#civil engineering is NOT my strong suit

[soupacool]

Hope it's okay if I Hop (lmao) onto this post to expand upon one of my favorite cities in the country. MKE, like many US cities, used to have a pretty extensive streetcar network that was torn up from lobbyist pressure, and they really screwed themselves for it. A lot of streetcar lines were replaced with bus routes, which are still some of the most used to this day- if you compare this poster I created of then/now streetcar lines to this map of current bus lines (blue is the most used, red is likely to be cut in 2025 due to MCTS having financial problems) you can see a TON of overlaps. Some bus lines even carry the same route numbers and colors of their predecessors.

The Hop (existing streetcar line) is unfortunately pretty unusable because it was built off the back of corporate interest. It connects the Amtrak station to downtown, which isn't entirely a BAD thing on its own. However, even being totally free, ridership is low because it doesn't GO anywhere where residents of the city want to go, and is slower than basically every other option because it gets EXTREMELY stuck in traffic. I went to school within range of the Hop and knew extremely few people who EVER used it. And those who did would often end up late to class because of it. All to say it's in a real sorry state right now, and that bums me out. They are planning a few extensions despite city financial troubles, and I hope that improves things

In brighter transit though, Milwaukee opened its first BRT line this year! It's not perfect, I wish the bus only lanes extended the whole length, and I haven't had the chance to try it for myself just yet, but I'm glad it got built at all.

I guess the point of this is that there are people in Milwaukee who care and want to make things better, and in my opinion I think there'e a lot of potential! So people from the area gotta get excited about transit, rope in their friends and loved ones, and make sure to pressure your politicians to secure funding for transit!!

Bonus rambling: Steps I would love to see personally, as a limitedly informed layperson. 1) I think the streetcar should focus on a UWM connection, as that is a HUGE population of non driving students, and would give access to a LOT of residential area. 2) AFTER that, getting the Hop to go all the way to the Summerfest grounds is a NO BRAINER to me. The Fiserv Forum is another place it would make a lot of sense to expand to. 3) This is only tangentially related but Brady Street should be pedestrianized!!! It would be an excellent way to encourage use of transit, and it would make an already cool spot into one of the best places in the city!

The upper midwest could easily become as interconnected as the Northeast, Lets explore what steps are needed to do that.

I am defining the upper midwest as Northern Illinois and Indiana, alongside Wisconsin and Minnesota. So the Major cities we are looking at are Minneapolis, Madison, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Duluth, and Chicago

[supermaks]

re: chirlies rejoicing that pgasly said c2 aren't friends, the chirlies are rejoicing bc, well a fair amount hate carlos for various reasons but it's a combination of (1) bc the ferrari civil war is ongoing (2) the way ferrari has pushed c2 content to paper over their own shortcomings (3) chirlies being accused of being fake tifosi bc they don't like carlos and they should support both drivers, (4) adding to the prev point, c2 fans will often point to how c2 are friends and like each other as to why they should both stay at ferrari and chirlies should stop hating on carlos (vs how the chirlies want carlos out after 2024)

imo, i think chirlies are just on edge bc charles' contract hasn't been renewed yet and carlos is allegedly pushing for a 2 yr deal. personally, i don't hate carlos, he's just kinda there but 2022 & 2023 has kinda shown the limits of the partnership bc they just want different things from the car so i think it's better for everyone to turn the page come the end of 2024 for c2

fascinating ok before i give u my understanding of what was said here and which wud prolly turn a 1950's lancia engineer to dust like the sentence 'chirlies are just on edge bc charles contract hasnt been renewed yet' alone has been radiating thru my skull like a concussion for like 20 mins

I'm starting to c that a lot of sharl fans are very threatened by carlos and his influence on the team and again, from what ur telling me, the fact that he wants different things from the car than sharl is a problem and so .. basically .. for sharl to win a championship, which as a fan thats what u wanna c happen, carlos needs to go. Like thats where the animosity comes from, right, that Carlos is an obstacle to sharl's success or whatvr. If that is it, in my opinion not only ur overestimating Carlos, ur underestimating sharl and by a gross amount, btw. IF bald man is telling the truth and the car is gonna be sharper, better suited to oversteer, ((faster)) and they're working on their strategy, and the pit wall and stuff and actually becoming a title contending team, dont u think this hierarchy of 1st and 2nd driver will be forced on carlos whether he likes it or not? Because its kind of inevitable, and it'll be up to him and his management to fit into that role, not the other way around. Sergio Perez and his dad earlier this year were floating prost and senna conversations. And we know what happened, and of course it happened. We know there was never a point where Max was slower than Checo, just like sharl has never been slower than Carlos. So if theres gonna be a car, in these current regulations, capable of winning the title, sharl will be the one who has better pace wid it. Because hes just faster, his setups are faster, he knows how to extract more from the same car. Carlos winning in Silverstone, Singapore, is literally him doing his job, scraping the success he can out of a messy, unfocused, somehow well positioned Ferrari team, wid the tools he's given at the time, just like any other ((self respecting)) driver wud btw. Bro if Carlos ever thought he cud be a 'first driver' is because Ferrari let him, and I refuse to blame him for that. Not even 'blame' like hes doing his fucking job hes a competitor. When teams are strong the roles drivers play become better defined and they either put up or shut up. I cant even envision a Ferrari where sharl has some type of dominant machinery to work wid and Carlos is still a threat in any way lmfao

'the way ferrari has pushed c2 content to paper over their own shortcomings' totally get that, like thats been their literal marketing strategy for years and personally I dont like it either I think its unserious especially for a brand like ferrari to appeal to ((mostly female)) new audiences just thru the like parasocial angle of hey do u wanna fuck our drivers cool heres them doing charades and almost kissing like ur literally one of the most established most recognizable brands in the world moving like HYBE. ok.

'chirlies being accused of being fake tifosi bc they don't like carlos and they should support both drivers' bro I find carlos whole dynamic wid ferrari and tifosi and like that whole establishment so interesting and kinda brutal when u think about how hes paired up wid il predestinato whose like suffering and unfairness in this world is literally part of his brand and puts him and his fans on the defensive against everybody else. Like Sainz fans just gotta learn to pick their battles bro. Carlos is doing a job at Ferrari, the other guy is fulfilling a prophecy lmfao.

'c2 fans will often point to how c2 are friends and like each other as to why they should both stay at ferrari and chirlies should stop hating on carlos' I .. are c2 fans all 12 years old idk what else to say about this. Its gullible and seems like those people dont know exactly what they're engaging wid but thats not their fault again its how the sports being marketed

In conclusion sharl definitely gonna re/sign and prolly for a fucking insane amount of money because like carlos is not even top 5 of shit Ferrari needs to address so they can win a championship and they know first order of business is to make sharl happy and keep him extremely employed. Its looking like sharl will get a 3+2 and tbh like I said before, its up to carlos and his management to try and make the best out of a situation where the car is moving away from his comfort zone. A bottas like contract wud be an insult to the Sainz family but idk if they got much of a choice and it'll be interesting to c what happens. Im also thinking like if carlos does leave who wud replace him and why wud they for sure be a better fit than he is

[surveillance-0011]

got any headcanons for Douglas or Harper?

yeas :3 I'll do some for both but mostly douglas if that's alright!! 2nd half for douglas + harper hcs below the cut bc this got a bit long I have Many Thoughts on Douglas . lil warning for references to the whole skrendel thing for douglas and mentions of harper's military past but all in passing and whatnot . nothing super angsty or explicit just going over stuff. All of that is below the cut tho

Douglas

he/him. bicurious/questioning and a little shy about it, but it's more of an open secret than anything. He is slowly realizing he likes guys a lot more than he likes women and he's unsure how to feel about it

Space is very pro lgbt it's very much normal for them bc there's all these different species and civilizations. why would any of them be cisheteronormative lol?? But really he's more embarrassed about actually feeling strong attraction and realizing he's a mushier person than he'd like to think. if that makes sense. like "oh no i am giggling like a schoolgirl over this guy what do i fucking do"

In general he doesn't like being seen as a vulnerable person, both physically and mentally. The idea of being in love for real is a little daunting to him...

I'd say he'd probably eventually land on bi or pan tho? Just with a heavy male/masc/etc lean.

early 30's? for his species? Late 20's?

From a moon with seas on it, think a less icy Europa! Currently lives on Port Terrene or a nearby territory.

His species is a delicacy for some alien races, mainly those living on the moon but he was basically fair game for anyone in that solar system so he booked it by sneaking onto a commercial spaceship to safety. Living in the background and slimy underbellies lead him to be where he is now.

He thinks that this is kind of funny by the way he has totally taken some of the higher ups to a restaurant that serves his kind to either stare them down for the whole meal or insist they order it and then wait in the bathroom so they think he straight up got cooked

Pretty physically fragile. PT's conditions are similar enough to his home moon in terms of gravity and whatnot that he's doing alright but he needs the suit to thrive there and survive on many other planets. That and he's very vulnerable to physical damage out of his suit. So, the suit is mainly for protection and an advantage in combat but there's also the advantage of hiding what he actually looks like-- useful for his line of work, deceiving others, and not letting most know he's a squishy lil guy.

Does not like the cold. He will languish… please…

Amphibious, can spend time out of the water but needs to be moist to breathe + thrive. Suit mists him down too.

In general the suit is pretty well coded and whatnot... engineering masterpiece... it's like a little mini mech kind of in my mind.

Would kill to pilot a huge ass mech some day btw. Douglas needs a huge ass mech.

Garmantuous, Nipulon, and probably Giblets have seen him out of his suit or otherwise know/have been told abt it. That and whoever of the Skrendel Bros he had that little tryst with. or not. idk.

Everyone else? A good deal of people mainly those in the crime syndicates have seen him without his helmet or been able to kind of see his face through it but I'm under the assumption that only some folks know he's a straight up octopus. Assuming this since Kenny didn't know and it took Gus some time to recognize him/he had to figure it out first so ig that means most folk (Including Rel and Krubis) don't really know !!

As for how the whole delicacy thing. ig that's like. other side of the galactic community. niche shtuff.

While he's generally an asshole and cruel to those beneath him, when it comes to the other officers of the G3 he's generally friendly (by Douglas standards tho). Still it's very 50/50. Total wildcard, does whatever entertains him. Prone to mischief, trickery, and dragging others along in his antics, sober or not. Will be your pal one day and your worst enemy the next. Workplace warfare game is peak I'll tell you that much

He does a good job at worming his way outta trouble. He's a clever lil guy pretty damn resourceful. People don't give him enough credit bc for all the lack of impulse control he shows he's smart and slick enough to un-fuck up the situation if need be.

always a little pissy abt dealing with the long term consequences that he can't get himself out of but hey. he tries his goddamn best

Decently buddy-buddy with the Skrendels though this have been a bit Complicated since. Yknow.

Honestly I think it was Jonathan. Makes the most sense to me in my mind. The two are pretty much still just friends but Jonny boy kind of wishes there was more there now. Douglas doesn't, all that much. The other brothers know and Angela has probably pulled Douglas aside to beg "for the love of all that's holy let him down gently"

Mona was more like "If I so much as see a tear in my brother's eye you're calamari"

But they're all still pals. I guess. Everyone has their ups and downs? They still like getting up to mayhem when their paths cross and Jonathan is pretty friendly with Douglas still even if the other two are pretty... not all that ok abt the whole thing. the bros get protective.

Weirded out by Giblets but is honestly much too entertained by how pathetic he is to tell him to fuck off. He just tries to up the "what the fuck" factor when he can. On the other hand Giblets is very terrified yet very enthralled w/ Douglas. He is an enigma to the dr....

Things are also weird with Krubis. They kind of totally hate each other but it kind of makes them good friends. Above all else Douglas reminds Krubis of himself when he was younger so he kind of. Gets It and wants to keep a closer eye on him

like. they would get along so well but so awfully as well. there's no way krubis isn't jealous that Douglas has a better job and manages to keep it despite all the bullshit. There's no way they haven't been screwed over by Douglas once or twice by being caught in the crossfire of all the stuff he does. And I think Douglas is fickle with some of his workplace alliances some days he’ll take Krubis’s side others he’ll take Giblets he’s just like that for the goofs. Krubis gets pissed off w/ him a lot but I think they are low-key on the same wavelength. idk if that makes sense i'll probably draw or write it out in detail some day soon... hm...

Garm is Tired of Him. Nipulon is consistently disappointed and somehow also surprised with the crazy shit Douglas gets up to but does appreciate when Douglas comes around and does something competent by his standards. Gurgula found him annoying but is just. whatever.

Not always the best at reading the room.

A pretty optimistic person actually. Assumes best case scenario often. Even if his idea of the best case scenario involves killing people he doesn't like it's fine he's just a little guy

He can change colors somewhat, mostly at the tip of his tentacles. It's a signifier of health and emotion. There's a lot of patterns of flickering for communication and whatnot. They curl and deepen in color to denote distress, for example. And he's usually a pretty bright blue unless he's sick.

Epic gamer. With that many tentacles how could he not be. Total sucker for arcade games especially,,

Also big on party + group games. This is a man who has killed over mario party or kart… I just know it.

And drinking games ofc

Watches shitty daytime television on his days off esp when he’s hungover

Also loves riffing on shitty movies

Laughed over people crying about the space titanic movie only to bawl at the end. He blames the alcohol but we all know… we all know.

Facultative carnivore or omnivorous with preference to meat. main diet is like. fish shellfish maybe some sea plants... algae things... idk... he can stomach other foods but most plants just don't do anything for him nutrition wise. i say most because who knows what crazy stuff is out there in space. le shrug. gotta think the space food stuff over...

He thought Sweezy was annoying but useful. Lots of bickering but considering she doesn't talk during the fight he probably turned off her ability to with that inhibitor thing later on into their time together? because i do not think she would willingly be quiet for his sake.

Honest 2 god he coulda been a stand up comedian or an actor or written a book or something he's funny enough for it. But ig torturing people was his calling.

And he is a very creative torture technician! He's definitely squeezed information out of people well before. He shows enough prowess here that Garm is still impressed enough to not have totally gone sicko mode on him god bless

Beer and adjacent spacey drinks (there's a lot more choices out there in the galaxy after all) are his alcoholic beverages of choice. Some fruitier cocktails catch his eye sometimes too

Even when he is not going off on wild adventures or partying he is being generally bewildering.

he just wants 2 have fun at the end of the day...

Harper (i don't have as much I need to watch another play through i think)

she/they sapphic. Soft butch ish but dorky always looks like she's taking fashion notes from Luz (saying this as someone who hasn't watched TOH but. you see what i mean. and i mean this with affection and understanding.)

Thrilled to find about about axolotls on Earth. Frilly like her :) very fond of amphibians in general

Stoked to be learning all this cool shit about people and the world around her and doing cool shit as a bounty hunter and meeting Gene and stuff...

Kinda easily impressed. not used to having nice things.

Traumatized for sure but she's trying to be chill about it. Not used to asking for help

Generally A Bit Anxious at all times. jumpy in casual life

Vaguely morally fucked from being in that task force. This is kind of canon i guess... she'll be a little cheap or nosy or callous if she has to be and while i don't think she's super scummy I'm sure that cold blooded training will not be wearing off anytime soon

She does care about other people she's just bad at empathy and relating... and yknow... taught not to care... taught to be a soldier... but she cares she loves her pals so so much goddammit!!

The sort of person who googles her symptoms and convinces herself she's dying of ultra instinct tuberculosis

Professional armchair psychiatrist

Capable, just clumsy. She'll get the job done but not without some mishaps and taking the long way around.

Big fan of summer+warmer weather

Likes strawberry and mango... big on fruit in general. fruitpilled.

Ice cream and sherbet fan

But she love burger also. yes i am going to do the thing where a character mentions food and consider it their favorite sorry. i just love a girl eating aburger.

Never got to meet Kenny. They did, however, cross paths with Lezduit sometime before the G3's invasion.

I am a Harper x Sweezy truther. women... awesome... not yet tho i think it is a gradual thing... i like to imagine it just kind of happens. no confession or whatever just someday soon they wake up look at each other and say "wow i guess we've just been dating now"

could apply to other Gatlians but esp for her she likes to watch tv with gene and will totally watch youtube on the Bounty Hunter's computer... my little iPad baby...

Really likes nature documentaries. Worlds biggest casual geographic + Lindsay Nicole fan also

Speaking of I am choosing to believe both of them survive and start making alien zoology videos.

In an anthro or human au she would have a prosthetic leg

Either way anthro or not, the cybernetic bits are all kind of like a prosthetic and she talks to Gene sometimes abt disability + combat stuff during the uncommon occasions that she opens up about it a little.

And lastly a little prediction: if they bring back Kenny w/ a new VA then I'm expecting either an ability to switch which one you want to use, maybe having the option of dual wielding the two of them, or that Kenny gets an upgrade that makes him more powerful and he's a late game addition like Lez :3c

Or maybe pointing to a two player mode or switching perspectives with Lizzie if she finds Kenny wherever she is?? Kinda like Yokai Watch 3 switching between chapters until the two protags meet up.

[hummingbird-of-light]

June of Doom Day 11

11. “We’re out of time.”                          

| Firearm | Backseat | Self-defense |

TW: blood oath, non-con kissing

A/N: Alternate Universe - Demons

~

'We're out of time.'

Nurse Chapel's words were still wandering through his head when Montgomery Scott entered the deserted crossroads, far from any civilization. In his trembling hands he held a small metal box, which he pressed close to his chest. He closed his eyes and swallowed. How had it come to this?

Of course... There was only one reason. Everything that was important to him. Everything he loved and valued.

'Leonard...'

The name flashed through his mind and he sighed deeply. His loved one had been infected on a mission with a bacterium for which there seemed to be no cure. If they didn't find a way soon, the CMO of the Enterprise would die.

Scotty shook his head to get rid of the horrible images.

The work of the scientific team was not progressing fast enough, so there was only one solution: a miracle!

Scotty did not know if his plan would work, but all the prayers had brought nothing.

'The opposite then...'

The engineer knelt down, put the box aside, and started digging a small hole in the sandy roadbed with his hands. He had no idea how deep it had to be for the ritual, so he just kept digging until his fingers hurt, bled, and he could take no more.

He took the metal box in his hands and gently placed it in the hole, thinking of what the box was filled with. It were many things, important to him personally. But he would now have to part with them. For Leonard.

The Scotsman filled the hole again and then straightened up, looking around. What should he do now?

Should he just stand still and wait? Was there a special magic formula?

He was about to leave, his head down low, and turned around, when suddenly a man stood right in front of him. He was startled and took a step back. Should it really have worked? Were the stories his wee grandmother had told him true?

"Hello, Montgomery," the stranger said with a smile.

How did he know his name?

Scotty eyed his counterpart. He was a handsome man with raven-black hair and cool blue eyes. He wore a black suit, was neatly dressed.

"H-hello," the engineer stammered, not knowing what to say.

The man chuckled. His human counterpart had just summoned a demon and the only thing he had to say was to return the 'hello'? Usually humans demanded what they wanted right away. But Montgomery Scott was apparently different.

"You called me. What can I do for you?"

Scotty cleared his throat briefly before finding his voice again.

"Ye... are a crossroad demon?"

Again he got a laugh in response and the man moved slowly toward him.

"Yes, honey. I'm a crossroad demon. My name is Khan," he introduced himself and it amused him that the human in front of him kept backing away. He was afraid; the demon felt that clearly.

"But you don't answer a question with a question."

He raised his hand and grabbed his counterpart by the arm. Immediately Scotty stopped as if rooted to the spot. The power emanating from this demon was really incredibly intimidating and strong. Usually, he was not a coward after all!

"E-excuse me," he stammered, barely able to control his words, and Khan began to slowly move around him.

"So, what can I do for you?" he asked again, and Scotty swallowed the lump in his throat.

"I don't know if ye can grant me my wish?"

Khan was standing just behind him and now he smiled slyly, leaned over and whispered in his ear, "Honey, I can give you anything you want."

A shiver ran down the Scotsman's spine as he felt the cold breath.

My God... What was he doing here? He was talking to a demon and wanted to make a pact with it.

Maybe it had been a mistake to come here. But Khan had said that he could do anything.

"My... boyfriend... He is seriously ill. All I want is to find a cure and save him. I just want for the bacterium to disappear and for Leonard to be healed. He shall survive," Scotty summed up his wish and Khan chuckled again, finally coming to a stop in front of him.

Humans were really stupid sometimes.

Mr. Scott could have anything he wanted, but he gave up his wish for someone else. Love could be so strong. Such a powerful feeling that made people forget their selfishness. How Khan would have wished to feel it himself sometimes. But he had forgotten what it felt like.

And yet... the man in front of him triggered some feeling in him, touched his cold soul in a way no one else ever had. It was strange.

"If that is your wish, then I will grant it. But, you know the price, don't you?"

Scotty swallowed. Yes... yes, he knew the price, but it was worth it to him. For Leonard, he simply had to give everything. Even if it was the most valuable asset he owned.

"M-my soul."

Khan ran a hand over Scott's face and nodded.

"Very true, Montgomery. Your soul. In ten years I'll be at your doorstep to take it. So if you make a pact with me, you're mine. Are you sure that's what you want?"

Scotty nodded, not quite as firmly resolved as others had been, but he nodded.

"If that's the case... Then let's seal the deal, shall we?"

Again Khan smiled. The seal was his favorite part of making a pact.

He grabbed Scotty's arm and carved a deep cut into the human's arm and his own. Blood gushed from the wounds and Khan pressed them together.

"My blood for you. Your blood for me."

Slowly, he leaned in and kissed Scotty. The human didn't seem to want it, but that was how it usually was. Khan could understand. These humans had just sold their souls and then they were supposed to kiss a demon, too?

He, however, enjoyed it because he knew that he now had this human all to himself. He belonged to him from now on and no one could take him away.

When he was done, Scotty stared at him with wide eyes as if wondering if that had been it. Had he sold his soul to a demon so easily?

"Well then... take a backseat and let me do my job. See you in ten years."

With a wink and the typical smile, Khan disappeared, simply vanishing into thin air.

Scotty looked at the spot where the demon had been standing only a moment before. What had he done?

[claire-starsword]

Shining Force Country Guide Translation - Part 4

The usual pie chart legend:

Pao

Population: 130 inhabitants GNP: 2300 gold

Species Ratio:

The Pao tribe itself has only 130 people, but as they often take visitors on the ride as well, the population tends to fluctuate. Most are humans, as Pao citizens are racially homogeneous. ____

The transport revolution attained by the people of the plains

The Pao plains are around 1500 meters above sea level. This vast area that makes up the majority of the northern region of West Rune is entirely territory of the nomadic people of Pao. Around 2500 years ago, there was a massive immigration from East Rune, going from island to island of the Uranbatol archipelago. This group arrived all the way to these great plains after many generations, and their population slowly increased as well. It eventually divided into several tribes (still sharing the same ethnic identity) that would gather than split up again and again through their nomadic lifestyle, until an influential tribe emerged in the southeast around 2000 years ago, and got the others under their control (with an hereditary line of succession).

Paopigs were wild creatures living in the region, but being naturally calm animals, they were incredibly well suited for the nomads. They live off mostly of raising the paopigs as livestock, making dairy products out of their milk, and other specialties such as woolen goods made from paopig hair. These woolen goods in particular are valuable enough to gather merchants from other countries all year around, fighting for the chance to buy them. They mostly use the bartering system, with little interest to adopt any foreign currency.

It can be said that the adventurous and pioneer spirit of the Pao people is what made it possible to establish a nation in this region. As they continued to live reliant on the paopigs, they developed a strong faith on them as holy beasts, and thus do not eat their meat. Around 150 years ago they found by chance a huge engine in ruins of the previous civilization, and built the Pao Train. It brought a huge upheaval in their economy when it comes to the circulation of goods, and their culture has been modernizing as well. Besides that, the Pao Train also brought an energy revolution, as they began successfully using paopig excrement as fuel for it. Currently, Pao welcome a time of great changes.

-At a glance, it looks like a mere village. However, this is how Pao looks like while the Pao Train is stopped. A kilogram of paopig excrement fuels the train to run approximately 20 kilometers. The Pao Train is 300 meters long.

-The paopig's cry is surprisingly beautiful. It is comparable to the sound of a sitar (an octave higher to be precise). Such heartrending echoes deeply move the hearts of travelers around.

I'm very shaky on my translation of this caption. It mentions an instrument called カラッコ (karakko), and I could not find translation anywhere, so it might be made up? But since I was unsure I just brought up the sitar it is compared to right after.

Waral

Population: 300 inhabitants GNP: 5600 gold

Species ratio:

Waral is built atop a small island. The 50% percent of "other" species here are all merpeople. While they do not show up in the game, plenty of merman live there as well. ___

The ocean people who lost themselves in the mermaid paradise

A small island country north of the Lunatic Ocean. It has the hot and humid climate of tropical rainforests, and the coast is rich in resources. At the southern coast of the island, there is an encounter of warm currents flowing north and cold currents flowing south, called "The Sea God's Cauldron", famous for the frequent shipwrecks it causes. Around 150 years ago, a fishing ship from Rindo suffered such an accident and drifted to Waral, founding the country. Back then, Rindo was still a fishing country, and their main fishing spot was the "Mermaid's Roundtable", a wide shallow beach west of Waral.

The stranded people thus settled in the island, and eventually the fishing spot to the west became their alone, as Rindo shifted to merchant activities. Even now fishing is their main activity, with 70 percent of the population working on it, and the remaining part being mostly shipbuilders and the merpeople who already lived in the region.

Back when the country was founded, coexisting with the merpeople was a huge social issue for the small island. However, Harengett Splasher II of the royal family married a mermaid, reaching a compromise between both parties this way, and it stays to this day. Some historians criticize this as a marriage of convenience.

The country was born out of an unfortunate accident, yet supported by the warm climate and its plentiful resources, the citizens are distinct for their endless cheerfulness. Its GNP of 5600 gold is third place in Rune, after Rindo. In recent years it has also been planning to expand its tourism business, as its strategic positioning right between the west and east parts of the continent makes it a country that cannot be ignored.

-It's an unusually small island, yet it is blessed with warm climate and plentiful resources. Because of this, it might be the greatest place to live in all of Rune. Its main activity is fishing, but just setting up nets is enough to catch plenty of fish, so people don't work much.

-Described by the king himself as a tropical paradise, life in Waral is full of pleasures. Swimming in the ocean, fishing, gathering shellfish and the like in the beach, there are plenty of ways to kill time. Even so, some who are still bored have began to venture into the tourism business as a hobby.

The weird royal guy name was unfortunately left for me to romanize. I have no clue if his first name means anything, but his last name, チャップチャップ, is literally "chopchop", but given that it is close to チャップン, the onomatopoeia for splashing, I feel that's what they were going for.

Rudo

Population: 40 inhabitants GNP: 1700 gold

Species ratio:

Much like Manarina, Rudo doesn't look anything like a country. As said in game, it is in fact just a village. The species distribution is very balanced, excluding centaurs. Perhaps they have all gathered together because of the dragon gods. ___

The mountain village of the dragon gods' faith, declining in population

The west side of the Dragonia mountain mass is extremely steep, and this natural barrier forms an unusually long and narrow coastline between mountains and the Cypro Ocean. The village of Rudo is in this northwestern area of East Rune.

Around 300 years ago, to protect the dragon gods who were on the verge of extinction, the royals of Guardiana proposed that each country sent some settlers there, and thus the village was born. At first they succeeded in their conservation efforts, but then reached a dead end, and in recent years there has been a sharp increase in the number of people leaving the village and spreading the view that the dragon gods are over.

To show how complicated this tendency has become, the village currently only has about 40 people. It is also said that they are all children under the age of 11. The adults seem to have moved to some other village north of Prompt. The dragon god faith the adults had converted into was still deeply rooted in the hearts of the children, and some sociologists think of this village's separation as a sort of religious schism. The children, following a girl named Karin as their leader, have developed small scale agriculture and fishing, restoring the self-sufficient activities the village had sustained so far. Besides that, they have also gone past their original boundaries, advancing halfway up the Dragonia mountains and hunting there.

Before the schism the village had a prosperous fishing industry in the calm waters of the Cypro Ocean, as the gulf surrounded by sandbanks on its north and south made for a good fishing spot thanks to the ocean currents. Some think the place could recover economically fairly easily if the population problem was solved.

-Rudo village is blessed with a surrounding environment of plains and the ocean. It is hard to believe that the place is suffering from a decline in population. Going east from there, there's Dragonia, where the remaining dragon gods live.

-Since there are so many children younger than 10 gathered together,  the village is really lively. They aren't playing around, being pretty busy each with their own tasks (such as taking turns to cook or doing the laundry). Despite that, the whole village has the feel of being their playground.

[antisolanum]

I had such a crazy good character idea recently, imagine a power suit, like a "big daddy" type armor suit or the spider robot from Spider-Verse, but it's a genetically engineered lifeform, not a machine. Like the alien suits from Independence Day, where it is being piloted from inside? And the suit is made of crab, like it's a hard carapace shell with strong muscles and big sharp claws but also tiny manipulator arms and big stomping hard-shell boot-feet, and if it gets damaged it will regrow parts. And it's being piloted from inside by an intelligent octopus.

In my fantasy game ideas, he's effectively an astronaut coming onto land from a bottom-of-the-deepest-oceans civilization of intelligent octopus people, and he'd be one of your companions, mass effect style. He's here to see what the surface world has got, and more importantly, if the surface world will prove a threat or a challenge to be conquered.

His name is "Ielo Sumari", which in his tongue literally translated means "the light beneath the water", but in his tongue it sounds way better, more like "the dawnlight that pierces the darkness of the depths". The name is, metafictionally, a pun on "yellow submarine", since I would want quests and achievements and stuff to be named after songs and albums and artists, New Vegas style.

The quest to get him as a companion would be gotten from getting a job to go check out the rumors going around about a weird "ocean man" down by the coast scaring travelers, and the quest would be called "ocean man" after the song. You'd have to defeat him in combat to show him you've got what it takes to be worth following, and he's eager to engage in glorious honorable organized non-lethal combat. If he beats you, he'd pull his final blow and let you walk away, and tell you to come back when you've got "a little more brine in your heart".

Defeating him and earning his respect and status as a companion would earn you the achievement "Rock Lobster", and his personal quest would end with him permanently leaving your service to return home, with the impact of that being dependent on your interactions with him in conversation after you let him see certain big important things. This would work a lot like Veronica Santangelo's personal quest in New Vegas, where many story and quest events would count towards his development, but if all else fails a few specific locations would always count and could always be visited, even if the player had already done the story stuff without him.

[thoughts4all]

Day 119: The Importance of Y (Why)

I had a dream last night. Here are some bullet points so I don't forget later.

I want to become a consultant and make my own money using managerial strategies not technical strategies

I had a dream about spiritual into zombies and told the FBI, going into basement/sewer trains for the war's "Business development", sewers were a whole different world like outcast in a mutant predator environment, escapes with the lady in red who was my cousin, and we bought a gift for my girlfriend, I was the bazar, street, supermarket to find my mom and rich bf, I came from the outcast world and I wasn't in the super market to shop but to climb and find my mom and the rich people and the security was getting me in trouble for even running I guess because of my raggedy appearance they knew I was from the outcast world or at least not from the system, outcast world were you barely survived but lived for yourself or civilized world where you were safe but lived for the system, I experience the butt end of the system where I was indirectly forced to join the corporate world or starve.

I want to live for myself again. Not head down engineer or computer scientist to make a really good but average income. I want to be building my own thing and getting jobs for experience to build my thing or connections to build my thing not a salary.

Waterloo engineer is not what I want. I want to think long term. Queens business would have been better. They build high level leaders.

It is not too late to switch. I am thankful for my brother as he is going down that route and is giving me hope. Yes, he has a better foundation than me, however it is not too late as the important stuff did not start yet. I did not want to do an MBA since I was already going to get a good technical job post grad. However, I want high level now.

How can I do that? I can mimic my brother and become very present in student councils. That might take a lot of work. I could get consulting coops and build connections. I can use my parents connections for coops. I would have to study the soft skills required for these. I would have to dress nice, show up with suits, really understand people. I could become my program class rep. I could stay on top of my emails and communications. I could make sure I do not have grammar mistakes in my writing in put in the additional effort to address the audience's concerns not mine, the writer's.

Trust gut feeling and see how they can fake the fact they used to prove their point logically.

I always had the desire to grow and better myself. Read, workout, develop skills, and more. The reason they do not stick is because there isn't a strong Why. I realized that the reason "because it will help me" is not strong enough. Why will it help you? "because it will allow myself to be the person I want to be and do the things I want to do?. Who do you want to be? How does doing this specific action become that person? What do you want to do? How does doing this specific action allow you to do that?

Now I have a good Why. I have a life goal. To you my voice to build a successful career not my hands. Both include strategy but one is at a higher level because it addresses my own criteria and not only that of the task.

The dream:

The dream starts as my brother and I in a tropical island. We are younger in this dream. There are different classrooms built like an elementary school. We are to choose a different class that teaches spirituality or like a unique way of life. We join one and everything seems off. We soon figure out that all the students are under hypnosis. During nap time, obviously we are not asleep since we are not hypnotized yet. One kid that must have been new as well accidentally makes a sound. The teacher starts getting aggressive as the kid is trying to make up a story. He is trying to reason that he woke up because he was falling. There is commotion. It is soon revealed that there are a few others like my brother and I that are not hypnotized yet and the teacher starts fully commanding the hypnotized students like zombie soldiers. We run outside of the classroom. Everyone else does not know what happened in our classroom yet. As we are running, we see teachers in different classrooms use the exact same sentences on their students. This makes us believe that the whole spiritual resort/establishment is a front to actually make mind-controlled people. We run past the entrance of the resort, and we are on the edge of a cliff trying to warn newcomers of the reality of this place. We attempt to call the FBI but someone throws our phone over the cliff. Instead, we call the Chinese and they start to arrive and attack to take control of this resort island. Calling the enemy worked. The FBI soon comes and personally asks me why we took so long. Soon the cliff turns into a full tactical area with soldiers wearing camouflage and holding advanced assault rifles taking tactical positions. There is a war with the Chinese shooting missiles from the foot of the cliff and the US army holding the position.

My friends and I are part of this war as we discovered the island and started everything. We do not want to actively fight on the front lines so we decide to help in a different way. We were sent to the underground sewer complex to discover new weapons. We were kind of like the business development department of a company. We were going to discover new opportunities to advance the FBI. The underground world has a train line that splits into two. The friend that vouched to become like a business development for the FBI goes in before us. We had no idea what this underground place was except that there were train lines come out to the outside world. Everything was dark and claustrophobic. We departed into this creepy world to find the first friend. I accidentally got separated as I went down the left line and they went down the right line. Somehow, we could still talk with each other. We must have had walkie talkies. Suddenly I hear shaking and see a dirty yellow light appearing brighter and closer reflecting off the murky metallic circuit-like walls. I barely make it out before the train comes and we are all panicking through the walkie talkie, they also had a train. We meet up and we are shaking at how dangerous and spooky this place is. As we are talking, we hear the whole place start rumbling. We are frightened. Suddenly all the circuit like components making up the walls expands, and we are floating in zero gravity. There are floating cubes and larger chunks of metal start flying out of nowhere. We are jumping, floating and dodging to safety. Clearly this place does not operate with the laws of physics we know of. The rumbling stops and everything comes back to normal as the metal shrinks back to its original place. We are no longer floating in a dark world but back in the murky tunnel. We venture forward to find our first friend. We are walking and then lights start flashing by and we start to see people. They are together like a clan. They are barbaric. They have long dirty beards. Dressed in makeshift metal that is supposed to be armor. They are like jungle people but as outcasts in the underground world. It seems like they live to survive and only the strongest lives. We see our friend and he is part of the group. There is a lady in red that we somehow recognize but don't know who she is yet. There are only a few girls, and she is not dressed like them. It looks like she learned the lifestyle down here but only came down recently and is going to escape. Everyone else has no intention of leaving they have adopted this lifestyle. Plus, I doubt they could leave if they wanted to. The lady in red seems determined to escape this place.

I follow her out this place. Then I am her for a little bit in a flashback experiencing her an encounter with a weird nerve monster. As she was trying to escape this place she steps on a creature. This creature sinks into her nerves and she shrieks. Soon this fungus like creature grows and she is inside it. Inside is pink and these giant floating single celled organisms are going around to see what stepped on it. There are different pieces of metal from the tunnel in here. The pink cell extends an arm like thing to the first piece of metal and the metal expands into a virus like shape. The nerve creature that is now this giant ball, knows that that piece of metal is not alive. The cell goes on to the next piece. The lady in red knows the creature is looking for something alive to eat. Right before the pink cell extends its arm to her, she burst through the wall. She is now swimming in a mucus filled world and at the center there is a nucleus. She is swimming to the surface away from the nucleus. But the giant nucleus extends its arm thing super-fast and touches her. It is sticky and she is pulled back into the pink room with the large cell. She burst through again and is able to escape by swimming. She is somehow back in the tunnel. The flashback cuts and now her and I are leaving the underground world.

The upper normal world is giant metropolis. The streets are like a bazar and super store combined. The lady in red reveals her digues and is my older second cousin. We go to the mall with her family because she is going to buy my girlfriend something. She finds something and she asks her mom which is actually my girlfriend's mom if it is too much since the mom will be paying. My second cousin has enough connections and money to live in this world. I leave to find my mom and her rich bf. I need money. I am raggedy, dirty, athletic, strong and nimble. I am roaming the street supermarket. I just came from a deadly underground world where I barely survived. Here, everyone is generally fat and is walking on the ground and getting what they need to get from the bazar supermarket. I am climbing things, running and ultimately trying to climb up to the rich people level to find my mom to get money. There is security and apparently, I can get three strikes on my record. I quickly climb this stack of coolers - not to grab and buy one, I could have done that from the bottom - but to try and understand this world and where I could find my connections to some income. I knock over some coolers and security give me a strike. I am frustrated as I barely did anything wrong. I am barefoot, hungry and dirty. Security can see this and that I don't belong and keeps an extra eye on me. I get another strike for running in the street market. I think that is so stupid. They are finding excuses to banish me because I don't have the same intentions as regular people in this world. I don't have a job and I am not on the street to buy something. Currently I am a poor outcast from a different world. I am also getting really hungry. I have to accept the fact that I have to live as a poor homeless street boy. There is no way to tell my mom I am alive. I have to survive right now. I need some kind of income. I don't know how to get any income since I come from an outside world. I used to be a university student getting coops with a higher middle-class family. I don't know how to get back to that as I am hungry right now and security has an extra eye out for me. They are definitely against me. Even if I told them about my mom and her rich bf they wouldn't let me contact them out of pure hate and disbelief. It now kind of makes sense why the outcast underground people did not want to escape that hell hole. At least they weren't hated and feared by the system up here.

[radfemblack]

Why Is the UK TERF Island?

An answer-

Tradition of Cross-Dressing: Cross-dressing is a common trope in British comedy & has been for centuries - there are a variety of forms with the trope including the pervy dude who dresses as a woman to access womens changing rooms. So men cross-dressing is a cultural norm here: they do it for fun & laughs. See Monthy Pythons 'Loretta' scene in Life of Brian - link in another of my comments up-thread. See also: The Two Ronnies, multiple Monty Python sketches, Mrs Browns Boys, Little Britain, The League of Gentlemen, and pantomime dames. So in the UK if a man or a boy puts on a dress, we don't immediately think "there must be a reason for this!". Plus we had a lot of gender bending in the 1970's, 1980's & 1990's popular culture: men in make up, with long hair, wearing skirts were common, as were women with short hair wearing suits - see Boy George, Annie Lennox & Bowie.

Gender Non-Conformity: Gender non-conformity is quite normal & accepted. I think a lot of this is rooted in women being conscripted to work in traditional male jobs during WW2 (eg. as engineers or in the land army) when all men that could be spared, were recruited to fight. Working class women have commonly failed to conform to a meek, helpless patriarchal version of femininity. And British women through history have worked to dismantle gender stereotypes as 'gender' was often offered up as a reason to limit our rights - so the concept had to be destroyed. Thus gender identity theory isn't a good fit with British culture, as gender stereotypes were never as rigourously enforced here & have been consistently challenged / critiqued. See also: cross-dressing

National Character: We have a national character which can be blunt & unpretentious (we call 'spade is a spade') with a DGAF attitude - particularly in the Midlands / North. We also have a tendancy towards piss-taking & we don't particularly like cheats or queue jumping - it's a national delusion of truth & justice (it's just not cricket). For all the talk of British manners, we can actually be quite forthright - we're very good at being very polite & 'civil' while telling people to 'fuck off' to thier faces. British people might not complain about things to your face, but we'll sure as hell go home & complain to EVERYONE we know about it. We've turned sarcasm & passive aggression into a cultural art form. We also seem to have a natural skepticism, resistance to authority & subconcious collectivism.

British Left: The British left is rooted in left wing, socialist, materialist philosophy & class analysis rather than liberalism. This means the that whole of the left in the UK didn't immediately capitulate to a liberal, idealist philosophy that elevates subjective individial feelings over objective collective material reality. Our long history of class analysis & strong leftwing philosophical tradition gave us a powerful basis from which to resist gender identity ideology.

British Feminism: There is a strong history of feminist thinking, activism & networking, & of feminst participation in the union movement & in left wing & LGB campaigning. This mean British women activists had a lot of experience in debating, public speaking, organising, awareness raising & delivering material political change in the UK - this made it easier for women to quickly build organisations & networks, set up programmes of talks, work politicians, etc in response to proposed changes to the GRA. Compare this to the UK TRAs whose main orgainising seems to be around hidden politcal agendas, counter protests, social media echo-chambers, de-platforming & colonisation fo established spaces, etc.

Secular: We're not divided politically by religion. We're quite a secular society - so getting us to collectively accept that people have 'gendered souls' was going to be a struggle b/c you'd need to get us believe in the idea of souls first. Our lack of a Christian right also means we don't have religiously enforced homophobia so much here. And gay & lesbian people are part of our cultural history (even though we treated them like shit). Much of the resistance in the UK is coming from feminists, the left, & gay & lesbian people, and the lack of a Christian right means it's harder to smear British left-wing feminists as right-wing religious conservatives, or to denounce one of the founders of Stonewall as "homophobic".

Long History of Civil Rights: We've been fighting over civil rights for centuries - we know a genuine civil rights movement when we see one, & we know a demand for privilege when we see one. See also: we call a spade a spade & sense of justice.

British Womens Culture: It's almost like a 'culture within a culture': my Mum has a saying 'your son is your son until he gets a wife, your daughter is your daughter until the end of your life'. And it's true - there is quite a strong female bond in the UK. I saw it through the female lines in my family with my great aunts, grandmothers & aunts; the women will take on the men in defence of each other - I've seen my 70 year old mother take my 42 year old brother to task in defense of my SIL. She just wouldn't tolerate that kind of shit from him.

Which relates to another aspect of traditional British female culture: the 'battle-axe' - these are older, formidable women who are fierce, determined & take no shit. They're a common trope in British TV (eg. Nora Batty, Ena Sharples) and used to command respect & awe in the British working class. They're not as common these days due to changing social structures, but powerful, courageous women who take no shit are a cultural norm. My maternal great aunt was a battle-axe: she was brilliant & an inspiration.

Country Size, Legal/Political Structure & Population Density: We're quite a small country with a high population density: we have collective experiences as a country & our laws (& power) are very centralised (apart from the devolved powers). This means that you can't really miss the main national issues, as they impact everyone - it's not something remote happening in a state or province on the other side of a large nation. Living cheek by jowel, & having a smaller population than some other countries means that less people have to hear about something for it to become a hot topic, news & ideas spread faster, & you can peak half the women in the country much more quickly as fewer people have to hear about it.

[askabbyandeva]

Story Below:

These Pokemon are small, long-tailed and scrawny-looking creatures with strong psychic abilities and typically pink in color, but weren’t especially bright, having an intelligence level below the average pokemon even. Due to their sterility, they are very few in number nowadays, but they make up for that with their longevity, one instance could live for countless millennia at a time! However, they suffered a very unfortunate side effect beyond their control that made themselves a threat to humans and pokemon alike: Anyone who saw them had a chance of becoming brain dead on the spot due to their powers. While bad enough on its own, there was a second power that made them especially dangerous: Transformation. Like Ditto, they also had the ability to shapeshift, but they were capable of using this to grant them any powers they desired. It’s because of this that the organization I work for are hunting them down to prevent them from getting close to the human population, using lethal force if needed.

Now if you payed attention so far, you’re probably wondering “Wait, isn’t that the Mew? aren’t they a myth? and why would lethal force even be necessary even if they weren’t?” and of course “what does any of this have to do with the precursors?” And to the first two questions, I will answer “Yes and No“ in that exact order, as for the last two questions, that’s where things get ugly.

You see, there were two lies that were mandated in this story: The first one being their powers causing brain death by accident: it’s never an accident, they do it on purpose. Why? Well that’s where the Second lie comes in: They aren’t dumber than the average pokemon, they’re smarter, even more so than humans. Now why are they hostile to Humans? well, when I first described the Mew, they didn’t originally look that way. Back in ancient times when humans were still emerging from their caves, The Mew looked taller, much more bulky, and much more civilized. They had cities, organic technology, and even engineered Flora and Fauna to lifeforms to suit their needs. Unfortunately, the Mew were also prideful and lustful creatures, treating humans as less than livestock for their creations... at best.

The Humans would have been phased out, had one event not sealed the fate of the Mew.

The details have never been clear since Victor never goes into much detail about it, but seven mythical beings took pity on the humans, and orchestrated an event known as “the last generation”. Soon, Mew started to be born prematurely with more deformations and conceptions started to outright fail at worst. With their numbers dwindling, Humans used the Mew’s own creations against them, and after a bloody battle, the Humans came out on top. But after the deed was done, they wiped their memories and went back to becoming hunter/gatherers. Of course the creations of the Mew were still in the wild, and soon the Humans used them again, this time not as weapons, but as companions, forming the earliest recorded history of Humans and Pokemon.

Though doubtful if any Mew of today were still capable, the fact is that the Mew would still harbor (understandable) resentment towards humanity makes them enough of a threat that my foundation recruited anyone with even the slightest affiliation with them as a means to combat them.

We didn’t lie to keep them contained, we lied because we’re terrified of them

and they know this

[joaquinwhorres]

Blank Out - Ch. 2 (Bucky Barnes x Reader)

[ Masterlist ]

SUMMARY ››››› Bucky Barnes has a list of names–amends he needs to make. When he gets to yours, he finds the amends process a bit more…difficult than it should be.

WORD COUNT ››››› 3,550-ish

WARNINGS ››››› language

A/N ››››› I’ve decided that this story calls for alternating perspectives. Also, lemme know what you think about how this explores post-End Game life.

"You know Bucky Barnes?!"

Rocio was upon you before you had even fully entered the dining room. Despite the fact that it was probably cutting off her circulation, the eight year old was still proudly wearing her "Soldier Arm". You were surprised she could even put it on anymore, a thought that brought on the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia. When the two of you had constructed the costume four years ago, you had needed to roll the ends of the glove up and then safety pin it to the top of Rocio's sleeve to keep it from sliding off. Now it didn't even reach her shoulder anymore.

"I never mentioned that?" you asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No!" Rocio exclaimed

"Oh," you shrugged, rounding the table and passing by a wiggling Ravi in his booster seat.

Rocio fell into step behind you letting out an indignant and frustrated sound. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"

She had an amazing and irritating talent for both shouting and whining at the same time. You breathed out your annoyance through her nose.

"Rocio," you said, flatly. "Do you really think I know Bucky Barnes and kept it a secret from you?"

The little girl pouted for a second as she thought it over before slowly shaking her head. "You're not very good at keeping secrets."

"Hey," you pointed a finger at her.  "I never told anyone about your crush on Spider-Man did I?"

"I was six!"

"And yet, old enough to propose," you grinned, remembering finding the letter Rocio had addressed to Spider-Man with haphazardly spaced and sized letters. It had taken a few attempts to decipher some of the spelling, but it had proven excellent material to tease Rocio about for the past two years.

Your niece scowled at you and marched back to the table, dramatically throwing herself back into her chair.

You turned back to the stove and the probably cold eggs, smiling to yourself in victory. It was a brief moment of peace as you dished eggs onto three plates because the moment you popped the first one in the microwave, the interrogation started back up.

"Well, if you don't know him, why was he here?"

"He wanted to talk to me and your mom," you said, watching the eggs spin round and round.

"About what?"

"The weather."

"Y/N!" Rocio hit her hand against the table, causing Ravi to jump in his seat and stare at his sister with wide eyes.

You whirled on your niece. "Rocio Ishani, you know better."

"Sorry," Rocio mumbled, casting her eyes down to the table--one of her tells of genuine embarrassment and regret. The microwave beeped, and you sighed, switching the plate out for another one.

"I don't know what he wants to have a conversation about. He was here for three minutes and you did most of the talking. And even if I did know," you added on, stopping Rocio before words could come out of the little girl's open mouth. "I don't think it's a child friendly conversation. Which means when he comes, you're going to your room."

"He's coming back?"

You nodded. "When your mom comes to pick you up," you said, stopping the eggs with six seconds left on the clock. You took the two plates to the table, setting the hot one down in front of your seat and the warm one in front of Rocio. You raised your eyebrows at your niece, gesturing with your head to the kitchen before turning back to get Ravi's plate. Rocio trailed you in, pulling out the silverware drawer to get forks for the three of you and tearing off three paper towels as napkins. She still hadn't quite grasped that Ravi wouldn't be using a napkin however much he needed one. Instead, she ripped one half sheet into a quarter, as if that would convince him to use it in the same way that the small bright green fork convinced him to be somewhat civilized in his eating instead of using his hands.

It was a few more minutes before you were all at the table, ready to eat.

"Your arm, please," you said, gesturing to Rocio's glove. The little girl put up no fight, shimmying out of it and lightly laying it on the empty chair next to her, signature side up so she could admire it all of breakfast.

While the interrogation seemed to be over, talk of the Avengers was not. Most of the breakfast conversation revolved around ranking the Avengers from most powerful to least powerful, and most helpful to least helpful, and the ever ambiguous "best" to "worst." And then, as it did with young kids, talk bounced from subject  to subject--connected only by the vaguest semblance of eight year old logic. It ended with a request to watch Wild Kratts after breakfast.

You did.

You did a lot of other things after breakfast too.

You made and played with play dough and stopped when you noticed Ravi was alternating between building with his and eating it.

You each drew pictures for Lilly with varying degrees of realism, had a fashion show turned impromptu dance party, and played hide and seek during Ravi's nap. (Rocio was such a good hider that you hadn't found her until after Ravi woke up, and you were definitely looking very hard and not reading a book.)

You painted each other's nails, and built an epic race car track for Ravi and made individual pizzas.

You raked leaves outside and picked a few favorites to press in books and even found time to fit in a small hurt self/strong self activity before Lilly arrived.

You were in the middle of deconstructing eating your creations when the front door opened.

"Where is my family?"

You looked up with a smile and gestured towards the door, but Rocio remained put. "We're in here!" she shouted, fingers sticky with peanut butter and fluff.

Lilly sauntered into the room, her emerald green suit still pressed and wrinkleless despite a day on the job. She arched her perfectly threaded eyebrows as she looked at you and daughter and the table all covered in graham cracker crumbs. "Looks like you three had a good day."

"Yep!" Rocio chirped, and Lilly clicked forward and into the corner of the room where Ravi was playing with his two cars on a section of the track.

"How is it my two year old is the least messy of the three of you?" she asked, bending over to press a kiss to Ravi's head. He squirmed away, continuing to move his cars along the track.

You laughed as Rocio licked a finger clean of peanut butter. "Because Ravi takes after you, and Rocio takes after me," you said, grinning at Rocio. Lilly frowned and crossed back over to the girls. "Don't worry though, I think we're all adventured out, so tomorrow we're just going to sit and stare at the walls."

"No!" Rocio shouted, and Lilly hushed her.

You tilted your head as if thinking. "I guess we could wash my car," you said, tapping your chin with a finger. "And the baseboards do need some dusting."

Rocio let out a dramatic groan, and you laughed, picking up a napkin to rub away at the spot of marshmallow fluff on her chin.

"Well, if you're not going to clean my house, you can at least clean your hands."

Rocio gave you a look of exasperation that she should have been much too young to even think about giving. Nevertheless, she slid out of her chair and headed to the sink, Lilly stopping her en route so she could press a kiss to the top of her daughter's head.

"How was work?" you asked as Lilly sunk into Rocio's vacated chair.

"People are idiots," Lilly rolled her eyes, giving a sigh.

"Says the literal genius," you returned, and Lilly snorted, shaking her head.

"It doesn't take a genius to follow simple instructions. I'll lay everything out for them, and even with pictures, they can't complete a single build without running into some potentially catastrophic error."

"That's not what you want to hear from the lead engineer at Stark Energy."

Rocio skipped back to the table, and Lilly scooched out her chair, gesturing for Rocio to come sit on her lap. The little girl veered off early though, instead attempting to climb into your lap. You shook her head, casting a quick glance at your sister who dropped her open arms.

"Your mom's missed you," you said, gesturing with her head across the table.

"I live with her," Rocio whined.

"And?" Lilly asked, moving her chair back up to the table. "I still miss you when I work."

"Really?" Rocio asked, walking over to the chair next to Lilly, and claiming it.

"Really," Lilly assured, placing an arm on the back of Rocio's chair, gently combing through her daughter's hair with her fingers. She looked up at you offering a small, weak smile before looking back down at her daughter. Her brow creased. "What are you sitting on?" she asked, tugging at something underneath Rocio. The little girl joined her mom in looking down, her eyes lighting up as she recognized the object.

"My Soldier Arm! Oh yeah! Guess who we met today!"

"Who?" Lilly asked.

"No, guess!"

You would have to teach your niece about the art of not playing a guessing game after making the answer so obvious. Then again, it still seemed so surreal that Bucky Barnes would turn up at your doorstep, that even with the "Soldier Arm", you doubted that Lilly would guess.

Lilly pursed her lips, putting on a show of thought. "Was it--"

There was a knock at the front door interrupting Lilly's guess. Rocio practically launched herself from the chair, already halfway out of the room by the time she could scream "I'll get it!"

"No!" Ravi shouted. His usual reaction when Rocio was too loud, too energetic, too Rocio.

Lilly exhaled a laugh at her son before turning back to you. "This was too much sugar," she said, circling a finger around Rocio's half-eaten creation. You laughed and Lilly smiled, and it felt nice for things to be normal between you--easy. Even if it was just for a moment.

A moment that was brought to a screeching halt by Rocio dragging Bucky Barnes into the combined kitchen and dining room by the hand.

"We met Bucky Barnes!" she chirped.

Lilly's face went slack, only managing to get out a small "Holy shit." Your eyes didn't linger long on your sister though. Instead your gaze was drawn to Bucky Barnes who looked vaguely amused at Rocio.

"Rocio, release your captive," you prompted, and reluctantly, Rocio released his hand, taking a few steps back towards her mother to give him some space.

"Is this--are you--what is happening here?" Lilly asked, looking between Bucky and you and Rocio, as if one of you had a reasonable explanation for this.You had only ever seen your sister this flustered twice before. Both of the previous occasions had been heartbreaking and traumatic, and you'd never quite gotten to experience how funny flustered Lilly was.

"He wants to talk to you and Y/N about something!" Rocio filled in.

Lilly's head whipped to you. "You know him?" she whispered, as if this was some secret conversation for your ears only.

You shook her head. "No, he just came by this morning and asked to speak with us."

"About what?" Lilly asked, furrowing her eyebrows and looking back to Bucky.

"I don't know."

For all of the differences between Lilly and Rocio--and there were many--their brain processing was eerily similar.

Bucky cleared his throat, drawing your attention back to him. "I um--I don't know if you want--" he gestured to Rocio. "Here for this."

"Rocio, go to your ro--the playroom," you corrected.

"I promise I'll be quiet if you let me--" Rocio started, and Lilly cut her off.

"Rocio, take your brother and go up to the playroom please,"

"But--" Rocio's face melted into the start of a complaint, but there a sharp cut of her mother's eyes stopped her dead. You remembered being on the receiving end of that look quite a few times while she was growing up. If anything it'd grown in power.

Rocio stomped forward, taking Ravi by the hand who whined and complained until she let him pick up a few cars to take with him, and the two exited the room, heavy footsteps echoing up the staircase.

You turned back to Bucky who was staring over Lilly's head, at the wall of family pictures.

The idea had hit you four years ago after Rocio woke up crying from a nightmare. Together, you spent the night going through old photo albums and Facebook albums, searching for the best pictures of the family. You ended the night with about forty pictures that needed to be framed, and the whole project took about a week to finish.

Every time the two of you ate lunch together over the past four years, Rocio would choose a picture, and you would tell her the story behind the picture. Your eyes flitted amongst them now.

There was the first time Lilly held you as a baby which was also the first time you smiled. Lilly's high school graduation--one of the few pictures with both of your parents in it, hovering on either side of Lilly as a six year old you sat on her hip. Lilly and Hector's beautiful wedding day. Lilly and Hector at your high school graduation. Lilly and you at the baby shower for Rocio, and Lilly and Hector at the shower for Ravi. There was one of Rocio's grandparents meeting her for the first time, and a good number of photos documenting your visits out to the family. Before the blip.

During your four years together, you and Rocio had also taken pictures of memories the family couldn't be there for and hung them on the wall; reminders of stories to tell should they ever return.

Rocio and you moving into a new house.

Rocio's first day of Kindergarten, first, and second grade.

The two of you and Rocio's ill-fated hamster, Churro.

Birthday parties and day trips that the rest of the family should have attended.

Bucky stared at the pictures, his frown deepening.

"Would you like to sit?" Lilly invited, allowing her collected professional persona to seep into her voice and straighten her spine.

The super soldier nodded, choosing the chair at the end of the table, closest to the door. He wet his lips, his eyes drawn from the pictures and down to the wooden table. It was strange seeing an Avenger--someone who had fought Thanos--seem so nervous in the company of two ordinary women.

He reminded you of the fourth graders who entered your office.

The fourth graders were always so hesitant to work with you--terrified of opening up and showing even a glimpse of vulnerability. It took three sessions just to get them to admit that they weren't fine and a few more before they lost the skittish look in their eyes. You doubted Bucky would be pried open by bags of chips or any of her fidgets, but figured you could at least try.

"Can I get you something to drink?" you asked, and Bucky shook his head.

"I don't want to take up too much of your time."

You nodded, and Lilly cocked her head. "So what brings an Avenger to my sister's house?"

He wet his lips and then looked up at the pair of you. "You're part of my efforts to make amends." Bucky made an attempt at a smile.

Across the table, Lilly's chest constricted with barely suppressed laughter, and the corners of your lips twitched in and out of a smile. Whoever had advised him to smile, surely hadn't meant for him to smile like that.

"What are you here to make amends for?" Lilly asked, her voice steady and betraying none of her amusement.

"I…" his eyes drifted back to the wall of pictures looming beside the group. "I'm the one responsible for your parents death."

You felt the world stop.

Or maybe it wasn't the world, maybe you stopped. Maybe every single atom within you stilled for a moment. Maybe your brain shut down and heart paused its beating, keeping you from thinking or feeling anything other than the numbness of shock. Because as surprising as it was for Bucky Barnes to show up on your doorstep at ten in the morning, you never expected he was responsible for changing your entire life.

"I know there's nothing, I could ever do to truly make amends--"

"You don't need to make amends."

Everything seemed to restart then. Your heart picked up its beating and brain whirred into action, sifting through memories and thoughts you'd long ago pushed to the back of your mind and locked there to remain untouched even by years of therapy.

Your skin prickled with flashes of images. The dark figure at the top of the staircase, the glint of metal you'd assumed was a gun in his hand, the cold blankness of his stare as his eyes bore into yours. And then the horror and sick relief of finding your parents in the moments after his disappearance.

"They were horrible people, and I'm glad they're dead. Thank you for salvaging my childhood"

"Y/N," Lilly gasped, horrified.

"You hated them too," you argued back. "Don't pretend you're not glad that Rocio and Ravi never have to meet them."

"Our relationship with our parents aside, they were still our parents. The least we can do is not thank the man who murdered them in their sleep."

Bucky for his part looked completely bewildered as his eyes darted between the two arguing sisters.

You shook your head. "You were more of a parent to me than they ever were."

"And it's because of that that I remember you waking up screaming every night for three years. So if you're not going to ask for amends for our parents' murder, at least ask for amends for what you had to go through because of him."

"My nightmares aren't because of him," you dismissed. Lilly would never believe--let alone understand--the reason behind your nightmares.

Seeing the argument was fruitless, Lilly tsked and dismissed you with a flip of her hair, turning instead to address Bucky. "Why?"

"Why…" Bucky stumbled along, confused by the conversational whiplash or the vague question.

"Why did you kill our parents?" Lilly demanded.

"Does it matter?" you asked.

"It matters to me."

You stared at your sister for a solid thirty seconds before, and shutting your eyes and bowing your head in surrender. Lilly didn't understand. If you had it your way, Lilly would never understand. You would never burden your sister like that.

Bucky swallowed hard. "I wasn't told the specifics of every...assignment. All I know is that your parents were working on something HYDRA wanted, and when they were offered a chance to join the cause, they declined. I was tasked with eliyoution and retrieval."

"Retrieval?" Lilly pressed

"Of their research."

Lilly gave him a single nod before looking down at the table in front of her. "I didn't even know they were conducting their own research."

You felt her skin prickle, an icy hot sensation shooting through your veins. Carefully calm, you reached across the table, palms open for your sister's hands. Lilly placed her hands into yours. "They never let us get to know them," you said gently, squeezing Lilly's hands. "That's why I'm angry and you're hurt."

Even as you said this, you could feel Bucky's gaze on you, intently studying your motions and facial expressions.

You looked back at him. "Thank you for coming to tell us. I'm sure it wasn't easy."

He nodded, his brow still slightly creased as he looked at her. And then his gaze flicked to Lilly, and you released a breath.

"I know it doesn't mean much--it doesn't change anything, but I'm not the person who did that anymore. I am no longer the Winter Soldier. I am James "Bucky" Barnes."

Lilly nodded, releasing your hands and looking Bucky square in the face. Her own expression was completely neutral, not a trace of a tear or any of the hurt she'd voiced.

"If you want to make amends, you should come here for Thanksgiving."

Neither you nor Bucky had been expecting that. Your instinctive reaction was to snort out a laugh as if it were a joke, and Bucky looked like the very dictionary definition of confusion: brow knitted together, eyes narrowed, mouth hanging open.

"It would mean the world to my daughter. You can think about it as replacing a memory of my daughter meeting her grandparents. you's right, this will probably be a happier memory anyway."

"You have to come!" Rocio rushed into the room, you and Lilly shouting her name in a mixture of surprise, horror, and reprimand. The eight year old made no excuses or explanations. Instead she stood by Bucky's chair, peering up at him with a bright intensity only a child could muster. "Please."

Bucky looked away from Rocio to Lilly and then you. "Ok."

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Patent troll's IP more powerful than Apple's

I was 12 years into my Locus Magazine column when I published the piece I'm most proud of, "IP," from September 2020. It came after an epiphany, one that has profoundly shaped the way I talk and think about the issues I campaign on.

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

That revelation was about the meaning of the term "IP," which had been the center of this tedious linguistic cold war for decades. People who advocate for free and open technology and culture hate the term "IP" because of its ideological loading and imprecision.

Ideology first: Before "IP" came into wide parlance - when lobbyists for multinational corporations convinced the UN to turn their World Intellectual Property Organization into a specialized agency, we used other terms like "author's monopolies" and "regulatory monopolies."

"Monopoly" is a pejorative. "Property" is sacred to our society. When a corporation seeks help defending its monopoly, it is a grubby corrupter. When it asks for help defending its property, it is enlisting the public to defend the state religion.

Free culture people know allowing "monopolies" to become "property" means losing the battle before it is even joined, but it is frankly unavoidable. How do you rephrase "IP lawyer" without conceding the property point? "Trademark-copyright-patent-and-related-rights lawyer?"

Thus the other half of the objection to "IP": its imprecision. Copyright is not anything like patent. Patent is not anything like trademark. Trade secrets are an entirely different thing again. Don't let's get started on sui generis and neighboring rights.

And this is where my revelation came: as it is used in business circles, "IP" has a specific, precise meaning. "IP" means, "Any law, policy or regulation that allows me to control the conduct of my competitors, critics and customers."

Copyright, patent and trademark all have limitations and exceptions designed to prevent this kind of control, but if you arrange them in overlapping layers around a product, each one covers the exceptions in the others.

Creators don't like having their copyrights called "author's monopolies." Monopolists get to set prices. All the copyright in the world doesn't let an author charge publishers more for their work. The creators have a point.

But when author's monopolies are acquired by corporate monopolists, something magical and terrible happens.

Remember: market-power monopolies are still (theoretically) illegal and when companies do things to maintain or expand their monopolies, they risk legal jeopardy.

But: The corporate monopolist who uses IP to expand their monopoly has no such risk. Monopolistic conduct in defense of IP enjoys wide antitrust forbearance. What's the point of issuing patents or allowing corporations to buy copyrights if you don't let them enforce them?

The IP/market-power monopoly represents a futuristic corporate alloy, a new metal never seen, impervious to democratic control.

Software is "IP" and so any device with software in it is like beskar, a rare metal that can be turned into the ultimate corporate armor.

No company exemplifies this better than Apple, a company that used limitations on IP to secure its market power, then annihilated those limits so that no one could take away its market power.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay

In the early 2000s, Apple was in trouble. The convicted monopolist Microsoft ruled the business world, and if you were the sole Mac user in your office, you were screwed.

When a Windows user sent you a Word file, you could (usually) open it in the Mac version of Word, but then if you saved that file again, it often became forever cursed, unopenable by any version of Microsoft Office ever created or ever to be created.

This became a huge liability. Designers started keeping a Windows box next to their dual processor Power Macs, just to open Office docs. Or worse (for Apple), they switched to a PC and bought Windows versions of Adobe and Quark Xpress.

Steve Jobs didn't solve this problem by begging Bill Gates to task more engineers to Office for Mac. Instead, Jobs got Apple techs to reverse-engineer all of the MS Office file formats and release a rival office suite, Iwork, which could read and write MS Office files.

That was an Apple power move, one that turned MS's walled garden into an all-you-can-eat buffet of potential new Mac users. Apple rolled out the Switch ads, whose message was, "Every MS Office file used to be a reason *not* to use a Mac. Now it's a reason to switch *to* a Mac."

More-or-less simultaneously, though, Apple was inventing the hybrid market/IP monopoly tool that would make it the most valuable company in the world, in its design for the Ipod and the accompanying Itunes store.

It had a relatively new legal instrument to use for this purpose: 1998's Digital Millennium Copyright Act; specifically, Section 1201 of the DMCA, the "anti-circumvention" clause, which bans breaking DRM.

Under DMCA 1201, if a product has a copyrighted work (like an operating system) and it has an "access control" (like a password or a bootloader key), then bypassing the access control is against the law, even if no copyright infringement takes place.

That last part - "even if no copyright infringement takes place" - is the crux of DMCA 1201. The law was intended to support the practices of games console makers and DVD player manufacturers, who wanted to stop competitors from making otherwise legal devices.

With DVD players, that was about "region coding," the part of the DVD file format that specified which countries a DVD could be played back in. If you bought a DVD in London, you couldn't play it in Sydney or New York.

Now, it's not a copyright violation to buy a DVD and play it wherever you happen to be. As a matter of fact, buying a DVD and playing it is the *opposite* of a copyright infringement.

But it *was* a serious challenge to the entertainment cartel's business-model, which involved charging different prices and having different release dates for the same movie depending on where you were.

The same goes for games consoles: companies like Sega and Nintendo made a lot of money charging creators for the right to sell games that ran on the hardware they sold.

If I own a Sega Dreamcast, and you make a game for it, and I buy it and run it on my Sega, that's not a copyright infringement, even if Sega doesn't like it. But if you have to bypass an "access control" to get the game to play without Sega's blessing, it violates DMCA 1201.

What's more, DMCA 1201 has major penalties for "trafficking in circumvention devices" and information that could be used to build such a device, such as reports of exploitable flaws in the programming of a DRM system: $500k in fines and a 5 year sentence for a first offense.

Deregionalizing a DVD player or jailbreaking a Dreamcast didn't violate anyone's copyrights, but it still violated copyright law (!). It was pure IP, the right to control the conduct of critics (security researchers), customers and competitors.

In the words of Jay Freeman, it's "Felony contempt of business-model."

And that's where the Ipod came in. Steve Jobs's plan was to augment the one-time revenue from an Ipod with a recurrent revenue stream from the Itunes store.

He exploited the music industry's superstitious dread of piracy and naive belief in the efficacy of DRM to convince the record companies to only sell music with his DRM wrapper on it - a wrapper they themselves could not authorize listeners to remove.

Ever $0.99 Itunes purchase added $0.99 to the switching cost of giving up your Ipod for a rival device, or leaving Itunes and buying DRM music from a rival store. It was control over competitors and customers. It was IP.

If you had any doubt that the purpose of Ipod/Itunes DRM was to fight competitors, not piracy, then just cast your mind back to 2004, when Real Media "hacked" the Ipod so that it would play music locked with Real's DRM as well as Apple's.

http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3387871/Apple+RealNetworks+Hacked+iPod.htm

Apple used DMCA 1201 to shut Real down, not to stop copyright infringement, but to prevent Apple customers from buying music from record labels and playing them on their Ipods without paying Apple a commission and locking themselves to Apple's ecosystem, $0.99 at a time.

Pure IP. Now, imagine if Microsoft had been able to avail itself of DMCA 1201 when Iwork was developed - if, for example, its "information rights management" encryption had caught on, creating "access controls" for all Office docs.

There's a very strong chance that would have killed Apple off before it could complete its recovery. Jobs knew the power of interoperating without consent, and he knew the power of invoking the law to block interoperability. He practically invented modern IP.

Apple has since turned IP into a trillion-dollar valuation, largely off its mobile platform, the descendant of the Ipod. This mobile platform uses DRM - and thus DMCA 1201 - to ensure that you can only use apps that come from its app store.

Apple gets a cut of penny you spend buying an app, and every penny you spend within that app: 30% (now 15% for a minority of creators after bad publicity).

IP lets one of the least taxed corporations on Earth extract a 30% tax from everyone else.

https://locusmag.com/2021/03/cory-doctorow-free-markets/

Remember, it's not copyright infringement for me to write an app and you to buy it from me and play it on your Iphone without paying the 30% Apple tax.

That's the exact opposite of copyright infringement: buying a copyrighted work and enjoying it on a device you own.

But it's still an IP violation. It bypasses Apple's ability to control competitors and customers. It's felony contempt of business-model.

It shows that under IP, copyright can't be said to exist as an incentive to creativity - rather, it's a tool for maintaining monopolies.

Which brings me to today's news that Apple was successfully sued by a patent troll over its DRM. A company called Personalized Media Communications whose sole product is patent lawsuits trounced Apple in the notorious East Texas patent-troll court.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-19/apple-told-to-pay-308-5-million-for-infringing-drm-patent

After software patents became widespread - thanks to the efforts of Apple and co - there was a bonanza of "inventors" filing garbage patents with the USPTO whose format was "Here's an incredibly obvious thing...*with a computer*." The Patent Office rubberstamped them by the million.

These patents became IP, a way to extract rent without having to make a product. "Investors" teamed up with "inventors" to buy these and impose a tax on businesses - patent licensing fees that drain money from people who make things and give it to people who buy things.

They found a court - the East Texas court in Marshall, TX - that was hospitable to patent trolls. They rented dusty PO boxes in Marshall and declared them to be their "headquarters" so that they could bring suits there.

Locals thrived - they got jobs as "administrators" (mail forwarders) for the thousands of "businesses" whose "head office" was in Marshall (when you don't make a product, your head office can be a PO box).

Productive companies facing hundreds of millions - billions! - in patent troll liability sought to curry favor with locals (who were also the jury pool) by "donating" things to Marshall, like the skating rink Samsung bought for the town.

https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-south-korea-s-samsung-built-the-only-outdoor-skating-rink-in-texas

Patent, like copyright, is supposed to serve a public purpose. There are only two clauses in the US Constitution that come with explanations (the rest being "truths held to be self-evident"): the Second Amendment and the "Progress Clause" that creates patents and copyrights.

Famously, the Second Amendment says you can bear arms as part of a "well-regulated militia."

And the Progress Clause? It extends to Congress the power to create patents and copyrights "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts."

I'm with Apple in its ire over this judgment. Sending $308.5m to a "closely held" patent troll has nothing to do with the "Progress of Science and useful Arts."

But it has *everything* to do with IP.

If copyright law can let Apple criminalize - literally criminalize - you selling me If copyright law can let Apple criminalize - literally criminalize - you selling me your copyrighted work, then there's no reason to hate on patent trolls.

They're just doing what trolls do: blocking the bridge between someone engaged in useful work and the customers for that work, and extracting a toll. It's not even 30%.

There is especial and delicious irony in the fact that the patent in question is a DRM patent: a patent for the very same process that Apple uses to lock down its devices and prevent creators from selling to customers without paying the 30% Apple Tax.

But even without that, it's as good an example of what an IP marketplace looks like: one in which making things becomes a liability. After all, the more you make, the more chances there are for an IP owner to demand tax from you to take it to market.

The only truly perfect IP is the naked IP of a patent troll, the bare right to sue, a weapon made from pure abstract legal energy, untethered from any object, product or service that might be vulnerable to another IP owner's weapons.

A coda: you may recall that Apple doesn't use DRM on its music anymore: you can play Itunes music on any device. That wasn't a decision Apple took voluntarily: it was forced into it by a competitor: Amazon, an unlikely champion of user rights.

In 2007, the record labels had figured out that Apple had lured them into a trap, selling millions of dollars worth of music that locked both listeners and labels into the Itunes ecosystem.

In a desperate bid for freedom, they agreed to help Amazon launch its MP3 store - all the same music, at the same prices...without DRM. Playable on an Ipod, but also on any other device.

Prior to the Amazon MP3 store, the market was all DRM: you could either buy Apple's DRM music and play it on your Ipod, or you could buy other DRM music and play it on a less successful device.

The Amazon MP3 store (whose motto was "DRM: Don't Restrict Me") changed that to "Buy Apple DRM music and play it on your Ipod, or buy Amazon music and play it anywhere." That was the end of Apple music DRM.

So why hasn't anyone done this for the apps that Apple extracts the 30% tax on? IP. If you made a phone that could play Ios apps, Apple would sue you:

https://gizmodo.com/judge-tosses-apple-lawsuit-against-iphone-emulator-in-b-1845967318

And if you made a device that let you load non-App Store apps on an Iphone, Apple would also sue you.

Apple understands IP. It learned the lesson of the Amazon MP3 store, and it is committed to building a world where every creator pays a tax to reach every Apple customer.

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Painted Windows 17

Masterlist

Warnings: violence, trauma, allusions to abuse, noncon, isolation, torture, suicide attempts and thoughts, further tags to be added.

This is dark!Bucky and a side of Steve and explicit. Your media consumption is your own responsibility. Warnings have been given. DO NOT PROCEED if these matters upset you.

Summary: Freedom is a relevant concept.

Note: Well...

 <3 Thank you. Love you guys!

Please leave some feedback, like and reblog <3 Let me know your thoughts.

As you neared the city, you felt your heart bloom. You watched the pedestrians, the buildings, the other cars. It was as if it was the first time you’d ever seen civilization in practice. Joggers, couples walking their dogs, others in suits with their urgent steps, and the slovenly in hoodies and frayed jackets. It was all surreal. So distant and so close. Just on the other side of that window.

“Where are we going?” You asked suddenly. “Your place? Can’t Bucky find us there?”

“No, not my place,” Steve said flatly. “Just… trust me.”

“Shouldn’t we go far away?” You fidgeted, restless as reality set in. You were on the run from the most dangerous man you’d ever known. “Hide, somewhere.”

“I know a place,” Steve assured you as he looked out across the traffic. “Dor, it’s alright now.”

You tapped your fingertips along your bottom lip. You stared out the window. The sky dulled as the afternoon wore out. It would be dark soon. The night would make the city more sinister. Already, the romantic glow began to fade. You noticed the steaming sewers and the litter on the curb.

“Steve,” you whispered as he turned a corner.

He didn’t say anything, even as you called his name a second time. You squeezed the bag still in your lap and felt a hard shape inside. You loosened the drawstring and pulled out the notebook. Your journal. He reached over and pushed it down until it was flush against the rucksack.

“Dora,” he turned into an alley, barely clearing the reeking dumpster.

“Wait,” the breath went out of you. You glanced up at the boxy concrete buildings. The shadows were familiar, the way the wind tunnel between the walls. “You…”

“Put it away, Dor,” he said.

He stopped at the dead end of the alley and the engine settled and stopped. He sighed and grabbed the notebook from you. Then he snatched the bag and tossed it in the backseat, the journal pressed to the wheel. 

“Please, don’t do this. Not again.” You begged as you grabbed the handle and the doors clicked. “You can’t. You were supposed to save me.”

“Save you?” He shook his head and snorted. He opened his door and heaved himself out of his seat, slamming the metal shut behind him. He rounded to your side and pulled open your door. “Get out.”

“No,” you said, “No. No, you can’t make me.”

“Dor,” he growled and placed the notebook atop the car roof, “Come on!”

He bent over you as you flailed out at him and screamed. “Help! Help! Somebody--” 

He clamped his hand over your mouth and unbuckled your seatbelt with his other hand. He grabbed the back of your neck and jolted you out onto your feet. You grunted and tried to stomp his toes as he thrust you ahead of him. He looped his thick arm around your neck and squeezed. 

“Walk,” he ordered as his bicep threatened to crush your throat. “Now.” He scooped up the notebook and kicked the car door shut. He pushed you along the alley and turned you at a metal door. “Open it.” He snarled.

“Steve, Steve,” you kicked out against the door and tried to shove him back with all your weight. “Let me go! I’ll die down there! You don’t understand, I can’t-- Not again, not again.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he tightened his arm around you, “But don’t think I won’t.”

He pushed down the handle with your journal and hooked a finger through it and forced the door open. He pushed you inside as you continued to lash out. You knew these walls, knew the dimpled concrete and the dark stains. You knew the stagnant smell and the tepid air that grew cooler as you neared the top of the stairs.

“How did you know?” You gasped as he kicked open the heavy door at the top of the steps. “How--”

“Don’t make me throw you down. It’ll hurt but you’ll survive.” He wrenched you off your feet and you clawed at the narrow walls as he pressed onward. 

Not much had changed since your time there. That round table where they sat, smoked, gambled, and plotted remained. The chairs were broken and bullet casings were scattered on the floor, their scars marked the walls. He took you to that hallway, that long hallway, and you cried out again.

“It’s best for you, Dora.” He said, “You gave us no choice.”

You twisted and writhed. He dropped the journal and nearly lost his grip on you and snaked his arm around your waist. He walked backwards as he dragged you along the stone. 

As you reached that door, you dug your nails into his hand but he didn’t even flinch. He flung you inside and pulled closed the bars. You threw yourself against them, the mechanism held. You looked down at it and hit it with your fist. It had been fixed. You gripped the bars and shook them.

“Steve!”

“Steve,” another voice echoed you evenly.

Bucky came up next to Steve, the duffel slung over his shoulder and your notebook in hand. He slapped the cover and shook his hand as he neared. His jaw twitched and squared as he clenched. His blue eyes pierced you.

“Bucky… Bucky, please,” you reached out, “Why? Don’t leave me here. Please, you can’t--”

“You said it yourself, sugar,” he looked down as he fluttered through the pages. He looked to Steve and nodded. “I have to break you.”

Steve swung the heavy outer door and it clanged into place. The small cell blackened entirely. You barely withdrew your hand before it was crushed. You staggered back and pressed the heels of your hands to your eyes.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. How could you think that you could ever be saved? That anyone could ever love you?

The cot was still there. You didn’t lay on it though. You couldn’t. You just sat on the floor and waited. For what… for the same torture that always came down there. You didn’t cry. At times, you felt as if you would, but the tears didn’t come. You sat, numb yet terrified. It was a grim sort of acceptance because you thought you’d come to terms with it years ago.

You woke from bouts of shallow sleep against the wall. Your back was stiff and tight. You had no way to count the hours. Time didn’t exist down there. It never had. 

The door opened once. You didn’t look as a bottle of water was slipped between the bars and some pre-packaged bullshit. You drank the water but ignored the food. 

Waiting, waiting, waiting… 

Dreading, dreading, dreading…

When the door shifted a second time, you stayed as you had been. Keys jingled and the hinges whined. The sealed container was kicked aside and the bars were jolted back into place. You tried to ignore the figure as the light flickered on. Another shadow loomed in the hall, looking in at the other.

“Get her up.” Bucky ordered. “Strip her.”

“No!” You slapped away Steve’s hand as he reached for you. “No!”

He batted you back and grabbed your arms. He jerked you to your feet. He pulled at the top of your jacket until the zipper split and clawed at his arms. He ignored your struggles, barely flinching as he tore the hem of your shirt up. He struggled as you latched onto the tee but he ripped it away with a hard yank.

He spun you and threw you so that you fell against the cot. Before you could turn around, he gripped the top of your jeans and pulled them down, taking your panties with them. He struggled with your shoes and bunched them up in the denim with your socks. He passed each piece of your clothing through the bars as you curled up on the cot as you tried to cover yourself.

“You like Steve?” Bucky asked. “He told me you said you love him.” He snickered darkly then hit the bars hard. “You’re supposed to love me!”

You quivered and stared at your knuckles, your arms wrapped around your knees. “I hate you. Both of you.”

“Oh? You hate him now?” Bucky challenged. “Steve, go on.”

Steve approached the cot again. You cowered and bent your head as you sat with your knees bent and hugged your legs close. He grabbed your wrist and twisted it back until you cried out.

“Steve, please,” you pleaded, “Please. Don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt your Dora.”

“Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be,” he uttered as he took your other wrist.

“Don’t talk to her,” Bucky snapped. “You know what to do.”

You cried out as you wrestled with Steve. He held your wrists apart and forced you down onto your back. You kept your legs bent as he climbed onto the cot, his knees on the thin mattress. He let go of your arms and pulled on your knees. He was overwhelmingly strong. He parted your legs as your muscles strained and screamed against his strength.

You flung your arms out as he moved between your legs. He unbuttoned his fly and you kicked around him. You shook your head and pushed on his thighs. He bent over you, his thick arm across your chest and you peered up into his eyes desperately.

‘Please,’ you mouthed to him.

His blue eyes didn’t waver as he stared down at you. He prodded your entrance and you winced as he entered you in a single motion. His hot breath tickled you and you closed your eyes as he thrust atop you. Your fingers curled into his shoulders and you grasped at the cotton of his shirt.

He grabbed your chin as you tried to turn your head. He pressed his lips to yours and groaned. You choked on a whimper. You wouldn’t let him hear your pain.

“What’s the matter, sugar?” Bucky taunted from the hallway, “I thought you loved him.”

You opened your mouth and quickly bit down on Steve’s lip. He pulled away and grunted. “The fuck?” He touched his bloody mouth, “She bit me.”

“Give it to her harder,” Bucky growled. 

Steve muttered and snapped his hips up into yours. The teeth of his zipper hit your tender flesh and rubbed coarsely against your folds. You hissed but held in the cries that threatened to overflow. He crushed you beneath his weight as the scent of his sweat seeped into your nostrils. His head fell down beside yours as he began to pant.

“In her mouth,” Bucky demanded, “Like they did.” He inhaled, “Isn’t that right, sugar?”

You covered your face and Steve sat back. He shuddered and pulled out of you. The cot moved as he stood and he came up along the side. He wrenched your hand from your face and stroked himself over you. His fingers slid down to your jaw and he pushed his thumb against your lips until you opened your mouth.

He held your mouth open as he slipped his tip just past your lips. He finished himself with a long groan and hot ribbons covered your tongue and trickled down your throat. He released you and swore as he backed away.

He stretched his neck as he sighed and fixed his pants, zipping them up as he approached the bars. You spat his cum onto the floor and coughed as you wiped your lips. You felt like puking but you merely turned your face down and hid.

“Oh, sugar, you can end this,” Bucky said as he unlocked the door. You listened as Steve stepped out into the hall, “I only ever wanted to give you what you need. I still do, sugar. You just have to ask.”

There was a pause. You didn’t move. Bucky tisked and the door closed loudly, then the other, the metal echoing against the concrete walls. You shivered as the light went out. Their footsteps faded away and you turned to face the wall. 

You knew what Bucky wanted. How long before you gave it to him?

-----

I know that was a rough chapter, so please, take care of yourself and stay safe.

[ironhusband]

Rhodeytony seasons of love master post of headcanons

What I didn’t miss too many days and decided to make up for it this way, not at all!

Rhodey is a rocket scientist and Tony is an engineer so you would expect that if they followed the recipe for fireworks, everything would be A-Okay. But of course, those two genius boys can’t ever let anything be simple. So when they try to make fireworks for Rhdoey’s family fourth of July party, there might have a close call with Tony’s fingers and the grass in Rhodey’s yard is burned to the crisp. Mama Rhodes is Not Happy.

Rhodey doesn’t often get drunk without Tony, but during the era between Ultron and Civil War where Tony is retired, Rhodey is a new Avenger and they miss each other terribly, the team makes Rhodey drink two shots of Nat’s too strong booze, and he maybe leaves him a voicemail before being wrestled into sleep. “Toooooony,” he whines into the phone, “I love you. I love you very very much. Did you know that your friends are the best? Because they are! Sam, you are the best! Tell Tony you are the best. No, but for real though, I miss you. I miss you, I miss you, I miss you. You should leave your stupid Malibu house and come live with us. Your friends are the best. And you are the best. It will be so fun. And then I won’t miss you anymore...” The next morning Tony calls him and tells him, “that’s the worst way you could have asked me to move in with you” but by the afternoon boxes start showing up.

Tony is often up by 3 AM so 3 AM voicemails aren’t uncommon, even if Tony hates leaving them (”it’s not 1993 who has an answering machine?”). He especially stays up and leaves voicemails when Rhodey isn’t there to drag him to bed. He’s usually a little bit manic, and just a tad longing at that time. But Tony’s sane enough while leaving them so it’s mostly just ramblings about Rhodey’s suit and its modifications and muses about Tony hijacking a military plane to see him. Rhodey sometimes uses them as a way to relax when he’s away and missing his husband.

None of them knit the ugly sweater. Roberta does. Tony cries when he gets his first ugly sweater from her because he knows more than anyone it’s a right of passage into being a Rhodes, and he finally gets a family. Tony wears the sweaters all the time because it fells like knowing someone cares for him. Rhodey, however, isn’t that touched by the ugly sweaters, and resumes to be seen with them. He doesn’t touch Roberta’s ugly sweaters on any day but the extremely cold or laundry day. That is why Tony is Roberta’s favorite.

Neither of them screams first in the haunted house. Our two prankster boys pull all their resources in Halloween and create a haunted house out of their MIT dorms, making everyone scream. Some of the things they invent for the house shouldn’t even be possible so people scream more than at any haunted house because they are convinced there’s magic involved. It makes Tony and Rhodey fall to the ground laughing.

Rhodey pulls Tony back in for the lazy day. Not only because Tony’s mind is so busy that he gets up way too early because he’s dreamed of an equation, but also because Tony gets up way too early for the time he fell asleep, and Rhodey wants to make sure his boyfriend gets at least some sleep. Besides, Tony needs to learn what a lazy day is and Rhodey wants cuddles when he’s finally home.

Tony is on the fall festival’s planning committee out of spite (one of the students there KICKED HIS CHAIR) and pure mischief and makes sure to ruin it in some way every year, or at least antagonize everyone else. He and Rhodey scheme every year how to torture the planning committee.

Tony wins Rhodey a stuffed platypus at the carnival and Rhodey wins Tony a faulty tape recorder. I have this exact scene in road trip fic.

Tony is the ice skating pro because he was a dancer as a child and part of his training was ice skating, but even he can’t skate without falling on his ass with how tightly Rhodey is holding on to him. Tony never takes Rhodey ice skating again, but him, Natasha, and Jeanette all have fun while ice skating together. Rhodey is upset about not getting ice skating dates with his boyfriend anymore, especially with how tight he gets to hold on to Tony in the ring. But he still likes to watch videos of Tony mastering the skill.

Rhodey makes the best hot cocoa! He learned the secret recipe from Mama Rhodes and will not share it, not even with his husband. Tony always pouts over not getting the recipe (”you’ll butcher it, no way”) but he’s happy to have his husband to make it for him, because it tastes like heaven and he’s the luckiest person on Earth for it. The Avengers also enjoy Rhodey’s hot cocoa in the winter and also try and figure out the recipe. None have succeeded so far. Mama Rhodes is delighted by so many superheroes enjoying her recipe.

Cuddling ensues when they get snowed in. Tony hates the cold and the boredom it all entails so he’ll leech on to Rhodey for warmth and entrainment. Tony sort of gets on Rhodey’s nerves by the end of it, but he finds Tony super cute when he falls asleep on his chest. It ends with Tony making himself so insane he creates robots to shovel all the snow away. It somehow works. 

Tony doesn’t much like the holidays because they bring back too many bad memories but he finds how Rhodey’s excitement adorable. Rhodey’s near childlike joy at getting presents on Christmas morning makes the holidays bearable for Tony. Rhodey insists they create their own traditions (like his parents did) when they get together and rent their own apartment during their MIT days, and so they create a few. During Thanksgiving dinner, they each get to make one dish and they order the rest of dinner to make up for the lacking food (Rhodey only made the turkey Tony only makes the cranberry sauce). Their tree is purely for decoration as they exchange gifts privately with each other, and it’s a rule that they must make all the decor for the tree. As they grow up and get more family members, the thanksgiving tradition is stopped but they leave the Christmas ones and create a few more traditions. For Thanksgiving, their small tradition is getting each other a gift card for a restaurant they recommend, a memory from the old times. They never eat at the table, but instead set up a buffet and allow people to mingle on the couches while they eat the food. Tony does the shopping for Thanksgiving and Rhodey does the cooking, except the cranberry sauce, because it’s easy and Tony can handle it. For Christmas, they have a lazy day in bed instead of wake up to see their presents. The Avengers might leave them presents under the tree but Tony and Rhodey only care about the gifts they give each other. Every new bot gets its own sock stocking and they let the bots decorate their socks. They both leave the suits in a random square in New York with the sign “they want to be dressed for the season!” and watch the different creations of Iron Man and War Machine “snow”men. It happens a few years in a row.

Rhodey hides the mistletoe right above Tony’s workshop door because he knows Tony’s always there and he’s one of the only ones allowed in, so Rhodey’ll get plenty of kisses. Plus, he gets some adorable pictures of Tony kissing his bots.

Tony hides the mistletoe in frequently-used spaces (notable mentions: Fury’s drawer when he leaves his pencils and the hanger on which Clint hangs his arrows) because he’s a little shit, and wants everyone to hate him. “I’m going to make you some of my hot chocolate, Tony,” Rhodey says as he opened the cupboard for the pot. Tony desperately tries to hide his smirk, “okay, hubby.” It takes a few minutes before Rhodey says, “fine, I’ll kiss you, but no hot chocolate for you.”

The season which reminds Tony of Rhodey is spring. Because Rhodey is just as lovely and beautiful as the season is. Spring reminds him of Rhodey’s passion and intelligence, the way everything turns green so quickly reminds him of how quick Rhodey is to develop an idea. It reminds him to pick flowers for his husband and finally being in the season to buy Rhodey’s favorite fruit, strawberries.

The season which reminds Rhodey of Tony is winter. Because Tony hates the winter. He hates Christmas and snow and rain. He hates the cold and the blackouts. So whenever something especially winter happens, like snowmen building or Christmas shopping, Rhodey thinks with a fond smile “oh, Tony would hate this”.

[css1992]

I absolutely love all of your stories and was hoping to give you a prompt! I haven’t seen you write Tony or Peter as superheroes, but I would love a story where the team goes on a mission that goes wrong and they think Peter is dead. A few months pass, and Spider-Man pops up in a different color costume next to a big baddie (Quentin? Rumlow? Whoever it is def has a crush or Peter lmao). If you can’t write the prompt, no worries.❤️

(...)

“Thank you so much for taking my prompt omgggg! To answer your question, Spider-Man pops up as a baddie, and he works with/for another baddie”

You’re too sweet and kind, my dear, thank you so much! I’m so sorry this took so long, something happened in my personal life and I was too heartbroken for love stories for a while there hahaha Everything’s fine now. I hope you’re still out there to read this and I really hope you enjoy it! <3

[*]

This takes place a few years after Civil War.  A few details were changed – Peter was recruited at 18, while attending MIT; Endgame never happened, they defeated Thanos in Titan; Tony and Pepper never got back together after their break-up somewhere between IM3 and CACW.

TW: Mentions of blood, alcoholism, grief and death. I guess that’s it, let me know if you find anything else triggering!

[*]

“It’s him.” Tony stood there paralyzed, staring at the hologram projected from Nat’s phone, heart pounding, ears ringing. “It’s him,” he repeated, running his hands through his hair, trying to get a hold of himself, trying to make sense of what was happening, of what he was seeing. It was too surreal – impossible! – he had to be hallucinating. Right? Maybe dreaming? Had he drunk himself into a stupor again? Had he finally gone mad?

It was a regular day, Tony had been down in the lab for an unknown number of hours when Friday announced Steve, Nat and Bruce were at the door, which was unusual. Usually, they’d visit one at a time, an unspoken agreement not to overwhelm the engineer, but that particular day they all marched into his house saying that he needed to see something. He was too exhausted to tell them to fuck off, so he just poured himself a drink and shrugged, gesturing towards the living room.

Nat proceeded to project a video from her StarkPhone and what he saw took away the ground from beneath his feet. He tried to sit down, but he didn’t make it to the couch, his legs were not responding, he fell on his butt in the middle of the living room. The blood felt like ice in his veins, his throat was closing up, his eyes were burning and his hands were shaking so fucking badly. He was boneless and petrified all of a sudden, as he watched him swing from building to building on his webs, a black and white blur.

Peter.

He felt Steve and Bruce on either side of him, trying to help him up, but he didn’t take his eyes off of the projection. It was him. My Peter, you’re back, you came back to me, you’re okay, you’re alive–

“Tony, it’s not him.” Steve’s voice brought him back to the real world, and he looked around. Natasha and Bruce both stared at him with worry in their eyes, like they agreed with Steve.

“What, are you fucking insane? Of course it’s him!” His voice was firm, angry, even though his hand was shaking when he pointed at the hologram, to the short video that kept replaying on a loop.

“Tony, he robbed a bank. He put civilians at risk. How could you think this is Peter? Are you insane? Don’t you know him? Look, we had to show you this because it’s going to be all over the news soon and whoever this is, they’re trying to tarnish Peter’s memory and we can’t allow it, but this – this isn’t him, Tony. I’m sorry.”

The older man stopped for a second, taking a deep breath. Was he going insane? Was he seeing things, was his mind playing tricks on him again? It wouldn’t be the first time in the last few months. He focused on the images. The bank’s alarm was sounding loudly, as people started running wildly out the front door. Seconds later, someone wearing a cape and a – helmet? Fish bowl? – on their head walked out, then finally him.

Not him, Steve said, but how could it be anyone else, when Tony could clearly see it was Peter gracefully swinging around on the webs. Not him, Steve said, but how could it not be him when Tony recognized every inch of his body? The long neck, the narrow, yet strong shoulders, thin waist, round ass, strong thighs, small feet, long hands and thin, wiry arms. How could it not be him when Tony could recognize the way he moved, the way he leaped and landed effortlessly, the grace with which he swung back and forth?

“It’s him, Steve.” Even as the words left his mouth, his eyes were fixed on the boy in the video. The suit looked a lot like the one Tony made for him, but it was slightly different. Black, instead of blue. White, instead of red. But it was him. Alive and breathing. “It’s Peter, I know it is.”

***

It was supposed to be an easy mission. Even though it called for every Avenger in town, it was just a security measure, Steve told them. They intercepted a terrorist group communicating online, planning a coordinated attack on Stark Tower, the Avengers Compound and Times Square. They were professionals, but only human. They thought they’d be enough: Captain America, Black Widow, Iron Man, Spiderman, Winter Soldier and even the Hulk as a safety net.

In a way, they were sufficient. They were able to avoid the attack and arrest almost every single one of the terrorists that weren’t killed during the mission. But the cost was high – way too fucking high.

Peter.

Tony knew what happened the exact moment when it did. He knew there was no saving him when he opened his lips and tried to call out his name and instead of words, blood came out. Thick, dark blood. He saw the life leaving his eyes when he looked at him one last time, eyelids drooping and then closing. There was no saving him, Tony knew that, and yet he tried. He flew as fast as the suit would allow him, even though he had no idea what he would have done if he had reached him in time. Which he didn’t.

Peter disappeared before his eyes, along with the man who had put a knife through his heart. And not just any knife, not any metal would have been able to pierce the suit. It had to be vibranium. Whoever that man was, he knew that, maybe he had Peter in mind all along. The only thing Tony remembered about him were his wide, blue eyes. Cold and wild. The sadistic smile when he heard Tony’s wail of despair. Tony thought he knew him somehow, but couldn’t be sure.

They just disappeared. One second, they were there, right within his reach, the next, they were gone. He’d lost him. The person he’d sworn to protect at all costs, at the cost of his own damned life, but he was useless the moment Peter needed him the most. Gone. Disappeared before his eyes, Tony couldn’t even bring his body home.

He remembered crumbling to the ground, broken and unbelieving, staring at the empty space where Peter once stood.

“Tony...” Steve crouched down next to him, looking pained and devastated, and the older man broke down.

“I lost the kid, Steve. I lost him.”

He didn’t remember a lot of that day, he’d passed out drunk in his room for the first time in ten years, woke up hours later in the med bay with Steve, Rhodey and Pepper speaking in hushed voices. He didn’t care what they were saying, because the first thought he had when he opened his eyes was that he’d lost the love of his life. His Peter.

***

“Boss, I was able to acquire the footage from the bank’s security cameras.” Friday’s voice brought him back to the present and they all jumped up, all eyes turning to the huge screen facing the couch.

“Good girl, play it,” he answered quickly, taking a seat because he knew he would need it.

It started with a normal day in a bank, people walking around, standing in line, talking to each other, nothing out of the ordinary. Then the guy they’d seen leaving the bank in the other video – Fish-bowl-guy – appeared out of nowhere, levitating above the patrons, slowly floating down.

“My fellow citizens, do not fret, I mean you no harm.” Of course, New Yorkers wouldn’t take his word for it, not after everything they had gone through over the course of the last decade. People started screaming and running, trying to get to the exit, but Peter stood there by the door. When they tried to push through him, he webbed some of them to the walls and the others froze, slowly stepping away from him. “This will all be over soon, I promise.”

Fish-bowl-guy demanded the tellers filled bags with money from their drawers as Peter guarded the exit. He didn’t say anything and it was driving Tony crazy, because he was dying to hear him. Both because he wanted Friday to run the audio through a voice recognition software to prove once and for all that it was him, but also because for six months he hadn’t been able to even look at pictures of Peter, let alone hear his voicemails or watch his silly videos. And he had several of them, the younger man sent him at least a video a day – his daily vlogs, he called them – even if they were just in different rooms.

But Peter didn’t say anything, he just stood by the door as Fish-bowl-guy talked to the patrons.

“I know we seem like the bad guys right now, but I promise you, we’re not. We’re the heroes here, really,” He started, overlooking the tellers as they filled the bags with cash. “We’re here to take the city back from those who took it from us. You know what I’m talking about, right?” The man looked at the patrons as if he was expecting an answer, but no one said a word. “Tony Stark and his little army. He took over his daddy’s empire, now he thinks he can just take anything and claim as his own. He’s done it to this city, even if some people haven’t realized it yet. We’re his hostages. He built himself an army and they control this city, the country, even! They fake threats and then come to ‘save us’, they destroy our homes, they kill our loved ones, they don’t care about collateral damage! Some of us have lost everything, because of Tony fucking Stark and his minions. But it will all be over soon, I promise you. I will set you free.”

He took the twelve bags full of money that the tellers placed on the counter and gestured for Peter to come closer and the young man webbed his way to him, until he was standing by his side. That was the moment people started running out of the bank, the moment they saw from another point of view in the other video. As they watched people leaving, Fish-bowl-guy placed an arm around Peter’s shoulders, pulling him close in a very friendly way, it made Tony’s blood boil and his heart sink.

“You’re doing great, honey. You’re doing the right thing. Come on, now.” He stroked his shoulder softly then walked outside, followed closely by Peter and then the video was over.

The room was silent for a few seconds after that as they tried to understand what they’d just seen. Tony didn’t want to read too much into it, Peter was clearly not in his right mind if he was robbing a bank, but still – the guy called him honey. He was… comforting him. And Peter let him.

“We have to find him.” Tony quickly ordered Friday to do a thorough search on the web, check surveillance cameras all over New York, police database, anything that could give them a clue on  where they might have escaped to – or where they had come from. The news said they were followed by the police for a few blocks, then they simply disappeared before their eyes. It brought back terrible memories.

“Yes, we do, but not for the reasons you want, Tony.” Bruce frowned, coming to stand next to his friend. “You have to agree this – it’s just not possible. Peter is dead, he would never –“

“Then where’s his body, Bruce? Huh? Can any of you answer me that?” He looked around the room and they all avoided his gaze, as if worried they’d break him if they dared to say what they thought. “He disappeared. Right before my eyes, Bruce. Friday couldn’t connect to Karen, we have no idea what could have happened after that.”

“Tony, his heart was pierced.” It was Natasha’s turn to try. Tony could see it was hard for her too, she had a soft spot for Peter, from the very first time Tony recruited him, when he was still an eighteen year-old kid. “He couldn’t possibly –“

“He was enhanced!” He yelled, annoyed they were all so ready to discard the possibility that the person in the video could be Peter when it very clearly was. “Is! He is enhanced! I was never able to measure just how far his healing factor went, Friday could only estimate with the amount of information we had at the time, but clearly–“

“Tony, listen–“

“No, you listen! You listen to me, okay? That’s my fiance! I’m telling you this, that is the man I love, the man I sworn to protect and then abandoned for six fucking months assuming he was dead, when I didn’t even try to look for him! I just fucking drank my days away when I could be looking for him and now he needs my fucking help! So you can either help me find him, or you can fuck the fuck off, ok?” He was breathless by the time he was done, and they all looked at him like he’d gone insane for good.

“What do you suppose happened?” Steve asked quietly, and Tony frowned. “What do you think could have happened in these past few months that would turn Peter into that?” He pointed at the screen. “If he was alive this whole time, why not look for you?”

“I don’t know, Steve, we’ll have to ask him.” Truth was, Tony was terrified of the answers to those questions. He couldn’t think about it at that moment, he had to find him first. “What happened to Barnes? You of all people –“ He didn’t need to finish the sentence, couldn’t. He sighed and Steve flinched, eyes growing wide as the familiarity of the situation seemed to dawn on him. “Do you think you could’ve mistaken him for someone else? Ever?” Tony’s eyes were burning, but he didn’t shed a tear, he didn’t have time for tears. He needed to find him.

Steve was stunned silent after that, watching Tony with huge, watery eyes.

“Tony, we just don’t want you to get hurt,” Bruce intervened again, approaching him carefully. “We don’t want you to go through the pain of losing him again in case...”

“It’s doesn’t get any worse than this, Bruce,” Tony sighed, because he knew that nothing could hurt more than the thought that he’d failed Peter. That he didn’t try to look for him. That Peter had been held captive by a fucking terrorist organization for six months because he was too drunk to get out of bed and fucking try to look for him. Because he just lost hope and never thought Peter might be out there, waiting for him to come, to save him. “There’s nowhere else to go but up, from where I’m standing.”

Nobody said anything else after that, but later that day he got a message from Steve saying they would find Peter.

***

He was in the hospital for three days after Peter’s death. He was a fifty-year-old man with a shitty heart, after all. He was sedated for most of it, whenever he woke up he was so out of his mind with grief that they put him right back to sleep. When he was finally able to go home, he insisted he was left alone, but to calm Pepper and Rhodey down, he activated Friday’s babysitter protocol. It was Peter’s creation. It would let them know if Tony wasn’t eating well, or if he harmed himself in any way. If he tried to deactivate it, it would notify them immediately.

So he was left alone, at least most of the time. He spent his days in the lab, drinking, working, crying, thinking. The memories came and went unsolicited, specially when Tony was too out of it to control them. Suddenly, he’d be back in the boy’s dorm room in Boston, looking at that ridiculous onesie that he hid in a box of books under his bed, watching him stutter as he tried to explain it was just a cosplay.

“A cosplay of some dude who does stunts on Youtube?” Tony raised a brow, amused, and Peter’s face grew red as he scrunched up his nose and frowned in annoyance.

“He’s not some dude doing stunts, he – he’s helping people!” He argued, taking the “suit” back from Tony’s hands and stuffing it under his tiny bed, before sitting on top of it.

“Sure, if you consider doing back flips for the camera helping people, then Spider-boy is doing great,” Tony shrugged, sticking his hands in his pockets nonchalantly, only to watch him grow even more irritated.

“Man! Spider-man! And I don’t just do back flips, I– He...” He stuttered and Tony took pity on him. His expression softened and he sat next to him on the bed, feeling the tension coming in waves from him as he muttered a quiet “fuck” under his breath.

“Peter, I know. I know. Okay?” He clasped a hand on his shoulder and the young man looked at him with huge, round eyes. Scared. Unsure. “I’ve been watching you for years. Your secret is safe with me. I’m not here to expose you.”

“Then why are you here?” He raised a brow and Tony took a deep breath, trying to organize his thoughts.

“I kinda picked up a fight with Captain America about signing some papers and then he met this friend who was supposed to be dead, like, eighty years ago, but is somehow alive and possibly a mass murderer? Now I need all the help I can get to fix it.” He winced and watched the boy’s face for his reaction, but he just raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

There was silence for a few seconds as Peter looked around the room, then back at Tony.

“So when do we leave?”

That was the thing about Peter. He trusted Tony blindingly, he never asked too many questions before jumping headfirst into whatever the older man proposed him. No matter how crazy, how inconsequential, how inappropriate. So he wasn’t too surprised when the boy said yes when he asked him out.

They had just arrived at the compound after Strange teleported them back from Titan, they hadn’t even showered yet, they were both covered in bruises and blood, but he looked at Peter and couldn’t help but think he could have lost him. They could have died, and he would have died without knowing the answer to the question that had been sitting at the back of his throat for months by then, which was–

“Yes,” Peter nodded, a faint blush taking over his dirty and bruised cheeks, and Tony blinked a few times.

“Don’t you want to think about that for a minute?” He asked, tilting his head to the side, and Peter frowned.

“Um, no? Why?”

“Because you’re twenty and I’m twenty-seven years your senior, kid.” It was terrifying to say that out loud. Peter was twenty. Tony was forty-seven. Twenty-seven years separated them. Tony was full grown man when Peter was swimming around in his father’s testicles.  

“You just asked me out, you can’t call me kid anymore, I’m sure that’s written in some rulebook somewhere.” Even though he was still blushing, he found it in himself to be sassy and annoying. Tony rolled his eyes playfully.

“Fair enough. So, should I call you later?” He pointed over his shoulder, signaling that he was going to his quarters to shower and rest for a few hours. Peter frowned.

“For what?”

“For your answer? About that date?” Peter just looked at him like he’d asked the most stupid question ever.

“I just said yes.” He said, raising an eyebrow, and Tony sighed.

“I thought we agreed you’d think harder about it.”

“Uh, no, you just chickened out for a second there, but my answer is still yes.” He shrugged with a playful smile on his lips and Tony gawked at him.

“I didn’t chic – ugh, you’re such a brat.”

“I’m sure brat is off-limits, too.” He winked, walking away towards his quarters.

Tony worried about their relationship – as did everyone else, specially their close friends and May. Peter was so young and, to make matters worse, he sort of worked for Tony. Ever since Germany, the older man paid him a hefty salary for being a part of the team – he was always on call, after all, and always trained at the compound whenever he was in New York.

But as it turned out, his worry was unnecessary. Although young, Peter was mature beyond his years and acted more like an adult than Tony did most of the time – they sort of met in the middle. As for the power imbalance, it actually felt like Peter was in control more often than not. It was subtle, though, Tony only noticed because Rhodey pointed it out once.

“That kid’s got you wrapped around his little finger.” He laughed into his beer bottle as he watched Peter walking away. Tony blinked, having a sip of the tea the younger man had just brought him. Peter was dead set on getting him on a healthier diet and tea was somehow involved. The young man insisted it would help with his sleeping schedule, so Tony just agreed, even though he thought most teas tasted like dirty water. “If he says jump, you ask how high.” Tony was going to argue, but then stopped himself. He tried to think of the last time he’d said no to Peter, the last time he’d denied him anything, but not a single memory came to mind. “I’m not judging, it’s a good look on you. Whipped boyfriend.”

Tony noticed, then, that he was. Whipped, that is. Peter was always telling him what to do – gently, of course, and always with his best interests at heart. And he listened, because, as it soon became apparent, Peter was usually right about most things. Tony was more practical, he was in charge in the lab, what with decades of experience over him, as well as in the battlefield, for the same reason. But when it came to their personal lives, Peter called the shots. And it was fine. It was good.  He felt loved and cared for like never before and he loved it. He loved Peter.

But he’d lost him.

And he couldn’t help but feeling guilty. It was his fault, had to be. He was in charge out there. He was supposed to look out for him in the field, he was supposed to keep him safe, bring him home alive and well, but he couldn’t even bring his fucking body back. He had nothing left of him but terrifying memories of cold, dead eyes and bloody lips trying to call out his name.

Days and weeks and months went by, but he barely noticed, barely left the tower anymore. He was vaguely aware of people coming and going – Pepper, to check on him from time to time; Rhodey, trying to get him out of the lab; Steve, with constant reports on what the Avengers were doing, as if he cared; Bruce, with excuses about projects he was working on; and Nat, for unclear reasons. They never asked him to suit up, though, not for anything. Not in a Tom Ford three-piece, not in Mark L. They just let him be. Which was good, it felt good to be forgotten up there in the workshop, which used to be their favorite place in the world.

Over those three years they’d been together, Tony had taken Peter everywhere – and he meant everywhere. A boy who had barely left Queens before he met Tony got to see so may different cities, so many different countries, even if just for one night sometimes, just for dinner, before they had to get back to their hectic lives.

But they always went back to their favorite place, Tony’s workshop, filled with so many memories it sometimes felt like it was haunted by their ghosts. Both of them. Because some part of Tony must have died with him and sometimes, when he got distracted, he saw them. Specially on the floor by the couch, that was too tiny for the two of them and Tony kept saying he was going to buy a bigger one, but for some reason he never did and they always ended up on the fluffy rug on the floor.

“You feel amazing,” Tony whispered as his fingers enveloped Peter’s hips, pulling him down lower, and the younger man moaned quietly and smiled as the words left Tony’s lips. He leaned forwards to kiss him as rocked his hips in a slow, lazy pace. “You are perfect, my love.”

“If you keep feeding my praise kink like that, I’m not gonna last two minutes here.” He laughed quietly against the older man’s lips, who sighed when he felt the boy’s muscles tightening around him.

“I won’t complain too much about it.” He tightened his grip on Peter’s hips when he sat back up and started moving up and down in a way he knew would drive the engineer insane. “You’re gonna kill this old man someday, I swear.”

“I really hope not, I kinda like him a little.”

And their ghosts giggled together and disappeared into thin air, like dust in the wind, and only a half-dead Tony remained with a glass of whiskey in hand, staring at the rug on the floor.

***

Friday was monitoring the press and the internet for any sign of Peter, but there was none to be found. For the first couple of days, Tony was restless, but hopeful. Peter had been missing for six months, there hadn’t been any sign of him for all of that time, so the fact that he appeared out of the blue that day meant that something had changed. He was sure he would show up again at any second.

As days went by, though, his hope started to dwindle. He grew desperate by the hour thinking that he would have to go another six months without seeing Peter, perhaps even longer – perhaps he’d never see him again. Sometimes he wondered if he was wrong, if that wasn’t even Peter in the video, if maybe he was really dead after all, but whenever he watched the video again he was sure of it. It was him.

So he couldn’t help but think that he had to be locked up somewhere. It brought back terrifying memories of those three months he spent in that cave in Afghanistan and how he never really recovered from that – he still had nightmares about it, twelve years later. Peter had been gone for six months, seventeen days, four hours and thirty-three minutes. And counting.

He couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, the only thing he could think about was Peter, and the cave, and Barnes’s sessions with BARF, and Hydra’s brainwashing methods. He drove himself mad with all the possibilities of what could have happened to Peter – what might be happening right at that second as he waited for answers.

He’d been awake for almost sixty-two hours straight when it happened.

“I think you should see this, boss.” Friday’s voice interrupted the loud music and Tony frowned as he raised his eyes from his latest project – a new suit for Peter, one so sophisticated and impenetrable, not even vibranium could pierce through it. Friday wasn’t supposed to interrupt him unless the world was ending or she had news about Peter, Tony was very specific about that, so, yeah, he was a little freaked out when he heard her voice.

She showed him footage of Stark Tower’s security cameras, Tony’s heart almost stopped when he saw the boy sneaking in through a window, along with Fish-bowl-guy.

“He’s here.” He whispered to himself, unable to move for a second. His first instinct was to run to him, but he couldn’t be irresponsible, there were lots of people in the building, he couldn’t predict what could happen, so he had to take a few precautions. “Friday, where’s Pepper?”

“Miss Potts is not in the building, she’s caught in traffic a few miles away, boss.” Tony nodded to himself, taking a deep breath, then he started moving.

“Evacuate the building immediately, but don’t cause a panic, I don’t want them to know I know they’re here. Call Pepper, tell her to stay away. Where are they headed?” As he barked out orders, he watched Peter climb into the vents.

“They seem to be heading to the mainframe, boss.”

“Revoke Peter’s access to the systems,” Tony rushed to the elevator, the mainframe was situated right below his penthouse, it took up the whole floor and there was no way in or out other than the elevators and the air vents.

“Done, boss.”

Tony’s heart was beating wildly in his chest, filled with mixed feelings. He was going to see Peter for the first time in six months, after he literally rose from the dead – he’d gone to his funeral, for Christ’s sake – but it wouldn’t be a heartwarming reunion. He knew Peter wasn’t himself. Something had happened to him and he wasn’t okay, he was worried about what might happen, but the anxiety to see him again in person after so long was stronger than anything else.

He activated Mark L and when the door to the elevator opened, the room was quiet. It was huge, the light was low and blueish, there were at list seventeen rows of processors from one end of the room to the other, and Tony knew that at the very back, in a corner, there was a computer. He walked down the aisles quietly until he saw them. Peter had his back to him, but there was no mistaking the line of his shoulders, his neck, the way he stood, his quick fingers flying over the keyboard.

“Peter...” It came out as a sigh, but it was loud enough for both of them to hear and turn to him. For the first time, Fish-bowl-guy had his helmet off and Tony could see his face – the same face that took Peter away from him months earlier. “You!” He stalked towards them, but Peter webbed his feet together. Tony could easily break it, but stopped in his tracks, he didn’t want it to escalate to a fight. “What are you doing, Pete?”

“How dare you talk to him, Stark! After everything you’ve done?” Those eyes were so familiar, but he couldn’t place them. Tony frowned, taking a step closer, breaking the webs around his ankles.  

“What– Pete –”

“You revoked my access?” Peter asked, exasperated and nervous when the computer announced his access was denied. That voice. That sweet, honey-like voice...

“So it is you.” Tony took yet another step closer, reaching out to him, but Peter got into a fighting stance.

“Why did you have to do that?” To Tony’s surprise, his voice trembled, like he was actually hurt by that. His heart broke in a million pieces. “You used to love me, you said–“ He shook his head, taking a deep breath. “You leave me no choice.”

“Peter, please–“ Before he could say anything else, the younger man leaped at him and almost managed to rip the faceplate off his face as he sat on his shoulders and started pulling it, but Tony was able to grab him and throw him away, but not far enough to hurt him. He stumbled a few feet and got right back up. “Pete, what are you doing, just stop!”

“No! You stop, Tony, please! How could you–“ He came at him again, and Tony flew out of the his way, but was caught by his web around his ankle. Peter swung him and threw him to the floor, but Tony quickly got up. “Please, Tony, you –“

“Don’t talk to him, Pete, he’s gonna try to manipulate you! We have to kill him, there’s no other choice!” Fish-bowl-guy was typing furiously at the keyboard, but Friday was keeping Tony updated. He was good, definitely above average, but he probably wouldn’t be able to hack into his systems. “Once we’re done, we can’t let him live, Peter.”

“What the fuck is he talking about! Kid, it’s me, it’s me, what are you doing?” Tony tried to reach Peter again, but he shot webs at him, trying to tie his arms to his torso, which was useless. The engineer knew Peter was going easy on him, he was almost as strong as Mark L and if the suit he was wearing was anything like the one Tony made for him, it had an instant kill mode. Still, he kept trying to bind him, not hurt him.

“I can’t let you release Extremis to the public! Please, I’m begging you, let me help you, we can–“ Fish-bowl-guy grabbed Peter’s arm, pulling him away and shaking him.

“Peter, stop fucking around! He’s dangerous!”

“Don’t fucking touch him!“ Tony had had it with him, he charged his repulsors and was going to aim right at his head, but for a short while, the room went dark, then when the lights came back up, only Peter was there. He had his mask off and, for a moment, Tony was free to breath. For the first time in months, he could fill his lungs up with air because his beautiful face was right there in front of him, within reach. Alive, healthy.

And staring at him with hatred.

“You’re disgusting, Tony. How could you do that to me? You groomed me, you sick fuck, I was just a boy, you molested me!” He started walking towards him and Tony blinked in shock.

“What?”

“You’re a good for nothing piece of shit, you left me for dead months ago, didn’t even come looking for me, I bet you found some younger ass to fuck, didn’t you? You old perv.” Tony took a few steps back, heart beating loudly in his ears. He’d never seen such hate in his eyes in all those years they were together.

“Pete...”

“You came after me because you couldn’t find someone your own age who would put up with your crap, right? The drinking, the nightmares, the fucking panic attacks, I was so fucking done with it! All of it!” He couldn’t believe his ears, Peter – he would never talk to him like that. Right? Or was that how he felt the whole time? “Give me access to EDITH, Tony.” He demanded and Tony frowned. EDITH was an AI that gave its users access to Stark Industries's global satellite network along with an arsenal of missiles and drones. It was only supposed to be used in case of Tony’s death, Peter knew that. “If you want to redeem yourself, you’ll do it, and I might forgive you.”

“Boss, I think you should see something,” Before Tony could answer, Friday activated the suit’s thermal imaging and Tony frowned. Peter was not standing in front of him. In fact, he was nowhere to be found and there was nobody where he stood just seconds ago. First, he panicked, thinking he had disappeared again, but it just took him five seconds to realize what was going on.

“Where is this hologram coming from, Fri?” Friday deactivated the thermal imaging and Tony was shocked by how realistic the Peter staring back at him was. So realistic that only one person in the whole world could have made it: himself.

“There are five drones projecting images in the room, sir.”

“Take them out.”

In seconds, five tiny missiles were launched from his suit and the drones fell to the floor, lifeless, and suddenly the whole room changed. It was still the same setting, but it somehow looked more real then, and of course, Peter had disappeared.

“Tony? Tony, where did you go?! What – what happened?” He heard Peter’s voice on the other end of the room and he rushed to get there.

Peter was curled up in a corner, looking scared and desperate as he looked around him in confusion. The other guy was kneeling next to him, trying to comfort him again.

“Pete, whatever he showed you, whatever you saw, it wasn’t real. He’s using BARF!” He tried to approach the young man, but his eyes were wild as he shook his head. He pushed the other guy away but kept crawling backwards, away from Tony as well.

“Stay away from me, please, don’t come any closer. I-I don’t wanna hurt you, please, Tony, please...” He was still looking around like he didn’t expect to still be there.

“Why do you always have to ruin every-fucking-thing, Stark? Why do you have to stand in the fucking way of every single thing that I do?” Fish-bowl-guy got up and started marching towards him, furious.

“I have no fucking idea who you are, you fucking weirdo.” Tony aimed his repulsors at him and the guy stopped, laughing incredulously.

“You hav – you motherfucker! You think you’re a God, don’t you? Above everything and everyone, literally wrapped in wealth and technology you’re unfit to wield. Like the holographic system I designed. A revolutionary breakthrough with limitless applications, that you turned into a self therapy machine and renamed it BARF! My life’s work, Stark, and you renamed it BARF! I told you it was a mistake, that my technology could change the world and then you fired me. You said I was… unstable. Ring any bells?”

It clicked, then. The crazy, wild eyes, the hand gestures, the insane world domination plans.

“Beck.” No wonder Tony had forgot about him, the guy was brilliant, but completely insane. He helped develop the technology behind BARF, but once he started talking about weaponizing it, Tony decided to let him go. “I didn’t steal it, it belonged to me, it was my idea, I made you head of the project because I thought you could see it through, but your ideas for what it could be used for were clearly unhealthy and a fucking threat to the world. So, yeah, not sorry for firing your ass, I was clearly right. What even is your endgame here, Beck? What do you want?”

“These days, you can be the smartest guy in the room, the most qualified, and no one cares. Unless you’re flying around with a cape or shooting lasers from your hands, no one will even listen. Well, now I’ve got a cape. And lasers. With my technology and with EDITH, I will be the greatest hero on Earth!” He spread his arms and laughed like the madman he was, and Tony frowned.

“Yeah? Where are your lasers now?” The guy looked at him like he had just realized he had nothing. Peter was curled in a corner, too confused to act, his drones lay limp on the floor, and he had no way out of the room. “Better luck next time, asshole.” Tony wanted to kill him, he did, but he controlled himself and just knocked him over the head. He fell heavily to the floor and Tony turned to Peter, who was still looking at him like the whole world had been turned upside down.  “Peter, baby, c’mon, it’s me, it’s Tony,” He tried to approach him, but he shook his head violently.

“S-stand back!” He panted, eyes flicking between Tony and the guy on the floor. “What’s happening, I don’t understand, I don’t… We were… Outside and you…You killed people, how…”

“It’s fine, it’s gonna be fine, I promise, just trust me, I will take care of you, I’ll take care of everything, I –“

“Stay away from me!” Peter got up and run towards the elevator, Tony had no choice other than shoot him with the tranquilizer he used on Bruce when he hulked out at the wrong time. He rushed to catch him before he hit the ground and carefully cradled him in his arms.

Finally, in his arms. Warm and alive, solid and breathing.

“I’m so sorry,  Peter. For everything. I’ll make it up to you.”

***

Tony startled awake when he heard screaming. His heart almost jumped out of his chest and he was on his feet in a matter of seconds the minute he registered it was Peter’s voice. He was distressed, possibly hurt, so he flew to his side, but was quickly pushed away by nurses and doctors that rushed into the room and Tony remembered the last 24 hours, where they were and why.  

“Tony! Tony!” Peter called as he gasped for air, and that was more than enough for the older man to force his away back to him, grabbing his shaking hand.

“I’m here, baby, I’m here, are you okay?” He asked in a rush looking into his wild, scared eyes, and the kid just looked back at him for a few minutes, blinking several times, before he nodded slowly.

“Are you – are you real?” He rubbed his forehead, panting, and Dr. Cho approached him to run a few tests. Peter had been out for a whole day after the Hulk-sized dose of tranquilizer Tony shot him with, even with his fast metabolism.

“I am. Do you feel that?” He brushed his thumbs across his cheeks and Peter closed his eyes, sighing and nodding slowly. Tony took his hands and pressed them to his own face, down his scratchy cheeks that hadn’t seen a razor in weeks, and Peter smiled. “It’s me, I’m here now, it’s over.” Tony explained to him as doctor Cho checked his blood pressure and his pulse, asked him a few questions, then once she was satisfied, she nodded.

“You’re okay, Peter. You just need a lot of rest, ok? Most of your wounds from the fight have already healed, but I’m going to keep you here overnight just to be sure, then you can go right home, ok?” He nodded and she smiled. “Welcome back.”

She left the room and silence took over for a second, but they still looked at each other, as if afraid that if the looked away the other would disappear. Nat had interrogated Beck and figured out his plan. The terrorist attack was an ambush, it was his goal to kidnap Peter all along, he knew he was the only person, besides Tony, who had access to EDITH.

He made them see Peter’s death as he kidnapped him with an illusion of Tony. He was holding Peter in a warehouse in Queens and the sad thing was, he didn’t even need anything to contain him. He kept him there with illusions. Peter thought he was at Stark Tower the whole tome, living with Tony as if nothing had changed.

Well, with a few changes. Beck’s Tony was slowly going mad, called himself Superior Iron man and planned to take over humanity by spreading a virus called Extremis 3.0. When Peter refused to help him, he was turned into a hostage. Peter was “Tony’s hostage” for months before Beck “rescued him” – by keeping him in the same warehouse, with different illusions. He managed to make him believe the Avengers were in on Tony’s plan and they had to stop them. The bank robbery was necessary to weaponize the few drones he was able to build after he left Stark Industries.

“How… How are you feeling, Pete?” He braced himself for the answer, because he knew it would be nothing short of horrible and he knew that whatever happened to him was his fault. The younger man bit his lower lip, frowned, and shook his head slightly.

“Confused. Scared.” He confessed, tearing up, but he kept holding Tony’s hand tightly. “Not sure if any of this is even real. If you are real.”

Tony could see that he meant it when he looked into his eyes. He was terrified. The older man took a deep breath and sat beside him on the bed.

“Do you remember our trip to Brazil?” He placed Peter’s hand on his own face again, kissing its palm. Peter nodded with a small smile. “Remember our last night there, on the hotel suite’s balcony? We had been together for, what, two, three months at the time? Remember what I said to you?” A tear ran down his cheek when he whispered yes. “I’m gonna marry you someday, kid.” Tony whispered back, joining their foreheads.

“And I said you couldn’t call me kid when you were making marriage plans.” Peter laughed wetly between tears, leaning up to place a gentle kiss on Tony’s lips, sighing in relief. “I should have known that could have never been you…” Peter’s hand slid from Tony’s cheek, to his shoulder, down his arm, until it reached the little cuts on his hands, the rough pads of his fingers. Peter took a deep breath, closing his eyes. “How long?”

Peter didn’t have to ask the whole question, Tony heard it, and he squeezed his hand.

“Six months.” He winced when Peter’s eyes grew large as saucers.

“Fuck... Fuck! Tony – I feel so stupid… I should have known, I should have fucking –“

“Hey, hey, don’t, don’t you dare blame yourself, you hear me? He fooled us all, Pete. The reason why I didn’t come looking for you before was because... For six months, I thought you dead.” He cradled his face in his hands and Peter gasped.

“Oh, God, Tony.”

“I saw you die, Pete,” He whispered, lowering his head so Peter didn’t have to see his tears. “I saw you die before my eyes. And I – I believed it, too. I never went after you, kid. I’m so sorry, I could have saved you, but I–“ before he could finish, he felt the boy’s fingers under his chin, lifting his head, and he was met with an equally wet face staring back at him.

“I’m here, now. And so are you. We’ll get through this together, okay?”

“Pete...”

There were no more comforting words to say other than his name. The name he hadn’t dared to say for so many months. He knew they had a long way to go, he could predict the sleepless nights, the nightmares, the anxiety attacks, the absolute terror of thinking of ever losing him again. He knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but they were going to do it together, they would heal together and relearn how to recognize each other blindly once again. One step at a time.  

[veryvincible]

Hey! 👋🏼 I was looking at Tonys panel with Carol and his AA panels. It got me thinking how can a person like Tony .. who is an atheist, a believer of science and a confident engineer rely on AA which has a religious foundation (the 12 steps) and place so power on God. I know secular AA have different takes on it and encourage a personal definition of God as any higher power the person may choose. But doesn’t that defeat Tonys belief? Because I don’t think he believes in a higher power regardless if it’s a deity or not.

This is a wonderful question. There’s a lot of nuance to the answer, in my opinion, because I think there are some things called into question here that Tony (very realistically) treats with a lot of complexity.

Firstly, Tony’s atheism is kind of... I don’t want to say it’s up in the air, because at this point, I think it’s kind of made its place in canon and fanon both. But, most likely as a result of the times in which he was created, he has been shown in canon (at least in the early stages of his life) to follow some sort of organized religion. This is from Iron Man Vol. 1 #164, and it’s... not strong evidence for him being a spiritual man, as most people who call themselves “not that religious” tend to be religious by way of traditions, but. You know. It is what it is.

Of course, we could dismiss this as yet another thing that early canon imposed on a character who wouldn’t be like that at this point in time, but I think it brings up interesting beats in the way Tony’s character has progressed over the years.

Considering him as someone who may have been raised as traditionally religious makes sense in the context of defining events, as well, given that we watch him pray the Lord’s prayer in #14 of Iron Man Vol. 4, one of his Civil War tie-ins.

Given the proximity to the alcohol (and the point he’s at in the timeline, here), one could also easily assume that even if he had no religious background, the very presence of the Lord’s prayer in AA meetings could have formed a connection in his head between this “worship” and sobriety-- at the very least, enough of one that the prayer strengthens the effectiveness of his willpower. It seems the little push he needs to pour a drink down the drain is borderline Pavlovian.

There’s actually a lot of religious imagery in Tony comics in general. He’s a man with a suit facing conundrums of cosmic proportions. It’s difficult for him to keep rationale exclusively within the range of earthly probabilities.

Point is, his atheism doesn’t come from his disbelief in a higher power. It’s quite the contrary, actually. His atheism comes from a belief that there’s no single entity that could claim the title of God, that any being willing to try has, just by being, already forfeited the title.

Which is a fair assessment to make, given that he’s fought many people claiming to be Gods, and they’ve all bled. He’s also watched people worship Gods that turned out to not... really be Gods, whether they were otherworldly beings, his buddy Thor, or, uh, himself. The idea of him, at least. In space.

Because of course that happened.

But Tony actually does have a higher power to give himself up to in these meetings. In Civil War II #1, he very explicitly states it:

“I respect the future. I believe in the future. I worship at its feet.”

“The Future” to him is something he can affect, certainly, but he’s aware of just how massive it is, just how massive all of time is compared to the few decades he’ll spend on earth. This is his higher power, his cosmic deity of choice.

It can’t bleed. It can’t falter. It’s inevitable.

And this mindset is... pretty in line with everything else he’s done. He’s referred to himself as a “necessary monster.” He’s implied many times over that he thinks he’s rotten and potentially dangerous, but he’s also intelligent and capable and he wants to do the right thing, even if he doesn’t always know what that is. 

If you’ve ever been in a religious environment, you’ll probably recognize his mindset going into any problem: there’s always a solution, always information he’s missing, always a “right choice” he’s looking for with a domino effect that’ll be as favorable as possible for future generations. He trusts in the future the way people trust in God, with an awareness that he’ll never have all the pieces to make sense of everything, but he can have enough information to act. And he must act, or else his worth, his right to be alive, even, is at stake.

So, needless to say, he’s not praying to a mainstream God. But religious imagery isn’t and has never been off-putting to him, and though he certainly could seek out unreligious (is that a word?) alternatives to AA, I find it hard to believe that he would, given just how influential his higher power of choice is as it guides him through life. He puts everything at stake for it, going so far as to make choices that will destroy not only himself, but also his relationships with his loved ones if it means he’s doing what he perceives to be the right thing.

Secondly, even if he were a man who had no belief in any form of higher power, not even a stand-in for it, AA still might not be something he’d discard in favor of an alternative.

Religion serves as a guide. Most often, it has “do”s and “do not”s, certain beliefs it supports, and a kind of... basic explanation of what human life is and how it should be treated. One of the more common threads among most religions that I’m aware of (I am not an expert in religious studies; please don’t @ me) is the idea that human life is generally sacred, and as such, people should treat each other with respect. Yes, some texts can contradict this, but the general rule is “be nice to each other!” when you really look at the basics of what people are trying to teach. At its core, religion is linked to what we as humans already tend to for the sake of survival: compassion.

As such, though we might not always identify with religion as a concept, it’s not difficult to identify with some religious morals and teachings. Some people take to certain teachings better than others-- it’s super case-by-case-- but if you’re stuck in a religious environment listening to some preaching or anything, there’s probably going to be something you can relate to, and some way you can morph and adopt the message. This isn’t, like, all-encompassing, by the way. Of course there are some things that atheists and religious folk will never be able to relate to within each other, but.

You get what I mean.

I’m an atheist myself. I spent a chunk of my schooling at a religious institution. At best, there were messages that affected me deeply (as they were hard-hitting even when I stripped them of the God-worshipping aspects). At worst, I had to grit my teeth through some assignments, though I felt mostly indifferent (if slightly resentful at times, more out of frustration with the closed-mindedness of the administration than with the concept of religion itself). My experience isn’t universal, of course-- some people in my shoes were more frustrated and angry than I was, and I can see why. But my point is, being an atheist in and of itself (even one as strict as Tony) doesn’t render religious imagery useless.

For example, if you happen to pass by a pastor preaching about struggles with guilt, you might not identify with the sentiment of “Give your worries to God and know He’ll take care of you.” However, you could identify with the sentiment of, “Those little things, those side effects of decisions you’ve made? They’re here. Those decisions have been made. You’re allowed to swallow past the reality of what it is that’s passed and move on. You’re allowed to let go of it, so long as you’re better today than you were yesterday.”

It’s especially easy to do this if you’re listening to or being exposed to content from a religion you’re already familiar with; in Tony’s case, if we assume he was a Christian at one point or was raised with Christian ideals (not unbelievable in the slightest, given his circumstances and upbringing), then he wouldn’t have to do a lot of heavy lifting in order to get to “core messages” of certain Christian teachings that he could still identify with. Couple that with the higher power mentioned before, and... it’s not hard to see what might be appealing to him about AA, and it’s not hard to see why it was so effective at sticking in his mind all the way through his darkest periods in life.

Now comes the less healthy part.

There’s also an aspect of self-flagellation to it that I feel Tony might identify with on a deeper level. We’ve seen him hate himself openly, and we know how he regards himself. Even if he managed to find himself in a courthouse-like environment where the religious undertones were more about judgment than recovery, I don’t know that that would necessarily... push him away? He’s already told himself there’s something rotting and evil at his core many times over. He’s already committed himself to a lifestyle of atonement and progress, punishing himself when he fails to accomplish things no human reasonably could and barely praising himself when he doesn’t fail. Do I think these kinds of meetings would be totally sustainable for him, given that he clearly needs to feel pride or relief on some level for conquering his demons? No, not really, but. I don’t think he’d abandon them straight away.

Besides, every healing environment he’s been shown in has been more on the welcoming, open side, even if we only get to see a bare bones interpretation of AA (with deeper exploration happening more with Tony’s response to it, or his and Carol’s responses to each other) in canon. He’s in a good place with it, and it’s very nice to see.

Tl;dr: Again, great question. At the end of the day, I think the combination of self-loathing, his desire for progress, and his conceptualization of “the future” as his higher power makes AA a good fit for him despite his lack of a belief in "God” as an entity.