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jiminjamms · 8 months ago

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sex therapy :: 29. karma's a bitch

chapter tags/warnings: manipulative! naoya. naoya's anger issues continue. infidelity/adultery. extremely strong language. corruption. mentions of physical violence. family drama.

word count: 3.2k

notes: my sixty-hour work weeks have been taking a huge toll on me, so i apologize for this incredibly slow update. the good news is that i cannot take this corporate america bullshit anymore and will resign in the next two months. thank you for being patient! likes, comments, and reblogs are much appreciated. xoxo

fic masterlist | 01. 02. 03. 04. 05. 06. 07. 08. 09. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33.

Naoya had never felt this humiliated in his entire life.

When people said karma was a bitch, he never thought that it would actually make its way back to him. While he was not the most righteous person in the world, he was the Zenin CEO, for god’s sake! He was the leader to a multi-billion dollar conglomerate, the heir of a centuries-old bloodline.

Yet, here he was, charging back to his apartment like an irate animal.

He startled the lobby doormen upon his loud entry, and once he returned to his penthouse, he had to will every muscle in his body not to tear apart his abode in a rampage.

In his head, his encounter with Toji looped like a broken record, fueling his chagrin.

When Naoya sought to confront his cousin for the first time in months, he thought he had been prepared. He did not expect to end up digging himself into a deep hole surpassing the world's layers due to a judgment error—a slight miscalculation.

Correction: this miscalculation was anything but 'slight' because he wildly underestimated what felt like everything. Now, he bore the consequences of his mistakes after inadvertently turning himself into a laughingstock. Because his ego was his hamartia, he had become a mere jester in a story where he was meant to be the sole hero, and thus his ill feelings burned hotter than the surface of the Sun.

As much as he hated to admit this, Naoya had been shortsighted. He should have known better. Just weeks ago, he saw a vision filled with saccharine promises of a happy, comfortable life as the most powerful man in Japan imbued with power and wealth. He had been confident—a hundred percent certain—that absolutely nothing could go wrong in the trajectory he worked hard to create. But, what the actual fuck just happened at the therapist's office?!

He did not expect his mistress to make a complete fool out of him. Her very existence was an anathema to him, and he hoped to never be in contact with that woman ever again. In hindsight, Naoya should have taken the hint a while ago. He had previously forgiven his cousin's ex-wife, dismissing her blissful but intentional ignorance. Mari had never been too keen on actual intellectual and corporate matters, for she took far more interest in the money and comfort that came with starting from the bottom and sleeping her way to the top. Despite that, Naoya trusted that she at least had half the mind to not publicly discuss their affair, only for him to be proven wrong in front of none other than...Toji Fushiguro.

"Fuck!" Naoya screamed into the void of his empty living room. His reality was a nightmare as he thought about his despised cousin again—the assured gleam in his viridescent eyes, the smug smirk that tugged across his lips. The imagery soured his mood beyond measure. "I'm going to fucking—"

He did not finish his sentence.

Instead, he kicked a nearby lamp in an angry bout, toppling the fixture over and sending tiny shards cascading across the floor accompanied by the dull thud of the shade. Whatever. His housekeeper tomorrow morning would come in and clean that.

What he instead focused on was how he had never been this infuriated, this belittled, this undignified.

The entire apartment echoed with Naoya's loud huff.

'About ‘your wife’ or whatever you want to deem her, there is not a single chance in hell that she’d ever think about calling you her husband anymore.' These words from Toji affected him more than he would have liked.

What did he mean?

That bastard is bluffing, the blonde had to tell himself, yet even he could not believe in his own consolation.

He needed to do something about this.

No, no, Naoya wasn’t scared.

He couldn’t possibly be, right?!

Yet, after he could feel his ears begin to cool and breathing start to re-regulate, he stared at the emptiness in his halls as he came to the realization that had no better choice but to talk to you.

You didn't want to be here.

The moment you read Naoya Zenin's text to meet up for a 'quick chat' at the café near his office, you already knew that the upcoming conversation was going to be anything but 'quick.' The last thing you wished to do was to be in the same vicinity as that very man again.

After spending the last few days at your family residence, you had been showered with warm attention from aunts, uncles, cousins, and even house attendants who—despite naturally wondering the reason behind your stay—welcomed your visit with open arms. To your relatives' many inquiries, you forged a pretense that all was well even if all was not. (Besides, all did seem well in your family estate, away from the incessant pandemonium that was the Tokyo city center.)

While you knew that this peaceful break was not meant to last forever, you did not anticipate returning to the capital just to sit with the Zenin CEO alone.

Naoya had specifically chosen a corner table in the Hong Kong-inspired establishment, distanced from potential eavesdroppers. He seemed to have been waiting for a while by the time you arrived, his right leg crossed over his left knee as he twiddled with his thumbs impatiently. Sprawled on the table were a freshly brewed pot of jasmine tea and a platter of warm custard pastries.

He remained quiet as you took the seat across from him, observing with a crease on his forehead and a knit to his brows.

Anyone could tell that the blonde was not the least bit happy.

"Giving me dirty looks is not going to get this conversation anywhere," you pointed out while helping yourself to a tart.

From your comment, the inverted slope on Naoya's lips twisted into a deeper frown.

He did not understand where your annoyance came from.

Fine, he never treated you nicely either, but he did not expect you to snap at him when the discussion had hardly begun. You offered him no greetings, and Naoya also took great offense at how you chose not to look at him as you talked.

Truth be told, your neglect reminded him of all the other upsetting things that he was dying to bring up, and your unpleasant attitude whittled away the little restraint he had left.

“You didn’t try to ask where I’ve been. Not one text or call. Guess it would not have mattered to you if I disappeared, huh?" he lashed out through gritted teeth. He hated being forgotten, hated being looked over, and hated how easy it was for him to prove you to be a neglectful and apathetic wife.

Which was why there was no better option than to cut him off.

“You ordered me to leave you alone, Naoya.” Only slightly did you turn your head to glance at him. Stirring sugar into your tea, you kept your attention otherwise on the nearby window and watched businesspeople scurrying about on the streets on their lunch breaks. "You can live without my attention since I'm not the only woman you have around. What happened to your lady friend? Hasn't she been entertaining you long before our marriage? I am sure she would love your company, so why not pay her an impromptu visit?”

From a slanting angle, you could tell that the transformation from your normally calm demeanor dismayed him. Naoya, not you, was typically the one to make snide comebacks, but he could not deny your latest comments. Evidently, he wanted you to go back to your submissive and passive self, but that was precisely what you no longer could be for him.

His silence prompted you to reach into your purse and retrieve a thick manila envelope, and you presented the package on the table.

Naoya's gaze snapped to the parcel.

He was curious, but cautiously so. He had invited you here, expecting to control the narrative, to dictate the terms. As a result, your unexpected move threw him off balance.

"What...?"

“Take a look and find out for yourself.”

A puzzled Naoya demonstrated no hesitation.

He snatched the folder, tearing the top open and greedily grabbing the curated pieces inside. He stared for a long time at the first item: a photo. But he recognized the image of him and his mistress, boarding a private jet for their most recent trip to Mexico. Then, he flipped through the stack rapidly, barely registering each item before he turned to the next. Some were printed-out pictures and others were cutouts from news articles, but all featured him and his paramour. The confusion on Naoya's visage slowly morphed into aggravation, and when he finished his inspection, he forcefully threw the items back onto the table.

In the end, Naoya sat back and went still, not even blinking, thinking, or doing anything but pressing his tongue along his inner cheek. "How did you get these?"

No apologies. No remorse.

Hell, based on his response, the man could not even bother to deny your accusations, a telling sign of how little he could care for his relationship with you. Obviously, you must be a joke to him.

In one firm motion, you placed down your teacup.

"You're missing the point.”

While one's eyes may be the windows to the soul, Naoya's offered nothing in his current state. His pupils looked at—no, examined you in intense dark pools despite the iridescent glow from the lights above.

"Toji gave you these, didn't he?" Naoya continued with a disdainful laugh, himself insistent on getting answers to his own questions. "You can't find this shit on the internet anymore since I've had them all taken down. But Toji's fast. He has eyes everywhere, I know he does. Look at him. Months later, and he's still hung up on reclaiming a position he should've never had the right to in the first place!"

Thankfully, you didn’t flinch from his loud voice. What you did do was become more indifferent as if you were placing a wall to separate yourself from him, mentally bracing for his emotional maelstrom.

"You are missing the point," you said once more. This time, you shook your head in disappointment, and your tone was far more frustrated than the last. "Aren't you shameless?”

"Me? Shameless?!” His brows pinched closer from fury. "Take a look at yourself, woman! What did you do to get all this dirt from Toji and his henchmen, hm? Ha! Know what? I bet it’s because you're so willing to spread yourself for them,” he rambled with a nasty sneer plastered on his expression. At his comments, your jaw fell open before snapping shut as the meaning behind his words sank in. The way this man disregarded how he had an affair (that began many months ago!) only to redirect the spotlight onto you was repulsing, implying that the sole reason the therapists talked to you was that you had slept around. “A whore like you love taking all them all, don’t you? Well? Well? Am I right? Goddamn, you’re such a—”

The harsh scraping from your chair as you stood was what finally interrupted him. Unable to tolerate his vilification, you counteracted his anger with the venom in your rancorous glare.

"How dare you talk about me like that!”

In the meantime, prying eyes started to turn in your direction from the commotion: teenage girls, sharing nervous glances across their table; a lone businessman, stopping mid-sip from his cappuccino; even the barista, pausing mid-grind such that her arm froze inches from the hopper.

"That man...doesn't he seem familiar?" a distant voice asked.

"Is he a celebrity or something?"

"No, wait. He's the person on the cover of last month's Fortune magazine. Naoya Zenin!" another replied.

"Isn't that lady his wife?"

While the onlookers' curious glances turned into full-on stares, their regard steeled your resolve rather than bothered you. Instead, you wanted the crowd to take in the spectacle. Corrupt tricks and dirty money had long painted the Zenin heir as 'the most perfect man in Japan,' and the public deserved to understand the fraudulence and cruelty that underlaid his facade.

"For months, I trusted you. I respected you. I put aside the harrowing loneliness weighing on my heart all because I tried to understand you. You told me that finding the time or energy for our marriage was not easy because board meetings kept you late in the office or business meetings required you to spend several nights abroad. Fine! So, I had been patient. But," and your voice overflowed from anger as you pointed a shaking finger at the pictures on the table, "Taking another woman to Michelin restaurants for dinners? Spending nights with her at Ritz-Carltons and Four Seasons? Going on entire vacations with her across the Pacific? All while you had a wife at home? Are you out of your fucking mind ?!"

The man's nose flared with deep-seated rage, his eyes mirroring the same bitterness in yours. "At the end of the day," he began sternly, "we're still married."

Ridiculous.

“On paper, ” you had to clarify. "Otherwise, you wouldn't be cheating on me with your older cousin's ex-wife."

Immediately, louder murmurs rippled through the crowd. Naoya turned stiff, uncomfortable with the attention. So much for selecting a quiet corner in the café. He wasn’t stupid enough to sense that he had to be careful. Saying one wrong phrase would condemn him to a public meltdown.

However, you were already steps ahead of him when you loudly declared: “I’m filing for a divorce.”

That caught him off guard.

Your announcement even drew audible astonishment from bystanders as they stopped their meals, turning to each other and drawing out their phones.

In literal milliseconds, the vexation once riddling Naoya's demeanor shifted into denial.

“No. We’re not going to talk about a fucking divorce right now. We’re going to fix what we have, and you’re going to come back to me. We’re...We're married for a reason, and we’re going to keep with it!”

"That's a bullshit reason,” you had to snap. “Listen to yourself. Do you hear how selfish you sound!?" At this point, nothing could hide your bafflement. "Naoya, you were the one who said that if I wanted to leave this marriage badly, then I should leave. Ask Mai and Maki! They heard the entire conversation. Didn't you also say that you didn't give a fuck anymore?"

The man attempted to salvage some semblance of control. "I was just joking!"

"No, you were not." Picking up a photo of Naoya and Mari together, you pressed the picture to his face. “How much more can I take? How many days would I still have to go through alone in the penthouse, all because you would be spending your sweet time with the woman that you love?”

Unloading all this emotional baggage, not only for Naoya Zenin but also for the café spectators to hear, took courage. Previously, you would have let the burden gnaw at your soul. You would have rather wallowed in suffering rather than even think about speaking up.

But the past was the past, and you had grown immensely since then. Currently, you were stronger, more confident. You knew that, in Toji's words, you deserved better. Life was too beautiful to waste on a man who did not love or respect you and, with that in mind, you relaxed your clenched fists with an exhausted and fatigued sigh.

You broke me first, you said through a deserted gaze.

Naoya Zenin was the reason why you had become the way you were: a cold, seemingly heartless wife who cared none for her husband. The misery that he placed on your shoulders finally reached its limit, and while you could forgive, forgetting the memories in your scarred heart would be a task over months, years, and even a lifetime.

“Listen,” you began, tone terse, “this divorce will set you free. Mari is the person whom you need—”

“The hell. No!” the man interrupted in a violent outburst, taking your breath away as he slammed the table and hissed. “I don't give a damn about her right now! We’re…We’re over!" he snarled with incredible anger such that he almost appeared to growl. "I don’t need her, I need you! That...That whore doesn't give a flying fuck about my shit! All she cares about is...is...Fuck this. All she wants is the money. Why else do you think she married and then later divorced Toji? She doesn't want to hear about all the shit in my family because she had not been brought up to deal with all the fuckin' drama in my household. She can't understand because, unlike you, she wasn't born with a silver spoon shoved down her goddamn throat!"

Quietly, you absorbed his words, stunned.

So this was how their relationship had been.

You had not expected him to reveal all these entrenched feelings willingly, but his concoction between reckless rage and sheer desperation had allowed him to spill the ugly side of this extramarital affair. Naoya could not afford to lose you, and not just because this marriage solidified the respect of those around him. While Mari offered him an outlet for physical indulgence, only you could offer the cornerstone to Naoya's mental and social fortitude.

“So you ‘need’ me now, but what happens when you find another reason to hate me again? What will you do if you don’t think I can fulfill the role you want me to have as your partner? Or if you wake up one day and suddenly want your cousin’s ex-wife again? Or if you meet another woman? Am I supposed to stand there again, and watch this all happen?"

No answer.

The fact that he couldn't respond hurt.

"My decision is final. Looking back, I despised every single second married to you. In fact, I feel sorry for myself. The fact that I blindly put up with your manipulation, betrayal, and blame for all these months.” With your belongings collected, you prepared to leave. “You would be stupid to think you're the only one with options, you know.”

Only when you turned around did Naoya react, scrambling to his feet.

“What the fuck are you—”

In any other situation, he would have grabbed you, lunged at you, did everything in his power to stop you from going. Yet, given all the witnesses, all he could do was call you back like a helpless child, trying his best to not escalate the scene (although, at this point, even passerbys outside have stopped by the window to spectate).

"Hey!" Naoya called after you. “Hey! I’m still talking with you!”

Pathetic, really, to see him desperately beg for you to stay in his life.

There was a certain satisfaction in finally having the control at your fingertips. The feeling was empowering—electrifying, even—and you became so focused on the gratification that you barely registered Naoya's last question.

“Where are you going?”

At this point, you already stood by the exit.

“That’s not something that my soon-to-be ex-husband would need to know,” and you hardly gave him another glance as the door closed behind you. “Thank you for showing me everything I hope to never find in another man again."

last chapter || next chapter

end notes: Part of why this update took so long was because I wanted to have an encounter between Naoya and Y/N to showcase Y/N’s development, from someone who thoughtlessly defended her husband to someone who could stand up for herself (all while alone!). I envisioned this interaction many times, and I thought about different ways to approach the scene, the delivery, the dialogue, the choreography, etc. It took me a while to go for what I currently have. Thank you for reading!

taglist: @dissociatingdiva @httpsplanetmarsdotcom @nemoyr @huangfairy @shadowarchon @203steph @agentdedf1sh @cloudybabes @lynn-writes-things @illicitwriter @7oji @kikuchimi @chaoticjojofan @musicisme333 @kumocchin @s-guru @mwahilovemylife @hey-gurls69 @cloudsinthecosmos @moon-mumu-moon @kazscara @skilerfrostfairy @funicidals @nico707 @proteovaldez @tsukiyohanayome @marimoares @qirbys @puffaloxx @sakanoshitaa @arizzu @kissditrio @lewd-bunny14 @mistyheart @szired @supsii @yvy1s @lazyassfinals @katkbc @tokyometronetwork @downtown-roponggi @the-cosmos-network

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bloodyfries · 4 months ago

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Hey, so, what if their was a third transmigrator but they got a character that was just so out there that they never found about the other two well into post cannon

Imagine a avid reader of PIDW, (heck maybe they'd beta read for airplane or translate it to a different language (probably English)) dies and ends up as one of the wives. The only catch is that this wife lives far away from the main plot. Maybe she's a ruler of some small kingdom of the PIDW world that Bingge wives up so that he can own every conner of land (that mentioned in PIDW, I'm not diving into the concept of weather that includes the entire world (ex. All of aisa, Europe, the America's, ect)). She wakes up and knows that one day her kingdom will belong to Binghe and that she'll be thrown into a harem, forgotten. So she trys to ignore the impending doom but it still claws at her stomach at night.

Once the year comes that it's supposed to happen she's a nervous wreck. Nothing happens. Well, that's just a miscalculation, airplane never was consistent. More years past and still nothing. Something must have gone wrong, though it means she can still hold power and not marry a stranger, she'll take it. In the meantime she uses her modern knowledge to improve her kingdom.

Skip back to Sqq and Lbh who decided to do a bit of traveling. Sqq probably wanted to see some of the PIDW world and Lbh, being the loving husband he is, picked up on this. So they decide to travel and eventually come to a small kingdom by the coast. It's a lovely kingdom and seems to be thriving. Sqq vaguely remembers this kingdom from PIDW but something is different. The way things are run, the laws, some of their inventions... they all seem so modern. That can't be right, this isn't how it was written???

Cut back to our third transmigrator and she's freaking out. Why? Well she just saw Binghe! But where's his military powers? Sure he's strong but- IS THAT THE SCUM VILLAN????!!!!

Might post more about this later

(Ignore the fact that she low-key looks like sqh in the low effort drawing I did, I'll post a real design later)

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foureyedfella · 3 months ago

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☆I've gotten the case of a little art block so I'm sharing my headcanons on what I think the biggest injuries each fighter has had (apart from bring in the ring!)

Glass Joe

☆man what hasn't happened to Joe it's hard to pinpoint his biggest injury 😭 his biggest was probably a combo: twisting his ankle and then falling down the stairs due to said ankle. While trying to get him on a leveled area, Disco Kid and Bear Hugger drop him (butter fingers). Several bones broken and a concussion 😞

Von Kaiser

☆ Prank gone wrong.

☆ His students tried setting up like a Kevin McCallister home alone prank, miscalculated how bad the punching bag would swing, sent Kaiser FLYING-

☆If anyone wonders why the boxing schools' water fountain is snapped off the wall, it was him

☆ Dislocated his jaw, and if he is still or resting he can still feel the lower back pain from the incident 💀

Disco Kid

☆ He was in a paired up dancing competition, and his partner was NOT locked in 🙏

☆ During the climax of the dance, Disco Kid needed to spin mid air and get caught by his partner. His partner did not catch him.

☆Cracked his skull, but was more upset to find out they would have made it to qualifiers if it weren't for the infraction

King Hippo

☆Rogue Coconut.

��This in itself isn't terrible, but it KEPT happening on the same spot on his noggin.

☆Severe concussion, can still hear the coconut conk when its quiet.

Piston Hondo

☆ He is honestly pretty careful and mindful when doing stuff so he probably has not had anything catastrophic happen to him

☆Unfortunately his carefulness does not account for those around him. He was caught in the Bear Hugger Fishing Fiasco.

Bear Hugger

☆The Fishing Fiasco.

☆Was on a fishing trip with Hondo, decided to try to get all fancy with his cast.

☆To be fair, the motion of his fishing line was cool- unfortunately a badly timed sharp swing while the fishing hook was still swinging behind him sent the hook straight across their backs

☆Both got stitches done

Great Tiger

☆ To the surprise of no one it would be Aran to cause his demise 💀

☆ He was doing an eye coordination test on Aran with his clones, with the goal being that Aran can still spot him after shuffling between the clones.

☆What he did NOT expect was for Aran to just lunge at him AND his clones at once, safe to say he found the real Great Tiger

☆Fractured neck, for the 2 months he wore a neck brace, he made sure to not leave Aran alone about it

Don Flamenco

☆ His heart 😢 por Carmen 😢

☆I'm lying, he was drunk one night doing the bachata on a flimsy table, it quite literally folded on him

☆ Everyone was too drunk to take anyone anywhere, so he just woke up the next morning in agony 😭

Aran Ryan

☆ Tried getting into a classic bar fight like he was back in the grand city of Dublin at the pub, except he's not and he was in America

☆Definitely got shot, but it grazed him so he clowned the guy on his way out for not getting the job done right, passed out after the adrenaline rush

Soda Popinski

☆ Also incredibly drunk one night, decided to put his juggling skills to the test with more and more stupid objects

☆ Curse whoever recommended him knives because he did just that

☆Several hand stitches, claims they're from boxing so he doesn't have to bring up how he actually got them

Bald Bull

☆ Early in his career when he was setting his persona straight, his manager was pretty adamant on having bull tied into it

☆ Did this really need to involve actual charging bulls at him? No, not at all. Was he doing pretty good wrangling them? Yeah honestly but you can only do so much with so many bulls

☆ Got rammed. Broken ribs, and a fired manager

Super Macho Man

☆ Unironically got into a "how much you bench bro" squabble with some other meathead at the gym

☆ He did NOT have the physique he has now so idk what he was thinking actually

☆ Tore his chest muscles, devastated that he ruined his precious pecs 😞

Sandman

☆ Actively chooses to gatekeep this information. Never shares it

☆ (but between you and me, he absolutely snapped his arm in an arm wrestling competition when he was younger.)

☆ It took way too long to heal and it pisses him off when he thinks about it now

☆ Little side note, but the punch out community has been so awesome here, I was surprised to find such a nice community when I started posting you guys have been so awesome 😁

☆ I love that everyone has such differing opinions from eachother and we're all like "👍" I love hearing everyone's headcanons

#punchout #punch out

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fans4wga · 1 year ago

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[September 1] Don’t Fall For Hollywood Bosses’ New PR Spin

'Today marks the 122nd day of the Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike and 48th day of the Screen Actors Guild and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) strike. The dual work stoppages have brought Hollywood to a standstill, with production halted on films and television programs, and premieres and other promotional events either scaled back or canceled. Both guilds are striking over demands that are more than reasonable, particularly given studio executives’ record pay. These demands include fair compensation for streaming media (particularly better residuals, which currently pale in comparison to what they are for network and cable broadcasts), robust studio support for health and retirement funds, and safeguards around the use of artificial intelligence. (For more on why WGA and SAG-AFTRA are on strike, read the excellent reporting of Jacobin’s Alex Press).

In a move that has shocked…pretty much no one, Hollywood bosses don’t want to share their earnings with the very storytellers responsible for generating them. At the same time, they’re happy to make workers pay the cost for their own miscalculations about streaming.

The major Tinseltown studios – organized under the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) trade association – remain stubbornly opposed to striking a fair deal with either guild. Under the leadership of AMPTP president Carol Lombardini, studios have employed brutal tactics to bust the strike, including threatening to drag things out until writers lose their homes and using management-friendly trade publications to pressure the guilds into accepting lowball offers. These tactics have backfired spectacularly: not only have they failed to end either strike, but they’ve also turned the public overwhelmingly against the AMPTP. A new Gallup poll finds that Americans back the WGA over the AMPTP by 72% to 19%, and SAG-AFTRA over AMPTP by 64% to 24%.

Aware of their reputational damage (but willfully ignorant of the anti-worker attitude that caused it), the AMPTP announced a “reset” to its approach this week – not by negotiating in good faith or meeting the guilds’ demands, but by hiring a pricey crisis-management PR firm to revamp its image! According to Deadline, the AMPTP has hired The Levinson Group – a D.C.-based PR shop best known for representing the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team in its campaign for pay equity – to “reframe the big picture for studio and streamer CEOs who have been characterized as greedy, imperious and out of touch.”

If you’re feeling like you’ve seen this movie before, you’re not wrong. During the last WGA strike 15 years ago, studio bosses hired former Clinton comms strategists Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane to revive the AMPTP’s flagging public image. The revolving-door duo were paid a jaw-dropping $100,000 per month by the AMPTP to strike-bust, deploying campaign-style spin attacks designed to break the WGA’s resolve.

As I wrote for The American Prospect in May:

“Fabiani and Lehane created a website with a live tally of the millions of dollars in income that guild members and on-set crew had purportedly lost by striking. They urged studio CEOs to publicly refer to WGA representatives as “organizers” rather than “negotiators” because the former “sound[ed] more Commie.” Lehane even told the press at one point that striking writers were “making more than doctors and pilots,” cynically arguing that the strike was harming “real working-class people” like below-the-line workers who had lost income from struck late-night talk shows […] Fabiani and Lehane were [also] the brains behind a “strongly worded and downright menacing” AMPTP press release breaking off negotiations with the WGA in December 2007. This move allowed the studios, which cited a protracted strike as an “unforeseeable event,” to invoke force majeure contract clauses and cancel multiple writer-producer deals worth tens of millions of dollars, severely demoralizing the WGA’s rank-and-file members.”

The parallels between 2008 and today are striking. Like Fabiani and Lehane (who have worked for scandal-plagued clients like Gray Davis, Bill O’Reilly, Lance Armstrong, and Goldman Sachs) the Levinson Group has no qualms about representing greedy and unsavory characters. Over the years, Levinson has done PR for predatory student lender Better Future Forward, reviled monopolist Live Nation/Ticketmaster, a talc mining company linked to the Johnson & Johnson baby powder cancer scandal, and Theranos fraudster Elizabeth Holmes.

And just like the ex-Clinton spin doctors, the Levinson Group boasts close revolving-door ties to powerful politicians and the news media. The firm currently represents President Biden’s personal attorney Bob Bauer and previously represented John Podesta’s family lobbying firm. Levinson partners have previously worked for an array of influential politicians, including former President Bill Clinton, Senators Jon Tester and Amy Klobuchar, Representatives Maxine Waters and Ted Lieu, and former and current Los Angeles Mayors Eric Garcetti and Karen Bass. The firm’s founder and CEO Molly Levinson spent eight years working for CNN and CBS, while two of the Levinson Group’s top managing directors are alumni of CNBC and The Wall Street Journal. With a web of strong connections to power players in the entertainment industry’s twin capitals of LA and New York, along with the nation’s capital, Levinson could help the AMPTP tilt the regulatory and media scales back in the bosses’ favor.

Though this may sound demoralizing, striking writers and actors shouldn’t lose hope. For one, consider a surprisingly uplifting parallel between 2008 and 2023. Fifteen years ago, after Fabiani and Lehane took the AMPTP’s contract, the SEIU and other unions that had previously worked with the duo severed ties with them for trying to bust the writers’ strike. Fast forward to this week: the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team Players Association (Levinson’s star client!) publicly rebuked the firm for doing the AMPTP’s dirty work and voiced support for the dual WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. If history is any indication, it’s only a matter of time until other pro-union Levinson clients – like the majority SEIU-owned Amalgamated Bank – follow suit and sever ties with the firm.

There is also one crucial way in which 2023 is thankfully not like 2008: The Levinson Group is bad at their jobs.

Consider an August 27th New York Times article about AMPTP President Carol Lombardini*, which was almost certainly pitched or otherwise molded by Levinson flacks. The article goes to ridiculous lengths to rehabilitate Lombardini’s image:

The article passively describes Lombardini’s tenure as “marked by labor peace until now” (a peace that she has now broken) and shifts blame for her unpopular decisions to anonymous AMPTP members (how convenient!).

Article co-authors Brooks Barnes and John Koblin quote a 2014 email from then-WarnerMedia CEO Kevin Tsujihara praising Lombardini’s negotiation skills and recommending she receive a $365,000 bonus. Curiously absent from the article is any mention of Tsujihara’s high-profile 2019 resignation from WarnerMedia for pressuring actresses into non-consensual sex.

Barnes and Koblin attempt to paint a “she’s just like us” picture of Lombardini (who reportedly earns a $3 million annual salary), mentioning her upbringing in a “working-class town outside Boston” and love for Red Sox and Dodgers games.

Barnes and Koblin paint a rosy picture of the AMPTP’s “sweetened proposal” (their words) to the WGA, describing the studios’ August counteroffer as “including higher wages, a pledge to share some viewership data and additional protections around the use of artificial intelligence.” Barnes & Koblin never quote the WGA’s well-founded reasons for turning down this lowball offer, saying only that the WGA is “holding firm to demands related to staffing minimums and transparency into streaming-service viewership.”

Bizarrely, the core issue of underpaid streaming residuals (the main reason writers are demanding greater streaming transparency) is never mentioned in the article.

Barnes and Koblin frequently imply that criticism of Lombardini is unfair, describing her as an “easy target” for the “grievances of striking workers” and singling out a tweet purportedly “mocking [Lombardini] as a fuddy-duddy who hangs out at chain restaurants”.

Barnes and Koblin quote a pre-strike September 2022 Deadline interview with Teamsters organizer Lindsay Dougherty to claim that Lombardini has the “grudging respect” of union leaders who see her as a “fair individual.” They did not quote more recent statements from Dougherty, who last month tweeted that the “greedy” AMPTP had “declared war on Hollywood Labor” by refusing to negotiate in good faith with WGA and SAG-AFTRA.

In one unintentionally eyebrow-raising line, Barnes and Koblin state that Lombardini was “inspired to become a lawyer by reading articles about F. Lee Bailey.” Neither Bailey’s sordid clients (like OJ Simpson) nor his multiple disbarments are mentioned in the article.

And it’s not just me who finds the Levinson Group’s efforts laughable. Discussions of the NYT story on Reddit and Twitter are dominated by comments tying the story’s blatant reputation laundering for Lombardini to the AMPTP’s concurrent hiring of Levinson. A recent New Yorker puff piece on Warner CEO David Zaslav has been met with similar ridicule – with many commenters also pointing to Levinson’s potential influence. So too have recent stories from management-friendly trades like Deadline – all of which have failed to make a dent in strong public support for WGA and SAG-AFTRA. This is a good sign: not only is the public more inclined to side with striking workers than it was in 2008 – it’s also seemingly more attuned to the role of corporate PR flacks in shaping the media narrative. If studio bosses think they can remake the same movie and end another strike with flashy spin-doctors, they’re sorely mistaken.

So here’s my advice to the AMPTP (and it won’t cost you six figures per month to hear it): the way to fix your reputation problem is to end the strike by giving writers and actors what they want. No strike-busting comms team can rescue you from the hole you’ve dug yourself into.

As the LA Times’ Mary McNamara recently put it, “You’ve lost the war. The best thing to do now is negotiate the terms of surrender.”'

#wga strike #writers strike #sag-aftra strike #sag strike #actors strike

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slippinmickeys · 10 months ago

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Totality

Fiona made me write an eclipse fic.

Scully gently shut the door behind her, the crisp blue duffle with leather handles in her grip; the go-bag she always left in her car, just in case. It had been a just-in case, Mulder had to admit. They’d had to fly to Idaho with no time to pack, and had worked a grueling five days straight on a series of local murders with only enough time to catch maybe four hours of sleep a night and pop into a shabby JC Penneys once for more underwear. They were both overworked, overtired, and their suits–of which each of them only had two–were overworn; ripe with the scents of stale sweat and stale coffee and stale eau de morgue.

Scully looked weary as she handed over the bag to where Mulder stood in front of their rental car’s open trunk.

“How far away is the airport again?” she asked, squinting up at him as he deposited her bag next to his and slammed the trunk closed.

“Only about an hour,” he answered, mentally girding himself for what he was about to tell her. “But, I uh,” he went on, “pushed back our flights to this evening.”

Her posture visibly slumped. “You…what?”

Mulder bit his lip, hoping he hadn’t made a horrible miscalculation. He knew she wanted nothing more than to get home, slide into a hot bath and pull the covers over her head for three straight days. She’d certainly earned it.

“Hop in the car,” he said, moving to the driver’s side door. “I have a surprise.”

He was exhausted himself, his nerves shot. He was running on caffeine and cortisol, his skeleton rattling with every step. But this…she would like this. He was sure of it.

“Mulder,” she said wearily, a whine in her voice that he’d rarely had the opportunity to hear. But she said nothing more and reluctantly dropped into the passenger seat, leaning her head against the headrest and rolling it to look at him beseechingly after she’d clicked her seat belt on.

Mulder turned the ignition and the sedan growled to life under them.

“It’s a good surprise,” he assured her.

She only sighed, and they bumped out of the hotel parking lot and onto town’s main drag, the sun shining on the shabby line of depressing suburbia. Ten minutes and five stop lights later, Mulder pulled into the mostly empty parking lot of a dying mall, the tires popping over stray gravel and broken glass. He cranked the wheel and the car swung over the cracked asphalt in front of a defunct Frederick & Nelson, turning in a reflex angle and stopping when the sun shone in full through the windshield. He killed the engine.

Scully opened her mouth to say something, but he reached into the inner pocket of his suit coat and pulled out a couple scraps of cardboard, handing one over before she could voice a complaint.

It took her a moment to register what he was handing her.

“Eclipse glasses?” she said, sitting up a little in her seat.

Mulder had found the black polymer lenses next to the cash register at a local coffee shop that morning, the bespectacled co-ed working it disinterestedly telling him he could have two pairs for a dollar.

The upcoming eclipse had been in the news recently, but he’d mostly ignored it–back east it would only be partial at best, the path of totality only hitting the Pacific Northwest and parts of Canada. Four murders and a rough case later, he hadn’t given it another thought. Until that morning in the coffee shop.

“We’re in the path of totality here,” he explained. “We’ll only get it for about a minute and ten seconds according to the local newspaper, but I thought you might like to see it.”

A look Mulder couldn’t read crossed over her face and he swallowed.

“The next full eclipse over North America won’t be until 2017,” he went on nervously. “I can probably change the tickets back if you-”

Scully reached out and put a warm hand on his arm, cutting him off.

“I’d love to see it,” she said delicately. “Thank you.”

Despite the dark smudges under her eyes, the soft smile she gave him quieted any lingering apprehension about his decision, and he gave her a smile back.

“I figured we could get on the hood, lean against the windshield,” he said.

“What time does it start?” she asked, popping her wrist out from her sleeve to look at her watch.

“In about five minutes,” he grinned.

Scully fingered the glasses and then opened her car door. Energized, Mulder did the same.

“I ask you to avert your eyes,” he said drolly, putting a hand on the warm hood of the car before awkwardly lumbering his way on top of it, the metal plane thumping loudly under him as it dented to accommodate his weight and then popped back into place.

Scully, opting to watch, looked on primly.

Once he was settled, he held out a hand.

“Milady,” he said, and she settled her warm palm onto his, grabbing on while she put a foot on top of the tire and dexterously swung herself up next to him.

“Nimble,” he complimented her, reluctantly letting go of her hand.

She shrugged and leaned back gingerly against the windshield, mindful of the smear of desiccated bugs across the face of it.

“Here, wait,” Mulder said. He sat up quickly and peeled off his suit coat, rolling it into a ball to tuck behind her head, pillow-like.

“Thanks,” she said quietly.

“Don’t mention it.”

Mulder could feel something ineffable pass between them. He coughed once awkwardly, and then pressed his eclipse glasses to his face, the sharp cardboard edge digging into the skin behind his ear.

“How do I look?” he asked.

“Like a dork,” Scully said, delicately donning her own, in, Mulder hoped, solidarity.

She looked nothing like a dork, Mulder thought, eyeing the sharp lines of her face. She looked like a space girl, sleek and silver, an otherworldly beauty.

He cleared his throat. “So do you.”

Scully’s face was tilted to the sky and he turned to follow her gaze.

“It’s starting,” she said, her voice a little irreverent.

Mulder looked at the sun, dark through polymer lenses of the protective eyewear. The moon was just beginning to edge itself in front of its celestial sister; incremental, pendulous.

Lacking the pillow he’d given Scully, he raised his arms up and bent his elbows, resting his head back against cupped hands. Beside him, Scully breathed serenely. He caught a whiff of his fusty clothing and hoped his jacket had fared better in the olfactory department than his shirt.

They were silent for long minutes, watching the gradual procession of moon across sun. The day was bright but began to take on a verging luminosity, and Mulder raised his glasses up to take a look at the dark shadow of the car under them, which took on an off-putting sharpness against the dusty asphalt.

“What do you think ancient peoples made of solar eclipses?” came Scully’s voice, a little dreamy. “What must they have thought?”

It was an invitation to oratory. A small gift. Mulder smiled.

“Cultures throughout the world had wildly different theories,” he said, and Scully turned her head towards him, her eyes hidden behind the dark lenses. “Most of them, obviously, wildly incorrect.” Despite the fact that he couldn’t see her eyes, her look was encouraging.

“The sun being devoured was popular,” he went on. “From the Norse mythology of Sköll,” at this she smiled. “To Asian cultures like in Java and Vietnam that variously had creatures or monsters swallowing the sun. It was commonly held in ancient China that a celestial dragon attacked and devoured it. Here in the Northwest, the Pomo people’s name for a solar eclipse is ‘Sun got bit by a bear.’”

The bear, Mulder mused, was widening its jaw. It was getting gradually darker, and he could feel the temperature start to dip. He put his glasses back on and looked back at the sun.

“The Inca and Ancient Greek believed eclipses were a sign of a wrathful and unhappy god.”

Scully hummed. “The word ‘eclipse’ comes from the Greek word meaning ‘abandonment.’”

“Right,” Mulder said, “though I think I prefer mythologies of a more solicitous nature.”

Scully raised her glasses to give him a look. “Solicitous?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

Mulder couldn’t help his grin. “In Australian oral traditions, the moon falls in love with the sun and chases her across the sky. If caught, the sun plunges the world into darkness. Medicine men recite magical chants to combat the evil omen. In German mythology, the sun and the moon are married. One rules the day while the other the night. When the moon is lonely, he’s drawn to his bride and they come together to create a solar eclipse.”

She looked at him frankly. “You know a weird amount about eclipses.”

“I like to impress you.”

“Is this why you were so late getting back to the hotel this morning? Research? My coffee was cold.”

“But are you impressed?”

“I wasn’t impressed by the coffee…”

Mulder gave her a long look, the odd light turning her hair a hazy copper wool.

“I like the German one best,” she finally said, plunking her glasses back on and leaning back to gaze at the sky.

“Me too,” Mulder said.

More long minutes of silence between them with the occasional car whooshing past on the roadway. Mall security drove by them slowly and Mulder gave the rent-a-cop a small salute. It was impossible to see Scully with the glasses on, so he kept taking them off.

“You’re going to permanently burn your macula,” Scully said from beside him, not taking her eyes off the welkin of the heavens above them.

He ran his eyes over the brushstroke of freckles on her nose. She was goddess-like; as luminous as a star. If he was the moon, he’d chase her through the sky, too.

“You lose enough photoreceptors you won’t pass your next firearms recertification.”

He was tempted to tell her that in all the years he’d known her, her shine hadn’t damaged anything but his poor, lonely heart, but pulled his glasses back down and looked to the sun. It was nearly covered.

He sighed and felt her hand reach for his. His heart beat hard once against his sternum.

“You can take them off during the totality,” she said, squeezing. “And should. It’s supposed to be incredible.”

“You ever seen it?” He asked her quietly. She was still holding onto his hand.

“I missed the one in ‘79.”

“Me too,” he said.

Around them, the air had taken on a distinct chill and the light shining down had grown metallic. Next to the car, in the long shadows of the trees along the edge of the mall driveway appeared little crescents. The colors on the mall’s signage dimmed and brightened. Mulder sat up and pulled his glasses off and blinked, shaking his head. The world felt odd, he couldn’t properly adjust his vision. It felt decidedly like the moment after someone takes your picture with a bright flash.

Scully still held his hand and squeezed it.

“It’s called the Purkinje effect,” she said calmly, pulling off her own glasses with her other hand, and looking around with a wondrous smile. “As we near totality and the light dims, our eyes transition from photopic vision–which uses the retina’s cone cells to deliver full colors and fine detail–toward scotopic night vision, which relies on rod cells to detect objects in low light. When the light’s intensity dims in an eclipse, colors with longer wavelengths like red will look darker as the cones become less active. But rods are sensitive to shorter blue-green wavelengths, and those colors will appear to shine. It’s not just you. It’s the rod and cone cells in your eyes trying to make sense of the sudden dimness.”

Scully put her glasses back on and looked up at the eclipse. Mulder felt a surge of something so like love that his eyes burned.

Scully pulled in a sudden inhale of breath.

“The totality,” she said, pulling off her glasses and gazing up. “It’s starting.”

Mulder raised his eyes to the heavens. The world was dusk-like, the stars in the top of the dome of the heavens were winking on. In the bushes nearby, crickets began to chirp.

The eclipse itself was like nothing he’d seen before outside of a big budget movie. The moon was utter blackness, but along the upper edge of the eclipsed sun was a hot pink half-ring that erupted into a single bring spot along the edge of the moon’s shadow like the diamond in a giant engagement ring formed by the rest of the sun’s atmosphere.

And then the flaming plasma of corona as the moon reached complete totality. Second contact. It was a living thing. Streams of white light danced around the ring of the black moon. Scully gasped in pleasure and Mulder couldn’t help but exclaim: “Wow!”

He pulled his eyes from the eclipse itself and looked around. Along the entire horizon, all 360 degrees of it, was in full, brilliant sunset. Everything else was the darkness of post golden-hour. He turned toward his partner and locked eyes with her. Her smile was brilliant, and she held his gaze for only a moment before canting her face back to the eclipse itself.

“This is incredible,” she said breathlessly.

He had found, as the years of their partnership wound on, that their job turned them into ecstatics, subject to mystical experiences. This was perhaps the most transcendent of them all. He would remember the moment forever.

“It is,” he agreed.

A sharp flash, and Scully squeezed his hand.

“Third contact,” she said. “Put your glasses back on.”

He did as she asked, and they leaned back and watched in silence as the moon continued its journey, as the sky relit and the nighttime animals calmed, as the world came back to itself.

Eventually, Scully sat up. The light was still odd, seeming to come almost from inside her, and she lowered her glasses and leaned in to him. For a heady, divine moment, Mulder thought she was about to kiss him, but instead she pressed her cool lips to his cheek, her hair falling down to brush along the skin of his jaw.

“Thank you, Mulder,” she said, and then straightened, the cool air rushing to fill the space she’d just been.

“You’re welcome, Scully,” he said, his voice a little rough. He lowered his glasses slowly and watched her slide off the hood of the car, watched her stretch and smile to herself; a Mona Lisa grin gently stretching the planes of a face with the same faultless symmetry of the celestial bodies sliding across the sky.

#the x files #fanfic #my fic #ficlet #prompt #msr #please forgive the scientific/historical/canon inaccuracies #i really should have been working

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theconstantsidekick · 9 months ago

Text

Captain America: Civil War ft. Static (9) | s.r

Pairings: Steve Rogers x Stark!Reader, Tony Stark x Stark!Reader (siblings)

Genre: Angst city babyyyy

Summary: Zemo has a revelation in store for the Stark siblings, and suffice it to say neither of them takes very kindly to being betrayed by someone they had once trusted with their life.

(These scenes incorporate y/n, codename—Static, into the pre-existing story as a character without making drastic changes to the plot or mythos. All the major plot points from the MCU remain in place with the addition of the reader as Static, who is not only a Stark but also enhanced. Whatever events from the canon aren’t mentioned, take place without much change.)

Warnings: Swearing, Mentions of Past Trauma, Canon Typical Violence, Accident?

a/n: My writing speed is that of a fucking turtle.

“Ross has no idea I'm here. I'd like to keep it that way. Otherwise, I gotta arrest myself,” she hears Tony’s voice ring out somewhere ahead.

“Well, that sounds like a lot of paperwork,” she can hear Steve’s desperation for truce in his response.

Y/n can glitch in right now. She’s at the end of the corridor, a couple of steps and she’ll be with them. But not yet. She’s desperate for there to be a solid sign of the truce. She isn’t sure she can watch her brother and the man she loves with her body and soul fight any more. It’s been tearing her apart.

The truce—even a temporary one—is all she can hope for. And apparently good things come to those who wait.

“It's good to see you, Tony.” Steve adds finally.

“You too, Cap.” Tony responds. A smile breaks out on her face. “Hey, Manchurian Candidate, you're killing me. There's a truce here. You can drop the…” she hears Tony say and she knows that is the right moment.

Sergeant Barnes lowers his weapon and the moment he does, she miscalculates by an inch and glitches in just behind him.

“Am I interrupting something?”

The progression of Sergeant Barnes’ gun changes instantly. It’s aimed at her within the second. The response time on the man is beyond absurd. She’d go as far as to say it’s impressive if she weren’t, you know? Whatever, you get it.

Her hands fly up. “Easy there, Sergeant!”

“What the hell are you doing here?” Tony asks from where he’s standing down the stairs, in front of Steve.

Slowly, with her hands still up, she descends down the stairs to stand between the two most important men in her life. “What the fuck does that even mean? You thought I was going to leave you two alone after the shit you’ve been pulling in the last 72 hours?”

“I didn’t think you’d come,” Steve adds, with a hint of hope in his words. If she were looking his way, she’s sure she could spot the curve of his lips forming the most subtle smile. She absolutely loves seeing that smile… but she doesn’t really wanna look his way, in the general direction of the man right behind Steve.

“I wish I hadn’t, then I wouldn’t have a gun pointed at me,” she retorts, eyes straight ahead, staring at the slimy gray walls of the HYDRA facility.

“Are you—” Tony takes a step closer to her, “Are you trying not to make eye-contact with Barnes?”

Her hands are still up as she’s facing Tony, “Yeah, no. I’m trying not to even look in his general direction. I’m still pretty scared of him.” She turns to the Sergeant but her eyes are locked on a spot on the floor that seems particularly interesting right now. “I’m extremely sorry, Sergeant Barnes, I mean no offense by this,” she looks to Steve, “but can you please make him put the gun down, it’s really not helping.”

“Bucky,” is all Steve has to say and instantly the gun’s down. It’s like whatever trance the Sergeant was in has broken. .

“I really am sorry,” she tries to tell him, looking vaguely in his direction. “It’s purely instinctual. It’ll fade… eventually. But for now…”

“I—” Sergeant Barnes tries but she cuts him off.

“We’ll talk about this, but not here and definitely not now.” Sergeant Barnes just nods slowly. Satisfied, she looks back at her brother and her boyfriend, “Let’s focus on stopping Zemo for now, rest we can figure out when time comes.”

With that sorted, all four of them begin making their way slowly down the corridor.

“I got heat signatures,” Tony comments.

“How many?” Steve asks.

“Uh, one,” Tony offers after a moment of consideration.

That makes Y/n halt her steps. Something’s off. She can feel something off. There’s a presence she can’t put her finger on. Not Zemo. Something else.

“What’s wrong?” Sergeant Barnes asks her.

She thinks it over for a second and then, “Nothing.”

As they walk into the vast chamber the lights come on. There are capsules in front of them, attached to the wall each one containing an enhanced soldier from the 1991 experiments. Hazy, yellow mist descends within the capsules. However, the bullet holes on the glass enclosures is what scares the shit out of her.

“They’re… They’re dead,” Y/n notes.

There’s a short crackle and a voice sounds out from the speakers. “If it’s any comfort, they died in their sleep.” It’s Zemo. Her eyes fly from Tony to Steve who seem to be having the same realization. “Did you really think I wanted more of you?”

“What the hell?” Sergeant Barnes questions under her breath.

“I’m grateful to them, though. They brought you here.” Zemo appears in a control room.

Before Y/n can warn him against it, Steve hurls his shield at him but it ricochets easily against the chamber and comes flying back to Steve.

“Please, Captain,” Zemo’s voice is laced with a smirk. “The Soviets built this chamber to withstand the launch blast of UR-100 rockets.”

“I’m betting I could beat that,” Tony retorts, walking closer.

“Oh, I’m sure you could Mr. Stark… Given time,” Zemo taunts. “But then you’d never know why you came.”

“You killed innocent people in Vienna just to bring us here?” Steve questions Zemo from across the glass window of the chamber.

Zemo, fucking, smirks.

It should terrify her, and to some extent it does. But there’s something in his eyes, something so familiar to her that she can’t believe she’s seeing it reflected back. She’s seen that look in her own eyes in the mirror for decades.

It’s fire. It’s fire and it’s rage and it’s as personal as it can get.

“I thought about nothing else for over a year. I studied you. I followed you. But now that you’re standing here, I just realized… there’s a bit of green in the blue of your eyes,” Zemo notes, and fuck if that doesn’t creep the shit out of her. “How nice to find a flaw.”

“You’re Sokovian,” Steve notes. “Is that what this is about?”

“Sokovia was a failed state long before you blew it to hell. No.” Zemo dismisses the assessment so easily, so carelessly, it’s making all the damn alarm bells go off in her system. “I'm here because I made a promise.”

Steve studies Zemo for a second and then,, “You lost someone?”

His eyes darken.

Y/n knows that feeling, this feeling. She knows it through and through.

Zemo clicks his tongue, then, “I lose everyone. And so will you.” He presses something on the console to his right. Instantly the computer on Steve’s right lights up. Something flashes on screen, Y/n can’t help herself, getting more curious by every passing word of the conversation, she walks over to Steve, to the computer.

16 Декабрь 1991

She… she’s not sure how to…

What’s happening?

This isn’t—this isn’t…

“An empire toppled by its enemies can rise again. But one which crumbles from within? That’s dead…” Zemo’s words are dangerous.

“Anthony,” is all that Y/n can choke out. It’s probably her tone, and the use of his full name that brings Tony rushing over to her side.

She reaches for his hand. Instinctually, Tony disassembles his armor from his hand so he can hold hers.

When Tony looks at the freeze frame of a secluded road and the date on the tape, December 16 1991, his eyes rove with anxiety. “I know that road. What is this?”

As the tape begins to play, the horror unfolds in front of her eyes. She watches unable to breathe with an iron grip on the Iron Man.

She watches the car crash, she watches Howard Stark plead only to be shocked at the face of his assailant. She watches as her bloodied-up best friend, the person who saved her, the person who gave her a home—the person who gave her a family—is struck in the head with a metal arm. She watches on as Howard’s body slumps, falling to the ground lifelessly. His corpse is then dragged back and placed in the driver’s seat of the car.

Then the assailant moves on to the next target, the collateral damage, Maria. He walks over to the passenger seat of the car where Maria is calling for Howard. She watches Maria plead for help but help doesn’t arrive. Instead, expressionless, the assailant chokes the life out of her. Maria Stark dies. The kindest woman she’s ever known in her life is drained of her life and left like trash at the corner of an unnamed road.

The Winter Soldier then walks up and aims the gun at the surveillance camera and shoots it.

The screen goes black.

Y/n had some semblance of an idea that perhaps yes, Howard and Maria Stark’s death wasn’t an ordinary accident. She’d desperately begged Peggy to look into it, with Thompson and Souza. They had and gave it the all clear.

But in this moment, she thinks—she realizes, perhaps she always knew the truth and was too afraid to look into it. Because if not then, why didn’t she investigate it herself? Back then she’d given herself the excuse that Tony needed her more than the investigation. She’d told herself that she’d be too biased to conduct a sound inquiry. Her feelings would’ve gotten the entire thing too muddled up and messy. She told herself it was the smarter thing to maintain distance.

That was all horseshit.

She was a scared little kid on the streets of Madripoor once again. She’d lost her family and was walking around without a place to call home and the thought of having to fight HYDRA on top of that would’ve been too much. She’d looked the other way, let things slide, let the murder of her only family slide on account of being a fucking pussy.

And now, she has to confront the truth.

“Did you know?” Tony asks Steve somewhere behind her.

She can’t take her eyes off the now black screen.

“I didn’t know it was him,” Steve answers.

“Don’t bullshit me, Rogers! Did you know?”

There’s silence for a few seconds, a long, long few seconds, and then, “Yes.”

That—now that makes Y/n turn.

She only catches Steve’s eyes for a second, before Tony’s punching Steve and reengaging the Iron Man helmet.

More things happen, the fight’s broken out, she’s sure more shit goes down but something just pricked her in the back of her neck and she’s feeling a little dizzy. Everything feels… so fucking heavy.

Y/n can still hear the commotion from the fight between the men but it seems distant.

“My apologies, Miss Stark, you imbalance the scales too much,” Zemo’s voice rings out on the speaker. “You’ll be back in the game in just a little while.”

“You ever plan on opening your eyes, sleeping beauty?

“What have you got against my happiness, you cruel, cruel man?”

“I’m not the one who wanted to do this, remember?”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re an ass?” She dragged herself out of the passenger seat of the car. Stretching to unfold her joints, she shoved the man next to her just for the fun of it.

“I’ve got a list of ‘em under my bed, you want to be the latest addition?” He threw back with a smile. Say what you will about the man, but no one can ever deny that Howard Stark had a killed smile.

“Smart ass,” she chided him without much heat.

“Yeah, yeah. Tell me something new,” he retorted, hand waved in dismissal. “You ever gonna tell me why we’re here? As far as I recall, I was promised the best bachelor party known to mankind.”

She rolled her eyes. “I didn’t promise jackshit, dickwad. I told you we were going to Atlantic City, the rest you made up all in your head, all by your lonesome.”

“What’s a man supposed to think when his best friend tells him that the bachelor party road trip is going to be to Atlantic City?” He pulled a box of cigarettes from his pocket. He put the cigarette between his lips and lit it.

They were leaning on their broken down car, parked on the beach—parked, however would be a generous term. They’d pushed it off the highway onto the beach as a makeshift camp site. The sun was setting ahead of them, slowly being swallowed up by the waves. The wind blew in their faces, as the cars passed by behind them. It made the shit-show of a road trip seem almost worth it… if you didn’t include their car breaking down in the middle and having to push it for a couple miles. Yeah, pretty worth it apart from that one slight glitch.

“I’m your best friend?” She asked, absolutely confused.

Howard just looked at her once before breaking out in maniac laughter. “What sorta question is that?”

“A genuine one,” she told him, serious as ever. “Howie, you serious? I’m your best friend?”

“Yeah, Stark! Obviously you’re my best friend, who else?” He replied, still laughing his ass off.

“Any fucking body, man. Even Jarvis seems like a more likely option than… me,” she answered.

“That’s some horse shit, Stark and you know it! We live together, we work together, we shit together, eat together. I don’t think I’ve seen anyone’s face as much as I’ve seen yours in the last couple years. You’ve got my last name, damn it. Who the fuck else would be my best friend?” He was looking at her then, genuinely concerned. He seemed like she was asking him if the moon truly revolved around the Earth.

“I… I thought all that—all that’s shit you have to live through cause Peggy dumped me on you,” she provided meekly.

That apparently irked him some. “You think I do all that shit with you cause of Peggy?” He asked.

She nodded in a simple reply.

That apparently was not the right move.

He threw the cigarette to the ground, quite angry now, “Why the fuck would I? I’m not a saint and you know it. I never have been. You could count all my good deeds on one hand and all of them had a selfish reason behind it.” He began to pace.

“What was the reason behind this one?”

He looked at her, eyes wide in astonished fury. “The reason behind letting you into my life was that you are by far the only person who understands me. You are the only person I have ever met who’s never asked me to mold myself into something I’m not, while simultaneously encouraging me to be better. You’ve been in my corner, without hesitation and you’ve ripped me a new one when I’ve been wrong. You, Stark, are the only person I’ve ever met who is able to make me believe I am a good man, and understand that I can be better!” He seemed like he was about to blow a gasket. “People see me, see an ass and let me be. You are probably the only person who looks at me and sees the complexities, the entire picture of me as a man. No one gets me, Stark, not even me… Not like you do.

“At the end of the day, sharing a beer with you, working on cars with you, bitching about S.H.I.E.L.D. with you, that shit keeps me sane. Part of me’s so fucking glad you quit, cause now you’re not gone for days on end for stupid fucking missions. Cause then I get to sit with you and chat about absolutely nothing.” He was still pacing. “You really thought I did all that out of the goodness of my heart? You think I gave you my name cause Peggy asked me to?”

She nodded again, which again was apparently not the right call.

“FUCK, Stark! If I were such a giver I would’ve joined the fucking Red Cross! I gave you my name cause you are my family, damn it!”

“Oh.”

“Oh?!” He raged, not pacing anymore. Facing her, he asked, “That’s all you got?”

She thought for a second, looked over at the man who was standing in front of her, wearing a t-shirt and jeans like any normal dude. The last time she saw the man without a suit and tie was a long time ago, he looked much less of a dick this way.

“We came here for, i don’t know, for something like a… a last hurrah. I found a place downtown. That and—” she was cut off.

“What?” Howard Stark looked like someone had just punched him in the gut.

“I found a place downtown,” she told him. “Gimme a week or so, I’ll be out before the wedding.”

“What?”

She hesitated, “I’d be out sooner but I don’t really own… furniture?”

“WHAT?”

She didn’t know how to respond to this line of questioning anymore. “What do you mean what?”

“Is this about what happened? If you’re mad at me, which you have every right to be, let’s fight it out. Punch me if you want, Stark. I’ll take it!” He looked so desperate, it threw her for a spin.

“No! No, this isn’t about that,” she told him, because it’s not.

“Then why else would you talk about moving out?” He didn’t let her answer. He took a couple steps towards her. He fumbled with his words, going back and forth before he looked at her and said, “Look, I understand what I did… I wa—I was way out of line. But I am truly sorry, Stark. I promise you, it will never happen again. I… My head wasn’t in the right place. I thought if I found something—no I don’t know. I thought I could help. You were struggling with controlling your powers, so I thought maybe I could find something to help you with it. I thought I’d tell you if I found something, and if I didn’t then… Then no harm done, right?” He seemed beyond desperate.

“It’s not about that, Howie.”

“Come on! I know you’re pissed at me! Just say it!”

She walked past him, with her back to him and her face to the ocean ahead, she replied, “I am not pissed at you, Howie…”

“Don’t bullshit me.”

She exhaled deeply. “I’m hurt, not pissed.”

“Is that why you want to move out?” He asked, his voice small.

She turned to him then, “What? No! You’re my best friend, dickwad. I ain’t ditching you cause you did something profoundly stupid?”

“I’m your best friend?” Howard asked.

She rolled her eyes. “Fuck off, asshat.”

He took a step towards her. “No, seriously. I thought, after what I pulled…”

“You were an ass, yes. It was a breach of trust and like I said, I am… I’m pretty hurt… But that’s got nothing to do with any of this.”

“Then?”

“You’re getting married, man. I can’t keep crashing on your couch once your wife’s around,” she explained. “How is she gonna feel?”

“Elated,” he answered easily. Before she could argue, continued, “I think Maria is more excited about sharing the place with you than me. Something about you being a better cook or whatever.” He leaned on the car again, pulling out a fresh cigarette, he lit it.

“Oh so it’ll be you, your wife and the freeloader on the couch? One big happy family?” She was frankly really confused about the entire arrangement.

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right. I’ve never bought groceries a day in my life, and yet the fridge is always stocked. You’re the farthest thing from a freeloader, Stark. And besides, I’m not as big a dumbass as you think I am, you know? I’m not gonna make her move into my room that shares a wall with yours.”

“Then?” She asked, motioning him to pass the cigarette to her. She took a drag.

“I live in a mansion, you idiot. We’ll move into the master-bedroom, like God fucking intended I’ll turn my old room into my lab, which let’s be honest is already my lab, and we’ll be fine and dandy!” He took the offered cigarette from her hand and took a drag himself.

“Oh…”

“You really didn’t think I had a plan?” He asked with the smirk audible in his words.

She shook her head, “I thought moving out would be the kinder, smarter thing to do.”

“How?”

“I’d be done burdening you and it’d be less humiliating than you finding me a place as a way of politely telling me to fuck off,” she offered.

He looked at her again, “If after all these years you don’t already know that place is your home, then I have been doing something seriously wrong.”

Somewhere behind them, up the hill on the road, a car was parked as the two passengers were yelling out their names from inside it. It was Jarvis and Maria, calling out to them. She and Howard had called them asking for help once they knew their car couldn’t be saved even with the joint acumen of both friends.

They both turned at their names being yelled out. Looking back at the site of Maria waving at them, Howard’s head fell. “I really have been doing it wrong, haven’t I?”

She motioned for both of them to park the car and join them on the beach before turning to Howard. “You’ve been doing just fine.”

“I shouldn’t have lied to you about the experiments,” he stood up straighter. “If you want to move out because of all that shit, I understand. I’ll get you a place in New York, not too close but not too far either. And you don’t gotta worry about any furniture or any of that shit. I’ll get it sorted.” He turned over to Jarvis and Maria who were walking down the hill to them. “Hey Jarvis, what was the name of my realtor?” He shouted.

She punched him on the shoulder, hard.

“OWW! What was that for?”

“For betraying my trust and conducting experiments on my blood without my consent,” she told him, his face sobered instantly. So she punched him again.

“FUCK ME! WHAT WAS THAT FOR?”

“Thinking I cared for you so little that betraying me would change the fact that you’re my best friend.”

“What in God’s name are the two of you doing?” Maria asked as she and Jarvis finally came to stand in front of them.

“Oh I was just about to ask Stark if I can punch for thinking you and I were going to kick her out,” Howard told Maria while looking at her with a smirk.

“You’re welcome to try.” She told him.

But Maria intervened, “What kind of nonsense is that? Why the hell would you move out?” Her tone is so stern it throws her off. “You’re family.”

And just like that, it was settled.

Y/n was a Stark.

When she wakes up, all she can hear is Steve’s voice ringing in her ears.

‘Don’t bullshit me, Rogers! Did you know?’

‘Yes’

Her eyes couldn’t focus. Try as she might, her head is too heavy for her vision to be anything but blurry. Everything’s too heavy. She tries to stand, but the weight of her bones seem so foreign, she can barely flip herself onto her stomach.

But then, she hears something. The sound of a metal clashing into metal.

And a yelp. Tony’s yelp.

That’s a war cry.

With whatever little strength she can muster up, she pushes herself off the ground. Stumbling across the hall, struggling to make her way through the broken pieces of concrete, she gets to the end of the corridor, to the sight of her brother, on his knees, being tag teamed by Sergeant Barnes and Steve Rogers.

Suffice it, all hell breaks loose.

Her armor is up within the second.

Instantly she glitches in front of Tony, between the two super soldiers. Punching Barnes in the throat, her focus lands on Steve.

“Y/n,” Steve tries, stumbling back.

“Steve,” she speaks evenly, as she takes a step towards him.

“Y/n, he didn’t know,” his words are haphazard, confused. He keeps stepping back, trying to put distance between himself and her.

She’s not going to let him go that easily. “Uh-huh.”

“HYDRA had brainwashed him,” Steve says.

Her fists clench.

“You know what that’s like, don’t you?”

And that—well, he shouldn’t have said that.

The first punch she throws lands straight on his jaw. She even hears it crack.

“Y/n,” he tries again, stumbling back.

“Talking part’s over, Rogers.” The second hit lands directly to his gut. He falls to his knees, she grabs his collar, dragging him upright, she hits him, and then hits him again, and again. As she’s going for another hit, a metal arm wraps around her wrist—halting her in the process.

Turning she faces Barnes. Knees him in the side, waits for him to recoil, for the hurt and lands a gorgeous uppercut. She grabs him by his shirt to keep him from falling. Pulling him back, she knees his other side, elbows him right to the face, once, twice, thrice before he blocks her.

He tries to land a hit to her side but she dodges easily. He’s using his right arm, instead of the metal one. It’s Barnes fighting her right now, not The Winter Soldier. She aims a kick to his temple but is blocked by Steve before she can land it. He pulls her by her leg, ready to throw her to the other side of the room only to get her off Barnes. He thinks she’s targeting him, that Barnes is her focus, the main subject of her anger.

He couldn’t be more wrong.

Mid motion of Steve yanking her off, she glitches out of his hand easily. She glitches in, less than a second later, only a couple steps ahead of him.

He yelps, shaking off his hand. The contact of his hand on her leg sent a bolt of electricity through his hand. She’s brimming with so much power right now, she’s kind of impressed with him still standing. He eyes her. She can see a confusion of determination and.. Fear.

It makes her a little cocky.

With a clenched jaw and a slight tilt of her head, she challenges both men to do their worst.

Steve attacks her from the left side, while Barnes takes her on from the right. It’s hubris at its best. Steve Rogers is holding back because he believes he’s stronger, he believes he might hurt her. Sergeant Barnes is afraid to even have the fight, he’s only fighting to protect his best friend. But otherwise, he’s ridden with guilt—guilt of killing Howard and Maria, guilt of all the people he killed when he was brainwashed by HYDRA, the guilt of torturing her relentlessly under HYDRA’s mind control. Barnes is fighting with his heart, not his head.

Both men have made the crucial and substantial error of pissing her off.

She reads their attacks easily, dodging most and letting Barnes hit Steve by just moving out of the way or using Steve’s momentum to land a punch on Barnes. Their fight pattern is old and boring, just like them. Barnes manages to land a hit to her leg, she gives it back to him two folds by wrapping her thighs around his throat and throwing him through the ground. Steve on the other hand barely manages to land a hit to her gut.

“Ugh!” She yells out, and the man halts instantly.

“Are you okay?” Steve asks, more out of habit than anything else.

Fucking idiot, she thinks, before kicking him straight in the chest. He stumbles back and falls on his ass. Furious at his naivete, he’s back on his feat instantly. With Barnes in toe, they jump back in on her.

But she sees them coming a mile away every single time—that’s the curse of fighting with your heart. It makes you predictable… if you know the person you’re up against.

There’s a hold, Steve’s shield against her punches, while the other hand’s occupied dodging attacks from Barnes. Steve looks at her then, right in the eyes before speaking between her punches, “Never thought you’d use it against me when I taught it to you.”

Belatedly, and only once the words leave Steve’s mouth does she realize that the move was his, he taught it to her on a sweet summery evening. They were covered in sweat and it felt sweeter than sin when one thing led to another and he’d tackled her to the ground for a completely different purpose altogether. She can practically feel her blood run cold.

The irony is, she would look back on this moment later and realise, that right now she’s doing the same fucking thing as the boys—fighting with her heart, with all the fire that’s burning inside of that small fragile little organ that her head doesn’t have a fucking chance against it. And unfortunately she doesn’t realize it until she makes the mistake of ignoring Barnes’ left arm. The metal arm.

Barnes lands blow right to her chest, the force of his super strength along with the metal fucking arm courtesy of HYDRA, sends her flying across the room. Her head hits the wall before she falls to the ground.

Her consciousness comes and goes, but she can swear she can hear Tony cursing at what she presumes are the offending party, Barnes and Rogers. But she can’t be too sure, the world seems to be slipping from her, like sand through her fingers.

“I know you always do, but I’ll say it just for my peace of mind—look out for Tony, will you?” Maria asked with such trepidation that one would think she genuinely was afraid the answer could ever possibly be anything except yes… AS IF.

But Y/n just nodded.

Maria nodded as well and then looking back she placed a kiss on Tony’s cheek.

“We’ll back by Monday morning,” Howard informed her, a little hesitant.

“Enjoy the fucking Bahamas,” Y/n had replied with a substantial amount of bitterness. She never appreciated it when they—more pointedly Howard—left Tony behind, so the bitterness came quite easily. And somehow it became the last thing she ever said to the two people who (along with Tony) constituted her entire family.

Her eyes open because of the sheer brightness of it. Her concussed brain cannot fathom what could possibly be radiating so much light. Until her eyes focus, then she sees it. Tony’s blast against Steve’s shield.

It breaks her heart.

Then they’re fighting again. Steve’s falling heavy on Tony. With emotions running so high, she’s sure Tony’s not quite focused on his training. He’s probably relying on F.R.I.D.A.Y. to examine his fight patterns. She wants to help, but her head feels heavy, like there’s a leak in it. Stretching a hand with all her might, she touches the offending leak on the back of her head and apparently it really is a leak, because when she brings her hand back in front of her, it’s covered in red.

She looks around for Barnes then, suddenly very worried for Tony’s safety. She can’t protect him from both of them if she’s injured. But when she spots him lying on the ground, left shoulder armless and in ruins, all her fear fades away and she’s only left with pity.

When she looks back at Tony, he’s turned the tides. Steve’s on the floor on his knees in front of him.

“He's my friend,” she hears Steve say in between heavy breaths. But even on his feet with Tony looming over him, Steve Rogers sounds nothing but determined.

“So was I,” Tony replies… heartbroken.

Tony punches him again, then again and then throws him off to the side. “Stay down. Final warning,” he warns, blasters pointed at Steve.

Steve struggles to his feet, his face bloody and his gate weary. He raises his fists and stares Tony down, “I can do this all day.”

Iron man raises his left palm ready to fire. Bucky grabs his leg and Tony spins, kicking him in the face. Steve grabs Iron Man and lifts him over his head, then throws him down, punches him and bashes his mask off with his shield before striking down hard on the suit's core.Tony looks horrified and glowers fearfully at Steve who pants for breath. Both have blood spattered across their faces. Steve looks back at Tony then shuts his eyes and slumps down.

Later, much much later she’ll realize Steve had slammed the shield onto the arc reactor at the center of Tony’s suit on purpose. She doesn’t know that right now. Right now it’s too late, she sees red.

Slowly and then all at once the ground begins to shake. All three men are confused for a second until it clicks, for Barnes before either of her two favorite men in her life. Barnes is the one who looks to her for an explanation for what could very easily be a natural calamity. The other two follow eventually.

“Y/n,” Steve tries.

But like she’s already pointed out, it’s too fucking late. She’s radiating power, too much of it. Only when the men begin covering their eyes does she realize she’s radiating light, too much of it. She’s on her feet, levitating, inches above the ground.

“Doll,” Steve tries again. He shouldn’t have.

Her hands clench and the building begins shaking.

Steve takes a few steps towards her, with something akin to love in his eyes perhaps but she doesn’t much care for it now. “Doll, you gotta hear me out.”

“No…” she thinks aloud, “No I don’t.” She lets her hands go free, there’s a wave of energy that explodes from her, it's bright and it’s pink and it’s pure unadulterated power. The walls begin to crack, pieces of the structure begin to fall and all she can do is relish the horror in Steve’s eyes as the realization of her strength dawns on him.

The sky above them becomes more visible as the building and its miscellaneous parts fall away, and the sky is a soft shade of pink. She’s moving each and every part of their surroundings, even the clouds. They’re rubbing against each other, thunder crackling above them. There’s heat in her power, just as much as there is inside her. She’s burning with it, she wants to burn Steve with it as well.

How fucking dare he raise that shield against Tony? Against Howard’s son? After everything he did for Steve? After everything Tony did for Steve? After everything she did for him… after all her love?

How fucking dare he?

Her armor is up in a second and she hits the ground. Before Steve can even comprehend what’s happening, she manifests her blade, before he can register it, she’s shoving away Barnes who had stepped in to protect his best friend, before he can even react, her blade is glowing bright and pink inches from his eyes, already at his throat.

“Y/n,” Tony calls out, and his voice is the only thing between her and the death of Captain America at her hands.

It takes everything in her to not give in, to not slide her blade a little further, it’s already cutting in, drawing a drop of blood. She watches it trickle down onto his uniform. It breaks her heart, it breaks her apart. She loved this man, she loves this man, body and soul. She is his, even now. She doesn’t know how to not be his. She doesn’t know how to stop loving him, she is not sure she wants to, even now. But this is the cost of betrayal.

Barnes tries to step in, but he’s quite broken already. Moreover, he’s not her sinner. She glitches away with Steve only a couple steps away. Barnes is about to try again when she presses the blade further in, only by a millimeter but it draws more blood and Barnes backs down immediately. He looks to Tony, hopelessly.

“Y/n,” Tony begins. “Let him go.” His voice is broken and strained as it takes everything in him to get back on his feet.

“Why?” She challenges. She’s raging, there’s so much inside her, so much brimming just under her skin, she’s electrified by it. The ground beneath her feet is shaking well enough that it’s cracking. They should be running, all of them should be running. Outside they can hear the structure crumbling to the ground, pieces of the building are falling all around them too.

“Because you love him, Y/n,” he tells her easily. There is no urgency in his voice, there is no fear either. He’s not worried about getting buried under the rubble, he’s not particularly worried about Steve either, she thinks. He’s speaking as if he’s just stating a fact, and a fact it is. “You love him so damn much.”

“So?” She watches Steve wince at her response, which wouldn’t throw her off all that much but he hadn’t even flinched when she’d first placed the blade against his throat.

“So?” Tony throws back, his voice rumbling alongside the thundering clouds. It’ll begin raining any second now. “So it’ll kill you to kill him.”

“He deserves it,” she tells Tony, because he fucking does.

“I know,” Tony acquiesce. “But you don’t. It’ll break you, Y/n. And I can’t… I can’t lose you too….”

She knows he’s right. If she kills him right here, right now, and she could, she really fucking could, Tony would lose her because she well and truly loves this man more than she needs air to breathe. Because with every one of her responses she watches his heart break and while it felt like vengeance, her heart is aching knowing that she caused it.

What the fuck does that even mean? She wants him to hurt, like he’s hurt her but causing him pain hurts her more than it harms him so what even is the fucking point?

What in the fuck is the motherfucking point?

“Fuck!” She curses.

She looks at Tony, covered in wounds and blood, who, just like her, is raging with anger only kept at bay out of reverence for her. He shakes his head.

“FUCK!” She yells out, another wave of power pulsing out of her, breaking the entire foundation of the building at once. And then swiftly, she pushes Steve away and rushes over to her brother, shouldering his weight.

Behind her, she hears Steve take a step towards her, but is stopped in his tracks when an entire staircase falls in front of him, blocking his path. It’s for the best. “Get out,” Tony tells him. “Get the fuck out of our lives, Rogers.” She doesn’t turn to look at Steve’s face at his words. She doesn’t want to know.

Steve begins leaving, helping Barnes up and shouldering his weight.

There’s rubble falling all around them when Tony calls out one last time. “That shield doesn't belong to you. My father made that shield!”

“You don't deserve it,” she says it only as a whisper but she knows he can hear it clear as day.

Steve stops, raises his chin, then drops the shield and walks away with Bucky's arm around his shoulder.

Before the entire thing can collapse on their heads, Y/n glitches Tony and herself outside, near his jet.

It begins raining. It’s not supposed to rain this time of year in Siberia, but with the amount of energy Y/n has let escape into the sky, the clouds had very little say on the matter.

They sit there on the snow, under the rain and watch as the building crumbles to the ground. It’s a fucking mess.

It’s silent but the animosity in the air is clear.

She knows he hates her right now and she can’t blame him all that much to be honest.

“You should have let me kill him,” she tells him.

Tony scoffs. “You should have let me kill Barnes.”

“Wasn’t his fucking fault he was brainwashed. He probably didn’t even remember till Zemo showed him the fucking tape. But Steve… he knew, and he lied to us.”

“You got great taste in men.”

Her jaw clenched, “You should have let me kill him then.”

“What would be the point?”

She doesn’t know the answer. But the terse tone of his voice is proof enough that a part of him blames her for it too. And well, he should. She could’ve done so much more about it all but instead she chose to fall for the man who lied to them about the death of their family. Of course he hates her. She hates herself.

Her phone chimes. Reluctantly she checks it. “Fuck,” she curses.

“Let me guess, in another 5 minutes I’m about to get a text from dear old Theadore about how he’s on his way ready to rain down hellfire?” Tony questions, clearly rhetorically. When she doesn’t respond, Tony clenches his jaw and says, “Get out of here, I’ll take care of it.”

“Tony,” she tries.

“Get out of here, Y/n!” Is all he says as he gets up and begins making his way inside his jet.

She stands there for a second, soaking in the rain, letting the snow beneath her feet burn her cold. And then she glitches away.

Read the next part here, Find the series masterlist here. Find other Static Verse works here.

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dreaminginthedeepsouth · 3 days ago

Text

An upwelling of outrage spreads across America

January 29, 2025

Robert B. Hubbell

Trump plunged America into chaos on Tuesday as the implications of his unconstitutional “freeze” on federal grants and loans began to sink in. In a gigantic miscalculation, Trump risked driving the US economy into a tailspin that would take years to overcome.

Or not.

Trump has the opportunity to blink (voluntarily or involuntarily)—but that window is closing rapidly. There are three offramps to this crisis caused by his illegal “freeze” on all federal grants and loans:

Public outrage will force Trump to retreat. A massive upwelling of public outrage is spreading across America. It may take a day or two for MAGA members of Congress to absorb the outrage from their constituents who suddenly realize Trump's thoughtless action has threatened their constituent��s economic security. Millions of Americans have been plunged into uncertainty over government benefits, loans, grants, and payments. They are letting their representatives know how they feel. See Politico, Trump's spending freeze spreads chaos across US. Indivisible has called on congressional Democrats to oppose all nominees until Trump repeals the unconstitutional freeze, saying, “Shut down the Senate.”

The markets may tell Trump to retreat. In a day or two, the money managers on Wall Street will realize that freezing government benefits to seniors, students, veterans, families, government contractors, and people in general will cause a sudden, massive contraction in consumer spending. A shrinking economy will instill fear in the most bullish fund managers. If the markets drop over worries of recession, Trump will hear from the only constituency he fears: Megadonors upset over losses in their portfolios.

Private litigants should be able to obtain an injunction. It is also possible that a judge will pick up a copy of the Constitution and read it. If they do so, they will grant a permanent injunction against Trump's unconstitutional order. On Tuesday, a federal judge granted an “administrative stay,” but that stay was ambiguous and limited. The stay was designed to allow the parties to submit briefing for a hearing next Monday. Moreover, the stay appeared to allow some portions of the “freeze” to remain in effect. See CNN, Judge temporarily blocks part of Trump administration’s plans to freeze federal aid.

Trump attempted to quiet the growing sense of panic by claiming that the freeze would not affect individuals receiving “direct assistance” from the federal government. That assurance is illusory because most federal grants and loans are not paid directly to individuals but rather, are paid through states, federal agencies, and third-party programs that manage federal grants and loans—e.g., Head Start, scientific research grants, federal infrastructure projects, educational subsidies to state schools, programs to support and house veterans.

And despite the assurances from the White House that “direct assistance” to individuals would not be affected, the facts proved otherwise. The Medicaid portal was closed to states (who administer Medicaid funds) for much of the day. See Quartz, Trump Medicaid freeze locks 72 million Americans out of their health insurance. The administration claimed that the shutdown of the Medicaid portal was a “fluke” unrelated to the freeze—a lie so transparent it hurts to repeat it.

Here is the (semi) good news: The Trump administration has already begun to walk-back the reach of the ill-considered freeze, claiming that the following grants and loans are not affected by the freeze: Medicaid, student loans, small business loans, and SNAP food assistance. It is likely that as the media and constituents identify more crucial programs—like food inspection, air traffic control improvements, law enforcement subsidies, veterans’ programs--the administration will make case-by-case exceptions that will swallow the rule.

Although millions of Americans may suffer economic hardship and extreme anxiety in the short term, the financial crisis of withholding hundreds of billions of dollars with no notice may be averted. But the constitutional crisis remains front and center. We cannot allow the constitutional questions to be lost in the understandable focus on the financial implications of Trump's order.

Trump's order is unconstitutional—and it is important that we not lose sight of that fact

Many in the media are downplaying the illegality and unconstitutionality of Trump's “freeze” order. Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC described the illegal order as “controversial.” The New York Times covered the freeze order as a political kerfuffle: “Trump’s ‘Flood the Zone’ Strategy Leaves Opponents Gasping in Outrage.” The NYTimes Editorial Board had nothing to say about Trump's blatant effort to rewrite the Constitution by demoting Congress to an advisory body subject to being overridden on presidential whim.

Congressional Republicans defended the order’s legality. The few Republicans who criticized the order did so only on the ground that it “went too far” in affecting their constituents. Susan Collins said,

I think the administration needs to be more selective and look at it one department at a time, for example. But make sure important direct service programs are not affected.

Here’s the problem with Susan Collins’s analysis: The order is unconstitutional not because it is overbroad but because the president has no authority to freeze funds appropriated by Congress. Period. See ABC News, Trump funding freeze a blatant violation of Constitution, federal law: Legal experts.

As I wrote yesterday, we need to set aside euphemisms and niceties in raising the alarm. Rebecca Solnit (of The Guardian) rose to the challenge with a post on BlueSky:

[T]hat was a coup last night in case no one mentioned that to you. The executive branch seized the power of the purse the Constitution gave to Congress, which is a pretty authoritarian / illegal consolidation of powers move. Time to go yell at your reps, the media, etc.

Senator Angus King of Maine said,

This is a profound constitutional issue. What happened last night is the most direct assault on the authority of Congress, I believe, in the history of the United States.

See Charles P. Pierce, Esquire, Trump’s Federal Grant Freeze Looks Like an Assault on the Authority of Congress.

The grassroots organization Indivisible likewise pulled no punches with a special alert to its members, headlined: Trump’s Dictatorial Power Grab: Chaos, Cruelty, and Constitutional Collapse.

Indivisible wrote:

Congress Controls Federal Spending. The Constitution explicitly gives Congress—not the president—the power to allocate and control federal funds. By freezing funds Congress appropriated, Trump is undermining a foundational principle of democracy. The Impoundment Control Act (ICA). Enacted after Nixon’s abuses, the ICA explicitly prohibits the president from withholding funds appropriated by Congress without following a strict process. Trump has not followed this process, and in many cases, the ICA outright bars the impoundment of these funds.

Indivisible suggests a “no holds barred” response (with which I wholeheartedly agree):

Refuse to Negotiate. Trump is using federal programs as hostages in a power grab. Democrats must refuse to engage in any funding or debt ceiling negotiations while this freeze remains in place. No compromises with dictatorship. Sound the Alarm. Every senator must become a megaphone for what’s at stake. Go on TV, hold town halls, and flood social media with the stories of families who will lose food, homes, and healthcare because of Trump’s chaos. Back Legal Challenges. Support every lawsuit challenging this freeze. File amicus briefs, amplify cases, and make it clear this isn’t just morally wrong—it’s illegal.

All good suggestions. And the point about backing legal challenges may be the best way to fight this power grab. US District Judge Loren L. AliKhan issued a short-term administrative stay to allow further briefing on an application for an injunction. See CNN, Judge temporarily blocks part of Trump administration’s plans to freeze federal aid.

The lawsuit before Judge AliKhan makes an important point: The memo was issued by the Acting Director of the OMB. Per the lawsuit, the OMB has no authority to direct agencies to freeze funds appropriated by Congress. Per the plaintiffs in the lawsuit:

The [OMB] Memo fails to explain the source of (the Office of Management and Budget’s) purported legal authority to gut every program in the federal government.

Good point. While the OMB is integral to the preparation and monitoring of congressional appropriations, OMB has no authority to override a congressional appropriation. See, generally, Congressional Research Service, Office of Management and Budget (OMB): An Overview.

Here are the takeaways:

First, the freeze threatens the separation of powers specified in the Constitution. We must not allow that point to be lost in the chaos and pain that the illegal order will cause.

Second, the upwelling of public outrage spreading across America is already having an impact! This is the path forward! We must do more of it consistently over the long term. We are off to a good start!

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]

#Robert B. Hubbell #Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter #The US Constitution #Constitutional Crisis #illegal orders #OMB #Bagley

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simply-ivanka · 7 months ago

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Joe Biden and America’s Out-of-Control Spooks

The president should step aside rather than find out how the deep state would save his candidacy.

Wall Street Journal

By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.

Thursday’s catastrophic debate can be a lifesaver for America. A different kind of 2024 election is still possible, starting with a rollicking contest of impressive Democratic governors for their party’s nomination. The outcome wouldn’t merely result in replacing an invalided Mr. Biden. It would allow Democrats to hire a new standard-bearer who doesn’t need to dig America ever deeper into the pit of lawfare, media lying and intelligence meddling to get himself re-elected.

This is the real issue now.

Not exactly the bipartisan wise person I’ve been hoping for, Bob Bauer will have to do. A former White House counsel under Presidents Obama and Biden, he has a timely new book, “The Unraveling.” Our democracy, he writes, endangers itself with its free fall toward win-at-all-costs cynicism, and the trouble doesn’t begin and end with Donald Trump.

He’s right, and only missing is 75% of his case since he doesn’t mention the collusion hoax or intelligence officials lying about the Hunter Biden laptop to help Mr. Biden get elected, episodes in which his own hands may not be entirely clean.

Now he has a chance to put his money where his mouth is. I see the same descent into reckless, zero-sum politics that he does. So does fund manager Ray Dalio, who told clients this week that the behavior of our parties is “threatening the rule of law as we know it and is bringing us closer to some form of civil war.”

What I don’t see is an underlying cause or dispute, such as slavery in the Civil War, of transcendent magnitude to explain it.

The tainting of our elections itself is what’s driving Americans apart.

This is where Mr. Bauer’s moment has arrived. He played Mr. Trump in Mr. Biden’s debate prep. He’s obviously trusted by the candidate. He could point out a few things about how we got into today’s mess, starting with former FBI Director James Comey’s ill-advised meddling in the Hillary Clinton email case to help another Democratic candidate. Play history backward without Mr. Comey and everything is different now. Mr. Trump likely loses in 2016. The collusion follies never happen, profoundly damaging half of America’s faith in Washington.

Mr. Biden is playing with the same fire all over again. He had every moral and political reason not to seek a second term—his age, Hunter Biden, the intelligence community’s unseemly lying to the American public to secure his first victory over Mr. Trump.

Almost anybody in the Democratic Party was a better bet to beat Donald Trump a second time, and Mr. Biden wasn’t a good bet to beat almost any Republican who might earn the GOP nomination instead of Mr. Trump.

But Mr. Biden insisted on being the candidate anyway, and we got the bubbling up of Trump prosecutions from dutiful Democratic prosecutors around the country. Whatever their merits, the charges had an overridingly political purpose: Return Mr. Trump to center stage and give Mr. Biden the one opponent he might reasonably hope to beat.

The miscalculation is now apparent. Mr. Biden’s own deterioration makes him the opponent even a scandalized and distrusted Mr. Trump could likely beat, possibly in a landslide.

What now? Ours was already in danger of becoming a government of siloviki, to borrow Russia’s word for intelligence operatives actively manipulating domestic politics. This subject our media continues to shy away from though academics are taking it up: the revolutionary and unprecedented activities of Mr. Comey and Obama intelligence veterans James Clapper and John Brennan starting in 2016 and again in 2020 with the laptop lie.

In my view, Mr. Biden is more blundering than calculating in this mess. He foolishly indulged his son over the years, getting himself in a situation in 2020 where his campaign had to be rescued from his family-created scandal by the shockingly disingenuous intervention of intelligence officials falsely fingering Russia for the laptop.

But ask yourself: Having stumbled into a dynamic where they might need a failing Mr. Biden to hold off a Trump restoration, how will our Clapperized elite prevent the outcome they have been telling themselves and us for eight years would be the end of America? Do you want to find out?

The 2024 election is already shaping up to be a deeply souring democratic experience for millions of Americans, the third such presidential election in a row. It can get a lot better or a lot worse depending on what Democrats decide to do, with Mr. Bauer hopefully whispering wisdom in Mr. Biden’s ear.

The next few days will be telling. If Mr. Biden remains in the seat, Mr. Trump may romp to a broad, unambiguous victory and mandate. Then you’ll want to hold your breath on the morning of Nov. 6.

#wall street journal #trump #trump 2024 #president trump #ivanka #repost #america first #americans first #donald trump #america #democrats

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justenjoythegossip · 1 year ago

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CHRIS WILL BE JUST FINE…

A portion of Chris’ fandom is really mad at him for accepting to be part of a shitshow with such a problematic girl. And rightfully so. But it’s important to keep something in perspective: Chris is going to be just fine.

Stars have gotten away with much worse

I saw this article this morning about celebrities being involved in big scandals. https://www.buzzfeed.com/hannahmarder/wild-forgotten-celeb-controversies

There are many more that didn’t make the list and definitely could have. Even recently, Greta Gerwig’s partner left the mother of his unborn child to be with her. It’s awards season so of course, it has been buried. Same situation with Claire Danes’ sordid affair with Billy Crudup a long time ago.

So many of these Hollywood folks are problematic and have gotten away with it and continue to get away with it.

Their behavior range from the problematic to the horrific and criminal.

Casey Affleck allegedly assaulted a woman sexually and settled his case out of court. He won an Oscar for Manchester by the sea anyway. If people are curious, look at how Brie Larson handed his awards. She knew!

According to Rose McGowan, his brother Ben Affleck would have told her after she had confessed to him that Weinstein (let's not even discuss him) raped her: “I told him to stop doing that”.

Allegedly a former girlfriend of Fassbender pressed charges against him after he violently assaulted her. And I could go on and on.

Many have done much worse than being in a PR relationship with someone problematic and have gotten away with it. So in the grand scheme of things, Chris will be just fine. His “relationship” with Abba will be buried and soon it will be a forgotten memory, only remembered by a small portion of his fandom.

Chris’ darker side

Chris’ history is rather tame compared to all those super problematic people and or criminals that are still on the loose.

But yes, he has made mistakes in the past like everyone else and he has done his fair share of problematic stuff as well. In his younger days, there were rumors of fights and being thrown out of bars. There has been rumors of drug use. There was that messy affair with a married costar during the shooting of Gifted. Also let’s not forget the more recent papwalk in London with Lily James during Covid Lockdown to clean her sniffing cocaine in the park. The pairing of Captain America and Cinderella was a good idea on paper but the execution was atrocious and tactless. It was already a sign of his team’s gross incompetence and miscalculation. There was also the leak of the screenshot of his phone. The d..k pic was all people talked about but some of the other pictures were even more problematic, not as embarrassing of course but more problematic.

Also Chris’ friends and family and Chris himself have trolled his fandom for years. A day before he left for Portugal at the beginning of this shitshow, he tweeted a pic of himself and wrote something like: “I love my fans and Dodger loves you too”. He then hopped on a plane and purposefully filmed a video for that teacher from his hotel room in Lisbon so that his fans (plants?) could place him there. And surprise surprise, there was some backlash on certain platforms and just afterwards he or his team tweeted a picture of him with a bald kid with cancer. It was actually the low point for me. Much worse than anything he did with Abba. I think the picture was 2 years old and I know celebrities use charities to make themselves look good all the time. But using the pic of a sick child for damaged control was as low as you can get. I am not sure he promoted Christopher’s Haven ever since.

And of course, there are still the ongoing shenanigans with the Nazi sympathizing yacht girl…

But like Chris said in an interview the past year, the industry makes you do things you don’t want to do. Hollywood is indeed a snake pit where they sometimes force you to compromise yourself and play certain games if you want to be successful. That is part of the price to pay.

He needed a change in his PR image

Chris was at a good place in his career after Endgame. Knives Out was a huge hit and Defending Jacob got good reviews. He seemed to have diversified but Covid happened and derailed a lot of stuff. Little shop of Horrors was canceled. He didn’t have Marvel to fall back on and he seemed to be at a crossroads career wise and PR-wise. He couldn’t remain the perfect internet boyfriend and play Prince charming waiting for the one forever. He had to evolve into more adults parts as well: husbands, fathers etc.

This is probably why his team came up with this PR relationship and those kinda of weddings. Again it was a good idea on paper because it enabled them to change his image in a natural and organic way. But the execution was again as disastrous as it gets. Abba was not a good fit for him and she was not a good choice especially if they wanted to rebrand him as a family man.

The question remains whether she is the only one who agreed to this charade. Indeed the contract’s terms seem rather drastic. She has never been able to even post anything about him (just his dog) or about marrying him. She has mostly hid for the past years and just popped up for PR events or reasons. And given the GQ event, it's likely she is not even allowed to speak in public. Remember the articles saying she was rude and refused to talk to the media. Who would agree to this kind of contract but a desperate clout chaser with little prospect?

An artist’s career is full of ups and downs. Hopefully, once this is over, Chris will get opportunities to expand on his body of work with more diverse roles. I think Pain Hustlers was supposed to do that for him but even if he was rather good in it, the movie wasn’t. I do think he has the acting chops to do it. Whether or not he will get such opportunities is another question… I am not sure this shitshow would have helped him at all in that regard but time will tell.

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anteroom-of-death · 1 year ago

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Teacher's Pet part 9

Synopsis: Can lover's fights be resolved quickly? Or does it set up a new game?

A/N: I would like to thank my younger self for being infinitely cooler than I am now. Also the Kendrick Lamarr version of America has a problem. And to my readers. You fuel this beast that is my spiral into madness. Yippee!

The Doctor had to work quickly. He wasn’t about to let (y/n) slip through his fingers.

How much of a miscalculation this was! He thought this experience would further bond her to him. The swoop of glamor, the gravitas.

So many of his past companions followed a script. See the TARDIS, get a chance to save the day. Enter, become his friend and companion. Come to grips with reality and then cling to him as a life preserver.

He mentally cursed himself out. He should have just stuck to his original plan of never telling. Or just casually, maybe after her graduation, to do a meeting with Missy and explain Nardole.

It was better to keep her in the dark.

The thought of a memory wipe crossed his head. But after all that with Donna and after he got his mind wiped of Clara…the idea was less savory and could backfire.

If not for Missy and his duty to care for her, he would never had remembered Clara.

Missy was good for that. Her psychic skills and progress were always far superior, more accurate than his.

The thought of him contacting her mentally and getting her on board and then having her disentangle this day from his little fawn’s mind briefly flitted through.

Too late, as (y/n) was already climbing out of her shower. She didn’t take her time with it.

He braced himself for the next bit.

He usually wasn’t on the receiving end of this behavior.

She exited, wrapped in the towel. Her eyes were red from tears and lack of sleep. She stood in a defiant stance facing him, water still dripping off her legs.

She kept on hand braced at the top, protecting her modesty. She rose the other and pointed with her index finger. She inhaled and held her breath for a long second. He could tell that she was steeling herself. Preparing what she had to say, and wanted to say it without stopping or stuttering or anything else.

He let her have to floor.

Her next breath was long and rattled out of her like death from a corpse.

“Listen, I understand that you couldn’t have came out saying ‘Hey! I’m an alien stuck on Earth!’ without sounding totally fucking schizophrenic.” She hand went to under her armpits. More protecting of her precious modesty. A mini suit of armor, he gathered. “Am I blaming you for not wanting to sound insane? Even if it’s the truth? Sort of. But like, it’s also my fault. I was too stupid. I also made my happiness contingent on a man’s affection. If you are a man. You look pretty damn male to me. Feel pretty damn male to me. But I digress!” An exhausted, bereaved look fell over her face. “I said from the beginning I never wanted this to happen. But I did. This did.” She caught her breath and swallowed heavily. “I don’t really fucking know what to do or think here. Would it be dumber to leave, or dumber to stay? Would you just abduct me and probe me if I left? I don’t know any aliens besides you. I think. I don’t know…I don’t know what aliens do.”

“It’s too late to get anyone driving.” She finished up. “I’ll sleep on it. But, I don’t know.” Her eyes slammed shut tightly and she shook her head. He dare not probe in her brain to see if he could do anything, say anything, especially after that comment she just made…

“Find somewhere else to sleep.” She ordered. “Or sleep on the cuck chair. I don’t care. I need my sleep and to clear my mind. Don’t fucking touch me.”

It was a better outcome than he was expecting. A testament to his methods and his abilities. It was real affection too. In parts and pieces.

A shot in the arm, at least.

He could make strategies and find the most clever words at night. After all, he did need less sleep than a human. Mental seduction was now a line drawn in not sand, but concrete. And it was drying quickly.

He sat down in what she deemed the “cuck chair”. He’d have to Google that term later.

She got dressed quickly and did her little human skincare rituals quicker. After crawling into bed, she put her back to him and snapped off the lights.

The silent treatment…

He could work with that.

He heard her let out a few heaves of a half cry.

The thought of throwing her secrets into her face crossed his mind. Secret for secret. But he knew that was petty and would further alienate him from her. To shame her into submission was the opposite of what he needed to do.

Plus, with the way she operated, it’d be a blow out. Only a Time Lord with access to her brain would know.

All night his mind raked through scenarios.

And her sleep was restless, tons of thrashing and some talking. He got out of the chair a few times and it seemed she was also leaking tears.

He resisted the urge to wipe them away. And to rifle through her mind.

Thankfully the morning robbed him of overthinking any more.

She woke with such a start, her chest heaving and face crusted with dried tear salt.

The Doctor made his way to fake…something in the bathroom. Give her space.

He flushed the toilet and washed his hands.

She had already dressed up and sat on the chair. Just a pair of jeans and a short-sleeved turtleneck. She was slouched and a glum expression slacked across her face. She was chewing on her pinky nail with one hand and the other was tapping very quickly.

“I’m not going back to Bristol. Fuck it, I’m in London.” She announced very nonchalantly.

She heaved.

“You can’t help how you are. I can’t either. We’re an odd couple. An alien and a…” She caught herself. “Human.” She wasn’t ready to reveal her secrets yet. Of all the people in the universe, he understood the urge for secrecy.

“Don’t take me for a fool. No more wool over the eyes or a snow job. If I want to know, I’ll ask. Vice versa. Of course.” She conceeded.

“If you lay hands on me, it’s my right to launch you into the stratosphere.” She stood up for herself…it seemed like she was speaking from deep experience.

“I’m not going to waste whatever is between you and me. But yeah.” She cracked her knuckles and wrists. “Is that good for you? It’s good for me.” She ended getting up and grabbing at her purse.

His time to speak came.

“That’d work for me.” He decided the simplest words would make the best impact. He noted that this incarnation of himself was a sucker for women who likes to pull a bossy act, but came undone so easily under him. He’d lure his fawn back to him. Somehow…

“Okay, ummm. Fine, I’m going to go out, get some things. I’ll be fine. Message me whenever your done with whatever you needed to do today.”

She exited and he went off to help UNIT.

Distracted and raw, he did his duties.

They went off and Kate declared the operation a success.

He texted (y/n) to meet him at a café that was near the unit head quarters.

She met him and he went to kiss her hand. She smelled heavily of cigarette smoke and her sunglasses were glinting, eyes damn near unreadable. She had a few small shopping bags on her.

“You were busy.” He noted.

“Well, you did mention a play and I didn’t have anything appropriate.” She admitted. “I wanted to look nice…for you. Don’t want to embarrass you. Especially since you’re so nicely dressed this weekend.” Her head nodded to the side. “I’ve never seen you in a button down.” She mused, “They suit you.”

She gave a crooked half-grin, half-grimace.

It seemed that yesterday and this morning laid heavy on her mind.

Against his better judgment, he gently entered the surface of her mind and gently swept aside some doubt of self and this. Still there but not probing sharp and heavy. Gently safe, gently there. Letting her still have her free will, just sheltered nerves.

Maybe he still hung around Missy too much.

Even though, this wasn’t as bad as what either of them has done in the past regarding Time Lord’s skill sets in meddling in people’s minds.

This was for the better, would stop her from harming herself, he rationalized…

She relaxed and they finally entered the café. He got his usual cappuccino with enough sugar to overwhelm an entire preschool’s population, she got a simple espresso lungo.

“See!” He said as he took a sip, “Just like humans do.”

“Ah.” She said, her mouth partially hidden behind the cup.

“Sun feels nice…” She said, sitting down at a seat that got the full blast of it on her face. “Rare English sun…” She mused again. “Maybe it’s an omen.” She shrugged, fingering the one pendant around her neck like it was a talisman.

The late-spring sun shone in her hair, illuminating different shades and colors in her (insert your color of hair you have here, dear reader!). Much different than in the early days with the weak winter sun. It was radiant.

Semi-sarcastically, semi-impertinently, he asked, “Can I touch your hair?” His hand already halfway shot out. (Maybe he did have ADHD.)

She took another petite sip of her drink. She nodded, “Sure.” She placed the cup down and let the sun hit her more, shrugging out of her jacket, and extending her arms out to get the rays on then.

He leaned out and slipped his right hand through the line of her hair. Feeling it’s textures and gave a short swirl of the ends between his fingers. With his other hand he gripped her already clasped-together hands.

The cool metal of her rings was already warming in the sun.

It felt right, a small simple moment. He wished he had gotten more with more people.

“Let’s cut the mishegas.” She said after a while. “Let’s make this work.”

The Doctor nodded in assent, taking another sip of his drink. “Whatever you need.”

After a while, and minimal talking, they went back to UNIT head quarters and the Doctor took a meeting with the entire engagement crew and leads. (Y/N) decided to give a quick check in and chat with Petronella and asked her about her favorite place for a brunch on Sunday.

Sadly, Petronella didn’t know any good places, but she’d ask around and get back to her.

(Y/N) went off to prep for the night out.

The Doctor was buzzing, he was entirely intrigued by what his fawn’s idea of appropriate was for a West End play. Especially after her comment about his outfit.

He had no references, just what he’d seen a few companions wear.

He was properly doing a date in the first time since he sent River off to die on his younger self in the Library.

He hoped this one would be less chaotic. (Y/N) seemed a flight risk if any invasions or anything close to his normal dalliances he had on Earth happened.

He could respect her need for peace and quiet. It was admirable.

The meeting was just about ready to close up when she entered and sat next to him, sliding the chair over closer to his.

He gave a quick look over. Everyone did. It was a distraction. She entered in a slightly-overdid cloud of perfume.

She was…glittering. Glowing.

That was the only word to explain it. Obviously, she’d taken certain professional cues. Her legs were elongated in some ridiculous contractions masquerading as shoes. Her hair was pinned back in some areas and let loose in others. She wore a simple black dress and a tight black opened, long cardigan.

It seemed she was trying to send a message.

Her face was shining and her eyes were accented.

Definitely a big one.

He turned, interrupting the already interrupted meeting, slowly blinking.

“Don’t mind me. I’ll just wait.” She smiled, crossing over her wrists, sliding her arms onto the board room table, slightly slouched, slight pushed forward.

Whatever this little message was, he felt his cock stiffen a bit.

Is this what her clientele saw? This bejeweled wonder? All a show of confidence and heavily-scented fodder?

Was this her doing? To show him that she could invite the gaze of anyone she wanted?

His mind swirled with jealousy.

Then the rational side, who knew her for what she was when she wasn’t trying kicked in. She was just trying to look nice for the theatre! Nothing more, nothing less.

He hadn’t felt this white-hot dagger of jealousy since that PE teacher…What’s his name, Danny? Denny? Denise?

This human had him stymied again…

Too soon and yet not long enough, his duties ended for the night. She got up and went to Petronella for a moment to exchange numbers and she tossed her head, hair reacting to the little motion, shaking away. He caught a glint of her teeth backed against the lipstick, deeply pigmented.

His observation about them being friends was correct.

He felt a little unable to leave his seat. He had to will his body to do such an action. He accomplished it and went to near the door frame.

“Yeah, text me any time. I’ll see you later.” He heard her say.

She took a giant step away and joined him. She gripped his arm and shrugged on shoulder up. “How do I look for my first West End play?” There was a very new expression in her eyes. One that seemed unreachable.

He was rather uneasy in those micro-clues in this body, unless he relied on his mind to connect and check in...

“You’ll do.” The Doctor beamed.

She fixed her strap under the cardigan and they began their walk to the outside. A swirly motion, it was oddly hypnotic and drew his eyes to her chest. Her necklaces glinted in the light and clinked together gently. He let a small, sardonic grin form on his face.

On to call a cab, the Doctor noticed he had a bit of trouble counterbalancing his weight against her in the added three or four inches of (y/n). His little fawn had little trouble on her wobbly legs. He was the one in trouble, slightly stumbling like a newborn deer…

A reversal.

Before he properly could form any more thoughts she got a cab to come off the side of the streets.

Onto the play, onto a new act.

But what was she getting at showing up like that?

Or was this just nothing…?

He had to find out or give up quickly.

Not acts, no playing.

Just the night ahead.

#personal #doctor who #doctor who fanfiction #12th doctor #12th doctor x reader #reader x 12th doctor #12th doctor x you #you x 12th doctor #self insert #teacher student #im being evaluated for bpd #yay #lol

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comeonamericawakeup · 4 months ago

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"It's 2016 déjà vu all over again," said Chris Lehmann in The Nation. The Justice Department last week exposed a sweeping plot by Russia to influence the U.S. presidential election and undermine democracy. The DOJ said it had seized 32 internet sites, disguised as American news brands, peddling "Russian propaganda as straight news reports." One headline on a spoofed Washington Post site read "White House Miscalculated: Conflict With Ukraine Strengthens Russia." The Justice Department also charged a pair of Russian nationals--both employees of the state-run RT network - with covertly funneling $10 million to Nashville-based Tenet Media to produce Kremlin-friendly content. Most of that cash allegedly went to Tenet's stable of "hardcore MAGA" influencers, including You Tube stars Benny Johnson and Tim Pool. It's a reminder that Russian election interference on behalf of Donald Trump "was never a hoax," said Philip Bump in The Washington Post. But now, instead of St. Petersburg bot farms, Moscow has Americans doing its dirty work.

"Americans should be informed of foreign efforts to mislead them,” said Noah Rothman in National Review. But it's not just Russia - "all of America's enemies" are doing it. Iran was behind the recent hack of Donald Trump's campaign, and it has backed news-like websites aimed at undermining U.S. support for Israel. China has meddled in local elections. Yet "it serves Democratic political objectives" to focus solely on Russia. Anyway, this scheme did not deliver much "bang for the ruble,” said J.D. Tuccille in Reason. The 2,000 videos on Tenet's now-shuttered YouTube channel clocked a mere 8,000 views each. And Pool, Johnson, and other contributors claim they were duped in the Tenet scheme, and that they were expressing views they'd always held. So Russia paid them "to say things they were already saying" to a small audience. Should we really be worried?

Yes, said Tom Nichols in The Atlantic, because this is likely "only the tip of the iceberg." The Justice Department noted that a Kremlin-linked propaganda outfit had identified some 2,800 online influencers as potential mouthpieces for Moscow.

We have a social media grifter class filled with easy targets for foreign recruitment, and "a big slice of the American public" that's eager to lap up "wild conspiracies" and tune out legitimate news. The Russians have "scads of money" to exploit this weakness in our democracy. "And plenty of Americans are despicable enough to take their cash."

THE WEEK September 20, 2024

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komsomolka · 2 years ago

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(Article's date: 2014) I think that President Obama’s attempt to destabilize Russia will be seen by history as disastrous as George Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003. Like the Iraq war, the de facto declaration of “war by other means” against Russia will accelerate the very dynamic that it intends to halt: the steady weakening of U.S. imperialism’s grip on the world. It will increase the resolve of a host of nations to disengage themselves from American madness and to strengthen collaboration and cooperation among many countries, and not just Russia and China.

The result will be the exact opposite of Washington’s intention. The attempt to isolate and destabilize Russia, the other nuclear superpower, may appear to some to be an act of brashness, a flexing of American muscle, an act of imperial overconfidence and recklessness. People thought the same thing when Bush went into Iraq. They were shocked and more than a little bit awed. In fact, sometimes I think that Americans are more shocked and awed by the American military than anybody else. But the Iraq invasion, and the brazen offensive against Russia, as well as the so-called “Pivot Against China” and the octopus-like U.S. military entrenchment in Africa — these are really symptoms of weakness and desperation.

U.S. Imperialism is losing its grip on the world and responds to its weakening condition with massive campaigns of destabilization. Destabilization characterizes U.S. foreign policy today more than any other word. The purpose is to reverse the general dynamic of global affairs today in which U.S. influence and power shrinks in relative terms as the rest of the world develops. U.S. and European hegemony — and that is the ability to dictate the terms of economic and political life on the planet — has daily diminished in myriad objective ways, ways that we can measure by the numbers. China’s soon-to-be status as the world’s biggest economy is just one aspect of that decline.

The process is inexorable and it’s gaining momentum. The trajectory of imperial decline has been firmly set ever since the Western capitalists decided to move the production of things — that, is the industrial base — to the South and the rest of the planet. Inevitably power and influence follow and imperial hegemony diminishes. This is of course unacceptable to the rulers of the United States who now find themselves in objective opposition to all manifestations of collaboration and mutual development under terms that are not dictated by Washington. They are in objective opposition to all manifestations of independence by countries in the world. This applies not just to China, not just to China and Russia, but to the rest of the BRICS and to other developing nations. And it even applies to America’s closest allies.

That is because hegemons don’t really have allies. All they have are subordinates, and so the U.S. is quite prepared to do serious harm to European economic interests by pressuring them to break long established economic ties to Russia. They will ultimately do the same thing in the pacific region with China and cause great destabilization there. They do so not because of strength but because of growing relative weakness. Their desperation compels them to risk war because their only clear superiority is in weapons.

However, the net end result, if we survive these flirtations with all-out war, can only be further isolation of the United States and the further weakening of imperialism. I think there is on what passes for the left in the United States a tendency to describe U.S. aggressions like the Iraq war, like the current offensive against Russia, as mistakes and miscalculations: “They didn’t mean to do that.”

In reality the U.S. goes to the brink and beyond the brink of war because it perceives itself as having no other choice. Its soft power is fading. It has few other means beyond the military to strategically influence events. It recruits or buys allies where it can get them, be it jihadists or Nazis. As imperialism’s sway in the world shrinks, so do its options.

U.S. policymakers surveyed the world in 2002 and in 2003 and they concluded that the dynamic in Asia was going against them. They knew that most of the world would be horrified with a war against Iraq, but they rolled the dice anyway and invaded. The net result was the opposite of what they intended. The U.S. was humiliated and the U.S. was humiliated so badly that the rulers of the United States chose to put a dramatically different face on U.S. power — a Black face, Barack Obama.

Iraq was supposed to be a forward U.S. base in Asia to disrupt China’s growing ties in the region. Instead the Iraq war exposed U.S. imperialism’s weaknesses. In the days before that invasion, we wrote in Black Commentator that the U.S. had reached too far and succeeded only in accelerating the process of its own decline. Today Barack Obama is rolling the dice just like George Bush did. To sever Russia’s ties to Europe, Washington has surveyed the global scene and concluded that it has no other choice. The result will be a strengthening of ties between Russia and China, a great anxiety and rethinking among Europeans about their ties to the United States which is about to harm their economy, and an acceleration of imperialism’s death spiral.

#posted links #from 2014 #omg this was prophetic

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intersexcat-tboy · 9 months ago

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Examining Miscalculations and Intersex Definitions Regarding Sax's .018% Claim

The debate surrounding the definition of intersex and their characteristics has been a topic of debate within various professional fields, advocacy organizations, and studies for decades. Amidst this discourse includes a response from Dr. Leonard Sax, who claims to provide a "clinician's standpoint" despite lacking specialized expertise in these conditions, having only served as a primary care physician.

However, his arguments stand in stark contrast to those of Fausto-Sterling, a world-renowned professor of biology and gender studies. Furthermore, they diverge significantly from the consensus among major health associations, medical organizations, intersex rights groups, and human rights organizations.

Leading/Major Health Associations

The definition of intersex is resoundingly clear among leading health associations. The World Health Organization recognizes that intersex individuals are those "born with natural variations in biological or physiological characteristics, including sexual anatomy, reproductive organs, and/or chromosomal patterns that do not fit traditional definitions of male or female." Similarly, the National Institute of Health acknowledges individuals who are "born with, or who develop naturally in puberty, biological sex characteristics that are not typically male or female." The National Health Services emphasizes that intersex "involves genes, hormones, and reproductive organs, including genitals, and a person's physical sex development can differ internally, externally, or both."

Major/Leading Medical Associations

Major medical associations provide crucial insights into the understanding of intersex variations. The The American Medical Association adopts a broader definition, recognizing those with "a congenital condition with inconsistent chromosomal, gonadal, or anatomic sex development." Likewise, the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (PDF - which trains and accredits physicians in Australia and New Zealand) recognizes the significance of "congenital variations in a person's physical, hormonal, or genetic characteristics that do not match strict medical definitions of female or male sex." Additionally, the Center for Disease Control highlights the concept of "variations in physical sex characteristics, including anatomy, hormones, chromosomes, or other traits, that differ from expectations generally associated with male and female bodies." The International Symposium on Disorders of Sex Development notes there to be over 40 conditions

Leading Intersex Rights organizations

Intersex rights organizations, including Intersex Human Rights of Australia and Brújula Intersexual in Mexico, explicitly disagree with Dr. Leonard Sax's narrow definition of intersex individuals. They align themselves with more inclusive perspectives. For instance, Intersex Society of North America (working with) InterACT still use Fausto-Sterling's estimates over a decade later. Intersex Campaign for Equality in the United States also uses Sterling's estimates, believing the figures may even be higher than 2%. Intersex Asia and Intersex Russia both use estimates ranging from 0.5%-1.7%, Russia even including PCOS by name (which would be higher than 1.7%). InterAction from Germany's Intersex Rights suggests a range of 1-2 individuals per 100 births, highlighting how the medical community tries to "keep the frequency as extremely low as possible". Stop Intersex Mutilations from France posits there are over 40 variations and also suggests the prevalence might surpass 1.7%. Additionally, OII Europe presents prevalence estimates of 1:200 and 1.7% in their materials.

These organizations stress that intersex variations encompass a wide spectrum of biological and physiological characteristics beyond chromosomal ambiguity, challenging Sax's limited viewpoint.

Major human rights organizations

unequivocally support intersex individuals. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights emphasizes that intersex individuals are "born with a wide range of natural variations in their sex characteristics that don't fit the typical definition of male or female." Amnesty International notes that intersex encompasses "a wide umbrella of natural variations" (1.7%) and human rights abuses faced by intersex individuals. Human Rights Watch and the Human Rights Campaign underline the broader definition of intersex, acknowledging variations in genitalia, chromosomes, gonads, internal sex organs, hormone production, hormone response, and secondary sex traits, noting 1.7% as a prevalence rate. These human rights organizations underscore the importance of acknowledging intersex variations to ensure the protection of human rights.

Other Medical Orgs

Additional medical organizations like the Société Internationale d'Urologie (PDF) (an international professional organization dedicated to the field of urology), and the National Society of Genetic Counselors (uses 1.7%, says sex is not based on chromosones) adopt definitions that align with broader medical perspectives, they recognize the complexities of intersex conditions and advocate for understanding beyond binary definitions. Furthermore, the Endocrine Society acknowledges CAH to be part of a continuum of disorders, acknowledging the variations in severity.

Examining oversights: Discrepancies in Calculations

What's interesting is that even within Sax's own criteria, defining intersex as when 'the chromosomal sex is inconsistent with phenotypic sex, in which the phenotype is not classifiable as either male or female,' there's an evident inclusion of conditions like 'sex reversals' and ambiguous genitalia. However, Sax overlooks contributors such as mixed gonadal dysgenesis (MGD), as well as Swyer Syndrome and de la Chapelle syndrome, despite the former being the second leading cause of ambiguous genitalia.

Let's do the math

CAH (.0077) + CAIS (.0076) = .0153

+ ovotestes (.0012) + Idiopathic (.0009) = .0174

+ PAIS (.00076) = .01816

Fausto-Sterling includes de la Chapelle syndrome and MGD, although not as separate statistics. MGD is amalgamated with Turner's statistics, and de la Chapelle syndrome is grouped with other sex chromosome variations. However, Sax completely disregards these conditions when he discards several categories from his estimates, effectively throwing out qualifying numbers and ignoring their potential impact on the overall prevalence of intersex conditions.

While newer studies suggest a prevalence of .004 for de la Chappelle, we also have to consider that neither study includes Swyer Syndrome (+.00125), and PAIS is now recognized as at least as common as CAIS, with the latter being less likely to cause ambiguous genitalia at birth, and more likely to be identified in childhood.

The leading causes of ambiguous genitalia are CAH (.0077), PAIS (.00076), MGD (.005) and ovotestes (.0012), which places us just below (.01466) the ambiguous genitalia observed at birth from Mothers And Babies Reports from Australia, if we account for 15% (0.0006) of de la Chapelle births having ambiguous genitalia, it brings ambiguous genitalia at birth to a total of .015% found before.

If he includes CAH, PAIS (since CAIS is often not identified until childhood), ovotestes and idiopathic causes under his definition of intersex, it leaves us with .005% of births with ambiguous genitalia without a possible causing condition. This gap can easily be explained by his exclusion of MGD and de la Chapelle syndrome.

If we count only CAIS (.0076) and CAH (.0077), and the newer study estimate of de la Chapelle (.004), it already surpasses Sax's estimate at .0193.

With the addition of ovotestes (.0012), idiopathic (.0009), MGD (.005) and Sawyer syndrome (.00125) it brings us to .022%. With older estimates of PAIS (.00076), .0234%; with newer ones (.0076), just a bit above .03%, which is over two thirds an increase of Sax's original estimate.

There is overwhelming support for a more comprehensive understanding of intersex variations that emphasizes the importance of respecting a wide range of biological and physiological characteristics beyond mere genital and chromosomal definitions. This approach is essential in safeguarding human rights and ensuring equitable treatment for all individuals

TLDR;;

The collective stance of experts and organizations, spanning from health associations to human rights advocates, sharply contrasts with the limited definition created by Sax. He claims to know other clinicians' thoughts, without any evidence to back it up. As stated previously, he also lacks education and clinical experience on intersex individuals, he is a family doctor.

#intersex studies #actually intersex #intersex activism #intersex awareness #intersex discussion #intersex issues #intersex erasure #intersex theory #intersex things #intersex #purrspectives #intersex advocacy #queer activism #queer stuff #queer tag #intersex tag

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