#font: buzzfeed unsolved

[rebelsafoot]

direct dialogue from silence in the library

[art-by-micket]

mac, about to pull the funniest prank of his life:

[shurisneakers]

unsolved (x)

Summary: Bucky doesn't even believe in the paranormal. So who the hell thought it was a good idea to stick him in a series about everything haunted for the internet's amusement? With his loose-canon of a teammate who has no concept of subtlety or shits left to give, to make things even worse. (Buzzfeed unsolved AU)

Warnings: swearing, frustrated bucky, obnoxious reader, conventions, mediums,

A/N: this chapter is 9k words long. next one? who knows.

Previous part || Series masterlist

The stupid cat is plotting something. 

There’s no outwardly indication but the vibes are there. She’s evil. Plotting comes with the gig.

Bucky knows this, accepts this, but refuses to bow to tyranny.

She stands in his doorway. Unmoving. Unblinking. Blocking his exit like she pays rent.

She takes a slow, calculated step forward. A warning.

He blocks the doorway. A counter-threat.

She glares at him. He’s fairly certain he’s going to be late to meet you, because Bucky, never one to pick his battles wisely, glares back.

It’s a western standoff.

There is no reason she should be sauntering into his room the second he has to leave. None. Therefore, it would be wise to assume she has untoward ambitions. 

“What are your intentions?” he asks.

Alpine narrows her eyes.

His phone buzzes. Another missed call. 

Fifteen minutes late.

Bucky does not have time for this.

She knows he does not have time for this.

She takes a daring step forward. He steps back, blocking the doorway.

"Do not rip my pillows again," he warns. "I made you a scratch post. Use that. Or I will drop you fifteen miles away from the house."

She blinks at him, slow and deliberate. He swears she scoffs, but at this point he’s not convinced whether it’s the confirmation bias of you telling him she can speak because she was hexed, or that he was losing his mind. 

His fingers twitch at his sides.

The second he takes a step over her, she immediately brushes past him, slipping into his room like she was just waiting for an opening.

Bucky turns around just in time to see her jump onto his bed. Like she owns the place. 

Like she won.

The door slams behind him, cutting off his irritated growl.

The hotel is overrun.

The lobby? Packed. The hallways? Worse. 

Every inch of this place is crawling with ghost enthusiasts, cryptid fanatics, and people who are way too comfortable walking around in full Victorian mourning attire.

A few months ago, Bucky would say that he hates it here. Now he’s grown a sort of indifference to it all. Begrudging acceptance, even. 

But it doesn’t help that he and you are stuck there for two days, thanks to Maya “Budget Cuts” Reyes, who apparently decided that ParaCon didn’t warrant separate accommodations. 

Bucky’s grateful that at least you had different rooms, because can’t imagine how you were going to be after hanging around a convention full of people who were furthering your agenda. 

He wonders if you know there are two rooms booked, considering that you’ve plowed your way into his instead of going to yours, which was literally across the hall from him. 

“This is so exciting,” you say, flopping dramatically onto his bed.

He supposes this is where Alpine gets it from. 

Bucky, standing in the doorway, stares at the strange hotel decor and the suspicious stain on the carpet.

“This is hell,” he corrects. “And you’re in my room.” 

You wave a dismissive hand. “You’ve survived worse.”

He drops his bag onto the nearest chair, then holds up the massive brochure he had thrust into his hand in the lobby the second he entered. 

PARANORMALCON 2024: EXHIBITS, PANELS, AND SPECIAL GUESTS!

“Give me a rundown,” he says, flipping through the pages, scanning the many pictures and standard haunted font. 

You stretch out on his bed but he’s already gotten over it, phone out as you scroll through the con schedule. “Alright, so there’s three main areas. The exhibit hall where we’ve got cursed artifacts and overpriced ghost-hunting gear. The panel rooms where people talk about their haunted houses, near-death experiences, or whatever. And the main stage, which is where they do the big interviews, and stuff.”

“Okay,” he says slowly, processing the information. “And is there any particular reason they decided to hold it in the dead of the night instead of the day like normal fucking people?”

“Witching hours, Barnes,” you tsk. “It’s a paranormal convention. You gotta commit to the bit.”

Decidedly terrible. 

“We’re also live streaming for both days, so we gotta hit all the big stuff. Maya said if we don’t get enough footage, she’s making us do another investigation next week, and I am not getting locked in another basement with you.”

Bucky’s lip curls up inadvertently at the four hours you spent blindly stumbling around together after your flashlight ran out of juice. “You think I wanted that?”

“I think you pray every night to get locked in basements with me.” You sit up and grin. “Also, you’re fine with suffering in silence. I, however, am not. We’re making content.”

Bucky does not suffer in silence. His favourite thing to do in the world is whine and bitch. 

“Do I have to be on camera?” 

You squint at him. “One of us has to hold it because I don’t want to freak out a bunch of trigger happy ghost hunters with a floating recording rig, so I guess-”

“I got it,” he interrupts. “I’ll hold it. Love holding cameras. Love it.” 

You raise an eyebrow, but there’s a smile on your face. “I have a feeling you’re gonna have a great two days.”

Bucky doesn’t feel the same, but he doesn’t not feel the same. 

He’s right. Well, half right.  

Bucky knew this was going to be bad.

He did not, however, realize just how bad it could be, considering he’d always skipped out on large conventions and gatherings. Those were more Clint and Sam’s speed.

If he thought the hotel was packed, the convention center is even worse. Crowded hallways, groups of people huddled together, debating ghost sightings and cryptid encounters. There are panels happening in three different rooms, vendor booths stretching as far as the eye can see, and a worrying amount of sage in the air. 

Some guy in a trench coat brushes past, carrying a full-sized Ouija board under his arm like a briefcase.

Bucky holds steadily onto the camera gimbal.

“Welcome to Day One of ParanormalCon!” The announcer’s voice booms over the loudspeakers, followed by a loud screech from the microphone feedback. 

Bucky visibly recoils.

The guy continues regardless, “We have amongst us today enthusiasts of the supernatural, the supernatural themselves. Be sure to check out all the exhibits, the panels, the mystery, and of course, our special guest speakers!”

A wave of polite applause across the convention from whoever was still listening. He’s sure the guy made the announcement hourly. 

Bucky checks to make sure he had fully charged the camera, and checks his pockets for extra SD cards and batteries. 

“Don’t miss our exclusive panel with the author of best-selling ghost erotic novella Ghost Lusters--”

He exhales sharply through his nose, especially considering a copy of the book lay on unread on his nightstand. A very unwanted gift from you, signed and with a note addressed to him on the front page so everyone knew it was his.

“--and, of course, tomorrow’s highly anticipated panel with the stars of The Graveyard Shift, the latest paranormal sensation!”

There’s another round of applause.

Then there’s Bucky.

“What?”

It’s loud. It’s too loud. Several people turn to look.

You make a noise in the back of your throat and step slightly to the left, creating some distance like you don’t know him, still peering into your phone. 

“What do you mean ‘special guests The Graveyard Shift?’” he demands. 

“Hmm, yeah we’re scheduled for a panel discussion,” you correct, not looking up at him.

Bucky turns fully toward you now. “What the hell does that mean?”

You squint at the screen, scrolling through messages. “Apparently that’s why Maya sent us here.”

His stomach drops.

“And when,” he says, voice carefully level, dangerously calm, “was anyone gonna tell me that?”

“Mmm.” You tilt your head. “They weren’t. To me either, apparently, because he didn’t trust me to not tell you. Because then you’d make a run for it.”

Bucky stares.

“Yeah,” you add, scrolling further. “They literally said, ‘Don’t tell Bucky, or he’ll make a run for it.’”

Bucky hisses like a feral cat. “I am not going on that stage.”

Your face pulls into exaggerated shock. “You’re really gonna send me up there alone? In front of a bunch of people who clearly know more than us?”

“Without a doubt.” 

“Wow.” You shake your head, letting the disappointment sink in for all of two seconds before your face resets like nothing happened. “Yeah, no, I figured. I already texted Maya and told her I’d do it by myself.”

Bucky blinks.

“Oh,” he says.

“She wasn’t happy about it.”

“Rarely is, when it comes to me,” he mutters.

“I’m heading down that path too, it seems.” You pocket your phone. “Anyway. Vlog time. This camera should last us the whole day, but you got your phone in case?”

“It’s on 20%.”

“That’s fine, no one’s calling you anyway.” You clap him on the back.

Bucky exhales slowly.

It was going to be a long 2 days. 

The con floor is something out of his nightmares.

People are everywhere, packed shoulder to shoulder, moving in clusters, stopping without warning in the middle of walkways like NPCs with broken pathfinding. Someone in a full Slenderman suit glides past, which is just fantastic.

Bucky follows behind you, camera held up, watching you navigate the space like you were born for this. You’ve got a big smile on your face as you point out artefacts and people with an explanation for each. He may not be the most comfortable but hearing you prattle on about lycanthropy makes it oddly better. 

You move through the crowd easily, glancing between the camera feed and the con map on your phone, while he keeps an eye on the strangest people in the room. Which is most of them.

He doesn’t even mind them. He’s not made one comment so far, which is a personal record.

It’s just that most of them stare at him the second he walks past like he’s got a neon sign hanging above his head pointing out that something is strange about him and his presence. Which could be because he was generally off-putting and weird, but the way they were staring at him makes him believe it was something else entirely. 

"You know, this is kinda fun," you say, stepping around a guy holding up a ‘Bigfoot is My Dad’ sign.

Bucky does not respond.

You laugh, undeterred. “Already got you to one, it’s only a matter of time.”

He hates that you’re right. 

A speaker crackles overhead, making both of you glance up as another announcement rings through the venue.

“Attention attendees! The séance demonstration will begin shortly in Hall C. Please remember- do not antagonize the spirits.”

Bucky stares at the speaker. . “What the hell does that mean?”

You grin. “How does it feel, knowing you could absolutely get possessed in the next twenty-four hours?”

“I’m not joking,” he warns. “If anyone even touches me with an incense stick, I’m leaving.” 

“Good, keep that energy. Makes for a great thumbnail.”

In a split second, you snap a picture. He blinks. 

“I’m keeping this one. You look especially handsome when you’re mad,” you note, observing the picture. “No wonder everyone’s all over you in our comments. I got competition.”

He watches you very calmly stuff your phone back into your pocket and start walking ahead like nothing happened.

For the first time that day, Bucky already knows this is going to piss him off. 

He just doesn’t know how much yet.

“What are we walking toward?” 

“There’s a guy that says he can astral project himself.”

“What?”

“His consciousness leaves his physical body and travels to the astral plane, but in his case, we can actually see his conscience separate from his body.”

“So there’s gonna be two of him?”

“Well, apparently this is just his astrally projected self.”

His eye twitches. “What the hell does that mean?”

“I don’t think his physical body is here,” you say, scanning the crowd ahead.

"His physical body isn't here," he repeats, deadpan.

“Yep.”

“Then how the fuck is he here?”

You grin, already relishing how much this is going to ruin his day.

The crowd is way too excited about this.

You and Bucky push toward the front of the roped-off area, where a dramatic announcer in a cape stands next to a spotlight-covered chair.

Bucky doesn’t like any of this.

“Welcome,” the announcer calls, hands clasped together, “to the extraordinary phenomenon of astral projection!”

People oooh and ahhh. 

“Before we reveal one of nature’s most unexplainable wonders,” the announcer continues, “we ask that you refrain from crossing the barrier. Touching the astral projection is strictly prohibited.”

The spotlight clicks on.

“Behold.” She sweeps an arm toward the display. “Mr. Astro himself.”

A man sits in a chair. Motionless.

Eyes closed. Hands on his thighs. Pale, glowing blue. His skin shimmers faintly under the stage lights, like a goddamn glowstick. He is shirtless but wearing pants, rocking a thick mustache, looking very, very peaceful.

The audience gasps.

Bucky looks around, watching them stare in awe.

He leans closer to you. “What are they all looking at?”

“That,” you whisper.

“What?”

“That he’s astrally projecting.”

Bucky squints. Hard. “Where?”

“Right there,” you say, motioning toward the man. “Can’t you see it?”

Bucky turns, eyes narrowing at the guy. “It’s just a guy sitting in a chair.”

“Exactly.”

Bucky blinks, processing. “What?”

“You see him,” you say, nodding like this is the most profound thing in the world. “Which means you can see his astral projection.”

Bucky’s brain actually stalls.

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “I see him because he’s right there.”

The guy next to you shushes Bucky loudly.

“This is the dumbest shit I’ve ever seen,” he whispers aggressively.

“Behold,” the announcer repeats. “His physical body is at home, resting.”

Bucky fucking hates it here.

"Just touch him," he says, voice low and dangerous.

"Sir," an attendant immediately warns, stepping closer, "you are not allowed to touch the astral projection."

Bucky’s head snaps toward him.

"The what?”

“The astral projection,” the attendant repeats. “It is strictly prohibited to make physical contact.”

Bucky looks at the guy. Then at the attendant. Then back at the guy in the chair.

“Just touch him,” Bucky repeats, growing increasingly frustrated. “He’s right there.”

“Sir, you need to move along--”

"Fucking Christ.” Bucky runs a hand down his face, physically forcing himself to walk away before he loses whatever is left of his patience.

As he moves past, the guy cracks one eye open, looking directly at him.

Bucky glares.

The guy closes his eye again.

Bucky exhales violently, one second away from walking into the woods and never returning.

“Good job, Buck,” you say, clapping him on the back. “You totally ruined his astral projection with your bitching.”

“He was sitting there in blue paint like a fucking Avatar, that’s not astral projecti--”

Bucky is still muttering under his breath about Mr. Astro and his bullshit astro body glitter when you drag him toward the vendor booths.

There are stalls selling everything. There’s even a guy doing aura readings in the corner, staring at people way too intensely.

He’s barely recovered from the last stunt when you veer off-course, pausing in front of a booth displaying protection sigils and tattoo designs.

“Oh,” you say, voice casual, flipping through a binder. “Would you ever get a tattoo?”

“No.”

“You answered that real fast.”

“Because it’s a hard no.”

You hum, still flipping through the pages. “What if I designed it?”

“Even more of a no.”

“How rude.”

“Why did you think that would work?” 

“Because,” you say smoothly, “people in love often get tattoos together.”

“Commonly a garbage decision,” he asserts. 

“Speak for yourself.” You scoff. “I’d get this one right now if you agreed.”

He rolls his eyes at the random design you hold up. 

Bucky raises an eyebrow. “You’d actually get a tattoo with me?”

Your eyes barely flick up. “Why is that your question? Why didn’t you question the ‘in love’ part?”

“I’ve developed this thing where I automatically filter out most of the shit you say.”

“Oh, have you? That’s romantic, you know.”

“Give it a rest,” he says, picking up a tattoo design and pretending to be interested in it just to avoid looking at you. “Besides, everyone knows you’re in love with me. No point acknowledging it.”

Your entire face lights up.

“Bzzt, wrong,” you say loudly. “Everyone doesn’t know. Only most people.”

“You better get right on that.”

“I’m trying to get on that but you’re not letting me,” you say, wiggling your eyebrows.

Bucky looks to the heavens for patience.

“What tattoo do you want to get together?” you push, grinning.

“I don’t.”

“Stick to one answer, you flip-flopping son of a bitch.”

“Fine.” He pauses, then settles on a firm, “No.”

“You hurt me so much every day.” You clutch your chest dramatically. “All I do is be nice to you--”

“You’ve almost broken my window several times.”

“From feral longing. All I do is show you kindness--”

“You tie-dyed my shirt.”

“You have seventy-five black shirts, pick another one and cry about it.”

“Wow,” Bucky deadpans. “Kindness.”

“Just say you don’t want me and put me out of my misery.”

His eyes narrow, instinctively snapping back, “Never said that.”

You stare at him, waiting.

Bucky just stares back, expression unreadable the second it leaves his mouth. 

“Oh my god.” Your mouth drops open when he doesn’t add anything else. “Are you saying I have a chance?”

Bucky turns on his heel and walks away.

“Excuse me?” you yell after him, immediately discarding what you were holding. “Come back here and explain yourself. I love you.”

Bucky walks fast.

You walk faster.

“You know, there’s a playground behind the hotel. Be a big boy and play with the sand instead of my feelings.”

Bucky does not respond. He picks up his pace, determined to lose you in the crowd, but it’s no use.

You’re tenacious. Like a bloodhound. A very annoying, very persistent bloodhound.

“Come here, loverboy,” you yell, finally catching up. “I demand clarity.”

“No.”

“I think you love me.”

Bucky exhales so hard it should’ve put out a small fire.

Before you can continue your line of attack, a voice interrupts.

“Oh, what a tormented aura,” someone says.

Both of you turn toward the source.

A woman sits behind a booth stacked high with charms, protective amulets, and little glass vials of salt. She wears dark clothes, and so much jewelry.

She locks eyes directly with him.

“You,” she says, leaning forward. “You are not alone.”

“Excuse me?”

Her expression darkens. “Something follows you. Always in step.”

“Yeah, can’t you see this pest?” he asks, jutting a thumb towards you.

“You just said you’re in love with me.”

“I did not,” he bites. 

��No. Something not in this realm,” she says, voice low. 

You slowly turn to Bucky. “Oh, this is fun.”

He glares at you. “Shut up.”

The vendor ignores this. She tilts her head, scanning him with an intensity that is deeply uncomfortable.

“They have strong emotions,” she murmurs. “It is almost like torment.”

Bucky’s entire face locks up. “What?”

“You are not the only one carrying your burdens,” she continues. “You have a presence that lingers with you.”

“Holy shit.” You turn to him immediately. “You’re being haunted?”

“I am not.”

“Oh my god,” you whisper, eyes wide with delight. “This is the best day of my life.”

“I am not being haunted,” Bucky repeats, teeth clenched.

The vendor nods gravely. “He is.”

Bucky gives her a look.

She does not falter.

You clap your hands together. “I cannot believe you were gonna hide this from me.”

Bucky looks like he wants to walk into traffic.

“Oh, what’s the ghost like?” you ask, practically vibrating. “Is it vengeful? Does it like to follow you around? Does it ever like, I don’t know, whisper ominously in your ear at night?”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Do you ever see it?”

Bucky rubs his temples. “I am not talking about this.”

“Oh, you’re absolutely talking about this. I think I deserve to know if my boyfriend is being haunted.”

“Not your boyfriend.”

“You literally just said you wanted me, you-”

“This will protect you,” she says, reaching nto a box and pulls out a small charm. “Twenty dollars.”

Bucky stares at her.

Then at the charm.

Then back at her.

“You should buy it,” you say immediately.

Bucky glares. “I should punch you in the throat.”

“You should absolutely buy it.”

He does not. He turns on his heel and walks away, towards Mr Astro and his not-physically-here body, because he prefers that over feeling very attacked from every direction.

The guy is still sitting in his chair.

Some of the blue near his hairline is smudged off, beads of sweat glistening under the bright stage lights.

He looks mildly uncomfortable.

Bucky, standing a few feet away, free arm crossed over his chest, deeply suspicious, narrows his eyes at him.

The guy cracks one eye open.

Bucky asks wearily, “Do you even want to be here, man?”

The guy shuts his eye again.

_______

Bucky is starting to get tired of people trying to sell him things for his strange aura. 

It’s also nearly midnight, and you’ve been here hours already. He thinks he has seen everything the con has to offer and more. Perhaps he could even skip the next day. 

Which is exactly why you drag him further into the con chaos.

"C’mon, Buck, you’re missing out,” you say, weaving through the crowd like this is your natural habitat.

“I am not missing out,” he mutters. “I’m actively avoiding. There’s a difference.”

You ignore him, because of course you do.

Bucky trudges behind you as he always does.

To the left, there’s a booth with ‘Genuine Werewolf Hair’ in tiny glass jars. Suspicious.

To the right, some dude is holding a full exorcism consultation like it’s a casual business transaction. Deeply concerning.

Ahead, a vendor is selling extremely cursed-looking mirrors, each one labeled with ominous tags like “Do Not Look Into This At Night” and “Object May Contain Attached Entity.”

A guy in a Mothman costume poses for pictures near an exhibit about unsolved disappearances.

And then, of course, there’s the die-hard conspiracy theorists.

Bucky should’ve expected them.

"Oh shit, Bucky, look." You point toward a makeshift stage area, where a man in a wrinkled suit is gesturing dramatically at a whiteboard with a detailed diagram of the moon.

"The moon landing was faked,” he declares, voice booming through a barely functional microphone. “And NASA has been covering it up for decades.”

Bucky’s face twitches.

You immediately pull out your phone. “We’re watching this.”

“No, we’re not.”

“Yes, we are.”

You both end up standing there for ten full minutes.

It is a mistake.

By minute two, the guy is ranting about shadows and camera angles. By minute five, he’s talking about secret government bases on the dark side of the moon.

By minute eight, he’s making direct eye contact with Bucky.

"You there, sir!" he calls, pointing. “You look like a man who’s seen the truth!”

Bucky stiffens.

“Would you like to share your opinion on NASA’s involvement in the biggest lie in American history?”

Bucky slowly opens his mouth.

Closes it.

Reopens it.

Then at last--

Bucky turns and walks away.

The guy blinks.

You burst into laughter. “Stop, you’re ruining your chance at being on Fox News.”

"You’re the worst person I’ve ever met,” Bucky mutters, rubbing a hand over his face.

“No, I’m your best friend,” you correct. “And that’s so much worse for you.”

After two hours of wandering the convention floor, being forced to look at ghost-hunting equipment, and listening to the guy in the Mothman suit explain his spiritual connection to the cryptid, Bucky grows sort of interested. Which is worse than actually being done. 

You're thriving.

"Alright," you say, scrolling through the event schedule. "We’ve still got some time before we have to stream at the main stage, so where do you wanna go next?”

Bucky looks at you like you’ve lost your mind. “You think I wanna go anywhere?”

"You haven’t left yet, have you?” you challenge, still looking at your phone. “Alright, well, there’s a panel on spirit photography, a paranormal VR experience-”

“Absolutely not.”

“--or we could go to the past-life regression hypnosis booth.”

Bucky pauses. “What?” 

You grin, flashing him your phone screen. "Says here they’re doing a free group session.”

"Not a chance in hell."

"Oh, come on," you say. "It could be fun. What if we find out you were, like, a 16th-century poet or some shit?"

Bucky stares at you.

"I’ve died before. If I go, it’ll tell me I was me,” he deadpans. 

You scoff. “Okay, but what if it says you were like, a farmer before that?”

"No."

"You are so boring," you groan.

“You just tried to drag me into a fake hypnosis session.”

"The poster says it’s legit scientific!”

“Oh, then by all means, they must be right.”

"You literally came back from the dead and you’re still doubting past lives? You just don't wanna go because you're scared it's gonna say you were a moth or some shit."

Bucky opens his eyes, deadpan, ready to retaliate when a voice interrupts.

“Wait, so you guys really are just like that in real life?”

Both of you turn.

A group of con-goers stands nearby, staring with mild fascination.

You blink. “Us?”

“Oh my,” one of them breathes. “You both are so much worse in real life. We only get the edited version.”

And just like that, it happens.

The first person notices you. Then another. Then another.

It starts as a trickle, just a few curious looks, but then the recognition spreads.

The group grows. People start turning, whispering.

And then, like a goddamn avalanche you’re swarmed.

“Holy shit, are you guys filming right now?”

“Do you guys actually believe in ghosts or is it just for the show?”

“Are you guys dating?”

“Who wins in fights more?”

Bucky clenches his jaw.

You, on the other hand, light up like a fucking Christmas tree.

And then you do the absolute worst thing you could do in this situation.

You start feeding into it.

“Oh, boy do I have answers for you,” you say, grinning. “You wanna know who wins in fights? Me, obviously.”

“That is a fucking lie,” Bucky responds immediately. 

“He’s haunted, by the way,” you tell them.

Bucky’s head snaps toward you. "I am not."

And then your phone buzzes.

And then it keeps buzzing, frequency only increasing until you’re concerned that someone has actually died.

It goes absolutely wild. 

You finally whip it out, holding a hand up to the crowd for a quick pause, turning away for a second to check what the fuck was going on.  

Bucky barely registers it at first, still caught up in his escalating war with the growing crowd who wanted to know whether he actually saw a cryptid or was it just a prank.

But then you freeze. Your entire expression shifts.

Bucky’s brain takes a second to catch up. He sees the way your shoulders stiffen, how your posture goes rigid as you look at your screen.

And then he sees it.

The onslaught of notifications you ignore as your phone screen floods.

Bucky only catches a glimpse of it, but it’s enough.

There’s a headline, all caps, stretched across your phone screen. 

His eyes snap to yours, but you’ve turned on your heel, shoving your way through the crowd.

Bucky reacts immediately. “Wait-”

You don’t answer. You’re already moving fast.

Bucky moves to follow, but the crowd’s already lost one part of the crew, and they certainly were not going to lose the second.  

More people push in, asking questions, talking over each other, swarming.

Bucky grits his teeth.

You disappear into the crowd.

Bucky stares after you, and then at the livestream camera, still rolling.

How the fuck does he turn this shit off. 

It takes ten full minutes for Bucky to dig himself out of this mess.

By the time he manages to break away, there’s already a thread of frustration curling tight in his chest.

The livestream is still running.

Bucky stares at the interface, clicking through random buttons, trying to find the off switch.

The camera flips.

Shit.

Now it's just his face, tired and unimpressed, staring directly into the lens.

He exhales slowly. “Fucking-- whatever.”

He clicks something.

The screen goes black.

After Maya’s third ignored call and just letting his phone die so it would stop buzzing, and after shoving his way past the last group of people still trying to ask him questions, he heads straight for the hotel floor.

First he checks his room, but no dice. So he turns his attention to the room across the hall. 

His knuckles rap against the door, firm and quick.

No answer.

He knocks again, harder this time, ears straining to hear any signs of life. 

Then finally, he hears footsteps. The faint shuffle of movement before the door unlocks and swings open.

You stand there, leaning against the frame, already out of the clothes you wore to the con. 

Expression calm. A little tired. But you look fine.

Bucky doesn’t say anything right away. Just scans your face, looking for something, anything.

“You okay?” he asks finally.

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

He doesn't know how he knows, and quite frankly, why it’s a bone-feeling when a few months ago, he didn’t even know who you are- but he can tell the answer is too easy. It’s too quick.

Bucky doesn’t quite believe you. But he doesn’t push.

“Alright.”

You shrug, stepping back inside. “Maya’s freaking out.”

Bucky exhales through his nose. “Yeah.”

A beat of silence.

You shuffle, throwing yourself onto the bed. “Shit happens,” you mutter. “It’s whatever. I’ll deal with it tomorrow.”

There’s a part of him that wants to call bullshit.

Wants to ask questions, press for details, push until you actually say what’s on your mind.

But he doesn’t.

So instead-  

“Alright,” he says again, turning to leave. “Get some sleep.”

“Yeah,” you mumble, already pulling the blankets over you. “You too.”

He hesitates at the door, but you’ve turned away from him.  

So he just leaves. 

Bucky doesn’t sleep.

He remembers the trials by court and media, remembers how anything he did made headlines for month. It was easier to slink back and stay away from people than to feel like he had to justify every move he made in public. 

Every new discovery in court of leaked Hydra documents, of testimonies from informants, all eager to know exactly what had happened to him, what he had done as if he wasn’t a fucking person. Like he didn’t have a right to keep some things to himself. Like he was just a stone-cold, barren cadaver ready to be dissected. 

He turns in bed, ratty sheets feeling too hot all of a sudden. 

He didn’t want people to talk to him. He doesn’t know if that’s what you want.  He doesn’t want to assume because plenty of people are assuming things on your behalf right now. 

From Buck:

awake?

From Steve:

Are you guys safe?

From Buck:

yeah. we’re at the hotel.

From Steve:

Next steps?

From Buck:

do i just pretend like nothing happened

From Steve:

Is that what you want to do? 

From Buck:

i dont know 

He pauses, letting his fingers hover before he types. 

From Buck:

no 

From Buck:

i dont want to overstep

From Steve:

You’ll know if you are. You know each other.

Bucky swallows back a tightness in his throat.

From Steve:

Let me know how it goes. 

And so he hastily shoots you a text, asking if you're up. 

He waits for a response to  a text that would in any other circumstance have you asking if he was booty calling you. 

The message doesn’t even say delivered. 

It’s past 1am when Bucky’s knocks to your door get no response. 

He presses his ear to the door like before.

There’s nothing, not late night sounds of television, not sheets rustling, no air conditioner hum. 

You’re not in your hotel room.

And you’re not even in his hotel room, which is more worrying than the last.

And so he starts looking.

At first, he thinks maybe you just needed a walk. Something to clear your head. But when he circles the floor twice, the side entrance, the lobby, and there’s still no sign of you. 

He knew you had to be somewhere away from the noise. 

He doubts you’d have gone back to the convention. There was no library in the hotel, he checked. You couldn't have left because he knows you would have told him. 

Right? 

The more he thinks about it, the more the uneasiness settles in because you never actually told him if you’d ever waited to say bye to the places you’d left. 

He shakes it out of his head and instead zeroes in on raking through his memories of the day. 

Any sort of clue, anything about the center, the hotel-- until something finally clicks. 

Bucky cuts through the lot, past the street, toward the small stretch of open space behind the hotel.

An empty playground, just far enough from everything to be quiet.

The cold air of the night does nothing to help soothe the nerves that are building, and the lack of any people around admittedly makes it worse, but he’s daring to hope for once that maybe he’s right, and Steve was right and he knows you enough that--

And there you are.

You’re seated on one end of the old metal see-saw. The only movement around is the slow, steady rhythm of the old metal structure shifting up and down. Except there’s no one on the other end.

You’re moving it with your mind. A small push, just enough to tip your weight, then another to pull yourself back up. A slow, mindless repetition. Like you’re not even thinking about it.

Bucky exhales through his nose. Forces himself to unclench his fists and loosen the tightness in his chest. 

Finally, he steps forward.

You don’t look up. He doesn’t force you to.

Instead, he walks toward the see-saw, before crouching slightly. 

Then, without a word, he presses his palm against the other end and pushes.

The motion is smooth. Subtle.

The second he adds his own force, you slow your own down, letting him take over.

The see-saw goes up and down. And repeats and repeats and repeats. 

It’s quiet for a long time, except for the mechanical whine from the rusted playset. 

“You’re up late,” Bucky says at least.

“I’m always up late,” you reply, voice almost a hum.

“Y’mind?”

You don’t answer right away. Just give a small, half-hearted shrug.

He takes that as permission and keeps his hand pressed to the see-saw, moving it up and down, keeping the motion steady.

A few more beats of silence. He lets it play out the way it wants to.

“I’m fine, you know.” Your voice is carefully even.

Bucky doesn’t respond.

“I mean,” you continue, and then under all the calculated responses, he hears that tiredness he’s been expecting, “I knew this was coming.”

“That what Nat was talking to you about?” he asks. “The other night?”

“Yeah.”

The see-saw creaks softly.

“Yep,” you reply. “She heard from sources that people were looking into it. It was just a matter of when.”

Bucky shifts his weight, keeping the rhythm smooth. “It’ll die down.”

You let out a slow breath.

“After Nat leaked all of SHIELD’s files, it was madness for a while. And look where everyone is now,” he continues.

You glance at him.

Bucky continues to look only at fulcrum, a slight crease between his brows. 

“Did you read it?” you ask, voice quieter now.

“What? The leaked files?”

“The article,” you clarify. “About me.”

Bucky keeps the see-saw moving. Steady.

“No,” he finally admits. 

The seesaw comes to a halt, with you paused in air. 

“You didn’t?”

Bucky avoids your gaze, but answers steadily, “No.”

“Why not?”

“Didn’t think you’d want me to.” His fingers press a little harder into the see-saw handle, insistent. “Besides, what’s a fuckin’ article gonna tell me that being stuck with you every day won’t?”

Your lips twitch.

Bucky pulls the see-saw bar back up, watching you lower back down.

When he sneaks a peek at you, there’s a small smile on your face.

When you’re close to the ground, he pushes the handle back down so you’re lifted into the air again.

“Did you read it?” He clears his throat.

“About half.”

“What’d you think?”

You shrug. “It’s all facts. Don’t really have an opinion on it.”

Another long pause. Bucky feels like he should have more to say but he finds his mind blank. 

You push out a slow breath. “Got that panel tomorrow.”

“I remember.”

“Maya texted me. Told me to lay low, stay out of sight till it’s over.” Your lips pull into a straight line.

“What does lay low mean?” Bucky questions, still keeping his focus on the see-saw. 

“No leaving the compound. No interviews, no posting, no official statements, no videos,” you recite, voice dry. “Especially no panel tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, like he already knows where this is going. “But you’re gonna do it anyway.”

There’s a small pause. He wonders if he miscalculated. 

Your voice comes back slightly surprised. “I am.”

“Good.” He nods. “You got no reason to hide.”

“You think so?” you ask, voice lighter now, almost amused.

“Yeah,” Bucky says with no hesitation. “And I hate most of your ideas, so that should tell you something.”

You let out a small laugh.

It’s silent for a while as the see-saw moves up and down, with you seated on one end as Bucky maneuvers it from the other.

“I know what she’s saying is the logical thing to do,” you say eventually. “But I don’t know. I just feel-”

“Trapped,” he says simply.

You swallow the stone in your throat.

Bucky doesn’t look at you when he speaks. Just keeps his hand steady on the bar. 

He knows it’s why you jump from place to place. What happened at the clock tower may have confirmed it, but he’d picked up on every breadcrumb in the last few months whether you’ liked it or not. Why you left when the café lady gave you keys to a home. Why you didn’t like closed doors, routine, time loops. Why you hadn’t picked a new codename even though you’d been here months. Anything that makes you feel like you’re tied down, anything that makes you feel trapped again with no room to breathe.

The see-saw tips slightly.

You let out a long, slow breath.

“I just don’t want to feel the way I used to there,” you admit.

Bucky nods. “I know.”

“Every day was the same. And everything looked the same, and everyone was the same,” you say, voice quieter now. “Staying still leaves you exposed.”

“I know,” Bucky repeats.

“Not everyone does,” you say, staring at the sky. “I don’t leave a place because I don’t like the people there anymore-- but sticking around for too long feels like…”

“Another trap,” he finishes.

You glance at him.

He shrugs. “You got no reason to explain. I get it.”

Except, the reason why he’s stayed at the same place for so long is the same reason you couldn’t. Bucky liked stability. He likes being rooted. 

You exhale a small laugh. “Lived a thousand lives, huh.”

”And then some,” he says, pushing the handle down, slow and deliberate. “Maya’s just another person. Do whatever you want.”

You study him. The way his jaw flexes just slightly, the way his fingers press into the metal bar, like he’s already thinking about what comes next.

“There’s gonna be a lot more eyes on me now.” Your voice is careful, testing. “On you too, you know.”

“I’m aware.”

“Wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to end the show.”

“I’m aware,” he says again. “But ‘m fine. Got all these batteries I need to use somehow.”

He lets a hush fall between you as you contemplate your next words. 

“Do you ever get used to it all?”

His grip tightens, just for a second. Then--

“I didn’t.”

It’s a quiet confession. One that sits between you for a moment, stretching out into the cool night air.

“But that doesn’t mean it’s the same for you,” he continues. “You’ll figure it out.” 

Then finally he looks at you.

And he really looks this time. Not just a glance, not just a flicker of acknowledgment, but something that lingers.

Something weighty. It makes your stomach stumble and your breath catch.  

His mouth twitches, just barely. Not a smile, not quite. But close.

“Spotlight looks better on you anyway,” he says, like it’s the simplest truth in the world.

The morning is quiet.

Not in the world outside, though. The internet is still on fire, messages still flooding in, theories spiraling out of control.

But in the hotel, it’s different.

The air in the room is still. Heavy, like static waiting to shock someone. 

You sit on the edge of the bed, scrolling through nothing, really. You keep opening and closing the same apps, flipping between blank notes and unsent messages.

Bucky watches from where he stands, leaning against the doorframe.

He knows that look. The anticipation before impact.

“You eat yet?” 

You glance at him. “Not hungry.”

He doesn’t push. Just nods. “You will be later.”

Your lips twitch, but no real smile.

Bucky doesn’t like the flatness behind your expression.

But he doesn’t call it out. Not yet.

Instead, he asks, “You sure about this?”  

You look at him. “I don’t really have a choice.”

“You do,” Bucky says, matter-of-fact. “Always do.”

You blink. Like you weren’t expecting that.

Your gaze flickers.

“Yeah,” you say, voice a little softer. “I know. But I feel like I owe it to myself.”

Bucky holds your stare for a second.

He pushes off the doorframe, straightening.

“You got time to kill,” he says. “You should eat something.”

You roll your eyes. “Bucky-

“You should eat something,” he repeats, firmer this time.

A pause.

Then, begrudgingly, you stand.

“Fine,” you mutter. “Whatever. You’re buying.”

“Absolutely not,” he remarks, as if wasn’t fully intending to before you even asked. 

“Dick.”

“You brought me here, you’re paying.”

He lets you lead the way, wait until you’re ahead of him to let out a small flicker of relief. 

_____

The hallways are buzzing.

Everywhere you look people are talking, whispering, staring. Some subtle, some not.

Bucky walks beside you, shoulders squared, pace steady.

The closer you get to the panel, the more the weight in your chest presses down.

It’s not fear. Not exactly.

It’s the knowing.

Knowing the eyes are on you. Knowing the second you step on that stage, this all becomes very real.

“Y’okay?” Bucky asks, voice low.

You exhale slowly. “Yeah.”

“Liar.”

You huff a small laugh.

Even as the crowd thickens, even as you near the panel doors, the noise rising, the air buzzing with anticipation, Bucky keeps a steady pace beside you.

Just in a way that says he’s around.

The second you step into the backstage area, a con staffer immediately moves toward you.

“Hey! Oh, great, you’re here.” They glance behind you, at Bucky, panicked like he wasn’t expecting him. “Is he--”

“Not on the panel,” you say, quick.

Bucky just shrugs. “Not on the panel.”

The staffer nods, relieved. “Okay, cool. Just making sure.”

They move to adjust something on their headset, then glance at you again. “Uh-- how are you feeling?”

“Grand.”

They nod again. “Okay, cool. If you need anything, let us know.”

You give them a smile, and they move away.

Bucky watches you for a long moment.

“What?” you ask, feeling a bit squirmish under the intensity of his stare.

“What?” he asks right back. “Don’t lie about me out there. I’m not haunted.”

“The truth. Got it. So I should say you’re in love with me.”

“You can get your own ride home.” Still, it makes him feel better that you’re still somewhat okay. 

You throw a smile on, shaking the nerves out of your shoulders and standing more straight. “I should go.”

Bucky nods. “See you in a while.”

You take one last breath, and step onto the stage.

The lights are bright.

Clearly, there are more people than had attended the con yesterday because the front row is entirely stuffed with people with mics and notebooks. The seats in the crowd stretch farther than they should, a sea of people watching, waiting. 

The air is thick with attention, the hum of voices settling as the moderator clears their throat and leans into the mic.

You drop into your chair way too casually, tossing a leg over your knee, leaning back with the complete ease of someone who has zero fear.

The moderator glances at you, vaguely unsettled by your energy because they clearly had not prepped for the absolute hellfire that is Maya dealing with a PR nightmare. You had no doubt she had put the fear of God into that man the morning of, vetting and then re-vetting every single syllable that was to come out of his mouth. 

“Well,” he says, clearly trying to find footing. “We, uh-- we’re really excited to have you here, especially after everything that’s been going on.”

You grin. “What’s up?”

The moderator visibly stumbles. “You-- you mean, regarding the article?”

“Oh,” you say. “That. Yeah, wild week.”

He pauses.

“…Yeah?” he tries, attempting to meet you where you are.

You just blink at them. The audience is completely silent.

You shrug. “What about it?”

“Well,” he presses, clearly hoping for something, “given everything it exposed--"

“Sure.”

Another pause.

The moderator glances at his notes, clearly flustered.

“Oh-kay,” the moderator says, regrouping before quickly saying, “You know what, let’s open it up to audience questions.”

A ripple of excitement moves through the crowd as the first person grabs the mic hastily and stands before anyone even gets a chance to fight for it.

“Hey,” they say into the mic, clearly hyped. “Love the show, love your work. Just wanted to ask- does any of this change what you’re doing? Like, do you think your past is gonna affect the future of the show?”

You hum, taking a long break before finally, you go, “Nah.”

Some people in the audience laugh. Others are still unsettled. 

The moderator looks like he’s breaking out into a cold sweat. You don’t even know what he’s so nervous about, unless Maya had held him at gunpoint the night before and threatened him. 

The next question comes.

“So, like, do you- do you regret not saying anything before?”

You tilt your head. Squint at them. “…Saying what?”

“About your past. About everything.”

“Oh.” You pause, nodding thoughtfully. “Nope.”

Maya was going to kill you, you think, unless she didn't die from a hemorrhage. 

Then, someone stands up, clearly a little hesitant. "Okay, so, uh- sorry if this is a weird question, but, like…"

They shift awkwardly.

“Did Bucky know?”

The room stills. Not in a bad way, not tense. Just expectant.

You tilt your head, raising your eyebrows slightly. Like you hadn’t considered that being a question.

“Bucky?” you repeat. 

“Or any of the Avengers really,” he adds quickly.

You reponse comes out slowly as you think, “Well, I don’t want to speak for him-" 

The crowd instead drowns you out immediately. A loud ripple of noise in surprise, excitement, recognition.

You blink, whipping our head to see where their eyes had diverted. 

You snort loudly when the fool steps into view, a scowl on his face and shoulders stiff like he would rather be literally anywhere else. 

“Oh,” you say, leaning back. “Look who decided to show up.”

Bucky doesn’t sit.

Just sweeps the mic off the moderator, turns toward the person who asked the question, and tilts his head slightly.

“Did I know?” he repeats.

They nod.

Bucky shrugs. “Yeah.”

The room buzzes.

He leans into the mic slightly.

“I mean,” he says, flat as anything, “we literally live together. What, you think I found out from Twitter?”

The audience laughs, tension in the room dissolving.

You grin.

The person with the question nods slowly. “Right. That makes sense.”

Bucky hums. Moves the mic away.

Then he reaches down and tugs a chair closer, flipping it around.

“Move, would ya?” he grunts, face slightly flushed. 

You silently move your chair to give him some space. 

He drops into it, not even bothering to look at you.

He doesn’t even say anything else, just sits. 

Close enough that his knee bristles with yours.

“Uh, good morning.” The moderator stares at him, shuffling through cards rapidly as someone hands him another mic. 

“Morning,” Bucky says, voice gruff.

“We weren’t expecting you.”

“I’m in the show too.”

“Well, yes, but-”

“So ask me questions too,” Bucky grunts.

You glance at his knee still touching yours. Then at him, expecting him to pull away.

Instead, Bucky just shifts, adjusting so he’s comfortable.

He doesn’t move away, just sends you a curt nod, clears his throat and looks straight ahead. 

It brings a stupid big grin to your face. 

The whole thing goes by quickly, question after question, answers delivered with just the right balance of stupidity and earnestness. 

Bucky had sat beside you the whole time, occasionally muttering some dry remark into the mic, mostly just letting you take the lead.

Things feel good. Not as heavy as the world did the night before. 

The moment you step off stage, you exhale sharply, shaking out your hands.

“That was fun,” you say.

“For you,” he responds dryly.

“That’s why it was fun.”

You glance at him as you walk, stepping through the side exit toward the quieter halls behind the venue.

People glance your way as you pass. Staff, attendees, lingering eyes that recognize you now.

Bucky doesn’t like that.

Doesn’t like the sharp shift in the air, the new weight of attention that seems to cling to you heavier than before.

But you’re still walking easy. Still comfortable in your own skin.

Not because it surprises him. But because it makes him feel something he can’t quite name. 

He didn’t even think he had feelings like those anymore. It makes him deeply bothered that he doesn’t immediately hate it. 

A staff member nods at you as you pass. "Great panel."

You flash them a grin, throwing up a lazy thumbs-up. "Hell yeah, it was."

Bucky shakes his head, exhaling through his nose. "You're insufferable."

"You love it."

"Not even a little."

"Liar."

Bucky doesn't immediately deny it.

He just keeps walking.

You catch it, smirking slightly but let it slide.

A few more turns, and the noise of the main venue fades into a distant hum.

Bucky watches you roll your shoulders, adjusting slightly, as if releasing the last bit of energy from the stage.

Channelling the last bit of insane energy from the last day, he says-

“You looked good up there.”

You freeze mid-step. Just for half a second.

You turn your head, slow blink, slow grin. "Oh?"

Bucky regrets it immediately.

"Ohhhh?" you drag, delighted.

Bucky presses his lips into a thin line. Keeps walking. "Forget I said anything."

"Oh, no, absolutely not." You catch up, shifting to walk backwards in front of him, grinning the whole time. "Bucky Barnes, ladies and gentlemen. Giving me a genuine fucking compliment."

Bucky looks to the ceiling like he’s begging for an escape.

“Truly, a rare occurrence,” you continue. "I gotta savor this moment. Hold on, let me memorize every word. Can you repeat it, but this time do it way slower."

"You are the worst person I've ever met."

"Say it again."

"Absolutely not."

"C'mon, one more time."

"Nope."

"You looked good up there," you mimic, voice dramatically low and serious.

Bucky shoves you. You laugh, almost tripping over your own feet.

When the teasing fades slightly, he catches you looking at him for real this time.

Bucky shifts slightly. Looks away. 

"Hey," you say, voice lighter now. "Thanks."

Bucky keeps his eyes forward. 

"Yeah," he mutters. "Whatever."

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to those who comment and tell me what u think-- i love u. ur the sole reason i haven't abandoned this lil fic. thank u for everything mwah <333333

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Next part

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Have you never heard of such a thing, darling?

There is an abrupt cut to a classic YouTube channel intro. It’s the name ‘The Gotham Files, with Tim Drake’ in a metallic font, bouncing around to royalty-free, terrible dubstep music while fake strobe lights dance in the background. It is impossible to tell whether this is ironic or not. Assumedly yes, though, because then it cuts to a blank title card that seemed to have been ripped right off of a PowerPoint presentation that reads ‘Also Marinette is here’.

(The Timari Buzzfeed Unsolved Au)

Chapter 1: The Mysterious Case of Wayne Manor

A boy sits in a nondescript white room, on a white sofa, in a white shirt and black slacks. This could have all been controlled, of course, however, even the boy himself is not the most colorful – his skin is pale, his hair jet black, and even his eyes are a seemingly lifeless grey. He smiles at the camera, but there’s something unsettling about it. He shows off way too many teeth.

He waves jerkily. “Hello, everyone! I’ve gotten a lot of new subscribers since my last video hunting down the demon known as Poison Ivy –.”

There is an abrupt cut to a new bit of footage, in black and white to signify that it was from the past:

“If you’re a demon then you have to curse me,” the boy is saying from behind a camera.

A seemingly normal woman, though admittedly she is covered in enough dirt to make you wonder if she had just come back from digging up a grave, gives him a blank look. “Why would I do that?”

“You gotta.”

“I’m not going to.”

“Lame.”

The woman’s face drops into the annoyance that had clearly been threatening to appear for a while, and she starts to stand. The boy makes a squeaking noise and immediately runs in the opposite direction.

“– who was not a demon, she was just a regular lady who was really obsessed with poisoning rich people. Which is perfectly understandable and could happen to anyone.”

He nods sagely. There is no reason for this. He simply does. And does it for too long. It gets uncomfortable very quickly.

“But, this does not necessarily mean that ghosts and demons do not exist!”

He smiles. 

“Now, in this episode, I am going to solve the mystery of whether Wayne Manor is truly hauhahaha–!”

He breaks character abruptly, bursting into laughter, covering his mouth with his fist in an attempt to smother it. A flush spreads across his cheeks, finally adding much-needed color to the room. “Sorry, I can’t – I can’t do my usual intro with you there.”

A person behind the camera giggles. “Aw, am I distracting you?”

“You were looking at me like you thought I was possessed, of course it was distracting.”

“You looked possessed, I don’t know what to tell you –!”

He laughs at her and makes a spinning motion with his pointer finger. “Oh my god, Editor!Me, just roll the intro here.”

On cue, there is an abrupt cut to a classic YouTube channel intro. It’s the words ‘The Gotham Files, with Tim Drake’ in a metallic font, bouncing around to royalty-free, terrible dubstep music while fake strobe lights dance in the background. It is impossible to tell whether this is ironic or not.

Assumedly yes, though, because then it cuts to a blank title card that seemed to have been ripped right off of a PowerPoint presentation that reads ‘Also Marinette is here’.

When the white screen disappears, the viewers find Tim standing alone in front of a wrought iron fence. The plants at the fence’s feet are overgrown, weaving intricately around the poles and climbing up the sides.

Tim had also climbed up the fence, evidently, seeing as he was still breathing a little heavily. The boy looks more normal now, wearing an old hoodie and jeans and smiling in a way that shows off his dimples. His cheeks have far more color in them now, but that just might be due to overexertion.

“Hey, so, GCPD – I know you watch my videos because Poison Ivy got arrested like a week after I posted – I would like you to know that I’m not actually trespassing. In order to trespass, there have to be people living in the place you’re supposedly trespassing in. Probably. I don’t know the law. But you guys don’t, either, so!”

He flashes a finger gun with the hand not holding the camera and attempts a wink. Unfortunately, Tim is unable to wink, so he just ends up blinking aggressively at a camera lens.

But that’s beside the point! He turns the camera around to point it at what one would, politely, call an abandoned mansion.

Less politely, it would be called a safety hazard. Half of the building looked like it had caved in on itself, graffiti covered the previously pristine white walls, and plants climbed in and out of every window. The back door hangs half off its hinge, and Tim doesn’t even want to imagine what has taken residence in the place since the Wayne family’s unfortunate passing.

“Everyone ready for another day of probably getting tetanus?”

There is no answer. He is talking to a camera.

Said camera speeds through the next few minutes of Tim exploring. Stagnant water and mold, dust bunny families and spiderwebs, a raccoon that Tim runs from immediately, rusting cookware still left out on the counter for a family that would never get to eat it, a moment to linger on Tim when he stubs his toe on a loose floorboard and heaves a deep sigh, a portrait that was peeling out of its frame, a broken grandfather clock, Tim posing in front every graffitied penis he could find, ransacked closets and cabinets…

He stops in the middle of the mansion, smiling widely when the camera is spun back to look at him. “Well, no ghosts yet, but we can’t rule them out. I guess.”

He takes off his backpack and begins rifling through it until he finds his Spirit Box.

“Now, I’m sure that most of you know what this is, but just in case you don’t: a Spirit Box will cycle through local radio frequencies at a rapid speed. The theory is that ghosts can string together these snippets of words to speak or answer questions.”

He shrugs his shoulders.

“Or, at least, that’s what people say. I’ll believe it when I see it. Until then, I’m going with a healthy mix of the ‘lucky coincidences’ and ‘confirmation bias’ theories.”

He flicks the nob to turn it on, and the radio immediately begins to cycle through vague sounds, the box crackling.

Tim shuffles a little, letting the box run as he shrugs off his jacket and sets it down so he can have a clean spot to sit for a while. He props up the camera on his knee and angles it up to show his face as he lifts the Spirit Box to his lips.

“Is anyone there?”

“Ye –!”

Tim looks unperturbed. “You said there’s someone there?”

The box sputters out an indecipherable string of sounds. A fluke, then.

He gives a small hum. “I see, I see.”

There is another moment as the box continues to make sounds. They’re deeper in tone now, but no closer to human language.

“Well,” he says. “If there is anyone in the room with me, I’d like to ask you to show yourself in some way. Possess something nearby, move something, make a sound –.”

The door slams open, and Tim instantly jumps to his feet, the camera catching a terrible view of the underside of his chin for a moment when he hugs it to his chest. Don’t worry, though, dear viewer, for he soon remembers that he is a YouTuber and quickly readjusts, pointing the camera at the door.

There is no one there, but a brilliant light illuminates the door opposite the room they are in.

“Wha…?” Tim says, his voice a whisper, only barely caught by his mic.

There is a person talking just outside the room. They are speaking in tongues.

Or perhaps in French, it is often hard to tell.

Regardless, the captions at the bottom of the video say that it is French and that she is apparently saying a vast quantity of demonetizable words that Editor!Tim could not write out.

The gist, though, is that she is apparently there because of a bet and not happy about it. Hence the many demonetizable words.

After a few seconds, Editor!Tim apparently gives up on censoring individual words, and instead chooses to bleep out the entirety of what she was saying. For the sake of monetization, not because he’s a stickler for rules or anything.

You might think that demonetizable words should be allowed when you are hunting ghosts and demons and the like, and Tim might agree, but he actually likes money, so...

What was the point here?

Oh, right.

Slowly, a girl makes her way into the room, her phone out in front of her like a pitifully tiny shield, the flashlight nearly blinding Tim.

She stares at him for a long few moments. She mumbles something to herself, but even in editing Tim had been unable to decipher it. So, yellow question marks litter the screen.

“Uh… hi,” Tim says, lifting his hand in an awkward wave.

[Ew, an American.]

Tim’s eyebrows shoot up into his hair. [You realize that you’re in America, right? Most people here are going to be Americans.]

Her eyes widen. “You… you speak French?!” she asks in heavily accented English, seeming mortified. Not because she felt bad about insulting him, but instead that she had been caught doing it.

[Obviously.]

Her face reddens, and she tries, unsuccessfully, to hide it with her free hand. “Oh. Sorry.”

“Are you really?”

She seems to consider this for a few moments, before shrugging. “I guess not.”

Tim should probably be offended. He isn’t, though. At least she was honest. Eventually.

She sticks a hand out. “I’m Marinette.”

He shakes it, smiling. “Tim.”

There were a few moments as they looked at each other, unsure what to do.

“I think your radio is broken,” she says finally, pointing at the Spirit Box. It lay on the floor, abandoned, just barely vibrating from the force of its own sounds. “Or, at least, it’s not getting any reception way out here. Keeps saying ‘Hi’.”

Tim frowns. “What time is it?”

“Like…” she looks at her phone. “About seventeen…”

She catches on to his blank stare. She glances behind herself, further into the house, as if considering braving the ghosts.

She is not brave.

She closes the door behind herself, smiling. “Right. American. Five in the afternoon.”

“Oh, that’s because everyone is getting off work and they’re greeting the sudden influx of viewers.”

“I have literally no clue how that correlates.”

“It’s ghosts,” he says, rolling his eyes.

She either does not understand sarcasm or simply does not want to risk it, because her shoulders hike up to her ears and she looks around quickly. “I’m going to kill Alya,” she hisses.

“If you hate ghosts that much, I don’t think that’s in your best interest. Because killing someone would lead to more ghosts, you know,” Tim points out.

Despite the fact that he keeps his tone as gentle as he can while breaking this news to her, she looks absolutely devastated.

Slowly, Tim picks himself up off of the floor, turning off the Spirit Box as he goes. The Spirit Box gives a high whine before sputtering out, but he pays it no mind, so this must not be important. He stuffs it in his bag and heads over to Marinette, slinging an arm over her shoulders and starting to lead her away, out of the room and through the many, winding hallways.

“Know what will calm you down? I’m going to tell you all about the family that once owned this place, and their unfortunate demises.”

“Are you streaming?” she asks, eyeing his camera warily.

“... does the way that I answer this affect whether I’ll die here or not?”

She giggles and does not answer. He does not seem assured by this.

Still, he points the camera at themselves and begins to explain: “The Waynes were a lovely family of philanthropists, and the town lost quite a lot when they were tragically shot after their family outing to the theater. To this day, twenty years after that tragic night, Gotham has yet to recover.”

A few moments of silence swallow them.

Text at the bottom of the screen says that this is not an editing mistake, and instead a choice made to respect the dead. There is also a timestamp where a person can skip to the next bit of ‘content’ if they so wish, and they would go on with their day none the wiser of the fact that Editor!Tim had called them a ‘limp noodle of a person who would not know morality if it walked up, introduced itself, and then punched them in the face’.

But, again, those people would be none the wiser, so…

Tim smiles charmingly at the camera, as if he had not just insulted a large portion of them without their knowledge. “Now their house is a prime hangout spot for dumb teens, such as Marinette and me.”

“I’m not dumb,” she huffs halfheartedly.

“You believe in ghosts.”

“Well, yeah, duh, I’d be stupid not to, seeing as my house is haunted.”

“You’ve seen ghosts?” Tim says, skeptical.

“You don’t see ghosts,” she sniffs, in that tone people use when they are offended by the stupidity they are being presented with. Tim gets this a lot, but never has he ever felt it was so unwarranted. “You just know they’re there. Like when they knock over your cups for no reason.”

Briefly, the image of a cat flickers on the screen. Because that is what she is describing. A cat.

“Okay. Unrelated question, is belief in ghosts common in your culture? Because they won’t treat you if it is.”

She shoots him an annoyed scowl, but there is something amused tugging at the corners of her lips regardless. “You’re the absolute worst.”

He grins. “Glad you think so. I put lots of effort into making people hate me, you know. It’s nice to have my efforts appreciated for once.”

“I wouldn’t say appreciated…”

“No no. I’m appreciated.”

“Okay,” she says easily.

They reach the front doors, and Marinette raises an eyebrow.

“You know, if you wanted me to leave, you could have just told me. I would have left.”

“I couldn’t just leave a woman in need alone,” he says, pressing a hand to his chest.

She looks unimpressed.

“... and, besides, I was pretty much done here, so…” he shrugs. “Figured I’d escort you out.”

She looks at her phone for a moment before shaking her head. “I appreciate it, but I can’t leave for another… twenty-three minutes.”

He thinks this over for a few moments, frowning. He glances back the way they came, as if considering hanging around for longer. And then he decides against it with a tiny shake of his head.

“You know, it’s illegal to be here,” he says.

“You’re here. And filming yourself doing the illegal thing. I think that makes what you’re doing way worse.”

Tim’s eyebrows knit together. “I mean, touche and all, but I was just saying that you could tell your friend that to get out of this.”

“... oh.”

He snorts into his hand. “Oh my god, did you really not realize?”

“Shut up! I hate you!” she whined. “I’ve had a lot on my mind, you know!”

“Yeah. Like cups falling off of tables, apparently.”

She punches him in the shoulder lightly, and he only laughs more openly.

Still, ever the gentleman (even while laughing at her misfortune), he opens the door for her. Still, despite her supposed hatred of him, she rushes through all too eagerly with a murmured thank you.

He only gets a second to follow after her before the door slams shut behind them, so close to hitting Tim in the back that the force of it makes his hair blow in his face.

Marinette throws him behind herself immediately, her hands up in a fighting position as if she intends to fight the ghost for him. Not that it would help, probably, but the thought was still there.

Tim looks a little touched as he rests a hand on her shoulder comfortingly.

“Don’t worry about it, the place is old, and the loss of weight is probably just throwing everything off balance.”

“... is that supposed to make me feel better? Because all I’m hearing is that this building is super unstable.”

“Then it’s a good thing we’re outside now, isn’t it?” he says, grinning cheekily.

And, despite herself, she smiles back.

His expression drops immediately as something hits him to make up for the door’s near miss. He groans and falls to his knees in utter devastation. “I left my jacket inside…”

“It’s the ghosts’ jacket now,” she says, patting him on the back in a way that really isn’t as consoling as she seems to think it is.

Tim starts to fake cry.

There is a hard cut. Tim is back on the couch he had been on at the beginning, but his posture is more relaxed this time and his smile is actually normal.

“Well, as usual, there was no ghost to be found. Because they don’t exist.”

A pillow sails across the screen, very intent on hitting him, but he bats it away easily. Because it’s a pillow.

“But maybe the real ghosts are the friends we made along the way!”

Marinette groans off-screen. “Don’t do this to me. You’re going to make me have an existential crisis.”

He hums a little, his eyes gleaming as he leans back, letting himself sink into the plush couch. “So, as usual, there isn’t much to go over…” He smiles. “I guess I can talk about meeting Mari, though. My first thought when meeting Mari was…” He trails off, visibly mulling it over in his mind with pursed lips. “Well, my first thought was that she looked scared and it would probably help her if she had someone to do this with.”

Someone behind the camera coos, not noticing the way his lips begin to tug upwards into a smirk.

“My second thought was ‘The people like it when I have guests on. I can capitalize on this’.”

Marinette makes a sound incomprehensible to human ears and rushes into frame, a new pillow raised. Tim screams.

The scene cuts. Marinette and Tim are sitting on the couch together, now. Their hair is a little messy from the unshown pillow fight. Marinette is lazing across the sofa, her legs thrown over Tim’s lap, so it was safe to assume she had won.

“You want to know what I thought when I first met you?” Marinette wears a slightly sheepish grin. “I thought ‘Oh my god, why is the ghost so tiny? He needs soup.’”

Tim snorts. “No way.”

She nods, trying and failing to keep her expression neutral. She turns to look at the camera dead on. “And, if you guys at home don’t want to be mistaken for skinny little ghosts, then you should hop on over to the website of our sponsor, Hello Fresh!”

Tim rests his arm over the top of the couch, smiling openly. “We’re actually sponsored by Raid: Shadow Legends.”

Marinette snaps her fingers in her best overdramatic ‘awwwww man’ gesture, shaking her head. “God dang it. It was worth a shot.”

“Eh, I’ll still use it as an excuse to do my ad read now.” He turns to grin at the camera, opening his mouth –.

As one, everyone watching leaves the video.

~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 2

[ashadowofburnedoutstardust]

Hello all

Another thing I'm going to point out

Something is fucking up

I talked to Edwin via Instagram during this whole mess

The podcast video comes out with a whole bunch of stuff making references to things I've said and done as well as stuff the hackers said to me, they claimed they were CIA, something about Division one which after a bit of searching led me to the SAC/SAD

The day that came out was probably the most terrifying day of my life

Only trust things from official source they said and someone send me the link to the video on his story, brighams being the name of the font that had my address, blank slate in the background from my answer to the coyote anon, Dodger in the video background (their nickname for me was Dodger), following the north star when they wanted me to go somewhere, eye contact/look me in the eye being a reference to my YouTube playlist being manipulated in front of me, a reference to lawyers and practicing a script, anxiety kicking up at night, the need to meditate, a reference to the word "newbie" from my "Before we go" post that he also mentions directing, going on a "vacation" which I posted right as I left the discord chat, the suggestion of wearing a mask as a disguise that had something on it that ended up making my mouth go numb, the Amazon truck in the background, for some reason they wanted me hydrated and healthy, things that I "had inherited from being born", Plato's cave which I've talked about before, the reference to hallucinogens which I mentioned to one of the scammers, the Russell Crowe reference (I've mentioned before to others elsewhere he's a second cousin), the James Cameron reference I've also mentioned on another platform, not watching a lot of TV after the hackers disabled my Chromecast, the raglan t-shirt (it's also a beach in my country that I had a picture of on my Instagram, (the IG pic manipulation of what was showing and what wasn't is an entire other story), ghost mosquitos being a reference to a Buzzfeed unsolved video conversation between Shane and Ryan of whom I've mentioned being a fan of before, the octopus reference I've made before- featherless and bipedal (they walk on two tentacles on the ocean floor) "behold a mand", the Jensen reference - that exact meme was my banner pic on LSA,

That's not even all of it either, but if you look at how fucking bizarre all of that "synchronicity" might be you can understand why it scares the living shit out of me and made me wonder if Christopher was actually behind it all

But I don't know what came first, the video being filmed or my movements being manipulated using those references

I asked Edwin if he knew if anyone else had been scammed via DM, the next day Buzzfeed comes out with that tweet about scammers

And then not long after that Chris Deactivated his social media like they knew something was coming and he needed to get out of the way of it coming out by being off media

Make of that what you will, that's the TLDR version of last fortnight of my life

Things are weird and still a little scary

Hence I don't trust Christopher right now

💜🪽🌟

[iwannaread13]

Thanks for the information! I'll go check them out and set some accounts up. I'll probably not use Webnovel; too many bad reviews for me to fully trust it. The tips about the font use are really helpful. Maybe changing them up once in whilebfor editing will help with that?

I'm mainly doing this to get over my perfectionism with my writing and to just see what happens. I want to see people interact with my works but that doesn't happen if you don't put it out there. So your excitement makes me really excited to write and showcase the world even more.

I was inspired to write a mystery story after playing a hidden objects game and that rolled out in to this. Lots of mystery and horror game references, like with FNAF for example. Agatha Christie and Carolyn Keene are some of my favorite authors that inspired me to write mysteries.

Some of the cases take inspiration from the games and other novels. I couldn't help it. Looking over the cases showed the inspiration. Buzzfeed unsolved is also useful when writing up both the cases and cold case for the setting.

I cuts down the workload enough for me to not have fits over it. It's also why minor characters are being used the way they are. Less of a workload in making new ones and it helps build up the world as well.

The Supernatural element is actually a really big part of the series. Both a way to gain evidence and witnesses but then the main character has to find a way to make it viable evidence that won't get thrown out. It's a useful tool through out the story and holds a major effect in almost everything. Especially when most of the other characters don't notice the Supernatural. It's fun.

Thank for the advice and support. I hope you end up enjoying it when it's out.

I'm writing a mystery novel. It's outlined, planned, and in the draft stage. I'm making it a webnovel and want to if people have any tips? What website should an aspiring web-novelist use? What stories do best online?

LitRPG, Fantasy, and Asian based stories due well in my communities. Which one due well in yours? Is cultivation and isekia popular?

I have a lot of questions.

It's scheduled to published in later months in order to have a build up of chapters when I'm too busy to write. Is that a good plan?

That arcs and most of the characters are planned out. Some of the minor characters just have 3 main traits, an ambition, and relation to the main character listed. Is that a good thing to have?

What else should I do?

[madseance]

[milfgabrielle]

here’s some silly little edits for an au that i may never write:

bonus:

shane after hearing about lestat’s “disappearance” from louis and claudia’s lives

[lesbianwithchainsaws]

Ryan and Shane really just said FUCK ending buzzfeed unsolved supernatural

[madejgifs]

shane ‘ryan are you ok’ madej

[shurisneakers]

unsolved (i)

Summary: Bucky doesn't even believe in the paranormal. So who the hell thought it was a good idea to stick him in a series about everything haunted for the internet's amusement? With his loose-canon of a teammate who has no concept of subtlety or any shits left to give, to make things even worse. (Buzzfeed unsolved AU)

Warnings: swearing, frustrated bucky at his little shit supreme, Very Loud reader, images and memes that all have alt texts.

A/N: yes this is literally harmless in a different font. do not ask me if anything doesn't make sense. i cannot explain. i resurface every 3 years to present you with ideas born from menty b's. ANYWAY shout out to my beloved ryan and shane. pls enjoy <3

Bucky doesn’t appeal to the youths.

Apparently. 

On God, he cannot fathom why.

He had definitely left the house in the last six months, maybe. Smiled in at least two pictures that existed on the internet. He even knew what Discord was. Sort of.  

By all accounts, he should be treated as the modern day icon that he was.  

“The youths?” he repeats, the word so foreign on his tongue it felt odd to even say it.

“Your numbers are the lowest of the whole team.” The latest tech-dude, with a tablet twelve models ahead of the one Bucky had in his room, tells him monotonously. “Wilson, Romanoff and Barton score the highest. Everyone else lies around the middle. You are dead-last.”

Bucky has the audacity to look offended. 

“Anything to say?” Their PR head, Maya, asks him, amused. 

He stares, formulating the wittiest one liner he could in three seconds.

“I don’ care,” he mumbles. 

Maya sighs. “Look, the team took the decision together. As far as I’m aware, you are still a member. You need some PR if you guys want to stay in the public’s good books.”

“No one’s gonna listen to me.” Bucky wasn’t exactly the poster child for American values. He couldn’t even vote until three years ago, and that came only after the full wrath of a Steve Rogers descended on the email inbox of the DMV. 

“That’s why it’s important to get them to like you,” Maya emphasizes. “Or the idea of you at least. A very sanitized, corporate friendly version.”

His eyebrow twitches unintentionally.  

“And also you signed the contract.”

Well. Shit. 

Truth be told– and he has openly and rather loudly stated this on numerous occasions even especially when no one asked– he doesn’t understand why they need a PR team. The world has calmed down significantly over the last few years. Bucky hadn’t really been out crime-fighting as much as he was people-watching. There hasn’t been an earth-shatteringly dystopian-level event in the longest time, and there seemed to be a group of spandex-clad teenagers who seemed to do a good job at taking care of them when they did threaten to occur. Go kids.

Even if they needed PR, he could arguably understand the appeal of Sam and Nat and why the people would want to see more of them. Bucky, on the other hand, looked like he crawled onto Earth most days of the week. 

“What do I have to do?” he asks ultimately, knowing there was no way to get out of this. “Interviews?”

The intern shares a look with Maya. Bucky shares a look with the ceiling. 

“The team agreed to do a series of videos, each focusing on a different niche,” she begins, “Crash courses on science, pointing out mistakes in spy movies. Once a week.”

Bucky nods along. He can pinpoint Bruce and Nat for those.

Maya stares at him.

Bucky stares back.

“So,” she says slowly, like he’s a moron, “you would–”

“No.” 

The intern sighs heavily like they discussed that this was going to happen. Bucky was getting predictable. This annoys him even further, for some reason.

“Only once a week, and it doesn’t have to be anything crazy–”

“I’m not doing videos,” he interjects. “I’ll tweet a few times. I’ll even go outside. But ’m not doin’ videos.”

A big step was to get the Avengers off Twitter after the regular shit-storm that occurs every time they’d quote-tweet another politician calling them shitheads. Getting them back on seems counterproductive. 

“Fine,” Maya relents, looking at the intern. “We'll work something out.”

Bucky leans back in his chair, and meditating on ways he can weasel his way out of those too.

So they stick him in a couple of interviews.

Bucky, as the recluse extraordinaire that he was, does unsurprisingly terrible at them.

Variety does a piece on him that was supposed to take up 2 pages. They send back half a page worth of usable material and Bucky gets a lecture on how monosyllables don't count as answers.

He grunts in return. Maya’s itch to smack his shoulder with the rolled up draft increases.

They set him up for pap walks. Just him getting fast food for the team, or sitting in the park.

They don’t take into account that Bucky was trained professionally for years on how to hide, sneak in and out of places without a soul knowing he was ever there. 

The paparazzi spend three hours waiting for him outside the pizza place, while he’s been home for two hours with two demolished pepperonis and an order of mozzarella sticks. 

They give him access to his Twitter. 

He tweets some dumb shit and gets shadow banned by that evening. 

Maya is sick and tired, and the interns have shifted three times since the whole ordeal started. Bucky honestly feels a little bad. Maybe he should try to be like Scott, who not only wrote a book, finger-gunned at photographers, did an interview a week, but also agreed to a podcast and a video series about literally anything they suggested. 

“Play nice,” Sam tells Bucky one evening. 

It’s an off-hand comment, not even really looking at him while he says it. 

Bucky doesn’t need to ask what he’s referring to, but he thinks that maybe he has gone too far.

He begrudgingly agrees. 

Therefore, it begins. 

They stick him in the background of a few videos. Just to interact, add his commentary on what was going on, suggestions. 

Then the jokes really start.

“I just don’t got anything to add,” Bucky tries, in a failure of an attempt to justify his lack of contribution. 

Maya only stares at him, but Bucky swears he can hear her curse quietly, even though her lips don’t move even a millimeter.  

He is not put in another video. 

And so he finds himself here. 

In a meeting room that he’s convinced is barricaded from the outside so he can’t slither out the door again. Another intern with pink-tinted glasses that took up half their face.

Maya’s in the midst of explaining to him that sure, his numbers had gone up by a decimal, but that was because people had started editing him into the backgrounds of other pictures for other users to find in a perplexing take on Where’s Waldo.

“Videos seem to be working,” she ties it together. “But we need more than you just standing silently behind Captain Rogers.”

“But it’s working,” Bucky objects. “I don’t see why it has to change.”

Maya sends him a glare. Bucky decides then it’s good to shut up. 

“Are you on the internet a significant amount?” the intern asks. The glasses on their face have changed colours to green. Bucky’s eyebrow furrows. 

“No.” 

For the next thirty minutes, he is subjected to a pop quiz about too many words ending with ‘core’, ‘coded’ and ‘eras’. He’s surprised that he knows what cottagecore is. He definitely doesn’t fucking know what a tomatogirl, nor does he want to. 

“What do you like doing?” the intern enunciates, pulling up a spreadsheet of niches that had built a dedicated community around themselves over the years. “Makeup? Cleaning? Parkour?”

Bucky wonders if they’d really create a montage of him just micro cleaning the kitchen every week. It doesn’t sound half bad. 

Beyond that, the only thing he can think of is woodworking, which Sam introduced him to. While he spends time creating little figures, he wouldn’t say it was– 

“You really are dead silent,” the intern breaks his train of thought, tone almost that of wonder. “Guess the whole ‘ghost story for seventy years’ is more true than I thought.”

Bucky throws him a weary look, and works on unclenching the fist that tightened involuntarily. 

“Was that necessary?” Maya’s voice comes coldly. “Take fifteen. Go find the other one we were supposed to meet.”

While sheepish and somewhat apologetic, the kid still looks relieved to be out of there. To be honest, Bucky isn’t really offended– he’s grown a thick skin over the years. But he also thought the guy was a little shit now. 

Maya turns back to him, but Bucky finds that the table contains wonders far more interesting than the conversation at hand.

“Back to what we were talking about.” She ruffles through something on her laptop. “Puppets? History?”

He wordlessly shakes his head. 

Been the former, seen too much of the latter.

Maya’s head tilts abruptly. “You like ghosts?”  

He wonders if the prior conversation had anything to do with this insightful question. 

Bucky shrugs. “Don’t exist.”

“Really,” Maya deadpans. “Aliens and multiversal baboons are fine, but no ghosts.”

“I’ve seen aliens and multiversal baboons. Never seen a ghost in my life,” Bucky argues right back.

“Other people have seen ghosts.”

“Good for other people.”

The door swings open right as Maya’s eyes narrow at him. Guess it wasn’t padlocked. 

“Whatever it is you think I did, Maya, I didn’t. I think,” you announce in a volume too much for a closed room, stopping when you see Bucky sitting cross-armed and looking delightfully disgruntled. “Oh hey, Barnes. Fancy seeing you here.”

Bucky had met you. The newest addition to the team that had made a grand entrance a couple of weeks ago. He thinks you stay on the floor below him, but he has nothing backing this hypothesis other than the disco funk music that had started appearing at odd hours of the night. 

“Please sit,” Maya cracks a smile at you that Bucky had yet to earn. “Sorry, I know our meeting is scheduled for later, but I figured we could kill two birds with one stone.”

You look between her and Bucky, who hasn’t moved an inch since you got here, much less even said hello.

“You must be really bad if Maya had to call me in,” you tell him outright. “I’m usually like, her last option.”

“Thanks,” Bucky replies dryly. 

“Look, here’s my final pitch.” Maya sighs, before turning to you. “You’re new, and we need something to introduce you slowly to the public.”

“Oh, am I finally getting hard launched?” You grin, and Bucky doesn’t know what that means. “Just imagine me kicking my feet, giggling or whatever.” 

“And he needs… an upgrade.” Maya’s thumb juts out towards Bucky who simply rolls his eyes.

“Right.” Your sight lands on him from across the table. “I’ve seen the memes.”

“What memes?” he grunts, because while the team had definitely seen them, it didn't occur to anyone they should show it to him. He loves them. Really. So much. Die for them. 

You only look too happy to pull out your phone and start typing.

“Do you know what skinwalkers are?” 

“No.”

“That’s what they say you look like, lurking in the back of all your friends’ videos,” you continue, swerving around your phone to show him.

Bucky doesn’t look impressed. He can’t say he blames them either, which makes him inexplicably maddens him.  

“At least they’re calling you their boyfriend,” you add, entirely unhelpfully. “That’s gotta count.”

“Right.” Maya clears her throat. “The both of you–” 

“Are getting paired together, I suppose,” you hum. 

Bucky’s eyebrows pull together. 

He barely knows you. Just a little bit on how you ended up here, that you enjoyed hanging out with the team, figuring out your place in the compound, and were seemingly doing a great job at it. 

You were… loud. And open. 

Bucky feels the compulsive need to compensate for that by doubling down on how silent he could get, as if the two of you couldn’t co-exist in the same space in equilibrium. 

Maya pointedly raises a finger at you. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

“For the right price, I will believe in whatever you tell me to.”

Her face lights up brighter than Bucky's ever seen.

“Great.” Maya slams her laptop closed. “See you later.”

Bucky’s left staring as she exits, not even throwing the both of you another look.

“That was quick,” your voice cuts through the silence. “What was that all about?”

 “Don’ ask me,” he grumbles, with a sinking feeling that he knew exactly what was about to follow. 

“Ghost hunting?” Bucky echoes a week later, as expected.

“Yes,” Maya tells him simply. “Two of you. A series based on paranormal activity.”

“I don’t even believe in them,” he reiterates. 

“That’s the point,” she emphasises. “Skeptic and believer. It makes for a good contrast.”

“Why us both?” He hopes it doesn’t come off as offensive. He just doesn’t see why he can’t do this with Sam. Even Clint, if a gun was really pressed to his head. 

“I’m new, no one gives a shit about me,” you say brightly and full of promise. “Yet.”

“Exactly. It’ll be low key. Not an overwhelming number of viewers, no expectations. It’s perfect for launching one Avenger and re-launching another.”

“Sounds rad.” You grin, leaning back as your feet rest on the chair in front of you.

Maya looks relieved for a moment that at least one of you was on board. “No promises on anything. We shoot one video, and if it does well, we stick with it.”

“What if I don’t want to?” Bucky argues. 

“Then you have until tomorrow morning to give us another feasible idea,” Maya dishes back.

Bucky retreats into his seat, arms crossed over his chest. 

Truth be told, he considered himself to be the most boring person in the team and though he had made his peace with that, he was sure thar bringing that up now would entail Maya shooting him in the foot.

“Fine,” he agrees and the sighs around the room are loud. 

He scoffs. So fucking dramatic and for what.

“Put her there, partner.” You stretch ungracefully over the large table, sticking out your hand.

Bucky eyes your hand. “Do you even believe in ghosts?” 

“I do now, yeah.” You nod seriously. “Love ‘em. Can’t get enough of them.”

“One video,” Maya reminds him as a balm. “And if it doesn’t work, you’re off the hook forever.”

Off the hook? Forever? For Bucky?

Yay. 

“One video,” he reiterates.

You roll your eyes before smiling when he leans forward to grab it. You yank it up and down clunkily. He blinks at you, letting go slowly. 

“Thank fuck,” Maya groans, head dropping onto the table. 

Your smile is wild. “Guess we’re doing this shit together.”

He doesn’t even have to look very deep in his soul. He already knows he’s going to suffer.

here’s my ko-fi if you’d like to support my writing!

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also i'd absolutely love to make this a community led fic like how harmless was! if you have memes or any paranormal ideas or just any prompts in general, please please send them my way <3

Next part

[bccgaras]

comrade shane madej (2020)

[praisebebaby]

[madseance]

[battleshipdrive]

BFU Quotober Day 17. Listen to the man.