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momo-de-avis · 9 months ago

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ana can you explain the liberal wars in simple terms? i visited algarve recently and the tour guide (like yours where it's mostly related to history) talked about the war between the brothers and a guy named remexido(?)

Just yesterday I told my boyfriend to please ask his coworker who graduated in history for a book on the civil war because thats the one thing I'm not good at lmao I didn't even know who Remexido was but apparently he was a guerrilla fighter from the Algarve which yay but fought on the side of Miguelistas which nay

The liberal wars was between Pedro IV of Portugal, better known as Pedro I fo Brazil, who was its first Emperor after declaring its independence, then to quote a brazilian client I had once, homeboy was a better king for the portuguese than he was an emperor for the brazilian... He basically stepped down and answered the plea from Portugal to come back here and kick his brother off the throne.

Now, his brother is Miguel I, the absolutist

Important background is that Portugal was an absolutist country thruoghout the 18th century, which means the king held absolute power. Think Louis the XIV level. Not only does the king have last say about everything government related, he works hand in hand with the church, who is below him (except the Inquisition) and he is celebrated as Godsend's. He is the centre of the universe. Its a time of extravagance, of theatricality, of excess, and the people, as you might imagine, are dirt poor.

This is essentially a kicker into the French Revolution, as you might imagine.

But with portugal, there's the Napoleon problem. Napoleon sends out General Junot to invade Portugal after successfully capturing spain, and on 1808 Junot arrives.

The Portuguese monarchy realised we did not have the arms to face off this guy, and the english, with whom we'd signed a treaty in 1387 and had always upheld it, said they were too busy fighting the french elsewhere... we needed to sort ourselves out. It was obvious by now that an invasion would be unstoppable. We did not have the navy nor the weapons to fight it off. So, the king, John VI, who by now is king because his mother, Maria I, went insane, decided to deceive Napoleon. He uprooted the government and took everyone to BRazil. He established court there and changed the name of his kingdom slightly to the kingdom of Portugal and brazil, it was something like that And then he made the capital city Rio de Janeiro. All in all he took with him about 100.000 people, nobility and court members as well as government. When Junot arrived, he was greeted by a Regency Government that basically said "step right in"

It was a way to show Junot that there was no government to overthrow and that he and his troops had been formally invited. Junot lived here until Napoleon told him to go pound sand somewhere else, and in the time he did, he fucked everyone's wife, lived in complete excess, and angered virtually everyone.

So, two more "invasions" happen, and by the third that's when Wellington and his beef come along to (this time, successfully) fend off the french.

And then, what happened was that this single event changed the country forever.

You'd be surprised to find how many in portuguese society were for Napoleon. Overall in Europe Napoleon was seen as the dude who was going to change the modern world, and it was actually accepted that he was undefeatable. When looking at the case of Portugal and Spain, most countries just went "submit bro there's no turning around". So it was a bit of a surprise that in the end backwards catholic portugal and the english won.

For example, the painter Vieira Portuense, arguably the most celebrated artists of portuguese neo-classicism and someone who met and hung out with Angelica Kauffmann, was so in favour of Napoleon not only was he arrested for it, he had to leave the country to escape persecution. There are paintings of him that originally had Napoleon's eagle hidden in it, but he had to repaint it to not offend anyone.

Basically, Napoleon offered a liberal alternative to the absolutist nightmare that was our country. Napoleon was the opposite of what Portugal was: a country ruled by a royal family who relished in absolute excess and also ruled by the church, and a country where the church held not just a monopoly on riches but controlled the country, so much so that the inquisition was still here despite the Marquis of Pombal's efforts to reduce its power. And a country that was mostly rural, ignorant, illiterate and extremely, painfully catholic. Liberals saw in Napoleon the chance to grow past this, embrace enlightenment, to evolve past catholic fervor.

These ideals, even long after Napoleon's death, will remain. Napoleon will influence the country enough that it will infect it with new liberal ideas and change the 19th century forever.

The absolutist monarchy stood against everything Napoleon defendedm because if those things were abolished, they would go to shit.

So when the french are kicked out, the english stay. General Beresford basically becomes a de facto king in the king's absence, because John VI turns out enjoyed the brazilian weather a lot more.

Now excuse me cause this is the part I'm not too familiar with. I was actually looking at a series of books by Laurentino Gomes on the topic. he's a brazilian historian who wrote about the portuguese court in brazil and slavery, so here's a tip for those like me who want to know where to start. What I'm not very familiar with is the court in brazil.

Basically, at a certain point, the king is forced to come back and get rid of General Beresford. The anti-british sentiment in the country that prevailed through the 19th century starts here, with Beresford benefitting a lot of his countrymen and repressing anyone who stands against him. THe book Felizmente Há Luar, which we had to study in school and is about the failed revolt by Gomes Freire, is about this exact fact.

There's a character here I haven't mentioned. Carlota Joaquina, wife of John VI, and arguably the vilest woman to have ever lived in this country. By "vile" I mean, spotting a hot guy on the way, finding out who he is, and having his wife killed so she can fuck him. It's downright insane. And Carlota Joaquina was the great manipulator behind her son, Miguel I.

WHile the royal family comes back to portugal, Pedro IV stays in Brazil. What led to the Ipirange scream is another thing I'm not familiar wiht but the presence of the royal family in Brazil reinforced the wish for independence. Maybe a brazillian follower can chime in and explain this a lot better (I'd actually REALLY appreciate that!!)

Pedro IV ends up declaring Brazil an Empire, this becoming Pedro I. I think it's shortly after that John VI, the man who hid chicken legs in his coat pockets out of fear of being poisoned, died by poison. Thus, his son Miguel gets to the throne

Now Liberal sentiment since Napoleon had grown considerably, and by now, Miguel is not happy, so he conducts a "purge". He leads a very repressive regime against Liberals, which lead them to contact Pedro in Brazil and ask him to come here and get rid of his brother.

I seriously don't know what leads to Pedro stepping down and his daughter Maria ascending to the throne (again, if another brazilian wants to either fact check me or teach me, I'm more than happy to hear), but Pedro comes to Portugal precisely to fight a war against his brother.

And that's the civil war.

Listen, in the middle of all of this, the root cause of the fight, is the Constitutional Charter. The Constitutional Charter had been approved in 1821, but barely upheld. I believe Miguel's mistake was to refuse the Constitutional Charter, as it was against absolutist ideals. Think of the constitutional charter as something like the 19th century Magna Carta, what limited a king's ability to jsut rule over everything and delegate the government to a parliament.

Another point of contention was the church. By now, the Inquistion is finally abolished (1820) but the church still holds IMMENSE power over the country. Liberals want something VERY CLOSE to a secular state. They want the people to have access to education outside of the church, and they want the extinction of monastic orders (which they will achieve in 1834). The absolutists can only exist with the church and its power, so Miguel is naturally against this.

Pedro IV ends up winning the war, and his brother is sentenced to exile and signs a contract stating his side of the family can never, ever take the throne. Fun fact: the "Duque of Braganza", the only remnant of the royal family we have today and who is at the head of the monarchist party, actually descends from Miguel. So you want to have an argument against him, just say "maybe your ancestor shouldn't have lost the war".

I don't know much about the liberal wars, but I know that, like the war againsat napoleon, it involved a lot of guerrilla. A notorious moment was the siege of Porto, in which Porto held strong agaisnt the absolutists (so, Miguel) so spectacularly (they even bombed Clérigos), Pedro IV left it in his will that his body should be buried in Brazil but his heart belonged to Porto. His heart is still there lmao

Again, if any brazilian reading this wants to add whatever, I'm more than happy to hear cause this is an episode of both our histories I am lacking in a lot

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futurequibblerjournalist · 3 months ago

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Wilhelm bullying Karkaroff?? You're torturing everyone lol

Um um um if you wouldn't mind,,, since I know ur tired of the wilkes yapping and glazing LMAO would you mind telling me about seabunny and starry Night? I've never heard of either of them :3 tbh I would totally listen to like anything u wanna yap abt tbh your posts are just so !!!! Ykkk?? like I dont think Ive seen anyone give Karkaroff that much attention before lol or Aurora honestlyyy

Sorry for the long anon LOL Ive been lurking for like a month and haven't anoned before aghhhh sorry for the spamm

-🍃

Please don’t apologise for the length, I’ve been loving all the asks I’ve been getting recently, any excuse to yap is one I greatly appreciate!! Feel free to spam me as much as you’d like lovely 🍃 anon (I will say my brain keep thinking these are weed leaves so I’m sorry but you’ve become weed leaves anon in my brain now lmao). Super flattered to hear you’ve been enjoying my posts btw jcnfjcbfjc

Yes!!! Wilhelm bullying Karkarov!!! With the help of especially Dolohov lmao. I don’t think Karkarov was particularly popular when he went to school in general but that’s a different topic for another time cjfncjfn

I would love to tell you about seabunny and starrynight!! I am obsessed with both. I’ve been lowkey obsessed with Igor and Charity for a while but Aurora and Severus is a new one for me. A friend of mine came up with the shipnames so major shout out for that lol

Seabunny is 100% something that happens because of Charity. She’s an it girl, she’s an icon, she’s pink, she’s got her daddy’s credit card, she’s got a heart ready to love anyone and she loves men that look like a rat after it’s walked through the underground sewage system (or in Igor’s case a goat lol). You’d think she does it to piss off her parents but that’s not even close. Her mum’s a little sus at first but she’s sus about everything so that’s not really anything to pay attention to. She sees Igor being his awkward self and she’s like “yes that’s the one I want”. Aurora and Wilhelm have to listen to her talk about him on and on as she praises him for doing the bare minimum like “and then he like, responded to me!! He even like, totally looked at me when I was talking this time”.

They’re so silly. For Igor he’s already decided she’s out of his league but the more persistent she is the more he actually starts to think he’s got a chance. And let’s be fr, Igor’s not the best person. He’s a bit more violent than what’s normal (he plays quidditch and oh dear you can catch Evan Rosier scraping the ground for stray teeth and bone bits by the time a game featuring Igor is over) and he’s a huge coward. Their first time alone Charity asked him over to her dorm to look at her cat and he was so confused when she pulled out an actual cat because there’s a slight language barrier at first (the cat also strangely really likes him and of course Charity sees that as a good sign (also the cat’s name is Pudding))

As for them after Hogwarts I’m so interested in seeing how being with Charity (Muggle Studies teacher and while a pureblood herself genuine lover of all things muggle) mixes with Igor (known death eater and technically convicted criminal until he was pardoned). How does knowing Charity affect how Igor basically abandons his death eater ways after the first war? And his reaction to his dark mark calling on him again and his decision to flee and go into hiding and in the end die for that freedom. How much of that is because he was influenced by Charity?? They die a year within each other and I just,, urgh there’s so many things about these two cjfncjnf have a mini moodboard lmao

Now starrynight!! That’s an entirely different vibe. It’s autism², it’s a lot of learning together, it’s a lot of enjoying each other as they genuinely are. Even if they’re not dating I love love love Aurora and Severus as friends. They just work really well together in a way where they actually get to chill for a bit, at least usually.

Bruce (Mulciber Jr) introduces them, not that they didn’t know each other beforehand, they’ve known each other for years, but the idea of them dating each other came about because Aurora really wanted to just “be normal”. Choosing Severus as her boyfriend might not be the best way to do that but she definitely feels more normal when she’s just hanging around with him cause she’s not constantly performing her normal-sona lol.

Aurora is, to me, incredibly reserved yet curious at the same time. She doesn’t want anyone too close yet she wants to experience everything everyone else does. She spends most of her time (if not hijacked by Charity or thinking she’s best friends with Wilhelm) in the Astronomy tower with the large golden telescope that Hogwarts provides and because homegirl loves this telescope so much she brought Severus to see it no doubt and being the mindful and demure girl she is she even checked if he was dying when he was dry heaving and trying to catch his breath while leaning on the walls as he climbed the stairs. Their dates consist of them sharing their interests with each other, whether it be knowledge about stars, telescopes, potions, chemistry etc. their compliments to each other consists of “I really appreciate that you know how to be quiet” and “I admire your knowledge on insert topic no ones ever heard of ever”. They sit together and read and call it a date where at most they share a few glances. They’re such an awkward looking couple, Aurora towers over Severus, but you’ve never seen communication skills like the ones these two have.

Charity is over the moon when Aurora announces that she’s got a boyfriend because they can finally talk about boys and everything that comes along with it. Aurora is over the moon, not necessarily because of the boyfriend thing (though she’s also fairly happy with that) but because she feels normal and god is she excited to feel normal cjnfjfnf

There’s a bit of Aurora and Charity friendship for you too and here’s another moodboard lol

I was gonna yap about Edmund Avery Jr but this post has already gotten like sooo long so I'll save that for another timenvjfnbjgbg

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sonwar · 1 year ago

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hello!! i would like to first preface that i'm a fan of your writing (ao3 user sonwar) from your kpop works (namely the seokhoon (seventeen) titled 'do you know my heart? (i can't be without you)' in 2020. and if i remembered you wrongly, and you have in fact never heard of this fic or the kpop group before please feel free to delete this ask i apologise deeply aaaaa (whoops ahahaaa im sorry if that's the case)

today. as one does, i was thinking of this fic: its definitely one of the bigger fics the seokhoon tag has seen, and also one of those fics which leave a kind of Impact. even as i ponder seokhoon today as a writer myself, i find so many of the symbols and metaphors i use in my writing to have come from that fic. (if you remember) the ideas of jihoon admiring seokmin's singing & calling him the best singer—i took that and i turned it into a kind of how jihoon's music has been made real vs seokmin's which comes more as instinct—and jihoon, who is in awe of this. and of course seokmin thinking about jihoon all the time—that's something that i genuinely hold so close to my heart. it's so sweet and just soooo seokmin. aaaaaa

your writing there has such a tender and sweet quality to it that ive been striving to achieve—emotion comes across in a way that is. muted (i mean this positively). i feel comfortable reading it because it never feels shocking everything just feels so natural. those 33k words are a source of comfort. i love and value growth in characters/the progression of time in fic, and oh man!!!! you really show the emotional growth of seokhoon so incredibly well in that fic. its so good to me. it feels so alive because of the references you made but also because of how you wrote them. to create life!!! it's so incredible because. its all just so rich and perfect and good and i'm so grateful that ive been able to read this and have it affect me on such a level. my comment on that fic does nothing to live up to what i actually thought of it and now even if i cant convey my appreciation on the fic comments itself, i tried to find another way to reach out to you (hence, this lengthy anon ask)

feel free to ignore this/not reply!!! i understand that you've orphaned the seokhoons for a reason but in a way i just really wanted to let you know that your writing has made me feel so much. and for that! i am so grateful!! thank you again and so much for all of it.

hi anon! you have me right, i am responsible for do you know my heart (as well as "when i'm with you i bloom" and "i'm dying to be taken apart" in case you were looking for me...) i had sort of decided i was going to keep my kpop fandom side off tumblr, since i have found it to be sort of unwelcoming towards kpop, for whatever reason? but your message was so touching i'm throwing that out the window and doing whatever i want anyway! (more under the cut <3)

Letting you know off the bat that your message made me! incredibly emotional and teary eyed! Thank you very much for your kind words, you really can't know how much it means to me, and I'm so glad you reached out to me this way as well! I genuinely got so excited when I read your ask, I'm always happy to talk fics and even more happy to talk seokhoon, as I don't have many people to discuss them with! So thank you! The reason why I orphaned my old fics is...probably a lot more simple than what you might be thinking? The truth is, after posting those three seokhoon fics (which I wrote in pretty quick succession to each other), I went about two years without writing anything at all because I didn't have the bandwidth for it, and then I wrote The Mystery of The Pears in some kind of fugue state over the course of a couple months, and when I read that back to myself I felt that my writing had grown so much, I didn't really want that writing to be associated with my writing of a few years ago. But, to be honest, I re-read my Seokhoon fics again a few weeks ago and found that I enjoyed them much more than I thought I would, and much more than I did when I first wrote them, so I wonder if it's less that my writing has grown and maybe more that I've learned to be kinder towards myself...that'll teach me to orphan fics without completely thinking it through first, I guess. (that being said! i'd like you to know i am still planning on writing more seokhoon! seventeen is very near and dear to my heart, like. i really can't put into words the love i have for those boys, which is to say that i'll probably be a carat for as long as they're seventeen, and maybe even a little longer than that. plus, i feel personally tasked with bringing more seokhoon into the world, so, you know. currently, i'm really trying to finish a seokhoon fic i promised a friend MONTHS ago, even before tmotp was finished, and then i have about...3? seokhoon wips i've started and would like to finish? whether they all get done is to be seen, but hopefully!) Anyway...I have to say, I really love the way you took my little headcanon about Jihoon admiring Seokmin's singing and devolped it further! It's something I think a lot about, too, I think it's so interesting that, objectively, Seokmin has a much wider range and capacity as a singer, but that ever since Jihoon was a trainee he's been told he "already knows how to sing" and "doesn't need singing lessons." It makes me wonder how Jihoon approaches singing, if it's something that he considers more physical, like a muscle that he can control, rather than something emotional, which I think might be closer to how Seokmin approaches singing. I mention this because, considering that Jihoon is also the one making guides for the others to follow and the one directing them in the recording booth, I'm a litte curious about how those different approaches meet together in a more practical way, if that makes sense. I do still think it's something Jihoon would admire and think about a lot if only because it would be so different from his own approach. I also have some theories about certain songs in their discography being written specifically for Seokmin's voice (Same Dream Same Mind Same Night immediately comes to mind, I really think out of all their songs, that's the one that showcases the style Seokmin's voice is suited to the most and he really shines on that song...)

I am of the belief that Seokmin would have been watching Jihoon a lot longer than Jihoon would have been watching him...something about admiration that shifts and changes the closer you get to it...And I don't think Seokmin knows how to not take care of people, it's just who he is, but I also think that feeling is heightened a little bit with Jihoon specifically, who takes on a lot of responsibility without ever complaining about it, and who describes himself as someone who deals with things on his own. I think (and I've seen him) he would try to find ways to make things easier for Jihoon without him having to ask for it first, so that's where that comes from. I think muted is one of the sweetest ways anyone has described the way I write emotions. I like the idea of emotions that come easily and gradually, like. Slow drip love rather than sudden and all-consuming (and, that way, when trying to convey something that is bigger and overwhelming, it's easier to contrast those two emotions against each other), so thank you very much for that. I also think it's very funny you mention the way I wrote the progression of Seokhoon in that fic because, while I find your words incredibly kind and I'm so happy to hear you enjoyed it, and I can still sort of see why I wrote that fic the way I did, I do sometimes consider sort of re-writing a different version of that fic because I'm so sure I could do it better now...nowadays, I think the timeline would be a little different? Idk. Something for future me to consider... Anyway! Thank you, again, for such a lovely ask, I really am so very thankful, and I'm so glad you enjoyed my Seokhoon. Please feel free to message me whenever you'd like! (I'm also on twt! I only use tumblr on browser so I only log on when I'm using my laptop, but I'm a lot more active on twt.) Also, if you ever post your fics or already have, please let me know! I'd love to read them, and I'm always looking for more Seokhoon fics, since there's so very little of them to go around, as I'm sure you know...

#rowan's inbox #anon #my fic #my fic: do you know my heart? (i can't be without you)#seokhoon #seventeen #svt #once again i prattled on and on because no one's ever taught me to shut up #especially not about seokhoon my twt is a mess of seokhoon threads...anyway.

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spacedikut · 4 years ago

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“i want to love someone and be loved” ; spencer reid - part 2

pairing: spencer reid (criminal minds) x f!reader

summary: spencer decides it’s time to tell you, but he needs some help. 3887 words. part 1

a/n: THIS is the longest fic ive ever written but im actually kinda proud of how it turned out? i hope this is a good sequel :)

Spencer chickens out of telling you the next day.

He avoids you all weekend, actually. You resisted texting him the day after Rossi’s because you assumed he’d be busy – with his big plan involving a girl that isn’t you. You’re not bitter – but Sunday comes around and you message him not long after you wake up and six hours later there’s no response.

Twelve hours later - there’s no response.

Monday, you don’t have time to say hello to anyone – there’s a case waiting for you, somewhere in Florida.

Reid avoids your eyes. His body language tells you something is wrong, so you assume whoever he confessed to didn’t reciprocate (they’re insane) and he’s dealing with it. So you don’t press.

Spencer pretends to sleep the entire jet ride. He’s avoiding everyone, not just you.

He spent the whole weekend beating himself up. He drove to your apartment on Saturday, sat outside for so long a neighbour knocked on his window and asked if he was lost, but couldn’t bring himself to step foot out of his car.

So he locked himself in his room, away from you and your loveliness and away from his phone because he knew you texted him and he knew you’d send some soft message about being there for him if he needs anything and he didn’t need to be reminded of how beautiful and out of reach you are.

Derek seemed to be waiting for him Monday morning, arms crossed as he held a cup of coffee. It was weird seeing him in before Spencer.

“How’d it go?” He immediately asked.

“How’d what go?” Spencer mumbles, flinging his bag on the floor by his desk. He slumps in his seat.

Derek raises a dark eyebrow, “You know what, pretty boy. You had a big thing? Big plan?”

“Didn’t work out.”

It doesn’t take a profiler to realise Spencer is very clearly saying leave me alone. Leave it alone.

Derek isn’t one to leave it alone. Especially when it comes to Spencer.

He sighs and moves a little closer to Spencer’s desk, just in case someone overhears them.

“What happened?”

“That’s exactly it,” Spencer slams open a file, “Nothing happened.”

“And why did nothing happen?”

“Because I’m an idiot that can’t even tell a girl how I feel.”

“Whoa- hey!”

Derek spins Spencer’s chair so they’re face to face. Derek takes one look in Spencer’s eyes and knows what’s going on – he got too into his head and backed out at the last minute.

“You’re not an idiot. Why didn’t you do it?”

Spencer shrugs, “I got to her apartment. I had flowers, too. I don’t know.”

Derek’s evidently concerned – Spencer’s beaten up over this, over whoever this girl is, and he deserves the chance to experience love. Spencer deserves a lot more than he himself thinks he does.

“You seemed really excited, man. You can still do it. Just cause you try once and it doesn’t work out doesn’t mean you can’t ever try again.”

Spencer stares off into the distance, accidentally ignoring Derek as his thoughts slip out of his mouth, “Yeah, it probably wouldn’t have worked anyway – I was stupid to think I could get someone like her.”

“Hey, no.” Derek nudges Spencer’s shoulder so he looks at him again, “Don’t talk like that. You’re one hell of a guy, Reid. All you gotta do is get that confidence that you had Friday night back, and you’re all set. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Spencer gives a feeble nod. Derek moves back to his desk, knowing he isn’t convinced, but he isn’t done yet.

+++

Later, in Florida, Spencer’s making a coffee in the precinct’s kitchen after waiting twenty minutes for you to leave. Luck’s on his side, for once, and you’ve been working non-stop with Prentiss going crime scene to crime scene so he hasn’t had to actively avoid you. You smile at him every chance you get, though, and it distracts him.

Someone clears their throat behind him. It’s Penelope, whom Spencer didn’t realise was invited on this case.

She looks guilty. Spencer recognises that face; the face she has when she’s done something she shouldn’t have or knows something she isn’t really supposed to. Given current circumstances, Spencer bets it’s the latter reason.

“Morgan told me something he shouldn’t have.”

Bingo.

He leans against the kitchen counter, stirring his coffee absentmindedly.

“What did he tell you?” He asks, feigning tranquillity. Inside he’s screaming non-stop.

She’s got her hands clasped together in front of her, almost innocently, and fiddles with her fingers, “He told me you needed assistance in the love department.” Before he can object, she continues, “And I am willing to do anything if it means our resident weirdo-slash-genius falls in love and gets to experience some much needed cuteness.”

There’s no point in lying to her. There’s also no point in being mad that Morgan told her about his situation – they’re kind of a package deal. And, who knows, Garcia might be able to help.

“So…” She sways, trying (and failing) to appear nonchalant, “Who’s the lucky lady?”

Spencer shuffles on the spot, scuffing his shoes against the floor. He debates whether he should tell her, since, you know, you’re in the next room over, but Spencer worries that Garcia is so good at her job she’d somehow find out through hacking Spencer’s phone, or maybe somehow hacking his dreams. His subconscious. He’s terrified of Garcia and her abilities.

“You can tell me.” She insists, “I’m much better at keeping secrets than Morgan.”

Spencer turns away from her, she steps closer, and he mumbles your name.

“What?”

“Y/N.”

“WHAT?!”

Spencer spins, hands coming up to tell Garcia to shut up and Garcia immediately covers her mouth in both shock and hopefully so she doesn’t shout again.

“Since when?!” She screeches. “How could I not have known?! Oh God, almighty Doctor Reid, I feel like I’ve failed you by not realising earlier.”

Her enthusiasm makes him smile, for the first time in far too long. Garcia has that power – this innate skill to comfort those around her and make them feel special, make them smile when the world feels like its collapsing.

“Let me help!” She requests.

Spencer’s clearly hesitant. He knows it’s a bad idea.

“Please!” She begs, “I just- I have so many ideas of how you can go about this. Let me brainstorm, get back to you, and if I’m too over-the-top you can tell me no and we’ll pretend it never happened!”

He takes a deep breath. Yes, Garcia is the definition of over-the-top, but that’s one of his favourite things about her. It’s your favourite thing, too. And he did tell Morgan he had big plans. Anything involving Garcia is a big plan with big payoff.

“This is between us.”

“I’ll take it to the grave. Unless you realise how amazing my ideas are and use one to tell Y/N how you feel and then years later I get to commend myself during my maid of honour speech at your wedding.”

She looks ecstatic, hands now together under her jaw as her eyes twinkle. Spencer can’t help but laugh at her eagerness.

+++

The next day, the team returns to Quantico after a semi-successful case. The general mood is good and Morgan invites everyone out for drinks – Spencer declines, but you have your first full conversation since last Friday.

“C’mon, Spence,” Your head rests against the jet seat and you blink sleepily at him, “I feel like I haven’t spoken to you for years!”

Spencer gives you a small smile, “I promised my mom I’d call her tonight. Sorry, Y/N.”

You nod in understanding, “Will you tell her I say hi?”

“Of course. She loves you.”

You grin at eachother, immediately lost in your own world. You’ve missed him more than you realised, and you have no idea what’s going through his head, but you’re happy that you’ve had this – a Spencer Reid smile that makes you feel at home and on top of the world simultaneously.

Spencer has to tear his eyes away before he blurts something stupid, like she’s not the only one that loves you.

+++

“Spencer!” Garcia greets, Cheshire cat grin on her face. “I need to see you in my dungeon, please. Immediately.”

Spencer drops the file he’s holding. Unfortunately, Penelope’s request caught the attention of the whole team.

“What business do you have in the villain’s lair, Reid?” Derek asks. You’ve looked up from your computer, Emily smirking and leaning back in her chair in expectation.

“Uh…”

“Important nerd business. Go away.” Garcia says, eyes narrow as she tugs Spencer’s hand. He’s whisked away from any further questioning, leaving the befuddled team behind.

He isn’t sure what to expect when he stumbles into Penelope’s second home, but the display in front of him explains why he overheard a conversation about missing evidence boards earlier. Penelope’s obviously been using the new printer in her cave to her advantage – there’s at least twenty different pictures printed out on one board titled “date ideas”, then the board on the right has a picture of Spencer and you in the centre with a perfectly drawn heart around it. Under and around that is a mixture of love quotes, including song lyrics and quotes directly from romantic movies. He notices “The Parliament of Fowls” on there – Garcia remembers that he mentioned it’s considered the first Valentines poem?

“Whoa,” Is all he can say.

“I know it’s a little intense,” Garcia squirms, “But! I started scrolling through Pinterest and couldn’t stop. I don’t know what came over me, maybe some type of love deity, but I started thinking about you and Y/N in a classic love film in, like, black and white and I…”

She’s out of breath from animatedly explaining.

Spencer laughs through his nose, almost a scoff, but he’s impressed. He shouldn’t have expected anything else from the Penelope Garcia.

As Spencer wanders towards the first board, Garcia follows him like a shadow, “My personal favourite is-“ She points to a picture of chocolate fondue with faceless people in very little clothing, “-this one.”

Spencer awkwardly clears his throat when he begins to think of you and him like that.

“A little much for your declaration of love, though, I get it,” Garcia nods.

He scans the board – heart speeding up when he moves from idea to idea and picturing you and him in each one. He can’t help but think no, that one would be good for our anniversary – ah, she’d love to do that one for her birthday.

“What’re you thinking?” Garcia asks quietly. She knows his brain is whirring like her computer drive, so she approaches him gently.

“This one.” He says. “Where should we do it?”

Garcia grins behind him. The one he’s referring to shows a dinner table set up outside, brown wooded table with white wooden chairs opposite eachother. There’s flowers at the centre, a bottle of wine already poured in each glass in front of a basket of cookies, and the area around is shrouded by shrubbery, fairy lights hanging delicately from every-which-way.

It’s perfect. You love fairy lights, Spencer loves cookies, and the set-up looks private enough for Spencer to feel confident when he empties his heart and soul to you.

“The roof.” Garcia says wistfully.

“We have access to that?”

“Yes.” They both know they don’t. “Leave it to me. Oh… one more thing.” She adds, hesitantly, “Can Morgan help? I’m a lot of things, including emotionally strong and your love guru, but physically I’m gonna need some assistance.”

Spencer doesn’t even need to agree – Morgan’s gonna involve himself no matter what.

+++

Five o’clock is quickly approaching and you’re slumped over your desk, lost in your work. You need to be lost in it, because ever since Garcia released Spencer from her office right after lunch he’s been sneaking glances at you (he’s not sneaky) and has made several attempts to approach you but decided against it, sharply turning and pretending he meant to go another way instead.

You are beyond confused. You assume it’s to do with the girl he’s been trying to get over – you hope he’s been trying to build the confidence to tell you exactly what happened and maybe, you really hope, he’ll invite you over for the weekend so you can slip back into your old routine.

“Psst.”

You assume they’re not trying to get your attention, so you don’t move.

“Psst!”

You still don’t move.

“Y/N!”

Your head snaps up to Spencer leaning over the divider between your desks. He looks alarmed – which is odd, given he’s the one who called you – and he opens and closes his mouth a few times before he finally speaks.

“Are you busy tonight?” He sits back and, if he wasn’t so goddamn tall, all you’d be able to see would be his eyes. His added height means you can see his eyes and his nose. You wanna kiss it.

You smile – this is an olive branch, “I am completely available for whatever it is you might need.”

You sound incredibly eager, which you are. You miss him.

His cheeks move upwards, a smile, “Can I talk to you, later, on the roof? Uh-“ He clears his throat, “-I need to tell you something.”

You raise an eyebrow, “You’re not gonna push me off, right?”

“No,” He laughs.

“Promise me.”

Now he guffaws, “I would never, Y/N!”

“Promise me, Reid!”

“Alright, alright! I promise!” He’s jokingly raising his hands in a form of surrender.

You give him another smile and turn back to your work. You feel at ease, now, thinking he’s finally gonna tell you what happened on the weekend – finally you’ll be able to help him and go back to normal.

Spencer, on the other hand, is the exact opposite of ease. He’s about to pour his heart out to you.

He takes a deep breath and looks back to his computer, which is open on a tab titled “How to Tell Someone You Like Them.”

Step 3: Be Confident.

Spencer opens a new tab and searches, “How to be confident.”

+++

Garcia hacks into Spencer’s computer to open a document and type that the roof is ready. She wishes him luck, tells him she loves him, and calls dibs on being the godmother of your future children. As if she doesn’t have enough godchildren as it is.

He clears his throat and your head snaps towards him. You’ve been done for a while, playing Tetris on your phone, waiting for Spencer to take you to the roof where he swears he won’t kill you – you’re not entirely convinced.

“Um-“ He scratches his neck, “You ready to go?”

You nod and give him a weak smile in hopes it gives him some type of reassurance.

“Whatever happened, it’s okay, Spence.”

All he does is nod in return, gathering his coat and bag. He doesn’t really register what you say, or he would’ve been very confused.

You follow him up to the roof. The elevator ride is silent and Spencer is jittery; his hands twitch and tap against his legs, he’s bouncing on his toes and he keeps looking at you through the corner of his eye. You’ve taken several deep breaths to calm your racing heart – you hate heights, and this is the closest you’ve been to Spencer in a week. This will be the longest conversation you’ve had with him in a week, too.

The second the doors open, Spencer leaps in front of you.

“Wait!”

You jump back in surprise, “What? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Completely fine. Just… when we get there, let me explain first, okay? Before you say anything.” He’s pleading, as if you’ve already told him no. You look at him with furrowed brows and mumble an ‘okay’.

You’re visibly confused as you trek up the flight of stairs to the roof. Spencer pushes open the fire door and the first thing you notice is how bright the roof is – you always assumed it’d be dark, little light, especially at night like this.

Wait.

There’s fairy lights… everywhere. You’re pretty sure this isn’t the norm for the FBI roof.

Spencer is equally as awed at what he sees before him - it’s exactly the photo he saw in Garcia’s cave brought to life, but he’s too distracted by you to fully appreciate it. You look like a child on Christmas; eyes wide, pupils blown, mouth slightly agape. You’re gorgeous.

“What…is this, Spence?” You wonder, noticing the set table, fingers grazing the roses that sit in a vase in the middle. They’re fresh and smell wonderful.

He stands a little behind you, fiddling with his hands, and clears his throat, “Would you like to take a seat?”

You do. When he finally sits, he pours you a glass of wine and you immediately take an anxious sip. Although Rossi is a big fan of wine, you rarely take interest in it only when Spencer’s involved. You’ve come to associate wine with him – a smile peeks out from your glass as you stare at the man opposite you.

“I need to get something off my chest. But there’s cookies, if you want one,” He picks one up from his plate, breaking it in half and giving it to you. He’s stalling, but you seem to take the bait and bite into it.

“Are these from the bakery two blocks away?”

“Yeah,” He replies, but he isn’t really paying attention. He doesn’t know where to begin.

You wait patiently for him to open up. You’re still unsure of what to make of all of this – the beautiful setting, the wine, the flowers, the lights. God, the lights are dazzling in the Virginia night sky. You need context, and you need it now.

“Spence-“

“Listen.”

“Oh.”

“Sorry, I just…” He trails off, “I need to say what I need to say before I back out again.”

You fold your hands in your lap. You’re ready for whatever’s to come.

“Do you know how long we’ve known eachother?” He asks. His head tilts like a puppy.

“Nearly five years. Our friendaversary is coming up, you know.”

You realise, then, that this must be a celebration for that – that explains the… typically romantic setting. Before you can open your mouth to ask if that what’s this is, Spencer speaks.

“Four years, three-hundred and sixty days. That’s how long we’ve known eachother.”

“If we were dating, we would’ve been my longest relationship the second we passed a year.”

You don’t know why you said it, but it flusters him. He has to pause to take a breath and collect his thoughts.

“I’ve been in love with you for four years and three hundred and fifty-eight days, Y/N.”

It’s silent as you process and he figures out how to continue.

“I knew you were special when you were introduced to us. Hotch already had such a soft spot for you, and you had this way about you that made us all fall in love instantly. I remember Garcia did a background check the second she found out your name and she said you remind her of me and I… that freaked me out, to be honest. I thought you’d try to replace me.” He huffs a laugh, but can’t bring himself to look you in the eye, “I realised I was in love with you when you drunkenly defended me. Do you remember that?” His eyes flicker to yours for half a second – you’re wide-eyed, “You’d known me for two days at that point, but we’d already done a case together so we were celebrating. And these guys at the bar were whispering about me, acting like I couldn’t hear them, and the second you realised what was happening you stood up, stormed towards them and gave them a piece of your mind. It was incredible.

“You barely knew me, at least personally, but you thought so highly of me you scolded a group of drunk bodybuilders without a second thought. You made them apologise – it was hysterical watching someone half their size force them into submission like that – and when you were done you asked if I wanted to leave and go get ice cream. We couldn’t, cause you vomited on the way there, but I knew in that moment I loved you and I feel so hard, so quickly, I didn’t know what to do. And you never… you never indicated you thought of me as anything other than a friend so I didn’t try. Then you dated Greg who, in my opinion, sucked on his best days, and you encouraged me to date Abigail and I…”

He’s run out of breath and of things to say.

“I just love you, Y/N. I’m in love with you.” He adds, “I hope that’s okay.”

He finally looks at you, then. You’re just staring and he panics when he can’t make out what you’re feeling. He’s always been able to read you, you’ve always hated the saying that eyes are the windows to the soul because your eyes are always your tell, but now they’re… glassy.

You’re crying.

“Spencer…” You gasp, throat tight.

“It’s okay.” Spencer gives a tight-lipped smile. He knows what’s coming. He should’ve expected it. He has been expecting it.

“I love you too, Spence.”

Spencer chokes on air. He takes a gulp of wine.

You give him a teary smile in disbelief, “I’ve always loved you, Spence. I thought you knew that – I thought that big brain of yours knew exactly how I felt and… you didn’t do anything about it so I thought you didn’t feel the same. Spencer…”

He slowly moves a hand to place it palm-up on the table. Immediately you place your hand in his, your grip tight as you lovingly stare at him. This feels unreal.

“I’m in love with you too, you idiot.” You half laugh, half cry, “If you’ve really loved me this long, we’ve wasted so much time! God, we’re both idiots.”

Spencer’s crying too, now, and he starts laughing with you.

You’re two idiots in love, sitting opposite eachother on the roof of your place of work in a dream-like surrounding filled with fairy lights and flowers, and you could’ve been doing this for years.

Spencer sniffles, looking at you through his wet eyelashes, “Would you like to be my girlfriend?”

“If I say yes, will I get more dates like this?” You tease.

“Well, Garcia has a whole evidence board of date ideas she stole from Pinterest. We have enough ideas to last a lifetime.” He giggles.

“Penny was in on this?!”

Spencer gives a heh, “This is all thanks to her, so yeah.”

“She’s always had our backs.”

“She’s also now going to be convinced she’s cupid.”

You laugh again, and can’t help yourself when you lean across the table, still gripping Spencer’s hand, and letting your lips fall on his. Spencer leans into you, lips moving against yours as you both try to suppress grins.

You pull back slightly, Spencer’s lips following you, and whisper, “I would love to be your girlfriend.”

He kisses you again. And again. And again, just cause he can.

Big plan, big payoff. You’re worth every little stress and more.

#spencer reid x reader #spencer reid fanfic #criminal minds x reader #criminal minds fanfic #mine #garcia is watching everything through the security cameras btw #you think she'd do all this and NOT watch her hard work flourish?#think AGAIN

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analviel · 3 years ago

Text

TIM DRAKE IS NOT ROBIN

It just so happens when Tim was planning to find Dick, his parents suddenly call him to tell him that there's a party or an event or just something on the other side of the world he can attend with them.

Sometimes they do this and Tim always says yes. It's as rare as leap years. Meaning it has happened only three times in his life before. He agonized over it. But you know, Tim's just a kid and there's no guarantee he can actually do something about Batman and Nightwing. Besides, Batman's been managing -if you can call it that- this long, with Alfred by his side, who's words certainly weights more heavily than the neighbours kid. He can afford a couple of weeks away from Gotham. By that time, Batman probably would've gotten his head straight. He's a hero, he's like, really strong, if anyone can get through this... besides, Tim figures Superman or Wonder Woman will do something before he truly crosses the line, right? Why would a kid know better than real superheroes, right? They must just be waiting until they're really needed. Right? Even though Tim personally thinks they should've at the very least locked Batman up somewhere he can't harm anyone or himself if they can't convince Dick to go back to being Robin. They're heroes.

Tim really wants to spend time with his parents. But before he leaves, he sends letters to every place he thinks Dick may be. The Titans Towers, his apartment in Bludhaven, where he lives with Starfire, Haly's circus, even to houses of his friends heroes. (Tim is twelve/thirteen alright. And one that has maybe below average self-awareness and his letters were very polite even if the act itself might've been vaguely sort of threatening).

So Tim leaves Gotham to spend time with his parents. It's busy, his parents keep him busy, and he doesn't have much time to dedicate to the news from Gotham. And really, if this is how it always is, no wonder his parents don't always have attention to spare on their kid in Gotham. So many things to do, so many things to attend, so many people to meet, and even more sites to visit. And the fighting. Tim hadn't realize it was this bad and suddenly thinks that, you know, it might've been better if he did stay back home. He realizes his parents actually brought him with them because they think a kid will somehow... magically fix them...??? Tim doesn't know, adults can be stupid.

Eventually, they realize the wrong in their ways and sends Tim back when his presence proves ineffective. Tim comes back to the city burning.

Well, not literally, but sort of.

Parts of it are burning. But not the whole thing. That's something.

Batman has been missing. And looking into it, at his last appearance, Tim surmise he retained a heavy wound.

(Or he's dead, not like they'll reveal it to the city just to cause more chaos and panic.) Batman seems to be out of the field and that was what Tim wanted, before he would've crossed the line.

Only, thing is, he'd already revealed too much weakness. The Batsignal had been taken down after one too many close calls on the perps they pick up. And the violence only raised from there.

(The first month when Batman and Robin and Batgirl's absence started to become suspicious. The second month Batman is deep in his spiral of violence. The third month Tim follows him around and then makes plants to pick up Dick that doesn't come to fruition and then sends his letters and then leaves. Six weeks with his parents, a few days from and to Gotham, two weeks to get caught up with what happened in Gotham. Batman is out, recovering, resting, dying, who knows.

Five months was all it took for Gotham to go to hell. And all it took was one dead son.)

Spoiler rises.

Gotham has a new champion.

Tim regrets that he hadn't been able to help. Tim will help.

Tim has a new champion.

Spoiler has a fixation on Cluemaster. It's not that difficult to go from there.

As long as, one, you know who was giving the police the answers to Cluemaster's gimmick. And two, that you know there even is a new vigilante because Spoiler is not like Batman who beats perps and leave them on the sidewalk for the police to pick up.

For wearing an almost eyesearing purple costume, Spoiler prefers to keep in the shadows and if not for the time Tim had trailed after Batman's madness, he wouldn't have learned the streets enough to notice the hints.

Tim purchase a laptop, watch tutorials day in and day out, buys pieces from junkyards to fiddle with wires and boards, and leaves Stephanie Brown a gift on her windowsill with a purple ribbon. Tim greets Spoiler over the comms. He calls himself Asset.

(It is not well-thought out because Stephanie takes to calling the mystery person who snuck into her room and refuses to give anything about themselves out 'Ass'. Tim did not actually sneak into her room but sent a drone to drop off his gift. Steph doesn't budge.)

Tim is not yet good enough to hack into cameras around Gotham. He finds he's good with a computer but not that good, his real talent lies not in the software but in the wires and soldering iron and the tiny bug camera/audio he has Spoiler plant around Gotham. If he can't take other cameras, he'll make them. (Also in case someone more experienced at hacking than he is manages to get in the system, Tim has a self-destruct button just for that. Yes, Dr. Doofenshmirtz is a good role models for mad scientist wannabes.)

A week is all it takes for Spoiler and Asset to get all the necessary evidence against Cluemaster. They celebrate. They are thirteen year olds and they just prevented a bomb from going off and put a bad man behind bars. They are high. They find more cases, for the most part C-rank villains and bellow but they also help with the big names by Spoiler planting more cameras and Tim sending the data and feeds for her to drop off to Jim Gordon. He is the only one who knows of the characters that have risen after Batman's sleep and can guess enough from Spoiler's stiff shoulders to keep that to himself.

Then...

Then it is six months and two weeks.

Tim watch from his now multiple screen behind his walk-in closet as a grave is dug out from the inside. Because S&A have put cameras everywhere just in case. After all, it's places you think are of no interest that criminals will sought to make deals in.

Tim does not send his partner to what may be a zombie but instead tells her to clear the direction Jason is stumbling towards. It takes him minutes to realize that Jason is patrolling his Robin patrol. Jason is sent to the hospital and Tim contacts them to list him under the Drakes, paying for his room and every other necessities. Has him transferred to the hospital that Drake medical industries is personally funding. When asked the name, Tim says Alvin Draper. He gets a cab to the hospital, finds Jason knocked out, peers at Robin's face. It's when they're alone, the previously dead boy's hands wrapped in bandages that Tim confirms in disbelief that as far as he knows, the boy matches Jason Todd. As if him digging his way out of Jason Todd's grave wasn't enough. Granted, Tim doesn't even know the shade of his eyes, so he's not the best judge.... Tim snaps a picture from different angles of the room and takes another cab back to Bristol while thinking up a story.

Tim knocks on the neighbour, tells them he's got something of Jason and if he can see Mr. Wayne. Tim is surprised himself by how relieved he is to see Bruce standing alive and well. Or not standing, leg and arm in a cast, an IV beside him on the couch in the drawing room. Tim weaves his story. Little Tim Drake wandering around Gotham, stumbles on a bunch of medic picking up a boy that Tim recognises as the neighbour's dead kid, pays for his hospital bills, takes a couple of pictures after the first aid or whatever and gives Bruce the pictures. Bruce makes his way to the hospital.....

I've lost steam at this point.

You decide if they arrive to see Jason and Bruce and Alfred is all tearful while Tim awkwardly leaves the room to resume his brainstorming on the S&A latest case, or they find an empty bed and Bruce goes on a frenzy tracking his undead lost son.

Additional idea: So Tim not being there didn't kill Bruce, but Bruce has been crippled and Batman is dead now. So without Robin, Batman did die.

Maybe Dick comes back to become Batman with Jason as his Robin, since that's not a combination often seen (Or the Batman Jason and Robin Tim, that's more common, though I'm loath to give up Spoiler and Asset). Around this time Babs comes back to the scene as Oracle with the birds of prey.

Additional additional idea to how they'll work with everyone back on the scene: since the Bats have the fighters and more equipped to report to time sensitive stuff, maybe S&A focus more on cold cases. Where Spoiler goes sneaking around, poking at old cases with Asset in her ears, figuring out puzzles and old clues, making breakthrough after breakthrough and bringing long overdue justice together.

Either the Drakes dies without Batman there to slap the poison out of Jack's hands because he's too busy searching for his son, or maybe they live with Tim able to direct Batman there immediately. Either way, Drake industry sponsors S&A, so now Spoiler also has toys like the Spoil... er plane??? Spoiler bike??? Eh, the name's work in progress.

#tim drake #dc #robin #batfam #dc comics #red robin #batman #Stephanie brown #spoiler #batgirl #and i write #jason todd #fic idea #red hood #bruce wayne #tim is not robin #asset tim drake

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nevertheless-moving · 4 years ago

Text

Suicidal Misunderstanding IX

Star Wars Time Travel AU #27

Part I - - - - - Part II - - - - - Part III - - - - - Part IV - - - Part V - - - - - Part VI - - - - - Part VII - - - - - Part VIII

Content Warning: This chapter contains potentially triggering material, particularly aftermath of attempted suicide as well as discussions of bodily injury.

Cody woke up the morning after the...drunken keldabe still feeling uneasy. He spent half an hour attempting to read over reports in preparation for the Umbaran campaign before giving it up as a lost cause. He distracted himself for a little while by pouring over last night’s cantina surveillance, before giving up on that as well and sending a message to General Skywalker.

‘Any updates on General Kenobi’s status?’

He watched the comms as communications from everyone besides the General trickled in. He answered a few requests for requisitions, forwarded some medical reports, and ignored an irritating handful of overly-personal questions.

Agonizing over it the whole time, he opened a comm-text link to Obi-Wan. It took nearly an hour, but he managed to send two sentences. ‘Hope you’re recovering well. Look forward to upcoming mission discussion.’

He immediately wanted to retroactively delete the message, mortified by every word and deeply concerned at every second that passed without a reply.

He spent the next 30 minutes hunched over, quickly closing every incoming CT and CC communication, justifying the time to himself as ‘technically on leave.’

He lurched forward when he finally received a General’s comm code, but slumped in disappointment when it was Skywalker, not Kenobi.

‘Not as drunk but still seems a little high. He says he wasn’t drugged. He’s taking the rest of the day off. I’m monitoring.’

Taking the rest of the day off. Did that mean he wasn’t carrying around his comm? Kriff. Should he more or less concerned that the general was actually taking a day off?

He decided to be more concerned.

‘Thank you for the update. Respectfully request information on any changes.’

Hopefully that would encourage Skywalker to keep him informed even if he stopped freaking out over his vod’s behavior.

Stowing the remote comm, he stood up and exited the temporary planet-side office, throwing himself into cleaning up the mess that was nearly 20,000 clone troopers simultaneously attempting to get the most out of a very brief R&R.

Shortly before mid-day, he received another update from Skywalker.

‘Just managed to get him to medical. Healer cleared him of drug interactions but Obi-Wan’s still acting strange (not crying, but a lot of hugging).’

Cody stared at that for a long while.

‘Any other verbal indications of upcoming danger?’ he finally asked. Skywalker didn’t reply.

Shortly after nightfall, his incident reports were interrupted by a call from an unknown temple number. He quickly opened it, and a holo of an unfamiliar Mon Calamari female healer appeared in miniature on the desk.

“Commander Cody. Thank you for answering so quickly. Are you somewhere private?” she asked, voice deliberately neutral.

The Commander tensed up. “Yes, sir. I’m in CC office space, alone. The room and the channel are both secure. Is this regarding General Kenobi?”

“Yes.” She replied. “My name is Master Bant Eerin; I’m a temple healer as well as a personal friend of Obi-Wan’s. He’s...he’s in the healing halls right now. We’re still trying to understand exactly what happened- I’ll tell you what I can but first we need to rule out any possible drugs he may have contact with. I need you to describe in detail anything he may have been exposed to that could have possibly had mind-altering effects.”

The Commander was a professional. He swallowed back his fear, his questions, and his demands to know what was going on.

“Of course. Everything on the Negotiator was GAR Standard, and I was with him when we left the ship. We went directly to the lower levels. The first time he was exposed to anyone outside the 212th was when we left our transport on level 3915. I...actually have footage of him the whole time night after that point. I’m sending it over right now, sir.”

“That would be extremely helpful, thank you.” He watched as she pulled it up on a second comm, sound barely audible.

He continued with his report: “One of the boys took it without permission. He didn’t mean anything by it, he’s just an idiot; I’ve already issued a severe reprimand. In any case, he brought it to me after I issued surveillance on the cantina, it tracks everything the General did- as far as I can tell, he had a glass of house grub wine, two shots of rancor blood, and an unnamed mixed cocktail ‘on the house.’ You can see everything the bartender added- as far as I can tell nothing was slipped in. He just... blacked out suddenly after the fourth drink, and quickly startled awake, confused by his surroundings.”

“I see.” Her tone was still carefully neutral and Cody didn’t know how to read her expression. He waited, wishing he was wearing his bucket so he didn’t have to keep schooling his face into professional patience.

“You brought him back to the temple...correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

She let out a deep breath, gills fluttering slightly. “We’ll probably have more questions later, but please understand our inquires are entirely based around determining how we can best help Obi-Wan. This call and any future ones are not intended, and should absolutely not be interpreted, as indications of blame. He’s actually spoken to me about you before, I know he has the deepest respect for you, personally and professionally. Someone will likely be assigned to talk to everyone whose spent time with him recently, including myself.”

The sick feeling in his gut from last night returned full force. “I...believe I understand sir. His condition is serious, then?”

Her gills fluttered again.

“Even now, I think we can safely anticipate a full physical recovery. He...there’s no easy way to say this...it appears he attempted to end his own life. Knight Skywalker got to him just in time, and he received bacta within minutes of the initial burn. I...like I said...we’ll began work to figure out why-”

Her voice broke and she stared up, large tears pooling in the corners of her eyes. She hastily wiped them away.

“Rest assured commander, he’s getting the best treatment possible. Thank you for your assistance. I’ll do my best to answer any questions you might have right now. This is my personal comm link- please feel free to reach out to me at any point for updates.”

“I-” Cody cleared his throat. “Can I come to the temple? To...” he trailed off, not sure how to finish.

“Not tonight, I’m sorry. The healers need to focus; he’s not allowed any visitors until he’s out of Bacta, I’m afraid.”

“Skywalker must be throwing a fit at that” Cody remarked numbly.

The healer winced. “Knight Skywalker is currently sedated. He was...injured in the struggle to keep Obi-Wan from further harm. Master Windu witnessed part of it, but we’ll have to wait until its safe to wake him to get the full story. I’ll be notifying Captain Rex of the situation after we finish speaking.”

“I’ll do it.” Cody offered immediately. “Tell me what happened.”

Eerin hesitated.

“Please, Sir. It will be better coming from me and...if he’s the only other trooper who’s being informed at the moment...”

“Of course,” she said quietly. “We don’t know the full circumstances, but at some point in performing emergency care for Master Kenobi, Knight Skywalker was stabbed in the lower abdomen with a vibroblade. It pierced his large intestine. The blade was pulled out shortly before healers arrived, causing some further damage and blood loss. He’s already finished surgery, and should only need a few hours of Bacta at most. Considering his extraordinary past recovery rates, he’ll likely be out of bed tomorrow and fully healed by the end of the week.”

“General Kenobi wouldn’t...” Cody trailed off again. He was having a hard time putting coherent sentences together.

Bant looked at the ceiling for a moment, seeming to collect her thoughts.

“Psychosis can have many manifestations. Even with- with conventional injuries, people can mistake help for harm. There’s just too much we don’t understand, and only so much we can learn before they wake up. Are you certain you wish to be the one to inform Captain Rex?”

“Yes.” That was about the only thing the Commander was certain of right now. “Is there anyone else in the GAR I should inform of...anything?”

“The military aspect of this isn’t my area of expertise. If there’s someone you trust who can be a support for you, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to tell them in confidence. Some form of what happened is going to get out eventually.” she replied. “Please use your discretion, I suppose. It’s...not really my speciality but I imagine you’ll receive further orders on how much to release to the GAR once Obi-Wan’s stable.”

Right. Discretion. Because Obi-Wan wasn’t just Obi-Wan- he was a high general in charge of nearly 1/3 of the republic’s forces. If word of this got out to the wrong ears it would cause mass panic, maybe even an emboldened separatist advance. It was an insane amount of responsibility for one person, no wonder - he deliberately didn’t finish the thought.

“I’ll comm the Captain immediately. Thank you for the information, General.” he said out loud.

“Feel free to contact me for further updates, and tell Captain Rex he’s welcome to do the same. I’ll message you when its clear to visit the halls.”

“Yes, Sir.” Cody responded, saluting automatically.

“Take care of yourself, Commander Cody”

The hologram blinked out. Cody sat motionless for several long moment before sweeping his desk off, sending the assorted flimsies and redundant comm-units of various designations to the ground.

He stared at the empty desk, then tapped a button on his wrist comm, opening a private audio channel. “CT-7567, please come in” he said calmly.

“Cody?” came the alarmed reply. “I’m here, what’s going on?” Why did he sound so panicked? He had deliberately used his calmest voice. Oh well.

“Please report immediately to CC Office 12 in Guard Headquarters”

“I’ll be there in 10″

Cody hung up. He stared at the blank wall. He knew something was wrong with how the General said goodbye.

He opened the single desk drawer and dumped the odd wires and coins inside to the floor. Eerin had said burn. That could mean a lot of things, but lightsaber was the most likely.

Cody puked profusely into the empty drawer. He stared at the vomit for a moment before carefully closing the drawer. He still felt a little sick. He hadn’t even said anything back to the General, he just stood there, frozen.

He stared vaguely at the wall across, wondering if he was going to puke again.

Rex burst into the room. “Cody! What’s going on?! You- kark, what is that smell?”

“I puked in the desk drawer” Cody explained.

Rex shut the door behind him and slowly walked over. He knelt down next to the desk, gently taking Cody’s hands in this own. “Cody. Vod. Talk to to me.”

“Obi-Wan tried to kill himself.”

Rex’s hands tightened over Cody’s compulsively and Cody squeezed back harder. He closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at Rex’s expression.

“Some of ghost company went out for drinks last night. Obi-Wan started acted oddly. We flew towards the temple. He started crying. We got to the temple. He Keldabe kissed me. He told me goodbye. I didn’t say anything back.”

“Oh, vod” Rex whispered. He gently pulled the slack Cody off the chair and onto his lap on the floor. Cody continued mechanically. “I did reports today. Skywalker said he was with him. I left Obi-Wan a message. I don’t think he saw it. He tried to kill himself. Skywalker must have left him alone. He saved him. Obi-Wan stabbed Skywalker.”

Rex froze, still holding on to Cody.

“The healer called. Asked about drugs. They don’t think its drugs but they had to ask. She said they’re both going to heal completely fine. I have a link if you want to call the healer directly. That’s...it. I have reports to do now.”

Rex held Cody tighter. “Not right now”

“It’s war. People get hurt. People die. I have work to do”

“Not right now,” Rex repeated. “You have the right to be upset. You have the right to grieve. You’re a person, of course you have feelings.”

“Obi-Wan said that.” Cody whispered. Then he started crying. He continued to quietly sob for some time, hurt and bewildered and scared. They sat on the floor together; Rex barely moved, simply held on to his older brother as he fell apart.

Inevitably, Cody’s tears dried up and he pulled away.

“I don’t know how to clean this,” he said gesturing at that closed drawer.

“I’ll take care of it. Let’s just get you to bed. There’s CC bunks here, right?

“Yes but...”

Cody didn’t really like sleeping so isolated, but he also couldn’t imagine facing the 212th right now.

“I’ll stay here with you. We’ll go to the temple together in the morning.”

Rex shepherded Cody to the fresher. He stared at the mirror with a vague sense of recognition before automatically moving through a standard sanitation routine. By the time he finished, Rex had joined him in his room.

“What did you do with the vomit?” Cody asked, suddenly exhausted. They slipped into bed together.

“Swapped the whole desk with Pond’s. That bastard knows what he did.”

Cody let out a snort. Then, much to his surprise, he sank heavily into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Part X

#star wars #my au #suicidal misunderstanding au #star wars au no 27 #potentially triggering #attempted suicide #injury #all off screen this chapter #character is not actually suicidal but is severely divorced from reality due to space wizard plot device #starwars #codywan #angst #fanfic

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hargrove-mayfields · 3 years ago

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Just A Dream Away

Chapter 1/13 read here on ao3!

my piece for @harringrovebigbang!

Art and moodboard from my amazing team, @monochromegee and @shewritesdirty respectively, to come soon!

~~~~

Six months. Six months and twelve days.

That’s how long Billy has been in the hospital. In a coma. His health rapidly deteriorating.

After one month it was required he be put on a ventilator. Two and his wounds started getting infected. By month three, the hospital asked that a representative be chosen for him, just in case he didn’t pull through.

Neil Hargrove refused. Barked into the receiver something along the lines of, “What do I care if the boy wanted to go and get himself killed?” It was entirely defensive, his voice cracking as he finished his sentence, but the hospital still never contacted him again, not for updates or bills or anything. His wife was far too busy taking care of one grieving child and a lazy husband already to worry about an additional burden.

All of Billy’s extended family was still in California, had written him off years before they’d even left home for Indiana anyways. The moment his mother walked out the door, nobody else wanted him either, so they were off the table too.

The town of Hawkins had been turned inside out by the deaths of more than thirty community members, some of which were still being reported as missing so many months later. Nobody had the time, or in many cases the heart, to take care of the lone survivor.

That left only one person. The one who’d been taking care of him even before he’d fallen into a coma. The one who’d understood him better than anyone else, who’d given him a chance, who’d loved him more than anything.

Steve gets a call from the hospital, the way he is usually woken up these days. Every other morning, as soon as visitation opens, a nurse calls him for a quick update. The duties of a representative for someone unconscious, for his Billy in a coma.

He’s beyond exhausted, dragging himself to and from Hawkins General day in and day out, sometimes bringing Max or a few of the other kids along with him. Mostly because every day is the same thing, walking through the halls, facing the polite smiles from nurses who deal with this on the daily, don’t understand the way it feels to see the one you love on that bed.

If he does hear anything new, it’s usually not good news. He knows Billy is getting worse, but still he sits in that room for countless hours, watching and waiting for the moment he’s struck with a miracle, and he comes back to him.

The hospital is not quite as patient though, and since about month four of Billy’s hospital stay, they’d been encouraging Steve to consider his wards right to die. After so much time had passed by without signs of improvement, the nurses had started hesitating in the doorway when he was around, and offering kind little suggestions that were supposed to push him towards the decision to let Billy go.

Things like, “It’s not really him anymore, honey.” and, “He’s getting worse by the minute, poor thing.”, and Steve’s favorite, the one that made him leave the hospital in tears, “If he wanted to wake up, he would have done it by now.”

But no matter how true what they were saying may have been, Steve really did not want to hear it. The only reason the thought of letting Billy go had ever crossed the minds of doctors and nurses was because of what was on the news, all these up and coming stories about hospital ethics committees that were popping up all over the country recently.

They were being selfish, willing to let Billy die just because they were scared they wouldn’t be able to stand the heat that would come from keeping an eighteen year old boy on life support for as long as they had. Whether or not they actually thought they could save him was a question for another day.

So they would mail Steve countless papers and claims and pamphlets to try to reason with him, to persuade him that the best thing to do was to kill Billy because they didn’t want to deal with him anymore. It made him sick to his stomach, to think that people who were supposedly trained to help people were so hellbent on giving up on a patient.

He wonders sometimes, if they wouldn’t be so hasty to pull the plug had he been an easier case. If his father was more supportive and his biological mother present, or if the government hadn’t worked so hard to cover up the origin of his injuries. Maybe even if his representative was a nice young woman instead.

But there’s nothing he can do about it, so he just crumples the papers and ignores their premature condolences, and goes to visit Billy at every moment he can.

The drive to the hospital that particular morning feels like it takes a whole day instead of the 20 minutes the route actually is, Steve feeling like he’s suspended in time. It doesn’t seem real, taking the stairs up to the second floor, elevators were a no go after the free fall he took at Starcourt, and taking a visitor sticker and a bunch of papers from the woman at the reception desk.

He’s walked this route more times than he can count, but this time he can feel that something is wrong, different. On the top of the very first sheet the desk lady hands him, in bold black letters, are the printed words “Right-to-Die” and Steve already knows what is coming.

The woman gives him a half sympathetic look and reads off her scripted spiel. “The Hargrove boy has been unresponsive for six months now, with no signs of improvement in his condition. The recently instituted hospital ethics board wants you to seriously consider the contents of these forms.”

The words are so hollow, the look on her face mostly bored. Steve guesses this same speech was probably given to a thousand other people who’d come through this hospital, and it makes him feel nauseated just listening to it, her less than genuine pity as she reads off her clipboard, making it seem like she doesn’t even care what she is asking of him.

“It’s of course among your rights as representative to say no, but we want to remind you that he has no quality of life being artificially kept alive, and it might be best to let him go.”

“No, they told me he couldn’t feel anything. He’s not suffering.” Steve insists, and as much as he believes that he is right, the confidence in his voice is false. This was something he’d been thinking about every day for the last half a year. “You’ve kept him alive this long, right? That’s got to mean something.”

“Still, this is about him. We just want you to think about if keeping him alive is the right thing to do anymore when we can’t be sure what he’s going through. When he isn’t himself.”

Of course this was something he’d considered in his own mind, six months is a long time, and it was inevitable that a few times on his worst days, he’d have to think about pulling the plug. It was just so different hearing this nurse who didn’t know Billy insisting on it, it was just so impersonal, and it made him think about the hospital's greed, and how they probably just wanted to save money on ventilators and open up another bed.

Without saying another word to her, Steve walks away without the clipboard of papers, and off to room B-216. Of course he'd known this was coming. They’d been trying to drop hints since the moment Billy stopped being able to breathe on his own, but he’d been in denial. As long as Billy's heart was still beating, Steve had hope that he would recover if the doctors would just try.

Still, as he sits down in the chair next to Billy’s bed, he decides he doesn’t want to call Max today. He takes the desk woman's advice, as angry as it made him, and takes the time to truly reflect on the boy in that bed, with the feeding tube down his throat, the respirator breathing for him beside his bed, the IV in his neck, there because the veins in his arms had been so overused.

His hair is much longer now, just past his collarbones, but without maintenance, his blonde curls are knotted and dull. His skin is unnaturally pale, his freckles faded to nothing, and his whole body is littered with angry, dark red scars. The hole in the center of his chest still isn’t all the way healed, and the nurses are constantly fighting to keep it free of infection.

When he wakes up, they say he will be in immense pain and that he will have forgotten how to walk and talk and probably even breathe on his own. There was a chance too that his memory will have gaps in it, which could mean anything from forgetting what happened to him in July, to not even knowing his own name.

Basically if, no- when he wakes up, he won’t really be Billy.

Steve had always heard about and seen in the movies coma patients who twitch their fingers or moved their eyes, or who really give any signs of life, miraculously waking up and being themselves again, but Billy, he had only done the opposite.

At some point, he has to accept that Billy won’t be like one of those other patients, and, in the condition he is in, all pale skin and open wounds and zero signs of responsiveness, they were only prolonging his death. They had tried just about everything they could thanks to Steve’s willingness to cover the expenses, and, although he didn’t want to believe it, maybe just couldn’t accept it quite yet, it was, as the nurse had said, time to think about letting Billy go.

Not today though. He’d spend today with him at the very least, trying to push those thoughts to the back of his mind while he still could. The nurses used to say, when Billy had first been admitted and they still thought there was a chance of recovery, that Steve and Max, whenever she could come, should try talking to him, and Steve always did.

He never really has a whole lot to say, not since everything has been calming down recently. There were no more funerals to attend, no more grieving families to take a hot dish and his condolences to. The kids didn’t need him to watch them anymore, and Family Video had decided to lay him off until he didn’t have to make daily hospital commutes and he could work again. Basically, Steve’s entire world was Billy.

So it was only fair that Billy was what he usually talked about, reminiscing about everything they’d gotten to do together before the accident, telling him about what was happening with his sister now that she was getting older, and giving him updates on how many days it had been and how much he missed and loved him. One of the nurses had heard him say that once, seen him lean forwards and press a kiss to Billys forehead, but she had only turned away, pretending she hadn’t noticed.

Today though, it was much harder than usual to think of something to say to him. He always tried to leave all of the bad stuff at the door, didn’t think it would do Billy any good if he could even hear, to be listening to him always complaining or moping about their situation, but with death weighing heavy on his mind, what else was there to think about?

The anger and the remorse and the depression would be for when he went home tonight and downed a whole bottle of Fireball, Billy’s favorite whiskey, and called Robin drunk off his ass at two in the morning to tell her about how terrible he felt.

It was because he loved Billy with all of his heart that he wouldn’t put him through that. Even if it hurt more than anything else to see his love broken down and dying, which was, in Steve’s opinion, the worst thing that had ever happened to him, he always wore a smile on his face every day he walked into that hospital room.

As hard as that was, and as guilty as it made him feel to admit, Billy's sickness wasn’t the only thing making Steve miserable. He had also been through some unimaginable things himself while trapped in the Starcourt mall, and he didn't come out the other side the same.

Nightmares plagued him constantly, so that when he would eventually come back home from the hospital, he didn’t sleep more than fifteen minutes through the night. Being alone for too long warped his perception of reality, made him think everyone he knew and loved was gone, that he’d been abandoned or all his friends killed. He would constantly call to check on them, most of the time drunk and panicking, but they’d stopped picking up after the first few times. There were so many triggers too that could send him back to that night in an instant, where he’d just get stuck again.

And perhaps that is exactly why he can’t let Billy go so easily, because even if it is heartbreaking and makes him feel so empty inside being there with a version of his Billy who couldn’t speak to him or who he couldn’t hold, he was still alive. If he died now, Steve would have nothing. It would be no different from the losses everyone had suffered, the death of the chief of police and at least thirty other community members robbing them of their soundness of mind.

Letting go of Billy would just be another blow, to him and to the tight-knit community who had come so close together after the accident that rocked their little town. You wouldn't be able to tell from the fact that his room was always empty except for Steve or his sister, but the papers had revered him as a hero. Who he’d become after being hospitalized meant his death wouldn't just affect loved ones.

But more than any of that, he just didn’t want to give up on him. Pulling the plug meant sacrificing so many more moments they could have together, losing the chance to move on from what had happened. How could Steve ever know when it was the right time to do that?

When was it safe to say that Billy wouldn’t ever recover, and that they were just stretching out the inevitable? When could he feel right in letting his very best friend and the love of his life die? Deep down, past his initial reaction of shock and heartbreak, he knows he’ll never truly be ready to say goodbye, but that now was that time regardless.

Just like the nurses said, he wasn’t really Billy anymore. Who he’d been was a teenage boy with too much energy to burn, always getting into trouble and always in motion, bouncing his knee, twisting the ring on his middle finger or the locket around his neck, chain smoking cigarette after cigarette. It used to drive Steve insane how he wouldn’t sit still for anything, but now he would give anything just to have that back.

There was no personality left in him, no stupid jokes to cheer Steve up, no pestering his sister and her friends like a big brother does, nothing left in him at all that made him distinctly Billy. Steve wondered if maybe he had already given up.

If maybe, Billy wasn’t even in there at all anymore, and they were holding on to nothing just to feed their own selfishness. Steve wasn’t the most emotional of people, usually panicking before he got upset, but he could feel tears pricking at his eyes now, as he watched the slow rise and fall of Billy’s, or not Billy’s, chest, and listened to the beeps and hums of the machines that kept him going.

He knew what needed to be done. Just not today.

For now, he holds Billy's hand, unmoving and just warm enough that he could tell he was alive, and whispered to him anything that came to his mind.

If Billy could hear him, he knew he was probably tired of hearing the same stories over and over, thinking of Billy waking up and complaining about Steve being too boring made him chuckle to himself. An instant pang of regret tightens his chest, feeling guilty for being happy.

There was a really sweet nurse about the age of his mother who always checked in on him at the same time everyday, like he was the one with tubes and machines sticking out of his body. Her name was Dale, and she always peeked her head into the room around meal times to ask if he had been down to the cafeteria yet. Usually he hadn’t, and sometimes he still forgot to eat anyways, but it meant a lot to him.

Today though, she came all the way in the room, a sad look on her face, and he had to avoid her gaze entirely to keep himself from breaking down, choosing instead to focus on Billy’s slender fingers where he’d laced them through his own.

“Steve, honey, I know this is really hard for you, it’s hard for all of us when something like this happens, but you need to take care of yourself.” She was just being kind, but he wouldn’t hear it.

If this was going to be the last full day he’d ever spend with Billy, he was going to make it count. A soggy sandwich in the dingy old cafeteria wasn’t worth spending a single moment away from the other boy's bedside. He feels vaguely guilty about it, but he ignores the well meaning nurse, even as she says her generic condolences that all of them were trained to say.

He smooths out Billy's hair, brushing the part that always hung in his eyes to the side carefully, something Billy himself had always seemed to do when he was nervous. It reminds him of the time they tried to do each other's hair and Billy taught him how to make a braid, so he tells Billy about it.

When he hears the distant roar of a car's engine from the open window, it reminds him of the first time Billy drove him home in the now totaled beyond recognition Camaro, so he talks about that. A bird landing on the windowsill reminds him of sitting on Billy’s bed and talking about the seagulls and the beaches back in California where Billy had grown up, so he tells Billy that story too. The phone ringing at the receptionist's desk down the hallway reminds him of the time Billy had called him in the middle of the night to invite him out to the quarry, where they’d kissed for the first time and Steve clumsily asked him to make things official, so again, he told Billy all about it.

It's mostly a comfort to himself, keeping his mind off of the reality of the situation, but then the desk lady announces over the overhead system that visiting hours are over, and it’s time for him to go.

They had been giving him a lot of leeway here at Hawkins General, allowing him to visit every single day and sometimes with a 14 year old, which was strictly against the rules of the ICU. The end of visiting hours was a rule they always stood by though, and despite how much it crushed him to leave Billy by himself overnight, he always did it.

On his way out, he grabbed the stack of papers the receptionist tried to give him off of her desk. He would call Susan in the morning and ask her what she thought. He would try to involve her in the choice, since she’d technically claimed Billy as her dependent after her marriage to his father, who had given enough verbal and written agreements that he wanted nothing at all to do with his son while he was hospitalized that his wife could, and had, stepped in.

He went home that night with the thought in his head that this was the last time he’d do this, and by this time tomorrow, Billy would be dead.

#harringrove big bang 2021 #harringrove #steve harrington #billy hargrove #billy x steve #ej writer #story by ej!#so excited to start sharing!#chapter two will be on tumblr later today!#it’s up on ao3 already if you wanna get ahead!

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medusinestories · 3 years ago

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Black Sails, IV (S1, ep 04)

- Silver's horrified face when he finds out he's going to have to roast pigs is a Journey, starting with shock, then fake smiling, and then this horrified shuddery expression. It's just as interesting when they drop the dead pig at his feet and he clearly doesn't know what to do with it and also finds it disgusting. I can absolutely see where all the Jewish John Silver headcanons come from, especially since it's unlikely that a London urchin has never seen a dead pig and raw meat in general before.

- Here we have the first performance of Cassandra DeGroot: he knows that the bay they'd chosen to do the careening was too dangerous, and warns the crew. He's immediately countered by Flint, who has much more persuasive arguments to get the careening done fast but in a risky manner. (this whole thing reminds me of our current COVID/climate situation, where scientists get talked over by politicians, and people prefer listening to the latter because they seem to offer much better prospects than the “catastrophist” former)

- In this episode Billy is now quartermaster and he shows himself to actually be really good at disciplining the crew, something Gates, DeGroot and even Flint recognise. However, he also agreed to do the careening only because he's afraid to say no to Flint and allowed the men to have a fuck tent, which he feared would distract them - and it did, the two men who placed the rope on the wrong tree decided not to follow his orders and go fuck instead. This all weighs on him enormously after the disaster with Randall and Morley, who accuses him minutes before his death of already being in Flint's pocket. It's pretty clear that more responsibility doesn't do Billy's mental state any good.

- Morley's story about the Maria Aleyne gives some idea of a timeline, albeit a faint one. The incident took place "a number of years back", before Billy joined. This means that Billy is a somewhat new addition to the crew. We know that Randall was bosun when Billy joined. This also establishes that Lord Hamilton has been dead for several years, which now begs the question: who is the Lord Proprietor that Richard Guthrie is now in touch with? Did Thomas have a younger brother who inherited the Bahamas? Was someone new appointed? Was there a gap between Proprietors that allowed the pirates to establish themselves even more after Lord Alfred's death?

- I just adore the fact that Miranda actually went to stinking, violent Nassau because she was just too impatient to wait at home and wanted to be there when the Walrus came in and immediately hear the news of Lord Alfred's death. She is that vengeful and angry and I love her <3

- Speaking of which, this episode gives us the Passive-Agressive Sex Scene which makes so many people doubt of Flint's attraction to Miranda. Just look at Flint’s face: this man isn't uncomfortable or sad he is PISSED. He plays starfish and glares at Miranda all through it (while maintaining an erection all the same!). Miranda must be hella frustrated (or determined) because she manages to get off in spite of all of this (also, how uncommon is it for a sex scene to end when the woman climaxes rather than the man?) It's only when it ends that both Flint and Miranda are both shown as vulnerable and sad and reflective, with Flint reaching up to touch her but not quite getting there - imo because he's still angry but knows that she (and he) needs comfort.

- This leads into the argument over Meditations, and Miranda explicitly talking about Thomas and not wanting to forget him. The book hasn't been touched in a long time, confirming the idea that Miranda shared it with Richard Guthrie because Flint refuses to touch it. Her grief, her loneliness, are incredibly poignant in this scene, and we see Flint shift from bristling and stonily glaring at her, to absolutely melting (Toby's facial expression shifts here are just *chef's kiss*) and finally being gentle and tender with her. However, even though he promises to make things better, Miranda clearly doesn't believe him anymore.

- This brings in a big theme in the episode: betrayal from people you care for/trust. Mr Scott asks Eleanor not to do anything rash in order to get the Andromache’s guns, only to discover her Plan B: to kill Bryson if he didn't comply. In the meantime, Richard Guthrie tells (a very sceptical) Miranda that he can only support Eleanor and Flint, because he pretty much has no choice in the matter. He then proceeds to betray his daughter by making a deal with Bryson and with Mr Scott, who’s still smarting from Eleanor’s betrayal and who Guthrie tries to convince by saying that Eleanor's endeavour will lead to her death and Nassau’s destruction (considering what we later find out about Mr Scott, Eleanor’s safety is probably not be the argument that actually compels Mr Scott - but he certainly doesn't want the Navy searching the area and finding Maroon Island, and needs a stable Nassau to continue supplying his island).

- The Undercooked Pig scene and Silver's attempts at communicating with Flint will never not be funny. Silver looks so small when Flint glares him down, but that doesn't last all that long: once Flint has taught him how to cook the pork, Silver seems much more bold, asking Flint how he learned to glaze the pig, insisting that Flint should trust him and not Billy. This is also a moment where Silver shows that, unlike Flint, he is incredibly perceptive: he noticed that Billy is "straining at the seams" because of the lie he told. And while Flint spits a "there is no we" and calls Silver a rodent, it's obvious that Silver's words still have an impact on him. Their collaboration is sealed when Silver hands him the cleaver so that he can save Randall (and himself). When Flint returns the cleaver to Silver, he's ready to accept that Silver is actually on his side (albeit for selfish reasons) and listens to him for the first time.

- Max believed that she could charm Vane's remaining crew into being kind to her - and overall it seems to have worked. While again I hate this plot, it does give an interesting insight into how even the worst pirate crew is portrayed: most of the men are happy to comply with Max and get sexual rewards "for gentle obedience". Most of them, basically, aren't violent monsters deep down. However there's always one, in this case That Big Bastard (I'm sure he has a name, I just can't be bothered to google it), who clearly gets a kick out of torturing/raping people and hates the idea of a woman taking the lead.

- Fuck You Jack is another theme of this episode. Vane is high on opium and booze and has basically lost the will to do anything. Anne has been courted by several other crews, but Jack hasn't received any offers (note there's no loyalty to Vane here, Jack’s ready to leave, but nobody will have him) and nobody is willing to help him after the pearl cock-up. Then Noonan wants Max back, which Jack refuses because she's the only thing keeping the few members of his crew loyal - and Anne isn't on board with that, leading to her telling him to fuck himself. This, btw, might have crossed Jack’s mind considering the position she was in when he found her. I think it’s easy to forget that Jack is portrayed as pretty callous and happily willing to treat people like pawns too.

- When Richard Guthrie talks about Nassau, he describes it as a place "a place where she [Eleanor] matters, a place where you [Mr Scott] matter", and adds that a place like this isn't meant to last. Nassau, then, is currently an utopia where women and black people can have some semblance of power - and he doesn't believe that this will ever be allowed to exist because this kind of story never has a happy ending in their current society. But when Flint talks to Eleanor about their project, he's of the opposite view: people don't believe that it's possible, but when they succeed, they'll say it was inevitable. It seems Flint is firmly in the camp of "winners get to tell the story", and that the story will influence how the rest of the world sees them.

- When the Walrus tilts and squashes Randall, Flint stops Billy from intervening and rushes to rescue Randall himself - even though he knows the ship will be cut loose at any moment. He puts himself into incredible danger in this moment. Why? Theoretically, it could be for a manipulative purpose: to look good to the crew, or to get rid of Morley. But Flint seems genuinely involved in the struggle to save Randall, and he barely had time to think before he ran off. I feel that this is a rare spontaneous moment for Flint, where instead of thinking about his plans or his position as Captain, he just thinks like a person in an emergency who wants to rescue someone else. He absolutely could have died out there. And while Billy seems to suspect him of having killed Morley, I don't find that reading compatible with what we're shown of Flint trying to save Randall. True, he may have kicked/pushed Morley at the very last second, but we’ll never know that for sure.

- Back to the theme of people betraying their loved ones, we have Richard Guthrie getting back to Miranda, telling her he knows who she is and revealing the "Thomas went mad because Miranda and Flint cheated" story which he heard from Lord Alfred himself. So now Miranda knows that her identity has been revealed and that Richard could spread the story to, say, Pastor Lambrick (let's not pretend this didn't cross her mind, she keeps her identity secret for a reason). And then Guthrie offers her a way back to civilisation. This, right after a kid threw a stone at her, calling her a witch. This, after Flint has promised to make things better, even as he goes deeper into reckless/utopian plans of fortifying Nassau. Backed into a corner, was Miranda ever going to refuse, if she could be safe and have him be safe? And obviously, Richard Guthrie isn't doing this out of the kindness of his heart. He apparently figured out that Miranda was a way to get in touch with Pastor Lambrick and that ridding New Providence of Flint and winning over the “good”, normal inhabitants would be a perfect beginning to buying back his influence on the Island - the end goal being named Governor, of course.

- If there was any doubt that Vane’s tough guy thing is part of an act, his opium hallucination of Eleanor makes it crystal clear: "you're alone, you don't have to pretend with me". That is, pretend that he's not afraid and that he's not vulnerable. The hallucination also offers Vane an explanation for why Eleanor is how she is: like him she's afraid of appearing weak. He's actually spot on, a big problem in their relationship is that they're too alike and are struggling for dominance. Which is probably why Vane wants to overcome his fear and weakness, and regain power by confronting his old slave master (btw, nice parallel with Flint haunted by Miranda in S3). The scene where Vane kills Noonan also shows him in a very animalistic light - at first he's cornered and somewhat pathetic, beaten, throwing up, only saved by the fact that a gun misfires. Then he turns violent: quick, instinctive and relentless, deaf to Noonan's plea to leave him alive, even if theoretically it could have been profitable for him.

- I have to say, I snickered quite a bit when Pastor Lambrick sees Richard Guthrie and tells him "God teaches us not to cheer when someone stumbles, in your case I may ask his forgiveness". I mean, I really see his point. He leads a group of Puritans who are trying to make a life for themselves on this island. Historically, people who lived and farmed in New Providence were constant targets for errant pirates, who robbed, raped and killed a lot of them. This is what the Pastor is trying to protect his congregation from (and Miranda, since he doesn't understand why she's with Flint and is likely terrified that a pirate lives so close to his congregation, hence the spies he sends out). There's a bit of a parallel with Billy, where both Lambrick and Billy are presented as being very preoccupied with the well-being of the group they're responsible for, and both are presented as, well, Goody-Two-Shoes - (self-)righteous, loyal, honest, caring. Except they're both human, and sooner or later they falter.

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anntoldst0ries · 4 years ago

Text

Everything else is just the weather

Book: Open Heart Pairing: Dr Ethan Ramsey x F!MC (Dr Noelle Valentine) Word Count: ~5.3k (I sinned!) Summary: Ethan takes Elle out on their “first” date. Category: Fluff Warnings: None

A/N: It has literally taken me ages to finish this fic. To the point that I couldn’t look at it anymore, but here it is. I had it in mind for a really long time and now that OH is back, I feel like I’m ready to show it to the world. As always thank you for your support and I hope you like it!

This fic is part 2 of birthday present for my friend, part 1 is the fan art which you can see here. Once you read the fic, the fan art makes more sense :)

This is my submission for CFWC Silly Love Stories, Day 12: Date night.

Loud knocks resonated throughout the room.

"Come in!"

"Good morning, Mrs. Peterson.”

“Good morning, Dr Valentine. I think you are the only doctor in this hospital with some sort of manners, everyone else just waltzes in here as if it was a damn barn!”

“Hospital or no hospital, everyone has their right to privacy.”

“Thank you, child. Once again, please call me Faye."

"Alright Faye, but only if you call me Elle.” She smiled sweetly, and the whole room seemed to be suddenly lit by a thousand suns.

“How are you feeling? Are the meds making a difference?"

"They are. I am ready to be discharged today.”

"Not so fast. I am not ready to say goodbye to you yet."

“Why would you possibly like to be lumbered with an old nuisance like me for even a second longer than necessary?”

Elle just laughed and shook her head. The ‘nuisance’, as the elderly lady so lovingly put it, was exactly what she loved about her job. She loved spending time with her patients, she loved their stories and their worldly wisdom. It made her sad to see how many of them thought they didn’t matter or considered themselves and their lives boring. To her, they were anything but.

Many of Edenbrook’s staff members kept asking themselves: what is it about her? She was a great doctor, no two ways about it, and she was a genuinely nice person. But what was the source of power she had over people? If she woke up one day and decided to start a rebellion, patients would have most certainly followed her, even if it meant they’d be leaving the premises of the hospital with naked butts or trailing their IVs behind them. Doctors, nurses, administration, cleaners and security would follow shortly. She only had to say a word.

And how on Earth was she capable of turning Dr Ramsey, the grizzly bear of Edenbrook, into a benign teddy bear with as little as one look? It was beyond everyone’s apprehension.

Had they spent more time actually observing her, rather than gossiping in the corners, the answer would have unveiled in front of them within minutes.

It was very simple.

Noelle was truly curious about people. She genuinely liked them and was determined to get to know their story, for it helped her diagnose them faster and also satiated the young doctor’s hunger for knowledge.

Patients never felt like “curious cases” or “numbers” in her presence. They were… themselves - people with hopes, dreams, fears, pet peeves and odd habits. They were human.

So little and yet so much.

Those never touched by serious illnesses often failed to understand that sickness strips you of your dignity and becomes your identity. Your true self becomes covered by this weird, annoying sticker that wouldn’t come off no matter how hard you tried to remove it.

But this young woman, despite the nature of her profession, somehow managed to notice what was hiding beneath this misleading layer.

Had all these gossipers spoken to her patients, that’s exactly what they would have heard.

"What's happening today?" The older lady asked with a flick of curiosity in her wrinkle-haloed eyes.

"What do you mean, Faye?" The young doctor sounded genuinely baffled by the out-of-the-blue question.

"Well, I am no diagnostician, but I believe I am rather observant and you radiate with happiness. Something special is happening today, am I right?"

"Yeah, you are right." Elle blushed like a teenager caught in a lie. "My boyfriend is taking me on a surprise date today, but he won’t say a word about it, so I'm super excited to find out what he planned for us. He usually isn't one for romantic gestures, so the secrecy is killing me."

"Do you think he's gonna pop the big question?" Faye’s eyes lit up with excitement.

"No, we're not there...yet." Elle faked a smile, but a tone of doubt and sadness coloured her voice. They probably never will be, those things weren’t in the cards for Ethan, as he already stressed once.

But once was enough and she didn’t dare mention the subject again.

"Well, I'm pretty sure he's got some big guns in store, I would if I had a lady like you." - a male patient lying in the bed adjacent to Elle’s patient added smiling flirtatiously.

"Jerry, you were supposed to focus on getting better, not stealing my girlfriend." They all jumped when a deep baritone echoed throughout the room, hitting present company like a wrecking ball. She must have left the door ajar or Ethan could penetrate the walls soundlessly, because no one heard him coming.

Exactly how long has he been standing there for and how much did he hear?

"Dr. Ramsey, flirting makes your blood flow faster. Isn't it the very definition of life itself?” Jerry’s tone was brisk and lively.

"Well, it definitely isn't the definition of recovery after a heart attack." Ethan used his authoritative doctor’s voice but knew this wasn't a battle he was going to win. Jerry had something he didn't: a couple more decades of life experience under his belt and even the best medical school in the country couldn’t compete with this.

"Besides, Dr. Ramsey, I don't think that the beautiful Dr. Valentine here fancies old farts like me."

"That's where you are wrong, Jerry, looks like this is exactly the type I fancy." The two women laughed, however Ethan was far from amused. "Dr. Ramsey is 10 years older than me."

"10 years? What is 10 years in these times? Nothing. When I was getting married 40 years ago, it was something. But today? Look at all them playboys with girls younger than my granddaughter. 10 years is actually a very healthy difference. Men are immature and slower with growing up emotionally. So I'd say you've caught up, Dr. Ramsey, and the two of you are emotional peers now.”

“Thank you for the fascinating lesson in human psychology, Jerry. To think I’ve wasted all this time and money on medical school and no one taught me this.”

“Dr. Ramsey, it’s because schools and useful knowledge are mutually exclusive.”

Elle and Faye were on the verge of bursting out in laughter, but managed to keep their composure and used the non-verbal communication of exchanging glances instead.

Once they made sure their patients had everything they need, Ethan and Elle wished them a good day and promised to stop by in 2 days, as the following day was their day off.

The moment the door closed behind them, Ethan crossed his arms on his chest.

"I lose you from my sight for one second and this happens. 5 more minutes with Jerry and I'd be single again."

"At least no one wants to poke your eyes out for being with me."

"And someone wants to poke yours?"

"Where do I start... nurses, who had a crush on you long before I even set foot in Edenbrook? Female interns? Anyone, who has a pair of functioning eyes and ever looked at you?"

She was adorable when she was doing this, her whole body overtaken by excitement and her hands waving. When she was talking about something really important to her she wasn't just conversing with her mouth, she was doing it with her whole body.

Suddenly, his pager painfully reminded Ethan that this was neither the place nor the time to lose himself in adoration.

"I need to go, I'm completely swamped today and I have my favourite cherry-on-top board meeting. In case I don't see you for the rest of your shift - I’ll pick you up at 7."

He was gone before she was able to form a response. Was it just her or was Dr Ramsey weirdly… nervous?

* * * * * * * *

At 7pm sharp, Ethan Ramsey curled his palm in a fist and gently knocked. The door opened in an instant, as if someone knew he'd been standing there for the past few minutes.

"Ethan! I mean Dr. Ramsey...please come in!" Sienna squeaked with nervous excitement as she let him in.

"Outside of Edenbrook Ethan is just fine, Sienna. If you don't mind me calling you by your first name, of course."

"Mm..mme? No, yes, I mean... Elle is on the balcony." She tried to hide her embarrassment and motioned towards the tall windows surrounding the living room. Some time ago, he would have been oddly proud to have such an intimidating effect on people - nowadays, more than anything, he was amused. Has he really changed so much?

The answer to his question was leaning against the railing, glass of wine in her hand. Gauzy, flowery dress enveloped her frame and tanned skin.

For Ethan, it was as clear as crystal: summer had the face and scent of Noelle Valentine.

Long before she started leaving her toothbrush in his apartment and sleeping in his old JH t-shirts, Ethan noticed that whenever he laid eyes on her, his whole body started acting in a very irrational way. His doctor’s instincts prompted him to think of all types of biological causes and chemical reactions in the brain. Then, when he sort of admitted to himself it’s not just pure science, Ethan leaned towards the forbidden fruit theory - the more he couldn’t have his drug, the more he was craving it.

But the feeling never disappeared. Whenever he wouldn’t see her for a while - be that an hour, a day, or just when she went to take a shower or make a coffee - the very moment her face came into his view again, he felt his stomach somersaulting.

Every. Single. Time.

It wasn’t any different now.

"Drinking without me?"

She almost dropped the glass when his voice stopped the train of thought in her head. But then she saw his face, the way too seldom relaxed muscles and a barely-there smile.

A perfectly tailored shirt clung to his torso marvellously. If not in medicine, he surely would have made a name for himself in the fashion industry. Fortunately for her, the idea never crossed his mind.

The warm wind blew in her face, carrying the scent of expensive cologne which overwhelmed her nostrils. She didn’t know this one, so it must have been new. But she did know that smelling it for the whole evening while staring at his handsome face will be a pure torture.

Simply put, she was a goner.

"I don't know why, but I was quite nervous. Had to summon the courage somehow.”

“As you should be. After all, it's not every day that one goes on their first date."

She looked at him as if she’d just been told that a UFO landed on the roof.

“On a what?”

"Well, I was thinking a lot lately about how we never had a first date. Nothing was ever...typical with us. I promised myself I will do my best to fix things that caused you pain or deprived you of the things you deserved. Maybe I cannot fix some immediately, but this one I can, so I will."

Her eyes, overbrimming with affection struck him like thousand lightnings. Thank god a comfortable silence fell between them - had she asked him a question, it would have been clear that right now he is nothing but a simpering moron.

With this in mind, he took his hands from behind his back, holding a small bouquet of pink gerberas.

"These are my favourites." Her face instantly illuminated at the well known sight and smell. "How did you know?”

"I had some amazing helpers."

Elle instantly turned her head left and looked inside, where grinning, Sienna was showing her the thumbs up.

"Wow, now I actually wish I'd downed the whole bottle."

"I'm glad you didn't. I want to go on a date with a woman, not her lifeless body, even though the body itself is very appealing. Shall we?”

“King of compliments…”

* * * * * * * *

"You actually look like you are having a good time, Dr Ramsey.”

"Why wouldn't I? There is alcohol, sitting under the sky definitely has its charm and the company is acceptable." She playfully swatted his arm, the gesture a quick reminder of how comfortable they felt with each other, something he constantly remembered to never take for granted.

“Although I love this, I still don’t understand why you dragged me all the way outside Boston, I’m pretty sure the rooftop bars are pretty acceptable there, too. A bit more crowded though, that’s for sure.”

“Are you complaining about the fact that we have this entire place to ourselves? I know the owner and he was indebted to me.”

“Of course he was.” Looks like the whole town is indebted to Ethan freakin’ Ramsey.

“With regards to why I brought you here… you’ll just have to wait and see.”

Gosh. She couldn’t decide whether the mysterious side of Ethan Ramsey was hot as hell or annoying as hell. But she didn’t really have time to contemplate, because her companion asked her a question.

“Why did you become a doctor?” The ocean eyes pierced her to the core and she had a feeling that even if she was the best actress in the world, there was no way she’d be able to hide something from this man.

“That’s a terrible change of subject. Also, I must have told you like a million times already.”

“No, you never told me.”

When she looked at him and really, really thought about it… she suddenly realised Ethan was right. Elle told the story so many times she sort of… assumed she told Ethan, too.

“Are you sure you want to hear it today? It’s a pretty sad story, a mood killer I’d say.”

“It’s what makes you you, so yes, I want to hear all about it - the good, the bad and the indifferent.”

“I’ll tell you, but I need to ask something first. Why now? We’ve known each other for a while and you just… I just sort of assumed this isn’t the type of conversation you’d like to hold.”

“You’ve hit the nail on the head.” Ethan’s expression was gentle, not a hint of irony in his voice. “I’ve known you for a while now, but there are still so many things about you that I don’t know. At first, I didn’t want to ask, because asking these questions meant admitting that there is something more between us. What a fail would that be, after I’ve mastered the art of denial.” He laughed, but it wasn’t a bitter or a nervous laugh, it was a genuine banter between them, as the British half of her soul liked to call it. “But you made me want to dig deeper.”

Was it the heat that made her catch her breath, or did it have nothing to do with the temperature?

“Plus, this is sort of what first dates are for, right? I’m sorry for skipping right to the more complex questions. It’s not that I don’t want to know what you were afraid of as a child, I want to know all the details… but it feels like the atmosphere calls for something…bigger.”

So she told him all about her friend, how she fell ill, how she couldn’t be saved and how the experience wreaked havoc on her whole life, tears glistening in her eyes at the mere memory of the events that shaped who she was today.

Ethan listened, his whole body tense and eyes transfixed. She was giving him one of the most fragile parts of her and he had to make sure his hands were there to catch, carry and care for this treasure.

“And that’s when I realised that if I focused on becoming the best doctor I could be, then maybe one day, I’d be that person who has an answer, who can solve a mystery and save a relationship that means the world to someone. Sometimes, people don’t realise that when a person dies, it’s not only them that’s gone. The part of someone who stays, who has to deal with the whole ‘me after you’ - that part is gone, too. So for me, in a way, this meant saving more than one life.”

For a couple of seconds he didn’t move. Then, without saying a single word and with an unreadable expression he got up and offered her a hand, which she silently accepted. He led her to the railing, where the sun was slowly sinking into the boundless waters of Quincy Bay.

His lips found the all too well known way to her forehead, placing a loving kiss on her delicate skin.

“I am so proud of you.” There was something so mesmerising in his whisper, sending a shiver down her spine.

“As a mentor or as a boyfriend?”

“Both. I want you to know that your dedication to people who rely on you is astounding and hardly present in doctors your age. Or any age, for that matter.”

“Wow, Dr Ramsey, smooth. Trying to hit on me with a recycled pick-up line used on a national TV? No wonder you didn’t have too many girlfriends.”

“No, I didn’t. But I believe everyone has a limit of luck they can get per life. And looking at you, I got a couple of lifetimes worth of luck.”

This was enough to render her speechless. She smiled and at this very moment he knew he would do anything to make her smile like this. She wrapped him around her pinky finger and suddenly his whole existence revolved around finding ways of seeing her curve these breathtaking lips as often as possible and making sure he is the reason she smiles… not crying her eyes out.

Although the other didn’t know, because none of them said it out loud, they both thought the same thing.

This feels so right.

There isn’t a hint of awkwardness in the fact that they can go from being serious or emotionally vulnerable to funny and teasing in seconds.

In one effortless movement, Ethan spun her and pressed her back against his chest. Then, he started placing a series of tender kisses along her jawline and the crook of her neck, slowly moving towards her shoulder.

Come on, just say it Ramsey. It doesn’t get any better than this.

He wrapped her palm in his and pointed them towards the sky.

“There they are - the Little Dipper and the Big Dipper.” Their intertwined fingers were jumping from one tiny flashing point to the other, as if they were playing connect the dots. “And that’s Orion’s Belt.”

“I really don’t get why at this point I’m still surprised that you’re good at everything.”

Elle was drunk on his every word, as this annoying trait of Ethan Ramsey being the know-it-all was actually one of her favourite things about him.

As for Ethan, he couldn’t help but think that life wasn’t perfect and was never going to be. But this - this moment - it was in fact perfect. Why take chances of ruining it, when so many things can go wrong?

What if she doesn't say it back?

What if she's just gonna laugh at him or tell him he had it all wrong.

What if he misinterpreted everything and she never thought about him this way?

He was terrified of being this exposed. The last person he loved so much left him without batting an eyelid and disappeared for 25 fucking years.

Maybe it was better to live in a perfect illusion than a reality in which there was even a 0.01% chance she doesn't love him back.

So they both drowned in the moment, drifted in the sea of rapture, lost in the illusion that it can all last forever.

It was her who broke the silence.

“I’m getting a bit cold, is it ok if we call it a night?”

“Right, of course.”

“Thank you for the first date, I loved it.”

Handing her his jacket (her favourite, the dark green leather one) Ethan was furious at himself.

Maybe he was broken. Maybe he will remain broken forever. Maybe that’s the way it must be.

“Do you want to spend the night at mine?” The question slipped his tongue before he was able to fully reflect on it.

“At yours? Unless you have some secret place I don’t know about, just a quick reminder - I live there too.”

“Since this was our first date, I thought it was a gentlemanly thing to ask.”

“In that case… I am afraid I have the ‘after the 3rd date’ sleepover rule, Dr Ramsey.”

* * * * * * * *

The morning came all too soon and the hot, ruthless rays of the rising sun announced that Ethan is now way past his regular wake up and get up time. He barely slept, tossing and turning, replaying every second of the evening in his head.

His hand mindlessly reached for what he hoped to be the familiar curves and softness of the body he adored so much.

But his palm hit the mattress with a loud thud. The bed was empty.

The all-too-well known feeling of hopelessness slipped into the doctor's mind with ease. What did he expect? He was acting weird the previous day. First date, what a stupid idea. She must have realised something is wrong with him and finally left.

But before he was able to fully wallow in the mud of pity, the feeling was soon replaced by an old friend Ethan haven’t heard from for a long time.

Panic.

Where was she? Is she ok? What if something happened to her and he was just sleeping like a log instead of being there to protect her. He couldn’t stand the thought of losing her… again. Something grabbed his chest in a tight grip and wouldn’t let go.

Scenes flashed before his eyes, vivid and bright. Their hands touching through the glass wall. Her hand cupping his cheek through the layer of hazmat suit.

He got out of bed at the speed of sound and started running around the apartment, but she was nowhere to be seen.

Suddenly, he noticed.

The balcony door was opened wide.

Shit.

Heart in his mouth, Ethan crossed the distance between his kitchen island and the balcony door in the blink of an eye.

Elle was just serving pancakes outside. The goddamn pancakes. The only thing he couldn’t cook. The one thing she kept teasing him about and he rolled his eyes every time she did.

God, he promised himself he will never learn how to make them, if it meant she would just tease him forever.

She was smiling as widely as ever, putting the sun and everything else in the world to shame. Ethan was still a bit shaken and his uneven breathing gave him away. Elle finally noticed his presence.

“Good morning, I was just about to—“

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

They both froze.

The tension in the silence that had just set in was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

But the silence didn’t last long. As one man, with eyes full of disbelief, they both murmured simultaneously:

“What did you just say?”

This time, he felt obliged to break the silence.

"I...I...I mean, I…"

Damn it, get it together, idiot.

"I didn't mean to…”

Great, Ramsey, keep digging an even deeper hole for yourself, then crawl in and stay there forever.

"You didn't mean to say it?”

"Yes. No. I mean, damn it, I am making things worse, aren't I?”

She didn’t set him straight.

"The thing is, I wanted to say it yesterday. I had it all planned, I took you for a first date and I wanted to say it for the first time yesterday.”

"Why did it have to be yesterday?”

“Give me a minute.”

She just rolled her eyes, but Ethan didn’t have a chance to notice before disappearing inside. A few moments later he re-emerged, his face and torso covered by a neatly wrapped, rectangle-shaped object.

"What's this?"

"Something you should have unpacked yesterday, but then... life happened."

Elle sat down on cold tiles, her hands trembling with a mix of fear and excitement. And just like he did months ago, he took her hand in his, only this time he cupped his own cheek with her palm and placed the most tender kiss on the inside of her hand.

It was her favourite medicine, a remedy for all things wrong.

He sat beside her and nodded at the mysterious package. With impatience growing inside of her, Elle has torn the paper up.

Inside was a dark blue, framed print - the colour of it an instant reminder of her favourite set of irises.

She studied everything with intent. A circle must have been representing the earth and the irregular dots and lines must have been the stars and constellations.

"A map of the sky? That's beautiful, Ethan."

He knew immediately that although her delight was sincere, she had absolutely no clue what she was looking at and why she was looking at it.

“It's not just any map of the sky.” Ethan explained gently, hints of pride colouring his voice. “It's a map of the Boston sky from exactly a year ago. Well, a year and a day.” He smiled faintly, now a shade of sorrow in his enchanting voice.

Silence. Was she supposed to know what that meant?

“Aren’t you full of mysteries today? Ok, you need to throw me a lifebelt here. What's so special about the sky from a year and a day ago?”

“For the world? Probably not too much. For me? Everything.”

At this stage of their relationship, she knew a lot about Ethan’s behaviours, triggers, his body language. And not just a relationship as a couple, but also everything that came before Ethan became someone she was running through life with (the life of two doctors in one of the busiest and most prestigious hospitals was certainly not a walk in the park).

But it still fascinated her how his demeanour changed whenever the subject was serious, whenever he was talking about something that truly mattered to him. It was as if he’d stripped down of all the layers and let her look into his bare soul. These rare moments of vulnerable intimacy meant more to her than any night of passion they ever shared.

Her eyes turned to him in pledge, because as much as she wanted to, Dr Valentine still couldn’t fully comprehend the scene unraveling in front of her.

“Read the description below the map.”

Dear God, did she actually hear shyness in his voice?

She skimmed through the image again, and there it was, right at the bottom. Elle was so focused on trying to decipher the meaning of the image that she didn’t notice the words below.

The words which explained everything.

I WILL NEVER FORGET THE DAY

THAT MADE ME REALISE

YOU ARE THE SKY

EVERYTHING ELSE IS JUST THE WEATHER

Her emerald eyes brimmed with hot tears as the meaning dawned upon her. Words were very unnecessary, but now that he summoned the courage to speak, there was still a lot he wanted to put into words. He gently took the frame from her hands and leaned it securely against the wall.

Taking her palms into his, he placed delicate kisses on her knuckles, his lips tracing the shape of these two tiny hands, which held all of him. Everything he had, everything he was and was going to be, he placed in those two fragile palms, with an unspoken hope that they will hold him and catch him if he falls.

“Look at me.” The words were pulsing with care and affection, even though his voice coloured them in serious and desperate shades.

“One year ago… and a day from today…” He smiled and she felt the warmth spilling inside of her. The power he had over her was beyond the limits of understanding.

Little did she know that the object of her affection was lost in the same thought.

“I was standing exactly where we stand right now. It was dark and the view wasn’t that spectacular.” He freed one of his hands, but only to make contact with her cheek to caress it slowly. In this moment, he had to touch her any way that he could. With his hands. With his eyes. With his soul.

“But I always found comfort in staring at the sky. When I was at med school, I had countless moments of doubt, I wanted to quit more times than I can count. So I used to go to a secluded place at night and stare at the sky. It made me realise how, in one respect, I am just a grain of sand in the universe and how little my problems are. Funnily enough, this thought actually brought me a sense of comfort. If I am as little as I think I am, then what is the harm in being brave and taking chances? A wise man once said… There are some things that are worth any risk.”

She giggled through the tears, the sweet sound soothing his shattered nerves.

“I was standing right here and I never felt more miserable in my life. And I couldn’t understand why, for God’s sake. I was thriving at work. I had everything figured out and planned. I was pushing you to be the best you could be and I watched you turn into someone who would one day be far greater than me. But you looked so sad, so… broken. You already know I can’t just gloss over you feeling down. The sadder you were, the more miserable I felt. One evening, I was having a glass of scotch and I remembered some tiny exchange we’ve had earlier in the day, literally a chit chat. No idea what it was about. But I remembered your smile and your laugh. Every tiniest move of your muscles, your eyes, how your hair set around your face. It made me happy. Even if it was just for 5 minutes, knowing that you are happy in that very moment filled my chest with lightness. That’s when I realised I want to be the person who makes you feel this way.”

She blinked the first time in a while, as if she was afraid to make the tiniest movement, afraid it will all disappear and turn out to be a dream. Giant teardrops rolled down her angelic face, trailing the path of joy.

“Noelle Sky Valentine, I love you. I have loved you for a long time but I was too stubborn to let myself give in. And that, as you already know, will always be one of my biggest regrets.”

“Ethan, I don’t… I’m so sorry, I just don’t know what to say.” Her voice was saturated with emotions.

“I’d be lying if I said this wasn’t the reaction I was hoping for.“

“I love you too, Ethan Jonah Ramsey. You are by far the most complicated and stubborn person I have ever met. You are… everything I never knew I looked for in another human being.”

Once he heard her say it back, he couldn't get enough of it and a lifetime didn't feel like enough to tell her he loves her, as many times as he wished to.

“But I do have to mention this, Dr Ramsey… from the first date to a love confession in less than 24 hours? I’m sorry, I think this is moving too fast.”

“I’ll show you too fast…but I’m afraid we need to get inside, I don’t want the whole world and its wife to see how I teach you a thing or two.”

Ethan scooped her in his arms and carried her inside, despite her mock protests. He smiled and corrected himself.

He wanted for the whole world to see.

Because the whole world was right there.

In his arms.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

If you’ve gotten this far, I need you to know you are absolutely amazing 💗

Tag 🏷 list: @jamespotterthefirst @romewritingshop @romereadingshop @genevievemd @starrystarrytrouble @terrm9 @mrs-ramsey @maurine07 @gryffindordaughterofathena @mercury84choices @lovingramsey @qrkowna @openheartfanfics @choicesficwriterscreations @lisha1valecha @oldminniemcg @iemcpbchoices @tsrookie @fayeswiftie @levinsdowneyy @brooks-eden @poudredevie @queencarb @caseyvalentineramsey @lucy-268 @tenaciousdeputydreamfriend @alwaysmychoices-sideblog @whippedforethanfreakingramsey @schnitzelbutterfingers @the-pale-goddess @lem-20 @wingedhairstylemusicweasel @liaromancewriter @ohchoices @archxxronrookie

#ethan ramsey x mc #ethan x mc #dr ethan ramsey #play choices #open heart #open heart fic #cfwc silly love stories #choices fic writers creations #fics of the week #ethan ramsey

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heliosthegriffin · 3 years ago

Text

Jaune’s Big Breakout Pt 2

Part One

------

“Ack!” Jaune yelped as he halfway fell off his cot.

He had failed another attempt.

“So much for breakout number 30...”

He sighs and slides to the floor.

“This is getting depressing, I wondering how everyone else is doing?”

He frowns. “Nah, no use worrying about them, they’re probably better than ever without me there.”

“Why are you talking to yourself?”

“Ah!” Jaune jumps up and looks at the door, which had been cracked open, where a scraggly looking man leaned against the wall. Jaune could smell the booze on him from across the room.

“Ha, you gave me a heart-attack, who the heck are you?”

“You didn’t answer me question,”

“And neither did you, why are you in my cell?”

“You call this a cell? If it is, it’s much nicer than any other cell I’ve been in.” The scraggly alcoholic pulled up the only chair in the room, the one that was for the desk.

“Ok, my containment room I guess.”

“Well, anyway I’m the guy that dropped your butt in here, so lets see if that can turn the gears in that blonde box you call a head.”

Jaune frowns. “You’re trying to figure out why I’m trying to escape, aren’t you?”

The drunk smiles. “See, you didn’t need to be a genius to figure that out.”

Jaune climbs back on his padded cot, it was actually really comfy. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Why’s that?”

Jaune leans back on his bed looking at the ceiling, where the only window was, and the skylight, watching the blue sky. “You’d just think I’m crazy,”

The guy just sighs. “Fricken teens, man. You’re all so damn self-important, you know what? Whatever, you do you, kid. I’ve seen the feeds, you don’t have what it takes to escape Beacon.”

Jaune frowns. “Is that why you haven’t taken Crocea Mors? You think I’m too pathetic to be a threat?”

“Your words not mind kid, but, I’d also say that we couldn’t take the sword from you.”

“Huh?”

“Anyway, try to be a little less destructive in your attempt to leave, Goodwitch is getting prissy about having to do reconstruction.”

Jaune gave the man a smile. “Oh, it makes her mad, does it?”

“I don’t like that look on your face, way too sinister for a kid.” The drunk gave a smile in return. “But, yes. It does make a her day harder. Go buckwild, kid.”

The man turned to leave, opening the door.

“It gets lonely in here, talking to myself helps.”

The man paused. “I guess it would, names Qrow by the way.”

“Jaune Arc, you’re pretty alright for a guy who imprisoned me.”

“Don’t take it too hard, kid. I’m just trying to do right by me and mine. It’s not forever either, we just got to keep you out of the spotlight till after Vytal, after that we’re shipping you out, maybe home, maybe Atlas, maybe something different. You’re just a kid, so we’re going easy on you, so don’t worry about real prison or anything.... But, anyway here’s some advice from a veteran though, don’t make waves, the attention is not worth it.”

Jaune let out a sad laugh. “I think it’s a little late for that, the whole school, Haven, Shade, and Atlas all know. Everybody knows team JNPR’s leader is a fraud, and they’re laughing at me, and they’ll keeping laughing at me as long as I’m around.” He rest’s his head in his hands. “Ah man, I hope their doing alright, my team I mean, well my former team. I doubt they want anything to do with me, now.”

Qrow looked at Jaune from the hallway, gripping the door in a reverse grip, and shrugged. “That’s for them to decide, not you. I can’t imagine many people are allowed to visit you. Even I’m a special case.”

Jaune sad nothing and looked at the ground. “Why would they even consider wanting to see me?”

“Why not find them and ask if they want to?”

Jaune looked at Qrow. “I thought you said I’d never breakout of Beacon?”

The older man smirked at him. “I said out, I never said anything about this little tower or getting into the campus.”

A slight smile breaks across Jaune’s face. “I’m not trying to breakout of Beacon anyway, I’ve got somewhere I want to get to on Beacon soil.”

“Hmm, maybe.” Then the man closed the door.

Jaune got up and stretched, loosening up his body for his next escape attempt once his aura recovered in a couple minutes. Then focused his semblance, rapidly regenerating from any exhaustion and damage he’s taken.

His aura full, he sighed contently as a feeling like a warm, fuzzy blanket settled over him. “Lets do this, try 31.”

--------

Attempt Third-One, The third floor in front of the stairs.

Jaune had once again cleared out the first two floors of the drones and was sitting comfortably at the seventy-five percent mark, it was getting easier.

Hopefully it would be enough to defeat the tank on legs.

Jaune opened his shield and stared at the metal giant in the center of the room.

“Lets do this,”

< TARGET SIGHTED, SURRENDER OR BE EXPOSED TO MAXIMUM ALLOWED FORCE >

Jaune took a determined look at it and assumed a combat stance.

It’s singular eye glowed a blue-white and fired a lance of burning light at Jaune, who hastily raised his aura charged shield, which absorbed the light with burst of aura, the shield’s glow diminishing by at most half.

The two rocket launchers on the robots shoulders then pointed at Jaune and he got the message and started to run away as rocket exploded behind him, heat burning his calves and shrapnel cut at his aura on his back and legs, still it was better than enduring rockets to his arm and getting pinned.

He kept running till he heard a click as the last of the rocket were fired, or at least he assumed so.

Jaune made a sharp turn in his run to the robot, he wasn’t going to escape and let it be on his tail while he fought whatever dangers blocked the next floor, and held his shield high as another laser hit him.

The energy hit the shield and broke the aura coating on it, Jaune tsked and kept running forward, recharging the aura into the shield to give it extra oomph.

The robot seemed stunned at Jaune ran into it’s legs shield first and unleash a shock wave into it’s pillar like legs, only briefly though, before bringing an enormous fist down on Jaune, who was too jarred from the impact he delievered to dodge the blow.

The fist the size of a bucket hit him on the shoulders and knocked him to his knees hard enough to feel a buzz in his teeth and chest.

He snorted and tried to rise, pooling aura into his legs and arms, to push up against the mechanical menace. But the robot threw it’s other arm down on him, pushing him to the ground on his knees.

Then he gulps as he heard a mechanical whirring, and buzz coming from it’s head.

< INITIATING RELOAD >

It’s cyclopean eye then begin to glow as it’s shoulder rockets turned towards him.

His world became a explosion of light and fire for the second time today.

Attempt 31 failed.

Defeated by Mark IV Sentinel

#Jaune Arc #Jaune's Big Breakout

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upsteadhq · 4 years ago

Text

attempts

*same warning for the last two parts. this is whump and contains whumpy things, angst and blood*

masterlist series masterlist

Part Three

The more time went on, the more tired Jay could feel himself getting. The only thing keeping him awake was the previously fired gunshot still ringing in his head. He could still hear the echo of the bullet of leaving the chamber, of the body dropping to the ground and the ting that came after as the casing dropped on to the concrete.

It kept playing in his head as if it had just happened.

He was just praying the unconsciousness would take him under it’s wrath, maybe for good. He couldn’t go on without Hailey, there was no point.

In his delirious state the realization of the fact he couldn’t hear the shell casing hit the floor when the actual bullet rang out didn’t hit him until moments later. The first bullet had shot on the opposite side of the building, the other ones were getting closer. He swore they were getting closer.

But then all went quiet. No gunshots. No whispers. No footsteps. No, no, no. It was silent.

Jay tries moving, slowly starting to turn on to his shoulder so he could investigate the sudden silence but the stab coming from his abdomen stopped him, causing a pained groan to rise up the back of his throat and expel into the air. He allowed gravity to work and it took him on to his back and that’s when he assessed the damage done by the offender, seeing the large stain growing bigger by the second, now being able to feel the blood pooling out of the hole left by the bar.

He then catches the sound of footsteps coming toward the door again, which was now slightly pulled-to, and he braces himself for the next beat down, for the next set of punches and kicks.

He doesn’t even bother to open his eyes when he hears a voice calling his name, a familiar voice he knew in the back of his head.

“Jay? Jay?” The voice drew closer and then the person behind the voice calls over their shoulder. “Sarge! He’s in here!”

The sudden weight of hands against his abdomen brings another ached cough into the outside world, getting the voice’s attention again.

“Hey, Jay, look at me, you’re okay, we got you,” they say frantically and then in the corner of his eye Jay can see another figure appear in the doorway, this person looking down to him. The first voice then looks to the second. “We need another ambo here like five minutes ago, he’s dumping blood.”

The second one disappears out of the door again, and Jay could hear the gruff voice fading away, leaving him alone with the first.

Jay finds his own voice, speaking it through coughs. He stumbles the first few times, unable to get the full word to leave his mouth and the person hovering over him pushing down on his stomach shakes their head, telling him to save his energy. But he kept going, one thing on his mind and he needed an answer. “H- Hailey?”

The voice nods. “She’s fine, a little beaten up but she’s fine.”

There’s a momentary feeling of relief that comes over him as he knows Hailey is okay, enough to wash away all those anxious thoughts that had been keeping him awake. Now he knew she was okay he could fall asleep.

His eyes started dropping before cold hands slapped the side of his face gently. “No, Jay, you gotta stay awake, just stay awake for me.” The voice says, and Jay swears he recognizes it, but he can’t see the face of the person behind it. He couldn’t focus on figuring it out, all he wanted was to sleep.

Another tap to the side of his face. “Jay, please, just stay with me, you have to.”

But Jay could just feel his eyelids get heavier, the exhaustion hitting him over and over. He needed the nap.

He had been busy all day, no wonder he was tired. Surely this person should understand that, surely they should know he needs a rest, and that they should just let him have it.

Jay was getting more drowsy, everything fading away from around him quickly. The last thing he hears is the voice shouting his name, and it’s almost enough to pull him back into the dark, cold concrete hell-hole but it isn’t enough, and everything goes quiet, cutting to black.

xxx

When Jay finally opened his eyes again it was to the sound of a rhythmic beating echoing throughout the room. He was blinded by the bright overhead lights that filled the room, a huge contrast to the blackness he had seen for god knows how long and to the dim lighting he had been in for hours before that.

He rolls his head across the pillow, an ache started to throb through his head as he rubbed a newly-healing scar against the fabric, but the dull pain was nothing compared to what he had been feeling earlier that day, and he takes it the needle stuck into the back of his hand had something to do with that.

A voice from inside the room makes him move his head back to where it had been before, back in the direction of the origin of the noise. “Jay?” They called his name again.

Through squinted eyes he makes out the figure of the familiar red-head sitting at his bedside and Jay let’s out a grumble.

“Why’d they send in you? I would have preferred anyone but you.” Jay’s dry voice mumbles into the room, making his older brother chuckle.

“It’s nice to see you too,” Will remarks, leaning forward in the chair so he got closer to the bed. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

Jay brings a small upturn to his lips, the numb pulling on his cheek making anything more than that sore. “You were worried about me.” He says in an amused way.

Will would have reached forward and smacked Jay for that one, for the playful hint in his voice, but after the day he had had, Will decides it’s best to just leave it alone. “Of course I was worried about you, dumbass, you’re my baby brother,” he says, causing Jay to roll his eyes. “And I will always be worried about you,” he adds before a smile comes up on his own face. “You are aware of the fact you’re not a cat, right? You do know you don’t have nine lives, so stop acting like it, you might not be so lucky next time.”

Jay shrugs. “I can be a cat.”

Will’s eyebrows furrow before he looks up, seeing the IV still dripping into his brother’s hand. “That’s the pain meds talking, why don’t you get some more rest?”

His younger brother then shakes his head. “Where’s Hailey?” Jay questions.

The red-head isn’t exactly surprised by Jay’s question, in fact he was quite expecting it. Over the past couple of months Will had noticed the drastic change in Jay. He was happier now than he was just a few months ago. Will had also picked up on the more obvious flirting between Jay and Hailey that happened at Molly’s after they had had one too many drinks. That and the constant absence from the apartment, Jay spending nights somewhere and coming back first thing in the morning to change before work. But as not to overstep into his brother’s personal life he pushed it off, nodding along with Jay when he used the “stayed late at the district doing paperwork and doesn’t have clothes in his locker” or “crashed at Adam’s after watching the game” card for the third time that week.

“She’s downstairs.” He replies, sparking another question from Jay immediately.

“Is she okay?”

Will nods. “Scrapes and a couple bruised ribs but nothing a bit of glue and time can’t fix.”

Jay tries to sit up, only to feel a sharp searing pain in his abdomen. Will jumps from the seat and pushes him back down on the bed fully, shaking his head quickly.

“You’ll pop the stitches, don’t move. You need to rest.”

Jay’s breathless now, the stinging taking his wind away and it was slowly coming back. “What stitches?”

Will points to the covered torso. “Those stitches. Just be careful.”

The vague memory of the attack from the offender then rushes back to Jay, telling him why he needed the stitches, the memory of one of the jagged ends of the bar cutting through his abdomen coming back to him.

He sighs, allowing himself to sink back into the uncomfortable pillow, starting to feel his eyes close again as the pain meds do their job. “I have to see Hailey.” He mumbles quietly.

Will taps Jay’s shoulder before sitting back down in the chair, noticing the tiredness coming over his brother again. “Once you’ve had a bit more rest,” he says, gaining an argumentative grunt from Jay in return. “We’ll get her up here for when you wake up again.”

There’s another complaining noise that comes from Jay as he tries to fight off the drowsiness but he doesn’t get the chance to voice his dissatisfaction over that before he’s out.

xxx

When he comes to again he’s still half-out if it, the pain meds still coursing through him, making everything hazy. He groggily looks around the recovery room he was still inside and sighs. All he wanted was his own bed at home, not the uncomfortable hospital bed with a needle stuck into the back of his hand. Although he was grateful for what the needle was doing to him, taking away most of the pain from earlier, so he guesses it can stay.

As his eyes travel around the room he spots a figure sat in the chair again and he doesn’t think too much of it until he realizes it wasn’t the figure that had been sat there what felt like moments before. He spots the loose blonde locks draped over her shoulders then notices the red cuts plastered up with steri-strips and bruises that littered her face. His heart sinks at the thought of her having to go through what he did, with the games and attacks, at the sight of what the offenders did to her too.

“Hey you.” She says through the small smile.

Jay was still half-asleep but he tries to mimic her expression, however he definitely doesn’t do it properly. “Hey.”

She stares to him for a moment before tilting her head to one side. “You look great.”

“I’ve looked better.” He says through a chuckle which he immediately regrets by the stiffness felt in his ribs.

“Actually I don’t know, I’ve kinda got used to you with all the cuts and scrapes. I think it suits you.”

Jay slowly shakes his head. “Well after these heal maybe I’ll get another set.”

Hailey let’s out a scoff, swiftly shutting down the idea. “Uh-uh.” She tuts.

They fall into a silence as Jay looks around the hospital room again. He puts his eyes on the pole sat beside his head, the one where the IV bag was hanging.

“Are you running low?” Hailey asks and he catches her slowly moving on the chair in the corner of his eye.

He looks back to her. “No, I don’t think so,” Jay replies, watching her sit herself back into the chair with a small grimace and his heart aches again. “You okay?”

Hailey nods, using her arms to sit herself up straight against the back of the chair instead, ditching the sliding back plan. “I should be asking you that question.”

Jay goes quiet again, watching her and he doesn’t notice how his face drops sadly but Hailey does, furrowing her eyebrows toward him.

“Jay, what’s wrong?” She asks and then Jay realizes the tears that had started stinging in his eyes.

He brings one of his hands up, the one that didn’t have the IV stuck into the dorsal side, and wiped his eyes, clearing his throat as he did and shaking her question off.

The more he sees her sitting there the more he thinks back to when he was lying on the cold concrete floor of the warehouse, that gunshot going off and ringing through his ears and that momentary dread he felt sit on his chest when he thought it was Hailey that had been hit.

Despite having just sat back, Hailey scoots forward again and leans toward the bed, grabbing hold of his free hand, lacing her fingers with his and the rule about keeping it professional at work - or anywhere else where one of their colleagues could walk in unannounced - flies out the window. “Jay, talk to me.”

His voice was dry and cracked and the multiple attempts to restore it back to normal doesn't work. “I don’t know, it’s stupid,” he sighs. “I thought it was you. When that gunshot went off, I thought it was you and I had just been stabbed but that didn’t bother me. All I could think about was how I didn’t want to carry on without you because I’m in love with you, Hailey, I have been for a long time and I don’t know what I would do without you,” he spills, not realizing what he had said until it was too late. He sees her reaction and his words play over in his head. They had only been dating a few months and he curses at himself for letting it blurt this early. “I didn’t actually want to say that to you for the first time in a hospital room. I’m so sorry if I overstepped.”

Hailey stops him before he could say anything else, squeezing his hand lightly as she slowly moved herself close enough to him. She ended up leaning over him on the bed, putting a soft kiss against his lips. It wasn’t anything more than that, it was intimate, delicate and it didn’t need to be anything more than that. After a beat she pulls away and looks past the bruises surrounding his eyes and scars scattered across his forehead and cheeks, moving past the evidence left behind from the events of today and just meets the gentle look in his eyes. “I’m in love with you too.”

taglist @5021ida @agnesgranberg97 @angelsjedi @anna-justice @benharmonsupremacy @fandomlife7 @natszyd @thedanishprince @who-am-i-58-13

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high-supernatural · 3 years ago

Text

The Merge

Kai Parker x Female Reader/Character

Word Count: 1687

Warnings: typical tvd themes, the merge (not fluff, not smut, there’s a sentence of angst but its not much, mostly just toxic friendship)

Summary: “V” took Kai out of his prison world with a condition that they’d stick together. She helps him find his family and prepare for the merge. ((read part I – IV of the series to understand the backstories))

***since y’all like the one shots better than the series, I’m gonna write one shots for female readers under the name V for what I would’ve/will write in the series***

V and Kai have been out of the prison world for a few weeks. She got him out under the conditions that they would stick together no matter what, and that’s what she was doing, sticking by him.

Kai explained his plans to V when they got there and put together a plan. She knew his true motives, and she wanted to help.

While they prepared, trained, and got everything ready they stayed at motels but were mostly busy with the plan and didn’t see each other very often. The motel they were staying at only had one bed. They checked in in the middle of the night when they got back, “queen room fine?” asked the clerk, “absolutely,” Kai responded in his dramatically sarcastic tone.

“Hope sleeping in the same bed as me doesn’t scare you off… I’m a violent sleeper,” he joked with big eyes.

“Better than sleeping in vamp infested woods with a violent sleeper… I think I’ll be fine,” V responded with the same dramatics.

There were a few nights Kai had woken up in the middle of the night or before V and had intrusive thoughts come into his mind of killing her, not that he really wanted to. When he woke up one morning with his hand resting on her throat, he decided to sleep on the couch instead. He might have been a proclaimed sociopath, but he had morals for killing, and killing people who help him weren’t on that list. It scared him, but he ignored it.

V had the gift of seeing behind people and what they say their motives are, which is part of the reason Kai didn’t scare her. She knew why he started sleeping on the couch but didn’t bother to tell him she knew, just like she knew where he went during the day to antagonize his family, but still didn’t bother to confront him about it. She already knew why and what he was doing.

She liked pushing boundaries with him. To see how far he’d really go or what he’d do if she didn’t act scared or flinch even an inch at the things, he’d say to get a rise out of her. She liked seeing how he’d react to her affections, knowing he hadn’t experienced much of it.

When he started sleeping on the couch, she would sometimes join him, walking over to him with a blanket around her shoulders and laying on top of or next to him under the blanket. She liked how he’d tense up until he fell back asleep, nervous to put his arms around her. Sometimes she’d tell him she had a bad dream and say, “this is the part you put your arms around me,” when he wouldn’t.

They were best friends who loved pushing each other’s buttons.

V found his twin for him and told him where she worked, she found this out through gullible Elena. She didn’t question him about his whereabouts when he found out either, she knew this too.

They made another deal with each other when they started playing out their plan – if either of them was going to be out, they have to tell the other how many hours they’d be gone before the other should start worrying, and the general location they’d be, just in case anything went wrong. They didn’t have to explain what they were doing, they actually preferred if the other didn’t know, it worked perfectly.

When Kai disappeared for longer than he said he’d be gone, V knew to worry. She went to the cemetery he said he’d be around and saw Damon, the person who sent her to the prison world before her and Kai got out.

She hid behind a tree just enough so Kai could see her, but Damon couldn’t. Through the Earth, V sent Kai some of her magic to siphon, just enough so he could siphon the magic out of Mystic Falls that the travelers put there and free himself.

“How do you feel?” V asked Kai when they got back to the motel.

“I feel…. Really good,” he responded, “I soaked up a lot of magic,” he chuckled.

“Do you know how to use it?” She asked, “I can’t even imagine how much magic was in that spell.”

Kai jittered and sat down, “I uh… I should probably practice, you know? Make sure I can control it.”

“Let’s practice then,” V said.

He looked up at her when she said, “push me with your magic.”

“I don’t know if I can control it—” she cut him off, “I can handle it, I can’t die, remember?”

“Remember we can’t hurt each other though, that’s the pact,” he said. Kai was a lot of things, but deal breaking wasn’t usually one of them.

She stood in front of him and pushed his head playfully before getting on his lap with both legs on either side of his, “we said no fighting, this isn’t fighting, it’s practicing.” She pushed his shoulders back and pinched his face to annoy him, “come on, do something to get me off of you,” she played.

He grabbed her arms, “I can’t practice on you,” he spoke to her with an almost serious tone for the first time.

She grabbed his biceps and shocked him with her magic before sending burning waves up his arms, making his face turn in pain.

“Fight back,” she said, “or I’ll go hotter.”

Kai squeezed her biceps as she squeezed his and tried sending the magic she was using on him back to her, but it didn’t work.

“Try harder,” she said.

“I can’t—”

“Yes, you can, you have to focus,” she sent warmer magic through his arms and down his chest making him groan. “Make me stop at least once, you’re not gonna hurt me, you got this, focus on sending me the pain.”

With that encouragement Kai was successful not only in sending the magic she was using back to her, but sending it back more intensely, causing a sensation of being on fire for a couple of seconds.

When he heard her wince and felt her arms go limp, he knew it worked and quickly pushed her off of him to stand up, not knowing if he could stop if they were still touching.

She let out a “whoof” breath and chuckled, “you did it,” she looked at him, “why the long face?”

He stared at her like he just killed a puppy, “I need someone else to practice on.”

“Kai, it worked, what’s the problem?” she asked.

“I just need someone else to practice on, I’ll be back tonight,”

“Wait, I think I know who you can use,” she said, stopping him from rushing out and finding a random person.

“Elena Gilbert. She’s always pissed me off. When I found out vampires were in town she acted like I was crazy, now she is one. She never treated me how she treats everyone else, she’s still hung up on the fact that her brother confided in me instead of her,” V said, “everyone’s always saving her and letting others die for her own life. I think she could be put in her place a little better.”

Kai was always confused about why V was so helpful to him, another thing that scared him a little. It was unusual to him.

He practiced his magic on Elena at the high school after he left while V did her own thing, which usually included writing, drawing, or causing some chaos, until she got a call from Elena.

‘great,’ she rolled her eyes before she answered the phone.

“What?” she answered harshly.

“Kai just tortured me for hours,” Elena whined.

“Ok? How is that my problem?” V answered, knowing that all of them still didn’t know she had been with Kai this whole time.

“He’s on his way to the woods to complete the merge!” Elene blurted out.

“What,” she said with concern this time, “I’m on my way,” V left and went to try and stop Kai from doing the merge so soon.

She called him multiple times on her way, but he didn’t answer. When she had got there, Kai and Luke’s eyes were already white, and they were about to complete the merge.

Just when she was about to run up and stop them, they both fell back, and everybody stood like statues until Jo ran to help Luke.

V watched them both with wide eyes, looking for psychic signs that one of them has died or merged, but saw nothing.

After a few seconds of watching, she walked up to Kai. Everybody was watching Luke at this point, so V knelt down and put her hand on his chest, feeling for magic but felt none.

She teared up and tried blinking them away, shaking him by his shirt and saying his name before pressing her hand on his chest to transfer magic to him, waking him up.

His eyes darted open and he grabbed her wrist, sitting up silently. Nobody had noticed him yet. V sat behind him with her hand still on his chest when he turned around, “thanks, kid,” he whispered before he stood up.

Kai said some words to Jo before turning around and offering his hand to V before they walked off. They heard them ask, “did they just leave together,” but ignored it.

V drove them back to the motel and glanced at Kai every so often with worried expressions as he sat silently and wondered at his hands, “how do you feel now?” she asked.

“I feel good.. I feel.. different, I don’t know how to describe it,” he said in breaths.

“That’s good, I think,” V said still confused and paused for a few seconds to think, “we should get out of town, like, tonight, they’re going to look for us,”

“Don’t worry, I got it covered,” is all Kai said.

She looked over at him with a worried face again, “no really, we need to get out of town,” she was serious.

“I dunno, I kinda like it here,” he smiled ominously.

((read the next story for continuation of this one))

#kai parker #kai parker x reader #kai parker x you #kai parker imagine #kai parker series #kai parker fanfic #malachai parker #tvd #tvd au #tvd fanfiction #tvd series

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the-slasher-files · 4 years ago

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ANDREI KULOKOVA HEADCANONS

Clearly I cannot get this man out of my head.. like ever! Honestly I’ve been in a big big writing lull lately and I only want to write for Andrei, so I happy to share these hcs with you!.. hope you enjoy 🔪💕

MASTERLIST

Andrei’s code names in the army were ‘The Wolf’ or 'North’

He has O negative blood type, meaning he is a universal donor. Andrei always (when he is wearing his vest) has IV tubing and needles, just in case.

On that topic, Andrei is very knowledgeable with medical information, he has saved many of his brothers in the army from death. He can save you, but the issue is if he cares to.

Yes he is a very hot bloodied man, but under pressure he is calm and cool, especially with his s/o. Feral rage can turn instantly off if he sees someone he loves really hurt, calmly giving orders and helping you.

Andrei never went to school after his mother died, at age 12. He may not be super educated in math or sciences but this man is smart. Never underestimate him. He can fix a truck, be your handy man around the house, and has amazing people skills.

He is a history buff.. Yup, you heard me. Andrei loves history, specifically war history. After his uncle died he was free to explore more education and he found a deep love in history, learning it all himself through reading, documentaries and listening to people around him. (Me and @horrorslashergirl have a weird AU where he is in college and works in a museum, in a suit with glasses 👀)

Andrei is trained in many things but one I don’t talk about often is bombs and specifically land mines. This guy loves to blow stuff up for fun and has a few land mines in specific places on his land, and abandoned town.

His favorite drinks are a deep earl grey (a Russian blend of course) and Vodka on the rocks.

He loves bath time.. yup a hot bath, even with bubbles he doesn’t care, he loves it.

One of my favorite things about Andrei is when he needs to think or stop his active mind, he goes into his field (usually shirtless) and just stands out there, closes his eyes, enjoying the peace and quiet.

Andrei HATES condescending and controlling people, it brings him back to when he was a kid or in the army. Now that may seem hypocritical but honestly it is not. Degradation is for sexy time and teasing only, and Andrei is only controlling with his playthings but even then he lets them decide and have a good amount of freedom.

Man is a furnace and doesn't feel cold what so ever

He loves action movies, even though he will comment on how unrealistic they are. Also he loves documentaries.

Andrei listens to all kind of music. Mainly rock or metal but he loves Russian new wave and some rap. He also had a HUGE punk phase so that occasionally comes on.

He will do any dare or bet, not even kidding. His army buddies stopped daring him to do stuff because he would just do it. Andrei is a big thrill seeker and will do so much stupid stuff.

He used to have a wolfdog, a brother to Amaria’s wolfdog Dyn. Unfortunately it had too high of a concentration of wolf in it and he had to let it go, but he does still see him every once and a while. He even named him Alexei, meaning “great defender” in Russian. Andrei always leaves one of the outbuildings open for him just incase the weather gets too cold or dangerous. Also he may or may not use him to get rid of bodies, if he sees him wandering around.

Andrei drives a 1995 Range Rover all black with giant snow tires, or his black old Russian truck.

He can ice skate and used to play hockey with his buddies

He is secretly loaded. Yes he has money in his walls and all over the town. Andrei knows what he is worth and his rates aren’t cheap, plus it’s all in cash so there is no paper trail. He is never one to flaunt his wealth, you probably won’t even know until you see him coming home from a mission with a duffle bag of cash, throwing it in under the floor boards.

Andrei had a secret male s/o in the army, it was his first male relationship but they had to hide it from everyone. In a dangerous feral state the wolf had killed him, that was his last undercover mission.

This guy can read people like no tomorrow, every tiny subtle thing you do he notices. Could be the way you bite your cheek if you’re nervous or the way you rub your hands together when excited. He knows.

Also Andrei is very good at manipulation but doesn’t use it often.

He is a terrible sleeper. Andrei wakes at every noise in the house and only gets about 5 hours a night but only 1 hour is actually deep sleep. Sometimes he gets so exhausted that his body gives out and he will sleep for 12 hours fully clothed, in his cargo pants, vest and jacket. However he is much better with an s/o to sleep with, it’s still bad though.

I say this a lot but Andrei has an incredibly active mind, and it’s hard for him to relax or ease up. He uses drinking and smoking as a way to calm down, also just walking into the field for peace.

His favorite food is a nice hardy warm stew with rabbit meat.

Andrei adores just holding his s/o in his arms as on the couch or in bed.

He is honestly kind of paranoid, not so much by himself but if he has a s/o. You can come with him to the nearest town, but never ever draw attention to yourself or him, for your safety. He has people after him.

The wolfs signature is ripping off someone’s jaw or ripping out their spine by gutting them and reaching in.

If you mess with him but he dubs you as not a worthy hunt or not a good kill, you might see a bear trap in your home the next morning.

His tattoo on his left palm 'NO GODS’ is something he got to remind himself that he has control of his life and take his fate into his own hands, not his paranoid controlling uncle. It also holds him accountable for his actions, there are no gods to blame, he did it. The tattoo connects to Amaria as well. She is a lil crazy and does kills for 'the gods’, but Andrei sees that as foolish, he does his kills for himself, nothing else.

The 'grateful for the hunt’ thing I often write in Andrei’s stories is what his uncle would always say to him, with people or animals. It’s burned into his brain and it will never leave him. The words remind him to breathe and take in every deadly detail, that Andrei loves so so much.

Alright time to get.. a little odd lol… me and some friends have an interesting thing going where Andrei has a 'wolf pack’.. Dallas (@slashersins oc) is his husband, not legally, but Dallas wears a wolf ring for him. Xaviera (@horrorslashergirl oc) is Andrei’s soul mate and girlfriend. Xaviera’s cousin Akshay is Andrei’s best friend, they fight constantly but have so so much fun.. plus they fuck when they’re drunk lol. I am Akshay’s 'snow queen’ aka girlfriend. Andrei also has 2 'playthings’ Bianca (@horrorslashergirl) and Sights (@thesightstoshowyou)… the house is too full and Andrei may or may not regret having all these people lol.

#my writing #andrei kulokova #slasher oc #oc #slashers #slasher x reader #slashers headcanons #hcs #horror

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ad1thi · 4 years ago

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2020 fic recs!! [Part 1]

this idea was stolen from @iam93percentstardust cuz i just,,,thought that this year was absolute shit and it would be nice to make a fic rec list of fics from this year that helped me through it. this will be over a range of fandoms and ships, but all fics were written this year.

fics are ordered by the month they were published. ive tried to keep to five fics per month, but this is not obviously all the fics ive read that month - i just didn’t want to make this insanely long.

im releasing the first half of this on the 1st of December, and the second half on the 1st of January 2021 - because otherwise it would just get so long (and also so i will actually have fics for December)

happy reading!! hopefully you find fics on this you haven’t read yet

***

January

The cat is mighty dignified (until the dog comes by): @five-wow

Steve and Danny find them on the pillow in the corner of the dining area, where Eddie is on his side, ass half on the floor because the pillow is more cat-sized than lab-sized, and Pickles is nestled between Eddie’s front legs, essentially being spooned and looking very I-got-the-cream about it. Pickles’ head is tucked into the crook of Eddie’s neck and Eddie’s head slots perfectly on top of Mr. Pickles’, like a furry jigsaw puzzle.

“They’re cuddling,” Steve points out, unnecessarily.

Or: There is a love story unfolding under the McGarrett roof.

Captain ‘Socialist Rage Muffin’ America: @baffledkingcomposinghallelujah

It takes three months of dating Steve Rogers for Tony to understand why Aunt Peggy once shot at him in sheer frustration.

Alternately titled, Honey, I committed treason again.

The Best Laid Plans (Of Mice and Men): @arboreal-elm-ash-oak

His Dark Materials AU

It was Annalise who noticed their small visitor first.

“Tony,” the spider daemon said softly, skittering up the collar of his dress shirt, two of her eight legs resting delicately against his cheek, “Don’t startle them, but I believe we have a guest. Look, by the coffee table.”

Fourteen Million to One: @tunastorks

Six months after Thanos, six months after Tony’s death, six months after Steve returns to his own timeline, Tony Stark turns up on their doorstep.

Brewed Awakening: @iam93percentstardust

Two years after he comes out of the ice, Steve is drifting through life. On his teammate's recommendation, he decides to go back to school where he meets the grandson of an old friend. He finds happiness with Tony but Steve won't be in Boston forever and someone is out to hurt the Starks. Will Steve and Tony be able to reach their happily ever after?

February

the young, the reckless and the foolish: @bruciewayne

In most universes, they don't know each other, not in the slightest, or they hate each other, in a way that's perfectly logical for anyone who were to find themselves in a similar situation.

In this one, they've known each other since they were four years old and naively idealistic.

This is them over the years, against the odds.

a giant sign: @areiton

“Think you can get him to open the weapons division up again?” his CO asks, his voice hungry and Rhodey laughs because this--

“No. Tony hung up his weapons.”

“That’s not what the suit says,” his CO objects, and Rhodey shrugs.

Tony has always had rules, rules he expects the entire world to live by.

And then there was Rhodey, slipping under them.

my heart is driftwood, floating down your coast: @nethandrake

Tonight, there’s a stranger in his backseat. That’s not unusual.

He’s also sad. That’s not unusual either.

What is unusual is that the stranger is silent.

(One night, a stranger enters Steve's taxi. Nothing is the same again.)

Just A Cold: @/delighted

There’s a new text waiting for him. It’s from Steve of course, and it’s vaguely threatening as most messages from Steve are these days. Still Danny ignores it, and now he’s really playing with fire. Maybe it’ll burn the cold out of him.

Or, Danny’s sick, and Steve can’t stay away. The usual comfort fluff. With a little cameo from a gently meddling Grace.

An Unexpected Guide: @/Rachel500

Danny Williams has hidden his Guide status to keep being a detective, but his time of hiding is up when he unexpectedly finds his Sentinel, Steve McGarrett in the midst of a tragedy.

March

Why don’t we (Collide the spaces that divide us): @five-wow

When they finally catch sight of each other again through the milling crowds, they’re both a little worse for wear. Danny’s left side is covered in glitter and every time he brushes a hand over his hair, more blue and purple confetti rains down. Steve is- Well, Steve is randomly shirtless, which is all things considered not excessively remarkable, but he’s also covered in smudges of colorful paint and has a very nicely printed bloodred lipstick kiss mark on his cheek.

“What did you do?” Danny asks, because it looks like Steve had a lot more fun than he did.

Or: Steve and Danny accidentally end up in the middle of something entirely new.

A Little Unsteady: @finduilasclln

Written for the Tumblr prompt meme : "Hey! I was gonna eat that!"

Tony lashes out at Bucky for eating his dessert. Only, it really isn't about the dessert.

a national treasure: @starklysteve

Steve isn't looking for an apple and Tony decides his passion is to inspire young souls. -x- OR: the AU where Tony is a Youtuber and Steve is Captain America and somehow they still save the world together.

April

cycle through: @ambivalentmarvel

Twenty-five years ago, Tony Stark disappeared from his family home a month after the tragic deaths of his parents, Howard and Maria Stark, leaving a billion-dollar tech conglomerate without an heir and the world wondering what happened.

Twenty-three years ago, HYDRA gained another super soldier.

Ten years ago, Peter Parker’s parents died in what is ruled as a home invasion gone wrong but he knows was murder, plain and simple, because he spoke to the killer.

And in the present, Project Insight fails, and the Iron Soldier pays the price.

FOREVER-LOVE YOU-I: @/Eudoxia

Tony Stark is twenty-one when he loses his voice. It shouldn't matter, but in a world where the first words your Soulmate says to you are marked on your skin, it can be pretty damn annoying.

Especially for Tony's soulmate.

Companion piece to my fic Thumb, Index, and Pinky Extended. This is Steve's POV, with a few extra scenes, as a treat.

(Edit: Sorry if you guys get multiple notifications for this. I just realized (about two hours after posting it) that I fucked up the grammar in the title and I HAD to fix it. YOLO, I guess.)

come build a home out of me: @maguna-stxrk

Steve clears his throat.

“What if I went with you?” he asks nonchalantly, like his heart isn’t threatening to beat out of his ribcage.

Tony blinks a few times, looking at Steve, his mouth ajar. “As a— As my date?”

“Yeah.” Steve nods, feeling a little breathless.

“You don’t mind?” Tony furrows his eyebrows.

“I don’t. In fact, you can just tell them I’m your boyfriend. I’m sure they’ll back off, wouldn’t they?”

What.

“I— Huh?” Tony stares at him, brown eyes blown wide open.

What. What. What.

“Huh? Uh, I mean— You know, that way people will see that you have definitely moved on. Monica will see that you have moved on. Right?” Steve smiles, hoping that it masks his inner panic, because what?

Steve Rogers, what have you done?

i don’t have a choice (but i’d still choose you): @nethandrake

There’s a name inked onto his chest, a name written in an all-too familiar scrawl. And it’s— It’s—

Steve doesn’t realize his body is quaking until he’s tracing the tattoo with a shaky finger.

Because of course that is the name etched into the skin. Like a brand, a reminder for everything he has done. An appropriate retribution.

Anthony Edward Stark.

(When Thanos snaps half of the universe away, he unknowingly leaves the other half with soulmarks.)

ua haʻalele ʻoe iaʻu (a ua hoʻomālamalama ʻoe iaʻu): @just-fandomthings

"The truth is, I was shot in the chest and nearly died, and not even three days after I was released from the hospital, you up and left-- and of those two, I'm not sure which one hurt me worse!"

(Coda to 10x22 because come on, we all need a better ending than the one given to us.)

Title loosely translates to: "You left me in the dark (you lit me up)" -- inspired by the brilliant song "Say You Won't Let Go" by James Arthur

May

A Piece Of The Past: @hddnone

It had been so many years since Bucky had gone undercover in the Stark family's mob, he thought he'd gotten away clean.

Then Tony Stark slid into the seat across from him at his breakfast diner, and Bucky's boss has a new case for him.

the privilege of loving you: @starklysteve

“Why won’t you let me touch you?”

It’s a desperate plea, half-shouted and half-whispered, Steve’s voice cracking at the end. Tony stops in his tracks, halfway to the stairs. He doesn’t dare to turn back, and he really doesn’t want to fight, or to leave, to spend the last month of his life away from his husband and their son. But Steve can’t know, can he?

-x-

Or: Tony has palladium poisoning, but he doesn't tell Steve and Peter

your pillow feels so soft now (but still you must advance): @firebrands

When Bruce is 13, he decides to go to boarding school. It's an opportunity for him to learn about other people, and how to interact with them.

Bruce has the misfortune of meeting Tony Stark upon his arrival in Roxbury. Bruce is moving into his room, and Tony opens the door of his room to watch. He looks a bit younger than Bruce, hair wild and eyes bright. Bruce has never seen a boy like him before—handsome and confident.

Bruce doesn’t like it.

IMPORTANT: This fic has them meeting at 14, then progresses slowly until they’re 17. Includes underage drinking and kissing.

This is set before Bruce becomes Batman and Tony becomes Iron Man and I have no explanation as to how or why they just DO Canonically, Bruce is 17 when he finishes school and goes around the world to train, so we're sticking with that

The Real MVP: @sword-and-stars (part of a series)

[“I have saved this Tuesday!” Sokka announces, rattling the bag upon reentry.

Zuko doesn’t even look up from his phone as he deadpans, “It’s Thursday.”

Okay, so Sokka is still having trouble getting his days right without checking. At least he’s gone back to sleeping at night! Going to bed at night is way easier when you have a cute, cuddly boyfriend who starts falling asleep around eleven o’clock. It also helps that he and Zuko are on solid gold butt-touching terms.

It’s been a while since Sokka has been on butt-touching terms with someone and it’s amazing.]

Or,

Sokka knows a guy, gets laid, and introduces Zuko to the merits of an afternoon delight.

When is a bed not a bed? (When you’re not in it): @riotwritesthings

There’s a tiny safe house, with one tiny window and one tiny couch.

And one tiny little bed.

June

Nice Fingers: @anthonyed

A single compliment given by Tony stirs Bucky restless until he caves in and asks him out on a date.

With Steve’s help of course (whether he likes it or not).

The Darkest Touch: @starkrogerrs

This is the story of how Steve finds that it has been ordained that he is to marry a monster he cannot resist aka the God of Love himself, Tony.

It's Cupid x Psyche retold, but with thrice the amount of porn.

The Night Shift: @weethreequarter

Welcome to the Emergency Department of San Antonio General where Dr. Tony Stark joins the team fresh from his most recent tour in Afghanistan and - much to the consternation of the other staff - strikes up an instant rapport with Nurse Steve Rogers. Meanwhile, new resident Bruce Banner refuses to give up on his patient, and Dr. Sharon Carter learns something from her own patients. Throw in a pissed off hospital administrator, Clint using the coffee pot as a mug again, and a major car crash and you have, well, just another night shift.

Wind Beneath My Wings: @iam93percentstardust

Sam first meets Tony Stark in 2005 when he joins the EXO-7 Falcon program.

In jest: @/apathyinreverie

“No, babe,” Danny shakes his head with a grin. “If the apocalypse were to go down while I’m elsewhere for some godforsaken reason, then you stay put and I’m coming to wherever you are.” His grin widens. “And I expect you to have cleared any aliens or zombies or whatever else might be messing with us off the island and to have set up a nice, comfortable military dictatorship for us to rule over by the time I get back.”

It’s a joke.

Of course it’s a joke.

Until it isn’t.

(A the-day-after-tomorrow-style apocalypse AU, where the world decides to end right when Danny is visiting one of the other islands with Grace. Because, of course, it does.)

#adi's rec list #mcdanno #stevetony #buckytony #brucetony #rhodeytony #zukka #samtony #january - june #there's so many different ships on this #and different authors #and it spans three fandoms #so hopefully you guys enjoy this!!

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