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tumbling-darkling · 3 years ago

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You Can’t Punch a Ghost

Ch 6. “Don’t worry, what’s the worst that can happen?”

AO3

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Danny found himself hanging out with Denki even beyond the tutoring sessions.

He was the only one so far that knew of his very specific predicament, even though he stumbled upon the truth rather than Danny trusting him with the information. At first he was worried. Worried that Denki would tell all of his friends, worried he would tell Aizawa, worried he would break his promise the moment Danny wasn’t looking.

And he must have noticed how Danny avoided his gaze, his touch, everything the day after the secret was out in the open between them.

Then after classes Denki tracked him down, tapped his shoulder causing him to flinch at the thought of being electrocuted once again and invited him to hang out, to join his group's study session.

Danny had intended to decline, but then Ashido- who asked him to call her Mina, had dragged him along anyhow.

What was odd was how casual it was. A bunch of super powered kids studying for a final exam at a superhero school. And they all studied the basic subjects, asking questions when one got confused and each person jumping in to give thoughts or answers.

The day after, Denki and Danny had another tutor session. It went along as a normal session would and then- Denki offered to hang out afterwards. Danny continued to hesitate, but the begging look on his face made it impossible to say no.

Was he… making friends?

Denki peeked over the edge of the building before turning to Danny with a massive grin on his face, “looks like we got our privacy! If a flying hero shows up we will see them long before they get close enough to hear us! So! I’ve been thinking a lot about your- dimension problem. But I had no clue where to start! So I thought- hey! What if we come up with ideas together? Jump off each other’s thoughts!”

Danny blinked at the suggestion, “just, think out loud?”

Denki nodded, “it works in study sessions! Here, I need some questions answered first and maybe we can end up with a solution! So, how did you get to this world?”

Danny pauses, “well, a ghost zone portal, I think. It’s the only logical answer actually, no other kind of portal would drop me in another dimension of all places.”

“Okay, so how do these portals show up?”

“It’s, um… random really. But mostly only in the ghost zone, it’s much more rare for them to show up outside the ghost zone,” Danny stated.

Denki rubbed his chin in thought, “okay-, so in order to get you home, you need one of these very rare portals to just... pop up at the right time and place. Any way to predict it?”

Danny shook his head with a frown, “I haven’t been able to figure that out yet. I’m sure my parents could have made a device to predict such things, but I don't believe I could make one on my own. I would need Tucker for the engineering side of it, or some kind of mechanic.”

“Could we find you someone to make a device like that?”

Danny frowned even more, “I would… prefer not to. A device like that needs background information about ghosts, ectoplasm, dimension hopping. Dragging another person into my mess isn’t really something I want to do at the moment. Maybe when I start to get desperate.”

Denki leaned back a little, “so man made device may be off the table, what about a man made portal?”

“Do you know one that exists in this world that leads to the ghost zone?”

Denki paused, then deflated a little, “Ah- nope. But! We could try to look into it! So it’s a possibility!” He then glanced back over to Danny, “were there other ways to travel between your world and the ghost zone? Or other ways to open portals?”

Danny knit his eyebrows together in thought, looking down at the street below when a very hairy stranger sauntering down the street reminded him of a friend with exactly that kind of ability, “actually… I have a wolf friend who could tear through the veil with his claws into my world or the ghost zone at will.”

Denki blinked, “that’s… fucking incredible. Do you think he could find a way to get here with that kind of power?”

Danny then felt that glimmer of hope vanish, “...no his abilities are limited to the ghost zone and my world, not other dimensions.”

The pair sat in silence for a few moments, thinking over the ideas they managed to work off of eachother, that is until Denki broke the silence.

“... can you open portals to other dimensions?”

Danny looked over in confusion, “no, what makes you think I could?”

Denki shrugged, “well, you are like a godly powerhouse. You have like 20 quirks; flying, invisibility, going through walls, ice, changing forms, dropping temperatures around you, lasers-, the list goes on! So why not add portal opening in the mix?”

Danny shook his head, “Well it’s not one I have-,” and then he paused.

Wait a second.

Didn’t…

Didn’t Dan have the ability to open portals into the ghost zone?

As much as he hated thinking about the alternate version of himself, sometimes he couldn’t help but compare himself to the other at times. Especially in regards to powers.

Dan had a lot of powered up versions of his abilities, honed powers from experience and usage. Not to mention Danny had to remember a good half of the abilities were Vlad’s.

But he also got powers Dan never had, like his wail. And Vlad didn’t have portal opening abilities. If he did, he wouldn’t have a man-made portal under every damn mansion he owned.

So did that mean… that Danny could develop abilities in regards to opening portals back into the ghost zone?

Danny opened and closed his mouth like a gaping fish before he found his words, “actually, I think I might.”

He looked over and nearly fell off the roof when he spotted Denki’s face mere millimeters from his own, a grin spread out wide across face. “Well it sounds like we have a solution to our problem!”

Danny slowly looked down to his hands, “now… how exactly would I activate them?”

Denki hummed in thought, “that’s a good question. Everyone activates their quirks in their own way. For me, it’s like flexing all my muscles at once. But portals… maybe you have to like, think like a teleporter? Like try to picture where you want to go and try to summon it?”

Danny tilted his head back, “that… may work?” He closed his eyes, trying to picture the ghost zone. Thinking about the swirling green void and floating islands that were scattered within. Picturing the friends he had in the zone, the Far Frozen, Clockworks tower, the Fenton Portal.

He slowly peeked a single eye open, hoping to see swirling green. Then fully opened his eyes when he didn’t see anything and deflated with a sigh. “Or maybe it will never work and I’ll just be stuck here forever.”

Denki leaned forward, “hey now, you can’t just give up after a single try! We can practice and maybe something will happen! Heck, I bet you will figure it out randomly! That’s how a good chunk of society figures out their quirks!”

Danny snorted, “yeah- I guess that is the way it will most likely happen, alright.”

“Besides, this world isn’t the worst place to end up! You could’ve fallen into a world full of spiders! Or mushrooms! At least here we have really awesome and cool powers!” He winked. “How about I show you some really cool and awesome things we can do around here?”

Danny blinked, “what are you suggesting?”

Denki grinned mischievously, “how do you feel about pranks?”

Shouta shouldn’t be this stressed.

His students were dealing with studies for final exams which he already had set up and ready to go, even with Danny participating in the exams for the sake of even pairings. So he shouldn’t be stressed about the exams, he had faith his students would survive. They all should pass.

But of course he would always worry about those with lower grading scores.

No, that wasn’t what was causing his stress.

It was his goddamn problem children.

The ones with good scores have been causing him problems. Midoriya always caused a very specific headache, and his stunt in Hosu was a barely covered up mess. Iida pulling a stunt he never would have predicted, though he had a feeling that he was working towards never trying to commit murder again for the sake of revenge. At least Midoriya was good at slapping some sense into his friends, though he desperately needed to save some of that common sense for himself.

Danny was a mix between a headache and a blessing. He hadn’t caused any issues yet, no running off and fighting villains, no attracting villains, and he rarely injured himself in training if at all. (Unlike one student that could never seem to leave a training arena without at least one shattered bone.) He paid attention in classes, other teachers had informed him of Danny’s progress as well, the young boy being quite brilliant in some of the scientific fields. The only headache was trying to figure out what the hell happened to him.

Who tried to kill him and left him to die amongst trash? Or was he trying to escape someone, or something, and crawled into the dumpster to hide? Did he really have amnesia regarding these events or was he hiding it?

Why was his speech in Japanese flawless yet his writing and reading non existent? Did someone never teach him to keep him under their thumb? Keep him from realizing what was happening to him was wrong?

Then there was that nagging feeling that Danny was hiding something. The flickering looks, the stiff posture from time to time. Even on the first training day when he finally saw Danny in action instead of just the aftermath. Witnessing the fight brought back his thoughts regarding Danny’s handle on the villain attack. He didn’t fight like a child in training. He fought like an experienced pro.

It’s like a switch was flipped.

Danny always seemed to hold himself in a meek way, he would hunch as he walked, hands held close to himself or in his pockets, he wasn’t big on eye contact either and always seemed to watch the surrounding area instead of others. Then when he stepped on the battlefield, everything shifted. His stance would straighten, holding himself steadily as his focus was primarily trained on his opponent. He became confident, he knew what to watch for in order to predict an opponent's attack, bounced back quickly when knocked down, even the air around him seemed to shift. It was almost like watching a different person entirely.

And then there was ANOTHER new problem.

A vigilante that was more public than any other vigilante. Usually they barely lasted a week, facial recognition software finding documented files of the most foolish vigilantes. Pro heroes were also quick to end public vigilantes' antics as they didn’t have the same training and back-up. And finally, Shouta would be the last resort in the area. Once tracked to a familiar fighting ground and sighting area, he would swoop in and cancel out their quirk before any more damage could be done and the capture would be swift and painless. The more painful vigilantes stuck to the shadows, remained out of sight and those were the few that could last years unnoticed.

So this new Vigilante, which the media had shamelessly dubbed ‘Spooky Boy’ since the vigilante hadn’t dropped a name, was very public, very powerful, and very headache inducing.

Midoriya even admitted that Spooky had a hand in helping apprehend Stain before he vanished. Yet the most concerning aspect that Midoriya had reported was his quirk.

Spooky had to have multiple quirks from what Midoriya had seen. Lasers, flying, invisibility and intangibility, and an overall very mutated look. Midoriya even said he may have some sort of delusion in regards to actually being a ghost, joking about being dead and acting like he was a ghost.

So there was a young vigilante with multiple quirks running around pretending to be a ghost, easily avoiding being apprehended thanks to his power set, and had no clear motive in place. He had been lucky to avoid the top 5 heroes so far since he mainly operated at night while the most popular heroes operated during the day, yet his luck was bound to run out. The police had asked him to keep an eye out, to assist if he came across the vigilante but to focus on other issues since the vigilante hadn’t shown signs of causing damage. The only issue so far was just his ability to avoid the law. Which encouraged others to attempt to copy him.

He didn’t need kids not from his class causing more damage based on bad influences.

Not to mention he showed up a night after they found Danny.

It could be a coincidence.

Or it could not be.

It could be a ruse. A trick. Faking heroism to gain public trust. To get close to his real target and strike.

He couldn’t be too careful.

He needed to know Spooky’s motive because if he was connected to Danny in any way… then Danny may be in more danger than Shouta initially thought.

He leaned back in his chair, digging the palms of his hands into his eye sockets in an attempt to keep himself awake and rid himself of another headache that pounded against his skull.

“Late night again? Isn’t this the time of year where the load is supposed to be lighter?” Shouta glanced at his doorway spotting Hizashi leaning against it in a casual way. “Who’s giving you the headache now, Midoriya? Todoroki? Or is it Shinsou?”

“The new one…” Shouta sighed, slowly getting up from his chair and glaring at the paperwork scattered over his desk.

“Oh! Young Fenton, was it? Goes by Danny? Where in the world did you pick up an American transfer student?” Hizashi leaned forward, tilting his sunglasses down to reveal that devilish glint in his eyes, “or should I instead ask what it is about him that you're hiding from everyone.” Shouta shot the other teacher a glare, which only seemed to make that smile grow even wider. “Oh you totally are hiding something! Come on! You can tell me! You know I’m going to find out when I come over this weekend!” He hummed, skipping over to him as Shouta attempted to escape the room. “I’ll find all that pesky paperwork about him, so it’s easier if you just give up now!”

“How much trouble would it be if I had to set Danny up at All Mights house?” Shouta muttered under his breath, which it seemed Hizashi managed to pick up when he very, audibally, gasped.

“He’s staying in your apartment?”

Busted. “Yes, I’m… acting as his Guardian until we can confirm his safety.”

“Confirm his… is he a child of a mob boss or something? Like the bastard child they usually want dead?” Hizashi dramatically asked.

“It’s a possibility, really,” Shouta humoured him, “but it’s suspected to be more… experimental.”

Hizashi’s playful grin dropped, “seriously? You think he was experimented on? By who? And for what reasons?”

Shouta shook his head, “we have no leads that could answer either of those questions. A citizen found him passed out in a dumpster. He wasn’t dressed like he had been on the streets, he had a head injury, has amnesia about his past, and every day I see evidence that it was worse than I would originally think.”

“He’s such a bright kid, a little shy at most. I mean yeah, he gives off some creepy vibes from time to time but I never would have guessed-,”

Shouta placed a hand on Hizashi’s shoulder, “Wait-, what do you mean by ‘creepy’?”

Hizashi scratched lightly at his cheek, “well, it’s just- sometimes he seems to stare at nothing, like your cats do at ridiculous times in the morning. Or the air around him chills, which I think is just his quirk acting up or something. The most prominent is just the presence at times. I don’t know how to describe it but it feels… off. Like how you can just tell that it’s going to be a bad day, or how you can tell the incoming storm is going to be really bad? It’s almost like that but you don’t really know why it feels like that.” Hizashi then shrugged, “but you know, every kid has their quirks, right?” he offered a slight grin, “maybe that’s just a family thing.”

Shouta frowned, trying to piece together the information. He did notice Danny had such an odd presence about him, as well as his accent was something Shouta had such a hard time placing. It was another reason he had a hard time pinning down Danny’s origins. An accent can sometimes pinpoint locations. Southern Japan versus the northern areas. Different countries' citizens all had different accents, American and Canadian English accents in Japanese were slightly different, as well as the ones between Mexico and Spain Spanish accents. Danny’s accent was an outlier. It didn’t fit under any accent he had ever heard before. In fact it sounded… odd. There always seemed to be a wisp of the vowels, a slightly off pitch of the words being spoken, a twist of sounds that made it seem like a forgotten voice was speaking.

Shouta just scratched his chin and managed to shuffle out of his office, waiting for Hizashi to exit after him before closing and locking the door, “it could be anything. Everything about that kid is odd and it worries me. Why does it worry me?”

Hizashi nudged his shoulder with a grin, “because he’s your new cat.”

Shouta blinked slowly, processing Hizashi’s words. “Excuse me, what?”

Hizashi barked out a laugh, “you seriously don’t see it? I’ve never seen you latch onto a kid so fast, but I have seen you latch onto a cat this fast. Hell, you latched onto your other catboy, Shinsou really fast after the sports festival. Your weakness isn’t just cats. It’s cat-like kids!”

Shouta shoved past Hizashi aggressively, which only prompted more laughter from him, “it’s not my weakness, I just know if I let those two flail around on their own they won’t get very far. I don’t have a bleeding heart.”

“You said bleeding heart! You have it bad! Oh man, are we going to have to have custody battles over these kids?” Hizashi grinned, “heck, Danny already lives with you, soon he’s going to start calling you dad.”

“You really don’t know when to shut up, now do you?” Shouta sighed.

“Look, this is what happens when you adopt cat boys, I’m going to mock you over it.”

“Please stop calling them cat boys. This isn’t anime.”

“I will when you can prove they aren’t cats by heart,” his grin became sinister, “maybe I can convince your class to get pictures of them with cat ears just to mock you even more.”

“Hizashi, please.”

“Oh no need to be so serious all the time! Look, Danny may be just a little odd but he’s in no danger! He goes to the most highly secured school in Japan and he lives with an underground hero! The kid couldn’t be more safe!”

Danny glanced over the edge of the top of a light lamp pole in ghost form, a good 50 feet off the ground. He grinned at Denki who gave him a thumbs up from the ground. The area was empty thanks to the late time and construction sections surrounding the area. Danny pulled the walkie talkie Denki gave him close to his face and pressed the button, “so you think if I am in mortal danger, the power might spontaneously manifest?”

He heard a beep erupt from the small device before Denki’s voice followed, “exactly! Sometimes quirks have been known to develop early because someone was faced with a life or death situation so they just- BAM!! Manifest their quirk! So this might jumpstart it into showing up!”

“But I’ve been in mortal danger before. A lot. And I can fly.”

“Just turn off the flying part! And now it may show because you’re thinking about it! Just trust me!”

“Okaaayyy….” Danny said, glancing nervously over the edge again. He leaned back and took a few quick breaths, then squeezed his eyes shut and threw himself off the lamppost.

He tried to think of the Ghost Zone again, the safety of the churning green abyss. He risked a peek and immediately regretted it as all he saw was cold, hard pavement before his face painfully collided with it. Green splattered out of his now shattered nose in all directions, and all he could do was groan in response, turning back to human as he sat up. The green remained but now fresh red blood began to spill out of his nose and mix with the green, making a swirling mess of blood on his face and his shirt.

“Ouch.”

“Holy fuck- dude you were supposed to fly before you hit the ground!”

“Yeah I kinda forgot to do that,” Danny said in a nasally voice, leaning back his head and tenderly touching the mess that was his nose. “Oh god I can’t believe I have to do this again…”

“Do what-,”—Danny snapped his flattened nose back straight with a horribly sickening crack—,”hoLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK!”

Danny twitched his head a little, blinking wildly, “hOO that hurt! I forgot how much that hurt!” He shook his head again. “Oh- well at least it will heal all right. Hopefully before Aizawa notices…”

“How long will it take for it to heal?”

Danny thought back to the last time he broke his nose so horribly, “uh- 2 days. Oh no it’s gonna bruise so badly. He’s going to notice, Denki! What do I tell him? ‘Hey I leapt off a lamp pole to try and manifest portal making powers’?”

“Yes.”

“NO! No, I can’t tell him that!”

“Fine. Ride or die it is.”

“Ride or- what do you mean-.”

Denki punched himself in the face, causing Danny to yelp in surprise, “what did you do that for?!”

“RIDE OR DIE, DANNY!” Denki exclaimed. “I have a black eye, you have a broken nose, what happened? I don’t know! Do you know? No! I don’t know either! No questions asked!”

Danny snorted, which made his nose hurt even more, “you’re my ride or die then?”

“Of course dude! Look, we are secret buddies now. You’re stuck with me whether you like it or not!” He cackled in a joking manner.

Danny sighed and leaned back, looking up at the darkening sky. “Stuck with you, huh? Say we still have some time to kill. Wanna try out some pranks you suggested earlier?”

Denki grinned, “I thought you would never ask.”

Todoroki tapped the whiteboard surrounded by other white boards and cork boards with a long pointer stick he seemingly whipped out of nowhere. Izuku was leaning forward on his seat, his full attention directed towards Todoroki. Mina, Toko, Momo, Tsuyu, Uraraka, Iida, Sero, and Kirishima filled the empty seats of the room around him. The rest of the class was busy with other things and couldn’t make the theory fury crew meeting, Kacchan’s particular excuse being, ‘I’m not joining your stupid insanity club.’

The cork board had many images of Danny, which were very, very bad images. Blurry and out of focus, too dark, or having really bad cases of red eye. All provided by Mina that she gathered on the day she met Fenton a few days prior to the first class (which he felt a little betrayed that she never mentioned that she and Tokoyami had met Fenton beforehand AND saw his quirk in action and never told him) and throughout the first day back to classes. There was also a large tangle of strings, red, blue, white, pink glitter, you name a colour and it was somewhere amongst the cork boards. On the whiteboard that Todoroki was pointing to, was a list.

Theory 1: Danny Fenton is my long lost twin given away at birth because Endeavor fucking sucks.

Theory 2: Aizawa fucked my mom and Danny Fenton is my half brother.

Theory 3: Aizawa had an affair with an American woman and never paid child support but now he has to and also spend time with his son.

Theory 4: Aizawa and Present Mic somehow made Danny. (Young clone of Aizawa??)

Theory 5: SPACE.

Izuku nodded along as Todoroki read out each of the theories, scratching his chin in thought.

Tsuyu raised a hand, “how can he be your twin if he looks nothing like you, your dad, or your mom, ribbit?”

“Well, actually Tsuyu, it’s very possible for twins to have two different fathers, if they’re fraternal that is!” Uraraka pipped in.

Tsuyu tilted her head slightly, “how so? Ribbit.”

“Well…” Uraraka’s cheeks flushed a bright pink, “there’s a lot of… like science and biology about boys and girls but- you know how identical twins are the baby split in two and fraternal twins are two babies from the start? So like if two daddies like a mommy very much during the same week… it’s very possible to have twins that have two different dads.” Her entire face was a bright red by the time she finished explaining, but Tsuyu seemed to get the idea.

Kirishima raised a hand, “what about the ‘space’ theory.”

“That one is very simple,” Todoroki nodded, “he came from space.”

Sero scratches his head, “I don’t get it.”

“Oh! That’s because you all weren’t at the mall! Danny LOVES space!! Once you get him talking about it, he won’t even stop to take a breath! He especially lit up when we mentioned Thirteen, but it was odd how he never heard of the hero before! Or like… any hero before. So someone who loves space and actually doesn’t know a lot about earth customs? He has got to be an alien,” Mina grinned.

“A very valid point,” Todoroki nodded, “though his lack of knowledge could be because he lived a very sheltered life. If he was my half brother or twin, he, as you said, shares none of our family attributes. Black hair and blue eyes? I’d be suspicious if his quirk was a fire quirk but instead it’s ice, which my mother has white hair and grey eyes. So his father must at least have black hair. So clearly, an affair had happened and Endeavor covered it up to protect his precious reputation. If Danny was kept away from hero propaganda, he would never be encouraged to pursue a life of a hero and therefore remain a hidden secret from the public for the rest of his life.”

“So… who’s his father then?” Momo asked.

“None other than,”— Todoroki dramatically tugged a sheet off a covered board revealing a massive picture of Aizawa with red arrows and circles drawn around his face—,”Our own teacher, Mr. Aizawa!”

Several gasps were heard from the members of the theory club.

“Black hair, walking zombie look, sinister grin when he attempts to smile, and unkempt hair. There is no denying that he is somewhat related to our homeroom teacher,” Todoroki slapped his pointing stick against Aizawa’s picture.

“But what about the eyes?” Toko asked. “Neither Aizawa or Todoroki’s mom have blue eyes like his.”

Izuku spun around so fast he nearly knocked over his own chair, “this is where I can add explanations!!” He jumped up next to Todoroki and whipped off another covered whiteboard, revealing an absolute mess of words, circles, arrows and various theory looking images. “His eyes are like that because of his quirk!” Izuku explained. “You see, some users have extra features that are like side effects of a quirk! Like Kirishima! You have very sharp teeth despite having the transformative hardening quirk! It’s slightly related but not as directly! Or Mina! You have pink skin and hair, black whites of your eyes and horns, but your quirk is acid! An emitter type quirk!” The room nodded and hummed in understanding. “Therefore his eyes don’t need to be taken into account in terms of genetics because they are a direct result of his quirk!”

Izuku flipped their whiteboard over, revealing even more writing and notes that looked even crazier than the first. He knew how it looked, but he couldn’t help it, he couldn’t stop when it came to quirks. “Now, to discuss his quirk. Phantom ice! We have to consider what that means for ice to act ‘phantom-like’, so we can start with the definition of ‘phantom’, which from the thesaurus is-,”

“Slow down there, bro. This meeting is mostly about theorizing who his parents are. We can have a separate meeting for his whole quirk analysis aspect,” Kirishima stopped him before he could go buck wild.

Izuku dropped his head in sadness at his inability to rant about what Danny’s quirk could be to a full extent and slowly flipped the white board back over and took a seat back in his original chair.

“Thank you for your contribution, Midoriya,” Todoroki nodded. “Now it is voting time. We shall vote on our most likely theory and continue our research back at our homes to discuss at our next meeting.”

Tomura glared at the shop windows full of merchandise surrounding that new pest. He’s barely been here a week and his stupid fucking crest was everywhere.

What the fuck did the D even stand for?!?

He should be getting all this attention! All this credit!

First Stain and now some little glowing freak that doesn’t even photograph well? What do these brain dead NPCs even see in this fucker?

‘He’s the one who took down Stain,’ Kurogiri’s voice rang in his head. ‘A single hit and the glorious hero killer was down. We should consider recruiting him.’

Recruiting!! Recruiting he said! They tried to recruit Stain and all they got was a bunch of freaks! He was getting tired of putting together a circus instead of a boss-crushing team!

Sensei hadn’t spoken on the manner yet either, it was up to him to decide what he wanted to do about this ‘illegal hero’.

Well… he wasn’t easy to track, so maybe they will just ignore him and one day some stupid hero will kill him.

He grinned to himself, that would be quite fun to watch.

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#danny phantom #danny fenton #phantom #danny #fenton #ghost #au #you can’t punch a ghost #ycpag #chapter 6 #crossover #bnha #mha #dennys #ship #rare pair #tw swearing

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inknopewetrust · 4 years ago

Text

Manipulate Me

Summary: As Peter travels Europe as a normal kid, the world’s peril throws a wrench in his plans. With you by his side chaperoning the trip as an undercover S.H.I.E.L.D agent, the mysterious introduction of Quentin Beck leaves you breathless.

Pairing: Quentin Beck/Mysterio x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2.8k

Warnings: None!

A/N: Thanks so much for requesting this @mrs-blooooom ! I had a great time writing for Quentin Beck again. For context, reader is Peter’s older sister but also happens to be a shield agent (it was the easiest route of explanation as to why she would be meeting with Fury and Maria Hill). Requests are currently OPEN and you can check out who I write for in my request guidelines tagged in my bio. Thanks for reading! :) *gif not mine* I do not own any of the dialogue from the film.

“May-”

“-And don’t forget the passports! Oh! The passports!”

“May!”

May stopped scrambling around the apartment only to find that you had the two passports already in your hand. The tired aunt pushed her disheveled hair out of her face, pushing her glasses back up her nose, and slowly calming down. It was fine... Peter had you, Peter had all his friends, Peter would be fine in Europe.

“Everything is going to go fine. I’ll be with him at all times and if he decides to wander off and do his Spiderman stuff––well then I’ll just have to call in some Avengers to stop him.”

“I trust that you’ll be able to keep him out of trouble if it comes down to it.” May picked up Peter’s suitcase off the floor and listened to his heavy footsteps draw down the hallway and into the living room where you had gathered with her.

“All ready?” He asked with those inquisitively wide eyes that reminded you so much of your mom. May handed him the suitcase but not before capturing the boy in a tight hug. Her “motherly” instincts grew since she returned from the blip. It was strange without the two of them. You, stuck here in New York without a leader in either Fury or Tony and the remaining members of S.H.I.E.L.D, Avengers and then the developed Sword, were left to pick up the pieces and build a life without them. That was the most difficult part.

“Promise me that you won’t get into any trouble?” May asked Peter who in reply rolled his eyes with a chuckle.

“It’s just a school trip. Besides, Y/n is going to be there and I’m sure she’s told you a million times that she can keep me in check.” You smacked the side of his head but he just ignored you and turned to the door, opening it with a rough pull with his spider-y force.

“We’ll see you in a few weeks, May!”

If you were able to take back all the words you said and never go to Europe, you would ask Stephen Strange to reverse time.

Venice was a mess. The water-creature-man-thing...? had erupted the small city into a chaotic terror with locals and terrified students trying to find cover. Peter was somewhere flying with webs while another hero whom you had never seen before was assisting him. After a few minutes of trying to guide a group of students to safety, you secured cover underneath an awning in front of a store.

“Ms. Parker! What do we do!?” Flash was almost in tears from fear which you couldn’t help but judge. It was water? the kid survived Thanos’ snap so he could survive this. Not to mention Fury would have your ass if any of the kids died on your watch.

Out of nowhere the ground started to fill up with water and cracking of concrete or bricks began echoing throughout the small courtyard you trapped them all in. The green man came swooshing in with a cloud of smoke, almost like an illusion, and stopped the water with the sheer force of his magical abilities. The creature reformed into what looked like a water man and the green man dodged the attack with made the sound of bricks tumbling increase in intensity. Suddenly, the tower to your right began crumbling and you pulled as many students as you could closer to the building you sought shelter next to.

“Get back! Get back!”

“Who is that guy!?” Jason, one of the students shouted out but you couldn’t answer the question because you didn’t know.

“I don’t know, but he’s kicking that waters ass.” Brad voiced exactly what you would have said.

The green man continued to fight the water as the tower crumbled beside you all and then, like the blink of an eye, the monster was gone and the water scattered, soaking your shoes with a safety that was much welcomed. The man landed to sounds of cheering from the students and locals that found themselves in the same spot as you. But something was different.

Maybe it was the fact that you couldn’t see his face, or maybe the fact that you had never heard of this hero and you literally worked for the agency that worked with them all. Maybe he wasn’t from this world? Space? Another universe? You could have sworn that you heard of the idea of a multiverse.

But maybe it was the fact that beneath all that smoke and mirrors that made up the helmet of the mysterious man, it felt as though when he looked around at his admiring fans, his eyes trained on you, staring through your soul with some feeling that wasn’t welcomed or unwanted either. Intrigue, that’s what it was. And when he flew off, everyone was left with a curiosity that sparked a great debate throughout the entire world. Who was this man?

Well, the T.V. at the hotel identified him as Mysterio. Peter managed to make it back in one piece which you were able to celebrate in a brief moment outside before the voices of interested students and the television interrupted the moment. Betty and Ned were searching every website for some kind of clue but nothing other than what the news reported was to be taken as fact. It wasn’t aliens, it wasn’t witches, it was just another hero.

So that was what you went with. That was until you opened your door to Fury sitting in a chair next to the window.

“Oh my God!” You shrieked and Fury laughed, laughed, at you.

“You scare too easy.”

“What are you doing here? I thought you were in spa-”

The slight reveal of a green hand made you shut up. "Fury” tilted his head with a slight “Ah, well.”

“Is this about that Mysterio guy?”

“We’ve got him at a site. Says he’s from another Earth and that these creatures destroyed his own and intend to destroy this one too.”

“Another Earth? So, the multiverse.. it’s real?”

“Fury” didn’t respond to that, but he simply rose and gestured over his shoulder to the window.

“There is a car outside. Go and wait in it while I go get Peter. The big man told me I need to scare the kid.” You smiled at the thought as the man left to go retrieve your brother.

You had been part of the world of superheroes far longer than Peter had. You had been there when Loki first attacked New York way back when and that seemed like so many years ago. With the blip, it seems like an entire eternity. Nick never let you in on his secrets of his relationship with Carol Danvers, but you had met the Skrulls when you went on a mission three months ago to visit Monica Rambeau in space. Unlike her, you weren’t blessed with some badass powers, though she didn’t always have them.

Peter looked terrified walking out to the car and when he saw you inside, he breathed a sigh of relief that he wouldn’t be alone. The site of S.H.I.E.L.D in Italy wasn’t far from where you had all taken up residence for the last day or two, but it was secluded, down in the catacombs of old buildings that no one would suspect. It reminded Peter of a Mission Impossible movie that you had watched with him before the two of you left for Europe, he felt more like a spy than a superhero in that moment.

As you walked behind the two down the long corridors of the abandoned treasure that was used as a make-shift S.H.I.E.L.D, you were surprised to see Maria at a computer, though now knowing about Fury, you were sure it wasn’t even her. The center of the room was filled with scattered agents who you weren’t familiar with and then a projection in the middle of the room, along with the man without the helmet.

You weren’t one for fawning over men. Jesus, you worked with Thor sometimes and while you were aware of his Godly looks, you never gawked. But this man, he wasn’t a God, he was just naturally beautiful. Dark hair, blueish-gray eyes that surely did pierce your soul, and a stature of a man who knew how to carry himself with power in the world. It was like he walked out of your dreams and into reality.

“This is Mr. Beck.” Fury introduced you and Peter to the man. Mr. Beck approached Peter with a small smile and held out his hand. Peter looked nervous but responded with his own shake.

“Mysterio?”

“What?”

“It’s just what my friends were calling you.”

“Well, you can call me Quentin. You handled yourself well out there today. I saw what you did with the tower. We could use someone like you on my world.”

Peter looked puzzled but Quentin looked behind the boy to you. He held out his hand with another smile which you returned. Maybe there was a shock when you touched hands, but you were sure it was just your imagination.

“Y/n Parker, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.”

“It’s good to meet you, Y/n.”

“Likewise.”

Did time rush by faster when you were in the presence of someone you were obviously attracted to? Yes, because before you knew it, the night was over, and Fury was leading you and Peter back out to the car. Peter was absolutely smitten with Quentin and could hardly break conversation. The man gave the attention to Peter like Tony did. It was like life imitating itself in another time. Quentin reminded you so much of Tony. Smooth with words, handsome, gifted in almost an unfair way, and he took an interest in the last piece of close family you had. You wanted nothing more than for Peter to have a figure in his life to give him a positive purpose. With Tony gone, he’s struggled trying to find his niche again.

“See you, kid.” Quentin looked disappointed but hopefully that his and Peter’s paths would cross again one day, even with Peter trying to avoid being identified by his class or the world. At some point, someone would figure it out if they hadn’t already.

“Yeah, see you.” Peter said as he walked out, following Dimitri, who Fury ordered to keep Peter in check with you. You were more than capable of doing it yourself but for some reason, Fury felt the need to send another agent.

“Good luck, Quentin.” You told him and he nodded his head, glancing at the holographic map of Venice next to him.

“I fear I’ll need it. But I’m hopeful that the good luck will be for more than just winning this fight.”

Swoon. That’s what you did for the remainder of the night and into the early morning. You couldn’t sleep a wink after the revelations that Quentin relayed to you and Peter about the elementals. That worried you too. How in the world was Peter supposed to sit by while other heroes with indisposed and couldn’t help? Sam and Bucky were on their own missions, Carole and Monica were off, Stephen and Wanda were no use and Thor was off on his own adventures with that team of riff-raffs from space–you know, the one with the talking tree.

But somewhere in all the jumble of thoughts, the scenery of the canal that had been a scene of something far different, calmed the noise. Enjoy the trip. This was the first time in years that you had traveled for something other than work and yet it was still filling every thought and moment. The thoughts were so loud and invasive that you didn’t register the person coming up to your right, ready to take the bag off your shoulders. You felt the tug and turned around, ready to punch the person but they dogged it, pulling it off your shoulder. It was a game of tug of war for the bag, but the person was strong.

“Let go! I said let go!” You pulled as hard as you could, therefore the bag came flying back to you and its contents spread across the sidewalk. The person glanced at the wallet on the ground and then back at you before you both dove to the ground. They grabbed it first and you tackled them to the ground. Wrestling with grunts and yells, you hadn’t noticed the audience of one that rushed to help. A blast of green light shot the person off of you and you clutched the wallet to your chest tightly, trying to reel in your ragged breath.

“I heard yelling from my hotel...” The hero started only to realize that it was you and with a turn of your head, you had realized it was him, Quentin.

“Oh! Are you alright?” He extended a hand, which you readily took to stand. He then helped collect the scattered items and put them back in the now ripped bag before handing it back to you.

“I’m fine. Thank you.”

“It’s no problem.” There was a brief, awkward lull but you weren’t sure what else to say.

“So, do you always wander around at night in a city you don’t know?” It was an icebreaker, a line that he knew would make you at least chuckle.

“No... I just had a lot on my mind. What you told us in there–it’s a lot of information to retain.”

“I’m sure an agent like you could handle it though.” You smiled bashfully at the compliment. Quentin gestured over his shoulder and shoved his hands in his pockets. You realized he wasn’t wearing his uniform anymore but just a pullover sweater and some dark jeans. How he shot the green light in the first place you didn’t know, but all heroes worked a little differently you suppose.

“Would you like to take a walk? I promise I won’t try to steal your wallet.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” The conversation was so light, and carefree that for the first time in a long time, you felt like a normal person. Quentin returned your cheeky smile and began walking.

“I’m pretty sure a woman like you could figure out who trust and who not avoid. Isn’t that what they train you for? Agents?”

“I suppose so, yes.”

“Can I ask you something?” You asked Quentin and he looked at you with a nod of his head.

“How did you know the elementals would turn up in our Earth?”

“Intelligence. My wife, she had worked for our version of your agency. Before they came to destroy our city, one had already manifested itself in Mexico. It was as if there would be a pattern to follow. So when she passed, I used her intelligence to figure out where they might be, which led me here.”

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you, it’s been some time now. She would be glad to see Peter helping me, and you helping out with the cause.”

“Peter really took a liking to you. I could see it in the way he could barely contain himself.” You laughed, changing the heavy subject to one more light.

“He’s a good kid. You’re related I assume?”

“My little brother.”

“You should be proud of him. He is doing a lot of good for the world. I just wish he was more confident in his abilities to realize identity protect isn’t everything.”

Quentin was right, it wasn’t everything. But it was more than identity for Peter. It was also no Tony to lead the way, his want to be a normal kid, his need to have friends and well, MJ to like him. But neither of you would know what it was like to be a teen hero, that was a lot of unneeded pressure.

“It seems that I brought you around full circle.” The sound of Quentin’s voice broke the silence and the realization that you were outside the barely standing hotel. You sighed and tugged the bag on your shoulder.

“Thanks for saving the day, Mysterio.”

“Anything to help protect Agent Parker.”

If you hadn’t just met him a few hours ago, you would have asked him to come upstairs but that was far too forward for the world you created for yourself, so you extended your hand as he had earlier.

“May our paths cross again.”

He grasped your hand tightly and agreed.

“Hopefully under better circumstances.”

You watched then as he walked away, unaware of the man underneath the facade of Mysterio. How he already knew who you were, knew all your secrets, and was ready to manipulate you to take down the institution that denied him success so many years ago.

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kinnoth · 3 years ago

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ok so this post accidentally blew tf up, but it was actually just my crackiest conclusion to the conviction i now hold that anybody who writes ensemble casts should be required to play dnd just so they understand character class/ability differentiation. like imagine if the mcu was written by proper fucking nerds as opposed to fucking disney focus grouped losers.

like i've talked about this before but one of my biggest fucking quibbles with the mcu and the avengers films in general is that they didn't know how to handle characters of different classes/abilities

[these movies do] a really bad job at showing us the difference between people's relative power levels and abilities. like which avenger is the one that can hit people from across the room with some sort of blast?

everyone. the answer is everyone. ironman's is some kind of rocket booster; thor has lightning; captain america has his shield (which even returns to his hand now, just like mjolnir); hawkeye has bomb arrows; hulk throws shit; black widow has a literal gun. you might as well have just given them all guns, actually, cos it's all the same fucking ability

this is counterstrike. they have made superhero skinned counterstrike cos it doesn't matter which skin you choose to play in, the game balancing and mechanics are all the same for a fair experience.

like literally why are natasha and clint in these action scenes; i thought their whole point was spycraft. like, why are you utilizing all your characters as if they were all equal. nobody can be good at anything if everybody is good at everything.

so with this in mind, let's rebalance all the the MCU characters I can think of into actual character classes with stats. to define a parameter, let's do what they would be in their last appearances in iw/eg

- tony stark: lvl 6 human artificer. standard human constitution. every fucking thing he touches turns into some sort of magic technology, which boosts his strength/dex. good at ranged battle, bad at hand-to-hand. been playing this game for like 15 years? getting a bit tired tbh. main weapon: artillery. highest stat: intelligence. lowest stat: wisdom.

- natasha romanov: lvl 8 human rogue. standard human stats +2. her training as an assassin makes her an excellent choice for infiltration and an expert at blending into her surroundings. if caught, she can be very persuasive and seductive. not great at battle in general, best at hand-to-hand. been playing this game since the cold war. main weapon: hand pistol. highest stat: charisma. lowest stat: strength

- steve rogers: lvl 7 superhuman cleric. standard superhuman stats +2 (double standard human strength and constitution). steve rogers is a devotee to the neutral evil god America. he is a conduit for America's wishes throughout the world, for good or ill, mostly ill. best at mid-range battle. took a 75 year break from the game to take a nap, or he'd be higher leveled. main weapon: blessed shield. highest stat: constitution. lowest stat: intelligence.

- sam wilson: lvl 4 human fighter/cleric multiclass. standard human stats. not been in the game very long, with a vacillating devotion to his god. background as a soldier gives him solid mid-range battle abilities, but he's not great long-range or hand-to-hand. main weapon: mechanical wings. highest stat: charisma. lowest stat: dexterity.

- bucky barnes: lvl 9 superhuman rogue. superhuman stats but +2 strength, -3 constitution. excellent at ranged battle, his training as a sniper and an assassin have made him a great option for infiltration. can hold his own in combat if caught, but would prefer just not to get caught. fragile constitution due to past torture and mistreatment. been in the game on and off for the past 75 odd years. main weapon: sniper rifle. highest stat: dexterity. lowest stat: constitution.

- clint barton: lvl 1 human rogue/ranger multiclass. standard human stats. pretty good with a bow. not the worst at sneaking. good at ranged combat but not good at mid-range. terrible at hand-to-hand. should probably just play the game more seriously to level up but he's got lots of scheduling conflicts or something. main weapon: bow. highest stat: dexterity. lowest stat: constitution.

- wanda maximoff: lvl 2 human sorcerer. standard human stats. regular human teenager who got some sort of drugs (?) that now allow her to manipulate energy to create offensive and defensive fields. mildly useful in mid-range combat. zero martial training, not terribly athletic, stamina non-existent. the limits and rules to her powers aren't terribly clear yet bc she's not been in the game very long but it does seem like she might just be making them up as she goes along which seems a bit unfair, but she is only like 17 or something so it's hard to have That Talk with her. main weapon: magic energy fields. highest stat: intelligence. lowest stat: constitution.

- hulk/bruce banner: lvl 6 changeling(?) barbarian. superhuman stats +2. human passing, but his true form is a pretty big deal. background as a physicist affords him high int in his human form which does not carry over to his changeling form. superhuman str/con does not carry over his human form. super effective when raging. character was originated by another player who was kicked out of the campaign for creative differences. only capable of hand-to-hand combat. main weapon: big stinkin hands. highest stat: constitution. lowest stat: charisma.

- steve strange: lvl 3 human warlock. standard human stats. human healer whose hands got fucked up in a tragic backstory event and now draws magical powers from some unnamed powerful otherworldly entity. able to open and close dimensional portals, useless in every other form of combat. cannot take a single punch. he's the wielder of an OP af time controlling artefact that frankly he probably shouldn't be allowed to have due to his general inexperience as both a player and as a warlock. main weapon: dimensional magic. highest stat: intelligence. lowest stat: dexterity.

- thor: lvl 15 aesir fighter/druid multiclass. standard aesir stats (human str/con x5) aesir come with vehicle proficiency and allspeech as a racial trait. 1500 years old, he's been at this for a long time. proficient in just about every melee weapon; good for every range of combat. he was some sort of royalty back home so he's well educated but kind of sheltered. he's suffered some really nasty tragedies in the recent past, so he's gained some wisdom but he's become quite psychologically fragile and is no longer as constitutionally strong as he once was. druidic affinity to atmospheric effects (wind, storms, lightning etc). main weapon: greataxe. highest stat: strength. lowest stat: constitution.

- loki: lvl 15 aesir/jotun rogue/sorcerer multiclass. standard aesir stats. he built up this whole tragic backstory about how he's a jotun who was magically transformed into an aesir but has done nothing with that storyline since the first session, even though it's still on his character sheet. 1500 years old, has been at this for a long time. excellent dexterity; good at slipping in and out of spaces using his tricks; good at slight of hand. middling in all forms of combat. hasn't put a lot of points into sorcery even though he multiclassed in it, mostly just spams the cantrip minor illusion. textbook poorly min/maxed build. main weapon: dagger. highest stat: dexterity. lowest stat: wisdom

- heimdall: lvl 17 aesir paladin. standard aesir stats. at least 3500 years old, has been playing this game since before anybody else currently in the game. devotee to the neutral evil god Asgard. has a special oath spell that just lets him see like at least 30 feet in every direction. aces every fucking perception check. was pretty faithful to his god's will until his god blew tf up. has a powerful channel divinity spell that just acts as a teleportation beam? never uses it though which is frankly a fucking waste. crazy strong, but he doesn't get much play bc he's kind of too cool for all the other kids. excellent at hand-to-hand, not much good at other combats. kind of a stick in the mud. main weapon: greatsword. highest stat: intelligence (for his perception checks). lowest stat: charisma

#the avengers #internal thor tag #obvious joke post is obvious #also typed up on my phone while in bed so you'll forgive me if I've forgotten anyone

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river-bottom-nightmare · 3 years ago

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Nightwing 83 Review

guess who isn't weeks late this time. my opinion of the series is going up a little bit. it's still not great, but i'm not actively put off by it anymore the way i was after 81. not going to tag as spoilers, but be warned that they are under the cut

i’m sure you all are well aware of this but now, but dear god i love bruno redondo’s art. like, an unhealthy amount. the pink and blue is getting to be a theme with either him or just this run, but i am definitely enjoying it. the movement in this cover is clearly obvious, but well done. you recoznize right off the bat that the cover was drawn to drag your eyes down the page until you get to the bottom, but you enjoy the whole ride there.

also, redondo’s way of drawing a character in stages of action so we can see just how much they’re doing in a split second of movement is quickly becoming something i like to see drawn with dick, and any other character that has that sort of ease of movement and body sense, like cass or sin or maybe a super.

and he’s in action the entire time! there’s shot drawn just to show off a shirtless comic book character, the way nightwing is so often subjected to. he’s shirtless because he’s changing his clothes, and that’s all we see, no more and no less. very practical, very well done. i like it.

he looks so cute right here oh my god. the little squint, the hair curls. it’s adorable.

but also like. unless melinda has specifically outfitted the door spyhole so that the person on the other side can’t see dick looking through it (and in all honesty she might have) then everyone on the other side can see dick looking through that door.

bringing your attention back to the “i can’t see melinda’s fbi file oh no!! it’s redacted!! whatever can we do!!” stupidity. redacted files are child’s play for oracle, and definitely doable for both dick and bruce. so that’s bullshit.

now, melinda apparently grew up with the maroni family, then took down part of the family from the inside. the maroni family is a large and notable presence in gotham, one that bruce pays a respectable amount of attention to. he definitely would have grown suspicious when two members of the maroni family were taken down, and with some investigation, he would have discovered melinda’s plan. and it should go without saying that the majority of things you see batman doing? dick can do it too.

it’s not so much that i don’t like how clever the villains/antiheroes are getting. i don’t like how dc heroes are increasingly written as less intelligent. they seem to be relying on pure fighting skills or luck, which may be the case for a couple heroes, but has never been the case for most of dc’s big name heroes, the bat family included. it’s irritating to me to see this sort of stuff pop up as a major plot point when i know that, if dick or bruce had been written with the amount of skill and power that they canonically possess, this entire mess would have been sorted out years ago.

unrelated but dick and melinda have the same hair

this may just be me, but i was always under the impression that dick doesn’t really have a “double life???”

yes, he’s talented enough to create enough differences between robin/nightwing and dick grayson’s mannerisms, way of movement, voices, and speech patterns so that it’s very difficult to put the two together.

but nightwing has never been separate from dick grayson, not the way bruce and batman is. he’s always leaned more towards clark in that aspect: his hero persona is an exaggerated, stately, larger-than-life version of who he really is. there’s no second persona, no real “dick grayson identity” and “nightwing identity.” they’re the same person with the same goals, ideas, and skills. one just pretends to abide by the law, and one gives up pretense of that.

oh good thank god. if he’d trusted her right off the bat (hehe. bat.) i would have slapped him upside the head. at least he’s still got instincts.

gosh the colouring on this is cool. the red has enough purple and pink tones to it that it doesn’t abruptly ruin the tone of the artwork. but it’s definitely glaring enough to take the reader outside of this personal moment they had slipped into between dick and melinda, to put them back in the present where they’re reminded that oh yea there are people hunting dick down.

the next panel keeps this up too, in a less severe way. melinda’s bodyguard shows up (i forgot her name sorry :[ ) and subtly places us in the middle of an action scene rather than a private, personal scene.

laughing so fucking hard have our little vigilantes grown so accustomed to breaking into places that it doesn’t even register as a crime anymore??? tim coming in through the fire escape to pick bernard up for their date and being very much confused as to why bernard is freaking out.

i really like melinda’s shirt and now despite all the work i have to do and the fucking conference i have to host on monday i want to spend hours scrolling through clothing shops online trying to find this shirt. the mock neck/neckline is so cool i want it

so roland just assumes that a very dangerous vigilante who is highly talented in combat and a very dangerous bodyguard who is also highly talented in combat had a fight that ended with this very dangerous bodyguard being tied up and she looks completely fine? roland just assumes that her having no visible wounds or bruises means that they got into a fight and she lost that easily? uh. aight then

dick what are you doing. legitimately what the fuck are you doing. why are you posing oh my god. you are injured and tired and in absolutely no position to go hand to hand with one of main enemies. jesus christ run away or head to lower ground or something. don’t just stand around letting the floodlights show exactly where you are.

i don’t understand what he’s trying to do here??? blockbuster fully bought the story that dick fought them both, won, tried to get info out of them and failed, then hightailed it out of there. he didn’t have to draw roland out for a fight.

but it does look cool. the way the light just highlights his silhouette and the blue parts of his costume does look badass. he does get style points in my book for this.

w h a t d i d i f u c k i n g t e l l y o u , d i c k ?

very classic superhero line and it does sound like something dick would say in a fit of righteous rage but also it makes me laugh so hard because all vigilantes think they’re so powerful that the law doesn’t apply to them. dick vigilantism is illegal. you’re acting above the law and pretending it doesn’t apply to you. hypocritical much?

it happens so often in superhero movies, tv shows, comics, whatever and it makes me giggle every damn time.

pretty decent comeback but before i start seeing people writing blockbuster as a thug i’m going to remind you that he made a deal with a demon for genius level intellect. if this turns into another bane situation i’m going to be a little miffed. he’s a smart man, which makes him a dangerous and infinitely more interesting enemy for nightwing.

this is so horribly in character i want to scream. (or. at least. it lines up with one of the versions of nightwing i have in my head.) he’s running right towards the bullets, miraculously doesn’t get shot, while making a sort-of pun. i hate this so much. i love him.

this is cool. this art is really really cool.

he leaped from a building right towards a helicopter that’s actively shooting at him, but none of the bullets are touching him. none of the corruption of the city can touch him no matter how hard it tries, because he’s too good to be corrupted. Comic Book Logic Can Be Good Sometimes Actually.

batman’s belt what??? swiss army knife who?? sorry, i only know nightwing’s bright blue escrima.

this is one of my favourite things about heroes with exceptional abilities, even more so if the hero is human. the things they can do are so far beyond the realm of normal human abilities that it’s equal parts terrifying and awe-inspiring every time they act.

he just used modified grappling wires to hook to the door of a moving helicopter, swung around the helicopter safely without hitting the blades, gained exactly the right momentum to swing upward again right through the opening of helicopter, then fought and tied up the men before they had any idea what was happening. that’s near impossible to do.

it’s stuff like this where i just sort of sigh in contentment. no matter how many times they leave out dick’s detective skills or conveniently forget that he’s actually a master planner and team leader and make him out to be this forgetful dude who makes everything up on the fly because of his “circus roots,” at least they won’t ever take away dick’s sheer physical ability honed to perfection.

the art, too! in a few panels, dick’s drawn a little lightened or blurred. he’s moving so quickly and fighting so efficiently that he can barely be seen by the enemy. he’s got perfect form all the way through.

and THIS!

there was a helicopter that had five men shooting at him with what looks like machine guns. most people would be dead. some would run away, and be nimble enough to survive without fatal hits. there are very few people, even in fucking comic books, who can look at that hopeless situation and turn it around so quickly and thoroughly that he benefits from it instead.

i just. love nightwing.

it was funny the first time as a comic reader aware of the meme. it’s really not anymore. why the hell would you, in universe, be wearing a shirt that has a picture of your boyfriend being hit in the face by his father.

okay that was funny.

look at lil bitewing, so concerned for her human!!! love her sm.

also a question as to the timeline of things. is nightwing happening before or after urban legends?

i was so distracted by dick wearing a robe and briefs and nothing else that i didn’t register the second part until later. he slept for two days?? babs, baby, he recently had a very traumatic brain injury. why do you sound so nonchalant?

@TIM X COFFEE SHIPPERS GET FUCCCCKKKKEEDDDDD

ngl i totally forgot about that dude oops

this comic is giving so many reaction pictures. you know how you always use the worst possible picture of your friend for your friend’s contact picture? i’m just getting so many of these.

leslie!!! the titans!!! lucius!!! dick going to go see old friends!!!! the titans!!! this part made me so irrationally happy it really did. gar being the one to just. offer dick solutions with open arms. this was the best

i wish i could just copy and paste this entire scene, but that would take up way too much space, so i’m just going to talk about it instead.

you gave me my name, nightwing, and you gave me some of the best advice i’ve received in my life: beautiful little throwback to nightwing’s origin. you’d be surprised at the amount of people who don’t know where the name came from, or who don’t know how much clark means to dick. and the fact that dick still looks up to clark as a hero, recognizes that clark isn’t always perfect and yet continues to hold him in such high esteem, and still looks back on advice that clark gave him fondly just warmed my heart so much.

for a man who has fearlessly stood up to darkseid, bruce will do a lot to avoid a conversation: “grrr. i’m the BATMAN. i’m so DARK and MYSTERIOUS. nobody knows the true me. no one ever will. i will be LONELY for the rest of my CURSED LIFE. such is the price of a hero. ignore my farmer himbo husband in the background”

but i don’t think there’s anything heroic about being a billionaire: another nod to how much dick follows clark’s example rather than bruce. yes, this was a very poignant and important criticism, and i think it’s wonderful that this was published in a pretty popular comic book. but the thing is, there is a way to be a heroic billionaire, but only in fictional universes. the way bruce, ollie, t’challa only ever use their wealth to help people. they donate massive amounts of money to charities that they themselves create so they know exactly how the money is being used. they hire people who aren’t likely to get jobs anywhere else and pay them much more than what a base living wage is. they use their power to help push progressive laws and social change. they are helping.

dick doesn’t fully see it that way. he spent more than half his childhood the son of a billionaire, but still believes that one could be more heroic when one doesn’t have obscene amounts of wealth. whose example do you think he followed to come to that conclusion?

superman looked up to alfred pennyworth?: i mean yea alfred may have been a wildly irresponsible guardian and one hell of an enabler but goddamn if he didn’t love his kid.

you don’t need my input. you’ve thought it all through: ooooooh this line made me grin. for so long, dick’s treated clark as a mentor and a guiding figure. he’s still seen as a kid, an up and coming, snot-nosed titan with dreams of a better world. clark still thinks of him as a kid, despite watching him grow up. but this little line was something i think dick needed sorely to hear. he doesn’t need anyone’s guiding hand on his shoulder, he doesn’t need to ask for permission. he doesn’t need clark to support him the way he did when he was a teenager. he’s all grown up now, and he doesn’t need clark’s help. i imagine it was a bit of a surprise for dick to hear that.

honestly, i couldn’t think of a better role model: ohhh but it doesn’t stop there. clark just straight up turns the tables on dick. imagine you’re dick, and you’ve looked up to this one hero your entire life, and then one day he turns to you and says that he thinks you’re so kind and smart and worthy of a person that he wants you to mentor his son!? goes to show just how much clark trusts dick.

i swear to god dick probably cries every time he hears clark compliment him because bruce is so rare and sparing with his praise that clark giving him the slightest hint of approval is just a dopamine rush.

also, now deathstroke and superman have both asked nightwing to mentor their kids. the juxtaposition is fuckin hysterical. imagine either of their reactions when they realize what kind of company they’re with

lets talk colours for a second, because i absolutely adore how classic colour tropes have been subverted in this comic, and in this general run really.

warm tones have usually (usually, not always) been associated with light and comfort and friendship and,,,,,well,,,warmth. whereas cool tones are usually used to unsettle, or make a scene seem colder and put the reader on edge. this varies if a comic only uses cool tones, or only uses warm tones, but if a comic uses both, this is generally well-used.

that isn’t the case in this run.

dark red, orange, and other warm tones have been used to symbolize danger, action, attacks. hot pink isn’t usually included in this colour group, but it’s definitely part of it in this case. in contrast, scenes that have cool colours give us the impression of slipping into a comfortable, calm scene with babs, tim, the titans, and other allies. even the beginning scene with superman has this blue, but then it transitions into something more golden coloured. dawn broke over dick, as his new idea came to light, and that was reflected in the art (and the sunrise setting.)

have there ever been times when dick’s longed for the comfort of his mask because he didn’t feel confident as dick grayson? i can’t think of any. i may be wrong, but this struck me as pretty ooc.

am i just??? gay and reading this all wrong??

cause i was under the impression that when someone says they are grateful for your friendship you don’t immediately kiss them.

or is this like. normal straight mating rituals.

i mean he’s smiling afterward but still babs aren’t you supposed to at least make sure it’s okay first? you guys broke up a while back after you said something along the lines of “i want to be coworkers with you and nothing more because i don’t trust you or feel comfortable around you as a civilian anymore.” like lmao after you say something like that to someone i would assume that you don’t have the permission to just kiss them whenever you want.

show of hands who else got real sad when they realized dick was talking about himself in this.

sure, he could be referencing the things he’s seen blockbuster pull, and the children on the streets. but “i’ve seen money used for enforcement,” sounds a little too close to dick’s entire life being destroyed by one man threatening the circus to pay protection money for me to completely ignore. and “i’ve seen the poorest and most vulnerable blamed and punished rather than assisted” becomes a lot worse when you remember dick was thrown in juvie for a couple months until bruce was able to obtain legal guardianship, and in there, not a authority figure believed him when he told them his parents were murdered.

he’s lived this before.

a. mother. fucking. typo.

fucking why

i mean i’ve stated my distaste for the batfamily groupchat before but like. this is reaching new levels of ridiculousness. jason sounds like he was written by a fanfic writer. tim sounds like he was written by a fanfic writer. steph sounds like she was written by someone who doesn’t know the first thing about steph and wanted to include her for “family points!!!!!” damian’s supposed to be completely off the grid, and everyone’s searching for him. i do love the way cass texts tho.

well god fuck now i’m crying

dick got a phone call, a sorry, and a thank you out of bruce. i feel so much secondhand happiness for him, if that’s a thing. we’ll just ignore the way bruce looks ugly af and focus on the good parts okay?

and again with the colour symbolism here!

i’m either going to love this or hate this. who knows, we’ll see.

something something hearts something something pink is an evil colour something something. i need to know more about this guy but there’s definitely symbolism there.

is it just me or does this dude look like the backstabbing traitorous absolutely motherfucking piece of shit villain that killed tadashi hamada in big hero 6?

taggggg list: @woahjaybird @birdy-bat-writes @anothertimdrakestan @subtleappreciation @screennamealreadyused @bikoncon @pricetagofficial @catxsnow @maplumebleue-blog-blog @sundownridge @thatsthewhump @xatanna-troy @red-hood-redemption @capricorn-stark @batshit-birds @comics-observer @buticaaba

#river thinks too hard #nightwing #dick grayson #nightwing 83 #dc #nightwing review #nightwing meta #dick grayson review #dick grayson meta #nightwing 83 review #nightwing 83 meta #dc review #dc meta

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why-this-kolaveri-machi · 3 years ago

Text

we are our family, even if we don’t want to be.

Titans 3.07

a bit over halfway through the season, and we still don’t have all of our main characters on the board! i love this show.

as always, typing this up as i watch. live reaction, baby! *shadowboxes*

SPOILERS AHEAD

1. i don’t think i’ve mentioned this before, but i kinda miss the old ‘dc universe’ intro. it was cool! the whole idea of it was wild and waaaaay over-ambitious, but also very very on-brand because of it.

2. this is... the third time we’ve seen dick sleeping this season? that’s a record! checking another thing off my s3 wishlist...

2.5. i guess i rag on titans all the time for its wafer-thin plotting and bad pacing, but i have to admit that this season has been a step-up from the last one in this regard. titans has very reactive rather than proactive protagonists, and a lot of the last season seemed to be: x happened, the team reacted badly, then y happened, they reacted badly, etc. this time around, it’s not a huge leap up by any means, but at least they’re doing something about it.

i do appreciate the focus on character arcs over everything else. and when i say everything else, i mean it: arcs that started two seasons ago with no big cathartic moments, intermittent payoff and multiple relapses. big bads have ranged from interdimensional demons to superpowered assassins to whatever in the world scarecrow is, but trigon’s big weapon against the titans was to... use their worst fears against them. slade’s was to... use their fears to break them up. crane’s is to... use red hood to use their fears to break them up. even the threat of gotham’s citizens being in danger doesn’t feel real: gotham is mythologised into an entity of its own, infecting our heroes like a parasite. like. this is not to say that most other superhero media aren’t big character arcs intertwined with the main plot, but titans doesn’t even make pretend that it’s anything but.

anyway. that’s my entry #2345 to ‘give a grand unifying theory for titans’. thanks. i’ll be back with more.

3. “anger is just fear in a little black dress.” god I HATE HIM

(what’s he doing with barbara’s likeness? oh... oh god. a terrible thought just occurred to me. what if they introduce hush at the very last minute for plastic surgery shenanigans? would you put it past this show?)

3.5. jason, nooooooooo

3.75. i mean, they’re making it very clear here that scarecrow is the one in control--the one who’s always been in control--and is manipulating jason and literally poisoning him, but i hope it doesn’t end up erasing nuance or jason’s autonomy. if jason’s to reckon with the issues that brought him here, then the lines of responsibility will need to be set somewhere.

(this applies to dick as well but more on that later, i guess.)

4. just--the phrase “40% loss of income” is so funny to me. like, gotham is full of these larger-than-life characters who are idiosyncratic beyond belief, colourful and dramatic and creating chaos just for the sake of chaos, and then there’s the regular criminals and their henchmen who just want to make a quick buck sitting down with pie charts and graphs, griping about the joker reducing their returns or debating high risk investments in, i don’t know, two-face’s next scheme.

“yyyyeeeeeaaah, my financial advisor is telling me that going all-in with a guy who literally makes decisions on the flip of a coin is probably not the greatest idea.”

4.5. god i hate smug!smarmy!scarecrow so much

4.85. as big plans to “control” gotham go, it’s pretty bog-standard. clearly scarecrow has some bigger plan in mind but it really feels like we’ve got no clear insight into him and he’s this generic creepy mystery-man who knows more than he lets on and springs a twist/cliffhanger every now and then. i liked the scenes with him and dick in 3.04 where it seemed like he was genuinely on the backfoot and things weren’t going as he predicted. for all of his faults, dick is at least familiar with scarecrow’s bullshit and knows not to give what he wants.

5. i mean... i see where dick is coming from with the “he’s not jason anymore; he’s red hood” because his immediate glaring concern is scarecrow’s drug and the damage it could potentially cause gotham? i do not doubt that it’s something batman drilled into him, too, but when you’re expected to take point on a situation where the lives of an entire city weigh down on your shoulders, it’s better to simplify things and prioritise. i’m not saying it’s great or healthy! gar is absolutely right to consider this facet of the situation. it’s just dick can’t.

6. hmmmmmmm. HMMMMMMMMMMM.

i don’t know that i’m super fond of this iteration of oracle???? it looks like a cross between cerebro from x-men and jarvis from iron man. it’s giving me second-hand embarrassment. somebody help me.

(at least they remembered dick’s middle name is actually “john”. i like to think bruce printed D in that contract because for a while he genuinely thought richard “dick” grayson was his full name. duck duck goose, dick dick grayson, i don’t know alfred, the kid was in a circus, maybe they thought it was funny. or maybe it was a test in anger control, who knows.)

6.5 “maybe you two would like some time alone?” even AI can’t help hitting on dick grayson in this universe.

“oh mr grayson, if i only had another eye to see you better...”

6.8. on one hand, it’s a bit disconcerting that the title of ‘oracle’ has gone from barbara herself to this gigantic machine; from my impression of the comics-verse, barbara had an extensive computing and surveillance system, true, but she was very clearly the brains behind the operation. on the other hand, i’m kind of glad that the ethical boundaries that this kind of surveillance violates is a sticking point for barbara. (tho let’s be real, the nsa would kill to have this in their arsenal).

6.9. also it’s now obvious that scarecrow’s big plan is to take control of oracle itself. it’s why he had lady vic take that picture of her eyes, or why he’s meddling around with it on his computer.

6.95. if only i could ‘command sleep’ anybody overstepping their boundaries re: personal information...

7. “you can just sit back and watch as the titans destroy themselves.” i mean... he’s not wrong

8. “dick’s parents were killed by a criminal mob; he won’t work with them.” it’s wonderful that you have this insight into dick, kory, i just wish we could’ve watched some of these conversations actually happen on-screen.

8.5. i’m glad that kom’s being treated with such nuance and understanding, though it’s obvious that she definitely has a Plan of her own. (and did i entirely imagine her ability to mimic other people flawlessly at the end of s2? or is that going to come into play at some point?) i think her story has the potential to be genuinely poignant, and in a universe where being Different, either because of mental health or physical differences or whatever else, leads a straight line to Evil, it’s important to acknowledge and then emphasise that the mere fact of your existence as a Different Person doesn’t predispose you to evil. maybe your act of destroying a system that has destroyed you and not scrambling to “fit in” is only evil as defined by that system.

8.8. “you’re trespassing, i should call the authorities, i feel unsafe.” now this is a villain lady who’s definitely aware of her privilege.

8.85. kom smirking knowingly at her sister is everything.

“oooh that’s the kory i remember”

9. conner and dick working together woo!

9.25. god i hate a villain who’s always just a step ahead, no matter what. so crane anticipated dick using oracle to track his personal communications and set him up? how did he know when exactly dick would get to do this? how long did he have that poor man tied up in that van?

(the “save me, grayson” is a nice touch, tho. send dick spiralling even further! because if there’s one thing dick will do, it’s take responsibility for every goddamn thing that goes wrong.)

9.5. ahem. i’m going to need a million gifs of conner yeeting dick across that yard, fandom, thankyouverymuch.

(i understand conner is invulnerable to explosions, but how do his clothes survive??)

9.8. oooh crane is already in oracle! i’m just sitting here laughing helplessly because they’re overpowering this goddamned guy so much. he can build a lab in arkham’s basement! he has access to lazarus puddles! he has minions working across gotham, including a fully functional chemical laboratory staffed by chemists who only answer to him! he has the crime families of gotham quailing in his very presence! he has assassins at his beck and call! he’s enough of a manipulative bastard to have red hood under his thumb! and now he has enough of a tech know-how to not only be aware of oracle, but know how to hack into it! i’m sick of exclamation marks! i’ll shut up now!

9.95. dick leaving behind that smouldering grave for a person he failed to save without taking a second to process how he feels about it and running towards his next plan to corner scarecrow: a microcosm of where his head’s at right now.

10. really hammering in the themes of this season, aren’t we.

10.25. the interesting thing is the titans repeatedly call themselves a family this season (none more so than dick) and while that found family has helped encapsulate and put away their traumatic experiences with their ‘original’ families, it’s meant that they’ve not really dealt with those issues. and dick and gar and jason come from ‘found families’ of their own: they are twice removed, traumatised two times over. they still cling to this identity however, and because of it they’re losing each other. a family isn’t static. it’s an ever-evolving dynamic and you have to put in work constantly to keep it healthy.

10.5. anyway, that’s entry #2346. i’m here aaaalll night.

11. lookit gar the detective! half-transforming and using his powers to deduce things! what a hero! i’ve said this for a long time, but gar is the bedrock of this team, and an unsung one at that.

11.25. i’m confused about him calling this room jason’s though. it seems to me that this is dick’s room that jason later used, and one that dick’s using now. so the unmade bed isn’t really jason’s fault; dick was woken by barbara that morning, and in his hurry, he left without making his bed.

(it still confounds me that bruce didn’t find jason another bedroom in that gigantic mansion of his. you really didn’t give this kid a chance, did you?)

12. oh well. so much for the oracle.

13. ... sorry, wait. you didn’t think i wasn’t going to address the bit with dick right now, did you?

12.5. i honestly don’t think it’s very complicated: dick’s been reeling from one traumatic thing to the next, and just when it seemed like at the beginning of the season, he felt happy and secure with his team and his place in the world, bruce ups and leaves gotham to him, specifically naming him a successor and calling him a ‘better batman’. he’s lost garth and jericho and donna and jason and now hank and dawn. he’s not even sure where rachel is or what she’s doing. after being told that batman was a psychopath for moulding him into a weapon, he’s also been told that his failure to be a ‘better batman’ lead to further disaster. of course he’s going to get batman-goggles. of course he’s going to be a prick.

12.8. i don’t know what to say. i feel his frustration acutely. i don’t think he should’ve said what he said to barbara (can people stop pushing her around this season????) but that pressure to step in where your parent fails? to clean up their messes and try to think like them? to fall into habits drilled into you when you developed them as coping mechanisms growing up? I FEEL THAT.

every step he’s taking he’s putting 110% of himself in it and scarecrow’s still playing mindgames with all of them: i absolutely feel his desperation to take control of that game and turn it on scarecrow, no matter what it takes.

and he did apologise almost immediately, and finally--finally--actually works with barbara.

12.9. again, not excusing him! but i get it. and i think that’s a sign of great character writing.

“did you know i just reminded emmram of all of her daddy issues? what the fuck????”

12.95. i love that dick&barbara, kory&kom, and gar are all approaching solving this mystery from different angles, each as valid as the other. also, conner is there as... emergency bomb defuser man?

13. it’s like all fancy rich people in fancy rich houses do is pour fancy rich alcohol into fancy rich glasses on pristine, untouched tabletops. i wonder what it’s like to live like that.

13.25. I KNEW IT! poor michael. it was nice knowing you.

13.5. man, kory is contending with a lot of issues that she’s successfully bottled up and compartmentalised until now. the cold reality that a child can seek out their parents as refuge and they can view the child as a piece to be moved in a greater game (never out of cruelty, though, never, and somehow that makes it worse), that truth of blackfire’s treatment on tamaran because she’s different, and her own culpability in what happened. she exchanged one family for another, after all, and left that family to die and her sister to suffer. like dick, like gar, kory’s being forced to reckon with what the titans are meant to be, the larger implications of creating their found family in their own space.

14. it’s probably because it’s one in the morning and i’ve had two glasses of wine but i did not follow that bit of exposition at all and victor freeze??? what?

anyway. look at them solving things! together! go team!

“you made a deal with the mob?” oh the sense of betrayal on his face! fuck off, dick, your issues aren’t kory’s.

15. conner is really sweet and a bit of an awestruck crush on kom is to be expected. especially after that power rangers-esque transformation (i say this as a former huge power rangers fangirl. i’ve seen every series until 2007 including the original japanese versions and written fanfic for all of them. so i love a cool costume transformation, is what i’m saying.)

also?

FUCK YEAH

16. i love the gotham crime families just chillin’ around eating ice cream. I LOVE THEM

16.5. that was a fun fight sequence, if marred slightly by that bit of awkward flirting between conner and kom. i wonder if she’s really planning to use him in a larger scheme to get kory back to tamaran, or maybe something else.

16.75. so i’m assuming that scarecrow has jason either so paralysed by fear that he can barely move, or jason’s withdrawing from the drug that he’s been sucking in every few minutes.

17. it’s nice to see them chill after a successful mission! and it can be awkward, but conner’s crush on kom and him striving to impress her is also, well, uh... cute.

17.5. i guess the dick/barbara scene was inevitable, especially given the... unresolved nature of their relationship in the flashbacks? and they’ve been through a rollercoaster together this episode, discovering and then destroying an incredible tool within a matter of hours, re-discovering just how well they work together as a team. dick’s swimming in the nostalgia. i don’t expect it to last as a long-term relationship, but i totally get why this is happening now. and hey, they’re cute!

i have a weeeirrrrd feeling that kory is going to leave to tamaran at the end of the season and that dick and kory will rekindle--or rather realise--their relationship just before that. it’s going to be devastating and beautiful and painful and i will be writing essays about it which would be me just wailing into the screen.

18. gar found molly!!!!!!! MOLLY’S BACK! \o/ gar is the BEST

19. that was a fun episode! i love this silly show, even if it does destroy me sometimes <3

#titans #titans spoilers #meta #dick grayson #barbara gordon #koriand'r #komand'r #garfield logan #jonathan crane #conner kent #a byronic cupcake #badass strawberry truffle #manic pixie pop tart

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damn-stark · 4 years ago

Text

Fire

Diego Hargreeves x Fem!reader

Requested by anon: “Can you do a season 1 Diego Hargreeves x female reader one-shot where reader is his girlfriend, is a forensic scientist and met him when he was a cop, was born on the same day as him but wasn’t adopted by Reginald and can control fire, and she’s there when he reunites with his siblings after Reginald dies and gives him a comforting hug from behind when he cries and stutters as he turns Grace off? She’s basically a real life firebender from Avatar: The Last Airbender.”

A/N- I’m going to have make this into two parts just cause I didn’t want to make one part too long and just rush this, so I hope you understand anon :)

Warning- slight violence, angst but also some fluff, swearing.

———-

“We're going now live to a breaking story…”

At the sound of the fanfare playing from the tv you quickly glance up from your work and briefly watch the screen playout, not paying much attention to it and turning back to your work, tuning out the news until moments later you see patch walk up to your desk and point out to the news they’re announcing.

“Isn’t that Diego’s dad?”

You look up and narrow your gaze on the screen waiting until the picture of who they were reporting popped up, making your lips part in surprise, “...the world's most eccentric and reclusive billionaire. Sir Reginald Hargreaves…”

“Oh no,” you stand from your desk and forget your work at that instant and instead think of someone else, “Diego.” You sigh and pull your jacket off your chair, and walk around your desk to share with Patch your brief comment, “I need to go.”

——

“Diego?” You push your room door open and poke your head inside the darkened room, creating a small fire flame on your palm that brightens the whole room, showing no sign of the man you were looking for.

Probably still out on his “vigilante” business.

Turning back around you head back into the living room in silence, going unaware of the man that had walked in, only being aware as he walked up before you, seeing Diego’s face suddenly basked by the light of the fire ignited on your palm.

His face is expressionless, but his shoulders were slumped. He takes his mask off and finally mutters, “did you hear the news?”

You respond with a simple nod and cup his cheek before you speak, “how are you doing?”

He shakes his head and throws his mask on the couch, huffing out heavily and pulling away from your touch to move past you as he replies loudly, his voice trailing off as he heads into the room, “I’m fine.”

You sigh, “he was your dad Diego, it’s okay to feel sad and grieve.” Putting the fire out you spin back around and go after him, seeing the lights go on as he begins to rummage through the closet. “I understand he was not a good dad to you, but he was still your...dad.”

Diego let’s silence take over and just stands up abruptly to move to the drawer and take a couple of things from it before he shoves it in his duffel bag.

“Which means,” you continue as you walk up behind and carefully wrap your arms around his shoulders, “you have to go.”

Diego exhales deeply and nods stiffly, “yeah...but only because I need to figure out what happened, make sure his death was what they said. Will you come with me?” He asks as he lifts his hand to grab yours.

You smile and respond softly, “of course. Plus it gives me a chance to finally meet your siblings.”

Diego scoffs, “not much there, but it gives you a chance to finally meet my mom.”

“Good!” You pull away and sit on the edge of the bed, “so are we gonna tell them of my powers?”

“If you want,” he adds, resuming what he was doing, “I guess you’re lucky my dad's dead, doesn’t give him a chance to try to recruit you as a member to test on you.”

Letting out a lighthearted huff of air you add, “what superhero name do you think I would've had if he did?”

“Probably number eight.” He remarks.

You narrow your gaze and shake your head, “no like a real one,” you stroke your cheek and pretend to think hard, your eyes brightening up as you come up with a name, “how about Ember?” You raise your eyebrows and grin. “What do you think?”

Diego walks up to you and jokes, “how about dork?”

You frown and throw a pillow at his face, “hilarious!”

He smiles as he catches the pillow, “ow.” He throws at the bed and raises his eyebrow, “how long have you been thinking of that name?”

You shrug all nonchalant, “just...thought of it.” You lie, leaving out that it’s been something you’ve come up with since you were young.

Diego chuckles but pretends to believe you, “whatever you say, get ready we leave early in the morning.”

——

“Nothing seems to be tampered with….” You report, looking away from the window and turning back to the desk to see Diego put something in his pocket, you walk closer and he just hastily turns to face you. “You find something?”

“No. Nothing.”

You hum and your eyes go to the door to see a young beautiful blond woman and a vintage looking dress stop at the door frame. A bright smile decorating her lips. Her eyes land on you and then on your boyfriend Diego, her lips parting to make herself known. “Diego, why didn’t you tell me you were coming? I would’ve made cookies.”

Diego turns to face the woman and he walks up to her, putting his hand on her shoulder and talks to her in a gentle manner, turning to present you. “Mom this is my girlfriend y/n. Y/N this is Grace, my mother.”

Her smile seems to turn even brighter and wider as her eyes seem to give a twinkle. If that even was possible for a robot to do—“oh, you’re so beautiful!”

You smile and greet her, “hello, it’s lovely to finally meet you, Diego talks highly about you.”

“It’s about time Diego brought a girl home. I was worried he would be too lonely.”

Diego scoffs and shakes his head, “mom.”

Before you could tease Diego, you notice Grace's eyes drift to the desk, her smile falters and her eyes focus on you again. “Who wants cookies?” Before Diego or you could answer she turns to walk away, humming a melody that echoed in the halls as she walked further away. Diego watched her intently, his eyebrows furrowing with concern. Waiting for a moment before he looked back to you.

“Come on, my siblings should be here in a bit.”

You nod, “okay.”

——

Going based on the things Diego would say about his siblings, and on what you would read and watch of them on the news when you were younger and they were still active superheroes; you were nervous to actually meet them to say the least. Even talking to Diego for the first time was a nervous moment, even more so because you had on a crush on him when you began working at the police department. Literally any time when you would even see him you would feel butterflies in your stomach.

You wouldn’t say you were a big super fan of the Umbrella Academy, but you admired them, mainly because they could show off and use their powers to fight all the bad guys on their adventures. All while you had to hide them, so “the old man on the t.v. won’t take you away”. It really sucked, knowing you were powered, knowing you were born on the same day but having to hide unlike them. Having to really go untaught. Your parents tried to teach you, mainly how to control them when your emotions got too high, but they could only do so much since they knew nothing of what was happening. It wasn’t really until after you showed Diego what you could do, did you really know more, it wasn’t a lot but it was more than what you knew before.

So for that you were thankful. For him.

“Don’t be nervous.” Diego tried to assure you after noticing your hesitation as you walked down the staircase. “They’re underwhelming.”

You frown, “you’re only saying that because they’re your siblings.”

He stops before he reaches the main doors to yet another big room in this huge house. “It’s exactly why I’m saying it.” He tries to offer you an assuring look before he finishes his comment. “You’ll be okay.”

You take a deep breath before breathing out your short answer. “Okay.” You stop and hesitate one more time before you could completely go in, overhearing as one Diego’s siblings asked him who he had been talking to just now. At first you thought he would just wait to answer, but he answered right away and a very simple way.

“My girlfriend.”

None of them said anything right away and definitely didn’t say anything as you finally walked inside. They all were expressing a form of shock, almost as if it were impossible for Diego to have such a thing. It wasn’t until one of them, a man with long hair at the bar broke the silence with a very warm and exciting greeting.

“Hello! It’s so nice to finally meet you! I thought the day would never come.”

The corner of your lips turned slightly, but not fully because it was doubtful Diego had ever talked to any of his siblings since you began dating or at all actually until today; which meant that none of them would know about you.

“Okay.” Diego sighed as he shot the same man an odd look. “Well, that’s Klaus,” his eyes drift to the two girls and he points to them, “she’s Alison and that’s Vanya.” He turns and points to the tall, very muscular man. “And that’s Luther.” Said man offered you a tight lipped smile while Alison said a simple, “hi, it’s so nice to meet you.” And Vanya just said very shyly, “hi.”

Your smile widens but it’s still very timid, “I’m y/n, it’s nice to finally meet you guys, Diego talks a lot about you guys.”

Allison blinked in genuine surprise before she looked to Diego in shock, “oh, really? Who would’ve thought.”

Diego rolls his eyes and just adds, “she has abilities just like us, born on the same day and everything.”

“Really?” Luther finally spoke up, stepping up closer to Diego and you.

You nod, “yes, I can manipulate fire and make it myself.”

“Oh like from the cartoon with the little bald kid?” Klaus questioned curiosity before taking a drink from his beverage.

Your lips part to argue, but you find that he��s actually right. “Uh, yes actually.”

“I thought we were the only ones.” Alison queried, “dad never told us there was more.”

Diego scoffs, “I don’t know how you find that at all surprising. He was not a good man.”

“Diego,” Luther warned.

Said man's head snapped around and his eyebrows furrowed, “don’t defend him and pretend he was. He—”

“Diego.” You snapped, “don’t. Not now.” He met your eyes and huffed before he took a seat, creating a painfully awkward silence in the room that you noticed as you sat down too. None of them spoke up, or had the thought to apologize, they let it pass and only Luther dared to speak up moments later. A genuine question that too quickly turned into an argument amongst them, one you chose to stay out of and watch from your side of the couch. It was short and wasn’t as bad as he would say it would go, but it was still torture hearing them, which made you grateful to be told to go several minutes later.

Not that it was any better, Diego stayed quiet most of the time, his mind seemed to be somewhere else as his body was physically here. But you also didn’t want to bug him, he said he wasn’t affected by his father's death but he was here so...you let him have his time, he always ended up talking sometime or the other. But maybe that time wasn’t going to come anytime soon due to some blue rumbling portal opening that resulted in dropping someone Diego said was his brother. The same one with the portrait in that huge room.

It was overall to put in the fewest words crazy. And even if your curiosity was killing you about what the heck really happened, you chose to stay out of that reunion and joined when it was finally time for the funeral outside under the oak tree as Luther had put it. Putting aside the fact that it was stormy and their no actual leaves on the tree. Hmm.

Regardless you stayed close to Diego, interlacing your hand with his and feeling his unease as he stood there and heard Pogo begin to give a heartfelt speech. A moment that was ruined by Diego finally releasing what he’s been dying to say. “He was a monster.” Klaus laughed and you sighed, muttering his name as a warning, but that did not stop him as he continued. “He was a bad person and a worse father. The worlds better off without him.”

“Diego.” Allison sharply interjected.

“My name is number two.” Diego remarked, “you know why? Because our father couldn’t be bothered to give us actual names. He had mom do it.”

“Diego!” You snapped, earning nothing as he ignored you and Grace interrupted like if nothing were happening.

“Would anybody like something to eat?”

“No, it’s okay mom.” Vanya replied.

“Oh, okay.”

“Look, you want to pay your respects?” Diego pulled away and stepped to the center of the gathered group; “but at least be honest about the kind of man he was.”

“You should stop talking now.” Luther warned.

“You know, you of all people should be on my side, Number one.”

You huffed and crossed your arms on your chest, “Diego, please drop it.”

“No, just listen.”

Luther seethed, “I’m warning you.”

Diego continued pressing on the matter, “after everything he did to you? He had to ship you a million miles away.”

“Diego, stop talking.” Luther snarled.

“That’s how much he couldn’t stand the sight of you!” Diego bellowed, pressing an accusing finger on Luther's chest, making said man finally snap and punch his arm before he swung. A move Diego luckily dodged but didn’t stop and instead continued, both men ending up fist fighting in the courtyard and ruining the day.

Neither of them listened to the calls to stop either, they both continued like children. Making Pogo walk off out of anger and Five to do the same but in more of an annoyance. It wasn’t until Luther broke a statue did they break apart and made Alison walk away, whilst Diego pulled out one of his knives making you hold onto your breath and finally gasping as he threw it and the blade scratched Luther's arm. It stayed silent for a moment as they tried to process what happened, but it was also then that Diego was going to go in again, that you finally created a narrow fire blade that created a drift between the two. An action that made Diego look at you wide eyed. Surprised that you would do that.

All you did was respond with a glare before you took Grace's arm and softly told her to come with you inside. She smiled and accepted.

Just as you passed Diego you stopped and shot him a quiet but angry comment. “Unbelievable.”

He tried to grab your arm to stop you, but you pulled away and added one more thing before heading inside. “Don’t. Talk to me when you’ve calmed down.”

Diego sighed, but didn’t try to argue. Instead he watched as the fire went out as you walked inside with his mother in hand.

#the umbrella academy fanfiction #the umbrella academy imagines #the umbrella academy imagine #the umbrella academy #tua imagine #tua #tua imagines #tua fanfiction #tua diego #diego hargreeves imagine #diego hargreeves x reader #diego hargreeves imagines #diego hargreeves #tua klaus #tua vanya #tua allison #tua luther #five hargreeves #grace tua

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delaber · 4 years ago

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Just Friends (Part 2)

Story Summary: After moving to America for a 3-month long internship, you meet two interesting characters on a boring night out.

Word Count: 3.7K

Pairing: Rafael Casal x Reader

Warnings: Alcohol, minor drug use, smut, slight dom!Rafa, swearing, and loads of British references (sorry not sorry lol).

Chapter Note: Thanks for your kind words! So nice to feel the love in this community. Feel free to ask and hit me up if you want to be on the tag list, have questions, suggestions, etc. /Best!

Tag List: mysearchforgratification lonelydance

Other Parts: See Masterlist

You were trying to count eight hours ahead but with each passing margarita, the math was becoming harder and harder to do. Eventually you just opened the app on your phone and let it do it for you; it was almost 11 a.m back in England. If you went to the coat-check immediately you could call your old lab-partner Laura on your way home and get a much needed update on the project you'd both been working on before your American exchange program had started. Constantly being eight hours behind was rough on keeping in touch, and right now you missed everything back home - even the stupid yeast cells from your project that had kept dying on you and Laura.

You were just about to message Laura and tell her that she should be expecting a call from you shortly, when you were interrupted by someone clearing their throat loudly above you. You slowly looked up from your phone only to see the snarky blonde mystery man from earlier towering above you, clutching two drinks.

"Hi," he smiled as you looked up at him.

"Mystery man," you nodded in greeting.

He sent you what seemed to be his signature charming smile and you realised that his right incisor was just a little bit crooked. It was annoyingly cute.

"Mystery girl," he winked at you, "mind if I sit?" he said as he made himself comfortable on the cushion next to you.

"Uh, I guess not?" you raised an eyebrow at him.

"I brought you another double Margarita," he handed you one of the drinks he was holding, "I wanted to apologise for my behaviour earlier. I hope I'm not interrupting anything?" he nodded towards the lit phone in your hand.

"No, uh, not at all. I was just typing up an email for work," you tossed your phone aside.

The blonde mystery man sent you a sceptical look, "who types up emails for work after they've had a million drinks? Not to mention; at 2.30 in the morning?"

"What can I say except welcome to my story: the life and death of a temporally challenged European in America."

Mystery man laughed at your words, "yeah, you're far away from home, aren't you?"

"Oh what gave it away, bruh?" you said slowly, doing your best to fake a Californian dialect.

Mystery man almost choked on his drink, "You're British?" he asked with a smile while wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Nice to finally see his human side.

"English," you nodded.

"Definitely far away from home then," mystery man nodded, "you here on holiday?"

"I'm actually here for a couple of months in a mandatory exchange program as part of my PhD."

"PhD, huh?" He looked impressed, "damn, I could tell you were smart."

"Well," you said quietly, turning your eyes away from his burning gaze.

He sensed your discomfort at his statement and continued, "What about your friends over there? Why aren't you out dancing with them?" He pointed towards Miranda and her two friends on the dance floor.

You were just about to tell him about your situation with the three girls when you realised something, "hey; how'd you know they're my friends? Been keeping an eye on me, have you?" you laughed at his suddenly stiff smile.

"Well," he ran a hand through his blonde hair while licking his lips slowly, clearly trying to come up with a clever answer, "I couldn't just let you leave before you've found out where you know me from, now could I? Have you given it more thought?"

"No, I actually haven't thought about you at all," you teased him, earning yourself a sincere laugh from the guy, "but... that being said; I'm no closer to guessing it than I was a few hours ago. Although I am sure that I've seen both you and your friend before. So if you have any ideas, I'd be much obliged."

"Hey; I don't know," he shrugged, "I'm just trying to get you to admit to your obvious pick-up line."

"That was not a pick-up line!" you chuckled, "I was genuinely wondering where I've seen you before."

"That's what they all say," mystery man rolled his eyes with a playful smile on his lips, "you're lucky it worked, you know."

"Too bad it didn't work on your friend though," you clicked your tongue, mocking him before continuing in a whisper, "it was intended for him."

He clutched his heart in mock offence, "Ah!" he exclaimed as if he'd been shot, "sadly, that's what they all say too..."

"Aw, you poor man," you smiled and took a sip of the drink he had handed you.

"So why aren't you out dancing with your friends? They seem..." he hesitated as he looked them over, "...fun?" he tried.

"I think you just answered your own question," you laughed.

"Good point," he mumbled.

"Why aren't you out dancing with your friend?" you nodded towards his friend Diggs who was casually moving on the dance floor next to a swarm of girls who all seemed to want his attention.

"Well, I've been patiently waiting for the only interesting woman in here to go dance so I could casually bump in to her on the dance floor. But apparently her ass is glued to this booth. If I was out grinding on Diggs, I wouldn't be able to talk to her - Which would really be a shame as she is without a doubt the prettiest woman in the room," mystery man smiled.

You made a gagging noise at his horrible attempt at flirting.

"Over the top?" He laughed.

"Way over the top!" You joined in, "remember; I'm British. We like it low-key."

"What? You want me to invite you out for tea and scones instead?" he said in a horrible cockney accent.

"It wouldn't hurt your chances," you laughed, "but I'm good with the margarita for now."

"So you don't want to go out with me?" he raised an eyebrow.

"Nope."

"So the way you were staring at me and Diggs earlier really wasn't an attempt to flirt?"

"No," you laughed at him. He looked almost shocked.

Mystery man squinted his eyes as if seizing you up, "You're completely unfazed, aren't you?" He said.

"About what?"

"Well about me being charming as fuck of course," he said with a chuckle.

"Meh," you shrugged. It wasn't true. You were completely mesmerised by him. But he was acting too cocky for you to not give him a challenge.

"Meh?" He repeated.

"You're bloody cute - I'll give you that. But you're a silver tongue, and well... let's be honest; you need the rejection."

"Are you challenging me?" He raised an eyebrow at you, "it feels like you're challenging me..."

"Hey, no need to feel down by the rejection. I'm doing this for you. I have your best interest of heart," you laughed, touching your heart with the palm of your hand.

He looked you over for a couple of seconds, "I cannot figure you out."

"Well that's a good thing, isn't it? Keeps things interesting."

"Yeah, you definitely strike me as a girl who keeps things interesting... What's your name?"

"You can call me -" your eyes landed on the drink in front of you and you remembered the bartender’s words from earlier, "- Margarita Girl. As that is probably how you're going to remember me after tonight," you smiled.

"How about breaking-my-heart-girl?" He smirked.

"Ah see; you're doing it again," you pointed your finger at him and he laughed at you, "you're way over the top. Keep it low-key for Margarita Girl, damn," you laughed.

"Okay, so we're really not doing names?" His smile grew wide. He was probably already thinking about how hot it'd be to fuck a girl's brain out without even having to bother to learn her name first. Textbook fuck boy.

"Let's keep it interesting," you reciprocated his smile with a small shrug, "what can I call you?"

"You can call me whatever the fuck you want," he said cockily, probably realising that by asking for his name, you'd agreed to spend more time with him.

"Okay, Margarita girl and Mystery Man it is."

"Sounds like a superhero duo," he smiled.

"Interesting. What are our powers?"

"Well, in line with our names: you're intoxicating as fuck luring in all the bad guys, and I have the ability to turn invisible."

"Only creeps want to have a superpower where they can vanish on command," you laughed at him.

He was about to retort when he was interrupted by a male voice coming from beside you, "Hey Rafa!"

You'd been so fixated on the blonde man in front of you that you hadn't even seen Diggs approach your booth with a swarm of girls at his heel. So his name is Rafa? Odd, you thought to yourself but had enough decency to pretend that you hadn't heard.

"What's up," Mystery man - or Rafa apparently - responded to his friend.

"The bar is about to close. I'm thinking about grabbing a cab home. You coming?"

Rafa looked at you briefly before answering, "I think I'm good for now, bro."

"Alright, see you tomorrow then," Diggs padded Rafa on the shoulder before heading towards the door.

Rafa turned his attention back on you and stared at you with a small smile playing on his lips, "So bar's closing down in a bit," he said, "maybe we can squeeze in another drink somewhere else?"

"Yeah, no," you shook your head, "I think I'm about to head home. I have a long walk ahead of me. If you're fast, you can still catch your friend and join him in that taxi though."

Rafa looked at you, "do you live far away from here?"

"I live over on the corner of Mayflower and Lafayette," you responded, "it's roughly a 30-minute walk or something."

"Yeah, I know where it is - I live close by," he eyed you carefully, "if you want to, we could walk together?"

"Taxi doesn't sound too enticing?"

"Meh, I'd much rather take the walk," he shrugged

"Alright then," you nodded, "I guess I wouldn't mind the company."

"Aw," Rafa said, "I think that's the sweetest thing you've said to me all night!"

No more than ten minutes later, you were both wearing your coats and were headed in the direction of the townhouse you were sharing with another British girl, Samantha, who you'd met online a couple of weeks back.

"So how do you find California?" Rafa asked you after a couple of minutes of walking.

"I like it. It's different, that's for sure," you sighed, "but I think it's quite great here."

"Different how? Are you from a small town or something?"

"I'm from a small town called London. I don't know if you've heard of it?" you teased him.

"Hey, don't get smart with me," he laughed, "But in all honesty; apart from the obvious, how is L.A. so different from London?

"You know... London's population is almost twice as big as that of L.A., yet somehow everything's just bigger over here."

"Yeah," he nodded, "I could imagine. I remember the first time I was in L.A... It completely blew me away."

"You mean you're not from here?"

He shook his head, "I'm from up north. I moved here a few years back to focus on my career."

"Yeah? What do you do?" You asked curiously.

"Hey; what's the point of not having names if you know all about my career?"

"That's not fair. You already know that I'm a nerd," you winked up at him, pronouncing the last word as he would've.

He smiled down at you, "yeah sorry for calling your field of work nerdy earlier," he laughed awkwardly.

"I work in a lab. It is nerdy to be honest," you laughed, "no need to worry."

"It's just... I don't think I've ever pictured anybody looking like you to... you know.... actually be a nerd," he chuckled.

"We come in all shapes and sizes," you winked up at him and noticed how his smile grew wider, "as I'm sure people in your line of work do."

"Smooth u-turn you just did there," he laughed at you, "Well," he drawled, "if you absolutely must know, I moved to L.A. to focus on my music."

"You're a musician?" You looked up at him. Of course he was. Probably one of those douchy John Mayer-types who brought their guitar everywhere and always had to play Wonderwall at every. single. party. "Is that where I know you from? Am I currently being walked home by a well-renowned musician that girls from all over the world would be dying to be serenaded by?" You laughed.

"I assure you that millions of girls would kill to be in your position right now - but I highly doubt that it's because of the music," he chuckled, "I don't even have an album out."

"What kind of music do you do?"

"Rap mostly," he said proudly.

You looked him over; you would not have taken him for a rapper. "Oh, that's... cool," you said quietly.

He looked at you with a bemused smile, "what? You don't like rap music?"

"I hate it..." you whispered with a chuckle.

"WHAT?" He bellowed while looking at you with huge eyes, "are you insane?"

"Right after accordion-music, it is the worst genre there possibly could be! It's probably what they play for you when you enter the gates of hell."

"I've finally done it," Rafa looked shocked, "I've gone and found the only person in L.A. that doesn't like rap. You're probably the type of person who'd murder me in my sleep!"

It made you laugh loudly, "well how else would I know what kind of music they play you down there." He chuckled at your comment and you continued, "sorry. It's just not really my style."

Rafa clutched his chest, "I'm offended! How can it not be?"

"I didn't grow up with rap music," you laughed, "Name one famous British rapper!"

"Uh, easy!" He started counting on his fingers, "Skepta, Dizzee Rascal, Giggs, Doctor Green, The Streets, Stormzy - should I just keep going?"

"Okay, okay you've made your point. Apparently, I'm uncultured."

"So, what do your uncultured ears like then? Adele? Ed Sheeran? One Direction? Should I throw in some Spice girls?" He joked.

You smacked his arm lightly, earning yourself a low chuckle from him, "oi, the fact that I'm English doesn't mean that I only listen to the pits of British music."

"Sorry," he continued in a chuckle, "but I am genuinely interested."

"Well I'm not going to tell you now. You'll just mock me!"

"If you don't tell me, I'll keep assuming the worst."

"That's not my problem," you laughed at him.

He blinked twice, his charming smile still in place, "You are easily one of the most interesting women I've ever had the company of. You keep surprising me."

"I'll take that as a compliment," you smiled up at him.

"Oh, you definitely should."

You kept walking side-by-side for a couple of minutes, talking about the differences between life in L.A. and life in London. Just like when you had observed him at the bar, he talked with much vigourosity, hands flying everywhere as he spoke, his fingers slightly brushing against yours on several occasions. You had no idea whether he was doing it on purpose or not.

He was in the middle of a story about something that had happened to him earlier that evening when you suddenly stopped dead in your tracks. He looked at you with raised eye brows, "what? Was my story boring you?"

"Not at all. But this is me," you nodded towards the small townhouse in front of you.

He let out a soft whistle, "Nice place. You live here alone?" He took in the building.

"I know it seems childish at my age but since the rent is expensive for a common student I atually have a room mate..."

"Having a roomie is not childish," he laughed, " I know society would have you believe that, but fuck 'em. It's much nicer than living alone. I have a roomie too; Diggs - you know, the guy you met earlier tonight."

"Oh! That's why he asked you to come home with him," you teased him.

Rafa shot back his head with laughter, "you really thought we were an item or something?"

"Hey, who am I to judge?"

Rafa continued to chuckle, "I love the man but it's completely platonic. Also; he's too ripped for my taste," Rafa joked.

"Waaaaay too ripped!" You chimed in, rolling your eyes to match Rafa's.

"So manly!"

"Too manly!" You continued in an over-exaggerated tone.

"...And he definitely doesn't have enough tattoos!" He continued.

"That man is a boring plain canvas," you joked.

"I keep telling him that a tattoo on his pec would do him good. But - sigh - he never listens."

You looked him over and couldn't hold back a small snicker, "Strong words coming from you."

"Yeah? What do you mean?"

"You're not exactly the 'tatted up'-type, now are you?"

"I have several tattoos," he chuckled.

"Eh, you do?"

"Yeah," he nodded with a vibrant smile, "on my chest and arms."

"I did not see that coming," you laughed.

"See - I can be interesting and unpredictable too," he looked awfully proud of himself, "How about you? Do you have any?"

"I do," you nodded, "just a small one. It's embarrassing really..."

"Yeah? Where?" He smiled sweetly. Even though it was dark, you could easily make out his charming crooked tooth.

"Uhm..." you contemplated not telling him but ended up thinking to hell with it, "it's on my inner thigh," you said carefully. Talking about your dumb tattoo that was located at a highly sexual place wasn't exactly something you'd normally do with men you'd only just met.

"Inner thigh, huh?" He licked his lips while examining your face, "not gonna lie; the thought alone turns me the fuck on!" He laughed, "why don't you invite me inside so we can study eachother's tattoos?" He took a step closer to you. The sweet, charming guy who you'd had the pleasure of walking by your side was suddenly replaced by the fuck boy from the bar.

"You really don't waste your time, do you?" You laughed at him. Men you'd been on several dates with back home in England hadn't even been half as forthcoming as this guy was and you hadn't even known him for more than a couple of hours.

"Sorry," he shrugged while not looking the least bit apologetic, "I might've had a drink too many, but all I've been able to think about tonight has been how I want to take you home and get to know you better," he said while leaning in and stroking his thumb on the side of your arm, "you seem... different."

"Okay; full disclosure," you said with a sigh, "you're cute and all, but I'm not going to sleep with you."

He sent you a pout, "why not?"

"Well, as much a turn-on as it is to have a grown man beg you for sex," (he laughed at that), "I'm not going to have casual sex with someone I've only just met."

"Who says it has to be casual?" He smirked while leaning even closer, "I can do you good."

"God, you're insufferable," you rolled your eyes at him while fighting the urge to just jump him.

"But the good kind of insufferable, right?"

You laughed at his remark while slowly leaning closer to him, "no," you whispered.

"I'm really fighting hard not to kiss you right now," he groaned as he released his lower lip from between his teeth, a small smile playing on the corners of his mouth. His put hands on your waist, and he was slowly edging his face closer to yours.

Your fingers easily found the back of his skull, and you softly nuzzled with his hairline, silently telling him that it'd be alright for him to kiss you.

His hungry gaze was fixated on your smile as his lips came crashing onto yours, finally closing the distance between you completely. As soon as your lips touched, he stopped dead in his tracks however; he was clearly waiting for you to take the next step - which you did, but not as fiercely as he would have hoped; instead of attacking him - as he was used to when he normally whipped up this move - you captured his lips in a soft, tender kiss, lips barely touching but still with so much raw emotion spilling into him, that he was left with a weird feeling in his chest. He thought to himself that the way you reciprocated the kiss almost was... loving? It was definitely something he hadn't tried in years.

He was about to pull you closer and advance further into the kiss, when you pulled your face away from his and whispered, "I've had a great night tonight. Thank you." You stepped out of his arms.

"Ah, you're being serious," he said with just a hint of hurt to his voice, trying to pull you back to him without any luck.

"Yep," you laughed while turning away from him.

"Hey," he called from behind you, "will I see you again?"

"You know where I live, don't you?" You looked at him over your shoulder. His hair was a mess and he was looking at you all innocently while you continued to walk away from him.

"What? You want me to make a big romantic gesture or something?" He laughed.

"You have my address, do what you want," you smiled before turning away from him and towards your front door.

You heard him groan from behind you as you put your key in the door, "Hey, I don't even know your name!" He bellowed.

"It's Margarita Girl."

"Aw, come on. The least thing you could do is give me your name," he called from the pavement.

"Goodnight Rafa," you laughed before the door closed shut behind you.

#rafael casal x reader #rafael casal #daveed diggs #blindspotting #rafael casal imagine #smut #rafael casal fanfiction #bay boys

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lokiondisneyplus · 4 years ago

Link

For his entire tenure as an Avenger, Anthony Mackie had never been the first name on the call sheet.

In a galaxy of stars populated by Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans and Scarlett Johansson, the actor was aware of his place in the on-set pecking order, but would never miss an opportunity to make his presence felt.

“Number six on the call sheet has arrived!” Mackie would routinely shout on films like “Captain America: Civil War” and the box office-busting “Infinity Saga” sequels, according to Marvel chief creative officer Kevin Feige.

It exemplifies the sort of winning tone that the 42-year-old actor has brought to his superhero character the Falcon, aka Sam Wilson, for six movies from the top-earning studio — wry and collegial humor, with the potential to turn explosive at any moment. Both Mackie and his character are set to burn brighter than ever when the Disney Plus series “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” lands on March 18.

On that call sheet, “Anthony is No. 1,” Feige is happy to report, “but it still says ‘No. 6.’ He kept it because he didn’t want it to go to his head.” The series is essentially a two-hander with his friend and longtime co-star Sebastian Stan, the titular soldier. All six episodes were produced and directed by Emmy winner Kari Skogland (“The Handmaid’s Tale,” “The Loudest Voice”). The series, for which combined Super Bowl TV spot and trailer viewership earned a record-breaking 125 million views this year, is reported to have cost $150 million in total.

For Mackie, though, the show comes at a critical time for both his career and for representation in the MCU. Sam Wilson is graduating from handy wingman (Falcon literally gets his job done with the use of mechanical wings), having been handed the Captain America shield by Evans in the last “Avengers” film. While it’s unclear if he will formally don the superhero’s star-spangled uniform moving forward (as the character did in a 2015 comic series), global fandoms and the overall industry are still reeling from the loss of Chadwick Boseman, who portrayed Marvel’s Black Panther to culture-defining effect. With this new story, Mackie will become the most visible African American hero in the franchise. And when asked whether he’ll be taking the mantle of one of its most iconic characters, he doesn’t exactly say no.

“I was really surprised and affected by the idea of possibly getting the shield and becoming Captain America. I’ve been in this business a long time, and I did it the way they said you’re supposed to do it. I didn’t go to L.A. and say, ‘Make me famous.’ I went to theater school, did Off Broadway, did indie movies and worked my way through the ranks. It took a long time for this shit to manifest itself the way it has, and I’m extremely happy about that,” Mackie says.

Feige says that, especially with the advent of Disney Plus and the freedom afforded long-form storytelling, the moment was right to give the Falcon his due.

“Suddenly, what had been a classic passing of the torch from one hero to another at the end of ‘Endgame’ became an opening up of our potential to tell an entire story about that. What does it really mean for somebody to step into those shoes, and not just somebody but a Black man in the present day?” says Feige.

Like many comic book heroes, Mackie has an origin story marked by tragedy at a young age — specifically around the loss of a parental figure. The New Orleans native is the youngest of six children from a tight-knit middle-class family, whose trajectory was spun into chaos when his mother was stricken with a terminal illness.

“It was unexpected and very untimely. I was 15 when she was diagnosed with cancer, and a few months later, she was gone. She passed the day before my ninth-grade graduation,” Mackie recalls. “If my mom wouldn’t have passed away when I was so young, I wouldn’t be where I am today.”

Mackie had already gravitated toward the performing arts before the loss of his mother, having enrolled at the pre-professional school New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. Like many young people grappling with trauma, Mackie says he began to act out. A core group of teachers helped get him out of trouble. Ray Vrazel, still an instructor at the school, personally drove the student to a Houston-based audition for the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, where he was accepted for his senior year of high school.

“Everything I did, I did for my mama. The idea of leaving home at 17 to go away to school would have never been an option if she was still around. She was my best friend. Losing her gave me a kind of strength, and a desire to succeed,” Mackie says.

Succeed he did. Spending that formative year as a minor on a college campus helped Mackie find his “tribe,” a misfit crew of artists and performers, which propelled him to acceptance at New York’s prestigious Juilliard School in 1997. There he was part of the breakthrough class of students of color to be chosen for the notoriously selective drama program, which Mackie says was liberating given the institution’s track record.

“Our year was a huge transition. There were hardly any Asian people in the drama program, maybe one or two Black people and hardly any Black women. In our class, we had three black women, two black men, one Native American, one Asian female, out of 20 people. Ever since then, the classes have been wildly diverse,” says Mackie, whose fellow students included stage and film star Tracie Thoms and actor Lee Pace.

Following his training, Mackie launched a staggeringly versatile career. He has played Tupac Shakur and Martin Luther King Jr. to similar acclaim, a juicehead bodybuilder in “Pain & Gain” and a homeless gay teen in the Sundance player “Brother to Brother.” He has exhibited remarkable staying power in an industry that often pigeonholes actors and has a pockmarked soul when it comes to inclusion.

“I was drawn to Anthony because of his electrifying ability to combine intensity with sensitivity, courage with compassion, and all of it comes across as inevitable, as if it could be no other way,” says Kathryn Bigelow, who directed him in the 2009 best picture Oscar winner “The Hurt Locker.”

Samuel L. Jackson, whom Mackie calls a mentor and has played alongside in several films, says he has “an innate quality that first and foremost makes everyone want to cast him.” On a recent idle Netflix search, Jackson came across Mackie’s latest sci-fi film, “Outside the Wire,” and it triggered a memory of sitting in the audience for his performance in the 2010 Broadway production of Martin McDonagh’s play “A Behanding in Spokane.”

“Watching him onstage, I thought, he’s a very adroit actor capable of putting on many hats. He’s fearless and will try to be anybody. Then, on my TV, he’s playing a nanobyte soldier or some shit,” Jackson says.

Though always humble about getting the next job, pre-Marvel Mackie was rarely offered pole position.

“There were certain pegs. My first was ‘8 Mile.’ It was a monumental step at the beginning of my career,” Mackie says of the 2002 Curtis Hanson film that elevated rapper Eminem to multi-hyphenate stardom.

“After that it was ‘Half Nelson.’ It blew up Ryan Gosling, so I was there to ride the wave. Then ‘The Hurt Locker,’ and it blew up Jeremy Renner. It was the joke for a long time — if you’re a white dude and you want to get nominated for an Oscar, play opposite me. I bring the business for white dudes,” says Mackie.

He remembers the sensation “Hurt Locker” caused during its awards season. It was a moment he thought would change everything as he stood on the stage of the Dolby Theatre with the cast and filmmakers, having just sipped from George Clooney’s flask while Halle Berry radiated a few rows away.

“I thought I would be able to move forward in my career and not have to jostle and position myself for work. To get into rooms with certain people. I thought my work would speak for itself. I didn’t feel a huge shift,” he says, “but I 100% think that ‘The Hurt Locker’ is the reason I got ‘Captain America.’”

He’s referring to “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” the 2014 Marvel film that was the first to be directed by Joe and Anthony Russo (the current title holders for the highest-grossing film of all time with “Avenges: Endgame”). Mackie says that blockbuster not only gave him his largest platform to date but changed expectations of superhero movies forever.

“It was the first of the espionage, Jason Bourne-esque action movies at Marvel. After that, the movies shifted and had different themes and were more in touch with the world we live in, more grounded,” he says.

Bolstered by the words of another mentor, Morgan Freeman, Mackie feels no bitterness about his path.

“We did ‘Million Dollar Baby’ together, and when we were shooting this movie, I got offered a play. When you do Off Broadway, it’s $425 a week. In New York, that’s really $75 per week. I got a movie offer at the same time, and it was buckets of money. Three Home Depot buckets of money were going to be dropped off at my door,” Mackie says. “The script was awful; the whole thing was slimy. I went to Morgan’s trailer and asked him what he would do. He took a second and said, ‘Do the play. When Hollywood wants you, they’ll come get you. And when they come get you, they’ll pay for it.’ That blew my mind, and I left him that day with such a massive amount of confidence. He’s been a huge influence on me.”

He used the currency of that first Russo Brothers film and five subsequent ones to do what many creators and performers in Hollywood have done in recent years to help balance the scales of profit and representation in content: make things on his own.

Last year, Mackie produced and starred in “The Banker” — what would be Apple Studios’ first foray into original streaming film distribution and the awards landscape — through his banner Make It With Gravy. The film follows the true story of America’s first Black bankers and the white frontman they deployed to acquire the institution, all while supporting Black-owned businesses and communities in the process. A late-breaking scandal over sexual misconduct accusations involving the real-life family members of the film’s subjects delayed the release, overshooting awards-season deadlines and entangling the fledgling producer.

“It was a good lesson, and gave me a new perspective on the world around us. It’s very important to me that the women by my side are treated equally. It was a valuable lesson learned. I was very humbled by my sisters, for once not being mean to me,” he says.

Mackie is in development on the film “Signal Hill,” about the early days of lawyer Johnnie Cochran and the theater he brought to courtrooms long before the O.J. Simpson trial, and is hoping to secure the life story of civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin as a vehicle for his directorial debut. Raising four sons of his own now, Mackie wants his off-screen work to make them well-rounded men.

“Look at Robin Williams,” he says. “He used to be crass and funny, and then he had kids, and he started doing all these family-friendly movies. Same thing with Eddie Murphy. I’m trying to curate my children’s experience with the things that I’ll be producing, rather than starring in. That’s what is most important. They know my job is my job; they know who I am. I’ve given up the idea of them ever thinking that I’m cool,” he says.

Jokes about the call sheet are among many of Mackie’s filming quirks. Jackson says that sets are often littered with hidden cigar stubs, to be fired up between takes or after long days. Bigelow says his rapport with crew has led to nights where the “clock was ticking but it was impossible to regain composure enough to shoot.” But according to Evans, no Mackie-ism is more famous than the phrase he bellows whenever his directors cut a scene: “Cut the check!”

Evans says this “will be forever associated with Mackie. I find myself saying it on sets all the time. I love it. But I’ll never be able to say it as well as him.”

As the man handing Mackie his armor, Evan says the Falcon’s “role within the Marvel universe has answered the call to action time and time again. He’s proven his courage, loyalty and reliability over multiple films. Sam has given so much, and he’s also lost a lot too. He believes in something bigger than himself, and that type of humility is necessary to carry the shield.”

The question of Sam Wilson’s humanity will be explored at length in “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier,” what Mackie calls a deeper showcase for both himself and Stan and their characters. It was a prospect that at first confused and frightened him.

“I didn’t think we could do on the television what we’d been doing on the big screen. I didn’t want to be the face of the first Marvel franchise to fail. Like, ‘See? We cast the Black dude, and now this shit is awful.’ That was a huge fear of mine, and also a huge responsibility with playing a Marvel character,” Mackie says.

He was quickly assuaged by the level of depth in the scripts from head writer Malcolm Spellman (“Empire,” “Truth Be Told”), especially when it came to the nuances of Wilson — a Black American man with no powers beyond his badass wings.

“Sam Wilson as played by Mackie is different than a Thor or a Black Panther, because he’s not from another planet or a king from another country,” Feige says. “He’s an African American man. He’s got experience in the military and doing grief counseling with soldiers who have PTSD. But where did he grow up? Who is his family? Mackie was excited to dig into it as this man, this Black man in particular, in the Marvel version of the world outside our window.”

Mackie celebrates Sam’s relatability in a universe full of mythological gods and lab-made enforcers. “I’m basically the eyes and ears of the audience, if you were put in that position where you could go out and fight alongside superheroes. It adds a really nice quality to him, that he’s a regular guy who can go out there and do special things,” Mackie says.

While bound by standard Marvel-grade secrecy, the actor confirms there have been no discussions of a second season for “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.” As the majority of domestic movie theaters remain closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, he is equally unaware of the theatrical prospects for his Falcon character — or the Captain he may become by the end of this Disney Plus run. For now, he’s content to take up the mantle left by Boseman, a quietly understood pact of responsibility to Marvel-loving kids the world over.

“For Chad and I, [representation] was never a conversation that needed to be had because of our backgrounds. There was a hinted-at understanding between the two of us, because we’re both from humble beginnings in the South; we have very similar backgrounds. We knew what the game was. We knew going into it,” he says.

Outside comic book movies, Mackie is not done searching as a performer. There is a particular genre he would very much like to cut him a check.

“My team gets mad at me for saying this, but I would love to do a cheesy old-school ‘When Harry Met Sally’-type of project,” he says. “One of those movies where I’m working outside and have to take my shirt off because it’s too hot. I want a romantic comedy. I want to do every movie written for Matthew McConaughey that he passed on.”

#Anthony Mackie #The Falcon and the Winter Soldier #Disney+#interview

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bananasmiles2952 · 3 years ago

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I'm aboutta post about the miraculous fandom again, but I'll hide it because it's gonna be a rant and that shit gets long sometimes <3

So, new episodes, new problems. I really love the way the show shows these ineffective methods of problem resolution and avoidance, and effective methods as well. You see, I am just going insane, frothing at the mouth if you may, at this whole "Alya knows who Ladybug is but Chat Noir feels betrayed because he is her partner first and ooops now he gets less action in akuma fights and he thinks Ladybug doesn't really need him anymore but actually she's just a scared little girl and adults are terrible" thing. Oh geez I'm gonna have to itemize all my points, here we go:

1. Alya knowing Marinette's identity is a good thing. It's a really good thing. I have mentioned in a previous post that these teenage superheroes are in a really bad position of extreme parentification and being forced to grow up too fast. Ladybug has seen her partner literally die several times!! She has seen entire sections of her city, sections she knew had people, leveled and flooded and burning and crushed to the ground, no sign of the life that was once inside them. She has had to lie pretty much every second of every day for more than a year, with the old guardian saying she should lie more and her kwami suggesting she lie less (about things that aren't about her identity) and it gets so confusing that now everything is a secret for Ladybug, because no one can know what's the truth about what she says and what's a lie, because if they know, then they'll know who Ladybug is and the world as she knows it will end. Now, that last take was irrational, but for a child with the weight of the world on their shoulders and that weight getting heavier and heavier every day? That's what she thinks she has to think, because any complacency would cost lives.

Alya knowing means less she has to think about, less she has to plan completely alone, and more confidence that she can handle this insane responsibility. Alya knowing means she can go back to being Marinette just a little bit more, and know that she doesn't have to be Ladybug all the time. Every aspect of her life has been taken over by this bullshit and that is traumatizing and exhausting, and she just went from zero support system to having her best friend back.

2. Chat Noir doesn't have to know who she is, and he is alright with being upset about it, but the right thing to do in that situation is talk to the person who is upsetting you and letting them know how you feel. Now, Chat Noir is an abused child. He has never been allowed to tell his father that his behavior was upsetting him (think internalizing reasons like, "he works so hard, he's probably too busy, and if I say something, then he'll just be stressed and busy"). It makes sense that he would transfer this thinking over to Ladybug, another authority figure in his life, not over him, but someone he knows to have a lot of responsibility. In his mind, if he tells her he's upset, it will only cause her stress and make her job harder because she has more important problems. But the thing about being an adult?? Just because you're busy and you're stressed and you're dealing with the weight of the world doesn't mean you are allowed to upset the people around you, even unintentionally. A healthy family for Adrien would have allowed communication, for his father to listen to him, even though he's busy, and to let him know that he understands and it's alright for him to be upset about something like that. And if he was using this framework for handling conflict, he would know that even though Ladybug has big responsibilities, they can talk to each other about their issues and reach an understanding. BUT let's move past his childhood trauma, there's more to talk about in this point.

Chat Noir is allowed to be upset, but internalizing it is bad, very, very bad, especially because he's a superhero. Gotta practice that healthy mindset when you need all your focus to defeat butterfly man. If he bottles it up and hides it from the world, his pain will grow and morph into something dangerous as it turns from sadness to anger. We've seen him lash out at a chimney, which shows just how much pain he's been hiding, since he's never been a person to lash out, especially not with violence. That scene was meant to make it obvious he's getting close to a point of no return, that he is so upset at the world that his method of holding it in is cracking and his anger is breaking loose. And from the new episode, we can see that he's now losing control of his ability to hide it, and Ladybug keeps seeing and keeps asking if something is wrong. And this is supposed to be a relief for him!! He's supposed to see her reaching out to see what's wrong and know that she cares and that he should tell her, because she'll want to fix it with him!! But his dad is shitty, so instead of seeing how much she cares, he only sees a warning that his mask is slipping, and he hurries to right it before running off.

The adult thing to do is talk about your feelings and problems, but they're kids, and for him at least, abused kids at that.

3. (told you this would be long) Chat Noir and Ladybug knowing who they are is different from Alya and Nino knowing who they are, by a lot. Alya and Nino are supporting superheroes, which doesn't mean they aren't as important as Ladybug and Chat Noir, but you literally can't get things done if you don't have a Ladybug. If Alya and Nino knowing who they are compromises them, there is so much less to lose. Hawkmoth getting their miraculouses means he gets more powerful, yes, but it doesn't mean the fight is over. Ladybug and Chat Noir would still be in the game, and they could still fix it. If Ladybug and Chat Noir knowing who the other is compromises them, there are 4 things at risk:

1. The miraculouses and the balance of the friggin' universe

2. The holders for their miraculouses would have to be replaced if they avoided capture

3. Now that Marinette is guardian, her memory and the safety of the miraculous box would be at risk.

4. Marinette would have to replace Chat Noir, and I don't think she can ever do that

If Shadowmoth could use their identities against them, there is so much more to lose. And Alya and Nino don't have the same weight on their shoulders that Adrien and Marinette have. I get why Chat Noir is upset they know each other, but the rules are different because the risks are different. And the pain this causes them is yet another reason this is parentification and abuse!!! Fuck Fu, you don't do this to children!!!!

4. Chat Blanc is some serious fucking trauma my dudes. Like, oh my god, Marinette touched her catacyslmed body aND WATCHED AT IT DISINTIGRATED BEFORE HER VERY EYES. She saw miles and miles and miles of what was a vibrant city under a sea of water, not a single living person to be seen. The fucking moon had a hole in it. And she saw the one person she trusts the most, the one person who know just what they are going through because they're going through it together, vulnerable, angry, and ready to destroy the world. And he said it was their fault, but we know Ladybug only heard that it was her fault. That if she hadn't slipped up and let him know her identity by leaving her name on a present, she could have prevented the loss of life of millions, potentially billions, and she could have prevented whatever pain caused her kitty to lose control and end the world.

It makes sense that she doesn't want anyone to know. It was her slip-up, after all, that caused the chain of events leading to Chat Blanc, the lucky charm proved as much with that eraser. And if she doesn't say anything about it, she can lie to herself and say it didn't effect her, because none of what she saw ever actually happened. But we know Chat Blanc haunts her nightmares, we knew that even before we saw her nightmare in Sentibubbler, and if she doesn't say anything about it, if she doesn't talk to a fucking therapist, she will break apart everything she is desperately trying to hold together. It would be easier for her to know that she is hurting people if they would tell her, like with Chat Noir refusing to talk about his need to be needed, but she doesn't know. And I think she wants, more than anything, to make sure it doesn't happen ever again by defeating Shadowmoth as soon as possible. If he's gone, there will be no one to turn her kitty into a monster, and she will have saved him and herself. If he's gone, she can finally let down all the walls. You can see her desperation to end everything by her crazy ladybug towel getup mad scientist lab experiment, and her desperate ranting and hurried rush for ideas, and her sadness at how close she got to getting rid of him in Sentibubbler as she watched him get away. She wants her kitty to know, and she wants him to be safe, but he never can be with Shadowmoth around.

#feel free to interact #even if you disagree #i wanna see what people think about all this #tw language #tw childhood trauma #tw childhood neglect #tw parentification #miraculous ladybug #ladybug #chat noir #alya #nino #i just really wish my little disaster children were okay :(#they deserve the world and to make mistakes in a safe environment where false steps wont be punished with emotional manipulation and death #long post #oh my god do i ever shut up

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sxveme-2 · 4 years ago

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blueberry pancakes // bucky barnes

MASTERLIST

Description: A single mother. Juggling being a mom, a full time pediatrician, and a difficult ex who believed now would be the best time to finally be a father. A soldier ripped out of time. Ex-assassin turned superhero. Learning how to balance a new domestic life with handling demons of his past, while facing the trials of the future. a love story began over something as simple as chocolate chip pancakes with hidden blueberries.

Disclaimer: I do not own any original Marvel characters! All canon plots and canon characters belong to Marvel Comics and Marvel Studios. This is an original work. You may not publish it anywhere else

Status: Edited

Note: Takes place after endgame. I have elected to ignore Tony's death and Steve's leaving. Did not happen. Quick Reminder! My works are only published here, AO3 and on Wattpad, thank you.

Chapter Five: The One with the Burnt Pancakes

Warnings: N/A

Word Count: 2516

Coming out of a divorce unscathed was more uncommon than its counterpart. Typically, a bit of baggage attaches itself to one or both parties. No matter whether or not divorce rates are through the roof in today's modern era, it still hurt more than words could describe. Especially when it's due to an affair. It creates this sense of unworthiness, and as though you weren't good enough. And when the pair has a child, it makes it ten times more difficult. Knowing that you'll have to break it to the child that their parents will no longer be together, and that they will most likely spend more time with one in comparison to the other.

But, when your child already has a bit of distaste towards your partner, it can make the blow a little softer. Sure, every mother wants their child to have a relationship with their father, other mom, etc. Whatever the situation is, parents, want that. They want to be able to see their child's face when they see their ex-spouse, but sometimes, there's nothing you can do about it. Especially when your ex never put in the effort, to begin with.

Above all, your perception of love changes. and that's exactly what happened to Lily. She lost all belief in herself and didn't believe she could ever find someone who would love her, along with the baggage that she carried alongside her. And that broken heart that she has yet to mend, and honestly, she wasn't sure if she'd ever find someone who could help. To cup warm hands around the two halves and hold them together until they combined once again.

Other things she deemed impossible, was her sitting in a kitchen with the avengers. Earth’s mightiest heroes. The people that destroyed an entire army. travelled to space. Some even having been ripped out of time and thrown into different roles and periods. These people had stories people couldn't even dream of, lived lives people only wished to be able to experience. And here sat Lily, a single mother of an 11-year-old boy, who lived in a domestic area, and worked as a pediatrician. She was minuscule in comparison to the Gods and soldiers that sat around her.

"So, is Hunter’s father around?" a soft voice asked, an accent dripping from the words. It had pulled Lily out of her thoughts of astonishment, as she tried to wrap her head around what was currently happening.

"Hm? Oh, no," Lily spoke, her voice as soft as the gentle ripple of a pond, while she sipped the coffee they had given her. Glancing up, a few of the superheroes looked at her with inquisitive eyes, wondering where he may be, or if he even was to be anymore, "We uh, we divorced four years ago."

"I'm sorry to hear that," the girl continued. Lily had placed her as Scarlet Witch, or Wanda Maximoff. Hunter adored her. He ranted and raved about how cool her abilities were and how she could probably take down an entire army by herself if she wanted to, "He's cute. I've always wanted kids."

Lily nodded along as the conversation continued around her. She stayed as silent as a sleeping lamb, her green eyes glancing around as she tapped her fingers against her coffee mug. She wasn't sure what they wanted her to say. It had been proven time and time again that Lily was the farthest from a talker. Deep inside of her mind, the little voice of self-doubt had convinced her that no one cared about what she had to say. That the only reason people even spoke to her, to begin with, was because it was polite. But she's also been told that the world around her found that shy demeanour endearing, and mysterious. As if she held secrets behind those sealed lips when in reality, Lily was scared that if she spoke, she'd create secrets. Letting the world in on the pain she hid, that she kept locked away in a vault deep within her mind. protecting herself from being destroyed again.

"...So if you ever need a babysitter," Wanda’s voice sang again, yanking Lily away from her deeper thoughts once again, as though the two were tethered. the young blonde's attention perked up as the young girl continued speaking, "I'm your girl."

Was the Scarlet Witch, offering to babysit Lily's eleven-year-old? As in, seriously? Like to pick him up or come down from upstate New York to deliberately take care of him? If it weren't for the fact Lily rarely left the house, and if she did, it was with Hunter, she may have considered the idea. But Lily wasn't one to go out. The noise that came along with the idea of partying or going out on the town always got Lily's heart beating at a much too fast pace. If she was going out, it was to gen's cafe, or with three glasses of wine down and a whole bottle to go. The world was loud and intimidating, and could easily crush Lily's fragile heart and mind with a simple touch. And where would that lead her? Nowhere good, that's where.

"Oh that's sweet, but I don't typically go out, and when I do, he comes with," Lily stated, lips forming a tight smile as she ran her finger along the circular hole atop her mug.

"Really? A girl that's as beautiful as you must get tons of guys and go out on dates. and I see no ring on that finger," the infamous Tony Stark teased while shifting his weight to look at the blonde, "unless there's already a lucky fella."

A laugh of almost disbelief escaped through Lily's full lips as if the idea of Tony Stark calling her beautiful was too good to be true, "Oh no. my best friend tries but I don't date. Already have my hands full with work and Hunter."

"Where do you work?" Steve's voice now chimed in, pushing off the counter he leaned on as Bucky worked away, staying silent. He hadn't spoken a word to Lily since Steve walked her through the threshold of the kitchen, merely a gruff hi before returning to the feverish work he was doing on the pancakes. It was as though he was trying to make them perfect.

"I'm a pediatrician at Mount Sinai Kravis Children's Hospital down in Manhattan," Lily answered, her eyes averting from looking at any of the intimidating people around her. Why were they so interested in her? Why did they seriously care so much about her personal life? She just brought Hunter here for a tour, not an interrogation...was this what people did? Like...they wanted to learn more about her? It didn't make sense, she was pretty basic. There was nothing special to her, Lily thought.

"Oh, that's awesome. I have a few-"

"SHIT!"

The large outburst caused everybody to immediately turn their attention to where it came from. Behind the counter, Bucky was waving smoke away from his face that seemed to be billowing from the pan on the stove. He burnt the pancakes. Lily felt a small smile tug at the corners of her lips as she watched him throw a towel at the counter, his face turning a crisp shade of red, like a cherry. The moment his eyes landed on her though, his entire body lit up in a hue of pink it seemed. He grew flustered, biting down on this ever so soft lips he had. Lily was only human, she couldn't help but avert her eyes down to the thin layer of skin. And as if on cue, Wanda let her voice ring through the kitchen.

"Damn it, Barnes! I told you not to cook, and you decide to challenge your abilities in front of our guest?" The ginger exclaimed while standing from her chair, going to help the built man clean his mess.

A few of the others in the room whined, and Lily guessed they had been waiting for a bit to eat. She felt a twang of guilt deep within her, as though it was her fault. But it really wasn't, she wasn't the one making the pancakes. no, she was merely answering the personal questions they all seemed to have for her, as well as constantly glancing at the hall or behind her to see if Hunter was on his way back. Instead, he was now outside with Sam, looking at all of the different artifacts and things that weren't able to be kept inside of the compound.

"You much of a chef, Lily?" James Rhodes (Warmachine, she reminded herself), asked. No matter the amount of mental effort it took, Lily couldn't help but allow the tinge of rose to decorate her full cheeks. They seemed to want to get to know her, and she felt almost...accepted? No, maybe more so welcomed, by these beings of immense power and ability. She allowed her shoulders to relax, and her grip on her mug lessened.

"Nothing impressive, but I do know my way around a kitchen," she responded, tilting her head to the side, causing her blonde locks to dance across her shoulder, "Most nights, I try to make homemade meals for Hunt and I. It's important for a child's development." she finished but noticed how all of their eyes were glued to her. Raising her left eyebrow ever so gently, she let a giggle escape from her throat, "but sometimes I give in and order pizza."

"You should help Bucky out, he's never been the best cook. Got used to boiling everything in the forties, so he makes a mean hot dog," Steve teased, sauntering over in all of his Captain America excellence, "Anything else? Completely lost on him."

"It's a good skill to have. But difficult to master, I suppose." Lily shrugged, crossing her legs over one another as she rested her elbow on the glass table, cupping her chin as she sipped the hot liquid in her cup. She couldn't seem, however, to take her eyes off of the culprit of the burnt pancake smell. The way the muscles in his neck rippled whenever he clenched his jaw. How his metal arm glinted as a small stream of light entered through a window, creating a bright reflection. How his scruff along his chiselled chin seemed to be a bit overgrown underneath.

Her mind began to wander momentarily, a gentle and soft vision dancing itself into her brain. Him sitting on a chair in her bathroom, Lily sitting comfortably on his lap, facing him. His eyes sleepy and his hair unkempt. Her skilled and nimble hand resting on the side of his face as she trimmed underneath his jaw, getting those areas he seemed to miss. His lips parted as he seemed to slowly drift off again, as though Lily's gentle hands were willing him to...

A hand waving in front of her face snatched Lily out of her odd fantasy land. She cleared her throat and looked around her, eyebrows knitting together in confusion, as though she had been paying attention to the whole conversation she just missed. Holding her lips inside of her mouth, Lily shifted once again in her seat, attempting to play it cool as the blush that had formed on her cheeks seemed to grow rapidly.

"Sorry, could you repeat what you said?" she asked, her voice weak as her eyes shifted to look at the man behind the counter once again. She couldn't help it...he was beautiful.

"I said you should help Buck out making the pancakes. Most of us haven't eaten, and if you're as good as you say, maybe you can help." Steve grinned, a knowing glint in his sky blue eyes. The way he looked at Lily, as though he could see inside of her head, sent a shiver down her spine. The idea of anyone knowing where her mind just wandered was basically mortifying for her. Being such a conservative person, the idea of that getting out? Yeah, no.

"Oh no I shouldn't...I'm positive he's capable of making pancakes." Lily chuckled, her voice cracking halfway through. This caught everyone's interest, and Lily had to hide her face with her mug as the dark liquid slid its way down her throat.

"He isn't. We don't normally let him in the kitchen. C'mon Lily, show us whatcha got." Steve continued to pry, leaning back in his chair as the others encouraged the entire idea.

Lily's head turned back to where Bucky stood, an almost pleading yet bashful look gracing his perfectly sculpted features. Just the way his eyes seemed to call out for her, was enough to allow the eldest Osborne to give in to the peer pressure of her new acquaintances. That was something Lily believed to be impossible, being friends with these heroes. These people that laid their life on the ground multiple times, saving her and her son by protecting the world around them. She was in debt to this group, everybody was. They've kept them protected for countless years. But how would one even begin to thank them?

"Okay okay, I'll do it," Lily mumbled, finishing her drink before pushing herself out of the chair that probably cost the same amount as her dog. She pulled a hair tie from her wrist and securing the blonde locks at the nape of her neck as she gracefully floated towards the kitchen. Glancing around, she couldn't help but let out a laugh at how expensive the items around her were. Sure, she didn't live in a house with run-down appliances, but these were top-of-the-line, high-end, see-on Food Channel things. A far reach from Lily's budget, "Well, first of all, Bucky, you need to turn on the fan."

After preparing everything to ensure not only safety but also to optimize space and time, Lily turned towards the man she had just moments ago daydreamed of. For a moment, she found herself lost in those steel-blue eyes he had. As though he had captured the moon and made them his own, adding a tinge of the blue from the sky above. How with every flicker across her face, a story was told. The pain and suffering he had endured etched into the dips and creases of his face, especially around those beautiful orbs. A part of her wished that the other members of the group were gone and that she could grip the sides of his face and kiss those lips he kept licking. His tongue darting out to wet them, creating a slight chapped ring around the pink layer of skin.

"Hey if you two are done gazing into the eyes of each other and looking like Hollister models, the rest of us are hungry." Starks’s voice rang, snapping Lily out of the trance the ex-soldier had put her under for a few seconds.

"I have no idea what you're talking about, coke can," Bucky muttered while turning his gaze away from Lily's and focused on washing the blueberries, "I'm just cleaning fruit."

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babiesdreams · 4 years ago

Text

Superhuman +18 Chapter 1

Warnings: Violence, mentions of blood, smoking, mentions of suicide, gore(?.

Renjun’s story:

She came to me when I was just sixteen. I knew something was wrong with me since a long time ago, but her presence made it worse. She always makes feelings much more intense and pure... It’s really hard to leave feelings aside.

You know my... powers are related to feelings, the purest feelings are the strongest power source. I’m basically a generator. Anger and sadness are usually the best ones.

I finally got out of my home, I was gonna start a new life, a new stable and normal life. For once I wouldn’t be judged for being too shy, or not letting my feelings in, or for being “a psychopath”

But then she passed by, offered me a cigarrette and whispered how she knew everything. I felt like my whole life plan ended right there, but she was right. If I simply ignore my abilities I’m only making it worse, I had to learn more about them, and use them in my own advantage. I needed to know how to properly control it before getting into another messy life, before hurting anyone else, so she was a savior at the time.

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“You have to meet them” 972 shouted at me. “I don’t want to, we can just go as a duo” I screamed back. “Huang Renjun, your anger levels aren’t under control, please relax, or I’ll have to call security”

“I don’t want others to get involved with me” A soft wave moves the air around me, as I start getting more and more angry. “You know what happened”

“Huang Renjun, control yourself or I might take action” 972 kept her angry tone, making it worse. “Let me go alone on the mission” My eyes fire up with anger, feeling how my power grows inside of me. “Stop. Now” She demands, making everything worse.

A big explosive wave brushes the whole place, destroying everything on its way. I fall on my knees, crying for what I just did. “I can’t have a team, I’m a monster, I’ll fuck everything up” I shout with a broken voice tone. For a moment I thought she was dead, but then her voice sounded in the distance.

“We all are monsters here” Her voice whispers as her hand rests on my shoulder. “We... all... are” She whispers with a sad tone.

Shotaro’s story:

Since I was born, the weather changed along with my mood, if I cried, it would start raining. If I was angry, it would turn into a thunderstorm. I think you get it. The thing is that at first I was quite good at controlling my mood, but growing up made it harder and harder, to a point that I couldn’t control anything about it. I got scared of feeling, and isolated myself for months, but that only made it worse.

When I got in here, I wanted to learn how to destroy my powers, ended up knowing how to control them. Now it’s not at all linked to emotions, more like I have full control over the weather, I can change it as I want.

I was known for being the best at controlling my powers and even if they’re not the most powerful ones I think my ability to control them made me stronger, that’s how I ended up being the leader.

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“Guys you need to practice more” I say calmly. “Why would we practice? we are quite strong” Jisung says, not taking his eyes off the screen as he plays some stupid videogame. “It doesn’t matter how strong you are if you can’t control it” I say calmly, trying to make them understand. “You’re just jealous of our powers” Jaemin spits out, taking another chip into his mouth.

“You all are bombs, uncontrollable bombs, that’s not useful at all. Sure you’re powerful, but you’re basically dangerous for everyone” I say with a more serious tone. “Should I make him think we are training?” Chenle asks to the rest. “I heard you” I tell him.

But all the mess calms down when Renjun stands up. “Let’s go train, he’s right” He says with a serious voice and everyone follows. I sigh, feeling useless in comparison to his natural leader abilities, but yet glad that he helped me with it.

Jaemin’s story: healing body (His fluids heal any harm)

I realized when I was a kid, I used to cry whenever I got hurt and then everything was fine. It got more intense when I kinda saved my mother.

I was holding her hand, focused on the beats produced by some machine. The sudden beep, made me anxious. I didn’t really know what to do, I panicked and started crying and when I realized she was fine again.

With time and some exploring I realized it wasn’t only my tears that healed people, but all my fluids. Someone could be dying and if I licked his hand, they’d be completely fine. It feels like a lot of responsability tho, you never know the story behind someone dying.

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The agonizing man starts choking on his own blood, trying to breath, yet unable to do so. I roll his body, getting him to rest on one side, to stop him from choking. I take his bloody hand and lick his index finger.

Seconds later, the blood stops coming out from his mouth, and the cuts on the man’s stomach dissappear. “What did you do?” He says with a low voice tone. I look at him challenging, sometimes people really are ungrateful. “I just saved your life” I reply, proud of myself.

“Nobody asked you to do so” He shouts at me. “S-sir, I saved your life” I say stuttering. “They are gonna get my family if I don’t die you idiot” He shouts at me. I step back, scared of his words, letting tears fall down my cheeks. “I-I didn’t, I didn’t know that”

That’s where I discovered that saving a life sometimes mean killing others. Butterfly effect. Maybe someday I could have saved a serial killer and then how many deaths would I be responsible for? I needed to learn that I can’t save everyone and sometimes I need to let people die.

Jeno’s story:

I was an average student when I found out. Well actually I was a pretty stupid teenager. Classes were boring so I just went around with my friends, play games, and live life I guess. One day I saw soe students bullying a transfered kid, and I got into the fight.

I have always been pretty strong, so fights were an easy task for me. However those kids were much older than me, and I was alone. So they basically beated me up, until I did it. I don’t even know how I did it, I was just angry.

Trash from bins started floating, making people concern as to what was happening. I’ve heard my eyes turn red whenever I use my abilities so that might have helped to make them fear me. But after that day I became the school’s king.

Being at that place I started to hating my powers. I just wanted to feel normal, to be normal. But I guess that’s something none of us can really achieve. So I just kept training my brain and try to be better.

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“Get out of the way” I say to Jaemin. The scared boy gets behind me, making me feel his shaking hands on my back. “So you want to die sir?” I say, looking at him with a fierce look. The man nodded, so sure of his decision, and I smiled at him.

“Have a nice trip” I say, while concentrating on the knife resting on the floor a few meters away. I held the knife mentally in front of him, pointing at his neck. “Do it” He says, crying desperately. “Look away” I whisper to Jaemin, before tearing his throat open. My figure gets covered by the man’s blood, while he dies slowly in front of my eyes.

I throw the knife a few meters away, still not touching it for a split second. “It’s done” I say lowly, turning around to face Jaemin. My bloody hands hold his face, trying to calm him down. My fingers clean his tears, replacing them with blood. “It’s fine” I whisper, letting him hug me tightly.

The bloody scenario felt specially creepy under the moonlight, so I understand how Jaemin felt so guilty about everything. Still, he needed to grow up for future missions.

Jisung’s story:

I remember looking up to superheroes like Spiderman or Hulk, or Superman. But being super strong isn’t exactly the best. Plus people don’t trust me when I say I’m strong. Of course, I tried to hide it, since all heroes in movies do that. But, it felt wrong somehow... Letting people take advantage of weaker people. Even letting people take advantage of me.

So I decided to go anonymously, that way nobody would know who I was. But, again, nobody took me seriously. My family was also not doing so good, so I got into some illegal businesses.

A guy decided to trust me and I started getting into street fights. I won money thanks to people’s bets. It wasn’t the best job, but at least I had something, and I stayed anonymous so they couldn’t interfere in my normal life.

However I started to get tired of it and I stopped going there. I didn’t expect them to find me so fast.

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“We had a contract” The old man says. I couldn’t stop trembling from fear. “Put the gun away” A woman’s voice says from behing the old man. He turns around, to find out how his bodyguards were already dead on the floor.

The gun the man was holding started melting in his hand. “W-what are you?” He asked stuttering. The girl chuckled, and inmediately after a hole appeared where the man was standing, making him fall. His fingers held the floor, to stop himself from falling helplessly.

“Hi, Park Jisung , I’m 972, I would like to recruit you into our team. What do you say?” Her eyes were fiercer than any eyes that ever looked at me, kinda hypnoticing. The grunts of the old man resonated all over the room, but they eventually stopped when she stepped on his fingers, breaking them with her heels. The fall was slow and long, ending with a disgusting sound, as the old man reached the floor somewhere at the bottom of the hole.

“I’m interested” I finally say, shaking the smiling girl’s hand.

Chenle’s story:

Changing people’s percception is so funny. I can literally get away from every situation. I’ve never got punished for anything at all. Plus I can do whatever I want, no limits, no judgements.

Sure, sometimes I don’t quite control what they are seeing instead of what I’m doing, like that time I was borrowing some clothes from a shop and people were seeing me pee on the clothes. I got arrested anyway. But I know how to use my power, that’s why I think training is stupid.

We are basically gods, our powers’ limits are barely there, so let’s just have fun right? right?

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“Let jun take care of this” 972 says, making all of us stay aside. I turn to look at Jaemin and Jisung, changing their perception so that they would see everything going fine, but I looked.

A loud sound scared all of us, and the buildings around the zone he was in started falling apart, getting reduced to ashes. People’s screams were really horrifying, something I will never be able to forget. And a loud growl from Renjun followed, filling the air with anger. “W-what happened?” Jaemin asked confused.

“You have some work to do hyung” I told him, letting him finally see what really happened. He fell on his knees seeing all the victims from Jun’s powers. “You think you can do it?” I ask him doubting the limits of his abilities.

“I can” His voice was shaky but I trusted 972′s plan. “Zhong Chenle get the living victims and make them think nothing happened. I’ll get the buildings back to normal. Lee Jeno, find the enemy’s body and bring it here. Remember, no fingertips on anything. Osaki Shotaro and Jung Sungchan get Na Jaemin to the victims. Park Jisung, you stay here in case I need protection” She ordered, while the buildings started getting back to normal.

“On our way” We all shouted at the same time. It was something chaotic, but it worked out. “Now I’m gonna get an agent from unit V. Thanks for your collaboration, Unit D. You can all go now”

Missions are always like that, cold-hearted and all about “Getting the job done”

Sungchan’s story:

I touched my grandma’s old clock. And I saw my grandfather, when he was younger, fighting in war, leaving home, giving her the clock. Everything happened in front of my eyes so fastly, I couldn’t really...

It took me a really long time to really get used to it. And when I did I hated the feeling. I wore gloves everywhere, so that I wouldn’t touch nothing directly. But avoiding it made it worse. Much worse. Because when it happened accidentally I could see more than what I normally would have.

The thing is that I thought my powers were more of an inconvenience than something useful. Until my father got that complicated case about a “Suicide” I touched the letter she wrote, and the chair he got over to hang herself up. Except it didn’t happen like that.

Someone else wrote the letter and she was forced to stand on the chair that the man kicked, making her die instantly. I told my father my theory, and they got enough proof to take the responsible man. That’s when I felt like a hero. I thought I found my future profession as a detective.

I read all Sherlock Holmes books, idolizing what he did, wanting to be just like him, and now I have my chance.

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I touched her face, and I saw everything she went through, who she really was.

“Jung Sungchan, we talked about this didn’t we?” She says calmly. I nod, recalling her words about not touching her, probably to avoid me knowing her secrets. “We all have secrets here, we need to help each other okay?” I nod once again, and watch as her figure gets lost in the distance, still trying to process the information.

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