to @thenocturnenarrator for helping me with this! Superhero AU belongs to @thelunarsystemwrites!

This turned out so much more gruesome and complex than I expected, so VISUAL AND DESCRIPTIVE CW for the following;

Lab Experimentation (Might be considered child experimentation), Body Horror involving mushrooms growing out of the body, Gore, Blood, Insects, Vomiting, and potentially heavy subjects that not all viewers may like.

Backstory

Meet Nightmare “Nyx” Yggdrasil, a 12-13 year old who was kidnapped and experimented on alongside his brother Dream. At the time, he was only able to talk to plants and comprehend how they felt, but that was going to change very soon. The scientists wanted to enhance the powers of the soul’s magic, creating a serum that could do so but was incapable of working on Nightmare’s current state. His “soul” couldn’t be classified as one, seeing as it was more of a purple fireball of pure negative energy, so they needed a way to make it something tangible and experimental. They eventually gain the idea to have the brothers eat a Gold Apple from their home world so their “souls” can merge with the apples and therefore be alterable. While Dream’s process goes fine, Nightmare’s Apple obviously rots, but he’s still forced to eat it, and soon after so he’s injected with the enhancing serum. This not only enhances his ability to talk to plants to being able to control them and connect with them on a higher level, but it enhances the magic and power of the Black Apple, causing black goop to begin tearing out of Nightmare’s body. To prevent his body from literally ripping itself apart from the inside, Nightmare controls the plants around him to seal himself away into a large, cocoon-like growth. A few months pass after Dream escapes the lab with CORE FRISK, and the cocoon breaks open.

The fungi and other plant life had merged with his body. Nightmare was still mostly mentally there, but the cordyceps merging with most of his body was taking tolls on his brain and making him go a little crazy, not to mention the pent up vengeance and wrath he was feeling. Naturally, he slaughtered everyone in the laboratory and fled to the same place Dream and various other superheroes found themselves in. Craving any sort of comfort and affection, he forced together a team of supervillains including Dust, Horror, Killer, and maybe other willing characters. He’s convinced everyone including himself that he assembled the group for personal revenges on the world and to show everyone that they’ll be more than just tools, as well as general instinct telling him to feed off people’s suffering and all that.

But deep down, it’s just because he doesn’t want to be alone with nothing. Never again after all of the suffering he felt growing up in the laboratory…

Powers

Pre-Experimentation

Plant Communication

Hand-To-Hand Combat

Post-Experimentation

Phytokinesis / Plant Manipulation (Includes roots, mushrooms and fungi, flowers, ETC)

Poison Expulsion and Immunity (He pretty much vomits it up, or can poison people with poisonous plants/spores)

Regeneration

Spore Infiltration (He uncontrollably gives off spores every time he exhales as well as from his body’s fungi. Inhaling these spores can cause headaches and nausea, but severe cases can result in brainwashing, in which a host will become a mindless drone forced to take commands from Nightmare)

If a skeleton is spore-infested, they must wash out their skeletal system and clear all spores before the spores begin growing inside of the body and through the eye sockets and bones. The fungi that grow from these spores feed off a person’s negative energy and soul magic, slowly draining them and turning them into an emotionless husk, eventually killing them and leaving behind a visceral mess of flesh and flora. Humans and non-skeletal Monsters require more advanced surgical procedures to remove spores and fungi, and have far lower chances of surviving the infection.

Abilities

Insect Attraction (The foul stench that Nightmare gives off usually attracts flies, maggots, worms, caterpillars, ETC to feed on and live in parts of his body. This also means it’s not just chunks of moss and goop he’s throwing up…)

Nauseation and Headaches (Nightmare smells like rotting flesh and mushrooms, and the scent is very potent)

Intimidation (He’s scary!)

Weaknesses

Extreme Flammability/Fire

Explosives (He’s weak to those and generally dislikes the loud noises)

Light/Blaster Magic

Herbicides/Plant-Toxic Chemicals

Low Temperatures/Cold Climates

Abandonment (General Fear/Phobia)

Other Information

Alignment is Chaotic Neutral that eventually becomes Chaotic Evil

He's asexual and biromantic

One drastic difference involving this Nightmare from the original personality-wise is that Passive Nightmare is still in-tact. He's not dead in this AU, he's just been driven a little mad by vengeance and his own fungus. The apple he had consumed WASN'T the one that was possessed by the human that killed Nim; It was a Gold Apple he turned rotten, meaning he'd have more of his conscious than the main universe's Nightmare

Furthermore, he's also more of a liar and willing to bend the truth, such as when he lies to himself and others about the true reasons as to why he formed a team

Nightmare doesn’t leave his team to fight alone; he comes along with them every chance he gets to, even if it seems like a bad idea towards the others

When Nightmare realizes who Dream is, he’s hellbent on killing him and everyone that he has bonds and friendships with. He believes Dream had abandoned him and wishes to exact the same suffering he had to go through. It’s that Spiderverse-Miles-And-Spot “They turned you into a lovable hero, but I was turned into THIS.” dynamic we all know and love. Nightmare’s also very envious of his brother due to the fact he got to live a better, more fulfilling life than he did

Nightmare could definitely do that sick “Akira hand explosion attack” thing

[randomshyperson]

Can I request a celebrity AU with Elizabeth Olsen and Female Reader? Where R is Vision in the MCU. And like throughout a series of interviews and behind the scenes shots, you can see how the two actually fall in love in real life. And in like the final interview they ask “Are you two dating?” And this time they can finally say yes

Hello darling, how are you? I hope well. This took me a while, and i’m not sure you’re even going to like it. But i hope you do. It was honestly kind of strange to write for Lizzie, i kept mistaken the name as Wanda. Also, i changed your idea a bit, because i could find the right way to write the interviews. But anyway, here it is. Good reading.

Elizabeth Olsen x Reader - Love is outside the screen

Summary: The one where Reader plays Vision in the MCU and she falls in love with her co-worker Elizabeth Olsen.

Warnings: None.

Words:  4.308 words  //// Read on AO3

Marks:  @wandamaximoffpuppy

Part. 2  || Part 3

Eight years ago

Your agent was calling you for the third time, and you thought you should answer before you lost your contract.

Letting out an impatient sigh as you reached for your cell phone, you left it on speaker.

- Hello, Sara. - You say with a slight irony as you relax your body in the water of the jacuzzi again.

- It's not polite to ignore someone who keeps you employed. - she said irritated, making you laugh.

- Sorry, but I told you I was on vacation. - You reminded her. - And what did you keep doing? Oh yes, calling me.

- Don't be so grumpy, woman. - She replied with a light humor in her voice, and you could hear the clatter of keystrokes, suggesting that she was working. - I have an opportunity for you.

You raised your eyebrows in curiosity, but said nothing. And by your silence, Sara kept talking.

- Tell me, have you ever thought about being a superhero?

You let out an incredulous laugh, thinking it was a joke. 

- I'm not going to make any weird latex movies, Sara. - You warn her, and she lets out a laugh.

- Actually, honey, it's Marvel.

You blink in surprise, and then turn to rest your arms on the edge of the jacuzzi and look directly at your cell phone.

- What are you talking about? 

- Ah, caught your interest, huh? - She remarks. - You actors are all the same, one famous name and you fall to your knees.

- Sara...

- No, it's okay. - She giggles. - They want a openly queer actress to play a lesbian heroine, I think. And then they called me.

- Wow, Marvel doing something like that? - You comment. - It sounds like a lie.

Sara giggles.

- It pays well anyway. - She says, and then a notification pops up on the screen. - I just sent you the script. Let me know if I can confirm your audition.

You let out a sigh before saying goodbye and hanging up, grabbing your cell phone to read the script.

It is the scene description of your character's appearance, and there is also a note for the chemistry test. You bite your lips thoughtfully. You were known in the media for roles in international, indie and cult films, mostly lesbian romance. You had a few academy nominations, and had been awarded twice by the critics. Superheroes were not really what you were looking for. But then you remembered how much you missed having a lgbt reference in media like this, and then you are sending a message to your agent confirming your audition.

//-//

Present

You are twiddling your thumbs in your dressing room. It must be the ninth interview in less than two weeks. Letting out a sigh, you stand up, momentarily looking at your appearance in the mirror. The make-up team did a good job, you look well. And then you are walking outside, to the dressing room next to yours. 

You knock on the door, and are soon answered. But Elizabeth doesn't smile when she pulls you inside.

- Hey, Lizzie, what's up? - you ask worriedly as you close the door. The next second she's hugging you tight, and you sigh. - You're anxious, aren't you?

- I feel like my heart is going to burst out of my mouth. - She grumbles and you start stroking her back, trying to calm her down.

- Remember that exercise we practiced, okay? - You ask her tenderly as you move your feet so that you move together toward the sofa in the living room. You break the embrace slowly, to sit Lizzie down on the couch as you kneel in front of her. She looks on the verge of tears, and you place your hands on top of hers. - Breathe with me, okay?

It will take you many minutes to calm her down, but you don't care. And then she smiles, and brings your foreheads together.

- Thank you. - She whispers before kissing you. She walks away too quickly in your opinion, but you can't say anything because the producer is calling you next, announcing that the interview starts in two minutes. You smile at Liz before getting up.

//-//

Seven years ago.

You had just finished filming your last scene in Age of Ultron when your agent called you. Scrolling your finger quickly across the screen, you answered while your cell phone rested on the table in your dressing room, and you kept your hands busy trying to pin up your hair.

- I'm leaving the studio, Sara, what's up? - you told her.

- I wanted to congratulate you on the affair, although I'm surprised it happened so quickly. - She says and you frown in confusion, finishing up with your bun. You pick up your cell phone next.

- What are you talking about?

Sara giggles, and sends you an attachment. You pull your cell phone away from your ear to look at it. It is a photo of you and Elizabeth, your teammate and romantic partner in the franchise, taken the same day you discovered Liz had social anxiety and took her out for coffee with you to take her focus off the celebrity world for a while. The paparazzi managed to capture the exact moment when you kissed her on the cheek in farewell. 

- This is all over the gossip sites as Marvel's mysterious romantic couple. - Your agent commented, and you rubbed your fingers across your forehead in irritation.

- You want me to publicly deny a relationship, is that it? - you ask, walking around the dressing room and gathering your things.

- What? No! This is great for advertising. - she says with slight excitement in her voice. - Especially after the movie comes out! Fans love couples who fall in love behind the screen.

You roll your eyes, switching your cell phone to your ear.

- I'm not going to make a relationship contract if that's what you're thinking! - You say with irritation and can imagine Sara rolling her eyes on the other end of the line.

- Yes, yes, we've been over this, Miss Morally Correct. - She scoffs lightly. - But I really called to talk about the premiere. We have details to discuss.

Sighing, you ask her to wait. Then you finished putting your things away, and grabbed the phone as you walked out the door.

//-//

Six years ago, California

Interviewers can be motherfuckers when they want to be, you thought as you bit the inside of your cheek, trying to keep your face impassive as you watched the woman in front of you list the "missed moments" from the Avengers set. You knew that your agent had talked to the show's staff about the authorized questions, and yet here you were on live television, having to declare whether the timely photos taken on the Avengers set meant that you had a secret relationship with your best friend Elizabeth Olsen.

A slideshow was playing on the screen behind you. There were pictures from the footage, many where you and Liz were laughing together, or having lunch together. There were some where she was sitting on your lap, or vice versa. Your expression softened when you noticed one where she was looking at you adoringly. It was so strange to be an artist sometimes. You smiled politely at the presenter.

- Come on, Ellen, you know how these things are. - You said. - Things are different on camera, Lizzie and I are friends.

The audience let out a chorus of displeasure, and Ellen laughed lightly.

- You know that many of the fans would like this rumor to be true, especially since you two play a couple and you are openly queer. - She says, and you wiggle your fingers in your lap, uncomfortable with where this conversation is going, but you nod in agreement. - Furthermore, you say that the paparazzi cameras are deceiving, but what about the stories you post on your personal networks?

She asks with a chuckle, and then other videos are playing on the screen, and you force yourself to smile and watch.

The vast majority are harmless, and platonic. You spend a lot of time at Liz's house because when she moved in, you were her reference and tour guide, and so you got into the habit of checking up on her. And then you became friends and you spent more time at her house than at yours.There were many videos and pictures on yours and her instagram where you two were tending a garden, playing board games, cooking together, or watching sports.  You bit back a smile as you watched the memories through the images. 

- See?It's hard to believe that this is just platonic. - Ellen insisted again, and the audience laughed.  You tried to cover it up with a smile. - But since you claim to be single, we're going to play a game now. It's called "Who Would You Rather?

The audience applauded and you giggled, straightening your posture in your chair. And then the studio screen had a sign with the name of the game.

- It's very simple, you just have to choose which of the artists you would rather. - She explains, and you blink.

- Rather what?

Ellen lets out a giggle, and you understand, nodding in embarrassment. The audience laughs. The picture changes to two pictures.

- Who would you rather, Scarlett Johansson or Chris Hemsworth?

- Wow, that sounds like a trap. - You comment awkwardly, making the audience laugh. And then you bite your lips. - I think Scarlett.

Ellen gives you a suggestive look, and the audience chuckles, you force yourself to imitate them. The picture changes again.

- Scarlett or Sebastian Stan?

You laugh, smoothing your hair slightly.

- I don't know, I think Seb. - You answer. And then the picture changes again, and you want to run away when the audience gives a chorus of excitement.

- Sebastian Stan or Elizabeth Olsen?

- There it is the trap. - You comment clumsily, causing the audience to bust out laughing. You swallow dryly and look down at your lap before saying. - I'd say Elizabeth Olsen.

You played for a few more minutes, and then the game ended with you choosing Elizabeth at the end, which got the audience cheering and celebrating. When the interview was over, Sara was calling you, and you were massaging your forehead when you answered.

- I thought you said you two weren't dating. - She teased, and you grumbled in irritation. 

- I thought you had discussed these matters with the staff. - You retorted, slightly irritated. - She only asked me about Lizzie and dating the entire interview.

- Honey, you're America's sweet couple. - She sneered. - Ellen wants viewers and will ask the questions that the audience wants to know.

- That's ridiculous. - You said and then sighed. - Why did you call me anyway?

- I have your new shooting location, so get your coats and jackets ready.

//-//

Six years ago, Berlin.

You are laughing at Anthony's imitation of Robert. Sitting in the shared dining hall, you were having a good time over lunch with your other colleagues while you were recording Civil War.

And then you were in scene again, many minutes later, and you found it strange that the nervousness was crossing beyond your character during a specific scene in which you were counteracting with Elizabeth. 

You saw her laughing at a comment your character made, and you should have this expression of surprise and embarrassment, but you didn't even have to act it out. Your cheeks reddened naturally at the image of Liz laughing. And then the director said cut when you were done and you were rushing out to clean up your makeup.

Later that day, after the shoot was over, the team wanted to visit a local pub, and you accepted the invitation, ignoring the previous event, and smiling when Elizabeth touched your arm to get your attention.

- A toast to the Avengers! - shouted the camera crew chief when you were all gathered at the bar, you thought maybe he had had too much to drink, but you joined in the toast. 

You stood next to Lizzie and Chris at a table while sipping a dark drink that might have been craft beer, or something German.

Your cell phone vibrates with a notification and you choke in surprise at the content of the message. Sara had sent you a note from TMZ, stating that your secret romance with Elizabeth Olsen was threatened because you had been seen leaving a coffee shop with Katie McGrath. 

Chris and Lizzie look at you curiously, and you just lay your cell phone down on the table for them to see while you turn the entire glass of beer in your mouth.

- Wow, so your type really is super heroines. - Chris commented with a smile, and you laugh, pushing him away slightly. 

- I swear, I can't be seen talking to any woman that she is automatically my girlfriend. - You say irritated as you put your beer glass back on the table. Your gaze returns to Lizzie, who has picked up your cell phone from the table and is reading the news. Then she hands the phone back to you, and gets a strange look on her face that you can't read very well, but she forces a smile.

- At least you cheated on me with a pretty girl. - she says and you frown in surprise. Chris laughs at the joke, but before you could have any other reaction, the rest of the team is joining you.

//-//

Five years ago, California.

You gave up fighting the questions about your relationship with Elizabeth. They would happen anyway, whether your agent talked to the teams or not, so you just smiled politely when you told people you were just friends and remained truthful in your statements. 

Usually the interviews with Lizzie were easier, because you went into protective mode and your brain was ready to give sharp, snappy answers to keep Elizabeth from being embarrassed. 

So here you were on the Night Show, with one of your favorite interviewers, and your best friend by your side. Jimmy was asking good questions, and he was funny. You hoped he wouldn't ask anything too embarrassing.

After many questions about employment, and worldview, which was refreshing, he finally asked you about the rumors of your secret relationship.

- Girls, you know that the public wants to know. - He began with a smile, and you laughed lightly, exchanging a look with Lizzie. - And actually, we have arguments this time.

- Here we go. - You commented with light irony which made the audience laugh. 

Your latest posts on instagram were visible on the big screen.

- Last Tuesday, both of you posted these stories on your personal accounts. - Jimmy started with excitement. - And it rocked the internet completely, because the location was visible on your instagram, Elizabeth.

Lizzie let out an embarrassed giggle.

- Well, if the public's doubt is whether we were together there, they can confirm it. - She said, and Jimmy let out an excited exclamation. Lizzie waited for the audience to stop their celebratory chorus before speaking again. - But this was a special celebration, since it was my birthday. 

- And I took her on a trip to Mexico. - You completed the story with a slight smile. The audience let out a chorus of happiness and you looked at them in confusion. - Guys, friends do this!

Jimmy and the audience laughed for a moment and then the image came off the screen.

- Come on girls, you're giving us material. - He remarked with a smile. - And you're still going to deny the relationship like you always do, I imagine.

You and Wanda exchange a short chuckle.

- Look, Jimmy, all I have to say is that Lizzie is amazing, she really is. - You saw yourself confessing. - Anyone would be lucky to date this brilliant, spectacular, sweet, fun-loving woman. But that person is not me.

Jimmy lets out an exclamation of sadness along with the audience, but then they applaud your words, and you smile wryly. You risk a glance at Lizzie for a second, and she has slightly flushed cheeks, and looks surprised at your words.

You ignore the nervous feeling at the pit of your stomach, and decide to keep your posture polite as you answer the next questions.

//-//

Four years ago.

You had to kiss Lizzie. And then you shook your head. No, not you. Vision. Your character, Vision, had to kiss Lizzie's character, Wanda Maximoff. And you repeated this like a mantra as you walked from your dressing room to the set.

The day you read this scene, you smiled politely at your agent, and disguised any apparent nervousness. And then you spent the last few weeks pretending that if you didn't think about it, eventually the director would make a change and the scene wouldn't even exist. But here you were, trying to have one last drop of professionalism.

You weren't even recording the scene officially, it was just the rehearsal of lines and marking, and you had sweaty hands. 

As you walked through the studio, the staff smiled and greeted you, and then you spotted Lizzie and ignored the uneven beating of your heart.

- Let's get started girls. - announced Russo as soon as he caught sight of you. He signaled for you to follow the team's prearranged schedule. You smiled at Lizzie as you took your place. - We can test the order of the scene directly. I need to know which angle is best to have Vision ask Wanda to stay with her.

And then you started recording. And now you were Vision. There was no time to think about how naturally your hand fit into Lizzie's, or how good it felt to feel her hugging you. And then Russo shouted cut again.

- That's pretty good. - He commented, looking at the monitor. - Let's shoot the stone scene okay, then the action scene.

The scene started, and you said your lines the way you were supposed to. And then you were looking at Lizzie, and she kissed you as the script said. You held the sigh in your throat, and pulled away. Vision doesn't sigh, so you shouldn't either. And then you are smiling as written, and the director closes the scene again.

You were getting pretty good at hiding how affected you are by Lizzie the more you kiss her onstage. And then you wrap up the day's shooting, and you are mentally exhausted. You want to sleep in your dressing room, but you decide to go home.

And as you are walking back to your car, Lizzie calls out to you.

- Hey, partner. - She greets me by walking beside you. - Don't you want to go for a drink tonight?

You let out a sigh, ignoring the urge to shout that you would go anywhere with her, and thinking about how tired your body is.

- I'm exhausted, Lizzie. - You tell her, and she looks upset, but you add with a smile. - But I'll take it if it's something at your place.

Lizzie's face lights up quickly, and she nods, and then says she'll leave something in her car. She returns when you are already in yours.

- All set? - You ask to confirm, and she smiles and nods. And then you start the car and drive out of the studio.

Lizzie turns on the car stereo a moment later, and you begin humming the song.

- You've been distant lately. - She comments distractedly as you drive away. - You know you can talk to me, right?

You smile, ignoring the feeling in your stomach.

- Yes, Lizzie. - You say without taking your eyes off the road. - I'm just busy, that's all. It's nothing.

Lizzie makes a noise of agreement and looks away. You think maybe she believes you're not telling her the truth, and you feel guilty. So you decide to change the subject.

- How are things at home, Liz? Are Mary-Kate and Ashley well? - you ask, and she looks at you quickly.

- Everything's fine. - she says, and then she bites her lip. - Did I do something?

You frown, glancing quickly at her before looking down the street again. The light was red. And when you turn your head toward her, she lets out a sigh.

- You don't talk to me anymore. - She says seriously, looking at you. - Since Berlin, you're just distant. Always busy, and with ready-made answers. And now you try small talk, even though you hate it. I wish you would tell me what I did wrong.

Your heart is racing at the accusations, because she is absolutely right. And then you swallow dry, and prepare to speak, but then Liz is pointing ahead, the headlight has opened. And you have to drive, and she crosses her arms and looks away to the window.

You drive the rest of the way to her house in silence, and when you park the car in the driveway, she mumbles a goodnight before getting out. 

Squeezing the steering wheel in your fingers, you take a deep breath. And then you get out of the car, and the noise of the door opening surprises her because she turns to look. But you are walking toward her, and raising your hand to the back of her neck, bringing your mouths together. Lizzie chokes in surprise, but in the next second she melts against you as she kisses you back.

You part breathlessly, holding your foreheads together.

- I am in love with you. - You confess. - I'm sorry I was a complete idiot, but I was terrified.

Lizzie giggles, kissing you again quickly before hugging you. And then she is breaking the embrace to look at you, a shy smile on her lips.

- I'm in love with you too. - she says. - I'm glad that's the problem and not something else.

You laugh, and kiss her one last time before entwining your hands and walking toward her house.

You decide to take things slow, so naturally, two weeks later, you ask her to be your girlfriend over dinner. Lizzie smiles all night, but you know that if this is a secret, she can't wear the ring.

Public relationships mean contracts, and agents, and unwanted questions, and lots of opinions about your lives. And you two wanted to keep that to yourselves for the time being.

So when directors comment that your onstage chemistry is amazing, you two just nod and thank them. When the interviewers ask if you are together, you deny it as before.

The first time you sleep with Lizzie, you almost break the bed. And it's all right, because you two are laughing with happiness and pleasure, and she pulls you in for another kiss. And you entwine your hands, the commitment rings on your fingers.

A year and a half later, you are getting very busy with your participation in a youth series, and there are many rumors that you are dating your co-star, so Lizzie is jealous and you can't blame her. 

You decide that the secret cannot go on any longer, at least not to your friends and employers. So you talk to Lizzie, and you both call your agents. Sara laughs for ten minutes when you tell her, but she is happy to talk to Lizzie's agent. You are not public yet, but it is important that all parties are in agreement. You hate bureaucracy, but you don't mind as long as Lizzie's hand is in yours. Your friends are very happy, and the other cast members tease you constantly about it.

When you shoot the last movie, you think you are going to be fired because your character has died. But then you and Lizzie get a series together.

You try not to overthink how you will deny the rumors on television, but Lizzie kisses you on the cheek and tells you that you will face it together. 

It takes three more months for you to propose. You think your chest will explode with happiness when she accepts.

And then you are calling your agents again, and Sara almost faints when you tell her that you got married in secret at some registry office in the Caribbean and she needs to get the paperwork sorted out. When you get back to California, there is a small ceremony with your family members.

//-//

Present

You and Lizzie are sitting side by side in the interview. The questions about WandaVision are over, and now you know from Jimmy's expression what he is going to say.

- The last time you were here, I had only an instagram post as an argument for your secret relationship. - He says, making you, Lizzie and the audience laugh lightly. - But now I have talked to the production and they prepare a presentation.

- My goodness. - You remark, making him laugh. And then he waves to the big screen, and you try to disguise your nervousness.

A presentation of images began to play to the audience to the sound of "honeybee" by the band "The Head and The Heart". There are several studio shots, from photo rehearsals to behind-the-scene moments. There is a picture from the day you met, from the first cast test, from the Avengers taping, paparazzi shots of you laughing in the parking lot, or in the open areas. There are pictures of you walking around Los Angeles together, pictures of your rides, or your travels. There are clippings from instagram stories where you spend time together, laughing and hugging. The presentation ends with the BTS photo of WandaVision from the first day of recording where you have your arm around Lizzie, and the two of you are laughing.

You clear your throat away the emotion, but Lizzie wipes her eyes lightly.

- That was very beautiful. - She comments as Jimmy hands her a piece of tissue paper. The audience bursts into tears of excitement.

- I guess we can get to the part where you deny everything now can't we? - Jimmy jokes and you smile and straighten your posture.

- Actually, Jimmy, we have something to announce.

[aphrodite-would-be-proud]

🕯Anon said: just wanna say I adore your writing and how you write Reiner and the kids and the other warriors is my favourite thing ever !! I just wanna give them all hugs :) do u have any hcs for the types of jobs you see them all doing in modernverse ?🕯

The types of jobs they have in modern au

{Annie, Bertolt, Colt, Marcel, Pieck, Porco, Reiner, Zeke, }

{Implied Reiner x reader}

{ "Porto" 1935 by Renato Natali 1883-1979 }

Annie is an Animal rescue worker.

Having had experience as a dog trainer before, it wasn't hard to find a full time job at her local shelter after graduating high school, having volunteered there before.

With time, effort and a lot of energy she made her way into the position of "animal control officer" now she spends her days busting animal's abusers doors and rescuing injured or neglected pets.

With long shifts and a high maintenance job, her time was all poured into her work. Usually she'd be exhausted after a long day.

Despite that, she's fulfilled and satisfied with her job. Not having to deal with a lot of people is a plus too, it's a hard job yes but she prefers it this way.

Her friends are bumped about not being able to see her a lot but they understand, plus she keeps in touch with them by lurking in the group chat only to send a snarky remark to stir the pot every now and then.

Bertolt sees her everyday because they work at the same animal shelter, even if their jobs are different they still walk home together, she also met some different people like Hitch and Marco at her job.

The kids love her job, they think it's badass, especially Gabi and Udo. Gabi because Annie gets to kick people in the face and Udo because he genuinely cares about animals.

She'd never tell anyone this, but part of the reason she wanted the job was because she felt guilty for her past self and wanted to fight for those who couldn't fight for themselves.

Bertolt is a veterinarian.

Having changed his mind post graduation and going to college instead of with Reiner, he graduated after 4 years of studying and is currently working with Annie at the local shelter while also planning to open his own clinic one day.

He takes some animals under his personal care for weeks or months even till they get adopted, he fears something bad will happen to the weak or ill ones if left at the shelter overnight.

Just like Annie, the job takes a lot of his time, not to mention caring for animals off of work. So he's in the same situation as her, but for the sake of his best friend he still finds time to visit and hang out once a week.

Reiner and him still text daily, it's mostly pictures Bertolt took of the animals, Annie on her break, interesting plants he finds along the way. And Reiner replies with pictures of the kids.

They still find time to play basketball together, they try to keep it a secret from Annie because she will kick their ass in it.

Bertolt is comfortable with his job, he feels like he belongs and likes being needed. Yes the long hours are a con but seeing the fruits of his labour grow and get better day by day makes it all worth it.

The kids like visiting his house because there usually will be a new dog or some animal in there every month or so, Reiner makes sure they don't bother the animals. 

Something he's never told anyone is a big part of the reason he changed his mind last minute was because Animals feel much safer and secure for him to work with than humans.

Colt is a college student working part time.

He's majoring in nursing, being a four years degree he's trying to balance his studies with work and taking care of Falco.

Zeke offered him to work full time after graduation at his clinic, since he's been working part time there for a while and the pay is good, plus it's really convenientnal.

He has worked different part time jobs in the past like a barista, flower shop assistant, tutor, kindergarten teacher, etc.

Between all his responsibilities he barely has time for himself, his courses end right before his work starts and the small bits in-between is spent on Falco and his friends. Zeke and Pieck try to take some of his responsibility but he refuses saying it's the least he could do to Falco.

He's really good at his job like multitasking, reading people, gaining their trust and having high stamina that he could stay for night shifts even.

He relies on coffee a lot.

Falco sees him as a real life superhero, they weren't that close before but after the incident he really started appreciating his big brother. 

Something he keeps inside is that despite pursuing this job because he genuinely wanted to make a difference in people's lives and help the sick, he also felt a crushing guilt after his parents passed away, and so he's trying to save other people's lives now instead.

Marcel is a pilot.

It's a dream he always had since middle school, soon after graduation he joined the military to gain enough flying hours and experience to apply to a commercial airline after taking some mathematics, aviation and some general flying courses.

He was officially hired as a pilot after getting his first class medical certificate to check his health.

His work isn't measured by hours to him but by days, he needs to be available 24/7 in case of an emergency call. Now he's working overseas and far away from his friends.

You've actually never met Marcel, only seen pictures of him and received letters. The person he keeps in touch with the most is Porco.

He likes his work, it's his dream. He doesn't like the work hours and being so absent from his friends and brother, he misses them so much at times.

Pieck is a tattoo artist.

Her shop is actually her old flower shop after she decided to change her career. She's always been good with plants and taking care of them, at that time Colt worked as her assistant. 

It wasn't till later after some years of practice and training under other artists that she was confident enough about her skills to start the project 

Her art is full of life, mesmerising and beautiful. She puts her soul in every piece and has gained a good reputation because of it, plus having really high ratings and strict hygiene rules, no health inspector could ever challenge her.

Having her own independent work meant that she has a very flexible schedule, being mostly free ment she could pursue other hobbies like gardening.

A peaceful and simple life where she can indulge in her art and be happy is all she ever wanted

Porco is a frequent customer of hers that gets a family discount, Zeke came once before and later sent his friend, a really tall and blonde woman who became her most frequent customer.

Zofia thinks her work is really cool and wants to go and just watch her do her thing, but it's frowned upon to have a kid just sitting at a tattoo shop.

Despite changing into this career, the town people still think of her as the sweet flower shop lady.

Porco is a bartender.

That job came to him by accident more than anything, he was working part time as a bouncer in a local bar but a slot was open after the old bartender suddenly quit and he gave it a chance.

He didn't expect to love it so much, neither did he know about his hidden talent in mixing drinks. So he took it as full time and changed to better bars after gaining the experience he needed.

Being naturally charismatic and good at influencing people, while also multitasking in making drinks and keeping a conversation going, he was instantly a hit in whatever place he worked at.

Working the night shift ment he's mostly free in the morning, he tries to help Pieck with her gardening and is actually attempting to grow some plants at his house.

Naturally whenever there's a gathering, he's the one mixing drinks and being the self assigned bartender who openly judges his friends for their choice in drinks. The charismatic persona being thrown out the window and replaced by a no mouth filter.

He genuinely cares tho, he's the one taking care of someone when they drink more they can handle. It's mostly Colt who underestimates his drinks and is left clinging to Porco who drives him home.

Because of his line of work, tattoos and general brash personality, the kids' parents don't like him even one bit. They're suspicious of him no matter how many times Reiner assures them he's trustworthy.

It's actually only Colt who trusts Falco with him, and maybe Zofia's mom who is at the bar every weekend. 

Reiner is a firefighter.

With his mother pushing him into this line of work, he applied for the physical and psychological exams after graduation before getting accepted. He wasn't unprepared per say but actually being in that line of work was more than he could ever prepare for.

It instantly took a great hit at his mental health, so much in fact that he was thankful Bertolt changed his mind last minute and didn't follow him in this job.

It was both everything he ever wanted, like saving people, helping children, animals and knowing it's him who saved them even if it means putting his own life at risk.

But also everything he hated, like the hunting faces and screams of the people who were far too gone for him to save, the recurring nightmares and constant guilt paired with imposter syndrome.

He works a 24/72 shift, meaning he works for a whole day before getting 3 days off. Approximately only working 7-8 days a month, not to mention unpaid leave, sick days and holidays.

So it both gave him a really tight schedule on some days and on others more free time than he knows what to do with, that's why he naturally took the main role of being the kid's caretaker. Looking after his little cousins genuinely helped him and he liked playing the big brother role.

Especially to Gabi, he was the only stable adult in her life. It's common knowledge that you call Reiner first for anything concerning her before her parents because he's more likely to answer and be available.

After meeting you, his life improved to the better as you moved in and became a trustworthy person in his life, someone he can depend on to take care of his little cousins on the days he works.

Not to mention that after you persuaded him to see a therapist, his mental health began improving too.

Gabi may or may have not committed arson at one point, she still wants to be a firefighter despite that and follow in Reiner's footsteps.

He hasn't told anyone beside you this, but he really fears for her, but doesn't have the heart to tell her no.

Zeke is a doctor.

Previously he worked in a hospital but was able to open his own clinic afterwards, Colt was a great help to him at that time when he was getting on his own feet and even worked a lot of unpaid hours.

After that he insisted Colt works an official part time job there with a much higher pay, till he graduates at least. Plus the experience will greatly improve his resume.

Zeke is brilliant at his job, he'd be a perfect doctor wasn't it for the fact he's a huge hypocrite who doesn't follow the advice he gives his patients. 

He does a side job in his free time that honestly no one of his friends know what it is, but they know it gained him a lot of connections and made new friends.

Something he always keeps buried inside was that he really never expected himself to become a doctor especially after what his dad did to his mother, and yet here he is. In some way it's like his own personal stepping stone to prove he's a better man than his father ever was.

Bonus:

Falco: middle schooler

He does volunteer work on the weekends, sometimes Udo joins him.

Doesn't want Gabi becoming a firefighter.

Likes all videogames , just all types.

Likes watching cartoons and medical shows with Colt who covers Falco eyes whenever an adult scene is on

His favourite food is chicken nuggets

Wants to try coffee

Is good at PE

Reads comic books

Likes yellow and blue

Gabi: middle schooler

Takes self defence classes and really wants to go to summer camp

Wants to be like Reiner, aspires to be as strong too.

Likes shooter videogames or really hard ones.

Likes watching Anime and cartoons

Her favourite food is Pizza

Wants to try energy drinks

Is also really good at PE and surprisingly good at puzzles.

Likes red and pink 

Udo: middle schooler

Takes music classes at the weekend, wants to go to science camp

Kinda wants to be like Reiner or an astronaut.

Likes calming videogames

Likes watching anime and Minecraft let's play

His favourite food is mac and cheese 

His favourite drink is strawberry milk

Is good at language classes and creative writing, he also just likes animals a lot.

Likes green and black

Zofia: middle schooler (could've been in a special program)

Takes music classes with Udo

Wants to be a lawyer

Likes co-op Videogames 

Likes watching true crime and youtubers drama

Her favourite food is Donuts

She likes strawberry milk and ice tea 

Is good at all classes

Likes white and purple

[thran-duils]

Use All of Me (P.7)

Title: Use All Of Me (Part Seven) Summary: Fem!Reader x Dark Mob!Steve Rogers. The Avengers are heroes saving the world but in this AU, they are also permitted by the powers in charge to have less than favorable business underneath their guise of mere superheroes. Steve and Tony are at the helm, keeping their empire’s wealth in check, both devious and perilous if crossed. Steve takes a liking to the reader at a party and it may be her undoing to her autonomy choosing to go home with him. Words: 3,097 Warnings: Dark AF, angst, emotional/mental abuse, smut, breeding, death Author’s Notes: I really like writing scenes of them working because… it’s hot. So, part of this is me indulging myself.

Part Six || Part Eight || Masterpost (mobile) || Fanfic masterpost

Steve got back onto the plane, sitting down as soon as he could. He was covered in sweat, having had to run back to the plane. He had sent Natasha ahead of him, insisting he could finish the mission on their escape. He had succeeded too.

“You alright, Cap?” Clint called from the cockpit.

“Yeah,” Steve answered as heartily as he could. He wiped at his forehead, inhaling and exhaling deeply.

“Must have been a tough sprint if it wore your ass out,” Tony commented from further into the plane.

“Got it done,” Steve responded, to a smirk from Tony.

As he relaxed, he pulled out his phone from the bag on the table next to him. He opened it, searching the cameras of the house for Y/N. It was something he did regularly when he was away; he liked keeping an eye on her whenever he could. He enjoyed watching her do regular things, even when doing nothing like sleeping. She was tranquil and he loved her pensive looks when she was reading or focusing on knitting.

Now though, she was racing through the house towards the front door and his brow furrowed in curiosity of what had her so excited.

He switched cameras to the driveway and saw a car pulling in. He straightened up in alarm, trying to zoom in on the driver. He relaxed, remembering their conversation a few days ago. He had told her that she could have her friends visit soon. She had technically asked but had not clarified when.

<> <> <>

They were here!

You came down the stairs as quickly as you could. Natalie and Yua had driven up upon your request. You told them Steve was going to be on a mission across the country, so it would be okay for them to come over for a few hours.

In the main living room, Bryce was talking to the front gate saying he was not informed any visitors were coming.

“It’s my friends!” you told him, slowing down next to him. He shot you a look of surprise. “Tell the gate to let them in or I’ll run down the driveway and push the button myself.”

“Did you ask Mr. Rogers? Does he know?”

“Yes!” you called over your shoulder. You were barefoot, not stopping to grab shoes. It was warm enough out being late summer.

<> <> <>

Bryce stared after Y/N confused. Steve had told him no such thing. He watched her disappear around the corner, and said into the phone, “Yeah, let them in.”

<> <> <>

Steve watched Y/N come out the front door – wearing no shoes at that – excitedly. She practically threw herself into their arms. Jealousy crawled over his skin; she had not done that for him for a couple months. She responded when he initiated sex and kissed him when he came home. But it was never with that much enthusiasm. Perhaps it was her pregnancy hormones; it is what he had to chalk it up to to avoid outright anger.

He dialed Bryce’s number and held it up to his ear.

“Don’t let them stay too long,” Steve ordered Bryce as soon as he answered.

“She did ask you, correct? She said she did.”

“Yes… she did,” Steve said with some difficulty. “I am just irritated I had not been informed exactly when she meant. But she did ask. We just have guests coming over later, remember?”

“Of course. I haven’t forgotten, sir,” Bryce replied.

“Good. I want Y/N to be able to freshen up with enough time. She doesn’t need to spend the whole afternoon giggling like a schoolgirl with her friends. And no, they can’t stay for dinner. Because I know she’s going to ask.”

He hung up the phone.

“She’s quite the little handful sometimes,” Tony commented lightly. “A foxy little handful. But a handful nonetheless.”

“Unfortunately,” Steve muttered in response, returning to the camera.

“You ever watch her shower on there when she’s alone?”

“Jesus, Tony.”

“Don’t lie to me.” Tony returned quickly. Steve gave a little laugh and Tony chuckled, wagging his finger at him. “See. I knew it. Nothing to be ashamed of. She is ultimately yours after all. Totally okay to be examining your most prized possession.”

“Who is over there?” Natasha asked.

“Her friends, Natalie and Yua.” Natasha perked up at the mention of Natalie and Steve noticed. He shook his head, “No. Not happening.”

Natasha mocked a pout, “Oh, come on, Steve. I don’t rough girls up too bad. She seemed interested enough. Even if she was seeing someone at the time. She may be single now.”

“Not happening, Nat. I don’t want anyone else there so we can talk freely.”

“Fine. Buzzkill,” Natasha muttered, leaning back in her chair.

<> <> <>

“Twins?” Yua and Natalie exclaimed at the same time as soon as you told them.

You nodded, cracking open your pop and taking a swift drink. You had asked the maid, Patricia, to whip up some sandwiches to have lunch with them. The three of you were seated in the living room, plates in your laps.

“Yeah. Can you fucking believe it? My first pregnancy and I get slammed with this.”

“Well, I won’t deny you got slammed—” Yua started.

“Oh, shut it,” Natalie cut in, slapping Yua upside the head.

“Ow! Okay, well, also, look at your tummy! I wouldn’t believe that you would be already showing like that if it were just one baby!”

“Yua! God!” Natalie scolded. “It’s not that big, Y/N.”

“It’s going to get a lot bigger,” you joked, a smiling tugging at your lips.

“See, Y/N can take a joke. Why can’t you, Natalie?”

You smiled at their banter, a feeling of loss tugging at your heart. You had missed last month and the month before girl’s night much to everyone’s disappointment. You had vowed to not make that mistake again which is why you had asked Steve if your friends could visit and he had agreed without much resistance, shockingly.

“How are you going to take care of two babies?” Natalie asked seriously as you picked up half of your sandwich, taking a bite.

“A nanny.”

She cocked her head in surprise. “Like… live in?”

You shrugged, “I’m not sure yet. Pepper is going to come over at some point and help me interview people.”

“Pepper?”

“Um, Tony’s wife.”

“First name basis with them now. Nice,” Yua said, nodding in approval. “You’re in with the big people now. Thanks for honoring my request to remember us little people. But, do you really want a live in nanny? If you do, you should get one that’s not too comely. Don’t want Steve Jude Law’ing you or anything.”

“Honestly, if he gave me a break, I might actually welcome the reprieve.”

“I TOLD you. Sex addict!” Yua exclaimed, throwing her hands out, her mouth full of sandwich. “I mean, the pregnancy—" You shushed her, trying not to laugh. You knew Bryce was nearby and you did not want him to overhear. She quieted down and whispered, “I told you. Didn’t I?”

Time flew by; sandwiches long gone, replaced by a bag of chips that were on their way to being completely demolished had taking their place. When you were interrupted with a clearing of a throat, the three of your eyes fell upon Bryce standing in the doorway from the hallway.

“Mr. Rogers said three hours. You still have to get ready for dinner tonight.”

“Oh…” you said, heat tinging your cheeks at being told you had a schedule to keep in front of your friends. Especially since dinner was mentioned and he was essentially telling you you needed to kick them out. “But, there is room—”

“Mr. Rogers said the team only,” Bryce cut in, only looking slightly apologetic at having to tell you that no, you could not ask your friends to stay.

“Dinner? And you didn’t invite us?” Yua teased.

“It’s with the team only, apparently…” you trailed off, shooting a quick glance at Bryce. He nodded once before turning to leave the room. “Steve wanted them over so we could break the news about the babies to everyone.”

“Oh, so we were the first you told? Perfect. I love feeling special,” Yua chirped, not seeming bothered by the fact she could not stay. Natalie on the other hand looked reserved; she had always been more perceptive than Yua.

“Of course you’re special, Yua,” you said, standing up from the couch. “I suppose we should… start saying goodbye. Have to make sure my hair is nice and all.”

Standing outside, Natalie turned to face you before getting into the passenger side. She leaned in, staring at you. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked, the playfulness from moments ago having disappeared from her face. She was solemn, studying you closely.

You forced a smile, “I’ve got to be okay.”

“No. You don’t.”

“I know,” you whispered, giving her hand a squeeze. “It’s not all bad though.”

She exhaled heavily, looking dissatisfied with your answer. “Not all bad doesn’t mean good, Y/N.”

“It’s just… different,” you said, choosing your words carefully. “And I’m nervous. I mean, giving birth to one baby is terrifying. But going through the pain twice? What if they fight to be the first one out?”

That at least made Natalie laugh, relaxing the tension. You took the opportunity to pull her in for one last hug.

“Call us. For anything.”

“I will.”

As soon as they disappeared out of the gate, you felt weight pressing down on you again. You were alone once more. The mere few hours you had together had been reprieve but it had been far too short.

Annoyance built up in you at Steve refusing to let them stay for dinner. Deciding right there, you thought to hell with looking perfect. Simple hair, leggings, and winged eyeliner was the best he was going to get. You turned to go back inside and let Patricia know she could go home because you were going to be the one cooking dinner.

<> <> <>

Pepper sighed heavily settling into one of the tall plush chairs at Steve’s – well, your – kitchen island.

“Where’s Patricia?” she questioned, seeing you removing the chicken from the marinade Patricia had let it sit in for the better part of the day. You arranged it in two prepared pans, enough pieces for thirteen people, including Bryce and Eloise.

“I sent her home early.”

“Oh?”

You shrugged, “I wanted to cook the dinner myself. She’s wonderful but I wanted to do it myself. It calms me down. Always has.” You checked the clock and saw it was almost 5:00pm. Dinner was supposed to be at 6:00pm. The chicken would take thirty, so you decided to wait another ten minutes before putting it in.

“As long as you don’t poison me,” Pepper joked as her nanny, Eloise, came into the room, bouncing her baby. She smiled, “Oh, is she awake now? Ugh, she’s probably going to keep me up all night. Something to look forward to, Y/N.”

“Wonderful,” you said under your breath as you went into the pantry to look for the potatoes.

Pepper spoke to Morgan, playing with her as you turned the heat up to high on the stovetop to get the water boiling and began chopping the potatoes. Skin on, you thought to yourself. That is where most of the nutrients were anyway and Steve could not complain about you getting more nutrients now could he? You were going to roast them too.

“Shit,” you muttered to yourself remembering you were going to roast them. You moved to the fridge quickly to grab the baking soda and eyeballed the amount to toss in.

“What are you doing?” Pepper asked from the counter.

“Baking soda helps draw the starch to the surface and then when you bake them, it makes them extra crispy.”

“Interesting,” Pepper commented, sounding genuine. She eyed your stomach and said, “Are you wearing a loose sweater on purpose? Hiding a baby bump?”

Snorting, you lied, “There’s not much to see yet.”

“You’ll start showing more soon enough. You’re almost four months along now,” Pepper told you.

“Steve is very excited for that.”

“Men love seeing it because it makes them prideful that they put a baby there. But they’re not the ones growing the baby, are they?” Pepper noticed your stare over your shoulder, and she laughed. “Well, it’s true. I think women are our own brand of superhero. Our bodies are powerful. You should be proud of yourself. You’re doing something remarkable.”

You refrained from telling her she sounded a little Handmaid’s Tale-ish. It was true, of course. Your body held a special kind of magic to grow another human being. But like Bucky, she sounded like she was trying to coerce your thoughts and feelings to be more accepting of the situation.

“It’s not what I had planned for myself,” you finally said after debating about what to say. You opened the oven to slide the pans with the chicken inside. Now to prep the salad. Shit, you also needed to get the wine.

“Me either.”

You stopped what you were doing, standing still to give her your full attention.

“I hoped I would be on the board at Stark Industries. It took a long time for me to admit to myself I liked Tony, first off. His attention he gave me, his sarcastic wit. Yes, he was a little forceful, but he saw something there that I refused to see because I was so focused on getting a leg up in the company.” She was explaining all of this to you calmly, but you sensed some hurt beneath the surface. She gave you an encouraging smile all the same as she said, “Things don’t always work out the way you plan. But it doesn’t make it the end of your life. Just life as you knew it. Change doesn’t mean everything is falling apart.”

“And… you’re satisfied being home and taking care of a baby then?”

Pepper was quiet for a moment. “Most of the time.” She shot you a look. “I think you understand Steve and Tony are very much alike in their… ways and temperament. There will be days you pine for what could have been. But it’s best to keep that to yourself. It’s not worth the fight.”

She sounded like she was speaking from experience.

“I have a different sort of power now. You ever seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding? ‘The man is the head of the house, but the woman is the neck. And she can turn the head any way she wants.’” She leaned in. “Make him happy and you can have him wrapped around your finger. It makes things easier. For everyone.”

You bit back a comment, nodding in its stead.

“Trust me,” she said, leaning back in her chair, turning her attention back to Morgan who had began pulling at her hair. She poked Morgan’s tummy gently, smiling, “You little hooligan. I spent a long time on these curls. Daddy loves them, don’t go ruining it for him.”

Self-consciously, you touched at your hair that you had barely spent any time on. It looked fine but you had not put any extra effort into it. You had already made your choice though: a good dinner and sticking it to Steve subtly about waving off his ‘freshen up’ idea for you or do exactly as he asked, letting someone else cook the meal for the guests coming to your home. You had chosen the former.

A line of cars rolling up the driveway caught your attention out the window, and you told Pepper, “Looks like they’re here.”

You went back to attending to the potatoes, prepping them for the oven.

Tony came in first, much to Pepper’s happiness. She rose to give him a kiss and he commented that she looked lovely. He said hello to Morgan, tickling her, before his gaze fell on you. You could feel the heat of his stare on your back.

“Y/N is cooking?” Tony questioned. “Where’s the cook?”

You looked over your shoulder and said with more conviction than you felt, “I sent her home. Wanted to do it myself.”

“Hmm.” His expression and tone were unreadable, which made you slightly more nervous. Gauging his reaction would help you determine what Steve’s was going to be more accurately. “What have you guys been talking about?”

“Nothing, just cooking tips,” Pepper told him without missing a beat. She held Morgan up to him. “Your daughter is in need of some cuddles from her father.”

Steve walked in next with Bucky, Sam, and Clint. His eyes fell on you, running over you quickly. He was stoic for a few moments, taking it in. Your resolve to be a brat was dissolving quickly, even if you knew he would not cause a scene in front of everyone. There was ice behind his eyes, if only for a moment that you caught.

“Seems Y/N is doing the honors of making our meal. What a treat,” Tony said to Steve and you knew then what his real feelings were about you cooking. You had a maid for a reason, that was the message.

The mask Steve donned was well crafted. “Truly. She hasn’t cooked me anything since we first started seeing each other. I have faith in her.”

He came over to you and now that his back was to everyone, you could see the truth in his eyes. He was not pleased with the situation, which had been your goal. Steve’s hand rested on your stomach, his nose nuzzling into your hair, inhaling deeply.

“We’ll talk about it as soon as everyone leaves,” he whispered into your ear. He placed a quick kiss on the side of your face before pulling away.

The dinner had gone well, everyone satisfied with the meal and even more happy with the announcement. That still did not quell Steve’s disappointment in your choice to be preoccupied with cooking rather than entertaining and spending quality time with your new pseudo-family. Talk about it you did not though. As soon as everyone left, Steve turned away from the door, not sparing you a look. He did not answer his study door when you knocked and called his name. You slept alone and cold. He shut you out and you hated to admit how much the rejection stung more than if he had yelled at you.

~~~

Tags: @imsonick , @alexakeyloveloki, @kvzctam, @ironlady1993, @taintedgenre, @inlovewiththefictionalcharacters

[fictionplumis]

A Lambert/Aiden Thing

Okay, bear with me here, this might be long. And maybe at one point I'm gonna try to RP this but unfortunately there's no one on the Lambert/Aiden RP tags on the site I use. So I'm just gonna put this here for now. And if anyone wants to, oh I don't know, write a fic or whatever based on this, PLEASE link me 'cause I wanna read it but anyway. 

Set after the Wild Hunt, one of those rare AUs where Aiden genuinely did not survive.

While traveling together as super cool witchers, Geralt ends up telling Ciri all about helping Lambert get revenge for his Cat friend, right? 

Time passes, and Ciri starts trying to really solidify her control with her ability. Geralt ends up spending more and more time at Corvo Bianco and Ciri is out on the Path, but every so often a girl needs a break, y'know? So sometimes she'll disappear for a couple days, maybe a few weeks, just off in another world. It's a good way to practice. 

In one world, she ends up running into this man named Aiden. (This world being our world. Not a modern Continent thing, not some point in the future, I mean OUR world.) They talk, and he ends up mentioning his roommate Lambert, and the more he says about Lambert, the more it becomes obvious that it's LAMBERT. 

Now Ciri has absolutely no intention of doing anything about this. It's not her place, telling Lambert would be an AWFUL idea, and going to meet that world's version of her uncle just seems like a bad idea. But she is curious about what kind of man can inspire such a strong sense of friendship in Lambert, so she decides to pop into that world every so often, "accidentally" find Aiden, and just kind of get to know him a little bit. Plus it's another way to practice her abilities, not just pin-pointing and traveling to a specific world, but to where a specific person is. 

She does that on and off a few times, enough where her and Aiden are sort of acquaintances. 

Now in this world Aiden isn't a saint, okay? This boy pretty much grew up on the streets. He has a past that he's trying to get away from. He knows his way around a knife fight, has ample experience running from the cops, and has been through so much therapy. (I don’t get into detail here but any kind of modern Aiden I usually have some kind of neurotypical. Might be something as simple as ADHD, though I do love bipolar!Aiden and psychotic!Aiden as well. I’d imagine at this point he’s good at managing it, with the help of therapy and medication. Now the therapy wouldn’t be all that accessible with where this is going, but Ciri could help him make sure he has his medications. Hell, if wanted to have him keep things consistent with his therapy too, he could move down to appointments maybe once a month and Ciri could make sure he could get to them, the same way she helps attain other things later on in this snippet. I absolutely support positive and accurate depictions of mental illness, I’m not just using the terms bipolar or psychotic lightly.) And unfortunately his past ends up catching up with him. 

Ciri happens to get there just in time. Before Aiden can end up with a bullet in his eye, she's teleporting him to the first safe place that comes to her mind: Corvo Bianca.

Now poor Aiden has no fucking idea what happened. One second his old "friends" have him backed into a corner with a gun to his face and the next he's experiencing the worst motion sickness of his life and throwing up in a pot that smells like shit. He spends the next two days sleeping off some major jet lag and when he comes to, he had no fucking idea where he is. 

Then comes Geralt and Ciri having to awkwardly explain the whole witcher thing to him, the Continent in general, the time period, the fact that monsters and sorceresses and magic exists in this world, all that happy shit. And it's a lot to process. Before they can even get to the whole "do you want to go back to your world and handle the deal with people trying to kill you thing" Lambert shows up. 

At first Aiden doesn't even think, he's just like oh thank fuck a familiar face, I know you hate hugs but I think this can be forgiven because I've had the weirdest most stressful week of my life.

And then he's like, wait a second. Lambert is... Thicker. 

Like Lambert's always been a very physically active guy, he's a mechanic or whatever you want a modern day Lambert to do, but his shoulders weren't THAT broad before and under those spiky metal arm things are some impressive biceps. Also what are those spiky metal arm things? Lambert, what are you wearing? How the fuck did you get here? Holy shit your eyes--

He puts two and two together. Right, the name Geralt sounded familiar because Lambert's mentioned the name. That's his adopted brother. So if this Geralt is a witcher, then Lambert in this world is a witcher. And Lambert is also having a minor breakdown because, y'know, AIDEN. 

Let's just say Geralt warned him. Explained the whole situation and asked Lambert to come back to help with this, and Lambert was very torn because it's not HIS Aiden. It'll hurt too much, to see someone so much like Aiden but just slightly to the left. He knew it would. He just didn’t expect this Aiden to be SO MUCH like his Aiden. By this point Aiden has had to change his clothes into some of Geralt's trousers with a belt to hold them up and a loose tunic, but it's fucking him. 

They all talk a bit. Aiden pretty much admits that yeah, there are people after him. And they probably won't stop until he's dead. That's how gangs work, y'know? You can't really... Get out. He tried, he really fucking did, but even if it's not the ones that cornered him before, it'll be someone else. So yeah, Ciri saved his life and going back is probably not the best idea. 

Now I absolutely don't want to fuck over another world's Lambert just to make Continent!Lambert happy, so we're gonna say the two were really good friends. They were roommates, they were close, Lambert was pretty much Aiden's only friend, but they weren't lovers. Lambert was with a woman named Keira. A doctor. They were good for each other, y'know? When Lambert first started dating her, Aiden thought she was kind of a bitch but as time went on she kind of mellowed out. It wasn't that she became less full of herself, but more that she actually felt confident enough that she didn't feel the need to try to take on the world anymore. And Lambert's happy with her. So leaving Lambert behind in that world kind of sucks, yeah, but he'll be okay. And this Lambert is so similar that to Aiden, it doesn't feel like he's losing someone. 

Now we have Aiden getting to experience the Continent for the first time. Getting to experience witchers for the first time. 

Lambert. Sword fighting. 

And that's so fucking cool. Can you please teach me that?

Which of course has Lambert a little iffy, because this Aiden is human and no fucking away is he letting this Aiden anywhere near a monster, but Aiden is like, nah, relax, I just want to learn because sword fighting is really cool. Look, I'm really good with a knife, teach me some cool sword stuff. 

So Lambert gets to teach Aiden some cool sword stuff. And how to make bombs, which Aiden LOVES. And maybe some alchemy, too, because Aiden asks about the potions and Lambert is very adamant that he never drinks any but Aiden likes at least knowing how to make them. It's fascinating. You all fucking know you would love to make potions out of gross monster parts and herbs if you had the chance, don't even lie. Lambert even shows off some signs and Aiden is delighted. 

This eventually leads to one of those serious conversations about what it takes to become a witcher, and what all Lambert went through, and how people view witchers. And Aiden gets it, maybe not completely, but he gets the just of it. Because he knows about the other Lambert's past, and his shitty father, and all that stuff. And Aiden's brown, and people don't like that. And he's gay, and people don't like that either. Lambert's whole thing kind of reminds him of the X-men. 

And Lambert doesn't know what the fuck that is so Aiden explains comics and superheroes and the X-men to him. 

Because in his world they don't have witchers or magic, so they make up stories that have people like witchers, that have magic, and in those stories, those people sometimes face very similar prejudices. So to Aiden, Lambert is a lot like a superhero. 

And Lambert's like uh huh, no way, definitely not any kind of hero, that's pretty boy's job. 

To which Aiden responds, no, I definitely think you're a hero, even if you don't, so suck it up. 

And they probably kiss and stuff. 

Eventually Aiden gets restless and he's curious about the rest of the Continent, and he's tired of wearing Geralt's ill-fitting clothes because he's used to skinny jeans and shit so he gets Lambert to take him into Beauclaire for clothes. 

And Beauclaire is fucking beautiful, he loves it. 

The clothes are okay. Eventually he just asks Lambert what he used to wear and they go see the armorer instead. Aiden's not entirely sure about it, because Lambert looks like he's swallowed a mouthful of tacks when he sees Aiden in the Cat armor, even without the chest piece or the gauntlets, but Lambert assures him that he's fine. 

It just doesn't quite ease the restlessness. So the next time Ciri pops in, Aiden asks for her help and together they scheme. The next day, Aiden tells Lambert to go find something to entertain himself with for awhile because he needs to spend some quality time with his BFF. 

A few hours later they find Lambert sulking out in the vineyard, Aiden looking fine and fresh in a brand new pair of skinny jeans that show off his very nice ass, and some well-fitting combat boots that aren't nearly as durable as actual leather boots on the Continent but they have studs and buckles and look really cool.

Lambert is torn between thinking Aiden looks like a fucking idiot and thinking that he's never wanted to fuck Aiden more in his life.

Then Aiden drops the news that he also put together an outfit for Lambert because in his world, when you're interested in courting someone, the first thing you do is take them on a date. And he wants to take Lambert on the most stereotypical first date. What's that? Why the movies, of course! There's an X-men movie that just came out (I don't know which one, okay? I don't watch the X-men. You figure it out.) and he thought, maybe, he could show Lambert a little bit of the world he came from. They wouldn't be there for long, and they wouldn't be going to a theater anywhere near where Aiden's old gang would be. Nothing would be tied to Aiden's name, and he would be with Lambert, so he would be safe. 

It's a big change from the Continent. 

Lambert's never seen so many fucking people in his LIFE. Aiden had warned him about cars and technology and Lambert is pretty quick witted so while he's absolutely amazed, he manages to take it in stride pretty well. The thing that throws him off the most is when they go to buy popcorn and the girl at the counter goes, "Oh my god, I love your contacts! Where did you get them? They look so real!" 

Lambert doesn't know what the fuck contacts are, but Aiden steps in all smooth-like, "Fuck, Lamb, you've had those forever, haven't you? I think he got 'em off some cosplay site." 

Then he has to explain later that sometimes people put these little discs in their eye to help them see better or to change the color of their eyes for costume purposes. To which Lambert has the understandable reaction of, "Who in their right fucking mind would CHOOSE to do this to their fucking eyes?" 

Well, y'know, they can take contacts out whenever they want. It's a cosmetic thing. They don't know what you had to go through to get your eyes to look like that. You'll probably have some old conservative people eyeing you weird, thinking you're some Satanist or whatever, but most other people will just think it's a cool choice you made, to put those in to go to the movies.

The world is weird. Lambert can't decide if he likes it or hates it. 

He definitely likes the movie, though. And the popcorn. Probably finds the soda to be a little too sweet for his taste. There's still a lot of people, which makes him a bit on edge, but they came to the theater at an off time and not many people are actually in the room with them. They sit at the back and hold hands and Lambert decides he loves it. Ciri picks them up like a proud parent driving her kid and her kid's date home, only instead of driving she's teleporting and neither of them are her kids but whatever. 

But Aiden isn't done scheming. When they get back he tells Lambert to stay put and gets Ciri to take him back for one more little errand. 

A couple hours later they clang back into Corvo Bianco. CLANG back because each of them has a weird metal cart piled high with items and they're laughing their asses off. 

So you might be wondering, how did Ciri and Aiden afford clothes? They stole them. How did Aiden afford movie tickets and popcorn? He pick pocketed. Boy grew up on the streets. He knows how to steal wallets. And now they performed the greatest "run out the doors of Walmart with carts full of shit" EVER. Because as soon as they were out of sight, they teleported, no one the wiser. 

Aiden is thrilled with his non-purchases. Firstly, he has about a year's worth of toilet paper. he throws a package at Lambert, who's like, what the fuck is this. Toilet paper. What do you use it for? To wipe your ass after you shit, Lambert. Trust me. Once you use it, you'll never go back. It's a blessing, you'll thank me for it. There might not be indoor plumbing here, but god dammit, I want toilet paper.

He then hands Ciri two boxes of pads. Yeah, she was there shopping with him, but he just kind of dumped stuff in carts without explaining anything, and while Ciri knows what most of the things are, do you really think she's thought about how other worlds deal with menstruation? Because I menstruate, and the thought would genuinely not cross my mind. I would continue using whatever method I used back in my original world. So Aiden leans in to whisper what they are, because he's polite, and he becomes her favorite uncle just like that. And when Geralt and Lambert are like, uh, what? She tells them it's for menstruating and, "Oh, don't make that face at me, Geralt. I bleed, it happens."

Aiden admits that most of the other purchases are for Lambert, and when Lambert tires to protest Aiden makes it very clear that everything he bought is NORMAL in his world. Not even luxury, just NORMAL, so Lambert just needs to shut up and let Aiden make his life a little easier. 

First up, sunglasses. Because Lambert mentioned how painful it can be to take Cat and then step out into sunlight before the potion has run out. He tosses a pair at Lambert, who tries them on with a frown and is like, "Oh. Huh. Alright. These might actually be pretty useful." Aiden got himself a pair too. They match. There's also a tent. It folds up pretty small, but witchers travel, right? And Lambert mentioned how shit it is to camp in the rain, so here's a tent that’s better than the shit you can buy on the Continent. You lay out your bedroll in it, and you don't have to worry about bugs, and it helps protect you against the weather. It's small, but it looks kind of easy to put up, should be durable enough. 

And maybe just big enough for two, because Aiden isn't stupid. Eventually Lambert will need to take to the Path again, and Aiden wants to comes too. He wants to see the Continent. He can't help with the monsters, he knows, but maybe he can do something else to help them earn money. Who knows, right? This world isn't run by capitalism. He could make a living doing nearly anything. He can figure something out. 

He even got a water filter, and a couple filter replacements because witchers can probably drink any kind of stagnant water they want but he would rather not die of dysentery, thanks. And he got himself a sleeping bag. And he got Lambert a very, very soft fleece blanket just because he thought Lambert would like it. (He does.) Oh, also, Lambert, smell this soap. And this shampoo. Using a bar of soap has not done Aiden's hair any favors, he got actual fucking shampoo. The BIG bottle. And now Lambert has some nice pomade to use in his hair instead of bear fat. Won't make his hair greasy plus it smells better. Also there's bubble bath, just because. And beard oil for Lambert. Some moisturizer. Here, Lambert, put on some chap stick. Trust me, you'll love it. 

They set out on the Path and it's not always easy because Aiden worries CONSTANTLY. But Lambert is good at what he does. The few times they're ambushed, Lambert always keeps Aiden safe, because in this household everyone fucking survives. 

Aiden likes seeing Lambert in action. He swoons and calls Lambert his hero. 

There are some stunning places to visit on the Continent. Aiden's favorite are the elven ruins they sometimes come across. Only after Lambert deals with the wraiths, though. 

Aiden learns how to play Gwent. He's not that good at it. Aiden learns how to cheat at Gwent. He's VERY good at it. Lambert teaches him how to fish with bombs. Aiden is fucking delighted. 

Eventually he realizes how he can make money. He copywrites Disney. 

He's no bard. He can't sing or play an instrument. But he CAN tell stories, and no matter how much you hate Disney, there are probably a lot of Disney movies everyone can quote by heart, and they're either already time-period approved, or they can easily be adapted into something time period approved. Lambert comes back from a hunt to find the entire tavern listening to Aiden with rapt attention while he's in the front of the room putting on a one man performance of the whole, "I am Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die," while jumping back and forth to play each part. He's clearly having a blast with it, because who doesn't love telling other people every little detail about their favorite movie? 

As he's heading upstairs with Lambert, he just keeps raving about how he can't believe he actually made money with that. He hands Lambert a handful of coins, just like, "I don't know how much money this is, but look, it's money!"

Which probably leads to some conversation about capitalism and how easy it was in his world to feel insignificant, to feel like everything is pointless, and how much happier he is with Lambert. How it's even given him a new outlook on the world he came from. He doesn't want to go back, per se, but he doesn't want to completely leave either. He wants to show Lambert the best parts of it, to re-experience his world through Lambert, to really feel the amazement of it all the way he's supposed to, the way that's so easy to stop doing when you're actually living there. It's so easy to take it all for granted, but when you're showing it to someone who's experiencing it for the first time, you can really appreciate it all. 

So every winter they head back to Toussaint and Ciri takes them back long enough for them to do something FUN. They play laser tag. They rope Geralt, Eskel, and Ciri into doing an escape room with them. They go kayaking. They do one of those rope courses and zip-line things. They go to an amusement park. A water park. They walk around a nature trail. They go to a comic convention. (Lambert wears his armor and so many people want pictures with him. He's just sad Aiden wouldn't let him bring his swords, the kids would have fucking loved to see a sword.) They have so much fun. And Aiden stocks up on modern supplies for the year while he's there. Another year's worth of toilet paper, a new tent, another fuzzy blanket, a few pairs of sunglasses because Lambert always ends up breaking his, a nice backpack because Lambert really likes having a bunch of different pockets in his bag for organizing things.

And you know what? Give it ten years, Aiden's bordering on his forties, and he finds some way to make himself functionally immortal. Magic, fairies, a curse, a blessing, I don't know, I don't care. Their plan becomes to live until one of them dies of something--probably Lambert, because he's the one Aiden always has to patch up (he now always buys a very large, well stocked first-aid kit from his world too) what with fighting monsters and all, and the other will follow. It's morbid, sure, but it works for them. With the way things are going, neither of them thinks they'll need to do that anytime soon anyway.

Basically, they live happily ever after, okay? 

HAPPILY EVER AFTER.

[ladyloptr]

•Part-Time•

Request: twt@LUSTFORLOKI. To sum up this one, Reader is a college student who took a part-time job in the Avengers tower as a sort of housekeeper/maid/butler. Steve, for all of his self-righteousness, doesn’t know how to treat a housekeeper/maid properly in the 21st century. Thankfully, Loki shows up, and as usual, has a plan for everything. (I’m such a Steve-anti. Poor Steve.)Lots of angst, some fluff.

Fandom: MCU AU

Pairing: Loki x College!Reader.

Warnings: Angst, Abuse, Violence. OOC Steve, Major Steve bashing, so any Steve-stans, please look away.

{————}

You need this job.

That’s the only reason why you’re here, and why you tolerate some of the insanity that you’re forced to endure.

You saw the advertisement on the internet, it was hard to miss. Big, bright and attention grabbing, just like your employer, Tony Stark. He was looking for a butler basically, but also sort of a housekeeper. Someone to help keep the tower in order, but also to help the Avengers if they ever needed anything.

Surprisingly, for all of his melodrama, egotism and childishness, Tony Stark is a great boss, and his wife, Pepper, is an even better boss. They’re both always pleasant to you, they pay you well, they pay you on time, they’re never rude (despite Tony’s jokes sometimes being a little-uncalled for), and they never really ask much from you.

Sure, your job is to help keep the 90-something tower “in order”, but you, interestingly enough, don’t do much cleaning. As Tony once said “I have people I pay to do all of that.” Your job is mostly centered on making sure that Tony’s physical files are organized, that the training room has all of the practice weapons properly locked up, and to make sure that the kitchen and main lounge/living room isn’t a hot-mess-express.

So, the only thing you really ever have to clean up is the kitchen, and on occasion, the living room. The Avengers don’t typically leave behind much of a mess.

Really, the insanity isn’t Tony, or Pepper, or cleaning, or the pay, it’s helping the Avengers when they “need something”.

Oh-correction. The insanity is helping Steve Rogers when he “needs something”.

The Avengers are all grown ass adult superheroes (minus Peter), and you’re a college student taking a part-time job so that you can take care of yourself. Most of them find it uncomfortable to ask you to do meager things for them, so they mostly ignore you, and do things for themselves like functional members of society.

Except for Steve Rogers.

You are unsure of what you did, but the moment you started working here, he’s been nothing but cold and mean to you. He asks you to bring him a drink, to bring him a snack, to bring him a napkin, to bring him his breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s gotten ridiculous. He’ll even ask you to make sure his bedroom is neat after he wakes up, and to make sure his bathroom is cleaned every few days.

This is behavior you expected from the Asgardian princes, Thor and Loki, but definitely not from Captain fucking America.

Then again, as Captain America, perhaps his behavior rightfully represents what a lot of Americans are; entitled.

(I’m American also, lol, no hate plz.)

He’s nothing like what he was supposed to be. On camera he was gentlemanly, kindhearted and appreciative. It was a shock to you when you found that Loki, of all the people in the tower, acts more like Captain America, than Captain America.

Which was truly bewildering to you at first. Just think about it for a moment...

The guy who tried to take over the whole world and enslave mankind is the one who greets you with a smile everyday, and offers to make you tea on Saturday and Sunday mornings (which are the only mornings you can work-you got those 7am college classes, RIP). He even helps you with your studies, homework and college essays if you find yourself falling behind. It took some time to get used to his kind gestures, which sometimes bewildered even Thor at times.

While Loki got familiar with you, your relationship with Steve Rogers, on the other hand, ended up only getting worse.

It turned abusive, sometimes violent, and the only reason you never went to Tony is because you know that the two are close friends and coworkers. You could go to the other Avengers, but you’re sure that their relationship to Steve is similar, as well.

Bucky Barnes is another person you know is close with Steve. Those two go way back-before you were even born.

One day, you were careless in leaving your house. It was a Saturday morning, you were tired and you hadn’t noticed that both of your arms had begun to bruise from Steve’s super soldier strength.

He had hit you a few times in anger yesterday. You can’t really recall why.

“What are those on your arms?” Loki asks, within seconds of seeing you. “What’s happened?”

“Nothing.” You say.

“I’m The God of Lies, my dear, you’ll have to do better than that.” Loki says, looking over your arms, carefully. “Is someone harming you?”

“No. I fell.”

“Try again.” Loki challenges, looking up at you sternly.

“I’m fine.”

“Who is harming you?” He asks, narrowing his eyes. “Is it someone in here?”

“Loki...”

“Is it an Avenger?”

Loki catches the subtle change in your eyes, the spark of fear that lit up when he asked whether or not it was an Avenger.

He growls. “Who is it?”

“Loki, please, I don’t want to talk about it.” You plead, getting rather uncomfortable now. “Can we just... play chess or something?”

Loki frowns at you for a while, before sighing in defeat. “Fine, alright.”

He doesn’t bring it up for the rest of the day.

You make sure to wear long sleeves to cover the bruises on your arms for the next couple of days, at least until the bruising goes down.

“What did I tell you about leaving my bedroom a mess?” Steve demands. “It’s a simple request. I’m not asking you to teach a dog to sing.”

Steve has decided to now confront you in an empty hallway about not tidying up his room yesterday.

“I’m sorry...” You mutter. “...Tony wanted me with him all day yesterday.”

“You couldn’t have come do it before you left? You just went home knowing my bedroom is a mess?” Steve asks, quickly getting upset.

“Tony clocked me out himself, so I was already off shift. Besides, it’s not like you can’t clean your bedroom yourself.” You answer.

Wrong answer, apparently.

He grabbed your arm and held it in a bruising grip, once again reminding you that he’s no ordinary human.

You let out a whimper and try to pull away, which proves no use. You’re not surprised when he slaps you. You’re surprised by how a super soldier serum can make a simple slap so painful. You’re even more surprised when your nose starts bleeding.

He must’ve inadvertently popped a blood vessel or something.

He raises his hand again, and you close your eyes, prepared for a punch or something worse, but it never comes. You open your eyes and see Steve looking at something behind you. You turn around and see Loki standing at the other end of the hall, his hands behind his back, an indifferent look on his face, but his eyes tell a different story.

You’ve known Loki long enough to realize that if you want to know his true emotions, you read his eyes, not his face. He’s a master at using his face to guard his true feelings.

And his eyes currently hold a barely contained storm of rage inside of them.

“I apologize for... interrupting...” Loki barely managed to keep his voice steady. “But dinner is ready, and I was wondering if (Y/N) would be joining us tonight.”

You nod, frantically. Steve releases your arm, and you rush over to Loki’s side.

“Loki Laufeyson, master of perfect timing, always ready to save the day.”

“Actually.” Loki corrects. “It’s Loki Odinson, master of sorcery, always ready to put ignorant Midgardians in their place.” He smiles a very unpleasant smile. “But yes... I suppose you’re also somewhat correct.”

“No one will believe you.” Steve says.

“Perhaps you’re correct.” Loki drones. “I am not here to hold a conversation with you, however, I am here to take (Y/N) to dinner.”

Steve snorts derisively, and walks by Loki, intentionally bumping shoulders with him.

Well, Steve was bumped, Loki didn’t move even a centimeter.

“Might want to clean her up first.” Steve says, as he retreats. “Wouldn’t want everyone to think you were beating up on her before dinner.”

Loki clenches his jaw. You look away, nervous about what he’s going to say.

You’re startled when he tilts your face up by your chin, and then slowly uses his seidr to heal any damage Steve has dealt you, including the bruises on your arms. He checks you over multiple times, making sure you aren’t still hurt.

Once he’s finished, he takes both of your hands and makes eye contact with you. He’s still upset, but the anger has tapered down to a manageable level.

“How did you know he was hurting me just now?” You ask, in a hushed tone.

“The same day I inquired about your bruises, I forged a... connection of sorts.” Loki explains. “Today, I felt that you were in danger, so I went looking for you. I have a similar connection with Thor, otherwise that oaf would’ve perished long ago.”

You nod, it makes sense, somewhat. You blush as he kisses your cheek and then your forehead.

“I am sorry.” Loki squeezes your hands, gently. “I wish I had noticed earlier. I would’ve killed him in that moment, would it not result in me being casted back to Asgard. The last thing I want, is for you to be left here to deal with all of this on your own.”

“Well... there’s nothing we can do about it now...” You murmur.

“I believe that to be untrue...” Loki’s eyes slowly shift up to the security cameras. “...Rogers appears to have forgotten about the many eyes this tower has.”

Your eyes widen. “The security cameras...!”

Loki smirks. “Stark will review the footage if you ask him to. I could accompany you to his lab tonight after dinner, if you so wish.”

“Yes, I’d love that.” You wrap your arms around Loki as tight as you possibly can. “Thank you!”

“You’re most certainly welcome.” Loki chuckles. “Time to cook up a scandal...”

A/N: SORRY STEVE STANS, I TAKE ALL REQUESTS, NO REQUESTS LEFT BEHIND.

Also, I wrote this while struggling with depression (it’s been two weeks, and it seems to not be improving, and this crap can last as long as a couple of months, so I wrote it anyway. Better than waiting a few months to finally get on this), and I’m not sure if y’all have noticed, but my storytelling feels weird in this one. My ability to produce a thorough, flowing storyline appears to be sort of hindered right now. I’ll try to update it if I can.

[fiddlepickdouglas]

Viva Las Vegas, Pt. 11 - De Orfeo Records

Summary: Sunset Cure AU, Willex, is there a chance?, 2.8k

@trevor-wilson-covington is the bestie who makes these lovely edits, we stan supportive friends

WARNINGS: death mention

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10

Reggie and Carlos were running around in the middle of taking down equipment after their latest gig. Luke shook his head as he wrapped cords over his arm and placed them in a storage box. Alex, however, was nervously trying not to get run into as he carried various pieces of his drum set out and handed them to Bobby in the back of the van. He could forgive Reggie not really helping out since he was taking responsibility for the kid, but also hadn’t anticipated that their energies combined would put him more on edge.

As he went inside to grab the last piece of his set, he found that Reggie had taken his flannel and tied it around his neck like a cape, with Carlos wearing his leather jacket in a similar fashion. They approached Bobby, who immediately joined their game and they pretended to battle each other. By the time Alex had finished getting his whole set in the van, they were playing out a dramatic victory over defeating Bobby.

“Guys, this is great, but we really should finish packing up,” Alex said, although he was smiling from the entertainment.

“I guess you’re the next bad guy we fight,” Carlos said in a mock-deep voice.

“We can schedule it later, Robin,” Alex teased.

“Oh, no, he’s Batman,” Reggie corrected. “I’m Robin!” He put his fists on his hips in a proud superhero pose.

A big SHHHHHH came from Luke and they all looked over at him to see what was up. He was far off by the venue office, holding a phone to his ear and writing onto a notepad. His eyes were wide with excitement, and his energy was only held back by the other hand tapping against the paper. The boys watched as his smile grew bigger and he said goodbye, barely putting the phone back in place properly.

“YEEESS!!” he cried, raising his fists into the air in celebration. They all came running toward him to see what had happened.

“Boys, we’ve got good news!” Luke told them. Looking on in anticipation, Alex gripped his fanny pack tightly. “One of the record execs that came tonight is offering for us to sign onto their label and put out some songs! He even heard our demo!”

Everyone celebrated, jumping up and down and high-fiving each other. Reggie let Carlos climb onto him in a piggyback and they both yelled triumphantly. Luke pulled Alex into a bro hug, then Bobby. Alex held his arms up and placed his hands on top of his head, unable to believe what had just happened. Euphoria filled his head like helium and he went to double-high-five Carlos, who was still perched on Reggie’s back.

“So what else did they say?” Bobby asked, still smiling.

Luke had to shake off some more excitement before he could explain the rest.

“Ahhh, so he said we could meet in a few days to discuss business and contracts and such, let us get a look at the studio and stuff. I got all his contact information and he’s totally excited to get us on. We’re moving on up boys!”

The celebration continued, and their renewed energy caused the rest of the take-down to go by much faster. They were still riding the high as they drove home. Alex listened to Luke talk about which songs they would want to record first and where they would land on the charts. He remembered that feeling he had back at the Pearl during their sound check. Doing that? For real and not just dreaming and hoping about it? They hadn’t made it just yet, but this was a change he could be excited for.

Reggie had been staying with Carlos, which the rest of the boys figured was a good excuse to not stay home. As Bobby pulled up to the house, he and Luke began climbing out of the van. Carlos and Reggie were already inside.

“Uh, guys?” Alex said, still in the back of the van. They all turned back to him. “What are you doing?”

“Oh,” Luke gestured like oh-silly-me. “We all decided to stay here for the night. It’s just a nice change from the garage and Julie’s aunt has lots of leftovers that need to be eaten so…”

“So...I’m grounded,” Alex reminded, raising his eyebrows. His parents hadn’t been happy about him sneaking out to the pier the other night.

“Screw your old man, Alex,” Bobby said.

“Yeah, he can eat my shorts if he tries to do anything about it,” Luke added.

Alex took a moment to think. Disobeying wasn’t going to do anything for or against him at this point - he kept anything truly important to him out of his parents’ reach and since he’d gotten the punching bag he could actually contend with their tempers. They couldn’t punish him in a way that mattered.

“Yeah, you’ve got a point,” he said finally, following them into the house.

They found Reggie and Carlos already raiding the kitchen.

“Alex, you’re staying too?” Reggie said when he saw them enter.

“Yes!” Carlos cried, pumping his fist. “You get to make popcorn. Tonight, the Empire Strikes Back!”

“Oh yeah, baby!” Reggie responded as the rest of the boys began following orders from Carlos. Alex wasn’t crazy about Star Wars, but eh….young Mark Hamill was hot so he didn’t mind too much. He was sure most of them would fall asleep during the movie anyway.

A couple hours later it turned out he was right. Carlos was slumped on the floor leaning back against the chair Luke was sitting in, hand still in the bowl of popcorn. Luke was leaning on his hand, breathing soundly. Alex had watched earlier as Bobby’s head flopped onto Reggie’s shoulder and the flustered look that had overcome Reggie’s face, and it was too good not to smile at. Once the VCR began automatically rewinding the movie, Alex shut off the TV.

He stared at the ceiling as he pulled the handle on the La-Z-Boy he was in and reclined into a somewhat comfortable position. Even now, weeks later after meeting for only a day, the first thing he wished he could do was tell Willie the news about the record label. He probably would have been just as ecstatic as the rest of them, if not more. Victoria would be back soon and hopefully have some news. He guessed it didn’t matter if he’d been right about the missing kid, but maybe just knowing if she got to talk with Willie would be enough.

The memory of soft brown eyes still rose in his mind. He’d been doing his best to keep that moment cemented in his brain because he’d noticed it helped him sleep. It was funny because he’d done the same thing with the guys, but staring into Willie’s eyes had been an entirely different experience. Alex wished he had the proper words to describe it, but the best he could do was marvel. Willie was clearly unaware of the strength he held, and it made Alex want to bring that out with his entire being. If he ever did get the chance, that would be something worth looking forward to.

Victoria didn’t arrive until the afternoon the next day. Since Alex felt that she had gone because of him, he made everyone else clean her house as well as they could. No traces of food on the floor, no messy beds, and the kitchen was cleaner than when they had found it. As she came back into the house, she put a hand over her heart.

“Wow!” she exclaimed. “I should take trips like this more often if you boys are this good!”

“Yes, tía, please, please, please let them babysit me again! Pleeeeaaassee!” Carlos begged with his hands pressed together.

“Ay, sobrino, no me quieres?” she shook her head.

“No, I do!” Carlos tried to recover. “But they’re fun!”

As if to make a point, Reggie rubbed a hand on Carlos’ head.

“It’s okay little dude, we’ll be back.”

Victoria pulled her wallet out of her purse.

“Well, you boys took very good care of him and I promised I would pay you, so here you go.” She handed each of them a generous amount of cash. Luke, Reggie and Bobby all whooped as they thanked her and headed to the van. Alex held back with anticipation. Victoria looked at him seriously.

“There was no connection,” she told him before he asked. “His guardian explained everything to me, and there was nothing else to go on. I wanted to know because I thought I could solve an old case, but I had to let it go.”

“Well, did you get to talk to him?” Alex tried not to sound too urgent.

“You mean Willie? No, I never saw him. After talking with his guardian I didn’t need to.”

Bowing his head, Alex made himself swallow his other questions. She had at least tried.

“Thank you,” he said. “I’m sorry if it was inconvenient.”

“I chose to go, don’t worry about it,” she assured.

Nodding and saying thanks one more time, Alex hurried out after the rest of his friends.

A few days later, the boys slammed the doors of the van shut as they looked up at the building before them. It was so plain and simple on the outside; they never would’ve guessed there was a studio there. It was likely they had driven past it many times on the way to a gig. Pushing through the door, they all looked at the logo in neon lights on the wall: De Orfeo Records.

Collectively, the boys took in awed breaths at the reality of where they were standing. This was too good to believe. Alex took in the scene, trying to imagine this being a place he came to regularly. Could he ever get used to it, or get over the sheer excitement of just being there? Luke patted him on the back, desperately trying to contain himself. They wandered through the halls a little bit until they came to a room where the door was sitting open.

“Oh, boys!” A man called as they almost walked past it. “In here!”

As they all shuffled in, the man shook their hands and pointed them to a couch where they could sit. Alex nervously stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jacket as he took a seat. The man across from them was dressed surprisingly casually, if not with obvious expensive taste. He still had sunglasses on, but their yellow tint was clearly not for actual UV protection.

“Nice to meet all of you,” he was saying. “My name is Alan, I’m one of the producers here at De Orfeo. Which one of you did I talk to on the phone?”

Luke raised his hand.

“That was me,” he said, already gushing with excitement. “How’d you hear about us, anyway?”

Alan didn’t answer, but instead looked up at the doorway as someone else came in.

“Hello boys!” Caleb Covington entered, his charismatic smile spread wide across his face. “So nice to see you again.”

Alex’s heart rate immediately sped up and he clenched his hands inside his pockets. How could it be? He thought his last chance to reach out to Willie was gone and seeing Caleb brought back everything he hadn’t been able to ask Julie’s aunt. All the guys were happy to recognize him.

“I won’t be staying for the negotiations,” Caleb said. “but I wanted to properly introduce myself as the owner of this label. I want to assure you boys the best experience as newcomers in the industry. Let any nerves that still linger walk right out the door.” His eyes landed on Alex for a moment, and it felt purposeful. “Take it away, Alan.”

Listening to the producer’s pitch was difficult to focus on now, and Alex had to fight hard against his brain latching onto the new hopes that had arisen. He was thankful that when paperwork came out, Bobby was mindful enough to have them read through it. It was taking too long, though, and Alex was already wishing he had his drumsticks in hand to help pass the time. Reggie had so many questions, and Luke had trouble understanding numerous words - at least that kept Alex occupied because he could be helpful in that. A good hour had passed going over all the information.

“This looks great!” Luke said finally. “How are we feelin’ boys?”

Each of them nodded and looked around at each other, confirming that they all agreed on every settlement. Luke grabbed a pen and pulled his copy of the contract toward him, pausing momentarily to drink in what was happening. Then he signed his name in giant letters. Alex, Bobby, and Reggie followed suit, and Alex could feel a weird tingle rush through his hand as he made the final flourish with his pen. They were all in now.

As the band began celebrating, Caleb knocked on the doorframe.

“If it’s alright with you boys, I wanted to speak with Alex privately for a moment,” Caleb said, gesturing for Alex to follow him outside the room.

His curiosity was at the point of overflowing, and he went out trying to control his trembling hands. Maybe Caleb had talked to Willie after all. This could be his way to bridge that gap and he wouldn’t have to live off of just memories.

Everyone else was still going nuts over getting the contracts signed back in the room. Standing in the lobby, Caleb was looking at him seriously, maybe even pitifully. It quickly drained the exhilaration in Alex’s chest.

“I can tell you’ve been wanting to ask me some questions,” he began. “But before you do, I thought it was best to inform you of some important details first.”

Alex looked up at him with his hands back in his pockets and gulped. Why was his heartbeat suddenly so loud? He knew Caleb couldn’t actually hear it, but it still embarrassed him. His mouth began to go dry.

Caleb furrowed his brow, as if what he was about to say wasn’t easy to get out. He bowed his head and took a breath before looking at Alex again.

“Willie,” he started. Then he paused. “Is dead.”

The trembling in Alex’s hands stopped.

He stared at Caleb, as if he could pull off the serious expression and find a joking smile underneath. It was a few moments before he remembered to breathe in, and blinking seemed to cut that moment into two as if the first one wasn’t real.

“No, no, that can’t - ” he heard the words spill out of his mouth. Why was his body so tense and ready to defend itself? His cheeks felt hot.

“I know the news is hard,” Caleb interrupted, placing a hand on Alex’s shoulder. “I can hardly bear it myself. There was an electrical fire. He didn’t make it out.”

Alex could only shake his head. Caleb’s expression wasn’t changing and for some reason it was the most infuriating sight. He could punch that face and make him bleed if he really wanted to. The adrenaline was already rushing to his fist.

“There has to be a mistake,” he said, chuckling darkly.

“There is no mistake,” Caleb told him firmly.

How was the man so calm? How could he say those words out loud and not immediately crumble to the earth? How could he have worn such a large smile earlier?

“I know you two weren’t friends for long, but he made it clear you were important to him.”

The words came through as if from a tiny speaker. They’d only gotten one day and it wasn’t enough. Willie couldn’t go like that, he simply couldn’t - not when Alex needed to know if they could’ve ever had something real. He still wanted to know so many things about him and look into those brown eyes and soften the hard edges on them. He needed to - 

He was crying. On his hands and knees, trying to get the dark shadow that had grown inside his chest to come out. It made him choke. Caleb had apparently left him alone, unable to console him, and he felt hands on his back and shoulders as he fought to properly breathe. Luke was knelt down before him, mouth hanging open in want of words but not able to form any. Bobby was gripping his hand and supporting him as he and Reggie pulled him up onto his feet.

“We need to get him in the van,” one of them was saying.

Any movement from there was not his own. All three boys were trying their hardest to help the tallest member of their band out of the building. Everything was numb - like a machine that had broken down after being run too hard.

The brown eyes faded into darkness, murky and thick. There was no air in his lungs to scream into that dark, no tie-dye, no rolling of wheels on the sidewalk, no ‘ribbit’, no more wondering and hoping.

Dead quiet. That was all.

[jawritter]

His Old Ghost

Created For: @spndarkbingo

Summary: Some things from the past just never really want to let go, do they?

Square Field: Mobster AU

Rating: Explicit 

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Reader x John Winchester

Word Count: 1672

Warnings: Heavy Trigger warning!! Suicidal!Dean, heavy suicidal ideals and implications as well as prompts, control, manipulation, talk of death past and present, depression, language, angst, I think that’s it. Sorry if I missed something.

Beta’d by @deanwanddamons! <3

A/N: As always please do not copy my work! Feedback is golden! This is the last fic for this Bingo! Hope you all enjoy!

**Masterlist**   ~  **Become A Patreon**

The deep amber brown liquid swirled easily around the tumblr that Dean  held tightly in his grip. His gaze was fixed on large rain drops falling against the window that was behind his desk, blurring the lights of the city that seemed to sit miles below his penthouse office on the 51st floor. 

Below him were thousands of people, young and old, going about their daily lives, only worried about their own little bubble of problems. Most of them were unable to even see past the cell phone that seemed to captivate their attention as they moved about amongst each other. 

With a disgusted snarl on his lips, Dean lifted the tumbler, and downed it in one pull. The burn of the alcohol has stopped affecting him a long time ago. Now it was the only warmth he felt.. 

“Those people, they’re ungrateful for what we do son,” John’s voice sounded from somewhere in the back corner of the room. 

Dean had known he was standing there watching him. When you have lived many years with people trying to kill you, tend to heighten your senses in a way you couldn’t turn off. 

“Get out of my head old man,” Dean’s voice drew out unamused. “I couldn’t give a fuck what they want or don’t want, see or don’t see. It doesn’t matter anymore.” 

Dean could hear John moving closer to the desk, and the wood creaking attop it, as the smell of cigar that seemed to constantly linger around his father, misted with just a hint of some expensive Italian cologne and whiskey let Dean know he’d perched himself on the corner of the desk.

“If it weren’t for us, half of this city would be in ruin. Their businesses  would be shut down, their schools and churches would be sitting empty, and they wouldn't even have a roof over most of their heads. Still, look at them down there, walking around without a care in the world, and you’re  telling me that doesn’t bother you? Not in the least?” 

In truth, it didn’t bother him. He wasn’t mad that most of them were ungrateful, and lived in blissful ignorance.In fact, he envied them. He wished he could walk around in the same happy little bubble they walked and lived in everyday, not knowing what really went on behind closed doors, or the sacrifices other people made at their expense. “It’s just good business,” or so his father always said. Dean was starting to beg to differ. 

He hadn’t  known when he’d take over his father’s ‘family business’ it would come with so much pain, and heartache or so much death. Now here he was, The Godfather, as it were, but it wasn’t anything like it was in the movies. No, it was darker, and colder, and lonely as the grave he’d seem to keep lowering his friends into. 

He thought he could have it all when he was younger. He thought that he could have it all, ruling the city on his throne of control as the people  moved about like his little pawns in a game of chess only he could master. He was wrong. So very fucking wrong, and now? Well, now he was just left with the ghost of the past.

“It doesn’t bother me,” Dean said with a slight shrug of his broad shoulders. John’s dark chuckle sounded from behind him as he got up and moved closer to the window, putting a hand on the cold glass as he watched the rain slip down the pane, determined to ignore the old demon that seemed to come and visit him after every failed job. 

“Sure is a long way down isn’t?” John’s voice said from directly next to him now, as if he was looking down at the city below him just as Dean was now. “You know, it wouldn’t be hard right? The fall? In fact, it would almost be peaceful. Hell, they say by the time you hit the ground from this height your heart’s already stopped anyway, and you're dead before you even hit the ground. It’s as easy as falling asleep.” 

Dean’s jaw clenched as he closed his eyes and fought against the thoughts that were clouding his judgement. “Fuck off,” he growled, but John just laughed in earnest, sending a familiar shiver down Dean’s spine. 

“Come Dean, what do you really have to live for anyway?” John taunted, walking around him like a lion stalking down his prey, getting ready to land the deadly pounce that would ultimately destroy the poor, worthless beast that was weaker than he.

“She will never love you Dean, you know that right? First time shit goes sideways, she’s gonna do the same as every other bitch you have ever used to get your dick wet. She’s just there for the money you hand her, and you know it.” 

John’s hot breath blew against the back of his neck as the next passing words were made in a whisper against his sweat damp skin. 

“But, you had to fuck around and get feelings, didn’t you boy?”

“SHUT THE FUCK UP!” Dean roared, but it only seemed to edge on his torturer even more. 

“No! Feelings make you weak, make you vulnerable!” John’s voice sounded louder than his own, and Dean flinched as if he’d raised his hand and struck him. 

“I shouldn’t be surprised, you always were too weak. You and your feelings were the reason I’m dead today Dean. Sam would have made a better leader. He was smarter, stronger.  You were never even able to protect him.That’s why you let him go off to Stanford, isn’t it Dean, because he’d be safer out of the life.” 

Dean’s fist pounded against the glass in a hollow thud, and he gritted his teeth almost painfully, “Sammy deserved better than this. He deserved to get out.” 

“Is that what Benny deserved today Dean? Was that round through the heart his way of ‘getting out of the life’.He’s in the ground right now because you sent him on that delivery Dean, he’s dead because of you.”

“I said, fuck off!” Dean growled, but to no avail. 

“Do Y/N a favor. Open the drawer where you keep that 45, and end it. A simple shot to the temple and it’s done. She’ll be free of the coward that she’s tided too.”

Dean’s eyes shot to the small drawer at the bottom of his desk, and his pulse quickened.

“That’s it son, do it, end it.” John's voice growled deep in his ear, as one large tear rolled down Dean’s face. 

His legs felt weak. His breath was coming in short spurts as a grip tightened around his pounding heart, like a vise in his chest. John’s voice repeated, growing in his ear to “end it, do it now.” the same tone he’d used his whole life to order him around, and Dean had never been able to disobey an order. 

Maybe his dad’s ghost was right, and was weak. Maybe you would be better if he just ended it, took the cowards way out of this shit show, and let you move on. He’d make sure to leave you enough money to live comfortably for the rest of your life.You’d be better off if he were dead.

Before he could even move from his spot against the window, two hands, much smaller than the ones that felt as if they were gripping his throat, slipped around his chest, and your scent seemed to push through the fog of self hate and regret that was weighing on him from years past. 

“Dean, baby breath, it’s okay,” your voice soothed over him, and he turned to lean into your embrace, thankful that you had come in just in time to once again chase the old ghost away. 

“I know, it’s just one of those nights,” Dean murmured into your hair, letting the scent of his favorite shampoo that you always used calm his racing pulse. 

“It wasn’t your fault baby. I can see you literally blaming yourself. Benny knew the risk of what he was going to do, he knew that it could go the way it went. You couldn’t have stopped it if you wanted to,” you try to sooth him. 

Dean’s eyes flickered to the corner of the room, where a pair of glowing yellow eyes shone like cat eyes in a dark alley, and his father’s face disappeared into the darkness. He was never gone forever. He was always there, always lurking, always haunting, taunting him. 

“Come on handsome, let’s get some sleep,” you tell him, grabbing his hand, and leading him from the dark, cold office to the master bedroom were you could keep an eye on him, keep him close to you, and help fight off the old ghost of his past that never seemed to want to let go. 

Tonight he’d win against them again, but there would always be a battle, always a struggle with demons that had their hooks in him so deep, that one day they’d drive them to his grave. Tonight though, he’d hide in the safety of your arms, and your warm embrace to get up and do it all over again tomorrow. Until one day, by an enemy or by his own hand, he’d be lowered into the ground, and with a hero’s funeral to cover up a black soul that had more blood on his hands than the devil himself. 

As long as he had you, and as long as you were here, he could find his resting place here. This was as close to heaven as he’d ever get, and when he’d died, and they covered him in gold, he’d be able to say he had you, for just a little while. For just a little while, he got to see heaven, and it was all because of you. His hiding place. His sanctuary. A place where his ghost couldn’t find him. 

Forever Tags: @deanwanddamons @rvgrsbrns @bi-danvers0 @onethirstyunicorn @i-love-superhero @akshi8278 @lyss-dw79 @magssteenkamp @lemondropirwin @squirrelnotsam @hobby27 @spnbaby-67 @mrsjenniferwinchester @defenderrosetyler @screechingartisancashbailiff @thecreatiivecorner  @aflamboyanceofgays @vicmc624 @busy-bee-angel-misska @justanotherwinchester @brilovesdeanwinchester @idksupernatural @lyarr24 @amandamdiehl @love-jackles-37-blog @miraclesoflove @Waywardsistershy @emoryhemsworth @dean-winchesters-gardian-angel @softsebastian @tatted-trina6 @deanmonandnegansbitch @hayleeharling   @flamencodiva @coldmuffinbanditshoe @bxbyizzy @dirty-pan-goblin @itmejado @supernatural3002 @teresa-67 @thoughts-and-funnies @hearteyes-j2​ @miss-nerd95​

[mushyjellybeans]

Can’t Help Falling In Love

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Enemies turned to friends. Friends turned to lovers as a misunderstanding brings the two people who hated each other together. 

Warnings: Angst, Language, Bucky is a jerk and a bit of a bully sorry, fluff, implied smut.

Word Count: 3,466 (uhhh oops? Like seriously before I edited this it was at 1.5k LOL)

A/N: Nobody asked for this but I was in an angst/fluffy mood and I love these enemies to lovers AU’s so... I haven’t posted much in a while so this is my apology!! I have lots of requests to get through though and they are NEXT! This almost had smut but wasn’t in the mood to write it :( maybe for part 2?

Masterlist

You honestly couldn't fathom the real reason why James Barnes hated you so damn much. You didn't even need to speak for him to become pissed off at you, your presence was enough.

You've tried being nice, and you've tried asking Steve why his friend was such a jerk with you when he was lovely and kind to Wanda and even Natasha. "He doesn't hate you, Y/N. You're overreacting." Is was the only explanation you would receive.

It was Stark's weekly movie night, and for the first time in a long time, you were actually excited to sit down and relax with your friends. 

Walking in the common room with a bowl of caramel popcorn in your hand, you realized there were no free seats. Wanda and Vision occupied one couch, Nat and Bruce were snuggled on the loveseat, Tony was relaxing in his very expensive massage recliner chair. Steve was out at a bar with Sam and you were disappointed Bucky didn't go with them, bringing you to your current predicament. Either you could sit on the uncomfortable floor for a few hours, or suck it up and sit next to Barnes. The latter seemed more plausible. When Bucky saw you from his peripheral, he immediately kicked his legs up longways on the couch and you huffed, tempted to throw the damn popcorn at him and smash a vase over his head at the same time. He was making it difficult for you and you didn't understand why. 

"Can I sit, please?" You rolled your eyes to the ceiling. 

"No." He responded, his gaze fixated on the title screen on the TV.

"Fine." You exhaled as you sauntered towards him and sat on his legs. He hissed out in pain as your weight crushed his bones and for a moment you were happy you hurt him. 

Good, he deserved it! You beamed. 

When he realized neither of you was planning on leaving anytime soon, he retracted his legs and you bounced on the cushion underneath. 

For the rest of the night, Bucky didn't utter a word to you but you could sense he was beaming holes into the side of your face every once in a while. You ended up going to bed at midnight. 

You woke up later than usual and threw on some yoga pants and a tank top, making your way down to the kitchen where the rest of the team were already sat down at the dinner table eating their breakfast.

Bucky was making coffee in the kitchen when you walked in, and for a moment you considered leaving since it was just the two of you. He scowled in your direction and you rolled your eyes and walked to the pantry.

"Keep rollin' your eyes, they'll get stuck up in your brain." He sneered.

"Good morning to you too, James." You mumbled. As usual, he ignored your greeting. And then Natasha walked in grabbing a mug from the cabinet and pouring some hot black coffee.

"Good morning Nat. You look absolutely gorgeous today!" Bucky smiled. You watched their interaction carefully. Natasha greeted him back and you felt a pang of hurt in your chest. You sheepishly poured your cereal in a bowl and added some milk, you were about to take a seat on the barstool when Bucky grumbled.

"You're seriously eating here? I'm here and there's a fucking empty chair at the dining table, take your cereal and go and eat there!" He spat angrily.

"Buck she's entitled to eat here." Nat intervened, sick of his attitude towards you.

"No, she isn't!" You tried not to take his words so personally, you really did. Your lips quivered as a sob threatened to break out. You covered your mouth with your hand, your appetite quenched by his hateful words and bitterness. You sprinted on out of there, ignoring the concerned calls from the team.

You headed back to the only place you knew you were safe from Bucky, your room. You dropped face-first on your bed and screamed into your pillow. You ordinarily wouldn't let his words hurt you, and if he was being honest he was expecting you to fight back with your usual sarcasm or your typical eye roll you loved to give him so much. He didn't anticipate you just skipping breakfast and leaving.  

But you've just given up, accepted the fact he hates you and you're done trying, you're done with this job.

You question your role amongst the superheroes. You wondered if it was best to find your own place to live away from them, away from him and resign as an avenger and live a normal life like you desperately wanted.

It was clear he would never accept you as a friend, or even as a teammate. You had so much to think about, it was the weekend too so you gave yourself until Monday to come to a decision.

"Hey, has anyone seen Y/N?" Sam asked, grabbing the bowl of salad on the dinner table. There were some mumbles and the rest of them shook their head. Bucky lowered his gaze to his plate, his heart wrenched tightly in his chest as he reminisced over what he has done to you. 

You stayed in your room for the whole day. Skipping food and occasionally sneaking out for the odd bottle of water with FRIDAY's assistance. The team were worried about you. You didn't answer any of their texts and didn't acknowledge them when they stopped by your room. You knew Tony could have ordered your door to be knocked down if he wanted to. And you didn't know but Bucky had stopped by a couple of times too, but he had to keep up his facade.

It would be the next day when you came face to face with Bucky again. You woke early and decided to get some training done, a bad mistake on your part for doing it on an empty stomach since you started to feel dizzy and nauseous. 

You were jogging on the treadmill when he barged in through the doors in his shorts and tank top, he went straight to the weights. He audibly tutted when he saw you but you decided this time to ignore him.

In the floor-length mirrors, you watched him as he stretched his muscles. Mumbling something under his breath and he kept looking at you, so you knew he wasn't saying nice things. Your legs were starting to turn to jelly, so you shut the treadmill off and stepped off and slowly approached Bucky. As you got nearer him, his nose scrunched up in disgust like your scent was offensive to him.

"Hey, Buck. Do you need a spotter?" You motioned with your head to the weight. He ignored you and continued mumbling under his breath.

"If you have something to say, say it to my face Barnes." You huffed out, a sheen of sweat on your forehead.

"I have nothin' to say to you. I don't know why you keep botherin' me."

"What- what did I do to make you hate me so much?!" Your jaw clenched. Blinking to stop your tears from falling, you refused to let him see you break down.

"You didn't do anything wrong." He shrugged, resuming his squats.

"So you just hate me for no reason?" Your arms folded over your chest, pushing your breasts together and you noticed his eyes quickly glanced at your swells and his tongue darted out between his lips. You cleared your throat and his gaze met yours, as you stood there waiting for his answer. 

To Bucky, you were looking as gorgeous as ever. But he didn't overlook the way your eyes were dark and your skin was pale. If anything, he was concerned about you but his strategy was working and couldn't let his emotions slip through now.

"Look, Y/N. Just because you're friends with the rest of the team doesn't mean we gotta be friends." His pointer finger motioned between you. "I don't like you, it's as simple as that. I don't need a reason. So stop badgering me with questions and creeping up my ass like you're my wife."

Before you could argue, Nat walked in. She looked at the two of you with a questioning eyebrow, a small hope you've sorted your differences out.

"Hey, Nat!" Bucky smiled at her. "I need a spotter. Can you do it?"

"But Y/N is here. She can do it."

"But I'm asking you. I trust you more." He grinned.

And it was then you understood you didn't need to wait until Monday to make your decision.

You watched as Nat walked alongside Bucky to the weights and spotted for him. You murmured a quick goodbye to Nat and went to your room, taking a hot shower and sat on your bed with your back against your headboard, you sighed as you opened your laptop.

You explored Google for a couple of hours looking for apartments you could realistically afford. It would be perfect if you were a billionaire. Then an idea hit you.

"You want me to what?!" Tony yelled, swinging on the stool to look at you like you had just grown 2 heads.

"Tony please I promise I will pay you back in monthly payments once I get a job-"

"A job? You've already got a job."

You sighed and massaged your temples. This was not going as well as you had hoped.

You had very kindly asked Tony for a small loan, without giving him the details as to why you needed the money. You just needed enough to cover rent for a couple of months and some furniture, and when you found a stable permanent job, you would repay him. But you neglected to tell him about your plans to resign because you knew he wouldn't allow you to leave.

"Tony, I can't explain it right now but please trust me-"

"Are you in any trouble? Drugs? Gambling? Are you pregnant?" He asked, cutting you off. You groaned and shook your head no to his questions. "Sorry kiddo, unless you tell me what's going on, I'm not giving you that amount of money."

You felt helpless. You just wanted, needed to get away from the compound. But nobody was willing to help you and you couldn't face the hundreds of questions from Tony right now if you did explain the real reason why you needed the money.

Leaving the lab defeated, you leaned against the wall and yelled into your hands. 

"What did you need the money for?"

Your head shot up to the sound of the voice and furrowed your brows. Bucky leaned against the doorframe of the room next door with his arms folded over his chiseled chest. You were surprised to see him here.

"None of your damn business." You spat and started to walk down the hallway and unfortunately, you needed to walk past him. His hands grasped at your wrist as you step past him, he pulled you back so you're face to face with the man of your nightmares.

"It is my business if it concerns you." His grip on your wrist tightened painfully.

"LET GO BUCKY!" You screamed in his face as you saw his nostrils flare. You pulled your arm back and walked away from him. His heavy footsteps were not far behind you. 

"Don't you walk away from me, Y/N!" The sound of his voice prompted you to move your legs faster. 

You made it to your room and just as you were about to shut the door behind you, a large foot stopped you from doing so. 

"Bucky, leave me alone!" You groaned as he easily pushed the door open and slammed it shut behind him. 

"What, so I ask you a question and now you don't wanna talk to me?" He questioned. 

"What the hell are you talking about? YOU'RE the one who's been acting like a total asshole towards me. Ignoring me when I speak to you!" You hissed. 

"Yeah and only because I heard you and Nat talking about me in the kitchen days after I got here!"

"What? What did I say?"

"So what do you think of Bucky?" Nat asked you, leaning over the kitchen island as she sipped her tequila. 

"He's kinda cute but I don't know... I don't like him that way." You chuckled. You had the hots for the new recruit James Barnes, wild and vivid dreams invaded your mind as you dreamt of him every night. 

While you were busy gossiping with Natasha, you didn't hear the footsteps and heavy breathing outside of the kitchen. 

Your eyes widened when he retold you the story, a simple misunderstanding lead to this much hate and it was all your fault. 

"I - I didn't mean in the way that you thought Buck." You whispered, your heart was heavy with the guilt. The guilt of him assuming people already didn't like him when he was just learning to accept himself and settle into society. "I'm so sorry." you sighed and sat down on the edge of your bed. 

"I'm sorry, too." The bed dipped to your right. "I should have asked you about it first before I... did this." 

"Is that why you ignore me?" You asked, wanting a real answer this time.

"It was. Because I thought you hated me too." Bucked tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear and smiled. "We're both stupid huh." He chuckled.

You nodded your head and joined him with a chuckle of your own. 

"God, I feel so stupid." You cringed as the memory of that night replayed in your mind. 

"Imagine how I feel." Bucky sighed, running a hand through his locks.

"Don't leave." He whispered, catching you off guard. "That kind of money you were asking for would make it possible for you to run. Please don't." His eyes pleaded.

"Are things gonna be different? I can't really cope with this anymore..." You admitted. 

"Most definitely, I don’t wanna fight anymore. I’m tired of fighting. He sighed. “I know of this really great diner a few blocks away. Would you care to join me for some food and a milkshake?" The corner of his lip was pulled up and you nodded your head eagerly, earning a deep chuckle from Bucky.

Dinner at the diner was amazing and for once you enjoyed Bucky's company. The two of you talked everything over and apologized to each other repeatedly. 

You learned a lot about Bucky in the span of an hour. What kind of music he listened to, what his favorite movies were. Turned out he loved the gangster movies and you couldn't blame him. You recommended Goodfellas and he invited you to his room to watch it with him sometime. 

Bucky talked a lot about the 1940s. How different the music was back then and how different the women were. He loved women with self-confidence who didn't need to wear dresses and skirts every day and was comfortable being in her own skin. 

You shared a lot of common interests with Bucky and you regretted not speaking to him sooner about everything. Though the many times you did and he shot your attempts down. 

Bucky paid for dinner and that was another thing you felt guilty about. You offered to pay for your own but he insisted it was his treat for the way he had so rudely spoken to you. 

"Thank you for dinner." You grinned from ear to ear. 

"You're welcome, doll. I love this between us." He admitted, putting an arm over your shoulder as the chill from the air bit you. 

"Me too. I don't wanna go back yet." You chuckled. 

Bucky walked to the vacant bench overlooking the city. You shivered as a gust of wind blew past you. 

You sensed Bucky was staring. You turned your head smiling ready to question him when his lips pressed yours. Your angled heads allowed you to deepen the kiss as your hands wrapped around his neck pulling him closer. His tongue tasted of the chocolate milkshake he had earlier at the diner. The need for air becomes greater and Bucky rested his forehead against yours with a goofy grin on his face. 

"I'm so sorry for everything." His breath fanned against your lips. 

"I'm sorry too and I forgive you. Can I ask you a question?" 

"Anything." He pulled away and smiled.

"Was that - was that your first kiss since...?" You pondered. His body stiffened and you were worried you crossed a line. 

Bucky bellowed out a laugh as a visibly crimson blush crept up his to his cheeks. 

"Maybe." He looked away embarrassed and you couldn't help joining in on the laugh. 

You and Bucky spent a lot of time together since the diner. You watched movies in each other's rooms and took each other out for dinner. 

Everyone at the compound were surprised by the turn of events. 

Just weeks ago, you and Bucky would have happily killed each other and now? You were joined at the hips. Where there was you, there was Bucky and vice versa. 

Since you became so close to each other, Bucky had no problem asking you to be his date to the upcoming party Tony was hosting, which was happening this evening.

You wanted to wow Bucky tonight. With Natasha and Wanda's help, you chose a black dress that showed just the right amount of cleavage with the laced arms, black stockings, and heels. Wanda curled your hair and Nat painted your nails to match your dress and did your makeup, creating a black smokey eye effect. 

You looked gorgeous and the girls knew you would make him weak at the knees as soon as you stepped in the room. 

Bucky was already downstairs with a drink in his hand as he waited for you. He was dressed in a black tuxedo and bowtie, unintentionally matching your outfits. 

The party was in full swing, people dancing, talking and catching up. The main doors swung open and everyone in the room went quiet. Bucky was worried he had gone deaf until his eyes followed the trail of everyone else's. 

His eyes bulged out of his head and his jaw hit the floor when you walked in with your clutch in your hand and looking gorgeous in your dress. 

He watched as your eyes scanned the room and landed on him. He watched as a grin was etched on your face and he returned it. 

His feet carried him closer to you and you met him halfway. 

"Hi, soldier." You greeted as you admired his bowtie. 

"Y/N... you- you- you look..." He was speechless as his eyes wandered up and down your form. He was so used to seeing you in jeans and shirts and on occasion did he see you in your tactical armor. "You look- wow... just... breathtaking." He stuttered and blushed. 

"Do you like my dress?" You grinned up at him as you wrapped your arms around his waist. 

"Yes. Very much." He panted, his eyes turned dark with lust and this gave you the encouragement you needed. 

You leaned up near his ear, your breath made him shiver. "Would you like it more if it was on your floor?" You whispered as his arms snaked around your body and pulled you closer to his. 

"Fuck yes." He growled. 

"Y/N! Wow, you look beautiful." Sam beamed from beside you. 

Bucky growled and before you could respond to Sam as he interlaced his fingers with you and pulled you away. You smiled apologetically at Sam, who just shrugged in return with a knowing grin. 

It was only Steve and Sam who knew of Bucky's lust for you since you became friends. 

Bucky pulled you along and into the elevator when it opened. 

"My room, FRIDAY." He ordered.

"Yes, Sergeant Barnes." The elevator began to move and anticipation built up inside of you. 

"Ready for a long night, doll?" He asked as the doors slid open and he pulled you to his room. You nodded eagerly, relieved your plan worked and you didn't need to resort to using Sam to make him jealous.

**********

Taglist: @buckysmischief @stuckonjbbarnes @sebbbystaaan @valkyriesryde @mypassionsarenysins @honeyvbarnes @stateoflovinged @tuesdays-are-for-bobby @photography-to-all @dark-night-sky-99 @veganfangirl5 @infj-slytherclaw @imma-new-soul @hailqueenconquer @mood-pancakes @seb-be-holding-these-tatas @seb-owns-these-tatas @margoshanotherwriter @iheartsebastianstan @lovvliies @buckysdumbmetalarm @livylou3333 @marvelsangels @donnaintx @crushedbyhyperbole @teamcap4bucky @zeilenkrieg @itsunclebucky @this-kitten-is-smitten And tagging my loves: @babiiface95 @perpetually-tuned-out @pinnedandneedled @captain-kelli @captainchrisstan @capandbuckylvr @simsadventures @nerdy-bookworm-1998 @smutsonian @jobean12-blog@sebastiansloserclub @buckythewhitewolfx @babblingbonky @a-mess-of-fandoms @hey-its-grey @the-ss-horniest-book-club @littledarlinhavefaithinme @godofplumsandthunder @criminal-cookies @stateoflovinged @eurynome827

[imgoingtocrash]

Made of Iron, Born of Fire: The Fanmix 

by @imgoingtocrash

Listen on Spotify and 8tracks

Read the series on Ao3

AKA: A labor of love for @savvysass’s birthday!!!!

What can I say that hasn’t already been said because we’re both incredibly sappy people in our Author’s Notes? Writing this series with you has brought me so much joy in the last two years, and I never could have hit over 100k words without you. Here’s to whatever we write next in the series...and all of the WIPs we’re working on right now...and only god knows what’s next for us personally and professionally...and most importantly, to you on your Birthday. Thank you for being such a good friend, in both fandom and outside of it. I’m so, so thankful to know you and love you. 🥰

Director’s Cut Below, because we all know I love talking about this series, and yes, that does extend to why I picked these songs. (And also maybe because these song choices only make sense in my brain and hopefully Savannah’s?? Who knows! Feel free to ask questions if you want but let’s be honest this series and fanmix are most importantly for us, because we love the series so dang much.)

My Wildest Dreams by Ron Pope

I spoke in riddles and in rhymes, but my time with you has taught me to simplify, you’re not quite what I pictured you would be, you’re better than my wildest dreams.

We’ve talked about this one before, and I’LL TALK ABOUT IT AGAIN!!!! Ron Pope is so good imo, and this song wowowow the father-child feels, but especially with Tony and newborn Peter a la A Foreign Feeling and A First Time For Everything.

Big & Scared by Raleigh Ritchie

I want to be better for you, let me do that now, you’re my favorite human, so you should be prepared, I’ll help you get through it, when you’re big and scared

We’ve mentioned Tony’s thoughts about legacy multiple times by now, and I think this song really represents Tony looking forward to the person Peter could be become and that “breaking the cycle” mentality of supporting Peter even when he’s not a perfect father.

Legacy of Sadness by Ron Pope

irrational as it may seem I guess I’m sorry, even though I know that none of it’s my fault, it is easier for me to count my blessings, than to cry for every single thing we’ve lost

I have 0 shame putting these two songs by Ron Pope almost back to back because they’re the opening and closing of an album dedicated to his child like...it’s so perfect for Tony and this theme of reflection on who he is and who Peter will become/is becoming and all that entails.

this is me trying by Taylor Swift

They told me all of my cages were mental, so I got wasted like all my potential, and my words shoot to kill when I'm mad, I have a lot of regrets about that

I wrote something...very sad but also soft recently??? and this is for That it’s about pre-CW Pepperony being separated and the road to them trying to come back together including Tony working on himself and I love it!!! It hurts really good!!! This whole song is perfect for it and I can’t wait until people get to read it.

Be Good When I’m Gone by Four Year Strong

I'm sorry I can't stop to listen, but I've got so much to do and I've got some place to be, the house looks like the aftermath of a hurricane, I hope it stays that way

Tony being a busy parent but doing his best to make time for Peter in his life and making that time count has been something super important to illustrate to us, especially the transition from being a CEO to being a superhero and how that changes how Peter sees Tony’s absence over time.

I Won’t Back Down by Johnnyswim, Drew Holcomb & The Neighbors, and Penny and Sparrow

Tony puts on the original version by Tom Petty in Home Is Where The Heart Is, but I think this cover has a very slow, emotional undertone that’s really great too. The interludes, if you didn’t catch it, have all been featured in a fic previously.

Let It Matter by Johnnyswim

So if it matters let it matter, if your heart's breaking let it ache, catch those pieces as they scatter, know your hurt is not in vain

Pepper in Never Tell Me The Odds ALL DAYYYYY. She’s the emotional rock of that fic (and of our Ironfam TBH) and it’s all because she allows herself to feel her feelings and encourages the Stark boys to do so as well.

Simmer - Acoustic by Hayley Williams

And if my child, needed protection, from a fucker like that man, I’d sooner gut him, cause nothing cuts like a mother

Post-Home Is Where The Heart Is...y’all know Pepper’s not that mad about what happened to Obie. Also just Pepper when someone hurts her family?? I always write it as her sort of putting all of her emotion into something she can control and doing it well, so, this song is all about that.

Tightrope by Nia Hendricks

one step after another, keep holding on to each other, don’t look back, move on and let go, that’s how you walk on a tightrope

Pepperony trying to navigate their relationship and the insanity of superhero stuff and also co-parenting. It’s all excellent, I love them so much, I enjoy writing it so much!!!!

Dancing With Your Ghost by Sasha Sloan

Never got the chance, to say a last goodbye, I gotta move on, but it hurts to try, how do I love, how do I love again?

This song is tilted towards romance, but if you’ll remember, we’re a Pro-Tony Survives Endgame AU series, so it’s not about THAT...but well...Infinity War sure will hit something fierce for certain non-romantic relationships in this series, huh?

The Bones by Maren Morris

Call it dumb luck, but baby, you and I, can't even mess it up, although we both try, no, it don't always go the way we planned it, but the wolves came and went and we're still standing

Post-Endgame Ironfam!!! Tony and Pepper married with their kids, their family and HAPPY...THIS IS WHY WE DO ALL OF THE ANGST...FOR A FAMILY...WE LOVE THEM

Carry on Wayward Son by Kansas

Considered Pepper and Peter’s ‘song’, as it’s referenced multiple times in the series, and was one of the bigger solidifying moments of their mother-son relationship as a whole.

Mundane by Hardcastle

And I’ve been sinking into silence, dwelling on my thoughts, and in these months, I haven’t felt that most conversations have left me anything but blue

Peter’s selective mutism was something very special to us when we originally had the idea, and making sure we talk about it and utilize it in the right way is something we’re still working on, particularly with the Therapy Fic we’re brainstorming atm.

survivin’ (One Eyed Jack’s Session) by Bastille

What can I say? I'm survivin', crawling out these sheets to see another day, what can I say? I'm survivin', and I'm gonna be fine, I'm gonna be fine, I think I'll be fine

Spoiler Alert: Peter’s not fine, like, a decent amount of the time. But he’s sure trying, and we love him for that.

Jacob from the Bible by Jake Wesley Rogers

Mama, don't worry, it took me years, to say I'm sorry, to see your tears, Mama, forgive me, I grew up too fast, but it's not on you, it's in the past

Mostly part of Peter growing up to become a hero and realizing what his parents--particularly Pepper--have gone through for him to become the person he is today, but that sometimes he still doesn’t feel like he’s making them proud enough.

Compassion Is a German Word by To Kill A King

Don't be so arrogant, you ain't no different to anyone I've met, we're all the heroes in our own film, or maybe the villain in someone else's

Spider-Man being an excellent superhero boi!!! Being kind and good!!! We love it!! Also, I put a TKAK song on...a LOT of my playlists, because I think they’re great.

brutal by Olivia Rodrigo

And I'm so sick of seventeen, where's my fucking teenage dream?, if someone tells me one more time, "Enjoy your youth", I'm gonna cry

I mean...this song is such a Teenage Mood...I had to do it...

In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning by Frank Sinatra

So, I had this cute little scene in my head that went with this song for SO LONG but there wasn’t really anything for it to fit into so...yeah that’s part 2 of Savannah’s Birthday Gift, a little soft Baby Peter drabble. Fluffy Goop from top to bottom. That can be read here.

Home by Phillip Phillips

Just know you're not alone, 'Cause I'm gonna make this place your home

...I know it’s not original, okay? It’s found family, it’s great, I don’t care!

Comes and Goes (In Waves) by Greg Laswell

And this part was for her, and this part was for her, this part was for her, does she remember?

This song is good family angst in general BUT these specific lyrics made me think of Mary and that they never forget her in their lives despite the other stuff going on (because we refuse to let them).

I Have Made Mistakes by The Oh Hellos

I have made mistakes, I continue to make them, the promises I've made, I continue to break them, and all the doubts I've faced, I continue to face them, but nothing is a waste if you learn from it

No one in the Ironfam is perfect, but they all do their best to try and grow even when they’re scared they’ll never be able to. The ups and downs are all par for the course of this series to us.

Easy Days - Demo by Bastille

Cause I don’t wanna fall back again, back into the easy days, everything was so simple then, little fires burned away

Strife is a part of life, and the family in this fic growing through their loss and struggles and moving ahead as a unit to get to a better place is super central to making the fic what it is...but it’s easy for them to remember the old days before being superheroes and wishing it was simple again.

North by Sleeping At Last

Let the years we’re here be kind, be kind, let our hearts like doors open wide, open wide, settle our bones like wood over time, over time, give us bread, give us salt, give us wine

The way Tony went from feeling so alone to having an entire built family that’s so full of love and everything he never dreamed of...*screams into my pillow* I love this series so much thank you and good night!!!

[themadauthorshatter]

... This is going to be more triggering than my Sanders Sides Beetlejuice AU, and I deeply apologize.

This is a Happy Tree Friends story I've thought about and it got inspired by a scene in the Asylum season of American Horror Story.

MAJOR TRIGGER WARNING FOR PTSD, AVERSION THERAPY, FORCED/DELIBERATE TRIGGERING OF PTSD AND HALLUCINATIONS, ISOLATION, BEING HELD CAPTIVE/HOSTAGE, ANIMAL DEATH, AND A LOT OF OTHER THINGS!!!!

PROCEED WITH CAUTION!!

Additional note: I'm visualizing the characters as human, so don'tbe caught off guard when I bring up a character's hair or complexion. It makes this story easier for me to picture in my head, that's just how I work. And this is mostly TV perspective, so thought I'd tell you that, too.

We begin with the sun rising and a new day starting, how lovely. No one is fully awake, but two people are and they are having a race.

Who's against who?

Simple.

It's Flippy on his feet and Splendid in the air to see who's faster on which and they're neck and neck in this.

Flippy sees Splendid next to him and asks if he's holding back, because this is not the fastest Flippy can run.

Splendid jokes that maybe it is because this is the SLOWEST he's flown in a long time.

Flippy laughs and kicks it into maximum overdrive, full on sprinting as fast as he can, even faking a turn to throw Splendid off his flight. While he stays on his intended path, and shouts that Splendid fell for it, Splendid calls him a cheating bastard.

Flippy laughs and contunues sprinting until he stops on a sidewalk in the town.

How lovely because Splendid is sitting on the wood of one of the telephone poles and waves at him.

Flippy pants and asks how Splendid both beat him and got up there.

Splendid simply floats down and claims it's just a hop, skip, and leap of faith.

And no cheating, which he points out.

Flippy clarifies that he actually DID NOT cheat. He would've gotten some of kryptonut and put it in his pocket, if he really wanted to.

Splendid gasps that he wouldn't, but Flippy shrugs and says he knows a guy, so don't tempt him.

The two share a laugh, but Flippy freezes as he hears a nearby woodpecker.

Splendid spots it and comments on the lovely avian specimen.

That's when a knife is thrown and (TV perspective) off screen kills the bird.

Splendid sees Flippy threw it and has 'killer instinct' eyes.

Thank goodness it's just them and there's no one else around because just as Flippy readies another knife, Splendid grabs him and flies to a hill, fast enough to get there within a minute or so, but not so fast that Flippy dies from the velocity.

It snowed a little bit, but it's enough for Splendid to toss Flippy into.

The cold instantly snaps him out of it and Flippy quickly looks around and asks where they are.

Splendid shrugs and answers the hill, and the realization sets in as Flippy's face drops, groaning and putting his hands over his face.

Splendid sits next to him as Flippy asks if 'it' happened again.

It did, but there was no one outside, so at least it got stopped before anyone got hurt.

Flippy is still crestfallen and rests his head on his arms, which are on his knees.

Splendid asks if he really can't control when he flips out, and Flippy confirms that as much as he can, but he still can't, mainly because when he feels like there's nothing to worry about, he remembers how he got comfortable and confident before and it ruined everything.

And he can't control the world or what randomly happens.

If his instincts say he's in danger, he's using thise same instuncts to keep himself safe.

Splendid digests those words as Flippy takes a breath and stands up, thanking him for the race and apologizes for talking his ear off and snapping on him.

Splendid stands as well and asks if Flippy needs help getting home, to which Flippy politely declines, not wanting to beat Splendid in another race. Splendid narrows his eyes and dares Flippy to repeat that, but Flippy chuckles and says he'll see him around before leaving.

Splendid watches him go and gets to thinking. He and Flippy have been friends for a while, and this stuff with flipping out and all that has been bothering him for a long time. He'd also been informed that Flippy went to Lumpy for help, but it failed miserably, so he was left to deal with it using the medicine he'd been prescribed. Beyond that, nothing seems to have helped him.

He also remembers how he had once had a doctor friend that helped people with addiction and talked with him about how some people aren't addicted to substances, but to feelings or emotions, as a comfort thing.

We don't get any more thoughts because we return to Flippy as he lets himself inside and leans against the door, very much upset with the fact that he lost it in front of one of his friends, especially one loke Splendid, who he rarely flips out on.

And it doesn't help that he hasn't lost it in a very long time.

Because his instincts are going haywire and he just needs to know HOW bad his episodes get, Flippy gets up, grabs a couple party poppers that were left over from a party he was fashionably late to(he had to do a check-in/catch up call with one of his army higher ups so they knew he was okay), and goes down to a basement, one that has a hatch door in the floor rather than a regular door.

He locks it behind him and goes down to a fully concrete basement that has holes and scratches in the concrete, because he's strong.

Here's where that deliberate triggering of trauma and an additional blackout Trigger Warnings come in, because Flippy sets up a camera, that's recoeding, takes one of the party poppers, and squeezes his eyes shut as he pulls the string and sets it off.

Flippy instantly starts seeing that he's back on the battlefield and not in his own basement, and hyperventilates as he sees an enemy standing over him, smirking and gun ready.

Flippy stares up at this enemy, but that fear melts into anger and throws himself into his enemy, landing next to a gun, which he uses to take this enemy out.

No time to relax because he gets grazed by another enemy soldier.

He smiles and chuckles, readying the gun and a knife from his leg before he races forward.

We don't see anything happen, save for black, but we fade to see Flippy coming to on the floor, sweaty, bruised, and knuckles bloody.

He groans and pushes himself up, rubbing his head for a minute before he finally looks around the basement.

The walls and floor are worse than before, but at least the camera is still intake.

Flippy gets up and stops the camera, sitting down as he reminds it back until plays it.

There's no battlefield, no enemies, no threats at all. In the video, Flippy pops the party popper, and clutches his head as he curls into the ground.

He hyperventilates and looks up backing away from someone that isn't even there. At least before he throws himself into the wall a makes a small shelf of knives fall. He mimes shooting the person before grabbing numerous knives and racing toward and hitting the wall and stabbing the wall, even punching and kicking it.

That explains the busted knuckles and bruises.

We don't see the rest of the video, but we do see Flippy's face grow more distressed and upset as he keeps watching himself fight nothing and just beat himself instead.

It is not easy to watch at all.

The video eventually ends with Flippy passing out on the floor, where we caught up with him.

Flippy puts the camera away and leans against the wall.

Guess he's a lot worse than he thought.

He sighs and rests his head against his knees.

Guess he's not leaving the house today either.

Time jump to a week or so later!

It's bright and sunny, and we're checking in on Flaky now as she struggles with some groceries; it originally started as a trip for shampoo and a new toothbrush, but it became a food run as well because she got hungry. She can't really see where she's going, but is trying her best, okay?

Carrying five bags at once a was huge mistake because she trips on a rock and almost falls down.

Almost, because Flippy catches her and helps her back to her feet.

Flaky shrieks and asks who it is.

Flippy decides to mess with her and lowers his voice, asking for either a hello or her life.

Flaky gasps and says he'll get a shoe to his shin, if he doesn't watch himself.

Flippy chuckles and asks if she skipped breakfast again, seeing all the bags she has. Flaky, turning to look at him, corrects him: she DID eat breakfast, but lunch was calling and she couldn't leave it on voice-mail.

Flippy, following along with the analogy, takes a bag or two and advices she try to learn how to BLOCK those calls when they drain her wallet.

Flaky hums, but thanks him for helping, and for the wallet he got her; it's sleek, but holds a lot of money and cards. Or card, which Flippy mutters as they walk to Flaky's house.

Flaky kicks at him, but they half walk, half run to Flaky's house. Once they arrive, Flaky thanks him again for the help and says she'll have a potatoe, butcher beef, apple soup/curry waiting for him next time he comes over.

Flippy chuckles and agrees, countering he'll bring her a cake SMOTHERED in sugar, cubes, chunks, powered, candy, caramel, all that garbage so that her teeth fall out and he can help her get METAL teeth instead.

Flaky sets down her groceries and stamps her foot, saying Flippy is not her father.

They still hug each other and Flippy leaves, telling her to take care of herself.

He continues on his walk and pays attention to the birds that are singing and wind blowing through the trees.

No time to fully appreciate it because Splendid turns a corner and Flippy waves him over, much to the superhero's delight.

They quickly touch in and ask how the other has been before Flippy interests Splendid for another race, 'the only rule is win' edition.

Splendid has a better idea: coffee. He had just finished some errands and was on his way home when he and Flippy ran into each other.

The invite seems iffy, but Flippy accepts, not wanting to run off like last time.

They walk and Splendid's smile drops a little, which draws Flippy's attention, the ex-soldier asking if everything's okay.

Splendid nods, saying everything's fine. He's just had some stuff on his mind that he can talk about when they get to his house.

Flippy stops for a second and watches Splendid continue walking, following behind more cautiously.

Cut to Splendid's house as the superhero fixes himself and his guest some coffee, though Flippy is slow to drink his because it doesn't smell like black coffee.

When asked, Splendid explains that the grounds were a little stale. He'd bought some that was fresh, but didn't want the old stuff to go to waste.

It calms Flippy enough for him to take a drink of coffee. He also asks what's been eating at Splendid, even apologizing for leaving him hanging last week.

Splendid shakes his head. Water under the bridge, everyone has their moments.

Speaking of moments, Splanedid asks if Flippy's been better since their race.

He shrugs, admitting that he's had worse happen, but that still doesn't make it good or even okay.

Splendid asks if he's ever gotten help for his 'issues' and Flippy asks back if he thinks Lumpy is really as good at everything as he thinks. Splendid supposes not, all things considered.

Done with the interview, and taking a drink of more coffee, because he's tired, Flippy asks what Splendid's deal REALLY is, and why he's so interested in Flippy's personal issues.

Splendid gives it to him straight: he's noticed that Flippy's trauma is bothering him on a pretty big level, and it has him worried for his friend, not because he can hurt people, but because he's seeing how unhappy Flippy is, and how much it tolls on him. He's had SOME experience with people who've had similar problems to Flippy's and there's a sort of therapy that's helped them. Granted, he knows Flippy doesn't enjoy flipping out, but, in a sick sense, his mind and body do. And there's a way to trick his mind into pushing his instincts away and leaving him with a normal life.

Flippy keeps his head propped up on an arm and finishes his coffee, so tired that he's barely listening and is instead asking for a fresh mug, because he doesn't understand either.

Splendid only takes his empty mug and suggests he's probably had enough coffee; he'll be up all night, if he drinks more than one cup and, as he's already said, Lumpy is a terrible doctor and will say he's about to die and overlook that he's just high of caffeine.

Flippy laughs and shakes his head, asking if Splendid is a better doctor and scoffing that he can take Lumpy.

He stops laughing when he sees that Splendid is straight faced and looks a little apologetic.

Yeah. Heavily delayed, 'oh shit!' moment for Flippy, who now realizes that there was something IN his coffee; he knows what stale coffee tastes like because he once suffered through a month of the stuff.

And he can't flip out on Splendid because he's too tired, so he's left to try running for the door.

That fails, too, so he can only pull and push himself away from Splendid, who apologizes for lying and for making Flippy go into such a panic, all the same he's just trying to help him and hopes he both forgives him and understands where he's coming from.

Flippy only keeps trying to get away, weakly telling Splendid to stay away from him.

From Flippy's blurry and world-spinny eyes, Splendid is the General from the Tiger Bomb mission, said General kneeling in front of him and smirking as Flippy knocks out with a sigh/groan.

Flippy doesn't wake up until MUCH later. He's got a splitting headache and, upon seeing all of the white-ish walls around him, sighs that he really must've fucked himself up when he set off that party popper, rubbing his head as he does so.

That's when he notices the handcuff and chain on his wrist, one that keeps him chained to one of the walls. He checks his other hand and sees that there's an identical handcuff on his wrist, also connecting him to the wall.

Not a dream.

Before Flippy can lose it, he sees a door open and Splendid walk in, looking very sheepish despite being the stronger of the two at the moment.

Before he can get any words out, Flippy charges toward him, at least until he's stopped by the chains.

It still makes Splendid jump back; powers be damned, if Flippy's mad at you, your days are numbered.

Splendid, from his place against the opposite wall, asks quite stupidly if Flippy's mad.

No. He's not mad at all. He's having the best damn day of his life, thank you for asking.

Sarcasm. All sarcasm that Splendid misses and is relieved by.

That relief vanished when Flippy charges again, pulling the handcuffs enough to make himself bleed.

Flippy demands to know what the hell is going on and why he's handcuffed in a padded cell.

When Flippy starts pulling a little too hard, like he's pulling hard enough to dent the chain links out of place, Splendid acts fast and aims a spray bottle at Flippy, and sprays water on him.

When Flippy backs down, Splendid repeats what he said upstairs, especially apologizing for not explaining how he was going to help him.

Flippy banks up, stands down, and sits down criss-crossstyle, which makes Splendid let out a sigh of relief, following his friend so they're sitting across from each other.

Flippy asks what EXACTLY Splendid was thinking when he drugged Flippy's coffee and then took Flippy to a loaded cell in his basement.

Splendid explains that he was just thinking and didn't regard what would have happened, even admitting that drugging the coffee wasn't his best or first plan; somehow sneaking up behind him with a nasty was, but that seemed insulting to Flippy's skills, so he thought about just working him out with races and exercise until Flippy passed out. That seemed like the most painful option, and the most tiring because wherever Flippy would fall would be unpredictable, so he just went south putting something in his coffee so he'd go unconscious for a little while.

Flippy takes all of this in and asks why Splendid didn't just ASK him to try this treatment he was babbling about earlier and Splendid admits that it's used for addicts to help them stop using whatever substance they're on. It's a pretty brutal technique, but it has worked.

The brutal part has Flippy concerned, so he asks what that means.

Splendid stops beating around the brush: aversion therapy. Using old war footage and medicine to make Flippy not want to go on a rampage whenever he gets triggeres.

Flippy stares at Splendid for a minute before taking off his boot and throwing it at him, asking if he's out of his damn mind.

That's not how his 'issues' work. Aversion therapy is meant to change another person so they AVERT away from something. Besides, what if they go through the therapy and Flippy's ordered backninto service, but ends up dead because he can't rely on his instincts?

Problem solved already because, as Splendid points out, Flippy's on a paid leave; his job is to stay OUT of the army now.

Flippy readies his other boot and Splendid backs down. Yes, he could've been more open about this to him. Yes, the whole chained to the wall in a basement thing is WAY too far. Yes, he should have told him as soon as he can, and he's sorry he didn't.

Flippy calms down and asks why he thinks it will work. No offense, but this is already working less than anythung Lumpy did, and the fool hypnotized himself into being a chicken.

Splendid admits he isn't sure, but he still wants to try to help.

Flippy asks what he'll do if he refuses to try this therapy. He's already on pills.

Splendid shrugs and says that while he'll be disappointed, he'll understand and won't be mad. Again, he just wants to help his friend and this is something that's worked for other people, not the chaining to the wall thing, but the aversion and sensory friendly environment, hence the padded room that isn't white, just a very light grey mixed with some blue, which is a calming color.

Flippy considers it for a minute before askung Splendid if he absolutely knows what he's doing.

Splendid nods. It took him a little freshing up and some review from a friend of his, yes. He knows what he's doing.

Flippy eyes him for a second before nodding, agreeing. Despite not saying it out loud, he wants to live life without worrying about killing everyone or snapping because his old instincts getting the better of him.

But stipulates that as soon as things get REALLY bad, they're calling this whole thing off and won't have anything to do with each other after that point.

Splendid rightfully agrees to those terms and tells Flippy to follow him to another room.

Flippy holds up his hands, reminding him of the handcuffs.

Those come off and the two leave the room, Flippy hoping Splendid was good on his word that he knew what he was doing.

Splendid shares a similar sentiment, instead hopi g that he can help his friend have a normal life.

[hopeswriting]

KHR x The Umbrella Academy AU

I need to get this out of my system before I think too much about it and want to write an actual story about it lol. With the Arco as MCs because I’m very predictable. TUA spoilers.

Words: 2579

Kawahira is Reginald because who else he’d be.

Every generation he gathers the most powerful extraordinary kids to make sure there will still be a world come next generation for him to do it again.

The current Arcobaleno he gathered are, well, the Arcobaleno lol.

Maybe there are the ones who’ll be smart enough to find another way around the Tri-ni-sette that doesn’t involve human sacrifices too, or strong enough to fight back against him and not let him kill them even if it means the world burns, or even strong enough to straight up kill him and put him out of his misery.

A dead man can’t be blamed to not give a shit about the end of the world after all or make it his problem.

(Well, this went dark real quick lmao.)

But why does he give a shit while he lives you ask?

He met this one human that one time and love sure has a way to make you care like the dumbest of humans.

(Yes I’m talking about Sepira.)

------

An Anti Tri-ni-sette Movement is born in this generation only, but not so much because of the whole human sacrifices thing mind you.

By design they just so happen to actively trying to prevent it, but they don’t care enough to come up with an alternative to stop the apocalypse.

Not that stopping the apocalypse was ever their end goal because yeah, it’s Byakuran and his Guardians that lead the movement, and Byakuran would just like to say if Kawahira wanted the most powerful extraordinary kids, he was right there.

Also playing the anti-hero (when he’s actually a chaotic neutral bad guy lol) sounded like a lot of fun.

------

The Commission is also still a thing because, well, someone still has to keep track and protect the timelines, right?

And as I’m writing this I realize it would have make more sense to have Kawahira leading it, or even Byakuran, but whatever.

Among their many assassins there’s this one elite squad the Commission tries very hard to keep them out of the field as much as possible (and fails), because they always need to send others agents after them to sort through their collateral damage and actually keep the timelines as they should be.

Yes I’m talking about the Varia.

Byakuran is very acquainted with them (both the Varia and the Commission), because they keep trying (and failing) to kill him.

Because Byakuran keeps using his power whatever the way he fucking wants, even while being very much aware of how timelines work.

Because of course he is lol.

------

Reborn and Verde are number one and two respectively, and always butt heads.

Not because of jealousy or because Kawahira trying to pit them against each other works on them or anything like that, they just infuriate each other at a very deep level lol.

Especially because they recognize (and begrudgingly admire/respect/trust) each other’s respective strengths.

They just don’t agree/approve on how the other uses them.

(Does Reborn need to be such a huge show off all the time? Being confident in his strengths enough to play with his enemies before winning against them is one thing, showing all his cards for the world to see just so he can win against them after they tried their hardest to defeat him is just incredibly stupid.)

(Does Verde have to be so straightforward and play by the book every time? Being the smartest in the room is one thing, walking out of the room alive because of it is another one entirely.)

------

A mission goes wrong and Reborn is dying, so Kawahira injects him with the Deus Ex Machina whatever-it- is, and he gains super healing.

And the super villains and every day villains are in for an entirely new level of Reborn wiping the floor with them lol.

(And yesI know, I’m shallow, but come on Reborn is too pretty to become half-ape, half-human.)

Reborn doesn’t go on the moon.

(They all turn eighteen and Kawahira isn’t even allowed to breathe in their direction anymore, let alone send them on the fucking moon.)

------

Fon is number three.

I have this headcanon he’s a bit of a manipulator, and uses his nice guy persona to wrap people around his finger.

Or he can be anyway, but it isn’t nowhere near in the first options he considers, because I also headcanon he’s genuinely a nice guy.

Anyway he doesn’t exactly hate his power, but he doesn’t trust it himself for shit, and wants to rely on it as little as possible.

So he also ends up a martial artist in this universe, and a very quiet guy.

(He remembers all too clearly what kind of words he can speak while under emotional stress.)

(The awful, horrible, haunting feeling of realizing even he can’t take them back.)

(Lal remembers it too.)

(Then Kawahira makes it so everyone forgets.)

(And Fon makes himself forget.)

------

Colonnello is number four.

Yeah I know, it could be Skull, but let’s go with him.

Reborn is number one but it’s Colonnello who’s daddy’s good little soldier boy.

For a very simple logic that goes like this: the more he behaves, the better he is at being and doing whatever Kawahira wants, the less traumatic encounters with his power he’s forced to have.

(Colonnello was never afraid of the dark, but then he’s thrown into the mausoleum again and again, and he never stops being afraid of the dark.)

So he doesn’t turn to drugs because he can’t afford to not be at the top of his game, but he does turn to Lal and her music.

If he closes his eyes and listens hard enough and it’s loud enough, he forgets the ghosts for as long as the music goes on.

------

On the other hand he can’t help having a bit of one-sided strained relationship with Reborn, with a lot more resentment than he’d want.

(Meaning zero because in an ideal world they’re best friends, and it’s really easy to tell the rare times when Kawahira isn’t looming above their relationship.)

It’s not even like he can’t see where Reborn is coming from, taking a stand against Kawahira and defying them and crossing the line further and further each time (of course he does), but he really could do without the collective punishment.

All in all, number four is doing very good, while Colonnello is doing very bad, and maybe does become an addict as soon as he doesn’t have to play superhero anymore.

------

Viper is number five.

They’re very happy with their teleportation power, and is right there with Colonnello in being daddy’s obedient child until they can hightail it the hell out of there.

Kawahira is very invested in their training and making them take the next big step with their powers.

Viper is smart so they know of the possibility of them being able to time-travel, but no surrogate A+ parenting dad is getting them in no time-travel shenanigans, nu-uh, they don’t think so.

 But then a mission goes wrong, and instead of the little jump back a few minutes in time they wanted to do, they jump in the future.

They keep jumping in the future as they try to go back, and oh, look at this, the end of the fucking world.

And his siblings’ dead bodies.

And a very alive, adult Skull??

(This is such a relief.)

(Skull is so happy to see them again.)

------

Something goes wrong when they try to jump back to the present, and only Viper makes it back.

In their thirteen year old body, because stopping a goddamned apocalypse isn’t enough to deal with already.

Their siblings are useless and no help and broken and very traumatized dysfunctional adults and alive, and they’re so, so happy to see them again.

(If they tear up and cry a bit later when they’re alone, that’s no one business.)

They hug (only) Skull, to no one surprise, and keep hugging, which does surprise everyone, and Skull may have written that book but he’s no monster and it’s Viper, so he hugs back.

(Of course he does.)

Viper still doesn’t know he’s immortal.

(Because Skull is a dumbass and kept waiting for the right moment, and what do you know, it never showed up, but to be fair with him they had a lot to deal with.)

------

No number six even though I do like the Ben, and dead!Ben, and ghost!Ben storylines.

But it there was a number six, I guess it could be either Skull or Viper maybe?

------

Luce is number seven as in she’s the most OP of them all. Not in a “raw strength” sense of course, but seeing the future?

I think Byakuran demonstrated perfectly how OP a power it is if you’re willing to weaponized it.

She doesn’t see the end of the world coming (where would be the fun if she did?), or at least doesn’t understand it’s the end of the world she’s seeing, and not just some big scale catastrophe.

She is not daddy’s good girl even though he shows a particular interest in her power, but he can go fuck himself actually.

She’s a bit of a number four too as in she hates her power, and it certainly gives her her fair share of nightmares.

It’s a special kind of gut wrenching feeling to see when and how people will die, and not always being able to save them even if she wants to.

(Nothing terrifies Luce more than when she sees her siblings in her visions.)

------

Skull is also number seven as in he’s the ordinary one who’s actually the most extraordinary of them all.

They just never figure out he’s immortal because Kawahira doesn’t push them that far in training, and he doesn’t go on missions.

He’s shunned and isolated by everyone, except for Viper and, hear me out, Luce.

Viper is afraid of heights, and maybe it shouldn’t matter because of the “jump” way their teleportation works, but sue them it does and they can’t help it.

Skull is the only one who takes the time to help them with that in another way that isn’t telling them to get over it, or making them dangling over edges.

Their friendship starts from there.

------

Luce on the other hand approaches him for selfish reasons.

Skull is the safe sibling, the one if she were ever to see his death, she can only hope it won’t be a too brutal one (or a brutal one at all).

But then, well. Skull is Skull, and he’s fun to be around with and funny, and he’s so good at keeping you out of your own head and thoughts, and he is such a breath of fresh air from her usual, unbearable routine, and—

He’s better than her at keeping his resentment and envy of her extraordinariness at bay than she is at doing the same with his ordinariness, and she’s so grateful he doesn’t push her away for it.

------

Skull is still very much treated like dirt, and he rolls with it as best he can.

Mostly because being left out of this whole extraordinary superheroes stuff lets him see how truly fucked up it is.

Skull is the one who wakes up at night not because he can’t sleep, but because the others can’t, and they don’t always manage to be silent about it.

He’s the one who sees them coming back from missions injured like no children should ever be, who assists Kawahira during their training and has to help them up at the end of it because they can’t move anymore.

He’s the one who watches them never really growing close with each other as much as he is the only one shunned, because Kawahira only has enough favors in him for only one of them.

Except he doesn’t even have that of course.

Skull is the only one who hasn’t blood on his hands, and he always feels guilty and awful at how relieved and lucky he feels whenever he sees that look in their eyes.

So he rolls with it, but not quietly, and forcefully makes himself a place among them even if it’s only to be their Lackey, because these guys are in dire need of ordinariness, no matter what Kawahira made them believe.

No matter what Kawahira made him believe.

It doesn’t work a lot of times, and only work a little when it does, but it’ll have to do.

Skull of course still hurts and is forced into his own traumatic childhood, so he still writes the book.

------

Skull figures out he’s immortal as soon as he’s left alone into adulthood because he is a dumbass.

The others learn about it because Luce saw the vision of his first death, and they were quite literally there to stop it from happening.

But instead they saw him coming back to life.

They don’t talk about it.

(None of them are in the right head space to talk about it).

And then they’re back at having no contact between them until the next time Luce has a vision of his death.

(Because he’s immortal now, but what if he’s not anymore?)

(Skull is so sorry of this new layer of fucked up he added to Luce’s visions.)

It’s very awkward when Viper comes back and tells them Skull is the only one who survived the apocalypse though they don’t know how, and they have to break the news to them.

------

Lal is also number seven as in she’s the one being medicated to keep her powers at bay.

She’s The White Violin, if only because one of them needs the raw strength and ability in their power to blow up the moon lol.

Lal is extraordinary until she isn’t.

She’s thirteen, and the mission goes wrong, and she’s losing control of her powers, and Fon says some unfortunate words.

Then Kawahira makes him say other unfortunate words, and Lal never has been extraordinary.

(Because she’s too powerful, and he’s trying to keep the world turning, not end it whenever she’ll feel too strongly too much.)

Her relationships with the others kind of fall short because it kind of feels hollow/shallow now, and she ends up isolated too.

But because of their respective unique circumstances, Skull and her unfortunately never bond.

Colonnello and her stays close, because if Lal can be useful with her music that way, she’s more than happy to do it.

And on an entirely unrelated note, I really like the idea of musician!Lal actually.

------

Sepira is Mom.

Yeah I know, the similarities with Luce would be very obvious, but let’s pretend it wouldn’t be.

And they don’t have a chimpanzee uncle, but they do have pets from that one time they gang together against Kawahira.

But they never said what kind of pets they wanted to have lol.

------

So it goes something like this:

Number One: Reborn – Super Strength and Super Healing

Number Two: Verde – Either The Smartest Man In The World or controlling the trajectory of weapons (while still being the smartest man in the world even if it isn’t in the “super” way), or both

Number Three: Fon – The Rumor

Number Four: Colonnello – The Seance

Number Five: Viper – The Child

Number Six: Luce – The Prophetess

Number Seven: Lal – The White Violin The (Extra)Ordinary One

Number Eight: Skull – The Immortal The Ordinary One

*

I actually have AUs of this AU, but let’s not make myself too comfortable in this hole lol. Hope you enjoyed it, and feel free to add!

[lennydaisy]

SWAN SONG || The Walking Dead AU

‘You have to trust that every friendship has no end, that a communion of saints exists among all those, living and dead, who have truly loved God and one another.

You know from experience how real this is. Those you have loved deeply and who have died live on in you, not just as memories but as real presences.’

HENRI NOUWEN

                         The Walking Dead.

        Season 1-?

                                         FEM OC! and ?

This is the prologue for a Walking dead AU that I wrote ages ago, and I feel like its too good to waste. So here it is :))

‘Now to John, who's live at the scene. John, what's happening there?'

'I'm here at Central Atlanta Hospital where there has been a reported disturbance within the wards. Patients allegedly have gone rogue, biting and scratching the doctors and each other.'

'If we pan to our left here, you can see the hallways are overflowing with newly found patients from the attacks.'

Glancing up at the ancient box TV perched in the top corner of the room, eyebrows frowned as I take another bite of my bland chicken sandwich.

The screen displays a lit yellow Hospital hallway with beds and chairs cluttering the space. With no room to breathe, the patients packed together like a tin of sardines.

The camera zooms into one patient in particular, who judging by their attire is a nurse themselves. A sickly colour of unnatural grey washed over their face, a layer of sweat glistening under the cheap lights and her veins protruding from her neck as though she's struggling to keep herself calm.

'Miss, would you be able to explain how your feeling?'

I can't help but scoff at the reporter's request. She is clearly in no condition to answer any of his questions and it's downright ignorant to shove a microphone in the face of a woman who has clearly seen better days.

The women slowly turned to face the reporter, her eyes appearing to lack any colour with bags drooping down to her jaw, and glares with all she can muster. Despite clearly being exhausted from whatever is happening to her body, she has no problem expressing her aggravation towards the man.

'Not responsive I see. Well no mind, as the viewers at home can see, Central Hospital is in desperate need of doctors and nurses. So I'm here to announce that if there is anyone-'

I don't know how to describe what I just saw. Just know that it was revolting enough to put me off chicken sandwiches forever.

In the midst of the reporter's announcement, a pair of hands slowly made their way around his body. Their nails were bitten down to stumps, their fingers a troubled colour of blue as though clogged with blood. The sickly hands, lazily but purposefully, claw at the reports button-up shirt from behind. Tugging on the attachments like grips, the women who the reporter was previously questioning is now sinking her teeth into the man's neck. Trails of blood dripping from her lips as she pulls her jaw roughly away from his neck taking a clump of him with her.

The look of pure horror wash over the man's faces, and mines in probably mimicking his. I've never seen anyone's eyes pop so far from their head. The face of sheer panic and terror covering his visuals as he opens his mouth to let out what I can only assume to be a deafening scream but before a sound is made the camera quickly cuts back to the studio, where the two anchors are now shaking at the sight they just witnessed live.

'We'll be back after this quick intermission,' squeaked out the anchor, eyes still wide, never leaving the screen off camera.

'Were you recently involved in an accident?',  the convenient ad was interrupted by the television being turned off. Snapping my head to my right, only to be met by the sheepish face of Darcy, the department receptionist. Smiling weakly at me from her desk, "I'm sure it's nothing to worry about."

Nothing to worry about. "Were we just watching the same clip," I breathe baffled at the idea of not worrying about what we just witnessed, "That man just had his neck bitten into but some Wednesday Adams looking women," I laughed, struggling myself to understand what just happened.

"I'm sure he's fine," she waves her hand in my direction before quickly standing up as I did seconds before, " What are you doing?" She questions as I grab my hat off my peg.

Rolling my eyes as I make the reach for my keys, "My job," my fingers scraping the keys before they are snatched out of my reach. Looking up at the elderly women with bored eyes, I hold my hands out waiting for her to cave.

"No, half the department is already helping the city, we need you here in Kings County," she argues quickly running back to her desk, sliding into her roller chair. Out of my vision but not hearing, I hear the clashing of keys, the slamming of metal and the sound of a lock.

She locked my keys in her desk.

"Darcy- " I begin only to be interrupted.

"No" she heaves, hands crossed over her chest tightly, "It's bad enough those two are God knows where doing God knows what, I can't allow the only deputy left in the building to leave."

I would be annoyed and honestly, I am, the woman isn't not letting me do my job, but with just a simple look in her eyes I can see why she doesn't want me to leave, "You're scared," I point out pulling my chair over to the front of her desk, sitting my hat on the table.

Refusing to meet my eyes answered my assumption. She was scared and she had every right to be. What we just watched on the news isn't normal but it's not the first we've heard of this 'infection'. It's been going on for weeks, especially in the city. Residents reporting sights of people staggering through the streets, grabbing and biting anything they can get their hands on. Honestly sounds like a typical weekend in the city in my opinion, after a couple of drinks, you'd be surprised what some people turn into. I haven't seen any of these things personally but that news clip just made everything people have been bustling about all too real.

"These things are apparently migrating. It's not just a city virus, they're making their away out into places like this," her hands brushing the nonexistent lint off the top of my hat, her voice so soft, if you didn't listen closely enough you'd miss it.

"I'm not going to fill you with false hope because honestly, I have no idea what is happening but I will say this if I know you at all, something like a little virus isn't going to be the end to the bombshell that is Darcy Peters."

A small smile begins to creep onto her face, "You should have seen me in my youth," flipping her white shoulder-length hair.  Shaking my head with a giggle, I lean over her desk and turn her desktop towards me looking at the set back of work left for her to complete. Moving the mouse to the bottom of the screen I log her off, " Take the rest of the day off."

Knowing fine well she would say no, I left her no room for arguments as I hastily grabbed her coat passing it to her, "Don't tell me no Peters, Deputies orders," I said with authority behind my voice but eventually broke out into a smile at the delightful women before me.

"But what about-" she points at the computer addressing the work she still had to do. Grabbing the women's hands as I begin to drag her out the door, "Don't worry I'll handle it but you need to go home and chill out," snatching her car keys as I begin walking with her hand in hand to her beloved mustard Ford Fiesta.

Opening the driver's door, "M'lady," I bow holding the door. Shaking her head at my act, she wraps her arms around my shoulders, brings me in for a hug, slightly shocked but I hug her back none less, "Thank you, Macy," she laughs in my ear before pulling away, cupping my face like an affectionate grandmother.

Slapping my cheeks lightly she points her finger timidly at my face, "Now no running off play superhero, you're needed here," her eyes never leaving mine as though to challenge me to say otherwise. Well, I like a challenge, "No promises."

A dead look in her eyes causes me to laugh once more, "Okay, I promise I won't run off, I'll stay put. Now beat it, tell Richard I say hi," closing the door behind the women before stepping away from her car.

Just before she was about to drive off, she rolls down her window, "Oh before I forget, here's the key to the desk. Also there's something for Officer Friendly in there you won't miss it," see spoke throwing the flimsy key my way. Nodding my head towards the women, I mockingly salute her off, catching a glimpse of her rolling her eyes smiling.

Tossing the small, rusted key between my hands, I make my way back to Darcy's desk. After a couple of shakes and jiggles, the lock to the drawer eventually clicks. Pulling open the drawer, I grab my car keys stuffing them in my back pocket. That's when my eyes catch a shine reflecting out of the space. Reaching my hand in my finger brush across metal embroidery.

A Sheriff badge.

Unable to help the smile that made its way to my face as I stare down at the achievement of my friend. 'Officer Friendly's going to flip. So will someone else but for a different reason.' Shaking the thought from my head, I quickly run round to the desk of the newly found Sheriff. Going to place the shining badge on the desk, a note stops me;

Gone for a quick lapse of the county. If I'm not back by finish, I'll see you tomorrow, Officer Friendly.

Still sitting the badge on his desk, hoping that he at least makes it back in an hour, his face will be priceless. Snatching the remote from the floor, I flick the television back on, wanting to see if there are any updates on the situation.

'Government officials have requested that everyone stays inside their homes, only leaving unless extremely necessary. Until this is contained, please be cautious. This has been channel 5's news.'

Drowning out the rambling of the adverts, I absorb myself I'm my phone. 7 texts, damn I'm popular.

From Corey. Hey, can you drop me off :) Sent 07:39

From Corey. Oft okay never mind then I know I broke 3 of your car window, but that doesn't forbid access does it?? Fine two can play at that game, I'll walk. Ummmm that's when you're supposed to be the super big sister and say 'no sweet little sister, don't walk and ruin your BRAND NEW BOOTS, I'll happily drop you off' Boo you, you suck :(( Sent at 07:57

From Corey. Hey, can you pick me up ;) Sent at 17:12

This girl, I swear.

To Corey. I'll think about it :)) Sent Now.

Collecting my things, preparing myself for my leave. All too quickly trying to rush out the door, I skid to a halt and turn round to a certain desk in particular. Contemplating my options, I decided to take the newly found badge with me. For one; it is past shift time and I really want to witness his face when he gets promoted.' I'll just give it to him tomorrow when everyone's here', I thought.

Now I'm well aware that my car isn't exactly the best site for sore eyes, I'll be the first to admit that, but it was my dream car and it was the first real big purchase I ever made as an adult. My glorious, yellow Volkswagen Beetle. She's seen better days that for sure, but she means a lot to me and a couple of bumps and scratches isn't going to make me trade her in. Ever.

I grew up in Mormont, Georgia. A small county that no one has heard of and when people ask where I'm from I'm always met with the same look. In Mormont everybody knows everybody. It's a tight-knit community with no secrets. When word got out the resident widow had adopted 3 girls from the now shut down orphanage, the community was sent into a frenzy.

The same woman who was framed for burning down her old farmhouse that her husband happened to be still asleep in, was now going to be a mother of 3 very different daughters.

Without my mom I wouldn't even be here today, I would be how I am today. Mom adopted me when I was 4 years old, and even at a young age, I know that something about me was different from the other kids at kindergarten. Kids would come and leave joyfully holding the hands of their parents whitest they rambled on about what we did that day. I would leave on a bus with a woman who didn't really care enough to remember my name, looking after me in the centre was just a 9 to 5 for her and she got to go home to her family without a care in the world. I will never forget the day I was called down to the main office.

Believing that I had done something wrong, I reluctantly climbed down the creaking bunk beds steps. Looking around the room, I'm met with many stares, some glaring, some shaking their heads. I was in a room surround by judgemental toddlers.

I've never been called down to the office before. I've seen others been called down and they never come back. Tommy told me that Glenda, the houses mistress, feeds them to the two-headed man in the attic. I never believed him, knowing that he only wanted to scare me but now I'm not so sure. 'I don't want to be eaten', I thought.

One step at a time, I slowly make my way down the wooden steps that despite my lightweight still shriek under my shoes. Before I reach the bottom of the stairs, I'm met by the glorious Glenda. Her lopsided, spectacles clawed eyes boring down at me, 'Come,' she said before spinning around and heading to the room she just walked out from, 'There's someone here to see you."

'Someones here to see me? But I don't know anybody' I thought to myself as I follow behind the women with a newfound spring in my step.

"Mason this is Charlotte, she'd like to adopt you."

I guess you could say that's when I knew. When I first land my eyes on hers, I felt something that then in my short 4 years of life had never felt before, safe. Fast forward 22 years and that feeling had never left. Like the light of an eternal flame, that shine behind my mom's eyes never left, never even flickered. It's a constant reminder, I knew it when I was 4 years old and I still know it now at 26, that home isn't found in a physical building but instead found in those you surround yourself with.

No matter how hard I try, I will never be able to fully express my gratitude towards my mother. She gave me a chance and took me into her home with open arms. She says 'Thats what mothers do' and that might be true but she didn't have too. That's just the type of person she is. A heart of gold, a heart that is far too big for this world. She might not be my birth mother but in my opinion no one could do better, I don't know what I did in a past life to deserve the right to call her my mother, all I know is that I'm forever thankful for that.

Cora, or Corey, my sweet baby sister. The best way to describe her would be prissy. A real drama queen but strong-minded. When it comes to Corey no mountain is too high. Basically it's Corey's world and we're all just live in it. I take deep pride in telling her that she was an ugly baby and I'm not telling any lies. One look at her baby pictures sends a shiver down your spine.

She's your basic stressed college student who believes that the world will end if she fails to hand in one essay on time, but has no problem with partying the night before a big exam. Beginning to understand what type of person Corey is?

Then there's Ally. The big sister, my big sister. I remember growing up and always wanting to be like her when I grew up, I thought she was the coolest person in the world. She shaved off her hair when she was 18 and me and my 8-year-old self desired to do the same. Mom was mortified and kids at school did laugh at me for a while but I didn't care, I wanted to be like my sister, buzz cut and all.

As I grew up however I realised something, Ally had a darkness inside her. When I was younger I never noticed, I always saw her acts for rebellion as inspiration for my own mischief but as I got older and matured, she never. She always stayed the same. It some cases that's a good thing if you're a good person that is. I never believed my sister to be a bad person, more troubled than anything. I think why you get to the age of 36 and still rebel against your mother like an edgy teenager somethings not right.

Ally thinks the world is constantly against her, that the whole world is testing her, but that couldn't be further from the truth. I was the first to know she was pregnant, she didn't tell me herself but the positive stick sitting in the bathroom bunker was a big give away. I've seen her anger a handful of times and more often than not it consumes her, her anger is her own worse enemy and that day I meet the worst of it. There was a lot of screaming and hitting, and things being thrown in my direction. Luckily enough no one else was home when all this happened, but it was quite hard to explain why I had a black eye and Ally had burst knuckles. I lied, that's what I did.

'I got jumped,' it was the best I could come up with at the time. I made up a story of me being mugged and Ally saving the day. Mom barked up a storm, ask question after question, and I was slowly running out of ideas for my action sequence. That was until Ally spoke up,

'I'm going away for a while,' she said placing her fork down on her barely touched the plate, 'Work,' she replied to the looks that were sent her way. I refused to meet her eyes but I knew fine well that she was staring at me in particular, that didn't stop me from listening though.

'Oh, well for how long?,' Mom asked swirling around her glass of wine, 'A couple of months.'

'And what work relate thing causes you to be away for a couple of months?' Corey spoke up, her eyes never leaving Ally's as though to challenge her, 'The companies looking for a new manager, I thought I would try and run for it. It is more money,' she spoke trying to convince not only Cora but our reluctant mother too. Reluctant and our mom isn't two words that I would put together, she's a keen believer of 'if you want it, go and get it', but not when it comes to Ally.

'It seems like a good opportunity,' mother said honestly, nodding her head at her oldest daughter, 'seems like bullshit,' I muttered under my breath causing my mom to kick my shin from under the table, only to be faced with the stern stare of my mom.

'Language Mason' sternly spoke our mom making Cora laugh slightly at the use of my full real name.

'I'm just saying, she seems to go on a lot of these trips and comes back empty-handed every time, sorry for having some doubt.'

'That's enough Cora,' Mom said not breaking eye contact with her youngest who is sitting across the dinner table from her, 'yeah whatever, can I be excused?' Before she could get an answer she was already on her feet marching out the room.

Nodding sadly, mom looked around the table at the remaining 2, 'Macy, darling,  you've barely touched your dinner.'

Meeting her eyes, 'I had a big lunch,' the lies pouring out my mouth at this point.

The rest of the dinner that night was filled with awkward silence. The sound of the chair next to me scraping against the old hardwood floor breaks my concentrated gaze on my plate. Ally's hard duty boots marching out of the room and storming up the stairs.

My mom let out a sigh and placed her fork on her now empty plate, looking up at the only remaining daughter at the table. Flashing my mom a small smile, taking a sip of my now lukewarm water, "You make good spaghetti mom"

"Go check on her for me please," she practical begged, her voice suggesting nothing but defeat, "She never talks to me anymore."

'I'm probably the last person she wants to see," is what I wanted to say to my mom, but looking at my mother with her head in her hands at the thought of my troubled older sister broke my heart.

Before taking the dreaded walk up the stairs and to the door at the end of the hall, I placed a hand on my mom's shoulder, squeezing in reassurance.

'Everything will be okay.' I thought to myself.

Knocking on the door, only to receive no reply, 'I know you're in there,' I said continuously knocking on the oak door. Getting bored with being ignored, I did the brave and open the forbidden door, Ally's bedroom door.

Ally's bedroom is something, I don't know what that something is but it screams Ally. It's dishevelled yet bland, perfect for Ally I guess. Nothing but a set of drawers with half the handles missing, piles of dirty washing sitting in the corner of her room that will probably stay there for weeks, and a chipped dark wood bed. And then there's Ally, who is currently packing a bag.

'There is no business trip is there?' I asked even though I fine well knew the answer already. Throwing the last of her clothes in the bag, she stares me dead in the eye from her position at the bottom of her bed, 'I have to get out of here.'

Walking further into her room as she walks back to her drawers closing them loudly, 'Promise me one thing,' I asked looking out the window at the deserted street. Hearing no noise for behind me I continued, 'That we'll get to meet them one day,'

'I can't promise you that,' turning round to stare at her in confusion, 'what you're never coming back?' I asked softly shaking my head at the idea of her leave and never returning. Ally goes away a lot but she always comes back. We might not be as close as we use to be when I was younger but it's a comfort to know that she's here with us.

She just looked at me not speaking yet her glances spoke a thousand words. I didn't know silence could get any quieter but I was proven wrong in that moment. It was as though the whole world stopped spinning, it was like the world ended right and then. Shaking my head at my sister mentality, my heartbreaking even at the thought of what she wanted to do, 'Oh,' was the only response I muster up as I move to sit at the edge of the bed, my legs suddenly feeling like jello.

Rubbing my hands over my eyes and tugging at my hair, trying to get all my thoughts to settle down. The feel of a hand softly holding my shoulder caught my attention. Looking down at me was my sister, my big sister, that I wanted with every fibre of my being to be like when I grew up. But people change, and Ally surely did. That moment made me realise something, Ally never changed. No, she was always the same. It was me who changed, I was just too young to realise.

The day that Ally left, a part of myself left with her, and that necessarily wasn't a bad thing. No, she took the naive part with her. The sense that everything was okay now, that everything was perfect now because I had a family. Sometimes families go through rough patches and for some reason ours was never-ending.

Shaking my head, snapping myself out of my thoughts, focussing once more on my journey home. I love county lanes, there the best to drive on. You can go as fast as you want and when you go over a little hill you get those silly butterflies in the pit of your stomach. My family hates driving with me on these roads. Apparently I'm too careless when it comes to driving, I argue that I'm not careless I'm just used to acting like I'm in the Fast and Furious movies.

Speaking of radical driving, I hit the breaks slowly once I spot what's up ahead. A car parked sporadically in the middle of the lane, but that's not what's got me confused. There are people, a headcount of about ten, all banging their hands lazily on the windows of the car, smearing their faces over the glass.

Cutting the engine, leaning over to the car pocket reaching for my emergency gun, I slowly stalk my way out of the car. Holding the gun with both hands at the ground, the safety still on as I make my way closer but not too close.

"Hey, what are you guys doing, what's the problem-" my voice slowly losing its confidence as the figures around the car turn to face me and begin to walk drunkenly towards me. The noise they make doesn't sound too good, the air now filled with grunts and groans, the sounds of pain. I noticed a couple not paying me any mind, to busy eating something. Oh.

Realising exactly what I'm witnessing. Those are the sick people that has the world on edge. A group of them a coming right towards me. Raising my gun and flipping the safety off, I take aim, "Don't come any closer, I'll shoot," I announce not really wanting to have to shoot them. I might as well not have spoken, they just keep pushing, stumbling over one another as they inch closer.

Lining up, setting my sights on one, in particular, a middle-aged man, a civilian, I shoot one shot into his left leg. Nothing. A slight knockback at most but he's still alive. Trying again, I aim for his chest and the same happened again. Lastly shooting the head, that's what does it. He's down.

That one alone took up to much time, I have another 8 headed my way and I only have a limited amount of bullets. The odds were not in my favour, that much was clear. Making a dash for my car, hastily ripping my keys from my pocket. Silence.

"Come on don't fail me now!" I said through gritted teeth. Shoving the keys into the engine once more and twisting. Sounds of my struggle echo throughout the car as I feel the nonexistent sweat beginning to build as my breath becomes hot with frustration. Now as good a point as any to point out that I have 3 broken windows, no thanks to Cora. Not broken as in they don't go down, oh no, they don't go up. I mean how one single girl breaks 3 windows is beyond me. Honestly, it didn't bother me that much to begin with, it gives my car character. Right now though it's a different story.

If my internal panic with my car not starts wasn't enough, then maybe those things reaching their grimy hands in my car are. Before I knew it my car was surrounded by the creatures, some toppling over the bonnet of my car, others pushing their hands through my half-cracked down windows. I feel the lazy touch of the fingers brushing against my shoulders and hair causing my entire body to shiver.

"Please" I beg over the sounds of the deathly groans and screams. Turning the key again with my sweaty hands, my body shaking in fear of what's to come. As though Jumpstarted, my car roars to life. The sound of my own engine has never sounded so delightful and I should honestly appreciate it more.

Not caring for speed limits, I push the pedal to the metal. The shrieking of my tires scraping on the hard concrete leaving evidence of my wheels spinning. Pushing through the moss pit of things before my car wasn't as hard as it sounds, even though they look like dead weight, they are quite easy to redirect.

Speeding my car a distance away for the scene, next to the car they were previously attacking, before I slow to a stop again, looking in my rearview mirror. They're following me. Looking to my left, I see the beaten car. Curdling blood dripping from the passenger seat window with loose pieces of straggling hair stuck to the wing mirror. Leaning over slightly I see a few fingers laying on the ground. Holding back my gag, I look back up into the car, only to be met with a figure. A hard to distinguish figure. Completely devoured and unrecognisable. Those rabid animals shredded these poor souls face to shreds with any features now ruined.

Shaking my head at the sounds of the things coming closer to my car again, I slowing start moving, only to hit the breaks instantly as a thought came to my head. Looking in my rearview mirror again at the car, tears begin to build in my eyes. A mustard Ford Fiesta. That's the car. That's her car. My cheeks slightly soaked, my hands shaking once again as I roughly grab the roots of my hair. Having enough, I swat away the tears that are trailing down my cheeks, nose scrunched up as I try my hardest not to look back again. I didn't.

Driving down that road, the road that usually fills me with overwhelming joy, felt different this time around. It felt darker. The road that I knew ultimately leads me to home is beginning to feel like a drag. It's a road that I never want to drive down again because the only thought that I can think of now is: it's my fault.

[pl-panda]

Damienette arranged marriage: part 25

Credits: Miraculous Ladybug team for the elements I take from MLB show. DC for their characters, @ozmav for the AU, @maribat-archive for giving me access to so many different stories to have take inspirations from, @thyladyanput for idea for Chat Damian and me for the plot.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8

Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 part 14 part 15

part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20 Part 21

Part 22 Part 23 

Part 24

Damienette arranged marriage: part 25

NEXT

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Tossing her weapon at him and using some of the moves she learned from maman over the years. 

This was like a spark. Immediately after Ladybug’s charge, other heroes also attacked. The battle has begun. At least until there was an ear-piercing cry of pain that got everyone’s attention.

----------------------

During previous encounters with the superheroes Mayura had much less trouble. It was clear that Pink Tigress was much better trained. Nathalie herself was a master martial artist even outside of the suit and her skill only increased when she put on the feathered outfit. But this was something entirely different.

Mayura redirected a very quick jab of the Chakram with her fan, but she had no chance to counterattack because Pink Tigress did not lose balance and instead followed up with low kick. The blue villainess jumped up to avoid it and used the opportunity for a scissor kick of her own. Her opponent reacted in time to cross her hands in front and rebound her, but it only led to further stand-off. They proceeded to meet each other in close quarter, exchanging quick, but viscious strikes. They were pretty evenly matched, at least it looked like that for first minute or so. But with each move it became clearer that even if Mayura had skill to back her up, she lacked in terms of deadliness. Tigress was silent and composed as the fight went on, while the peacock miraculous started to panic. It might have been just three minutes at best, but Nathalie found herself at complete defence, being pushed back constantly. 

While the two women were fighting between themselves, Chat Noir and Ladybug had their own battle going on. Over the course of last month Marinette trained with her mother to utilize her yo-yo as more than just a simple thrown weapon. Before she didn’t really connect her fighting style with the projectile. It sometimes served as a shield for her to block the attacks but offensively it was much harder to utilize. At least until her mother helped her change perspective. The yo-yo was basically a blunt version of rope dart. She could use it both as a projectile as well as at close range. Sometimes the young girl even grabbed the weapon and used it like a stone to add weight to her attacks.

At the same time, it was clear that Chat Noir did not stop training. Marinette kicked herself over and over that she did not recognize clear fencing training before, but right now it was different. Adrien was now fighting with much more aggression than before. He did not back away or dodge the attacks, instead taking them on the weapon or even forearms or legs. He just pushed ahead. At first Ladybug tried to regain control and momentum she had in the beginning, but this new viciousness force her to stay defencive. She rather quickly got pressed to the wall.

“You don’t deserve to be Ladybug!” Chat Noir shouted at her. “Cataclysm!” The pasisian heroine managed to dodge the last second as the black bubbling energy crashed into the wall. The structure crumbled and cracks started to go up and onto the roof. Adrien turned where Ladybug lunged to to avoid his attack and fumed with anger. “You took everything from me Ladybug! You turned her against me! You corrupted her! But it doesn’t matter. She is the true ladybug and not some imposter. After my father is done I will give her your miraculous and we will be the greatest heroes Paris… No! The Wor…” He didn’t finish his speech because Ladybug lunged and pushed him away as a large chunk of debris fell where he just stood. Marinette could be disgusted with what Adrien has become, but deep down she still saw a friend. A friend she would not let die. In the impact, the ring slipped from his finger and rolled away. Adrien wanted to grab it, but a quick punch from his former partner knocked him out cold.

Elsewhere in the room, Viperion just managed to get the akumatized object. He quickly broke it and released the Akuma, causing the gorilla to fall down exhausted. Luka did not have time to focus on this. He turned to where Ryuko and Hawkmoth were going at it. She was a world-class fencer, but somehow Gabriel Agreste could match her and even overpower her. He was pushing the girl back. Then, he suddenly drawn a hidden sword from his cane and lunged at Ryuko. Without second thought, Viperion tossed his lyre like a frisbee to stop the attack. It worked, but he didn’t notice Mayura and Tigress fight getting dangerously close to him. Before he even realize the blue vilanness held him in front of her like a human shield, making it impossible for him to use second chance. 

“Give up Tigress. Or the boy will suffer.” She threatened and to make it more real, she pressed the bladed fan to his neck. “We wouldn’t want to spill any snake blood today, now would we?”

Instead of answering, Pink Tigress tossed her chakram up. The spinning weapon bounced from the roof and fell at Mayura. She had no time to follow up on her threat and instead pushed the boy forward while she jumped back. She did slip the bracelet from his hand at the same time, making him detransform.

Ryuko noted the whole event in the corner of her eye. She was grateful to Luka for helping her, but she would berate the reckless boy later. For someone so composed he rushed in too often. She refocused on her battle. The plan was to keep Hawkmoth busy while other heroes get rid of any support so they could overwhelm the villain. So far it didn’t work as planned. She was on constant defensive.

“Tell me, miss Tsurugi. What would your mother say if she saw you get defeated by a civilian with so little training.” Hawkmoth teased her. “She would be so disappointed in you.” He added in mocking tone. Ryuko withstood the banter without even blinking. She tried to shrug it off, but he started to get to her. He also had to notice that her moves became more sloppy, because Gabriel continued with the mockery. “Or maybe she already resent you for skipping so many classes and trainings to just play hero? I can’t imagine what will she say…” He finally managed to catch her sword in place long enough with his own blade to use the cane he still held in the other hand to strike her arm. The pain made her let go of her weapon, but she made no notable sound. She tried to punch him, but Hawkmoth stepped out of the way and grabbed her choker instead. Kagami detransformed and fell on the ground, panting from exhaustion. 

The whole building was falling apart and more debris now landed. A particularly big chunk would crush the fencer, but Sabine noticed in time. 

“Power Up! Strength!” She jumped to where the girl stood and stopped her from turing into a wet puddle. At the same time, more chunks fell, cutting them off for the most part. 

“Thank you madame.” Kagami bowed while still lying on the ground. “I owe you my life.”

“No worry sweety. Let’s finish it and go skin a cat, okay?” Sabine focused and used her enchanted strength to push the large chunk away and release them. She picked the girl and jumped out. 

In front of her, the scene was mortifying. Hawkmoth held blade at Ladybug’s neck while she was forced to kneel before him. Next to him, Mayura had Luka in similar position. 

“I think that was enough of the show.” The villain commented. You’ve all proven just how strong and heroic you are… But it ends here.” He was about to grab the earrings of Ladybug, but she started to toss around. 

“Hold still girl if you want to see your friend and yourself walk out of here alive!” Mayura threatened her. To enforce the point made by his partner, Hawkmoth pressed the blade closer, drawing some blood. A single droplet traveled along the edge and hit the floor. The heroine felt her whole body go stiff with fear. She silently accepted her fate when suddenly there was an ear-piercing cry of pain behind her. The blade, together with hand that was holding it, fell to the ground. Hawkmoth stumbled holding the stump that used to be his hand. Behind him Damian wiped the blood from his blade.

“Leave. My Wife. Alone!” He barked and turned to Mayura. “The game is over.” 

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Taglist (sorry if I missed you)@pheonixashtree @sassakitty @unabashedbookworm @vixen-uchiha @maggiecc12 @actualdisasterwoman @tired-butterfly @shizukiryuu @floralfi @imanerddealwith @northernbluetongue @krispydefendorpolice @toodaloo-kangaroo @dast218 @bluesoulblueheart @theatreandcomicfreak @disneyfoxuniverse @mindfulmagics @alwaysnumberonetruth @nyaabinch @jardimazul @lenamau @rosep16 @dramatic-squirrel @sonif50 @daminett4life @lulutheawkwardess @weird-pale-blonde-person @mooshoon @jeminiikrystal @mochegato @moonlightstar64 @dragonflyswing @silverwhiteraven @shamefullove @magic-miraculous @valeks-princess @heaven428 @mlbchaosqueen @winter-gardenflower @spicybelladonna @emo-elaine13 @vetilora @karukofox21 @my-name-is-michell  @sturchling @lokiifriggasonn @redscarlet95 @melicmusicmagic @interobanginyourmom @the-fusionist @razzledazzle247 @miss-mysterys-blog @darkthunder1589 @i-is-mysterious @catthhay @the-one-woman-army @zestyzealot @dahjokester @write-for-your-life2 @mermaidreject @peachedpocky @sassakitty @dahjokester @crazylittlemunchkin @novicevoice @justafanwarrior @eliza-bitch @schrodingers25 @tired-butterfly @toodaloo-kangaroo @redscarlet95 @miukiiu @sassakitty @corabeth11 @vixen-uchiha @lilypos03

[nobodyfamousposts]

Felix July - Enemies to Lovers Demon Felix AU

Felix was not a nice person. Or even a good person. Or even a person at all.

It kind of came with being a demon. And Felix WAS one of the best, thank you very much. It was part of the reason why he was one of the demons at the top of the list to contract with. Felix did his job and he did it quite well, giving people what they wanted and reaping their souls afterwards.

Over the centuries, he had played all sorts of roles to cater to the whims of whomever was foolish or desperate enough to call upon him. Whether servant, guard, or subordinate, he played whatever part they wanted of him and he played it well—often so well that the fools would mistakenly think he was truly their ally when their end finally came and he finally took his payment.

He wouldn’t say he relished in their cries of dismay or betrayal.

He just thought it was amusing.

Felix was a DEMON. He had a job. He did the job. And he took great pride in it. Even if business had been slow over the centuries.

Early on, things were…well, not easy, but certainly plentiful. People would call upon him for the standard three wishes, generally wanting power, wealth, or revenge—he rather liked that last one, he was at least able to get creative with it. But with the increasing antics of the various religions and the whole atheism belief gaining traction, not many people actually subscribed to the old ways of demon summoning to get their wishes.

So when he had been summoned for the first time after a good few decades, he was actually somewhat impressed.

Then he met his would be contractor, and he was decidedly LESS impressed.

Lila Rossi.

A preteen at this point. She had all the makings of a future serial black widow. Sociable. Perceptive. Manipulative. And a complete disregard for others. Even early on, she had a way of drawing people to her like moths to a flame that was only all too happy to set them alight. It would have been interesting to see, if anything.

But she was lazy. And impatient.

So she summoned him to make things easier for her.

He’d give her credit that she at least knew what she was doing. When she made her wishes, she made sure to word them in such a way so as to get exactly what she wanted. Not that he would have twisted her wishes the way she feared. He had pride in his work after all.  Not to mention his reputation. After all, word spread easily and no one was going to call on an entity for anything if he was known for screwing them out of it.

No. Felix gave them exactly what they wanted. How things worked out from there was entirely on them.

He just sat back and watched the fallout.

“Mistress Rossi”, as she preferred he call her, thought she was so smart. She had her wishes already written out before she’d gone about summoning him. She worked them precisely to make sure what she wanted would be exactly what she got, and even more than he technically should have given per wish.

Two wishes in and she had it all. Youth and beauty. Charm and charisma. An automatic positive perception in the eyes of others. The ability to lie and fool without anyone doubting her.

By the end of it, she was able to keep people almost enthralled by her, obeying her every whim and taking her every word without question. She could have told anyone anything she wanted and they would believe her. Honestly, it took the fun out of things. What was the point if she didn’t even have to work for it?

Well, Rossi liked it well enough, so that was what she got. And the only stipulation was that the illusion wouldn’t hold on anyone who knew with absolute certainty that what she was saying couldn’t be true.

Like, say…lying about being Ladybug’s best friend in a way she could easily be discovered by the girl who just happened to be the civilian identity of the superhero in question.

If he cared or felt even the least bit of sympathy for her, Felix would have laughed aloud at her idiocy. First off, that she would openly lie about knowing a superhero in the ONE place the superhero would likely hear about it. And two, that she wouldn’t catch on that the one girl who DIDN’T fall for any of her lies could only be said superhero.

It was some amusement, at least. Not that he was going to tell her.

He never told any of his past contractors when they were being foolish, after all.

He just watched with hidden amusement as Rossi first hid away in her home for months on end wasting her days complaining about Ladybug and then after her return to the school would waste her days complaining about the hero’s civilian self. Letting her spite and hatred of both fester and grow to the point she was nearly inclined to turn to Felix to “deal” with them. After all, her enemies were technically his enemies as well for as long as his contract lasted.

She instead took to trying to ruin the two girls/one girl with two masks on her own. Telling lies to exaggerate her importance to others. Playing the innocent victim in any circumstance. Slowly trying to poison the girl’s friends against her. Helping a known terrorist to try to murder a superhero and take over the city.

And for the most part, it was working. With the powers her wishes had gotten her, every plot she made seemed to work out in her favor. Her enemy was struggling to hold on while Rossi was living the high life.

But with two wishes in and only one to go, Rossi suddenly realized just how precarious her situation was. When she thought he wasn’t present—how stupid, of course he was always there—she spent her time trying to somehow weasel her way out of the deal.

He didn’t try to stop her. She hadn’t been the first to suddenly try to back out of the contract once it was made and two of the wishes granted. There was little about Rossi that showed she would turn out any differently.

And really, it was his power. His rules. He was the one to decide what was acceptable and how to apply his own magic with each wish.

So finally, the day came after a particularly frustrating clash with the civilian side of her “enemy” (which he didn’t fully understand the point of continuing to call her as such, given how many times Ladybug had rescued her by this point). Rossi barely caught herself from saying the words to make her third wish and end the contract.

A pity, but he’d known it wouldn’t be that easy.

Except then it was. Because her own almost-wish gave Rossi a particularly interesting idea.

It was likely his own fault. He had let her push the limits of her wishes before. Clearly she had the mistaken belief that SHE was the one to decide how the wishes worked.

And so, she thought she could make THIS work, too.

She spun on her heel and turned to him in a grand flourish.

“Felix!”

He didn’t roll his eyes, as much as he wanted to at the display. Rossi still thought him docile and obedient to her. He doubted she even considered if she was seeing his true personality.

“Yes, Mistress Rossi?” He asked, dutifully.

“I have my third wish!” She said with glee.

“Of course, Mistress Rossi.” He said with a small bow.

“I wish for you to transfer my contract to Marinette Dupain-Cheng and take her soul instead of my own.”

It was probably the first bit of surprise he’d shown her since she summoned him. Likely even the first he’d physically shown in a century.

This girl—this arrogant self-centered witch of a girl was literally trying to lay a claim to another person’s soul and trade it for her own. Sacrifice another person’s life and soul in a contract SHE made with a demon SHE summoned—one she had to have bet her soul on in the first place to even accomplish. Trying to save herself by arguably stealing the soul of an innocent person—not just an innocent, but a hero…by all counts a saint even.

And of all things, the little brat actually thought she could get away with it!

He could have laughed.

He wanted to laugh.

But Felix…

Felix merely bowed at her request.

“Very well, Miss Rossi.”

And promptly vanished from her sight, leaving a smirking and all too satisfied Rossi alone in her room.

In all honesty, he should have ended things there. Considered the contract complete based on the prior wishes. Or at least just told Rossi he couldn’t fulfill those terms.

Technically, it shouldn’t have been allowed.

Technically, it had only never been done before.

But Rossi did it, fully thinking it would save her own skin and remove an enemy. Two birds with one stone.

So he let her think that and went along with her little attempt to pass the buck onto someone else. More out of amusement than anything. She had to be a fool to think she could really trade another person’s soul so easily?

Of course, Felix could find a way to make this work in his favor. After all, every person who made a contract got three wishes before the contract was closed and the soul was forfeit. And one Miss Ladybug ne Dupain-Cheng had a very vehement attitude towards now Miss Rossi.

She despised the liar. Likely as much as Rossi despised her, albeit with more justifiable reasoning. It would be simple enough to have her wish some misfortune on Rossi and then he would have her anyway.

And besides, how could he say no when offered a free opportunity to add to his collection? Dupain-Cheng’s soul was a rarity, one he could sense regardless of the distance. What other chance would he have to get one like that?

He should thank Miss Rossi. By the end of all this, he would have two souls for the effort of one.

Yes, he thought with a feral grin. This would be all too easy.

Needless to say, it turned out to not be that easy at all…

[tirednotflirting]

does it ever drive you crazy, just how fast the night changes?

baby’s first au whaaaaaat? 

special thank you to @clumsyclifford​ for linking the prompt list i got this idea from! this was the prompt (it was a whole slew of celebrity AUs: “wait, you’re supposed to be DEAD and i just recognized you at the grocery store, turns out you just didn’t want to be a celebrity anymore” au. bella is also writing one from this list and it’s one of my most favorite lashton things i have ever read, highly recommend, 10/10, i could yell about hello, hello for ages omg

also here is the ao3 link if that’s your preferred way to read :)  

There are few things that bring Luke as much joy as his Friday night (well, Saturday morning, really) grocery trips.

He had started working the night shift at the nurses’ desk at the children’s hospital about a year prior after graduating. He had found the job through the friend of a friend of a friend who was a nurse herself and mentioned the job needed filling fast. Luke had never really considered the idea of a night job but ultimately the work wasn’t all too bad. He made coffee every couple of hours (he made an effort to never let the pot empty which got him lots of smiles from the nurses) and every once in awhile Lina, the 6 year old cancer patient whose room was just around the corner from the brightly colored desk, would wander out to ask him to check for monsters under her bed and to be tucked back in. It was pretty simple (and heartwarming) work.

However, staying up through the night for 5 nights a week made it damn near impossible to be awake during the day on his weekends off. Luckily enough for Luke, he had friends like Michael who tended to play video games all night despite working through the day (he stopped questioning how he managed it a long time ago) and his favorite grocery store was a 24 hour location.

The first time Luke had come to do his shop at around 2am, he had felt a little spooked by the parking lot and eerie silence in between Top 40 songs that played over the intercom in the store. But he soon grew to find the general atmosphere pretty calming and he made friends with the nighttime stocker (a guy named Calum who also never saw himself doing nighttime work but here they were) and it became something he really looked forward to on his Saturday (very early) mornings.

He arrives at the store just a bit after 1am. He just finished ‘a late breakfast’ (he still always finds himself giggling at the concept of eating meals at opposite points in the day as everyone else despite the obvious logic to the schedule) and has a list tucked into the pocket of his sweats. It’s a little chilly out so he grabs the first sweater he sees on the backseat - a blue cardigan - since he knows they also keep the store pretty cool in the night to make sure everybody stays awake through their shift.

As he grabs one of the smaller carts as he heads into the store, he feels his phone buzzing in his pocket. He pulls out his list first and drops it into the baby seat of the cart and then grabs his phone. Luke’s faced with the wild selfie Michael set for his profile picture and he rolls his eyes as clicks the icon to answer the call.

“What’s up, Mikey?” he answers as he starts pushing the cart in the direction of the produce section. 

“You at the store yet?” Luke can hear the clicking of the buttons on the controller in Michael’s hands.

“Yeah, just got in. You need anything?”

Michael then rambles off a short list that Luke jots down into his notes app since he doesn’t have a pen or anything with him. He assures his friend he’ll come drop off the odd collection of snacks and things (“They have to be the dinosaur shaped ones. I swear Luke they do taste better.”) once he finished up his shop of real groceries.

Luke wanders around the produce, picking out what fruits and veggies he wants to have around for the week. He takes his time finding the apples without the bruises, bananas that will be the perfect amount of ripe by midweek, some leafy bunches for the salad he’s been assigned to bring for the breakroom potluck on Tuesday. He’s checking out some strawberries that he thinks might be nice to toss into the mix too when a human sized figure appears in the corner of his vision.

It’s a man around his size (in similar cozy clothes) facing away from him. He’s got hair the opposite color to Luke’s bleached blonde. His messy black curls are pulled back into a tiny bun that mirrors Luke’s own. The other man is broad and has a tattoo of a bird across the back of his neck, just barely visible above the collar of a faded blue sweatshirt. The tattoo is one that seems oddly familiar to Luke, as though it belongs to someone he knows. The man begins to wander off toward the bakery section of the store though and Luke shrugs off the recognition, figuring it might be someone he’s seen around a waiting room in the hospital at some point. He settles on some strawberries and starts pushing his cart in the direction of the deli and meats.

As he stares at the different packages of chicken and breakfast sausages, he can’t help but think back on the man he saw though. There was something achingly familiar about him, and more than just the tattoo. He can’t shake the thought for some reason and finds himself jumping in surprise when he feels his phone buzz once again in his pocket. 

He doesn’t even have to look to the screen to know that it’s Michael calling again to add something to his list. In fact, he happens to even know the items that his friend failed to mention the first time he called. Luke presses the accept button and lifts the phone to his ear.

“Froot Loops and the character shaped fruit snacks?”

“The superhero ones, if they have them please!”

*

Luke continues around the store, grabbing all the bits from his list (and Michael’s 12 year old boy list) and eventually lands in the dairy section. He grabs the yogurt he’s been mixing granola into for breakfast lately and some butter for the cookies his mom sent him a recipe for. Only thing left in terms of food is cereal milk and coffee milk (2% and oat, respectively, of course). When he looks up from the list to make his way over to the fridges containing the plethora of milks, he is faced once again with the familiar stranger. 

Except this time, as he catches just the briefest glimpse of the man’s face, of his hazel eyes and strong jawline, he realizes this isn’t a stranger. Very much not a stranger. It’s Ashton Irwin, the host of at least three of those reality dating shows he forces Michael to watch with him on the weekends since he can’t watch them when they air live on Monday and Tuesdays. 

Or, well, he was the host of all of those shows until about two months ago.

Because Ashton Irwin has been dead for two months due to a freak heart attack while on vacation on some remote island.

Luke glances away from him for a moment in a panic. Has he completely lost it? Have the late nights finally gotten to him and he’s starting to actually see things that don’t exist? Was Calum right all along and the store really is haunted? (Though it's a little lost on him why a star TV host would want to haunt a grocery store. And not even a good one like that Whole Foods in Downtown.)

Then he realizes that perhaps he was just wrong. (Though now that he thinks about it, he very much remembers liking an Instagram picture of that tattoo on Ashton Irwin’s account a couple years back.) He’s far enough down the aisle from him that he can chance a look at the man without being caught. So, slowly, Luke turns again just slightly to look toward him.

It’s the hair that left him not immediately making the recognition. His hair has been dyed black, a stark contrast to his signature dark red but definitely a change that likely doesn’t draw as much attention. The sweatshirt he’s paired with black skinny jeans is pretty baggy and it’s a damn shame because Luke knows he has the arms of a god.

(Something Luke knows from the tabloid covers he glances at from time to time at the pharmacy and the summer version of the show that Ashton hosted, of course. He most definitely has never searched up his name + ‘biceps’ before. Never.)

But despite the obvious attempt to match the look and aesthetic of ‘2am grocery shopper’ he's still very unmistakably Ashton Irwin.

As Luke grapples with this new knowledge that apparently this person he thought was dead is not dead and also apparently goes to the same grocery as him, he fails to notice that Ashton has turned to face him and that he is still staring at him in shock. 

Very quickly, Ashton’s face comes to mirror Luke’s expression and he’s rushing toward the blonde in a state of terror. 

“Please don’t say anything,” he gasped in a hushed voice. The accent similar to his own that Luke has grown used to hearing on his TV sticks out some in his panicked words.

“How? I - uh? Are you,” Luke trips over every syllable that comes out of his mouth as he attempts to let his brain wrap around the situation. “Are you a ghost?”

The feared look of the black haired man actually fades some as he lets a quiet giggle escape (a very cute giggle, if Luke is being honest). “I’m, uh, not a ghost. No. Though I guess that does kind of accurately explain what I’m trying to be.”

Now Luke is even more confused. Based on the statement, he obviously wasn’t making up all of the tabloid stories he had seen about Ashton dying but something isn’t adding up to the present moment. “I don't-”

“Listen, if you’re going to go tell the press, can you at least give me like,” he glances down at his phone screen displaying the time. “2 hours to get back out to my friend’s place where I’ve been hiding?”

It’s now Luke’s turn to laugh. “You do realize if I go to some paparazzi or something and tell them I saw deceased Ashton Irwin wandering around my grocery store trying to decide between hazelnut and cashew milk they would just laugh in my face, right?”

The statement causes Ashton to look down at his hands to the milks in his hands. He sighs down at the cartons before tossing both of them in the cart. “Guess you’re not really wrong.”

“Is someone pulling some kind of long-winded, over the top prank on me right now? Am I being punk’d?” Luke asks, his head tilting some in a way that would normally have Michael making fun of him for the child-like behavior. “Because I know for a fact that I am not worth that much effort.”

The questions have Ashton smiling a bit again and Luke suddenly finds himself wanting to say increasingly dumb things so long as it’ll keep the hazel-eyed man smiling. “No, no. Not at all. I just,” his smile falters some, leaving his lips still turned up but his eyes drop some. “I started to get a little sick of the world and the world started getting a bit sick of me, I think.” Luke wonders if Ashton knew just how heavy his words feel.

He scoffs then, as if hearing Luke’s silent question. “Wow, sorry that was really dramatic,” Ashton shakes his head a bit before continuing. “Hi, I’m Ashton.”

Luke looks down to the tanned arm being stretched out toward him. He lifts a hand from his shopping cart and wraps it around Ashton’s. “I’m Luke.”

Ashton brightens again as he shakes his hand. “Well, Luke, you’re the first person other than my current landlord of sorts that I’ve come across since literally dying in the eyes of the media. So I guess I owe you an explanation? Since it seems like you’re familiar with that media viewpoint?”

Ashton moves to start pushing his cart in the direction of another area of the store but peers over his shoulder and gestures with his head to follow him. Luke quickly reaches into the fridge on his left to grab the rest of his dairy before catching up to him. “Well, you really don’t owe me anything. I don’t know you beyond what I see of you on my TV screen,” Luke wonders then if maybe he should have played it a bit cooler and not told the cute, presumed dead TV star that he watches his shows. “But I am a bit confused by whatever is going on and would like to hear anything you’re willing to share.”

“Cute and polite,” Ashton muses, avoiding Luke’s eye as he continues forward toward the packaged food aisles. “You’re already checking boxes, Luke.”

Some kind of intelligible noise falls from Luke’s lips as he feels a blush rush up to his cheeks because he’s flirting with him. Ashton only laughs and starts his story.

“Well Luke, you seem to be aware of what I did for a living up until about 2 months ago. I’ve been doing this job for like, about 5 years and before every new season of anything, there’s all these big network and programming meetings about production and filming and such. And every single time, I get hounded by our ratings people because I apparently don’t do enough to instigate and promote drama. Like my contract was getting threatened like three times a year because rather than trying to make peoples’ lives miserable, I just want to help them fall in love.

“And so at this particular meeting, about two and half months ago, just before the ‘accident’,” he punctuates the word with air quotations. “I got the boot. Ratings from the previous season were down by 3% and all of the uppers decided it was because of my congeniality and not the fact that the guy they chose for the season was a complete dick.

“So that night I have to host the red carpet stuff for an awards show. And I’m talking with all these glittery people who also do TV work and it suddenly hits me, harder than it ever has before, that every single person I’m speaking to would never even bother to smile in my direction if they didn’t know who I was. If I was just a plain old guy, the kind of guy I was back in school before I signed on to the shows, they probably wouldn’t pay me a single bit of kindness. So I decided, right then, as I was talking to some Grey’s Anatomy actor, that I wanted to get out.”

He turns into the chip aisle then, and Luke follows close behind. “You decided you wanted to step away from television and your first idea was to fake your own death?”

Ashton laughs as he reaches for a couple tubes of Pringles. “It was more than that,” he starts as he tosses the tubes into the cart. “I wanted to escape celebrity all together, not just the world of television. A friend from back home that I would trust with my life had this cabin kinda out in the middle of nowhere in this forest and he only ever uses it for like, two weeks in the summer and said I could camp out there until I find a way to get back to Australia undetected to live at the house I bought over there a few years ago. My manager helped with all the media stories and such. And two months later, here we are.”

“That’s insane,” Luke shakes his head as he speaks, reaching for his own tube of Pringles as he realizes it's been quite awhile since he got his hand stuck in a Pringle tube so why not?

“The journey is a bit wild, I will agree, Luke, but the life I’m living right now is much more enjoyable than faking it every damn day.”

Luke shakes his head (and ignores the fluttery feeling he keeps getting when Ashton says his name). “No, I mean it’s insane that I am somehow the first person that’s caught you.”

Ashton’s brows perk up at the statement. “Oh yeah no, I’m also pretty surprised by that. Figured I would have had to pay off a lot of people by now to keep them quiet.”

They’ve both pushed their carts up toward the self check out how and start scanning away at their items. Luke looks up halfway through his cart and catches Calum giving him a look from a little ways away. He’s got a suggestive look on his face. But thankfully it's one that reads much more as “ohhh Luke is talking to a boy” rather than “ohhh there’s a celebrity in my store”. Plus Luke knows Calum wouldn’t be the type to go rushing to media people to out the presence of dead celebrities in his grocery store at 2am so he chooses to subtly flip him off before reaching for the next item in his basket.

They’re both about done scanning and bagging up their groceries when Luke starts to realize he really...doesn’t want this little bit of time he’s spent with Ashton to end yet. And given his lack of normal human interaction during daylight hours as of recently, he’s a bit out of practice on the whole asking someone to extend a conversation beyond the grocery store aisles. He drops his bags back into his cart to roll back out to his car and as he watches Ashton perform the same action the words just sort of leap from his mouth. “Hey do you, uh, have anywhere to be right now?”

Ashton gently places a bag containing some produce into his cart before turning to Luke, a teasing smirk resting on his lips. “Luke, it’s 2am and I’m presumed dead to everyone but about 4 people,” he catches that Luke still looks somewhat nervous (something he would later reflect on to tell him just how damn cute it was) and continues. “So I’ve got just about all the time in the world.”

“Want to come to mine for lunch? We could make something and watch a show or keep chatting or something?” he asks, tentatively. 

He watches as Ashton’s face shifts a bit, obviously confused by some part of what Luke’s just said. “Why would you ask if I’m free now if you were wanting to make lunch plans?”

Luke realizes his request requires some explanation for people that live during normal human hours. “Oh, because I have lunch at about 3am. Because I work nights. So right now feels like,” he pauses a moment, trying to decide and calculate what time this would have been for him before taking his job. “It feels like about 11am-ish for me right now. So close to lunch time.”

They’re out in the parking lot now and Ashton just stops for a moment beside Luke in the middle of the lot and looks up at him for a moment, a smile spreading across his face, his dimples, ones that Luke had grown used to seeing on his TV screens over the last few years, increasingly deepen. “Lunch sounds nice.”

* 

Ashton follows Luke back to his apartment (and to the brief stop he makes at Michael’s where he ignores the comments about the man parked in the car behind his) and they park in the garage, carrying their groceries in their arms up to his unit. They each deposit their cold and frozen items into Luke’s fridge and he pours them each a glass of water as Ashton takes a seat at his kitchen counter. Luke sips from his glass as he watches Ashton glance around his kitchen and living room.

“I try to keep it cozy,” Luke explains as he reaches into a cabinet for a couple pots and pans. He migrates over to his sink to fill a pot with water to boil. “Needed it when I first started the working at night thing and I needed to find a way to force myself to sleep when the sun was up. Gonna make some pasta and chicken thing, that cool?”

Ashton smiles warmly from his place at the counter. “Sounds lovely. You mind if I use that?” he points to the opposite corner of the space where a black Keurig machine sits. “I don’t often do this whole living like normal in the night thing.”

Luke laughs at the comment on being nocturnal. “Go for it.” 

He turns back to the pan of chicken, chopping it up and moving it around some before turning to a different burner and tossing in a few things to make a garlic sauce. He can make maybe two things that qualify as meals rather than just large portioned snacks so he’s opted for one of those since he so rarely has company. 

“What do you do then that’s got you up all through the night?” Ashton asks as he opens the cabinet above the coffee machine pulling down a bright yellow mug. The color suits him, Luke thinks. “You work in tech support or something?”

“Thankfully very far off from that,” Luke starts with a giggle. “I’m absolute garbage with computers. I work the nurses’ desk for the recovery wing at one of the children’s hospitals. It’s a lot of checking and distributing charts, ordering things for the nurses, talking to parents when they want more logistical updates on their child’s care there. Sometimes I get to help entertain the kids who get to go out and about. Yesterday I let them request songs to play for awhile and then we had show and tell.”

“God, you’re like something out of some cheesy movie, huh?”

Luke turns to see Ashton smiling up at him, his arms crossed at his chest as he leans against the counter to face him, the coffee machine whirring to life behind him. Luke bites at his cheek to avoid an entirely too large smile to spread across his face though he knows he can’t help the blush painting it’s way across his nose and cheeks. “It’s a good job. Even worth the whole graveyard shift situation.”

Ashton grimaces at the end of Luke’s reply. “Night shoots used to kick my ass. There is nothing in the world more terrifying than slightly drunk women in hot pink crying over some complete asshole rejecting them after a cocktail party at 2am.”

“Was there anything about it that you liked, though?” Luke asks after he turns down the heat to let the sauce simmer for a bit. He watches Ashton stir some milk into his mug that he retrieved from the fridge.

“Of course,” Ashton answers quickly, in a tone that projects honesty rather than just being used to answering the question. “I got to travel to places I would have never made it to otherwise, meet people that I considered heroes growing up, provide for myself and my family. And for a while that’s why I just dealt with the bull shit. But I started to realize I was working my ass off for all of that good stuff I was getting. That I didn’t have to deal with things in exchange for those things that were mine because of my work.”

Luke isn’t quite sure what to respond to that. Because he’s right, the logic is obvious and sound on all of it. As he’s trying to formulate a response though, Ashton cuts in again. “Though I guess maybe that’s a pretty privileged logic I-”

“No, don’t,” Luke cuts him off. “You shouldn’t justify the unfair parts of your job like that. You shouldn’t have to sacrifice your own values about the way people should be interacting with one another for the sake of drama for good TV ratings. You don’t owe anything to anyone who doesn’t actually give a shit about you as a person. I’ve known you for like two hours and it already just baffles me why someone wouldn’t want to know who you are behind the stage makeup and scripted lines.”

He watches as Ashton lifts the mug to his lips, pink cheeks peeking out from each side (he wonders if the change in color comes from the heat of the mug or the words he’s just said). He lowers the mug and his lips lift into a lazy smile. “See now I’m starting to wonder if I’m actually dead. Your kindness is angelic.”

Luke hasn’t a single clue how to respond to that so he gives the hazel-eyed man a small smile before returning to his saucepan. Ashton shifts the conversation then, asking Luke more about his job before telling him about the gardening he’s taken up since being stuck out in the middle of nowhere on his own. He shows Luke pictures of his herb garden and points out each one as he names it. As he starts putting food into bowls, Luke offhandedly mentions how he’s always wanted to grow lavender but tending to plants when you sleep through the sunshine makes gardening difficult. He drops a fork into a bowl and when he turns to hand it to Ashton, Luke watches as he hits the “Add to Cart” option on an Amazon page for lavender seeds. His heart does some kind of funny rhythm as butterflies burst in his chest. Their eyes meet as Ashton locks his phone and looks up to him. 

“Pretend you didn’t see that, I want it to be a surprise,” Ashton whispers between the two of them, his right eye winking up at Luke as he accepts the bowl.

“So this is going to be happening again then?” Luke muses as he grabs his own bowl and walks toward the living room. Ashton follows behind him. “I should plan for future early morning lunches with a dead celebrity?”

“I know it comes with some amount of risk for both of us but,” Ashton looks down toward his feet, scratching at the back of his neck as he tries to come up with the right way to phrase things. Luke turns to face him as he hears the hesitation in his voice. “I really want to see you again. This has been nice. And not just because you’re the first person I’ve spoken to other than my mother in two months. I...want to know you, Luke.”

Luke smiles tiredly, feelings the earliness of the hour in a way that he hasn’t in quite some time. He watches as Ashton’s fingers fidget with a string hanging from the end of his sweatshirt, obviously nervous about what he’s just admitted to the man he’s only just really met, still. Luke reaches forward for his hand, tangling their fingers together as he squeezes his palm against Ashton’s. It feels nice to be close to someone like this. It’s something he didn’t realize he was missing out on while only really living in the night.

“I think you’re worth the risk, Ashton.”

He watches as Ashton looks down to their intertwined hands, Luke’s eyes following to the same place. His hands are pale from the lack of much sunlight other than what he gets at sunset when he goes out to take his walk after waking. Ashton’s is warm and tanned, likely from the sun he gets from days in his secret garden hideout. He barely knows this man, apart from the apparently highly curated version he’s seen on screen. He wants to know the Ashton that speaks like sunshine and loves love enough to lose his job over. He wants to know the steps he knows he’s skipping in his story right now that led to him faking his own death. So it’s no surprise that the next words have him smiling bright enough to light up the early morning they found each other in. 

“I think we’re worth the risk, too.”

*