#but I think is the thing that would be most devistating for both of them

[popculturebuffet]

Transformers: Windblade International Women's Day Special

Hello all you happy autobots and welcome to my international women's day special!

So last year as part of my ongoing retrospective of Transformers More than Meets the Eye, aka one of my faviorite comics ever, for patreon Brotoman.EXE, I took a look at it's sister series Robots in Disguise. And i'm fine.. just...

For those less familiar on paper RID was supposed to be a gritty political intrigue type series. Game of thrones with robots to More than Meets the Eye's combination of Star Trek and JLI also with robots. In practice... it's a bunch of assholes constantly squabbling while Starscream is the best. RID had a great premise, exploring a rebuilding cybertron fractured by centuries of war and the civilians who weren't exactly stoked about said war, but wasted it.

Thankfully after the dark cybertron crossover things got transformed: RID was now about Optimus and a group of autobots heading to earth for shenanigans, crossovers and a few title changes, leaving a gap open for a new cybertron set book. Enter Windblade.

Windblade was part of hasbro's "fan built bot" inittiave.. something I just found out exists. It allowed fans to help design a new character.. the team still clearly had ideas in mind, but select parts were voted on by us. It's a nice way to engage fans.

So her traits were slowly selected: An autobot with a jet alt mode, a sword, a red and black color scheme and a valiant personality. I would've prefered wild man (or wild woman in this case), but hey. A second round determined her name and gender. The last two selections would be reworked: Her home city was chosen.. but as a female transformer she was reworked to be from another planet as the bots on cybertron were all male at birth, while her generalized telepathy became a cityspeaker. Both are changes I have no issue with: the former fits into the unvierse better and the latter is just a cooler more speciality skill with a lot more intresting lore and character stuff attached. I find this whole concept fun and simple: a way to add a new character into the books but give writers and artists wiggle room. Her design was contriversal from what I can tell with a lot of fans fearing her kabuki look was another drift. Me I think it works, especially with the given context: Windblade's story is an immigrant story: she's new to cybertron, Starscream resents her alien status, so it fits she has a deisgn that's diffrent from most g1 designs, more elligant and ornate. It shows off her status as a Cityspeaker is a MASSIVE deal on their homeworld and crucial to cybertron's survival, but also her fish out of water status: she was absent for the war and now has to dive into a world that she HOPED would be helpful.. but instead is a cesspit of decption, intrigue and is barely holding on. I admitely don't know much about kabuki, but unlike drift it at least feels like the artists did their research instead of going off a 12 year old's scribblings about samurai.

Finally we unfortunatley have to talk about a transfomers Legend. Simon Furman is impossible to untangle from transformers legacy , creating Primus itself, finishign the marvel run of the book, continuing his run and ending it on his terms at idw, and launching this very continuity.

He also decided to make a massive ass of himself over this very book. See Simon has it in his head the Transformers are a genderless race. That they have no concept of it and thus are beyond it. As such he's ALWAYS hated the idea of female transformers. Can't stand them. When forced to use arcee in the uk comics he made it a stink of humans asking for a female transfomer then being offended at her design, while the autobots were confused why humanity cared about gender.

So when adding Arcee to IDW he made one of the most infamous stories in all of transformers... on the level of otptimus prime making out with a human to unlock his power, devistator's literal truk nuts or.. these guys

So in IDW continuity Arcee was forcibly switched from Male to Female and torturned into insanity by the evil scientest Jhiaxus. Just reading that sentence you the astute reader can proably see the mountain of issues: Equating being a woman with torture, being trans with a mad scientst experiment, either of the above with mental illness and ptsd. It's.. ti's bad. I've read the issue and while it has been a while it wasn't great. This wasn't the INTENTION, Furman jsut wanted to explore what would happen if a genderless race was forced into a gender.

The problem Furman ignores and later would gripe about in the comments section, is that the transformers.. are male coded. They use male pronouns and cybetron made their bots traditionally masculine. It was concived as a toyline for boys in the 80's. Of course the bulk of characters are male coded. As many a commentor tried in vain to point out to furman, they are not non binary (Andrgnys was the term used), they have a concept of gender. It's why James Roberts was able to make a cast load of gay later: If the race is all male, then of course most of the relationships would be male and thus allowed him to throw in gay characters after he realized Chromedome and Rewind were less "good buddies" and more "husbands". Hence the invention of Condjux Endura and Prowl being Chromedome's bitter ex. As Roberts shows you CAN play with this gloriously, but he accepted transformers are male coded. It's why Rebecca Sugar made the Gem race in steven universe female: in addition to making a female mostly warrior race, something rare in fiction beyond sterotypes, it allowed her to easily make most of the main cast gay or pan without the censors getting pissy at first. They did eventually but the alien thing helped slide it on by.

You CAN have aliens who are genderfluid or genderless.. but the transformers just aren't. He could've made them that way, tried having the desgins tweaked, but because he can't disgnuish between a mono gender and non binary, the transformers wound up being male and the easy fix to make more cisgender female transformers was just have other cybertronian colonies. Most of transformerdom is at most mildly puzzled at the concept of a new gender and moves on. Simple.

Now as for why all this matters to windblade for those unaware Scott had a tumblr at the time , as this platform was popular at the time, and answered questions as I do. Instead of talking about various animated series from various networks, she answered questions about the upcoming book before everyone properly debuted in dark cybertron, since these things get announced months in advance. She then was asked the question: What did she think about ARcee's idw origin. Her exact response

"

What are your thoughts on the IDW Arcee origin that Furman made?

Okay, this question has come up a lot and it’s time to finally answer.

In a vacuum, Furman’s story is completely legitimate. The idea that someone is fundamentally changed against their will and struggles/rages against that is a really interesting idea. In fact, I wrote a very similar thing with the Dinobots. It taps into a deep human fear that God exists and is apathetic to/causes our pain.

Also dealing with characters that are literally alien naturally leads writers to play with/explore what aspects of humanity do and do not translate: are they alive? does Primus really equate to God if they have concrete knowledge of his existance? what does it mean to be male/female in a non-reproductive species?

The issues I have with Furman’s choice is that we don’t exist in a vacuum and the suggestion that 1. women only exist in aberration 2. being a women is inherently traumatic 3. being a women has any correlation to mental illness are extremely upsetting. Do I think Furman was trying to make a statement about human women with Arcee’s origins? No. In fact, the largest share of blame lies with the tokenization of women in the brand in general. If Arcee was one of many women transformers and she became female in this manner, it would not be an issue for women writ large (although still troubling for the transgender community). It is because she is the ONLY women (and that this story ensures that she will ALWAYS BE the only woman) that Arcee’s story becomes untenable.

Hopefully John, James and I have come up with a way around this Gordian Knot that will satisfy the fan-base, but satisfying-or-no, the most immediate imperative is to ENSURE this story does not continue to keep women readers, fans and characters at arm’s length from the brand. I’ve often said that everyone should feel that they are allowed to like Transformers and it is my complete and utter privilege to take this next step to make that happen.

TLDR version: Arcee’s origin is offensive because we don’t have any other female origins to balance it. We’re working on it, stay tuned.

PS To fans that still claim Transformers are asexual: Academically, you have legitimate standing, but practically, ask yourself this: Jazz has been voice by actors from three different races over the years. If, in the next video game, Jazz was voiced by a woman, would you feel the character had been changed at all? If so, you do not perceive Transformers to be asexual. If not, you are a rare, rare bird indeed.

I quoted it in full to illustrate a few things: Scott is nothing but respectful and even in 2014 was keenly aware of the needs of the trans community. She even started using cisgender when informed it was the proper term for Windblade. It's a very small bar but given the society we live in, it's nice a writer clears it at all. She also does not directly attack furman. She gets why he made the mistake, points it out and makes the valid point that the issue is largely that transformers barely cares about it's female fans and is working to fix that. It is a rational, well thought out response and something necessary to adress given what a clusterfuck spotlight arcee is. She responded to all of this like a rational adult. Furman's response to her

Yeah Simon Furman's response to this is one of the most painful, defensive and mind boggling essays I have ever read. Furman INSISITS the transformers are genderless, cannot grasp that his work does not exist in a vaccum, and that he is not right and any mentions of the cartoon by scott or the comics irk him. He also somehow bafflingly thinks the relationships in MTMTE are metaphors

"James’ run is being rightly lauded and it had been done by using metaphors not direct correlations. Cyclonus and Tailgate’s early relationship can be viewed as a metaphor for a domestic violence situation but it is not literally that. "

... it.. it is literally that. They have romantic feelings and Cyclonus beats Tailgate at one point. It's domestic abuse. They grow past it but the way Cyclonus can treat tailgate is abusive. They.. .they can have relationships Simon. Being genderless or non binary does not = asexual or aromantic.

Mr Furman just.. genuinely DOES not get that and refuses to get that. The contrast is night and day: Scott was polite, wasn't trying to be conforntational to a colleuge, asked other communities for their imput and made a persuasive argument. Furman just cherry picks the sections of her answer that bothered him and hammers the same dumb argument again and again and onto the comments which yes I did read the bulk of.

Shockingly for early 2010's internet comments: their civil. Theirs some assholery and Furman apparently removed full on bigots. But it's a LONG stream of people telling furman he's wrong while he plugs his ears and goes THEY DON'T HAVE GENDER, OTHER MEDIA DOSEN'T MATER TO THIS VERSION EVEN THOUGH IT REFLECTS HOW PEOPLE SEE THESE CHARACTERS, I'M RIGHT JUST LET ME BE RIGHT, AT LEAST ONE WOMAN AGREED WITH ME

It's a case of a creator getting so caught up in his ego he can't see other perspectives and refuses to alter his. Furman was never my hero, but I know he was a hero to many a transformers fan and it's sad he had to tank his own reputation being a defensive asshole. It's not the worst public blowup of one's rep i've seen. He isn't parading around half assed oversexualized art of women like it's some great victory like frank cho or writing heroic comics about Q of Quanon like chuck dixon. He just kinda sucks and refused to admit he was wrong and we sadly had to spend a LOT of this review talking about that.

Thankfully sad old man time is older and we can talk about how good this book is. While Windblade apparently got an eh from most I find it to be one of the best idw transformers books out of the pile i've read. While that isnt' the highest bar the fact it even nears the quality of MTMTE is praise alone. It's an excellent book about a genuinely kind and decent person with pure motives enterting a world where such a thing has been lost in a sea of war and deception. It's a wonderful four issue series that to two sequels: a decent one and an utterly fantastic one and it's under the cut.

We begin with a narration telling us it's the dawn of the new era. It's something I skipped over with MTMTE sumarizing the three pillars of this new ear: Optimus for RID, Megatron for MTMTE and Windblade for take a wild guess.

So quick catchup for those who didn't read the previous reviews or arent' as familiar with IDW Comics: The War is Over. The Autobots won.. but got nothing out of it: Cybertron is free.. but the final fight left it in a dangerous state that left Iacon the last safe harbor and all the various neutrals blaming the autobots for something that genuinely wasn't their fault. The autobots then split: Bumblebee wanted to stay and work things out, Rodimus wanted to go on a grand quest to prove his deep seated self loathing and inferority complex wrong. Optimus opted out enteriely to help with the healing.

This left cybertron in the hands of bumblebee.. who fumbled his time as leader, spending most of it getting bitched out by what were essentailly his seconds in command: Prowl, who had turned into an authortarian shithead over the years and is only going to get worse having already manipualted the lost light's command into taking a serial killer on board as prisoner, something that went about as well as you'd expect, and was such a bad person no one noticed he got mind controlled or fully bought he was. The other was Metalhawk, a self righteous asshole who constantly blamed the Autobots for fighting a war that gave him the freedom to be a self righteous asshole.

This left Cybertron with leadership no one on it wanted who bickered constantly instead of doing things. So instead.. they got Starscream. Starscream did Trumps bit before trumps: he manipulated assholes with actual problems into aiming their anger at whatever he wanted. The only differnce is Starscream has actual style. He easily slid into leadership and after Megatrons return used that to exile most of the autbots to the wilderness to die. Not in those words, unlike trump he has subtly: it was give up being an autobot or leave. Add in a giant robot picking him as robot jesus and it was pretty easy.

Starscream's reign wasn't all sunshine lollypops and rainbow cherry drops as Dark Cybertron nearly dethroned him: the reveal the prophecy of him as a god king also meant cybertron's destruction didn't go well. But since huge horrifying disasters haven't stopped politicans before, and the apocalypse was canceled, Starscream was able to skate by. He still had the NAILS and with the Autbots having saved the world, made an uneasy peace with them. None of them LIKED him but they couldnt' just dethrone him and expect cybertron to not devolve into another war.

So the autobots reluctantly left Starscream in charge and went off to do their own thing.. with a few left behind to try and live their lives and hope he dosen't blow up the planet which sounds.. totally.. t..totally unfamilar

As for our heroine, Windblade was introduced during the crossover. She was sent by everyone's faviorite ace rimmer cosplayer Thunderclash along with her best friends Chromia and Nautica. These three come from Caminus. Long ago when it was an empire Cybertron spread out, sending out titans, transformers the size of cities. The concept of city sized transformers isn't new, Metroplex has existed for some time, but I like what these comics do with it, making them unfathomable giant beings. They think and feel like any bots.. but their thoughts are so massive, dense and complicated their hard to speak to.

Hence the cityspeakers, specialized transformers who can telepathically communicate with titans. It's why Windblade has her kabuki makeup: to pay homage to caminus and why Thunderclash called on her. Windblade managed to save metroplex during the crossover with the help of the lost light and her own skills, turning the tide against Shockwaves own titan.. but leaving him a badly damaged wreck. Nautica went with the lost light while Windblade stayed behind to be the voice of a city. Chromia stayed behind for windblade.

The series slowly fleshes out Windblade and Scott does so wonderfully: Windblade is an optimist, badly wanting the best for people and having come expecting cybertron to be this kind, wonderful new empire finally free from war that could help her own people. As we find out in an excellent swerve at the end of the first issue.. Caminus is not doing well. As we find out later their resources are so stretched they'll only last a hundred years if lucky.

As you can tell... that didn't happen. Windblade's story is of an idealist, a genuinely good person who has pure goals: heal metroplex, heal cybetron and hopefully in turn get Caminus better. In most other transformers works she'd be the protaganist, working with optimus and co to save the world no matter the cost even if things got murky.

But that's not the world she gets. She gets a cybetron badly damaged by the war and everything after, barely holding on, a titan that's barely functioning despite his best efforts, and a leader who openly threatens and accuses her twice not because she did anything wrong but because he can't share the spotlight. Starscream blames her for power outages and a series of bombings.

She's the perfect foil for starscream: both are jets, both are red, but both could not be more diffrent. Windblade only wants to help. She's kind compassionate and empathetic. She wants a better world for cybertron and caminus and will do what it takes. When hunting down waspinator for a lead later, her friend Chromia just.. chases after the poor guy after he bolts, who it turn sout only bolted because EVERYONE beats him up. Her response? Be genuinely contrite, kind yet firm. She gets exactly the info she needs and an ally, if one who will flee at the first time of danger.

Starscream.. well after some interviews Windblade herself puts it best

Starscream is at his most evil so far here. Previously I rooted for him in RiD. He was a scumbag sure.. but he was the only COMPITENT scumbag. Prowl was a facist both with and without brainwashing, Bumblebee focused more on internal politics than helping anyone, and Metalhawk was a self righteous ass. There were other characters who were likeable, Blurr, Ironhide, Wheeljack, but none of them had any power to do anything about the world around them. It's hard not to vote for the bad guy when he's the only one actually trying. Sure he wasn't really solving cybetron's issues either, but at least he was playing the game.

Here since he's largely not gesturing for the public or metalhawk... he's a cold monster. There was a CHANCE he could've changed.. but killing metalhawk, public service or not, was the tippping point: killing the only person who for some unknown reason belivied him in was it. Winblade GENUINELY hoped he wasn't as bad as his rep or his actions.. starscream could've played her... but he dosen't want to. Starscream spent so long clawing to the top, trying to overthrow megatron, trying to worm his way to the kingship, getting declared the chosen one, he finally has everything... and he can't let himself enjoy it. Because suddenly there's a charasmatic bot who he can't just kill or banish, one who makes friends easy, and has nothing but pure motives. She's another optimus.. and he can't let that exist.

He's not so hard on windblade because he couldn't play her but because he knows the longer she's around, the more power she gets. If he can pick her off NOW while she's just a naive visitor, then he wins. And that's what fucks him over: before he played the long game, slowly earning public sympathy, getting the public's support, doing what a politican, even a complete monster whose hollowed out inside, does. He played the game. But now becaues he dosen't want to play again he's just trying to break everything he wants or sees as a remote threat.

He's still a threat himself, still easily outmaneuvers our hero at first: She finds his illicit mine? He sends goons. They survive the ambush? He throws everyone in prison and plans to frame them for his crimes. What makes starscream fascinating here is even when throwing a tantrum because baby not getting enough attention.. he's still fucking terrifying. He has windblade fucking tortured, only stopping when he realizes "No she really didn't blow herself up to get points that's a you thing". He CAN maneuver things and as seen in the climax easily fights off most of the cast and nearly kills windblade till she plugs herself into the city itself. This book does a fantastic job making starscream terrifying and despite his complexity not showing as much.. he's still engaging.

He's also what helps windblade slowly develop: She starts just trying to do the right thing.. but quickly proves to be far more capable, far more badass and far more of a fighter and manipulator than Starscream could've imagined. The second she realizes he's actively trying to kill her... she stops seeing the best in him. I mean think about it.. all it took was one day of her taking him seriously as a threat and she finds out he has a mining operation to find an ore tha twould make him invincible, makes allies easy because no one like starscream and easily revolts even escaping jail. He still comes CLOSE to beating her.. but in a day she has proof off his crimes, has proven she can protect that proof. It's a throughly engaging back and forth: Windblade may be mildly outnumbered.. but she's not giving up. She may speak for the city.. but she can damn well fight for it. She still has lessons to learn like her foes can fly, but she learns them as she goes.

She also gets a hard truth in the big twist.. and it's one I have mixed feelings on. Starscream is not behind the bombings. Nor is his minion rattrap and since we're on the topic I do like IDW rattrap to a point, but I liked him more when he was more weasely and spineless, as it fit early beast wars rattrap's characterization than a torturing monster. I also questoin why IDW only trickled in two beast wars characters at all. Glad to have them but it's still just.. why. You have a massive franchise to mine why are you like this.

Back on topic this brings us to our third lead.. and our secondary Villian, Chromia. Chromia is seemingly windblade's only friend besides ironhide at first, her bodyguard, her best friend and perhaps more. I do TRY not to pair up every remotely romantic friendship I see.. but int his ecase.. Chormia tries to open a space bridge, endagering all or cybetron... to save Windblade> She also talks about seeing enough of her tail fans, aka her ass. There.. isn't a straight explination for either thing.

Chromia is a mixed bag mostly because the series bein gshort.. dosent' really have time to unpack it and I don't remember the followups really doing much to do so. Windblade's best freind betrays her in a horrific way and we just.. don't get time to process it. Maybe when I revisit the other series, as I intend to, we'll get a better arc.

I do like the position it puts windblade in for the climax. It complete's the journey she's been on.. as she plays starscream. His silence and stopping the mining shit.. and in exchange.. other worlds. Caminus isn't the ONLY colony and when theyf ind them.. he can have the credit. It's her using her good nature.. to play his game. She geninely just wants a better world. CYbetron won't last, caminus won't last... so who cares who the fuck gets the credit. It also gives her time WITHOUT him trying to murder her. She takes the blame for Chromia not to save her entirely, but because it puts her in a better positoin: Starscream THINKS he has dirt on her, and while she'd take the fall if it happens, she has dirt on him. It's sneaky, underhanded.. but it feels way more organic than the supposdely "grey" actions of the autbots last series. Windblade is doing something shady.. but it's the only way to buy herself and caminus time. She can deal with starscream later. Right now she just wants a better world. And it's a question of CAN she keep up with this kind of thing and if so what will that make her? And it's a question we'll answer eventually.

So some scatterd thoughts. The art by sarah stone is fucking gorgeous. Truly amazing stuff. Nice digital work. It's expressive and cartoony but the line work and ink make it feel raw and real: it let's the transfromers be bold nad colorful.. but the skethciness helps underline how dark the story is.

I love the idea of the titans, them being these big larger than life beings.. and of metroplex, being a kind friend who adores his speaker and in her darkest hour helps pull her out. I also like the message of this: speakers are supposed to subsume themselves, be one with the city and answer only to others.. but windblade wins by being herself and selfless. By being a person, not consumed by duty but still bound to it. Being a cityspeaker is part of her.. but she is not metroplex. She is his friend. And she will fight for him.

Windblade.. is a masterpiece. Going over it again three times, ocne to read it, once for the first draft and again when that draft mostly done got ate by tumblr, it shows off just what a fantastic book this is. The pacing probably coudl've been slowed down a tad, but I get it. This was the pilot. The series would sadly always get punched with pacing, with the next one opening on a crossover we'll get to, the one after having to bridge series fast and till all are one having to wrap up quicker because IDW impulsively decided to reboot everything. Despite all this windblade is excellent and you should go find it in some corner of the internet while we wait for IDW to republish it. I"m pulling for you, we're all in this together.

[the-yappstronaut]

I cant be the only one who thinks Steve, Will, and El WON'T die in s5. Like none of their deaths would make sense. Especially if Will or El died it would be too predictable since in all of their cases the GA expects (and lowkey wants) them to die.

But like, El has done her whole screaming-the-gate-away thing TWICE. She even already "died" in s1. If she were to die it would be reusing the same ending that they used in s1, and I seriously doubt they'd do that. It would just be cheap and lazy. Plus, Hopper's whole arc was keeping El safe, and he's for sure not dying, so having BOTH of his daughters die would be too devistating for him and his character arc would be useless.

On the other hand, the entirety of s1 and 2 were to KEEP WILL SAFE. If the series were to kill him off at the end it would completely erase all of the hard work that went into keeping him alive. Especially since it would likely end up being spoiled to new viewers, and what new viewers would care about the show if the main character is just going to die in the end? Plus, imo it would be so awful of them to kill off the gay, abused, traumatized, (supposedly) heartbroken teenager who spent literally all of the seasons absolutely GOING THROUGH IT in a show where the outcasts are supposed to be celebrated.

Steve won't die because the audience spent so long rooting for him. They have watched his entire character growth and he's easily the most loved character on the show. To watch that growth just for him to die would be stupid. Yes, it could be symbolic to have him die for people who he used to hate, but again, EVERYONE THINKS IT WILL HAPPEN. I doubt that the Suffer Brothers would choose a character so predictable to be the one to die. (Also, I'm pretty sure I saw a leak about Steve visiting Dustin at college in an epilogue, but I might just be making that up and I don't feel like looking it up so correct me if I'm wrong.)

Anyway, argue with me if you want, but I'm tired of seeing the same three theories over and over again. CHOOSE A NEW CHARACTER TO THEORIZE ABOUT PLEASE IM BEGGING.

[jetsteeleyourheart]

My top 5 Crackships

Inspired by my top 5 8 characters thing going around, I want you all to vote on your favorite of my Top 5 Questionable Rare pairs

I will be providing excuses reasoning excuses below the poll, so if you feel like roasting me properly seeing my justifications, do that - or don't!

And remember, they're fictional characters, so it costs nothing to be normal about this and have fun

*Not all of these are controversial, but those that are? watch out!

Excuses:

Zuki:

If you follow me then you know I'm an OG Zutara fan, but on the rare occasions I'm feeling Cannon Compliant, Zuki is my go too ship. This has all to do with the comics, where basically Zuko's only confidant is Suki and you get wild panels of them looking at each other like this:

I was devistated when Korra came out and it seemed like Sokka and Suki didn't last, but if the above is why, then I'll take it.

Stobin:

I am going to get so much flack for this one I think. BUT. Consider: The cannon ships in the show are generally not well written. I like Hopper/Joyce, I like Max/Lucas, but Nancy/Jonathan and especially Mike/Eleven do literally nothing for me, they are so bland. I do see the irony that one of the things that makes Stobin well written is because its one sided on Steve's part because Robin is gay. But their interactions are literally the reason to watch the show if you ask me. Pushing past these excuses though, I just kinda dig the ship. In my head its an open poly situation for certain, but sexuality is so wild and fluid and weird, and Gold Star status is gatekeepy at best anyway, so like, why the fuck not. I had a great aunt who had an open marriage with a gay man, (big beard behavior) and they had kids and did everything together. Its like... Platonic soulmates + if you will. And that's what I want for Stobin. Platonic soulmates + and a big ole polycule surrounding them. Or maybe its just my incoherent bisexual ass talking

(If I could put fan-art with the polycule in it I would but I wouldn't repost someones art like that... so I'm stuck with cannon images)

Zacknei:

No one has played this game. When people think Zack, they either ship Cloud or Aerith, and honestly I ship both those as well (though ClAerTi will always be my top for them). But I love Cissnei. She has big Sydney Sage energy for me, and all of Zack's emotional beats in the second half of the game surround her (...or cloud) not Aerith (just for the record). Also if you join all the fanclubs and work hard you get invited to your own fanclub and I'm pretty sure there's evidence that Cissnei is the president which is hilarious. I just love their interactions and was DEVASTATED at the end. Analytical Girl & PuppyDogHimbo is a beautiful ship dynamic. Also Rick Gomez will always be my Zack Fair VA. I hate the new guy so much (and its not his fault!! Sorry man!)

Aquarella:

So the section is really short. But my god. Cinderella and Aqua have the most chemistry of any character in that game series bar none. I'm including Riku and Sora in this. I'm including Roxas and Axel. Ok, not really this is not the hill I want to die on. BUT. At least in Birth By Sleep, this is the emotional high-point. Aqua taking her hand like a gentleman at a ball? The way Aqua saves Cinderella from getting run over by her demonic carriage??? The way she lovingly protects Cindy's body with hers? Did you see Prince whats his face doing any of that ? NO. And then. If Aqua were a guy everyone would've seen it when this game came out (but I guess gay people weren't invented until 2015 or whatever.

look how devastated Aqua is when Cinderella goes to Charming at the end. IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THEM.

Sorayla:

I really do like Raylum, but this is a poll on my hot take rare-pairs, not cannon compliance. Let me start off by saying, no, I haven't seen this season yet, it only came out twelve hours ago whats wrong with you? This pair grew on me starting in Season 4 after the time skip. I think it goes along side my preoccupation with tough smart girls and their dumbass golden retriever himbos. They have a nice trajectory, and with Callum going a lil dark and edgy on us recently, I like their banter a lot. Especially in Season 4 I was surprised by them and I crave more adventures with the two of them alone. I don't think it will ever happen, but I like it none the less. They bring a certain... Sokka & Suki vibe to the party that I'm here for.

Anyway, I tag @ebbilayart @retiredficwriter & anyone who decides to do it!

And if no one feels like setting themselves up as a target, that's good too!

[mydahliarose]

Niiri and foras since it seems he might be of some importance for this next update on friday (this gets angsty)

I dont know what fate is about to happen with foras in this upcoming chapter or event

But if something bad happens to him niiri as much as she wants to try and hide it as much as she wants would be absolutely devistated he was the one that came up with the idea of her creation until orias completely took over in creating her entirely.

Although often times foras got super jealous for niiri taking up all the attention to leviathan he couldn't deny the fact that his beloved king did smile around her back then knowing his taken idea truly worked on keeping him happy was more than enough to be proud of her.

And then the banishment happend and in the end took his majesty side along with the others which forever left niiri betrayed.

Despite her rage towards foras seeing him die especially by the hands of the race that she so desperate wants to be a part of?

Its going to break her apart and no massacre of demons is going to make it go away and act everything is fine and dandy.

In my story he was sent out to search for her after leviathan refused to believe she was prounounced "dead" at the hands of Michael but this was all a fabrication to make sure they wouldn't have doubts about it so they wouldn't start some sort of investigation of sorts. A high ranking seraph killing niiri? Believable. But at the end of the day the king still had his doubts he didnt just want her back, he truly loved his created sister despite what he had done to her that he refused to accept what was bieng said. Thus enter foras .

Eventually he ends up finding her and learns about her forbidden relationship but niiri cannot bring herself to kill him or even hurt her former friend so if this ever happens to him?

Silently crying alone in her dollhouse holding a plush formed foras while surrounded by her former creators in the same form.

Little had she known foras whished for things to happend differently and whenever his final moments come while thinking of his friends and descendant of solomon

The last thing he will remember is his majesty bonding with his sister when he needed her most when his trauma creeped up to him watching them play while he stands there guarding and smiles.

Would he be supportive of niiris relationship with Michael? Knowing the times hes silently watched her from afar he couldn't help but realize how much happier she was with him despite the atrocities theyve both committed. He understands why niiri does what she does but he dosent justify her actions, Michael? Hes an angel of course he does what he does.

He is very wary of Michaels intentions yet the more he watched them together the more he was realizing there was more to them. and when he overheard the conversations where Michael was showing concerns of her angelfication path and upon hearing what happend during Christmas with her rescue mission? He was finally beginning to see how real there love was, thou it still gave him the ick that niiri chose Michael of all angels. Heck if he could meet her hed make fun of her. at the end of the day he mostly tolerates there relationship.

But he also realized something upon seeing there relationship. Michael tended to her most out of anyone in her life even during her worst moments. Something he himself failed to do when she needed him most that tragic day. God he felt so guilty, but he couldn't deny his majestys orders. and most of all he felt most guilty when he felt a weight lifted within him as soon as she was out of the picture finally he could win his majestys attention, foolish he was...foolish to also think he never bonded with her much and yet all this time she still considered him as somone important into her life.

And so if he takes his final breath wether it be this update or whenever that day comes

He just wants her to be happy at the end of the day, if Michael is the one to do so then so be it as much as he detests him

But his final wish is for niiri and leviathan to reunite and reconcile so that the palace could radiate that once peacful joy yet again

[his-hidden-yandere]

ask game ask game ask game ask game

all the questions on it :3

how easily do you give into your darling’s desires ? ( bonus : assuming you’d kidnapped them , how much pleading from them would it take for you to let them go ? )-- depends on the disires but <3 like i said your not going anywhere

are you more interested in your darling’s comfort , or your own desires and excitement ? - both? more in their comfort. i want them to feel loved

what kind of physical ownership would your darling ‘ wear ‘ ? ( a collar , matching necklaces , bruises , etc . ) -- bite marks mostly,but id like matching colars with locks

how much control do you want over your darling’s life , body , and mind ,, if any ? -not sure

how much affection do you give to your darling compared to other people ?

would you prefer to provide for your darling ( with work , food , etc . ) , let them provide and take care of them along the way , or be equal ? -- way more - theyre my darling and fp so yhey have most if not all my attention, id like to be equal but more leaning twards me

would you ever punish your darling for something ? if so , what would you punish them for and how ? - never,hhes very sweet and good, i think th eonly thing id 'punish' him for would be leaving me or insinuatig

would you ever be nervous with your darling , are you naturally stoic , or do you put up a brave facade with them ? - i am nervous lol but i pretend

is there anything you wouldn’t accept your darling for ? ( different beliefs , identity , etc . ) . if so , would you try to change them ? -nope ! we pretty much have the same belifs,and i dont want them to change

do you like to mark your darling ? if so , how ? and if no , why not ? -- yesss bite marks and bruises

what’s the absolute worst thought you’ve had about your darling ? -- mmmkiddnapping and keeping them in my basement until they loved me,but they already do <3

if your darling tried to leave you or get away from you , how far would you go to get them back ? how long would you try before giving up ? - pretty much anything,id be devistated,id probably keep trying

are you more of a submissive or dominant yandere ? in what ways ? how does that affect your relationship with them ? -- no idea? i like to think im dominant but im probably just submissive and try to play tough

[the-firebird69]

Trump attacks judge and clerk again in ‘Happy Thanksgiving’ post: Live | The Independent

this man trump is aggrevating me. he is not your helper does not holdt he line here nor code. is not a loyal s in any way. is a blaspheme and loser. thankfully.

i have ordered him to the board room today to fire him. and use fuel yes like any sophmore or other would lol. and more. and to relive him of his duties and stocks. and use the confinement as a threat to take his robots to shiut him down and shut him up and use as false flag on any shortly.

i also am ordering the removal of hardware whilst he sits annoying our top brass in the meeting and tries to attack and we repel and search it down to city areas and vaporize him.

on top once searched we seek out teh gold and silver and hopspitals, to take the intel and other there devistate that system of his.

further i have ordered the take over of chrysler and we shall proceed and use the meetings as cover he thinks it is macs and or psuedo macs. and we use the method described yesterday take it and push them out hard. the guys say we shall

i am ordering ours to find teams for each city area that are good with money he has tons and we need it and to help ours it is in the top ten for priorities since yu cannot get a thing in this rhealm wihtout moeny and trump sat draining and keepin the poor poor and worse. big teams who call for armies and today and blitz and today and in all financial ctners and we take over the banks and we are ordering branches out and in support of all housing city areas and more and to assist andconcide with infiltration methods. Hera says too

we will focus on trump and his due to thier holding these items in order to turn the canon on us.

Zues Hera

we shall and are but now we grow it he is ridiculous and obscene. and a smudge on the face. we need him out. i have things to add

-we put restraining orders on him non stop if removed we re install them. tons will help too. and start here. we do it now well tommorrow....can do it with the police we shall.

-we also add them to the americas most wanted and all trulmps characters even in dc. tons of them resemble him. and are other ppl he uses the characters.

-we arrest him for every criime he committed and is. and point out the flaws in his character non stop. h e is an ass pays for yesterday too.

-we pull the file on him dig up dirt expose it now. tons ofi t. and sling it and fals flag works nobody cares much.

-we are takng him down and hit him we bring in protecitn for our son and now. tons of it. so do the psuedo empire empire and misc and morlock minority and forgeiners and even bja and others. tons will now he is an ass and a jerks. a mean idiot too ruins tons of stuff shores us uup.

we pull his stuff out of store and use it and send it sell it. and for us mostly. ton of his stuff. he wihters in the parks and we knock him out. take it draw them in. pulll i tout of storage clear nevada too and the wiine vineyards. push himo ut fully. too mlich time on tis one ahole we need him out now.

we see their attitude with the hammers ad their talk we take them make it hard. use it. too.

Thor Freya

thank you wessee it

mac

we dont get it your threatened you win no i see it. we do the opsppsoti and dont tell

trump

ahhahaha ok fat head

Hera Zues i apply now to remove my name from his family. get permission but do so now. let it sit ok and we shall revive it.

i agree this has gone on long enough and from both families. they used you too the paris family. sometimes goodbye is anohter chance and to trump meaning macs the analogy we do this now

Bitol and Goddess Wife

andw eh ear it post now and wil

Thor Freya

Olympus

need htis out

Nuada Arrianna

[placetneplacet]

VegasPete Novel Spoilers Speculation

Ok! (Sorry I had to figure out how to add the read more from the mobile app in order to accomplish this and I’m just very thrilled that I figured it out)

I keep thinking about how I’m 90 percent certain there is no Nop in the show and that Vegas is no longer a university student (honestly neither is Porsche, why did they keep it in that he was??).

These two things Nop, as a character and Vegas’ school, are both instrumental in breaking Pete out of the play that he is performing with Vegas and prompts his breakdown. Without Nop sewing distrust and discord and without the freshman as a focal point, what is Pete’s catalyst?

Pete’s catalyst in the show could be Porsche.

The show has spent a great deal of time pushing this Vegas seducing/falling in love with Porsche storyline, which obviously is also there in the novel, but I still think they’ve taken time to really emphasize it and for Pete to witness it.

I always thought the college “nong” was kind of a flimsy excuse for jealousy on Pete’s part anyway. If Pete is “acting” it just seemed silly for him to be taken apart so quickly, by one of Vegas college classmates texting him.

But I know (and we even get a glimpse of this in the novel) that Pete would be devastated to realize he was feeling jealous of Porsche. Porsche, his best friend, the reason he even stepped into the Minor House in the first place, when he knew he couldn’t succeed, to be jealous of him? To let this thing that had grown up between him and Vegas to start to hurt his relationship with Porsche?

That’s a reason to fall apart after fighting for so long. And it’s a real threat in a way that the college classmate never was, because Vegas did really want Porsche. And Pete watched Vegas pursue Porsche.

However you feel about what Vegas “feelings” towards Porsche were, I think it’s hard to argue that Vegas wasn’t attracted to Porsche, even if you feel Vegas had no real “feelings” for him.

It would be easy and shattering for Pete to see a text or video that showed Vegas still in contact with Porsche. It would also be a good way to emphasize Pete’s feelings of inadequacy, part of what Pete receives from Vegas that he hadn’t had before is the feeling of being special and desired.

Pete considers himself fairly average and, at least in the novel, lacking compared to the Theerapkyul family including Porsche. But Vegas calls him lovely and devotes all of his attention on Pete. The thought of Vegas still wanting Porsche, that Vegas is settling for Pete, because Pete is convenient. That Vegas wouldn’t treat Porsche the way he’s been treating Pete.

That is a something, that I think, is capable of ripping Pete out of the make believe world he has created for Vegas and back into reality where Pete has allowed himself to fall under Vegas spell and to actually believe that Vegas loved him.

It would also be a lot harder for Vegas to combat.

It would also be more devastating for Vegas, because Vegas knows exactly how it feels to be second best and to think that Vegas has made Pete feel that way? Vegas will be undone. They both will.

“I can’t be apart from you, Pete. I have no one but you.”

[static-fanatic-1]

Hello, I hope you are doing well today. I was wondering if I can get a semi-angst hc of Pakunoda, Illumi, Milluki, Silva, Chrollo, Kurapika and Shalnark + Setsuno, Overhaul, Chronostasis, Tamaki, Endeavor, Shinsou, Aizawa and Shiggaraki with a s/o who hates them, but once their children gets kidnapped they beg and cry to the boys/girls to find their child and bring them safely home. Hopes that makes sense. Please and thank you.

Pakunoda:

She hates seeing you in pain, in ANY pain, so this doesn’t sit well with her at all. It hurts that you hate her, but to her it doesn’t matter as much as her undying love for you. She is sweet, and she knows despite keeping you captive, you are cared for. This includes your and her child. She will tear the world to shreds with her lovely heels.

She will be more methodical in ending whoever took her child, and no harm will come to the sweet baby. She will not use this against you in anyway, she would rather you love her naturally. So when da baby is returned, she won’t tease you or ask for something in return. She just wants to comfort you both and tell you everything is okay now.

Illumi:

Like Paku, Illumi cares about both of you, just in a really different way. He “loves” his kids more as a tool and as a successor to his lineage, not like he loves you. So when his kid is taken, there will be hell to pay.

He doesn’t really think much on the fact you are begging him, though it is a nice change to your typical screaming. He won’t brag, boast, or use it against you, for the most part anyway. He might be robotic, but he still is smart. He will keep your children in mind next time you try anything too risky.

Milluki:

He doesn’t care about his kids, they are spoiled little shits in his eyes. He probably didn’t really want kids in the first place, but one thing led to another and here they are now. So when they are taken, he sees it as an inconvenience, but also an opportunity once he sees how distraught you are.

He makes it into a big deal and boasts about how only HE can save your kids. HE is the only reason you will get your little babies back. And don’t worry, he will make sure you inderstand that. He will ALWAYS use this against you at any moment of any day. He wants you to know you need him.

Silva:

He doesn’t care about your kids, to him they are an end to a means, and another way to keep you with him. So as much as he knows his kids can take care of themselves, or at least he wants them to be independent through whatever means, seeing you hurt makes him take initiative. You are devistated, fine, he’ll save your kids.

Silva makes quick work of whoever took your kids, and makes sure to savor it. Once he’s done, he lets you take a moment to be happy for your kids being safe, but don’t expect to be in the clear. You will have to give him something in return, and knowing his sex drive, you probably wouldn’t like it. But your kids are safe, so everything is fine, right?

Chrollo:

Like Silva, Chrollo doesn’t care about your kids. A means to an end, to keep you locked with him. Though, he really does care about you, so he will do anything to make you happy.

This means getting that little bundle of attention-stealing-shitness back. Anything for you to get on his good graces. Besides, he has the whole troupe that loves the kid, so they will all pitch in to find the little one. I don’t think he will use this against you, mainly because you should already knows nothing will get between the two of you, not even your child.

Shalnark:

Shalnark is a strange one, to me he seems like a mix between Chrollo and Pakunoda. He cares, a lot, but if anything was to come between you and him, he wouldn’t mind making a point. Still, seeing you in so much emotional pain makes him jump into action.

He calls up his best friends to help find the poor sap who took his and your kid. Yeah, they won’t last long. Shal takes great care in handling the little one to make sure they aren’t too scared. He also spends a lot of down time after to bond with the both of you. Maybe this wasn’t a good thing to you, but to him it only brought you closer together.

Kurapika:

Really big family man, whoever took your kid must have been the most stupid person to walk the earth. He is defiantly on your side with getting his kid back, so he won’t use this against you as much as the others might. Instead of bragging or boasting about how you need him to keep you safe, he will want a little something in return.

He might be on your side, desperately wanting his kid back, but he wouldn’t waste an opportunity to get a little treat from you. He will manipulate you to feel guilty, like it was somehow your fault, just to get something from you. Wether it be some bonding time, or something more suggestive, he will get it through manipulation. Of course he’d love to bond some more with your kids after he retrieves them, just don’t think you are safe around Kurapika.

Setsuno:

This poor guy had a terrible relationship before you, so there is no way in hell he would let what happened before happen again. He hates the fact you hate him, but he refrains from hurting you in anyway, this includes your kid. He will leave the room, break things, anything other than touching you and both of your kid.

When someone takes the baby, you aren’t the only one pissed off. Setsuno is furious, so he will do anything to get your kid back. He calls his friends just in case, and the three of them destroy whoever laid hands on his baby. Setsuno is happy to have everyone together again and he’ll take this time to bond with the both of you. Just don’t push him away or else he’ll remind you who saved your kid.

Overhaul:

Overhaul finds children to be dirty, they are nasty things that need so much attention. With that being said, to an extent, he treasures his kid. He wants them to be just like him, so he takes his time to teach them everything there is to know about ruling the underground. Again, his kid is an end to a means, but he does think of them a bit more than most of the others on this list.

When he kid is taken, he is frustrated for a few reasons. One is because he taught his kid to use their quirk (if they are old enough to have it by now), and two because he has to waste his time trying did of dirty things. Though, seeing you beg for him to save your baby makes it more worth his time. Much better than when you grit your teeth and turn the other way. So when he gets the baby back, he makes sure you understand what he went through to appease you.

Chronostasis:

Another one that actually likes his children and treasures them. Chronostasis is more of a family man, taking care of the children, getting groceries, the usual stuff to help around the house while you are there. He doesn’t keep you stuck, he just uses his profession to threaten you. But other than that he acts like a normal father when he doesn’t have work to do.

Taking his child is a really bad thing. He values work a lot, so he will put work first, so he will only leave to find his kid once overhaul gives him the go. He might get help, but in the end it doesn’t matter. He will tear anyone apart to find your baby. When he does, he brings them home and smiles at you, taking as much time as he is given to comfort the both of you. Everything can go back to normal now, just ignore the spots of blood on the bottom of his white jacket.

Tamaki:

Such a shy guy, he doesn’t do much to your hatred against him, he kinda just lets it happen while apologizing profusely. Though he doesn’t let you go. He does, genuinely, love his kid. In a way it gives him a sense of pride that he helped create such a beautiful baby. So when they go missing, and you grip his shirt and beg for him to find them. Tamaki is relieved you finally need him, but so frustrated at the same time.

He wants to sulk and cry through his frustration at loosing his kid, but your begging doesn’t allow that. Instead he asks his besties for help and makes sure to hurry. He’s so happy to get his baby back he can’t help the tears of joy falling from his face. When he comes back home you both cry and hold your baby as close as you possibly can.

Shinsou:

I think Shinsou has an inner demon when he is a Yandere, this is when it shows itself. He loves his kid, and is a really relaxed guy when it comes to the both of you. It’s just when his patience is pulled by someone out of his obsessive behaviors is when it becomes a problem.

He goes on his own, after all he is a hero not many know about, and his ability is insanely powerful. He will find the people resposible and tell them to “jump off this building” or “go kill yourself”. Things that will force them to get their hands dirty and stay away from his kid. He comforts his kid, tells them everything is okay now and that the two of them are going home to see you. Y’all can all watch a movie too, get take out and simply take it easy.

Aizawa:

He is almost exactly like Shinsou, or Shinsou is almost exactly Aizawa. The biggest difference is Aizawa has less patience, and isn’t afraid to get a little sadistic. With that said, you are more likely better “behaved”, though you still have some fight in you. Your kid is one of your joys in life, so when he comes home from work and sees you begging for your baby back, he’s happy.

He goes on his own and takes out whoever was involved. He doesn’t kill, he isn’t that reckless, but he definalty beats them to a bloody pulp until the police arrive. He does the paperwork, and then happily takes back his kid. Aizawa will make sure you know he did this for you and he will make sure you only think that. He loves his kid, a lot, but if you think you owe him more love, then that’s a win for him.

Endeavor:

Enji thinks his kids are weapons, I mean, that’s obvious right? He does care, but more as it would be a waste if something bad were to happen to them. Also, they are keeping you stuck with him. So yeah, when they are taken he gets pretty pissed about it.

Enji kinda rubs it in your face too, I mean you are begging for his help. You NEED him to save your kid. He won’t tell you he would get them back either way either, he wants you to think you owe him. So expect listening to whatever demands he wants from you. Not much time to appreciate your baby being safe.

Shigiraki:

Crusty man actually kinda likes his kid. In a way it’s like he has a distaste for them but can’t help but have a connection with them at the same time. Even Shigiraki doesn’t think he would be too distressed if something happened to his kid, but he was wrong. He takes it personally, and your begging makes him even more pissed. How dare they?!

Shigiraki makes a huge deal out of it, the entire league (those close) will be involved to cause chaos to the idiot who hurt his kid. It will be all on the news, how much carnage he caused, but not a single person will know it was because of his kid. He will boast about how he defeated the final boss for you and his kid, and he expects you to reward him. After you reward his efforts he will relax with the two of you, taking in the warmth from your love.

[painfullydistended]

Maggie 2

He stood at the door jam shaking with anxiety as another series of moans and hisses escaped the lips of the woman he loved. He faced away from her, his eyes staring into the dimly lit hallway as labored breathing could be heard inbetween the fits of moaning. She weakly called his name but he refused to respond, trying desperately to tune her out and focus squarely at the task at hand. He clutched his cellphone tight, 911 already dialed but his finger hovered over send. This was the moment. The moment he feared. The moment he told himself he wouldn't hesitate. He had promised himself he would never let things go this far...yet here he stood. Frozen.

"Its ok baby, I told u its ok..." she said. Her voice was so faint. Exhaustion coated every word, every syllable and the lizard part of his brain relished it. The reptile wanted to hear her burden.

"Look at me baby...please." her voice trailed off.

He slowly turned around, letting his hand relax around his cellphone. He kept his eyes closed cursing his name and lamenting his weakness. Frustrated at his inability to act and worried that what little resolve he had left to make that phone call would melt away if he locked eyes with her. He heard a snort and a chuckle come from his wife and he realized he must look like a fool standing before her with his eyes shut so tightly.

"Open ur eyes silly..." she said and he could hear the laughter in her voice. Her voice was sweet like honey and under the weight of that voice what was left of his resolve withered and he opened his eyes. Laying in their bed was a woman that fufilled his darkest of desire. Desires he was far to afraid to admit even to his own subconscious. His eyes drank her in starting at her jet black hair, long and silky, contrasting sharply against her ghostly pale skin. Her large blue eyes gazed at him lazily, once clear but now glazed with chronic fatigue. Her lids were heavy and a wisp of darkness lay underneath each eye telling the story of her inability to sleep as of late due to the pain of the incredible burden she carries. She parted her plump lips to let out a labored breath. He noticed she had put on the ruby lipstick he loved. Bright, full paintedlips sat sharply against ashen skin. Her thick cherry lips curled into grimaces as spikes of rolling pain shot through her at random intervals. He tightened his grip on the cellphone ready to call for help but just like always that grimace turned into a weak smile...a smile directed at him. Not to hide the pain of it all, no she wasn't smiling to conceal her pain but instead smiling with the knowledge that she knew he liked it, loved it, wanted it.

Her chest heaved almost disturbingly. Filling and collapsing in a way that looked far too fragile. Short shallow breaths following long labored ones. As if she was fighting for air moment to moment.

"Please...touch me...Im doing this for u baby..." she said. Lifting her hand with long slender fingers and bringing it to the cause of her suffering. She slowly slide the sheet from her grossly distended abdomen and he found himself struck with arousal and they moaned in tandem but for very different reasons. Her middle dwarfed her slender frame, jutting from her and towards the ceiling in a way that seemed inhuman. As if just her middle defied all gravity and was being drawn ever upwards. Stretched across the massive globe was skin pulled to its thinnest, marred by a roadmap of blue veins that lay prominent under her almost translucent skin. Her belly button had stretched until it lay flush with her swell and at the very apex of it all the skin was blushed pink and showed all the signs of incredible strain. She pressed into the side of her belly, biting her lip and closing her eyes as just the smallest of added pressure shot waves of ache and discomfort through her. Her belly refusing to give even a centimeter under her finger tips. Rock hard and tight as a drum. The growth inside of her filling her so completely that it was a wonder she hadn't given way to it. Running her hand along her belly she made her way to where her expanse encroached upon her ribs and lungs, demanding more room than she had to give but refusing to stop. With each breath she took she grimaced.

"I can feel it getting bigger...stretching me" she wheezed.

"Stop...just stop Maggie..." He started. He tightened his grip on his phone. Running his hand through his hair he began to pace.

"Don't be that way baby..." she reached out for him but he ignored her hand and silence briefly fell between them.

"Im getting so big...I have a new symptom...are u curious?" She asked but he didnt respond and she didn't seem surprised. He continued to pace, eyes directed to the floor. He muttered to himself, going on and on about responsibility, depravity and the inevitable conclusion if this continued.

"My back has been so sore...hurts so bad lately. Feels like something is pushing on my spine from the inside." She said and as it left her lips he stopped pacing. The phone fell from his hand. He stared at her with an intensity she had rarely seen from him. He made short work of the distance between them. His hands unsure of what to touch, what to prod, what to feel to confirm what she just said...confirm that it was true. The mass inside having filled her to such a degree even her spine was being displaced.

"Its never going to stop baby...its gonna keep getting bigger even if it snaps me in half to do it" she whispered. she motioned to shift her weight but it was futile. Her belly seemingly pinning her down. Despite his mental reservations his cock sprung to life with those words. The sheer size of the thing swelling within her excited him to his core. Maliciously growing and devistating her in the process. His darkest thoughts flooded him. The idea of more torturous growth gripped him and he wondered what would give way under the pressure first...her ribs? Spine? Or her middle? He wondered what it would look like, sound like, feel like...he wondered the face she would make...he wondered if she would continue to grow despite it all. And as quickly as his thoughts fell into the pit of his depravity he immediately admonished himself.

"This can't go on anymore...I just..." His voice was small. Uncertain.

She reached out to him again and he noticed just how small and frail her hand was. Her body had become so slight with time, as if the ever growing mass that lay just under her burdened skin was pulling from her everything she had. He clasped her boney hand and she led him to the very connection to where the aggressive growth met her ribs.

"I dont think I can handle much more pressure here..." she said and she smiled devilishly.

"I want ur hand right here when it happens..."she said placing his hand right under her breasts and resting them on her ribs that had already begun to compress and jut strangely from her torso due to constant and increasing pressure. Her breathing became even more shallow as she played into his desire. She arched her back pushing her chest into his hands and he could feel the bulge within her pressed so firmly into her ribs he wondered how they had not snapped. With each breath, regardless how shallow, her ribs attempted to expand but met a brickwall of resistance. He became entranced by the inconsistent rhythm of her breathing, wanting nothing more than her to grow in this very moment. And with each shakey breath she took he found himself anticipating the flash of pain that fluttered across her face.

"Why pretend anymore? Why pretend this isn't what excites you?" she whispers and he shudders. The phone and his promise now long forgotten.

"Im so tired.." she said suddenly. Her glassy eyes fluttered with sleep. He slid his hand along her skin, watching her face carefully and applying pressure randomely. He was instantly rewarded by her mouth suddenly agape, she lifted her chin and pushing her shoulders into the mattress while hissing at the sudden pain and discomfort. Her chest heaved even more wildly at his prodding. Her reaction excited him even further and he went on to lay both hands on her massive mound hearing her moans turn into exclaims as he increased the pressure. He stopped his exploring hands at the very peak of her swell. Where the skin was the most taxed and the pressure the most apparent. With the mind and intention of someone with uncontrolled sadistic desires he relished in the idea that his actions filled her with pain and suffering on such a scale and he wanted more, much more. He sought agony. He jumped at her sudden touch. Her tiny hand snaking down his pants and her chilled fingers grasping his cock. His knees almost buckled as she began to stroke. Slow, rythmic.

"Do u want me bigger?" She asked. And just the question alone made his cock jump.

"Maggie...you know this can't continue..." he managed to say through gritted teeth. His hands traced the veins down the entire length of the massive dome and once again landed on the crease where her unrelenting growth met her ribcage. His favorite spot. She smiled slightly and tightened her grip on his manhood. She quickened the pace and he moaned trying but failing not to thrust into her hand.

"Do you like what its doing to me?" She asked. And he nodded emphatically. YES, yes he loved every second of it. In the darkest pit of himself was a desire for her to grow until her body was destroyed by this malignant thing and its selfish need to grow. He wanted to see her ravished by growth and he wanted her to feel every agonizing second of it.

Her hand suddenly loosened on his rod and her pace slowed, leaving him fruitlessly humping with dreams of her filled to the breaking point playing out in incredible detail. He glanced from her belly to her face to find her eyes screwed shut, Her back arched, toes curled. One hand clutching her belly with fingers splayed while the other, now pullled free of his pants, clutched the sheets. She began to writhe, squirming underneath the gigantic ball that immobilized her.

"Stretching..." she gasped, using what little air she had left in her lungs before the pain took her breath away. Her belly seemed to strain forward as if being pulled by an invisible force, the thing within her pressing further against the walls of its shell without care. Her breath growing more strained as the growth surged further into her chest cavity. Her eyes wide, mouth open, head thrown back the pain continued to escalate as the growth stretched her. He watched the skin pull tighter as her entire middle forcibly pushed towards the ceiling. His mind clouded with sexual fever. He jammed one hand down his pants, the other he rested on her enourmous mound. he could feel it swell underneath his fingertips, feel her body contest the growth but fail. Her fat ruby lips open and waiting for a scream to escape that stayed stuck in her throat. Her hand slid from her belly and up to cluch her chest as if she could stop the unstoppable. He feverishly stroked himself towards climax with his mind replaying what she had said not too long ago...and while her belly pushed higher and the pressure in her chest reached critical he knew the relentless pressure on her spine grew as well. She must feel as tho she could break in two at this very moment he thought. The sheer agony etched on her face only solidified his wonderings and caused him to erupt. He panted from the ferocity of his orgasm...and as he came down from the high of it all her spasm of growth slowed and then stopped. Leaving her suddenly still.

"Baby..." she said, her red lips barely parting. Her hair was in disarray, and her skin seemed that much more pale and ashen as if the mass had drained from her her vibrancy in exchange for unchecked growth. Her abdomen was impossibly bigger. She continued to arch her back, the continuous discomfort of her new size obvious. And where the growth spasm had ended the pain had not completely ceased nor would it ever from this point on. He cupped her cheek in his hand. He found himself overwhelmed with euphoria. This woman looking so spent on his behalf. Tortured, suffering through for his delight. Going to such lengths to realize his desires. He looked over her swollen middle. The blush at the tip of her swell had spread and darkened and he was sure he would find more consequences of her new growth that would excite the darkness in him but he also noticed she shook as if chilled to the bone. He pulled the sheet and blanket over her fragile form and kissed her forhead. And even underneath the layers of cloth her belly looked positively explosive.

"I dont know how many more of those I can take..." she whimpered. And he shushed her with a reassuring smile. She smiled back weakly, the smile was barely there. As he looked upon her at her most fragile and vulnerable he realized that he wanted more. It wasn't enough.

"Ok Maggie, I wont fight this anymore...but we have to do it my way..." he finally said.

[miss--river]

4, 17, 26 & 36 for Eleanor! :3

and 42, 32, 22 and 24 for Jori!

4. what is their comfort food? orange chicken and lo mein! she also just really love chinese food in general so she’ll eat it any time haha!

17. when were they the most angry that they’ve ever been? as a teen when she was abandoned by her parents and then when she was around 21 she was attacked by some gang memebers, was caught in a grenade explosion and lost both her arms. she got her spiked arms as replacements and got revenge on her attackers. none of them were left alive.

26. do they like to collect things? if so, what? just money 🤭

36. are they introverted or extroverted? i would say she’s more of an ambivert tbh!

-

42. how similar is your character to you? not that similar i dont think! i gave her some talents i wish i had lmao! the only thing i can think of thats similar between us is that she’s bi/ace like me because i make all my characters bi and/or ace. oh and also neither of us can cook but we love to bake!

32. what emotion do they feel the most often? happiness, and its thanks to scorpion! if it werent for him and of course the other aldecaldos she would have felt so alone in the world after leaving the bakkers.

22. if they were to have a social media profile, what would it look like? the username, bio, type of thing they’d post about, etc. her bio would probably just have her name in it tbh lmao! her bio would probably have something to do with foxes and she would post about music, video games, and art!

24. are they good at keeping secrets? does it depend on how big the secret is? jori would be devistated if someone told one of her secrets to someone else no matter how big or small it maybe. she would have felt so betrayed so she could never do something like that to someone else.

[word-scribbless]

Oh baby part 1

Gibbs x female reader

Summary: Gibbs decides that he is all in with Y/N, even if that means doing something he never thought he would again, raising a baby.

Masterlist | Series Masterlist

————————

Y/N wiped her eyes for the hundrth time that minute. She peered at the sweet little girl sleeping in the brand new crib she had bought just hours ago. Y/N’s whole life had changed with one phone call and now she had to decide how much she wanted to let it change gibbs’.

Y/N and Gibbs had been dating for almost a year. Things were going well. She gave him all her heart, and still space when he needed and he gave her more love than she knew was possible. He may not have said it but he showed it. Everything was perfect, but now everything was different.

Y/N’s brother had gone off the grid a year and a half ago. Before that Y/N had taken care of him, paid for rehab, tried to get him straightened out. He alwaus ran away when he didn’t want to deal with her help anymore but she never gave up.

That morning she got a call. Her brother and his girlfriend, that she didn’t know about ,had been killed in a drunk driving accident. Their baby girl, that she didn’t know about, was in the back seat. She was an aunt and had no idea. Her brother was a dad, and now he was dead. One of them got behind the wheel DRUNK! And could have killed their daughter. What mattered now was that that little girl was in Y/N’s care.

As much as she loved Jethro Gibbs, she couldn’t pull him into this. He already had, and lost daughter, would raising Amelia(her niece) be too painful? Did he want that with her? God she had no clue what to do. She just needed time. What came first for her now was Amelia. If Gibbs down the road wanted to be in both their lives, she’d never say no, but she didn’t want to put him in that place.

So here she was, at Jethro’s front door. She decided she also needed to do what was best for Gibbs and felt she figured that was to call it off. She dropped Amelia off at her best friend’s house, and after a long explanation of why she was now a mom and why she had to watch her for a bit, she made it to Gibb’s. She took a deep breath and knocked on his door.

“Hey” he greeted, kissing her softly. She almost broke into tears right there.

“Hi” she whispered

“Come in”

“I- I can’t” she stammered, catching his attention.

“What’s wrong” he asked, cupping her face

“I think we need to take a break”

He stopped in his tracks and looked at her the way he does when he doesn’t want people to know how he feels.

“I’m sorry” she whispered. Placing her hand on his chest.

“If that’s what you want” he sighed. Stepping back and putting his usual walls up. It killed her to do this, but she needed to.

“It’s not what I want Jethro, it’s what’s best for now. Please trust me and know I care about you okay?”

He wanted to fight for her but didn’t know how so he just nodded.

She began to cry. Before he could even react to her tears she was turning away and rushing back to her car.

It had been three days since she left him and Gibbs couldn’t handle knowing they were over. He drove to her house one night around 11:00 after several sleepless hours and days.

“Gibbs what-“ y/N began when she answered the door.

“Why?” He grunted out, stepping into her apartment.

“What?”

“Why do you need space?” He asked gently and reached for her hand.

“J I-“

“Usually I’d just let you go, if you didn’t want this I’d just accept it. I can’t with you though Y/N. I need to know why, need to know if I can fix it.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong J.” She said, eyes tearing up. He stepped closer to her and cupped her cheeks with his hands.

“Why?” He asked again before he suddenly heard the firmiliar sound of a young baby’s cries.

“That’s why.” Y/N said, pulling away “Hang on” she told him before disappearing into her spare room.

A moment later she walked out with an adorable baby girl who couldn’t be much more than 2 or 3 months old. “ Jethro Gibbs, meet Amelia Y/F/N Y/L/N, my niece. Well my daughter now.”

“Hey beautiful” Gibbs cooed, pushing down his questions to scoop the little girl from y/N’s arms. Amelia cooed softly and nuzzled into his chest. Y/N’s heart melted at the sight and she began to cry again. God she wished she hadn’t ended things, wished things were different and she could do this with him.

“Ryan?” Gibbs asked, referring to her brother. They had met once before, and Gibbs had helped her through dealing with him leaving.

She nodded and answered his unasked questions “Killed, either him or her mom was driving, both drunk. I didn’t ask many questions that didn’t have to do with Amelia.”

“Y/N.” He sighed, adjusting Amelia so he could hug Y/N with a free arm.

“J I didn’t want to break things off but I’m not abandoning her and I-“ she began to admit when Gibbs stopped her with a soft kiss to the head.

“You don’t have to choose y/n.” He assured her

“What?” She thought she was hearing things. So much had happened in the past week, she couldn’t let herself get her hopes up.

“It’s not me or her.” He said rocking the sweet girl back and forth making silly faces at her when she started to fuss. “You can have us both.”

“You’re so good with her.” Y/N said, watching the little girl slowly drift back to sleep in the arms of the man she loved.

“She’s sweet” he said “already reminds me of you.”

“Well she’s got my name” y/n laughed.

“And your eyes” he smiled

Y/N smiled back and lead Gibbs to the couch, sitting down on the chair across from him.

“I didn’t want you to think you were stuck with us.” Y/N admitted.

“Ya want me here?” Gibbs said taking her hand and gently pulling her to join him on the sofa.

“Yes” she said nodding she brushed her finger against Amelia’s face and then looked up at Gibbs, doing the same thing to his cheek, “No one I’d rather do this with. I didn’t want you to feel obligated though.”

“I love ya Y/N” Gibbs whispered, wrapping his arm around her.

Her breath caught she couldn’t speak for a moment, so he took the opportunity to kiss her gently.

“I love you too”

“So don’t give me space, let me do this with you.” He said. Pulling her so her head was on his shoulder, both looking at Amelia.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, please.” He said and placed a kiss in her hair.

“Didn’t want you to- I didn’t know if you’d be up to do this again.” She said, moving her head to look at him, while staying laid on his shoulder.

“ I’d do any thing for you” he smiled “and her” he said looking down at the baby.

“She’s pretty great huh?” She smiled.

“Yeah, just met her and already wrapped around her finger.” He laughed and looked at Y/N “she gets that from you.”

“Just wait until I really have time to teach her.” Y/N laughed

“ what do you say, want a partner in this?” Gibbs asked seriously.

“You offering to do late night diaper changes?”

Mhm he nods and kisses her, laughing when amelia wakes up a bit and gurgles at them.

“How should we do this? I mean I moved to teaching online courses next semester” she began, explaining how she’d moved her job as a college professor around “ so her and I can stay here on week nights an-“

“Move in with me.” Gibbs stopped her to ask.

“Jethro you don’t-“

“I want you to, wanted you to anyway, now I do even more.” He admitted “I’m all In.” He said smiling at the little girl who was awake again and looking at them both curiously.

“What do you think Amie, should we live with Poppa?” Y/N cooed and heard Gibbs breath hitch a bit at the name.

Amelia made happy baby noises and y/n giggled, looking up and Gibbs.

“I think that’s a yes.” She said kissing him.

“Poppa?” He asked with a nervous smirk.

“She doesn’t have to call you that, you can be Gibbs if you want I just thought it sounded nice.” Y/N offered and Gibbs loved how much she trusted and loved him. He was afraid she wouldn’t believe he wanted to do this, but suddenly they were a team and he couldn’t have been happierZ

“I love it, just wasn’t sure your plan.” He admitted, gently bobbing his knee to get Amelia to rest again.

“She’ll always know who her biological Mom and Dad were, I’ll never deny her that, but she’ll also know that her momma and Poppa love her more than anything.”she said while gesturing to him and herself.

“She’s a lucky girl” Gibbs smiled and y/n smiled but tears came to her eyes. He knew she loved Amelia, but she also just lost her brother.

“You doing okay, with everything?”

“I’m a lot of things, not sure if okay is one of them.” She said and Gibbs nodded his understanding.

“I’m happy about amelia, angry Ryan didn’t tell me, Devistated that he is gone, furious he made a dumb ass decision that got him and his girlfriend, WHO I NEVER MET, killed and almost killed Amelia! But I’m happy you and her are here. And I feel guilty for being happy, but also I’m so angry.” She said with tears in her eyes as she ran her thumb over her little girl’s tiny hand.

Gibbs kissed her head. “Nothing to be guilty about, you are going to raise and love his little girl, more than most people would do. We’ll get through it together.” He said against her head. She nodded and snuggled into his side more.

“Let’s put this peanut back to bed.” He suggested, starting to get up.

“Wait” y/N stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“Hmm?”

“How bad would it be if we didn’t put her back in her crib yet? I just want to be with both of you.” She asked quietly.

Gibbs smiled and settled back in. “Put a pillow under this arm and I’m a better place to sleep than a crib.” He teased and moved so Y/N could wedge a pillow gently under his arm. She curled into him again, pulled a blanket over her legs and gently held amelias hand again.

“I love you J.” She whispered and turned her head to kiss his chest.

“I love you”, he replies, kissing her head “and you” he whispered, leaning in and kissing amelias head too.

———-/

Next chapter

@gibbsandpridegirl @averyhotchner @andreasworlsboring101

[popculturebuffet]

Monthly Muppet Madness: Sesame Street Luis and Maria Valentine's Day Special (Comission for Emma Fici)

Happy valentine's day all you happy people and welcome back to monthly muppet madness. All the muppets you can handle once a month. And for this special day of love and chocolate we're going down to sesame street to look at the love story and wedding of Luis and Maria.

Now this one was a bit of a challenge for two reasons: the first is that my Seasame Street knowledge is limited: i know the 2010's decently enough as I watched a ton of it when my niece and nephew were toddlers, and I reviewed Follow that Bird last year, which was exellent.. but I really don't know who most of the cast are as characters outside of the major muppets and even some of those escape me as many have been phased out over the years. I mean why they don't use the two headed monster ine verything is beyond me, he's a two headed monster> that's awesome.

Thankfully the muppet wiki is super expansive so if like me you didn't know these characters going into this article yoru great. If you did, well... go get some juice or a pop while I fill in the blanks.

Luis and Maria were both introduced in season 3 of Seasame street and lasted all the way to 2015. Luis was introduced as the owner of the local fixit shop, a kind man who fixed bikes, toasters what have you. He also fixed them for Snuffy before knowing he was real. They were dropped off and picked up by... oh let's say moe. He's notable for playing the longest lasting mexican american roll on a television series and Seasame Street celebrated his heritage frequently. Sesame Street did not fuck around and I appricate that. Maria was introduced as a local teen who worked at the library, aging in real time and quickly becoming a young adult. She soon started working with Luis at the fixit shop, getting hired by simply pitching in when he was too busy to actually listen to her ask for a job and being hired on the spot as it helped with his work load. She later asked for a raise... only to not only get THAT but be promoted to partner.

So the two already had a working relationship and friendship when Sonia Manzano, Maria's Actress, got pregnant. Rather than dance around it Seasame Street decided to integrate the story, but since it was the 80's by the time of this pregnancy, they also needed Maria to get married first because GASP apparently kids couldn't handle the idea of a single parent. Or a multiracial couple as her previous love intrest David, was also ruled out though the why is a bit murky: One documentary said his actor was leaving anyway , another said he was devistated. I wouldn't rule out an 80's tv show avoiding an interracial marriage to avoid scandal.. but I also think Seasame Street was progressive enough to try it anyway, so i'm inclined to belivie the actor simply wasn't avaliable, especailly since the idea was pitched by Carol Spinney's wife Debra and passed on to Caroll himself. Given the two characters were already close as friends, buisness partners and on good terms, having them do the relationship upgrade makes some sense: while friends to lovers CAN be really tricky, here it just feels wholesome: like two people who were simply friends for a long time, caught feelings eventually and fell in love.

So today we'll be covering the two realizing their in love and thent heir wedding day. I wish I had something for the middle but Sesame Street.. is hard to track down these days. Most of it WAS on max.. but Max being max, a lot of it was removed and digtially most of seasame street is best of compliations and what not. There really isn't a consitent, episode by episode archive for the show that I found. So I found two complitions on youtube covering parts of this storyline. I am sorry that I coudln't find a more in depth one covering the whole thing up to the wedding, and would be glad to cover more of their story in the future. For now though let's tell the timeless tale of man and woman brought together by two 5 year olds asking difficult questions.

Part 1: In Love So the Luis and Maria story has a LOT of parts to it, and like I said I could only find so much on youtube. I tried archive of our own too, no luck. So before this the two started growing from friends to something more after tending to a baby bird... and not the normal one they tend to what lives in the back of their store.

The building feelings pay off here.. but first what most people come to seasame street for: two five year olds arguing: while playing Cowboys, Big Bird wants to go Eha Eha, and Snuffy wants to go Eha Eha Eha. Somehow it's far from the most gripping cowboy dillema i've seen

Gordon easily solves the issue and the two get their eha's on when they notice Maria and Luis holding hands. We don't see it because they only have a set for that part of sesame street, but it leaves the boys confused and they decide to go ask the adults up front.

Luis and Maria.. have no adquate explination for why they were holding hands and i'ts hilarous, mostly beause it feels so REAL. Kids will oftne ask questions that end up super awkward simply because they don't know any better. The two REALLY don't know how to answer this, saying adults do it because they like each other not because they need to, but not sure how they feel about each other. Until an idea hits

But since it would they instead realize their in love and go to tell each other and we get a really sweet well done shot as we look in on the fixit store through it's window as the two confess. it's some really well done acting and really cute.. then they shut the curtain so all of sesame street dosen't see their live sex celebration.

That night Big BIrd asks when their getting married which panics the two especially since you know THEY JUST STARTED DATING. Again it works because it's a harmless kid thing and Big Bird is just a giant toddler. But he bets they will

And he's right though there's according to the wiki a whole ass arc where everyone in sesame street is pressuring the two to get married. I mean Delgado's pregnancy is part of why they speed it up and as a show for younger kids they don't have to really get into emotional complexity... buuuuut it dosen't make it any less hilarous that all the muppets are wondering when this couple's going to get hitched already depsite being none of thier buisness.

Eventually Luis proposes, we get some planning and now it's time for the wedding.

Part 2: It's Your Wedding Day

So we get to the wedding, as everyone prepares: Maria's been so nervous she can't sleep while Luiz

Maria talks to linda, her bestie and just the best. Linda is kinda sorta dating bob, the og sesame street human and local teacher, the two even getting a mental duet about possibly getting maried and Linda catching the boquet. Both of these things go nowhere but given the two never married anyone else, I like to think they just had a quiet wedding officiated by kermit off screen.

Anyways everyone prepares for the wedding day with a big fucking musical number, as you should, and then has the wedding to one as the soon to be weds panic internally, the various adults and their relatives sing about how in love they are , and Oscar hopes fo ra fight because of course he does. Also elmo looks like Oscar slipped him about 80 ounces of cocaine because he is TRIPPING BALLS the entire cermony while panicking about dropping the rings.

Hey kids, just a life lesson if the garbage monster on your street offers you cocaine to help you relax before a wedding, don't take it. he's probably just wnatin ga laugh at your expense. Also just.. don't give 5 year olds cocaine. That's not a good thing to do. And don't shake them.. unless your Larry david then that sorta thing is just expected of you and you'll be dealt with later.

This message has been brought to you by popculturebuffet and the two penguins on my desk.

The wedding ends up working an dis beautiful. Also oscar the grouch somehow got a plus one, his girlfriend grungetta who i'm somehow just finding out exists. Oscar was getting it on the reg and not ONE of you fuckers thought it was a good idea to tell me. Good for him. A reception is held and everyone is happy... well almost everyone.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

[hetalia-has-a-secretary]

Omg Axis or Allies (your choice) react to their s/o crying when they find out their boyfriend is an immortal country because they love them so much but they can’t get over their dream of growing old and having grandkids with the person they love and they just don’t know if they can be with them anymore 🥺

Hey- hey stop stabbing my emotions (I say as I think about this daily ಥJಥ ) Bold of you to assume I can't turn this into fluff though, HAHA! Also, going to go with the Axis since it was first on the list! (And if I have to write this with Russia involved I'll cry. Y'all going to have to send a request to get me to do that!)

TW: Light mentions of sleeping around

Axis' S/O cries over being Mortal!

Germany:

His heart pretty much shattered.

Especially when he hears the reason his S/O is sobbing so hard.

They were right.

One day they will leave his side, and he sometimes forgets that. So he let his own tears fall.

He decided if this was truly their fate, he will let his S/O see him in his most vulnerable state.

He held them, not even bothering to console them. How could he? This was doomed to happen, and he has had it happen before, but those relationships didn't last long after that, but with his S/O? It felt so... Wrong.

It didn't feel right that he found the perfect fit, and to be yanked away... It devistated him.

He never loved someone this fully before? He didn't even realize till now how much he fought to keep them by his side.

As their life got shorter he did everything he could to love and cherish them. Refusing to let them pass anywhere but where they called home. Even if it wasn't with him.

In that moment they passed he felt numb, but that same feeling came back from years ago.

It still felt wrong.

Dreams plagued him, thousands of scenerios for years. Meeting them again, and reliving their life over, and over again.

At first it hurt, but then it was like they were still there... Maybe they were?

One day turned into years, even after learning of his S/O passing. The dreams never stopped, and neither did he. He tried shaking it off by going out to town, and wandered into a cafe. The chilling sensation he felt when he recognized the cafe, but didn't remember why. His body became panicked as the owner told him they just opened last week. Frantically he looked around, the scene unfolding before him, just like in his dreams. Then he slowly remembered the window seat. To his shock, sitting right there was the same person in his dreams. The one he called by his S/O's name. The one that, even in waking life, made his heart race and cheeks flare. He had to kiss them...

He walked over, and asked them if he could sit with them. Their face seemed to be in udder shock. Their mouth was left wordless and wide open. Their eyes wanting to run, but their body lurching forward, capturing his lips in a kiss. A kiss that felt like... Forever.

Pulling back they looked at each other, eyes the only familiar memory from a past life together. It turns out this stranger had dreams about him too.

Japan:

His knees buckled beneath him by his S/O's side. Trying to console them.

Regret filled him, thinking about how he should have known better to keep such a secret for such a long time. Least the worst being letting his S/O stay.

He didn't want to let them go. He wanted them to stay. Even when they first uttered "Hello" to each other, their absence made him feel, strange?

But he knows this story. If they chose to leave, they can leave. If they chose to stay, they will not suffer alone. And if they did nothing but fade in and out, he'd wait for them with open arms, and a warm bed.

But still. The sensation of isolation after they're long gone never left.

The dreams he would have of them made him harsh, and cold. He would never change.

This would be the first time he became insecure over his existence. Being a country was hard, and he had past lovers but this one. It was the final one. So he thought.

The dreams had one day just, stopped. It made his mood worse, and he had snapped at anyone who tried talking to him. Even he knew the only reason he stayed sane was seeing his S/O face behind closed eyes. So he ran to a hidden opening in a nearby forest. The same one he vowed his love for his S/O. He had hoped it would reignite the dreams, and maybe give him some peace. He was beating himself up for not thinking about it earlier.

But his heart shattered at the sight. Where the tree that protected that undying love was replaced with a small home. He had lost his S/O, and now it felt like he lost his S/O's remaining love as well.

He had turned away only to look back at the sound of his name being called. An almost electric shock going through his body. The person who called out to him had felt so familiar. It made him feel warm, and... Happy? But he chose to shove that feeling down, refusing to fall for humanities vices. Yet he still marched over to this stranger, but the closer he got the more hazy he felt. His world spun as he met eyes with them, and his mind filled the blanks, and he embraced them, tears falling. He was unsure if it was the summer heat, or the shock of his last resort being abolished. The only thing that lead to him knowing this was his Darling, was the choked up words he hadn't heard in a century, or three. "It's okay. You don't have to say it right now, I can wait forever for you..."

Italy:

He never felt so alone in his life.

He knew it was the end of the relationship, and he knew better than to stop them. Though he tried.

Eventually the bonds broke, and things got worse between them the longer his S/O bounced between loving him, and wanting to live a normal, human life.

Them leaving felt no different from their passing.

Many years went by, and it flew, but dragged at the same time. Woman after woman, and man after man he tried to rekindle that same passion he had with S/O. But to no avail.

It burned and tormented him. The only one who allowed him to take out his aggression was Germany. Yet even he couldn't give what had been taken...

Italy never remembered his dreams of his S/O. All he knew was the muscle memory of his happiness when they were around, and the tears that fell from the reminder and afterglow of those dreams.

Another person who caught his eye. How many has it been since his S/O passed? Enough that even France had been out to shame, apperantly. Italy just needed the pain to be numbed over, just one more time. It was his addiction, it was his only respite. He should have been wiser. And he wished he knew how Grandpa Rome managed his affairs, Because Feli certainly couldn't do the same.

His hand lingered over the stranger's shoulder, ready to tap, but their scent caught him off guard. His heart gave a painful flutter, and he had to turn and walk away. Hiding away in an alley, he let his eyes water over. The tears poured down like rain as the years of trying to fill a never ending void finally caught up to him. The shame and guilt coming in waves. He didn't want to replace them, he only wanted to be with them. The scent he escaped had found him, and he had looked up to see kind and gentle eyes of a stranger. Italy felt oddly at peace. Like all those years of sleeping around was forgiven due to this stranger.

They had followed him, but why? When he asked his body froze, heart racing. They saw him in almost every dream they had, even when they were little. Some of their friends and family thinking they'd gone insane, and it was passed off as a rare occurrence by professionals. Yet there he stood. A dream made reality. Italy couldn't comprehend what they meant, and knew this should have been a red flag, but between the scent and their glassy eyes, he felt compelled to hold them, and kiss them. So he did, and they didn't even pull away. Not until streams of tears fell, leaving them both with sorrowful smiles, and fond memories stitched back in place.

For those who are confused, I Headcannon that when a country finds their one and only true love (cliche I know) they never have to lose them. Either through reincarnation or some form of magic their S/O will find their way into the countries arms time and time again. Both having vivid dreams about each other. The countries getting glimpse of their S/O in their new form, and their S/O reliving past lives through theirs. Only when they cross paths again, and physically come in contact, the S/O will slowly piece back their life with the country. Though they say nothing lasts forever, it depends on how many lives they decide forever truly is.

[woolieshubris]

OK SO IM GOING TO WRITE SOME BACKSTORY THEN CLICK THE CUT TO SEE THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE WITH NO EDITING.

OK SO BASICALLY. At this point in the series, (season 1 had been out and season 2 kept getting hints dropped) every main love square ship had gotten their "scene", except for marichat. Marichat, argueably, was the (and still is) most popular ship on the show. Suddenly a still frame (or concept art?) was released of marinette and chat sitting on her balcony together looking out at the stars. This was quickly dubbed the "balcony scene" and many many many ficwriters quickly made fics of the scene, people made art for it, and people were overall, generally super f/cking hyped for it. Then, glaciator dropped, and reviews were... mixed to say the least. So here, presented in its full, unedited glory, was my hot 2016 take.

enjoy.

Yes. I will be talking about THIS episode. The episode so anticipated by shippers everywhere. The episode that was supposed to finally give marichat shippers a chance, and we ended up with this.

I hate this episode, for many many reasons, but do not worry. The balcony scene isn't one of them.

Here is my summary, (which is very long, so if you would rather just rewatch the episode feel free to do so)

The episode starts out, with chat asking lady out. Nothing out of the ordinary. She says no, but chat takes it as a maybe. (Which is already really stupid, but I'll let it slide)

After they wrap up the escapade, Mari goes to Andre the sweetheart ice cream man, and becomes disappointed when Adrian says he can't go. (Which is not his fault, so I'm letting this slide as well)

Mari feels like a third wheel and declines Andres ice cream because she's heartbroken? (You can get ice cream any day? And it wasn't Adrian's choice either, she should know this by now?)

Andres feelings are hurt.

Cut to chat, who is waiting for ladybug, and lady isn't showing.

Cut to hawkmoth who akumatizes Andre, and then cut to mari, who feels bad about the who ordeal.

Chat blows out candles angstily (even though lady clearly said no, AND thought he was joking) and decides that lady doesn't love him.

Mari is sad about Adrian and goes out to her balcony, balcony scene happens and chat brings Mari to his date he had planned.

Mari is surprised that chat hadn't been joking this entire time (ehh it makes enough sense) and now she feels double as bad.

Andre attacks.

Chat leaps into action and ladybug comes right after. Chat is angsty, and ladybug doesn't show any kind of remorse (what?)

She says sorry, but with no meaning. (maybe bad voice acting, so I'll let this one slide as well) chat is still mad. They soon make the discovery that he doesn't hurt couples, so lady asks if they could pretend to be a couple and chat says no. (Which makes sense) then lady like 1 minute later asks the same thing and chat says yes. (What why would he say yes? ) And they pretend to be a couple but it doesn't do anything to help them?

It helps them escape but they could have done that without pretending to be a couple? Anyways, they save the day and then lady comes to go see chats surprise. He offers her a rose, and lady says she only wants to be friends.

(Chat should have still been mad at her, since she never even said sorry properly, I mean I know I would have,) and chat smiles and says that's fine, then he blasts off.

We follow chat to his room and he's smiling in his bed. Plagg tells him it's ok to be heartbroken, and that a little cheese can help, but Adrian says he isn't heartbroken, and that he's glad she sees him as a friend.

Oof that summary was longer than expected, but it was hopefully shorter than the episode.

Ok, so now that we are all refreshed, I will now list m problems with the episode, in order to make it easier to fix.

First problem, Marinette is heartbroken over the ice cream.

We can easily fix this by making it a special day, like maybe it's a blue moon that night, and Mari wanted to see it with Adrien. It could be the same for Chat with Ladybug, they wanted to see the blue moon together. He takes the, "maybe, I have plans" as a, "sure I'll make it a plan" because he really really wants it to happen, maybe even have plagg mention it, say something along the lines of, "She said she had plans," and Adrien says, "She said maybe!" (I know they already say this, but it isn't portrayed very well in my opinion.

Problem two, Ladybug never says sorry, and chat doesn't care.

Honestly, throughout the entire episode, I was waiting for ladybug to give chat a hug and just say sorry properly. Throughout most of the episode, chat looks on the brink of tears, and lady acts like she can't see it, and chat forgives her almost instantly. It would have been much more interesting to see a chat begrudgingly doing as he's told, just to save Paris, and go home.

Problem 3, Chat isn't heartbroken.

As stated in the show, we don't ever see the sensitive side of chat noir, and the show seems to want to avoid the subject. Chat got friendzoned. He says he's happy to be lady's friend, but he always was, from the start. All of this buildup, only for it to be knocked down in a single episode. Adrien should have been devistated, but then again, this is one of those "reset" type of shows, where everything must resolve before the credits roll, and it becomes very obvious with the awkward transition. You can tell that they were planning to have him heartbroken in bed, mad at ladybug, but someone said, "kids don't want meaningful character exploration, they want happy endings!"

Ok, so now I write my script doctored version of this episode. Warning, it's pretty long.

Ladybug and chat are talking it up as they help the people get off the bus.

"So, you heard about the blue moon tonight chat noir?" Lady asks.

"Yeah, when there is a full moon twice in a month? It's very rare!" Chat says, explaining to all the kids what a blue moon is. "Well, m'lady, can you visit me tonight? You know, to see it together?" Lady shakes her head.

"I have plans," lady thinks it over for a bit however, "but maybe I can come." Chat looks at the time on his baton, and realizes he has to go back home, his piano practice is almost over.

"Gotta go, see you later ladybug!" He says, as he runs off. Lady goes home and realizes that's she's almost late to go meet her friends. She runs out the door and we cut to Adrien, who is texting Nino.

"Sorry nino, father said I can't come" he's talking as he's texting. Plagg flies by and says, "you didn't even ask your dad, how do you know he'd say no?"

Adrien responds, "I have plans with ladybug remember?"

Plagg rolls his eyes. "She said that she had plans."

Adrien looks at plagg and says, "she said maybe."

We cut away from Adrien and we now see a heartbroken Mari.

"It's the blue moon, the most magical night of all, and we were going to eat Andre's ice cream, the most magical ice cream in Paris!" Mari sighs sadly as she sits down on a bench. Nino shows her the text and says, "It's never adrien's fault, so don't blaim him for not being able to show."

"I know, I know." Mari stands up and they all start looking for the ice cream cart.

Cut to chat, who's has just finished setting up the date.

"I really hope she comes." Chat says this with certainty, showing his trust in ladybug. Without having to OUTRIGHT SAY IT. (cough cough episode 12 cough cough)

Cut back to mari, who is exhausted from the chase to find the cart, and salty about Adrien. She sees alya and nino holding hands as they get their ice cream, and looks at the ground while she sits on the bench, not wanting to see it. "We can never be like them" She says, salty. Andre notices this and gives her the ice cream.

"Perfect, just like your love!" Andre says, with a smile. Mari's twisted salty head decides that she doesn't love him, because she and adrien will never be like alya and nino, so when Andre is passing the icecream to Mari, she doesn't grab it, and it falls to the ground.

"I don't love anyone." Mari says, as she stares at the fallen ice cream. Under her breath Mari says, "because no body loves me." Mari looks up at Andre who looks very sad. She realizes what happened and runs to her house. Cut to chat, who is doing the candle thing he did before because that was a really good and powerful scene and I don't want to change it. Start balcony scene, and everything is the same up until the "reveal" of the surprise to ladybug. This time, she hugs him, and you see chats eyes tearing up as she friendzones him. He lets go of the hug prematurely, and smiles, putting the rose in lady's hair. He goes back home and no more cuts to chat or Adrien so we can let the viewers draw their own conclusions. Everything is the same up until when Adrien gets the ice cream. This time, Adrien looks a little happy/sad when Andre prepares him the ladybug ice cream. Happy because he knows he still loves ladybug, but also sad because he knows she will never love him in the same way.

I'm sorry for making you read that entire thing. If you made it through, please, tell me below, which version you like more, and I really want to see your criticism of both. I'd love to have a conversation about it.

[3pirouette]

Fic: Iterate (1/1)

Title: Iterate By: TriplePirouette/3Pirouette Spoilers: Up through Endgame. Disclaimer: They're not mine. Word Count: 2953 Distribution: AO3 Anyone else please ask first :)

Summary: Steve lived through the 21st century twice, the second time hurt much more than the first.

A/N: I literally made myself cry today on the way to work while I was working this out in my head. It was SUPPOSED to be FLUFFY. I’m not exactly why I decided on this format, all I know is that it felt right. I hope you enjoy. Steggy is just mentioned, more Steve-centric. 

It was supposed to be a stupid, fluffy story about Old Steve living with his granddaughter and being a LITTLE SHIT to her all the time because he’s 100% comfortable with modern things and it drives her nuts. I’m sorry.

Also, please pay attention to vague time stamps. Certain details are changed for impact. Hence, AU (Even though I FULLY BELIEVE that once the stones are placed back there is only ONE main timeline where Steve lived, was Peggy’s husband, and that’s how he showed up at the end of Endgame. Fight me.)

AND I’M SORRY.

~*~ October 2023

He supposed he’d always been waiting for this day. Steve knew he’d be around for it, one way or another. At least, he’d always assumed that, though he’d thought he’d experience it in a very, very different way.

He didn’t know the exact time, just a vague recollection that it was early afternoon, that there had been sunlight they’d blocked out with the blast shields, that they’d tried to eat lunch but they were all too nervous.

Funny. Same thing happened to him today. He couldn’t manage to get anything to slide down past the lump in his throat, couldn’t fill his stomach to calm the butterflies. He tried coffee first. It was warm and robust but had no effect.

He pulled out the tin from the back of the cabinet and made a cup of tea from one of the few remaining bags there. He sipped it and imagined Peggy sitting across from him, telling him off for using old tea that would be bitter and teasing him for how much sugar he put in it.

He drank a beer and wished to god that he had just one flask of whatever it was Thor used to carry around. He needed something to calm his nerves.

He caught his reflection in the window over the sink. For just the briefest second he saw his young self, so broken by so much, not knowing that today would be the day he’d be put to his greatest test. But the sun shifted and he could see every wrinkle in the refection, every grey hair, the haziness to his eyes that the doctor said was the beginning of cataracts.

A lifetime ago this day had changed everything for him without him knowing. Today, he was just as eager for the moment when Banner would put on that glove, this time for very different reasons.

~*~

In the end, Steve Rogers managed to live a fairly normal life.

Once back with Peggy, he kept away from the spotlight. Unsure if he’d created a parallel timeline or if he was living in his own, he did his best to avoid changing things.

Because even when he wanted to change things, he realized very quickly, he couldn’t.

He became enamored with sci-fi and fantasy that included time travel, with physicists who wrote books on the subject. He wanted to understand it, to know the unknowable.

He eventually decided that he was prescribing to the Doctor Who Theory of time travel: that it was all very, very complicated but that some things, no matter what, had to just happen in their own time and some things were simply fixed and would always happen the way they were supposed to. He’d seen this first with Zola- as he’d tried to get the man and his influence away from SHIELD they only dug their heels in deeper and kept him. It was later reaffirmed when, despite every effort, The Winter Soldier escaped him and Howard and Maria were left for dead in their car, young Tony devistated.

After that day, he stopped trying so hard to avoid squishing butterflies and focused instead on enjoying what he had.

What he had was, after all, quite a lot: A wife, two young boys, and a second chance at the life he’d missed while fighting other men’s wars.

~*~

Despite knowing all that laid ahead for him and his friends in the future that was now his past and yet somehow once again his future, Steve eventually started longing for the new millennium as decades past him by. He missed the technology, the ability to have whatever kind of entertainment he waited at the tips of his fingers. Though he’d known a good portion of what would happen from history books, once he’d gone back, he’d lived an entire lifetime full of surprises, experiencing things like the moon landing and the Vietnam war first hand. But now, as he grew older and he knew his days with Peggy were numbered, he longed for the small comforts of familiarity, for e-mails and smartphones and heated steering wheels on cars that parked themselves.

As the 2000’s arrived, he felt himself get more and more comfortable with the things around him: the news, the events he’d already experienced once and would again in a different way. It felt good to feel at least on solid ground with the world around him, knowing what was to come for him.

His home was lonely after Peggy was gone, and he made his only granddaughter an offer she couldn’t refuse: free room and board if she helped him keep up the house. An elementary school art teacher, Maggie was happy to step in for a little financial relief as she tried to navigate the churlish economy.

If he never told her that he was perfectly capable of taking care of the house by himself, it didn’t quite matter. The company was more than enough. And if when she smiled she looked just a little like her namesake and it warmed his heart… well, that wasn’t a bad thing, either.

The best part, he’d found though, was that it was hilariously funny to drive his granddaughter crazy. He’d lived through the early decades of the 21st century as a young man. He’d learned how to navigate the internet, interface with the most complicated technology there was to offer, and listened to music that wouldn’t be written for years to come. He loved watching her face as he sang along to Billie Eilish on the radio or realize that she didn’t have to explain to him how to use an iPad or Facetime.

~*~

She yelled at him the first snowfall. Skidded her car (all-wheel drive, thank goodness he’d convinced her to get the newest model) into the freshly shoveled driveway and tore out of the driver’s seat, yelling at him a mile a minute.

They’ll think I’m some kind of self-centered princess letting a centenarian shovel this and try to kill himself!  She’d yelled, trying to take the shovel from his hands.

He was still stronger than he should be, and held his ground. I don’t want you hurting yourself on this stuff.

Me? She’s screeched, and he’d laughed. He couldn’t help but smile and find her concern at least a little comical. Deep down he understood, knew that he should be trying to sell his age a little more, be trying to hide that he was still strong and fast and in better shape than some of his middle-aged neighbors.

As much as he’d like to push her off, tell her to go inside, he couldn’t. She wasn’t a self-centered princess, but she was his princess, and he bent to her whim like a branch in the wind. He’d kissed her on the head and finally handed her the shovel, leaving her the last bit of the path to her to clean up, and promised to take better care of himself.

She didn’t know that when she left for work, he still went down the basement and bench pressed 225 on an easy day.

~*~

She teased him about his record collection. Even though records had come back in style, she still thought it was silly to have a whole wall dedicated to them when she could access nearly all of musical history on her cell phone. He showed her his own digital playlists and popped in his airpods when he was reading sometimes, but he loved the sound the needle made when it hit the wax.

One night, when he couldn’t listen to her teasing anymore, no matter how good natured it was, he played dirty.

You know, there’s a new song coming out by one of those artists you like. WAP? Heard it’s a cover of a song your Nana and I used to dance to all the time.

Two weeks later, he heard the familiar opening bass to the song Barton had played incessantly in the gym while he was working out and had quoted for months, the song that he hadn’t been able to get away from even in the past with random phrases like macaroni in a pot popping into his head at the most inconvenient times.

Barely half a verse in she’d either shut it off or turned the music way lower. At dinner she couldn’t look at him.

That was not at cover, Pop Pop. And I don’t want to think about you and Nana like that… ever.

~*~

She cried when she came home, a year after Peggy’s death, to see Peggy’s beautiful vanity had been moved into her room, Peggy’s jewelry box on it front and center.

What did you do? She’d kept asking him, tears in her eyes.

She’d want you to have it. He knew it was the truth. He hugged her tight as she sniffed and knew he’d made the right decision. He remembered Peggy sitting with Maggie on her knee on the small stool, letting the girl paw through her necklaces and play with her big fluffy make-up brushes. Maggie reaching for her eyeshadow and Peggy deftly pulling it away. Peggy being just a little too slow with the lipstick and the toddler bouncing around the house, proudly showing off the circle on the bottom half of her face to anyone who would look at her.

They’d loved their boys, but Maggie had both of their hearts in a way they hadn’t been prepared for.

Steve had to make up and excuse to leave the house the next morning when Maggie came down to breakfast, wearing the single pearl drop necklace he’d gotten for Peggy on their 25th wedding anniversary and her signature red lipstick. It was a good pain, but the first time he saw her in her grandmother’s necklaces, it was pain none the less.

~*~ Spring 2018

He knew the date it was supposed to happen. He’d kept up enough to know that it would, too. His other self was out there, somewhere, fighting what would become the biggest battle of his life.

Steve decided to focus on the small things. He kept the house stocked up with food and drinks, nonperishables that would last months and even years, toilet paper and paper towels. He ordered big metal shelves for the basement and made sure there was enough for multiple people for the long haul.

He didn’t know what would happen to his family in the snap- who would make it and who wouldn’t, but he was going to be sure whoever survived would be set for the following months where there was chaos, food and water shortages, and fear.

It would be a long five years for anyone that was left.

Even though she was home most nights, he asked Maggie for a standing Thursday night date. Some nights he showed her how to keep the house up: where the water main was, how to shut it on and off, where the gas line was, what to do if the roof started leaking. He made notebooks full of lists of things to do, how-to’s for the house and for life, and even, when he was awake in the middle of the night, wrote her letters so she wouldn’t be lonely.

Somehow, he just knew it would be him this time. He had survived the first snap, but if there were two of him and one survived, the other, statistically, did not. Thanos was very clear on how half worked.

Maggie, at first, had been scared. His family knew he had a knack for predicting the future, but didn’t know quite why.

Are you dying? Maggie had asked, fearing the worst when she started to realize that their Thursday night take-out and movie date was about more than just spending time together.

No, he’d said so very often, I just want you to be ready for anything.

Despite all of her questions, she went along with it.

When the day came, he couldn’t quite keep the sadness out of his eyes. Couldn’t quite smile at her. They ate pizza in front of the TV, watching a comedy Maggie had picked. He kept his eyes on his watch. It was coming.

His fingers itched. Like he could already feel his cells pulling apart.

He reached out, taking her hand in his and covering it with is other hand. “Maggie, you know I love you, right?”

She smiled at him, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. She’d sensed his anxiety all day. “Of course, I do. And I love you, Pop Pop.”

He looked away and then back at her. “I promise you, whatever happens, I’m alright, and I’ll be back.”

“Pop Pop,” her eyes filled with tears, “What are you talking about?”

He shook his head, “I’ve left you everything you’ll need, and I promise I’ll be back.”

A tear fell from her eye as she squeezed his hand tighter. “But where…”

It was as if the world went silent as it started to happen. Though the television droned on in the background, he could swear the air was stiller. He started to see the dust fill the air and tried not to breathe.

But it was wrong.

It wasn’t him.

Her hand was falling to nothing in his, the fear in her eyes haunting as the skin of her cheeks flecked into the air, swirling before falling along with the rest of her into a pile on the couch.

It was so fast. So fast.

And it wasn’t him.

“No…” The word fell from his lips as a whisper, sobs starting to form in his throat.

~*~

He wondered, nearly every night for five years, if Thanos knew. If it had somehow been a conscious choice to keep him alive, to make him suffer just a little more. To make him watch his other self on television trying to promote healing.

Sometimes, he realized that this was a blessing. His sons and granddaughter were safe while they were snapped, protected by the fabric of the universe. Bucky had told him that he didn’t remember anything from being snapped, didn’t feel any different when he woke up than if he’d taken a long, heavy nap.

Somewhere, his family was taking the universe’s longest nap without him.

But they’d be spared these memories. They’d be spared lonely nights of missing loved ones and too little to eat while the world sorted out the jobs that were suddenly empty to keep things running for those that were left behind.

They’d be spared the fear of the gangs that started roaming the streets of half abandoned cities, looting for food and clothes in stores that had never officially closed but also couldn’t open with their owners simply gone.

They’d be spared the rolling blackouts and the contaminated water scares.

They’d be spared the fear of the country as the government suddenly found itself missing elected officials and the infighting and the rhetoric that came with martial law and hasty elections.  

They’d be spared so, so much pain and loss.

Every day, he relived it all, twice over.

He counted every day for five years, making his way through each week and month motivated by only one thought: they were coming back. He needed to be ready for them, for her.

He helped his daughter in law keep their house, managed his other son’s apartment in DC and kept his things ready and waiting, made sure Maggie’s things were safe and in working order, made sure her bank account stayed open and her phone bill was paid. He’d never, not once, considered he’d be the one left behind, and the logistics of all there was to do left him busy for the first few weeks.

Everyone told him his hope that the dusted would return was infectious, but after the first year, people stopped listening. He knew, for a fact, they’d come back, but everyone else didn’t. Even the past him was operating on the idea that they’d never be back.

Some days he didn’t make it out of bed. He laid there, talking to the ceiling, whispering to Peggy, wishing she could talk back, wishing she could be one of the ones brought back. He missed her with a ferocity that hadn’t changed since the first time he’d been in this time, but had only been tempered and strengthened by a lifetime together.

As the days drew closer to the five-year mark, he began to make arrangements.

~*~ October 2023

He cleaned the living room and set it to the way it had been that night. He pulled out every note and letter he’d written Maggie and his children and put them in the kitchen, ready and waiting.

He sat on the couch, facing the blank television, a new, piping hot, pepperoni pizza sitting in front of him, untouched.

He still couldn’t eat.

He still didn’t know if this was the right timeline. As he’d gotten closer to this day his faith had wavered. What if all he’d come to believe wasn’t true? What if this wasn’t the one fourteen million? He wanted to believe, but he didn’t know for sure.

He looked at his watch, watching as the seconds ticked by. What were a few seconds to him? He’d lived more than one lifetime, and that had been enough. He had barely made it through these five years the first time. The second time had almost truly broken him. He was ready for this to be over. He was ready to stop having to deal with loss and to be able to live whatever time he had left with the family he loved.

He held out his hand, and waited.

[libsterslobsters]

Black Dog...

A Bucky Barnes x Reader fanfic

A/N: The motherfluffer strikes again! I know I said I was going to do a pt 2 of "What Is and What Should Never Be", but I was sitting with my doggo tonight and this is what I was inspired to write. It's more of a prequel, I guess.

Summary: There's not much Bucky wouldn't do for his best girl, but when she suggests they get a dog to help them readjust to life after the final battle with Thanos, he's not so sure it's a great idea.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes/ fem! enhanced! Reader

(reader can see moments into the future as well as understanding all languages and processing new information quickly, plus she's also a super soldier)

Warnings: Slight angst, mild swearing, fluff!, mentions of PTSD and panic attacks, No editor, we die like men

“You want to do what?”

Bucky considers himself a fairly reasonable person (well, there is the “was brainwashed for over fifty years” part) and he prides himself on valuing whatever his girlfriend (fiance he reminds himself, she kept the ring on for five years) says instead of only listening to come up with a response, but this time, he’s almost certain he’s heard wrong. At least, he hopes he has.

“I want to get a puppy.”

That’s exactly what he thought she said. “Or really a dog of any age.” Where to begin with that suggestion.

He likes dogs. He had one before the war. But that was back when it was safe to walk through Brooklyn at night, not to mention walk your dog along the sidewalk after dinner. Back before sudden noises in the night, however light or normal they are made him bolt upright in bed and reach for the knife he still keeps on the nightstand just in case. Before fighting “bad guys” was part of his every-day life, and way before he himself had become a bad guy. All of that considered, there’s only one way he can answer.

“I don’t think so, doll.” The corners of her lips turn down and her eyelids lower.

“Oh.” She’s more disappointed than she’ll let on. Maybe there’s a way to smooth it over.

“Why did you want a dog?”

He takes a seat on the sofa next to her (they were going to settle into their usual after work activity; watch something neither of them will remember later as an excuse to be together, usually with her legs resting in his lap and a bowl of popcorn between them) and silently wills her to look up, not be saddened by something he’s done. Goodness knows she’s had enough of that to last a lifetime already, and the wedding isn’t for another month.

She shrugs, still absently picking at her pilling sweater.

“There’s been studies done on how having a pet helps lower stress levels and raise seratonin levels. That helps with PTSD and sleep disorders.”

Something that used to just apply to him, but after Thanos, it’s as often her waking up from a nightmare that felt just a little too real or staring at words in a book that she’s not even seeing long after midnight.

“Plus-” She laughs, but it’s not the unbridled sound he treasures, it’s… bitter somehow. “-it’ll be like exposure therapy. We’ll be forced to leave the apartment for more than groceries and work.”

It seems as if the outside world has become even louder and more unbearable since the world ended and restarted again.

“All of that sounds good-” There’s the beginings of a smile on her face. He hates that he’s about to crush it all over again. “-but what about the logistics of it?” She frowns, clearly confused. “We don’t know where we’ll be living once your lease is up-”

“There are plenty of other apartment complexes that allow pets.” He nods.

“Yeah, but not all of them. And on top of that, when we’re away on missions, who’s gonna look after the pooch?” She seems to be considering it, mulling it over, then-

“Here me out: we train the dog to come with us on missions and do reconnaissance.” The smirk on her face lets him know that it’s a joke. Good. Then she’s not completely devistated.

“If the situation looks too tough, we’ll send him out ahead of us. While he’s licking their faces and their guards are down because even the worst of the worst can’t resist a cute puppy-”

“We storm the place?” She nods, shoulders shaking in a quiet laugh.

“You’re catching on! And, we can order a special doggy uniform since you can find anything on the internet these days.”

That’s the final straw, and before he can even consider it, he’s laughing too.

“You do make a pretty compelling argument, but let’s stick a pin in it until this thing-”He indicates her left hand, which is now resting casually against his thigh. “-becomes official.”

“Fair enough.”

___________________________________________________________________________________

She’s doing better now, she thinks. Better than she was for the past few months. Still, after her last class at the community college lets out (so many new enrollments now that the population is back to normal, and the majority of them have no memory of the hell those who survived the snap endured for five years), she sits in her car for a solid half hour, shaking and crying her way through a panic attack. When it passes, she reaches for the makeup bag hidden in her purse and, in an effort that’s really muscle memory at this point, repairs the damage to her face. There. Nearly normal.

Driving home is considerably more difficult than it used to be now that there’s more cars on the road, but the route is familiar, so that’s some comfort. Not everything changes. She really should pick up some potatoes and cubed beef for tonight’s dinner, but after the day she’s had, facing a crowded supermarket seems like just a step too far. Takeout, then. Maybe a pizza. After all, she’s got the same chemicals running through her veins as he does, which means their metabolisms can keep up with excess calories. It’s one of the better side effects of being “enhanced” as her file is labeled.

She’s so busy thinking about which toppings to order that she barely manages to swerve in time to keep from hitting the animal slowly limping towards the curbside.

“Shit!”

The miriad of horns honking from behind and beside her let her know that her decision isn’t a popular one. Still, she eases the car to the curb and as soon as the coast is clear (she should just run into traffic… no, that’s an intrusive thought, acknowledged and dismissed), steps out.

The animal made it across, at least. Animal, because she can’t be sure what species it is. It’s trying to get away from her, but the poor thing is limping badly, so there’s not much chance it’ll manage that particular feat even if she weren’t faster than the average human. She approaches with caution (if she were to be bitten, would it even effect her? More than likely not) in case she startles it.

“It’s alright.” She’s got it cornered now, and she can see that it’s a dog. A pathetic lump of matted fur and mange with at least one broken leg, but a dog none the less. She crouches, holding her hand out in front of her, palm open.

“You’re okay, sweetie. I’m not going to hurt you.” The poor thing is shaking, letting out low growls that quickly turn to whimpers as soon as she touches it. “You’ve had some tough luck, haven’t you? Yeah.”

She can’t tell what color it is under the filth and… her breath catches in her throat… blood. Black for now, but maybe a lighter color once it’s washed. However, the tongue that peeks out from a swollen muzzle is unmistakably pink. “Good boy. Or girl. I’m not going to look close enough to find out right now. Don’t worry.” It’s not a huge dog. She could probably lift it. That is, if it’ll let her. “A car hit you, didn’t it? Hurt that poor leg of yours.” She leans closer to get a better look. No collar. A stray, more than likely, and definitely a mutt. The decision is made. She’s not leaving it here.

“Alright. I’m going to get you some help, but that means I have to pick you up. Now, I’d appreciate it if you’d kindly refrain from biting me when I do that, okay?” She takes the blink as agreement. “Here we go.”

She must look strange, emerging from an alleyway in the middle of Brooklyn with at least thirty pounds of unidentifiably colored dog in her arms, but if any of the other motorists notice, they don’t let on. Thank goodness for technology. With the press of a button, her car unlocks and she’s able to deposite her new friend in the passenger seat before settling behind the wheel once more. “Siri, show me the nearest animal hospital.” Once the gps is online, she adds as an afterthought, “Call Barnes.”

___________________________________________________________________________________

Somehow, when he picked up the phone and the first words out of her mouth were, “Bucky, you’re not gonna believe me…” he didn’t expect it to result in him sitting in a veterinarian’s office an hour later, waiting to hear about a dog he’s never seen. Well, that’s not quite true. She did snap a quick picture. Even though he knows it probably wasn’t at it’s best, that had to be the most pathetic lump of fur and fleas he’s ever laid eyes on, through a photograph or otherwise. He’s not even sure it had both ears!

None of that matters though, because now he’s sitting there, pretending to study his phone with his baseball cap drawn low over his eyes and a pair of sunglasses to boot while she flips through the same magazine for the fourth time. If he’s being honest with himself, he doesn’t think the dog’s going to make it (actually, it might be kinder if it didn’t, the pooch is in such bad shape), but he’s decided it’s best not to bring that up. Time will tell.

“Are you mad?” That’s the first thing she’s said since he arrived and she informed him that they’d taken the dog back for immediate surgery.

“That depends. Did you walk into traffic to save him?” It probably wouldn’t hurt her, considering she’s strong enough to stop a car if she really wants to, but it’s not exactly a healthy habit to get into. Especially if they’re trying to be inconspicuous.

“No.” She flips another page. “Although I may have swerved to avoid hitting him, then chased him down into an alleyway and cornered him by a dumpster.”

That sparks a memory from the early days in Romania, the ones where he thought he was dating someone for the first time since the forties (albeit, moving very, very slowly) and she was under the impression that he saw her as a little sister. Her apartment was the equivalent of “low rent” and when, halfway through ‘Singin’ In the Rain’, a rat made it’s unfortunate appearance, she told him, “No, don’t kill it! Just get rid of it!” while standing on top of the coffee table (because clearly, that was so much safer than the floor). In the end, he did catch the rat (thanks to her precognition), and they safely moved it and it’s nest into a quiet corner of the courtyard. That’s when he realized he was in way over his head with this girl, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. It’s still one of his favorite memories, so-

“ ‘Course not.” She doesn’t look entirely convinced, so he wraps his arm around her, pulling her close despite the plastic waiting room chairs. “Why would I be mad at my girl for having a big heart?”

She chuckles, leaning into him. “You mean I’m a softy.”

“Isn’t that the same thing?”

Before she can reply, the door swings open. It’s late, and they’re the only ones left waiting, so it’s no surprise when the woman in scrubs stops in front of them.

“Your dog made it through surgery, although we did have to amputate the front left leg.” Huh. That’s the same one he lost. “We also took the liberty of giving him his rabies and heartworms shots, and since you said it’s a stray, we’ll call animal control to pick him up once he’s awake.”

That’s for the best. She may have a thing for hard luck cases, wounded animals, and lost teddy bears, but it’s not like they can keep the dog. He’s come around to the idea of getting a pet at some point (maybe he’ll surprise her at Christmas), but an animal that’s in that bad of condition… it’s a lot of work, and he’s not sure either of them is up for it (well, if truth be told, if he’s up to it).

“Did you want to come back to see him?” She looks up at him, clearly trying to get a read on what he’d rather do. He could just say no thanks, they’re alright. It’ll only make things harder when they have to go home. But, it’s obvious she wants to, and he’s not great at telling her no.

“Sure.”

He’s panicking just a little as they walk through a maze of corridors and metal doors that lock behind them. Calm down, it’s just a vet’s office, not a prison. You’re not going to have to fight your way out.

Finally, after the dozenth turn, the vet announces, “Here we are. He’s still a little groggy, and we had to shave him. It looked like he could use a trim anyway.” and pushes open another locked door.

Even with his leg repaired and his fur at least partially groomed, he doesn’t look like much. There are indeed two ears; one of them is just crooked, folding down instead of sticking straight up. He still couldn’t guess at the breed, but with all the muck washed away, it’s still a black dog. There’s an I.V. attached, and Bucky’s expecting that the most it’ll do is whimper if it’s touched, but as she approaches the table and gingerly begins to pet it between the ears, the dog’s eyes open, and it licks her hand.

“Hey, boy. You made it through. I knew you were a fighter.” Is it sticking it’s tongue out and- “Whoa. Your breath could take out an army!” -attempting to lick her face.

“We think he’s about eight months old. May get a little bigger, but not much.”

He’s a decent sized dog. Not exactly one you’d chose to guard your house, but not a lap dog either. And he seems friendly.

“Some nice people from animal control are going to come get you once you’re all better and they’ll find you a good home.”

Unlikely. After all, the dog’s a tripod. He’s going to regret asking this, but-

“Is there anything else wrong with him besides the leg?”

The vet shakes her head. “Nothing that a flea bath, mange treatment, and a few good meals couldn’t fix.”

So really, it wouldn’t be THAT much work. He’s seen plenty of dogs who can still walk with only three legs. He needs to get ahold of himself. The dog might not even like him. Animals are funny; they can tell a bad person from a good one, and if he’s being honest with himself, he’s not sure if he qualifies as the latter after all he’s done. There’s only one way to find out.

“Hey, boy.” He reaches out his hand (the metal one, because even if it’ll heal quickly, he’s not crazy about being bitten) and scratches under the dog’s chin. “You had a hard day, didn’t you?”

The dog sniffs at his arm and then, wonder of wonders, his back leg starts to kick. “But you still seem pretty happy even if you are a little worse for wear.”

He really shouldn’t do this. It’s a lot of work, having a dog of any kind. They don’t know where they’ll be living once her lease is up, and oh yeah, they’re getting married in three weeks. But, the big puppy dog eyes look up at him (the dog’s looking pretty desperate too), and he knows his decision’s made.

“Think Stark ever designed armor for dogs?” Her brow knits in confusion.

“You know, since we can’t very well have him out there on missions without some sort of protection.” There it is. Recognition.

“Are you serious?”

“No.” The beginnings of a smile freezes on her face. “There’s no way we’re taking an innocent dog into a situation with hostiles. Are you nuts?” That laugh gets him every time.

“So we’re keeping him?”

He nods.

“We’re keeping him, doll.”

She hasn’t looked this purely happy in ages. For once, the memories of the past and worries about the future are completely forgotten, and that makes it worth it. That, and, well… he is a pretty cute dog.

Author's note: here's a picture of my good boi and writing pal, Rigby.