#(( also Tony won’t shut up about Thor’s muscles ))

[ironhardpacker]

((Apparently Tony considers Thor to be his brother?? And when asked what he likes most about him, Tony says “…he’s one of the most honorable and loyal people I’ve ever known. I don’t say that sort of thing lightly, and if we’re being honest there was a time when I thought such sentiments were naive or useless given the kind of world we live in. I’ve since learned they’re actually the most important aspects of a person’s character.” I love themmmm. ))

[traveler-at-heart]

Shopping

Summary: Natasha hates shopping, but an incident might change her mind.

Natasha Romanoff x Reader

Who knew saving the world was so much work.

Specifically, paperwork. 

Thor, unfamiliar with Earth’s customs and the bureaucracy of any organization, always had trouble filing his reports. You volunteered to spare him of endless hours sitting in front of a computer and to save Steve the frustration of trying to figure what the god meant when he wrote things like “the screams of our victims can be heard from Hell”

Only, you had been at it for almost three hours now. You stretch, feeling your back muscles strained.

Time for a snack break. 

Which you were doing, eating cereal and browsing through some emails. There’s a sale at your favorite store. Maybe, if you find the right outfit, you’ll agree to that blind date Tony’s been nagging you about. 

The day seems to be getting better, until Sam rushes past you, mumbling.

“Run, hide, anything”

“What?” you say, mouth full of cereal. He’s already gone. Five seconds later, Natasha storms in. “Oh, hey, Nat”

She glares and you gulp down the rest of your food. Against your better judgment, you smile again and ask her if she wants to go shopping. You can’t stop talking, she makes you that nervous. 

“I hate shopping”

You already know it and she tells you for good measure, before rolling her eyes and leaving the kitchen.

Right.

“Bucky, she’s alive,” Sam whispers as you walk back to your room. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“She was pissed. Had an argument with Tony” Bucky barely opens his door.

“They always do” 

“Romanoff looked ready to kill him”

“She always does. And why are you hiding behind the door?” you look at Bucky.

“He ate all of Romanoff’s angry cookies” Sam replies.

“Terrible timing”

“Yeah” Bucky sighs, peaking around to see if Natasha is coming to kick his ass. Frankly, you wouldn’t stop her.

“Well, if you’re done gossiping, I have a shower to take”

“Where you going?”

“Shopping” you immediately shut down Sam’s curious tone. These boys are so nosy.

“Can I come?”

“Absolutely not. You always flirt with the girls and I can never get them to help me out”

“Oh, come on”

“Knock it off or I’m telling Nat you ate those cookies”

“No!” he sprints down to his room, while Bucky shuts the door so fast, you swear the wood cracks.

Ugh, it’s like living with teenagers. Thankfully, you have a plan. As you suspect, Natasha is going around the kitchen cabinets, mumbling something about “killing Barnes”

“Hey” you don’t expect her to respond or turn around, so you just place the package on the counter. “I know those man babies eat everything on sight, so I always have some saved in my room. Your favorites” 

Natasha stops her movements, but still won’t turn around. 

“Thanks” she finally says as you walk back to your room.

You wish it was enough to make her feel better. You also wish she trusted you enough to vent about what it is she’s so upset about. 

But with Natasha, there’s always been a wall. You don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse, because you find her so attractive, endearing and even cute. 

If you get close, then you’re sure it’s going to evolve from slight crush to full time pining.

That can’t happen.

These thoughts take up most of your shower time and as you get ready to leave, you only turn around once to check your hair.

There’s a surprise waiting for you at the garage. Someone sitting on the driver’s seat of your car.

Natasha looks up and smirks.

“I don’t let anyone else drive”

“Mind you, I’m more worried about how you broke into my car without the alarm blaring” you tsk as she takes the keys from your hand.

She shrugs her shoulders and to your surprise, guesses which mall you’re heading to.

“I notice things too”

“You’re talking about those cookies?”

“I guess”

“Well, you’re always welcome to get them from my room. Secret cabinet behind the mirror”

“Nice”

You chuckle and she actually looks like her mood is improving.

And you… you are approaching the pining stage at an alarming rate.

--

“So, what are you looking for?” she asks when you finally get to your favorite clothing store. Natasha looks completely out of place between the lighting and the bland pop music playing in the background.

When she turns around, she finds you putting some lingerie sets over your clothed body, evaluating the shape and color.

She’s thankful you’re too focused on your own reflection to catch her blushing madly. Now is not the best time to picture you wearing one of those sets.

“Oh, maybe something to go on a date” you reply, choosing the black lingerie.

That answer is enough to put her in a bad mood again. 

After a few minutes looking around, you sense that she’s starting to get impatient. Natasha shrugs her shoulders at every dress you show her. You might as well be holding a hot dog suit to get her approval.

“Alright, I’m going to the dressing room. Hold this” you give her your purse, to guarantee she won’t flee the minute you close the door.

“Don’t be long” she mumbles when you’ve barely taken your top off. Without thinking much about it, you peak through the door and smile mischievously.

“Relax. If you’re a good girl I’ll get you something nice”

The redhead blushes furiously as you close the door again. You think it’s pointless to show her the dress, thinking she’ll just shrug and make a non committal hum. 

You’re on dress number three and think it’s the best one yet. 

“Shit” your smile is quickly replaced by a frown when you realize the zipper on the back is stuck. “Nat” you call frantically for her.

“What?”

“I’m stuck”

“What…?”

“Come here” you jump out of the dressing room and pull her inside, shutting the door behind you. “The zipper. Can you pull it down?”

“Y-yes”

“Ok, go” you move your wavy hair out of the way, expecting it to be over with one swift motion.

But Natasha’s touch is surprisingly soft and delicate. You feel her breath close to your neck. Fuck.

“Fuck” Natasha says and you snap back.

“What is it?”

“It’s really stuck” she sits on the little chair at the corner of the room and pulls you along. As she keeps trying to undo the zipper, your body gives in, sitting almost on her lap, your back to her front.

“Almost… there” she grunts, pulling so hard that you end up actually sitting on her lap, squealing at the force of her movements. “Sorry, sorry, I got you”

“I thought I was gonna die” you sigh, not moving away from arms that are circling your waist.

“Trained spy is scared of a little fabric?”

“Jerk” you stand up, but the dress is halfway down, limiting your movements. It falls completely to the ground, you stumble and turn, landing once again on Natasha’s lap, this time face to face.

Or rather… Breasts to face. She has her entire face on your lingerie clad breasts.

“Jesus, Nat, I’m sooo sorry…” your apology dies down when you feel strong arms pulling you closer. You look down and find emerald eyes, pupils dilated with lust and lips parted, waiting for permission to move forward.

There’s not much else to think about, so you place your hands on either side of her face and kiss her, desperate and fast. Natasha moans against your mouth, moving down to your neck and sucking until she leaves a mark. Her expert fingers are trying to unclasp your bra when...

“Everything ok in there?” a store clerk asks. You break apart, feeling frustrated and very much turned on.

“Yeah, I’m almost done here!” you shout, a little too out of breath.

“I think your friend left. She really hates shopping, huh?”

“Oh, I think I’ve managed to change her mind” you wink at Natasha before putting your clothes back on.

--

“Stop” Natasha says as you head back to the Compound, one hand on the wheel and the other hovering above your leg.

“I’m not…!”

“You’re staring”

“You’re a really good kisser”

The redhead blushes and you think you’re in love.

No turning back now.

“So… when’s your date?”

“I don’t know, when are you free?”

“But I thought...”

“Tony was insisting on setting me up. That was before I knew my not-so-secret crush wanted to have her way with me in a dressing room” 

For the first time ever, Natasha is speechless and you laugh.

“So how about tomorrow?” she finally asks as she parks your car.

“That works for me” you walk side by side and then smile. “See? Aren’t you glad you went shopping with me today? You got to pick the clothes you’ll rip off of me” 

Natasha stops walking, and she’s actually considering just taking you up to her room right now.

“Tomorrow” you promise, smiling as you peck her lips.

--

“Hey”

“Yes, Sam?” you still have a silly smile, walking back to your room.

“I just saw Natasha and she smiled at me. Do you think she’s ok?”

“Yes, Sam” you roll your eyes, but he keeps staring. “What?”

“What’s that thing on your neck?”

Fuck. You slap your hand over the hickey and rush to your room.

“None of your business”

“As long as you keep her happy!”

“Shut up, Wilson”

[just-another-blog-of-fluff]

An Unfortunate Predicament

Warnings: tickling, fluff, maybe a little bit of reader crushing on a certain Asgardian

Word count: 2600

Honestly not sure where this came from, but I've dumped this silly idea out of my head and into this fic. Hopefully you find it amusing.

* * *

For the life of you, you don’t know how you ended up in this position.

Well, you do know how you got up here, at least. Tony had announced that he had a ropes course installed in the tower (for ‘additional training opportunities’ he insisted, although you all knew he just wanted an excuse to watch you all fall flat on your faces when you missed a step). Many of the Avengers were eager to try it out, especially Thor and Peter, who had giddily shoved their way to the front of the line to be the first to attempt the course.

You, on the other hand, had hung back from the group. You were afraid of heights, and while this ropes course wasn’t more than 6 or 7 feet off the ground, and there were soft rubbery mats underneath to break your fall should you slip, you couldn’t bring yourself to try it. Especially not in front of your teammates. No one knew about this little fear of yours, and you preferred to keep it that way to avoid being teased for being the only Avenger afraid of heights.

After a week or so, once the novelty had worn off for the rest of the team, you started to consider if maybe practicing on the course might help you to learn to get past this silly phobia. On a few occasions, you had casually made your way down to the gym where the ropes course was housed under the pretense of looking for someone, when really you were scoping it out to see if the room was unoccupied. Every time you tried, though, there was inevitably someone either practicing on the course or otherwise using some of the other gym equipment in the room. You much preferred that no one was there to witness you attempt it for the first time just in case you started to panic when you started to climb up that first rope ladder.

This morning, the other Avengers had disembarked on a mission before you had woken up for the day. This particular mission had no requirement for your talents, so you were able to stay behind and take a much-needed day to yourself. After lounging in bed for much of the morning, the notion crossed your mind that the gym would be completely and definitively empty for the afternoon.

And so, you made your way down to the gym and started slowly climbing up the ladder to the first platform. Once you reached the top and stood up, you looked down at the floor and felt your stomach drop just a bit. However, you steeled yourself and continued on across the swinging rope bridge in front of you. After a few obstacles, you had finally started to feel your fear start to ebb away as you became accustomed to the view. You started moving more quickly across the obstacles, now trying to see how fast you could get through the entire course.

Unfortunately, your rushing ended up being your downfall. You were crawling across a rope net to get to the next platform when suddenly you felt the net start to tip to the side. Normally, the purpose of the obstacle would have been to continue climbing upside down until you reached the other side. However, you had panicked at the sudden motion, stiffening as the net rolled over. Your leg slipped through one of the holes of the net, and somehow it twisted around your ankle enough to hold it in place while the rest of your body continued to flip over.

And now, here you were, hanging upside-down from this ropes course with your leg tangled in the net, blood rushing to your head as you tried to process what just happened. Your head was much closer to the ground now, at least, but it wasn’t quite close enough for you to reach the floor with your hands to try to gain leverage to untangle yourself. You tried to lift your upper body up in a sort of 180-degree sit-up to attempt to untangle your ankle from the net, but the rope was too taut for you to loosen it enough to pull your leg out. Frustrated, you relaxed your aching abdominal muscles and let yourself hang there, realizing with dread in the pit of your stomach that there was no one else in the compound to come help you escape.

Figuring you would have better luck getting yourself unhooked if you allowed yourself some time to rest, you let yourself just hang there and took a few deep breaths. Just as you were mustering up the strength to try again, a voice from the doorway caused you to jump in surprise.

“Well now. What an unfortunate predicament you’ve gotten yourself into.”

No. Oh no. Literally anyone else could have walked in and you’d have felt some relief, that someone was going to help you get down from this trap. Why did it have to be Loki?

“Shut up,” you muttered, folding your arms across your chest in an attempt to look annoyed despite your inverted position. “You could just help me down from here, you know.”

“I certainly could. But where would be the fun in that?” Loki strolled into the room, coming to a stop just a foot away from you. From this angle, you had to look down (or, rather, up) slightly to see his face, as your head hung at just about his shoulder level.

“What’s so fun about standing here and watching me hang upside-down?” you retorted. “Suppose I enjoy this?”

“If you did, you wouldn’t have just asked me to help you down, now would you?” Loki started to pace in a slow circle around you, forcing you to twist your neck and torso to be able to keep an eye on him. You knew better than to turn your back on the trickster by now. “Besides – if I recall, it was you who stole all of my books last week and hid them throughout the tower, hmm?”

You snickered at that. It was totally worth it to watch Loki storming around the tower, grumbling as he emptied drawers and crawled on the floor to look under furniture in hopes he would find his books. Honestly, you were surprised he hadn’t tried to prank you in return yet, but you had a feeling it was coming. Although, it seemed you had put yourself in just the position for him to exact his revenge without having to think of a prank.

“Oh yes, I’m sure you thought it was amusing then,” he growled, pacing back around in front of you and leaning down so his face was inches from yours as he glared at you. “You realize, I hope, that the others will not be back for at least another four hours?”

“What? I thought they were supposed to be home in an hour!” you exclaimed. Loki smirked.

“They are running a bit late. Ran into some minor complications during the mission. They should be leaving to head home in about an hour.”

You groaned at this revelation. You knew they were a three-hour plane ride away, and so if Loki was telling the truth, you would be dangling upside down for quite some time unless you convinced him to help you. Taking a deep breath, you swallowed your pride and started to plead.

“Loki… I’m sorry about your books, really. Please, could you help me get down?” you begged. His smirk only grew wider at this.

“You must be truly desperate, darling, to already be begging for me to help you,” he chuckled. You felt heat prickle in your cheeks, partially from embarrassment at having gotten yourself into this situation and partially from the unexpected thrill that rushed through your chest at the slow, smooth tone of his voice as he taunted you.

“If I admit it, will you finally help me get down?” you bartered, ready for this interaction to end so you could go hide in your room for the rest of the night in complete humiliation.

“Hmm. That certainly would help your case, but I’ll need a bit more than that,” he countered.

“Ugh, like what?” Loki thought for a moment, touching a finger to his chin.

“Admit that I am the superior prankster in the tower,” he demanded, “and that you never stood a chance against the all-mighty god of mischief. AND-“ he added, cutting you off as you opened your mouth to protest, “you have to say this to all of the Avengers when they return.”

“Ok, first of all, you know they’ll know you’re making me say it, so where’s the fun in it for you?” you quipped.

“I know. I also know how much embarrassment it will still cause you to have to say it out loud.” His smirk was practically wicked by this point.

“Alright, but suppose it does embarrass me that much - even if I agree to it, how do you know I won’t just go back on my word once you get me down?” you retorted.

“If you do, I will put you right back where I found you, and someone else will have to get you down,” he opposed. Your eyes widened, then narrowed indignantly.

“You wouldn’t.”

“We both know you know I would.”

“You are insufferable, you know that?” you muttered, pinching the bridge of your nose in frustration. “Fine. I’ll do it. Just get me down.”

“A wise decision,” he declared. Loki stepped underneath the net and inspected the rope wrapped around your ankle. He reached up and tugged on it a bit to test how much give it would provide. “The rope is wound too tightly for me to unwind it,” he observed.

“Well, can’t you get me down some other way then?”

“I think if I lift you up enough that your weight isn’t holding the rope taut, you should be able to slip out of it,” he suggested. You nodded, willing to try anything at this point. He reached up and grabbed hold of your waist just above your hips, causing you to jerk involuntarily and let out a high-pitched squeak. You felt your stomach drop again, the same way it had when you’d first climbed up onto the ropes course, when you saw Loki’s expression morph from confusion to pure mischief.

“Wh-what are you giving me that look for?” you asked hesitantly, reaching up absentmindedly to pull your shirt down where a sliver of skin had been showing.

“Because I just learned something new about you, and I don’t think I’m quite ready to help you down just yet,” he explained, his tone ominous.

“Don’t… you… dare,” you growled.

“Darling, I don’t believe you’re in a position to be making threats,” he retorted, starting to pace around you again.

“Loki! Get back here where I can see yOU!” Your voice pitched up an octave as you felt him tweak your side. “I swear to god, Loki, I will hold you down and beat you senselehehehess!” You lost your composure as you felt ten slender fingers gently scratching at your sides just below your ribcage.

“You don’t sound very threatening, love,” Loki teased, working his torturous fingers up between your lower ribs. You couldn’t respond coherently anymore, batting at his hands and twisting around violently trying to escape his touch. “Maybe you should try again, but this time with a bit more malice in your tone.”

“I will kihihihill you!” you shrieked, uncontrollable giggles spilling from your mouth as his fingers traveled to your belly, his thumbs digging into your sides. Being upside-down, in addition to not being able to see his face with him standing behind you, made you feel incredibly exposed. You reached down and grasped both of his wrists, tugging as hard as you could to pull his hands away from your ticklish torso to no avail.

Loki thankfully paced back around in front of you, continuing to tickle you with one hand as he walked. You realized this was actually probably worse than when he was behind you because now you could see his amused expression, and you knew he could see the flustered flushing of your face. You tried your hardest to shoot him a menacing glare, which only succeeded in drawing a laugh from him as he latched both hands onto your upper ribs and continued to tickle you with renewed vigor.

“OK! OK! WAIHIHIT LOKI! I CAHAHAN’T!” you pleaded as he slipped his thumbs under your arms, his fingers wrapped around the back of your uppermost ribs and digging into your skin in the most agonizing way. You were thrashing violently now trying to evade his fingers, not noticing the rope looped around your ankle slipping.

The next thing you knew, your ankle slid out of the rope net above you, and you came crashing to the floor. Or, rather, you came crashing down onto Loki, who then crashed to the floor under the impact.

Relieved that at least he was no longer tickling you, you gasped for breath and pushed yourself up onto your hands. You heart skipped when you realized that your nose was practically touching his, but the shock caused your muscles to freeze. For a moment, Loki didn’t move either, looking straight into your eyes.

You finally regained your composure, deciding to play it off as if you’d found a way to beat him at his own game to hide the fact that your heart was pounding in your throat at the close contact. You grinned wickedly down at him.

“Looks like I got myself down, didn’t I?” you quipped. “Guess I don’t have to lie and say you’re the best prankster after all.”

Loki narrowed his eyes at you for a moment, which should have been your cue to get up, but before you realized it he had grabbed your arms and flipped you so he was now hovering over you. You looked up at him, bewildered, as he smirked evilly back at you.

“Oh darling, that was a mistake.” You jolted as his fingers once again made contact with your ribcage, unable to control the hysterical laughter bubbling from your chest as he dug his fingertips into every ticklish spot he could find. You kicked and scrambled to try to scoot away from him without success, his hands darting rapidly between your sides, belly, underarms, ribs, back to your belly…

“ALRIGHT! W-WAIT! S-STOP! I’LL SAY IT!” you begged, your muscles so weak from laughter now you could no longer fight back, lying there on the floor as he drove you into madness. At long last, he finally released you, moving away to kneel on the floor beside you. “Jeez, Loki… that was… that was evil,” you huffed, still breathless from his malicious attack.

“Maybe next time you’ll know not to mess with the god of mischief,” he warned, offering you a hand to help you sit up. “After all – now I know your weakness.” You blushed furiously, wrapping your arms subconsciously around your ribs as he deviously wiggled his fingers at you. Ready to finally go hide in your room, you picked yourself off the ground and started walking toward the door. “Don’t forget! I expect to see you in the common room when the others arrive home this evening!” he called after you. You turned and shot him one last glare before leaving the room.

You couldn’t make any promises that you’d actually show up. And if that meant he would come find you and torment you some more… well, you supposed you maybe wouldn’t mind.

Read part 2

[iam93percentstardust]

Prompt: tony can’t get enough of Steve’s strength and Steve loves it bc he’s still quite self conscious of his body? 💚

I realized halfway through writing this that you probably meant for a canon-compliant fic, but I was already so deep into the worldbuilding for this little science fiction fic (seriously, you don't even know how much unnecessary worldbuilding I did) so I kept with it

Also on ao3 here!

~

“Steve!” Tony hollers through the communicator. Steve glances up from the board game he’s playing with Natasha and Clint and over at where the communicator hangs from the ship’s wall. He still doesn’t really understand the technology behind the communicators even after a year of being awake, but they’re hung all over the Avenger’s Shieldand he won’t deny that they’re useful.

“I’m here,” he says at a normal volume, knowing that JARVIS will easily pick up what he’s saying and transmit it to Tony. Tony’s just being loud because he’s always loud and because he’s down in the engine room of the ship with all its noises from the conversion of stardust into energy.

“Great! I need your muscley goodness down here like yesterday.”

Steve hides a smile and stands, passing his pieces off to Clint, who’s losing worse than either Steve or Natasha. “Here, you can have mine. Not sure how long I’ll be down there.”

Clint’s eyes narrow and Steve tries not to fidget under the cybernetic enhancements. When he went into the ice nearly three hundred years ago, mankind didn’t even dream of space travel, at least not realistic space travel, and now they’ve got colonies on galaxies as far away from their own, it makes his head spin. Humans have peace treaties with over two thousand alien civilizations. And mechanical body enhancements, meant to augment humans for travel and work and sometimes sheer entertainment, are as common as breathing. But Steve, with his serum-induced enhancements, is somehow still the odd one out.

“You know,” Clint says, “you don’t have to help him out if you don’t want to. Tony means well but that doesn’t mean he can’t be abrasive sometimes.”

“I don’t mind,” Steve says truthfully. Everyone else on this ship seems to dance around his non-cybernetic enhancements—and around the fact that he’d been frozen in the ice caps, now stretching as far south as Florida, for three hundred years—but Tony never once seemed to care. He’s thrilled about Steve’s enhancements—no one else on the ship is quite as strong as Steve is, not since Thor joined the crew of the Milano—both because of what Steve can help him with and because of what the serum means for scientific advancement, though Steve hasn’t let Bruce or Yinsen take any of his blood yet.

He heads down into the belly of the ship, pausing once at one of the portholes to look out at the stars flashing by them. It still amazes him that humans have achieved all of this (and horrifies him that they achieved this but left their own planet behind).

Tony’s “lair” (as Clint calls it) is located at the very bottom of the ship. It’s here that Tony holds his court, making sure that the engines that run the ship are still intact and running smoothly, tinkering with other projects that the other crewmembers give to him, and designing improved systems for the Shield, whether that’s comms, mechanical, or even medical. Tony does it all. According to Natasha, Tony, who’s one of the few nonhumans on the ship, was once a member of high society on his home planet, Aur’a, but left it all behind to join the Shield and travel the galaxy.

Steve opens the door and is immediately met with a wave of heat. It’s always hot down here. Tony says it’s because of the celestial energy, that stars run so hot that even residue energy is still too hot for unenhanced humans to handle. Fortunately, neither Steve nor Tony are unenhanced, and Steve would be willing to bet that the reason it’s so hot in the engine room today is because Tony is working with raw stardust.

The copper pipes running the room are too close to avoid bumping into for someone as large as Steve, so he doesn’t even bother trying to avoid them, letting them brush against his skin as he follows the sound of Tony humming. When he’d first joined the crew, he’d been worried about Tony complaining that Steve couldn’t move around the engine room without knocking something over, but Tony has never once complained, only just made easygoing jokes about bulls in china shops and told him that the pipes are built to withstand forces a lot stronger than Steve. It had gone a long way toward helping him feel comfortable in the space and now he spends a lot of time down here, talking with Tony about the mechanics of the ship, even though a lot of it goes over his head.

He ducks underneath one of the pipes and rounds a corner to find Tony sitting on a bench, carefully chipping at a speck of stardust on the benchtop in front of him. Tony once told him that it only takes a miniscule amount of stardust to power the ship for an entire week, which is good because stardust is difficult to mine. Tony’s goggles are perched on top of his nose, giving him an owlish appearance. Steve finds it adorable, but he waits until Tony is done with the chisel before walking over to drop a kiss on top of his hair.

The rest of the crew doesn’t know that they’ve been seeing each other for a month. After their first kiss, Steve had asked if it would be okay to keep it quiet a little longer. Steve’s brain is still firmly convinced at times that they’re in the forties, so the idea that he can date a man and have it be as accepted as dating a woman is still a little foreign to him. Tony had been more than accommodating though, which is only one of the reasons Steve loves him so much.

“Oh!” Tony exclaims, clearly startled. “Didn’t realize you were already here.” He turns, pushing his goggles up to his hair. “Did you get even more muscley since the last time I saw you?”

“Tony, you saw me this morning,” Steve says amusedly.

“Right you are, Capsicle, but I still stand by what I said,” Tony shoots back with a cheeky wink. He runs his hands over Steve’s biceps, making a low purring sound under his breath. Steve just barely manages to hear it over the sound of the engines, and it makes him smile.

Sometimes, he still feels self-conscious about his size. Spending most of his life looking and feeling one way only to change in only seconds had been disorienting, and he hadn’t had much of a chance to get used to his size before he’d been thrown into the war and then frozen in the ice. Tony’s always good to talk to though when he needs someone to remind him that this is okay, that he isn’t taking up too much room just by existing. Somehow, he always manages to get to the heart of Steve’s insecurities and allay them.

He indulges in Tony’s warm touch for a little longer before asking, “So what did you need me for?”

Tony perks up, spinning on his heel and picking up the speck of stardust with his bare hand. “I need your help opening the converter door so I can toss this in. Something must have gotten damaged during the battle with the Hydra’s Scales, because it’s not opening for me.”

“Huh,” Steve says, following Tony through the warren of copper pipes toward the energy converter. He has no idea how Tony knows where he’s going without a map. Steve still sometimes needs a map and he’s lived on this ship for a year. “That’s not something you can fix?”

“Not with what I’ve got on ship. I’ll ask Fury if we can stop in Knowhere later this week. They’ve probably got what I need.”

“Wow, Tony Stark admitting he can’t jury-rig a solution from his lab. Hell must have frozen over,” Steve comments, grinning when Tony turns to scowl at him.

“You shut your mouth,” Tony growls.

“Or what?”

Tony’s eyes turn dark and heated. He slinks closer to Steve, runs his fingers up Steve’s chest, and purrs, “Or I’ll shut it for you.”

Steve’s brain shuts down. “Uh…”

“But not right now,” Tony says abruptly, tweaking Steve’s nipple through his shirt. He spins back around and marches off, leaving Steve floundering in his wake. He gapes after him for a second before hurrying to catch up.

“You,” he says, carefully bumping Tony’s shoulder with his—he doesn’t want Tony to drop the stardust after all—“are a menace.”

“That’s me: mechanic and professional menace,” Tony says cheerfully.

They stop beside the energy converter. Steve can immediately see what Tony means by there being something wrong with it. The converter is made out of some sort of transparent material—Steve doesn’t know what—so he can see right in to where something is twisted in the converter itself, partially fusing the door shut. Even Tony, with all his abilities as an Aurum, can’t reach into an active energy converter without burning his hand to ashes, and the converter has to stay active or they’ll be dead in space, so they’ll have to stop somewhere where he can make the necessary repairs.

“See?” Tony says. “I need someone who can muscle that open for me.”

“Well, I’ve definitely got muscles.”

“Mmm, yes you do,” Tony murmurs. Steve wonders if Tony’s thinking about the same thing he is: that time he pinned Tony to the walls of their shared bunk and—well, now’s not the time to be thinking about that.

He grabs onto the wheel and wrenches it to the left. Tony sure hadn’t been kidding; the wheel doesn’t budge at all. He applies more of his strength, muscles bulging. Under the squeal of metal, he hears Tony’s breath catch, and he grins saucily at him. Tony sticks his tongue out and gestures at the wheel again.

“Come on, Captain Crunch. Put your back into it.”

Steve, having no idea what Captain Crunch is supposed to be a reference to, makes a mental note to ask Tony about it once they’re done here. For now, though, he uses all of his strength and slowly—so slowly—the wheel turns, protesting the entire way. Eventually, he gets it open, letting another blast of heat into the engine room. Tony tosses the stardust in. It flares in the heat of the converter, setting off beautiful gold and purple sparks. Steve closes the door. It closes a lot easier than it opened. Tony hums thoughtfully at it.

“Well, that narrows things down,” he says, once the door is fully closed.

“What, that it was easier to close than it was to open?”

“Mmhmm. Only a few things that could be. Probably need to tell the One-Eyed Pirate though that we have to stop on Xandar instead of Knowhere. I don’t think Fujikawa will have what I need. Steve, don’t let me forget to tell Fury the course change.”

“Got it.”

“And thanks, by the way. Definitely couldn’t have done it without you.”

Steve glows at the praise. Maybe it’s silly, but it’s nice to be reminded that even in this oversized, clumsy body out of time, he’s still able to do some good. “Happy to help,” he says honestly.

They head back to Tony’s little work area, Tony eagerly chattering on about the project he’s working on for Natasha. Steve listens, fingers itching for the drawing tablet he’d left in the galley with Natasha and Clint. Tony is lovely when he’s animatedly talking about his inventions. Steve has half a dozen folders saved on his tablet, filled with nothing but different poses of Tony.

Tony leans up against the workbench and pulls Steve in, looping his hands around his neck. “Now, where were we earlier?” he hums, eyes dark.

“Careful,” Steve warns, bracing himself with hands on either side of Tony’s body. “I might crush you.”

“You might,” Tony agrees, though he doesn’t sound concerned at all. “And I might like that. All that coiled strength pinning me down? Oh, honey, yes.” He shivers, a small delighted smile curling his lips up.

“You just like me for my body,” Steve accuses. It isn’t the truth and he knows that. Tony loves him for many reasons; Steve’s strength is only one of them. But it’s fun to tease his lover and Tony is always happy when he does. He frequently worries that Steve is too serious.

“Yes, darling, that’s exactly it.” Tony kisses him lightly. Steve lets himself lean into Tony’s body a little more, grinning when Tony shudders against him.

He pulls away, tucking his head against the curve of Tony’s neck. “Thank you,” he breathes. He doesn’t know how Tony always knows when Steve is feeling self-conscious about his body, but he somehow does and he always comes up with something that’ll help.

Tony strokes his hair. “Anytime, darling. Anytime.”

[imarvelatthesight]

Spar

A/N: I’m trying to branch out to more Marvel characters :) let me know if I should start adding a fic summary

Summary: Reader fights Thor on Saakar.

Pairing: Thor Odinson x Avenger!Reader

Pronouns Used: Gender Neutral (They/Them)

Recommended Song: Tia Tamera by Doja Cat ft. Rico Nasty

Word Count: 1,578

Warnings: fighting, one mention of blood, reader has super strength and partial magical abilities, mention of alcohol, swearing, it’s kinda sad in places

   The day you had been brought to Sakaar had been possibly the worst day of your life. And that was truly saying something. Being in a relationship with a god-- never mind the fact that he was also an Avenger-- was a trick in itself. Trying to have a good relationship with his adopted brother? Well, that’s how you ended up in this mess. Get caught snooping around his room once and suddenly you’re on a different planet.

Your clothes were uncomfortably tight and the decorative paint on your face had you dying to itch it. Every week for the past two years you’d suffered this same treatment. Though, the fact that you had survived your rounds in the pit meant you were treated more well-off than others. A nice room, any alcoholic drink you could wish for (but because you were from Earth, more than a couple of sips would have you off your ass in moments). Even with all of your so-called luxuries, you felt empty. Why had no one come to rescue you? Did the Avengers even notice you were gone?

The door opening in front of you interrupted your thoughts. There was no time to think about anything else other than trying to survive. The roar of the crowd above you had your ears nearly ringing. “My champion!” You heard The Grandmaster announce. You burst out into the area, the crowd seemingly getting even louder. Before you had time to revel in the applause, one of the few advantages of your predicament, your eyes settled on your opponent. “Oh shit.”

“Yes!” The god of thunder boomed, excitement covering his face. Silence befell the crowd. Your features softened for a moment, happy to see your lover. You knew, however, you would not be able to express it. If you showed any fondness for each other it would surely compromise your life. “They’re my lover!” He threw his hand in the air, swinging his weapon up with it. “This is great, Y/N! I’ve been looking for you- Loki’s alive. Loki!” 

Your eyes snapped up to the god of mischief. You scowled. You could faintly see him gulp and mouth something. “Thor.” You turned back to him, leaning forward slightly. “If we don’t fight, they’ll kill us both.” 

“Nonsense, come with me and we’ll go-” Thor’s words were cut off by you grabbing him and flinging him away from you. His body slid through the dirt, a pained groan leaving him. The stands erupted with joy at the battle beginning. Thor jumped to his feet, brushing himself off. “Love, this is embarrassing! I told them we’re lovers!”

His words made you hesitate. You didn’t want to hurt Thor. But you couldn’t risk both of you dying. Someone would figure something out. Hopefully. You raised your hand and Thor’s weapon flew out of his grip, finding it’s home in your palm. The mace was in your hand for a fraction of a second before you flung it back at your partner.  Your eyes clamped shut, not wishing to see if it struck him. After a few seconds you opened them and watched as Thor caught the mace and swung it back in your direction. Quickly, you raised your hands in an attempt to catch it again, but the tip of the mace nicked your cheek. You dropped the weapon, your thumb sliding over the wound to collect the blood from it. 

Your feet carried your body with agility as you leapt through the air. Thor threw a swift punch to your abdomen, throwing your frame into the wall where it dented from the force you landed with. Fuck, that hurt. A collective gasp filled the arena. 

The sound of quick footprints coming closer caused you to groan and assume a pleading position with your hand outstretched in front of your face. “Y/N, sweetheart?” You lifted your head, watching as Thor crouched to your level and extended a hand to you. “It’s alright. I won’t hurt you anymore. No one will.” The god of thunder cooed. Timidly, you reached out to him. “There you go, c’mere darling.” He smiled and pulled you into a hug, practically purring.

You melted into the contact. You were home. Anywhere with Thor was home. But part of you couldn’t resist looking up to where The Grandmaster sat. A frown soured his expression, Loki bouncing his leg at the opposite end of the couch. “Shit.” You whispered, though your Asgardian boyfriend didn’t notice as he placed a tender kiss to your forehead. The crowd was growing restless. Reluctantly, you pulled out of his hold. You grabbed his biceps, mentally admiring the way the muscle rippled under your touch, and lifted him in the air--using both your strength and your magic to assist-- before slamming him into the ground again. 

Your fists found purchase on his face, tears filling your eyes and a scream tearing through your throat. To the crowd, it was a war cry. To you, a plea of mercy to whatever higher being was listening, and a shriek of forgiveness from Thor. The god laid there, your punches landing blow after blow on his cheeks. Within moments, his body and eyes flowed with electricity, and he returned your action, the lightning launching your body into the air and backwards, where your head made contact with the loose dirt. 

Both astonishment and horror ebbed through you at the sight of Thor, covered in lightning, walking in your direction with purpose. You thought to do the same move you’d tried previously and leap at him. Only this time, he copied your movement and delivered an uppercut to your jaw. The sonic boom that erupted from Thor’s fist had your ears feel as if they were bleeding. Luckily, you’d managed to gather your bearings and land in a three-point stance. As Thor paced toward you, blue flashes decorating his muscles and dancing from his fingertips, he suddenly began to convulse and fell on his side. “Thor!” You cried, falling on your knees beside him. 

Your gaze shot to the large window again. The Grandmaster slid his finger back on a device and Thor stopped twitching. Of course. He couldn’t afford to lose. You stroked your lovers face. His hand covered yours. “My love, I’m so sorry. I-I didn’t want to hurt you.”

He chuckled. “It was quite a fight you put up. I’m sure Tony would have liked to see.” 

“We’ll tell him when we get back to earth.” You muttered. As Thor went to speak again, he started shaking again, the veins on his face darkening. Mere seconds later, an electric jolt shot through you and your consciousness slipped away.

When you awoke, it was with panic. You recognized the room as the one you’d been forced to stay in for so long now. You groaned and attempted to roll over, being stopped by the weight of another person. Your breath hitched and you tried to move away, only for an arm to be wrapped around you and pulling you closer, a deep sigh escaping the person.

“My love.” Thor rasped out as you flipped over to face him. He playfully rubbed his beard against your jaw. His contentedness left as his hand gently grasped your face, his thumb moving over the scratch on your face. “Oh, Y/N. I wish this had never happened. I’m sorry it has taken me so long to find you.”

You turned your head and placed a kiss on his palm. “A few years is quite a long time.” You agreed.

“Years? You’ve only been gone for a week, dove.” He cocked an eyebrow at you. “Though according to Loki, time does move quite differently here.”

You rolled your eyes. “Ugh, Loki. That fool is the reason I’m here in the first place.” You snuggled into Thor’s chest and he pulled his arms tighter around you like you would disappear. “I want to go home, Thor. I want to listen to Steve complain, and I want to watch TV with Wanda, and I want out of these stupid devices-” You barely noticed the sobs leaving you as you tugged on the technology implanted on your neck.

Thor took your face in his hands. “We will get out of here, sweetheart. I will be sure of it. And Loki will right his wrongs, I swear it.” He kissed you softly. You nodded, silently acknowledging his words. “I love you, Y/N L/N.” Another kiss. “The light of my life.” Another. 

You held back a laugh in favor of burying your face in the crook of his neck. “Stop, you big sap. I love you, Thor Odinson.” You suddenly pulled away with wide eyes. Thor only smiled in confusion. “Valkyrie! She and I get along quite well, she’ll help us. I know it!”

Footsteps from down the hall had Thor scrambling out of the bed, standing politely with his hands folded. You rushed to the door, where Valkyrie nodded in you greeting. “Y/N. It was quite shocking to learn that you are romantically engaged with our lord of thunder here.” She motioned with her hand.

“It’s god of thunder, actually-”

“We must get to training, Y/N. You two can kiss it up later.” She looped her arm through yours. You cast a look over your shoulder at Thor, who gave you an enthusiastic thumbs up. 

“So, Val, I must discuss a proposition with you...”

“Does it involve drink?”

“It can.”

“I’m listening.”

[americasass91]

Pull-Up Contest

So here is my second ever request! Thank you @shythingstudentdragon​! I had a lot of fun with this! It’s kind of a sequel of this 👉🏻 Push-Up Contest. But it can be read as a one shot. Of course it is smutty! My specialty. Haha. Also I just want to take a moment and thank every single person who reads my stories! You’re awesome! You’re extra awesome if you like, comment, or reblog! But I love everyone who reads them! I just put them out there in hopes of helping you escape from this fucked-up world if only for a few minutes. That’s why I read fics. Okay and because I’m a Super Hoe for Chris Evans and more recently Henry Cavill👀. But anyways I’ll shut up! I hope you lovelies enjoy this!

Also. I’m well aware this👇🏻 is Ari and not Steve but fuck me 🥵

Rating: Explicit(duh, it’s me 🤷‍♀️)

Words: 3.9k

Warnings: smut, unprotected sex, oral(m receiving), shirtless Steve(This is a valid warning), language, I think that’s it.

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You were starting to think that there was something seriously wrong with you.

Here you were, at another one of Tony’s parties, supposed to be mingling with everyone and making friends and building stronger relationships.

But all you could think about was your sexy as fuck super soldier and having him pin you down against the pool table he was currently standing at and fucking you until you couldn’t see straight.

It was his fault really. Ever since 2 months ago when he and Tony had that push-up contest and you’d asked him to fuck you after, he couldn’t stop.

You’d be minding your own business and just walking to the gym for a workout when all of a sudden you’d be pulled into a closet and Steve would have his way with you.

Or you’d be having a movie night with the Avengers and he’d bring you to orgasm on his fingers as many times as your body would allow under the blanket you two shared.

So really this was all his doing. The fact that you were sitting at the bar with yet another Amaretto Sour and clenching your thighs together is all his fault.

There he is playing pool with his stupid perfect blonde hair. And his stupid tight, blue button up shirt. And his stupid tight, black pants.

You know exactly what’s in those pants and you can’t help but feel needy. You are trying your best to control yourself. You even keep trying to pull Nat into a conversation but then zone out when she starts telling a story.

She’s just about to snap her fingers to get your attention when a commotion starts over near the couches.

You both walk over in time to see Clint attempting to lift Mjolnir off the table.

You go sit by Steve who kisses your cheek. “Um, What’s he doing? He knows he can’t lift that right?”

Steve chuckles. “Well he’s had a little to drink and Thor told him only people who are worthy can lift it so naturally Clint thinks he’s worthy.”

You roll your eyes. Next Tony stands up and starts pulling at it. He has no luck. He quickly leaves the room.

You wrap your arms around Steve’s neck. “Well, what about you? Think you can lift it?”

Steve rolls his eyes. “I may be a little tipsy on Asgardian Mead, but even I know I’m not worthy either.”

Your eyes widen a bit. You pull back and study his face. His cheeks do look a little flushed and his smile is a little dopier than usual. You’ve never seen Steve anything close to tipsy before.

“I bet you could. You should give it a shot. You’re my big, strong super soldier.”

His eyes darken a bit and he leans in to whisper, “I think there are other ways I’d rather show off my strength to you, baby girl.”

Shivers go down your spine. But before you have a chance to respond, Tony returns. This time he has the right arm from his suit on. “It’s just physics.” He exclaims as he goes and grabs the hammer again.

And to no one’s surprise, he fails again. He scoffs and tells Rhodey to go get a piece of his suit.

Steve is trying his best to hold in his laughter. As is everyone else in the room. The almighty Tony Stark can’t lift Mjolnir.

Rhodey comes back and they both attempt to lift it with no luck. Eventually everyone who wants a turn in the room has tried and failed. Steve is losing it at this point. All because Tony can’t get over the fact that he’s not worthy.

“What’s so funny Captain Righteous? You think you’re worthy to lift it? Why don’t you give it a try?”

Steve rolls his eyes and stands up. “Tony I really don’t need to prove anything to you. You’re still pissed that I wiped the floor with your ass with that push-up contest you challenged me to.”

Wow, it may be the Asgardian Mead talking but damn. He was being a little cocky and fuck if it wasn’t turning you on.

“You know something was wrong with my suit! And what are you too afraid you won’t be worthy? Go ahead. Everyone else has tried.”

Steve rolls up his shirt sleeves to his elbows. Fuck. You cross your legs and clench your thighs together.

“Fine, I’ll try my best.”

He grabs the handle and tries to lift it. You swear you see it move just a fraction. But then he pulls again and nothing.

“Ha! Even the great old Captain America can’t lift it!” Tony points and laughs at Steve.

Steve looks pissed. He goes and stands in front of Tony and pokes his finger to his chest. “Why don’t you put your money where your mouth is, Stark? Sure I can’t lift the hammer, but I can certainly lift other stuff.”

He goes over to the couch where Bruce and Nat are sitting and bends down and lifts it up over his head. Holy shit. Well there go your panties.

He gently places the couch back down. He then smirks and starts flexing his arms. “You couldn’t do that without your precious suit Tony. So just admit I’m stronger and let’s get on with our lives!”

Tony scoffs. “Like I’d go down without a fight! How is my suit any different than you being genetically enhanced? You wouldn’t be able to even breathe without that serum swimming through your veins! Hell you’d probably even be dead! So I think it’s still a fair fight when I use my suit against your ‘muscles’.” Tony put the last word in quotation marks with his fingers and then crosses his arms and raises his eyebrow expectantly at Steve.

“Fine! If you think you’re so amazing then how about another contest? A Pull-Up one this time? If you think you can handle it?”

Tony rolls his eyes. “Bring it on, Capsicle!”

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Next thing you know, everyone from the party is down in the gym making bets on who’s going to win. You refuse to engage in such childish antics. You’re standing off to the side with Steve who has done a few more shots of Asgardian Mead.

“Babe, are you sure you want to do this? I mean you already proved yourself with the push-ups.”

He rolls his eyes and waves you off. “Don’t you worry, sweetheart. Let me just take a few seconds to kick his ass and then I’ll take you back to my room to celebrate my win.” He gives you a wink that goes straight to your still-wet pussy.

Tony saunters in with Rhodey with both arms of his suit on. He meets Steve at the pull-up bars. “Alright, ready to lose you old timer?”

Steve scoffs. “Bring it on, tin man.”

They are about to jump up to the bars when there is a shout from the back of the crowd. “WAIT!”

Everyone turns toward the voice which happens to belong to a very inebriated Maria Hill. “They should do this shirtless!”

“I really don’t see how doing this shirtless is going to-” Tony gets cut off by girlish screams coming from the audience. He looks over and sees that Steve has already removed his shirt and is posing and flexing his muscles.

“I think doing this shirtless is a great idea!” He smirks over at Tony, knowing full well he has the better physique of the two.

Tony scoffs once again. “Oh please, let me show you what real muscles are supposed to look like. Not ones that came from a bottle.”

He of course makes Rhodey put on some kind of sultry song while he seductively strips his shirt as best he can over the arms of his suit. He throws his shirt in Pepper’s direction. He of course has to do a few poses himself. Making sure his muscles are also on display. Which you have to admit aren’t too bad. Nothing compared to your super soldier, but still, not too bad.

Rhodey stands in front with a stopwatch. “Alright ladies! Let’s please get this over with because there is still more alcohol to be drunk!” The crowd cheers at that.

You move over to stand beside Nat. “So who are the odds for?”

She smirks as she’s counting her money. “Oh easy. After that last display, Steve.”

You smirk back. “Well I’m biased but if I was betting, that’s who I’d put my money on too.”

She raises her eyebrow at you. “It’s not too late to make a bet.”

You roll your eyes. “I’m not going to bet on my friend’s failure, Nat. I told you that.”

She shrugs. “Suit yourself.”

You move your gaze back up to Steve who is now somehow in the middle of a posing contest with Tony. They look fucking ridiculous if you’re being honest. You just smack your forehead and shake your head.

“Alright, Barton! Banner! Get up here! Banner, you’ll be counting for Stark and Barton you’ll be counting for Rogers.” He glances back at the two flexing morons. “And please let’s hurry before they embarrass themselves further.”

You chuckle at the look Steve is now giving Rhodey. He reluctantly stops flexing and gets back into position. Tony mimics him.

“Alright, the most pull-ups in 60 seconds will be the winner! Ready? Set? Go!”

Once again you are so glad you don’t have to count for Steve. They are both going way too fast for you to keep up. But then Steve starts grunting every time he pulls himself up and that steals all of your attention. It’s the same sound he makes when he’s fucking you and you can’t handle yourself.

He must be focusing on you because all of a sudden he makes eye contact. You bite your lip and clench your thighs. He smirks and let’s go of the bar with his left hand and starts doing one armed pull-ups. Jesus Christ. He winks at you. His pace has only faltered a little. You still think he’s going to win. God damn you can’t wait until he takes you-

“Time! Alright let’s see how our ladies did!” Rhodey turns to Bruce. “Okay, Banner. How many did our Tin Man do?”

Bruce replies with 214.

The crowd erupts into cheers. “Okay! Okay! Settle down! We need to get the other number before we get all crazy!” He turns to Clint. “Okay Barton. How did Cap do?”

Steve crosses his arms over his chest and flexes. He throws a smirk your way.

Clint raises his head and smirks at Banner. “350.”

Steve starts clapping. “And the best man won, again!”

Tony lowers his head in defeat. “Well, Capsicle. Good match. I’ll get you in something eventually.” Steve goes over and shakes his hand. “I look forward to it, Tin Man.”

You look over at Nat. “So what are you going to do with all of that money?”

She shrugs as she counts it. “Maybe donate it? Buy some expensive shit I don’t need? Not sure yet.”

You shake your head and make your way over to Steve. He’s buttoning his shirt back up. “That was quite impressive there, super soldier.”

He just smirks and picks you up and throws you over his shoulder. You squeal as he smacks your ass. “We’re going for a swim to celebrate!”

“Put me down, Steven!” You try to say with authority but fail when a giggle escapes you.

Tony points at your retreating forms. “So help me god if you fuck in that pool!”

Steve turns quickly to look at Tony. “What do you expect, Stark? We’ve already christened the kitchen, the gym, the movie room, and several utility closets. Might as well christen the pool too!”

“Fine! Alright everyone! Pool party!” Tony screams. The crowd cheers and heads in the direction of the pool.

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Steve finally sets you down when you get in the elevator. “Well now what, genius? You didn’t have to tell him your plan of fucking me in the pool.”

He smirks. “That was never my plan, baby girl.” He presses the emergency stop on the elevator. “I’ve always wanted to take you in an elevator. Now I believe I won a contest so I think I deserve my cock sucked. So.” He looks from you to the floor as he unbuckles his belt and lowers his pants and briefs enough to free his rock hard cock. He hisses as its slaps against his abdomen. “Well what are you waiting for, sweetheart? It’s not gonna suck itself.”

You cross your arms and raise your brow at him. “And just what makes you think I even want to suck your cock?”

He smirks and presses his body up against you and backs you up against the wall. His erection is now pressed against your stomach. You can feel his precum leaking through your shirt.

He puts his hands on either side of your head and leans in to whisper in your ear. “Because you want me to fuck that sweet pussy don’t you? You’d do anything for me to fill you up. Make you come so hard around my cock that you can’t even remember your own name. And because I can smell your arousal, baby girl. I know you want to. Now why don’t you be my good girl and get on your knees and open that pretty little mouth for me?”

As much as you hate to admit when he’s right, you know he is. Without any hesitation you lower yourself on your knees and open your mouth.

He groans as you look up at him. He strokes your cheek and grabs the base of his cock. “So fucking pretty on your knees for me.” He brings the tip to your mouth and smears his precum around your lips. Then he proceeds to push the head inside. You place your hands on his thighs for leverage and start sucking his tip and making sure your tongue is licking over the slit. He moves one hand to the back of your head and grabs your hair. He places his other hand against the wall.

You remove your mouth from his cock and lean back and take some deep breaths. He looks down at you. “Getting ready to take me in that throat, dirty girl?”

You nod your head and once again lean forward. This time you take him all the way down until his pubic hair is tickling your nose. You hollow your cheeks and suck as hard as you can while running your tongue along the vein on the underside of his dick. You start counting to 10 in your head.

“God damn, look at you. My little cockslut swallowing me whole. I’ve taught you so well.” He moves the hand that’s on your cheek down to your throat. “Fuck baby, I can feel myself in there.”

You get to 10 and pull off of him.You take a deep breath and wipe the tears that have fallen down your face away.

He tilts your chin up. “You are doing so good baby. So good for me. Can you swallow me one more time? Then I’ll fuck that tight, little cunt.”

You moan at his words. “Yes, Captain. I’ll be a good girl and swallow your cock again.”

You lean forward and take him in your mouth all the way down again. You begin to suck and work your tongue. Steve is grunting and cursing above you. You don’t even make it to 7 when he’s pulling your off of him and raising you to your feet.

He pushes you against the wall and crashes his lips onto yours. He hastily unbuckles your belt and pushes your jeans and panties down in one go. You quickly kick them and your sandals off to the side.

Steve moves his mouth down to your neck and starts sucking on the spot that drives you insane. He takes his right hand and movies it in between your legs to your heated core. He’s instantly met with wetness. He growls against your neck and proceeds to push 2 fingers inside you until he’s knuckle deep.

You grab onto his shoulders for support and whimper out his name. He takes his left hand and starts pinching your nipple through your shirt and bra.

You start grinding against his hand. You move your fingers up into his hair and tug. “Stevie, please. Need you.” You’re able to moan out.

He smirks against your neck and removes his fingers. He brings them up to your lips. You waste no time and suck them into your mouth, enjoying the taste of your arousal on them.

He releases his fingers and grabs your thighs and hoists you up until your legs are wrapped around his waist. “Are you ready, baby girl? I don’t think this will take very long. You got me too worked up with your pretty, little mouth.”

You quickly nod and once again tangle your fingers in his hair. “I don’t care. Just please fuck me, Captain.”

He doesn’t need to be told twice. “Guide me in, sweetheart.”

You move one hand in between you and grab a hold of his cock and move it towards your entrance. You ruin the head along your opening a few times, getting it nice and coated in your slick. As soon as you remove your hand, Steve snaps his hips forward and fills you with one thrust.

You scream out into the otherwise empty elevator. Grabbing onto Steve’s shoulders, nails digging in. “That’s right baby. You like the way my cock fills you up? Like feeling me that deep?”

You can only nod in response. He gives you a few more seconds to adjust before he starts thrusting at a brutal pace. You can only hang on and enjoy the ride.

“So fucking tight. God damn I love this cunt. Like it was made just for me. Isn’t that right, baby? Your cunt was made for my big, fat cock wasn’t it?”

You whimper out what you think is a yes. You’re not entirely sure. With every thrust his tip kisses your cervix in the perfect mixture of pain and pleasure. You already know your orgasm is going to be intense. You can feel it building.

“Fuck baby, I can feel you squeezing me. Gonna be a good girl and come for me? Come all over my dick?”

“Harder, please Stevie.” You are able to moan out while tugging his hair hard enough to make him growl. He obliges and starts slamming into you harder. His hands on your thighs tighten even more. His lips attach to your neck. You know there’s going to be bruises and hickeys tomorrow. You could care less.

All you cared about right now is being here in this moment with your Steve. Even though he was fucking you stupid in an elevator, you couldn’t help but think how much you cared about him. You were so in love with him it stole your breath away.

He moves his lips up to your ear and bites your earlobe. “Come on, baby girl. Come for me. Need you to milk me. I know you can do it. I know you’re close. I can feel you. Come for me, pretty girl.”

That was all you needed. You came with some kind of mix of a scream and a moan. You’re not even entirely sure what you said. You just know you have tears running down your face from the most intense orgasm you’ve ever experienced.

Steve stops thrusting and still inside of you. It takes you a minute to realize he’s no longer moving. You look up confused. At the same time you both say,

“Did you come?”

“What did you just say?”

You look at him with what you can only assume is a confused expression. “I didn’t say anything...did I?” You try to bring up any recollection of the thoughts that were going through your head the moment you reached your high. You couldn’t come up with anything.

Steve helps you out. “You said, ‘I love you’.”

You chuckle for a minute and then your eyes go wide as you stare into his beautiful, ocean eyes.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh no.

You guys hadn’t said that to each other yet and here you are screaming it out mid orgasm inside of an elevator.

“I’m sorry, Steve. I was in the throes of passion. I didn’t even realize I said it.” You cup his face.

You can swear you see disappointment flash in his eyes.

“Oh. So, you didn’t mean it.” His gaze falls onto the wall behind you.

You grab his cheeks with more force and move his head so he’s looking at you again. “I didn’t say that.”

The corners of his lips raise slightly. He looks so adorable and vulnerable right now. Like the man before the serum. “Really? You love me?”

You beam at him and lean in for a passionate kiss. Hoping to show just how much you love him through it. “Of course I do, you big meatball.”

He laughs and rests his forehead on yours. “I love you, too. So much. Tell me again.”

You smile, happy to oblige. “I love you, Stevie.” You feel his cock twitch inside you. He groans and starts thrusting again. He moves his head into the crook of your neck.

You hear him mutter into your neck. “Again.”

“I love you, Steve.” You tangle your hands in his hair as his thrusts return to their brutal pace from before. You can feel his cock twitching even more. You know he’s close.

You move your mouth to his ear. “Come for me, baby. I love you. I love you so much, Steve.”

You hear your name in the form of a moan falling from his mouth as he pushes himself all the way in and releases inside of you.

You both just stay like that for a moment. Clinging to each other. Coming down from your highs. Both from your orgasms and from your confessions.

After a few minutes, Steve raises his head up and pulls you in for a sweet kiss.

“I love you, Y/N.”

You smile so big, you think all of your teeth are showing. “I love you too, Steve.”

He was about to say something else when he’s cut off from a voice from above.

“Look, as much as I’d hate to break up this beautiful moment, I have something to say….Are you guys fucking kidding me?? The elevator? You know that’s the elevator I take everyday! You fucking did this on purpose!”

You and Steve burst into laughter at Tony’s anger.

“Oh yeah you’re laughing it up now! You won’t be when I make you take the stairs for a month for this little tryst! Your elevator privileges are hereby suspended!”

Steve smirks at you mischievously. “Ooh, we haven’t done it in the stairwells yet!”

“God dammit” you both hear from the speaker.

Permanent Taglist: @stargazingfangirl18​, @drabblewithfrannybarnes​, @harrysthiccthighss​

[plainlo-inthemorning]

A little written-in-the-middle-of-the-night Loki fic snippet that just grew another leg. TVA Loki + Lokane. Rating T.

(First part is here)

Shine a Light, part II

The tempad feels hot and slippery in his palm as he stalks down the hallway, quickly putting distance between himself and the hunter he left unconscious amidst overturned chairs and tables in the canteen.

The mess had already been there, leftovers from workers rushing panicked to man their stations. He had simply added one more touch.

Tiny droplets of sweat bead his brow and blood has started seeping though the tear in his crumbled shirt.

The fabric is clinging wetly to his bicep, but in the mayhem unfolding around him, nobody gives him a second glance.

For the first time, he is thankful at least to be wearing the anonymous uniform dictated by the oppressors.

He reaches the kill me kind of room again and shuts the door behind him.

You were meant to cause suffering and death.

You’re a cosmic mistake.

You were meant to die at the hands of the mad titan.

Lies.

All lies.

Still projected on the wall is the paused image of a lost memory of his unfulfilled fate.

He sees himself, Thor and her on the barren planet with the black soil. The man he never became is lying on the ground, Thor cradling him.

She watches them both in shock.

It resonates in his bones. He has to go there.

He has to reach his brother at this precise, excruciatingly rare moment of heroism. His act of heroism.

Before the scheming and deceit poison their bond once more in an endless loop of disappointment.

In this moment, all is forgiven. Thor will listen and help. A different path will branch.

And he has to go to her.

It is ludicrous, this riddle, yet the truth of it presses hard on his chest.

On the grainy roll of film, he saved her life and her eyes bore into his with such intensity, his acute need still reverberates like an echo between the walls of the kill me kind of room.

The smell of lilacs lingers.

What will happen when he faces his own self on the timeline, he can’t imagine. Also, he gives it little thought at this late stage with universal logic already suspended as it is. Hopefully he can reason with the man he was meant to be.

He has had quite enough of being his own past, present and future selves’ worst enemy.

And so he pushes the buttons on the tempad.

//

Something is very wrong.

The sky is too blue, the distant sound of waves lapping calmly at a shore is misplaced.

He has emerged from the door onto a quiet gravel road lined with tall grass and low pines. A single, white wooden house stands to his left, surrounded by a lawn dotted with wildflowers. The sun is warm on his back.

This is Midgard, he is sure of it.

How could he shoot past his destination so spectacularly?

He is about to scroll down the list of numbers and names on the tiny screen of the tempad when he notices a man approaching. Old, walking leisurely with a round, short-legged dog much the same white color as the mortal’s own wispy hair.

The latter starts a little when he spots Loki.

And then he does the most unexpected thing and speaks his name.

Loki’s name.

He almost drops the tempad (no! Not again) and the old one grins good-naturedly. “Hold on to your fancy phone there. Far away, were we?”

Loki only just about stops himself from shaking the man by his shoulders. His fists clench uncontrollably.

“What year is this?! How do you know my name?”

His voice sounds shrill, feverish, and unsurprisingly the eyes in the lined face before him go wide with puzzlement and … something else.

“Loki, what on Earth? Are you quite alright?”

Shock washing over him, Loki staggers back. H-how?

But the man is closing the gap between them, oozing concern. “Have you - are you drunk?” he asks incredulously.

He reaches out.

What is happening?

Loki shies away from the touch, his mind spinning.

Forcibly gathering his composure, he straightens and wills his words to come out steady. “No, I’m okay. Apologies. A bad joke”.

He smiles reassuringly. It takes more effort than parting an ocean.

The dog is sniffing insistently at his ankles.

The man looks him over with suspicion but the worry is subsiding. “Okay, then… no harm, no foul. You know, sometimes these peculiar ‘jokes’ of yours can make a neighbor all kinds of slightly worried”.

Neighbor?

“Most understandably, won’t happen again. Sorry to have bothered you”. Loki cuts him off smoothly. “Have a nice day”. He nods and turns before hysteria can creep into his voice.

“In case you need it for your punchline, the year is 2016”, the man calls over his shoulder as he shuffles away, pulling the reluctant dog after him.

Loki’s blood runs cold. 2016. Oh, this is so wrong. Three years wrong.

Did he hit another button at the last minute? He had been clutching the tempad so hard the edges cut into his fingers.

He curses his own impatience. Tech savvy indeed.

Holding up the blasted piece of TVA wizardry, he tries to enter a new series of numbers when his name rings out again.

And again, he almost jumps. But this time, his heart stays in his throat.

//

“Loki? What are you doing out here? I’ve been looking all over for you”.

Her voice reaches him from the porch of the white house. She is skipping lightly down the steps, the screen doors left open behind her. Music drifts into the garden from somewhere inside.

She is crossing the lawn. He is no longer breathing.

Her long auburn hair is tied back in a ponytail, and she is wearing a light blue summer dress. Her feet are bare.

Absurdly, he notes that she looks more tanned than the last time he saw her through the visor of the destroyer in the desert. A year and a lifetime ago. To him.

His grip on whatever reality he’s been clinging to since New York is seriously faltering.

She is beaming. He cannot move a muscle.

She comes all the way up to him and without pause wraps her slender arms around his neck. He can feel the warmth of her body through his shirt, smell the perfume of her skin. She smells of … -

“Where did you go, handsome?” She smiles playfully.

“Pepper called earlier to say that she actually got Tony out of the door on time, if you can believe it, so they’ll be here any minute. And her and I agreed that you two hotheads are going to play nice tonight, okay?”

She is teasing him but he hardly understands the words she’s saying. It makes no sense.

And then, before he can begin to form a response, she stands on tiptoes and kisses him and the world falls away.

Reflexively, he puts his arms around her, drawing her close to him. She moans happily. He leans into the kiss, not knowing what he’s doing other than that he never wants to stop.

Her mouth is soft and warm and new and familiar all at the same time, and the way her fingers curl in his hair sends electricity shooting down his spine.

It should be all anguish and tragic confusion, like before in the castle beyond time, but it is not.

It feels more right that anything he can remember since before his fall from the Bifrost, more real and yet more magical than his recent journeys into mystery.

Then it’s over all too soon and she draws away.

His arms are suddenly much too empty and he almost reaches for her again, craving her touch.

For a fleeting heartbeat, his soul had no longer felt torn apart to the point of forgetting he’d ever been whole.

The chaos had crumbled in on itself like a bad dream.

He is surprised he still knows what peace of mind feels like after what has happened to him since arriving at the TVA.

But now she looks at him with alarm in those beautiful brown eyes and he is crudely reminded that he is an intruder in her reality.

What she thought she saw, she clearly no longer recognizes.

It takes him all of three stupidly long seconds to remember that she said his name. That he’s wearing his own face and not a disguise.

That she knew him immediately, just like the old man.

She kissed him.

Too many impossible possibilities and the thunderous sound of his own heartbeat (surely she can hear it too) blur his vision.

He’s only vaguely aware that he is stepping towards her, trying to say something without the faintest idea of what’s going to come out of his mouth.

If it’ll even be words.

Her eyes dart over his clothes, his face.

“Loki, what - Why are you dressed like that? Have you been gone? Is that … blood?”

She retreats further, fear building.

“Jane, I-“

Her name rolls of his tongue with a sweet-tasting intimacy like he has said it a thousand times before.

But he doesn’t get to dwell on this, nor gather his thoughts to say anything else before something abruptly lifts him off the ground and hurls his body across the road.

“How dare you touch her, beast?!”

Immediately as his back connects with the rough gravel, someone is there, a knee pushing him down, fingers closing around his throat. A sharp object presses against his chin.

There is a dangerous, unhinged growl as his attacker breathes hotly in his ear. “You will die for this!”

The man is strong and somehow blocking Loki’s own magic, but he still manages to twist his head -

And looks right up into his own eyes, nearly black with rage.

//

“Speak! What are you??”

The man with a face exactly like his presses the tip of his blade closer to Loki’s left eye. “You will show yourself right now or -“

Gathering his magic tightly around him (focus!), Loki pushes back, hard.

With a surge of energy, their bodies are separated, and the other version of him lands heavily in the middle of the road some meters away.

Both of them are on their feet with the fluid movements of two panthers ready to pounce, the other now in full armor.

He has to leave, right now, even if means leaving her which is a catastrophe that might either kill him or make him try to kill his other self if he stays here another minute.

This timeline is clearly not his own.

It cannot be.

Arm outstretched to ward off his furious twin with a shield of magic, he tries to work the tempad with one hand.

“Well, well, what do we have here?”

A booming voice above their heads.

“You know, when Jane pressed the panic button just now, I thought we had an actual emergency. Not that you were preparing a little dinner show for us, Reindeer Games. Gotta be honest though, this doppelgänger stunt was never my favorite -“

“Stark!”

The variant - for he must be a variant - angrily interrupts the man in the metal suit hovering in the air.

Of course, Loki remembers him all too clearly.

What has it been, less than a week since he threw him, or a version of him, out the window of the glass tower?

“This is not my creation”, the variant hisses with venom dripping from every word. “I caught him assaulting Jane. Kissing her”.

“What?!”

Stark focuses all his attention (and one of his iron fists) on Loki. A metallic humming rises steadily from inside the suit.

“A man on a suicide mission then. Boy, did you smooch the wrong wizard’s baby-mama. He may look all domesticated and cute now, but I assure you he’s still all kinds of crazy. In fact-”.

“Hey!”

“What?”

“I know it’s asking a lot, of you in particular, Stark, but could we possibly save the personal insults till we have dealt with this right here?”

Wait, just wait.

Damn it, he can’t tap in the destination on the tempad without looking at it.

Green smoke is swirling around the hands of his other self. He knows what’s coming.

“This is your last warning, devil! I will not have you hiding behind my face as I -“

“This is my face! I’m you, you fool! Bigger things are at large here and-“ Loki falters, his silver tongue failing once more with rising predictability within what seems a disconcertingly short period of time.

Although he honestly can’t tell anymore.

“Please, take a minute -“

He can’t help but shout, sounding hopelessly desperate.

In another life, he might have felt humiliated, but letting pride dictate his emotions is no longer a luxury he can afford to indulge.

Still, the silence that follows his outburst is not nearly as long as he needs it to be.

The variant stares blankly at him, mouth slightly ajar, but Stark recovers easily, his voice now icy.

“Yeah, dude, that one might have worked better if you’d put on a clean shirt. Time to fess up real quick or we’ll have to-“

Drawing what might become his last breath, Loki looks away and down at the tempad. He presses the button. No more time to double check.

“What the?!”

Both Stark and the variant visibly flinch as the door appears.

He quickly makes for it. “I - I’m sorry. Truly, I am”. He looks to their stunned faces before turning to his exit.

Out of the corner of his eye, he registers the variant move (he has to be a variant). His mouth twists in an ugly snarl and two familiar daggers are appearing by his sides.

Before the door snaps completely shut, Loki sees Jane run up to the man and grab his arm.

“Love, no, don’t!”

He sees the slight bump under her dress that he didn’t notice before.

And then the scene disappears and he’s gone.

Part III

[melancholymaz]

Enceinte (2)

Pairing: Natasha Romanoff x reader, Avengers x Reader 

Warnings: Pregnant reader, Soft!Nat and Fluffy avengers!!!

Summary: You and Natasha have had your time keeping your little secret between yourselves, now it’s time to tell the team.

A/N: Here’s part two!! Let me know what you think and some things you’d like to see in the future for this series! 

Готовы ли вы встретиться со своими дядями и тетями, боб? = Are you ready to meet you uncles and aunties, bean?

You stand in front of the tall mirror in yours and Natasha’s now shared bedroom, your top sitting above your 12 week bump. You were surprised no one has clicked on yet, considering you weren’t exactly hiding your morning sickness and nausea. Your growing belly, however, you hid behind loose jumpers and Tony’s t-shirts. You’ve kept your little bean under wraps for 4 weeks now, and you and Natasha decided it was time you shared the news for the uncles and aunties to be. You stand sideways, really taking in the look of your small bump, and lightly rub it. 

“Bean is the size of a plum!” Natasha exclaims randomly, still laying in your shared bed, taking comfort in one of your shirts and pyjama pants, her hair still in a million directions from the night before. 

“Bucky’s gonna love that.” You smile as you pull your top down, going to lay beside your girlfriend, lying your head on her shoulder. 

“He has fully formed organs, muscles, limbs, bones and even his little willy!” Natasha says with her award winning smile, quickly giving your head a kiss before going back to scrolling through the pregnancy app on her phone. 

“He?” You quirk your eyebrow with a smile. “We don’t even know the gender yet.” 

“It’s a boy, I can feel it in my soul.” She gives you a cheeky wink, before standing up, stretching her body, giving you the perfect view of her toned back muscles. “Our next baby’s a girl. Everyone knows it goes boy then girl.” 

“We can’t just choose our baby’s gender, Nat.” You laugh, wrapping your arms around her neck as hers go around your waist. “And who said there’s gonna be a second?” 

“Me, and there’s going to be a third and a fourth.” Natasha gives you a sweet passionate kiss as she gives you the most loving look you only dreamed of receiving. You shake your head at your baby mama, thanking the lords up above for giving you everything you ever wanted. 

“Are the presents ready?” You ask as you walk into the wardrobe picking your outfit for the day, a floral top with leggings, a jumper on top to hide your belly until the team finds out the news. 

“Yes my love, all presents are wrapped and named.” Natasha replies, following suit in picking her outfit for the day. You and Natasha thought the best way to announce the new family member was by getting each and every avenger a personalised t-shirt with their respective titles. Everyone had gotten Uncle and Auntie, Bucky and Steve were getting Grandpa shirts to be funny, and carol an grandma shirt, as she’s picked up the habit to mother both you and Natasha. 

“Are you ready, bub?” Natasha asks. 

“Yeah, are you?” You ask, spraying perfume on yourself, facing Natasha as she quirks her eyebrow at you. 

“I wasn’t talking to you, My sweet.” She says, before leaning down and lifting your shirt, She presses a soft kiss before whispering in Russian. “Готовы ли вы встретиться со своими дядями и тетями, боб?” 

“You’re a dork.” You laugh, flicking her forehead as she stands, she sends you a playful glare before picking up half the boxes. 

“FRIDAY, please let everyone know that we need them in the common room and there’s no room for arguments.” 

“Yes Agent Romanoff.” FRIDAY replies, picking up the rest of the presents you leave your bedroom heading to the common room. 

-

“Can someone please explain what’s going on?” Bruce sighs for probably the hundredth time in the past 10 minutes, meanwhile the rest of the team won’t stop talking. You huff and rub your temples before using your fingers to whistle loud enough to hurt their ears, the team immediately shutting up. 

“Are you done now?” You ask, remembering why you were there in the first place. “Thank you. Now, Natasha and I are about to hand you a box with a present and no ones allowed to open it until we say so. It must be at the same time okay?” 

“Whose birthday is it?” Bucky asks, a frown set into his face. 

“Why would everyone get a present if it was a birthday you idiot.” Sam rolls his eyes, narrowly missing getting a slap to the back of the head from the ex-assassin. You and Natasha start handing out the presents to Tony, Bruce, Wanda, Bucky, Sam, Steve, Rhodey, Carol, Thor, Clint and Peter. Once everyones got their box and inspecting it curiously, Natasha gives them the green light to open it. They all open it around the same time, their faces written in confusion. Wanda’s and Carol’s eyes go wide first, a small shriek coming from Wanda as they both jump up to hug you both. 

“I’m so happy!! I can’t wait!” Wanda says, her eyes teary. You laugh before giving her a tight hug, before doing the same for Carol. 

“I can’t wait to meet my grandbaby.” She gives you a wink, before giving you a bone-crushing hug, kissing your hair in the process. Steve and Bucky hug you both next, wishing a congratulations and expressing their excitement to be grandpas. Rhodey and Bruce wish you both a congratulations without the hug, and you don’t fail to notice the light traces of sadness in Bruces eyes, and you feel bad when you remember that’ll be hard for him to have his own children. Peter comes up and hugs you both at the same time, rambling on how he can’t wait to play with the baby. Sam comes up next, giving you both a kiss on the cheek and a hug as he teases. 

“It was only a matter of time considering how much we have to hear you two.” He laughs, before walking to Steve giving him a ‘I told you so’. Thor congratulates you both, giving Nat a tight cuddle before giving you a soft cuddle as to not hurt you or the baby. Tony and Clint walk up together, a proud smile on their lips. 

“Come on tell us about our junior avenger.” Tony says, you laugh before taking off your jumper, everyone’s attention now on your belly.  You look at Natasha, she gives you a soft smile while Clints arm sits around her shoulder. 

“Baby is now 12 weeks old, a size of a plum.” You say, waiting for Bucky’s reaction. His bright blue eyes light up, and you’ve never seen the man have a smile as big as it is now. “All organs, muscles and limbs are fully developed, now we wait for baby to grow.” 

“All organs? including their... you know.” Peter shyly asks, a blush on his cheeks as he twiddles with his fingers.

“Yes Peter, even it’s naughty bits.” Natasha laughs, pulling Peter into her and Clint, now resting her arm around his shoulders. 

“Oh... cool.” His cheeks go more red with embarrassment, but yet looks content resting against Natasha, like he’s been there a thousand times. You wouldn’t be surprised if he has to be honest with yourself. 

“Do you know what the gender is yet?” Steve asks. 

“Not yet, We’ve still yet to decide if we’re going to find out or wait until baby’s born.” You reply, giving Clint a nod as he wordlessly asks to touch your belly. 

- 

You lay in your bed, quietly watching your favourite show while Natasha reads beside you. You lay there in just your sports bra, absentmindedly tracing random patterns on your swollen belly. You blink tiredly, exhausted from spending all day with the team. You hear Natasha lightly place her book on her bedside table before turning to look at you, you look up at her when you feel her gaze. 

“You tired babe?” She asks softy, a small smile on her lips as you nod in reply. Natasha presses a delicate kiss to your forehead before moving down the bed so her face hovers over your belly. “Let me quickly talk to bean and then we can go to sleep.” 

“Okay babe.” You whisper, too tired to talk any louder. You start running your fingers through her hair as she starts to talk to your unborn miracle. 

“Hi my love, It’s your mama. Even though I know you can’t hear me yet, I just wanted to tell you that I can’t wait to meet you, hold you, love you, protect you. I’m going to give you everything you could ever want, but to also teach you to be grateful and keep you humble. No one likes an arrogant brat, we’ve already got one of those. Your mummy and I can’t wait for you to meet your family too, they’re already smitten and ready to spoil you. Well my baby, it’s time for me to say goodnight because mummy’s tired and gonna get grumpy and we can’t have that. Goodnight.” Natasha finishes it off with a rub and kiss for the baby and you couldn’t help the lone tear that falls from your eye. Natasha notices this and crawls back up to wipe it away. 

“I can’t believe I was so scared to tell you. I would never change this for the world.” You whisper, Natasha giving you one last smile before turning off the lamp, wrapping you up in her arms where you both fall asleep instantly. 

[athenasbloodyspear]

Say Something to Stop Me: Chapter Two

Writing Master List | Say Something to Stop Me Master List

Please note: This fic describes depression, anxiety, panic attacks, past/referenced non con and domestic violence. Please read at your own discretion.

________________________

You wake to a slight pounding in your skull right between your eyes and an extremely dry mouth. You groan and flop onto your back, squinting at the bright light streaming through the window. Rolling to glance at the clock on your nightstand you discover that it is 6:30 in the morning. It makes sense, you estimate you fell asleep somewhere around 7:30 last night.

You suddenly shoot straight up in bed, your heart pounding. Oh my god. Bucky. He carried you here last night. You’re still wearing your jeans and t-shirt from the night before. There’s a glass of water and two small white pills on your nightstand and your shoes are laying right next to the bed. He must have put you to bed. You don’t remember anything after he picked you up.

You flop back against the pillows and stare at the ceiling above your bed, watching the early morning light flicker. A small smile fights its way to your lips. You couldn’t stop the growing grin if you tried. Bucky. James Buchanan Barnes himself carried you to bed last night and for some reason your heart is leaping around in your chest. You can almost feel it bouncing around in your rib cage. What the hell is wrong with you?

You put both hands over your face and let yourself giggle for a moment. You feel like a teenager who just spoke to her crush for the first time. Your fingers are a little tingly and you feel like there are butterflies making a nest in your abdomen. After a few moments of this you suddenly decide you have to get your shit together and go thank him.

Swinging your legs over the edge of the bed and standing up proved to be more painful to your brain than you expected. You had to promptly sit back down on your mattress as your head spun and your vision began to tunnel. You hated hangovers. They made you feel so dizzy and weak. You attempted standing again, slower this time, and took a second to orient yourself to your now vertical stance.

You were… giddy. It felt strange to be fully present in your body and feeling something beyond apathy, but it was also the most relieving feeling. You gave another small smile to yourself. You felt more like yourself than you had in months. Immediately upon realizing that, you heard a voice in your head start whispering things to you.

Don’t spend any time being happy. You’re an embarrassment. If he knew who you really are lately he wouldn’t waste any time on you.

Oof. Just like that all the wind left your sails. You could feel your shoulders curve instinctively. The voice in your head was technically right. Bucky would be so embarrassed and disappointed in you. He’d never look at you the same. None of them would. They respect you for your strength and resilience, and if they knew what happened they wouldn’t see you as strong anymore. You’re not the person who you thought you were. Everything about your personality that you loved had shattered into pieces about seven months ago and you didn’t even know what to do about it.

You squeezed your eyes shut and shook your head. There had been a moment just now. A brief wonderful moment that you saw clarity. That you felt like the person you used to be. It had been months in a row of feeling like your head was stuck under water. The world felt blurry, the sounds around you were muffled. You felt like your lungs weren’t really getting the oxygen you needed. But for a moment this morning, with the sunrise reflecting off the metal beams of the ceiling, your head had crested the surface. You had taken a huge breath of air and felt the sun on your skin for the first time in such a long time.

How did it slip from you so quickly? You were sinking under again, but instead of the drifting feeling you’d had, it suddenly felt like every muscle in your body was kicking toward the surface. You didn’t want to drown anymore. You wanted to feel the sun on your hair and the breeze across the back of your neck. You wanted to run and run and run and actually feel the oxygen in your lungs.

It suddenly felt very dire that you move. That you didn’t stand here with your eyes closed in limbo. You had to move, go somewhere, do something, talk to someone or you’d fall deeper. You shoved your feet into your sneakers and stumbled out the door with no real direction in mind.

I suppose I could just go thank Bucky. That’s a good starting point.

You whip your feet to the right and head farther down the hall toward Bucky’s room. Once you approach his door and knock you have a moment of silence to organize your swirling thoughts.

What are you going to say to him? Thank you I guess. Oh god you were still in your clothes from last night and you’re positive that your breath is probably so rank it would kill flies. You swallow hard and take a reflexive step back from the door. If you’re farther away, he might not be able to smell you. You try to take a surreptitious sniff of your armpit and you actually don’t smell quite as bad as you expected, but you still don’t exactly smell as fresh as a daisy.

Your head is spinning, but he’s not coming to the door. It’s at this moment that you realize that it is in fact only 6:30 in the morning and it’s entirely possible that everyone stayed up much later than 7:00 last night and could still be sleeping. You slap a hand to your forehead. God you’re so spacey lately.

You whip around to head back to your room when Friday speaks into the hallway above you.

“Agent Barnes is not home, Y/N. Agents Barnes, Wilson and Parker left around 6:00 this morning on a short reconnaissance mission. They should be home this evening. Bucky did peek his head in your door this morning before they left. You woke shortly after.”

Ah. Okay then. So the two people you were thinking of trying to talk to this morning are gone. In fact, the person who probably would have been third on the list of doors to knock on is gone too. Shit. You still felt restless, like if you didn’t keep treading water you’d drown. Absentmindedly bouncing on the balls of your feet you chewed on a thumb nail. Friday spoke again.

“Natasha is downstairs in the kitchen making coffee. Just so you know.”

You look up at the ceiling. How did Friday know you needed to talk to someone? Was Tony watching and wanted you to talk to Nat? Did Nat ask Friday to tell you? Did you care?

“Thanks Friday.” You say to the ceiling. You spin and begin your walk to the elevators.

“Anytime.”

~0~

Nat was indeed making coffee in the kitchen. She looked up when you stepped in and smiled.

“Morning Y/N. How’s that head?”

You chuckled at that and shook your head, wincing a little as your brain sloshed around in your head. “It’s… a little painful I won’t lie.”

“Sit. Coffee, water, tylenol and a really messy egg sandwich will help.”

“Thank you, Nat.”

She turned and started the coffee machine before walking to the fridge to grab you a glass of water. You leaned over the counter and placed your forehead in your hands. Suddenly two tiny little pills and a glass of water were pushed into your field of vision. You lifted your head and saw Nat walking over to the stove with some butter, eggs, cheese and bread in hand.

“Thanks.” You swallow both pills and then spend the next few minutes just slowly trying to get as much water down as you can. When your glass is empty you stand up to refill when suddenly an egg sandwich is set down in front of you.

“Sit and eat. I’ll refill for you. Milk in your coffee?”

“Just a splash. Thank you, again.”

Nat smiles. “You’re welcome.” She returns with your coffee and fresh water in hand. As you dig into your sandwich she leans her back against the kitchen island across from you.

“So. It sounds like James had to carry your ass to bed last night. What’s up with that?” Nat tosses casually over her shoulder. There’s something in her voice that you can’t quite pick up on. There’s a subtext you’re missing.

“Um. I was drunk. On accident. I think I was just dehydrated and didn’t eat dinner. I almost fell on my ass so he uh… carried me.” You keep your eyes on your egg sandwich, your cheeks felt like they were on fire with your blush.

“Hm. I don’t remember you being such a lightweight. If I remember correctly, when we were in Vienna you nearly drank Thor under the table.” Nat quips.

You huff a laugh. You nearly had. God you missed that big hulking brute. You really hoped things were okay in Asgard. “Yeah… I just am out of practice I guess.” you say through a mouthful of eggs.

“I suppose that’s not the worst thing to be out of practice with.” Nat says, turning toward you fully this time. She’s looking at you like she asked you a question even though she definitely did not.

“I suppose” you mutter back. You hadn’t felt anxious since walking in the kitchen, but now theres a small seed of panic in your gut. You shift a little in your seat, shoving the last bite of egg sandwich in your mouth. She’s giving you her Black Widow interrogation stare and you don’t like it.

She breaks the silence. “You’re kinda also out of the ‘talking to your family’ practice.” The last bite of egg sandwich gets lodged in your esophagus. You choke and start hacking a cough as you try to force the suddenly very dry bits of bread down your throat. Nat just leans her elbows on the counter and lifts one eyebrow at you. “What’s up with that?”

“Oh. Um.” You’re sputtering as you try to get air back down your throat. “Uh. It’s nothing personal. Just kinda… don’t feel like talking.”

“Hmmm.” Nat hums as she leans back. She slaps her palms against the countertop. “Well, you better muster up the strength because Tony has a therapist scheduled to start coming here every other week. No ifs, ands or buts. You’re going to spend an hour every two weeks with her whether you ‘feel like it’ or not. Got it?” She turns to go.

“Yes ma’am.” You mutter.

“I thought I told you never to call me that again.” Nat tosses over her shoulder as she picks up her coffee and starts to exit the kitchen.

“It’s a reflex, Nat. It’s hard not to when someone talks to me like a commanding officer.”

She pushes her hips against the door to open it and rolls her eyes at you. “Whatever. She’ll be here at three tomorrow. You can meet her in the conference room. If you’d rather not be around with prying eyes it sounds like it’s gonna be sunny tomorrow. Maybe you could sit by the lake.” With that she leaves.

“Okay.” You say out loud to the empty room.

~0~

Even though your moment with Nat was brief this morning, and rather scathing, you still feel better than you did standing in the middle of your room this morning. You’re not quite on dry land, but you feel your nose and mouth are at least above water and you’re breathing more deeply.

You spend sometime in the gym. You go back to boxing and lifting some weights. You figure that part of Tony’s forced therapy is that he cares about you, and also probably that they need you back on the field. It’s rare that they send Peter on recon missions as they don’t like to pull him out of school if they can help it, so Steve and Tony must be a little short handed at the moment. You should probably start getting back into field shape. Although, with how much running you’ve been doing you could probably hold your own out there.

After working out and showering you decide to wander around the outside of the complex. Nat was right, the weather is pretty pleasant right now so you might as well get some fresh air.

You think about your impending date with a therapist tomorrow. You feel a small twinge of shame twist in your chest when you think of it. Steve and Tony are so busy all the time, and yet you let your own stupid emotions and inability to cope make them worried. They had to take care of you, again. It’s exactly the kind of self hatred spiral that you’d been sucked into lately.  

This was all just so unlike you. It was so antithetical to everything that you held as your core personality traits. The reason that Tony and Steve had hand picked you to be the one that got the final dose of super serum they had uncovered is because you were resilient. Time and time again, mission after mission you had kept a cool head. Rolled with the punches. You’d been knocked down, beaten, stabbed and shot and still stood back up and jumped back into the next mission they’d offer. Sometimes even begging to be sent out before you got your medical clearance.

You’d gotten along with the team instantly. Even back when you were just a basic agent running their com links. You’d been trying to coordinate a million different channels and Sam had made some sarcastic comment about how the new kid was causing interference on the channels. You’d been trying to juggle so many things at once that you hadn’t even registered that you had snapped back that if he could just be smart enough to block his head while fighting and keep his com from being bashed around, your job wouldn’t be so hard.

There had been a moment of silence on the other end of the line and then all at once 4 different com links lit up as laughter spilled into your ear piece. You’d heard Nat ribbing Sam for always forgetting to block his ears and Steve cackling that “the kid just really got you.” Tony was chuckling quietly and Sam was saying “Fair. Fair.” You couldn’t keep the smile off your face.

That was who you were. Managing what felt like a thousand com links, and still making jokes. You were cracking up with Sam on the battlefield. Helping Nat try to set Steve up on dates while you were doing recon. Laughing while you and Bucky beat each other up on the sparring mats.

You didn’t know the person you had become this year. Laying on the floor of your living room for hours on end? Not answering the door when Peter came over after school? Not taking a single mission for nearly 9 months? It just started one day and then just snowballed and snowballed. The more you laid around, the more you just hated yourself for not being able to get back up.

I mean c’mon . You’d been shot once busting up an arms deal in Sudan and all you did was laugh before hopping back up and clobbering the guy over the head with a loose cement block. Bucky had panicked and run your way when he saw you get hit, insisting he medivac you out. You had just winced and put a hand over the hole in your shoulder and said “and miss all the action? No chance.”

It baffled you that you couldn’t pull it together now.

Maybe the therapist would be good. As much as you hated to admit it, you clearly needed help.

A rumble in the distance alerted you that the quinjet had arrived home. You wandered across the grass to the landing pad to say hi to your friends. You could thank Bucky for last night and maybe ask Peter to watch a movie tonight. Or you could help him with his homework, not that the kid needed it. Just something. You suddenly really didn’t want to be alone.

As you rounded the corner of the building and caught sight of everyone, you realized that everyone was running around a little too frantically for your comfort level. You heard Sam yell “Someone get him to the med wing.”

“On it!” That was Steve.

Your heart froze in your chest and you paused mid step. You felt very torn between running toward the jet, and running clear in the other direction. You weren’t sure if you could handle whatever it was that was happening. It was then that you saw Bucky walking down the ramp of the jet with a red suited body cradled in his arms.

Your heart restarted with a vengeance and your feet moved on their own. Sprinting toward the jet. A choked “Peter!” ripped from your lungs.

As you stepped up on the landing pad Sam caught you around the waist and pulled you back. “He’s fine Y/N. He’s gonna be fine. Just needs some stitches and a concussion check.”

You were panting hard as you stood up on your tiptoes to peek over Sam’s shoulder in time to see Bucky pass Peter to Steve. You placed both palms on Sam’s chest and pushed with all your strength to get him out of your way. It was unfair, you used all your super strength against him. His breath wooshed from his chest as he skidded a few feet back. You started your dash towards Peter again before two arms, one warm and one cold, wrapped around your waist and dragged you backward.

“Stop. Stop sweetheart. Give him space. He’s just dazed.” Bucky grunted as you slammed into his chest. His lips brushed the shell of your ear as he dragged you backwards away from the retreating form of Steve. Your hands scrambled for purchase over his arms. Pushing with all your strength against the metal and flesh wrapped around your middle. He, unlike Sam, did not budge.

This was your fault. You couldn’t get your shit together and Peter had to go on a mission for you and he got hurt. It was your own damn fault.

“Breathe. Please breathe for me. C’mon baby breathe.” Bucky was lowering you down to your knees now. You were suddenly aware of the concrete of the landing pad beneath your knees. Your breaths were ragged and choked. You felt like you were breathing through a straw. “Whoa whoa whoa sweetheart. You have to breathe for me.”  

Bucky was on his knees now in front of you. He had pushed back a bit so he could look into your face, but his arms were still wrapped tightly around you. You could feel the rise and fall of his chest as he tried to get you to match the pace of his breathing. You couldn’t tear your eyes off the door that Steve had just walked through.

“I can’t” you choked out. “Peter.” It felt like your throat was closing up. Where was the oxygen in the world?

“He’s fine. I promise. He got a little distracted and someone bashed him over the head with a two-by-four. He probably needs like 2 stitches in his eyebrow. He was also a little panicked and dazed, that’s why I was carrying him. It’s fine.” Your eyes flicked to Bucky. He was scanning your face now. He looked absolutely petrified.

“You’re lying. You’re lying to me right now. I have to get to him.” You tried to stand up. To push him away. Bucky and his damn bionic arm didn’t move.  

Bucky wraps his arms tighter around you and pulls you back down. You’re basically smashed against his chest now. He lets out a frantic humorless laugh “I am not lying to you. I’m terrified because you’re hyperventilating and I need you to breathe. Now.”

All at once your muscles go slack and tense at the same time. You stop fighting Bucky as it registers just how low on oxygen you are. Your heart is pounding nearly out of your chest and your throat keeps getting smaller. “I-can’t” you choke. Your chest spasms a bit as your abdominal muscles clench. You feel tears burning behind your eyes. Over Bucky’s shoulder Sam looks on with an equally panicked look on his face. He has one foot pointing away from you like he’s wondering if he should go get someone but doesn’t want to leave in case you need him.

“Yes you can. I know you can. Just match me, okay?” Bucky murmurs in your ear. His flesh hand is running smooth lines down your spine and he’s rocking your body very slowly back and forth. He takes a very deep breath and you splutter and choke as you try to force your lungs to match his pace. “That’s my girl. C’mon keep following my chest.”

Your body collapses fully against Bucky now. You bury your face in the crook of his neck and hiccup as you try to force your lungs into breathing cyclically in time with him.

The burn behind your eyes increases and you feel yourself slipping backwards. You’re falling deeper into the water the way you were this morning. Falling away from the sun and the breeze.

“I’m drowning. I’m drowning, Bucky. Oh god.” You pant.

Bucky whipped back to look you in the eyes “What?” he breathed. He was scanning your whole face and body, like he was looking for the source of water in your lungs. He didn’t know you meant it figuratively.

“I don’t know what’s happening to me Bucky. I’m so scared.” You whispered. You could barely keep your eyes open. Seeing the pain on his face, the look of pure terrified confusion on Sam’s face was so painful.  

Bucky brought his metal hand up to cup your cheek. “It’s okay. It’s okay Doll. I’ve got you. Sam’s here. It’s okay.”

You buried your face into his neck again. You couldn’t look at him. You couldn’t explain. With your head buried, you missed Bucky throw a questioning look over his shoulder at Sam. You missed Sam shrugging his shoulders. Both of your friends, at a loss of how to help you. All they knew to do at the moment was make sure you were breathing.

The tears finally came. Big, hot, wet tears pouring from your eyes. Your body shaking with the force of them finally escaping after months of holding them in. You were incoherent. Babbling now as you just tried to rid your body of this demon of pain that seized every muscle. “Oh my god Bucky. I just… I let him do this to me. I… I’m such an idiot. I just… oh god” you were practically seizing in his arms now, he was holding tight to you like he was trying to keep pieces of you from cracking off.  

“What?” He choked out.

“Him!” You wailed. “I let him hurt me. I let him destroy who I am and I don’t even know why.”

Bucky was running a hand through your hair now. Softly whispering “Shhh it’s okay. It’s okay” into your neck. Sam had moved closer and placed a hand on your shin in quiet support. He had his head bowed and was looking at the concrete. You stayed in your tableau for a long time. Like a renaissance painting frozen in time. Slowly your heart beat went back to a steady rhythm and your breathing evened out.

Eventually, you sniffled and leaned back to look at Bucky. You were sure your hair was a mess, your face was splotchy and you probably had snot and tears running down your whole face. In fact, you probably got snot all over him. You really hoped it didn’t mess up anything in his arm.

Bucky looked at you quietly. He seemed to be waiting for you to speak, offering you a life preserver in a sea of uncertain emotions. Your voice was raspy when you finally spoke “I want to see Peter.”

Bucky just nodded and picked you up to set you on your feet. He backed away with his hands still on your hips, like he was worried you couldn’t stand on your own. “I’m okay.” you mumbled as you tried to smooth out your hair and use the sleeve of your t-shirt to wipe up your face. “I can stand. I’m okay.”

You turned and started walking back into the compound, the two of them flanking you as you began the trek to the med wing.

~0~

Upon arriving in the medical wing you snagged a tissue from a nearby box and tried to wipe up the rest of your face. You glanced at your reflection in one of the nearby glass panels and winced at how puffy and blotchy your face was. You tried to rub your face to even out the tone of your skin, but there was nothing you could do about how puffy your eyes were.

After walking farther down the hall you spotted Peter. Sitting up on a table where Dr. Cho was shining a light in both of his eyes. As you stepped into the room you just heard her say “A slight concussion. You should be cleared for activity in a week or so.” Before turning to put away all of her instruments.

“Hi.” You squeaked out. When Peter turned his eyes in your direction you nearly burst into tears again. He had brightened and smiled at the sound of your voice, but when his eyes hit your face his smile fell.

“Are you okay?” He asked. Sliding off the table to walk over to you. You glanced behind you and saw Bucky and Sam hovering just outside the door of the room. They were very obviously trying to watch you without looking like they were watching you.

“I think that’s my line.” You chuckle as Peter wraps you in a hug. Over your shoulder, Peter shoots a questioning look at Sam and Bucky.

Sam speaks up. “Someone got a little freaked when you got carried off the jet.”

Peter pulls back to look at you again. “Oh god Y/N. I’m okay. I promise. I just got a little overwhelmed when I realized I had let my guard down and panicked, and then I got dazed when I got whacked on my head. I’m okay.” When Peter notices the water fill up in your eyes he pulls you back in. “Oh please don’t cry. I’m fine. Just four stitches is all.”

“Bucky said you were only gonna need two.” You grumbled into his chest. Peter snorted. In the hall Bucky humphed.

“Four is not that far off, okay? I was close.”

Peter was rubbing his hands up and down your arms and laughing softly. “You know I think I’m supposed to be the one comforting you,” you noted, “this is sort of backwards.” Then all three of them were chuckling. You pulled back from Peter to look at him. “I’m sorry for being a baby, you just scared me.”  

“ I scared you?” Peter questioned “I think normally it’s you who shows up here all bloody and unconscious scaring the hell out of me, so I guess it was my turn.”

You chuckled a bit and grinned at Peter. His eyes lit up when he caught the upward tilt of your lips and he hauled you back against his chest. “I missed you, Y/N.” Peter said quietly.

“I’m right here, Peter.”

“Yeah, you are.” Peter sighed. Then he pulled back to look at you again. “Movie night? Maybe in the common room so everyone can watch? We haven’t finished the Fast the Furious movies yet.”

“Oh god I’m not watching if you’re past the third one.” Sam groaned from the hall. “They just went downhill after that.”

“Good news for you then birdman, we’re on Tokyo Drift.” Peter called out as he wrapped his arm around your shoulders to walk you out of the room.

“Who you calling birdman, spider punk?” Sam shot back.

You snorted. All three of them whipped their heads to look at you. “What?” you asked indignantly, “It was funny!”

Bucky reached out and mussed your hair. “There she is.”

You pushed back against his arm. “Oh shut up, Terminator.”

Sam buckled over and held his stomach as he cackled, Peter’s chest shook next to you.

“What’s a terminator?” Bucky asked, making Peter and Sam laugh harder. Peter had to lift his arm off of your shoulder to put his hands on his knees.

You patted Buck on his metal shoulder. “I’ll tell you when you’re even older, you dinosaur.”

Sam and Peter stumbled forward down the hallway together, wheezing through their laughter. Their arms placed on each other's shoulders, quoting the terminator and wiping tears from their eyes.

You and Bucky followed behind them on your way to the common space. When Peter and Sam were far enough out of ear-shot Bucky spoke.

“You okay?”

You glanced over at him. He had his eyes on the two men stumbling down the hall together ahead of you. He was trying for nonchalance, but you could tell he was still on edge.

“Yeah, Buck. I am. I will be.”

He turned to look at you then. His lips curled up into the smallest of smiles, but it was enough to get you to return one. He threw his arm over your shoulder and dragged your head into his shoulder as you kept walking. “Yeah you will.”

And he was right. You would be. Not all at once. Not right away. But you would be. The sounds of your two friends laughing up the hall was proof.

[shieldedbythunder]

9 &/or 16 please <3 Either way, your drabbles are always enjoyable.

Thanks so much, Stormy! For the prompts, and for being so patient <3 I really enjoyed writing these! Both of these can also be found on my ao3 account :)

9. You took all the pillows, so I’m using you as one.”

i’ll get by with a little help from my friends

“Alright,” Natasha says briskly, “you need anything, just give JARVIS a call, okay?” An authoritative tap to his shoulder tells Steve to raise himself up long enough for her to fluff the pillows up a little.

“Is all this really necessary?” Steve grumbles, letting himself fall back once she’s done. Scowling at the thick, white cast that entombs his left leg, propped up on an extra two pillows, like it’s done him a personal wrong. Which, in some ways, it certainly has. “I’m probably gonna be fine by tomorrow.”

One lucky hit. One lousy, lucky hit, he thinks to himself irritably, and he’s out of commission. He’s going to kick the crap out of Batroc the next time they cross paths. Or maybe return the favour; see how he likes an iron girder pinning down his leg.

“Well, you heard the doc’s orders.” The innocent, sympathetic look Natasha sends his way would almost be believable, if it weren’t for the telltale gleam in her eye; she’s loving every moment of his sulking. “Let the serum do its thing with the broken bone, and help it along as much as we can. Which means plenty of bedrest, no negotiations.”

“Yeah, yeah… I guess,” he mutters darkly. With a sigh, he lets himself sink back into the bed properly, willing the knot between his shoulders to ease out a little. “Listen, thanks for the help, you didn’t have to.” General irritation aside, he’s genuinely grateful. Natasha looks just about as exhausted as he feels, and yet she’d never left his side, from their evacuation in the field to the medbay and back up to his room; just as stubborn and loyal a trooper as himself.

“No problem. You sure you don’t want anything else?” Her job done, Natasha hovers by the door, hands on her hips as she gives him one last once-over. “The others should be back soon, so I’ve gotta head to the debrief, but some of us can stop by afterwards if you want.” Even with the lingering traces of mirth, her eyes are as shrewd as ever, head cocked as she watches him carefully.

“Naw… it’s okay,” he says, managing a smile. “It’s been a rough day, you guys look after yourselves. The last thing you need is baby-sitting duties. Really, I’ll be fine.”

And he will be fine, he tells himself as Natasha leaves with one last inscrutable look, her footsteps quickly fading away. It’s not the end of the world, just a day or two of bedrest at most. Nothing to make a fuss about.

It’s just… it all feels horribly familiar. The long hours cooped up in bed, days at a time during his worst spells. At the very least, all he has to worry about is boredom, rather than how every rattling breath tightens up his lungs that little bit more. The helplessness, an old, distant, but never forgotten chill gnawing at his stomach. It seems even his new body and all its wonders could only stave it off for so long.

On that thought, he exhales sharply through his nose as he shuts his eyes; wallowing in self-pity won’t make his leg heal any faster. He just needs to rest up and let his body take care of itself, like any sensible soldier. Sleep takes a while to come, but when it does, it’s mercifully deep and dreamless.

***

He doesn’t know how long he passes in fitful slumber. But the first thing that registers as consciousness slowly creeps back in is how dry his throat is. The second is the feeling of something warm and heavy resting against his collarbone. And the third is a deep, familiar voice close by, words pitched soft and soothingly low. His parched throat aside, it’s an oddly comfortable situation to wake up to.

His eyes cracking open, Steve shifts around enough to get a look at his bunkmate. “Thor?” he croaks out, unable to manage any better between the thirst and lingering grogginess. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, good, you’re awake!” Thor says lightly. Perfectly nonchalant as he sets down his book, reaching over to the bedside table to pass him a glass of water. Like this is just another Tuesday evening for them. “I should have thought that was obvious - you took all the pillows, so I’m using you as one. Speaking of which, would you mind holding still? I’ve just gotten comfortable.”

“No, I mean… what are you doing here?” Gratefully accepting the offered glass, Steve takes stock of his surroundings between gulps. He’s been out a while from the looks of it; it’s late afternoon by now, the sun low in the sky and bathing the room in bright golds and ambers. Casual in an old hoodie and jeans, Thor’s got his legs stretched across the empty side of the bed, as perfectly at ease as ever.

“Keeping you company.” Twisting himself around, Thor props himself up on one arm to give him a knowing look. “I know inactivity isn’t one of your stronger suits, so I thought you might like some distraction. And I talked to Tony, he’s arranging a movie night for you, so you can expect a full house tonight.”

“Thor…” Steve runs a hand through his hair, equal parts touched and exasperated. “I appreciate the thought, but you really don’t have to-”

“I know, I know I don’t have to. But… I still want to.” His smile losing its sardonic edge, Thor leans in a little closer. “Your first thought is always for others, for what they need before you. And…” He hesitates before laying one hand over Steve’s, squeezing it ever so gently. “I was worried for you, after your injury. Will you just… let me make sure you’re taken care of?”

… well. The prospect does sound inviting, delivered with such achingly heartfelt words. And with those soft, earnest blue eyes trained on him so beseechingly, Steve would defy anyone to resist. “... are you sure?” he asks, hedging even as his resolve crumbles. “I mean, Buck’ll tell ya, I get pretty crabby when I’m stuck in bed.”

In lieu of answering, Thor retrieves his book after a moment’s thought, smiling to himself as he finds his place again. “How features are abroad, I am skill-less,” he reads softly, the words almost musical in his smooth baritone. ”But, by my modesty, the jewel of my dower, I would not wish any companion in the world but you, nor can imagination form a shape besides yourself to like of.” His eyes are fond when he lowers the book again to look at Steve, with just a hint of amusement. “Does that answer your question?”

Ducking his head, Steve makes no effort to hold back his smile, even as his cheeks heat up. “You’re a real sap sometimes, you know that?”

“Well, it’s a good thing I’m your sap, isn’t it?” Thor chuckles, leaning in close to press a kiss to his forehead. Honestly, with this kind of bedside manner, he could grow to like mandatory bedrest.

“Will you keep reading?” Steve asks, letting his eyes fall shut again as Thor settles back into place against him. “Just ‘til the others get here?”

“Anything you want, love. Now, then,” Thor murmurs, licking one fingertip to turn the page, “where were we… ah, yes, let’s see what Ferdinand has to say to that…”

~~~~~

16. “Can you please just hold me?” (This one’s more inspired by the prompt, rather than including it word for word)

just a little change, small to say the least

If there’s one thing Thor’s come to appreciate in his time on Earth, it’s the concept of central heating.

It’s nearly a week now since Manhattan woke to find itself blanketed in the first snow of winter, with little respite since. Just beyond the tower windows, a whirling cloud of white engulfs the city, the reds and golds of Christmas lights twinkling intermittently through the haze. And of course, with the snow and the driving wind comes the resulting drop in temperatures. Not quite on par with Johtunheim, but still enough to steal right down to the bone, even through the thick layers they pile on whenever one of them feels brave enough to venture out on foot.

And yet, thanks to JARVIS and various other innovations of Midgard’s technology, the temperature within the tower walls remains at a pleasantly mild warmth. Enough so that he can comfortably stand stark naked in one of Tony’s bathrooms, all cool chrome and marble tiling, without so much as a shiver.

Not that he isn’t capable of generating his own heat under the right circumstances, Thor thinks to himself with just a touch of self-satisfaction. All the same, the wet washcloth he presses to his brow is a welcome balm, drawing out a sigh of relief at the bracing damp. Moving quickly, he gives his torso a thorough wipe down before running the cloth under the cold tap again, giving himself a moment to catch his breath. To savour the warm, syrupy drowsiness, all the pleasant little aches he’s accumulated over the evening.

Strolling back out into the bedroom, a smirk tugs at the corner of his lips at the sight of the figure still sprawled across the bed. “Comfortable, are we?” he asks, leaning against the door as he takes a moment to admire his handiwork.

Tangled in the rumpled sheets with one arm thrown over his eyes, his spent cock still half hard as it lolls in the groove of his hip, Steve looks every inch the cat who just got the cream. “Just give me a minute,” he murmurs, dreamy and languid as he stretches out with a groan of satisfaction. A far cry from the hoarse, desperate pleas for more he’d filled the room with just a few minutes ago, almost loud enough to drown out the slap of skin on skin. “Almost got the feeling back in my legs.”

Thor chuckles, allowing himself just a little smugness as he settles back down on the bed, washcloth in hand. “Here, let me,” he says, propping himself up on one elbow. With slow, sweeping movements, he wipes down the mess of their coupling, starting from Steve’s chest before gently working his way downwards to his ass. Watching the muscles shift and relax in response to the sudden cold, a trail of goosebumps erupting across the miles of pale flesh in his wake.

The sight would be enough to tempt a saint. Gods know it’s been enough for Thor, time and again.

Humming softly with satisfaction, Steve finally shifts his arm enough to look at Thor properly. Traces of his earlier flushed state linger, eyes half-lidded and hazy against the rosiness in his cheeks. His lips still slick and swollen red from the few frantic minutes he’d spent sucking Thor off, his fingers an iron grip digging into Thor’s hips as he’d fucked into that mouth, sinfully hot and wet, and gasped for Steve to touch himself. Thoroughly wrecked and utterly gorgeous, and a curl of heat reignites in Thor’s belly at the knowledge that it’s his doing. That only he gets to see their captain like this, touch him like this.

“Thanks.” Steve’s voice breaks him out of his thoughts, and there’s something inscrutable behind his satiated smile when their eyes meet again. “You don’t have to do all that, you know.”

“Well, I do owe you one for that rescue in Florence last week,” Thor quips, smiling at the chuckle the remark pulls from Steve. “But, really… it’s no trouble”. Not for you. He leaves the words unspoken, resting on the tip of his tongue even as his heart beats a little faster at the thought. But the quiet remains easy and companionable as he finishes his work, Steve’s eyes bright with mirth when he lets himself fall back on the mattress with a long sigh. Savouring the warmth radiating from the body next to him.

It’s one of his favourite parts of their trysts, these little silences as they allow themselves to just be in each other’s company. No world-threatening dangers, no responsibilities beyond the door. Just the two of them, sated and content.  A respite he’s always sorry to see come to an end.

As if in response to his thoughts, a jaw-cracking yawn swells up from deep in his chest; a reminder of the late hour, and all their exertions on top of it. “Well,” he sighs, heaving himself up off the bed, “I think that’s my cue to leave.” He hunkers down, even as his weary limbs protest at the effort, sorting through the scattered trail of clothing for what’s his.

“... does it have to be?”

Shaking his head, Thor grins to himself as he locates his underwear under the bed. “Don’t tempt me,” he chuckles, straightening up and casting an amused look back at the bed.

But Steve doesn’t return the smile, his expression thoughtful as he regards Thor. As if carefully measuring his next words. “I mean… it’s already late enough. You could stay, if you want.” He gestures towards the empty space next to him, watching Thor with careful, questioning eyes.

… oh.

It’s not an unpleasant thought. That much, Thor can parse out from the tangle of emotions the request sets off. But since they began this… whatever this is they share, there’s never been any expectation. Just an hour or two of pleasure and stress release between two friends, nothing more. And there’s something to be said for not upsetting the balance on a good arrangement.

It would be simple, to take the easy out Steve’s offered and be on his way. To let things go on as they have for the past few months. Just friends and teammates who occasionally fall into bed together whenever one or both of them need a good, hard fuck. Who always enjoy one another’s company, whether in sex or laughter or comfortable silences. Who set each other’s hearts racing with the merest glance or smile. Just friends.

So, all things considered… there’s really only one answer he can give.

“That… sounds nice. Thanks.” Even with his mouth dry, the words come as naturally as breathing. And though he tries to school his features, the sight of Steve ducking his head as he turns pink right to his ears sets an immense warmth surging in Thor’s chest.

Not that it quite assuages the hesitance he feels as he climbs back into the bed, eyes on Steve for any sign to withdraw or slow down. This isn’t new territory for him, or for Steve, possibly. But it is for them.

If nothing else, he clearly isn’t alone in his apprehension; Steve clears his throat awkwardly, eyes raised to the ceiling as they fix the covers. “Uh, JARVIS, could you get the lights please?”

“Of course, Captain Rogers. Sleep well,” JARVIS answers, smooth and discreet as the lights dim, until only a faint glow from the streets and snowfall outside remain. Leaving the two of them lying on opposite sides of the bed in near total darkness, a prickly, unsure silence stretching between them. The glint of Steve’s eyes is barely visible in the shadows as they watch each other. Waiting for someone to make the first move.

The spell is broken when Steve exhales sharply through his nose with exasperation before scooting in closer, and Thor has to bite back a laugh; leave it to Steve to step up first and take a dilemma by the horns. Throwing one arm across Thor’s chest, Steve settles himself along his right side, the crown of his head tucked neatly under Thor’s chin as he lays it down on his shoulder. Spurred on by the show of sheer stubborn confidence, Thor lets his arm curl around Steve’s back, his hand resting at the base of his spine. Noting how nicely they fit together, a thought that sends an odd little flutter through his stomach. Not an unpleasant one, though - quite the opposite.

“You okay?” There’s a familiar ring of the steadfast captain to Steve’s question, always checking in on his men. But it doesn’t quite mask the uncertainty of a man with his heart laid bare.

“Yeah, just…” He huffs out through his nose, smiling up at the shadows the snowfall sends dancing across the ceiling. “Trying to figure out why we haven’t been doing this part all along.” He strokes his hand up the length of Steve’s back, his palm spread broad and flat to his spine, and savours the shiver of pleasure that runs through Steve’s body. All of a sudden, he doubts he’s going to be using his own bed very much after tonight. Not alone, anyway.

“Well,” Steve finally answers, and Thor can hear the smile of relief in his voice, warm and content as the arm across his chest curls around him a touch more securely. Pulling them that little bit closer together. “We’ll just have to make up for lost time, won’t we?”

[no-gorms]

Hi! If you're alright with a request, can you do something with Steve or Tony sitting in the other's lap as a joke? Or refusing to sit in the other's lap? Thanks! Feel free to ignore this if you're busy or uninspired or whatever.

Hello, this is ridiculous but I hope you like!

Steve/Tony, lap-sitting, background Bruce/Nat (also on ao3)

+

It’s nice to visit the Barton farm on their own terms, without the threat of world annihilation looming over their heads. A city boy Steve may be, but he gets the appeal of the place – the peace, the quiet, and especially the (comforting illusion of) distance from the never-ending stream of Avengers-related problems back in the city. Here it is calm, and here they can recharge.

Not that the others seem interested in recharging. They’re all outside the house: Natasha and Clint are having an intensely polite disagreement on how to handle the grill, Thor and Sam are chasing and being chased by various Barton kids, and Bruce and Tony seem to be yelling at each other about the chairs.

Steve’s on the porch, a glass of lemonade in his hand. He follows the steps down, into the thick of Bruce’s huffing at Tony.

“That’s my jacket,” Bruce is saying, his hands on his hips. He’s looming over the only deck chair among the series of wooden chairs, in which Tony is sitting in with his legs stretched out in front of him.

“That doesn’t mean dibs,” Tony says. “If you wanted the deck chair—”

“Then I should have put something of mine on it to call dibs? Is that what I should have done?” Bruce looks up at Steve’s approach. “Cap, Tony stole my chair.”

“I already said that we can share,” Tony says.

“There are other chairs, Bruce,” Steve points out.

“It’s the principle of it,” Bruce says quietly.

“Look, right here.” Tony pats his lap. “Is it the view, is that what you want? Come on, make yourself comfy.”

Bruce hums thoughtfully. “What if I Hulk out and then sit on you?”

“Bruce,” Steve says.

“Maybe you can ask Cap to build you another one,” Tony says.

“I thought building things was your specialty,” Bruce says.

“Tony, just let Bruce have the chair,” Steve says.

“Why are you taking his side!” Tony exclaims.

“Because he knows a chair thief when he sees one,” Bruce says. “I could flatten you. Like that.”

“No, you’re what, 170? That’s nothing. Come on.” Tony gestures at himself, while Bruce’s face twists in irritation. “It’s early, but you can tell Santa Stark what you want for Christmas.”

“You’re both being ridiculous.” Steve doesn’t exactly know why he does it. It’s probably a combination of the easy atmosphere, Bruce’s petty seething, Tony’s petty mockery, and the refreshing ridiculousness of their arguing about a chair instead of anything really important, which makes Steve want to take the most nonsensical route as is befitting the situation.

So Steve sits on Tony’s lap. He does it over Tony’s squawk of surprise, his back facing Tony and his feet flat on the ground, with his knees and Tony’s knees in rough alignment. Steve takes care to spread his weight carefully to avoid squashing him, though the solid muscle of Tony’s thighs really do seem to take his weight just fine.

Bruce blinks a few times. His expression clears. “Okay, this works for me. Enjoy your deck chair.” He happily trots over to another empty chairand sits down.

“Nooooo,” Tony whines, his voice somewhere to the left of Steve’s neck. “I’m being crushed. I’m dying. This is cruel, even for you.”

“The view is nice, actually,” Steve says.

“Not that I can see anything now, thanks,” Tony grumps.

Steve takes another sip of his drink. “Why did Bruce want this chair?”

“He’s just holding a grudge because he thinks I took his chair on the Quinjet earlier,” Tony says.

“Did you?”

“Yeah, but that’s only ‘cause, like, I thought he’d want to sit next to Nat.”

Steve sighs. “Tony.”

“What!” Tony shifts a little, and Steve moves his weight higher up to reduce pressure on Tony’s knees. It’s kind of nice, actually – Tony’s lapis firm but with some cushiony give, though Steve will definitely get up in a minute or so once his point is made. “So if Bruce thinks I just have a weird chair-stealing fixation, then he can keep on believing that I’m dumb enough to not have noticed that that thing is going on.”

“Or maybe you can just not interfere at all,” Steve suggests.

“Oh please, like you haven’t not done anything yourself.”

“I haven’t been reduced to stealing furniture, no.”

“I have lows that will surprise even you.” Tony pauses. “As do you, apparently.”

Steve laughs under his breath. “Yeah.” He glances over at Bruce, who’s made his comfortable sitting in one chair, and his legs propped up on another. “Okay, Bruce is looking better, so please don’t antagonize him any more than necessary, all right?”

Steve starts to move his weight forward onto his feet but is stopped by Tony’s quiet: “No, Steve, wait, wait.” Tony’s voice is urgent and barely above a whisper. His hands come to Steve’s waist, fluttering lightly as though unsure if he’s allowed to touch or not. “Just – just don’t move yet, okay?”

Steve immediately tenses up, his first thought being that he’s hurt Tony. He carefully inches to the side a little, hoping to ease the pressure on Tony’s lap, and this is when he feels something twitch under his right buttcheek.

Steve freezes, Tony freezes, and the whole world briefly takes on the shocking glow of revelation, before it fades and devolves back to a relaxed and scenic daytime barbecue. A couple of yards away, Thor is holding Mjolnir out and letting a pair of the Barton kids swing from the handle.

“Ah.” Steve adds quickly, “Tony, it’s okay. You don’t need to freak out.”

“Me?” Tony says. “You think I’m the one who should be freaking out?”

Steve rolls his eyes, though Tony can’t see it. “I’m afraid to have to tell you this, but your appreciation of my ass is not subtle.”

“Okay fair, but, uh… that’s just, you know, aesthetic appreciation and this is, um…”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” Steve says gently. “You want to me stay until it goes down? I can tell you some bad jokes, if it helps? Sam told me some doozies the other day.”

Tony doesn’t reply. Steve moves again, only to find that the tell-tale length feels rather more solid than it was five seconds ago.

“Wait, really?” Steve says in disbelief.

“It’s sexy, okay!” Tony hisses. “When you’re sweet and thoughtful it’s really sexy! If you want to help, you need to not do anything or say anything.”

“All right. Oh.” Steve shuts his mouth and keeps it shut. At least, he tries to keep it shut and be quiet, but he’s compelled to say out loud, “Sexy? Really?”

“You know what does not help? You saying that word.”

“Sexy? Or sex?”

“Steve!” Tony digs his fingers into Steve’s sides, making him half-yelp half-laugh. “Come on, you’ve been really mean to me today!”

“All right, sorry.” Steve releases a slow, calming exhale. “I’m sorry, I’ll be nice.” Then, because he can’t help himself from grabbing a once-in-a-blue-moon chance, “Just like how your thighs are nice.”

“Steve!” Tony exclaims. “Uh. Really?”

“Very solid.” Steve nods. “Comfy.”

“Oh. Thanks. I mean, I try not to miss leg day.”

“Excellent results.”

“Cool. Very cool. Yep. Okay, you can get off—I mean, you can…” Tony groans, which is Steve’s cue to slide off of Tony’s lap entirely and parkhis butt on the significantly less-warm and less-comfy slats of the deck chair.

Tony swings his legs over to one side and plants his feet on the ground, so that they’re effectively sitting by side. Tony doesn’t cross his legs, but Steve can see that he wants to.

They sit like that for a handful of weighty seconds, while the smell of the grill wafts over. Someone might even have yelled that the food is ready, not that Steve’s been paying attention.

Steve clears his throat. “You feeling better?”

“Yep,” Tony says. “Much. Thanks. But I think I’ll stay here for a while.”

“You want me to get a plate for you?”

“You would?” Tony definitely aborts crossing his legs just then, which is all sorts of flattering. “Yeah, that’d be nice, thanks.”

Steve stands up. He could go and will go, but Tony’s starting to look miserable, which just won’t do. “Okay,” Steve says, firmly but kindly, “Iam sorry that I made you uncomfortable—”

“Geez, Steve,” Tony sighs.

“—but would it make you feel better if I had one, too?”

“I don’t…” Tony trails off, his eyes widening. He slowly looks up at Steve. “You do?”

“Not right now, but I could.” This is 100% the wrong place for this, but isn’t it just like Steve’s life to dangle opportunities at the most inopportune moment. “For you. If it’d make you feel better.” Steve wills meaning into the words, and doubly wills Tony to understand.

“I… think it would,” Tony says slowly. “But not right now. Like you said.”

“Later?” Steve says, just to be sure.

Tony nods. “Later. Okay. Yeah.”

Steve smiles, and feels a leap in his chest when Tony responds with a dazed smile of his own.

“Good,” Steve says softly, and bounds off to get some lunch for both of them.

Though Steve’s enhanced hearing means that he still catches Tony’s under-the-breath, “What just happened?”

[litttle-annie-adderall]

A Halloween Special (WinterSpider AU)

Summary: It's Halloween at the Avengers Tower, and the team plans a very special group costume. Peter is thrilled and can't wait for the event. Bucky, however, is decidedly not participating in the costume. Peter comes up with a plan to get his boyfriend to dress up in a costume and go to Tony's Halloween party.

Pairing: Peter Parker x Bucky Barnes

Word Count: 5.0k

Warnings: None really...lots of fluff... an excessive amount of smirking and blushing...

A/N: Here’s my self-indulgent Peter x Bucky Halloween fanfiction in July lol. It’s been up on my AO3 (@lynnnieee) for about a week now but I thought I might post it here as well! Thanks for reading!!!

Also, here’s a gif that has nothing to do with the story just brighten your day😊😊

Peter is more excited about this year's Halloween than he has been about any other in years. Usually, Ned came over, Aunt May ordered pizza, and they'd binge Halloween horror movie classics all night until they finally crashed on the couch in the early hours of the morning. Even last year, when Peter turned 18 and moved into the Avenger's tower, everyone decided not to do anything special. Most of them were just arriving home from a mission cleaning up some of the remnants of Thanos' visit to Earth and were too exhausted to carry out any sort of plans. But this year, things have been calm for more than a month now, the longest period of time in a while, and Steve had managed to convince Tony to throw a party in the tower on one of the multipurpose floors.

And for Peter, this Halloween only kept getting better and better. All of the Avengers planning on attending the party made a deal to dress up in costumes of each other. When Natasha had jokingly teased Sam with the idea, Peter was instantly excited. Though some were more reluctant than others, Peter and Clint managed to get everyone on board. Well, almost everyone, that is.

Bucky had sat back on the couch, drinking coffee from one of Tony's oversized mugs, watching his boyfriend and Clint try to rally the team together into a group costume. He had a smug look plastered on his face the entire time until Peter turned to him and Bucky realized he was expected to "join in on the fun" as well.

"No."

Peter frowned, "But Buck,-"

"No."

"It'll be fun-"

"No."

"Maybe you'll get somebody with a really cool suit, like Thor-"

Sam chuckled, "Or maybe you'll get an outfit like Nat's."

Peter bit his lip, imagining Bucky in a skin-tight, all-leather pantsuit, "Even better," His eyes gleamed bashfully.

Bucky smirked when Tony cringed from his spot behind Peter and muttered, "Eww."

Peter walked over to Bucky and plopped down in his lap, wrapping his arms around the man's neck. Bucky set his mug down on the side table so he could rest his metal hand on the small of Peter's back as Peter gave him the puppy dog eyes he knows Bucky has a hard time resisting. "Please, for me?"

Bucky smiled and brought his other hand to cup Peter's cheek, a small blush forming on the boy's cheeks. Bucky leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to Peter's lips, but then pulled away and still said: "Not a chance."

Peter pouted, "You're so mean to me," Causing a small laugh from the group.

Bucky chuckled and wrapped his arms around Peter's waist. "Come find me after the party, and I promise I'll buy all the Halloween candy I can find so that we still have our own after-party of watching horror movies all night."

Peter's cheeks turned even redder, knowing that Bucky's idea of an after-party will definitely include more than just candy and movies. He dramatically sighs but can't help the grin on his face, "Okay, fine."

"Good." Peter turns back around to face the group, who was in the midst of discussing the best way to go about deciding who gets to be who, when Bucky placed a soft kiss to the back of his neck. Peter doesn't think he could ever get sick of this, even when Bucky is being stubborn.

But Peter thinks that Bucky must've forgotten one thing, he can be equally as stubborn as the solider when he wants to be. So by the next morning, Peter had come up with a plan he believes to be pretty foolproof. The rest of the gang decided to draw names from a hat to determine who'll they'll come dressed as, but Peter requested his name be taken out of the drawing because, as he told Tony and Steve, he has a fantastic idea that he guarantees will get Bucky to cave on Halloween. He tells them not to mention anything to Bucky and refuses to disclose the details of his plan, saying it will just have to be a surprise.

Steve had smirked at him, telling Peter that he's hasn't seen Bucky in a Halloween costume since they were six years old, so if Peter needs anything at all, just let him know and he'll be happy to be of any assistance. Peter didn't realize Captain America could be so mischievous, but he liked it.

So today, on Halloween, Peter is fully ready to enact his plan, hopefully causing Bucky to laugh and come to the Avengers' party in a costume. The secret costume he picked out for Bucky is tucked away in the corner of the closet in Peter's room where he knows Bucky won't find it. He managed to put both of their outfits together for a pretty cheap price as they already had most of what he needed. Although Peter knows Mr. Stark has told him dozens of times to just ask if he needs money for anything, especially now that he's living in the tower, he always declines. It doesn't feel right to mooch money off of his mentor when he's already living in the luxurious Manhattan tower free of charge.

Peter's just about to pull his own costume for the night out of the closet when Bucky pokes his head in, knocking twice on the door. Peter looks up at him with a bright smile as Bucky walks in. "You getting ready for the party?" The man asks, shutting the door behind him.

"Mhm," Peter hums, pulling the bag out of the closet but leaving handles tied shut, "But you can't see my costume yet."

"And why's that, doll?" Bucky teases, sitting down on Peter's bed.

Peter sits down beside him, tossing his legs over Bucky's lap, "Because it's a surprise, so you have to wait just like everyone else." He responds playfully, knowing Bucky's already aware of that because he's asked Peter only about a thousand times over the past few weeks.

Bucky chuckles, shaking his head, "I still couldn't believe it when Stevie told me you decided not to take part in the name drawing when the whole thing was your crazy idea."

Peter smiles, "Hey, it was Clint's idea too!" Bucky laughs again, tucking his hand under the collar of Peter's shirt on the back of his boy's neck, running his fingers through the ends of his curly, brown hair. Peter leans his head back against the cool metal on his neck, his eyes falling shut for a moment as he makes a small purring sound that always brings a soft smile to Bucky's face. "And anyway, I know you're going to like my new costume a lot better." Peter opens his eyes, a troublesome glint reflecting in them, "But I made sure to stay in line with the theme!"

Bucky raises an eyebrow lightheartedly, "And you're really not gonna tell me?"

"Nope," Peter shuffles off of his bed and gently pulls Bucky up at the same time, "And you gotta go so I can change cause the party starts in less than half an hour."

"Alright, alright, I'm going," Bucky raises his hands in mock surrender with a smirk playing on his lips.

"You sure you don't want to come with us?" Peter asks yet again.

Bucky smiles, then leans over and pecks Peter on the forehead, "I'll see you out there, doll." Peter flushes at the soft touch and resists the urge to pull Bucky back and keep him here a little bit longer. Peter shoots the man one last grin before shutting the door behind him.

Although he is absolutely not going to partake in the costume swap, Bucky is a little excited to see everyone dressed up as each other. He wanders into the living room, planning on watching TV while waiting for everyone to meet up in their costumes, but mostly so he can laugh at whoever has to dress up in Nat's combat suit.

Not even five minutes after sitting down, he sees Sam coming walking into the common room from the small hall leading to the few bedrooms on this floor. "Even in a random draw, I'm still a damn bird," Sam says, throwing a bow over his shoulder on top of the arrow quiver.

Bucky snorts, eyeing Sam in Clint's Hawkeye uniform. He's dressed in all black, except for the underneath his vest, where a dark blue shirt with one short sleeve and one long sleeve sits with its collar popped. A quiver of arrows is hooked across the middle of his chest with a leather strap lacing over the bulletproof vest. But the bow and arrows aren't the only weapons Sam wears, though, as a gun is holstered on his left thigh and a knife is attached to his right boot. Sam completed the outfit with a black cuff on his right wrist, black combat boots, and a wristbow fastened to his left wrist.

Before Bucky can even say anything, another voice carries in from the hallway, "Woah, you look awesome!" Clint rushes into the room, "Right down to the details," He points to the knife on Sam's boot, "Great job, man! Now we'll just have to see if you can use that thing as well as I can." He nods to the wristbow.

Sam snickers, "I can't wait to see Steve's face when he gets a look at you." Bucky honestly could not agree more. Clint arrived in a full spandex Captain America suit, the colors notably much brighter and costume-like than Steve's battle suit. Clint obviously put muscle padding under the sleeves on his biceps and one of Steve's cowls adorns his head, as well as a tall pair of black combat boots, but the standout of the outfit is undoubtedly the blazing shield on his arm.

"Is that actually Steve's shield?" Bucky asks, looking at the reflective metal shield resting on Clint's right arm.

"You bet it is," Clint smirks, "I'm not one to half-ass it on Halloween!"

Bucky laughs harder as Sam raises an eyebrow, "Does he know you have that?"

Clint's smirk turns sheepish, "I may have asked Tony to get it for me as a favor." Sam rolls his eyes but chuckles nonetheless.

"Somebody say my name?" Tony opens the door from the main hallway, marching into the room in what Bucky automatically knows will take the cake for the most extra costume of the bunch.

Clint's eyes go wide, "Oh. My. God." Tony recreated The Falcon suit down to a T, even some slight smudges of dark dust and dirt litter knees and boots to resemble wear. Tony put on a maroon and gray military-grade suit identical to Sam's, a weapons' belts with a holster on one side and an array of knives on the other, slick metal boots with knee pads clicked onto the shoe rims, and automated gloves with red accents and tech lining the cuffs to control the wings. His eyes are covered by sleek goggles with red lenses and a gray strap.

Sam approaches Tony slowly, his eyes continuously flicking over the suit as if looking for any sign of flaw, "Do the wings work?" He eyes the red and gray harness resting over Tony's shoulders.

"Please, what do you think?" Tony smirks, pressing a button on one of the wrist cuffs. In a split second, maroon and silver wings shoot out from the pack on Tony's back, which begins emitting three soft, red lights. "I know your wingspan can go up to 50 feet at full stretch, but I figured a twelve-foot wingspan was good enough for a party."

"This is incredible, man," Sam slowly shakes his head, "How long did it take you?"

Tony shrugs, "Not long, Peter helped when I had to be in meetings."

"As much as I hate to say it, I'm impressed," Bucky says to Tony, although he usually hates to stroke the man's ego.

Tony's self-satisfied expression only grows, "Thanks, I know," He stares at Bucky's plain black henley and jeans, "Still not coming to the party?"

"Well, I can't now, how am I supposed to beat that?" Bucky says as if he had any plans to go in the first place, gesturing to Tony's extremely high tech costume.

Tony rolls his eyes but smiles, "Oh, I ran into someone pacing in the hall that I think definitely has this and everyone else beat." He turns his head to the door, "C'mon Capsicle, I think it's your turn to come in now!"

Bucky raises an eyebrow when Steve calls out from behind the hall doors, "No, thanks, I'm good out here!"

"Don't be shy, Steve, you look fantastic!" Tony yells back, his amused grin never slipping.

Steve groans loudly enough to be heard in the common room, but he pushes the door open anyway. "You know, I knew there was a chance of this, but I guess I thought my one out of six odds were good enough," He mutters, and, well... Bucky can't help the chortle that immediately leaves his mouth.

Clint doubles over, laughing so hard Bucky thinks he might cry, "This is the best thing I've ever seen in my whole entire life!" Steve growls slightly, but his face showers with embarrassment.

Sam pats Steve on the shoulder. "Don't worry, you look great, man!" He says, though clearly holding back cackles of his own.

Steve's face goes even redder, if that's possible, as he stands in front of half of his team in a one-piece, tightfitting, black leather pantsuit. The outfit is fitted with two belts, one around his waist for various weapons, and the other around his middle with a small red hourglass buckle pulling the suit even snugger than it already was. The top is unzipped down past his pecs, only inches above the hourglass. Black, fingerless gloves and tall combat boots (Bucky never noticed until now how many of them wear those) put the finishing touches on his costume.

Bucky tries to control his laughter, "How did you- Where did you-... Stevie?"

"Tony helped me out a little bit," Steve replies, still avoiding eye contact with everything but the floor.

"Did you end up figuring out who everyone drew?" Sam knowingly asks Tony.

Tony shrugs, "What can I say, there was a high demand and I'm the only supplier you all know, apparently. And not quite everyone, Nat and Thor both kept theirs very close to their chests, though I know they each have to one of the only two remaining on my list of unknowns." Tony suddenly rolls his eyes, "And don't even get me started on Peter. Since he's come up with his costume idea he won't spare a single detail except that it's still 'on our theme'. It's incredibly irritating." Bucky only smirks to himself, all the more intrigued at what or who his boy is going to show up dressed as.

"Yeah, I'm sure-" Steve starts to say, but stops when he gets a good look at Clint, "Wait, is that my shield?"

Clint puts the shield behind his back sheepishly, "Uh... no."

Steve gives Tony a stern look that is met with a one-shoulder raise from the inventor, "I owed him a small favor, now we're even."

Steve sighs and shakes his head, trying to keep back his grin, "I expect it to be returned without a scratch, Barton."

"Aye, aye, captain," Clint salutes him. Heels clicking echo out of the main hallway into the room and Clint's smirk widens, "And here she comes, ladies and gentleman."

"Well, hello boys," Natasha dryly smiles as she enters the room dressed completely in metallic red and gold.

"Natasha!" Tony blanches, "What have you done to my glorious armor! While you look undeniably stunning, that does not do my infamous technology any justice!"

Steve and Bucky roll their eyes dismissively at Tony's over-eccentric outburst, while Natasha's lip twitches in a way suggesting that this was the exact reaction she was aiming for. Her rendition of the Iron Man suit was powerfully feminine and she somehow manages to exude the same intimidation she always does while wearing a one-piece, bright, metallic, vinyl outfit. Her costume includes red knee-high, high-heel boots with golden tights pulled on underneath and matching red, metallic shorts layered on top of those. The shiny red top matching the boots has a high-neck collar and long sleeves, but with a slit over her chest emphasizing the shoulder pads to provide some of the bulk of Tony's armor. She pulled on gold, fingerless gloves and let her ginger hair fall down over her shoulders, a gold headband tied around her forehead.

"Your suit was a little bulky for me," Natasha smiles innocently, "I had to improvise."

"You look fantastic, Nat," Clint cheers from the kitchen as he grabs a bag of chips from the basket on the counter.

Natasha cracks and her smile turns genuine toward her best friend before she looks over the rest of the team and her lips titter, "Well, Steve, I think you pull off my suit even better than I do." Steve's cheeks enflame once more, inciting another laugh out of Bucky.

The door flings open again beside the group. Thor marches into the room completely covered in green body paint. "It looks as though everyone has outdone themselves tonight!"

"That's got to be some kind of fate that the most overly bulked out person here gets to be the Hulk, right?" Sam points out. Thor's costume is relatively simple and straight to the point. Aside from a pair of purple shorts with ripped bottoms, he painted his entire body in shamrock green paint.

"I hope you used actual body paint and not some kind of crap from an art store, Point Break." Tony grimaces.

Thor beams at Natasha, "Ah, yes, I had some help picking out the right kind of thing from tonight's Woman of Iron."

"Yeah, well, didn't want you turning green for a week."

"Yeah cause that wouldn't have been epic." Clint scoffs and mutters sarcastically, earning himself a glare from Natasha. She puts her hands on her hips and he slouches down in his seat, finishing off the bag of chips in his hand to keep his mouth closed.

"Am I the last to get here?" Everyone turns to see Bruce dressed in a replica of Thor's Asgardian armor with a long red cape flowing down his back and a foam Mjolnir in his left hand.

"Bruce!" Thor quickly stalks over to the scientist.

"Nope, we're still waiting on the kid too," Tony cuts in.

"This is sensational! We have switched roles!" Thor pats Bruce's shoulder a few times while asking, "How did you get my clothing so realistic looking?"

"Oh, um," Bruce nods his head towards Tony, "I had some help."

Sam shakes his head as Tony gives a shit-eating grin, "Like I said, supply and demand, folks, the making of a billionaire."

Bruce raises an eyebrow, "Did I miss something?"

"Of Tony's egotistical rambling?" Bucky snarks, "Consider yourself lucky."

Bruce ignores him, instead opting to ask Tony, "Did you end up getting anything out of Peter about his costume fro the night?"

Tony playfully pouts, "No, kid's keeping his lips sealed tight on this one."

Bruce chuckles and Steve smiles, "I guess you're due to find out any minute now then."

Speaking of Peter, Bucky glances back at the hallway leading to his bedroom door, looking for any sign of the boy. "Hey kid, you almost ready?" Tony calls out, "Heavy metal over here is getting anxious for your arrival." Bucky rolls his eyes to himself at the nickname, but tries to school his face, not wanting to show the slight truth to the inventor's statement.

Peter hollers back, "Yeah, just a second, Mr. Stark!" The door slams and then a thud is heard from Peter's direction along with a shout of, "I'm okay!" Bucky can't force down the smile that creeps onto his face as he catches a glimpse of Peter running down the hall towards the team. When Peter comes into his full view, Bucky freezes, taking in exactly what it is he's looking at.

Peter stands in front of him in an all too familiar outfit. The navy bulletproof vest, the dark long-sleeve shirt hiding underneath it, the brown pants with various sized pockets on the sides, the belt of empty knife holders around the boy's waist, the empty gun holster strapped to his thigh, the black lace-up boots, leather gloves, and not to mention the black mask currently unclasped and hanging off his boy's left ear. The shirt gives Peter sweater paws and the pants are so baggy around his legs that Bucky knows he must have pulled them from Bucky's closet. Heat rolls under Bucky's skin all through his body as he stares at Peter in front of him dressed like a smaller, cuter, and less-violent Winter Soldier.

Peter bites his lip, a soft flush rising onto his cheeks. Most of the team is smiling at him, while Tony's draw is dropped open a bit and Bucky just stares at him. "I couldn't quite solve how to do the metal arm justice but I figured this would be good enough," Peter gestures to the small red star patch sewn on into the left shirt sleeve.

Tony loses his stunned expression and lets out a loud guffaw, "I don't know why I'm surprised, seriously. I had a lot of ideas of what you might come dressed as, including the horrific possibility of a sexy Spider-Man, but admittedly this was not one of them." Peter's a little happy to have been able to shock Tony, honestly.

"Well, I think you did an excellent job, Peter," Steve says from across the room, looking knowingly between Bucky and the spiderling.

"Thank you," Peter cracks a small smile when he looks at Steve's costume and tries to hold his giggles in, "Wow, that's... quite the outfit, Captain."

Steve's face reddens into a blush matching Peter's. "It's already eight o'clock, I guess we should head on down to the party," Steve says to the group.

"Probably a good idea," Natasha shoots Peter a sly smile. She nudges Tony towards and pushes him towards the door when he tries to stay to see what's going to happen considering Bucky is still frozen in his spot.

"Just because you're me for the night doesn't mean you get to be the boss now," Tony mutters as the team exits the common room, Clint sending Bucky a suggestive look on his way out, but the soldier barely even registers it.

As the door slams closed, Peter looks back at Bucky with a shy smile. He anxiously begins to the wind his fingers through the dog tags around his neck - the only thing Peter was wearing that was not a part of his costume. Bucky had gifted him the tags for their one year anniversary, and he hasn't taken them off since. The sound of the metal clinking together snaps Bucky out of his Peter-daze and he instantly makes his way toward his boy.

Once he's mere inches away from Peter, he allows his eyes drag up and down the boy's body again, struggling to hold back his urge to drag Peter back to his bedroom as he ogles him. Bucky definitely has a thing for Peter in his clothes, and he knows Peter knows it too if Bucky's constant stream of missing shirts and jackets is any indication, but he never thought he would be this enticed at the sight of Peter in his combat uniform.

"So, what do ya think?" Peter says quietly, peering up at Bucky through his eyelashes with a kittenish smile.

Bucky shakes his head, unable to push back pleased smirk any longer, "I think I know exactly what you're doing." His hands fall to Peter's upper arms, moving slowly up and down.

"And what am I doing?" Peter steps even closer, their shoes bumping together, as he leans up on his toes to nudge his face closer to Bucky's, pressing a soft kiss on the man's jawbone.

"Peter," Bucky's voice drops warningly, only sparking more excitement in Peter. "I'm not going to the party." Bucky's hands trail down Peter's forearms to the tips of his fingers and rest on his hips.

Peter cuts him off with another kiss, this one beneath Bucky's chin, "Who said anything about the party? I'm just showing you my costume before I leave," A kiss below his ear, "I spent a while putting it together," Another low on Bucky's neck, "and I wanted you to be able to get a glimpse of it before I show it off to everyone else at the party." A kiss gently on his collarbone.

The sensical part of Bucky knows Peter is toying with him, but apparently his body didn't get the memo as he clenches his teeth, struggling to resist giving in, "I think everyone's really gonna like it," Peter stares at him with his big, innocent doe eyes, whispering, "don't you like me like this?"

A growl escapes Bucky's throat and he presses his thumbs into Peter's hipbone, but as he tries to move the final inch to press his lips to Peter's, the boy moves his head away. "Sorry," Peter grins coyly, "I should be getting to that party now. Don't want to be late."

He tries to step away, but Bucky's grip tightens on his hips, just above the empty weapons holster. "You really are a little menace, aren't you?" Bucky puts a hand under Peter's jaw, his fingers trailing over the boy's cheek.

"You really gonna make me go to the party alone?" Peter whimpers gently as Bucky moves his leg in between Peter's thighs.

Bucky huffs a sigh, and places a kiss on the top of Peter's head, "I can't believe I'm saying this..."

"But...?" Peter beams at him.

"We're going to leave early," Bucky tries to sound serious, but the ecstatic look taking over Peter's expression overpowers him.

"Deal!" Peter jumps up to press his lips to Bucky's before he whispers a soft, "Thank you."

Bucky just nods in defeat, "Alright, let's go."

Peter frowns, grabbing onto Bucky's hand before he can walk away, "You can't go to the party without a costume, Bucky."

"Afraid I don't have a costume, doll." Peter grins mischievously and Bucky stops, "You got me a costume, didn't you?"

Peter laughs and nods, pulling the man towards his room. "It's actually what triggered my costume idea too! I promise it's simple!"

Bucky chuckles as he watches Peter pull a plastic bag out of his closet, "I considered getting a suit fit for you, but no matter how perfect I know you would look, I also knew you never, ever wear it in front of other people, so I tried to do something basic instead."

Bucky raises an eyebrow but his silent question is immediately answered when Peter pulls out a hanger holding a long sleeve blue Henley shirt underneath a sleeveless, red zip-up hoodie with a black spider decal in the middle. "You can just wear blue jeans with it and your army boots, the red ones, to match." Peter hurries to say, "Oh, and one more thing," He leans over to pulls the last object out of the bag and hands it Bucky. "I don't use that one much anymore. It's the one from the first Spider-Man suit Mr. Stark made for me."

Bucky glances from the mask in his hand to Peter's hopeful face in front of him. For some reason, this party obviously means a lot to Peter, so he sighs, resigning himself to endless teasing from Steve and Sam for the next hundred years, "Only because I love you so damn much."

Peter bites his lip, "Really? You'll wear it?"

Bucky smiles teasingly, "What? Me giving in wasn't a part of your master plan? What tricks were you planning on using next?" Bucky wraps his arm around Peter's waist, laying their foreheads on each other, "Cause I'll bet I'd be open to more persuasion."

Peter flushes beet red but still grins softly at Bucky, "Of course it was part of my plan, but I wasn't- I just wasn't actually sure that you would do it in the end. I know Halloween isn't your thing and although I really, really wanted you to go I'd never make you do something you definitely did not want to do in the end, because you had to do that for too long and I love you too, and-" Bucky cuts off Peter's flustered rambles with a small kiss to the boy's lips.

Peter is still the color of tomato when Bucky pulls away, "There isn't anything in this world that I wouldn't do for you, doll." He smirks at Peter's outfit once more, "Especially when you're all dressed up for me."

"Bucky," Peter whines, dropping his head into his soldier's chest. Bucky laughs and Peter feels the rumbling on his temple.

"C'mon, let's get me all ready for the party." Bucky pulls back, "Sooner we go the sooner we can come back here, eat a shit ton of candy, and maybe," Bucky nods toward the mask, "we can put some of this webbing to good use." Peter bites back a moan and slowly hands Bucky the costume, trying not to fumble under the lustful gaze from Bucky that he's grown so in love with.

>>><<<

"Steve!" Sam says, pointing to the elevator that just let off.

Steves glances over only to find Bucky entering the room, all dressed up in a makeshift Spider-Man costume, with Peter at his side pulling him over towards Tony and Pepper. Steve chuckles and turns to Natasha, "Bucky in a costume at a Halloween party, I can't believe the kid actually managed to do it."

"I'm not surprised," Her lip quirks up, "He always goes soft when it comes to Peter."

Steve clinks his glass against Sam's and Natasha's in agreement as he watches Bucky stare at Peter's rambling with fond, loving eyes.

[occasionalfics]

touch every star (6)

main masterlist | thor masterlist | ao3 | previous 

Pairing: Thor X Cinderella!Reader AU

A/N: This is it! It’s sort of a miniseries but yup, this is the final chapter! Thank y’all so much for reading! Let me know what you think 💖💖💖

Warnings: Lots of angst, a really, really shitty boss, but overall this is probably the most pure fic I’ve ever written? Borderline 18+ at the very end but it’s mild as hell and mostly fluffy 😎

Words: 3,908

//

Always patient and responsible, Y/N decided she would give her two weeks at the end of the next day. She’d say nothing of Sitwell’s behavior, just move on quietly and hope something better came along.

She’d already looked at open listings on the company’s portal. There were so many jobs she could do, some she wasn’t exactly qualified for but seemed straightforward enough, and a few she probably wouldn’t even try to apply for, given her resumè and experience. Those were the ones that made Sitwll’s voice ring in her head over and over again about how she was nothing, she was just a clerical whore.

Y/N sighed and shook her head to clear the voice away.

She forced herself to think of her friends, of their faith in her. They made her believe in herself. But knew she wasn’t a firestarter, even if Nat’s suggestion was to burn the Accounting office to the ground along with Sitwell. Y/N was worthy and reliable, yes, she was sure of that now thanks to Nat and Wanda, but she was still someone who went quietly, but on her own terms. She could do both, and she was happy to do it that way.

But just before lunch, Tony Stark himself burst into the Accounting office. Everyone stirred, including Y/N, who watched incredulously as the CEO himself headed straight for her. She stood, and was just about to ask him what she could do for him when he asked, in a soft and careful tone that absolutely did not match the fire in his eyes, “Are you Y/N?”

She balked for a second, but nodded in the end.

“Follow me, please,” he said, hushed and hurried. And then he went right around her desk and into Sitwell’s office without knocking or any kind of acknowledgment.

“Mr. Stark,” Sitwell started. “What can I do for-”

“Stuff it, Jasper,” Tony interrupted. He turned to make sure Y/N was behind him, then held an arm out as a gesture for her to stand next to him. 

She looked between her boss and her boss’s boss, then hurried to do as the former said.

“You really took the piss this time, Sitwell,” Tony said.

Sitwell looked at them both, at Y/N who was trying not to cower beside the Boss To End All Bosses, and at Tony Stark, who’s eyes blazed with fury.

“I can assure you that whatever you’ve heard is a lie,” Sitwell said, eyes now stuck on Y/N. He glared at her like he had never been angrier in his entire life.

“Oh really?” Tony shoved his hands in his pockets and took a large step toward the desk. “You must have me confused with some idiot CEO, Sitwell. You think I don’t have this place surveilled? On the same floor as my security team, really?” He went forward and leaned on Sitwell’s desk like Sitwell had done to Y/N the other day. Only this time, Y/N watched in awe instead of fear. 

“You think I don’t have hours of footage of you verbally abusing this poor girl, forcing her to work so late she’s the last one in the building besides the nightly cleaning crew? Who the hell do you think you are?”

“Mr. Stark-” Y/N tried, to no avail.

He looked at her over his shoulder quickly. “No, Y/N. This’s been a long time coming.” And then, advancing once again on Sitwell, he lowered his voice. “Just because I’m a busy man doesn’t mean I won’t make the time to go back and watch every excruciating thing you’ve made this girl and the rest of your staff do and turn it back on you tenfold. Since my Director of Security is also on my board, I have that ability.”

“Yes, of course, Mr. Stark-” Sitwell tried.

“No, you shut the fuck up!” Tony said in an even tone, almost refusing to yell. Y/N was glad for it, at least. “All you’re hearing is me saying that this is a mark on your record, that once I leave this office, you might face a few small consequences but soon, everything will be back to normal. But I want to be crystal clear, no room for misunderstanding. You’re. Fired. Sitwell. And the second my team and I are done reviewing your tapes, expect to be served. Get your shit and get the fuck out of my building.”

Tony turned on his impeccable heel and marched out of the room. Y/N didn’t move for a split second, but then decided that following Tony Stark was a better idea than hanging out in a soon-to-be-emptied office with a man she hated. A man that had tried to knock her down every chance he’d gotten and was currently glaring at her, sweat dripping down from his bald head and around his nose.

A man who was no longer her problem.

She knew Nat was at the core of this altercation. She’d said something to Bucky, who’d said something to someone or maybe just went straight to Tony himself. She’d never be able to thank her friend enough for saving her, even if she’d asked not to be saved the night before.

Because, when she thought about it, Nat and Bucky or whoever caused this wasn’t just saving her. If Jasper Sitwell was fired - and he was - then he could never do what he’d done to her to anyone else.

When they came back to her desk, Tony closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. Then he looked at her in a completely different way from the glare he’d given Sitwell.

She could’ve sworn she saw kindness and empathy in that look. Maybe a hint of regret, too.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re done in this office,” he said quietly.

For a beat, her heart stopped as she thought that Tony Stark, the Boss To End All Bosses, was firing her, too.

But then he said, “I looked into your background a little. There’s a job in P.R. opening that a mutual friend of a friend - and your resumè - says you might be perfect for. It’s creative, in a much nicer office, and all yours if you want it. There’s a sign-on bonus and a raise involved, too.”

Of course she wanted the job. Being a secretary wasn’t her life-long dream, just the only job she’d thought she was worthy of, despite her degree. Until recently, that is.

Something still held her back, though.

“Mr. Stark, I-”

“Tony.”

“I can’t just walk into a job I didn’t earn, sir. Or even apply for.”

“Please, call me Tony. And our mutual friends’ word is reliable.”

Since she didn’t know exactly what “mutual friend” he might be talking about, and since she  was determined now to prove her worth, she pushed back. “You have no idea if I can even do the job. You haven’t interviewed me or anything!”

He sighed, and everyone listening to this conversation had to have seen the gears turning in his head. Tony Stark hadn’t kept his father’s company running the way he had by being bad at business, after all. Even if he was a genius scientist, he was still a genuinely talented CEO.

And one that cared, apparently. A busy man, like he’d said, but one that still came down to the Accounting office to take care of some little thing - comparatively, or at least that’s how Y/N would see it for a time.

“Fine. You’re right,” he conceded. “Take the rest of the day off, with full pay, and come in tomorrow for an interview. I’ll have my assistant email you the best times, so keep an eye out for that. Be prepared to present in front of me and my head of P.R. Clear?”

She nodded, and for the first time that day, smiled. “Yes. Yes, thank you, Mr. Stark.”

“You’re not gonna get the job if you don’t call me Tony. ‘S just the rules.” He shrugged as he backed up, turning quickly to the door, though not so quick that Y/N missed his smirk.

She saw it. She reveled in it.

And then she looked back at Jasper Sitwell through the glass office walls and gave him the most genuine, biggest smile she’d ever smiled.

---

“So,” Bucky said as he strode right into Thor’s office, no questions asked. Not even by Val, who gave everyone a hard time. “Did you hear about Accounting?”

Thor nodded. “I think everyone heard about it.”

“Right.” Bucky took a seat across from Thor, but didn’t look settled. His thumbs ran in circles over one another, and his foot bounced on the opposite bent knee. “I heard Sitwell’s secretary was offered a promotion, point-blank.”

“Where’d you hear that?” Thor finished up what he was doing on his computer, then sat back to really see his friend. His body language read all wrong, but Thor couldn’t decide what, exactly, was off.

“Tony.” Bucky shrugged. “Said she refused the offer without an interview. Something about earning her way and proving herself or somethin’ like that.”

“Sounds like a smart woman,” Thor said, completely oblivious. He wasn’t even subliminally wondering why Bucky was talking about some random secretary, just reacting to whatever the man said. “Tony can be impulsive when he’s emotional.”

“Oh my god,” Bucky whispered. Clearly, he knew something, but it only hit Thor when he asked, “You really don’t know, do you?”

Thor stared. “Know what?”

It took Bucky a second to respond. He kept a close eye on Thor, but he breathed heavily and fiddled with his left arm - muscle tears and scar tissue beneath his jacket sleeve that would be with him til the end of his days. Messing with the arm was another one of Bucky’s tells, one that Thor was confident enough in their friendship to read well.

“What’s going on, Barnes?”

Bucky sighed. “I probably shouldn’t be the one to tell you this. Nat said she wanted to do it herself, but the line out your office the other day scared her off and-”

“Who?” Thor interrupted. “What’s this about?”

“You remember Natasha, right? The drop dead gorgeous model I’m seeing?”

Thor nodded. “‘Course. Glad to hear it’s going well.”

“Well, her roommate was Sitwell’s secretary.” Bucky’s eyebrows rose, and Thor could just tell he expected Thor to know where this was going.

But he truly didn’t. He had no clue. Not even an inkling.

“‘Are you really that dense? What- she had to be, like, the only woman on the floor - maybe the whole god damn building - that didn’t come crawling up here for the chance of getting you to notice her.” Bucky shook his head, dropped his leg so both feet were flat on the floor, and leaned forward. “Thor, c’mon, man. Get with it, I mean this is so obvious! I shouldn’t have to spell it out for you-”

“And yet,” Thor interrupted again, “I’d like for you to get to the point anyway, James.”

That name was only used, in reference to Bucky, when his friends were tired of games. Thor wasn’t so much tired as he was perplexed and a little frustrated, but it was enough. The effect was the same.

“The girl with the interview - the only woman that didn’t come to claim the mask - is the one you’re looking for, dude. Nat’s roommate was Sitwell’s secretary, who was the only other person left on the floor the night you got on the elevator with a woman you didn’t know. I know for a fact she’s the girl you danced with at the gala, despite never having seen her, because their other roommate needed the dress she was wearing at the gala. Nat’s told me everything. Made me swear I wouldn’t say anything unless it was absolutely necessary but, my god, was it necessary.” He finished it all off with a laughing flourish, shaking his head in disbelief.

Thor sat straighter in his chair and, once more, just stared. He processed what he’d heard, tried to make sense of it all, and wondered why he hadn’t put it all together himself first. But he knew, with how little information he had on his Elevator Crush, he couldn’t have done it anyway.

Bucky’s girl was, apparently, the key. But he had to be sure.

“Bucky, did Natasha say how she knows all of this?” he asked.

“I assume Y/N told her.”

Y/N. Well, he finally had a name. He’d deal with the fact that he’d gotten it from Bucky before he’d gotten it from her later.

“But she… She never came. She didn’t even email me back about the mask, not even to say she didn’t want it.”

“Again, probably shouldn’t be saying anything but Nat thinks she’s scared.” Bucky picked up a pen off Thor’s desk, just to tap it against the nameplate that faced him. “Tony gave her the rest of the day off, so she’s gone home by now.” He smirked, tapped the pen once more, then put it down again. “But lucky for you, I happen to know her roommate pretty well.”

---

She was in her room organizing the things she’d brought home from her former desk when someone knocked on the door. Too engrossed in her work to get it herself, she yelled out for Nat since she knew at least one of her two roommates was home.

The day didn’t feel real. She’d had every intention of going into work with a job and coming out as a quitter, had never even fathomed that what had happened today was possible.

An interview? With Mr. Stark - Tony - himself? For a job he was ready to give her on sight, no questions asked?

She never would have accepted the position without a proper interview, but she did at least appreciate the thought. She’d appreciate it more when she had the chance to prove that she was worthy, when she could put herself on display for her new potential bosses and earn their respect with just her own two hands and intellect.

Which meant she had a lot to prepare for the next morning. She’d picked the earliest interview possible, so she might have the rest of the day for training or a celebratory walk through Central Park. It’d been so long since she’d had time and energy to explore the park, and even though it was starting to get cold out, she nearly convinced herself to go see it now.

But Nat called her name, which meant the park would have to wait. She wondered if her roommate had ordered lunch and forgot cash for a tip or something, so she picked up her purse to fish her wallet out before heading down the short hallway into the living room.

The whole world stopped then. Or at least it felt like it did.

Two men stood by the door - one of them had to be Bucky, if Y/N was guessing by the way he held Nat close to him. He smiled vaguely at her and sent a polite nod in her direction.

It was really the other man that made her stop, though. Tall and handsome, broad shouldered and bright eyed. Just like she remembered him. She couldn’t remember how long it’d been since she’d seen him in person, especially not with the way he was looking at her.

Like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

She just barely heard Nat clear her throat and announce that she and Bucky were leaving before they did. And then she and Thor were left alone.

Before she knew what she was saying, she let out, “You-you’re here.”

That seemed to break some of the tension between them. Thor went to step further into the apartment before he realized it wasn’t his space, so he backtracked. Y/N hardly noticed, since her eyes were glued to his face.

“I, uh, came to return this,” he said. One hand dipped into the inside pocket of his blazer, but Y/N didn’t look until he pulled something out.

Her mask. She’d all but forgotten about the thing by then, even though she’d gotten in that line the other day in an attempt to retrieve it. The mask had never been important, not even when she’d looked at that line, despite what she’d told herself.

In that moment, she knew she’d gotten in that line just to talk to him. To find out who he really was, even though Nat and Thor himself had already told her. She should have stayed, but she didn’t know it until this moment.

A moment where the past didn’t really matter anyway because there he was, standing in her living room. He was there for her, and she just knew it.

She approached him, accepting the mask even though it wasn’t important. “Thank you,” she whispered, surprising herself as her nerves kicked in. The only time she’d been nervous around him before was on that elevator. Now seemed a rather arbitrary time to feel that way again.

He didn’t move. Neither did she. They looked at one another and, clearly, could see the same battle in the other’s eyes. They each fought for what to say next, what to do next. This situation was unprecedented for them both.

Thor pushed through a lump in his throat and said, “Actually, that’s not why I came.” He made sure to keep eye contact strong, but not intimidating. Honestly, he liked looking at her more than anything, and he wanted to read her reaction to what he said next. “I’m Thor, and I didn’t really know how else to find you. This was Bucky’s idea, really. Well, no, the mask was my mother’s idea- and now that I say it, I realize how embarrassing that is.”

She laughed and shook her head. “No, no. That’s...cute.”

His smile widened at her approval. His fingers rested just beneath hers, because as much as he was confident in what he was saying, he was still cautious. After all, she had run away from him twice now.

“But I needed to know, one way or another, who you were. Why I kept being pushed toward you. And you didn’t even answer my email so I’d all but given up, and then in storms Bucky looking like he knows every secret about you and-” He sighed. Bucky clearly hadn’t known that much about Y/N, but that didn’t stop him from feeling...well. Jealous. “I had to know.”

Her mind immediately screams I’m no one.

Jasper Sitwell had not been the first person in her life to say so. Her stepmother had done just as much damage, usually when her father hadn’t been around to protect her. 

But she had removed herself from her stepmother’s clutches, and she’d proved to be a bigger person than Jasper Sitwell. She’d gotten herself an interview for a better job and suddenly had the opportunity to make something of herself-

So no. She was not no one, not nothing. Thor being in her apartment only made her think he saw something like that, too.

“I’m Y/N,” she said, placing the mask on one of the end tables with her equally useless wallet. “And up until recently, I didn’t think that meant anything. But I was wrong.” A surge of confidence boosted her, and she grabbed one of Thor’s hands between hers. “I don’t know you well, Thor, but I’m pretty sure you’ve gotten this far by thinking I was worth something. I’d really like to thank you for that.”

---

SIX MONTHS LATER

The town car was parked at the end of the row, with only a handful of empty cars that were situated at least seven spots away. The party had already started, which meant they were not likely to be disturbed, at least not for a little while.

That was the thought process Thor had used to seduce Y/N into the back of the car - the rented car - where he now pinned her body to the seat with his own. There was barely space enough to breathe, especially given how electric their kiss was. And how sweltering the New York summer was around them. But neither had power over the connection, so they succumbed to it, drank in the energy and tension and let it wash all thoughts of a posh and somewhat unnecessary summer solstice party away.

Thor knew that, eventually, they would have to go back in. This was his mother’s party, one she threw every year. It was the first time he was bringing Y/N to an official family function, and he was...nervous. Actually, really nervous. She’d already met his parents but Hela and Loki were in that building, and they’d somehow evaded them both before sneaking back out to the car.

His solution to those nerves was to keep her to himself for as long as he could. She calmed him down while simultaneously riling him up. She kept him grounded even when he felt like he was flying.

It’d only been 6 months since they’d finally, officially started seeing each other but he was sure he loved her. It wasn’t so much that knowledge that put him on edge, but the idea that showing up together tonight meant that everyone else would know how important she was to him. Even his siblings.

But when he really thought about that, the nerves melted. Some totally normal feeling settled, and he felt...content.

One of his hands attempted to run up one of her legs beneath her heavy, pale blue velvet gown, but she stopped him and pulled her lips back from his. The look in her eyes was playful, but she shook her head.

“We’ll spoil the whole evening like that,” she whispered, chest rising to meet his quickly as she tried to reign in her breathing.

“Screw the evening,” he retorted, attempting to dive back into the kiss.

Her free hand stopped him by his shoulder. “I did not fight with the zipper on this dress and spend two hours doing my makeup and hair to have you mess it all up in the back of this car, Thor Odinson.” She tapped his shoulder, disguised as a meaningless slap, and he relented.

“Fiiine,” he whined, head slumping against her shoulder. “But the second either of us is bored, we’re out. Deal?”

She giggled and ran her fingers through his freshly cut hair. “I’d say that’s fair. Deal.”

“In the meantime,” he murmured, kissing up her neck and along her jawline, “if I keep my hands here,” as he pressed his fingers into her waist above the velvet dress, “can we stay like this for...five more minutes?”

Their eyes met just as she was rolling hers. He kissed her, knowing he’d gotten his way.

“Five minutes, no more.”

He kissed her quickly.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“Not my fault you’re irresistible.” A quick peck. “Absolutely ravishing in this dress.” A longer, more meaningful kiss this time. 

“Hey Jarvis,” she called out into the empty cab of the car. When the familiar voice responded, she told it, “Set an alarm for five minutes, and lock the doors until it goes off.”

Thor shook his head, ignored Jarvis’s response, and went right back into the kiss.

[sauntered-vaguely-downward]

Flight. Loki x Reader.

SO HEY! Its been a while. Uni is hard guys like damn so much work! But anyways, lockdown is happening in the Uk So im bored and procrastinating on my last essay so here have this slightly shitty loki x reader. 

“I do not wish to go anymore, I think perhaps I would be better if I stayed here, help Banner with the computers and intel,” Loki protested. “I’m sure I would be more use here than wherever it is you’re going off to in that… that… metal bird.” 

“Oh no no no… I am not leaving you alone in my building,” Tony snapped. “You are coming with us so we always know where you are, I do not trust you one bit not to destroy my building.” 

“Thanks for looking out for me Tony,” Bruce sighed. “Loki your skills are needed in the field, you won't be of much use to me here, I need to focus on the screens and well… you struggle with technology as simple as the fridge, I don’t quite think you’ll be much help when it comes to the computers.”

“But I do not want to go… not on that thing,” Loki pointed to the jet they were loading with gear, not hiding his disgust at the metal bird before him. Now Loki may have been a god, a god who had travelled from planet to planet, through time and space, but he was not a god who was accustomed to the ways of travel here on earth. 

When Loki had first returned to earth after his attempt at taking control of its people, he had managed to avoid using the methods of travel the humans used as much as possible. His first experience was on a bus. He hadn’t much liked this, one because he found there were far too many people around him, and two the driver seemed to aim for the holes in the road rather than avoid it. His second experience had been worse. He’d been travelling with Thor from one side of the city to the other by the subway. The first couple of stops were fine, but as more people joined and the gaps became further apart, Loki began to feel far too overheated, his head spun trying to make sense of all the sounds around him, and before the doors were open at his stop, his stomach began to churn so much he could no longer hold in its contents. Loki had other experiences with travel of the mortals all of which he found rather displeasing, but this was to be his first experience with any form of aircraft, aside from when he had been captured but he had been far too preoccupied at the time to focus on the jet or worry. 

Loki simply did not want to get on the jet before him. He had no faith in the humans, and thought it highly unlikely they would be able to build a craft that would hold all of the team in the air for the duration of their trip. Loki didn’t particularly want to meet his end through crash landing in some godforsaken land. 

“You scared of a little plane?!” Tony mocked, not being able to contain the joy and laughter that escaped him at the thought of the mighty Loki being scared of a little jet. “Ha, not so amazing are you?” 

“Hey cut it out Tony,” a voice called from inside. Y/N came out, carrying with her her own crate needed for the mission. Steve rushed to her side to assist her, taking the crate and loading it alongside the other boxes already inside the jet. 

“Nice to see you’ve finally joined us,” Clint smirked, knowing full well Y/N had overslept again, something that happened on the regular. 

“Shut it,” she smirked back. “Tony don’t be a dick alright? If you’re not used to flying like this it can be scary alright, I doubt anyone here wasn’t scared the first time they got on a plane, you included, so leave Loki alone otherwise you can deal with me.” Tony knew not to test this out. Y/N was nowhere near as scary as Nat, but that didn’t make her as deadly. Y/N had the power of mind control and reading, and anytime anyone annoyed her she didn’t stop herself from sharing their deepest darkest secrets. Last time Clint had wrong her the whole team had not only watched him dance like a chicken for thirty minutes, but had learnt that in order to sleep he had a little blanket he liked to rub against his nose. 

“Thank you,” Loki smiled softly. Y/N had always been so kind to Loki, he was never too sure why, it wasn’t as if he deserved it. She always had his back, helped him understand things and had the patience to keep helping evening when he took a while to understand. She was always the first to volunteer to spar with him, happily taking him on with or without his powers. 

Loki hadn’t ever felt a connection as close as he felt with her, everytime she was near his heart felt a little bigger in his chest, its rate increasing with every breath he took. He hadn’t ever experienced a feeling like this, and certainly not towards a mortal woman, but he knew what it meant. 

“That’s alright sweetie,” she smiled, coming to his side while they waited for the rest of the packing to be done. “How about you sit beside me on the jet, it’s a bit of a long flight but I’ve brought some little travel games. Personally its not the flight itself that bothers me its having to listen to Thor and Clint discuss who has bigger muscles.”

“We do not do that!” Clint barked.

“Although if we were to have that conversation it would certainly be me,” Thor said quietly, earning himself a grin from both Y/N and Loki. 

Y/N and Loki boarded the plane when it was ready, and as agreed Y/N had sat beside him. From her little bag she pulled out a small plastic box. 

“It’s travel checkers. I also have travel connect four if we get that bored… oooh and pen and paper to play hangman and that box game…” 

“Sounds like a wonderful distraction to me,” Loki was not too interested in the games she had brought with her, although he was grateful she had, no he was more interested in the woman that sat beside him. The best disraction was not going to come from moving small magnetic checkers pieces around a board or haning a man if she spelt his word wrong, no the best distraction for him would simply be listening to her talk and knowing she was by his side. 

The pair played most of the games for the duration of the fight, and so far Loki had not once thought about the fear of flying he had once possessed. Y/N made for a wonderful companion to have on a worrying trip so he had felt most at ease for the most part of the journey.

“Hey guys,” Steve called over his shoulder from his position in the pilots seat. “The next bits going to get a bit rough, just hold tight.”

He wasn’t lying. The small craft began to feel as though it was being hurtled through the sky by an unknown force that made it bounce up and down along the clouds. Loki instinctively hung onto the arms of his seat feeling as though his whole body was being shaken around inside a glass bottle. Even the other Avengers, seasoned flyers, felt queasy as the plane hurtled forward. 

Loki tried a breathing technique Y/N had taught him for when he got mad, however the repetitive in and out seemed to not help at all. 

Y/N, who like the rest of the team was struggling with the constant jumping of the plane, remained as calm as possible. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Loki’s hands gripping so tight on the armrest that his already pale hands became as white as snow. His panicked breaths echoed around her. Without thinkin about it, wanting only to help the man beside her, she placed one hand on top of his, tightly enough so he would know she was there, and with the other pulled his face around to face hers. 

“Hey, Loki,” Y/n said sweetly, looking at him as his eyes remained tightly shut. She couldn’t help the little jump in her chest as she looked at him. Y/N had taken a liking to him and hated seeing him like this. She would do everything in her power to help him get through this. “Hey, look at me sweetie.” 

Loki did as instructed, his panic lessening as he looked into her eyes, getting lost in them as if they were their own star system. 

“That’s it,” she smiled softly, trying to assure him it was going to be okay and not show her own worry as the plane continued to be thrown around the sky. “It’s okay I promise, this is normal okay, it’s just because of the bad winds today okay. This plane is the best out there and will get us there safely okay.” 

“Okay, okay…” Loki breathed, trying his very best to focus on her. His eyes traced the lines of her face, studied every freckle, every stray hair from her bun. Loki realised just how beautiful she was right now, seeing her completely for the first time. Just as his breathing began to slow, Steve made another announcement. 

“We’ve got to make an emergency landing, were in a storm, hold tight… it’s going to get worse.” 

Instantly Loki began to panic again, his hand gripped Y/N’s as his breaths began to quicken once more. Y/N watched as he once again shut his eyes tight and the fear began to radiate off him again. She had to try and help him, she hated seeing him like this, she needed to take his mind off it. Without thinking it through, Y/N leant forward and pressed her lips against his firmly to try and bring him back, to take his mind off the panic. As his lips remained still against hers, she suddenly realised how this was perhaps not the best method of distraction. She went to pull away when his lips began to move against hers. 

The panic of the plane hurtling to the ground began to fade, instead his body began to react to the sensation of her lips being pressed against his. His chest remained tight, but this time it was because of her, the way he made her feel in his heart. His facial expressions began to soften and he let go of his tight grip on her hand to allow it to find her cheek. 

As their focus became just each other, both allowing the kiss to become more than just a distraction, the plane began to slow, finally coming into land. Neither noticed as they reached safely until Tony cleared his throat.

“Can I be the first to say ew? Your reaction to our plane potentially going down was to kiss?” He chuckled. 

“Shut it Tony, you peed yourself a little during that so you can hardly talk,” Y/N bite back, reading his thoughts as he mocked them. Tony soon shut up. “Sorry I shouldn’t of just kissed you, that was probably kind of weird for you,” she said quietly so only Loki could hear. 

“No, don't apologise,” Loki smiled, taking her hand in both of his, “I’m not the best with interaction, particularly with mortals, but you make me feel something I haven’t before, that kiss made me feel it even more… I wouldn’t mind you using it to distract me more often.” 

“That can be arranged,” she smiled, leaning in once more so their lips joined. Perhaps that was the best distraction method she could find after all. 

[nicole-lynne]

A Pair of Dummies

Hi there! This was a request from a lovely nonnie and I hope it finds its way back to them.  “I was wondering if I could request a fic where you have eyes for Steve and Bucky tells you to go flirt with him, but Steve’s being an oblivious little butt and doesn’t get what you’re doing. So later you just tell him that you like him.”

Pairings: Steve Rogers x Reader Warnings: Some minor cussing

It was three in the afternoon and the only sounds in the gym was the sound of Steve’s weights slamming together after each rep and Bucky shouting commands as he paced around you on the mat. However, your gaze was focused on Steve’s back muscles tensing each time he pulled the weights back and the tiny little grunt he would make.

“Hello?! Anyone in there?” Bucky’s punching mitt slapped against the side of your head, knocking you sideways. 

“Ow, what the hell, Barnes?” You snapped as you tried to shove the super-soldier but he didn’t move an inch. 

He chuckled smugly at your failed attempt, “maybe if you’d been paying attention to me instead of Steve’s ass, then I wouldn’t have hit you.” 

Your mouth gaped open and closed like a fish, trying to think of some comeback. ���I-I wasn’t- you don’t- just shut up and put your hands back up, buddy boy.” You wiped off a bead of sweat with the back of your hands and got back into the stance. 

Bucky worked around you in a circle while you worked through the combo he’d showed you. You shot your leg out and kicked against the mitt roughly and he shook his hand. 

“Okay, that one actually had a little bite to it, kid. Ya know, you don’t have to be so defensive about crushing on a certain Avenger.” 

You swung your fist hard toward Bucky’s head but he ducked just in time. “I have no clue what you’re talking about.” Your breath was starting to get heavier as he moved quicker. 

“Hey, I totally get it. He is literally America’s wet dream. The perfect man. He embodies everything about the apple pie and the white picket fence.” 

Annoyance was bubbling up in your stomach so you hit a two punch combo, hitting the mitt with a loud smack. “Barnes, you are so insufferable.” 

“There’s no need to be so elusive. I’m just saying, I think I saw a little bit of drool coming out of the side of your mouth.” He pointed to the corner of his mouth for a moment, giving you the very opening you needed. With lightning reflexes, you threw your fist out and were centimeters away from connecting with his jaw when Bucky grabbed your hand and flung you onto the mat. 

A little puff of air escaped your lungs as your back connected, Bucky’s body sitting on top of you, holding your arms pinned back. Dropping your head, you growled with frustration. Both of you were drenched in sweat and it was making your back stick to the mat uncomfortably. 

“You didn’t really think I’d let you get me, didcha?” He mocked. 

“I’ll admit, I thought I might have a small chance.” 

Bucky rolled off you and held his hand out, hefting you off the mat in one swift motion. Dropping a heavy hand on your shoulder, he steered you toward the locker rooms. Steve was still in his own world, ignoring the two of you leaving the area. 

Rounding the corner out of his sight, Bucky spun you around and rested his hands on your shoulders. 

“Be honest, kid, you into Steve?”

Your eyes widened comically as Bucky stooped down to your level, making extremely pointed eye contact with you. An unease settled in you and you shifted your eyes down to look at your sneakers.

This wasn’t really the type of thing you wanted to talk to your friends about, let alone his very best friend. You had cleverly avoided discussing your embarrassing crush on Steve Rogers for two years, opting for admiring him from afar.

“Buck-”

“I’m not judging you, I just want to know if I’m wrong because if I am, I’ll shut up right now. But I’m telling you right now, I think you’d be good for him.” 

“Uh,” wait, did you hear that right? “Wait, what?” 

“Steve is a dummy, always has been and getting the serum didn’t help him any. I see him perk up when you’re around, though. I think you’d be a good fit with him. You’re ballsy, intelligent, albeit a smart ass, and you don’t push...that much” 

When Steve had first started helping Bucky reintegrate into modern society, you had casually taken him under your wing. First it had started with tiny things like getting him to participate in small talk, then it was going out in public so he could realize that civilians didn’t worry about him. Gradually, you started hanging out all the time. Bucky quickly became one of your best friends at the compound. 

It was clear that he still struggled with PTSD from his time as the Winter Soldier. You never acted like it was something he should be over already and you tried not to push him into talking about it for the most part. 

The longer your friendship went on, you assumed that Steve would hang out with the both of you more, but he always kept his distance.  He’d have small conversations with you, but more often than not, he wouldn’t move any further than ‘how’s the weather’ or ‘Tony called a meeting’. 

Hesitantly, you shrugged Bucky’s hand off and took a step back. “But...Steve doesn’t even like me. Why would I be into him?” 

“What the hell are you talking about, you doo-doo bird?” 

Offended at the implication, you scowled. “I mean, Steve doesn’t even talk to me for longer than five minutes, so why would I be crushing on him, ass-hat?” 

“Boy, you two are dumber than I thought.” Bucky mumbled to himself. 

“Excuse me?” You squint your eyes and took a menacing step toward him. 

He looked back at you and held his hands up, stopping you in your tracks. “Calm down, killer. What I meant is, you are both missing the obvious. Steve is just too stubborn so he thinks he doesn’t deserve happiness, which comes in the form of you. And you, well I’m not sure why you haven’t pursued him, but I just don’t think you’d be staring at him as much as you do if you didn’t like him.” 

Your shoulders sagged in defeat. Why, oh why, did you have to be best friends with a sniper? Of course he saw right through you from a mile away. 

“He doesn’t like me, Buck. How am I supposed to get anywhere with him if he won’t talk to me about anything but the weather or how many cookies Thor ate last time he was on Earth.” 

“You’ve got to flirt with him, knucklehead.” Bucky smacked your shoulder. “He’s not gonna get the hint unless you actually act like you’re into him. Ya know, maybe ask him out to a meal or something. And talking about Thor isn’t gonna help the situation so cut that shit out right now.” 

“But-”

“No buts, just go out there and flirt with him like the woman I know, love, and wish would get a life.” Then he was shoving you back towards the weight room with a huge shit-eating grin on, ignoring your shouts of offense. Hesitating for a moment, you glanced back to see Bucky shoo-ing you forward. 

Letting out a huge sigh, you walked around the corner and slammed right into a large wall of muscle. Steve’s hands shot out and steadied you, the contact making your skin break out in goosebumps. He’d put his shirt back on and the blue was making his bright eyes even more hypnotizing than normal. 

“Whoa there, sorry doll, I didn’t see you there.” Steve chuckled bashfully. “I thought you and Buck left a while ago.” 

“We did. But we didn’t really, we were just talking. I-I came back to talk to you, actually.” It felt like you were sweating more than you had been during your workout. His hand was still on your arm and you couldn’t focus on anything but that sensation. 

There was no reason for you to be so irrational right now, he’s just a man. Just a man who had saved the country and the entire world numerous times and was America’s Adonis. A man who also just happened to always have the most flawless hair that you always wanted to run your fingers through. Lord almighty. 

“What did you want to talk about?” 

“Ope, um,” crap, you hadn’t thought that far ahead. Here goes nothing, “I...just wanted to tell you that you looked really great during your workout today.” 

He gave you a puzzled look, “Oh thanks, yeah I was really burning steel in there.” 

“I could totally tell.” You reached forward and felt his bicep, “it looks like it’s really paying off for you.” 

Steve’s gaze fell to your hand on his arm before giving you a small smile and you promptly let go again. “I think that might be more thanks to the serum than the workout.” He teased. 

You chewed on your bottom lip, wracking your brain for what to say next. You weren’t good at flirting, it’s why you never did it in the first place. Bucky said to ask him out for lunch. “I guess you’re probably right about that. Well, I bet you worked up a huge appetite after that, huh? All that hard work.” 

“For sure, I could eat a buffet out of business after a workout.” 

Here was your chance. 

“Would you want to-” 

“But I’ve got a meeting with Tony in like twenty minutes so I’ve got to get a move on.” Steve kept talking and you grimaced slightly. “Did you have anything else you wanted to talk about?” He tilted his head, a little half smile on his lips. You wanted to leap forward and press your lips to his but that probably wouldn’t go over well, so instead you just shook your head confidently. 

“Nope. I’m all good. Enjoy your meeting with Tony!” You called in a sing-song voice as he made his way to the door. He rolled his eyes at the mention of Tony and waved back at you before letting the door swing shut. 

The air deflated out of you and you fell back onto the wall behind you, sinking to the floor and curling your knees up to your chest. If someone were to look up “embarrassing” in the dictionary, that interaction would be found. And you still hadn’t even made it past five minutes. 

“Oof, that was painful.” 

You lifted your gaze to find Bucky leaning on his shoulder above you, still in his workout clothes. Great, he’d heard the whole thing too. 

“Why did you make me do that, you ass-hat?” You yanked on his leg hair harshly, making him jump further away from you. “I’m not good at flirting!” 

“Wait, is that what you call flirting?” He exclaimed baffled. 

You scowled up at him, “I’m not friends with you anymore.” Dropping your head back against the wall, you closed your eyes in hopes of going to your happy place - without Bucky around. 

“It wasn’t that bad, kid, it just wasn’t much of anything. You started off strong but...” He crouched down so he was at eye level with you.

“But nothing. I’m an embarrassment and I will never be talking to Steve ever again.”

“No, no, no, stop being ridiculous. You just have to...flirt better. Maybe you could ask Tasha if she’d help you.” 

You flung out your hand and pushed Bucky hard in the chest, making him tip backwards onto his butt. “Not happening, Barnes. I’m not asking the Black Widow,” you emphasized, “for help flirting with Captain America. You can just forget this ever happened and I will resume being friends with you in one to two weeks - you will be notified.” 

Bucky was chortling and yelling at you to stop, but you’d already stood up and were booking it to the hallway, letting the door slam loudly on the way. 

~~~ 

Life had been perfectly fine when you were admiring Steve Rogers from afar. You were content with pining for him but knowing that nothing would ever happen, resigned to the fact that you would find a good man someday and that would be the end of it. 

What you hadn’t expected was Bucky butting his nose into your business and telling you that you’d be great with Steve. Or the fact that you couldn’t get the feeling of his hand lingering on your skin or his rippling bicep out of your head. 

It had been a full week and you were living in a continuous loop of ocean blue eyes and trying to put the lid back on the feelings you’d successfully ignored for years. 

You hadn’t talked to Bucky since you’d walked out of the gym, regardless of how many times he’d tried to trick you into speaking to him. And now you were being called for a meeting where Bucky and Steve would both be in the same room as you.

The sound of Steve Roger’s laugh made you look up instantly from the snack table and your stomach flipped at the sound. He was talking animatedly with Wanda, one hand flailing around in the air while the other hand was gripped tight to a stack of paperwork.

“You should talk to him, ya know.” Bucky’s voice was right in your ear and you elbowed him in response before walking to your seat across the room from him. You didn’t want to think that Bucky might be right so you’d rather take him out of the equation all together. 

From his chair near the front, Steve glanced over and raised his lips in a timid smile at you. It felt like you could melt into a puddle of goo right there in your chair. You returned his smile cheerfully just as you felt a small nudge on your ribs. You swiveled your chair around to see Wanda grinning like the Cheshire cat. “What?” You asked innocently. 

“I think you know what.” She giggled. “And Barnes is not wrong, you should ask him out.” 

“Hey! You promised you wouldn’t look in my head anymore.” You pouted and turned back to the front room where Bruce had just started talking about the numbers from the previous quarter - how many civilians had been saved, how much structural damage had been done, ways to stop wasting so much on utilities.

The meeting could have been only fifteen minutes but it seemed like it’d been two hours. The entire time, your mind had been on one thing, well one person. This was getting out of hand, you couldn’t even focus on a simple meeting now.

Before you knew it, Bruce was dismissing the team and everyone was stampeding to the doors. Steve, on the other hand, was casually gathering his paperwork back up with his back to you. It was just you and him alone now in the conference room. 

Sheepishly, you shuffled your shoe against the floor, praying for any smidgen of bravery to come. Steve peeked over his shoulder, surprised to see you still hanging around. 

“Hey, you. Figured you’d be headed down for lunch, I heard Tony ordered in sushi from that fancy-pants place everyone loves.” 

You shrugged loosely, “eh, thought I might stick around here for a little bit. I’m not really hungry anyways.” 

“Oh yeah?” He leaned against the table and folded his arms across his chest with a look of concern on his face. “Is everything alright? I noticed you and Bucky haven’t been hanging out much lately.” 

“Yeah, we haven’t... It’s kind of because of you...” 

It was dead silent as you both exchanged looks. 

“Me?” He asked, stunned.

Gradually, you moved to stand side-by-side with him. Maybe if he wasn’t looking directly at you, rejection would be easier. “Do you remember the day in the gym last week?” He nodded once. "The reason that I came in to talk to you was because... well, Bucky told me that I needed to flirt with you if I wanted you to realize that I liked you. But then I’m shit at flirting, and you didn’t really seem to notice or care, so I got mad at him for giving me the idea in the first place.” 

“Wait- Did you say you like me?” 

You glimpsed over at him and slowly nodded. Steve angled his body so he could see you better and you were just waiting for the moment where he starts laughing and mocking you for ever thinking he could want you. But it hadn’t happened yet. 

“You were flirting with me?” His face was scrunched up like he was trying to think back on the whole interaction. 

“Well I was trying to flirt with you. I figured you thought I’d had an aneurysm or something.” You joked, trying to lift the mood of the room but he didn’t crack a smile.

“I didn’t even realize...” Like lightning, he stood up straight and faced you, his blue eyes focused only on your face. “I’m sorry, doll, I didn’t even realize.” 

“Steve, you don’t have to be sorry. I know you don’t feel that way about me, and I was just mad at Barnes for letting me get my hopes up.” 

He lifted his hand and cupped your face delicately, his touch making your heart rate skyrocket. “Who said I don’t have feelings for you?” 

“U-um yo-you never, well you never wa-want to talk to, ya know, me...” You stammered out clumsily. 

“I thought you liked Bucky, doll.” He said without hesitation. “You guys are always spending time together and I didn’t want to get in the way of either of your happiness.” 

“Are you serious?” You couldn’t help the loud laugh that passed your lips. “I wanted to be friends with Bucky in the first place because you thought he was worth being friends with... and I thought you might hang out with us.” 

Steve shut his eyes and let his head fall forward, his forehead bumping against yours softly from how close he was to you. His hand was still against your cheek and you allowed yourself to relax into his touch more. 

Finally, he lifted his head, “so last week when you asked if I was hungry, that’s because you were-”

“Trying to ask you out, yes.” 

“Boy am I dumb.” 

You snorted at that, “that’s the same thing Bucky said.” 

Steve let out a breathy laugh before moving a bit closer to you. “I hope I haven’t lost the chance to take you up on that offer.” 

The smell of his minty breath fanned in your face causing your mind to go blank and the only thing you could do was smile up at him like an idiot. As if your body was moving on its own, you shifted closer and his arm wrapped around your waist as if he’d done it a million times. 

At the same time you both leaned together and connected your lips in an innocent kiss. The entire world stopped turning at that moment. It was so soft and pure as he held you tightly against his body, a good thing because your knees had buckled at the contact.  Draping a hand over his shoulder, you twisted your fingers into his hair, letting your other hand curl up on his muscular chest. 

After the most blissful moment of your life, Steve pulled back and was beaming. This beautiful man had just kissed you and was happy about it. Damn, life couldn’t get any better. 

“Would you allow me to take you out to lunch, doll?” He asked, his voice a little husky. 

“Absolutely, Captain. Lead the way.” You said, laughing when he blushed from you using his title. 

Setting you back down firmly on the floor, he intertwined his fingers with yours and led you out to the elevator. The whole time, you were so enamored with Steve that you barely noticed Bucky waiting at the end of the hall with the most arrogant, smug look on his face.

[abreathofthewild]

And They Were Roommates, Chapter 1/?

Summary: After the events of Endgame, the Avengers try to regain a semblance of normalcy.  Steve Rogers decides to move to a small town, get a regular job and a regular room mate...

Word Count: 1832

Warnings: mentions of death.  some language.  some hanky panky (MILD exhibitionism?!??!).  Like neck kissing, hip straddling.  But not between Steve and reader...  yet.  Eventual warnings for possible PTSD and traumatic flashbacks.  Smut.  Oh boy I can’t believe I just wrote that this is going to be a wonderful journal.

Notes: Holy cow I’m actually posting this.  This is my first time posting a fic so please be kind?  I’m also open to constructive criticism though so yeah.  How I’m posting a Steve Rogers fic before a Thor fic is beyond me but I guess ya gotta follow the spark?  This literally is based off a dream so it should be interesting?!  If I can actually finish it?!  I have not seen Endgame (I’m not mentally prepared) but I have a general idea of how it goes and I’m writing things differently.  For reasons.  I hope you all enjoy!​ EDIT: I’m so mad at Tumblr I tried to add a tag through mobile and it DELETED THE WHOLE DANG POST FORMATTING AND ALL so here it is again.

Links: Chapter 2

You groaned as you rolled over and blearily felt around for your phone on the nightstand; the display lit up so bright it made your eyes squint in pain.  As they finally adjusted to the screen and you saw the numbers 2:43, you felt a familiar anger boil up inside you.  That anger spiked when you heard a few thumps and more giggling from the living room.  This was the third time this week Steve had brought some random drunk girl home from the bar where he worked.  He was a popular guy because he was great at what he did, good-looking too you had to admit.  And he was Captain America.  He knew he had these qualities though and he flaunted them.  For most people, his cockiness was a turn on; for you, it was the exact opposite and made most of the time rooming with him a miserable thing.  You rolled over and squeezed your eyes shut, desperately willing sleep to come.  Your mind trailed off to when you first met Steve.  After the defeat of Thanos and the death of so many, Tony in particular, the Avengers had dispersed; they remained in touch but they all had decided to lead normal lives.  As normal as possible anyway.  

Steve Rogers?  Captain America?  He decided to get a regular job at a regular bar in some regular town and move into some regular house.  You knew he hurt.  Who didn’t?  Everyone had lost someone.  You…  You had lost your sister.  She was the one who roomed with you before Steve.  Some of her pictures were still on the mantle along with one of the Avengers together.  You always smiled when you saw those pictures.  The one with your sister was her in the snow, her skin flushed a bright red from the cold, her nose and eyes scrunched up as she laughed.  That memory was so sweet, still fresh as if you had taken the picture yesterday.  She had tripped and fallen face first in the snow.  It was deep so it hadn’t hurt her.  Instead she had flooded the air with her laughter.  The two of you had ended up gasping for breath from hysterics.  The one of the Avengers was similar although the focus of their laughter seemed to be Tony Stark’s frown.  It wasn’t really a frown though, more as if he was trying to keep a smile off his face.  Steve had never told you the story (he never really told you much about that time) but you guessed they were ribbing him for something.  The love for each other was evident though.  Steve seemed to be the most enthusiastic; his head was thrown back, eyes closed.  He was holding his stomach and his golden hair was falling loosely in a wave.  It made you smile every time you looked at those.

“Steeeevveee…”  A whine came from the living room.  Your efforts to go back to sleep were a no-go.  All those girls he brought home were so…  Not Steve.  It made your blood run hot.

“That’s it,” you whispered angrily to no one in particular as you leapt from your bed and stalked down the hall.  The was a furry rug running down the length of the floor; you weren’t exactly trying to move quietly.  Still, you doubted Steve wouldn’t hear you, either way.  At the last minute, something stopped you from rounding the corner.  Really, what right did you have to tell him not to bring girls home?  This was half his house.  You had to be at work in three hours now though, a thought that made you somewhat desperate.  You took a deep breath and slowly padded out into the living area.  

There was Steve, sitting on the couch (the couch you sat on too sometimes for Christ’s sake).  The girl was straddling his lap, her blonde curls loose around her shoulders.  Her mini skirt was hiked up to her hips.  His arms were at her back and he was kissing her neck; her hands were in his hair and she let out a small moan.  You stood frozen in place.

They were completely absorbed in each other, completely oblivious to you standing there gawking.  It was an impressive sight to see Steve in action if you were being completely honest with yourself.  Then he opened his eyes.  You’d looked him in the face before, knew he had pretty blues but this…  This was different.  They were stunning, intense.  And focused on you as the girl he was holding let her head fall back on a sigh.  He didn’t stop, just watched you watching him.  It made the muscles in your stomach clench.  What the hell?  You stood straight, shook your head in an attempt to make the haziness leave your brain and cleared your throat.  She jumped in his arms but didn’t make any move to get off his lap.  She did a half turn to see who was there; you crossed your arms and tapped your foot.

“Look, I don’t wanna be rude and I don’t know if Steve told you but he doesn’t live alone.  And I gotta get up for work in the morning.  I mean, can you guys just be a little quieter, Steve?”  You directed your gaze to him.  He watched you lazily but…  Your cheeks flushed hot when he kept watching you.  Shit…  “That’s all I need…”  You trailed off awkwardly, frustrated with yourself.  He finally looked away and back at her face.

“Gosh, doll, looks like our fun’s over.  Maybe some other time?”  He smirked, squeezing her hips.  He continued smirking as she stared at him in disbelief.

“Look,” she finally said, mirroring your statement with sarcasm, “I don’t wanna be rude but I don’t  know who this bitch thinks she is—”  Your eyes widened when Steve didn’t even let her finish her sentence as he stood up abruptly, letting her fall indignantly to the cushion next to him.

“That bitch,” he said quietly, “pays half the rent.  She’s my roommate.  And I won’t have anyone disrespecting her.”   Now it was her turn to widen her eyes; her mouth gaped open.  Steve stood, imposing, one hand in the pocket of his blue jeans, the other arm extended to the door.  The girl stood quickly and grabbed her bag from the coffee table.  The door slammed as she left.  You crossed your arms and tried to look everywhere but at Steve who still faced away from you.

“Sorry,” you mumbled.  “I didn’t mean for that to happen.  I just…  I have to be there at, like, six—”

“It’s fine.”  His shoulders and back flexed; you gulped when he turned around and studied your face.  “She shouldn’t have said that.”  God those blue eyes.  He took a step forward and another when you didn’t back away.  Finally, he grinned.  “I think you made her jealous.  I mean, who wouldn’t be jealous of you?  You get to see America’s ass in person every day.”  You rolled your eyes.  Steve having access to the internet was all at once the worst and best thing.  He was fascinated by memes and when it came to memes of himself… well, he could make you sit for hours showing you memes.  “Play hooky with me tomorrow, let me make up for how she treated you.”  You crossed your arms again and pursed your lips, shook your head.

“No-can-do, Steve.  I’m one of the openers.  I wouldn’t do that on such short notice.”

“I figured as much.  I’ve never seen you call out.  I mean, except that one time you were puking your guts out.”  Steve smirked, you shuddered.

“Ugh, that was awful.  I was so sick!  Thank god you didn’t bring anyone here those nights.”  You returned his smirk as Steve gave you an expression of mock surprise, throwing his hands up in surrender.

“I don’t bring that many girls home, okay?  Besides, I have to drown out the bad memories somewhere.”  There was an uncomfortable moment of silence.  

“Steve—"

“Plus, you were so miserable.  I didn’t want to bother you.  I tried to stay scarce those days.”  He’d crossed his arms again, and you had to force yourself to keep your eyes on his face instead of how good he looked in that worn white t-shirt of his.  His words jarred a memory in you though from the last time you remembered being that sick.

You were fifteen.  Your mom had to work the night shift at the hospital.  She wasn’t particularly caring anyway.  Y/Sister’s name was the one who found you in the bathroom in the middle of the night, laying on the cold tile floor holding your stomach.  She had rubbed your back and held your hair back from your face and made sure you drank little bits of water to wash away the gross aftertaste.  

“Ssshh,” she had whispered.  “It’s all right, you’re okay.”  She had helped you back to bed, tucked you in with a bucket on the floor.  She had stayed there all night, waiting it out with you.  It was the best feeling just knowing someone was there.  She was always there for you, even when no one else was…

Tears sprang unbidden to your eyes and you bit your lip.  Shit.  Shit shit shit.  

“I, uh, I gotta go to bed, okay?  Um, sorry about tonight.  Didn’t mean for it to go that way,” you said again.  That quick he closed the space between you; he was so close you could smell the subtle aroma of his cologne, see the way his eyes searched yours.  He reached up and brushed a thumb across your cheek, wiping away a tear you hadn’t even noticed falling.

“Please don’t apologize.  Can I take you out after you get off?”  You looked up at him (you definitely had to look up) and studied his face.  He looked so tired.  His eyes looked sad.  How had you never noticed before?  Maybe it was time you paid attention.  A small nod.

“Yeah,” you whispered, even though you didn’t even know why you had to whisper.  “I get off at 1.  Should I meet you?”  Steve smiled then.  Golden boy.  Apollo.  The sun.

“Nah, I got this.  I’ll pick you up.”  Was he always a gentleman like this?  A quick hitch of your breath as he leaned forward and spoke close to your ear “Good night, Y/N.”  He stood up and slowly brushed passed you heading to the room at the other side of the hall where he saluted you with a grin as he went in and closed his door.  He knew.  He knew the effect he suddenly was having on you and he was loving it.  If you were being honest, you didn’t mind that you were finally acknowledging it.

And now, somehow, you were going to hang out with Steve Rogers tomorrow.  You slapped a hand over your mouth to stifle your disbelieving giggle.  It felt good.