#the government exists to make my life hard and miserable

[gunpowder-gemini]

crying when you're mad/frustrated is so fucking stupid and useless and i would like to opt out

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[queerlymasculine]

What My 24/7 D/s Dynamic Is Like (no, it's not like that)

what up, gamers, my name is Seth

I'm a man in my 30s, and the other day, I realized that I'm in a 24/7 dynamic with my partner and dom. now, you might be wondering - and justifiably so - how I didn't know that, and you would be even more justified to be extremely skeptical of my intellectual capacity when you learn that I've been with my partner for almost three and a half years and our dynamic existed from the beginning lmao

but here's why: my 24/7 dynamic does not look like any definition or description of a 24/7 dynamic that I have ever heard or read.

whenever I heard about any kind of kink being 24/7, it was usually - but not always - in the context of total power exchange (TPE). if it wasn't a 24/7 TPE, the seemingly most important defining characteristic of a 24/7 dynamic was the emphasis on rules that one partner follows even when another is not (others are not) present. these rules could be sexual in nature or not but often or usually included both.

routine was another defining characteristic. one partner adheres to the rules or routine governing certain activities (getting up, bedtime routine, etc.) at all times. the routine wouldn't always be an everyday routine, but every time X condition applied, you do Y and Z, and the consequence of noncompliance* is punishment of some kind, whatever was decided upon by all parties. compliance was often rewarded but not always or at least not part of the established plan.

Sometimes the rules and routine could relate to domestic duties. Sometimes a person would have to keep their partner(s) updated about whether they were following the rules.

The narrative was always one of control, of restriction, of limitation. whether these themes were explicit is beside the point. you can't do this, you have to do this by or before this time, etc. It was one partner telling the other no.

And that............. is not for me. good on you if it's your jam and you're able to negotiate a scenario that hits all your buttons, but it's not for me.

I don't enjoy rules. I don't like having the specter of failure lurking in the back of my mind. I don't want to live with the anxiety that comes with the potential to disappoint someone I care about very deeply, whose opinion of me truly matters to me. I don't want to be deprived of the flexibility to dictate the rhythm of my day.

and you know what, I just don't want to be told what to do during my everyday life. I don't want someone telling me I should be punished for making choices I'm entitled to make as an adult. the idea of having my autonomy limited in any way genuinely pisses me off. there is no world in which rules between me and a partner are anything but inevitable sources of guilt, shame, fear, self loathing, and misery.

similarly, an established routine is quite frankly incompatible with my brain. there would legitimately be no point in even trying. but honestly, the real reason I hate the very idea of it is because a scenario in an interpersonal relation where there is some kind of expectation regarding how I choose to spend my time and the possibility of negative consequences for failure to comply is an inherently coercive and miserable situation to me. I know a lot of people want a little help achieving certain goals - maybe having a consistent sleep schedule or being more consistently on time for things, whatever it might be - because those kinds of things can be really hard and being accountable to someone else motivates them, and that's great for them, but that's not how it works for me. I'm independent. if I am going to do something, it is will be the result of an active choice that I have made. other people's opinions or feelings on the matter are never significant factors in my decisionmaking process. they never have been. my entire life has been a series of decisions I have made to build for myself a life worth living when the people around me wanted me to accept conditions that might have killed me if given enough time. I'm not exaggerating.

this applies not only to big decisions but also the small, everyday ones. for example, I'm trying to eat takeout only once a week. I'm sure I don't have to tell any of you that anything more than that is really expensive and most likely inconsistent with reasonable health outcomes lol

some people might get a lot of value out of coming up with an agreement with their partner to help them stick to that goal, and honestly, I can understand how that might be helpful for someone, if that's your jam.

but here's where I differ: the significance of my decision to be mindful of my money and advance my health goals is derived entirely and exclusively from the fact that I am actively choosing those things every single day to the best of my ability. that I can just as easily and without external consequence choose to get food delivered three times a week is a crucial part of the equation.

okay real talk I literally just had a revelation as I work on this post. I realized that the problem with the imposition of rules and routine intended to result in me taking care of myself is how it makes self care compulsory. I would not be doing it for myself; I would be doing it to avoid punishment, disappointment, etc.

And that's just........ not good. that is the opposite of self care. self care isn't what happens if you just check the right items (and enough of them) off a to-do list. it's not the inevitable product of doing a specific number of specific actions.

anyway, back to my point--

so, you're probably still asking exactly how it took me three and a half years to realize I'm in a 24/7 dynamic.

well, it's because we don't do any of the shit I used to associate with the idea of a 24/7 dynamic.

rules? we don't have them. we don't play with anything even remotely close to that universe, not even when we're joking around. really.

routines? nope.

tasks I am required to do? no. tasks that my partner would like it if I did? no.

punishment if I do/don't do something specific during a play session or in the course of a regular day? no. we don't even play with the language of punishment, discipline, correction, etc. we're not interested.

so, the question remains --

what does a 24/7 dynamic look like if those elements are not present?

uhh we both work full time and live in different states so... there is that. in terms of what occupies the overwhelming majority of my time and energy, from an external perspective, I am doing what I would be doing on my own. I work, I play video games, I spend time with my friends, I go to therapy.

now that I'm trying to explain it, I'm struggling to find words.

it's the way we relate to each other, the way we interact. a mutual understanding of what we have decided to build together. it's so simple and straightforward and profound in its simplicity -- ze takes care of me, I let hir take care of me.

it probably sounds like I'm getting the better end of the deal. after all, the sentence I wrote kind of makes it seem like I'm the passive beneficiary of hir love and efforts, offering nothing in return. I wouldn't be surprised if someone thought, "What's in it for hir?"

and that's the thing.

it's not an exchange. it's not a deal, it's not a bargain. there's no admission fee, no price to pay. I haven't given anything up, and ze hasn't taken anything away.

I feel like this will be incomprehensible to many people and even not qualify as kink to a few.

ze wants to take care of me. ze wants to call me sweet thing and tell me I'm a good man and a good boy, and I want hir to say those things to me. I want to be safe, I want to feel safe, and ze is safe, and with hir, who I am and what I am, my feelings, my thoughts, my fears -- it's okay. I don't have to be pleasant and sunny if I'm actually feeling grumpy. I can feel grumpy, and I can express that I'm grumpy instead of packing it all away so it doesn't kill the mood.

there's no threat of failure, no standards to conform to, no goals to achieve, no expectations to meet. we're just gentle and sweet to each other, that's all.

I'm hirs, yes, ze owns me, that's the language we have chosen to use, but it would be a mistake to try and understand our dynamic through the lens of capitalism. capitalism cannot comprehend ownership devoid of exploitation, and thus, many people would not consider this ownership. after all, capitalist ownership is about control, it's defined by the right to control and make decisions about your property, and ze doesn't make any decisions for me. so how is that ownership?

exactly.

also, 24/7 dynamics that other people have have always sounded like so much fucking work to me. what we have is so natural and easy. it's easy to be sweet and gentle with hir. ze is easy to talk to. ze is easy to trust. the hardest part of this relationship has been learning to allow myself to ask for what I want and what I need and not judging myself for daring to want or need something. actually getting and giving what I want and need is easy.

anyway. it's been a long day and my brain is tired. I just wanted to share all this so hopefully fewer people will walk around with the misconception that kink is only one specific thing or the idea that you have to give things up in order to get what you are looking for. you don't have to.

oh and by the way this shouldn't be understood or interpreted as some kind of commentary on anyone else's relationship. it's a description and explanation of my relationship and why it works for me and my partner.

*to me, compliance/noncompliance are not the same concepts as obedience/disobedience. You can comply with the rules but find ways to subvert the spirit of them if you get creative and believe in yourself.

[link-the-bard]

I don’t often talk candidly on here, as most of my posting tends to just be reblogging some cool or funny or inspiring shit, but too many people either went to bed with or woke up to Bad Fucking News. It’s easy to give into despair about the future of the country and the people close to you. Please do the hard thing and persist. Stay alive. Even if it means you have to make some difficult decisions.

I have a lot of feelings on the current state of the world right now, not just on the results of one election. This was just the natural course of action for our government to take. It is the result of so much apathy, so much “I got mine, fuck you”, so much petty individualism that allows you to see your neighbor as your enemy. We must reject this mindset with every fiber of our being. We must get to know our neighbor. We must be involved in our communities. We must show up and do the work, do the hard thing and reach with outstretched hands to another living being and say “I will be there for you, please be there for me.” It is the only way to get us through not only the next 4 years, but the rest of our lives on this planet. Every action you take alongside another is an act of rebellion. Kindness in a cruel world is an act of rebellion.

I’ve been reading and writing a lot of poetry and music this year, and it’s really helped me digest my feelings on hope and despair, on living and dying, on action and stagnation. I haven’t really shared much with anyone because of how vulnerable it is to give part of yourself to the world. In these words I talk a lot about the necessity for all living things to thrive and spread joy and laughter and love, in contrast with how the current world is designed to keep everyone apart and miserable. I wish to share some words with you all. One of my current projects is a concept album of songs with the theming of the Greek concepts of love through the lens of the divine. The final song of this collection is devoted to “agape”, the highest and most ideal form of love. Selfless. Unconditional. My interpretation is partly inspired by the creation of humans in the book of genesis as well as my experiences singing in choirs my whole life. I hope these words inspire you to seek others in your community and find comfort in such a tumultuous time. Let it be a catalyst towards direct action, towards rebellion, towards hope.

Agape

“Children, reach with your outstretched fingers

I’ve molded you out of the earth

My tears form your clay bodies and my breath gives you life

Use this life, reach for each other and give yourselves

To yourselves.

In my image be you

My will, to be good to others

Sing, sing with the voice of one

Voices of many in one

All in harmony, harming none.

If there exists a realm between “hope” and “caring”

You will find me there.”

[not-available-for-comment]

I’m always a little amused when people assume that something very commonly enjoyed by a lot of people is actually a government/corporate plant because they don’t personally enjoy it.

“Gift wrap is a big business conspiracy” Actually people have been wrapping gifts or putting them in fancy boxes or bags for millennia before capitalism existed but now I know not to gift wrap your presents so at least there’s that I guess.

Not quite the same thing, but I had a conversation at a bus stop a few months ago where a man told me that the rich people in my town hated homeless people so much that they’d intentionally blind them with bright headlights at bus stops.

Me: Or… they don’t want to run anyone over?

Him: Well that’s just what I’ve been told

Me: It just seems like a lot of work…

Like, I actually get how this happens. You experience enough adversity in life, due to being neurodiverse or homeless or part of a generational cycle of poverty or subject to systemic racism, and it gets hard to believe that things can be this consistently fucked for you without it being personal. People don’t like gift wrap, or small talk, or other small social gestures, it’s actually Big Business manipulating the people who expect them of you, or a cruel joke they’re playing on you, specifically, because they hate neurodiverse people. Ultrabright headlights aren’t a known problem on roadways due to various social and economic pressures, people are just blinding you, specifically, because they hate you.

And there’s often a kernel of truth in these things! Some people do use details of social interactions to make autistic people miserable, intentionally or not, because their own inflexibility refuses to meet people halfway. Like, if you don’t like gift wrap then I’m going to start just handing you shit, rather than insisting you like my wrapping job. And I’ll work with you to find super easy and non-stressful wrapping solutions for when you do need to give wrapped gifts. But there are people who would insist that you continue giving and receiving gifts Properly, because you Need To Learn, and that’s still not big business manipulation but it *is* shitty.

Rich people in my town *do* kinda hate homeless people actually. They’re just probably not intentionally blinding people who wait for the bus in the dark. Because rich people hatred is usually disinterest and carelessness, not intentional malice.

I could go on with more examples, but my point is that whenever I encounter these messages from bizarro world where everyone has conspired to convince you that [gift wrap][saying hello][driving with headlights on] is a good thing when they all secretly hate it and/or you, I always have two reactions. One is to laugh a little, because dear god no one has that kind of time, buddy. Most of us are just living our lives in the best way we can. Vast and deeply pointless conspiracies aren’t fun and are a waste of time. Why would we live like that?

But the other reaction is always to be a little sad. Because life has to have hurt you for you to start believing this stuff. Has no one ever explained social interactions to you, to the point you’re assuming gift wrap is a practical joke? Have you received so much heartless cruelty in life that the idea of being intentionally tortured at a bus stop is more likely than “people trying to see in the dark”? How do I show you the world is kinder than that, when you have so much evidence to the contrary?

[depressedhatakekakashi]

Hey, what is the monarchy like in GOS after King Lee dies. Like in the travelor, Teacher and farmer lifetimes? Did Lee put a system in place to ensure his decendants would not fall off the past like the last monarchs? Did he create something akin to the rounf table, and have it so the king/ queen would not be the sole ruler in charge? Maybe even specific areas of the government are directly owned by the lower class, and they have something akin to a union and their own leader, so the king can talk with them and discuss their needs at the time.

You mentioned once that Kakashi had a talk with Lee when he was crowned king, and that if his heirs are not suited, that perhaps he can pick another person he finds have the qualities needed. Does Lee put that system in place, contingencies to avoid a bad apple in his blood line?

And does Kakashi present himself to every new ruler? I could see there being a ceromony when the new king/ queen is decided, that the amulet Rougue Gainmade all those years ago, is passed on and worn by the new king. When its put around their neck, I could see Kakashi appearing to the new ruler either that night, or in some sort of vision.

Which means if/ when a new king is crowned in Kakashi's mortal life time, I could see the ruler freaking out because OH MY GODS THERE WAS NO VISION. OUR PATROM GOD HAS ABANDONED US/ DIED!!!! (Hopefully they do so in private XD;)

(Kakashi: *2 weeks after he comes back visiting the new ruler* Yo, sorry for the delay. I was a little dead for a whilw there... just a little. Still, great work keeping things together and running in my absense. 31 whole years without rain and you kept the kingdom running like a champ.

Queen: *WAAAAH IT WAS REALLY HARD!!!*)

So we definitly have the system King Lee puts into place to ensure that the next ruler in line is hand chosen by the previous one, with no restiction of them having to be related the the current monarch by blood. For Lee it's more important to keep them from falling back into the same mistakes and miserable existence than it is the keep the royal line 'pure'.

But i also really love this idea of Kakashi making a habit of greeting the new monarch the night after their coronation and reminding them of their duty. Ensuring for himself that they're not going to make the same mistakes of the past.

Because of these systems, perhaps by the time of Kakashi's mortal life, the monarchy has no biological relation left to King Lee, but they embody his beliefs and everything he was taught by the roughs and gods he grew up beside. Perhaps some people within the kingdom try to use the knowledge of Kakashi never appearing to the new Queen as 'proof' that she is not the correct choice, leading to a revolt or two during their mortal life (one when he and Gai are kids and one when they're adults). In that second revolt, Kakashi and Gai are expected to choose a side, and they choose the queen's side.

Kakashi, even in his mortal life, chooses to stand by the Queen chosen by her predecessor, and Gai, the one who had fought so hard to put an end to the corrupt monarchy and lost his life in the fight, also chooses her side.

Anyone who knows who the two really are realizes that this is the queen the village needs, so even if they were on the fence beforehand they quickly change sides.

As for when Kakashi would finally appear to the queen, I'd say it would be the same day the rain returns. He needs to rest of course, and he's going to do that, but Obito's going to have to kill him again to keep him from doing his duty.

and he doesn't just appear to her. he knows that won't be enough cuz those who are against her will simply accuse her of lying about the god of storms finally appearing to her

No, he appears at her side during a meeting with all of her highest-ranked officials. The general who leads her army (which isn't that big but is strong), the head of the merchants guild, the Queen's advisors, etc.

The Queen is speaking when someone opens their mouth to object, but before they can speak lightning cracks through the sky and Kakashi appears at her side.

And maybe some of them recognize him.

maybe the General had met Kakashi when he and Gai stood up to defend the queen's reign and lamented at how intelligent Kakashi was in tactics and how he would have made a great soldier, or even a great general himself.

Maybe the merchant guild's head knows Kakashi because he would often interact with him as he was growing up bringing produce from his farm to the market.

They see this man who they had stood beside, and possibly fought beside. who they'd had conversations with and laughed with, but now he's standing at the queen's side as a god, and they're faced with the reality that the god of storms wasn't just gone.

he was mortal

he was living among them, and even in his mortal life he stood at the Queen's side and fought for her right to rule.

No one's ever going to question her legitimacy to rule again.

[daimonclub]

100 excellent quotes

We are all leaves of one trees 100 excellent quotes and aphorisms by great and famous authors to inspire your thoughts, give new life to your ideas and stimulate your critical thinking skills. Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish dictatorship. George Orwell To find yourself, think for yourself. Socrates The believer is happy. The doubter is wise. Edgar Allan Poe Associate with people who are likely to improve you. Seneca My pain may be the reason for somebody's laugh. But my laugh must never be the reason for somebody's pain. Charlie Chaplin The doctor sees all the weakness of mankind; the lawyer all the wickedness and the theologian all the stupidity. Arthur Schopenhauer To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment. Ralph Waldo Emerson If most of us remain ignorant of ourselves, it is because self-knowledge is painful and we prefer the pleasure of illusion. Aldous Huxley There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self. Ernest Hemingway From error to error one discovers the entire truth. Sigmund Freud No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness. Aristotle Those who are able to see beyond the shadows and lies of their culture will never be understood, let alone believed, by the masses. Plato If the literature we are reading does not wake us, why then do we read it? A literary work must be an ice axe to break the sea frozen inside us. Franz Kafka One cannot step twice in the same river. Heraclitus

True wisdom lies in one's confession about the limits of one's knowledge. Socrates People who are aware of, and ashamed of, their prejudices are well on the road to eliminating them. Gordon Allport A truth that's told with bad intent, Beats all the lies you can invent. William Blake Wisdom outweighs any wealth. Sophocles You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation. Plato Know that the body is merely a garment. Go, seek the wearer, not the cloak. Rumi The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it. James Bryce Doubt is the origin of wisdom. Rene Descartes Rules for Happiness: something to do, someone to love, something to hope for. Immanuel Kant The universities do not teach all things... So a doctor must seek old wives, gypsies, sorcerers, wandering tribes, old robbers and such outlaws and take lessons from them. A doctor must be a traveller... Knowledge is experience. Paracelsus Beauty is truth, truth beauty. John Keats Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude. Arthur Schopenhauer You are a little soul carrying about a corpse, as Epictetus used to say. Marcus Aurelius Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, havegreat sadness on earth. Fyodor Dostoevsky I worked hard. Anyone who works as hard as I did can achieve the same results. The final aim and reason of all music is nothing other than the glorification of God and the refreshment of the spirit. Johann Sebastian Bach

Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being misunderstood. Friedrich Nieztsche The strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone. Henrik Ibsen The art of living well and the art of dying well are one. Epicurus Be a free thinker and don’t accept everything you hear as truth. Be critical and evaluate what you believe in. Aristotle If my soldiers started thinking, no one would stay in my ranks. Frederick II King of Prussia Miserable dictators who rave about a new world order, while governing nations of poor sheep, confirm that we live in the toilet of the universe, animated by the supreme and chaotic entropy of their total stupidity. Carl William Brown Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink a great ship. Benjamin Franklin' Any soldier who fights for money and for a dictator is a waste of society, an object without a brain, only capable of a good action, that of dying. Carl William Brown We have art in order not to die of truth. Friedrich Nieztsche Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence. Robert Frost Never underestimate the power of stupid people in a large group. George Carlin Doubt is one of the names of intelligence. Jorge Luis Borges One must be a sea, to receive a polluted stream without becoming impure. Friedrich Nietzsche To the poor Chomsky, about what he said on ChatGPT, I would answer with an aphorisms by Carmelo Bene, who once said: "A work is not by an author, and neither is life". Carl William Brown The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. Bertrand Russell

100 excellent aphorisms and quotes Frederick II King of Prussia once said: "If my soldiers started thinking, no one would stay in my ranks.". That's why a dictator who favors war is without brain just as well, capable of nothing, but only a good action, that of dying. Carl William Brown Evil people always support each other; that is their chief strength. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn When the student is ready the teacher appears. When the student is truly ready, the teacher disappears. Lao Tzu Science is organized knowledge. Wisdom is organized life. Immanuel Kant Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge. Alfred North Whitehead All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth. Friedrich Nietzsche Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices. Voltaire The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became the truth. Geroge Orwell Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact. William James There are no dangerous thoughts; thinking itself is dangerous. Hannah Arendt Thinking in itsself is very dangerous, as Hannah Arendt said, avove all if you are under the supreme cruel power of human stupidity, as Mr. Putrid shows us. Carl William Brown Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it. Bertolt Brecht Life is nothing but a reckless, unaware, risky, and incautious bet that in the end everyone is doomed to lose. So you’d better get used! Carl William Brown Nothing is more fairly distributed than common sense: no one thinks he needs more of it than he already has. Rene Descartes It is a little embarrassing that, after forty-five years of research and study, the best advice I can give to people is to be a little kinder to each other. Aldous Huxley The soul is born old but grows young. That is the comedy of life. And the body is born young and grows old. That is life’s tragedy. Oscar Wilde The human species is mainly made up of people who do nothing but fill the sewers and pollute the environment in which they live, an endless mass of donkeys who unfortunately believe themselves to be horses and since they even believe to have a religious spirituality, they are also quite convinced to gain eternal life. Carl William Brown Geniuses are like thunderstorms: they go against the wind, terrify people, clear the air. Soren Kierkegaard

100 excellent quotes Humor is definitely a form of religion, of course it’s not as generous and solid as other traditional forms of worship. To his faithful theorists, pratictioners or even to his martyrs he cannot certainly offer virgin maidens in his paradise, as Islam does; in any case one must be satisfied, at the limit it can offer a dramatis personae disguised as a joker, or if you prefer, a kind of fool! Carl William Brown Don’t educate your children to be rich. Educate them to be happy, so they know the value of things, not the price. Victor Hugo Two percent of the people think; three percent of the people think they think; and ninety-five percent of the people would rather die than think. George Bernard Shaw The voice of the majority is no proof of justice. Friedrich Schiller Sadness is caused by intelligence, the more you understand certain things, the more you wish you didn’t understand them. Charles Bukowski If you allow men to use you for your own purposes, they will use you for theirs. Aesop Society often forgives the offender, never forgives the dreamer. Oscar Wilde Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiation - creation - there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe One can hardly read our history without conceiving a horror for mankind. Voltaire True freedom is the right to say something that others don't want to hear. George Orwell For all evils, there are two remedies - time and silence. Alexandre Dumas Giordano Bruno and the roots of our culture in the light of the darkness of holy imbecility. In fact, the roots of our culture are Catholic Christians, since if you tried to have other roots, they would burn you alive. Carl William Brown He who dares not offend cannot be honest. Thomas Paine Humans arose, rather, as a fortuitous and contingent outcome of thousands of linked events, any one of which could have occurred differently and sent history on an alternative pathway that would not have led to consciousness. Stephen Jay Gould The first thing that reading teaches is how to be alone. Jonathan Franzen The trouble with the world is not that people know too little; it's that they know so many things that just aren't so. Mark Twain A noble heart will refuse happiness built on misfortune of others. Saadi The more unintelligent a man is, the less mysterious existence seems to him. Arthur Schopenhauer Respond intelligently even to unintelligent treatment. Lao Tzu All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. Edmund Burke

100 excellent quotes by the world of English The intelligence consists not only in the knowledge but also in the skill to apply the knowledge into practice. Aristotle The mark of a civilized man is his willingness to re-examine his most cherished beliefs. Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. When all think alike, then no one is thinking. Walter Lippmann Television is the mirror where the defeat of our entire cultural system is reflected. Federico Fellini Day by day, what you think and what you do is who you become. Heraclitus Make your own rules or be a slave to another man’s. William Blake Life is not a problem to be solved but a reality to be lived. Søren Kierkegaard No man on earth is truly free, All are slaves of money or necessity. Public opinion or fear of prosecution forces each one, against his conscience, to conform. Euripides Without goals, the very concept of intelligence is meaningless. Steven Pinker What worries you, masters you. John Locke Art is to console those who are broken by life. Vincent Van Gogh The reading of all good books is like conversation with the finest men of past centuries. René Descartes Humanity is as if immersed in sleep, it is interested only in what is useless and lives in the world of error. Hakim Sanai You are wealthy when you can freely decide what to do with your time. Vala Afshar A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears. Montaigne There is one art of which people should be masters - the art of reflection. Samuel Taylor Coleridge The foundation of every state is the education of its youth. Diogenes Don’t miss these other similar posts: Wise quotes from the Ancients 100 golden quotes and aphorisms 100 admirable quotes and aphorisms 100 wonderful quotes and aphorisms 100 best quotes and aphorisms 100 magnificent quotes and aphorisms 100 brilliant quotes and aphorisms 100 famous quotes and aphorisms 100 memorable quotes and aphorisms 100 top great quotes and aphorisms 100 great quotes on love Great and famous philosophy quotes Quotes by authors Quotes by arguments Thoughts and reflections Read the full article

[voltaspistol]

This goes for so many invisible disabilities. My parents fought SO HARD to make sure I didn't end up on "Happy Pills". I am now on some of the exact medications that existed back then that they were so afraid of. The result? I'm happy. Not neurotypical by any stretch, but functional. It makes me so furious that they FOUGHT to keep me as authentically miserable as possible. And then scaremongered me from getting help, then told me to go to the same people (the government) for help that they'd always threatened would institutionalize me at the local insane asylum if I didn't carefully manage my emotions to be as pleasant and inoffensive as possible at all times. ..... The fury at missing so much life never really goes away.

big ole comic about adult ADHD diagnosis + big feelings + making sure childhood me is okay

[crocusina]

Hello dear friends!

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Thank you from the bottom of my heart for the support you are giving to help Palestinian families stay safe and alive. ✌✌

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We collect such donations to provide the minimum basic needs of life and help find safety and peace for young children who do not deserve to live in such horrific situations. Thanks to your contribution, my family is slowly approaching 1/2 of the way to reach the goal. Every form of your help makes a difference to the free people who have been struggling and paying so much for almost 305 hard days

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Please continue to support the most just cause in the world either by donating directly or by sharing the link to let others know. Don't hesitate to help people in difficult and miserable times until the dark days are over.

❤🤍💚🖤🇵🇸🇵🇸

people in tumblr, i share with you this valuable info @yasermohammad shared with me. i hope it's ok to share it publicly, more people need to know about this.

i also hope there's much less censorship here than in tiktok (but i haven't been here in a long time... so... we shall see...).

this tumblr account (my tumblr account) loves watermelons. ✨🍉🍉🍉🍉✨ long live watermelons all over the world! (if you know what i mean. 😉✨)

NO MORE VIOLENCE! NO MORE WAR! ✨ 🇲🇽 ❤️🖤🤍💚 🇵🇸 ✨

let me be clear: i do not support isnotreal's government's vile decisions and i do not support the us' government's cynical decisions. i do not support any government or person that is in favor of erasing other human beings (i don't care what they think and feel about it---there's no excuse). and, of course, i do not support zionism; it shouldn't even exist. 😠😤😤😤

please, let's help and support any country that is under unfair attack. congo, we haven't forgotten about you! and we know there are more countries to mention. i repeat: no more violence! no more war! ✨✊✊✊✊

[randynewfan]

im tired.

i am okay, i will not be throwing in the towel or anything, but man am i tired.

this world is exhausting. it feels like every single aspect of life revolves around money, everything feels so anxious.

there are tall blue flashing lights all along the streets of this city. cameras watching, making it hostile to anybody the state sees fit. it’s so dystopian, they blink incessantly, like some sort of lukewarm compromise when the government suggested a massive camera designed like a light pole and the general public caught on. they always set the rules, we have to try to pull them back to reality.

it feels dumb to even talk about any of this. so much of online discourse is just that exact thing. i don’t know how to make it bear fruit. at least, in my own life. it’s so hard to make a difference in a world that has been designed around you. it’s been designed for cars, for land developers and business owners, for the rich people who carve our cities and our lands, build our sprawling housing developments, and the people who make and enforce the laws.

so much autonomy has been stripped away. do or die, yknow. thankfully im not teetering like many are.

these are simply scary times. these would all feel less *urgent* or scary if it wasn’t for this impending … something. i don’t want to say collapse, because it’s just we need to change our entire economic system and way of living to prevent global catastrophe. you have to believe we’ll fix it. that’s how optimism works, that’s how hope works, if you don’t get it then ur miserable, just how it goes. but it’s scary, seeing how the state has been flexing its arms more and more with the police, digital control and avoiding addressing digital issues. i think it’s intentional that the rich politicians stay old, that’s best for everybody running the CIA, NSA, all the autonomous parts of our government.

just trying not to get lost in nonsense and information. trying to stay grounded. i’ve fallen through that before. im aware of it.

im just not sure what my future looks like. i know nobody does, but i don’t know if everyone realizes how fundamentally our world has to change. getting rid of fossil fuels means a top to bottom shift of american culture and social hierarchy. how do you make the people making the decisions do the right things? when they cannot convince us of their truth, they exert violence.

i read something about how the economy exists as something simultaneous across the world. it exists in billions of places and ways. people, cards, money, transactions, but all of it is reliant on value and, importantly, people being able to communicate and exchange shit. except, this inherent cultural value, to gather resources and wealth, and everything being connected, this economic idea has become, in a sense, alive and consuming. and it will keep eating because it’s reliant on its parts.

thought experiment. economics is all nonsense anyways. when musk either fires himself off into space or gets himself publicly executed, and all the stock brokers have escaped the matrix or whatever they’re calling suicide these days, it’ll stop existing. fun stuff.

i hope i’ll know how to use this drive. this passion. this rage against all the stuff we could be fixing, all the people we can help. it’s there. not going anywhere. i guess it just works its way out. just don’t conflate it with anger. this is not frustration. this is The Word they don’t give you meaning for. a hatred for normal, status quo, whatever until that means it’s good. a frustration with the complacency of being scared to die on the streets, and not having anything else you like to do so you work.

we’ll see how it all shakes out. i am glad i process this terrible situation we’re in as something more active than fear, denial, or acceptance. i know there is plenty of community action i can do. it’s just hard to even keep myself afloat in all this insanity. people aren’t meant to live like this, and our material conditions have not ever existed before this. people don’t feel the impermanence like they should.

anyways. i should sleep. my rambles are getting a little maniacal.

it makes me feel like a caged animal, knowing i’m being listened to. ads and videos popping up that, surely, are relevant because some database heard me say a buzzword last night on the couch.

[vagrantclown]

I’m so fucking sick of being in poverty it makes me dizzy I want to be secure why is it so fucking hard to have a secure life why does the government want me to fucking die why do people with functioning brains and bodies want me to die I never fucking asked for a brain that makes even existing hard I never fucking asked for that!!!

And I’m not trying to play the fucking victim I’ve tried working I’ve been trying since I was 19! But I’m so fucking damaged I try and I try and I try and then I tried to help my stupid fucking brain and I can’t do any of it without fucking money!

And I ask for help I ask all the fucking time and I feel like a miserable sack of shit and a burden and I try to put on this fucking happy face and I try to be positive and optimistic but the truth is I’m so fucking scared I’m going to die on the streets one day and I’m already lucky I have some help but I know there’s only so long people have tolerance of people like me so I try to make myself smaller and I try to not ask for much but I can’t keep doing this

I’m safe I just need life to stop pulling the rug out from under me I don’t want to die I just want to stop getting hurt and I have nowhere to go if school doesn’t work

[xsadcorebenji]

i get sad and lonely often,

but it’s hard to access the emotions of self-hatred,

and it’s hard for me to care as much whenever anything bad happens anymore,

Fox died, i had to make a terrible decision,

it was the worst decision i could ever make for myself but it was necessary

that was my zenith,

not every other troubling experience i went through

that moment

i lose friends often and

i picture myself

again in some random town

anywhere

with another social group

until i am inevitably alone

and there’s no reason for me to want to die, as long as i live Fox lives on,

he’s here in my heart and in my memories, and i never want to die because i don’t want the world to forget Fox

there’s nothing

that will ever clear out that pain and

there’s no point in suppressing it or running away or avoiding it

it’s there; an open wound that refuses to close

and i’m tired,

i’m tired of people not making the fucking effort to understand me,

that’s not my responsibility

and thank GOD for a therapist patient with me enough to not tell me to just stop talking about Fox,

that pain lives on,

but as time passes and i remember

the good parts it’s hard not to fall in love all over again

no one was there when i was 23

there’s so much me where it’s like

Fuck Life, if Life wants to pass me by,

go fucking ahead, fuck life, fuck everything and everyone, don’t fucking rush me,

i just want to carve out space for myself to learn things i wanted to learn and fuck how fast everything passes,

i don’t care, pass me the FUCK by already then, fuck accelerationism, fuck the government, fuck all of it, how months feel like years,

and a day passes and it already feels like a fucking century passed

and everyone who “breaks up” (even in platonic context) with me with some variance of

“life goes on” (with every connotation of “oh well”)

suck shit and die already

“life goes on”

i wanna fucking smear your face into the pavement get the fuck over yourself.

the same people will idolize you

the same people are the first to demonize you

and i don’t care,

i’m so tired of all of it,

i’m tired of these lonely feelings that come on, and there’s really not much but to wait for it to pass

just a lot of missing out;

put simply lately been considering how i should’ve have skipped out on some dates during high school,

just because i wasn’t interested in the person

realize now that’s the point in dating,

actually fucking getting to know each other better

and i spent a lot of last year getting close to someone i really shouldn’t have been so forgiving with nor should have gotten close to,

just absolutely frustrating, because there was so much of the time we knew each other, you didn’t even FUCKING register in my head as anything like that,

and i just get so fucking suckered in whenever anyone reaches out to say “i care” whenever i’m feeling it, but christ

i wish people like you don’t exist,

energy vampires who feed off of anyone who seems to carry an earnestness you lack

and i am earnest by god

and i don’t care to carry resent for you

maybe just this large disdain,

and the ugly miserable thought of how easily you can throw it away

and if the thought of me hurts, i genuinely hope it does actually,

and i always want to say “and what are you going to fucking do about it?”

because whenever i think of you; i think of how i really need to be more careful,

but also

how much I NEVER WANT TO BE YOU;

i’m grateful shit failed because i want me more than ever,

and 33 has been a frustratingly lonely year thus far, and i suppose i don’t know if 34 will be better

part of me feels like i should be concerned with how often i alienate others now, but i also DON’T CARE, i am LITERALLY feeling like the most honest i can be with myself lately and if y’all can’t fuck with that

then fuck off, easy

just tired,

and in the end,

there’s just so much stuff i want to do for the sake of doing it absolutely for myself

and admittedly some of the stuff i do i have some petty motivation like

hope all this exercise and skin care and everything else pays off and i become so physically alluring that anyone’s who’s ever snubbed me just feels a searing fucking pain in their stomachs

but even then,

it’s just nice to move around again ultimately

and life

just keeps happening

stuff keeps happening

new things keep happening

it never ends and i’m painfully curious

and good stuff happens for friends and so many things happen

and admittedly i get jealous of good events just wishing i could experience the same

like wish i could experience dates

but i know i’m too picky, and i know it’s incredibly difficult for me to like

FEIGN having interest when i don’t

i just can’t call it a “closed mind”

but it’s like if there’s nothing really interesting i’m getting out of it, then what’s point

still,

i wish i went to more of those movie dates

and bowling dates

but again, i’m definitely more grown than i was in highschool

like understand myself a lot more

it just sucks it comes at a time where realistically

not a GODDAMN person “emotionally available”

like yeah, no shit, why you hanging out with me then?

oh right ENERGY,

drink it up, i hope you choke on it

sincerely sometimes,

“ewww you’re so ugly when you’re mean”

well you piss me the fuck off when you just come up with shit excuses to blow me off cuz you ain’t got integrity,

like all of it.

stop blaming me for your fucking messes please,

all of it,

fucking teacher sends me to the hospital because i have a fucking meltdown because motherfucker couldn’t hold his FUCKING end of the responsibility of a misunderstanding

“it’s all YOUR fault”

well, fucker i hope all those steroids or whatever fitness bullshit you were on just rotted your dick off and you’re just eternally flaccid

motherfuckers that can’t say “i’m sorry”

“shit was a mutual misunderstanding”

nah it’s “you this or that”

or “life goes on”

literally fuck off

you ain’t ever going to meet a motherfucker alive that even comes close to me,

and y’all better be armed with someone way better because some of y’all, i ain’t ever gonna fuck with you like that again

so i hope it was worth losing me, fucker

so many of you,

i genuinely hope it was worth it

“whew well you sound so toxic, so it’s probably relief for them,

they probably spare no thought for you”

shut the fuck up, negging self-talk,

if you’re trying to convince me they don’t spare a single thought about the craziest motherfucker they ever met

then you’re delusional as shit my friend,

well my obligatory friend,

who only recently can i just recognize you’re just bullshitting and to not take you so seriously

i’m angry so yeah “toxic” “toxic”

but i still fucking know

i’m the best friend anyone could ever have

because i actually show the fuck up.

[dasha-through-the-snow]

Then both China and USSR still qualify, as they preached forsaking your material needs today and working hard for miserable pay in order to build a perfect vision of a future. They would not need to rely on extreme propaganda to sell their way of life to their citizens if their material needs were prioritized.

USSR intentionally sought to replace the church with the party, including holding "science lectures" that were barely different from propaganda in the poorest areas of the country in the same style a preacher would lead a church service.

Modern Chinese regime heavily relies on an idealized version of their past in their propaganda, including very ridiculous things, like propping up anti-scientific folk remedies and fake supernatural martial arts, but also glorifying ancient emperors and generals.

I only brought up antisemitism as it's a specific sort of xenophobic hatred that has its own name. USSR massively prioritized Russian citizens over the rest of the giant multi-ethnic country. Across 74 years of its existence, we've seen everything from ethnicity-based forced resettlement to ethnicity-based political purges to things like "Jewish quotas" in universities, where only a small amount of Jewish students were allowed to even enter higher education. National profiling was an official policy and the "nationality" column in your government ID heavily influenced your education and employment opportunities. Local languages were suppressed at several different points in time, all colonized countries were forced to switch to Cyrillic script, even if they did manage to keep their own language. Central Asian countries are still struggling wit that, because Cyrillic was not made for Turkic languages.

I also want to make it clear, that I do not consider USSR or China as fascist regimes. Rather, they're elective monarchies and exhibit all traits of those.

My point here is that your definition is too academic and, with enough semantics, could apply to a variety of different regimes that have nothing to do fascism.

Fascism, in essence, is just a fancy word for autocracy. It's just a very charged word and very easy to throw at regimes you do not like. I also dislike a wide variety of autocratic and soft-autocratic regimes, like Russia or Iran, but I stopped calling any of them "fascist", because it's a completely meaningless accusation today.

Also, genuine advice, if you want to see your side of the political spectrum achieve anything, you will have to talk to people who never read political theory and will never read political theory, because they have enough on their plates already. And you will need to find words and definitions that they understand. I'm not being condescending or sarcastic here, this is something I've learned the hard way from actually being involved in politics.

@brazenautomaton again, you really could not have picked a worse person to try this on

it'd be like going up to warren balogh and saying "i'll bet your forehead is a normal size, for a human person to have. bet you can't prove me wrong" or telling chris cantwell that he is not sufficiently versed getting owned via diss track

i have a specific definition of fascism that i use, and one the self-described fascists also seem to use. if you want me to whip it out for you, i can. but don't pretend i'm a lib with an amorphous shifting definition of fascism because you're boxing with the ghost of the Dreade SJW from tumblr 2016 and want to score some sick dunks on her. i mean, i'll happily play along if it makes you feel better, but please know i find it goofy and a little obnoxious (not obnoxious enough to not play along, of course!).

[seabass17]

All that’s left | Pt. 2

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Fem! Reader

A/n: So, this is... a different reader in comparison from the one in the first part but I kinda like it? Anyway, Im considering making a third part and im thinking it'll contain some smut. I used google translator so please don't judge me. Tell me what you think. Happy reading.

All that's left pt. 1

Warnings: angst, mentions of scars, swearing, implied smut?

Word count: 3.263

Summary: After moving from her life in New York, away from the Avengers and him, she finds happiness and a life that she actually enjoys, but that seems to last little when she spots the familiar jet on the roof of the building she lives in. Is she ready to face them? To face him?

*Three months later*

The warm air surrounding my body made me take a deep breath and unconsciously smile. I was happy, I was free, I was whole. I was with my neighbor drinking coffee in our usual spot, which was a cafe near the main street of the place that I decided was going to become my new home.

“Продолжай рассказывать мне о своем боссе, который сводит тебя с ума” (Keep on telling me about your boss who drives you crazy) Andrei said making me laugh and shake my head.

“Не о чем говорить, он просто засранец, который дает мне слишком много работы и заставляет меня плакать” (Nothing to talk about, he's just an asshole who gives me too much work and makes me want to cry) I laughed. I had met Andrei a week after I moved in and there was an immediate connection. No, it wasn’t in a romantic one, god no, we were just really good friends that had a lot in common.

“Now now, that was not what i saw the other day when i went to pick you up from work” He said with a playful smirk plastered on his light brown face. I gasped, a fake indignant expression on my face while my hand went to my chest. He laughed loudly. “Don’t play that card, I saw you!” he added

“I don’t know what you are talking about” I said, trying to fight the smile that tried to come out but failing miserably, we both laughed.

He and I had become quite close in the little time that we had known each other. He was an American with a Russian name. He explained that his mother was from the states while his father was a russian spy, they fell in love against all odds and eventually, Andrei was brought to this world. When he was fifteen his father died and he and his mom went to America, where he finished high school and surprisingly, entered the military. He did two tours before he decided that he had enough and returned to Russia. Hence why he could speak both Russian and English fluently. As for me, I told him that I was in some sort of organization that worked for the government, and that’s why I knew russian. He believed me, thank God,  I didn’t want to talk about how I was part of the Avengers and why I left. Obviously I will tell him when the time is right and I know that he can be fully trusted.

“Oh, come on Ames, are you going to tell me that you don’t like him one bit? Not in the slightest?” he asked, smiling and I shook my head. He stayed silent for a second and stared at me, like he was considering whether he should ask me something or keep quiet. “Is it because of him?” he finally asked, watching me closely to see my reaction. I felt my stomach twist at the mention of him. Of course it was because of him, because of them, I couldn’t afford getting hurt and betrayed one more time. Andrei didn’t know his name, or theirs for that matter, so I smiled weakly and nodded.

“Yeah, I know it sounds stupid but… I just can’t afford getting hurt, not again, not anymore” I said looking at my hands.

“I understand, believe me I do” he said, his hand reaching out to hold mine. I looked up to find his brown eyes looking for mine, I saw nothing but genuine love -the friendly kind- in them. I smiled and squeezed his hand. He was going to say something but his phone rang; a notification. He withdrew his hand to look at his phone and the moment he did, people around us started getting up and running in the same direction. I looked at him confused to find him frowning at his phone.

“What is it?” i asked.

“The Avengers are here…” He said and my heart skipped a beat and my body went rigid. Andrei noticed. “What 's wrong?”. Well, there’s no use keeping him from the truth anymore.

“So, remember when I told you that I worked for an organization for the government? Okay don’t freak out and hate me but, here it goes” I took a deep breath. “That organization was called The Red Room were they trained me from a very young age to be a perfect cold-blooded killer, years later i escaped and was on the run until i got a new identification, name, address, new everything and then joined the avengers to amend the wrongs I made in the past. To my luck, it didn’t go great because it ended up breaking me the same way The Red Room did, so I left to find a fresh start and came here where I met you. Please don’t hate me” I concluded in one breath. Andrei was silent with a straight face, which was hard to read, and eventually after a few seconds that felt like an eternity and shrugged his shoulders. WHAT THE HELL DOES THAT MEAN.

“Believe it or not, I've heard worse” he simply said

“Worse than finding out that your best friend is a train killer and former avenger?” i asked incredulously and he tilted his head and smirked

“US Agent mother and Russian spy father” He said. I laughed and he followed right after. “So, I'm guessing we are running away?” he asked. Say what now?

“We?” I asked, almost in shock to which he simply nodded, “You don’t think im just gonna let you go like that, please, is not that easy to get rid of me” he snorted. “And I'm supposing Amelia is not your real name either, given the fact that you ran off,” he added. Damn, he is good.

“Y/n, y/n y/l/n” I said and he slowly smiled

“Well y/n, nice to meet you, my name is Andrei Petrova” he said, extending his hand, i repeated his action with the same smile. “I’ve got to say, I like the name y/n more than Amelia '' he added and laughed. We were brought back to the matter at hand when the screaming of the people were getting louder. I snapped my head up and saw the familiar jet on the roof of the building where I was living.

“Here’s what we are going to do, I’m going to my apartment and buy us some time while you go get a car and,” i handed him my card “you are going to get all the money from my bank account. I will meet you in front of the cafe that’s two blocks away from my place”

“Are you going to be okay?” He asked with clear worry in his eyes. I smiled and nodded

“Yes, I promised. Now go” I said before he got up and ran. I sighed and went to my apartment. Was I really going to do this? After months, was I ready to face them, already knowing the truth? Well, guess I'm going to find out.

Once in the building I decided to programmed the lights to go out in 50 minutes and then I went to the elevator, wanting to appear as normal as possible even though I felt like my heart was going to explode from how fast it was beating inside my rib cage. When the elevator stopped at my floor I walked until I was standing in front of my door. I didn’t need to wait and confirm, I knew they knew I was here, now there’s only one thing left to do. But before I did anything, the door creaked open.

*10 hours earlier*

Bucky paced from one side to the other, finding himself incapable of staying put. Natasha sat silently on her chair, Tony was in the front with his head in between his hands, Steve was resting on the side of the wall looking at the floor, Bruce was just standing there holding his chin analyzing everyone in the room. Sam sat on the couch looking through his phone, Vision was sitting next to Wanda on the other couch, while Clint and Thor were sitting on the other chairs. Peter had some school stuff to deal with like the teenager that he was. They’ve been looking for her for the past three months, and about a week ago, a picture was found of someone that looked exactly like her, all except her hair that was a bit shorter and the color was different, but other than that, it was practically her.

Not wanting to get their hopes -or rather enthusiasm- up, they decided to look deeper and found out that the picture was taken a month ago in the city of Magadan located in Russia. They found out that before three months, the name Amelia Agapov, didn’t exist. The more they looked into it, the more they were convinced that it was her.

“The mission report from Agent Carter arrived, should i put it on the screen?” the voice of the AI filled the room. The team had been waiting for that report for days, the nerves of the question that lingered in the air ‘was it her?’ being present for that time only grew stronger as Stark asked FRIDAY to project the report on the screen.

Pictures were shown, most of them were about this woman buying in the market, having coffee with a guy, but there was one, where her face was looking straight into the lens of the camera, and it was that picture that left the people in the room absolutely rigid. It was her.

“We found her…” Tony said in a whisper. Everybody kept their gaze on the picture on the big screen. After months looking for her, they finally had found her. To everyone, it was like someone just discovered something new, a kind of relief and anxiety all at the same time.

“Suit up, we’re going to get her” Steve said to the group, but see, it was the choice of words from Cap that Bucky found unsettling.

“Get her? Like she is some kind of criminal?” he said, looking at his best friend dead in the eye. Steve opened his mouth to say something but Tony beat him to it.

“She was trained by The Red Room to be an assassin, we can expect nothing more from her '' He said, trying to calm Bucky down, but instead it only caused him to get angrier, and not only him.

“So was I” Natasha said, her voice low that could scare anyone to the bone if they weren’t so used to her.

"It's different" Tony said

“How is it different?” Wanda said this time, “It wasn’t when you practically recluded me after I helped Ultron and tried to kill you all” she added.

Tony sighed and looked down, realizing that he might be overreacting.

“Let’s just get suit up and get on with it” Steve said, cutting the rather awkward silence that filled the room.

The avengers were suit up and on the quinjet in less that forty-five minutes, and they were in Madagan in nine hours, it took them an hour to find her building, and once they found it, Clint landed the jet on the roof and they all got out and looked for her apartment. Funny enough, it was the same number as the one she used to live in New York; 108. They waited for what seemed an eternity until they heard footsteps just outside the door. Suddenly, the air felt thick with anticipation, but Bucky couldn’t wait any longer so he crossed the living room in two steps and opened the door. She was standing there. Silence took over the entire apartment until she broke it.

“Well, are you going to move so that I can get inside my goddamn apartment Barnes?” she said expectantly. Bucky realized that he had been staring at her since he opened the door. Her hair was different, more wavy and a shade or two lighter. He moved to the side and she was able to see the rest of the team. This was going to be one hell of an evening.

Breathe. In… and out…

It was hard. Fuck. Okay i can do this.

“Well isn’t this nice. All the team back together again!” I said with sarcasm dripping from every letter.

“What the hell did we ever do to you?” Steve said firmly.

“Damn, getting straight into it. That’s okay” i shrugged as I went to my room but the sound of the blasters of Tony's suit stopped me.

“Stop, don’t take another step” He said, lifting his hands and I smiled.

“Really? Well unfortunately i have to change, so i’ll leave the door open if it makes you comfortable” i said as i continued to walk to my room, and like I said, i left the door open.

“Y-you don’t have to do that, you can…” Wanda said but trailed off. I had taken my shirt off; my scars were shown.

“So, Steve” I broke the silence as I put on a black shirt, “the thing that you did wasn’t as bad as tin man over there, but you still let Hydra take me the day we took out the helicaries” i added. His face got pale and started shaking his head.

“What? No, you made it out safe, you-” He started saying but i interrupted him

“You sure? Who do you think stopped Rumlow when he tried to interfere with the exchange of the chip when you were in the helicarrier with Bucky?” He started thinking for a moment until he realized what I said fell into place. “Yeah, I took one hell of a beating, and if that wasn’t enough, I fell to the water. I fell thirty floors down, and I alone got myself out, because I didn't have anyone to cover me or have my back” i concluded.

“Your scars…” Tony said this time and i turned to him

“Yeah, thanks to you Mr. Stark” i said and he looked at me. “Doctor said that 74% of my body is covered with scars, along with one or two burns”

“You were that girl in The Red Room” Natasha said, causing me to turn my head to look at her and I smiled cynically, “You are Eliza” she finished.

“Давно не виделись с Натальей” (Long time no see Natalia) i said and she looked at me in pure surprise in her faced. That’s something coming from the famous Black Widow.

“What about the rest of us y/n?”  Sam said this time, redirecting my attention from Natasha to the rest of the group. Thor was standing there holding his hammer, Bruce was next to the fridge, Clint was by the sink, Wanda was with Vision beside the kitchen table and Bucky was by the door. They were all looking at me. I took a look at the clock, I have to leave in less than thirty minutes.

“Long story short, Clint, Bruce, Sam, Wanda and Vision are the ones that didn’t do anything, so just chill out, you are still on my good side” I smiled and waved my hand.

“Hold on, but what did I do?” Thor asked and I looked at him.

“God it really is unfair how such a little thing can cause such a big problem. The first time you came down to earth, met Jane, bla bla bla… when her stuff was under custody of shield, and you took that notebook; they blamed me. I know it may seem weird because, how? Thing is, I was undercover at that time inside Shield, so when the notebook disappeared, guess who was the one that got beaten for it. I couldn’t move from the pain.”

Thor was standing completely still.

“Lady y/n…”

“How is it possible? I was there  and never saw you” Clint interrupted Thor.

“It was before the avengers, i was on the run and a girl's gotta eat. Don’t worry, I never gave them anything. Got the money and then killed them, they were nobodies” I shrugged off.

“So, that’s all you needed to know, so if you please leave my…” I said but then he interrupted me.

“No” I would be lying if I said it didn’t send shivers down my spine at his tone, and I hate even more that he noticed it. “You’re missing one doll” Well fuck me

I turned to see him and he was walking painfully slow towards me and I was praying for my legs to not give out.

“Barnes” I simply said, thanking God and all the saints that it didn’t come out as a whimper. I took a look at the clock once more. I have to leave. Now. “Such a shame, wish you had fought for us, I would have gone through hell and back for you, Buck” his eyes were looking straight to my own and I felt like he was staring at my bare soul. In a way, he was. I smiled and I saw behind my back that the team was looking at us, we’ve never been this close, not in public anyway. I standed on my tiptoes and reached for his right ear, he instinctively reached down so it was a bit easier for me.

“If you want to know, you’ll have to find me first дорогой” (Sweetheart) I whisper. Next thing, the light went out just like I programmed it to and I slid beside Bucky to reach out to the door and to the hall. I could hear the team screaming ‘what the hell just happened’. I ran to the emergency stairs, and once out I could still feel him behind me, getting close. I went into an alley, having to detour, knowing that he eventually was going to catch up to me and I couldn't have him follow where I was really going. A few seconds later, I felt him caging me to the wall on the alley, both of us breathing heavily. His flesh hand went to my throat and his metal one rested on the wall.

“Given a different occasion, I would have loved this, don’t get me wrong, I still love how you…”

“What the hell are you doing?” he asked huskily and I smiled.

“I told you, you’ll have to wait until you find me again. Alone.” i said

“Come on Barnes, do you really think that the charade of being your personal fuck toy would last forever?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“It wasn’t like that, i…” he said but trailed off. The pain in my chest starting and clenching my heart.

“There it is…” i said lowly, the hurt in my voice evident, “listen, i’d love to keep talking about how you used me, but like i said,” i got close to his face, my nose touching his, “find me to found out” after that,  I raised my knee kicking him right in between his legs.

He let out a pained groan and fell to the floor, causing his grip in my neck to give out. I took advantage and ran. Two blocks away, I saw Andrei. When he saw me running to him, he immediately got in the car and turned the engine on, then I got in.

“Drive, fast” it was the first thing i said

“Where?” he asked while we took off. I smiled and looked at him

“You’ll see”

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Taglist

@silentkiller2374 @vikingqueenlove @girlfriday007 @supraveng

[giorno-plays-piano]

Heartache

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Soldat!Reader

Warnings: yandere, obsession, kidnapping, captivity, torture, brainwashing, delusional Bucky.

Words: 2535.

Summary: You don't need the one whose name was Bucky Barnes, a hundred years old broken man who returned back to the world that couldn't offer him anything but regrets and nightmares. You need your Soldier, the one who won't return to you even if you throw Bucky back into that iron chair and fry his brains for the thirtieth time.

P.S. I have to say it turned out darker than I expected. Attention! Bucky is free from his programming, but he does not heal as he should. 

__________________

“You look old.”

You decide to give him the pleasure of hearing your voice. It sounds dull from behind the glass when Bucky comes closer, looking at someone he recognizes too well, but you do not recognize a man he became, nothing reminding you of the one with whom you once shared your bed.

You know what the man looking at you through the glass thinks. You didn’t age a day since the last time he saw you, and while he knows why, it still surprises him to see a young woman watching him calmly as if all those years didn't pass.

“You miss your star.” You say, tilting your head to the side and narrowing your eyes at him when you see his new vibranium arm.

“It doesn't matter.” His answer is immediate, and Bucky isn't surprised to hear the raw anger in his own voice: he is no longer the Soldier you knew, and he is worried he won't find a way to interact with you. You don't seem too interested in Bucky Barnes and whoever he works for despite the fact you are hardly HYDRA's soldier yourself.

What he doesn't know is that you still stay the soldier you have been once, and nothing will ever change that regardless of whoever Bucky Barnes sends your way to cure you from HYDRA's conditioning.

"I'm glad you remember me."

You find it peculiar: a man who has been trying so hard to get rid of anything that ties him to the Winter Soldier has been looking for you for years, finally tracking you down, capturing you and bringing you here as if your pure existence didn't remind him of the worst years of his life. What did he expect to find? A comfort in someone who once had been paired with him just for the sake of research?

"Don't bother, Mr. Barnes. There's nothing there left for you."

You see he's taken aback because you have hit a nerve. Apparently, James Buchanan Barnes thought the connection between the two of you remained the same, and he could dig up the feelings that had long been buried. Stupid, you think, he's forgetting the most important part: he is not the man you formed the bond with. You don't need the one whose name was Bucky Barnes, a hundred years old broken man who returned back to the world that couldn't offer him anything but regrets and nightmares. You need your Soldier, the one who won't return to you even if you throw Bucky back into that iron chair and fry his brains for the thirtieth time.

It doesn't matter. After all those years you didn't believe in happy endings, and even if the man watching you through the glass think he is going to get one after getting out, he is clearly deluding himself.

Averting his eyes, Bucky clears his throat and changes the topic, trying to give himself a false hope he can mend things. “I will convince Shuri to treat you. She helped me break through the conditioning, and she will do the same to you."

You could raise your brow at him, but maintaining this facade is tiresome and doesn't make sense. "I see you have no idea how much my conditioning differs from yours. You can't break through it. It's embedded in me."

"I thought so, but I got rid of mine. You can do it too, I'm sure."

Although you see him trying to assure you, Bucky's getting agitated because he really has no idea what HYDRA did to you. He couldn't know it when he still was the Soldier, but now the lack of his knowledge leads you to the thought your former masters destroyed whatever info they still kept - they foresaw he would search for you.

"Your brainwashing was flimsy. I've always wondered how come you were considered HYDRA'S greatest assassin when you just needed to see your dear friend once to start getting your memories back." You snort, knowing Bucky would feel a slight hint of jealousy in your voice, but you don't care: you've never hid from him you only needed the Winter Soldier, and he was gone.

Bucky doesn't know what to say as a part of him wants to scream there was nothing flimsy about electroconvulsive therapy he went through over and over again, but he looks at you and sees how different you are from him, having no memories of your own, not knowing even your name or the place where you came from. It doesn't scare him, but the fact you had long merged with the Soldier you've become does. You don't separate yourself from her the way he did. In fact, the Soldier had completely absorbed your true persona, and Bucky doesn’t know the real you. He only knows RED, a Soldat who at one point was been created by HYDRA just like all of them were. Despite searching for the information about your past for years, he found nothing, not even the year when you became a part of the organization. Bucky doesn’t think you did it willingly judging by the fact how you reacted when he had been training you among the other Soldiers, but he can’t be sure.

You’re a ghost. None of the masters who had been giving you orders know anything about you except your specialization and things you can do. Bucky supposes there were once people who knew the truth, but all of them are probably dead since the ones he has captured were utterly useless. His only hope is Shuri who might bring whatever is left somewhere deep inside your mind to the surface, yet he isn’t sure she will take you: the more you talk, the more it becomes clear you will not ask her to do it willingly, and Shuri won’t like that. The redemption can only be granted to someone who asks and works for it.

You don’t seem the type.

“What do you want me to do?” He asks you quietly, his forehead almost touching the glass separating you two when Bucky watches you with that pathetic expression of his. “If I let you go, you will return to people you serve. If I bring you to police, you will end up in a lab in the hands of the government.”

You allow him to see your smile as you observe him, desperately hoping you will tell him you will come back to the good guys and stay with him, playing a role of his funny little girlfriend because Bucky Barnes cannot allow himself to form an adequate relationship with any woman who has not been tainted the way he was. It probably seems so tragic to him that he had to spent years trying to catch you.

Although the chair you’re bound to doesn’t let you stand and come over to him, you still lean closer to the window, wearing the same polite but welcoming smile you used to lure your targets closer to you.

“I want you back in that chair, going through the whole process of brainwashing again until you become the Soldat you’ve been. I want you standing with me and feeling as much pain as I did until your sensitivity goes down to zero, and you no longer remember those funny friends of yours. I know you won’t trade your freedom and whatever else you have after getting out, but I don’t need James Buchanan Barnes or White Wolf or whoever you have become. I am RED of HYDRA, and I have bonded with the Winter Soldier you buried, Bucky.”

When he leaves, the massive metal door getting locked ten times the least, you stare at the grey wall beside the glass. You wonder how getting the privilege of remembering his past made him so miserable, a pathetic, broken man who did not understand how lucky he had been, not only breaking free from HYDRA’s grip but gaining his true identity back. He probably pitied himself, poor little boy who had been broken by the big bad guys. He did not understand that all other soldiers who came after him, except the suicide squad made with Stark’s serum, had been turned into ashes. There was nothing left to break in them - and you either.

_______________________

Shuri wasn’t happy to hear your story just like he thought, but Bucky couldn’t lie to her, hoping she would understand. Of course, she didn’t, telling him outright it was impossible to treat somebody who didn’t want to be treated. While it was also inhuman, forcing you to do something against your will just like HYDRA has been doing all these years, it also erased the possibility to use the same methods she chose when she treated Bucky.

“You don’t understand,” she tells him, shaking her head, “it’s not that I don’t want to help, but without her cooperating it’s close to impossible. They didn’t use the same ways to program her just like they did to you.”

He isn’t satisfied with her answer even though he knows Shuri wants to help. He can’t leave it like that, leave you to your fate, return you where you belonged, and he keeps asking who or what may be able to help you until she finally tells him something about electrical stimulation of the brain that can awake memories that you have buried. Shuri immediately regrets it, seeing how Bucky’s face lights up.

“It is a very complicated process that requires an extensive medical knowledge. Worse, even if performed correctly, this technique can traumatize her even further. Please don’t do this. We don’t even know if this method will be effective.”

Bucky doesn’t promise her anything, though a part of him feels guilty he made her tell him this. He just has to do it: undoubtedly, HYDRA or whoever you work for now will force you to go through the brainwashing process again, and whatever treatment Shuri told him about can’t be worse than this. If Bucky does everything right, you might stand a chance to live like he does, away from the horrors of the war you had been a part of ever since the organization abducted you. Even if you don’t want it, clearly it is an effect of the memory suppressing machine: any sane human being wants to have a normal life, right?

It takes him months to find and steal the equipment he needs, leaving no traces - it reminds him of the days when he had been under HYDRA’s control, but he does what he has to. Learning how to use the machine is a much more complicated task, but Bucky is grateful for that serum-enhanced brain of his: he nearly swallows the information from the books in record time, reading about sending a burst of electrical energy into your cerebral cortex to stimulate your brain and finally retrieve your memories. Now he knows what Shuri meant by traumatizing, but this doesn’t stop him either. He does what he has to do.

“What is your name?” He repeats after listening to your screams for ten or maybe twenty minutes, your body going limp in the black, cold chair when you open your mouth, breathing heavily, your face stained with tears and sweat.

“Dolores.” You say immediately, knowing he will repeat the procedure if you keep silent, your heat beating wildly. “I grew up... on a small farm in Iowa... I had an older sister... and slept with a big teddy bear with a red ribbon...”

“You are lying.” He says simply, and a jolt of electricity cuts through your head, nearly electrocuting you while you scream again and again.

For some reason he always feels it when you say what he wants to hear instead of the truth. What he doesn’t understand is that the truth he wants has been told months ago: you did not remember and you were not going to remember anything from your past. It was stupid to try. There was nothing left of you, and while he thought he was resurrecting a human in you, he was simply destroying your body that was regenerating every night after the therapy.

When you receive a new jolt, shaking and screaming, tears streaming down your face until they fall down onto your already wet t-shirt, you whisper through gritted teeth, “Either I will have you as my Soldat, or I will not have you at all.”

Bucky presses the button.

__________________________

When he is finished he takes you to a bath in the room next to your cell. You almost lose the ability to move for an hour or two, giving him time to prepare you: Bucky undresses you and slowly lowers your body in the tub filled with warm water, watching that you take a comfortable position and don’t slip, effectively suffocating. Today he had almost gone too far, risking to fry your brain: you still refused to give up even after two months of therapy you have gone through, and Bucky isn’t too happy.

Pouring a strawberry-scented shampoo on his palm, Bucky starts to carefully wash your hair that grew longer in the months of captivity, watching that neither shampoo nor the foam gets in your eyes. You are nearly breathless: the serum they gave you made you less stronger than him, but your regeneration abilities are on a whole different level, and soon your body will adjust and erase the damage made.

He asks himself whether keep using the machine makes sense since he didn’t make much progress, the programming still very much in you even after all those incredibly painful sessions. What if you were right from the start? What if there was nothing to remember, and all he could do was to leave you in the state you were in before he destroyed whatever was left of you?

No, he can’t do it. Leaving you means taking away your chance to ever get back to normal life, and he can’t force himself to do that.

Never in his life Bucky Barnes will admit letting you go meant never getting his own happy ending the way he wants it.

“Why reinventing the wheel when you can make it so much easier?” All of a sudden, your hoarse voice whimpers in his ear when you look at him, tiredly moving your head up. “Do what they’ve always done. Use the programming to give me an order.”

A part of him is shocked with the revelation: he wanted to be neither the Soldier nor the one giving him commands. But the other part makes him realize how much easier it would be if he just used what has already been done to you instead of relying on an obviously ineffective method that damaged your mind and body. Of course, he has nothing in common with Karpov sending him on the assassination missions. Bucky only wants you to learn how to become human again, free you from HYDRA once and for all, give you the life you undoubtedly wanted. Even if he uses the same method the organization did until he finds a better way to undo the programming, it is still for your own good.

___________

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[theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin]

Have you ranted/expressed your thoughts on Peter Pettigrew yet? If not, then I'm sure we'd love to hear it!

I don’t think I actually have yet.

Wow, this brings us to the last of the Marauders. What an age.

Peter, what to say about Peter?

Well, I guess to start, for me he’s actually the closest to what JKR intended to write with him. He’s the sniveling cowardly character who sells his very soul if only to save his own life and reaps the rewards for it. This is a rare experience for me, as shown by my many rants, I rarely agree with what JKR actually intended.

In fact, it gives me this strange surreal feeling inside that I’m not sure what to do with. Peter wasn’t secretly good? He wasn’t secretly a coward? He wasn’t somehow 10,000x worse than what I already thought he was? I mildly agree with JKR? What is this?

But yes.

I see Peter as the fourth guy in the dorm room and somebody who’s distinctly aware of it. When it came to James, Sirius, and Remus he’s the friend that nobody likes and in his desperation to not be that friend he just makes it worse. He happened to be sorted into the same year, into the same room, and because of that he was included in on things. I imagine him laughing way too hard at Sirius and James’ jokes (therefore making them awkward and not funny anymore), probably subtly bribing his friends with expensive things/food by picking up the bill at the Three Broomsticks or buying the fanciest gifts, trying to make his own jokes that are probably just as bad as James and Sirius’ but they just look at him and say, “Dude, you can’t say that”, and always nearly being left behind or left out of the adventure of the day (and when he’s brought along it’s probably because James and Sirius’ know he’ll give them so much grief if they leave him behind).

McGonagall talks briefly about Peter in “The Prisoner of Azkaban” and notes that even the professors didn’t really like him. He was this whining, obnoxious, fat kid who was always hanging on to James and Sirius while everyone wondered when the pair would dump him. So, basically, no one likes Peter and he’s trying way too hard and is desperate for friends.

Then the war happens and shit gets real.

All his friends immediately sign up to be a part of Albus Dumbledore’s secret guerilla army. As Peter always does what his friends do, and would probably lose all his friends had he not signed up, he signs up too. He then realizes that Dumbledore’s serious about sending untrained school children into combat. Peter, I imagine, barely squeaked by in Defense Against the Dark Arts and is probably an awful duelist. He, in fact, is probably an entirely useless member of the Order and is there for moral support. Well, several members of the Order of the Phoenix are entirely useless, most of them actually... I think Dumbledore just kind of likes telling people what to do and then making them babysit Harry and only ever giving real work to Snape who is both a) competent b) is kind of forced to be loyal to Dumbledore.

BUT ANYWAYS.

Shit’s getting real, I imagine Peter starts shitting bricks. He wants out but if he gets out then James and Sirius will never speak to him again. And here’s where I start headcanoning things. I think Peter’s betrayal was fairly late in the game.

Here’s how I imagine it goes. The order starts suspecting Remus of being a traitor not because information is necessarily leaking but because he’s a werewolf and has literally 0 reason other than his gratitude to Dumbledore and his shitty one-sided friendship with Sirius and James to be loyal to the ministry. This is a government that will keep him homeless for the rest of his days and with a snap of their fingers might send him to a penal colony simply for existing if not murder him. When they realize that Voldemort’s made an active alliance with the only really organized werewolves in the country, Remus, just by sitting in the Order, looks really really really bad.

I imagine this gets Peter thinking. Before, hypothetically, he could simply leave. He won’t because James and Sirius would call him a miserable coward, but he could. Now, what if Remus is a spy? What if Remus starts leaking names? Peter would have to leave the country, and even that might not be good enough, the Dark Lord could probably track him down anywhere and when he does... Peter will wish he had never been born.

I think that’s when Peter gets the idea. Remus might not be a traitor now, maybe, but he probably will become one. Worse, the war’s not going well at all, the aurors are completely useless and the government’s virtually run by Voldemort already and the only thing seemingly in its way is this collection of school children and housewives called The Order of the Phoenix. Some of whom, I imagine, have very loose lips and could make it all too easy to find out who these people are.

Peter has to beat Remus to the punch. Peter decides to become a mole for the dark lord. Now, canon implies that Peter was a spy when Lily and James go into hiding. Personally, I don’t buy it. I think it’s more that they were convinced Remus was a spy and that James was such a loud mouth he was probably awful at keeping anything secret, Voldemort didn’t really need spies. 

Because Peter has no skills to offer Voldemort other than an ear in Order meetings. He’s not a good duelist, he’s not like Snape where he’s a potions’ master, he doesn’t appear to be particularly good at anything. He’s just nicely slimey.

So, I imagine he is the one to convince James, Lily, and Sirius to make him secret keeper so that he has leverage. He becomes a Death Eater, is offered protection and security, and in return he gives the dark lord the Potter’s location. He sells out his best friend’s family to save his own life.

Only, it all goes horribly wrong. The Dark Lord dies, Sirius immediately comes for Peter and he has 0 protection, the fight happens and then Peter Pettigrew must disappear. And he finds himself stuck as a rat for over ten years.

He probably debates whether or not he could miraculously come out of hiding or not. Except too much time passes. How would he explain where he went and why he didn’t show up immediately? What if they interrogated him with veritiserum? What if they went back and actually questioned Sirius? What if some other vengeful Order member figures it out and tries the same thing Sirius did?

Peter is so debilitated by terror that he chooses every day to live as Scabbers. And he grows used to it. Just, god, the level of sheer slimy cowardice to live as a rat for the rest of your life eating god knows what and sleeping in the pocket of little boys. God, Peter’s such a great awful character. You beautiful, terrible, man.

The rest is history: Peter’s found out, has to flee back to Voldemort, and then spends the rest of his days in surreal hell as he has to nurture devil baby Voldemort back to health, cut off his own hand, and probably wishes he was never born but is just too cowardly to die with any honor.

Peter’s in this hell ride until the very end and it just keeps getting worse.

What a legend.