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mollywall-e · 9 months

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WIP Chapter 3 of Take Me Home (RDR2 AU)

As the hazy orange light of the flaming fields fades, the moonlight shimmering across the water providing just enough light for visibility, the ever-present buzz of adrenaline begins to settle. Imogen rows, and rows, and rows, finding comfort in the repetitive motion, clinging closer to the coastline the further north they travel.

The stretch of land between Braithwaite Manor and the Temult homestead is quiet, the roads too dark to be deemed safe at this hour. Most folks have long been tucked away in bed, preparing for the next day's work. There’s bound to be a few drunken stragglers livening up the old saloon in town. If they haven't passed out already, that is. But from the boat, the town of Rhodes is a mere speck on the horizon, too far from shore to pose any real threat.

They're alone. For now.

As if on cue, the dim light of a poorly tended campfire comes into view along the cragged shoreline. Imogen slows her rowing, scanning the campsite. To her relief, she finds it empty. No signs of movement, no one keeping watch. Just a handful of empty canvas tents and a campfire that's more ember than flame.

Raiders, likely out on their nightly “patrol” of the roads. They've been set up in the pasture west of the Temult homestead for years now. The law is too lazy to do anything about it, but Imogen's managed so far. She knows their routine, knows to keep her distance. She also knows to sleep with her daddy's old shotgun on the nightstand. She hasn't had to use it so far, but it's a comfort nonetheless.

“We’re basically there now, Laudna,” Imogen announces, steering the boat towards the shore. The girl startles a bit at the sound, shaking herself from the silent stupor she'd fallen into. Imogen continues, quieter. “My house, it's just past that camp there.”

Laudna says nothing, wide eyes reflecting the reddish orange glow of the dying campfire, growing larger as they rapidly approach the shoreline.

“Don't worry, no one's there.” Imogen rushes to reassure. “We're safe.”

Laudna nods, barely perceptible, and mutters. “Safe. We're safe.”

The water grows shallow as they approach the shore. Once they're within a handful of yards, Imogen sets down the oars and climbs out of the boat. Her boots squelch in the muck as she steps into the knee-deep water, pleasantly warm despite the late hour. Grabbing the back of the boat with both hands, Imogen pulls it ashore, the worn wood of the bottom scraping against the shale-laden soil.

“Alright, Laudna,” Imogen holds one hand aloft, the other remaining to hold the boat in place. “C'mon out.”

Laudna shuffles to the back of the boat, stumbling a few times before righting herself. She hesitates for a moment, eyeing the water lapping at the shoreline with a thinly veiled fear.

“It's just a little water, it's not gonna hurt ya,” Imogen assures her, voice soft and certain.

It’s strange how easily the words flow while still feeling alien in her mouth. The quiet comfort, the careful cadence. It's so far removed from the barking of orders, strained attempts at small talk, and outright hostility she's surrounded by every day. She's not sure where it comes from, this inexplicable need to comfort and protect a stranger, but it’s consumed her since she first heard that humming. Like the natural instinct to soothe a frightened child, or to tend to a wounded animal.

She's not sure how effective it is, but her clumsy attempt at comfort is enough to get Laudna's attention. Those eyes, wide, dark, and terribly frightened, glance away from the water. They lock onto Imogen, searching for something. Whatever she finds in the lavender irises is enough to dissuade her previous doubts, quickly clutching onto Imogen's offered hand and clambering out of the boat.

“S'alright, you're alright” Imogen's eyes smart with the sudden flash of pain as long, jagged nails dig into her palm, but she breathes through it. “It’s alright, I gotcha.”

Imogen can't help but sigh in relief as Laudna lets go of her hand to scramble further inland, beyond the water's reach. Imogen discreetly shakes out her hand, palm ridden with freshly carved, crescent-shaped divots, before shoving the boat back out into the open water. She watches it drift for a moment, desperately hoping the gentle breeze and residual current from the river will carry the boat far enough away to clear them of any suspicion.

“That should do it,” Imogen mutters more to herself than her new companion. “Right, this way.”

Imogen guides Laudna through the rolling fields, giving the campsite a wide berth, until the Temult homestead comes into view, delicately perched atop a sloping hill.

If the fence surrounding the property had seen better days, Imogen wasn't around for it. It's been rundown and haphazard for as long as she can remember. Nearly half the pickets are missing, rendering the fence almost entirely useless. Imogen had taken to using some of the remaining wooden panels for repairs, so it was good for something, at least.

The rest of the exterior was in a similar state of neglect: overgrown grasses, rusted hinges, and boarded up windows. Though covered in a persistent ivy that Imogen had long since given up on clearing, the house itself was well-crafted and structurally sound. Except for the goddamn stairs, that is.

“Here we are…home, sweet home.” Imogen announces, doing her utmost to ignore the white-hot sting of shame simmering in her stomach. As the pair slows to a stop at the base of the stairs, Imogen scratches at the back of her neck, turning to face a wide-eyed Laudna. “Just…watch your step, alright?”

Imogen leads the way up, holding her breath as the remaining wooden stairs groan underfoot. She stretches across the freshly created gap, huffing a sigh of relief as her feet safely reach the infinitely more stable porch. She turns to help Laudna along, only to find her already standing beside her. Poor thing's so emaciated the wood didn't so much as squeak under her weight.

“C'mon, let's get you inside.” Imogen fumbles with the knob for a moment, before the door opens with a familiar creak.

The interior of the Temult home is entirely dark, to be expected well past sundown. Ushering Laudna through the doorway, Imogen quickly settles into her normal nightly routine, kicking off her muddied boots and locking the door behind them. She checks it again just to be certain.

“Just one sec, lemme get some light goin' for ya.” Imogen comments under her breath, grabbing her matchbook from her pocket once more.

Flitting about in the shadows through sheer muscle memory, Imogen lights the oil lamp she keeps on the table and the handful of candles she keeps across the mantel, dancing around table corners and errant chairs with a practiced ease. The flickering orange and yellow light quickly floods the interior, revealing it to be exactly as she left it this morning: a bit cluttered and covered in a thin layer of dust, but cozy all the same.

“That's better,” Imogen announces, turning back towards her new house guest.

Laudna hasn't moved an inch since being let in, hovering in the entryway with gangly arms wrapped around her sickly frame. Like she's trying to take up as little space as possible. Like she's trying to hold herself together. Maybe both. Imogen goes to step towards her, but stops herself. Instead, she busies herself straightening the picture frames scattered atop the mantel, drifting over to one of the two armchairs in the main room and fluffing the pillows.

“Come on, have a seat while I find you something to eat.” Imogen punctuates her sentence with a few pats on the long-flattened cushions, hoping it looks at least a little inviting.

Laudna eyes her for a moment, eyes the chair, and takes a small, shuffling step forward. Then another. And another.

“That's it, there you go,” Imogen coaxes, smiling a bit to herself as she watches Laudna collapse into the seat. She takes a few steps back, so as not to crowd the girl. “Comfortable?”

Laudna nods, though she doesn't look up at Imogen. Her gaze is drawn to the threadbare cushions, fingers idly twirling the stray bits of string.

Imogen watches her for a second, before turning on her heels to head back towards the kitchen.

“I'm afraid I don't have too many options,” Imogen calls over her shoulder, reaching up to open the kitchen cupboard. The cabinet is pitifully empty, save for a couple of cans, some cobwebs, and a particularly robust cockroach. She vows to go to the general store in the morning. “We got kidney beans, sweetcorn…” Imogen rotates the cans so she can read the label. “...or corned beef. Any preference?”

“...beans, please.”

Plucking the can from the cabinet, Imogen pulls open one of the drawers, grabs a knife, and pries the can open, careful to leave smooth edges. She grabs a spoon, plops it into the can, and shuts the drawer.

“Alright, now. I got a deal for ya,” Imogen drawls, walking her way back towards Laudna. She waits until the girl looks up to continue her offer. “This can's all yours. I can even get you another one, if you want it. But once you're done eating, we've gotta talk, alright?”

Laudna tenses a bit, eyes bouncing from the can, to Imogen, and back to the can. “Alright.”

Imogen sighs and holds out the can, quickly snatched by spindly fingers.

Rather than using the spoon, Laudna raises the can to her lips, tilting it as if drinking from a glass. She hesitates, growing sheepish as she catches Imogen staring.

“Go on, then. drink up,” Imogen encourages, nodding towards the beans. “Manners don't matter too much to me. Especially not with you starving the way you are.”

Laudna wastes no time in delving in after that.

#imodna #imodna fic #my fic #rdr2 au

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dancedance-resolution · 5 months

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this started out just as a cute little idea but turned into a little poorly written ficlet ish thing? that i might try to turn into a real fic... found family story for kara involving sam, ruby, and a bookshop.

au where kara crash lands in midvale as an adult. eliza discovers her wandering around the town looking lost and looking very much like an alien, so she takes kara. she encourages kara to stay in the house for now, at least until she learns how to better assimilate to earth's culture, because the public doesn't know about the existence of aliens like she (a high level scientist) does. it's for kara's own safety that she has to stay locked away, eliza explains as kara's cabin fever makes her more and more restless. one day, she hands kara a book. "this is your way to explore new worlds for now within the safety of this home."

but kara can't explore the new worlds because she can't read. eliza teachers her a little, but she's so busy with work that she can't help kara as much as she needs--and the standoffish alex, whose job similarly pulls her out of the house at all hours, certainly won't help kara. eliza gave her a thin sheet of paper to use as a bookmark--a receipt, she'd called it--but the scrap is good as useless when kara can't make any progress in the book to mark anyways.

she's home alone and fed up trying to understand the words when she sneaks out one day. she wanders the streets and sees a welcoming looking shop. there are letters on the front--ruby's reads--and kara realizes with a start that those are the same letters she's seen at the top of her bookmark! surely that's a good sign!

she heads into the store. a kind-looking woman greets her from the register, but kara doesn't acknowledge her. she's too distracted by the bright display of children's books in the back. she makes her way back there, grabs the most colorful cover, and plops herself down on the carpet.

"hi!" she hears someone say.

she turns--a few feet away from her, hidden from the view of the front door by a bookshelf, is a kid. she looks like the woman at the register but much younger.

"h-hello."

"i loved that book! it's such a good choice. who are you buying it for?"

kara hesitates. "um... me?"

the child makes a face kara can't decipher before shrugging, scooching closer to her.

kara stares at the page, hoping the girl will go away if she ignores her. she tries her best to decipher the words, bringing the page up close to her eyes like that might help.

"the whole series is great," the girl says. "i prefer the second one over this one though, actually. have you read that one yet?"

kara stares blankly at her.

"what do you think of janie? isn't she so brave in this chapter?"

kara tentatively shifts her gaze back to the page. "janie..." she whispers, trying to locate where that sound's letters are on the page.

she feels the girl staring at her. she's uncomfortable but also so desperate to read. curiosity soon gets the best of her. "c-can you..." she shoves the book towards the girl.

"oh, do you want me to put it back and get the second one for you?"

kara shakes her head vigorously. "um, no, um.... can you... read it? to me?"

"out loud?"

anyways i'm running out of steam here but basically ruby reads to kara and kara starts sneaking out for it every day. sam makes her and ruby snacks and soon ruby teaches kara how to read, never asking why a grown up like her can't read. the cashier who's sometimes there--nia, kara learns her name is--recommends some books for them when they run out of middle grade books, blah blah blah etc etc etc

one day alex runs through the doors of the store panting. uh oh, she shouldn't be here, she should be at work? "have you seen a blonde--" she starts panting, before she sees kara and runs over.

"kara, what are you doing! shit, come on, we need to leave--" alex looks up at sam as she ushers kara to her feet-- "sorry about her, we'll--"

"no need to apologize! we've grown quite fond of kara here!"

blah blah blah plot plot plot basically kara spends so much time there that sam, ruby, and nia become her friends. she learns how to read. alex starts spending time there with kara too, at first to ensure the safety but eventually bc she likes it (but she'd never admit that). blah blah blah agentreign starts.

one day sam's friend from out of town stops by and walks through the door. kara turns at the sound to see who's entering and promptly drops her book. and her jaw. and her dignity.

it is the most beautiful woman she's ever seen.

the woman turns to face her now, she must've been started by the sound of the book dropping, and--

they make eye contact.

"h-hi," kara says.

"hi," the woman breathes.

end fic

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discordiansamba · 6 months

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have this scrapped scene from the next the stars shine a different shine update because I decided I liked the idea of us *not* knowing what's going on in Pidge's head until a later point in the chapter.

Half Galra. For a long moment, all Pidge could do was stare at the two words in confusion. What did it mean, Keith was half Galra? That shouldn't be possible, for like… multiple reasons. "Translation error, maybe?" Pidge mused. It was certainly possible. This was the first time she'd ever run this program. It made more sense than Keith having alien blood, at any rate. Booting up the translation program, she checked its code. She was pretty sure she hadn't made any mistakes in her programming, but it never hurt to check. Hm. Nothing looked out of place. Frowning, she ran the translation program again, but this time only on the file with Keith's data in it. It took a few minutes- she was definitely going to have to work out a way to speed things up- but when it was done… It… came back with the exact same result. Half Galra. But that didn't make any sense. Even if she got past how unlikely it was that a human and a Galra could have enough in common to produce offspring, how did one get to Earth? Wouldn't that have meant that they would have already known where the blue lion was? Keith was twenty-five years old- Earth should have been taken over a long time ago if he were really half Galra. It couldn't be possible. Except… …except, in some ways, it made sense. Closing out of the data from the Galra ship, she brought up that data that she'd scrapped from the Garrison's servers. There was a copy of Keith's test results in them. He'd displayed consistently above average- even abnormal- results all throughout the testing phase. It was why Admiral Sanda had decided to choose him to pilot the Kerberos mission, despite her misgivings about… well, about Keith's everything, basically. If the Galra Empire had been ruling the universe for the past ten thousand years, it stood to reason that they might have some kind of biological advantage when it came to combat, right? Chewing on her lip, Pidge frowned. Maybe she should avoid speculating. Biology was more of her mom's thing, anyways. Besides, if Keith was half Galra, why wouldn't he have mentioned it? Closing her laptop, Pidge set it aside. Getting to her feet, she naturally fell into a pacing rhythm, trying to organize her thoughts. The way the aliens had talked about him… they'd made it sound like her dad and Matt had been the only humans that the Galra had brought in. Or at least, the only ones that they counted as humans. They'd seemed… afraid of him. He'd come to wait with her in the pod room for them to wake up. Did he not want her to be alone with them? Why was he the only one that had escaped? And how did the Galra find them so fast? They'd wormholed across the entire universe. And why was Keith's lion, the only one they hadn't been able to find at first, so conveniently located on the Galra ship that had been sent after them? Pidge came to a dead halt, smacking both of her cheeks. Nope. She didn't like the way she was thinking. She knew Keith. Or at least, she thought she did. No. No, she wasn't doing this. She trusted Keith. She couldn't doubt him like this. He was the man that her father had chosen to fly them to Kerberos. Her dad's intuition was never wrong. Her dad. Right, she couldn't lose focus on what her true mission was here. Whatever… this was, her main objective hadn't changed- she was out here to find her family, not to debate over Keith's bloodline and what that might mean for his motivations. She wasn't even out here to be a paladin. And now she had a lead on them. She couldn't just ignore that. She might not get another chance like this. Drawing in and letting out a deep breath, Pidge made a decision. She'd probably need a full day for all the prep work, but once it was done, she would be following that lead. She couldn't take the green lion with her, tempting as that was- she needed to leave that here, so they would be able to find another green paladin. She'd need to gather supplies, and maybe modify one of those pods… …and then she'd be going after that lead. Nothing- and no one- would stop her.

#the stars shine a different shine #it is also. actually. all I've written so far #pollen season has already started and it is kicking my ass

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internal-bleating · 2 years

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Monsters Vs Aliens isn't that bad and people should give it more of a chance and Susan Murphy is one of the best female protagonists ever actually

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!!Long Post Warning!!

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People seem to collectively hate Monsters Vs Aliens and idk why. My fam and I have always loved it and me and my dad used to always quote it all the time.

Now, is it better than Megamind? No way. Megamind is a masterpeice of cinema and is very much obviously the superior movie. But is Monsters Vs Aliens THAT horrible? I really don't think so.

I watched it again recently for old times sake and sentimental nostalgia and I really do think it's kind of underated. Is the animation style kind of ugly? First off, ugly and pretty are very subjective, second, yeah I can see why some might find the character design kinda ugly with their weird porportions and Susan's huge fucking eyes. But I really don't think it's THAT bad.

Also people seem to rag on the plot a fair amount as well but the plot and message are both actually pretty awesome if you ask me.

Susan is SUCH a good protagonist ok???

Gonna share my appreciation with ya'll for her.

I know there's probably people out there that view her as annoying and whinny but like??? Give her a fucking break! The girl literally starts off as the most basic average young adult white girl you've ever seen. Like fr she was probably on the more populer side at school, was definitly on the richer side when it comes to the middle class, seemed to live in a very cookie cut suburd neighborhood, and was going to marry one of the most painfully boring and typical white dudes ever. Like this girl was DEFINITELY one of those white girls you always see youtubers do impressions of n shit.

And by PURE CHANCE and coincidence, she gets hit by a meteor on her wedding day (Also can we talk about that hysterically anticlimactic "Oof!" she lets out when she got hit and her mom just brushing off her words when she says she got hit my a meteorite like "yep, everyone feels like that" as if her daughter wasn't fucking COVERED in dirt and ash) and it completely derails her very normal life.

Can we talk about Derek for a sec tho? Like what a fucking selfish jackass! The guy KNEW how excited Susan was about Paris and yet he only cares about himself and continuesly proves he doesn't give a shit about her enough to inconveiniance himself for her AT ALLLLL. Unlike Susan who was completely ready to forget about her Paris honeymoon for him. Like I bet you if Susan hadn't had this whole thing happen to her she'd have the most miserable loveless mariage with this dude and would be in denial of it for YEARS and keep trying to tell herself he cares but probably won't realize he doesn't until way way later. This guy was going to definitly waste a good chunk of her life and leave her feeling so so incredibly lost...

She's confused and scared(seriously her hair turned white in miliseconds becuase of how distressed she was) as everyone runs away screaming and she tries in vain to calm everyone down and things only get more disorienting as helicopters and fucking military men start attacking her and she doesn't understand what she's done wrong. And we also get some foreshadowing of how strong and how much potential she has with her newfound strength yet she doesn't know that yet. A few soldiers attempt to pull her down with ropes around her arm and at first she struggles against it but as SOON as she sees Derek is in danger she's like "Hey leave him alone! Don't hurt him!" and pulls herself free with incredible ease!

So then, Susan is very understandably freaking out and panicking when she wakes up in Area 51, yelling and screaming that she doesn't belong here as she's up until now most likely never experienced such and confusing and stressful situation. And honestly I feel SO SORRY for her that whole thing must've been so overwhelming and scary. We kind of get a timeskip after she sits in the corner of her cell but I bet you she was having a breakdown for the whole first week.

Small note, the government changed her name to Ginormica. Like bruh...

Then villain introduction yada yada skipping ahead a little bit.

Quick mention of the BANGER scene where the President plays Axel F for an alien robot. One of my fave scenes in the whole movie fr.

Also mentioning how Susan is SO SO determined to get out of monster prison.

So Susan and the other monsters are tasked with fighting an alien robot in exchange for their freedom. Susan is like "Oh yes! I'm gonna see my family again!" and I don't think the thought of fighting a robot has fully sunk in yet becuase she's way more focused on the prospect of seeing her lover again.

And THEN she sees this MOUNTAIN of a fucking robot that actually kind of scared me as a kid, and it finally sinks in. They want her to fight THAT. She was not expecting it to be so fucking big. Do these people actually expect her to fight this thing?? She starts freaking out again because like?? HOW??? How is she supposed to fight that thing?? She's never fought before!

Then big action scene, comedic moments with the trio, Susan runs away from the robot scared out of her fucking mind as this huge hulking metal monster aggressively persues her. And we get an actually really funny joke where she's clinging onto the edge of a roof, scared she's gonna fall only to fall like, two inches onto her feet when her grip slips and she's like "Oh. Right. Haha.".

Monster shenanigans again, She's on the bridge and continuing to get as far away from the robot as she can when she sees a car crash happen and reflexively stops in her tracks. She can clearly see the robot just a short distance away, but instead of continuing to run, she risks closing the gap of distance she's created for herself from the robot and chooses to instead help the people who might possibly be hurt and injured. She tries to warn them even as they run away becuase they are scared of her to get off the bridge before the robot gets to all of them.

Yeah, ok, maybe it's kinda ridiculous how fast the robot closes that distance between it and her but movie logic™ ok???

The robot has her cornered, it opens up a panel with a bunch of rotating teeth, intending to GRIND HER INTO A BLOODY PASTE like can we talk about how horrifying of a situation that is?? You're literal inches from a killer meatgrinder that's angling the bridge you're on so that you slide right into a waiting painful hole of death!

Insectisaurous, another big monster she was at first terrified of, shows up just in time. You see that look of incredible relief on Susan's face as he comes to her rescue, incopasitating the robot and pulling the bridge back to it's correct angle in order to help her get away.

Susan starts frantically asking why this robot is so hellbent on killing her specifically. It's not like she's been trying to attack it this whole time! Like why??? Robot seemingly crushes her in its robot hand but then, she pries its hand back open, the gang watching in awe.

In the struggle, the robot creates a huge hole in the bridge and a couple's car starts to fall into it but Susan stop it! "You're doing great!" "I'm doing EVERYTHING!!!" - ASFDJKLHFSDLAJKHSFDJKFASD

Susan, still thinking about the wellbeing of others, prioritizes getting all these people off the bridge and away from danger. When Bob clears the way somewhat, she yells at the people in their cars to go while still wresting with the robot hand to prevent it from harming any of them.

She's obviously tiring from holding his hand at bay for so so long and knows she can't keep it up forever and that's a scary thought to have cuz she's unsure how she's going to get away from this thing. But then she takes in her suroundings and a plan forms in her head.

Once again, Susan has never had to do this before. She's just winging this and is fighting for her god damn life! She speaks to herself to hype herself up for what she's about to attempt, hoping it will work.

Then BAM! With a determined burst of strength she jumps into action, pushing the robot hand wide open before grabbing the other and pulling the robot towards her, using its weight and topheaviness to make it lose balance and fall forwards. She grabs Link whose out cold btw rn, and carries him to safety, jumping out of the way JUST in time before the robot completely destroyes the bridge where she just was as it falls over.

A peice of the bridge comes down with it and severes its head from the rest of its body, effectively damaging it enough to power it off, permanently. Susan peers over the edge of the collapsed bridge, a smile of relief that the danger has passed and she's still alive spreading across her face. She actually did it!

Villain scene and monolouge, impending doom approaching, time skip,

Susan is excitedly talking to the others as they ride in the plane's cargohold about how "Wow! I can't believe I actually did that!" and she's so so proud of herself and you see Dr. Cockroach and Bob smiling back at her becuase from their POV she's probably glowing so so brightly and looks the happiest they've seen her ever. Her confidence is at skyrocket height right now! And yet, she can't help but long for her old life. She tells them how she's going to find a way to become normal again and that Derek will help her because he loves and cares about her and won't rest until they've fixed this(poor thing doesn't realize how much of a shitstain Derek is yet).

Bob (yeah he's the comic relief but i feel like people greatly underate how honest and genuine he can be like come onnnnnn(also yes I added him to my kinlist idgaf)) is like "Wait but you were just talking about how you're so strong now and how there's not a jar in this world you can't open" and yeah the whole line is played in a comedic light cuz Bob seems to only care about whatever food is in the jar she can't open but I feel like it's a little deeper than that.

After hearing about how great Derek seemingly is, the gang wants to meet him and Susan is like "Yeah sure I'll gladly introduce you guys!" and they all arrive at her home and she looks so happy to be back!!

Her family is kinda wary of the gang but she reassures them they're all chill and introduces them as her new friends, showcasing how far she's come relationshipwise with the three of them(since she was scared of them and found both Bob and Dr. Cockroach gross when they all first met. She legit tried to kill Dr. Cockroach when they first met like wow.)

Another example of Derek not caring, he doesn't show up to welcome her home from prison. Susan runs off to go get him so they can all celebrate together.

The monster gang tries to adjust to society and does their best to be friendly and nice but everyone is still super scared of them and it doesn't go very well...

Susan is SO SO HAPPY to see Derek again! She forgets how big she is and how strong she is in her excitement and Derek is kinda... understandably distressed when she picks him up, swings him around, almost suffocates him and almost crushes him. When Susan realizes this she immediatly apoligizes to him and puts him down.

Derek proceeds to show just how much of a fucking dickwad he is. When he asks her if he expects him to put his whole career on hold to help her, she's like "YES???" like bro this girl was ready to make the sacrifice of her PARIS HONEYMOON that she was VERY VISIBELY LOOKING FORWARD TO for your benifit!! Derek breaks Susan's heart and she's completely at a loss now. Everything feels like a lie. She leaves her home to go off to where she does not know.

Once again, yes, I KNOW it's kind of an impossible reach for the monster trio to show up right then. And ONCE AGAIN, I'm claiming movie logic™.

Bob once again being incredibly blunt and honest. Makes the whole gang face the fact that everyone hates them and doesn't want to be around them.

Heard somone bring up and praise the "We could save every city on the planet and they'd still treat us the way they've always treated us. Like monsters..." and honestly, fucking correct and valid.

They all have that quiet sad moment together.

Link tries to lighten the mood by asking how things went with Derek, the seemingly perfect and accepting loving guy Susan has sung the praises of for her entirety of her time with them in prison(seriously Link's whole response to her talking about him in that one scene way earlier implies she talked about Derek NONSTOP). He and the others do not yet know he's a prick as Susan had just discovered.

Susan finally accepts the fact that he's a selfish jerk as she tells the gang so.

"There was never and us! There was only Derek! Why did I have to get hit by a meteorite do realize that??" - Girl go OFF!!!!

She gets a good old rant out and in the process realizes that she doesn't have to feel lost. She's gonna be just fine without him because she's fucking amazing and has four new awesome friends now. She tells them just how awesome they all are and that none of them have to be accepted by society. They all have a character turning moment where Susan has learned she loves this new her and things are looking real up for the five of them! But then, of course, something has to go wrong.

Galaxar's ship shows up and abducts Susan. Insectosaurus tries to help her again but is hit by a ball of energy from the spaceship's cannon. He lets out the most heartwrenching shriek and we get an actually really sad scene as Susan is pulled into the ship and Link, knowing there's really nothing they can do for her in that moment, rushes over to his friend.

"Don't close those eyes. Don't you DARE close those eyes!" *Insectosaurus's eyes slide shut* "You can't..." - LIKE COME ON THAT WAS FUCKING SADDDDD AAAAAAAAAA

Susan has a confrontation with Galaxar, the villain of this movie. They have a very "You have gotten in my way for the last time" "I don't know who tf you are!" moment.

Susan has a moment of clarity where she's like "Wait, all of this is YOUR fault??" and she realizes that he's the reason her whole life was derailed and why she suffered all this trauma of her wedding day, being taken away from everything she's ever known with no hope of ever seeing her family again, and almost dying in a fight with a robot. He's why her fiance wants nothing to do with her(not defending Galaxar or anything for this cuz he did a lot of horrible shit but he really did her a solid by derailing her life cuz as i've stated before, Derek would have ruined her life in the long term if all this never happened to her).

Galaxar is all smug during this.

"You destroyed San Fransisco, you terrified millions of people, you killed my friend, just to get to me??" - My poor girl really out here still putting other people before her and caring more about them than herself...

Galaxar is so sure he's got the upperhand, so sure he's safe from her becuase of that forcefeild. But nah, Susan is fucking LIVID now and breaks through that forcefeild.

She proceeds to break through every barrier Galaxar puts between himself and her becuase she's learned just how imposing her power is now. She's chases after him through the ship like "I'M GOING TO FUCKING KICK YOUR ASS!!!" and Galaxar is actually genuinly scared of her as he's fleeing.

LIKE YES QUEEN!!!! GET HIS ASS!!! KILL THE BLUE FUCK!!!!

And because we still got a fair amount of run time to go, and because we still need our protagonist to struggle a bit, Galaxar manages to trap Susan in the extraction chamber just as she's about to get him. She's still glaring absolute daggers at him through the glass though. He looks back at her, smug expression returning. She then slams her hands into the glass and it STARTS TO CRACK!!! Galaxar is getting scared again and jumps back but he also commands the computer to begin the extraction process.

Susan is determined to break out and get to the person responsible for everything that has happened to her in the past month, but as the Quantonium is removed from her body, her pounds on the glass get weaker and weaker and soon she's no longer cracking the glass. Her now much smaller hand weakly presses against the glass one last time before the chamber retracts and she's left lying there back at her original size.

And even after all that, and even though Galaxar now towers over in instead of the other way around, she still meets his gaze with her own determined glare.

Side note, I know it's supposed to be a joke and all but im really curious about why exactly Galaxar came to the conclusion of destorying his whole fucking planet.

Also,

"There were innocent people on my home planet before it was destroyed!"

"Well I'm sorry your planet was destroyed..." "Oh don't be. I was the one who destoryed it" - Idk this whole exchange is just really clever to me. Like talk about speedrunning the whole trying to sympathsize with the villain and then discovering they really are just a bad person trope LMAO.

Another big skip,

Link is still mourning Insectosaurus, and both Bob and Dr. Cockroach are unsure what to do. Link takes the intiative right then and there.

"We're not gonna let Insecto die in vain. We're gonna get up there, find Susan, and we're gonna take that alien down!" - HELL YEAH BRO!!!

Skip skip, they get onto the ship, they find Susan(Galaxar was going to throw her into the incenerator. As a pyrophobe, WHAT a horrible way to go out wow), Bob fucking murders somone,

"I can't believe you guys actually came for me ;-;" "Us monsters gotta stick together" - Like holy shit that's so adorable.

Poor Susan isn't sure if she can even call herself one of them anymore becuase she's small again :( (Only thing different is that her hair is still white)

Dr. Cockroach assures her she's still awesome.

Skip again,

Big epic fight scene. Link actually gets to do shit this time and isn't unconscious.

They set the ship to self destruct and the doors to the chamber begin to shut. The gang rushes to reach the doors before they close all the way. They manage to get Susan through the doors right before they shut but the trio isn't so lucky.

The trio urges Susan to leave without them but she doesn't want to.

"You can finally get your old life back..."

"But I don't want me old life back!" - SHE DOESN'T WANNA ABANDON HER FOUND FAM FR!!! She finds a way up to the control chamber where Galaxar is priming the escape pod and intending to leave with the Quantonium.

"Are you crazy?? You could've killed me!" "Then we understand eachother." - fuckin baller line.

Susan demands for him to open up the doors and release her friends but he's like "lmao make me" and then when he goes to climb into the escape pod, she stops him and they have a scuffle that ends with her holding him at gun point like "You better fuckin do it right fucking now buddy!"

"Even if I wanted to I couldn't! That's what happens when you set the ship to selfdestruct!! Now we're all going to die! And there's nothing you can do about it! Sooooooooosan." <- says her name in a very mocking tone.

And Susan is like "Actually I can do something about it" "And the name is Ginormica" *points the gun up and shoots it at the thing holding the Quantonium so it falls on her* - FUCKING BAD ASS!!!!

So Susan is big again, she saves her friends just in time, She jumps off the small platform they were huddled on just as a peice of the ship comes down on top of it, smashing through the floor of the ship. The four of them grab onto eachother and dangle thousands of feet above the ground, Susan clinging on for dear life to the bottom of the ship.

She loses her grip and they all start to fall but they're caught by somone.

Turns out Insectosaurus isn't dead!! He's a butterfly now!!!!!

They all fly away to safety just as the ship's automated computer voice counts down.

Galaxar is frantically pushing buttons on the control panel since the escape pod doesn't work without the Quantonium. He covers his ears and squeezes his eyes shut as the countdown ends.

"Three, two, one."

.................

*distant bird call*

"Hmm, nothing happened, maybe my count wa-" *ship explodes* - This part had me DYINGGGG the first time I saw this movie.

Butterflyosaurus lands before a crowd of cheering people.

Susan's parents are all proud of her.

"Oh Susan, ever since you were a maybe, your dad and I knew that you'd... you know, save the planet from an invasion from outterspace" - Can we talk about how fucking weird this must've been for them??? Like yeah it was scary for Susan, but imagine how her parents must be feeling; like their only child started growing into a giant at her wedding and then she was taken away from them to some place unknown and they didn't hear anything from her after that(bet you the government deleted her birth info and denied she ever existed and was straight up gaslighting them into believing they never had a daughter.) until suddenly their duaghter is on the news becuase she fought a giant alien robot and I wonder if they knew she almost DIED doing it.

Derek shows up then, makes a shitty attempt at apologizing to her- no wait he DOESN'T say he's sorry, nah he doesn't hold himself in the wrong. This fucker.

"Baby I thought long and hard about what I said, and I wanted you to know, I forgive you." "... You forgive... me?" Susan is visibily perplexed at this.

"Yes it's not your fault you got hit by a meteor and ruined everything. In fact you didn't ruin everything. I just got a call from New York. They offered me network! All I gotta do is get an exclusive interview from you!" - Yes, he's only "forgiving her" cuz it benifits him. I cannot believe I saw people in the comments of a video about MvA saying she should've forgave him like ya'll are fucking stupid.

So Susan is like "Oh wow reallY?!?!?! Cool! Hey is the camera still rolling?" And Derek, unaware he's fucked up, says "Of course lol!" So Susan proceeds to break up with him on live television and then flick him up into the air. She also tells Bob to catch him so he doesn't splat onto the pavement.

Bob then tells him off for being a selfish asshole and Derek, now humiliated, tells them to shut the camera off.

and honestly??? FUCKING DESERVED!!! Hope that clip becomes immortalized as a meme and you are forever branded as the idiot who icon monster celebrity Susan Murphy broke up with on live television. also 100% convinced that the group of people on the internet who have a huge thing for giant women hate Derek for turning down having a supersized wife like all of them would KILL for that COME ON BRO!!!!

A slug apparently got turned into a Kaiju in Paris so the gang all fly off into the sunset to go deal with that and the movie ends~ LIKE HELL YEAH SUSAN YOU FINALLY GET TO GO TO PARIS YEAH!!! After all the shit she's been through she deserves at least that.

There's a fair amount of things I didn't mention but I think that if anyone reading this hasn't seen Monsters vs Aliens before, or hasn't seen it in a while, you should give it a watch again/for the first time. You don't HAVE to, but I recommend.

Maybe some of the jokes aged poorly, maybe some of the humor is kind of childish and unfunny, maybe its full of outdated "HEY LOOK THIS MOVIE WAS IN 3D!!!" bits, but I fucking love this movie ok???!?!?!?!?!

It's in no way perfect and in no way one of Dreamworks best films ever but I feel like it isn't necessarily one of their worst ones either.

#monsters vs aliens #dreamworks #susan murphy #the missing link #dr cockroach #bob #insectosaurus #galaxar #this isn't my new hyperfixation i just had some thoughts I wanted to get out #a LOT of thoughts I wanted to get out ¯\_(ツ)_/¯#might reblog some MvA art later tho #little me kind of hyperfixated on it ngl #went through a phase where I obsessed over all the main characters #kept switching faves and all #Link was def by far young me's all time fave #and fr he's so gender

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arsonists-oatmeal · 6 months

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I had finished watching Transformers: Earthspark yesterday. Got a few notes, spoilers below:

-"Malto-bots" awwwww my heart -shit starts ramping up after the halfway mark of the season. which is classic and I did not realize how much I missed that type of pacing -oh, hello body horror in a kids show, didn't expect to see you here! -did not expect to get as invested as I did in the human parts of the plot, like how the rest of humanity is reacting to the Terrans. I think for a kids show they wrote that bit pretty well -speaking of: its clear from the get-go that the whole Terran plot is allegorical to a lot of things. Immigrant families, biracial families, being a first generation citizen, etc. I've seen a lot of media try to use aliens as a plot device for "bigotry is bad", but very rarely have I seen it actually like, show how it hurts people and effects how they see themselves, and show that you have to shut that shit down if you want to be an ally, and not just tolerate your racist uncle, friend, etc. I think this show did a pretty good job of that. It had made parts of me feel seen and heard for the first time ever. -The way they handled the Starscream thing was kind of weak though, imo -Man i wish we got to see Hashtag having more moments with the seekers, she'd fit right in -Nightshade!!! I like Nightshade, I think some parts were a little on the nose (like how they're the only person who introduces themselves with their pronouns), but its not as some people are making it out to be. Idk if its just me but I also feel like they got sidelined more than the rest of the characters, which is suspicious. But anyways, every group needs a mad scientist character who can be slightly unsettling and I'm glad Nightshade is there to fill the role. -Ok i get this is a kid's show, and there was already more nuance than i expected (which was none) about the decepticons, but I do feel like they didn't make the final leap in logic here. -"Ok not all decepticons are bad, but we still wont stop surveilling and locking some of them up because they chose to do bad with their second chance". Has anyone here heard of the word "REHAB"?? -Megatron is cool. Cool theme, no comments there -Really liked the fight scenes as well, especially the shots of the transformers fighting it out in the background where the camera focuses on the humans running away. It really shows the scale of things. Small detail but the fact that we've got several bots using their inbuilt guns' recoil in fights is really cool! Megatron essentially did a rocket jump. One critique however is that nothing really looked like it had weight. -Also I wished that they kept Karan Croft as the lead antagonist till the end. Like idk, show that this whole oppression thing is systematic in nature. Could have had Dr. Meridian change sides given the fact that he was being put in a similar position to the transformers by the humans in charge (he was also fighting for basic resources to live after his first defeat). -Also this one may be unpopular: It looks like at the end the Terrans get their own symbol/badge. Which I think sorta breaks the whole "the war is over, there's no more sides and factions" things that they keep repeating throughout the show. It just feels like they've created a third faction now, and the continuing dynamic is now autobots vs decepticons vs terrans. Which, no. You're going to replace your war with another.

Overall, good show, 8/10, I think it fumbled the ending. I know im not the target audience here but also its not like kids are stupid.

Also representation matters. The choices of having the lead human characters be a non-white biracial family, having the first nonbinary transformer, having the terrans be allegorical, it may not mean anything to some viewers, but for others it could be the first time someone has actually acknowledged them, has said "I see what you've gone through and I know it to be real and I will take it seriously". The diversity in the show only serves to make it better

#transformers earthspark #transformers earthspark spoilers #the show isnt perfect but it has potential #I also hear they're making a season 2 so I hope this potential is realized #Also i apologize for how much i jumped around in my review can you tell i probably have an undiagnosed something?

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sodaliteskull · 2 months

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Writerly Questionnaire

Thank you for the tag on this, @harmonic-melodii! Check out how she responded to this over here!

Gonna have this one be an open tag for EVERYONE, so if you're looking for the questions, head on over here!

About You

When did you start writing?

Kindergarten, so when I was either 5 or 6? lol I wanted to write sooner, but I didn't quite grasp the mechanics of how to actually do that, but the second I learned how to read and write, I could not be stopped! I know the first story I wrote was about dinosaurs, because I was OBSESSED with dinosaurs at that age.

Are the genres/themes you enjoy reading different from the ones you write?

I like reading hard sci-fi, but I hate writing it! Trying to make sure everything is as scientifically accurate (or at least plausible) as possible is not where I find my joy in writing. I'm much more of a "technobabble something that sounds reasonable but don't elaborate further" girlie when it comes to my own stuff.

Is there an author (or just a fellow writer!) you want to emulate, or one to whom you’re often compared?

None that I really want to emulate, or any I get compared to that I can recall. lol not to be trite, but I'm trying to develop my own writing voice, rather than mimic someone else's!

Can you tell me a little about your writing space(s)? (Room, coffee shop, desk, etc.)

I Mostly write at my desktop computer, and my desk is currently swamped in assorted stationary bits and bobs I haven't had the time or energy to sort through recently! Otherwise it's with my laptop in bed (being absolutely blasted by my fan, because I hate being hot), or hopping around town with my bestie to find cafes where we can get in joint writing sessions.

What’s your most effective way to muster up some muse?

Thinking about elements (settings, tropes, themes, stuff like that) from pieces of media that I like and breaking them down to get to the core of what sets me off like a boiling tea kettle about them.

Did the place(s) you grew up in influence the people and places you write about?

I've always lived somewhere with quick access to the forest and the sea, so the both of those tend to crop up in my writing, even when I don't intend them to. lol basically all my stories are like the sci-fi and fantasy shows of the aughts, in that they were "filmed" in the Vancouver/Lower Mainland area!

Are there any recurring themes in your writing, and if so, do they surprise you at all?

Alienation tends to crop up in my writing, as well as people struggling against exploitation. I also tend to write about some kind of rebellion against some form of authority. None of them surprise me in the least!

Your Characters

Would you please tell me about your current favorite character? (Current WIP, past WIP, never used, etc.)

Iradurel, one of the protagonists from the Starcrossed Cycle, because she is such a shit disturber! She has no respect for authority and doesn't bother sugarcoating her words, so I use her to vent every nasty little thought I have about behaviours in people I have to bite my tongue about in my day to day. It's always cathartic when I write dialog for her!

Which of your characters do you think you’d be friends with in real life?

Probably Ryla, the other protagonist of the Starcrossed Cycle. She'd be happiest avoiding drama and just spending her days indulging her curiosities, and that is something I would also like to do. We'd be study buddies!

Which of your characters would you dislike the most if you met them?

Rounding this out with the antagonist of the Starcrossed Cycle, Ransaran, who is a conglomeration of traits that I hate! I literally designed this asshole to encompass everything that I loathe in a person, so we would not get along!

Tell me about the process of coming up with of one, all, or any of your characters.

I'm usually a plot first kind of writer, with either a beginning or an ending clearly in mind. I then start with really broad stroke archetypes (something like The Witch, or The Ace Pilot) that I think would either get me to the ending I want, or shoot off from my starting point in interesting directions, and use that as a metaphorical armature that I can slap on the equally metaphorical clay that is tropes and traits until I like the shape of the character.

Do you notice any recurring themes/traits among your characters?

I've been making them queer since before I realized that I, myself, was queer!

How do you picture them? (As real people you imagined, as models/actors who exist in real life, as imaginary artwork, as artwork you made or commissioned, anime style, etc.)

I rarely imagine real people when coming up with characters (which kinda blows, because using actors to make gifsets of my characters is something I want to do!), and instead tend to visualize them in whatever style of animation (traditional or cgi) I last happened to watch. Been usingvideo game character creators, dollmakers, and picrews for years to help with the visualization process, because my own drawing skills are rather lacking!

Your Writing

What’s your reason for writing?

There's so much noise inside me, and writing is the most efficient way to quiet that!

Is there a specific comment or type of comment you find particularly motivating coming from your readers?

I like being able to lay out enough breadcrumbs that readers get an idea of what I'm leading to, so having people correctly guess the broad strokes of what I'm planning is always cool! Incoherent screaming is also a good one.

How do you want to be thought of by those who read your work? (For example: as a literary genius, or as a writer who “gets” the human condition; as a talented worldbuilder, as a role model, etc.)

I want people to wonder what is wrong with me. lol but for real, being known for mashing up wildly different concepts would be kind of cool.

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer?

I'm pretty good at finding connection points to link disparate plot elements together.

What have you been frequently told your greatest writing strength is by others?

The most common one I hear is that I come up with some interesting turns of phrases.

How do you feel about your own writing? (Answer in whatever way you interpret this question.)

I'm catering to my own likes when it comes to writing, so I enjoy it quite a lot!

If you were the last person on earth and knew your writing would never be read by another human, would you still write?

Well yeah! I write everything for myself as is, so having no readers beyond myself would not hinder me at all!

When you write, are you influenced by what others might enjoy reading, or do you write purely what you enjoy? If it’s a mix of the two, which holds the most influence?

Since I write for myself, I selfishly fill my writing with things I know I'm going to like. Otherwise, if I know a certain person is going to be reading what I wrote, I'll throw in something that (I hope!) would delight them specifically.

#Writerly Questionnaire #writers on tumblr #writeblr tag games #voidyelling.txt #gametime.exe

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mayhamster · 4 months

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Presenting a fan character for @newapocalyptia 's New Apocalyptia world-building, writing, theoretical TV show, thing. (Go check it out, it's really good). All images made in https://www.heroforge.com/

This is Jane "Giant Slayer" King, also known as Giant Jane, a joke about her short height. She/Her, Transfem, Bisexual. The apocalypse trope she stems from is Godzilla/Pacific Rim - basically giant monster apocalypse. She was very young, roughly 4 years old, when the apocalypses hit. Her parents were rich paranoid doomsday preppers, and when the apocalypses arrived the three of them trooped into the bunker they'd had built. They stayed there for the next 12 years, with no idea what the surface was like. Slowly, the isolation began taking a toll on them all. Eventually, her parents grew violent with each other, and she took the bag she'd packed with food and bottled and left into the wasteland. A few years later, she gained a small modicum of fame after using an anti-aircraft gun at an old beat-up military base to shoot down a gigantic floating jellyfish monster that turned everything it touched to stone. She took the barbs and fashioned them into a sword, which retained their petrification properties. Since then, she went on to become a full blown monster hunter. Alongside her trusty sword, which she mostly uses against human/humanoid opponents, and a dart gun with darts coated in toxic blood from a mutated monster, she has a vast inventory of more specialize weaponry (wanting to avoid turning monsters into stone because then she couldn't salvage them) mostly made out of the parts of the various monsters she kills. She also kept a small journal on the different weaknesses and abilities of the monsters she encountered. With the help of the Den of Snakes she made photocopies and began selling them, alongside her signature hair dye. She claims the dye is made from the blood of slain monsters, but this has never been verified and is generally regarded with mild skepticism. She lives and sells out of the military base where she first brought down the jellyfish (The corpse is still there, alongside statues of the idiots who wanted to see if it still petrified things), but she has extensively renovated it.

Jane is a hardcore thrillseeker/ drenaline junkie. She fights the monsters because she enjoys it, and will sometimes begin to complain or grow despondent when she goes too long without word of a monster. She's fairly humble, rarely using her reputation for anything other than marketing her book and her hair dye (The latter bearing her winking face on each bottle). The isolation of her formative years has made her very socially awkward. Additionally, she hates being alone for more than a day or so, and whenever she goes for too long without human contact she travels to the nearest village and just spends time, drinking, carousing, flirting, and such. She has had quite a few lovers, but none ever amounted to anything more than one night stands.

Relationships with the rest of the cast! (Unofficial, of course)

Marian - Normal, healthy respect. Totally normal. No crushes here. 0%, none, not at all, you-can't-prove-it levels of attraction felt on Jane's part.

Sal - Knows him by reputation. She sent him packing when he came by asking for some "samples" of some monsters she killed.

The Owl - Not very familiar. Spoke to him in passing at the Den of Snakes.

Sunrise - Jane helps her whenever asked. Has more than once shown up on Sunrise's doorstep with injuries from fighting a creature.

Cannibal Jack - Friendly but extremely cautious.

Glipix - Jane brought down an alien spacecraft under the impression that it was a monster and she and Glipix got into an argument that escalated into a standoff, before Sunrise intervened.

Percy Adder - On fairly good terms. She convinced him to hook her home base up to their power supply by saying she was helping protect people, and by photocopying and selling her book, she'd help people protect themselves.

Bunny and Tucker - They've spoken on occasion, comparing Bunny and Tuckers descriptions of demons to the monsters and samples Jane had hunted/collected. Jane doesn't necessarily believe in demons, but she also doesn't disbelieve. She maintains an attitude of "Who can tell?"

Killjoy and Nashville - On good terms. She's helped Killjoy with various things, usually either attempting to kill Sal or killing monsters that wandered near the Shark Mutants home.

LOTUS - She sometimes seeks out and participates in it's deranged competitions. She never really takes it seriously, and usually manages to make it out relatively unscathed.

(Any unmentioned characters are those she doesn't know) (Sorry for the long post, but thank you for reading to the end :D)

#new apocalyptia #oc #fan character

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biitchcakes · 11 months

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— character info sheet.

(repost, don’t reblog)

name: Jessica Miriam Drew

name meaning: Jessica ( Hebrew: "to see" ; "God beholds" ; wealthy / rich ) Miriam ( Hebrew: "wished-for-child" )

alias/es: Jess, Spider-Woman, formerly Archane

ethnicity: White British

one picture you like best of your character:

three h/cs you never told anyone:

The fragrances she uses are most often are vanilla scented. And, if not that, she tends to gravitate more towards sweet &/ or fruity scents or spice scents, such as: coconut, black cherry, berries, cinnamon, coffee, pumpkin. . . Bath & Bodyworks had two seasonal fragrances I always pictured her loving ( 1. Pastel Skies — "soft cloud berries, pink spun sugar, & coconut musk" and then 2. Sweet Whiskey — "golden amber, vanilla-infused whiskey, & sweet red berries" ). That said, what she views as overly sweet, such as birthday cake or frosting, she tends to avoid.

I actually don't think I've brought up her favourite colour ! Amazing. Obviously, she loves red, it's her whole ✨thing✨, but if you actually asked her to pick out ONE favourite ? It's #facbdf ! It's the colour she painted the walls in her and Lindsay's first PI office, and she's incorporated into every office she's had since. Makes her nostalgic, a little at peace for a few seconds.

The venom that courses through Jessica's veins is what turns her irises the green colour they are. Naturally blue, her eyes fade back to their genetic shade whenever powers are weak ⸺ like when she's brought back to life and her abilities fluctuate. Or, to a lesser extent, whenever she needs some time to recover from a fight, they fade juuust a little while she heals. It varies if it's noticeable or not.

three things your character likes doing in their free time:

Riding around Manhattan and Queens on her motorcycle, somehow there's always something new to see ⸺ as well as the comforting familiar.

Puzzles ! Solitaire ! Sudoku ! Brain teasers ! Crossword ! Simple problem-solving games and things of the like. Basically anything you can find in an adult activity book at the gas station.

Rewatching some of her favourite movies, such as: Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan, Alien, The Karate Kid, Short Circuit, Total Recall, Heat, Sean Connery era Bonds, or really any 7/8/90's era martial arts, action, sci-fi or horror movie. She's got a lot of genres she likes the most and couldn't chose between if you asked her to, but most carry some significant theme to her: such as the main character being a detective or spy, a science experiment gone wrong, the strength of friendship and how much it can mean, standing up for your morals and values, or it's got a mentorship of some kind ⸺ usually a paternal one. It's not something she really realises she does.

Eight people your character likes / loves:

Carol Danvers ( bestie )

Lindsay McCabe ( bestie )

Miguel O'Hara ( boyfriend )

Johnny Storm ( boyfriend )

Clint Barton ( boyfriend // ex; he still means a lot to her even when they're not together ⸺ don't tell him )

Magnus ( father figure // mentor )

Nick Fury ( father figure // mentor // friend )

Logan Howlett ( mentor // friend )

two things your character regrets:

A lot of her anger, and the way that causes her to reaction in some situations and towards others. How she lashes out, and how venomous fists and words are always her first instinct. . . And how this has occasionally hurt those she holds closest.

Retiring her private investigator agency in Madripoor. After some time, her and Lindsay return to San Francisco, where Linds begins taking classes to become a professional stuntwoman, and Jess starts to take up more jobs wherever she can find them ( including all the way to places like Istanbul ! Lindsay went along for that one — ). This leads to her being on the east coast / in New York more often than she'd have ever thought. And, the more she's out there, the more she's encouraged to allow HYDRA restabilise her powers, which she eventually agrees to ⸺ only for it to turn out to by the Skrulls in disguise. So, tl;dr, she feels leaving Madripoor lead to her getting abducted, and allowing the Skrulls to fully return her powers resulted in the Skrull Invasion since Veranke, the queen, chose to impersonate her. After that has been a mixed bag that has a lot of good, but sometimes, she wonders. . .

two phobias your character has:

musophobia: the fear of rats

monatophobia: the fear of dying alone

tagged by: @gwenbiote tagging: all of you, tag me in them ! if you've already seen this and you're tagging people, tag me in yours anyway !! I wanna read them all asfksj

#the irony of her name meaning wealthy and she's one of The Broke Heroes #THREE hc i have never told anyone....#bruh i never shut up about her ahsjkfha #THAT KEPT ME STUMPED #so i listed hc i may or may have not talked about idk #if u have seen them before no u haven't #also obvs the boyfriend thing is verse dependant #BUT i couldn't leave her boys out cmon #whew this was a lot more info than i thought it was gonna be tbh #i do not mean to ramble she simply just makes me 😔#( ch. study. ) ⸺ ⌜𝕚 𝕥𝕠𝕠𝕜 𝕞𝕪 𝕓𝕚𝕥𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕟𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕞𝕒𝕕𝕖 𝕚𝕥 𝕤𝕨𝕖𝕖𝕥⌟#( headcanon. ) ⸺ ⌜𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕝𝕚𝕗𝕖 𝕒𝕤 𝕨𝕖 𝕜𝕟𝕖𝕨 𝕚𝕥 𝕟𝕠𝕨 𝕓𝕖𝕝𝕠𝕟𝕘𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕪𝕖𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕕𝕒𝕪⌟#( queue. ) ⸺ ⌜𝕟𝕠𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕣𝕚𝕝𝕝𝕤 𝕞𝕖 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕔𝕚𝕥𝕪 𝕒𝕟𝕪𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕖⌟

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boyakishantriage · 1 year

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Picking her nose, I merely stared at her while the class 6 explosives remained strapped to her body.

"All of y'all are insane." she decided, she looked at him.

"Eh?"

We'd been assigned to stop pirates from taking over this outpost and stopping this galaxy spanning operation. Three posts were gained to this woman, but as she'd failed basic training, refused to get dirty if she didn't have to, spent a lot of time on making sure she was safe. I refused to believe the claims. This woman, this woman who so far was proving to be more of a civil-

The sound of a weapon discharging as the woman's weapons till smoked, a revolver, aimed at the tree above her.

"WHAT-"

Saying nothing, she put her finger to her lips. That cheery demeanor vanished as-

BOOM

Something exploded soon after the firing of her weapon.

THUMP.

A Galcon, pirate no doubt fell from the tree above, bullet ingrained in his skull as she twirled a cylinder to the end of the revolver.

"More. Back later."

She stated simply, yanking the pack she'd refused to carry until now effortlessly onto her back. Not only was she capable, but she could do it with ease.

Nobody could say anything however as she vanished into the jungle.

Night had fallen as the sounds of feet stomping to the ground, the loud call of. "LEFT. RIGHT. LEFT RIGHT LEFT." More Galcons marched behind the woman, explosives strapped to her chest as the she called out. "ATTEN HUT. HALT!!" The soldiers stopped, holding attention as she held a trigger in hand. The trigger.

"CORPORAL. I HAVE POWS. WHAT THE FUCK DO I DO?" She shouted near the amidst the group, hand firmly on the trigger still not letting go. "WHAT??" Shouted the man, slipping night vision goggles on as she forced Galcons to sit into the firelight.

"I have a bunch of soldiers prisoner and I'm using myself to keep them in line." She said, her finger on the trigger to the explosives strapped to her chest. In her other hand, a revolver.

"We're pinned down!" Shouted a soldier, the outpost was right there. Right there, scouts, guards. Camps surrounding the outpost near the choke point to the capital's air defence all removed, and now they had to re-

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Shouted the corporal to the human as another human unstrapped the explosives off her. "I don't know?" She said, throwing the explosive blocks into the air. As far as she could, shouting.

"I really hope this works. GET DOWN!" She could barely figure out what her pan was, managing to shout the order as she let go of the trigger.

The battlefield quietened down very quickly after that, or would if the woman jumped out tossing a grenade, revolver in her other hand..

"CHARGE!!!" She shouted, running forward, dropping to the ground before running forward into the smoke cloud. More grenades thrown into the field, "ATTACK!" Shouted the woman, the other human beside him sighing. "Ah fuck it."

"LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOO" She shouted, leaping into the smoke gun in hand as an explosion lit the smoke up. More grenades tossed, we charged after her.

Somehow that'd worked, guns shooting down the front guards, C4 the gate and holding the gate down as my friend reached behind me.

"Are ya fuckin' crazy??" She shouted, shoving me as I rolled my eyes.

"Ah. Right. you're a fuckin' cunt tho. Ya know that 'ight?" She snapped, cocking her Ak as we charged in.

The aliens had managed to secure a perimeter as the rest of the humans just charged in, C4 would blast holes through the bedrock walls, humans firing into the gap as they charged intot he building. Calls of "CLEAR!" "MOVE!" "FUCK!" and "STING!" Continued for about an hour, before the humans stepped out the building.

"Ok. So building's clear."

"How did you know what you did would work??"

"I didn't. I just guessed that y'all are pansies and went with it."

"But why? What humans-"

"Listen ate, I'm Australian."

"..."

She seemed at a loss for words, but to be fair. Most aussies weren't as mad as I was, nor did they condone using as many explosives as I like. But then again...

The sound of an engine revving it's way over to the group came to, they'd held the fort for a while now. So far nothing had happened for ages.

She managed to mutter under her breath.

"Humans are crazy."

#tag #Triage #humans are space orcs

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saiilorstars · 1 year

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Ch.11: Bitter and Sweet

Story Masterlist ◦ Anais’ Masterlist ◦

Also on: Fanfic • Ao3

Pairing: Winn Schott x OFC

Taglist: @ocappreciationtag @arrthurpendragon @anotherunreadblog @maaaaarveeeeel @stareyedplanet @foxesandmagic @kmc1989

If you’d like to be a part of this OC’s work/edits, let me know!

James gave a light knock on Anais' office door and stepped inside, wearing a bigger smile than usual. Of course, ever since he put Snapper in his place - leaving both men to their respective job roles - who wouldn't be happy?

"What can I do for you Mr. Boss?" Anais pushed her chair closer to her desk, putting her hands on her desk.

"I just sent a reporter to the Children's Hospital new building to see what we can get for an article so I need the pictures to go along with it."

"Oh, great!" Anais winced when she heard her own words. "Not like that! I meant — I'm happy to take the assignment before I lose my mind!"

James chuckled. "I take it Winn is still fixing your suit, then?"

Anais glared at nothing in particular but it was a deep glare nonetheless. "Yup," she muttered and got up from her chair.

Winn had kept his word about not letting her go out in the field until she told the DEO — primarily J'onn, Kara and Alex — about Cadmus' threat. It drove Anais up the wall that she wasn't able to convince him otherwise and the use of the physical threats was no good either as she would have to explain to everyone else why she suddenly decided to kill their friend. So, until she decided to tell the truth, Winn was basically holding her suit hostage.

To everyone else, he was just mending her suit.

"And how's Mon-El doing?" James curiously asked since he hadn't stopped by the DEO in a while. He only knew what he was told.

"Kara and him are learning to get along-ish," Anais said, "And we're testing Mon-El's abilities too. See what he can and can't do. He's not leaving the DEO for a while, I'm assuming. Poor guy must be going crazy too."

J'onn had given the order to test Mon-El in every possible way to deduce the danger he could post if left unsupervised. Winn was put in charge of monitoring him and recording the results to later discuss together.

Anais could only imagine the frustration Mon-El would be feeling soon since he'd already been cooped up in the DEO for days now and training since then. Maybe she could help in some way, she thought before leaving the office.

~ 0 ~

Anais walked down the street before the hospital site, adjusting her clothes and hair since she'd basically sped there from CatCo. As she approached the site, she began to smell the after scent of burnt rubber and metal, along with the horrible sight of the crumbled hospital.

"Oh, what happened here?" She stopped in front of the yellow tape keeping civilians away.

"Aliens happened," a familiar voice answered. Anais whipped her head to the right and saw Lena Luthor approaching her.

"Miss Luthor," Anais smiled politely, "I didn't expect to see you here."

"Yeah," Lena nodded. "No one expects to see a Luthor at accident sites unless they caused it." There was a brief moment of silence before she added, "And just so we're clear, I didn't cause this."

"I didn't think you did," Anais clarified for the woman's sake. "So what is Miss Luthor doing here, though?"

"Please, it's just Lena, I told you," the black-haired woman sighed. "And I was one of the investors of this building. It was brand new when it was destroyed."

"Millions of dollars lost, I assume," Anais gazed at the crumbled building. She could still see some leftover melted medical equipment peeking from under the walls.

"Oh please, it's not about the money," Lena set her hands on her hips. "This building was built because the first hospital was getting overcrowded. Now the children that did survive this, had to return to the first hospital."

Anais pulled her camera in front of her eyes and snapped a picture. "What happened to the building?"

"Your reporter hasn't come to you yet?" Lena nodded to the young CatCo. Reporter talking to a cop at the moment.

"Nope, I just got here, remember?"

"Well, we don't know much but we assume it was aliens judging by the mass strength of whatever hit the walls. Plus, some of the records from the kids say they saw hooded people."

"Ah," Anais started walking a bit to get better angles of the building. "Which could mean it was a regular human crime scene."

"But they didn't steal anything," Lena countered. "They just came in to destroy."

"Well, sometimes people don't need reasons to do something," Anais lowered her camera to see Lena giving her a look. "What?"

"I'm assuming you're like Kara in that you both share pro-alien opinions," Lena crossed her arms.

Anais gave a shrug of her shoulders. "Well, what's wrong with that?"

"Nothing. Everyone's entitled to their opinions and thoughts," Lena looked ahead at the building again.

"It's so refreshing meeting someone like you," Anais chuckled. She felt her phone buzzing and picked it out from her pocket. "Oh, gotta go. It was nice seeing you, though. Wouldn't mind doing this again."

Surprise etched across Lena's face, making her dark eyebrows simultaneously raise. "Really?"

Anaís paused after taking another picture to see Lena's expression. "What?"

Lena smiled warmly. "Not a lot of people would say that. In fact, I don't think I've ever heard that."

"You're nice and you're badass, so...yeah, I'd like to see you around," Anaís chuckled. "You're doing what I'm doing and, as I've said, I admire that."

Lena's smile widened, clearly beaming at the chance of a second friend. She hadn't admitted it but she liked to believe she was friends with Kara Danvers too. "Okay then, you're welcome at L-Corp anytime."

"Cool," Anaís beamed then. "Now I gotta run for real. See you around." She hurried past Lena to get going because if she wasn't at the DEO in the next five minutes, she was sure Arun would come for her himself.

~0~

"Again!" Arun shouted the order without hesitance.

A blonde speedster whipped past him in circles, repeatedly, until she would come to a stop and attempt to throw a lightning bolt she was meant to create during her run. Just as Anaís was about to throw her bolt, it shattered in her palms..

"Dammit!" she growled and glanced back at Arun who stood at the end of the room with his hands behind his back and no emotion on his face.

"Again!" he simply commanded once more.

She sucked in a breath and took off again. She'd been doing this for more than an hour now with no such luck. Arun silently watched as she sped in circles - a long circle too - to see exactly where she was going wrong. He never felt the visitors coming into the room, much less Anaís.

"Woah, that is awe and some!" Mon-El's cheer startled Anaís and caused the speedster to trip over her own feet. She came hurtling into a wall, face first. She groaned and turned on her back to glare at Mon-El then Arun and Winn for not warning her.

"Two things," Winn made a motion for Mon-El to listen, the latter even nodding his head to show him that he was indeed listening. "One: never sneak up on a speedster, especially when she's throwing lightning. And two: it's just 'awesome'. You got to put those two words together and you'll be golden."

"Awesome," Mon-El tested the word out and felt like it did sound better put together. He then looked over to Anaís who was getting back on her feet. "And sorry. Just thought that whole…" His fingers wiggled in the air as he attempted to mimic what she'd been doing, "...the whole lightning thing was cool…"

"You taught him the word 'cool' already?" Anaís dusted her legs off. Winn grinned. "Of course you did."

"If you three are finished talking, Anaís has a lot more practice to do," Arun spoke up with an air of annoyance. He knew well that they had a new alien amongst the DEO but he hadn't actually talked to Mon-El.

"Are you the other Solista?" Mon-El asked, though he was sure of the answer by the looks of his beam. "You got the whole lightning thing down, I assume?"

"Since I was a teenager. Child's play, really," Arun said plainly, shooting Anaís a look that meant to point out she was extremely behind. For that, Anaís looked down.

"W-well, I mean, it is lightning we're talking about," Winn purposely glanced at Anaís in hopes of lifting her spirits. "It takes a while to practice when it's the first try. I-I'm assuming."

Anaís smiled softly at him. She appreciated his attempt to help her out…until she remembered what he was doing with her suit.

"Yes, when we're teenagers," Arun brokered the silence without realizing it. "But Anaís is twenty three now."

"Okay, can we just call it a day with the training?" Anaís decided it was for the better lest Arun wanted a lightning bolt thrown at him instead of the practice dummy. "I'll continue tomorrow."

"Your call," Arun shrugged. "You wanna go get lunch?"

"No, I can't. Supergirl's waiting for me. We have a lead on that dead alien we found in the back of a car."

"Alright then, until tomorrow," Arun said and started heading out. He suddenly stopped though by the doorway and glanced back. "Oh, and Winn, the suit seems to be working fine right now." He made a gesture at Anaís' regular DEO suit she was wearing. "Have you finished mending it?"

"Nope," Winn replied without a second thought, even wearing that big smile Anaís was beginning to hate. "Still got kinks to figure out."

Arun nodded and walked out of the room.

"It doesn't have any kinks!" Anaís shouted after he was fully gone. "You're just purposely keeping it away from me!"

"Me? What?" His pretense sarcasm only made her even more mad. "Never."

"I'll kill you," Anaís warned but all Winn did was ask Mon-El if he wanted to continue practicing. With a shake of her head, she left the room and went to find Alex and Supergirl in the control room. "Anything on our alien perp?" Anaís stopped by them.

"Yes, actually," Kara motioned to Alex, "Alex was just telling me what the lab found."

"The thorn found in the dead body is from a Brevakk. Some sort of biological defense mechanism," Alex explained. "So, yeah, that's new and terrifying."

"Don't suppose there's any ideas where we can find him?" Anaís tried her luck.

"Turns out there's exactly one Brevakk registered in National City for the President's Alien Amnesty Act," Alex moved on over to an empty computer. She pulled up the profile of said alien. "And we got the address ready to go."

"Alright, so what's our first step?" Anaís looked between the more experienced women.

"It's just a check out, so...I think we're good," Alex's words surprised both aliens. "I got someone in mind I'll take."

"Are you sure?" Kara raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry," Alex waved her off, really smiling like she meant it. "She's good, trust me." And with that cryptic description, she left.

"You want to train, then?" Kara asked Anaís once they were on their own. Anaís groaned and covered her face. "What?" Kara looked around in case anyone knew what she said wrong.

"I just finished a round with Arun and I didn't get it right."

"You mean the lightning bolt thing?"

"Yes!"

"When we agreed that he would train me, I didn't know Arun would be one of those uptight 24/7 trainers!"

Kara chuckled.

"And he won't get off my back for my pathetic attempts to create and throw a lightning bolt!"

"Don't get so worked up about it, remember how long Barry said it took him?"

"Yeah, but... he's a metahuman and I'm an alien. It's in my biology to get it!" Anaís exclaimed particularly loud enough to draw some attention.

Kara, in particular, was giving her a look. "Some funny words you used there." Anaís dropped her hands to her sides and looked back. "Sounds like something Arun would say." She'd come to learn that Arun's 'words of encouragement' were not so light. They seemed like backhanded insults instead.

"Well, he kind of did, and he's right. It's in my biology to get it and I'm taking longer than a kid would!"

"Okay, maybe you need to reel it back a little," Kara brought Anaís to the side so they could speak better. "You may be a speedster with incredible strength but you still need practice and you know that. I know you know that."

"Yeah, I know…" Anaís sighed.

"Then why don't you let Arun know that? He's the one that needs to reel it back a lot more." Kara suspected Arun was the one putting more pressure on things than Anaís really thought. "He's a hard coach, and maybe a good one, but a hard one nonetheless. He wants you to do exactly what he did and that's not gonna happen."

"Because I'm only half a Solista?"

"No, because you're you and you're different. Everyone is. So c'mon, let's go train nice and easy."

Anaís finally agreed and followed Kara to their training room meant just for them. They trained for about an hour before J'onn called them back to the control room. Alex had returned but not with good news. Their lead on the dead alien had been whisked away by a group of men in a suspicious can.

"Do we know who the men in the van were?" J'onn asked Alex, and the woman shook her head.

"No. But these weren't low-rent thugs. They were definitely combat-trained. They mean business."

"So do we. Or have you forgotten about that?" J'onn's snark startled all three women.

"Hey, what's with the grumpy?" Alex finally noted. "Today and yesterday. Is everything all right, J'onn?"

"I appreciate the concern, but I assure you, I'm fine."

"Don't make us pout," Alex nodded to Kara beside her.

"They're surprisingly good at it," Anaís admitted being victim to it a couple of times.

J'onn knew they would never let it be so it was better to get it out in the open. "I am not the last Green Martian. There is another. Her name is M'gann. Megan."

"It's a miracle, J'onn," Kara's eyes widened.

"I met her at that alien bar Alex spoke of. We talked, but... I think I made a mistake."

"Why do you say that?" Anaís asked. "What happened?"

"I offered to merge with her in the Martian way."

"But you guys just met…" Kara trailed off, thinking of something else.

"Psychically, Kara. The bond is the traditional Martian way of communicating. We...we link minds, share dreams, emotions, memories. We kept no secrets from one another. Imagine a world without ego, selfishness. Without... lies."

"That sounds beautiful."

"She didn't seem to think so. The moment I talked about it, she left. I am grateful to have you all in my life. I truly am. But with Martians, it's... It's different. It's deeper. Deeper than talking. Fuller. With her, there's a chance for me to live how I was meant to live."

Of course everyone there understood.

"Just tell her that," Alex encouraged him to go for a second attempt. "Why don't you try apologizing?"

J'onn seemed to be encouraged enough.

~0~

The night brought Alex and detective Sawyer to an illegal fight club that ended up in catastrophe. Supergirl nearly had her head torn off by a large alien creature, and neither her nor the detectives had luck in capturing the ringleader of the fight club. It did, however, leave them with a new clue that could lead the DEO to capturing the culprits.

It also led to a new wave of anger inside a certain Solista.

Mon-El had just failed to conjure up heat vision on a piece of cement when Anais came storming in.

"No heat vision, no x-ray vision…" Winn was recording the results on his tablet for later study so he was startled when Anais used her own heat vision to destroy the piece of cement. "Hey!" Winn made a gesture but Anais looked far too upset to care.

"Kara nearly got hurt in an underground alien fight club and I couldn't do anything about it and do you know why!?" She came storming up to him, making him backtrack several steps. "Because I didn't have my suit so they didn't call me in for backup!"

"Is she okay, though?" Mon-El thought to ask if only to pull some of that attention off Winn for safety reasons.

"Yes, but she could've gotten hurt," Anais deeply sighed then set her glare back on Winn. "C'mon, Winn, enough is enough. Give me my suit back"

Winn was first and foremost relieved to see that anger fading because it decreased the chances of being heat visioned. "I'll do it as soon as you come clean to Kara and the others."

Anais' hands twitched in the air as she air-strangled him. "I'm gonna—" She started for him again.

Winn jumped back, throwing his hands in front of him. "If you kill me now, you'll never get your suit!"

Anais stopped in her tracks and dropped her hands. "I really hate you right now."

"Yeah, got that," Winn swallowed hard and moved away to put down his tablet. "But you also know why I'm doing this."

Mon-El cleared his throat to remind the two of his presence. "Can I offer my help to Kara as an alternative?"

Anais briefly smiled at him. "Thanks, Mon-El, but I don't think the DEO wants to let you go out until you've finished your examinations."

"Well, I think we have," Mon-El gestured to Winn. "Right?"

"Sort of," Winn shrugged and turned to the two. He brought his fingers up to list what they knew so far of Mon-El's abilities. "No heat vision, no X-ray vision, but you're strong."

"As strong as Kara?" Mon-El curiously asked but Winn scoffed with a great big 'Ha!'

"No, not even close. No freeze breath, which is kind of a bummer, right?" Winn glanced at Anais but she was still kind of glaring at him. "Right. No flight either, but his leaping is fantastic. I'm... I'm talking about like "tall buildings in a single bound" kinda stuff. Yeah, we...we definitely have the makings of a superhero here."

"Superhero?" Mon-El repeated. "Is that what Kara's called?"

"Yeah. You know, you...you go out there, you fight crime, save people, wear a costume…"

"Yup," Anais crossed her hands. "I'm almost there…"

"Speaking of going out there, I'm, uh... I'm going kind of crazy in here," Mon-El admitted. "I could really use some fresh air."

"Yeah, you heard Hank. I mean, you got to stay here at the DEO."

"You know, I'll bet if I were outside, I could fly like Kara and you, Anais," Mon-El put on his best smile for the blonde.

But before Anais could say anything, Winn cut in. "Nice try, buddy. No, we got to stay here. Them's the rules. I mean, I'm new here. I'm trying to make a good impression."

"Failed!" Anais dramatically exclaimed, much to his annoyance. And because she saw his annoyance, she decided to go on ahead and make it worse. Screw being an adult, she shamelessly thought. "And you know what, Mon-El? I'll take you out."

Mon-El looked deeply surprised at the easy give in. "You will?"

Even Winn had the same reaction. "You will?"

"Yup!" Anais grinned from side to side. "I don't think it'll do any harm. But you gotta listen to me, alright?"

Mon-El was now almost grinning like Anais was. "Of course!"

"Anais y-y-you can't do that," Winn started wagging his finger, but by that point it was too late. "You're gonna get in trouble!"

"Feel free to join us, if you're so worried," Anais patted his arm.

"But I - but we can't!" Winn practically shouted in the room while Anais and Mon-El started leaving. He tried to stay put and just let the two aliens figure it out on their own how big of a mistake this would be, but…

He scrunched his face. "Damn you, Anais Allen-Mjorkland. I'm so weak." And he took off to catch up with them.

~ 0 ~

Mon-El didn't know anything about Earth but that didn't stop him from learning in one night. Especially when Anais introduced him to the cellphone.

"I gotta get me one of these!" Mon-El laughed after Anais showed him the search engine for bars.

"I'm sure we can arrange that," Anais tucked her phone into her back pocket and led the way to the bar across the street. "Maybe a small computer for the time being. Or a tablet!"

"You can't make promises like that," Winn trailed behind her, still unable to believe she was pulling this off.

"It's a computer with restricted WiFi," she reminded him that it wasn't a big deal. "Now let loose and have some fun, if you're capable of that anyways."

Winn stopped just by the doorway with a look of offence. "Excuse me?"

Anais smirked with Mon-El. They both knew they'd gotten him now.

"You heard me," Anais crossed her arms and watched as Mon-El went to open the doors for them. "Can you have some fun, Winn Schott?"

"And I continue to be weak," Winn scrunched his face in defeat while Anais yanked him inside the bar.

"Did I ever mention you're my absolute favorite alien in the whole DEO?" Mon-El said to Anais, making the woman laugh. "You are! Totally are!"

Winn did not agree with the sentiment and he definitely did not agree when they somehow found their way to the bar counter. Mon-El was introduced to human alcohol very quickly and he learned that it tasted really good. Anais monitored how much he drank but did let him experiment how much he could tolerate. She figured if anything went wrong she could speed him out of there in less than a second. But so far, he just seemed intent on mingling with the other humans and discovering what human men do for fun.

"Why do you guys like to arm wrestle so much?" Anais wondered out loud and reached for her own drink on the counter. Mon-El had just defeated his third opponent.

"He's cheating," Winn's flat tone made Anais laugh.

"Then go stop him or...have a drink and join him," Anais slid his untouched drink to him. "You can watch him while you're closer."

Winn knew his options were very limited here, and so with a small glare he picked his drink up and got up from his stool. He could hear Anais's second round of laughter while he walked away. She would not win forever, he thought.

Anais took refuge at the bar counter with the only other female in that place. As the hours ticked by, all the other customers started getting more and more annoying, in Anais' perspective. Mon-El had gone past arm wrestling and moved on to good old fashioned drinking challenges, most notably beer pong. But, to his credit, he had somehow gotten Winn to join in.

"Amazing," she huffed while she went for another drink. The two men ended up becoming more buddies than they had been earlier. Now she had become the third wheel. "Men are idiots."

"Tell me about it," the bartender mused when she walked by Anais.

Anais soon learned that, just like herself and Kara, Mon-El could actually not get drunk. However, Winn most definitely could. While they entered a series of drinking games, somehow Winn ended up winning most of them.

"Oh my God, he's a drinker," Anais said with a laugh as she and Mon-El watched Winn go at it against another fellow bar customer. They had a line of shots they needed to get through.

"So, you don't get drunk here?" Mon-El was curious as he gazed at his newly filled cup of beer.

"The earth stuff isn't strong enough for you guys," Anais shrugged, crossing her arms.

Mon-El picked up on her word choice and glanced at her. "How about you?"

"I'm half human, Mon-El. I don't get granted all the perks of a Solista. Don't get me wrong, it takes me way longer to get drunk than an average human but in the end, I can still get drunk."

"Have you ever tested the theory out of how many glasses it takes?" Mon-El offered her his glass of beer, making her laugh.

"My parents would kill me," she said, pushing his glass back to him. "They're humans and they don't really care how alien I am. I cannot drink when I'm supposed to be on business matters."

"I know I'm not from here but is this business?" Mon-El gestured towards the scene. Winn had just won another round of shots.

A smirk crossed Anais' face. "My business, anyways." It was Mon-El's turn to laugh.

A short time later, Mon-El had entered another wrestling match. He'd won every single one but the last man he went up again ended up with a broken elbow.

The man, angry, tried punching Mon-El but then broke his hand as well. His buddy went to fight Mon-El for support yet the Daxamite easily won as well with a simple 'push'. The human man crashed into a table behind them.

Mon-El was overly surprised with his strength but the other men had grown furious.

"Time to go!" Anais hopped off her stool after the strangers had met face to face with a glass table — another accident on Mon-El's part. She scurried through the group - possibly using her alien strength to push some of the men away - and got her two idiots out of there.

~0~

By the Anais returned home, she expected to find a dark apartment most certainly not Kara wide awake in the living room.

"Where were you?" Kara noticed Anais' disheveled appearance.

"One could say babysitting...or one could say proving a point," Anais fixed herself and released a deep breath. "Beginning to think my plan backfired and it was more of the first then the latter."

Kara couldn't and honestly didn't want to try and understand what all that meant. There were more pressing matters to deal with anyways.

"What are you doing up so late anyways?" Anais pulled her jacket off and headed for the couch chair. "I thought Kara Danvers always has a timely bedtime set up." Kara playfully rolled her eyes but even the playfulness faded very quickly. Anais noticed it and knew that the Kryptonian was worried and/or upset. "Kara, what is it?"

Kara hesitated to speak but after a moment of thinking, she figured it was better Anais knew now in case something happened later.

~ 0 ~

Veronica Sinclair - aka Roulette - was a formidable human enemy to the DEO. She proved herself last night when Supergirl made a visit to her and Sinclair only retaliated with confident words knowing she would not be defeated that night.

Kara now relayed her visit to J'onn, Alex and Anais (again). "I should've heat vision'd that stupid champagne glass out of her hand," Kara balled her fists on her sides.

"That's what she wanted," Anais offered a different perspective on the matter. She'd gotten over her anger last night when Kara had told her. "Supergirl heat visions local human and the media has a field day with that."

Kara gave her points on that, but it didn't stop her from wishing she could've used her heat vision. "I mean, do you think Sinclair is right about this? That she's the only one who can offer something to aliens?"

"Not a chance," Alex answered instantly.

"But then how do you stop them from letting themselves be used and exploited?"

"By offering something more powerful than fear," J'onn settled things and glanced at Winn at his desk. "Winn?"

"Nothing!" The man in question startled awake — his hand holding an ice bag on the side of his slipped and he nearly hit his head on the desk. "I'm not hungover! You're the one being defensive!"

Anais barely hid her smile from the others while J'onn approached a hungover Winn.

"Agent Schott—"

"S-sir, yes, s-sir!" Winn dangled a hand at the front of his forehead. "Er, Mon-El is doing great, by the way. He's here in the DEO. He's here. Did you know his heart is on the other side?"

J'onn gave a nod of his head. "That's absolutely fascinating. You know, the DEO received reports this morning of a six-foot alien attacking two men in a bar last night."

Anais' own smile faded upon learning that.

"The news is so very violent these days…" Winn briefly said as he slowly turned his chair back to his desk.

"Apparently this alien had a 5'2" sidekick—"

Winn jumped out of his chair, leaving it to spin from the force just to shout, "I am 5'9!"

"No, wait," Anais slid in between the two men with her hands raised in front of her, "This one's on me. I'm the one who took Mon-El out. Winn actually tried stopping me several times."

"Anais, why'd you do that?" Alex moved forwards with the same questionable face as J'onn.

"Because sometimes I'm an idiot," Anais answered with the simplest of shrugs. "But this was totally on me."

"You know better," J'onn snapped unexpectedly. "Everything we do is under a microscope. We work so hard to make humans trust us. All it takes is for one alien to ruin it for all of us."

Anais' eyes had slowly widened while J'onn scolded her. "I-I didn't mean to do that…"

"You should've thought about it!"

Alex exchanged looks with Kara, both agreeing J'onn was projecting his fight with M'gann on Anais. "J'onn, why don't we go talk somewhere else," Alex held onto his arm and persuaded him to walk with her.

"I'm really sorry," Anais said to Kara and Winn afterwards. "I wasn't meaning to do that. I was just...I was mad at you," she made a languid gesture at Winn, which didn't surprise him. "And I have to apologize to Mon-El too."

As she left, Kara briefly stopped by Winn to ask, "What's she mad at you for?"

"It's...it's just better if I hold off on that," Winn made the call thinking Anais would want to explain it herself once she got the courage to actually accept that CADMUS was looking into her.

~ 0 ~

Kara caught up with Anais in the hallway, and while Anais didn't exactly say why she was mad with Winn, Kara got the jist that it'd been a long argument now.

Anais led the way into Mon-El's training room where the man was currently doing his training. When he saw Kara, he assumed he was in trouble for the previous night.

"I'm sorry," he immediately said but Anais raised a hand to stop him.

"You're good, I'm the one who screwed up."

Mon-El blinked. "You were?"

"Yes," Anais sighed. "I was basically trying to stick it to Winn and I ended up using you. It was very wrong of me."

"Well…" Mon-El bobbed his head, "I've done worse, believe me. But this has helped me realize something neither of you told me about." Anais exchanged a glance with Kara, both confused of what he meant. "Hank told me I needed to stay here because it wasn't safe. But he didn't mean for me. He meant it wasn't safe for humans. From me."

"Listen, we've all been through that," Anais spoke up first and received an agreeing 'mhm' from Kara beside her. "I was taken in by human parents when I was a kid and just got my freedom a couple months ago. The government didn't want to let me out because they were afraid I'd hurt someone."

"After I first got to Earth, I went to my junior prom and Scott Klein asked me to dance. I stepped on his foot and I broke three of his toes," Kara shared her embarrassing yet meaningful story. "It's just gonna take some time to get used to having these abilities and...and living in this world."

Mon-El appreciated both women trying to make him feel better and even showing sympathy for him, but he was especially thankful towards Kara considering their respective backgrounds. "I know it's not easy for you to be nice to me, Kara. Where I'm from and all."

"That's not why I've been standoffish. And don't say I haven't been," Kara sighed and dug her hands into her back pockets. "My parents gave me so much. And I was so loved. My dad was a scientist and my mom fought for justice. They were proud, strong people. Good Kryptonians and even better parents. And that's the way I want to remember them."

"And why shouldn't you?"

"Because...they weren't perfect. And no matter how smart they were, or how hard they tried, they couldn't save us."

"Yeah, you never met my parents. They weren't exactly role models," Mon-El shook his head.

"But mine saw the end of the world coming, and didn't do anything about it!"

"Hey, it's not...it's not your parents' fault. It's not even Krypton's fault. Okay, we shared a star, that's all. I promise that I will do as I'm told from now on."

"And I promise not to be a manipulative bitch," Anais raised her hand but then pointed a warning finger at Mon-El. "Don't repeat that."

"Repeat what?" Mon-El blinked with genuine oblivion. He wasn't up to speed with curse words yet. "Anyways, I heard you survived Draaga." Kara nodded. "I once saw him fight on Warworld when I was, uh, guarding the royal family. Draaga took a blade to the right leg. It hit a nerve cluster. He's favored his left ever since."

The new piece of information was enlightening for Kara. "Thank you."

~ 0 ~

A couple hours later, the group got word that J'onn was missing. The only known person who'd seen him was M'gann and since she hadn't shown up for her shift it led Alex to conclude J'onn was taken by M'gann's boss: Sinclair.

"The fightclub was cleared out," Supergirl returned to the DEO very put out from her failed trip. "It's like it was never there."

"And there's no sign of where they went?" Anais curiously asked since she'd once again been planted at a chair instead of the field.

"No," Supergirl crossed her arms and thought about it for a minute.

"Okay, so where are we going to find them now?" Alex leaned against a table, trying not to look so frustrated even if she was.

"I bet that fight club has a list of recurring invitees and I think we may know one invitee in particular," Supergirl's suggestion made Anais jump from her chair.

"I'm coming! It involves no actual fighting therefore no need for super suit!"

She practically led the way to Lena's office. Kara understood her since Anais hadn't come out to the field in weeks now. She'd feel antsy too if she was cooped up (which then led Kara to feel even more sympathy for Mon-El).

"Excuse me, you can't go in there!" Lena's assistant failed to stop Anais and Kara from barging into Lena's office. "I swear I just blinked and they got right past me!" the poor woman did her best to explain to Lena before she was fired.

Lena, for her matter, was quite surprised at the sight.

"Lena, I'm sorry," Kara apologized first and foremost. "We just need to talk to you."

"Not her fault," Anais jerked a thumb at the secretary.

Lena's calm smile was a sight of relief for the two aliens. "Jess, will you make a note downstairs that Kara Danvers and Anais Allen are to be shown in right away whenever possible?"

Jess was surprised but since it meant she wasn't going to be fired she dutifully noted it and hurried out of the office.

"Woah, thanks," Anais beamed.

"So, how can I help?" Lena gestured for them to come sit down.

"We think a friend of mine has gotten involved in something shady," Kara's excuse was met with a light scoff from Lena. "It's an actual friend, we swear. And he's missing."

Lena got serious fast and nodded for her to continue.

"Do you know of a woman named Veronica Sinclair? She caters to people in your, um, your circles. Tight dresses, tattoos like Lisbeth Salander?"

Lena pursed her lips and played with a pen on her desk. "Yeah, I know Roulette. We went to boarding school together. I never liked her."

"We share the sentiment," Anais nodded. "We need to find her. And since her little fight clubs are mobile, we need to know where she's holding the next fight."

Lena seemed at a cross of amusement and impression. "And you assume I'm on the invite list?"

"Your last name is pretty famous," Anais shrugged.

"We wouldn't ask if we had any other option," Kara promised Lena as a last means to get her to talk.

Luckily for them, Lena was a smart, kind woman. "I'm a Luthor, of course I'm invited to her little pop-up. Not that I'm interested in her type of entertainment." She wrote down the location of the next fight club and handed it to Kara.

"Thank you. We owe you, big time," Kara tucked the paper into her purse and stood up with Anais.

"Not at all. I know you'll be there for me when the time comes," Lena offered them a genuine, friendly smile.

~ 0 ~

Together with the DEO, J'onn and even M'gann, Supergirl managed to put an end to the fight club with minimal injuries. Mon-El's tip about the Draaga came in handy to put the creature down for a bit. She was even more relieved to see J'onn patch things up with M'gann because it meant J'onn would finally have some peace.

This time Kara was the one to get home to find Anais still awake. Of course Kara wasn't surprised since Anais wanted to know the outcomes of the fight club.

"I would've stayed at the DEO but figured there was no use for me anyways," Anais shrugged at the counter where she was having a drink. "Update: I still can't do the stupid lightning bolt trick. I'm considering opening a stupid breach to find my young adoptive Dad for another training session because it is not going well."

"Arun's still too hard?" Kara assumed since Anais hadn't talked about him in a while.

"He expects too much from me," Anais sighed. "But what happened with Sinclair? Is she done for good now?"

"No," Kara ruefully answered. "Alex says Maggie got the orders to let Sinclair go and there's nothing we can do about it, not even the DEO."

"We'll get her one day," Anais assured. "So how come you're coming back late, then?"

"I…" Kara removed her glasses and set them on the counter, "...stopped by Mon-El's room to talk to him."

"What about?" Anais got up from the stool and went into the cupboards for some more wine.

"I offered to take him under my wing, basically, and show him around the city for real now."

"Yeah, because I totally screwed that up," Anais cringed at the reminder and pulled two glasses from the counter. "And the DEO is going to let you do that?"

"Yup, it's sort of what I did with you in the beginning, remember?"

"How could I forget!"

Kara smiled. "I think it'll do him some good. Plus, I can get him a job at CatCo. Maybe not as a reporter but somewhere there should be good."

"Speaking of," Anais returned to the counter with two glasses of red wine, "Your editor called about that new article you sent in. Apparently he expects your rewrite tomorrow morning."

"Mm," Kara sipped some of her wine. "May have sent him a new one earlier at his e-mail which I got off from James."

"Taking initiative," Anais pointed. "Very good. Look at you, Kara Danvers, having all your crap together. I'm jealous."

Kara chuckled and lowered her glass to the counter. "Well, maybe you can unburden yourself a little bit by telling me what you and Winn are arguing about."

"Ooh, smooth," Anais commended Kara for her easy transition but was still reluctant to go into detail about her disagreement. "But it's nothing, and you shouldn't worry about it."

"I worry when my friends aren't okay. Right now, it looks like you're not okay, so...tell me. Please?"

Anais released a small sigh. "I mean, I just don't want it to be made into a bigger deal than it is...just like Winn made it."

"Well, what is it?"

Anais put her wine glass down and prepared to spill the truth. Who knows, maybe it would be better for her. "CADMUS sent a message for me at the DEO." Kara's confused expression implied she hadn't heard that from anyone at the DEO. "Yeah, Winn caught it and showed it to me instead. Apparently, they want to use me as a fuel for their growing army. Whether or not I want to join them is not really up for debate in their perspective. They made it very clear that they were not above taking me dead."

"Oh my god," Kara said, horrified. "So how does this go to you getting mad at Winn?"

"Because he told me to tell you guys and I said no so instead of nagging me to tell you the truth, he is keeping my suit hostage until I decide to tell you the truth."

"Why wouldn't you want to tell us anything?"

"Because you guys would overreacting and keep me on lock-down like Mon-El!"

"If it was to keep you safe then why wouldn't you?"

"Because I just got my freedom, Kara. I don't want to lose it again." Anais picked up her glass but at first glance she could tell Kara was putting more thought into the situation.

"Maybe Winn's making the right call in keeping you out of the field. The less you're out there, the less chances CADMUS will find you or hurt you."

"No ma'am, not you too," Anais shook her head. "I've spent the better part of my life in seclusion. I'm not doing it again."

Kara was not aiming to argue like Anais and Winn. She would rather find an alternative that would benefit both sides. Making peace was her job, after all.

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retro-memo · 2 years

Text

For the @friendly-neighborhood-exchange and @iron-mum! I hope you enjoy this fic and I wish you a Merry Christmas!

Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, May Parker (Spider-Man) & Peter Parker & Tony Stark

Characters: Tony Stark, Peter Parker, May Parker (Spider-Man), Happy Hogan, Dummy (Iron Man movies), You (Iron Man movies), Friday (Marvel), Karen (Spider-Man: Homecoming), Pepper Potts, Other Character Tags to Be Added

Warnings: Swearing

Ao3 link

"H'y Kar'n." Peter paused, taking a moment to swallow the bite he'd taken out of his sandwich. "Can you crank up the heat a little? It's getting chilly up here."

"Of course, Peter." Not even seconds later after she said that, there was a low sizzling and Peter leaned back into the suspended hammock he'd strung up earlier, basking in the warmth.

It was times like this when he really appreciated Mr. Stark's suit. Especially now that it was the middle of December and temperatures were way colder than they had any right to be.

Peter was pretty sure if he had been wearing his old suit — and no it wasn't a onesie. Stop calling it that, Mr. Stark — he would've probably gone from Spider-Man, and this was in May's words, to 'Spider-Popsicle'.

Which was something Peter found a little ridiculous since it hasn't even started snowing yet.

He would've been fine.

Well, he wouldn't have gone into a coma like last year when he was waiting for Mr. Stark to fix his usual suit after the wiring got damaged in the fire and he was stuck with his old one.

Maybe.

Peter groaned and threw his arm over his eyes, cursing his stupid spider DNA. Why couldn't he just have gotten the cool powers without basically having snow as his kryptonite?

Was that too much to ask of the universe?

"Peter, there's a police report of a bank robbery two blocks down from us."

"Wait, really?" Peter perked up at that and lifted his arm; all thoughts on spiders and the overprotective adults in his life flying out of the window.

"Yes, there are reports of six armed individuals holding several hostages in the building." Karen paused. "They appear to be possessing extraterrestrial firearms."

"Wait, extraterrestrial?" Peter froze, his outstretched wrist hovering mid-air from where he aimed it. "As in alien?"

"It appears so." That was the last thing that Peter expected to hear today. Especially since Toomes had been in jail for the better half of this last year. It couldn't have been him that sold these.

So it wasn't him, that meant it had to be someone else that sold these weapons…

"Should I contact Tony Stark?"

Peter blinked. "Uh, no. No." He shook his head. "You don't need to do that, Karen. I'll be fine."

At this point, he'd gotten very much used to Karen suggesting to call Mr. Stark. He had a sneaking suspicion that she'd been programmed to do that but decided to not question it. It was nice to know help was there if he needed it.

"Are you sure, Peter?"

"Yeah, besides what's the worst that could happen?" Peter paused only for a moment. "Hey Karen, do you think Mr. Stark would like an early Christmas gift?"

"While I can't speak personally, I believe he'd appreciate it. May I ask why?"

Peter grinned. "Send Mr. Stark a message that I'll be swinging by to drop off a present."

Tony had been having a pretty good morning if he had to say so himself.

For once, he actually got in a full night of sleep. And no; he didn't mean his usual two hour power catnap that came with ditching the other five in the lab way.

This time, he clocked in all seven hours and was energized in a way that he hadn't felt since forever.

Hell, even the cheese burgers and coffee he had ordered had tasted better than it had in ages. It felt as if nothing could ruin this day. Not even one of those dreary meetings that Pepper had set up for him seemed to dampen his mood.

That was until he got a message from Peter.

Tony didn't want to think the worst of the kid.

But goddamn, Peter made it hard. The newly-sprouted grey hairs on his head - that certainly weren't there before the kid practically bulldozed into his life like a bull in a China shop - were enough evidence of that.

So when he got the notification from the kid's suit about Peter dropping off a 'present', all sorts of possibilities immediately started whirling through his mind.

With the kid involved, that 'present' could range from a 'minor' stab wound to being shot or even impaled.

Tony tried not to think about those 'worst-case' scenarios as he glanced at the workshop's window. It was the one of kid's favorite spots to crawl through when he popped in for lab days after patrol.

The kid had to be fine. If he wasn't, Tony would've already known from the suit which was programmed to send out an automatic distress signal if something had gone wrong.

This time around, he'd even made sure to put extra encryption so that the heart-attack-inducing kid wouldn't be able to hack into it again with his grubby fingers.

Unless the kid somehow managed to bypass the codes again and was bleeding out somewhere without Tony knowing. Too far away to call for any help.

Alone. Cold. Hurt and -

"Hey, Mr. Stark!"

"Holy shit!" Tony jumped, the soldering iron that he'd been holding clattering onto the metal table below as he whirled around to where the offending voice had come from.

"No, just me." The kid's head popped through the window, and even through the window, and even with the damn mask on, Tony could practically see the grin from where he was standing

The little shit.

"Oh, hey, kid." Tony crossed his arms, watching Peter as he crawled through the window. The kid seemed fine, his movements didn't seem jerky, there wasn't any visible blood that he could see and -

"What the fuck is that?" Tony knew what it was. He recognized it as soon as the kid landed on his feet and turned to face him but still.

"Uh." The kid shrugged as if the glowing alien weapon wrapped up in his arms wasn't a big deal. It was comically picture perfect to the whole damn turtle fiasco from a few months ago. "Merry Christmas?"

"Where the hell did you get that thing?"

"I found it on patrol." The kid answered like it explained everything and Tony stared.

So much for a good morning.

"What are we going to do with it?"

"We're not going to do anything." Tony leveled a glare with Peter. "I'm going to take this Happy and have him deal with it the way he wants to and you're going up to your room."

He should've known that with Peter, it wasn't going to ever be that easy.

"Why do I have to go to my room?" The kid looked awkward but determined as jutted his chin up and shifted on his feet the same way he always did when he didn't agree with Tony.

In a way, it reminded Tony of May whenever they would get into an argument. Which didn't happen a lot even after finding out about Peter's alter-ego.

"I didn't even get hurt this time and technically, I got the weapons here. Finder's keepers."

Kids these days and their damn loopholes.

Tony scowled. "One, because I said so and two, I know for a fact that you have one of those fancy language quizzes tomorrow. May called me earlier to make sure that you study for it if you swung by."

"Wait, you talk to my aunt?"

"Just give me the weapon."

"But—"

"No." Tony shook his head. "Kid, I value my life. I'm not going to risk it with your scary aunt."

Tony wasn't exaggerating there. May was terrifying in her own right. He'd been there to witness how May transformed from Peter’s usual sweet aunt into a pissed off mother bear who’d tear his head off if it meant protecting her cub.

He wasn't going to go through it again.

"Please?" Goddammit. The kid was on the verge of pulling out the big guns; those damn puppy eyes that made even the coldest of men melt into a warm puddle of goo. Tony knew if he didn't get this finished quick, it was going to be game over.

"Come on, Pete." He was on the verge of begging the kid to throw him a bone. A small chance. He could feel himself crumbling, just as he had with the turtle. "Just hand it over. I promise later after you've finished studying, we can blow up some other stuff here in the lab."

The kid didn't miss a beat. "Can we work on it for five minutes, please?"

And there they were. Those puppy-dog eyes that not even Tony on one of his best days he could say no to.

His mouth dried as he stared at the kid, who was clutching the weapon against his chest. Like it was a stuffed animal rather than something capable of massive destruction.

He groaned, throwing his hands up, finally waving the white flag of defeat. "Fine! But if your aunt asks, say that you were doing boring non-dangerous shit."

The kid grinned, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as if he didn't con Tony into risking his life on the line. "Thanks, Mr. Stark! You're the best!"

"Uh-huh." Tony waved Peter off. "You better remember that next time when you're grounded."

The kid giggled and Tony rolled his eyes as he turned back to the table and picked up the soldering iron that he'd dropped before.

He faced the kid again, gesturing to the table behind him. "Okay, gently, place here. We don't want to accidentally blow that thing up. For all that we could know, just sneezing the wrong way could make it go off."

Tony took a small step back, making room for the kid but keeping an eye on the weapon as Peter moved past him.

Once it was on the table and he was satisfied that it didn't look like it was going to blow up anytime soon, he felt the tension in his shoulders loosen.

"Alright." Tony tore his eyes from the weapon. It was fine. Nothing bad had happened. They were fine. Peter was fine. "Alright, I'm going to get a few tools."

He paused, giving Peter a pointed stare. "Do not touch that thing while I'm gone."

"Yeah, mom." The kid snarked back. "I'll be fine, don't worry. What's the worst that could happen?"

"Famous last words," Tony grumbled under his breath, stalking away and passing Dum-E on the way. He pointed a stern finger at the bot, who had for the past hour been trying to find the screwdriver that Tony 'lost', and asked the bot to find. "Don't let the kid get into any trouble, you hear? If he does, I'll be donating your parts to MIT."

The bot whirled at that and Tony shook his head. However, he'd barely taken another step when it all happened at once.

He felt the blast of heat hit his back before even hearing it. He was blown forwards, his insides feeling as if they were ricocheting against his skeleton as he hit the ground.

And just like that, as quickly as it had started, it was over.

Everything was silent as Tony pushed himself up, having been blown forward hard enough to have lost his balance in chaos.

It was quiet. Way too quiet. Even straining past his ringing ears, Tony couldn't hear anything. All he could hear was his thundering heart beating against his chest.

Oh God. Peter.

"Kid!"

Tony scrambled to his feet, whirling around to where the kid was, his heart in his throat at the cloud of smoke covering the whole lab.

"Pete!" He ran, a million possibilities running through his head. Distantly, he heard the lab sprinklers turn on but paid little to no attention to them. "Buddy, you there?"

He didn't get any reply and Tony was almost scared as he came to a stop where the kid should've been. Where he left him with that damn weapon. He should've known better, shouldn't have turned his back and now Peter was -

That was when Tony heard it. The smallest of coughes but it was enough to jumpstart his heart faster than a V8 roaring to life, but something stopped him from running forward.

Terror gripped Tony so that he stayed rooted in place as it overwhelmed him. Fearing that he'd just heard the kid's final breathes.

"Kid?" Tony took a hesitant step forward, almost too scared to peer through the smoke and -

He blinked once. Twice. And then a few more times because there wasn't the burnt-to-a-crisp corpse or pile of ash that he'd conjured up from the darkest depths of his worst fears.

No, no, no. It wasn't that but rather, there was a baby.

A baby, who barely reached to Tony's knee and was waist deep in the Spider-Man suit with hair soaking wet from the sprinklers. It was rubbing its eyes, letting out the smallest of coughs and whinning, its little chest heaving with the action.

Tony stared. He was a genius. He could put two and two, together. Heck, he could do even more than that.

That didn't stop him from freaking the fuck out.

This had to be some sick part of his imagination or he'd finally gone crazy from the blast hitting the back of his head too hard. Because there was no way that this was possible.

Still, Tony swallowed and opened his mouth. "Kid?"

If it wasn't possible for Tony's heart to beat faster than it had before, it certainly was now. The baby tensed at Tony's voice, its head turning up to him, blinking up at him with those oh-so-familiar brown eyes. "Mr. St'k?"

It was muffled, choppy, and barely coherent but it was enough. The final nail in the coffin. It confirmed everything. Any sliver of hope that Tony had that the baby in the middle of his lab wasn't who he thought it was, vanished with that single word.

"Oh God." Tony stumbled back, gripping onto the table nearest to him to stop his legs from giving out from under him.

He stared at the very small and fragile baby a few feet in front of him while his heart throbbed in his chest. It felt ready to jump out from his throat and throw itself out of the nearest emergency exit.

"Shit, Pete." Tony closed his eyes and shook his head, letting out a small giddy laugh that felt as if it quaked his heart with it. "You're a baby."

And May is going to kill me.

#irondad and spiderson #Exchange Gift Fic #peter parker #tony stark #irondad #spiderson #ao3

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