#but specifically marketed towards super villains

[hestzhyen]

Chapter 55 Stress Posting

Greetings, dear void. It is time... FOR A HAKURI PoV CHAPTER! And more JP-EN yapping from me than usual because honestly, this chapter was cool, but it was mostly set-up for whatever's going to happen next week. There's not much to muse on without trending towards pure speculation rather fast. Plus I finally got access to the JP version so I've been despairing at how far I have to go to actually learn the damn language...

But hey! Another color page next week! Hokazono-sensei's really suffering from success isn't he? Kagurabachi's getting the top-tier marketing push now that it managed to get over 1M copies in circulation with only 4 volumes out. Maybe we'll start to see the same level of CPs as Akane Banashi soon!

Samura and the Makizumi

Who the hell are you?

Does whatever he's got going on explain the female bearer's super young appearance...? The EN TL leaves it vague here, but JP is pretty specific that his body is that of a child but he isn't one in truth.

Why the adult in a child's body thing at all though? Why mimic Samura like that too? And why are we getting that packaged with a lazy-yet-competent commander archetype? Something about the combination of traits for this character just rubs me the wrong way. The cognitive dissonance worked -I'm interested in him and his situation- but it's unpleasant to deal with. This introduction felt unexpected in a bad way. I bet I'll be a minority on that though so I'll keep my rubbish opinions about him to myself. Maybe.

I have a theory on why Mini Samura is copying our favourite blind fighter guy at least. The official name for the squad in Japanese is 神奈備御庭番-座村親衛隊 [Kamunabi oniwa-ban - Samura shineitai]. The professional EN TL will parse all that much better than I can, but I just want to point out something fun. The last word (親衛隊) means "elite guards"/"bodyguards". Most of the time. It can also mean "groupies" or "ardent fans". So take that and stuff it in your back pocket in case the squad doesn't job here.

Anyway, this chapter is why we met the Makizumi [巻墨] a few weeks ago in chapter 50. Yes, it's the same kanji as "Masumi" that they were introduced as. I'm not sure why since my Japanese is, uh, not great. But it's not an EN translation error. The original JP indicates that Uruha says ますみ [masumi] in Ch. 50 via the Ruby next to the kanji. This time, however, the Ruby over their name in the spread says まきずみ [makizumi]. At least it's not truly a new name I suppose? The meaning -Rolled Ink- stays the same regardless.

At any rate, these guys are definitely all going to live and fight another day. Because named teams full of elite personnel formed for a specific purpose have great survival and success rates in this series. Yup. (Maybe being ninja will make the difference? Somehow???)

Who trained these guys, I wonder... Samura's hella scary for an "assistant master".

Samura getting annoyed that his disciple joined the fight...! It's sweet of him to care and still treat Uruha like an apprentice in some ways. They're both war veterans who have seen and experienced too much, but some dynamics don't change with the passing of time.

I appreciate that the villains and their tactics are well-thought out. Adjusting to fight a blind man with super senses isn't done as well as one would like in many series, sadly. They often get to style all over their enemies because they're underestimated, then are treated like a sighted person with a gimmick thereafter. But the Hishaku ain't about that and have actively planned against him by scrambling his smell and hearing while also sending Mr. Hatshaku and his undetectable trees. Very smart on Hokazono-sensei's part!

This is just so awesome! The spreads of Chihiro and Hiyuki meeting and parting again in ch. 29 are two of my absolute favourites in the series so far, so to see it again (kinda) makes me happy.

Samura cut part of Uruha's topknot here. He played it that close, huh. It's pretty cool that Samura has a wild fighting style that his allies have to adjust around. Normally blind fighters are super precise but Samura's just slicing and dicing anything that's living and ready to kill! But if you're that good then I guess it's worth training a few people to be able to compliment your moveset so they can safely support you.

Samura and Uruha aren't in perfect sync, and Uruha's still willing to take risks and throw himself into danger. But he's more than capable of being an asset in this fight without guaranteeing he'll become a burden later (unlike a certain someone...).

Uh Oh

He's so cute with his big ol' eyes and pensive expression.

Did Chihiro whip out his phone while keeping Hiruhiko pinned to the seat with his foot!? Anyway, this is only the second time in the series where he hasn't appeared in even a single panel. So we get to spend a whole chapter getting exposition via Hakuri!

I'm gonna take some time to yap about him because it's been nearly three weeks since he showed up a lot and I missed him terribly.

Stop, stop, STOP!!

Note: Hakuri's line in the panel before (...俺だけじゃないか" ["I'm the only one."]) doesn't directly match up to Kyora's final line from Ch. 43 (私だけだ... 私だけが全うできなかった ["I'm the only one... who failed to fulfill my duty."]), so it's not a direct reference even if the TL makes it seem like one. Hakuri's sentiment is different- his is "I can't be the only one" vs. Kyora's "I'm actually the only one". There are just a lot of characters who are convicted in their beliefs in this manga!

So much for getting to recover in 30 minutes, I guess.

Really cool that we see the mask "assembling"! It's only been shown intact when he activates the storehouse sorcery up to this point. So it's a neat visual representation of his resolve coming together during the time crunch as well. Hakuri is nothing if not dedicated to hurting and throwing himself into danger for the sake of others. Even after Healer Lady set up a flag for him to become useless or worse if he does so here. Oh, Hakuri...

He's helping Chihiro because he wants to make the world a safer place. Plus his whole thing after Ice Lady is that he'll "never let a life slip through [his] hands again". It's exceptionally noble and heroic of him! But is it worth potentially derailing the plans via brain damage or permanent ability loss?

Hakuri's not gonna die, obviously. I'm also 50/50 on him losing access to his sorcery at all, much less permanently. But something's going to get fucked up here and it'll probably be his fault. Again. He's gotta learn how to value himself the hard way, apparently. All we can do is wait to see what price will be paid for Hakuri's reckless disregard for his own well-being. (I'm not sure how I feel about this, but what if Hakuri gets Healer Lady killed? He could go 2/2 on women who were kind to him dying because of his actions right in front of him. Man that would suck.)

This is looking to be like one of the developments I was hoping for at the end of the Rakuzaichi arc. Hakuri does NOT chill when it comes to saving lives. Being borderline suicidal about this is his way of atoning for his and his family's sins, in my mind. But is it better to risk your life every time, or let people get hurt -possibly die- to keep doing greater good in the long-run? It's a common question raised in super hero comics, and I hope we get to see it explored with Hakuri (and Uruha) here. I'm really interested in what Hokazono-sensei has to say about it and the dissonance it would cause in Hakuri's character.

Arc Soothsaying

This is just a supposition, and I've been wrong so many times that I'm kind of hesitant to put this out there, but here goes. I know I can be as cringey as I like in your ambivalent embrace, kind void.

I think... I think... Hakuri's growth this arc will be specifically learning to value himself enough that he's able to act against his ideals.

Recall how Hakuri was the one to point out that Uruha knew the value of his life in Chapter 48 when he would have charged right in. And now he's with Samura, the guy who fights and kills to preserve himself despite it going against his Buddhist beliefs. Hakuri's constantly pushing himself to the limit, refusing to let other people get hurt for his sake. He won't let himself be the only one risking his life even if there's no strategic value for him to act- even if it would most helpful for everyone if he ran to safety. So I think he's going to have to put saving his own life above anything else later this arc and it's going to be terrible for him.

It would compliment the theme of negative self-image that's been set up with Chihiro too. They're both heroic, though it usually comes across in completely opposite ways (Chihiro's in his villain era right now, for one). And both of them have a lot of work to do when it comes to learning how to love themselves. Hakuri to understand his own "value", Chihiro to understand he's not a monster.

Learning more about the Bearers, Kunishige, and what happened in the Seitei war will almost certainly help Chihiro to realize he really isn't so different from the heroes he idolizes. As for Hakuri, it's hard to say right now. Uruha's going to be important to his growth I'm fairly certain. But we haven't even met all the Bearers yet so I don't want to start thinking in absolutes about who will help who and in what way.

We also have to wait and see what becomes of Hiruhiko after this encounter. He's obviously meant to be a counter to both Hakuri and Chihiro; how that manifests, exactly, is something I'm looking forward to seeing. It'll give more insight on how we can expect them to develop. Chihiro and Hiruhiko are pretty blatant right now with their outlook on what it means to kill and such, and there's set up for Hiruhiko to clash with Hakuri over what it means to be an equal and a friend.

For Chihiro and Hakuri... too early to say. Need to see what happens at Senkutsuji. My instincts are saying a rift of some kind will form between them over killing, equality, and/or their self-sacrificing tendencies but I'm always wrong, so. Just waiting and watching on that for now.

Anyway. Thanks as always, void. Here's hoping our boys don't have to suffer too much in the coming weeks/months. Except Hiruhiko. He can suffer enough for all of them.

[sho-minamimoto]

6 20 23 Sho

1 7 8 23 Shiba!

Sho

6. What's something you have in common with this character?

Hmm.... hard to say since Sho is just. completely batshit. I guess the easiest and most obvious answer would be that we're both artists and like to find beauty in aesthetically strange things. But I dont think i have a single thing in common with him personality wise LOL

20. Which other character is the ideal best friend for this character, the amount of screentime they share doesn't matter?

I think susukichi and sho have extremely similar temperaments + quirks and if they weren't on opposite sides of The Conflict they'd get along great. I said once before that Susukichi would be the Sho Minamimoto of NEO if sho literally wasn't also already in the game. Their vibes are super similar and they both want to have a fun time.

23. Favorite picture of this character?

This one marketing image from when the anime was airing is the funniest thing in the world to me. like. why the fuck is sho even here. he is in no way buddies with anyone in the hachiko gang (during this specific timeframe anyways) there is literally NO logical reason for him to be posed alongside this specific group of characters here. This image from sho's pov is just him + guy hes actively trying to kill + guy he's stalking only bc he's joined at the hip with the guy he's trying to kill + guy he met twice and beat the shit out of one of those times + 2 people he's never met or interacted with before ever. On a marketing level its clear they just wanted to include him with the main characters simply bc hes a super popular character among fans but it's makes for the most unintentionally hilarious image ever.

Shiba

1. Why do you like or dislike this character?

First. he's extremely funny and dresses like a harlot. Second THE LAYERSSSS Shiba's primary motivation is like a puzzle that the narrative gives you all the pieces to and then invites you to solve. Not in that the game doesn't tell you what it is At All, it says as much that he's on a powertrip towards ascension, but it's difficult to wrap your head around Why until you deliberately examine and unravel each of his relationships with the other shinjuku reapers: how they affected him, what their side of the story is, why they're emotionally estranged but still sticking together, etc. I enjoy that you have to take the time to put it together yourself, but also the full picture you get once that puzzle is complete is one that i enjoy immensely. The fact that the core of shiba's plight is rooted in his relationships (or lack thereof) is very true to the spirit of twewy and I greatly appreciate that they applied all this to the game's main villain AND gave him a chance for redemption on top of it. His final scene is one of my favourites in the game and really sticks with me.

7. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you like?

The memes. Shiba's so easy to meme on its great. I have a folder of shiba memes on my desktop whenever i see a new shitpost or edit i Have to save it. im glad he gets clowned on so hard. Shi Basuks Cok lives in my head rent free. I wish shiba's va did small comms like I've seen other voice actors do sometimes bc i would pay him money to hear him voice act that post as Shiba for real. But i can dream

8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

I know i like Just finished talking abt how much i love the shiba memes but i also dislike how Majority of what i see of shiba is Just the memes and jokes. I wouldn't go as far as say i despise them at all (or i wouldn't have a folder of shiba memes) but I think its disappointing that i hardly see anyone actually take him seriously as a character or give him any consideration for analysis. Or not as much as I'd like to see, anyways (when i do see it it fucks hard though.) I also get the impression sometimes that some people take delight in the memes + clowning on shiba specifically bc they think he's just Not well written or interesting which bums me out a little.

23. Favorite picture of this character?

this clown shiba edit i made a yearish ago. i hold it close to my heart.

[howtohero]

#012 Theme Music

No superheroic image is complete without some heart-thumping, moment-making, chart-topping, theme music. A tune so catchy, so infectious that even your enemies find themselves absent mindedly humming it while doing the evil dishes. A song so melodious that each and every citizen in your fine town can’t get it out of their heads no matter how hard they try. Like, there are people who catch themselves singing it so often that it’s basically their theme song.

There are many different kinds of theme songs, just as there are many different kinds of heroes. Some heroes like to go for a full-on forty-instrument orchestral piece. No catchy lyrics, no backup singers, no beautiful harmonies. Just instruments. This kind of theme music is super classy and can be very useful in eliciting emotional responses from people. The downside is that without poppin’ lyrics it might be hard for it to stick out in the public consciousness. Also you can’t just grab the best line from the song and use that as your catchphrase. ADDITIONALLY do you think people are gonna sing along to a theme song with no lyrics? Nanananana son, you’re totally boxing yourself out of the karaoke party market. Nobody is performing a lyricless song at a karaoke party, like are you even using your head.

Other heroes like to write (or have someone else write, I’m available!) their own catchy theme songs. Words and all. Backup singers optional. Sometimes, if a hero is really fly (that’s a pun) it’ll be a rap song. There are a couple of problems to this approach (sorry, one second, I don’t know if it was clear before, it was a pun because some superheroes can fly). First of all, for whatever reason most superheroes are not skilled songwriters so really I recommend outsourcing that (to me). Like there have been studies, there are graphs, having superpowers has an inverse relationship with ability to write a kickin’ theme song. (K last time I’m gonna talk about the pun from before, I just want you all to know that that pun was all me. My editor left me a note saying “this is a terrible pun. Rated -5 on a scale of -10 to 10.” Which is just, a dumb scale? Who measures things like that. Also, like -flyve would’ve been funnier.) Secondly, it’s important to note that for the most part, your theme song will be played either in the background of news reports about you, or maybe at the odd public event you show up to (like a ribbon cutting ceremony or one of those events where they shear a sheep that’s wandered out of the forest with like seven years worth of wool growth,) if you’re into that kind of thing. Because of this only brief snippets of the song will ever really be played so a lot of the work you put into crafting clever or upbeat lyrics is just a huge waste of time (I don’t mind wasting that time though. I still get paid even if no one ever hears the song). You should also make sure that each verse packs a lot of punch and verve and is just bursting with sick rhymes about how superheroic you are. Additionally, if a hero writes their own song they’ll often accidentally (or, if they’re just dumb which is a possibility I am not ready to discount) insert details about their origin story or possibly (heaven forbid) nods to their secret identity. Which is, of course, and I shouldn’t really still need to be saying this at this point, bad.

Once you’ve decided on the style of theme music you want you’re going to need to get someone to actually record it. Or, if you don’t want a recording (I dunno maybe you’re Amish,) you’ll need to get a choir or something to follow you around. And then you’re going to need to get jetpacks for your choir so they can follow you around and sing your praises from a safe distance while you’re throwing down with eldritch abominations or animated terracotta soldiers. These things, of course, cost money and then you get into things like royalties and insurance claims when one of your jetpack choir members inevitably flies into a building or a cloaked alien warship, it’s all just a huge hassle. To raise money for these kinds of highly essential superhero things might I suggest having a carwash or perhaps a bake sale or, wait, what? There’s a better way? A way where you don’t have to pay anybody anything? Well of course there is. There always is.

All you have to do to get someone to write, compose and record a theme song for you for free is to save a singer/songwriter/producer’s life! Then they’ll be indebted to you, or be so grateful that you rescued them from certain death by exploding cake (there are a lot of exploding baked good themed villains out there, like honestly, you’d be surprised,) that they’ll offer to do it on their own volition. Being a superhero is awesome! Doing this for an entire orchestra might be a bit trickier. That’s probably why only the highest profilest superheroes have super fancy orchestra theme music, it’s not often super villains attack busloads of musicians. Come to think of, this is probably why. 

Once you’ve got your theme music all recorded and whatnot, you need to get it out there. The first thing you’ll want to do is send it to all the major news outlets so they can play it over reports about you. If you’re the kind of hero that wears super-advanced-high-tech-chock-full-of-cool-stuff-like-bunker-busting-missiles-and-cupholders armor, then maybe see about hooking up a dope surround sound speaker system to it that can actually play your theme music while you’re doing superheroic stuff like flying with both your fists facing forward or changing in telephone booths. You’re also going to want to send your theme song to all the major radio stations (and you know what all the minor ones too), then get that sick track to every dance club and juke-box-owning establishment that you can think of. 

Remember, a theme song is not something to be taken lightly. A powerful theme song can be a powerful weapon. The type of song you use says a lot about the type of hero you are (and about the quality of singer/songwriters you save). A good theme song is catchy, upbeat, timeless. It should give the listener some information about who you are and what you’re about without giving too much away, (for example, if you are an animal-based hero, maybe throw in a line about being able to do whatever that animal can). Make sure your theme song leaves the public with the knowledge of who to call when there’s trouble. Maybe even throw in your hero-hotline phone number, like a commercial jingle! But most importantly your theme song needs to be able to provide hope in the darkest of times, inspiration during periods of helplessness and comfort to a public who is tired of living in fear of maniacal mechanical engineers with giant spider mecha! (Um actually, it’s Spider-Maniacal Mechanical Engineer and Spider-Mecha.)

[thepenultimateword]

Regarding your latest post about the VillainxSupervillain story snippet thing... uh... okay so... I am now super invested... and want to make fanart for this.... and man this needs to be a book cuz I have never been the type for love stories especially from villains but this one caught my attention and I am in love with it.... but I just wanted to say that your writing is super amazing, and are there any good villainxvillain story reccomendations or anything??? cuz I seriously need to see more of this type of thing. ANYWHO IT WAS AWESOME AND I HOPE YOU HAVE A GREAT DAY!!!

Oh my gosh thank you!! I’m so glad you enjoyed! If you ever do fanart of them I would love to see it!! I'll probably do a continuation after I've whittled down some of my asks first.

Also, yeeees join the side of villain x villain shippers mwahaha 😆 Hmmm as for suggestions, I can’t really think of any villain x villain stuff I’ve seen in any actual books or tv shows, I think that’s why I gravitate toward that dynamic so much, because it’s not often used. As for on tumblr, I have a whole lot of other villain x villain fics in my master list if you haven’t read those yet. Also @some-messed-up-writing-for-you does a lot of really fun villain x villain prompts and fics. (I get a lot of inspiration from them)

Hmmm…as I look at the villain x villain tag page now, it looks like smuwfy and I are the ones pretty much running the market 😂😂 I know there are more out there, I'm just blanking. I can recommend a couple favorite specific stories off the top of my head though!

@selene-stories wrote this lovely supervillain x villain snippet.

@yourheartonfire wrote this scientist x villain piece that I adored. It’s kinda civilians x villain, but I count it since the scientist is involved in villainous projects.

If anyone else has any good suggestions, please put them in comments! 😁

[descendantofthesparrow]

old request that has been sitting in my files for.....idek - Harry Hook x Sparrow! Reader - oneshot - My Bonnie Lass

Ok so I have a request Harry’s betrothed to the reader since birth so like there close and she’s the daughter of jack sparrow and he’s like super shy and quiet and he chooses to pretends she doesn’t exist but then he sees some picking on her but people don’t know their like a thing I guess so he gets really angry and they ask him why he’s angry and it slips out

this oneshot has been sitting in my files since before i went exclusively commission writing

@daughter-of-the-stars11 here you go! after...idk how many months but i finally finished ur request! 

=

The isle of the lost, a place filled with criminals and thieves alike, some of the vilest villains had been trapped there as punishment for the crimes.

While the isle was deprived of fresh food, there was no shortage of alcohol. And one night, as Captain James Hook and Captain Jack Sparrow sat in a tavern drinking until dawn, the two had decided that Hook's firstborn son and Jack's firstborn daughter would be betrothed.

Why? No one knows, and Jack or James cannot be bothered to remember why the thought had even come up in the first place.

It would work to their advantage though, at least that’s what they thought, once the barrier surrounding the isle was down and their children would rule the seven seas with their combined power.

Now 16 years later, the two betrothed teens, who neither minded their “secret” engagement, still lived on the isle of the lost under the barrier that prevented them from concurring the seas.

….yes, you heard that right “secret” engagement, only Jack, James, Harry, and (y/n) know about the drunken night that ended in the kids getting hitched.

now if only Harry didn’t pretend (y/n) didn’t exist, the two could rule the docks of the isle. The two had been close all their lives, then suddenly, the son of Hook had decided to completely ignore (y/n).

something the young pirate teen had been burning to try to find out why one of her greatest friends, and her fiancé, had decided to just abandon her.

Now Uma, Harry's best friend, and Captain of the lost revenge, knew why Harry had decided to ignore (y/n).

He liked her….yeah Uma was extremely confused too. The two had known about their engagement since they could think and had been close since they could comprehend each other's existence.

By the time Harry had learned what “feelings” were, specifically the feeling of affection and love….he distanced himself from (y/n).

He always heard the villains go on and on about how love had doomed them, destroyed them, how it would destroy them if they allowed it to grow.

he knew what the butterflies in his chest and stomach meant when he saw (y/n) glance at him, the rapid beat of his heart when she laughed, the stutter of his breath as she smiled up at him.

To protect both of them from destruction, he had to separate himself from her. he knew deep down he couldn’t avoid her forever with their parent's insistence on their engagement, but Harry reasoned with himself that if he pretended, she didn’t exist, soon the feelings for her would disappear.

Yeah, that would be going out the window as one day, as he turned the corner of the main market place and saw a group of vicious Vks surrounding (y/n). he stopped, feeling heat build-up in his body as he saw them poking and prodding at her clothes and skin, one even attempting to take the necklace Harry had given her when they were kids.

He saw red, gripping onto his hook tightly as he stormed up to him, his mind told him (y/n) could easily take care of them herself, that she was one of the best swordswomen on the isle.

His heart screamed to rip them apart for talking to HIS girl like that.

“ello~” he purred, giving an airy chuckle as the group leaped 2 feet into the air and turned to him, fear filling their eyes “wha’ do we have here~ picking on the bonnie lass are yeh~”

(y/n) gave him an odd look, months and months of ignoring her only to call her that? What-her eyes shoot to her feet, confusion bubbling in her mind. “we-we were only putting sparrow in her place Hook; you know how it is-“ the lanky blond male who spoke up yelped as Harry gave a sharp snarl and shoved the sharp end of his hook under his chin.

Harry chuckled darkly at the growing dark color in the male's pants. “I don’ take kindly ta those threatenin’ my lass, I suggest yeh leave her alone from now on~”

“you-your lass?” the redhead muttered, looking at his friends before his neck was grabbed and he was shoved against the wall, knife at his back.

“yes, his” (y/n) seethed, grinning as the redhead yelped as she further dug the knife into his back “but don’t forget I’m not as helpless as you all think, stay away from me or it's your head hanging from the black pearl” the group nodded, running down the market place as soon as the two descendants of legendary pirates released them.

(y/n) glanced at harry for a moment before walking past him, yelping as he wrapped his arm around her waist and hefted her over his shoulder, making his way towards his apartment. “Harrison James Hook you put me down right now!”

“in a moment” he muttered, wincing at the metal rings on (y/n)s fingers bashed against his back as she punched it.

Soon (y/n) gave up her struggle to get out of his grip and simply let herself hang, hands tightly gripping onto his jacket to not fall off.

He carefully lumbered up the steps to his apartment and kicked open the door, he shut it with his foot and set (y/n) on her feet, sighing and leaning against the wall as (y/n) stared at him in heavy confusion.

“what the fuck was that?!” she yelled, smacking his shoulder “you ignore me for months and then call me “your lass”?! the hell?! You better explain yourself hook-Mff!”

Harry dived forward, pressing a soft kiss to the ranting (y/n)s lips, before pulling back and sighing, quickly patting his face to rid of the heat “I-I fuck-I figured shit out and I didn’t want ta ignore yeh any more love, I’m sorry” (y/n) just stared at him with wide eyes and her mouth slightly open “I-say something…please?” (y/n) closed her eyes and sighed, before suddenly reaching out and grabbing onto the lapels of his jacket and pulling him to her height, pressing her lips to his in a quick kiss. She grinned as Harry just turned red and stared at her.

“you’re forgiven….but, you owe me lunch”

“done” Harry muttered, eyes drifting down to her lips. (y/n) caught the action and snorted, patting his cheek and walked around him to the door and swung it open. “where are yeh-“

“I got shit to do Harry” (y/n) laughed, turning and winking at him as she backed out of his apartment “we can hang out later, bye~” she skipped down the steps and ran out of sight, leaving a blushing breathless harry in his apartment.

He groaned, sinking to the floor and covering his face “I could've done that such a long time ago” he groaned, smiling at looking back up at his open door “fuck yeh da’, shell be worth everything”

-end-

permtaglist

@queer-cosette @sephiralorange

@lunanight2012 @musicarose​

@remembered-license​ @random-thoughts-003​

@verboetoperee​ @rintheemolion​

@imtryingthisout​ 

[tonystarktogo]

(this could’ve been) a villain’s origin story

You have to understand, Tony Stark has Opinions™ on supes. Doesn’t matter if you’re talking superheroes or supervillains -- or the rare case that toes the line in between -- because Tony Stark doesn’t give a fuck about alignments. The very idea that people of a certain alignment deserve to be lauded or condemned, independent of their actions, chaves at him like a particularly painful itch. It’s just not right. 

[How dare they?]

And unlike most people, Tony Stark is allowed to have Opinions™ on supes. Is in fact uniquely qualified to make any and all statements, if anyone bothered to take a closer look. Not that qualifications really matter in the battle of public opinion on supes, but that’s another issue. And even Tony Stark can only fix the world one problem at a time.

The point is, when Tony discusses supes and the various icky legalities surrounding their existence, he knows what he’s freaking talking about.

Not that Tony is super in any way. Oh no. Tony is 100 percent of incorrigible human. [He’s a medical miracle, is what he is, but that’s another story altogether.]

Actually, the point is that Tony’s never been particularly good at discussing interesting things theoretically only and leaving it at that. Honestly.

[In another life, Tony would have become the first human superhero -- or perhaps supervillain. His alignment always was a toss-up made by circumstances, luck and stubbornness. He would have used that too bright, too fast, too brilliant mind of his and built himself a power source average humans can’t dream of -- can’t hope to match -- and he would have suceeded. This is not that world.]

Tony’s always been of the opinion that hypocrisy is for the weak. If he preaches that supes are human, as good and or bad as the average person next door, then he has to own up to that. If he believes that alignment doesn’t define a person, is no more or less conclusive than the freaking Sorting Hat from Harry Potter, then he has to see that belief through to the very end.

Supes are human. They are stronger, faster, more devastating, but still so human at their core.

Most humans may look at them as something akin to gods, but personally Tony thinks an average guy on crack with a slight suicidal tendency is a much more fitting comparison. [Because independent of any alignment, supes are crazy. Completely and utterly mad. Seriously, you wouldn’t believe the shit they get up to.]

With that in mind, supes are just as much in need of medical attention, technical back-up, information etc. as police men, first responders and firemen all over the world. Tony, having been raised with a mind for business and the skill and contacts to back it up, recognises a market niche when he sees one.

Granted, most supes seem to have their own minions-slash-employees [depending on their alignment] for that sort of thing, but that’s probably just because no one else appears to offer them any services.

[What self-respecting superhero goes into the ER? What self-respecting supervillain lets himself get treated in a public hospital? What health insurance even accepts supes with their nightmarish tendency to throw themselves off buildings and run straight through walls instead of using a perfectly unlocked door? Exactly.]

The point is, the Supe-Centric Emercency Services Of Any Kind are opened and ready for business on Tony’s twenty-second’ birthday.

In other words, Tony’s literally been in business for one day when he stumbles across a passed-out Winter Soldier on his way home.

Which, fun fact: Tony grew up in Miami and has been ignoring the existence of New York professionally for years, just to ensure that he doesn’t accidentally get confronted by the old man. So. He’s only been in NYC for two months at this point and is still going through great pains to pretend that the city he may or may not reside in doesn’t exist.

On the one side, this makes finding a good restaurant kind of a hit or miss experience. On the other side, it means he gets to avoid Howard Stark. Always a plus.

But what it also means is that Tony is only vaguely familiar with the local super community. As such, he can be forgiven for discovering a badly beaten Winter Soldier and assuming the guy must be an outclassed superhero, which Tony promptly declares his first customer and who’s unconscious body he drags home into his personal science-lair workshop.

In Tony’s defense, how was he supposed to know that the Winter Soldier is one of SHIELD’s ten most wanted supervillains with more hits to his name than Tony’s arm is long?

[Not that it would’ve changed anything. Read Tony’s aforementioned stand on alignments. He simply might have been better prepared for the whole SHIELD team, knocking down his open, unlocked door, is all.]

[JARVIS, meanwhile, is genuinely impressed by the fact that even after the Winter Soldier awakens, threatens Tony, is confused by Tony, is exasperated by Tony and finally decides to accept Tony’s offer for help with a healthy dose of suspicion and scepticism, it still takes Tony two months to realize that his first -- and favorite -- customer is, in fact, a supervillain.

It’s probably a good thing that SCESOAK was never geared towards a specific alignment because the Winter Soldier? Is -- in true Tony Stark fashion -- only the beginning.]

[yarrowleef]

Read Darkness Within all in one sitting last night and then passed out so here are my scattered thoughts i wrote down as i read, (afterthoughts in parenthesis)

Darkness Within Spoilers, obv

UGH GOD THE SECOND HAND EMBARRESMENT FROM SQUIRREL FAKE FLIRTING WITH ASHFUR IT HURTS

Just remembered Sandynose died and got a small boost of happiness (will Hawkwing and Plumwillow ever be allowed to talk again now? I mean probly not b/c they aren’t protags and non-protags don’t rly have friends but I can hope. Sorry, Hawkwhing and Plumwillow’s short-lived friendship in Hawkwings Journey was one of the last times I felt something)

Ghost fleas lol

Mothwing: i’m rude now. (but more importantly, Fuck Tigerheartstar for forcing his son to be around the cat that hurt him so badly, like he HAS to know how upset everyone is regarding Shadowsight and his accidentally helping the imposter, and he’s making him be the sole one to tend to him??? There is NO REASON Puddleshine couldn’t have done it. You think Puddleshine is going to try and murder someone?? )

Oh no don't make this a traveling book, and a ROOTBRISTLE traveling book this is going to be insufferable

BACON AND EGGS

Lightleap Is Good (Hey didn’t Shadowsight have another sister? lets be real we all knew Pouncekit was going to end up as the forgettable 3rd one)

Bristlefrost’s crush continues to feel unnatural to me. It’s like she’s grasping at straws romanticizing the most generic things.....wow....I love how ur just so...bare minimum competent....being polite to the loner we came all this way to ask for help like any somewhat reasonable person would....How admirable...I love the way you just *clenches fist* exhibit some basic traits of loyalty and skill that literally every warrior has (I s2g I’m this close to head canon-ing Bristle as a clueless aromantic who doesn't understand what romance is actually suppose to feel like so she just looks at feelings of low-bar admiration and assumes “oh I guess this is that “romantic attraction” everyone’s always talking about? guess I must be in love???” because both her crushes have felt out of nowhere and like. Idk fake/forced sounding like she’s just telling me that that she’s In Love Now while I continue to not actually feel it at all from her end. I know it’s just that I hate the way Erin’s write female characters in love but this head-canon makes me laugh)

Got scared because I thought they were going to villainize Spotfur for not wanting kits for a minute, but also excited at the concept of maybe exploring a female character that doesn’t want to be a mother, but it turns out she was just pulling a Sparkpelt and actually DID want the kits all along and was only hesitant because she’s sad. Shrug oh well.  (the only female character in warriors that was distinctly upset about pregnancy and motherhood was Lizardstripe and as we all know she was eeeeeevil and abusive and “overly ambitious” because why else would you not come around to being happy about motherhood?? YES I’M STILL SALTY ABOUT YELLOWFANG’S SECRET, BAD BOOK)  Whatever it’s fine so long as Spot doesn’t lose her rebel leader spirit forever and default to “soft mom” personality for the rest of her life, I gotta have hope because I actually like Bristle and Spot’s current relationship. Also I am actually very grateful they never made Bristle resentful at Spot for getting with her crush, as lots of middle grade/YA media has a very bad habit of demonizing female romantic “competition” and its super gross, so I rly do like that Bristlefrost is so protective and caring towards her instead. )

This series is trying to tell me that Rootspring is actually Big but I refuse to accept that. he has dumb scrawny bitch energy and we all know it

Sunrise: “Thunderclan may be better with a new leader” lol go off (i mean........they right tho...It’s unfortunate that the tension in this whole plot is a bit dampened by the fact that i DO in fact want bramble to die v badly. I don’t even have special hatred for him, I’m just bored of him.)

Yes Lionblaze beat the shit out of Ashfur

*HOLY SHIT THAT’S FUCKED!!!! (I wrote this in reference to the ghost summoning scene, this was all I could manage at the time, that scene was WILD and I am VIBING WITH THE HORROR OF IT ALL)

* Brashfur: Oh yeah? Could Ashfur fake THIS? *stands up with slightly better posture* Shadowsight: oh damn you got me there...... (asdfhhfhhgh im sorry that was really funny, how did that prove anything?? ONLY A ~REAL~ WARRIOR COULD STAND UP STRAIGHT WE ALL KNOW ASHFUR IS INCAPABLE OF GOOD POSTURE!)

End of the book: *LAUGHING NERVOUSLY* WHAT THE FUCK??? (I thought he was just gonna kill Squirrelflight right there holy shit can you imagine the RIOTS that would ensue in the wake of all this Squirrel/Bramble discourse I was so scared for a second.  

 But it’s fine, she just....went to super hell instead......Warriors has come so far lmao WHAT IS HAPPENING

Final Notes:

*On Mothwing, I don’t think her behavior struck me as “CHARACTER BUTCHERING” as much as it did for other people? I mean.....Warriors fans will say that literally any time a character does ANYTHING less then perfectly nice I think her actions just seemed that much harsher because we are reading from Shadowsight’s POV, and Shadowsight is taking everything 10x more personally right now (understandably so, but Mothwing isn’t inside his head) she wasn’t trying to hurt him. Also... like... Shadowsight DID get his name too early. It’s not Mothwing’s job to put his feelings above everything else, she’s not even his mentor, Puddleshine on the other hand, as his main mentor, I don’t understand what his deal is ignoring Shadowsight, that’s not how you help an apprentice but I suppose I chalk many of his mistakes up to also not being the most experienced medicine cat (he barely even had his own mentor.) Maybe he’s distant because he feels guilty and actually blames himself for not guiding Shadowsight better?? the two of them haven’t communicated about it yet so idk

 any way I give Mothwing a pass to be a little short tempered right now as a cat who has had her abilities periodically questioned all her life no matter how hard she works or how much experience she has, just because she doesn’t vibe with the spiritual cult side of the clans, I can understand why she’s a bit defensive of being questioned and frustrated watching so much hurt happen Yet Again due to reliance on StarClan visions over common sense, and I for one still stan her for slandering StarClan and refusing to accept Mistystar’s bullshit banishing like everyone else. Sometimes a character is at the end of their rope and can’t manage to be 100% nice 24/7 and that’s maybe not inherently bad writing? idk just my hot take. At a certain point we all gotta reckon with the fact that our perception of most popular supporting characters in heavily colored by fanon and we can’t always get mad at the authors for not adhering to it

*The sisters magic shit is my fav worldbuilding warriors has had in AGES, I love the way it’s described and it actually feels like it adds something to this world. I love this horror imagery with the ghosts, very excited for that. 

*still won’t be thrilled if Ashfur is working alone, because his motive doesn’t make sense right now. I mean the trying to get Squilf thing, sure, whatever, but the “I will make everyone pay for what they did to me”???? cause like?? Who??? they didn’t do anything to him?? Ashfur’s grievance was very specifically JUST Squilf. He has no other cause for revenge, he had no other beef or complaints about the clans to my knowledge? The cat that killed him is dead, and she’s like, the only other one that I could see as having “wronged” him?? I guess he also didn’t like Firestar much according to Graystripe’s Vow (and on account of how willing he was to kill him w/ Hawkfrost) but Firestar is ALSO dead. I don’t understand his angle. Will have to see last 2 books to judge i suppose.

*All in all I am interested to see where this is going!! but also the pacing as I feared is becoming a major issue. It’s better then ending the main conflict on book 3 like Vision of Shadows did, but omg. Hardly anything happened in all these pages. I realized I was over half way through and nothing about the situation had actually CHANGED or advanced at all in all that time. Similar to the past 2 books which I believe could have been combined, this plot felt like it should have been the first half of a book. Discussing whether or not to kill the imposter isn’t much of a standalone plot, it’s just the set up to a plot. Finding the sisters didn’t need to be a whole long thing, the debates about the Imposters fate didn’t need to be repeated 10 times, all those chapters illustrating that “Shadowsight is sad” were also drawn out, repetitive, and interchangeable, we probably only needed 2 or so chapters showing his struggles to get the necessary information across. It felt like a lot of padding, it was really slow and I did a lot of skimming. I am still very interested in the overarching plot and mystery behind the ghosts so that kept me reading but man this “will they won’t they kill him” plot did not justify it’s own whole book. Alas this is a persisting issue that will never be resolved while they continue to force 6 books into 1 series that doesn’t need 6 books. I’m sure the writers are doing the best they can with these unfortunate constraints but still, it’s a wonder this slow padding isn’t more of a detriment to their younger readers that the books are supposed to be marketed to.

[ahgastae]

curiosity (wip) – bang chan x f!reader

➥ word count: 6.1k | spider-man au | action (?? idk) | fluff

➥ m.list

➥ a/n: alright,, let me explain myself lol. i started writing this like?? over a year ago? and eventually got to the point where i kind of just lost ALL of the ideas that i had for where i wanted this to go. SO, instead of letting it sit in my docs forever, i decided to go ahead and post it here for all of you! i hope you enjoy ♡

One thing you can say for sure is you really, really didn’t expect your life to go this way. Not that you have any idea as to how you actually want it to go, but barely hanging onto the edge of the tallest skyscraper in New York definitely isn’t on the top of your list. You feel your fingers start to cramp from the weight, and part of you realizes that this might be it. The end of the infamous Black Cat. Done in because you finally decided to do something good with your life.

Tch. Figures.

A bitter smile spreads across your lips. Of course, this would be the way you go. Ever so dramatic, but on your own damn terms. The thought is comforting, even if it only soothes your beating heart just a bit. You focus on that when your fingers finally start to give out, and you lose your grip on the edge of the rooftop. 

When your eyes slowly slip closed, and you feel the wind rushing through your hair. 

There’s a small voice in your head telling you to hold on, that it’s almost there. It’s weird. It almost sounds familiar. Almost like-

“Y/N!”

You jolt up in your bed, chest heaving as you struggle to regain your breath. Stars twinkle faintly outside a large window to your right, but your vision quickly adjusts to the rest of the darkened room. Your hands release their iron grip on your plush comforter, a sigh of relief escaping your lips. You’re in your bedroom. It was just another nightmare.

A scoff. ‘Just another nightmare.’ You’ve been plagued with the same stupid dream for weeks now, and you still can’t figure out why. It always starts and ends the same way. You’re hanging off the skyscraper, you try to hang on for as long as you can, you realize very quickly that you can’t hold on any longer, and then you fall. Presumably to your death. But you never seem to make it that far.

Not that you want to, but don’t most people not wake up until they hit the ground during those dreams? Why do you wake up gasping for air before you’re even halfway down? You suppose you should be lucky, but you can’t help feeling like there’s more to it than that. Especially with that voice, the one that calls your name? You always hear it calling out to you, every night, right before you wake up. Tonight wasn’t any different.

You sigh, swinging your legs over the edge of your bed and eyeing the clock on your night stand. 3:25AM. 

….Shit.

Well, you’re probably not getting back to bed anytime soon, so you might as well put this wake up call to good use. Padding over to your closet, you carefully swing open the wooden door, cringing to yourself when a slight creak echoes off your bedroom walls. You wait a few seconds just to make sure you’re in the clear. But the apartment is completely silent, save for your roommate’s soft snores in her room next door.

The hidden panel in the back of your closet slides open with a click, and you can’t help the excited smile on your face. No matter how you’re feeling, the sight of that black catsuit never fails to brighten your mood. Your hands run along the smooth material, quickly changing into the familiar suit, and grinning when you catch a glimpse of your reflection in the window. You didn’t really plan on going out, but….

Looks like the Black Cat is going to have some fun tonight after all.

The museum is quiet when you drop through the skylight, landing softly on the balcony of the second floor. Your EMP seems to have done its job, as the security system is powered down and there doesn’t seem to be a guard in sight. They’re probably all back in their office, hurriedly trying to figure out what the hell went wrong. If only they knew about the small, catlike figurine hidden on the roof. Although, maybe not. You don’t mind leaving your adorably deceiving EMPs behind, but they’re not for some random night guard to find. No, you leave them behind for a specific someone. A certain web-headed hero, if you will.

Oh, who are you kidding? It’s no secret (at least, not to him) that you love to tease New York’s  friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. Everywhere you go, every heist you pull, you always make sure the hero knows it was you. Obsessed? You wouldn’t say so. Sure, you definitely get a little too excited at the thought of just barely slipping out of his fingers again, but you don’t spend every waking minute planning his demise like some of his other big, bad villains. 

Really, if you were to rank yourself, you’d probably be somewhere between “Lovable Anti-Villain” and “Hero With an ‘F’ in Good”. Not super “evil,” more like just enough to keep the wallcrawler chasing your tail. 

But that’s not the entire reason you’re here tonight, slipping into the museum’s new exhibit on fourteenth century Japan. 

The law labels you a criminal, Spider-Man believes you’re misguided, but you know what you are. You’re the Black Cat, a thief notorious throughout the underground. Well, you say that, but of the people that actually believe you exist, very few have actually seen the Black Cat in person. Actually, it may just be Spider-Man, now that you think about it. Maybe that’s why you feel a weird connection with the wall-crawling hero.

Either way, bottom line is you’re a thief, and a damn good one at that. It’s definitely not the most noble profession (or legal one), but your very specific set of skills make you the best at it, so why not? Plus, it’s not like you’re entirely heartless. 

No, you only steal from the wealthy of New York, the highest of elites, the ones who can stand to lose a few thousands (or millions, if you’re feeling pretty moody that night). You’ve tried to explain that to Spider-Man, that it’s okay for you to steal from them because they’re the ones who deserve it. It’s downright disgusting how many of them used dirty means to come into their wealth, methods ranging from less than savory to straight up nefarious.

You may be bad, but you’re definitely not worse than them.

That brings you back to the exhibit. Most of the artifacts in this room were already either stolen or bought from the black market, so what does it matter if you just continue that line?

The latch of the display case clicks as you open the lid, admiring the ancient Japanese tea set nestled inside. You don’t really know its value yet, but it’s going to earn you a pretty penny, that’s for sure. Your hand reaches into the case, hovering over the ceramic teapot when you hear it.

THWIP.

You drop to a crouch, glancing up at the webbing splattered across the lid of the display case. If you hadn’t moved, that would’ve been all over you. And you’d definitely be pissed, if you didn’t know exactly where it came from. A sly smile crosses your face as you stand and turn, locking eyes (or masks?) with your favorite hero perched atop one of the exhibit’s statues.

“I’m starting to think you like us meeting this way, Spider-Man.”

The playful lilt in your voice never fails to catch him off guard. His broad shoulders tense, and it takes everything in you to suppress the giggle from escaping your lips. But he’s quick to compose himself, like always, and you’re almost certain you can hear the smirk in his tone.

“What can I say? My mom always told me to follow my dreams.”

You laugh, trailing a hand along another case as you stroll towards him, “How did you know I’d be here?”

“New exhibit filled with priceless artifacts and no rooftop security,” He shrugs, jumping from the statue’s head and landing in front of you with a soft thud. “Figured it’d be a cat burglar’s dream come true.”

“You thought of me?” You step closer, resting your hands on the white spider emblazoned across his chest. The muscles tense underneath your fingers, and you smirk when his hands twitch in the corner of your eye. “Don’t worry, Spidey. I promise I’m on my best behavior. I just want a few teensy, tiny things and then I’ll be on my way.”

“Sorry, Cat, but I don’t think any of these artifacts are for sale.”

“But they could be,” You shrug, turning away from him. Your fingers toy with the latch on a nearby display case. “See, I think I have a buyer who would love to add something like this to his collection…”

A gloved hand wraps around your wrist before you can open the case. Your eyes trail up his arm, blinking innocently at his white lenses.

“You know I can’t let you do this.”

You smile, leaning into him once more, “Can’t, or won’t?” He stays silent, and you reach your free hand up to cup his masked face. Your thumb softly traces back and forth on his cheek. “Isn’t it funny,” you whisper, “how something as simple as a piece of fabric can keep someone from knowing who you really are?”

“Cat…”

“Do you really think that you can save me, Spidey?” You tilt your head, eyes desperately scanning his face for any sign of his thoughts or feelings. “How do you know if I even want to be saved?”

He swiftly tugs you closer, and despite the white lenses shielding his eyes, you feel his gaze pierce into your own. When he speaks, his voice is soft but deep, and for the first time since you met him, you’re rendered speechless.

“Because you wouldn’t still be here if you didn’t.”

Before you can respond, the sound of footsteps down the hall startles you both. Spider-Man’s grip loosens as he quickly turns towards the exhibit entrance, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what’s going on. The guards must have finally figured out that someone is after the new exhibit, and they won’t be happy to find two intruders standing inside. 

Your eyes shift between Spider-Man and the exhibit entrance. It won’t be hard for you two to escape together before the guards even set foot in this room, but what will you do then? Will you laugh and tell him that he’s wrong about you, that you really don’t want his help? 

….Or is it that you don’t think you deserve it?

No, he’s just wrong. Spider-Man doesn’t know you, and it’s silly of you to even pretend that he does. You know you like your life just the way it is. That’s not going to change, no matter how much your chest tightens as you gently tug your wrist out of his grip.

It’s not going to change, no matter how much a part of you wishes he would notice you climbing up to the skylight in the center of the room. That he would stop you from slipping through it, and back into the starry night. That he wouldn’t let you fall through his fingertips yet again.

But you’ve never been particularly lucky. Especially not when you really want to be.

By the time you get back to your apartment and change out of your gear, it’s already well past dawn. Like usual, your roommate is still asleep, blissfully unaware that you were gone for a good portion of the night. Which is good, because you really don’t know how you would explain your “other life” to her if she ever found out.

With your suit safely stowed back in its hidden panel, you collapse onto your bed with a heavy sigh. What a fucking night. You’re a little upset that you ended up leaving empty handed, but you knew that was going to happen as soon as you saw the wall-crawler. He really just guessed that you were going to be there tonight. Are you getting that predictable?

Ugh, no. You shake your head. The last thing you want to think about right now is what happened at the museum. How could such a simple sentence send all of your thoughts into a whirlwind of emotions?

“Because you wouldn’t still be here if you didn’t.” 

His voice still echoes in your mind, and you stuff your face in your pillow with a groan. This is dumb. Why are you freaking out over this? It’s not like he meant anything by it, just his usual Spidey “I can help you!” stuff. Yeah, that’s it. He just gave you the same spiel he gives all his other enemies, nothing more, nothing less.

….But why does that hurt more?

You throw the pillow off your face as another sigh escapes your lips. Sometimes you really wish you could be one of those super evil villains. You know, those ones who never have to deal with their feelings and shit because they’re too busy taking over the world. Although, you guess you don’t really want to take over the world, at least not all of it. That’s way too much responsibility. You wonder if the people who actually do want to rule the world think of how much time and effort that’s going to require. How do they prepare for that? Is that mental preparation how they’re able to turn off all their feelings? Could you somehow learn to-

“Whatcha thinkin’ about?”

You shriek at the sudden whisper in your ear, instinctively rolling away from its source and tumbling off the end of your bed. Your butt hits the floor with a dull thud, and you glare at a giggling Sana over your mattress.

“What the hell was that for?!”

“S-Sorry!” She chokes out. “I didn’t think I’d scare you that bad!”

Crawling back onto your bed with a grumble, you eye Sana as she struggles to collect herself. She really shouldn’t have scared you that bad, but you guess the lack of sleep and your frazzled thoughts are finally starting to catch up with you. When Sana finally manages to contain her giggles, she plops down on the edge of your mattress with a small huff.

“I really am sorry for scaring you, Y/N,” She reaches out to squeeze your hand. “I thought you would have noticed me walk in.”

You shake your head, giving her a small squeeze in return, “It’s fine. I’ve just...been having some trouble sleeping lately. That’s all.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Her voice is so sincere and caring, you almost find yourself saying yes. You don’t, though, because you can’t tell her the real reason why you haven’t been sleeping, and you don’t think you can bear to lie to her about it, either. With that, your roommate leaves, going back to her room to get ready for her day while you try to muscle up the energy to start yours.

Throwing your legs over the side of your bed, you grab your phone from your nightstand to check the time. Oh, looks like you got a good number of texts during your daydreaming, too.

...And it looks like most of them are from your best friend.

changaroo 🦘 : hey, jinyoung’s in a bit of a mood today, so make sure you’re here on time, alright?

changaroo  🦘 : also i think i have an idea for your next article, i’ll tell you about it when you get in

changaroo  🦘 : y/n, you were supposed to be here 20 min ago, everything okay??

changaroo  🦘 : ….you fucking slept in again, didn’t you?

changaroo  🦘 : hold on i’m texting sana

Ah. So that’s why she was in your room. Chan’s texts are just what you need to get yourself out of bed, though, instantly motivated by both your best friend’s caring nature and the thought of your boss’s wrath hanging above your head. The last time Jinyoung was in a “mood”, you ended up covering the city’s sewer system for a whole month just because you left your dirty coffee mug sitting in the break room sink. That’s a mistake you only make once. Or four times, if you’re poor Hyunjin, who just can’t seem to stay on your boss’s good side, no matter how hard he tries.

Speaking of which, you really need to get your ass moving, or else you’ll wish you only had to cover rats and raw sewage.

Your chest heaves as you approach the Daily Bugle building, the red neon letters standing tall and proud atop its roof announcing the paper’s presence to all of New York City. Some tourists stand around here and there in front of the building’s entrance, and you have to push past them in order to make it inside. Once inside, you think you can take a brief moment of rest. 

Until you notice the clock above the receptionist’s desk and realize you’re almost forty-five minutes late.

With a small cry, you take off in another mad dash towards the stairs, taking the steps two at a time and only almost faceplanting once before you finally burst onto your floor. Everyone immediately turns at the noise, and you avoid their probing eyes as you make your way to your desk. 

You sit down, turn on your computer, and get yourself ready to act like you aren’t almost an hour late to start your day when you sense a familiar gaze still boring into your forehead. You can’t stop yourself from glancing up, finding his eyes staring at you over your monitor. 

“Not. One. Word.”

Chan laughs, leaning back in his chair and giving you a view of his entire face. He mimes zipping his mouth shut and throwing away the key, and a small smile crosses your face. Leave it to him to automatically brighten your day.

If you’re being completely honest, you were a little worried at first about the curly haired Australian your boss decided to place at the desk across from you. Not that you didn’t like him, but you didn’t exactly become the paper’s best investigative journalist by sitting around and making friends. Sure, you don’t necessarily need this job given your…”other” career, but it gives you something to do during the week and keeps your mind busy. That, and you really just like digging into people’’s deep, dark secrets.

Long story short, you weren’t exactly thrilled about some new guy coming in and taking your eye off the ball. At least, that’s what you thought, until the day Christopher Bang showed up and introduced himself as your new partner. Turns out, Jinyoung didn’t just hire a new photographer for the Bugle, he hired a new photographer specifically for your articles. You knew then that you just had to suck it up and deal, but you didn’t count on Christopher (or Chan, as he later insisted you call him) being literally the nicest, most charming guy you’ve ever met.

And despite your attempts to stop it, you and Chan quickly became “thick as thieves,” as he likes to call it. The phrase makes you cringe a little every time he says it, but you can’t deny its truth. If you were to trust anyone with your secret life, it would definitely be your best friend. Now, you’re never going to do that because what in the hell would you gain from it, but the sentiment is still there.

Actually, speaking of secrets….

You glance up at Chan again, except this time his attention is focused on his own computer screen. Part of you wants to just leave him be, but this has been eating at you since you talked to Sana this morning. Or, no, when you first woke up at 3AM today. You swallow your pride, clearing your throat just loud enough to get Chan’s attention. His brown eyes immediately find yours.

“Something wrong?”

“I, um…” You bite your lip. “I had another one of those dreams again.”

Chan’s brow furrows, and he leans forward in his seat, “The falling one? Isn’t that the fourth time this week?”

“It’s the twelfth time this month, Chan.” 

“Shit…” He mumbles, running a hand through his blond hair. You try to ignore the way your heart speeds up at the small action, staring down at your keyboard to hide your face. You’re just...not used to trusting someone as much as you trust Chan. Yeah, that’s it. Absolutely nothing but that sole reason alone. “Y/N?”

“H-Hm?” You blink up at Chan, cheeks heating up even more when you realize you were caught daydreaming. Again.

“I just figured there must be a reason you keep having the same dream, you know? Like, maybe your subconscious is trying to tell you something?”

You think for a moment. Could that be the case? Is your subconscious really fucking up your sleep schedule for some important message that’s getting lost in translation? Are you just a dumbass who can’t understand your own brain?

Honestly, all valid possibilities.

Before you can respond, though, the phone on your desk rings loudly. Chan’s brow raises as you pick it up, but you both already know who it is. There’s really only one person who uses that line, and it’s the same person you were hoping not to hear from today.

“L/N, my office. Now.”

And then he hangs up. Your boss has always been a man of few words, but sometimes you really hate how such a short sentence can strike so much fear into your heart. Chan watches as you stand up and adjust your outfit with a heavy sigh.

“Tell him you haven’t been sleeping well lately,” He suggests, and for a minute you think he’s actually being earnest. But, of course, he just has to open his mouth again, “And if that doesn’t work, then at least we’ll be exploring the sewers of New York together!”

A laugh bubbles past your lips, “Are you serious?”

“Hey, I’ve always wanted to know if the Ninja Turtles were real,” Chan grins widely, chuckling when you just shake your head and walk away. He can still see the smile on your face, though, and it only grows when he shouts after you, “You know you wouldn’t mind being the April to my Casey!”

“In your dreams, Christopher!”

His loud laughter follows you all the way to the stairwell, and your chest feels light as you climb up to your boss’s office on the top floor. With Chan’s bright smile in the back of your mind, it’s hard to remember what you were so worried about in the first place. At least, until you’re standing right outside your boss’s door.

“Thank you for taking your sweet time, L/N. Please, sit down.”

Park Jinyoung is, for lack of better words, intimidating to some, and outright terrifying to others. You like to think you’re somewhere near the former, but the look on the twenty-four year old’s face right now is enough to send even the most despicable villains running for the hills. Really, who needs a Spider-Man when you’ve got a Jinyoung to just death glare the bad guys away?

You take a seat in the chair in front of his desk, nervously wringing your hands in your lap. He spends a few more seconds shuffling around the papers and files on his desk, then fixes you with a deadpan look. 

“Do you know why I called you in here, L/N?”

“Because I was...late again?” Your shoulders hunch, automatically preparing for the verbal barrage of scolding to start, but it never comes. You glance up at Jinyoung cautiously, shocked to find his brows raised in amusement.

Much more to your surprise, he chuckles, leaning back in his office chair, “You look like you’re about to faint, L/N. I really think you need to loosen up a bit.”

“O-Okay, sir-”

“That’s why,” Jinyoung cuts you off, “I want you to take on a new side project for the paper.”

You blink. A side project…? What could he possibly mean by that? And how does giving you more work equate to you “loosening up”?!

“Let me explain.” You stay silent as your boss clears his throat, sitting up in his seat to look you in the eyes. “Truthfully, it would be less of a side project and more of an ongoing investigative piece. It’ll take the place of your other responsibilities for the Bugle, so you can divide and spread out your workload as you see fit. You don’t even have to report to me until the full piece is finished, if you’d like.”

...Is this a test? Because it feels like a test, doesn’t it? He gives you some too-good-to-be-true offer, and then fires you for being stupid enough to accept it. Or, maybe-

Oh, god, is this where the sewers come in?

“I’m sorry, sir,” You force out, steeling your nerves against his hard gaze, “but I think I’m going to decline.”

You hope that’s going to be the end of it, that Jinyoung will just nod and send you on your way, but of course that’s not the case. No, instead your boss surprises you for the second time, and he actually smiles.

“Are you sure, L/N?” He asks, and you get the strange feeling he’s getting some sick satisfaction from messing with you. “I haven’t even told you what the piece is about yet.”

A small sigh leaves your lips, “What...What is it about, sir?”

“Oh, it’s simple, L/N,” Jinyoung’s smirk grows, taking your question as an acceptance of his offer. His next words shock the objection right out of you, though, and leave only one thought in their place. “You’re just going to do this city and this paper a favor, and finally find out who New York’s friendly neighborhood Spider-Man really is.”

...Fuck.

“He wants you to what?!”

You flinch, pulling your phone away from your ear as Sana’s voice screeches from the device. Honestly, she hadn’t been your first choice to tell about your new “project” (Jinyoung didn’t give you much choice, after all), but Chan was nowhere to be seen when you got back to your desk. You did, however, have one simple text waiting on your phone.

changaroo 🦘 : had to run out. meet you at the usual spot for lunch. my treat <3

So, here you are. Waiting at the pizzeria you and Chan regularly meet at with your roommate loudly screaming in your ear. You mumble something to Sana about needing to go and seeing her at home, and hang up the call. You love her, you really do, but right now you need someone who’s not going to blow out your eardrums without listening to what you actually want to say.

But it’s starting to look more and more like that won’t be Chan, either.

The blond boy has a habit of disappearing every now and again, both during and outside of work, and right now is starting to seem like one of those times. It doesn’t usually take him this long to respond to your texts, and he never likes to miss your little ‘lunch dates’ without any warning. Either something is seriously wrong, or…

“This just in, the NYPD advises all civilians to evacuate the east Harlem district. We’ve received reports of the Rhino attacking parts of the area, along with sightings of the masked vigilante, Spider-Man. That’s all we know for now, but we will continue to keep you posted as the story develops. Now, onto the…”

Ah, that makes a lot of sense. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Chan’s mysterious disappearances always line up with whatever villain of the day getting their ass kicked by everyone’s favorite “vigilante.” The news anchor’s choice of words makes you snicker, but you can’t help but worry for your friend. Most people run away from villain attacks, and it doesn’t sit well with you knowing Chan is regularly risking his life just to get a few good shots for his portfolio. His photos are amazing, there’s no denying that, but you always wonder how he gets his impossible close ups of villains and their destruction. It’s almost like he has to be right in the middle of–

The bell above the pizzeria’s door rings, jolting you out of your thoughts. You look up expectantly, but it’s still not your best friend. A quiet sigh escapes your lips. Another look at your phone tells you that you can’t wait here much longer; you need to get back to work sometime today. Still, it pains you a little bit to stand from your guys’ booth. Your usual tip is left on the table despite it being only one meal, and you head back to the Bugle with your best friend lingering in the back of your mind.

Back at your desk, you finally get a chance to mull over your new “assignment”. Jinyoung has tasked you, for whatever reason, with figuring out Spider-Man’s real identity. You remember now why you wanted to talk to Chan so badly. You thought, since he’s always running back and forth between villain attacks, that he would have some kind of idea where to start. That, and you really just wanted to rant about your asshole boss to your best friend. Chan ended up being a no show, though, and he’s still not answering any of your texts. You hate to admit it, but you’re a little lost.

Your first thought was to use the connection you already have with the spider to your advantage. You’ve “known” each other for a couple years now, and maybe, just maybe, you can convince him to actually take off the mask. It wouldn’t be that hard to just don the Black Cat suit and wait around one of your usual hang outs for him show up. Actually, that would probably be the easiest thing to do.

Except that you can’t.

As you stare at Chan’s vacant desk in front of you, you’re bitterly reminded that Y/N L/N has been assigned this job, not the Black Cat. And unfortunately for you, Y/N L/N does not have the same connection to Spider-Man as your alter ego. Looks like you’re starting this investigation from square one.

...Which is why you wanted to talk to Chan. He’s your partner, after all; he’s “technically” supposed to help you out with this stuff. That is, if he was actually fucking here. Maybe you should drop by his apartment on your way home, just to make sure he didn’t get trampled or something trying to get a snapshot of the Rhino’s rampage. You try to tell yourself you meant that as a joke, but it doesn’t stop the flash of worry in your chest. You’ve seen firsthand some of the destruction Spider-Man’s battles leave behind. Hell, you’ve even experienced it. And honestly? It doesn’t sit well knowing your best friend makes a hobby of putting himself right in the middle of it.

A heavy sigh escapes your lips, and you’re just starting to consider giving up and calling it a day when your phone lights up with a notification. You hastily snatch it off your desk, immediately perking up upon seeing the name on your screen.

changaroo 🦘 : sorry i missed lunch...take out at mine?

changaroo 🦘 : i’ll order from that korean place you love <3

The tension in your shoulders immediately melts away, tension that you didn’t even realize you were holding. You waste no time in responding, though; relieved to know that he’s okay, but wanting to mess with him a little bit for leaving you on radio silence for so long.

you : tsk tsk channie

you : don’t you know how rude it is to leave a lady waiting all by her lonesome??

you : frankly i don’t know if i’ll ever be able to trust you again (tear emoji or some bs idk)

Three little dots pop up seconds after you press send, and you bite your lip to stop the smile threatening to break through. 

changaroo 🦘 : my apologies, princess!! 

changaroo 🦘 : please, allow me to make it up to you with some of your fav ice cream from the convenience store down the road!

you : hmm…

you : with or without sprinkles?

changaroo 🦘 : uh, with ofc. just who do you think i am??

A small laugh bubbles up your throat, but you cover your mouth before it can escape. Woojin, head of the paper’s advice column, side-eyes you from his desk a few feet away. You don’t notice, though, happily typing out your reply to Chan with an eager grin on your face.

you : apology accepted. i’ll be there in 15

you : ...casey 😉

The train ride to Chan’s apartment is a familiar blur. You’ve taken it more times than you care to count, and it’s honestly become a bit of a habit to instinctively get off at his stop. You don’t have to stop yourself this time, though, putting your legs on auto-pilot and letting your mind wander as you walk. Today has been….a real doozy. From that stupid dream this morning to Jinyoung dumping a monster of an investigative piece on you with zero notice, you’re exhausted, to say the least. No wonder Chan’s front door is such a comforting sight. 

You gently rap your knuckles against the wood before letting yourself in, like you always do. A relieved sigh escapes you as you drop your bag by the door, inhaling the light, summery scent of your friend’s home. That reminds you, you’ve really been meaning to ask him what air freshener he uses. Or maybe it’s his cologne, because it’s not just his house that smells this sweet; it’s Chan himself. Or who knows, maybe he’s like your coworker Minho and it’s really both. Actually, now that you think of it, isn’t it a little weird to have a specific smell you associate with your best friend?

…Which is something you can worry about later.

“Chan!” You call as you walk into the living room, eyes scanning around. There are various take out boxes scattered across the coffee table, but the blond is nowhere in sight. You try again, “Chan?”

A frown etches onto your face when there's still no response. That’s weird. It’s not like him to just leave when he knows you’re coming over, especially without telling you first. But the food on the table is still warm, meaning he had to have been here recently. Did you somehow miss his text? You pull your phone out of your back pocket, confirming that you did not, in fact, miss any “brb” texts from Chan. So, what the hell?

Your search takes you into the small kitchen next, but there’s no sign of your best friend there, either, unless the dirty dishes in the sink count. Oh, gross, you know for a fact some of those have been in there since last week. Your nose scrunches up in disgust and you quickly move on from the room, but not before making a mental note to tell Chan to do his fucking dishes. 

However, the bathroom is empty, too, leaving the apartment’s one bedroom as your last stop. If you had more of a conscience, maybe you would think twice before barging into your friend’s bedroom unannounced. Then again, boundaries never really have been your strong suit.

The door swings open, and the first thing you see is abs. Nice, well toned abs that, as you soon find out, belong to your best friend. Said best friend is frozen, one of his signature black tees pulled halfway down his torso. After a few seconds of stunned silence, you force yourself to tear your eyes away from Chan’s stomach, only for your cheeks to immediately explode in pink when your gaze meets his.

A small squeak leaves your mouth, and you quickly mumble something about waiting for him in the living room before slamming the bedroom door shut. That could not have gone any worse.

[reaperintheroses]

Minuscule

Bucky x villain reader

A/N: I tried to keep the reader pretty gender neutral but if there are any pronouns other than they/them let me know so I can fix it. This is what I’m thinking to be the first week in my writing rotation so we’ll see how long this lasts. Also I know it’s short and a little rushed- I did my best. Also if you weren’t aware a magazine is where you pre-store bullets for a gun, and is, in this case, external. The reader talks about using a finished magazine to replace what they are stealing in case there is a weight sensor like in indiana jones. This specific mag. is made out of metal so it would work for the weight sensor. I don’t specify the rifle so that much is left up to imagination. 

Warnings: swearing, gun use, violence, crappy writing

readers power description

It was peaceful in a way, to sneak around as the rest of the world was sleeping. It really made you realize how small you were compared to the rest of the world. Just a mere drop in the ocean. You thought this way often. Realizing that no one would really care much about you. It was fine. You preferred to live in the shadows verse being one of the huge villains in the spotlight. That was a dangerous way to live. Far easier to get caught. You weren’t in this life for fame and anyone who was, you considered just plain stupid. You rose from your crouch on the roof of the building. You had to move fast if you wanted to get away and unfortunately, there wasn’t time to enjoy your surroundings. As cliche as it sounded, this artifact would have you set for life. It was just your luck that it was conveniently located in your current city and the heist involved one person with your exact skill set.

You worked for a group of black market mercenaries going under the name “the red merchants”. The group consisted of about 10 people with completely different skill sets and levels of training. None of you had ever met each other, only communicating through strange online chat rooms and a shared bank account. Recently though your group had fallen under shields spotlight and were placed on a government watch list. This would be your last heist with the group before completely dropping off the grid. Oh and the artifact you were trying to steal? An Asgardian jewel, worth billions. 

You turned around and strapped the gun you had been holding onto your back. You turned on the earpiece that you received in the mail a week ago and looked around to see if there was anyone around you who could possibly be working against you. After confirming that you were safe you made your way down the fire escape on the side of the building trying to be quiet as possible. When the static in your ear broke you stopped. “How far away are you?” a voice questioned in your ear. “About two jumps,” that was the reason you were so perfect for this job, see you had a superpower that allowed you to teleport short distances. You called these jumps. They were super helpful for stealth missions. “Let me know when you’ve completed the first. I can turn off the internal security for up to fifteen minutes, once you are inside you have to work fast. I’ve already started looping the cameras but if you have company it won’t take long for them to realize.” you sighed. “Understood, about to start the first jump.” The static returned showing that your fellow merchant had switched channels. You focused your energy and shut your eyes trying to be discreet. Making the first jump you looked around checking to see if anyone was around. You lifted your head to your ear piece, “First jump complete.” You ducked behind a dumpster and waited for further instruction. “In 60 seconds I’ll turn on the software. This is the last you will hear from me. Once your mission is complete destroy your earpiece and any evidence leading you to our group. It’s been a pleasure working with you.” It was sentimental, in a way. You almost felt sad. “You as well, thank you.” You switched channels in case there was anything else they had to tell you and started another jump. Taking a deep breath you ran into the portal that had been created. 

You came face first with the side of the building you were supposed to infiltrate. You recalled your notes about the entire layout of the building and the codes for each door. 2576. Nothing happened and you started to panic that was the wrong code and you would be locked out. You started to look around for other things you could use to break the system before it locked you out. You had worked so hard to get here and you would be damned if you got stopped before even getting in the building. You unstrapped your gun and raised the butt to hit the keypad as you heard a small beep and click. Moving one hand away from the gun with a confused face you used your other to grab the door handle and pull. ‘Okay strong start’ you thought to yourself as you placed your gun on your back and walked into the building. You saw a few guards walking away from your direction. ‘They must have just switched posts,’ You started another jump, trying your best to not make any noise as to make up for the time the door lost you. The jewel was located in the middle of the building in a vault, which was surrounded by about 20 guards so when you jumped in there you would have to be careful. Going through the jump you had just created you paid no attention to where you ended up as long as it was close to the jewel.

This of course was a mistake because when you emerged from the jump you were face-to-face with five armed guards who seemed to be on their break. “Hi there,” you raised your hand in a mock wave. They all reached to their sides where you assumed they had concealed weapons. Quickly jumping behind the first guard you kicked them in the back causing them to fall towards the table in front of them. Unstrapping your own rifle you hit them over the head before you took aim at the closest guard to your left. Once you hit them you kicked them in the stomach using the impact of your kick to throw the guard into the other behind them causing them both to fall to the ground. You aimed the rifle in the direction of the 4th guard grinning when you heard the impact of the bullet. The 5th dashed out the door. You looked back down to the guards who you were restraining with your body. “I always hate it when they run.” You sighed before jumping into the hallway right behind the running guard. Raising your rifle you let out a quiet “coward,” before hitting them over the head with the rifle, catching them before they fell and jumping back into the break room. You dropped the unconscious guard onto the floor before grabbing a chair and propping it under the door before locking it as well. 

Getting ready to jump again you thought back to the layout of the building. You imagined the very center of the vault, where there were no guards as a security measure, and thought about what it would look like. You had maybe 5 minutes left before the security came back on and you would be caught. You jumped again and looked around. You were face to face with the green jewel. The security was seriously lacking, the only thing protecting the jewel from your hands was a glass case. This really was too easy. You figured that sense Thor was on Earth he would be more involved with the safety of one of the most prized possessions of his people. Oh well. Made life easier for you. You stalked over to the jewel with your finished magazine in hand just in case there was a weight sensor. You outstretched your hand and right as you were about to close on the jewel you heard a break in the static in your ear. “The security countermeasures I put in place have a minute and 30 seconds left,” You withdrew your hand confused and turned around to face the wall. Why would they tell you that? You were well aware that you wouldn’t be able to finish in the time frame you were given. They said when they turned on the countermeasures that it could be the last you would hear from them. “4 of the avengers known as captain america, the falcon, the winter soldier, and of course thor have joined you, they are 1 floor away just thought I should inform you. Best of luck.” You squint your eyes. Not good. You fully switched off the earpiece before turning back towards the jewel. “I wouldn’t if I was you,” a voice came from behind you. You froze. “Of course you wouldn’t, falcon.” you replied before dashing for the jewel. Wrapping your hand around you turned around and looked. Calculating how well your odds were you realized that no matter how spent your power was there was no way you were getting out of here by taking them all down in a fist fight. You made eye contact with the winter soldier. Oh just lovely. Not only did he know exactly how your power worked he knew almost everything about you. This was just fan-fucking-tastic. Trying not to show how scared you were, you smirked at him before turning and facing the entire group that had come to try and stop you. “I would really love to stay and hear all about everything I’m doing wrong and how the only person I’m hurting is my self and so on, but I really must be going seeing that I have prior engagements that involve pawning off this rock and setting myself up on a beach with a margarita that has one of those tiny umbrellas.” Thor looked like he wouldn’t have an issue killing you in order to get the jewel back so you decided it was time to take your leave. Hopefully, they were slow enough that you could make it to the roof and have a few minutes to regain your bearings before they reached you. 

The falcon started to make his way over to you and right as he was about to secure you by the arm you jumped and almost fell off the side of the building. You stuck your arms out to help you regain your balance. Once you were sure you weren't going to plummet to your death, you sucked in a huge breath. ‘Maybe you would get away after all.’ You turned around and began to look at the sunrise and draw energy to yourself. Right as you were about to open your last jump to get you away from this dumpster fire of a heist you heard the door to the roof slam open and 4 sets of footsteps spill out from the stairwell. With an annoyed face you turned back around and faced the heroes that were still in pursuit of you. “y/n, I know that you don’t think it but you don’t need to do this.” Shit he knew your name, that makes everything even more difficult. “Shield helped me, they can help you too.” You rolled your eyes. This was a cute attempt but in the end it was pointless. ‘Bucky I’m not going to prison, I refused to be trapped down.” He recoiled slightly at the fact that you too knew his name. You blew out an aggravated breath, there really was no point to this savior monologue.  “I know this sounds super cliche but if you just stepped down I promise I will do everything in my power to help you.” You smiled a tiny bit. “Look, I appreciate the effort but theres really no point.” He continued to talk while you summoned more energy for a final jump. You cut him off, “Sorry lover boy, I’m just beyond saving.” You raised your middle finger in the hand not holding the jewel and started to lean off of the roof. Right as your feet left the edge, he started to rush to the side of the building. you summoned energy to help you jump. “We should do this again,” you shouted as you felt the energy surround you and you were pulled out of the air. 

[you-cant-spell-subtext-without]

hey buddies -

just sitting at my kitchen table drinking coffee thinking about Supernatural, and fathers and anger, and angels and love.  

yeah.  it’s Saturday, I guess.

my eagworms are back, so come think with me after the cut!!

so I'm thinking about how that terrible man Randy who manipulated Claire Novak, a narrative mirror for Dean Winchester, in SPN 10x09: The Things We Left Behind was a narrative mirror for J*hn Eric Winchester, the terrible man who manipulated Dean Winchester for the entirety of his childhood and young adult life

and all Cas wanted to do was make Claire see that Randy was just using her, and she was better than that because he fucking loved her

also thinking about how Dean Winchester was the one who killed Randy

thinking about how it wasn’t as much the Mark of Cain as it was his repressed feelings about his abusive damn father that he’s never dealt with (because he thought he deserved it), and he reacted in a murderous fucking rage because of that, because he saw J*hn in Randy and himself in Claire -

now thinking about the Mark of Cain and Dean’s tendency towards anger, stemming directly from his childhood with J*hn Eric Winchester, thinking about how J*hn used him as a weapon, how J*hn’s entire purpose after Mary’s death was his quest for vengeance, how Dean had to protect Sam from him over and over, despite his father mentally pitting them against each other constantly and manipulating them

ex: 1x22:Dead Man’s Blood

thinking about Cain who took on the Mark of Cain to save his brother Abel, to protect his brother Abel and send him to heaven,  despite it turning Cain into a killer and demon -

thinking about how that story was manipulated through time and turned into a story of Cain killing Abel instead

thinking about how Cain and Abel were Dean and Sam’s ancestors - 

(all hail King Matt Cohen)

how Cain became the father of murder

thinking about how Cain was the son of Adam

thinking about how when we meet Adam, Cain’s father, in 15x17:Unity,  he says all this about Chuck/God:

ADAM

God's "first story," yeah. Jumped through every hoop, talked to every snake. When he kicked us out of paradise, Eve and me, we figured, eh, we deserved it. Then he moved on... to our sons.

...

JACK

You hate him.

ADAM

Oh, no. I've been wanting this for going on 300,000 years. Took me that long to figure out how to do it, too.

JACK

Wait-- killing God is your plan?

**now thinking about Adam’s 300,000 year quest for vengeance on Chuck. but how Adam doesn’t hate Chuck. how there’s no rage in Adam. thinking about why.

NOW THINKING ABOUT HOW LUCIFER WAS THE FIRST BEARER OF THE MARK OF CAIN

HOW CHUCK TOLD LUCIFER HE WAS HIS FAVORITE 

AND THE MARK WAS GIVEN TO HIM BY HIS FATHER WHO USED HIM AS A WEAPON TO IMPRISON AMARA

AND THEN LOCKED HIM UP IN A CAGE WHEN THE MARK CORRUPTED HIM,

MANIPULATING THE STORY SO EVERYONE BELIEVED LUCIFER WAS JUST EVIL 

11x18: Hells Angel

CAS!IFER [smirking]:

It's marketing. He's creating a need in the consumer's mind. Can't be a Super Savior if you don't have a Super Villain.

 ***

thinking about how Lucifer didn’t want to fight Michael in 5x22: Swan Song

LUCIFER/SAM

So why? And why make us fight? I just can't figure out the point. MICHAEL/ADAM

What's your point? LUCIFER/SAM

We're going to kill each other. And for what? One of Dad's tests. And we don't even know the answer. We're brothers. Let's just walk off the chessboard. MICHAEL/ADAM

I'm sorry. I-I can't do that. I'm a good son, and I have my orders. 

***thinking about how Chuck manipulated the two brothers into fighting each other

***DAMMIT NOW THINKING ABOUT AU!MICHAEL AND HOW HE SPENT THE ENTIRETY OF SEASON 14 ASKING THIS QUESTION:

“What do you want?”

***thinking about how angels aren’t supposed to understand how to feel, how to love.  So Lucifer and Michael didn’t understand how to feel, how to love. 

***NOW thinking about how Adam wasn’t vengeful despite wanting to kill Chuck for 300,000 years.  thinking about how Adam had an angel lover named Serafina that entire time. 

JACK (to Dean)

She's an angel.

ADAM

Yeah, she's my old lady. She's the only one who could put up with me all these years, huh?

***REALLY thinking now about how Adam had an angel lover who kept him from going vengeful and murderous, and they just lived happily in love for 300,000 casually plotting to kill God as a side hobby***

NOW thinking about how Cain stopped killing when he met Collette (I won’t go into how she was basically Cain’s angel lover and the Cas/Collette parallel because you should know it by now, and there’s plenty of material out there if you don’t)

****thinking about how our crack-in-his-chassis angel Cas loved Dean. he wasn’t supposed to love, but he did anyway.

how he kept Dean sane for years and years like Seraphina kept Adam sane, how he was Dean’s Collette, how he helped cure him when he was a Demon, how he was the only reason This Dean and This Sam didn’t kill each other in this particular one of Chuck’s worlds, how he pulled Michael out of Dean when Michael eradicated all of Dean’s hope and trapped him -

thinking about how Dean showed Cas how to love because Dean Is Love.

thinking about how Cas loved.

thinking about how his actual confession of love led to this:

Just like Seraphina’s love kept Adam from vengeance, how Collette’s love kept Cain from murder.

THINKING ABOUT how Lucifer didn’t know how to love.  how he wanted to take Jack because he was his son.  how he wanted to be a dad.  how he wanted love.

thinking about Mi!Dam. 

thinking about specifically about “Since when do we get what we deserve?”

thinking about how the Lucifer/Michael fight happened ONLY AFTER CHUCK DISAPPEARED EVERYONE, INCLUDING ADAM - 

thinking about how it was only then that Lucifer and Michael carried  out the story charted for them by their abusive father - because they didn’t have love, Lucifer never having it to begin with and Michael no longer having Adam, the closest thing he would have had to love.  

so yeah, just thinking about that. 

Supernatural Is A Show.  A Show About Love. 

(and daddy issues)

[thisiswhatwereupagainst]

LITTLE KNOWN X-MEN VILLAINS--- THE RAVENS! A hidden race of psychic vampires that walks among humankind!

The Ravens are a group of vampire-like beings who appear in a story in X-Factor #54 and X-Factor #56-58. Their story stars Archangel, whom they try to make into one of their numbers. Like a lot of Marvel vampires, Ravens don’t drink blood (I think there was a Comics Code law against it for awhile or something, which is why so many Marvel vampires or vampire-like beings are energy-suckers instead?) but they do call themselves “vampires” as well as Ravens, as do others, and they have all the same other tropes---they live forever unless killed and the only means of death seems to be beheading or if they fail to keep their number at 24 through converting someone else if one is killed. They can’t be photographed, nor captured on film, and are weaker in sunlight. They can fly or levitate, and they can teleport by transforming into energy or mist (their true form) before reforming in their human shape elsewhere. They have super-strength that comes from the lives of all those that they have consumed, as the process adds the victims strength to their own. As for for they feed on instead of blood, they’re a very specific sort of energy vampire. They feed on the painful memories of human beings, seeking out people who are suffering great mental/emotional anguish from the bad things that happened in their lives, and sucking it out of them. Which would sound great if not for the fact that it KILLS the person and leaves nothing but a skeleton! They can do it partway, though---Azure, for instance, takes the memories from a businessman to get info on the stock market to fund his decadent lifestyle, which doesn’t kill the man but merely gives him a heart attack. The feeding process is traumatic; a mere touch from one was described by Beast as drawing up some of his worst memories as well as “like my soul was burning, like it was draining away into her hands” In order to find the best prey, Ravens can sense pain in others, sensing both a person’s suffering and their strength in their aura. It’s for this reason that Crimson, one of their number, is attracted to Archangel---she wanted a meal of horrible suffering, as well as seeking a warrior’s soul, for she had tired of feeding on the homeless and destitute. Archangel, who was going mad due to hallucinogens he had been exposed to, was reliving the memories of his torment at Apocalypse’s hand as well as other traumas, and this is what made her want to feed on him. But Crimson’s plans go beyond merely devouring Archangel; she manipulates another Raven, Azure, into going after him as a competition. Archangel kills Azure, just as Crimson hoped, which means. . . .the circle is broken. Another way that Ravens differ from traditional vampires is that, as previously mentioned, only 24 of them exist at any time. No more, no less. They spread out over the globe, but concentrate in major cities. There are six in New York alone, and they’re the named ones who star in this story. If one Raven is killed, as mentioned, they’ve got 24 hours to make a new one. And Crimson argues successfully to the others that Archangel should be the new one, that he proved his power and worth by killing Azure. In reality, her plan is that once Archangel is a Raven too, she’s going to use him to kill the others, and then drain him for herself, believing that his pain energy would give her the power to survive despite all the other Ravens dying. Naturally, this did NOT go as planned. Archangel beheaded her with his wings just as he had Azure, and when Cobalt’s head was crushed in the fight with X-Factor, the rest of the Ravens went up in literal smoke due to the circle being shattered beyond repair from too many members dying: “Ravens,-- creatures seemingly of flesh and blood-- implode, dissolve into their true form of shrieking, noxious mist” that shoots up out of the theatre roof en masse and dissipates on the wind. As a note, the ones in this tale are all named after colors (Crimson, Cerise, Cobalt,  Azure) or gems (Ruby, Beryl, Coral). The names are apparently unisex; Cerise and Beryl are used as names for women by humans, but the Ravens who bear those names are male. They also all hate each other, and are extremely petty, jealous, and competitive with one another. And yet, their hatred binds them together, and they will hang out in little packs to hunt with each other, as well as engage in little challenges with each other, such as pursuing the same prey, to pass the ennui of eternity. And killing each other isn’t an option, for previously mentioned reasons. As is common in vampire media, there’s an air of pseudo-bisexuality/homoeroticism/etc in the way that they talk about their prey, because the male Ravens will say things like “he’s not my type at all” or talk about how they wish they could “have” Archangel right now and things like that, and like. . . obviously they are talking about feeding on his energy, but the phrasing out of context sounds sexual if you don’t know that. The “Lesbian Vampire” trope actually does get averted for the female Ravens, but that’s probably just because this story happens to focus on a male target. And Crimson herself, despite her appearance of being the “seducer” type vampire lady, doesn’t really do that with Archangel---she never flirts with him or rubs on him or anything, nor ever seems like she’s actually attracted to anything but Archangel’s power and energy, and I like that. That said, her dialogue is fantastically campy AND vampy, saying/thinking things like  “I will use his fascination for things dark and deadly to bind him to me” But what I like most of all about them is, like so many vampires, they are DRAMATIC AS FUCK. They kidnap Archangel to make him one of them in a dark ritual and they do it in an abandoned, decaying theatre and STRAP HIM TO AN UPSIDE-DOWN ANKH while they chant in ancient long-dead languages and they drag Charlotte Jones towards him to be a human sacrifice as his first victim AN UPSIDE DOWN ANKH IN A DECAYING THEATRE Like. How Goth can you get? I love it. I love them. Ridiculous. I think the Ravens are really cool, and I like to think that the ones NOT involved in this story are still out there, despite the implication that the deaths of this bunch caused the circle to “shatter beyond repair” and that the others around the globe went up in literal smoke too. I like to think they didn’t though, that they made new Ravens, and twenty-four of them are out there still. I’ve also got a wild headcanon that they might be an offshoot of mutantkind descended from Selene. They’re not just energy vampires like her, they specifically take the memories of their prey, and part of Selene’s energy vampirism was that she too had the remember the entire life of those she absorbed. It doesn’t seem too wild to me to think that the first Ravens might have been her children or descendants, ancient as they are implied to be, and evolved into these completely new creatures over the long centuries who could convert others into their kind. We’ve actually seen that before---Bishop once stated that in his future there were a group called the Emplates, who resembled Emplate (another vampire-like mutant) and preyed on mutants. Since later it was discovered that Emplate can "infect" another individual with his powers, it makes sense that Emplate would be the progenitor of the group from Bishop's timeline. So, maybe it’s the same deal with Selene and the Ravens. To be clear, no connection in canon is ever made between the two, and the Ravens are NOT portrayed as being mutants or related to mutants in any way, but a race unto themselves, I just couldn’t help being reminded of Selene by them, both in how they feed and a lot of the things they say, the cruel and petty personalities they all have, the way they look at mankind, their ancient nature, etc. And like...I think it would make sense! Also:

Bobby: hey girlfriend, what is my type again? of woman? that I like? Opal: It’s me, that’s why we are together, see how that makes sense? Bobby: yes it does that is why I am with you, a woman, who I like I am starting to see why Bendis picked him to be The Gay One

[ghoulciifer]

Hi! I just saw your English exchange student headcanon and I was wondering if you could do a Irish exchange student headcanon? Like she's always messing, having a bit of the craic but one day the bakusquad accidentally eat a load of the food she was sent from her Nana and she just goes off because there's barely any Irish food in Japan and she misses it but bakuboy helps her out! Sorry if this is really specific! I think it would just be gas if that happened 🤣😂 Thank you so much!! 💕💞💗❤️

hc: the bakusquad eats irish!reader’s food from home, but Bakugou comes to the rescue.

tw: none

tags: irish!reader, bakusqaud tomfoolery, bakugou being the tsundere he is

notes: hi anon!! i’m so happy to hear that you enjoyed my british!reader headcanons. this request also required me to do some research because i honestly didn’t understand some of the terms you used AJAHSGAHAJJA again keep in mind i am VERY american so i apologize of any of this is off/inaccurate. also, this ended up being much longer than i intended so it’s not proofread :,) but i still really hope you enjoy!! i know i enjoyed writing it! thank you so much for your submission, and my inbox is still open for asks ❥

» just like i said in my british!reader hc, pretty much all of class 1-A befriended you at some point during your stay at UA, so when you decided to stay in japan it left you with some lifelong friends!

» ESPECIALLY the members of the bakusquad, literally cannot get rid of the fuckers (not that you want to, tho)

» and they absolutely love you! you’re an essential part of their group, they can’t imagine what their lives would have been like without you.

» they especially love that you still value your heritage, and they shut their mouths n’ open their ears every time you talk about it because they’re SO interested (especially bakugou but he won’t admit it ajdhsjahah)

» because you’re so in touch with your roots, you often talk about your family, your childhood, what it was like living there, etc.

» they lowkey feel bad when you get super homesick because they definitely begged you to stay after graduation, but you always reassure them you wouldn’t wanna have it any other way! they’re your home now!

» but it is especially sweet when you receive care packages from home, as much as you love it in japan you still like having a little piece of home with you

» so when your nana sends you snacks, trinkets, and all kinds of random shit she can stuff in a box? you CHERISH that shit

» every now and then you’ll share with your buddies but you NEVER show them your stash, bc you know they’re gonna be selfish especially sero n’ kaminari, stingy bastards

» they love the snacks almost more than you do, swear they’ve never tasted anything better in their lives

» even bakugou’s like “damn this shit IS good”

» but they’re yours! not theirs! it’s your own little secret taste of home that they wouldn’t be able to understand, so you keep that stash on LOCKDOWN

» but... what you didn’t account for was mina’s incredible snooping ability

» while you were on patrol one day, mina was cleaning up around your shared apartment with sero. halfway through doing her laundry she realizes she’s missing one of her favorite sweaters, which you borrowed about a week ago, so by that logic she takes advantage of your absence to go find it

» while she’s shuffling around in your closet something falls and bounces off her massive hair, landing next to her feet and as she investigates she instantly recognizes the packaging

» “SERO!! Y/N HAS MORE OF THOSE HUNKY DORY THINGS!”

» the speed in which sero reached your room rivaled iidas, istg

» “YOU MEAN THOSE GOD TIER CHIPS?”

» she frantically nods and immediately begins searching for more, finding the box you keep buried in the corner of the shelf of your closet

» their eyes are practically bulging out of their heads at the amount of snacks you’ve been hoarding; things they’ve had before, things they’ve never tried, it all looked so beautiful as their mouths instantly began to water

» the rational thing to do in this situation would be to put the box back and ask you about it later, right?

» nope

» they’re quick to call up the rest of the group and before you know it, they’re all surrounding the coffee table staring at a mountain of irish snacks

» bakugou and kirishima are surprisingly the ones trying to convince everyone to not eat them, because you probably had them stored away for a reason

» but after sero shoves a jam mallow into their mouth they’re definitely on board to chow down

» you finally come home after a long day of dealing with bs villains, feet aching, back sore, only to find your idiot friends devouring your sacred snacks

» apparently they never heard you come in because it takes a good minute before kaminari catches your fuming face staring right at him, arms crossed with your brows furrowed into a harsh V

» “so, uh... how was patrol?”

» you lost it

» “Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph could ye be any more stupid, ye feckin’ melter?”

» suddenly all eyes are on you after you begin spewing some very irish insults with very expressive hand gestures, slipping between the two dialects you were fluent in with every angry breath that left your body

» toward the end of your raging you can’t even bring yourself to look at your guilt-ridden friends anymore, so you stomp off to your room and slam the door behind you before locking it

» the silence that follows almost hurts them more than the words you threw at them, and it definitely nearly brought mina and kaminari to tears. but they knew it was because they fucked up

» bakugou eventually grumbles something under his breath before hoisting himself off the floor

» “I’ll be right back, you assholes clean that shit up.”

» about an hour and a half later, after a much needed shower and change of clothes, you finally emerge from your room to grab a quick meal

» you’re still upset, but you at least want to apologize for the not-so-nice words that came out of your mouth during your little fit, so you figure now’s as good a time as any

» so imagine your surprise when you pass through the living room to find a pile of all the snacks you were pissed about missing moments ago

» the bakusqaud is all sprawled out on your sectional in wait for you, and when they see your surprise they jump from their seats to tackle you in a group hug

» apologies are coming in left and right as you giggle between the tangled mess of limbs surrounding you

» of course you forgive them, how could you not?

» as happy as you are at the moment you couldn’t help but wonder how the hell they pulled this off

» everyone catches your confused look and simply points at bakugou, who stuffs his hands in his pockets with a harsh ‘tch’

» “There’s a market across town that sells imported snacks, Deku told me about it weeks ago.”

» you smile uncontrollably at the thought of bakugou being so considerate and being the one to take initiative to right your friends wrongs

» so of course you rush forward to smother him in a hug of his own!

» he pretends not to enjoy it, but the blush covering his cheeks says otherwise 😌

[unicyclehippo]

Prompt if you want it, polymorphed cat/dog!Jester ends up spending the entire hour being fussed over by Beau who has no idea it’s Jester

It had been going really well, you know? And she’s done it dozens of times over now, changing her form or someone else’s so there’s really no trouble to it at all. Or. There shouldn’t have been any trouble to it at all.

Here’s the thing though: she’d been thinking first of all about changing into a big dog, like the ones they’d seen around town, specifically like the one she had seen wandering around on the outskirts of the market, and she had been thinking about that one in particular because it had had a lovely black coat at one point, she could tell because of the snout where it was sleek and black like their sweet and so, so ugly moorbounders, but it had rolled at some point or another in the grey yellow dust here in the city of beasts and so the rest of the coat was now this kind of coarse grey brown, but still a very handsome dog and also very clever because she had seen it wait for the shopkeeper to be distracted before it ran away with a whole fish! And that’s the dog she had been thinking about specifically, only it was just as she was casting it that she kind of wondered if maybe stealth was the thing, you know? And if maybe she should pick a smaller creature, something that would be good at being sneaky, like a cat! Except what if they ate cats around here? She didn’t want to make presumptions or anything but it was called the city of beasts for a reason (probably because of the beasts, let’s be real) and she hasn’t seen any cats around the place except for Frumpkin and as lovely of a cat as he is, he doesn’t count. And so she had gotten stuck, you see, between being a big dog and being a stealthy cat, and when the spell had taken effect she ended up as...this.

She’s not entirely sure what it is. Kind of a dog, kind of a cat. Her fur is mostly a sandy grey, but if she crosses her eyes she can see her about is black (though these eyeballs don’t enjoy crossing as much as her usual eyes) and that her paws are black up to the knees. Of which is has four. That’s a good sign—she’s definitely a creature of some kind. Looking into the smoky, somewhat reflective surface of the brilliant obviously Kryn building she has hidden beside, Jester can see that her form is squat and strong, with the big shoulders of a dog and a narrow cat-like face. Her tail is long and fluffy but the rest of her fur is short and sleek, besides a few tufts on the elbows. Jester spins to gnaw at one of them that dares to tickle and as she does, she can see—not in the poor reflection of the building but with her own eyes—that her fur is spotted and slashed with dark markings, like the patterns on Frumpkin’s coat and she has to laugh, realising that somehow she—or the Traveller—had turned her into some mix of a dog and a cat. The laugh surprises her, the way it feels in a creatures body—in a dog she might have whined, a cat might’ve flicked their tail, but this creature laughs a snickering high pitched laugh that seems oddly familiar, but Jester can’t quite place it.

It seems smart enough of a creature, luckily, and Jester trots out from the alley to find her friends. It takes no small amount of time—not because she has lost them but because the world is extraordinary like this. It unfolds around her in a hundred new and novel and wonderful scents—ones she might ordinarily have dismissed as bad, like the almost rotting fish and the manure shovelled from the stalls with buzzing flies working around them, aren’t bad. They’re interesting, complicated, and Jester has to keep reminding herself that she’s looking for something.

Right! Her friends!

Had they wandered off? Or had she?

She lopes back to the same alley, sure now that she had disappeared out the opposite end she had entered, and revels in the power in this creature—the lean, stocky form hosts powerful muscles that bunch and push and quickly she has eaten up the distance back to the alley and dashed through it—right into the legs of a human, who smells of sweat and dried blood, old meat and leather, of dry bark and dust.

‘Whoa, holy shit! Oh fuck—it’s—Fjord, pull me away, oh fuck,’

‘It’s not attacking you, relax.’

The human—Beau, of course—is accompanied by Fjord. He smells—and Jester knows this because she goes up to him and sniffs, entranced by everything her nose is telling her—he smells of the sea, still, despite their not having been back for weeks. His scent is heavy with brine, washing away most of any other scent that might stick to him, and she finds herself growling, not out of anger but of frustration. She wants to know!

‘Whoa, okay, nice doggy,’ Fjord yelps.

‘Ha! She hates you, Fjord, suck it!’

‘Ha ha, yes, very funny—now help me.’

‘Okay, okay, yeesh.’ Something soft wafts down before Jester’s face, grey and floaty, and she snaps out at it with interest. Before she can snag it, it is pulled below her and wraps neatly around her collar before rushing closed. A leash, Jester thinks, and as this creature, she rolls over and starts trying to gnaw at the fabric. Beau stands above her, a look of clear amusement on her face. ‘Aw, look at you, you’re cute! Hardly vicious at all, are ya?’ She rubs at the creatures belly with a foot, pulls it back with a bark of a laugh when the creature bites playfully. ‘You must have an owner or something. We could look for them while we’re looking for Jes,’ she says to Fjord, who agrees. ‘Also, she’s not a dog. She’s a hyena.’

‘Huh?’

‘She’s a hyena. They’re cool. Kinda weird, but cool. Matriarchal societies. Super powerful olfactory systems. Strong bite. Probably one of the coolest creatures that exist.’

Jester scrambles to her feet. She can feel her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth, which has opened into a big grin—it must be scary, coming from a toothy beast like a hyena, but Beau doesn’t seem scared. Properly wary, for sure, but fascinated. Carefully, she reaches out a hand toward her and when Jester allows her to put a hand on her square, furred head, she hears a low,

‘Whoa. Very cool,’ from the other girl.

‘Looks like we won’t be looking for the owner, huh?’

‘I mean. It’d be super wrong. To steal someone’s hyena. When we’re trying to help out the place,’ Beau says, haltingly, clearly eager to take the creature and book it. ‘But if we just happen not to find the owner...’

‘Great. A dying weasel and a terrifying hyena. Perfect.’

//

Fjord and Beau make a great team. Jester already knew that, but to see them in action without having to take part is something special. Fjord butters up a few people. Threatens a few more with a surprisingly cold and terrifyingly genial demeanour.

Beau cracks her knuckles a few times, or backs him up in such a way that it’s like watching a good play, seeing them bounce increasingly horrifying threats between one another before lobbing one them at the person they’re interrogating.

Jester likes to think having a hyena sat at the humans feet helps too.

It’s getting near to the end of her hour, she’s pretty sure, when a fur-clad individual—half elven, maybe, with the wine dark skin of a dark elf—approaches with a toothy smile.

‘Ah,’ they sigh, ‘I see you found my majestic creature. How good of you to bring them back to me.’

The half-elf smells of dozens of creatures, and of some sharp chemical scent that makes Jester want to growl and back up, hackles raised.

‘Weird. Doesn’t look like she wants to go with you.’

‘It matters little if the creature wants to go with me,’ they say, in the way someone might speak to a child. If that person were, you know, a villain. ‘I bought them, they are mine.’

‘Got some papers to prove that?’ Fjord asks, accent a deeply fake drawl once more. ‘Friend,’ he tacks on, unfriendly like.

‘Papers, of course. I have them in my shop, around the corner. If you come with me, we can sort this out with no drama necessary.’

It’s obvious it’s rubbing Fjord the wrong way, and Beau has a hand buried into the scruff of the hyena’s neck possessively, suspicion and upset rolling off her scent in waves.

It could all be fixed, Jester knows, by transforming back into herself—but doing so even in a private area of the market would risk too many eyes on them, could be taken as a threat.

She growls, deep in her throat. Feels Beau scratch reassuringly at her beck, behind one of her ears. Jester flicks that ear and hunches down, starts to step slowly back toward an alley. Beau’s hand tightens and then loosens and when Jester pulls mightily away, she sees with some amazement and pride that Beau pretends rather remarkably to be a clown and an annoyance, pretending very well to fall when Jester runs, and then tripping the fur-coated poacher, as Jester guesses him to be.

The sounds of an argument rise up loud behind her as she sprints away, and the magic strips from her bit by bit until she is an ordinary tiefling once more. For an instant, the world seems a little dull—her hearing dulled, her sense of smell a fraction of what it had been—and then she sees the blue sky and, returning to the street, the blue of Beau’s coat, and the green and purple in Fjord’s clothes, and is happy to realise she can see colours again.

With the hyena missing and nowhere to be found, Jester and Fjord are able to diffuse the argument—though none of them like the way the poacher looks at Beau like they’d like to take her in the hyena’s place, a human rarity—and they hurry her back to the quarters awarded them by the lady of Asarius, meeting with their friends who had returned not but ten minutes earlier. Fjord tells them all about their largely unproductive afternoon, ending with a fight over the hyena—

‘It was Jester,’ Beau tells him.

‘What?’

‘The hyena. It was Jester, right?’ She crooks a grin over to her. ‘I mean, the hyena disappears and Jester finds us a hot second later? Too much of a coincidence.’

Under Fjord’s surprised attention, Jester plucks at her skirts and curtsies, fakes a blush. ‘Oh well, you’re welcome, yes, it was me,’

‘Holy shit!’

‘I know, right?’

‘Holy cow!’

‘Yah. Yeah. My thoughts exactly,’ Beau and Fjord say to one another, and Jester can’t help but grin under the attention. If she notices—and she does—that Beau’s eyes remain focused on her for long after Fjord’s attention is recalled, she doesn’t make a comment on it just yet.

‘You did great today,’ Beau tells her later, as they climb the stairs to their room.

‘I mean,’ Jester laughs. ‘I got lost at first.’

‘Yeah but it all worked out so... you did great.’

‘I guess so! Sucks we couldn’t find out who is doing that plot thing the author totally is interested in.’

‘Yeah, we’ll definitely pick that up tomorrow so it’ll be fine, though.’

‘Right.’ Jester nods. ‘They can smell super good,’ she tells Beau. ‘Hyenas. I could smell, like, everything, it was pre-tty wild.’

‘Oh yeah?’

‘Mhm.’

‘That’s fuckin’ dope.’

‘I can turn you into one, if you want. I have one left.’

Beau’s eyes light up, but she shakes her head. ‘Another time. Maybe tomorrow, if we’re still hanging around the city. That’d be cool. Quick question, hopefully not weird—more of a comment than a question I guess but it wasn’t, like, weird that I was patting you, was it? Because I don’t want. To be weird.’

‘I mean, you’re being pretty weird now,’ Jester points out, because Beau isn’t quite stuttering but it sounds like she’s punching out the words through sheer force of will.

‘Okay, okay, fair,’

‘But I don’t mind. And didn’t mind.’

‘Okay.’

‘You’re still being weird, Beau,’

‘Yeah, it’s just because you’re like, super powerful and cool and brilliant and hyena’s are one of my favourite animals. Not that you knew that. It was like, one of those things where we had to research for hours in the archives when I was first starting out and I hated it but I read a whole compendium of animals from start to finish and now I’m rambling and,’

‘Is it because you’re covering for the fact that you called me cool and brilliant?’ Jester teases, and she isn’t sure what to do with herself when Beau grimaces and her cheeks burn with sudden colour. She doesn’t lie, or deny it. Which is. So so weird. And cool. And great, maybe. ‘I think you’re super powerful too,’ she blurts out, because she’s supposed to say something, and when Beau waves that away Jester frowns. ‘Really! And cool and so smart and you have beautiful hair and, and—‘

Oh Traveller, she remembers saying those words before, and the fluttering in her belly isn’t new but it is a lot more noticeable now. Beau laughs, smiles. Winks. Blows her a kiss, like she had that last time, obviously remembering the same moment. Jester flushes. Stammers for a second before pulling the door to their room open—stopping. Pushing the door to their room open.

[amplesalty]

Christmas 2019: Day 1 - Anna and the Apocalypse (2017)

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...

A burning Christmas tree!

And the angel said unto them, fear not for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day another marathon of Christmas related movies and TV specials. As is tradition, we start by saying what a tradition it is to start the month with a horror. As we shall come to see, a not as serious Christmas Horror movie this time. Well, having said that, Silent Night Deadly Night is pretty silly at times. My horror tastes have a tendency to lean towards the silly anyway and I did do all 31 days this year so there’s perhaps less of a need to make up for lost time by extending it over in Christmas. Look, stop going on about it, it’s Anna and the Apocalypse.

It makes for a fairly obvious choice to open proceedings, it’s a Christmas zombie movie. What more do you want? Well, how about a musical? Yeah, this is like Nativity crossed with Shaun of the Dead. Or more appropriately, High School Musical crossed with Shaun of the Dead. Or, as the marketing goes with, La La Land crossed with Shaun of the Dead. I think that movie is cursed to be forever associated with anything vaguely zombie related and comedic. It’s like the new ‘It’s Die Hard but…’

Anyway, we start with the eponymous Anna on her way to school with her bestie, John, and her dad who is the janitor at the school. This is meant to be a British film, I think you’ll find it’s caretaker, lousy Americanisation. I think this is more specifically Scottish made actually, whole bunch of English people around mind you but there’s a few Scots mixed in as well. I feel like there was a lot of Scottish made kids shows when I was growing up, I dunno if they just get good investment up there or if it’s like a tax or lottery thing or something?

There’s a total Michelle Keegan thing going on with the girl who plays Anna, not a bad thing since she is one of the most desirable women in the world.

The real star of the show here though is Paul Kaye as Mr Savage, a jobsworth assistant headmaster who we first meet warning off one of the students, Steph, who is running a piece on the school blog about the local homeless problem. Mr Savage points out that the local council set their budgets so it’s probably best if she drops the whole thing. When she threatens to go over his head to the more soft touch headmaster, we learn that he’s retiring next month and Mr Savage is taking over and things are going to be a lot different around here. Kaye is hamming it up a bit as Savage but in a more reserved way? He pretty much delivers every line in this very hushed but stern tone, it’s like he’s a villain in a cheap action film but he’s really just a teacher at a small school in Scotland.

We very quickly get our opening number ‘Break Away’, dealing with the problems that Anna, Steph and John are dealing with. Anna wants to get out of this town and see the world, John has an unrequited love for Anna and Steph feels abandoned by her parents who are on the other side of the world. It’s a powerful song that talks about wanting to be more and the girl playing Steph is really giving it socks and emoting. I don’t think they’re dubbing their voices or anything so fair play to her. They even work in some lyircs that tie into the whole zombie thing; “As I wake half dead in this same old bed at the dawn of another day”. It does catch you off guard though when you’re not expecting a musical.

This would work well as one of those deceptive genre bending movies you could trick someone into watching and be like ‘Boom, zombies!’ halfway through. At the very start there’s a radio piece that kinda spells it out before it’s cut off midsentence that talks about a supposed super flu that has now being discovered to cause ‘reanima-‘. But there’s little nods here and there otherwise that make it sort of cute like those lyrics or people theatrically clawing at a wall like a zombie.

The songs in the Christmas show don’t quite match up. They’ve probably got that whole non-demoninational thing to adhere to where they can’t sing about Jesus so instead they’ve got two break dancing penguins dancing to a fish rap. Yes, fish rap. “My favourite dish is fish, mother flipper, and I eat it for the hell of it!”

Then there’s Lisa’s song which is basically an attempt to seduce Santa. Think ‘Santa Baby’ but a bit more explicit. Like, she invites Santa over to ‘empty his sack’ at one point, that sort of thing. Then you have a bunch of backing dancers who are all topless and wearing short shorts. This is a high school production, right? Seems a bit risqué. Mr Savage seems to agree so too, though at first it just cuts to him saying ‘Filthy....salacious...’ whilst pulling these funny faces, almost like he’s getting some illicit thrill from all this. Thankfully he ends that thought with ‘and it must be stopped!’ before storming off.

Going back to the zombie movie in disguise thought, when we finally do get the zombies, the movie still plays dumb to the whole thing by having Anna and John walking to school whilst performing a musical number (Turning My Life Around) where they say they’re ‘miles away’ whilst being totally oblivious to the carnage unfolding behind them. This rather disturbingly includes a zombie eating the contents of a pram. It’s an amusing scene, the juxtaposition of this bright, upbeat song and these two cheery characters with no knowledge of all the death and destruction behind them. The song has a similar message to ‘Break Away’ but looked at from a slightly different perspective, much more optomistic and poppy.

Mr Savage’s breakout moment comes when everyone gets trapped in the school after the outbreak and they hear of evacuation plans that call for them to stay put and await the arrival of the army. The headmaster seems to be out of the picture and he revels in taking charge. But, when days past with no contact, everyone wants to head out and Savage has a bit of a run in with Anna’s Dad. Savage snaps before sulking off in a corner muttering that this is his school now, hearing zombies clattering at the door and seemingly having a ‘lightbulb above the head’ moment. I’ve made comparisons before to Dead Rising and how the proper movies based on it missed the ‘psycho’ characters. This right here is a psycho character, that sense of a rather mundane character being pushed over the edge in this apocalyptic situation. I’m thinking specifically here of the supermarket worker in the first game who thinks you’re looting and tries to run you down with his adapted trolley that has a bunch of pointy things stuck on it whilst screaming ‘THIS IS MY STOOOOOOOOOOORE!!!’.

Speaking of looting, Anna’s dickbag ex shows up to help her and her friends out of a jam with a trolley full of toys he’s ‘found’. Him and his friends arm themselves to take out a nearby hoard but I feel like only two of them are actually trying. He has his baseball bat and another guy puts knives in his hands like they’re Wolverine claws. I don’t know how useful knives are going to be, especially wielded like that, but at least he’s making a better effort than the other two who have a video game controller used like a mace and the last guy who has two watermelons. Okay, so we see a vaguely similar situation to this earlier in the movie in a bowling alley where someone squishes a zombies head in between two bowling balls so maybe that’s what this guy was thinking? Well, A) I don’t think that’s going to work with watermelons and 2) say it does, that’s only going to work once with watermelons because they’re going to explode. What’s your secondary plan once they’re done with? At least the guy with the bat can keep on swinging it.

This is the lead in to the ex’s song ‘Soldier at War’ which is really good as well. Between the delivery of the song and the way it’s acted physically, there’s this kind of sultry, seductive thing going on? Apparently Rocky Horror Picture show was an inspiration for this movie and I definitely get a Dr. Frank-N-Furter vibe from this.

They all eventually fight their way back to the school only to find Savage is just calmly eating his Christmas dinner. He points them in the direction of their parents, only to lock them in a room full of zombies. He even gets a villain song as they all struggle to survive, basically summarising that for too long he’s been held down but now it’s his time. There’s a fast paced energy to the song and, at the risk of making another Shaun of the Dead comparison, having it cut to shots of the kids fighting off the horde and the fact that it’s called ‘Nothing’s Gonna Stop Me Now’ makes me wonder if this wasn’t a conscious nod to the big climax at The Winchester.

Things come to a head when Anna tries to track down her Dad, only to find him tied up with Christmas lights on the stage with Mr Savage waiting for some sort of final showdown. I say showdown, it’s more a duet with Anna fighting off zombies and Mr Savage prancing about on stage trying on top hats and wrapping himself in tinsel like they’re cheap feather boas and he’s a fifty pence tart. There is a bit of fisticuffs between Mr Savage and Anna’s Dad in the end though and there’s even a call back to a moment from the start of the movie to serve as the final blow which is neat.

I was a little taken aback upon the revelation that this was a musical but it turned out to be really good fun. Just a really cool mix of genres with some good songs that are complimented at times with on screen theatrics. For the zombie portion of it, there’s some creative kills in one portion of the movie in the bowling alley but otherwise it resorts to blunt force trauma in order to ‘destroy the brain’. But the kills can be suitably over the top with a lot of blood splatter so that all adds to the cheese factor it’s got going on. It’s a suitable addition to the Christmas Horror or even just comedy-horror sub genres.

[geneticmisfit]

Okay, so, I had posted this before, but it was during my Identity Crisis and Waning Muse so it didn’t really stick. Not anymore. Basically RIP to MCU canon but we’re doing things differently here. 

Below you will find a numerous canon rewrites from Peter’s highschool years up to his post-graduation days, incorporating elements from the MCU movies, tv shows and games. No specific mentions on relationships and other characters unless it is necessary to the Narrative, because a lot of that tends to be extremely thread and partner based. We got it? Good.

ANYWAY ON WITH THE SHOW:

HIGH SCHOOL:

Freshman Year

-DECEMBER OF 2015 -Gains his powers after being bitten by a radioactive spider during a class trip to Doctor Curt Connors’ lab in Empire State University. -Spends the Christmas Break discovering and learning about his abilities, makes his First Suit out of some old pajamas.

-JANUARY 2016

-Being a kid and wanting to make a quick buck with his abilities, he enters a wrestling competition against Crusher Hogan.

-It’s the classic wrestling origin. Peter gets swindled out of money, a burglar steals money from the fight manager, Peter lets the Burglar go out of anger and spite for the manager. -Uncle Ben is murdered, Peter goes after the assailant and is horrified to discover it is the same Burglar he had let go earlier. -When you do the things that I can, but you don’t, and then the bad things happen, they happen because of you. -Guilt stricken, he realizes the importance of Power and Responsibility and starts to fight crime, initially stopping small crimes, petty robberies, etc.

MARCH TO JUNE 2016:

-Rumors of an Insectoid-Man spread quickly throughout the underworld, it is initially believed to be a Lie made by crooks who want to dodge blame, but more and more YouTube videos of a man in a red and blue pajamas doing extraordinary feats quickly kills that possibility. -At the recommendation of his teachers, Peter starts interning at Connors’ Lab in ESU, it allows him to get a closer look at the kind of spiders that bit him, and leads him to discover that the irradiated spiders are a project Connors is working on under the funding of Oscorp. -During his crime fighting, he unknowingly halts several of The Big Man’s jobs. -Frequently swings into and stops the crimes of Alex O’Hirn and Flint Marko. -He runs into his first Out of the Ordinary Bad Guy when he ends up fighting Stilt-Man, instead of going for his legs he just punches him out cold.

CIVIL WAR INCIDENT - JUNE 26TH 2016

This is where the first of the several big canon rewrites comes in. For starters, the Airport Fight happens in New York instead of Germany, and Tony does not recruit Peter for his cause or give him the new suit. What happens is as follows,

-Peter sees the news of The Winter Soldier’s attack on United Nations. ( For the purposes of this rewrite, let’s say Bucky gets extradited to the U.S. for interrogation and trial and he is held in the same SHIELD base Steve woke up from his coma or whatever ) -Peter and Ned argue about Spider-Man not going for Stilt-Man’s legs during their fight. -Hearing the news of JFK suddenly closing down and rumors of people spotting ‘Very Serious Government People’ , Peter puts the two and two together and leaves abruptly, heading to the Airport in hopes of ‘Auditioning’ for the Avengers, because that’s what you do when you are a 15 year old with superpowers. -Beginning of the airport fight and Steve and Tony’s argument happens the same, majority of the fight happens the same way. -Peter, as Spider-Man, jumps into the fray during the Line Up. He immediately swings to Tony’s side because Iron Man is the hero he idolizes the most at that point in time. -Tony and Peter banter, with Tony not wanting a kid there and Peter being a dumbass kid and wanting to impress Tony. -Peter does not fight Steve, he is only there to take down Bucky and Prove His Mettle as a superhero. -The entire sequence with Bucky and Sam versus Spidey happens as shown. -Seeing Giant-Man appear and grumbling himself about the whole Stilt-Man argument still, Peter realizes he can go for Scott’s legs to take him down and does the whole AT-AT takedown move. -Gets knocked back onto the ground like in the movie, Tony goes to check on him to make sure this dumbass kid didn’t get himself killed, seeing he is alive and well, Tony is impressed but he tells Peter to go home. -Bedroom scene occurs as a post-credits scene, it becomes less about Tony recruiting Peter to his side and more about figuring out what the deal with this Spider-Man Kid is, leaves the suitcase with the Stark Suit as he leaves, says they’ll be in touch.

HOMECOMING - END OF AUGUST - SEPTEMBER 23RD 2016 / SOPHOMORE YEAR

-Peter turns sixteen in August 10th. -The movie happens largely the same -a Film by Peter Parker and the Limo Conversation naturally doesn’t happen considering the afromentioned changes to Civil War. -Tony does not save Peter from drowning, Peter gets out of the lake on his own.     Reason for this change is that this scene makes Tony way controlling and uncaring towards Peter? Which, compounded by the following scenes, really paints Tony in an awful light. It also makes it more impactful that the next time, and thus the first time, Peter properly interacts with Tony since Civil War is in the direct aftermath of the Ferry Fiasco when Tony comes to collect the suit. They are then both valid in their arguments in that Peter has let the Stark Suit’s abilities get to his head and act way reckless than he should, ( Stark Suit thus serving the same narrative purpose as the Symbiote Suit ) but it also makes Peter valid in that Tony has been completely ignoring Peter ( at least on the surface / from Peter’s point of view ) until it was too late. -Rest of the movie unfolds as shown. -Toomes is Peter’s first proper Super Villain.

OCTOBER 2016 - MAY 2017

-Toomes’ arrest causes his Alien Weapons empire to fracture and for alien tech to be more readily available to the highest bidder ( In the movie it seems like Toomes really wanted the sales to be more gradual and under the radar ) -Shocker breaks away from Toomes’ crew and ends up joining the Enforcers, working for Hammerhead, who works as the Right Hand Man for The Big Man. -Spidey’s encounters with the Enforcers leads Peter to learn about the existence of The Big Man. -Phineas Mason is still at large, Peter dubs him ‘ The Tinkerer behind Toomes ’ toys ’ because he does not directly know who he is but highly suspects his existence. -A Mysterious Benefactor starts bankrolling experiments for Super Mercs, armed with the alien tech, with the, initial, goal of ‘distracting’ Spider-Man from the Finer details of The Big Man’s organization (if he’s too busy fighting Super Villains, he’d be too busy to stop Illegal Shipments ya kno). -Alex O’Hirn undergoes the procedure to become the Rhino, having the experimental alien armor fused to his skin, and only able to perspirate through his face. It is due to this fact Peter manages to take him down the first time, ‘ overheating ’ him to get him to pass out. -During this incident, Spidey gets Rhino to spill the identity of the Big Man, one L. Thompson Lincoln, aka Tombstone. -It is also during this time Spidey has his first run-in with Captain George Stacy. -He goes to visit Tombstone to tell him he knows about him, promptly gets his ass kicked and high-thwips it out of there.

THANOS INCIDENT - MAY 2017

Welcome to the Big Canon Rewrite Number Two, here, Peter does not go to Titan. First part of his appearance happens as shown, with Peter seeing the giant Q ship up in the sky and sneaking out of the bus to help Tony and co. fight the Aliens, but after losing Strange to the ship’s tractor beam, he stays on Earth and helps with the clean-up in the aftermath. Maybe even bumping into a few Defenders while doing so wink wink nudge. As a result, he does not get the Iron Spider-Man suit, sorry Marvel’s toy department.

ENDGAME - DATE UNKNOWN

Okay here’s the deal, it literally does not matter how long it has been since they’ve been blipped. Literally anyone important to a plot has been Conveniently Snapped, only reason there is a five year jump is so they can age Cassie so she can become Stature in Ant Man 3, and have Tony have a family for the Drama of it. Literally that’s the only reason, there is a reason why Far From Home makes a joke out of it. So for the purposes of sanity, let’s just say they were snapped throughout the duration of the summer and they conveniently get brought back at the beginning of the school year. -This means Peter is a part of the Final Fight but in his Stark Suit instead of the Iron Spidey suit, he also does not activate Instant Kill (why the FUCK would he, Russos!!!!!) I don’t care either way about the hug, so that’s up in the air, but he definitely does not cling onto Tony’s body lmfao nah. It is nevertheless very upsetting and near-traumatic for him to see someone die in front of him (again!)

JUNIOR YEAR

SEPTEMBER - DECEMBER 2017

-Peter is now seventeen. -And he’s got PTSD like a motherfucker lmfao. -Getting turned into dust and coming back has everyone rattled, so the Criminal Underworld is working overtime. - Captain Stacy comes to Midtown to teach about Criminology, and also to keep an eye on his kid considering the circumstances. -Silvio ‘Silvermane’ Manfredi, head of the Maggia, is also due to be released on parole by the end of the year, so various Mob factions are trying to prepare themselves. -As a result, schematics to make more Rhino-like people hit the market, Spidey and O’Hirn actually end up teaming-up together to destroy the schematics, resulting in a three way fight between them, Hammerhead, and the Manfredi mob. -Hammerhead’s recent repeated failures shakes Tombstone’s faith in him. -The Enforcers get fancy schmancy Combat Enhancement Suits, courtesy of The Tinkerer, and Spidey has to deal with them. -Hammerhead stops the Enforcers’ getaway attempt in secret, signaling a rift between him and Tombstone. -Manfredi is released right before Christmas.

JANUARY 2018

-The Gang War™ begins in full force. -Spidey’s hands are full navigating the powder keg of a situation, with Tombstone and Manfredi vying for control, with Hammerhead planning something behind the scenes.

FEBRUARY 14TH 2018 -Hammerhead arranges a meeting of the factions in Metropolitan Opera House, without Tombstone’s knowledge. -Once revealed, Tombstone does not take kindly to this disobedience. -Hammerhead reaches his breaking point and attacks Tombstone. -Silvermane decides to take both of them out to eliminate the competition fully. -Silvermane, in a mechanical combat suit of his own (because comics bebey) attacks Tombstone and Hammerhead, resulting in a three way fight. -Spidey arrives and has to fight the three of them. -After a long and exhausting battle, Spidey prevails, Silvermane is arrested once again, L. Thompson Lincoln is publicly revealed to be The Big Man of Crime, and Hammerhead is nowhere to be found. -Tombstone posts bail, but Captain Stacy tells Spidey that his crime empire is crippled and there is a power vacuum. One that a certain Wilson Fisk will take advantage of soon.

LATE FEBRUARY - JUNE 2018

-Spidey is basically doing clean-up duty in the aftermath of the Gang War™ -He is trying to find where Hammerhead is, but comes up empty. -All Spidey can find are the rumors that he went back to his old employment under the Maggia. -He takes down last of the known Manfredi fronts before preparing for his Europe trip (it’s the restaurant fight from the FFH trailers)

FAR FROM HOME - JUNE 2018 -Happens largely the way it is depicted in the movie -He does not have the Iron Spider Suit still, in case you forgot. -Smaller differences being Peter being pegged the ‘New Iron Man’ less because of his ‘Mentorship’ under Tony and more because people are just fucking desperate for a new Big Hero, which is where Mysterio comes in. -He sees Ben’s grave instead of Tony’s during the Mysterio Fun Tour of Trauma, Zombie Iron Man still comes out of it tho because Symbolism ( not because Tony is a new Uncle Ben figure, but because it represents Peter not always being able to save everyone, even though Tony’s condition was out of his hands.) -BIGGEST DIVERGENCE: Unless plotted, I generally DO NOT recognize Peter’s identity being outed. There are two options / variations I could go with                    -Peter IS claimed to be Spider-Man, but after a Movie’s worth of adventures, he enlists the help of either a skrull or Chameleon (Dmitri the Bus Driver in FFH) to have Spidey appear in the same room as Peter and re-establishes his secret identity.                    -Mysterio just brands Spider-Man as a menace and that’s that. In any case, this leads to..

SENIOR YEAR

SEPTEMBER - DECEMBER 2018

-Peter turns eighteen. -Branded as a menace, Spider-Man is now disliked and hunted by most authorities. -Captain Stacy, however, does not believe Mysterio and is one of Spidey’s few friends still left in the police force. -He also makes numerous remarks towards Peter and Spider-Man that suggests he figured out his secret identity on his own. -Anastasia Kravinoff arrives in New York with the intention of Hunting Spider-Man. -At the same time, Mac Gargan is hired by The Mysterious Benefactor to undergo the Super Merc procedure to hunt Spider-Man. -Kraven has her first encounter with Spidey, in which she manages to tear off a piece of his suit that she later uses to track his scent. -Mr Harrington’s class trip to Bronx Zoo is promptly ruined when Kraven shows up tracking Spidey’s trail. -The publicized skirmish in the Zoo attracts the attention of Gargan, now in a mechanical suit with a long, poison-tipped tail, stylized after Gargan’s favorite arthropod, which easily earns him the nickname ‘Scorpion’. -Spidey manages to escape, but barely. -It all comes to a head in New York Botanical Garden is a totally epic final showdown. -Maybe Rhino gets involved too and it’s a full on Survival of the Fittest in the jungle. -Peter gets stung by the poison tail but manages to shake it off. -He gets speared in the thigh at least once during the battle. -Scorpion and Rhino get imprisoned in the Vault, Kravinoff gets arrested as well but she posts bail and gets out scot free because she’s got Powerful Connections™

JANUARY - MAY 2019

-Doctor Connors achieves a breakthrough on his Cross-Species formula -He tests it on himself, and initially achieves great results by regrowing his arm. -Over the following weeks, however, more and more side effects start to show by patches of green scales on his skin, increased aggression and hostility and occasional lapses in intelligence. -Around March, he has his first Lizard transformation. -Peter suspects it’s Connors, but he does not figure it out until April. -With each transformation, Connors stays as Lizard longer and longer. -I am basically ripping off the plot of the first TASM movie. -Peter and Gwen manage to synthesize an antidote. -Connors has a similar goal as to his movie counterpart, but he decides to Unleash the Lizard virus on top of Empire State Building. Because a) King Kong reference with Lizard climbing the antenna, and b) Connor going from Empire State University to Empire State Building, it’s a fun progression. -Spidey and Lizard fight on top of Empire State, with George Stacy coming to Spidey’s aid. -Spidey manages to administer the antidote to the Lizard, reverting him back to Connors who retains no memories of his actions as the Lizard. -Stacy gets injured by Lizard and before succumbing to his injuries, tells Peter to keep Gwen safe and ‘out of it’. -Lizard’s true identity remains unknown to the public, but Connors decides to relocate his family to Florida to get away from the noise of the city. Before leaving, he tells Peter to seek out his old colleague Otto Octavius if he wants to further his studies.

END OF MAY 2019

-Peter Parker graduates Midtown School of Science and Technology. -He applies and is accepted by Empire State University. Peter does not consider any other college as he wants to stay in New York for obvious reasons.

FRESHMAN UNDERGRAD

SEPTEMBER - DECEMBER 2019

-Peter is nineteen. -He starts his studies in ESU -He is still not the Most Popular -Peter reconnects with Harry Osborn (they are Old Childhood friends and Harry used to be in Midtown for the first year but then he went to Europe, as you do.) -Spidey is still branded as a menace and hunted, though not as ferociously as before as the public’s opinion starts to turn positive ever so slowly. -The Mysterious Benefactor has Alistair Smythe build robotic spiders to hunt and slay the Spider. Like Spider Slayers. Catchy name huh. -Peter has various encounters with Slayers while trying to figure out who is behind them -He eventually discovers it’s Alistair Smythe and tracks him to Oscorp. -Smythe unleashes the Ultimate Spider-Slayer, The Black Widow to try and stop Spidey once and for all. -Fight spills to the power plant, an Oscorp employee who is currently working on the plant, Max Dillon, gets caught in the crossfire and gets electrocuted. -Spidey manages to take down Smythe, Dillon is hospitalized. -Norman Osborn publicly denounces and distances himself from Smythe ( he’s The Mysterious Benefactor if you haven’t caught on yet ) -Norman profits both from making Super Mercs and Spider-Hunters for various factions behind the scenes, and for building housing units to hold said Super Mercs and Spider-Hunters, Vault is his creation. -He is also a terrible dad, but he does genuinely care for Harry, go figure. -Harry starts taking Gloublin Green, an experimental enhancer, to boost his academic and athletic life, as his body is regularly failing due to a hereditary disease (NOT the Goblin disease, the one Harry’s mom had in the PS4 game) -Max spends Christmas in the hospital and gradually transforms into Electro. -Black Cat drops in to give her Christmas Greetings by saying the mob is salvaging the parts from Spider-Slayer fights to re-arm themselves, also notifies him to the existence of a new Big Man consolidating power. -Peter thinks it’s Hammerhead, the only loose end from the previous Gang War, and starts his investigation into him. -Peter discovers Hammerhead leads the Maggia now, having quickly climbed through the ranks after the fallout of the last Gang War.

JANUARY - MAY 2020

-Harry joins the ESU football team, his performance enhanced by The Green. -Electro is Born and he’s Angry -He blames Smythe for his condition and tries to attack Oscorp, not knowing that Smythe is imprisoned. -Spidey arrives and fights him, fight eventually spilling to Times Square -Is it obvious I’ve started ripping off TASM 2 yet or…. -Electro is arrested and sent to Ravencroft for rehabilitation. -The news of a new Big Man starts making the rounds. -Harry’s Green Juicing gets bad, he starts blacking out.

SOPHOMORE UNDERGRAD

SEPTEMBER - DECEMBER 2020

-Peter is twenty. -He starts interning for Otto Octavius after Doctor Connors’ suggestion. -Flint Marko returns after a long absence in the streets, Spidey learns that Marko left the life of crime when he fell in love and got married, but returned back into it once he learned his baby was born with a disease and he needed the money for surgery. -Bet you didn’t expect me to rip off Raimi in this. -Marko is offered money to undergo a Super Merc experiment of his own, inspired by the Elementals Mysterio faked back a few years ago. Experiment uses bio-electricity generated by Electro, but it goes ‘wrong’ and Marko is turned to dust. -Sike he can control it, he’s Sandman now. -Spidey and Sandman fight, once Peter learns of his motives, he tries to get him to stop. -Marko is told to stop the movement of an oil tanker so the new Big Man can siphon it dry. -Spidey and Marko fight on the tanker, tanker explodes, Marko expresses remorse for he only wanted the money and not to hurt anyone, so he helps usher the ship crew to safety and contains the explosion, turning into glass due to the heat. -Sandman is presumed deceased, but he survived and just blew away gently in the wind. -Maybe he’s out there somewhere who knows.

JANUARY - MAY 2021 -Norman discovers Harry’s Green Usage, he gets Harry to stop. -Stupid boy drinking the Green instead of inhaling it like his dad did I mean what -Harry discovers the Green exacerbated the progression of his illness. -Spidey meets Yuri Watanabe, who is the lead detective and later Captain who is after the Big Man and the Mob. -Peter discovers the identity of the actual new Big Man, it’s Wilson Fisk, quickly filling the power vacuum after Tombstone’s defeat. -Spidey and Fisk fight, with Fisk seriously injuring Spidey and him having to swing away.

JUNIOR UNDERGRAD

September - December 2021

-Peter is twenty one. -As Harry’s illness progresses more and more, he and Peter’s friendship is strained, Peter is unaware of the illness.   -Norman starts winding down Super Merc experiments as he turns his focus into curing Harry. -He also readies for a mayoral run because he’s nothing if not a multitasker. -Harry wonders if Spider-Man’s abilities can cure him, wants a bit of his blood, Spidey is like ‘ew no wtf’ -Great Harry hates Spidey now. -Desperate, Harry springs Electro out of Ravencroft to sic him on Spidey and make him bleed. -Electro is like ‘Sure’ but once freed, he immediately goes to the Vault to try and kill Smythe. -You just can’t trust bio-electrical beings nowadays. -Spidey fights Electro in the Vault. -Electro cuts the power to the Vault and releases a bunch of inmates, but Spidey stops him before he can cut the power that holds the more super powered inmates. -Electro is imprisoned in the Vault.

MARCH - MAY 2020 -Yeah Peter had a quiet winter for once can you believe it. -Norman is elected mayor of New York, using his role in the building of the Vault to boost his approval ratings, motherfucker was playing the Long Game. -Norman revives his old genetic experiments to find a cure for Harry. -Devil’s Breath experiment is resurrected. -Harry’s condition worsens, Norman decides to send him to ‘Europe’ to heal. -In truth, Harry is in Oscorp in ‘stasis’. -Spidey’s attention turns yet again to the rising gang activity, he channels his focus into taking down Fisk.

SENIOR UNDERGRAD

SEPTEMBER 2020 - MAY 2021

-Pete turns twenty two. -He spends most of the year working on his thesis like a good nerd. -Spidey is occasionally tipped toward Fisk fronts by a Mysterious Goblinafactor -Norman wanted to bust into the Crime Scene being the Goblin and taking over the Big Man’s turfs but Fisk beat him to it so he has to be content with just being the Mayor for the time being -Goblins am I right. -He’s also the one who supplied Silvermane with his own armor. -Also the one who maaaay have broadened the rift between Hammerhead and Tombstone by sabotaging Hammerhead’s plans behind the scenes. -He is the Big Man behind the Big Men if you will. -Anyway back to Peter -Turns in his thesis, graduates ESU. Strength of his thesis is what convinces Otto to have Peter also come into work with him in the Brand New Octavius Industries. -Norman is content to just play the Mayor and let Fisk be as Spidey and Yuri gather more and more evidence.

POST-GRAD / INSOMNIAC’S SPIDEY STUFF -Events of the game happen broadly the same -Fisk is taken down, Mister Negative enters the scene, Devil’s Breath Incident happens and Spidey gets his ass thoroughly kicked by Sable, etc. etc. -Otto turns into Ock. -Ock facilitates the Vault Breakdown (MCU got a Raft up and running and it ain’t in NYC sooo, Vault it is) and forms the Sinister Six. -However instead of Vulture being part of the Sinister Six, it’s Kraven. She’s back for a proper rematch. -Unless plotted, May does not die from exposure to the virus, she just gets really messed up and hospitalized, but she gets cured later. -Events of the DLC happen largely as shown as well, Hammerhead techs himself up, Yuri goes Wraith, Sable kicks Spidey’s ass again but also grows a Heart. Aw. -Osborn resigns in disgrace, but as luck would have it, Fisk and Li’s arrest leaves a nice Goblin-shaped hole in the criminal underworld for Gosborn to fill. -Norman discovers Harry’s ‘cure’ is sorta sentient.

WILL GORMAN GOSBORN FINALLY FACE OFF WITH SPIDER MAN? WILL SPIDEY LEARN THE REAL MASTERMIND BEHIND EVERYTHING? WILL HARRY GET GOOPED? WILL PETER FINALLY DISCOVER WHY KIDS LOVE THE TASTE OF CAP’N CRUNCH?

ALL THAT AND MORE, NEXT TIME ON, THE SPECTACULAR ADVENTURES OF THE AMAZING SPIDER MAN!

[everbrilliantheartbreaker]

(shows up a week late with Starbucks and Psycho Pass season 3 episode 2 thoughts) //spoilers for eps. 2 and 3 ahead//

Tenma being all surprised and excited about him owning a house in Arata’s example I’m emotional but I suppose he would be. they might have a job and lower level police authority but they’re still prisoners with a life sentence for crimes they never actually committed, with, from the few Enforcers’ rooms we’ve seen in the series, not a ton of their own belongings. I’m sure the idea of owning his own house sounds amazing to Tenma (it’s literally just a hypothetical situation but he gets so offended when Arata says hypothetical him sold it hkhskghs)

fact that there are still yakuza gangs around leaves me with so many questions and episode 3 touches on some of them a little more but no actually 3 didn’t clear anything up I still have a lot of questions so in 3 it’s revealed that the abandoned zones were left in existence on purpose to make it easier to monitor those more likely to commit a crime, because majority of them would self collect in areas that promised more freedom from Sibyl’s eyes but I’m kind of amazed that the yakuza is literally chopping people up and selling the body parts on the black market and Sibyl is just letting it slide?? that bypasses “likely to commit” with a flying leap lmaoo is it because they’re in an abandoned zone where there’s no reception for Sybil’s scanners so maybe Sibyl doesn’t know what they’re up to?? in that case that’s. kind of defeating the purpose of the abandoned zones but when Arata’s explaining this we see police drones positioned outside the borders so??? either Sibyl can monitor the people in the abandoned zones through the drones or there’s no reception > hence the Dominators not working in episode 2 and Sibyl can’t monitor the people living there OR Sibyl knows the yakuza were murdering people and selling their body parts and didn’t do anything about it which is it (how long have there still been yakuza in this Japan? Irie looks around the same age as Akane and Ginoza so that + things we find out about his past imply that this gang, at least, has been around a while which would mean they’ve been around since Akane was very young which means Sibyl’s “perfect” Japan we hear so much about in s1 and 2 was really not that perfect which THEN begs the question how the yakuza managed to evade all the public Hue scanners before the abandoned zones were created aaaaaaaaaaa the more I think about it the more questions I end up with what is the truthhh) (there’s still a black market in New Japan???)

I am fairly convinced that Irie only half told Kei about Numakura because it was his job and that the other half was purely to get Kei in trouble

yakuza member: u can’t enforce sht in this neighborhood Kei: lmao hold my beer and watch this

- I just enjoy watching Kei kick ass in general and the scenes of Arata parkouring across the city with the relay line were honestly kind of lovely, but the two interspersed with each other is a particular kind of staging aesthetic/technique I just really like

so far s3 seems a lot less gory and in-your-face violent compared to 1 and 2. more of the intellectual, detective work-centered side. in 6 episodes’ worth of time we’ve only seen like two people get Enforced and the side violence - Tojo falling several stories to the pavement below, Yonehara’s dismembered body, etc. - is all framed so you can’t actually see much of it, as opposed to 1 and 2 and their showing a woman getting beat to death with a hammer and dismembered bodies being made into public art pieces and all that fun stuff 

highly ironic and poetic that the mafia boss who chopped people up ended up in bloody pieces himself all over the same room his victims did

they’ve already gotten themselves into a fair amount of minor trouble with outside complaints in general and Shimotsuki in more specific but Kei and Arata are going to get themselves in some serious trouble one of these days. unlike say, Akane or Kogami, people who joined because it was the best place for them according to Sibyl or maybe because they wanted to make a difference, Kei and Arata joined Public Safety Bureau for their own personal reasons. they are here first and foremost to achieve their own personal goals and are blatantly willing to ignore procedure and disobey orders to pursue said goals. honestly at the time that Mika told them to stop pursuing Sasagawa and come back to base - literally telling them that she had the rest handled, it wasn’t strongly implied, if at all, that she was letting him go - I don’t think they had any reason to think all that was connected to their own personal mission. they went rogue without even stopping to consider that Mika already had a plan for dealing with Sasagawa or letting her explain anything. for better or worse they pretty much do whatever they want and one of these episodes it’s gonna catch up with them big time

...that being said, the two of them being so on the same wavelength that they both hung up on Mika at the same time and were both like aww what a shame...such poor cell signal in this place... was so funny Tenma looked so horrified kshgkjdfg

in Irie and Tenma’s defense, Kei didn’t say how long they were supposed to stand by. a solid 20 seconds counts, right?

...when I said, “if anything happens to Kei and Arata I’m going to kill everyone in this show and then myself”, I didn’t expect “anything” to be Kei getting his ass kicked by Ginoza LMAO

on that note, GINOZA

and Kogami????? Ima be real I haven’t actually seen the movie yet so if there was foreshadowing or an actual scene of him coming back I did not know it and therefore was super surprised to see him also he and Arata just kind of standing there watching each other while Ginoza and Kei scuffle right next to them was highly amusing

Ima be real part two up until now I really did not care for Kogami and actually really disliked him and honestly I don’t clearly remember why at this point but after this episode I’m neutral leaning towards very mild like towards him

Ginoza vs. Kei + Irie and Tenma vs. Kogami is one of those fight scenes that’s actually kind of stupid/unnecessary if u stop and think about it too long and could’ve been easily avoided in 4 seconds if everyone used their common sense and communicated (and followed orders (to return to base) Kei and Arata (and to stand by, Irie and Tenma) but instead is put in as a small dose of fan service for fans who wanna see their faves in a brawl (I’m not complaining at all I was quite entertained) (kind of love that Kogami still carries an actual gun)

Sugo!

honestly scene on the plane where all the other passengers turn out to be holos and vanish revealing the detectives concealed among them was really cool it’s like in cop shows when it turns out a bunch of the people chilling in the background of a restaurant or street are all plainclothes cops and the bad guy was surrounded the whole time

Sasagawa: u can’t prove anything!!! Frederica: tbh my dude idgaf 

Ginoza smiling and waving at Hinakawa before they left MY HEART 

I only caught this while rewatching the ep. and making this post but...the parallels between Kogami and Arata as unorthodox Inspectors more interested in being “detectives” and both chasing their own personal villains and conspiracies that may or may not exist...good stuff

love how much more relaxed and happier Ginoza seems nowadays love how Mika still snipes at him but it’s from a less spiteful place, love that she accidentally admits she thinks he’s a capable officer and how he teases her about it, love that they’re at a place now where they can talk normally 

(love that line at the end of their conversation: “Have you seen Akane?” “There’s no need to. I know what I should be doing for her.”)

Arata still pretending that the call dropped, instead of that they hung up on their boss khfgkdf

(when Mika tells them if they want to stay Inspectors, they need to follow orders and the will of the system...is she referring to whatever happened to Akane?)

Akane and Hinakawa still keep in contact my hearttt