#fic: beacon

[zephyrchama]

I like to sometimes think that the OM! demons and angels have a heightened sense for noticing other beings, like they know when someone or something is nearby even if it's incredibly still and silent. But they're so used to MC being around that MC can completely slip under their radar. MC's presence is a totally natural, constant part of their daily life. For better or for worse, they're too used to it.

They're just chilling in their room, doing whatever, until MC coughs. It really spooks them. Maybe they jump a little.

"How long have you been there?"

"I came in, like, three hours ago."

"What have you been doing that entire time?"

"I dunno, just... sitting here?"

"The whole time?"

"Yeah."

👀

[star-girl-05]

Were Dating?

Stiles Stilinski x Reader

~★~❤︎~✦~

His signature blue jeep pulled into your driveway at exactly eight. Surprisingly the brunette was on time for once. As soon as he parks he’s jumping out of the jeep, giving you his dorky smile before opening the passenger side door for you. You just chuckle at his actions. 

You and Stiles have been friends for years though it was only lately that he's been acting somewhat differently. He’s been sweeter to you, more thoughtful, you contribute it to the fact the two of you have been spending more alone time together. Tonight the two of you are going to see a new horror movie that you’ve been dying to see. 

You and Stiles just buttered your popcorn when you bump into Scott and allison. Coincidentally they are going to see the same movie, so you decided to join each other. ‘A double date’ in Stiles' own words. The night went amazing, after the movie the four of you decided to get food. At the end of the night Stiles drives you back to your house. Even going as far as walking you to the door. Just as you're about to say goodnight he kisses you. You freeze when his lips meet yours, completely stunned by the boy's bold move. 

“Uh.. What was that?” You weren't against Stiles kissing you but you wanted to know why he's kissing you out of the blue. 

Stiles tilted his head a blush still coating his cheeks, “It’s a goodnight kiss, can’t I kiss my girlfriend” Now you're really confused. 

“I’m your girlfriend?” 

“Of course you're my girlfriend”, he chuckled thinking you were teasing him. It's only when you ask since when with a completely straight face does he realize you're being serious. “A week in a half, I asked you out two tuesdays ago.”

It took a few seconds to place the day.

It was an average day, Stiles was driving you home like he does everyday. Only this time when you pulled up to your house he stops you. “Hey before you go I wanted to ask you something” He was oddly nervous but you didn't think anything about it, giving him a nod of encouragement. “I was wondering if you wanted to hang-out, like just the two of us.” Why he’s so nervous to ask you to hang out you don’t know but you answer right away. 

“Of course, I don’t know why you were so nervous to ask. I could never say no to you.” A huge smile blooms on Stiles face, his dimples fully on show. 

“Thank goodness, I was so nervous that you would say no” you laugh at his reaction, why on earth would you ever say no. 

Now looking back on it’s so obvious that he was asking you on a date. In your defense he never used the word date or the word girlfriend. So it wasn’t totally your fault for not connecting the dots. 

“I didn’t realize you were asking me out” your voice is soft 

“Oh” an awkward silence covers the two of you as both stare at each other. He had no idea how to respond, this whole time he thought you were his girlfriend, but you thought the two of you were only friends. He had no idea how you thought the two of you were friends. He wasn't hiding his affection for you. The two of you would hold hands, and cuddle yet you thought you were friends. He felt like an idiot, he just kissed you when you saw him as just a friend. “Well then goodnight I guess sorry I kissed you let's just forget about it” he tried to laugh off his discomfort, this is not how he thought tonight was going to go. This morning he was dating his longtime crush and now he’s finding out it was all a lie. He just wanted to run away and die of embarrassment. 

Before he could leave you grab his arm pulling him back to you and placing a kiss on his lips. His mind short-circuited, he’s on a rollercoaster. One second he's dating you then you're rejecting him and now you're kissing him. 

“Stiles, do you want to be my Boyfriend?” 

“Yeah I would love too” his smiles huge 

“That's how you ask someone out” you giggle out

“Well when someone takes you on dates and holds your hands that means your dating” the both of you laugh kissing each other once more.

[bittersweetyrn]

big fan of essek thelyss, not the fanon interpretation, which is either "smol bean, tiny fragile elf who's a sweetheart and basically a child" or people mistakenly calling betrayal of one's home country a "war crime" and then proceeding to be flippant about it anyway, but the real Essek

pretentious motherfucker that committed treason bc he though he was smarter than everyone else

learned to float literally just to impress other rich people

canonically neutral evil

basically head spymaster of his country and master of lies but sucks shit lying to his friends

stayed bitchy even after his redemption arc

"there is nothing I would love more than to not be around you all for the remainder of this day"

a space wizard that crushed someone with telekenesis just to show off (the person was already dying)

sexy feet, nice ass, overall hottie

fell in love with a traumatized wizard of his enemy country and it was mutual despite all the betrayal

faggot

gave away state secrets to enemy wizard bc he though he was sexy

discovered time travel with his boyfriend

proceeded to say they shouldn't use time travel (bc now he's a good boy) but was willing to sacrifice everything and help if his bf wanted to use it

once confessed he had such a bad fight with his dad that his dad ran into the demon caves and never returned (essek doesn't feel bad about this at all)

young for an elf but still 120 years old, he called his bf "young man" and flexed on him about how much more evil he is

[doyelikehaggis]

7 Days of Scarepairs: Sciles | Scott McCall x Stiles Stilinski (Teen Wolf) + “Grief”

Requested by @joanthangroff (TW mention of suicide attempt)

It was a long ride back from the motel. At least, it felt longer. Stiles' gaze burning holes in the side of his face wasn't making it go any faster, either. Scott could see his bouncing leg, hear his racing heart and smell the anxiety radiating off of him. Even if he were oblivious to all of that, he would still know something was wrong with him.

"Stiles," he said wearily, looking at him properly for the first time since Coach snatched his whistle back off of Lydia and told them to sit down. "Are you okay?"

"What? Oh, yeah. I'm fine. All good."

The way he glanced at him said otherwise. Scott raised his eyebrows pointedly and the leg bouncing stopped. Stiles ran a hand over his thigh and nodded jerkily as if reiterating that he was fine.

"Look, we're gonna figure this out, okay?" Scott assured him as best he could. "From what Ethan said, there's a good chance that Derek is alive. Once we get back to Beacon Hills, we can find him, and we can make a better plan. No one else is going to get hurt."

He just managed to bite back a promise. He knew he couldn't. He only hoped that it was the truth.

But Stiles stared at him like he could see right through him, his eyes narrowing. He parted his lips like he was going to retort, as he usually would, but instead, he just shook his head and turned to face the back of the seat in front of him. As he ran a hand over his face, Scott frowned.

"You're angry," he blurted out.

Stiles shook his head again and sighed. "No. No, Scotty, I'm not angry." His heart skipped but he acted like Scott couldn't hear it. "I'm just... I'm tired. Last night was..."

"I know," Scott said softly. His own heart skipped. "But the darach's not going to catch us by surprise like that again."

Stiles nodded, but he didn't say anything else. In fact, he didn't say anything else for the rest of the ride. Scott wanted to, but something stopped him. He took to staring out the window and letting his eyes unfocus as he repeated his plan to find Derek in his mind the whole way home.

*

The bus dropped them off at the school. Stiles insisted on driving Scott home, even though he had his bike. He didn't put up a fight - he just wanted to go home and see his mom before he did anything else. That phone call back at the motel had felt too real. He just needed to see her.

Of course, she was at work. Scott sighed when he found the note on the fridge, but he told himself not to overthink it. She was fine.

"Alright, well, I think we should go to Derek's loft first," he said, turning to Stiles who was lingering by the back door, his arms folded. "He'd most likely have gone back there to try and heal."

He frowned.

"Although, if the alpha pack are looking for him, that might be too obvious. Maybe we should try the animal clinic first. He could've gone to Deaton, right?"

He waited for Stiles to agree with him or suggest something he hadn't thought of because right then, all Scott had was a handful of guesses and maybes.

But Stiles didn't chime in. He shrugged when he realized Scott was looking at him.

"Stiles, are you sure you're okay?" he asked gently.

Stiles dragged a hand over his face and sighed again, his tongue in his cheek, and he could smell the irritation on him, just like when they were on the bus.

"You know what? No," he snapped, throwing his hand up. "No, Scott, I'm not okay, and, quite frankly, neither are you, and I don't get why we're just pretending that last night never happened. Because it did."

"Do you mean..." Scott couldn't quite get the words out, his throat closing up around them and forcing them back down. He shifted his feet, his gaze dropping to the ground for a moment. "The wolfsbane?"

"Yeah, I'm talking about the wolfsbane," Stiles said, his voice thick with emotion he was failing to contain. "More specifically, what the wolfsbane did to you, Scott."

Scott shook his head, his eyebrows drawing together as he tried to ignore the sick feeling weighing down on him. "It was just... you saw what it did to all of us. Ethan-"

"Tried to saw himself open, yeah," Stiles cut him off. "Probably something to do with his freakish ability to combine into one even more freakish mutation with Aiden. Isaac - he was hiding under his bed. Boyd and Lydia were hearing things. But you, Scott..."

He took a step toward him, and Scott watched his feet, observing every little detail of his shoes and the kitchen floor.

"Scott, you tried to kill yourself."

"It was just..."

"No. No, Scott, the wolfsbane brought out all of your biggest fears and just - just heightened your true emotions. Boyd's guilt about his sister, Isaac's fear of his dad, Lydia always being the one to find dead bodies. It wasn't the wolfsbane talking when you did that. Was it?"

Scott knew he had to give him an answer. He just didn't think either of them really wanted to hear it. The truth hung in the air between them, as suffocating as the gasoline that still clung to Scott's senses.

"It doesn't matter," he said quietly, then looked up to meet Stiles' disbelieving stare. "We need to find Derek. We can't waste any more time, we need-"

"Scott, stop! Can you even - you nearly died! Twice!"

"But I didn't-"

"Because someone stopped you! Allison literally had to sew you back together because you felt so guilty about Derek being dead that you were going to let yourself die, too! Scott, I had to talk you out of setting yourself on fire, how can you not - how do you not see how messed up that is?!"

"Stiles, I'm sorry about last night, okay? I shouldn't have... I should've fought the wolfsbane, or..."

Stiles just stared back at him, shaking his head incredulously. Finally, in a much softer voice, he said, "Scott, I don't want you to be sorry that I had to save you. I just... I just wanna know that you don't actually believe what you said last night."

It was a simple request. It would take just two words. And yet...

Scott opened his mouth. Then he shook his head and closed it again, looking away with a piercing pain where his healed wound was just yesterday.

"You have to admit that a lot of what we've gone through wouldn't have happened if I hadn't..."

"Hadn't what?" He looked back up to see the reason for the quiver in Stiles' voice; tears shone in his wide eyes. "Hadn't survived being bitten by Peter? That's what you meant, wasn't it?"

He tilted his head but he didn't get a chance to deny or confirm. Stiles already knew. He looked like he might crumble into a million pieces.

"Scott," he said, his voice cracking as he moved closer. "I don't care what's happened to us. I don't care about the murderous werewolves or - or the hunters, or any of the crazy supernatural things that keep happening around us, alright? Because we've survived it, but what I wouldn't have survived was losing my best friend."

Scott bit his tongue, his eyes stinging. Part of him wanted to point out all the bad things - the numerous times he's put his life in danger, the people who haven't survived the craziness of their world, and everything else.

Then Stiles really did crumble. "Scott, I meant what I said last night. And I can't lose you. I can't - you and my dad, you're all... you're all I've got, and I can't - Scotty, I can't lose you as well. I need you. And I know how selfish that is, but it's true. So, if you need a reason to - to believe that you should be alive, then there it is. Me, Scott. Make me your reason if you have to, or your mom, or even Allison, because I promise you that none of us would be better off if you weren't here."

"You'd be safe, at least."

He didn't mean to say it. It just slipped out.

"You don't know that," Stiles countered, then he shrugged. "And even if that was true - I don't care. Scott, I'd rather be in danger every day of my life from some supernatural threat than live without you."

He didn't know what to say to that. All he could do was surge forward and hug him. Stiles immediately wrapped his arms tight around him, as if he never intended to let go.

"I'm sorry," he repeated quietly into his shoulder.

"Just make me a promise, Scotty. Alright? Promise that you'll talk to me, so that, when you start blaming yourself for every bad thing that's ever happened, I can tell you what an idiot you are."

Scott chuckled and nodded. "I promise." Then, he softly added: "I mean it."

Stiles tightened his arms just a little more. Both of them savoured the feeling of the other against them. Solid. Real. Alive. Safe. For a moment, they were as physically intertwined as they were in every other way.

Scott knew they should look for Derek. They should come up with a plan to stop the darach. But he wasn't ready to let go of the first real feeling of comfort he'd felt in a while.

[lulublack90]

Prompt 24 - Intent

@jegulus-microfic August 24, Word count 920

Previous part First Wolfstar part

Regulus flew into James’s arms when they met again. 

“We got it!” He whispered excitedly after they'd slipped out of the Manor, unseen. 

“Well done, love. Let’s get out of here,” James nodded to the others and they all disapparated. 

They hadn’t gone back to their camp. The plan was to go somewhere else first and destroy the Horcrux. They were somewhere in the Brecon Beacons. The wind howled around the wild mountain range. Their robes whipped around their legs and threatened to be torn off completely. 

“We need somewhere more covered!” Sirius called out, his voice stolen by the wind. 

“Come with me!” Remus yelled, holding out his hands to them. They all grabbed on. Regulus felt the familiar squeezing sensation as Remus apparated them again. 

The wind stopped, and they were inside a wooden shed. 

“Where are we?” Marcus asked, picking up a dusty watering can. 

“My da’s old potting shed.” Remus shrugged. “It’s out of the wind at least. Regulus moved to the sturdy-looking bench and moved aside the collection of spider web-coated seed trays and mini-plant pots before taking the notebook out of his pocket. 

For the first time, he looked at it properly. It was definitely muggle in origin. It had a date printed on the front, 1943. So it was a diary, he thought. He opened it hoping to find some hidden secrets. It was blank. The only writing was the slightly smudged name on the first page. T. M. Riddle. Well, at least they had the right item. 

“Damn, that thing smells awful,” Marcus complained, holding his nostrils closed with his thumb and forefinger. Regulus ignored him and put the diary on the workbench. He took the box containing the basilisk fang out as well and carefully extracted it. 

He held it up gingerly to his brother. 

“Do you want to do the honours? You were the one to get it after all,” 

“Narcissa literally threw it at me. I wouldn’t exactly say I got it,” Sirius barked out a laugh, but carefully took the fang. He held it above the diary. He was about to plunge it into the diary when a shimmering form began to break free of the pages. 

“Quick, just do it!” Regulus urged Sirius on. “Before whatever that is can fully form. Sirius stabbed down with intent. He stabbed the fang so hard it went straight through the diary and stuck in the wood beneath. 

A loud scream escaped from within the pages as waves of ink flooded out of the diary, coating Sirius from his arms down and covering the dusty floor. Then everything was still and the destroyed Horcrux lay there, just a diary again, albeit a diary with a large steaming hole through the middle of it. 

It took Sirius a second to wrench the fang from the wood, but once he had, he returned it to its box and handed it back to Regulus. 

“Shit, Moony, the fangs burnt through the potting table. How pissed is your dad going to be when he sees it?” Sirius grimaced after he’d vanished all the spilt ink from himself and the shed. 

“Not much,” Remus replied sadly. “He doesn’t use it any more, not since Mum died,” Sirius wrapped his arms around Remus and whispered what sounded like sweet words in his ear, but Regulus couldn’t make them out. 

“Okay, let’s go home,” Sirius said as he pulled away from Remus, but didn’t let go of his hand. James grabbed Regulus’s hand and Marcus rolled his eyes. 

“Because you can’t apparate without holding hands. Bleh!” He fake gagged and dissapparated. 

“Poor Marcus, he needs to get laid,” Sirius snickered, before bringing Remus’s hand to his lips and kissing his knuckles and apparating away. 

“Just us, love,” James said, crowding Regulus against the neglected shed’s wall. Regulus surged forward and attached himself to James’s face. It was over. They’d found and destroyed another Horcrux.

“Can we go back to Potter Manor?” He asked, between gasping breaths. James groaned into his mouth. 

“Oi! Who’s in there?!” A voice shouted from outside the shed. 

“Shit, Lyall!” James cursed. He wrapped his arms around Regulus more securely and apparated them to Potter Manor. He pulled out his mirror and called into it. “Hey, Padfoot,” James waited for a moment, and then Sirius’s voice came through. 

“Why are you calling me on the mirror? Where have you gone? Have you gone back to Potter Manor?!”

“Er, yeah, change of plans. We need to check the library again. See you in the morning, yeah. Oh, and can you tell Remus that Lyall came out and yelled at us? He didn’t see who was in the shed, but he might have gone in by now. Love ya,” He blew a huge kiss at the mirror and snapped it shut.

“He’s going to kill you for that, you know,” Regulus couldn’t hide the grin spreading across his face. 

“Nah, he loves me too much. He might take a page out of your book though and hex my bollocks off the next time he sees me,” He grimaced. 

“I’d like to see him try,” Regulus narrowed his eyes dangerously. James chuckled, and they walked into Potter Manor, greeted by an irate Flitsy, who had not been expecting them and had nothing ready. It took James a good twenty minutes to calm her down and promise that it wasn't a problem. Regulus headed upstairs. He needed a shower after everything they’d been through the last few hours. 

Next part

[a-writing-otter]

“Now we just go in there, with bats swinging, and we—“

“Slow your roll, Mabel.”

The gates open and Bill has to squint against the bright, pulsating, technicolor lights of the glen. He holds a hand up to shield his eyes as an over pronounced “neigh” is shouted into the air, the unicorn in question shaking its mane back and forth as it stands up proudly beside the babbling water.

“Welcome to my realm of— You!”

Mabel takes three strides forward with her crossbow in hand, but stops when Bill puts a hand out to stop her.

“Quit the drama, Celeste,” he tells the unicorn flatly.

Celesteabellabethabelle and Bill regard each other for a few moments. It squints at Bill before its eyes go wide.

“Bill?!”

He raises his hand to give a wave with a grimace.

“What’re— What’re you— Why are you here?!”

He folds his arms and then starts to tick off on his fingers.

“Tried to take over the universe, got taken down by meddling kids and their pet grunkles, was sent to prison, flunked out of prison, was sent to this universe to do community service, and now my ex-boyfriend wants to turn me into a living beacon so he can take over the world.” Bill pauses for a second before looking down at Mabel. “Am I missing anything?”

“We’re here to take her hair?”

“Oh! Right. We need your hair.”

“What?! I’m not just going to give you my hair! In order for a lock of my hair, you need to be a maiden of—“

“Yeah, yeah, pure of heart,” Bill waves it off. “I remember that whole scam you set up in your realm.”

He leans down to Mabel, a hand put against his mouth as he speaks to her in a stage whisper.

“You know, they used to be from another dimension pulling this shit before everyone got pissed and they were able to bleed over here. Anyway!” He straights up and looks at Celesteabellabethabelle, “Either you give us a lock of your hair so we can do what we need to do, or I set this thirteen year-old on you.”

“And I’ve got so much pent up puberty rage!”

The three of them regard each other for a moment, Celeste looking put out, Mabel looking bloodthirsty, and Bill is kind of proud of the look on Mabel’s face. He really is starting to rub off on these kids, he thinks.

Or puberty is more of a bitch than he gave it credit for.

He prefers to think it’s the first one.

[amethyst-beacon]

CHAT CHAT ITS A WIN FOR THE SKY FORCE-

HE LOOKS SO PRETTY STOP I LOVE HIIMM

[rambleonwaywardson]

Clegan Olympics AU - Event Finals Part 1

Masterpost Now on AO3 - Sous Le Ciel de Paris

Part 11 I think?

Author's note: sorry for the delay on this guys, but I just couldn't get it to a place where I was happy with it for a while. And I don’t like putting things out when I’m not happy with them. Plus I wanted to wait until I watched event finals to make sure I felt relatively okay about the logistics. Plus I've been very busy with life 😬. But this part is a bit longer, so maybe that makes up for it?

Hope everyone is enjoying the Olympics! Here's Bucky's event finals, as promised.

---

The first day of individual event finals, Bucky is alone. Just him, his coaches, and seven of his new closest friends – the other athletes from around the world competing for a medal on men’s floor exercise. The only other men’s event today is pommel horse, and none of the U.S. athletes qualified. Croz damn near did, but he placed ninth after a form break, and only the top eight on each apparatus advance to finals.

So it’s just Bucky back here in the Bercy arena warm-up gym, and he feels oddly bereft. He doesn’t remember the last time he walked into a competition alone, without Curt at his side. It’s been the two of them at the top of men’s gymnastics for years. Even when they competed in college for different schools, they met up at competitions and became fast friends. Since then, they’ve trained together. They’ve competed together. They’ve faced the world and this crazy ass sport together. And now Bucky is alone. 

It’s nearing 9am in Paris, and he’s getting ready to do his fourth floor routine of this Olympics. His fourth floor routine in about a week, after qualifications, team, and all-around. 

We don’t think it’s a good idea for you to do floor yet, the doctors told him months ago. It’s too much of a risk. It’s too hard on your leg.

Bucky basically told them to fuck off because he planned to try for Paris. Once the idea was in his head – the idea that it could be possible – he couldn’t let it go. He needed to at least try. Honestly, not even he himself knows if he really expected to get this far. On one hand, yes he absolutely did. He’s John fucking Egan; as far as he’s concerned, this is what he was meant for, a destiny set forth by the gymnastics gods. On the other hand, did anyone really expect it after the year he’d had? Did anyone think it was possible? Did anyone think he could do it without hurting himself all over again?

And yet here he is. He wasn’t supposed to do floor exercise at all, and now he’s doing it four times in one week. And honestly, not even he’s sure that it’s a good idea. Not even he’s sure that he isn’t in over his head today. 

But that kind of mentality does not have a place on the gymnastics floor.

A wet nose presses against Bucky’s thigh as he sits on the floor, securing his brace once again as he prepares to head out into the arena for warmups. It’s his ever-dutiful good luck charm, getting Bucky through these Games just like he got him through trials. 

“Hey bud,” Bucky says, patting Beacon on the head. The golden smiles at him and wags his tail, as if he’s saying you’re not alone, you have me, and it makes Bucky smile, too. “Yeah, at least I have you,” he says. “Just you and me against the world, Bea.”

Beacon licks his hand in agreement.

The golden almost hadn’t made it to the Games, but Bucky and Curt had personally advocated to find a way to get him and his owner across the pond to Paris. USA Gymnastics wasn’t going to turn down their two stars, and they pulled some strings to make it happen. Since it’s an international event, the dog can’t be out on the competition floor, but USA Gym negotiated a way to have him back by the warm-up gym, and at this point just about everyone agrees it was the best decision anyone at the Olympics had ever made. He’s become not only the team USA therapy dog, but the therapy dog for every Olympic gymnast who needs a little extra comfort. Many of the athletes from other countries have made friends with him in the last week, taking photos with him and de-stressing by petting or playing with him. No one goes out onto the floor without petting Beacon for good luck.

Beacon, who started as a USA Gymnastics celebrity, is now an Olympic celebrity. Everyone knows who he is, especially at Bercy. After winning team silver, Curt laid his medal around Beacon’s neck for a picture, citing him as part of the team. He attends interviews with the boys, gets professionally photographed, and can be spotted from time to time around the Olympic Village. The dog even has his own custom “Beacon the Good Boy” pin for the Olympic pin exchange, and it’s quickly become a highly sought after souvenir for the athletes.

A Japanese gymnast, the favorite to win floor finals, walks by as he prepares to head out into the arena. He stops to lean down and scratch Beacon on the ears, and Beacon wags his tail and boops him on the arm. Bucky and the other gymnast exchange a smile and wish each other good luck, and then Bucky’s coach is grabbing his bag for him, letting him know it’s time to go. 

As Bucky gives Beacon a kiss on the head and walks away, he’s aware of every single athlete heading out to floor exercise – all eight of them, no matter what country they’re from – stopping to pet the dog. For good luck. 

As the announcer calls his name – “For the United States of America, John Egan!” – Bucky walks through the open doorway into Bercy Arena, the American flag projected on the wall behind him. He smiles and waves at the crowd packing the arena on all sides and heads over towards the tumbling floor with the other gymnasts. As he walks, he feels some nerves begin to return, and he runs a hand through his hair and bites his lip as he takes a deep breath. 

One more time, he tells himself. He’s hit every other floor routine this week. He can hit this one, too.

He’s leaning over his bag, which his coach had set on one of the chairs to the side of the tumbling floor, when he hears a familiar voice. “Egan, why don’t you give me a smile?”

Bucky whips around, and he can’t stop the grin that breaks out across his face. “What the fuck are you doing here!”

He pulls Curt into a hug and claps him on the back. The other gymnast, not competing today, is wearing one of the red USA Gymnastics coaching polo shirts. He has his Paris Olympics ID card and a floor pass strapped across his body on one of those pink and blue Paris lanyards. Hand-written on the pass in a messy scrawl are the words “MAG Coach 2” – Men’s Artistic Gymnastics coach 2. 

“Pulled some strings,” Curt says. “I’m your other coach for the day. Thought you could use some of my awesomeness down here.”

Bucky rolls his eyes but hugs Curt again. “Thanks, man.”

Curt grins at him and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Let’s rack ‘em up and knock ‘em down.”

When it’s Bucky’s turn on floor, he spares a glance up to the stands. When he was younger, cockier, he’d interact with the crowd constantly during meets. Sometimes his coaches would reprimand him for it, telling him to focus. He didn’t really listen.

He didn’t necessarily lose that cockiness, but a greater wariness has welled up within him during his recovery, dimming it. In the last week, he’s been finding a better balance again, but he’s been different since he returned to competition. During trials, he tried to block out the crowd, not wanting to let it get into his head. He didn’t have quite so much fun, didn’t want to think about anything other than the next apparatus, the next pass, the next skill.

But that was before he cared about who was watching. Here, in Paris, he’s made a point of knowing exactly where Gale is sitting, as if that alone can fight off his nightmare from before all-around. As if that alone can keep his leg together, keep his mind and body on the same page, ensure he can stick the landings on these tumbling passes that his doctors don’t think he should be doing. 

Gale Cleven. Bucky’s other good luck charm. 

Gale is exactly where he said he’d be, five rows up, right in front of the tumbling floor. Benny is beside him, and Marge, fresh from winning team silver in show jumping, is in the next seat over. She waves excitedly when he looks up, and he waves back. Gale notices him at the last second and breaks into a smile that takes away any last remnants of nerves that had been swarming around Bucky’s head. Any anxiety he feels starts to simply melt away, because Gale smiling at him like that is like basking in the glow of the sun.

On Gale’s other side is Croz, Alex, and Brady. The rest of Bucky’s team, here to hype him up and cheer him on. Brady has a tiny American flag stuck behind each ear, and all three of them are wearing quite obnoxious custom John Egan t-shirts. Bucky wonders how they got them without him noticing. 

He stops at the chalk box and kicks the slides off his feet before stepping into it, coating his feet in white chalk as he waits for the go-ahead. Then he leans over to the elevated chalk bowl and does the same to his hands. Over the quiet chatter as the audience waits, he can hear Brady yell “Yeah you get that chalk!” And it makes him laugh. 

The commentators on TV will note that John Egan has the second highest start value in this competition. Second by a mere tenth of a point. If he chose to compete the floor routine he wanted to – before he fought with his doctors and coaches over the integrity of his leg and the importance of not fucking it up – he’d have the highest start value by a mile. But as a compromise, he chose to omit one of his harder passes due to the danger of over-rotation and re-injury. The commentators still talk about how it’s incredible that he’s doing what he’s doing at all, that he qualified second on floor after the injury he had. 

Bucky knows that, injury or not, his gymnastics speaks for itself. His floor routine speaks for itself. His difficulty score speaks for itself. He knows that, injury or not, he is seen as one of the best gymnasts in the world right now, and that is why he’s here. But sometimes he wishes the commentators and the interviewers and the media would see it that way too, that they’d stop qualifying his accomplishments by saying he’s doing a great job “for being terribly injured just months ago.”

Injury or not, he’s John fucking Egan. And he’s going to make sure everyone in this stadium knows it. Sure he already has the all-around gold, but as long as he’s here, he needs to keep proving that he’s more than a comeback, more than a pity story.

He’s John fucking Egan. 

When the green light comes on and the announcer says his name, he swears he can hear his friends cheering for him over anyone else in the stadium, and he lets it fuel him. He salutes the judges, steps into the corner of the floor to set up his first pass, and he throws himself at it with every last bit of energy he has. 

Triple twisting double back layout. Perfect stick. Applause. Combination pass. Near perfect stick. Applause. Double salto forward. Stick. Applause. Cartwheel, somersault into the splits. Japanese handstand – his non-acrobatic element – arms straight out to the side, hands pressing into the floor holding himself up, head no more than a fist’s width distance from the floor, legs straight in the air. Hold. Roll out of it. Three more passes left. 

On the penultimate pass, he can feel it when he’s only midway through, still ten feet in the air. It’s a feeling no gymnast, no matter how well trained, likes to have: he’s going to under-rotate this. When he lands, in an attempt to save himself from falling on his face, his left foot hits the floor at a very strange angle in front of him and causes him to stumble back a step on his right. He grimaces when he feels a painful tug on his left knee, straining the joint. 

Not now, he thinks. Not fucking now.

The commentators on TV will comment on the disconcerting way he landed, the look of concern that flashes across his face before he schools his features once again and regains his balance. They’ll mention his knee, his injury, his comeback, the fact that his doctor’s didn’t think he should do floor but he wouldn’t be stopped. 

Curt watches with concern, wondering if his fears were right, that today was just too much. He tries to analyze the way Bucky landed and the look on his face and what it might mean. He’s playing coach today, and he’s trying to make heads or tails of what’s going through Bucky’s head right now. But like any coach, it’s not up to him. Out there on the floor, it’s up to John and John alone. All he can do is watch what happens next.

In the stands, Croz, Alex, and Brady all cringe at the same time, making Gale go “What? What’s wrong?” with his eyes wide in alarm.

“He landed a bit weird on his left,” Croz explains. “Looks like he’s gonna keep going, but…”

Shit.

He’s gonna keep going, but he’d keep going even if he shouldn’t. 

Bucky’s fine. Enough. He’s fine enough. He needs to be fine enough. He’s still standing, so there’s no other option. He can still move, so anything else he can work out later. Whether he’s actually fine or if the adrenaline coursing through his body is masking the pain, he doesn’t know. Doesn’t matter.

He cocks his head, shakes his arms out as he brings his feet together in the corner once again. Just gotta make it one more, he tells himself. It’s fine. We’re fine. He can hear Curt on the sidelines, yelling encouragement despite his own uncertainty. “You’ve got this! Get it done, Bucky! Get it done!”

Bucky takes a deep breath, looks across the floor at the opposite corner. He can see the judges, watching his every move, finding every possible little fault in his performance. He stares them down, like a dare. They all know he has to be perfect on this last pass. 

He thinks of Gale. Find your line. 

“Find your line,” Gale whispers in the stands. Benny puts a hand on his knee and squeezes in anticipation. 

Ignoring the slight stinging pain in his leg, Bucky runs, flips his way into his dismount, and launches himself up into the air to complete the triple full. When he hits the floor, that spike of pain shoots through him again, but he grits his teeth and forces himself to stay in control. He landed with one of his heels just barely out of bounds, and he knows that one-tenth deduction will probably cost him the gold, but he stuck the landing perfectly otherwise. He gets too much power on that pass; he always has, and he’s quite frankly surprised this is the only time he’s landed out of bounds the entire routine. He laughs a little bit anyways, because even if it’s not gold, even if that Japanese gymnast beats him out, he fucking got it done. 

He will be only the second American male gymnast to ever win an Olympic medal on floor exercise, and the first since 1976.

Deafening chants of “USA! USA! USA!” go up around the arena, and he salutes before pumping his fist in the air and jumping across the floor, leg be damned. He waves his arms to pump up the crowd, and they cheer for him. Because they know, no matter what country they’re from, what it means for him to be here right now. 

“LET’S GOOOO!” He yells out, and he can hear Curt doing the same as he goes absolutely crazy on the sidelines. When Bucky haphazardly shoves his slides back on his feet and hops down, he jumps right into Curt’s arms as the other gymnast lifts him off his feet, jumping up and down in celebration.

“That’s how it’s done!” Curt exclaims.

If Bucky’s in any pain, as the commentators, his coaches, his friends feared he would be, when he steps up onto the podium for the medal ceremony, no one notices. He hides his slight limp. He waves to the crowd. He can’t stop smiling as he bows his head to receive a silver medal. His third medal of the Paris Olympics. 

He shakes hands, he poses for photos with the other medalists. He blows a kiss to Gale in the stands. He waves to the crowd. He talks to a reporter about what this means to him.

He has one event left. 

—

Bucky sits on the uncomfortable mattress, leaning back against Gale’s warm chest. He’s polishing off one of the infamous chocolate muffins from the dining hall, which he’s been looking forward to all day. Curt snagged it for him earlier that afternoon after Bucky complained about not being able to get to the dining hall to get one himself, and Bucky could have kissed the guy for it. Sure, maybe he still has one more event to go bright and early tomorrow morning, but he’s earned himself a damn muffin and then some. Gale bumps the side of Bucky’s head with his nose, and Bucky raises the muffin up so Gale can have a bite before it’s gone.

Curt and Bucky’s small bedroom is full the night of his floor exercise silver. Tomorrow, he and Curt have rings and vault finals, so it’s a chill night in for them. No drinking or painting the town red or even mingling with the other athletes in the USA House. Bucky and Gale sit together on Bucky’s bed. Curt sits on his own bed, Croz beside him and Brady half laying across them both. Alex sits on the floor in the small space in between, leaning back against Curt’s bed, with Benny also on the floor, leaning against Bucky’s. Marge sat out their little gathering in favor of meeting up with her jumping team, which benny gave her shit for.

Ice is wrapped around Bucky’s knee, which is still sore but doesn’t seem to be seriously damaged. He’s been able to walk fine unless he stays still too long, and Gale took it upon himself to massage his leg earlier in the afternoon (which Bucky totally did not try – and succeed – to turn into a makeout session). Either way, he thinks the soreness might be worth it, because he has three Olympic medals hanging around his neck. And they’re heavy. 

“Maybe you should compete with those weighing you down,” Alex jokes. “Give the rest of us a fighting chance.”

Bucky laughs and holds up his second silver medal, bites down on it like he did for the photos on the podium. “Jealous, much?” 

“Of Olympic all-around gold medalist, comeback kid of the year, John Clarence Egan?” Alex says dramatically. “No. He’s an ass.”

“Oh fuck off!” Bucky laughs and throws his pillow at Alex, who doesn’t have time to dodge and lets it smack him in the chest. Then he takes it for himself and shoves it behind his back. 

“Wait! Bite down on the medal like that again,” Croz orders, motioning to Bucky as he pulls out his phone. 

“Aren’t there enough pictures of me biting an Olympic medal?” Bucky asks. There’s at least several from each event so far this week, and if everyone in this room is being honest, they fully expect him to add another medal to his collection tomorrow morning.

Gale makes to unwind his arm from around Bucky to get out of the frame, but Croz says “No, Buck, you stay there.” Gale arches an eyebrow but slowly wraps his arm securely around Bucky once again, pulling him close.

“Oh! Hold on,” Bucky says. He tells Curt to grab his silver medal, and Curt understands. He pushes himself off the bed, nearly knocking Brady to the floor, and grabs his medal from his bedside table, because that’s obviously the perfect place to store an Olympic medal. Reaching across Bucky’s bed, he motions for Gale to bow his head, and he places the medal around the blonde’s neck. A stand-in for his own eventing silver medal. 

“There,” Bucky says, pressing his fingers to the medal now resting on Gale’s chest. “Très beau.”

“Très beau,” Gale agrees with a soft smile.

“Okay, look over here,” Croz tells them. And he takes their picture.

Bucky decides not to even be shy about it. He posts the photo on Instagram immediately, with the caption “silver medalists ❤️” at the bottom. Bucky biting down on his silver medal with a smile as he leans back against Gale’s chest. His other two medals hanging around his neck. Gale’s arm wrapped around him as he holds up his own silver medal with his other hand, smiling shyly. Both of them in comfy team USA t-shirts. The ice on Bucky’s knee is barely visible at the bottom of the frame.

“Aren’t you two cute,” Benny teases, reaching up to pat Gale on the leg. 

Gale rolls his eyes as Bucky kisses him on the cheek. “We sure are,” Bucky agrees. Then he looks at his teammates on the other side of the room, as if he just remembered something very important. “Did you guys see the adorable pictures of Buck and Whiskey after the medal ceremony?”

The other gymnasts shake their heads, and Bucky insists that they look. Gale blushes, trying to hide his face in Bucky’s hair, but Bucky won’t let him. He pulls out his phone and forces Gale to look at his own post with him for about the hundredth time. Gale may be the one who posted it, but Bucky is the one in love with it, as is the rest of America. It’s been re-posted by the US Equestrian, US Eventing, and Team USA accounts, so millions of people have seen the pictures at this point. Between that, opening ceremonies, and the media tracking his and Bucky’s “love story,” he’s gained hundreds of thousands of followers during the past week alone.

After Gale won his individual silver medal, the first thing he did when he saw Bucky again was shove his phone in his face and say “look at my girl!” It wasn’t even himself he was proud of; it was his horse. As usual. 

Aside from the professional photos that came out later that day – photographs of Gale on the podium, Gale on Whiskey with a pretty second place ribbon attached to her bridle, Gale and Whiskey together as he held up the medal around his neck – there’s also countless non-professional photos, mostly taken by his groom, Kenny, after he got back to the stables that day. 

Bucky’s favorite, though, is a selfie that Gale took, still looking sweaty with his cheeks flushed, hair sticking up in all directions, as he held up the medal. The picture was taken from below, so you can also see Whiskey’s face. Her forelock, which had just been released from a braid, is also sweaty and sticking up in all directions, but she looks like she knows exactly what she just accomplished. Her ears are perked forward and she’s sticking her tongue out at the camera. Bucky’s favorite part is the ecstatic smile on Gale’s face. Him and his mare and nothing but pure exhilaration. 

Bucky wasn’t the only one who liked the picture either. It’s tucked in the middle of the photo set Gale posted that night, but it’s the most shared photo from the entire set, circulating across social media platforms and even on the news. The eventing team had been invited to the Today show to talk about their Olympic success, and they displayed that very picture for everyone tuning in to see. 

Now Bucky looks around, satisfied, as the other guys find the post and instantly like it and comment on how awesome Gale and Whiskey look, because apparently he’s that kind of boyfriend now. The kind that wants anyone and everyone to know how awesome and adorable and successful and sweet his boyfriend is.  

And… boyfriend. Wow. Okay. That’s the first time he’s thought of it that way…

It makes him feel funny. A little scared and uncomfortable and unfamiliar, but also warm. It makes him… happy? Proud.

Before he can really panic too much about it, though, Croz is holding up his hand and saying “Wait wait wait, is it true that the horses fly on a plane called Air Horse One?”

Gale chokes on a laugh, blowing warm breath into Bucky’s hair where he’s still hiding his face. It makes Bucky feel fuzzy. He’s been sitting here, wrapped safe and warm in Gale’s arms as he ices his leg for quite a while already, but he’s suddenly very very aware of it. 

“Yes and no,” Gale says.

“Air Horse One exists,” Benny explains. “But our horses didn’t fly to Paris on it this year.”

“Well what’s the fuckin’ point then?” Curt exclaims.

Gale shrugs. “Just kinda depends what company is available to fly ‘em. It’s pretty much the same treatment no matter what.”

“Didn’t you say the horses have passports?” Bucky asks. Almost experimentally, he leans forward, out of Gale’s hold, under the guise of taking the ice off his leg. He quickly realizes, though, that he really misses the warmth and security of Gale’s embrace, and that information assaults his brain with all the subtlety of a freight train. He doesn’t know why. He doesn’t know why he can’t just admit that he loves this guy and be okay with that and let himself be happy and not question it anymore. But every single time he feels himself coming to a new realization about it, it throws him off guard.

Just let yourself be fuckin’ happy, you idiot, he thinks. 

He realizes Gale is answering his question. “Yeah, they all have to have a passport to travel internationally. Just like us. Whiskey’s technically been to more countries than I have.” Benny scoffs from the floor below them.

Curt gets up and takes the ice pack from Bucky. “You good?” he whispers, no doubt seeing the startled look on his face. He also accepts the medal that Gale hands back to him. 

Bucky nods as he leans forward, basically folding in half as he stretches his leg out, then rubs at the joint.

Gale, who, of course, noticed the concerned exchange between Bucky and Curt, puts a gentle hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “You need heat next?” he asks.

Bucky’s heart stutters because yes he does need heat, and of course Gale thought about that and wants to make sure Bucky has what he needs because he’s thoughtful and sweet and it’s not like anything Bucky has ever had before. And why does Bucky feel emotional about that?

And Gale and the others were having a totally different conversation but now everyone is looking at Bucky instead because he got freaked out and pulled away and Gale got concerned because of course he did and now Bucky’s face feels hot.

So he just nods and looks at Gale and sees those beautiful blue eyes looking back at him, wide and sweet and concerned. “Yeah,” Bucky says quietly. “Yeah, heat would be good.”

Curt gives him a knowing look, flicking his eyes from Bucky to Gale and back, that says almost exactly what Bucky just told himself: stop overthinking this and just be fuckin’ happy that this amazing guy likes you. Curt knows everything Bucky has been through in the last several years. He knows how stupid Bucky can be. And he knows that Gale is one of the best things that could ever happen to him. If Bucky would just accept that.

“I’ll get the heating pad,” Curt tells him, with another look that says now lean back into his arms and quit bein’ stupid.

So Bucky does. He sighs, and he lets himself lean back, and Gale’s arm immediately wraps back around him like it belongs there, and then gentle lips are being pressed to the top of Bucky’s head. And Bucky lets himself smile again.

“Wait what country has Whiskey been to that you haven’t?” Croz asks, now that the attention is off Bucky again.

“Austria,” Gale replies. “That’s where she was born.”

Benny pops his head up and looks, surprised, at Gale. “She was born in Austria?! I thought she was born in Germany.”

“What?” Gale laughs. “Just ‘cause she’s a Hanoverian?”

“Well, yeah,” Benny nods.

Gale shakes his head. “No. Austria. I’ve been to Germany.”

“You imported your horse from fuckin’ Austria?” Brady asks, incredulous. This makes Bucky snort, because clearly Brady knows nothing about these ridiculous equestrian folk. Not that Bucky does. But he’s learning a lot.

Gale nods, and Benny adds, “My gelding came from France. Just about an hour from here.”

Curt returns with the heating pad and helps Bucky wrap it around his leg. “15 minutes, okay? No more.” Bucky nods and Curt returns to his own bed, manhandling Brady so he can sit back down. Brady promptly flops back across his lap.

“Fuckin’ equestrians,” Alex mutters, shaking his head. “Buying horses from Europe and then full sending themselves over shit at break-neck speeds.”

“Yes, that is the motto of FEI eventing,” Gale deadpans, and that makes Bucky laugh, too.

“And he’s funny,” Brady exclaims, nearly smacking Curt in the face as he throws his hand up dramatically. “Damn, Bucky. You gotta tell me where you found this guy so I can find one just like him.”

“On a plane,” Bucky says through a yawn. He grabs onto Gale’s hand, which is resting against his side, and pulls it up close to his chest, interlacing their fingers. “A very special plane.”

This somehow leads into a weird conversation about dating horror stories that Bucky doesn’t much feel like contributing to. The whole world already knows his biggest dating horror story, after all. How much worse can it get after a crazy ex forces your coming out on a global scale?

He’s started letting himself drift off instead, his eyes blinking tiredly closed as his breathing slows, and he settles even more fully into Gale’s arms.  

“How’s your leg?” Gale asks him eventually. Bucky blinks his eyes open again when he feels Gale shift, leaning forward to carefully unwrap the heating pad from his leg. The caring gesture makes Bucky feel as warm as the heat did. “It’s been 20 minutes,” Gale whispers. “Don’t tell Curt, but I understand wanting that heat just a little longer.”

Bucky smiles sleepily. “It’s alright,” he says. “A little sore. Somethin’ fuckin’ weird happened when I landed the second to last pass.”

“I know,” Gale says soothingly. “You gonna be alright for tomorrow?”

Bucky nods. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ll be alright.”

—

Bucky has always liked rings. Any other event, the slightest inkling of nerves can have a domino effect on your entire body, and one second you’re doing fine, but the next, a bit of tension in your neck can cause you to land all wrong or smack your foot on the apparatus. Next to no one, for example, ever wants to start all-around on pommel horse, because if you are anything other than completely relaxed and perfectly focused, the odds are high that you fuck it up.

Many of the other events are not much better, in that way. There’s no room for nerves or fear on the competition floor, because no matter how good you think you are at hiding them, your body will betray you. It’s Bucky’s biggest concern this season, in his first handful of competitions back after near-certain career death. He’s used to being the cockiest bastard on the floor, for better or for worse. He’s used to having next to no doubt about his capabilities. In the past few months, though, he’s found himself still battling the remnants of the anxiety and the fear that nearly kept him from returning. He fears the pain that he felt when he flew off that high bar. He fears another set back. 

After nearly having his career ripped away, after crawling his way back, he fears losing it again. For good.

Still rings are the most forgiving for people like Bucky, who have the brute strength to pour their entire being into that routine. That’s what still rings are about – pure strength. It’s about holding your body as still as can be in positions that other people think look impossible. It creates an illusion of sorts, making people wonder how it can be real. It can be almost meditative, despite the burning in his muscles. All he has to do is hang on and channel the wayward energy in his mind and body into staying still. No matter what Bucky is feeling, he can pour it all into rings and it’ll hardly cost him a thing.

In Tokyo, it was anger. He became known for “angry gymnastics” after his sister died. Between that and the pandemic, he was mad at the whole world, and he shoved all of that emotion into his gymnastics. He limited his focus to one event, and then another, making sure every single move was perfect, crisp, strong out of pure spite and adrenaline. He pushed his way through all of it, straight-faced and with a sheer determination to keep going. Don’t look around, don’t look back, don’t look forward, just do.

The rings are served well by that kind of emotion, and that’s what got him his first silver medal on this apparatus three years ago.

He’s not angry anymore, though. That’s another thing the commentators have caught on to. He’s not angry. He looks like his normal, cocky, carefree self, just having fun out there. The angry, rough gymnastics he was doing three years ago has refined itself into something elegant, strong, unbreakable. He came out the other side somehow better than before, they say. 

He’s not angry anymore. But he isn’t always carefree either.

He’s relieved all he has left is rings. Because he’s worried anything else would betray the anxiety slowly creeping over him, the exhaustion weighing him down, the pain crawling up his leg like a vine. He can try to push it away, convince even himself that he doesn’t feel it. But the apparatus always knows. The body always knows. Even if your mind doesn’t. If Bucky’s learned a single lesson through the process of returning to the gym, it’s that.

In the hall outside the warm-up gym, Beacon keeps gently booping John’s bad leg like he knows something is wrong with it before staring up into John’s eyes and wagging his tail. Don’t be dumb, he seems to be saying. Don’t hurt yourself.

“I know, bud,” Bucky says, reaching down to pat Beacon on the head with an encouraging smile. “I’ll be alright, though.”

“The dog’s tryin’ to tell you something,” Curt points out as he sits on the ground beside Bucky, stretching out his hamstrings. Rings and vault finals are on the same day, so Bucky and Curt arrived at Bercy arena together, bright and early this morning. “You sure you’re alright?” 

Curt is still worried about the way Bucky landed on that pass yesterday. It was just the right kind of slightly off that it could easily have screwed up something in Bucky’s knee, and he’s concerned that it was something more than some ice and heat last night could fix.

Bucky just shrugs as he straps on his brace. He’d been debating over whether or not he should wear it for rings, since the entire routine relies on upper body strength alone aside from the dismount. But after yesterday, even he can admit that the brace is probably a good call right now.

“It’s a little sore,” he admits. “I mean, I’ve done three all-arounds and an extra floor routine in less than a week. I think that’s to be expected.”

Curt frowns and pauses his stretching to sit up and look Bucky in the eye. “Would you tell me if it was bad?” He knows what it is to push through pain to hit that one more routine. Just one more vault. One more pass. It’s the nature of the sport, always has been. That toxicity of gymnastics might be getting better now, but every athlete is the same. Every gymnast. Just one more. I can do one more.

Bucky shrugs again. “I’m fine, Curt. Just one more event. And it’s my best.”

He smirks before kneeling down in front of Beacon and giving the dog a good scratch and a kiss on the head. “Got my good luck charm and everything. What can go wrong?”

He pats Curt on the shoulder, and he hopes to God he’s right.

Today is Bucky’s fifth day walking through that doorway to thunderous applause in Bercy arena, and no matter what, it always feels surreal. Today is his last day in this stadium, and Bucky takes a deep breath as he walks out, smiling brightly and taking it all in one last time. He knows better than anyone that the career of a gymnast is uncertain. He hopes this isn’t his last Olympics; he thinks, if he plays his cards right, he could make it to LA. But there are no guarantees in this sport, or in any sport, especially after the injury he’s had. So he looks around him at the Olympic rings on the walls and the packed stadium cheering “USA! USA! USA!” as he walks out. And he actually lets himself think, for a moment, about how goddamn lucky he is to be here.

The Tokyo Olympics were a mess for him, between COVID and the death of his sister looming over him. Paris has been the exact opposite, with team and individual success, good times with his friends, meeting Gale, getting to actually be with other people. He has loved every single moment.

Despite having to prepare for vault finals, taking place in just a couple of hours, Curt manages to leave the back gym and get to the competition floor for Bucky’s turn on rings. He stands to the side of the rings podium with the coaching staff, calling out things like “You got this!” and “Show them what’s what” and “Just remember, you’re a fuckin’ Greek God! Buck said so!”

Bucky chokes as he takes a drink from his water bottle, looking over at Curt and mouthing what the fuck?

“It’s true! He did!” Curt yells back.

Bucky laughs and shakes his head. Somewhere inside, he knows Curt said that on purpose to get him to relax, but hey, if it works it works. His eyes scan the crowd as he adjusts the ring grips on his hands and rubs chalk over them. He quickly finds the rest of his team, and right beside them are Gale and Benny, who have taken the time to be here this morning before rushing to Versailles to watch equestrian in the afternoon. 

Bucky waves, as has become custom this week. As if he can’t start his routine without waving. Gale smiles at him and waves back. 

“Go John!!!!” Benny yells. He’s quickly joined by the other gymnasts, who get to their feet and jump up and down obnoxiously, yelling his name. Bucky shakes his head and re-focuses on preparing for his last event of the Paris Olympics. He checks his brace one last time.

When the green light finally comes on by the judges’ table and the announcer calls his name, he salutes, and then he jumps up to grab the rings. His coach grabs his legs from behind and lifts him higher while he adjusts his hold, then eases him down so he’s hanging from the rings, arms straight. Bucky’s on his own. 

He rotates himself upwards, keeping his whole body perfectly straight, so his legs swing up over his head and then back down again in a full 360, leading into his first strength hold, a cross. “The iron cross,” they call it, because the gymnast is meant to look immobile, still as a statue, a pillar of strength. Bucky has spent years perfecting it. He spreads his fingers out, letting go of the rings so his hands rest flat on them, just to show off a little. It’ll make the commentators laugh, because even though it’s such a small gesture, it’s so characteristically John – a little bit of a show-off.

He lets himself drop down, feeling that familiar pull straining his shoulder muscles before he pulls his hips upward, folding himself in half with his upper body upside down, legs straight, toes pointed towards the ground. He holds himself like that for just a moment, gathering his strength, before launching himself upwards, flipping his legs up towards the ceiling so he’s upside down again, landing in an inverted cross. His muscles ache as he holds himself up, arms out to the sides as straight as possible.

Don’t wobble, he thinks, trying to keep his legs still and straight, toes pointed towards the ceiling. 2 seconds. Each strength hold must be held for 2 seconds, but sometimes those 2 seconds feel like forever.

Letting himself drop out of the hold with a quick exhale of relief, he throws himself into a couple of swing elements, flipping around first in a tucked position and then in a piked position until he stops stock still in a perfect maltese. His body is perfectly parallel to the floor, his arms extended below him, holding him steady. One. Two. 

From there he sinks down until his body is level with his arms, his arms out to the sides. A maltese cross. One. Two. 

Relax. Drop, hang upside down. Flip up into a handstand. Hold. Drop. Up into another handstand. 

And then the kicker. The skill that, if he can hit, will indisputably secure him another medal in this event. It’s the reason his difficulty score is the highest of anyone here. The reason he qualified first in the world for rings. 

He used to flip himself up into another maltese cross, impressive and highly valued in itself. But before his accident, he’d been working on another skill that he’s wanted to achieve for years. When he came back to gymnastics after months of being told he never would, with his leg giving him grief but his upper body strong as ever, he threw himself into perfecting this skill because, if absolutely nothing else, he still had rings.

First he does another swing element, flipping himself up until he stops, perfectly immobile, in another cross. One. Two.

Then ever so slowly, he tilts himself back, his legs extending out in front of him until he’s parallel to the ground again but facing upward. His arms are extended out to the side, level with the rest of his body. An inverted maltese cross.

His shoulders burn. His core. His back. His everything. But this skill has been attempted by so few, and done well by almost none, that of course John Egan took one look at it and went “I can do that.” 

So he did it. He’s doing it.

He competed the skill in qualifying, but chose to omit it from all around in an attempt to save his upper body. He made the decision to bring it back today, because he can’t resist a little showing off. And, he won’t lie, he wants that damn gold medal. It’s only the third time he’s ever performed this skill in competition – once at Trials, and twice in Paris, and he grits his teeth and forces himself to breathe through it as the two requisite seconds seem to pass in slow motion. One… Two…

But finally, they do pass. Fighting the urge to gasp in relief, he lowers himself out of the strength hold and flips up to one final handstand. A couple flips on the rings to build momentum, and then he’s launching himself up into his dismount, flipping and twisting through the air until his feet hit the ground and he sticks the landing perfectly.

The moment his feet hit the mat, the entire arena is cheering and applauding for what he just accomplished. Even in a foreign country, an unmistakable chant of “USA! USA! USA!” goes up around the stadium for John Egan. He forces a smile, feeling a sense of pride wash over him for a fraction of a second. It’s just too bad that it can’t last, because the moment his feet hit the mat, no matter how perfect of a landing it was, he felt the pain.

Pain shooting up through his left leg, filling him with some instant, vague sense of dread and nausea that he knows he has to push through right now.

He keeps that damn smile on his face. And why not, he just gave the best rings performance of his life. He hit the skill he’s dreamed of hitting for years. He’s in Paris, and a French stadium is blaring with a chant for the United States, for him.

He salutes the judges, because he isn’t officially done with the routine until he does. He pumps a tired fist in the air. It’s uncharacteristic, not like his typical scream of “LET’S GO” as he hypes up the crowd, much like he did after floor. But he just… can’t. He can’t right now.

“Fuck,” he mutters instead. 

He needs…

He needs…

He lowers himself slowly to the ground with a grimace, pulling his left knee up close to his chest as he leans back on his left hand. Then even that is too much, and he lets himself fall onto his back so he’s staring up at the ceiling, staring up at the bright lights that blind him.

“Bucky!” Curt yells from the side. “John?”

The USA chant disintegrates into nothing as the stadium goes silent.

...

...

Please don't be mad.

Much of Bucky's rings routine comes from Asher Hong's in 2023 (right through the first maltese cross)

After the maltese cross, I have Bucky doing an inverted maltese cross (or inverted swallow), which is kinda insane

Side note: I would die for Stephen Nedoroscik ❤️❤️

[zacs-of-rwby]

Day 1: Scars/Healing

Home is Where Your Wounds Heal

Summary: Oz needs some help completing his physical therapy routine, Qrow finally learns the whole story behind Oz's disability.

Categories: Hurt/Comfort, Disabled Character, Disabled Ozpin, Angst, Established Relationship, Oz's Halfway House AU

Author's Note: The Vytal Festival is upon us! I'm so excited for this event to start! Here is my one and only creative contribution to the week; a Cloqwork fic set in my Halfway House AU (I may or may not have already had this idea and was rooting for this prompt to win specifically so I could have an excuse to write this XD). I hope anyone who decides to read this enjoys it! I loved writing it and was super proud of the results!

[strqyr]

harbinger has gears. def something qrow picked up from ozpin, so if he already had harbinger before attending beacon, it would have had to look different.

thinking about younger qrow, hearing stories about the grimm reaper and wanting a weapon similar to hers. maybe he had a sword similar to omen at first ( hence the hidden red blade that is only seen in harbinger's scythe form, cut into parts to account for the curved blade ), but after scavenging enough parts, he starts to build up from it. with lots of trial and error, he finally succeeds in creating something... workable, though the mechanism he has in place still jams more often than not.

just... the thought of harbinger that looks more like scrap put together that still works but isn't quite what he expected it to be, just because qrow wanted a scythe and that's not something you just find laying around, so he did himself with what little he had.

and then he gets to beacon and can upgrade harbinger to his heart content, taking inspiration from around him; harbinger finally becoming how he always imagined it to be.

[billy-cockblock]

Your beacon fic goes SO HARD dude. I gotta ask, will Caz be developing any more mutations as the fic goes on?

WILL THERE BE HINTS OF HIVE MIND STUFF WITH HIS FELLOW INFECTED?????

Your getting me invested bro and it's perfect timing I just started watching Jack's let's play of this gameeee <33

THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! And YES JOIN US

For Caz developing more mutations as the fic goes along, I thought about it, and kinda wanted to, but ultimately decided not to. Kinda spoilers for what I want to write later, but my thoughts were that the shape infected them and caused them to mutate, but if this were a good end thing, then they couldn’t come back to the mainland if they were still infectious. So, once they get infected, it mutated them, but then their immune systems kinda fight off the infection and just leaves them like that. The same happens to Caz, but on a much smaller scale (and with a sprinkling of my theory that he gets Ethan Winters’ed and it somehow slows his infection). He got infected, it mutated him to be able to bioluminesce, and then his body fought off the infection and left him like that.

And I LOVE HIVEMIND STUFF. It might not be on the level of a true hivemind, but I definitely plan to have some “we’re connected on a deeper level than people are supposed to be” stuff. Hehehe

[star-girl-05]

Knight in Shining Armour

Stiles Stilinski x Reader

~★~❤︎~✦~

There were a hundred reasons why Stiles hates Theo Raeken. He’s a douche and on multiple occasions he has tried to kill his friends. Lately though his hatred for the man has grown, all because of you. More specifically the way Theo interacts with you. He’s always overly touchy with you, finding any excuse to touch you. Even going as far as whispering in your ear. The worst part is you let him do it. 

Stiles wants to be the only one allowed to be that close to you. To whisper sweet nothings in your ear. Instead you let Theo, and it takes everything in Stiles not to do something about it, scared you’d get mad at him. Tonight though that all changes…

Tonight is one of the few nights the pack is doing something normal teens do, Partying. Everyone’s just cutting loose, forgetting about all their responsibilities and just living in the moment. Of course just as they were having fun Theo has to show up souring everyone's mood. He only says a few words before disappearing into another room but his presence is enough to put everyone on guard, especially Stiles. 

While the others try to get back into a partying mood, Stiles is focused solely on Theo. Watching closely as he walks over to you, standing much too close for his liking. This time however instead of letting Theo stand close to you you're shoving him away earning a silent cheer from Stiles. However his smile quickly falls when he sees Theo roughly pull you back to him. 

Stiles moves on instinct making his way across the room to you. As he approaches Theo drops your arm rolling his eyes once Stiles is in front of him. 

“Are you okay?” Stiles asks immediately, concern evident in his voice. 

“Yeah I’m fine, Theo was just leaving” you set Theo with a glare making sure he got the message. Not that he ever does no matter how many times you tell him off he just comes back. 

“Oh come on Princess” he moves to reach you again but Stiles intervenes. Theo chuckles as Stiles stands in front of you, “Oh I see, you’re her knight in shining armour. Well when you get sick of this dumbass give me a call”, with a final smirk he walks away. 

You let out a breath of relief, before turning to Stiles. “Thank you, he just never listens” 

“This has happened before?” He looks so concerned, it warms your heart that he cares so much. 

“Yeah he’s always bugging me can never take no as an answer”  

“Well if he tries something again call me” you can’t help but chuckle a little, stepping closer to him. 

“Guess you really are my knight in shining armour”, Stiles blushes at your words, “Every hero deserves an award” he freezes as you lean in, placing a kiss on the corner of his mouth. 

“I- it was no problem” he stutters doing his best to try to seem like he wasn’t totally freaking out. 

“Come one my knight, let’s dance” you grab his hands leading him into the crowd of teens all dancing.

[teecupangel]

Thoughts on Desmond/Aiden Pearce from watch dogs

Well, I happen to like Aiden so I am obligated to say that they would make a good pairing.

Although, Aiden’s path of revenge happened along the time period of Black Flag’s modern day setting (and we’re setting them in the same universe, fuck whatever Ubisoft says) so around 2013.

We can set their meeting as somewhere before 2012 then.

Perhaps during one of his hacking ‘sessions’ with Damien, they got a lot of money and they decided to celebrate in Bad Weathers. That’s where he and Desmond first met and they grew close.

In this one, Desmond and Aiden started dating before 2012 and Desmond became one of the few people Aiden loved.

Now, Aiden and Damien would attempt and fail to hack the Merlaut Hotel on Oct 2012 but… before that…

Desmond disappeared on September 1, 2012.

Maybe Aiden even sees it happening but is unable to save Desmond because Cross jumped on him and knocked him out, only leaving him alive because the order was ‘no bloodshed’.

When Aiden wakes up, the trail had run cold and Aiden spends the entire month trying to find him.

Finally getting a hit… in Italy.

Desmond’s phone was in Italy.

So, before Damien could even pull Aiden to helping him hack Merlaut Hotel…

Aiden had already booked a flight to Italy.

.

On Desmond’s side… having a very techie boyfriend has some upsides.

Like… knowing a trick or two to bypass certain surveillance and security programs embedded in computers and see the good stuffs.

So by the time that he had relived Altaïr’s fourth memory block, Desmond already knew about Project Siren and about Subject 16.

He also knows…

He needs his phone back.

While he can’t fully understand them (hell, the most he understands is that Aiden modified his phone to have apps that lets him hack to other devices connected to the internet or to any other type of connection with really easy UI. Desmond mainly uses it to force the lights to turn red so he can cross), he does know… that phone is the key he needs to get the fuck out of this place.

[ishouldgay]

You ever read a fic and it makes you ship something that you never thought of before so you go to read more fics for it only to discover that there are less than 50 fics of them??

I read a Ashely/Liara fic and now I’m obsessed. I love ME1 but let’s be honest the romances are kinda lacking so adding Ashely’s prejudice against aliens to that made it way more interesting. And honestly it really works as a ship??? I need a 100k fic of them so bad????

[empress-violetlight]

Hyperspace Beacons: The Empire of the Hand’s unique way of navigating the Chaos

Another in my Empire of the Hand world-building series, written for my fanfic series. Please see my document on Nirauan, the capital planet, here, on the Empire of the Hand's capital ships here, and on the Empire of the Hand military's ranks and the Explorer program here.

-----------------------------------------------------------------

How Hyperspace travel seems to work in most of the Galaxy Far Far Away:

It seems that very little thought was actually put into how exactly hyperspace works in Star Wars, but there a few "rules" that seem to pop up (mostly) consistently:

Firstly:  You can't jump to hyperspace while still within the effects of a large gravity well -- i.e. a planet. 

(Note:   Rise of Skywalker can eat a bag of dicks for ignoring this long-established rule first set by Han Friggin' Solo in Ep. 4 for Force's sake!)

Second:  Objects in real space cast "mass shadows" in hyperspace, so you can't go right "through" a star, for example, without killing yourself. 

Third:  When ships unexpectedly encounter a large mass while in hyperspace, they will exit into real space as a precaution.  This is the basis for how interdiction technology works, where an artificial gravity well is generated to give the appearance of a large mass, and ships are either pulled out of hyperspace, or prevented from jumping to begin with.

Fourth:  There are a lot of chaotic, unexpected and unpredictable large objects (i.e. large asteroids, rogue planets, black holes, etc) in most of the Unknown Regions/The Chaos, which makes hyperspace travel through the region a lot more difficult than in the rest of the galaxy.

Fifth:  Hyperspace travel is very fast.  No consistent speed is given, and travel times in stories vary by plot, but it is implied it takes no more than about two weeks to travel all the way across the diameter of the Galaxy.  If we assume the Galaxy Far Far Away (GFFA) is similar in size to the Milky Way, that would mean it has a diameter of about 100 000 lightyears.  That's so fast I can't do math well enough to determine just how fast it is.  Compare that to another well-established sci-fi franchise, where it was predicted the “hero” ship would take about 70 years at maximum warp to travel across the galaxy (they found a few shortcuts, but still). 

My idea, based on the rules established above (in both Legends and Disney Canon) is that when a ship "jumps to 'lightspeed' ", what they are actually doing is jumping into a dimension where the speed of light is not the absolute speed limit it is in our universe (or in SW's "real space", presumably).  The time spent in hyperspace is actually the time it takes the nav computer /astromech droid /Navigator /skywalker/etc. to plot the course based on how fast they can determine where mass shadows lie along the wanted path.

Therefore, it's not the Millennium Falcon's engines that are fast, for example, it's the ship's nav computer.

Ships "pop out" of hyperspace when the nav computer/whatever determines where the "exit" is.  With well-established hyperspace routes, this is why a planet can be “blockaded” by just blocking off a small area in the orbit of the planet, as seen with Queen Amadala’s escape from Naboo in Episode One, when logically, a ship should be able to jump from any point in space as long as they were far enough away from the gravity well.  It’s not the planet itself that is being blockaded – it’s the long-established hyperspace jump point. Heading for a different point is like making a beeline for a highway instead of using the exit ramp – technically doable, but likely to wreck your vehicle if you try. 

Say, for example, you were plotting a course between Tattooine (Outer Rim) and Alderaan (Core) .  There are X number of stars and planets between your "entrance" and "exit".  The nav computer's job is to plot the most efficient course around those large masses that occur between the two points, and the hyperspace engines do little more than open the entry and exit points into real space at either end.  It accesses its most up-to-date astrometrics information available (likely through the holonet, and knowledge of well-maintained hyperspace routes) and plots its course accordingly.  The time spent "in" hyperspace is the time it takes the computer to finish its calculations.  For well-established routes, the computer doesn’t even try to plot a new course – it just reads the “road map” and follows that. 

This is also why the non-inhabited planets of any given solar system in the GFFA tend to be ignored.  Unless there’s something in the outer solar system of interest (i.e. a metal-rich asteroid belt), nobody’s going to be visiting Saturn when they can jump right to Earth.  Hyperspace routes to outer planets are simply not established at all, and when plotting new routes takes so much comparable “work” (comparable to blazing a new trail instead of taking already-established highway), most people and computer systems simply don’t bother.

This system, as imperfect and even counter-intuitive as it seems, does seem to be so much the norm in the majority of the GFFA that even people who perhaps should understand the value of blazing new trails (i.e. the Rebellion, smugglers) almost never even think to do so, never mind bother.   

In the Unknown Regions, however, there are so many objects going every which way that real-time astrometrics information is required, and nobody has apparently figured out a way to do this except for using the Force.

The Empire of the Hand's Hyperspace Beacons:

However, a clever use of communications technology could end the dependency of a relatively tiny portion of most species' populations.

Using an Imperial probe droid as a basis, the Empire of the Hand has developed a "hyperspace beacon".

A Viper probe droid, as seen in The Empire Strikes Back, the basis for the Empire of the Hand's hyperspace beacons.

Dropped in small clusters, in regular intervals in real-space, the beacons continuously scan real space around their locations, and communicate astrometrics to any ships that can pick up their signals, who are part of the beacons’ network. The network is only usable by ships with nav computers or specially programmed astromech droids that can pick up the signal.  To everyone else, the data looks like regular space background radiation (R2-D2 or other similarly “independently-minded” astromechs might be able to pick up on it themselves, but such droids are a rarity).  All ships on the network can use it to communicate with each other as well as the beacons, and the network can act as a safety tether to track ships’ locations and to call for help in the event of emergencies. 

A line of beacons could act like a "trail of breadcrumbs" or “railroad tracks”, and allow ships to safely and efficiently navigate through the Unknown Regions/The Chaos without reliance on a Force User, since all the beacons working together transmit real-time data.  The beacons are dropped in clusters so that if one becomes damaged, the others in its group can cover for it until repairs are completed.  If all the beacons in any given cluster are disabled, a star destroyer is dispatched to the nearest other beacon cluster on the “trail”, then uses jump-by-jump navigation to get to the beacons’ last known location to investigate. 

One of the primary purposes of the Empire of the Hand’s Explorer program is to drop these beacon clusters as they go, using their own powerful sensors to plot "microjumps" through hyperspace (journeys of less than a light year) and creating trails of beacons as they, well, Explore.

To a lesser extent, Navy vessels also drop beacons, though they usually follow the paths the Explorers establish for them.

Also, because Explorers create these beacon trails, when they get in trouble, they can signal the nearest Star Destroyer for help, and by "following the breadcrumbs", the Star Destroyer can arrive at their location much faster than they would be able to otherwise.

Similarly, established “beacon tracks”, like that down “Thrawn’s Cut” between Watchtower Station, just outside the border with the Chiss Ascendency, and Nirauan, can make travel between these points far faster and more efficient than traditional hyperspace routes, since the nav computers need to spend far less time checking their routes, instead following the paths the beacons tell them to.  Such “tracks” connect all the major systems in the Empire of the Hand. 

Hyperspace Beacons’ Strategic Benefits:

Hyperspace beacons can also be used in the “known” regions of the Galaxy to give the Empire of the Hand a navigational (and thus strategic) advantage, letting them carve their own paths around and through known systems of interest, regardless of established hyperspace routes.  Probe droids can be delivered by jump-by-jump scouts (often Explorer ships) to the outskirts of a solar system, which, as established earlier, are usually ignored.  The droids are small and independent enough to travel well into a system on their own, then go into low power mode (which subsequently makes them extremely difficult to detect), to wait to activate their beacon signal, which Hand ships can use to jump into (and out of) a solar system well away from established hyperspace entry/exit points.  

As was utilized in the Honoghr mission, where a probe droid was used to find the asteroid in the outer solar system, which would be sent on a collision course to the planet of the race that murdered Grand Admiral Thrawn

"Nightfall of the Final Day"

This technique, the “Faro Ambush”, was first developed by Admiral Karyn Faro for use against enemies of the Hand and later saw extensive use in the Far Outsider War. It is very similar to the “Thrawn Pincer” technique, which uses interdiction ships, only it does not block off entry/exit to and from hyperspace.  It is thus not used to trap enemy forces, but to just get the jump on them.  It is not a technique that can be used on the fly – it requires planning.  However it can be used to devastating effect against hit and run targets, allowing attacking ships and fighters to come in from a course not expected by the enemy.

Systems of interest within New Republic, Imperial Remnant and Chiss Ascendency space have had their solar systems “seeded” with probe droids on stand-by, so that the Hand Navy can jump in and help if needed. 

Cultural Ramification of Hyperspace Beacons:

Unlike in “Lesser Space”, where star systems form economies and coalitions spanning  tens of thousands of cubic lightyears, often advertised as “Galactic” in scope, the space-farring cultures of the Unknown Regions, or as its inhabitants aptly put it, “The Chaos” are usually a lot smaller in scope of area and influence.  This is because in order to navigate the ever-changing hyperspace hazards safely, they are forced to rely on Force-capable navigators.  Most cultures use the Pathfinders or similar navigational guilds, comprised of Force-Sensitive adults who choose to hire out their ability to navigate.  Most only use their ability to communicate with the Force (Great Presence, Third Sight, etc.) strictly as navigators, with no training or interest in the further abilities demonstrated by the Jedi, Sith, and other Force-using groups of Lesser Space.  However, there are notable downsides to the use of essentially mercenary navigators:

Rarity.  Force users comprise of a tiny minority of any given population.  Navigators are correspondingly rare, and thus can be quite expensive to hire, and may not be available on short notice. 

Security.  Despite most navigator guilds’ guarantees of client confidentiality, many cultures do NOT wish to use hired navigators for military or otherwise sensitive missions, preferring to use their own loyal people, who, because of the rarity of Force users, may not be available.

For the Chiss Ascendency especially, where the ability to sense hazards through “Third Sight” is limited to only a tiny number of pre-pubescent female children, (known as “sky-walkers”) this is a severe strategic weakness, and that is before addressing the ethical problems with the sky-walker program.  The girls are taken from their families, with their memories erased, and used as child labour aboard Chiss Expansionary Defense Fleet ships, usually only being allowed to interact with their assigned caretakers, who are often far from nurturing.  The Chiss are well aware of how terrible the program is, which is why it was kept secret from the general public, with only CEDF bridge officers, high-ranking members of the Syndicure, and the perpetrators of the program even aware of its existence (officially speaking, at least).  There has only been one known instance of a sky-walker keeping her abilities past early mid-age, which suggests the children are overworked to the point of burn-out. 

Despite “improvements” said to be made to the system in recent years, the children are still often abused, isolated, and not given the time for a proper education nor for social development.  It is still essentially child slave labour, completely against the “light of civilisation in the Chaos” that the Chiss Ascendency portrays itself as.    

As stated earlier, a huge advantage of the Hyperspace Beacon Network, especially in the Unknown Regions/the Chaos, is that it allows navigation through that chaotic third of the Galaxy without relying on Force Users, or any kind.  The Empire of the Hand’s ships, from Explorers to Navel vessels, down to civilian transports, do NOT have to hire expensive, liable navigators nor rely on literal child slaves. 

During a diplomatic visit to the Chiss Ascendency, the Empire of the Hand’s chief diplomat and Heir to the Empire, Princess Mitth’andor’randeth – Andorra – offered to outright give the Chiss Ascendency hyperspace beacon technology, saying, in a public forum, that by setting up their own beacon network (which does not even need to be connected to the Empire of the Hand’s), they could finally eliminate the need for the sky-walker program.  Princess Andorra claims had been unaware that the program was secret when she exposed it to the Ascendency publicly. 

Princess Andorra, the Heir to the Empire of the Hand, daughter of Grand Admiral Thrawn and Empress Xelarra

The Ascendency declined at the time, but due to the political ramifications of Princess Andorra’s revelation, the Empire of the Hand is confident that they will eventually change their position. 

In the meantime, the Empire of the Hand offers refugee status to any sky-walker, would-be sky-walker and their families or caretakers who manage to seek refuge with Empire of the Hand forces.  Once on Nirauan or another long-standing Hand world, they are granted the same educational opportunities as any other child, and are given a special gift from the Empress herself, a comforting and low-maintenance pet ysalamir.

[gothsuguru]

starting my curator!geto fic officially now! <3