#the weight of your own history and the dead person whose body you’re wearing when you know you’re someone else and yet not is a lot okay

[idkaguyorsomething]

something something thinking about regeneration and self-perception again

[plumoh]

[SK8] whirlwind

Rating: G

Word count: 2341

Summary: Three times Kaoru gets into a fight; Kojirou is never too far away. / high school era.

Note: AO3 link. As usual, high school era means pre-relationship and Kaoru being a little bit oblivious to Kojirou’s feelings haha.

i.

Kaoru didn’t mean to punch him.

Well. That’s not exactly true. He did want to punch that smug smile off the bastard’s face, but he didn’t mean to knock him out. It’s not his fault that his punch landed exactly at an angle that made the guy’s head twist on the side and bang on the streetlamp, before collapsing on the ground and invoking a silence so loud everyone’s breathing felt like an entire storm.

And then all the guy’s goons start screaming and yelling for blood, pointing accusing fingers at Kaoru like Kaoru just killed someone (their boss isn’t dead, not yet), and most of them also start crowding around him with a palpable vengeful intent. As if that will ever intimidate him.

Nobody thinks that Kaoru is built to fight, which propels them into a state of shock and complete disbelief when he attacks first and manages to strike down two people by smashing their heads together and kicking them in the stomach for good measure. He doesn’t stop moving, always ready to spring back and to collide his fist with something breakable or crouching low to dodge and literally sweep them off their feet. He’s like a volcano being poked until it swallows everything around him.

His impulsiveness means he gets hurt too, mostly from his own moves that use more strength than necessary, but also from attacks he decides to go up against instead of avoiding, simply to get closer to his opponent. He ends up with scratches on his face and bruises on his legs or cuts on his arms, in a way that undeniably adds to his overall appearance of a troublemaker. He doesn’t give a shit; the messier and more dangerous he looks, the better.

It’s when most of the guys have fled, leaving Kaoru breathing hard and leaning forward with his hands on his knees, that Kojirou materializes next to him.

“What the hell, Kaoru?” Kojirou yells, not knowing if touching Kaoru will be a wise idea. “Did you pick a fight with random people again?”

“I didn’t pick a fight with them, they provoked me,” Kaoru growls, wiping the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand. It comes away with a little blood. “Why do you always assume I’m the one instigating?”

“Maybe because two times out of three you’re the one who throws the first punch,” Kojirou mumbles.

“Thank you for the vote of confidence.”

“Am I wrong, though?”

Kaoru makes a poor attempt at shoving Kojirou in the shoulder but he misses by a large margin and ends up swatting at his chest, which does nothing to abate Kojirou’s annoyance.

“Shut up,” Kaoru says.

Kojirou shakes his head and takes Kaoru’s arm to steady him, dragging him towards a less crowded and more luminous place to get a look at his injuries with supplies that seem to have appeared from nowhere.

ii.

Kojirou nearly lands on his face after failing a trick, all graceless and devoid of finesse, which makes Kaoru double over in laughter.

“That was really stupid,” Kaoru snorts.

“Yeah, I didn’t see you try doing that trick,” Kojirou scoffs.

“At least I don’t look like a limp caterpillar when I’m on the ground like you are.”

“You’re insufferable, you know that?”

Kojirou picks himself up from the ground and dusts off his pants, looking back at the track that he just descended from. Kaoru watches the way Kojirou is considering the path again, eyes focused on the last meters of the bumpy pavement. They chose this part of the track specifically because it isn’t well-maintained, full of holes and uneven ground that forces them to work on their stability. Kojirou, like the brainless ape he is, wanted to show off by doing some fancy trick that only served as evidence of his stupidity.

“Hey, you’re Sakurayashiki, right?”

Kaoru turns around and raises en eyebrow. He has no idea who the guy talking to him is.

“Get out of our turf,” the guy says on a tone that’s supposed to be menacing. “Or you’ll regret it.”

“Your turf?” Kaoru repeats, unimpressed. “The hell are you on?”

“You thought you could swing by after sending some of our guys to the hospital?”

The words go in Kaoru’s ear and make a swift exit in the other. He blinks.

“I didn’t send anyone in the hospital,” he says, tone raising like a question as he turns around to address Kojirou.

Kojirou lifts his hands in sign of innocence. “I don’t know, I’m not there to watch you fight every single person in this city.”

“You would remember if I did anything like that, wouldn’t you?”

“I just said I don’t know!”

“Stop ignoring me!”

Kojirou shouts wordlessly and yanks Kaoru by the arm, saving him from a well-aimed kick that would have sent Kaoru sprawling, and suddenly it’s like a switch has been flipped.

People say that Kaoru has a bad temper, an accusation that’s not totally unfounded. He’s quick to anger and he doesn’t mince his words—when he’s having a casual conversation with someone, many wrinkle their nose at his lack of proper forms of address, and others outright say he shouldn’t be so aggressive in his choice of words. One can only imagine how vulgar and straightforward he is when he’s insulting someone or spitting out a string of curses that are probably not yet in the dictionary.

Kojirou, of course, has a deep knowledge of the ways Kaoru can react before a taunt, a physical threat or a low blow to his ego. He’s not exactly a saint either, since he will without a doubt get into a fight if he’s provoked enough, or throw back cruel words when the situation calls for it, but between the two, Kojirou has less difficulty keeping his bad mood in check.

Kaoru twists around and is ready to swing his fist at full speed, but Kojirou is already scolding him while having a grip of iron on his arm. He’s also trying to drag him back, stopping him from making even one step towards their opponent who is, quite frankly, looking too fucking pleased with himself.

“What, too chicken to fight me?” the guy snickers. “Too scared of hurting your little hands?”

“I’m gonna punch a hole through your skull, you absolute buffoon,” Kaoru hisses, struggling against Kojirou’s grip. “Let me go, Kojirou!”

“Stop getting into fights, damn it!” Kojirou yells.

“He asked for it!”

“Same difference, you idiot!”

Kojirou loops his arms under Kaoru’s armpits and keeps him still, pressed against his torso, even when Kaoru is trying to pull forward with the sheer force of his will. Kojirou’s stronger than Kaoru, but Kaoru doesn’t give a shit when he is moved by rage alone, stomping and wriggling and squirming in the hopes of getting away.

The guy is watching them with the most self-satisfied smirk ever, as if Kaoru’s inaction is proof of his victory over a petty squabble that Kaoru himself doesn’t remember. It pisses him off.

He usually wouldn’t resort to such dirty tactics. In a fight, the more they use their fists and feet and entire bodies, the more gratifying it is. Sporting injuries and scars are simply a natural consequence of it, and everyone should wear them proudly—like real battle scars, resembling a physical history of their hard-won fights.

Kaoru’s skateboard is within leg reach. He has long legs, Kojirou keeps reminding him, so might as well make use of them. He makes one big step forward, grunting when he’s met with resistance due to Kojirou holding him back, but he manages to have his foot on the tail-end of the deck and brings the skateboard at his feet. He can feel Kojirou’s and the bastard’s confused and intrigued gazes on him; all he does is offer a grin, the sunlight catching on his lip ring like some wicked gleam of mischievousness.

Kaoru gives a harsh kick into his skateboard that goes straight towards the guy, hitting his ankle at full speed and tearing a cry of pain and surprise out of his throat. He puts all his weight on his other foot and cradles his injured ankle, glaring at Kaoru with burning anger. Kaoru isn’t sorry in the least.

“I’ll end you,” the man threatens, visibly shaking with fury.

“Good luck with that ankle,” Kaoru replies smugly. “You’ll fall over before you can land a single hit on me.”

Kojirou audibly sighs and shakes his head. And then, two things happen at once.

The first is that their friend bends down with difficulty, not wishing to put strain on his ankle, and picks up the skateboard. He gives it a long contemplative look, like he’s wondering if this object is worth his interest, before dropping it back on the ground and getting on it.

The second is Kaoru watching this with mounting irritation and rage, and he decides that stomping on Kojirou’s foot to let him go is less aggravating than letting some random prick steal his skateboard. So he does just that with minimal hesitation, causing Kojirou to loudly yelp as his grip loosens enough for Kaoru to slip out.

Skating all day doesn’t mean they can’t run with their feet. Kaoru pushes on his feet like his life depends on it and in a few large strides he catches up to the guy just as he starts skating away, and Kaoru, without a second thought, decks him.

Skateboard back in hand, a broad smile splitting his face in two, Kaoru leaves the track with a victorious fist lifted in the air, to Kojirou’s growing exasperation.

iii.

Kaoru presses his lips together and remains stubbornly silent.

“Kaoru.”

Arms crossed and a frown deeper than usual on his face, Kojirou is staring at him with disappointment so clear that Kaoru actually feels bad, for once. He shrugs.

“You’re lucky that it didn’t rip off your lip,” Kojirou continues. “Why did you get piercings if you know you’ll never resist fighting people? Do you want to risk permanent damage just because your brain is filled with a useless need to fight?”

“Shut up, Kojirou,” Kaoru mutters.

Kaoru winces when Kojirou presses something cold on his mouth, gently dabbing at it and being careful about the lip ring, whose presence alone did a number on his face. Having his head smashed into the ground would do that, he supposes.

Kojirou is silently working on cleaning and bandaging his various cuts and bruises on his face. Kaoru glances up, noticing that the tense line of Kojirou’s shoulders is heavier than usual, a bit more worried, as if today’s encounter could have ended in a disaster. It wasn’t any worse than the previous times. Maybe Kaoru got roughed up a bit more and maybe he got kicked in the ribs more times than necessary and yes, maybe he should have taken off his earrings and lip ring before going skating, but these are all possible factors disrupting his routine he always considers before doing anything. And it’s not like he knows in advance that someone will pick a fight with him. He just got unlucky this time.

Kaoru watches Kojirou’s brows knit together in concentration. This isn’t a rare expression on his face, but Kaoru has never noticed the way Kojirou’s focus is single-minded when he does this kind of detail-oriented tasks, or the way he purses his lips like he does when he’s trying to solve a complicated math problem. It’s the face he makes when something requires his entire attention, unperturbed and going at the pace he needs to finish what he started.

“Hm,” Kaoru says, partly because he’s thinking and partly because he shouldn’t open his still bleeding mouth.

“What?” Kojirou’s gaze never strays from Kaoru’s injury.

Kojirou takes Kaoru’s hand and guides it towards the compress placed on the corner of his mouth, and makes him apply pressure while the cleaning shifts to his ear. Kaoru’s lip isn’t bleeding as much as before, judging by the color of the compress that didn’t become completely red in five seconds, so he supposes talking shouldn’t make matters worse.

“Your precision is a bit surprising,” he admits, laughter in his voice. “I didn’t think you could be so calm while handling things that need careful maneuvering.”

“I’m not the one who can’t break eggs without dropping pieces of shell in them,” Kojirou snipes back.

Kaoru rolls his eyes. “Breaking eggs needs practicing, and I can still pick out the shell pieces if I really need to. If you poke someone in the wrong place while tending to their injuries then you’ll make it worse, moron.”

Kojirou is visibly putting all his efforts into remaining focused on his task, trying not to get riled up by Kaoru’s comments. It would be funny to watch, actually, if Kaoru wasn’t the one receiving treatment.

“I haven’t let you down yet, have I?” Kojirou asks.

And Kaoru can’t find anything scathing as an answer, staring at Kojirou’s bright eyes that never hide what he’s feeling.

“I suppose you haven’t, no,” Kaoru says lowly.

“You’re so much trouble, you know that?” Kojirou sighs.

But he finally meets Kaoru’s gaze and Kaoru is almost taken aback by the sincerity and raw emotion shining in it, like Kojirou is looking at a treasure he has locked behind a chest and kept the key close to his heart. Kaoru swallows.

“Not as much as you,” he replies with less bite than he intended.

“Says the one who is covered in bandages and band-aids.”

“I have to put up with your nonsense every day!”

“And I have to drag your ass back from whatever scuffle you get involved in!”

Kaoru shoves his hand in Kojirou’s face, and they start jostling each other, as if they weren’t being as still and cautious as possible to avoid complicating the process of patching Kaoru up. This familiarity, too, is something that will never change, no matter what happens—Kojirou has Kaoru’s back.

[asclepius-erebus]

The Armored Man

Title: Personal Eden (Ongoing)

Chapter 1: The Armored Man

Rating: Mature (17+)

Word Count: 2.0k

TW: Mentions of abuse (physical/verbal)

Flanked by suited guards at all four corners of the private billiards room, you stand nervously at the side of your master; an aging politician, paranoid about not only his perception in the public eye, but also self-preservation in the wake of his long winded history of gambling, trafficking, and despicable ideologies that have even the most corrupt audiences cannot accept. He frequents this particular casino, how fitting, and is notorious for his poor betting skills and overall ineptitude for making any sort of rational monetary agreement. You’ve witnessed his dumbness before, betting all of his credits away simply to serve his enormous ego.

You keep your head low, not allowing yourself even a glimpse at his newest client until it was permitted of you to do so, that was the rule. Instead, you focus on the sparkling silver platter in your hands, covered with an equally as spectacular dish cover, with elaborate embellishments and with enough brilliance for you to make out even the finest details in the reflections of the muraled ceiling. You catch your own reflection in it, your ruby lips coming to a fine line of both despondence and humiliation.

For as long as you’ve endured this job, it never fills you with the pride that your master promised you it would, nor what he shames you into believing.

You’d agreed to the work a few years ago (five… perhaps), where the pay was handsome, living conditions guaranteed to be provided, and with the promise of growth and experience to graduate you into higher ranked and paying jobs. However, you quickly learn this was not the case when standing in a line with many other girls who looked nearly exactly the same as you. But by then, you’d signed the contract, and you were picked out of that line of young women to serve the man you are not allowed to refer by name but simply master and sir. It’s an arrangement you deeply detest, but one you’ve been conditioned to follow out of fear for your own safety, and security.

“Mando!” Your master greets boisterously, “If you don’t mind me calling you that.”

“Ja’Aele Malsifer.” You hear a voice say in polite greeting, filtered by a modulator, the speaker likely wearing a helmet. But even over the digital graininess, their tone felt warm and pleasant. You do not hear them take the empty seat at the other side of the table, Malsifer is surely displeased by the blatant rejection of his gesture of performative kindness.

“Lighten up, will you? It’s just us friends here today. Y’don’t need to be so uptight.” Malsifer continues, popping open the top of a crystal whiskey bottle and serving himself and his guest a drink. There was still no movement to be heard from the guest he refers to as ‘Mando’.

“I don’t remember us ever being friends, Malsifer.” Mando responds, you hear him lean on the back of the upholstered chair, “What do you have for me, otherwise, I’m leaving.”

You understand this to be your cue to set the silver platter down between them at the table, before the sharp quip of Malsifer’s metal cane snaps at your shins and you nearly let the silver platter collapse onto the ground. Luckily you catch it.

“I didn’t tell you to put it down, did I?” He hisses through his teeth, returning his cane at the side of his seat before taking a drink of his whiskey, “Please, Mando, you haven’t touched your drink!”

“I didn’t ask for it.” Mando responds sharply, “I don’t have time, nor the patience. What do you have?”

Malsifer bitterly motions with his glass for you to set the platter down at the center of the table, removing the cover to unveil a handful of tracking fobs, some blinking more erratically than others. At this opportunity, you steal a glance upwards at his guest, Mando, to find him completely decorated in armor made of Beskar.

He looks completely and utterly enormous in his costume; broad shoulders, puffed chest, gnarly buttons and switches across his wrists, and a cape round his neck for what could only be dramatic effect. He is terrifying.

You have experienced your fair share of questionable clients that Malsifer hosted, some as physically repulsing as Hutts, and others more beautiful like Twi’leks, but this armored man (if he even was a man) is clearly a terrifying force, one that earned the Beskar to decorate his armor.

You back away to the side of your master, awaiting any further instruction, and perhaps the opportunity to finally lift your lowered gaze.

“I have a few… enemies, so to speak.” He begins, “Some unfriendly business partners for whom a bounty is worth less than what they owe me.”

“What’s your point?” The armored man asks, “You’d rather have them killed than for them to pay you back?”

You agree to his logic. At this point, you’ve known that Malsifer has exhausted his coffers extensively, and that it’s much easier to clear his debt by killing the ones who owe him and to upcharge anyone or anything that is now required to repay the enormous sums.

“I’m offering you payment for a service.” He replies simply.

“I’m a bounty hunter, not an assassin.” Mando replies just as tersely.

“Exactly!” Malsifer exclaims, “What made you think I won’t compensate you for your troubles?”

“It’s not just me who thinks so.” Mando responds.

Malsifer laughs, swirling his whiskey, “I’m well aware, which is why I’d rather invest in something well worth my money.”

At this point, your eyes perk up at the conversation, sensing that Malsifer’s patience is eating away with every passing moment. Mando does not seem willing to entertain his comments and sarcasm, however, it is how Malsifer determines who is his friend or foe. He is the classical example of someone who requires others to enable his behaviors rather than constructive criticism, no matter how kindly you approach the matter. You’ve felt it across your knees and shins even with the softest, most encouraging, tone of voice.

Mando clears his throat, reaching from some place behind him and keeping his hand there for a moment, “I’ve been given an offer much more expensive than yours…”

“I’ll double the pay!” Malsifer says boldly, his vision set on what Mando holds behind him.

Suddenly, clattering onto the table, is another tracking fob, blinking angrily and rapidly as though the target were right in front of it.

Mando clears his throat, “You.”

Malsifer’s eyes widen in surprise.

The room erupts into the deafening shrieks of red blaster fire as they fly into every corner of the room with deadly precision and accuracy and into Malsifer, before stopping at you.

Your skin erupts into fine little goosebumps, a chill sweeping over you as you barely finish inhaling a breath and drop the silver platter’s cover onto the carpeted ground. The yell you let escape is short lived when you realize that the blaster has taken aim at you, with Mando behind the trigger.

“You. Who are you?” He demands.

Your name quivers from your scared lips, tears blurring your vision altogether as you silently pray to the Maker in an effort to consolidate a good place for you in the afterlife.

“Will you help me take him back to my ship?” Mando asks, his blaster still trained onto you, grip slightly loosened. His voice took on a softer tone, more sympathetic.

Your eyes focus onto him. You didn’t notice his helmet before, too focused on the elaborateness of his other armor to see that the same skill and craftsmanship had been applied to his helmet as well. Sharp angles of the Beskar metal accentuate where sunken cheeks would be, and a thin and impenetrably black visor is the only point of reference for eyes. It looks too much like a storm trooper’s helmet, but judging from the medium of choice, an Imperial manufacturer couldn’t possibly invest so much time, effort, and credits into giving all hundreds and millions of stormtroopers a full set of armor made of Beskar.

“What are you?” You ask, voice shaking, already feeling your makeup melt off your face with every trickling tear.

Mando lowers his blaster irritably, “Will you help me take him back to my ship?”

You decide against any further questioning, knowing that soon, more security will arrive to investigate the situation. For you, it would surely be on sight.

Nodding, he hoists the lifeless body of your master onto his shoulder before slinging his arm over your shoulders to distribute the brunt of the weight more equally. Malsifer’s metal cane topples to the ground.

Mando kicks it up into his hand, briefly investigating it and removing the silver head piece, revealing the small and compact dagger that you’ve seen be used as a letter opener and an interrogation device.

He hands it off to you, “Might come in handy.” He says.

You’re physically repulsed to be holding the instrument of yours and other’s misery in your hands as a ‘handy’ tool to inflict yet even more suffering, as if it weren’t enough. Clearly, the armored man had little consideration for that.

The two of you clamor out another exit, one that led down an empty stairwell and out back into the gardens. The air smelled rich with incoming rainfall and the aromatic flowers that bloom during the later night hours. This would be an enjoyable setting, however, with a dead body slung over your shoulders, your body experienced all ranges of emotions at once, fifty times over.

The sky begins to open up as the two of you race across the mazes and patches of flowers and into the neighboring forest of trees whose dense canopies made it that much darker than the night and two moons could already afford. The leaves, however, did little to shield from the heavy rain that punished you further on the already unfortunate night. The light and flowy dresses that Malsifer had you wear did little to protect you against the cold downpour that transpires over the course of a few minutes. They stick to your arms, legs, and back as you race with the armored man through the forest, the sounds of shouting and alarms blaring behind you.

The armored man slows, stopping upon an open hull to a ship you could not see very well in the dark. He releases you from the weight of your dead master, dragging him up into the darkness of the hull.

“Go!” The armored man shouts at you insistently.

Your eyes dart behind you, the noise of the shouting, the alarms, and the rain overwhelming your already stressed senses. You try to quickly think of a way out of the forest, but you’re helpless without anything to protect you, feed you, and keep you safe against the elements of the landscape you’re not familiar with. The mobs will certainly find you amidst the shrubbery and trees, making you basically dead. You’d be framed for Malsifer’s death, and subsequently be put to death as punishment.

You look back up at the armored man, who continues to haul Malsifer’s body further into the abyss of his dark hull.

“I have no where to go!” You cry up into the hull, hoping that Mando could hear you, “If I stay I’ll be killed!”

The familiar armor returns into view, side stepping one side of his body out of the ship and the other remaining inside, also deliberating something.

“I don’t need anyone else on my ship.” He says dryly, his helmet looking down at you from his height.

You look back in the direction of the casino, the mobs sounding as if they’re closer.

“Please?!” You beg, “You don’t understand, I have no where to go! I have no family, no friends, no money! If they find me here they’ll blame the murder on me, and then they’ll kill me if they don’t do it now!”

The armored man looks into the distance, seeing the same dancing lights as you are of search animals and security officers scouring the area for yours and his scents.

“Fine.” He says, “Get in”.

[ichikaakiyama]

FIC: Blades In The Dark (Vigilante Iida, Villain Deku)

DISCLAIMER: Usual ownership disclaimers apply. Characters who are underaged/minors in canon are aged up in my work by default. TITLE: Blades In The Dark CHARACTERS: Vigilante Tenya Iida, Villain Deku RATING: None WARNINGS: mild descriptions of violence, mentions of canon characters dying

- - - - -

He feels the wind pick up before he hears the telltale rev of engines close in, but it’s enough to alert him. Not that there’s much he can do; no matter how strong he gets, Izuku will just never be as fast as Iida and his legs.

He looks down at the body on the ground, crouches down by the head hidden under a mass of blood and hair. “Stay down if you know what’s good for you,” he threatens, low and under his breath, a sharp contrast to the absolute vice with which he stabs his dagger down into the pro-hero’s shoulder. He ignores the yelp that escapes his victim as he straightens up, dusting off his vest and slacks as an echoing clang of metal meeting asphalt signals the arrival of his uninvited guest.

“I thought it might be you,” starts Iida, a quiet threat where his frame takes up nearly half the width of the narrow alley he has trapped Izuku in.

“Hello, Tenya,” Izuku greets back, cocking his head to one side as he turns to him, “Been quite a while, hasn’t it? Still wearing your brother’s armor, I see.”

Izuku sees Iida’s left eye twitch slightly, and feels the corner of his own lip curl into a tiny smirk. 

“I’ve come to stop you, Midoriya,” Iida declares, voice still even despite his warning, “Once and for all.”

Izuku lets out a singular chuckle, one hand shoved into his pocket. “Have you now?” he asks, amused, “Of all the people you could’ve gone after, I’m the one that’s made the top of your little black list?”

“How could you not?” Iida shoots back, “Aquario at Gungan Park, Lightspeed and their intern at the Kashyyk Mall, the murder at the winter fair, the bomb in that agency in Hosu, the ‘unexplained’ poisoning of the owners at Club Twi’lek…”

“...And the maiming of Laser Hero, Blast,” Izuku finishes for him, waving his hand to indicate his latest victim, nudging the unmoving form with his foot, “Well, maiming only because you got here before I could finish him off. What was your point again?”

“My point,” Iida growls, teeth gritted, “Is that your reign of terror is coming to an end. Right here, right now.”

“Terror?” Izuku asks in reply with a tiny chuckle, feigning incredulity, “I don’t see how me taking out the trash and weeding out the ineffectual is terrorizing.”

Iida tsks. “Don’t make me laugh, villain,” he spits out, “You hurt and maim for the fun of it, for the hell of it, indiscriminately and without abandon. You don’t even care to clean up after yourself, you’ve left too many clues behind for anyone to be able to brand you as anonymous.”

Izuku laughs, running his other hand through his hair to brush it out of his eyes. “Who said I was trying to be anonymous?” he points out, grinning when Iida’s eyes narrow at him, “If anything, I’m surprised it’s taken anyone this long to find me, let alone you, considering I - how did you put it? - haven’t bothered to clean up after myself. Do you honestly think I would be that careless? Come on, Tenya, you know me better than that.”

“I thought I did,” Iida retorts, “But then you...you…”

His chest heaves, seemingly with the effort of completing his thought. Izuku doesn’t need him to; he already knows. He shifts his weight onto one foot, his head tilted to one side again as he watches Iida struggle with himself. He remains silent as Iida recomposes himself, straightening his spine, tilting his chin up and squaring his jaw.

“You betrayed us,” Iida finally says, “You betrayed everyone who ever believed in you, everyone who ever cared about you and loved you. You betrayed your classmates, your friends, your mentor, your mother, him -”

“That’s rich, coming from you,” Izuku interjects, fist unconciously clenching at the mention of that person, “Or have you finally stopped pretending and lying about what you’ve been doing too? Since you’re still wearing that, I’d say the answer is no. Tell me I’m wrong, Ingenium.” 

This seems enough to make Iida snap. With a burst of firepower, he launches himself at Izuku at near top-speed, smashing him hard against the wall and pinning him there with a heavily armored forearm.

“You’re wrong,” Iida hisses through clenched teeth, “You don’t know me.”

Izuku laughs again, sputtering against the arm Iida has on his chest. “I’m the only one who knows you,” he challenges, “I’m the only one who knows why you’re so diligent at patrolling in the day. I’m the only one who knows what you’re really up to at night.”

“Shut up,” Iida threatens, pressing harder into Izuku’s chest, “I’m warning you…”

“Funny how you ran down my laundry list of hits without mentioning yours,” chuckles Izuku, “Or was it all just a convenient coincidence to you that the locations of my crime scenes were always just close enough to yours to steal attention?”

Iida’s eyes widen in surprise, and the pressure he has on Izuku lessens involuntarily. Izuku takes his opening, ramming an elbow into the side of Iida’s head and twisting out of his grip when Iida recoils from the unexpected attack. Ducking to avoid a kick from Iida by a literal hair, Izuku rolls out of range, pulling his knife out of Blast’s shoulder as he goes. He plants his feet and readies himself as Iida just narrowly avoids stepping on Blast in an effort to chase after him.

“I knew, Tenya,” Izuku reveals, “The moment I heard about your brother in the news, I knew. We’d already been down that road once, and your lucky ass got out of there alive because of him and me. But I knew, ever since that day in Hosu, that if he and I hadn’t been there to stop you, to save you, you’d have become someone very different.”

Iida grunts in disagreement, but says nothing else in response. He, too, is in a ready stance, one foot in front of the other, the opposite arm held in front of him, ready to defend against Izuku’s knife in the unlikely event that Izuku gets the drop on him and attacks first. Izuku knows he has to keep Iida at bay with words - he’s gotten too fast now for anyone to ever really be able to put any distance between him and themselves.

“I’ve been watching and waiting since I heard about your brother,” Izuku presses on, “Tensei Iida’s ‘untimely death’ during a botched robbery at the hands of a couple of unnamed criminals who were never caught. Hell of a tragedy, if you ask me.”

“Shut. UP,” Iida warns again, but Izuku waves him off.

“Almost as big a tragedy as the ‘sudden disappearance of Tensei’s brother,’ of course,” he continues, ignoring the anger seething from Iida, “Turbo Hero: Ingenium, suddenly goes missing and remains unheard from for months, only to turn up a bloody mess in almost exactly the same spot where his brother was killed, with no recollection of what had happened to him or how he ended up there in the first place...Or at least, that’s the story your stupidly rich family fed to the media to deflect suspicion. Because what else was it that they found in the same spot that night you were ‘found’? Oh, that’s right - the body of two people later barely identified to have been low ranking pro-heroes assigned to patrol the area.”

Izuku sees Iida’s fist clench, can see him practically vibrating with anger.

“Your family moved really fast to clear your name, didn’t they?” he says, “Wanted to make sure the Number Five hero Ingenium didn’t go the same way the former Number One hero Deku did. I guess some of us are just lucky enough to have been born and have made enough money to wipe a slate clean, while some of us aren’t. Next thing anyone knew, a criminal with a history of heinous acts was convicted of the hero deaths and put away for life. And so Tenya Iida, one of the top in our class in UA, heir to the name and armor of Ingenium, was exonerated of any suspected wrongdoing in the eyes of the public.”

Iida’s stance slackens. He straightens, but hangs his head, a hand remaining loosely fisted at his side. “You don’t…” he stammers, “You don’t...know…”

“But I do though,” Izuku tells him, matching Iida’s posture and relaxing his own, his tone softening to offer sympathy, “I do. I was there the next time you went out and made someone else pay for not being the hero that your brother needed when he was attacked. I didn’t mean to be - I just saw you. You had disguised yourself, of course, but anyone who has known you long enough would’ve recognized you. You never were very good at pretending, even when we were teenagers.” When Iida shows no signs of reacting, Izuku sheaths his dagger. “That patrolling hero never saw you coming, wouldn’t have stood a chance even if they did. You’re much too fast and much too strong. They were dead before they even hit the ground after you dropped them through that construction site to try and make it look like an accident. Fortunately for you, I knew enough to know that an autopsy report would’ve revealed the stab marks were the killing blow, not the impact of the fall.”

“So you...what?” Iida asks, “You killed Aquario and left him out in the open in Gungan Park to draw attention away from what I did?”

Izuku shrugs. “What are friends for, eh?”

“You are not my friend!” Iida replies, pointing a finger right at Izuku’s face, “I lost my friend the day you joined Shigaraki’s cause!”

Something jumps in the back of Izuku’s jaw at the mention of the name. “Is that what you think I did?” he asks Iida, whose eyes narrow at him in askance, “Joined Shigaraki. Hah. That’s funny…”

With Iida’s brow furrowed in confusion, Izuku closes the distance between them, putting a hand on Iida’s shoulder. “It doesn’t have to be this way, you know,” he says gently, sincerely, “I know what you’ve been doing, and I know why you’ve been doing it. I don’t blame you. But if anyone else were to find out, you wouldn’t get away scot-free again. They wouldn’t understand. Very few people do.”

“And you do?” Iida snorts, looking sideways at him.

“You don’t think so?” he shoots back, “Did you know Aquario, in addition to being a little-known but well-loved hero, was a secret head of a small group of drug traders? Did you know Lightspeed and their ‘intern’ were embezzling money from their agency, which meant they weren’t paying anyone else the right wages? Did you know the agency I bombed in Hosu was set-up by a hero who had once been caught in connection with a sex trafficking ring? Or did you really think I was choosing my victims, any of them, even the ones who came before them, at random?”

Izuku watches Iida’s jaw clench. “You have evidence of these people being fake with their heroism?” he asks, tone dark and ominous.

“Does it matter now?” Izuku retorts, “They’re dead. They died because they tarnished the name of heroes, a name I - we - used to believe in as a beacon of justice and peace-keeping. Someone had to make them pay for ruining heroism.”

“This doesn’t make you right,” Iida argues, “This still makes you a murderer.”

Izuku snorts. “Like you, you mean?” he says, “Or is it my turn to run through your latest hits?”

Iida stares straight ahead of him, eyes slightly squinted but focused on anything but Izuku. Izuku feels the tension leave Iida’s body, watches his fist unclench, hears the long, slow sigh of resolution that Iida lets out.

“So you know my secret,” he says after a while, “That doesn’t mean anything. That doesn’t change anything. I’m still a hero, and you’re still a villain. I can still take you out and keep my reputation intact and my secret safe. All you did was expose yourself as a witness. A loose end I’ll need to deal with.”

Izuku actually tosses his head back when he laughs this time. “Oh Tenya,” he says, clapping Iida on the shoulder, “You and I both know if you really wanted me dead, you’d have killed me by now. No one’s faster than the Turbo Hero, after all. Not even the former Number One hero.” He lets go of Iida and approaches Blast, passed out now from the blood loss and the pain. 

“So what now?” asks Iida as Izuku crouches down again.

“That’s up to you, really,” Izuku answers, going through the folds and pockets of Blast’s costume for anything to keep for himself, “We could have it out here, you and I, and maybe you’ll kill me or maybe I’ll kill you, and no one will ever know what truly happened here.” He turns Blast over onto his back.

“Or, we walk away and go about our days the way we have been over the past few weeks, where you, er, shall we say, stain the streets in the dark of night with the blood of those who should have saved your brother, while I help cover it all up from a distance by pulling focus with a more grandiose crime.” 

In Blast’s pocket, he finds a particularly beautiful silver ring, glistening even in the dim light of the alley, with jewels he suspects are very real and very expensive. He pockets it with a shrug. “And then, should you ever need my help, well...I daresay you’d know how to find me.” 

In another pocket, he finds an attractive pair of sunglasses; he hangs it off the top button of his vest. “While you think about it, let me just, ah, clean up here, as you said I should.” 

With his teeth, Izuku pulls off the leather glove on his right hand, exposing the scars that run down from the tips to the palm. He places his hand open-palmed on Blast’s chest, and watches as the hero’s body hardens into stone-like flakes that gradually crack and wither into dust carried off by the wind, until there is nothing left of the man once known as the Laser Hero.

Izuku grimaces at his handiwork, or the disappearance thereof. He can feel his nostril twitching in disgust as he looks at his scarred fingers, clapping his hands together to dust them off, as if anything of Blast might linger on his tainted skin. He pulls the glove black on as Iida watches him silently, eyes slightly wide as, Izuku suspects, realization dawns on him.

The two former friends stand staring at each other in silence, one in slight shock, the other in a quiet challenge. The wind whistles between them, the sky above them turning from orange to a bluish purple as dusk begins to fall and turn into night. No one moves, no one speaks. 

Iida’s phone rings. His eyes still on Izuku, he taps at a piece in his right ear. Izuku can’t hear what the other person on the line is saying, but from Iida’s responses, he can hazard a guess.

“No,” Iida says, still watching Izuku, who clasps his hands behind his back and grins at him quietly, “All clear here. Either a false lead or we lost the trail...I know. I know….Yes, return to base. We’ll pick this back up tomorrow.”

Izuku waits for Iida to end the call with another tap to his earpiece. “I take it we have a deal then?”

“Call it a temporary, flimsy truce,” Iida answers, “Stay out of my way, and I’ll stay out of yours. And don’t let anyone I work with get close to catching you, or I’ll be forced to deal with you myself.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Izuku says with a mirthless chuckle, “Just tell your partners to watch who they shake hands with.”

Izuku puts on the sunglasses despite the quickly darkening evening, runs a hand through his hair again before putting up the hood on his coat. 

“Have a productive evening, Ingenium.”

Only silence follows Izuku as he walks out of the alley, hands in his pockets and dark glasses on as he leaves Iida to his warring thoughts.

- - - - -

END.

[ariadnelives]

Chapter 17 -- The Pros and Cons

[Missed earlier chapters? Go catch up here! Otherwise, welcome back! Oh, and make sure to join our discord server! Chapter can also be found @ ao3”]

“Your objections have been noted, Sweettalk,” Ariadne addressed the crew about 25 minutes later, give or take, in front of the whiteboard once again, “and none of us likes having to work with this slimeball—”

“—Can I raise an objection?” Prescott cut in.

“All objections have been noted,” Ariadne spat back, “but the information Prescott’s carrying is too valuable to our cause to pass up.”

“And what is our cause, exactly?” Sweettalk asked, “because, I mean, I get that this cult is bad news, but, why is that still our business?”

“Would your conscience allow you to let Vi’s sisters stay locked up?” Ariadne replied casually.

Sweettalk considered this. “It… ugh, it would not…”

“Besides,” Ariadne continued, “and this is a totally selfish reason, but as long as they’ve got one of the impostors, they can keep posing as me and ruining my good name.”

“Your good name as… a wanted criminal…?” Prescott interjected.

“This is now the fifth time someone has told you to cram it,” Sasha pointed out. “I’ve been counting.”

“Do you want our help or not?” Ariadne offered in assent.

“I’m getting your help regardless,” Prescott smirked, “remember, my information is ‘too valuable to pass up.’”

“What information do you have?” Pilar snapped, “God, sorry, it’s hard to keep this group focused sometimes.”

“Thank you, Ms. Pilar,” Prescott smiled at her.

“Don’t get friendly. I still hate you. Keep talking.”

“Must have been raised in a barn, I swear,” Prescott muttered. “No matter. I have extensive information on the cult leader known as The Zealot. I’ve already told your captain enough independently verifiable information to prove that I’m not full of shit, but given our track record thus far, I understand if you still don’t exactly trust me, and believe me, the feeling’s mutual.”

“Prescott and I have worked out a deal,” Ariadne explained. “He needs our help retrieving some valuable artifacts from a casino in Lohnausfall where he believes his girlfriend—”

“—ex-girlfriend,” Prescott snapped.

“Shock,” Ariadne replied sarcastically, then continued, “a casino where he believes his ex-girlfriend fled to with the bag of church artifacts he stole from the Red God compound.”

“Church artifacts are valuable?” Alicia chimed in from the crowd.

“These ones are,” Prescott explained, “The Zealot, see, he’s bartered, stolen, and even killed to get just about every ancient text, every holy artifact, basically anything the Catholic Church wanted to keep under wraps. He learned how to establish a religion using primary sources on some of the most powerful churches of all time. I’ve got nothing against people of faith, but, he took something good and twisted it to his own ends, which obviously I appreciate. One of the reasons my security company never sold those compounds out is because we knew they were sitting on a fortune bigger than any sticker price we could’ve given a buyer, and we could just quietly slip in any time, take one document, sell it to fund our operation for a year, and if they ever noticed it was gone, they’d just chalk it up to an archaic and confusing filing system. In that duffel bag alone, among other things, there was an original manuscript of the Gospel of Judas, one of the nails purportedly used to hang Jesus on the cross, the true shroud used to cover his body, and enough documentation to prove the authenticity of every bit. In the right hands, each artifact is worth millions, maybe more.”

“Okay, so, it’s obvious Prescott is a slimeball who’s attempting to exploit humanity’s cultural heritage for his own profit,” Ariadne began, “I think we can all agree on that—”

“I can’t!” Prescott scoffed.

“Everyone whose opinion matters can agree on that, but, given his history, I wasn’t exactly comfortable helping him out with no guarantee that he won’t throw us under the bus and make a mad dash to save himself. So, we came up with a little arrangement. Prescott wrote everything he knows about the Zealot on a tablet which will be entrusted to Sweettalk, the least likely person in the universe to ever help Prescott—”

“Yo,” Sweettalk said, making a thumbs-up to indicate that she was absolutely game to be unhelpful where Prescott is concerned.

“—and, to ensure that we don’t just take the information and drop him out the airlock on the way to Lohnausfall,” Ariadne continued, holding up two small memory drives, “these are the two decryption keys. I coded them myself. Even I can’t hack my way into that tablet without both of these, so if either of them are missing, the tablet is useless. One will be on Prescott’s person, the other in Pilar’s. Both of them need to return for this to work.”

Sweettalk raised her hand.

“We’ve established that this is not a classroom, Sweettalk, ask your question.” Pilar sighed.

“What’s to stop him from taking his key and booking it once he has what he wants?” Sweettalk asked.

“I hate that she makes such a good point,” Pilar asked.

“Oh, you’re gonna like this,” Ariadne grinned, and, without warning, quickly tackled Prescott to the ground.

There was a quick scuffle, the sort you might expect when one person abruptly throws their entire weight onto another person and knocks them to the floor, but after a few seconds it resolved itself into Ariadne twisting Prescott’s arm behind his back and attaching a heavy-looking black manacle to his wrist.

“THERE.” Ariadne said, slotting one of the drives into a small notch in the manacle, which closed behind it.

“WHAT THE HELL?!” Prescott bellowed.

“I like it already,” Sweettalk laughed. “What is it?”

“I call it The Jumper,” Ariadne said, “I invented it a few months back and I’ve always wanted a chance to use it. It’s got a small, long-range teleporter inside it, hardwired to our receiving pad. Only I can unlock it, although I have no manual control over it. It activates automatically if it leaves a 1-kilometer range of my person, or if any of our crew’s vitals go critical for more than 30 seconds. If he attempts to flee, or harms any of us, the Jumper will automatically return to our station.”

“And what’s stopping him from leaving Spacebreather in the back of some cop car, so having his key back doesn’t do us any good?” Sweettalk asked, “Sorry, Spacebreather, I’m not doubting you, but we can’t afford to underestimate how much of a snake in the grass this guy is.”

Ariadne released her hold on him. “I’m right here, you know,” Prescott said, sounding somewhat offended.

“OH, ARE YOU?” Sweettalk asked, “I WASN’T SURE, I WOULD’VE SAID SOMETHING MORE INSULTING.”

Ariadne jumped in at this point, hoping to keep the crew focused, “the Jumper is programmed to return to our station. It is also designed to take the wrist it’s attached to with it, and do so in such a way that ensures the wearer will bleed out within minutes.”

“So, we know he can’t screw us over again,” Sasha started.

“Don’t count on that,” Sweettalk interjected.

“But, do we have a plan to actually extract the target?” Sasha finished.

“The security at the casino is lax,” Ariadne explained. “Big Top Casino is owned by the Rizzo crime family. Now, I’m told they used to be a big deal, and the head honcho Harry ‘Big Top’ Rizzo is a force to contend with, but their wealth has waned in recent years, which I’d bet is why they wanted these artifacts in the first place. They’ll have a lot of goons on the ground, but the main threat they’re there to guard against is hit jobs by rival families. They don’t think anyone would be stupid enough to try to steal something out of the safe in Big Top’s office, which is where the target will undoubtedly be.”

“Can you crack the safe?” Pilar asked.

“I’ve never met a safe I couldn’t,” Ariadne said, “all I need is to make sure I don’t get caught cracking it. So, we’re going to need to divide into two teams. Diamond Team, that’s Spacebreather, Deathsbane, Sweettalk, and any available Whiptals, your job will be to stage a robbery on the casino floor. Make a big show of it. You don’t actually need to get anything out of the robbery, just make it believable enough that security thinks you’re the threat and comes running, and most importantly, don’t get killed.”

“Do we really think that Deathsbane—” Pilar began.

“I don’t want to hear any arguments on this,” Ariadne cut in, “we need a field medic on site for any dangerous missions from here on out. If you’d like Deathsbane to take on an apprentice, we can talk about that when we get back, but in the meantime, we’ve only got one medic and we can’t afford to be away from her.”

Pilar let out a somewhat angry-sounding sigh. “Fine, whatever.” Sasha smiled and Sweettalk smiled wider.

“Easy enough,” Sasha shrugged, “I’ll prep a few auto-capsules for the regen serum that’ll monitor our vitals and inject us in the event of any sort of trauma. They’re one-use only, though, so try not to get hit, and if you do, go down and play dead so they don’t shoot you again.”

“So, we’re the diversion,” Sweettalk mused, “but what happens when you’ve got the safe? Do we have an exit strategy?”

“Fastwing will keep the shuttle cloaked nearby with a receiving pad idling. As soon as I give her the signal, we flee as quickly as we can and she flies us the hell out of there.”

“What will I be doing during all of this?” Prescott asked.

“Other than cramming it?” Sasha proposed, and Sweettalk quietly high-fived her.

“You’ll be with me,” Ariadne said flatly. “If you’re seen on the casino floor this ex-girlfriend of yours will know what we’re there for and the diversion will be blown. For all your faults, you’re a pretty good liar, and that’s going to work to our advantage. You’ll be our lookout, wearing your security guard getup. If anyone catches us red-handed, your job is to get us out of trouble.”

“You’d trust him to do that?” Sweettalk asked incredulously.

“I’d trust him as far as I could throw his grubby little severed hand and a bag full of blasphemous goodies,” Ariadne replied casually.

“Fair,” Sweettalk nodded.

“So, anything else we need to know?”

“One thing,” Prescott interjected, “Don’t underestimate my ex, Nicks. She may look harmless, but she might be the most dangerous person I’ve ever met.”

Pilar looked moderately offended.

“Ego still a little bruised from the breakup?” Sweettalk offered.

“I’m not kidding,” Prescott insisted, “maybe it’s from growing up with the rest of the Rizzos, but she has this, like, Bonnie and Clyde thing, she lives for danger and that’s more important to her than her own safety or anyone she loves. There is no risk she’s unwilling to take, and no consequence great enough to give her pause. Call me biased or jilted or whatever, but if she confronts you, don’t bother firing a warning shot. She can’t be intimidated, if anything, it’ll just encourage her. Shoot to kill.”

“Noted.” Ariadne rolled her eyes. She was sure they could handle whatever squeaky-voiced rich brat who was airheaded enough to find Prescott attractive, and she didn’t need to know him for very long to know you couldn’t trust a word out of his mouth. “If there’s nothing else, let’s saddle up and get this heist underway. I don’t want to spend any more valuable time helping Prescott, whom I hate, than we need to.”

[letsgetfuckingsuperwholocked]

Found

Steve Rogers X Reader Soulmate AU

A/N: I know I said I was going to bed, but ERMERGERD!! I finally hit 200 followers!! I have been obsessing over Soulmate AUs, lately, so I figured what a great time to try and bang one out! A special occasion fluff piece! Thank you so much for those who have followed me! 200 may not be a lot to some of you, but it is a huge milestone for me!

Summary: Soulmates are born with their partner’s name tattooed over their heart. What happens when the reader is born with a famous missing Captain America’s name?

Warnings: A poor deer gets hit by a car, minor accident, very little injury and blood.

Word Count: About 1700 words (more or less)

Masterlist

Steven Grant Rogers.

When I was born, my parents and doctors were astonished. Captain America had been presumed dead since the forties, making it an impossible scenario at the time. History books never mentioned that he had a name tattooed over his heart. He hadn’t made that information public. I guess soulmates were considered controversial at that period of time, since there was not a lot of information about it.

“You mustn’t let anybody know who your soulmate is, Y/N.” My father always warned, failing to hide the fear laced in his voice. “You don’t want the wrong people to know this piece of information. It could do a lot of damage and get you hurt.”

So, I covered up the delicate writing. Foundation and high-cut shirts became my life-line. I never told anybody that I had a soulmate, and people didn’t question me. Not everybody’s born with a soulmate, anyways.

The world is cruel. I would rather have had no soulmate, instead of a dead one.

I had gotten pretty good at hiding my tattoo, and refused to let the sting of knowing I would never meet my other half get me down. I had graduated high school with honors, graduated from a great college, and got a job as a nurse in a local hospital in New York. I loved my job. I worked really hard to have a good life, and enjoyed the satisfaction of knowing that I was helping people.

Then he was found. He was alive.

I was sitting in the break room, talking to one of my colleagues about an upcoming vacation I’d planned, when someone had shouted to turn on the TV.

Captain America Alive – Frozen in time!

The headlines all said it.

My heart almost stopped beating. He was alive. After all this time. He was alive.

I ran to the restroom to call my mother. “Did you see the television?” I all but shouted, hands shaking.

“I did.” She responded, a smile in her voice. “He’s alive, after all this time.”

“What do I do? I don’t want to freak him out! I’m sure waking up in a different era after being frozen is hard enough, without adding me into the mix.” I sat down on the counter, next to the sink. I needed to think this through, before making any rash decisions. I was overjoyed. I was nervous. I was hurt. I had spent my whole life believing that I was never going to meet my other half. Thinking that the universe was playing a cruel joke on me by giving me the name of a dead man.

I had been wrong after all this time.

“It’s up to you, sweetheart. You need to be the one to make the decision.” I could faintly hear the television in the background of the phone. “If you really want to meet him, you don’t need to do it today. Do it in your own time.”

So that’s what I did. I waited. Three years.

I had followed what he was doing through the news and social media, over time. He had joined a group that called themselves The Avengers, and was trying to do some good in the world.

I was trying to get my life in order, before I met him. I was paying off my student loans, I was working a lot, and I had moved closer to Stark Tower – now called The Avengers Tower – to be close when I was ready to talk to him.

After a particularly grueling day at the hospital – a twelve hour shift – I was supposed to be making my way to see my parents for an upcoming birthday. I was tired. It was really late at night, and I was skipping the set-up with my mother, since the party was the next day. It was a gross night, the rain was coming down in sheets, and it was way too cold. I had been wearing my scrubs, but the shirt was too dirty, so I was driving with my scrub pants and a tank top, making sure the heat in my car cranked up.

Luckily, traffic was pretty light, but the rain was not letting up.

“What the hell! Pass me, asshole.” I muttered, looking in my rearview mirror at a giant SUV behind me. “What, are you trying to pick your goddamn teeth in my mirror?”

My eyes had only flicked to the SUV for a second, but when I looked forward all I saw were a pair of shining eyes.

DEER! SHIT!

I gasped, slamming the brakes as the deer was tumbling onto my hood and smashing into my windshield. My body was forced forward, and my face made contact with the steering wheel. My foot felt like it was forcing my body weight onto the brake, and I threw my car in park, praying I was on the side of the road. “God dammit.” I yelled, bringing my hand up to my throbbing nose, and it came away sticky with blood. I felt it, and – luckily – it hadn’t been broken.

Shit. My windshield was fucked.

The deer!

I clicked off my seatbelt, throwing open my door. Before I climbed out, I grabbed my dirty scrub shirt, pressing it against my face to soak up the bleeding.

“Woah, are you sure you want to be getting out of the car, right now?” A woman’s voice said from a few feet behind my car. “Are you okay?”

My windshield was splattered with blood and hair, and the car was totaled. “Fuck! So much for paying off my car!” This fucking sucks.

I turned to the woman, and froze in my tracks. I would recognize that red hair anywhere. Natasha Romanoff? The Black fucking Widow? “Uhh, I’m fine. I just hit my nose. It’s bleeding, but it isn’t-”

HOLY SHIT.

The passenger door to the SUV opened, revealing none other than him. Captain America.

He was a lot bigger in person. He was tall, broad, and handsome. His hair was so golden blonde, but dirty at the same time. And his blue eyes stood out from his clear, attractive face. They were the most beautiful shade of blue I had ever seen.

Oh, God, I’m freaking out…

Oh, shit. You were talking, Y/N.

“-It isn’t broken. I’m more pissed about my car.” I shivered, rain making the cold seep into my exposed flesh, and shock of the accident waring off. “I just need to call a tow.”

“I already called one, Ma’am.” His perfect voice flooded my ears, and I had to stop myself from embarrassing myself by swooning. “Are you sure you’re okay? That’s a lot of blood.”

I nodded, using the soiled scrub shirt to wipe the blood from my face and chest. I tossed it into the car and grabbed my umbrella to block off the rain, “D-did they say how long they would be?”

“Twenty Minutes.” He responded, unzipping his hoodie and tossing it to me, “Take this. You don’t want to catch a cold.” Such a gentleman.

I was so focused on not embarrassing myself in front of Steve, that I didn’t notice Natasha eyeing up my badge and my half-wiped makeup over my tattoo. “Hey, Steve.” She looked over, beckoning him closer. “Check out the name on her badge.”

My heart stopped beating. Oh, shit. My eyes were almost bugging out of my head, and I could tell that she knew exactly whose name was tattooed over my heart.

“Y/N Y/L/N?” He read aloud, voice questioning. His head sprung up, looking serious and taken aback, “Your middle name wouldn’t be Y/M/N, would it?”

I smiled sheepishly, taking my sleeve and wiping the rest of the dripping foundation off my chest, “Hi.”

“Hi.” He smiled, a look of relief on his face. “You’re my soulmate.”

I felt my face blush, and I bit my lip – heat radiating off my cheeks as he walked up to me, “And you’re mine.”

“Why didn’t you say anything, before?” He questioned as Natasha walked back over to the SUV.

I wrung my hands together, nervousness taking over my body, “Well, uh, I don’t know. I mean, it’s pretty surreal seeing you in person and not on the news.” I wrapped his hoodie tighter around my body, “Plus, I mean, I thought you were dead my whole life, so I never exactly planned out what I would say the first time I ever met you.”

His face fell, “I’m sorry. I had my whole life before the ice thinking about meeting you, and you spent yours thinking that I was never going to be with you.” He gently grabbed my hand, leaving my other one free so I could hold the umbrella. “I’ve had a whole speech planned since I knew what this tattoo meant, and I’ve forgotten every line.” He chuckled, rubbing his thumb over my knuckles. “I’m happy to finally meet you, Doll. You’re beautiful.”

I cleared my throat, “You’re not so bad yourself, Captain.” Oh my god, he isn’t disappointed. Thank god.

“You can call me by my name, you know.” He winked, leaning against my dripping car. “So, do you want to go get some coffee, or something?”

“Oh, shoot!” I pulled my hand out of his, and leaned back into my car to grab my phone, “I was on my way to my parents’ house for a birthday that’s supposed to be tomorrow.” I quick texted my mother, letting her know that I was going to be late without going into details. “I would love, some coffee, though.”

He chuckled, running his hand through his wet hair, “Why don’t we leave Natasha with your car, and I’ll take you to your parents’ house? We can stop for coffee on the way?”

“Sure, that sounds lovely.” I was so relieved that he wasn’t disappointed. I had always dreamed of meeting my other half. This was not a dream, this was reality – and I was so ecstatic, I could cry.

Natasha came over, tossing Steve the keys to the SUV and my suitcase from the back seat. “You kids have fun, I’ll have this towed back to the tower. Make Stark pay for it.”

Steve ushered me over to the vehicle, opening my door and taking my umbrella from me. He jogged over to the driver’s side door and closed my umbrella, hopping in and starting up the SUV.

As he pulled back onto the highway, his right hand took hold of my left, “I am really glad I found you, Doll.”

Another blush crept its way over my skin, and I gave his hand a little squeeze, “I’m really glad I found, you, too.”

As we rode, I felt a sense of happiness spread through me. My soulmate had finally found me, and I’d finally found him.

My heart felt complete.

I could finally show my tattoo to the world.

Steven Grant Rogers.

My soulmate.

TAGS: (I do forever tags, whoever wants to join the party!)

@luckynumber1213 @mrsnegan25

[healthnotion]

21 Epigrams Every Man Should Live By

Editor’s note: This is a guest article from Ryan Holiday. 

As long as man has been alive, he has been collecting little sayings about how to live. We find them carved in the rock of the Temple of Apollo and etched as graffiti on the walls of Pompeii. They appear in the plays of Shakespeare, the commonplace book of H. P. Lovecraft, the collected proverbs of Erasmus, and the ceiling beams of Montaigne’s study. Today, they’re recorded on iPhones and in Evernote.

But whatever generation is doing it, whether they’re written by scribes in China or commoners in some European dungeon or simply passed along by a kindly grandfather, these little epigrams of life advice have taught essential lessons. How to respond to adversity. How to think about money. How to meditate on our mortality. How to have courage.

And they pack all this in in so few words. “What is an epigram?” Coleridge asked, “A dwarfish whole; Its body brevity, and wit its soul.” Epigrams are what Churchill was doing when he said: “To improve is to change, so to be perfect is to have changed often.” Or Balzac: “All happiness depends on courage and work.” Ah yes, epigrams are often funny too. That’s how we remember them. Napoleon: “Never interrupt an enemy making a mistake.” François de La Rochefoucauld: “We hardly find any persons of good sense save those who agree with us.” Voltaire: “A long dispute means that both parties are wrong.”

Below are some wonderful epigrams that span some 21 centuries and 3 continents. Each one is worth remembering, having queued in your brain for one of life’s crossroads or to drop at the perfect moment in conversation. Each will change and evolve with you as you evolve (Heraclitus: “No man steps in the same river twice”) and yet each will remain strong and unyielding no matter how much you may one day try to wiggle out and away from them.

Fundamentally, each one will teach you how to be a better man. If you let them.

“We must all either wear out or rust out, every one of us. My choice is to wear out.” —Theodore Roosevelt

At the beginning of his life, few would have predicted that Theodore Roosevelt even had a choice in the matter. He was sickly and fragile, doted on by worried parents. Then, a conversation with his father sent him driven, almost maniacally in the other direction. “I will make my body,” he said, when told that he would not go far in this world with a brilliant mind in a frail body. What followed was a montage of boxing, hiking, horseback riding, hunting, fishing, swimming, boldly charging enemy fire, and then a grueling work pace as one of the most prolific and admired presidents in American history. Again, this epigram was prophetic for Roosevelt, because at only 54 years old, his body began to wear out. An assassination attempt left a bullet lodged in his body and it hastened his rheumatoid arthritis. On his famous “River of Doubt” expedition he developed a tropical fever and the toxins from an infection in his leg left him nearly dead. Back in America he contracted a severe throat infection and was later diagnosed with inflammatory rheumatism, which temporarily confined him to a wheelchair (saying famously, “All right! I can work that way too!”) and then he died at age 60. But there is not a person on the planet who would say that he had not made a fair trade, that he had not worn his life well and not lived a full one in those 60 years.

“It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.” —Epictetus

There is the story of the alcoholic father with two sons. One follows in his father’s footsteps and ends up struggling through life as a drunk, and the other becomes a successful, sober businessman. Each are asked: “Why are you the way you are?” The answer for both is the same: “Well, it’s because my father was an alcoholic.” The same event, the same childhood, two different outcomes. This is true for almost all situations—what happens to us is an objective reality, how we respond is a subjective choice. The Stoics—of which Epictetus was one—would say that we don’t control what happens to us, all we control are our thoughts and reactions to what happens to us. Remember that: You’re defined in this life not by your good luck or your bad luck, but your reaction to those strokes of fortune. Don’t let anyone tell you different. 

“The best revenge is not to be like that.” —Marcus Aurelius

There is a proverb about revenge: Before setting out for a journey of revenge, dig two graves. Because revenge is so costly, because the pursuit of it often wears on the one who covets it. Marcus’s advice is easier and truer: How much better it feels to let it go, to leave the wrongdoer to their wrongdoing. And from what we know, Marcus Aurelius lived this advice. When Avidius Cassius, one of his most trusted generals rebelled and declared himself emperor, Marcus did not seek vengeance. Instead, he saw this as an opportunity to teach the Roman people and the Roman Senate about how to deal with civil strife in a compassionate, forgiving way. Indeed, when assassins struck Cassius down, Marcus supposedly wept. This is very different than the idea of “Living well being the best revenge”—it’s not about showing someone up or rubbing your success in their face. It’s that the person who wronged you is not happy, is not enjoying their life. Do not become like them. Reward yourself by being the opposite of them. 

“There is good in everything, if only we look for it.” —Laura Ingalls Wilder

Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the classic series Little House, lived this, facing some of the toughest and unwelcoming elements on the planet: harsh and unyielding soil, Indian territory, Kansas prairies, and the humid backwoods of Florida. Not afraid, not jaded—because she saw it all as an adventure. Everywhere was a chance to do something new, to persevere with cheery pioneer spirit whatever fate befell her and her husband. That isn’t to say she saw the world through delusional rose-colored glasses. Instead, she simply chose to see each situation for what it could be—accompanied by hard work and a little upbeat spirit. Others make the opposite choice. Remember: There is no good or bad without us, there is only perception. There is the event itself and the story we tell ourselves about what it means.

“Character is fate.” —Heraclitus

In the hiring process, most employers look at where someone went to school, what jobs they’ve held in the past. This is because past success can be an indicator of future successes. But is it always? There are plenty of people who were successful because of luck. Maybe they got into Oxford or Harvard because of their parents. And what about a young person who hasn’t had time to build a track record? Are they worthless? Of course not. This is why character is a far better measure of a man or woman. Not just for jobs, but for friendships, relationships, for everything. When you seek to advance your own position in life, character is the best lever—perhaps not in the short term, but certainly over the long term. And the same goes for the people you invite into your life.

“If you see fraud and do not say fraud, you are a fraud.” —Nicholas Nassim Taleb

A man shows up for work at a company where he knows that management is doing something wrong, something unethical. How does he respond? Can he cash his checks in good conscience because he isn’t the one running up the stock price, falsifying reports or lying to his co-workers? No. One cannot, as Budd Schulberg says in one of his novels, deal in filth without becoming the thing he touches. We should look up to a young man at Theranos as an example here. After discovering numerous problems at the health care startup, he was dismissed by his seniors and eventually contacted the authorities. Afterwards, not only was this young man repeatedly threatened, bullied, and attacked by Theranos, but his family had to consider selling their house to pay for the legal bills. His relationship with his grandfather—who sits on the Theranos board—is strained and perhaps irreparable. As Marcus Aurelius reminded himself, and us: “Just that you do the right thing. The rest doesn’t matter.” It’s an important reminder. Doing the right thing isn’t free. Doing the right thing might even cost you everything.

“Every man I meet is my master in some point, and in that I learn of him.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson

Everyone is better than you at something. This is a fact of life. Someone is better than you at making eye contact. Someone is better than you at quantum physics. Someone is better informed than you on geopolitics. Someone is better than you are at speaking kindly to someone they dislike. There are better gift-givers, name-rememberers, weight-lifters, temper-controllers, confidence-carriers, and friendship-makers. There is no one person who is the best at all these things, who doesn’t have room to improve in one or more of them. So if you can find the humility to accept this about yourself, what you will realize is that the world is one giant classroom. Go about your day with an openness and a joy about this fact. Look at every interaction as an opportunity to learn from and of the people you meet. You will be amazed at how quickly you grow, how much better you get.

“This is not your responsibility but it is your problem.” —Cheryl Strayed

It is not your responsibility to fill up a stranger’s gas tank, but when their car dies in front of you, blocking the road, it’s still your problem isn’t it? It is not your responsibility to negotiate peace treaties on behalf of your country, but when war breaks out and you’re drafted to fight in it? Guess whose problem it is? Yours. Life is like this. It has a way of dropping things into our lap—the consequences of an employee’s negligence, a spouse’s momentary lapse of judgement, a freak weather event—that were in no way our fault but by nature of being in our lap, our f*cking problem. So what are you going to do? Complain? Are you going to litigate this in a blogpost or an argument with God? Or are you just going to get to work solving it the best you can? Life is defined by how you answer that question. Cheryl Strayed is right. This thing might not be your responsibility but it is your problem. So accept it, deal with it, kick its ass.

“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.” —Marcus Aurelius

In Rome just as America, in the forum just as on Facebook, there was the temptation to replace action with argument. To philosophize instead of living philosophically. Today, in a society obsessed with content, outrage, and drama, it’s even easier to get lost in the echo chamber of the debate of what’s “better.” We can have endless discussions about what’s right and wrong. What should we do in this hypothetical situation or that one? How can we encourage other people to be better? (We can even debate the meaning of the above line: “What’s a man? What’s the definition of good? Why doesn’t it mention women?”) Of course, this is all a distraction. If you want to try to make the world a slightly better place, there’s a lot you can do. But only one thing guarantees an impact. Step away from the argument. Dig yourself out of the rubble. Stop wasting time with how things should be, would be, could be. Be that thing. (Here’s a cool poster of this quote).

“You are only entitled to the action, never to its fruits.” —Bhagavad Gita

In life, it’s a fact that: You will be unappreciated. You will be sabotaged. You will experience surprising failures. Your expectations will not be met. You will lose. You will fail. How do you carry on then? How do you take pride in yourself and your work? John Wooden’s advice to his players says it: Change the definition of success. “Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to do your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.” “Ambition,” Marcus Aurelius reminded himself, “means tying your well-being to what other people say or do . . . Sanity means tying it to your own actions.” Do your work. Do it well. Then “let go and let God.” That’s all there needs to be. Recognition and rewards—those are just extra.

“Self-sufficiency is the greatest of all wealth.” —Epicurus

A lot has been said of so-called “F*ck You Money.” The idea being that if one can earn enough, become rich and powerful enough, that suddenly no one can touch them and they can do whatever they want. What a mirage this is! How often the target seems to mysteriously move right as we approach it. It calls to mind the observation of David “DHH” Heinemeier Hansson who said that “beyond a specific amount, f*ck-you money can be a state of mind. One that you can acquire well in advance of the corresponding bank account. One that’s founded mostly on a personal confidence that even if most of the material trappings went away, you’d still be happier for standing your ground.” The truth is being your own man, being self-contained, having fewer needs, and better, resilient skills that allow you to thrive in any and all situations. That is real wealth and freedom. That’s what Emerson was talking about in his famous essay on self-reliance and it’s what Epicurus meant too.

“Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.” —Jose Ortega y Gasset

It was one of the great Stoics who said that if you live with a lame man, soon enough you will walk with a limp. My father told me something similar as a kid: “You become like your friends.” It is true not just with social influences but informational ones too: If you are addicted to the chatter of the news, you will soon find yourself worried, resentful, and perpetually outraged. If you consume nothing but escapist entertainment, you will find the real world around you harder and harder to deal with. If all you do is watch the markets and obsess over every fluctuation, your worldview will become defined by money and gains and losses. But if you drink from deep, philosophical wisdom? If you have regularly in your mind role models of restraint, sobriety, courage, and honor? Well, you will start to become these things too. Tell me who you spend time with, Goethe said, and I will tell you who you are. Tell me what you pay attention to, Gasset was saying, and I can tell you the same thing. Remember that the next time you feel your finger itching to pull up your Facebook feed.

“Better to trip with the feet than with the tongue.” —Zeno

You can always get up after you fall, but remember, what has been said can never be unsaid. Especially cruel and hurtful things.

“Space I can recover. Time, never.” —Napoleon Bonaparte

Lands can be reconquered, indeed in the course of a battle, a hill or a certain plain might trade hands several times. But missed opportunities? These can never be regained. Moments in time, in culture? They can never be re-made. One can never go back in time to prepare for what they should have prepared for, no one can ever get back critical seconds that were wasted out of fear or ego. Napoleon was brilliant at trading space for time: Sure, you can make these moves, provided you are giving me the time I need to drill my troops, or move them to where I want them to be. Yet in life, most of us are terrible at this. We trade an hour of our life here or afternoon there like it can be bought back with the few dollars we were paid for it. And it is only much much later, as they are on their deathbeds or when they are looking back on what might have been, that many people realize the awful truth of this quote. Don’t do that. Embrace it now.

“You never know who’s swimming naked until the tide goes out.” —Warren Buffett

The problem with comparing yourself to other people is you really never know anyone else’s situation. The co-worker with a nice car? It could be a dangerous and unsafe salvage with 100,000 miles. The friend who always seems to be traveling to far off places? They could be up to their eyeballs in credit card debt and about to get fired by their boss. Your neighbors’ marriage which makes you so insecure about your own? It could be a nightmare, a complete lie. People do a very good job pretending at things, and their well-maintained fronts are often covers for incredible risk and irresponsibility. You never know, Warren Buffett was saying, until things get bad. If you’re living the life you know to be right, if you are making good, solid decisions, don’t be swayed by what others are doing—whether that is taking the form of irrational exuberance or panicked pessimism. See the high flying lives of others as a cautionary tale—like Icarus with his wings—and not as an inspiration or a source of insecurity. Keep doing what you’re doing and don’t be caught swimming naked! Because the tide will go out. Prepare for it! (Premeditatio Malorum)

“Search others for their virtues, thyself for thy vices.” —Benjamin Franklin

Marcus Aurelius would say something similar: “Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.” Why? For starters because the only person you control is yourself. It’s a complete waste of time to go around projecting strict standards on other people—ones they never agreed to follow in the first place—and then being aghast or feel wronged when they fall short. The other reason is you have no idea what other people are going or have been through. That person who seemed to rudely decline the invitation you so kindly offered? What if they were working hard to recommit themselves to their family and as much as they’d like to have coffee with you, are doing their best to spend more time with their loved ones? The point is: You have no idea. So give people the benefit of the doubt. Look for good in them, assume good in them, and let that good inspire your own actions.

“The world was not big enough for Alexander the Great, but a coffin was.” —Juvenal

Ah, the way that a good one liner can humble even the world’s greatest conqueror. Remember: we are all equals in death. It makes quick work of all of us, big and small. I carry a coin in my pocket to remember this: Memento Mori. What Juvenal reminds us is the same thing that Shakespeare spoke about in Hamlet:

“Imperious Caesar, dead and turned to clay, Might stop a hole to keep the wind away. O’ that that earth which kept the world in awe Should patch a wall t’ expel the winder’s flaw!”

It doesn’t matter how famous you are, how powerful you are, how much you think you have left to do on this planet, the same thing happens to all of us, and it can happen when we least expect it. And then we will be wormfood and that’s the end of it.

“To improve is to change, so to be perfect is to have changed often.” —Winston Churchill

While this is probably not a Churchill original (he most likely borrowed from Cardinal Newman: “In a higher world it is otherwise, but here below to live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often”), Churchill certainly abided this in his life. He’d even quip about his constant change of political affiliation: “I said a lot of stupid things when I worked with the Conservative Party, and I left it because I did not want to go on saying stupid things.” As Cicero would say when attacked that he was changing his opinion: “If something strikes me as probable, I say it; and that is how, unlike everyone else, I remain a free agent.” There is nothing more impressive—intellectually or otherwise—than to change long held beliefs, opinions, and habits. The more you’ve changed, the better you probably are.

“Judge not, lest you be judged.” —Jesus

Not only here would Jesus call us on one of our worst tendencies but immediately also ask: “And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye?” This line is similar to what the Stoic philosopher Seneca, who historical sources suggest was born the same year as Jesus, would say: “You look at the pimples of others when you yourselves are covered with a mass of sores.” Waste no time judging and worrying about other people. You have plenty of problems to deal with in your own life. Chances are your own flaws are probably worse—and in any case, they are at least in your control. So do something about them.

“Time and patience are the strongest warriors.” —Leo Tolstoy

Tolstoy puts the above words in the mouth of Field Marshall Mikhail Kutuzov in War and Peace. In real life, Kutuzov gave Napoleon a painful lesson in the truth of the epigram over a long winter in Russia in 1812. Tolstoy would also say, “Everything comes in time to him who knows how to wait.” When it comes to accomplishing anything significant, you are required to exhibit patience and fortitude, so much patience, as much as you’d think you’d need boldness and courage.

“No one saves us but ourselves / No one can and no one may.” —Buddha

Will we wait for someone to save us, or will we listen to Marcus Aurelius’s empowering call to “get active in your own rescue—if you care for yourself at all—and do it while you can.”

Because at some point, we must put articles like this one aside and take action. No one can blow our nose for us. Another blog post isn’t the answer. The right choices and decisions are. Who knows how much time you have left, or what awaits us tomorrow? So get to it.

_______________________________

Ryan Holiday is a bestselling author whose books like The Obstacle is the Way and The Daily Stoic have sold more than one million copies worldwide. For a handpicked list of life-changing but mostly unknown books, go here.

The post 21 Epigrams Every Man Should Live By appeared first on The Art of Manliness.

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[hasansonsuzceliktas]

The Essence: Fruitarianism and Raw Foodism

Have you ever questioned your lifestyle by asking yourself, “Why am I living like this?” It’s a hard thing to do, because there first needs to be a problem, and what’s more, you need to be willing and able to see it. Fruitarianism and raw foodism (or rawism) crossed my path at such a time. I saw a problem, but I couldn’t find a solution. Even if you’re saying something like, “Just fruits and raw veggies? What the hell! Are you crazy? I’d never give up my mother’s spaghetti bolognese. I hardly eat vegetables as it is, and you’re talking about eating them raw?” please read this article. At least you’ll gain an idea of our alienated way of living. Raw foodism is a diet—or more accurately, a way of eating—that involves eating uncooked, unprocessed, and generally organic produce. There are variations of raw foodism based on the person’s views, so anything can be a part of raw foodism: fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds (especially via sprouting), eggs, fish, meat, unpasteurized dairy products, and so on. In this sense, we can talk about three basic types of raw foodists: raw omnivores, raw carnivores, and raw vegetarians/vegans. Whatever the food is, it is either not heated at all or cooked at no more than 40-46ºC (104-114ºF). Let’s talk briefly about the history of raw foodism. Fire was discovered by humanity around ten thousand years ago. For us today, it’s almost unimaginable to think about eating just raw food. While some people in today’s globalized society accept some raw dishes, such as sushi and Carpaccio, even these are out of the question for other people. We know humans only ate raw food before the invention of fire. They gathered and ate fruits, vegetables, and nuts. It’s still unknown as to why they began cooking food, but it quite probably started when a caveman dropped something onto the fire by accident, so we started eating cooked food. The only beings currently eating cooked food are humans and their domesticated animals. Throughout history, many famous people have eaten a diet of raw food. For example, Pythagoras, who was famous for his theorem about triangles; Hippocrates, whose oath is still repeated by physicians today; and Leonardo da Vinci, who enchanted the world with his intelligence and artwork. As I mentioned above, there are three different approaches to raw foodism, but the one I follow and want to share with you is raw veganism. In my previous article, I wrote about veganism. It has love and respect for everything, so accepting living beings as fellow earthlings and protecting their right to live is the basic principle of veganism. Like with all ideas, consumption is an important way of showing a political view, but it’s more accurately anti-consumption: not to eat or wear animal products, not to use products tested on animals, not to condone the use of animals for entertainment, and oppose animal reproduction for profit. This sums up how vegans use consumption to express their views. If you haven’t read my previous article, you may wonder why I made such a choice. There are two reasons: ethics and health. I believe it’s unethical to use animals for our own purposes. All living beings on Earth are essentially equal, and the absurd notion of the food chain is just to justify the human ego. Humans who ate animal products before agriculture don’t need this anymore. We don’t need to eat meat for protein because there are scientifically proven plant alternatives that are even richer. To those who say we need meat and dairy products to avoid vitamin B12 deficiency, ask yourself why it is that in the USA, where meat consumption is at an extraordinary level, the rate of vitamin B12 deficiency is about 40%. We don’t need animals for clothing anymore either, thanks to the technological improvements of modern times. To put my views simply, animals are not resources but rather companions with whom I share this planet. There are many things to tell about raw veganism as regards health, but let me first explain the benefits of raw foodism. Cooking is a process of destroying food through heat. If you were to hold your hand in boiling water for a few seconds (but please don’t), you would understand what I mean. Nutrition is cooked at high temperatures for an extended period, and this is why although nutrients are present at the beginning, they are dead by the time the food is cooked. What’s wrong with this? Vitamins are destroyed at high temperatures. Minerals turn their organic structure into their natural structure, which is unusable for the body, so the body ignores them. These then combine with fat and cholesterol in the circulation system to form cement-like planks. Proteins start to coagulate and lose their amino acids during high-temperature cooking, so they have no nutritional value by the end. Fats are even more dangerous when cooked because they form carcinogenic substances like acrolein and free radicals. Furthermore, cooking is a toxin-producing process. Research has shown the number of white blood cells (leukocytes) to multiply two or three times after eating cooked food. Because white blood cells are the first defense mechanism of the immune system, we can say cooked food is toxic for the body. Now, how about the known and unknown dangers of animal produce. Let’s go back to basic chemistry. We all heard about pH (potentiel hydrogrène) levels, which measure a solution’s acidity or alkalinity. Ranging from 1 to 14, 1­–6 is considered acidic, 7 is considered as being neutral, and 8–14 is considered alkaline. Our body has an acid-alkaline balance, so in order to keep its homeostatic state, the blood and tissue pH needs to be 7.40, which is slightly alkaline. If this varies even a little, the body can go into a coma or even die. The foods we eat have two kinds of pH values. The first value is measured before the food is eaten. For example, lemons are highly acidic with a pH of 2–3. The second value is measured after the food is eaten based on the pH generated in the body (metabolic pH). For example, lemons are highly alkalizing, which means after eating a lemon, the body has an alkaline state. Because the body has to stay slightly alkaline, the metabolic pH of food is very important. Now, here comes the danger of animal products: They are all acidifying for the body. Can the body defend itself against acidifying food? Yes it can, because our body is managed by a perfect mechanism. It uses alkaline minerals to keep the acid-alkaline balance. These minerals neutralize the acid before being discarded from the body. Can you guess which mineral is most important for this? It’s calcium! This means the more animal produce you eat, the less calcium you will have in your body. The best reserves of calcium are in the bones and teeth, so by eating animal produce, you’re inviting osteoporosis. Now, as regards dairy… The dairy industry has created propaganda such as, “For healthy and strong bones, eat at least three dairy products a day. Dairy is our friend for life.” In fact, dairy products can bring you various diseases, starting with osteoporosis. Increasingly more people can’t digest milk, because many people’s bodies can’t digest casein, a protein found in milk. If you have gas after drinking milk, you know why. Let me now explain how I eat. As I said at the beginning of this article, there are different approaches to raw food. I’m a high-carb, low-fat raw vegan. This is based on a high carbohydrate, low fat consumption of food, which is also called The 80/10/10 Diet or 811. It represents the daily percentages of the three macro nutrients: carbohydrate, protein, and fat. According to this, at least 80% of daily calories should come from carbohydrates, at most 10% from proteins, and at most 10% from fat. Here are the reasons: (Adapted from THE 80/10/10 Diet, Douglas N. Graham, FoodnSport Press, 2006.) 1) Carbohydrates Carbohydrates are basically forms of sugar. Vegetables, fruits, honey, and milk, which contain monosaccharaides; beans, which contain oligosaccharides; and cereals and legumes, which contain polysaccharide-fibers, are in this group. Many world-renowned nutritionists agree that 60-80% of our total calories should come from carbs. They are fuel sources for the body because they provide sugar. Whether a food is carb, protein, or fat, it is first transformed into simple sugar (glucose) before being used by the body. Glucose is the only nutrient that the brain, red blood cells, and some nerve cells use. Humans have a limited capacity to store excess carbs or protein, but they can stock them by transforming them into fat, which can be later transformed into glucose for energy in a process known as glucogenesis. This process saves people’s lives in time of famine, but it creates by-products called ketones because of the lack of carbs. When these are present in the blood, they have an alcohol-like effect on the brain and influence its ability to think. Those who don’t eat enough carbs often suffer from eating disorders, fatigue, or excessive fat consumption. People on a low-carb diet are also eating a high-fat diet. Generally, we assume that if we decrease our carb intake, we increase the protein, but this is not necessarily true! Carbs and fat are good friends here. If you decrease one, the other goes up. Fats are twice as dense in calories than carbs, so eating a low-carb diet usually means increasing the daily calorie intake. If you know people who have lost weight this way, it’s probably because they decreased their calorie intake. Yes, they may have lost weight in the short term, but they may also have health issues in the long term. 2) Protein Protein is a macronutrient formed by multiple chains of amino acids. It has many roles in our body’s cells. People have become increasingly concerned with protein, choosing to take protein supplements in addition to eating meat and dairy. Whenever I tell people I’m a raw vegan, the first thing they ask is, “Where do you get your protein from?” or “You must eat lots of nuts, right?” Before you think like this…oh it’s too late, you already have. Anyway, please try to answer these questions: How much protein do we need in a day? Why do we need protein? Have you ever heard about protein deficiency? The main roles of protein are growth, healing injuries, and regenerating cells. The meat and dairy industries try to persuade us that we need a lot of protein, but on the contrary, we don’t need that much. Many health organizations, including the World Health Organization, conclude that 10% is enough. Think about this: A mother’s milk contains only 6% protein, and this is the time when humans need protein the most because a baby needs to grow. So, 10% is really more than enough. Even athletes and body builders don’t need more than 10%, because when we get enough carbs, the need for protein decreases. Muscle is built with exercise rather than protein. There are many famous vegan bodybuilders, and they are good examples for this. Increasing protein intake to more than 10% causes problems like low energy, high acidosis, osteoporosis factors, kidney diseases, arthritis, immune system disorders, and cancer. What we really need is amino acids rather than protein. Protein is reduced to amino acids to be used, but our bodies already have a pool of amino acids where 100–300 grams are recycled every day. This is why protein deficiency doesn’t exist, especially in Western societies. All vegetables contain protein. The legendary Popeye grew strong thanks to spinach. Leafy green vegetables, asparagus, broccoli, cucumber, and apricot are great protein sources. 3) Lipids Saturated and unsaturated fatty acids, triglycerides, and cholesterol are all in this group. Lipids (fat) have important roles. They are the main transporters of fat-soluble vitamins and the source for necessary fatty acids. We need fat for hormone production, but too much fat influences hormones in a bad way. Fat protects us against cold and heat, provides the electrical flow in our nerves, and protects our organs from injury. All fats are not the same. There are good and bad fats, liquid and solid fats. Most of them are indigestible and unnecessary for the body, while others are indispensable. Animals that resemble us physiologically consume little fat. They eat fruits and vegetables for energy. If our diet is more than 10% fat, we can develop diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular problems, cancer, and so on. What’s more, without salt and other seasonings, we can’t taste fat, and this speeds up the aging process. The 811 raw vegan perspective includes just raw fruits and vegetables. Generally, breakfast, lunch, and snacks involve eating fruit, and dinner is composed of vegetables. In this way, the body gets its daily calorie, vitamin, and mineral needs. One reason to eat vegetables raw is to preserve the nutritional value. Cooking dehydrates food, but our bodies need water. Cereals, potatoes, and legumes are not welcome in the 811 diet either. Cereals, such as wheat and oats, and rice are acidifying when heated, but as I said earlier, our bodies need to be alkaline. When the body has acidosis, we have get conditions like cancer, arthritis, chronic fatigue, hypothyroid, and so on. Humans have cooked cereals for the last ten thousand years, but the history of humanity is much older. It takes a lot more time for the human body to adapt, so it’s easy to say the human body can’t digest cereals properly. That’s why many people suffer from bloating and gas after eating pasta, bulgur, and so on. In addition, cereals containing gluten have addictive effects and cause serious problems, such as neurological disorders, constipation, urinary problems, and vomiting. Gluten intolerance leads to asthma, arthritis, chronic fatigue, type 2 diabetes, depression, eczema, and gastrointestinal cancer. Furthermore, gluten intolerance is thought to be associated with autism and schizophrenia. If you still can’t give up your pasta, pay attention to vitamin C. Eating cooked vegetables and cereals provides most needed vitamins but not vitamin C, which is needed for the immune system and tissue protection. Add as much fresh fruit as possible to your diet to ensure you get enough vitamin C. Potato is impossible to eat raw, but it’s recommended to eat boiled or steamed potatoes if you can’t eat enough fruit. Legumes also need to be cooked to eat, so they are also not included in the 811 diet. They should be soaked long enough before cooking so the phytic acid is largely reduced. So, how about my transformation? As I said at the beginning, I suddenly encountered raw foodism while questioning myself. I was in the middle of a problem, namely the fear of regaining weight after a traumatized childhood of suffering from eating disorders, but I couldn’t find the solution. I’d been on a high-protein diet for almost a year, eating only animal products, oats, and occasionally vegetables. I was making myself ill without realizing it. One of my students, who is a triathlete and a raw vegan, then told me about his lifestyle, and I was inspired to conduct some consumer research and try this style of eating. This made me understand that the solution to my problem was in my essence. I say essence here because our essence is about eating fruits and veggies. If you give an animal something to eat that is not in its essence, it’d sniff it and ignore it, but we humans think we are true omnivores that can cook and eat things not in our nature. When the addictive ingredients invented by the food industry come into play, and the system’s most important players, the media and medical professionals, have the same discourse, we continue to live as omnivores. Everyone talks about “balanced” eating. On all the TV shows, people talk about it. People consult a dietician to try to eat a “balanced” diet, but if we are so “balanced,” why are there more and more sick people? Why do we continue to learn about new diseases? They’ve brainwashed us for years, yet we don’t realize it. Wake up people! I started this adventure two years ago in October. It was difficult in the beginning, and I suffered from painful gas for three weeks. I used to have a lower-back problem then, which I’ll talk about later, and the gas made it worse. This gas was the result of the detoxification process I was going through. As my body was in acidosis because of cooked food and excessive protein consumption, the toxins were being forced out of my intestines. This process of colon cleansing meant gas was inevitable, but I couldn’t stand the pain anymore, so I decided to have an incremental transition. In the beginning, I ate only fruit for breakfast, but I ate cooked vegan food for the rest of my meals. Between October and February the next year, I gradually increased the amount of raw food I ate. In February, I wanted to have a “banana island” experience. This 30-day detox period is very famous in the 811 community and especially important for athletes. It involves eating only bananas and drinking only water for 30 days! Well, I rolled back evolution and ate like our primate ancestors. I ate at least 30 bananas a day and drank two or three liters of water. I’m not kidding! It was an extraordinary experience. It was kind of like fasting because you need to control your appetite, and it was a very good vacation for my stomach. Unfortunately, since we don’t know the correct foods, we eat as we want, so our digestive systems are very tired. I think we’ve all said, “I’m so tired” at least once after eating a meal, and this fatigue is caused by the energy needed for digestion. With the banana island experience, I’ve also disproved the urban legends about bananas. Contrary to what people say, bananas don’t cause constipation but actually make the intestines work really well, at least if they’re ripe enough. Contrary to what some people say, bananas don’t make you fat either. I think I would have become obese after this 30-day challenge if this were true. Instead, I lost weight. All my cellulite vanished and my skin was clear again. My hair and nails also grew fast. After the banana challenge, I started eating 90% raw food. I barely have gas problems anymore, and this is really interesting because I had colitis before. Anyone that’s had colitis knows that raw fruits and vegetables are not good friends of it. I’ve not taken any pills in the last two years, nor have I been sick. Of course, I had the odd sore throat and  cold, but I’ve cured myself with natural ingredients like orange juice, lemon juice, and ginger. I never feel tired, especially not after meals, and this is something I have to pay attention to as a fitness instructor. Sometimes I lead classes for eight or nine hours a day, so I need a lot of energy. Thanks to fruits, I’m more energetic than ever! I haven’t suffered from any of the allergy or asthma problem that I did previously since childhood. Most importantly, though, my lower back problem is gone! I’d had a lumbar problem for three years, and no one knew the cause. I heard many explanations from different specialists, such as lack of flexibility, hernia, disc problems, and so on. I started yoga and Pilates and gained enough flexibility and abdominal strength but still had problems. In the end, examinations showed it wasn’t a hernia. But what was it then? Why couldn’t I even walk straight sometimes? Why did I have to reduce my sporting activities? The answer was simple: my diet! I had such an increased acidosis rate that my joints and my discs between vertebrates were yelling, “STOP!” My two-year detox worked, and I’m now back on the stage. I was so lucky to meet that student at the right time and avoid developing more serious problems. By the way, my husband was also on a high-protein diet, and he developed kidney stones in just four days. Now I know why. In terms of ethics, this lifestyle gives me another pleasure in addition to not exploiting animals: an environmentally friendly lifestyle. For example, the amount of detergent I use for washing dishes has decreased, and if my husband ate like me, I could eliminate it completely. Because I eat mostly fruits and vegetables, I’ve reduced my garbage with things like packaging. What’s more, because I don’t eat any animal produce anymore, the water requirement for my food has decreased. Did you know that animal production requires more water than agriculture and produces more carbon dioxide? Even one person not eating animal produce reduces the rate. I also don’t visit the doctor anymore, so I save money on that. Who could want more? I’m sure you’re wondering what I eat. I generally prefer simple meals, just one food at a time. I eat bananas in the morning to give me enough energy. For lunch, I eat bananas again if I’m out, because it’s easy and practical to take anywhere. In the evening, I eat a huge salad of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, and avocado, all seasoned with lemon juice. When I eat cooked food, I don’t use any fats such as oil. I like Turkish-style veggies, but I only cook them a little or steam them. I prefer quinoa and buckwheat to pasta and bulgur. Cooked food makes up about 10% of my diet, about three or four meals a week. If you’re asking, “Why should I eat like this?” I have an answer: to control your body and your life on your own and free yourself from the dogma of the health and food industries and the media. Most importantly, you will age in a healthier way. It saddens me greatly when people say, “It’s normal for people to have this much sickness when they’re old.” To me, it’s our choice to be healthy or sick. Aging shouldn’t automatically be associated with being sick, not being able to walk, or pain. I like to imagine myself dancing, running, talking about healthy eating, and inspiring people in my 70s and 80s, and I know I’ll be like this. Like Buddha said, “Every human being is the author of his own health or disease.” Read the full article