#I don’t know. I should probably start main tagging it so. people actually see it but. y’know-

[shmorp-mcdurgen]

The Gardener

Aka the monster au’s Preacher. Basically a forest creature that helps protect and look after. Well. The forest. Mostly the Savior’s Willow.

[necrotic-nephilim]

Sorry if this might be a rude question but why don’t you just make a seperate account for your nsfw fics?

not rude, it's a valid question! tbh it's a combination of a couple reasons.

i started posting anonymous dead dove batcest fics long before i had the balls to make a tumblr. at first i was content to just leave them unassociated with each other because i didn't really care about them being tied to me. i made this blog to actually show solidarity to my partner who wanted to make a sideblog for Sandman comic stuff so we could cheerlead each other and be brave together, since i've wanted to make a batcest sideblog but i've been nervous about actually having to get it going. (mal ik you're reading this go be brave and actually make your blog so i can cheerlead you damnit-) only did it dawn on me then that i should probably mention the fics i've written on the blog after like, three of them were posted anonymously. and it would've annoyed me to have half of them anonymous and half of them not, because notifications for them would've gone in different places. i could go back and take my fics off anon if i wanted to, but i can't switch the account they're on without taking them down entirely and that'd fuck over people who have them bookmarked already.

which, ties into my second reason, if i made an entire second ao3 account it'd be harder for me to see notifications, reply to stuff, and post things for both accounts because i'd have to constantly switch. and honestly i'd be terrified of accidentally posting on the wrong one on a brain fog day. posting fics is always the most tedious part of writing them for me lol. it's easier for me to stay logged into one account and have all of my stuff in one place for me and just use the anonymous collection when i feel like it. if ao3 pseuds worked like tumblr blogs, where you can't see all my side blogs but i can, i would've used pseuds, but since you can see all pseuds on an ao3, i felt it was a moot point.

and the last reason is i just feel more comfortable being anonymous on ao3 because of the rise in anti culture. on tumblr it's very easy for me to just filter that out and find the people i want to follow and block the people i don't. i don't mind getting hate, on tumblr or on ao3. but i think, for whatever reason you want to blame it on, there's been a massive boom of antis on ao3 who are very entitled about how they read on ao3. i tag extensively, but i just feel safer from getting targeted attacks if everything i write on ao3 isn't attached to one profile. if people like a fic i wrote, want to find more i always link my tumblr in the notes, but if an anti wants to get huffy with me, they can't easily track down my other things. they definitely could if they wanted to, but being anonymous on ao3 just makes me feel more secluded, in a weird way. it's like saying "if you want you can come find me but on here i'm just a weird faceless guy throwing stuff in the void". i've used ao3's anon feature a lot, actually, i used to be a hydra trash party dumpster kid back when that was in it's prime.

i also used to be vaguely popular on a different tumblr blog and my main ao3 and while i think it'd definitely be cool if i got a decent chunk of followers on this blog too, i don't really miss having fanfiction do so well i got targetted hate on all of my fics from the same people, i had my fics stolen, etc. it was really exhausting for me. i have 120+ works on ao3, not counting what's anonymous, and that level of exposure tires me, even when i use my main ao3 to post things that aren't trashy. it's just a weird feeling knowing so many people are subscribed to you on ao3 and what if you post something they won't like because you jumped fandoms again, or you're posting something niche, or you don't think it fills enough fandom tropes to be well-liked. i used to obsessively think like that, and it made me not write the things i wanted to because i cared about numbers. and i don't want to slide back into that hole. writing on anonymous is mostly to remind myself i wrote this for me, and if other people like it, they can come find me, but i don't have to perform like that anymore. if i get a really weird fucked up idea, i can write the really weird fucked up idea. at the end of the day, just makes me more comfortable! but i get it's a super confusing set up from an outsider perspective so, i really don't mind the question, thank you for asking!!

[mariejordans]

i honestly don’t even know where to begin with this post, so i guess i’ll start with hi! sorry, i’ve been gone so long, though probably most of you didn’t even notice i was gone lol. sorry for not giving any warning to my absence, and i am especially sorry to the mutuals who have reached out to me that i haven’t responded to. i was and still am struggling with anxiety and depression and towards the new year it was getting to be a bit much for me, so i decided to take a mental health break from social media.

i’d honestly been contemplating coming back, but today i received a dm from someone with a link to a post that was accusing me of bullying and creating fake accounts to bully other people in this fandom. first of all, i would like to emphasize that this is not true. attached below is a screenshot of all the blogs that i own (EDIT 2/9/24: i have since deleted the screenshot for my own privacy and i believe that since i made this post, there has been more than enough evidence to clear my name.) milfsociety is my main account, which i have linked before on this blog and many of my mutuals also follow me on my main, and the rest of them are just me saving my old usernames or other sideblogs that i rarely use, but all of them have been inactive for two months at least.

i do NOT condone bullying ever, and to be continually accused of it by this person is very disheartening. it started with this post (seen below) that i made back in november after seeing a post discrediting marie as the main character of gen v. i admit that my language was probably a bit harsher than was necessary, but honestly my intention was not to send hate to op (which is why i never tagged it with any gen v related tags) but to defend marie. it also wasn’t meant to be solely specific to this one person but as a general post because at the time, there were lots of accounts discrediting marie and to be honest, i was just kinda venting bc of how sick of it i was. (also, just to mention, i have intentionally left out their username because the last thing i want is to send hate to this person.) this was the only post i made on the topic and later i heard that apparently op blocked me afterward (which does not offend me in the slightest since i have since done the same thing) so this honestly should have been the end of it.

i honestly hadn’t given this post a second thought until a little under a month later i received this ask out of nowhere, accusing me of ableism and bullying. i replied to this ask, which i will link here. honestly this ask came as a complete shock to me, because i had honestly forgotten all about my previous post.

i responded to anon and in the reply i apologized to their friend for my hurtful comments and expressed that it was never my intention to attack anyone, especially anyone with a disability, which i did not know about when i initially made the first post. i also explained my side, stating why i made the post in the first place, which i still stand by. originally, i had linked their post in my reply, which in hindsight was a mistake that i regret and i should’ve known better. again, my last intention ever is to spread hate and negativity or to bully anyone, so i deleted the link when i was asked by a third party. this person has also since deleted that post about marie entirely.

shortly after i posted the reply, i guess i can only assume that whoever anon was told them about the reply. i’m honestly not sure if they’ve ever actually read this reply or not, but they made a response to my reply, accusing me of harassment and bullying. honestly, it really confused me at the time, since i’d only made two posts in reference to them, and one was a reply to an ask, but we ended up having a third party account who was mutuals with both of us acting as a mediator to settle things and i genuinely wanted to move on from the situation. we both had each other blocked and it seemed to me that anon was just trying to instigate more drama between us, so i thought it best to just leave it at that. i was also going through some mental health issues at the time (unrelated to this situation even though it didn’t help) and had been considering taking a break from tumblr, and so i thought it would be best to just go inactive for a while.

this is honestly the first time i’ve used tumblr in the two months since i’ve been gone, so i have no idea what else has been happening regarding any other blogs and this person, but apparently i am being named as the sole instigator here and i just wanted to once and for all clear up this issue and my name. i’m honestly not sure if this person will see this post or if they’ll even accept it as truth. i can’t force them or anyone to believe me as i really don’t know what else i’d have to do to prove that i don’t have any other secret accounts other than making this post.

i will probably continue to be inactive on this account as i think it is in everyone’s best interest. i never wanted to contribute or start any drama in this fandom, but i feel like i am partially responsible in how this situation has turned out, so i would also like to apologize to you all as well. i’ve never had an account of mine get as big as this one has (thank you to everyone who liked and supported my silly little ramblings!) and i can honestly say i have had the best time interacting and fangirling with you all about this show and these characters that i love so much and i will continue to enjoy and love gen v and marie from afar!

goodbye for now,

rose (aka mariejordans)

[drivestraight]

first of all, what the fuck. whatever i just read, i’ve never read anything so good. like ever. like scream worthy good. you don’t understand i’m absolutely gagging over this latest writing of yours.

to put in to perspective i’m kind of a bore and stick to the basic lestappen/landoscar business and keep to what i know i like yap yap etc etc. anyway i was perusing the landosc tag on ao3, and before reading any tags, and i mean any, i saw linearity and was like okay let’s go i should buckle up for some good shit let’s get started. well fuck me because not knowing anything was a brill misstep on my end going into this 50k ride.

i’m getting through this thinking ooohhh okay so this is what’s going to happen, ahhhh right okay yeah i see what’s going on…sister you did not have a clue because i had preconceived ideas of a landosc love story! and guess what!! i was wrong!!! and i’ve never been so over the moon about being wrong in my whole life!!!! i was like “haha it would be so cool if max and oscar fucked around a lil... but they won’t...” and then linearity was just like surprise you win 🤩🤩 and i was surprised at myself for how much i didn’t dislike it lmfao

imo, rpf can be a rocky road in a way. i find people are very good at placing the drivers - or just celebrities in general - into certain boxes based on outward appearances or things they’ve said, and produce them into these one-dimensional, stagnant beings, which completely contradicts the fact that they’re human. while this is fiction, and we really do not know these people, i think you’ve humanised them in a way that stays within the realm of actuality. it’s solid and sincere and just amazing.

that was the best reading experience i’ve had in a verrryyyyy long time and literally thank u so so much for it because i farking need it. the pairings, the relationships, the nonlinear storyline, the characterisation, just the writing overall, all had me rolling, kicking my feet, giggling and gasping like please do know that your efforts are HIGHLY valued. i’m a bit of an old stickler; like when i like a pairing, i like that pairing, but your writing made me see the light. and being a verstappen fan…..this diva….

god maybe i’m dramatic maybe im riding some weird adrenaline emotion fuelled high but i could sing praises about this fic for days. im rambling but puhlease know that i loved eat them alive to the fucking stupid baka core of my heart xxx

p.s. i didnt write this with intentions of being answered!! just needed to yap 🙏

WELL I'M GOING TO RESPOND ANYWAY I HOPE THIS IS OKAY 😭 this was just such a lovely ask i had to post and respond...

i'm glad you ended up stumbling across the fic hahaha. i do tend to tag on the sparse side, but it really must've been a ride going into it completely blind !! probably the best way to experience it in my opinion :) glad to have tricked you into reading all 50k 😈

yeah like. re: landoscar

the whole thing about this fic, one of the very first "moods" or throughlines, a framing of sorts, idk, was basically like - i needed at least the first 2/3 of the fic (thinking, like, pre-spa) to feel like a funeral march, in a way.

the point for me was that, you know how it ends (landoscar fighting for a title, lando not wanting to talk about oscar in the interviews, oscar thinking back fondly on the time they were teammates, but they're not talking, and most importantly, they're not teammates anymore), but you also get to see how it began (hungary, abu dhabi, and then the development into silverstone where they start sleeping together). it WAS a love story, but it was always one that you knew was doomed from the start.

and i guess i'm rambling a bit but, in the present timeline, qatar was the very first moment where lando and oscar actually speak. lando's a very present/main character in this fic, but the thing is, he's completely absent (aside from like, mentions of how he's doing on track and in the championship) from the present timeline. he exists only in oscar's memory, and as a stranger, in a way. a rival/competitor, someone oscar left behind - an ex, literally.

originally i hadn't intended for maxcar to be like, as emotionally involved as i did. i had originally intended for it to just be fucking around, but then the more that i wrote the more i realized - oh, they actually can work. there's actually an emotional underpinning here we can use (re: the helmets in abu dhabi). and i'm glad you didn't dislike it!!

and i'm very very happy that you found all the characters very human! this was really a sincere work in a way. i was really hesitant before i posted, because i knew that this one didn't pull any punches with how i characterized any of them (re: lando being a bit of a crybaby, oscar being an asshole), and i took a lot of risks, and i don't think i've ever written a fic with so little of a moral undergrounding (like... for example i feel like there was this weird sort of moralizing to all to play for, mostly bc it was a love story, and because it was a bit of a hero's journey... something that i felt obligated to do/what served the story the best). but i think it turned out really well, and i am very proud of it. like. there was no pretending inside the fic that what oscar was doing was right - only this undercurrent that - he was going to win. the more he fucked up, the more he won, the more he was rewarded for it. you don't win championships by doing right by your competitors. is the thing. you don't win championships by being kind.

something i pay a lot of attention to when writing is, like, the pacing of things. but with pacing, you also have to know how it's going to end, how it's going to feel satisfying/convincing, etc. but for this fic, the endpoint was qatar, really, and it was all about how to get to qatar, and how to bring the characters as much to life as possible, in order to get to that point where it's emotional, and it's hurt, and oscar in particular can't keep anything in side anymore. i'm really happy you found it both sincere and within the realm of actuality !! thank you so much - it's always one of my favorite writing compliments to know that the characterization works :)

and thank you thank you !! i'm very happy you enjoyed reading it :) like this is a whole little universe that i'm so happy i could share with people, and a part of me was worried about posting 57k all at once, but i think it was the best way to do it - just release this whole thing out into the world at once. and i've been very happy with the reception :)

max my little diva... i love him... this entire fic he really was just like. chilling. having fun. playing minecraft. being oscar's little boyfie.

THANK YOU SO MUCH ONCE AGAIN ❤️❤️❤️

[avanatural]

Mind Games

Part 4

Series summary: Set in 1984. It’s that time of the year – the supes are having the time of their lives at the Herogasm festival. Soldier Boy seems to have taken a special interest in Y/N, a fellow superhero.

Pairing: Soldier Boy x female Reader

Category: Angst, humor

Word count: 3.3k

Chapter warnings: Cursing, mentions of alcohol and smoking, Soldier Boy being Soldier Boy

A/N: Welcome to part 4! I hope you enjoy the new chapter! Poor Y/N’s patience is being tested in this one. Wanna be added to my Soldier Boy tag list? Send me an ask ❤️

Part 3 | Series Masterlist | Soldier Boy Masterlist | Part 5

Main Masterlist

“I see you’ve changed into your intended outfit.”

His deep voice made me want to cut off my ears. No one had told me that this movie required me to wear a dress that would suffocate me with how tight it was.

“I’m not sure it even fits me,” I mumbled as I stroked the fabric around my midriff. It was a white leather dress with a corset, similar to my actual supe outfit, but it was restricting my goddamn access to air. It was short enough that I couldn’t sit or bend or fight without people seeing… Well, all of me.

Soldier Boy pushed himself off of the wall he was leaning against. He’d put his helmet back on. It was like a mask. That open, vulnerable side of him that I’d gotten a tiny glimpse of was long gone. Hidden. Nowhere to be found.

“Oh, but you do look beautiful in it,” he flirted, pointing his finger at my scarcely clad body. His head bobbed from side to side as he stalked towards me. He was back to oozing confidence. The anger and resentment in his eyes had faded.

What was he up to? Did Soldier Boy himself even know what he wanted? 

“I take it you don’t wanna rip my head off anymore?”, I asked. My voice sounded a lot weaker than intended. At this point, I just wanted to go home. This movie was a shit show.

“What can I say? You’re lucky I’m into the assertive type.” He smiled an alluring smile. Combined with a charming tilt of his head, he deepened the creases around his eyes. 

The scariest thing about his change in demeanor was how my body responded to it. His charm was surely working its magic. My stomach was filled with swoony sensations that were begging me to shake them off.

“Lucky me. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you’re sweet-talking me.” I tried sounding sarcastic, to the best of my ability. The problem was, his sweet-talking was working. My insides were practically yelling at me to finish what we’d started in that trailer. So, I tightened my vice-like grip on my heart as best as I could. I wasn’t gonna let him steal it.

Soldier Boy tempted me with his mossy green bedroom eyes and those plump pink lips. “Well, is it working?”

“No,” I lied, hoping that he couldn’t see through me. But then again, he probably wouldn’t believe any woman who told him his charm wasn’t working. He was self-centered like that. I had to remind myself that I was not a toy. That he couldn’t treat me as he pleased. Too bad male attention was my kryptonite.

Soldier Boy scoffed. I could see that he was losing what little patience he had. “Keep tellin’ yourself that, princess. Girls like to play hard-to-get. I know how it goes.”

“You know what?” I puffed out my chest in a rush of impulsion. “If you want different responses, maybe you should work on your technique. You need to win over a woman’s heart. Not just her body.” 

Soldier Boy narrowed his darkening eyes at me. He was like a loaded gun, ready to spit bullets in your face as soon as you got even remotely close to hurting his ego. “With manners like yours, you’re never gonna find a man. I don’t need to work on anything, how about you work on your fucking attitude?”, he snapped.

“Okay, everyone on their marks, please!”, the director called out.

Everyone hurried to their designated spots – the crew, the extras, the supes. Everyone except for us. Soldier Boy and I stood chest to chest, glaring at each other. The tension could easily have been cut with a rusty butterknife.

Gunpowder scurried past us, headed for his mark. I could feel the young man’s curious gaze on me as he tried to sneak past the two of us undetected.

Soldier Boy’s cold emerald gaze attached itself to the young supe. “Careful,” he spoke through gritted teeth, sending a warning Gunpowder’s way.

Gundpowder quickly averted his gaze and mumbled an incoherent apology. I didn’t even get a chance to catch his eye or say anything to him as he made a beeline for his mark, tail between his legs.

“Alright, doll face, let’s get this shit show over with,” Soldier Boy huffed. He took a step back, finally giving me some space to breathe. His hand reached out to me, his palm facing upward.

My eyes fixated on his hand. I hesitated. My muscles were frozen by ice-cold skepticism. When I looked up and met his eyes, warm pools of green and gold stared back at me. I tried not to let them melt away my distrust. This man was going to be the death of me. He was so unpredictable.

After a few seconds of hesitation, I placed my hand in his. As I felt his hand close around mine, a tiny, irritated smile attacked my face, forcing its way onto my lips.

“There you go,” Soldier Boy praised me with a nod of approval. He tugged me towards him and put his hand on my lower back. Seemingly deciding that he was in charge, he steered me to our marks.

We were about to shoot the final battle scene of the movie. Vought's strongest heroes vs. some no-name-greedy-for-power supervillains. And, who would have guessed, Soldier Boy was gonna save everyone’s day! Including mine. Damsel in distress number who-the-fuck-knew.

“Where- Oh! What the fuck?”, I exclaimed as Soldier Boy suddenly scooped me up in his arms, bridal style.

“Relax, princess. I’m supposed to catch you, you know that,” he had the audacity to scold me.

“How exactly is this scene gonna play out, huh?” I knew I was gonna fall from the sky like a stupid fucking apple from a tree, but this scenario rubbed me the wrong way.

“I’ll toss you into the air and catch you, piece of cake,” he sighed, obviously annoyed with my sheepish attitude.

“You’re gonna toss me?” I found myself locking my arms around his neck – a weak attempt to make him keep me in his arms. I was a supe, sure, but my body wasn’t immune to every possible danger. I wasn’t immortal. I could feel pain. My bones could break.

“Oh, have some fucking faith, will you?” Soldier Boy leaned in, so close that I could smell the whiskey we’d shared on his breath. “I’m not gonna let you hit the ground.” His insanely green eyes, framed by his new helmet, penetrated mine. “Unless you piss me off.”

“Ready, everyone?”, the director yelled.

“You better catch me,” I hissed in Soldier Boy’s ear.

He scoffed, radiating hubris. “Wanna fucking bet?”

“Sure. If you let me fall, you can kiss my ass,” I mumbled under my breath. Sue me, I was a nervous talker.

“And if I catch you, I’ll get to gag you, how about that?”, he retorted.

“You’re so-”

“And 3… 2… 1!”

Before I could say another word, Soldier Boy bent his knees, pushed himself back up, and used the force to throw me straight up into the air.

I cried out as I flew towards the sky. Right in that moment, I questioned my own sanity. A few profanities left my lips as I reached the highest point and felt myself fall back down. My stomach turned as I pictured myself flat as a goddamn pancake, spread out across the floor with blood for sirup.

Then suddenly, I felt some harsh pushback, and a loud gasp was forced out of my lungs. I had abruptly stopped falling. My eyes were shut tightly, waiting for the pain to arrive. Or the shock. But nothing really happened.

“You’re okay,” a warm, breathy voice hit my ears.

When I opened my eyes, I was met with Soldier Boy’s handsome face. He was the pushback. His arms were wrapped around me, holding onto my legs and my back. He was carrying me bridal style, just like he had a few moments ago. That son of a bitch had actually done it.

“You caught me,” I mumbled, faintly remembering the lines I was supposed to say. My heart was still throwing a tantrum in my chest.

“I sure did.” He put on the kindest smile I’d ever seen. The asshole could act, who would’ve guessed? “You alright?”

“Yes.” I had to bite my tongue before I was able to say my next line. “Thank you for saving me.”

“Anytime, my dear.” Gently, he placed me back on the ground. His hand stayed on my lower back, sending a surge of warmth through my body. “You look familiar. Do I know you?”, he asked. 

I batted my eyelashes at him as hard as I could and placed my hand on my chest. “I’m Trouble.”

“You’re part of the cavalry,” he said, pretending to be surprised by widening his eyes. “Payback appreciates your help. Just be more careful from now on, alright?” He inched closer, cooking up his very own line before delivering it straight to my face. “Though I gotta say… It’s not every day that pretty women like yourself fall from the sky.”

The corners of my mouth quivered slightly, threatening to break out in a smile. His gaze held me down, taunting me, asking me to break. I didn’t want to give him that satisfaction. “Careful, my dear,” I responded, repeating his pet name for me. I lifted my chin to meet his eyes. “You don’t wanna get in trouble, do you?” When he paused, not saying anything, I continued, “Say hi to Countess for me.”

With a wink, I turned around and walked away from him, out of the camera’s sight. I felt his heated gaze on my back and didn’t dare turn back.

I let out the biggest grunt as soon as the door to my apartment fell shut behind me. Home, at last. Without a care, I dropped my bag on the floor. My hands found my hair and tugged on the strands before brushing them back.

“You sound tired,” a small voice rang out from the living room.  

With enlarged eyes, I pushed myself away from the door and stomped into the living area. “Lily??”

And sure enough, my sister was sitting on the couch, watching tv like she’d done nothing else all day.

“What the hell are you doing here?”, I demanded, “You’re supposed to be with aunt Gemma!”

Lily shrugged her shoulders at me, wearing a tiny frown on her face. “She had an emergency.”

“Yeah, I bet with that Greg guy.” I ground my teeth. The muscles in my jaw already hurt from all the tension I’d lived through that day. I leaned against the couch, my hands landing on the backrest. “How long have you been here by yourself?”

“Just a couple hours.”

“A couple hours,” I repeated. “That’s it. I’m gonna kill her.”

“Y/N, I’m fine,” Lily objected, looking up at me with those innocent eyes, trying to be convincing.

“Did you eat?”

“Not yet.”

“Okay,” I sighed, trying my best not to seem annoyed with her. Lily wasn’t the problem. Everyone else was. Including me. I tried pushing my anger down and locking it away. “I’ll heat up some leftovers.”

My sister nodded and followed me into the kitchen, trailing after me like a puppy. “How did it go today?”, she asked.

Well, that was a loaded question. “Let’s just say you’re gonna get those sneakers you asked for.”

“Yes!” Lily fist-bumped the air. “Thank you, Y/N!” She hurried around the counter and wrapped her arms around my waist.

Despite my sour mood, I smiled and hugged her back. “You’re welcome.” I squeezed her small body and paused for a second to enjoy the moment. The smile on her face, the joy in her eyes – that was the reason why I’d accepted Vought’s offer. It was worth the crappy day I had.

“So, how was working with Soldier Boy?”, Lily asked, wriggling out of my embrace, looking at me with wide, curious eyes.

“It was… Good,” I lied through my teeth and looked away, busying myself with preparing dinner. I couldn’t look at Lily’s face and tell a lie. I’d never been able to.

“What’s he like? Will you see him again? How tall is he?”

Oh boy, it was gonna be a long night.

A few weeks later

“Touble! Trouble, just one shot, please!”

“Trouble, over here!”

I pulled down my cap, hoping to somehow disappear in it. Too bad I didn’t have teleportation powers. Ever since pictures from the movie set of Payback Rising had been sold to the press, the general public had taken an interest in little old, mediocre me.

A picture of Soldier Boy and I had made it into the newspapers. A photograph of him carrying me. Of us staring into each other’s eyes. Now people were making up stories left and right. The press liked to make these things bigger than they were.

The good news was, I was getting offers. They wanted me for talk shows, interviews, and photoshoots.

The bad news was, these offers all included Soldier Boy. It was either both of us or nothing. On my own, I still wasn’t interesting enough. Still not worthy. So, what I had gained aside from the money was to be a target for the paparazzi.

“Let me through. Thanks,” I snapped, annoyed, knowing that I once again had to take a detour before going home. I didn’t need these sleazebags in front of my building. It took me a bit longer to get home that way, but I was willing to make the effort.

When I came home to a ringing telephone, I instantly rolled my eyes. I couldn’t seem to catch a break these days.

As I stood in front of the telephone, I contemplated whether I should answer or not. All I truly wanted was to sit down, have a glass of wine, and forget about everything that had to do with Vought and Soldier Boy.

“Fuck,” I mumbled under my breath and picked up against my better judgment. “Hello?”

“Trouble?”

I recognized that voice. But I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. With narrowed eyes, I leaned against the ugly wall in the hallway. “Who’s this?”

“Vought’s VP of hero management. We met briefly on the set of Vought’s new movie.”

That certainly rang a bell. “The Legend,” I sighed and made a fist around the telephone cord, “What is it?”

“I heard that you’ve been declining a whole lotta offers. Interviews, photoshoots, that kind of thing.” He lowered his voice, making me guess that his call was anything but official.

“Well, they don’t really want me for those appearances,” I said, “They want-“

“You and Soldier Boy, I know. Excuse my foul language, but I think you’re being a fucking dimwit.”

“You’re calling me just to tell me that?”, I demanded, clenching the muscles in my jaw.

“I’m calling you to help you out,” he retorted, “I know talent when I see it, Y/N.”

“You told me not to take anyone’s shit. And now you expect me to take yours?”

“I told you to play to your goddamn strengths. Right now, the greatest superhero in the world is interested in you. And the biggest fucking talk show just sent in an offer. Forget all the other jobs, this is the one you’ll wanna take. This is your fucking way into the business, Y/N. You can be huge. Don’t be dumb, girl.”

“Lily? Lily!”, I called out, walking out of hair and make-up. Yes, I had taken the offer. I was attending the damn talk show to speak about my experience on Payback Rising. Of course, I couldn’t say anything remotely close to the truth.

I’d told my sister to wait for me while they dressed me, and now she was nowhere to be found. 

She had begged me to take her with me to meet Soldier Boy. And when I say she begged, I mean she fucking begged me. Dozens of puppy eyes later, I had agreed to let her say hi to him. Just say hi. In my presence. I only hoped he wasn’t going to disappoint her. Because if he did, I was going to put him in the ground, no matter who the hell he was.

I stopped dead in my tracks when I found my sister standing in front of a table with snacks. I recognized him instantly. He was wearing his signature suit, minus the mask. Lily was being accompanied by none other than Soldier Boy himself. Her small hands were clasped together nervously as she admired him from below. She was staring up at that tower of a man with little hearts in her eyes.

As soon as Soldier Boy spotted me walking towards them, he smugly lifted his chin. A cunning grin appeared on his lips. “Ah, Y/N! There you are! We were wondering when you’d join us.”

My hands found my hips as I ignored him and addressed my sister instead. “Lily, I told you to wait.” I was anything but amused.

“I’m sorry.” Lily pouted at me. Underneath that pouty face, though, she was hiding tons upon tons of excitement. Her eyes held a spark.

“It’s my fault, really,” Soldier Boy spoke up, pulling my attention back to him, “She looked a little lost back there, all by herself, so I took her under my wing.” His gloved hand squeezed my sister’s shoulder to highlight his point.

I stared back at him with a blank expression. I knew exactly what he was doing, and I didn’t like it. He was painting me in a bad light. I left my sister by herself, so of course, he had to go and play her savior.

“How incredibly kind of you,” I praised him through gritted teeth.

“Nah, it’s no big deal.” He shrugged his massive shoulders, delivering a little show of humbleness. “Lily and I were having a grand old time, weren’t we?” He looked down at my younger sister with so much kindness that it didn’t surprise me how enamored she was.

“The best!”

“I may be the strongest man alive...” Soldier Boy placed a hand on his chest and inched closer to me. “But you, Y/N.” He pointed his finger at me and clicked his tongue. “You’re the real hero. Working two jobs at once, no husband to support you. This might be your breakthrough. I truly want it for you.”

Yeah, because you know this ‘breakthrough’ isn’t happening without you. “Thank you.” I put on a friendly fake smile. The one I’d practiced in front of the mirror because I’d known he was gonna annoy me one way or another. “It means a lot, coming from you. But I think we’re about to start rolling, so…”

“Yeah, let’s go.” He turned to my sister and ruffled her hair, which made her fucking laugh. Usually, she all but freaked out when someone touched her precious hair. “You stay good for your sister, okay?”

“I will. It was a pleasure meeting you, Soldier Boy,” Lily spoke, using the same polite words I’d spent years trying to teach her.

“Oh, the pleasure was all mine, sweetheart.” Soldier Boy bent down, hands on his knees as he looked her in the eye. He lowered his voice, whispering to her like he was telling her a big secret. “And call me Ben.” With a charming wink, he straightened his back again.

“Okay, Ben.” The smile on Lily’s face became so wide that I could have sworn it was about to break her cheeks. “Thank you.”

I, on the other hand, wasn’t half as bewitched as my sister. The corners of my mouth sagged, a scowl masking my face. “Let’s go… Ben.”

Part 5

Tag list: @akshi8278 @leigh70 @impalaslytherin @mimzy1994​ @asgardiandeadpoetsociety @panhufflestugf @spnwoman @themerc-with-a-mouth @waynes-multiverse @tzillas @josephslittlemetalballs @deliriouslybi​ @ryethebrokengae​ @epiphany-of-a-madwoman​ @rach5ive​ @mrsjenniferwinchester​ @may85​ @jassackles @mimaria420

[something-tofightfor]

On Deck, a sneak peek

So it's finally happening - I'm finally actually WORKING on Baseball Jack, and he will definitely be ready to go starting next month - just in time for the beginning of the MLB season.

You can read about him here - there are a few pieces already written for this pairing... but the main story needs to be told, too.

Before the main story, though ... there's a couple special things coming. First (and within the next couple weeks) will be Jack's Player Profile. And as promised the other day... here's a couple of excerpts from the first two chapters of On Deck, along with chapter titles.

the Statesman logo was created (OH SO LOVINGLY) by @stealyourblorbos

From Chapter 1: Hot Corner

He took his place in line - still wearing his uniform but without his hat - and you watched as he greeted the other players, smiling and laughing with them as they interacted. You couldn’t hear him, but you could tell he was happy, and that made you smile, too. Maybe he really will be back by next week.

The handshakes ended, and when Jack headed back toward the dugout, he didn’t look in your direction again - until right before he made it to the top of the steps. 

It was then that he raised his head and turned it, eyeing the seats until he saw the two of you. You tried not to react, but Caleb didn’t hide his response; the boy raising his hand and waving wildly. Jack laughed at the sight of it, lifting one of his hands in a wave, too. 

You thought that was it, but then his head turned just enough that he made direct eye contact with you.

Even from the distance, you could see one side of his mouth lift into a half smile as he nodded, raising one hand and touching the tips of his fingers to his temple before tipping them toward you. Your smile grew and you nodded in return, but before you could do anything else, Jack disappeared into the dugout, leaving the two of you standing in front of the seats.

---

She hummed again, the sound non-committal as you took your first bite. “But not with you. And not with Caleb.” No, I guess not. “You should post those pictures and tag him.”

“Erin, I’m not trying to -”

“No, just hear me out. Maybe he’ll see them. And maybe he’ll remember you. And maybe he’ll -”

“Erin, come on. That’s a fantasy. I’m sure he’s got a million people tagging him every day. He won’t even see it if I do.” 

“You never know. It can’t hurt.” She said your name, the tone teasing. “And since Caleb’s account is private, it makes sense you’d post ‘em. He really had a lot of fun with you. He’s already asking if you want to go to a game again.”

From Chapter 2: Call Up

Steadying yourself with a deep breath, you picked it up and answered, holding the phone to your ear. “Hello?” 

The sound of his voice through the speaker made you shiver, even though it was only one word. “Hey, Jack.” Stepping away from the counter, you headed for the other room, lowering yourself onto the couch. “How are you?” 

“Real good.” He cleared his throat. “I apologize if I put you on the spot. I just don’t like typing and I thought this would be easier.” Easier for what? There was no reason to continue the conversation. It didn’t … “You there?”

“I’m here.” Head shaking back and forth, you closed your eyes. “It’s fine. I definitely wasn’t expecting you to call, but … it is easier.” And more terrifying, but … “Don’t you have a game tonight? I thought -”

“I’m in Louisville.” What? You straightened up, eyes going wide. That changes things. “Had some things to take care of here so I drove up today. Headin’ back down on Monday.” So he’s got a weekend off. And he’s up here. And he’s calling me. “You got any big plans on a Saturday night?”

---

“Y’know, I invited you here today before making sure that you weren’t seein’ anybody.” He put his spoon into the dish and then pushed it forward, crossing his arms loosely over his chest. “And since you agreed, I figured… well, I figured you weren’t, but I should probably still ask.” You took another bite, eyes on him as you swallowed. This is not at all what I thought he’d be like. 

“Then ask.” It caught him off guard, Jack laughing quietly and shaking his head, after he lowered it. 

“You’re a handful, aren’t you?” He looked up at you through his eyelashes without lifting his chin, and it took everything in you not to react - or answer. You wanted him to ask you if you were seeing anyone, because Jack actually verbalizing the question shifted the casual activity of getting ice cream and having a conversation to something else entirely. And I want to know if that’s what this is. “Alright then.” Jack nodded, staring at you. “There some guy I’ve gotta worry about getting mad at me for askin’ you out tonight?”

Want to talk about Baseball Jack? My inbox is open, and I'd love to hear from you.

[some-of-us-watch-the-sunset-too]

Wait it’s pride month do you think you could do like modern hcs of the boys at a pride parade?

The gang at a pride parade

A/N: i normally don’t like writing modern boys idk but i tried my best here!

Tags: modern!gang, pride parade

Warnings: homophobia is mentioned but is far from a main point

Darry

he would be like the mom that’s so supportive it’s annoying yk? he’d 100% bring like a backpack that’s just full of chocolate, water and fruit and let anyone take what they need

Darry’s just a big mama bear in general imo so he would also just beat any homophobes heads in.

Will hand you a list of secret codes that mean something different. for example if you call him and say idk- “broccoli pizza” that could mean “i need to get out of here” so he’d come get you and the two of you would go for coffee to calm down and then see if you wanted to go back or just go home.

Ponyboy

To be frankly honest i don’t think pride parades would be his thing? it’s very loud and lots of people which i think would make him a little nervous.

just hold his hand while you’re there ok? he’s doing his best even being there and having you beside him all the time will just make him feel slightly more at ease.

He will make sure you have fun even though it’s not really his thing and who knows maybe he’ll warm up to it by the end? i think he likes the idea of it, just not all the people there.

Sodapop

This boy is in his element! he’s probably in some crazy outfit and asked you to give him the most sparkly makeup look ever and he is definitely in the parade.

He’s his normal hyper self, but 10 times worse. he’s running around the place, like a dog that has the zoomies type shit. nobody give him sugar under any circumstances..

Soda is going to make like 17 friends and then invite them all back to the house for another party so be ready for that. also, remind him to hydrate because he will forget.

Dallas

He won’t be in a cool outfit he’ll in his leather jacket and jeans, but maybe you can get him to wear a pin.

He will be kinda uninterested tbh but he will let you drag him around all day. and hey, maybe it’ll grow on him over time you never know.

The only time that he’ll leave your side is if he spots some homophobes, then he’ll start a fight as we know Dallas does so just, keep an eye on him. or don’t and join the fight, whatever works for you 🤷‍♂️

Two-Bit

He’s “there for the drink and only the drink.” is what he tells you but he still gets you to help him pick a nice outfit and paint his nails for him. once you get there the drink becomes his second priority.

Two actually really enjoys himself in the end but he has a habit of wandering off so be careful. He will be flirting with everyone he sees unless you tell him you’re not comfy with that then he’ll stop

He probably brought a disposable camera with him so a few days later he’ll have a picture of all the people he spoke with and all the memories you made

Steve

Was probably dragged along by soda. If you want him to wear something for the occasion you should sneak into his room the night before and decorate one of his sleeveless denim jackets. he gives me the vibe that he’d rather DIY his outfit rather than buy it.

Same as soda he will be 10 times more hyper and he would be showing off his gymnastics talent doing flips off cars and stuff.

He would be similar to dallas though since as soon as he spotted a homophobe he would right there to beat them up. nobody ruins this day for him.

Johnny

I don’t think it’s Johnnys thing to go to a parade so he’d either go but be slightly terrified of everyone or he would let you go with your other friends and stay behind.

if he stayed behind though he’d love to hear everything about your day once you got home. then you two would go to the cinema together.

If you did go together then he’d be a little like Darry, very prepared for anything that could happen and he would make some code word that means “time to go”

[crybaby-bkg]

sᴄᴏʀɴᴇᴅ | ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ғɪᴠᴇ

Bakugou x f!reader Warnings/Tags: male OC tries to assault reader, short scuffle between reader and OC, attempted sexual assault (but nothing actually happens), poor living conditions, slowly creeping into the hesitant friends arc!!, panic attacks, very brief suicidal ideations Word Count: 4.6k Minors/blank/ageless blogs DNI!

Main Masterlist AO3

A couple days have gone by since your meeting with the heroes and the Hero Commission’s worker. You still haven’t come to a clear decision yet, but granted, this is a big decision and its not just one that you can make over night. 

As you head home from your job, you try to weigh the pros and cons of rebranding as a hero. For one, you’d probably make more money and be able to afford your apartment. You wouldn’t have to sneak around so much, and you’d probably get a lot more respect and credit when walking amongst people, and not just in online spaces.

But…who’s to say the rest of society will accept you? In hero society, being a vigilante is illegal. You know that if you accept the conditions of rebranding, then your crimes will be forgiven, but for the rest of your career, you’ll be under strict watch. What’s the point of saving people if you have to be monitored the whole time?

A lot of those who have become victims themselves, or had been saved by you, respected what you did and how you went about it. But so, so many, including heroes and the government and police alike, hated you. Not because of what you stood for, that most didn’t know or didn’t care to know, but because you were targeting men. Its not like those men were innocent, but due diligence and the whole concept of “judge, jury, and executioner” really turned people off from you. 

If you did accept, how would other heroes see you? Would they find new respect for you, after hearing your story? Or would they only condemn you to being a vigilante, someone who should’ve never been forgiven? 

How would Miruko see you? Would she respect you, and what you’ve become? Would she still carry the same disdain she shows on the news? 

What would become of you, if you let the Red Medusa lay forever forgotten in the streets, and become someone new? Should you bring up your vigilante days, or do you let the news dig it all up and find out when you start flourishing as a hero? Do you keep the gap between victim and hero empty, or would you have to spill it all to everyone?

The thoughts overwhelm you, and you find yourself in front of your door before you know it. You drop your keys twice, and by the time you finally unlock your door, someone clearing their throat interrupts you. Your head whips around to find your landlord standing a few feet beside you with his hands tucked into his jeans. 

He’s a younger guy, which was a surprise when you first met him. You thought all landlords looked like sewer rats with greasy hair and a creepy aura. This landlord, Mr. Riku only exudes one of those things—creepiness. 

“I’ve been meaning to talk to you about your rent, sweetheart.” Mr. Riku nods his head to you, and you bristle at the name. 

“Don’t call me sweetheart.” You snap at him, keeping your hand locked on your doorknob, the other holding a pocket knife tight in the front of your hoodie. Mr. Riku rolls his eyes at you, holding his hands up in mock surrender as he laughs. 

“Ah, right. Trauma, and shit.” He says flippantly, making a face that you think is supposed to disarm you and make you laugh with him. You don’t. You stare at him for a minute, chewing the inside of your cheek as you take all of him in. 

“What do you want?” You bark when he stands there staring at you for too long. Every time you talk to him, you feel like you’re going to emerge out of the conversation covered in slime weighing you down. 

“You’re three months behind on rent. I should evict you.” He singsongs, twisting his mouth as he leans against the wall beside your door. 

“So why don’t you?” You sneer at him, all bite and sharp teeth that he ignores to instead clean invisible dirt from under his nails. 

“It would be a shame to lose such a pretty face in my building, you know? I’d miss it.” Mr. Riku looks up at you from under white haired bangs, grinning something evil that makes your stomach churn and your chest tighten. Before you can say anything, he’s slinking his way inside of your apartment through your open door, coming in before you can stop him. 

“The fuck are you doing?” You shout at him, hand tightening on the pocket knife as you flip it open inside your pocket. You really don’t wanna slice up your landlord and get into actual non-vigilante trouble for this, but you’re starting to fall into fight or flight mode. Right now, he’s one of the men who’s hurt you, and you refuse to be a victim again. 

“I own the building, sweetheart.” Mr. Riku says snootily, walking into your living room, violating it with his yuck. “I’m entitled to come into each and every unit when I damn so please.” He looks around the place, holding up a shirt you left on the couch and sniffing it blatantly in your face. 

You cringe at that, heart rate picking up as you take a step to him, frozen in your spot when he suddenly appears in front of you again. He reaches a hand out to your own that’s still in your pocket, and you finally find it in you to move, snatching away as you stumble into the still ajar door. 

“What do you think you’re doing?” You growl at him, though your voice shakes much more than you’d like. Usually, when facing off with creepy men like this, they don’t know who you are, can’t hang your living situation over your head, don’t know your connections to a high ranking hero who paid for you to live here.. 

“I have an offer for you, that I can’t let the other neighbors hear.” Mr. Riku whispers, inching closer to you until his nose damn near brushes yours. 

You jerk back, one hand still gripping the knife, the other curling up into a fist at your side. If he attacks, you can either cut him or punch him, but that might not be enough. You might have to get your gun strapped to your hip, even though you’re sure that it’ll be too loud and alert the neighbors. You’re not sure if that’s a good thing or bad thing. 

“Which is?” You reply back, calculating his next move as much as you can, trying to keep your head leveled. 

“I’ll extend your stay here. But you have to treat me right in return.” Mr. Riku mutters, hands—creepy, disgusting, too bony, too long, too veiny hands—reaching out to cup your chest. Before he can, you swing your fist, nailing him directly in the jaw, sending him crashing into your bookshelf next to your front door. A few books fall on him, and you stand above him, heart racing at the thought of what he just tried to do to you. 

“Fuck you, you fucking pig.” You spit at him, voice cracking as he moans in pain. You pick up your bag, kicking him between the legs once as hard as you can before you finally dart out into the hallway. 

From there, you run and run and run until your legs take you to a safe place, heart in your throat all the while. You don’t think you can breathe; you don’t think you took a single breath the entire way there until you found your back against a familiar door, gasping in the musky air of the warehouse. 

Nobody seems to be here, as all the lights are off and its quieter than it usually is. You call out Vanity’s name, expecting for at least her to be there, but nobody answers you. You feel rooted to your place at the door, eyes welling with tears as your shaking hands hold tightly onto your bag. You can’t move—have your limbs always been weighed down so heavily by lead? Has your heartbeat always been so loud in your ears?

After what feels like hours, do you slowly start sinking down onto the hard, cold floor beneath you. Your fingers are warm and clammy when you finally let go of the bag, to instead wrap your arms around your figure. You take a breath, and then another, before the sobs start to wrack your body, heavy and loud and ugly, shaking and screeching, angry and full of—of, rage, fear, terrifying, body consuming fear. 

Your eyes burn with every blink, your chest getting too tight, you don’t think you can muster anymore breath inside of your lungs. You can’t move, you can’t move, you can’t move. 

A shadow emerges from the steps in the back corner, and you think that this might be the end for you. Maybe it should be—you won’t have to fight anymore, you won’t have to suffer. You won’t be such a pain in the ass for Dynamight anymore. 

But instead, you’re greeted with an emerald green eyepatch and a golden, glowing eye. Vanity. 

She says something to you, but your ears feel like they’re filled with cotton. She crouches in front of you, waving a hand in front of your face, but your eyes have been unseeing for a while now. So she holds you, close to her chest, gathers you up in her arms like a mother would, and she holds you. 

You don’t think you’ve ever cried harder. 

You two stay like that for what feels like days, before your tears have slowed to trickles down your cheeks, and your sobs have dissipated into quiet little hiccups. You don’t know when you started holding her back, but your hands grip her shirt, and you belatedly realize that she’s wearing her usual pajamas. 

“Sorry for waking you,” you croak out, throat dry and scratchy. Vanity leans back to fix you with a frown, and you notice that her own eye holds tears. 

“Don’t apologize. I heard my girl crying, and what kind of best friend would I be to not comfort her?” She reassures you, wiping away the few stray tears that still fall down your face. You smile wobbly at her, before planting your head in her chest again. She’s warm, and holds you close to her with her arms wrapped tight around your shoulders, stroking your hair. She lets you stay like that for a few more minutes, before she speaks,

“Can I ask what happened?” Her voice is tiny in the big, spacious room. “It’s okay if you don’t want to share.” You sit with her question hanging in the air, trying to gather the words in your mouth to spit out. 

“Creepy, shitty landlord.” Is all you can muster up. It’s enough though, as she only hums in acknowledgement, muttering, 

“It’s always creepy, shitty landlords, ain’t it?” You can hear her smile when you start to laugh against her skin, finally pulling back to look at her. Her cheeks are tear-stained, and you wonder if she can cry from an empty socket. 

“Let’s get you cleaned up, yeah?” She asks, helping you to your feet. 

The rest of the afternoon goes by in a blur, with Vanity helping you to the shower, lending you some clothes since you didn’t have anything clean in your bag, and fixing you up something quick and easy to eat. You two are quiet in the empty warehouse, and you fall asleep next to her on the cot in her room. It’s uncomfortable sharing such a small space, but at least you know you’re safe. 

…

Things went by uneventfully when you “broke” into your apartment to get some extra clothes and other necessities with Vanity. After that though, you’ve stayed in the warehouse full time. It’s not the most ideal living situation though, long term, since there’s no Wi-Fi and it interferes with your connection to the outside world and possible villain activity going on. Also, there’s no hot water, nor is there a fully functioning kitchen besides a microwave. 

This hideaway was only supposed to be for temporary usage—running away from the cops, needing to get stitched up, some extra ammo, a safe place to sleep for a few nights. 

Not for two weeks. Once your higher ups started asking questions about your performance after a few patients expressed their worry about your near constant zombie-like state, you realized that you had to find another solution. (You think its the consistent cold showers that really did you in. Miruko spoiled you with such a nice place.) 

You finally decide to swallow your pride, grumbling all the while as you stand behind the warehouse, holding your phone up high to the sky. 

[ You , sent at 8:49pm ]

hey asshole, its trm. got a minute to chat? 

[ Dynamight , sent at 8:52pm ]

yeah, only took you three years to text me

what?

[ You , sent at 8:55pm ]

you're even ruder over text

I need a favor, but don’t expect anything in return 

[ Dynamight , sent at 8:57pm ]

Never. 

[ You , sent at 8:58pm ]

got some housing issues going on rn. do you have any recs for low rent apartments in the area?

[ Dynamight , sent at 9:00pm ]

Ur shitting bricks if you think you can get something low in this neighborhood

[ You , sent at 9:05pm ]

thanks for the fucking help then

[ Dynamight , sent at 9:06pm ]

got a spare room at my place tho?

[ You , sent at 9:06pm ]

And what the fuck does that mean?

“What the fuck does that mean, Dynamight?” You immediately call him before the text can even send through, heart in your throat, your breathing heavy. Dynamight answers on the second ring, and grunts at your loud tone this late at night. 

“What else would it mean?” He asks, voice disinterested as he yawns on the other end of the line. “I gotta spare room at my place, if you wanna crash.” He offers up like its the most casual thing a person could ever do. You’re silent on the other line as you let his words sink in, eyebrows furrowing as your gaze unfocuses on the thicket of trees in front of you. 

Why would he offer up his place to you? Is he looking for something in return? Would he take advantage of you? What if the fucker had some kind of freaky room where he could tie you up and do whatever freaky shit repressed heroes do? You bite at your lip, mind reeling, as you form your mouth to reject his offer.  

“Look, not to be an intrusive dumbass but—” Dynamight speaks up after a long stretch of silence. 

“You are.” You cut him off, listening to him grunt on the other end of the line. 

“Shuddup.” You can practically hear the frown in his voice before he continues. “But I see Miruko hooked you up at a shelter near the apartment you were staying at, and its pretty close to where I’m at. If you don’t wanna take an hour commute to get there because you gotta stay in some shitty apartment, then you could come crash with me.” 

He’s too fucking nonchalant for you, to be offering up something so hugely important. You just don’t get it, you think, as you exhale, one hand gripping your phone tightly and the other gripping the roots of your hair. 

“And why would you do that?” You ask him in the tiniest whisper you can muster, brain struggling to figure out why someone like him would offer his space to someone like you. 

“The fuck? I just explained why.” Dynamight grunts confusedly on the other end, and you can damn near see his thick brows scrunching in confusion.  

“No, I mean why you?” You ask desperately, hands starting to tremor as you speak through your teeth. “Why are you offering up your place for me to live? We don’t even know each other, much less like each other.” Your voice, quiet, shaking under the weight of the words. Dynamight is silent for a few seconds before he retorts, 

“We’d have to know each other to dislike each other.”

“Shut up, you know what I mean.” You snap at him, back straightening as if he could see you. He goes silent for a few beats, formulating the right words in his head before he talks quietly into the mic. 

“Call this a gesture of good faith.” He states, voice firm and unwavering. “I’ve intruded on your life a fuckton these past weeks, trying to rope you into hero life, ‘nd all that, so I wanna offer up something that means a lot to me. Even playing field, and shit.”

You fall silent, mulling over his words, everything that could go wrong if you were to put your trust into a hero, a man. He could hurt you. He could get away with it, easily. He could paint you out to be the crazy one, the problem. 

But…he could help you. You would never need a man’s help but—Dynamight, in all of your interactions, never seemed like the type of scummy guys you frequently punished. He felt genuine, in a sense, firm but not too pushy. And maybe—maybe you could trust him. Just a little bit. 

He hasn’t turned you into the police or to Hero Commission (yet?). You guess the guy couldn’t be all bad. 

“I’m not taking any fuckin’ handouts.” You snap at him after a minute of silence. You can hear him chuckle on the other end before fabric starts ruffling in the background. 

“Not a handout, dumbass. Just letting you borrow some shit for the time being.” He shrugs, and you swear you hear him yawn once. You frown, kicking up some branches that lay fallen at your feet. 

“I’ll pay rent.” You mutter to him. 

“No shit you’re paying rent.” Dynamight snorts, barely giving you a second to even offer. Shit head. 

“Okay. Text me your address.” You go to pull your phone away to hang up, interrupted by his voice calling out on the other end. 

“You’re coming now? I was about to go to bed.” He grumbles. Your eyebrows furrow in confusion, pulling the phone away from your ear to check the time. 

“The fuck? It’s not even 9:30 yet, you old fart.” You poke at him, listening to his annoyed mumbling on the other side. 

“Shut the fuck up.” Dynamight says with no real malice. “Call me when you’re outside.” He hangs up before you can say another word, and sends his address through to you only seconds later. 

You look up at the sky before going back inside, gaze focused on the full moon and the cloudless skies, and wonder how the hell you’re gonna tell Vanity that you're moving in with a male pro hero. You decide that the best way to tell her, is by not telling her face to face at all. 

Before you leave, you write a note left on your cot for her to find. You know she’s not going to be happy about this, but you have to put yourself first every once in a while. 

…

“Well you look like shit.” Is the first thing you tell Dynamight when he opens the door to his apartment. He’s frowning at you, with half of his ash blond mane flattened on one side, his tank top twisted at the neck a little, his sweatpants low on his hips, and his feet bare. He looks like you’ve just woken him up. 

“Fuck off,” he mutters, yawning before he turns on his heel to walk back inside. You follow, albeit hesitantly, afraid that something or someone might be wanting for you around the corner, ready to attack. But you take off your shoes, and pad into the living room, and it looks like no boogeymen are plotting on snatching you before you can even scream. 

Dynamight stands behind the couch with his hands on his hips, a sleepy little frown on his face as he looks at you. He gestures to the open layout of his place, voice a deep grumble in his throat. 

“Living room. Tv remote there,” he points to the coffee table before hooking his thumb behind him. “Kitchen—don’t eat my fuckin’ protein bars.” He points at you next and you only sneer at him. He tries to match your look but he’s too sleepy to keep up, so he only turns on his heel again before guiding you down a long hallway. 

“Did you fall asleep already? We just hung up like, thirty minutes ago.” You ask him, frowning when it takes more effort than you’d like to keep up with his long legs. 

“Shut it. I thought I was gonna stay up, but ‘m fuckin’ exhausted.” Dynamight grunts at you, sidestepping at a door across from what looks like the bathroom. You peer inside, hiking your heavy book bag up higher on your shoulder. Dynamight goes to take it without warning, and you instinctively grab it back, head whipping up to stare at him in confusion. He scrunches his face up before shaking his head at you. 

“Sorry. Looks heavy, and I was gonna put it down for you.” His voice is small, and he folds his arms across his chest. You blink up at him for a few seconds, taking a few breaths to calm your suddenly racing heart before you drop the bag into his barely ready hands. He grunts at the weight of it, tired face surprised at how much you’ve stuffed inside. 

“This my room?” You ask him, ignoring his question of how many bodies you’ve packed in there, to walk inside the new space. 

It’s big. Entirely so, almost as big as your whole apartment from before. There’s a deep marooned carpet covering the floor, the walls a muted gray, with cream colored black out curtains covering the windows. The bed looks too big for just you to sleep in, decorated with more gray and cream sheets. Four pillows sit against a wooden headboard, and a small circular decorative one sits in the middle. There’s a purple throw blanket at the end of the bed that doesn’t match anything, but you see that its knitted, and you wonder why someone like Dynamight owns something so soft. 

There’s a TV in front of the bed, and a small couch at the end of it. A closet on one side of the room, open and empty, the other wall decorated with a wooden dresser pressed against it. The room is beautiful and so…un-Dynamight. 

“Why’s the bed so big?” Is the only thing you can muster up, shocked at how nice the room really is. Dynamight grunts at that, and you think it might’ve actually been a chuckle. He enters the room, setting your bag on the cream couch and letting you enter, before he stands back at the doorway again. 

“‘Cause I’m a big guy, with some big friends who like to invite themselves over and get too fuckin’ drunk to go home.” Dynamight leans against the doorsill with his arms crossed over his chest, yawning at the end of his sentence. His eyes are so low, and droopy, and if you didn’t know any better, you’d think his quirk was actually being half lion. If you tilt your head enough, you’re sure you’d see some fluffy ears hidden in the mane of his hair. 

You look away, realizing you’ve been staring as you run your hand over the soft blanket. You look back to him, almost as if in question, but he only blinks at you. You’re quiet for a while, taking everything in. 

“Bathrooms across the hall, too. It’s all yours, since I have my own in my room.” Dynamight tells you, head jerking back to across the hall. Your eyes flicker behind him before landing on him again, feeling something warm starting to light up your chest. 

“Thank you, Dynamight.” You whisper to him, voice tiny, as you awkwardly fold your arms over your chest. You hate feeling so meek, so in debt, so needy. But he doesn’t seem to take advantage of it, rolling his eyes as he pushes off the wall. 

“We’re roommates now. Call me Bakugou.” He tells you, voice firm. You want to be an asshole and come up with some smart remark, but you can’t seem to find any. So you nod at him, once, and give him your last name, too. He smiles a tiny little smile at that before a yawn breaks his face again. He backs up from your door with a small wave, nodding to you. 

“We can discuss rent and shit in the morning. Get some sleep.” He tells you, going to turn his back before you speak up as you start unzipping your bag to pull out some pajamas. 

“I could say the same to you.” You call out to him, watching his eyebrow quirk in surprise. 

“So say it.” He nods his chin to you, slowly walking backwards to his own room. You bristle at that though, shoulders hiking up to your ears as you flip him the bird, something you’re really starting to like doing to him. 

“Fuck off.” You snap at him, no real malice in your tone. Dynamight—Bakugou, laughs at that, before turning on his heel to enter his room. He closes it without another look and you feel yourself release the breath you hadn’t realized you were holding in. 

So what now? You think to yourself, your eyes falling to the pajamas you’re tightly holding before glancing up to the bathroom. 

Now—a hot shower. 

The bathroom is just as big as your room, with the same maroon-grey-cream color scheme going on. He’s even got some decorative towels in here, and it makes you wonder if someone did all of this for him, or if he did it himself. Either way, it doesn’t matter much when the hot water is all you really came for. 

You go on about your nightly routine without further preamble, stiffening every time you hear a bump in the loft. You keep your gun close to you, even seating it on the toilet as you shower and brush your teeth. But nothing happens, and you dart quickly into your room, locking it behind you the moment you’re safe. 

You check the closet, behind the door, and under your bed, and find nothing thankfully. You let yourself breathe for the first time in a long time, as you sit on the side of the bed in your pajamas. You won’t stay here long, you muse over with yourself. Just use his Wi-Fi and shower and oven until you can find a reasonable place to live, even if you have to start taking extra shifts at your job, even if it means having to do less vigilante work. 

This is only temporary, you tell yourself as you lay back in bed, pulling up the purple blanket until it reaches your chin. You don’t want to get under the bed covers—it’ll signify that you’ll overstay your welcome. You can’t stay long. You can’t. 

You don’t sleep much the first night, watching the door all night long, anticipating someone to try the doorknob. It’s left alone the entire time, and only when the sunlight rises, do you finally rest your eyes and let sleep take you. 

chapter six

please do not repost or rec on tik tok!

tag list: @endlessfreaky @iamaconfusedpan

[imminent-danger-came]

Anon chilling on the precipice of madness again, and I’m so glad you liked that last ask! Truly, there is much joy to be found in discussing how much we enjoy (*cough* are dealt immense emotional damage on a daily basis by *cough*) the monkey show. Also, since I apparently can’t stop bugging you, for clarity’s sake I’m going to call myself Unhinged Anon if I submit any future asks lol. 

As always you make excellent points, and I am very normal about you bringing up the ‘MK smiling at his reflection’ thing because the motif of reflections in this show (see also: S2E5, S3E4, some others I’m probably missing, and especially S4E1) doesn’t make me even the tiniest bit insane. Nope! Not at all. But this time, it’s actually something you said in the tags that launched my marbles into the stratosphere for me to never find, because now I can’t stop thinking about how badly I want, like… a Sandy spinoff series or something. 

And I don’t mean a lore-heavy, epic adventure rich in heavy themes and conflicts like we have in the main series, just with Sandy at the center instead of MK. I want Sandy's series to be almost exclusively season one-style laid back episodes. But the good kind of laid back episodes, you know? Stuff like S1E6&7, that a lot of people dismiss, especially on a first watch, as nothing more than filler but actually serve as a subtle expansion/exploration of characters (“I also summoned monster trees with my stress, so. Should I see a doctor? We’ll worry about that later” still haunts me) and dynamics hidden under the guise of a silly little adventure with funny jokes, great animation, and fairly low stakes. 

I want to see what an appointment with Sandy’s therapist looks like, or even just the shenanigans he gets up to during those episodes where he’s mysteriously absent and only Tang seems to notice. 

I want to see Sandy teach Tang how to make tea, and maybe nerd out about those theories Sandy mentioned having about the gang's whole deal with the OG Companions.

I want to see Sandy’s endless teddy bear energy clash with Red-wants to seem intimidating but will also grab his new friends warm milk if they ask-Son. 

I want to see Wukong forced to have an extended conversation with Sandy, or really anyone from the team that isn’t MK or actively yelling at him, and getting to really see how they work off of each other. 

I want to see the secret ‘how do we help our clearly not okay friend?’ talks Mei and Sandy have behind MK’s back whenever he starts acting weird, and all the gossip that goes on during the yoga sessions they start doing together after Mei gets the Samadhi fire. 

I want to see Sandy talking with the little girl that LBD possessed, especially since something kind of similar happened to him during season 4, and accidentally becoming her new (and favorite) giant blue uncle. 

I want an episode of MK and Sandy hanging out. Just chilling on the boat, playing with Mo, going for a little walk around town until BOOM! Sandy brings MK to his unsuspecting therapist, who’s about to get the most interesting case of their career. And maybe, if we’re allowed a little angst, a discussion about how scary it is to be born with a lot of power that not only can, but will, hurt a lot of people if it isn't carefully controlled. About how they’ve tried, and failed, to avoid causing pain. About wanting to never cause pain, and how the futility of that sentiment almost outweighs the importance of trying anyways. 

And above all, I DEMAND a Pigsy-Sandy origin story! 

Anyways, this is basically just me edging ever closer to the brink of madness after you accidently inflicted No Thoughts, Only Sandy syndrome upon me with your last response. But, it's also an invitation to gush about Sandy some more, if you want, and also share anything you would want to see in a hypothetical Sandy show!

Unhinged Anon I got you, here's a motif post where I have every MK reflection in the whole show.

AND “I also summoned monster trees with my stress, so. Should I see a doctor? We’ll worry about that later” HAUNTS ME TOO. There's something about the way those shots are set up, cracking from blue to gold:

MK also becoming a "master of focus" in this ep, with focus becoming important later in episodes like 1x09 and 3x11/12 with Mei.

BUT ANON.

Imma use this ask as a spring board for one of my fav personal theories, which is this: OG Sandy, from the original jttw pilgrimage, is also our current day Sandy!

I'll probably throw this into an official theory post later, but for now I'll go into this theory underneath the cut:

First, let's start with 2x08 To Catch a Leaf, during which Sandy has several PTSD flashbacks:

So, the first one is some sort of battlefield, and the second one...

Is of Zhu Bajie?

Now, we know Pigsy has never worn an outfit like this based off of this comment in 4x05:

Pigsy: "Blue ain't really my color, but it beats looking like that monster, Zhu Ganglie."

-

The Pig Demon in that flashback from 2x08 HAS to be Zhu Bajie of the original jttw pilgrimage. But why would Sandy have a memory like that?

Next is the fact that while everyone else in 4x09 Roast of the Monkie Kids is compared to their past life, Sandy notably isn't.

Tang knows friendship, but unlike Tang Sanzang isn't studious.

Mei is bold and brave, but lacks Ao Lie's caution.

Pigsy like Zhu Bajie is stubborn, but he has the heart his predecessor originally lacked.

Yet this is all Subodhi has to say to Sandy:

Subdohi: "You have nothing more to learn my hilariously blue student! Another star for you!" Sandy: "Dooww thank you wise master!" Subodhi: "But! You're far too nice for your own good." Sandy: "Uh huh, you noticed!"

(4x09 Roast of the Monkie Kids)

-

It's exceedingly strange that in an episode where Subodhi breaks down everyone's character arcs, Sandy is told he's all good. He has nothing more to learn, and no more character development to go through.

Unless of course...Subodhi quite simply couldn't compare Sandy to his past life because there was no past life to compare him to.

Another detail in s4 that's always intrigued me is how Sandy is brought back to himself from Sha Wujing in 4x06.

Pigsy's heartfelt speech on the legacy of their past lives not defining their current one, or how they're not monsters, doesn't work. It's instead Mo offering Sandy wholehearted love that brings Sandy back:

Which, of course Sandy has a close bond with Mo, but Pigsy's speech wasn't anything to scoff at either:

Pigsy: "No. No! Just cause we look a certain way, cause our monster ancestors were, well, monsters, none of that matters! I won't let his legacy define mine, and neither should you! Your the strongest, the biggest, the bluest guy I know! But all you've ever used those muscles for is to help people in need—your friends. That don't sound like a monster to me." (4x06 Show Me the Monster)

As far as we know, that should have been the exact thing Sandy needed to be freed from his past life, and yet it wasn't.

That would be because, at least under the confines of this theory, the guy Pigsy is saying Sandy wasn't like was indeed who Sandy used to be. Yes, Sandy has far outgrown the person who fought to establish his own place in the world, learning that "hurting others isn't a measure of one's strength". But here's the thing, who you used to be matters. Unlike Pigsy's relationship with Zhu Bajie, Sandy's relationship with who he was in the past can't as easily be written off. It's still a part of him.

There are also certain other details. like the fact that Sandy knows his way to Flower Fruit Mountain in "A Hero is Born", or how he's so knowledgeable on ancient powerful remedies like the crimson jimson weed. Of course these details could be chalked up to plot convenience—which is by no means a flaw or complaint—but I've always wondered if there was anything more to it.

But, Sandy's more laid back reaction to most things has always intrigued me, and it would re-contextualize certain scenes like this one from 2x10 in a fun way:

Pigsy: "No! What could have been so important that you'd leave MK alone to face that- that thing! You're supposed to be his mentor-"

Sandy: "ENOUGH!" "I think we should give Mr. Monkey King, a chance to explain."

(2x10 This is the End!)

Of course with this theory comes a few questions, like why Sandy didn't meet the same fate as the other pilgrims, or why he wouldn't let Sun Wukong know he was alive, or why he would bother to pretend he wasn't the OG Sha Wujing at all. And honestly? I don't have an answer to these questions!

But what I do know is that Sandy's friends are greatly important to him-

Sandy: "Hurting others isn't a measure of one's strength—took me a really long time to realize that. As long as I'm doing something to help out a friend, I don't mind what it is! I just want to be there for 'em when they need me. Cause at the end of the day, helping my friends is more important than anything else in the world!" (2x08 To Catch a Leaf)

-and losing them would affect him greatly.

Whatever happened to the og jttw crew, that could very easily be the reason Sandy was "the most dangerous, deadly, rage filled warrior [Pigsy] ever [knew]". Based off of that 2x08 Zhu Bajie flashback, Sandy could very well have watched his friend die.

But, now that Sandy has his friends back in his life? Of course he's going to do whatever he can for them!

Which would include anything from making tea to breaking his vow to never fight again.

And please for the love of god give us a Pigsy - Sandy origin story. I'm begging. WHAT IS THEIR HISTORY MAN. WHY DID PIGSY KNOW HOW TO COMMIT A JAILBREAK.

[cyandreamsinwords]

Cut and Run — Pt 6 (BoaWT AU)

Again, none of this is cannon to the main fic, I just like to self indulge. (2.1k)

Now also on Ao3

Link to the main fic here

A/N: I'm finally wrapping this AU up! There will be one more part after this, and that should be later this week.

Pt 1 Pt 2 Pt 3 Pt 4 Pt 5 • Pt 7

Perhaps the most unexpected result of bringing Harry back with him was how it had brought out his daughter’s voice. Lyra had been a fairly quiet child since Sirius had gone to retrieve her, but after the few days it took for Harry to settle into a routine with them, that borderline concerning silence was gone, and he realized she was capable of great amounts of noise and trouble.

As the two kids loudly chased after one another, playing the world’s smallest circle of tag, Sirius and Remus watched over them with a smile. “I think,” Sirius said with some amusement, “when the heat has died down, we will need to get on finding these two a proper backyard in which they can run and scream to their hearts content. Maybe a farm with a pen we could corral them into.”

“I think that should be sooner rather than later,” Remus agreed, a smile playing at his lips. “Maybe then each round of this game of theirs wouldn’t be over every few seconds.” Though, it didn’t seem to bother them, as their enthusiasm did not die each time one of them caught the other.  

But both men could see problems arising sooner or later with this set up of theirs. They were content for the moment, but what about a month from now? Or a year? Sirius loved to see his daughter's confidence grow, but with that may come discontent with their current situation. When the children weren’t chasing one another, they could be found peering out the window, making stories up of what they saw in the distance. What happened when they wanted to go see what was there for themselves? When they were older and bold enough to open the door themselves? Sirius wouldn’t even be able to blame them, this was torture for him as well. 

Remus leaned onto his elbows, slouching over the table and staring off thoughtfully. He looked so much older now than when they had graduated, like he was an entirely new man, yet oddly the same. The bags under his eyes didn’t seem to be weighing him down anymore and that worry he often expressed to him didn’t show as prominently on his face as it had when he first turned up. Sirius was so lost in the thought of just how much his friend had changed in their years apart, and then again in the short span of their reunion that what he said at first didn’t register with him, and he had to hum a request for him to repeat himself. 

“I said, I think I found a place,” Remus repeated. “I've been out scouting. There are areas not looked in on by the ministry or any wizarding agency over in the west. They’re remote, even by muggle standards. The area I found doesn’t get much in terms of typical muggle news, let alone our sort’s stuff, so there’s potential we could actually interact with the people there. To an extent.” 

“Someplace warm?”

“At times. Someplace safe and private—“

“And there’s nowhere safe and private that is warm all the time?” 

Remus leveled him with an unamused look that he did not back down from. “You are not in a position to be picky, Sirius.” As he rolled his eyes, Remus sighed heavily. “It doesn’t have to be forever. It would probably be smart to move around a few times if this doesn’t resolve itself any time soon. I’m working on it, so this would just be a start. But I think it’s safe enough now to move, and this place I found, you wouldn’t have to learn a new language—”

“So America—“

“Which means you’d stick out less than you would elsewhere. It’d be an easier transition—“

“I speak multiple languages, you know this Moony—“

“But Lyra and Harry don’t.”

He ran his tongue over his teeth, feeling his wants losing to rationality. “….where is it?”

They made the move not long after that, on the darkest night of the month, without the moon in the sky to guide them. Remus had gone on ahead to scout the area one last time and move their stuff in (the entirety of their life here fit in one singular trunk) and leaving only the kid’s stuffed animals to carry. One of them had just momentarily posed the question if those too should be packed and shipped away, but was quickly met with heavy opposition by the youngest of them. Harry had grown quite protective over his brand-new stuffed deer Remus had picked up for him, and Lyra, out of solidarity, had begun to cry and cling to Jumper the frog, pleading they get to keep them. It was an overly melodramatic event. 

“You’ll like it there,” Sirius told Harry as he buttoned up Lyra’s little jacket before they went. The little boy was the most curious about their move, as he was about most things it seemed. Never made a complaint, but always questioning. He’d too settled into a far more lively child then when he first arrived, and interacted easily with both him and Remus after watching Lyra lead the way. “Moony says there’s two rooms and a loft, and lots and lots of outdoor space for the two of you to play in. It’ll be very nice for the lot of us.”

“Is it big?”

“Remus says it’s bigger than here. You’re short though, so I’m sure it’ll be massive to you.”

“Do we get our own beds?”

“Eventually. You’ll probably still spend a few nights tucked into one, but the plan is to get you both your own in the next week or so.”

“Did you find a house with a dragon in it?” Lyra excitedly asked, referring to an earlier conversation about her own housing requirements. 

“No, I got you a Harry,” he pointed at the boy, who’s mouth had dropped open and eyes went wide at the idea.

“Harry doesn’t breathe fire!”

“Just you wait till he hits puberty.” The two shared a confused look, unfamiliar with the word.

“It’s okay if you couldn’t find one,” Lyra comforted sweetly, patting his hand. 

Sirius smiled as he took the sides of her coat to shake her wildly, making her giggle with delight. “Oh, you think so, is that it? Maybe I couldn’t hire one who thought they could handle such a sassy little girl! If I don’t get my tropical beach house, you don’t get your dragon!” Harry smiled even wider too as she laughed louder and louder, and held out the edges of his coat to Sirius to button and shake him as well. 

It wasn’t snowing in England when they left the run-down shack they’d called home these last few months, but as they arrived at the new hideout Remus had picked for them it was. The crunch of it beneath their boots could be heard as each man stumbled carefully through the dark towards the door, a child in each of their arms. The blanket of it was laid thick, and trudging through it was the best workout Sirius had received in an age. They’d found themselves deep in the woods, large trees towering above them, only the twinkle of far off stars as lights above. It was so dark, the frame of the house was barely visible at all and only became real once they put they stepped foot on the porch. 

“You just had to have us move during a blizzard, didn’t you?” Sirius grumbled as Remus unlocked the door and let them all in. “Had to be sure I’d be properly miserable getting here.”

“The snow will cover our tracks,” Remus argued. 

“Why not try and beat the storm then? Would have still covered them!”

“Well I had to be sure you’d be properly miserable, didn’t I?” He placed Harry on one end of the couch, pointing his wand toward the fireplace to light it, illuminating the place. Harry jumped at the suddenness of it, mesmerized and in awe. 

Sirius walked the perimeter, running his hand over the slanted walls, taking in the A shape of the house. “Did you pick a place that’s all roof, Moony?” Lyra’s little hand reached out too, and he shifted her closer so she could touch as well.

“The slant of the roof makes the snow fall off it,” he grumbled, adding a few more logs to the fire before walking towards the back. 

Sirius groaned. “There’s specialized roofs for that? You chose the snowiest place on earth, didn’t you!” Lyra began to pat his back, the way he would for her when she gets upset. 

“Kitchen and the living room down here in the main area. One bedroom here—and here.” Remus swung both doors open to reveal each in turn. He circled back out, reaching up to grab a rung of the stairs up to the second level. “Loft above us. It gets a tad restrictive up there, just as a heads up.”

“Good thing we have short kids,” Sirius murmured, taking a look again.

“I figured I could take it. Since I spend the least amount of time here.”

“Do you really want to be ducking all the time? You spend half your time with us anyway.”

“Which is half as much as you all. Besides, these stairs are too steep and have gaps, the kids can’t climb these.”

“I can!” Harry claimed, rushing toward them to prove himself. 

Remus smiled, coming to stand, hands out as he climbed. “Yeah, now try that when you’re tired, which you apparently aren’t.”

Sirius let the subject of their sleeping arrangements go as he wasn’t sure where he was going with what he was trying to say anyway. “Well, I think this should do. I guess.” Lyra’s head rested against his shoulder, and he could feel her sagging heavily in his arms. “How about we get these two to bed and unpack a little.”

“I’m not tired,” Harry said excitedly, kicking his feet from the top of the stairs. “Can I unpack with you?”

“How about you go check out the rooms and pick out which one you and Lyra are staying in,” Remus said, lifting him back down. “Then you can get your stuffies settled in and by then you’ll be tired enough to sleep.” 

Lyra didn’t rush off after him as he ran toward the back, darting between both to pick which one, and was absolutely no help in pulling out bedding or setting the room up for the night. 

Harry ran back out after some time, holding his hands out to Lyra. “I can put Jumper to bed now! It’s ready!”

She grumbled and groaned, already mostly asleep in his arms, but still unwilling to part with her stuffed animal. “Go get in your pajamas and I’ll put the both of them to bed,” he told Harry, ruffling his hair. 

With unreasonable amounts of energy, Harry ran off to grab his pjs, while Sirius grabbed Lyra’s, and pulled the ragdoll into them. When he finally laid her down, she was fully asleep and out of it. 

Harry came running back in, jumping on the bed with a wide and excited smile. “Careful,” Remus warned. “Don’t wake Lyra.”

“This place is so cool!” he said excitedly, bobbing up and down. “There’s so much room to play!”

“Yeah, and even better—” Sirius in. “There’s even more outside. We can go check it out tomorrow.”

Harry’s eyes were about as wide as his smile. “I’m so glad we moved here,” he gasped.

With both kids now settled under the covers, and Harry’s eyes finally starting to droop, the two adults left the room, turning off the light and half shutting the door. A knot of anxiety being separated by walls and doors from his kid started to settle in Sirius, having only slept and existed in the same room together since their reunion.

“They’ll be okay,” Remus assured him, hand on his shoulder. “This is how it’s supposed to be.”

That sad part of Sirius thought mournfully this isn’t how it’s supposed to be. James and Lily are supposed to be here, we’re not meant to be in hiding. They should be safe, but instead I’m going to sit up and worry that someone may crawl through the window and steal it all away from me again.

Yet, James and Lily weren’t here, and they were in hiding, and none of them were really safe. But they were together, and that was a better position than they were in at the beginning of the year. And now in an actual house with walls and space to grow, and that was even better than just yesterday. 

“Yeah,” he said, clearing his throat, easing away the uncomfortable ache. “Everything will be alright.”

[redley-of-many-noodles]

Hello there,

Welcome to my blog.

I’m Redley. Relatively new to Tumblr still, but I’ve been finding that I’m comfy here. Though it still feels awkward (thanks, dysphoria), I prefer she/her pronouns. I don’t mind they/them, but… meh. Note that Redley is neither my legal or chosen name; it is solely a handle, and I will only tell you my chosen name if I feel comfortable with you. If I extend that trust, please treat it with respect. If you don’t, I will remember.

Here’s the main stuff I’m comfortable sharing or want you to know about me:

1) I’m transfem, but haven’t had an opportunity to do much actual transitioning yet. Dislike my voice, adore my hair. My luscious, glorious, flowing hair.

1.5) I am likely pansexual, but I haven’t done enough research to know for sure. All I know is, people are… well, people are hot.

2) I live in Florida, but was not raised here. The climate and scenery are nice; the local government sucks ass though. Also, I miss snow.

3) I’m a diagnosed autistic, falling somewhere on the high-functioning end of the spectrum. I’m on prescribed antidepressants, but have not been able to find a psychologist/psychiatrist yet because it’s fucking Florida.

4) There are a lot of things and people I don’t understand, but I’m always open to learning. Trying new food is a special passion of mine, and I’ve met some quite fascinating new people since starting this blog. (*eoughck* @potentially-a-poser *aucghk* @analogue-system *ahem*)

5) I will not tolerate hateful behavior. You will be immediately blocked for shit like denying any of the shades of aro/ace individuals as being part of the LGBTQIA+ community. If you see me spreading misinformation or saying something that excludes members of the community, please tell me. I’ll research the matter, as well as review any sources you send me.

5.5) okay so I think I’m demiromantic

6) I do not mind being tagged or sent asks or otherwise brought into conversations. People who abuse that will likely get blocked, but whatever your social anxiety is telling you probably comes nowhere near ‘abuse’ in my book. Anonymous asks are enabled, but that can likewise change if the feature is abused. Hate asks will be blocked, naturally.

7) I would prefer being asked before you directly message me. If you don’t, there is a possibility you’ll be blocked, but it’s not a guarantee. I don’t want me and my friends’ conversations getting buried by anything.

8) If you consistently and frequently post tiktok/reddit memes with little to no commentary, I may block you simply out of annoyance should you repeatedly show up on my dash. It’s not personal. If something about you makes me suspicious or uncomfortable, but not outright offended, I’ll most likely notify you of my reason before I block you.

9) Age: pick a number between 1 and 100 because it’s none of your fucking business. None of you are entitled to any of my personal information, regardless of the reason. I will share only what I want.

My Behaviors

There are certain things I gravitate towards or away from on this site. Here’s some:

1) I am most likely to follow people who are part of the LGBTQIA+ community, are mentally ill, or are dealing with some variety of personality disorder. This is mostly just due to the fact that I find the most common ground with those people. But even those who I have little common ground with, I’ll tend to find very interesting.

2) I don’t mind things like roleplay and hornyposting on my dash, but will almost certainly not interact myself, or make original posts in that category. More extreme examples won’t necessarily get you blocked or unfollowed, but… well, my filtered tags list may grow.

3) I don’t always tag reblogs. This may mean that my followers will see random things that caught my interest. It could be art, shitposting, tender affirmations, politics, or just goofy-ass Tumblr shit. If something I regularly reblog/post about bothers you and isn’t properly tagged, let me know.

4) I am discovering that maybe, I might, perhaps, be a little bit nosy. When I see someone receiving hate or suffering and stressed, I am likely to take it upon myself to do or say something to try to make them feel better. If I bother you with this, I will not be hurt or offended if you block me. In general, I will do my best to be respectful of it when people draw boundaries, so don’t hesitate to draw any you feel necessary.

5) If your intentions are pure, you will likely find that I try to be forgiving and/or understanding of your mistakes, at least in regards to interacting with me. (The /or is a very important distinction.)

6) I will often be attracted to dark, tragic, or dystopic works of art/fiction. I get a form of catharsis from such media, and some of my writing will reflect that.

That’s about it.

That’s all the important stuff I can think of, aside from tags which are at the end. Still, this post may be updated or rewritten in the future. In general, just be kind and open-minded, and we’ll get along fine. Even if you disagree with me, as long as you are civil and rational about things, I’ll likely have no problem interacting with you.

Be safe, and be yourself! <3

🇵🇸🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈

My Tags:

#redley’s playlist - Some of my favorite songs!

#redley’s photos - Photos taken by/of me!

#writing - Writing related things and occasionally stuff I’ve made! (#poetry will also contain some of my work)

#let me just frame this one - My personal favorite posts by others. Put that right up on the wall!

#cw/tw: [content] - I will tag posts that I recognize may be disturbing to others with content warnings and/or trigger warnings. This way, you can filter content that may be harmful to your mental health to view. If a post is missing an important one, let me know.

[detailtilted]

Sample of Upcoming "Enhanced Edition" CHICON 2007 Solo Jensen Panel

This sample was removed when I updated the full video with drastically improved video quality. I did not recreate the sample, but you can find the full video here.

Original post:

This is just a small, 1+ minute segment of a larger video that I’ll probably post next week.  Thanks so much to the people who watched, reblogged, and/or liked the CHICON 2007 Enhanced Edition Breakfast video!  It made me super happy to see some interest, and I know that was mostly thanks to those of you who managed to stumble across my obscure post and reblog it so people would actually see it.

I’ve started working on the main panels involving Jared and/or Jensen from the same convention.  Jensen’s solo panel is next sequentially, so that’s what this sample is from.  This clip was one of my favorite parts from his panel.  I’m including Jared and J2 in the tags because Jensen talks about working with Jared here.

If you don’t have any particular interest in the subtitles, you can skip the wall of text below.

On this sample, I used a much lighter color of blue for Jensen’s subtitles.  The more I looked at the shade I'd been using, the more I thought it was too dark to be read easily.  It became more apparent to me while working on his solo panel because there’s so much more of it.  I’d be happy to get opinions, good or bad.  I was really attached to the idea of using blue for Jensen and red for Jared because of their marker tape colors, and I’m pretty sure the previous shade of blue was more accurate in that regard, but it’s far more important to me that the subtitles be readable than that they be symbolic!

If people like this color better, I’ll go back and update the subtitles for the Breakfast video to use the same color for Jensen.  Subtitles are a separate file from the video, so it’s not too difficult to make changes and switch the subtitle file out without affecting the video itself. 

Speaking of which, feel free to let me know if you catch any errors with the subtitles and I’ll fix them.  Also, if there’s a subtitle that I marked as [inaudible] and you’re confident that you know what they said, let me know.  There were parts I marked as [inaudible] even though I felt sure I could guess what they’d said based on the context, but I couldn’t hear any sounds or see any mouth movements to clearly confirm it.  I tried not to put words in their mouths that they might not have said, and I didn’t want to force my own interpretation on anyone.  Sometimes though, there were places where I felt like I should have been able to figure out what they were saying but I just couldn’t get the sounds to make sense to my ears, so someone else might be able to hear those.  Other times, I would hear something for the umpteenth time, often when I was focusing on some other aspect of the video and not thinking about the subtitles at all, and suddenly it would seem blatantly obvious to me what they were saying.

As far as issues with the videos themselves, I can’t easily change them after I publish them because it would create a new video link on YouTube and I'd rather not create a confusion of links.  However, please do still feel free to let me know if you catch any errors in my added content.  I’ll keep a list of errata for my own notes in case I ever do have a reason to update the video.  If it’s particularly egregious, I can at least put a note in the video description. (And since this is a sample, if you catch any issues, I can fix it for the full version.)

[thelanor-s-astame]

Episode 1 Behind The Scenes!

Welcome to Amateur Hour! I mean this whole series is amateur hour, but stating out was REALLY amateur hour. So most of the way our videos worked is we would do a weekly video (Either podcast or Over The Shoulder game review). And I’d release a Funny Joke Video every two weeks. I was given Carte Blanch over my videos and basically just kinda did them on my own. So everything I did was suuuper rudimentary My scripts weren’t formated very well, there were tons of spelling errors, stuff I’d cut out I’d leave in the document and just remember I cut it out. But all this worked just fine because I was the only one looking at them.

And the way I’d send people their lines was I would *send* people their lines over discord and have them send me back an audio file that they’d recorded. I didn’t even really do any audio directing aside from a couple of notes. I might have directed Dalsson and TheDragonLover (heretofore referred to as Dergo), but that was it.

For anyone who might want to make a narrative series, uh… don’t do this with your main cast. If you have a guest star who knows what their doing and might not be comfortable being directed in a discord call with a stranger, that’s fine. But for everyone else you’ll just end up playing phone tag for a a couple of VA lines that won’t be nearly as good if you just set the people down in a call and told them what kinda performance you want them to give. A thing that, And I cannot stress this enough, they will be fine with you doing and in fact would much prefer this to the alternative.

And if you sit multiple people down in the call and do their voice lines in one day, that’s just way better! Your actors will be more comfortable with more friends around, and after the session is over, you have multiple scenes worth of voice lines to work with! It’s one of those “We do this thing like this for a reason.” kinda deals.

But ultimately a lot of the What Worked for those videos I’d put out every two weeks, and the video essays, did not really work here. But anyway lets look at the actual video.

The like first scene you can see how the cutting around is really off. That’s because the footage of me just standing there lasted, like, 3 seconds and I had a minute of dialogue, so I HAD to keep cutting if I wanted to use that footage. I should have just started a new save and rerecorded it but… again amateur hour.

But. The first joke here I think is really good. I have a lot of thoughts about it, so I’m going to make it a separate thread. There’s quite a bit going on there and I’m really proud of it.

But the beginning of the video, and the beginning of the series as a whole, is just kinda me moving from bit to bit like I did in the previous Joke Videos. These started out as those with a tiny bit more structure.

The Conversation with Elderbug here is what got Lordfrezon to get a better mic. Like this video convinced the man to get a better microphone. But you’ll notice Elderbugs mouth keeps moving when he’s not taking. I didn’t start putting a still picture over the talking characters yet

The quirrel scene is probably the best put together in the entire video. The editing is sharp. and I realized I could like, just reverse the video of him looking at the Black Egg to make it a little more dynamic.

But most of the dynamic-ness of these scenes comes down to me zooming in and out of characters faces for emphasis. The footage I’m working with is a character with a one second animation loop and another character staring up at them. So I gotta do a lot of cuts and zooms to make it look like a conversation with multiple emotions in it is happening. And I already had a pretty good grasp of that thanks to the joke videos! Say what you will about youtube video editing, but it sure teaches you how powerful quick cutting for emphasis is!

This was also before I started putting Reverb on every scene that takes place in a tunnel… which most of them do, and if there’s one thing I love, love, love playing with, it’s reverb. Sound design is my passion tbh. It is also the only thing I have any formal training in! I was taught it by a bunch of 80s rockers who showed me how to use an old analog soundboard for live mixing! And I’ve always held to the idea that 75% of video editing is sound editing, and 95% of that sound editing is shit no one would notice unless it wasn’t there.

There a little after the Quirrel scene I got *extremely lucky* and found a sign mender. Which is a really rare event. Just immediately out of the gate I see that man. I’d never seen him before I was getting footage for the video and he blessed me with his presence like an angel. Thank you Sign Mender! You gave me a great bit about property destruction!

The Cornifer scene is firstly, a great look into how a voice role evolves over time, and secondly, a great exemplification of what I started this with. Just Direct Your VA’s. You’ll notice how Saine’s performance on his first line here are worse than any of the other ones he’s given. He didn’t know what I wanted. And if I would have simply directed him, that wouldn’t be a problem!

He did, however get to delever the funniest lines of the video. And he did a great job with those! And, another thing to Saine’s credit is he does a fantastic job as Iselda! Man eats up that whole scene! Just great shit there!

Sly’s change is less in that the voice evolved as time went on and more I changed the character. I focused more on the Shopkeeper aspect rather than the teacher aspect as his Central Thing, and ultimately I think that was the best choice. Surly Shopkeeper who can “Show You Da Ropes” Is always a great character and he’s a lot of fun to write. Also all the thing’s Sly says about ‘God’ put me in a bit of a bind because “Okay, so why the hell does this guy know about The Radiance… a thing that a lot of people were lied to about for decades?” So I had to come up with some stuff for that. But that’s the kind of problem I love solving. Because it goes from “Weird plot hole” to “Ooh new character aspect! let’s give this man some depth!

Dergo’s performance as Myla is the best one in the video. And it’s great that’s the case too, because of how much *that* kicks off a lot of the story. But, yeah 10/10 no notes. Dergo is incredibly good at this shit.

The end bit with the snail man is probably my biggest regret of the video. It very much does not fit in with the tone of everything else. It’s kinda something that just happens in the first episode and I hope everyone forgets about. The implication he just murdered the snail guy is funny but it doesn’t fit in the wider whole. Whole scene just is not very good tbh. I also probably should have had someone else voice the Snail man as well.

And I wholeass forgot I used a different font for the credits! But I think that’s that for the first episode. IT’s kind of just a collection of thoughts, but the episode is just kind of a collection of scenes so, there we go!

[mxtxfanatic]

These last few days are really making it tempting to run an experiment, but I'm not an avid poster so it would really be up to more outspoken blogs like yours to help actually do it and see what happens. I agree with standing ground and not leaving the tag, but given how they feel entitled to the tag despite it not being for them and how they go around blocks to still harass, I am curious as to what would happen if we expanded our tag use but did not advertise it whatsoever. (This would mean quietly spreading the word through asks that aren't answered [including this one] or DMs). But if they are obsessed enough to notice, I believe they would be bothered by using tag names like "authentic Jiang Cheng" and "genuine Jiang Cheng", both of which are currently empty with screenshots on both mobile and desktop to prove they are empty.

I don't want to force anything on anybody however, especially since I hold little stakes as a lurker, but they keep trying to play the victim of the evil "anti" crowd that just won't use the anti tag and downplaying the fact that they are invading a tag made for a reason. If they are curating their experience like they should be, they should not see these posts and therefore would have no idea that new tags have been added. But if they do notice and start posting in those tags and try to flood them like the cannon Jiang Cheng tag, then there would now be documented proof in the screenshots I hold, a screenshot of this ask being typed, and afterwards me making a post about it with the receipts.

I chose those two tag names to be similar enough in meaning to canon in that they are meant to discuss a certain view of the character (because what is more authentic or genuine than the source material?) and because I honestly think it's going to bother them if they notice just like canon did and I'm not exactly above being petty sometimes. Overall the results would be for the "neutral" crowd asking why people can't just block each other and get along. Either the stans are being truthful that they are blocking people they do not like and not being weird cyberstalkers, or they invade the tags and prove our point once again, but this time with pictures and this proposal to show the setup. Is it essentially baiting them, yeah, but their arguments of just wanting to talk about the character in a space about that character hinge on them not taking the bait. They have no excuse for noticing people they are supposedly ignoring silently adding new tags to their posts, and if they do it means they are looking at your blogs still and are purposefully going to start using the same tags again.

It just seems like a minimal effort way to showcase for the newer people and the "neutral" how they go after anyone saying anything bad about their fave since it's just adding two tags to posts they have no business seeing.

So feel free to say no or ignore this ask, but I figured it was still worth sending

I get where you’re coming from, I really do, but I don’t think there’s any point. We already know they aren’t curating their experience, because many of us stopped using the main jc tag after the canon jc tag was created. Had they blocked the jc tag, they would not see the content. I, personally, never used character tags to begin with, and the exposure of my posts is probably low to begin with cause of that, but because I got associated with “antis” for interacting with this side, I got the same hate. They have already stated publicly multiple times that they are doing this because they want to push us into “anti” tags that don’t apply. The only people stans are playing victim for are the fencesitters who need an excuse to pretend like this fandom has “always” been a welcoming space “until the jc antis attacked.” These “neutral” blogs may not be willing to flatout attack us over it—hence the faux-pacifist stance they pretend to believe in—but they have a vested stake in jc stan content dominating all the tags because they, too, prefer the fanon, which is why they’re only popping their heads out now when the jc stans are losing the battle.

In short, it would just be a massive waste of energy on out part to prove something that the jc stans have already admitted to doing, publicly multiple times with glee.

[moefling]

ok i’m gonna talk about the RWRB Movie...

SPOILER: i’m gonna be negative and i’m not planning on watching the movie (i guess that means ppl are gonna block me??? idk why ppl are just mass blocking because of this but whatever) (edit: per a suggestion I swapped the tag on this post so it isn't tagged under "rwrb movie")

so i’m gonna start by saying that i’ve watched the trailer a few times and honestly i love the vibes, it makes me smile ever time.

-the kiss is great

-the butt slap is everything

-Henry’s facial expressions *chefs kiss*

-the visible chain around Alex neck. yes

i’m also gonna say that its great that people ARE going to see the movie, we need more queer movies and the only way for that to happen is if ppl watch the ones that are being made now.

so the bad.

honestly i could deal with a lot of the little things.  like they make my eye twitch a little but i do actually understand that you can’t 100% remake a book into a movie.

 BUT

it’s June that i can’t forgive.

if i’m wrong and she is in the movie than amazing and i redact everything but it doesn’t seem to be that way.

removing June makes me SO angry.  its like removing Alice from Twilight or Sam from Lord of the Rings.  if Main Characters are just the romantic leads (Alex and Henry) than June defiantly falls into secondary tier - all the Super Six kinda do (Bea would be the most removable for me but is is also necessary for Henry’s development as much as June is for Alex.

June balances Alex out.  the book even specifically states WHY all of the White House Trio are needed (page 28: “Alex pushes them. June steadies them. Nora keeps them honest.”) She keeps him sane and she put her life on hold to watch out for Alex, and Alex knows this!

the idea of Alex being an only child is terrifying.  he is already kinda selfish (i say that lovingly) and “a little shit” without growing up with an older sibling to shut him up he would be a monster (and Nora doesn’t count because first they don’t actually meet until Ellen is running with Mike as VP and second Nora’s personality is to “go with the flow” to really steady Alex)

June also has some important moments that happen in the book! like it doesn’t really work to have Nora be fake dating Henry for the like 2 days that that happens and no June means no Magazine moment (i know that isn’t really directly in the book but its a fav for everyone).  no June also really changes the tone of the Lake House....

ANWAY, moving away from June here is some other things that i don’t like (because its my rant and i want to, feel free to change my mind)

- the height difference (i did love the lifts comment in the trailer but idk if they’ll be able to keep that up in a way that makes since - that means that if they are every barefoot Alex would have to be shorter *cough* like swimming)

-the actor for Alex is to old.  i know ppl are really split about this but the actor feels put together and like an adult to me (vs. book Alex feels very young - or he honestly acts his age of 21/22).  i think the polo match scene says a lot for me in the postures of the 2 actors, Henry is ok (tho honestly i think he wouldn’t have the loose posture once he rejoined ppl but its cute so pass) but Alex is to stiff, he should be almost bouncing as he walks.

-WFT is Ellen’s accent in the trailer???

-i heard a rumor that Raf and Liam are merged and redone.  Gross and big no.

-King instead of Queen.  i understand why this was done but the tone changes a lot in my head of abusive Grandpa vs. Grandma

-Zahra.  don’t like, the vibe is off with the actress... can’t explain why except the smile in the photos and the bow in the trailer

 -i feel like some of the scenes feel still (this is 100% my opinion and i could be reading this VERY wrong so ignore this if you interpret it differently)

i really wanted to like the movie but realistically i probably wouldn’t watch the movie anyway because i have issues with that so..... i guess it doesn’t matter.

i hope ppl who watch it enjoy it and please separate tags of movie vs book, thanks

[sleepy-moron]

A lot of tag discussions about gay Mike have happened recently and it has brought a point that I was aware of but hadn’t really posted about to the front of my brain again:

Will is defined as gay almost entirely outside being attracted to guys. Will’s queer coding is implicitly tied to other people’s perceptions of him, mostly revolving around Will behaving in ways that aren’t seen as “masculine”. In my mind (being that I didn’t really get into the show until season 2) the second we see Will at the snow ball dancing with that girl but looking at Mike I knew he was intentionally being written as gay rather than just a character that has gay coding. This is a pretty common thing, to define gayness by the way a character looks and acts rather than being attracted to men. Usually the big exception to this is characters who follow the armored closet gay trope. While these characters are defined by being macho guys who constantly insult and accuse other people of being gay, they usually do show attraction to other guys to make sure the audience understands the dude in the closet is actually gay himself.

Will has character depth and he probably wasn’t written to conform to gay stereotypes but he is definitely read that way by the audience. People have been taking the more reserved artistic kid and making him much “softer” or more feminine than he actually is for years because that’s how media has trained them to view gay people. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that people started saying Will is going to become a bad guy, or die at the same time they started calling him a home wrecker. There’s an implicit mold that a lot of gay characters follow so people project traits associated with that formula onto all gay characters.

Mike is a very different story. Mike is gay coded through symbolism and a noted disinterest (and in some cases displeasure) in girls. Sure he’s not athletic but Mike certainly breaks the mold a bit for gay characters. He’s defensive and reckless, the archetypical generic guy hero who gets the girl and lives happily ever after. How many action oriented shows and movies can you think of that have a gay dude as the main hero without using the hero being gay prominently in marketing? I can’t think of any but I also don’t watch a lot of tv so I could be wrong….

The audience has no idea what gay coding for a character like Mike is really supposed to look like because it’s not something that happens. If a character is gay coded he either never expresses any interest in women (including having a female love interest) or it’s made very clear through either explicit confirmation or use of general character tropes that this character is meant to be gay. Mike has a girlfriend, and while I think after s2 the show goes out of its way to suggest Mike isn’t into girls he doesn’t act the way gay characters who have girlfriends are expected to act. Mike acts like the standard loser dude with a girlfriend who should be way out of his league is expected to. He has trouble emotionally opening up with her, he’s controlling and overprotective, and he complains about women while burping loudly after El dumps him. People can’t conceive the idea of Mike being with El for (in their mind the whole show but actually only two seasons) for as long as he is without the show making sure you know this character is gay.

The tropes for establishing bi characters work very differently. Usually either the character is seen being attracted to men and women very soon after being introduced or they are usually assumed to be straight until they either come out as bi or figure out that they’re bi. This feels like a much more reasonable way to make Mike queer and result in endgame byler because this is something that has precedent. Heck they literally did the same thing with one of the robins from Batman like a year ago.