#but if this is actual ich ich I want to get on top of it before it actually gets bad

[chipped-chimera]

Hey fishblr, so I've determined I think I have an outbreak of ich - in my introduced tetra. Not entirely sure it's 'stress ich' or ich that gained hold BECAUSE of stress - the spots are slowly increasing in some of the fish but it did not start in the gills like typical ich: I don't see any frequently going for oxygen at the surface.

I've read about running the tank at a warmer temp like 30°C/86°F, but I have a L183 Starlight Bristlenose in there (she's fine, far as I can tell, don't see any 'itchy' behaviour. Also she's covered in spots anyway so it'd be hard to tell) - although I've seen temp values vary wildly, highest I've seen is 28°C/82°F so I am not comfortable running the tank that hot, even for two weeks.

If I do treat it, it'll be the whole tank given the Pleco was sharing the same tank AS these tetra in the first place, just bought a week-ish apart. Problem is this tank also contains Ninja Shrimp and a lot of plants that I don't want to kill. They're just getting established.

Points for it being 'Stress Ich' (if that's real, hard to tell based on my cursory search): Behaviour wise the fish are fine now. Better than fine actually, they've adjusted super fast to the new tank, all out exploring and not always schooling so they clearly feel comfortable (which given they're green neons and everything says they're shy - real good actually). All energetic, not lethargic and probably wouldn't be able to tell they had ich without looking closely at them. Tank also seems bombproof stable with the amount of plants I have, and I have a external temp controlled thermostat monitoring the tank temp along with the internal thermostat of the heater itself so it's running at a constant 25-26°C/77-78°F (switches on at the lower end, shuts off at the upper, and it's a very slow heater on purpose).

Honestly I think they're just happy to be in a tank 3-4 times bigger than the display shoebox they were in with no cover at all. They have a jungle now with lots of microfauna and biofilm to pick at. So it's likely stress of netting/transition. I have been doing tank maint daily, but it's very sparing and I move slow - more to get them used to me messing around in there. Yesterday they followed around my cleaning magnet so I think they're not too fussed.

So uh ... treatment suggestions? I live in Australia btw so some products might not be available for me.

[f1fnatic]

SUR LE POINT ⤿ c. leclerc 16

→ ( in which. . . ) you, toto wolff's daughter, are dating semi-rival team driver charles leclerc and toto is trying his best to support your relationship while also being a proud dad.

→ ( fanfic genre. . . ) smau

→ ( face claim. . . ) taylor hill + pictures from pinterest

→ ( pairing. . . ) charles leclerc x wolff!ballerina!reader

→ ( content warnings/disclaimers. . . ) cursing, fluff, google translated german and french

→ ( author's note. . . ) woohoo another smau! these are genuinely so fun to make but sooo time consuming. i hope you enjoy! see end for more

→ ( masterlist )

─ INSTAGRAM ↴

y/n_wolff

📍monte carlo, monaco

liked by susiewolff, lewishamilton, yourbff, charles_leclerc and 953,730 others

y/n_wolff a break between shows ���

view 19,572 comments

user7 she is stunning!

user10 mother is mothering

charles_leclerc that dog better not be in the apartment when i get home.

y/n_wolff um about that!

charles_leclerc oh mon dieu

y/n_wolff btw her name is olive!!

susiewolff Meine schöne tochter 💓 (my beautiful daughter)

y/n_wolff woher, glaubst du, habe ich es? (where do you think i got it from?)

mercedesamgf1 baby boss is glowing 🫡🫧 liked by y/n_wolff

yourbsf my legs are dead because of you.

y/n_wolff not my fault you couldn't keep up 😒

user44 need to know where you got that top!

y/n_wolff its actually a dress and i made both of the flower and lemon one myself!

user16 i wonder how toto feels ab this

user19 he was asked during an interview and was hesitant, but supportive !!

charles_leclerc holy 🥴 liked by y/n_wolff

lewishamilton you're in monaco and you dont even stop and say hi? smh 😒

y/n_wolff I AM SORRY BLAME CHARLES

charles_leclerc WHY ARE YOU DRAGGING ME INTO THIS?

y/n_wolff BECAUSE ITS YOUR FAULT?

lewishamilton i was kidding 😀

charles_leclerc has added to their story!

caption: i can't even be mad 😔 y/n_wolff

lewishamilton has added to their story!

caption: apology accepted ✅ y/n_wolff

─ TWITTER ↴

─ INSTAGRAM ↴

y/n_wolff has reposted a story!

caption: she's in the zone dnd 💆🏻‍♀️🌙 y/n_wolff

y/n_wolff

📍vienna, austria

liked by charles_leclerc, lewishamilton, susie_wolff, francisca.cgomes and 987,540 others

y/n_wolff ladies and gentleman... your 2024 white swan!!

it is such an honor to be awarded this role. ever since i was a kid and saw my first performance of swan lake, i fell in love. from that moment, i knew i wanted to be odette. this is truly a dream come true.

i would like to thank the wienerstaatsballet for such a wonderful opportunity and trusting me with such an important role. along with my amazing parents, toto & susie_wolff, and my wonderful boyfriend charles_leclerc. you have all shown me such support and love, i couldn't have done this without any of you.

(p.s. see the link in bio for showings 😉)

view 23,517 comments

user16 she is so unbelievably pretty

mickschumacher woohoo!! you go y/n!

y/n_wolff thank you mickyyy

user8 CONGRATS Y/N! liked by y/n_wolff

charles_leclerc so happy for you mon cynge 🫀 (my swan)

lewishamilton congratulations y/n! i remember watching you as a young girl just starting out, this is such a wonderful achievement, you deserve it more than anyone 🖤

y/n_wolff thank you so much lew 🥹💞

user5 they're so sibling coded 💔

mercedesamgf1 woohoo! congrats baby boss 🥳🙌🏻

y/n_wolff thank u admin 🥰

charles_leclerc when you called me to say you got the part, pride flooded my senses. i know how much this part means to you, etoile. i am so happy for you, je t’aime plus que tout ❤️ (star, i love you more than anything)

y/n_wolff i love you so much, mon coeur 💌

yourbsf the best to do it ❣️🦢 liked by y/n_wolff

yourballetfriend happy for u y/n 🙂

user77 she doesn't seem happy...

user44 i wouldn't blame her 🤷🏾‍♀️

user2 yeah but ballet is competitive it's part of the sport

susie_wolff Ich bin so stolz auf dich, Y/N. Worte können meinen Stolz nicht ausdrücken. Es ist mir eine Ehre, dich meine Tochter nennen zu dürfen (i am so proud of you, y/n. words cannot express my pride. i am honored to call you my daughter)

y/n_wolff hör auf, mama, ich werde weinen, ich liebe dich so sehr (stop mama, i'm going to cry, i love you so much)

francisca.cgomes my fave ballerina 🩰✨ liked by y/n_wolff

scuderiaferrari 🩰🏎️ liked by y/n_wolff

user10 i am so normal about this (i am so insanely happy for her)

─ TWITTER ↴

─ INSTAGRAM ↴

toto_wolff

liked by y/n_wolff, lewishamilton, susie_wolff, charles_leclerc and 2,836,123 others

tagged: y/n_wolff

toto_wolff Congratulations to my wonderful daughter, Y/N. Ich bin so stolz auf dich, meine Blume. Zu sehen, wie du zu dem heranwächst, was du jetzt bist, war so ein Segen. Ich fühle mich geehrt, dein Vater zu sein. Mach weiterhin großartige Dinge, ich liebe dich. (I'm so proud of you, my flower. Seeing you grow into what you are now has been such a blessing. I am honored to be your father. Keep doing great things, I love you.)

view 959,237 comments

user71 THE STREETS WERE RIGHT!!

user50 this is so sweet oh my god

user9 oh to have a dad like toto wolff

y/n_wolff oh papa, ich liebe dich so sehr. Ich hätte mir keinen besseren vater wünschen können, ich danke dem universum jeden Tag dafür, dass ich gesegnet genug bin, dich als meinen vater zu haben. danke, dass du immer für mich da bist 😭❤️ (oh papa, i love you so much. i couldn't have asked for a better father, i thank the universe everyday for being blessed enough to have you as my dad. thank you for always being there for me)

user11 i want what they have 🥲

susie_wolff Unsere wundervolle Tochter (our wonderful daughter)

lewishamilton What a star🌟!

user14 crying in daddy issues

christianhorner Congratulations, Wolff. You have raised a wonderful daughter.

toto_wolff Thank you, Horner.

user88 the passive aggression

user51 the girls are fighting

mercedesamgf1 Boss man making us cry 🫡

charles_leclerc it is such an honor to be dating your daughter, toto

toto_wolff Couldn't have asked for anyone better.

y/n_wolff does this mean that you will let him win, papa?

toto_wolff No.

*comments under this post have been limited*

whoop! another fic done 🥳this was super fun to write, i loved looking for pictures, especially the toto-baby reader one 💔 not a lot of toto content... oh well. i am thinking of making a taglist, so let me know if you would like to be on it! also, hope i made it clear enough that toto does not know how to use instagram, and reader had to help him with making a post/comment. he doesn't know how like comments yet. thank you for reading! as usual, requests and feedback are welcome. make sure to leave a comment and kudos! (only if you want :P)

[currantlee]

Something I love about the memory of Zelda and Sonia in the German dub of TotK...

(Translation: And your Link, too, is surely awaiting your return.)

Sonia uses the phrase "dein Link" ("your Link") here, which in German is a common phrase to indicate the belief that someone might have romantic feelings for another person. And the way Pauliner Weiner (Sonia's German VA) delivers this line very much indicates that she is indeed teasing Zelda a little here! Sonia ships Zelink confirmed!!

But wait. There's more!

(Translation: May one ask who this Link is?)

Rauru definitely notices this too! His tone, as well as the use of the very specific article "dieser" ("this") indicate as much. If he was simply curious about who Link is in order to follow the conversation, he would more likely use the phrase "Darf ich fragen, wer Link ist?" ("May I ask who Link is?"). He is also teasing Zelda a little here.

Zelda's reply is also very sweet! While her first two lines are nothing special (she is essentially just recapping the events Breath of the Wild, as well as what led up to it), it gets interesting once Rauru reacts to her description, once again in a somewhat teasing manner (indicated by both the delivery and the language of the line):

(Translation: Oh, a hero you say.)

To which Zelda replies with:

(Translation: Link is the most steadfast and fearless knight who ever existed.)

(Translation: Yes...)

(Translation: He is so strong...)

That last line is pretty much the same in English, but Julia Casper (Zelda's German VA) does an amazing job making it sound like Zelda is not only admiring Link throughout this entire short monologue she is having, but like she is talking more to herself than to Rauru and Sonia, almost like she forgets they're there for a moment because she is thinking about Link. I really loved this little touch!

Also note that Zelda is not explicitly talking about physical strength in the last line (although she might be. It isn't clarified, leaving the interpretation of what kind of strength she is talking about up to the player).

(Translation: ... and on top of it all, he has a good heart!)

This last part seems to be directed at Rauru and Sonia again. But we're still not done!

After Rauru remarks that Zelda seems to think highly of Link and that the way she's talking about her knight makes him want to meet him, Sonia agrees and delivers a final line that, once again, makes it very clear that the two of them are engaging in a little bit of good-mannered teasing in this scene (both from what's actually said here and how Paulina Weiner delivers the line):

(Translation: Chivalrous, and full of gallantry...)

(Translation: Don't make us so curious, Zelda!)

And then they all break out in light-hearted laughter.

All in all, I really love this scene! Huge respect to the German VAs, who did an absolutely stellar job (not just in this scene, but for the game in general - especially Julia Casper!).

[ms-rampage]

Fluent When Upset

König x Y/n (fem-reader)

Warnings: Language

Authors note: This is my first time ACTUALLY writing König. I sort of based it off on this

I apologize for the butchered German 😂😅

You have been living in Austria for 3 years now. You and König have been together for 5 years. As time went by, and you discovered you were pregnant with a baby boy that König was absolutely excited about.

Aside from all that, you did struggle to learn the German language once you settled in, the only time you did speak it properly (or at least you think it is) when you get mad or annoyed, and König rarely to never upsetted, nor annoyed you. It only comes out when you stub your toe on the table, or when you hit your head, or when someone on a bike or scooter nearly hits you when you cross the street.

This day, you went to the store to do a little bit of grocery shopping, and you took your son with you in his stroller. He needed some fresh air after being in the house all day. König was on the fence about going with you. He went against his anxiety, and went with you two.

"You don't have to come." you tell him, while putting your jacket on, "I just need to buy a few things for dinner."

"I know, liebe, I just want to make sure you're both safe." he tells you, figetting with the bag on your sons stroller handle.

One of the few times, your husband takes off his sniper hood when he's at home and isn't expecting company. He has those tired, sad European eyes that you fell in love with. He was always worried and concerned about your well-being, even more so after having your son.

"We'll be fine, I know how you feel about crowds, and I don't want you to be uncomfortable." you reassure him.

"I know, but I know your German isn't good." he tells you with a slight hesitation in his voice, but he wasn't wrong. Your German is okay at best. You know the basics but not enough to hold onto a conversation.

"Well, you got me there." You chuckle, checking to see if your son is secure in his stroller. It was only a 10 minute walk to the store. König had never heard you speak German, maybe one or two words but never a full sentence.

After buying what you need from the store, a little grocery store that sells everything. You were always careful when crossing the street, especially when you had your infant son with you. You had the right away to cross, you had the green. König standing next to with one of the bags of groceries in his hand and the other around your waist.

Taking a few steps onto the street, some asshole decides at the very, very last second to go forward when he had the red light. A few feet away from hitting the stroller, that absolutely sent you into a verbal rage.

"Scheiße!." König exclaims, pulling the stroller back.

"Arschloch!." you yell at the driver, looking back at the other cars stopped at the light to see if there's another jackass that will do the same, then back in the direction of the car that nearly hit you and your child that is long gone now, "Siehst du uns nicht! Verdammtes arschloch!."

You both continue crossing the street while you yell at the driver who can't hear you anymore, but you just wanted to voice your opinion on drivers like them.

"Wir hatten gleich das recht, und ich schiebe einen kinderwagen!." you continue to shout as if you were a native speaker.

When you get to the other side, König is wide-eyed, mostly because of how your German is.

"Liebe, where did you learn that?." he asks, moving you to the side. Away from others walking by.

"I don't know, probably from having the TV on throughout the day. I picked up on a few phrases, and also the neighbors." you tell him, checking on your son who is asleep.

He kisses the top of your head through his hood. "I guess I did need you to come with me to the store." You joked as you two continued to walk back to your apartment. To König you German did sound broken, but hey, you were yelling at some dipshit who had zero patients for pedestrians.

[thelittlestsquid]

How I Met You (1/3) - König x F!Reader

A/N: Graphic design is my passion, yes. Anyways, this is my first fic ever! Yaaaaaa.....aaayyy.. yeah. I'm German, so obviously I had to write about König. Before anyone says anything - yes, I know he's Austrian. I headcanon him having family in Germany that he visits when he's on leave. He speaks standard German so it makes sense to me. I also gave him the name Mathias. I don't know, he seems like a Mathias to me. :,) This will have three parts, so hopefully y'all enjoy it, because we'll be doing it again. Twice. I don't really know how Tumblr works yet but if you want to request anything - I always gladly take requests! <3

Anyways, this is getting pretty long - if you want anymore info on me or the rules for requesting, look at my pinned post! Thanks so much for reading! <3 (I'll translate everything German, don't worry!) Kaufland is a German supermarket btw., it's literally 'buy land' wtf

Summary: König never thought he'd have to worry about falling in love or starting a family. He also never thought that he'd meet is partner-to-be in a Kaufland, trying to reach bread - and failing horribly.

Warnings: (Social) anxiety, König doubts himself a lot, Kinda Meet cute, Fluff, language, Female Reader, German Word count: 2k

From an outsider's perspective, König was a skilled operator, a deadly fighter who was deadset on completing his objectives.

Even if he was built like a mountain, he somehow managed to go completely unnoticed by his enemies, making him a deadly weapon.

That was him. That was all he was supposed to be - all he had to be good at.

And he was, well, he tried. He tried so damn hard to be. But lately, his mind seemed to wander. Suddenly he felt like being this perfect weapon wasn't the only thing he wanted - something he thought would be long lost to him became an option again. A family of his own.

He believed that, if he ever tried to find a partner, they would be military as well. His life was full of murder and misery, he thought that he needed someone who understood his job. He thought only a fellow operator would.

So why the fuck was he here, in a Kaufland, staring at the cute woman at the end of the aisle - clearly not a soldier. Clearly struggling to reach the top of the shelf. His legs started to walk towards her - his social anxiety somehow forgotten.

''Äh, entschuldigung? Soll ich dir helfen?'' (Uh, excuse me? Should I help you?)

--

Fucking bullshit these… tall fucking… shelves in Germany…, you were visiting a friend in Germany for two weeks. Everything went well - until you went shopping and tried to get some bread that was at the top of a giant shelf. Fucking hell, why are shelves in Germany this big?! Fucking Germans…, you cursed wildly in your head, trying to reach that damned bread for more than five minutes now. It was getting embarrassing but your ego didn't allow you to just ask someone to help you. 

A shadow fell over you. You turned around and looked right into a broad chest. Slowly your eyes wander up into the face of the absolute giant in front of you. The lower portion of his face was hidden by a face mask, his blond, long hair in a low bun - some strands of hair falling into his eyes as he slightly bend down to look at you. Blue eyes look down on you but his gaze doesn't quite reach your eyes - he seems to stare at your nose. He says something you don't quite understand - it's only your second day here after all. He seems to understand your confusion, his eyes widen slightly as he clears his throat. ''You speak English?'', he slightly tilts his head to the right. You nod, letting go of the shelf next to you. ''Yeah, uh.. sorry, what were you saying?'', you say as you straighten up a little so that you can actually look into his eyes. 

The mans eyes widen a little as you straighten up. Standing a little straighter himself he points to the bread, his eyes crinkling as he seems to smile a little. ''Do you want me to get that for you? I would not want you to hurt yourself'', without waiting for your answer, he grabs the bag and hands it to you. You take it, glad that this madness was finally over. You put your aquired treasure into your shopping card and turned back to the giant. ''Thanks. What's your name?'', he seemed to think for a while, eyes becoming distant. Did he forget his name? After a short while he cleared his throat again and look back to your nose. ''Mathias. My name is Mathias. And what is your name?'', you could see the ghost of a smile behind his mask. It didn't quite reach his eyes but it seemed genuine. You told him your name and held out your hand. Mathias stared at it but decided to shake it, his large hand covering yours completely. He was insanely warm, like he just held his fist into a bonfire. ''You uh, have a pretty name'', he says, even if it was a little quiet. -- What the fuck was he doing? 'You have a pretty name' - really? Fuck, he should've never asked to help you. He should've just gone into another isle and finish his shopping. Did he really think he could just... chitchat? He was never good with that! When you asked him for his name, his mind seemed to go blank for a second. Scheiße, was he König or Mathias? Would it be weird to make you call him König? Yes, yes it would - Mathias it is. (Shit) You are not on base. This is a civillian. Callsigns aren't normal here. This is not military ground.

He repeated the mantra in his head. So much, that he almost forgot to answer you. After some debating, he shook your hand - reminding himself to be gentle. Civillian, not military. This isn't a seasoned operator.

Fuck, what was he supposed to say now? How would a normal conversation continue? Was he annoying you? Surely you had better things to do as standing here.

He was taking up so much of your time, maybe he should just turn around and walk away, maybe that way he could forget about all of this and just finish his shopping and-

--

His eyes were distant again. Was he okay? Should... should you ask? Something about his entire act was extremely confusing. He was tall, undeniably strong - his face was almost hidden by the mask yet what you saw was... actually really fucking handsome. He seemed gentle and thoughtful - he helped you, a complete stranger, after all. Smiling, you took out your phone. ''Let me buy you a coffee as a 'thank you', yeah? Want you give me your number?'', you held out your phone, opened on a new contact. Mathias flinched a little and blinked down onto the phone. He stared for a few seconds before taking it. ''That would be... nice. Thank you'', the phone looked absolutely mini in his hands, he could hold the entire thing with one hand as the other typed in his number. It seemed to take him a while because his fingers pressed down on two numbers at a time. He scrunched his eyes a little, seemingly very concentrated. It looked really adorable.

After returning your phone, you bid farewell. You still had some shopping to do and surely Mathias had other matter to attend to as well. Whatever it was, he seemed pretty determined to leave the supermarket as fast as possible, almost tripping over himself in the process. You huffed out a quiet laugh as you continued through the aisles.

--

Okay. So you obviously didn't hate him. She gave me her number... She wants to meet me... He stood in front of his mirror, two shirts in his hands. Today was the day you two would meet a cafe, not far from his home. He liked that one, it was quiet, not too full and their menu was amazing.

Should he wear his mask? It would be hard to eat with it on... Should he go with his normal, black shirt? Maybe he could try something new? No. He wanted to be comfortable and not worry if anyone thought his outfit was weird.

König decided on his usual stuff, black pants, black shirt - it became a habit from when he was on base. You couldn't exactly wear bright ass clothes on a mission.

After some spending some more time on panicking, he decided to take his mask with him - put it on once he felt the need to.

König didn't think he was ugly. Quite the opposite, actually. He found himself to be handsome. The thing he was most worried about wasn't his looks.

On missions, he wore his sniper hood - an old shirt he couldn't use anymore since it became too small. It wasn't what he imagined to be wearing when he joined, but it stuck. König was used to hide his face, not caring about his expressions. It was so familiar to him that he sometimes forgot to show emotions when he was on leave. Old habits die hard, eh?

But he wanted to try - he found you genuinly interesting and he loved how patient you've been with him. Since your first meeting, the two of you texted daily. König behaved completely different over text. More bold as usual. You, in return, answered with the same boldness - subtle and not so sublte firts were exchanged over the past few days which resulted in König being even more nervous when he thought of meeting you again.

How the hell did he manage to get into this? Since when did he talk to people, let alone befriend them? Was he trying to be friends with you? Clearly you seemed interested, did you want more too? Wait, too?

Before he could loose himself in his self-doubt again, he threw on his jacket, took his keys and wallet and left his apartment.

This was all so... new to him. On the field, all he had to do was function. He had to set his emotions aside, they didn't matter. What he thought didn't matter, how he talked to his subordinates didn't matter. But he wasn't on base now. He was on leave and he had to remind himself every. single. time. that he needed to behave differently here.

It was hard which is why he usually kept to himself, resting alone in his apartment or going out with some comrades to drink - people who understood him and thought like him.

As he walked down the street, he suddenly worried if you even recognised him without his mask. But König didn't have to worry for long, as your friendly voice called out to him from further away. --

This cafe was absolutely adorable. You arrived a little earlier than necessary to get a good view of the place. It looked really old, baby blue accents and plants everywhere. Almost like a little palace.

Spotting Mathias wasn't hard, as he towered over pretty much everyone. But something seemed different today.

You could see his face - all of it. And fuck, was he beautiful.

He frowned slightly as he walked down the street, his eyes cast onto the floor. You could see some freckles covering his cheeks. His hair was in a ponytail, his blond curls falling over his broad shoulders.

You had to stop yourself from staring. Any time now. But it was so damn hard to look away.

You don't know how it happened but after your short encounter in that stupid supermarket, the mountain of a man didn't leave your mind, his voice basically replaced your inner voice at this point.

He was an absolute treat over the phone and in real life. Especially in real life.

You jogged over to him, calling out his name in the process. ''Mathias, hey! Hi, how are you?'', you smiled up at him. He smiled slightly and it absolutely melted your heart. He had dimples that only became more prominent when he fully smiled at you. ''Hello you. I am good and you? I hope you will like it here'', he nodded towards the cafe.

-

You had an absolute blast. It was nice and quiet, the food was amazing and most importantly - you had just the right company.

Mathias was cautious with telling you anything about him but after some convincing he told you about his work. He was a soldier in the military, stationed in Austria but visiting his family in Germany.

That makes sense, you thought. Something about him screamed soldier. His height, the way he dressed, those absolute huge muscles - you kind of already knew.

But all this only made him more attractive in your eyes. Strong, capable but at the same time he seemed so... gentle, so sweet.

The date - as you called it in your head - ended sooner than you wanted it to. But inside you knew that this wouldn't be the last time the two of you crossed paths.

[jamisonwritestf2trash]

“I really just need to make an entire breakdown on Medic one of these days 😭” Well, do it. Umm, you coward —I'm so sorry for calling you a coward, Jamison :'(—.

Medic's Past Headcanons (Also Some Archimedes Content!)

————————————————————

No apology needed my friend, I am but a coward 😭

I lied a little bit, I changed my mind on doing a full breakdown, just changed it to some headcanons about his past and meeting Archimedes </3

But no, I've mainly not posted this because I've had other requests and also this one will probably get heavy. I wasn't sure if I wanted to post content with actual angst and upsetting themes.

But I'm here now because looking past all the jokes and my own personal love for doctors. I should also mention, written by an American and a person with know knowledge of the German education system, and medical practices in general!

ALSO, finally writing Medic with his accent and some actual German, please forgive me if you are a native speaker for using a mix of google translate and my very poor German skills 💖

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ALSO ALSO mutual appreciation comment! Another thank you for letting me talk about Medic <3

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TW: CHILD NEGELECT, SU!C1D@L IDIATIONS, FLUFF AT THE END!

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He's been asked about his mother before, his answer has always been,

"Meine mutter? She vas good woman, she... she did her best." Said with a softer tone than anyone has ever heard him speak in.

He's lying. She severely neglected him as child. After his mother fell pregnant, his father left. His mother resented Medic for this, blaming him for his father leaving, refusing to realize how volatile their relationship had been before he was conceived. When Medic was born his mother refused to bond with him, holding him only when others gave her expecting looks. For the first years of his life his mother only tended to his basic needs to keep him from crying, his crying always annoyed her. It never got better with time, she never learned to love him like people had claimed when she started expressing her contempt for him. She would sometimes give him small bits of attention, then she would get a wicked smile on her face as he cried when she stopped paying attention to him for seemingly no reason. Always making him feel like he was responsible for the sudden lack of attention.

————————————————————

His younger years in school is also something he will lie about if asked. (I'm ignoring college because uh, I have no idea what to write for that 😭)

"I vas great, top of my classes, Natürlich. Ich war sehr beliebt."

(Of course. I was very popular)

When he was younger, he was top of his classes. He always excelled at whatever class he was put in, his favorites being science, he obviously loved medical textbooks, along with zoology textbooks, always had one of the other, he'd spend lunches just reading from his books, or hiding in the library, trying to learn everything he could about both. In a way you could say he was popular, but not in the good way. He always had his books on hand, always had the best grades, was always the teachers favorite student, and the other kids hated that. He took his fair share of beatings while he was in school.

————————————————————Medic had never thought about dying, sure he watched patients die, and he knew deep down his mother had died at some point, (He never heard from her after he left his home town, despite his attempts to contact her) but he never thought about the concept of him dying. It hit him like a ton of bricks when he had his first panic attack, and it clicked in his head that he just didn't want to be alive. He couldn't tell you why the switch flipped in his head that made him reach that low, but it did, and it was awful. He almost went insane, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't do anything besides sit in his room and feel years of emotions just hit him out of nowhere. He thought he would die, he wanted to die, dying would be preferable to whatever this was. In the midst of his panic attack, something hit his window with a loud thump. (Aren't I so clever for this transition? lmao 😭)

————————————————————

The day Medic and Archimedes met continues to be one of the best days of his life. A bird had hit his window, pulling him out of whatever spiral he was currently having. Medic just looked at the window for a minute, content to just assume the bird flew off after being dazed a bit. When he heard tiny coos and chirps outside. He pushed it open and saw a little dove huddled in a corner, cooing sadly, shaking as it tried to move its wing but chirping painfully when he moved his wing. Medic put his hand out and tried to scoop up the bird, and the bird ended up attacking his hand. Medic pulled his hand back, a tad shocked, but then tried again. The bird slowly eased up to him once he understood Medic wasn't going to hurt him. Medic took him inside and checked him out. His wing was broken, and it was nothing Medic couldn't fix. He fixed up the birds wing, then decided to get some things to keep the bird comfortable while he recovered. He ended up spoiling him without realizing it. He went to go buy a bird cage and ended up buying the nicest one, the best bird food, and even toys 😭 He came back and set it up all nice for the bird. They bonded pretty quickly after that. However, time passed, and Medic found himself growing attached to the little bird, even naming him, which he knew was a mistake the moment he did so. He knew it was a bad idea, and he did it anyway. After about a month of them living together, Archimedes wing was functional again, Medic enjoyed watching him fly from his cage to the door to great him when he came home from wherever he had gone. But after the third or fourth time, Archimedes greeted him at the door. He knew he was well enough to go back out into the world. That evening, before sunset, Medic opened his window and put Archimedes on the ledge, prompting him to fly off, totally not on the verge of tears, about to experience the worst pain of his life or anything. Archimedes just tilted his head, confused, turned around, and nestled up to Medics arm that he had been propping himself on. Audible sobbing could be heard from his house that night. Medic would later find a way to keep Archimedes to live forever with him, making sure that Archimedes was spoiled to death, and was told each day the value Medic put on their friendship.

"Wir werden für immer zusammen sein, mein Freund, das verspreche ich!"

"Coo"

(It'll be us forever my friend, I promise.)

(I'm counting on it)

————————————————————

Ough, im a sucker for a happy ending 😭or for some reason, I feel like this is super embarrassing, but I' going to ignore that feeling. Sorry for the angst dump, but it had to be done, and I'm sorry it's not very long! I hope you guys like this! Uh, a mini headcanons, then another Medic post, and then some new headcanons are in the works! There is so much Medic content, but I'm not complaining 💖

[abarbaricyalp]

Hi! Not sure how it works, but for the Whumptober event: #15 for SamBucky?

Oh it is so embarrassing to be answering this so late. I have literally been working on it (off and on) since October. It never strayed from the top of my WIP pile. I just...gestures vaguely Thank you so much for sending in a prompt and I'm so sorry to have taken so long. I do love a good "Leave me alone, I'm fine" whump. I went with "Makeshift bandages" but I'm sure you can find "suppressed suffering" and "I'm fine" if you squint.

Putting Bandages Where Stitches Should Be

CW: Injury, violence, blood, etc

Read on AO3

Steve was right again. Sam hated it when Steve was right. It was making an indisputably bad day even worse.

"Don't go out today," Steve had said, all puppy-dogged eyes that morning. "I've got a bad feeling."

Him and his bad feelings. He called it a soldier's intuition and Sam called it a soldier's paranoia. But, dammit, he was usually right. That couldn’t be a byproduct of the serum, could it?

But it was a beautiful fall day and they needed groceries something fierce, so Sam had rolled his eyes and called him paranoid and headed out.

It had been fine for several hours, Sam wanted it noted. Just a normal day of errands. Hell, no one had even recognized him. He even tried a new coffee drink.

With a hysterical kind of laugh, Sam realized he hadn’t even made it to the grocery store yet. Probably a good thing since the car was now languishing in a parking lot somewhere and it was only going to get warmer as the day went on. What time was it, he wondered. Had Steve realized something was wrong yet? That paranoid intuition would be real handy right about then.

Sam leaned back against the dingy wall and tried not to think about how badly he was sweating against it. It was going to start mildewing. He still couldn’t figure out where these guys came from. The parking lot had been almost completely empty. There’d been no one else near him. One second, he was loading up a bag of new blankets into the back of the car, and the next someone was hitting him upside the head and dragging him away.

He knew they had to be trained at least a little. They were quiet and fierce. Nothing that Sam couldn’t normally hand, but there had been no fighting through the early wound to his head. Actually, it was still pulsing, each heartbeat a new throb of bruise-ache against his skull. The longer he sat here, the further the ache traveled, reaching for his temples, his ears, his eyes.

He closed his eyes, as if that would stave off anything at all, and listened to the ambient noise of whatever not-so-safe house he was being held in. He’d seen neither hide nor hair of his attackers since they’d thrown him into the small room. He assumed it was an apartment and this was some bedroom or office. It was clean, the carpet was almost soft. There were worse places, he thought. And with it being carpet, maybe they weren’t looking to make him bleed. That’d be nice.

He knew other people were around. He could hear them pacing around the other side of the door. His head hurt too much to concentrate on what they were saying. They were speaking German, which he didn’t speak, but it gave him a good feel that this was probably Hydra. It made the apartment even more confusing. What would Hydra want with Sam that involved just keeping him thrown in an empty office?

There was a cacophony outside then, snarling and the sounds of blows landing on bodies, bodies falling to the floor.

“Ich habe es dir gesagt!” he heard someone shout. “Er ist der Winter Soldier!”

Someone was shitting Sam. Instantly, all of the minor irritation of the day flooded over the actual concern of having been kidnapped by neo-Nazi assholes. If he’d said ‘this day can’t get worse’ this is the exact outcome that would have made it worse. He’d take bleeding over this.

There was more fighting and then the door was wrenched open and a very bloodied and bruised Winter Soldier was kicked into the room, landing hard on his face and wrist beside Sam.

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” Sam said, just to get it out there.

Barnes turned over onto his back, keeping his hurt wrist against his chest. He looked up at Sam, scowled through the blood on his face, managed to glare while both eyes were almost swelled shut. “I ain’t thrilled to see you neither, birdbrain,” he coughed. He turned back onto his side to spit out a glob of blood that landed on the knee of Sam’s jeans.

“Asshole,” Sam snapped and tried to clean it off, even though it was already a lost battle. “I take it you fought back,” Sam guessed.

“I take it you did not,” Bucky shot back and it felt more like an insult than an actual insult would have.

Sam scowled at him. It had been months since they’d seen each other. Sam couldn’t even say what city or even country it was that he’d caught up to Barnes in. It hadn’t been a long meeting. More or less just enough time for them to grapple and exchange a few threats before Barnes shook Sam’s tail again. At first, Sam took it as a personal failing that he kept losing Barnes. He was too ashamed to admit to Steve that he’d caught up with the reanimated best friend but let him slip away. Then, as time went on and Sam caught him more often, he placed all of the blame fully on Barnes. There were times, he knew, when Barnes let him catch up. These happened only often enough to keep Sam in the cat-and-mouse game. There were times, he also knew, when Barnes fully didn’t expect Sam to have found him. Two months ago was one of those times. Barnes had seemed healthy and adjusted. He had his own place and there was fresh bread on the table. Small miracles.

That did not explain why Barnes was in New York or anywhere near it in order to get the shit beat out of him by Hydra goons and dragged into whatever this was.

Barnes shoved himself up by the elbows and spit more blood out. So much for keeping the carpet clean. “So what the fuck did you do to land us here?”

“This is not an ‘us’ situation,” Sam objected with a snort. “What did you do to land you  here?”

“Fuck all,” Barnes answered. He leaned against the wall next to Sam, tilted his head back to avoid gushing more blood from his nose. Sam had seen him hurt before, but he’d never been around for the fall out like this. He was like some stray dog, sleeping off the worst of it and trying to lick clean all of the rest. “You told me it was an emergency.”

Sam looked away from a smear of blood on Bucky’s neck to frown at him directly. “I did not reach out to you. And what kind of emergency could possibly make you come all the way back to America?”

Bucky’s head lolled over to him. A muscle worked in his jaw and down his neck as those obnoxious eyes scanned over Sam’s face. “You said Steve was hurt. Bad.”

“I didn’t. He’s not. That’s all it would’ve taken to get you back here?” he asked, just a little offended that he’d been traipsing around the world and digging huge chunks into his sleep deficit when there was a magic code to bring Bucky back on his own. And all it would take was Steve landing himself in a hospital again.

Bucky half waved him off, turned his head away again. “Someone must’ve really wanted me here.”

“I cannot fathom why.”

They sat in stony silence for too long. Sam much preferred being alone, he decided. At least then silence was just silence and not this crackling energy between them. Barnes broke the silence by coughing wetly again and spitting out more blood and tissue.

“Christ alive,” Sam sighed. “What’s going on with you?” He reached out without any fanfare to hold Bucky’s face and examine the injuries there. There’d been no time for any of them to heal, not that Sam would’ve been able to tell through the blood. “Hold still,” he ordered and reached for the hidden knife in Bucky’s bootheel that he knew was there.

“How?” Bucky asked. Sam was surprised to only find curiosity in his voice and not anger.

“I’ve seen you take it out before. Just had to hope it wasn’t something Hydra taught you and knew to look for.”

“Nah, that one’s all Brooklyn,” he said with a tired sigh. “Well, kind of. I adapted it.”

Sam rolled his eyes. The old-timey Brooklyn posturing was the same whether it was Steve or Barnes, evidently. He cut the sleeve off of his shirt and used it to begin cleaning away some of the blood on Bucky’s face. It was slow going without water, but Barnes was remarkably quiet during the entire thing. He let Sam work without fussing. His eyes remained focused and sharp, bright even in the dim room. He was more enjoyable when his eyes looked like this, instead of the dead shark stare he got in the middle of a fight.

Not that Sam was going to admit Barnes was ever enjoyable to be around.

“What do you think this is about?” Sam asked to distract Bucky from the fact that he was about to set his nose back.

“Clearly they wanted the both of us–Fuck you, Wilson!” Bucky shouted and shoved Sam hard enough that Sam actually rocked back and lost his balance, sprawled across the floor. Sam subtly rolled out his shoulder–it was definitely going to bruise–before he sat up again and glared.

“I didn’t think you wanted the rugged crooked nose look,” he defended without any real belief in the words. He was actually kind of worried about what the serum would do to a persistently crooked nose.

Bucky rubbed from the bridge of his nose into the soft, squishy bruises around his eyes. Already, impossibly, the color was draining from the outer edges of the bruises. Sam hated him for it.

“Clearly they wanted both of us,” Sam agreed and rolled his shoulder again. “But…they don’t seem keen on cutting off fingers.”

“Not yet,” Bucky grunted.

“They gotta know we won’t talk. You won’t talk. Don’t you think it’s kind of playing with fire to bring you here? I mean, you’re not even drugged.”

As if his words were a reminder, Bucky eyed the door. Sam knew he could take it out of the wall if he wanted too. He also knew that whoever these assholes were, they had enough manpower to bring Bucky in bloodied and rough. He figured Bucky was doing similar calculations in his mind.

“Why us?” Sam prompted again.

“Steve,” Bucky grunted. He leaned back against the wall and drew his knees up to his chest. “They wouldn’t bother to hunt me down, wouldn’t take that risk, for anything else. They probably think if they have both of us, they have twice as much leverage.”

“Maybe they couldn’t decide which one he was more likely to come for,” Sam suggested, only a little sarcastically.

“That man would rend the Earth apart for you,” Bucky said as simply as he would talk about the weather.

Sam tried not to blow over again. Bucky believed that. He wasn’t just saying it to be a shit. “Have you been watching us?” he asked, instead of asking for a thesis on why Bucky thought that so assuredly.

Bucky cut him a look. It was dampened by the bruises. “I had to keep making sure neither of you had gotten yourselves killed yet.”

“Yeah, you’re a real shining example of how to do it right. Show back up on American soil for two minutes and instantly get captured,” Sam snarked back. He needed to put some distance between his current situation and the fact that Barnes thought Steve would ‘rend the Earth apart’ for him. “Come here and let me look at that wrist.”

“Is this how you were with the pararescue?”

“Good at my job? Yes.”

“So damn pushy,” Barnes corrected. But he shifted how he was sitting so they were almost knee to knee and then held out his arm. “It’ll heal on its own,” he said. “I’ve had worse.”

“Or I can just wrap it and you don’t have to worry about rebreaking it later. Do you know how many carpal bones there are? You keep fucking them up, or the tendons attached to them, and you’re gonna be in a world of hurt for longer than you need to be.”

“There are eight,” Barnes said, just to be difficult. “Should I name them all for you too?”

Sam took half a second to glare at him before returning his attention to Bucky’s wrist. Barnes was long fingered, which was something Sam knew logically. He’d seen him handle weaponry. Seen him fight. Still, it was different when those fingers were laid out across his forearm, a little swollen, a little curled in, but still so damn pretty. Sam had never met someone with pretty hands before. He’d expected Bucky’s hands to be gnarled and scarred from a lifetime of fighting and training and abuse, but they just weren’t. The serum helped, he assumed. He wondered what they had looked like on the man from all of Steve’s stories. Had they looked like this, even working on the docks all day and boxing his way through the nights?

Everyone Sam knew who’d ever worked around boats had hands that were rope-burned and muscled and suntanned. He’d half expected Bucky’s to be similar. Instead, his hands were…not soft, exactly. But clean and smooth.

He pushed his thumbs into Bucky’s wrist, dragging them down his metacarpals. Barnes hissed in a breath and his eyes darted away from Sam’s ministrations. Sam returned his thumbs to Bucky’s wrist and then pushed down into his ulna and radius. He didn’t react as strongly to that, so Sam focused on the carpals that were up high in his wrist. (Down low? He could never remember how to orient the body)

“Where does it hurt?” he asked, probing for the misaligned bone but coming up empty.

“Everywhere,” Barnes ground out. “It fucking hurts everywhere.” But he didn’t yank his hand away, so Sam kept at it. Finally, finally, something snapped as Sam pushed his thumbs down into Bucky’s wrist for an umpteenth time. Bucky swore colorfully and snatched his hand back at that, rubbing his own fingers over his wrist while new curses came out.

“Let me wrap it a little,” Sam offered, holding his hand out again.

Bucky looked at him like he bit. Sam had read all the notes about the Winter Soldier. How medical treatment was administered. When the Soldier cooperated and when he didn’t. The Soldier could handle inordinate amounts of pain. Bucky Barnes, it seemed, did not feel like keeping the habit alive.

“It’ll be fine without a sling,” he insisted. “It already feels better.” And then, from between his teeth, he added, “Thank you.”

He was still bloodied, hair matted all to hell. He looked like some kind of wild man. Actually, he kind of looked how Sam expected to find him at the beginning of the Great Barnes Search and Rescue Mission. He came forward again, beginning to wipe at Bucky’s face one more time.

“You’re disgusting to look at,” he defended when Bucky tacked a lazy glare on him.

“Just admit you wanna touch my face, Wilson,” Bucky shot back.

Sam accidentally reopened a wound, so he tore off a piece from his demolished sleeve and stuck it to the gash like toilet paper on a shaving knick. 

“You’re so dumb,” Bucky sighed as his eyes closed. Then he pitched right into Sam, almost completely boneless.

“Barnes?” Sam barked as he fought to get his hands under Bucky’s body enough to lift him again. “Do not fucking pass out,” he ordered, possibly irrelevantly. “Barnes,” he snapped again, and gently smacked the better, less bruised side of his face. “You didn’t say you were concussed. You didn’t say you had more injuries.” He yanked up Bucky’s shirt, prodding his belly and ribs for any signs of internal bleeding, but came up short. Just a bunch of outside bruises, maybe a crack in his ribs. He wrenched open Bucky’s mouth to check for signs he’d been coughing blood, but didn’t find any of that either. He was just about to shove his fingers down Bucky’s throat to look for a blood clot when his eyes fluttered open again.

He took a few seconds to recognize his surroundings–distressingly still and relaxed about waking up in a room he didn’t know–and then he reached up for Sam’s wrist and pulled his hand away. “Why were your fingers in my mouth?”

Sam rolled his eyes while he waited for his heart to stop thundering in his chest. Just his luck. Find the prodigal best friend and watch him die before Sam could drop him at Steve’s feet. “You basically begged for me to,” he scoffed. “Sam, please, you’ve just got such good fingers. I need them in my mouth.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, then grimaced. So it probably was some kind of concussion. At least Sam didn’t have to worry about blood clots. “What’s happened? How long was I out?”

“Nothing. A few seconds,” Sam answered. “Don’t do that again.”

Bucky saluted from halfway up his chest. “Whatever, man. I’m just tired.”

“I don’t care what you are. Keep your eyes open.”

The door opened then and a tall man, dressed like a movie villain with tall dark boots and a long dark coat, walked into the room. He had Sam’s phone in his hand and it was trilling with a waiting phone call.

“You don’t keep a passcode on your phone?” Bucky asked drily.

“Of course I fucking do,” Sam snapped back.

“Gentlemen, please,” the man said with a stifled German accent.

Steve picked up just before it would’ve gone to voicemail. “Sam, hey, I was about to send out a rescue party.”

Bucky looked at Sam pointedly, which Sam ignored. It was just a joke. He hadn’t been gone that long. Probably.

“Mr. Rogers,” the man in the coat greeted. Sam could practically feel Steve go still on the other side of the call. “I seem to have acquired not only your friend’s cell phone, but him as a whole person. And he came along with another friend.”

He snapped a photo of Sam and Bucky. Bucky barely flinched at the flash, but a few seconds later, he was still blinking and shaking his head, like the light was still in his eyes. The bad guy du jour tapped around on Sam’s phone and Sam heard it buzz in on Steve’s end.

Steve was quiet, contemplative for a few seconds. Then he said, “You have Sam and Bucky?”

“Yeeesss,” the man agreed with a lilting exaggeration. “I didn’t know they came as a pair.”

“They don’t, usually. But now that you do have both, good luck.”

And then the little shit hung up the phone. Even the asshole German guy stared at the screen in disbelief. Another man appeared in the hallway. He cast a nervous glance towards Bucky, whose eyes were shut again, before redirecting his attention to his boss.

“What’d he say?” the man asked. He was fully American. Jersey, maybe.

“Bad connection,” the other man ground out before stalking down the hallway. The second man hurried to keep up. The door remained open.

Sam nudged Bucky’s ribs. “Stop it,” Bucky grumbled without opening his eyes.

“If you pass out again, I’m not waking you up this time,” Sam lied. “What did Steve mean?”

“I think he meant we can handle ourselves. I just need to…” He grimaced. “I just need to rest my eyes for a little while. Then I’ll be good to go.”

“The door is open now,” Sam pointed out under his breath. “Come on, you don’t have some kind of super hearing where you can fight with your eyes closed?”

Bucky raised one eyebrow in consideration. It stressed a gash across his brow. “I can fight in the dark,” he agreed.

“I’ll keep anyone from hitting you in the face again,” Sam promised. “But we have to go now.”

Bucky squeezed his eyes open and leveled a calculating glare on Sam before he nodded. “Alright,” he agreed, which felt like a miracle in and of itself. He pushed himself to his feet and then leaned back against the wall as he pressed the heels of his hands over his browbones.

Sam stood as well and put a hand to Bucky’s elbow. In all their brief encounters, they didn’t get much time to touch each other, unless they were brawling over nothing but ego. Bucky was actually…kind of soft beneath Sam’s fingers. And warm. He was certainly not the sharp edged, battle ready soldier Sam kept finding. He felt real and alive. And he was still trying to blink his eyes open.

Sam curled his fingers tighter around Bucky’s elbow and pulled him out into the hallway. He scanned the unit for any sunlight that he could use to orient himself. Without speaking, Bucky pulled him to the stairs. They made it most of the way down before the wall of the stairs gave way to an open railing and they were spotted by more assholes in black.

“Y’all coordinate these outfits beforehand or y’all keep changes of clothes here?” Sam asked before he threw Bucky into the crowd of assholes.

He tried to keep his promise about keeping punches away from Bucky’s face. They landed damn near everywhere else. Sam had underestimated how many people there were–numbers growing from three to five to nine until he lost count. Bucky was holding his own, putting men down two-to-one to Sam, climbing to three-to-one. Sam tried to catch glimpses of the rest of the house. There was a wall of windows, covered in curtains and pasted over with film or paper. The rest of the room looked like a dining room or something. Behind them was nothing but more room and dark walls.

“Find the front door,” Bucky snapped when Sam’s eyes went to the window again. He smashed someone’s head down on the banister with enough force to crack either bone or wood. “I’m not jumping through glass.”

Sam rolled his eyes and then ducked away from a Goddamn hammer. He wrestled it away from the man wielding it, then threw it at the window to shatter it open. “There you go. No need to jump,” he said breathlessly. He turned just in time to catch someone around the waist and throw them into the wall before they could get the drop on Bucky, who was, if Sam had to guess, wrenching someone’s arm out of socket. 

Bucky got a gun from somewhere and made fast work of everyone else in the room, but not before the guy who Sam had thrown into the wall smashed Sam’s head into it in retaliation. On the opposite side from the open wound Sam was already contending with, of course. Why shouldn’t the bruises match?

“You’re bleeding,” Bucky said, cutting through the ringing, violent silence that had fallen over the house. He wiped away the blood that was pouring over his own eye, completely oblivious to the irony. “Jesus, you’re bleeding a lot. What happened?”

Sam stared at him a little dumbfounded. “Are you serious right now?”

Bucky tsked away his bitching, yanking Sam over to examine his forehead like a collector looking at diamonds. “Gross,” he decided and then ripped the collar of his shirt off like it was nothing, along with a chunk of the bottom of it. “Don’t move,” he ordered as he folded the fabric over on itself a few times and then pressed it tightly over the wound on Sam’s head. He used the collar of his shirt to tie the fabric down.

His fingers were absurdly gentle as he worked. The warmth that had radiated off of his body was gone now, fingers cool against the bruise-hot burn of Sam’s skin. Sam didn’t realize his eyes had fallen shut until Bucky gently touched his other cheek and tilted his face down just a little. “Don’t die,” he said.

Sam didn’t have the energy to glare at him. “Pot, kettle,” he managed to say. He pulled Bucky’s hand away from his face and looked around the room. “You know this wasn’t everyone.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got the rest handled,” he promised and held up a grenade.

“What the fuck?” Sam asked, staring at it like he’d never seen one before. “Why did someone just have that on them?”

Bucky shrugged. “It’s not even a good one,” he said disappointedly. “There probably isn’t anyone else here, but at least no one will be able to come back,” he offered. He crossed to the window and removed the remaining glass with his metal arm, still looking at it like it was personally offending him.

They helped each other through the window with the unspoken agreement not to mention it again after this. Both of them had enough blood dripping in their eyes and rattled brains to warrant it just this once.

“You handled yourself pretty well without your wings,” Bucky offered as they walked away from the house. “How big do you suppose that window is?”

“I was trained before I had the wings,” Sam pointed out sharply. He glanced over his shoulder to reassess the broken window. “Four by six, you think?”

“Sure, the whole thing, but what about the cleared part?”

“Two by three? Four?”

Bucky regarded the grenade in his hand and the distance between them and the house. “I can do that,” he decided.

They walked a few meters more before he turned fully, pulled the pin of the grenade, and then threw it with an accuracy that would have more Cy Young winners seething with jealousy. Not to mention the distance and force of it too.

A few seconds later, the house exploded. Bucky was right. It wasn’t a very good grenade.

Sam looked around the wooded area they were in, a marginal field around them before the trees started up again, which was probably best because of the fire now. “So, where the fuck are we?” he asked.

“And how the fuck do we get home?” Bucky finished with a ridiculous perturbed set to his lips.

“Ah, shit, that asshole still had my phone,” Sam groaned when the patting of his pants came up empty. He knew Steve’s number by heart, but he didn’t imagine Bucky had his phone on him either.

“We could go see where he went,” Bucky suggested. “That explosion was not cool enough to take out any of the cars.”

“Neither one of us is in any condition to go track someone down.”

“Could be fun.”

Bucky was already looking at him when Sam glanced over to see if he was being serious. “You wanna try to live out the last third of an action movie?”

“Second third at best,” Bucky scoffed with a wave. “Lots more adventures ahead of us. The Winter Soldier and the Falcon has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?”

“It would absolutely be The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Captain Good-Looking and  The Grouchy Soldier. Angel and Asshole.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bucky interrupted, reaching for Sam’s hand. For just a second, Sam’s heart may have stuttered in his chest. But all Bucky was doing was unwinding the bandage Sam had put around his wrist earlier so that he could patch up the sluggishly bleeding gashes on Sam’s knuckles now. “Come on, Pilot Hyperbole. We’re losing daylight.”

“The Falcon and the Hound Dog,” Sam added, following Bucky as they skirted the smoldering building to find a car.

They drove away into an easing sunset.

If you enjoyed this, please consider leaving a kudos and a note on AO3

[eaturheartout2021]

Playing Rough (König x Fem!Reader)

Warnings: mild adult language, personal descriptions of MW2 characters, AFAB!reader, descriptions of fighting

Summary: König and Reader get to train for the first time and he gets to see what everyone’s been talking about.

It’s early when you waltz into the training hall, empty apart from you and König. He’s wearing a pair of dark gray sweats, loose tank top, but opted to skip his usual mask with just a plain black medical one. His usual hidden face was on partial display and this made you stop in the doorway. You catch his gaze, captured in those blue eyes as he stared back into yours. Blushed bloomed across his cheeks as he turned away, hiding under his shaggy strawberry blonde hair. You had never seen this side to him, the shy man in front of you was a stranger compared to the ruthless killer on the field you’ve heard of.

“Guten morgen. You must be Phoenix. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.” He spoke so quietly that you seriously doubted that the mountain of a man standing in front of you was the German killer they all feared, almost as much as Ghost.

You gave him a gentle smile and extended your hand. His warm, calloused hand gripped yours firmly and gave it one small shake.

“I am. It’s good to finally put a face to the name König. King, if my German isn’t too rusty, right?” His eyes flicked up to yours and something of curiosity and admiration ran through.

“Ja, du hast Recht.” His voice was thick with his accent, almost as if his body relaxed into it. You smiled up at him. His face blooms in scarlet one again and he turns away shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweats. You chuckled to yourself at his shyness, finding his blushing rather cute but wouldn’t admit it aloud.

“Aye, König, ready to see what the big fuss is about this little she devil?” Soap’s voice boomed through the training hall like a canon causing König to jump like someone had shot him. You turned and groaned shooting daggers at Soap who strolled through with Ghost and Gaz on his heels.

“Was meint er?” König turned to you brows raised in question. You threw your head back and let out an exaggerated growl. You could kill Soap, actually kill him for not letting König know about the extent of the training session today.

“You could’ve let him know, ass hat.” You flipped him off and put you hand on König’s shoulder.

“I’m one of the best sparring partners the 141 has,” Ghost cleared his throat in a rather loud tone, “aside from Ghost. Since you’re new to the Task force, Price wanted you to spar with us today. Get you into the swing of things.”

His brows shot up and he looked back at the trio. “Ist das alles? Ich komme damit klar.” He shrugged his very large shoulders.

“König, we don’t hold back. We don’t yield.”

“She’s broken my nose more times than I can count, doc’s say it’s a lost cause at this point.” Gaz quipped from behind you in a careless tone causing König to look over your shoulder.

“What’s the point of training if we only stop when best the other. We have to survive out there so we have to survive in here. Price and Laswell give us hell for it but this has saved our asses in more ways than one.” Ghost didn’t falter in his little speech to König and no one else stopped him. You had gotten the same one when you had joined all those years ago.

“This is a smart tactic. Fine, I’ll train with you.” König replied crossing his arms across his broad chest. You could practically see the evil smile creeping across Ghosts face when he pointed to the large red circle on the floor behind him.

“Good, because you’re going first. Phoenix, give us a good show.” Soap and Gaz we’re giving each other slips of cash and Ghost just stood with his arms crossed watching you as you shed your hoodie leaving you in a sports bra and a pair of leggings. König left his mask on which made you smile, you could use that to your advantage.

You entered the circle and bounced on the balls of your feet and then quickly settled into a slight crouch. Fists drawn close to your face, you eyed König, the extremely tall, 6”10 man was a mountain. He would use his height as his main strength and try to over power you with it. But you were smaller and faster. You waited until he lunged to you before you moved. He striked with a fast right hook. Faster than what you expected from him. It’s like a switch flicked inside him.

Gone was the shy, bashful man and before you was the soldier everyone whispered about. You dodged his fists, weaving away in short bursts as he played offensive, pushing you into a corner. You grunted and swore loudly still dodging his flying fists.

“Phoenix get on him!” Gaz yell from the side. You looked down and saw that König’s footing wasn’t grounded properly. You crouched low, missing a hit that was aimed for your face and swung out your leg. Your shin made contact with his and a sharp pain rang through causing you to bite your cheek to keep you from crying out. He stumbled and left an opening for you to take on the defensive.

You brought your fist up and met the bridge of his nose with a teeth chattering crunch. He took a few steps back clutching onto his mask but you didn’t give him the chance to progress to you. You grabbed what you could of his shoulders, pulled him down and rammed your knee into his stomach, causing a groan to tumble from his lips. While he was bent over you tried to over power him and bring him to the floor but his elbow met your nose with such force that it knocked you back and onto the floor.

“Oh shit. Get up lass!” Soap’s voice rag out to you as you stood up and met König’s bare and bloody face, mask now gone. You felt a warm trickle run down your lip but you just advanced to König, ducking as he swung towards your face. You ducked under his arms and threw a heavy punch to his now exposed chin causing him to growl at you with fire in his eyes.

He grabbed your arm and pulled you to him, holding you close as he wrapped a muscled arm around your neck, cutting off your air supply.

“Wie weit ist zu weit Phoenix?” He whispers into your ear, a chill runs down your spine, you refuse to tap out, you’d rather faint than yield. But you still had fight left in you. So, you leaned down and sunk your teeth into the meaty portion of his arm, hard. He pulled back with a hiss. You took the opportunity to slam your head back into his face hitting his nose once again. His let out a scream, dropping you from his grip and you scrambled away. You got your footing, turned and football tackled him to the floor. Using his size to bring him down.

His head hit the floor with an audible thud causing Soap and Gaz to physically wince away. You crawled under König wrapping your thighs around his neck. You twisted your lower body and squeezed so that it would cut off his air supply. You had his arms pinned away from him so that he couldn’t grab at your legs to try and break free.

His face was a bloody mess, his nose was most definitely broken. But when he gazed up at you, you seen something shining back. Something you couldn’t place.

“Ich gebe nach.” He whispered. You gawked at him. Still having him between your thighs.

“What?” You didn’t move. “That’s not how it’s done König.”

“I know when I’ve been beaten.” He ever so gently tapped your thighs and you reluctantly relaxed. He stayed laying between your legs gazing up at you, with that same unknown expression until Ghost’s deep voice cut through your shared gazes.

“König, go get checked out in Med bay. She’s officially welcomed you in.” He didn’t say anything as he sat up and walked out the doors leaving you sitting on the mat wondering what was swirling in those eyes of his.

[bexfangirlforlife]

First rewatch of the new Spatort episode. So gonna put all my notes in one post (under the cut). Let's go!

Oh hello lake scene. Here we go again. Let's hurt a little.

I think I already have to rewind. Needed to watch that whole scene through once but had multiple thoughts during it.

Leo is all of us during kde talking about Adam carrying around the Geldtasche

"Vielleicht ist es Blutgeld, ja. Aber ich hab auch geblutet, meine ganze Kindheit lang." - Why is that such a good line? Or is that just me?

Very serious angsty scene and then "Gibs mir" makes me chuckle again.

Tell me you don't actually hear the music playing while you dance, without actually telling me...

Oh the old lady was Kiwi! I missed that yesterday, but saw posts mentioning Kiwi and I was like what?

Nooo. Now I have to watch the dead Omi part again 🥺

Mein erster Gedanke wär vermutlich verhaftet gewesen, aber dann auch direkt tot. Dabei hätts auch einfach Handy verloren sein können. I mean yeah she was in the car, but it's hours later (it's all the way dark rn)

I'm headcanoning that Esther purposefully uses "bff" to get one of them to burst out "if you mean boyfriend then yes" one day.

Home office... what exactly does he do there? Paper work? I mean we know he does Gartenarbeit, but would anybody believe he's gonna go do paper work?

Ah hello hallu!Adam. We should have gotten more of him. Like why not commit?

Why does the name "Jens Jens" sound so much cooler than just "Jens"? Or is it only because I heard that so much yesterday? 😅

Die Taubenwette ist einfach so krass bescheuert 😆

Als Pfand für was? Dafür dass sie warten? Why do you need Pfand for that? Just leave if he's not back after an hour.

Leo Leo Leo... beim fahren telefonieren, also wirklich

Adam's soft "Was ist los, Leo?"

I can't quite decide what exactly Adam looks like in his tank top look... but it's certainly something

Wenn Jens Jens mal nich stehengeblieben wär, hätt ers Wettrennen vlt gewonnen.

"What the fu-" very true Adam.

The fact they didn't notice Adam even slightly once is wild to me.

Leo searching Luisa's bathroom would have been a good opportunity for another hallu!Adam

Does this make 4 on the Adam fck count? If I count the wt fu- I mean... (i counted one Leo fck later on top. But maybe someone paid more attention to these counts?)

Worrying Adam my beloved. Guter Ansatz. Let's take it a step further next ep...

"Woher hast du das ganze Geld?" Vom boyfriend, next question.

Time for Spatenflashback

I want Flips

"Yes, sir"

Proud Adam smirk 😏

Niemand darf mit geschlossenen Augen fahren, Leo! Egal ob Führerschein oder nich.

Another smirk. Und der Blickkontakt 😏

"Aber wenns schief läuft bist du da." Cute. Though I gotta say I liked the moment before a bit better. You know when Adam puts Leo's phone back into his pocket and looks at him. Idk that got me all 🥰

Wait. Wie ist Betty jetzt direkt zu Pia durchgekommen? Hat sie ihre Nummer? What?

"Pisshaargenau" truly is a wild word.

Adam: "schüttel das ab, Leo" - Me: 🎶 shake it off, shake it off... 🎶 (I'm sorry)

24 seconds of touch. 22 of them face cradling. Yes I stopped the time. I'm fine.

"Wir brauchen dich hier" ... again got destiel flashback we need you. I need you

Glauben die eigentlich echt er heißt "Jens Jens"?

I'm sorry but I really liked Leo's entrance with his Schulterholster and little Heftchen. ... "Jens Jens, wusst ichs doch"

Den Prozess will ich sehen. "Warum war Herr Hölzer unangemeldet auf eigene Faust als verdeckter Ermittler tätig? Und was für ein Deckname ist bitte Jens Jens?"

Immernoch kinda weirdes Ende. Idk obs der fehlende Cliffhanger ist oder obs dann am Schluss einfach alles zu schnell ging so der dritte Akt felt kinda rushed as a whole.

[polaroidcats]

So. Sirius and German (Austrian?) punkrock and antifascist music. I'm thinking about die Ärzte here. Do you see my vision? Thoughts?

YES OKAY I AM SO HERE FOR THIS!!!!

first of all is Sirius german/austrian in this scenario, does he speak german or does he just think it sounds cool and punkrock? Because I am obsessed with him not understanding a word and just going for the vibes, that's hilarious. But I also think he'd deeply love some of the lyrics if he understood them.

May I propose a playlist, and please add to it if you want:

Schrei nach Liebe is such a Sirius song! All the anger? All the feelings? Screaming "Arschloch" at the top of your lungs and moving into air guitar the next second? I rest my case!

Junge is just a song about Regulus Black, you can't change my mind on this (I've had this opinion for 0.5 seconds but I am CONVINCED now). Like at first you might think it's about Sirius because that's the obvious choice and it fits him even better than it fits Regulus, I know. But think about it being from Sirius POV about Regulus??! galaxy brain idea, i'm telling you!! anyways so Sirius loves the song and can relate, in either way.

IF Sirius understands German, he would 100% be the kind of person who drunkenly sings their heart out to Linksradikaler Schlager by Swiss & die Andern. You can hate Schlager all you want, but linksradikaler Schlager is it's own glorious genre. And if you don't know it yet, please do yourself a favor and listen to the entire EP. It might be the best album I own. I mean "Und wir tanzen bei G20 im Wasserwerferregen / wenn sie irgendetwas anpisst / kommt sie um das zu regeln / anti dies anti das / sie hat sich nie angepasst / und sie kämpft für eure Freiheit / aber keiner kämpft für sie / anti dies anti das / sie saß tausendmal im Knast / und sie opfert ihre Freiheit für die Welt die sie so liebt" (Antifa).

Okay so imagine Remus has a date. With someone ELSE who is NOT SIRIUS. And comes back home to find Sirius listening to Alles aus Liebe by Die Toten Hosen on full volume. Like obviously Sirius just needs an outlet for his emotions, he'd never actually act on anything like the lyrics suggest. But sometimes you just gotta be a melodramatic idiot listening to this song, feeling your feelings because he can't tell Remus he loves him out loud (yet) so he just sings along to the song in the privacy of his room and doesn't know Remus is listening in.

I also think Sirius would love Bonnie & Clyde by Die Toten Hosen. Just the general vibes of the song, I think they totally fit his vibe.

One day Remus and Sirius get stoned and Remus finally gets to decide on the music. And he puts on Hurra die Welt geht unter by KIZ&Henning May, and Sirius is obsessed. Not only is Sirius a little bit in love with Henning May(s voice) but he also loves the lyrics. Postapocalyptic vibes is everything these angsty teenagers need.

Okayokay ANOTHER GALAXY BRAIN IDEA!! Queere Tiere by Sookee is a song about the marauders, change my mind (you can't). It's a song about queer animals and homophobia?! OBVIOUSLY they love it and Sirius thinks it's the most hilarious thing ever that THEY ARE queer animals and that there's a song about it.

And Hüpfburg is obviously just another song Sirius can relate to so much. A song about your right-winged extremist family and you questioning their beliefs?! I rest my case.

Obviously Sirius loves everything about Kerosin95. Like, trans Sirius loves Trans Agenda Dynastie, obviously (not just for the JKR slander).

I think Sirius would also love the lyrics to Scheiß auf Ironie by Deine Cousine. (I mean: "Du denkst du bist ein Feminist / Ich glaub du weißt nicht was das ist / nur weil man Frauen gerne leckt / ist das noch lange kein Respekt ?!! ICONIC)

I also think Sirius would have loved Kein Gott, kein Staat, nur Du by Kraftklub feat. Mia Morgan!

I am also a firm believer that Sirius would have been obsessed with Nena and would have loved all of her songs. Like Irgendwie, irgendwo, irgendwann? Sirius knows all the lyrics and his and James' performance of the song in the gryffindor common room is always a treat for everyone involved. And Sirius listens to Nur geträumt on full volume when he's pining after Remus, that's just canon tbh.

Okay this list is already ridiculously long and I kind of swayed away from the original punkrock prompt so if you have any more songs/artists to add to this, please do, this was so much fun!!!

[all-my-worlds-a-stage]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

Thank you for tagging me in this @bluespring864 <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

42 – the answer to everything.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

206,473

3. What fandoms do you write for?

These days it’s mainly Tatort. And I guess I should also mention Star Trek, even though it’s been a couple of years. And then there’s the odd TV show or movie that somehow piqued my interest, plus stuff like Harry Potter and Sherlock back in the day. But my main fandom, and the one I feel most at home in, is definitely Tatort. 

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Apart from the number 1 spot, these were actually quite surprising to me.

Past, Present and Beyond: Star Trek: AOS (Post-Star Trek Beyond), Kirk/Spock - Spock retrieves the box that contains the belongings of Ambassador Spock and carefully puts it on his desk.

Über Nacht Bleiben: Tatort Münster, Thiel/Boerne - Boerne findet, man kann nachts ruhig in einem Bett schlafen. Um nicht so allein zu sein.

Grün und richtiges Grün: Tatort Münster, Thiel/Boerne - „Das kann Ihnen doch völlig egal sein, mit wem ich…“ Boerne verstummte und starrte ihn aus seinen grünen Augen an. „Ist mir aber nicht egal“, sagte Thiel.

Wenn aus Münster Meer wird: Tatort Münster, Thiel/Boerne - Es war ein warmer Sommerabend, er hatte hervorragendes Essen vor sich stehen und er saß mit den Menschen an einem Tisch, die er eigentlich am liebsten mochte. Er hätte glücklich sein können. Aber es war ihm alles zu viel. Zu viele Menschen, zu viele Gespräche, zu viele Eindrücke. Und zu viel Boerne. Sie waren doch mal sowas wie Freunde gewesen. Warum hatten sie das kaputt machen müssen?

Late-Night Cravings: Grace and Frankie, Grace/Frankie - “Grace, I want cake!”

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Oh, absolutely. I love reading comments and the least I can do is say thanks when people take the time to write one. It’s also always fun to talk more about an aspect of the fic or a character, and I love when I suddenly find myself talking to people outside of the comment section. Fandom’s supposed to be about community, after all.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I tend to write happy endings. But I guess Manchmal hört sie heimlich zu (Tatort Münster, Wilhelmine Klemm/Monika Hanke-Helmhövel) and In Vino Veritas (Tatort Münster, Thiel/Boerne & Klemm/Krusenstern) have the angstiest endings I’ve ever written. They’re both Hurt No Comfort and Unrequited Love.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I guess, all of my other fics have rather happy endings. I don’t actually think there is a happiest.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Haven’t in ages. As I said, the Tatort fandom is nice <3 But some of the Harry Potter and Sherlock people were… intense. A couple of times people told me a fic was alright, but I should’ve written for another ship, which isn’t hate, of course, but why? And then there was this one time some biphobic asshole complained about me writing a character as bisexual ¯\_(ツ)_/¯   

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do. The explicit kind. Sometimes it serves a purpose in a story, sometimes it’s just for the fun of it.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Do crossovers between different Star Trek shows or between different Tatort teams count as proper crossovers? If so, I’ve actually written quite a few of them. If not, then the only ones I’ve written were back in the day with a Harry Potter fandom friend. We used to take our favourite characters from all sorts of media, plus our self-insert OCs and send them off on all kinds of adventures together.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don’t think so.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but I know that people have used Google Translate in order to read my German language fic for a French movie.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yep, see question 10. Also, @fallingforfandoms and I are currently working on a Tatort AU together, which is very exciting.

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

I don’t actually know. It varies. But Kirk/Spock, Janeway/Crusher, Thiel/Boerne and Klemm/Lürsen will always be among my favourites.  

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I’ve got the beginnings of a Star Trek Bake Off AU somewhere. I still love the idea, but right now I can’t really imagine that I will ever continue writing it.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Oh boy, maybe my readers would be better at answering this question. I like to think that I’m quite alright at writing dialogue. But maybe that’s because it's what I find most enjoyable and what often comes to me fairly easy.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I feel that my writing sometimes lacks description or insights into a character between dialogue. And I’m not that good with longer stories. Plotting is hard for those, especially for crime shows, when you want to incorporate the crime aspect. And I am a slow writer.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

If it fits the story, sure. So far, I’ve mainly used dialect rather than a completely different language.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Technically, Star Trek in 5th grade or so. But I didn’t know that I was writing fanfic or what a fandom even was. First thing I published was for Harry Potter, and first thing I published on AO3 was for Tatort Münster.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

I’m bad at choosing favourites. It would depend on my mood, I guess. Right now, if I absolutely had to pick one, I’d probably go with In Vino Veritas, which might be strange, since it’s a rather short one and doesn’t have a happy ending. But I just like it.

Tagging @fallingforfandoms @thotstochter @iiiflow @cornchrunchie and @carlomenzinger if you feel like sharing a bit about your writing.

[freebooter4ever]

i talked with jilly bean for as long as her kids would let her today, and she's been trying to undo the guilt i feel over grandma telling me i should just choose to not be sick and stop seeing doctors. anyway i was describibg the 'elemental' diet to jillian and she said she would fly down to LA to work here remotely and take care of me for the two weeks it takes to kill off the bacteria if i end up having to do that (i still have two rounds of back to back antibiotics to try first). so that might be my early november right there.

but as i was crying a little over how during the bad hours i cant do anything like read or even watch tv because its hard for my brain to follow, she was asking if there is anything i do that even is remotely comforting or distracting. and i was like LOL. well. and admitted that ive been scrolling through old hockey gifs and pictures and i was like this is evgeni and sent her the video:

Ok so some backstory jilly bean and i grew up together, both of us living in the same little neighborhood for 18 years. And our high school football team was like...state champions the entire time i think ( i say think because the only time i realized i should have the 'high school experience' and actually go to games was as a senior ) ( we definitely won state that year lol ). Except like... Our graduating class was some of the first championship years so the football field was more rudimentary and only the popular kids and band members and families could get seats on the bleachers (the yellow arrow):

The entire bit circled in blue did not exist in my day lol. anyway my point is if you were kind of a weirdo and didnt have friends to give you seats you just ended up wandering around the track (the bit i colored purple). I never paid much attention to the actual football game i was just there to support jillian who desperately wanted to feel like a normal teenager. She was the sports fan, i was the nerd who forced her to watch lord of the rings.

Jillian would make up dances while we walked back and forth on the endline to stay warm. We were not cheerleaders by any stretch of the imagination - this is washington state in the fall and winter, back then 90% of the time it was raining, we were bundled up in jeans and sweatshirts. But my favorite of her 'cheers' was the 'ewok dance' which consisted of humming star wars music and a lot of less flexible leg lifts. Watching geno's uncoordinated jumping around and waving the towel took both jillian and i back about twenty years i think, lol.

ANYWAY my point is she approves:

🤣🤣🤣

See turnabout is fairplay though because even longer ago when we were extremely awkward preteens in middle school, while i was transitioning from my historical pirates phase to my elves phase, jillian was becoming increasingly obsessed with baseball. It wouldnt be until POTC was released that finally our interests collided and we both decided pirates were the coolest. In the meantime, 12 year old jillian went online searching for a brett bo*one desktop background for her family's computer. This story could end really inappropriately because 90s internet but instead jillian just happened to find a relatively tame photo edit that stuck boone's head on top of an extremely musclar angel with feathered wings and wearing nothing but a diaper. I mean you think sports fans are creative now...thats nothing compared to early 90s geocities. She made this 'boonie angel' her family's computer background much to the amusement of her computer scientist father.

'boonie angel' quickly became an inside joke. At one point jillian ended up with a lifesize sticky cut out on the wall of her room of actual boone hitting a home run. And the only reason i ever went to seattle baseball games was to support jillian's ridiculous crush (our other friend nuri only came for the stadium sushi which was all the rage during the ich*iro era). And i would randomly gift jillian with cards depicting the signature stick figure 'boonie angel' like this guy enjoying the rose garden yesterday (note the diaper, that was important for his modesty):

Keep in mind boonie angel was like...a thirty year old man. Nothing about this made sense, to this day i have no idea why jillian latched so hard onto this player. But back then preteen me was crushing hard on fictional elves who were immortal thousands of years old so i couldnt exactly judge (my favorite was kyrtian from elvenborn who was this reclusive military genius with a heart of gold who tried to hide behind a veneer of 'madness' to avoid the evil elves and was suddenly thrust into the spotlight when the rich and powerful elves realized they could exploit kyrtian's academic talent)(he was so much more complex and interesting than legolas and also he shared my daddy issues).

So what im sayin is i enabled her ridiculousness, and i should have known she'd be more than willing to enable mine lmaooooo.

ok but now im wondering what geno would look like as an angel with a diaper....

[korealog]

(1) Like a Daydream (ENG/DE) — Friday, 26.07.24

(ENG)

Wow, if you haven't written a blog entry for a few days, you immediately realise how much you have to keep up to date in order to write everything as well as possible. So let's move on to my Friday. I had arranged to meet a friend in Itaewon (a district of Seoul) at 2.30 pm. To avoid wasting my time until then, I had decided to explore the N-Seoul Tower (or Namsan Tower). It was actually more tiring than I thought, but I really wanted to walk & not take the cable car. Just before I reached the top, it started pouring with rain. But that didn't deter me from my plan. On the contrary, the rain was a great way to cool off during my walk to the top. I then treated myself to an iced coffee and enjoyed the marvellous view. As quickly as the rain had come, it was gone again & I was able to continue my tour. Up here on the Namsan (that's the name of the mountain) you can find countless love locks or locks from people all around the world. I also hung my lock up here. Afterwards, I strolled along the platforms for quite a while. The view was breathtakingly beautiful & I fell a little more in love with this country. After enjoying the view, it was already time to make my way back to Itaewon. Even the way down was enough of a sight. Flowers, bushes and trees everywhere, providing shade in the heat. Once I arrived at the bottom, I took the bus & then walked a short distance. Most of the houses in Itaewon are a bit older, there are hardly any high-rise buildings here, just tiny alleyways and the charm of Korea. Before I met up with Yonghwa, I stopped off at a small café for a strawberry latte. We then set off together at 2.30 pm. By chance, we ended up in one of the more hidden cafés. A little dog greeted us at the entrance and the interior was super cosy, with fairy lights and plants, as well as a screen playing music videos. We must have spent almost 3 hours here & talked about lots of things. As we are both rather introverted people, there were also moments of silence, but that was also completely okay. At some point it got a bit cold because of the air conditioning and we headed off to get something to eat. Yonghwa showed me some meat (actually offal) that day. Sounds daunting at first, but I tried it & most of it was actually really tasty! At around 8.30pm we went in search of a small bar to have a drink. We found what we were looking for in the far corner of a house entrance. The bar was super small, but very nice. They picked up on the sea theme everywhere & you almost felt like you were in an aquarium. At around 23:00 we slowly but surely made our way towards the metro & said our goodbyes! When I got home, I just freshened up and fell into bed. I also didn't want to get up quite so late on Saturday to get everything done that I had planned.

To be continued...

(DE)

Wow, hat man mal ein paar Tage keinen Blogeintrag geschrieben, merkt man direkt wie sehr man doch hinterher sein muss, um alles so gut es geht wiederzugeben. Kommen wir also zu meinem Freitag. 14:30 Uhr hatte ich mich mit einer Freundin in Itaewon (einem Stadtteil von Seoul) verabredet. Um bis dahin nicht sinnlos meine Zeit zu vergeuden, hatte ich beschlossen den N-Seoul Tower (oder auch Namsan Tower) zu erkunden. Das war tatsächlich anstrengender als gedacht, aber ich wollte unbedingt laufen & nicht die Seilbahn nehmen. Kurz bevor ich oben angekommen war, fing es an wie aus Eimern zu schütten. Das hat mich aber nicht von meinem Plan abbringen lassen. Im Gegenteil, der Regen war eine gute Abkühlung während meiner Tour nach oben. Ich habe mir dann erstmal einen Eiskaffee gegönnt & die traumhafte Aussicht genossen. So schnell wie der Regen gekommen war, war er auch wieder weg & ich konnte meine Tour fortsetzen. Hier oben auf dem Namsan (so heißt der Berg) findet man unzählige Liebesschlösser oder Schlösser von Menschen von überall her. Auch ich habe mein Schloss hier oben aufgehängt. Danach bin ich eine ganze Weile auf den Plattformen entlang geschlendert. Die Aussicht war atemberaubend schön & ich habe wieder ein Stück mehr in dieses Land verliebt. Nachdem ich die Aussicht genossen hatte, wurde es auch schon wieder Zeit mich auf den Weg Richtung Itaewon zu machen. Selbst der Weg nach unten, war schon Sehenswürdigkeit genug. Überall Blumen, Sträucher & Bäume, die einem bei der Hitze Schatten spenden. Unten angekommen habe ich den Bus genommen & bin dann noch ein kleines Stück gelaufen. In Itaewon sind die meisten Häuser etwas älter, hier findet man kaum Hochhäuser, sondern kleinste Gassen und den Charme von Korea. Bevor ich mich mit Yonghwa getroffen hatte, bin nochmal in ein kleines Cafe abgebogen um dort einen Erdbeer-Latte zu trinken. Ab 14:30 Uhr sind wir dann gemeinsam losgezogen. Durch Zufall sind wir in einem der versteckteren Cafés gelandet. Ein kleiner Hund hat uns am Eingang begrüßt und der Innenraum war super gemütlich gestaltet, mit Lichterketten & Pflanzen, sowie eine Leinwand, an der Musikvideos abgespielt wurden. Hier haben wir bestimmt fast 3 Stunden verbracht & uns über vieles unterhalten. Da wir beide eher introvertierte Menschen sind, gab es auch mal Momente der Stille, aber auch das war völlig okay. Irgendwann wurde uns dann doch etwas kalt wegen der Klimaanlage & wir haben uns auf den Weg gemacht um etwas zu essen. Yonghwa hat mir an dem Tag Fleisch (tatsächlich Innereien) gezeigt. Klingt erstmal abschreckend, aber ich habe es probiert & das meiste war tatsächlich echt lecker! Gegen 20:30 Uhr haben wir uns dann noch auf die Suche nach einer kleinen Bar gemacht, um noch etwas zu trinken. In einem Hauseingang, in der hintersten Ecke, sind wir dann fündig geworden. Die Bar war super klein, aber sehr schön. Überall haben sie das Thema Meer aufgegriffen & man hat sich fast wie in einem Aquarium gefühlt. Gegen 23:00 haben wir uns dann langsam aber sicher in Richtung Metro begeben & uns verabschiedet! Zuhause angekommen habe ich mich nur noch frisch gemacht & bin ins Bett gefallen. Außerdem wollte ich am Samstag nicht ganz so spät aufstehen um alles zu schaffen, was ich mir vorgenommen hatte.

Fortsetzung folgt…

[rabentochter]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Thanks so much for the tag @arabesqueangel <3

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

239

2. What’s your total ao3 word count?

1,654,908.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

I used to write for Frostiron (Loki/Tony Stark).

4. Top five fics by kudos

Start from Scratch, my baby. My love. My sunshine, my boobies.

Iron doesn't rust, with the lovely STARSdidathing.

Bosom Friends with the fantastic @quietlyapocalyptic

Glorious, my kinda deserted and i do think about it still, baby.

Kairos, with STARSdidathing.

5. Do you respond to comments?

Rarely. Mainly when it's a comment left on Start from Scratch. I read them all though <3

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Come Home, I think? I remember lots of angry yelling there tbh.

7. What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Start from Scratch, lol. I put Tony through so much and every single reader, the happy ending there is the most appreciated and most needed.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Used to get a lot. Especially about my choices where I took my stories, or funnily enough, my metaphors because apparently people do not enjoy them. Well their bad, must suck not to have any imagination. But it's part of the reason why I stopped writing lul.

9. Do you write smut?

Yes! Absolutely love it. Absolutely sitting on my piles of filth that I've never posted and loving the ones I have posted :D

10. Craziest crossover?

Uh. Frostiron in the Percy Jackson Universe I guess.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yopp. I hope someone yells at you in public once that you owe them money and that your mother tells some strangers the most embarrasing stories of you :)

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yeah! It's pretty cool! I'm absolutely honoured every single time

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Haha yeah. With the lovely @arabesqueangel, @amidnight--dreary, NamelesslyNightlock, STARSdidathing <3 every single one of them been a blast.

14. All time favorite ship?

Frostiron.

15. What’s a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Glorious. Not that I don't want to. I just don't want to anymore.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Sass, funny metaphors, rambling thoughts. Writing unneccesary thoughts about hands and hair, leading to smuts. Thinking up long and wild plots.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Writing short things. There is an inner wolf in me, demanding that I write more and more and more and more-

18. Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

Kann man machen, find ich funny.

19. First fandom you wrote in?

Twilight.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

Start from Scratch, lul. Possibly also to spice things up "Pure Chaos on his Trails"

I remember writing that together with Namelessly in one afternoon because we had time and gawd, it was a blast lul. Jesus, that's been the good times omfg. I miss em haha. But, yeah, unfortunately that time's over but hell yeah, do I cherish my writing days. Maybe I actually find my muse and desire to write and post again haha.

Thank you for the tag! Everyone who wants to, please do feel tagged and go wild!

[fitzrove]

maybe you've already answered this before, but if you were directing a schonbrunn concert and you absolutely had to cast 2 elisabeths and this was non-negotiable, how would you handle the change? personally, i feel like it would make more sense to put it in the *reprise* of ich gehör nur mir, since that already involves a big dramatic reveal of elisabeth

Omg, what an interesting question! :D Thank you for asking.

I agree, I would absolutely put it in the portrait reveal/IGNM reprise, and I was in fact somewhat expecting that the change would happen then in Schönbrunn too. (I get why it didn't - everyone wants to hear Maya do as much IGNM as possible - but still.)

There's an added irony/thematic element to the audience seeing familiar iconography - the famous Winterhalter portrait of Sisi + the diamond dress and hair - AND a familiar actress :) From a production perspective, it would still be a pretty equal split (Elisabeth barely sings in Act 1 after IGNM), and it would just... make more sense to me. XD

Also, since you asked (you didn't, but I'm using the opportunity)... I've been thinking a little about how I would direct an Elisabeth production in general, so scattered thoughts on that under the cut.

My friend IRL asked me this question and immediately followed up with "you'd just make Tod **** everyone right? lmao". And like... XD While it's no secret that I like the more intense Tod performances, I actually don't think that fanservice would be my top priority at all. In fact, I'd definitely lean all the way in on the rotting/sinking/decaying of the empire from its former glory + the fact that the entire musical is Lucheni's creepy puppet show/unhinged defense speech to justify his actions. So like... okay, this is going a bit into costuming, but I'd definitely have something along the vines of the Vienna original/1st revival on every character except Lucheni. For most characters it could be fine dark/black lace, sewn into the costumes in a way that makes it (in all ots opulence) look like spreading rot, but for Tod it should be very subtle, colour-matched and more integrated into the costume, blink-and-you'll-miss-it.

As for the actual show... Definitely keep the master of ceremonies/puppetmaster imagery for Lucheni in some form in Prologue. He should be really charismatic and engage the audience a lot - it's his horse and pony show and it's on him to make the audience believe the story. This could mean that he introduces Tod in a more outright way - with a visible hand gesture or something, holding his arm up almost desperately until Tod finally appears in the place he was implying he would. And Lucheni is fascinated by, obsessively drawn to, working in collaboration with AND terrified of his creation - you must remember that the real Lucheni, like the one in the show, did take his own life. Tod should gain more "autonomy" as the show goes on - he's a bit stiff and puppetlike in the prologue (w line delivery to match), but starts to become more believable as a character as the show goes on. Lucheni is believing his own story.

As for Tod... I'm not going to tackle an explicitly fem-presenting fem Tod because heterosexual Schatten is so unappealing as a thought and they would never make Rudolf a girl. XD It's not a sacrifice I'm willing to make to have lesbian WITW etc. But he (?) could definitely be portrayed by an actor of any gender - I'd just style him in an androgynous way. Depending on how strong the actor's own gender presentation is, I'd adjust the styling and makeup accordingly - for more fem-presenting actors the look could be 25% pretty and 75% handsome, while for masc-presenting ones it could be the other way around, and for someone sitting in the middle of the spectrum it could be 50-50. On the acting front I'd avoid leaning into aggression - given her history, it makes more sense for Elisabeth's dream man (man as a very loose term lmao) to be quite non-threatening. Tod's "wrongness" and aggression is not human or physical - it comes from the fact that he's fulfilling his role (of taking lives coldly) and that he doesn't feel things in quite the same way that a human would.

Given Lucheni's story, there should still be aspects of romance and especially fascination in Tod and Elisabeth's relationship. But: no KKOG (nice song, completely ruins the story though) - instead insert the very first original 1992 version of Schwarzer Prinz. Tod is a force of nature.

For FJ: just copypaste Arnaud Masclet's performance from the Bruxellons production and go ajdjksjd. He's visibly torn between doing what his mother taught him the country needs (until he completely internalised it) and what he wants himself (freedom!! Every character in the show wants some amount of freedom - for FJ it's the freedom to love an unconventional woman). The show should sell us on their relationship, the tragedy of it not fitting the rigid environment they're forced to be a part of, and it breaking apart. ALSO, we should use the Essen thing where he briefly sees Tod during Der Letzte Tanz. Whether it is as a reflection of his own concerns or as Elisabeth's anxiety brushing off on him, we don't know. But after/at the end of the song he should really comfort her - the audience needs to see that the thing stopping him from being open and sweet to her is the external environment. It makes the betrayal the next morning even more bitter.

For Sophie - we can just copypaste Else Ludwig's performance from the 2005 dvd, it's flawless. She really believes she's doing everything for the best of the country and the people around her, and she's quite kind in scenes like Kind oder Nicht. She's doing unkind things but they're wrapped up in a box of kindness and she herself firmly believes that they're necessary evils.

Jumping to Rudolf - I think most productions haven't really screwed up the portrayal itself! Lukas Perman's performance in Schönbrunn 2022 is really moving in how desperate he is and how he suffers, just put the "skandaaal" high note back in and you're good to go XD But Rudolf and Tod... that needs major reworking. It doesn't need to be a rehash of the original Schatten blocking, just something that shows the depths of messed-up longing and just how much Tod is willing to indulge Rudolf in it. A bit of violence wouldn't be out of place, but it should be intimate and interspersed with moments of extraordinary gentleness - Tod holding him just a little too hard. It should really come across that this is Rudolf's most important all-consuming relationship right now - maybe throw in a little obsessiveness into how he seeks comfort from Tod. We could maybe keep the "Rudolf at Tod's feet" moment from Schönbrunn prologue, just have Tod visibly react to it in a subtle way - puzzled, like "oh, this happened - still have no idea how but it did. Humans are weird".

I'm a big fan of my "Rudolf is Lucheni's self-insert" theory, so maybe it should be made visible to the audience that he throws Rudolf onstage in Schatten (like in some productions). And definitely keep Serkan Kaya's take on "che bambino stupido" - he's actually empathetic to little Rudolf because he too was a child who was always alone.

Fanservice things / random mentions

- Put Tod in the brothel scene. At least in the derniere lol

- Lucheni watching Schatten from the shadows until Tod glares at him

- LUCHENI KISSED AT DERNIERE? 👀

- If they want to put in pyros they should be during Der Schleier Fällt. It's a bit on the nose but it would look epic with the ending choir thing

Banned elements

These elements are banned from my hypothetical production:

- Tod being more feminine in Schatten and more masculine in Elisabeth scenes. He can be genderfluid, I'd love that (more femininity in IGNM reprise and perhaps Sei nicht verzweifelt, to contrast w FJ) but why in the world this way around ??? For Mayerling, I'm fine with Mary Vetsera symbolism, but there should be a reveal soon before the kiss and a flash of recognition in Rudolf's eyes. If we keep Tod stationary like in Schönbrunn, there should be a veil that he (or Rudolf) takes off. And the veil coming off should only make Rudolf more enthusiastic/desperate for the kiss lol.

- Split Elisabeth is banned. It's just sexist to do it for her and not FJ...

- Leather/pleather outfits

- Carry kiss ending - Elisabeth and Rudolf should both get dumped on the floor. There isnt a way to convey the energy of "cat carrying dead prey around" with two humans and that is the only scenario in which I would accept Tod carrying them around post death.

- Die Verschwörung / Conspiracy. It's a good song but also kind of a nationalist conspiracy theory irl lol.

If anyone read this far, thanks for hanging along for my rambles XD VBW should hire me lmao

[angelmichelangelo]

brother i will devour any content of that human au

AH OKAY I HAVE MORE !!

so the purple dragons are like. preeettyyy prominent in this au. they’re just bad influence gang members. raph + casey + eventually mikey all get caught up in their, uh, escapades and it doesn’t really end well. poor mike ends up the worst out of it (sorry michael this is the curse of being the writer’s favourite)

but raph meets mona through them! and they become each others reason to be better people so. that’s cute :3

i also added yuichi to the list of side characters because who am i if not a leosagi enjoyer <33 and they’re happy… for now >:)

WOODY IS ALSO PRESENT!! we gots to have my main boy woody. he also is a good enough reason for mikey to get away from the dragons but.. but poor mike is a vulnerable kid. he’s had a tough childhood. maybe woody is sadly not enough to have him change his life around :(

donnie is just vibing. i haven’t really through it all the way through as to what his whole arc is gonna be in this fic. i know i wanna fix the whole april/casey/donnie love triangle in some way.. so yeah. maybe donnie gets the spicy arc lmao

i also love the idea of single foster father splinter. not sure where he’d actually fit into the story but he’s there. in my mind. with the rest of this fic LMAO anywho. here’s a flash forward snippet that i did the other day to kill my writers block :3

tw: mentions of drug abuse + vomit (i said this one was gonna be sadder lol)

Three am. That’s the time that his phone blinds him with when he grabs it off the end table, stopping it from skirting off the edge where it dances across the wood top as it buzzes fiercely at him.

Leo pulls himself away from Yuichi’s arm that’s lovingly and heavily slung over his waist and hits accept on the call.

“Mike,” he says, voice raspy and tired and coming out of him all slow like it often did when he was awoken so abruptly. “What’s up.”

Silence, only for a small fraction of a second, then shuffling and movement. A sniff, like he’d been crying and that gets Leo more awake in mere seconds.

“Leo,” he says, voice so small and far away sounding, like they were just kids again, scared and alone and, fuck. Leo’s heart is ramming hard against his chest. “Leo. I, uh. I need you to come get me. Please?”

Leonardo has now managed to entirely untangle himself from the loose limbs of his sleeping boyfriend beside him, slipping out of the bed to stretch the knot of muscles out of his calves and rub a knuckle into his eyes to smear away the sleep that lingered there.

“Yeah,” he says without a second thought. His alarm is set to go off in just a few hours. He has a full shift waiting for him but Mikey needs him. “Sure. Where are you?”

More shuffling. More movement. Leo wants to blink and have his little brother appear here in front of him. “I’m. Uh. I’m just leaving now. Can you meet me on 41st?”

It’s not far, and Leo can go faster knowing the streets’ll be mostly empty at this time of night. “Of course,” he tells him firmly. “Just stay there, okay? I’ll come get you.”

He hears the sound of a broken off sob and he’s cutting the call dead, spinning in a half circle to blindly search for his forgotten sweatpants on the floor when there’s the sound of Yuichi slowly waking from his side of the bed.

“Hmmm,” he says as he’s pulled from his sleep, stretching his arms out in front of him like a cat. “What’s wrong?”

Leo’s found his sweatpants, dancing about in them, one leg hopping about the room before he’s able to yank them up and pocket his phone away safely. “Mike,” he says plainly. Even in the dim room, he can make out the sad expression the other boy makes. “I’m gonna go get him. He’s– he’s in a bad way, I think, Ich.”

Yuichi makes no such fuss. He sits up, pushing back the shaggy locks of his blonde hair from his face – letting it stiffly stand up on end, he makes himself comfortable before looking at Leo with a loving gaze.

“Need me to come with?” He asks gently.

Leo shakes his head. “No. Though, I wouldn’t mind if you set the couch up for him for when we get back?” He asks.

Yuichi smiles, then gestures for Leo to come to him with little grabby hands. Leo gladly follows, pillowing his face between his warm, gentle hands.

“Love you,” he simply says, pulling him closer to press a soft kiss to his nose. Leo sighs, melting into the touch with ease.

“I know. Love you too.” He pulls away with a pout. “I won’t be long.”

And so he goes.

Leo’s old Sedan might be a heap of junk but it gets him to Mikey’s destination in good time. He pulls up, clipping the curb and bouncing the entire car with a jerk, to find his little brother perched sadly on a bench, his face wet and sunken, curls plastered damp across his face.

“Oh, Mike,” he says softly to himself as he peels himself out of the car to approach him. “What’s happened.”

Mikey almost doesn’t even notice that he’s arrived just yet, not until he’s up close in his bubble does his blank stared reserve seem to burst and his whole face crumples, reaching up for his brother like he’s five years old again.

“Hey,” Leo says with a breath, wrapping him up into his arms. He smells like booze and sweat and something else that has his gut turning in circles. He only pulls away to inspect him up close, holding his face between his palms like Yuichi had done for him, his heart sinks when he notes his brother’s blown out pupils and how pale he really was.

“M’sorry,” Mikey slurs, a mixture of intoxication and tears, bottom lip wobbling about on his face. “M’so sorry, Leo. Fo’everything.”

Leo pulls him in again, running his fingers through his matted, unkempt hair. “It’s alright. I got you now.”

Mikey’s breath shudders. He’s so small still, so lilith and… god so little. Leo is able to practically pick him up whilst he’s sandwiched up in his arms like this and guide him back to the car where it’s warmer.

They get in the car where Leo blasts the heaters on full and turns the radio down to mute.

He watches as his brother sluggishly slides his seatbelt over his chest, then wipes his nose with the back of his wrist, wetting his sleeve.

“I’ve been worried sick about you, Mike,” Leo says to him, unable to hold back the words any longer. “Weeks without any contact. I… I was thinking the worst.”

Mikey, unable to hold eye contact for longer than a brief, fleeting second, sighs, dropping his head down with shame as more tears spring hotly behind his eyes.

“I’m an idiot. I ruined my life, ruined yours and Don’s and Raph’s–” He hiccups, whole body shaking violently as a brutal sob crawls out of him. Leo’s instinct is to fly a hand out and land it on his arm to try and quell him. But he doesn’t.

He can’t. He just watches.

More silence. Aside from the sniffling and the grizzling, Leo takes a sobering, steady breath.

“What…” he loses his confidence. He clears his throat and tries again. “What did you take? Tonight?”

Mikey pinches his whole face together, like he was simply trying to just… pop himself out of existence into thin air. He scrubs a hand down his face and relaxes, eyes still closed, he tells his brother,

“I dunno. Think. Think it was somethin’ a lot stronger than I’ve taken before. S’okay. I didn’t. I didn’t shoot up. Just pills, this time.”

This was how it would go. This was how it would go for Leo’s littlest brother – his little brother that found a crutch with pills and substances rather than his own family. His little brother that had found a more solid foundation in pushing poison through his veins than his own flesh and blood.

Leo’s chest gives a little unsteady wobble. “Okay.” He says slowly. “Do…do you need a hospital?”

Mikey is quick to shake his head, his curls loose, go skirting about his forehead before he’s frantically pushing them away with the palm of his hand.

“God no,” he says in one breath. Eyes still shut, he tips his head back against the headrest and sighs. “Can. Can we just go? I don’t care where you take me.” His eyes slide back open, hazy and lost. “I’ve, uh. I’ve been staying at that hotel, the one with the flamingo on the wall. You know it?”

Leo shakes his head, swallowing thickly. “No,” he tells him. “I’ll take you home.”

Mikey blanches. Someone outside the bar gets loud and rowdy and starts singing a song with all the wrong lyrics.

“Home?” Mikey says, voice small. “What home?”

Leo swears he feels his heart dive to the long, endless bottom of his gut. “My– I’ll take you back to my place.” He tells his brother. “It’s your home, too.”

Leo has to watch the way tears well up, big and wobbly in his brother’s soft, brown eyes. Listens to the way his voice trembles when he asks.

“Will Yuichi be mad?”

Leo scoffs and then does he finally start the car, clunkily putting it into drive. “Course not. Your family, Mike. I’ve been waiting for you, remember?”

The drive is slow and long and bordering on torturous on the account of Leonardo having to sit beside his brother that continues to muffle his sobs into the palm of his hand. Eventually when they pull up to his apartment building, does it seem like the crying has subsided for now.

“Oh, shit,” Mikey says with a breath grazing past his teeth, climbing loosely out of his side of the car. He wobbles, catching himself on the door, and then laughs somewhat wetly. “Yeah. That’s— that’s hitting, now.”

Leo’s face tightens as he goes around the car, shouldering some of his brothers shaky weight, walking him up the steps like a baby deer, they finally make it inside.

Not before Mike pukes all over the welcome mat.

“Aw,” he says weakly, his entire body sagging against Leo’s now as his bottom lip trembles slightly. “I’m sorry.”

Yuichi, who seems to appear within the blink of an eye with bundles of blankets heaped up in his arms, shares a softened expression between both brothers.

“It’s alright,” he assures him, voice gentle, gesturing for him to follow him inside with a nod of his head. “Here. Come in. I’ll clean that up, you just go sit.”

Leo steers his brother around the puddle of vomit and towards the couch that is currently resembling more of a nest than it did a piece of their furniture.

Leo peels off his hoodie and unlaces his sneakers for him. Mikey hiccups, and Leo scoots away, mindful that he might just be sick on him, but untenses when he notes it’s just another little sob evading him.

Yuichi gets to work mopping the entryway and Leo tucks his brother up in his makeshift bed, flattening his unruly curls back with the palm of his hand.

“Sorry,” Mikey whispers again, eyes drooping shut. He whimpers another sad, pathetic sound, and then, finally, is he asleep

There’s the sound of running water, the squeak of the faucet turning off, and Yuichi’s bare feet padding across the small living room to meet Leo, bumping a comforting shoulder with his.

“I’ll probably stay up, keep an eye on him in here,” Leo says with one heaving breath. He runs a hand down his face, fully feeling the effects of being awake at such an hour catch up on him hotly.

Yuichi brushes his knuckles against Leo’s; a gesture so intimate and warm, it almost makes him fall asleep on the spot.

“You sure you don’t want me to?” He asks, mindful to keep his voice hushed. When Leo turns to face him, his brows are furrowed, a look of concern etched deeply across his face as they watch Leo’s sleeping brother sprawled out on the couch.

Leo hums. Knocking his knuckles with his with a small tap. “No, it’s alright,” he assures him, offering him a warm, easy smile. “You get some rest. I’ll call work in the morning. Tell them there’s been… a family emergency.” His voice goes tight as he looks again towards Mikey.

He’ll also have to call Raph in the morning also. And he could try Donnie, but he’s not so sure he’d really be up for caring all that much right now.

“Okay,” Yuichi says after a while, leaning over to press a chaste kiss across his cheek, lips lingering for just a second before he’s pulling away to stifle a yawn.

“Get some rest, Ich,” Leo says softly, nodding towards the direction of their bedroom. His boyfriend smiles warmly, and then does he go.

“Wake me if you need me,” he says before he disappears behind the door. Leo agrees and finally allows himself to slump his weight into the small, plush armchair that resides beside his brother.

He watches the steady rise and fall of his chest, coming and going, knowing that with each pump of his heart, he was shooting poison and pain through the very veins that kept him going.

Anxiety causes his gut to form like a hard knot. So he swallows the thought down, bitterly, and keeps watching the up and down motion of his brother’s chest.

Up. And down. And up. And down.