#evil science triumphs in her metal heart

[those-fucking-marvel-fans]

Oc posting ahoy

Justine is aroace not because 'cyborg no feel love' but because it takes too time away from important stuff like evil science.

[master-gaia-tetron-crystalblue]

Similarities between Quintet games

The Quintet Trilogy

There are a few connections between Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma:

Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma deal with world regeneration and all three games deal with the concept of reincarnation.

Blazer and Will (in form of Shadow) have the technique of launching the spirit of the Firebird/Phoenix and apparently in Terranigma the weapons of the Hero, Ark, are shaped like a phoenix, too.

In both the Japanese and PAL versions the Soul Armor of Soul Blazer, appears in Terranigma.

In Illusion of Gaia, Will uses his powers to attract "Gems" like Blazer.

In Neotokio, the most advanced city in the world, Ark fights a ghost hidden in a garbage can, there by reviving the Quintet programmers, including a chicken, who are creating the game Illusion of Time 2 that is Terranigma. In the Japanese version the game, he is developing 天地 創造 (Tenchi Sōzō), they were literally making Terranigma. Also, in that version, you could answer a questionnaire (Quintet Quiz) if you were an expert in the games of the company, among them Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia.

Some characters and locations seem to appear in more than one game with different names:

All three games feature a dog named Turbo: in Soul Blazer, he appears in Greenwood; in Illusion of Gaia, he's at the Diamond Coast; in Terranigma, he's Meilin's dog.

In Illusion of Gaia, "The Moon tribe" people, are in the form of a Soul Blazer enemy: Ghost.

The enemies of Illusion of Gaia, Dinapedes and Nitropedes are similar to Metapedes of Dr. Leo's Lab in Soul Blazer.

Both Illusion of Gaia and Terranigma deal with Dark and Light Gaia.

In Illusion of Gaia the secret boss is Metal Mantis, who was the first boss of Soul Blazer.

Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma share a painter in their story.

The "Tulip" that appears in Illusion of Gaia in the of Edward's Castle Prison, is the same as those that appear in Soul Blazer.

Terranigma has Capetown in South Africa (though it can't be visited) and Illusion of Gaia begins in South Cape.

Mu exists in Illusion of Gaia and Terranigma.

In Soul Blazer there is a place called St. Elle's Seabed, in Japanese "Palace of St. Ells" (セントエルズの宮殿), name like Elle (エル) of Terranigma.

Some characters are equivalent to the same ones from Soul Blazer:

Guardian of the Forest = Ra Tree

Queen Magridd = Bloody Mary

Magridd Castle = Sylvain Castle

Dr. Leo = Beruga (Dr. Leo says  "I am not passing away, rather, I am going to sleep. When a scientist with my knowledge is needed, I will be back.", and Beruga was alive in the ancient world, before it was revived by Ark).

Connection of the Quintet classic games between Quintet Trilogy

ActRaiser and ActRaiser 2: For being the beginning of the Quintet Trilogy and their complementary games (Robotrek and The Granstream Saga), there are different references in these:

In Soul Blazer, The Master (a non-playable character this time) is represented as a serious, kind, understandable, positive, and pious deity. He forgave King Magridd and never gave up hope that Blazer would triumph against Deatholl.

In ActRaiser 2 The Master has the power to turn into the spirit of the of Firebird/Phoenix for a few moments to attack the enemy.

In the Japanese version of the ActRaier 2, "Tower of Souls" is the "Tower of Babel" (バベルの塔戦]), which appears in Illusion of Gaia.

In Angel Village, appear enemies similar to Ramskulls which are from ActRaiser.

The outside of Angkor Wat temple of Illusion of Gaia is very similar to ActRaiser's Marahna temple.

In Terranigma, you can see two paintings: The Master of ActRaiser 2 painted by Matis and located in Mati's, which is in Loire, and the other in Britain in Sir Rich's mansion. Like some statues of one of three angels that help him in ActRaiser 2, specifically The Warrior Angel in Loire Castle.

ActRaiser and ActRaiser 2 are of the games that appears in the Quintet Quiz of Neotokio in Terranigma in the Japanese version.

In Terranigma the virus created by Beruga, "Asmodeus" is a reference of ActRaiser 2 the boss: Deception, in Japanese version: 欲望|Lust. Deception, apart from his attacks, sludge spit, fireball and bomb; he teleports to escape and uses his "Teleportation orb" to take The Master to another site on the same battlefield. Unlike "Asmodeus", that demon teleports the combatant, but doesn't erase him forever.

Although in interview of Koji Yokota by John Szczepaniak of his book The Untold History of Japanese Game Developers: Volume 1, he revealed that The Master is part of the games Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia. It's believed that he is also Light Gaia and Tanzra is Dark Gaia. This is believed because of the opening of Terranigma, (both in the original and the European version) which says, "They came to be called 'God' and 'Devil'."

The damaged sound effect of Blazer is the same of the ActRaiser when The Master is damaged.

The sound effect when defeating an enemy can be heard in ActRaiser, Soul Blazer, and Illusion of Gaia.

Sound effect of the enemies attacks bullet firing can heard in ActRaiser and Soul Blazer.

Robotrek: The game is a parody of the Quintet company's themes; such as is creation and destruction, human ambition, the use of science for good and evil, the theme of immortality that is implicit in Nagisa an assistant android with the resemblance to the deceased mother of the protagonist, problems between neighbors and among others. In addition to having some elements found in the ActRaiser and Quintet Trilogy, Robotrek would be the complement of those games:

The "Blade 4", in the Japanese version is called "Soul Blade" (ソウルブレイド), which could be the replica of the legendary weapon of the hero of Soul Blazer, with the technique of launching the spirit of Firebird/Phoenix.

The form of Tetron (bipyramid) resembles with the "Shrine of the Master" from Soul Blazer.

In the Clock Tower of Count Polinky's mansion where there is an enmity of some dolls with the mice of the place, this part of the game could be a reference to Soul Blazer in parody form.

In the Japanese version, the chicken on the farm is called "Catherine" (カトリーヌ), which is made a small mention in Terranigma, and are the only Quintet Super Nintendo Entertainment System games where chickens appear and the main character can talk to them.

On Robotrek "Rococo Town" (ロココ町) is a reference of the art style that originated in Paris in the late 17th and early 18th century. In Terranigma, Ark buys for 800 Gems: "Rococo Apartment" (ロココアパート).

In the computer of the main character (Hero's house) and that of his father, mentions ActRaiser 2 and Illusion of Gaia (in the Japanese and American version).

With the CyberJack, the player can enter the computer in dad's house and meet the Development staff of Quintet. This secret is present in Actraiser 2 and Terranigma, too.

The outside of Gateau's space fortress is shaped similar to that of the Tower of Babel.

In Rococo Town, The Master is mentioned in one diary where it narrates the preparation of a wedding: "We must thank the Deity" (神), doesn't seem to refer to the deity of South Isle. In addition to the fact that the main character of the game learned to create replicas of The Soul Blade.

Robotrek is one of the games that appears in the Quintet Quiz of Neotokio in Terranigma in the Japanese version.

The opening of Robotrek (Japanese version) the planet Quintenix "Paradise Star"(Gokuraku Hoshi) it's mentioned as small "star" (星):

"Infinite universe Among them, various forms of life were performed. There was a small star called Gokuraku-hoshi somewhere in the universe and there was a town called Rococo". "無限にひろがる大宇宙 その中では様々な生命のいとなみが行われていた その大宇宙のどこかに極楽星という小さな星がありロココ町という町があった…"

In Japanese opening of Terranigma, the planet Earth is also called "star": "The star had two hearts front and back faces Light Side and Dark Side The 4.6 billion years since the star was born... The two great wills are repeating evolution and decline." "その星は 二つの心を持っていた 表の顔 と 裏の顔 ライトサイド と ダークサイド この星が 生まれてからの 46億年という 年月は… 大いなる 二つの意志によって 進化と衰退をくり返している。"

In both the Japanese and American versions, a girl's dog and her grandmother's have the name Turbo (タ ー ボ), a name given to the Turbo that appear in Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, and Terranigma.

In one video "Brute Press" VHS Vol.24 July 1995 (【非売品】ブルートプレス Vol.24 1995年7月号) published Terranigma Beta version.The sound effects can heard is the same of the Robotrek.

The Granstream Saga: It's not certain if the story takes place on Earth or in another planet in a distant future.In American version the story of manual tells us:"One hundred years ago, on the planet of Granstream, a great war devastated the land"; while the Japanese mention "the world" (世界) and "land" (地表) or "above ground (地上): "Going back in time, 100 years ago. The war that divides the world broke out, and humankind was on the verge of extinction. Based on different magical powers as the basis of civilization, the two opposing forces "Magical Empire Army" and "Spirit Alliance Army" do not yield to each other, and finally the empire destroys the enemy's center with forbidden super magic weapons Executed the operation. It shattered the earth's veins and caused cataclysms. The earth's axis tilted greatly and the surface of the earth was completely submerged. And all life and civilization rooted on the earth have perished".

"今より時をさかのぼること、百年前。 世界を二分する戦争が勃発し、人類は滅亡の危機に瀕した。 異なる魔法の力を文明の基盤とし、対立する二つの軍勢「魔導帝国軍」と���精霊同盟軍」は互いにあい譲らず、ついに帝国は禁断の超・魔導兵器で敵の中枢を破壊する作戦を実行した。 それは、大地の地脈を粉砕し、大変動を引き起こした。 地軸は大きく傾き、地表は完全に水没した。 そして、地上に根差したあらゆる生命と文明は、滅びた。"

Although in an interview Koji Yokota, identifies Terranigma and The Granstream Saga different from ActRaiser, Soul Blazer and Illusion of Gaia,these two games from different consoles, presented various themes related to the company's previous games, for these that suggest to be possible sequel of Terranigma. Due to the fact that the connection with the others isn't official, it could be considered as another complement to ActRaiser and Quintet Trilogy:

In the game Eon and Arcia make it a goal to raise the other continents to restore the world.

The level of Stalagmite Castle just like Dr. Leo's Painting of Soul Blazer.

A stone appears named: Star Stone.

Among Eon's weapons we find a sword called: "Arc Blazer" that increases damage to enemies that are weak against ice.And the axe of the Spirit King: "Gaia Edge."

The stained glass window of the church is very similar to the one that appears in Terranigma in Litz's church, but not the colours.

Outside of Airlim, the magic control Tower, it's similar to the form of Tower of Babel.

The background of Curio Shop, you can find a vase with two handle, just like Illusion of Gaia.

Appears the enemy "Mimic", like in Soul Blazer.

Eon use"Dried herb" and "Special herb" to heal like the herbs from Illusion of Gaia.

The original form of the Demon King Demaar (Digol) looks like the final form of Dark Gaia of Terranigma.

In The Granstream Saga, if Eon decides to sacrifice Arcia using her pure soul for defeat demon Demaar. In the end, The Master (Deity) appears, sitting on a throne in the Palace of the Heaven, talking to her.

The most powerful weapons of Blazer and their connection with the Quintet's classic games

In Soul Blazer, if you want to use the Phoenix, previously invoked, it's essential to equip the Soul Blade, the Soul Armor and have enough Gems in order to face Deathtoll. The games that followed represented the equipment menu of Blazer and the need have Gems:

Weapon: Soul Blade (Robotrek: The replica of the Soul Blade).

Armor: Soul Armor (Terranigma: Soul Armor).

Magic: Phoenix (ActRaiser 2, Illusion of Gaia, and Robotrek).

Item: Super Bracelet (the Scepter of The Granstream Saga).

https://quintet.fandom.com/

[vumomovies]

Alita: Battle Angel is a worldbuilding triumph and a storytelling failure

Genre films face a chronic problem: they have to introduce viewers to new worlds quickly and efficiently. There’s often so much lingo and history to lay out that writers have to choose between clumsy information dumps, or leaving their setting unexplained for long stretches, so they can get to the action. By the time a film’s original science fiction or fantasy setting starts feeling familiar, it’s about time for the credits to roll. That’s one of the many reasons studios find it so irresistible to turn these titles into franchises. By the second outing, the groundwork has already been laid, and the writers can hit the ground running. The challenge is producing a first film that’s worthy of a sequel.

Alita: Battle Angel, based on Yukito Kishiro’s 1990s manga series Battle Angel Alita, is a triumph of worldbuilding and a failure of storytelling. The film is set in a distant future following a devastating war that leveled all but one of Earth’s great floating cities. That last survivor, Zalem, is fueled by the factories of Iron City, and the humans and cyborgs who live in Zalem’s shadow literally feed off its scraps while dreaming of a better life above. Scrounging for spare parts amid the trash Zalem dumps down to Earth, the kindly cybernetics genius Dr. Dyson Ido (Christoph Waltz) discovers a cyborg girl who’s still alive, and repairs and adopts her.

vumoo

The amnesiac Alita (Rosa Salazar) progresses from wonderstruck child to moody teenager over the course of days, rebelling from Ido’s fatherly protectiveness to spend time with her generic “criminal with a heart of gold” boyfriend Hugo (Keean Johnson). Alita has a particularly good reason for thrill-seeking, as a battle against the cyborg equivalent of Jack the Ripper triggers some memories of her past life, and convinces her that more violent conflict might reveal more information. Like a video game hero, Alita progresses through the film, earning gear upgrades and memories of extremely lethal martial arts that allow her to take on increasingly more powerful threats.

The cliché game plot isn’t helped by the film’s cartoonishly evil villains. Jennifer Connelly plays Chiren, Ido’s haughty, morally compromised ex and fellow cybersurgeon. She stands out from the grittier denizens of Iron City, with her fine clothes and a forehead gem which looks distractingly like a BIM mark from the trash classic The Apple. Grewishka (Jackie Earle Haley), the hulking murderous cyborg hunting Alita for much of the film, at one point literally kills a dog just to show how irredeemably evil he is. Moonlight’s Mahershala Ali fares a bit better, by virtue of a plot quirk that has him alternately playing sports mogul Vector, and Zalem’s maniacal ruler Nova. But his acting talents are largely wasted on the clunky script, written by James Cameron and Laeta Kalogridis.

Photo: 20th Century Fox Too much of the film is devoted to Alita and Hugo’s YA romance and to “motorball,” a sport that provides the same action setpieces and irrelevant narrative filler as Harry Potter’s Quidditch or The Legend of Korra’s pro-bending. The only clear way to make it from Iron City to Zalem is to become motorball’s champion, making it an obsession of scrappy teens like Hugo, who play it with little more than motorized rollerblades, skateboard ramps, and a ball. But practiced professionally, it’s more like the eponymous event in Death Race, a sport for athletes who have traded most of their bodies for cybernetics, and are ready to creatively eviscerate each other for control of the ball. The fact that they can survive nearly anything, since they’re only losing metal bits, lets Alita deliver some pretty brutal fights while maintaining its PG-13 rating.

[bloomsoftly]

in the shadow of your heart

a thank you fic for @ragwitch. ❤️❤️❤️

pairing: darcy/bucky (wintershock) rating: t warning: implied torture (nothing graphic)

(thanks, bb, for beta’ing your own thank you fic. 😳 also this plot bunny turned into an outline for a full-length fic, if anyone is interested.)

There was snow falling all around her—the mountains were covered in it��and she was unbearably, bone-shakingly cold. The rocking motion of the train, back and forth, back and forth, made her uneasy. A screech of metal deafened her ears, reverberating down her spine, and as she turned toward the noise—that sound was never good—a blaring horn from behind knocked Darcy off her feet. Without any time to react, she was tipped over the edge.

Falling, falling—the winter air was whipping around her ears, cold and sharp, and she knew she was falling to her death. The wind howled in triumph, carrying her deeper and deeper into the abyss. It was almost a relief, after everything.

She heard a man’s voice, calling out a name. Not her name, but something else. She strained to hear, but the wind was too loud, he was so far away.

He said it again, and she strained—

“Darcy!”

No, that wasn't right. That's not what she wanted to know—

“Darcy!” Her whole body shook, and she wasn't falling anymore. She was—

Blinking out the window of the train from Edinburgh to London, Jane a worried mess at her side.

“Damn it, Darce, you scared me. What the hell did you see?”

Darcy tipped sideways, pressing her cool and clammy forehead against the window.

“Jane,” she moaned. “Janie, I don't think I can take trains anymore.”

Her friend, used to these episodes by now, rubbed gentle circles into Darcy’s back and hummed her agreement.

The younger woman took deep, even breaths to steady the nausea in her stomach. Each measured exhale imprinted a circle of fog on the window. She stared, mesmerized, and couldn't shake the sense that she'd been on the verge of discovering something important.

(read more link here)

-:-

When she was eight, she dreamt of the apocalypse for the first time. Darcy had been working on her vocabulary homework, browsing the dictionary for words that started with the letter ‘a’. She’d been scrolling down the page, a bored finger tracing words at random, when she saw one she’d never seen before. As her fingers followed its curves and angles, the world tilted sideways. Her vision was filled with grotesque creatures spilling out of a hole in the sky, of strange whales that swam through the air, twisting and turning through a mass of half-destroyed buildings.

The heavy book fell from suddenly nerveless fingers, thumping against the carpet. Normally the noise would’ve had her eyes darting toward her bedroom door out of fear, but instead all she could focus on were the words seared across her brain.

Apocalypse ...noun  ... an imminent cosmic cataclysm in which God destroys the ruling powers of evil and raises the righteous to life ... something viewed as a prophetic revelation; armageddon... a great disaster...

Shaking with fear, she dove under the covers and whispered reassurances to herself, half out of her mind with panic. She laid there, trying to convince herself that it had been some kind of crazy, waking dream. Just an expression of grief, her foster mom would’ve said disdainfully. Another flight of fancy from the stupid, silly girl. But she could still taste the dust caking the back of her throat, and her ears were still ringing from the shrill sounds of the sirens, and she couldn’t shake off the certainty that she’d seen an image of the future. Some terrible event that she desperately hoped would never come to pass.

She didn’t finish her homework that night. The punishment from her new ‘parents’ was severe, as it always was, and soon her fantasies of escaping the foster home eclipsed everything else, even dreams of the apocalypse. For a few years, at least.

-:-

She began dreaming of soft eyes in a careworn face, tired lines and a gentle touch. On good nights—nights when her dreams were left untouched by nightmares—she was wrapped in firm arms with a hard body stretched out along her back.

As long as she didn’t open her eyes, she could feel his even breathing, basking in the way it stirred the hair at the nape of her neck. Each morning, she woke up happy and warm and well-rested.

Only for it all to go abruptly cold as soon as she opened her eyes.

-:-

Once she was old enough to escape the horror that had been her life in the foster care system, the dreams came back.

They started out small, pleasant. The feel of warm sunshine on her skin, the desert breeze as it ruffled her hair. The feeling of sweat trickling down her temple after a long day of honest work, the sting of salt on her dry lips and the burn of alcohol as it slid down her throat.

She started college with the strange experience of knowing exactly what tequila tasted like, even though she’d never actually tried it. Thunderstorms followed her into her dreams, the clap of thunder and the strike of lightning oddly soothing to her for years.

When she met Jane Foster—the best mistake she’d ever made, forgetting about those science credits—the hair at the back of her neck stood up straight, and the faintest hint of scorched ozone hit her nostrils.

“I know you’re a political science major, Darcy, and I should give you a harder time about why you want the internship. But to be perfectly blunt, you were the only applicant. So…when can you be ready to head out to New Mexico?”

Darcy grinned and tried not to feel as though she was being guided by fate. Clearly, she was meant to go to New Mexico.

At first, everything was fine.

Then the nightmares started. Some nights she’d wake up cold and shaken, frozen and numb even through layers of blankets and sweatshirts. With the chill of fear and despair lingering along her spine, she stared out into the pitch black of the desert and played it off as acclimation jitters. They didn’t stop for months.

Sometimes, she woke up screaming with fire in her throat. On one of those nights, she’d fallen asleep at the lab table as Jane plunked away at the data until well past two o’clock in the morning. She hadn’t known how to tell her boss about her dreams, even knowing she should (she’d lost so many roommates over the years the school had given Darcy her own room), and Jane was completely unprepared for the nightmare.

“Darcy! Darcy, wake up!” Her boss’s wide-eyed panic was the first thing she saw, ducking out of the way of her instinctual swing.

With a blink, Darcy realized where she was. One beat of her heart, then two, and she could breathe again.

“What the hell was that?”

“A nightmare,” she answered, her voice raspy and raw.

“That was not just a nightmare.” Jane’s voice was hard, and her stare was probing. Suddenly, Darcy remembered that her boss was deeply driven to uncover all of the universe’s secrets. Watching as her intern’s expression went unsettlingly blank, the astrophysicist changed tack.

“Everything’s okay, Darce. We’re safe here. What were you dreaming about?”

The reds and oranges still burned in her mind’s eye, and without thinking Darcy answered with the truth.

“Fire. Fire and heat. A furnace, burning hotter than anything I’ve ever felt. The screech of metal on pavement, of shattering glass, the sound of people screaming.” Her voice was eerie and smooth as she spoke, like she was an observer in her own body. Jane’s brow furrowed at the change, and Darcy hurriedly pushed away the visions.

“Just a stupid dream.” When Jane looked unconvinced, she added, “Really. I probably shouldn’t fall asleep in the lab anymore, huh? I was clearly missing my bed.”

With pursed lips and distant eyes, Jane let it go. Darcy could tell she was suspicious, but there was nothing the young woman could do to distract her. Jane was more tenacious than a terrier.

Then Thor showed up, distracting Jane better than Darcy ever could. To be honest, Darcy was pretty distracted herself, what with the abs and the L’oreal hair, and the name stolen straight from Norse mythology.

It wasn’t until after the Destroyer had terrorized the town, and Thor had gone too—with a whispered ‘Be brave, little sister’ that made no sense at all—that Jane made the connection.

“You—” she growled, pointing a shaking finger in Darcy’s direction, still wrung out from Thor’s kiss and his abrupt goodbye, “have some serious explaining to do, Darcy.”

-:-

Jane let Darcy’s intuition guide their career decisions. They visited New York the spring after meeting Thor, for some astrophysics conference that was being held in Manhattan.

Right before the conference was due to start, Darcy had her vision of space monsters and the hole in the sky. Smack dab in the middle of the street, with tourists and New Yorkers alike streaming around the inconvenient obstacle she made on the sidewalk. With some difficulty, Jane dragged her up to the hotel room.

She shook for hours, locked in the horror of her vision of the future. When she gathered her shit enough to tell Jane what she saw, they hopped on the next plane out of the city.

SHIELD came to collect them, but they were nowhere to be found.

-:-

When their train reached London, Darcy resolved to research what she could remember of her vision and hunt for more clues. After the Destroyer, after the Battle of New York, she knew better than to sit around and ignore her nightmares. Even if this one had felt different, she was worried about what might happen if she failed to heed its warnings.

Of course, that's when Jane's doodad went haywire, the convergence happened, and Dark Elves zapped in from another realm and tried to kill everyone. Plus, Jane got possessed by a goddamned infinity stone (where was her warning vision for that, she wanted to know). And Thor came back.

In the long list of catastrophes, only Thor’s return was even remotely pleasant. Though, she was highly tempted to tase him again. For Jane's sake.

After their long, overdue reunion—Darcy had to buy earplugs, they were so enthusiastic—Thor pulled Darcy aside.

“You are wearing yourself too thin, soothsayer.”

She turned the word over in her brain; it sounded a lot better than freak. Thor stared at her, waiting, and she rolled her eyes.

“Yeah, I mean. Aliens just dropped out of the sky and tried to kill everyone, Thor. I'm a little in the tired side.” He waited for her to finish, as patient as, well, only a centuries-old demigod could be.

“No, little sister. You must focus your efforts on finding your anchor.”

What?

-:-

She was always alone.

The nights she dreamt of her anchor were bliss, but the mornings were hell. She dreaded waking up, so badly that she avoided going to sleep altogether. Her eyes looked bruised and tired with the weight of her insomnia and stolen joy, and she started to lose weight. Even Jane noticed, her absent glances from before turning to mother henning, vibrating in Darcy's orbit with worry.

The dreams wouldn't be denied, though. She began to have them even when she was awake—the  ghost of a breath across her ear, the echo of a chuckle across her cheek. The faint nip of a bite against her collarbone, so real she had to stifle a moan in the middle of the lab.

One day, it was all too much. She'd fallen asleep the night before, too exhausted to fight the urge, and had woken up wrapped in her false lover’s arms. Except he hadn't been there when she'd woken up—he never was, because he wasn't real. She broke down into gut-wrenching sobs, aching for the loss of something she'd never even had, driven mad by a ghost lover who had never even existed.

It was so bad that Jane was forced to sedate her.

When she woke up, Jane's arms were around her, not the right size or weight but anchoring her to reality nonetheless. Thor held her hands in his, eyes filled with solemn remorse.

“I have been remiss, little sister, and I only hope you can forgive me. It falls to me to explain the nature of your kind, and I have failed you by not doing so before now.”

Her kind.

Her kind. She had a kind. The thought filled her with warmth.

-:-

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

The words echoed through her brain for months, so often that it started to drive Darcy mad. Not that she knew what to do with them. She didn't recognize the voices or the name, and there weren't any visions that went along with it.

Until she woke up gasping, one morning, with the image of icy blue eyes and a glinting metal arm flashing behind her eyelids. She knew that face, even half-hidden with the atrocious muzzle thing that she wanted to rip away from him. She wanted to tear into everyone who'd ever hurt him (she didn't know how she knew, but she was certain it was a long list). Darcy had never seen him before, but she knew him.

Something told her that he was her Anchor—the one Thor had referred to, months ago. And now she was having dreams of him, clad in black and murderous, fighting against Captain America himself.

With only that knowledge in hand, Darcy did what any sane woman would do: she went on the hunt for Steve Rogers.

(She didn't tell Jane, couldn't tell Jane. There was something that screamed at her for even thinking of it, and she'd long ago learned to trust her instincts. Her friend thought she was taking a sabbatical, instead.)

On the way back to the States, Darcy dove into her research. The secret to the man in black could only be unraveled by the question that still echoed through her brain:

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

-:-

She found Steve Rogers in the cheesiest place a superhero named Captain America could be: the National Mall. The troll was running laps around a poor, beleaguered man who was clearly trying to run in peace. Part of her wanted to offer the hapless captain some advice on flirting, but she couldn't afford to get distracted.

Deciding it was best to allow them to bond, she watched from a distance as they chatted and got to know each other. A prickle at the back of her neck—actually helpful in the real world, for once—informed her that she was about to miss her opportunity. Not knowing what else to do, she stepped directly into his personal space. His words skidded to a halt immediately, mind clearly whirring as he assessed whether she was a threat. Satisfied that she had his attention, she took a step back but held his gaze boldly.

“Captain Rogers.”

“I'm sorry, I don't really have time right now for—” His words were polite, but his tone was annoyed. There were lines around his eyes and mouth, and she wondered whether anyone had given him a single moment to rest.

“I'm not a fan.” As his eyes widened, she amended, “I mean, I'm not not a fan. I'm just…not here for your signature or whatever it is that fans of yours ask for.”

“In that case, I really don't have time. Apologies.” He started to turn away, but she took that step forward again, intercepting him. She knew he could bowl her over in a hot second if he wanted to, but she was counting on his chivalric nature. It was a close call, judging by the ticking of his jaw, but he refrained from physically pushing her aside.

“Look, Miss—”

“Steve, is everything alright?” It was the handsome man from before, the running companion with a charming grin and easy manner. He had stopped pretending not to eavesdrop from the captain’s other side, and wasn't looking all that casual now.

Darcy knew she'd run out of time.

“Listen, Captain, I know you don't know me or have any reason to trust me and I don't blame you. But your friend Bucky—”

Captain Rogers’ eyes widened, but she was interrupted yet again, this time by a purr of an engine as the red-headed Avenger pulled up to the curve. The woman rolled down the window, and Darcy knew that she was losing him.

“Bucky is the Winter Soldier,” she hissed, forgetting that the man had no reason to know who that was.

“He's the what? Nevermind, I really have to go. Bucky Barnes died in 1943, Miss. Everyone knows that.” With that final bitter statement, he slid into the car and they went roaring off down the street.

Unable to face the literal disappearance of her only hope at finding the man who haunted her dreams, Darcy closed her eyes and tried not to cry. Tears pressed against the edges of her eyelids, hot and stinging.

“Hey, uh, you okay? Is there…someone I can call for you?”

He had a therapist’s voice, the captain’s friend slash companion. She laughed at the implication hidden in his words.

“Thanks, dude. But I'm not crazy.” He offered a falsely supportive grin, and she knew he didn't believe her. “Really. You're friends with him, right?”

“Not really. We just met.” He crossed his arms over his chest as he spoke, shutting her out. But all she needed was one little in.

“He's gonna come find you again. He needs you.” The words rang true as they escaped her tongue, and the man stood up a little straighter. “Things are about to get really bad for him. The shock of a lifetime, even for a man who was frozen in ice for seventy years.”

He straightened up, grinning sliding off his face as he pulled himself up to his full height. He towered over her, and she tried not to shiver.

“And how do you know that? What are you saying—?”

“I've said too much already. But please—when the shit hits the fan, will you give him my number? In case he wants to talk.” He hesitated, so she wheedled, “What could it hurt? If nothing happens, he doesn't even need to know that you had it.”

He shrugged, accepting her logic, so she reached into her pocket. His eyes zoned in on her motion with alarm, and she slowly withdrew the strip of paper. It had nothing but a phone number scrawled in her handwriting. A prepaid burner phone, because she wasn't an idiot.

“Thanks.”

“Now you hold on a second,” he said, reaching out to stop her from slipping away. Her eyes widened in alarm—this wasn't part of the plan—and she dodged his reach.

Thankfully for her, a noisy bus of school children disembarked not twenty feet away from their position. The sudden influx of kids screaming in excitement drew his attention. By the time he turned back around, she'd already slipped away.

-:-

Captain Rogers did call her, she found out later. After the assassination of Director Fury, when Agent Romanov told him about the bogeyman of the intelligence world. As soon as she'd said the words “winter soldier,” he'd thought of the strange woman in the park.

Faithful Sam had held onto her number, and Steve tried to call her at some point between getting marked as a fugitive and warring with his best friend on a busy freeway.

She didn't answer, of course.

By then, she'd already been taken.

A small part of his brain had wondered, vaguely worried about her welfare, but then he'd been called upon to save the world yet again, and she'd fallen through the cracks.

She was used to that.

-:-

She didn't think it was supposed to work like this, him anchoring her even though they'd never even met.

But as the scientists poked and prodded at her, taking her blood and other tests she didn't want to think about, the memory of him held her steady.

Her gift, as Thor had called it, stopped showing her visions of the future. Perhaps because it was too bleak, and she'd lose all her remaining will to live. Instead, she saw the past.

She saw Bucky’s past: his friendship with Steve, their lives growing up in Brooklyn. It came in snippets: the heat of the paved streets in the summer, the way Steve would sway as he picked a fight with someone twice his size.

It kept her going, the urge to reconcile the images with a set of sad eyes and a weary heart, the arms that once could've held her at night.

Hope burned away before rage did, and eventually the dreams left her too. But though she'd long lost the hope that he'd come for her, fury kept her alive.

She was very good at doing things out of spite.

-:-

Darcy got lost in her own mind, her only solace that Hydra couldn't seem to figure out what was so different about her. They knew something, clearly, else she suspected she would have been dead long ago. But her ability never manifested itself during her captivity, and they were left forever guessing.

Still, she was poked and prodded and harassed for hours on end, for days. It was too much for her mind to bear, and she escaped within herself to cope. She dreamt of Jane, of the desert, warm fires and thick blankets.

She dreamt of her anchor: nothing she hadn't thought of before, and everything seemed so distant now. She no longer felt the brush of his fingers through her hair or along her spine, and her body ached with the loss. Instead, she saw his eyes. Sometimes bright and lively, mischievous and playful—sometimes dark and brooding and filled with terrible pain.

Her haven was so deep that it took hours for her to realize that the blaring alarms weren't just the soundtrack to her dreams of the lab. Jane hadn't forgotten to change the fire alarm; instead, hell was being rained down upon her captors.

By the time she dragged herself up and out of her self-imposed mental prison, the building had fallen silent again. She blinked gummy eyes—her tears had all dried up ages ago, and her sweat laid dry and clammy on her skin—and realized that her ever-present torturers had disappeared.

No, there they were, sprawled across the floor. Their white coats were soaked red.

A scuff of a boot on the floor drew her attention away, until she was face to face with—

Darcy blinked. Surely, after all this time she was hallucinating.

But there he was, no longer wearing the muzzle but eyes as aching and angry as ever. And he was pointing a gun at her.

She blinked again.

“You,” he growled, his voice harsh and rough with disuse. “It's you.”

She licked her lips, but her threat was raw from endless screaming, and she couldn't speak.

“You've been haunting me.” He sounded almost as desperate as she felt. Her head spun; it wasn't supposed to be like this. Thor hadn't said anything about her anchor dreaming too. “Why are you haunting me?” he demanded.

She shook in her restraints, trembling with the need to be free. His eyes dropped to her hospital gown, the bloodstains at the hem and the gauze at her elbow, and all the wariness bled away.

“Jesus. What did they do to you?” In two strides, he was at her side and reaching for the straps that held her down.

In no time at all, she was free and tumbling over the edge into his arms.

He held her tight, and they sank to the floor.

“Shh,” he murmured against her hair. His hands swept down her back with smooth strokes, sure and steady, like a muscle memory he'd never managed to shake. “Shh, I've got you.”

His breath ghosted against her hair as he spoke. Not ghost-like, anymore. He was real, and he was there.

Darcy began to sob in earnest, and he gripped her tighter.

It felt as good as she'd ever imagined.

[selinaneveahcrystal]

Breathe

WARNING: This fic down here may be a little dark and angsty, so a fair warning for people who are sensitive towards issues of miscarriage or losing a child.

A/N: When I chanced upon this dialogue prompt from @themutantunderground ,the only thought for a prompt that I had that would fit the prompt was an angsty one. So I started to write xD and it turned out darker than expected. I know some of you may believe that a Dark Lauren is somewhat OOC from her character in her show, but I believe everyone has the propensity to actually be dark. It is the anger and the dark emotions in your chest that directs you on that path--only difference is: if you choose to listen to its calling and turn yourself into a monster that has the capacity to kill. I believe Lauren DOES have that darkness in her, its just that as the more grounded two of the Strucker siblings, when her brother is volatile and angry, she takes it as her responsibility to be the calmer one, as well as the more grounded one, but she does have the capacity to become evil too, or be vengeful. So this is my take on it :3 I originally thought it would be an angsty Eclaris, since its my otp, BUT WELL. 

Side Note: Lauren’s powers lie in the essence of matter manipulation, bordering on elemental manipulation, hence I took the idea that she could manipulate air molecules to her bidding to a higher level. For all we know, anger or grief does help in increasing mutant abilities or the feel of their own powers.

Dark!Lauren

Couple: Eclaris

Prompt: “Breathe, please breathe.” The atmosphere of the once cheerful headquarters is deathly silent, save for the cries of shrill hoarse pain that fills the air sporadically in the direction of Lorna and Marcos' room. All of them are gathered right outside the room that Lorna's in, having just managed to rescue her from the twisted facility that was experimenting on both Lorna and her unborn child, boosting and torturing Lorna's powers both mentally and physically. And it was obvious how much it had affected her, for the slim lanky leader of the Mutant Underground was reduced to almost an unhealthy image of skin and bones, mirroring Claire who had died from an overdose of the drug Doctor Campbell had consistently given her, and it was obvious her body, despite having fought to survive and hold her baby safe for a couple months more, was giving out. The moment they had taken her off the support that was delaying the inevitable, her body had gone into an extreme reaction from the rough withdrawal of the drug and medicine, forcing her body into a state of prematured labour in an attempt to rid Lorna's body of any possible impedement to her body's survival and recovery, both external and internal. Lauren's throat tightened. That meant that Aurora was four to three months too early to come into the world.

The smell of metallic blood filled the air and made bile rise up Lauren's throat, and she watched her mother bustle in the room, hands slick with red red blood, her face tight with concentration. "Hey." Andy grabs her hands tightly. She knows he's feeling just as much guilt as she is for leading Lorna into a trap, despite how unintentional it was. "If we hadn't gone ahead with what we planned, Lorna might not have been captured." Lauren whispers softly, her blonde hair falling over her face slightly. "If we'd been stronger---" "There's no use regretting now. Lorna's always been a fighter." John's voice was rough with emotion as he tried to comfort the two young teens, but the shake of his voice betrayed the amount of nerves he felt for the condition of his friend. "Marcos." All of them are startled from their silent reverie as Caitlin retreats from the bloodied room, face pale and wane from working hours on end in saving both Lorna and her baby. "Caitlin." Marcos is half torn with anxiety and grief. "Are they alright? Is Lorna alright?" Their mother chafs her hands slightly in anxiety, her eyes trying not to meet Marcos' earnest ones desperately. "Caitlin." John steps up, holding a supporting hand on his friend's back before giving Caitlin a low nod. "Lorna's fine. I've managed to stop the bleeding, and whatever drugs they pumped her with, it's fading from her system." Caitlin swallows, her throat tightening as she meets her children's eyes and Reed's eyes with tentative honesty. "It's Aurora I'm not so sure about." The whisper delivered is fairly soft, but still equally devastating. "Wait. W-wait, so it's a girl?" Marcos can't help but feel torn at the happiness and grief that mingles in his heart. "She's small, but she's Perfect. Just weak." Caitlin whispers. "I don't think she's gonna make it past tonight. Whatever the drugs did to Lorna, it impacted Aurora the most. She's not breathing on her own, and her lungs are underdeveloped. She's not even getting enough oxygen into her lungs, and her heart can't keep up with the stress her body is putting it through. Her body is slowly breaking down." "Isn't there anything that we can do?" "Here? I don't have the facilities to give her the right life support nor the expert care she needs to be able to pull through the first few months of her life." Caitlin responds almost immediately. "I know she urgently needs surgery to help her breathe, but I--I've never studied that far in my nursing career. I'm not the best doctor to be able to help determine if---" "Caitlin?" They're rudely interrupted by Lorna sudden frail but frantic and hysterical voice. "Caitlin, my baby--she's not breathing; she's not breathing!" Marcos starts almost violently, dashing in after a pale Caitlin back into the room that smelt of death and gloom, and Lauren slowly stepped beyond the threshold to peer in, reeling back at the strong scent of blood and just nothing but more blood. Lorna was a matted mess of blood, sweat and tears, her chest heaving as she curled over a small figure, whose tiny chest Lauren could just barely make out it's slow rise and fall. "Lorna, I need to see what's wrong with Aurora, you need to let her go." "I can't! She's gonna leave me if I do." Marcos grabs his girlfriend by the arms, gritting his teeth as he fights her tooth and nail to hold her away from their struggling daughter. Lauren's eyes are wide at the bluish baby that's as tiny as half of her mother's arm length, and the small mouth thats opening and close like a fish out of water. Even under that mess of blood and fluids of a newborn child, she could make out the slight cute upturn of Lorna's nose, the wild messy curls from Marcos, dark and slightly greenish under the light, and the pale skin marred with blue from the lack of oxygen. The small baby that they had all looked forward to be meeting, that was so clearly Lorna and Marcos' coughed, then wheezed for breath, her lungs collapsing inwards than expanding outwards as she struggled to breathe a single breath. "I don't--I don't have the equipment to keep her alive, Marcos, she's dying." Lauren has never seen her mother so distraught and frantic before, and her feet stay rooted to the ground as the small chest struggles desperately to rise, then falls with a sound whoosh, and became deathly still. Lorna keens a low mourn in the near distance, and Lauren flinches as though she's gotten a electric shock at the pure agony that ripples through her mentor's voice. "No no no no." Caitlin backs away slowly as Lorna gathers the remains of her newborn in her arms, tears spilling like a raging river over her hollow cheekbones and splashing onto her arms. "Breathe. Please, breathe. Aurora. Baby, please. Breathe." Marcos simply holds her as he stares at the half swaddled daughter he barely got to know, and slowly presses a comforting kiss to Lorna's temple, his agony blatant in his avoidance of looking at everywhere but his dead daughter. Lauren steps out of the room, her chest hollow and empty, and the mantra of a distraught mother that just lost a child echoing through her head filling her with broken rage. .... Doctor Campbell stares up from his chained cell at the young blonde mutant that was the less violent of the two, her brother like a dark shadows figure hovering close by her side. "Hows the baby?" He thinks he sees a violent flash of anger and remorse flicker through the girl's face at his words. "I hope she made it. She'd have been really strong from all that boosting." "You make me sick." The low violent echo of Lauren's voice even surprises her brother with it's vehemence. Lauren has always been close to Lorna, even way before she had been captured, both mentor and student reveling in each other's strength and appreciating what  each could mutually do. In Lorna, Lauren had found a kindred friend that she could look up to, and now, there was nothing left of Lorna but tears and shattered pieces that could never really be put back together. "None of them know that both of you are down here, don't they?" Campbell is smug in his speech, taunting in his words as he smirks at the uncontrollable anger Lauren shows. "I'm guessing they must be mourning the child's death. If only you had waited till the full term of the pregnancy before rescuing Lorna Dane, then perhaps, the chances of the baby surviving might have simply...risen." "Don't you feel any guilt? Not even a single piece of guilt for ripping a child of her life before it even begun?" "I created experimentations of mutants to give humans the boost the needed in order to triumph as the superior species amongst their more...superpowered friends." The doctor said lowly. "It's both profitable and lucrative for science. A new knowledge to add to our histories, starting with the beating down of those that are far ahead of us. Which are, people like you." Lauren feels her brother's anger roiling beneath her veins as he trembles beside her, and the ground shakes just so minutely as he struggles to rein in his temperamental temper. "I'm gonna kill you for this." She delivers her sentence with a smile, the aching urge to do something to avenge the loss of the child upstairs taking over her usually less violent temperament. "Painfully. And slowly. I'm gonna forget everything about peacemaking and make the last three minutes of your life the longest that you've ever experienced." She feels her brother's horrified eyes on her. Andy has always been the volatile one, the more destructive of the two, while she was the calmer and more sensible counterpart. They worked liked a clockwork, but Lauren knew that deep down she had the capacity to be violent when she wanted. It was just a matter of choosing not to. And with Aurora's death, that was the final straw. "Lauren." Her brother's low warning falls on deaf ears as she steps forward powerfully, her fingers twitching half in anticipation and eagerness for the vengeance she promised. "Are you sure you're the one that has the right to strip me of my life? I thought, perhaps the mother might be more inclined to take revenge with her own hands." Till the end, the atrocious doctor still has the indecency to laugh in her face, and it sends Lauren's blood boiling. "No, I don't. But I'm doing this so that you can't harm anyone ever again. Take it as something from all of us." Lauren tilts her head ever so slightly, a picture of perfect innocence as she smiles, eyes creasing and lips twisting upwards in a angelic curve. The doctor simply laughs softly at her self righteous exclamation. "I guess monsters do give birth to monsters." He grins toothily up at the siblings. "That can never change." "Oh yes. But it's always the quietest monsters you have to watch out for, Doctor." Lauren's anger amplifies her matter manipulation abilities, and the air around her hums with her sensitivity towards the molecules that she's always been able to feel so attuned to. "Because the quiet monsters don't lash out like the others. They bottle up their anger and wreck destruction when they've lost enough." She twists her fingers violently, feeling the air molecules respond to her call as it twists and rips the air out of Doctor Campbell's lungs and body, forming a vacuum unseen to human eyes. She watches with quiet vengeance as his cheeks hollow, and his lungs collapse into themselves, the flesh of his cheeks twisting off violently as she rips the last of the remaining air in his lungs away through his mouth, depriving him of well needed oxygen. "I thought this would be a fitting end, since Aurora's lungs collapsed the same way just moments after she was born. She couldn't breathe, you know." Lauren continued, watching as the doctor gurgled on his own blood, his lungs turning inside out as she deprived him from life giving oxygen and air, the tell tale signs of his lungs hemorrhaging beginning in the gurgles of liquid blood that bubbles in sound from his chest. "That medicine you injected directly into her bloodstream even before she was born was slowly killing her." She could feel Andy's horror at her actions as he shifted behind her, and Lauren exhaled, releasing her grip on the air molecules swiftly as soon as she deemed Campbell too far gone to be medically rescued. "Good day, doctor." She turns to her stiff brother. "Andy, Let's go." In spite of Andy's horror at her actions, they leave Campbell in the cellar, drowning in his lungs of blood, and even as his body, with signs of death by Lauren's distinctive air matter manipulation, is found hours after John remembers they've held captives in their basement, no one, not even their parents say a single word.

~~~~ @eclipsepolarisxauroraborealis