#fantasy marvel au

[19thcenturylover]

Sambucky? YES RARH🗣💥

Hello, I don't have much to show today, I just realized that I've never really drawn these 2... I wanted to try it with the silly "Vampire/Werewolf" dynamic

There are details that are more than anything from a quick AU that I made for this, Im very happy with how it turned out despite being so simple JAJS (Also, I needed to draw Sam as a vampire, idk, it was almost an impulse)

[artficlly]

smog & spirits: spirit-raiser (mini-series)

Gangster/Peaky Blinders Inspired Fantasy AU

gangsterboss!bucky x witch!reader Bucky Barnes, the leader of Sootstone's Smog Boys, needs a favour. A nasty curse has been cast on him, and you are the witch he has chosen to help him break it.

Warnings: 18+ content minors dni, smut, fem reader, begging, orgasm denial, fingering, p in v, no aftercare, sex magic, blood magic, potion for arousal, curses and hexes, witchcraft, possession, mediums, if you squint theres some plot, smoking, mention of death/violence/torture, mention of police brutality, vaguely british setting??, no use of y/n, lmk if i've missed anything

Word Count: 8k

A/N: hey. don't ask. this idea came to me a few days ago and i wrote it all out in like two sessions at 2am. i want to write more for this, i have so many ideas for some more one-shot style interactions. this just got so long so quickly so i had to cut some stuff. sorry for any typos - not proof read and edited while half asleep lol.

main masterlist | series masterlist

You did not remember leaving your door unlocked. 

The fog that settled over the smokey, portside district of Sootstone was suffocating. Despite it being only midday, the entire neighbourhood was cast into a muggy gloom. The sun could not break through the thick smog that comfortably nestled itself along the windy streets of The Warrens. The stench of smoke and fish hung heavy in the air, with sweaty dockworkers and dirty children darting between alleys. In your short journey to and from the small Sunday market, you had nearly been bowled over thrice by oblivious residents. 

The Warrens, or Sootstone Port, as it was formally known, was not a pleasant place. Home to the working class and the rotted underbelly of the city of Blackstone. The high society chatters liked to forget such a place existed, as it was simply not a charming place to think about. Most worked the ports, ferrying in the sea trade. Others worked in the Smokestack district, manufacturing metal in factories that pumped ash and soot into the air. There were also the select few who turned to other trades, such as pubs, hotels, brothels, or even those who were forced into a life of joblessness on the streets. 

The Warrens weren’t so imaginatively named. It was a clever joke among high-society gossipers that the poor fucked like rabbits and lived in their elaborate winding burrows, from which they rarely emerged for air. The people of Sootstone had accepted the insult, finding the whole metaphor rather hilarious. That was because the Warreners could take a joke, unlike the condescending crowd of high society. It could also be argued that the residents of The Warrens could not come up with a better metaphor, as most were not educated in any sense. 

Perhaps the mixture of smog and that lack of an education had finally made it to your head. You were left standing, perplexed, as your front door swung open without so much of a nudge. The lock was normally a sticky one, leaving you to jiggle the knob and slam your shoulder against the frame until it came unstuck. Never in your two years of living in the tiny flat had you ever witnessed such a sight. 

You would’ve thought it a miracle if it weren’t for the implications. 

It was true that The Warrens were notorious for crimes. Theft, assault, and murder. Even if coppers paraded the streets, they weren’t truly there to stop criminals. No, they were more interested in beating any poor innocents that got in their way. It was better to find protection from vigilante gangs who roamed Sootstone’s streets, scrapping like stray dogs over territories. As much as those uninvolved in such business were afraid of them, they also respected them. Their deeds weren’t always motivated by blood and destruction; the gangs stood to protect their communities as no one else would. 

Even if you and your surrounding neighbours were under the protection of Barnes’ Smog Boys, it was definitely still alarming to see a group of them gathered in your small kitchen. 

“Lookie who's home.” One of the men cooed at the sight of you. He stood closest to the door, one hand tucked in his jacket pocket while the other fiddled with a toothpick that hung from his lips. His blond hair was slicked back, tucked under a flatcap. Steve Rogers. The Smog Boys right hand man. Next to him was Sam Wilson, his stocky form leaning against your rickety cupboards. His gaze was fixed on a silver pocket watch he had tightly secured in his left palm, a short chain draping across his vest. He glanced up at Steve’s words, a wicked smirk crossing his lips at the sight of you. 

“Sunday market?” Sam queried, and you drew your woven basket closer. There was an unsettling sneer in his voice. 

The Smog Boys were one of seven gangs that roamed the underbelly of Blackstone. Their territories lay in the fog of Sootstone Port and the smokey streets of the Smokestack district and The Warrens. You could commonly see them stalking the streets, dressed in all black with their flatcaps and slicked back hair. They moved through the smog like ghosts, navigating the twisting streets with an unnatural ease. Some called them ghouls; others called them saviours from the fog. 

The final man, the worst of them all, was Bucky Barnes. He sat across from you, half obscured by your small dining table. He had laid a box of cigarettes and matches on the marked wood. One was smoking between his lips, his head angled down and cocked to one side, as he assessed you with a look of boredom. There was a terrifying edge of calculation in his gaze as he evaluated you. He was just as large as the other two men, with muscles poorly hidden beneath his black, tailored suit. His hair, similarly to Steve's, was slicked back, and the sides buzzed. A 5’oclock shadow ghosted his jawline, but overall, his appearance was unsettlingly neat. 

Not a speck of ash or soot. As if he had just appeared within your flat, blinking into existence rather than having walked The Warrens like any other mere mortal. 

You had never seen the man in person. No. If the Smog Boys were ghosts, Bucky certainly lived up to the name. He was an enigma, a haunting story whispered between children. He had clawed his way up to a position of power from the gutters of The Warrens, bloodshed and all. He was a notorious skirt-chaser, his handsome appearance and strong build drawing in women from all classes. Looking at him now, despite the terror congealing in your blood, you could understand the appeal. 

“Why’re you here?” You ask hesitantly. Unlike the gangsters before you, you were not pristine by any means. Falling ash had coated your shoulders, staining the tartan fabric of the mantle draped over your shoulders. Your hair was swept up under a head scarf, which was also covered in a layer of soot and dust from the smokestacks. Even your worn leather boots were not safe; mud and filth caked onto the heels and sides. The streets of The Warren had never known any type of cleanliness. 

“Come to introduce ourselves. Don’t think we’ve ever met before, ‘least I think I would’ave remembered a pretty face like yours.” Steve speaks up, a gleam in his eye. His tone is playful yet somehow cruel. The chuckle he and Sam share rattles you. The two of them were also said to try their luck with the women who crowded around, searching for the thrill of a gangster lover.

“You might’ave mistaken me for someone else… I’ve lived here two years now.” You speak with a continued caution. With precise movements, as to not brush either of the hulking men crowding the kitchen entrance, you place your basket on a nearby surface. Even the cloth that you have thrown over the items is coated in a layer of ash. 

“We know.” Sam says, twisting his body. He lifts up the cloth, inspecting the food beneath. You know it is nothing exciting—some bread, fish, and vegetables. As well as a handful of sweets you gave to the children of your neighbour. You keep your mouth shut as Sam dips into the white and red striped paper bag and pops one of the sweets into his mouth with a satisfied hum. 

Steve pushes himself off the wall, his jacket brushing against you. He was far taller than you, tall enough that he had to crane his neck down in order to whisper in your ear. “A lil’ birdy told us you’re a spirit-raiser.” 

“I—No.” You stumble over your words, eyes darting between the three men. Bucky is still silent, still like a cat hunting a mouse. The gaze he assessed you with was one of a predator, taking a slow drag from his cigarette. He doesn’t crack a smile as the two men beside you laugh between themselves. 

To fend off some anxious energy, you make quick work of unknotting your headscarf. Ash and dust flutter to the ground as you shake out the fabric, a frown etched across your features. You could not help but let your mind wonder to the stories you had heard growing up. You were a lifelong resident of The Warrens, only moving to live on your own after sickness claimed your mother. You father had passed long before that, lost to drink. 

“What do you call yourself then? Hm?” Steve asks, breath hot against your cheek. You flinch as he pulls a fleck of ash from your hair. In the stories, they would speak of men with their tongues cut out. Bodies that were filled with bricks, then stitched back up and sunk to the bottom of the Sootstone Port. Men were found hanged from street lights, severely beaten, with sections of skin along their thighs and chest peeled off with a blade. And those were only the bodies coppers found. 

“I prefer witch.” You correct, brows furrowing. Your head turns to look at the gangster, wary of how close his fingers lingered. Teeth bared in a grin, he blows a soft breath across your hair, the last of the ash unsettled as it floats away. You can smell tobacco on his breath—a familiar scent to you.

“I need a favour.” Bucky finally speaks up, his voice low. Your gaze snaps to meet his. 

You blink. “A favour?”

You jump as Bucky finally moves, his foot jerking as he kicks the seat opposite him. The chair scrapes across the hardwood floors, stopping centimetres before your boots. 

“Sit.” He commands. 

Sam’s hand finds the back of your neck, a soft push guiding you in the direction of the free space. You obey, your knee bouncing as you take a seat. You sit near the edge of the chair, leaving some distance between yourself and the table. As if sensing your desire to bolt, Steve sweeps up behind you, pushing the chair in until you are fully tucked in. Then, with mocking laughter, Sam and Steve take a seat on either side of you. 

“No one told me there was any issue about magic—” You begin. Steve snickers beside you, returning to fiddling with the toothpick still poking from his mouth. 

“A favour.” Bucky repeats, exhaling smoke from his nose. Sam leans back in his seat, legs spread so widely that his knee touches yours. You shrink back as far as possible. “I’m no copper. I don’t care what you practitioners get up to.”

You find yourself blinking in surprise once more. Magic was a subject that divided many, mostly due to it’s misunderstood nature. High society treated magic as another lavish hobby or skill, with some even going to private schools to turn their gifts into professions with the right licences. Of course, the people of the lower-class were banned from performing such tricks unless they were in possession of the right permits. Due to the nature of the slums being, well, impoverished, unlicensed magic ran rampant through the streets. It wasn’t uncommon knowledge that an entire blackmarket of forbidden arts ran in the backalleys and warehouses of The Warren. Places where those needing particular services could find them for a much more convenient price than in the higherclass areas of Blackstone. 

You had kept your services rather secretive, never using your real identity with clients. It was a precaution to not have coppers knocking down your door in the middle of the night. It seemed, despite your best efforts, that nothing flew past Bucky Barnes. But then again, nothing seemed to fly past the gangster. He knew of every black market and every whisper of illegal activity in the slums. It would be foolish to believe he was unaware of you; however, why did he specifically sort you out? Now that was a mystery. 

“I don’t understand—” You choke out, head whipping back and forth as you look between the men. 

Bucky sighs loudly in annoyance, loud enough that you flinch back. He puts out the remains of his cigarette on your dining table, the smouldering dip leaving a black, circular mark on the wood. He digs into one of the pockets of his vest, revealing a large pendant necklace. The chain is silver, with an oval shaped jewel hanging from the centre. The silver that encrusts it in place is swirled, ensuring there are no gaps for it to escape. Sam and Steve fall quiet, any feeling of twisted amusement dropping from the room. Bucky slides the necklace across the table.

You recoil. This time not out of fear, but rather from the aura the necklace exudes. 

Goosebumps rise across your skin, and bile rises in your throat. There was a wickedness in the air, as if all the light and sweetness in the world were sucked into an empty, yawning void. The world feels still, as if even the ash outside has failed to fall. The room is cast into a sickening silence, a silence so strong that even the surrounding world refuses to push through. You can no longer hear the people walking through the winding streets of The Warren, not the clang of metal from the smokestacks or the cry of the dockworkers. 

Rot. 

It is the only word that comes to your mind. It is as if the jewel itself is rotten, potent, and putrid. An invisible smell so strong you nearly gag. Your skin crawls the longer you stare, as if you rot along with it—bugs squirming beneath your flesh, the taste of dirt in your mouth.  

“What’s this?” You asked, your voice strained. You know the blood has drained from your face. Bucky looks at you with curiosity. 

“You tell me.”

You look down at the necklace. Dread rises once more, and the chill of soil settles across your shoulders. You twist your head and your neck, feeling uncomfortable and strained the longer you gaze upon the necklace. 

There was something terribly, terribly wrong about it. 

“There’s a… a sickness… a rot—a curse.” You stumble over your words, your entire body squirming against your will. The feeling of dread swims through you; the sensation that you need to get as far away as possible reverberates down your spine. 

“Becca was right.” Steve sings somewhere besides you, but you barely register his words. 

“Where’d you find this?” You ask. The room is tighter than usual, with the rickety, peeling cabinets closing in around you. The oven screeches on its iron legs, the yellowed wallpaper crushing closer and closer. Your head falls into your hands, elbows propped onto the table. You let out a shuddering breath, trying to rid yourself of the sickly feeling. You rub your fingers up your face, pinching the bridge of your nose, then massaging your forehead

“It was given to me. As a gift.” As he speaks, you reluctantly open your eyes once more. The room has returned to as you remember, your vision less dizzying as you take in a deep gulp of air, your heart thundering in your ears. You must make a face, because it prompts him to speak once more. 

“My sister has a sensitivity. She is convinced—”

“There’s a spirit attached to that jewel.” You interrupt before thinking. Your knees bounce beneath the table, your feet shaking. Your entire being screams that you need to get away from the object. You do not care for politeness or fear of these men, as the horror in your heart you felt gazing upon the necklace greatly outweighed any potential anxieties of the future.

“Yes.” His voice matches his composure—cool and collected. Wholly unaffected by the horrific aura cast by the necklace. Bucky and his men were not magically inclined. They were completely oblivious to the calamity that sat before them. 

“The spirits're attached to you, too.” You pause, the feeling of bile rising in your throat once more. “You need to get it lifted.”

“That’s where the favour comes in, doll.”

“I don’t…?” You nearly doubled over. “Please get rid of it. I can’t—”

Barnes leans forward, slowly dragging the necklace over the wood. He slowly deposits it into his breast pocket, watching with curiosity as you sag in relief. You would need to burn this table after they left. You could still sense the rot engrained in the pores of the wood. 

“I need to speak with the spirit attached.”

Your forearms lay flat on the table, and you rest your head against them as you try to remember how to breathe. A wave of exhaustion rolls over you. Was this how they tortured their victims? Wore them down into pathetic, panting messes? Were you about to become another body at the bottom of the Sootstone port? You mumble into the fabric. “I can’t raise a spirit without a name.”

“I know her name.”

You pause, lifting your head slowly. “You want to ask her how to break it? You may know her, but spirits’re tricksters they won’t always give ya the correct information—”

“I know how to deal with her.”

You arch a brow, unsure.

“She’s a scorned lover.” Sam whispers beside you. You jump, having forgotten the two other men sitting besides you. Bucky scowls at his words—the most emotion he has shown in the entire time. 

“Everyone knows you don’t ‘ave a witch for a moll unless you’re gonna marry her.” Steve butts in, and the two men share a chuckle. 

“Shut your mugs. The both of ya.” Bucky snarls, and they both fall silent, although you can’t help but notice their bemused smiles. After a brief, tense silence, the gangster settles back into his seat, tipping his chin upward in a nod. “Morwenna Blackthorn.”

You hesitate, glancing between the three men. They watch you expectantly, relaxing back into their respective seats. Given their status and reputation, you had to presume they were familiar with the workings of underground magic. Licenced practitioners would have clients sign lengthy documents for protection in the event of a spell or session backfiring. The Warrens did not have such luxuries—if you made a mistake, no one could protect you or them from the consequences. 

You inhale sharply, placing your hands palms down on the table. The wood hums beneath your touch, the invisible vapours of the curse tickling your flesh. With a roll of your shoulders, you exhale slowly, allowing your body to relax. 

Ink drips across your vision, swirling darkness millimetres before your eyes. You stare hard into the invisible void, searching blindly through the tendrils of smoke. Morwenna Blackthorn. Morwenna Blackthorn. Morwenna Blackthorn. Your mind hums. Through the dark fog, you can make out figures—flickers of candle flames casting large, distorted shadows. Morwenna Blackthorn. Bones crunch beneath your feet, yet at the same time, you float. Morwenna Blackthorn. Your hands burn into the table, the rotting sensation tangling through your digits, pulling you deeper. 

Morwenna Blackthorn

You can see a thin line of thread hanging through the void. 

Morwenna Blackthorn.

It is red; a series of knots tugged tightly intermittently. 

Morwenna Blackthorn.

Your fingers grasp the fibres gently, your nail hooking around one of the tiny knots. 

You tug.

Morwenna Blackthorn.

A violent, ragged gasp leaves you. It claws up your throat, ripping at the flesh. Your entire body tenses, your spine straightening as your head snaps back. For a moment, you are suspended. You can feel her with you, her ghostly fingers stroking tenderly across your skin. She smooths over the back of your hands, slowly and gradually winding her way up your arms. She clutches your shoulders, her bones digging into your flesh.

Then, with violence strong enough that you fear she has folded your spine in half, she pushes down. 

Your body instantly relaxes, head lulling downward. Your eyes roll into the back of your head, and despite the appearance being a milky white, you can see perfectly clearly. Morwenna has settled herself deep within your bones, controlling your movements like a puppeteer. You are conscious enough to understand what is happening, but you are not in control of your actions or speech.

Your mouth spread into a wide, sly smile. “Bucky, my love.”

“Mor.” The gangster greets, although he does not seem entirely pleased. You pout, leaning your elbows onto the table. 

“Not happy to see me?” You coo. Somewhere beside you, Steve shifts in his seat uncomfortably. It is the most off put you’ve ever seen the man so far. He winces as your head swings around, a wicked grin gracing your lips. “Oh, Stevie and Sam. Didn’t see you two here.”

“Mor.” The two men grumble in unison, scowling. 

“Awh. Why so glum, boys?” You whine, your chair scraping against the floor as you stand. Your movements are fluid and graceful, entirely not your own. Your hands stroke across the back of the chair, then swooshes up to meet your chest. 

You lean forward, tutting as you inspect your reflection in the glass of a nearby cupboard. “Trust you to find a pretty one in The Warrens.” 

Your hands move to unpin your mantle, a cloud of ash lingering in the air as you drop it to the floor. You sigh in relief, your fingers unbuttoning the top of your shirt, revealing the curve of your breasts. Your hands smooth down your waist to your hips; your full figure is now displayed. 

“You missed me that much, my love? That you had to find a pretty vessel for me so you could get your cock wet, hm?” You hum, sashying towards the table once more. 

“That’s not why you’re here.” Bucky replies. He seems frozen in place. The horror of familiarity. Recognising the mannerisms of someone he once knew in a complete stranger. 

You ignore his words, unpinning your hair. Thick locks unroll, cascading down your shoulders and back. You let out an exaggerated, satisfied sigh, rolling your neck. The strands frame your face, and the rich colour brings colour to your cheeks. 

“Morwenna.” Bucky snaps. Your brows furrow as you look over to him, pouting once more. “You put a curse. On the necklace.”

Your mind momentarily blanks, as if Morwenna were trying to recall what he said. Spirits often grew confused trying to recall memories, especially ones that brought them anguish. A cog seems to turn as you flash the gangster another beaming smile. 

“The necklace… oh. Did you like it? My parting gift to you? Before you fucked me over you piece of—” Your voice, once sweet and soft, deepens to a guttural growl. Your body shakes, and words cut off as you cough and hack. Your hand raises to your mouth, warm fluid leaking from your lips. You let in a shuddering breath, rubbing your fingers and palms down your chin. Blood smears across your skin. 

“You shot me, my love.” You gasp, your brows furrowing as your head tilts. “You shot me.”

“You betrayed us, remember? You were a rat—” Steve jumps in, but is quickly cut off. 

“Steve.” Bucky warns.

Your hands find your stomach, doubling over as you sob. There is no wound, no blood. Still, your hands dig at the fabric while ragged, pathetic cries leave your blood stained lips. 

“How do I break the curse?”

You shuddering sobs stop, a dreadful silence falling over the tiny kitchen. A guttural laugh erupts from you, saliva mixed with blood dripping from your lips to the floor. “The curse. The curse? I should have known… I should have known…”

Your body jerks upward, movements stiff, and jerks like a marionette doll. Sam’s face contorts into one of fear, while Steve looks horrified. You jerk forward, nearly tripping over the chair as you plunge towards the table. Your stomach smacks hard against the wood, a winded wheeze escaping your lungs as you drag yourself forward by your nails. 

“Don’t you love me? Don’t you want me?” You cry, your head beginning to twist, the angle so unnatural that it strains your neck. 

“How do I break it?” Bucky repeats, voice firm. He hasn’t so much as flinched, a wall of steel as you crawl towards him. 

“It was born in chaos, so it must be undone in chaos. I will find you. I will tear you limb from limb. I will make you rot from the inside out; maggots will grow within you; and mould will bloom in your soul. Everything will crumble to dust beneath your touch. I will ruin you until you b–b—be—”

Your body slides back, and for the first time in the entire session, you grab the reins. You search blindly for the knotted thread, tugging hard. Your body steps back from the table, muscles spasming and tense as your body locks in place. 

You tug harder, and darkness swims across your vision. Candles flicker and dance in the distance, the sun rising and falling as your body twists up and down. The smell of rot slowly subsides, threads slipping from your fingers. The scent of copper and ash is on your tongue, and your head is pounding. 

A dramatic sigh leaves you as your body slumps. You find yourself standing before the table, three sets of eyes burning into you as your own eyes roll back into place. Sam and Steve look equally disturbed as they are horrified, the blond’s mouth agape in shock. 

“The fuck was that?” Sam barks.

“I ain’t never seen a spirit session like that before, Buck—” Steve begins.

“Shut it.” Bucky barks, rising to his feet. 

There is a sickly feeling in your chest, a radiating pain across your ribcage. You barely register the gangster walking up to you, gripping your chin between his index and thumb. 

“You pulled yourself out early.” Bucky sneers. “Why?”

“Buck—” Steve calls again. With a growl, Bucky releases you, twisting around to snarl at Steve. 

“I thought you told me she was the best in the Warrens?”

“She is. Did’ya not see that shit?”

“She didn’t get me an answer—”

“Chaos magic.” You finally speak up, your voice raspy. The gangsters pause, slowly turning to face you. “She told you. It’s chaos magic. What’s born in chaos must be undone in chaos.”

Your hand raises to your face, your fingertips touching your upperlip as warm blood flows from your nose. You raise your hand into the light, inspecting the crimson liquid. Your eyes cut over to Bucky's, and he frowns. 

“Chaos magic?” He questions. 

“Sex magic.” You state, fighting the heat growing across your cheeks. Without much of a care or a flinch, you navigate your way past the group. Your shirt brushes against Bucky’s jacket, the rotting feeling momentarily settling in your stomach as the fabric brushes his breastpocket. You pause in front of your sink, knuckles white as you grip the lip. Blood continues to stream steadily from your nose, dripping into the basin. 

“You focus your thoughts on one thing; you get pulled into a trance. Take the energy, the chaos, and you focus it. At the peak, picture what you’re manifestin’. The chaos that you’ve built through the act is released at the moment of orgasm.” You explain, your gaze solidly locked onto the blood that swirls down your drain. 

“Sex magic.” Bucky hums in thought.

Steve spoke up from beside him with a snicker. “How poetic.”

—

You hated how your hands shook. If Bucky had noticed, he hadn’t brought it up. He was coolly inspecting your tiny bedroom, hands tucked into his pockets. The room had an eclectic taste, with walls covered in shelving. You collected books, objects, trinkets, or other things that helped your work. Drying herbs hung from your curtain railings, your desk cluttered with papers you had hastily scribbled notes upon. 

You ground your palm harder into the pestle, gritting your teeth as you worked the herbs inside into a fine paste. Your bed, stripped bare, had been pushed to the side of the room. It usually sat near the centre, atop a fraying rug. The rug had also been removed, rolled up, and placed somewhere in your stairway. The old wood beneath had been painted by your hand, with intricate runes, symbols, and swirls making up the general shape of a circle. You had already lined it with black salt, candles burning at each cardinal direction. At the centre of the circle, you had laid your bedding and pillows for comfort. 

Bucky had sent Steve and Sam away, the two men snickering like a pair of school boys. You all knew what was about to unfold; it was just a question of why you had allowed yourself to become tangled up in such a situation. You had done similar rituals for clients before, yes, but none of those clients had been the boss of the Smog Boys. None of them had been Bucky Barnes. 

You eyed him as he paused in front of the carved circle, mindlessly playing with the jewelled necklace that hung from his grip. The awful, dreadful, rotting sensation was dulled; you’d nearly begged the gangster to let you cleanse the object. It was a temporary relief that would wear down in a few hours, but at least you could complete your work without gagging at the feeling of it. You hurriedly poured the thick paste from the herbs into a pot, which boiled in your fireplace. It only took a couple of stirs for the potion to settle. You could feel Bucky’s eyes assessing your every movement as you poured the steaming liquid into two cups, briefly swirling each to ensure the consistency was correct. 

“Remind me what this is.” The gangster asked, closing the distance between you. His nose wrinkled in distaste at the scent. 

“A potion to help with the ritual. Some find it…hard to perform.” You say, wincing as you realise what you implied. Bucky raises a brow as you fumble over your words. “It heightens arousal and pleasure.”

“I won’t find it hard to perform.” He replies curtly. 

“I know. I wasn’t saying that—I just… from experience…” You stumble again. If only you could punch yourself in the face for this idiocy. 

“Relax, doll.” He hums, his hand finding your shoulder. You exhale sharply, lips pressed together, as your shoulders drop in response. “I can find someone else if you don’t want this.”

As much as you hated yourself for admitting it, you did want this. Maybe it was a sick curiosity, wondering if this dangerous yet handsome man could perform as well as you imagined, as well as it was rumoured. You swallow, your mouth feeling dry. “No. I want this.”

“Good.” His hand brushes a loose strand of hair from your face, and his head dips to look at you better. “Honestly, I could fuck you with or without the potion, doll.”

There is a knowing smirk spreading across his face as your mind blanks. Fucking rake. You consider if the fumes from the potion have already leaked their effects onto you both. You can feel a warmth growing between your legs. 

“It’s my job.” You mutter, stepping away. Although you’re unsure if the reassurance is for yourself or for him. His chuckle follows you as you sweep across the room, returning to your small desk. “Do you want me to explain the ritual in detail or just give you the gist of it?”

“Spare the details; just run me through what I need to do.” He responds. He has closed the distance between the both of you again, peering over your shoulder as you fumble through your things. 

“Well, it’s pretty simple.” You sigh, turning around. Your chests are nearly pressed together as you spin. You back up as far as possible, your hands moving behind your back as you grip the edge of the desk to steady yourself. "We’ll have to draw some blood with a blade and put it on the necklace to link it to our energies. It’s sigil magic, nothing you’ll have to worry about. We take the potions…”

You fade off with a shrug. Bucky smirks once more, his chin lifting in amusement, but his gaze remains solidly locked onto you. His hands go to his pockets, and his wide chest blocks your movements. You clear your throat. “The ending is more what you’ll need to focus on. When you reach… climax… you must focus all your energy on the necklace and nothing else. I will be there to guide and remind you, but you can’t let your thoughts stray.”

“What about you? What will you have to think of?” He questions, his voice low. His adams apple bobs as he swallows slowly, his tongue running across his bottom lip in thought. Intriguing question. No one had asked you that before. 

“Doesn’t matter. You’re the only one who needs to orgasm.”

“Why?”

“The curse is linked to you. Only you can break it, with my assistance, of course. I am just here to help guide you and lend you my energy. I am just a conduit for the magic, to focus it.” You explain. Thinking it was best to get it over and done with, you finally pluck up the courage to push past him. 

Your athame was already in place; the candles were lit, salt laid, and sigil memorised. There was only one thing left to do—the act. You crouch down by the fireplace, retrieving the two cups. Bucky gives you an incredulous look. 

“It tastes better than it smells.” You reassure him, handing him the saucer. He inspects the liquid once more, wincing, then shrugging in surprise as he finally downs the lot. You watch with a scrutinising gaze as he places the cup down, rolling his shoulders. 

The potion would take all of five seconds to take affect. It didn’t alter the brain or take away authority; rather, it heightened already present feelings of arousal or pleasure. The user would experience a rather euphoric sensation. Dodgy brothels often microdosed their clients with such herbs to heighten the experience. Also to hook in a new, loyal customer. Used sparingly, the herbs were fine, but they were highly addictive. 

And illegal. Most of your work fell into that category.

Within moments, you could see Bucky’s pupils dilate, his jaw and shoulders relaxing, and his nostrils flaring as he exhaled slowly. His voice was strained as he spoke up, his tone gravelly and low as he cleared his throat in surprise. “Fuck. That does feel good, doesn’t it?”

You smile shyly into your own cup and swallow down the liquid. You were familiar with the taste and it’s effects. It was surprisingly sweet, with a vanilla, nutty aftertaste. As soon as it hit your stomach, you could already feel the warmth growing in your core—a delightful tingling sensation spreading up your spine and skull. 

You were quick to place your cup down and cross the room to retrieve the athame. You had to pin point your actions very directly so as not to get distracted by the hulking man looming in your room. The potion was definitely potent, because any fear or anxiety had left you. Your body begged for him to come closer, to touch you, to kiss you. Not yet. Soon. 

“Come here.” You murmur, drawing the blade from it’s sheath. Bucky obeys, wordlessly stalking towards you and presenting you with his palm. You look up at him through your lashes, gently taking his hand into yours. Your skin sings at the content, a rush of goosebumps raising across your skin. “We don’t need much blood.”

The gangster is still as you drag the blade in a short cut along the heel of his palm. You push into the mound, coaxing out droplets of blood to blister to the surface. “The necklace.”

He lets out a low, agreeable grunt as he hands it to you. The potion has helped you ignore any bad energy attached to the object. Your skin simmers as you brush your finger tips along the cut, gathering Bucky’s blood. You take the jewel, smearing the blood across the slippery surface into one half of a symbol. Bucky watches expectantly as you hastily repeat the process with your own hand, smearing your blood to complete the symbol. 

“You need to wear it.” You hum and guide the chain over his head. You know you should find a bandage or some kind of healing salve for your hands, but your attention is pulled away as Bucky grasps your hand. An involuntary whimper leaves your throat as he raises your palm to his lips, his tongue peaking out as he runs it across the open wound. The potion had definitely taken effect. Holy fuck, your back arches as pleasure shoots down your arm, blooming at the base of your skull. 

His lips kiss along the cut, sucking and licking. Your mind swims from the sensation—ideas of where else he could be putting his mouth to use. You pull your palm away, dragging it across his cheek as you cup his face. A crimson streak is smeared along his skin, and his lips are glossy from saliva and stained with your blood. The two of you clash in desperation, a rumbling groan being pulled from the gangster as his lips engulf yours. 

You can taste copper on his tongue, his hands finding your waist as he pulls you flush against his body. The two of you move in a frantic rhythm, scarcely making room to breathe. You guide him clumsily to the painted circle, the two of you falling to your knees in unison. Blindly, you find his clothing, helping him tug off the jacket and then unbutton his vest. 

His hands slip under your blouse, caressing the skin beneath. His fingers roam to your brassiere, your nipples hardening as he brushes them through the sleek fabric. You mewl into his mouth, squirming under his touch as the pulse between your legs quickens. His large palm comes to rest below your breasts, his thumb sitting on your sternum as he yanks you backwards onto his lap. 

Your lips break, and you gasp for air as the gangster continues his assault down your neck to the exposed skin of your collarbone. His stubble tickles across your neck, and he gathers your skirts, fingers gliding past your stockings to your exposed inner thigh. 

Your head tips backwards to rest on his shoulder, and loud, satisfied sighs leave you. The sensation is near blinding, your body alight with pleasure. Had you accidentally made a stronger dose in your nervousness? You had never yearned in such a way before—

“What’re you doing?” You query with a gasp as his fingers slip beneath your loose tap pants. 

Your question is answered as he strokes a fingertip through your wet folds. 

“You’re so wet.” He hums against your skin, voice strained. You can already feel his erection pressing into you. His grip on you remains firm, your back flush against his chest as he dips two of his fingers into you. Ecstasy fizzles across your skin, nails digging into his skin where you grip his arm. 

“What’re you— I’m supposed to make you—ah!” You whine, your breath coming fast as you lean harder into him. Your hips rock greedily, pushing your pelvis in time with his pumping fingers so the heel of his palm grinds against your clit. 

“Shh, doll. Relax.” He whispers, his tongue licking up the shell of your ear. Your eyes squeeze shut, and your body is locked in place by his grip. His pace increases, and the panting in your ear grows as his two digits glide in and out of your tight cunt. 

“Do you like that?” He groans in your ear. Your grinding hips are now giving friction to his cock, which twitches against your backside through his pants. You whimper in response, a short sob bubbling from your mouth as you clench around him. 

Your head lifts, eyes widening as you look down. You can’t see much due to your skirts, but you can feel the knot tightening within your belly. Your hips move more desperately, needy, pathetic moans escaping you as his pace remains steady. 

“Please—” You beg, squirming as the gangster chuckles. 

“You do like this, huh? Even if you acted like a little innocent virgin earlier.” He growls. The vibration is enough to set you over the edge, a loud cry leaving you as you clench hard around his fingers, body spasming. Bucky continues to steadily pump you through your orgasm. “Good girl.”

A continued arousal stirs in your belly at his praise. Your body slumps against him, panting and exhausted. 

“Such a good girl.” He hums again, his digits slipping out of you. You can feel the sloppy mess between your thighs, and as Bucky pulls his hand into the light, you can see the wet drenching his fingers. “I think I like this version of you. The one who makes pretty little noises while I fuck her brains out, hm?”

You’re left speechless as the gangster lifts his fingers to his lips, sucking them clean with a devilish smirk. 

“Well, time to get this ritual over with then, don’t you think?” He says. You’re too exhausted and drunk on desire to bother replying. You allow him to guide you down, so your head is placed side-ways on one of the pillows. He guides your hips up, your legs slightly spread, and pushes your skirts to your hips. 

“You’ll have to tell me when you’re close, so I can guide you.” You finally muster up the strength to say. The gangster pulls your tap pants down, exposing your cunt fully. 

“Sure thing, doll.” He says in response. You hear the sound of fabric rustling as he pulls out his cock. 

Without much warning, he pushes into you, your arousal making it easy for his member to slide in and out of you. A growl burns in the back of his throat while you wordlessly make a fist around the sheets and blankets beneath you. 

“Fuck. You’re so tight.” Bucky groans, his voice strained. “And to think you’ve been hidin’ out in The Warrens all this time.”

He sinks deeper into you, pulling small whimpers and moans from you as he finds a steady, pleasurable rhythm. His hand slides up your clothed back, pushing you harder into the pillow with a grunt. His other hand finds your hips, his grip bruising as he guides you. 

You bite down into the pillow, your pleasured sobs muffled by the feathers. 

“You squeezed so tightly around my fingers; I can’t wait to see how you’ll feel when you come around my cock.” Bucky grunted as he ploughed into you. His hand fists around your loose hair, fingers tangling through the locks as he tugs. Tears are beginning to prickle in your eyes, and your legs are wobbling from the sensation. 

“Please—” you gasp out. 

“Please, what?” The gangster asks, tugging harder. The hand on your hip is squeezing tighter as he holds you in place. 

“Please—I need to—”

“No.” He growls, tugging you upward. You fall backwards into his lap once more, his cock still inside you but somehow deeper from the angle he holds you. “You need to finish the ritual, remember? I can’t have you guide me if you’re too fucked out to talk.”

Another sob leaves you, but you wordlessly nod. You hold onto the burning sensation in your gut, the waves of satisfaction so immense that your limbs tremble. Bucky continues to fuck up into you, his cock steadily driving into you as his free hand comes to lazily swirl your swollen clit. 

You try to remember words, instructions, anything. You feel too high to even breathe. All you can do is focus on the sensation of the necklace rubbing against your back and the friction burning against your skin. 

“Focus on the necklace. How it feels around your neck.” You squeak out, your eyes squeezed shut, as you try to ground yourself. “Focus on the feeling of the chain, the weight of the jewel. Think of your blood, how a piece of you is painted onto it.”

There is a moment of silence between the two of you, only the slapping of skin and the rasping of breath. 

“Are you focused on it?” You ask.

“Yes.” The gangster cuts back. His strokes were beginning to grow sloppy. 

“Focus.” You whisper, though a breathy moan leaves you. “Feel your energy flow; feel your blood seep into the stone. Picture how it will shatter beneath your power.”

His hips jerk beneath you, his finger on your clit swirling faster. Your breath comes in sharp stutters, your back arching as you find no way to escape the rising sensation. His back is rock solid behind you, his hands keeping you in place as you begin to spiral. Your pussy tightens around him as you begin to scream—

“Please, Bucky. Please!”

Something snaps between the both of you, his hips jerking wildly as he spills into you. He moans into your ear at a deafening level, his fingers digging into your thighs. You double over in pleasure, your vision briefly going black as you cry out. Sparks dance across your skin, your body momentarily alight as the power of magic flows through you. You can feel the rush as your energy meets Bucky’s entangling with one another in a fierce battle. For a second, you feel intoxicated, colours bursting across your sight as the rush of magic rests in your chest, and then, just as quickly as it arrived, it cascades out of you.

Behind you, the sound of shattering can be heard above the moans.  

Panting, Bucky releases you. You slump to the floor, off his lap. His cum drips from your pussy, thighs wet as sticky as you close your eyes, desperately trying to catch your breath. You roll onto your back, pressing your thighs together. Through heavy-lidded eyes, you look down at Bucky. He sits kneeling, dishevelled. His hair is ruffled, blood is still smeared along his cheek, and his shirt is untucked and creased. 

At some point, he has tucked his cock away, suspenders hanging loosely by his hips. His gaze is not on you; rather, it is solely focused on the necklace in his palm. You go to lift your head, but you find yourself too weak and exhausted to bother. A mixture of being too fucked out to care and the lack of energy from acting as a conduit for the ritual. 

“Did it work?” You ask the gangster, and his eyes finally pull up to look at you. His gaze wanders over your face, examining your swollen lips, the blush across your cheeks, and the areas where exposed skin remains. He cracks a grin, lifting his hand. The necklace dangles from his fingers, the large, blue jewel now gifted with a large crack down the centre. 

You let out a sigh of relief, letting your head fall back as you stared up at the ceiling. Your eyes flicker closed, a sleepy warmth prickling across your scalp. 

“Doll?”

Your eyes snap open with a jolt. 

“It’s all done? The curse is gone?” The gangster questions. You weakly nod in reply.

“Her spirit and whatever curse she held have been released.” You affirm, voice sleepy, relaxing back into the pillows and blankets. “Apologies. This type of spell drains me.”

Bucky chuckles. You were just glad you had enough sense near the end to actually guide him. The gangster appeared to be attempting to prove something with the orgasms he extracted from you. In the state you were in, you had little reason to complain. 

When you opened your eyes again, he was across the room, vest on and jacket slung over his arm.

“I’ll leave your payment downstairs.” He says, only pausing to look down at you, still curled up on the floor. You blink up at him sleepily. “Thanks for your help, spirit-raiser.”

You can’t find the energy to correct him.

PONY CLUB (PART 2)

[mikazureart]

DnD/Fantasy AU

[leehanji]

Illustrations from my Stucky fic The Limits of Duty

Read it here on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/48358507/chapters/121967410

[phoenixcatch7]

In love with the idea of captain marvel being Billy's imaginary friend. Like, it'd be so easy. Early depictions had them as almost fully separate people sometimes, like one soul with two minds, rather than just two filters like we mostly see now.

But imagine a Billy down on his luck, hurt and hiding from police and criminals alike, daydreaming the hours away as children do, taking inspiration from all the superheroes rising to fame, making little stories to play out his dreams of saving the world with a generic action doll he found while dumpster diving once. Most of the paint's rubbed off.

Red's his favourite colour, his comfiest jumper is a bright ruby even after all the grime and washes. Gold, too, it's shiny and warmer than silver! A hero cape is a must, big and eye catching! And he can fly, of course, like superman, and in his daydreams, when he's sore and frustrated after a long day's grind, his superhero is smart enough and knows all the right words to get the bullies to stop without resorting to fighting.

His superhero fantasy is one he spends a lot of time on, the first one he goes for when struggling to sleep at night, and he can picture it so clearly. Captain marvel is big and bright and kind, strong enough to lift the boxes for the old lady up the road who's moving all by himself, fast enough to catch Jamie who fell out of the tree on Saturday and broke his leg and couldn't come to class for weeks. He appears at the entrance to alleys when Billy is cornered, he steps up behind to cover for him when he gets caught shoplifting, he sits at the bus stop with him when it's pouring rain and the right bus doesn't seem to be coming.

And then the wizard comes, or rather whisks him away, and like a magician from a fairytale breathes life into his imaginary friend until Billy feels thrice his size and a million times more invincible.

From then on, captain marvel is a real hero, just like Billy is a real boy, and as one they save the whole city, and then the whole world, and get cats down from trees and help Mrs Victoria move the last of her boxes and she gives them a pinch in the cheek and cookies for the road and sometimes it hurts but it's so much better than he imagined.

[mysteriesmuse]

~~Delightfully inspired by being at home~~

Bakugou Katsuki is an only child. No siblings - because one gremlin spawn is enough to take care of. All of Katsuki’s cousins are older than him. Katsuki IS the baby of the family. . . Which is why when he meet you, and then proceeded to meet your family, he was in a total culture shock. You’re one of the oldest kids in your family. When the two of you arrived to your families summertime reunion he was absolutely flabbergasted. Once you stepped into the house you were gone in a flash!

I mean he expected as much since you lived so far away now and had such a good working relationship with your family. But he didn’t expect for you to DISAPPEAR ON HIM.

To be swallowed by a hoarde of similiar-faced relatives all shouting about how you’ve been!! the L/N genes were strong apparently . . . you really all do look alike, huh.

Bakugou had barely stepped into the house, your luggage’s still in hand, before becoming an obstacle for children. One of your little cousins actually barrelling into his muscular thigh with a little “oof” and “sorry mister! hey! wait for me!”

Before bounding out the wide open front door to chase their playmates back around to the backyard, and then through the entire house again . . . as children are often prone to do. Now, Bakugou tried to find you amoungst the little gaggle of children and sometimes teenagers that blew around his ankles, as they giggled and shouted and whooped as they weaved their way around him. at least let him find you, or one of your parents or siblings, so they can tell him which room you’d be staying in. he’d meet them on several occasions before and secretly reveled in watching watching you and your siblings engage throughout the few visits and events he’s been invited on. All these other people and rambunctious kids he wasn’t all too sure about . . . ——————

now Y/N was having the time of her life relaxing and catching up with her family

Her boyfriend, Katsuki, was not finding this relaxing. Bakugou Katsuki felt totally out of his element: a fish out of water. Or rather, an explosive man in water. ———— his ruby eyes would snap open most mornings, at some inhumane hour from some early bird kids stomping around and giggling in hushed tones (not so hushed in his opinion) as they moved down the hallway and past your door. And Bakugou would squint his eyes into the blackness; the void. And stare at where the door was supposed to be until they passed and burrowed his face back against your perfectly sloped shoulder and slept until some kid was send by the older folks to slam open the door and wake you up. Bakugou absolutely couldn’t fathom this part of the routine. He absolutely hated it.

You however only ever seemed a touch miffled. And always informed the tiny correspondent with a playful pat on the head that you and him were now awake and would join the rest of them downstairs. . . . but eventually the little cousins would soon come running around the side of the bed to make sure he was awake too. . . and Bakugou couldn’t help but turn, pick the kid up, and playfully wrestle the flailing and giggling kid on the bed into submission, and they revealed the menu for breakfast. And they would giggle and dart out of the room so fast saying, “Y/N’s awake! And her boyfriends Bakugou’s awake! He wants extra eggs!” And it definitely wasn’t his idea of relaxing playing UNO with about 10 players every other evening. And constantly hearing you and the older kids and adults all explaining what color card the youngest one needs to put down. Or GO-FISH for that matter!

Since apparently that silly game of chance seems to be the only one every age group can play without explaining the rules. What’s the point of a game of guessing who’s got what card? Especially when he never even gets close to winning. (Yes, he was terrible at it.)

Your family even plays for second to last place, and lo and behold he’s somehow duking it out with a 9 yr old now. And Katsuki Bakugou definitely doesn’t enjoy participating in the family water balloon fights, or watching and dodging the stray streams from squirt guns fights as he stands at the grill with all the other men, or chasing down the muddy dog in the house, or the epic made-believe quests. And you definitely believe him when you pass him walking through the house on morning after finishing the dishes in company with a fairy princess, pirate, and a mermaid “but-she’s-got-legs-right-now-cause-she’s-on-land.” as he walks about wearing an eye-patch on his face and a tutu around his arm

And he’s no longer “not in his element” by the end of the trip when he takes his turn to make breakfast for the whole family. Going upstairs himself to wake up the little ones and the grumbling teens. Making sure to let you sleep in and it’s a pleasant surprise when you make your way downstairs a little later to see him manning the kitchen. everybody sat down or standing around as they chow down. And you get greeted with a swift kiss to your temple and grumbled “g’morning.” your mom chirping up, “Katsuki’s made your favorite sweetpea!” ——— And you’re pleasantly surprised once again as Bakugou joins you in on the last day of your visit. Finally stepping foot into the mattress/sleeping bag kingdom that’s set up in your house. He comes in to find you sitting at the front of the room waving your hands across the air as you engage in the last saga of this thrilling interactive bedtime story you’ve been narrating the whole trip. And Bakugou walks in and tosses all the fallen blankets back over peoples beds. Shuffling himself underneath a blanket he’s just rescued and making himself comfortable as he squeezes in next to the teens. And it’s at some part in your story that he furrows his brow and opens his mouth muttering something to the two adolescents squished beside him. His arms crossed across his chest as a dinosaur stuffed animal rests, precariously balanced, on his broad shoulders because, “you need a stuffie for Y/Ns storytime” and the three of them wave their hands and signal for you to pause and Bakugou grumbles out “- hold on babe, who is this dragon prince character anyway?” And all the kids erupt in laughter shouting, “YOU, YOU SILLY BOYFRIEND.” and his mouth is agape. And you simply shrug, “well duh ‘tsuki. who else? Now where we’re we? Right so then the Dragon Prince, the Swordsman, and the Dashing Runaway Prince of the Kingdom decided that they . . .”

[kenandeliza]

A Marvel Family Fantasy AU

A few days ago, I randomly dreamt of Drawing Billy and Tawny in a fantasy setting.

Billy was this kid wizard and Tawny was his companion (or an animal to ride on like a horse)

Then it got me thinking, maybe in this setting, Mary could be someone of high status in this fantasy setting (since she's in a rich family in the golden age comics)

I'm inclined to think Freddy would be a captain of a ship for irony-sake but I have a feeling pirates and fantasy settings don't match well?

It's just funny for me to think of him with a peg leg xD

After further discussion with @the-brash-spud :

Warning: Too many text :>

These are the ideas we have so far (if there are quotation marks, those ideas belonged to @the-brash-spud ):

—

Maybe Billy and Mary were prince and princess separated by birth, (i'm not sure if its a kidnapping or the baby got lost on his own) but the wizard founded billy and trained him.

At the ripe age of (insert young age below a teenager's), The wizard decided to grant him the power of shazam to turn him into the world's mightiest Wizard!

Captain Marvel!

Wizard dies and then Billy and Tawny have adventures together, maybe helping people along the way (maybe somehow found out that Mary is his sister :p idk)

“ I think you could go angst if you made the wizard get brutally hurt in a battle to protect Billy and the rock of eternity so in a last ditch effort he transports the rock to its own pocket of existence and then giving Billy powers of shazam because its as ready as he'll be able to make the kid :) and it's his last effort for Billy to be protected even if he has to do so himself because he has failed :)) made Billy cry as Wizard turns into dust in Billy’s hands :)))”

—

Uncle marvel can be a con-man/thief who took pity on Billy or realiz, teaching Billy that the world isn't always honest and he's like, "Billy, don't always give money to the poor on the streets, sometimes they faked their illness to be lazy”

" Billy: "The man in the shadowy corner needs my help."

Uncle: "No, the hell he doesn't!”"

—-

How Billy Met Freddy

Billy probably met Freddy in a bar fight. How did the kid get into a bar?

Billy looked at the man exiting the pub with a bottle.

Billy: Ohh! So this is where you get refreshments here! I wonder If they have enough Milk for Tawny..

Pub sign written NO KIDS ALLOWED!"

*Billy can only read magic scrolls and not regular alphabet*

Cue him meeting Freddy (who's armwrestling with one of the people there)

(Insert Bar fight for some reason because The child decided to drink a white cocktail thinking it was milk and the fact that Billy is a Kid)

“Freddie is definitely that kid having his ass thrown out of the bar/pub/inn”

I'd like to think he and his brother are a team, prolly sailed a ship together.

“Yes, they target slave ships. Unless you wanna go different routes. Then, he is focused on certain nations' flags that have a whole lot of red in them

Also, he goes to the bars just to start bar fights over drunks being mean/nasty to the landlady. The landlady doesn't appreciate it bc now she has a broken table and four broken chairs”

Freddy faces the Captain Nazi equivalent of a pirate [Captain Arian? Like Aryan?] XD, Freddy lost his leg the same way, from his encounter with Captain Arian.

Kit (probably a necromancer or a ghost who's cursed to be bound in the ship Freddy's in, making Freddy more attached to the ship) can still summon crewmembers.

Maybe they both meet mary during the birthday ceremony parade

Maybe Mary snuck off from her family (disguise herself as a regular girl, i know, generic plot) and then meet Billy accidentally

Billy: It's my birthday today!

Mary: What a coincidence! It's mine too!

The-brash-spud: “Billy, in his innocence, thinks ,"There must be something to us sharing birthdays!" While Freddy calls him stupid, Billy tries to get a look at the princes and then cue the lung-fu panda rocket incident, but maybe something else more fitting with Freddy being pulled along”

On an unrelated note, i think Billy knew about Freddy's peg legafter either a pirate slashed it clean and Freddy just used it to bonk his head.

Billy is still screaming from the shock and immediately casted healing spells (i'd like to think everything about billy is lightning based- so yes getting struck by lightning is a healing spell for him :D) Freddy got shocked lmao

And what about boarding Tawny on the ship?

Billy:"Please???"

Freddy: "I'm not letting a tiger into my ship."

Kit who absolutely adores animals: "YES"

Freddy:"NO!”

Kit:" Does he love belly rubs??"

Billy:" yes but you have to ask him politely for his permission-”

Freddy rolled his eyes, realizing he has to clean cat fur everyday off from the furnitures.

___

How did Mary, a royalty tag along with a kid wizard and a pirate?

“Yeah, I guess forced separation would work better. Hell, go with a scenario that will allow them to have Mary with the parents' blessings as long as she's kept safe (she isn't, but that's because she is the danger herself)”

Mary and Billy: "Yay adventure"

Freddy: "Oh great, now I have to take care of two kids and a tiger in my ship!?"

*Freddy looking at Kit and the kids + a tiger playing together, kit seems happy*

Freddy: "...i guess it's alright..”

___

How Freddy and Mary found out about the wizard?

“Hmmmm, maybe Billy takes them to the rock because they were in a pickle, and unforeseen effects happen?

They got surrounded maybe?

Also I can see the aftermath

"You were raised by THE Wizard!? THE Wizard?! A Wizard of legends so often told he is recognisable even if his name was lost?!"

"Oh, his name is Shazam-" *BANG*”

____

Hopefully i could draw these AU ideas, I don't plan on making this into a story, i just like the concept that my dream gave my a few days ago and I’m just expanding it. Sorry for too many text xD

I don't mind if you want to add something to this silly lil AU, It's just a fun thing for me to do :p

[moon-language-0]

captain!tony and mermaid!steve manips by @fohatic for my stony mermay fic

[darsynia]

Dragonfly (Steve/Reader fantasy AU)

MCU MASTERLIST | STEVE ROGERS MASTERLIST | Ro Roll

Summary:  Evil has prevailed. Your mentor’s dead, home destroyed, family scattered--you’re all that is left. At the last second, a stranger is called by magic to save your life. Can the two of you defeat the villain before he reaches the pinnacle of power?

Words/Warnings: 4,700 | canon-typical violence

draGONfly is 3/7 of my birthday gift set for @ronearoundblindly and is an action/adventure, angst with a happy ending story set after the blip. I know right now is a hugely busy week for you, Ro, and there's no pressure to respond right now, they'll all be here when you have time!

NOTE: it's MCU Steve in here! 'Worlds Collide'

Excerpt:

“You’re afraid,” Steve says from only feet away.

You close your eyes. “Yes.”

“Sometimes fear is a friend. It was definitely that in the army. Kept us sharp. You could tell when a soldier lost his fear because he was suddenly very brave. Problem was, we needed the brave ones sometimes.” 

He falls silent, and you can’t help but look at him. The bleak look in his eyes is clear, despite the distance between you, and in that moment you decide to trust him. If he’s another monster construct, if Micht can understand you that well, then the villain deserves the win, and all is lost.

Dragonfly

You’ve been on the run for ten days, with no safe haven to look forward to. The magic hunting you is relentless, fueled by hatred of your now-dead mentor and everything the two of you stood for. Your only reprieve is sleep; your enemy wants to witness the horror on your face in your moment of death.

All you can do is forge a path deeper into the forest, away from any innocent who could be harmed by Jovann Micht’s conjured creatures. As if watching Bram die hadn’t been torture enough, it seems you’re destined to die in the wilderness, alone.

You lean back on a tree and risk a pause to drink from your flask. Deep inside you feel your magic tremble; rest, food, and hydration is needed to stay powerful, but that is the point of Micht’s pursuit. Eventually you’ll falter, and he’ll achieve the last of his goals.

Does he know you bear the vial of his destruction? Those few teaspoonfuls are a potent culmination of your mentor’s study of the arcane, a life’s work of gathering and refining the most dangerous, mystical ingredients and combining them to make a weapon. You’d been able to see just two of the substances interact before being sealed into the final mixture, and the light they’d emitted had lingered in your vision for almost an hour afterwards.

There are three ways this can end: ideally, you’ll pour the vial into the glacial source of the valley’s drinking water and let the power propagate amongst the population Jovann Micht means to control. If that fails, you might be forced to break the vial with your dying strength, spilling its beautiful potential into the ground rather than empower one of Micht’s monsters-- or Micht himself.

The worst, most horrible option is for you to drink it yourself and spend the rest of your life battling to control the power Bram Ersk warned you about.

Heavy buzzing nearby sends your adrenaline racing, but it’s only a dragonfly angling its way past you toward the stream you've been following up to the mountains. They’re your favorite insect, brightly colored and free, with wide wings that decorate tree branches too delicate for a human’s weight.

You tuck away your canteen and check to see that your weapons are ready. The bow and arrows had only served to slow you down, so you’d sent them towards the plains with a burst of precious magic, a misdirection that hadn’t worked. Bram’s sword is cumbersome but necessary, and the daggers scattered through your clothing are a last resort.

Seconds later your preparedness pays off. The barest rustling of the leaves above your head has you crouching down with one leg stretched out for leverage if you need to run. You draw a dagger from its sheath at your back and watch in fascinated horror as your newest attacker reveals itself.

It’s a huge snake, fast and menacing. It strikes out and you dodge sideways, performing a half-roll to distance yourself, dagger still at the ready. Smoke rises from a splash of venom on your padded trousers, and a stab of fear strikes your gut. The snake can spit, likely with magic-enhanced distance. Is this how you finally die? Worn down with nowhere to hide from this acid toxin, then slain once exhaustion drops you?

You curl into a protective stance and tighten your grip on the dagger, drawing the creature in. Once it’s close, you spin up from the ground in a flurry of slashing blades. One dagger connects, but it’s glancing, enough to send the snake into retreat, but not enough to kill.

That only makes things worse. Your field of danger has increased to include the entire forest canopy.

There may only be a few minutes before the next showdown. You wipe your dagger on the nearby moss and place it back in its sheath for now. The forest around you is new growth, full of brambles and other scutgrass that tear at your armor, with a hundred branches arching over your head. You fight your way through to the stream with fear choking your throat, worried that you’ll have to expend more of your depleted magical energy to save yourself. If you need to use magic to survive his enchanted attackers from this point on, there won't be anything left. 

You’ve kept that power in reserve for some kind of final showdown, but there's at least a day left before you get where you're going.

Despair hits, and you scrabble at your neck, suddenly furious at the friend and mentor whose plans have brought you to such misery. The locket he’d given you has always been a talisman, a symbol of hope, but now you look at its silver concentric circles and feel nothing but betrayal.

Movement catches your eye, and you swing out blindly, the locket flying from your grip. As it spins, a blinding golden light spills out, growing larger and brighter until finally a figure steps forth--just as Micht’s devil-snake launches directly at you.

“Down!” a voice commands, and you drop, watching in shock as the glowing figure hurls a disk through the magical snake. The horrid thing lands in pieces that immediately shrivel and writhe. They melt into the ground, leaving only a low-lying, putrid fog behind.

The man stalks towards you, still obscured by the now-fading golden light. Instead of finishing you off, he strides past and pulls his disc-- his shield-- free from the tree it had sliced into. When he turns back your way, the man tucks something into a pouch on his chest, and the glowing light diminishes enough to see him. He looks you over, brows furrowed not in anger, but obvious confusion.

“Are you all right?”

“Thank you,” you say, struck near-dumb by the imposing presence of the man. He’s tall and broad, handsomely clad in padded armor with leather accents, but it’s his shield that has your attention. Its concentric circles and inner star look just like Bram’s locket, but in color.

He seems self-conscious about it, spinning the shield around and attaching it to his armor at his back. “Was that-- did I interrupt some kind of re-enactment?” your savior asks, curiously examining the last remnants of the toxic fog. He turns to look at you with the same studious intensity, but your head is spinning. Did Bram conjure this man with some sort of latent magic? “You should sit down,” he declares, thrusting out his hand with the confidence of a commander. The man clearly wants you to take it, but your hesitation prompts him to give up and walk over to a cluster of rocks. “Here. Do you have something to eat?”

Bemused, you pick your way toward him, deflecting your ‘I usually have to forage for something to eat’ answer with a question of your own. “What’s your name, hero?”

The word turns up a shy little smile that flies like a joy-tipped arrow right through your chest armor. “Steve. Yours?”

“Well, Steve, you’ve shown up for a battle, but I’m still fighting a war.” There’s no more time for niceties. You walk past the rocks he’d suggested you rest on, and pick up a sturdy-looking walking stick. It’s safer to stay close to the stream, and you’ll need the stability. “You’re welcome to come?”

There’s a chance that this summoned savior will disappear soon. You only have so much physical strength left, and you can’t spend it like this.

Steve turns in a circle, taking in the trees, the stream, and you, then nods, squaring his shoulders. “All right.” He certainly doesn’t seem at ease here, and you wonder if he’s real, whether he was somewhere fighting with that shield of his before Bram’s magic plucked him away.

Truthfully, you’re afraid to ask, as if naming the magic will destroy its cohesion.

Instead you lead the way along the uneven stones and brush that edge the stream, and he follows in clearly baffled silence. Sometimes you pause to adjust your armor or fill up your canteen and catch his brow furrow as he looks around at your surroundings. Once, he lunged forward to steady your steps on a slippery stretch of rocks. The warmth of his hand through your many layers was enough to bring rare tears to your eyes.

It's been so long since you’ve been touched in comfort.

Steve sees the tears but can’t know their context. You’re not willing to tell him, so you speed your pace, and he remains silent. If he’s been summoned as support, you question what triggers the magic might use to determine you’re no longer in need. If it’s words shared, you’ll hold yours in reserve. If it’s help provided, you’ll labor beside him with every ounce of your remaining strength until you finally ask for that help. If it’s distance traveled… well, you can’t think about that now.

Countless birdcalls and shared silence later, the landscape starts angling up more, and the trees thin out.

“Oh,” Steve says. His stunned tone makes you stop and look back at him. “I came to the forest--a forest to retrace my steps, looking for the echoes of what we lost. I didn’t want to. I didn’t know what I’d do if I found that the dust of my lost friends had fertilized plants that their shadows never--” he faltered, and you make your way to him, powerless to help, desperate to try. 

You recognize this grief. It's the hopeless kind, where a person just stands desolate in the aftermath and looks for the signs of their own death.

“Steve--” 

“It’s not the same forest,” he interrupts, a catch in his voice. “That’s a mountain.” He tears his eyes from the now-revealed peak in the distance and looks at you, concern and an odd sort of exhilaration in his eyes. “I kept walking because I thought we’d eventually get where you’re going, but we won’t, will we? Not today. Where am I? When am I?”

“‘When’ is easy: my waking nightmare. ‘Where’ is tricky. Who’s to know you won’t be pulled back where you came from if I tell you?” You can’t keep the bitter fear from your voice.

Steve steps forward to look down at you with gentle kindness. He’s so handsome you can’t help but feel self-conscious, clad as you are in shapeless armor, sweating with the exertion of carrying Bram’s sword (actually heavy) and Bram’s vial (metaphorically heavy)-- but you drift closer to your unexpected savior, catching the earthy scent of his sweat. You can see the sheen of it on his forehead, and you lift your hand to draw a finger across and feel the moisture of it.

“You’re real,” you breathe, surprised despite the snake, despite his steady presence behind you for this stretch of your journey.

He moves his hand to touch the drops of freshwater that have spilled from your canteen, going as far as to taste the tip of his finger. “So are you.” As though realizing that’s an intimacy the two of you haven’t agreed on, he steps back and squares his shoulders, the picture of a warrior again, despite his lack of weapon. Perhaps he is the weapon. “So what’s the plan? Camp for the night?”

You sway on your feet at the thought (both that he’d put aside his own situation and at the idea of rest), but shake your head. “Micht will send something else soon. I must reach the base of the stream. Everything relies on that.”

He looks askance at the darkening sky, then back at you. “What would make you willing to camp?”

A promise that you won’t leave me! you scream in your mind. A look of determination crosses his face, and you realize you may not have spoken the words aloud, but your body language has done that for you. You pull in a breath to prevaricate, but he brushes past you, headed into the forest.

“There’s a clearing,” he calls out, a minute later.

“Steve, I can’t--”

“You can.”

A terrible, insidious, horrid thought crosses your mind: that Steve is not from Bram at all, but an illusion with the same purpose as all the others that Jovann Micht has sent you. That his attack is formed from trust this time, rather than fear.

The shape of Bram’s locket is the only thing you can think of to refute your fears, but couldn’t Micht have torn that knowledge from Bram before killing him?

“You’re afraid,” Steve says from only feet away.

You close your eyes. “Yes.”

“Sometimes fear is a friend. It was definitely that in the army. Kept us sharp. You could tell when a soldier lost his fear because he was suddenly very brave. Problem was, we needed the brave ones sometimes.” 

He falls silent, and you can’t help but look at him. The bleak look in his eyes is clear, despite the distance between you, and in that moment you decide to trust him. If he’s another monster construct, if Micht can understand you that well, then the villain deserves the win, and all is lost.

Steve can hold a lot of supplies in his ‘tek’ suit, as he calls it. He gives you a few dense grain bread things, full of dried fruit and nuts that revitalize you. While you eat he lights a fire for the two of you, meaning you can save your newly bolstered energy rather than using it for warmth-- and best of all, he has a strange silver blanket that seems to hold heat so much better than anything you’ve used at night, even the homemade blankets from your cabin. Despite all this, you find it hard to relax, and Steve can tell. You are reluctant to explain and thus relive the trauma that sent you into the forest, and he doesn’t elaborate on his own.

He seems surprised when you want to sleep right away. That surprise morphs to a quiet, concerned anger when you explain the thin agreement you have with your aggressor, that he’ll only kill you when you’re awake.

“That won’t happen,” he declares, and you believe him. Just like a parent who promises they’ll always protect you, his words have an unspoken caveat; ‘for as long as I’m here to stop it.’

It’s enough.

You wake with the light, finding to your surprise that Steve has slept at your side, his broad back acting as a wall between you and the dangers of the woods. It’s been a week since you’ve been able to lay still in the morning, but your respite is marred by a large worry: why hasn’t Micht sent something else? Had he sent his most fearsome conjurations early on in your journey because you’d been stronger? It would be like him to conserve his energy and insult you at the same time. If you die to something more mundane, that would just add to his narrative, after all. The alternative is that he knows about Steve, and his new plan is to create something fearsome enough to destroy them both.

“You’re barely breathing,” Steve rumbles.

Selfishly, you want him to turn over. You want a memory to cherish when he’s gone. Just once, you'd had someone lying beside you whose sole purpose was to ensure your safety.

He does roll over. He’s no less real for it, and that thought lets you release everything you’d held back since Bram, since the village, since the slain, tortured lamb that was the harbinger of all the horrors that followed.

Wordlessly, Steve pulls you to his chest and lets you cry.

The next attack comes within sight of the glacial moraine. You were right. Micht had sent his worst to finish you. 

Steve pulls his shield from his back as soon as you pass through a group of boulders and see the creature. It’s twice as tall as he is, a four-legged monstrosity with the same number of snarling heads. Each serpent-like head is riddled with teeth, and like snakes, they bob and weave easily, able to turn and react with lightning swiftness.

“Your sword, please,” Steve says grimly.

“It’s armored--”

“So am I.”

Adrenaline mixes with the magic surging inside you. “Listen. I have a thing to do. It’s all that matters,” you tell him breathlessly. “After that, I don’t care what happens. Do you hear me?”

He’s looking at the creature, and you can see his soldier’s mind. You watch the fear dwindle, replaced by bravery, and you cannot let that happen.

“Steve!” you beg-- and he looks at you, still alert and ready to fight. “This was always going to end one way, okay? I just need you to--” The thing screeches with many voices, each wielding a knife that slices away some of your resolve.

You swallow hard and start taking off any extra weight, dropping your canteen, the sheathed dagger at your back, even the heavy brigandine leather that covers your blouse. It isn’t a match for a hydra’s teeth and claws anyway, and you must be fast.  

“I need to get to the base of the stream. That monster is here to stop me.” It probably isn’t. If Micht knew you bear this potion, he’d have long ago crushed you into paste and taken it for himself. “Don’t you dare lose your fear!”

Steve laughs ruefully. “I wondered if you would remember that.”

“Something sent you to me, and this is why. If there’s any justice, it should send you back, once I succeed.” The words stick in your throat, but you get them out.

“It’s a hydra,” Steve says with a hatred in his voice you didn’t think he was capable of. “I was created for this.”

You both turn to face the horrible creature. Steve lifts the sword and you ready yourself to run.

“Wait,” Steve says, a manic happiness in his eyes. He steps close and dips his head, kissing you. It’s awkward, with the sword and shield held wide at his sides, but that just makes it more real. “Go get him.”

Then he charges toward the beast.

You’d planned to wait until the two were fully focused on each other, but every fragment of magic in your body is screaming for you to help Steve. You tamp that down and hold still, certain that the hydra will only focus on Steve if bloodlust blinds it to your existence.

That’s even harder when there are multiple sets of eyes to look for you.

Steve makes first contact, roaring up and smashing his shield against the first head that lunges toward him. The thing reels back in obvious surprise, the injured head lolling to the side. The other heads rear up, and you take the moment to run far to the side, sticking to the treeline, even though it means farther to run. You weave between trees, catching glimpses of the battle but always hearing it. Screech follows screech follows the smash of metal against armored skin, over and over and over.

Just as you’re forced to cross into the rockfield, the hydra lets out an agonized scream, and you risk a look over. Steve’s holding his shield protectively above himself as he hacks at the two heads he’d sliced from the hydra. He’s panting from exertion, and as you watch, magic bubbles at the sliced necks, growing two new snarling heads from each stump. They sink down to the body of the beast and then stretch back out as individual, fully-realized necks right in front of your eyes.

You can’t send any power to Steve, not yet. Instead, you send it to your own legs, and the burst of resulting speed tears through the remaining distance. You reach into your shirt--

“You could have given it to me right away, foolish child.”

“Liar!” you spit at your enemy, furious and fragile. “You wanted this.” Of course he’d known. Micht had always loved theatrics.

“You’re right. That’s quite a guardian you’ve found for yourself,” Jovann Micht muses, leaning casually back against a large boulder. He’s standing between you and the stream.

You’re done with this. One way or another.

“Move.”

“I don’t think so.” He moves towards you, confident, commanding. “Hand it over.”

Behind you, the screeching gets louder, and oddly, Micht stumbles sideways, hissing. You risk a look over your shoulder and see that Steve’s sliced off more of the creature-- a leg this time. It brings the deadly heads closer to him, and you can’t watch.

Micht has conjured a walking stick that he’s now leaning on with a vicious look of delight on his face. “I prefer an intelligent adversary.”

He doesn’t mean you.

He’s always underestimated you. Everyone does.

Your fingers close around a vial, and you pull it free. It’s been shaken up by your headlong run, as evidenced by the blue glowing light.

“If you want this, you have to catch me.”

Your burst of speed still sings in your veins, and you start to run-- toward the hydra, not the stream. Gathering up all of your magic, you hurl it toward the back legs of the hydra, meaning to destroy them and hopefully disable Micht, if your hunch about the connection between them is correct.

The fireball hits home. The ground shakes as the terrible beast falls sideways, all seven heads turning to assess the damage. One catches fire, its agonized scream piercing your ears even at this distance. You can’t see Steve, but the desperate flailing of the inflamed head soon spreads the fire. 

You hook around, satisfied. Micht is in a heap not far from where you’d left him, recognizable by his signature blood-red suit. All that’s left is to get as close to the headwaters as you can. Bram had confided in you about the rip current that swirls right at its base, sucking the water down into a secondary stream that he’d helped the village tap into.

It serves as the drinking water for the whole valley, surfacing down past your former home and bubbling down to the sea, or so it’s said.

If you can get even half of Bram’s concoction into there--

A powerful blow knocks you to your feet, and you lose your grip on the vial. Dazed, you struggle to your knees, watching as a hand curls around the vial.

Get up! You have to be convincing! UP!

You’re unsteady as hell, but you lean into that, begging with a suddenly raw throat for Micht to stop. Your magic is almost gone again, but you grit your teeth and start for the vial. Behind it is your goal, the origin of the stream. Just ten strides, and he’ll think you’re giving up and throwing yourself in instead. Eight strides…

A rough hand curls around your neck and pulls the true vial from your bodice before shoving you to the ground.

“Ahhhhhhhhhh!” Steve roars. Through tears, you can see him running toward the two of you. He swings his arm, releasing his shield. 

Micht stands triumphant with the vial, unstoppering it in preparation to drink. It’s all of your worst fears realized, and the moment seems to hang in time, more misery for you to experience right before he kills you face to face, just as he’s always wanted.

Steve’s shield smashes into Micht’s midsection, knocking him backwards. The vial flies up, its contents fanning out in a glowing blue rain over Jovann Micht. Everywhere it lands, white lightning and red flames erupt. He’s screaming, you’re screaming, thunder and agony crashes all around you, until finally, he’s gone.

The silence is oppressive. It’s as though your blood’s stopped pumping, the air’s trapped in your lungs, and your muscles are frozen solid. The pressure builds until Steve stabs the bloody sword into the ground beside you and slumps over to rest his hands on his knees.

“We won.”

Your body's working again, but you don’t know whether to feel happiness or horror. “Yeah.”

Both of you are exhausted, the kind of bone-weary that isn’t possible without having experienced something unspeakable. The smell of burnt hydra is horrendous though, so Steve pushes to get as far away as you can before collapsing beside the placid stream. You let your hands dangle in the frigid glacial meltwater, needing to feel something bad that isn’t horrible.

“Don’t fall in. I’m too wiped to go back for the rest of your armor, and that’s a white shirt.”

He’s speaking in riddles, and honestly it's the first regular thing Steve’s said to you since… all of that. “What?”

“The water makes it transpar-- Never mind.” Embarrassment drips from his words, and it’s enough to make you scooch around so you can see him.

Steve’s black armor hides most of the blood, but he’s almost drenched in it. He’s got his legs stretched out in front of him, and he’s wrapping a once-pristine white bandage around a gash on his leg, pausing every few revolutions to rest. Noticing your scrutiny, he offers you a weak smile.

“That fireball was something.”

“So’s your swordsmanship.” You search your resources and make a decision. “Want me to heal that?”

“What?” he says, then laughs, the sound genuinely joyful, though astonished. “I just fought a real hydra. Did you know that’s the second bad guy that’s disintegrated right in front of me? Of course you can heal. This place is… this place is something.”

His voice breaks on ‘something.’ You don’t know him very well, but the trauma you’ve shared tells you he needs a moment. Avoiding eye contact, you reach out, sending your magic in a gentle golden trickle across the ground between you. It slides smoothly over his boots and up the fabric of his trousers, finally sinking into his wound. You send a little extra, too, even though it makes your chest ache with warning. It’ll soothe his mind, and that’s worth it.

That done, you turn back to the water, staring past your fractured reflection into the stream’s shallow depths. Across the stretch of rocks and bubbling froth a dragonfly twists and dips, reacting to shifts in the air too subtle for you to notice. It’s a reminder that not everything’s been affected by the life or death struggle you’d just experienced. It helps, so much so that you don’t notice that Steve’s come to sit beside you until he speaks.

“Did you know that dragonflies are a symbol of grief and rebirth?” He doesn’t wait for your answer. “Part of their life cycle is underwater, I guess, and the story goes that each one reaches a point where they need to surface. They each promise they’ll come back and tell the others what they find up there, but--”

“--but they can’t. They’re trapped either side,” you breathe.

“Trapped, yeah, but not dead.” The word is ragged, and you look up at him, even though it hurts your neck. “I lost friends in my forest. They turned to dust. We lost.”

Your hand is freezing, but his armor is thick. You reach out and squeeze his leg, and Steve stays still, clearly moved to quiet reflection.

“There’s a second life, is the moral. I don’t know if this is mine, but I wouldn’t mind if it was.”

You don’t dare hope, but you pour yes please into your expression. He smiles and pats his chest.

“There’s a pocket here. When I first showed up, you threw a locket--” he shakes his head curtly, enough to stop you from speaking. “I only caught a glimpse, but it looks like my shield.”

You squeeze his ankle, and determination hardens his expression.

“I think you might-- I think this place might need me. Do you have enough magic to, I don’t know… freeze it? Put it in stasis so it doesn’t send me back? I know just where I’d like to put it.”

You feel brave, but it’s not due to a lack of hope this time. This time, you have an abundance of hope.

“I’d like that very much.”

[nicomoon69]

spider bernard doodles + dnd/fantasy AU I’ve been crafting inside my brain

still working on what everyone should be but what I do have (tho it’s still up for change tbh):

Tim: elf, cleric or paladin

Bernard: tiefling, warlock

Cass: aasimar, monk or paladin

Bruce: human, paladin

Jason: undead (human), rogue -> barbarian

Steph: halfling, ranger

Dick: half-elf, sorcerer

Damian: half-elf, druid

Duke: fire genasi, wizard

again, everything is up for change but I have so many ideas for fun scenarios with them

[tankgotstuckinthecircusgate]

big compilation some of doc ock x rosie fantasy au art bc this story is dear to me

[artficlly]

smog & spirits: a drink with deceit (mini-series)

Marvel 1920s Gangster/Peaky Blinders Inspired Fantasy AU

gangsterboss!bucky x witch!reader

Bucky Barnes, the leader of Sootstone's Smog Boys, needs a favour. A nasty curse has been cast on him, and he needs a witch to help him break it.

Warnings: 18+ content minors dni, fem reader, physical violence, heavy angst, wound description, threats, catcalling, cults and religion mentioned, criminals & crime, 1920s street gangs, witchcraft, drinking, smoking, vaguely british setting??, no use of y/n, lmk if i've missed anything

Word Count: 6.2k

A/N: hello guess who is back!! this is very angsty, promise there will be more bucky in the next chapter just gotta set up the drama! much love <33 sorry for any typos - not proof read.

taglist: @nash-dara @sebastians-love

main masterlist | series masterlist

Three days after Becca Barnes's visit, the bodies of thirty-six Penance Boys were found in the streets. 

You hadn’t seen the bodies yourself, but the whispers that slithered through The Warrens painted a picture too horrific to ignore. The rumours spoke of a scene ripped straight from a penny dreadful. Maybe even worse than the stories that circulated, but in your heart, you knew the violence to be true. The bodies, each one marred by countless lashes, were barely recognisable. Their flesh was shredded, every inch of skin scarred beyond recognition. They were scattered across the Warrens like grotesque trophies. Some were dumped in the filthy, stagnant waters of the port, their bodies bloated and twisted. Others swung lifelessly from lamp-posts in the streets, their necks bent at unnatural angles. Several were displayed in the Smokestack District, mangled offerings laid out before the factories, and then there were the bodies hidden in the winding alleys, tucked into the shadows like forgotten, discarded trash, left to rot under the ever-thickening smog. It was all rather theatrical, a meticulously planned out act. One of the bodies, clutched tightly in a bloodstained fist, held a crumpled note. Smeared with copper, the words read: "Do you confess?"

You couldn’t help but remember Bucky’s words from that dreaded night.

Massacre.

You couldn’t shake the feeling that you had stitched up thirty-six lashes, even though the flesh had been so ravaged, the wounds mashed together until they bled into one, an indistinguishable mess. The thought lingered in your mind, haunting you no matter how much you tried to push it away. Each memory of those nights felt like a needle driven deeper, not just into his skin but into yours as well. You had done what you thought was best, what you had to do to survive, but the consequences and marks were there for both of you to wear.

The letter you found on your doorstep that same day was no surprise. Becca’s warning had loomed over you, leaving little room for doubt. You hadn’t even bothered to open the envelope; instead, you had tossed it into the fireplace without a second thought, the flames licking at the paper until it was reduced to ash. It seemed Becca was fierce when protecting her brother, and you didn’t intend to test that determination. She had been clear—stay away from him, leave him alone. She had outright said it; the bitterness in her voice made the message unmistakable: I know a threat when I see one.

You spent the next three days simmering on her words, turning them over in your mind, weighing them against the memory of your hands working on Bucky’s back. Healing him—an act you never should’ve performed. Magic meant for destruction wasn’t meant to mend wounds, and you had known that. But you had done it anyway, given into his demands. He couldn’t have been entirely in his right mind… not with the wounds, the loss of blood. Is that why he had left? Did clarity finally strike him as he lay beside you in your rickety bed? Your magic wasn’t meant for healing. Those scars would remind him of what you had done, of what you were. It had been a mistake, yet it had also been a choice.

You were bitter in a sick and twisted way. You were furious. Part of you wanted to hold him accountable for his absence—no thank you, no goodbye, just an empty space where his presence had been. You had spent the better part of a week tending to him, feeling something unspoken between the two of you, a quiet understanding that hinted at more. But once the job was done, once he had healed, it was as if he had disappeared into the shadows of the Warrens, leaving you to deal with the mess of your emotions.

Maybe it had just left you to confront your own loneliness. 

In those long, quiet moments in your home, you wondered if that was what he did best—leave. He had walked away without a word, without even a flicker of care. What about Bucky Barnes made you long for something you couldn’t quite name? Something that had you clinging to the fragments of him despite the warning signs you knew to be true?

You were fed up with yourself, with his pull on you, even after all that had happened. You were unsure if it was your heart or your cunt that was the culprit, but either way, your head knew one or both were the traitors keeping you eating from of his hand like the good little witch he had primed you to be. You had let him hurt you, and yet, part of you wanted to run toward him again, to go against Becca’s threats. The way he had looked at you and leaned into your touch—there was something there. Something more than just business. You could feel it. But the other part of you? The brighter part—the one that had always kept you alive in a city like Blackstone—wanted to just wash your hands of it all, to disappear.

And maybe that was the answer: You could leave.

The countryside called to you, with its quiet spaces and the promise of a life that didn’t involve constant vigilance and constant fear. Witches were always in high demand in such isolated places. You could have been a travelling act, banishing curses and hauntings, keeping your head down and movements quick. The law wouldn’t bother someone who was as transient as the wind. The Smog Boys wouldn’t have had the time or resources to track you. You could disappear. It was possible.

But it wasn’t just about Bucky. It was about your mother. Michael. The countless, nameless others. You had stayed because you had a game of your own to play, a plan for revenge that had been set in motion long before the Smog Boys ever darkened your doorstep. If anything, they had complicated the situation. That display in the Pony Club… that raw power within you…you were sure it hadn’t gone unnoticed. 

—

Just beyond the Smokestack District, across the filthy, winding expanse of the Sootline River, lay the Grimrow District. Its streets resembled the Warrens: cramped rows of lower-class housing, grimy industrial factories, decrepit shops, and weathered churches that seemed to sag under the weight of sin and soot. Yet, for all their similarities, the two districts held a defining difference. While the Warrens belonged to the Smog Boys, Grimrow was claimed by the Iron Rats.

Like most rival factions in Blackstone, the Iron Rats and the Smog Boys maintained an uneasy truce—a brittle thread of peace stretched taut between their territories. The fragile truce held as long as each stayed within their respective borders. But to call it harmony would be a misstep. It was more of a begrudging tolerance, simmering hostility kept in check by necessity, not respect.

You would never typically risk crossing the Sootline. But tonight, your frustration had driven you to the brink of recklessness. The boundary, marked by the Sootline River’s churning filth and the crumbling bridge spanning its breadth, seemed less a warning and more an invitation to tempt fate. Maybe it was exhaustion from yourself, the relentless weight of the Warrens, and the invisible chains tethering you to its grime-soaked alleys.

You needed a drink. One poured by someone else’s hand in a place that didn’t reek of your desperation and solitude. The sight of your miserable flat had become unbearable, its four walls closing in tighter with each passing hour. And then there were the Smog Boys, whose ever-watchful eyes you had grown weary of evading. Maybe slipping away into Iron Rats territory would give you some reprieve. Maybe they’d let their guard down if they thought you had vanished entirely—an act of rebellion against the summons you had so pointedly ignored.

But the summons wasn’t something you could forget. Bucky’s call to a family meeting had been the last thing you’d expected, even if Becca had warned you in the days prior. It gnawed at you, questioning why he suddenly considered you significant enough to include. Family. What a strange, hollow word coming from him.

You didn’t trust it. The invitation felt like bait in a carefully laid trap. Why invite you into the fold now, after leaving without a word of thanks or farewell? Why disappear, only to pull you closer the very next day? It reeked of manipulation, and you couldn’t help but think it was somehow connected to the Penance Boys and the gruesome spectacle their deaths had created. The pit in your stomach told you it wasn’t a coincidence. You couldn’t deny your own hand in the sequence of events, no matter how indirect. If you hadn’t healed him, hadn’t used your forbidden magic to save him, would he have bled out on the floor of your home? Would his story have ended there, spilling his blood into the cracks of your rotting floorboards? And, in some twisted, alternate reality, would you now be living in a Bucky Barnes-free world?

The thought clawed at you, leaving a strange ache in its wake. As much as you despised the tangled mess of emotions that tethered you to him, the idea of his absence hollowed something out of you. That pit of dread opened wide, devouring any attempt to convince yourself that you’d be better off without him.

Bucky was a wound you couldn’t help but pick at—a scar you couldn’t stop tracing with trembling fingers.

The air of Grimrow reeked of industry—smoke, oil, and sweat mingling into a nauseating miasma. You passed groups of factory workers slumped on steps, nursing bottles of something too potent to be legal, and street vendors hawking stale bread or pilfered wares.

A bar came into view just as you sensed them: footsteps too close and laughter too loud, their presence evident in the silence they carried with them through the narrow streets. Three men trailed behind you, their voices brash and oily as they jeered.

“Oi, sweetheart! Where’ya off to in such a hurry?”

“Yeah, don’t be shy. Give us a smile, eh?”

You kept walking, your stride steady, your face unreadable. Reacting would only embolden them.

“She’s got an attitude, that one,” another mocked. “Maybe we should teach ‘er some manners.”

You turned a corner, hoping they’d lose interest, but their footsteps quickened. One of them closed the distance, and you felt his fingers graze your sleeve.

“You’ve got a death wish, ‘aven’t ya?” a new voice rang out, sharp and unwavering.

The three men halted as a woman stepped out of the shadows. She was tall and composed, her auburn hair curling at her shoulders, and her eyes sharp enough to cut glass. Her tone wasn’t loud, but it carried weight, each word like a warning.

The man closest to you sneered. “What’s it to you, love?”

“You’re botherin’ my friend.” she said, stepping forward.

Her words made you pause, but you didn’t correct her.

“You’ve got no business ‘ere,” the man growled, though the uncertainty in his voice betrayed him. 

“And you do?,” she replied coolly. “Say, do’ya ‘ave friends in high places? ‘Cause I do. One word from me, and they’ll hunt you down. They ain’t the type you go lookin’ to make enemies with, that’s for sure, love.”

One of the men muttered something under his breath, probably the same question you had on your mind. Who were these friends in high places? Certainly wasn’t the Smog Boys. You had never heard or seen such a woman slinking around. She had a fierceness to rival Natasha, a sharp-tongue like Becca. The men hesitated, exchanged glances, then slunk away with grumbled curses, their bravado evaporating like steam.

She was with the Iron Rats, perhaps. 

Or something worse.

The woman turned to you, the sharpness in her expression softening into something sly and amused. “You’re welcome.”

You raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t ask for your help.”

A tense pause washed over the two of you, the auburn assessing you with one swoop of her sharp eyes. You wondered if she was searching for a concealed weapon, assessing if you had the strength to take down a grown man with your hands alone. It was a fruitless pursuit, as the chaos inside of you was invisible. 

But you had a sneaking suspicion the woman before you were also more than she let on, maybe something more like yourself, hiding in plain sight.

“You’re far from home.” She commented. There was a drawl to her words, a subtle accent foreign to Sootstone and Grimrow—one higher class, or perhaps from beyond the city walls in the countryside. “Dangerous for a woman of the Smog to be over the river.”

“And how would you know where I keep my home?” You test.

“You reek of it. The Warrens.” Her lips pulled into a honed smile. “I don’t blame ya, lookin’ for a change of scenery.”

You narrow your eyes.

“Let me buy you a drink.” You offer.

The woman grins. “I thought you’d never ask.”

—

The bar was exactly as you’d expected—a dark, smoky hole-in-the-wall with warped wooden tables, a cracked mirror behind the bar, and the faint smell of spilt beer and sweat clinging to the air. It was neither welcoming nor hostile, merely indifferent to the chaos of the outside world. You stepped inside, the noise of murmured conversations and clinking glasses briefly pausing as heads turned to size you up. They saw the woman with you, her confident stride and sharp gaze, and immediately lost interest.

The two of you weaved between tables, stepping over uneven floorboards and discarded peanuts. Wanda—as the auburn-haired woman had introduced herself—walked as though she belonged there, her boots clicking against the wood in a steady rhythm. You tried to match her nonchalance but felt out of place, the weight of the room’s gaze lingering even after it had turned away.

You slid into a corner table, its surface scarred with knife marks and initials dug deep into the wood. Wanda eased into the chair opposite you, draping one arm over the backrest and stretching her legs out beneath the table, completely at ease. She watched the room with a faint, amused smile, as though everything she saw confirmed something she already knew.

The bartender approached, a burly man with greying stubble and a perpetual scowl. Without asking, he set down two glasses of amber liquid and muttered something about payment later. You nodded, and he disappeared as quickly as he’d come.

You eyed the drink warily before lifting it, catching a faint whiff of cheap whiskey. Wanda, meanwhile, raised hers without hesitation, swirling the liquid in her glass with an air of appreciation. “Grimrow’s charm ‘asn’t changed much,” she remarked, her tone light, almost teasing.

“You’ve been here before?” you asked, leaning back against your chair.

“Once or twice,” she admitted, taking a slow sip. “Though it was a little... less grim the last time.” She chuckled, her eyes flicking back to yours. “Still, it has its appeal. Don’t ya think?”

“Depends on what you call appealin’,” you said, glancing around at the dimly lit room. “I guess it’s got character if nothin’ else.”

“Character,” she echoed, raising her glass as though in a toast. “A generous way to put it.”

You couldn’t help but smirk, though your guard stayed firmly in place. Wanda’s ease felt calculated, her words chosen with care. 

“So,” she said, tilting her head slightly as she studied you. “Do ya always bring strangers to such charmin’ establishments, or am I special?”

“Strangers?” you repeated, raising an eyebrow. “You don’t seem like much of a stranger, not with the way you act like you own the place.”

She laughed, a low, melodic sound that drew a few fleeting glances from nearby tables. “I’ve been accused of worse.”

You took a sip of your drink, the burn of the whiskey grounding you. “What’s worse than that?”

“Oh, you’d be surprised,” Wanda said, her smile playful. “But enough about me. You’re the real mystery here. Someone like you, runnin’ around Grimrow? You’ve got to ‘ave a story.”

You narrowed your eyes slightly, unsure if the comment was meant as a compliment or a probe. You got the sense the woman was lying, or atleast hiding something. “Maybe I’m just passin’ through,” you said evenly.

“Maybe,” she allowed, though the look in her eyes suggested she didn’t believe you. “Or maybe there’s more to it.”

Her words hung in the air for a moment before she shifted in her seat, leaning forward slightly. “What about you, though?” you asked, deflecting. “What’s a woman like you doin’ in Grimrow?”

The question landed with a faint ripple of tension, but Wanda didn’t flinch. Instead, her smile widened, and she reclined back into her seat, looking at you as though she’d been waiting for you to ask. “A woman like me? Now, what does that mean?”

“You don’t exactly blend in,” you replied, motioning to the sharp lines of her coat, the expensive leather of her boots. “You’re not Iron Rat, and you’re definitely not factory folk. So, what are you?”

Wanda smirked, swirling her drink. “Observant, aren’t ya? Let’s just say I don’t stay in one place too long. Too many people eager to stick their noses where they don’t belong.”

“People like me?” you challenged, leaning forward slightly.

“Maybe,” she said, her tone light but her gaze sharp. “Though you’re not like the others I’ve met. Most witches these days—” She caught herself.

You forced your expression to remain neutral. “Most witches? That’s a strange thing to say.” You continued, feigning nonchalance. “And what about you? You don’t seem entirely ordinary yourself.”

Wanda chuckled, taking a slow sip of her drink. “You could say I have a... talent for recognisin’ my own kind.”

Your suspicion hardened into certainty, and for a moment, you felt a flicker of camaraderie. But something about her tone, her carefully chosen words, kept you wary.

“Let’s just say I’ve been around,” Wanda said, her voice smooth. “Blackstone is full of people. Some are content to lay low, keep their heads down. Others... well, others are harder to ignore.”

You narrowed your eyes at her words, your grip tightening around your glass. “And which category do I fall into, exactly?”

Wanda tilted her head, a knowing smile playing on her lips. “Oh, definitely the latter. You’re not exactly the lay-low type, are you? Not with the kind of power you carry.”

The statement caught you off guard, though you did your best not to show it. Power. She said it like it was obvious, like she could see it written across your skin. You leaned back slightly, studying her. “Is that your skill? Recognisin’ power in others?”

“Somewhat,” Wanda replied, her tone light as if this were a game. She swirled her glass idly, her eyes flicking to yours with a spark of something unreadable. “It’s all about readin’ the chaos, innit? The aura of a person, an object. Every thread leads back to somethin’.”

Your brow furrowed. “So you see power in the chaos? You read it like... energy?”

“Exactly,” she said, flashing a quick smile. “I imagine it’s much like spottin’ a spirit tethered to an anchor—recognisin’ the energy surroundin’ it.”

There it was—a slip. A thread tugged loose. Your breath caught for a split second, your instincts sharpening like a blade. “I never said I was a spirit-raiser,” you pointed out, your voice colder now, every word deliberate.

Her smile faltered, just a fraction, but it was enough to confirm what you already suspected. “I believe ya did,” she countered lightly, though there was a tightness in her tone, a tension she couldn’t quite hide. Her fingers tightened around her glass, the faintest tremor betraying her rising panic.

“No,” you said, leaning forward now, your gaze boring into hers. “I didn’t.”

Her laughter was forced, brittle. “It must’ve been ‘n assumption—”

“Who’re you?” you cut her off, your voice sharp and unyielding, like a blade striking metal. Already, you were shifting back in your seat, the air between you charged with suspicion.

Wanda sighed sharply through her nose, placing her glass on the table more forcefully than necessary. “I’ve already told you,” she said, her voice cool but her expression uneasy. “My name’s Wanda. I read auras. That’s all.”

“This meetin’, it isn’t a coincidence, is it?” Your words came quickly, your pulse thrumming in your ears. “How long ‘ave you been followin’ me?”

The question hit like a hammer, and for the first time, Wanda hesitated. Her gaze dropped to the amber liquid in her glass, the faint clink of ice filling the silence. When she spoke, her voice was soft, almost hesitant. “I know more than ya think,” she admitted, swirling her drink in a futile attempt at distraction. “I know you’re... different. Special.”

The room seemed to narrow around you, her words settling over your chest like a weight. Your heart was pounding, though you weren’t sure if it was from anger or fear. “Special,” you repeated flatly, your voice thick with disbelief. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Wanda didn’t answer immediately, her eyes still fixed on her glass. When she finally looked up, there was something raw in her gaze, something that made your stomach twist. “You’re not wrong. It isn’t just a coincidence that we ‘ave crossed paths,” she said, her tone almost gentle. 

You stood abruptly, the chair scraping loudly against the floor, but Wanda reached out, her hand wrapping around your wrist. “Wait,” she said, her voice urgent. “Just listen to me.”

“Why should I?” you snapped, yanking your arm free. 

“The Church of Light is your home.”

The name struck you like a thunderclap, the world tilting briefly, nauseatingly. You stared at her, uncomprehending, the name echoing in your mind. “The Church,” you said, your voice hollow. “You’re with them.”

“Father Leofric—he sees your potential. He won’t harm you. He wants to guide you.” Wanda urged, though her voice lacked conviction.

“Guide me,” you repeated, your voice cutting through the haze of the bar like a blade. Disbelief curled each syllable into a sneer. “Like they guided my mother? Like they tried to use her?”

Wanda’s face tightened, her carefully composed mask slipping. Rage flickered behind her eyes, barely restrained. “Your mother, the traitor. Are ya gonna follow in her footsteps? Run from ya destiny, Light-bringer?”

The name hit you like a blow to the chest. Your breath faltered, and you stumbled back a step, gripping the table's edge for balance. The entity's voice in the Pony Club whispered fresh in your memory, unshakable.

I know what you are.

Spirit-raiser… diviner… light-bringer.

It had felt abstract then, something distant and strange. But now, spoken aloud by Wanda in this grimy bar, it solidified into a terrifying reality.

“Don’t call me that,” you managed to hiss, but the tremor in your voice betrayed you.

Wanda stood now, her chair scraping harshly against the floor. Her composure cracked, and her anger bubbled over like a storm breaking. 

“You don’t understand what you’re carryin’,” she snapped, her voice rising with an edge of desperation. “You don’t know how to control or use it! Do you know how ungrateful you are? Holdin’ onto such power? It’s wasted potential, wasted on you. Do you think the Smog Boys will protect you? Do you think Bucky Barnes will? Pathetic.”

The mention of Bucky’s name stung, the scorn in Wanda’s voice twisting the knife already lodged in your gut. It wasn’t just how she said it, dripping with mockery—it was the storm it unleashed within you. Bucky Barnes was a thorn lodged deep in your side, one you couldn’t seem to dislodge, no matter how hard you tried. You opened your mouth to snap back, but a sudden hush stopped you short.

The bar had gone eerily silent. Every pair of eyes in the room was on you, the tension thick as smoke. Even the bartender had paused mid-motion, his expression slack-jawed. Wanda’s words hung heavy in the air, especially one name: Smog Boys.

Your heart dropped. Of course, this was Iron Rat territory. Of course, the wrong ears would be listening.

Fear clawed at your chest, and you didn’t wait for them to act. You shoved past Wanda, her protests drowned out by your pulse pounding and stormed out into the smog-filled streets. 

Your thoughts spiralled as you made your way down the winding streets. This night was a mistake. This entire saga was a mistake.

You should have disappeared into the countryside when you had the chance. But you had stayed. And why? Because of Bucky Barnes? Because you had let yourself believe, for one stupid, vulnerable moment, that the man behind the brutality might see you as something more than a pawn?

Wanda’s mocking voice echoed in your ears. “Do you think the Smog Boys will protect you? Do you think Bucky Barnes will? Pathetic.”

Maybe she was right. Maybe you were pathetic for clinging to the small moments of connection you thought you had shared with him. That flicker of warmth you thought you saw in his eyes? It had been a lie, or worse, a cruel trick to keep you in line.

Your thoughts raced, fear and anger warring within you. The Church of Light, your mother, the Smog Boys—your mother's burdens follow you more closely than you first realised. You were tired of running and being a pawn in everyone else’s game. It was a noose tightening around your neck. All this time, you’d thought you were free of it, that her choices wouldn’t define you. But now, it was clear.

They already had.

—

From the moment you’d left the bar, you knew they were following you. You felt it in the weight of their stares, in the scuff of boots behind you, in the way the streets seemed to close in tighter.

The Iron Rats weren’t subtle. They wanted you to know they were there.

You quickened your pace, ducking into side streets and weaving through narrow alleys, but the sound of their pursuit only grew louder. Panic clawed at your throat as you turned corner after corner, the labyrinth of Grimrow offering no sanctuary.

Ahead, the bridge over the Sootline loomed, its iron framework a skeletal silhouette against the hazy glow of gas lamps. Crossing it would bring you into Smog Boys territory, and though the idea of safety under Bucky’s rule left a bitter taste in your mouth, it was better than what awaited you here.

As you bolted across, the bridge groaned under your weight, its boards slick with soot and damp. The stench of the river below was overwhelming, a mix of rotting debris and chemicals that clung to the air. But you didn’t stop. When you reached the other side, you noticed the boundary. It wasn't marked by signs but by a change in the atmosphere—an unspoken rule. Here, the Iron Rats shouldn’t follow. Here, you were supposed to be safe.

But tonight, the rules didn’t seem to matter.

A shout rang out behind you, followed by the thunder of boots on the bridge. They were coming.

You didn’t have time to think, only to run, your breath ragged and your chest aching. The smog was thicker here, wrapping around you like a suffocatingly familiar embrace, but you pushed through, darting into an alley.

You didn’t see the fist until it collided with your jaw.

The impact sent you sprawling, your back slamming into the filthy cobblestones. Stars danced in your vision; before you could recover, they were on you.

Rough hands yanked you upright, shoving you against the alley wall. The cold stone bit into your back, but the pain was nothing compared to the fear twisting in your gut.

“What’d we‘ave ‘ere?” One of them sneered, “Little Smog Whore, all alone.”

“Thought crossin’ the bridge would save’ya?” another mocked, his breath hot and reeking of alcohol. “Not tonight.”

The first punch landed in your stomach, forcing the air from your lungs into a choking gasp. You doubled over, but they didn’t give you a chance to recover. Another blow, this time to your ribs, sent you crumpled to the ground.

The cobblestones were cold and slick beneath you as you curled in on yourself, arms instinctively wrapping around your head. It didn’t matter. They kicked and stomped, their boots a relentless assault. Pain exploded in your side as something cracked—your ribs, maybe more.

You tried to scream, but the sound caught in your throat lost in the chaos of their laughter. One jeered, his voice distant and distorted, like you were underwater. You pressed your face to the filthy ground, the grit cutting into your skin as you tried to will yourself away from this moment. But the pain kept you rooted.

And through it all, your thoughts betrayed you.

Bucky Barnes. The Church of Light. Your mother.

Wanda’s words rang in your ears repeatedly: “Do you think the Smog Boys will protect you? Do you think Bucky Barnes will? Pathetic.”

Maybe she was right. Maybe you were pathetic for staying, believing you could survive here, and thinking someone like Bucky might care. You should have fled the moment your mother passed. Staying in The Warrens had pushed fate to its limits and now you were suffering the consequences. 

The laughter stopped abruptly, replaced by the sound of shouting—new voices, deep and commanding.

“Fuckin’ Smog Boys,” one of the Iron Rats hissed.

Boots scrambled on cobblestones as your attackers scattered, the echoes of their retreating footsteps fading into the smog. You didn’t move. Not when the Smog Boys’ shadows passed over you, chasing the clatter of shoes further down the alley, the Iron Rats racing at break-neck speeds back to the Sootline.

You forced yourself to sit up, the movement sending a fresh wave of agony through your body. You dragged yourself upright with much effort, leaning heavily against the wall for support. The smog swallowed you as you stumbled away.

By the time you reached your home, the world was spinning, a disorienting blur of pain and exhaustion. Every step was a struggle, every breath shallow and sharp. Your ribs screamed with every movement, the fractured bones grinding against each other, each step sending a jagged edge of agony slicing through your chest. The dull throb in your face from the Iron Rat’s punch had blossomed into a searing ache, and the taste of blood lingered on your tongue. 

Your trembling hands fumbled with the door latch, and for a moment, you thought you wouldn’t even manage that. When the door finally creaked open, you didn’t feel relief. Just the weight of the smog following you in, curling around your battered body like an unwanted embrace.

The room was dark and cold, the air thick with the musty scent of soot and old wood. You didn’t bother lighting a lamp. Your knees buckled before you made it to the bed. Instead, you collapsed onto the floor in front of the fireplace, your body folding in on itself like a broken marionette. The sharp jolt of the impact stole what little breath you had left, and you stayed there, gasping, too weak to even cry.

A thin blanket was within arm’s reach, and you dragged it over yourself, your fingers clumsy and stiff. It wasn’t warm—barely large enough to cover you—but it was enough to cocoon yourself in, enough to pretend for a fleeting moment that you were safe. The fireplace was nothing but a blackened shell, its faint embers flickering. You stared at them anyway, your vision blurred.

The smog clung to your clothes and skin, thick and choking, settling in your lungs with every laboured breath. But you couldn’t bring yourself to care. There was something strangely comforting in its suffocating presence as if it was all left of you now—a swirling, toxic reminder that you belonged to this broken city, and it to you.

Pain radiated through your body in waves. You were too broken to think about the wounds that needed tending, too shattered to consider the risk of infection or what damage had been done to your ribs. 

What a fool you’d been.

The tears finally came then, hot and bitter, spilling silently down your cheeks. You buried your face in the blanket, biting down on the fabric to stifle the sobs that threatened to shake your fragile body apart.

You wanted to move, feed the fire, and bring warmth and light back into the room. But you couldn’t.

Instead, you curled tighter into yourself, surrendering to the darkness. If you closed your eyes, you could almost pretend the smog wasn’t filling your lungs, almost pretend the world hadn’t left you broken and bleeding on the floor.

But no amount of pretending could quiet the truth. You were alone, and the city had won.

—

The morning light filtered through the grimy window, faint and cold. The air still smelled of smoke and smog, clinging to every surface of your home. You hadn't moved from your spot by the dying fire. Your body felt foreign—too heavy, too broken. The ache in your ribs was constant. You hadn't had the strength to tend to yourself, let alone address the mess of bruises and blood that painted your skin.

The floorboards creaked underfoot, and then the door to your tiny flat was pushed open with a sharp squeal. It didn’t take long for the familiar sound of shoes against the creaky set of stairs to echo up the hall.

“Spirit-raiser.” A voice sliced through the stillness, a low growl of irritation. Natasha. “You missed your summons; Barnes has got me playin’ messenger again. Better be a good reason.”

You remained silent, unable to summon the energy to respond. Of course, Bucky would send Natasha to do his dirty work, too proud to face you himself. The blanket was wrapped around you tightly, your face hidden from her view. You could feel her eyes on you, the judgment heavy in the air. Her boots scraped against the floor as she moved further into the room.

“Spirit-raiser.” Natasha's call was sharp, accusatory, “Your wards were down; what were you expectin’? Barnes to turn up and just forgive you for missin’ the meetin’?”

She gave a scornful snort. “That’s not how any of this works, I thought you’d know that by now, witch.”

The silence stretched long, the weight of her disdain unbearable. Finally, after a moment that felt like an eternity, you slowly turned your head. Just enough for her to see the state you were in—your bruised face and the bloodied split in your swollen bottom lip.

Natasha’s gaze flickered over your form, and the contempt was gone for a moment, replaced by something colder, harder. Her jaw tightened as she took in the sight. She didn’t rush to help you, but you could tell by how her eyebrow twitched that she was taken aback.

"Who did this?" she asked, her voice flat but cold.

You looked away, avoiding her gaze. "Why would you care?"

Her lips twisted into a thin line. She took a step closer, her posture rigid. "You know why."

The world felt heavy around you, each breath a struggle. You didn't want to acknowledge that she only cared because of who you were to Bucky, not due to any worry for your well-being. Bucky’s pet fucking witch, injured. How would they banish the skeletons from their closet without their witch, chains, leash and all?

"It doesn't matter," you muttered, a forced shrug, which was then followed by a wince. The words tasted bitter, but they were all you had left to cling to.

"Of course, it matters," Natasha pressed, her voice growing sharper. "Who did it? Who the fuck did this to you? If it’s those Penance Boys again I swear to the gods—"

You couldn’t bring yourself to answer. You didn’t want to. You couldn’t stand the thought of going back, of being dragged back into the suffocating web of the Smog Boys.

"I don't want anything to do with that family," you finally whispered, your voice hoarse. You clutched the blanket tighter as if that would shield you from her questions, from everything else.

Natasha's lips curled in a sneer, a harsh laugh escaping her throat. She knew exactly what family you were referring to—the Barnes. "It's a little too late for that now, isn't it?" Her eyes were cold, assessing. “You think you can just walk away from this?”

The words stung, cutting deeper than you thought they could. 

"You know I didn’t have a choice." Your voice cracked, and you barely recognised it as your own.

Natasha’s expression softened for a brief moment, a flicker of understanding crossing her face before it hardened again. “I know,” she said flatly, her eyes narrowing as she studied you.

You wanted to scream. In a vulnerable, fucked up way, you wanted to tell her everything—the truth, the pain, the defeat, about Wanda and the Church, about your confliction and entanglement with the Barnes siblings—but all that came out was a shaky breath.

She stood over you for a moment longer. Then, without another word, Natasha turned on her heel and walked toward the door. She didn’t offer help, didn’t offer comfort. She didn’t need to. 

She had said all that she wanted to say.

PART SIX

[under-loch-n-key]

I saw a really cute drawing on Pinterest of a family base and I immediately got inspiration to draw it for my Ironstrange Fanfic on A03, one of which I still need to complete. The picture is a work in-progress but I think it's cute so far. I'm just posting a bunch of work on here to get my stuff out there. So, don't mind me. Lol.

[mikazureart]

DnD/Fantasy AU

Jake Lockley as a ''beastkin'' (with a twist :3)

[wolfsbanesparks]

Hey y'all!

This is the fifth of seven stories written for Billy Batson Week 2024! Today's prompt was: Into the Elseworlds + Favorite AU

Summary:

All his life Billy had heard tales of magic, but he'd never expected them to be anything more than stories to frighten children. He certainly never dreamed that he would one day be able to do magic himself.

That all changed when he met the Wizard

[cosmicourple]

idk dark fantasy! Scogan where Logan is a wandering eldritch-y! magic-fugitive, his ‘mutation’ (AKA in this world, natural-born magic) having well, mutated & caused their body to become a barely self-contained black swirling mass of dark matter & ash that smells of rotten flesh hidden under his tattered robe AND Scott being a part of this worlds wild magic friendly/wizard-y X-men + a former cult ‘raised’ child that was almost turned into a Supernatural weapon & as a consequence, is constantly running into life &/or soul-threatening danger bc hey, he’s already had his mind & body almost completely collapse into each other in a botched ritual attempt, why should he care about self-preservation now??????