#also i wanted to see so much stuff about them... them right after the missile hit... flashback to the bed scene.... something... | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

lgg5989 · 2 years ago

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Church Encounters Chapter 10

Hey guys! Thanks to everyone for your continued support of this fic, @barbiewritesstuff and I are having a great time writing it. She is posting this on her tumblr as well so jump over and give her a like or a comment. We have had a few requests for side drabbles and stuff about these characters and we will be happy to answer them! Just send us asks :)

You can find the previous chapters on my Masterlist, and you can read the whole series so far on my Ao3! I made the moodboard, I hope you enjoy it! :D

Comment on my post or @barbiewritesstuff’s post to be added to the tag list.

Tagging: @roosterscock

Jake had been dreading the mission assignment for weeks now. The team had been training vigorously and while it was not as intense as the uranium plant mission it was going to require more dogfighting. While the opportunity for a promotion had been hanging over his head for a number of months now, Jake knew that this mission was a test of not only his skills as a pilot but his skills as a leader.

Rooster would be flying at his wingman, and as much as he loved and trusted Dove, she and Vegas were slated to fly as spares. He trusted Dove more than anyone else, but Vegas was a wild card and after her stunt with Halo at the bar, Jake didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her. Payback and Fanboy as well as Phoenix and Bob would also be along for the ride.

They were being asked to provide air support for a group of Navy seals who were infiltrating an enemy compound. While there were only a few threats of fifth generation fighters, the enemy had a large array of aerial vehicles at their disposal.

For the last few weeks, the team had been practicing with Maverick in the sky. He taught them the skills that he used in the F14 to take down the fifth generation fighters and while it wasn’t as discouraging as the uranium mission, the pilots were feeling the pressure of the dogfights.

“Rooster, where are you man?” Jake called into the coms, Maverick hot on his tail with Warlock not far behind him.

“I’m coming Hangman, just try to hang in there another second,” Bradley replied, his voice straining from the Gs that he was pulling in his climb to get up to Jake. He pulled up behind Warlock and Maverick, quickly trying to get a missile lock on one of them, hoping that the other would bug out.

He got tone on Warlock, “That’s tone Warlock,” Rooster called out, now trying to focus his efforts on getting Maverick off of Jake’s tail.

“Alright Hangman, break right,” he said, as Jake shot off to the right, Bradley took aim at Maverick as he followed. The sound of tone came through his cockpit and he called out, “That’s it for you Mav.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Mav called back, “I’ll get you next time.”

Jake had been pushing the team through hours and hours of rigorous dog fighting. He wanted them to have the skills be second nature so that in the field when they were tired, their responses would be fast and without mistakes. At the end of the day, his goal was to bring everyone home alive and he wasn’t willing to risk that for someone’s stamina not being enough for the length of the hop.

As he landed the plane, he caught sight of you disappearing into the building, your flight suit tied around your waist. Jake’s heart hurt watching you walk away from him. He hadn’t the time he wanted to spend with you as of late due to the pressure of the mission and the promise of a promotion. You told him that it was alright, but he still felt badly, he didn’t want to put anything but God above you in his life.

He jumped out of the cockpit, finishing his post-flight checks quickly before running inside after you. The door to the women’s locker room closed just as he made it inside. He knocked quietly on it, pressing his ear to it trying to see if anyone else was in the room with you.

When your voice called back, confused, “Yes?” he pushed the door open slightly, “Are you alone baby?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’m alone, why?” you called back, coming to the door.

Jake pushed it open at that moment, taking in the sight of you. In the time it had taken him to reach the door, you had stripped off your flight suit, leaving you in a black t-shirt and a pair of black leggings. Jake groaned as his eyes took you in, he moved towards you, cupping your face in his hand, “You’re going to kill me darlin’.”

You laughed at him, pulling his sweaty frame closer to your own, “I think you’re going to do that to yourself, sailor.”

Jake pressed forward, catching your lips in a gentle kiss. Between sweet kisses he said, “Not if these leggings kill me first.”

Running your hands through his hair, you pulled his mouth firmer to yours, a quiet moan slipping out as Jake pressed you into the wall behind the door. You began to lose yourself in the kiss before the sound of people walking in the hallway outside the door reached your ears. Breaking the kiss gently, you looked up at him, “We have to stop, Jake.”

“I know,” he said, pressing his forehead to your shoulder, “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” you said, rubbing the back of his head, “I’ve missed you, we haven’t had much time together.”

“I’m sorry for that, once this mission is over, I promise that we are going to have a few lazy days to relax,” he said, his face buried in your neck.

You let out a soft hum as his five o’clock shadow scraped across your neck. Using your hold on his hair, you pulled his head back from your neck, pressing one last kiss to his lips, “Now get out of here Lieutenant, I’d hate for you to be caught in the wrong lockers.”

Jake gave you a sly smile, “For you baby, I’d risk it all.”

You let out a laugh, pushing him out the door, “I’m sure you would Seresin, it's too bad for you that I love you too much to let you risk that promotion.”

With that you let the door to the locker room fall closed again, pressing a hand to your smiling lips, you made your way back to your locker. After showering and redressing, you left, noting that Jake’s truck was still in the parking lot.

You made a mental note to make him up a few more containers with meals. He had been staying late each night trying to ensure that every angle of the mission was covered, and you knew that he wasn’t eating properly.

With that in mind, you headed to the store before making your way home to get started on some cooking.

—

You had messaged Jake when you got home, but his response had been short, you were a bit disappointed but you knew that it was for good reason. Settling in front of the TV for the night, you turned on one of your favourite shows, BONES. As you sat in front of the TV, your hands were working on something special. The patch that you had been making was for Jake. If he got this promotion he would likely be the leader of more dangerous and difficult missions, you wanted him to have a piece of you and God with him, something to keep him safe in the skys.

You had made a patch, it was his favourite colour blue. The words of the bible verse had been written in a striking black thread. You anticipated sewing it to the inside of his flight suit, right over his heart.

The verse was a Psalm, “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life. You stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes; with your right hand you save me. The Lord will vindicate me; your love, Lord, endures forever—do not abandon the works of your hands.”

Underneath you had embroidered your name, a heart next to it as well as a small, “I love you.”

You were hoping that the extra time you had to spend on it meant that it would be done before the mission. The team was scheduled to ship out in two weeks if the plans didn’t change and if you estimated it correctly, you had a few days worth of work left.

A knock on the door interrupted your sewing. Placing the patch on the coffee table, you paused the show before making your way there. Glancing down at your watch, you noticed that it was after ten, you should probably be in bed already. You were dressed for it, wearing one of Jake’s old t-shirts and a pair of sweat shorts.

As you got to the door, you glanced through the peephole, Jake was standing on your doorstep, a deep frown etched on his face. He looked like he was wearing pyjamas and you wondered if he had come from his bed to see you.

Pulling the door open you looked at him confused, “Hey, what are you doing out so late?”

Jake gave you a once over, the tense lines that were around his eyes and mouth relaxing some at seeing you, “I’m just anxious about this mission, I know it's late, but could you just…can we talk for a bit, or just watch some TV?”

“Of course,” you said, pulling him into the apartment behind you. You settled him on the couch before making your way into the kitchen to make two cups of peppermint tea, your grandma had always done the same for you when you were anxious.

When you came back into the living room, you found him holding the patch in his hands, running his fingers delicately over the words that were embroidered there, “You’re not supposed to know about that yet,” you said, startling him.

“Sorry it was just out,” he said, taking the tea that you had made him in one hand, still admiring the patch with the other.

“Yeah, I’m hoping it’ll be finished before the mission,” you said, smiling at him.

“I would be honoured to wear it,” he said, looking at you lovingly, more of the stress melting from his face.

You felt yourself blush, “I was going to sew it into your flight suit,” you said quietly.

“Where?” he asked, confused.

“On the inside, over your heart,” you said, now looking at the couch, your face burning red.

You saw him put the patch on the coffee table out of the corner of your eye, before he used his fingers to lift your chin so that you were looking at him, “I love it, and I love you. I would be happy to wear it in my suit, baby.”

A smile broke over your face, “I just don’t want you to feel obligated-” you started but Jake interrupted you, “It’s an honour to wear anything you make me.”

You leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his lips. The two of you talked and drank your tea, you eventually snuggled into Jake’s side for a while. He told you of his worries for the mission and you reassured him that it would all be alright. At the end of the night, he left you with a chaste kiss pressed to your lips before climbing into his truck and driving to his own apartment.

—

The two weeks before the mission passed quickly and you soon found yourself standing on an aircraft carrier looking out at sea. You had sewn the patch into his flight suit a few days ago, but after that he had been so busy that the only time you had gotten to spend together was the night before you deployed. Now that you were on the ship, things were even more busy for him and you hadn’t even had time to pray together like you had for the last mission. A bad feeling had settled itself firmly in your gut and no matter how many prayers you said, they didn’t seem to take the sinking feeling away.

That night, as you tossed and turned in bed, there was a knock on your door. Being careful this time to rise from the bed and not fall on to the floor, you opened the door to reveal Jake, his bible in hand.

“Can we pray for a few minutes?” he asked, “I know we should be in bed, but we won’t have time tomorrow and I won’t feel right about this until we do.”

You pulled him into your room by his hand, “Of course, I have been praying all day,” you said. Quickly, you switched on the lamp by your desk before pulling the blanket off the bed to set on the floor.

You both knelt on the blanket. Pulling your rosary from your duffle bag, you and Jake began to pray it together. After a round of the rosary, you both spent some time in quiet prayer, bringing your thoughts to the Lord. When you started to fall asleep against Jake’s shoulder, he crossed himself. Gently taking you in his arms, he picked you up and placed you in your bunk. Picking the blanket off the floor, he spread it over you, before he left, he pressed a kiss to your forehead.

—

The next day, you rose early. Making your way to the mess hall, you found that the only thing you could bring yourself to consume was water, your stomach in knots at the thought that you were going to sit on the deck and listen to the mission.

When the time came to fly the mission, you sat in the back of your jet with Vegas, both of you stewing in a tense silence. The radio occasionally crackled with the other pilot’s voices as they made their way into enemy airspace.

Every time Jake’s voice came over the line, your heart clenched. The knots that had tied themselves in your stomach hadn’t left all morning, and now they were making you feel sick.

“You see anything Bob?” Jake called out.

“Nah, nothing,” he replied, another minute passed before his voice came over the comms again, “I’ve got something here, twenty miles nine hundred knots closure.”

Rooster’s voice called back, “I see him, it looks like it might be a grouping.”

“Shit,” Fanboy said, “They’re splitting, there’s got to be six planes there.”

Vegas put her mask up to her face, “This is Dagger Spare requesting permission for take off.”

“Denied Spare,” the comms controller called.

Your stomach sank further, hopefully the four planes could handle the six enemy aircraft. As the dogfight everyone had been anticipating began in the air, you listened for fatigue in your fellow pilot’s voices intensely.

—

Phoenix’s voice had a tremor in it when it crackled through the comms, “I’ve got one one me and I can’t shake him. Where are you Hangman?”

“I’m right below you,” Jake said almost immediately trying to think about how to get his friends out of their current situation, “Dive down so that he will follow and let’s see if I can get him to bug out.”

A second later he heard Rooster’s voice, “Hangman, you’ve got one moving in behind you. I can’t cover, and Payback is a little busy.”

“I’ve got it, Rooster,” Jake said, “Let me get this guy off of Phoenix and Bob first.”

He moved in behind the jet that was on Phoenix and Bob right as his missile lock warning went off in his cockpit. Pressing a hand over his heart for a second, feeling the patch that you had sewn into it, he let out a deep breath, “Alright Phoenix, I’m taking the shot on your bogey.”

“Any day now Hangman,” she said, her voice sounding more strained as she struggled to evade the enemy aircraft.

“Smoke in the air Hangman,” Payback shouted and Jake’s heart clenched. He reached up, hitting the button on his control panel for flares.

“Dagger One defending,” he called, “Shit, I lost the missile lock. Phoenix, keep evading.”

“I’m doing all the work here Hangman, get me some help,” she called back, “Bob do you see a way out of this?”

“No, not unless you want to try something sketchy with another jet,” he said.

“I’ll line one up for you, Phoenix,” Jake said.

“Let’s do it Hangman,” She called back.

“Alright, I’m going to break right, you break left, let’s bring them back around and into each other,” Jake said.

“Copy. Bob keep an eye on him, make sure he doesn’t lose us,” She directed.

“Copy that,” Bob said, “He’s still on us.”

Phoenix and Jake turned around, now going head to head, “Alright, Phoenix, you go for the over then break right. I’ll go for the under then break off as well and they’re going to fly into one another, like a big game of chicken.”

“This has to be the craziest thing you’ve ever gotten me to do,” she said, disbelief in her voice.

Jake cussed as he took a few hits, the other pilot realising that he wouldn’t be able to defeat Jake with missiles had switched to guns. He desperately tried to avoid the fire as the jets got closer and closer to each other, Jake pressed his hand over his heart one more time before saying, “Now!”

He pushed the stick down, diving just below Phoenix as she pulled up. They waited with baited breath as Bob called out, “They barely missed each other, but it looks like they aren’t coming back after us.”

“Damn right,” Jake said, relief flooding his system. Just then, his control panel started going crazy with alarms.

“Shit, right engine is on fire,” he said, “Extinguishing engine. I’m losing hydraulic pressure, fuck me.”

He heard Vegas call again for takeoff, only to be denied again. Letting out a breath, he tried his control surfaces. He had pitch and yaw, but rolling was difficult, he could still fly this plane.

“Alright, let’s get these assholes out of here and get home,” he said, “Everyone fall into formation on me. Rooster, how many are there left?”

“Those two you played chicken with bugged out, Payback picked one off of me and I got a fourth,” he heard Bradley say.

“Okay, two left,” he said, “Bob, Fanboy, you got anything?”

“Nothing Hangman,” Bob called back.

Fanboy took an extra second to respond, “I have two on the radar dead ahead of us.”

“Alright, Phoenix and Bob on me, Rooster you take Payback and Fanboy. Shoot them down or scare them, it’s time they went home,” he said, his hand struggling with the stick to keep control.

As they manoeuvred towards the enemy aircraft, Phoenix was able to lock on with a missile. Firing, she got a hit, with only one enemy jet left, he bugged out.

“Dagger Squad, radar is clear, continue running air support until mission completion,” command’s voice said.

Jake was fighting his plane, keeping it in the air was becoming harder and harder as more and more fluid leaked out of the lines. He glanced down to the picture he had of you taped to the control panel. It was a polaroid that he had taken earlier that month, the two of you were at the beach and the sun was setting. You had been sitting in front of him, your knees bent and your elbows resting across them. Your chin sat on top of your arms, a small smile on your face.

With you on his mind, he prayed the Hail Mary over and over, he might have even been whispering the words into the comms, it wouldn’t have surprised him. When, finally, command said that the SEALs had gotten out, and they were cleared to fly home, Jake drew an easier breath.

As mission leader, Jake waited to land last. As he passed over deck one last time before landing he asked, “Vegas, Dove, do I have landing gear?”

Pressing the button, his heart stuttered when he didn’t hear them fall out beneath him.

Your voice came over the comms, “No Hangman, no landing gear.”

“Shit, Dagger One to Command, I don’t have landing gear,” Jake reported.

“Copy Dagger One, we will have extinguishers waiting on deck. Dagger One call the ball,” he heard back.

“Copy that, Dagger One has the ball,” Jake said, lining himself up for landing.

As he touched down, the bottom of his plane scraping along the deck of the carrier, he felt the tail hook catch on the cable, pulling him to a quick stop. Smoke started to fill the cockpit and he struggled to get out. The jet was likely covered in hydraulic fluid and the sparks thrown by the metal dragging along the tarmac would likely cause it to ignite.

He punched the button to raise the cockpit, pulling at the straps around his shoulders. He grabbed the picture of you from the control panel before climbing out of the plane. You were waiting for him on the ground, surrounded by the rest of the team. Without waiting for a ladder, he slid down the side of the jet and dropped off the wing.

Immediately pulling you into a hug, he felt you grip him tight, “I thought I was going to lose you,” he heard you say.

“Me darlin’? Never. You’re stuck with me,” he said into your ear, pressing a kiss to the top of your head before separating from you. He kept one arm wrapped around your shoulders as he shook hands and hugged the other pilots.

Once the celebration on deck started to calm down, Dagger squad was commanded to report to debrief. After the debrief was over, everyone relaxed into their bunks. The long day of stress and then the sweltering heat of the debrief room had not been easy, but tomorrow, they would be going back to California.

Jake laid down to sleep that night and thanked God for bringing him back to you. He didn’t want to admit it but he had been less scared of losing his life and more scared of leaving you before he could properly call you his. He vowed that he wouldn’t wait much longer to ask you the question he had been pondering since he had brought you home for Thanksgiving. With thoughts of you in a white dress on his mind, Jake fell asleep quickly, a smile on his face.

—

Immediately upon arriving back in California, Jake had been called to Admiral Simpson’s office where he was informed that he was receiving a promotion to Lieutenant Commander which would be made effective at the end of the month when a small ceremony and banquet could be planned. You couldn’t be happier for him and knew what had happened as soon as he had come out of the office building and into the parking lot.

He pulled you into a tight hug whispering into your ear, “Oh thank God that all of the time spent away from you was worth it.”

You let out a series of giggles, “Jake, I wasn’t worried about it.”

“You might not have been, but I was,” he said, setting you down on your feet and giving you a kiss.

“When is this banquet to take place, Lieutenant Commander Seresin?” you asked, using a slightly sultry voice, your mouth pressed up to his ear.

Jake pulled you a little closer to him before replying, “At the end of the month.”

You hummed, “Well I guess I better go dress shopping then.”

“I guess you should,” he said back, smiling widely, “But right now, you are coming with me!”

“Where are we going?” you squealed out as he picked you up, carrying you to his truck.

“You are going to put on that dress mom got you at Christmas, and I am going to take you out to dinner,” he said, placing a kiss on your cheek before sitting you in the passenger’s seat.

Dinner was fantastic and Jake treated you like a queen, opening every door for you and even bringing you flowers when he picked you up from your apartment. He had on a dark button up shirt and dark jeans, and the dress that you had bought took his breath away. The orange complemented your slightly tanned skin perfectly and the cut was just right to tease Jake but not so revealing that you felt uncomfortable.

“Wow, this dress…it’s really something…” he said, placing his hands gently on your hips and turning you around in his grip. You could feel the way that his fingers pressed gently into the soft skin of your stomach and it made you smile.

As you turned to face him again, you asked, “Do you like it?”

Without hesitation he said, “I love it,” before giving you a quick peck on the lips, “Are you ready to go?”

“Let me just put these in some water and I will be ready,” you said, heading to the kitchen. Once you had placed the flowers in water, you grabbed your shawl and clutch before following Jake out the door.

Dinner was delicious, Jake took you to a fancy steakhouse where the waiter poured your wine and packed the leftovers for you. By the end of the night, you felt happier than you had in a long time. Riding home, Jake held your hand in the car, talking to you about everything and nothing. When he walked you to the door, he placed his hand on your back, giving you a deep kiss.

“I was so scared up there,” he said quietly against your lips, “I’m just so glad I made it back to you.”

“I knew you would make it back to me,” you replied, giving him a gentle peck.

Jake let out a quiet sigh, “How?”

“Because you promised,” you said to him, looking in his eyes.

A grin broke across his face and he placed one more kiss on your lips before bidding you goodnight and walking back to his truck.

—

The few weeks before the end of the month had flown by and you were feeling stressed. You never liked shopping for yourself and while you were happy for Jake’s promotion, you were dreading the banquet. Every dress you owned was deemed by Annie and Audrey either not fancy enough or too reminiscent of prom. So you had to venture out to the department stores where after trying on dress after dress and using almost all of your monthly data talking to your sisters, you had found nothing.

As you were walking out of the store, Annie said from your video call, “What about that store? The one just behind you? Have we been in there yet?”

Turning to look, you saw the store she was referring to, it was a boutique and there were quite a few dresses hanging in the window, but only one had caught your eye.

“I see one, it looks promising,” you said to them, making your way through the doors. You were greeted by an attendant and you pointed out the dress in the window, “Do you have that one in a six or an eight?” you asked.

“Let me see, it should be hanging over here,” she said, and you followed her over to the rack.

Picking the dress off the rack in both a six and an eight she looked at you, “Just these two doll?”

“Yes ma’am, if they don’t work I'll browse some more,” you said in a quiet voice, following her to the dressing room.

She let out a sigh, “Ah, long day of looking?” she asked as she unlocked the door for you.

“Yes, a long couple of weeks actually,” you said, looking at her with a defeated face.

“Hopefully this will be the one then,” she said, giving you a kind smile, “I’ll be just over there restocking if you need a second opinion.”

“Thank you,” you replied, giving her a warm smile, before closing the dressing room door. You pulled your clothes over your head and grabbed the bigger dress off of the hanger, if it was too big then at least you could feel good about yourself. Pulling it over your head, you adjusted it over yourself before slipping up the zipper. It fit you like a glove, and as soon as Annie and Audrey caught sight of you in the mirror, they both squealed, “Oh my goodness, Y/N you need to get that one. You look stunning!”

----

For all of his many qualities, Bob had one, irredeemable flaw. Robert Arthur Floyd had never, in his entire life, for any occasion whatsoever and despite his best efforts, been on time. He was perpetually twenty minutes late, even when he left early. Bob wasn’t actually his original callsign, ‘Tardigrade’ had been put forth but abandoned when they couldn’t fit it on his flight helmet.

Knowing this, you didn’t bother getting fully ready before the time Bob had promised to pick you up for. You showered, prepared your hair and makeup and then chilled on your sofa, practising your needlework until Bob’s signature “Sorry, I’m going to be late!” text, then, you went back to your room and put on the emerald green velvet sheath dress you had bought for the occasion.

The dress had been gorgeous on the rack, and even when you wore it in the shop’s changing room, under the neon light of a single overhead light bulb and in front of a purposefully unflattering mirror, but now you put it on, you felt as though you were staring at a goddess.

You stood there staring at yourself for another minute before suddenly waking up and running to the bathroom to remove the clips from your hair and brushing out your finger waves. Then, you practically sprinted to the entry hall to briefly root through shoe boxes and pulled out a pair of heels you had only worn once before. They were beautiful, a thin stiletto heel, a toe strap the same colour as your dress and a golden ankle strap made out of a delicate chain. Just as you were putting them on, the doorbell rang.

Bob stared at you, speechless for a moment when you opened the door, “Wow, you look gorgeous,” he said, “I can’t wait to see his reaction,” he added with a little laugh. You couldn’t either. You had done your level best to hide the dress from Jake since you had bought it, you wanted it to be a surprise. Bob turned towards his car, offering you an arm, “Shall we?”

“Lead the way,” you said, interlinking your arm with Bob’s after grabbing a coat and shawl and locking up your apartment.

Once at the car, he opened your door with an exaggerated bow, “M’Lady,” he said, quickly running to the other side of the car and getting into the driver's seat. You looked at the delicate golden bracelet watch on your wrist to see you were still a little early. Bob turned the key and started the car, pulling out of your apartment’s designated guest parking space. By the time you made it to the hotel where the banquet was being held, you were only forty-five minutes late.

You spotted Jake leaning against the bar, nursing a bourbon and talking to Rooster. He had his back turned to you and only knew to turn around because Rooster had seemingly stopped speaking mid-sentence. The second he saw you at the top of the stairs, Jake dropped his glass. It shattered with a loud noise that echoed through the space.

As people fussed over Jake, you gingerly walked down the grand marble staircase to the hotel’s ballroom, careful not to twist an ankle and add to the commotion. Once both of your feet landed on the soft red carpet, Jake shook himself off of the waiters trying to clean up the glass and advanced towards you.

“I’m not sure what to say,” he admitted, “you look breathtaking, mia cara.”

Jake had started calling you ‘Mia cara’, My dear, a few months ago. You liked the name, and it made you feel special, he didn’t call anyone else mia cara, but a month or so ago, you had gotten curious where the name had come from. When you asked him about it, his explanation made you feel so warm inside. His grandpa Thomas had called Nonna mia cara from the time they met until the day he died. Jake, even as a child, was in awe of his grandpa and seeing how long he and Nonna were married, he figured that the man must have been doing something right. He said that the name just felt fitting for you, “You are everything near and dear to me, why should I call you anything else?” with that you had given him a kiss. You had never been happier to have another name.

Jake had completely lost himself in your eyes when something collided into his shoulder with enough strength to knock him forward a little. He turned around to see Harvard and Yale, shortly followed by the rest of the squad. Bob and Fanboy were deep in a heated debate the likes of which could only ever be caused by Star Wars. As they both angrily gestured at each other to prove a point, you sidled closer to Jake, just to avoid getting hit. Instinctively, he threw an arm over your shoulder and held you closer.

Bob was gesturing wildly, deeply enthralled in the conversation, when his hand bumped Phoenix’s arm. The toothpick in her martini, which still had an olive on it, fell from her glass and landed on the floor. She moved to get it but, being stuck between all of the guys, it would be more awkward for her than for you.

“I got it,” you said, bending down, pressing yourself against Jake to keep your stability.

You heard a groan come from the man behind you and when you stood up, your head turning towards him, you saw a blush rapidly spread over his face. The rest of the team let out laughs as you just looked at him confused, “You alright?” you asked him quietly. To which he just nodded his head in answer.

Bob, his face red from laughter, choked out, “You good man? Still planning on waiting for marriage?”

Your eyes grew wide at his comment, realising exactly where you had brushed up against Jake. Now that the cat was out of the bag, the rest of the team seemed to all at once understand the situation.

Coyote looked at him with a pained expression, “That's why you’ve had a stick up your ass the last few weeks?” his voice surprised.

Now both of you were blushing, you didn’t want to discuss your sex life, or lack thereof, in front of the whole team.

Rooster just stared at him wide eyed, he smacked Coyote on the back of the head, “Hey man, Y/N is right here, let's leave this for later.”

With that, most of the group dispersed. Rooster, Coyote, and Bob all making their way to the bar, glancing back at you and Jake every now and then.

Jake rubbed a hand over his face, turning to you and trying to give you a smile, he opened his mouth to speak but before he could say anything you started talking first, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

The hand that was sitting on your hip squeezed as he cut you off, “It’s okay, I need to have some more self control,” he said, his eyes darker than you had ever seen them.

You felt a blush burning across your own face, and you were sure that it could be seen through the makeup that you had put on before leaving the apartment.

“I’m just going to go take care of this,” you said, holding up the toothpick that had caused the whole issue.

Jake nodded, giving you a smile, “I’m going to go tell our friends to mind their own business.”

As the two of you parted ways, Phoenix came over to catch your arm, “I’m going to borrow her for a minute Bagman, hope you don’t mind.”

“It's no problem,” he said, turning around and walking towards the bar.

Phoenix looked at you for a moment before speaking, “Dove, that man is going to marry you and I’m not sure what you did to get him to change but good for you.”

You felt your blush get deeper, “Well we just wanted to do this right…” you started.

“I get that,” she said gently, “I just can’t believe that you tamed the Hangman.”

You let out a laugh, “No I don’t think…”

“Don’t tell me you’re blind Dove. The way he looks at you? I’ve been waiting for someone to look at me that way my whole life,” Phoenix said quietly, “I’m happy for you.”

The two of you found a trash can for the toothpick, as you made your way back to the bar, Vegas and Halo approached you.

“Well, it’s a shame you aren’t using Hangman to his full potential,” Vegas said, looking at you like you were a piece of gum she needed to scrape off the bottom of her shoe.

You started to defend yourself when Halo stepped in, “You see how he looks at her Vegas, they aren’t using one another. Stop trying to drive a wedge.”

Vegas turned on her, “I’m not trying to drive anything. Sex is an important part to any relationship, they will have to do it sooner or later.”

Rolling her eyes, Halo fought back, “Well it's really none of our business when they decide to do it. If you can’t respect that then maybe you should leave.”

Vegas’ face got red before she walked away from you, heading to the opposite end of the bar as the rest of the team.

“Can you believe her? I don’t know how you ride backseat for her Dove, I couldn’t do it,” Phoenix said.

Halo cleared her throat, “I can’t believe I thought she was my friend. I can’t be friends with someone who treats others so poorly.”

You were surprised by Halo’s words. Ever since the incident at the bar, you had exchanged only pleasantries. You had wanted to mend things many times, but the presence of Halo had always been a deterrent, and with how stubborn Halo could sometimes be, you thought she might never apologise for hurting you. This wasn’t the apology you had hoped, but it was a start.

“Yes, well, good of you to realise that,” Phoenix said, a hint of disapproval in her voice, “I need a refill.”

She marched off in the direction of the bar, before she could tell the bartender what she wanted, someone tapped a knife against a glass to catch everyone’s attention. Standing tall on the stage the live orchestra had been playing on stood Admiral Simpson.

“If I may have your attention for a moment please. We are gathered here for two very special occasions. This year marks the 40th birthday of the F-18. Although the aircraft has often been pitted against the Grumman F-14 Tomcat, the Grumman A-6 Intruder and the LTV A-7 Corsair II and criticised for its shortcomings in various departments, I think it is important that we highlight how versatile and reliable this aircraft has proven to be, as well as how instrumental it was to the creation of the Boeing FA-18E Super-Hornet. This brings us nicely to the second occasion. We are here to celebrate a man who showed exceptional leadership skills and bravery in the face of danger. He was brought back to Top Gun after being stationed in Lemoore where he had the honour of flying the FA-18E with his squadron, The Vigilantes. Lieutenant Commander Seresin, Congratulations,”

Cyclone raised his glass towards Jake, leading the way for everyone else to do the same. A blush creeped on his face but luckily did nothing more than tint his cheek a rosy shade of pink. You looked at him, finding him already looking at you, he winked.

For the rest of the evening, Jake was swarmed with people coming up to congratulate him. Eventually, he managed to extricate himself from a group of particularly chatty military wives and joined you by the bar.

“Please save me,” he whispered in your ear as another group of attendees dragged him into another round of ‘Congratulations’ and ‘It’s an honour to meet you’.

One of the men introduced himself, elbowing his way through the group to stand right in front of Jake, “I’m Killian Jones with the Nantucket Sunday Times, we’re doing an article about the great aircrafts of the twenty-first century. First of all, thank you for your service. I gather from the Admiral’s speech that you have some experience with the F--”

“Honey,” you interrupted, seeing Jake’s panicked look, “We should go, the babysitter needs to go home. It’s a school night”

“Right, yes, the babysitter. Yes, of course, we should go,” Jake said, trying to play along, “We should go now, actually, we really have a lot of road to do… It was lovely to meet you all, I hope you have a wonderful evening. Good luck with your article, Mr. Jones,” Jake said as you grabbed his hand and led him away, “Thank you so much,” he whispered to you as soon as he was out of earshot.

You waved towards the squad as you passed by, but didn’t stop. You gathered your coat at the door, forgetting to check if you had your shawl and stepped out of the hotel just in time to see the bottom of Coyote’s shoe step into a taxi, shortly followed by Phoenix. Tearing your eyes away from them, you followed Jake to his truck.

----

Jake guided the truck down the road smoothly, his hand resting on your thigh, his thumb rubbing your knee gently. You couldn’t tear your eyes from him in his dress whites, somehow he made them look like they were made just for his tall, broad frame.

“I’m so proud of you,” you said softly, smiling at him.

He looked at you, a smile on his own face, “Thanks, mia cara.”

Before you could say anything else, he added, laughing, “Also, the babysitter? That’s the best you could come up with?”

You let out a quiet chuckle as Jake pulled into the parking lot of your apartment, “Well since we both want a whole brood I figured it wasn’t the worst white lie I’d ever told.”

He put the truck in park and walked you up to your door, his warm hand grazing the exposed part of your back, you couldn’t help but think about how much you wanted to kiss him. In the time you had been dating there were definitely a few times where you wanted to know what more was like. You knew that those were not the thoughts that a lady should be having, let alone an unmarried one, but it made you wonder how long he would wait to propose. If you were being honest with yourself, you wouldn’t mind a short engagement.

You got to the door, popping open your clutch purse to get out the key. You felt Jake press slightly against your back, his warm body in his dress whites keeping the slight chill of the night air from getting to you. As you pushed the door open and leaned down to take off your heels, you expected him to follow you inside, when he didn’t you looked up at him confused, “Coming in?”

“Baby, if I don’t leave now, I am going to do something that I’ll regret,” he said, giving you a light peck on your lips before physically pushing himself away from the doorframe.

As he took another step back, your hand shot out, grabbing on to the front of his dress whites, “I trust you not to,” you said, quietly, looking at his lips.

Jake moved so quickly, if you weren’t the thing he was moving towards, you would have missed it. He pushed you back into the apartment, slamming the door closed with his foot. Spinning the two of you around, he pushed you up against the door, his mouth never leaving yours in a passionate, deep kiss.

His tongue traced your bottom lip and you opened your mouth to his, letting him deepen the kiss more. You could feel his hands tracing your curves through the thin fabric of your dress, their warmth leaving a burning path in their wake. His hips stuttered forwards into yours, and you could feel the arousal that was so prominent in the bruising kiss that he had you trapped in.

You let out a quiet moan and Jake’s hands started to bunch up the fabric of your dress. His mouth suddenly separated from yours, his panting breaths blowing gently across your heated skin as he kept repeating, like a mantra, “We need to stop. We need to stop. We need to stop.”

But you found that you couldn’t stop. You were pressing little kisses to his cheek and jawline, running your fingers through his hair and down his back, you knew it was improper but you wanted more. His mouth found yours again, giving you small pecks between his whispered chanting. He pulled one of your legs up to his hip, his hand skimming over the bare skin of your ass. You let out a small squeak before biting his lower lip at the unfamiliar sensation of his calloused hand on your smooth skin.

He let out a groan, still chanting quietly to himself, “We need to stop, baby.” Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. It startled you both and Jake’s hand squeezed you tightly enough that you knew there would be a bruise left in the morning. Before either of you could react, you heard the one person you didn’t want to see at the moment.

Cyclone’s voice came muffled through the door, “Damn, I told her to be careful with him. I hope they aren’t doing anything inappropriate.”

At that, Jake let go of you, the fabric of your dress fluttering to the floor, you both looked flushed and well kissed, but that wasn’t your biggest problem. Jake had marks from your teeth embedded in his lip, and his pants were tented with his prominent arousal. You stepped in front of him, turning to face the door, “Stay behind me,” was all the warning you gave before plastering a smile on your face and pulling the door open.

Cyclone looked the two of you up and down before holding out your shawl to you, “You left this at the table, just wanted to make sure it found its way back,” he said quietly.

“Thanks, Dad,” you said quietly, “Jake was just walking me in, like a good gentleman,” you threw on the end, hoping that your current states weren’t overly noticeable.

“I hope that’s all he was doing,” Cyclone said as he turned around and walked to his running car.

The blush that covered your face would have made a beet jealous, Jake reached forward and closed the door. The two of you looked at one another before bursting out in laughter, “Did that just happen?” you asked.

“I think it did,” he said, his gaze no longer holding the same amount of desire as it had previously.

You stepped forward looking through the peep-hole to see that Cyclone’s car had left, “Well sailor, you better get going, before we do something we'll both regret,” you said to him, a smile on your face.

“Obviously I can’t be trusted,” he said, placing one last, firm kiss on your lips before pulling open the door and running out to his truck. With a glance over his shoulder back at you, he climbed in the cab and pulled out of the parking lot.

#hangman #jake hangman seresin #hangman top gun #hangman x reader #hangman seresin #hangman fanfiction #hangman fic #hangman imagine #jake seresin imagine #jake seresin x reader #jake seresin #jake hangman x reader #jake hangman seresin x reader #jake seresin fanfiction #top gun maverick #top gun fanfiction #top gun

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the-gay-prometheus · 2 months ago

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OP, I see what you're going for here and I can appreciate it, but we also need to remember that the Creature's first response to rejection was NOT violence. In fact, real violence was the very last resort for him. Essay incoming, because I think it's important to get the facts right about these characters. I'm not disputing anything you said about Victor, but what you've said about the Creature is demonstrably incorrect.

First and foremost, the Creature basically speedran Growing Up™. When he first awakened, he had no concept of Literally Anything. Him standing over Victor's bed can be attributed to little more than basic instinct of trying to attach to the first person he sees. In his recounting of his side of the story, he has no memory of ever even doing this, because at that point in his story he was barely capable of having memories beyond the fact that everything was so overwhelming. He can't even conceive of the fact that he had to have come from someone, somewhere, because for all he knows he's just. Here. He doesn't know why or how, and at that point the why and how isn't important. So of course he's not seeking out his creator, because he can't even conceive of the fact that he's been created.

Secondly, his first and only initial interactions with human beings goes as follows: A. Somebody screams and runs away from him. B. Many people scream and run away from him. C. Someone faints upon seeing him. D. People start pelting him with stones and (his words) "other missile weapons". How does he handle this rejection? He runs away. He doesn't fight back, he doesn't run after them, he doesn't destroy their property, he just leaves.

When he does finally discover how and why he was created, he was disgusted by what he read (and likely for good reason - we don't know all the details, but Victor himself knew what he was doing was fucked up and was disgusted by his own actions after the fact). Of course he's not going to want to have anything to do with his creator at that point. All he knows about Victor is that A. Victor isn't in his life anymore for some reason (he has literally no idea about the illness or fainting stuff, and Victor never tells him anyways) and B. Victor seems like kind of a gross guy to him.

Even after he gets rejected by the DeLaceys (and straight up beaten with a stick by one of them), he flees. By this point now his fear is turning into anger, but even now he tries to cope in a way that won't harm others (runs into forest and just screams for a while - good for him). He calms himself down and tries to go back to talk to them the next day, and instead hears the guy who beat him say "Hell no we're not coming back here ever again with that damn thing hanging around."

And it's only then that he actually chooses some form of violence - but it's barely even violence! The cottage is uninhabited. Nobody lives there anymore, the DeLaceys are very much not coming back. So yeah, he burns it to the ground in a fit of rage because at this point there's only so much that screaming in the woods can do. But it doesn't even belong to anybody except the landlord anymore (who he doesn't even know lol), so really he's not actually causing any harm here even though it is a more "violent" escalation.

We see again and again and again that the Creature does his damn best to control his anger and not cause harm, but eventually, yeah. He snaps. He's alone in the universe with no one to help him through all the shit he's going through. Of course he's gonna snap. And even in his first true moment of violence (killing William), there's some evidence that the murder of William was accidental. That's a whole separate essay, though.

The reason he doesn't even bother going to Victor until after William's death is because remember, at this point, his opinion of Victor is "This guy straight up left me and also did some really fucked up shit to make me, so I don't really know if I want anything to do with this mf." But now he figures "fuck it, I've got nothing left to lose, I don't have any other options, and I mean I guess I've got leverage against him now if he's as much of an asshole as I think he is, so alright. Lemme find this guy - I don't want to be his friend, but maybe he can make a companion for me." It also doesn't help that Victor's first reaction to him upon seeing him is "COME AT ME BRO!!!!1!!!1!!!! I'll beat your damn uglyass face in!!!!!!!" Like. This is clearly not a safe person for my guy to be seeking any form of companionship from, so his first instinct isn't going to be "Hi dad ;~; Can u pls love me? ;~;"

Anyways. Their dynamics aside, by this point he's tried over and over and over and over and over and over to respond to rejection with nonviolence or at least in a way that isn't causing direct harm. He's done with that now, because clearly nonviolence is doing nothing. So yeah. He chooses violence. But again - it is the LAST choice, not the first.

And it's a really bad and awful choice!! Anyone saying "the creature did nothing wrong" either should be saying that as a joke or is completely missing the nuance of this book. I completely and totally agree with you that Victor gets way more hate than he should, but we don't need to lift him up by putting the Creature down.

I'm so protective of Victor Frankenstein, because everyone is like "the creature is actually completely right and he should have just made a second creature and it would be fine" or "he shouldn't have abandoned his creation" and like, come on.

First of all, he didn't abandoned the creature. He basically spent 9 months obsessing of creating this thing because (a) his mother died and he developed a morbid fascination with death to cope and (b) his father, instead of explaining why alchemy was a bad idea, just dismissed his interest out of hand. But the thing was that it wasn't //actually// supposed to work. And he also isn't eating or sleeping and he is mentally Not Well. But then the creature opens it's eyes and it's terrifying because even though it should be beautiful, being made of beautiful parts, it is still made of fucking corpses.

So, Victor passes the fuck out and wakes up after the creature has escaped. And then he's like, wtf was that?? Am I going insane?? He doesn't go looking for the creature because he thinks he made it up in his head. I think his friend was also like, "hey, dude, I think you just have a fever."

And then he finds out that his 6yo brother has been MURDERED and his childhood friend is accused of having killed the child, so he goes home. He can't even say, "hey, I think I made a monster that did this" because no one will believe him. And this creature shows up and tells him that it killed his brother simply because it hated Victor. It killed a young child because it wanted to hurt Victor. Now it wants Victor to make a second creature like the first.

And, for the record, the creature has been having a hard time because its a giant walking corpse and people aren't giving it a chance to prove that it can read Shakespeare. Here's the thing. The creature is smart. It reads classic literature. It speaks well. It is also cunning. After snapping William's neck, it frames Justine by slipping William's gold locket in her apron pocket.

Victor takes responsibility for this. He is aware at this point that he has fucked around and found out. He feels guilty about his little brother's death, and the execution of his friend. He agrees to create a second creature out of fear, but then decides that he will accept his fate and let the creature kill him because he is afraid that, given how terribly the first creature turned out, he will be endangering more people. What he didn't count on was that the creature would not actually kill him (he is its only shot at getting a companion, after all) and would instead kill his best friend and his wife.

The creature is lonely, but it's first response to rejection was not to seek its creator and ask for a companion. Its response was to murder people weaker than it, then seek out a companion from Victor through threats of violence. Why would he want to help it at that point? Why would he trust it?

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judgeanon · 2 years ago

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Plastic Skies - Model 5: Su-37 Berkut

After that last, highly-demanding build, I made a conscious decision that my next kit would be something simple. No hyper complex camo schemes, no funky weird tools, just a cheap little palate cleanser. At first I thought about getting another of those baby models, but I was lucky enough to find something that not only checked all the boxes, but was also one of my all-time favorite weirdo planes. This, at last, was going to be just fun, dammit.

For those who haven’t had the pleasure, the Berkut is an experimental plane built around the idea of forward-swept wings and other technologies like thrust vectoring. The project was started in the 80s, but the plane itself first took flight in 1997, and while its test results were pretty impressive, it was eventually scrapped for more conventional airplanes. Still, the sole working prototype remained in use as a test bed for further technologies, and along the way, it gained a pretty strong following. Japan in particular seems to adore the Berkut, and it has appeared in pretty much every Ace Combat game since 3. In fact, an amusingly sizeable bunch of online articles about it just straight-up use game renders of the Berkut, even if they feature markings from Ace Combat’s various fictional countries.

But anyway! Beloved weirdo plane. 95% black fuselage. No missiles because it never saw actual combat. And according to online resources, the model had the simplest landing gear doors I’d seen yet. It was fate. Especially at the price the online reseller I bought it from was asking: less than half the price of the last model. Sure, I could tell it was an old kit, but how bad could it be?

The Berkut’s construction was every bit as easy as I imagined it to be. So easy, in fact, that I built it in literally a single day. Although I did make a few ugly mistakes along the way. The biggest one, which is hard to notice unless you see it very up close and/or with the light right over it, was the paint. Thinking I’d need a lot of black, I went overboard on the paint and ended up with some really ugly brush strokes covering most of the model. The glossy varnish I picked for the finish hid some of it, but it was a lesson I’m trying to keep at the forefront of my mind for next time: chill with the paint.

I did, for once, enjoy doing the landing gears. Not just because they were hilariously easy compared to pretty much every other one I’d built, but because it (and the thrusters) gave me a chance to break out the metallic paint. Seriously, I fucking love that stuff. I’m thinking about building another MiG-21 or a Sabre or even another P-51 Mustang just so I can give them the shiniest coat of metallic paint I can find.

The white details were a bit of a problem, but that’s because white paint in general kinda vexes me. For some reason I end up needing at least twice as many coats as any other paints. Maybe it’s a matter of priming, another thing I’ve yet to try with models. But in any case, before I knew it, the Berkut was complete, moving canards and all. It was time to get my decalling on.

I dunked one of the red stars that are supposed to go on the wings on warm water, took it out, removed the excess water, put it on the fuselage and gently poked at it with a toothpick like I’d done with dozens of other decals before. And then it happened. The star shattered completely inside the paper, its points snapping off like twigs. Grimacing, I tried to hold it together, but that just obliterated it further. Before I could do anything else, the star was just a mangle of red decal on a damp piece of paper.

So that sucked, but I knew I had five more stars to use. At worst, I could just not use one of the bottom ones. But I needed to do some testing. I wanted to check if this was a freak accident or if there was something worse going on. I picked a different decal and tried again. It disintegrated even faster than the star. And I gave up on the decals.

A quick online search confirmed my fear: this model kit was released in 2000. It is old enough to drink. Surely, the protective plastic coat around the decals was a hundred times weaker than the toothpicks I used. And while I did find a few ways to solve it, they all require products that I’m not entirely sure what their local equivalents would be. So while I’m definitely gonna be doing some more research about this to try and find a solution, for now, this poor Berkut is gonna remain un-decalled.

Also, one of its tailfins is a bit curved, but ehhhhh. I got what I paid for. It’s still a nice model, and it’ll probably get a little better once I find some gray panel line/wash to really bring the fuselage out, but as it stands, I’m just happy that a couple of sellers have more modern and bigger kits of this plane available.

Like in real life, this Berkut deserved better.

#My Stuff #Hobbies #Journals #This is also the latest model I've built #So far #So it might be a while #Until you see another one of these posts #So hey!#If you have any comments or suggestions or feedback #Now's as good a time as any!#And if you want to show off some of YOUR models #That'd be awesome too!

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helloalycia · 4 years ago

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teenage dirtbag [three] // wanda maximoff

summary: Wanda's boyfriend continues to be an aggravation in your life, causing some distance between you and Wanda

warning/s: none

author's note: i really appreciate the feedback you guys gave in the last part – it’s always motivating to read your reactions/comments 🥰

Sorting things out with Wanda made everything return to normal in no time. So much in fact that she decided I was worth inviting to her and her brother's birthday party.

Never in a million years did I expect the most popular girl in our grade to know who I was, let alone invite me to her birthday party, so to say I was surprised was an understatement.

"It's not a big deal if you can't make it," she said when she handed me the invitation in class. "I mean, I'd love it if you could, but yeah, no pressure."

I was in awe, accepting the invite and reading it quickly. It must have been a pretty expensive party if she was giving out special invites, that's for sure.

"You want me to come?" I asked, still unsure whether this was a joke or not.

"Only if you want to," she said quickly, eyes darting around the room and anywhere but at me. "Like I said, you don't have to. It's not a big deal and– I– yeah." She pressed her lips together and stopped rambling, offering me a small smile.

"Thanks," I said quietly, slotting the invite in my notebook. "I'll, er, I'll think about it."

She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and faced forward, nodding. "Yeah, sure, no rush."

After that awkward conversation, I discovered she'd also invited Y/BF/N, the two of them developing a little friendship the more she'd hung out with me. He didn't mind going, but only wanted to do so if I went.

"I feel like I kinda don't wanna go," I admitted to him after school as we were studying in the library.

"Oh?" He rose an eyebrow. "And why's that?"

I played with the pencil in my hand. "I don't know, it's just– it's gonna be full of all of her other friends. And they don't really like me. Plus, her dick of a boyfriend is gonna be there. I just think she might have invited me to be nice. Like she might have felt like she had to because we sit together, y'know?"

"I think you know that isn't true," he said knowingly. "Maybe, just maybe, she actually wants us there, wants you there, to celebrate her birthday."

I chewed the inside of my mouth, giving it some thought. But the idea of going to Wanda's house party and seeing a bunch of people I didn't care about getting pissed wasn't comforting. Besides, even if I went, I'd probably see Wanda once before she'd get scooped away by Nate. What was the point?

"Nah, I don't think I'm going," I decided. "She won't notice. I'll just get her a present instead."

Y/BF/N sighed, clearly not impressed with my answer. Nonetheless, he said, "Okay, suit yourself."

"You can go if you want," I added, knowing his presence wasn't linked with mine.

"No Y/N, no party," he said with a dismissive shrug, and I couldn't help but smile.

"Such a good friend," I said teasingly, but there was truth to my words. And I knew he knew that.

When I saw photos and videos of Wanda and Pietro's party all over my social media the day after, I knew I'd made the right choice in not going. It was the same visuals of everyone getting drunk, doing stupid shit and making a mess. Call me a loser, but that wasn't really my scene. Pietro and Wanda both seemed to enjoy it though, judging from the pictures.

Instead, I bought her a birthday present, knowing I didn't have to but I kind of wanted to, and planned to give it to her when she turned up to class. It was her birthday today, despite throwing the party over the weekend, so I hoped it would make up for my absence (thought I doubted she noticed).

She showed up and settled beside me as I was writing the date in my notebook, making me look up to see she'd made an extra effort to dress up for her birthday, looking fancier than usual. I couldn't help but smile at the giant '18' birthday badge pinned to her jacket.

"Happy birthday, Wanda," was the first thing I said when I saw her. "You look amazing."

A bashful smile appeared on her lips. "Thank you, Y/N."

"I hope your party went well," I said, giving her my full attention whilst trying not to drool over how beautiful she looked.

Surprisingly, her smile faded and her eyebrows knitted together. "Yeah, it did... could you not make it? I tried looking for you and– yeah..."

I opened my mouth to speak, admittedly a little embarrassed that she'd caught me out. I was sure she wouldn't notice – the pictures made it seem like there were loads of guests, I'd definitely have blended in if I were there – but clearly I was mistaken.

"I just thought–" she began, before shaking her head. "Never mind."

"Sorry, I thought–" I started, but like her, didn't know what to say. "Parties aren't my thing," I admitted truthfully. "But it looked fun. You enjoyed it, right?"

She nodded, a small forced smile on her lips. "Yeah, right. It's cool. No biggie."

I swallowed awkwardly. It seemed like a biggie and now I felt bad.

"I, er, got you a gift," I blurted, hoping to change the subject. Reaching into my backpack, I pulled out the terribly wrapped present and held it out nervously. "I hope you, er, like it."

Her eyebrows raised as her eyes flickered between the present and I. "Oh? You didn't have to. I wasn't expecting anything."

Was it hot in here or was it just me?

I pulled my collar away from my neck, hoping to circulate some air. "I wanted to. It's not a big deal."

She accepted the gift, fingers brushing mine and making me even more nervous, before opening it up. Her eyes sparkled with delight as she revealed a brand new leather paintbrush carry case.

"The one you always carry around is tattered and falling apart, so I thought I'd get you a new one," I explained, feeling like I had to. "I mean, unless the other one has some sort of sentimental value, then in that case, I can just return this."

"Are you kidding? I love it!" she exclaimed, looking to me with a grin. "It's beautiful, Y/N. I don't even know what else to say."

My shoulders relaxed, a relieved smile tugging at my lips. "Good. Th-that's good. I'm glad you like it."

Without warning, she moved forward off her stool and wrapped her arms around my shoulders, pulling me in for a hug. I was startled, unable to think straight with her body pressed so close to mine and her floral perfume wafting into my nose. Why did she have to smell so good?

"Thank you," she muttered, pulling away but not quite letting go. Her eyes were glowing as they watched me carefully, accompanying her weak-in-the-knees smile. I was sure I'd melt. "It means a lot."

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak for fear I'd say something stupid. I resisted the urge to look down at her lips, which were pulled into a small, appreciative smile. She let go of me, looking to the case again and unravelling it. I caught my breath meanwhile, my senses still on override as her perfume lingered.

She was just so damn beautiful.

—

"Okay, how about this – robotic or organic aliens. Which would you rather invade our planet?" Y/BF/N asked.

I chuckled at his question. "Definitely haven't thought about that one, but let's see..."

We were hanging in the bleachers out near the football field as we waited for football practice to end. Y/BF/N had a Film project to do and needed to film the field, so I offered to help like the good friend I was.

"Probably organic," I answered as I balanced on the bleachers, standing up and tiptoeing down them like steps. "At least we could reason with them if they tried to kill us because they'd have a conscience. Robotic aliens would just be programmed to take over and that's it."

Y/BF/N seemed against the idea as he played with his camera. "Yeah, but if they were robotic, all we'd have to do is launch a missile at them and they'd explode. You can break metal. It's harder to break organic matter."

I stifled a laugh. "You've given this much thought, I see."

He gave me a knowing look. "You telling me you don't think aliens exist?"

I stopped tiptoeing and stood still as I looked down at him with humoured eyes. "You know I know aliens exist."

He waved his hand like that was enough reasoning. "There you go then!"

I laughed, wondering how he thought of this stuff, then continued to balance as I walked down the bleachers. Probably the wrong choice as when I heard a voice call me, I looked up, saw it was Wanda, then proceeded to miss a step and fall onto my arse.

"Oh God, Y/N, are you okay?" she asked, moving forward to help me.

My face heated up as Y/BF/N laughed his arse off beside me. I accepted Wanda's hand and let her pull me up, before letting go immediately when I could handle it myself. Her presence always made me nervous, but this was just terrible.

"Yeah, I'm good," I said, glancing at her and freezing at her piercing gaze and suppressed smile.

"You sure?" she asked, glancing at Y/BF/N, before trying to hide her own laughter.

Fuck me, why was I such a mess whenever she was around?

"Very sure," I said, though my back began to ache from where I hit it. "What's up, anyway?"

Y/BF/N finally shut up, to my relief, and Wanda minimised her laughter before scratching her head.

"I'm waiting for practice to end so I can take Pietro home," she said, nodding to the field. "I saw you both sat here and thought I'd say hi. Are you guys watching practice?"

"Not really," I answered, before tilting my head to Y/BF/N. "We're just waiting for it to end so Y/BF/N can film for his project."

"Ooh, that sounds interesting," she said, intrigued and looking to him now. "What's that about?"

As he caught her up on it, I found myself checking Wanda out without realising. She was animated as she listened to Y/BF/N talk about his assignment, eyes giving him all of her attention, and a permanent smile was fixed on her lips as she listened to him. Though it wasn't directed at me, I felt butterflies swirling a storm in my stomach and clutched it, hoping they'd go away. I loved and hated the feeling all at once.

Breaking me from my reverie, a football flew past all three of us and hit the bleachers, startling us all. We looked in the direction it came from and saw the football team looking back at us, some laughing and some disgruntled. Two players ran towards us and when they got close enough, I made them out as Pietro and Nate.

Nate was laughing as he looked between us all, before his gaze fell on me. "It's Y/N, right? I feel like I'm always throwing that thing at you. Sorry about that."

But his constant laughing and lack of guilt refuted his words. I merely clenched my jaw and narrowed my eyes his way, not that he seemed to care nor notice. I was a mere fly in a world that revolved around him. He'd never notice.

"Babe, I'm sorry, I didn't even know you were over here," he added, looking to Wanda. "You okay?"

Wanda crossed her arms and seemed frustrated. "I'm fine, Nate. Just get your ball."

He shrugged and grabbed his ball. Before leaving, he pressed a kiss to Wanda's cheek which made me wince, but she made no attempt in enjoying it. He didn't seem to care as he took off running back to his team. Pietro smiled apologetically at the three of us.

"I'm sorry," he said genuinely. "He can be such a dick sometimes."

That was the understatement of the century.

With that, he turned and ran back to his team to finish up. Wanda sighed, running a hand through her hair, as Y/BF/N and I exchanged glances.

"I should get the car running," she said awkwardly, pointing a thumb over her shoulder and towards the car park. "Good luck with your assignment, Y/BF/N. And I'll see you tomorrow, Y/N."

Waving goodbye with an awkward smile, I watched her leave and wondered the same thing I always did whenever Nate decided to make an appearance in my life.

How could she be dating such a dick?

—

Apart from the birthday party I didn't go to, I'd never been invited (or had a reason to go) to Wanda's house. I'd seen it, rode my bike past it, but never actually been in it. So, when she invited me to her place to work on a project we'd been assigned in class, I was unsure how to feel. She was adamant though and I had no reason to say no, so the only thing left to do was say yes. Even when she offered to drive me there after school.

"This is your car?" I asked with disbelief.

I knew absolutely nothing about cars, but I wasn't blind. Hers was a gorgeous deep red colour with a convertible roof that was currently lowered so anyone in it would feel the sun on their back and wind in their hair.

"Yeah, you like it?" she asked as she got into the driver's seat.

I gulped and sat in the passenger's seat, throwing my backpack at my feet. "It's so nice. You sure you don't mind me drinking in this?"

I had a Pepsi bottle in my hand and was deathly afraid of opening it now in case I spilt it and the cleaning bill would be more than I made in a year at the pizza parlour.

She laughed, already pulling out of the car park. "Of course. Don't be silly."

I glanced in her direction, trying not to get distracted by how good she looked in the driver's seat. She was wearing a red leather jacket, funnily enough, matching the exterior of her car, and she had dark eyeliner around her eyes, accentuating the shape and colour of them and leaving me speechless whenever she looked my way.

"There's CDs in the glove compartment," she was saying as she focused on the road. "Or you can mess around with the radio. It's up to you."

"CDs?" I asked, it piquing my interest. I reached into the glove compartment, adding, "What is this, the 2000s?"

She rolled her eyes playfully, accepting my teasing, as I flicked through the small stack of albums.

"I don't know, I guess I just like having the physical version," she said with a shrug. "It's kind of like a collection."

I chuckled at her need to explain herself, watching the way she rubbed her neck nervously, smiling with embarrassment. Looking back to the albums, a particular one grabbed my attention and I plucked it out with raised brows.

"Oh my God, you like Paramore?" I asked, looking to her with surprise. "Now it's definitely the 2000s."

Her cheeks flushed as she grew flustered. I nudged her in the side gently, getting her attention briefly.

"I'm kidding," I reassured, tilting my head her way playfully. "I actually love Paramore. They're my favourite band."

"Really?" she asked with surprise as I put the CD in her car. I hummed in response, to which she continued, "Have you ever seen them live?"

As For a Pessimist, I'm Pretty Optimistic played quietly in the background, I nodded my head. "Yeah, once. It was a few years ago, but the tickets were shitty and I could just about make them out on stage in the distance."

Wanda laughed, the sound making my heart skip a beat. "No, that's so sad!"

I chuckled in agreement. "Yeah. It was, but oh well. They have a tour coming up this summer, right? Maybe I can get better tickets this time 'round... what about you? Have you ever seen them live?"

She hummed, making a turn at some traffic lights and chewing her lower lip as she focused on doing so. It was definitely the wrong time, but I found myself admiring how attractive it was, especially when her jaw tensed and her defined jawline was on display.

"Yeah, I saw them a few times," she finally responded, pulling me from my stupor. "Some really good seats, some really shitty ones." She giggled at the end, making me smile. "Maybe we could go to that concert in the summer. If you're up for it?"

This seemed like one of those times where you made plans with a friend that you knew would never happen, so to not cause an awkwardness in the conversation, I nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, maybe."

She glanced at me and I mirrored her smile, the flash of excitement in her eyes knocking me breathless.

When we reached her house, I was awestruck at how big it was from the inside. I mean, it looked huge from the outside, but the inside was even better. Her family were rich, I knew that, but this was some other level of rich.

"Here, c'mon, I'll get you a drink, then we can go into the dining room to start," Wanda said, failing to recognise my amazement and instead leading me to the kitchen. "We have tropical juice, apple juice, water, Sprite, Cola... which d'you want?"

I settled at the island, taking a seat and subtly admiring her kitchen. "Er, apple juice is fine with me."

She smiled brightly before pouring me a glass, whilst pouring herself some Sprite. Standing opposite me, we both took a moment to have a drink, but didn't get chance to exchange words as her mum entered the room and noticed me instantly.

"Y/N, it's so lovely to see you again!" she said kindly, patting me on the shoulder before heading to the fridge. "You girls hanging out? Studying?"

"We have a project," Wanda filled in as I nodded in agreement. "We alright to claim the dining room?"

After grabbing some water from the fridge, Wanda's mum pressed a kiss to her daughter's cheek. "Sure thing, sweetie. If you need anything, just let me know." Smiling once more at me, she said, "It's good to see you, Y/N."

"You too," I said with a friendly smile before she left.

"Come on," Wanda said, motioning for me to follow. "We have tons to do."

The next hour and a half was spent with Wanda and I planning out our project, our work sprawled along the dining table messily. We were making progress, until she got a call suddenly. It seemed serious as she gave me an apologetic glance and excused herself. I let her go and leaned back in my seat, wondering what I could do as I waited for her to return. That thought was resolved quite quickly when Pietro popped his head in the doorway and spotted me.

"Y/N! What an honour to welcome you to our humble abode," he exclaimed, entering the room fully. "What brings you here?"

Pietro's presence always brought an amused smile to my lips. "Wanda and I are working on a Chemistry project. She's just nipped out for a phone call."

He tutted dramatically, crossing his arms. "Well, well, well. We can't have that! Wanda needs to learn to entertain her guests. C'mon. I was about to head to the gaming room and could use the company."

I was visibly surprised. "You have a gaming room? Dude, that's awesome!"

He laughed. "C'mon."

Joining Pietro, the two of us headed to this so-called gaming room and I was not disappointed. There was a huge TV with a PlayStation and Nintendo Switch connected to it, a snooker table, a foosball table, a dart board, some old arcade games – it was amazing, any gamer's biggest dream.

"What you feeling, princess?" he said with that flirtatious smile of his.

I rolled my eyes playfully. He was being overtly flirty, more so than his sister was – was it a Maximoff personality trait or something? – and I wasn't sure whether he meant it or was just being his usual self.

"Are you flirting?" I deadpanned, tilting my head curiously. "I can't tell."

He pocketed his hands, swinging back on the heels of his feet. "That depends. Is it working?"

Despite my lack of interest in him like that, I felt my face heat up at the attention. "Pietro, I must tell you that any moves you attempt to make kind of won't work."

"And why's that?" he asked, sitting on the edge of the snooker table with a cheeky smile on his lips. "Am I not your type?"

"Unless you change into a girl, then no," I played along, making him flush with embarrassment. "Hate to break it to you, but I'm gay."

"Okay, I guess that makes sense," he mumbled to himself, before sighing and meeting my eyes. "We can still be friends, right? Or is that forbidden since you're already friends with my sister?"

I laughed and approached him. "Friends works. I don't think Wanda will care. I certainly don't."

He grinned. "Awesome! Well, d'you wanna play a round of foosball?"

"Sure," I said with an amused expression. "Bet I can kick your arse."

He pushed himself off the table and feigned surprise. "Oh? Game on, Y/L/N."

I didn't realise how long Wanda had been on the phone until I managed to get through three rounds of foosball and was in the middle of a snooker game with Pietro.

"You may have beat me at foosball, but you're terrible at this," he pointed out with stifled laughter.

I'd missed my third shot and it was more funny than it was embarrassing.

"Your talking distracts me," I said dismissively, before lining up the next shot with my cue.

He watched as I tried to take my shot before sighing loudly. I glanced at him with a quirked brow.

"You have a thought you'd like to share?" I asked playfully.

He hesitated, moving forward to correct my posture. "Look, if you just aim it like this–"

"Don't even think about it, Romeo," I said jokingly, standing up straight and pushing him away gently. "I know what you're thinking."

He laughed. "What? I was just going to help you aim!"

I gave him a knowing look. "So holding me close is just a bonus?"

"Fine, take your shot without my help and see what happens," he said dismissively, waving his hand.

"I'll do just that," I said with confidence, before bending down and taking my shot. The ball hit the other and neither were pocketed, which was an achievement as I'd got the cue ball in several times before, but still pretty shit as I didn't score any points.

Pietro smiled with satisfaction, leaning on his cue. "You happy with that?"

I held in a laugh as I looked to him. "Shut up."

He chuckled before bumping me out the way. "Now for the professional."

Bending down to take his shot, he pulled back his cue before hitting the balls. They rolled around on the table and one ball was about to go in, but I quickly grabbed it before he could get the point.

"Y/N!" he shouted between laughter. "That's cheating!"

"Technically we didn't establish rules," I pointed out, before moving backwards as he tried to grab it from my hand. "What do you say to calling it a draw and playing something else?"

"I say that's a childish way to admit you've lost," he responded, before moving forward quickly. I dodged his attempt and he pursed his lips. "Y/N."

"Pietro."

He smirked. "Seriously?"

I grinned.

He tried to grab it again and ended up chasing me around the room as I avoided giving in. Taking the piss out of Y/BF/N enough times had prepared me for moments like this, so I was able to avoid Pietro long enough to run into whoever walked through the door.

"Shit, Wanda, I'm sorry," I said between laughter, steadying both me and her.

She smiled with confusion, about to speak, but Pietro caught up to me and lifted me up, throwing me onto the couch before I could protest.

"No more cheating," he said sternly, as I lifted my head from the pile of cushions on the couch to look up at him.

"You're an arse," I said, pushing myself up off the couch.

"And you're a sore loser!"

We had a mini staring competition before the two of erupted into laughter.

"You're not half bad, Pietro," I complimented as he helped me up.

"Thank you, princess," he said, the flirtatious smile on his lips again.

I shoved him in the shoulder playfully before looking to Wanda, who was chewing on her lip as she looked between Pietro and I with an unreadable expression.

"So, what prompted you to leave Y/N alone for an hour?" Pietro asked, wrapping an arm around my shoulder, making me shove him away. He grinned at me before looking to Wanda.

"Nate called," Wanda responded carefully, arms crossed as she continued to look between us. God, I hoped she didn't think Pietro and I liked each other. That would be embarrassing.

Pietro scoffed from beside me, making Wanda sigh with annoyance.

"Don't start, Piet," she said and gave him a look which he seemed to understand.

By the sounds of it, Pietro didn't seem to like Wanda's dick of a boyfriend either. That was strange since wasn't impressing the brother the first part of being in a relationship with someone? And they were on the same football team, so I figured he'd at least tolerate him.

"Are we alright to get back to studying?" Wanda asked, directing her stare to me. The annoyance she held for Pietro was still present in her eyes and I suddenly felt nervous when she looked my way.

"Yeah, of course," I said, before giving Pietro a half-smile. "Rematch at snooker next time. Sound good?"

"Try to keep the balls on the table and we'll see," he teased, before nodding to Wanda. "You should get back to your project before Wanda kills us both with her deadly glare."

I smiled awkwardly, looking back to Wanda as she was indeed glaring at her brother. Clearly there was some sibling rivalry going on here, and I definitely didn't want to get in the middle of it, so I headed to Wanda, signalling I was ready to leave.

The two of us headed back to the dining room in an uncomfortable silence. I felt like I'd done something wrong and she was giving me the silent treatment which was strange. Then I figured it was probably something with Nate that made her annoyed, so didn't question it too much.

We sat back down and I looked at what we'd done so far to try and pick up where we left off, but then she spoke out of the blue, taking me by surprise.

"Do you like my brother?"

It was so abrupt that I took a moment to acknowledge it, blinking. "What?"

"Pietro," she clarified, saying it with such dismissiveness like it wasn't a big deal. Her attention was on the books before us as she continued, "Do you like him?"

I tried not to laugh as I shook my head. "No, Wanda. I mean, don't get me wrong, he's a great guy. But yeah, no, I don't like him like that."

She chewed her lip, nodding, but I swear I saw a hint of a smile on her lips. I hoped it wasn't the thought of Pietro and I that made her annoyed. I wasn't that bad, was I? I know she cared about her brother and was probably overprotective, but me being his girlfriend couldn't have been that bad, right?

We got back to work in no time, getting a lot done. I didn't realise how late it was getting until Wanda's mum poked her head in, asking if I wanted to stay for dinner.

"Dinner?" I asked, eyebrows raising with surprise. I checked my watch and realised how long I'd been here. "Damn, maybe I should head back."

"Nonsense, you must stay," her mum insisted. "Y/M/N won't mind. A daughter of hers is a daughter of mine."

"You can even sleepover if you want," Wanda offered, and I almost choked on my own spit. "It's getting pretty late."

I shook my head, forcing a small smile so they wouldn't get offended. "Honestly, it's fine. I can head back."

"Please?" Wanda asked with a hopeful expression. "It's the least I can do. I kinda wasted your time for an hour earlier..."

"I should ask my mum," I said, chewing on the inside of my mouth.

"Oh, I'll ring and let her know," Wanda's mum said breezily, before looking to Wanda. "D'you think you can clear your things up? Your brother is gonna set the table."

"Sure, mum." Wanda smiled her way as she left, before looking to me. "I've got clothes and a spare toothbrush you can use tonight."

I smiled awkwardly, nodding. Sleeping over at my crush's house wasn't how I thought I'd be spending my Wednesday evening, yet here we were.

#wanda maximoff au #wanda maximoff x you #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda maximoff #elizabeth olsen #marvel imagine #mcu imagine #marvel #mcu

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charming-mage · 4 years ago

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The Search For Marinette Dupain-Cheng

This is my take on my prompt The Search For Marinette Dupain-Cheng.

You know, I always wondered about Marinette taking care of Akumas while overseas. If she takes too long, she’ll scare her loved ones half to death. Can’t rush too much or else she risks losing her miraculous because of it. Since no one is aware of her identity, she doesn’t have anyone to cover for her. Friends who are unaware of the truth will cover her for so long before they have to fess up.

In salt fics, the class usually doesn’t care where Marinette is on Gotham trips. Here, they give a shit.

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In which Lila messes with some signs and Marinette gets lost when she comes back late (via Kaalki) after dealing with an Akuma attack in France.

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The two week school field trip in Tokyo was supposed to be an enjoyable experience. There’s booked reservations at classy restaurants, a fancy hotel with a big pool, shows, and tours throughout Tokyo. Lila is most looking forward to the fashion expo. If she doesn’t do something soon, it looks like she’ll miss out on that too. Marinette been missing for two days and Lila is already sick of it.

All because she miscalculated in a spur of the moment plan.

“Marinetteeee! Where are you,” shouts a crying Alya. The girl spots a few tourists and shoves a flier in their faces. Nino joins in with his own fliers. “Have you seen my friend Marinette Dupain-Cheng? Cutest French girl you’ve ever seen with a heart of gold. So kind she’d innocently help a stranger, unaware they’re a bad guy.” The tourists each give a half hearted ‘no’ before speed walking away.

“Walk faster Lila! Marinette can be anywhere.”

Lila puts on a concerned mask. “Of course.”

All this time wasted just because she moved some signs.

She hadn’t meant for Marinette to go missing. Only to buy some time so she can guilt trip Adrien to be her partner for the fashion expo.

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The day before, the class went to a big nature park. It’s notable for its many trails. The deeper you went into the park, the denser the trees are. They all partnered up and to her dismay she got Nathaniel instead of Adrien. The best thing about the artist is that he gets so into drawing the sights he doesn’t notice when she wanders off. It gave her more time to plot how to switch partners with the least amount of fuss.

During one of her secret plotting sessions, she heard a very loud conversation farther down the trail she’s on. Rose shouts for Marinette to not split up, and Marinette screams back a blatant lie about wanting to see a moose in the Relaxation Trial. Also to not expect her for forty minutes. Total hypocrite this girl is. ‘We can only be friends if you stop lying.’ Sure, and it’s okay for only Marinette to lie. Everyone else who does so is bad. Can’t even tell Rose you honestly want to ditch her.

When Lila noticed the Relaxation Trail sign nearby, an idea formed in her head. She ducked into a bush to hide. When Marinette ran into the trail and her map fell out of her bag Lila burst into action.

It took a little adjustment to the multiple sign post. It wasn’t too hard as the signs on the pole were already a little loose. Just needed to switch the sign that led back to the meetup with the Reflection Trial sign. According to the map, the Reflection one is a winding trial leading to a dead end. Marinette would be forced to walk all the back as the park employees told them it’s easy to get lost if you go off the trial. Aside from putting some sticks on the map, it was left mostly alone as she wanted her rival to use it to get back to base. She may not have liked Marinette, but she didn’t want anything horrible to happen to her.

By the time it got dark, Marinette still hadn’t gotten back to the meetup point. Forty minutes had already flown by. Lila hadn’t noticed as she was trying to convince Adrien to switch partners and tell everyone it was his idea. If Marinette was here the noisy girl would have interfered.

Rose’s cry of alarm got the others to find out Marinette was missing. The goodie two shoes wasn’t answering Rose’s calls. A quick check near the Relaxation Trial sign revealed Marinette’s map had flown into a bush.

The field trip went downhill from there.

The police were called. Afterwards, it’s discovered the cameras in that area were down much to Lila’s relief. Even though she feels a bit responsible, she’s not admitting to anything. Even if she did confess, it’s not like it’ll help the police. Doing so will get her in huge trouble and gain scrutiny in her actions from then on. How will telling what she did help find Marinette? It’d be for nothing.

When it comes down to it, Lila’s self preservation is above Marinette’s well being.

Some good fun will keep her mind from unpleasant things. Too bad no one besides Lila is interested in the scheduled events. This is a vacation, so going to a few events is a must. The class just want to spend time searching for Marinette. The transfer student wouldn’t have minded hanging up missing posters or spreading the word. This class takes it to another level.

Every waking moment is spent looking for Marinette. Breaks become a treasured time. They walk many miles each day. Max posts missing posters in Japanese forums. Alya bothers the police for updates. Adrien even got Chole (who stayed in Paris) to pull some strings to get more attention in the local news.

Because of Marinette’s disappearance, they have to stay in groups of at least three. No exceptions. So if Lila wants to do anything, she needs to convince any group she’s in to go with her.

It’s more challenging than expected.

Day 5

"Hey guys, why don’t we take our break inside the museum we were supposed to go to? It has air conditioning and we can look at some stuff for a bit while we’re sitting down.”

“Sorry Lila, I’m not in the mood to admire art.”

“I agree with Nathaniel. Just doesn’t feel right.”

Day 8

“Let’s go on the sightseeing tour. We can look for Marinette while we’re on it.”

“No thanks.”

“Nah, a taxi is better as we can choose where to drive.”

Day 10

“.....my leg injury is acting up. It’s okay to leave me here. I don’t mind.”

“No way Lila. We’re not leaving you alone on a bench outside Universal Studios. What if we lose you too?”

“.............”

Day 11

Lila has had it with these people. Reservations and events have been canceled. Solemn, awkward moping. Refusal to do anything but looking for Marinette. The only event left is the one she’s been most looking forward to: the fashion expo. Through some maneuvering and sneakiness, no one remembered to cancel the expo tickets.

There’s no way in hell she wants to miss this event: a lecture by Edna Mode herself. There’s rumors circling the fashion industry the famous designer is going to explore a new clothing line. Along with finding a muse for it.

The previous class activities can be let go without much struggle. Not this one, though. This could be the golden ticket to a very prestigious job. Even more than being a Gabriel model.

There’s a chance things might go right this time. The group is filled by pushovers Adrien, Rose, and Juleka. As long as she stays firm, they’ll go along with her plan.

With the directions in mind, Lila manages to slyly maneuver the group to walk outside Tokyo Big Sight. The sight of the Edna Mode banners hanging outside the arena fills her with excitement.

Lila coughs for their attention. “Guys, it’s time for our lunch break. We need the energy to keep this up.”

Rose reluctantly says, “Oh you’re right Lila. Can you pass out our lunches please?”

“Sure thing.” She reaches into the bag and whoops. There’s conveniently no lunch bags in there. “Oh no guys, there’s only water bottles in here.”

“It’s okay Lila, we can buy some food nearby.” Rose digs out her phone. “Hmm... I think there’s a cheap fast food place nearby.”

“There’s no need to look far. We can just go into the expo. They have to have some food near the entrance.”

There’s silence at her words.

Juleka narrows her eyes. “Why do I feel you just want to go to the expo?”

Lila is surprised Juleka of all people is calling her out. “No, no. It’s just, why walk more when there’s food right here.”

“Lila, do you not care about finding Marinette?,” a sad Rose asks.

“How could you say that? Of course I do! We worked so hard and we deserve a break. Marinette would understand.”

Rose snaps. “Understand? Every minute counts! We might never see Marinette ever again. She could be injured and alone, kidnapped, or worse! If one of us was missing, she wouldn’t give up.”

The fire in Rose’s eyes startles Lila. Never thought she’d see the bubbly girl break her happy persona.

“No one said anything about giving up. Besides, the police are looking-”

“That doesn’t mean we should sit by and do nothing.” Rose tears up. “It’s my fault Marinette is gone. If I didn’t let her run off on her own, she would still be here.”

Juleka gives a comforting hug to Rose.

Adrien speaks up. “I know you don’t like Marinette, but I never thought you would sink so low. It’s one thing if you’re not interested in helping. It’s another to actively interfere in something our friends care about.”

“I d-d-o care. We can pick up search after we eat.” It’s not like Lila wanted to prevent them from searching for Marinette. Ms. Bustier has forbidden anyone from being on their own. So she needed someone to be with her in order to do something.

Lila spent so much time reassuring them, they missed the lecture.

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“---Breaking News! A French teenager stopped a missile launch by terrorists. Marinette Dupain-Cheng went missing during her class’ field trip. Miraculously, she disabled their base of operations, rescued a Princess, fought against pirates, escaped on the back of a deer, got their leader to surrender to the authorities-”

“That’s our every day Ladybug.” Alya hugs the TV with tears of joy. “Obviously she’d save the day while missing.” The reporter actually hissed when a stranger tried to tell her to stop hogging the TV. No one attempted removing her after that.

Since Ms. Bustier is currently with the police to bring Marinette back, there’s no one to reign in the partying classmates. Alix somehow convinced the hotel to give them a big complementary celebration cake.

The only person not celebrating is an angry Lila. Glaring at her phone, the headlines riles her up every time she sees it.

Edna Mode’s First Baby Fashion Line

The Inspiration Behind the New Designs

“My godson is my inspiration-”

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Jack-Jack is Edna’s muse. Lol.

To save you a google search, this park mentioned in this fic is made up. It’s based on a bunch nature parks I’ve been to before. Tokyo does have parks and nature trials, though. In case you missed it, an attack happened in the late afternoon and Marinette got back at night (when it got dark) in Japan Standard Time. Keep in mind there is a 8 hour difference between these countries.

With this completed, I can finish chapter two of Dupont’s Worst Nightmare. :)

#lila salt #lila rossi #miraculous ladybug #answeredprompt #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #thesearchformarinettedupaincheng

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vizowrites · 3 years ago

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My BlitzStrike Twins: Headcanons and Shenanigans~ [probably with a bit of my M&M kids thrown in just for fun]

So today I got a couple of fantastic asks about Blitz and Striker as parents, and since there seemed to be a pretty positive response to them--and because @helluva-simp is amazing and encouraged me to be brave enough to write this up--I thought I’d go ahead and make a full post of my headcanons for these two little devils. I really do love the hell out of them and hope you guys enjoy hearing about them too!! <3 <3

Twist’s and Ty’s full names are Twister and Typhoon but literally nobody calls them by their full names ever so they like to make the joke of “the ‘-er’ and the ‘-phoon’ are silent”

Ty is actually the older of the two [though not by much] but everyone thinks that Twist is because his name is always called first. It’s always “Twist and Ty” [or just collectively “Twist-Ty”] instead of “Ty and Twist”. Ty honestly doesn’t mind that much as far as following after his brother goes, just don’t make the mistake of trying to label him as the younger of the two. There are a lot of things Ty’s perfectly content to let Twist take the lead in, but having the title of “the older twin” is just going too far.

Twist and Ty are mirror twins, meaning that they’re mostly identical except for a few key things: 1. Twist is left handed and Ty is right handed, 2. they both have heterochromia but Twist’s eyes are Left: Red | Right: Green-Gold whereas Ty’s eyes are Left: Green-Gold | Right: Red, 3. Twist has a birthmark on his right hand and Ty has his birthmark on his left hand--and yes when you put the two marks together, they form a design not unlike the heart shaped one on Blitz’s forehead :)

Both of the twins are incredibly agile, but Twist is faster and Ty is more flexible

Striker affectionately calls Twist “Whirlwind” because of said fastness

Blitz affectionately calls Ty “Noodle” because of said flexibility

.....Though it should be noted that it’s not all fun and games because Twist is CONSTANTLY crashing into things or tripping over his own two feet from going too fast, and Ty is so flexible that he’s able to contort himself into positions that honestly make both of his parents throw up a little in their mouths with the split-second panic of “OH GOD OUR BABY WAS BORN WITHOUT BONES!!” DX DX They’re both usually just fine tho!! :D

As noted in an earlier post--but I want to say it here too--Twist’s first word was “Bang!” and Ty’s first word was “Fuck!” Twist was the first one to talk, though, and it made Striker and Blitz second guess the context of his first word by the time Ty said his. XD

Another thing that was noted in another post but I want to put it here too is that Twist and Ty have incredibly high self esteem and both Striker and Blitz wouldn’t have it any other way

Twist is dyslexic and so gets easily frustrated when he has to read a book, but he love love LOVES the hell out of stories.....and so Ty is almost constantly making up random stories to tell him

This actually also works out well in Ty’s favor because Ty’s attention span is about as short as Blitz’s patience and he has a lot more fun telling stories than he does sitting still long enough to read the ones that other people made up unless it’s a book about something he’s reeeeeeally interested in

It’s also made Ty hella good at bullshitting on the fly, which I think most of the older/adult members of his family wish he was a lot less convincing at

Twist knows how to lie and is a natural at acting, but his flair for the over-dramatics tends to give him a way a lot easier than his twin

They both have what I’m calling a “hierarchy of obedience” within their family which really translates into a range of “eh I can think about maybe listening to this person sometimes” to “oh SHIT I need to listen to this person 5 fucking minutes ago”. For Twist, his hierarchy of obedience is: Millie --> Blitz --> Striker --> Loona --> Moxxie. For Ty, his hierarchy of obedience is: Loona --> Millie --> Blitz --> Striker.....and Moxxie doesn’t even make the list for him because honestly I’m pretty sure Ty just naturally tunes him out most of the time and not even fully on purpose. As he puts it: “You just have one of those voices”. XD

Ty can sleep literally anywhere and on anything. I’m pretty sure there have been mornings where Blitz and Striker have to play the game of 'Where the hell is my kid??' because they THOUGHT that he went to sleep in his bed like their other child did but NOPE they go into their room in the morning to get them out of bed and are just like, “.....Twist where the hell is your brother??” and Twist just gives an innocent shrug and says, “I don’t know--probably on the roof or something.” u3u and goes out into the kitchen to make himself breakfast--and then two seconds later Blitz and Striker hear him calling out “NEVER MIND! HE’S IN THE OVEN!!” and that starts off a whole new kind of panic because they know damn well that Twist’s favorite thing to have for breakfast is cinnamon rolls XD

Twist’s laughter is infectious--this really cute witch-like cackling that just bubbles out of him in the most adorably genuine way when he’s that delighted about someting

Ty does this adorable thing where--when he sticks his tongue out at someone--he flicks it in a very snake-like fashion and even gives the tiniest of hisses in lieu of a raspberry when he does it

Ty also manages to twist himself into the most uncomfortable-looking positions when he sleeps but rest assured, he’s never been more comfy

Twist’s tail never stays still. It is constaintly flicking to and fro, back and forth, swishing and swirling like a cat’s tail, and he loves flicking it in front of people’s faces to get their attention

Twist in general doesn’t really stay still very often but the one time he did was when Ty broke his arm--and then he spent almost every moment of the day and night plastered to his side because he knew it was driving Ty crazy not being as mobile as he usually is while having to wear a cast

The twins really don’t ever go that far apart from each other. If you look and only see the one, you can rest assured that the other one is around somewhere nearby and it’s probably not a good sign for you if you can only see the one.

Ty is much more of a biter when it comes to self-defense and Twist always goes straight to using his claws

Twist is the outwardly more protective twin and is vicious with his words when defending his brother. He will force every last ounce of moisture out of your body from how hard he makes you cry.

Ty, on the other hand, will fuck you up hard physically if you try to hurt his twin--and Lucifer himself would not be able to save you if you actually do hurt his twin

As they get older, and their sexualities and gender develop and grow, Twist would discover that he’s a nonbinary he/they homosexual panromantic and Ty would discover that he’s a genderfluid he/she pansexual homoromantic

The above being said, both Twist and Ty wholeheartedly say “fuck you and your gender norms” from a very young age and well into their teenage and adult years, with Twist enjoying painting his nails and Ty carrying all of his stuff around in a purse--and they both have a preference for wearing high heeled shoes [Ty because he just likes being tall in general and Twist because he likes being specifically taller than his parents because it drives them crazy XD]

Twist and Ty’s best friend is “Missi” [Moxxie and Millie’s eldest daughter, Missile] and she’s honestly an absolute hero for putting up with as many of their shenanigans as she does

Whenever they go out on family outings, Twist is that kid who just NEVER wants to leave--and so Blitz usually, after spending ten minutes of trying to get him in the damn van and Striker even using his Dad Tone (TM) and that not working, will just be like, “Alright kiddo, I tried playing nice. You asked for this.” And he puts his fingers to his mouth and whistles with a, “Loona Sweetie? Fetch.” >3 And Loona gets the BIGGEST grin on her face and Twist gets the biggest “oh shit I’m so fucking screwed” look on his face and Ty--who’s honestly probably very awkwardly coiled up in Striker’s arms because after a long day of family fun he’s tired af and decided that he doesn’t want to use his limbs anymore--just kind of looks over at his twin and says, “I believe in you, but also maybe try to run faster than last time” u3u

I think that they would both love their Auntie Barbie a lot and she would have soooooooo much fun teaching them different circus tricks--especially how to yeet each other back and forth on the trapeze XD

I also think that their Auntie Barbie would really love just how close they are.....and probably inspire her to make up for lost time in her relationship with her own twin too

For some reason I can’t shake the thought of the twins being great at acapella and I have no idea why but I’m also ttly here for it XD

In school, I feel like Twist’s favorite class would be Art [he loves to paint and happily makes all kinds of messes with his “expressing creativity”] and Ty’s favorite class would be P.E./Gym [because he loves testing the limits of his physical body]

Family game nights are always fun in their household because usually what happens is Twist and Ty team up against Blitz and Striker, and while they’re in the middle of duking it out, Loona ends up getting a monopoly on every street and is just like, “Pay up fuckers.” u3u

Moxxie and Millie both love and hate babysitting for the twins because on the one hand, they love them to pieces and love seeing how well they get along with their three kids, but on the other hand.....the twins keep finding Millie’s strap on and putting it on their middle child [Mark]’s head and calling him a “cockicorn” XD

Ty’s favorite food is ramen noodles and Twist spent three weeks [and probably set their kitchen on fire at least twice] learning how to make them with JUST the right flavor profile that he knows his brother likes the best

While I think both of the twins know that they can talk to their dads about anything, I think that they still keep their most personal thoughts reserved only to themselves and each other

Twist’s favorite type of weaponry tends to be more of the flashy ‘sharp and pointy’ kind whereas Ty’s favorite type of weaponry tends to be more of the aggressive ‘point and shoot’ kind. However I honestly kind of think that in terms of what they’d use themselves in the field, Twist’s primary weapon of choice would be a whip [though he would definitely have some throwing knives and handheld revolvers in his back pocket too] and Ty’s primary weapon of choice is honestly poisons. Assume that everything this kid has that he throws at you--be it a knife or a bullet or even a fucking cannonball--is poisoned somehow.

They both definitely play wrestle like Blitz and Barbie did as kids.....and just like Blitz and Barbie, they also get their horns tangled together more than once and need to have someone come rescue them. There’s almost always a photo taken that gets posted to Voxtigram first tho. XD

There are plenty more headcanons where this came from but I feel like this is already waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too fucking long so I’m going to go ahead and stop here for tonight!! If you guys are interested in hearing more about these two, please please please feel free to let me know and I’d be happy to write up a Part 2 to this, or just overall write up a quick little oneshot with them in it, or if you want to send me specific questions about them that I can answer, feel free to do so!! Thanks so much again and I hope you guys have as much fun reading these as I did writing them up!! <3 <3

#vizowritesheadcanons #BlitzStrike twins #ocs: Twist and Ty #BlitzStrike #Striker x Blitzo #Blitzo x Striker #Helluva Boss AU where Blitz and Striker are parents #I.M.P. family fun #kid AU

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sineala · 4 years ago

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A Few Thoughts About Hurt/Comfort

I have been asked this month to make a post about hurt/comfort in Avengers comics. And I love h/c -- I actually have a massive number of WIPs right now that are h/c -- so I am very happy to talk about it! Anyway, this is not really all that planned out and this mostly turned into an excursus on Tony Stark's pain. I'm sure you're all surprised.

Like pretty much everyone else, I'm sure, I have found that everything lately has been... pretty tough. And the coping mechanism that really got me through last year and this year was reading and writing a lot of h/c, on the theory that, however lousy a day I'm having, I can absolutely make sure that Tony Stark has a worse one. And then I can make sure he gets hugs. Wish fulfillment? Why, yes. (Once at Hallmark I was trying to find a "get well soon" card, forgot what it was called, and described it to my wife as "a hurt/comfort card.") I think Marvel Comics -- the Avengers side, in particular -- is an interesting canon for h/c for a lot of reasons. Though, honestly, if you asked me to recommend you, a hurt/comfort fan, a new fandom, I would probably just hand you some Starsky & Hutch DVDs. Go watch "The Fix" and get back to me later. If you like that, there's way more where that came from. But there's still lots to love in Marvel! Superhero comics are really a goldmine as far as the hurt side of h/c. Because superheroes, and you probably have noticed this, get hurt a lot. They get hurt repeatedly, in fantastical ways that are probably impossible in real life both physically and emotionally (at least, I don't think anyone's invented mind control yet), and even the heroes without superhuman healing powers tend to get physically hurt a whole lot worse than actual people can take. Currently in Iron Man comics, Tony has a broken back and is dealing with this by locking himself into the armor as a backboard and injecting himself with massive doses of painkillers. He's busy! He's got stuff to do! He doesn't have time to lie around and heal! So, basically, if you name a kind of pain that you would like to see happen to a character, it's probably happened to superheroes. Multiple times. The downside, though, is that comics do not really deliver that well when it comes to the comfort part of h/c. They could. It's not inherent to the medium that they don't. But because of the serial nature of comics and also the fact the primary audience is dudes who want to read about people in spandex punching each other, a lot of the time they don't really feel the need to provide closure and write about people dealing with any of the hurt. (Raise your hand if you're still annoyed with the end of Hickman's Avengers run.) But at the same time, I think that's a quality that makes Avengers ripe for h/c fanfic. Because, generally speaking, fandom likes to provide the things that canon doesn't, and fandom is more than happy to provide the comfort. If you enjoy canonical h/c in comics, I think you really can't go wrong with Iron Man. One of the big innovations of modern Marvel Comics was the concept that heroes would also suffer from relatable human problems, and in practice what this means is that a lot of heroes start with a fully-loaded angst-ridden backstory and origin story, ripe for h/c. So Tony starts out by incurring a heart injury that he fully expects is going to kill him, which he responds to by vowing he won't get close to anyone so they won't be sad when he dies, and throughout the early Silver Age is constantly on the brink of death as his heart nearly gives out on him practically every issue. And then even after his heart gets (mostly) better, there are various plots involving his armor being detrimental to his health and him choosing to fight on anyway. It's hard for me to think of another superhero hitting that particular variety of h/c in exactly the same way. Sure, superheroes risk their lives constantly, because this is how superhero comics work, but Tony is the only one I can think of who is this constantly this badly off, physically. Like, think of all the other heroes who have had a continual solo presence as fan favorites across Marvel history -- Captain America, Thor, Spider-Man, Wolverine, maybe even Deadpool. You know what those guys all have? Healing factors! For the most part, they are not running around continually on the verge of death, and while there are certainly memorable arcs involving several of them being severely injured and/or dead, you really have to work at it. It's not their constant state of affairs, whereas Tony is the kind of superhero who shows up to a fight already bleeding out under his armor. Yeah, I know Extremis gave him a healing factor. But he didn't have it very long, and also he did some extremely dangerous things while he did have it; I'm pretty sure I've never seen Wolverine saying that he'll just solve a problem by cutting off his own foot. So, anyway, yeah, there are a bunch of good arcs involving h/c for Tony. If you're looking for physical injury, he has a whole bunch of heart problems over the years, gets several new hearts, then ruins his brain, et cetera. That level of hurt is basically the background pain of Tony's life; every so often, his heart will get damaged or he'll have to live in the armor or the armor will be killing him, et cetera. If you're looking for more unusual trauma, I am, as always, going to rec Manhunt, a relatively obscure arc in late v3 (IM v3 #65-69) in which Tony has an extremely bad week. His tech is stolen and used to bomb a building. Then he gets shot in the chest. Then while he's at the hospital a nurse tries and fails to poison him, and she then tries to beat him to death. Then he checks himself out of the hospital and a helicopter shoots missiles at him. Then he becomes a fugitive from justice. And then, oh, yeah, he has to fight the Mandarin. It is... a lot. (Volume 3 of Iron Man is pretty good as far as h/c possibilities. You've got a lot of physical pain, Carol's drinking arc, the Sentient Armor, both DreamVision arcs, and Manhunt. Manhunt is finally supposed to be out in trade this month, by the way.) There are of course the drinking arcs, which probably count as their own type of hurt. But if you haven't read the second drinking arc (IM #160-200), please do. Marvel likes to up the stakes on events (Fear Itself, Secret Empire) by making Tony drink, and it does work, I think. I feel like I've spoken at length about Tony's drinking elsewhere so I don't really want to rehash it all here. And then there's the emotional pain. Angst and drama is something that happens to a whole bunch of characters, yes, especially in comics, but somehow Tony seems to end up with possibly more than his fair share of it. Fandom likes to make a lot of Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, so much so that you might think, if you didn't know canon, that this was just fandom running with a throwaway mention of Tony's terrible childhood and making it worse. But, no, canon really does go there with a reasonable amount of frequency. Howard's actual first appearance is in a flashback where he's ordering teenage Tony to break up with his girlfriend because she's the daughter of one of Howard's business rivals. And then we get into the verbal abuse, and the physical abuse, and the time Howard made Tony take his first drink, and the part where Howard was a demon in hell who Tony fought while he insulted him. And more! Currently, in canon, Howard is alive again and is in league with Mephisto for the express purpose of ruining Tony's life. Also when Tony was a baby, Howard tried to trade him to Dracula. I think you can make an argument that fandom is actually showing restraint when compared to canon. Tony also has a whole lot of Terrible Exes whose presence and/or former presence in Tony's life can be used for a lot of hurt. If you've read any amount of fanfic, you probably know that the exes who get the most play in fandom are Sunset Bain and Tiberius Stone -- not that Tony and Ty were ever canonically a couple, of course, but fandom is definitely enamored of this idea. Ty and Sunset both have relatively similar interactions with Tony in canon, in that they are both liars and emotional abusers, heavy on the gaslighting, with the purpose of becoming more successful than Tony. They both also attempt to murder Tony, although this is after he figures out they're evil, at least. (Yes, I know, this is not how either of them usually appear in AUs.) Tony also has a bunch of exes who also have just straight-up tried to murder or otherwise hurt him, sometimes while they are dating, and sometimes before Tony dates them: Whitney Frost, Indries Moomji, Kathy Dare, and Maya Hansen come to mind. There are probably more I'm not thinking of! But, yes, if you want to write about a guy in a series of terrible relationships, please consider Iron Man comics. If mind control is one of your favorite flavors of hurt, Tony's pretty good for that too. We all know about The Crossing. I suppose when I say "mind control" I mostly mean "armor control" because there are an awful lot of plots where someone else makes Tony's armor do whatever they want it to do and Tony is along for the ride -- Demon in a Bottle, Sentient Armor, and Execute Program are the first things that come to mind. There is also a fairly obscure What If that is What If Iron Man Lost The Armor Wars in which Justin Hammer apparently really wants Tony in a mind control collar to take off all his clothes and lounge around in his underwear. No, really. I think a lot of pain for Tony often revolves around his issues with control, generally -- his alcoholism comes into play here again. The entire aftermath of Civil War is also notable for its propensity to hurt Tony over and over and over. Is he stoically soldiering on through his grief after Steve dies? Hell, no! He cries, like, six separate times. He 100% blames himself for Steve's death. It's great. Everybody loves The Confession and the funeral in Fallen Son, but one of my personal favorites is Avengers/Invaders, in which Tony is confronted with a time-traveling Steve from WWII and in order not to screw up the timeline, he can't tell Steve he knows him. He is clearly not coping well. He shuts himself in a room with a giant wall of pictures of Steve! Also there's a part where he has to try to convince Steve he can trust him and he ends up having to tie Steve to a chair to talk to him, and Steve looks at him and asks, "Who did you kill to get where you are?" and I feel like that is probably one of the worst moments in Tony's life. No wonder he gave himself amnesia. So now we might want to ask, okay, but why is hurting Tony in fanfiction so much fun? I mean, I can tell you why I think it's fun. I can't speak for anyone else. One reason is that he is very emotional and very affected by everything he does. Sometimes you will see people complaining that the heroes of m/m fanfic cry too much and this is not realistic. This is not a problem if you're writing Tony! He can cry as much as you want and it's perfectly in character. I don't think it would be as fun to hurt him if he didn't express so much of his pain. But he does. He also feels guilty, and for me that's a very satisfying character element. If he were well-adjusted and didn't blame himself for so many things, it wouldn't be nearly as fun as watching him blame himself for everyone whose death he thinks he is responsible for, whether or not he is. And then he just keeps going, and it's, y'know, nice to watch him be resilient, too. So, I guess, I think hurting him is interesting because it's easy to hurt him, his weak points are pretty obvious, and he reacts a lot. Steve doesn't hurt quite as much as Tony does, in canon. It's certainly possible to hurt him -- I mean, they did actually kill him after Civil War, after all -- but I don't think the canonical patterns of hurting him are as numerous. Obviously deseruming Steve is a fairly popular go-to in terms of physical hurt; he's been deserumed at least three times that I know of. I think's easy to see the appeal there of taking a character who is fairly physically resilient and making him... much less so. Certainly Marvel seems to see the appeal. But other than that I don't think he has any other really common way to get physically injured. Unlike Tony, whose origin story is basically "oh no, I've acquired a disability," Steve's origin story is "I drank a serum that cured all my disabilities." Which, I mean, great wish fulfillment but there's not really as much there to poke at. Pretty much all of Steve's pain is emotional, but, unlike Tony, his pain isn't often specifically in response to someone directly, purposefully hurting him. Hickman's Avengers run is a big exception, yes. His pain seems to come up most often as a kind of situational angst. He feels like a man out of time. He feels out of touch with the modern era, with people his own age. He feels guilt because he feels responsible for Bucky's death. He feels like he can't trust the government and therefore he can't be Captain America. He worries that he doesn't know how to have a normal life. And, yes, these are deep and important worries but it's different than, like, Indries Moomji dumping Tony with the intent to make him sad enough to start drinking. Very few of Steve's villains want to personally ruin Steve's entire life the way Tony's villains do; mostly they just want to do things like bring back the Nazis. In terms of Steve's potential for h/c, I think Steve is harder to hurt than Tony is. Physically, he is definitely harder to hurt. You can deserum him, sure, but unless you want everything you write to be a deseruming fic you're probably not going to want to do that more than a couple of times. And if you want to hurt him physically while he has the serum, you have to hurt him hard. Usually past the point where a regular human would ever survive it. He's also harder to break, emotionally, than Tony is -- which means it's very satisfying when you can get him to break, but this is a guy who's only cried twice (that I remember) in canon. So if you want to get him to cry, you really, really have to wreck him, and he doesn't have as many obvious weak spots. He also doesn't generally sit around blaming himself for things that aren't his fault, and the whole "stewing in guilt" genre of plots for him basically came down to "he was sad that he thought Bucky's death was his fault," and that's really the biggest regret he seems to have, and also Bucky's not dead anymore. The Steve/Tony relationship itself, I would think, is also appealing to h/c fans because canon provides a lot of ways for them to hurt each other. Some people only ship pairings who would never, y'know, take turns beating each other half to death in major event comics. (And for a lot of Marvel Comics history, that was also Steve & Tony, so if you want them to be BFFs who have never fought, you can just set your fic earlier.) They have definitely hurt each other both physically and emotionally, so if you're looking for something easy and satisfying as a h/c fan, you can just read or write something where they... make up. What about Marvel characters other than Steve and Tony? Surely some of them are angsty, yes? Well, yes, but also it depends on the particular flavor of angst that you like. If you like the way Tony hurts, you may very well enjoy Doctor Strange comics, because they have a very similar attitude towards life -- they are both former alcoholics whose origin stories involve physical disabilities, who routinely make tactical decisions that negatively affect their continued existence and/or happiness a whole lot. It's very much an "I must suffer alone in the dark and no one will ever know what I am doing to save the world but it's the right thing to do" sort of vibe. Like, you can read comics where Strange is lying in hell with two broken legs, hallucinating that Clea has finally come to save him. Strange's biggest fear, akin to Tony's control issues, is basically that one day he's going to be an asshole again, so he's out there trying as hard as he can to do good. Also, if you like tentacles, he has all of them. I mean that. Carol also occasionally hits similar angst spots, and her drinking arc is great. A lot of people like Natasha, too; I have read zero Black Widow comics but I get the impression many people enjoy her brand of angst. The mutant metaphor is a little different in terms of overall vibe, but some people really like it as a source of angst -- the whole "protecting a world who hates and fears them" thing. It may not work for you, but if you like your hurt to include things like systemic oppression, go pick up some X-Men comics. Start with something like God Loves Man Kills. I feel like I liked this sort of thing a lot more as a teenager but that I kind of aged out of liking the mutants quite so much. It's also worth mentioning that not everything that hits the spot in one universe will be the same in the others, and I'm mentioning this because I feel like I have to say something about MCU Bucky. MCU fandom seems to get a lot of mileage out of Bucky's guilt about being the Winter Soldier, everything he was forced to do, et cetera. I have definitely read my share of those fics, and FATWS sure went right for that angst too. But as far as I can tell, he doesn't hit the same way at all in 616. And I like him a lot in 616; I'm always pleased when he shows up on a team. (He was so good in Strikeforce. Everyone was so good in Strikeforce.) But the thing is, 616 Bucky is, basically, phenomenally well-adjusted, given everything he's gone through, and I'm including the time he wrestled a bear in a gulag. He gets over having been the Winter Soldier, and now he's just, y'know, a guy with a cool arm who likes to bring guns to every fight to horrify his teammates, and he snarks at Clint. If you're looking for that angst, that is really not him these days. He's all better. So pretty much all that is canon. So what do we do in fandom for h/c? Well, as far as I can tell, a decent amount of it is canon-based or very canon-close -- there are a whole lot of stories exploring the angst of Civil War or Hickman's Avengers run. Tony's drinking comes up a fair amount, and if one of Tony's Evil Exes comes back to haunt him, it's pretty much only Tiberius Stone. I don't think I've read a lot of fic with Steve getting deserumed; it doesn't seem as popular in fandom as in canon. When Steve gets hurt, he tends to just get physically whumped pretty hard, and there's a fair amount of that for Tony too, but of course Steve can take more. There's also a thriving, uh, subgenre of pain involving Hydra Steve doing terrible things to Tony, presumably the terrible things he would have wanted to do to Tony in canon if Tony had had a flesh body. There's the usual kinds of h/c setups that appear in basically every fandom as well -- sickfic, whump, dub-con/non-con. You get the idea. But since fandom in general likes to take specific inspiration from canon, there's a lot of fic where the hurt tends to resemble things that happen more in canon. Like, I feel like comics fic probably has more tentacle fic and more mind control than canons that don't come pre-stocked with those. Probably everybody has a whole lot of "tied up by bad guys," though. And then, of course, fandom brings the comfort that canon does not. This is true in pretty much every fandom -- I mean, you aren't going to find a lot of actual canons where Character A saves Character B from mortal peril and then there's gay sex -- but, like I was saying, comics don't provide a lot of closure before it's onto the next thing. Usually with a different creative team, who has no interest in wrapping up anything from the last team. Steve and Tony talked about the incursions exactly once after Secret Wars and nobody mentioned the part where Steve spent several months trying to hunt Tony down and kill him. Tony is never going to remember the events of Civil War. Hydra Steve died ignominiously in a fire and no one has ever talked about him again. Honestly, if you're looking for a way to get some comfort in your fanfic, picking an event, any event, and just having the characters talk about it will be way more than any of them get in canon. I feel like honestly that can often be a pretty satisfying to read. And even though comics canon physically hurts characters pretty often and pretty badly, they also often skip right past the recovery. Maybe you'll get one page of a character in a hospital bed at the end of the story arc. Maybe you won't. Demon in a Bottle has one splash page of Tony going through alcohol withdrawal and then he's all better. I think Manhunt skips to Tony getting out of the hospital at the end. That's just not a story that they want to tell very often. The second drinking arc is notable in that it devotes almost as many issues to Tony's recovery as it does to getting him to rock-bottom. Similarly, Steve is done with his Nomad angst way way faster than you probably think he is (though The Captain does go in for a fair number of issues). So one of the things we often want to do in fandom is focus on all the bits that canon skips over, both in the "why did no one ever mention this story arc ever again" way and the "wow, so how long are they in the hospital after that" way. That's really all I can think of about h/c! I'm off to write some more of it!

#posts i actually wrote

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