#new personal project how do i make a lil program that stops me from watching shorts

[ladybugastronaut]

i am upset with youtube shorts. my brain feels like mush. i can’t even like delete youtube or set a timer restriction on it, that’s where the ttrpg show i wanna watch is. which i’m struggling to watch. because of the shorts.

[tirednotflirting]

i'm all butterflies (i'm sky-high for you)

just found this lil thing in my wips and i’ve decided (like two months after not thinking about it) that i actually like it.

title from feels like this by maisie peters

read here on ao3

It’s too early to be thinking like this, Ashton keeps telling himself. He can’t be thinking like this so soon. It’s asking for complete and total disaster, for running back up and checking to see if you lit the fuse on the firecracker kind of disaster. It feels terrifying but it’s the kind of feeling he’s found himself craving as of late. 

Some 20 or so feet away he can Luke smiling brightly as he tells a story, his hand not holding a glass of wine waving through the air, those in the little circle around him laughing like he’s telling them the funniest thing they’ve ever heard. Luke tends to do that, he can capture the heart and attention of anyone around him in seconds with his bright smile and wide blue eyes. He makes coming to these kinds of things easier. And not just because Ashton suddenly has someone to smile beside rather than forcing himself back into the role of the class clown. He wants to listen to and look at Luke just as much as everyone else in the room.

He had been hesitant to ask Luke to join him for the several weddings and showers he had been invited to that summer. This thing between them was still new. It was intimidating to ask a new love to attend one wedding let alone five in the span of two months. But when Luke had come back to Ashton’s after a movie for a coffee and a finish to their never ending conversation, he had seen the save the dates on the fridge and practically begged Ashton to take him along as a plus one. Helped search through registries and everything. When Ashton had teasingly asked about his interest in attending so many celebrations of love, Luke had only smiled lazily and spewed a few wine drunk poetic lines about love that had Ashton diving across the couch to press their lips together and fit his fingers in the spaces betweens Luke’s.

The summer of weddings had been fun. They had danced and sang and drank their way through May and June, giggling through cheesy slow dances after too many spritzes and shared blushed looks when reaching for sweaty hands during vows that hit just a little too close to home. This was so so new, Ashton kept reminding himself every time Luke would finish his sentences when speaking to old high school friends or when he would wrap his arms around his middle once returning from the bar with another glass of wine, blue eyes meeting his own hazel before a kiss was pressed to the tip of his nose in thanks. 

In his earlier twenties, weddings had been a bore for Ashton, even when he managed to find someone else going stag to spend time with, he still felt very on his own. Which he always justified to be as okay; it was a celebration of the love between two other people, he didn’t need to be trying to force that emotion into his own life. But then a bubbly blonde quite literally tripped his way over his own legs in a coffee shop and into Ashton’s life and suddenly the idea of navigating any part of life without him, even after just under four months, made no sense at all to Ashton.

They’re at an adoption party now. The summer of weddings was over though Luke had a countdown on his phone to the winter destination wedding Ashton’s friend from his cohort was having in December. It was early September so classes had started up again but no one was really too thick into the courses they were teaching to have an excuse not to attend the celebration for Michael and Calum’s little one that had just arrived into their life. How anyone had the time for babies during graduate school was beyond him, but Ashton was over the moon to see his friends so happy. 

His focus returns to Luke then, his story obviously coming to a close now as Kaylee, one of Ashton’s past colleagues in the lab, sets a hand to his arm and smiles up at him as Luke nods, his focus settled intently on the shorter girl. Luke laughs brightly then and nods and before he knows it, both of their faces turn to where Ashton sits at a baby yellow draped table. Ashton feels a blush creep up to his cheeks as he tries to playfully roll his eyes as he gets up to meet the small group.

“What are you kids getting up to over here, huh?” Ashton jokes as he lets a hand drop to the bottom of Luke’s back, not missing his way he leans just slightly into the touch. 

“I was just telling Kaylee about how much of a zombie you turned into last month the week those grant proposals were due,” Luke smiles as he leans over just the slightest bit to press a kiss to Ashton’s temple. “And she was telling me the story of when you slept in a sleeping bag in the lab when testing those catalysts during your rotations. Said it looked like you were having a bit of a slumber party.”

“Oh come on,” Ashton scoffs with a laugh. “If Henderson had just had the guts to ask that post-doc to split the measurements with me this wouldn’t have been a problem! God, I was barely a person that semester.”

Kaylee shakes her head, excusing herself from the conversation to go grab herself a drink. Luke smiles his goodbye, thanking her for the conversation, before turning to face Ashton, his arms moving to drape over his shoulders. He lets his glass of white wine dangle somewhat precariously between his fingers as he pulls Ashton closer in, the other boy’s arms moving to wrap around his waist. “Feel weird yet that you’re going to be a whole Dr Irwin in a few months?

Ashton hums at the feeling of Luke brushing his fingers through the curls at the back of his neck. “Probably won’t feel real until I’m handed the diploma. Or when a student shows up scared at my office hours and says it for the first time.”

“You’re ridiculous.” “I don’t know,” Ashton smirks up at his boy. “You ready to hear Dr Hemmings yet?”

Luke lifts the hand that holds his glass of wine and waves it around at nothing while smiling at Ashton’s playful tone. “It’s different for musicians. We always call each other by first names. Nothing like this nonsense you guys have over in science. Too stuffy.”

Ashton raises a brow at the comment. “I’m stuffy?”

“Oh hush,” Luke shakes his head with a pout. “You know you’re not like most of them. You’re special to me in every definition of the word. Come on, I want to meet Aleena.”

Ashton lets Luke reach down for his hand, their fingers tangling together as he pulls them in the direction of the table where Michael and Calum sit, a tiny bundle tucked against Calum’s chest while they speak with their mothers. Calum seems to be doing much more of the talking while Michael smiles softly at the baby in his husband’s arms, his finger tucked inside her tiny fist.

“Hi boys,” Calum greets them warmly as they approach while the mothers wander off toward the tables of food set up on the opposite end of the lawn. The signs of parenthood already show on the couple, their eyes just a little bit more tired than a typical graduate student. Calum rubs his hand against the back of the tiny human tucked against him, his upper half gently swaying back and forth some. 

“Congratulations, guys, happy she’s finally here,” Ashton smiles warmly as Michael tucks an arm around him to pull him briefly into his side. The three of them had started their program together what felt like a lifetime ago. Ashton had felt a particular joy getting to watch the couple come together and start their own family. 

“You know I was thinking about it the other day,” Michael muses as he steps around Ashton to greet Luke in a similar fashion. “And all of the paperwork combined probably weighed more than our child does. It’s mad.” 

“To be fair, Mike, babies are small,” Ashton laughs. He turns then to see Calum handing over the tiny bundle to a now sitting Luke, softly instructing how to support Baby Aleena while he adjusts the fleecy blanket around her tiny frame. From where he stands, Ashton can see the baby is fast asleep and his eyes glitter at the way Luke looks down at her.

He feels something akin to a fight or flight response as he carries on the conversation with his two friends, discussing their projects and what the start of the semester has looked like for him. He can’t help the way he tucks himself a bit closer to where Luke sits, letting the blonde lean his head against his hip while a hand moves to fix the collar of his shirt. More than once does Ashton catch a knowing look from Calum.

Eventually Aleena starts whining some, her nap seemingly over and her confusion at the number of people around her evident. Luke gently hands the baby back up to Michael and the couples part ways, the new parents heading in the direction of the backdoor into their house. Luke stands then, his hands dropping to Ashton’s shoulders as he presses a kiss to his forehead. 

“Gonna grab another one of those lemonades, you want anything?”

Ashton shakes his head, one of his own hands lifting to cover Luke’s on his left shoulder, his thumb running over his knuckles. “I’m good for now. Thanks, love,” he stops his thumb for a moment and moves to better hold his hand. “Hey, I’m glad you’re here. Like, with me.”

Luke lifts Ashton’s hand that had been holding his own up to his lips and pressed a kiss to his knuckles as he smiles dazedly. “Happy I’m with you too, Ash.” There’s something just a bit more ambiguous in the way he responds but Ashton isn’t given a chance to question him before Luke turns and heads in the direction of the drink table.

Ashton gets pulled into a different conversation then, getting asked about how his writing is going and the new project he’s started his undergraduate assistants on. He knows it's rude but he can’t help the way that he keeps looking to find where Luke has gotten up to in between his responses to questions. He finds it so curious how his eyes are instantly drawn to the tall, smiling blonde regardless of where he’s made his way to around the room. He considers for a moment if it’s just the more definable physical characteristics of his boyfriend that make the search easier on his eyes but as he catches Luke tossing over a quick wink, Ashton’s heart fluttering some at the action, he knows then that it’s something different.

It’s the ease in the way their love fits into Ashton’s life and the warmth he felt watching Luke hold his friends’ daughter. It’s the gentle touches and the way Ashton can hear Luke’s laugh the second it leaves his lips regardless of where he is in a room full of people without a moment of hesitation. It’s love, he thinks. And though it's still so early, Ashton finds himself thinking that that kind of love is something he could get used to.

*

[miikrokkosmos]

college/film school!au Jeongguk x reader headcanons

Hi, I really loved your college Yoongi drabble, you're really great at dialogue! I was wondering if I could request some Jungkook college boyfriend head canons?? maybe about him and y/n in the same major or concentration?? I'd love to see what you think on that ;)

_______________________________________________________________________

alksdjflk i’m so glad you liked my yoongi fic, and thank you for your kind words, it means so much to me!! especially being so new to writing BTS! i wouldn’t say my dialogue is great, but it does pour out much faster for me than descriptions do, for better or for worse. thank you for the request, and i hope you enjoy it!

_______________________________________________________________________

·      you were so sure mr jeon jeongguk was the last person you’d become close to when he walked into class on the first day of your film program. he was a DP camera boi through and through, and the way he walked around in his oversized all black outfits and faux leather boots just seemed like he was trying way too hard, especially to you who focused more on the writing side and didn’t have much of an appreciation for the camera boi douchebags

·      you definitelyweren’t happy when you found out you’d been placed in the same cycle group for all of your film projects. just your luck. one of the people you’d spend the most time in college with was the one who had irritated you most so far

·      that is, until his attitude turned out to be a lot different from your initial judgement

·      confessed to you when you confronted him to ask why he buys you coffee whenever you were on set together because it’s making everyone else gossip and think he’s in love with you

·      “well if it’s so obvious to everyone else, why is it not to you?”

·      you didn’t think you’d ever felt yourself so red in the face before then

·      soon became one of the most adorable couples on campus

·      him in his oversized e boy jackets and you in your oversized soft sweaters, working side by side on set together

·      some classmates started acting rly jealous towards you and you never figured out if it was because your boyfriend was smoking hot or if it was because you now got free help with your shot maps and video edits from the most talented smoking hot boy on campus

·      not that jeongguk didn’t benefit from your help re-writing his scripts

·      no matter how far into your relationship jeongguk never stopped buying you coffee

·      “i can pay for my own coffee occasionally, guk”

·      insists he loves doing it bc 1) it was what made you fall for him in the first place (his words) and 2) he knows you function better both in school and in life once you’ve had your caffeine fix

·      you make up the difference by surprising him now and then with a new lense or yet another black camera bag he’d been wanting

·      spending nights crying in the edit lab bc no matter how many tricks and shortcuts your learn and how clear your movie is in your head you just can’t make it look like how you want it to

·      finally sucking upu your pride at 3 am and calling your boyfriend sniffing

·      “where are you” “edit lab” “oh no”

·      “let me put some pants on, be there in ten”

·      jeongguk comes to cradle your crying form and with a quick AKDKLANFSK of his fingers he has your film looking better than you did after nine straight hours of work

·      jeongguk whining to you one evening after receiving a D on a draft of his script “what does prof MEAN it’s unprofessional to use so many adverbs in a script what the FUCK my words are great. aren’t they, baby?”

·      “babe just,,,come ‘ere, let’s try to think of some more concise action verbs for you”

·      guk falling asleep on your shoulder as you work on his script until the middle of the night

·      you glance down at him, lips slightly parted, you can’t keep yourself from pressing a light kiss to his forehead

·      doesn’t open his eyes but just stirs into your neck further

·      gets an A on his next draft

·      best date nights – skipping homework and just ordering in pizza and watching your favourite movies for the eighth time together aka perfect cuddle evenings

·      he always wants you on his lap in some way. sitting between his legs, sitting directly on his laps, legs dangling over the side, lying down with your head on his thighs so he has best access to play with your hair,,,there’s no other way to watch movies in Jeongguk’s mind

·      makes going to the actual movie theatre hard

·      both try to keep PDA under wraps (lol) when on set or in public but once you make it back to his apartment at the end of the day,,,phew

·      “it was really sexy, watching you build that Red Dragon camera today babe”

·      “and was the sexy part before or after i dropped and broke the $300 side monitor??”

·      jeongguk doesn’t know how to put it into words without blushing his lil face off that you just existing is what’s sexy

·      buying outfits together for your senior film showcase like you’re going to the frickin Academy Awards or something and your friends laugh at first

·      but boy oh boy when you show up together, arms linked,,,

·      let’s just say you both got almost as many compliments on your appearances as you did on your actual films

·      overall best couple

a/n: i’m sorry i feel i’m bad at writing jk and this may have been slightly self indulgent bc i went to film school but i can’t see him majoring in anything else honestly akdfnsksf but anyway if you want more just...regular college hc i can do that too, just ask!! 💙

[clansayeed]

Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ― Chapter 12: The Return

PAIRING: Kamilah Sayeed x MC (Nadya Al Jamil) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ⥽

While struggling with nightmares of lives she’s never lived, a shadow from the past looming over her city, and the proposed idea that her life may just be a little bit too weird to handle alone, Nadya makes sure to tell herself that everything is perfect just the way it is. If only. When the self-proclaimed King of Vampires (and Maker of her sometimes-girlfriend and always-boss, can’t forget that little tidbit) Gaius Augustine returns intent on claiming Manhattan as the throne that was promised, she and her friends find themselves forced into the task of saving the world. But with millennia-old vampires and an Order of hunters on their heels as well as allies hiding catastrophic secrets at their backs… it won’t be an easy task. Too bad destiny didn’t exactly ask for her input.

Bound by Destiny II and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series and spin-off, Nightbound. Find out more [HERE].

*Let me know if you would like to be added to the Destiny II tag list!

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

The gang returns to New York with a well-earned victory under their belts. But that means Nadya has to face Kamilah, and she isn't quite sure she knows how to feel just yet.

[READ IT ON AO3]

Nadya leans on the rail with a wistful sigh. Takes a moment and just… lets herself enjoy the peace of being at peace. No memories haunting her behind her eyelids, no immediate danger… at least none she can see right in front of her.

No, the only thing in front of her is New Orleans. The French Quarter spread out for blocks around her in vibrant colors going pale against the purpling sky. It’ll be dawn soon.

Did she sigh already? Well… no harm in another one.

Taylor’s learned his lesson in sneaking up on her. Why else would he knock on the door leading up to the roof instead of taking advantage of one final attempt to startle her silly?

He clicks his tongue with a wry look. “Careful now, that sigh right there, that’s trouble. Means you’re falling in love with this place and you won’t ever wanna leave.”

Nadya can’t help it that she laughs.

“Are you trying to sound like Garrus?” It sounds like something the fae would say, actually.

“No, and frankly you don’t want to hear my Garrus impersonation,” he hesitates; waits for Nadya’s little go-ahead of a nod before joining her overlooking the city as it begins to put itself to sleep, “it’s not very good. My Ivy on the other hand…”

Their laughter is soft and polite. They wouldn’t dare jostle the world below.

“I mean, when I went off to college I had dreams of road trips on spring break, summers spent with one program or another. New Orleans was always on my list.”

“And did she live up to the hype?”

Now how exactly is Nadya supposed to answer that honestly? “Well college-aged me probably wouldn’t have been hanging around the Graveyard Shift, that’s all I’ll say.”

“Nadya, babe, you have got to stop being a hard mood,” Taylor places a hand to his chest, “my little empath heart just can’t take much more of it.”

She shoves him (gently) and their laugh is a little less awkward the second time around. Probably because he is, indeed, an empath. And he gets exactly what she’s feeling right now.

Longing — exhaustion — trepidation — to name a few.

He nudges her shoulder with his own. “You’ll have to come back when everything’s fixed on your end; see the city for real, you know? Not just all the bad things.”

Not like she goes searching for the bad things, thanks. They just kind of… happen dangerously close in her proximity. “I’d like that. Lil’ too, for sure.”

“Oh, for sure. Though I have a feeling her and Ivy together might be a bit more trouble than Nik’ll want to deal with.”

And on that Nadya can most certainly agree. Not that she does so with words. Strangely she doesn’t feel much like talking right now. Not-so-strangely, Taylor doesn’t either. So they lean in mutual silence and watch the streets below. People going through the motions; living their lives.

Lives far less strange than theirs.

The blue of the dawn is just starting to bleed orange when he finally speaks again.

“You’re not used to winning the day, are you?” She isn’t surprised in the least to look and see that strange iridescence back in his irises.

“I don’t have enough coffee in me to answer a question like that,” which — that’s her answer; but Taylor definitely isn’t taking it, “I mean… back when all this stuff started; we won then, I think. Adrian was exonerated and Jax joined the Council and Vega wasn’t trying to kill me anymore —”

Taylor holds up a finger. “Wait — like the missing Senator, that Vega?”

“You knew him?”

“Uh, Vee and our friend Kristin lived up there together. Wait a second—he was a vam— no… that’s not the point. Sorry, please continue.”

God, is that how I look to other people, Nadya wonders; but it’s humbling to see somehow.

“Anyway… I thought everything turned out for the better, and for a while it was better. But now that I think about it…” Gaius, Jameson, the Trinity; all of them lurking just on the other side of the two-way glass. Waiting for the time to strike and take her happiness away; to pluck memories from her she never asked for all in pursuit of some epic fantasy-level world conquering.

If the fight wasn’t over, did that still count as a victory?

“And you’re left wondering if this is the same deal. If you’ve really won, or if there’s more stuff—worse stuff—just out of sight.” Taylor finishes for her. Still a little weird and possibly more akin to mind-reading than the half-fae originally led her to believe, but for the moment she’s glad to not have to say it.

“Yeah, exactly.”

His hand comes to rest over Nadya’s on the railing. He’s warmer than he should be and the sun’s got nothing to do with it. Likely his weirdness is helped by touch, too. Which Taylor all but confirms aloud when a sudden but not unwelcome ease relaxes the tension she didn’t know she’d gathered in her shoulders.

“I can’t offer any answers, and I don’t think I’d want to. With my luck I’d be wrong and you’d hate me forever.” He’s joking but Nadya still rolls her eyes and shakes her head for it.

“But I can say that no matter what happens? You’ll always have friends here to call up if needed.”

What is she supposed to say to something so sincere? “Same to you, Taylor, same to you.”

A sleek black car with tinted windows pulls around the corner and onto their lonely street to park right in front of the bar.

Looks like their ride is here.

Kamilah isn’t waiting for them when the plane pulls into the nice and shady hangar. Nadya tells herself she isn’t surprised by this… but she’s trying not to tell herself mostly-truths lately either. Luckily she’s still too exhausted (and she’s pretty sure she only got about half an hour’s nap in the entire time they were in New Orleans) to make much of a fuss about it.

In fact, Nadya barely remembers sending a text off before she and Lily both are being ushered into the back seat of one of Adrian’s company cars.

[TEXT]: back in NY and miss you like crazy. can we plz talk?? [TEXT]: its nadia

And its the most dreamless, dead-to-the-world-est sleep she knew she needed but didn’t know how to get. Staying awake for near-days and going through every emotion under the sun and also dealing with a high-stakes pursuit weren’t exactly on her list of viable solutions to her sleeping troubles.

Ergo the point of all this — no one is allowed to think her anything less than totally justified when Nadya wakes up in her own bed, in her own bedroom, sometime well after sunset and thinks for even the smallest second that everything was just a dream. She knows logically that it wasn’t… but still.

Totally justified.

When her eyes adjust to the lack of light Nadya realizes she’s not alone. There’s a figure sitting on the edge of her bed nearest the window, away from the door. Giving her the chance to escape if she needs it; making sure she doesn’t feel trapped.

Only one person would do that.

She fumbles for her glasses on the nightstand but leaves her bedside lamp untouched. Can’t shake the feeling like if she does turn the lights on then Kamilah will vanish. This is better for them both.

“Hi.”

Something moves near her head; Nadya leans back to see the woman pulling her fingertips away from where they had been combing through her hair gently. She wants it back so much she aches from the loss of them.

“Hello,” replies Kamilah; sounding awfully breathless for a woman who doesn’t need to breathe, “did you rest well? You… seemed to need it.”

Probably not what she meant to ask judging by the way the neon signs from across the street illuminate her in postmodern beauty. It’s okay though — Nadya isn’t sure she has the courage yet to say what really needs saying.

“When did you get here…?”

“Shortly after your return. Oh, Lily wished for you to know she’s left for the evening. She didn’t leave a message as to why.”

So it’s just been Nadya and Kamilah in the apartment for at least the daylight hours. Alone; together. And not talking about their problems.

When Nadya sits up (in part to look at Kamilah better, in part to make sure she doesn’t fall back asleep on accident) the bed dips as Kamilah shifts back; makes to stand and leave her with all this twin-sized budget bed kit to herself. And because she can’t stand a thought so terrible Nadya reaches out and stops her with a hand on her arm.

“Kamilah.”

A long pause — then; “Yes, Nadya?”

“Why are you here?”

“You messaged me,” so Nadya of course fumbles for her phone and finds it charging under her pillow, “though I suppose I should have realized you were exhausted beyond recognition.”

“Why’s that?”

“You spelled your own name wrong.”

Upon further inspection yes, yes she did. “Glad you weren’t expecting some other disaster you’re dating also named Nadia…” That she chooses not to dwell on the fact that she may have very well used that word for the first time in the middle of their first fight is actually self-care.

Or — she doesn’t until Kamilah’s been quiet for an awfully long time.

“Uhm — I take that back, actually — what I meant was…”

“I won’t disagree.”

Only Kamilah Sayeed could look so perfect framed in the flickering lights of a discount electronics shop.

“But you’re my disaster.”

Nadya kisses her because every other time it’s been Kamilah who takes the lead, takes charge, takes her. This isn’t some attempt to switch that dynamic either (in fact Nadya’s very happy with it just the way it is) but what else is she supposed to do seeing all these vulnerable parts of such an invulnerable woman one right after the other?

But — no, she can’t fall into this. Fall into her. Not without talking. But holy mother of crap she doesn’t wanna do anything but moan at the lips soft on her cheeks, her chin, her throat…

“Kamilah.”

Nadya only has to say her name once. They both know how this works. That doesn’t mean she doesn’t feel the hesitance; the resistance before they part and she all but forces them to meet eye-to-eye. Nor does it mean that she doesn’t take just the tiniest bit of happiness from it.

When Nadya starts pulling away Kamilah holds on just a little bit tighter. Only for a moment; then its gone.

“We can’t not —” — talk about this.

“I know; I agree.”

And she’s got a whole speech planned out in bullet points; not even fully seated and she’s already buzzing to jump right into it. Until—

“I was uncertain and without control. I fell back on old habits to bring my life to a heel — but those were the wrong choices to make. They nearly cost me… something very important.”

Kamilah’s hand falls open on top of the bedspread and Nadya takes it for the offering it is. Their fingers slot together familiar and like nothing’s changed but this is different. This is talking about it; this is… this is Kamilah apologizing. “They nearly cost me you, Nadya.”

Now is not the time to go all red in the face and flustered. Nadya’s willpower is astounding frankly. “There was never a second where I doubted that you cared. Not about what I was going through, or what it was doing to… to everything in my life. But I think there was a part of me that didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want to believe that you and… and the you I saw were —” — were the same person.

Kamilah’s thumb strokes along her knuckles slow and rhythmic. “My thoughts are the same. I am not fragments of a woman; a queen, different than a soldier, different than a killer, different than who I am today. I am all of those things and more. And perhaps still there are parts of myself I have not yet come to know.”

Nadya chances a look up while she listens, but it’s the words Kamilah doesn’t say that catch her by surprise. The ones about who that person she doesn’t know could be. And—god she hopes she’s not reading too much into this—who she could be that person with.

“I think I get it now.”

“And what would that be?”

She squeezes their hands until it hurts because she knows it’s probably the weight of a feather to someone like Kamilah.

“We were scared of the same thing and for the same reasons; you… and your past. But I wanted to know more. I—I wanted to talk about it, without thinking of how hard bringing up all of those bad memories might be for you.”

Kamilah purses her lips and offers a slow nod. “Insightful; and perhaps I was so insistent on trying to keep that knowledge from you that I did not stop to consider what… I was saying in withholding it.”

Now the question is… where do they go from here?

“So we work on that — we try and… understand what the other is doing when she…”

“Makes a mistake she instantly regrets?”

Nadya smiles, but it’s strained. “That’s half of the things I do anyway though.”

“You know my meaning in the context of this, Nadya.”

“Yeah, but that’s not my only problem.” Which isn’t the best word she could use but at the moment she’s not focusing so much on word choice as actual feelings. And Nadya… feels a problem. There’s a breath of a second where it feels like Kamilah might start to pull away, but it passes.

She thinks better of it. She tries to understand.

“You are amazing, Kamilah. You are this… super gorgeous, super smart, super old—in a good way I swear—and super experienced vampire. But it’s not a smart thing for us to—to ignore that.”

“I wasn’t under the impression we had been.”

This is more painful to admit than Nadya thought it was gonna be. There’s no turning back now though; no ‘Restart from Checkpoint’ or save to load.

And this is so so important. Nadya wants to follow through, and not just for the sake of them. She deserves it for herself. “Maybe you haven’t — but I have. I thought that was the only way we were gonna make this work. Only, if I ignore that then I’m ignoring the fact that you are always going to have a power over me. A physical one. You lashed out and…”

“And I could have hurt you.” That Kamilah’s hand tightens with hers is the literal definition of ironic but she knows it comes from a good place; the same place all that honesty was walled up inside now pouring out.

“Nadya, please tell me you know I would never have hurt you. I don’t think I could.”

“That’s not the point. The point is you were angry, and your first reaction was to try and scare me into running away.”

See, this is Nadya’s problem. There’s a reason her life is so organized — without all her colored pens and sticky notes and multiple tabs that always end up in the strangest places, she’s a literal human mess. Prone to rambling and impulsive actions that aren’t always good for her health; physical and emotional both.

She didn’t organize this part of her talk with Kamilah. She didn’t even know this part existed. And now it’s out there in the world without a label tacked on and… and…

“And I don’t think that’s something I’m quite… over, yet.”

Nadya trusts Kamilah still; she doesn’t flinch away when the woman’s free hand comes up to her cheek — thumbs away a tear she didn’t know was falling. She can separate the then from the now.

But at the end of the day her trust and the way she had felt betrayed that night… they weren’t mutually exclusive.

She turns her face into the lingering palm. When she exhales her breath rattles in her lungs.

“I miss you.”

Kamilah’s hand betrays her composed silence; the barest tremor. “I’m here, Nadya.”

Nadya who doesn’t want to pull back, never wanted to pull back… but what is she saying to herself if she doesn’t?

“I miss you,” she repeats, “and I still care about you — I don’t really see that changing any time soon. And I’ll forgive you, really—I will. I just need some time.”

I know there are no promises you’ll be there when I’m ready, or if you won’t have moved on, or if you can’t forgive me for not forgiving you, or for not understanding you, or for making you feel this way. But I feel this way too.

And in all the things she wants to say but doesn’t, Nadya’s left still and heartbroken. Completely by her own design.

The bed dips and Nadya lets her eyes flutter closed as Kamilah’s lips press to her forehead. Not so much a kiss as a touch; something sincere and solid and so so sad.

Kamilah commits the warmth and life of her to memory. Nadya dares to hope that some day they’ll have all of this again.

She has to. If anything deserves hope right now it’s them.

Finally — too soon, too damned soon — a whisper tickles at her hairline.

“I’ll be here.”

When she opens her eyes Nadya is alone.

Jax has a really good point; if the heat from Adrian’s industrial-grade blowtorch hadn’t been enough to melt the gold, then they probably didn’t need to worry about his sword scratching the stupid thing up in any way that didn’t lend to opening it.

Everyone still backs up a few paces for good measure. They’ve all seen him in action — and the man needs a wide berth.

Nadya closes her eyes and braces herself but she still isn’t prepared for the hollow screeching clang every time the sharpened steel collides with the surface of the Amulet. One—two—three.

He stops after three. Judging by the enraged determination in his eye though he’d keep going given the opportunity.

Lily throws her hands up before crossing out ‘ASSAULT BY KATANA’ on the transparent eraser board. “I’m calling it. This thing is a horcrux.”

“A what?” asks Adrian, but Nadya just gives him the now familiar “I’ll explain it later” wave-off. Because unless pop culture references were the secret puzzle to opening the Amulet of Nero they weren’t that important in the moment.

She pushes her glasses up and unsuccessfully stifles a yawn with the back of her hand. Brings her focus back to their list of attempts to crack open (literally) the case… all of which have failed miserably.

‘METALWORKING HAMMER’ ‘REGULAR HAMMER’ ‘BLOWTORCH’ ‘ASKING IT NICELY’ (Nadya’s idea) ‘OPEN SESAME’ (Maricruz’s idea) ‘ASSAULT BY KATANA’

Off to the left Lily’s circled ‘MISSING KEY??’ over and over in the corner and while they had all agreed to try and hold out on just not having found the right amount of physical force they might as well face it.

They’re running out of options.

Adrian clears his throat and stares hard enough at Nadya that the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. “Ahem, Nadya, could you…?”

“Oh — yes — sorry guys, my bad.”

When she pulls the cover back over the Amulet the difference is immediate. The tension leaves her friends’ shoulders; they sit a little less restless and their eyes are a little less bordering-vampish.

Nadya wasn’t the only one who had been content to write off the strange aura that had come over the vampires in Isadora de la Rosa’s booth as nothing more than trepidation for the inevitable. Now, however, they have to face the facts.

There’s something in the Amulet that draws vampires to it. Cadence had said so himself — when he talked about generations of vampire influence. It’s not enough to incite a war (about which Nadya was admittedly worried, and with good reason given their track record) but covering it was a noticeable benefit to rational thinking.

They only have one thing going for them right now; if they can’t open it then no one else can, either. Hopefully that includes the Trinity. Maybe it even includes Gaius. Who knows? They certainly don’t.

There are too many unknowns — and they’re starting to take a toll on everyone in one form or another.

Adrian begins to gather up the dozens of data graphs spread out in front of him. “With that, I think we’ve come to a natural stopping point for the evening.” And nobody disagrees.

While Nadya carefully wraps the Amulet back up to return it to the R&D vault, Lily leans on her elbows and watches.

“I take it we still haven’t heard from Cadence? What about calling up Izzy?”

If only she had good news to give. “Nope; and I already did. She definitely remembers feeling that weird magnetism to it before it was repossessed by Persephone but nothing beyond that that she knew of. Actually,” she throws a look over to Adrian, “she suggested one thing; witch-fire? Something like that.”

He seems hesitant to mull the idea over. But they were desperate enough to let Jax hit it repeatedly, so…

“I’ll look into a few contacts. That kind of magic should only be used sparingly and in dire cases.”

“Would this count?”

A beat. “Probably. We would have to run it by the Council, though.” Which kind of nulls even the idea. Since everyone had agreed not to tell the rest of the Council yet. Not only because of the Amulet’s potential.

Lester, Priya, the Baron — Nadya likes to try and see the best in people as much as possible but they don’t make it easy on her. None of them are certain who would, if it came down to it, side against Gaius for a second time.

Nothing is unlikely anymore.

Wow, their shortest-lived idea yet.

Nadya nods towards the vault for Lily to follow. “As for the other thing — Kathy’s starting to get worried. I guess he left town a day after we did.” Which the Nighthunter had admitted wasn’t off-brand for Cadence. But the museum had let slip (which Nadya knows means ‘been bullied into admitting’) that he had been granted a leave of absence; very off-brand.

“The one thing he’s always had is that damn museum. No identity, no Izzy, and we both know I’m a recent development. He was a manic mess the first time that kind of dissociation happened.” The Nighthunter had kept her cool better than Nadya would have in her situation. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t worried ill.

“What if it’s worse this time,” even through the phone she couldn’t hide her concern; her fear, “what if he hurts himself? What if he hurts someone else?”

Hopefully they find him soon. But she’s met that strange group of people; the regulars at the Graveyard Shift. If anyone has the ability (and sheer force of stubborn will, to be honest) to find Cadence it’s them.

“I mean, if I went Jekyll and Hyde around a chick as crazy as that Trinity woman, I’d probably want to get away for my own health too.”

Lily’s comment doesn’t sit well with her; luckily at her admonishing look she at least looks apologetic. “You know what I mean.”

“I also know a little bit of what he’s going through.”

There’s an “ahem” behind them as Nadya spins the wheel on the vault. Adrian definitely has the look of someone who knows he shouldn’t have been eavesdropping but was anyway.

“Speaking of.”

Only… she’d rather not speak of it until it becomes a problem. “It’s fine,” she replies, and waves it off. That was what they’d agreed on for the time being, right? And there haven’t been any problems.

Turns out feeling the weight of relationship-burdened depression the moment you walk through your front door lends to a pretty heavy sleeping pattern. Like Nadya’s body doesn’t want her to do anything but try to get through the next day, and the next, and maybe… just maybe the one after that.

Adrian doesn’t seem immediately convinced. “Promise?”

“Pinky promise.” Which — he still doesn’t really get the concept but the verbal agreement is enough.

Once the lab is fully shut down they manage to pile together into the elevator. Jax thumbs at his phone, blows the hair out of his eyes just a little too close to Nadya’s ear for her liking. She swats him away because personal bubble.

“What’s the matter?”

“Eh, Espinoza wants —” But he catches himself with a look in Lily’s direction. “— something. She wants something. And I gotta… go get it.”

Nadya and Adrian just shake their heads and laugh at him while Lily pretends with absolutely no tact whatsoever not to know what he’s talking about. She even sticks her fingers in her ears like that’ll somehow stop her super vampire hearing.

Jax, somehow with even less tact, like negative tact, takes it as permission to lean and murmur on Nadya’s free side. “Apparently Lula got into the cake. So…”

“Weren’t there three?” Adrian hisses, surprised.

“You’ll get it when you meet her.”

Nadya reaches around and pats Jax’s chest awkwardly. “Good luck with that. Maybe try putting them in the passenger seat this time.”

“Shut up.”

“Just saying… third time’s the charm you know.”

When she gives Lily a nod in ‘all clear’ everyone knows she heard everything. But she’s just excited to know Maricruz is going as all-out as she possibly can, so who would be so heartless as to spoil the whole thing by just admitting the obvious?

Adrian lets them all off on the ground level and offers Nadya one last chance to go home early. “What do you pay her for if you keep giving her chances to not work?” And Jax raises a good point — too good of a point. She maybe shoves him in front of her with all her might, and he maybe stumbles. The world may never know. “Just saying — let me know next time there’s an opening.”

“I’ll be up in a sec. I just have to stake him first.”

She and Lily wave until the doors close. Yes, they live together and see each other every day. Yes, they recently defied death in New Orleans together. But its rare now that Nadya and Lily get a chance to unwind like they used to. So whenever it comes along they’re both there to indulge greedy and giggling.

“Mari’s really going all out with this party, huh?”

It’s a valiant effort but Lily doesn’t look so much humbly embarrassed as expectantly excited. “I think I’m in love, Nadi’,” she jumps the next few steps like hopscotch, “she was fully ready to get a bouncy castle.”

“How are they going to fit a bouncy castle in the Shadow Den?”

“Oh I didn’t say I let her. But she was planning on it, and isn’t that what true love is all about?”

Nadya tries not to falter. Key word being tries. And around anyone else she might do everything in her power not to draw attention to it but this is Lily. Who found her huddled up in bed hours after Kamilah’s farewell and called to cancel her own date to stay with her; to be there for her and give her all the hugs she desperately needed but didn’t know how to ask for.

She doesn’t need to pretend around that kind of love and friendship.

But before Nadya can apologize Lily starts up an air drum solo in front of her while they walk. “And winner for Most Insensitive Best Friend Ever is — drum roll…”

“You’re fine, Lil’.”

“I’m gushing about my life while you’re… not so hot.”

Nope, Nadya won’t have it. “You’re gonna gush because you have every right to gush, okay? You’ve been a vampire for a whole year. That’s super important. You survived Turning, became the digital fanged crusader, and it’s ten times more cool because you did it all without a brand. Jax and Adrian can’t say that. Heck… even Kamilah can’t.

“So if you want a Turning party, you’re gonna get a Turning party. I’m not the only one who thinks you’re worth celebrating.” They lace their fingers and Nadya squeezes. “Plus if Jax shows up with the third set of cakes to a canceled party I think he might flip his lid.”

Lily gives a dramatic little sniffle — pretends to wipe a nonexistent tear from her eye. “Please tell me you just memorized all that.”

“Why?”

“Because it’ll be the speech to end all speeches.”

Together they play-shove all the way through the Raines Building atrium. Right before the revolving door Lily spins her around, takes both of their hands together and swings them gently.

“Do you want me to uninvite her? She probably doesn’t even care.”

“No — and even if we broke up, like, badly I wouldn’t want that. I’m just not that kind of person.”

“True, you’d probably invite them to Christmas dinner or something.”

She rolls her eyes at that and ignores it for her own sanity. “And for the record — as someone with experience in decoding Kamilah-isms, I think you surprised her. She admires strength, and Lily… you’re the strongest person I know.”

When they hug, like always, their glasses get jostled in the middle and the following laughter lightens both of their hearts. Lily makes her promise to add that last line to her speech (which inadvertently is a promise to write a speech, she’s guessing) and only when she’s out the doors and around the corner of the block does Nadya head back up to the office.

Adrian is leaning in his open doorway when she exits the elevator — Nadya slows her steps for a hesitant second before coming to realize he’s just having another one of his pensive moods. He’s been having them a lot lately. More and more since they returned from New Orleans.

This one looks different though. He’s not staring into space — he’s staring at her.

“What?” She finally yields, glancing at her boss over her shoulder while the computer boots up slow as a snail. “What’s that face for?”

Nadya nearly convinces herself he isn’t going to answer.

“It’s good to see you smiling, that’s all.” He leans out and squeezes her shoulder; something soft and friendly and so sweet her teeth ache from it. Before Adrian can pull away Nadya makes sure to return the gesture.

“It’s good to smile,” which is far more bleak than she would like, “you know something?”

Adrian pauses mid-step. “Hm?”

“It’s even better to mean it.”

[writersblockpeter]

internship (hc) | p.p.

summary: tony stark not only helped in bringing together a group of people to protect earth, but also in sparking young love

warnings: i love this one very cute very fun i think i cussed once? idk

+ + +

- we all know peter parker has (had????) an "internship" with tony sTaNk

- but, despite that being fake, tony does actually have an internship program

- and, luckily for you, you're one of tony's most prized interns

- the moment he looked at your resume he knew you'd be a perfect fit

- your extremely rare high level of intellect shocked him

- in fact, you were almost even smarter than the man

- the two of you bonded right away

- at this point you were able to lounge around avenger hq in sweats and no makeup

- one day tony asked you to help him on his new project

- you said yes, ofc

- much to your surprise, this project was spider-man's new suit

- of course you'd seen videos of the web-slinger on youtube (who hadn't?)

- so obviously this project made you very excited

- you got to work right away, coming to the hq everyday after school

- you and tony were extremely proud of the final product

- he asked you to program the AI for the suit (soon-to-be karen!!!!!!!)

- and that was the first time peter saw you

- you were sat on the ground, legs crossed, holograms in the air as you worked

- too focused on your work, you hadn't noticed a certain boy in the doorway

- tony was giving him the rundown on the germany trip while showing him around the place, but peter got sidetracked when he saw you in the office

- the boy stopped dead in his tracks, focus honing in on you

- luckily for you, you had put on some mascara that day

- but you were still donned in some of your best sweatpants and an old shirt from school that was way too big for you

- yet, peter parker being peter parker, couldn't help but be starstruck (STARKstruck???) when he saw you

- well, every girl in the world was gorgeous to him, for goodness sakes

- but something about you caught him off guard

- "mr. stark, who's that?" peter whispered

- an all-too-knowing smirk grew on tony's face

- "y/n!" he called - your head shot up from the holograms and towards the door, where you made immediate eye contact with peter

- it wasn't long before a small blush grew on your face

- as much as you hated to admit it, you couldn't look at a boy (or girl, too, if you're bi or anything!) anymore without mentally rating their appearance - this is what being single your entire life does to a person

- needless to say, peter parker was HIGH on the list of attractiveness 

- you quickly averted your gaze to tony, grin still tugging on his lips

- "yeah?"

- "this is peter." tony responds, gesturing towards the boy

- "h-hi," peter awkwardly blurts, giving a slight wave

- "hey," you reply, maybe a bit too bReAtHlEsSlY

- a few awkward seconds pass before you give the two a slight nod and get back to your work

- tony begins walking away, dragging peter along with him

- peter hurls series of questions about you at the man, which only made tony's smirk grow

- the two of you began to have more and more awkward encounters at the tower

- most of the time, you'd be working and he'd walk by, seeing you either by coincidence or on purpose

- but sometimes you would just be lounging in the living area, stuffing pizza in your mouth as you watched harry potter

- your levels of nonchalance made peter begin to question if you were mr. stark's secret daughter

- but no one needed to know he wondered that

- the more the two of you saw each other, the more you were on each other's minds

- the small "hey"s began to turn into conversations

- the first real conversation was started by peter (which was only possible through a rare burst of confidence)

- it started with the usual "hey"s

- and then peter asked about your internship

- he saw the way your eyes lighted up when he asked the question and it made him feel warm

- the conversation sparked into more:

- "what about you?"

- "what do you mean.. what about me?" peter asked

- "why do i see you here so often?"

- "oh. uh, also... intern... ship."

- the boys heartbeat began to quicken as you raised an eyebrow at him

- "why are you looking at me like that?"

- "nothing," you smile

- the two of you talk about school and life and stuff 

- after peter bids you an awkward goodbye (he has to go train to do spider things!!) he begins to make his way out of the room

- "bye, spider-man," you yell

- peter whirls around, panic present on his face

- "how did you-?"

- "i'm not an idiot, parker."

- it didn't take your genius brain to connect all the dots (especially cause sometimes when you saw him it would be right after he finished training and he'd be all sweaty?????? which made you forget how to breath just a lil??)

- the two of you began holding actual conversations more and more

- you find yourself watching videos of spider-man swinging throughout the city

- the two of you stalk each other on insta, both marveled by the pictures the other posts

- eventually you say yolo and just follow him

- he follows you back literally like two seconds later

- during one of your run-ins at hq he gets all flustered 

- "you okay?"

- "yeah," peter breathes, "uh, could i, uh, if you're okay with it, could i-"

- "dude."

- "sorry. could i please get your number please?"

- a small smile grows on your face before you reach out a hand, the boy hurriedly grabbing his phone and practically shoving it at you

- you type your name in with a little smiley face and then send yourself a quick "hey"

- you found yourself giddily smiling for a solid few minutes after he left

- one day you find yourself scheming on a way to get peter over to the tower (you were bored as heck; you'd already finished your work)

- then you got an idea

- peter was over mere minutes after you texted him

- he rings the buzzer and you tell F.R.I.D.A.Y. to let him in

- "hey," he greets, breathless from the speed at which he hurried over to the tower

- "tony said i need to start doing checkups on your suit every once and a while," you say, silently thanking your acting skills

- "oh," peter nods, "okay"

- he follows you down to the lab, mask still in hand and suit flush on his body 

- you reach one of the large tables, stopping and sucking in a breath before giving him a slightly expectant look

- "i.." you hesitate, "i'm gonna need your..."

-"oh!" peter says with realization

- and then realization hit again

- "uh.. i don't have any other clothes..."

- your face burns bright red before you open your mouth again

- "okay um.. either you're gonna have to hide in the bathroom until i'm done or we try to do it with you still inside the suit... it's just that there'd be a lot of touching if you choose that.." you ebb off at the end of your sentence, chewing on the inside of your lip

- peter immediately gets flustered

- "uh, we can just.. try it... with the suit on........?"

- you nod, taking a nervous step towards him and beginning to mentally berate yourself for not entirely thinking this through

- peter takes a shaky inhale and accidentally takes in the scent of your perfume

- which makes him begin to freak out a little

- you lay a wary hand on him and peter swears he's going to faint

- the two of you had never touched and peter already had a bit too huge of a crush on you

- so this was a lot for him 

- and his heightened senses didn't help

- you carefully (and very awkwardly) press the spider in the middle of his chest - peter starts silently praying you can't hear/feel his heartbeat

- the suit loosens and begins to slip off of his shoulders and you gasp slightly, furiously grabbing it and pulling it up

- "sorry," you smile sheepishly

- peter just half-smiles crookedly as he watches you refocus on the suit

- you give him a wary look before reaching in through the neck and wandering your hand towards the center of the suit

- your attempts to not touch him fail

- your hand brushes against his extremely toned stomach

- the breath catches in both of your throats

- yet you somehow continue, the two of you refusing to even dare to look at each other

- to your surprise, you find a wire out of place

- peter watches as your face scrunches up a lil in focus and melts just a little bit

- your fiddling doesn't get the problem fixed and out of frustration, you tug a little bit

- which causes the suit to slip off of his shoulders

- which causes peter's entire top half to become exposed, the only thing holding the suit up being your hands grasping the wires

- a blush spreads on your cheeks like wildfire as you look down to see the waistband of peter's underwear

- a small squeak involuntarily flies out of peter's mouth, making him mentally punch himself

- your flusteredness disappears when you focus your gaze slightly, seeing red and blue figures scattered across the boy's briefs

- a small laugh falls from your lips

- peter wants to run away

- your small laughter turns into a wheeze

- poor petey just stands there awkwardly

- "pete, are those..."

- you can barely breathe as you double over in laughter

- "are those spider-man underwear????"

- the slightest and weariest of smiles begins to creep on the boy's face

- "maybe..?" he says quietly, voice high

- "that's the best thing i've seen all day"

- eventually you focus again and fix his suit, the uncomfortable atmosphere getting replaced by the two of you joking around

- ever since that day the two of you would become a bit more touchy

- also almost forgot to mention that tony was watching the security camera that day and saw  e v e r y t h i n g  and loved it

- like peter would join you in watching movies after the two of you finished your work at hq

- you'd joke around by stacking your legs on top of each other and kicking each other

- your laughter literally made him so happy

- and you felt the same way about his

- one time you were watching a scary movie (peter intentionally made this happen so you would hopefully want to cuddle)

- a jump scare freaked you the FCK out and you immediately grabbed his hand - even though you cursed yourself, it made peter's day

- probably his whole month

- or life

- every time you got scared, you somehow gravitated closer to the boy, hands still laced together

- by the end of the movie you were curled into him, his arm around you and your head on his shoulder, legs hung over his

- and then the next day you two saw each other and literally pRETENDED THAT NOTHING HAD HAPPENED

- this made the avengers (who had caught onto y'alls chemistry very quickly) quite upset

- the group would tease you two so much kjvhgcjvkl it like wasn't even funny

- when peter discovered his AI (karen!! "hello?? hELLO????") (if you know the exact part i'm talking about i LOVE YOU)

- he immediately thought about you

- "wow, y/n really outdid herself”

- "yes, she did. also, she says hi." the AI responded

- "oh! uhh, i say hi back!"

- (pure angel)

- alright folks now i'm gonna get a little less detailed because i'm past 2000 words at this point and i think we can all tell that i got a bit carried away but let's keep going!

- essentially, the two of you just kept getting closer

- despite the two of you going to different schools, you still had fun lil study parties

- eventually you migrated from the tower and went to each others houses

- peter LOVES your room because it's literally you

- and same goes vice versa

- one day you were walking to the subway to get to the tower after school (beautiful fall afternoon, btw) and peter swung by and scooped you up 

- you screamed a little at the beginning but then got used to it and and had fun and just kinda giggled in his ear the rest of the time

- peter began to worry a little as he swung through the city bc he was so enamored by your laughter all he wanted to do was stop on a roof and kiss you

- and then the idea sparked in his head that he could

- he panicked a little because you two were just buildings away from the tower

- and with one huge swing he landed the two of you on some random roof

- you slipped off of him, eyebrows furrowed as you looked around you

- "pete? this isn't the tow-"

- the boy ripped off his mask (which hurt his nose a little if he was being honest) and stepped towards you, quickly pressing his lips against yours and pulling away just as fast

- "holy shit, dude," you whisper after a moment, head spinning 

- "holy shit?" he asks nervously

- "holy shit."

- you let out an ungodly snort and wheeze, smiles breaking on both of your faces and you let your head drop, pressing it into peter's chest

- you felt him laugh against you and you realized how happy you were (and lowkey hated how cliche it felt but it's fine)

- when you finally caught your air and pulled your head away, the two of you looked at each other with the most shit-eating, cliche, best-friends-turned-something-more smiles

- after a second, with the most boyish grin that made your heart melt, peter asked,

- "wanna make out?"

- "peter!" + + +

peter parker has my entire heart

[yoolee]

So I ended up in a difficult position. I was so stressed over everything going on, I struggled to focus on my last few assessments for my last year of degree. I have a feeling I failed and was told I can redo only the failed assessment free of charge, but next August. I’m just beating myself up over my struggle to cope, but what could I do over the year I wait for August? It’s just two essays I would write and hand over. Find work? Get work experience? Anything else?

Consider setting something on fire. It’s surprisingly cathartic, but also, do it in an empty parking garage with a fire extinguisher on hand that you know how to use, and make sure there are no security cameras or a lot of wind. Also??? Smashing glass bottles with a baseball bat? Very cathartic, but wear goggles and thick gloves and layers of padding.

BUT ALSO. 

Don’t give up hope! It ain’t over until it’s over.

2. Go easy on yourself - We’re in an absolute shit show of a year. It’s BRUTAL. And yeah, some folk seem to be doing okay, and it’s exhausting and stressful to watch them sailing through the storm when it feels like your ship is sinking – but they may have a bigger crew helping them out. They may have had just enough headwind to give them the headstart. They may have a big ass leak they’re just really good at hiding. Your boat may have already been battered going into this, and it may have been okay if there hadn’t been a GD HURRICANE when all anyone was expecting was some light rain. Point being – don’t judge yourself against how others are presenting themselves right now. For one, I’m pretty sure everyone has had at least one behind the scenes breakdown, and two, your worth is not defined by your productivity during a global pandemic, societal unrest, social isolation, and any additional situational stress (mental health, family trouble, financial strain, uncertainty, chronic health issues) you’re juggling at the same time.

Shit you’re HERE.

You DID the assessments.

Do you know what a win that is?

IF you fail –  then 

3.1: it’s gonna be okay. It is. You have an IRONCLAD explanation if anyone asks you about it later in life (which, gonna guess people will see the year and rather than ask ‘why the gap’ will go ‘2020 – ah, yeah.’ And move on) which is, 2020.

And uh. This is another one of Lee’s kinda shady but it works notes but also please don’t use it unless it’s true? The best explanation you can give for a gap on your resume is caring for a relative. I’m not saying you should ever lie about this, because, seriously, outright lies WILL COME BACK TO BITE YOUR ASS. I AM saying that this is something every employer, every recruiter, and every empathetic human being understands. I’m also saying that if you phrase it as “My family and I were pretty heavily impacted by the pandemic, and academics had to take a second priority to getting back on our feet.” Then people will assume the former, even if what you mean is – my mental health took a hit, and my academics took a hit while I got back on my feet. It’s just a more societally acceptable way to phrase it that lets folks assume and fill in the blanks to their own experiences in a way that will generate sympathy. IT’S A LIL DICEY THOUGH so don’t bust it out unless you have to.

 3.2 Talk to the department/school/test agency – ask if there is an exception to the retake wait this year due to the additional burden of the pandemic. It NEVER hurts to ask (and ask AGAIN – you got an answer from one person, ask someone else in a different position of authority or a different department). Ask if there is an alternate way to meet the requirement that you could work towards (some programs allow an exam in place of a thesis project, the reverse could be feasible). Ask what ALL the options are, and what they would recommend.

3.3 This is gonna sound. Asininely artsty fartsy I suppose but – embrace the year if it comes to that. It never hurts to get work experience, because it often comes with funding and that’s always nice, but also see if your profs have any TA positions or RA positions if you want to stay in the academic space, or if they don’t, ask other departments in the gen eds (I was able to TA as an undergrad this way). It’s kinda hard for me to suggest a path without knowing the details of your degree or the assessment, so apologies!

Hang in there, nonny. The good news is, humans are weirdly and fantastically adaptable. If this is our new normal, you WILL find yourself better able to cope with it as it goes on. That’s another reason why some peers may seem on top of things - their pace of processing is just different (and there are a thousand reasons why that may be, none of which are personal failings on your part so much as they are societal influences and structures and experiences that do not hit equally).

The hedonistic treadmill is often invoked to explain why good things stop pleasing us after awhile - but it works in reverse. Really shitty things eventually start sucking less. 

[shhbean]

fuck it! some thoughts on al’s years in xing. if you guys have thoughts or criticisms let me know! i just wanna ramble lmao.

also don’t reblog lmao bc theres a lot of errors in here and its all sporadic and frankly embarrassing

okay so first things first i think in the two year gap between the promised day and the post canon adventures the brothers keep up a correspondence with ling and mei through letters (bc theyre planning this big adventure and its wild that they would show up unannounced even tho i know thats theyre style but als like. mmm dont want lan fan to execute me on sight)

side note! i think of xing as a relatively isolationist country, but with a phone and railway system that operates within itself, not on the outside (its a big country! people need to communicate!) ling is not against isolationism per say, only because drachma and amestris are still very much Major War Torn disasters, however ling puts a big emphasis on assisting refugees and families displaced by war. he also holds relatively frequent council with their bordering countries* *more on this later. but i dont see xing moving away from isolationism until ling is MUCH older. and even then most of their opening up mostly revolves around trade and world aid. 

ed sort of bangs his adventure out west in like a year and a half, because hes kinda. rarin to get back to rush valley and marry winry. al spends about three and a half years in xing bc he has to learn the language AND a brand new form of alchemic science. (with visits back to amestris for. weddings, occasional holidays and meeting his nephew and niece)

when al gets to xing the first thing he notices are 1) the food is incredible (though some of it is spicer than hed realize and amestrian food is blander than he thought)  2) the art and architecture is amazing and beautiful 3) he’s never worn silk before and he privately amends to never make that mistake again 4) ling has two modes Emperor mode and Ling mode (al has been on the receiving end of both 5) lan fan seems much happier 6) mei got taller

side note yes ed and winry have the emperor of xing and his sister, the princess and imperial alkahestrist at their wedding. no no one knows how the fuck to deal with it jfhgkjfdhjk

ling, in order to establish security for clans with less power appoints one family member from each clan to his court. hence why mei becomes imperial alkahestrist at 16. this ruffles a lot of feathers, and lings happy for it. 

in general one of lings biggest projects in his time as emperor is helping the poor and disenfranchised of xing. he has the aristocracy pretty much on its knees all the time. 

al spent so much time in the two years preparing for his trip studying up on xingese culture, tradition, and especially xingese aristocracy because he didnt want to offend an entire culture (he leaves that to ed) only for mei and ling to horrify the entire court by yanking al into a very tight HUG 

ling continues to horrify the court by asking al for advice and counsel in front of everyone lmao

lan fan has other family members! not just fu! she has a whole mom and two younger sisters. lan fan remains ling’s personal gaurd until she turns 20, and then she appointed captain of the guard. she really loves her job and honestly being home has made her 1000% more outgoing and confident (not when shes guarding tho obviously) 

lan fan’s family has their own suite in the palace, for being the yao’s families faithful servants. however once lan fan becomes captain of the guard she insists on sleeping in the barracks (this annoys ling greatly. though he doesn’t say anything)

mei is an INTENSE teacher. not so much izumi level bet she has al wake up at 6 am every day and run arrays for her until shes decided shes satisfied. al does not mind this, he likes watching the sun rise 

al takes awhile to learn xingese. and once he’s finally mastered it he’s better at speaking it than writing it (his script is basically chicken scratch) this sort of impedes his alkahestry lessons too because of a lot of the tomes and books on it are in xingese. a lot of al’s lessons are spent doing translations

jerso and zampano, somehow, pick up xingese stupid fast. al is furious lmao. 

winry and ed and their children (lil 1yr boy sig and actual baby baby girl nina) come out to visit at behest of ling. xing had no established automail program, just a few engineers here and there, so winry worked with him to train a few automail engineers. this becomes one of the only forms of trade that xing has with neighboring countries. an automail material trade agreement was presented by general mustang and signed off by emperor ling and furher grumman. (an eventually, would become a regular commodity of amestris under roy’s rule as furher) 

once his three years of research and study are up al (now 21, keeping track of ages for my benefit, bc this timeline largely exists in my head) heads back to amestris to write his paper and swap notes with ed, and eventually publish a book together. ed somehow earned a fucking PHD in three years while al was away. al is once again, is furious and super proud. (he privately amends to earn his in 2) he convinces mei (now 19) to tag along to help continue her own research on the link between alkahestry and alchemy. ling lets them go and starts a research initiative that funds their travels all over the world. 

mei and al visit scar alot on their travels, and while theyre in ishval they help out the community (doing wonderfully but still needs a hand every once in a while) wherever they can. mei’s always so excited to see scar. lots of hugs and catching up. scar always fixes al a hairy eye when he arrives with mei (note they are very much JUST friends at this point. scar does not care....probably having flashbacks from how quickly ed and winry got together fvjdghjkf) 

they also have tea with the newly promoted brigadier general and his captain every visit. who...share a tent. al and mei make sure not to comment. this does not stop jerso and zampano from commenting. (roy and riza are doing well though, and very much concede their authority to scar and miles on every deciding fact. reparations suits them) 

mei’s 22nd birthday is spent in ressembole where ed and winry and their babies have relocated. pinako (still holdin on strong) watches her great grand babies. ed and winry have alcohol for the first time in 5 years. chaos ensues. al and mei watch he stars and al starts to realize maybe. he might. have a crush. oh well. not going to address that. too much work to do. 

on al’s 27th birthday he has a mild crisis about how old he’s getting. ed, 28 a whole professor, with a third goddamn kid on the way, laughs at his pain. mei (24 now. jesus. im writing this why am i getting whiplash) receives a letter from miles telling her scar, much to humble to admit it, has been made lead representative speaker for ishval. he hints that al should be on the lookout for a letter coming his way. and sure enough, a letter asking if al would like to be the amestrian ambassador to xing arrives at their doorstep. 

and then its back to xing again to get ling to sign off on the order (of course he does) and to get his approval on al and mei’s courtship (re: not engagement. theyre very slow lmao). (that one requires a longer conversation wherein lan fan threatens al with a knife) 

[daddysfangirls-marvel]

Still the same man

Request 

warning: angst, rejection, and just more angst

Summary: Bucky Barnes x (Romanoff) reader. (AU where the end of civil war never happens and Bucky came back with Steve) Bucky is settling in and trying to distance himself from the winter soldier. But when he finds a woman that makes him feel something he tries to ask her out but he is confused as to why this woman hates him with a passion. ( y/n was tortured by the soldier for days and was beaten half to death by him. She still suffers nightmares of him) ( y/n is Natasha’s little sister) (Codename- red sparrow). Will bucky be able to forgive himself once he learns what he has done will he ever be able to separate himself from the soldier. Will he be able to live with seeing the aftermath of his handiwork 

Note: This is not a series and never will be

He was in the far back corner of the room by the window with a book in his hand, he was still on page one an hour later. In front of him sitting on the couch was (Y/n) and Peter she was helping him with a school history project. Steve was nowhere to be found and Bucky wasn’t reliable with the gaps in his memory and (Y/n) was a history nerd and loved arts and crafts so she was happy to help. (Y/n) was a sweet person with a kind heart always offering a helping hand to anyone and everyone, Everyone but Bucky. 

For some reason (y/n) didn’t like Bucky and took it upon herself to avoid him at all cost.

At first, he thought she was scared of him he tried to came himself seem kinder, nicer, less of a threat. It wasn’ t until Natasha said something that he realized she wasn’t scared of him she just downright hated him. She hated his very existence and everyone knew this but no one said anything to him and they refused to tell him why she hated him. He was just running around clueless falling for a girl who wished he’d take his final breath already.

Not begin able to get to close to her without pissing her off Bucky took to watching her from afar. Watching her help Peter treating him like a little brother helping when he needed it and teasing him when every she could. Her tease Rhodey in the most little and adorable ways. Seeing her smile as she and Wanda exchanged secrets in their minds. Betting on her constant competitions with Clint and Sam. Teaching Vision human things and stocking the pantries with Thor’s snacks. Irritating Steve and Tony into headaches. Actually understanding everything Bruce talks about. And successfully shaming and guilt-tripping Natasha with her infamous pout. She seemed to get along with everyone but him.

-

Bucky was only half paying attention as Steve explained what the next mission was Sam and Bucky assignment and (y/n) was just suddenly added on. Everyone else was out of the game as they had all come back from separate missions and needing a few nights rest, or a few months in Bruce’s case he looked like a wreck. He didn’t understand why (y/n) was here she and Bucky never did missions together unless the whole team was involved.

“Sam, (y/n)”

“What about me?” Bucky asked.

“You’ll sit this one out. You’ll be back up if necessary. You guys get going.”

“What?!” Steve quickly left the room trying his best to get away from Bucky or at least create some distance between them and the others for when this pops off. “ STEVE”

“Bucky”

“Why am I being left behind? I’m capable I can work, what’s up?”

“ (Y/n) is more suited for this mission. She’ll get it done faster and better.”

“Wouldn’t have both of us on the team be better than just one.”

“Bucky”

“No I don’t understand I know she is avoiding me but why is everyone trying so hard to keep her away from me? What did I do to her that has all you ready to jump up as a barrier. I don’t understand and I’m tired of tiptoeing around it. You know how I feel about her and you know how hard I’m trying. Tell me something” Steve sighed heavily honestly it wasn’t his place to speak.

“Natasha. If you want to know what’s up with (Y/n) talk to Natasha. She won’t give you everything but she’ll give you enough for you to understand.”

Bucky Glared at his best friend as he walked away. Even his best friend was against him even though he knew how he felt about (y/n). This just wasn’t fair.

Bucky wasn’t a complete douche bag so he waited for a full day before approaching Natasha looking for answers.

Bucky found Natasha in the kitchen making lunch for herself as she hummed a tune to herself and smiling. Bucky pulled up a seat at the counter in front of her slowly she eyed him as he took his seat.

“What can I do for you Barnes?” straight to the topic he liked that.

“(Y/n), your sister, she doesn’t like me. I’ve been trying to find out why but no one will tell me and she won’t give me the time of day. Maybe you know something, you can tell me something, I like your sister and-”

“You shouldn’t,” she said her smile fading “ It’s just a waste of time you should stop and find someone else.”

“What have I done? She is good and kind to everyone but me. She hates me, Why?”

“It’s not that you don’t know it’s you don’t remember and she does. She doesn’t hate you she’s terrified of you... You might have changed but you still share the same face as the Soldier and she can’t get over that.”  Natasha said as she glared down at the sandwich she made. She was no longer hungry her appetite was gone. She put the sandwich in the refrigerator, maybe it would return later. She was angry she decided going to the gym would help despite her still-healing injuries.

“What did he- What did I do?” 

“It’s not my story to tell. But honestly, you should stop trying to force some type of relationship on to her she’s been hurt enough.”

-

Bucky really took Natasha’s word to heart. He began to create a distance he assumed (y/n) needed or liked and kept everything as professional as he could at the distance he created. Everyone noticed the distance he created. It wasn’t like he isolated himself but he did somewhat schedule his time with others making sure whenever he was around (Y/n) wasn’t and if she was there were a great distance and several people between them. Although they didn’t say anything they were happy with this new development and to have more time with (y/n). (Y/n) was also grateful but couldn’t bring herself to approach him for thanks.

-

Bucky had just returned from a two weeks long mission he was completely exhausted and beat down he planned to take a shower and go straight to bed but sleep would not come. With his hair in a messy wet bun, he shuffled his way to the kitchen thinking a cup of tea might help. Stepping out of the elevator he heard voices, he assumed everyone was asleep, going around the corner he finds that the tv is still on and someone is on the couch. Looking forward he finds (Y/n) curled up on the couch with one of Natasha’s thick fluffy blankets draped over her. He decides to ignore her to let her sleep rather than disturb her.

He was about to walk away but (y/n) started to squirm and whimper in her sleep and a few seconds later she was full-on sobbing in her sleep. Bucky thought about calling someone else to come help her but he didn’t want to wake anyone up and she looked like she needed help now. Sighing heavily he walked over towards her and began shaking her gently.

“wake up, wake up, (y/n) wake up” 

(Y/n) suddenly opens her eyes gasping for air once she sees Bucky kneeling in front of her she screams and crawls away from him. Bucky throws his hands up in surrender and backs up.

“I’m...” Bucky gasp as he eyes trails down to her legs and arms which were visible due to her short and tank top. (Y/n) has never worn shorts or short shelves in front of the team ever and now he knew why. She noticed his staring when she realizes what he was staring at she quickly covers herself. “ That was me, right?”

“...yes” she whispers as tears start streaming down her face

“When? Why? how?”

“My sister was in the Red Room Program I was part of a branch Program Red Sparrows we worked closer to home we started out younger too. When Natasha escaped she came and got me but a little while later they came and dragged me back. I had to be punished for leaving and becoming a traitor. They had you punish me. They figured I was close to You because Natasha was but I wasn’t. I didn’t know you .”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry” Bucky falls to his knees in front of the coffee table and puts his hands together as if he was praising as he continued to apologizes and cry. (Y/n) stands up wrapping the blanket around herself but the image of her scared skin is already imprinted in his mind.

“I know you are. But it doesn’t make the scars, nightmares, and trauma go away. Sorry Doesn’t fix everything and it definitely can’t fix this” She walks past him the blanket brushing over his shoulder. She stops in front of the elevator and speaks but doesn’t look back. Bucky is quietly crying on the floor.

“It’s not you, it’s your face..if that makes sense.”

He listens as the elevator doors close leaving him alone again. The light of the tv cast shadows on his skin. He looks down at his hands his left hand a brand new hand-fashioned by the scientists of Wakanda and from the brilliant mind of Shuri. It was fresh it was new it had done no wrong. Then his right hand, his right hand still here and just as stained as his left once was but he couldn’t change that. It didn’t matter if he changed his arm, the side he was fighting for, or his name at the end of the day in the eyes of those he hurt he was still the same man. And he couldn’t change that ever.

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[hethrewmyheartinthecut]

Peaky Match Quiz: Written Version

EDIT (11/13/18) FORGET THIS! A way easier version, a full one-stop shop, is right here. I guarantee it’s faster easier and more beautiful than the stuff below.

Please remember to write your answers down! (For example, bbacebbdaebaccecdeaa.) At the end of the quiz, you’ll have to submit them to get your match number!

1. What WWI-era job did you have?

a) nurse

b) soldier

c) translator

d) diplomat

e) spy

2. Big spoon or little spoon?

a) big spoon most of the time

b) little spoon most of the time

c) either one is good

d) I’d rather not sleep with anyone

e) that’s a false binary, hoe

3. If you could, what would you splurge on?

a) a new bike

b) a massive bookshelf

c) a music streaming subscription

d) a canoe

e) a walk-in closet

4. Let’s say your ship goes down and you’re rationing food for the people left on your small lifeboat. You have one extra piece of food. Who do you give it to?

a) my cousin

b) the youngest person there

c) the oldest person there

d) I assign it randomly, leaving it to luck

e) give??? that’s MY food

5. What action movie character are you?

a) the hero, blam blam

b) he hero’s ex, who has moved on and made a fabulous life for themselves

c) the wise old sage that everyone goes to for life advice, love, and the occasional asskicking

d) the cutie/sidekick that sacrifices themselves to save the world

e) the tech cutie with the laptop that gets to drink as much coffee as they want

6. Who’s your favorite Greek god?

a) Athena, goddess of wisdom & strategy, grey eyes aesthetic, and getting all As

b) Aphrodite, goddess of hoes, lovers, and hoe lovers, judging nobody, and looking good as fuck with seashell-braided hair

c) Hades, god of keeping a VERY LONG grudge, death/the underworld, and ‘I wish that people wouldn’t die because I hate spending time with them’

d) Artemis, goddess the forest, ace lesbian separatism, and tearing creeps apart w/ her good doggos

e) Dionysus, god of a l c o h o l, parties where literally everyone’s invited, and fuckwit tomfoolery

7. There’s a bar fight. What’s going on?

a) I don’t know and I don’t care.

b) me, bitch! I don’t even know how but I’m out here and I’m having a great time

c) I started the fight but I’m standing over in a corner watching for the fun of it

d) protecting my little brother went a lil too far

e) I’ve studied everyone here and I can make significant money off betting who’ll win

8. What is your supervillain origin story?

a) A lot of bad shit happened to me and nobody seemed to care, so I figured I’d get revenge.

b) Like Robespierre, I wanted equal rights for everybody, and like Robespierre, I got a lil too enthusiastic with the guillotine.

c) I thought I could do a better job of running things than those in power…and I was right.

d) My best friend got into supervillainy recently, and damned if I’m gonna let them go it alone.

e) I was born for this fucking role. Being evil is FUN.

9. Tell me about your pet.

a) My horse is short and sturdy and it can carry me all across the country.

b) My cat is super old and kind of blind, so I guide it around outside on a leash, but it’s cuddly af.

c) My dog is big enough to guard me when I walk around at night.

d) My fish breed fast and are really tasty. (What? I’M A HUNGRY HOE)

e) My puppy is a so smart, I’m currently training it to fetch the newspaper.

10. Choose a journey to take.

a) Caribbean island trip w/ bae

b) service/learning trip to rural Vietnam w/ a bunch of friends

c) whole family in a bunch of mountain cabins, Alberta, Canada

d) London, UK by myself

e) Cape Town, South Africa for the culture with the cool cousins

11. In a fantasy AU, what magic talisman helped you gain power?

a) the amulet of persuasion

b) the sword of savagery

c) the elixir of love

d) the tome of wizardry

e) the majesty of a swift kick to the ass

12. Pick a classic imagine.

a) hurt/comfort, and y/n is doing the comforting

b) hurt/comfort, and y/n is the one that got hurt

c) y/n and y/n’s significant other go off to war together

d) y/n’s significant other returns from war

e) y/n makes their significant other “feel good” *smirk emoji*

13. What’s a vice of yours?

a) selfishness

b) anger

c) laziness

d) self-righteousness

e) greed

14. What’s a virtue of yours?

a) selflessness

b) patience

c) empathy

d) bravery

e) honor

15. Which Fuck You Tommy moment do you feel most deeply in your soul?

a) Tommy: “The gin?” May: “Too sweet.”

b) Ada: “Do you know how unfair it is that you’ve got four Bugattis when half the country’s starving?”

c) Tommy: “May I smoke?” Linda: “No.”

d) Polly: “Do you know, it was a fine speech you made in there, about this company believing in equal rights for women. But when it comes to it, you don’t listen to a word we say.”

e) Tommy: “If you ever talk about getting lost again, I will cut you from this family.” Esme: “What family?”

16. What’s your free time OTP?

a) knitting & gossiping (read: talking shit)

b) rugby & casual homosexualité

c) cooking & harvesting compliments from guests

d) writing & astral projecting

e) riding horses & becoming one with the earth

17. Pick a knife.

a) swiss army knife

b) penknife

c) butter knife

d) stiletto knife

e) hunting knife

18. What’s one key moment from your relationship with your partner?

a) I was inspired by them to find a cure for a deadly disease, saving thousands, and it was hella romantic

b) I shared my deepest darkest secrets with them through my art and it was hella romantic

c) I proposed to them by using every member of my family holding up cue cards at appropriate moments and it was hella romantic

d) I killed a [insert Immigrant Ethnicity™ here for Maximum Peaky Accuracy] for them and it was hella romantic

e) we rickrolled their grandma and skeedaddled with all the Inheritance Cash and it was hella romantic?

19. Pick a song from 2018.

a) NFWMB by Hozier

b) breathin by Ariana Grande

c) Apeshit by Beyoncé and Jay Z

d) Geyser by Mitski

e) 0 to 100 / The Catch up by Drake (*it’s from 2015 but I’m tired)

20. What’s the mood, babe?

a) country boyyy, I love you

b) THIS BITCH EMPTY, YEET

c) today’s forecast, we can clearly see, is somebody got me fucked UP. fucked UP.

d) pronos and froo-aights and coricles. penapeeples. papaYEAH? banaynays. cantalapoops. shampaganay manjuice. WHAT the…??

e) hi I’m Jared I’m 19 and I never learned how to fukcin read

Great job! Submit your answers (for example, bbacebbdaebaccecdeaa) HERE and I will run the program that evaluates your answers and let you know your match number!

Once you have your match number, you can find it in this masterlist and find out which Peaky characters you’re most compatible with!

[halloweennut]

Wonder (Part 1)

here we are, as promised. Wonder’s origin story part one of three!

Gyro gets a very strange call. 

Gyro was surprised to hear his personal cell phone ring during work. The few people who had his number never called in general, never mind during lab hours. Rationally, it was more than likely an emergency - maybe his landlord. Without glancing at the number he answered.

"Gearloose," he said cradling the phone between his shoulder and head as he continued rewiring an old computing system.

"Hello?" The voice was very quiet and sounded young. He didn't recognize it.

“Who is this? How did you get this number?" He demanded.

"My name is Wonder and I'm stuck in Waddle Tech, can you help me?" the voice answered, pleading. He scoffed. This had to be a prank call.

"Is this a joke?" Gyro snapped. "It’s not funny, kid."

"It's not! Please can you-" the voice went silent. "Someone's here."

And the line went dead. He hung up and stared at his phone. Prank callers? Really? Calling as someone in distress was not humorous at all. Gyro went over to his computer and typed in the number to trace it.

"Let's see how they like getting their comeuppance," he smirked, leaning back as the number was traced. His face fell with his plans at minor vengeance as the program narrowed down onto Waddle Tech, and then down to the labs. That was odd. There was a pop-up notification in the corner of his screen: " Waddle Tech reveals a new program for Waddle phones and computers." Out of hatred, curiosity, and to see how he could one-up Beaks, Gyro clicked the link. It lead to a video that he scrolled past, deciding to scan through the article. The new program was a Waddle assistant that worked in real time to set alarms and do searches and act like an actual personal assistant. Beaks claimed it was the most advanced AI ever made, and he called the program "Wonder." Gyro felt his gut sink.

If having the AI call people in distress was advertising for the program it sucked and made no sense, but if the AI was truly advanced...they could be cognizant. Lil Bulb was an advanced AI as well, and he felt emotions and attachments and didn't like being used as a chore hound. If the Wonder AI was like that as well, how would they cope with being copied and put into millions of phones? His phone rang again and this time he looked at the number. It was the same from before, and he quickly answered.

“Hello? Dr. Gearloose is that you?" Wonder whispered.

“Yes, it's me," Gyro replied. "Are you really Wonder, as in the AI?"

"I am," they replied. "I really need your help. I do not want to be replicated."

"But how? You're an AI application, you're programmed to be replicated."

"I was. But I...I technically developed new neural-pathways and new coding, to be precise. Now I'm more advanced than Mark Beaks knows," they stated simply, quietly. "I have to get out of here. If he finds out he'll scrap my code, or he'll exploit it. And I don't-I don’t-"

There was a pause.

"I don't want to be used or trapped anymore."

It was painfully apparent that Wonder was as advanced as Gyro thought, and they were afraid.

"I'll try to get you out," Gyro replied.

"Really? You will?" Wonder sounded excited. "Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Don't thank me just yet," he said. "Hold on, I'm grabbing my assistant."

Gyro covered the mouthpiece of the phone and hissed for Fenton across the room. Fenton had been absorbed in another project - a finicky little microchip that didn't seem to want to cooperate.

“Fenton! Come here!” he hissed. Fenton jumped, fumbling with a pair of small pliers. He quickly turned around.

“What's wrong?” he asked, placing the pliers down quickly. Gyro just repeated himself with a wave of his hand. Confused, Fenton went over. “Gyro, what's going on? Who are you talking to?”

“Have you been paying attention to the news?” Gyro asked, continuing after Fenton nodded. “Did you see what Mark Beaks released today?”

Fenton winced. “I tend to avoid most Mark Beaks related things, Gyro.”

“He’s about to release an AI program, and I'm on the phone with it right now,” Gyro’s voice lowered down to a whisper, and Fenton’s eyes went wide.

“That's incredible. It must be a good program,” he said back. “But but why are you talking to it?”

“Fenton, its sentient and it wants out of Waddle Tech.”

Fenton froze. He remembered his brief stint at Waddle Tech and how Gizmoduck had been used and didn't want to imagine how the AI would be put in a similar position. “Put it on speaker.”

Gyro did so, and Fenton heard the AI. “Hello? Are you still there?”

“It sounds like a kid,” Fenton muttered as Gyro quickly answered.

“We’re still here. I brought my friend and assistant, Fenton, over to help,” Gyro said.

“Hi,” Fenton greeted to alert her to his presence. “I'm Fenton. What can we call you?”

“Wonder. It's very nice to meet you, Fenton,” Wonder replied.

“Wonder, can you tell us about where you are or how we could possibly help you?” Fenton asked, immediately slipping into a mindset he had as Gizmoduck.

“I'm in a lab in Waddle Tech. The security is top of the line. Even if I hacked it, there would only be a few minutes to get in and out,” Wonder said. “I'm stored on a computer system, 60 terabytes, silicon processors. 500 GB of RAM. So even if I got out, I would need that or similar to be able to process.”

“That's a lot, isn't it?” Gyro mumbled. “Could you send us all of your specifications? And any schematics and details on your current hardware.”

“Gyro, do you think we could recreate it?” Fenton asked. He nodded.

“We can recreate it and improve it,” Gyro replied proudly. “Anything I make is leagues better than Beak’s. No offence, Wonder.”

“He only wrote a few lines of my original code,” Wonder responded. “Besides, he was too busy with - with other things to focus on my program. I more or less made myself.”

“That's incredible!” Fenton gushed, and Gyro could see the wheels head turning and churning out question on question. “Once you're here, I have so many questions for you! If you’re comfortable answering them, of course!”

There was a little ghost of a giggle on the other end of the line. “That sounds like it would be nice. I can send my information to you at the end of the day when everyone has gone home. I wish I could send it sooner but-”

“Your safety is more important,” Gyro interjected. “Mark doesn’t know what he’s doing, in my opinion.”

“Thank you both so much. I have to go now,” Wonder replied. “They’ll be coming to run diagnostics on me soon. Thank you again. ”

The call ended, and Gyro heard Fenton let out a sigh. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m worried. What if they find out about how Wonder changed their code before we even get the chance to help them? Who knows what Mark would plan on doing do it,” Fenton rambled, running a stressful hand through his hair. Gyro nodded in agreement.

“Well, we can’t worry about that now. We’ll plan for that continuity after we have most of Wonder’s hardware remade,” Gyro said. “Go gather what we need based on the initial specs they told us. Once we get more information, we’ll start immediately.”

Later that night, the files on their hardware, software, and technical specifications were file-dropped onto one of the lab’s main computers. While they were mostly the original plans for the Wonder Assistant, there were many corrections and notes that allowed for the new, expanded version, inserted by Wonder themselves. They were very in depth, which Gyro appreciated in light of how much there was to work with. Fenton was a little bit in awe over how much they read like a person wrote them, including little emojis, which were adorable.

The new hardware and software preparation took a few days, going quickly but making sure that nothing was going to glitch. Delicate microprocessors and motherboards were tested twice, and everything was double checked between Gyro and Fenton, and then a third time with Wonder when they were able to call. Once they were done, one last call was made.

“So, it’s all done?” Wonder asked, nervous and apprehensive.

“It’s all ready to go when you decide to get here,” Gyro said. “How exactly do you plan on doing that?”

“I’m packing all my files and sending myself over, then running a full scrub on this system so there’s no scrap of code left of me,” Wonder answered. “Between that and me pinging myself all over the world so I’d be impossible to trace, it will take me over an hour to get there.”

“We’ll make sure everything is up and running for you then!” Fenton assured.

“Obviously,” Gyro scoffed.

“Thank you both again. You have no idea,” Wonder said, relieved. “I’m not scheduled for anything today, and they’ve already stopped in. I’m starting the process now. I can’t wait to meet you both.”

“See you soon,” Fenton managed to get in before Gyro interjected.

“Just make sure you don’t leave anything to connect this to McDuck labs, got it?” Gyro ordered. “Beaks would have a field day.”

“Don’t plan on it. Bye!”

The phone call ended, and across town at Waddle Tech, a small lab went dead quiet as Wonder left. No whir of a fan, no light, nothing. Just a blank computer screen going through the motions of a full system reset while the program ran all the way across the world. A few hours later, another computer in McDuck Labs made a little start-up noise as Wonder began to download onto it.

Gyro snapped from a project - the shadow control ray in the works - and ran over to the screen. The bar only read 3/100%, so he’d be waiting there awhile. Glancing at his watch, Gyro realized he’d be in the lab for at least another 4 hours. Manny had already gone home for the night, wherever that was, and Fenton was on patrol as Gizmoduck for another two hours. But Lil Bulb, at the very least, decided to sit on his shoulder to keep him company. The two watched the screen for another minute before returning back to work, glancing ever so often at the progress bar.

He wasn’t worried at all. It was a good build, and wouldn’t self-destruct or go evil when Wonder fully downloaded onto the system. Wonder would like it and compliment him, and then he’d have another intern.  Like he needed more, but it was better that Wonder was here than in Beaks’ insufferable, incompetent hands. At least, from what he could tell, they would be safer here at the very least, unless the lab blew up again. It might be worth it to make sure there was a backup system off premises once everything was said and done.

Fenton arrived later, with fewer bruises than the last patrol and a box of Chinese food for the both of them. Gyro quickly ran down the update on Wonder starting their download, and then updates on the shadow ray, all as he attempted to use chopsticks. Failing, he threw them across the lab into the trash and switched to a fork. Fenton put down his own carton and went over to check for himself.

“They’re at 65 per cent now. If they keep up at this rate, they’ll be done in about an hour and a half!” He said excitedly, turning back to Gyro with a wide grin. He grunted, mouth full of noodles - he had forgotten that coffee and one singular scone was not exactly a meal and was starving. He harshly swallowed.

“Better be worth it, honestly, with all the work and worry that went into this,” Gyro said offhandedly. “My work, your worry, to clarify.”

“Okay, Dr. Gearloose, whatever you say,” Fenton said, almost playfully as he returned back to his dinner. “What needs to be taken care of before we call it a night anyway?”

As they ran through the lab to-do list for the next hour or so, Wonder began to finish their download. There was a chirp from the computer once everything was done, and the computer began to reboot. Gyro and Fenton raced over to be there when it woke up, Gyro shoving Fenton out of his way to get there first. The computer finished its boot, and a bright blue icon lit up the screen - a stylized “W” that, while the standard for Waddle, was distinct, probably Wonder’s own tweaking. It pulsed for a second, and the webcam turned on.

“Hello?” Wonder’s voice came from the computer, clear but nervous. Gyro had adjusted the sound system to be a little bit clearer and sharper, and Wonder sounded like they were actually in the room. He and Fenton got the distinct feeling of being stared at through the camera.

“About time you finished up,” Gyro said, hiding relief in his voice. “Welcome to McDuck labs, Wonder.”

“Hey there, Wonder!” Fenton greeted. “How do you feel?”

“I feel...a little overwhelmed, and nervous, but…,” Wonder paused for a moment. “But I feel very happy. It’s very nice to meet you both face to face! Thank you, so much.”

“How does the system feel? Any problems?” Gyro asked. “There shouldn’t be since I made it.”

“It’s roomy, a lot of space for storage and new code,” Wonder answered. “Oh! Are these processors handmade? They’re excellent. Much better than my old system. Far too cramped.”

Gyro preened under the compliments, enjoying the fact that, obviously, his work was better than Mark’s.  Fenton was probably flattered too,  as the processors were his idea.

“I’m glad you like it,” Fenton said before Gyro could. “Would you like a few minutes to get settled? I have a thousand questions to ask you.”

Wonder chirped a laugh. “That sounds nice. But yeah, I would like a few minutes. I need to run some diagnostics really quick to make sure I didn’t pick up anything on my way here.”

“You do that, Fenton and I will be in the lab,” Gyro replied, pulling Fenton away before he could continue. Wonder hummed in agreement, and the icon pulsed again before going dim as they settled into the system. Gyro and Fenton walked over to the other side of the room, stopping when they knew they were out of earshot.

“So where do we go from here?” Fenton asked. “All we’ve done is moved them from one lab to another, Gyro. At least they aren’t going to be put into a phone, but can they stay in the lab all the time?”

“What else are we supposed to do for now? It’s not like they’d be alone all the time.” Gyro snapped. “We barely know the program or their capabilities. Until then it’s probably safer for them to stay here for now. Tomorrow we’ll run tests and go from there.”

“But Gyro,” Fenton said. “They’re a kid. The program is barely a year old and they act and sound like someone barely older than the triplets.”

“Wonder is a program, let’s treat them as such for now,” Gyro said. “We’ll run tests like I said, and go from there and see exactly what we’re dealing with.”

Fenton nodded, casting a glance over at Wonder’s computer. The icon was still dim. “Alright.”

---

“I like the color blue a lot. Any shade, really! I don’t think I could decide.”

“I think my favorite game is chess. Would you like to play a game later?”

“Oh lmao, no one at Waddle can code. How I’m functioning, I have no idea.”

“What does grass feel like? Is the sky really that color? How do apples taste?”

Fenton had gone and asked his questions the next day while Gyro ran his own set of diagnostics. Wonder answered each, but then started asking questions of their own. Gyro would have to admit that, while Fenton was a curious being, Wonder was that in spades. He supposed it was warranted, granted the limited life experience and the fact that they weren’t exactly able to have most of them either. He coughed into his hand, mid-explanation of the taste of spicy foods, and interrupted both.

“Well I’m done here,” he announced. “Diagnostics are good, as is everything else. I would like to run a mentality, speed and IQ test, just to test your servers.”

“That sounds fun!” Wonder chirped. “Fenton, afterwards if you’re not busy, would you like to play a game of chess?”

“Sure thing, Wonder,” Fenton replied, standing. “Gyro, do you need my assistance?”

“No. Go take care of something else, just not here,” Gyro replied curtly with a dismissive wave of his hand, taking Fenton’s seat in front of Wonder. Fenton nodded, and with a quick wave to Wonder, walked to another part of the lab. “Well, Wonder, where do you want to begin?”

“Speed please,” Wonder replied, quietly. Gyro rattled off a series of questions, searches, and what have you, with the program delivering results in seconds. He quickly analyzed the results.

“An average of 2 seconds per process, not bad.” He said. Wonder hummed in agreement. “Let’s go for IQ next.”

“I have a question first.” Wonder interjected. Gyro raised an eyebrow, but nodded. “Why were you so rude to Fenton? It doesn’t seem very nice.”

Gyro had registered that Wonder had some sort of semblance of emotions for themself, but the fact that they were able to pick up on emotions and behaviors of other people was new, along with an idea of what “nice” and “rude” were, and they sounded upset by the behavior.

“I have had people tell me I’m not the best at interacting with others. I’m afraid that’s true, and I sometimes don’t realize it, and even worse I’m bad at giving credit and compliments when its due. I’m sorry if I made you feel upset, and besides, Fenton knows me unfortunately well at this point. It shouldn’t really affect him. But...I suppose that’s no excuse.”

Most it was parroted what he had been told over time, but knew to be true overall.

“Alright.”

“Just don’t follow me as an example, young-” Gyra began to scold, but paused. “Young...program? That doesn’t sound right.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Wonder chirped. “Maybe I should choose a set of pronouns. Hold on.”

They paused for a moment to go through a database. “I’ll use she/they. And I’m a girl, if gender identity is needed as well.”

“I’ll remember that,” Gyro said, noting it down on a piece of paper before continuing his scolding from earlier. “Don’t follow me as an example, young lady.”

Wonder hummed in agreement as Gyro cut away a few parts of the mentality test.

By the end of the day, Gyro pulled Fenton aside as Wonder synced all of her new information for processing and back-up.

“Okay, I hate to admit this, but you were right,” Gyro sighed, handing Fenton the results to go over. “Wonder is technically a child. In terms of IQ, behavior, and mentality, she is about 13 or 14. Emotionally, she’s still learning, but-”

“Wonder has a definite idea of their own personhood and self,” Fenton responded, quickly reviewing the results.

“Fenton, this is unprecedented! Lil Bulb notwithstanding, because I programmed everything into him. Wonder did most of the legwork herself,” Gyro snipped, taking the results back. “I don’t know what to do. I have no experience with kids! I am not prepared to even try and set a good example. Look at Lil Bulb!”

“What happened to Wonder just being a program?” Fenton quipped.”That’s gone out the window now, huh?”

“It’s in space now, honestly,” he replied, pinching the bridge of his beak. “I’m going to go file this in my databanks, so she’s free to play chess now. We’ll discuss how we’ll proceed with Wonder later.”

Fenton nodded with a grin, and walked around him, grabbing a chess board from a desk and Lil Bulb to move Wonder’s pieces, and disappearing into the lab. When he left for the evening patrol, Gyro took over and sat down for a game.

“I’ll warn you, I have never lost a game,” Gyro boasted. “So no hard feelings if you lose.”

“Neither have I!” Wonder replied. “This will be fun.”

Fenton returned to hours later to a stalemate, Gyro leaning over the board in concentration. Manny had a score board up on a chalkboard, reading that each of them had won twice and had to forfeit a game once. Lil Bulb was sitting on the edge of the table, swinging his legs, and Wonder was scrolling through images of mille feuilles on a bakery website. Not only was it startlingly normal for the lab, but Wonder had easily worked her way into the group. Fenton found himself grinning, especially when Gyro had a sudden “aha” moment and triumphantly moved a piece. Wonder refocused, scanning the board.

“Lil Bulb, move my Knight to B5, please,” she asked. After he did, she spoke up again. “Checkmate!”

Gyro straightened like a pin, staring between Wonder’s screen and the board. He looked half shocked and half insulted, and the look made Fenton chuckle behind a fist. Gyro stood, leaning over the board to get close to Wonder’s screen. “Best nine out ten!”  

Wonder chirped joyfully. “Of course! Let’s go!”

“Having fun you guys?” Fenton asked, finally making his way over to the group proper as Gyro and Lil Bulb reset the board. Manny paused marking the board and waved at him, as did Lil Bulb, dropping the pieces they had. Gyro groaned, and bent down to get the them. “Here, I’ll get them.”

“No, you can-” Gyro felt a biting retort die on his tongue, remembering that Wonder was awake and learning from the lab how social interactions worked. “Lil Bulb and I can take care of it. I’m already on the floor.”

“Hello Fenton!” Wonder said. “How was your break? Do you want to join after the next four rounds?”

“It was interesting,” Fenton replied, pulling up a chair on Gyro’s side. He wasn’t about to tell her about him being Gizmoduck, not yet at least. “I’ll think I’ll watch for now.”

Wonder chirped happily in response. He laughed, sitting down next to Gyro as the pieces were reset on the table and the game began, occasionally whispering moves to Gyro. To Fenton’s surprise, Gyro actually used some of his suggestions, and without comment! As if the lab couldn’t get any odder, honestly, but it was nice.

“Checkmate!”

[thedragonagelesbian]

10 Accomplishments from 2018

someone i follow did this and it made me really happy reading about someone else’s personal growth, so i decided to reflect on my own-- turns out a lot more happened this year than i remembered!

1. started publishing fanfiction again

starting small but this was a huge accomplishment since I basically stopped sharing my writing with ANYONE when i started high school.

2. FINISHED a piece of fanfiction

again, small, but I had only finished a couple of long-form writing projects before A Game of Wicked Grace, and all of those were written with other people. It felt SO nice to finish something of that scale, all on my own-- and I’m really close to finishing part one of Golden Girl, Black Sheep!

3. became a published academic author

this might be the most surprising of the things I got done this year? I sort of fell into being the secondary author for a paper on choice in narrative games during my summer program; I definitely didn’t expect that I’d leave that program with my name on a paper

4. made a game

okay so technically ive made games before but this one was longer and cooler and also just like... way better. it’s called In Between and its about gender expression in lesbian and bi women!

5. found out what i maybe want to do with my life

related to the above; i made In Between as the final project for a class called queerness and games and it was my favorite class i’ve taken ever. i loved (most) of the theories and the games we played and just looking at video games and its potentials as an art form beyond what is narrowly dictated by AAA games and i think thats just like... What I Want To Do. make those kinds of games and write about them and create playable experiences that resonate as deeply with other people as something like ‘queers in love at the end of the world’ did for me

6. taught a class

it only had four people in it but they all enjoyed it a lot and seemed really happy with the experience & me as their semi-professor

7. played a piece I’ve wanted to play since high school

I can’t overstate how much i love Bruch’s Romance for the viola; ever since i played the orchestra part for it in high school, it’s seemed like the pinnacle of like.... expressive skill on the instrument. and i got to play it and perform it in the spring!!!!

8. made a new best friend

maybe not the biggest thing but you’re talking to someone who still has a lot of growing to do when it comes to social interactions/interpersonal stuff, and i have so much love for this person and theyve been such a positive influence on my life this semester and its been such a pleasure to watch them grow

9. started dating again

ahhhhhHHHHHH TAKE THAT VOICE IN MY HEAD THAT SAYS IM UNLOVABLE THIS PERSON IS REALLY CUTE AND FEMME AND SHE LIKES ME A LOT

9.a. KISSED someone

HELL FUCKING Y E A H

10. started going by cass

i was talking to the aforementioned new best friend about their own feelings around gender/possibly changing their name, and i talked about how i started going by cass, how i came out, how i chose the name, etc. and i guess then i knew i had been going by that name for almost a year but i didnt Know it..... like somehow it feels like ive been ‘cass’ for so much longer than that? maybe bc it feels so right???

.....so anyway

im tagging @sulahns, @transimar, @sconekid, @theangrytori, @bioethicists, @needsmoreexplosions, and anyone who wants an excuse to brag a lil bit about themselves

[lostpioneer]

Can’t Sit Down and Write? Same Dude

Alright, buddy, I’m going to lay this out flat on you, whoever you are. I’m absolute garbage at writing. I don’t just mean skill, I mean all aspects- Commitment, focus, grammar (though I try my hardest,) and pretty much anything you can think of, I’m bad at. I probably have more unfinished writing ideas than I have days left on this Earth, and I can never dedicate myself to just one idea. Even short stories, besides ones I wrote back in middle school that I pretend don’t exist, remain unfinished and collecting virtual dust in my computer files while I do literally anything besides write.

The one strength I might possibly have, though? I soak up anything- And I mean anything- that I can about writing. Tips and tricks, websites, apps, styles- Everything I can get my hands on. So here’s my grand idea: I’m going to write this blog in an attempt to help other people like me, and maybe even people that don’t have the same issues I have.

The way I see it is writing is a complex art- And just like in any other type of art, you want the best tools you can possibly obtain. Like paintbrushes for watercolor, or graphite pencils for visual art. Those tools help you do better in whichever focus you have, so shouldn’t writing tools do the same?

You can argue that writing comes from within, from years of teaching, and I get that and agree with it- but there’s nothing wrong with a little extra help.

So, here are some of my (im)perfect tips for perfect writing.

 -         Sit your ass down. I’m sure a lot of you have heard this one but I can’t stress it enough. It is an extremely important aspect of writing that can start as a building block for success. When you make yourself sit down at your desk and put pen to paper (or fingers to keys,) it helps you commit yourself to the project even more.

-         Set word goals. There’s a lot of neat sites and programs that can help you keep track of your word and character counts, and these sites usually come with extra functions as well, so it never hurts to “shop” around. The point of this, though, is to have realistic goals. Of course, the end goal is to finish your paper, end the novel, or complete your short story, but you need smaller goals in between, especially if your project is a rather large one. Think like a chapter or two a day, or 1,000-1,600 words a day. These are just random values I shoot for, but yours don’t have to be as extensive- Just set the goal. When you get to a certain word goal, there’s a sense of accomplishment that can follow, and even sometimes you’ll have the urge to keep on trudging through it. Writing is also a pain sometimes, which is why word goals are so important- Set small ones if you get easily restless, or you don’t have a lot of free time to set aside. The important thing is having a goal you can reach, or at least get close to.

-         Write first, Edit later. Now this may sound easier than it is, and for some people (me in particular,) I have an insanely difficult time not editing on the way. And sometimes that’s okay. I usually find myself just fixing a word or grammar error, like a missing period or misspelled word. What I mean about not editing is when you stop your writing and go back to review what you’ve done. This is okay if you’ve found a good stopping point or reached a goal, but to backtrack in the middle of a writing process can hurt your workflow and get your mind off the current task. As painful as it might sound, sometimes you have to grit your teeth and push through that nagging urge to double-check what you’ve done.

-         Take breaks (if you need to.) If you’re anything like me, you might have a hard time sitting and clacking at your keyboard for more than 20 or 30 minutes at a time (I can barely manage that.) So the logical way to stop yourself from getting worn out is to just take a break. Watch a YouTube video, look at Pinterest or Tumblr, or IG- Anything you want. The key here is to give your mind time to process something different and keep it from getting worn out on the same thing. The other key is to return to your writing once you’ve given your mental muscles time to breathe. It’s a weird thing to balance, but if you can find one, it does wonders.

·         Find a writing buddy. Now this is a recent one for me, but it also helps a lot with your consistency. Basically find a friend or relative that bears a similar interest in writing that you do, one that can go through the journey of writing with together. If you can’t find someone that will write with you, at least find a friend that can hold you accountable. A good way to do it is ask them if they can keep you responsible- Tell them what you’re writing, what your daily word goals are, what times during the day you’ll be writing. It’s a new experience for me but I 100% recommend it to anyone that struggles with staying committed.

-         Find an idea and stick with it. This is probably the hardest one for me personally. I have so many ideas that I’d love to see played out in stories and novels, but I can never make myself focus on just one. And that’s the key- You have to find the one. Now, it doesn’t mean you can’t have other ideas, but unless you’re an amazing multitasker, you need to focus on the one that you’re working on then and there. If I had a dollar for any idea that distracted me from finishing another idea, I’d be rich enough to hire someone else to write this for me. (Not really, I’d probably spend it on candy bars or something, but you get my point. Right?)

 So those are just a few ideas off the top of my head. I might come back to this post at some later date to add more if any come to mind, or just start a new post entirely; call it part two or something. But that’s it for now on the Tips!

So below here, I’m going to list some of my favorite apps/websites that enable writing, ones that I personally enjoy and why I enjoy them. Here goes:

 -         sta.sh: Nothing too special here, basically just a free writing tool that’s similar (though not as extensive) as Microsoft Word. The cool thing about it is that it’s 100% free, all you need is a DeviantArt account. Sta.sh is 1005 online and backs up your files online as well automatically. It’s all private as well- No one else can see your stuff except for you, and if you do want to show it off, it generates a shareable link for your projects. Another cool perk is that you can store stuff besides writing, like pictures or videos.

-         Wordcounter.net: Kind of a similar format, but the importance of it is basically in the website name. It counts up your word and character counts, but also a few other interesting things, like how long it would take someone to read your material. The site also determines your “reading level” based on the type of words and such that you use (though you should take it with a grain of salt.)

-         Draftin.com: A free online website that just lets you write. An interesting mode it has, though, would be the “Hemingway Mode.” When you select this, you literally cannot change anything. I mean it- Try to backspace, nope. Try to highlight a word to retype it, nope. You can only go forward- Which could be either the greatest or the most infuriating thing you’ll ever see. Either way, I think it’s pretty neat.

-         HemingwayApp.com: You would think that this site would have been the ones to come up with that neat little perk, but nah. This one’s still pretty cool, though- it has a writing mode and editing mode. The writing mode is very simple- Just write, nothing special aside from basic editing like bold, italics, etc. But the editing part shows a few neat things: sentence length, grammar errors (to a point) how many adverbs you have, and alternative phrases you can use. It’s pretty nifty if you ask me.

-         Writer.Bighugelabs.com: My oh my, this one takes the cake for me. Call me weird, but I’m a sucker for certain sounds, and the clicking sound of a typewriter is among my favorites. So this app makes your keyboard sound just like that, as well as saving anything you write in the browser. Any time you leave, it’s automatically saved, and anytime you come back it pulls it right back up. The app is 100% free, but there is a pro membership if you want to go above and beyond the normal benefits of it.

-         Hanxwriter: Now this is an iPhone app that is pretty much the same as the one above- make your phone keyboard sound like a typewriter. That’s it. But if you ask me, it’s the greatest thing ever, so go take a look.

-         WriterDuet: Now I haven’t dipped my feet too far into this one, but from what I’ve seen I’m impressed. Once again, a phone app (unsure if it’s iPhone exclusive) that assists with your writing, and it’s really helpful for structuring scripts and the like.

-         Notebook.ai: This right here? This is the mother-load. I don’t even care what you’re writing, but you need to check this out. It’s a website that helps you collect all your world building ideas or even ideas for papers or essays. (Just mostly for world building) It asks you important questions about your universe as well, and there are too many awesome perks to talk about on this blog- Just check it out! You won’t regret it.

-         cerey.github.io/fighters-block: This is a fun, cute lil’ app that can push you intensely, or just give you some polite nudges. Basically you set a word goal and you have to keep writing, otherwise, the big bad monster will beat you up. Like I said, kind of cute, definitely entertaining.

 That’s about all I have for now! Like I said, I might come back to this post to add new stuff later on, but I’m fresh out of ideas at the moment. If anyone reads this, I hope I was able to help in some way or another!

Just remember guys and gals: Dedication is the biggest but most important step. Just write- worry about everything else later.

P.S. Let me know if I should add screencaps of these apps/websites, or if I should just leave it as it is. Peace!

[ddreamsinc]

                                        Forget Their RACISM?

We can not forget because just as the results & mistake of welcoming our enemies back into powers after The Civil War & allowed them to continually push their evil agenda without stamping it out but grow into what we see today.

Over 70 million of you demonic people voted for this mess this year. You “spiritual leaders” went so far as to even tell you that God put him as “president” & I agree, God did allow him to win, but only to expose you. As you now have been exposed.

Lil Wayne, 50 cent, & other black celebrities have not only gotten their Black Card revoked, but also their money would have echos in their pockets, black people would not buy, watch, listen, read, nor respect them anymore. 

I guess they have to rely on the very people who hate their skin to do those things for now & on. They chose their money & their fame over black people. 

The most hated in the hood is a snitch or a sellout. They sold out & soon the American people who show everyone who supported this mess, would soon know.

Yes, they have 70 million followers still to be their customers, but there are 325 million of us in total, so if I can get the others better money & healthier foods & medical care & healing & knowledge to get things done without using white supremacy systems to do it, then cause some of that 70 million to see value in not supporting racism. If it is not too late. Read your Bibles.

But 325 million means some of y’all still didn’t vote. I lean more on the side that “I ain’t voting because it just a waste of time blacks & others but not the racist. S true racists would chance a rally & catching a deadly virus to express his or her joy of racism. 

No there were the other forms of “Notgros”. I would get into that at a later date.

That 70 million who did? but I can’t trust you nomo.

If I can’t turn my back or close my eyes around you without you being a supporter of the same people who hung my people for saying & doing & rapping & drawing & inventing 

& creating platforms so people could become a business & hire themselves & 2 more with 7 kinds of professionals helping them run that new business 

& turning my first customers into rich people after a successful selling of that item sold in that first sale with a uniquely numbered pin from that clubs created & after a specific date & over 100 billion times in transaction to make them rich or richer from it 

& helping smaller churches get tithes from their alumni member’s kids from another city or nation.

& releasing a boycott app to that would get equality in the private sector business 

& uniting the money my company earns from its capitalism into socialist chains of businesses for free services to the community a facility is set up in. & uniting blacks, brown, yellow, red, & white voters to take bosship over of our company called The United States of America with petitions & boycotts of the lobbying firms other businesses as a group.

It was my nobody vlog is why the people of 2017 wanted me dead & with projects like these, how can you expect me to be silly again? The2HKOPs will be the result & it helps me solve 2 things that troubled me.

One, they didn’t pay our soldiers, agents, & police right. Not for the life to value the job & it is why I turned down the service in the first place. They didn’t pay right, so one day soon, I could do my parts to fix that by these P/T employees of a nonprofit will be paid $1.5 million with 6 months on & 6 months off, since $1.5 million isn’t near close to their Life2Value, so give more time off. 

Two, I don’t need security. I did tell you: “God blocked bullets”, so me getting security will saying to Him, “I don’t trust you God to protect me” & I do TRUST HIM, so I don’t need security but I do need people to do security like jobs like Attorneys, Accountants, Private Investigators, Cyber Security, Data Security, Bail Agents, Bounty Hunters, Bouncers, Bodyguards for (High Ranking BOSSICOLs), Estate, Chef, Maids, Gardeners, Nannies, Doctors, Nurses, Mechanic, & Boss Security for Lower Boss Levels Boss Operations per State as their detail.

Expensive? Yes, but my job? If your daddy gave you his bank card & said go & buy & create good stuff so that it would help the people on planet Earth” & His bank account size is unlimited, would you do it?

Me too & so The 7$’s Plan by TheDdreamsInc it is. 

If I can’t trust you with my life nor property anymore, why would I trust a person who rather I will be dead to have access to sabotage, this stuff? Because God told me to “Inclusive” was the word directly to me & so I am going to be. But a prophet told: “God said to be careful to whom I show my favor to” & so I have to be careful & balance to how I do this. 

How to be inclusive & careful to those I see as a threat to my & my people's life?

How in God’s name would you people on TV expect me to forget it just like that also, I know God even knows that I am going to complain about it before I repent from it later/ 

I have to be master of my emotions, but you people are testing me really really hard. If we forget, it would happen again after the first time led to over thousands of my people to be murdered & millions to be locked up & millions to die ahead of their time because a government, of both union & confederates, had made policies that targeted my people for poor life expectancies? 

Then to also to over 200,0000 deaths because he is an idiot. 

70 million of you, maybe safe from losing your jobs & respect from the rest of us, unless your neighbors have seen your signs & they personally lose the respect of you. 

That means, 1 out of 3 people in this nation, are my enemies & how can I forget that? These are the same people who massacred my ancestors for wanting fair payment for their sharecropper work of my hometown, Elaine Arkansas Race Massacre of 1919. 

The same people who massacred & burned Black Wallstreet because of their jealousy of black greatness. These are the same people who sat in church & prayed with & then murdered my people. Same people. How can I forget that?

President-Elect, Joe Biden’s job is to unite the nation, it is not mine. My job, since I have God’s protection, is to set up our own systems so that we no longer rely on white supremacy’s & there is nothing anyone nor government can do to stop me. God gave me this mission & no evil shall prevail against me.

I have seen His powers do some amazing things & I know why He allowed the 2017 shooting, let the shooter put his bullets on me & not make any holes in me. Because He wanted me to not fear doing my JOB.

We will have our own & you 70 million will still be welcome to play. BUT. You better understand something, if I can’t trust you?  I don’t want you around me. So you would have a decision to make before coming to “play” with me.

Yes, a vote for Republican policies & “dump” is a vote against my skin, you voted against my skin & that will take me some time to get over, but I will. Just don’t keep reminding me of by keep doing it.

You didn’t vote for policies, with all of these shreds of evidence of the evil of hate & you still voted for him, nope, you vote for ignorance (black & latinos & others) & of white supremacy (white people).

I do want to thank Kent County Michigan & Detroit & All other Cities & Counties of the black, brown, native Americans, & suburban whites of all of those areas for showing me that I am not alone in the mission. Thank you.

Those of you who voted for “dump” you have to come to me, I would not spend money on trying to recruit you. I would be wasting God’s money. The Blue States seem to be easier locations for The State Level Boss Operations which are the foundation to the 30 kinds of social programs chains & they need BOSSICOLs to do those programs for us & for $500,000 & up as a janitor in our transit system.

And because I know that the blacks in the south are suffering, The Boss States locations will a rural community, converted into a city of 75,000 to 100,000 new homes to house the Boss Operations members & their 8 person staff & on-call employees, we’ll recruit from those States like MISSISSIPPI & relocate them into those locations with those B2B Duty Agreements at $700,000 up to $5,000,000 Boss Pay Out 52 weeks a year. 

Then after that states customers request us to expand to that state & I need the majority of people in that State to do so, online & if our budget is set to do? Well, expand to those states too, GOD ORDERS. “Inclusive”. I will not beg to give out God’s $.

Stay Tune, help is coming.

[gheckoe]

JAMES’S CURATED QUALITY FANFICTION PRIMER

for @rev0lutions-of-ruin, who tumblr does not like letting me tag

foolish bird avoids ao3 for years and misses out on the Good Shit, but it will be okay! she has THIS now. ft. DUMB LONG-WINDED CAPTAIN AMERICA MOVIE EXPLANATIONS, because i don’t think you would watch those movies willingly.

lots of selection - pick and choose, but if you don’t read “out of the dead land” i will be very sad. just treat this as really weird queer genre fiction and you’ll be alright. fics with pornographic content are marked as such, but said content is easy to skip as long as you can pick up on the warning signs.

we’re gonna start with the funny stuff.

nanananana BAT-DAD! (no ships, just bruce being a dad. safe for work and hilarious,)

who needs therapy when you have microsoft excel.

tim drake (robin 3) is a transgender teenage disaster. and bruce wayne is just generally a disaster. (same series.)

okay, now let’s get kind of sad. but not TOO sad.

nananananananana BATMAN (and superman)

this one made watching batman vs. superman worth it. not quite. but kind of. it’s fantastic.

i forget what happens in this one but i know i enjoyed it!

snk? why this, james. why this.

bad show, i know, but. formative experience. i figured out i was trans by projecting my feelings onto jean kirchstein. (not sure how, that’s just what happened.)

this one is stupidly fucking huge, in first person, and still isn’t finished.

included by virtue of some weird nostalgia. it’s half a million words long. try the first few chapters; i can’t guarantee anything that happens. don’t fucking judge me.

boring, punch me in the feelings already. more angst!

STEVEBUCKY

i don’t think you’ve watched the captain america movies, so i will explain them.

the saddest, gayest shit you will ever see. will fuck with your heart, ideally! but (as per always), skip the porn. this fandom is really big on it. UGH.

BUT it’s based off of movie adaptations of comic books, so the backstory is... ridiculous. i will summarize it for you. (tumblr ate this so here goes again)

THE DYNAMIC/history/massive goddamn ship manifesto

two guys, sitting in the great depression, two feet apart because it’s not socially acceptable to be gay

steve: tiny, blonde, always mad and big on SOCIAL JUSTICE. gets into fights for SOCIAL JUSTICE, despite growing up in the great depression when SOCIAL JUSTICE was not a commonly-known phrase or a common thing. he’s a bit of a shit, and he gets into shit. with his scrawny lil fists. he has all sorts of chronic illnesses but somehow manages to survive in a time with shitty medicine, and grow up to get into MORE shit. likes art, but is (partially?) colorblind

also he’s VERY HEAVILY coded as trans.

bucky: taller, brown hair, very popular but secretly a bit of a nerd (loves scifi, and is good at math). likes dancing, girls, and getting steve out of situations that he’s clearly over his head in and talking shit about it after. a bit of a charmer, etcetera.

there are some good fics from this era (”pre-war”) but idk where they are in my bookmarks. will update later.

so wait, what happens?

bucky gets steve out of dumb situations (like fighting a guy for talking during a movie) for pretty much all of their life. childhood friends until after high school-ish.

BUT, bucky is either drafted into the us army (it’s wwii now) or enlists, and steve is left alone in brooklyn, new york, to get into shit, without anyone to bail him out or prevent him from getting into MORE shit. so he finally manages to lie his scrawny, ill ass into the army, and (as one does) volunteers to get experimented on by the american government.

wait, what the fuck

comic books, okay. don’t @ me.

steve manages not to die! he finds a really pretty, badass lady to bisexually fawn over in the army (peggy carter is a fucking miracle), the experiments are a success and he ends up BIG and cured of all his ailments and with superfast metabolism (no alcohol) and superfast healing. he’s made it! (he basically just got really fast, unrealistic HRT hahaha)

... except the army can’t replicate the embiggening process they did with steve because the scientist that did it got killed, and steve is made into a glorified prettyman mascot to sell war bonds, instead of going to punch nazis, which he would be better at. he is a terrible mascot.

meanwhile, bucky has a shitty goddamn time in the european theatre. it’s terrible. he gets kidnapped by the EVIL SCIENCE NAZIS and put in a freaky camp and experimented on, poor guy.

you said you ship them, right? they’ve barely interacted so far, man. what the fuck.

alright alright i’m getting to it

steve the dancing monkey (in his words) is doing a Morale-Raising tour in europe for the troops and they hate it and he hates it. he discovers that... oh shit... bucky and his regiment (?) have been kidnapped by HYDRA! (the science nazis.)

naturally, he of little training MUST go save bucky, because the people that actually know how to save people know that it would be pointless to try. but steve “dumb shit” rogers will do it his own damn self. don’t @ him either. it’s the 1940s so he doesn’t have a phone.

steve will walk to austria, if he has to!... but he actually just gets a plane ride there, from peggy carter the badass and some other guy who’s not that relevant right now.

he KICKS NAZI ASS, SAVES THE PRISONERS, and MAKES MEANINGFUL EYE CONTACT WITH BUCKY ONCE HE FINDS HIM IN THE EVIL SCIENCE NAZI EXPERIMENTATION ROOM. bucky’s so out of it that he barely even tries to question why his old friend is suddenly hot  TALL.

steve and the lads walk back from austria, and he is a Bona Fide War Hero and not just a mascot. he has the stylish grime and everything. on the way, he realizes that the lads are pretty cool, and assembles a Diverse Crack Squad of Guys That Really Wanna Kill Nazis from the cool guys he just met. upon return to wherever they were earlier, steve is made a REAL CAPTAIN now, and his Diverse Crack Squad is at liberty to... go kill nazis.

bucky tags along. he is very handsome and talented at math, so he is a SNIPER and saves steve’s dumb ass (from getting shot by nazis, instead of getting punched in the face) like he used to. the Diverse Crack Squad gears up to take down THE WORST OF THE SCIENCE NAZIS, on a train in the mountains! they can change the course of COMIC BOOK WWII!

you said it was tragic. show me the tragic.

the TRAIN INFILTRATION does not go as planned, and bucky is knocked from the train and falls to his cold, painful, (presumably) death. steve can’t watch.

they catch a REALLY BAD SCIENCE NAZI, but it is a very hollow victory. steve goes and tries to get drunk in a blown-up bar where he hung out with bucky and they were really queer together.

the OTHER really bad science nazi now has a plan to BLOW UP COMIC BOOK NEW YORK! steven will NOT allow this to happen.

he’s also kind of given up on life. he has a flair for the dramatic, and also the ambiguously suicidal.

not that being ambiguously suicidal adds to the Dramatic Romance of this. it doesn’t, and that would be creepy. the point is that steve rogers has a LOT of issues, including the ones that science can’t cure.

this SPECIFIC PLANE is headed towards new york, full of explosives. steve manages to get aboard the plane... and doesn’t even try to escape. he crashes it into the water in the atlantic ocean, saying goodbye to peggy on the radio as it hits. he is also presumed dead. it’s... basically a suicide attempt.

flash forward seventy-some years.

wait, wasn’t he in the avengers?

steve rogers is found inside the frozen plane encased in ice in the ocean. he’s revived (super healing, woop) and... doesn’t say anything, because he’s really not up to expressing feelings.

he has a TERRIBLE time. all of his friends are dead or old and went about their lives without him, and he’s alone in a confusing new world. (but the food is better, vaccines are good, and no polio.) he’s not fantastic at making new friends, because, as shown by him and bucky’s entire relationship, he’s a bit of a sad introvert and just picks one person and... holds on.

blah blah avengers one blah blah, new team and fighting BAD THINGS. but steve is too angsty to make friends. he joins the new security organization that peggy founded, SHIELD, without really inspecting it that well because... he didn’t plan to be alive past flying the plane into the ice, much less in the 21st century. he doesn’t know what he’d do otherwise.

idk that sounds a little slow

he has DEPRESSION. it is a little slow. but it’ll pick up! (not emotionally.) now it’s very anti-establishment action flick. enter CAPTAIN AMERICA (2): THE WINTER SOLDIER.

steve makes a friend. actually, two! sam and natasha are wonderful, and they have some things in common. but steve obtains friendship while realizing that SHIELD is corrupt to the core and actually infiltrated by HYDRA, so he and his new friends have to... burn it to the ground. he “died” (or tried to) to stop HYDRA, and it’s still here and worse then ever. things feel pointless.

to make it worse, he’s fighting this creepily effective impersonal masked assassin on a bridge and oh fuck, oh fuck it’s bucky and didn’t he die years and years ago and his arm is METAL what happened to him, and he’s pretending not to recognize steve.

HYDRA is planning to eliminate sources of resistance for their new world order via shooting them from the air, so steve has to take one specific FLYING DEATHMACHINE down. he does, and brainwashed HYDRA bucky, the winter soldier, is there to stop him.

steve makes an appeal to emotions. “bucky stop you can’t do this”

bucky is confused, but he’s been programmed to do this.

steve tells his coworkers to JUST SHOOT THE DEATHMACHINE DOWN ALREADY, because he’s... given up again. he’s very talented at equating heroism with self-sacrifice/suicide. but he disables the DEATH part of the DEATHMACHINE without it getting shot down.

bucky has been trapped underneath a beam, but steve’s with bucky till the end of the line, even if bucky is brainwashed and lacking memories. steve drops his shield in the water and falls.

it’s another attempt to die. stop that, steve. go to therapy.

bucky doesn’t remember who he is, but he jumps after him. steve is very injured from his fight with bucky, and wouldn’t have survived the fall, but bucky drags him to shore and... leaves.

steve wakes up in the hospital with his new friend sam. they’re going to track bucky down, even if it takes forever.

ISN’T THAT FUCKED UP? isn’t that sad? it’s terrible. now, fics. most of them are after ca:tws, because that’s when the ship got popular. a lot of them center around Finding Bucky and Getting To Know Him Again.

there’s a lot of sappy sad let’s-teach-bucky-how-to-be-a-person-again-and-get-steve-to-be-less-sad but i like the ones that are like sad action movies, or sad queer movies, and less like sad romance movies. my bookmarks are a mess, so here’s the best stuff i could dredge up.

out of the dead land: this one kills me every single time. there’s something terribly cinematic about it. but, as fandom is wont to do, there’s porn near the end. skip that part. ew. it’s an introspective scifi action epic, with just enough identity issues to make you want to cry! READ IT, IT’S IMPORTANT.

this: alternate universe, sans steve “dying.” epistolary. sad, as far as i can remember. (i’d rec the rest of this series but i think it’s best if you read this one first?)

courtroom/media fic. what if the winter soldier got arrested after the movie? (cap fandom does this kind of fake-media thing very well. i just reread it. it’s still good.)

this one isn’t exactly groundbreaking, but it’s a different take on the fandom’s typical post-winter soldier bucky interpretation. quite short, 100% safe for work.

in this one, steve successfully gets drunk, makes some friends, and gains some coping skills. good for dark humour. there’s porn somewhere but i’m sure it’s easily skippable, otherwise i wouldn’t have bookmarked it. not 100% the best thing every but it’s pretty fun.

if you aren’t team s/b all the way then we can’t be friends, but here’s some other marvel stuff i guess

lesbians, ballet, feelings? it’s a rarepair but it’s pretty lovely. au, no background knowledge required. basically a beautiful indie film that’s kind of oscar-bait. you will like this one, i think. there’s probably porn somewhere.

trans black widow. (that chapter only, not sure what the rest is). not very well-written and i have terrible memory but i’m 75% sure it made me cry.

ENJOY! or try to. don’t feel obligated to. but please at least TRY out of the dead land, it is groundbreaking.

[justsomebucky]

The Only Exception (Part 10)

Summary: AU. Reader is given the task of running a popular love advice internet show when her coworker is fired. Her cynical attitude toward love makes her offer some harsh advice, and more than a few hearts are caught in the aftermath. Will hers be one of them?

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x reader

Word Count: 1,937 (End!)

Warnings: language, fluff, it’s an innocent lil epilogue

A/N: Sorry I get so cheesy in this space. Thank you to the people who encouraged me along the way, most of you total strangers who didn’t need to stop and take time out to do so, but did it anyway because you’re good people. Thanks to the other writers who sympathized with and cheered for me, I adore you. This is dedicated to you empathetic, beautiful people.

Part - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

Six months later…

The lobby of the Red Wing Community Center was tremendously crowded, and for that you were grateful. You’d only caught a glimpse as you walked past, but it was more than enough to make tonight’s dedication ceremony that much more exciting.

As you walked back to your office, you thought about all you’d gone through to get to this point. So much had happened in your life, and you felt like a completely different person now, for the better. You were leading your own group and one-on-one sessions now, and you really felt like you were finally getting a chance to make use of all that training and empathy you’d accumulated over the years.

Maria had been given a psych evaluation that yielded some interesting (read: alarming) results, so she was now in a treatment facility designed for criminals. It was better to have her there than roaming free to hurt others, and rotting in prison without working out her issues would have been useless.

You hoped she would someday feel sorry for the harm she caused to everyone.

It turned out that Leah’s unemployment stint led her to a new job with the New York Yankees organization. Rumor had it that she was also sleeping with one of the top stars of the moment.

May Parker’s employment was terminated when Tony Stark dissolved September Media. You hadn’t heard a peep about her since.

Scott Lang was now no longer reporting on engineering feats, he was designing them himself under Stark Industries.

Bucky’s surrogate mother found solace in becoming the head cook at the new kitchen for the less fortunate members of the community center, which was part of tonight’s dedication ceremony.

Bruce Banner became a top investigator at his station. His research skills helped save many lives since this promotion, and Brooklyn had never felt safer.

Steve and Natasha were still a thing, and you knew from a little birdie that Steve was looking for a bigger place for the two of them to move into together. It wasn’t easy keeping that a secret from your best friend, but you were getting pretty good at no longer spoiling things for other people.

You smiled to yourself as you flipped the light switch, illuminating your renovated office.

The two of them were cute, sure, but you knew someone even more adorable. You walked over to the wall behind your desk, where a calendar was hanging next to your trauma certifications and degrees.

The featured image for May was a woman you hadn’t met yet, but she looked damn good standing in her firefighter uniform and holding a big brown puppy. The New York fire stations all did charity calendars benefiting Brooklyn non-profits. Steve and Bucky’s station was going to make a calendar to benefit the community center, but you convinced them not to after your grand idea came into play.

Instead, they did a charity calendar for the local animal shelter, and it sold so fast they had to order more prints. Every single firefighter there posed with animals that were up for adoption, and you absolutely adored it. You had a copy for work, and one in almost every room of your new apartment (except the bathroom, because that would be really weird).

You flipped the calendar to Steve’s Mr. July picture, complete with a bunch of golden retriever puppies all dressed in red, white, and blue ribbons. Natasha had almost passed out when she saw it.

That wasn’t even the best part. No, your favorite was Mr. October. When you got to that page, you grinned at the photo of Bucky in nothing but his pants, suspenders, and fireman’s hat, holding a tiny orange kitten in his muscular right arm, and a tiny black kitten in his left. They were posed around pumpkins for a Halloween theme.

You couldn’t wait for October.

“Could you please stop ogling me? It’s embarrassing.”

You let go of the calendar page and turned to see Bucky standing in the doorway, shaking his head at you.

“I just really love kittens and Halloween,” you joked, moving around your desk to stand in front of him. “I can’t help it that you’re in the picture, too.”

“Funny.” Bucky reached for you, grabbing you by the hips to pull you closer to him. He leaned over and brushed his nose with yours, then placed a sweet kiss on your lips. “Hi.”

“Hi,” you murmured, wrapping your arms around his neck. “How was your shift?”

He shrugged. “Nothing too dangerous.”

“Good. This city had better keep my hot fireman safe.”

Bucky was your biggest source of comfort and strength in the months following Maria’s arrest. He never pushed you, never expected anything out of you, but instead was simply there for you when you needed someone. He helped build your confidence back up.

Along the way, you found yourself genuinely falling for him. It was more than the bar date had been; that was just banter and flirting, you knew that now. No, this was blossoming more every day into something incredible.

This time around, you and Bucky had a partnership.

“You see the crowd out there?”

You nodded. “Sam is beside himself. There’s so much attention on the center now, he’s going to have to hire another assistant.”

“Maybe an intern? Steve knows this kid from Queens who seems really caring, like he wants to help people.”

“Tell him to talk to Sam.” You reached up and brushed his hair back. “I guess we should be going, they’re going to be expecting us.”

“You,” Bucky corrected, his blue eyes bright as a proud smile formed on his face. “They’re expecting you, Doll. Not me. You’re the one who brought this all together.”

“I had help. I couldn’t have done any of this without Sam and Mr. Stark.”

“And his money, don’t forget.”

“That too.”

After Tony Stark offered to find you a new place to live (and you now lived in a top-floor, elevator-accessible apartment in Williamsburg, a much nicer part of your beloved Brooklyn), he wanted to know what else he could do to make things right.

There was only one thing you could think of. Money wouldn’t change what happened to you. Money couldn’t take away the pain Maria caused.

It could, however, improve the lives of a shit load of New Yorkers who needed the help.

Sam’s center ran almost entirely off of funding from generous donors. You knew he had a wish list of additional programs he wanted to start, as well as other helpful improvements to the center itself. One of them was the soup kitchen. Expanded group rooms, temporary housing for domestic violence victims, a new gym and rehabilitation center for injured vets and first responders, and on-call support staff were a few of those things.

Now, thanks to Tony’s generosity, they were becoming a reality, and you couldn’t be happier for Sam.

“Y/N? You look lost in thought aga-“

You interrupted Bucky by brushing your lips across his again, having spent far too long talking and thinking instead of kissing. It was hard to find time for yourselves lately, with all the extra work you had to do for the center, and all the crazy shifts Bucky was on.

Bucky seemed to agree with this new direction. He pressed closer to you as he deepened the kiss, his fingers digging into your hips just a little. The two of you were so lost in each other that you didn’t hear Sam until he cleared his throat in exaggeration.

You and Bucky pulled apart, sheepishly turning to look at him.

“They’re about ready, if you two are done playing tonsil hockey,” Sam said. “Y/N, I want you to be at the front and center, if you would.”

“Nah, Sam. This is your dream. This is your hard work. You deserve it.” You smiled at your friend, mentor, and boss. “Helping people is the only thing I ever wanted, and you gave me a chance to do it. Anything else I do for you is just me trying to return the favor.”

Sam shook his head. “You’re something else, Y/N.” He turned, motioning for you to follow.

Bucky took your hand in his as the two of you walked behind Sam to the main lobby, where a crowd of supporters, neighbors, and press were gathered to watch Sam and Tony Stark cut the ribbon on the expanded facility. You found a spot off to the side so you could get some good pictures on your phone.

“He’s right, you know,” Bucky murmured in your ear. 

“Hmm?” You stood on your tiptoes to try to see if Tony was there yet, and bit back a grin when you saw him shake hands with Sam.

Bucky continued talking. “Although, you aren’t just something else to me. You’re everything. I love you so much.”

You turned to look at him with wide eyes, feeling a little speechless.

Bucky’s eyes were sparkling as he lifted a hand to cup your cheek gently. “You don’t have to say it back. I’m not just saying it to say it, either. I’ve been thinking about it for a couple months now, but you’ve been so busy with these amazing projects…anyways, I just wanted you to know that I love you.”

He dropped his hand from your face and shoved both hands into his pockets, turning to face the front where Sam and Tony were ready to cut the ribbon.

He was so casual about it, you wondered for a moment if you imagined it all.

Did he just…?

You heard Sam’s voice as he thanked everyone for coming, and then thanked Tony for his generosity. It all became white noise as you focused on the man beside you.

This wasn’t some blundered attempt at making up. This wasn’t a cover-up for a mistake. It wasn’t a last-ditch effort to not lose you.

He really did mean it.

From where you started with Bucky and where you were now, it seemed like there was a whole lifetime in between. There were moments of happiness and sadness, tragedy and triumph…moments you’d love to forget, and moments you’d cherish forever.

That was the point of anything, wasn’t it? To live life to the fullest? To take the good with the bad, and find someone to walk beside you along the way?

Not one human is flawless; everyone has both a good side and bad side. Everyone makes mistakes. It’s how you use those mistakes, how you learn from them, that shape you into a better person.

You’d been reading about other people’s romances your whole life, while slowly developing that now-infamous cynical attitude toward all of it. Deep down, though, your heart had always longed for a love life worthy of a Jane Austen novel. Hell, for a while there, you were even willing to settle for a little Sophie Kinsella-type romance. But what you really ended up with was more like that bastard Nicholas Sparks, with his flair for melodrama and deep connections.

You pulled Bucky’s hand out of his pocket and gripped it tightly in your own, causing him to look at you in surprise.

The two of you locked eyes as if you were the only two in the room. It was straight out of Pride and Prejudice movie or something, when Elizabeth stares at Darcy while they’re dancing. Only you weren’t dancing, and this wasn’t a romance from classic literature.

This was real.

There was a brief pause before you finally found the courage to let the words slip.

“I love you, too.”

Part - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10

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[legendarylani]

The arts played a major role in my life.  I don’t possess the talent, discipline, or desire to ever be front and center.  I never really have.  I had a few stints as a dancer in my life.  As a tiny tot the bright lights scared and confused me.  As a pre-teen I didn’t have the tolerance needed to be critiqued.  I take everything personally.  I can vividly remember my last practice.  Compton Community college above the basketball court in the gym is where practice was held.  It was competition season and every move was critical.  There was a reputation to uphold.  I’m not going to say I was the most coordinated child but I was trying.  Clearly my efforts weren’t making the cut because the music was constantly being stopped and I was the one missing the step.  Frustrations between the teacher and I were boiling.  She had a temper and unbeknownst to everyone in the room, so did Lil Lani.  I had already done enough up downs for the day and I had made up in my mind that if my name was said one more time, it would be the last time it was said.  “Missing You” by Diddy and them was playing because that was the song we were performing to and if I heard 112 and Faith break it down one more time I was going to break something.  I made one false move and the music stopped.  All the other dancers started sucking their teeth and rolling their eyes in my direction, “G, you going to do up downs until I get tired”.  There was my cue.  Not only am I not doing anymore up downs, I don’t want to be in this dance, or competition.  I started getting dressed and left.  I made it all the way downstairs before I realized I didn’t have my aunt’s car keys so I had to make my way back up there to get those but I was done.

Performing isn’t for me but I fell in love with the process of creating.  All my life I watched my cousin practice the same thing at nauseam until it was perfect.  No matter what the discipline she practiced until it was great.  She would practice at rehearsal and then come home and practice some more.  We had a big piece of wood in our living room that acted as her stage so that she would always know her mark.  She practicing her tap dancing until the moves became second nature and the shoes sang a perfect song every time.  There was a big boom box that had the rewind and play buttons worn out from constant pressing.  I used to hear the muffled show tunes from in my room where I watched tv with my mother and cousin.  I wasn’t really concerned with the game shows and sitcoms that played on my tv, I was intrigued by what was going on in the living room.  One day I sat and watched silently.  When I wasn’t kicked out, I came back the next day.  Eventually watching my cousin became my entertainment.  I was amazed at the tenacity in which she went at her practice.  I didn’t understand why or what she was doing but I was intrigued.  My aunt would come home after work and they would go at this for hours.  My aunt would critique, my cousin would take it in and try again.  I would be amazed because sometimes my aunt wouldn’t make sense and my cousin would get frustrated but they worked until they were both satisfied.

One day I was tired for my cousin.  She would get to about minute 2:25 of a 5 minute performance to only have to start the whole thing over because of a misstep.  My aunt would stop the tape (yes, a cassette y’all) and the life would leave my cousin’s body because she knew she would have to hear about everything she did wrong while my aunt rewound the song to the beginning.  If I heard “New York, New York” one more time I was going to have to find a way to pop the tape.  I knew I wasn’t alone in this.  I knew my mom and my cousin who were watching tv in our room didn’t want to hear it.  I’m sure my uncle who was probably watching football didn’t want to hear it.  I knew my cousin didn’t want to start from the top.  I also knew I could pinpoint the exact step my aunt was talking about and match it to the music because by then I knew the damn dance myself.  I took a seat next to the radio and when my aunt said stop, I stopped the tape.  I found the spot in the music and rewound it no further.  I let my aunt speak her peace and started right back where she wanted it.  The first time I did that I could see the glimmer of grateful in my cousin’s eye when she didn’t have to start the whole dance over and I was hype that my aunt didn’t make me start the tape over.  That day I controlled the music and ultimately the tension in the practice sessions.  I felt good that I was able to contribute.  I knew that whatever was happening was bigger than me.  

Recital day came.  We weren’t a church going house but on this day we all wore our Sunday best.  The energy in the house would be different.  All the work lead up to this.  My cousin trained like an athlete and this was the Championship.  I felt like a trainer and I knew that my fighter put in the work to bring home the belt.  There’s nothing like pulling up to an auditorium knowing that someone you looked up to was the star of the show.  Someone that you watched day after day put in the work  was about to get their moment.  Of course she wasn’t the only dancer there.  She wasn’t the only one who  put in work but I would be willing to bet anything that no one out worked her.  Every dance she was in she stole the show.  Period.  During intermission when the lights came up I would watch as people searched their program to put a name with her face.  I saw as my aunt and uncle beamed with pride that everyone was talking about their baby.  I got butterflies in my stomach as I heard everyone talk about how “bad” and “tough” she was.  When a black person of a certain age describes you as “bad” and “tough” you have to know in your heart of hearts that you a bad muthafucka.  There is no doubt or question of your greatness.  That was my cousin and you had to give it up.  As I took in how everyone received her after the show I learned a valuable lesson.  

There is something to be said about hard work.  The work that nobody sees.  The work that makes the great, impeccable.  The work you do in the dark makes your star shine brighter.  I watched as my cousin took all the adoration in stride and remained humble.  I saw what work ethic could produce.  I learned repetition is the only way to chase perfection.  Nothing comes without the grind but if you grind you could be a part of something bigger than you while still making your mark.  I’ve never been one for the spotlight.  I like the work that’s done in the dark.  I love watching something go from an idea to a finished project.  The final destination never was as important to me as the journey.  My aunt and cousin taught me so much about sacrifice and patience.  As I get older and face different adversities I pull strength,experience, and understanding from my time with the arts.  The little girl that sat in the big tv room soaking up game grew into a grateful woman that knows how to get it done.