#his presence in the world is Just There...fucking around economy left and right

[poliodeuces]

pantalone's anger towards the divine is so special to me. this guy hasnt appeared in the game yet but i love him and i need to witness the temperament his subordinates and the other harbingers describe lol need to see him yap in the game

[roccinan]

Hermano👀👀👀 (hopeful for new snippets)

I knew I could rely on you for that #hermanos support ;) Public shaming time asdfasdf I don't have any new snippets, but I do have more or less the whole plot of "Hermano" sketched out in my head. (Lots of spoilers below the cut!)

[ 👉 My Wips ]

It takes place directly after Hermanito AKA when Andres left the hospital 5 min. after waking up. dumbass. So we follow him and Sergio home, and Andres legit tries to act like nothing happened (the vibe: "dear diary, all the fancy restaurants are booked for Christmas parties. Maybe I could take Sergio on a ski trip. It's very hard to find gold-laced wrapping paper in this economy. If I can't find solid gold tissue paper, silver is fine too. I think Sergio would enjoy the imported chocolate I ordered for the holidays--" then in the margins, he goes, "oh yeah, we almost died the other night and I was in a coma for a week but who cares? anyway, presents-")

Andres and Sergio have completely different priorities. Which will be a Project for me because Hermano is from Andres' pov and his brain is something else. Anyway, while Andres is limping around and subconsciously projecting secret childhood trauma onto his preparations for the Perfect Christmas TM with Hermanito, Sergio's like, "hmm you don't look so well, Andres"

Eventually, Andres realizes Sergio's right because his insides shouldn't feel that way and coughing up blood isn't normal. They go to some underground street surgeon to patch him up. And Andres' delusions take a hit x1 when the guy suggests that Sergio's going to grow up to be as fucked up as him if Andres keeps raising him. (btw, no painkillers or anesthetic involved because the dude couldn't afford it LMAO- he'll be like "go buy some ibuprofen after this. I'm gonna start cutting into you now-")

Andres' delusions take a hit x2 when another of the thugs from the last story tracks him down to his shitty apartment like a day after the surgery. Andres manages to kill the guy, but not before almost dying (again). Sergio, unprompted, cleans up the blood and tells Andres how they should get rid of the body. Hit x3. Now Andres realizes maybe his idea of a perfect little life with Sergio isn't so great after all because 1) this is the second time he "failed" to protect his brother 2) maybe he's a terrible influence on Sergio after all 3) his shitty lifestyle just isn't suited for children.

But they spend Christmas together anyway, and it's the best one Andres has ever had even though they didn't get to do anything fancy.

Which is why hit x4 absolutely destroys him. Sergio falls ill again and Andres rushes him to the actual hospital (not the shady surgeon), the one he first met Sergio in. The doctor pretty much guesses Andres' entire life story at first glance and politely tells him, "hmm, I think you're a worthless nobody who's going to die from some fight on the streets. I'm disgusted by your presence already. But your little brother on the other hand, now, that's a young man with a future, if he lives lmao which he won't with you. no offense."

Since Andres has spent his entire life not listening to other people's words and building up his own delusional world, that speech shouldn't affect him. But it does because now it's not about him. It's about Sergio, the one person Andres ever cared about to this extent and the one person that truly, actually loves him back.

So Andres arranges for Sergio to be adopted by a family in Barcelona. Then he tells Sergio he doesn't want him anymore and tries to abandon him at the train station. Sergio, kid genius TM, sees right through him and doesn't get on the train. He and Andres make a really big scene there and cry a lot. Sergio makes it super clear that he's not going to Barcelona and that he wants to stay with Andres. He knows Andres doesn't think it's the best choice, he knows it's not the smartest choice, but it's what he wants. Andres didn't leave him when he had no one, so he's not going to leave Andres when it's the other way around.

The fic ends with the hermanos visiting papa Marquina's grave and Sergio teaching Andres the lyrics to bella ciao (this should have been the ending to Hermanito but I got tired adfadsf). Then Andres makes plans to take Sergio to Russia for experimental treatment, as per Alvaro's headcanons.

That's the outline in my head! Hopefully what I write will look the same LMAO and I'm hoping to publish in winter. It's up to fate!

Other things that happen:

Andres remembers that time he starred in a porno, felt it was beneath his dignity, and lost all the clothes he was wearing because they were bought by someone else. This led to him hiding out in a McDonalds bathroom, butt-naked at 2am and looking for chicken nuggets in the trash. Then the janitor tried to kick him out and Andres beat him up and stole his clothes. He considers this the lowest point of his life

Sergio gives Andres a little gift for Christmas, and Andres is surprise pikachu face

A mini-snippet that I hope to include (between the unlicensed surgeon and Andres):

"Take this."

Jose shoved a pair of earplugs into his hands. Andres quirked a brow. "Why would I need these?"

The older man laughed, a nasally trill of sounds that Andres did not appreciate. "They're not for you. They're for the kid-"

Jose grinned. "Because you're going to scream like a bitch."

Snippet from last time:

Occasionally, he would have a moment of clarity. He could step back then and see himself, not as Andres, but as he was. And he’d traded enough counterfeit art to know the difference between artifice and truth. This was a truth he’d always known, as universal as the rules of anatomy and color: Andres belonged on the pages of a sketchbook, lines of charcoal scribbled in haste and set to practice.

He was a replica of that sketch, counterfeit, a scribble made to tear out and scratch.

But Sergio? Sergio was the real deal. Sergio was the painting itself, the portrait that came from the work of countless sketches.

“You don’t have many prospects. How long do you think you can keep this up?”

“You can die on the street and nobody’d give a flying fuck.”

“You brother isn’t like you. He has a future.”

Andres looked back to the blood in his sink, the red on his knuckles, and the gashes peppering his face in the mirror. Jorge’s damned words surfaced in his head, as did the physician’s and the most accursed voice of them all: his own. They were right, he realized with a sharp- unfamiliar- ache, he could not keep this up. The dust from his charcoal had no right dirtying the gloss of Sergio’s paint. The portrait could never thrive beneath the counterfeit.

He made his choice. And he should never have fancied another option.

[creativelyderangedme]

Last Night Chapter 3

Previous chapter

Read on AO3

Before they could go gallivanting around Paris, though, Nino made a request to stop in at the club to deal with a last minute tab mix-up from the night before - which since it was on the way to the location tagged in the earliest posts of him and Ladybug, he didn't have a problem with it. It was also kind of hard to argue with a request from a guy literally planning on following you on a glorified scavenger hunt.

But before then, of course, there was also the matter of the strange hotel room mix-up that needed to be sorted out. 

So after combing over the room for anything else he might have left and changing into something a little more comfortable, both he and Nino went down to the front desk in the hotel lobby. 

The Huxton truly was a fantastically posh sort of place - giving off the air of old money with a mixture of fashionable millennial hipster charm. Warm leather chairs littered the open lobby, accented by the navy and bright reds of carpets and plush cushions, and deep greens of floral arrangements around the connecting room leading to the open terrace and bar and lounge. It was the kind of place Adrien could see himself spending a lot of time in given the chance. Something between the extravagance of his old room back at the mansion and a home he’d like to create some day; filled with things that were like him - things that screamed Adrien. 

But that was a day dream for another time.

"Good morning, Mr. Agreste, I hope your stay has been pleasant so far!" A young attendant beamed at him the moment they approached the desk. 

He recognized the bubbly blonde immediately, having been helped by her when they checked in the day before. 

Estelle was her name. 

He wondered briefly if they’d been professionally trained, or if Estelle always looked this perfectly coiffed and outwardly radiant and approachable. It sometimes took multiple cups of coffee before even he could muster the amount of charisma she seemed to have in spades. 

Adrien grimaced, but tried to hide it under a smile, "Please, just Adrien. And actually I think something happened last night and I wanted to apologize."

The young woman gave him a confused look but allowed him to continue without interruption.

"You see, I woke up in a completely different hotel room than the one we checked into yesterday, and for the life of me, I don't know how, and I am so sorry for any trouble that might have caused. I'll pay for the room and any damage fee to make up for it."

The receptionist merely blinked for a moment at his word vomit, her bubbly radiance flickering for a moment as she seemed to mentally ask herself how this always seemed to happen to her before turning back into a megawatt bulb of sunshine, "Oh! I-I see. Would you happen to remember the room number?"

"Yes, it was 414." Nino answered in his place, recognizing the mortification crawling up Adrien's spine.

Estelle nodded and quickly began typing at her terminal, silence and persistent tapping filling the void while they waited for the impending news. Though, the longer they stood there, the more confusion seemed to fill her expression, "a-actually, sir, while I'm not completely certain of the circumstances, it - it looks like you booked that room."

"What? No, I only booked the room you checked us into yesterday."

She smiled once more, though, this time it seemed a bit strained - as she turned the monitor so that he could see what she did, "it says here that this room was booked early this morning. It looks like Collette was the one to book the room for you. She's not set to arrive until later this afternoon, but I could give you a call when she does?"

Early this morning? If the time stamp was to be believed it was nearly four am when the room was booked. 

Staring at the screen wasn't giving him any further clues, so he nodded at the attendant.

"Yeah, please do. Thanks."

They began to walk away but Adrien stopped, turning back to the woman, "By chance, do you happen to remember seeing me leave here yesterday?"

Even as she appeared put off by the question, she answered him quickly.

"Yes. Both times. First with your friend and then again about an hour and a half later. Though, the second time you'd changed clothes. I remember because you asked me if I thought it looked too flashy for a club." She giggled good naturedly.

Nino snickered at his side, coughing to cover it up when Adrien scowled at him. 

Finally, they waved and headed out the hotel's main entrance.

If ever Adrien hated the reminder that alcohol was not his friend, it was then as he and Nino stepped out into the late-morning sun of a gorgeous day in Paris - where the combination of splitting headache and overwhelming nausea nearly brought him to his knees while his friend pulled up the Uber app to confirm their ride.

"You good dude?"

The blonde could only grunt in response, swallowing back the abundance of saliva in his mouth in an effort to keep from heaving.

Something that didn't exactly convince his best friend that he was in the clear, "You know they charge extra if you puke in the cars, right?"

"I'll - I'll be fine. Just give me a moment."

Nino hummed, watching him with a curious tilt to his brow, "I haven't seen you this fucked up since the day after your old man's arrest. Just how much did you drink last night anyways?"

The unwanted memory of sitting hunched over someone's (he doesn't exactly remember who's) toilet bowl while puking his guts up until he had nothing left in his system (then dry heaving for at least an hour after that) flashed in his mind. It was a party his friends had thrown to just celebrate the end of Hawkmoth's reign of terror. For him though, it had been an opportunity to forget that twenty-four hours prior to that, he'd unmasked his own father after the man had tried to kill him and his partner in the hopes of stealing their miraculous to bring back his comatose mother.

There had been a lot of things he'd wanted to forget. 

Unfortunately for him, he didn't have the tolerance for the alcohol he drank. Landing him in a nice cozy embrace with the porcelain throne the next day.

Apparently he still didn't have the tolerance.

Through his musings of the past, Adrien failed to notice his friend fishing something from his bag to hand to him until it was waving in his face.

A pair of aviators. 

The blonde thanked him before putting the glasses on, reducing the ever present sting of light on his hungover brain. And just in time as a car pulled up to take them to their destination.

The ride to the bar was blessedly short and Adrien had managed to keep his stomach from rolling for the most part, but was very thankful when they climbed out of the silver economy compact with a half hearted wave and 5 stars.

Looking up at the ostentatious entrance to Chez Moune, the blonde had the strangest rush of dejavu. Something about the gold embellished entrance trim sparking familiarity that he couldnt place.

Nino walked right past him and through the doors, making his way up to the main club room and Adrien shook off his thoughts to follow after. 

The former cabaret turned dance club was lit brightly for the early staff, stocking and preparing for another night of fun for tourists and local party seekers alike. 

It was a club that Nino had managed to land more than a couple gigs, and had reserved a portion of for the going away party they’d all thrown him the night before. Celebrating the next leg of his life...

I’m leaving town soon. Tonight I’m supposed to be celebrating...

The voice wrapped around him like a fine silk, beckoning him towards the edge of a memory. Red - he was surrounded by red and moving shadows. And if he listened hard enough, he could hear the pounding of a bass beat that synced with the beating of his heart - steady and rhythmic and sultry. 

There was the twinkling of bells riding on the coat-tails of a sweet voice.

You’ll get over it, I’m sure...

"Hey man - did you hear me?”

Adrien blinked, and the red club lights and shifting bodies disappeared, leaving an entirely too quiet empty bar and bright fluorescents. It took another moment before he realized he’d been asked a question, turning to look at Nino and ground himself in the present once more.

"Dude, you sure you’re good?"

His adam’s apple bobbed with the force of his swallow, but he nodded slowly. He was dizzy, and for the first time, not because he was hungover.

The blonde turned back to the bar and snippets pieced themselves together in his mind, bringing clarity to what felt like a fever dream.

"I actually did make it back."

"What?"

Adrien ran his tongue over parched lips, “I made it back to the club,” he said quietly, almost absently, but with much more confidence as he stared unseeing at a pair of bar chairs on the far side of the room.

There. 

That's where he'd seen her.

When he'd managed to make it back to the club and no one was the wiser of his identity behind the black mask, he'd looked up to find his friends, only for his eyes to lock on her almost immediately in the crowd.

Understatement of the year, but, It had been a total shock to his system. Knocking the breath clean from his chest as he took her in.

It wasn't the red mask or the signature pig-tails hidden beneath a chic rimmed hat that had given her away.

Funny enough, it was her skirt.

Maybe not funny, because the presence of that one article of clothing had turned his world on its head. 

It was more than possible he was mistaken. It could have been anyone.

But not just anyone could pull off ladybug spots. Which she did. Oh god she did. It was a long,  high-waisted skirt with a bow in the same fabric on her hip. 

But he'd remember that skirt anywhere. She'd only ever worn it one other time, afterall, and it was the last time he'd seen her, so the memory of her outfit from that day was burned into his memory.

It had to be her.

Right? 

Adrien ignored the crowd as he made his way over to her, all the while his heart raced and mind fumbled over what he was going to say. The nerves were killing him. What if he was wrong? What if this was a complete stranger and he made an absolute fool of himself.

But what if it was her, a voice pushed in the back of his head, sounding suspiciously like Plagg. 

He fought himself the entire way over, his mind completely unaware of the body's natural magnetism to the woman until he was standing close enough he could reach out.

It was now or never.

“What’s a lady like you doing in a place like this?”

Mentally, he'd face-palmed at the absolutely horrid words spilling from his mouth. Seriously? That's what he went with?

The lady in question rolled her eyes at what was probably not the first pick-up line she’d heard that evening, turning to look at him, blue eyes flashing with something close to shock and recognition before a brow pulled up under her mask. 

She searched him for a moment. 

The longest moment of his life. 

Those eyes (if he was right, and he was positive that he was - oh god please let him be right) had always been so expressive - and he could see everything as it flashed in her expression; uncertainty, disbelief, reluctant recognition again before a smirk slowly graced her perfectly painted red lips, “Really? That’s the best you got?”

"For now, yes.” He nodded decisively, before finally taking the open seat next to her, “Though it did get you talking to me, so, I count that as a win."

She eyed him critically again before commenting, "Smooth."

"I try."

"Too hard."

He chuckled, because she always had been quite sharp-tongued and feisty. Good to see that hadn’t changed. “You never did answer my earlier question, though.”

"Why should I? You're a stranger in a bar."

Maybe, maybe not, he wanted to say, but thought better of trying to be too pushy.

"That's fair. You don't have to answer if you don't want to."

He could see her eyeing him critically out of his peripherals. 

“I’m leaving town soon. Tonight I’m supposed to be celebrating, but it just doesn’t feel right.”

He didn't let the grin spread over his lips at having gotten an answer, but did nod along, “I understand the feeling.”

“Oh?”

“As it turns out, I’ll be leaving town soon as well. And I too am supposed to be celebrating.” what were the chances they'd both be here celebrating? Slim to nil.

“So what’s your excuse?”

“Well, I saw this lovely lady sitting at the bar and felt it was my sworn duty to keep her company.”

The masked woman snorted a chuckle, trying desperately to hide the amused grin as she brought her drink to her lips, “Wow. That was worse than your intro.”

“Meowch. You wound me!”

He caught the way her eyes cut back over him at the pun before answering, “You’ll get over it, I’m sure.” Laughing lightly into the back of her hand, sweetly, like twinkling bells.

He could spend eternity getting lost in the sounds she made, but he had a mission. He could not allow himself to be distracted.

He waved over a bartender and ordered a rum and coke, throwing a few bills on the counter, exchanging currency for liquid courage before turning back to his companion.

“Why doesn’t it feel right to be celebrating?”

She hummed, considering her words as she peered over at him and the drink he made himself busy consuming, then turning back to stare at the glass she passed back and forth between her fingers on the bar top, "There was - something I had hoped to do before I left Paris, but I don't think that's possible anymore… I missed my chance."

Missed her chance? Adrien fought every instinct in his body urging him to envelope this woman in his arms and tell her it wasn't too late - but he had no idea what she was referring to.

And it hadn't been her that had missed their chance. No, the blame for that was solely on his shoulders. "I see. I'm sorry to hear that." He murmured softly, not quite sure what else to say to her confession. 

Which left them sitting in an awkward silence that neither seemed to know how to dissipate. Both turning to finish their respective drinks.

That is, until the bartender came back around not five minutes after their glasses were empty with a fresh drink for the both of them.

Adrien’s masked companion immediately went to rectify the oversight, “Oh! But I-”

“On the house.” The bartender smiled, looking between the two of them - a kid in a candy store kind of giddiness to his stare, nodding his head like he was trying to find the right words to say before settling on, “And thanks. For everything.”

Both Adrien and his masked companion’s eyes widened at his words.

Neither confirming or denying his claims.

And the bartender didn’t stick around long enough for them to do so, either.

There was a moment where both of them just sat there staring at the drinks placed in front of them. Like taking the drinks would confirm every suspicion dancing between them. 

“I-it was almost like he recognized us or… something…” She said softly, and had it not been for his enhanced hearing, he probably would have missed it. She reached out and took the drink and Adrien watched as she stared at it, the faintest hint of a smile pulling at the corner of her lips. A soft yet sad far away look in her eyes.

A small chuckle escaped him as he too took his drink, “... or something.” He confirmed.

They were dancing around their identities again. It was so familiar and so frustrating, but he didn’t dare broach the subject in fear of breaking whatever spell kept her seated next to him instead of leaving. 

Because she had every right to.

She had every right to get up and leave and never say another word to him. Disappear into anonymity like a ghost of his past destined to haunt his every waking thought, but dancing just out of reach.

So he accepted the drink and accepted the company even if it meant hiding behind masks again, because - God he missed her.

He missed the easy conversion. He missed the quiet moments spent on rooftops under the stars. He missed her chiding him for his jokes. And he missed the way she demanded he take care of himself. Like her happiness depended entirely on his wellbeing.

And despite everything, he'd be lying if he said he wasn't still irrevocably in love with her.

It wasn't until they'd both nearly finished their free rounds that something caught the lady’s eye and made her groan to herself.

"Whats with the sound of distaste?"

She hummed, and shook her head, remembering her audience of one, "nothing. Just saw something gross." She threw back the rest of her drink then turned back to him, “You know… this place is seriously beat.” grumbling, and looking for sympathy.

But instead, she would be met with a flash of inspiration across his face. “Then what are we waiting for?” he stood, nearly knocking over his chair, but steadied himself, reaching out to offer her his hand, “Let’s blow this joint.”

She sputtered a laugh as she looked between his face and the hand he outstretched to her, “And go where? Do what?”

What couldn’t they do? He smiled, feeling an overwhelming excitement take hold of him. Like he’d just transformed and he could feel the power Plagg once offered wash over him. “Everything.”

“Everything?”

He nodded, not at all deterred by the ‘you’ve grown two heads’ expression on her face, “You said you’re leaving town soon, right?"

"Yes?"

“Then, what would one night of fun hurt?”

Because right now, he was Chat Noir. He could leap great distances, climb towers, defeat evil. They could do anything as long as they were together. 

"B-but I don't even know you. You don't even know me!"

He grinned still, "Perhaps we know each other better than we think we do? Either way, we're two people about to leave Paris. We can't just go without giving the city one last chance to give us an adventure, right? Something sweet to remember it by."

She chuckled again, looking dazed and stricken, and trying to convince herself that the man before her was nothing but a creep trying to lure her away. She glanced at something over his shoulder, but her eyes kept coming back to rest on him. The indecision was being overshadowed by a spark of temptation in her features - something giving away how badly she wanted to say yes.

All he needed to do was give her a reason. 

“Would I ever steer you wrong, M’Lady?”

The mystery woman's eyes widened as Adrien made the comment, confirmation of his suspicions in a single gaze as he offered her his hand in invitation. He could have said anything, and she could have denied it. She could have brushed off the comment as him being a terrible flirt and told him to take a hike.

Instead, recognition lit her eyes like summer fireworks and painful tenderness filled her stare.

And despite everything, She took his hand.

"No, I suppose you wouldn't. Would you, Chaton?"

[xenoredux]

The Legend of Silver Fang - Episode 1: The Birth

Alright, first part of the GNG rewrite aaaaayyy! As with the last rewrite, the major story beats and overarching plot are the same. This is written under the supposition that, in fantasy land, this is a mini series with episodes that run about 2 hours in length each. 

Some things to be aware of going in:

This story is violent as shit!!! CONTENT WARNING FOR: Firearms, various kinds of physical trauma, injuries to people and animals, the deaths of people and animals, search and rescue missions, self harm, animal and child abuse, and just a whole lotta spilled blood. Basically if any form of violence upsets you, it’d be a good idea not to read ahead

I was trying to achieve a decent adaptation that combines the strongest elements of the anime and manga. It will not be precisely like either and will occasionally totally deviate from both

This isn’t meant to be “better” then the canon. It’s just the way I’d go about rewriting the Akakabuto arc if I had that level of ungodly power lol

Character designs made to represent several mentioned characters can be found here and here. Others will be left up to the reader’s interpretation. A link to the next episode will also be provided at the end. If a link isn’t available, the next episode just hasn’t been posted yet!

THIS ALSO MARKS THE 34TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ANIME SO HAPPY BIRTHDAY GNG LMAO enjoy

In the year 198somethingidk in the forests of Japan, a white Akita Inu named Shiro ("white") is tailing behind an unusually large Ussuri brown bear dubbed "Akakabuto" ( "red helmet") by the nearby village's populace due to the unusual red tuft of fur trailing down his back. Shiro is followed by his owner, a crotchety old fart named Gohei Takeda, renowned bear hunter and the world's least called out animal abuser (hint: this will become relevant later.)

Before the old man can take aim with his rifle, however, the shadowy mass from the winter darkness barrels towards him. As the dog tries to leap to his owner's defense, Akakabuto smacks off a good portion of Grandpa Point-n-Shooty's face, sending a severed human ear flying into a bloodied patch of snow. Shiro takes this as an invitation to do his best impersonation of Lassie and dives at the monstrous beast, grasping hard atop his muzzle to avoid his claws. From a nearby hill, a small red puppy watches the horror unfold.

While Shiro baits the bear, as is his job as a bear-dog, Gohei fires a bullet into the massive animal's right eye. The eyeball bursts in the bear's skull, but it also stops the bullet from traveling through his brain, instead lodging it into his grey matter and jostling around his nerve centers and pituitary gland. Understandably pissed at Gohei taking the shot, Akakabuto swipes madly at him until both himself and the dog stumble blindly off the edge of a cliff, resulting in what is surmised to be their deaths. Gohei faints in a snowbank, his vision running red with blood, as the unseen red puppy runs back to civilization to bring help.

Five years pass. Gohei continues to raise, train, and hunt with Akitas, but now it's for more then the sake of bringing home bear skins. He believes Akakabuto is still alive, and he wants revenge. The massive scar on the left side of his face is explanation enough for anyone to understand why. He continues to explore the forest near his home, now aided by several new dogs, including one of Shiro's sons, a powerful red Akita named Riki ("power" or "strength") and the same puppy who had saved Gohei's life all those years ago.

Riki has comfortably begun filling his father's shoes, enough so that he's established a reputation as one of the best bear-dogs in Japan. With a title like that, it wasn't long before Riki had been mated to an equally powerful and very pretty red brindle Akita named Fuji, and the buns he'd so kindly plopped into her oven were fit to enter the bakery of life and this analogy sucks

Fuji is not Gohei's dog. She belongs to the Fujiwaras, a neighboring nuclear family who own and operate a ski resort in the mountains. Daisuke Fujiwara, a young boy with a heart of gold and a nose of snot, has been tending to his dog during her pregnancy, and she's finally delivered what is universally understood as The Best Thing Ever: a litter of roly poly puppies! Daisuke is especially taken with the smallest of the babies, a handsome silver brindle boy, because Daisuke is a stuck up dog fancier who believes silver brindles, or Tora-Ges ("tiger striped") make the best hunting dogs. He ever-so-creatively dubs the puppy Gin ("silver") and decides the infant will do him proud someday.

But all is not well in Skiiertown. Gohei's hunt of Akakabuto isn't just motivated by vengeance. The village mayor is currently trailing behind Gohei and his dogs, discussing how the town needs money from tourists and that Akakabuto's alleged presence would surely make some of them go "yeah, no" and leave. Gohei doesn't care about the economy, but he does care that a man named Genji from the neighboring town has been mauled under """mysterious""" circumstances.

As the two oldies argue about which is more important, money or human lives, Riki scents and points out the mutilated remains of two wayward tourists, a young man and his girlfriend. He also runs defensively to Gohei's side, snarling wildly. Everyone looks around, confused. Suddenly, a flash of black and red drops from the tree branches above onto the men and dogs. As the men's screams and dogs' cries fill the air, so does a fountain of their blood.

Soon after, forest rangers in helicopters are dispatched to locate and rescue the missing persons and - if they can manage it, no pressure at all - kill the illusive demon bear before he slaughters more innocents. Daisuke watches the helicopters pass overhead and leaps onto his snowmobile, incapable of not getting involved in anything.

He makes a beeline for Gohei's now abandoned camping tent. Finding it empty, he's about to drive off elsewhere when paramedics emerge from the wall of trees beside him. The mayor, bloodied and broken, is being carried on a stretcher. Daisuke runs up to him and asks what happened to Gohei and Riki, to which he's met with a simple "Akakabuto" as the man slips from consciousness.

Daisuke rushes back home to break the news to Fuji and her puppies about what happened to their doghusband and dogdad. Daisuke holds Gin close and insists Riki can't die until he's seen his shiny Pokemon of a son, to which Gin, being literally like a day old, merely whimpers and wiggles. Gazing misty eyed at the puppy, Daisuke changes his mind. Gohei can't be dead. Riki can't be dead. No mere bear could kill a man like Gohei or a dog like Riki.

Ten days pass. Neither Riki nor Gohei's bodies have been found, but the bodies of Gohei's other dogs, Riki's eldest son Aka ("red") and friend Don, have been located by lodge personnel. The animals were mauled so severely that everyone begins giving up the ghost on this whole "finding Gohei alive" business. Besides that, the cacophanic cries from Akakabuto have frightened everyone into leaving the forest, afraid of becoming the next victims. The bear is greatly distressed - his brain damage leaves him unable to rest for more then an hour at a time, let alone hibernate, and being awake during winter is disorienting him. He runs madly around the forest, roaring and swinging his massive claws at anything that moves and also most things that don't.

While the bear plods around wreaking havoc in the night, Daisuke is dreaming. He dreams of the old man and his dog languishing somewhere in the woods, starving to skeletal husks. He dreams that Gohei, in an act of desperation, raises his gun barrel to Riki's head. The old coot, overcome with hunger pangs and a desperation to survive, murmurs an apology to his dog, explaining a dude's gotta eat. He fires off a shot in Riki's skull, killing his closest companion, before tearing savagely into the dog's flesh with his bear hands. And I do mean bear hands, as Gohei begins to turn into Akakabuto, ripping the dog's flesh, then the Earth itself to pieces.

Daisuke awakens beside a sleeping Fuji a moment later. He's absolutely covered in sweat. He laments on how fucked up his dream was as he reaches out and caresses first Fuji, then Riki's puppies, praying that at least the first half of his dream, the half in which Gohei and Riki are still alive, is true.

Unbeknownst to everyone but Daisuke's subconscious, Gohei and Riki are in fact still alive! The two managed to struggle into a ravine just out of the bear's reach, and they've been holed up ever since. Riki's back has been shredded badly, and Gohei's right leg has been broken, mauled, and rendered useless. Gohei has begun to get sick of sitting on his ass incapable of doing anything, and with an ominous glint in his eye, raises the hatchet he had been carrying in his pack above Riki's head, murmuring something about home cooking...

In a twisted, eerie parallel to Daisuke's dream, the old man brings the weapon down, but not on the petrified dog in his lap. Instead, he's sliced through his own injured leg! Having severed the useless limb from the knee down, Gohei demands Riki eat his flesh, regain his energy, and seek help at the village just as he did when he was a youngster. Riki is understandably not for this, and his resistance in the form of wailing and vomiting is loud enough to catch the attention of the red helmeted hellspawn himself. In an effort to protect his even-more-fucked-up-now owner, Riki does indeed gather the last of his energy to throw himself at the bear.

Daisuke's dad begins leading a patrol back into the forest, saying that even if they're dead, Gohei and his dog's bodies can't be left to stink up the woods. Daisuke cuddles a quickly growing Gin as he asks to go, but he's told to stay home with the puppies. After all, Fuji is coming with the crew to find her doghusband and his owner's corpses.

Diasuke pouts for the 5 minutes it takes the men to be entirely out of sight before shoving Gin into his coat and plopping himself into the seat of his snowmobile, once again refusing to be left out of the excitement. Meanwhile, Riki continues his dual with Akakabuto, experiencing the slicing and dicing of a lifetime at the hands of the fiend.

The battle between bear and dog rages on, and fresh blood from both animals spatters the fresh fallen snow. Daisuke, having vroomed on over, catches sight of this historic event from atop a hill, and without a second thought begins driving down towards the bear. He tells Gin to have a look at his father, and once Gin realizes that his dad isn't the big red bear, he's awed at his old man's strength and resilience. This thought is interrupted by Daisuke screaming a one liner and driving over an incline, sending the snowmobile flying right into the bear's face. Daisuke and Gin both bail from the vehicle, and Gin tumbles out of Daisuke's jacket.

Akakabuto appropriately gathers his bearings before lunging at Daisuke, pissed off that a child has bitchslapped him with a small car. Diasuke screams for help as a bloodied, super manly arm yoinks him quickly into the ravine. It's (obviously) Gohei! He's (as we've established) still alive, and frankly very surprised to see Daisuke here! But Riki's still in unsafe territory outside, as is...

Gin! The puppy has tumbled into the bear's path, and he's too slow and uncoordinated to run to safety. Thankfully, Riki has already thrown himself at Akakabuto to save the little lad he's only just met. Daisuke and Gohei watch helplessly as the dual continues, as does a spellbound Gin.

Riki manages to break away from Akakabuto and snag up his son, but the lack of food and the constant stress on his body have taken everything out of him, and he collapses to the forest floor, Gin clutched in his teeth. Daisuke and Gohei call out to him, encourage him to come just a bit further, begging him to save himself and his son, but he just can't do it, even with the knowledge of the puppy's lineage in mind.

In a final heroic act, Riki works every muscle he's got one last time to leap forward just enough so he can yeet his son into the ravine. His effort works, and Gin finds himself safely landing in Daisuke's trembling arms, but it's too late for Riki. As the dog gazes helplessly at his master, his friend, and his child, Akakabuto delivers a final blow to his side. The red bear sends the red dog tumbling off a nearby cliff, and Riki disappears into the black snowy depths below, followed by a trail of blood and Gohei's cries of anguish.

Pissed beyond words, Gohei drags himself out of the ravine, hatchet clenched in his fist. He's just about to tell Akakabuto to 1v1 him scrub, but then everyone hears something. It's the search party come to call, all armed with guns and thermoses of hot cocoa. Akakabuto takes one look at all those shiny boom sticks and high tails it, leaving a madly wailing Gohei behind.

Daisuke emerges from the hole with Gin in his arms, much to his own father's surprise. As the men gather to take the boy, puppy, and old man to safety, Gohei drags himself to the cliffside and weeps openly for the loss of his beloved dog and closest friend.

In a short while, Gohei finds himself on a stretcher all his own. He congratulates Fuji on her litter and Daisuke on his silver brindle puppy, assuring him that Gin will make a fine bear-dog someday. Diasuke is understandably feeling glum as Gohei is carted off to hospital, but he's emboldened by the old man's words, as is his puppy. Gin is too young to speak or even truly understand what's happened, but he knows something lifechanging has taken place.

Several weeks pass. Gin and his siblings grow larger, large enough for Daisuke to initiate training them for their futures as hunting dogs. The boy has masterminded only the most exhausting, trying test of ability for the young animals today: cross a snowy field to get to him. While his siblings flop through the ice like suffocating fish, Gin's intuitive sense of laziness takes him onto the clean-driven road, where he easily makes his way into Daisuke's admiring arms. Daisuke decides that Gin is a veritable puppy prodigy, and he refuses to ever let him go.

Before he can heap more praise onto the puppy, here comes Shinji, one of Diasuke's classmates and closest non-canine friend. Shinji comes bearing news: Gohei has left the hospital at long last. Not because the doctor cleared him to, but because the impatient inpatient insisted he couldn't wait around with his thumb up his ass (or up the wound in his leg) any longer. Akakabuto has only continued to terrorize and traumatize the village folk and their visitors.

This doesn't surprise Daisuke, who is, at anything, glad that someone still has the gumption to do something about That Asshole In The Woods. Gumption doesn't benefit everyone, insists Shinji. Given Gin's a silver brindle and demonstrably the most protagonist-y out of the whole litter, Gohei will surely come to take him someday. He's Riki's son, after all, and now that Riki is gone, someone will have to fill his pawprints.

Daisuke is preemptively heartbroken, remembering back to the first time he saw the elderly man come back into town with his dogs. Gohei had taken a blunt stick and smacked Don around with it for some unknown insolence that transpired during their last hunt. The memory sends Daisuke's stomach and emotions reeling, and he clings to Gin.

Or perhaps his heartbreak was not so preemptive, because Gohei began chugging along towards the ski lodge the moment he left the hospital parking lot. The old man barges in on the boys' conversation and snags Gin up by the scruff of his little neck. Diasuke's dad notices the commotion and busts into it, telling Gohei the doctor demanded he get 6 months more bedrest. Gohei ignores him, instead striking Gin across the face for no reason but to test how pussy the puppy is. This only causes Gin to begin chewing in anger on the old man's fingers, to which the weirdass only grins.

Daisuke isn't happy about his dog being slapped out of nowhere, but Gohei insists it proves Gin's got a fighting spirit, an inherent gameness. Not like those worthless siblings of his, who Gohei proves aren't worthy of being mentioned outside of the first arc ever again by bopping them both in the face as well. To a chorus of squealing, crying puppies, Gohei leaves, carrying Gin away.

As Daisuke cries after Gohei not to kill the dog, the old man carries the puppy out of sight. Gohei takes the puplet to his cabin, showcasing his collection of bear skulls and animal hides. He leans back from his crutches and informs Gin that he'll be trained in much the same way his father was.

Gin doesn't understand what this means until Gohei picks up a stick and starts beating the everloving shit out of him. Daisuke seems to have had a hunch this would happen, because he's followed Gohei home, and the moment he sees what he's doing to Gin, he's even more pissed then the last time he lost a game of Fortnite.

Diasuke can't keep himself from whining about "animal abuse" and how "it's not good to beat infants" and other special snowflakery, to which Gohei responds by deadass picking up his rifle. He reaches down towards the battered Gin, lifts him up beside the barrel, and fires off a shot into an ancient bear skull on one of his shelves, shattering it to splinters. The gun is so GODDAMN LOUD that Daisuke falls back from the noise, and yet the tiny Gin doesn't even flinch. He seems more mystified by the gun then scared of it, a level of comfort that Gohei remarks Riki took a year of training to achieve.

Gohei says that Daisuke can leave whenever he'd like, because this dog is too suited for the job for him to ever surrender him. Daisuke unhappily ceases arguing, but he insists on staying and watching Gin train, to which Gohei just shrugs dismissively.

The next morning, Daisuke awakens in Gohei's cabin to the sound of Gin's whimpering. He rushes outside to find Gohei trying to forcefeed Gin bear flesh, a strong smelling meat with the world's most uninviting texture. When Daisuke tries to interfere, Gohei punches the 10 year old squarely in the jaw, making it ludicrously hard for the audience to appreciate his presence. Gohei insists he's doing this to get Gin acquainted with the enemy's scent and prove to him his will to live, but all Daisuke hears is "wah wah wah me like torture children".

At suppertime that day, Gohei offers Daisuke some of the soup he's made. Daisuke says he refuses to eat until Gin does. Gin has yet to have eaten any bear meat, and Gohei refuses to back down and feed him anything else. Instead, Gohei supplements Daisuke's meal for a story about a dog he owned long before Gin was born.

The dog was a Tosa Inu named Rikiou ("king of power"), and he never knew fear, common sense, or self preservation. The first bear he ever encountered was too big for him to fight off, and, unwilling to back down for even a moment, it killed him. His head was crushed like a grape. Daisuke wavers on what this story means, but he assumes it means that if Gin wants to survive, he'll take the most logical route to do so, and that his aversion to bear meat will likely grant him more respect for bears' power in future. Gohei had no moral in mind tbh. He just likes rambling about his dogs (okay relatable)

The next morning, Daisuke decides he's done watching his puppy's samurai-training and goes home. He's back only long enough to greet his parents when everyone hears a scratching at the window. It's Gin! He followed Daisuke back home! Daisuke takes this as a sign that Gin would rather live with him then with Gohei, but he doesn't receive a chance to make this so.

Gohei comes up from behind the puppy and gives him a swift bop in the side with one of his crutches. He then snags a rope around the little pooch's neck. Gin wails miserably as the old timer takes him back to his cabin for another day of bruising and starving.

Three days later, Daisuke comes to call on Gohei once again, mostly to make sure Gin isn't dead yet. Gin isn't dead, but he IS super weak. Gohei states that the little bugger has stubbornly refused bear flesh for the past few days, which means he's had nothing to eat in nearly a week. Daisuke is at the end of his rope with this insolent boomer and starts kicking and stomping the bear meat around the room.

He straight up tells Gohei to fight him if he doesn't like it when he notices the old man looking past him towards Gin. When Daisuke turns, he realizes that Gin is finally, FINALLY eating! Now that the bear meat's been stomped on, it's soft enough for the little dude to sink his baby teeth into.

Several months pass. One day, Diasuke and Shinji are piddlefarting around town. The two become enraptured with the guns inside a weapons shop. Daisuke thinks out loud about how Akakabuto could easily be defeated if the guy who went after him had a rifle as powerful as these. His train of thought is interrupted by a man and his dog, a German Shepherd, entering the store. The man orders his dog to wait outside, and the animal follows his command with no hesitation.

The boys go to have a better look at the pooch, a young, handsome dog in a brown collar. The dog gazes boredly at the two. Shinji is impressed with the dog's obedience, but since he's neither an Akita nor a brindle, Daisuke couldn't care less.

Tired of gawking at a stranger's dog, the two head back to Gohei's place to peep what Gin's up to. "He's up to eating," Gohei basically says. But what he actually meant was "he's up to learning how to swim without breathing so he can eat the bear meat I've put at the bottom of a water basin". Which, by the way, is what Gin's doing. In fact, Gin will continue doing this exercise of his twice a day every day for several weeks, growing in muscle mass and understanding of how to not die via water inhalation.

In the meantime, Gohei sorta zones out while hovering over Gin's personal swimming pool. He mutters something about Riki training just like this to the boys, to which Shinji politely excuses himself and runs home. God forbid he stay behind to hear an old man ramble.

Daisuke, on the other hand, is a nerd who is intrigued by the knowledge Gohei possesses. He asks what it was like hunting with Riki, to which Gohei chuffs and turns away. He doesn't go into detail about his dog - he's still in mourning - but he does detail what it's like to hunt bears. It's all math and muscle memory, he says, much to Daisuke's disbelief.

Gohei asserts that the simplest way to kill a bear is to abide by The Centre Line Rule, a theory among bear hunters that states that all of a bear's weakest points are down the middle of its body when it's standing erect. Fire a shot off into a bear's chest or gut or forehead from dead center, and you'll learn why it's called "dead" center. Daisuke doesn't know if he believes the boomer, but he rolls the idea around in his head as he watches Gin collect his soggy rations.

After a bit of time passes, Gohei comes to visit Daisuke. He brings little Gin along with him. At first, Gin's siblings are very happy to see him. They rush towards him to play, cheering about how their brother has returned, and he instantly kicks their asses. Gin's siblings are no longer very happy to see him. They run to their mother's side for comfort as Gin comes to a heel at Gohei's leg in an insanely powerful flex on momma's boys everywhere.

Daisuke asks the old hunter what he's doing poking around these here parts, and after scolding him for speaking like a cowboy, Gohei invites him along to watch Gin's first hunting trip. Obviously since something's happening, Daisuke MUST be included.

The three head out to a river gorge nearby to blast some ducks outta the sky. Gohei is taking his sweetass time with aiming and firing, which is very uncharacteristic of him. It soon becomes obvious why, though. As soon as he manages to snipe a bird outta the air, he allows it to fall into the ravine below before commanding Gin to go in after it.

Gin is still too full of vim and vigor to be afraid, so he leaps into the foaming snake of water below, his basin training finally showing some use. From somewhere nearby, a man's voice can be heard barking commands in English, which I cannot transcribe here because I don't speak English.

As Gin braves the rapids, a familiar silhouette also comes down into the gorge. It's another dog, and Daisuke recognizes it! It's the pompous German Shepherd from the weapons shop, and before you can learn how to properly pronounce "nagareboshi", he's snagged Gin's bird up and started making off with it!

Daisuke shouts obscenities at the thieving bastard as Gin follows behind him. For the first time, Gin begins to speak to another dog, though all the humans hear is adorable yipping. Gin tells the dog to let go of his master's kill. The dog makes like he's going to say something sarcastic back, but his mouth is too full to speak.

Instead, the dog continues to bolt, finishing his sprint by climbing to the top of the cliffside and leaping to the other side of the ravine. Little Gin tries to follow suit, but his anime protag powers haven't truly kicked in yet, and instead he ends up missing the mark and tumbling back down into the water below. The shepherd snorts in smug amusement before scampering away.

Gin, Gohei, and Daisuke pack up and start heading home. Gohei is visibly annoyed at the loss of the kill. Even Gin looks forlorn about it. Just as Daisuke begins trying to soothe the two of them, a Jeep drives past. Sitting proudly in the backseat is a dog - the German Shepherd from before! Daisuke and Gin both call out to the thief to return their kill, and the man driving the Jeep stops and gets out to meet them.

Daisuke recognizes the man from the gun shop, but only Gohei knows his name. The young man is called Hidetoshi Sekiguchi, and he's the son of the village mayor, the man who was attacked by Akakabuto alongside Gohei.

Hidetoshi apologizes for the inconvenience regarding the bird, but assures them that it was his kill all along. He tosses the bird's carcass to Daisuke to prove it. The bird's head is missing, clearly having been blasted off its feathery shoulders by the force of a bullet. That bullet came from the shiny, new, powerful-looking rifle Hidetoshi had just purchased.

The young man is a doctor by trade but a hunter at heart, and he's come all the way back from the UK with this new gun and his faithful hunting dog John to kill the bear that mauled his father. Gohei tries to tell Hidetoshi that all the fancy equipment and stuck up canines in the world aren't enough to kill that bear, to which Hidetoshi just patronizingly grins and drives away.

As Hidetoshi and John drive out of sight, Daisuke and Gohei begin heading home. Gin trails a little behind, both spellbound by John's achievement and poise as well as frustrated by his stolen victory. He swears to himself that if he ever sees the GSD again, he won't lose to him once more. He scrunches up his little baby face in determination before following behind the others.

A couple more weeks pass generally uneventfully. Gin continues his training and keeps growing rapidly. Daisuke has tried to keep himself involved in Gin's upbringing, but he's been cooped up inside for a few days now. A blizzard combined with the constant looming threat of Akakabuto makes his parents uncomfy with letting him lollygag around in the woods. So tonight he's chillin' inside with his folks when suddenly they hear an erratic banging at the door. Fuji gets up and snarls, looking more scared then aggressive.

Suddenly, the door flies open and its glass windows, frosted from the cold, shatter. A man tumbles headlong into the living room. A large, bloody gash on the side of his head oozes all over the new rug, horrifying the family for both altruistic and materialistic reasons. Daisuke's father runs to the man's side, trying to keep him awake, while his mother runs to call an ambulance.

The man begins gibbering through bloodied teeth about a monster with a red mane and how his friends and son are still in danger. Daisuke's dad sends his son off to retrieve Gohei, which Daisuke does without skipping a beat because oh my god something he can be involved in, SCORE.

Treading through the snow on his shiny new prosthetic leg, Gohei allows Gin to lead he and Daisuke back to the man. Gohei recognizes him immediately - he's an old hunting buddy, a renowned bear hunter named Shigematsu. Gohei catches the attention of the languishing lad just long enough to see recognition in his eyes before Shigematsu succumbs to his injuries, dying on Daisuke's floor.

Gohei knows he can't stand idly by while Shigematsu's crew are at risk, so he gathers his rifle and his dog and heads out the door. As they leave, Gin looks over his shoulder for an instant at his mother. Fuji gazes longingly at her son as he exits the house. Daisuke and his father follow behind Gohei and head off to gather the same dudes who have been wandering around in the forest looking for bear attack victims for the past several months at this point.

As the group enters the woods, they come across an unexpected sight. It's Hidetoshi and John. Word spread quickly through the village about the man dying from a bear attack, and Hidetoshi wants a chance to fire a few bullets into Akakabuto's ass to make up for his suffering. He joins the men in their hike to Shigematsu's cabin, much to Gin's dismay. Gin still isn't very fond of the callous asshole of a shepherd he's forced to walk beside. John sneers at him, fully aware of how bothersome his presence is.

Meanwhile at Shigematsu's cabin, his remaining friends are trembling and sweating, guns in hand. They know the bear is lurking just outside the cabin somewhere, having a merry little picnic of any men who tried to escape. They inch against the wall only to find it crumbling behind them. A gigantic bear with a red trail of fur down its back roars and swings its mighty paws at the men, shattering their skulls upon impact. Their screams ring through the winter air, entangling with the buzzing of the wind.

By the time the group reaches the cabin, the bear is wandering outside. Gin takes one look at it and leaps into action, ready to be the bear-hound he was meant to be, before tumbling into a snowdrift he can't wiggle out of. John makes fun of the stoopid newb xDDD before using his longer, less silly legs to bumrush the big boogieman of a bear. He snarls and snaps at the predator's face, swiftly dodging his swaying claws.

Gin finally manages to free himself from his strongest enemy yet, the snow, and follows John's example. Only he uses a different source of inspiration for his moves: the memory of his father clinging desperately to the upper side of the bear's snout.

It's already been seen that Gin isn't very agile yet, and the bear takes full advantage of this by smacking him away as if batting at a silver striped fly, sending the puppy squealing into the snow, embarrassed but otherwise unharmed. Daisuke rushes to make sure Gin is alright. The men all open fire on the bear, but the fierce blizzard winds prevent them from getting a good hit on him.

The bear makes a break for it only to be distracted by John. Hidetoshi takes aim while his pet busies the big boy and fires his rifle off square in the animal's chest. The unsteady teddy stumbles with a wail of pain, rolling back into the snow.

As the bear tries to get up once again, Hidetoshi lets loose another bullet into the animal's left eye, finally sending it to bear hell where it belongs. In a moment of catharsis, he lets fly a few more bullets into the dead animal's skull, images of his father's mauled corpse dancing in traumatic fashion around his head. Everyone is still for a moment.

Hidetoshi is about to say something about honor and family or whatever when Gohei interrupts the celebration by pointing out that this animal cannot be Akakabuto. Buty Boy has no right eye, whereas this unlucky fucker had two before getting blown away. Everyone gapes. The striking resemblance the animal has to Akakabuto can only mean one thing: the tyrant has been getting laid, passing his powerful and dangerous genes onto a new generation. A feeling of intense terror spreads through the crowd, and about 50 feet away, a single, glassy eye shimmers in the darkness.

The dogs are shaken from their own stupor by the scent of something wicked this way coming. John and Gin snarl at the large black mass watching the crowd, and the men look to see the forest's resident bastard glaring at them. Akakabuto stares spitefully at the men, taking in all of their scents and faces. His gaze also falls first on the German Shepherd, then on the little silver ball of fur beside it. He can't pinpoint why, but the upstart (pupstart?) looks and smells incredibly familiar.

Furious at the sight of his father's murderer, Gin tries to run towards the hulking mountain of bear. Daisuke snags him up before he can run very far, though, and he settles with barking obscenities at the enemy instead.

Again everyone fires, but it's too late. Akakabuto is wicked fast and not nearly as dumb as his offspring, so he's already gotten the hell outta dodge. Hidetoshi swears out loud, blueballed by fate once again. Gohei tells everyone they'd best go home. Nobody who'd wander into the forest to find that bear at night could make it back out alive, not even him in his golden days.

Everyone begins the chilling, chilly hike to the village. Daisuke sulks coldly in more ways then one, distracted from where he's going by his own dark thoughts about the bear that's been ruining everyone's lives. Because of his lack of focus, the boy takes a nasty fall into a sinkhole the snow covered up, and he finds himself screaming, flailing, and falling into a break in the mountain.

Everyone cries out to him, grabbing at him, but soon he's out of sight. Daisuke shuts up for the first time in his life when his head strikes a rock and knocks him unconscious. He tumbles onto a cliff overhang before truly entering the Earth's core, crumpling into a helpless heap.

All the men are losing their minds over what to do, especially Daddy Daisuke upon realizing the hole is too big for any of the men to squeeze into. Everyone's flipping shit except for Gin, who is gazing longingly into the hole, and Gohei, who is gazing thoughtfully at Gin. The old man has an Aha! moment and throws open his pack to retrieve a rope, which he then firmly secures on Gin's collar.

Everyone stops freaking and asks what he's doing. He rolls his eyes as if it's the most obvious thing in the world - he's sending Gin down to drag Daisuke back up, DUH!

With no better options, the crew send the puppy into the pit. Gin's a pretty clever kid, so he understands his mission well enough. He's lucky, too, and finds Daisuke quickly. He tries to lick the child's face to awaken him, but it doesn't work. Daisuke's alive, but he's out cold. There's no hope of him climbing out himself. So maybe, just maybe...

Gin thinks fast and literally runs circles around the unconscious kid, wrapping the rope tightly around his torso and under his armpits. After a few turns of Ring Around The Search And Rescue Victim, the doglet gives a tug on the rope and a bark up through the tunnel. Nothing happens for a sec sans the sound of unintelligible, excitable speech, but then Gin gets some feedback. The men understood, and they're pulling the rope up.

To keep things really secure, tiny Gin is forced to clench his jaws around the rope and support Daisuke's weight with his neck. His collar digs into the baby fat around his neck, drawing blood, but he refuses to let go of his buddy.

The men give one last hard yoink and pull both of the youngsters out of the sinkhole. Daisuke's dad cradles his child to his chest, announcing that the kid is unconscious but still alive. Everyone cheers while Hidetoshi cradles little Gin, who is also fading from consciousness from exhaustion, to his own chest. Hidetoshi wipes some of the blood from Gin's neck as John watches. John's eyes soften for probably the first time in his life as he sees how Gin has still refused to release the rope. Is this what it's like to be humbled?

Daisuke's eyes slowly flutter open, which elicits another cheer from the emotional crowd. His dad hugs him tightly, gushing tearfully about his son's survival and the little dog's bravery. Upon hearing Diasuke's exhausted response back, Gin's own eyes shoot open and he leaps from Hidetoshi's arms into Daisuke's. He licks the boy's face eagerly, clearing it of the tears that have streamed from it.

Gohei comes to Daisuke's side, his eyes even softer then John's. He reaches down and lifts the puppy up just inches from his face. Gin's tiny tongue flicks out to lick the end of the senior's nose. Gohei brings the dog child to his chest and gives him a gentle hug and a pet on the head. Everyone looks on in disbelief. As long as any of them have known him, Gohei has never pet any of his dogs, let alone hug them. Gohei hands Gin back to Daisuke, allowing the child to hold the puppy close.

As everyone gets ready to head home once more, Daisuke declares his eternal devotion to the silver brindle dog, appreciative of his friendship and forever convinced of his bravery.

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End of episode 1, the episode with what’s likely the most non-dog child beating in the series!!! Hope you “””enjoyed””” it!!!

Episode 2: The Invasion

[doubleshotofsomething]

Publicity Stunt

Part Four

[Part One<-- Find here]

Warnings: Swearing as usual. Trigger warnings??( just to prepare you, so be prepared). I think thats it?? 

Pairings: Bucky x Reader

Summary: Reader is a fixer/Pr and longtime friend of Pepper. Post-endgame.

PS: Thank you guys for the support and feedback, your kind words are music to my ears(eyes bc i read them) and i cant explain how much it means to me. Thank you all so very much xxxxxxx

Scroll to the bottom for the next part

You stood on the tarmac as the Quinjet landed. Your personal assistant, Jonah, had arrived a few hours earlier and met the Avengers at the Senate hearing. You weren’t a fan of court procedures, any more than you were of politicians, so you sent Jonah – along with the lawyers you trusted – to the courthouse to ensure everything ran smoothly. Clint was a bit anxious when you told him your assistant was replacing you, Wanda refused to leave unless you were going with them, and Bucky spent the entire time asking about your male assistant.

“You planned this whole thing but you’re not showing up?” Clint argued, eyes flashing with betrayal.

Wanda agreed with him. “This is your thing! If anyone can convince people to do anything they don’t wanna, it’s you!”

“I’m not one for damselling—” Sam stopped pacing and took a breath- “but you’re turning me into one right about now.”

“This, Noah, person you were telling me about—” Bucky practically shoved the laptop in your face, a picture of your security’s supervisor stared back at you, “—he looks like a registered sex offender.”

You rolled your eyes, fixed the search, and pulled a picture of your assistant. You turned the laptop back to him and faced everyone else. “Jonah is a qualified attorney, and the team of attorneys that will be representing you are the best DC has to offer. You are in great hands.” You tried to reassure them, but your absence was clearly something that they weren’t okay with.

“Noah looks like Rumlow.” Bucky scowled, staring too closely at the screen. “He looks like Rumlow’s Hulk brother.”

“Looks like Drax’s long lost brother,” Sam added, peering over Bucky’s shoulder.

Clint joined in, clicking a few buttons and nodded. “He looks like he eats Senators for breakfast.”

“You work around Rumlow?” Bucky looked back at you, eyebrows furrowed. “Every single day, you spend time with this guy?”

“Jonah.” You corrected.

“He looks like a registered sex offender.”

“That’s not what sex offenders look like,” you scoffed, “you’d be surprised how many suits and ties are actual sex offenders.”

“Rumlow Noah is wearing a suit and tie.”

“Bucky, his name is Jonah,” you looked at him pointedly, “and it would do you justice if you remembered that. He’s a nice kid—”

“-registered sex offender—”

“—and he’s really good at what he does.” You glared at him for a moment longer before looking at everyone else, “I wouldn’t trust this part of the job on anyone else. He’s good. He’s great, and his team of attorneys are sharks. You—”

“Why do we need attorneys?” Clint asked, looking away from the laptop. “I thought this was a senate hearing.”

“While you’re at it, ask her about the security team of registered criminals she has on speed dial.” Bucky muttered, scrolling through more pictures of Jonah.

“What?” Wanda practically cried; eyes wide with panic.

“Oh, for fuck sake—” You inhaled deeply, “—the attorneys are for back up and the security is for the attorneys.”

Bucky, because he’s Bucky and his natural instinct is to make things difficult for you, scoffed. “It’s to get us out of there in case this is a trap.”

“A trap?!”

“Barnes!”

“Did you know Rumlow Noah had the third highest grade score in his class?”

It took far longer than expected, than necessary, to get them onto the Quinjet and to the hearing. Bucky was still attached to the laptop when he boarded, Clint was satisfied that you weren’t sending an intern with no experience, and Wanda was contemplating using her abilities on you. But, eventually, they departed for the city and left you with enough time to do your job, make a couple of phone calls and listen in on the senate hearings.

You weren’t a rookie, you had Jonah wear one of his bugged suits. This was the senate, after all, and you had to be ready for anything they could pull.

Jonah was a large man. His build caused controversy in the courtroom, juries thought him intimidating and witnesses found him unapproachable. His voice was far too deep, his face was far too intense, his looks were too menacing. His presence alone had scared witnesses into committing perjury, a few simple objections had caused him fines from contempt, juries ruled against his clients because of his daunting appearance.

Jonah was a very large man, but where others saw a beast, you saw brains. He was far younger than you, he had graduated from high school and law school far too early, and he was ready to make a difference. He could recite every word in the constitution, poke holes in the most ironclad of nondisclosure agreements, he could tell you all about each crime and how to elude being charged with it. The kid could get away with a Presidential assassination in broad daylight if he wanted to. But he looked like a Mafioso and appearance is everything in DC. So, when he lost a case – a case he should have won – you walked up to him and offered him a job.

Personal Assistant is what you both called his title, but he was much more than that. He was the reason you were good at your job.

“I’m guessing it all went well?” You raised an eyebrow at Jonah, the rest following suit.

Jonah simply shrugged, handing you a folder. “That shouldn’t even be a question.”

“Shit hit the fan.” Clint sighed.

“I’m making a list.” Bucky grumbled, idling a few steps away as he continued with his face shoved against the laptop.

“He pissed everyone off!” Wanda glared at him, “how is that not supposed to be a question?”

“Jesus—” Jonah rolled his eyes, dark brown glaring down at Wanda. “—you really think that was supposed to end well? It’s a senate hearing, with a bunch of powerful that were in the room with, arguably, people that are far more powerful than them. Your abilities, your avenging, everything about you already pisses them off.”

“What was the point of all that then?” Sam questioned, staring at Jonah like a lion ready to pounce on its prey.

“To piss them off,” Bucky added, shoving the laptop at you. “This is Rumlow’s classmate. She’s married, graduated top of her class and lectures at an Ivy League law school.”

You took the laptop and closed it shut. “The point of all this was to prove to everyone that the whole case is biased, that the entire senate – along with the accords – was based on the simple fact that they are biased.” You said, handing the laptop to Jonah’s anticipating hands and walking back inside.

“If we could prove bias to the general public,” Jonah continued as they all followed, “we could dismantle the entire case against you.”

“Sounds like a sex offender thing to say,” Bucky grouched, earning a warning look from you.

You placed the laptop on the kitchen counter, telling Jarvis to seal off every entrance to anyone without residential clearance. The rebuilt Compound was larger, but with less floors, the design was a unique mixture of every Avenger’s taste, except it was more of an armoury than it was a home. Each room had a secret compartment of weapons, and an exit route that led to either the garage or the woods, and the security system seemed to be engineered to withstand a nuclear war.

You had already set up a seating arrangement for them, their absence helped in getting a couple of things done, and you waited as everyone took a seat.

“Everything, from here on out, is gonna be war.”  You looked at all of them, hating the next words that were about to leave your mouth. “The whole media stint where I had you kissing babies and walking dogs, helping the needy, all that was just for the cameras. All that was just the first phase of what’s to come next. We can’t win against the Accords, we can’t win against a hundred and seventeen nations. But the people can.”

“This was never about public image.” Wanda stated, bitterness coating her words.

You shook your head solemnly. “You pissed off a lot of powerful people. They don’t care about who you are or how good your intentions—”

“They care about controlling you.” Jonah interjected. “The accords are the perfect example of that, and that’s why I had to piss them off.”

“You didn’t have to do anything.” Bucky growled at him.

“The UN ordered you shot on sight,” Jonah fired back, glaring at him, “that’s illegal and the exact opposite of what they’re supposed to be doing—”

“—Jonah had to rile them up, I told him to do so. Senate hearings are televised and public record, we needed it to have the highest ratings possible.” You added, “because, now, the senate hearing is going to turn into an International court case, where your charges will be presented before you and the court. Testimonials and all that jazz, basically the same bullshit that the Accords doesn’t afford you—”

“—which is illegal and violates a shit load of rights.” Jonah interrupted.

“From that moment forth, we present our case to the world.” You completed, eyes lingering a bit on Wanda for a moment longer.

“We’re gonna lose and go back to the raft.” She said, too sure of herself for your liking.

“The people won’t let us.” Bruce chuckled softly, shaking his head at you. The wheels were turning in his head and the pieces were finally fitting together perfectly. “That’s why you spent so much time on our public image, why you started an uproar in a senate hearing.”

Sam’s shoulders dropped at the realisation, the picture finally becoming clearer. “You’re evil.”

“I’m efficient.” You corrected, “and I don’t like losing. I don’t like it when good people are wronged, and I really hate the government enough to defame it.”

“The economy is gonna suffer, international relations are gon—” Bruce started, but you were not having any of it.

You scoffed. “The accords are a pretty way of saying slavery, so I don’t care.”

“Uh—” Bucky raised his hand slowly, “—call me old fashioned, but I’m really confused here.”

“We’re going to lose to the UN,” Wanda said, turning to face him, arms folded and face twisted in spite. “But she’s going to start a civil war within all nations, and there’s nothing we can do to stop it because people love us, and she made them think the government is evil.”

“You’re evil.” Clint mimicked Sam’s words. “You’re worse than the government.”

“Someone has to be.” You acknowledged, unashamed and unbothered.

You knew what the job description was when you signed up, and you knew the kind of soulless monster you were going to have to be when Pepper called. You left DC behind, a town of vultures, to defend people that weren’t accustomed to those vultures. It wasn’t just DC’s most elite politicians you were going against; it was the entire country; it was the entire world – nations with resources to the disposal that you couldn’t even begin to fathom. First world countries, with the means to make you disappear without a trace, second world countries with the power to make your death seem natural, third world countries that had lost far too much to care about moral code.

To win, your only weapon was to start a world war.

To succeed, your only strategy was to make the people fight it for you.

You weren’t dumb enough to think you could win against world nations. But you were smart enough to know where to hit for fatal damage.

“We’re about to face the world and call their leaders a bunch of criminals,” You finally said. “Clint, I had Happy fetch your wife and kids, they’ll be here in a few hours. Scott will be here as well, with his kid. The compound is the safest place they could be, right now. Until this is all over. Until—”

“—until they’re no longer at risk of being held, by the government, indefinitely.” Jonah added for you, “because we’re not idiots to think they’re safe in their own country. They can and they will be used against you.”

“You’re saying our government would arrest minors for crimes they didn’t commit?” Rhodes, for the first time since he sat in the room, spoke – disbelief cloaking his face.

“I’m saying they arrested Wanda, Clint, Scott and Sam for not signing a contract.” Jonah, a man you trusted with your very life, fired back without missing a beat. “Because that’s what this—” he waved the accords in the air, “—this sad excuse of a law that will never stand, is. A contract. Not a law that has been enforced, not an amendment, and definitely not legal. So, yes, I do strongly believe that a government capable of forcing an Army experiment, which resulted in the Abomination – the same government that violated Bruce Banner’s constitutional right; by illegally searching all his belongings without a warrant – is capable of arresting minors for shit they didn’t do.”

“He can tell you all about the rights and laws that the existence of the raft violates,” you said, “but that’s gonna require a shit load of coffee and a lot of ‘I told you so’s’ from Ol’ man Rogers. And that’s not something we’re all ready for.”

Wanda sat up quickly, gaining everyone’s attention. “Wait,” she examined you, something finally clicking in her head. “Those rights apply to Americans and I’m Sokovian."

You shrugged. “I pulled some strings—”

“—made an argument that you couldn’t be eligible for death penalty for treason, in this country, if you weren’t a citizen—” Jonah added.

“—because then that’s gonna be a whole international dispute, and you would be handed over to your own country for the trial—” You nodded.

“—and, man, do we hate not having blood for blood.” Jonah sighed, shaking his head. “I could name a couple of states that want your pretty little neck attached to the adios syringe—"

“—and no country is a fan of those international disputes. So—,” you pushed the green file, you had placed on the table, towards her. “—you became a citizen the moment I walked onto the compound.”

“Which makes you eligible for the same protection as everyone in this room.”

“Pure evil.” Rhodes gaped at you, completely awed.

“We can’t stop the Accords from happening, but we can sure as hell change it. From this day forward, you guys must do everything I tell you, word for word. You’re a team, what you do and how you act will affect all of us. I know what I’m doing, and I need you to trust that; trust that I can, and I will, get you through all of this. You don’t have to trust me, but you can rest easy knowing that I don’t start wars I can’t win.

“I may be evil,” you breathed, straightening your posture and making sure to look every one of them in eye. “But I’m the kind of evil you need, right now.”

There was pregnant pause, an eerie silence encompassing the entire room. “’Til the end of the line.” Bucky voiced softly, his ocean blues capturing yours in a gentleness you’ve never known.

“We’ve come this far,” Bruce said, nodding in agreement to Bucky’s declaration.

Sam shook his head. “We’re so screwed,” he whispered to Clint.

*

Pepper didn’t know your plan.

The whole thing was going to be hard enough as it was. You had arranged the empty rooms into guest bedrooms, Jarvis was rather helpful in that department, you had him direct the Avengers’ loved ones to their designated rooms. You made a list of things for Jarvis to inform them of – the basics of the compound and the PG rated reason they were there – and made sure to stock the place with every single necessity you could think, that they would need.

She would disapprove of it.

Asgard was already on standby, in the unlikely case that the Compound was compromised. You had asked their current leader, Valkyrie, for the assistance and she was more than ready to help. The Avengers were dear to Thor’s heart, so taking in their loved ones for protection was something Asgardians were more than happy to do.

She would hate you for it.

Wakanda was on standby for extraction as well. In the event that the Avengers would need an escape route, Nakia – a woman that was very pleased to know about your plan – had promised to help in any way possible. She, too, was not a fan of politicians imposing their agendas under the false pretence of enforcing the law.

“Woah, woah, woah—” Bucky gripped onto your arm, pulling you into a slow jog then a stop, “—slow down there, doll.”

You were struggling to catch your breath as you pulled your arm out of his grasp, wiping your forehead free of sweat with the sleeve of your shirt. You fanned your face, trying to find something to lean against, someplace to sit, somewhere to breathe. Because, damn it all to hell, you couldn’t breathe. You couldn’t breathe and you couldn’t think, and it was freaking you out.

“Y/N…” Bucky called out, gripping both of your shoulders and turning you to face him, “Y/N, come on, look at me.”

It’s too hot. Dammit, why is it so hot?

You tried to push him away, worming your way out of his hold, but that only succeeded in him tightened his grip.

Let go.

Molars grinding, hands fisted, you ducked out of what felt like an ironclad grip and backed away from him. You just needed to think, that’s why you went for a late afternoon jog alone, to think. The compound was too crowded; too many voices for you to focus, too many smells, too many distractions. Your room was no better, it was big enough to be a master bedroom, but it felt small – why did it feel so small?

When did it get so dark?

You tried sitting outside, thinking that fresh air would do the trick. But Bruce and Clint and Jonah were outside, talking about something… you were close enough to hear, you think you even made a comment… What were they talking about?

“Come on, sweetheart, look at m—hey, hey, I need you to look at me.”

Go away!

You just needed to think. You rubbed your throat, continuing down your path – it was your path, right? – and tried to swallow down the dryness. You must have been jogging for a while, it was getting difficult for you to see or focus on where you were going. You tried blinking, alternating between rubbing your eyes and your throat, hating that you didn’t bring a water bottle with you.

What were you missing?

“Y/N—”

Why was he still here?

You just needed a second. You just needed to look at things clearly, for his sake, for their sake. Just a second. That’s all you needed.

Safehouses were sorted, because you could never be too safe. Black folders were ready, because you could never trust the other team to play clean. Everyone’s loved ones were accounted for. So, what were you missing?

Think about Morgan.

That annoying little twinge snapped at you, in you, spreading across the left side of your chest. You didn’t even like children, so that shouldn’t even be a thought. It shouldn’t have been a thought coated in Pepper’s voice.

This is exactly why, you thought, this is exactly why I don’t mix work with friendship.

You stopped walking when you could no longer see where you were going, reaching out to find the nearest tree. You couldn’t even hear your own footsteps as you did that, you couldn’t hear anything except the loud thrumming in your ears.

There was something in the distance, some sort of movement maybe – couldn’t be sure, you chose to pass it off as nature and focused on catching your breath. Your muscles felt tense, you blamed it on the jog – because you’re a walker, not a jogger. Your lungs were aching and each gasp for air seemed to not be enough, every deep breath you tried to take felt like it was twisting your chest.

You felt something crawl up your arm, an unwelcome heat that you recoiled away from, moving away from whatever it is. You mind shouted spider and you didn’t hesitate to speed walk away from the pest, but it wouldn’t stop clinging to you, pulling at you, dragging you back with its callous clutch.

You went to flick it away with your other hand, dread settling into the pit of your stomach. “Get off me,” you couldn’t recognise your own voice, drenched in trepidation as your hand tried to swat away at the thick-skinned creature.

Another one gripped at your hand, pressing it to your chest as you began to heave in an unadulterated panic. The iron grip on your arm moved to your back, unconcerned by the fight you were putting, and you were forced into something hard.

“Shhh,” Bucky soothed, wrapping an arm around your writhing figure whilst moving his other to stroke your head, “it’s okay, just breathe.”

This wasn’t you. This couldn’t be you. His shark, his girl, his little darling, his sweetheart couldn’t be the one that tried to fight him off. You couldn’t be this shivering wreck in his arms. No… it couldn’t be you.

But it was you. He could tell it was you just by the sound of your footsteps, so he followed the sound through the trees until he found you, taking a path he knew you’d never been on before.

His shark was shaking in his arms; he could pick you out in a dark room by your smell alone, and your disorientated steps struck an intrusive feeling in him, the kind he’d felt after the snow.

His girl, in the dark and alone, too scared to even let him hold her. This couldn’t be the woman he fell in love with, could it?

“Focus on my voice, I know it’s difficult, but—” he took a breath as he tightened his grip, “—you just need to breathe. Okay? Breathe with me, doll, in and out, slowly—”

He felt you tense, felt as your thrashing turned to uncoordinated twitching, felt as you tried to focus on what he was telling you to do. It took a while before you could mimic his breathing, he didn’t blame you – figured you were just realising what was happening, and even then, your breathing was off.

“That’s it,” he praised, “that’s my girl. You’re doing so good, darling, just keep focusing on my voice—”

You could barely make out his voice, the cloud in your head was too much, but the quick thuds that were drumming against your hand – each one strong as the other – pierced through the disarray. You moved away your hand, having been placed there from your attempt to push him away, and pressed your forehead against the area, forcing yourself to focus on at least that.

This wasn’t you. This didn’t happen to you. But here you were, in Bucky’s arms, hating yourself for letting this happen.

One sense at a time, your own voice rang in your head, that’s how you’ll get back control.

You shut your eyes, tapping your finger to beat of his heart, choosing to focus on your sense of touch first – not that it was a choice. Your first instinct was supposed to be listening, but your disarrayed mind ignored his voice, and went straight for the feel of his heart against your hand. The muscle beating against his chest, something you couldn’t hear, was the only thing you were capable of recognizing in that moment.

The thrumming managed to soothe away the ache in your chest and your feet, the feel of something soft and damp pressing against the crown of your head repeatedly managed to help cool you down, all that was left was for the slight stinging on your throat to disappear – but water could fix that.

You can’t do it all at once, Stark. You remember telling Tony, his panic attack had rendered him speechless, the first of the few that had. Divide and conquer, just like I taught you.

He had listened, focused on your instructions as you helped pull him out of the deep, then pretended he had it all under control – that he could have managed just fine without your interference. You laughed, accustomed to his humour, knowing it was only a defence mechanism, then told him about how it wasn’t something to be ashamed of. You told him that it was a normal thing, a reasonable reaction, to the horrors he had seen. You told him, insisted, that it wasn’t something to be embarrassed about because it happened to the best of us.

You didn’t think you’d have to tell yourself that.

Best of us, never included you.

You were the one that got people through them; helped them cope, taught them the little techniques that they benefited from.

You never thought you would have to use them on yourself.

Next Part

[spideybbg]

Everything

summary: ur in luv. u smoke sum weed. that’s it. that’s the story.

warnings: well...le marijuanas...and swearing bc ??

a/n: i jus wanna smoke w/ someone i love :( anyways my brain doesn’t work so proofreading just isn’t a thing also the code for line breaks makes my head hurt so i couldn’t figure that out lol

words: 1.1k

"Take me to your river,

I wanna go."

You're like sunlight, a breath of fresh air after being held under water for far too long. You're soft and warm against his skin, white rays of gentle comfort. He looks at you like art, noticing every fine detail, as if your eyes were crafted galaxies and each star was placed with purpose. You're real, like the wind he feels against him when he walks down the street, like the cold air that pricks his skin when he gets out of bed in the morning. You make the sinking feeling go away. You're everything.

You look at the sky and think of him. They way his lips are so soft against your skin it reminds you of the angels in heaven, the way one touch can make everything else melt away. You think of his laugh, how you love seeing him happy. You think of his voice, how you adore the way your name sounds rolling off his tongue. You think about how he deserves the world, and how much you want to be the one to give it to him.

It's dark, ash falling near your feet while you exhale. Whether the sparkles you see are planes or stars, you don't care, you'll still stare at them forever from your place on the roof. The smoke filling your lungs holds your attention, distracting from the sound of footsteps behind you. You like watching the grey clouds float through the air before disappearing, feeling the fuzziness cloud your brain, feeling everything get a bit lighter.

"Hey," he sits beside you, sides touching and warmth radiating from his body as he motions for you to pass it. You oblige, of course, smoking paper traveling from your small hand to his slender fingers. When he brings it to his lips you can't help but admire the way his jaw clenches whenever he takes a hit, and how he squints a little whenever he breathes in, still not used to the burning. You let yourself get lost in his features, the slopes and curves of his face, and how it seems like god himself had crafted this boy's bone structure. His sneakers are muddy and a bit worn, like yours, but you're left wondering how someone can look so good in sweats and a hoodie.

"You're pretty," you tell him simply, taking a hand and running it through his hair with an expression of pure adoration.

He smiles, looking up at the night sky and trying to will the blush on his cheeks away. It makes your heart flutter, unable to get angry at the fact that you're utterly whipped, "I'm supposed to be telling you that," he nudges your side, eyes finally connecting and all you can do is get lost in his stare. He can't describe the contentedness that he feels in your presence, how your mere existence is enough to take away the weight crushing his chest. With your red eyes and goofy smile, he's looking at the girl sitting besides him and seeing his universe.

"We're both pretty," your head falls to his shoulder, gaze going across the buildings in front of you as a cool gust of wind blows your hair around, "just a couple of hotties smokin' a joint."

"Casual," he proclaims, taking another hit.

"Casual," you retort, swinging your legs to rest over his lap. You take the burning white roll from him, bringing it back to your lips as he places his hands atop your thighs.

"That sweatshirts nice," you drawl, breathing out, "would be a shame if someone were to...take it."

"I'm actually pretty good friends with the Avengers, they'd get it back for me," of course he's going to give it to you.

"Really? My boyfriend knows them too," he likes hearing you call him that.

"Yeah?" He smirks at you, quirking an amused brow. He could listen to you talk forever. Whether it be about your favorite show, some dumb shit your friend did, the weather, the economy, communism, you could say anything and he'd just sit there, soaking it up like a sponge.

"Yeah, he never shuts the fuck up about it," you reply matter of factly, scrunching up your face.

The boy just chuckles, rolling his eyes, "I hate you," he coughs, shaking his head, but he can feel himself smiling. It's a smile that only appears with you.

"You wish," smoke flows out along with your sentence, hazing the air between you before it gets blown away. You only sit with each other, no words yet it is anything but silent. You let the moment blanket you, looking at him against the backdrop of the city, as if it's a canvas and he's the focus of the foreground. In this moment you feel like you're almost gazing upon a renaissance painting, each stroke filled with purpose, colors worn with time and endless stories.

"I love you," you want to paint the sky with him, create a whole new world and live in it, just you two. When he turns to you and witnesses the look behind your eyes, so raw and tender, he feels as though he's holding your heart in his hand. He's never been so grateful to receive something his whole life, he's never wanted to protect something so badly his whole life. You're soft, like drizzling rain and sun shining through windows in the morning.

His fingers take your chin as you stare up at him, bringing your lips to his. It's home, safety and peace, it's one of the only things in your life that actually feels right. It's all you've ever wanted and all you'll ever need. This boy is it for you.

"You're everything," the breathiness in his voice after you both pull away makes your knees weak, heart squeezing at the sincerity dripping from every word. He knows no one else will ever make him feel this way, he knows he'll never love someone else the way he loves you. He thanks all the powerful creators that could possibly exist every night, wondering what he could have ever done to deserve such a girl. The way you think, the things you say, it enamors him everyday. They say you can't pull someone out of water when you're drowning yourself, but you did. You slipped through the cracks in his walls without even trying, from the moment he first laid eyes on you he knew. Knew he'd never deny you anything, knew he'd spend the rest of his life falling at your feet.

You were both hurting, and you both made it hurt a little bit less.

[justanotherloveaffair]

Somewhere Secret (T’Challa x Reader)

Word Count: 2,677

Warnings: Smut, remote controlled vibrator, public sex, NSFW

Tell me when it’s in.

You grunted, pushing the smooth round toy into its tight new home, where a pleasant pressure made you shiver as your fingers withdrew from your panties to send a response back to T’Challa.

It’s in.

Your sharp gasp carried through the small office as Bast knows how many volts of vibranium-charged energy turned your pussy into ground zero of a catastrophic earthquake, sending shockwaves out to each extremity. It ended almost as soon as it began, leaving you breathless, with one hand on the desk to prop up your weight.

Once stable, you let out a short laugh.

T’Challa could be such an asshole sometimes.

Your heartbeat sounds like a herd of elephants. Did it work? Are you okay?

In the interest of anticipating a future emergency, like an attack on the Queen’s life, the King’s genius sister Shuri had figured out how to tweak your bracelet to download your diagnostics real-time into T’Challa’s.

It wasn’t too long after that the idea for this little sex game was born.

Your legs were still shivering a little, almost a queasiness in your stomach as you mentally evaluated your day full of meetings. The world’s most powerful bullet vibrator was in your pussy and the remote control was in the hands of a man who could be ruthless.

It worked. Go easy on me, Kumkani. Please.

You sent the message and involuntarily clenched, expecting a playful retaliation that never came. 

Your hand rested against the door while you counted to five, using each second to mentally center yourself before rejoining the Dora Milaje dutifully awaiting you in the hall. 

~ ~ ~

Not once during your morning and afternoon of polite visits did you forget that a horny King had control of your pussy. And not once did he use it.

It was almost worse that he didn’t. You nearly hoped for it, the way people living in a seismically active region hope for little earthquakes to avoid The Big One. Every hour he didn’t use it, the desire to was building, under the surface. You knew it, just like you knew he was paying attention right now, tuned in to his favorite radio frequency. You.

You were distracted all morning. All it took was an innocent shift of the body to rediscover the invading shape inside. As you went from meeting to meeting, you constantly imagined what would happen if he flipped that switch. You thought about it as you outstretched your hands to receive a plate of food at your lunch meeting. You thought about it as you discussed the health of the economy with the merchant tribe leader. You thought about it whenever you entered a new room, immediately looking for wherever you could make a hasty exit, should you need.  

Just before 2:00, your guards were accompanying you down a sun-drenched hallway towards your next meeting when the sight of T’Challa turning the corner with Okoye gave you an unexpected shock. 

Your steps faltered at the sight of his intense eyes, lit up with pleasure at having caught you off guard. 

While he closed the distance, you felt the presence of his soulful brown orbs sliding all up and down your body, with the slightest smirk on his face.

Your enthusiasm to see him bubbled out of you in a string of words, as your animated hands moved about. “My King! What are you doing here? I’m supposed to meet Tayo about the exhibition.” 

You and Tayo, the royal art collector, were about to finalize the details on a grand exhibition in a few weeks.

A business-like tone met you, but the warmth in his eyes was intimate, and the amused smirk made your stomach start to twist. 

“The schedule has changed, Tayo had to suddenly cancel. Will you join me for a walk, my Queen?”

A walk? What was he planning?

“Uh… yes. Sure.”

After dismissing your guards, you accepted his arm with a dubious glance his way, one he didn’t reciprocate as he was too busy looking proud as a panther who just caught his prey. 

As you began to stroll, you had to slow your usual walking pace to match with his more deliberate one. The two of you were constantly bumping into each other’s side, sometimes by accident but mostly on purpose. You gathered he was taking out outside and sure enough, you emerged from the cool palace into the punishing afternoon heat. 

“T’Challa,” you stated, finally sick of being led around with no explanation, “are we walking somewhere in particular?”

Nobody had mastered the expression of playful secrecy quite like T’Challa could. His eyebrows lifted in a wouldn’t you like to know twitch and his shapely lips pursed together with a restrained smile, but he did not answer your question.

You returned to walking together, this time with the frenetic sounds of the city surrounding you instead of the echoing corridors of the palace. It was a gorgeous day and Wakanda’s citizens was clearly enjoying it, based on the smiling faces you noticed everywhere. They were, of course, also smiling at the sight of their King and Queen, arm-in-arm, taking in the city just like everyone else. 

The visit to the city seemed perfectly mundane until a shocking vibration of unimaginable levels struck your insides. 

Your fingers gripped the solid muscle of T’Challa’s upper arm and you let out a squeal, loud enough to startle the Dora Milaje at your sides. 

“My love,” T’Challa’s honey soft voice called out to you as he examined you with mock concern. “Are you feeling alright?”

Meanwhile, the vibrations were still going. 

“Uh... I feel a little.. uh...”

As you spoke, you noticed his fingers partially hidden by the cuff of his wrist, lightly twisting a Kimoyo bead. As he did, what felt like a couple thousand volts of energy shot up to a million. 

The four of you had stopped right in the middle of a busy alley, where crowds were clustered around food stands. Knowing how public the area was, you clenched your teeth and resumed walking, even while the juices of your arousal began to make your thighs slick, originating from the throbbing heartbeat in your pussy. 

T’Challa never let up on you. He raised the vibrations, then lowered them, made them disappear entirely only to reintroduce them in full. 

His tinkering with your pleasure senses made you ache, and your heart beat faster. The colors around you were vivid and bright, your eyes picking out banana yellow, forest green, bright orange in textiles and clothes. You felt the fabric around your legs gather and caress your skin as the relaxing breeze made it swirl. Rich scents of spices and smoking, sizzling meat made your taste buds salivate.

Your every neuron was wide open to receive the sensations around you, and no sensation was more intense than your desire for T’Challa.

His presence seemed to engulf yours, like his huge palm and long fingers that had yours clasped tight, where sweat, warmth and tingling pleasure thrived within his touch. 

The vibrations continued to climb, and when your grip weakened, his got stronger, pulling you along. 

Surely, if not from the Kimoyo bead, then his enhanced senses could tell your heart was beating abnormally fast. He must have noticed how you pressed your thighs together whenever you could, or when nobody was looking, brushed the back of your hand across your crotch, just to reel from the fireworks of your aching nerve endings responding to the contact.

Sweat gathered at your forehead and made you feel damp and hot everywhere else. If the heat didn’t kill you, then T’Challa’s teasing would.

A tug at your hand made you turn and take a sudden left. T’Challa led you at an urgent, self-assured pace down a narrow street empty of people, while his guards followed, glancing at each other. 

He turned suddenly, stopping Okoye and Ayo a few feet away as they blinked impassively.

“Please, wait here. The Queen is not feeling well, and needs a moment to rest. We will return when she is feeling better.”

His earnest sincerity was no match for the sharp intelligence of his top general, who wisely hid her smirk.

“Kumkani, we will ensure your privacy. My Queen, I hope you feel better soon.”

You nearly disintegrated at her knowing smile and patronizing tone. It wasn’t the first time Okoye had stood guard while the King pounded you silly, and it wouldn’t be the last. 

“Thank you, Okoye.”

Strong fingertips guided your body around and you were intrigued, excited, shaky and nervous about wherever you were going. Your gaze swung side to side, finding solid building walls on both sides and in front of you, a T shaped alley. The faster you both walked, the more all the friction between your thighs made you bite your lip. 

With a simple yank of your hand and twirl of your body, you spun and then caught yourself with your hands, clutching the wall in an abandoned and empty, yet clean, alley. Before you knew what was happening, T’Challa was clawing at your panties under your dress, with one hand lifting your skirt while the other twisted and tugged, ripping your panties with a loud tearing sound.

“I think I have tortured you long enough.”

“Please,” you begged.

His fingers danced up your thighs that he pushed apart with his knee, and sank inside you to draw out the pulsating vibranium globe. He regarded it, turning it aside to see every bit of your cream left behind, before it disappeared in his pocket.

You braced against the wall but couldn’t stop your noisy gasp when T’Challa’s fingers began to explore you under your dress, while grinding his solid front all along you from head to toe. Your touch-starved body trembled like an overloaded circuit. You felt his power, his breath, his heat all around you. He had turned you into a greedy, weak, starving little thing, intoxicated on his touch. 

T’Challa’s hand slid up and gripped your throat, pulling you back towards him with gentle pressure until his lips were at your ear. 

“I cancelled your meeting with Tayo,” he whispered. “Do you know why?” 

You swallowed. The answer immediately left your lips. “So you could fuck me?”

An amused smile came to T’Challa’s face, softening his eyes for only a moment. He continued to hold your neck, while his other hand was busily handling the barriers of your clothes. “That’s right Y/N,” he purred. “So I could bury myself in you.”

You felt his cock sliding along your lubricated pussy, and you clenched up with surprise and anticipation, jerking upwards in his arms. 

“Relax,” he soothingly rubbed the palm of his hand over your clit until you grinded back into him, sighing. “Relax for your King,” he murmured, his voice thick with seduction. He knew this kind of talk made you melt, and used it against you.

You were turned away from him, facing a moss-covered wall with your legs being urged further apart, your dress a heap of fabric piled on your ass so his eyes could have access to your pussy. You leaned your chest down and braced your hands on the wall, creating an irresistible angle and telling him, in your way, that you were ready. 

Your act of submission was the ultimate turn on and he groaned, studying your glistening pussy. His hand pumped along his length a few times before he held himself against you, each breath from his lips coming strained and heavy. You closed your eyes, seeing starbursts as you were pulled back on him, taking half his length at once. 

You instinctively pulled forward and away, but the Panther side of T’Challa, wildly animal and possessive, wasn’t having it. He gripped your hips with both hands and pulled you back, burying every inch of himself deep in you with a groan of deep satisfaction. 

The pleasure of finally having him was tinged with nervous excitement of knowing you were outdoors, with people just minutes away in every direction, unknowingly walking past an alley where their King was currently pounding their Queen from behind. You couldn’t shake the thought as you were ass-up, thighs spread, stifling your moans with your hand, bent in half and taking Wakanda’s most astonishing dick like you were born to do it.

The first orgasm came so quickly you weren’t even aware of it until it started. “I’m coming!” You exclaimed with surprise, alerting your lover who began to slam into you with excitement. Nothing escalated his lust more than hearing and watching you come. He could become addicted, making you do it so many times you’d be exhausted for hours after.

“More,” he demanded, just as the initial rush was tapering off. His palms gripped your ass so hard you felt them pinching, as he pulled your cheeks apart to watch himself slowly thrust in and out, zoning in on your juices gathering around the base. 

Hearing his demand, you knew it would be easy enough with a bit of extra help. You reached up with your fingers to find your clit, only to feel them being pushed away.

His hips paused, and his voice took on an authoritative tone, grumbly and deep. “You will not touch yourself. Your pleasure is mine to give, you understand?”

“Ah, yes,” you gently retrieved your hand, placing it back against the wall.

T’Challa shifted you, pulling you upright to a standing position, but still behind you. He thrust into you again, both of you sucking in your breath. 

You felt a metallic coolness and looked down to see the vibranium bullet, cupped in T’Challa’s palm, held against you. 

When he turned the vibration on low, the rush of stimulation had you almost crawling out of his arms. He countered you with his strength and rocked his hips up into you, now with the urgency of wanting to race you to your second orgasm. 

“Oh Bast… I am….” you choked, “T’Challa… please…” 

The vibrations went to just the right setting and his hands and cock were in just the right spot to trigger something powerful enough to trap you in electric cage of pure pulsating pleasure for nearly a minute. The waves kept coming and coming, and you clenched and screamed, having not only beat T’Challa to orgasm but outlasting his. By the time his came and went, you were still riding the unbelievable high as the powerful bullet remained lodged against your clit by T’Challa, addicted to your pleasure.

“Please stop,” you begged with tears rolling down your cheeks. He finally relented and you slumped down, your body parts held together with nothing but willpower.

He took over your needs, dressing you and holding you upright while you hung there, dazed and weak. 

As he tucked, zipped and tied himself back into his formal clothes, you tracked his movements with the kind of goofy, starry eyed smile that made him laugh at the attention. You were both glowing, and it was going to impossible to disguise what you’d just done.

Sure enough, you rejoined Okoye and Ayo, who gave each other subtle eye rolls when their beaming King and Queen strolled up behind them. 

Okoye gave you a prim and proper smile, her voice dripping with sarcasm. “Are you feeling better, my Queen?”

“General,” T’Challa said with a warning growl. 

You bit back a laugh, Okoye’s prickliness not bothering you in the slightest. 

The crowd soon enveloped you as you retraced your steps back to the palace, both you and T’Challa off to your next meetings with matching smiles and a shared secret.

Taglist: 

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[shieldfoss]

Second Session - a wolf hunt

The same people again - Gnome Artificer (Gart), Half-Elf Sorcerer (Heso), Half-Elf Monk (Hemo), and Drow Sorcerer (Deso)

The obvious thing to do, having been to Vemb and seen the tracks of people being dragged into the sea, is to get your hands on a boat. Those are expensive.

So as a purely instrumental secondary choice, you gotta go wolf hunting for that quick cash. The Warden of the March offers a bounty on wolf pelts, and a significantly bigger bounty on an answer to this question: Why are the wolves killing his sheep but not eating them?

Side tip for you, DM to DM, that I tried out and it worked out super well: If you have a solid random encounter table, roll encounters ahead of time. It lets you flow these things completely into each other in an extremely organic way. I got lizardfolk hunters (There were two: Nightspear and Ebony/Longtooth); 6 wolves; 1 lone worg (Likely to run at first sign of trouble); and a Yuan-ti Patrol.

A powerful storm is roaring over the land and everything is getting soaked, but hearty adventurers being who they are, and the Warden’s lands being only a short brisk march west of Vesterhavn, the party sets out late in the afternoon because Low Light Vision means never having to apologize -_-.

So pretty late in the evening, after dusk, they come to the first of the warden’s sheepsteads[1] as they’re about ready to turn in for the night. The party call out to the last farmhand before he heads inside and have a brief talk where they cover the essentials - sheep are being mutilated, wolf attacks aren’t the worlds biggest mystery to shepherds and they’ve had a few before but recently - within the last two or three months, say - they’ve had some really weird attacks where the sheep have been savaged and their heads completely destroyed, but the carcasses left uneaten. Nobody has actually seen any wolves do this peculiar thing but what else could it be? And either case, the bounty is for wolf pelts.

The party heads for the site of the latest attack to search for clues, but as they crest a hill they spot through gloom and darkness two lizardfolk standing exactly at the site of the attack. Nightspear and Ebony/Longtooth are skilled hunters both but (sans darkvision or lowlight vision) they’re about to quit for the day and make camp when the party sees them - though at this distance, the two lizardfolk are just two large humanoid shapes.

A quick whispered conference. A decision to sneak closer.

Once they’re close enough to overhear the lizardfolk, they realize that only Heso speaks draconic (almost instinctually, the knowledge transferred through his bloodline) and that’s the tongue the lizardfolk are talking in - nothing interesting though. “Bad hunt.” “Sleep soon.”

Because the dark elf player is Like That (does literally every group have a player who is like that) he decides to sneak around and approach the lizard folk from the side as the rest of the party makes their presence clear and approach the lizard folk directly. (He doesn’t even have Sneak Attack! He’s👏🏻A👏🏻Sorcerer👏🏻!)

So anyway, they get to talking - the lizardfolk are surprised to see them, but not immediately hostile, especially since the party hails them on approach which rather does tend to signal that you’re not planning an assault. They’re here as hunters, they say. Hunters of what? Hunters of anything, what’ve you got?

At this point in the conversation, the lizardfolk look at the party. There’s a gnome in tinkerer’s clothes under a waterlogged traveler’s cloak. There’s a half-elf in court robes (under a waterlogged traveler’s cloak,) There’s a half-elf literally without any weapons. They don’t any of them have knives. They have one single ranged weapon among them (there’s another in the tinkerer’s pack where the lizardfolk cannot see it.) “We’re here to find out what killed this sheep and hunt it down to take its teeth. What brings you people here?”

The party claims to be hunters, too.

So anyway it’s at this point Nightspear realizes there’s somebody sneaking up on them.

Nightspear is not a subtle type of person. Nightspear does not manage to hide that he knows, he instantly freezes, as would be very appropriate if e.g. a deer was about to spot him.

Everybody else notices Nightspear freeze except Ebony/Longtooth who has been the main conversationalist and so has taken a step forward and has his back to Nightspear.

Several things happen at once.

Heso asks Nightspear “What’s happening?” (I honestly have no idea if he doesn’t know (because he hasn’t paid attention) or if he’s trying to pretend he doesn’t know to gain some imagined advantage or if he’s trying to keep Nightspear focused on him or what the fuck)

Everybody else looks directly at the spot Nightspear’s body language implies he’s worried about

Ebony/Longtooth realizes something real weird could be about to happen and starts turning around

Deso stands up from the tall grass he’s been sneaking through because obviously that’s what you do if you’ve been caught I guess?

WHY ARE YOU EVEN CLOSE ENOUGH TO BE SPOTTED

YOU’RE A SORCERER YOU DON’T HAVE SNEAK ATTACK

WHAT IS THIS

I DON’T UNDERSTAND PLAYERS

Deso has a plan though. I seriously have no idea why he decided to sneak up on the fucking lizardfolk, but having been caught at it, he has a plan. It’s not actually a bad plan. Deso is going to play this off like it’s nothing. He’s just going to stand up and rely on the fact that he is that cool and collected, plus normalcy bias, to convey that nothing weird is going on, what, doesn’t your people play sneaking games?

Through the high natural Charisma required of sorcerers and an astounding roll of the dice, he pulls this off. Nightspear is too embarrassed at letting a threat get this close to make something of it, and Ebony/Longtooth, who’s just slightly late at realizing what’s going on, takes his cues from Nightspear rather than insert himself into this whole thing.

So Ebony/Longtooth turns back to Heso and asks, if they’re such great hunters, where should you go to find the beast that did this attack?

This is the part where the party realizes they’re not actually hunters, they’re people on a hunt which is not exactly the same. Well, everybody except Gart who, it turns out, is actually a hunter, or at least has the Survival skill.

It’s been 14 days since the attack. It’s in the night. There’s a storm on. It’s a guess and a gut feeling more than evidence, but it’s the opposite direction of the sheepstead which is definitely not the best direction for a monster to come from. Gart avoids the critical mistake of appearing underconfident by explaining, just points south west and says “That way.” The lizardfolk are surprised the gnome, absent any real search, instantly came to the same conclusion they had reached after half an hour at the site and concede that maybe these strangers are hunters, just real weird hunters.

Well what are you hunting here? We thought all small-folk were herders and planters?

Actually we’re hunting the same thing you lizards are, what a coincidence, wanna join up?

A bit of negotiation ensues, but after the lizardfolk are assured the small folk only want the skins bul will happily leave flesh and teeth to the lizards, they all agree to hunt together.

At midnight, the weather improves markedly - the rain stops and the wind stills except for a mild warm breeze blowing in from the north.

In the much improved visibility, they find six wolves. Nothing much to say about the ensuing combat except this: One wolf manages to flee, and the remaining wolves manage to deal enough damage that the (first level) party decides to do a short rest.

The lizardfolk declare that five wolves is plenty of prey for them at this time and they will head back home with their catch after the skins have been taken off for the players to return with.

At this point, one of the players (I forget who) says: “Wait. What do their feet look like? Do we still have the sketch from the beach? (Yes they still have the sketch. The feet look extremely similar to those of the oceanic raiders, though perhaps larger)

In the ensuing conversation, the party manages to, through the translationary efforts of Heso

(1) make fun of the lizardmen for not being part of the gold-based economy,

(2) ask a lot of questions about the ocean that the lizards, sixty miles west, have no answers to,

(3) imply a lot of things about cannibalism and

(4) insult the lizardmen for being such pathetic hunters that they’ll be satisfied bringing back 5 wolves.

Apparently the goal was to goad them into sticking around and helping out with further hunting?

Player Characters I Swear 2 Fucking God

Listen up you little punk, Lizardfolk have a lot of respect for magic, and a lot of respect for dragons, and a lot of respect for dragon-magic sorcerers, but if you think they’re gonna sit here and take that shit from your can’t track can’t carry can’t stab non-hunter ass, you’ve got another thing coming. 

Anyway they part ways, not amicably. (The lizardfolk head south, not west, despite earlier having claimed to come from the west.)

It’s at this point as the lizardfolk are leaving that Deso says “I stand up and take a good look around.”

Far away, in the direction the fleeing wolf ran, he sees a wolf and a separate, significantly bigger, wolf. The two wolves turn and disappear behind a hill, and the party decides that, since they’ve got some skins anyway and it’s only a few hours back to town, and they’re kind of low on spells, perhaps discretion is the significantly better part of valor right now?

[1] I swear sheepstead is a word but my browser is putting a big ol’ red line under it.

[worldcakecakecake]

On Deutschland and Italia by Lovio Valenti

Lovino writes a series of blog entries on the relationship between Germany and Italy as he deals with a move to Hamburg, his brother’s wedding, and his budding romance (which he denies) to the infuriating Gilbert Beilschmidt.

                                                     Chapter 4

On Deutschland and Italia.

Division and Unity.

It’s Happening.

 I believe that in no other two European countries are you going to see such division in its country itself.

 We like to divide Italy as north and south, while Germany in west and east. It’s the kind of thing that helps create a crisis of national identity to the people, and we continue to feed it with media, accents, clothes and even foreign stereotypes, and no such ending can be expected soon. Yet, Germany and Italy supported the idea of a European Union even before other countries thought about it. You can find writings about it in Nietzsche and Mazzini’s work. Germany and Italy luckily got to see it happen and it was rather fruitful for both countries during a certain number of decades. After the harshness of unification, the passage of monarchy to republic, two world wars and the heavy presence of communism, Germany and Italy could focus on flourishing their economies and once again found themselves being a very important part of Europe.

 But even so, were dealing with two completely different countries here.

 The obvious first thing is the language, different views of politics, economics, culture, and of course, memes.

 Germany and Italy are the opposite on a girded scale, yet despite what I’ve written in my past entries and what it seems, Germany and Italy don’t actually have a rivalry and there’s no competition…well…in a political sense.

 In my next blog entries, I will be speaking more about this, but some of you had questioned about my brother’s soon wedding and want to hear more about it and my growing opinion.

 I still completely disapprove of it, but, my brother is expecting my help and since I am a good brother, I do intend to be a part of it…even if it involves having to meet with stingy face Gilbert here.

 We are constantly being told to stand each other for the sake of our brothers, but I’m thinking they’re only doing it to annoy us…or they actually want us to get along so this can go as smoothly as they want.

 I am not going to make it easy for anyone.

  “I’m going to touch… this salami.”

 “No!” Feliciano saved the plate, moving it in such theatrics from the counter.

 “Let me! Maybe it can poison him!”

 “Lovino! You’re not going to try and kill Gilbert with my food!”

 “Our food! I was the one that brought and boiled that spaghetti you really like.”

 Feliciano came to a realization, going to check the readied pasta.

 “I’m joking! I didn’t poison anything,” he found himself having to clear.

 Feliciano still tasted some of the readied noodles…adding a bit of the sauce…taking from the bread.

 “Don’t eat it all before they even get here!” Lovino scolded.

 “Just checking! It’s all delicious,” Feliciano signed as he cleaned whatever drops had fallen in the meantime.

 It was just as the familiar knock came, getting Feliciano to shriek, to rid of his apron and fix himself as quick as possible. He practically tripped as he made his way to get the door.

 “Careful!” Lovino scolded, not minding in taking his own taste from the sauce.

 “Lieben.”

 “Amore.”

 The two greeted to each other as disgusting as ever, with a deep kiss and a wrap of their arms around one another that left the brothers in the back silent and awkward.

 “Gee, Feli, thanks for inviting me in,” Gilbert interrupted, getting a groan from Ludwig but a smile from Feliciano.

 “Come on in, both of you.”

 Ludwig followed Feliciano to place a beautifully wrapped plate of colored meringue cookies in the table, both going on excited with conversation of how it was made, in each other, leaving Gilbert standing awkwardly still near the door, with nowhere else to lay his eyes but on Lovino, mixing the sauce to keep his eyes focused on something and not glare daggers at the older Beilschmidt in the room.

 “What ya’ making?” He dared ask.

 “Go sit down on the couch and don’t ask me questions,” Lovino commanded and Gilbert shrugged, not knowing what to expect, but followed his order and took seating, beginning to look through his phone in the meantime.

 The four of them enjoyed from dinner together, the ones mostly conversing being Ludwig and Feliciano, a comment here and there from Gilbert and Lovino, always a small temptation calling to fight over the smallest thing, but luckily Ludwig and Feliciano would stop it before it could escalate and heat the table in anger and hatred.

 Ludwig unwrapped the meringue cookies and they all dug in, Feliciano bringing in a hard-covered notebook, along with a folder full of financial information of both him and Ludwig.

 “So,” Feliciano clapped his hands to begin.

 “We’ve been researching, finding out everything we need to know about planning a wedding, and many sources suggest, before anything, to establish a budget,” Ludwig explained.

 “And why do you need us for that?” Gilbert wondered.

 “Control.”

 “To make sure we’re not exaggerating and that were not choosing a very low number either,” Feliciano continued.

 “We don’t want anything too lavish. We want simplicity, small, something for just us and our closest friends and family to attend.”

 “But beautiful, special and to remember,” Feliciano wanted to add.

 “Both your jobs, as we have chosen you each to be our best men, is to make sure we don’t exceed the amount we’re going to decide now.”

 Both the elder brothers shrugged, not seeing it such a difficult job.

 Feliciano opened the books and numbers, something that Ludwig was immensely proud about him doing, wrapping an arm around his waist to let him know, Feliciano smiling up at him.

 The elder brothers wanted to barf.

 “So…this is the amount we’re willing to use,” Feliciano pointed, professionally with a pen.

 “2,000 euros only?” Lovino raised an eye.

 “Yeah…is it still too much,” Feliciano worried.

 “No, that’s too little!”

 “I…actually have to agree with him here. I doubt they’ll be much you can do,” Gilbert said, earning Lovino another raise, not expecting that at all.

 “What number would you better recommend?” Ludwig leaned to them.

 “4,000!” At Lovino’s loud acclaim, a sudden idea began to settle in Gilbert’s mind, one that made him oddly smile for the moment, but he decided to push it and see.

 “6,000!” He suddenly shouted with Lovino, the younger brothers looking between the two in deep question.

 “That’s…uh…” Feliciano wanted to say.

 “Still too little, you’re right! How about 8,000 instead!”

 “No, no, 10,000!”

 “Hm…10,000 sounds about right,” Lovino had to agree with Gilbert.

 The younger couple was still too startled from the numbers to actually pay attention to how their brothers actually agreed and worked together to arrive at that final count.

 “10,000 euros?” Feliciano wanted to faint.

 “Yeah, it should be enough,” Gilbert shrugged it like it was no big issue.

 “That’s…too much.” Ludwig had written it down as a choice, looking at it as if it was a hideous monster to fear.

 “Trust me, people usually use more than that on a ‘simple’ wedding,” Lovino pointed.

 “There is no such thing as a beautiful and perfect wedding that was done cheap.”

 “But it…shouldn’t matter…we just want to get married. Everything else is just…making it more special,” Feliciano added shyly.

 “Yes or no, do you want it to be special?” Lovino went to the point.

 “Yes.”

 “Then you have to pay more than what you two were expecting.”

 The two gazed between one another with that deep question if to agree.

 “Should we…risk it?” Ludwig asked.

 “It’s your wedding!” Gilbert shouted.

 “You’re not going to get married and have a day like that again. So, I suggest you go full at it and enjoy it as you should be,” Lovino found himself backing Gilbert.

 It was working, the couple slowly coming to its agree.

 “But…we don’t want to go bankrupt either,” Feliciano brought sense again.

 “You two will have pretty good jobs. I’m sure the money will come to you easily. I think you should be thinking about what an amazing outcome it will be more than anything,” Gilbert continued and with those words, the two smiled between one another and decided on the 10,000-euro limit, writing and circling it in decision.

 Gilbert and Lovino smirked, evil intentions hidden underneath it.

 As the night went on, Ludwig and Feliciano made sure that they had the 10,000 euros available, working with checking their savings and loans, signing and calling, while Gilbert and Lovino settled on the couch, way apart from each other, looking at some random movie Lovino had chosen from Netflix.  

 “You should have put footloose,” Gilbert complained.

 “Fuck you.” Lovino raised the volume of Annie.

 “Come on, now you should help us with the guest list,” Ludwig called.

 “Already?”

 “Isn’t that for later?”

 “Knowing the amount of people who are coming will help us decide the size of the venue, of food, seats. Just come on,” Ludwig told, helping Feliciano in writing down the obvious of their grandparents, parents, brothers, close uncles, aunts and cousins.

 “Should we invite Laura?” Feliciano wondered happily, while Ludwig flinched.

 “You want to invite Ludwig’s ex to your wedding?” Gilbert laughed.

 “But she’s super nice to us! And she’s always bringing us waffles and I love baking with her. She’s also a really good friend of Lovino’s.”

 Lovino smiled, expecting of her company on such a dreaded party.

 “Are you sure it won’t start drama?”

 “Highly doubt so.”

 “What happened is in it the past,” Ludwig wanted to remind.

 “All right, go ahead!” It had Gilbert wondering of any other person in their lives who was bound to create disaster.

 “Okay, so, Carlos.”

 “Mhm!”

 “What about Martin?” Lovino smirked.

 “Oh yes! Let’s invite Martin!” Feliciano excited, in ways that made Ludwig ignite in fury and vengeance.

 “No!” Ludwig practically shouted.

 It brought sudden startling silence in the room.

 “Why? What’s wrong with Martin?” Feliciano wondered innocently.

 “Everything, absolutely everything! I don’t want him near the ceremony and party!” Ludwig was decided, even if he looked like a pouting child, Lovino and Gilbert having to hold themselves from laughing.

 “But…he’s a really good friend of mine. He’s super nice and buys me very nice things…like that golden bracelet with the really pretty heart in it.” Feliciano indeed thought it any other innocent gift, while Ludwig burned, Gilbert and Lovino having to hold their own laughs by getting pillows to muddle their possible sounds.

 “Please…don’t tell me you haven’t noticed it at all…” Ludwig worried.

 “Noticed what?”

 Ludwig didn’t know whether to give a breath of relief…or worry on how Martin could take advantage of Feliciano’s occasional naïve self.

 “You know what, I’m decided, he’s not coming,” he decreed.

 “Well I’m deciding that he is coming!” Feliciano denied in turn.

 The glare, the fury that sparked between them, had Gilbert and Lovino actually sharing impressed expressions, both eyes and mouths widened, ready for the big show that was sure to take place. Feliciano, in a show of disobedience, took the list and wrote the dreadful name, making it sure now. Ludwig huffed, a large intake of breath that many thought the release would make winds blow across all the apartment, but what came out was simple, given up…as the usual to make his lover happy. He let it be, not questioning, but he was visibly angry, not bothering to even speak and add to the list of visitors that Feliciano, Gilbert and Lovino continued to do by themselves.

 Gilbert added annoying family members, unwanted friends or relatives that they had long forgotten about, and Ludwig didn’t add a word. Lovino in turn added his own horrible suggestions, Feliciano too kind to deny. By the end of it, they had more than a hundred guests.

 “Are you sure…this is okay?” Feliciano for once questioned, facing the number and having second thoughts.

 “The more, the better!” Lovino assured.

 “You want everyone to celebrate, don’t you?” Gilbert suggested.

 “Yeah…but…”

 Lovino placed a finger against Feliciano’s mouth. “Don’t think about it!”

 “Think about the party!” Gilbert excited, raising himself and already celebrating as if it was to take place that very moment.

 “Uh…okay.” Although clearly unsure, Ludwig was stuck in his inner anger to really answer, just shrugging and so Feliciano sighed, forcing himself to accept.

 “Is that all you need us for then?” Lovino questioned, already beginning to get his things.

 “Yeah, I guess,” for once Ludwig answered.

 “Awesome! I’ll be getting my ass elsewhere too.” Gilbert joined Lovino in his own stuff picking, both cleaning the apartment of themselves on the way, running off as if they were escaping from something heinous.

 They left the apartment in awkward silence.

 Heading down the stairs was like a charge, and when they both headed out into the air, it exploded in loud laughs, echoing surely in the street and perhaps even their brothers could hear in their own flat.

 “I gotta give it to you! I gotta give to you!” Gilbert shouted, pointing and clapping.

 “You played along good!” Lovino shouted in turn.

 They both released, twisting in the area as they let it all die down, in a calm to match the night despite being in such a city. Then came a realization, one that hit them with the passing alarms of an ambulance making its way pass them.

 They actually…laughed and agreed on something…together…it was…horrendous.

 As if erasing its passing, as a try to ignore it, they stood straight, looked away, walking to their respective directions and not even wishing a single goodbye.

  On Deutschland and Italia.

Tensions.

 It is ongoing, and even traditional, that Germany and Italy continue to settle meet ups for events, institutions, activities and diplomatic visits. As I mentioned in my first entry, Germany and Italy’s relationship has ancient roots and our government and people try to keep it alive as I’m sure the Romans and Germanics would have wanted. The biggest Italian cultural institute is in Germany, while its counterpart, the Goethe institute has its own achievements in Italy. Politicians though, still think the relationship has its tensions and that it’s even declining.

 Germany and Italy, to my disgust, have a relationship like that of an old married couple, no problems but lacking the love and passion one would expect from a country like Italy. What needs to be rekindled is that desire, that want to try and improve relations so they can be yet another stronghold of Europe.

 For my brother and his fiancé, on the other hand, I would rather that they wouldn’t try to find such ailments to their problem.

 In a sudden, rare…and even disgusting, work of companionship, Gilbert and I managed to find that downfall to create that tension and oh we will celebrate and try to make it last for what is needed.

  “To be honest, I doubt you’ll get it,” Lovino told his brother as they reached the steps of the symbol church of the city, tall, charming, but not well placed or the majesty of the ones in Italy. In Lovino’s opinion. Sadly, Ludwig and Feliciano had decided that they will marry in Hamburg and the St. Michaelis church seemed the most appealing to do so in for now.

 “It doesn’t hurt to try.” Feliciano was too confident, a wide smile and jumping steps as they entered.

 “You’re too sensitive, anything hurts you,” Lovino had to remind, any other words halted in the wonder that fell on his eyes as he took the interior, beautiful despite its simplicity. Feliciano joined him in that contemplating as well, taking a small tour to gaze out further golden details and architectural forms, silent, the few who were there but tourists or perhaps devoted followers sitting in the banks.

 “Are you sure you want to go through with the embarrassment though?” Lovino asked in his most silent whisper, pulling Feliciano to his side, keeping his hand on his arm. They were now turning back, nearing the office and for once, Feliciano held question in his expression, a slight slowing in his steps. But this was his wedding, this was his union to Ludwig, and he was determined to do whatever to make it the dream they had wanted.

 “It won’t hurt to try,” Feliciano repeated.

 “This is a protestant church,” Lovino reminded again.

 “Why would it matter? As long as were united spiritually, the religion is of no importance to me.”

 “I don’t know how nonno and mamma will feel about that,” Lovino warned.

 “Can’t you help me by saying more positive things,” Feliciano exasperated, his hand having found reach of the door.

 “You’re marrying Ludwig Beilschmidt. It’s really hard to find positives.”

 Feliciano rolled his eyes and groaned, entering and ready to begin the process.

  Ludwig liked the fresh air here, the comfort, relaxing, quiet, a wonderful view to a lake and the city in the distance.

 “Wow…this place is actually pretty cool,” Gilbert admitted, spotting the couches in the terrace and taking instant sitting, letting out a deep sigh and pooling himself down in its comfort. “Definitely chose this one,” Gilbert seemed decided for Ludwig.

 “It is really nice…I just…to be honest, would have preferred to celebrate at Antico.”

 “At the restaurant?” Gilbert couldn’t believe, raising an eye as if with insult.

 “Originally, it was supposed to be a small get together. Antico had just the right size. It’s familiar, meaningful, beautiful, and I know the Valenti would offer us the best service and food.”

 “But we’ve already been there so many times! I think I had five birthdays there!” Gilbert groaned loudly, letting his head hang from the back of his chair.

 “Exactly, it’s special.”

 “Don’t you think kind of dull?”

 “Of course not.”

 “Do you really want to remember celebrating your wedding there?”

 “I really would not mind. Usually when I dream of a wedding, it’s always dancing with Feliciano in the restaurant.”

 “Oh god, that was sappiness I wasn’t expecting from you.” Gilbert had to sit up.

 “Yes! It just proves my point that we should go with the restaurant.”

 “No. None of the people we invited would fit there,” he had to remind, much to Ludwig’s distaste, grimacing at all the hated, uncaring, dull and criticizing guests they had recently added to the list. It didn’t make him as excited as he would have been. His thoughts went back to Feliciano, to how shinning, beautiful and happy he would surely be that day no matter, and it would be enough to get him to the task at hand.

 “Plus, it would just be too much for them. It wouldn’t look fancy enough and maybe people will even forget they’re at a wedding reception,” Gilbert tried to find as many excuses as he could.

 Ludwig sighed, “fine, I guess this is good. It’s better than some of the other places we’ve seen.” Despite everything, indeed it was beautiful, with space and profession.

 “Great! Want me to call them so we can get to booking?” Before Ludwig kept thinking and changing his mind.

  Feliciano rummaged the calendar, making all kinds of notes having to do with business, their coming move to Santo Domingo, how the season will react, keeping in mind length of preparations and just a time that can be comfortable. He was surprisingly silent, Ludwig sitting beside him, focused on his coffee and going over his last bank statements, trying to hide the grimaces of the toll his accounts will take with the new budget they had settled.

 “Do we really need to use that much?” Ludwig had to say, had to try and fight it.

 “I believe it’s what it’s normally used on a wedding,” Feliciano thought. If he minded, it was not shown to Ludwig.

 “Are they really supposed to be that expensive?”

 “I think so,” Feliciano sighed in disappointment.

 Ludwig neared, letting one arm wrap around, pulling him closer. “If it’s for you…then I really shouldn’t mind the amount.”

 “I think the same. I mean, Gilbert and Lovino were right, this is a day we want to remember, and we have to make it as special as we can, no matter what it costs,” it seemed like Feliciano was still trying to convince himself.

 Ludwig nodded and sighed, pushing himself more to having to accept, putting his phone away, keeping his mind from his accounts. To be near Feliciano, having him, got his mind in beautiful clouds and colors.

 “It’s rare that they agree on and actually work together to get us to do something,” Ludwig noticed.

 Feliciano laughed, beautifully shaking in his arms. “You’re right! We really do have to take their advice then,” Feliciano smiled in true happiness, one that rubbed off on Ludwig.

 “Perhaps this wedding planning could serve good for the both of them.”

 “Yes, it’ll get them to get along! They’ll be able to talk to each other and we won’t have to worry about them fighting so much!”

 “They could maybe even become friends.”

 Feliciano gasped at a sudden idea, “or lovers!”

 And Ludwig hurled in laughter, in a rare show of red and falling breathless. “Don’t get too carried away there.” He needed a moment to relax and breathe again. "For me it's enough that they can at least agree on something.”

 “But wouldn’t it be beautiful if they could get together too,” Feliciano dreamed.

 “It’ll be too weird really.”

 “No! It won’t be! Nothing is weird about love when it’s made right!”

 “I doubt they’ll love each other…that way.”

 “Well, who knows,” Feliciano shrugged, leaning more into Ludwig’s chest, quite a blush and smile on his face that made Ludwig feel more fortunate of having him. “Maybe the old Beilschmidt-Valenti magic can work on them like it did on us.”

 Ludwig hummed, “it’s quite a funny thing to put to mind.”

 “They’ll still be really sweet together, I know it!”

 Ludwig let him dream that idea as he let his hand traverse his hair, still not finding sense or chances of it actually occurring. “Don’t try to do anything.”

 “I won’t.” That’s when Feliciano focused his attention on a singular date, perfect between all, in spring, with space, sure and he knew many would be able to come. “April 27?”

 Ludwig took his own gaze at the calendar, smiling and agreeing along with him. “April 27.”

 They had a wedding date.

< chapter 3                                                                                                                          chapter 5 >

[kariachi]

Okay, we’re gonna see how much liveblogging I can get done today. We’re still in full Kevin mode, and we’re starting the day with Heads of the Family. I have minimal idea what to expect, but I love Kevin and I love the Bugg Brothers, so it can’t be bad.

Right?

My love for this show’s music selection continues.

Oh good lords, these people take family reunions seriously. There’s a fucking banner. You can see more people in this frame then there was at my last family reunion in it’s entirety. And that was everybody from this farming family that still lived in the northeast within six generations of relation. Not kidding.I know nix and I play with there being too many fucking Joneses but goddamn there are canonically too many fucking Tennysons!

Just, goddamn.

...Last year Ben and Gwen had a burping contest where Ben won by so much a fucking gazebo collapsed on them and several relatives. I’m not surprised, just concerned

And Aunt Kathy damn near banned them from future reunions. Honestly I can’t blame her. Made Max give her a month’s worth of foot massages to re-earn the right to attend.

They’re bringing the deviled eggs.

That is, a sad amount of deviled eggs for the number of people here.

Nobody is happy to see Ben, which, given last year, not surprising.

...yep, that’s a level of offhand rudeness you only get from relatives.

Honestly I gotta write a fic involving family reunions, that’s shit’s gotta be confusing for an Erinaen like Argit.

(probably Great) Aunt Kathy likes bacon in her deviled eggs. The presence of them was likely planned ahead.

There’s a Sweden branch of the Tennyson family. The representatives shown are Sven and Len. I’m horribly amused. Also Max apparently can’t tell which is which.

...Somebody just showed up given a headcount of nearly 600. What is wrong with these people?!

The headcounter’s name is Alfred. He has pumpkin pie. This earns him a point.

He’s Max’s second cousin. This is a relation I can accept as a family reunion.

Somebody is showing off Max’s baby pictures. Making him out to have been a worse-looking teen than he was though. Doesn’t look good, but I was expecting worse from the characters’ reactions.

Also this is apparently Grandma Rita, which given it’s Max saying that I have to assume she’s either his mother or his grandmother, so Ben & Gwen’s great-grandma or great-great-grandma. Probably great-grandma. Either that, or she’s aged real well, or she and Max’s mom had kids real young.

“I’m gonna get some deviled eggs“ Ben says before being stopped by the realization that there, by the food, is his archest of nemesises, Kevin. Who, given there’s nearly 600 people here, may actually belong. I mean statistically, with this many people just attending the reunion, nonetheless in the family, there’s acceptable odds he’s a cousin of some bent.

Also my son, dual-wielding fried chicken

Gwen, concerned Kevin might be related to them. Max, concerned Ben’s going to do something that gets them banned from the family reunion.

“Don’t do anything rash“ like Ben has ever done something not-rash ever in his life

Boys please. I know you’re both disasters but, for five minutes pretend to have something resembling chill.

Ben: *totally down to kick Kevin’s ass for daring to eat a food* Kevin: *certain he won’t because they’re surrounded by innocent relatives* Ben: *does not care one iota* Gwen: *about to have an aneurysm because holy shit is her cousin trying to get them disowned*

I have to admit, I do enjoy the addition of episodes where Kevin is just existing and it’s Ben who’s starting shit? Having a wide range of hows with regards to the boys getting into fights makes sure that we get some real character depth out of both of them, as well as making sure the episodes don’t get samey and that they can always do something new. They aren’t pigeon-holing themselves.

The boys have left to a less target-rich environment and are now fighting because, again, how dare Kevin come to a Tennyson family reunion and eat the food. And we still don’t have any real evidence he doesn’t belong. I mean he makes that ‘where you got all your weird’ comment, but it’s Kevin, if they were twins he’d say that just to rile Ben up.

Me thinks these boys should’ve gone out a little further. Attract less attention.

...Ben knocks Kevin clear across the fairgrounds, jumps into a dumpster to stay out of sight until he comes back for round 2, finds the Bugg Brothers. Of course.

Ben is just having A Day.

A particle decimator. Okay, cool, but why you guys hiding in a dumpster?

It’s a shrinking ray. The plan is to use it to destabilize the national economy, undermine the government, disrupt social order, and wreak havoc among the entire world population. I feel like Maurice needs to start thinking smaller.

And lo, they were using the wrong device and accidentally switched Heatblast and Maurice’s heads. I’m shocked.

This is gonna be a weird episode from here out isn’t it

Kevin, gonna kick somebody’s ass even if he’s not sure what the fuck is going on

Kevin, rolling with the head swapping thing. Though honestly with some of the shit he’s been through this probably don’t seem too bad

I do like how Maurice made a head-swapping helmet and yet he and Sidney have not swapped heads, despite, well, everything.

Ah, this is presumably the device that swapped their heads in the first place. Cool cool.

My son

So clarify, he’s outnumbered, his head in on the wrong body, and the Maurice and Sidney are looming. He shows no signs of concern, or lack of confidence he can handle the situation. He still gets divetackled, but hey

And he’s not doing bad, given he’s wrestling against two guys his size.

And Ben has the helmet

“You need to fix us!“ And how, pray tell, do you expect your cousin to do that, Benjamin?

Welp, Gwen and Max got their heads swapped now.

And the watches timed out, meaning how Maurice and Sidney are basically helpless until shit times back in.

Welp, Maurice and Kevin swapped. So now Kevin’s head is on Ben’s body and Maurice is on Sidney’s. Meanwhile Ben’s head is still on Maurice’s body, Max’s on Gwen’s, and Gwen’s on Max’s.

This play-by-play brought to you by Fanta. Thirsty? Get a fanta.

And now Ben’s head is on a squirrel body. And a squirrel head on Maurice’s.

“Gotta fix this before I get infected with this dork’s genes“ Kevin pls.

Okay, Maurice is whole again, but now there’s a squirrel using Sidney’s body

Wow, Maurice, maybe you should’ve hedged your bets on whether you wanted to leave the helmet in the care of an 11-yo or a fucking squirrel.

And lo, now Maurice is back on Ben’s body and Kevin is on Maurice’s.

And I’m not even gonna give a play-by-play of these last several switches, just assume everything happened including the rise and fall of the roman empire

Kevin is fucking done. Also he and Ben are on each other’s bodies now.

Oooo, I was wondering if this episode came before or after Kev joined up with the Forever Nerd, turns out it’s after. Also this phone doesn’t have the spikes.

Oh gods and Ben is answering the damn phone.

FN: Kevin where are you? Me: Kevin is dead. Yeah, horrible accident involving a sprinkler system, a can of soda, and a mountain lion. Just awful. So, ya know, you may as well just lose this number-

Oh

Oh fuck

Oh gods damn

Okay so Ben imitates Kevin and claims he’s hanging out with his family (which, kudos Ben for trying to cover for him, your sweet child) and the Forever Nerd fucking- The quote-

“Family? *scoffs* That’s a laugh. You have noone. Without me, you’re all alone, remember? Now stop playing around and report back here at once.”

I’m gonna kill him, y’all. I’m gonna kill him and then wrap Kevin in a blanket and feed him cookies and cocoa until he pops.

Even Ben’s like ‘wait, no family?’ Which, given this clearly takes place after Introducing Kevin 11, what is going on in Kev’s life and what did Ben think was going on in Kev’s life?

Also Ben theorizing that maybe that’s why Kev crashed his family reunion, just to be part of one, and gods preserve me that’s a painful thought.

Kevin, critiquing the Bugg Brother’s evil plot.

Ben: If you want your body back you just need to blast me- Kevin: *blasts him*

Maurice and Sidney have been getting on so well this episode, it warms the heart. And makes sense in an episode involving a family reunion and the official reveal that Kevin has jackshit in the way of familial relations. Now to find if this is because he dropped them for being shit, because he’s actually an orphan, or he’s been taken from his family because they were shit.

Rath trying to be friendly and welcoming towards Kevin.

Kevin, just walking away from that shit.

And Max and the squirrel are still mixed up, and continue to be as the family flees the event.

9/11 solely due to Kevin things. My son deserves better.

[bucklikethedollar]

home

Bucky had known that Steve was Steve since the tenth grade. Steve, Sadie then, had pulled Bucky into a back alley on their way back from school.

“Bucky, I gotta tell you something.” His voice was hushed and urgent and shaky and not at all hiding the lump in his throat.

“Oh God, Sadie, is it another diagnosis? Is this one fatal??” Bucky started to sweat, genuinely expecting to hear his best friend’s expiration date.

“No, God no, Buck. Chrissakes.” He forced out a chuckle. “Listen. You- you gotta stop calling me Sadie. It ain’t right. I ain’t Sadie.”

Bucky furrowed his brow. “What’re you trying to say, Sa-” he stopped himself and paused, “...friend?”

Steve took a deep breath and sighed it out. “Jesus. Look, the- the dresses, the makeup, this goddamn hair,” he motioned to the blonde ringlets hanging from his head, “they ain’t me. I ain’t a dame, Buck. Every sick, crippled bone in my body is tellin’ me that livin’ as a girl, or woman, or whatever, is wrong. I’m s’posed to be like you. I’m s’posed to be a man.” Steve was clenching his fists by his sides, avoiding eye contact with his best friend. The way he was shaking with fear or anger or whatever it was made his light blue dress flutter around his knees.

“Fuck’s sake.” Bucky turned away for a moment, running one hand through his hair, resting the other on his hip. “Um, uh…”

“Steve.” He had never said it out loud before, but it felt warm and soft on his lips.

“Steve.” Bucky sighed before continuing. “Okay, um, if you’re not a dame, then I guess you’re not a dame.” Steve finally brought his his head up to look into Bucky’s deadly blue eyes, brow rumpled above in sympathy. “You’re still my best friend Sa- no, Steve.”

Steve relaxed his fists and looked down at his feet, then up at the grey Brooklyn sky, exhaling tightly through his mouth. When he looked back at Bucky his eyes were very obviously watering. “Thank you.” His voice cracked. Bucky flung one arm above Steve’s left shoulder, and wrapped the other below his right armpit, holding him tighter than he’d ever been held before.

In the five years since Steve’s confession, he’d cut his hair, moved in with Bucky on the other side of Brooklyn, and started wearing his hand-me-downs. Shirts and trousers and shoes from at least ten years ago that only barely fit Steve’s slender and unfortunately feminine frame. Steve loved wearing Bucky’s old clothes, it was like finally going home after a lifetime of not knowing what or where home was, but they showed him off in all the wrong places. The shirt hung off his shoulders and the sleeves ended far beyond his wrists, the pants made a travesty of his already wide hips and pooled around the shoes that he had to stuff with newspapers. They couldn’t afford a tailor.

Thankfully, the economy was still bad enough that it wasn’t uncommon for two young men to board together. Their landlady did think it rather odd how often one of them needed a new mattress, or one would push the other into their flat as fast as possible, shutting the door behind them not quite fast enough to cut off their giddy laughter, but she shrugged it off as youthful rambunctiousness, and hardly gave it another thought.

Blissfully revelling in their proprietress’ ignorance, the two would smother each other in kisses, tender and violent and urgent all at once, hiding themselves and their secrets from the world in their tiny suite, hushing each other with poignant caresses and thirsty embraces, vowing never, ever to let each other go.

And then James Barnes was drafted. Dragged by the collar into a war other men started, forced to leave warmth and comfort and home in his past. Bucky and Steve spent their last night together wrapped in each other. No kissing, no sex, just holding each other. Each of them cherishing the warmth the other provided, knowing that once it was gone, they’d be colder than ever, but clinging onto the last few moments of heat and love before they had an ocean planted between them.

Steve wasn’t drafted. He enlisted. Voluntarily, of his own free will. By Abraham Erskine. His thick syrupy accent had intrigued Steve since the moment he stepped into the examination room, ready for his sixth rejection. But the man behind those round glasses enthralled him with his offer of a chance, however miniscule, in helping the American cause. As exciting as the whole ordeal was, Steve had to be Sadie again. Erskine had found his original birth certificate and medical records and insisted that if this agreement were to proceed, Sadie would leave all pretenses of masculinity behind. He had to be her again.

His bones were on fire. White light was bleeding in through his tightly closed eyelids, burning his eyes while he screamed. He was being pulled and compressed and torn open and forced shut all within an instant. He heard Erskine’s muffled orders to abort the experiment.

“No!” The word burst through him like a cannonball, the pain and heat bubbling through his body shot it out through his mouth with force and volume he’d never felt himself conjure. “I can do this!” He didn’t entirely believe himself, but he had to prove that Erskine’s trust was not misplaced. He had been told that this procedure would make him more. More good, or more bad, or more whatever was inside him. For Steve that could mean more sick. More small. More terrified. He certainly felt terrified as his body was squeezed like an orange and then pulled taught like fresh saltwater taffy.

Through the din of his agony rattling about his brain, he heard the machine whirr as it powered down. The pain stopped and Steve took a deep breath. He took a deep breath. All the way through his lungs, smoothly through his windpipe, and flowing to every inch of his sore body. The steam that had accumulated within the pod floated to the ground as the pod’s doors opened. He relished in the cool air now surrounding him. The only thing that prompted him to open his eyes was the thunderous gasp that seemed to come from every person in the facility.

“I did it.” He forced the words through his throat, but it wasn’t his voice. It rumbled in his chest and the deep timbre settled beneath him, giving him shivers.

Everyone hesitated to even breathe. Dr. Erskine managed to speak: “You did it.” Peggy approached him, and he couldn’t read her face, just acknowledged her furrowed brow and her mouth hanging agape. She looked him up and down. “How do you feel?” Her voice was weak and contemplative.

“Taller.” There was that voice again, resonating from deep within him and pouring out of his mouth like mist, vibrating in his throat. He finally looked down. He was….. him. His body rolled and rippled below him, like a photograph of a great wave, frozen in time, three dimensional and elevated. His chest was square, shoulders broad and intimidating, even to him, and his abdomen narrowed down to thin hips. He noticed a new presence between his legs and his stomach dropped. He looked at his hands, large and strong, reaching up to touch his face, finding a sharp jawline above a pronounced Adam’s apple.

He didn’t get a chance to examine himself more. There was an explosion, and then Erskine’s body, and then the taxi, and the boy in the water, and hail HYDRA.

He sat in the examination room after the nurse had left with his blood samples. They had given him the luxury of a full-length mirror leaning against the wall, and allowed him to examine himself in peace. Indulging in his own vanity, Steve admitted to himself that he resembled one of those ancient sculptures of Greek gods. Muscular and expansive. He closed his eyes and felt himself occupy this body. He took his shirt off and ran his hands over all the curves and canyons of his new body. Where his breasts previously fell were now square and solid pectorals, residing above distinct abs. He wrapped his arms around himself, feeling pressure against his sides as muscle collided with muscle. He squeezed his vast shoulders and slid his hands down to his narrow hips, which lead into thick, sturdy thighs. In between those thighs was something he had never even dreamed of, never allowed himself to indulge in the fantasy of his very own masculinity. Real, tangible, large masculinity.

He was overwhelmed. Eyes still shut, tears drifted down his angular, yet still familiar, face. He allowed himself a deep whimper as his arms wrapped themselves around his biceps once again, taking deep breaths and enjoying the oxygen now completely filling his lungs.

He hadn’t noticed Peggy walk in until she put his hand on his wide back, tender, yet almost fearful. “Sadie….” her voice was thick and wet. “Sadie, I’m so sorry. If I had known this would happen I never would have let you do this.” She stifled a sob as Steve opened his eyes, still just as blue as the day he confided in Bucky, and turned to face her. “I- I need you to know that you’re still the same beautiful woman in my eyes, Sadie. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” Now it was her turn to hug herself as tears streamed down her delicate face, now wrinkled into the paragon of sorrow. Steve didn’t know how to tell her.

“No.” His voice rumbled through him like a car engine.

“Wh-what?”

“No. Don’t be sorry. I’m not. Sorry. Listen.” He wet his lips and his eyes darted every which way. “This is… me. I was always s’posed to be this, don’t you see? The serum was supposed to make more of what was already there. I’ve been a man for as long as I can remember, only now everyone else can see it too. I never thought I’d be able to look in the mirror and be happy with what I saw.” He turned back toward the mirror. “I’ve had dreams where I would wake up and be a real man, go about my business ‘n have everyone call me ‘sir’. And now I’m not dreaming. I’m looking at myself and seeing me.” He knew Peggy didn’t understand. Her mouth was hanging open, eyebrows curling up toward her forehead, hand resting on her heart. “I’m sorry.” Steve got up and headed out the door into the crowded hallway.

“Sadie, wait-” Steve stopped dead in his tracks and whirled around to face her.

“I never thought I’d be able to tell anyone this.” He chuckled and clicked his tongue. “My name…. is Steve. Steven Grant Rogers. I have never been Sadie.”

“S- Steve…” she was shaking. “What are you doing to do?”

He walked toward her and covered her in a strong embrace, his head resting on someone else’s for once. “I am going to live, and be happy, and change my name, and be in love with myself. I am going to be more myself than I have ever been before.”

Steve sat at the piano in the church they had requisitioned for barracks. He hadn’t played since his mother died. He laid his long fingers on the keys and took a breath before he began singing. His fingers could finally reach all the keys in the chords he played.

“We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when. But I know we’ll meet again some sunny day…” He was probably singing a whole octave below where he used to, his new baritone range sinking onto the marble floors of the church and evaporating into the arched ceiling above. He stopped and let it echo. He hoped they would meet again. And they would.

Steve saw Bucky lying on a metal table in the middle of a damp, empty room.

“Barnes… Sargeant…. 32557….. Barnes…” He had obviously been drugged.

“Bucky!” As Steve ran toward his friend, his heart rose to his throat and his stomach dropped to the floor. Bucky would finally be able to see his Stevie the way he had always wanted to see himself. But what if he was unrecognizable? What if Bucky didn’t like all the muscles and the strength? What if he only called Steve Steve throughout their affair because he wanted to maintain access to his feminine body, and now that he didn’t have that anymore, he would be disgusted? Bucky hardly responded until Steve reached him.

“Bucky, oh my God.” Steve held Bucky’s face in his hands while he stared into Steve’s new face, clearly having trouble comprehending the situation. “It’s me, it’s Steve.” His fear solidified into a sturdy lump in his throat.

Bucky took a moment. “Steve?” Steve sighed like he had never sighed before. He was recognizable.

“I thought you were dead.” Steve helped his friend to his feet.

Whatever drugs they had given Bucky were evidently very strong, as Bucky only replied with “I thought you were smaller. What happened to you?”

“I joined the Army.”

“Is it permanent?”

Steve felt a grin spread across his face. “So far.”

Captain America had only just gotten out of the shower when Bucky came into his tent. Steve was wearing a t-shirt and camo pants, and his hair was dripping wet. Once again, a tidal wave of anxiety rose in his chest.

“Hey.” Steve set down his towel and slowly approached his friend.

“Hey.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Disoriented I guess. But I feel like I should ask you how you’re feeling.”

“Steve chuckled and leaned his back against a post, crossing his hands in front of him. “It’s been… it’s been a lot to get used to.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

“Steve?”

“Hmm?”

“That day, sophomore year, when you told me that every bone in your body was telling you you were s’posed to be a man. Is this what you meant? Is this who you’re supposed to be?”

Steve hesitated. That was a tough question. “I- I think so. I never really had a clear image of what I thought I should’ve looked like. It was always just me as I was, but with no tits and a better jaw.” Bucky smiled. “When I stepped outta the pod I was in when this all happened, I didn’t really even notice it at first. I just thought I was taller. I really only had a moment or two to take a look at myself before the explosion. Afterwards though, I had some time alone with a mirror and slowly I managed to fit into this body. I recognized that my reflection actually was my reflection, not just a moving picture. To be honest, it still surprises me when I wake up. I always expect to open my eyes and be 5’4” and skinny again. But I’m always so happy when I see this. It’s like I’m finally me, after all these years.”

Bucky paused and stepped closer to Steve. “I- I like your voice now. I mean, I liked it before, but now it sounds like the voice matches the words.” Bucky examined him. “Can I- can I see?” He gestured vaguely to Steve. Steve stood up, confused, and slowly took his shirt off. Bucky breathed him in. He looked up at Steve’s face (he would never get used to having to look up at Steve) with inquisitive eyes. Steve nodded, and Bucky raised his right hand and settled it on top of Steve’s left pec.

“It’s like… It’s like I’m seeing you for the first time. Not some poor kid in my clothes, but you.” Bucky circled his right hand onto Steve’s bicep and couldn’t help but squeeze, making Steve smile the same smile he’d had in tenth grade. Bucky’s left hand reached onto his abs, making sure to feel each crevice, each tendon beneath the skin. He lifted his hands off Steve just barely and circled around to see his back, rolling and dipping like the ocean in a storm. For the first time in his life, Bucky couldn’t see bones sticking up under Steve’s skin. Instead, there was solid, round muscle covering every area possible. Bucky circled back around to face Steve, who brought his hands up onto Bucky’s shoulders the way Bucky’s were already on his.

“Steve. We’ve been… something for a long time now. Up there, at Azzano, you were all I could think about, you were what kept me going. All those nights spent in our apartment in secret, I thought that was as good as it was ever gonna get. Looking at you now, is so… different though.” Steve’s heart dropped to his feet and he felt his mouth open, expecting rejection. “I still see your eyes storing everything to sketch later, and your nose is still crooked from all the times you didn’t know to leave a fight. And now I get to look up at you, and spread my arms just to touch both of your shoulders, and it’s like I don’t have to be scared for you anymore. I’m…. I-”

Steve couldn’t take it anymore. He cupped Bucky’s jaw with his right hand, placing his left on the small of his back, pressing their lips together like a jigsaw puzzle that had been missing a piece for years. Bucky grabbed Steve’s face, taking in the strong jaw, the Adam’s apple, relishing in tilting his head back to look up at him. Steve wrapped his strong arms completely around Bucky, squeezing and holding on for dear life, almost afraid he would hurt Bucky with the strength he didn’t quite know how to control yet. But Bucky let out the faintest moan and pressed himself further into Steve’s new stature, allowing himself to let down the guards he had built up in the previous months. Steve opened his eyes, and parted from Bucky, just far enough to see his whole face, still close enough to feel his breath on his chin.

“You are you breathtaking to me.” Steve cupped Bucky’s face again. “I have missed your face… so much. I’ve missed your lips and your voice and your cheeks and your eyebrows and every little thing about you and I’m never going to let you go again.”

Bucky blushed and gazed into Steve’s blue eyes. “I- I think everyone’s probably asleep by now. No one would notice…” Steve read his mind, and guided Bucky toward his cot. They sat down, not daring to break contact at all.

“Yknow, Bucky, the serum, it…” Steve grabbed Bucky’s hand and gaze down sheepishly between his own legs.

“No shit.” Bucky grinned. “Oh my god. You lucky son of a bitch.” Steve guided Bucky’s hand toward his lap as they made excited eye contact, both new to the sensation of the mass in Steve’s pants. They pressed their lips together once again, never stopping kissing, even as they both undressed.

They were finally at home.

[invisibleanonymousmonsters]

Control

Summary: No one told Y/N life was going to be this hard. She’s lost. But Bucky is the only one trying to find her. 

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 4,367

Setting: Avengers Compound is still in the NYC Tower for plot reasons. 

Warning: Adult/Mature Themes, Depression, Anxiety, Eating Disorders

** No Infinity War Spoilers - PROMISE! **

That’s the thing about being quiet and keeping to oneself. People forget they’re watching more than anyone else. They’re observing every little detail while everyone else is busy participating.

That’s probably why Bucky was the only one to ever notice.

————

Y/N was Pepper’s niece.

When she got her dream job but realized it didn’t pay the dream salary, Pepper offered to have her stay at the Avenger’s tower in the city. With her paycheck, Y/N wouldn’t even be able to live in Manhattan, let alone New York City.

Tony had known Y/N her whole life and basically acted like her quirky and immature uncle that cared more about her having fun than being responsible. He instantly pushed Pepper’s proposal.

Y/N couldn’t argue with either of them. She saved money on rent and never even had to buy groceries with how stocked the kitchen always was. It made sense, having to feed earth’s mightiest heroes and all.

Y/N knew she was lucky. She had an aunt and surrogate uncle that loved her and helped her in an area where most people her age were struggling. New York City was not a kind place to start your career or financial independence.

The lifestyle change was harsh. Y/N felt like she hit the ground running, but the ground was moving like a treadmill.

Adulthood was hard. Being in your 20s was hard.

People say millennial culture is feeling like a failure when you’re not a millionaire with your life figured out by 25. The pressure was ridiculous in this economy, in this time when a bachelor’s degree was barely above a high school diploma, in this job market.

Y/N started to get more anxious than usual; started getting depressed for no apparent reason.

But she never told anyone.

Y/N acted like everything was okay. She made sure to smile when it was needed, force a laugh to hide her sadness. The pressure to appear happy was even stronger when she was surrounded by the Avengers. How could she ever complain or vent about her mundane struggles when they were literally saving the world?

They were all so kind to her. They treated her like the little sister they all wish they could have. Sam constantly teased Y/N and joked around with her, being one of the few people that could genuinely make Y/N laugh still. Thor always came to her withs questions about Midgardian culture and rituals that he was to embarrassed to ask anyone else. Natasha and Wanda treated her like a girlfriend. Steve just liked to quietly hang out, watching a movie or asking Y/N what she was reading. Vision tried to learn baking and cooking skills from her even though she could barely make more than 3 different meals. Even Peter seemed attached to her, the smaller age gap made him think Y/N was way cooler than she actually felt.

Bucky was the only one that kept his distance. But it turned out his distance was the thing that made him see Y/N clearer than anyone else in the compound.

————

“Where’s Y/N at?” Sam asked as some of the team sat at the large dinner table.

It was almost impossible to get all the Avengers to have any sort of family dinner. People were always on missions, others were out of town, Thor was passing through different realms. It was too chaotic to even try. But there was basically always a group eating together.

Pepper was only half paying attention as her fingers typed out an email on her phone. “Ugh… She said she had to work late.”

Lie, Bucky thought to himself. But he knew that Pepper didn’t realize it.

He’d seen Y/N quickly walk into the compound half an hour ago. She went straight to her room.

Before Bucky figured out that Y/N probably had a problem, he’d already been drawn to her. Despite living in a tower filled with enhanced heroes and spies, Bucky found Y/N to be the most interesting person to watch. She was human. She was normal. She was the person that gave Bucky the most realistic depiction of how people were in this time period.

It also didn’t hurt that Bucky found Y/N beautiful.

————

Later that night, Bucky couldn’t sleep. His body just refused it. So he decided he’d try to exhaust his body to the point of sleep.

He was only half surprised to see Y/N working out in the gym. It was almost 4am. Thankfully it was a Friday and she didn’t have work in the morning.

Bucky saw her recognize his entrance through the mirror in front of the treadmill she was currently sprinting on.

No, Y/N wasn’t a superhero. But she worked out like one and was probably more fit than the average person.

But Bucky could somehow tell that Y/N had pushed it too far tonight.

She seemed to sense it too, for she finally pressed the stop button on the machine.

Y/N rubbed the towel over her face and gave him a sad smile. “Couldn’t sleep again?” She asked him quietly.

Bucky gave her sideways smirk and shrugged. “You too?”

She shrugged.

“I’ll leave you to it.” Y/N announced before starting to make her exit.

“Y/N, you know…you can still workout while I’m in here.” Bucky offered. He had noticed that she always fled when an agent or Avenger interrupted her workout sessions. It was like she was embarrassed to be in the same room as them.

Y/N blushed slightly, but her face was already red from the running that it was barely noticeable. “I know, Bucky.”

She continued her leave.

Bucky sighed and walked over to the treadmill that Y/N had just been running on. His stomach turned when he saw that she had run over 7 miles on the damn thing. He also knew for a fact that hadn’t eaten since she got home from work. She was probably lifting and doing other things before the treadmill too.

Bucky rubbed his scruff roughly. He didn’t know what to do.

It was clear to him that Y/N was suffering. But suffering so silently that no one else noticed. Bucky thought over and over in his head about telling Pepper or even Tony. But a part of him was scared Y/N would hate him forever after exposing her issues and forcing an intervention.

————

Bucky heard the stumbling right after the elevator doors opened. Then he heard her giggling. He shared a look with Steve, who clearly caught it too.

A moment later, Y/N came drunkenly stumbling into the kitchen.

She smiled at the sight of the two super-soldiers and then dramatically put a finger to her lips, shushing them.

“Someone had a fun night…” Steve smirked.

“I don’t know how fun it was. But I am definitely intoxicated.” Y/N folded her arms on the cold counter and rest her head on them.

Bucky moved smoothly around, grabbing Y/N a large glass of water and some crackers. “Doll, drink some water and eat this.”

Steve watched the way his best friend instantly started caring for Y/N. It would warm his heart if he didn’t also catch the deep concern in Bucky’s blue eyes. He thought it might be best to leave him to take care of her.

“You good?” He asked Bucky.

He nodded without taking his eyes off Y/N.

“Y/N, come on.” He urged softly as soon as Steve had left.

She nodded drunkenly and chugged the water, but ignored the crackers.

“You should eat something. It’ll make your hangover less horrible tomorrow morning.” Bucky tried to convince her. “I can make you something. What do you want?”

He knew his feelings were pathetically obvious as he tried to take care of her. But he also knew that Y/N would never remember this part of the night, so he didn’t bother hiding his affection.

“I’m not hungry.” Y/N moaned before putting her head back down in her arms.

Bucky sighed. “Alright. Let’s get you to bed, yeah?” He offered then.

Y/N nodded and let him guide them to her bedroom.

Bucky sat her on the edge of her neatly made bed. He kneeled in front of her to help take off her booties. Then he folded her leather jacket nicely before hanging it over her desk chair.

Meanwhile, Y/N had no regard for Bucky’s presence and stripped off her jeans and top before sloppily getting under the covers in just her bra and underwear.

Bucky quickly looked away in time.

It was obvious that drunk Y/N didn’t care if he saw her in this state. But Bucky couldn’t shake his chivalry.

When Y/N was covered by her bedding, Bucky put a fresh glass of water and a bottle of Advil on her nightstand.

“You’re gonna need that in the morning.” He muttered before sitting on the edge of her bed.

Maybe it was selfish or stupid. But Bucky allowed himself just a moment of taking her in without any repercussions. He brushed some hair away from Y/N’s face as she looked up at him.

“Y/N…” Bucky sighed. “Why do you do this to yourself?”

He doesn’t expect her drunk and hazy mind to even process the question, doesn’t expect an answer.

But Y/N was always full of surprises.

“Do what?” She giggled. “Have an existential crisis during the week and then black out on the weekend to forget about it?”

Bucky took in a deep breath and ran a hand through his shaggy hair in stress. “Doll, you gotta take better care of yourself.”

She scoffed, not fully realizing the extent that Bucky understood the abuse she put her body and mind through. “It doesn’t fucking matter.” The words were slurred.

“It matters to me. To everyone here, actually. We all care about you.” Bucky quickly corrected her.

But Y/N either didn’t hear him or decided to ignore him, because she rolled over to face away from him and pulled the covers over her head.

Bucky took in a deep breath before sitting up from the bed and making his way out of Y/N’s bedroom.

————

Steve knocked Bucky to the ground once again.

But the Winter Soldier barely even seemed fazed by it, which made Steve realize there was clearly something going on in that head of his.

“Want to tell me what’s on your mind? Or do you want to keep embarrassing yourself?” Steve finally asked.

Bucky blinked for a moment, still lost in his head.

“Buck?”

He finally came back to the present. “If you knew someone was suffering… that someone was hurting themselves, but it wasn’t any of your business. What would you do?

Steve’s brow furrowed. He was completely blindsided by the question.

“Bucky… is everything okay?”

He knew that Steve’s first reaction would be concern towards him. “I’m fine, Steve. I promise. This isn’t about me. I-I just don’t know what to do.”

Steve put his hands on his hips and looked at the ground. “Is this about Y/N?”

Bucky’s jaw clenched. Despite being at a loss for how to help, he refused to expose her trauma…even if it was to his best friend. He felt a protectiveness toward Y/N that he couldn’t give up.

Steve nodded slowly, realizing that Bucky wasn’t going to give details.

He sighed. “Buck, you gotta tell Pepper, or even Tony.”

“But she’ll hate me for it.” He mumbled. The only thing worse than doing nothing to help Y/N was having her hate him for trying to.

Steve sighed. In all honesty, he didn’t really know the answers himself. Especially when Bucky wouldn’t give him any details or specifics.

“Then you gotta talk to her yourself, Bucky.”

It broke Steve’s heart to see how sad his best friend looked. He stepped forward and gripped Bucky’s shoulder. “You really care about her, don’t you?”

Bucky just nodded dejectedly. “She’s getting really bad, Steve.”

————

Bucky didn’t see Y/N around for days, which just put him on edge. Her mere presence usually made him calm and happy.

It wasn’t until a four days after his talk with Steve that Bucky finally ran into her.

It was the middle of the night and Y/N was cozy on the couch while the rest of the compound was fast asleep. Everyone except Bucky, that is.

Her eyes looked sunken and tired. Even though she was watching the television, it didn’t seem like she was processing any of the movie.

“Hey, doll. Couldn’t sleep?” He greeted her softly.

She still jumped but smiled when she realized it was him.

Bucky tried to ignore how her face seemed to brighten up at the sight of him. But it still warmed his heart.

Y/N shrugged and nodded.

“Me too.” Bucky huffed before collapsing on the couch next to her.

When they had first met in the middle of the night like this, Y/N had assured Bucky that he never had to worry about bothering her or asking to join. ‘Us insomniacs need to stick together.’ She had once teased, making it clear that he never needed to ask for permission.

Bucky glanced over at Y/N. Her once tight t-shirt was now hanging off of her in a way that made it obvious how much weight she’d lost. Her sweatpants had to be tied for them to stay on her waist.

“Y/N?” He asked so gently that she felt compelled to look away from the TV. “Are…” He took in a shaky breath, "Are you okay?”

It was the complete and utter sincerity that Y/N wasn’t prepared for. On top of that, Bucky’s desperate and concerned eyes hit something inside her.

That’s when Y/N realized that Bucky knew. He knew that she wasn’t okay and that was exactly why he was asking.

Y/N stared into his blue eyes for a moment longer before her own filled with tears and her bottom lip trembled. She tried to hide her face from Bucky at first. But as soon as the floodgates opened, there was no hiding the silent tears streaming down her cheeks.

But Y/N was also desperate. She refused to give in so easily even though she knew her tears had given her away. She shot up from the couch.

Bucky instantly sat up to and took a step toward her, but she immediately stepped away.

“I’m fine!” Y/N sputtered out. “I’m just tired.” Then she fled.

Bucky let out a breath that he didn’t know he had been holding. His hands ran through his hair. What the hell was he supposed to do?

————

Y/N avoided Bucky like the plague after that.

Steve watched as his best friend became more and more heartbroken from the absence of Y/N. Most of the compound didn’t even see her. But if Y/N did show herself, she would leave the room as soon as Bucky entered.

But now Steve noticed the signs just as clearly as Bucky. Y/N needed help.

“I think you have to tell Pepper.” Steve sighed when the two of them were alone.

“I guess you’re right. She already hates me.” Bucky muttered quietly.

“She doesn’t hate you, Buck. I think she’s just scared of how easily you see her…and I mean truly see her.”

————

Bucky was gave himself a couple of days to talk to Pepper and Tony. He wanted to make sure you did it right, chose his words carefully. His concern was, and always will be, what was best for Y/N.

Bucky was up watching TV in the middle of the night.

His super-soldier senses heard the the elevator open in the lobby. Instantly, he recognized the drunken giggles of Y/N. Only this time, he sensed another presence.

“I can’t believe you live with them.” A male voice said in awe. Bucky could tell the man was buzzed too, but not as much as Y/N.

Bucky’s hands flexed into fist when her heard the kissing. They were stumbling down the hallway as they made out. Bucky quickly stood and decided he needed to leave before they reached the kitchen. This was not something he needed to see. Hearing it was already terrible enough.

He was just about to make his escape when he heard them pull apart.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Y/N slurred.

“What?” The guy asked.

Bucky didn’t like the annoyance in his tone. There was just a thin wall separating him from the two of them now.

“You gotta go.” Y/N urged.

“What are you talking about? I thought we were having fun.”

Bucky allowed himself to peek around the corner just in time to see the man try to kiss Y/N again but she pressed a hand to his chest and gently pushed him away.

“We were having fun.” Y/N admitted. “But I changed my mind. You gotta go.”

The guy wasn’t taking no for an answer. He still thought there was room for discussion. “Come one. Just relax.” He tried to kiss her again and was more aggressive with his next attempt. He managed to get a grip on Y/N and she struggled to pull away this time.

Bucky’s vision went red.

“Hey!” He barked. The tone alone made the guy jump away from Y/N. He whipped around to look at Bucky as the he marched toward him.

“You’re-you’re the…” He started to sputter, his eyes wide in fear.

Bucky’s metal arm clicked as his fist clenched around the guy’s collar. “Get the hell out of here.” He growled before shoving him in the direction of the elevator.

The man didn’t need to be told twice and stumbled back to his feet before sprinting to the elevator.

As soon as FRIDAY confirmed the man was being escorted out by security on the main floor, Bucky turned to Y/N. She had been frozen in shock from Bucky’s intervention. His entire body softened when his attention was fully on her.

“You okay?” He asks quietly.

She nods numbly. “You didn’t have to do that. I could’ve handled it.” “I know.” He agreed. “That was more for me.”

Y/N ran her fingers shakily through her hair. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, doll. You don’t have to apologize.”

She shook her head. “No, I’m not just sorry for that. I’m sorry for how I’ve been treating you…and-and avoiding you.” Then her eyes started watering.

Without thinking, Bucky brought her into his arms. He felt her entire body relax and release all her pent up emotions. She instantly wrapped her arms around him too and cried into his neck.

Somehow Bucky can sense that it’s been too long since someone actually held her.

That was probably why she dragged some stranger home: Y/N was desperate to just feel something.

But it took her awhile for her drunken mind to realize that a stranger couldn’t give her what she needed.

“It’s okay.” Bucky whispered into her hair. “I got you. I got you.” He repeated it to her and kissed her forehead.

Her entire body continued to shake through the sobs and Bucky just held her.

After awhile, Y/N managed to calm herself down enough to pull away just enough to look at up Bucky.

“I just want to go to bed.” She mumbled through a now congested nose and with bloodshot eyes.

Bucky nodded and guided Y/N to her bedroom with his arms still wrapped around her.

As soon as she unlocked her door and stepped in, Bucky lingered in the doorway. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t want to leave her, but he let Y/N make up her mind.

Y/N expected him to follow her inside and froze to look at him when he stayed back.

“I don’t… Can-Can you stay?” Y/N mumbled as she looked at the ground.

Bucky nodded and carefully stepped into her bedroom, softly closing the door behind him.

Y/N disappeared into her bathroom with a pile of clothes in her hand. She reappeared a few minutes later with her face clean and without makeup, wearing a tank top and pajama shorts.

Bucky couldn’t stop staring at her. She looked so innocent and fragile in this state. He couldn’t understand why no one else seemed to see it but him.

Y/N cleared her throat. “You’re right.” Bucky’s eyes narrowed. “I’m not okay.”

Bucky let out a shallow breath.

“But I can’t talk about it tonight. So can…can we just sleep? And then I promise we can talk about it tomorrow.”

Bucky toed his boots off and sat on the edge of the bed. “Come here, doll.”

Y/N gave him a shy smile before pulling the covers up and getting into bed with him.

The whole thing was innocent. There was no pressure or expectations or disappointment on Bucky’s end. But Y/N still eyed him, not knowing if he was really comfortable with this or just felt like he couldn’t deny her request.

“Y/N, come here.” Bucky urged and lifted his metal arm to beckon her forward.

She scooted closer until her entire body was wrapped in him.

“How do you do that?” She murmured against his chest.

“Do what?”

“Make me feel so protected.”

Bucky rubbed circles on her back and took in a deep breath. “I guess… it’s because I love you.”

He could feel her shake her head slightly.

“You say it like you’re so sure.”

“Because I am.” Bucky replied firmly.

“If that’s really true, then you shouldn’t.”

Bucky swore he felt his stomach drop at her words.

“It’s not going to stop. I’m not going anywhere. I’m always gonna try and protect you, even if I have to protect you from yourself.”

Y/N sighed. It was like she was so tired, like she’d given up… that she couldn’t even find the energy to argue with him.

“Get some sleep, Y/N. I’ll be here when you wake up. We can talk then.”

————

Bucky watched anxiously as Y/N was talking to Pepper and Tony. He could see them through the glass of the room. It was one of the perks of living in the modern and open concept of the tower.

“You okay?”

Bucky’s eyes snapped away from Y/N and looked at Steve.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just worried about her.” Bucky admitted. “Buck…” Steve sighed, trying to use his words carefully.

“What? What is it?”

Steve’s jaw clenched before he met Bucky’s dark gaze. “I know you care about Y/N a lot. I care about her too. But I just don’t want your helping her to overshadow or reprioritize you trying to get better yourself.”

Bucky felt guilty for clearly making his best friend worry about him.

“I haven’t been able to help people in awhile, Steve. Yeah, I go on missions and save lives. But I haven’t been able to help someone like this, especially someone I care about. It makes me feel better. I know that might be hard to understand, but she makes me feel like I can take care of people without having to fight or destroy to do it.”

Steve nodded slowly, understand where he was coming from.

Bucky remembered the talk Y/N and him had after he slept in her room.

“No one tells you this is how life can feel. You go to school and you think you know what the fuck you’re going to do with your life. Then you’re trying to do it and literally nothing makes sense. I don’t feel in control of fucking anything, Bucky. I hate my job, but don’t feel qualified to do anything I enjoy. I’m not even sure I like New York City all that much. I can’t control my career. I can’t control my love life because dating here fucking sucks. I drink the weekend away because it’s the only thing that gets me out of my head.” She tried to catch her breath. “So I just started obsessing over my body. It’s like a challenge. I eat less and less; workout more and more. You see the results right before your eyes. It’s the only thing I feel control over.”

Bucky listened closely and patiently as Y/N finally let it all come out.

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?” He finally asked when she took a few deep inhales to try and calm herself down.

“I live with earth’s mightiest heroes, Bucky. My problems just…seem so unimportant. How could I possibly explain my existential crisis to any of you when you’re busy risking your lives trying to save the world?” Then Y/N groaned as she heard what she was saying. “God I can’t even listen to myself talk! You’ve been through so much! My problems are so fucking pathetic and stupid in comparison!”

“Y/N, stop.” Bucky demand gently. “Just because you’re going through something different than me, doesn’t mean it’s not valid. You’re not alone, Y/N. I need you to know that.”

She watched him, trying to find a hint that he was lying to her. But he wasn’t.

“But you need to tell your aunt. Because I don’t know if I’m enough to help you. I’ll be with you every step of the way. But you’re not happy. And you deserve to be happy. I’m not giving up until we both get that, okay?”

Bucky stood up as Y/N approached him.

He looked past his shoulder to see that Tony was now trying to console a crying Pepper. Bucky knew it would happen: Pepper would blame herself for not seeing the signs sooner.

Y/N leaned into Bucky’s grip. He instantly responded, wrapping his arms around her and rubbing her back.

“You okay?” He whispered into her ear.

“Not really.” Y/N laughed bitterly. “But I’ll get there.”

I know I’ve been a little MIA and haven’t written anything in awhile. I really wanted to write this one-shot, but it was the hardest thing I’ve ever written. It’s very personal. Probably too personal. And I kept having to stop writing because I kept feeling like I wasn’t writing Bucky true to his character.

 I would love to hear your thoughts. 

MASTERLIST

[thesinglesjukebox]

LIL NAS X - OLD TOWN ROAD

[6.73]

We're gonna bluuuurb til we can't no more...

Katie Gill: The problem with "Old Town Road" is that it's more interesting as a thinkpiece than an actual song. The song charting, then being excluded, from the Billboard Country Music charts opens so many questions that can't be answered in one sitting. Is this a further example of the well-documented racism in country music? Or is this just a freak accident hick-hop song that vaulted it's way out of the depths of subgenre hell? Is a twangy voice and references to horses enough to make a song "country"? Does the presence of Billy Ray Cyrus in a remix that dropped on Friday legitimize the song's credentials or just make them worse? Where was all this controversy when "Meant To Be," an honest-to-god pop song, was holding steady on the charts? There are so many questions and so many points of conversation that spring out from this song, that it's a pity "Old Town Road" itself is just okay. Everything about it screams "filler track for the SoundCloud page," from the length to the trap beats to the aggressively mediocre lyrics. The song didn't even chart on it's own merits: it charted because it's used in a TikTok meme! This is like if "We Are Number One" or "No Mercy" made their way to the top of the iTunes charts and people decided to have a conversation about the limits of genre based on those charting. I'm a little annoyed, because the conversation around "Old Town Road" is something that country music should be having... but just not around "Old Town Road." [5]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: There are essays upon essays to be written about "Old Town Road" as a prism for the racial divides that have served as undergirding for the modern American genre system since the 1930s division between "hillbilly" and "race" records. It's the perfect hunk of think-piece fodder: a simple core question -- is it country? -- that can spiral out to all corners of culture until the song itself is obscured. So let's focus on the song, instead. Because beyond all world-historical significance, "Old Town Road" fucking bangs. It's all in the bait and switch of that intro -- banjos and horns plunking away until Lil Nas X's triumphant "YEAAAH" (second this decade only to Fetty Wap) drops and the beat comes in. It's a joke until it's not -- maybe you came in from the Red Dead Redemption 2 video, or from a friend of yours talking about the hilarious country trap song, or from the artist's own Twitter, which is more Meech On Mars than Meek Mill, but no matter the source, you'll find that "Old Town Road" has its way of looping into your brain, all drawls and boasts and banjos. It's meme rap, but much like prior iterations of this joke ("Like a Farmer"), Lil Nas X fully and deeply commits -- he doesn't drop the pretense for a single line, keeping the track short enough to not outlive its welcome while still exploring its weird conceit to its fullest. Yet even in its jokey vibe there's some actual pathos -- no matter how put on, the lonesome cowboy sorrow of Lil Nas X's declaration that he'll "ride till [he] can't no more" feels genuine. "Old Town Road" is everything at once, the implosion of late teens culture into one undeniable moment. [10]

David Moore: So here's a true gem of a novelty song -- a phrase I use with both intention and respect; I grew up in a Dementoid household -- that could launch a thousand thinkpieces about hip-hop, country, class, the object and subject of jokes, whether to call something a joke at all, you name it. But what I keep returning to is the economy of it, its simplicity, how there is so much in so little, the way that someone on the outside can grok things inaccessible to the insiders, maybe by accident or by studious observation and a fresh perspective, the way music can be a multiverse, characters from one world complicating or clarifying or confusing the limits of another in a mutually provocative way. I'm not a backstory guy, which is to say I'm not a research guy, which is to say I'm either intuitive or lazy or both, so I don't have any clue where this came from, but I know magic when I hear it, I know what it sounds like when you discover, or simply stumble into by accident, the path beyond the bounds of territory you presumed exhausted, territory that can always get bigger, always invite whole new parties to the party. It's a real party party; you can get in. [10]

Katherine St Asaph: "Old Town Road" is the "Starships" of 2019: a song that objectively is not great, but will be called great for the understandable reason that liking or disliking it now unavoidably entails choosing the right or wrong side. This tends to lead to hand-waving freakoutery about critics not talking about the music, man, but once The Discourse is out in the world, it becomes a real and critical part of the song's existence; not talking about Billboard punting "Old Town Road" would be like talking about "Not Ready to Make Nice" as an workaday country song. The problem is not quite as simple as "the Billboard charts don't want black artists," an argument with historical precedent but now doomed to fail: clearly, people like Kane Brown and Darius Rucker and Mickey Guyton (who's left off lists like this, somehow) have hits. It's more about respectability politics. Traditionalists hate the idea of memes, social media, and perceived line-cutting, all of which means they'll hate a song born not of the Nashville and former-fraternity-bro scene, but via TikTok and stan Twitter. But what they really, really hate is rap and anything that sounds like a gateway to rap; like if they tolerate this Cardi B will be next. Country radio, for the past decade or two, has been pop radio with all the blatant rap signifiers removed; its songs aren't about cowboys or horses but suburban WASP life. Of course, double standards abound. Talking about lean is out; talking about bingeing beer is fine. "Bull riding and boobies" isn't OK because it's from a guy called Lil Nas X -- I honestly think people would whine less if this exact song was credited to "Montero Hill" -- but "I got a girl, her name's Sheila, she goes batshit on tequila" is OK because it's from a guy called Jake Owen, and "Look What God Gave Her" is OK because it hides its ogling of boobies behind plausibly deniable God talk. Fortunately "Old Town Road" is better than "Starships" -- the NIN sample is inspired, and the hook is evocative and sticky. (It fucks with authenticity politics, too -- Lil Nas X wrote his own song, but the big corporate country artists often don't.) Its main problem is that it's slight: a meme that doesn't overstay past the punchline, a song that never quite gets to song size. [5]

Thomas Inskeep: Sampling Nine Inch Nails' "34 Ghosts IV" to (help) create a western motif is hands-down brilliant, so huge thumbs-up for that. Lyrically, this is pretty empty, a bunch of western clichés strung together -- but then again, the same can be said of plenty of Big & Rich songs. Split the score down the middle, accordingly. [5]

Scott Mildenhall: But surely this is how country music should sound? Lil Nas X has performed alchemy in combining two generic styles into something inspiring, flipping the meaning of "pony and trap" on its head. The mechanical sound of trap is rusted into the mechanical sound of fixing a combine, or at least pretending that is something you might do, and such performance is fun for all the family. Well, unless you're an American farming family tired of stereotypes anyway. [7]

Stephen Eisermann: Non country (trap) beat with subtle country instrumentation? Sounds like much of country radio, only way better! [7]

Nortey Dowuona: A burning, humming bass girds under sticklike banjos as Lil Nas X rides into town to water his horse and head back out onto the open road. [5]

Alex Clifton: I spent the weekend re-enacting this scene from Easy A with this song, so it's safe to say I like it. I especially love the "horse"/"Porsche" line, which is unexpected and amazing. [7]

Alfred Soto: The usual genre conversations threaten to smother analysis. If Lil Nas X can use trap drums, then why can't Sam Hunt use loops? Silly. (Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes: "The Constitution is what the judges say it is"). The Kanye allusion ("Y'all can't tell me nuthin'") works extra-diagetically. An assemblage of modest, discrete charms held together by a solid performance at its center -- nothing more. I await the Future-Frank Liddell collab. [5]

Edward Okulicz: It's affectionate and actually quite deferential in its treatment of its parent genres. Crossovers like this have been hinted at, and gestured towards in the other direction quite a bit of late (country artists affecting hip-hop, less so the latter), and the two genres have more in common than the caricatures of the sorts of people who are supposed to listen to them do. Of course, I mean those genres as they exist today, and not in the warped imaginations of purists. You can see why kids have latched on, and it's easy to snarl at Big Chart for sticking their oar in. The kids are right; artists control the means of production and radio and chart compilers can accept that they aren't the tastemakers, and attempts to force their tastes down other people's throats will lead to a backlash. This is not a brilliant song but it's a picture of one of many potential musical futures and, at two minutes, the perfect length too. The right response is to smile, and "Old Town Road" makes it easy to smile -- it's an earworm. Sure, it doesn't give me the same immediate feeling of fuck!!! this is the best that I got when I first heard that version of Bubba Sparxxx's "Comin' Round" but country music survived "Honey, I'm Good" and it will survive this. It might well thrive. [6]

Joshua Copperman: I recently found out that I have a moderate Vitamin D deficiency, but looking up the song everyone was talking about and hearing this basically confirmed that I should go outside more often. There are definitely things to talk about: it's the logical conclusion to "I listen to everything except country and rap" jokes when the inverse has taken over the Hot 100, and it's a song that's set to hit number one because everyone is incredulous that it exists at all -- with a Billy Ray Cyrus remix to boot. The conversations about what makes a song "country" are all fascinating, but it's hard to fully enjoy pieces about something that, as an actual song, is so fundamentally empty. The Nine Inch Nails sample is interesting, but like everything else, more intriguing in theory than execution. This will wind up on every site's "best of 2019" lists, and then in ten years people will snark on how a song with "My life is a movie/Bullridin' and boobies" was so critically acclaimed. As a meme/discourse lightning rod, it's an [8], as a how-to guide for late-2010s fame, it's a [10], but there's little appeal in a vacuum. Adding a bonus point, because music has never existed in a vacuum anyway. [5]

Taylor Alatorre: Remember when the internet was still described as a realm of lawless and limitless potential, when open source could be touted as revolutionary praxis and "free flow of information" was a sacred utterance? Now one of the key political questions is whether private companies should be doing more to banish online rulebreakers or whether the federal government should step in to delimit what those rules are. Whichever side ends up winning, it's clear that the wide open spaces of the Frontier Internet are rapidly facing enclosure. Montero Hill learned this the hard way when his @nasmaraj account was suspended by Twitter as part of its crackdown against spam-based virality. While Tweetdeckers are nobody's martyrs, it's a minor tragedy every time an account with that many followers and that much influence gets shunted off to the broken-link stacks of the Wayback Machine. Rules must be laid down, but their enforcement always entails loss -- the bittersweet triumph of civilization over nature that forms the backbone of every classic Western. Maybe Hill/nasmaraj/Lil Nas X had this loss in mind when writing the jauntily defiant lyrics of "Old Town Road." Maybe he was just riding the microtrends of the moment like he was before. Still, this particular microtrend -- the reappropriation of cowboy imagery by non-white Americans -- feels too weighty to be reduced to mere aesthetics. Turner's Frontier Thesis may have been racially blinkered to the extreme, but the myths and yearnings it spawned can never die; they just get democratized. So it makes sense that young Americans, even those who don't know who John Wayne is, would subconsciously reach out for the rural, the rustic, the rugged and free, just as we feel the global frontiers closing all around us. Our foreign policy elites hold endless panel talks about "maintaining power projection" and "winning the AI race," but most normal people don't care about that stuff. We're all secretly waiting for China to take over like in our cyberpunk stories, so we can drop all the pressures of being the Indispensable Nation and just feast off our legacy like post-imperial Britain. And what is that legacy? It's rock, it's country, it's hip hop, it's "Wrangler on my booty," it's all the vulgar mongrelisms that force our post-ironic white nationalists to adopt Old Europe as their lodestar. In short, it's "Old Town Road." We're gonna ride this horse 'til we can't no more, we're gonna reify these myths 'til we can't no more, because when the empire is gone, the myths are all we have. (Oh, and the Billy Ray remix is a [10]. Obviously.) [9]

Jonathan Bradley: People suppose that genre exists to delineate a set of sounds, and while it does do that, it depends even more on its ability to build, define, and speak for communities. The question of whether "Old Town Road" is a country song or not is in some ways easily resolved: country music showed no interest in Lil Nas X -- or at least not until Billy Ray Cyrus noticed an opportune moment to complicate expectations and grab headlines -- and so Lil Nas X's song was not country. Even taking into account its sound and subject matter, his hit is best understood as a burlesque on country music, one that parodies and exaggerates the genre's motifs and themes for heightened effect. The kids on TikTok, who turned the long-gone lonesome blues of the song's tumbleweed hook into viral content, understand this intuitively: they use the incongruity that clarifies at the beat drop as an opportunity to engage in caricature and costume. And while Lil Nas X, a huckster and a trendspotter before he was a pop star, has been happy to embrace the yee-haw mantle that has been bestowed upon him, his song is a familiar rap exercise in play and extended metaphor. The Shop Boyz did much the same thing with "Party Like a Rock Star" and it would be obtuse to suppose that was a rock song. And yet, as the country historian Bill C. Malone has written, country since its inception has attracted fans "because of its presumed Southern traits, whether romantically or negatively expressed"; there has always been a bit of schtick to this sound. I wondered when we reviewed Trixie Mattel whether country is, on some level, intrinsically camp, and it's tough to declare definitively that Lil Nas X's bold hick strokes are that much more stylized than Jake Owen's performance of small town ordinariness. And just as a country music based on cohesive community rather than sound has found itself broad enough to encompass northern hair metal, Auto-Tuned club stomps, and Ludacris, the gate-keeping involved in keeping Lil Nas X out begins to look suspicious. After all, the first song to debut on Billboard's Most Played Juke Box Folk Records chart, the predecessor to today's Hot Country Songs, was "Pistol Packin' Mama," a hillbilly goof by the decidedly uncountry combination of Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters. As Malone has written, "While the commercial fraternity thought mainly of profits, the recording men, radio executives, publicists, promoters, ad men, sponsors, and booking agents who dealt with folk music also readily manipulated public perceptions in order to sell their products." One of the ways they did that was to tap into already mythological figures of American individualism like the cowboy, who is, after all, a creature of the west and not the South. "The respective visions of cowboy and western life drew far more from popular culture and myth ... than they did from reality," Malone writes of the early country singers who embraced cowboy personae; in some ways Lil Nas X's purloining of meme interest in that same culture places him within a rich country heritage. After all, when in popular entertainment has shameless self-promotion not been part of the aspirant's trade? It does matter how cultural communities react to the music made in their name, but when certain people are adjudicated not fit for club membership, it is worth asking why. Country's culture, I said recently, is "one that's implicitly but not definitely Southern, implicitly but not definitely rural, and implicitly but not definitely white," and it's easy to see how Lil Nas X doesn't fit into that. Country music's racism isn't unique to the genre -- the historical hegemonies of punk and indie rock are at least as determinedly white -- but it is particularly visible. Country is racist like the South is racist like America is racist. Lil Nas X disrupts that settlement, helping us imagine a country music that genuinely encompasses the music of the American South -- a genre that has space for "This is How We Roll" and Miranda Lambert, Lil Boosie and Young Thug, "Formation" and Juvenile, and perhaps even Norteño and banda sounds. That would be, however, not only a far different country music to what we know today, but the music of a far different America. [7]

Iris Xie: Yeet haw! Aside from the great pleasure I've had in showing this to my friends, (Me, two weeks ago: "Have you heard this country trap song???" My friends, this week: "Iris, that song you're talking about now has Billy Ray Cyrus on it??") and either slinging back and forth memey references, engaging in discussions on the state of white supremacy in the music industry while also debating about the song's merit, or hearing my friends start singing "can't nobody tell me nothing..." very quietly at any moment and I can't help but join in -- it's all been very fun. Aside from making plans to play "Old Town Road" on my next country road drive to Costco, something that's occurred to me is that this is a song boosted by the status and calamity of its metanarrative. We could always use more discussions of the double standards that Black and POC artists face in the industry when it comes to genres and participating in it, and I'm honestly glad Lil Nas X just made something that was fun and made sense to him, even if "Old Town Road" doesn't stray too much from the conventions of both trap and country, resulting in a well-balanced mashup that sounds more safe than surprising to me, but is serene in its confidence nevertheless. On the flipside of that genre-mashing, Miley wishes and is probably very jealous of her father now for hopping onto this train, lest we forget about all of her cultural appropriation attempts. But for the song itself, those long, relaxed drawls and the imagery of riding a horse to the trap beat -- why not? We live in weird times now, Black people's contributions to country music were erased, and it's kind of a relaxing song. Also, I'm a fan of the "Can't nobody tell me nothing" lyric, which has become an unintentionally defiant line in the face of all the backlash, resulting in a message to rally around. Now excuse me, as I text my friends that "I'm gonna take my horse down to the old town road." [8]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox]

[mikegranich87]

Hitting the Books: How a radio telescope cost this West Virginia town its modernity

Deep in the heart of Appalachia, modern science and America's bucolic past meet at a unique crossroad of scientific discovery and luddite lifestyles. The Quiet Zone, by journalist Stephen Kurczy, is the story of a sleepy small town that hosts the Green Bank radio telescope. But the presence of this installation comes at a price: due to the telescope's exceeding sensitivity, virtually every device and appliance that emits radio waves, Wi-Fi signals, or microwave radiation is banned for square miles around. That means that Green Bank, West Virginia has about as much tech today as it did in the 1950's (maybe even a little less) — and some people very much like it that way. But not everybody. In the excerpt below, Pocahontas County attorney, Robert Martin, recounts the challenges of attempting to modernize the region without loosing a horde of gentrifiers upon it as well.        

Harper Collins

Excerpted from the book THE QUIET ZONE: Unraveling the Mystery of a Town Suspended in Silence by Stephen Kurczy. Copyright © 2021 by Stephen Kurczy. From Dey Street Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. Reprinted by permission.

For every electrosensitive who wanted radio quiet, there were probably one hundred residents who wanted WiFi and cell service, and they elected the county’s officials. In early 2018, the Pocahontas County Commission passed a resolution in support of cell service throughout the county, a challenge to the very notion of a Quiet Zone. The commission assigned its attorney, Robert Martin, to contact all major telecommunications providers asking them to invest in Pocahontas.

“I’m doing my level best to get another company in here,” Martin told me in the spring of 2018. He’d invited me to his house to discuss the new cell service ordinance, and we were swigging Bud Lights at his kitchen table.

“How many cell companies have you written to?” I asked.

“All of them,” he said. “I promised the companies that we’ll get everybody in the damn county to sign up with them. I’ll sign up first! . . . I wrote a letter to everybody and said, ‘We have shit for cellphone service here, we want you to come in here, we’ll partner with you, we’ll help you however we can. Come in here.’”

At our feet were two boxers and a basset hound. In the adjacent mudroom was a 250-pound Vietnamese potbellied pig named Pig, who was snoring. Pig knew how to open the front door and pull a blanket over himself. “I’m the true image of West Virginia, aren’t I?” Martin laughed. “I got a pig living in the house.” Despite his home literally being a pigsty, Martin was always the best dressed at county meetings, usually wearing tight designer jeans, leather boots, and a crisp dress shirt, top buttons undone and a few chest hairs curling out. A blustery guy, Martin was once jailed in Marlinton for contempt of court for arguing with a circuit judge. He had a history of getting into fights at West Virginia University football games. For years, he’d also operated a hotel in Belize, paying “tens of thousands of dollars in bribes” and putting the payments on his tax returns so the U.S. government could see the corruption he was dealing with (even if he was admitting to violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act). Martin came across as a dogged lawyer who knew how to get things done. And he wanted cell service.

“You seen that commercial saying Verizon has more coverage than anyone else?” he asked me. “Pause and look at it real closely, and you’ll see right where Pocahontas County is because almost the entire Eastern Seaboard is all yellow [signifying cell coverage] and right there in southeastern West Virginia there’s this hunk about this big—it’s Poca-fucking-hontas County. I swear to God. Right fucking there we are on Verizon’s commercials.”

Martin knew well what connectivity was like outside the Quiet Zone. He had earned his law degree from West Virginia University in 1979, married a girl from Marlinton, and started his career in Pocahontas County before becoming a well-heeled insurance defense lawyer in Charleston. He’d gotten his first cellphone in 1986—it was the size of a beer bottle, with a three-foot-long antenna, and it went to bed with him every night. That attachment ended in 2012 when he moved back to Pocahontas, where he only carried an iPhone so he could listen to music in his truck. I asked if he was concerned about the impact of cell service on the electrosensitives.

“Wackos that are afraid of their brains getting fried and all that?” he responded. “Yeah, I know about them.”

“They see Green Bank as a haven,” I said.

“So? So?” He said he wasn’t going to let the electrosensitives keep Pocahontas “behind the curve” for cell service.

“But I’m here because you’re behind the curve,” I said. “That makes this place unique.”

“You think we want to deal with stone knives and axes for the rest of our existence? You’re like these fucking people who move in here and don’t want it to change, that it? We have people who have moved here in the last five to ten years and they don’t want anything to change. They’ve ‘discovered’ Pocahontas County and now nothing can change. Well, fuck, that ain’t the way of the world. We have limitations because of the observatory, because of our topography, because of our insignificant population. But we need to do what we can as government entities to make things available to people.”

“Of course,” Martin added, the cell service would have to comply with the Quiet Zone.

“We believe in the observatory, we don’t want to fuck with them,” he said. “Right now, as you and I are sitting here bullshitting, they’re up there looking for fucking E.T. And I want to give them every opportunity to do that. But I’ve got emergency services I’ve got to render in this county.”

In addition to trying to bring in cell service, Martin was assisting the county’s emergency services director, Michael O’Brien, to improve communications. The 911 center in Marlinton had difficulty broadcasting any emergency radio communications toward the northern end of the county, where Green Bank was located. O’Brien found a partial solution by installing an internet-controlled radio system just north of Green Bank in the town of Durbin, but it had minimal range and failed altogether when internet or electricity went down. Pocahontas was also one of the only counties in the state unable to adopt a “smart radio system” that integrated radios with smartphones.

On the off chance that someone made an emergency 911 call from one of the county’s few pockets of limited cell service, authorities had an especially hard time pinpointing the person’s location. “We had a dispatcher spend two and a half hours on the phone one night with a lady that was trapped in her car in a creek,” O’Brien told me. “She didn’t know where she was or how she got there. We were just keeping her calm while we sent the department to look in all the areas that had cell service.”

ACCORDING TO DELOIT TE, a 10 percent increase in mobile penetration increases total factor productivity—a key component of economic growth modeling—by 4.2 percentage points over the long run. In Pocahontas, businesspeople like Kenneth “Buster” Varner felt they needed all the help they could get to keep the county’s economy puttering along, which meant bringing in cell service.

I first met Varner in early 2017, while eating breakfast at the counter at Station 2. A heavy, jowly man, he had leaned over and asked, “Do you think the gravy is too salty?” As we shoveled down heaping plates of biscuits and sausage gravy, he told me about his various businesses. Aside from owning Station 2, he operated a half dozen enterprises involved in logging, excavation, towing, septic pumping, and auto repair. He was also a fire chief. I told him that I imagined a lot of headaches trying to manage all those things within the restrictions of the Quiet Zone.

“You have to realize that we never had cellphone service when everybody else had it, so it wasn’t anything to us,” Varner said. “It’d be more convenient, of course, if it was so you could use your cellphones all the time. But it’s a unique place to live where you don’t have them, and we take a little pride in that.” He noted how the observatory provided jobs and shared its resources, such as lending one of its diesel generators to a funeral home during a recent power outage. “That to me means a lot,” Varner said. “And having the largest telescope in the world out your back door, that’s a pretty neat conversation piece.”

“People can get ahold of me the old-fashioned way,” he added. “Call me on the landline or come look for me.”

Spending more time with Varner, however, I realized that he was hardly a Luddite. When we met again months later in his cluttered office, I found it hard to keep his attention. He kept glancing down at his iPhone to check texts and alerts he was receiving over WiFi. When he took a call, I was left to stare at a poster of a busty woman in a red bikini and firefighter helmet. When he finally put down the iPhone, I told him I was confused. Hadn’t he said he took pride in not using a cellphone?

“I thought it was rude to have a smartphone,” Varner said of his “old” perspective, apparently from just a few months earlier. “I do a lot of business on that phone, more than I ever thought in my wildest dreams that I would do.” I asked if he could ever go back to living without one. “Wouldn’t want to. It’s so handy.”

Varner had an AT&T data plan. He used Siri. He wished all his employees and volunteer firefighters could always be connected through smartphones. Instead, because of the Quiet Zone, he’d invested more than $30,000 in a specially approved radio repeater system to allow his workers to communicate via low-band radio. “I don’t want the observatory to close and for people to lose their jobs,” he said, “but it’d be more convenient for everybody.”

from Mike Granich https://www.engadget.com/hitting-the-books-the-quiet-zone-stephen-kurczy-harper-collins-153030420.html?src=rss

[architectnews]

"I respond to every fucking detail of the time we're in" says Frank Gehry

Frank Gehry's new tower in Arles fits with both the ancient Roman city and today's environmental agenda, the architect claimed in an exclusive interview with Dezeen.

Speaking to Dezeen in Arles last week the Pritzker Prize-winner said The Tower, which has a steel-and-concrete frame and a glazed drum at its base, responds to current concerns about the carbon footprint of architecture.

The Tower opened last week

"We fit into it," said the Canadian-American architect. "But I can't explain it. I respond to every fucking detail of the time we're in with the people we live with, in this place," added the 92-year-old when asked about the building's environmental performance.

"So it's all taken into account as best I can," he continued.

"You know, I believe that's the most important thing to do," he added, gesturing to the face mask in his hands. "To live in the place and time you are in and what the issue is, you know, even with these fucking masks."

Sustainable elements include natural ventilation of the circular glazed podium while some of the building's energy comes from renewable sources. However, precise details of the building's embodied carbon have not been disclosed. The team did not submit the building for environmental certification under the French HQE programme.

The tower forms part of the Luma Arles cultural campus

The Tower finally opened last week along with the rest of the vast Luma Arles cultural campus after a 14-year gestation period.

It serves as an entrance pavilion, lookout tower, exhibition-and-events space and beacon for the 27-acre campus commissioned by Maja Hoffmann, the art-collecting founder of Luma Foundation and the heiress to the Hoffmann-La Roche (now Roche) pharmaceutical fortune.

Founded in 2004, the philanthropic foundation "focuses on the direct relationships between art, culture, environmental issues, human rights, education and research".

The Luma name comes from Hoffmann's children, Lucas and Marina, echoing the way her father, the eminent environmentalist and World Wildlife Fund co-founder Luc Hoffmann, named his philanthropic conservation body MAVA Foundation after the initials of his children.

"I try not to repeat myself"

Gehry and Hoffmann, who is Swiss but grew up on her father's estate in the Camargue wetlands near Arles, first began discussing the building in 2006. This was long before sustainability topped the architectural agenda but when shiny icons were still very much the rage.

Their conversations began nine years after the opening of Gehry's titanium-clad Guggenheim Museum Bilbao and three years after the completion of his stainless-steel Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.

But Gehry said that each project is a one-off rather than fitting into an evolution of his architectural approach.

"I try not to repeat myself," he said. "I just think about it at the time I'm doing it, the people I'm working with, like Maja, the community."

"So I don't think of it," he added. "I mean, naturally, there's like this historical lineage but it's just how I feel at this time in this place."

Gehry's influences include Roman and Romanesque architecture

The 1997 Bilbao building introduced Gehry to the world, rebooted the city's economy and self-image, and fuelled the trend for iconic cultural buildings in cities hoping to replicate "the Bilbao effect".

Gehry sounds a little bemused by the term. "I don't really care about that, but it's nice that it changed the community," he said, as one of his team interjected, pointing out that he received death threats when the building was first proposed.

"When I went to Bilbao it was sad," he continued. "They were having a hard time economically. The kids growing up left Bilbao to go to college. They didn't stay there."

Gehry's Guggenheim is credited with turning around the fortunes of the post-industrial city in Spain's Basque country.

"I didn't mean to change the city"

"This has changed the economy," he said. "People come. I've been told they earn over eight billion Euros since the building opened. When you go there now it's friendly and open and happy."

"People are always telling me how I changed the city," he added. "I didn't mean to change the city, I just meant to be part of the city."

But Arles is no Bilbao. The UNESCO world heritage site is already a magnet for visitors coming for its spectacular Roman remains, its connection with artist Vincent van Gogh and Les Rencontres d'Arles, its world-renowned annual photography festival.

Located in a former SNCF railway engineering works on the edge of town, the Luma Arles campus adds another world-class attraction to the tiny city, which has a population of just 50,000.

The Luma Arles campus is at the edge of the ancient city

The railway sheds, repurposed into workshops, galleries and performance spaces by Selldorf Architects, are monumental in scale but these are eclipsed by Gehry's 56-metre-high tower. It is by far the tallest building in the area and dominates Avenue Victor Hugo, the main route into Arles, on a rise above the campus.

It towers over French architect Marc Barani's low-slung and discreetly minimalist École Nationale Supérieure de la Photographie, the French national photography school that sprang from the photo festival and opened in 2019, which lies directly across the road.

Arles, once a Roman provincial capital, sits on a low hill beside the river Rhône just before it enters the Camargue wetlands (which Hoffmann's father is credited with saving and where he established the Tour du Valat nature reserve) on its way to the Mediterranean, which is over 40 kilometres away.

"I don't antagonise. I don't try that"

The idea to build a tower came from Hoffmann, who expressed a desire to be able to "see the sea from the tower". But despite the requirement to build tall, Gehry said he did not intend to build a provocative structure.

"Well, I try to make it the scale of where we are," he said when reminded of the backlash from neighbours when he built his seminal 1978 home in Santa Monica. "And I try to make it user-friendly and not off-putting. So, you know, I don't make it black. And I don't antagonise. I don't try that. That's not my way."

The design process involved making dozens of scale models, many of which are exhibited in the vast exhibition space beneath the tower. These show how various approaches were explored including stacks of cubes, piles of oblongs and fabric-like forms.

However, none of the early models shows the twin concrete lift towers that break up the sculptural form at the rear of the tower.

A pair of concrete lift towers protrude from the rear of the tower

"There are over 100 models made of metal, wood… it was a long, long journey," said Gehry.

Over his career, Gehry has pioneered new approaches to creating architectural form, including scanning roughly made paper and card models and manipulating them in 3D software.

But this time, the models were made by his team. "I don't make them myself," he said. "I used to. It is a collaborative effort."

Gehry cites numerous local influences on the tower's form. Vincent van Gogh, the artist who lived in the city between 1888 and 1889 and painted many of his best-known works here, is one of them.

Gehry has compared the stainless-steel facade to the brushwork in Van Gogh's painting of Les Alpilles, a low range of mountains to the north-east of Arles that features distinctive limestone outcrops. He has also cited the nocturnal Starry Night painting as an influence.

The cladding was informed by Vincent van Gogh's paintings

The Roman architecture of Arles is another influence, with its famous amphitheatre informing the glazed drum at the base of The Tower.

"Certainly the Roman amphitheatres were in my mind but I didn't want to copy them," he said at the press conference that marked the building's opening, when he joked that The Tower is "my first Roman building".

"But I thought that having a drum on the boulevard that became the foyer for the whole building was a simple way of inviting people from all sides, from all directions, as well as having a strong symbol, presence on the street."

The drum is naturally ventilated, one of a number of energy-saving features that were reverse-engineered into the project to make it more sustainable as the project rumbled on.

Others include a biodiesel plant and solar panels that provide some of the power for the campus, and the use of interior cladding made from local materials including agricultural waste, algae and salt to replace the originally specified gypsum drywall.

The glazed drum is informed by Arles' Roman amphitheatre

The latter interventions were carried out by designers at Atelier Luma, a design research lab located at the campus and headed by curator and educator Jan Boelen. There was apparently some tension over these interventions: when another journalist asked one of Gehry's team about the materials, he replied: "That wasn't us".

Gehry took further inspiration from Romanesque architecture, including landmarks he visited when studying architecture in Paris in the 1950s.

"I visited here," he said at the press conference. "I was living in Paris and studying Roman architecture. I was very moved by the architecture."

Speaking to Dezeen later, he rattled off a list of Roman-influenced medieval buildings around the country he recalls visiting in his student days, admiring their stonework.

"Autun, Vézelay, Tournus... I guess that's Romanesque. Yeah. I liked the stone blocks but I didn't want to repeat that."

Rather than stone, The Tower is faced in 11,000 hollow, non-structural blocks made of stainless steel sheets that have a textured pattern on them, allowing them to reflect the harsh Provençal light in a softer way.

"So we studied metal because it reflects the light. But I wondered if it could be soft and feel comfortable. Which it does."

Inevitably, the building has its detractors. Does criticism concern Gehry? Or does he prefer to give people a bit of time to get used to new buildings in their neighbourhood?

"It's more like the latter," he replied. "I don't presume anything. Really. I call it friendly or happy insecurity."

The post "I respond to every fucking detail of the time we're in" says Frank Gehry appeared first on Dezeen.

[ao3bronte]

Smutember: In Public

Masquerade on AO3

14: In Public

It’s been two and a half months since her and Chat had made their arrangement just as an inconvenient outburst of hormones and horoscopes combined to make the perfect storm, which means it’s been two and a half months since they’d sat down and actually been honest about their predicament with each other, carrying a serious load that had led to…well…

This.

“Can we keep it quiet?” she’d asked, ignorant to the way his face had hardened when she’d said it.

“Of course,” he’d responded, always the gentleman.

It’s been two and a half months since they’d decided they’d be better off weathering this storm together than apart, wary of dragging civilians into their messy, chaotic lives. Better to sleep with each other than be forced to explain to a potential girlfriend or boyfriend that they were essentially in heat and couldn’t keep it in their pants without losing their damn minds. But that wasn’t the problem.

“It’ll be our secret,” she’d reasoned, nodding as if she’d just come up with Newton’s third law of motion.

“Sure,” he’d replied.

It’s been two and a half months since she’d fucked him senseless for the very first time, bare skin and masks and heat and release and everything she could have ever wanted. There was no fear or pain worth mentioning; every horror story she’d heard about sex was irrelevant in her case. It had been amazing really, her body having been ready and willing for so damn long that even her kwarmi had wondered how she’d managed to keep it together. But that wasn’t the problem either.

The problem was that it wasn’t going away.

No, every time she touches him, every time she so much as comes near him, the territorial itch grows. She never talks about it, never so much as mentions the way she wants to suck a mark on his skin so hard that she hopes it’s permanent. She never mentions the way that she wishes she could parade him down the streets, boasting that he’s hers and hers alone.

She spends an inordinate amount of time wondering what it would be like to make love to him. To actually just give into the desire and destroy the status quo for what it is, an excuse. An excuse not to get caught up in messy emotions, emotions she’s already hopelessly tangled in despite her best wishes. An excuse not to fall in love with a guy who was never in the ten-year life plan she’d fantasised about since she was fourteen. It was supposed to be Adrien, it was supposed to be three kids and a dog and a boutique on the Champs Elysées.

Good god, what was she even talking about?

She’s seventeen now. What kind of fantasy world had she been living in? Adrien is a world-famous model, the monthly rent for a shopfront on the Champs Elysées is more than what her parents make in a year and hello? Life wasn’t like it was in the movies. Opportunities don’t just fall into your lap, even if the Miraculous she wore in her ears did just that. Life is hard, life requires work and Marinette feels old and entirely way too young all at once.

She sinks down onto her haunches against the brick wall and holds her head in her hands.

What do I do?

She heads home and eats her dinner, lethargic and pensive and only half listening to the way her father rants about the Sotnikova sisters and their elaborate cake design for their brother’s second wedding. She putters upstairs and finishes her homework, only answering a few of the questions on her statistics review. There’s something so purely and explicitly wrong about all of this, about the way she’s just torturing herself. Tikki says as much and the inflexible part of Marinette that’s been protesting since the start is beginning to have a harder time yelling above the din of all the other voices begging her to just admit it and give in.

Still.

The unspoken question remains.

Tikki and Master Fu had told her time and time again about the power of the Miraculous, about how the two most powerful of them all were bound together by magic and fate and all those things you could read about in fairy tales. Marinette loves pink and Snow White and Once Upon a Dream but she’s not naïve enough to think that the two of them are simply meant to be.

Love takes doesn’t just happen, she’d said to him just days ago. It takes time and patience and two people who actually want to make it happen. Chat wanted it, he’d wanted it enough that he’d let her string him along for years and god, she’s been so cruel to him. How could she have been so selfish?

She knows it now, recognises every sigh and feeling and emotion and urge. She loves him; a part of her knows she always has. But what if something goes wrong? Or what if they can’t get along? What if he finds someone he loves more than her in real life? What if Adrien asks her out? Could she still love him? Could she still be faithful to Chat when there was sweet, gorgeous Adrien hovering in her periphery, just out of reach?

She sighs.

It was time to make a decision.

~

Ladybug Yes.

CN Yes what?

Ladybug Come and find out.

~

She’s on the Île de Reuilly when he finds her, sitting on the circular bench of le temple romantique with her legs tucked up underneath her chin. It’s still light out, her text coming less than twenty-four hours after he’d up and left to blow off steam. The distance had helped clear his mind and he hoped it had done the same for her.

He stands there for the longest time and watches her, appraises her from his vantage point off the rocky outcropping. He knows that she’s aware of his presence and chooses to keep the high ground, if only for a while.

“I don’t know who you are,” she begins, resting her chin on her kneecaps, “and I don’t know what you do. I know you must be rich, judging by the fact that you vacation in St Barths and you wear expensive ties. I know you come from a broken family and your dad is a fire breathing lunatic who doesn’t know what a great son he has and I know you don’t have a mum anymore.”

“I know you enjoy playing sports but you love anime even more and you’d stay up all night watching it if it weren’t for Le Papillon. You like puns and cheesy jokes and making stupid decisions even though you could get hurt and it drives me crazy. You don’t get enough to eat at home, which is why I constantly bring you food so that you don’t waste away to nothing and you’re always miserable around the holidays because they remind you of better days.”

“I know that I can trust you with my life and I know that when an akuma attacks, I can count on you to be at my side. I know that even when there’s nothing happening, I can count on you to talk and laugh with me and tell me jokes, even if they’re awful. I know that you’re my friend and the only person I can talk to when it comes to being a superhero.”

“But what I don’t know is whether or not I can let go of that.”

Chat slips from the edge of the escarpment and joins her in the Grecian looking temple, slinking closer and pausing to stand a few metres away, “What do you mean?”

“If something goes wrong and this all falls apart…”

“Is that really what’s holding you back?” he asks, “The fear that we might break up?”

Marinette doesn’t dignify him with an answer. It sounds ridiculous when he says it aloud.

“We risk our lives everyday. I mean, anything can happen, just look at what happened to me,” he shrugs and she shudders and it’s not the right thing to say but neither one of them is thinking clearly, “Look, what I’m trying to say is…we live dangerous lives and they could be over in a heartbeat, so why are you so concerned about the future? We have to enjoy what we have now.”

“We all have to prepare for the future Chat. I have to have a plan.”

“And plan what?” he places his hands on his hips, “Le Papillon’s defeat? Been doing that unsuccessfully for three years. University? Sure, but your future job? Your future life? Newsflash Ladybug, these are all things you currently have no control over, so let it go.”

“Easier said than done Chat,” she replies, a little irritated. He’s so casual and nonchalant and it makes her feel weak, “I’m not some rich kid who can afford fancy ties. My parents are working class people and I’ll have to work my way through university in an economy that probably won’t even land me a job once I graduate, on top of being Ladybug. Life isn’t all honey and roses.”

“That’s true, and I work to make my due,” he brushes his hair from his eyes, “Every cent I make goes into a fund I can’t even touch until I’m eighteen. I’ll live under my father’s shadow for as long as he’s alive and there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t control it, I can only choose to make the best of it. And the best of it is being Chat and spending time with you, saving Paris and kissing you until it’s way past our bedtimes.”

He approaches her, “We can do this together, take it all on together and fight each battle together and share what we can of our lives together. We can’t change what’s going to happen, but we can try and live in the present together, you and I.”

She looks up at him then, those candid eyes in phosphorescent green speaking more truth than she ever could. How could he just say these things so easily? It dawns on her then that’s he’s so much more mature than she’s ever given him credit for.

“I can be yours, if you’ll have me, but only if you give yourself in return. I want you to be mine.”

Marinette closes her eyes for the longest moment and tries to give every voice inside her head a vying chance to be heard; she’s still not sure what she wants to choose.

“Yes,” she finally says and Chat knows better than to comment on the hoarseness of her voice. She feels incredibly small and helpless in this moment, vulnerable and afraid and a myriad of possibilities pop up in her imagination as she says it, possibilities of arguments and hatred and even death and—

“Ladybug.”

She opens her eyes and Chat is squatting in front of her, something akin to astonishment shining in his eyes. He runs a claw up and down her shinbone and takes a shallow breath, “Are you sure?”

Marinette releases her grip on her legs and unfolds them gently, bending forwards so she could meet him at his level, “Yes.”

Chat takes her hand and pulls her upright, pulling her into an embrace so passionately tight Marinette thinks it might just be branded on her skin forever, hard and soft and rough and tender all at once. It feels like she can’t breathe, overwhelmed by emotion and helplessness and the way his body presses against her, filling her senses with the unmistakable scent she’s begun to associate with the way her stomach fills with butterflies and her heart stammers in her chest.

This is love, she thinks, and it feels like a dream.

They close their eyes and detransform, blindly sliding their masks on without having to say so much as a word to each other and the two of them work in desperate unison to shed their clothing, her blouse and his trousers flung wildly onto the stone floor until there’s nothing but their undergarments between them. Marinette reaches down and strokes his cock through the front of his briefs and he growls in her ear, a territorial, possessive sound that vibrates from his chest to his toes and goes right to her core.

Marinette responds in kind, latching onto his exposed throat and sucking a line of bruises against his skin, raw and red and certain to leave a lasting mark. She digs her nails into the skin of his shoulder blades and the moans he makes sound so needy, so desperate in her ears that it only encourages her further, marking him and claiming him as her own.

After all, she’d always felt a need to have control, to have things in her possession that she could effortlessly operate; it’s why she applied to be class president in collège and why she continues to be an active member on the student council at her lycée. It’s why she makes her own clothes for her friends to wear and signs them with a signature so obvious that everyone can see it. She thrives on the ability to claim ownership and is proud of what’s rightfully hers.

And Chat, who’s lived through the consequences of neglect and abandonment more times than he can count needs that, craves it like he’s dying of hunger and she’s the hanging fruit, sweet and luscious and everything he could ever ask for.

“Fuck me,” she whispers against the shell of his ear and he’s not so far gone that he doesn’t hear her from where he’s busy nibbling at the hollow of her collarbone. She withdraws her hand from where she’s been stroking him through his briefs and drags her fingertips, wet from the slickness of his pre-come, across his chest, “Fuck me now.”

He pushes her towards one of the stone columns and pins her there, sliding a hand between their bodies. He ruts his cock against her and the sensation is glorious, the friction all too much and not enough and god, did she really agree to be his?

“You’re mine,” he slurs, drunk with the way she squirms against him. He runs his fingers along the waistline of her panties, lace and satin and midnight black and he pushes them down as far as he can while still pinning her to the wall. She shimmies them down the rest of the way and divests him of his briefs in much the same way before focusing on her bra.

Tossing it and pressing into her, he seeks out her hands and twines her fingers with his, pressing them to the stone column on either side of her head. Like his, her body is taut and slick with sweat from the heat and the itch, pliant and restless and thirsty with need and he’s so determined to show how deep his love for her is, how visceral his need to be loved by her is. He throws all self restraint to the wind and devours her like an addiction, greedy for the taste of the salt on her skin.

She thrusts her hips against him and the entire action lacks her usual finesse, her customary restraint. It’s an addictive feeling, to let go of every shackle and just feel, moaning and gasping and muttering praise like nothing else matters. Chat keens at the approval and it feels like he’s going to shatter at any moment, the elation so intense he swears he could burst.

Letting go and taking his cock in his hand, he strokes it twice before trailing it down the path of her lower lips, taking a moment to clip her clit with his cockhead before tracing farther, rubbing his member up and down. The tip of him teases her entrance, pushing just enough to make her squirm and buck her hips before moving away.

“Chat, please,” she rasps, dragging her teeth over the shell of his ear, “Please.”

It takes every ounce of willpower and more to ignore her, to press her further against the wall and capture her lips with his, intent to savour every moment, every taste and every kiss. It feels like the first time and the last time, feelings of hope and desperation surging inside of him. She shudders as he breaches her again, her muscles stretching only for him to pull back again, driving her crazy.

He twines his fingers in his hair and she spreads her legs wider, panting and moaning as he thrusts his hips shallowly, never quite reaching where she needs him to reach. Another shudder wracks her body as the blunt end of his fingernail rasps against her clit and Marinette moans into his skin, begging for release.

He drags his tongue against her lips, “Do you love me?”

Marinette closes her eyes and gasps, the unbidden words coming to her without hesitation, “Yes.”

He enters her and it feels like the air has been punched out of her lungs, the sensation so intense and so overwhelming she swears she sees stars. He hefts one of her thighs upwards and wraps it around his hip and it feels like a reward when he withdraws and works his way in again, slow and deliberate and tormenting and oh!

Chat’s patience is waning, what with the way she’s whispering praise in his ear, begging him and lauding him and please Chat, yes, right there, harder, I need you, please! He works his way up to a punishing tempo, revelling in the way she flutters against his cock and intersperses her praises with profanities, and crushes his pelvis to hers against the whitewashed stone. He bites into the soft flesh of her neck and fills his senses with her scent and groans, leaving incensed marks all along her skin.

“So good,” he babbles against her lips, writhing against her. She sputters incoherently, eyes closed and mouth wide open, her breaths coming in rasps. He can feel how wet her thighs are, her arousal dripping down the smooth skin of her legs and he can feel his orgasm building from inside her, thick and sharp from the sweet pleasure of how he thrusts into her. She can feel her clit throbbing, swollen and tight and just this side of painful and desperate for release.

“I…please!” she struggles to breathe, “I’m…”

“Come for me,” he gasps.

She takes her free hand and shoves it between them, pressing down just to the right of her clit in time with Chat’s increasingly frantic thrusts. She kisses him blindly, too overwhelmed to focus on anything but her fingers and the cock inside her, and his words in her ear, soft and reassuring and full of love are enough to fracture her control and send her flying over the edge.

She wails with pleasure, convulsing and trembling around his cock and lets out a moan of satisfaction, her mind wiped blank. He rams in harder, freeing her trapped hand and looping his arm around her waist, pulling her in as close as physically possible to regain the ferocity of his rhythm. Her body arches, catlike and taut as she’s pushed onto her toes, her hips offering themselves to him against the onslaught, forceful and powerful and fuck, she can feel it rise in her again, the rising tide of orgasm and fuck! you can orgasm twice? and yes, yes, yes!

A high, shocked cry bursts from her lips as he lifts her leg as hard as he can and he whimpers, moaning as he thrusts into her mercilessly, releasing inside of her. She digs her fingers into his hips so hard that they leave bruises and she can’t hear his cries over the rush of blood in her ears, their bodies convulsing together as one. He presses his mouth to hers and kisses her savagely, riding out the wave of white hot heat like a solar flare, collapsing and slumping against the wall, clinging to each other.

“Merde,” Chat whispers, stunned and thrilled and a myriad of other emotions all at once. Marinette looks much the same.

“That was…” she trails off, unable to keep her fingers from trailing across the marks she’s left on his skin for all to see, bruises of every shade peppering the length of his neck. She takes another deep, shuddering breath before burying her face against his shoulder, exhausted and utterly spent.

“Ladybug?”

She revels in the way his whole body hums when he says it, the sound reverberating from deep inside his chest, “Yes?”

“Do you mean it?”

She nods against his shoulder, “Yes.”

She feels his body slacken in relief against her and she can’t help but indulge the urge to wrap her arms around him, collapsing gently backwards against the cool stone. They tangle their limbs together, laid bare as the sun begins to dip behind the horizon, their bodies glowing in the sun.