#To continue to fight thanos together.

[swagging-back-to]

nebula and rocket are the best characters from GOTG and i will actually throw hands about it

[jpmarvel90]

Sacrifice

Masterlist Natasha Masterlist

Word Count: 5148

Relationship: Sister Nat & Sister Yelena x Reader Wanda x Reader

Summary: Y/n has been haunted since she watched Natasha fall to her death on Vormir. Her own grief is only intensified when Yelena finds out and shifts blame to the one person that wished it was her who had made the ultimate sacrifce.

Y/n's POV:

Coming home from Vormir without Nat was the most heartbreaking moment of my life. Seeing our sister Yelena's reaction added to the pain that I was already feeling. When Clint, Nat and I arrived at Vormir, none of us thought we'd be leaving as a duo. As soon as the realisation hit, I knew it had to be me. Clint had a family and the world needed Natasha. I was the obvious choice.

But Nat had other ideas. She had to be the hero. Whilst her and Clint were fighting, I took the opportunity to go myself. But Nat stopped me at the last minute. My feet were off the ground as I jumped, I was content with my decision. But my stubborn sister had to be the hero. She was able to grab me at the last minute and use her strength to switch our position.

I still had a hold on her hand, but she was out of reach from Clint, so it was reliant on me to be able to pull her up. That was made even more difficult by the fact that Nat didn't even try. My eyes were filled with tears when I realised that I wouldn't be able to save her. "You can't leave us. Yelena needs you. I need you!" I begged her, a sob getting caught in my throat. "It's ok. You'll be ok." She tells me but I shake my head, tears continuing to fall. I try once again with all my strength to pull her back up. "Let me go." She whispers before kicking off the wall. I can still see her body falling as I failed to save her. The world lost a hero that day and Yelena and I lost our sister.

It never should have been Nat. She was the true hero that carried on fighting when so many gave up after the snap. She gave her life to rectifying the wrongs she was forced to do whilst in the Red Room. Her ledger was already clean, and she deserved the chance to be able to have a normal life. To not have to fight any more.

After the battle was over, we were reunited with our family and friends that we had lost five years ago. I hadn't only lost Yelena, but my girlfriend Wanda too. It had been hell, and it was the reason I stuck by Natasha and worked tirelessly with her to find a way to bring everyone back.

However, telling them both the news was almost as devastating as the moment I saw Nat die. Yelena was angry and couldn't understand it. Wanda was devastated too. Nat had been like a sister to her when she first joined the Avengers. She was hurting too. I tried to be there for them as best I could. I was still grieving myself, but I knew I had to be there for my sister and girlfriend.

It was hard as they both started to withdraw, spending more time together. They had a shared experience and found comfort in each other. I started to feel like an outsider and my relationship with Wanda was slowly becoming more distanced. Yelena rarely spoke to me. Until she uttered the most devastating words at Nat's funeral. "It should have been you." There was a venom to her words and I could see that Wanda agreed. It made everything more painful as they were true. It should have been me. No one needed me. But Natasha Romanoff, everyone needed her.

Life at the compound become more difficult by the day. Those of us left signed to work with the government to keep the world safe from another situation like Thanos. There were rumblings that Hydra had resurrected, so most of our missions focused on wiping out anyone who posed a threat.

During this, my relationship with Yelena became non-existent. Any words said in my direction were said with hate. It got so bad that Fury could no longer put us on the same missions as he couldn't guarantee my safety from my own teammate, my own sister.

Wanda never officially broke up with me, but she moved out of our shared room and no longer spared any time for me. If I walked into a room, she was quick to leave. The love we once had seemed to have vanished when Nat died. Each day, it just reiterated why it should have been me.

So, I decided that I had to find a way that I could bring Nat back. No matter what the consequences might be. I spend a lot of time in the library working out if there was anything I could do that might be able to make everything right again. Though one phrase keeps coming up. "A soul for a soul." It's what's the Red Skull had told us when we were on Vormir, could that be a replacement for a soul already sacrificed.

I decide that's where I need to start. A trip back to Vormir and a conversation with the Red Skull will hopefully set me off on the way to bringing Nat back. I just need a distraction for everyone here so I can "borrow" a quinjet and make the journey. "Hey Y/n, we're going to have a team evening together. Maybe go for a couple of drinks, want to join us?" Bucky calls out after knocking on my door.

"Are Yelena and Wanda going?" I ask as I open the door. He looks at me sympathetically and nods. The rest of the team have been a little distant with me too. Not that I blame them. They're closer to Yelena and Wanda so I don't expect them to insert themselves into the middle of whatever shit show of a relationship we have.

"I'll give it a miss tonight. Thanks, though Buck. Have a great time." I tell him with a tight lipped smile. "You ok Y/n?" He asks me, taking me by surprise. "Oh yeah. I'm good. Thanks for checking in. I appreciate it." I respond. He nods and goes to turn before stopping and looking back. "How about on Friday, you me and Sam all go out together. Make a night of it. I know you've been a little isolated recently. I'm sorry for that." He suggests. "Oh uh. Thanks Bucky, sure that would great." I agree and I see him smile. "Great, we'll sort something out." He smiles and heads off.

This gives me the perfect opportunity. If they're all out, I can start to bring my sister back. I take a bit of time getting everything in order just in case I don't come back. I leave a message for Nat, hopeful that she might be able to see it one day. I considered leaving one for Yelena and Wanda, but they won't care. They'll be happy that the right person is with them.

I hear them all leave about 6pm so I gather a few of my things and head out. One of the few skills I'm grateful for from the red room is my hacking ability. Hopefully, by the time Shield realise the jet is missing, I'll be long gone. I'm weirdly not nervous as I board the quinjet. I feel a sense of hope. I know this is the right thing to do and I just pray that I'll be able to pull this off.

When I finally reach my destination, I take the familiar walk up to the top of the cliff. I get flashbacks of the last time I was here. The last time I was with my sister. I can still hear the conversations we had as I reach the top. I familiar figure waiting for me.

I take a deep breath and make my way forward as the figure turns to face me. "Ah, Y/n Y/l/n, I wondered when I would see you again."

Wanda's POV:

This night out with the team was much needed. Since everything with Thanos, it's been difficult to find the light. We lost a lot and we're still healing. I was surprised when I felt a pang of disappointment when Bucky came to us without Y/n in tow. Not that I'm surprised, we've not exactly made a welcoming space.

I especially have been bad with her. She's my girlfriend after all, but I just let my grief consume me. Add on the confusion of missing out on five years of life, it's just been difficult to make sense of it all. Yelena was the only one who knew how I felt and it was easier to be with her than Y/n.

But now I realise what I'm missing. The support and comfort of the woman that I love. I was stupid to let myself become influenced by Yelena. I started to feel her anger, but mine wasn't directed at Y/n. It was the situation. It just became my outlet as I had nowhere else to direct it. Which is completely unfair on Y/n. She was grieving herself and lost Yelena and me on top of it.

"I'm going to check on Y/n." Bucky tells us when we arrive home, earning a huff from Yelena. "Why do you care?" She snaps. "Because she has become isolated and it's not fair. I shouldn't have let it go on for so long." He defends. "Maybe she deserves it! If it wasn't for her, Natasha would be here." Yelena bites back. "ENOUGH!" Clint shouts, stepping in front of Yelena.

"I promised Y/n I wouldn't get involved, but I can't stand here anymore and let you talk like this. Y/n tried everything to save Nat. She had to watch as she slipped from her fingers after doing everything for it to be her. Y/n had wanted to make the sacrifice herself. So please just stop. If you don't want to be around her or have her in your life, fine. But this bitching needs to stop." He scolds the young Russian. Yelena doesn't respond but lets her head hang low for a moment. "I'll join you Bucky." Clint responds, following behind Bucky.

I should go with them. But when I take a step, Yelena looks to me. "I need more vodka." She huffs, taking my arm and moving us into the kitchen to get a drink. But before she's able to drink the shot she's poured, FRIDAY makes an announcement. "Director Fury has request everyone's attention in the conference room immediately."

"Cyka." Yelena huffs, quickly taking the shot and making her way to the meeting room. I follow behind and see Bucky and Clint return but without Y/n. I don't question it, instead I take a seat next to Yelena. "Would one of you like to explain where the quinjet is?" He asks, his tone flat. "No idea. We've all been out for a team meal." Sam explains. "Was Y/l/n at this meal?" Fury asks after noticing her absence.

The silence provides his answer. "That would explain the encryption on the tracking." Fury sighs. "Wait, you think Y/n has taken the jet?" Clint asks, giving Bucky a worrying look. "Well, considering she's the only one not here and only two people in this team have that ability to hack the quinjet like that." He responds and we all know the other is Yelena.

"This is not good. Do you think she's actually done it? That she found away?" Clint whispers to Bucky who matches his concerned look. "Do you know where the jet was heading?" Clint directs to Fury who shakes his head. "No, she's hidden the location." He replies. "Shit." Clint mumbles. "Something you'd like to share?" Fury questions him. Clint doesn't respond but pushes a piece of paper towards him.

Fury takes it and I see a sadness flash across his face. My heart rate picks up a little and the regret of how I have treated Y/n these last week's grows tenfold. I selfishly thought she would always be there waiting for me for when I was able to get passed this grief.

"Ok, let's go. Hopefully we can catch her before she does something stupid." Fury moves to leave with no explanation. "Would someone like to explain what is going on?" Yelena asks angrily. "Considering you haven't cared about Y/n's wellbeing recently, I'm sure you don't care now." Clint snaps and I see a flash of hurt on Yelena's face. "We don't have time for this." Bucky steps in, bringing the focus back to the situation at hand.

Mindlessly, I follow behind the others towards the quinjet. I have no idea what's going on, but from the panic in both Clint and Bucky's eyes, I know it can't be good. "You're going?" Yelena reaches out to grab my arm and spin me around. "You're not? She's your sister Yelena. I know you're angry at her, but it seems like you might lose her too. It's a loss I know that I won't cope with." I respond, snatching my arm from her and running to the jet.

"Co-ordinates set to Vormir." Clint tells Fury as the jet takes off. Hearing those words sends fear through my body. Why would she be going there? This fear and sickening feeling just grows as we get closer to our destination. The rest of the journey is in silence before the jet touches down.

Cautiously we all disembark and my eyes instantly land on the quinjet a few metres away. "This way." Clint instructs, directing us towards a worn path up to the top of a cliff. As quickly as we can, we start off to reach our destination. Though I don't think any of us expected the sight that was waiting for us.

In this moment, I feel like my heart is in my mouth. My emotions overwhelm me as I see the person that I had been grieving for. "Natasha?" Yelena whispers in shock as our eyes land on a familiar red head in front of us. I wipe at my own eyes, not believing what I'm seeing in front of us. Nat turns around with a confused look on her face as she looks over us. "You're really here?" Yelena says as she rushes forward and wraps her arms around her sister.

My own gaze then moves around trying to find Y/n. She has to be around here somewhere. "What happened? How am I here?" Nat asks once we've all greeted her, plenty of tears shed between us. That's when I notice the sadness in Clint and Bucky's eyes. "Clint?" I ask, panic building within. All he can muster is a whisperer sentence. "A soul for a soul."

Natasha's POV:

The last thing I remember was being in this odd space between reality and wherever I was due to move onto next. I was aware I was dead, and it seemed like I was just waiting. For what, I'm not sure. But I certainly hadn't expected that I would find myself back on Vormir. I knew time had passed. I just don't know how much time.

I look over the edge of the cliff as flashbacks from that day replay in my mind. I jumped. I stopped Y/n from doing it and I jumped in her place. I died, making the sacrifice so we could get the soul stone and beat Thanos. Had we beat Thanos?

I don't get time to really take it all in as I hear footsteps behind me. I quickly turn, getting in my fighting stance ready for whatever might be coming my way. However, my question is soon answered when I see two faces that I've not see in five years. Within seconds Yelena has wrapped her arms around me and is holding me close. I take comfort in her arms and look around for our other sister, desperate to hold her too.

After greeting everyone, I ask what had happened and that seems to bring a sadness to Fury, Bucky and Clint. When Wanda pushes Clint, he simply states, "A soul for a soul." I don't understand what he means, we already did that to get the soul stone in the first place. "What do you mean? Where's Y/n? Is she back at the compound?" I ask, not getting a good feeling about my sister not being here for this reunion.

"Let's get back home and we can share what we know." Clint suggests, guiding us back towards the path. Yelena and Wanda both stick close to me. Yelena seems delighted, but Wanda has a darkness around her. A worry that I don't understand. But I fear it is related to Y/n. "How long has it been?" I ask, wanting to get some sense of the time that has passed. "Three months." Yelena responds. "It felt like we had only been gone for seconds but in that time, I had lost you." She adds on, turning to me and pulling me into a hug once again. I've never seen Yelena this vulnerable before, so I just hold her that bit tighter.

When we reach the quinjet, I notice that there are two which takes me by surprise. "I'll take this one back. Then we'll meet to discuss moving forward." Fury explains, to which Bucky nods. "Not that I'm complaining, but is anyone going to explain how I'm back?" I ask, getting a little frustrated. They all look at each other until Clint speaks up. "We actually have no idea, but we think it has something to do with Y/n." He responds, before turning to enter the jet, preventing me from questioning him further.

My mind is so confused right now. It still feels a little hazy as we fly back to the compound. I have so many questions and I can't quite make sense of what is happening right now. As grateful as I am to be with my family again, I want to understand why. Is this temporary? Will I end up back in the middle place again?

When we arrive back home, I aimlessly follow the others to the conference room. "You go and rest Natasha, we'll give you any updates as needed." Yelena instructs me but I shake my head. "I want to know how this has all happened, especially if it's got something to do with Y/n." I reply, continuing on my journey with the others. I hear Yelena mumble something under her breath and she doesn't look too happy, but ultimately doesn't stop me.

I take my usual seat in the conference room, and I realise that the others are in a state of shock. They are all staring at me as if I'm going to disappear at any moment. "Where's Steve and Tony?" I ask, noticing two very empty spaces in the room. They take the time to talk me through what happened after they returned with all the stones. Knowing that Tony sacrificed himself for the greater good brought a tear to my eye. But I'm grateful that Steve was able to get his second chance with Peggy.

Now we come on to the more difficult conversation of how I happen to be back on earth, very much alive. "Bucky and I went to check on Y/n but she didn't answer. FRIDAY notified us she had left the compound but that she had blocked her location. With the door unlocked we went in and that's when we found that note." Clint explains as Fury nods along. "That would work with the timeline of the quinjet going missing. She obviously waited for you all to be out of the compound so she could do what she needed uninterrupted." Fury responds.

"What note?" I jump in, still confused about what is going on. Did Y/n really steal a quinjet? Why would she do that? Fury moved his hand into his inside pocket of his jacket and pulls out a note before handing it to me. I open it up and I feel both Wanda and Yelena peer over my shoulder.

Maybe this time I can make things right. I'll make sure it was me. Take care of Nat.

I look up from the note to the others. Wanda is full on crying when she sees the words on the paper. Yelena won't make eye contact whilst both Bucky, Clint and Sam look like they're grieving. "What does this mean? What does she mean by making sure it was her." I question, wanting to get some semblance of what is going on. This looks like a suicide note.

I start to get frustrated when no one answers me. In fact, they all make the effort to not meet my eyes. "Someone tell me!" I shout, banging my hand to the table making them flinch. "Yelena?" Clint speaks, raising an eyebrow at her. I turn to face my sister who looks as white as a ghost. "Lena, what is going on?" I ask calmly, but again she doesn't respond.

"Her and Wanda have spent the last three months telling Y/n that it should have been her and not you. I guess she finally found a way to make that true" Bucky finally breaks the silence and my heart with it. "What?" I gasp, turning to look between the two of them. "Did you really say that to her?" I ask, shocked that Yelena could do something so horrible to Y/n. They've always been so close.

When both of them fail to respond, I stand up ready to leave. I can't believe this. "Natasha wait." Fury tries to stop me. "No! From what I can work out, these two pushed Y/n so far that she has killed herself to bring me back. That's what you're telling me without actually telling me isn't it." I snap, tears filling my eyes. "We don't know exactly what happened." Fury responds but I just scoff. "She stole a quinjet and flew to Vormir. You found me and Y/n was nowhere to be seen. I think we all know what happened." I retort.

Quickly turning to face Yelena and Wanda, I feel my anger build. "I'm so angry at you. It was my choice! I decided it had to be me. I had my chance at living and making things right. Y/n still had so much of her life ahead of her. She was in there longer than us Yelena. She had you, Wanda and she was happy. I couldn't take that away from her or you! I made the decision to jump because I thought that if it was Y/n, you'd be left without a girlfriend and you your favourite sister." I yell, jabbing my finger in the direction of Wanda and Yelena.

"Fuck! It was my choice! It was meant to be me. But now I hear that she's spent the last three months without anyone whilst she went through grief, being told it was her fault and she should have died. Her last three months were probably miserable, and you can't change that. She's gone. Y/n is dead. Do you realise that? She's not going to magically rematerialize. And it's all your fault!" I rant, anger and an overwhelming sadness taking over me.

At my words, I see the realisation hit Yelena and Wanda. Tears start to fall down their cheeks. "I jumped so she could have the life you promised me she would have. A life where she would be loved and protected. A life where you would never hurt her. But it couldn't be any further from the truth!" I spit at Wanda, venom lacing my tone.

"And you. How can you even treat our sister like that. I don't think I'm ever going to be able to forgive you." I turn to Yelena, my heart aching knowing I've lost two sisters today. Not allowing them time to respond, I storm off to what used to be my room. Ignoring the calls from behind me.

When I reach the accommodation floor, I find myself stuck outside Y/n's door. My hand hovering over the handle. There is a part of me that is wishing this is some sick joke and I'll open this door to see her sat on her bed, drawing, or listening to music. That she'll actually be alive, and I won't have to face living in this world without my sister. The sister that gave me my humanity.

Slowly I push the door open, and I instantly get enveloped by her scent. Tears once again prickle at my eyes when I see the cold room is empty. Wanting to feel closer to her, I move further into the room and towards her desk where I spot a USB sat on an otherwise spotless desk.

Pulling her desk chair out, I sit and turn on her laptop. Letting out a teary laugh when I see the photo of her, Yelena, and I when we were drunk on a night out. We look the happiest we've ever been. It was one of the first times we'd been able to just forget about life all together and this photo represented that. I reach out and rest my fingers over her face. "Oh, moya malen'kaya sestra. (My little sister) I'm sorry I failed you." I cry as the thought of not seeing her again hits me.

Composing myself, I plug in the USB and open it to see there is only one file on it. A video file entitled "For Natasha." Hesitantly, I click on the file and let out a sob when I see Y/n's face appear on the screen. Straight away I notice that she's barely slept and there is a pain in her eyes I have not seen since we saved her from the red room.

Video message

Hey Nat. I really hope that you are watching this. If you are, it means that I finally did something right and managed to rectify the mistake that I made that day on Vormir. I never should have let you jump.

You see, the thing is about you Natasha, is you don't see your worth. You believe the trauma that you went through as a child is something that you must atone for, for the rest of your life. Despite telling Yelena, me and countless other widows how our actions were not our fault, you failed to allow yourself the same courtesy.

Since joining Shield and then the Avengers, you have done far more good than you ever did bad. Not that you had anything to make up for in life. You had every right to live a normal life, to try and move on from the horrors of your past. But instead, you set your mind to saving others who couldn't save themselves.

Don't tell the others, but you were the true hero of the Avengers. Your intentions were the purest. You were not blinded by money, fame, or righteousness. You were doing everything you could to try and drive out evil from this world. To stop others having to experience a pain like you did.

It's why I decided to jump. Why it should have been me that made that sacrifice. You had already given enough. It was your time to live your life in peace. If you had chosen to carry on your life as an Avenger, then so be it. But it would have been your choice.

The world needs Natasha Romanoff. Yelena, Clint, Shield, hell even my girlfriend, needed you more than me. It's why you never should have given your life that day. It's why I was the logical choice. The only choice.

Yes, hearing that being reiterated by people I love has been hard to hear these last few months. But it's the truth. It's why I tried so hard to find away that I could rectify that mistake and make the world right again. I think I finally have that answer now. A way that I might be able to bring you back. I pray that this works and maybe Yelena and Wanda can stop hating me. Not that I'll know, I guess.

I know that everyone will be able to move one without me in their lives. But you, well we know the world deserves and needs Natasha Romanoff. I just hope that I'm able to give it to them.

If you are sat watching this Nat. Please know how much I love you. You are the reason that I experienced freedom and free will for the first time. You gave me a family, a chance at love. All things that I thought I would never experience. You saved me in more ways than one and I will always be eternally grateful for that.

Being able to call you my sister has been the greatest honour Nat. I love you with everything I have, and I hope that one day, we may see each other again. In a life where there are no expectations of us. A life where we're free to live as we want. But before that time, live your life to the fullest. Enjoy it and have a vodka for me. Ya tebya lyublyu, moya sestra. Do svidaniya. (I love you, my sister. Goodbye.)

I feel the sobs wrack over me as the screen goes black. I feel grief wash over me in waves. It physically hurts to know that she sacrificed herself for me. For her to believe that this world needs me more than it needed her. She is a light that shone brighter than anyone I had ever met. But now that light is extinguished.

With my grief overwhelming me, I feel the sudden need to leave her room. Being surrounded by her things, knowing she'll never be here again is just adding to the pain. As I stand and turn around, I spot Wanda and Yelena crying in the doorway, clearly having overheard the video.

"Natash..." "Don't." I hold my hand up to stop Wanda straight away. "She needed you. Both of you. But you were selfish and put your own grief above hers. You could have supported each other. Grieved together, moved on together and had a life together. But instead, everything is ruined." I express, pain lacing my voice.

"Natasha please." Yelena practically begs, reaching out to take my hand but I'm quick to snatch it away. "No. As far as I'm concerned, I lost two sisters today." I state before barging past them both and to my own room. Quickly locking the door behind me.

I fall onto the bed, the whole day becoming overwhelming. I don't know where to go from here. How do I live a life that doesn't have her in it. How am I supposed to live like she told me to, when I can't share it with her. I feel at a complete loss. Of all the things I have sacrificed, my own life included, this was one I was too selfish to give. But have ended up losing anyway. 

[bensonoliviasstuff]

“Turning Page”

Chapter four! “We're gonna be Timeless”

Masterlist for Turning Page

Bucky Barnes x fem! reader

Summary: Once Bucky regained consciousness and was no longer the Winter Soldier, all he missed from the 40s was his wife. But maybe she's closer than he thought.

Warnings: English is NOT my first language, so I'm sorry if there are too many errors. A little bit of angst, Rape, memory loss, betrayal, trauma, Insecurities. And the best part: Thanos doesn't exist here

Taglist: @capswife @mostlymarvelgirl @scott-loki-barnes @bxckybxrnes24

“Even if we'd met on a crowded street

in 1944

And you were headed off to fight in

the war

You still would've been mine, we would

have been timeless

I would've read your love letters every

single night

And prayed to God you'd be coming home

all right

And you would've been fine, we would

have been timeless.

‘Cause I believe that we were supposed

to find this”

~ Timeless (Taylor's Version)

You and Natasha arrived at the medical wing, the last time you had been here was when you woke up to the doctors and Tony doing tests.

You hadn't been able to pay that much attention to your surroundings, but now you were hiding behind Natasha as she walked towards the room.

She went in first, talking to Bucky and asking details about the mission and how they got hurt, you continued behind her until she took two steps to the side, finally allowing Bucky to see you.

He seemed very surprised to see you there, opening his mouth to say something but not being able to produce a sound.

“Hi” you said shyly, thinking it would be up to you to break the silence.

“Hi” He said with a smile “What are you doing here?”

“She wanted to see you” Natasha said, hiding her smirk from you.

“Well I..." you stuttered nervously, Bucky smiled at how cute you looked nervous "I... It's not... I just... I was worried" you pointed to his human arm, which was where, you noticed, he got hurt.

“Were you worried about me?” he said pretentious “No need to stutter, thank you, doll”

You froze at the nickname, realizing no one had ever called you that before but with Bucky it felt so right.

He noticed how disconcerted you were and only then did he understand what he said.

He panicked, it was so natural to call you like that, he didn't realize that it wasn't anymore.

“I meant... I...” He stuttered, having no idea what to do to fix the situation, and what if you got scared and moved away from him.

“Who’s stuttering now, huh?” You joked, looking away and biting your bottom lip to hide your rosy cheeks.

He looked at you confused, weren't you surprised? You wouldn't be scared by the nickname and move away?

It seemed not.

Then he smiled at you, still a little embarrassed, but hope seemed to shine in his heart in a way it hadn't in a long time.

Natasha had a hand over her mouth almost in shock at the way Bucky seemed to have suddenly become a teenager, stuttering and flirting, that was definitely not the Bucky she knew.

That made her smile, it wasn't the Bucky she met at the compound, but it was the Bucky you met back in the 40s.

A week passed after Bucky was injured on the mission, and Steve and Natasha were currently sitting at the breakfast table, watching Bucky eating with a smile on his face, wishing good morning to anyone who passed him.

“I think he’s sick” Steve whispered to the redhead

“Lovesick” Natasha whispered back, which made them both contain a laugh.

“Oh my God” Steve put a hand over his mouth in shock. “In 90 years I have never seen Bucky Barnes wake up in a good mood.”

“90?” Natasha said with doubt “He looks like he just turned 15 and is having his first girlfriend”

Tony arrived in the kitchen passing Bucky who happily looked at him and said “Good morning, Tony!”

Tony looked at Bucky with an expression of true fear, quickly moving away and heading towards Steve and Natasha.

"He is sick?" Tony said with a terrified expression.

Steve and Natasha looked at each other before turning to Tony and saying together:

“Love Sick”

It's been like this for the last week, Bucky started spending more time with you, and consequently Bucky seemed to be constantly in his own pink world, no one had seen him this happy in a while.

Despite that, what was still killing him inside was the fact that even after a week here you still didn't remember anything.

He was losing hope that you would remember, but he didn't care about winning you over again, he didn't care about marrying you again, he would do all this dozens of times if it meant he would have you.

He was spending the rest of his hopes on the plans he had set up for today.

“Good morning” you said as you arrived in the kitchen and sat down next to Steve, extending your hand to take a toast that was on the plate when Tony patted your hand.

“This is mine, Little Princess” He said, taking the toast and putting it in his mouth.

You smiled with furrowed eyebrows. “What’s the difference between this one and all the others?”

“I wanted this one, so I got this one” Natasha and Steve laughed. “Earn your seat before choosing the toast”

You laughed, crossing your arms.

“Since you are the voice of wisdom in the kitchen, reveal to me what toast I can get with my insignificance”

He looked at you surprised by your answer, you knew how to suck up, he was starting to like you.

“Y/n don’t do this, If there's anyone sucking up to Tony he's going to get even more arrogant” Natasha said taking your hand.

“I’m just earning my place”

Bucky joined everyone who was laughing at the situation, sitting next to you.

“Good morning” he said, looking at you with affection.

It was still weird to you the way it felt like you had known each other your whole life even after just 8 days together.

But what could you do? You've never felt so comfortable with someone before.

“Good morning, Buck” You felt it was unnatural the way the compound made you feel at home.

“I have a surprise for you” He said, finishing eating and guiding you to your room. “There’s a dress in the wardrobe, I’m going to take you somewhere”

Here begin their last attempts to make you remember.

You went to the wardrobe finding a very beautiful dress, simple and beautiful, you seemed to have seen it somewhere before, but you didn't really know where.

You dressed feeling weird, in the week you were here you only wore hoodies similar to the ones you wore on the first day.

You put it on and decided that you would look better with your hair up, after taking a look in the bathroom mirror, you spent a moment trying to memorize how you looked, it was such a weird sensation that it felt like you were a spectator looking at you in the third person.

Weird, Weird, Weird, it was all Weird, you were tired of using that word for everything this last week.

It was weird having lunch with Bucky, it was weird watching movies with Steve, it was weird going to sleep with music.

You needed to find another word, "weird" was already losing its meaning in your mind.

It was like... It was like...

You sighed, giving up for now, but you would find a word.

You left the room going to the living room that faced the kitchen, Steve, Natasha and Bruce were sitting there.

As soon as Steve laid eyes on you he choked on his own saliva, Natasha patting him as she looked at you with a surprised look.

“Look at her so pretty, where are you going?”

You opened your mouth to respond and then you realized: you didn't know, Bucky hadn't told you anything.

“It’s a surprise, I’m going to take her somewhere” Bucky appeared in the room, placing a hand on your shoulder.“Have a nice ride” Bruce said friendly.

"Yeah, enjoy” Natasha said, patting Steve more.

“Thank you” Bucky said leading you out of the compound, only when you left Steve took a breath.

“What was that, captain?” Natasha said “I thought your hundred years were beginning to take you to the higher plane.

“That dress” Steve said, still a little breathless “It was the dress she wore when Bucky proposed to her”

Natasha opened her mouth in shock. “How did he get a similar dress?”

“Persistence” Bruce said, getting both of their attention “He’s determined to make her remember”

You smiled as the air hit your face and messed up your ponytail, it was the first time you had seen the city in a long time, And it was the first time you had ever been to a city without any mission to kill someone.

Bucky looked at you smiling, You were so beautiful that he fought every instinct to put a hand on your cheek.

"Where are we going?" you turned to him “I think we’ve been in the car for more than twenty minutes”

“I told you it’s a surprise” He said, after a few minutes you noticed a sign approaching.

‘Welcome to Brooklyn’

“Brooklyn?” You said with a smile “It’s my first time in Brooklyn”

Weird, that sentence didn't seem right.

“Weird” again???? What was the other word you were going to use anyway?

Bucky's smile faltered for a moment after you said that, it was quick, if you had blinked you wouldn't have seen it, but you did.

“Yeah, well... I like it here” He said looking into your eyes “It reminds me of home”

Weird, it felt like home to you too.

Agh, someone remove weird from your vocabulary.

When you noticed you were in front of a hospital. Wait, a hospital? Was this Bucky’s idea of “Surprise”?

"A... hospital?" You said, watching the nurses for too long.

It felt right, but you refused to say the word “Weird” again.

“The best place to park is out front” Bucky lied, he wanted to start where you started. "Let's walk"

The two of you walked for a short time, but everything seemed to be hitting you in the gut, the buildings, the streets, even the stores.

Bucky stopped when you arrived at a square, it wasn't that busy but there were still a lot of children and their parents.

Bucky looked at you, searching for any trace of memory on your face, you guys used to come here sometimes on Fridays before lunch, where you would look at the children playing after they got out of school and planned the future, planned children, you would have three children, two boys and a girl because you always dreamed of brothers Michael and Steve protecting the little Olivia.

You looked at the children, smiling with the desperate parents with the naughty children.

“Ah, I always wanted to have children” You said looking around. “Thanks to Hydra this is no longer biologically possible” You saddened, Bucky broke down.

“They… They…” Bucky couldn’t finish the sentence.

“I was kind of a toy, they took out my uterus for safety” You said, looking at Bucky with a smile to prevent him from falling to the ground right then and there “But I'm fine, thanks to you, You are my “Avengers” heroes, thank you for getting me out of there”

He still looked inconsolable, looking at you as if his puppy had died. You didn't want to ruin your day.

“Come on, what do you have planned?” You shook him, trying to make him forget.

He shook his head, seeming to remember his intentions from earlier in the day.

“That one there is the best ice cream ever” He said, pointing to an ice cream cart in the square.

“I can’t wait to try it”

Bucky smiled weakly, you used to prefer desserts before lunch, he always thought that was strange, but according to you it was the fun of being able to be a happy adult.

You went to the old man who was taking care of the ice cream cart.

You stared at the yellow car trying to remember where you recognized it from, but you were unsuccessful despite it sticking in your head.

“A cone of chocolate ice cream, please” Bucky asked, handing the money to the man.

The little old man handed you the cone, looking into your eyes as if he were an old friend, you smiled back, feeling something in your stomach twist.

Bucky guided you to another place, but you continued to stare at the old man, the weirdest thing was that he also kept looking at you and smiling as if he knew exactly what was happening.

You and Bucky sat on a bench near the toys and the noise of the children made you pay attention to the present again.

You tasted the ice cream, feeling astonished when the taste seemed so familiar to you.

You stopped, looking at the ice cream as if trying to figure out if there was some kind of pixie dust in it.

You looked at Bucky

“In fact, it’s the best ice cream I’ve ever had”

He smiled at you, waiting for something more, something like “Oh my God, I remembered all the times we ate ice cream before lunch because I looked like a spoiled child!”

But nothing like that came out of your mouth.

“What do you say we have lunch now?” He asked, the idea seemed quite pleasant to you, so he took you to a nearby restaurant.

As soon as you entered, you felt the atmosphere change, the restaurant smelled like home on Sundays with the family, homemade food, barbecue, children running around the house.

You never had any of this, no family on Sunday, so why did it all feel so strangely right?

Bucky seemed to notice that you felt the atmosphere of the place intensely. “It’s a good place, right?”

You looked around, your eyes seemed to shine and you felt like crying, stupid, why would you cry?

You placed a hand on your chest, walking through the restaurant and watching the customers sitting there with their families, children laughing, the sound of forks meeting plates, and a little melody in the background, God it made you want to cry like a child, And you couldn't find any plausible reason to be so emotional about a normal everyday scene.

Bucky walked behind you hopefully, his eyes almost begging you to remember all the moments you built here.

“How does it feel knowing this is your last day as a single woman?” Bucky held his hand, with a huge smile on his face.

You smiled, looking around the restaurant. “tomorrow I’ll be a married woman” You sighed at the title “Who knew, when I saw you the first time I was sure you weren’t a man who would marry one day”

“And I wasn’t” He laughed “I never was, until I met you” He observed every detail of your face. “I still don't know if I'm going to do this right, but it's not about being a man to marry, it's about knowing that I'll never be able to spend a moment of my life away from you"

He meant every one of those words, It hurt like hell every second he spent away from you after he had redoubled old Bucky's consciousness.

As soon as he left Wakanda, he and Steve went in search of any trace of you, Hydra had taken everything, even photos of your funeral, he spent a long time believing that you had died of cancer many years ago, never having married after him.

This left him inconsolable many times a day, you never having married again, never having had children, never having sought happiness after him.

And now he was here, willing to wait for your love regardless of how long it took for you to love him again.

“Lets sit?" He asked, and you seemed to snap out of your trance, looking at him and nodding.

You sat at a beautiful table that overlooked the entire square you were in before.

Bucky asked if you wanted to choose, but you didn't know exactly what to order so you left it up to him to choose.

You smiled in surprise when a combo with a burger and fries arrived at your table.

You grabbed a fry, putting it in your mouth and letting out a sigh at how good it was.

“This is really good, I don’t think I’ve ever had something this delicious before.” So you picked up the burger to take a bite and as soon as the flavor hit your mouth, your brain felt like a building on fire.

You let go of the burger, pressing your temple as it hurt more, the more it hurt, the more laughter you heard.

That's when you realized the laughter wasn't coming from the people in the restaurant, it was coming from your head.

“I’m always head over heels for you, Doll.”

“Are you okay, Y/n?”

You no longer knew what was really happening and what were voices in your head.

Then, just as it started, it suddenly dissipated.

“Y/n what is wrong?” Bucky asked once again, you looked at him and saw concern in his eyes.

“My head... It started to hurt like my brain was being roasted.” You placed your hand over your forehead “I started hearing things”

"What kind of things?" He asked, still worried, what if it was some side effect of something Hydra did to you?

You looked at him, how would you explain that you suddenly remembered hearing his voice somewhere?

“Things” you said bluntly, removing your hand from your forehead, Suddenly Bucky was laughing. “What's the fun?" You asked confused.

“You just got sauce on your forehead” he took a napkin and wiped your face, you laughed weakly, going back to eating your burger. “When you're done eating, let's go back to the compound, okay? I’m worried about your headache.”

You nodded and took another bite of the burger, this time the taste didn't hurt your brain, The taste was comforting, the way it seemed so familiar was weird.

Not weird, but... Ah, you haven't decided on a word yet.

You finished eating and Bucky left to pay the bill, so you were left wondering what could explain why you heard Bucky's voice in the middle of that chaos, what if Natasha was right? Did you know each other?

"Let's go?" Bucky's voice broke you out of your thoughts.

You walked calmly to the car, Bucky made a funny comment every now and then, and then you fell into a comfortable silence.

When you were near the hospital, Bucky took his keys out of his pocket and with them his wallet fell out.

He didn’t seem to notice so you bent down to pick it up “Buc...” the name died in your mouth when you took a look.

Your knees weakened and everything inside you felt like it was burning now.

There was a photo, a beautiful couple, it didn't seem so shocking until you realized it was Bucky

And you.

The breath left you when you took a look at the image, you were wearing a wedding dress and holding a bouquet of lilies, Bucky was in his suit and kept his eyes on you the whole time.

You stood up, feeling dizzy from the impact that photo had on you, were you married? No, it's impossible, you met 7 days ago, how could you be married?

Bucky turned back only to see your indignant face holding his wallet, he panicked very quickly.

“Y/n... Listen...” He tried to get closer but you took two steps back, dropping your wallet as everything in your body burned just like in the restaurant

"Who are you?" You almost screamed, but your voice didn't come out, tears falling from your face as you felt more headache.

“Come on, doll...” He said, and you remembered his voice that you heard from the restaurant, calling you doll.

“I’m always head over heels for you, doll.”

“Stop!" You placed your hand over your temples in an attempt to calm it all.

“What’s going on, Y/n? What’s wrong? let me help you please!” He begged, but his mind felt like it was starting to go blank, as if several light bulbs were flickering on and off.

“I promise to be true to you, in joy and in sadness, in sickness and in health; I will love you and honour you all the days of my life"

You smiled with tears in your eyes.

"You can kiss the bride"

You looked at Bucky as the memories made you more confused, God! it was driving you crazy, you had two people in conflict inside your head fighting for position.

That's when Bucky approached, holding you by the elbows, As soon as he touched you a key seemed to turn in your head.

It felt like someone had taken glass from your eyes.

Everything seemed to make sense.

Your heart seemed to make sense.

“Bucky” you whispered, tears streaming down your eyes, you raised your hands to touch his face, gently running your fingertips over the marks on his face.

He smiled “Yes, doll, Bucky” then he spent more time watching your face, he started to get rigid as soon as he noticed your gaze changed.

It wasn't Y/n from Hydra

It was his y/n.

His wife.

As soon as he realized this, he desperately placed a hand on your cheek, feeling you, feeling the heat of your skin, feeling your labored breathing.

“You’re alive” You said weakly, but before you could hear his response the headache overcame you, your vision became blurred.

Strong arms held you and you knew you were home.

It wasn't weird, it was... it was...

It was Timeless

[charbies]

I'm mashing together my review of totk and reactions to random encounters with the masterworks I've had lately into one stream of consciousness

Totk should have had true continuity, not a 6 year time skip that we never get to see, experience, and feel. It's not that hard to bridge 2 games with a 1-2 min cutscene, esp in a zelda game. Majora's mask starts with quick, but meaningful exposition that bridges OOT to MM! The intro to wind waker is a 6 minute long cutscene!! This series thrives with its detailed, intriguing intros, so what happened?? Before I even launched totk the night it came out, I booted up botw and replayed the final boss & ending because I was so stoked to see the transition in story/world and wanted to honor both games. Instead boom, we're walking in a cave w/ no context.

I was so disappointed that zelda wasn't a companion character to link in totk, it was disempowering to her character arc. Really thought this game would build off of botw's snippets of link & zelda working together in memories. The teasers and trailers for totk gave this perception that she would be there (which would also "break tradition" like devs wanted, ffs). When I was on the tutorial island I was fully convinced I'd be finding her and we'd reconvene like "ok what's next." When I realized 20 mins into the game that she was GONE gone, as in will not reappear likely until the end of the game damsel-in-distress-style, my verbatim thought "wait... really? Is this still going to be good?" Which was kinda sad, for a game I waited so many years for :/

I had major pet peeves with the copy/paste nature of the cutscenes with the old sages. The dialogue, bgs, pacing, literally all identical. They just hot swapped the character models for the sages and said that was good enough, wtf!!! I live for cutscenes in games, I have since I was like 5. This felt lazy, and seriously demotivated me from completing the dungeons bc I knew there was going to be nothing novel or intriguing to look forward to

The secret stones were gimmicky af. Sorry. Also stupid name, they couldn't even opt for "sacred?" Ik in other languages they have way cooler names, which would have helped. Link's fucking thanos glove of stones was a stupid gimmick, I cannot believe they didn't think to alter that concept to be more mythical, or creative, or just original. I would have killed for the stones to relate to the triforce in some way, or to do away with the stones and have this game connect to the triforce, since the whole direction of this story was going back to ancient myth & lore.

the Zonai lacked depth, and honestly just felt like a boring distraction even tho they were supposed to be a central focus of this game. I 1000% agree with other folks posts on the take that rauru was a flat, 2-dimensional colonizer. Sonia got sidelined. yikes. ew. no thanks.

^similarly, ganon really was given no character or depth imo. It's like they did a fantastic job making him visibly LOOK scary, so they didn't bother to give him motives beyond "I'm bad, I do what I want."

the cliche "back to normal" at the end irked me. Link could have come out with no arm, keeping the zonia arm, or at least scars w/ the zonai arm pattern and that would be meaningful. Zelda got factory reset from irreversible draconification in a method that for all intents and purposes, could have been done as soon as link got rewind ability. There was no investigation or inclusion of the other dragons, which seemed like a missed opportunity. Actively working on reversing her could have been a main quest in game!! Like 1. Complete all dungeons/get all stones, 2. you can now go round up the spirits of rauru & sonia and reverse zelda yippee, 3. you and zelda go beat the shit out of ganon together. The dragons fighting was beautiful, powerful imagery, but honestly I think too much potential was traded away just to execute that one fraction of the boss fight.

The masterworks book annoys me, which is sad bc I love concept art. I wanted to be a concept artist growing up, I can accept that you'll often see things that never make it into the final cut. I was enamored with early posts abt things like zelda's haircut, char designs, etc.

But more recently I'm seeing the anthology side of the book taking major liberties that it didn't even bother showing us directly or alluding to in the game, and I think that's such a cop-out. They are literally telling us instead of SHOWING us in the game they release a year ago, and spent SIX YEARS making. There was a festival celebrating the return of zelda/defeat of ganon?? Freaking show us that!!! Show us link & zelda acclimate to post-calamity life. Show us imperfect, non-linear healing and resilience. I would have loved a festival scene w/ link and zelda that conveys the nuance of celebration and recognition of their efforts, and the contrasting weight of what they went through. Show me zelda, exhausted after a festival struggling with guilt and indecision about whether to bring back the monarchy with hyrule's restoration. Throwing in a "oh btw imagine if we actually had done this" post-game makes me so irritated and feral. It's like the post-release canon is sidling up to fanon and saying, "hey look we can do that too! look at our fan art" idk if that makes sense, I don't think I'm explaining it well. But it just feels disingenuous.

I'm not a timeline purest, I don't need everything to interconnect, but I don't love how assertions in this book invalidate connections and lore of other games. Also really don't love how this game overwrites and sidelines the sheikah.

I know majority of my disappointment stems from my own, personal expectations of a game that, let's face it, was probably given many mandates and initiatives to appeal to *everyone* in broad, lackluster ways. I still love the world and characters of zelda, if anything, totk reaffirmed what I love and want to prioritize in my art that I didn't see present in this game. Fun fact I used the world of botw to learn a lot about drawing landscapes & composition. It actually inspires me a bit to try to learn to do comics, which has been a longtime goal I've been too busy and/or timid to pursue lol.

mmm anyway if u read this and any of this resonated DM me and lets froth at the mouth and commiserate lol

[the-wandering-mage]

Gotham Bats ruin and save Spiderman's Operation Nest

This is like a story concept written out for a Spider-Man Batfam crossover fic I don't have the time to write fully. This is more developed than a prompt but, still is thought I'd share and maybe you guys will enjoy it and/or somebody will pick it up and develop it into a fully fledged fic. So here it goes-

A more spidery Spider-Man is dropped into a DC universe right into Gotham. It's the beginning of fall in Gotham which is a problem for a Spider seeing as he is stranded in another universe with nothing but his Spidey suit and his AI companion. He has no access to the synthesized hormone cocktail he's been taking in the winter to keep him from going into hibernation. Now Peter could get together the stuff to synthesize the medication but, he need a stable place to set up a running lab to make it as he'd need it fresh and take it on the regular. That is a lot of work and resources he'd have to come up with and maintain. Also he is a depressed boi and a long nap actually sound really good. So instead of trying to set up a lab he starts Operation Nest. He is going to find a small enclosed space and prepare it for his long winters nest.

Peter also decides pretty quickly with all the crazy dangers of Gotham and all the warnings of what Karen was able to find after connecting to this world's version of the Internet to keep the suit on and just be Spider-Man full time. The suit would keep him safe from chemical attacks and the overall pollution of Gotham as well as keep him anonymous in the very likey event he has to use his powers to defend himself. Which will let him keep a nice civilian identity that Karen crafted come spring if he chooses to.

Peter's first two objectives in Operation Nest are to get money and find a location. The first Karen helps him with easily setting up a company, then filing and selling some benign patents, since this world is really behind in tech. She also helps him get more immediate cash without crossing into stealing just by doing online commissions for simple tech support type things while the patent money is still pending. Peter gets a laptop that he uses to help with some of the tech work even though Karen can literally do five jobs at once under several fake IDs she made herself.

Most of the day for Peter however is spent looking for real estate. Which is harder in Gotham than one might think considering the rival gangs, rival super villains constantly blowing up things, and all the homeless fighting over whatever is left of the abandoned buildings. The only good thing about all this is a giant spider nest will go relatively unnoticed amongst all the other craziness. Peter's adventures running all over Gotham trying to find a place to hunker down for a couple of months cause him to run into all sorts of characters.

Peter is in a weirdly apathetic state towards himself with all his trauma so he saves people obviously, and is still empathic, maybe more so with trying to get the villians to be better people and just talking with them like real people but, he is really basley about his own safety. He has already lost everyone he cares about and he's faced down Thanos, so none of the villians at this point faze him. He doesn't see them as a threat to himself. He ends up making a bunch of friends with villains by continuing what May believed in, what Ben believed in, and helps the villains out so they can hopefully make a change.

The bats hear about him and decide to investigate but all of them get terrible first impressions and they assume he's a villain or going to be one if they don't find him. Peter is OP and scary. He's not given up his friendly neighborhood spider-man but he has stopped trying as hard to look human type of friendly. He just has slow given into being a spider and is creepy. He also leaves spider webs everywhere, since his natural ones don't dissolve like the artificial ones that he uses sparingly. This also freaks them out and there is debate on whether what they are hunting is a meta human or an intelligent spider creature. Also at least one bat at the beginning runs into one of the webs and at least one gets temporarily stuck to a criminal they are trying to free from a cocoon

By the time the bats find Spider-Man they are all convinced that he's a villain plotting something big but really they've just been stalking Peter as he completes his to do list for Operation Nest. All the dangerous equipment and suspicious purchases from villains were really to get his nest set up. Peter knew his friends had some of the stuff he needed like a cytogenetic freezer to keep some of his food from spoiling over the course of a few months since he doesn't want anyone making deliveries to his house while he's hibernating. His friends were happy to help although he still paid them despite their insistence not to.

Karen thinks it's hilarious. Although they acknowledge itd be better to just explain the situation to the bats before Peter is in active hibernation and let them find them. They totally ruin their bust by opening the doors of a small dilapidated old tailors shop in the fashion district, where Peter had set up his nest in the basement. Peter isn't happy with them feeling very territorial. He wants them not to touch anything as he shows them into his nest. He warns them and they are a bit freaked out when he hisses at them when they inevitably ignore he's instructions out of curiosity but then settle a bit when they notice how tired he is. Cass probably gets them to back off. He explains things enough so they leave him to his hibernation with the promise of hanging out in the spring.

Or alternatively. Karen is too busy setting things up she doesn't notice with her smaller processing power disconnected from Stark Tech as she is to notice the Bats noticing them. Then she is being wired into the Nest when they start getting close so, she doesn't know they are closing in. Then she is doing system checks to make sure she is able to monitor Peter when he's hibernating and can use the machines and mechanical arms to help Peter for the parts of his hibernation he will be awake or partially awake to handle his bodily needs before cocooning back into his Nest made of his natural webs and blankets.

Karen doesn't know they are there until they break her perimeter alarms and she is forced to use her defensive measures since Peter has just gone into hibernation like a day ago. The bats having more resources than Karen at their disposal and coming at her from all angles breach her defenses and get into The Nest. Karen does her best to rouse Peter with alarms blaring but she is only able to get him into a semi state of consciousness. Not enough to move him without drugging him which would be dangerous for his health and with so many coming for her charge she does her best to throw her mechanically arms in front of him to guard him where he is.

The bats once they see a sleepy confused Peter with a strange woman's voice begging them to leave him alone they feel bad realizing they judged him wrong. Especially after seeing him adorably yawn with his fangs popping out.

[arceespinkgun]

"Also I think Megatron wanting to be a doctor is stolen from Marvel Optimus who wanted to be one in the UK comics because author James Roberts claimed to like those comics" YES! I thought I was the only one who thought this! It was really one of the last things that just further influenced my deduction that recent Transformers content has propagated this idea that they created a interesting, complex backstory for the Decepticon movement when in reality all they have done and are doing/likely will continue to do is steal the narrative of the Autobots struggles against the Decepticons

Sunbow Decepticons attacked the Autobots during a period of peace for power and conquest, Marvel Comics Decepticons used the overpopulation and energon shortage crisis to amass followers to support their wish of conquest (Megatron wanted to make Cybertron a mobile war planet and never stated it was intended to be used for anything else besides that, so people can throw out the misconception that Marvel Megatron did all that to save their planet and people from starvation like some weird proto-MCU Thanos)

100% this though, like you bring up the "one of Megatron's first big plans was to make Cybertron a Warworld..." well, JRo even stole that for the Functionist Council turning Cybertron into a transforming "Primus" to go around committing genocide as yet another facet of the "here's why life actually would've been worse without Megatron" plotline. And then the final battle against Functionist Primus where characters across factions work together to stop it was ripped off from the Unicron fight in Marvel! JRo even wrote the line "The Matrix is more than a bright blue bomb," which I'm convinced is like, an arrogant little dig at the fact that Optimus blew up Unicron using the Matrix in Marvel. I feel this way especially because Cyclonus warns Tailgate that he shouldn't be inside Primus when it explodes, which is exactly what happened to Optimus in Marvel.

Also, something that also bothers me a lot is that there were actually plenty of morally good Decepticons in the UK comics JRo claims to love so much? I love complexity! There was already lots to expand on there without smearing the Autobots! But look at what JRo chose to do to someone like Flywheels who was one of those noble Decepticons, having him repeatedly mocked for his appearance and instantly slaughtered in gory fashion. JRo chose to bring back tiny details nobody cares about like the Matrix Flame and designed an entire system of races based on a silly line from a random UK annual, but then chose to do things like completely rewrite beloved characters' morals and make many once-major characters into furniture and made the conflict between the factions into "the evil police vs. the evil revolutionaries."

[alexendria-rose]

My tears Ricochet~

Stephen Strange X Reader

“Get out.” Stephen he sat on his chair face in his hands as he couldn’t let the tears be shown. His tired red eyes lining his eyes. Wong huffed crossing his arms at the sorcerer.

“She wouldn’t want this Stephen.” Wong grumbled walking his way towards Stephen.

“Well she isn’t here is she!” Stephen snapped his head towards Wong. His tear stained face shown, the bags under his eyes, his hands shaking. “I couldn’t save her!” His heart was beating rapidly as the tears continue to fall. Wong didn’t know what to do as he’s never seen his friend like this, he loved her too, he wanted her back as well but he also knew she couldn’t want Stephen like this. Only if it didn’t end the way it did…

Stephen looked back at the fight hoping his plans were going exactly as he planned when he looked at how many outcomes would happen trying to defeat Thanos. That’s when he saw her- the love of his life knowing there last argument five years ago wasn’t what he wanted before sending off to space and her fighting along with the others. There she was fighting the aliens along side Thanos, using her powers looking beautiful as always. He so wish he would just stop what he was doing and hold her and apologize for everything he said. But his heart stopped when he saw her fighting Thanos instead. This wasn’t supposed to happen he made sure of it and that’s when it happened she took the stones instead.

“No!” Stephen roared as she made the snap. He stopped what he was doing immediately rushing to her side. Her body fell limp from the power rushing through her veins but she was still smiling knowing she saved everyone else around her. Stephen held her tight to his chest as he saw that the power of the stones fried her left side all the way to the side of her face, blood coating her precious mouth. Y/n looked at him with tears but a smile.

“Stephen.” She whispered her limp hand moving up to touch his face. Stephen was shaking holding her close.

“No stop, you’re getting out of here. You’re surviving this.” Stephen managed to gasp out. She just shook her head moving her hand to place on his cheek feeling the life of her slip away.

“I-I’m not.” She coughed out the blood her tears streaming down her pale face. “Surviving… I love you. I forgive you.” She whispered softly. Stephen shook his head holding her close to his chest knowing he was going to lose her soon.

“Y/n stop please no.” He sobbed. Tony came up behind him laying a hand on his shoulder trying to support Stephen as all the avengers watched her sacrifice her life for them to have another one.

“I love you Stephen strange.” She managed to gasp out before her eyes slowly shuttered closed as death overtook her.

“No!” He shouted. “You were supposed to stay! No please no!” He cradled her dead body against his chest not letting anyone near his love, his person, the light of his life. “I love you please.” He whispered his hands moving through her hair.

Stephen laid on their once shared bed holding tightly onto the pillow she laid her beautiful head on cradling it tightly just like he did before she left him. It smelt just like her, her face was all over the sanctum smiling and cheery, her scent overcame him cause it was everywhere. He was dreading going to the funeral knowing she wasn’t going to be there physically, he couldn’t hold her the same way, he couldn’t kiss her, and how badly he regretted their last time together.

It was the night before Bruce banner fell from the sky to tell them of the news of Thanos. Little did she know he was on his way to the avengers compound to apologize to her, to beg her back, because of his stupid mistake.

Y/n looked down at the broken watch that Stephen left behind wondering why he still had it in the first place. She held it up as they sat on their shared bed reading the familiar writing, she knew she shouldn’t have felt jealous of Christine but god it still hurt. That’s when Stephen walked in stopping in his tracks as he saw he touch the watch.

“What are you doing with that.” He mumbled, if looks could kill she would be dead. She traced her finger over the world’s glancing at him.

“Just wondering why you still had it.” She muttered. He walked over to her ripping the watch out of her hands scared of her to break it.

“It was a gift, you know that.” He put the watch back into his safe keeping, her abruptly standing up marching herself over to him.

“I know it was, but why is it so damn important to you.” She crossed her arms staring directly back at him. “Do you still love her?” Stephen looked at her and crossed his arms back irritated.

“I don’t know.” He mumbled. Her heart dropping her his tone.

“What do you mean you don’t know!” She shouted. “What the hell am I to you, am I just here because you arrogant ass was lonely?” She felt the tears prick her eyes, the fear she hope would never actually come true.

“I will always love her, she will always have a place in my heart you know that!” Stephen shouted back not knowing his words would hurt her.

“Fine if you love her so much, I’m leaving Stephen.” She muttered stomping away from him and out of the room. Stephen watched as she leaved too irritated to run after her, too mad but how much he would regret that moment would always haunt him.

Stephen looked down at her grave, the moment replaying in his head over and over again. Everyone had left by now to give Stephen some space. He dropped to his knees as he gazed at her headstone reading the words ‘earths mightiest hero’ oh she was, she was so strong, so happy except when she was with him. He made her miserable sad, but when she said those last words that she forgave him and still loved him hurt him even more. Even after all he did… she still loved him, still trusted him. He laid his head on the stone shutting his eyes close as the tears escape his eyes.

“I love you Y/n… more than anything. This wasn’t suppose to happen but god how much you surprise me. I’m going to miss you every single goddamn part of you. I never loved Christine the way I loved you and I’m so sorry that was the last words you heard before I disappeared for five years.” He whispered sobbed placing a hand on his tombstone. “I hope you can hear me I will always love you Y/n L/n, nobody will ever change that. You are mine love, always and forever I promise you that.”

[ynscrazylife]

Hey for your 4k celebration could you do purge the poison from marina with anyone from the mcu please?

Poisoned Mind, Poisoned Heart | Chapter 1

Series Summary: Dr. Strange turns to you, Wanda’s ex, to help him stop her before it’s too late. Can you do it or will Wanda corrupt you, too?

A/N: This is what came to my head when I listened to the song! Hope it fits. I'm excited for this series to start. Let me know if you want to be on this taglist.

Request to be on a taglist (or multiple) here! (Taglists are at the end of the fic)

Main Masterlist | MCU Masterlist

Doctor Stephen Strange was the last person you expected to see when you opened up your door. For a fleeting second, you considered slamming the door in his face, but that type of rudeness was never in your nature, no matter how much the flight in your fight or flight response was yelling at you to do so. “I should really start looking through the peephole before answering my door,” was what you ended up saying with a sigh. 

Stephen fixed you with a small, knowing smile. “I’m going to pretend that’s just because I might’ve been a stranger and not because you don’t want to see me,” he joked. You knew what he was doing - trying to ease you into whatever reason he had for coming over here when he hadn’t seen or spoken to you in years with humor. 

“Well, this isn’t just you being in the neighborhood and wanting to have a nice chat, is it?” You said, glancing down at the intricate costume he adorned. 

Catching onto the fact that you didn’t want him to beat around the bush, Stephen gave you a slight nod. “May I come in?” He asked politely. 

Despite being still weary and a bit nervous, you stepped aside. You knew that if he was coming here, he must have a good reason. Years ago, after the civil war between Steve and Tony, when you left the Avengers and said goodbye to being a superhero, you had strictly instructed everyone to leave you alone unless there was some threat to the universe. You had gone back briefly to help them fight Thanos, but quickly returned to your civilian life afterward. 

Stephen walked in and you closed the door behind him, but didn’t lock it. You weren’t intending for him to stay long. The sorcerer took a moment to look around your hallway, at all the paintings and photos on your walls. “Nice house,” he murmured, picking up a photo of you on a nearby table and looking at it. 

“Stephen,” you warned gently. 

Stephen cleared his throat and set down the photo, turning back to you. “What do you know about what Wanda has gotten up to recently?” He asked. 

It was akin to him dumping a bucket of ice water over your head - you visibly flinched, taken aback. Wanda. You had worked very hard to get over the woman you once loved, the love that ended due to you being on opposite sides of the Accords. Like Natasha, you had sided with Tony not because you really believed in the Accords, but because you wanted to keep the team together. Wanda hadn’t seen it that way and you didn’t exactly blame her for it, until you two started to get into awful screaming matches. 

“I heard on the news about Westview . . . They say that no one’s been able to reach or find her since,” you answered carefully, remembering the conflicting emotions you had when finding out about it all. Even after all this time, you haven't been able to fall out of love. She stuck with you. A part of you hated it, the other part was enchanted by it. You still wanted the best for her and discovering what happened in Westview was painful. 

“That was true, up until now,” Stephen said, taking a small step towards you. 

You tried to hold back the gasp building up in your throat, but you failed. All you could do was bore your eyes into him as you waited for him to continue. 

“There’s this . . . girl. Her name is America Chavez and she has these powers of accessing alternate realities that Wanda wants. I think she’s been corrupted by the Darkhold . . . If she gets access to these alternate realities, there’s no telling what she’ll do,” Stephen said. 

You furrowed your eyebrows, now confused and feeling a little overwhelmed as his words swarmed your head. “Alternate realities?” You questioned. 

“I can explain everything in detail, but I think you can get through to her, Y/N,” Stephen said. 

No matter if you still loved her, if there was some deep part inside you that wanted to help, you still felt reluctant to return to that life. You started to shake your head. “She doesn’t love me, she fell in love with Vision,” you muttered, trying - wanting - to deny it. 

“She never stopped talking about you,” Stephen revealed softly. 

This caused you to squeeze your eyes shut, feelings and memories of another time washing over you all at once. “Stephen, I can’t-” you started to say. 

“Let me explain everything back at the Sanctum Sanctorum and then we can go from there,” Stephen said, his voice still as sweet as honey. So charming and alluring, “This . . . isn’t just a threat to our universe. It’s a threat to all the universes.” 

That was the nail in the coffin - you would never be able to fully rid yourself of your natural, heroic instinct to help people. “Okay,” you agreed, letting out a breath. Despite just telling yourself that you were only agreeing to hear him, you knew deep down, in your heart, what you got yourself into - you were going to try and help. Help Wanda, help Stephen, help the goddamn multiverse.

[writingintheshadowsforever]

Imagine being Shuri's ex and almost dying

After the death of her brother you did everything in your power to be there for Shuri, and bring her comfort.

She wanted space. You gave it to her.

She needed a shoulder to cry on. You gave her yours without question.

She needed someone to her anger out on. You took whatever she threw at you without retaliation.

It was safe too say that your relationship wasn't the healthiest for a while, and although you tried to downplay the issues. Everyone close to her and you could see the relationship going downhill. Okoye told you many times to sit down with the Princess, and talk things out. Queen Ramonda corrected Shuri's behavior and treatment of you many times, even going so far as to have her removed from. The lab during a particular bad argument and making her spend sometime with you till the matter was settled. But they could only do so much to help keep the love between you and Shuri alive.

At the end of the day it was on you two to make sure the relationship didn't fall apart. Shuri continued to bury herself in technology, and you let her distracting yourself by accompanying the Dora Milaje on numerous missions. The distractions only worked for so long especially considering you had given up the hero life. Years ago to be with Shuri, and relocate from America to Wakanda.

It was a huge sacrifice to make on your part but you didn't mind it one bit. You had spent your entire life training, fighting, and protecting the world. Never knowing what it was like to be able to wake in peace and in comfort of a place you called home. After you refused to sign the Sokovia Accords, and T'Challa offered you a refuge in Wakanda. You accepted and then laid eyes on Shuri who had a little obsession with your backstory. The teenage Avenger with the power of molecular manipulation who had no idea where she came from.

After the Battle of Thanos was over you were given the opportunity to return to America with a clean slant, and resume your Avenger duties. But you turned the offer down and chose to continue to reside in Wakanda with your Princess. At the time it was the best decision you'd ever made, but now with Shuri constantly ignoring you and your worries, never coming to bed at night, and barely even looking let alone touching you. It had you thinking that maybe it was time to move on, and give her some real alone time.

Everything came to head on the anniversary night of you two getting together. Shuri had actually made it to bed the night before, and that morning. She insisted that you stay in Wakanda, and clear your schedule for the night. Because she had something planned for the two of you. There was a happy tone to her voice that you hadn't heard in months since her brother's death, and her steps were a bit lighter. You thought that she was finally starting to truly heal from the pain, and listened to her. But when nightfall came Shuri was nowhere to be found, and you gave her the whole night to come. Once a hour before midnight hit you made your way to the lab knowing that's where she was hold up at.

Her back was to you as she was focused on the equation on the screen in front of her. When you exited the elevator, but that was no problem in her hand was a vial of liquid. You pointed a finger feeling for the molecules in the air, and brought the temperature down. The liquid froze into a solid, and Shuri glanced down at it before looking over her shoulder to see. You standing there with your arms crossed over your chest, and one foot tapping the floor.

"Let me guess you came upon something big, and it was too important for you take a break before finishing." You said with a small shrug.

"Well if you already know then why are you here?" She asked trying to seem unbothered, but the hint of worry in her tone didn't go unheard. Shuri knew she had messed up big time.

"I'm here to ask a question that's needs to be asked." You said letting your arms fall to your side as a sign of defeat. Usually you would come down here and hear whatever excuse she had. Then she would apologize profusely promising to make it up to you, and the two of you would proceed to kiss and make-up. But you were tired of that repetitive routine since nothing ever changed afterwards. The two of you just went on letting the cycle repeat itself again and again.

Now you had her attention and watched as Shuri turned around to fully face you. She placed the vial of frozen liquid on the table along with the pen tucked in her ear. "And what question would that be?"

"Why are we still together?"

Before you could even finish her face fell, and she took a step back. She started fiddling with her kimoyo beads while staring at the floor in deep thought. She was starting to spiral and you knew it. This is why you didn't want to have the conservation. Deep down you knew without a doubt in your heart that Shuri still loved you, but was just going through a lot. The Princess was more focused on keeping you safe from any future threats or diseases than spending time with you. Plus she didn't want to deal with the grief that came with T'Challa's death.

You knew you couldn't let her or your relationship go on like this. Something had to give and unfortunately you felt like it had to be you. "Shuri I can't do this anymore I love you and I always will but this isn't working." You whispered your voice so low it was a miracle she heard you.

Her focus finally seemed to come back in play as she walked over to you wrapping an arm around your waist. She pulled your body to hers leaving no space, and placing a hand on your cheek. "Hey hey now come on there's no reason to be so hasty mmmhmm." She said with a light chuckle, and leaned forward pressing a kiss to your forehead.

You closed your eyes at the feel of her lips on your skin savoring the moment. Because you knew this would be the last time you would feel those lips. You made a promise to yourself to not back out of this decision no matter what before you came down here. Tears managed to break free of your closed eyes, and slide down your face.

Shuri wiped them away and peppered more kisses on your face till eventually her mouth settled by your ear. "My love please I'll get better okay I promise we can work it out." The pain in her voice struck you like a dagger in the heart.

You opened your eyes to find her's filled with desperation. "Shuri I chose you over everything and everyone else in my life, because you were home to me. Do you get that?"

Shuri nodded burying her face into your shoulder in attempt to muffle her sobbing.

"Shuri you don't feel like home to me anymore. Nothing about this place does, and I hate feeling like this. I'm going back to America to resume my Avenger status for the time being."

Her arm tightened around your waist constricting until your breath hitched. You let her hold you, and cry until she ran out of tears. Shuri couldn't find any words because she knew there was nothing to say. That she hadn't already said in the past back when it worked. This time those words were going to fall deaf on your ears. You weren't going to believe her, and what hurt the most was that this time. Shuri was going to mean it she really would've changed in order to convince you to stay, but it was too late.

Months Later

It'd almost been a year since your breakup with Shuri, and not a day didn't go by. Where you didn't think about her heck you still kept the kimoyo beads on, and wore the necklace with a little black panther charm on it. Shuri gifted it too you on your first year anniversary, and when you tried to give it back. She insisted that you keep it said it would make her feel better. If you had a piece of her with you wherever you went, and it brought you comfort too.

But you were now in a much healthier place in your life especially emotionally and mentally. You did go back to being an Avenger which meant just picking up random missions from whoever requested your help. Some jobs paid more well than others while sometimes there was no payment at all. It didn't matter to you because nothing was more fulfilling than helping people who really needed it. As for teammates right now there really wasn't a official Avengers team, and everyone was kinda scattered. Some were in space like Carol and Thor, some were to busy dealing with threats beyond this world like Doctor Strange, and some just didn't seem to want help like Spider-Man.

One night you ended up thwarting a robbery attempt, and the guy swung in helping you take them down. As if it was muscle memory or something you went in for a high five afterwards, and he froze. Unsure of what you did wrong you put in a call to the cops, and left. A day later Spider-Man tracked you down while he was on patrol, and just asked if you could keep your distance.

You found his behavior to be a little weird but nonetheless you respected it, and just moved on. Bucky and Sam were your go-to for partnerships whenever you needed back-up. You worked well with both of them not to mention. The sibling like relationship both of them had with you before you went to Wakanda. No one was more happy to have you back than those two were. And they never let you forget sometimes having a habit of arguing of who would accompany you on a mission. If it only required one of their assistance.

On your most current mission Bucky had won the coin toss, but you were starting to think. You should've just brought both of them as you were surrounded from all of sides in a room with no escape.

"Y/N what's your status?"

"I'm on the first floor but I'm surrounded" You spoke into the comms.

"Alright just hold them off okay I'm on the third floor making my way to you now. I might have to get through a few guys but I shouldn't be too long" Bucky replied. From the way you could hear his breathing it sounded like he was winded. Which was quite the feat to get tire out the super solider. Most likely he was outnumbered just as much as you were, but didn't want you to panic.

"Take it easy old man I don't need you passing out in exhaustion on me. I can handle these guys" You reassured him cracking your knuckles.

"Hey y/n" he said

"Yeah" You answered bouncing on your feet in anticipation.

"If you get hurt, hurt'em back, and if you get killed walk it off" Bucky told you.

You could picture the playful smile on his face as he recited one of Steve's old speeches from so long ago. You often told Bucky of your time with Steve, and every now and then. He would try to relive those moments with you. It was one of the things you missed the most after leaving the Avengers.

"Thanks Buck but I don't think this situation compares to that one even a little bit." You said shaking your head.

"Fine just make sure these guys don't get back up."

"Now that I can do."

After that both of you cease communication for the time being as the fight started on both sides. You threw out both of your hands calling upon your power to encase all of the agents in front of you a sheet of ice. Then you made your through all of them breaking them free of their ice prison with a kick to the abdomen, or a punch to the face. Sam always joked you got the move from Sub-Zero after playing Mortal Kombat one too many times.

He was right.

The agents started throwing themselves at you in an effort to overwhelm and take you down faster. But with a flick of your wrist the shoes on their feet exploded throwing the to the floor. You went low, and knocked the one who did reach down with a leg sweep. You slammed his head into the ground before he could recover rendering him unconscious. Out of the corner of your eye you caught three more coming from the right, and you whirled this time slowing down their approach with your powers. All of their bodies started moving as slow as possible. Their eyes began to widen in surprise mixed with fear, but even that action was slow.

You rolled over coming up in front of them and delivered a harsh kick to one's stomach. Releasing your molecular hold on him upon impact with his body back in full and fast motion. He flew back into the air landing in a heap. You repeated the move with other two, and once again caused some items on other agents too combust. Throwing them into the wall or into each other with the move. Even though the fight was going well for you right now you were tiring yourself out by using your powers so much. In an effort to preserve your strength you pulled your daggers from the holster on your jeans.

Having been trained by the almighty combat trio of the Avengers. Natasha, Steve, and Clint your fighting skills were unmatched and you had no problem taking these guys down. But when you finally did get to the big bad of the henchmen. It was pretty obvious for one he was dressed a bit different than others, and for two he didn't rush you either. He stood back watching you flip his last standing man over your shoulder.

"Ready for a real challenge Avenger" he asked with a evil grin showing all his teeth.

"For your sake I hope you actually mean that" You told him rolling your shoulders.

He didn't respond instead he just pulled a pair of knives from the belt in his pants, and gave them a quick twirl like a pro. They were smaller than your daggers, and probably weaker considering yours were made of vibranium. Another gift for Shuri before the war with Thanos's alien army.

You attacked first slashing in a wide arc aiming for his face. He blocked your dagger with his knife, and the blade held but a crack did appear. His hand trembled with effort as your blade was just inches from his cheek. You smirked and brought your other dagger forward toward his stomach, and he jumped back breaking contact. You followed keeping him on the defense as he dodged and knocked your blade away multiple times.

He was good but you were obviously better, so of course he did what any bad guy would do to get the upper hand. He cheated and dropped one of his knives. You frowned in confusion as he tucked and rolled away. The agent came up swung around throwing something at your face. You crossed your bladed together bringing them up to to block what you thought was a knife.

It was dirt.

Your daggers did keep some of it out of your face, but of course the tiny dust particles manage to slip past them entering your eyes. They stung and for just a second you dropped your guard letting out a groan. "Seriously dude what are you fi-" Your protest was cut off as a gasp of shock and pain left your mouth. You blinked through the pain too look down he was crouched before you with his knife buried into your stomach. You stared down a the knife in disbelief. Had you really been taken down with such a childish move?

He looked up catching your eyes as he gave the knife a hard twist. Your insides lit up with pain and you gaped like a fish trying to find your voice.

"Hmph some Avenger you are" he commented.

With the last of your little bit of strength you gripped the dagger in your hand, and plunge it into his neck. The blade went in and came out on the other side smoothly. He didn't even get the chance to gurgle before his body fell to the floor. He was dead, and you were halfway there.

The strength in your legs went first as you stumbled back and hit the floor on your butt. Your hand ventured to the injury, and came away slick with blood. You were bleeding but it was under control for now unless there was internal bleeding going on. Right now keeping the blade inside was the only thing preventing you from dying fast of blood lost. So you simply dragged yourself over to a wall to rest up against to wait for Bucky to come. Your comms had been lost in the fight, and were probably smashed to pieces anyway.

You were barely managing to stay conscious as the minutes went by, your mind wander everywhere trying not to stay focus on the blinding pain. You thought about your past and how someone literally left you on the doorstep of some Shield agent. In the beginning Nick Fury was just going to hand you over to the nearest adoption center, but then you cried and just about everything in his kitchen exploded. He knew right then you were something special, and he took you in as his own. Then your train of thought switched over to your love Shuri, and your heart broke realizing what dying here would mean for her. You had always believed deep down the two of you would your way back to each other. She actually started to send you letters a month ago asking you to come visit Wakanda.

You never wrote back or gave her answer in any form afraid of giving up the peace. It took you so long to find after your breakup with her, but now you were regretting not responding more than anything.

Bast, God, I don't whatever higher power is listening to me right now. Please don't let this be the end for me please you prayed silently to yourself.

"Y/N are down here" Bucky yelled. From the sound of it he was only a few halls away from your location.

You attempted to call out to him but instead broke out coughing. Blood sputtered from the cough coating your pants, and the floor around you. Bucky must have heard it because you could hear his thundering footsteps approaching. A few more seconds later he appeared in the doorway eyes scanning the room till they landed on you. "Y/N" he screamed your name running over and dropping to his knees beside you. His hand hovered the knife buried in your stomach as he observed the injury.

You were so tired and it was becoming so much harder to keep your eyes open. Your head fell back against the wall as you gasped his name.

He brought his hand to your face gently bringing it back down so you could meet his gaze. "Hey stay with me now you're going to be okay. This is nothing alright I've seen worse."

"Maybe for a super solider" you murmured.

Bucky let out a laugh void of all emotions as he pressed his forehead to yours. "You can't die here okay if you do Ayo is going to kill me, and take back the arm for good this time. Do you want that y/n? I mean imagine it me running around here fighting with one arm."

You let out a painful chuckle at the image, and at the thought of all the jokes Sam would make at his expense. "The government would give you a new one" You manage to say.

"Yeah but it wouldn't be made of vibranium" He shot back.

"Forget Ayo killing you Shuri is going to kill me" You whispered letting your head drift to the side.

Then it really hit Bucky why it was so important that you didn't die. He wasn't kidding about Ayo killing him if you died on his watch after all. She was the one who reached out to him begging him to look after up for the sake of Shuri. It's not that Ayo doubted your ability to protect yourself. It was just she knew how dangerous being an Avenger was, and could sleep a little better knowing someone had your back all the time. And there was one thing Ayo and everyone else was sure of. If you died in the field Princess Shuri would blame herself, and would never move on from it.

Bucky was calling out your name again as darkness filled your vision. He wanted you to heat up the injury saying it would buy you a little more time. You barely registered the request but your brain was in survival mode, and some part of you comprehend what he wanted. The last thing you remembered was the feeling of being lifted into his arms.

Bucky put his super solider speed to the test running back to the quinjet. That you had decided to park a mile away in order to hide your guys's arrival. He was starting to regret that decision with you limp in his arms with shallow breathing. Even though the scene before him was nearly a blur as he moved. Bucky still felt like he wasn't running fast enough until finally the quinjet was in sight. Once he was on the inside he placed you on the medical table, and strapped you to it.

He tried to work your kimoyo beads in an effort to alert Shuri of what was going on, but they were deactivated. Thanks to you and in his worried mindset Bucky couldn't think of how to turn them back on. So instead he got the quinjet into the air and set course for Wakanda. The only place with a genius scientist that could save your life right now. Auto-pilot was turned on giving him the freedom to call Ayo over and over. His calls were going unanswered which didn't surprise him at all. Ayo had cut off contact with him after the whole Zemo thing, and even though he understood why. Bucky didn't think it would take her this long to forgive him.

When she showed up out of the blue and asked him to watch over you. That was the first time he had seen and spoken to her since the incident, and just like that nothing but radio silence again. But now Bucky would keep calling until he got through to her Wakanda wouldn't open their borders to him alone.

Finally on the twelfth call she surprisingly picked up "James this better be good I'm busy."

"Ayo" he cried with a crack in his voice. He tried to keep his composure but the fear was starting to settle in.

His distress got her attention and put her on alert. "James what's wrong?

"Its y/n she's hurt and it's bad I'm on my way now she doesn't have much time left. I don't know where els-"

"Bring her to us I will notify the Princess now hurry James" Ayo ordered cutting him off. Even though it was subtle he could hear her falter.

Pushing the quinjet well beyond its limits worked, and he managed to reach Wakanda within record time. Somehow you were still clinging to life but just barely. Bucky didn't stop till the quinjet was in the landing zone of the palace. He lifted you back into his arms and exited the jet. A medical team was waiting for him with a hovering sand table. He laid you on it as gently as possible, and watched as they rushed back inside with your body.

Bucky wasn't sure if his presence was wanted and turned to go back to the aircraft. But someone caught him by the hand making him pause to look back.

It was Ayo with a woman standing a few feet behind her. He didn't recognize her, but could tell by her demeanor that the two of them were close. Tears were pooled up in Ayo's eyes and she blinked them away. "Stay."

If he didn't have super hearing the plea wouldn't have reached his ears. Bucky nodded and proceeded to follow them into the palace.

The lab was thrown into chaos as Shuri ordered everyone out the second the medical team arrived with you in tow. Ayo told her you had been injuried and needed immediate medical attention. She hadn't said anything about you practically being on death's door. Maybe she assumed Shuri was better off not knowing how serious your condition was. That she would better be prepared and in a better mindset to carry out the medical procedure on her ex-lover.

But nothing could prepare Shuri to see you lying on the sand table before her barely alive. The tools shook in her grip and she paused at the hilt of the knife. If she failed then once again she would lose someone she loved. When their lives were trusted within her hands. She couldn't go through that again.

"Shuri" a familiar voice said from behind her.

Shuri was so far gone in her thoughts she didn't recognize it and turned around to snap. "I told you all to get out."

It was her mother and her daughter's rebuttal didn't faze her in the slightest. Queen Ramonda knew Shuri was gripped with the fear of losing you and needed her support. She walked over and pulled her into a comforting hug. "Don't start doubting the gifts bestowed upon you by Bast herself now. You can do this my child y/n couldn't be in better hands." she told her rubbing her back.

Shuri stayed in her mother's embrace letting the warm feeling overtake all the feelings of worry and doubt. It wasn't until her A.I. system spoke up she pulled away.

"Princess you will need to act now to save y/n's life she doesn't have much time left."

Shuri let her mother wipe away the tears, and then she turned back around to you. This time there was no hesitation as she went to work in safely removing the knife. Griot kept her updated on your vitals, and heart rate. She worked diligently not letting anything throw her off, and Queen Ramonda sat at her workstation a few feet away. Her mother's presence brought her some much needed comfort. At some point Okoye, Ayo, Aneka, and Bucky entered the lab but stayed back not wanting to make her feel any pressure.

It took her one hour to patch up your injury with the help of her technology. But that hour felt like an eternity to her and everyone else. When it was over and Griot announced you were in stable condition. Shuri broke down into tears burying her face into your neck. You were still unconscious and probably wouldn't awake for another two hours at least. But the feel of your breathing and the sound of your steady heartbeat kept her from going insane.

"Please wake up soon my love" she pleaded.

"Is she going to make it?" Bucky asked walking tentatively towards you.

Shuri turned to give him a nod, and let out a grunt when his body collided with hers. As he covered the distance between the two of them with blinding speed. Bucky wrapped his arms around the Princess in a bone-crushing hug lifting her off her feet.

"Are we going to allow this?" Aneka asked her hand balled up into fists at her side. Usually the Doras didn't let anyone get within five feet of the royal family. Let alone touch them.

"We will this time" Okoye told her trying to keep her own tears of joy at bay.

After a while Bucky finally released Shuri and pulled up chairs for both of them to sit in, and wait for you to regain consciousness. Queen Ramonda retired to her room for the night promising to stop by first thing in the morning. Ayo and Aneka stayed in the lab to stand guard while Okoye went with the Queen.

Sometime in the early morning after Shuri had finally relieved the Doras of their duty, so they could go home and rest up. When Bucky was fast asleep in his chair despite how uncomfortable it had to be, and Shuri was the only awake but just barely sitting by your side with chin in her hand. Your eyes blinked open and you grumbled something looking around. "Shuri" you whispered a little confused.

She sat up a bit straighter at the sound of your voice, and looked down. A cry of relief left her mouth as she leaned down pressing her forehead to yours. "My love you're awake."

"Is this real?" You asked.

She nodded "you know you didn't have to try and get yourself killed to visit me right."

"Well you know me and my big ego" You joked letting a small smile take form on your face.

Just like that the dam broke and Shuri burst into tears moving to bury her face into the uninjured part of your chest. You brought a hand to ran your fingers through her curls. Your touch was a bit weak but it was real, and reminded both of you that you were still alive. Which was all that reminded.

"I'm alive Shuri it's okay" You soothed her. She lifted her face from your chest and captured your lips in a desperate kiss. Her lips moves slowly against yours as both of you savored the feeling. She kissed you like it was the last time she was ever going to be able to do it. She kissed you as if the entire world was ending. She kissed you like you were dying, because for a second Shuri was sure that she would lose you. When your lips finally parted from yours they were swollen a bit, and both of you were out of breath. If it wasn't for your heart rate spiking as your lungs begged for air. Shuri wouldn't have pulled away.

"Never again don't leave me ever again" Shuri pleaded to you.

"Nothing could take me away from you my love" You swore.

Shuri stood up and climbed onto the sand table. You scooted over into her awaiting arms, and rested your head on her chest. With her arms secured around your waist Shuri laid back. It didn't take long for either of you to fall asleep knowing that even after all this time. Your love for each other was very much still alive, and although it would take a lot to repair the relationship. Both of you wanted nothing more than to be together again.

[gothicprep]

so, apparently marvel is in disarray. ahead of the marvels coming out this weekend, variety dropped a bomb on the studio's somewhat dire state of affairs, as the franchise has hit its first real rough patch since the release of iron man 15 years ago. among the issues: jonathan majors, whose domestic violence arrest continues to hang over marvel's plans to make his character the thanos-like heavy for the next sequence of movies, the weak box office projections for the marvels (which some have said is tracking lower than recent bombs like the flash), the unending flood of hashtag content on disney plus which is overwhelming audiences who are finding it harder to keep up with the interlocking stories that have served marvel so well over the years, shoddy visual effects, spiraling budgets such as the reported $25mil an episode for she-hulk, a show that looked terrible because of the shoddy effects work aforementioned, behind the scenes chaos as kevin feige works to slash budgets and kill projects that aren't coming together. one movie at risk is the forthcoming blade reboot with mahershala ali, which has gone through rewrite after rewrite including reportedly one draft in which blade was the fourth lead in, quote, "a narrative led by women and filled with life lessons".

that last line has provided a lot of laughs for people like jay gothicprep, and critics who insist that marvel's efforts to diversify the lineup have led to much of this disaster, indicative of disney's overall failure with things like indiana jones and the dial of destiny or animated projects like strange world or lightyear. while this is potentially true (i guess, it's possible) it doesn't seem true because this certainly wasn't the case when black panther and captain marvel were both cracking the billion dollar mark a few years ago. rather it just seems, more simply, that marvel has run its course. marvel was hit by a double-whammy of endings. the thanos storyline that'd dominated the first ten or so years of the project came to an end. at the same time, the pandemic began and disney plus started flooding the zone with content, creating a natural break point for audiences that had no desire to watch hours of tv to understand 1.5 plot points in whatever the next movie that's coming out is.

this preamble is getting kind of long, and i have a lot more to say, so i'm going to continue to thought dump about this under a cut.

first of all, i'm still laughing like a week later at the women led life lessons description. no one has disputed that it happened. that description is the funniest thing i've ever read in a trade industry report possibly ever. what in the hell, my friends. did a writer even talk to a producer about what blade was? it's a movie about a guy with a sword who kills vampires! it's pretty straighforward! that sounds like something i want to see! there were three of them already, and two of them were pretty good!

anyway, i think you can take that incredibly ridiculous description of a draft that maybe wasn't the main draft – this movie has been through tons of writers and directors – and see some of the real problems with marvel's creative direction, which is that they've stopped making movies that highlight the core concepts of their characters. there are other problems as well, but when's the last time they put out a movie that was like, "iron man. he's a guy in a metal suit and he fights a bad guy." or "spider man. it's a guy in a spider suit with spider powers. he's got girlfriend problems and he fights crime around manhattan and maybe there's dr octopus." they don't do that. their recent stretch of movies have all been these impenetrable multiverse stuff with ties to tv series that you haven't seen and maybe won't ever see. there was a whole 25 minute section in black panther 2 that was setting up armor wars and ironheart. and like. who needs that sequence, which was boring and looked like total garbage? and now armor wars is being redeveloped lol. they've just departed from a lot of the core concepts that powered their earlier films.

they have some other problems. they've leaned into a slate of characters that is not all that well-known or inherently super popular, even for marvel being able to deliver on making billion dollar films out of guardians of the galaxy and such. maybe with the exception of spider man, which they don't get a full cut from because sony owns the actual movie rights. then there's the fact that the streaming series, by all accounts, aren't great but you *feel* like you need to have seen them. they're all real big problems. marvel needs to go back to making movies that are named after a character who's a superhero with a clear concept. guy with spider powers fights crime in his neighborhood. even though those movies got kind of repetitive, they did well enough because they didn't stray too far from the character concept.

i think, too, as a viewer, when you have a studio churning out so much stuff that's not good, you get the impression that the superhero industry feels entitled to your time and entitled to your money while not delivering.

this summer also represents an interesting counterpoint to what's happened with marvel and dc. the sheer amount of stuff that you devote every waking minute to keeping track of the damn things got exhausting and made movies stop feeling like events. this summer we've had barbenheimer and the eras tour, and those have been both big events and felt exciting. barbie was a chance to be campy, oppenheimer was a chance to see something serious and cinematic, the eras tour was exciting for fans of taylor swift who couldn't afford to spend $3k on taylor swift. and they felt this way because they were all unlike anything you'd seen at the movies in recent years. they had a high standard of quality, and going, it genuinely felt like people were there because they wanted to be, not because they were being force marched by a cultural behemoth to be there. you can't summon that same kind of energy for a marvel movie when it both feels obligatory and you expect it to be bad.

it also feels like there's a certain contempt for the audience where it concerns quality problems. i mean, i don't think that this is the intention. marvel isn't saying "we can deliver this stuff that's garbage and people will see it anyway". but one of the things i thought was the most damning about that variety story was the fact that, on some of the marvel tv shows, the final effects were inserted after the shows were released. so if you watched the show on opening night, you probably didn't see the final effects work. the arrogance involved in that is insane. it speaks to a total vanished pride in putting out a good product.

even some of marvel's better regarded films were heavily edited and heavily worked on right until the end, in part because kevin feige would come in and fix things, so stuff would have to get reworked. that's why effects deadlines were super tight and people were always crunching at the very end of this. there was that incredible quote from sam raimi from a couple months before the second doctor strange came out where he was like, "i think it's done but i'm not sure. marvel, they work on their movies until the very end." the director didn't even know if his own movie was locked or not because he clearly wasn't the one making the decisions about what the final print would look like.

that can work if you're making two movies a year and have a supervisor that comes in during the process and says, "i need you to redo this, in this way". but when you stretch that out to three movies a year, plus god knows how many episodes of television, there's no way to do that and make it a high quality product.

an instructive lesson comes from the book "disneywar", which chronicles michael eisner's time at disney. and one of the things in this book was the development and deployment of "who wants to be a millionaire" in america. bob iger is head of abc at this time. the guys making this show do it for a week. audiences love it. it's putting up huge numbers. everybody is excited. it's crushing it in the ratings. and the people who made it wanted to keep doing special week or two week long engagements that people would show up for. and iger was like, "no. i want this every week, three times a week, forever." and audiences got burnt out on it quickly, because it was something that only really worked as a special that ran for a week and disappeared for a few months. that's what the disney plus strategy feels like with marvel.

[buckyswintersoldiermask]

The Letter

Bucky Barnes x reader

Bucky Masterlist

Summary: You find a letter that Bucky has kept from a girl from his past, you leave once you find the letter. Bucky finds you and explains himself.

Word Count: 1.4K

Warnings: angsty and fluff, mention of PTSD.

A/N: these dates might be off and if they are that’s my fault. (Felt the gif was a good fit) I thought of this months ago but never posted it. I’ll be honest this isn’t my best work :/

(y/m/n): your mothers name

1943

“Mary, I have to go fight in the war.”

James Buchanan Barnes was going to war. Leaving his beloved friend, Mary. Knowing there was a possibility she’d never see him again she wrote him a letter.

Bucky was getting ready to go into the building which would deem him war ready. He stood there hand in hand with Mary.

“Here.” She places a letter in his hand. Bucky looks at the letter and goes to open it. “No not yet. It’s for when you miss home.” Mary hugs him one last time.

“You better not be stuck on Robert still by the time I get back!” Bucky calls out walking away.

“But he’s such a dreamboat, Bucky.”

“Bye Mary.”

“Bye Sarge.”

1944/1945

Weeks went as Steve continued to play “Captain America” show after show and Colonel still didn’t give him a chance. After talking with Peggy, Steve finds out that Bucky and his regiment went up against Schmidt and only 50 came back alive. Steve and Peggy rush to Colonel Phillips and he gives him his condolences.

He decides that the colonel’s decision isn’t good enough for him. Steve infiltrates Hydra and rescues all the men captured, including Bucky. He finds him strapped to a table repeating his Sergeant number.

“It’s me”

“Steve?”

“I thought you were dead.”

“I thought you were smaller.”

Steve and the men make it back to camp, celebrating their win. He was out drinking with some of the men he saved from being captured, asking them to go back to fight. They all agreed to fight with him.

“How about you? You ready to follow Captain America into the jaws of death?”

“Heck, no. That little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb not to run away from a fight, I’m following him.” Bucky replies, “But, you’re keeping the outfit right?”

“You know what? It’s kind of growing on me.”

Steve digs in his pocket and takes out a wrinkled piece of paper. Bucky could recognize that paper anywhere. “I picked this up off the table, thought you might like it back.” Steve hands Bucky the paper and Bucky opens it, seeing some of the words are faded.

2024

You have been with Bucky for about 2 years. If you can say that’s 2 years. You became friends with him in 2017, and stayed with him in Wakanda. You started dating in 2018, and then you were both blipped when Thanos won. Now you’re back together, happy.

You were cleaning around your bedroom when you came across a piece of paper on your dresser. It isn’t normally there so it caught your attention. You opened it to see it’s a letter:

Dear Bucky,

We’ve been friends for quite some time. I wish you didn’t have to go but I know you have to serve our country. I’ll always be your friend and I’ll be here waiting for you when you come back. But I need to tell you something, I love you Bucky and I always have. So come back to me.

Love, Mary

‘Who’s Mary?’ ‘How old is this letter?’ ‘Why does he still have it?’ Not knowing any of those answers you started to pack a bag. Bucky had left just an hour ago to go to the store. You decided the best place to go was to your mothers house.

Why would he keep an old letter from a girl? Did he not love you the way you thought he did? Your head swarmed with thoughts as you ran out the house. You bought a bus ticket and rode it all the way your mothers house.

Bucky came home from the store to an empty house. He searched every room and no sign of you. You were always at home on Thursday evenings, waiting for him with the groceries. Worried about where you are, he left you multiple texts and calls.

Doll, where are you?

Are you okay?

(y/n) please call me.

You ignored his texts as you stayed at your mother’s house wondering where you went wrong. As you ignored his texts Bucky got extremely worried. Did something happen to you? Bucky contemplates what to do, that’s when he stumbles upon the open letter of paper from Mary and some thrown clothes on your shared bed.

Oh crap, Bucky thought.

He yanks his phone out of his pocket and calls a couple of your friends and gets nothing. Then he calls your mother, her being his last resort.

“Hey, Miss (y/m/n), have you talked to (y/n) today?”

“Hi Bucky, she’s in my living room right now.” Bucky sighs in relief knowing you’re okay.

“She was gone when I came home and I just got so worried.”

“Did something happen between the two of you?”

“I think she saw an old letter and decided to leave.”

“It was an old letter from the past, right?”

“Yeah it was, I’m on my way.”

After that call, Bucky grabbed his keys and the letter and headed to your mother’s house. Your mom loved Bucky despite his history. She’s always asking you when he’s going to be her son-in-law. It’s almost like she loves him more than you. Once she heard both sides of the story she understood where both of you were coming from. You needed to talk it out.

“(y/n), I think you’re misunderstanding this.” Your mom says setting a cup of tea down in front of you.

“But how? Why would he keep a letter from this girl from his past?” You question, not knowing the answer yourself.

“Honey, Bucky has been through a lot, everything in his life from his past that he once had, is gone, maybe he’s just trying to hold on to that little piece he has left.”

She’s not wrong. Everything from Bucky’s past is gone, except his PTSD and dog tags. He doesn’t have Steve, he doesn’t have a war to fight. That’s all he done for years.

“You think I should’ve heard him out before leaving?” You ask, looking at your mother waiting for more words of wisdom.

She smiles grabbing your hand, holding it tightly in her lap, “You will, I’m sure he’s on his way now. (y/n), Bucky loves you without a doubt. You should listen to what he has to say.”

You sat around talking to your mother catching up with her, you learned that she had done some renovations to the house and that she has been waiting for you and Bucky to visit. But on better terms. You were taking your cups to the kitchen when you heard the doorbell.

“I’ll be in the backyard.” You say, walking to the back door. Once you were out of view, your mother opened the door and there stood Bucky.

“Hi ms. (y/m/n).” Bucky says, smiling at your mother despite the situation.

“Oh, Bucky, come in.” Your mother ushers Bucky inside and he gets a glimpse of your things. “She’s in the backyard.” Bucky thanks her and makes his way to the backyard. He puts his hand in his pocket, fiddling with the letter. As he walked outside, his eyes immediately found you.

He walks over to you, keeping his space so he doesn’t upset you. “(y/n).”

“Do you love me?” You blurt out staring into his eyes. He was shocked you’d ever ask him that. Of course he loved you, he didn’t just love you, he was in love with you, he adored you.

“Wha- Of course, I love you.”

“Then why do you keep that letter from your girlfriend in the forties, Bucky, huh?” Bucky sighs, taking out the letter, handing it to you.

“Mary was my friend, she gave me this letter right before I went to war, told me to read it when I missed home. Yes I know there’s no war now, but Mary, she’s a part of what I can remember before HYDRA.”

“She’s a reminder of who I was, who James Bucky Barnes was. I know I should throw it out, but this little letter is all I have left.” Bucky confesses, watching your hands has you hold the letter.

“I’m sorry.” You utter, gazing into Bucky’s eyes.

“No, doll-”

“I need to apologize to you, I should’ve just talked to you about it instead of just leaving.” Bucky comes closer to you, holding your hands in his.

“I should’ve opened up to you about this.”

“Its okay. And I know I’m not any of your buddies, but I know who James Bucky Barnes is.” Bucky smiles resting his hands on your hips, “Is that right?”

“James Bucky Barnes is my 106 year old super soldier that I love dearly. He’s the kindest, loving, caring, strongest, sassiest, grumpiest, and handsomest man I’ve ever met.” You lean in and give Bucky a long apology kiss.

“Are you two staying for dinner?” Your mother called out from the backdoor, making you and Bucky break away.

“Mom!” You groan, amusing Bucky.

“We’d love to stay ms. (y/m/n)!”

Please do not steal, copy or translate my writings, or post them on other sites.

Likes, reblogs, and comments are appreciated :)

Bucky: @qhbr2013 @allforkook @supremethunda @amelia-song-pond @tinylumpiaa @sammypotato67 @leyannrae @teebarnes @teti-menchon0604 @mogaruke @instabull @ccosmic-illusion @supraveng @1-800-imagines @chris-j-evans

Kofi

Taglist

Bucky Tags: @qhbr2013 @allforkook @supremethunda @amelia-song-pond @tinylumpiaa @sammypotato67 @leyannrae @teebarnes @teti-menchon0604 @mogaruke @instabull @ccosmic-illusion @supraveng @1-800-imagines @chris-j-evans

Taglist

[anti-anticheese]

Cause I need to get this out of my head, my musings on the biggest mystery of Agatha All Along... the Agatha/Rio relationship. Contains future Rio character spoilers.

So Rio is the "Green Witch" and as such has "earth magic", which should explain why in a promo she is able to create a flower in her hand. However, based on Funko Pop leaks (side note, been a while since we've gotten something spoiled by toy marketing) and her fight with Agatha, plus rumors that Aubrey is going to continue in the MCU, I think Rio is Death who likes to cosplay as witch. As a cosmic being, at least in the comics, she has the abilities to manipulate reality, time, space, matter, energy, or magic for any purpose.

Therefore, I think they are going to do a play on the Thanos being obsessed with/courting Death storyline, but instead Death is obsessed with Agatha. I'm thinking that Death was first drawn to Agatha, when she started her witch killing spree, and the relationship followed from there.

So with that framing in mind, let's look at some Agatha/Rio interactions again.

I think Nicholas was dying and as Death, Rio wouldn't save him, so Agatha went on the Witches Road to get the power to. (I then think Agatha got tempted by the Darkhold and thought she could have her cake and eat it too but... I digress). When Rio wouldn't save Nicholas and he died before Agatha could, Agatha started hating Rio and hid herself with Darkhold magic. Why did she need to hide herself? Because Rio still wanted them to be together.

She just wants her boo back.

Kinda hard to kill death...

Death can't be killing people before it's their time.

The courtship rituals are intricate.

Agatha knows Rio was first attracted to her when she was killing witches and taking their powers. And yes, Rio would like to sleep with Agatha, but first, she'd prefer her dead so they can always be together.

Yeah, the cosmic being that is Death, blasting her power into you is not going to go well.

Then goes on to list ways that Agatha could die, ie. paths to her.

Death doesn't mind how Agatha makes her way to her, and she likes to watch Agatha work.

Death will get what she wants one way or another, Agatha, her heart, with her.

[starlight-loki]

The Elevator (Loki x Reader)

Or, that time you and Loki got stuck in an elevator together.

Word Count: 957

Warnings: it's short and corny sorry in advance

A/N: i make a few small references to two earlier fics (linked below), but it's not necessary to have read them before this one :) gender neutral reader as always!

Precautionary Surveillance What Haunts Us at Night

“Did you press the button?”

“Do you think I’m stupid? Of course I pressed the button.”

“And?”

“You’re seeing the same thing I’m seeing, it’s not like you blinked and missed anything important!” 

Loki let out a ragged sigh, clenching his jaw as he leaned against the wall of the elevator.

“Relax,” you said, reaching forward and punching the call button one more time, the aggressive action a feeble attempt to keep yourself from taking your frustration out on the god trapped in the elevator with you. “If the call button isn’t working, you can just… y’know, magic us out of here and back into our own rooms.”

“It doesn’t work that way.”  

“You somehow managed to hide a damn Infinity Stone from Thanos, fake your death more than once, and prance around Asgard for two years as your father without anyone knowing. Please, Loki, enlighten me: what’s stopping you from getting us out of Tony’s piece of crap elevator?” 

“I create illusions,” Loki explained slowly, rolling his eyes at you as if this was basic information he was explaining to a child. “You’re asking me to tear apart the very fabric of space itself. That’s madness, even my own powers have limits.” 

“Alright, then I guess we’re going to have to go with Plan B: how loud can you yell?” 

“Don’t be ridiculous, that won’t work. We’re trapped in metal.”

“Oh please. Let’s be real, you just don’t want to make a fool of yourself, right?”

The annoyance in the air was palpable as Loki rolled his eyes at your retort. “By the gods, Y/N, pray tell… how in the Nine Realms did you guess?”

You cracked a hint of a smile at Loki’s thick layer of sarcasm as you sank down slowly until you were curled in the corner of the elevator. You rested your head against the cool metal, letting a tired sigh slip out quietly. Loki peered down at you, raising an eyebrow.

“Giving up so soon?”

“Someone in the Compound will figure out pretty soon that the elevator’s broken. No one takes the damn stairs in this place anyways.” You shrugged, crossing your arms over your chest. “Might as well get comfortable while we wait it out.” 

You expected Loki to scowl at you, or bite back with another one of his bitter remarks, but to your surprise, the god stepped over until he was beside you. Without a word, he sank down to match your position on the floor. 

You couldn’t fight the curious glance you shot him as you observed how Loki kept his gaze fixed on the elevator doors in front of you. 

“I thought you hated all us Avengers. After… y’know, the whole house arrest thing Tony put you under and all.”

“I hate most of them.” Loki corrected you slowly, a hint of a smile pulling at the corners of his lips. “I must admit, however, some of them have pleasantly surprised me.”

“And who might those be?”

Your question earned another eye roll from the Asgardian.

“You’re not half bad yourself, Loki. In fact, I think you’re becoming one of my favourite people here.” You voice almost seemed to reverberate against the metal walls of the elevator after a moment’s silence. Loki’s eyes narrowed at first, but then his gaze softened slowly as he took in your words. 

“I must admit, Y/N, I’m surprised and… honored?”

You chuckled at Loki’s loss for words.

“Maybe it’s all the sleepless nights we’ve spent together,” you continued. “But you make good company. Even now, when we’re stuck in an elevator.” 

You couldn’t take your eyes off of Loki’s slight smile. Hell, you couldn’t seem to take your eyes off Loki. Maybe it was the suspiciously good lighting in Tony’s piece of crap elevator, but something in Loki’s eyes almost seemed to sparkle. 

Loki was sitting so close to you. The two of you had fallen asleep together accidentally on the couch before, surely it wouldn't be the end of the world if you moved your hand just enough to touch his-

Before you could think any further about moving your hand over, Loki beat you to it. Without saying a word, his hand was suddenly resting gently on top of yours. If you hadn't known Loki as well as you did, you would've almost thought it was an accident, the way his hand brushed over yours and stayed there.

You glanced over at the Asgardian to see he was waiting for you to meet his gaze with a small smirk. In reply, you squeezed Loki's hand gently, and let out a laugh when he squeezed your hand back.

"Maybe it's a good thing the elevator stopped working?"

"And why would that be?"

"Well..." You nodded towards your intertwined hands. "We wouldn't be able to do this without getting the third degree from everyone else."

Seemingly right on cue, a whirring noise filled the air as the elevator came back to life, beginning its ascent back up to your original destination.

"That was surprisingly fast," Loki remarked as he helped you up to your feet.

"Like I said, no one here likes taking the stairs."

Before Loki could reply, the doors of the elevator opened to reveal a somewhat flustered Thor waiting expectantly at the entrance.

"Took you long enough!"

"Thor? How did you fix the elevator?"

Thor blinked at you in surprise. "I thought it was just slow... I hit it with a lightning blast, and..."

Thor trailed off as he noticed your hand intertwined with Loki's. The three of you exchanged anxious glances before Thor's face broke into a grin.

"Maybe I should have left you and Y/N in the elevator a while longer, brother."

_

I'm restarting my taglist! Please let me know if you'd like to be tagged in future Loki or Namor fics (you can specify if you'd just like to be tagged for one or both characters!)

[bensonoliviasstuff]

“Turning Page”

Chapter One! “ ‘I'll never leave’, never mind”

Masterlist for “Turning Page”

Bucky Barnes x fem! Reader

Summary: Once Bucky regained consciousness and was no longer the Winter Soldier, all he missed from the 40s was his wife. But maybe she's closer than he thought.

Warnings: English is NOT my first language, so I'm sorry if there are too many errors. Futhermore i don't think there are many warnings, a little bit of angst, memory loss, betrayal, trauma, Insecurities and other things that you will discover throughout the story. And the best part: Thanos doesn't exist here

The infirmary doors were opened in an angry shove, making a loud noise as the metal of the door met the wall. A nervous Bucky walked past with hurried steps.

“Bucky, Wait!” Steve shouted trying to keep up with his friend's steps. “No one can enter the room yet, they are carrying out tests”

“I need to see, Steve!” He shouted in a broken voice as he continued his way through the corridors of the compound's medical wing. “I need to see with my own eyes...”

The sentence died down when he stopped walking, facing the glass window of the hospital room.

It was you.

Bucky had the image of you memorized perfectly in his head, he could describe everything that had changed since 1940 with just one look, your hair was a few inches longer, there were a few small scars on your face. But it was still you.

He felt like his heart had stopped beating for a few moments.

He ran a metal hand over his face, holding back the sob that threatened to escape his throat. “It’s her Steve” Bucky placed a hand on the glass, almost as if he could feel it.

“It's her, Bucky” Steve said cautiously “But... We don't know what happened to her this whole time, we'll only know how she is when she wakes up.”

That's when realization hit Bucky, his fist closed against the glass, about to punch the wall.

“I’m going to kill those bastards” Bucky said, unable to calm the anger he felt towards those men, what if you went through everything he went through? All the torture he had to endure for years and years? The thought of you suffering like he did made Bucky's heart sink towards his stomach.

“Natasha is interrogating the man who told us she was there” Steve said “She’s waiting for us.”

“I was waiting for you” your voice echoed through the room before Bucky took you by the waist and gave you a kiss full of love. “Sergeant Barnes now then?”

You pulled away to take a good look at your husband, he was wearing the brown suit of a WWII soldier.

“For you it’s always ‘my love’, doll” Bucky said taking you in his arms, this was something you loved about your relationship, even after so long together you still acted like teenagers who had just started a fiery passion.

But Bucky didn’t fail to notice when you lowered your head to hide your teary eyes.

“Hey, doll, what’s wrong?” He already knew the answer, he knew it and it left him almost inconsolable before going to sleep.

“I’m afraid Bucky, what if you don’t come back?” Her voice became lower and lower as the doubt became more terrifying in her mind.

“I will come back doll, I promise you, not in a million years i'm leaving you alone” He placed a hand on your neck, forcing you to look at him.

“You can’t promise that” You said unsurely. “You don’t know if you’re really going to come back. ”

“Then you can marry Steve” He tried to joke to lighten up, and you couldn’t help but let out a tearful laugh, punching him in the shoulder.

“This isn't funny, you know?” You said wiping away your tears. “I know, I know” he apologized pulling you into a tight hug. “I will never leave you doll, that's the only thing I'll keep in mind while I fight: I can't leave my princess behind.”

“How did you know Y/N Barnes was alive?” Natasha asked the man chained in front of her, Bucky and Steve were on the other side of the mirrored glass.

“She was never dead, Hydra has been with her since Steve Rogers was presumed dead” Steve looked down, he still blamed himself for that, for leaving you alone even after you losing your husband.

“What did Hydra wanted with her?” Natasha asked coldly, leaning over the table. “Why did they taked her?”

“Even after we erased the Winter Soldier's memory, he always ended up remembering her at some point, we wanted to create an advantage in this regard, if he decided he was no longer on our side, we would threaten to kill her”

Bucky kicked the nearest chair, cowering in rage. He was ready to go into that room and kill that man in the most violent way ever recorded. “And why didn’t they do that when he disappeared?”

“He was already gone, we couldn't find him, but she didn't lose her usefulness, during the time she was at the base, she made a lot of noise after finding out that James Barnes was alive, sometimes she could spend an entire day screaming for her husband, it was irritating, so we decided to erase her memory, it became much easier to experiment on her after that.” The man was dismissive, he had nothing left to lose, he was already sentenced to prison, now he just wanted to see Sergeant Barnes suffer.

“Still, she always remembered him eventually, we also used it to test the soldier's memory, every time after we erased his memory, we took him to her, only to see he didn't recognize her, she would cry for days.”

At this point, Bucky was curled up in the corner of the wall, holding his head as the tears fell. You called out to him, you spent days screaming for him, you were in the same place as him all the time and he was never even able to recognize you.

It was tearing him apart, it was breaking everything inside him. He was about to leave, unable to listen any longer, when Natasha's question reached his ears.

“Experiments? So she has the super soldier serum?” Bucky turned around, waiting for the answer “No, but we trained her, she was very good at carrying out the missions she was sent, Y/N Barnes killed a lot of people”

That was the final straw for Bucky, they made his precious sweet girl spill blood.

He walked into the room, ignoring Steve's comments about calming down. He grabbed the man by the collar of his clothes and pushed him violently against the wall, starting to throw punches with his metal arm, he could spend hours beating and it still wouldn't be enough, but Steve ripped him off before the man's face was deformed.

“Never put her name in your mouth again! Your bastard! I'll kill you!" Bucky screamed trying to free himself from Steve, Natasha got in front of Bucky and ordered Steve to get him out of there.

Steve left dragging a nervous Bucky. “Look, I have the same desire as you, I wanted to go in there and finish him off, but that’s not how you solve things Bucky!”

Bucky sat on the chair he had kicked minutes ago, putting his head in his hands, everything in him was shaking, a mixture of hatred, anguish and guilt. “They put her through hell, Steve!” He stood up abruptly, putting his hand over his mouth. “All this because I left her alone, I forgot about her! I promised I would always be there for her and I just forgot about her!”

Steve looked at his friend with a very strong tightness in his chest, this whole situation hurt him in a way he couldn't even explain, imagine how much it was hurting Bucky? How much did it hurt you, going through all of this alone?

He still remembered when he had to break the news to you.

“Steve!” You said happily after opening the door to the apartment you and Bucky shared. “Oh, I'm so happy to see you! I still haven't gotten used to the fact that you're taller than me now” You walked forward giving Steve a hug, noticing that his face wasn't looking good but you wanted to ignore all the crazy theories in your head. “Where is my husband? Why didn't he come with you? I already said you can't steal it from me” You joked, despairing when Steve didn't laugh.

“I'm so sorry Y/n... Bucky...” Steve started to speak but you interrupted before he could finish his line of reasoning. "No! Don’t say that Steve, it’s not true, it can’t be true, don't you dare to lie to me!” You said taking steps back, with your hand on your stomach, feeling like you were going to throw up.

“He promised... He told me he would come back!” You started to cry as Steve walked over pulling you into a hug.

Your legs no longer had the strength to keep you standing when you started crying and sobbing in Steve's arms. “I'm sorry, I'm so sorry” Steve kept repeating, even though his heart was breaking more and more.

“He promised me Steve! He has to come back” You repeated between sobs, Steve didn’t know what to say when your pain seemed to be consuming you.

That day, he laid you in bed, made you some tea and sat next to you until you Say a sentence that ended that super soldier.

“The worst lie I’ve ever heard: ‘I’ll never leave.’” You sighed with heavy eyes “Never mind”

After saying that you fell asleep, Steve couldn't put into words how painful it was to see your red and swollen face sleeping.

“I promise to take care of you Y/n, I won’t leave you alone, for Bucky”

Even so many years later Steve's heart hurts knowing that if he hadn't left, maybe you wouldn't have been alone, and now he feels even more guilty knowing that if he had been around, Hydra wouldn't have taken you.

He felt like it was his fault, even if it wasn't.

Steve's thoughts were interrupted by the door opening.

“Sergeant, Captain” Tony appeared in the room, a curious and relieved look on his face “She woke up”

[queen-of-the-avengers]

In The Before

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~1.5k

Warnings: angst, character being dusted

Request by anon: Angst with steve and vixen . Both gone off the track after accords vixen goes with steve and all else went good both layed low even married in secret . Angst comes in the form of Fucking thanos  , its the fight at wakanda shes next to steve while everyone is on the feild when the dust settle grim reality that the bad guy won . Both bucky called to steve but before he steped bucky disapeared . Vixen walked found steve to her horror steve sees his wife vixen disapear while whispering "i love y-" she turned to ash before finishing. 

Summary: The fight of your life is here and you'll do anything to protect Vision and the stone in his head. However, you've never faced an enemy like Thanos before.

Squares Filled: "This isn't a back alley. This is war." (2020) for @star-spangled-bingo

Cat and Mouse Masterlist

Author’s Note: i didn't go into too much detail about the fight at Wakanda and with Thanos since we've all seen Infinity War and we all know how the fight goes.

x

This dingy and run-down apartment isn’t the best place you’ve lived in but it’s a roof over your head. Right now, you and Steve will take what you can get. It’s been tough after the fight about the Accords. Tony made half the team fugitives so you and Steve are living outside the country against the law. If you’re caught, the government will treat you like hard-core criminals and lock you up for good.

You’re on your own here.

You take the microwavable food from the kitchen and walk over to the table where Steve is. He hasn’t looked the same since the big fight with Tony. He looks broken, a shell of the man he once was. It breaks your heart to see him this way, and it hurts even more knowing the team is broken up. A team that once stood together to fight what others couldn’t is now disassembled.

“You should eat something,” you say and place the food in front of him.

He looks up at you and gives a half smile before taking a bite. He misses his friends. He hates how the entire situation played out and wishes he could go home.

“How are you feeling?”

“Me? I’m doing alright.”

“I mean with Hydra. No trouble with them?”

“Not since I left Wakanda.”

It’s true. You’ve been free from their mind control for a few years now. It’s been so quiet inside your head, and you welcome the silence even if you didn’t at first. Bucky hasn’t been with you two since the Avengers broke up, but you keep tabs on each other since he has the same fears as you. What if Hydra got ahold of you again? Could they put that back inside your head? Could you be a puppet again?

Zemo hasn’t been seen since you let him go. You haven’t had the desire to go after him like you promised you would. Seeing the fear on his face when you caught him was punishment enough. He will always be looking over his shoulder for you since you can come from anywhere, and that’s enough to satisfy you right now.

“How are the others? You were gone all day,” you ask and eat.

“Buck is doing as well as he can. He’s still having nightmares. Nat and Sam are helping him through it. Wanda and Vision are still off the grid. Nat has regular check-ups with them so I’m not too worried.”

“I’m glad she has someone like Vision. He gave up what he believed in to be with her. If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.”

“I know it’s rough right now, but we’ll find a better place than this. I’ll give it a few years before we can go home.”

“Believe it or not, this isn’t much different than the missions I went on. Bucky and I used to stay in places like this. Though, if we’re going to continue to live here, then we need a proper bed instead of a mattress on the floor.”

Steve laughs at this. “We’ll get one together tomorrow.”

After dinner, you two head to bed together. It’s another rough night but you make the most of it. In the morning, Natasha calls the phone you reserved for emergencies only. Wanda and Vision are in trouble. Bruce and Tony are in trouble in New York. Apparently, someone named Thanos is on a mission to get all six Infinity Stones, and one of them happens to be in Vision’s head.

Vision and Wanda are located in Scotland so that’s where you and Steve meet up with Nat, Bucky, and Sam. Two of Thanos’ children are after the stone in Vision’s head, but they can’t take on all six of you at once. Wanda and Vision did most of the fighting before you were able to get to them, so your team made the finishing move that caused one of them to be stabbed by his own spear. They left back into their alien ship before leaving.

“What the hell is going on? Who were those people?” you ask.

“I don’t know but they want the stone. Vision has been injured,” Wanda panics.

“What are we going to do?” you ask Steve.

“We go home.”

Looks like you’re going home after months of leaving it behind. You’re not sure what you’re going to walk into when you touch back down in New York, but you have to be prepared for anything. However, nothing prepared you for what you came across. Dr. Strange, Tony, and Peter have been sucked into an alien spaceship that was trying to take the time stone.

It doesn’t matter who you’re talking to or not, Earth needs defending from everyone available.

Thanos tried to get Vision’s stone once and failed, so you know he will be back with more reinforcements later. The only place on Earth that might be able to handle the fight is Wakanda. They are more than happy to assist your team in the fight that is likely to come.

“How are we going to do this? They’re not going to stop until they get that stone.”

“What if we remove it from Vision? He’s more than the stone, anyway. Can he survive without it?” you ask Shuri.

“It’s not going to be easy but I think I can separate the stone from him. It’s going to take time.”

“How much time do you need?” Steve asks.

“As much as you can give me.”

“Alright, Wanda, you gotta stay up here and protect the stone. You’re the only one with the power to do so. The rest of us are going to be on the field. They’re not going to go easy on us so we aren’t either. This isn’t a back alley. This is war,” Steve says.

“You heard him. Let’s go,” T’Challa says and walks toward the door. “Someone, get his man a shield!”

You along with everyone else line up on the battlefield just as alien ships come crashing to Earth. They try to hit the Wakanda barrier but explode on impact since they can’t get through it. Most of the ships land outside of the barrier, and a bunch of alien dogs come rushing out savagely. They try to get through the barrier but are killing themselves when the barrier slices right through them. For every five that are killed, one of them gets through.

This is going to be the fight of your life, and you channel your inner Vixen for this fight. You use every weapon at your disposal, every skill Hydra beat into you, and every gun that is handed to you. You’re giving the aliens everything you’ve got but it doesn’t seem to be enough. Only when Thor comes from wherever he was, does the fight seem fair. He has a new axe that replaced the hammer his sister broke, and he uses it to kill as many aliens as he can.

At one point, Wanda is forced out of her hiding space to help in the fight, and that’s when Thanos strikes. He sends the two aliens whom Wanda fought in Scotland to grab the stone. Most Wakandans stay in the field to keep most of the aliens busy while your team heads to the other side of the place where Vision is.

“Hey, are you okay?” you ask Vision and go to his side.

“He’s coming whether we like it or not. You should all get out of here.”

“We’re not leaving you. Eyes up, everyone,” Steve says.

It didn’t take long for Thanos to come with the time stone. He must have persuaded Dr. Strange to give it to him, but it’s unlikely he did it without violence. Steve tries to fight Thanos and loses. Natasha and Bruce try and they fail. T’Challa tries and fails. Bucky, Groot, and Rocket try and fail. You try and fail.

The only person stopping Thanos from getting the stone is Wanda, and she uses her magic to keep him back as she uses her magic to destroy the stone. It’s breaking her heart to hurt the one she loves but it has to be done. The stone must be destroyed so that Thanos can’t use it.

However, he has the time stone so after Wanda successfully destroys the stone, Thanos puts it back together just so he can steal it. He kills Vision right in front of Wanda and acquires the stone. He does what he set out to do years earlier.

He snaps his fingers.

Thor managed to lodge his axe into Thanos’ chest but that doesn’t stop Thanos from actually snapping his fingers, and then he disappears using the space stone. Your team is left to pick up the pieces after the big war.

“Is that it? Did we lose?” you ask and stand up.

Silence befalls Wakanda. Thanos got what he wanted. There is no need for the fight any longer. The alien dogs that are still alive retreat. Something doesn’t feel right. Thanos wanted to wipe out half of the universe.

“Steve?” Bucky says.

You and Steve look at him and see him turn to dust. You look to your right and see Groot turn to dust. Wanda turns to dust. T’Challa turns to dust. You look down and see your hand start to turn to dust.

“Steve?” you gasp and look at him.

“Y/N? No!”

“I love y--”

You turn to dust completely, leaving Steve and the remaining Avengers all alone.

x

Follow my library blog @aqueenslibrary​​​​​​ where I reblog all my stories, so you can put notifications on there without the extra stuff :)

[bedlamsbard]

POV (Natasha POV, if you're amenable?)

I got a little carried away.

*****

Natasha didn’t bother to think, just threw herself down over Steve like there was a chance in hell that her fragile human body could do anything against an Infinity Stone.  He got an arm around her as the power of the Infinity Stones washed over them both, a brilliant wave of blue and green energy with Thanos’s face grinning behind it.

There was a sensation like falling that seemed to go on and on, Natasha’s stomach turning over as she squeezed her eyes shut.  Then, just when she thought she couldn’t bear it anymore, she struck the bottom, Steve heavy on top of her as he rolled to get her beneath him, putting his body between her and any oncoming danger.  Natasha curled herself up, too dazed to do anything else.  Her heartbeat was a harsh, frantic patter that matched Steve’s, her breath a harsh rasp in her throat, and all she could see were coruscating waves of blue and green.  There was a kind of roaring in her ears that only belatedly resolved itself into shouting human voices, though she still couldn’t make out the words.

Steve was off her now, the scuffle of his feet close enough that she could identify it as the sound of fighting.  Natasha stumbled upright, her vision still a wash of blue and green, but she set her back against Steve’s and slammed a punch into the face – or whatever – of someone who tried to grab her, which resulted in a yell of pain.  She swept her batons out of their harness, wanting the extra reach of the weapons; she didn’t want to risk shooting off her bites when she couldn’t see what she was shooting at.  She jabbed one into the gut of someone who tried another grab for her, then another hard blow that knocked him away from her.

The white noise roar of sound was beginning to resolve into words, a man yelling, “Stop shooting!  Stop shooting up my lab, damn it!”

It was a voice she had heard before, but only in recordings.  No, she thought, astonished, even before the speaker went on, “Steve – Steve, it’s Howard, it’s Howard Stark.  You’re okay – you’re safe, okay?  You’re in SSR headquarters.”

As her vision slowly began to clear, Natasha saw that she was in a big brick-walled room with a groined ceiling, surrounded by men and a few women in old-fashioned clothing, even split between civilian clothing and American army uniforms that she had last seen on a History Channel documentary about the Second World War.  There were two men down on the floor in front of her, one in civilian clothes and one with an MP’s white armband.

“What the hell,” she whispered, looking back over her shoulder at Steve.

He was breathing hard, his eyes wide with shock.  He’d acquired a pistol somewhere, probably from one of the several MPs who were groaning on the floor near him, and had the barrel braced on top of his remaining Wakandan shield.  There was a man standing in front of him with his hands up, a dark-haired, clever-faced man with a thin moustache and a very obvious family resemblance to Tony Stark.  His gaze was fixed on Steve, unblinking but with relief so profound that it hurt a little to see.

“Steve,” Howard Stark said, “can you give me the gun?  It’s okay – it’s just me.  It’s just me, Steve.”  He reached out to take the gun from Steve, who let him do it, and passed the weapon back to one of the nearby MPs.  “Steve?” he said again.

“Howard,” Steve croaked, sounding he was on the verge of hyperventilating.

“Hey,” Howard said, his shoulders slumping a little in relief. “You scared the blazes out of us.”  He pushed Steve’s shield arm down gently, his gaze moving across Steve and then Natasha, before returning to Steve.

“Steve?” Natasha said, her brain still scrambling to put two and two together and come up with something other than five.  Or 1945.

“It’s –”  He had to take a moment before he continued. “It’s okay, Nat.  Stand down.”

She hesitated, then slid her batons back into their holster and turned to put her shoulder against his, looking Howard Stark over properly.  She had known it intellectually, but because most of the pictures or videos she had seen had been later in his life Natasha had never processed until just now that he was exactly the same age as Steve.

She could feel Steve starting to shake against her shoulder, his gaze darting wildly across the room and its occupants, but he looked back as Howard Stark said his name again.

“Steve, I’m going to hug you now, okay?”  Howard said.  “Don’t punch me.”

He moved slowly enough that Steve could have stepped back if he had wanted to, but Steve didn’t.  Natasha moved a little to one side to let Steve return his embrace, trying to watch them and the crowd of onlookers at the same time, and saw the way that Howard let his breath out in relief once he had his hands on Steve.  They lingered on Steve’s shoulders as he drew back and Natasha thought, Oh.

Suddenly a lot of things about Tony Stark’s complicated feelings about his father and Captain America had become clear.

“It is you,” Howard Stark said, before he finally let Steve go and turned his attention to Natasha. “Who’s your friend?”

Since Steve still looked like he was going to start hyperventilating at any moment, Natasha said, “Natasha Ro –”

“Rogers,” Steve said before she could finish.

“Natasha Rogers,” she said smoothly, nudging her shoulder against his and not letting herself wonder what the hell he was thinking; they could sort it out later.

Howard’s eyebrows went upwards, but all he said was, “Sounds like you have a lot to tell us about.  Starting with what the hell just happened and how the hell you got in here, because, Steve, a lot of people are going to be really happy to hear you’re alive, starting with me, but what just happened?”