#on a side note i love how you can just see the evolution of technology throughout this series too

[fedoraspooky]

I have just reached the 2000s era of Columbo and it's wild seeing him shambling around in the middle of the dance floor at a rave like a lost puppy on the side of the road

[wsancho]

Updating my preconceptions about Cyan’s preconceptions

Because he’s been taking up space in my mind, plus January is Cyan month and he should get more love ❤️

My first impression was that he was an ultraconservative, square-minded, old-fashioned, knight of the round table (by ‘94 my knowledge of other cultures was limited to whatever I got from the Saturday morning cartoons, so it never crossed my mind that he was a samurai from Japan).

This character got filtered through Ted Woolsey’s best try at localizing “samurai mannerisms”, which can’t really be translated faithfully without some thorough explanations on the side. He was portrayed as a Shakespearean-mannered knight, which I still embrace as a fan, but it made me see him as a prude. After reading about samurais, I feel that there’s more nuance to his conservative behavior.

The world of FF6 relies heavily on steam-based technology, so if we place this story in the steam era (between late 1600s and late 1800s) it matches the Edo period in Japan, in which samurais became bureaucrats and were no longer warriors, so this class/job was decaying in a way.

Cyan is old-fashioned even in his own land (he’s the only Doman with that manner of speech). He’s the last dying breath of a culture that already ceased to exist, so he’s a traditionalist sticking to a code of honor that has very strict protocols.

The scene with the prostitute made me think sex was taboo for him, because Cyan’s reaction looks like hypocritical, preachy prudery. Maybe that’s how it’s supposed to play out, because after Japan got westernized it acquired the same taboos as us. But Edo Japan Doma isn’t there yet. Prostitution was not deplorable, it was regulated.

Cyan may be scandalized because this girl is not adhering to his ways.

Whoring around is fine, just stay inside the whore-house and remain quiet and discreet until a client chooses you 🧐

I think my man has no issue with sex and sex-work, but with how the girl throws herself at him. In particular I wondered why the devs didn’t add any head-butting between him and Edgar, given that this girl was behaving like Edgar on a regular Tuesday. These boys barely interact, but when Edgar successfully used his man-whore superpowers, Cyan was not scandalized, but kinda proud.

Cyan's culture is chauvinistic, so there’s nothing to note if one of the boys is “exchanging pleasantries”. Cyan is also respectful of hierarchies, so he’ll never butt heads with Edgar (and I think he kinda does with Sabin only because at the time he wasn’t aware of Sabin’s lineage).

I think the chauvinism/machismo he’s accustomed to is what makes Cyan embarrassed when he’s caught being a softie.

The initiation for samurais included homosexual intercourse, because having sex with a woman can turn a man into a sissy, you see. Real macho-men have sex with other men, if you didn’t know 💪🏼🧐

Along those lines, I think being romantic with his wife would gain him a roast from the boys (not ridicule, just playful banter). So even thought romanticism comes natural to him, it wouldn’t exactly be celebrated by his peers, so he’s self-conscious about it 🙁💐

Finally, I think it’s heartbreaking that the way of the warrior is conflicting with his honest heart desires. His exchange of letters with Lola and his eclectic reading material 😏 tells me that this man is not done with life. He wants to love again and to find his footing in this new world. Which is unacceptable for a man who should live and die for his lord 🖤

The dreamscape quest serves as express therapy (there, we killed your demons, now move on!), but his inner conflict is quite deep and devastating, even if his story wasn’t already tragic. Yet this middle-aged, ultraconservative man is breaking through his conditioning (at an age when the brain has hardened to the point that it’s really difficult to learn or unlearn anything). His character evolution may be the most extreme and brutal, and he made it to the other side without bitterness, remaining kind and righteous. He's simply extraordinary 🥹👏🏼⚔💔🩸❤️‍🩹

[sleep-studies-and-pokemon]

#0001 - Bulbasaur

Hey, remember when Bulbasaur was only #001? How things change with a little research and people talking to one another across regions!

Anyway, it was off to Kanto a couple of years back that I started making my sleep study notes. Diana was only lvl 5 as I'd raised her from being an egg and I was only 2 years retired from rangerhood, something I'd studied for. I tell ya, my parents weren't pleased after they spent all that money sending me away to ranger school and I only stuck with it for a short while! But ah well.

I was on a Kantonian mission, armed with a book of the local dialect and a fully completed Pokedex (not from my own studies, just the kind you can get a copy of already completed by whoever does these studies) to tell me where to find what I was looking for!

I heard from locals that Bulbasaur and it's evolutions can be found wandering Viridian Forest and was super excited to be able to camp out in such a lovely place. I stocked up real good on Bug Type Spray (let's face it, this stuff is just Repel but with specific repellents and should not be so much extra than regular stuff or near impossible to get), a reinforced net and lots of antidotes and paralyse heals though...

Under the cut is what I found!

Believe it or not but Bulbasaur are group Pokemon and like to wander in herds, led by a Venusaur. Rarely do Ivysaur join them and newly evolved ones leave fairly soon (that's actually how I got to study an Ivysaur but more on that later...)

It took me a long while to track down a heard of Bulbasaur which was roaming between clearings in Viridian Forest. Luckily I still remember a lot of my ranger training and can put it to good use.

This herd had 14 Bulbasaur and a female Venusaur as it's leader. The sex of the leading Venusaur rarely matters for the Bulbasaur, only that they are strong enough to protect.

I wouldn't describe Bulbasaur as completely docile and they were on edge with my presence, especially since I stuck around all day. Even at a distance I could tell they were watching me carefully and I was doing everything I could to communicate my feelings of friendship without technological help.

The second herd I found had only 4 Bulbasaur and a rather elderly male Venusaur who was not as happy with my presence and regular sprayed Poison Powder at me.

The last was a huge herd of over 30 and it's this one i got most of my data from. The female Venusaur there seemed newly evovled - the colours of her petals still extremely vibrant and her seed mostly unformed. Clearly she had earned a lot of respect in her time pre-evolved though.

Bulbasaur as it turns out have stay apparatus and will mostly sleep for short periods of time standing up. I have to admit I love and am fascinated with Bulbasaur and all Pokemon which are florauna. Watching them stand around drinking up little bits of sunset light and moonlight was very peaceful. The soft 'saur...saur...' of the snoring ones...ahem, getting off track.

When entering REM sleep (Diana is good at detecting when this happens, she is a Drowzee after all) Bulbasaur do tend to lay down, often very close to other Bulbasaur and as many as possible will crowd around the Venusaur.

The whole herd moves very early in the morning, stopping to eat and enter these light dozes every so often. Sometimes a startled Bulbasaur would release a little poison powder when started awake - but this was rare and possibly just a personality trait of the couple I saw it in.

Over the number of weaks I spent with them their cuddling with each other really endeared me to the species. Gently butting your neighbour seems to be a Bulbasaur's sleepy way of saying 'hey, I like you, let's stand here and sleep together'. When laying they tended to give each other a little more space.

Side note: I found a lone Bulbasaur wandering around almost by accident. The swelling of it's bulb seemed to indicate it was close to evolution but I found it strange to see it split off before evolution had occured. When sleeping it often hugged itself with it's vines as if missing the company of other Bulbasaur. It became much friendlier towards me than the herd and slept right next to me on multiple occasions. I theorise that some kind of hiearchy based issue or social dispute may have resulted in this Bulbasaur becoming an outcast.

However, as much as it made me sad, I wasn't there to intervene too much so as a parting gift Diana lulled it into a deeper sleep with Hypnosis so it wouldn't worry so much~ she tasted it's dreams a little and reported that they seemed good - not as good as my curry though I hope! :)

[buckets-and-trees]

BELLA! THIS COMMENT WAS ONE OF THE MOST INCREDIBLE GIFTS! You and a few other dear friends have ... well truly gone above and beyond to give some immense amounts of love (unprompted) to this chapter, and I can't even tell you fully how much it means to me. This story I know is not for everyone because it's dark and angsty and hard, but it's been one of the most beautifully challenging things for me to write, and easily is one of the narratives I've become most proud of. And this chapter in particular I spent a lot of time on wanting to write it in a way that felt true to the characters and this plot journey I've been putting them through. So just THANK YOU for this.

You pulled out so many of the lines or moments that were really important to me while writing! That first line you identified about the White Wolf in particular was something I actually wrote in my notes for this at the end of last summer. I knew it would always be in there, and it was the tone I wanted to set for him - that he's grown infinitely more than who he was as Hydra's Winter Soldier, but that it's a side of himself that he hasn't maybe embraced because he'd rather not be any of that, he would rather leave the assassin, tactician, and hunter behind. But the other important thing I wanted this line to lay the groundwork for was the side of him that could deal with a Captain Hydra, because CH did lay a trap that Bucky and his omega willingly walked into, and so he needed to put his game face on in a way he never had before.

Techie Bucky - I felt that it really would be in line with a 1940s Bucky who went to the Stark Expo the night before he shipped off to WWII to have totally taken advantage of getting immersed in technology in Wakanda. Yes, we see him tending goats, but there are plenty of hours in a day and plenty of days in a week - he can do both. AND yeah he has like a flip phone in TFATWS, but I feel like that's more because he might think why do more with a phone than talk and basic text + not want a device he doesn't trust able to track his every move, because we also see him engineer a tablet in TFATWS to take control of that senator's car AND comment on what a good app the flag smashers have in the final episode. He's tech fluent.

The moment when Bucky has the idea to tamper with the camera footage was something I wasn't planning until I got to that exact point in the narrative, and then I was like... duh, Bucky CAN do this, and he WOULD do this to give him an advantage over anyone who will go back and try and figure out what happened to the pair of them, and it's an unconscious first moment that Bucky is investing in backing Steve in any way again, even if he doesn't see it for that at the time.

And sorry not sorry for making you cry during Bucky and Omega's reunion but it was one of the most important scenes to me, and I needed it to just be this collision of their longing and hurt over the separation AND her being upset that he had pulled back part of their alpha-omega bond connection but both of them talking about it and that it was kind of a damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don't situation, but that it has hard for both of them. And then I wanted them to be so immersed in reconnecting on every level physically and emotionally, and so I wanted to show it was about the intimacy that included to but also exceeded the smut - sharing feelings, sharing proximity, sharing secrets, sharing information openly, asking tough questions and holding space for each other... I wanted it to fully bring them back together, no questions of fissures between them. If I made you cry reading it, I think I might have done what I hoped I could do for Bucky and Omega. 🥹

AND THE STEVE PART REUNION

Bucky and his reunion with Omega Reader were so important, but the conversation with Steve and Bucky was the most important element in this entire plot up to this point. There were moments that were vital for the evolution and potential recovery of the relationship for Steve and Omega during Steve's chapter, but this was make or break for the alphas. There were a lot of points that I knew I could have just kind of gone ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ because plot, so just go with it, but I didn't want to cheat even a moment of that. Bucky saying their bond was in his bones felt so accurate, and yet with that being the case, he needed to know whether or not he could maintain any semblance of that, or if he would have to painfully abandon or re-evaluate it all.

Now that they're at this point, there are still important revelations and connections that need to happen, but they're not all in complete emotional peril anymore. Still questions, still pieces that need to be mended, but even if it's not a happy ending, we're not headed to a devastating heartbreak for any of them any more. At least probably not. But... who knows? Maybe Captain Hydra is playing Bucky and the Omega on a chess level while they're still playing checkers? NO. No. I could not do that because I do not want an ending of ultimate betrayal.

Bella, again, this is such an immense gift. I'm clearly not speechless over it, but absolutely moved. You are a wonderful friend, and I know it takes time and effort to comment like this, and that means the world to me.

Warm Shadows - Carving Through the Dark (3/4)

Fandom: MCU Collection: Warm Shadows [ part one | part two ] Title: Carving Through the Dark Characters/Pairings: established Alpha!Bucky x f!Omega!Reader, Alpha!Steve x f!Omega!Reader Word Count: 14.4k

Summary: Worse than a nightmare because it's real, Bucky has to track down his kidnapped omega and the man - the super soldier - who had been his closest friend turned into the dark, rival alpha, Captain Hydra.

Content Warnings: DARK, a/b/o dynamics, angst, explicit smut, vaginal intercourse, consensual forced orgasm

Logistical Notes: Shhh - yes this was the final story update I had planned for the Dark Forest Fest and it's the first week of January! But. Well. The word count. But we're here now, okay? Title taken from Hozier's Who We Are.

Additional Notes: Okay, I know that I did a poll asking last month if folks wanted the final chapter split into two parts or just one long chapter and - er - I kind of did both. I did not split this chapter, but a couple of days ago I realized we needed a fourth and final part. Lastly, @biteofcherry has been an absolute lifeline during the composition of this chapter - thank you for putting up with my conjectures and letting me piece together some of the elements. And even a little thank you to @rookthorne for cheering and bullying me over how long this got.

↠ Masterlist | Aspen's Ask Box | Field Guide to the Forest

“I can’t help you,” Shuri states, though there’s the flicker of it almost being one final question of it in her eyes.

“No,” Bucky confirms. “No more than you already have.”

He knows she says it as one last opportunity for him to change his mind, but also in acknowledgment that he must do this on his own. They clasp hands and then he turns to walk up the ramp of the aircraft.

“James,” she says when he’s nearly gone. He turns back to look at his friend, one who has seen him at the best and worst of times. “Whoever he is now, he knows Bucky, he knows the Winter Soldier, he will have learned everything about the Soldat from their archives, so you must truly be the White Wolf. She knows the wolf, but he does not.”

He nods and then walks further into the aircraft, leaving Shuri behind.

After you’d been violated and taken from him, Bucky had lain in anguish until just before dawn, raging over the loss of his world and everything he’d worked for, built, found, cherished. He would find you again – when he’d sworn, “There’s no corner of this earth you can go where I won’t find you,” it had been a promise to you as much as a warning to the monster – but none of you three were the same after that night.

To be the White Wolf…

It will take all the tactics he learned in the army, that he was forced to acquire as Hydra’s finest assassin, and since he escaped and then truly reclaimed his freedom. As angry as he is, as desolate as he feels, he holds the emotions at arms’ length, he needs to be at the eye of the hurricane so he can maneuver the way he needs to.

Bucky hasn’t been able to feel you. His desperate hope is that it’s because you’re sedated and unconscious and not … not anything else.

In Wakanda he and Shuri hadn’t been able to find even a sliver of a trace of the jet that had come and gone for Steve to enact his plan. It was a statement that whoever he was now, Captain Hydra was utilizing every ounce of knowledge Steve had and blending it with whatever Hydra hat put in him.

Bucky won’t leave a trail either.

It will take Steve time to figure out how Bucky left Wakanda – on foot, ground transport, or air transport – if he can figure it out. But Bucky was the untraceable ghost over fifty years of missions for Hydra, and he didn’t have the motivation he does now.

Bucky devised that going on the already-scheduled aircraft to the Wakandan Outreach Center in Oakland gave him the best options. He assumes Steve would have managed to get into the networks used by the Avengers and SWORD, and since he flew an aircraft in and out of Wakanda undetected and Bucky won’t be able to use Wakandan technology to best him either, so landing in Oakland also puts him in proximity to the hardware, software, and network resources he would need to build his own tech. During his convalescence in Wakanda before the Infinity War, it had been days of goats and technology research and development in the most advanced science facility in the world. He is not the expert that Shuri is, but he knows enough. His aversion to much of “modern” technology has always been due to how primitive it was compared to anything from Wakanda.

It takes weeks, but Bucky acquires the hardware he needs, modifies software, creates the network and protocols he needs to start Hydra hunting, and puts it all to work. He knows what to look for – the patterns, the seemingly innocuous inconsistencies – and he knows it because he was running data point for the team of analysts dedicated to Hydra hunting before this. He had taken more responsibility at the base of operations and fewer and fewer field assignments to be home and build his life with you.

Bucky doesn’t hesitate in ignoring any ethical limits whatsoever for his surveillance protocols. When he was working within the system, they had established some lines they weren’t willing to cross.

With seven billion humans in existence and him alone looking for two, lines to cross no longer exist.

He knows he will never get his life back, but he will not let anything prevent him from getting you back.

He puts every piece into play immediately as he builds, sleeps only the bare minimum. Truthfully he had only indulged in more than the minimal sleep a super soldier needed these past years because it was time spent blissfully with you.  Without a reason to rest, he didn’t have any problem cutting back to short sleep allotments to keep him operating at peak condition.

In putting his own tap into the Avengers’ database, he studies the work that had gone on while he was gone for his annual retreat away with you. He discovers that Steve and Sam followed leads in Europe.

“Damn you idiots,” he murmurs.

The reports show his two friends go dark after losing comms nearly a month ago. A team went in after them and their debrief says they found only their communication devices. ‘Search ongoing…’

That was a month ago.

He knows the status of Steve.

Sam could be a live asset in play, an asset still being trained and molded by Hydra, their prisoner for torture, or he could have been eliminated already.

It takes him sixteen days from the beginning of his build to finish – he’d been collecting intelligence, but once everything is in play and he continues to hone in on incoming results, things progress systematically, satisfyingly, in a foreign familiarity that evokes memories of this time hunting as the Winter Soldier.

Two more days and he’s got enough evidence in the intelligence to confirm you’re somewhere in Europe. Within two hours Bucky recalibrates calculations based the new findings, conducts new searches, gets confirmation of a face on a traffic camera in Gdańsk that looks like Steve, and when he’s able to piece a clear trail that follows him through the city and then to an aircraft that he’s further able to track until it disappears over northern Italy. He knows this for what it is – a trail tempting him closer to the trap. A challenge, an invitation, but only if he can put together more pieces to find you. How many times did he set beautifully complex traps for some of his prize targets when he was the Winter Soldier? Breadcrumbs to entice, to drive his opponent to work harder, to put their prowess to work, to make them feel confident so he could trick, trap, and kill them in the end.

This monster of a man tricked him in Wakanda. It will be the only time. Expert and intricate traps of this sort are something his opponent has been playing with for a few weeks. Bucky has more practice and expertise, infinitely more motivation, and no distractions.

He travels under cover of transports between Wakandan outreach centers from Oakland to Washington DC, and then from Washington to Bilbao. When he touches down in Bilbao, his information relay device has a new lead based off a visual of Steve in a bookshop in Turin twice in the previous week.

He takes the train to Turin. Within twelve hours he finds the location of the Hydra facility, and Bucky makes enough noise to reveal to Hydra that he’s in the city and trigger the personnel to raise the facility to its red alert security status. He plants a false trail indicating that he’s given up and gone further north, all the while watching every aspect of the base, making plans to infiltrate, and ensuring sure none of the vehicles or teams moving in and out look like they’re transporting you somewhere else. They drop to an orange threat level, and then yellow – standard caution and operating procedures.

Bucky would have been floored that they believed he’d missed them in Turin and moved on to search somewhere else, but it spoke to one of the weaknesses of Hydra’s organization: the arrogance. Instead, Bucky hacks into their base network as well as their external communications channels.

This observation, research, recon, and analysis Bucky does not rush. Everything he cares about is at stake. If he’s going to be successful in getting you back there can be no room for error as he’ll be up against Hydra and the only other super soldier on the planet who could potentially match or outmatch him.

And as the weeks wear on, the other thing he cannot deny, that he’d known from the beginning of this nightmare even if he’d wanted to try to ignore it, it that he isn't in this to rescue only you.

When all is said and done, the reality is he has to get Steve back, too.

Bucky knows the longer it takes, the more dangerously close he gets to your next heat. He knows an omega being in a distressed environment will affect the heat cycle. It could bring it on early, or potentially also push you to the extremes of a dry heat depending on the conditions they are keeping you in, and how you’re feeling. Once he determines he knows enough to start putting together a plan of extraction, he also determines it’s too close to when your heat might hit, and he can’t risk trying to extract you if you’re in heat – it becomes an element he can’t predict and ensure that his plan will still be successful.

His own senses are strained with the tenor of your unease in a way that’s different from before. It’s driving his alpha side mad, and he wants to storm the facility and reclaim you, and that’s one more element contributing to the volatility of the situation. He knows he can’t gamble on so many unpredictable elements.

He must wait.

But when he sees Captain Hydra leave in his jet right when Bucky is certain you are close to your heat, Bucky is stunned.

It might be too damn close to your heat, but clearly you’re not in heat yet or the other alpha would not leave you. This was not his plan, but it is a prime opportunity he can’t ignore – not if he can get to you alone and save you from a heat away from him. His heart can’t deny this unexpected opportunity.

After Bucky had hacked into the Hydra base’s network, he’d discovered that the small jet Captain Hydra had exclusive use of had been excluded from all navigational tracking and that the man only communicated by radio with one individual whenever he left. He’d further discovered that Captain Hydra was a weapon still cloaked from most of Hydra, with nothing about him other than his existence as a new asset available on the network. Even his former identity was not yet disclosed or recorded anywhere digitally.

This means Bucky has no idea where the man is going or when he will be back, but he hears Captain Hydra and his liaison discuss and confirm his time of arrival and his estimated time of return. Bucky must work quickly, but there is a window.

As he had not anticipated infiltrating so soon, he still has to finish putting things together for the actual extraction – like transportation, supplies, and thoroughly planning out three escape routes and destinations – and while he works quickly, he does not rush those final preparations, and so that takes him a significant amount of the window of time he knows he has.

But he only needs long enough to get you out.

He will have that.

He ambushes the delivery truck bringing in the week’s food shipment with no trouble and drives it right into the base as he has all the proper credentials on his person and its still pre-dawn hours, so lack of light works in his favor to get through the first gate.

But of course when he doesn’t follow delivery procedures once he rolls up to the shipping and receiving dock, that’s when his limited time really begins. The first decision he must make is whether or not to take out a man of average height but portly build that approaches the truck – one of the cooks, Bucky has studied the personnel files for everyone registered on this base – and Bucky evaluates as he steps out of the truck. He could kill him, but this man should probably be spared. Bucky doesn’t want unnecessary blood on his hands. So with lightning fast moves and a choke hold, the man goes down. But next are two security personnel, and them Bucky shoots point blank, taking each of them out with single shots. He leans down to lift the comms off one of them, putting the piece in his ear so he can hear everything as it unfolds across the base.

He yanks open the first door and moves down the hallway. And then there’s a frantic message over the comms, “Code Red! Winter Soldier, loading docks, two personnel down, in pursuit!”

Bucky growls and turns back down the hallway and swears when he sees the man putting comms in his ear and squaring up a gun he’d clearly lifted off one of the security guards was the cook he thought he’d put out cold. Apparently the man had more in him than Bucky had accounted for, and so now Bucky takes aim and shoots him once he’s close enough to secure the kill shot, only having to dodge two close but errant bullets himself as the cook had tried to run him down.

Lethal force for everyone it is, he thinks.

He’s irritated he wasted extra time on this man trying to keep down the body count.

He does not make that mistake again, killing everyone who comes across his path. The silver lining working in his favor is that this base in Turin is a science facility, not a military facility, so he has fewer muscle personnel to deal with than other places you could have been kept, and he can hear over the main comms that scientists and researchers are being given orders to shelter in place while there are instructions given over the security comms in Bucky’s ear that prime-level scientists are to be evacuated. It’s the directive he expected, which benefits him as the security personnel are split between pursuing him and evacuating those individuals deemed indispensable.

But dealing with those who are in pursuit of him is simple. When he’s out of ammunition, he makes quick work dealing what should be lethal wounds with his knives. Every man or woman down is one less he will need to contend with while trying to safely get you out, and while he’s reasonably sure he’s dealing death to everyone, there are a few he thinks may survive.

He has studied every aspect of this facility while making his preparations, and he sends a message to Captain Hydra that he was prepared by shooting glances cleanly into every camera he knows he passes.

There’s a flash of fear that ripples through him – it comes from the bond he’s tried to keep dormant between you since you were taken, but this is too powerful, and it’s a barb he can’t ignore. It flares and then dies out, which could be either a good thing or a bad thing. He squares his shoulders and moves more quickly.

As Bucky reaches the quadrant they’ve been keeping you a few moments later, the words, “The Omega is secured, sedated, and ascending to the roof with team Foxtrot, thirty seconds until air evac.”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

He knows he can’t make it in time, but Bucky still races down the hall to the stairwell, launching through the door and then hurtling up the stairs, taking them three and four at a time. His super speed isn’t enough to scale four flights of industrial facility stairs, and he bursts out on the roof to see the coaxial helicopter already twenty meters up in the air and navigating away to the north.

He wants to shout until his lungs bleed because he was so close, but he knows he can’t afford to indulge in emotions that strong in this moment. Instead, he takes huge gulps of the fresh air, pulls the door from its hinges, and hurls it across the roof before going back down the stairs.

He does not engage with anyone but comes across few through his retreat. Instead, his focus now is decimating what he can of the facility without wasting time or going out of his way as he escapes the base, rigging explosives quickly in key areas on his way out.

While he left destruction in his wake, and he leaves alone, he was precise in how much damage he dealt. He left the area of main logistical operations intact because he didn’t want to destroy their network and communications, eliminating his ties to tracking their next moves.

Bucky immerses himself in tracking and monitoring everything the second he’s back in his hideout with his tech. He sees the Captain return. He watches the final evacuations. They send him to Geneva, and Bucky is ready to follow, knowing exactly where the Swiss facility is located since he’s fully infiltrated the Hydra network of information. He can’t travel as quickly since he doesn’t have access to any Hydra aviation, but he makes it there by sundown.

He wouldn’t risk trying to disrupt your heat now, not with everyone moved and on high alert, it would be dangerous for you. Instead, he works on setting up his new undercover observation point in Switzerland. He fine tunes his information tap into the Hydra system. As he works, he notices the rise of an anxious feeling pulling at his hind brain. He’s felt the press of you trying to reach across the bond while you’ve been apart, but this is different – there’s a frantic, wild tug, and while it’s insistent, it’s more erratic, like the flickering of a flame, as if you aren’t even concentrating on the connection to him.

He knows so much of you that he knows you have to be on the brink of your heat but that you must desperately be trying to fight it. The discomfort he can sense continues to ebb and flow. It morphs. It becomes tinged with more discomfort. Then there’s a lick of desire that is almost imperceptible. That’s followed rather quickly be a flare of adrenaline – or is it fear? Another shift a few minutes later, and tone of this is pure arousal, the feeling he’s shared so much of with you, and the thought that you…

He grits his teeth, shuts his eyes, and abruptly stills every muscle in his body. You are his omega. Another alpha bonded you. Your heat is undeniable. His brain knows that – it’s one of the things he’s been focusing on, acknowledging the various scenarios that could play out for this heat, he just did not want this, nor was he prepared for what it might feel like. And so, with forced, measured breaths, he does everything he can to concentrate on shutting down the connection, to put his alpha side to sleep, because he can not bear this. He has suppressed so much of everything since losing you, only holding onto the faintest tether, but he cannot endure this – not and keep his rationality and do what he needs to do now, which is to formulate the next steps, the things he needs to figure out and watch for now that this cruel game has changed. Emotion will distract him, but there’s also the flow that could go the other way and throw you off, and he swore to keep you safe.

Diving into the network databases of this new Hydra facility, Bucky notices something he noticed in Turin: there are no records that contain any of your names on file – not you, not Steve, not Sam. He thought it was strange before, but he had a theory it could have been the nature of secrecy around all the projects at the research facility in Turin – there were very few data files on the science being explored on that base. But in transferring the Turin personnel out, with a contingent of them going to Geneva, he pours over all the documentation and the only he finds is the transfer of a high-level asset referred to only as Waffe SR4718. He easily knows the German word for weapon, and without missing a beat Bucky knows the letters and numbers are supposed to seem random but clearly refer to Steve Rogers whose birthdate is the fourth day of the seventh month in the eighteenth year of the previous century. It’s innocuous to anyone coming across it, but abundantly clear that it’s specific for those who were supposed to know.

With all Bucky knows of his own time with Hydra, how there were always layers within layers, secrets buried, hidden, withheld, he’s certain the acquisition of Steve and metamorphosis into Captain Hydra is as dark and as quiet as his own existence as the Winter Soldier.

There are quarters assigned to Waffe SR4718, and Bucky tags it track all status alerts – comings and goings, services, requests. He also puts the cameras for that hallway up on a constant feed monitoring protocol with the AI he’s adapted to bring up the imagery if there’s any movement in or out of the door.

Knowing you’re in heat, Bucky concentrates on new extraction tactics and mapping out escape options from this new facility.

But at three in the morning during the second night in Geneva – the second night of your heat – the door movement alert goes off, and Bucky immediately turns his attention to watch as Steve slowly emerges.

Why would he have any reason to leave you during your heat? He knows he could order food, clothing, bedding, medical personnel if absolutely necessary…

A quick check of the log shows that there have been no such requests.

And then he sees the unthinkable.

You’re right there behind him, following as he starts to make his way down the hall, dressed in darker clothing as he is. He has a small tactical pack slung across his back.

“What the hell are you doing?”

The question is only uttered out of frustration and disbelief because he could immediately decipher what is happening.

As precarious as it is to interfere with your heat, the two of you are clearly on the move.

The other alpha has no intention of staying at this base.

But why?

His mind begins deciphering even as he’s pulling up security cameras as the pair of you move through the facility, tracking your movements and actions.

The calculated risk is to get out when you’re supposed to be in heat. Bucky did see that status reported on the log – omega in heat. The protocols were to leave alpha and omega Hydra personnel undisturbed unless a priority one situation developed – typically reserved for life or death and rarely anything less urgent or pressing. It meant no one would think to check after the asset immediately. Even if an alpha skipped regular ordering for a meal or two to the living quarters, that wouldn’t be taken as out of the ordinary, merely unnecessary or forgotten due to being otherwise occupied, or deciding to make do with the food already with them.

The movement logically progresses toward the transportation hangar under the building – intending to employ ground transport.

On the way, the two of you duck into a room and close the door. Bucky accesses the schematics to discover it’s a data analytics workspace – cooperative computer sharing area. There weren’t any goons to hide from, so Bucky works quickly, trying to pull up the specific workstations in there. He sees the log in for a science officer. The user accesses the personnel transfer files for everyone from the Turin base submitted due to the evacuation. Four names are brought up on the roster and their locations are changed from Turin to the other the other bases anyone from Turin was reassigned to – a pair of them to Odessa, the other pair to Trondheim.

Subterfuge. He’s displacing security agents – or at least their location statuses.

Bucky frowns.

The rest of your course takes you directly to the vehicle hangar. Moving in the dead of night has capitalized on as few people as possible moving around the base for you to encounter, and it paid off. The other alpha selects a smaller SUV, loads some readily available weapons and supplies from the nearby vicinity into the back and then – faster than lightning – he withdraws something from a pocket near his chest, presses it over your mouth, and Bucky can see you seize up and then slump into his arms. He tucks you in amongst the supplies before throwing a canvas over everything and closing the hatchback.

Clearly you had been cooperating with this escape, so why was it necessary to knock you out?

Then he leaves the vehicle, leaves the hangar, goes back up two floors to the security personnel floor, and knocks on one of the doors.

Bucky accesses the database to see who’s assigned to that room as he watches this man converse briefly with whoever answers the door.

The two names assigned to the room match the two names reassigned to the Trondheim base on the evacuation transfer records.

“What larger game are you playing, Captain Hydra?” Bucky murmurs.

Because it’s back down to the hangar and the SUV with you stashed in the back, but then he waits.

And within five minutes, two men in full tactical gear get in the vehicle as well, and only then does he start up the car and leave. There’s a tracking device on this vehicle, so Bucky starts to pack up his tech, and pulls up the tracking on his smartphone.

He’s about to shut and pack away his laptop when he thinks of doing one more thing. It will take time, and this is why he knows Captain Hydra didn’t do it, but it will be worth it. But after his time in Wakandan labs and building up his own robust systems, within twenty-five minutes, Bucky has gone through the security camera system and successfully removed all footage of you and the captain moving throughout the base, rewriting it with the empty hallways from just before and after, effectively erasing the evidence of your escape. This will buy more time. No one may have thought to look for any movement in and out of Waffe SR4718’s quarters, but now they won’t find it when they ultimately go back and try, extending Bucky’s time to tail you without Hydra in the mix. They will assume the alpha and omega are still in heat seclusion now without any reason to doubt it.

Bucky leaves his temporary Geneva hideout with the essentials he arrived with. He chose this location because it was two streets down from one of the larger private car services in Switzerland. Bucky knows he can pass as a mechanic with his clothing, and the service staff works overnight to keep up maintenance for the large fleet of vehicles that provide VIP transportation, airport pick up and drop off, limousine transfers, corporate chauffeur services, ski transfers, and event chauffeuring. Acquiring a non-descript vehicle is as easy as he hoped, and it’s more than simple to de-activate this car’s GPS tracking system.

Within half an hour, he’s comfortably in pursuit. The vehicle he’s tracking has maintained its course and is an hour out of the city now, but an hour ahead is reasonable.

When the Hydra vehicle is three hours outside of Geneva, it makes its first stop. Bucky presses a button on his phone to pin the location. The stop is for less than five minutes, and then it continues, but Bucky will stop there as well to assess the purpose and glean any information he can.

Bucky is an assertive driver, making up speed, but not at a point to draw attention. When he reaches the pin he’d set on the route for the stop your vehicle had made, it’s on a bridge.

There’s only one reason Bucky can think of to stop on a bridge.

A reason that could make Bucky’s heart stop with devastation, but he must continue to operate under the assumption it wasn’t your body dumped into the river. Anything else wouldn’t make sense.

Unless the other alpha has become completely unhinged and all of this is an elaborate game to drive Bucky beyond all limitations of his own reason.

Within the next two hours, he sees you pass the border into Germany, and then another stop is registered on the GPS tracking near the city of Albstadt. Bucky has made up a significant amount of the head start the other alpha had had. When he arrives in Albstadt, he finds the SUV. It is most likely that this vehicle had been abandoned for another, but Bucky has to stop at this point and tap into security feeds for the city to see whether you’re here or not. He picks a spot that advertises wifi with their sandwiches, refueling his body while setting up his tech in a spot most won’t question him to hunker down for some serious work on a laptop. He gets into the city’s street cameras, sees Steve steal another vehicle, pulls the license plate, and then he programs his algorithm to watch for the number to track the route now. He won’t be able to smoothly follow the route of a GPS-tracked vehicle anymore, but Bucky knew this would grow more difficult. As long as his goal was to draw out the Soldat, Captain Hydra will still leave a trail of breadcrumbs, but it will be scant if he’s trying to evade Hydra.

While Bucky has questions of intent, he has no question that it’s what the Captain is doing now.

Bucky is able to pick up the trail with license plate tracking and route mapping into Stuttgart. All the way to the train station. But this is where the other alpha shows incredible skills for blending in. It’s a busy station. Bucky will have to run thorough security camera assessments of the Stuttgart station, figure out when – or if – they got on a train, and then continue tracking from there. If the alpha and omega got on a train, Bucky can at least narrow his search to that route and its stops for that schedule, but Bucky used train stations to cover his tracks as well, and sometimes that involved never boarding the train but leading anyone tracking him to believe that he had.

With that much information, he writes new coding into his overall system, sends it back to the larger machine he left in Oakland to do the heavy computing so it can start the work he’ll need to fine tune once he can settle in a more permanent stopover, pays for his meal, and then drives to Stuttgart. The hacking into facial recognition has been so enhanced beyond boundaries though – especially because he can tailor it to look for only two faces he knows as well as his own – that he sees the two of your board a train headed west, targets the route, sets up the watch parameters for the schedule, and catches you getting off in Paris.

Another smart move blending into the vibrancy of a large city, but Bucky is sure it’s not the final destination either. But Steve knew enough French to blend into the country, as well.

It takes Bucky and his systems six more days, but he confirms three separate facial recognitions for the other alpha in a town outside of Bordeaux small enough to be off the beaten path but big enough to blend in and go unnoticed by its people.

Bucky travels there as quietly as possible. He does not want to tip his hand. He’s too close now to have you slip through his hands again.

After two more days and with the assistance of satellite imaging, he has found the small house in a forested area outside of the town.

Bucky grips the edge of the small desk he’s been working at, grounding himself. Adrenaline had immediately surged through his veins, but he must keep everything contained. He has practiced so much control and restraint that if his heart betrays him now, he’ll carve it out himself and leave it behind. He cannot compromise this delicate situation.

He drives out to the area and leaves his vehicle well-hidden a kilometer out from the house and approaches on foot, circling at a large perimeter and slowly moving further in, cautiously, taking in everything. He doesn’t want to trip anything the other alpha may have set up to alert him to intruders.

What he discovers is minimal, and all old tactical elements – things they’d done as

Cap and the Howling Commandos back in the old war.

Effectively things that would have worked on anyone from this day and age but that only Bucky would know to look for.

He doesn’t trust it.

This is another trap.

But he has to walk into it and fare as best he can.

That’s what Captain Hydra had said was his plan from the beginning – draw out the Soldat.

The White Wolf would enter the trap but would need to control it and come out on the other side with his omega. 

He can’t even think those words without his pulse racing now, and he digs his vibranium fingers into the trunk of the tree under his hand, splintering the wood while he closes his eyes and stamps down everything that wants him to sprint to the house he can see, break down the door, and launch himself into your arms.

He timed his approach when he’d seen the other alpha leave – likely for more food and supplies – but he knew the time alone would be limited.

Bucky takes measured but determined steps to the green wooden front door of what’s essentially a little cottage.

Straining his ears and focusing on his enhanced hearing, he doesn’t pick up anything beyond ambient noises – and your soft, slow breathing.

He takes a deep breath, slowly twists the doorknob, and opens the door.

There you are, curled up in a cozy armchair, dozing, hand pressed up against the spine of a book that has fallen to your chest after you clearly fell asleep reading, and this.

This simple scene nearly knocks him to his knees.

The way you’re there, feet away from him, it’s the most beautiful sight of his entire life.

But still, he is quiet, cautious.

His entire chest aches for you.

He shuts the door softly behind him, then crosses the small living room and kneels next to you. He eases the book out of your hands and puts it on the small side table. He’s done this before so many times. You make a slight hum through your sleep.

Brushing his fingers over your cheek is almost enough to make the nightmare of the last six weeks vanish as if it really had only been a nightmare.

He almost doesn’t dare to breathe.

But the warmth of his hand against your skin evidently reaches in to stir something in your subconscious, because you shift slightly, sigh, and tilt your head into his touch and murmur, “Bucky…”

The stutter of his chest is both painful and euphoric at once, and everything wells up in his chest, everything he’s been holding back.

He drops his hand from your cheek to your shoulder, gently trying to nudge you awake.

Coming back into consciousness, you take in a deep breath before blinking your eyes open. Your gaze drifts to him, and then your body seizes up one moment, and the next you’re scrambling up and away from him, whipping over the back of the armchair you’d been curled up in.

“Bucky?” your voice comes out in a wounded whimper of a tone that pierces him, confounds him.

“Yes, it’s me,” he answers, brow furrowing. He hadn’t allowed himself to think over what this moment was going to be like – he knew the fixation would have been too painful to hope over – but it was not supposed to be this, with you looking at him with caution, with hesitancy, with your guard up.

“Omega?” he questions tentatively, rising from where he’d been crouched on the floor.

You don’t move your position, but you draw yourself up to your full height as well.

Bucky maneuvers around the furniture, wanting to remove the barrier between you, but he changes his position slowly, allowing you time to retreat if you feel compelled to. You hold your ground but do keep yourself squared off facing him as he moves. He does what he hasn’t done since this ordeal began and definitively opens up the gateway of the bond between you, tentatively reaching out, trying to read you.

Your mood is hard, and it doesn’t fluctuate. There’s a steady mix of fear, doubt, and what he thinks is exasperation there.

No, it’s more than that.

“You’re angry with me?”

“I’m more than angry with you!” you hurl the words at him and cross your arms over your chest. “I’m livid.”

“I came to you as fast as I could!” He steps closer, and now you step back. He moves closer again, but with a smaller step.

“It’s not that, I know you worked as hard as you could–“

“Then what else could you possibly be upset about, Omega?” His tone is desperate, earnestly seeking the answer, but also tinged with a warning he can’t help from bleeding into the question.

“I couldn’t feel you.” The anger gives way to let the anguish of your words bleed through, and they sweep over both of you. “You cut yourself off from me. I was desolate and scared and alone, and you withdrew any hint of our connection.”

He steps forward once more, finally close enough to reach for you, and as he continues to close the distance, you unfold one of your arms and backhand slap him. “I needed you!”

Bucky staggers a step back from the raw force you hurled at him, but it only takes him the space of a breath for him to recover enough, and he surges forward and pulls you into his arms, uttering your name the way one pleads in a fraught prayer. You try and push against his chest and squirm out of his arms, but he only secures you more firmly, holding you dearly and desperately to him.

“I needed you,” you sob out. Instead of continuing to try to struggle away from him, to hold your hurt at bay, he feels you stop fighting and the turn as you let everything out. He holds you, soothing you, but not trying to quell any of this yet. He knows everything you’re feeling is warranted, can feel now that you held back as much as he did while you were apart. Endured as much hurt as he did – more in many ways. He won’t tell you to settle down, because the hurt needs to be acknowledged and not minimized.

Once your chest is no longer wracked with sobs, when your crying has abated from steady streams of tears to the small sniffling, he gently wipes the tears from your cheeks. Then Bucky decisively nuzzles his face down into the crook of your neck. Slowly, tentatively, he presses his lips to the place he claimed and bonded you as his omega, his mate. You whimper, but your hands clutch at his shirt, and the immediate flood of relief, of love, of devotion, washes over you both. He can feel it, he knows you feel it.

His large hands are planted firmly on your back, one at the curve of your spine, and one between your shoulder blades, pressing you as close together as he possibly can. He plants a longer, more concentrated kiss to the mark, and your right hand slides up to thread your fingers into his hair and press him closer.

The more he kisses into your neck, the more whole he feels. He had ignored the hollow, empty feeling in his chest, had truly rejected all feeling, as cold and empty as he’d operated while being the Winter Soldier. He’s feeling human again. Himself again – or at least it’s all coming back to him now.

He doesn’t even realize when your body has fully melted into him, too caught up in the mending of the connection, but then you’re urging his face up away from your neck, but only so you can press your forehead to his, and you say, “I need you, Bucky.”

He nods, and then you kiss him. In a movement familiar to you both, his hand moves down, curving over your ass and to the back of your thigh, and he picks you up. Your legs wrap around him as you deepen the kiss, nipping at his lips. He carries you across the big open space to where there’s a bed in the far corner.

He sets you down gently on your feet, and his hands are already reaching for the hem of your shirt, and you readily lift your arms so he can pull it cleanly off your body. You’re reaching for his belt, and he’s pulling his own shirt over his head. Your lips eagerly seek each other as much as they can. You push his dark jeans down, and he huffs and sits down at the foot of the bed so he can hastily unlace and yank his boots off, so he can shuck his pants off all the way. When he raises his head, you stand before him in nothing but your simple underwear, one hand pressed against your torso, biting your lip.

You’re so damn beautiful to him, his heart aches again at the sight of you nearly naked before him again after so long torn apart.

He reaches for you, and though you don’t hesitate to take his hand, as he tugs you into his lap, your thighs straddling either side of his hips, he doesn’t miss the slight tremble of your body, and it kills him but there’s a deep part of him that resonates, recognizes the feeling. The separation had been hell on an alpha and omega level, and this is still too much, overwhelming, and altogether not nearly enough to soothe the deep loneliness he had pushed beneath the surface. His arms wrap around you again. While your left arm wraps around his neck, your right hand roams over his bare skin – shoulder, arms, chest, neck, face – questing to rememorize him.

He wants to be inside you, but having your chest pressed into to his chest, it’s like your heartbeats are syncing back together, and he almost needs this more. The side of your face rests against his, and the way he can hear you breathe in and out right next to his ear, can feel the warmth of every exhale, it’s yet another inimitable balm he didn’t know he longed for.

He murmurs your name softly against your shoulder.

“Mmm?”

He knows you can tell he’s working out something to say. Every season you two had been together had been time you had worked to only continually knit your souls more tightly to each other, not only to love each other more, but to understand each other, to work together, to support and lean into each other as true partners.

It had made the separation all the more painful.

He squeezes you more tightly for a moment, then inhales to speak. “I need to tell you why I put up the walls I did.”

He feels you tense slightly in his arms – of course he does, there’s no way for him to miss it any more than there was any chance for you to try and hide it when this intimately entwined. He bestows a soft, light kiss to your bonding mark, and you whimper, but turn your head to brush your lips over his cheek, and then both of you draw back just enough to look at each other.

“I’ll never know if it was the right or wrong thing to do to you, but it felt like the only way I could hope to survive navigating back to you. Immediately I knew I couldn’t allow the anguish of pain and anger I was feeling to flood to you when I knew you were living your own nightmare. When I held that back, the way Hydra had conditioned me to repress all feelings when I was their fist resurfaced, and I knew shelving the emotions would leave me to focus and be more effective in everything I was doing to track you and find you.”

“Bucky,” you start, but he shakes his head slightly, his eyes pleading for you to let him continue. You give a little huff. “Okay.”

The corner of his mouth lifts, and he pecks your lips before going on. “When I was closing in on where they were keeping you, I didn’t want to alert you and have you have to worry about how to hide that.”

“That’s a fair strategic tactic,” you grudgingly admit.

He grins at your tone, but it abates quickly. “I also…”

He pauses for half a beat and takes a breath to steel his resolve because you deserve his raw honesty as it’s still a concern in play.

“Also what?”

“I didn’t know how much of our bond he would feel. I didn’t want to tip him off, but I – I didn’t want to feel what might go the other way and bleed from him through you either.”

“Oh, Buck,” you bury your head into the crook of his neck now, nuzzling against the bonding mark you’d given him. “Our bond is ours, not his.”

“It’s not?”

“No, no,” you press quick successive kisses against your bonding mark on the juncture of his neck and shoulder. “You might feel the wake of what I feel from his bond to me, but the ties to each of you are very distinct within me. I’m especially sure of it now that ours isn’t dormant anymore.”

He holds you close while he sorts through this revelation from you. “I didn’t know – and I was worried if I felt him it would either devastate or enrage me and either way make me overrule logic and slip up, do something rash.”

“Now I understand,” you speak right into his ear. “Concentrate though, what do you feel right now?”

He breathes in. Breathes out. Another breath in. Out.

“Only you,” he says, no question.

Your lips drift back down his neck, and you press an insistent kiss to your claim on him this time, then you open your lips and suck over the spot.

Bucky shivers and groans, and you wince and laugh when his arms flex around you so tightly it actually hurts. Because he reacts so strongly, it doesn’t shock him in the slightest that you’re spurred on to seek more, but now he’s ready, so when you’ve satisfied with your initial torment and he feels you slot your teeth over the mark, he bares his neck, ready when you bite down to renew your claim on him, and he shouts – euphoric, flooded and overwhelmed with the way everything opens in such a raw way when a bonding mark is refreshed.

It drives you to rock your hips against him. You’re both still in those last pieces of underwear, but the friction of your cunt against his cock is glorious, and he can’t help the satisfied rumble in his chest in answer to the simple action.

His hand clamps on your plump, round ass, and he pushes you hard against him and holds you there – he doesn’t want the rocking, for a moment he just wants the intense pressure, the reality that you’re here with him.

You crash your lips to his desperately. He slants his head and works his tongue along the seam of your mouth, which willingly parts for him, an open moan passing between you both, your tongue inviting him into your mouth, stroking against his. Both of you fiercely hold onto each other, keeping that close chest to chest contact while you kiss more than you breathe. When you ultimately have to break off from each other to get air back in your lungs, the heaving expansion of your ribcages against each other is such a simple but intense intimacy, breaths mingling – another moment that adds to the replenishment for how much his soul had been depleted without you.

“Need you inside me,” you plead.

He nods while turning and tossing you onto the bed.

As he climbs up to join you, you quip, “No more clothes, Alpha.”

“Bossy Omega,” he chuckles, but complies in pushing his boxer briefs down and tossing them away.

You quirk your lips. “Give me what I need, and I won’t need to be so demanding.”

He growls, but it’s teasing, the feeling in his heart is a light one, a feeling he feels echoed in you, lines of it running through the overwhelming need.

Bucky moves up the bed, hooks his fingers beneath the band of your underwear, and you lift your hips so he can remove them immediately. He leans down and presses a broad flat lick of his tongue over your hip bone, causing you to squirm – desire and a sensitive spot of skin he discovered on your years ago. “I know what you need, Omega.”

“Yes, Alpha,” you nod eagerly, and he flips you over onto your stomach

He hears your breath hitch. He knows you love roughness and to be handled as often as you love softness, but the latter isn’t what you need right now. He crawls up over you and plants his left arm up by your shoulder while he slots himself between your legs. Your left hand finds his, twining your fingers together while he lines up his cock with your slick entrance, and the sigh of ecstasy that escapes you as he pushes his length in sings in his ears. The feeling of your warm channel gripping him is better than he remembered – or at least it feels that way – and he tries to push in as slowly as he can to savor coming home to where he belongs inside you, but it’s not nearly as slow as he wants it to be.

Once he’s fully sheathed in you, he kisses your shoulder, then nips along until he’s at the juncture of your neck, and you keen and bare your neck to him. He licks over his bonding mark, then bites down, reclaiming you, and you cry out, body thrumming beneath him. He starts to move behind you, pulling his hips back before thrusting back in. Your right leg hitches back to tangle up and over his, urging him on. He grips your hip, and then he fucks you. It’s the most primal it’s ever felt with you, the force of it rocking the bed to knock against the wall, and he almost worries about whether or not it’s too much, but you rock back against him, meeting his thrusts as much as you can in your prone position, eagerly taking all of him.

“That’s it, darling, take my hard cock inside you,” he urges you both on.

You sob out a breathless, “Yes,” that makes his chest rumble in satisfaction.

He can feel your cunt fluttering around him, can feel you on the edge of ecstasy, but it also feels like you’re refusing to fall over the edge.

“Come on, darling, let go.”

“No.”

That shocks him but doesn’t slow him down.

He maintains his pace and slips his hand down between you and the mattress, cupping your pussy and finding your clit. “Yes.” He starts to rub quick, concentrated circles over your tight bundle of nerves.

You shake your head desperately. “No, I don’t want it to end,” the words tumble out, and he hears the sound of you crying again.

“Omega, I will give you more. I’ll give you as much as you need, but I need you to give in to this, surrender and fall over the edge with me again.”

“Bucky!” you cry out as you’re unreservedly flung over the edge. Your cunt clamping down on him was the last of what he needed to reach his own climax, and so his shout echoes your own, and he exerts those final thrusts to pump his seed deep within you.

He stays sheathed within you but rolls both of you to your sides, brackets his arm around your waist, and keeps you close, nuzzling into your neck. You sink back against him, resting your arm over his and threading your fingers together.

“That was…”

He nudges your chin for you to turn your head back so he can kiss away the tears that escaped during the emotions that came through there at that end.

“Intense?”

“Yes.”

“We both needed it, Omega. I need you as much as you need me. Do not doubt it.” You shiver in his arms, and he swears, “I’ll make sure you never question it again.”

“Never let me go.”

“Never again.”

You shift and turn over to face him. He’s just as content to wrap you in his arms this way. You tangle your legs with his as you have so many times before. This is so familiar.

You brush your fingers over his face, retracing the lines and angles that define him, and he watches your face as your eyes drink in his features.

“I’m yours, Omega,” he says in a quiet, low tone.

A soft smile lifts the curve of your mouth. Your hand cradles his jaw and beckons him in to kiss you, and he is happy to acquiesce. The kisses he shares with you now are slow, solemn promises of lips and tongues, heated but not demanding.

When you eventually come up for air, you tuck yourself more closely into his chest, humming with contentment. He’s half hard again, and the frantic last moments of the sex he shared with you flashes back to the forefront of his mind. “I promised to give you more. What do you need from me? Tell me how I can please you, how I can love you.”

You reach up and press your fingers delicately against his bonding mark. “Just this. Hold me. I only need to be with you.”

He can feel how true it is as your fingers stroke lightly over the place where you claimed him all those years ago, reclaimed him here in this bed, flooding him with more peace. His brushes his lips over your forehead. “Whatever you want, sweetheart.”

There’s a little chirp that bubbles up out of you when he calls you sweetheart again, and it makes him just as happy as it does you. He slowly caresses your back, hand moving up and down, up and down, in a soothing motion, soothing himself as much as you.

There is still so much ahead for you both, but this – your connection to each other – he can feel that again so strongly. He never doubted it, but after being deprived, the return of how powerful it is engulfs him. This will anchor him through what’s coming.

“Buck?” you murmur against his neck.

“Mmm?”

“I can tell your brain is beginning to work away from here.”

He sighs. “Can you blame me?”

“No, but talk to me, take me with you if you’re going to think.”

“There’s so much to think through.”

“Start with one thing.”

You’ve done this with him before – late nights, afternoons, mornings, on a drive, on a walk, sharing a meal – you could always feel when he started to get tied up in his brain with his thoughts, and you’d listen, ask questions, sift through with him. He was perfectly capable of sorting through things on his own, but sharing with you made it altogether different. It was one of the best parts of having you as his mate.

“Why…?” He frowns and trails off. “No, nevermind.”

“No, Buck. I worked hard to soothe and relax my alpha. I want this gift of respite with you, however brief it is, and whatever string you don’t want to tug on first clearly is one that’s important.”

He nips your shoulder. “My gutsy omega.”

“Alpha,” you press, also literally pressing a finger insistently against his chest.

“Alright…” His tone turns serious. “Why didn’t you try to escape – especially here where he leaves you alone sometimes?” From the way he’d found you, it was clear this wasn’t an anomaly.

You cluck your tongue impatiently and roll your eyes. “First, how was I reasonably supposed to outrun him, hide from him, and try to find you? I don’t have any of the tactical skills or training you two do.”

“Fair enough. And second?” The first point is obvious now that he’s asked it and heard you answer, but he wants to hear the rest of what you have to say.

“Second,” you continue, your tone altering to something more somber, “he took me to lure you to him, so the most logical thing was to stay and wait for you.”

“Ah,” Bucky nods, the smallest of smiles taking over his mouth. “My smart omega.”

“And third,” you continue, though your words tone is cautious now, and you drop your eyes to his chest.

“Yes?” he urges you to finish the thought.

“He’s my alpha, too.”

This isn’t news – he’s known it from the second he witnessed that bite to claim you, he thought of it frequently while he was hunting for you both, he knew it would be the new reality, you’d even discussed the two bonds together in this bed – and yet having to think about it yet again in this light is still straining on him.

Clearly you feel his unrest, because your hands come up to cup his face and basically attempt to soothe him with gentle but insistent strokes along his jaw. “Bucky, I’m always going to be yours.”

He sighs and angles his head down to touch his forehead to yours. “I know.”

And it’s not jealousy that drives his unrest – it’s the not knowing what this means, not right now and not for the future. He’s started thinking about possibilities, but he’s limited until he can confront the other alpha. So, he decides to concentrate on what it has meant so far.

He makes sure his tone is soft but serious when he asks, “Did he hurt you?”

You’re quiet for a beat, then say, “I don’t know how to answer that.”

Bucky starts to sit up, but you pull him back down to the mattress, trying earnestly to soothe him. “What he did hurt us both, and it was meant to hurt. It was absolutely calculated. But they broke him, Bucky. They tortured him and tried to make him comply for weeks. They were experimenting on Sam, trying to pull the science they could from old records on you and what they could pull from analyzing Steve’s blood, but they weren’t having success, and so they enacted their last use for Sam – and they killed him in front of Steve. It destroyed him.”

Bucky’s own chest aches as he listens, throbbing painfully at this reveal, and his vibranium hand fists the sheet.

“And when he was at his most devastated and spent emotionally, what I have been able to piece together is that that’s when he couldn’t stand to feel anymore, shut off his emotions – or his humanity more like, and it’s his humanity that made him Steve. That’s when they were able to take over and mold him into the fist they wanted in Captain Hydra.”

Hurt, anger, the horror of his own past life as the Winter Soldier, it’s surging through his veins, but you continue.

“So that night in Wakanda? That was Captain Hydra at his height of cruelty. I haven’t seen that iteration of him since that night. It’s been slow, but he’s different now. He’s not our Steve, but he’s not Captain Hydra.”

It’s a few moments before he registers that you’re done – at least with that piece of sharing.

He cups your jaw and looks into your eyes. “Do you trust him?”

He sees you clearly put thought into your words before answering, worrying your bottom lip. “The heat he and I shared was intense in every way. It changed things fundamentally between us, but since the heat our connection has still been very tenuous. We’ve both been very guarded with each other. I know he’ll keep me safe, but I’m still wary of him.”

He nods.

“Where is he right now?”

A wry laugh tumbles out of your chest. “I don’t even know where we are right now, Bucky. I know we got off a train in Bordeaux, but then he moved us here while I was in one of my heavy end of heat sleeps. From the food, books, and supplies he’s brought for us, I know we’re in France, but that’s it. There’s not a lick of technology kept in here while I’m alone. We don’t even a radio.”

Bucky grunts at this news. He doesn’t like this, but other than being kept here cut off from the rest of the world and having claimed you and separated you in the first place, it seems you’ve been appropriately cared for.

“Wait, no radio?” He growls. Bucky had looked away to consider the new information, but his eyes snap to you again. “Have you had any music?”

“No,” you groan, and he can feel the pained irritation.

“That won’t do.” 

He quickly rolls off the bed to a small whine of protest from you, but it was so rare that he’d ever been in a space with you and there hadn’t been music playing – loud for you to sing, or low in the background keeping you company – and this is something he can fix easily.

He fishes the small communications device he had put together out of the pocket of his discarded pants, then comes back to sit on the foot of the bed and begins typing away. You’re quick to crawl up behind him, and you wrap your arms around his chest and settle your chin on his shoulder while he works. You don’t see the smile that breaks across his face as he feels your excited impatience radiate off you, having figured out what he’s doing. It’s so palpable he wouldn’t have needed your emotional bond as alpha and omega to sense it.

Once he’s modified his device to play music, it doesn’t take him much longer to hack into your music account. He pulls up the list of your most-played songs, picks one that he thinks will be perfect for this moment, and hits play.

You croon with joy and then fall back on the bed, arms spread out in pure rapture. He beams and then crawls up next to you, handing you the device. You hold it close to your chest with one hand and pull him in for a kiss with the other.

You break off the kiss so you can sing along to the chorus, and he laughs. He knows exactly the last time he felt this happy: the last day by the river with you in Wakanda. When the chorus is over, you actually kick your feet in delight, grinning at him. You kiss his nose, scoot your body as close to him as possible, then settle back into the mattress and pull his arm to rest over your stomach.

The two of you talk, sing, and continue to hold each other for a while. A string of two or three softer songs play, and you and up drifting into sleep, late afternoon sun pouring over both of you, its warmth too much for you to ignore after the physically and emotionally exhausting afternoon. He watches the rise and fall of your chest, his hand over your heart, no thought for time. He doesn’t want to move, doesn’t want to take his eyes off you. How did he survive without you for all those weeks?

A flare of light across the room pulls his focus though. It’s a repetitive flashing coming through the window to the wall.

Morse code. His blissful mood evaporates.

C-O-M-E  O-U-T-S-I-D-E

The other alpha is out there, summoning him.

He identifies which window the light is being directed into, then pads over, and releases the drape to cover the window, pulls it back, covers it again, and then secures it back in its open state. The other alpha will know he’s received the message.

Bucky has referred to him as the other alpha for so long now, but he’s ultimately about to discover who this man is. You say he’s no longer The Captain Hydra that he was, but not yet his Steve either.

He doesn’t hurry getting dressed. The other alpha isn’t going anywhere. He’s waited this long. He can continue to wait.

Bucky takes a long look at you from across the room before he leaves.

He’s relatively sure he will come back to you. There’s only one outcome that will keep him away, and now that he knows the potential danger, he won’t let this man ambush him ever again.

Bucky stalks as carefully to the tree line where the signal had come from as he had when he’d first approached the little house. He can smell the other alpha on the breeze that rustles through the trees. He tracks him in a kilometer or so – not in the direction Bucky had left his vehicle, but that works fine for him because if he needs to cut and run, he’ll be able to get to you in the house and then continue on to get to the getaway without having to double back and without the other alpha being able to cut off the route.

Bucky will think through every possible scenario as each moment of this unfolds.

His brain got him here.

His brain can get him out.

He will keep you safe.

The scent he’s known nearly his whole life grows stronger, and when he reaches a small pocket of the forest devoid of trees – not quite large enough to be called a clearing – instead of slipping silently out of the shadows, the other alpha steps out unabashedly to meet him.

“What took you so long, Buck?” he has the gall to ask, his voice barely covering notes of anger.

Bucky roars and hurls himself at the man standing before him, taking him to the ground easily, and they scramble against each other. They’re so closely matched in skill, prowess, and power, and the energy they’re both exuding is raw, primal, and angry. Bucky is incredulous that the other man is angry with him.

His own rage lands him a punch. He takes a blow to the ribs, and the other alpha gets a hand on the collar of his shirt, resulting in a tear, but it allows Bucky to grab his wrist, twist him around harshly, and pin the arm behind his back as he decisively thumps him into the ground, pinning him there.

The man beneath him only makes two attempts to struggle and shift out from under his hold, but then he sighs and sags into the tall grass they’ve been tussling in.

Is he feinting?

Bucky honestly doesn’t know.

“Who am I talking to?” he asks – the same line of inquiry Steve used on him in an abandoned warehouse outside of Berlin.

He knows it, letting out a guffaw beneath him. “I’m not him anymore.”

“Not who?”

“I’m no longer their Captain Hydra,” he pauses before adding, “but I’m not the kid from Brooklyn either.”

Bucky knows they’re not going to stay like this forever, and he needs to see this man’s face and look into his eyes if he’s going to be able to sort out any of this, so as swiftly as he can, he releases the alpha, pushes himself up, and takes a wary stance a few meters away.

Steve remains on the ground, but rolls over and sits up, planting his feet on the ground, and leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. It’s almost a casual.

Bucky will have the advantage of already being up on his feet if the man before him tries anything.

Bucky needs to know how to read whoever this is, so he decides to go with a different line of questioning – things that are more cut and dry.

“When you left the base in Geneva, there were two Hydra security with you. You stopped over a bridge two hours into your journey, and they weren’t with you when you switched vehicles in Albstadt. Who were they, and why the elaborate ruse only to drop them in a river so quickly?”

Rather than being surprised, it seemed he was satisfied that Bucky knew this much about what had played out. “Alright, we can start there. Leaving under the initial guise of a mission on security footage was supposed to be helpful when they started looking for me.”

“And why move the records of their transfer files to other facilities with two others?”

“I’m glad you picked up on that, too. Buying more time for some missing personnel before it was suspect and they figured out they really didn’t know where they were.”

“And why them?”

“Arbitrary.”

“Bullshit. You’ve gone on solo missions as Captain Hydra and you didn’t buy enough extra time by leaving with a two-man team to make it worth the set up only to drop them in the river without a reason.”

Steve’s brows knit together, and he chewed on the inside of his cheek for a moment before answering. “One was arbitrary. He just happened to be the roommate of my target. The one I was after? He was part of the extraction team who took our omega out of Turin. Specifically, he’s the one who handled her so roughly she had bruises from his casual brute strength. I watched the footage to figure out who hurt her.”

Bucky cocked his head and studied the man before him.

“I had only been an alpha to her for a month and I was willing to kill someone who harmed her. What are you going to do to me, Buck?”

Bucky turned and paced way, running his hands through his hair. He didn’t want to show this much unrest in front of the other alpha, but he was thinking and feeling so much, trying to read and decipher too many pieces.

He lets out a long exhale and just speaks the truth. He can’t try and take any other angle. “I haven’t decided yet.”

Before all of this, if there had ever been a situation in which Bucky would have needed to trust someone else to keep you safe, Steve would have been his immediate answer.

Steve waits silently.

There are so many questions he wants answers to, and so he starts asking them. The answers don’t shock him, and he can see that even when Steve doesn’t tell him the full truth, it’s a cautious guarding of information, but he detects no lies in any of it. That Steve has some guards up also seems tenuous, possibly temporary, like if he can only ask the right question, the tide will turn.

But it couldn’t be that simple with Steve, could it?

And when did he start to think of him as Steve again?

Bucky deals out one of the questions he’s had the longest, since the very beginning of this. “What you said that night in Wakanda – you did all of this to draw me out. Why?”

Steve lets it hang in the air for a moment, but Bucky can see this is a crux for this conversation with him, too.

“I can’t explain everything that went into that plan – I don’t know if the machine of Captain Hydra was fully in control or if part of the old me was trying to grasp at you as a lifeline, but as the weeks wore on, the strategist in me knew he needed either the Soldat to join him or his best friend to save him.”

Those words sink into Bucky, and he can understand that explanation as no one else in this world can.

“What took you so long?” Steve asks again, but this time it’s tinged only with angst, not anger.

The accusation in it unsettles Bucky.

He’s still not sure how to address the question, but he starts with, “The Soldat is gone. The Winter Soldier? Not who I needed to be to get here either.”

Steve pushes up from the ground but maintains the distance Bucky put between them. “Who are you now then?”

Bucky narrows his eyes. “Depends on who’s standing in front of me.”

Steve looks off into the trees for a moment – in the direction of the cottage.

Bucky’s instincts have failed him less than a handful of times.

They’re telling him now that’s where to start, even though he’s not sure exactly where it will end. “I’ve seen a lot of versions of you – my childhood best friend, the punk who couldn’t stay out of trouble, the stars and stripes symbol, Captain America, the target who wouldn’t let me assassinate him and then refused to finish me off in the hellicarrier, the Cap who went against the Accords, Nomad in exile – but always Steve. You’ll never be who you were before – I never was. Doesn’t mean you’re irredeemable.”

Steve scoffs. “It’s not that easy.”

Bucky gives a wry laugh and shakes his head. “I more than know that. But you’re shades of all those men right now in front of me. She sees it, too.”

“God, she…” Steve shakes his head, puts one hand on his hip, and scrubs over his face with the other.

“If you can be you, if you can be Steve, she will have you.” He’s not sure where the words came from, but he himself believes them as he says them.

“I don’t know if I can be.”

“Do you want to be?”

Steve doesn’t answer immediately. Bucky can see him sincerely work over the question in his mind. It’s a simple inquiry, but one that will define everything, and Bucky knows he will be completely behind whatever answer he gives because that is the core of who this man is and always has been – fully committed to his convictions.

When Steve says, “Yes,” Bucky can hear the heaviness in his voice. Bucky nods.

“What about you?” Steve asks.

Bucky shifts his weight from one foot to the other as he digs back into himself and where his head, his heart, and his gut now sit with all of this. But the answer is clear enough. “Till the end of the line,” he answers.

“Even after I–“

“Stop,” Bucky cuts him off. “I’ve had little more to think about over the last six weeks than us – all of us. And it felt like my heart started beating again when I found her, but you… Before this I never fully understood why you fought so hard to get through to me when I was trying to kill you in DC all those years ago, why you searched for me for years, why you were a goddamn pain in the ass who wouldn’t abandon me in Berlin and believed in me without question, but now I get it. We are in each other’s bones.”

He doesn’t move, but Bucky sees the look change in Steve’s eyes, and he can practically feel the air alter between them. They’ve always had an acute awareness of each other, and Bucky can feel the tentative return of it, like déjà vu even though he’s still figuring out who this Steve is or who he will be.

“When did you start giving Captain America speeches?” Steve finally asks.

Bucky shrugs. “One of us had to do it.”

“What now then?”

Bucky has sketched out many scenarios for how things play out from here, but every stage of this, every new revelation shifts the direction they’re heading. Even in the last two minutes things have significantly shifted again.

Bucky licks his lips and stares at Steve for another beat before he decides to head down a path he hopes is the right one. “You’re always a man with a plan, so you tell me. Tell me where this started, when it changed, where you think it ends. I figured out a lot, I have theories, and I still have questions.”

“We went to Italy to investigate a lead that came up on our radar. We thought it was an innocuous enough whisper about a couple of Hydra scientists. And don’t,“ Steve pauses to pointedly look at him because Bucky was already opening his mouth to argue. “I already know you’re going to say we should have involved you, I thought of it every day they were holding us captive. I thought it the second I heard their boots. It was a week after you left for Wakanda, and Sam–“

He pauses again, and his shoulders fall just a fraction.

“Sam and I weren’t gonna bother you.”

“She told me about Sam,” Bucky says.

Steve closes his eyes for a moment, pressing his lips together. “I told her enough about what happened, but I didn’t tell her everything.” He opens his eyes and meets Bucky’s again. His face is truly haunted, and Bucky nods, his own chest tight. He knows more than enough about that. He had still had to face the demons of his past, but when he was ready, and he had fought to find his way to do that. Steve would find a way, but it would take time, and not likely be the same journey.

“After they killed Sam, they got a raw version of me, shut down, and they went to work conditioning me, shaping me into Captain Hydra. I was too lost to fight anything. I couldn’t save him. I failed us. I didn’t want to be me. It was easy too easy for them to get the version of me they wanted when I was like that.”

There’s a full shift in how Steve lays everything out – and as he shares, Bucky knows it’s still not everything, but he can feel that it’s everything Steve can bear to tell him.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

Steve tilts his head and looks off into the forest. “It was and it wasn’t. It will always haunt me.”

“It will, but less and less.”

Bucky walks to the edge of the small clearing and sits on a fallen log. Steve follows him.

“When I was trying to find you after DC and taking down S.H.I.E.L.D. I read everything they had on record about you, how they conditioned you. They used some but not all the same methods on me.”

“I couldn’t find anything on you, and I found more than enough other hidden monstrosities in their networks these past weeks.”

“I think they got smarter after we were hunting them after exposing them – they couldn’t keep everything off the databases, but they have projects now that they keep paper-only, small teams. There was the team that captured us, but after they put us in a holding cell, we were transferred. From that point through the torture, the breaking point, and the conditioning I only saw four faces – three scientists and one officer who became my liaison. When they sent or let me out into the field, I never went with a team of more than four of their men, always the same four. Two of them I ended at that bridge.”

Bucky nods.

Already his mind is calculating – this means they could potentially contain and eliminate all of the people who knew any specifics about Captain Hydra.

“One of the scientists was killed when you stormed the facility in Turin.”

Bucky raises his brows. Even better.

Steve goes on to tell him about how he was sent on a few missions to test his loyalty before he was given the task to bring back the Soldat.

“I didn’t have a chair, and they were very adamant that my point person was my liaison and not a handler, they gave me a fair amount of autonomy. They didn’t want me to drag you in. They wanted you to join me. I think they felt like an asset who had to be controlled could break free as they saw with you the first time around, and this time they wanted operatives who weren’t giving controlled compliance, but allegiance instead.”

Bucky grunted. “A tether rather than a leash.”

“Yeah.”

“But you knew who I was tethered to.”

Steve’s head drops. “Yeah.”

“And you knew I’d be the most vulnerable and off my guard in Wakanda.”

“I did.”

Bucky lets him sit with that discomfort.

Bucky has replayed that night in his mind so many times.

“But your plan changed that night. I didn’t register it in the moment, but everything about you changed the moment you bit into her neck to claim her.”

Steve doesn’t deny it.

“Before you sunk your teeth into her, you were taunting me, dangling her like something to be smashed and discarded, you didn’t even know if it would work, and I think part of you thought it might even kill her.”

Bucky sees Steve’s jaw tick.

“You were in no way prepared for how a bond would change you fundamentally as an alpha.”

“Obviously it didn’t flip a switch immediately, but yes, it altered what I intended to do,” Steve admits.

He goes on to explain some of the things that happened in Turin – missions he went on, how things had developed with you, the clothes, and the books.

“The books were for her?” Bucky breathes. “I saw security footage of you in the bookshop.”

“I wasn’t worried about exposing myself because you were already taking longer than I wanted you to take, but when you didn’t access any of the Avenger networks, bases, or safehouses, I expected you were underground and untraceably hunting for us.”

“What else did you expect?”

“I wanted you to get foolish in your desperation and tip your hand.”

“Not with her on the line.”

“No.” Steve narrows his eyes. “You never left Turin once you showed up on our radar, did you?”

Bucky scoffs. “Course I didn’t.”

Steve nods. “A ploy to see all the defenses of the base.”

“But you left dangerously close to her heat,” Bucky shoots, the disapproving accusation blatant in his tone.

“And that’s when you made your unsuccessful move to get her back. If you’d killed everyone you’d encountered from the beginning, you probably would have made it to her in time.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

“No, I know you do.” Steve sighs. “You know, back in 1945, I thought you were dead when you fell off that train.”

Bucky doesn’t interrupt. He knew Steve knew he knew this. They’d touched on it before. But clearly there was more and a reason for Steve to bring it up again now.

“The thing is, when they found you, I know Zola did what he did to you because of me, your tie to me. When they took me and Sam, they tortured him and killed him because of me, again. You were both people I cared about, and you were hurt for it. I was not going to let it happen to her. The sense of responsibility I felt for her had already been growing and evolving, but when I felt that surge of adrenaline and fear through the bond when you attacked the base and they moved her? It had been a slow melting of ice, what was developing there, but that shattered the ice. When I found out they had moved her, I kept my personal weakness guarded, and I knew I would do everything I could to get her out of their web and keep her safe.”

At this admission, Bucky is quiet. So is Steve. Bucky knows Steve is letting him think. There’s so much to consider there – the guilt Steve has still carried for him for years, the fresh hell of Sam, and the fervent determination to keep you from being another victim by association.

He could think over this for much longer, but there are more pieces he still needs context for, so next Bucky asks, “Why did you leave the Geneva facility during her heat?”

“Best cover for time – alphas are given room to take care of their needs during rut or care for omegas if they’re bonded during their omega’s heat.”

It verifies what Bucky had theorized himself.

“But it’s been eight days since you came here.”

“Yeah,” Steve nods.

“And you’ve just…been here.”

“Yeah.”

This is the piece Bucky has been suspicious of now.

“Explain.”

“When I took her to Turin, yes, it was a trap to lure you. When I brought her here, it was to wait for you to find us. I couldn’t find you when you went underground before, and I couldn’t find you this time, and if I tried too hard, I didn’t want to risk Hydra finding us, but I knew if we stayd in one place and I focused on keeping us hidden from Hydra, you could find us.”

Bucky furrows his brow, frowning.

“Simple as that?”

“Simple as that,” Steve confirms.

Bucky studies him for another quiet few seconds, then says, “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay.”

“So, what now?”

“Her,” Bucky replies simply. “We’ve still got a lot of shit to figure out, but we’ve got to do it with her.”

↠ Masterlist | Aspen's Ask Box | Field Guide to the Forest

Still with me? This was a lot. I hope I've answered some of your questions, and there are some more that have been brought up, but... we're here. We're this far.

This is the single longest story/chapter I've ever published. You can see where I've left off, and there's clearly more story, but Bucky reuniting with his omega and with Steve were the primary objectives, and both of those elements I didn't want to cheat or shorten as they began to unfold. I hope they've truly done justice to these characters and relationships, and we'll see how they can possibly move forward together in the conclusion. These three still have big things ahead.

read more from the Dark Forest Fest

[jojo-schmo]

From a lot of your roleswap forgotten land au posts I've seen, I'm guessing you see the forgotten land as more of a place where humans could've once inhabited in the past? And with that question, I'd wonder what your roleswap Elfilis would be like if they met someone like Adeleine? Would it spark up those memories of humans from the past or just feel vaguely familiar to them? Also, I love your art it's so much fun!

Hello! Thank you for the lovely compliment!

And GREAT question! Lemme crack my knuckles and share some of my thoughts! Based on the lore crumbs we got fed in the game, these are some of my headcanons for the comic:

Humans were the previous inhabitants of the Forgotten Land

They were technologically capable on a scale comparable to our real-life Earth.

I don’t think they used the warp technology they got from Fecto Elfilis on a practical, civilian scale. There’s no evidence that the common person had access to this technology since the world resembles ours so much. Wouldn’t the technology make for some great transportation, killer amusement park rides, or even a good way to get rid of waste? But that’s not present in the game from what I remember! Their world is too similar to ours. They probably dedicated the technology to military and academic use.

There’s evidence that they left because they exhausted the planet’s resources, or outgrew the place. Perhaps finding a way off the planet was also what they mainly dedicated the warp technology to.

They abandoned the planet on a population-wide scale, which is why so much of their daily life is preserved. They knew they wouldn’t be coming back so they just sort of dropped whatever they were doing and left everything they didn’t need behind. That’s why the ruins that remain look so frozen in time. It’s like when stores at the mall close up shop. If you go into the space they left behind, you can often find the things they didn’t bother to take with them and get a glimpse at the kind of stuff they did there. (Side note, I friggin love urban exploration, dead malls, abandoned buildings/theme parks, the Life After People show, etc. So a big reason why I love Forgotten Land so much is because it feels like it was made specifically to cater to my interests, haha)

Left alone on the planet, the Beasts evolved to be the main species after a few generations of evolution

The planet’s resources healed after people left, so that’s how it was able to sustain life and even allow a “modern” settlement like Waddle Dee Town to thrive

As for the second half of your ask about Elfilis-!! OOOOUGH it’s a very good question and I want to answer this fully but I cannot go into detail quite yet since it’s a spoiler! But humans are indeed part of their past. That’s all I can say for now!!

Thanks for reading! Smooches! 😙

[inari-zaheer]

HII!! I’ve absolutely loved the ciel and ganyu request, would you mind taking my request?? I’m not a good explainer at describing a character or person so definitely go on the wiki to search their personality and stuff, it’ll be a big help, but lemme get started anyways…

Can you do Vi, Caitlyn and Jinx with a S/O who has a Noé Archiviste Personality from The Case Study of Vanitas??

thank you very much, i might send more to you a little later lolol

Thank you so much bestie💙💙💙

Vi, Caitlyn and Jinx With Noé Archiviste!Reader

Pairing:Vi x Reader;Caitlyn x Reader;Jinx x Reader

TW:None(unless you think vampire stuff is triggering lol)

—————————————

Vi

One of the things that you and Vi had in common was the amazement for new things, as she spent a lot of time in prision she didnt get to see the technology evolution

Before you started dating she got worried thinking that the beautiful purple in your eyes were because of shimmer, and felt relieved to know it was just because you were a different species

She often tried not to be as reckless as she was used to when she notices how worried you are of her

But the tables can turn quickly as she's the one being worried after you start a fight with someone that did something you considered wrong

Specially when you went to defend her on a fight she picked with someone, she trusted your abilities, but she could not help herself

She loved the contrast between your style and hers, you complimented each other in every way

Speaking of looks, Vi would often caress you sharp features, specially at night when she couldn’t sleep, it would be soothing for her

She was never good with words, so one time she let you feed from her so you could understand her past

Let's just say she had to spend a whole day cuddling you saying that it was ok now and you didn’t had to feel sad for her

She threatened to put a leash on you as a joke once so she would not lose you if you got distracted in a huge crowd

Caitlyn

You and Cait met when you were kids as you got adopted by people who were friends with the Kirammans

She always knew you were a vampire and used it on her favor when people were mean to her while growing up lol

She’d often steal your clothes to add in her style

She’d definitely keep a little note book and use it to write everything you needed to remember every day

You would be her partner after you both finished the enforcer academy, often being sent to sites where things might go crazy

Not only that but the both of you have the same morals, so you were literally made for each other not only in love aspect but also work wise

She’d take you on dates to wherever her money could just to see your surpised face and shiny eyes everytime you saw something new

You’d be the one always tending her injuries and scolding her for being reckless everytime she came back hurt

Sometimes she kind of prefer trusting the logic better than your gut feeling, but when you're right shes always there to praise you and thank you for the help

She’d let you feed from her from time to time, as you grew up together it was kind of a way to revive your best memories, but also helped you on helping her with insecurities caused by her strict parenting

Jinx

Jinx was not the only one to be taken under Silco's wing as a child, he saw your potential and took you in with her

Although you never saw each other as siblings, you were pretty much together all the time

Pranking others, helping each other get better at your respective abilities, going up Silco's office to snitch on his business meetings, you name it

When you do engage in a relantionship that’s when Jinx never leave your side

She knows she can protect herself, but having you by her side makes her feel secured

She thought it was so cool to be dating a vampire and definitely used it in her favour to kind of threaten people

Althought she’s super smart her memory might be as bad as yours lol

She definitely asked you to feed off of her multiple times, the first time you could not help but feel devastated for her but as time went on everytime you did it the memories got better as most of them were about you together

Not to mention that she saw it mostly as a sexual thing than anything else

Sometimes when she wanted to give you clothes she’d ask Silco for help, and he’d be happy to help Jinx as he definitely influenced your style

[pasteljeon]

Shadows (m)

summary | he could love you … if only you’d let him in.

genre | venom au, venom!jk, smut, angst

warnings | tentacle porn, oral (female receiving), edging, guk has a fat cock ana oop, size kink, sexual tension, mating cycles, heat sex (yeah, you read that right)

length | 1.9k

notes | i crawl out of retirement for this one (1) halloween fic that i’ve been dyin to write since forever. and, as some already know, this also just an excuse for tentacle porn. :D happy halloween everyone! wish i could’ve written sth longer, but it’s still midterm season for me & i’m beyond buried in work rn :”( regardless, please enjoy!

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.

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“Kook.”

Silence. The mass lying in the middle of the room remained motionless.

You sighed, forehead thumping against the one-way glass. Theoretically, you knew he wouldn’t be able to see you, but he could sense you. Feel your presence.

“Kookie. Please.” Your breath ghosted across the barrier.

The darkness shifted, a tendril reluctantly reaching to seek out your heat, pressed against where your palm was splayed on the other side.

“Miss ___.” You flinched, the monotone voice of your assistant startling you momentarily.

“The next trial begins in ten minutes. Should I bring the volunteer in?”

Her perfectly manicured nails tapped against the sleek black clipboard, sharp eyes unimpressed as they note your affection for the containment within.

Living organisms with compositions so extraordinary they were coveted as a chance to revolutionize humanity. A symbiotic relationship, they relied on molecular bonding with a host to survive. A symbiote. The term alien often whispered with every passing of fluttering white lab boats.

Simply put, they were experiments.

And you headed them all.

You glanced back briefly, only to find he’d already retreated, unmoving once more.

.

.

.

The research facility was intimidating, stripped white walls bare and plain, the building expansive and equipped with the latest technology. Endless floors filled with glass walls lining different divisions.

Within these walls, there was transparency. Outside of it, no one knew much at all.

The guilt chipped away at you slowly.

They were real. They felt. They were very much capable of the same human emotions your species processed. They hurt. Felt pain. Each compatibility failure was destroying them.

There were many that did not survive the crash. All that was left, scavenged from the space outreach initiative, were seven uniquely distinct specimens. All the equivalent of a male.

They all had binary identifications, but you gave them something else. A name.

Namjoon. He was exceedingly intelligent. The first few months had been spent attempting to establish ground communications with them. Namjoon had picked up your language easily, and it no longer shocked you to see a massive dark blob flipping through encyclopedias. He liked to read, consuming pages like oxygen. With every routine checkup, you’d deliver a few novels you’d enjoyed in the past. His upper section of his blobbed body would incline, and you’d imagine he was thanking you.

Seokjin was the eldest of the bunch, as concluded by your preliminary findings of their biological structure. Oddly enough, though it had been discovered early on that their kind could sustain themselves on anything, they still preferred human flesh. It didn’t make them dangerous, necessarily—you could teach them human ethics. For the most part, Seokjin tried not to nip at your ankles when you visited. As a substitute, you taught him how to cook. There was a mini kitchen set up in his quarantine, and some nights were spent with him stretching his mass over your shoulder and watching you work.

Yoongi was, kindly put, lazy. He slept most of the day, scarcely reacted when you tried to interact with him. You did, however, discover he liked music. He got speakers. Headphones made his head hurt, he once signed to you. Noise sensitivity.

Hoseok was so human it hurt. He was energetic, restless. He bounced around his containment. His own version of dancing, almost.

Taehyung and Jimin refused to separate. When you first examined them, you’d nearly mistaken them for one entity. Soulmates, if the concept existed in their world. They shared one cell, liked to tussle and fight one another.

Then there was Jungkook. He was shy, barely moved when you first met. If not for the pulse beneath his silk, there was no sign of life at all. You were endeared as he slowly broke from his shell. He liked you. You knew because you were the only one that could get close, that could touch him without repercussions. He’d killed his hosts, regardless of compatibility, thrice before they paused trials. He hated it more than any of them.

But here, they were safe.

And yet here, they were also being harvested. Used. To become the steppingstone in humanity’s evolution. Time was running out, and the private company that spearheaded the research was demanding results.

Here, they are to become weapons.

And you were going to break them out.

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“Kook. Jungkook.”

Your voice was urgent, though steady.

Panic setting in heavy in your stomach when you saw him press himself closer to the wall.

“Hey, hey. It’s okay. I won’t let it touch you. But we need to get out of here, and fast. The building’s going to collapse,” you coaxed. The flames licked your back, warning you of the fire that blazed across the hall.  

He quivered, drawing away from your extended hand.

Fire. Bad. Hurts.

You bit back your gasp. His voice was low, a quiet rumble in your head.

You steeled your nerve. “I know. Bond with me.”

He stilled.

And then—mine. You belong to me. We are one.

And you said, “always.”

He shot to you, sinking beneath your flesh and making a home in the beating of your heart.

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.

.

You disappeared.

As the building burned, so did all the data and files you’d accumulated over the years. The symbiote all dispersed, you having found a suitable host months prior. Some were friends, some were not. But they all cared, and you knew they would find sanctuary in a peaceful life with them.

So you let them go, and turned over a new page.

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.

.

You monitored your vitals for the first few hours, fearing the compatibility would elude you.

Will not. Belong together. Us.

His thoughts echoed, though always soft.

“Where do you want to go?” You wondered aloud as you fingered the plane ticket in your hands.

Hungry, he said instead. You could feel him gnawing at your liver. “Don’t do that. You might accidentally split it.”

If he had lips, you imagined he’d be pouting.

Where we going? You had the feeling he was trying to read the slip.

“Somewhere cold.”

You hate cold.

“You hate the heat.” The first calls for boarding had you wheeling your luggage to the gates.

Don’t care. As long as we are together. Can go anywhere.

You smiled down at your passport, cheeks warm. “Yeah.”

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.

It took time to adjust to a completely different lifestyle. Your previous line of work had compensated your risk generously, and you’d had enough foresight to invest and save wisely.

Here, you’d picked up a job as a pharmacist at one of the local drug stores. It was terribly mundane, but you found you liked this kind of routine. It was a welcomed change from the scars you’d collected. A sense of normality.

It was October when everything changed.

Jungkook had been restless lately. Distant. Withdrawn.

It’s like he’d curled up in the corner of your mind. Lethargic.

You knew the symptoms.

“Kook.” He stirred faintly at the sound of your voice.

Lover. He rumbles lowly, rousing slowly.

“Your heat. It’s coming soon.” You rolled over, the sheets pooling at your waist. A tendril wraps itself loosely around your calf.

Yes.

“What will you do?”

Another tendril creeps up your stomach, squeezing your breast firmly.

You.

.

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.

Their heats were intense. Nothing like you could’ve ever imagined. While they only occurred once a full cycle, the need overwhelmed them, made them ravenous and delirious. And a human host? They served as aphrodisiacs. Enhanced the craving until it all but consumed them.

You woke in a feverish haze, a thin sheen of sweat coating your skin, panties shoved aside and thighs smeared with wetness.

“J-Jungkook!” You gasped, back arching as he fucked you harder.

“Love. My love,” he rasped, fingers curling, watching you come undone with dark eyes.

It was also the only time they could fully materialize.

He was ethereal, pupils blown out, a thin ring of gold visible in the ebony that threatened to swallow it all. Completely naked, tanned complexion stretching over corded muscles, he hovered over you, arms braced next to your head. His hair was soft, luscious and long, falling in waves over his forehead. Darkness mirrored his every movement, his true form rippling beneath the surface.

“Want you. Need you,” Jungkook groaned, gaze smoldering as he fisted your sleep tee. “Please.”

“Since you asked so politely,” you managed breathlessly. You took his hand and slipped it underneath, guiding it until he traced the underside of your breast.

He ripped the fabric apart, buttons flying as he shoved the offending material off your shoulders. “Need. Can’t control. Please.”

In spite of the inferno brewing within, he remained your ever sweet Jungkook. The shadows drew closer, the touch soft though frantic, mapping your body in long strokes. He buried his face in your cunt, abnormally long tongue driving you crazy with every lick.

“K-Kook, I c-can’t,” you sobbed, fingers gripping his locks as he coaxed another orgasm from you easily.

His palms, warm and large, spread your legs apart. His cock was intimidating, tip angry and throbbing, a tantalising vein running along the side. He was dripping with something akin to precum, the substance slightly lighter and thicker than the human equivalent.

The dark tendrils snaked around you just as he slammed into you.

Your moan was lost to his lips, kiss messy and wild, your mind blanking with every thrust and the stroke of his tongue. His tentacles tweaked and pulled at your nipples, twisting and teasing, others suckling at your clit while some were wrapped around his length, providing ridges that edged your sensitive core.

“Mine. Mine. Ours. Breed,” Jungkook chanted, the grip of his shadows tightening as if to brand their shape to your skin. It was too much.

“Y-yes, Koo, need you, need you just like this,” you cried out, walls spasming around him as you reached your high once more.

The bedframe rattled loudly, Jungkook’s pace increasing inhumanly as he pounded into you. “N-ngh—ah! L-love, so perfect, made for me. Thank you, thank you,” he moaned, hips stuttering as he came, filling you up hotly. So much it spilled from where he remained inside of you, dripping down your thighs.

His forehead rested against yours as he fought to quell his hunger for just a moment longer. Though his release brought brief clarity, the lust was already beginning to trickle back in. His cock twitched, the ache so profound his shadows latched onto you harder.

Your legs wrapped around his back, eyes soft as you said, “I’m all yours. Don’t hold back.”

Jungkook exhaled shakily. “Make me crazy.”

He nuzzled your neck, even as his dick pulsed, he pushed his nose into your jawline and whispered, “Lover. You and me. Until the end.”

[gingerbreadart1]

Really loving the latest artwork and lore! You are so creative! Can't wait to see what's next! No rush though, I know the good stuff takes time.

Oh my gosh thank you!!!!! I'm having a bit of a writer's block when it comes to the actual story, so I've been kinda messing around and doing research about different things. Idk if it's obvious yet, but I'm a huge nerd. I especially love science and sci-fi(duh) as well as biology! I actually wanted to be a doctor with some kind of focus on congenital disorders when I was a kid. Weird kid, I know. Anyway, I love thinking about lore and nerdy shit, so I'm gonna take this opportunity to do just that! Beware under the cut is a very long essay about space, civilizations, rambles, and math. Lots of math.

So, I have no idea where I want to start, but I know what I want to talk about so I'm gonna pick something and roll with it. First thing's first, the Kardashev scale.

Because this isn't an English class and I don't have to re-word shit, I'm gonna copy and paste from wikipedia for this one: "The Kardashev scale is a method of measuring a civilization's level of technological advancement based on the amount of energy it is able to use. The measure was proposed by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Kardashev in 1964." Cool? Cool.

So yeah, basically it's an easy way to say how advanced a civilization is, and it's broken up into three types.

A Type I civilization, also called a planetary civilization—can use and store all of the energy available on its planet.

A Type II civilization, also called a stellar civilization—can use and control energy at the scale of its planetary system.

A Type III civilization, also called a galactic civilization—can control energy at the scale of its entire host galaxy.

Just to give you a grasp of what that means relative to us, humans are estimated to be a type 0.73 civilization. We're expected to get to type 1 in a few hundred years or so. Here's where math comes in. Note: I hate, and am not good at math. So, take all of this with a grain of salt.

So, a Type 1 civ. is usually defined as one that can harness all the energy that falls on a planet from its parent star (for Earth–Sun system, this value is close to 1.74×10^17 watts), which is about four orders of magnitude higher than the amount presently attained on Earth, with energy consumption at ≈2×10^13 watts.

Before I go any further, I want to ramble a bit about their star

For my own personal headcanon that the Irken planet is slightly dimmer than earth, I'm gonna make the Irken star a K0 type star. For reference, the sun is a G2V star, meaning it's a yellow dwarf. A K0 star is kind of inbetween red dwarfs and yellow dwarfs. Quick explanation on the letter-number thing, (as best as I understand it, disclaimer I am not an expert) The letter is the classification of a star based on heat and luminosity, going O, B, A, F, G, K, M, L. O being the brightest and hottest (and largest typically) and L being the opposite. The number is size. A higer positive number means a smaller star. A G2 yellow dwarf is smaller than a G-3 yellow dwarf.

Make sense? God I hope so. Anyway, I picked a K0 star for a couple reasons.

They live longer. Our sun has a lifespan of about 10 billion years, but a K type star has a lifespan of 18-34 billion years. Because of this some scientists think they're a prime place to look for life because of their long stability.

They emit less ultraviolet radiation, which can damage DNA, making the developement of life less likely to be hindered by this star

They're 3-4 times more common that G type stars, so it's literally more likely that the irken sun is a K type anyway

They're dimmer and cooler (but not by much) than G type, which fits into my own personal HC about a dimmer sun.

ANYWAY now to get back into the first topic, the Kardashev scale. The irken sun has a temperature of 5,240° Kelvin (8,900° F/4970° C), a radius of .85 (367,445 m/591,345km), a mass of .78 (3.42^30lbs/1.551^30kg), and a luminosity of .40 or 1.531^26 watts.

Compare all this to our sun (Temp of 5,780°K, radius 1, mass 1, and luminosity of 1, being 3.827^26 watts), basically the Irken sun is smaller and less powerful.

Back to the Kardashev scale. Modern day earth is .73, right? I imagine that Irkens are somewhere in the high 1's, like 1.7. The reason I'm not placing them in two is because I don't headcanon that they've built a dyson sphere or a matrioshka brain.

For those who don't know, a Dyson sphere is a hypothetical megastructure that completely encompasses a star and captures a large percentage of its power output. These bad boys are imagined to look kindof like this

Cool as hell right? Also not something I think Irkens would be focused on. they're more about outward and conquering expansion rather than efficiant energy consumption and useage.

With that in mind, I'm going to say on the civilization range Kardashev scale Irkens are 2.000279. The reason for that tiny decimal amount is because a level 2 civ is one that has full control over their solar system, and a level 3 is one that has full control over their galaxy.

Galaxies are huge. Really huge. The Milky Way galaxy (In W&C Irkens are in the Milky Way as well) is on the smaller side, but it still has 100 billion stars, and 100-400 billion planets. Of those planets, an estimated 300 million to 50 billion may contain life, but most people stick it down at the low end of 300 million. So I'm going to use that number as well.

To figure out where they are on the scale, I have to figure out how large the Irken Empire actually is, so I looked at some other fictional empires.

In Star Wars, there are 1.5 million planets under the galactic empire, and an additional 60 million colonies (which can be as small as a space station or something idk)

But in Star Trek, there are only 150 planets in the federation.

In Dune, it's the whole Universe.

So there's a lot of variation here. Personally, I think under a thousand planets is a good number for a rapidly growing Empire that has unrealistic visions of grandeur, so I placed the amount of planets under their control to be 837 and called it a day.

Thus, 2.000279 on the scale.

Now with that number I'm gonna assign Irk a year. Physicist Michio Kaku suggested that it will take a few thousand years for humans to reach type two status, so I'm going to use that as a starting point to work on.

One might tack on a few thousand years to 2021 and call it a day, but I can't do that because the Gregorian calendar is religion based, and irkens probably don't have Jesus so it would be weird to base make a year for them based off of the Gregorian calendar. So instead I'm going to use the Holocene calendar. If you haven't heard of it, you're missing out! It's a very cool calendar that respresents and encompasses all of human history, and it's a very simple change: It adds 10,000 years to the current calendar, so for example, it is the year 12,021 on the holocene calendar. Cool right? The reason for this 10,000 year addition is 12,000 years ago is right around the time humans actually started settiling and building structures and beginning to farm. Thus, the birth of human civilization.

So I'm gonna be unrealistic and apply that 12,000 year first farm -> cell phone period to Irkens, and then tack on... idk let's say 2700 years. Cool beans, now we have a 15,700 year old Irken calendar. Except, 15,700 human years isn't equal to 15,700 Irken years. They're different planets, with different rotations, so they have different years. I have a previous post where I mention some basic statistics about the planet, go check it out! But for here, know that an irken year is 1.3 times longer than an earth year, so their calendar is actually going to be in the year 20,410 in the same amount of time. Let's say it's 20,417 just for funsies.

Hip hip hooray, Irk has a calendar! A year! Woohoo!

And with that, this post is long enough so I'm gonna end it here, but I plan on making a subsequent post that deals with evolution, speciation, and whatnot so stay tuned!

[young-dumb-rocks]

countdown to launch: intro 2 - the people [bri]

We’ll be posting a new “countdown” on Mondays and Fridays. This will lead up to Friday 10/22/21 when we’ll release our first real post. While we continue prepping for the official launch, we hope you’ll enjoy these small insights into our concept and who we are as people!

Who runs this blog?

There are two of us working on young-dumb-rocks! Our names are Bri and Cat. We met in college and have continued to cause chaos together post-grad. Cat was the one to first propose working together on some sort of internet project, and from there we have worked together to set up this blog (and our tiktok which will be announced at a later time).

This week: Say hello to Bri!

Hey! My name is Bri, and I don’t really know what I’m doing with my life. But! I’m learning to just take the vibes as they come. When I’m not chasing dogs or doom-scrolling on tiktok, you can usually find me baking, gaming, or reading. I’ve been on tumblr since 2013 and, at this rate, will never escape.

As for why I’m here: I’m the kind of person who loves to have some sort of “project” going on. Whether it’s trying out new recipes, writing stories, learning how to crochet in a covid-fueled haze, or starting a blog about early 20s chaos – I love messing around and seeing what I can do. I don’t know where this project will go, but I’m really excited to have this space to be creative online!

*On a more technical note, I handle the behind the scenes work on the tumblr side of things, so if you notice any issues please let me know!

Cat and I are both open to talking about just about anything, but if you’d like to get a better idea of where my personal interests lie, here are some things I especially enjoy discussing: cooking/baking, videogames (Yakuza, Mass Effect, Stardew Valley, + many more), kpop, my monthly spotify playlists, anime, YA/NA books, writing, learning Korean, arts & crafts (drawing, painting, knitting, crochet), digital culture, behavioral economics, why the DSM is problematic, the evolution of “hysteria” and its relation to burnout, why Adobe is annoying, and candles.

And, if you want the typical profile stuff:

I’m 23 years old, a Cancer sun and Aquarius moon (I don’t know much more than that), and an INFP. I graduated with a bachelor’s in psychology and a minor in science, technology, and society. I’m currently looking for a full-time job (yay) so in the meantime I act as a full-time babysitter for my family’s two dogs and generally spend my days trying out hobbies and avoiding too much existential dread.

My representative quote these days is: “The goal is to get, let it roll.”

That’s about it for me! If you’ve read this far, thanks for stopping by and I hope you’ll look forward to our actual content (which is coming very soon)!!

[shefanispeculator]

Gwen Stefani had begun working on new music before the lockdown hit, but says it was only when she brought up the idea of reintroducing herself to her collaborators that inspiration struck. “I'm not trying to force myself on anyone, and I'm not trying to have a comeback,” she says with a laugh. “I’m simply going to do some music without feeling defensive about it. Whoever likes me can listen. If you don't like it, you can actually say you don't like it! I don't care. I just want to put music out.”

After cutting a song in February with rising songwriter and producer Luke Niccoli (who’s worked with buzzy acts like Yves Tumor, Miya Folick, and Joji), Stefani was virtually introduced to pop hitmaker Ross Golan (Selena Gomez, The Chicks, P!nk), who suggested the trio write about exactly what the singer was feeling: a desire to remind people that she’s not just records collecting dust on your shelf.

“Let Me Reintroduce Myself,” released Monday, is a feel-good return to the ska/pop/reggae hybrid — record-scratching, horns, a walking bass line — that Stefani perfected during her time fronting No Doubt. Using her downtime in Oklahoma during the pandemic to dig back into ska’s roots, she immersed herself in the history of the genre, leading her to feel like now was the right moment to return to the sounds that first put her on the map 30 years ago. “All of the riots had happened, and I just started thinking so much about when I started loving music and why,” she says. “It was eighth grade when I learned about ska and Madness and the Selecter and all those bands that started to define the kind of music that I felt like I fit into; here I was, this Catholic girl from Anaheim doing reggae music! But that music was all about unity and anti-racism, and that was in the '70s. Then we were doing it in the '90s. And now here we are, again, in the same old mess.”

After the “Let Me Reintroduce Myself” writing session in late August (for which she later cut her vocals safely at the Los Angeles studio, the Village), Stefani began referring to Golan and Niccoli as her “song soulmates,” joining forces on a handful of other Zoom-born songs since then that will, if all goes according to plan, see the light of day some time in 2021. But for now, the No Doubt singer’s new track is a welcome return to form after five seasons judging The Voice, twice topping the country charts with fiance Blake Shelton, and building upon the success of her first-ever Christmas album, 2017’s You Make It Feel Like Christmas. “I just said, "I want to do some reggae,’” she remembers. “And it was just this weird full circle moment, because as soon as I started telling whoever I was going into the studio about that, they were so inspired too.”

In a call late last week, Stefani walked EW through returning to solo music, revisiting her back catalogue on the heels of Tragic Kingdom’s 25th anniversary, and how some of her biggest hits have gained new resonance in recent years.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: How are you feeling knowing this song is about to come out? GWEN STEFANI: Under the circumstances, to be able to put out new music is just beyond a gift. Even if it wasn't a pandemic it would be exciting, but it's crazy with the pandemic, you know what I'm saying? I just didn't think it was going to come this year or that I'd be this lucky.

What was your headspace like as you went into writing and recording new solo material this year? Well, this is the deal: I haven't really put a record out in five years. That's a long time. I don't know how it went by so quickly. I would have loved to, but I was doing the Vegas show [Just a Girl] and that took up a lot of time. Before that, I toured the record before, [2016’s This Is What the Truth Feels Like], and the next thing you know, five years passed. I also was feeling like... "Does anyone really want to hear new music from me?" It's so much work to make new music, and I think about all the bands that I loved — I don't go looking for their new records. I just listen to the stuff that I liked in high school .

Somebody sent me a song called “When Loving Gets Old,” and I really loved it. Nobody sends me songs. Why doesn't anyone just send me, like, “Umbrella”? I got this song, I actually liked it. I went in to record it. The girl that sent it to me said, "They actually wrote this for you." And I was like, "Really? No wonder the lyrics feel so good. Why don't I write with them?” We wrote this song called “Cry Happy,” made up of all of these lyrics I’d written on my phone. We had this really great day, but I had to rush home to the kids. It's so different these days; you get there and you have to get home to cook dinner, so I didn't get to cut a demo. That was last February. And then we hit lockdown.

I spent a hundred days in Oklahoma, doing laundry and cooking. We had 15 people there. It was an incredible pause on life to be there at the ranch with the boys and just have this surreal lifestyle for a while, but nothing to do with the life included creating music or anything like that. But Blake happens to have a studio there and had to do some work and brought an engineer in. So I recorded the vocals on “Cry Happy,” and that was like lighting a match to a wildfire because I was like, “My god, I’ve got to do music."

You felt inspiration again? I felt all kinds of inspirations and ideas. It's like God saying, "You’ve got to do this now." When I get that urgency, you can't stop me. I'm like, “I’ve got to go write songs. That's what I need right now. And I don't even care if anyone hears them, or if they think they suck, I'm doing it, now.”

When I got back to L.A., I went into the studio. Everything was plastic-guarded. You get your temperature taken. Everybody's wearing masks. By then, all of the riots had happened. I started to go back and investigate ska and reggae, and I found all these documentaries about how ska was born in the 1960s, how that was linked to the Jubilee when Jamaica was being freed from England. Starting No Doubt, we were the third-wave imitating the 1960s.Then I found this documentary on a school in Jamaica called the Alpha Boys School, which was run by Catholic nuns. There's this little white Catholic nun called Sister Mary Ignatius Davies who helped nurture reggae music. You can see all these pictures of her with these little boys and they're learning these brass instruments. The first ska band that was ever born was these kids out of Alpha Boys School, the Skatalites. No Doubt used to listen to them. Doing my research, it all just felt so full-circle.

So this music was born out of that. I wanted to go back and make something that was joyful and back to my roots, where it all started. [Pre-pandemic] I’d been in the studio with Luke Niccoli and he's the one that said you really should work with my friend Ross, who turned out to be someone who really gets my sarcasm, and the fun side of my lyrics. We really hit it off.

With Luke, we taught each other a lot, especially when it came to ska and reggae, because I kept saying, "Dude, no, listen to Sublime. It has to have scratching in it. It has to be '90s." So he was discovering all this stuff that he didn't know, but bringing his technology and youth to the sound. It was a perfect kind of combination between the three of us. And we wrote a bunch of songs together and I know we're going to write more.

Lyrically, “Let Me Reintroduce Myself” addresses the idea of people thinking of you as a relic. Is that how you feel? At the beginning of this process, I feel like I had to make excuses for why I wanted to make new music. I felt like people were going to judge me and be like, "Well, you're like super old. Why would you even want to?" This is just how my brain works. Anyone would, you know what I mean? Everybody has their own fears or insecurities.

Ross’s reaction was [for us to incorporate] a way of saying, “Well, I haven't really gone anywhere if you really think about it.” I just had a No. 1 hit on [country] radio ["Nobody But You"] — two of them actually, because the next one's ["Happy Anywhere"] going to go No. 1 soon [Editor’s note: it did, 24 hours after our call]. We were just trying to say I haven't really gone anywhere. I'm still doing the same thing. I still wear the same kind of stuff that I've always worn. It's just an evolution.

“Let Me Reintroduce Myself” references your past, lyrically and visually. Some artists are really loath to look backwards, but you seem extremely willing to. Why is that? Five years ago, when my life blew up in my face, there was a lot of looking back. Music has always been a really amazing place to pour my heart and emotions into. It's like therapy.

When I was offered to do the Vegas show — a huge milestone for me — it was very reflective. I think it's an incredible thing to put out new music and have your sound evolve, whether it be through the No Doubt years or the three solo records I did. The first solo record [2004’s Love. Angel. Music. Baby.] was very much a dance record — that was the pop music when I was in high school that I wasn't into, but was the backdrop of my life. Back then, I said, "You know what? I want to try to make that kind of music. I want a dance song." It was so incredible to be able to work with all the talented people that I did and have such a different kind of sound like that, which made me want to do the second record, [2007’s The Sweet Escape].

The third solo record was not born in the same way. It didn't have a reference for the production. It was just, “How do I get through this time in my life? I've got to write these songs. I don't care how they're dressed up sonically. It's just getting them out.” During the process of doing that, I fall in love and I'm writing a song about my life basically being over and then starting to fall in love at the same time, all with one album.

After that, it was like, how do I evolve? When you do a new record, usually everything comes with that: the tour, the merch, the vibe. But when you're doing a Vegas show, you don't have a new song. You don't have anything new. How do you create a show around everything you've done? So there was a lot of looking back and thinking about, “How do I make this feel super nostalgic? How do I make this feel like, when everyone's coming from around the whole world to see me in this room, we have this common story, and that these songs were the backdrop to our lives?”

This year marked the 25th anniversary of No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom. How has that record changed meaning for you over the years? I don't really like anniversaries. I don't really celebrate like, “Oh, I wore that in 1995. Now it's 10 years later, woo!” But then when it actually happened and I started seeing everyone posting and seeing all the stuff that we had done — things I don't remember, until I see the image — I was just overwhelmed, like, "Oh my god, we did that?" It was a really emotional couple of days. I really enjoyed hearing just how much that record impacted people. It really is truly mind-blowing to me that I get to do music, let alone to be part of people's lives in that way. It's hard to wrap my head around it.

I'm really proud of Tragic Kingdom. It was a very weird album. I was so naive. I didn't even know how to write a song. I don't know how I wrote those songs because I didn’t know anything back then. But doing the Vegas show was a really reflective time, because doing a song like “Just a Girl” every night felt more relevant than ever, especially in the last couple of years with the rise of the #MeToo movement. It feels like history repeating itself. We've come far, but we haven't. I always thought that I would outgrow that song and be a woman and not be able to sing the words “I'm just a girl” anymore, but it felt more relevant than it ever felt in my whole life. It was bizarre.

[cartoonfangirl1218]

Remember When?

So slightly off in which Carter comes back alive somewhere in the middle of S1. Sorry for any spelling errors. My beta reader is all whacked up.

Kendra was really really annoyed. With one man, and no his name was not Rip.

Carter.

Kendra shook her head. Ever since he had been reincarnated in the 2020s and Kendra helped him regain his memories he had been annoying her like a mosquito about Ray. Trying to make her move on to him.

So not happening.

He wasn't doing anything so pointedly obvious like sabotaging their dates, oh no he was much to sophisticated for that. He just stood there with snarky comments on all things they had done together and Ray's ability with technology. Ray was trying to take the high road and not let it bother him, but Kendra noticed the way his eyebrows bristled every time Carter mentioned something about "that little place with went together in Rome" or "how you smiled at my marriage gift to you in Istanbul".

Plus every time he mentioned something a rush of feelings would come to Kendra, feelings of safety, love and passion, and she would find herself staring longingly to his lips, wishing to feel their softness against her own.

Until she came to her senses that is. Just because 208 versions of herself fell in love with Carter didn't mean 209 had to too. She was not going to do anything because of some star crossed destiny. Ray was her future, Carter was her past.

The group was getting ready to set off to Japan, and she and Ray were set to pretend to be married couple once again.

Carter had complained about it, how he had more experienced being married than any of them.

Rip refused as he needed a wing guy to watch from the air, and two males together in Japan would not be well accepted.

"Too bad, I was hoping to see you spar with a samurai again," He smirked at her.

Kendra felt the world shift to feudal Japan at a small meditation garden where she and Carter were fighting against a honored samurai, a duel that began after the samurai tried to get her to "behave like a lady".

Carter had punched the guy in the throat and she got him in where it hurts. A warm feeling spread through her, it was wonderful to be with a guy who not only defended her but fought right beside her. It made her feel safe, like someone cared to be with her.

"We make a great team." She smiled at him.

"Ready to go" Ray linked his arm between hers, reminding her where she actually was and felt a red flush creep up her neck, praying that Ray had not heard the samurai comment. He was a really sweet guy and it wasn't fair to compare them. "Yes, WE make a great team" Kendra smiled at the scientist and looked back at Carter. His smirk disappeared ———-

Paris, France 1974 They went to Paris to track down Vandel Savage's attempt to infiltrate the Parisian UN meeting.

The group was situated at the sidewalk cafe, waiting for Sara and Snart's signal to go to the embassy.

A man with an accordion began playing and Kendra could faintly remember the tune. Beauty and the Beast.

She didn't understand why it seemed so familiar. She hardly watched Disney when she was younger, she preferred action to Disney's cheesy endings plus her feminist mother despised those princesses. Most of the Disney movies she did watch involved animals like the Rescuers, or Lady and the Tramp or Aristocats.

"Barely even friends then somebody bends unexpectedly," Kendra sang under her breath

"Just a little change. Small to say the least. Both a little scared neither one prepared Beaty and the Beast. Remember our dance to this song. It was like after the movie came out" Carter smiled at her Kendra mind went back to her. Her hair in a small bun, and was wearing a gorgeous dark real evening gown and matching heels. He in a tux, smelling like pine and aftershave. The view of the Eiffel Tower in the dark, glowed as they danced by the river.

"Ever just the same. Ever a surprise. Ever as before. Ever just as sure. As the sun will rise" His deep, musical baritone surprised her every time he sang. She had insisted to dancing to the song because it reminded her that no matter how many times they were reincarnated, they needed up together.

Just as it should be. Just as certain as the sun. It was a fact of life.

"Tale as old as time, Tune as old as song. Bitter sweet and strange Finding you can change Learning you were wrong. Certain as the sun Rising in the east" He twirled her and Kendra smiled giddily, she didn't know how he had even managed to play the song in Paris and in English but he did. For her.

"Tale as old as time. Song as old as rhyme. Beauty and the beast" Kendra took her head off his broad chest looked up at him. His eyes gazing at her like there was no one else in the world.

"So who's Beauty and who's the beast?" A gruff voice asked. Kendra slowly turned her head to see Mick. She looked around. She was in street clothes, they were at a sidewalk cafe, holding on to Carter's arms in perfect waltz position, faces inches from each other and Carter was staring at her expectantly. Ray frowning. Jax, Stein, and Rip staring quizzically.

Did she just?

Kendra pushed Carter away and grabbed Ray's hands, "Come on Ray, dance with me. Jax you're next!" -

The ultimatum came one Saturday. For once the group was relaxing and talking.

Then Ray came in excitedly, he sat at the table, "Hey Kendra, I found this nice sushi place at the Upper East side we could go to. Then I rented a hotel suite we can stay for the weekend. You know if nothing happens during the time."

"Hotel suite, niiice rich boy," Sara smiled.

"Just the two of you?” Carter asked, looking up from his magazine on the love seat.

"Well yes." Ray grinded his teeth "In case you're sick head is wondering. She hasn't mistaken my name with yours. Seems like your little dance in Paris was one sided." Kendra patted Ray's shoulder soothingly. She had spend the weekend talking to him, convincing him that they were in the past.

"Oh woah man I don't want anything to intrude your relationship,” Carter held up his hands mockingly "But I was just wondering...you know just for advice. Is it the Carlton because last time we went there Kendra couldn't "get in the mood" because they didn't turn off their coolers. But that was 1930 so I'm not sure if it's quite the same.” Kendra froze. He was not, he could not... "Oh and make sure to wear red. Red makes her go crazy. Not a red suit, but you know red briefs would be good."

Mick didn't even hide his snickering. Ray looked surprised and slightly perturbed by Carter's sudden helpfulness. Sara, Leonard and Stein were muffling their laughter, Jax was too busy with headphones to care and Rip rolled his eyes, ignoring them.

"And make sure to know pressure points...Remember when I used to massage your wings and back beforehand." Carter cocked his head toward her.

Kendra felt the memories coming back, his strong, warm hands easing her back with oil and stroking her feathers, feeling his abs pressed against her. Kendra started violently coughing in an effort not to moan out loud "Kendra are you okay?" Ray asked.

"Oh, interesting fact. She gets turned on if you rip her clothes off with only your teeth. Ray," Carter clicked his tongue, "Take notes" Kendra grabbed a couch pillow and coughed into, biting it and gasping.

"I will not moan, I will not moan." she told herself.

"Turned on by ripping off clothes like a dog. That's a new one." Leonard dead panned.

"I want to try!" Mick cried, excitedly

"Carter get in the hall now!" Kendra growled after her coughing fit and grabbed him by the collar, slamming the door.

"Since you like this memory lane thing so much remember when I was an independent woman that's makes her own choices, and doesn't not take about YOUR turn ons in public!" Kendra cried, slamming the door.

"IT'S OKAY BIRDIE! I THINK IT'S PRETTY HOT TOO!" Mick called from the other side of the door. "FEEL FREE TO TALK ABOUT CARTER'S.” Sara added.

"Great, now I have something in common with Mick." Kendra grumbled. "Chay-era,” Carter started.

"No, no Chay-era, no Leyla or René or whatever name I was. That's done. That was years ago. Move on. I have told you time and time again that I'm with Ray now. I'm going to see things through with Ray, and I'm sorry but you are not apart of that. There's no love triangle or competition, I'm dating Ray and none of our adventures or anniversaries matter. I'm living in the present Carter. Time youstart." -

After that discussion, Carter stopped his remarks. He remained civil to them, he didn't bother Ray anymore or talked to them besides in the context of a mission. He seemed to prefer hanging out with Stein now, talking about artifacts and the evolution of science or with Sara and Mick, sparring.

Not that Kendra minded. She was free to spend time with Ray, and not worry about any memories come flooding back thanks to his stupid little remarks.

Though some came without him.

One night she woke up to a chilly dawn and she padded toward the kitchen to have some tea. It had been something she'd done in her past lives, she felt. It was all automatic and she didn't even have to think.

She turned on the light and was surprised to see Carter in the living room, watching tv. Kendra chose to ignore him and move on with her tea.

But she felt something off. She usually put a secret ingredient to make it better but she couldn't remember what.

"Um Carter?" she called out hesitantly. Carter's head jolted up. "What?” he muttered groggily.

"I..I can't remover what I use to put in my tea. Like I don't know when I well we were in a small apartment I think in Russia."

"Moscow, 1918. It was cayenne pepper. It made it "pop"" Carter air quoted and settled back to sleep, without looking at her.

Kendra found the cayenne pepper, sliced it and sat at the table. She looked back at Carter and felt herself pulled to sit next to him. No matter that she was with Ray, she still deeply cared for him. In a total platonic way she reasoned.

"Hey," she whispered, nudging him. "What?” he rubbed his eyes. "Thanks for respecting my space." She mumbled.

"Yeah, I'm sorry for getting in it in the first place. I..I don't let go of things to easily" Carter rubbed the back of his neck, sheepishly "I can tell,” Kendra replied.

"But I'll but out if that's what you want. I mean I should have followed what I said before. You are worth the wait...Just let me say one thing.” Kendra tensed up, waiting for some big romantic kiss, or a reminder of those memorable hot nights spent together.

"I miss you. I miss talking with you like this at night. You always listened to me."

"I'll still listen," Kendra said.

"Yes, but but it won't be..." He seemed to try to grasp the words with his hands "Like all those other times, loving each other unconditionally, not judging. As my wife. I've taken you for granted, but I don't like the thought of not spending a century without you.” Kendra sighed, she wanted so much to comfort him in some waym "Carter, I love you. But not now. Who knows maybe I will in a few moths from now. But I might not. Carter we've spent so many years together even if we don't get together in this one. At least we met."

"Thank the Lord," Carter smiled.

"And I'll probably be yours next lifetime. I don't think that many Ray's populate the Earth," Kendra laughed.

"That...would be interesting" Carter said slowly.

"But I'll listen if you want me to. How about this, every morning just like this we talk." Carter's face lit up "From a distance of 10 feet. No getting your hopes up." Kendra warned.

"Deal." He leaned in, and Kendra braced for the kiss. The kiss that always came after these talks, that slowed at first but they ended up melting into each other's arms.

Kendra waited for it but it never came, she opened her eyes to feel his arms hugging her. Then he left for his room, patting her back It's not like she wanted that kiss, she was just nostalgic. She just remembered how it felt when they were married. When she loved him. -

Remember when we kissed? Well I want to do that again.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #330

“and i don't want ya  /  and i don't need ya  /  don't bother to resist, or i'll beat ya  /  it's not your fault that you're always wrong  /  the weak ones are there to justify the strong”

If you have a job, do you like it? I'm unemployed. Do you like any kinds of fruit? Well of course. Are you waiting for something right now? Covid and this headache to fuck off, May for my tattoo, to be paid to take some pictures again... What is your favorite kind of animal? Kind, not the actual animal itself? In that case, social species, usually mammals. What kind of Dippin' Dots do you like? Holy shit, I haven't had that in like a damn decade or something. I don't know, I barely remember the taste. Who is the most badass woman that you can think of? My mom. My mother is a fucking warrior. Do you have a Pinterest account? Yeah. I get a lot of photography ideas from there, as well as base pictures to make Mark icons, haha. If you were to write a book, what would it be about? The stories I and my friends have weaved in RP. Have you ever seen the television show The Munsters? AHHHHH YES!!!!! Mom loves that show, so I used to watch it with her growing up. Have you ever written one of those 'Roses are red...' valentines? I don't think so. Would you/have you spent more than $200 on any one person for a holiday? I haven't, but I would for certain people. Do you have a favorite Robin Williams movie? Probably Night at the Museum. Thoughts on Slender Man? Have you even heard of him? I think it's a cool creepypasta; he does look pretty unnerving with his height and especially lack of a face. The movie was good too, btw. Do you know what the Tardis is? I think almost everyone does in this generation, haha. Doctor Who ain't no joke to a whole lot of people. Are there any children's shows that you'd watch today if they were on? Sure, like Pokemon or Avatar: The Last Airbender, among others. I wouldn't at all be opposed to watching The Lion Guard, either. I actually want to, with my whole TLK love. I'm not embarrassed to watch "kids" shows or movies at all. What would you call yourself the King or Queen of? Having not an ounce of knowledge on how to love things in moderation/avoid total obsession with things, haha. If I paid for you to take karate lessons, would you? No, especially not now with my legs. Do you read more fiction or non-fiction? Almost solely fiction. What modern technology are you especially grateful for? Laptops, ig. Do you have a favorite science topic? Genetics. Very fascinating stuff. Have you ever read any Sherlock Holmes stories? No. What is the saddest movie that you've ever seen? Either Johnny Got His Gun or Boy in the Striped Pajamas. What's your most popular post? On what? If Facebook, I don't really know. Possibly my "coming out" one or a lovey-dovey essay when Sara and I were together. On Tumblr, it's definitely the gif I made of Mark and Chica (his dog) with I think over 10k notes. Manga or anime? Anime. I don't read manga, though I've been tempted with Deadman Wonderland since the show only had one season and ends on a ginormous cliffhanger, but there's more story to be had. A card game that you're good at? None, really. A popular book you haven't read yet? To Kill a Mockingbird. I feel like every school student has read it at some point. Favorite Mean Girls quote? I don't know any. It's a fine movie, but I've never understood the hype. Name your top 3 albums from your favorite band/artist. Black Rain, Ozzmosis, and... then I can't choose. I love so, so many very dearly. Name your top 5 music videos. I don't really watch music videos, so I definitely can't name five. My #1 favorite is probably "Wrong Side of Heaven" by Five Finger Death Punch; I absolutely cannot watch it without crying. What are you most passionate about? How did this passion develop? Animals. I was born simply adoring animals and have always wanted to protect them and their environment. Do you like monkeys? Do you believe in evolution? Yes and yes. We've literally watched it in action. What embarrasses you the most in front of other people? Discussing RP if you're not involved in it. I'm terrified of people thinking I'm weird. Have you considered running for president? Absolutely not. Which famous person would you like to be BFFs with? I'd say Mark, but I'd be way too interested in dating him instead of being just friends, haha... So with that said, maybe Bindi Irwin? Would you ever go skinny dipping with the last person who commented you? Lyndsey would be that person, so no. She's a great friend of mine, but realistically I'd probably only ever - if ever - do that with the company of my s/o. Are you still friends with the last person who broke your trust? No. How long did your last relationship last? Around two years. Have you ever been banned from anywhere? Online, yes, as a little kid on the Animal Planet forum, haha... Has anyone kissed you when you weren't expecting it? Yeah, Juan. Did you like it? It was a sweet moment, but I didn't want it. Does your dad smoke? Like a chimney. Is your mom over 50? Yeah. Are you currently listening to anything? Yeah, kinda hooked on "The Horrible People" by Manson. I've found a lot of great music lately. Would you ever consider getting breast implants? No, but once (if...) I lose all the weight I want, it's going to be a moderate priority to get a breast lift. I've hated my body way too fucking long and am dying to be satisfied with it again, and with how much weight I need to lose, I would essentially have grandma tits. :x Do you know anyone who is bisexual? Me, haha. Among some friends. Who would you tell, or who did you tell when you lost your virginity? That's not something I'd just go to tell someone afterwards for no reason... I'd only ever mention having lost my virginity if I was actually asked or if it was relevant to a conversation. Is there something you have been trying to learn lately? I'm really trying to practice opposite action and behavioral activation, among other things I've learned in group therapy. When you think about your future career, do you envision yourself becoming the head honcho or CEO? If not, why not? Well, I want to be my own boss as a freelance photographer. In any other job, I definitely wouldn't want that. Too much responsibility and leadership skills. Can you think of a time when you seriously misjudged a music artist based on their name? I don't think so? Have you ever kissed someone that you didn’t really want to kiss (not assault, just indifference)? Why did you go along with it and how did you feel after? Yes, Tyler. I felt like I was "supposed to." I felt really uncomfortable afterwards. If you have to wake up early for something, what time is just TOO early for you to be there and be presentable and sentient? Have you ever had to be somewhere that early? Probably like, 5:00. No. Have the majority of your romantic relationships started with a physical attraction or a deeper connection? Always an emotional connection. Did you ever write a fan letter to a celebrity? How about submit something to a magazine? No to both. What hair color is the most attractive on the opposite sex? Of natural colors, black, but I like unnaturally dyed hair most. Where do you like to go to when you are stressed? On a carride, so long as I'm controlling the music nice and loud and not talking. Where do you go to get your hair cut/dyed? To a family friend's little salon/small business. Why do you want the career that you want? Because I adore art and think it's pretty darn magical that you can freeze a moment forever to not just remember in your head, but actually see. Have you ever watched iCarly? Yeah, I enjoyed it when I was younger. What was your favorite class during your sophomore year of high school? Art. Do you wear bandanas in your hair? No. Have you ever been on a blind date? No, not interested. How many living grandparents do you still have? None. Have you ever worked in an office? No. Who does the grocery shopping in your house? Mom. Have you ever stayed in a hotel without your parents or older relatives? No. Did you have an Easy-Bake oven when you were little? Sure did. Have you ever seen a donkey? Yeah. Have you ever made out in a hot tub? Pretty sure no. Do you always flush the toilet after you use it? Yes. What were the last words you said to your dad? Probably "bye, love you." Have you cuddled with someone you weren’t dating? Nah. Who has the ability to hurt you the most emotionally? JASON. Are you a really understanding person? Yeah, very. Are you the type of person that enjoys getting hugs? Yes. When’s the last time you wore a wig? For a witch costume many years ago. Why were you last hospitalized? Suicide attempt. What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without food? At least 12 hours, but I think I almost went a day once back when recovery started and my appetite was non-existent. What was the last name of your third grade teacher? Mrs. Britt. How was the last chicken you ate cooked? They were chicken tenders. What is your favorite kind of chip? Hot crunchy Cheetos. What grade did you have your first boyfriend? 7th. Have you ever been told that you’ve lost weight? Yeah, back when I actually WAS losing loads of weight. >> Do you have the same political views as your parents? Some things, but definitely not all. Does anyone call you babe/baby? No. Have you ever made a significant other cry? Sadly. If you could make your lips bigger, would you? Maybe just a teeeeny bit. Are you one to sneak food into movie theaters? Yep. Fuck them prices. Are you prone to illness? Definitely not. What races do you usually date? History says Caucasian, but I have no actual preference. I'll date any race. What’s your cup size? C. Ever flirted with a teacher? Yikes, no thanks. Who was the main cook of your Thanksgiving meal last year? My older sister made the most stuff. Have you ever been dumped really harshly? Well, considering it literally traumatized me... Do you have any ex’s you can’t stand anymore? No. Are you more of a phone or a computer person? Computer, definitely. When was the last time you made a sandwich? What did you put on it? Yesterday for lunch. Ham, American cheese, and mustard. Have you ever made friends with someone that you didn’t expect to get along with? Yeah. Do you own any accessories with your name on? No. What brand of eyeliner do you use? I pay no attention to this. Have you ever been sexually harassed? No. Have you ever sent a naughty text message? Suggestive ones, yes. How long have you had your pets? Roman, around two years. Venus, around three or four years. Who was the last person to tell you that they love you, other than family? Sara. Has one of your friends ever tried to hook you up with someone? Colleen tried obnoxiously hard to push Girt and me together. We all went out to eat pizza once just as friends hanging out, and this bitch prefaced an uncomfortable and nosy question to him with an even more uncomfortable "because I'm trying to get you in her pants...", and that, my friends, was the closest occasion I've ever come to slapping someone right across the face. I looked at her in absolute disgust, and Girt was clearly thinking "what the actual fuck" as well. I do not miss her feral mouth. Are you good at staring contests? No. Eye contact is very difficult for me to maintain. Do you like peanut butter? I love peanut butter. When was the last time you had to present something to your class? In this mandatory but entirely pointless entry class at my last college, we all had to do like this PowerPoint introducing ourselves. I hated it. Who was the last person that told you they missed you? I think my friend Chelsea. What store is your favorite shirt from? It's not a real store, but rather an online brand: Cloak. Mark is one of the owners/creators so I obviously support them intensely. Have you ever fell off your bed while you were sleeping? No, thankfully. Do you have something you’re supposed to tell someone, but you haven’t yet? No. What type of food do you never really eat? Vegetables, oops. Have you ever cut someone else’s hair? No. Do you like going to weddings? Not really, if I'm being honest. I'm only interested in photographing weddings for the only the couple pictures and pay, really. I'm not big on formal events. What’s your favorite flavor squash? I don’t like squash. Do you or anyone in your house have a severe allergy? No. Who was the last guest in your house and what were they staying for? Our landlord/family friend, just to hang out for a little bit and chat with Mom. What fad were you actually into? Hm. What was the last spontaneous thing you did? I'm not a very spontaneous person, so I really don't know.

[thepringlesofblood]

i have categorized every star trek tng episode bc its quarantine and i’m procrastinating

disclaimer: I fucking love star trek. so much. good god. this was a labor of love, not intended to demean the show in any way. constructive criticism is important in any loving relationship, including when you just really like star trek.

the three main categories, and their relevant subcategories

(a quick note: almost all of these also have aliens/space related aspects, bc star trek, but its not the focus in all of them, hence the categories. also many can coexist in one episode)

Alien Diplomacy

this dilemma with an alien society has nothing to do with current social issues/popular philosophical concepts i dont know what youre talking about

Amazing! semi-famous/revered ambassador still manages to fuck up every time

.....romulans......

H O N O R 

haha no don’t violate the prime directive youre so sexy aaahh

occasionally with a side dish of ‘starfleet wants us to do something that seems maybe a little unethical so everyone is very philosophically distressed’ 

technological failures exacerbate delicate relationships with aliens who probably have fucked up foreheads and a very limited amount of patience

you won’t believe how eccentric/morally grey this famous scientist we found is! hope we don’t have to rely on them or their works in any capacity...

Petty Bickering - from passive-aggressiveness to full-scale war! AKA ‘these two people have been at war so long they’ve forgotten everything else...doesn’t that suck?’ 

Picard has somehow managed to find himself in a position of power in alien culture or negotiations and is both incredibly good at it and also like “you those days when you’re like this might as well happen, adult life is already so goddamn weird”

special edition: this sometimes happens to Riker but he just fucking goes for it

Character Episodes

Q: ~owo~ what’s this? ooh...mon capitaine...notice me... ;-p

Data (the one true king of these)

Life Hack - literally, someone hacked Data’s life. rip

data tries Something New and we see how it goes 

family concepts are weird and metaphorical with androids

Someone Disrespects Data, and either the crew rips him apart for it or the narrative does 

Lwaxana’s here and ready to FUCK. would technically fall under the Fuckup Ambassador subcategory if she wasn’t a. recurring b. such an icon. also she usually doesn’t come aboard for ambassador reasons, she just does her own thing

Spin the wheel, someone’s getting a romantic interest for one episode! 

special edition: Riker Fucks An Alien

super special edition: Rick Berman throws a dart at a board to decide who gets an unnecessary heterosexual love interest. it usually lands on Geordi. 

super duper special edition: combine w/ a Fuckup Ambassador episode for a combo platter of uncomfortable flirting, other crewmembers Opinions, and the show trying to get you to care about the Fuckup Ambassador until they inevitably die or leave

rare edition: running into your ex in space does not make things less awkward.

An Event Happens to one (sometimes two) specific person(s) and we follow them the whole time to see how it turns out (e.g. barclay becomes superbrain, geordi becomes lizard, ensign ro and geordi become ghost)

Worf has a Klingon Thing and no one knows about it bc theyre not Klingon until someone researches it and throws him a holodeck party or something and he’s like ‘aaah stop knowing things about me!’ Often coincides with the subcategory ‘H O N O R’

Callback/cameo time! We know you like this one actor/character who isn’t usually part of the show so here they are, have fun kids! (e.g. Unification parts 1 and 2)

Life on a Starship and/or Space Weirdness

by far the most famous, the Holodeck Episode 

closely followed by the Plague/Natural Disaster episode (e.g. Evolution, Disaster, the Naked Now)

uh oh we ran into a big nothing in space

bonus points for its cousin: we met Space God

Advanced Technology Is Bad Sometimes

special edition: we gotta go in for Repairs but Something Happens

super special edition: combine with Data episode for extra panic about how the fuck they gonna win this one

this star’s gonna explode and we gotta do something about it/a scientific expedition is never actually just a scientific expedition. 

Let’s Do The Time Warp Again/does anyone know what wormholes can actually do?????

Oh, This Is What Started That Fanfiction Trope (e.g. Rascals, the Naked Now*)

and, of course, the centers of this venn diagram

We Can’t Beam Them Back! aka kidnapping/rescue episodes 

often a character episode about whoever got lost

often involves alien diplomacy if it is actually kidnapping

often is just trying to survive in an alien environment 

Perhaps Someday...

an episode about a social issue that ends with someone saying “Perhaps someday/perhaps if x/maybe when x....” and really meaning “Perhaps someday someone will make an episode like this that actually dives into the topic at hand in a less censored environment, because either we weren’t able to say what we wanted to or we know time will progress past us, so this is all we can say on it right now” 

can be about a certain character (e.g. Measure of a Man)

can be about aliens (e.g. The Outcast)

can be about space (e.g. the one with the traveler where they get yeeted a million lightyears away)

all in all, the most common episode has to be 

Sitcom in Space

just sort of general domestic shenanigans, like in a sitcom episode, but in the background a space dilemma is going on (e.g. Data’s Day)

*i hear yall diehards yelling at me that technically this episode is based off of a TOS episode w/ the same premise so it didn’t start the trope but consider: shut up you know what I mean. hugs n kisses <3

[fyeahcamcountry]

Cam: The Otherside - track by track

(Apple Music)

'...“I was a total idealist,” Cam tells Apple Music. The Nashville country singer, who’s also one of the city’s most sought-after songwriters, says the five years she spent writing her sophomore album were some of the hardest of her life. “I had this Disney idea of how the world worked, and at some point that just...broke.” Tracing a string of major life changes—breaking up with her old label, inking a new contract, marrying her husband, and welcoming her first child—The Otherside reflects a dramatic shift in thinking, or her journey through disillusionment into clear-eyed realism. That evolution unlocked a new side to her sound. “My songs have always pulled from my psychology background, but I had this filter on and didn’t even know it,” she says. “Once I took that off, I could be so much more honest. I could see the world, and myself, for exactly what they were.” Read on as Cam tells us the inside story behind each song.

[[MORE]]

Redwood Tree

“I grew up in the Bay Area with a redwood tree in my backyard, and I did a lot of thinking up there. I wasn’t raised in a specific religion, but the most magical, awe-inspiring experience I can think of is being in the redwoods, feeling so small. It’s like a cathedral in that it reminds you of your place in everything. Fallen redwoods have rings that represent the thousands of years that they lived, and you’re like, ‘Oh, we’re just flies buzzing around.’ We wake up one day shocked to realize our parents are suddenly old. Like, when did my dad's beard get so white? I had watched the movie Arrival around the time we wrote this song, and I loved the idea of time not being linear. The soundtrack has these voices that go ‘Da, da, da, da,’ and we nod to that in the production. I hope time isn't linear. I hope I get more time with my parents.”

The Otherside

“Tim, or Avicii, came to Nashville a few years ago to write for one of his albums, and we were in the studio with Hillary Lindsey and Tyler Johnson. He started playing this piano melody over and over and over again, and I don't smoke cigarettes but when Hillary took a cigarette break, I was like, ‘I'm going, too.’ It was just so intense. He was really stuck on this thing. While we're out on the back porch, she and I came up with an idea for the chorus, and he loved it. But he fiddled with it for hours. He was thinking about cadence, about how we speak, about code-mapping it onto a melody, and about the actual phonetics. Tim never wound up releasing that song, so I was like, ‘Ooh, maybe that means I can.’ Even though it’s such a heavy thing not having him around for the final edits, I did feel this great responsibility to work my ass off to get it right. Because I knew that’s what he would have done.”

Classic

“On the other side of the spectrum, this is one of those songs that just magically fell into place. I went up to New York for a few sessions with Jack Antonoff at Electric Lady Studios, and it was so fun. Creatives tend to beat themselves up a lot, but Jack and I sat there jangling around on this 12-string guitar and writing a song that had this nostalgic Simon & Garfunkel ‘Cecilia’ vibe. It’s about how there are people in your life that outlast everything else—technology, fashion trends, swings in politics, whatever. Nothing's a constant in life, but a few people are. It was inspired by this moment when my husband and I were in Argentina and he found a pack of Lucky Strike cigarettes. He doesn't smoke anymore, but he goes, ‘I’ve got to smoke these because they don't make ‘em like this anymore.’ And then he looks at me and goes, ‘That's a country lyric.’”

Forgetting You

“I was writing with Lori McKenna, Tyler Johnson, and Mitch Rowland, and we’re all pals from working on various projects together. Still, I always get nervous when I go write with Lori, even though she's so humble and chill, because I’m like, ‘Don't embarrass yourself in front of the poet of our generation!’ Which is to say, I knew I needed to bring in something cool. I had this line, ‘I'm getting older/But you never change.’ The song is about holding on to the concept of someone from the past, and measuring everyone up to them even though it’s no longer real. That's why you keep moving forward but they never seem to age.”

Like a Movie

“Before we were married and had a kid, I’d come home from tour and my husband and I would have this tiny bit of quality time together. And the truth is, we’d usually get high and go to Walmart. One day, we were unloading all our groceries and I was like, ‘How did you know it was me? How did you know not to settle for someone earlier or wait for someone else?’ And he just smiled and said, ‘Because when I met you, it was like a movie.’ Now, I can remember when we met. I was a mess. It did not look like a movie. But it was so, so sweet. I wrote with the love junkies—Lori McKenna, Liz Rose, and Hillary Lindsey—and the strings are David Campbell, who’s actually Beck’s dad. Jeff Bhasker wanted a ’50s movie soundtrack vibe with strings that swelled like an orchestra, and David immediately got it. Apple Music did a teaser video for the album, and if you watch it, there should be video footage from that string session.”

Changes

“I usually write all my own music, but this is the first of a couple songs on this album that I didn’t. I guess I feel like it's cheating. I'm supposed to be digging all this personal stuff up and figuring myself out, so taking someone else’s song feels like a shortcut. But I trust Harry [Styles]’s writing. I feel like he tries so hard to be himself in his music, and he doesn't take it lightly. That pursuit resonates with me. The demo had Lori McKenna singing with Harry on background vocals and his whistle, which is still in the track. It was amazing to hear a song that someone else wrote that clicked so much with me personally. It’s about feeling like you’ve outgrown where you're from, and you don't really want to admit that. It’s kind of an uncomfortable thing to say, but I love when things are uncomfortable. That means it’s important.”

Till There's Nothing Left

“This song has steamy sexual energy... Like, ‘I'm giving you my whole heart but also my body and a quickie in the back seat.’ While we were recording my vocals, I was trying to sit back and make it cool and sexy, and I realized I was blushing. I was blushing because society tells us that sexuality is a private thing. If you want to be respected as a woman, if you want to be considered intelligent, you can’t be sexual. But then I was reminded of my grandmother who was raised Baptist on a farm in Saskatchewan. She's the one who gave me the sex talk, unbeknownst to my mother. She said, ‘Sex is like a milkshake. Once you have it, you're always going to want it.’ She was comfortable with her sexuality without it being the main thing about her. So I thought, ‘If a woman born in the 1930s on a farm in Canada can own it, I can own it.”

What Goodbye Means

“A friend of mine was going through a divorce. It was pretty ugly, but he was being so kind. I asked him, ‘How are you being so nice right now? I don't get it.’ And he said, ‘Because she might change her mind.’ I still get goosebumps thinking about it. We've all been there, not quite ready to accept the reality of something, and that's okay. You've got to take it at the rate you can take it. This song has such a classic melody. It’s warm. For some reason it feels like a summer evening in New Mexico to me.”

Diane

“This song is a response to Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene,’ and man, it really seems to resonate with people. Crowds sing it back to me in this emotional, over-the-top, theatrical way. I suppose most people have had infidelity affect their life one way or another, but it’s hard to watch people you care about go through it. There's so much shame around it that you don't get to talk about what you need or how to heal. And you almost never get to hear the other party’s side. So ‘Diane’ is my moment to role-play, I guess. I'm the other woman and I slept with your husband and I didn't know he was married, but you’ve got to know the truth. Parton's lyrics to the other woman include the word ‘please,’ and that just killed me. She's so humble and human, asking someone to please not take the love of her life away. Immediately, I was like, ‘That's the narrative. That's what is so often left unsaid.’”

Happier for You

“This is the other song that I didn't write, and it’s from Sam Smith and Tyler [Johnson]. Sam and I have a great relationship because I helped write the song ‘Palace’ for their album and then they brought me out on tour. We have a lot of trust. When Lindsay [Marias, Cam’s manager] and I first heard this demo and Sam came in singing, our jaws dropped. The emotion was so raw and honest and real. I love the juxtaposition of saying something very loud and publicly—to the point where it almost feels proud—but actually it’s something that makes you want to curl up in a ball.”

Girl Like Me

“This is the author's note at the end of the book. Natalie Hemby had come over and started playing a verse on the piano, and I was like, ‘Oh god, that is so sad.’ And she's like, ‘It's your story. This is your comeback story.’ It’s funny how sometimes you can’t recognize your own self. Writing this song was uncomfortable but in the best way, trying to pull lyrics out in the chorus (‘They’re going to give up on you/You're going to give up on them’). You can’t just become jaded. You have to push through. It’s a gift to be able to see life for what it is, and to see yourself for who you are. I think anyone who has been through that phase of disillusionment will think, ‘Oh, yeah, tough. But this side is better.’”

[ackervida]

Flames of Nirvana, ch 1

Hello there, everyone! I’ve wanted to join the fandom and the Levi love bandwagon for the longest time, and since quarantine started I was like why not. So I wrote this bad boy (all day every day for the past month and a half might I add) and I hope you guys like it! The story is all written out, and updates will be every Sunday.

TW: This story will contain strong language, canon-typical violence, implied/mentions of rape, mentions of suicide, abuse, suicide attempts and explicit sexual content. It is manga compliant up until chapter 128, so there will be spoilers!

Read on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23990044/chapters/57707902

Summary: In the heat of a never ending war, Levi finds himself recruiting a compromised spy. But the war outside is nothing compared to their own inner battles, and hand in hand, they find the strength to conquer them one by one. And the world follows.

Pairing: Levi x Reader

Chapter 1

Levi swirled the tea in his cup pensively. It was still so strange to him, how the Marleyans drank their tea – sweetened and diluted with milk, leaving little room for the subtle, herbal flavors. He’d spat it back into the cup the first time he tried it, and in the following months, the Eldian Captain adopted the habit to request his tea plain, as much as it attracted odd glances from shopkeepers.

This particular teashop, however, was quite to his liking. Quaint, small enough to be peaceful, yet spacious enough to allow him to blend in with the other customers without being recognized, despite the telltale scars on his face. The tea itself wasn’t exactly what he remembered from home, but it came with free cookies and the Eldian old lady who usually brought his order was sweet, bubbly and never disclosed the fact that she knew exactly who he was.

Levi’s identity wasn’t as much of a problem as it used to be when the remaining Scouts permanently relocated to Marley’s capital, but there was still a level of dissent among the Marleyan citizens. After all, Eren’s near genocide had yet to be forgotten, and the new war put a wholly new strain on Marleyans’ views on Eldians.

Taking a tentative sip of the hot brew, Levi sighed. In his own way, the Captain had wearily come to terms with the fact that Eren had turned into a lost cause, yet he still couldn’t help but think that maybe, just maybe the idiot wouldn’t have done what he did if he’d been aware that peace still wouldn’t be an option. Yes, the Colossal titans would have crushed Marley.

What would have happened once they reached Starke?

It didn’t matter now, Levi mused. Whether the Starkans would have been able to fend off was irrelevant. What mattered was that this technologically superior nation suddenly entered the war and helped the Jaegerists seize control of Paradise Island; now, they’d joined forces against Marley and Hizuru, seeking the so-called spread of ‘civilization’ and ‘evolution’ through conquest.

Any hope that Levi might have had about seeing the carnage come to an end had been squandered.

“Is the tea not to your liking, my dear? I was excited to get this new mix, but I know you’re a fussy one,” Matilda, the shopkeeper, stopped by Levi’s table. Her mouth and eye crinkles spoke of a lifelong determination to smile, even though Levi knew better than to assume she’d led anything but an easy life in the Eldian ghettos. She’d never spoken to him of family, and the Captain had never asked.

“It’s not bad,” the brunet replied, taking another sip. His prosthetic fingers felt strange around the steaming mug ��� they couldn’t feel heat. “What was it called again? Robos?”

“Rooibos,” Matilda smiled, wordlessly setting another plate of sugar cookies on the table. Levi lifted a hand in protest, but the older woman shushed him quiet. “It’s on the house. If you’re worried about your silhouette, why don’t you share them with the pretty young lady back there? She’s been looking at you since you came in, and I don’t want to be insensitive but you do look like you could use some company.”

She winked to indicate precisely what kind of ‘company’ she was implying, and subtly tilted her head towards a table on the opposite side of the establishment, where a lone young woman was eating a bowl of soup. Levi met her E/C eyes as soon as he glanced her way and was inwardly surprised that the girl didn’t immediately avert her gaze. Instead, she held his stare for a few intense seconds, after which her eyes suggestively flitted to the seat in front of her.

Levi served the oblivious, but well-intended shopkeeper a half-hearted scowl, yet the Captain rose from his chair, having understood that the woman’s interest was not in any way hormonal or sparked by recognition. Matilda still leapt for joy – after all, Levi normally arrived and left alone, except for the rare occasion where he agreed to bring Hange or his former squad with him for an unnecessarily obnoxious lunch break. The bubbly shopkeeper took great care not to forget the cookies, setting them between Levi and the mysterious lady with a much too enthusiastic smile.

“So what’s your deal?” the brunet got straight to the point, leaning back and crossing his legs. Contrary to what he was expecting, the young woman broke into a quiet fit of giggles.

“You’re as charming as I’ve heard. You really must be the famous Captain Levi Ackerman.”

Though relieved that she hadn’t said it loud enough for the entire shop to hear, Levi snorted in annoyance. He really didn’t want to blow his only precious break with one of those air wasting assholes who liked to coat their point in useless pleasantries.

“Oi. Just spit it. What the hell do you want?”

The girl gave him a cool smile that lasted just a second too long for it to be natural, before resuming her eating. “Well, I… you don’t know this, but you saved my family when you coordinated the evacuation from the outskirts during the Rumbling. I wanted to thank you and… maybe treat you to some lunch?” she asked shyly, curling a strand of hair behind her ear in what appeared to be a coy gesture. However, Levi got a glimpse of the device attached to her ear and understood her message. She couldn’t be straight with him – she was being listened to.

The Captain downed the rest of his tea and politely asked Matilda to come over. “I guess I wouldn’t mind it. I’ll have what she’s having.”

He endured the conversation the girl seemed to produce out of thin air and ate his cauliflower soup diligently – even though, whoever she actually was, she was weird as fuck for liking something so bland. He figured that some of the questions she was asking were being dictated to her through the earpiece, so Levi offered vague or fake answers, silently hoping that whatever her plan was, she would get on with it faster.

“Oranges, you say? I don’t think I’ve ever had them,” the Captain commented almost absentmindedly, yet the woman’s eyes lit up with genuine joy and what seemed to be relief.

“Really? Never? You can come by my parents’ orchard anytime and you won’t leave without a full basket,” she laughed. “Actually, here, I’ll write you the address. If you have the time and, of course, if you want to… you can visit me. All the exotic fruit in the world won’t be enough to repay you, but this is the least I can do,” she opened her little bag and ripped a piece of paper from a notebook, scribbling furiously. “Not to mention… I’ve really loved your company. You seem to be a very gentle man, Levi. Can I call you Levi?”

“Be my guest,” the brunet replied, stuffing the paper in his pocket without looking at it and leaving their consumption’s worth of cash on the table. “You can make it up to me with that fruit basket,” he said when the girl began to protest, making her flash another one of those fake smiles. If she hadn’t made it obvious, Levi doubted he would have been able to tell, yet now that he knew that all her reactions were fake, he couldn’t help but dislike that forced smile on her otherwise beautiful features. Questions about who was employing her and what she was trying to gain from her interaction with him were swirling in his mind at miles per hour, way more interesting than any mundane topic of discussion.

The Captain made a point of ignoring Matilda’s cheeky grin as he led the young girl towards the exit and reciprocated her goodbye wishes. As she walked away, sundress flowing with the wind, Levi remained there for a while, a foot in the shop and a foot outside. After making sure no one was observing him, he fished out the note.

Once he read it, his hand flew straight to his own earpiece.

“Hange, get all the brats ready. We’re moving out as soon as I get back to base.”

“It’s still warm,” Hange said, her hand gripping a coffee mug. “They must have just fled.”

“Shit,” Levi cursed in frustration, dropping his rifle. The information the woman had given him was true – upon breaking into it much too easily, this produce farm was indeed a concealed military establishment belonging to the Starkan army. The note had also informed him that the Starkan commander, Victor Baal, would be present, so Levi had prepared an entire assassination operation at the speed of light – which made the complete bareness of the place even more of a disappointment.

It was also annoyingly pristine and unassuming at a first glance. The small room they were in looked like nothing more than a quaint, family-style common area, with hand-crafted rugs, a large wooden table and an attached kitchenette, where the coffee kettle still rested on a gas stove. Levi’s former squad, now led by Jean, as well as Reiner, Pieck and Annie had needed to very nearly demolish all the hidden chambers in order to discover the vast array of training areas, supplies and, most importantly, technological equipment.

“They appear to have left all equipment behind, including fuel and computers,” Armin confirmed as he walked back in, Jean, Connie and Mikasa following suit. “There is a massive storage room below us, fully equipped. At least that’s a good thing, right?”

“If they’re not laced with explosives that’ll paint the walls with our brains, then yes. Terrific,” replied Annie, who had given up any and all exploration upon realizing they’d been outrun, and was lounging casually on one of the chairs. Mikasa glared at her for the sarcastic way she’d talked to Armin, but the blonde merely rolled her eyes as if to say there was no other possible response.

“I already asked Magath to send tech support our way. Until then, if there’s nothing else, I suppose we can’t do much other than try not to get too depressed,” Hange sighed, rubbing her temples. Despite her words, the cat-and-mouse chase this war consisted of was really jarring – they’d finally gotten a good lead, they were so close, and they blew it.

All heads in the room whipped up, however, when one of the doors slammed against the wall. Reiner barged in, along with Pieck, both of them wearing distressed expressions.

“All of you need to come down to the storage room, now!”

“There’s weapons, Reiner, we know already-“

“I found a trap door,” Pieck interrupted. “We haven’t opened it fully yet, but… it smells like death.”

Upon walking into the spacious area, where the walls were laced with rifles and carefully attached explosive devices, as well as labeled boxes piled neatly behind pillars, the soldiers collectively covered their faces with their elbows. They were all used to the smell of corpses, but this level of decay and putrefaction could make anyone dizzy. Connie gagged almost instantly, not even reaching the top of the staircase before spilling the inside of his stomach.

“Do you need him for this?” Mikasa tilted her head towards her retching teammate while addressing Pieck. The brunette shook her head no, so Mikasa turned towards him fully.

“Connie, go and bring some wet rags. Take your time.”

“And clean that up,” Levi mumbled under his breath, upper lip curled in disgust. “Only other stench we need now is someone’s shit.”

Hange only graced her friend with a patient look, coughing into her fist. Her bespectacled eyes were inspecting the floor intensely, focusing on the small dent in the tiles. She hadn’t been in this room before, but it looked as though Reiner and Pieck had moved the asymmetrical tiles around in order to create the opening.

“How did you start opening it?”

“Better yet, how did you even see it?” Jean asked Pieck, holding the collar of his shirt over his nose. “Is that what happens when your face stays real close to floors for a long time?”

Severely unimpressed, the brunette merely pointed at the tiles lining the floor. They varied in shape and shades of grey, almost forming a pattern and yet not quite.

“If you press on them with your… hands, these tiles move. Also, the Starkans’ army symbol is a grey wolf. I figured I’d try arranging them to get that shape and… I got that small opening.”

Levi clicked his tongue. “So we’re going to have to play puzzle here?”

“No,” Armin replied, walking around the room with his eyebrows deeply creased in thought. “Based on the stench, and since we know that Starkans burn their bodies like we do, I think whatever is down there is a mass grave for prisoners and traitors. It would then have to be impossible to open from the inside, but-“

“Easy to access from the outside,” Hange finished his line of thought, very quickly deducing where Armin’s hypothesis was headed. “Also – have any of you found a possible way for an entire platoon to escape without being seen?”

Reiner huffed negatively. “You’re saying that’s what they used to flee?”

“That’s right,” Armin nodded, sharing a meaningful glance with his former Commander. “That makes it even more important for this trap door to open easily and quickly.”

The blond man crouched to the floor, his sky blue eyes gazing back and forth between the tiles with dashing speed and the wheels in his brain vigorously turning. No one spoke for a few pregnant moments, and they all held their breaths when Armin gently touched one tile, then pushed it with all his strength, huffing with the effort.

A loud machinery noise echoed in the room, and they all had to regain a sense of their footing as the floor moved with them. A gaping hole appeared in the floor, in the place of a grey wolf’s howling mouth.

“Holy shit,” Connie, who’d just begun his descent down the stairs, gaped. Instantly, though, he had to cover his nose and mouth with one of the wet towels he’d procured, promptly throwing the rest of them to his teammates as the stench became very nearly unbearable.

Levi turned his flashlight on and took the lead, overcome with a sense of impatience – after all, if the Starkans had escaped through this passage, there was still a chance they might be able to catch up if they moved quickly. “Let’s go.”

The first thing the Captain stepped on was a pool of moisture, and then something squelched beneath his foot. So much for shit being the last thing they needed. There seemed to be lightbulbs on the ceiling, yet inconveniently they weren’t functional. Levi pointed the light towards the wet floor and, unsurprisingly, he was met with floating bones, as well as feces and decomposed flesh that had not yet fully disintegrated.

It was a good thing Marley never had sewage overflows, though it might be a good idea for them to check for corpses – or the enemy - from time to time.

“They seem to have gone either forward or backward. Reiner, do you have any clues?”

“I’m not exactly familiar with the sewers, but my guess is they went towards the ocean. The other way leads to the water filtering facilities.”

“And they never mentioned having to filter human bones?” Jean replied bitingly. Out of all of them, he had the hardest time warming up to the idea that now they were working and living with their former enemies, still holding a grudge on Reiner in particular.

Reiner sighed. “No. But since a Starkan spy is what got us here in the first place, it’s safe to assume they have spies in plenty of other places, and they’re not as helpful as the one Captain Levi met.”

“I wonder what’s going to happen to her,” Armin voiced sadly, trying his hardest not to stare at the decay around him or reply to his own question.

Levi kept silent, but the matter was twisting his gut as well.

“Do you guys hear that?” Connie asked quietly, bringing the team to a full stop. Indeed, from a few meters away, they could hear… moaning?

“Oi! Is anyone alive in here?” he broke off into a sprint, despite his comrades reaching out to stop him. Mikasa darted to run after him, yet she yelped after tripping on a very sturdy obstacle. Her reflexes prevented her from falling, but she gasped loudly when the flashlight revealed what had tripped her.

A battered man wheezing for air.

“Hange, I need the first aid kit!”

“Me too!” yelled Connie, who was trying to bring the body of a woman into an upright position, wincing as she broke into a violent coughing fit.

“Same here,” Annie called out, her arms fully submerged as she lifted another breathing person from the filthy waters.

The soldiers scrambled to offer first aid, at the same time trying to figure out if there were any more survivors that needed it. Something caught Levi’s peripheral vision, causing him to leave Mikasa and Pieck to tend to one of the victims by themselves.

“Levi, is there anyone else?” Hange questioned, but the Captain didn’t reply, cautiously approaching a patch of rippling water. He turned the flashlight to its brightest setting, and the breath promptly left his lungs.

The woman from the teashop made eye contact with him immediately, just like last time, but now her bruised, swollen eyes showed despair instead of quiet confidence.

“…Run,” she choked, her voice barely coming out. Levi could see the extent to which she’d been beaten – no, tortured – even through the water and dim light. Her plea almost failed to register.

“Dammit. All of you, grab the survivors and head back!”

“-evi… no… run, now,” she begged again, and this time Levi fully understood the urgency in her tone. The entire corridor was slowly becoming brighter. Squinting, the Captain realized with utter horror what the source was – the bulbs on the ceiling weren’t light bulbs. They were concealed grenades. And they were all exploding.

“Move OUT!” he barked, just as the sound of the explosions caught up with the light. Levi threw the girl over his shoulder, momentarily unable to care about the state of her injuries, and ran back along with his comrades. A string of curses left their mouths when the corridor boomed, almost throwing them up into the air from the force of the sound alone – there was no way they’d make it in time.

The last grenade exploded, and everything turned white.

“Good call, Reiner,” Hange breathed, slumping against the carcass of the Armored Titan. Reiner simply nodded, not having the energy for anything else – protecting everyone from the explosion without bursting through the ceiling with his titan form had momentarily winded him.

“Oi! Are you alright in there? There was an earthquake in the entire capital!”

That was Magath’s voice, and it was safe to say most of them had never been so happy to hear him.

Thankfully, he’d had the insight to bring a medical unit as well, which promptly began stabilizing the four survivors they’d managed to collect. No one wondered if there may have been any more – there was little point in doing so, after all. Even the foul smell had been replaced with grenade fumes.

“They knew we’d figure the trap door out,” Jean sighed, holding a pack of ice over the minor head bruise the explosion had gifted him with. “Dammit. Every enemy we face, it seems like they’re always a step ahead.”

“And yet they obviously didn’t expect Reiner to have such good control over his titan form,” Pieck countered. “I really doubt they were planning to leave all this equipment intact.”

“That may very well be so, but so far it looks like we’re going to have to learn how to use it all,” Hange mused, feeling a rifle up. The tech support unit had, so far, confirmed her fears – this weaponry was more advanced than anything produced in Marley. Their allies from Hizuru would be of great help, but although they could measure up to the Starkans regarding their technological prowess, the two countries had very different methods and approaches. “Add to that the modifications we’ll have to make so we don’t end up being predictable… it’s going to take a lot of time and resources before we can actually use any of it.”

“Maybe not,” said Levi, surprising Hange to a degree. He’d been so quiet ever since they’d escaped the sewers – she knew something must have happened in there for the brunet to become so uncharacteristically lost in thought, and the scientist knew him well enough. She glanced his way inquisitively.

Despite his indifferent façade, the Captain’s eyes were fixating on the four survivors still receiving medical attention. The woman from the teashop in particular, though he had yet to reveal to his comrades that the small, nearly broken form currently getting bandaged from head to toe was the one who’d revealed this place to them.

“Maybe they can help with that.”

A shared look of surprise was shared amongst the group, with Magath silently snorting through his nose. “You think they’d be willing to help us?”

“Is that so far-fetched? We saved their lives, and their previous employers obviously haven’t treated them very well,” Levi said casually, arms crossed and back leaning against the wall. He then eyed his former foes pointedly. “The Starkans have been one step ahead of us all this time, and these four might be our one good chance to finally penetrate their defenses. Plus, it wouldn’t be the first time someone had a change of heart.”

Magath, Reiner, Annie and Pieck averted their eyes, the Captain’s point obviously striking a chord. Hange, however, was not entirely convinced, yet she didn’t question her dear friend’s suggestion in front of everyone else.

“One of them is conscious, sir,” a doctor came up to Levi, and the Captain turned around so fast Hange thought he would strain a muscle. He noticed that the other woman they’d rescued was sitting up against the wall, and the brunet’s shoulders minimally slumped, but he still approached her with a confident stride.

This time, Hange did dart after him.

“Don’t you think we should at least get them to a proper infirmary before asking them to join us?” she whispered aggressively, grabbing Levi’s arm. “Or maybe figure out who the hell they are in the first place?”

Levi raised a brow. “No and no. They’ll have the mental clarity to think of more reasons to refuse once they recover, and it doesn’t really matter much who they are. They’re Starkans. That’s already an advantage for us.”

“Kiyomi won’t like this at all.”

“Kiyomi should have admitted the Starkan forces were overwhelming her troops in Shiganshina before they seized control of the city. She may just have to deal with this as a small compensation, not to mention she isn’t due to visit for two months.”

Hange sighed. “Why are you so convinced about this?”

He didn’t verbally reply, but his eyes involuntarily flitted to the young girl from the teashop. Both of her arms had needed to be popped back into place, all of her fingernails and toenails were missing and there surely must have been a lot of internal damage that he couldn’t see, based on the severe bruises littering her entire body. Hange followed his gaze and drew in a sharp breath.

“…Is that her?”

Levi let her draw her own conclusions and knelt in front of the conscious woman. She seemed to be about his and Hange’s age, maybe a tad older, with a dark complexion, a sturdy build and the curliest black hair the Captain had ever seen. Her plump lips were dried out, with a deep cut that reached her chin and had needed stitches. It would likely leave a long scar. Levi felt a pang of sympathy – after all, he was lucky to have regained his eyesight, but the marks on his face would stay with him forever.

He opened his mouth, no doubt to very directly get to the point, yet Hange beat him to it.

“Hey there. How are you feeling?”

As always, she backed him up even when she didn’t necessarily agree with him. Levi gave the scientist a brief, but grateful look.

Dark brown eyes moved from one to the other, and the woman put in an enormous amount of effort to lift a brow. “…Like I almost died surrounded by shit.”

Levi let out a snort, and Hange shook her head, rubbed the bridge of her nose and rose to her feet. “I’ll… leave you with him. I think you’ll get along.”

She walked away, likely to inform their other comrades about what the plan of action was, which left Levi to grace the woman with a nod meant to inform her that he meant no harm.

“A long ass scar… short as all hell… oh, fuck me,” she chortled, bursting into strained laughter. Her Marleyan was a bit choppy and not at all as perfect as the teashop woman’s, but then again she didn’t seem like a proper type of person. “Don’t tell me you are who I think you are.”

“I am. And you are?”

“Anya. Anya Murphy. How the hell did y’all manage to find this place?”

Levi sighed. “With some… help.”

Anya squinted in thought for a couple of seconds, after which her face formed a grimace. “Shit. That’s what they were questioning that poor little thing for, huh.”

“They?” Levi prompted her further, to which Anya sighed, wincing at the sting of her injuries. He couldn’t tell for sure, but it looked like she’d been whipped.

“I don’t know how much the doll told you, but this is where the counter-espionage unit operated. So any and all unlucky bastards who did something behind big daddy Victor’s back would be dragged here, have all information tortured out of them and then be thrown in the sewers to die. Today was supposed to be me and a few others, but they’d barely gotten started when Victor dragged her in. Beat the hell out of her, she still didn’t talk. Then he got a call and ordered everyone to leave everything and flee. That includes me,” she said, gazing left and right. “And whoever else you managed to drag out of that hellhole alive.”

“So Victor Baal works directly with his counter-espionage unit?” Levi asked, ignoring the dread settling in his stomach. Increasingly, he felt like somehow this near failure of an operation was his fault.

Anya groaned in his face. “Listen man, I ain’t born yesterday. I am gonna work with you, I didn’t kill my entire fucking squad because I love Baal or his cocksucking Jaegerists. But for fuck’s sake, let me breathe, will you?”

In Levi’s book, that was a by-the-book success. Only when he agreed and rose to his feet did he notice the entirety of his former squad staring, with equally stupefied expressions.

Well, except Mikasa. She was more amused than Levi had ever seen her – at least since Eren died.

“Fuck are y’all looking at?”

“N-Nothing,” they stuttered collectively, reverting to their brat persona (as Levi liked to call it in the safety of his own mind) and scampered away. If the Captain was amused, he didn’t let it show – he’d never once reacted to anyone talking shit in his face, yet the brats still had the impression he would wreak havoc on the realm if such thing happened. It was funnier than it should be.

“Adam has agreed as well,” Hange appeared by his side.

“Who the fuck is Adam?”

The scientist gestured towards the older of the two men they’d rescued. He’d apparently gone right back to taking a nap after speaking with Hange, which was understandable considering the massive concussion he must have had, as well as his age. He looked well into his fifties, if not early sixties.

“Adam Tesla. He worked as a military engineer for the Starkans. He wanted to retire, but then realized that his wife had died without him being notified, and his two daughters were sold on the black market – he’d thought that producing weapons for the military would offer his family protection from Baal’s regime, but the army had conveniently ‘forgotten’. So he hacked all of their systems trying to find his daughters’ location, and ended up here.”

“You got all that from him in such a short time?” Levi asked in mild surprise, masking the sheer disgust the man’s life story evoked in him. For a nation that justified its ambition for dominance through a supposed spread of ‘modernity and civilization’, that sounded awfully primitive.

“You have your talents, I have mine,” Hange nudged him, her face turning serious after only a second of playfulness. “We should really head back now and let the tech team relocate all this equipment. I’ll take care of the other boy when he wakes up and you can talk to your spy.”

Levi sighed. “Right.”

Levi instantly knew the girl was awake, since she announced it by breaking into a very violent, rattling coughing fit. He tried not to wince – based on the medical report, she had several broken ribs. Breathing must have been painful as shit, let alone coughing.

Predictably, she keened in pain, gasping for air. The Captain rose from his chair and approached her bed, grabbing the glass of water from the nightstand. He pulled her up into a sitting position and went to make her drink immediately, but he was left blinking in stupefaction when she spat the liquid in his face.

Levi sighed.

“I’m not poisoning you. You need to drink water so you’ll stop coughing.”

At the sound of his voice, the girl opened her E/C eyes. They were bloodshot and squinting, yet he could tell that recognition hit instantly. She accepted the water this time, her features contorting in discomfort as she swallowed, and took a heaving breath while Levi carefully rested her head against the cushioned headboard.

“…Sorry,” she said hoarsely, watching him wipe the liquid off his face with a napkin. The Captain was a bit taken aback by the fact that she decided to speak Eldian, but somehow that made him involuntarily release some of the tension in his shoulders. It had been so long, after all, and even the former Scouts had taken to speaking Marleyan nearly 24/7 since it had become the norm.

“Don’t sweat it. I should have expected it.”

She hummed noncommittally, flinching as she tried to adjust her position in order to face him better. He couldn’t quite pinpoint the expression on her face, perhaps because almost half of it was bandaged, but it was something akin to deep regret – a stark contrast to the fake, but bubbly smile she’d greeted him with in the teashop.

“Did you all… make it?”

“Yes. And three other survivors we managed to rescue.”

“I see…Thank you,” the girl muttered, averting her gaze. “You didn’t have to… but I’m glad you’re all safe.”

Her Eldian was as perfect as her Marleyan, he couldn’t help but notice, but then again Levi figured he shouldn’t be so surprised – she was a spy.

“What’s your real name?” he changed the subject. He got the feeling that she required a much more delicate approach than Anya, so the Captain tried not to comment on matters which could very easily upset her further. It was plain to see – whatever had been done to her had left her in pieces.

“F/N L/N.”

Silence reigned for a while. Levi’s initial plan had been to make sure all four agreed to join their cause first and then deal with whatever happened afterwards – and yet, ever since he’d locked eyes with her in the sewers, there was a gnawing feeling in his chest that bothered him no end. No doubt, it would continue to eat at him until he received an answer, so the Captain decided to just throw it out into the open.

However, F/N spoke sooner than him.

“There is something you want, isn’t there?” she asked softly, and Levi realized she’d been studying his features. “You don’t have to worry. I’ll give you all the information I have.”

He sighed. “Before I get into any of that, I want to know one thing. How did the Starkans find out about what you did?”

His gut instinct had been right – F/N’s wistful expression turned into complete heartbreak. She closed her eyes and heaved a deep, yet uneven breath. Levi couldn’t take it back, however, so he simply waited for her to reply.

“I wasn’t sure at first… I planned every little thing and I was so, so careful. But I think I messed it up at the end,” she spoke, gazing into his eyes with a fragile inquisitiveness. “I should have kept you nearby until you were completely out of range. You said something through radio station after I left, didn’t you?”

Levi’s eyes widened minimally. He offered no reply, but he was beginning to understand the crucial error that had been made. That reaction was all the confirmation F/N required anyway.

“There were signal interceptors installed throughout the shop. I assume that your team employs codification, but it would only take the Starkan tech units a few hours to decipher it at most. I’m so sorry,” she shook her head, visibly ridden with guilt. “Your comrades almost died because of me – and for nothing. I guess Victor managed to blow up the base too.”

“…Shit,” was all Levi managed to say, his form hunching in the chair, forehead leaning into both of his hands. A wave of remorse and frustration washed over him – he hadn’t taken her seriously enough. He’d been approached by so many frauds in the past months, but that wasn’t an excuse. He’d allowed his mind to wander during their exchange, thinking of possibilities and motives, yet not safety. Only the contents of the note itself had revealed the actual significance of the risks this girl had taken, and then Levi had been too focused on acting upon the chance he’d been given to consider the danger of compromising her.

His gaze roamed her up and down, this time taking everything in. Joey, the other boy, had been lucky enough to get out of there with no injuries, and the other two had patterned, methodically attained wounds – whipping, stabbing injuries. F/N had been treated with no such methods – Levi had seen plenty of wounds before. He could reconstruct the entire incident if he put his mind to it: they’d started by ripping her nails off. Then they’d broken her arms. Then, in sheer anger and impatience, followed ruthless, aimless beating.

She’d trusted him with important information and that’s what she’d received in return.

“…The base and all of the equipment stayed intact,” Levi voiced. That seemed to snap her out of her haze, for F/N blinked in mild surprise.

“Oh.”

“The tech and engineering units have already begun their work on the equipment. We’re converting the establishment into a base of our own. All Marleyan employees in charge of water filtering are going through security checks. We managed to save three people who would have otherwise been dead and forgotten in filth. All of that is thanks to you. You have no reason to blame yourself for what happened.”

F/N stared, tears welling up in her eyes at his words. She wanted to say something, but her throat was too tight. Instead, she blinked the moisture away from her eyes and offered a small nod. Levi rose from his seat, fully intending to leave at this point – after all, it was the middle of the night and he needed to process this information so he could be functional once sunrise rolled along.

“Levi?”

He turned around.

“You really are a gentle man.”

[artdjgblog]

Innerview: Ercan Ucer / Grafik Tasarim (Turkey) October 2008 Image: Giphy Note: Take #2 of a design magazine interview.

​0​1) How do you name yourself other than being a versatile designer? In the past year and a half I’ve come to realize that I’m not really a graphic designer. It’s definitely in there and will always be because design is a poison, like any vocation or skill can be. But, I’ve always approached the way I work as an artist first, and I don’t fancy myself an artist either. I am what I am, though I can’t always be so selfish. Am I an illustrator? I guess there is a collision of the three. Add this to a love for getting my hands dirty, plus a celebration of youth and American pop-culture mixed with Eastern European and post-WWII American Design – B.C. (Before Computer) and the product is me? “Versatile” is too defining of a word for me and way too classy. I simply like to say I make things. Each day is new and I haven’t a clue what I’m going to do. ​0​2) What is the relationship between marketing and your designing process at different areas? (poster, packaging, logo…etc) A design is a marketing tool, no doubt. I haven’t really worked on a large scale setting with this, but I have in terms of marketing on a small scale for rock concerts and prospective CD buyers. Though, a designer plays eye-grabber, a designer is not really a marketer, but I guess it helps to attract attention or sell something. I had friends in college who studied marketing as well as design and they’d probably be more equipped to answering this question. It’s an area I’m not familiar with other than thinking of ways to attract people to get excited for a musical group, a sound, feeling or expression by way of putting a stamp on a poster, CD or logo design. It is a marketing tool especially when working with a client. It certainly is not only what the artist-designer can bring to the “product” (Though, I do think this can apply at a certain larger level with selling something), you’re also working for somebody and trying to sell an image or an item. In the case of a show poster, you’re selling a concert venue or the place the poster is hanging or even the music scene and the city and environment. I think this can be a tricky walk. I’ve been fortunate to have some small success with great clients and great projects to where things work out well. I guess it helps that independent music graphics kind of start out in left field to begin with, to where they are approached more like an art project than a product? Though, I don’t think that the work should not limit itself to a certain kind of audience. I think it’s great when the work speaks to anybody. There are times though where things don’t mix well, whether under the weather by design, client-wise or consumer. It’s just part of the deal. The work isn’t always going to be a homerun. Another deal is the way people interact with communication in marketing. Today I find that technology has a lot to do with people getting information for a rock concert via social networking sites, musician, ticket and concert venue sites. I don’t think that something like the poster will ever be dead, but technology can almost make a poster feel second-rate, a collector’s keep-sake and more for show than for the actual show. Logos are very interesting when it comes to marketing for bands because they are generally slapped onto many-many products. I’ve worked with a lot of music-related designs, but I’ve also made logos varying from a lawyer to an internet-computer company to a church before. So, these different applications encourage me to find new ways to talk to other audiences who come searching for something that isn’t entertainment, but I approach these designs with the same techniques and tools I use with the music graphics. I try to give something unique, and of a new take, to get a double-take. ​0​3) Can you tell us about your working environment and your different feelings or extraordinary events that inspires you? Ever since I was a child growing up on a farm, my working environment has been outside and especially in my bedroom. Working environments also extended to anyplace I had my eyes open. I certainly believe in a home base or comfort zone of operations, but a lot of my more thorough processing happens while out and about and then I bring it back home with me to make. Currently I work out of a basement in my home. I’ve constructed a work space out of wood found in the street. I call it my “club house”. I love it down there despite my continual problem with having a work space that barely has room for me to work in! I collect and store a lot of things around me and still have a lot of my childhood things around me, along with piles and piles of supplies, research and things I’ve found or see the potential in for a future use. I have a mind-set that if I can’t use it today, I can easily use it in 50 years. I’m a major fan of extraordinary events and tend to find humorous and peculiar ones to be more my taste, and more-so in retrospect of the event. I feel to be blessed with a certain quality that attracts odd circumstances, or maybe it’s all in my head? Extraordinary has its own brand of “something”, but more often I find inspiration in places, events and things that are fairly run-of-the-mill and everyday ordinary for anyone, which can give them an added cushion of “extra” for me. On my website I’ve made a list of my history, the things that have been the everyday ordinary for me, but might seem very out of ordinary to others. It all depends on perspective and where you’ve been. ​0​4) When did you discover the impulse that led you being a designer? This impulse to leave behind a paper trail of some sort on my impression has always been kicking around in me. I didn’t fully know it at the time, but I believe it started when I was young as I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t doing or making something. It’s a large part of my make-up. Much of it has to do with my farming background and watching my Dad and his Dad and others always doing or working on something whether it was building fences, planting crops or tending animals. I also owe a lot to my Grandma, for her hands-on making skills and to my parents for allowing me to grow-up fully plugged into the American pop-culture of books, toys, music, movies, video games and sports. Now, I just feed off of my former self and continue to feed for the future. It’s not work to me when it truly works and I enjoy myself. ​0​5)  Is looking at life always from a different angel, the designer’s necessarily ego? Most any area of most any job, skill, talent, business doesn’t come without some ego hurdling. The ego is amped further within the arts. Inflated achievement comes with ease when your voice gets a little loud in a “scene” or beyond. I’d like to think I’m fairly grounded, but it’s hard not to feel the eggs weight the other side when I’m told I could be sitting on a couple of golden ones. Working a day job can help matters, but it can also be a nightmare with time management. I have to just tell myself that I am a man and a man who happens to make things. Still, that can be hard. It doesn’t mean that I’m better than somebody or am a “somebody” because I’ve found a certain something within me. I just enjoy my life and feel very fortunate to even know what I want to do with it. I think one needs healthy doses of reality and a whole heap of humor to make it too. Besides, I have no answers. If you know somebody with it all figured out, have them call me! What helps me is to find comfort and ease is venturing back into my child manner. I’m much more content and find peace when I’m either looking at the world through a certain lense that I might qualify for, or just making and enjoying the act of celebration in creativity. The moment I start to think too much about it all or answer questions, that is when it can get a little dangerous in the head. I’d like to think gaining wisdom through age and maturity helps. I know that my energy and will-power have died some, and of late I’m leaning on this as a benefit. I think I say and do some dumb stuff today, though I’m positive it’s a little less than yesterday! ​0​6) Can you inform us about graphic design’ s one of the important field, package design and your sketches? / Tell me about the sketching and process of packaging. There is a certain amount of image longevity that becomes attached to packaging. I’m not experienced in much more than musical CD packaging, but I think a long life span especially applies to this in the iconic halls of pop-culture, even on small levels. Though, that’s not the reason to put into making something and/or package something but if you can add some meaty eye candy, then so be it. I love poster design because there are endless possibilities to exhaust, many ways to work reach-and-grab-of-the-moment and intuitive, and if something doesn’t work all-around, it’s throw-away and will die soon like house flies. CDs are so different, at least for me, and they can be quite intimidating and intoxicating. Sometimes another designer’s great CD package makes me not wish to do another one, and in a good way! With my own process, I do a little bit of sketching, but more-so the process and evolution of the CD package is the sketching for me. If I’m rewarded with an ample amount of time to work on a CD I usually make it happen in three different sessions, or what I call “incubation stages”. This allows me time to sit on ideas and to come back to them with fresh perspective and clear head, to play or spin off ideas and avenues. When figuring out an image or “look” for an album, I like to at least digest the music or get a track listing. With the way in which I work, I tend to feed off of my day-to-day (sometimes minute-to-minute) emotional handy work. It can be a little strange though as I can easily obsess over wondering the what-might-have-been with something like a CD package or anything. I think that a CD package for me can be extremely different given what day I’m at. I do believe my best packages have come down on me at the last minute, intuitively and usually on the lowest of budgets. And I mean cheap, major cheap. 0​7) What are the benefits of making global designs for the designer? I love a body of work, one that breathes and not only serves as a timeline for the maker, but also for views and observations on life itself. Ideas that can extend globally even, throughout time. I think that a great body of work can extend to anybody, anywhere in the world. And even if it is for some other body like a client, it is always from its original body of the creator. Anything that goes global is still connected to that first breath of singular life. Due to technology, it’s so much easier today to go “global” with designs, even if one does operate on a small scale. I think it’s great to put the work out there, to share, even if it’s not marking up or wrapping up a popular product. In today’s fast-paced world of millions and billions of images and things flashing, it really does mean a lot that my meager things have made it in some strange little way. Even, if it’s just a grin or a double-take by someone looking at a little poster on a wall or in a magazine or a global internet billboard or world-wide magazine and book distribution. Though, a part of me still likes to keep some things to myself. And I’m odd because I personally don’t like to attract attention to myself with graphics on the shirts I wear or product logos on bags and things. ​0​8) Can you explain the relationship between marketing and designing? I’m not sure if I was successful, but I tried to answer some of this in question 2. With this one I’ll try to wrap it into the way that I work, to where my designs act as marketing tools for me, as well as the product they are pushing. Until recently I’ve never had to market myself in conventional practice. For the first six years my work itself was the marketing. Everything from a poster to a package and a logo has been on the same level with causing a “Trickle Down / Word of Mouth” marketing effect. And I’ve been fortunate to keep fairly close relationships with my clients due to a small industry I work in. These clients have brought other clients. For my first two years I was living and working with several bands in a house. I didn’t have to leave and would get new work constantly. At times I’d just make things before I was even asked. Some of the best marketing can come in poster making and that is how I started to gather some attention. Posters have a short shelf life in comparison to packaging and logos, so there is always a new one to tack up. And if a poster doesn’t succeed, then it’s easy to just make another one. It’s just a poster and practice is good. After a while people start getting curious and come looking for you. ​0​9) Does any of your designs have an unforgettable story? The “Whatever Makes You Happy” CD package design I made in my basement in June of 2002 for the band Elevator Division, is one of my most memorable moments. It was a special run of 250 handmade CD packages and my idea came at the last minute. I made an image of a hand shooting off its index finger like a missile that married the themes for the album perfectly, with reflections of war and failed relationships. It was the idea of shooting off one’s options and making decisions. It was fitting for the band-music but also for the national-world climate. Each one was hand-cut from cardboard and stencil sprayed and rubber stamped. Inserts were copied, cut, folded and glued. At the last mist of red spray paint, a crack of thunder shook the massive home’s foundation and I bolted from the basement and out the front door to a down pour of rain. I leapt off the front porch and slid head first down the front lawn embankment and into the street flowing like a river current. The drug dealing squatters of the home across the street were on their front step looking at the fire in my eyes and the red paint streaming from my ears, nose and mouth. It was a high much higher than that of chemical substance. -djg