#truly the shit cherry on a shit sundae of a week

[frumpybutsupersmart]

they’ve ruined pixelogic

[spidermans-l-o-v-e-r]

That Should Be Me

Pairing: Buck x Reader

Word count: ....Anyway

Notes: I'm accidentally writing requests over my two series and I really just need to double down on my series like can I please just finish something for once in my life

Eddie knows how Buck feels about you. He’s not stupid, Buck just thinks he is. 

But really Buck hasn’t exactly told him how he feels about you, but they’re best friends!! He should know!! (He does) And it’s… it’s just a stupid crush but he can’t help it, not when you drop by the station just to surprise them all, or you bring them treats, or just presents in general. You’re just so sweet, you’re apple pie sweet, you’re- you’re that ice cream sundae with the cherry on top sweet

And the worst part is when you come up to him and Eddie, and Eddie is all smooth and hands-on, he’s holding your elbow, he’s got his hand on your back, your shoulder, your side. And Buck is a complete floundering mess. He accidentally bumps into things or he bumps into you! Or last week when he literally walked into the side of the truck like an idiot. He’s still not sure how he managed that one 

Watching how smooth Eddie is with you just bothers him, and he doesn’t really know why. He doesn’t even realize just how much it bothers him until you come into the gym one day and they’re both working out. You wander over to them as he’s spotting for Eddie 

“Hey pretty thing” Eddie sets the bar down and sits up, grabbing his towel and putting it over his shoulders 

“Hi Eddie” 

That blush on your cheeks makes Buck irritated as he looks into your eyes. Why can’t he make you blush like that 

“Hey, Buck!” You give him a little wave and he nods 

“Oh hey Y/N” He turns to reset the weights and you look at Eddie, who just shrugs and stands up 

“What brings you here?” He wipes down the machine and Buck lays down next, holding the bar in his hands 

“I brought cookies” You stand a bit closer to Buck, watching as he starts bench-pressing 

“How um- how much weight would you say that was?” You ask nonchalantly and Eddie snorts and turns his head 

“325” Buck answers distractedly as he pumps it slowly, he misses the way you wet your lips 

Eddie doesn’t 

“Yeah, he’s really strong, like super strong!  Do you see his muscles? My man” 

Buck laughs and has to put the bar back for a second so he doesn’t drop it and immediately kill himself 

“Oh shut up, it’s not that impressive!” 

“Come on buddy, we want that gun show!” Eddie taunts him and he rolls his eyes, before doing as Eddie asks and flexes for both of you. You can’t help your mouth dropping open as you look at his arms 

They’re nice 

Stupid nice 

Eddie looks at you gleefully and takes your hand “Oh you know you wanna touch em” 

“Oh my god, Eddie” you laughed embarrassedly but didn’t exactly stop him when he puts your hand on Buck's bicep. He wriggles his eyebrows and you nearly die as you squeeze his arm 

“Yup! Those…those are very- very big- a-arms” You yank your hand away and hold it to your chest “Hey I um- I have to uh- I forgot- shit bye???” You spin on your heel and run right out of the room and Buck sighs 

“I think I upset her…She’s never gonna like me is she?” Buck flops back on the bench and drags his hands over his face. 

And truly? Eddie has to fight choking his ass out. 

Everything about his not jealousy seems to come to a culmination tonight though. You show up tonight in a simple black dress with spaghetti straps, sheer black tights, and a pair of boots. Hen invited you for drinks along with the rest of the team and he’s been watching the waiter flirt with you the entire damn time you’ve been there. And you’re nice about it, with your polite smiles and pretty words… but it just gets under his skin when he passes you his number on a napkin. 

He doesn’t know what comes over him, as everyone stares at him in shock. But here he is, your chin cupped in his hand, his lips pressed to yours in an incredibly heated kiss, he ignores the gasps around him as he pulls you closer to him, His hand trailing over your neck and pushing the back of your head into him more. Your hands snake up his chest and you hold his face… like you’re actually enjoying this just as much as he is. He balls up that stupid napkin and throws it over to Eddie, the way he’s holding onto you now is possessive. He may have to compete with Eddie, But he’s damn sure not competing with this guy too, hell no. 

He pulls away, keeping his face close to yours, and kisses your nose, you giggle and nip at his lips and he pulls you to him by your waist. Eddie picks up the napkin with the number on it and hands it back to the waiter 

“I don’t think she’ll be needing this” 

Buck's hands start to wander, a bit quicker than really appropriate for public but he doesn’t care, he just wants to feel you. His hands slide under your dress, touching your soft skin and he groans appreciatively 

“Uh…Buck? Y/N?” Chimney is holding his drink to his lips as they all stare at you two. Buck is pushing you against the booth and you’re bringing your leg up around his waist and clawing at his shirt 

“Do something” Hen smacks Eddie’s leg and he rolls his eyes

“Why me?!” He pulls out his phone and makes a call while rubbing his brow. Suddenly Buck’s phone starts ringing and you reach into his back pocket and pull his phone out 

“Hello?” You pant as he attacks your neck, leaving a messy trail of hickeys, you listen for a second, your cheeks flushing 

“It’s for you” You hold his phone to his ear and Eddie rolls his eyes 

“Oh really? His phone ringing is for him?” You toss your straw paper at him and he snickers 

“Uhhhh hey Cap….uh huh… uh huh… uh huh okay bye” 

He hands you back the phone and you place it in his pocket. He pulls away from you, his cheeks flushing as he sits up and helps you straighten out your dress 

“What did he say,” Eddie asks, looking down into his drink 

“He said if I didn’t stop he’d have me on toilet duty for a month” 

You giggle as you take a sip from your drink, your body is on fire now, every brush of his skin against yours just fuels it more and more and you’re ready to pounce 

“So we gonna address that or??” Hen gestures and you shrug 

“That’s up to Buck. Maybe he’ll finally ask me out” 

“Wait you like me too?!?!” 

[w0ndrlvst]

i just had to cancel upcoming plans with friends because of personal shit, but this triggered me to kinda just...dump what ive been feeling into a public post. id usually go into an empty park and scream as loud as i can when im feeling this upset, but i think airing my grievances out onto a public social media platform is the best equivalent. its like we're all screaming into the void together!!!!!

anyways, venting below the cut.

im not going into specifics as to protect my irl identity, its going to be two years since i dropped out of school originally and ever since then ive been incredibly sick both mentally and physically. i can barely eat; i get full easily and some days i feel like ill throw up if i eat regardless of how small the portion is. my medicine is an apetite surpresant so that makes it even harder to eat as well. im constantly tired, ive lost so much weight, have no energy, my memory has gotten worse and worse...its just been so fucking awful. im seeing a doctor this week but im not optimistic that she'll help given how shit the medical system is in the states.

this alone is a lot but i have to live with a very dysfunctional family dynamic and attend college classes at the same time all while balancing a social life. i never truly got to rest when i took my gap year because my parents hounded me to apply for jobs, learn to drive, find a school to attend for the next spring; even though i needed to just STOP and not do anything just for a little bit. however, in their eyes it was seen as me 'giving up' and 'not trying hard enough,' so i never had the time to recollect myself. i never felt like i ever had a chance to rest. even now i am always working towards having to accomplish a responsibility and i never have time to take care of myself.

to add the cherry to the already shit sundae, theres just...external world issues that have me perpetually worried for my own future and the future of my peers. i dont think i need to go into detail about that.

yeah, thats kinda how ive been the past two years. pretty shitty. and i wouldn't be surprised if you're also feeling shitty too. its all been kinda shit. nevertheless, we persist. i dont doubt we'll seek better days, and that maybe in due time something magical will happen and we'll all finally start to feel better, but goddamn has it been a tough battle recently.

[queervegancryptid]

Just once, lately, I'd like to feel good. Just once, just a moment of joy to break up the monotony of all the fear, sadness, and guilt. I wake up every day feeling like a tornado of anxiety is forming in my chest, like I'm primed to go try to fix stuff, and there's so much to fix, and I can't do it myself, but I have to figure it out anyway. That's how my days start, to say nothing of the food and weight crap that's boiling over lately.

Putting this under a cut because it gets kinda raw.

I know nothing will change if I don't eat and get myself healthy. But I can't see my way forward to that. I increased my intake for a couple days and freaked out. But that's the only way out of this, and I'm so fucking tired of feeling like this.

Then I think, okay, but you'll get fat again. You kinda have to unpack that, though, because "fat" doesn't always mean "fat" with an eating disorder. For me, it's a stand-in for a lot of childhood trauma and self worth issues.

Lately, something will happen, anything even a bit upsetting, and my brain goes, "Well, how am I supposed to eat with this going on?" It invents excuses to avoid food. It does shit that I know is bonkers but can't stop myself from thinking and feeling.

And thoughts and feelings, a lot of people have to talk back to those things or analyze them in themselves, including me. But all day every day, I have to fight with my own brain. It's exhausting.

I just feel like falling apart. I was never allowed to do that growing up. I wasn't allowed to be afraid or seek comfort from others or even enjoy things much at all for a long time when I was a kid and teenager.

There was always something more important that meant I got pushed aside.

Accepting that you will not be the priority a lot of the time is part of life. But it's the feeling of there being no room for what I need. I feel like I've been slowly carving myself up to try not to need any space for myself. I've been doing it since November 2023. And slowly but surely, over time, I kept saying "that's fine, I don't have to have that" and "I don't need any help, don't worry about it" and basically downplaying all my needs.

And now I'm sick again. I need to prioritize myself. I can't seem to find the strength to fight lately. In a sick way, I feel bitter thinking about the fact that I "have to" eat and recover. I earned this weight loss. It's mine. Why should I give that up? Who gives you the right to take it away from me?

And I've spent weeks digging through insurance shit, trying to find some way to finagle or force my insurance company to pay for treatment. Looking for charities, looking up major hospitals, clinical trials, fucking googling providers in my area and contacting them directly. They don't accept Medicare, and almost none accept Florida Medicaid. Over and over, I found something that looked hopeful, only to have the rug pulled out from under me. Again and again.

There's only so much a person can reasonably be expected to take. I feel like I'm at my fucking limit. It just won't fucking stop.

And the cherry on top of this shit sundae: my weight has dropped to the point where I have a truly insane amount of loose skin. So not only am I dealing with the mental shit from anorexia, but I also feel less attractive than ever.

And I think about giving it up, and I resent it because it's mine. It's all I have that's just mine, by which I can measure improvement directly, and it's the only thing that makes me feel good about myself.

And you know what? That's sad.

I've been trying so hard to get up every day and pretend like everything is normal. I don't want anyone to accuse me of having a pity party or being overdramatic. But maybe I need to do that. Process some shit, I don't know. But the one thing I haven't tried is resting. I think I would need to go into the hospital to get the amount of rest I need, somewhere where people would make sure I don't get up and do things. I don't plan on doing that. But refusing to get out of bed for a day is a good compromise.

[vergess]

@autismserenity​ said: Your tags are the most American thing I’ve ever read, we are truly so screwed here   

May I interest you in a more complete, and more excruciating, explanation of what I spent the last 18 months doing?

It is, I need to emphasize, fucking nasty. Don’t feel obligated, especiallly if you’ve already had A Day(tm).

There’s a lot of disease, a lot of worker abuse including sexual and racial abuse, a fine portion of letting people die for not being white enough for real medical care, all leading to homelessness.

For NDA reasons, because my former employer was just as vile as any tech company has ever been, I cannot be super specific about who I worked for. However, I can say that we handled the records and patient contact for all COVID testing for several states, as well as 2 of the 5 largest metros in the US, and several dozen smaller ones ranging from the approximate population of San Francisco, down to little towns, as well as the testing for several public school systems and at least two government agencies that I am not at liberty to disclose.

I tell you this for a sense of scale. When I say shit like, “my boss was more than happy to let thousands or hundreds of thousands die” I am not exagerrating for effect. We handled hundreds of thousands of tests a week.

Again, I need to emphasize, government agencies. Ones you would know if I named them. Ones everyone in the country knows.

And we were in charge of getting their test results from the already over swamped labs back to the patients, who often were not allowed to quarantine while awaiting results.

The fastest we got our turnaround time to on any consistent basis was about 30 hours. Often it ballooned well into weeks.

There were a number of factors for this, but the big one was always understaffing.

The staff we did have were treated like trash. One of the big selling points of this company is how “trans friendly” it is to work there. That is a lie. Every trans employee on payroll had their dead name displayed to all other staff, and until I personally changed the system setup on my arrival, patient facing trans people’s dead names were displayed to patients.

Remember that thing about “hundreds of thousands of tests a week”?

I was able to change the way patient-facing names were displayed. I was not allowed or able to alter the way internal systems displayed trans people’s names. But I was assured that it’s fine, because once you get a legal name change, you’ll be given new system accounts with your new name!

Your old accounts with your dead name would still be displayed and associated with the new ones though.

This is the “trans friendly” working environment. We were allowed to be out of the closet, as long as we were willing to put up with that. And any attempts to get it altered were the result of those nasty little transgender ingrates not being thankful enough.

Meaning that by asking to use our own fucking names we were already in the disciplinary shitter.

Another big selling point is the ~racial diversity~. The CEO was a man of colour, and so were like four other people on staff!! Wow!!!!!!!

This, too, was laughable.

Once numbers started coming in about the care gap for COVID between English and Spanish speakers, and our Southwestern US service area began to have a separate and brutal backlog just of Spanish speaking patients, my employer encouraged me to interview potential hires who speak spanish.

Fair enough! We all wanted to do our part to help close the already massive mortality gap.

So, I found candidates, did interviews, hired them, trained them, etc. But I don’t speak Spanish. As a result, I appointed 2 assistant managers who do speak Spanish to assist me in managing, you know, like the job name.

So when my super contacted them directly, completely skipping me on the chain of command, and told them to stop all of our Spanish speakers from translating helpful simple messages to send to patients, and instead start translating medical and legal documents, they very reasonably assumed I was in the know and went ahead with it.

TO BE CLEAR, that could have ended my life, theirs, basically everyone involved. Everyone in the company would have been completely fucked. At that point, my subordinates, the people for whom I am wholly responsible, were doing everything from practicing medicine without licenses, to encouraging spanish speaking patients to enter contracts that no one on the fucking executive tier could even read.

The moment I found that out, I and the A.M.s immediately started trying to get actual medical translation services to do our documents. We collected them in a neat folder. We queried translation services. We got quotes. We contacted my super and the CEO, about this over and over again for months. In the late autumn, we received approval for one of the translation services.

The CEO decided at the last minute that having people with no medical or legal training draft medical and legal forms was fine and good actually, and refused to sign the contract or send the documents for translation.

The excuse I received was that the COVID emergency HIPAA relaxations would protect us.

That’s not how that works.

Throughout all of this, Spanish speaking employees were told to either keep doing medical and legal translation work, or lose their jobs.

Oh, did I mention everyone was working between 30 and 80 hours a week, and all of us were marked as “contractors” so the employer could tax evade? Don’t worry, we filed complaints with the labour bureau.

So the entire department was let go, and “rehired” as temps through a temp agency, which because it was a temp agency could keep them marked as contractors regardless of the facts.

This change was presented to all of us, myself included, as the company getting a new accountant to handle payroll.

So if you’re keeping score, we’ve covered racism, queerphobia, medical negligence, fraud, and a frankly uncountable number of deaths.

Let’s talk about the sheer negligence towards employees ourselves. If you’ve worked in near-death medical care before, or any number of emergency services really, you know that the standard benefit suite includes either a dedicated therapist for your staff, or access to peer support groups with other emergency and medical servants through your employer’s benefits program.

Do you know what our mental health benefits were for this company?

The CEO got on a fucking zoom call with us all one (1) time, and said that if we were feeling suicidal or traumatized by the work, to talk to him about it, and he would be our therapist.

Do you know how many people per fucking day we had to contact only to be told they had already died because our understaffing delays killed them? He doesn’t. He never listened when we told him.

But let me put the cherry on the “Oh baby, you can talk to me, oooh” sundae.

Anyone who “looked” or “sounded” female, regardless of actual or assigned gender, was subject to constant flirtations and slimy, overly personal compliments about our appearances. Fortunately, at 3 levels removed from the CEO (Executives > Department heads > Managers > Employees), most of the people under my management had relatively little contact with him.

I was not nearly so lucky.

The CEO of this company has a watersports (urination) fetish. I know this, because he told me so and attempted to get me to join him in it. I have no idea how many other people in the company he did this to. I mean, what the fuck was I supposed to do, risk losing my job to find out? I have a fucking family to support, people.

Not that it mattered.

Eventually, all of these abuses became too much for my subordinates. Productivity fell off a cliff. Delays were getting worse and worse. In a medical emergency like this, delays=deaths.

So, like a fucking idiot, when the department heads reached out to me to ask what they could do to improve productivity, I shot down their frankly insulting suggestion of raffling a $20 amazon gift card to patient facing employees, and instead suggested a very simple, “enroll us with a peer support group, every single person in this department has PTSD from working in this pandemic.”

They were confused by my assertion of PTSD. I was asked to compile a document of complaints, concerns, and weaknesses in our patient facing services.

I and the A.M.s did so. It was roughly 40 pages long, with each page given a known problem, the reasons why it was a problem, and some potential solutions that might inspire further solutions or be able to be implemented. We submitted it. There was no response.

A week passed.

I had been working 80 hour weeks for most of a year. I hadn’t even been able to take weekends. I took my first sick day, in a company with “unlimited vacation days.”

I received a call at 3PM.

I had been fired for “differences in communitcation.” If you’ve ever seen that “Problem Women of Color in the workplace” chart? Yeah.

So had most of my department, including every transgender member of the department, and several of our extremely limited in supply Spanish speakers, who were presumed to be “on my side.”

Some of them, I barely even knew beyond the formalities of the job, and they were punished anyway.

I lost my insurance, and as a result I lost access to my medications.

But the real problem? I lost my house. And not due to lack of payment.

I lost my house, because when I got the job we waited 6 months for stability’s sake, and then readied to move out of the area. I got a mortgage on the basis of my employer’s written guarantee to the bank that I would continue to be employed for the next year at a minimum.

With the mortgage approval in hand, we entered a sales contract on our existing home.

We got and accepted an offer just days before I was fired. To keep our house meant paying a 25,000 dollar broken contract fine. We didn’t have that. We had a 10% down payment for a modest fucking place in a cheaper area, which is less than half that.

But without a job, my mortgage approval was also voided, meaning we couldn’t buy a house either.

All of a sudden, we were homeless during the plague, because my employer wrote and signed a letter to a bank guaranteeing my future employ, and then changed his mind when too many people died due to his own negligence.

Oh yeah, one last thing: the job paid less than Pandemic unemployment Assistance.

...After that, well, it’s homelessness until just last month. I... if you’ve never been homeless it’s.

It blurs. Everything is happening constantly, except for all the ways in which you are endlessly, mind breakingly bored. Bored, overloaded, and always uncomfortable.

Obviously my health would have declined regardless. Malnutrition, stress, everything.

But I was also unmedicated.

It was hell. I was in hell. I don’t know if I can recover from it, to be honest.

I bounced back from being homeless as a child. Children are as resilient as they are stupid, and the monstrosity of homelessness was little more than a vaguely remembered loathing and a panicky fear that it would ever happen again.

A child who is dying is worthy of sympathy, even if it is meaningless coos from passers by. If they have family, they may be able to rely on them too.

An adult with the indignity to die homeless and crippled, according to the average passer by, is worthy only of disgust and perhaps even punishment for being such a worthless waste.

My reward for nearly killing myself in a desperate bid to help stem the tide of COVID was the destruction of not only my life, not only my entire family’s lives, but the lives of every single family of every single employee who worked with me.

And you know what’s worse?

Each one of us still did more to limit the lethal impact of COVID than the entire united states government.

It breaks something in you, going through that.

It makes you realize that hope is a fool’s game.

But, I have ever been a fool, and so, I continue to play.

[dastardlydandelion]

medium luci

ao3 link

content warnings: homophobia, comphet, child abuse, abusive relationships

It’s rare that Susan and Neil have the same weekday off. Neil typically works five days a week and she three or four, depending who’s on staff, being that she’s only part-time. But he’d had a dentist appointment midmorning so he’d taken today off and decided to make his hours up by volunteering for a double next week.

Susan doesn’t typically care to spend any extra time alone with her husband. They have so little to talk about these days, now that he doesn’t try to butter her up or feed her honey sweet lies as much as he used to. Now that Neil doesn’t care to talk much at all unless ranting or complaining about the various things he doesn’t like, his son’s style of dress, women who sit with their legs open, cab drivers who don’t speak English. Susan doesn’t even remember the last time Neil had to take a cab but he has strong opinions on them nonetheless, and the list goes on and on.

He thankfully hasn’t done much of that today, however. He’d parked himself in front of the television after coming home from his appointment and simply nodded when Susan announced she was going out to garden. She only comes inside when she hears the phone ring and by the time she’s walking up the back steps, Neil’s already answered it.

She watches his expression change as he converses with whomever’s on the other end, nervousness fluttering in her chest as his eyes widen, then harden.

“I’ll be right there,” Neil concludes as he hangs up, turning those hard eyes onto Susan. “That was the school.”

“Oh dear…what’s Billy done this time?”

“Not Billy.” Neil shakes his head and Susan’s heart drops with the realization her husband isn’t just irritated but seething, knuckles blanched as his hands ball into tight fists. “Maxine. Did you know the Sinclairs have a girl around her age?”

“N-No, I didn’t. I’m not very familiar with them, Neil.” Susan never had much luck getting close to anyone anymore, not in the least because of Neil himself.

“Apparently Maxine is,” he declares icily. “A teacher caught her and the Sinclair girl fornicating under the bleachers.”

Susan’s heart turns to stone and sinks into her stomach.

No.

Please, no.

Neil has very strong opinions about sexuality in general and homosexual conduct in particular, and Susan can practically feel the outrage radiating from him. It crackles in the air like the promise of a lightning storm. Neil’s fists are still clenched and his posture goes taut like it always does before he explodes.

“W-Well,” Susan begins, swallowing past the lump in her throat.

She hates herself for what she is going to say. She says it anyway.

“Well, you know where she learned that kind of b-behavior from, don’t you?”

Because if Neil is going to explode, Susan can’t stop him. But she hopes she can at least encourage the worst of it away from Max. She watches Neil’s eyes flicker and knows they’re both remembering the day they came home early from the short vacation they’d taken for their fifth anniversary, a girl and a boy sneaking out of Billy’s bedroom window, neither particularly clothed. She watches the angry bulge of the vein pulsing in his neck and knows they’re both thinking of that short young fellow with the skateboard who worked at the used car lot during the day and spent his time with Billy during the night.

“Yes, I know exactly where she learned it from. I’m picking both of them up and we’re all going to have a family discussion.”

“I should come with you.”

“No.” Neil holds up his hand. “Stay here, Susan. We’ll be back soon enough.”

Neil has gun powder in his gaze and she dares not argue. She lowers her head and steps aside when he walks past to fetch the truck keys from the hook. He stomps down the steps and slams the backdoor shut behind him.

Susan watches through the window as he gets into the truck and pulls out of the driveway, feeling dreadfully ill. She doesn’t mean what she’d said, of course. There are a number of behaviors that Max has picked up from Billy, but that isn’t one of them. If anyone is to blame, Susan supposes it’s herself for passing it along intrinsically.

She has her own secret desires locked away within the chambers of her heart. Desire she dares not confront for her own sanity, for her own safety. She’s never acted on her wants, always chose to play private games of hide and seek with them in her head instead, those insidiously innocent wishes of hers. Never spoken aloud let alone pursued those urges that flush hot beneath her skin when she finds her eyes drawn to other women’s lips, hips, breasts.  

Susan gave it to Max and unlike her, Max is brash and bold and brave. God save her, Max does what she wants to do and doesn’t care what other people think. Susan would admire her for it if it didn’t scare her to death.

Because Neil does care what other people think. He cares very much. And Susan’s seen him annoyed with Max in the past. She’s seen him frustrated with Max, displeased, exasperated. But never has she seen the silent stirring of a reign of rage to come where Max is concerned, never has she known that particular look in Neil’s eye to be directed Max’s way. She can only hope—

Oh, it’s such a despicable thing to hope for. Susan has poison in her soul, she swears she must. But Billy isn’t remotely hers and Max very much is.

* * * 

Susan doesn’t know if it was actually her remark that spurred Neil to turn the blame on Billy or if this was the conclusion he would’ve come to anyway. Neil often blames Max’s mishaps and mischiefs on Billy. Billy being the older sibling meant to lead by example. Billy being the older brother, meant to keep his younger sister out of trouble to begin with.

Her remark or Neil’s default thought process, in any case, it’s Billy he’s glaring at in the living room. Angrily dictates that Billy take off his shirt, belt in hand. Susan grabs a very pale Max’s shoulders and begins to usher her down the hall.

“Where are you taking Maxine?”

Susan freezes, mouth going dry.

Neil’s looking their way now, brow arched, stern and skeptical.

“I-I—“

“She isn’t going to learn if she doesn’t watch, Susan,” he declares with no room for argument. “Bring her back.”

Susan swallows, hands tightening on Max’s shoulders. Something dies inside her when she turns her daughter around. She buries it silently as she’s buried so many other pieces before and avoids Max’s eyes boring into her as she marches her back to the living room. Neil motions for them to sit on the couch, sunlight glinting off the metal buckle. Billy doesn’t bother to disguise his disdain, glaring murder, nostrils flaring like an ornery bovine. Susan suspects he’ll pay for this too.

“Your behavior today was beyond inappropriate, Maxine,” Neil tells her coldly. “Unnatural, disgusting, absolutely unacceptable.”

Max squirms next to Susan, hands tucking under her thighs. She is stone faced but this close, Susan can feel her shaking.

“Now, I know it’s not all your fault. Big Brother here’s taught you—“

“I didn’t teach her shit!” Billy cuts him off, sharp and acidic. “I told her to steer clear from Sinclair, this isn’t on me!”

Neil punches his son in the stomach with all the affect of swatting a fly, once, twice. Susan flinches. Billy’s gasping, breath knocked out of him. He staggers and Neil viciously shoves him to the floor.

“She saw you with that faggot’s tongue down your throat, don’t think I don’t know! I know you, I know the kind of shit you think you can get away with behind my back!” Neil roars like thunder. “Well, now it’s my turn to teach her a thing or two! Pay attention, Maxine!”

Max stiffens beside her. She opens her mouth to protest and Susan grabs her arm, sinking her nails in. Startled, Max's eyes dart to her. Susan gives a tiny shake of the head, urging her not to speak. Max bends her elbow like a chicken wing and jerks her arm out of Susan’s grasp. Ire flares in her gaze but she holds her tongue. She does not challenge Neil as he begins beating Billy with the belt.

Susan can’t watch. She lowers her eyes to the floor. She can see the movement in the shadows, Neil’s rapid whipping of the improvised weapon and Billy’s form jolting with the blows. Susan shuts her eyes to the shadows but she can still hear it, thick, hard leather striking bare flesh.

“Don’t turn away, Maxine,” Neil barks at some point between the sounds of violence.

Billy doesn’t cry out. Eventually it’s over. Susan raises her head and cannot bear more than a glance at her stepson braced on his hands and knee. The belt now rests at Neil’s side and still, her stomach is churning.

“If there is ever a repeat of the conduct you displayed today, there will be consequences. Is that understood, Maxine?”

Max looks to Susan. Her eyes are wavering. Then they glean whatever it is they were searching for from Susan’s and harden.

“Yes,” she mumbles.

“Yes, what?”

Max clears her throat.

“Yes, sir,” she corrects, louder and clearer.

“Both of you to your rooms,” he commands. “I want both of you to reflect on your actions until it’s time for dinner.”

“Yes, sir,” Billy answers this time, climbing to his feet in the corner of Susan’s eye. She remains on the couch as her daughter rises and plods down the hall, cheeks as red as the cherry atop a sundae. Flushed as red as the welts on Billy’s back that have Susan’s stomach in ropes even though she only spares a brief glance.

Neil sets the belt aside and plops down in his armchair. “Can you get me a beer, Susan?”

She nods and rises, quietly fetching one. Pops the tab and then passes it to him before she excuses herself. In times like this, Susan wants to leave more than anything. She wants to grab Max and take her far, far away. But she can’t imagine they would get anywhere, truly.

Neil controls the finances. Susan makes less money than he does and every cent she does earn inevitably winds up under Neil’s attentive purview. In a distant, ostensible kind of way Susan understands there are shelters for women in her situation. Shelters out there, somewhere…aren’t there? For her situation?

Neil hasn’t actually put his hands on her. Not yet. Not like what he just did to Billy. Hasn’t actually done so to Max, although the threat of that unfolded in the living room in a way that could not be more crystal clear. The threat alone feels like a fist to Susan, invisible fist clenched tight around her insides and squeezing so hard she's nauseous.  

Is the threat enough? Would Susan and Max be accepted on the basis of threats alone?

Provided she could ever find such a place to begin with. Susan doesn’t have the faintest clue of where to look for what feels more like a nebulous fantasy of a sanctuary than a tangible reality. A shimmering oasis in the desert. Even if she were to locate such a place, what if it were at full capacity?

What if she and Max got turned away?

That would mean choosing between being homeless or going back to Neil. Going back to Neil after a failed escape would certainly mean him making good on all those threats of his, the ones verbal and non. The examples explicit in his words and implicit in his actions. Above all, any failed escape would certainly ensure there would be no second escape.

Susan isn’t going anywhere. And neither is Max. The very notion is abstract and distorted, floating just out of reach in a gaussian blur of a wish. Their home isn’t a good home. But it is the home they have and so, Susan will simply have to do her best to make sure Max never does anything like this again. That Max never does anything to get Neil’s attention like that, nothing to stoke the coals always smoldering in his choleric soul. That as painful as it's sure to be, Max learns to keep certain parts of herself under lock and key.

When dinner is in the oven and Neil is engrossed in his program, Susan slips off to Max’s bedroom. She knocks quietly and lets herself in. Her throat knots up at the tear tracks on her daughter’s cheeks, far more gutting than the way she bristles as Susan steps closer, the sheer hurt in her eyes.

“What do you want?”

The same things as you, Susan thinks irresistibly. And I’d go after them too, if I didn’t know better.

“I’m sorry, Max.”

Max huffs and turns away. “Whatever.”

“I am.”

“No you’re not. You’re just like Neil, you think I’m disgusting,” Max spits, hiking her legs up on the bed and hugging her knees to her chest. “You think Billy’s disgusting too, you couldn’t even look at him.”

“No, I don’t…oh, Max.” Susan swallows and lowers herself to a sit beside her on the bed, gently placing a hand on her knee. She swallows her heartbreak when Max’s eyes flash as though the touch scalds her. “Neil and I disagree about many things. This is one of them.”

“Then why didn’t you say that?” The blaze in Max’s eyes dies down, voice softening to cinders. “Why didn’t you stop him?”

“Oh, he’s so much bigger than me, Max.” Susan sags with familiar defeat. “And I— I don’t think it’s wrong, you and this girl.”

“Lucy.”

“I’m sure Lucy is lovely,” leaves Susan’s lips, this fragile whisper she dares not tempt fate to speak above. “I could never think that you’re disgusting. But I’m just me, Max, and Neil is bigger, and the world…the world too, is so much bigger than I am. You can’t— never, ever in public.”

Max’s eyes widen. Susan shifts on the bed and moves her hands, finds both of Max’s and squeezes tight.

“You cannot be open with feelings like that. You can’t take girls to your school dances, you can’t kiss them where other people could see.”

Max lets out an angry growl even as her eyes well up.

“It’s not fair!”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“That’s not good enough!”

“I know.” She knows, oh, she knows, she’s never not choking on it.

Max chews her lip, scarlet and fuming. Susan halfway expects her daughter to headbutt her or holler right in her ear until she deafens. But after a moment it’s almost as if Max can decode all the things she cannot say because her hands twist under Susan’s and intertwine their fingers.

[sadachmesarthim]

peter learns to shut the fuck up challenge

oh my god hi okay i’m (kind of) freshly back to tumblr and haven’t written content like this in over half a decade please be nice to me i am a broken 21 year old who can’t take criticism for shit

marvel cinematic universe: peter!centric, eventually starker 

content: graphic depictions of violence, extremis!flash, selective mutism, brief talks of dying but it’s not that bad tbh, slightly aged up peter (he’s 18), use of slurs and derogatory terms, both in reference to self and someone else

summary: peter’s taken enough shit in his life. he lost his parents, he lost ben, he’s dealt with the number of shitty men may brought home - flash was like the cherry on top of the shit sundae. after a particularly bad day of taunting, peter is fed up, and decides to teach flash a lesson - but our baby boy is in for a big surprise when he discovers he isn’t the only freak kid at midtown tech. 

............................................................................................................................

Peter'd been categorized as a loudmouth for years - by May, his friends at school, the Avengers he fought (and fought beside) in Berlin.

Never able to stop his nervous ramblings, his mouth tended to run away with him. He somehow never developed a filter, often getting himself into quite a bit of trouble. Usually his pretty face and quick thinking kept him from any real repercussions.

But there was one such instance he... couldn’t exactly get out of.

He'd been struggling with Flash's bullying for years. He'd called Peter names, hurled slurs, spat out indecencies - normally, Peter could take it. But after the bite... they all landed so much harder.

Peter didn't understand it - spiders didn't have emotions, did they?? Even if they did, that doesn't explain why he's so sensitive. If anything, you'd think the bite would make him aggressive, or argumentative, or angry - spiders were predators, not pussies. What was his problem?

He'd finally had enough one day at the end of his senior year. Flash was being particularly snide - excitement from graduation pushing his normal antics into overdrive.

"Oh come on, Penis. You gonna fight back one of these days or are you just gonna keep hanging your sad faggot head around town?" Flash followed him out of the school building, laughing at his own "joke".

What he wasn't prepared for was an actual answer to his question.

"Yeah, actually. I will."

Peter turned around, grabbing Flash by the straps of his backpack. He glanced around, checking for spectators, before shoving his bully into a secluded alley just ahead of them.

Flash, surprised (but not entirely put off), worked himself free of the backpack and slid behind the smaller boy. Sure, Peter was enhanced, but Flash still had a good head on him height wise.

"Finally decide to manhandle me back, huh Parker? That's so cute." Flash smirked, looking him up and down as he crowded Peter into the corner. "If you're feeling so big and brave, go ahead."

Peter looked up, confusion warping his soft features. Flash... wanted Peter to hit him? Why?

Before he could actually ask, he found himself collapsing on the ground, gasping for air. Flash drew his fist back, shaking off the punch he'd just thrown into Peter's side. He snatched his bag off the ground, tossing it away from Peter & beside a nearby dumpster.

"Christ, you look so pathetic down there! I almost forgot how small you were for a second," he laughed, taking a second to gloat. "Come on, Parker. What happened to finally fighting back?"

Peter'd always been a bit overzealous - I mean, c’mon, the kid grew up listening to stories about Steve Rogers for fucks sake, how could he not develop an underdog complex? He'd spent his childhood defending his family name, his teens protecting May from overzealous asshole boyfriends, and the most recent few watching over all of Queens.

So yeah, of course Peter was going to take this opportunity to kick some ass if he could.

He struggled to his feet and stumbled forward, regaining his balance and breath as he met Flash's eyes. The tiny success was short lived, though, as he felt himself flying backward and up into the brick wall behind him. What the actual fuck?

Peter's senses never failed him - and yet, they just had, twice in the last five minutes! What the fuck? How was Flash able to hit him without warning? How was Flash able to throw him?

The confusion must've been all over his face - Flash laughed as Peter crumpled & didn't attempt to get up again. He crowded into Peter's space, getting close to the little spider's ear.

"You really think you're the only special one in Queens, don't you Penis? You think you're the only one that can break a grown man in half?" Peter groaned, wincing at the pain behind his eyes. "Newsflash, freak. You're not special, you're not important, and you're not leaving this alley alive."

It was then, as Peter glanced back up, that Flash's eyes were glowing a sick green-grey unlike anything he'd ever seem. The senses that'd previously failed him so tragically now did a full 180, sending a wave of cortisol through his system. The need to runclimbswingescapego washed over him, the spider inside completely overriding the human.

As if he'd read Peter's mind, Flash quickly grabbed him by the throat, cutting off both his airway and any potential escape route. He squeezed hard, dragging Peter up the wall until they could look each other in the eye. He crowded closer, setting Peter's skin on fire in the worst way possible.

Peter was choking, clawing at the hand on his throat and trying to kick the monster in front of him away. Flash, annoyed, tightened his grip until Peter's hands dropped and his face turned purple.

Flash chuckled, dropping a now barely conscious Peter into a puddle on the rocky ground. He opted to trade his hands for the steel toed boots he'd so carefully laced up that morning, lips curling as the idea took shape in his head.

The first kicks landed on Peter's stomach, forcing air and blood from his mouth. The next were more stomps than anything, not aimed with any thought or finesse. Each landed heavier than the first, quickly pushing Peter toward a complete blackout. The spider was still screaming, but Peter couldn't do jack shit about it.

He lay back, resigned to his fate. I'm going to die here, he thought, desperately wishing he'd just kept his fucking mouth shut. A little bit of bullying was so much better than dying a week before graduation.

But, somehow, he didn't. Sure, Flash beat him all to shit - May had the hospital bill and the new grey hairs to prove it. But Peter lived.

It took Flash a while to get it all out of his system. The more pain he inflicted, the brighter his eyes got, slowly taking over any illusion of empathy his once brown irises had. He did, eventually, tire, and grow bored of kicking the same stunned spider. When he’d had his fill, he reached down for his backpack, hooking it onto his shoulder and smiling to himself.  

Before leaving, though, he turned back to Peter, crouching down and settling mere inches from his face. 

“Looks like I got Peter Parker to finally shut the fuck up.” Flash looked down at him as he rose, spitting on Peter’s face as a last hurrah before ditching him and the alley completely. 

Peter crawled his way out of the alley after Flash left, blood soaking his shirt and face so swollen he was nearly unrecognizable. He dragged himself to the nearest shop, the kind (and very distraught) owner calling an ambulance the second she'd seen him.

............................................................................................................................

6 weeks later he was back to 100%, diploma in hand, ready to get the fuck out of Queens and up to Cambridge. He'd spent enough time being coddled, people hovering over him and tending to wounds he knew would take care of themselves. These took significantly longer, the extent of the damage worse than anyone thought - but he still healed, and was ready to stretch all eight of his metaphorical legs and get back to school.

The only problem? He couldn't speak.

Okay okay, maybe that's a bit dramatic - his vocal cords and tongue and everything still worked perfectly fine. But every time Peter opened his mouth, words failed him.

It was like Flash's hand was back around his throat, forcing air out of him and the words back inside. How the fuck was he supposed to go to school if he was effectively mute? Peter’d learned Italian in school, not ASL (a choice he was quickly regretting), but even if he had, he wasn't sure his hands would be willing to speak for him either. All forms of effective communication were stolen from him. 

He had less than a month before he was supposed to be in the MIT dorms and starting class. 90% of his prereqs required group discussion and verbal participation, so Peter was well and truly fucked if he couldn't figure this out.

Besides, what superhero couldn't talk? How lame was that? Half of his whole schtick was sassy one-liners. At this point, Spiderman was becoming synonymous with snark!

His first night back in May's apartment, he cried himself to sleep thinking about it. This sudden feeling - all grief and loss and shattered expectations he didn't even know he had... his whole world was suddenly gone, and he didn't know what the fuck to do. 

The worst part?

He didn't even have the words to ask for help.

[bunnylouisegrimes]

My Negan Vs Charlie story is going to have to be on hold, as are other things.

Unfortunately, my phone has unexpectedly went into a state where I can't access it. I went to restart it after it was acting up, and after turning it on, it said my phone was disabled and I needed to access iTunes. We tried that, and we had two options: restart it and it would update, but still save everything, or completely reset it and lose everything. Obviously, we went with the first option. Most likely because of my storage that I've attempted on many occasions to deal with (and I have in different ways), the update couldn't go through. I wonder if the age of my phone also plays a factor. I had to accept the hard decision of resetting everything. Now, as of writing this, my phone has reset, but it is stuck on one particular screen. I don't know if it is truly downloading anything I have from the cloud, I don't know what all I have in the cloud.

The brighter aspects of this situation:

1. Everyone irl and online I can still contact through Discord, here, or someone else having a person's number. Pretty much all my contacts can be saved.

2. I'm hoping my service provider will be able to allow me to save all old texts.

3. The majority of my pictures, including all digital artwork, were backed up on a computer a few weeks ago. Thank God we just so happened to do it then. Plus, many pictures I can retrieve from Dms, Discord, or here.

4. Many stories and artwork are here as well. In addition, I saved a minority of my stories to Google Drive. Not all of my stories are lost.

The biggest downside to all of this is I (most likely) lost the majority of my stories I didn't save over the seven years I've written stories in my phone's notes. This is very heartbreaking to me, but I am thankful that I have a good amount saved to Google Drive and uploaded here. I lost all my images of Charlie, but good thing many of them you can find on the Internet or I've sent in DMs and can retrieve. What little I've written of the Negan and Charlie story is gone as well. This hurts, but there are good elements of it that I am extremely thankful for. It could be so much worse.

Overall, today has been a tragedy for the obvious reason of heinous people threatening to kill government individuals, destroying a government building, and seemingly getting away with it, but this just adds a cherry to the shit sundae.

I am forced to use my brother's phone to type this. I don't know when there will be an update on my phone, I don't know what is going to happen. All I know is, if I want to access Discord or Tumblr, it will have to be through his phone (Tumblr I know I can access through a computer I use sometimes, I don't get on it often though, and as for Discord I don't know if it will work on that computer, I'm sure it will, I'll have to see when I get there) as of now. This may cause any replies and activity to be slower than usual. I apologize beforehand. I also apologize if I come off as bitchy at all. The events today both in terms of America and now my phone have really fucked with me (as the events with America today have fucked with us all, and I don't think it will be going away anytime soon sadly).

Thank you all for understanding. I love you all and I hope nothing but the best in terms of my phone, this country, and your safety during these times.

[isolctions]

KIDADA ALANI WHITE + past relationship with dominic stephens. (trigger warnings for domestic violence, mentions of abuse, and brief kidnapping. plus, this post kinda lengthy. sorry.)

now that we’ve touched on the up’s of kida’s life, let’s talk about the Down. clutch your pearls, everyone.

so. kidada crossed paths with dominic ‘dom’ stephens multiple times throughout the beginning of high school, but it wasn’t exactly anything eventful. they shared maybe a class or two and had the same lunch period, but kida didn’t actually meet and get to know dominic until their sophomore year.

dominic was an up & coming basketball star at their school, playing junior varsity his freshman year and performing so well that he got the opportunity to play varsity the following year. he was just about every fifteen year old girl’s dream — tall, handsome, popular, goofy, confident, ambitious, an athlete. he was the total package on the outside, and he wasn’t afraid to brag about being such whenever he passed by the bus full of cheerleaders including yours truly. the funny thing was, kida wasn’t exactly interested in dom at first, just her writing and cheer. but damn, was he persistent.

they talked and tweeted and texted and hung out the entire school year, and junior year, things were official. kida was now known as dom’s girl. and not only was she that, she was the co-captain of the varsity cheer squad during 11th grade year. kidada was just about on top of the world: nine on her cheek during every intense ball game at their school, the letterman jacket with ‘stephens’ on the back, leaving school during lunch just to ride around. then, there was the party.

just because dominic pursued her first didn’t mean that he was faithful. she’d come across her fair share of girls from other schools in the area that found their way in his messages, and she sunk low enough to fight them for rumors of her boyfriend responding and all, but she didn’t actually see it in action until she’d run into him at a party. one that he said that he wouldn’t be going to, because y’know. ‘studying.’ he was there, she was there, a girl on his lap, argument in front of their friends and peers — then, he grabs her up for the first time. she doesn’t think much of it...they were arguing, and she was using some pretty choice words. they’ll get over it.

time passes, and they argue again. over this, over that, over little stuff, over big stuff. a screenshot sent to her phone, the ages-old ‘you’d believe her over me?’ defense. pushing him to simply just talk to her, stop being so quiet and just be open with her, only to be denied and belittled in response. snatching her by the wrist here, pushing her against the wall there. pretty soon, her close friends and even her siblings start to notice how intense things were, but kida made habit of brushing it off every time. after all, he never actually hurt her before, and things were starting to be on their way up once senior year slowly approaches. then, her mother gets sick in april.

it took filling up a journal and a half with things she could never tell anyone about and the passing of her mother for kida to realize that there was more to life than simply being dom’s girl. co-captain to cheer captain, colleges, writing, taking care of her family, the nagging feeling of being cheated on. she figures, breaking up before the start of basketball season would give her plenty of time to re-gain her focus. she’s proven wrong, unfortunately, when she attempted this and expects to leave with a dissolved relationship, instead she found herself icing a rapidly bruising eye and a busted lip and leaving with a lot of newfound fear.

it’s basketball season and kida finds herself afraid to even cheer for other players on the damn team. she’s caking herself in foundation and concealer to hopefully deflect bright stadium lights, ducking hallways and paying off her siblings to keep quiet about her absence calls from the principal, and forged her father’s signature (or sometimes, paid friends of friends to poke her with an inked needle in their basement) in order to get tattoos that covered the things that make up couldn’t. while dominic wore many faces — primarily, the egotistical alpha male and the walking representation of school pride that their student body had ever seen, he’d actually been the monster hiding under kida’s bed for the duration of her final years in high school. a disagreement no longer meant shouting and ignoring each other’s texts. a friendly smile to one of her male friends no longer equated to just being friendly. in fact, most days, kida didn’t see nearly all of her friends anymore. (and because this is still high school, it wasn’t met with much concern to those who hadn’t known kida their entire life. in fact, most of her high school friends and cheer mates were convinced she’d just been acting brand new to them, and are no longer friends.) 

the boiling point was prom. she’d gotten all dolled up, just to stay at the table all night while dominic danced and talked and laughed and posed with whoever, discussing whatever. she hadn’t even danced at all. and by the time they reached the hotel after party with alcohol and weed entering the mix, jokes made at her expense about how much dom ‘really had his bitch trained’, kida simply...snaps. for once, kida talked back. for once, kida yells and screams at him at the same volume that he used with her. for once, kida tries to leave and actually makes it through the door, heels in hand and purse straps (and, the world) hanging off her shoulders.

but dominic stephens, underneath all the bravado, is a giant fucking piss baby. a piss baby who just won state championship. a piss baby who grew up on hyper-masculinity and fear himself. and who was she?

prom was bad, the after party was worse, and being locked in a rented cabin for an entire weekend with no friends, no phone, and with six feet, three inches of pure hell towering over her with fists and fury was the cherry on top of her shit sundae. (she doesn’t remember much of how they’d gotten home, or whether he had the decency to drop her off or not — just that she could barely see out of her bruised right eye, couldn’t hear nothing more than a ring out of her left ear for three days, had lead in her lungs and hadn’t left her room in two weeks upon coming home from prom.)

of course, her father knew. her brothers were pissed. her sisters were sad. everyone wanted to speak for her and over her, wanted charges pressed and names and this and that and everything from her, and she just wanted to be left alone for a while. it was the one freebie that she doesn’t expect to ever be used, but after begging for a little...her father lets her drop out of school, sends her to a family member’s house in southern california, and that was that.

naturally, in the aftermath of this tragedy, dominic didn’t stop trying to contact her. her siblings and friends said he demanded for her, drove by her dad’s house a few times looking. but within the next month, he’d already gotten another girlfriend or two, and by graduation, he was on his way to a top school to be an nba draft pick in the next two years. and who was she? angry, defeated, pouring drinks and filling journals.

kida’s now twenty four and in school, dominic’s now twenty five and playing for the league, jersey number twenty nine. she’s sitting on a ticking time bomb of words — nine is fine, nine is mine. dated entries from beginning to end, detailing the courtship right down to the color of the carpet in the cabin. and really, kidada could ruin his career any time she wanted to. one message to a credible source and it could all crashing down for him. could get him back for the relationships she’s wrecked since then, the over-analyzing her partner’s silence and overthinking the emotional depth and availability of potential suitors, the outbursts or the quiet spells. it’s all rocks for a glass mansion to her whenever someone close to her has the balls to tell her about an interview he’s just done, describing how he never found the right girl in school and how much he dreams of settling down.

lucky for her, most people don’t know she dated dominic stephens. and lucky for him, most people don’t know who dominic stephens is at all, thanks to her.

[okaybutlikeimagine]

(a little fic where Billy has been adopted by Jim, Jim and Joyce are together, Billy doesn’t know how to call Joyce ‘mom’ yet, and Billy has to give Will “The Talk” TM. Based off of a tumblr post that briefly mentioned this idea! if anyone knows the post pls let me know so i can credit them ♥)

Billy drags Will out to get some ice cream so they can get away from the mess that is Joyce and Hopper trying to explain to their children how to have safe gay sex. Really, it was probably the most embarrassing thing Billy has ever seen, and it only lasted for a total of 60 seconds. He got that boy out of there as quickly as he could, throwing a promise back to Hopper and Joyce that he’ll tell the boy all he needs to know to be safe.

But now here they are in the little Mom and Pop ice cream parlor in the next town over because the mall was destroyed a month ago and Hawkins has no other place to get ice cream. And they got here a little later than Billy was planning on because he forgot Will gets a stomach ache if he drives too fast, so he had to drive a little under the limit. They’re at a small two person table eating ice cream across from each other. Billy tries to think about how to start this conversation. It’s not like anyone had an actual civil conversation with him about this stuff when he needed it so he just says the first thing he can think of which is:

“So, condoms.”

It’s not smooth. No part of it is smooth but he doesn’t know what else to say at the moment. Will just looks up from his sundae, eyes wider than Billy’s ever seen them. His face is turning the color of the two cherries sitting on his ice cream. It’s a little concerning, honestly.

“They’re important.” Billy starts again, tilting his ice cream cone a bit towards Will who merely nods in response.

Well this is fun. Billy thinks sourly, catching the eye of a teenage girl among a big group of friends a table over. She’s giving him an irritatingly judgemental look, and starts whispering to her other friends, who look over at the two of them and cackle. He looks back to Will, whose eyebrows are knitted in what’s probably anxiety as he looks down at his ice cream. 

Fuck this.

“Y’know what? Let’s go sit outside.” Billy says, standing up and waiting for Will to walk ahead of him so he can glare the girls down.

He knows Will’s body tends to run cold and the weather is a little cooler than he’d like it to be now that they’re nearing the end of summer, but it’s balmy and warm enough. He just wants to get Will comfortable and being away from people seems like the only way. And he promised Joyce and Hopper he’d do this. Lord knows why he promised Joyce and Hopper he’d do this, but he kinda likes this kid. He’s not as fucking irritating as the rest of the nerds.

Billy takes a deep breath before he sits down at the table that Will has chosen.

“You know you can talk to me, right pipsqueak?”

Will rolls his eyes at the nickname and slides down the chair a bit. He nods, eating a spoonful of ice cream.

“Great. Right. You probably know about condoms too, right?” Billy definitely knew about condoms at 14. He didn’t know everything, but he knew enough to know of their existence and how to put them on.

Lord save me from having to put a condom on a fucking banana.

“Yeah, I know.” Will says, looking at his ice cream like it’s trying to ask him something. The pause is so long that Billy thinks Will is done talking, until the boy takes a small breath. “I just… don’t understand why.”

It’s so quiet Billy’s surprised he heard it.

“What?”

Will’s struggling.

“Why are they so important?” He asks again, looking up at Billy. “I can’t… neither of us would be able to get… pregnant.”

Realization falls over Billy. “Yeah, but see, there are more worries than getting pregnant.”

Billy takes a few licks of his ice cream as he watches Will attempt to process his words.

“Really?” He asks quietly after a few beats.

Billy sighs. In all of his life, he truly never thought he’d be the one to explain STDs to a gay 14 year old boy. He never thought he’d be the one to explain this to any child, really, but definitely not a gay 14 year old boy that he now calls his… brother?

“Yup.” Billy tries to buy himself some time to figure out how to word this by licking his ice cream cone. “See, there’s these things called STDs.”

Will’s screwed up face makes Billy retrace his steps.

“They’re these… diseases that you get through sex. The big one right now is AIDS, so when you put a condom on, you’re making sure you don’t get it.”

“Oh… a disease? Really?” Will asks. The fear in his eyes pulls at Billy’s heart.

“That’s what condoms are for. You can’t get it if you put a condom on. And he does too. Depending on what you’re doing.” Billy hates his cheeks for heating up. Why did he offer up being the dad in this situation again?

Then again, maybe he’s not being the dad. Maybe this is him being the big brother.

Fuck, never thought it’d get to this.

“But how does that work?” Will asks, his dish of ice cream sitting almost abandoned on the table and his hands in his lap. “I don’t understand. Other diseases don’t work like that. Are you sure I can’t… there’s no other way to get it?”

Billy shakes his head, eating at the cone now. “Nope. They thought you could get it just by being around people for a little bit, but they were wrong.” He takes another bite of his cone and speaks around the crumbs. “Oh, and if you do some hardcore drugs or something, needles can give it to you. But I don’t think you’re going to be shooting up heroin.”

In his weird attempt to lighten the mood, Will just gives Billy a blank look before rolling his eyes with a small smile. But Billy can tell: the boy doesn’t understand half of what Billy just said. Will doesn’t know anything about hardcore drugs. Hell, he might not even know about weed, even though Jonathan smokes with Billy out in the woods every week. Jonathan’s a good brother though, an actual good brother; he probably doesn’t talk to this 14 year old kid about the drugs he uses.

Still, Billy is a little surprised to see that Will doesn’t seem to know about drugs yet. He doesn’t remember 14 like it was yesterday, but he’s pretty sure he had at least an inkling as to what heroin was, and he lived in San Diego, where there’s arguably a shitton of stuff to do. Hawkwins, Indiana may very well be the most boring town in America, save for crazy lab experiments that insist on tearing the town apart and enslaving mankind. But it’s not like more than a handful of people even knew that stuff existed here. Surely there’s a bunch of kids getting hammered and taking any drugs their older siblings’ sketchy friends will sell to them. That’s how small towns work, right? Nothing but a single movie theater in downtown and a mall that got obliterated so the next best step is to get wasted on anything in sight?

But Will… Will’s a good kid. He doesn’t do much but listen to music with his brother, play that nerd game with the gang of dorks, and draw and color like a maniac. Sometimes they come over and run around outside or something, they go to the arcade… and now that Billy thinks about it, he can’t imagine him ever being exposed to that scary world of illegal drugs.

“Who is ‘they’?” Will asks, eating a spoonful of his ice cream that is slowly soup-ifying.

“Ah, like doctors and stuff.”

“How do you know so much about all of this?” Will asks around another spoonful, looking up at Billy shyly.

Billy pauses a bit, taking more bites of his cone.

How does he explain? How does he tell this boy about those final years in California when the major burst of AIDS hit? When the one news outlet his dad had fallen asleep watching began talking about this new disease that was found in 5 young -and previously healthy- gay men up in Los Angeles? An emphasis on gay. When Billy tried to get it out of his mind but started to secretly record those newscasts when he wasn’t able to catch them, to check up on it and see what was happening? When he would steal newspapers and check on them religiously for any updates?

When gay men started dying, 1,292 of them by the end of ‘83, and no one seemed to care.

He felt possessed. Obsessed. He learned everything he could. A young gay boy who had just began to be sexually active now learning that his passion, his desires, were actually dangerous? Just like everyone said they were? It was torture. God condemning him -all of them- right? Proving once and for all that gayness really is sin.

Back then it seemed like the threat of AIDS was scarier than his dad, most days.

He still checks up on it now, avidly. Hopper doesn’t say anything, but he gives him an encouraging pat on the shoulder before he sits down next to him while he watches more news come up. The physical presence irritated him at first, but it’s slowly become comforting. Joyce gives him a warm glass of milk sometimes and reminds him that he’s a “smart boy”. Billy’s never really sure what she’s referring to when she says it.

Billy wonders how the two of them would have brought up this topic with Will.

“I’m well-educated.” Billy responds, as if that makes sense. “I keep up with the news.”

“It’s on the news?”

“Well, yeah, it’s getting pretty big…” Billy’s voice fades a bit at the end, feeling like an idiot. Who ever thought he’d be able to do this? 

God, Jonathan should have done this, he’s bisexual, right? Probably never had sex with a guy, though…

He looks up at Will, who looks way too nervous and scared for Billy’s liking. Never in his life did he think he’d be so concerned for this boy but here he is, wanting nothing more than to comfort the shit out of him.

“I mean, on the bright side, I hear they won’t let us donate blood anymore. No big scary needles.” Billy begins, keeping a lightness in his voice that Will seems a little unimpressed by.

“Because… we’re gay?”

“Yeah.”

Will sits silent for a second.

“That’s… kind of awful.” Will’s voice is quiet as he looks up at Billy with confused and sad eyes.

Fuck.

“Yeah, it’s kind of shit…” Billy admits. He knows he was pissed as hell when he read that the Red Cross enforced that. Not like he was dying to give blood or anything, but it’s the injustice of it that gets his non-donatable blood boiling. “But I mean, I heard Murray said the Red Cross is just a group of vampires trying to collect our blood for their feasts or something. So at least they won’t be pestering us to give into their evil plans. Or whatever.”

That makes Will laugh. Actually laugh. He sits forward and eats more of his sundae, scooping up some of the soupy parts.

They sit there at the table, laughing quietly to themselves with the little lights of the shop illuminating them, an occasional car passing by.

When their laughter fades, Billy’s smile remains as he takes the last bites of his cone. He looks to his right, enjoying the silence, feeling a little better about all of this, when Will asks:

“Do-… Do you and Steve use condoms?”

It takes Billy out of it for a second. He looks over in shock at this boy who’s now beet red and spinning the soupy parts of his ice cream around in the dish with his spoon.

He blinks a couple of times.

“Yeah. We do. But uhm… they made a test. So we’re… going to get tested soon and if we’re clean then we’ll probably stop using them.”

His face is burning up. If he was in his right mind he might wonder why the kid is asking something so personal, but right now he’s spinning away with thoughts of Steve Harrington.

“Why?”

“Because-” Billy starts answering immediately, and he’s a little surprised at himself but he can’t stop. The image of those big, wide, brown eyes are melting him down. “-because I think Steve and I are in it for the long haul.”

“Really?!” Will asks immediately, all of the excitement in the world in his voice.

Billy is sputtering like an idiot, looking into Will’s face as he looks at Billy like he’s just promised him a new puppy or something.

Shit, what did I just say?

“I…” Billy falls flat. He doesn’t even know what he was planning on saying. Did he really just admit that to this little pipsqueak? “Shut up and finish your ice cream.” Billy mutters, crossing his arms and sliding down the chair a bit, tapping his right boot on the ground in irritation.

Will is smirking, going back to his ice cream with an irritating as hell look. Like he knows something now. Like he knew something this whole time.

Billy’s mad, especially mad that he can’t hold back a chuckle.

“You know,” he says, not looking at Will. “You’re annoying as hell.”

There’s not a lot of bitterness in his voice, but he slides his eyes over to Will to gauge his reaction. The boy still has that dumb smirk on his face.

“I know.” He admits around a spoonful of ice cream. “But you don’t think I’m as bad as everyone else is.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, I heard you talking to Max.” Will smiles like he’s won.

“You’re right, you’re not as bad. You’re worse.” Billy says it on a chuckle and kicks at Will’s foot, who laughs along with him.

“Well you’re worse than Steve.”

Billy sighs through his grin. “You’re not wrong about that.” He looks wistfully away, thinking about his boyfriend, wondering where he is right now. Thinking about the words he said to Will… about being in it for the long haul.

He meant them. He and Steve had talked about it a bit, albeit when they were both a little crossfaded and dizzy and pliant. But they talked about it. For like, three hours. Talked through plans and ideas and dreams.

Billy snaps out of it, looking back to the boy scooping up the whipped cream.

“Seriously, finish up. Mom’s going to get worried if we’re back late.”

And when the two boys share joint shocked, owlish looks with each other at the word that just came out of Billy’s mouth, they don’t talk about it. Not then as they let the sound of the occasional passing car fill in the silent space, and not on the ride home as they let the music fill in the space there. But there’s a feeling. It’s warm and it nearly suffocates Billy but… it’s good. It’s nice and soft and scary but… it’s good.

(find it on A03 here)

[her-phenomenon]

...

ok for real i’m gonna rant to talk about mr jumin han

DISCLAIMER: i have only done casual story mode routes, with the most recent being jaehee so if anything i say is inaccurate, then please excuse me

jumin is my fave char in mysme even from running through other routes (shallow reason being he’s in a suit and i’m a sucker for the proper-looking types). he’s generally depicted as a very stern, pragmatic person who doesn’t care for nonsense like emotions and can be extremely self-serving at the cost of jaehee’s sanity and sleep. he apparently hates women (a past i know very little about considering that it was just alluded to in jaehee’s route). he has the appearance of someone who is very well put-together and nothing much seems to bother him. 

but then you have scenes of him saying “meow” and teasing zen and then i think mr jumin han who or what are you really like???

one of the points in his personality i found really interesting is the whole hating women thing. let me get this straight: in jaehee’s route, he was a little shit and acted like a spoiled brat. but then i also got to thinking, mc in-game is a woman, no? why doesn’t he act like she has some kind of disease? again, this is all my reasoning and speculation but i feel that i have to rant a little bit.

in jaehee’s case, jumin has basically demoted her to a level of “assistant” - with that title carrying a very heavy, work-related responsibilities. that’s all he ever saw her as and so he treated her as, well, someone under him (which technically, is correct). he gives her such a hard time in her route because to him, she was there to do whatever he said and take care of him whenever he had one of this eccentric moments with cat franchises and businesses that he refused to see her more than, well, sub-human. or so you’d think, but the way he reacts to her quitting definitely shows that her absence has affected him. was he right in the way he treated her? no, of course not. but as we’ve learned, jumin tends to very clearly differentiate between work and personal life. so to his credit, it’s because he runs his ship the way he does that every goes smoothly.

in mc’s case, jumin does not react anywhere nearly the same way he does with jaehee with mc. sometimes, you can even say pretty antagonistic things against him but his replies are never angry - or at least, they are never angry towards mc. sometimes he even asks her for advice. i think in this aspect jumin has come to regard mc as one of the members of the rfa, a real member, and not sub-human or just another woman. despite his aversion to that sex, he seems to treat mc fairly normally and even has moments of being close to her - like when he describes her voice and how it’s not grating. like i said, i think this is largely owing to the fact that how jumin sees people under him and working for him and how he sees members in the rfa are completely different. i think jumin has learned to compartmentalize who goes where, how to treat different categories of people, and how to deal with them. because of that, he can seem like he is just a slave driver but somehow shows mc favouritism, but i think that it’s because he lives by such rigid rules and classifications that he can still function and run his company as well as he can.

and then comes v. mr jumin han is still a ball of complication but nothing has hit that home more than the above scenes.

holy shit was definitely my first reaction. in three screenshots alone, more was revealed to me about jumin than the entire week’s worth of chats. in three screenshots alone, i saw on his face and in his head emotions that i didn’t know he could exhibit:

anguish

hurt

betrayal

“At least not you... at least not you...!” gotta keep in mind that this period was already more of an emotional bombshell to jumin than he’s probably used to. jaehee had just quit and he couldn’t come to terms with the fact that he did miss her and took in out on poor 707′s car. so when v comes in wanting to disappear and gives him all this crap, look out. the above line, to me, comes from someone who’s just lost something important and he’s sick and tired of bullshit but he’s about to lose something else. i don’t even know their backstory but from this i can tell that jumin finds v extremely valuable to him as he tries to find answers in his friend as to why, of all the people in the world to turn against him, it had to be v. this simple line tells me that jumin has been through a lot of relationships, all probably shallow, and maybe some deeper than others, but that they didn’t hold a candle to how much he values v. jumin acts as someone who has experienced true betrayal for the first time, so much so that he’s actually pleading.  i have never seen something as heartbreaking as someone who usually has it together breaking down and pleading.

“Even my friendship... how dare you treat it like this!” my lord. this line screams selfish, but it also screams “after all the times we’ve spent together, did that all mean nothing to you?” i’ve honestly never seen jumin lose control like this, with such simple words screaming of anguish that it’s almost indescribable how much v really means to him. it means that he’s seen all those times with v as precious and extremely important to him, although he’d never admit that out loud. jumin has obviously invested a lot of personal and emotional ties in his friendship with v to a point where, well, v means almost everything to him. he looks like someone who was drowning, had a life buoy tossed at him, then having it taken back when he was almost back on the boat.

“Quit with the bull shit that you have cancer.” jumin’s pretty much done at this point. after everything, the fact that v still feels the need to lie to him at such a pivotal moment brings nothing but hurt to the guy. i can see him thinking “please, not you too, i don’t want to lose you” because, as i said, this had been around the moment jaehee quit. he was feeling a sense of emptiness from her loss, and v, of all people, coming in and dropping the bomb on him like this just made him snap. there’s a desperation here to me, in that jumin feels that if v’s gone too, he’ll have nothing and no one left. i think nothing screams about jumin’s loneliness more than this - well, more than all these lines.

i think the cherry on the top of my jumin feels sundae is his facial expression. the anguish, hurt and betrayal are all so evident on a face usually so stoic that it really makes you wonder and mull over how close the two of them are truly are that a couple of words from v can get jumin’s facade to crumble so completely.

i know more will be revealed in jumin’s route as i do it, but i felt i had to rant a little over this amazing character development and just... this amazing character in general. i won’t deny he has faults, of course. then again, so do the others. that’s just what part of makes them unique.

[skulllflower]

I need to vent a little so I’m just gonna chit-chat here. Can’t give out too much detail though so that sucks. But here goes.

Remember back at the end of July when our car broke down for good. It still hasn’t gotten fixed btw, cause y’know we can’t really afford it. Anyways, my mom saved up a little and managed to get a car sometime in August and that has literally saved our lives. Ever since she got the car though there have been minor issues here and there. The check engine light was on when she got it even though the place she got it from said that the car was okay.

The radio is a touch screen that was put in along with speakers and rims. Basically the previous owner tricked it out and then took some things away before selling the car. Anyways, we’ve had several problems with the radio working, like a speaker going out every time my mom would turn the car. A fuse blowing out and having had that replaced. Then the radio went out a good a couple of months ago so we can’t listen to anything other than a CD, Bluetooth or a USB cord.  (Which sucks when your sister basically hogs the radio and only plays her music.)

So last week she got someone to do an inspection on the car and it wasn’t good. The AC stopped working, she needs new spark plugs, there’s a hose or a belt that needs to get replaced. Something about a motor-head - I can’t remember all of it but I know there’s a lot of problems with the car. The short story is the car needs a lot of work and we can’t afford it.

My mom wants to get the first car fixed - the one that broke down - because she’s extremely attached to it. I mean I get it, the car has been with us for over 14 years and it’s hard to just let something go when you have so many memories attached to it. 

I just wish my mom had been a little smarter when buying the car all those months back. I told her to get something newer, something that was made past 2010 or so. But now she said and I quote “it was meant for us to have this car” because y’know when you get a gut feel for things it’s meant for you. Now on top of all the bills, food, and caring for the cats we have to find some way to fix this car and the previous one. 

It just feels like we’ve been having some shitty luck for the past 10 years or so. Like no matter what we do we just can’t win. We’re always behind on something, we can barely eat for a week because we can’t buy groceries, we can’t buy cat litter and food if they run out because payday is biweekly. The cherry on top of this shit sundae is that I can’t help her. I still don’t have a job and even if I did how would I get to work if I can’t drive and there’s only one car? We can’t depend on anyone and I don’t really have friends and where we live is kinda far. There is no win-win situation either way. Don’t forget the toll this taking on her health, literally working herself to death and somehow we’re still living paycheck to paycheck.

tl:dr: We’ve had a shitty luck with cars and we can’t afford to fix them. My mom is the only provider and I can’t help because I can’t drive and no one has hired me. Even if I was to get hired, there’s no one we truly trust to help us out. 

We’ve been fucked for years and I don’t see it getting any better no matter how many times my mom says and believes it’s going to get better and that we’re going to be okay. If things haven’t in the past couple of years I don’t see it getting better anytime soon. Not unless we miraculously get enough money to sustain us. Not until we win the lottery, a scratch off, or someone donates thousands of dollars to us.

[chocoholicannanymous]

Ember pt 3 (Teen Wolf)

This is the last part of this fic, that was commisioned by @rubylis​ through @fandomtrumpshate​ 2017. Better late than never, right?

Part 2 here,  Part 1 here and  Flare here

As always, I own nothing except an overactive imagination, way too many plotbunnies and a worn red hoodie.

Ember, part 3

Stiles faces the camera, features deceptively relaxed and calm, but eyes hard. He waits for the light to change, just as he's been told – just like he's rehearsed – and when it does he counts to three before starting to talk.

“My name is Mieczyslaw Stilinski. Two years ago my Mark flared, and I've been hiding from the Council ever since.”

O---o--o---O

It's not a bad life, this new one. Oh, it’s unfamiliar, but it’s not bad. Just...hard. Strange. Like it should be someone else’s.

When Stiles wakes up in an unfamiliar room - or rather, when Stiles wakes up nothing makes sense. He should be dead. He planned on being dead. And yet. His body feels strong, and capable, and absolutely in no way dying. It makes no sense, fits none of his memories, just as the room doesn’t.

And then he sees Derek.

After that it’s easy to start putting the pieces of the puzzle together, and by the time someone comes to give him information (say, two, maybe three minutes after he first wakes up) Stiles has a pretty accurate idea. Not with all the details, no, but enough that not much of what the woman - Marin, she introduces herself as - says comes as a surprise.

Weres don’t do well with losing their Matches. Someone like Derek, who’s already lost so much (and yes, even as emotionally compromised as he’d been it hadn’t taken that long for Stiles to connect “Derek” to Derek Hale of Beacon Hills’s biggest tragedy) would have done even less so. It doesn’t exactly take a genius to figure out that Derek had been just desperate enough to not think, and risk everything, to give his dying Match the bite.

Because when he focuses Stiles can tell he’s been changed - and interesting, he’s almost completely certain he’s a were, not a Kanima. That’s another lie exposed, another strike for the Council then.

One day, he promises. One day…

The rest of the puzzle unravels inside his overactive brain, and Marin’s information just fills in blank spots and provides nuance. Such as the room, and the cabin, they’re in being located in a warded community - Stiles had hoped, but it’s good to have it confirmed - and that he and Derek are welcome to stay as long as they wish.

There’s one thing Marin tells him that’s a complete surprise though. Derek has given up his Alpha power, for Stiles.

He thinks about that one for a long time. The idea of someone giving up that kind of power is...almost unfathomable. Power is addicting, for one, and since Derek inherited his power from his family, sentimentality also plays in. Plus, you know, a hundred more reasons. And it could have come in very handy, too, for Derek to be able to control Stiles in some way.

Except Derek just gave it up. To keep Stiles safe.

That’s humbling.

It’s also another sign that maybe he and Derek truly are well Matched - the two of them, not just their Marks.

Stiles remembers thinking that if he could have Derek and his soul both he’d never give either up. Well. Looks like he’s getting his wish.

It’s not quite that easy, of course. As much as Stiles and Derek both would love to just lose themselves in each other the truth is they can’t. Not even having freed themselves from the council make them completely free. Because second chances never come for free, and the price for Stiles’s is everything else - including his humanity.

Teaching him to live with the change and find control has to come first.

It sucks.

Stiles expects focus to be as hard as always, control to be difficult, and finding an anchor easy as breathing - with Derek next to him, how can it be anything else?

Only it’s not. It’s worse than he could ever have imagined, and it’s a fight for every inch. His first full moon is, well, a disaster. Not even Derek can keep him from trying to run back to Beacon Hills. Regardless of the danger Beacon Hills is where his dad is, and caught up in instinct that’s all Stiles knows - his dad’s been his everything for years, and now he’s not here.

In the end the community’s magic users has to step in. Stiles wakes up the next day with an impressive headache, chained to the floor of a room he’s never seen before. Apparently they knocked him out after he tried to literally claw his way out - through Derek.

The shame over that lingers for months, which makes control even harder to find. Derek helps him through it all without reproach, and by the time Stiles has found enough of a balance for them to be able to focus on each other too that steady support has endeared the man even more to Stiles.

(Finding out that one of Derek’s reasons for giving up his Alpha power was so Stiles wouldn’t ever feel like Derek could control him has already made Stiles very close to falling in love.)

It takes the better part of a year for Stiles to get his werewolfiness in check - to be able to run free during the full moon, and to even think of doing anything but keeping himself under ironclad control. A year before his desire to run back to Beacon Hills and snatch his father away isn’t a danger to all of them. Before he can be trusted to keep his claws where they belong even when his emotions are running high. Before he’s safe to even consider dating. (Stiles is a teenager, okay, and one with a more than healthy libido. He’s learned the hard way why getting his hands on his gorgeous Match isn’t a good idea yet.)

The upside to that is that once it is safe Stiles and Derek have gotten to know each other enough that they can safely say that getting together is about the two of them, not about being Matched.

Not to say being Derek’s Match isn’t amazing. It is. Maybe it’s because Stiles is a were now, and that he and Derek are connected through the bite, through pack. Maybe it’s the magic of the Marks. Either way they can feel each other, and having that is, it’s everything. Stiles loves his dad, okay, he 100 percent does, and he knows it’s mutual. It’s just that the loss of Claudia Stilinski had left them both feeling adrift and unstable, and having Derek there as a constant and solid presence gives Stiles solid ground under his feet for the first time since. And the same, Stiles knows, is true in reverse.

They’ve both lost just about everything. They’re both giving each other exactly that. Everything.

If this is what Matches and Marks are truly about, Stiles thinks, it’s no wonder there are poets whose works deal solely with the subject.

Knowing makes him hate the Council even more for twisting it.

Still, here and now life is good. And then some Council-connected asshole tries to kill Scott.

It goes like this, he’s told once he’s no longer a frothing ball of fangs, fur and rage. Some Council flunky calls the Beacon Hills sheriff’s station, requesting assistance regarding Scott McCall. The thing is, the Beacon Hills sheriff's station? Is John Stilinski’s station. That means he’s the one who answers the call.

As he’s fond of saying, John didn’t get his job through his looks. He’s smart, intuitive, and a good detective. He also apparently has a much better idea of what his late wife was up to than anyone - she included - has ever realized. Add the bitterness of having lost his son because of the Council and the result is a man determined to not have others suffer the same.

He saves at least three lives that day simply by thinking faster than the other party.

As soon as the name Scott McCall is uttered John talks over the flunky, firing off questions too fast for the other man to actually answer them, ending with a oh-so-casual mention that Scott should be safely with his pack for the full moon. That stops the Council flunky dead, just as intended.

It’s Scott’s first full moon after getting the bite - a bite more of less brought on by medical emergency after his latest asthma attack nearly killed him - and well, records can be real slow to update. With Scott being a relative no one, having his status as a were out there before anything else can be said could be the only thing saving him from the very fate Stiles once feared enough to take poison.

John’s not about to let that happen on his watch.

Something about how the flunky reacts makes John nervous enough to set up a watch at the McCall residence that night, leaving him in a position to stop an assassination attempt - there can be no other description, he insists, for an attack using mountain ash, wolf’s-bane grenades and wolf’s-bane bullets. Not to mention the attackers doesn’t seem to care too much about the fact that there are two people living in the house.

And that’s before John realizes someone’d broken into his house while he was at the McCalls, most likely to get him too out of the way.

The cherry on top of that shit-sundae is that Scott is Marked and the Council doesn’t have his Match in custody. Nor do they seem very eager to rectify that, or even share information about who the elusive Match is. Leaving John and Melissa with Scott, a newly changed were, who is almost guaranteed to not be in control is Marked and a missing Match.

It’s a good thing Stiles only finds out afterwards.

A really good thing.

A week after that clusterfuck Marin passes on the information that his dad and the McCalls are safe, hidden in another of the secretive warded communities. She won’t tell Stiles where it is, or let him pass messages back - it’s still too dangerous to let anyone know he’s alive, especially with Scott being so volatile, and likely to set out on a hunt for his Match. She does promise, however, that once it’s safe they’ll find a way to transfer John Stilinski to their community.

It’s good, but it’s nowhere enough. Having just had the fact that no one is truly safe shoved in his face makes Stiles angry, angrier than he’s ever been. It’s not the kind of red hot fury that causes him to pop claws and want to kill people. It’s an icy-white one, cold and calculating, every part of brilliance from his human genius stoked by the wolf’s desire to protect his pack. The Council might have gotten away with killing his mom, but not this. Going after the only people Stiles had left in him to love (preDerek, obviously) just because Scott taking the bite to save his own damned life stops them from twisting his Mark to suit their own purposes is passing the point of no return.

Stiles might not have been willing to fight for himself, but he sure as hell will for the people he loves.

At first he wanted to find those faceless people trying to steal one of Stiles’s two friends and hurt them. Wanted to rip, and claw, and bite, and tear. their. throats. out. With his teeth. Now that he’s calmed down some he knows that’s not enough. Stiles wants to destroy them like they wanted to destroy Scott.

So he starts plotting. Living where he does Stiles isn’t without resources. First of all, the warded communities contain a lot of people who are just like him, in that they are in danger from the Council, and want to see it torn down. That’s good - he’ll need people like that.

Also, he’s got access to a lot of information he’s never known before, information the Council would prefer if no one knew, but it’s not enough. He needs more. Lots and lots more.

It’s time, Stiles decides, to play his hidden ace.

That ace consists of two sets of numbers that his mom made him memorize not long before she died. The first is a phone number, and the second an ID code of some sort that he leaves on the answering machine along with a number he can be reached on.

Then all he can do is wait.

That wait is why he didn’t make the call when his Mark flared, why he chose poison instead. Getting an answer will take up to 48 hours, time he hadn’t had back then. And no matter how much his mom believed that whoever answers could help, Stiles has limited trust in what they can do.

48 hours would have seen him locked up in a sub-training facility (provided he’d survived that long) and yeah. Locating someone in a sub-training facility, breaking in and freeing them is beyond a tall order, it’s pretty much impossible.

He’s got time now though.

The man that meets him looks like a librarian, meek and mild mannered - if you look at the surface. Stiles doesn’t do that. First of all because his dad taught him that appearances can be deceiving, second because going to school with Lydia Martin brought that lesson home big time, and third because he doesn’t have to.

Being a were has its drawbacks, true, but the heightened senses mean Stiles rarely has to guess about somethings. Like the fact that this man is lethal. It’s a thousand little things that a regular person wouldn’t notice, and that maybe one by one mean nothing, but put together it’s obvious.

He moves in a way that only a true predator does. He’s not a were (even if he could mask it from Stiles’s senses there’s no fooling the talisman Stiles brought) but he’s just as dangerous as if he were. Dangerous enough that Stiles isn’t 100% sure he could take the man in a fight, and that’s...chilling. Even more so as he’s also not sure he’ll be allowed to walk away without one if he fails to answer the man’s questions to satisfaction.

The interrogation - because that’s what it turns out to be - starts out with Stiles having to explain how he’d gotten the phone number and code he’d used. It continues to why, and how he can’t really be who he claims to be. It takes a lot more than Stiles had hoped to satisfy the still unnamed man, but at the same time that’s somewhat calming. Someone that careful about speaking to the right person for the right reasons should be safe to trust - at least a little.

In the end the man nods, and tells Stiles to call him Christian. It’s fake, obviously, but it’s better than “the man”, especially for someone with a parent in law enforcement.

“Did your mom ever tell you why she had that number?”

“She said it was for someone who owed her a favor, and who could help me if I had no other way out. ‘A hidden  ace in the sleeve’ she said.”

Christian nods, clearly agreeing.

“And why did you wait until now?” All things considered hangs in the air.

“Wasn’t until now I felt I could. Considered it, back when… But mom told me you’d need time to respond, and yeah, I didn’t have that. Had another option that didn’t need time though. I wasn’t exactly wanting to gamble on you being able to get me out of their claws, should I land in them.

“But now? Now I’ve got time, and a use for that favor that doesn’t depend on you being crazy enough to take on the Council to repay it.”

Christian looks at him strangely, and seems to be thinking hard. Stiles can tell that whatever’s running through the other man’s head is important, so he clamps down on his impatience and waits. He’s gotten better at that, thankfully.

When Christian finally makes up his mind Stiles has run through his contingency exit plans five times, in a different order every time, and he’s close to going for one of them.

“You know why I owe your mom a favor? No? It’s not a pretty story. A few years back my old military commander called in a favor. A huge one, meaning I had to disappear from the face of the earth for a bit.”

Christian smiles, a twisted mockery of humor that tells Stiles there’s a story there that he wants to hear but won’t.

“I’d been gone for five days, had another three left when my Mark flared. I made enough of a stink that they opened communications for me. When I got through one of my partners informed me he’d experienced the flare too, at the same time. And so had our third. Their Marks lined up, and from what we could tell, mine did as well.

“I know, a triple Match? Unheard of, but. It felt right. Felt like everything I never thought I deserved, but would give everything to have.

“Except our third, she was missing.”

Stiles thinks about going through that, about having Derek missing, and can barely breathe from how horrible even the thought makes him feel. Across from him Christian is nodding grimly.

“She’d just gone out for a quick errand, some important call, and got pulled into a wan. Everything pointed to her having been picked up for sub training, only it made no sense. Neither of us are the submissive type, but her the least. Out of the three of us, if I’d had to make the call, I’d have said Ha-Harry.

“But what really made the alarms go off was the fact that neither me nor H-Harry had been informed of a Match. That breaks all the rules, and it was worrying enough that I was pulled out and allowed to go back. We thought maybe it was because I was where I was. Except I got home, and there was still no contact, and when my old CO went snooping through records he couldn’t find anything about her.”

It sounds, Stiles thinks, like what would have happened to Scott had he not been bitten, and had someone other than John Stilinski answered the call. Both the disappearance, and the missing records - they’ve got access to topclass hackers, and no one’s managed to find even the slightest shred of information on his Match. All they have is Scott’s insistence that they’re out there, somewhere, and a sense of direction.

“Your mom was the one to help us. She got us the location of three sub-training facilities, and ranked them in order of most likely, and with that we were able to make a plan.”

Apparently, Stiles muses as the tale unveils, it isn’t impossible to break into a sub-training facility. Also, he’s clearly underestimated Christian. The man is insane enough to launch an attack on a Council facility, and brilliant enough to pull it off. Good to know. He also gets every single suspicion regarding what happens in sub-training confirmed, not that he needed it.

“Once we located her… She was unconscious, strapped to a bed, and showed obvious defensive wounds. It made no sense. She’s not a fighter, even if she can defend herself if needed. The way she works, she’d have either waited for us to come for her or for them to relax and then break out. For her to have fought…”

Not good.

“Yeah. Except whatever you’re thinking, it was probably worse. I checked her over, to see if she could be moved without extra caution, and let me tell you, I’ve seen women treated better in war zones - hell, I’ve seen war criminals treated better. In the end we counted six broken bones, a dislocated shoulder, a fractured wrist and several burn marks. I’m not even going to touch on what else they did. Suffice to say we sure as fuck didn’t need to run a rapekit.

“She wasn’t alone there - they had four others in various conditions. Two had been given the same treatment as our girl, only it must have been for a longer time. One was physically unharmed, but completely broken. The last one… She was braindead. They kept her on life support though, apparently as a warm body for when they wanted a fuck but weren’t up for the fight with the others.”

That...that’s Stiles’s worst nightmare right there, confirmed. He fights back the urge to throw up, and renews his promise to never let them take him alive.

“I can help you get away. You’ll never have to worry about the Council again, I promise you, but you’ll have to give up everything.”

Stiles starts to interrupt, but Christian raises his hand and continues.

“I’m sorry, but that’s just the way it is. You can bring a bag, and if your dad’s willing, him too. Just, you can’t ever return, and you can’t keep in touch with anyone here.”

“Yeah, no. I’m not saying I wouldn’t give up a lot to be safe, but that’s not what I’m looking for here. I already did that, okay, I allowed my dad to think I was dead and left him behind to avoid the council. And I think I’ve done fine, staying under their radar. So thanks, but no thanks.

“But just for the record? If I’d agreed, there’s no way I would have gone without Derek. My Match,” he clarifies as Christian raises a questioning eyebrow.

For the first time Stiles sees the man react, apparently shocked by the fact that Stiles is with his Match, and that they’re close enough that staying together isn’t optional.

“So what is it you want then?”

“Information. Mom said you had ways to get it, on just about anything. Well, that’s what I need. As much as you can get me. The Council’s taken too much from me already, and from so many others, and I’m done letting them. It’s time they’re taken down. But I need information to do that.”

Once again Stiles gets to watch as shock travels across Christian’s face, followed by a longer silence.

“And you think you can do that?”

“I’m not seeing anyone else stepping up. Are you?” The double entendre hangs in the air between them, vibrating like the challenge it is.

“So, can you do it? Can you get me what I need?”

Christian hesitates, and Stiles is preparing to push when he hears a low murmur coming from somewhere close to the other man. Judging from the way Christian cocks his head slightly and from the way his face tightens - just minutely, only visible to someone like Stiles - he’s listening to something. Someone? A communications device of some kind, probably.

This...could turn nasty. He starts running through exit strategies again, but before he can make a decision Christian swears in a low, almost inaudible voice.

“Dammit, Ha-...”

Then he takes a deep breath and says, reluctance clinging to his voice, “you’ll get your information”.

As it turns out, back when they’d broken into the Council facility to get their girl the invisible “Harry” (and if that’s his actual name, then Stiles’s is Mike, which… yeah) had not only gone through the computers to steal as much information as possible, but also left a data mining program behind. Which is good for Stiles, but (understandably) makes Christian furious.

There are a quite few more muttered curses, as well as a very pointed remark about people who have no concept of safety, and who don’t understand that Christian can’t protect them if they keep fucking secrets. Stiles sensibly chooses to not even touch that with a ten foot pole. He’d react the same way if it was Derek being reckless - and he knows Derek will be even worse once he finds out just what it is Stiles is up to now.

Stiles won’t apologize for it though, not even though he knows he’s put not only himself but everyone in danger. Just as he won’t be anything but happy that “Harry” did something equally dangerous. It’s selfish, sure, but if getting this information gets him even one step closer to taking down the Council it’s worth it.

It’s another hour before Stiles can leave, the portable hard drive that supposedly holds the keys to the kingdom hidden on his body. Christian’s twitchy, and it’s obvious why. He wants to help, but at the same time he wants nothing to do with any of it.

“Look, I..:”

“No. You feel like you should offer to help out, right? Well, I’m not going to lie, I could use the help. But I’m not going to take it. You have your Matches to take care of, to protect. Your girl? She needs you to stay the hell away from the Council, and I’m running full speed ahead in their direction.

“Sure, you or your… ‘Harry’ find out anything, and send it my way, I’d be very grateful. But this is my fight, my choice. I’m not risking anyone else.”

That, of course, isn’t exactly 100 percent true. He’ll try not to, but something tells Stiles that in the end he’ll have no option but to risk others. He just won’t do it unless it’s completely unavoidable, and honestly? He’ll probably try and only risk people who deserve it. People whose deaths wouldn’t be that big of a loss.

But not these three. Not after what they’ve already suffered.

Christian looks him over, nods and reaches out to take Stiles’s hand. His voice is dead serious once he speaks.

“Alright. Once you launch whatever attach you’re planning though? You let me know. You hear me? And if you don’t let me know you’re okay after, I’ll come for you. They get you, I’ll get you out. Your Match too. No matter what, I’ll get you out and somewhere they can’t touch you.

“And not because of what I owe your mom. Because what you’re doing? It’s something I should have done - that I would do if it didn’t mean risking the others. And for that, man, I owe you.”

Once he’s back home, and has had his eardrums practically shattered from a dozen lectures, as well as almost getting frostburns from the cold shoulder Derek shows him, Stiles starts going through the material he’s been given. (Well, once he’s had one of the resident computer witches - or “techno pagans”, apparently - check that the drive’s safe.) It’s a lot. It’s a fricking mountain of information, is what it is, and Stiles is going to find what he needs in it even if it means not sleeping for a year.

He’s a were, he’ll survive.

Probably.

Three days in Derek tranqs him, forcing him to sleep through the night, and when he starts up again it’s with Derek next to him. That works much better. Well, “better” as in that together they cover more ground and sometimes Derek picks up on things Stiles misses due to different knowledge bases. “Not better” as in now Derek is involved. Stiles would prefer if he wasn’t, but considering Derek feels the same way about him there’s really not much he can do about it without looking like a big, fat hypocrite.

In the end they find what they need to know - and of course, Stiles thinks, it’s magic - and he makes a plan. It’s a good plan, in terms of achieving their goals, but he’s fairly sure no one else will agree.

“Are you insane?” Marin isn’t screaming, unlike everyone else in the room, but that doesn’t make her any calmer or less angry.

“No. Look, this is the only way to go. Worst case scenario-”

“We all die.”

“No. Okay, yes, but that’s the worst case scenario for every single day even doing nothing, as long as the Council exists. So we’re ignoring that. The worst case scenario is we break the magic that allows the Council to track the flare, and find Matches, but everything else stays the same. Best case? We ruin them. We free everyone, for the rest of time. I’m good with possibly dying being the worst case scenario if we can win that.”

Stiles isn’t suicidal, regardless of others might think. He wants to live a long life, with Derek next to him, and the year and a half they’ve had together is nowhere enough. (He’s not sure any amount of time will really be enough.) Just… The way they’re living, hiding and in fear, it’s not good. For now they’re safe, sure, but only if they shrink their lives, if they cut themselves off from everything outside the wards. And it really is for now. Sooner or later the Council will find them. The world has changed so much that not even the strongest wards will keep them completely hidden much longer. Once the Council starts truly searching - and they will - nowhere and no one will be safe any longer.

He wants a life where he can run free under the full moon with Derek by his side. He wants a life where Scott can find his Match and be happy. He wants a world where that is possible, and he’s willing to risk his life for it.

It’s as easy as that.

He gets a solid team of five. Derek - who won’t stay away, no matter how many times Stiles begs him. Jana the techno pagan. Another witch, a white haired old man who calls himself Raven. A bounty hunter slash bodyguard by the name of Braeden.

And then he gets Jennifer.

Under any other circumstance Stiles would rather cut his arm off than work with her. For one, she’s batshit crazy. He’s not making fun, or light, of the mental health issues she’s clearly got, no. When he calls her that he’s referring to the fact that she’s killed seven people (that he knows of) in some power-raising ritual.

She’s living in the community only because she can’t be allowed to walk free - either she’d continue to kill people, or the Council would capture her and use her - and the team sent to stop her wouldn’t dirty their hands or their ethics by killing her.

Stiles would have done the deed himself if not for the cold facts: if Jennifer could be made into a weapon by the Council she can also be one against them. That had been a possibility he hadn’t been willing to throw away. After all, there was always the option of killing her later should she turn out useless - unkilling someone however…

There are three things Stiles knows to be undeniably true about Jennifer: She hates the Council just as much as he does. She hates her Match who betrayed her to them even more. She cannot be trusted.

And now he’s going to have to do exactly that.

O---o--o---O

Stiles gives himself a mental shake, forces himself out of the memories, and refocuses on the camera. He's only got so long, and it’s important he do this right. His job is drawing attention. From the regular people watching his broadcast, the ones about to have the Council’s crimes thrown in their faces in full technicolor glory thanks to “Harry” and his data mining. But also from the Council, and their goons. He’s bait, plain and simple, to make them focus on him and hopefully miss as Jennifer and Raven smash two hundred years of oppressive magic to impotent little pieces.

“I've been hiding from the Council, because I know their secrets. I know what they are. I know what they do - what they would do to me given even half a chance. I know what they’ve done to others, and that the ones they killed are the lucky ones.”

He talks about Scott, and the girl that’s his missing Match. He talks about the Hales, about the people his mom tried to help, about people that only exist as notes and pictures in stolen files.

When he’s done, eyes aching and voice hoarse, he gives the camera as hard a look as he can.

“I'm done. No more hiding. No more living in fear. No more allowing them to break and twist and murder people.

“It's time for them to fear me.”

~The End ~

[animeniac]

Starbomb Ch. 7

Fandom: BNHA Pairing: Bakugou x Uraraka; slight Izuku x Tsuyu Genre: Romance  Chapter Summary: Uraraka doesn't show up to class. Bakugou confronts Midoriya about how he somehow caused Uraraka to run away, but he has no recollection of his "steamy" encounter with her. Late that night, he finally sees her again. (See Chapter 1 for story summary.) A/N: Sorry for the delay. Hurricanes and stuff. I don’t know if I mentioned this on here but there’s a possibility of a side pairing.  [AO3]

Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII

Bakugou had some choice words for the anti-gravity girl that sent him into the air not once but twice. In class the next morning, he leered at the door and everyone who passed through it. The moment he heard it slide open, he snapped his head around to see who entered. And time after time when he failed to see her round hair, face, and cheeks, he growled.

Initially, he assumed that she feared an encounter with him because of her transgressions. When the clock neared the start of class and the bell rang, he grew sick of the game that she had forced him into playing. The tension that spanned from his spine to his fingers and coursed through his veins had all been from her relentless attack, hadn't it?

She would pay.

The shrill bell of the end of class snapped Bakugou from his thoughts, and he needed an outlet for his hostility.

Midoriya crossed his path, and Bakugou pounced to corner him outside meters away from the door. Immediately, the green haired hero bowed his head and apologized, "Sorry for interrupting the other day."

Interrupting? Come to think of it, Bakugou had no idea what transpired before Uraraka fled. Narrowing his eyes at the ceiling, all he could recall was a decent workout; Midoriya entering; Uraraka pushing him into the air; her trembling back as she ran. That was it. Hesitant to ask, the blond figured that particular word choice to be impertinent to the main issue. "Didn't I tell you to go after her?" he reminded him.

"I couldn't find her," answered Midoriya, for he searched around the pathway up until the dorms before he figured that she wanted some time to herself.

Had Bakugou known his classmate's reasoning, he would have exploded. Fortunately, he used the time to try to recall the fragments of memory that he'd forgotten - the embrace, the bite, the almost kiss. They had all conveniently slipped his mind. Perhaps, his immature thoughts could not properly handle the depth of the raw emotions he had felt in those moments. The behavior all contradicted his vows that his association with Uraraka had been purely legal and self-serving to his bloodline.

And when she left because of Midoriya, Bakugou felt more than simply anger - loss.

Lost in his thoughts, Bakugou wouldn't have heard anything Midoriya had said within the past few moments if he said anything. "Why didn't you fucking try harder to find her? Tell me where she is now. Do you have some kind of pathetic crush on her?" he interrogated and with each question, his hand tightened into a fist.

Where did that last question come from? Midoriya's face reddened as he shook his head. "I don't know where she is, and I don't know if I have a crush on her."

Who wouldn't? Surely, a sappy, sentimental kid like Midoriya developed feelings for someone like her.

Snarling, Bakugou sneered, "Drop the bullshit."

Midoriya had yet to put his feelings into words, but maybe his concern and interest in Uraraka had developed into some kind of infatuation at least. He gulped. That tightness in his chest stayed with him along with the picture of ecstasy and intrigue painted across her reddened face. As a hero - no, as her friend, he just wanted her happiness regardless of who she chose to be with. "I," began Midoriya.

Their confrontation had gained curious spectators from class 1-A. After all, Bakugou decided to interrogate him outside of the classroom.

Iida interrupted, "You know, she was fine before you began harassing her." He believed that. Over the past few weeks, he sensed stress in her tense features.

Exiting the classroom with Kirishima, Sero caught sight of Bakugou and failed to read the tension of the scene. "Hey, you okay, man? We were just kidding yesterday. I don't care if you hang out with Uraraka," he interjected in an attempt to mollify the hostility.

Too many nosy people swarmed the area for Bakugou, so he barked, "Fuck off! Everybody. You know what? This isn't some kind of grand spectacle for people to chime in their fucking opinions. I don't give a shit what you losers care about what I do. Forget this." He backed away while staring down Midoriya. "You two can be all lovey dovey for all I care, but at the end of the day, I'm going to take what's mine."

He huffed and puffed as he stomped all the way down the hall and out the building. Midoriya and Uraraka laughing like kids - that's what he saw in his thoughts as he went up to his dorm room instead of the gym like he had planned. They might as well have been laughing at him, for that pit he had felt all day exponentially grew when he observed Midoriya's wide eyes and reddened cheeks.

Easily, he could have confronted her, but something subdued his typical hubris. His frantic thoughts tossed him, and of all the times he had lost control, nothing beat that afternoon. So he confined himself. These feelings that had flown asunder were more than just rage, and he only dealt with anger.

Surely, a loser like Deku liked a girl like Uraraka - that little cheerleading cutesy act was right up his alley. And that angered Bakugou. The pride he had felt when he drew the stick that promised her to be his partner faded into doubt that any of his plans would happen. At the end of the day, he loathed the idea of a love affair between the two. Yet, he felt the trajectory of events and fate nearly missed him and ensured the future of Midoriya and Uraraka.

Midoriya and Uraraka. His thoughts stormed as a premature drowsiness took over. If they liked each other, then what could an outsider like Bakugou truly do to stop it?

He groaned and put a pillow over his face to stop his heavy breathing for a few moments. The tension he felt had spread from his gut to his chest and then to his throat. Pain replaced his anger until he slowly fell asleep.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen of the commons, Asui hoped to catch Midoriya by surprise with a vanilla sundae topped with chocolate syrup and a cherry. Whipped cream, too. She didn't know everything about Midoriya, but after witnessing his Bakugou harangue him, she knew he would stew in his conscience. Surely enough, he sat at the table and stared down at the glass filled past the brim with ice cream and decadent toppings.

Within seconds after Asui clinked down the glass, he jumped and squirmed and stammered all in one place - much to her amusement. In response, she placed a finger on her chin and asked, "Are you trying to stall until it melts? You must not like it."

"No!" he squeaked in protest. "I'm really happy and surprised." Why would a girl make him a sundae? He would have never have guessed how to properly react to such a gesture. While he knew a simple thanks would have sufficed, he hurried the ice cream down his throat with a spoon.

Asui blinked as she sat next to him. "Don't drink it too fast, or you'll get," she began to warn until she observed the faded hue of blue cascade down his face, "brain freeze."

Midoriya leaned forward and rubbed his palm against his forehead. "I-It tastes good," promised the hero as he tightly grinned. Maybe such a treat could cure the troublesome encounter he had with Bakugou. In fact, he had already forgotten about the tense encounter in the wake of Asui's kindness. As an intense headache faded, his grin melted into a smile. His shoulders yielded to the largesse gesture of his partner, and he inhaled.

"Ribbit. You are pretty energetic sometimes," commented Asui.

"Really?"

"You're all over the place at once," she noted as she gently stretched a finger towards his face. Residual turmoil hung between his eyebrows and the slight tremor of the corners of his mouth had never left. Even as he bit his lip, she could sense every ounce of tension that radiated through the rest of his rigid joints. "Even now, I can tell everything that you're thinking."

Covering his features with his hands, he replied, "All over the place? I didn't notice." Peeking through the valleys of his fingers, he reluctantly and slowly dropped his literal guard and placed a hand on his lap as he continued to spoon more ice cream into his mouth. How could something cold cause him to melt?

And, he had a cute personality, but Asui knew not to say something like that. With the mere presence of ice cream and a friendly face, he somehow sprouted a smile and could shift his mood as easily as her younger siblings. She watched him finish the dessert that he rightfully deserved as she leaned forward on her open palm. Her large eyes wandered to the corner of his mouth where a sizeable dollop of whipped cream sat. Was he unaware?

By habit, her tongue pushed against her mouth and emerged to clean the goop, but she stopped herself with a hand and pushed it back. Even someone as nice as Midoriya would probably get put off by such an odd gesture. Her face heated, and she wondered why she would be that bold. "You have something on your face," she muttered as she averted her eyes and hoped he didn't see.

Midoriya saw, but he interpreted the gesture a lot differently than she feared. "She must have wanted some," he thought as he frowned at the emptied glass. Wiping Smoothly as he could, he commented, "This was really nice of you, Tsu. I guess I'm still hungry after all of that."

"If you'd like, I could make you something else," she suggested as she got up to return to the kitchen area. Asui frowned at the absence of her usual equanimity.

Midoriya apologized, "Sorry, no, I meant, we should go somewhere. You're probably hungry, too, right?" Was that an intrusive thing to ask? Girls probably didn't like to talk about their hunger. He wasn't sure.

In accordance with her buoyant, beating heart, she smiled, "But, I like making food for you, Midoriya." Maybe for that day, she wouldn't press him for introspection. Whether or not he liked Uraraka hardly mattered. She simply wanted his goofy smile to stay on his face for as long as possible.

"Tsu," he whispered with a wide smile. His chin pressed to his palm, he leaned forward and knocked over the glass. Scurrying to catch it from falling onto the floor, he somehow found Asui's tongue binding his hand to the glassware. Midoriya apologized as his heart raced, "Sorry! I wasn't thinking."

Asui released him. "Ribbit," she groaned. Why did she do that?

Bakugou made his way to the bathroom late one night. Surprisingly, he figured that he could sleep until the morning based on the heaviness of his eyelids and grogginess in his head. Maybe he had overdone it with his workouts that week. Yawning for the fifth time, he could hardly see through his blurred vision as he exited the boys' restroom. His drowsiness expelled the unpleasant thoughts of Uraraka from the day and his dreams until he saw her?

That cursed, revealing black tank top and those familiar navy blue shorts that she always wore to training had a different appeal for that time of night. His eyes shot open, and he had to use every muscle in his body to suppress the twitch of the corners of his mouth. Questions flooded into his mind. Raising a finger, he pointed and jeered, "Uraraka." However, he could think of no insult.

The curves of her face, thighs, and chest drew silence from his throat. The dramatic darkness of her squinted eyes would have been unflattering on most people, but on her, the contrast to her typically bright, brown and round eyes amused Bakugou. Where had that energy gone?

He stepped closer to her and tilted his head down so that he maintained an unbreakable stare.

"Bakugou," she whined. "I gotta go."

Bakugou slammed his hand against the doorway of the girls' restroom to block her way. No, he hadn't finished studying her yet. "Where the fuck have you been?" demanded he. He noticed that her face had regressed from its typical roundness and developed slight, deviant dips. If his audacity led him to survey the shape with his finger tips, then he knew he'd find an anomaly. He frowned as his eyes traced up to the tips of her paling, pink cheeks. Those had changed, too.

She jumped. "Bakugou," she repeated more shortly this time. "What are you doing?"

He dropped his train of thought and snapped, "Nothing."

"Come on," pleaded Uraraka as she squirmed and bounced in place. "Please, I can't take it anymore. I need you-"

Bakugou drew his hand back into his pocket and scowled, "Shut the hell up." He cursed his heart, for he enjoyed the desperation in her eyes a little too much. That jiggling dance she did definitely didn't help. Such desperation seemed all too familiar and evocative of a time they shared away in the dimensions of his dreams. His face grew hot with anger or something of the sort.

Without another word, she passed him. Instead of taking a step towards his room, he stayed still for more moments with her. As his observations gave way to his initial fury, he remembered just what had pushed him into a disturbed state of mind. He recalled watching her flee from behind in the gym the day before.

Fortunately, she returned and tried to pretend as if her tormentor had left.

"I'm not done with you! Why did you run away?" he growled.

Uraraka, without the energy to argue, reluctantly decided to engage in his interrogation. Her heavy head finally rose to meet eyes with his. She expected more of a hostile glare than a bitter, narrow-eyed stare. As she stood her ground, she could not recall the events leading up to her fleeing from the gym. "Run away? Didn't you tell me to leave? I've been sick," she answered both his questions as her chest heaved.

"Cut the bullshit. I didn't tell you shit."

Her shoulders slumped, and she finally admitted, "I don't remember."

Bakugou had few comebacks for that, for he had also forgotten. Earlier, Midoriya had claimed to interrupt something. "Deku showed up," he reminded her.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," she lied as sweat jumped from her face, for of course, she remembered Midoriya. Taking strides away to her dorm room, she avoided Bakugou.

That reaction - the renewed blush on her face and glow in her eyes. Did that confirm her infatuation with that loser? He couldn't sleep or stand still with that as the conclusion to their discussion. Reaching out, he meant to stop her, but once his finger tips touched the cold, soft surface of her triceps, his eyes dilated and heat climbed up his hand to his body and engulfed his entire face.

Racing heart, sweaty palms, he snatched his hand back as if her skin were molten lava.

He remembered.

Without dignifying him with eye contact, raw rage grew in Uraraka's eyes. She suddenly remembered as well. Midoriya had seen everything, but it wasn't her fault. It was Bakugou's. "What you did was unforgivable and weird," she muttered loud enough for only him to hear. The spot on her collar bone where he had marked abruptly sparked a hot sensation that spanned her entire body.

She remembered, and she had enjoyed it.

Bakugou had no chide remark to spit back at her, for she was right. Searching the words of his vocabulary, his teeth tightened to hiss an unorthodox term that had only passed his lips a few times in his life. Of all the instances to say it, he would have said it in that moment because truly, and he wouldn't willingly allow himself to lose control like that again.

He watched as her head fell back, and her body fell towards the ground like a toppling tower. Without a second thought, he caught her by the shoulders. The light had left her face like a new moon. Her eyes had shut and became illegible. A frown mounted on her lips complemented the solemn serenity of her empty profile.

Grimacing, he scoffed away his tension. His roaring thoughts and heart had mostly calmed, and he focused his energy on finding a place to dump her unconscious body. Lacking the tact of the conventional hero, he began to drag her backward towards her dorm. Uraraka Ochako.

Bakugou kicked the door open with the bottom of his shoe and entered her austere room. While she had a few clothes on the floor, some might assume she kept her area neat. Her barren, blank walls and solid, tan bed sheets lent to a completely neutral feel. Save for a few objects designed for organization, she had the bare minimum.

Tossing Uraraka onto her bed, Bakugou would have immediately left if he didn't catch sight of a sheet of notebook paper on the wall with his name on it. He scowled and put his left knee on the bed next to Uraraka's sleeping body to lean forward and get a closer look. "Bakugou and Uraraka 100% Friendship Compatibility! Perfect Match," he read next to a drawing of chibi, anime versions of themselves happily standing next to each other. He noticed a full, brightly red colored meter at the bottom beneath a somewhat intricate time graph.

He scowled, "They must have done this behind my back."

A few days before the arcade trip.

Uraraka sat in Kotone's room playing Super Smash Brothers and miserably losing. She hardly put as much heart into it as Bakugou or Kotone for that matter. Rubbing the back of her head, she apologized, "Sorry, I guess I'm bad at video games." Nonetheless, she enjoyed the energy of the room, and she always delighted in seeing Kotone.

Bakugou had gone to the restroom for longer than usual, so Kotone turned to Uraraka. They obviously wouldn't have much fun playing just video games. "Can I show you something? I want to know what you think," she casually suggested after staring at the door for a few moments. Kotone stood up before hearing her response, for time was of the essence.

"Sure," responded Uraraka as she stood up as well.

Kotone pulled a sheet of paper from her drawer and laid it out on the desk. "I never told you what my quirk was," she began. "I can hear hearts, and that tells me a lot."

"That's really cool, Kotone," she cheered before she spotted the contents of the paper.

While the girl smiled at the compliment, she wanted to be quick. "Hearts tell me a lot about people. I can hear their fears, happiness, and their sickness. Sometimes, when I hear two hearts together, I can figure out their compatibility, so I drew you and Bakugou's chart."

"Friendship compatibility, right?" Uraraka corrected her.

Pausing, Kotone then nodded.

"Really?" Uraraka grinned. "Lemme see that." She saw the ups and downs of their rhythm like an EKG monitor. Smiling faces were drawn between certain points. Although the hero-to-be could not properly understand the correlations of her student's logic, a light and flighty sensation fluttered in her heart. "100%"

"You two are really happy when you're around each other," explained the girl with a soft smile and blush on her cheeks.

Furrowing her brow to read, she looked up to ask, "Bakugou's happy?"

Kotone's eyes widened at the sudden shift in Uraraka's heartbeat - a habit that she knew that she needed to suppress one day. People usually didn't like to hear the meaning of their own hearts, so any indication that something had changed could cause conflict. Regardless, she smiled again. "Yeah," she nodded, "And, so I mapped out your hearts when you guys are together."

"Wah!" squealed Uraraka. "This is amazing!" Pointing to the first happy face, she asked, "W-When did this happen?"

Thinking back, Kotone remembered, "That's when you helped me with my history. I think you answered my question before Bakugou."

"He was happy about that?" she asked, for, at the time, she figured her eagerness to jump in annoyed him. Eagerly pointing to the second smile, she asked again, "How 'bout this?"

"Uh," Kotone stammered to keep up with her zealous attitude, "That's when he handed the controller to you."

"Maybe I was nervous instead," Uraraka suggested. There were more times, too, but in that moment, she reveled in the fact that there were any happy moments at all. Not that she could admit that she was particularly happy around him. In fact, that was far from how she'd describe her sentiments. Maybe fascinated.

To say the least, Uraraka's slight denial disappointed Kotone. She thought that her mentor would readily acknowledge any bit of joy that she felt around Bakugou. One of them had to, or else nothing would come of such a wonderful tune.

Uraraka's eyes glowed as she continued to study their personalized heart map. Her cheeks full of joy, she continued to grin when she praised, "You have a really good memory, Kotone! C-Can I keep this?"

Kotone nodded and waved her hands like a music conductor. "It's nothing, really - like listening to music. Your hearts make catchy music," she giggled as she rose her head to reveal her blue eyes through her black bangs.

They both had more questions.

Upon closer inspection, Uraraka noticed small, simultaneous jolts on the graphs. "What are these?" she asked.

"That? Oh, um, that's just," Kotone began, but she wasn't sure what to answer without sounding too intrusive. After all, no one truly liked for her to expose their deepest thoughts and feelings. She often tried to merely scratch at the surface. Otherwise, she would lose friends and alienate those around her like she had already accomplished in her young life. Moreover, she respected Uraraka to the degree that she didn't want to dig too deep.

Fortunately, Bakugou slammed the door open. "What are you losers talking about?" he frowned.

"Our game strategy!" cheered Kotone as she stealthily slipped the paper into Uraraka's binder. "How about we team up against you - 2 vs 1?"

"That's fair. You're not gonna beat me without a handicap," responded Bakugou as he sat in a purple beanbag chair in the corner of the room. He stared at Uraraka despite the fact that she hadn't challenged him.

When their eyes met, she nodded, "You're on."

In her head, Kotone noted, "There it is." That was the jolt that Uraraka had noticed earlier. Whenever Bakugou and Uraraka exchanged glances, she could almost guarantee that she would hear that familiar downbeat. At the young age of 12, even she could deduce what that meant, for only few heart harmonies had such a rhythm accompany such a happy melody. Closing her eyes, she heard the chorus return, and she smiled.

In his project partner's bedroom, Bakugou seethed as he knelt on Uraraka's bed above her. Initially, he thought to grab the paper, but more effectively, he could grab her. His rigid fingers sprawled as he reached the center of her face. And when his palm met her nose and his finger tips grazed her forehead, he pulled back once again.

She was hot. Not in that way - well maybe in that way, but he hadn't thought of her like that yet. Her skin was hot in the way that warranted concern.

The girl must have been sick, and thus, she had become his responsibility.

All that time, she had been suffering in this room alone and sick. "How could you?" Bakugou cursed with a twisting tension in his chest and a contorted scowl on his face. He had felt that helplessness on the train before. Moreover, how could he be blind enough to overlook the withering constitution of the person he had planned to marry? Just how sick had she been?

His hand hovered over her arm as he thought to shake her from her sleep and admonish her and force her to the infirmary, yet upon witnessing her heaving chest and reddened skin, he reconsidered his tactics. Sweat collected on her forehead as she furrowed her brow and stirred. Dark circles under her eyes, she tightly shut them as she not-so-peacefully slept. This stupidly sick girl was in no condition to walk herself. Even the student hero that only thought about beating villains knew that.

Pulling her arm, Bakugou awkwardly and as carefully as he could, placed her over his shoulder. He had no idea how critical her condition had become, so he erred on the side of caution by slowly proceeding to the door. "Fucking shit. You better not tell anybody I'm doing this," he warned the unconscious girl in a low murmur. While Bakugou may have thought of her as a foolishly stubborn and robust, without knowing her exact ailment, he treated her limp body a bit more tenderly than what was conventional for him.

What a troublesome idiot.

Sometime later that night, he reached the clinic. According to Recovery Girl, she had a moderate case of malnutrition and dehydration. All in all, she would fully recover with enough rest, food, and water - essential stuff for daily life along with the nurse's quirk.

Bakugou fumed as he overlooked Uraraka sleeping peacefully with an IV feeding into her arm. The sight wrung his gut as he bit his lower lip. She probably spent her money on that loser Deku instead of food or something. Moreover, she had too much pride to come to him for help. He would have figured something out despite literally having just enough money to cover his meals until his next allowance.

Allowance.

Whipping out his cell phone, he dialed his mother's number as quickly as he could. "Oi, I need money," he tersely greeted as he shut the door to the clinic behind him. Leaning against a wall, he slid down to sit.

"Katsuki?" Mitsuki answered from the other end. She spoke considerably louder than was necessary. "It's 4 am. Are you okay?"

"Just give me some. It doesn't have to be a lot," he paused to still his gravelly voice. "I need it for the girl I'm going to marry."

She shortly questioned, "What?!"

"Shut up about it," Bakugou ordered.

"You're telling me that a girl is not only dating someone with your attitude, but she agreed to marry you? She must be pretty tough for that to happen," she said with a chuckle at the end of her tone. "Masaru!"

"Hurry up. Pl-" began Bakugou before he corrected himself. "Now." With that, he turned off his phone and buried his face into his hands. Uraraka was tough - too tough like overcooked chicken. And stubborn like an untamed steed. That was why he decided to not lose her to anything or anyone including the likes of Midoriya.

[tiniest-hands-in-all-the-land]

(sorry for not responding earlier; I was in class and almost started crying when i saw this ofg;aoifnew)

Thank you ;w; It means a lot to me that you took the time out of your day to make this for me, especially since I’m assuming you’ve discovered my content relatively recently. I haven’t been doing so hot for the past couple of weeks, and this past weekend was just the cherry topping on the shit sundae. Most of it is completely out of my control, so there’s not much I can really do to make time for myself or create what I want to create, but I’m trying.

But I’m definitely thankful to have such lovely, amazing followers like yourself :’D I’m truly sorry that one of your first introductions of me was a vent post, and I’m praying I didn’t, in any way, make you feel obligated to make this for me. Regardless, your message did make my day, and I’m incredibly thankful for it :’)

Oh, and if you’re interested in reading my fics, [here’s my AO3]. I fluctuate pretty hard between fluff and angst, but maybe you’ll find something you enjoy ^^

@tiniest-hands-in-all-the-land

so !! ofc you are under no obligation to read this or respond but i wanted to throw some love and support in your direction!

i just found your blog from a dub on youtube and Wow Fuckin Great Art andd id love to read your fics too im ?? need to invest time i dont have into reading Wholesome and Good content but idont know yourao3 oof

but anyway you're !! Amazing and i saw you havent been doing great and idk how much these reminders actually apply to you rn but they are important nonetheless ! i hope things start looking up for youu you deserve the world !

also i did aizawas hair in sharpie bc i have one (1) drawing pen and i didnt wanna use it up so it got Thicker and his hair is in his mouth, he must be suffering F

also clarification bc im dumb and bad at words "i hope this is how it is for you" is referring to passions providing happiness and repreieve instead of mostly stress fjajfj

also i can delete this if u want ! you just dont have messages or submissions open rn which is completely understandable, and i just wanted to slide this in your direction in case it is helpful at all ♡!

[annwritesstuff]

Sticks and stones ... and Wolf

Ah ... journalism, comedy and perceived woman-on-woman cat fights ... these are three topics I have an interest in, and they recently intersected in the strangest way at the White House Correspondent's Dinner. As such, I felt the need to offer up my own two cents on the subject.

The White House Correspondent's dinner happened over the weekend, and you've probably heard about the comedy set that's been making waves. With her speech, hostess Michelle Wolf, heretofore best known for being a correspondent on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah, eviscerated President Trump, his cabinet and other big names in politics comedy-roast-style.

View her full remarks here: (Tumblr is being weird and not letting me post videos, so follow this link)

And in case you don't know, the comedy set has basically been the cornerstone of the dinner since 1983. Per ABC news (bold emphasis mine): "Perhaps the most well-known of the dinner’s traditions is the comedy routine. The president delivers the initial, joke-filled speech, followed by the keynote roast by a famous comedian. Recent headliners have included Cecily Strong, Jimmy Kimmel and Jay Leno."

A comedian has roasted the president at this dinner for 35 years. We've elected a President who's used his First Amendment right in a way many would consider non-Presidential, yet many of the same people who prop him up are saying that Wolf went too far with her remarks.

Seriously. A man in an actual position of power can tweet about Mika Brzezinski's "bleeding face lift" (for real, read the Tweet here) and it's fine and dandy, but a comedian makes reference to Sarah Huckabee Sanders using ashes from burning the truth to create a "perfect smoky eye" and people lose their minds.

Is this really that much worse than the jokes Stephen Colbert cracked at the expense of President Bush at the 2006 White House Correspondent's Dinner? "The greatest thing about this man is he's steady. You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday. Events can change; this man's beliefs never will."

Although not every critic of Wolf is a conservative, it seems to me that most people who are upset with Wolf's remarks are on the right. Which I find ... odd. In recent years, many conservatives have built an entire brand on ridiculing "special snowflakes" who are "too offended" and "need a safe space." Those offended by Trump's "pussy grabbing" comments have been told to lighten up - it was just a joke! Locker room talk, duh!

(From Samantha Bee's Twitter page) But suddenly, this "sticks and stones" principal doesn't apply to Wolf's speech. Perfect example, Mike Huckabee. He mocks people who may get "triggered" by the jokes on his show ... But then, wait! He decides there's nothing funny about the jokes made about his daughter! This outrage over a joke is justified!

Translation: Getting offended is stupid and makes you a "special snowflake" - Unless it's me who gets offended!

Locally, Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who is also running for governor, expressed his disapproval of Wolf's jokes via Twitter:

And, within the last week, Kemp released a campaign ad that depicts him pointing a rifle straight at a guy who wants to date Kemp's daughter. When people expressed disapproval of this ad - even gun owners piped up to say "always assume the gun is loaded and NEVER point it at something or someone you don't intend to shoot!" - the Kemp campaign responded with a statement that said, in part, "get over it."

Here's the ad: (side note: does anyone else find the old "I-will-literally-kill-anyone-who-wants-to-date-my-daughter" trope to be antiquated and creepy?)

Link to ad here.

DID Michelle Wolf's comments go too far? I would argue that no, they didn't. However I respect the opinions of people who say they did. Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Kemp have the right to be offended by Wolf's jokes. I'm not saying you can't be offended. I'm saying that you need to be consistent.

If you tell me to lighten up for disapproving of the President of the United States saying all Haitian immigrants have AIDS, then don't turn around and condemn a comedian for telling jokes at the President's expense.

I'm truly baffled by how strong the negative response has been. So negative, in fact, that many are arguing for an end of the White House Correspondent's Dinner altogether! It would be frustrating if this 19-minute speech with a few jokes some people didn't like would be enough to completely do away with a 97-year-old tradition that's almost never this controversial. That would be the definition of making a mountain out of a molehill.

Michelle Wolf makes jokes about the President that people don't like, so the White House Correspondent's Dinner is axed moving forward. Donald Trump mocks a New York Times reporter with a disability and is elected President.

I think television writer Nell Scovell, who has written for Late Night with David Letterman, put it beautifully in this opinion piece for Vulture:

"'The White House Correspondents’ Dinner is DEAD as we know it,' President Trump tweeted this morning. Margaret Sullivan at the Washington Post agreed and published an op-ed that opens with 'The 2018 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner should be the last.'

"This strikes me as the wrong response. Yes, the dinner has ballooned to an oddball mix of celebrities and politicians, but there have been moments where comedy allowed speakers to cut to the truth. I’ll never forget the wave of laughter in 2013 after President Obama declared: 'Some folks still don’t think I spend enough time with Congress. ‘Why don’t you get a drink with Mitch McConnell?’ they ask. Really? Why don’t you get a drink with Mitch McConnell?'

"The President calling out the Speaker for not being civil remains my favorite WHCD moment — and I didn’t even write that line.

"Mel Brooks once explained why many of his movies made fun of Adolf Hitler. 'You have to bring him down with ridicule, because if you stand on a soapbox and you match him with rhetoric, you’re just as bad as he is, but if you can make people laugh at him, then you’re one up on him,' he said.

"It’s important to laugh at Mitch McConnell and President Trump and Press Secretary Sanders and all the others that are corrupting democracy. Saying Wolf was vulgar and attacked another woman for her looks is a smoke screen — smokier than Sanders’s smoky eye shadow. These lies ignore Wolf’s very real observation, which is that the president’s press secretary is a fucking liar. Yes, that’s vulgar for me to say. But it’s even more vulgar for her to do."

A point that I realize I haven't really touched on is the pitting of one woman (Wolf) against another (Sanders). Never mind that Wolf went after many people, men and women, with her jokes - including Kellyanne Conway, Mitch McConnell, Anderson Cooper and others. Most of the attention in this controversy has gone to the jokes about Sanders - and I don't think they were any worse than the jokes targeting others. This is because, as Scovell noted in the same piece, our culture loves female cat fights for some reason.

As if this situation isn't disappointing enough, adding the layer of woman-on-woman hate is the cherry on this shit sundae.

For me, this is the lesson here: There is a group that prides itself in being tough and having a "sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me" attitude and love hectoring "bleeding hearts" who commit the great sin of taking umbrage at offensive things the president says. But the reality is that the big, bad and tough group really isn't so big, bad and tough after all. They can dish out the off-color, "fuck-your-feelings" attitude, but can't take it when it's served back to them. (And what Wolf did is nowhere near on the level of what our President does, but I digress ...)

I hope we all learn something from this. And I hope we have a White House Correspondent's Dinner in 2019. Let's see what that brings.

Related:

Trevor Noah's bit about the fiasco (brilliant)

No, Michelle Wolf didn't joke about Sarah Huckabee Sanders's looks, Vulture

The real reason Michelle Wolf is under attack is because her Sarah Sanders jokes are true, Vox