#yeah all platforms are gonna just have some of the worst takes just in different ways

[wwilsonbarness]

i can't do this anymore

pairings: bucky barnes x y/n reader  

summary: You overhear Bucky’s conversation with your friends and assume the worst but you couldn’t have been more wrong. 

warnings: ANGSTTT, fluffy ending, mention of marriage, more angst “I’m sorry i can’t help it), miscommunication. 

word count: 3665

a/n: I’m in serious need of miscommunication fics (I'm a sucker for angst) so I’d be grateful for any recommendations!! Enjoy <3 

Feedback, likes and reblogs are much appreciated :) 

I do not give permission for my work to be copied, reposted or translated on any other platform.

masterlist

“Buck? Can you pass my clothes?” You had just stepped out of the shower and realised you left your clothes in your room, but Bucky didn’t answer. “Buck?” He still didn’t answer so you wrapped your towel around you and headed through to see the room empty. You begin to get dressed before you hear Sam’s voice from the living room, he wasn’t supposed to be here for another half hour. Every week Bucky and Sam took it in turns to host dinner for the three of you and Sam’s girlfriend, Olivia. This week was yours and Bucky’s turn to host and you were super excited to serve your new recipe. Hearing the voices made you even more excited, but stressed as you still had some cooking to do before they were supposed to be here. You finish getting dressed and apply a little bit of makeup as quickly as you can. These dinners weren’t formal so it didn’t take long to get ready, they were mostly just so Sam and Bucky had some comfort after their missions, especially recently with them having to deal with John Walker. You take one last look in the mirror before heading through, until you hear something that stops you in your step.

“I mean I can’t say I’m surprised.. one look at you two and it’s obvious,” Sam tried to whisper but failed. “how are you gonna do it?”  Do what? You were confused what they were talking about, part of was tempted to interrupt but your curiosity took over. 

“I don’t know.. It’s just..” Bucky was stuttering which he only did when he was nervous, this really made you worry about what they were talking about. “It’s just she’s different from other girls, you know? And I know we haven’t been together that long but I can’t do it anymore. Do what anymore? “It’s not like I don’t love what we have but I just feel like I need more” More? You couldn’t help but overthink what you were hearing. They were talking about you, you weren't enough for him. I mean sure you’d thought that about yourself so many times but hearing it from the man you truly thought was the love of your life hurt. 

“I know what it’s like when you find the one, it’s the best feeling in the world.” You couldn’t see this but Sam had kissed Olivia’s head after his words. “This is gonna be good for you man, I’m happy for you.” 

You couldn’t bring yourself to hear anymore, the tears were already fighting their way out. You quietly walk back into your bedroom and try and calm down, you just had to get through tonight, just tonight and then you and Bucky could talk. You were at your happiest with Bucky, you thought Bucky was too but.. you didn’t even want to finish that thought. Bucky’s happiness was the most important thing to you, and if that meant he wasn’t with you anymore you would have to find a way to get through that. No matter how hard it would be for you, you just wanted him to be happy.

You took a few minutes to compose yourself,  your eyes were red and a little puffy but not enough for anyone to notice. You hoped anyway. This time when you left your bedroom you made sure to close the door loud enough so they could hear you coming and hopefully change the subject. 

“Hey guys, you’re early.” you said as you walked in, Sam and Olivia both stood up to give you a hug as you came in. 

“Yeah sorry we were just a couple blocks over and it didn’t make sense going all the way back home just to come out again,” Sam replied with a smile. “Buck said it was okay.” 

“Of course it is, you guys are always welcome, you know that!” You were surprisingly good at keeping how you really felt hidden, but with your words you couldn’t help but think you would lose Sam and Olivia as friends when Bucky ended things between you, they were technically Bucky’s friends first but you’d grown to see them as practically family as your relationship grew. You tried to push that thought away, you just had to get through tonight you kept repeating to yourself in your head. 

“You okay doll?” Bucky asks as he wraps his arms around you. You plaster on a smile hoping he wouldn’t sense anything being wrong. 

“Course! Just need to check on the food.” Normally Bucky’s touch helped you in situations like this but with what you heard his touch was only making you feel worse. You manage to untangle yourself from his arms and head to the kitchen. You notice that the ingredients and glasses were still laying out for the drinks you’d planned to make. “Do you guys want any drinks?” 

“Yes please!” Sam and Bucky replied at the same time. 

“I’ll help you.” you heard Olivia say through the wall. It only takes a couple seconds before she’s standing next to you in the kitchen. You and Olivia were like best friends, and she’s the reason you and Bucky were together. You had worked together for a few years, you drifted a little when she left that job but it only took one reunion dinner to get your friendship back to normal. That was 2 years ago, and from that night on she had insisted on setting up you and Bucky. It took a while for the meeting to actually happen but once it did you knew he was the one for you. Was. Not anymore. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Olivia asks quietly, she was aware of Bucky’s super soldier hearing and wanted to talk to you alone. 

You nodded and forced another smile. “Just a busy week, my boss is still being a dick.” 

“Ugh, you deserve so much better than having to work for that guy. He’s a creep.” She said at a normal volume now. “You should send Bucky after him, make him know he can’t treat you like that just cause he’s the boss.” She brings her hands up to put air quotes around ‘boss’, as he’s only technically the boss for the month while your real boss was on vacation. 

“I’ll manage.” You tried to play it off, you wouldn’t have Bucky there to help you soon, and you needed to stand up for yourself. 

“You know he would do anything for you.” 

“You think?” 

“Yep. I mean have you seen the way he looks at you?” 

“Hmm.” you mumbled. “Here,” You pass her two glasses with drinks in it. “take these and I’ll bring the other two once i’ve checked the food.” 

“Okay,” She starts to walk about but turns at the last minute, “It smells good by the way, I can’t wait.” 

“Thanks” you laughed as she walked away. She could tell there was something different with you tonight but she couldn’t figure out what was wrong, it felt like it was more than just your boss being a dick. 

You tried to take as long as you could checking the food without it being too long that someone would notice. After just under 10 minutes you walk through. “Dinner should only be a little longer.” You pass a glass to Bucky and keep one for yourself, normally you’d sit close to Bucky but tonight you kept your distance, opting for the armchair in the corner. Bucky thought this was weird but he kept it to himself. 

“So, what did I miss?” You hoped they would somehow be able to explain away what you heard but your hope didn’t last long as they started to talk about Sam’s plans to get a lizard. 

“Sam, we’re not getting a lizard,” Olivia replied, “if you insist on getting a pet why can’t it be a normal one like a cat or a dog.” This only reminded you of the plans you and Bucky made to adopt a cat, this was torture. Everything was reminding you of what you were about to lose. 

“I’ll look after it babe, you won’t even have to touch it.” Sam tried pleading. 

“And when you’re away on missions?” Olivia argued back playfully. 

“Okay, you got me.” You laughed a little at Sam releasing this was one battle he was going to lose. “What about you guys? You still planning on getting a cat?” 

Bucky looked at you as Sam asked the question, how were you supposed to answer this when you didn’t even know the answer anymore, luckily Bucky notices the panic on your face and jumps in to answer.” 

“Yeah man, we just have to find the time to get to the shelter.” 

“See,” He turns his head to his left, staring at his girl, “Y/n let’s Bucky get the pet he wants.” He was only teasing, he knew logically he couldn’t get a lizard but it was fun to pretend. 

“Lizards and cats are not the same thing.” 

“Y/n/n help me out here please” Sam pleads to you. 

“Sorry Sam, I’m on Olivia's side here.” You reply whilst laughing. 

“Traitor” he mumbles under his breath making everyone laugh. Bucky noticed it wasn’t your real laugh but he wasn’t sure why. Normally you loved bantering back and forth with them. 

You kept on chatting for 20 minutes before the oven timer went off, just in time as Bucky was about to tell an embarrassing story about you.

“Ah! Saved by the bell” you joked. 

“Don’t think I won’t forget to tell it after dinner!” Bucky shouts through, and you can’t help but laugh before thinking about it deeper. Was that one of the things he couldn’t do anymore, was he really embarrassed by you? 

You tried so hard to push those thoughts away and focus on getting through the dinner, you started plating up the food you were so excited about only an hour before. But you got lost in your thoughts again and picked up the hot tray with your bare hand, burning yourself in the process. “Shit.” The tray fell to the floor, luckily you had already plated everything and you were just moving it to the sink. Bucky rushes through and sees the tray on the ground and you gripping your hand towards your chest. 

“What happened?” He comes towards you but you walk back away from him. “What’s wrong?” You could see the worry in his eyes but all you could think about was his words earlier. I can't do it anymore. 

“I’m fine, Bucky.” You didn’t mean to but you snapped back at him. 

“You’re not fine.” he moves closer and tries to reach for your hand but you pull it closer to you, he notices and steps back. “Y/n?” You don’t say anything. “Look please just run your hand under some cold water at least, please?” 

“Can you just take the food through, I’ll be there in a minute.” You tried to hide the shakiness in your voice but he could hear it. This brought him back to the start of your relationship, you both struggled to open up to each other but he thought you had both gotten better at it, which is why he was extra worried.

He nodded, you hated yourself for being the reason he was sad, he didn’t deserve that. “I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay doll, just know I’m here for you okay?” You nodded but kept your gaze to the floor. He first grabs the tray with his left hand and puts it in the sink then picks up the plates and brings them through, having to make two trips. He doesn’t want to leave you but he wants to give you the space you asked for. You run your hand under the cold tap for a couple of minutes before drying it off and making your way to the table. 

“You okay y/n?” Sam asks as you sit down next to Bucky, there were only 4 seats at the table so sitting next to him was your only option. Bucky turns to you, concern filling his eyes, he sends a smile your way and you try to send one back. He went to put his hand on your thigh but you see him stop himself and bring it back to his leg. 

“Yeah, all good, just burnt my finger on a tray. How’s the food?” 

“It’s amazing as always.” Olivia answers.

 “Thanks again for having us over.” Sam adds

“It’s a new recipe, and no need to thank me. You know you are both welcome here anytime.” You reply, happy that they like it. 

“Tastes great Doll.” Bucky’s voice was quiet, almost like he was scared to speak, he had a slight smile growing as you turned to him. 

“Thank you Bucky.” 

The rest of the night went just like that, the four of you spoke about planning a trip to New Orleans, you felt yourself get excited about it but then grounded yourself, reminding yourself that it probably wouldn’t go ahead. Well, it maybe would, you just wouldn’t be there. Sam and Olivia stayed for a couple more hours, they couldn’t stay as late as usual as Olivia had picked up an early shift at work the next day. When they left you saw Sam and Bucky whisper something to each other, but you were too far to hear anything. 

Now you and Bucky were alone, it had just been the two of you for 10 minutes and none of you had broken the silence until now. 

“Y/n?” Bucky asks quietly, testing the atmosphere. You took the shakiness in his voice as a sign he was angry, when it was really because he was worried about you. You don’t say anything but bring your head up so you could see him. “Can we talk?” Oh god. This was it. He was gonna do it right now. You weren’t ready, you never would be but you couldn’t do this right now. 

“Bucky, I’m really tired, could we talk in the morning?” You were desperately hoping he would say yes. 

“Yeah..” He stands up and walks towards the bathroom, stopping slightly at you but speeds up again after a moment. “I’m gonna quickly shower then I’ll come to bed.” 

“Okay.” Almost a whisper but he heard it. 

You go through to your room and get changed, ignoring the mess in the kitchen. That was something you’d worry about tomorrow. You crawled into bed, facing the wall and tried to force the sleep to take over. It doesn’t take long for Bucky to come in next to you, you feel him hesitate but he wraps his arms around you and brings his mouth around to kiss your forehead. “I love you.” 

You hoped he’d think you were sleeping, and not know you were pretending. You tried to find comfort in his touch but it only reminded you that this time tomorrow you probably wouldn’t have him wrapped around you. You could feel your eyes growing wetter as you thought about this but you forced yourself to stop before it turned into a full meltdown. That would for sure wake Bucky up. So you sat there in silence, sometimes you could hear a quiet mechanical murmur from Bucky’s arm, and sometimes the one big deep breath he takes every few minutes. By the time morning comes you only got about an hour of sleep, you were exhausted and anxious for what was going to happen today. 

“Doll?” he pauses for a minute waiting for an answer, “Are you up?” 

“Yeah, I'm up.” You don’t turn around to face him like you normally would, you keep your eyes on the wall. 

“I was thinking we could go to your favourite cafe today? The one with the-” You interrupt him and turn around to face him, sitting cross legged. 

“It’s okay Bucky.” He’s confused about what you mean so he stays quiet hoping you'll continue which you do. “I heard you talking with Sam and Olivia..” Bucky’s eyes nearly pop out of his head. 

“You heard us?” Shit. He wanted it to be a surprise. 

“I did. So can you just do it now? Get it over and done with, so we can both move on.”

“What? You want me to do it right now?” 

“Yes. Please, just do it.” You knew you were coming across harsh but you needed this torture to end. 

“Erm. Okay..”  He stood up out of bed and walked over to his dresser, and started to dig through one of his drawers. “This isn’t really how I pictured doing this and I thought you’d be more excited but..” Excited? Why would you be excited over losing him? Once he finds what he was looking for he walks back over and brings himself down to his knees beside the bed. 

“Bucky what-” 

“My turn to talk doll..” What the hell was happening. “Y/n, you have been the best thing in my life since the very first day I met you. It might sound cliche but you’re the missing piece I always thought I’d never find. I know this might seem fast but..” He pulls a small box from behind his back. Oh my god. He was proposing. What. You wanted to stop him but the words wouldn’t come out, it was like your mouth was glued shut. “.. I don’t think I could ever feel happier than I do right now with you but It would mean the absolute world to me if you-” 

“Wait!! Stop!” Bucky’s smile dropped. He’d been scared to ask you but he didnt think rejection was actually a possibility. 

“What?” You stood up and started pacing back and forth, panic setting in. 

“Oh my god Bucky. Stand up!” He stood up slowly and closed the ring box, the loud click making things even realer. “Bucky, what were you talking about with Sam and Olivia?” 

“I thought you heard me? I was telling them I wanted to propose, I want to spend the rest of my time with you. This definitely isn't how I wanted it to go. I’m sorry if I.. I thought you’d want this too.” 

“Oh my god Bucky. I am so sorry. I’m so sorry, I messed up.” You were beginning to lose control of your breathing and your eyes were starting to burn, you were still pacing back and forth. “I thought you wanted to end things, I thought you were done with us.”

“What?! Why did you think that?” He had never been so confused in his whole life. 

“You told them you wanted more, and.. that I wasn’t like other girls.. and..” The tears had escaped now and it was hard to talk properly. “and you said you couldn’t do this a-anymore.” 

“Oh baby.” Bucky walks over to you and pulls you gently to the bed, he sits next to you but keeps one of his arms wrapped around you. “I did say those things but not in the way you think. Did you listen to the rest of what we said?” You shook your head, which only made your growing headache worse. “When I said I wanted more I was talking about marrying you, in case you haven't figured that out by the -I don’t even know if i can call that a proposal- but doll, I want to marry you, I wanted to show you how much I love you and how serious I was about us.” He tries to turn himself slightly so he can see your face properly. 

“I was right when I said you aren’t like other girls, I don’t want you to be like anyone else. I want you to be you, my girl. The girl I fell in love with the first day I met you. I’ve been planning to propose for a while but I couldn’t keep it in any longer, that’s what I meant when I said I couldn’t do this anymore. I couldn’t wait any longer to ask you. I love you so much, doll.” 

Oh god. You were so embarrassed. You had gotten everything so wrong. “Bucky, I'm so sorry. I didn’t, I don’t want things to end with us. I’m so sorry.” 

“It’s okay baby, really it’s okay. I just wished you’d talked to me about it. You can come to me about anything, you know what right?” 

“I do, I promise. I just panicked. I thought I was going to lose you.” Your breathing had started to slow down and you felt like you had control over it again.

“Nope. You’re never getting rid of me. I love you too much for that,” He brought his face down to yours and brushed your noses together before wrapping his arms tightly around you. “And I missed you way too much to ever let go of you again.” 

“I love you too, Buck, so much.. but you’re squeezing me.” For the first time since you heard their conversation you had a real smile on your face and you laughed at him holding you so tight. You were happy. Bucky was happy. 

“There’s the laugh I missed so much. Oh and,” he pulled away just for a second to look into your eyes, placing each of his hands on your shoulders and with a serious voice spoke again, “don’t for one second think that’s how my real proposal will go, I’m gonna make it special, just like you deserve.” he pulls you into his arms and lays you both down.

“I can’t wait, but before you do that..”

“Mhmm?”

“Can we go to the shelter today? I think it’s about time we got that cat.”

“You have no idea how happy that makes me doll” 

Maybe it wasn’t healthy how much yours and Bucky’s happiness relied on each other but for you two it worked. Things were perfect. 

[inkskinned]

im gonna start a fight; and, at the same time, i need you to take this in the most good-faith way possible, but:

videos that involve body-checking and intentionally (and uncritically) show a mealplan of an unhealthy number of calories are just a revamped version of pro-ana food diaries.

and yeah, i know there's arguments. i address some of them under the cut. but at the end of the day, we're just coming back to romanticizing mental illness; we've just found a better platform for it.

this is already something we've done. we knew it was wrong and tried to stop it. and tbh. it just wasn't enough.

there are people who argue "well, what if you have an eating disorder, you can't help it if you don't eat!" except that as someone with an ED; we are not infants. we know what we're doing. part of having an ED is that you are like, maybe too self-aware. even if we can't help our own food choices, we don't need to fucking romanticize the disorder - something we've been warning you about since 2013. there are hours of setup, filming, and editing that go into these videos. they do not happen to fall into place randomly. there is a reason they are pieced together to be beautiful, bright, inspiring.

there's this woman who pretty much only posts daily plans under a normal amount of calories, and everyone defends her saying but it's better than nothing! and i'm like. except she opens those with images of her showing off her body and provides no context in the video or caption that suggests that she believes what she's doing is unhealthy. she has hundreds of thousands of followers on a platform designed for young kids and teens. i refuse to believe that by accident her content just happens to be cheery advice on "healthy" versions of starving.

for any other symptom of mental illness, we would be incredibly enraged by this kind of placid acceptance of a "tips and tricks" fast-start guide. imagine if people posted pink & pretty videos saying "best places to cut yourself" as if it was a fucking storytime. we, as a society, are so fucking fatphobic that we would rather accept blatantly harmful displays of self harm than admit that we are obsessed with a hyper-thin body type.

i am not suggesting someone never talks about their disorder. i talk about mine. actually, it's a plot point in my book.

here's the difference: i recognize it's a fucking mental illness. i am very careful to never mention a specific weight, eating pattern, or calorie plan. i always make sure to position it as something that ruined my fucking life. i do not put cheery music in the background and hearts and sparkles over my worst moments. i do not film it in bright light. i do not start each passage with an image of a thin body followed by "here's how to look like her."

eating disorders should not be framed as aspirational. and the problem is that society worships the "after" image, so long as you don't get too sick. there is a reason so many people who quit being "influencers" will later admit - i wasn't eating well that whole time; an obsession with food was completely destroying my life.

we let any uncredited, uncertified person write the most backwards, fucked up shit about how to get the body you desire! because the underlying, secret belief is: well, at least they're thin! and the real thing that fucking gets me each time - they make fucking money off of it. their irresponsibility and societal harm literally pays off for them.

"why do you care so much." "don't like it don't look." "so what if people experiment with new ways of thinking of food?"

thank you for asking. we're about to get extremely personal. it's because when i was 18 i discovered "thinspiration"/"thinspo." and it absolutely influenced, shaped, and codified my pre-existing eating disorder. i went from having some troubling habits and traits to being incredibly unwell within what felt like a matter of days. there were actual pages designed to train me on how to have an ED correctly. it was all so suddenly easy. i was sick; and the nature of the illness meant - i wanted to be sicker.

it takes an average of 7 years for a person to fully recover. i know this personally - even now, 10 years from the worst of it, i still fucking struggle. i am so much happier now and i eat what i want and i literally don't think about food at all (19 year old me would shudder) and yet - i still fucking know the calories of plain toast with butter.

an eating disorder is one of the deadliest types of mental illness. over 1 in 4 people with an ED will attempt suicide.

and i'm sorry. i just do not see the exchange rate of "high rate of engagement" versus "the value of a human life."

[the1975attheirverybest]

What I mean with she’s not like the other influencers I meant that she doesn’t commodify her life like the others, I mean there are certain influencers that literally share everything they do, including how many time they piss during the day. I’m not a fan nor a hater of her, I just noticed that she could easily share more things about her private life to gain more popularity, especially now that she’s dating Matty and she literally doesn’t. Also i think it’s safe to say that she does more things as a model than as an influencer these days? Like she has done quite a good number of campaigns and walked the runway for a good number of designers, so idk it feels a bit reductive to say that she’s simply an influencer. All that being said I know that she comes from a wealthy family and I think she knows that since she never made a mystery of her origins. I genuinely take at her face value and I only pay attention to her when people share things on twitter since I don’t even follow her on instagram (that being said, I want to specify that I understand the criticism of Matty’s love life, but at the same time I don’t because even if his choices are not ideal, I still think that I don’t him personally and I never will, so if he’s happy with Gabbriette so be it. I think it was way more hypocritical of him dating TS last year since he publicly criticised her lack of substance and her approach to music from a business point of view). Again, I mean no hate to you or any of your anons, I just think this is a interesting conversation to have since it’s very nuanced

Yeah. I get what you mean!

Okay, I think that the way that we’ve been talking maybe conflates different types of social media use so let me be more specific:

I think that being an “influencer” isn’t just type of job. A lot depends on the platform and what your “niche” is or whatever. We won’t go into the nitty gritty but suffice it to say Gabbriette is not a “day in the life” tiktok influencer who has to put out 5-8 videos a day with stuff like morning routines and evening routines. And “here’s where I went today” and “get unready with me” she’s an Instagram model. The can’t be an irl model (this is not me shitting on her btw this is just fact. She’s too short for it and stuff like that) so she had to tailor her content to that. Naturally she’s gonna post about clothes and jewelry and stuff. This is not because she understands the moral depravity of monetizing your entire existence for clicks and stuff. This is simply because she has to be brand friendly for her type of work. Brands won’t wanna work with her if she acted a certain way or posted certain types of content.

Her job hinges upon her being aspirational not relatable.

It only takes a few moments of thinking when you look at how she used to look and act during her stint in Nasty Cherry vs now. She’s just hopping on the succubus chic thing rn. Once that’s fades, she’ll hop on some other trend.

Being an IG model still depends on those qualities that I find dangerous, the foster self-centeredness, exploiting people’s parasocial relationship with her in this aspirational way of wanting to be like her so they buy her clothes off depop or buy whatever she promotes or copy her eyebrows or whatever, is extremely materialistic, and depends by and large upon being brand-friendly, being likeable (literally and figuratively, she needs people to hit like on her content), and all those gross things that make this a problematic career at best and a downright evil one at worst. Again, all which matty has come out staunchly against.

There are reasons that not all influencers are content creators and not all content creators are influencers. I’m not saying you can’t have an online presence and be a morally conscious person. You just can’t have the kind of presence that she does and be a self aware person. Most content creators who care about social economics and justice have hard lines about brand deals and what sponsorships or collabs to take and stuff like that. That’s why they can never be an influencer. Gabbriette definitely is one. She’s one that has a niche in food and fashion so she’s obviously not gonna make other types of day to day stuff. But that’s not out of the goodness of her heart that’s just how being an IG model works.

[shit-talk-turner]

I don’t necessarily think mods agree with every bullshit anon says. I know you don’t. But you choose what’s gonna be the topic of the day and it’s highley opinion-forming. (mostly negative) You don’t say much and still influence others. Provoke and wait. Share and get other people to spread it. „Smart”. That way it’s never your fault. „Oopsie”. No remorse whatsoever even though you’re responsible for a lot of weird comments on a different platform and some really creepy profiles PRETENDING to be „fan accounts”. (they’re getting blocked for a reason, another long story) Because being annoying on here is not enough. But what can you do? Admit it? It’s easier to shift the blame and call people crazy. Oversensitive, of course. Looks like someone who cares is a big turn off you. 😜 Into bad boys much? Get well soon, honey. (Sorry, bad joke, we don’t romanticize it here, I know….unless…)Anyway. A lot of blogs are problematic but this one is the final boss? Probably the most active one? Not sure. But it’s famous for sure. Even for people who forgot Tumblr existed. Apparently it’s not just „a shit chat” here?

Manipulating younger, more naive fans it’s easy. A bunch of fake screenshots is all you need. Little minions will eat that shit up and spread it for you.

What a hero. Girl „ended” racism but invented a whole new genre of misogyny. Did we just end old misogyny to replace it with a modern, more subtle, yet still effective one? Like it never went away, you just got better at hiding it. Eh. If you want others to grow and apologize for their mistakes, how about you do something different once and use your platform for good? Boo. Boring 🤣 I know I’m crazy for asking that. You’re clearly way more influential than you claim to be. So own it. How about one thing that will make someone smile, for a change. SINCE YOU’RE SO OBSSESED WITH SMILES. Such a waste of potential. Smh.

Also tell me, how is it that you’re always against taking it from here to harass people on other platforms? And little minions still come back here with „Hey. I sent them a DM.” LOL! Saying that only out of guilt and then again, my personal fav: „I didn’t advise that.” Wow, thank you but it’s clearly not working and you’re aware of it as it’s been proven many times before and that, right here, makes you a part of the problem. Btw. Being able to read someone like an open book by one facial expression would be a great superpower. I absolutely agree! I guess we all dream of that one from time to time. We can joke about it, that’s for sure. But if you take joking/humor to like, seriously diagnose? a „toxic relationship”, now that’s something I’d call a stretch. Sorry, I laugh every time you say but they’re just „famous people”so it’s okay - that’s even worse. Maybe with people you actually know in real life you’d be at least slightly more accurate, so you’re only digging yourself a deeper hole, eh. Now say you don’t do that, look up the comments some people leave and tell me you never „kinda agreed” on that here. Yup. I’m not saying this blog is the worst thing that happened to humanity just because I say some things here 🤣 Yeah, there are bigger problems. Lol. I think the root of the issue here is that a lot of you are desperate for answers of things you’ll never get answers for which only leads to frustration. :(

A friend somewhere posts a comment and you’re all like „it has to be trolling”, if a friendly, wholesome, completely harmless comment is trolling to you - then what the fuck is this? Everything that’s NOT cruel to her can’t be real, smh. If you wanna troll, make it clear it’s a science fiction blog then? We are all hypocrites to some degree, yeah. I’ve made peace with that long ago. But the level here…. PS. delete your little #alexturnerwouldyoumarryme cute, innocent hashtag from all the „fan” accounts you have while you still can. Cause who knows(JOKE) maybe, one day, you’ll date him(no) and his whole fanbase will try to cancel you for it. 🤣Well, not cancel-cancel but them twisting it and using it against you at some point is inevitable. I think you often use this one here to prove…dishonesty? Whatever. All of the above is just the tip of the iceberg 🤣 TLDR.

So this is the last time we’re going to post your mania rants so if you want to continue this discussion we can do it off anon or you can start your own shit talk blog about us to post your manifestos. We appreciate that you think we’re the big bad boss of the AM underground or something, but we really don’t have that much power. There is no manipulation or cancelling happening here, just gossiping. We don’t care what other peoples opinions are as long as we can all play nice and keep it to some light hearted shit talk. We do not hate Louise like you seem to think we do and I guess you missed how often we do defend her (or delete unnecessarily hateful, disgusting asks about her). It seems you are genuinely misunderstanding a lot that is happening here or mistaking us for fans elsewhere or accounts elsewhere and are clearly having some kind of obsessive episode where we are concerned. We recommend you step back and do something else with your time because this is absolutely not healthy.

[abrieenthusiast]

i think its very funny that the heartstopper fandom, on pretty much all platforms, constantly create worst case scenarios based on nothing for just about anything that could happen in season 3.

the following ive heard/remember vaguely hearing (note: some have differing levels of understandability but most are very low)

charlies mental health storyline (aka his main character arc this season?) is gonna be reduced to make room for more characters...i get that this was a fear last season but judging how that just. didnt happen and this storyline is kinda the primary plot of the season also alice oseman adressed this a while back saying "idk how i would do that so ur good"

general thing about how are they gonna "squeeze" vol 4 and 5 into one season....if theres one thing the show can do its pace really well, also season one took place over 5 months and that was season ONE so im gonna go out on a limb and say its gonna be fine (also you guys really dont realize how fast paced the books are dontcha)

imogen will "take over" tara's role as nicks female friend....okay first he can have more than one female friend in fact he has a lot of them?? second this was another fear for season 2 that DID NOT END UP BEING A THING so CALM DEOWN

general things about other minor characters being in season 3 will take away the main plot...AGAIN THIS WAS A SEASON 2 THING WHEN NAOMI AND FELIX AND JAMES WERE ANNOUNCED AND GUESS WHAT IM ABOUT TO SAY???? oh and this was purely because aunt diane was cast...speaking of which-

aunt diane will take the place of nicks mom figure?...this only came up because of the haley atwell casting but tbh i think this is just a funny bit about how minor characters like nicks mom are played by very famous actors??

aunt diane will sub in for sarah in the beach scene....this was because there werent any pictures or reports of olivia when they were filming in mallorca/the big crew wrap photo? yeah neither was haley? or jack? just very odd reasoning?

olivia coleman couldn't be in this season because of scheduling conflict....i kid you not the only reason this is a thing is because she was never seen or reported on sets during shooting, which was also the case for season 2 so i dont know why this is a thing?

[australiablog]

24/7

Woke up quite early today so I just scrolled on TikTok a bit before getting up. I’ve got a Whitsunday island cruise today, and it leaves from airlie port, about 800m from my hotel. I wasn’t really sure where it was so I set off at a bit after 6. It was pretty straightforward so I was ridiculously early. I just sat down underneath a shelter on some benches and suddenly there was a massive rain shower. My phone is saying all sun so apparently the weather is as predictable over here as it is at home. I got my ticket once we could enter and I grabbed myself a coffee. I’m not having breakfast because the sign on the outside said that the sea temperature is 24 degrees (which is warmer than the outside temperature) and medium to rough seas. So I’m just drinking something so I can take my motion sickness tablets. Boarding was at 7:05 and I got a pink band because I have an all day cruise. I was told to go upstairs and wait inside. The first stop was half an hour in on daydream island. The way there was interesting with sun and showers and lots of rainbows. The weather is gonna be stupid today, I just know it. The next quick stop was Hamilton island after another 30 min or so. Once we picked up the people getting on this ferry we headed for open water, and Jesus motherfucking Christ that wasn’t just rough seas, that was the worst thing ever. If the crew starts handing out water and barf bags you know it’s about to be shit. It was a passage we had to cross to get to the other side of the island. It was so bad, the boat was violently shaking and there was a weightless drop sometimes with a particularly large wave. I was honestly sick as hell. Thank god it only took about 30 min to get over it. Although one might say that was 29,30 min too long. I was really glad I didn’t eat this morning because I would have joined the multitude of people around me that were throwing up. We all got different wristbands and since I'm on the pink tour we have got all day, so only minutes after we got back to calmer water our group was going on the tiny boat they were putting in the water. Me thinking it would only get better from there on out, yeah no the tiny boat was just as bad. I was green by the time we got to the beach and extremely glad I was about to be boat free for a bit. We are doing a tiny walk first thing this morning, before we started it we had a few minutes to explore the beach. I was walking along the dunes and the view was honestly spectacular. So pretty. The two Belgians that were behind me on the plane yesterday are on this trip too and while we were chatting among ourselves you could see people looking at us with confusion. It didn’t take long for them to ask what language we were speaking. The walk itself were tiny steps up to the top of the hill overlooking the beach below us. On the intersection of the back to the beach, to the bay or to the lookout we all left our bags so we didn’t have to bring them to the top. Once to the top the swirls of turquoise water with all different blues in there around the sandbanks you could see below us is the reason I wanted to come here again. So incredibly beautiful. There are 3 different platforms that go in a loop, I got pictures and a few videos on all of them. It was pretty windy but I was regretting my long trousers on the walk, I did bring shorts so as soon as I got back to my backpack I switched. The bay was really beautiful as well, unfortunately I didn’t see any turtles, not by the lack of trying that’s for sure. The boat to the place where we can spend our afternoon and have lunch was pretty eventful too. I sat in the front of the boat so I could be in the sun, and not 3 minutes in, a gigantic wave splashed over the boat, not once, not twice but three times. I was soaked and ofcourse I am wearing jeans shorts. Thankfully it’s not cold, although the wind is a bit chilly. When we got to the beach and I stood up my entire butt was wet. So I took my jeans off and let them dry in the sun.

[rosepetalsthings]

Wft is that post? Your team is bad and you will not win so don't try. Huh? You can't go into a game with that kind of mindset. I don't think they ment it that way, but they could have worded this 10x better. You probably have noticed, but there have been an increasing amount of people that want him removed from mcc for being competitive. After mcc 15, tumblr became just as bad as twitter. The subreddit is also starting to become wierd. Idk man, the CCs are fine. If Scott places them there thats not for us to decide.

Yeah, it was just a super weird post, like I get that they probably aren't the strongest teams (although let's be real here Dreams team may not be the most cracked but it's pretty solid. CPK does pretty alright overall, and did do pretty well last MCC. Bad has only been in like one other MCC from my knowledge so can't trust the stats and even then he's still a good player. And I love finnister so there) but like saying that there's no point in trying, and what's more that they won't manage to break top 15 individually?? Man you can be sure they all are gonna be grinding and trying their best.

Like I get that their point was that they should focus on having fun first and winning second but what a bad way of saying it.

And yeah trust me I've noticed the uptake of people wanting Dream and Sapnap gone cause they're competitive (which I still think is stupid because ultimately it's a competitive event and most are trying to win)

People really can't trust Scott to, y'know, team players together and handle issues huh.

[shurisneakers]

if you're taking ideas for harmless drabbles, i'd love to see one of bucky on one of those dates he mentioned and reader's shenanigans. if you aren't, feel free to ignore this!

a/n: are we really going to let a word limit define what a drabble is? is the vibe and spirit not enough? i say this bc this is 5.7k words long im so sorry. also hey thank you to everyone who piped in with their knowledge of violent geese and how apartment security works in new york!! also thanks to my bby @spiderrpcrker for reading this and telling me to publish this bc i wasnt going to fkjghfkj

warning: swearing, bad luck, dates, frustrated bucky, anxiety, mentions of gore but like only a sentence

here’s my ko-fi if you’d like to support my writing <333

Catch up with the rest of the series here: Harmless Masterlist

Bucky returns only two weeks later. His mission lasted longer than expected and all he wants is to lie down and sleep for forty eight hours straight.

“FRIDAY?” he mumbles, kicking off his shoes. His jacket had already been discarded by his bedroom door when he walked in.

“Yes, Sergeant Barnes?”

“How are ya?” He doesn’t miss a beat in asking, even though he’s exhausted.

“As good as ever. Did you have a successful mission?”

“If by successful you mean one sprained limb instead of two, then yeah.” He wasn’t really cribbing. His ankle was already starting to heal anyway and it was worth the roundhouse kick to a Nazi's face. “Do I have anything scheduled for this weekend?”

“You have a meeting on your calendar scheduled for this Saturday.”

“Could you send a text to Y/N and ask if we can push it to the next day?” His muscles feel sore and God, he could definitely use a hot shower but all of that becomes secondary the minute he feels the sheets under him.

“Would you like me to reschedule the other one as well?”

“What’s that?” He opens one eye in confusion. “There’s another one?”

“It’s on Sunday. You’ve labelled it ‘date’.”

Ah, fuck.

“Would you like me to change it?” FRIDAY never sounds like she’s judging him, which is nice. It also reminds him about how she, as an AI, can’t judge him, which is a rude wake-up call to how he doesn’t have friends.

“No,” his voice is muffled against the pillow, “no, let it be. Where is it again?”

“You’ve only specified diner, Sergeant Barnes.”

Public space, daytime, plenty of escape routes. Good on his less delirious self for selecting a diner.

“Thanks, FRIDAY.” Now that he’s a little more relaxed, he can feel himself slip in and out of consciousness.

“One last thing," her automated voice commands his attention again. "Y/N replied. She says sure and to take care.”

“Yay.” Not even a second later he’s out like a light.

____

“Did you bring me any souvenirs?” Is the first thing he hears as he marches into your lair.

“What could I possibly get you?”

“A postcard, a t-shirt.” You don’t look up from your tinkering.

“Decapitated finger, used bullets,” he continues, “cement blocks.”

“Ew.” You snap the lid shut on the thing you’re working on, spinning around on your chair. "That's not nearly romantic enough."

“That’s all you’re going to get from a Russian underground bunker.” He does a mini jog up the stairs of the platform to where you are.

“Does the finger have a ring at lea- oh hello?” You raise an eyebrow at the sight of him. “You look different.”

He peers down. The outfit was still all black. As always.

“Not your clothes, dummy,” you interrupt, making him look back at you. “Your face. What’d you do?”

He unconsciously raises a hand to his cheek.

“Did you wash your face? Is that it?” you squint at him. “Has it been a few months since the last time?”

“Wow, you’re so funny,” he drawls sarcastically.  “Top tier comedian right there.”

“No wait, it’s the beard.” You snap your fingers in realisation, completely ignoring his comment. “You trimmed it.”

“So what if I did?” He leans on your table.

“You going somewhere?” you ask, elastic snapping against your hands as you remove your gloves.

“It’s none of your busi-”

“Hold on a second.” A sly smile begins to make its way onto your face. “Are you going on a date, Bucky Barnes?”

His comeback dies down in his throat. That didn’t take you very long for you to figure out.

“I’m right, aren’t I?” You look smug, to say the least.

“Shut up.” A ray of light glistening distracts him. He traces it to the thing you were working on earlier.

“Where are you guys going?” You cross your arm across your chest, a small smirk on your face.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” It’s a silver box, engraved intricately with swirls that, when he observes carefully, looks like a skull. Wow, terrifying.

“I’m literally asking you.”

“What are those?” He shifts the conversation towards a more productive angle instead.

“Evil in a box and some other stuff.” You shrug offhandedly. “Is it a lunch date or just coffee?”

“Like Pandora’s Box?”

“A discount version, sure,” you confirmed impatiently. “Stop changing the topic, listen to me.”

He tilts his head, waiting for you to continue.

“Do you need a chaperone?” The sincerity in your voice for such a bullshit question has him scoffing.

“Good God- no, I do not need a chaperone. I’m 106 years old, I can go out unsupervised.” He reaches over and plucks the box off your table.

“Sir, you’re a geriatric."

“What are those?” He points to a few ray odd ray guns.

“Minor stuff you don’t have to worry about right now.”

He shakes the box in his hand. “What’s gonna happen if I open this?”

“Very bad things,” you whispered ominously before your volume returns to normal. “How’d you meet this person? Online?”

“She’s Natasha’s friend.” He turns the box over, seeing a small latch at the side. “What bad things?”

“Bad luck and misery. Don’t play with it, it’s dangerous.” You pull the box away from him. “Aw, is it a blind date?”

“Why do you care so much?” he shoots back, tugging the box back towards him.

“Just lookin’ out for you, Bucko,” you huff, adjusting your grip on your device. “Need to keep my favourite senior citizen safe.”

“I have a vibranium arm.” Whose force he could use to grab the box once and for all, but wasn’t. “I think I’ll be fine.”

“What if she has one too, huh? Then what?”

“She doesn’t.” As far as he knows, he’s the only one alive with a metal appendage made out of the strongest metal in the world. That could very well change by tomorrow but he's keeping the title for now.

“But what if she does? I swear to- stop trying to take the box!” You pull a little more forcefully, but he doesn’t relent.

“I want this to get over before this evening.”

“What time’s your date?”

“Why do you care?” He’s sure anyone who saw the dumb tug-of-war you both were playing would just automatically assume he was an absolute manchild, not an Avenger.

“Because.” You don’t explain further. “Tell me what time your date is, you weirdo.”

“Five o’clock, now let go.”

“Fine,” you say, suddenly loosening your grip. Clearly, it doesn't make much of a difference since he isn't struggling to keep his balance from the sudden loss of force.

“Fine.” He clears his throat, straightening up. 

You don’t say anything. He doesn’t either.

A putrid smell creeps into his nose, one all too similar to spoiled milk and decaying seaweed. He has to physically stop himself from gagging.

“Have a good day.” You smile and lean far back. Too far. It looks like you're almost going to fall out of the chair.

Through the tears that are threatening to line his eyelids, he looks down at the box whose latch you somehow managed to lift, leaving the box open.

“What the fuck is this?” He coughs, swatting at the air in front of him to clear it.

“I told you; bad luck in a box.”

“You can’t scientifically create bad luck, that’s bullshit.” He tosses the box back onto your table. You watch it slide past you, not making any effort to stop it. “What is it really?”

“I’m not lying.” You pull open a drawer, brandishing a small table fan that you set down beside you. “If you open it, you’re going to have terrible luck for the day.”

He glowers at you when you turn the fan on, forcing the fumes back towards him.

“Besides, that’s all I was doing today.” You kick your feet up. “So you can leave now.”

He doesn’t care if you’re lying about not having anything else to do today. You could burn down the world if you wanted to but he needs to take a stupid shower. Again.

“You’re the fuckin’ worst.” He tries airing out his shirt, hoping that the smell would dissipate as soon as possible.

“Have fun on your date, sarge!” you encourage him as he stalks out of the lair. “Remember to wrap it befo-”

He turns it into a sprint before you can finish.

____

Six hours later and he’s absolutely convinced he fucked up.

He isn’t used to having his weekends free.

He realises that this is the first time in months that he’s actually stepped out of the Tower for something that wasn’t directly mission-related. He should probably get some air. Touch some grass. See the sun.

His shirt thankfully manages to rid itself of the odour from the dumb box so he didn’t have to go take a shower. With nothing much planned and a few hours to spare, he heads to the coffee shop instead.

It’s a small place, bustling and alive with a crowd of people. They have a little bookshelf that usually is full of books donated by patrons, free for anyone to read.

The barista smiles at him. The coffee costs more than his high school education. He awkwardly smiles back.

He’s not a regular, but they’ve seen him enough times to know that he usually asks for black coffee in a to-go cup, later adding a sugar or two according to his own taste. They're nice to him, occasionally throwing in a cookie or something on the house. He can't tell if it's because of the Avenger status or the sizeable tip he leaves.

He picks up a random book from the shelf, fully intending not to read it but to just sit there and think. The book acted as a shield for his resting bitch face, resting murder face and his resting rage face. More often than not, a good combination of the three.

He sets the coffee down at the corner table he manages to nab in a quick second, along with the two sachets of sugar.

“Is this seat taken?” Someone asks from beside him. He earnestly shakes his head in a ‘no’, gesturing for them to take it.

They give him a quick thanks and drag the chair away from his table.

He does a quick overlook of the book he picked up.

The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot.

Well, now he’s too anxious to put it back. YA fiction it is.

He reaches for the sugar while glossing over the summary. He reaches a little further when it doesn’t come to his hand immediately, blindly running his fingers across the table.

Bucky peeks over the book, eyebrows knitting together when he notices that they’re missing.

He was sure he picked it up.

He looks underneath the table. It wasn’t there, neither under his seat. Strange, but okay. He picks up the book and the cup, walking back to the station to grab two sugars.

This time he makes sure to tuck it into his pocket, double-checking before going back to his table.

Which was now occupied. He wanted to groan.

His mind automatically reverts back to the box from that morning.

“Come on,” he scoffs quietly to himself. It was a coincidence. “Get yourself together.”

“A seat at the counter just cleared up,” the barista from earlier offers when she sees him standing in the middle of the store.

See? Good luck.

He shoots her a grateful look, venturing over to the barstool to take his place. It’s not the most comfortable, but then again, he wasn’t planning to stay there for very long.

He empties the sugar into the coffee, stirring slowly before opening a random page in the book.

He takes a long sip, ignoring how hot the drink was.

He chokes immediately. Because either he was losing his mind or his order had somehow got switched from ‘no sugar’ to ‘diabetes in a cup’.

He takes another small sip and his face immediately twists in disgust. Definitely too sweet. The sweetener he added only made it worse.

He catches the eye of the barista. She looks on in concern.

“Is everything okay?”

Fuck.

He’s not one to make a scene. He just wants to live as imperceptibly as he could.

“Yep.” The sweetness sticks to the back of his throat. “All good.”

He just closes his eyes and downs the rest of it without thinking twice, trying to hide the grimace in his face. He gives her a weak thumbs up. She doesn't look convinced.

He leaves the shop soon after, hands shoved in his pocket. Maybe he could go sit by the lake at Central Park, watch the clouds. It reminded Bucky of the lake in front of his hut in Wakanda and the hours he'd sit in front of it, feet dipped into the water as his goats fed. He misses it.

He makes a sharp turn at a corner, still thinking about his options when his ankle abruptly twists under him.

He stumbles rather ungracefully, almost hitting the ground, but manages to save himself through the newly built up immunity he has towards falling thanks to all his encounters with you.

His gaze lands on his hardcore combat boots. Their laces had come undone.

Now he just knew that was horseshit. He always double knots them; they had never loosened in the past before.

The box.

He shoves the thought out of his head, crouching down to tie them again. He tugs on them to make sure they’re secure before standing up again.

Central Park is a few blocks away but he’s glad he didn’t bring his bike. The weather was rather nice and the wind in his hair felt good.

He wanders around the park for a while, looking for the lake. He pauses at a board with a map of the park on it, assessing how far it was.

Once he's ascertained which path to go towards, he turns on his heel to go.

He fucking trips again.

“Are you serious?” he says furiously under his breath. “Cut it out.”

He’s half-convinced that he should tie it around his ankle like a sexy lace-up set of heels. He ties a triple knot this time, glares at it until he’s sure it’s fine and checks to see if anyone saw him humiliate himself.

Only a person on a nearby bench who looked like they were passed out drunk, given that their hoodie and sunglasses clad self was slumped over.

No witnesses. No 'You won't BELIEVE what the Winter Soldier did! Critics say it's his biggest blunder yet!' articles the next day on social media.

He manages to make it to the lake in one piece and no more falls, partly because he keeps his eyes fixed on his shoes to ensure no fuckery occurs.

There are a few people rowing and plenty of others lining the bank at scattered locations. There’s a mom and her kid at the place he ends up. She sends him a small smile in greeting and he returns the favour.

There’s a secluded bench that he takes a place on, letting out a small sigh. If he ignores the traffic and the skateboarders and the people in general, it’s actually kind of peaceful.

There are geese and their little goslings swimming around the water close to the shore. Maybe he should have brought some birdseed. Or kale.

The kid beside him is busy fashioning something out of leaves, only occasionally erupting into giggles when it doesn't pan out. His mom watches him fondly, pointing at twigs he could use. Everything seems kind of picture-perfect and his body automatically relaxes, easing further into the seat and closing his eyes for a second.

Until there's a large splash and loud distressed honking. He whips his head around to find the same kid staring straight ahead at the goose with a wide grin. His mother curses quietly, picking herself up off the ground and grabbing his hand, half chastising him for throwing something at an animal and half urging him to walk faster.

The goose turns to Bucky. With no one else to blame for the sudden attack, it logically launches itself at him. His smile drops.

He gets up in a rush. The dumb bird nearly comes for his head, but he deflects with his metal arm.

“I didn’t even do anything.” He swats at it swiftly, trying not to cause any real damage. The goose, understandably, does not speak English.

He flinches when one of them bites at his knee. He can punt it to the sun but he doesn’t want to.

“Stop that.” He sticks his hand out to shove the stupid thing away, retreating back to the road. “Jesus, why are you so aggressive?”

Among the barrage of feathers showering on him, he prays his damn shoelace doesn’t unravel as he shields his head with one arm, the other fending himself while he moves hurriedly away.

The goose honks angrily at him. He scowls at it, not exactly pleased with the reminder that these fucking overgrown ducks were constantly bloodthirsty.

It doesn’t leave him alone till he’s significantly away from where he was sitting. He wants to call it profanity but that’d probably piss it off more.

The box and its effects were definitely starting to feel real.

Fuck it, no more day out for him. The best plan he can think of is to just go to the diner he’s supposed to meet his date at.

The waiter greets him with a courteous nod, which Bucky can only imagine was the best he could muster when a dishevelled 200-pound man walks in covered in goose feathers and irritation.

He won't admit that he’s too scared to eat lunch at this point because he can’t rule out food poisoning. He spends the next two hours on his phone playing Fruit Ninja and plucking feathers that accented his all-black outfit.

Several glasses of water later and a second before he’s about to beat his high score, someone taps on his shoulder, breaking him out of his concentration.

Motherfu-

He clenches his eye shut, inhaling deeply before turning around.

“James?”

“Hey, yeah, that’s me.” Bucky almost falls over the table with how fast he stands up, clearly underestimating his size. “Leah?”

“Hi.” She smiles and he finds himself smiling nervously along with her.

“Hi.” He steps out to pull out her chair for her and she laughs. "Nice to meet you."

“How long have you been waiting here?” she asks while setting down her bag.

“Around ten minutes.” He clears his throat to hopefully hide the fact that he was lying through his teeth.

“Just give me a second, I need to tell my friend I reached,” Leah pulls out her phone and he nods.

“Another glass of water for you?” The waiter seems less enthusiastic about Bucky’s 8th refill.

“Yes,” he answers, hoping he doesn’t call him out on it, “please.”

“You must be really dehydrated."

Bucky turns to look at him slowly. “I like the taste.”

He can’t really blame the guy. Bucky’s been there for hours without ordering anything solid, just leaching off their free water and complimentary bread basket.

“So, James.” She tosses her phone back into her bag, leaning forward on her palms easily. “Tell me about yourself.”

He had rehearsed this a million times. He could do this.

“I, uh,-”

“Menu?” Okay, so someone clearly had a vendetta against him.

“Thank you.” She takes it with a smile.

His morning debacle with the coffee flashes through his mind. Suddenly the idea of a diner didn’t seem so smart.

However, she’s already placed her order and George is standing beside him expectantly, daring him to ask for another glass of water, so he places his usual order and hopes that your stupid bad luck thing wore off.

He quickly learns that his date is laid back, and it isn’t hard to fall into a rhythm with her even though she’s the one asking most of the questions.

“How’d you meet Nat?” Is his attempt at one.

“She used to come in for lunch every week at the place I work.” Leah leans back in her chair. “She can really handle her alcohol.”

He’d be worried about Nat day drinking if he didn’t know about her complete inability to get drunk. She might as well have been downing glasses of lemonade.

“Yeah, she’s-” Intimidating, scary, cool “-really something.”

“She mentioned that you like movies.”  He definitely spends a lot of time watching them. “You got any recommendations?”

It’s easier to figure out how different things are or how much he missed out over the years through them. He’s glad he sat out the early 2000s, judging by their fashion sense and hairstyles.

He's watched several movies over the past few months, a few of them critically acclaimed and others who were just there for the cult following.

But now everything goes blank and the only thing that he can remember are the biopics made about Steve that were somehow hilarious for gifting him the mental image of Freddie Prinze Jr. dressed in the stars and stripes, and highly distressing for the number of historical inaccuracies. Contrary to popular belief, Stevie did not, in fact, consider running for president after he took up the shield, nor did he start his own bar chain.

He can’t name Oh Captain, My Captain starring Channing Tatum as his favourite movie on his first date and hope to make a good first impression.

“Despicable Me was kinda fun.” He wants to kill himself. “I mean, it’s the last one I saw.”

Her face twists in mild disgust, but he can tell it isn't ill-intentioned. “It's a good movie, but God, that just gave me some intense flashbacks to my aunt’s Facebook page. Don’t think I can look at a minion ever again.”

He sniggers with her. He doesn’t know what the context is.

He’s a little awkward, and he can definitely tell he isn’t the most open book but she laughs at some of his attempts at jokes. There’s a distinct discomfort he has lingering at the back of his mind prodding at him, telling him over and over again that he isn’t ready for something like this. A warning bell, asking him to leave as soon as possible because he was in a dangerous situation.

He remembers what his therapist told him about breathing and remembering that the resources he had available were greater than his anxiety and he tries to get out of his head. It takes a few minutes of acting like he's fine but he manages to do it.

Other than the one time he scalds his tongue on the coffee but played it off with a pained smile, shoving down thoughts of your stupid invention, things actually went okay.

It was nice, even though they decided by the end that it was better if they both gelled together better as friends. It lifts the strange fear he feels and he can hear Dr. Mendoza say she's proud of him for taking this step before spending three hours psychoanalysing why they decided to stay platonic.

Bucky promises to visit her sushi shop with Nat soon and she says a bottle of sake awaits him for a drinking game. He doesn’t have the heart to tell her that Nat and he share the same tolerance for alcohol.

He makes sure to leave George a tip. A big one. It’s the first time he sees the guy smile the entire evening.

He’s waving goodbye to Leah outside and he thinks that maybe it was a good end to the day and that things actually turned out fine.

Until he turns around to leave, only to have someone walk straight into him with an iced tea.

The cold comes as a bit of a shock, making him jump slightly. He stares at his shirt, using his fingertips to pull it away from his body.

The person melts into a series of apologies immediately, offering to dry clean his shirt but Bucky just forces a shake of his head and says it’s okay even though he can feel the sugar making the shirt stick to his chest. Goose feathers and iced tea. Was there anything else that would like to attach itself to him?

His fists clench and his teeth grit and he has to physically control himself from sprinting to your lair because God knows what else is in store for him and he didn't want to add in any way.

The door to the lair is locked. Fuckin’ brilliant.

When no one answers after minutes worth of waiting, he fishes for his phone and realises that maybe two hours of Fruit Ninja was not the best idea, especially on a phone known for having shitty battery life.

There’s roughly 2 percent left. By the time he opens his app to give you a call, his phone screen goes black.

He groans. He’s desperate at this point and under any other normal circumstances, he would have never, ever considered doing this.

But ten minutes later he’s outside your apartment building. You’re aware that he has your address; no doubt that it was in the SHIELD file he had gotten, and he knows that you know but it was still weird.

The buzzer has your last name listed next to it. He’s sure that he’ll break it if he keeps pressing it at this rate but he really needs you to let him in.

“Who the fu-” your voice comes through the intercom.

“I’m sorry for showing up like this, my phone died and I couldn’t reach you,” He breathes out as soon as he hears you. “But I need you to fix this.”

When he doesn’t hear a reply, he wonders if the thing actually worked. He’s about to start pressing it again-

“Bucky?” You sound a little surprised to hear him. “You’re at my house. Why are you at my house?”

“I need you to fix whatever this is.”

“What are you- fine, I’m buzzing you in,” your voice, initially confused soon trails off into something more dismissive.

There’s a soft click from the door, allowing him to push it open. The elevator is already on the same floor as him so he just uses that.

The elevator goes up a floor or two. His feet tap restlessly against the carpeted floor.

The lights turn off and everything comes to a standstill. His foot stops tapping.

He should have known. He should have fucking known.

Thirty seconds pass. He’s still in pitch darkness with the elevator showing no signs of moving.

In fact, he’s resigned to his fate. He sits down on the ground, only one step away from completely laying down and hoping someone finds his body here someday.

It’s six minutes of plain silence. He might as well get comfortable if he’s going to get stuck here for the rest of his life. Did he change his will? Does he even have a will?

There’s finally a whir. He thinks that maybe he’s going to plummet to his doom as the perfect end to this day, but then the light switches on and it starts moving upward.

It stops at the floor with a ding. He doesn’t get off the ground, only eyes the door wearily. With his luck, it wouldn’t open.

But it does and within a second he’s on his feet, scrambling to get out before it changes its mind.

He remembers your door number, basically charging down the hall to get to it.

The door is white and the paint is starting to chip off it. The handle itself is dented in a few places and he wonders if it was your fault or someone else's.

His knocks are rapid, agitated even. He doesn’t stop until he hears your loud shouts telling him to cut it out.

“What the hell were you doing, trying to break down my door?” It swings open, revealing you in your pajamas. “Haven’t you done that already? And where were you, I’ve been waiting for like, ten minutes.”

He honestly feels bad for showing up uninvited and highly flustered. He can’t imagine it’s a pretty sight either. "This bad luck shit- fix it. My whole day’s been fucked up.”

“What are you-” Your eyebrows knit together in confusion, taking in his appearance.

It takes you a second to realise what he’s talking about but when you do, your face settles.

“How was your date?” You lean against the door frame, arms crossed over your chest.

“Really,” He glowered at you, “that’s what you care about?”

“Yes.” You nod. “Did you have fun?”

He hesitates. “I guess?”

“Was she nice?”

“Yeah.” Where was this going.

“Good, I’m happy for you.” The smile on your face is genuine. “Look at you go, Casanova.”

“We agreed to be just friends, but that’s not the point here. Y/N,” he whines. “I have a mission next week, I can’t afford to fuck up. My whole day was off and I don’t want it to carry over.”

“Your whole day?” you questioned, standing up instead of leaning against the wall. “Buck-”

“Just fix it.”

“Okay.” You lift your hand up, extending it towards his face.

He waits for you to do something.

You flick him on the forehead.

“There,” you declare, going back to your previous position. “you’re cured.”

What.

He says exactly what he’s thinking.

You laugh. “Dude. I was fucking with you.”

Huh?

“Well, actually maybe just like, three things and then I got bored.”

He’s confused.

“You know,” you begin when he doesn’t reply, “taking the sugar packets, switching your coffee order when you were looking under the table, took your place when you left, the shoelaces.”

“The shoelaces?”

“Yeah.” You nod. “That’s the other ray gun you saw this morning. Unties your shoelaces. I stopped after that because I thought you figured it out.”

His face scrunches in puzzlement.

“I mean, you looked right at me and told me to cut it out.”

He racks his brain about what you could possibly be talking about before it hits him. The hungover person on the goddamn bench in the park.

“You were the one in the hoodie and sunglasses.”

“I just followed the Avengers’ code of disguise.” You shrug. “Turns out it kinda works. Also teleportation. So helpful.”

He forgot about the teleportation. That's why you could do all of it so fast without him noticing you were even there.

“What about the fucking geese?”

You pause for a second. “The geese?”

“And the elevator.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” The confusion on your face is apparent. “What geese and elevator? I have no idea what you’re saying right now.”

“Everything’s been a mess today,” he grumbles. “I don’t know what’s real or not.”

“I swear I had nothing to do with it other than what I mentioned.” There’s indignation on your features that quickly gives way to delight. “Holy shit, did I just accidentally invent portable bad luck?”

“Okay-” his palm finds its way to his forehead in exasperation, “-then what the hell was the smell?”

“What smell- oh, the one from the box?”

He nods briskly.

“Secretions Magnifique.” You snorted. “It’s a perfume. The worst rated one I could find.”

“Perfume?”

“With notes of milk, seaweed and sandalwood.”

“It wasn’t an inator?”

“No, it wasn- did you get vibe checked by a goose at the park?” You stifle a laugh when you notice a stray feather on his thigh.

“What does that even mean?” he asks in despair.

“I can see why it attacked you. You got bad juju.” You raise an eyebrow. “Maybe if you stop staring so much-”

“So I just have shit luck.” Is that a fucking relief or even worse?

“Well,” you begin but decide not to continue.

Even with all the irritability masking it, you could see that he genuinely was just not having a good time.

“Wait here a second.”

You leave him at the door. He shifts his balance and sighs, fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. He still had to walk back to the Tower. Maybe he could grab a slice of pizza along the way since he skipped lunch.

“Okay, here.” You return with a large glass of water. He only looks at it. “It’s just water, I promise. You look like you ran a marathon."

He takes it from you sceptically, pushing away the urge to sniff at it. It’s gone within a few gulps.

You wait until he’s finished to point at his arm. He draws his eyebrows together, but you only curl your index finger and beckon for him to give you his hand.

He reluctantly extends it towards you.

“Don’t laugh,” you warn him, taking his metal arm. “This usually helps me.”

You tie a small bracelet around his wrist. It has a few beads, which he realises represent the colours of the solar system.

“Keep that for good luck.” You pat it gently after securing it. “I think you just had a bad day; those don’t last very long. Do you want to charge your phone before you leave?”

“Uh-” The bracelet’s pretty, the colours shine against the dark vibranium. “-no, I’m good. I’ll just leave.”

“Okay. Anything else I can help you with or will you be fine?”

He narrows his eyes. “You’re being suspiciously nice.”

“I’m not evil all the time.” You huff. “My hours are in the morning.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” he says again. “I’m gonna go then.”

“See you next week.” You give him a little wave. “I’d say break a leg on your mission but knowing your situation...”

He scoffs. “Thanks.”

You make a move to close the door when starts walking down the hallway towards the exit.

He adjusts the beads slightly so he can see them better. The Earth one has glitter in it. He thinks it’s cute.

“Bucky.”

He turns around.

There’s a hint of a smile on your face.

“Take the stairs.”

He doesn’t have to be told twice.

Next part

[tryingtimi]

You may have talked about this already in some other ask, but can you tell us about the Divum Council? What is its purpose? Who's on it? How is it structured?

*grabby hands* Gimme.

Actually no, I've got no chance to talk about it yet, so thank you for this ask! <3

Honestly, the Council is very incomplete yet, and will probably change things about it later, but here's what I've got already.

The Divum Council's original purpose is to bring balance in the Sectors, smooth out the chaos after every Rising, keep the "heavenly" order in place and strive to get Ionera safe. It's members always were the most competent people, each in different fields. They've been chosen from fields that kept Ionera going and “alive” if you will, not every one of them a politician from the start. Even though they fast to adapt to that position. However, the representative of the lower Sectors soon became a Caelus Sector folk, since being the member of the Council meant that you get some advantage you could take. Coming out from the dirt was one of them. This lasted for a while, and so all the members were chosen from the Caelus Sector only. But when the circumstance did not change for a very long time, in fact it got worst in the lower Sectors, people got upset. There were little riots here and there, protestors started to camp around the Terrana Sector (only there because the Aquor Sector was never a hopeful place, so people there rarely made an effort to change on things. “Why bother, it won’t help anyway” kind of mindset is the default there.) and when they loudly planned to get into the Caelus Sector, the Council stepped in. They needed to keep the order after all, so they gave people what they wanted. That’s how Dane gets into the Council, he’s gonna be the first lower Sector representative who truly came from there after some decades now.

The Divum Council is basically works as an autocratic association dressed in fake democracy. All the representatives has a say in things, they hear them out, they vote, but at the end of the day, the only thing that matters is what the current Astin wants and/or agrees on. Icharo, as every one of his ancestors, is only appeares at the end of a meeting (in holografic form) if he even shows up and not just sends someone/ something to deliver his “suggestions” *ahem* orders. The Council members soon learn to know their place and that inside the Council's building, Icharo can kind of hear and see everything, so they need to be careful what they say. But overall they very much okay with this situation when our story starts. They have the highest luxury on Ionera, each of them owning a separate platform in the Caelus Sector which is only theirs, they get the cleanest food etc. There's no reason to complain.

Oh, yeah, the Council also supervises and chooses who should go to the restoration facility, which is a thing that they – or more like Icharo – formed when the population hit a ridiculously low number. To keep humanity up, they can't let this number drop even lower. Therefore, the Council banned every object, device, anything that could be used to hurt someone else and thrown the idea of prisons out of the window. Ionera needs functional people, so that's how this facitlity were born. No-one really knows what happens in there tho. What people heared about it, is that criminals get help to change into someone who can be put back into society and be a useful member of it again. After some months or years, people can go out, live their life again. They're fine, they're social, they even gained some faith maybe?

Who knows, Dane never met any Restored. But when he does, he soon finds out that something is very strange about them, the same as with the Divum Council.

So here it is hehe! It was great to talk about it, thank youu again! <3

[actually-impostor]

I am so tired

And exhausted. Disappointed. And worried

Jesus christ I'm worried

Because they are kids. They are childrens.

I'm gonna go on a long rant, everything will be tagged as it should, and this post will be behind a read more. Care for yourself while reading.

Tommyinmit. Tubbo. Ranboo. Hell, even Purpled (tho luckily i havent seen him be fucking attacked and hounded and harassed in this way. Small mercies)

They should NOT have to carry the weight of expectation A Bunch Of Adults Have Put On Their Shoulders

Read that again

YOU AS AN ADULT SHOULD NOT PUT YOUR EXPECTATIONS ON THE SHOULDERS OF CHILDREN

Should they try to better themselves every day? Yeah, but that's something every human should do

Should they stop being children just because they have a platform?

FUCK NO

Im sorry the internet and the world and the adults around you failed you to the point where you think having a mental breakdown everyday for all the struggles around the world you Are Forced To Read About is somehow normal.

Because darling, it's not.

Its not normal, or okay, or something to flex about, that your mental health is being put to such a risk just so you can stay "on top of things"

Im going to re-phrase something i said in 2019 about child actors (i know they aren't "actors" in the traditional sense but they are child celebrities, and it fits)

What you guys have to realize is that the difference between them and... idk, kids you see in your school or in your neighborhood, is that They Have An Audience. They had a sudden spike of people who from one day to the other focused their attention on them and decided "mh, I want to give them attention and a platform for a/b/c reason". You gave them your attention, if you disagree with something they said or their attitudes or whatever, you are in complete liberty to take away your view without feeling like you have to put them on blast.

They are young enough where their personalities, reactions, and opinions are still an echo of the adults and friends who surround them. They are starting to form their own opinions, but its still very much filtered by whichever influence got them first (parents, idols, teachers, older siblings, etc)

We are all ignorants when we are kids, even those who had to suffer thru a lack of privilege are ignorants of things up to a certain point. We grow to educate ourselves in whichever way we can, but we are still ignorant to A Lot Of Issues while we are growing and becoming ourselves.

The difference between us nobodies, and child celebrities (or kids with a following. Twitch streamers, tiktokers, youtubers, actors, etc) is that they have a constant spotlight and millions of eyes on them.

Everyone has access to when they fuck up because its never in private, Because They Dont Have That Privilege.

They are not allowed to mess up, because they are expected to be perfect.

Read that again.

They are KIDS who are Not Allowed To Make Mistakes Anymore.

They aren't allowed to make mistakes, a central point of growing up that helps you become a better person. They are not being allowed to grow and become better because they are not being allowed to fuck up, which is human!

And instead of Actually being helpful, the solution you, ADULTS, have come to... is to send them hate?

Your solution is to call them racist, homophobic, horrible humans who wont better themselves.

What have you done?

Answer that to yourselves.

What have you done?

Have you donated to your charity of choice? Have you given the microphone to the ones that struggle? Have you woke up and think "im gonna do a random act of kindness"?

Or are you just going to waste your energy and yourself bashing a teenager on twitter and staring as his mental health fucks off? In front of a live audience that instead of realizing they were taking things TOO FAR decided to try to "hammer the point"

What are you gonna do if they fuck off?

Because what´s happening is not "EDUCATING"

Is bullying a child.

Thats all there is. You have successfully bullied a child, yay. Now he doesn't want to learn better because no matter how much he educates himself yall still decide he is the worst human being on the planet for not being able to express something in a way YOU feel HE should.

Allow people to make mistakes without them being crucified every fucking step of the way.

Another thing is this need to remind them "i have this mental health situation, now say something to make me feel better"

Fantastic that you found someone and something that can help you out of a dark place. Now do the next part of getting Actual Capable And Profesional Help.

They are children, they are streamers. They dont have the necessary knowledge and equipment and training to help you with something serious. It should not be in their shoulder the weight of actively helping people thru a traumatic event or a shitty situation. If their streams comfort you, great. But thats all they can do.

And if they want to be educated on something Dont Immediately Shut Them Down. Let them educate themselves even if it's on something considered problematic, or something you think "is not important enough", just let them explore their interests without feeling like they have to perform everything for their audience.

Be better.

Do better.

And honestly? I didnt wanted to add this, but after all my sister has a point.

Why are you guys putting so much effort and energy into this? They play video games for a living.

Use your energy into bettering yourself and doing your part for the world. Not into bashing a 16-17 years old child.

Go outside, see the sky, change your scenario a bit. Touch some grass.

I think tomorrow i'll go for a walk.

[ivarisms]

A SCAR THAT LOOKS JUST LIKE YOU

Title: A SCAR THAT LOOKS JUST LIKE YOU

Summary: You and your work colleague have travelled to Norway to to write a piece for an online article about the history of Vikings, and your travels have led you to a town where the locals talk about an abandoned castle deep in the mountains where Ivar the Boneless still lives as a thousand-year-old vampire. You don’t believe such nonsense, but are curious to see what artifacts this mysterious castle holds within its walls.

Paring: Vampire!Ivar x Female OC

Warnings: Blood, violence, death, non-con aspects, NSFW for sexual content.

                         “Baby, you’re cruel to me but you see I love it when you make me bleed. I want a scar that looks just like you, till then I gotta learn to be a wiser fool. ” ---- Vampire Smile, Kyla La Grange

                                               CHAPTER ONE

The treacherous winding path that spiralled up into the deepest and most isolated parts of the mountains was endless, or so it seemed after hours of non-stop walking. You were exhausted, and to make things worse the first droplets of snow began to trickle down from the sky above. “You said we would reach this castle an hour ago, and yet I still see no sign of it.”

“Patience, sweet cheeks.” Your work partner and terrible tour-guide Lawrence teased, a wrinkled map in his gloved hands as he turned to grin at you. “Always complaining, it’s not always about the destination but about the journey too. I find hiking in these mountains therapeutic…”

You rolled your eyes at that one, there was nothing therapeutic about this and you really wished you would have said no to this adventure. You weren’t even convinced that there was a castle, especially one that harboured a thousand-year-old vampire inside. “That’s bullshit and you know it.” You pressed on, frowning at the feel of wet inside your ‘waterproof’ boots. Great, you thought. All I need when hiking up a goddamn mountain. “I’m starting to think the locals swindled us here, I bet they’re all down in their local pub laughing about how stupid the latest tourists are in falling for this ridiculous ghost story.”

“It’s not a ghost story, it’s a vampire story – like Dracula.” Lawrence countered, a few steps ahead of you on the trail that became much steeper. “And yeah, it’s probably a crock of shit but hey, we’ll have the castle to ourselves and you know what that means.” Turning to waggle his brow at you, he winked and chuckled to himself.

“Yeah, shelter – and hopefully some firewood.” You grumbled, not even entertaining his attempts at flirting with you. He had tried time and time again to get into your pants, but just couldn’t get the hint.

“I don’t think there’s many trees up this high for firewood, but you never know… might be able to find a couple of ‘em and make a stake out of a branch as a weapon.” He joked. “They said this Ivar is terrifying, I hope I get to kill him. Imagine that on the front of the newspaper, I can see it now. ‘Handsome muscly man kills a thousand-year-old vampire Viking with ease… or Viking vampire’ which one sounds better?”

“None of them.” You smirked. “If he’s a vampire and a Viking, you really think you stand a chance?”

“Hey, I got some moves – I can show you them if you like.” He teased.

“No thanks…”

Walking up the steepest part of the isolated trail, you winced and tugged at the hood of your thick yellow coat as harsh icy winds hurtled towards you. They were powerful, nearly knocking you from your feet as you struggled to maintain your balance.

“There it is.” Lawrence pointed in front of him, and you stumbled forward a few steps to join him to see what he was looking at.

“Oh, wow.” You whispered, seeing for the first time the huge black winding castle in the near distance. It was hidden between two mountain peaks, so no wonder it took so long to find. The locals weren’t lying about one thing, but there was no way in hell a vampire lived within its walls. “The snow is getting heavier, let’s go as quick as we can.”

“Yes, lady boss.” Lawrence scoffed, his tone laced with sarcasm as he led the way.

Half an hour of struggling through near enough knee-deep snow led you and your colleague to the castle grounds. The great heaving stone structure was more than impressive to gaze up at, though the many windows that were draped in darkness made you feel uneasy. Its black towers and stone battlements were still very much intact, withstanding the test of time and the test of such harsh elements in the isolated area of Norway. It had clearly been abandoned centuries before now, yet still radiated a millennium of history you would never get to experience. You wondered what it would have been like back then, when Vikings were in their prime of greatness. Terrifying, you assumed.

Ivar the Boneless was known especially to be cruel and inhumane, the history books wrote him to be a tyrant and monster who killed all that apposed him. It was that wicked reputation that kept his memory alive a thousand years later, proven by how scared the local men and women were to even mention his name. You were intelligent enough to know that vampires didn’t exist, but if by chance they did, then you decided that Ivar would be the worst kind of vampire to bump into.

“Wanna go inside?” Lawrence broke through your train of thought and you looked at him as he pulled free his camera from the pocket of his padded blue jacket.

“Absolutely.” You agreed, deciding it was for the best to push fairy-tales aside and explore further.

Following Lawrence through the first set of steel gates, you were now in the courtyard. This area would have been used to make speeches to the people, used as entertainment and no doubt used for training how to fight. You could almost picture the Vikings now, swinging swords and axes at each other without a care in the world. Reaching into your own pocket to pull free your phone, you swiped at the screen.

No signal, low battery. Fantastic.

Your phone wouldn’t have enough power to last the night, but you had enough to snap a few pictures.

“I’m gonna explore the barracks, are you coming with or doing your own thing?” Lawrence asked.

“I’m…” You breathed, your eyes drawn towards the main doors that would no doubt lead into the very heart of the castle. “I’m going inside, I want to get a few photos before this thing dies on me.”

“Alright, I’ll come find you in a bit.”

Please take your time, you thought. “Okay.”

And with that you both went your separate ways.

 Pushing on the great wooden door that was stiff as a board, you clinched your jaw and rammed your weight into your shoulder with a grunt to try and budge it. One, two, three attempts before the frozen wood gave way. Shoving it open with a deep squeal that echoed loudly throughout the innards of the castle, you peered inside curiously. An icy breeze from within hit your face, and as you swept your gaze around the darkness you realised you were staring down into a great long hall that seemed to travel endlessly into the abyss.

Shrugging your backpack from your shoulders, you delved your hand inside and fiddled around until you grabbed hold of the flashlight you had brought along with you. Flicking the switch, a faint yellow glow lit the way as you moved forward. The old wooden floors creaked beneath the weight of your snow laden boots as you took your first few steps inside, allowing the heavy door to swing back shut with a loud thud. Wincing at the sound, you felt your heart thump nervously and felt a sudden pang of regret wash over you, almost as if you felt like you were trespassing. You can still leave.

“Stop overthinking.” You chastised yourself, knowing you were being irrational now. Ghosts did not exist and neither did vampires, it was all in your head.

Treading carefully, you made your way down the hall that had great long wooden tables lining each side with wax candles sat atop them, the table tops themselves had markings engraved within them and as you dragged your fingers along the symbols, you decided they were probably Old Norse. A language that had been dead for many years. Lifting your had, you rubbed at the thick layer of dust that had settled upon your fingertips. This place definitely hadn’t been touched in a long time, and for a moment you wondered if you and Lawrence were the first tourists to investigate in years. It seemed like it.

Unlocking your phone, you decided to take a few pictures of the beautiful furniture for your records before moving on. This would make for a good article on your blog – frozen in time, a look inside the world of Vikings. You wondered if you could steal something small and tuck it into your bag as a souvenir of sorts. Looking ahead, you noticed a stone fireplace in the centre at the back of the hall and as you strolled over towards it with your phone in hand to take another picture, something else caught your attention from the corner of your eye. Turning, you audibly gasped.

Two beautiful wooden thrones sat untouched at the furthest point of the great hall, sat atop a wooden platform. They looked over the entire hall, above the rest of the tables and you knew then that this was once where the King and Queen probably dined with their people.

“Wow.” You whispered, approaching the rare find. The floorboards creaked with each slow step and as you got closer, your eyes widened and twinkled in the dark as you absorbed the intricate detail of both beautiful chairs.

You walked up onto the platform and reached out to touch the main throne, the one you could only assume belonged to a line of great Kings starting with Ragnar Lothbrok. Dragging your fingers along the twisted branches and steel that bound them together, you smiled and took the opportunity to sit in the throne.

It wasn’t the most comfortable seat, but you definitely felt like royalty as you leaned back and closed your eyes. Just for a moment you pretended it was a different time, that you were a Queen of a Viking army. Breathing in a slow breath, you opened your eyes again and gazed down the hallway you had walked up.

Your eyes took a moment to adjust to the darkness as the flashlight rested in your lap, and as you blinked you were certain there was a shape of a figure standing by the main door you had entered through. Lawrence?

“You took your time, come see what I’ve found.” You called out, crossing one leg over the other casually with a coy smile. “I can’t be sure, but I think this throne once belonged to Ragnar Lothbrok and his sons. It’s beautiful…” You drummed your fingers against the arm rest.

No response. The silence was deafening, and you felt a deep fluttering within your belly as you snatched your flashlight and shone it down where the figure stood. But the light didn’t reach that far, and so you leaped from the throne anxiously.

“Lawrence?” You called nervously this time, your eyes narrowing as you kept them on the figure who stood in the shadows, unmoving. “This is not funny; I’m not playing your stupid games idiot.”

Once again there was nothing and you panicked, the stories that had been told to you from the locals playing in the forefront of your mind.

‘Ivar the Boneless died in battle, yes – but he was revived and cursed with immortality. The stories say his brother Hvitserk accompanied him back to the castle where he lives till this very day, surviving on the blood of those who dare enter his lair.’

‘Hvitserk too?’

‘Perhaps, though there have been no witnesses to survive that could tell us what they have seen. All we know is that those who travel up the mountains don’t travel back down, so in all probability they have been killed.’

“Ivar?” You breathed, the flashlight in your hand trembling.

“Hello, Y/N.”

The voice echoed through the hall and your breath caught in your throat, fear bleeding into every fibre of your being as you jumped from the throne platform and sprinted towards a side-door that led into the bowels of the castle. The last thing you wanted was to travel deeper inside, but you had no other choice. Gasping for breaths in the darkness, you tried to hold the flashlight steady and peered down at your phone in the other hand.

No signal.

1% battery life.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” You hissed, not having a clue what door led to which room or if there was any other exit that you could escape from. You just ran forward with no sense of direction, and eventually came face to face with a staircase. You couldn’t go back now, what if he was right behind you?

The thought alone made you squeal as you scrambled up the stone steps, tripping over your boot at one point and dropping your useless phone that tumbled all the way back down to the bottom. You wouldn’t be going back for it now. Reaching the upper floors of the bitterly cold castle, your flickering flashlight was threatening to give up on you as you desperately searched for a hiding spot. Bolting to the end of the corridor, you ran into one of the rooms and as quietly as you could, closed the door behind you.

Backing up until your thighs hit the wooden frame of a bed in the centre of the room, you felt tears well in your eyes. You were terrified.

“Y/N, it was a joke!” Lawrence shouted out from outside in the corridor. “It’s me, I was only teasing.”

Anger. You saw red and felt humiliated as your colleague shoved the bedroom door open and grinned back at you, holding his camera in your face and your phone in his other hand. You couldn’t believe it.

“HA!” He laughed loudly when he saw the look on your face, pointing at you as he filmed your reaction. “You ran like a shot, Jesus…”

“Get out.” You growled, storming forward to shove his chest. “It’s not fucking funny, stop filming me.”

“Hey, c’mon – it’s hilarious!” He laughed. “Ivar?” Mocking the way you had called out the Viking’s name, he shook his head and bent forward to slap his knee with amusement. “I thought you didn’t believe in vampires!”

“I said get out!” Slapping the camera from his hands, you scowled up at him as it tumbled and crashed to the floor with a thud.

“Hey, what the fuck!” He glared back at you and snatched the front of your jacket, clinching his jaw as if he was debating on whether to hit you or not. But he decided against it, shoving you instead and watching you fall to the bed as he leaned down to pick up his prized possession. “It was a damn joke, get over yourself.”

“No, you’re trying to use me for your stupid videos and it’s not happening. Whatever footage you’ve got of me on there, delete it.” You warned him.

“Hell no, this is going up on my blog first thing when we get back to town. You’ll see how funny it is when you’ve calmed down. Pretty girl gets spooked by Ivar the Boneless, idiots on the internet eat that shit up.”

That was enough. Lunging forward, you snatched the camera from his grasp and turned around, throwing it as hard as you could against the stone wall opposite the bed. You watched as it smashed, bits of plastic bursting out into shards across the floor and instant regret flooded you.

Not about smashing it, because he deserved that to happen – but because you knew the fact he wouldn’t get views online from his snot-nosed followers would infuriate him.

“Y/N!” He shouted, his voice echoing through the halls as he grabbed the back of your hood and yanked you back towards him. “What the fuck is wrong with you, that’s my life’s work you dumb bitch!”

Wincing as he flung you against the wall by the door, you kicked your boot at his shin and threw a punch that connected with his shoulder.

“Let me go!” You growled, struggling against him as he swung his arm back and swung it forward again, slapping you against the face. A sharp sting radiated through your cheek, and you closed your eyes and lifted your hands to defend yourself from the assault you thought was about to come your way.

But nothing happened.

Instead, you heard gargling.

Snapping your eyes open again, you felt your entire body weaken in terror as Lawrence stood in front of you grasping at his throat. Blood spurted from his mouth and nose as he stumbled back, staring back at you with fear and desperation. You were speechless, frozen stiff in place as he collapsed to his knees and bled out at your feet. Behind him had been standing a tall, broad man with the bluest eyes you think you had ever seen. His hand was coated in blood, and he brought his fingers to his mouth, licking them clean as he gazed back at you in the dark.

“I heard a struggle; it seems you needed some help from this boy.” He mumbled in a deep Nordic accent and stepped over Lawrence’s dying body, towering over you in the confined space. “Are you hurt?”

You stood perfectly still and parted your lips, trying to speak but the sounds of Lawrence’s gargled breaths distracted you. Never had you witnessed someone dying before and as much as you hated him, you felt sick and faint.

“You called my name earlier; it woke me from a deep sleep…” He continued, his blood-stained lips curling into a smirk as he reached his clean hand up to stroke your reddened cheek that would soon bruise from the slap.

A breath hitched in your throat at how cold he was, the gentle stroke of his fingers sending a shiver to ripple up the length of your spine.

“You… you are Ivar the Boneless.” You whispered fearfully, glancing down to the floor to see blood pooling around your boots.

“Yes.” He affirmed. “And you are?”

“Y/N.”

“Mm, and what are you and this…” He peered down at the body that had stopped struggling and sighed. “…moron doing creeping around my home, huh?”

“I’m sorry, we came here to see…”

“Go on.” Ivar pressed you impatiently.

“To see if you were real, to see if this place really existed.” You told him. “I’m sorry, I’ll leave. I didn’t mean to disturb you.” You took a step forward and slid past him, your body grazing against his as you tried to head for the door but he grabbed your hand.

“Ah, ah.” He tutted, shaking his head of dark braids. “That is not how it works, you see – as soon as you stepped through that door you became mine.”

You felt your belly flutter and shrank into yourself as he took a step in towards you again, leaning forward to breathe in your hair.

“Yours?” You whispered in confusion.

“Yes, mine.” He told you. “Everything in this castle is my property, that now includes you and this sack of shit on my floor.” Pointing to Lawrence’s body, Ivar sucked in a breath. “Unfortunately, my anger got the best of me when it came to him, I should have kept him alive for his blood. I haven’t fed in a long time.”

He looked you over when he said that, his blue eyes darkening with a hunger that made you want to run. “Please don’t hurt me.”

“I don’t want to.” He explained and ran his hands up over your shoulders, pulling you against him and holding you tight. “But I am hungry, and your blood sings to me my sweet girl. This won’t hurt for long, I promise.”

“No, no!” You gasped, your struggling useless as he dragged his soft lips down the column of your neck. Licking his tongue out against the beating vein that called to him, a deep growl rose from his throat and he sank his teeth into you with a savage bite that made you scream. “Ivar, please!”

Your legs gave way but it didn’t matter, he was unnaturally strong – clutching you to him like a bear would with its prey. Warmth spilled down your collarbone and you whimpered as he drank you, low groans escaping him. Digging your fingernails into his black armour, your eyes rolled as you became weaker in his arms.

Thump. Thump.

Thump…… Thump.

Thump.

Your heartbeat slowed and you huffed out a weak breath when he suddenly pulled his head back, snarling out an animalistic growl. His white teeth and long fangs were coated in blood, a trickle of it spilling down his chiselled chin as you sank against his chest.

“Fuck.” He groaned, eyes almost translucent they were that blue as he gazed down at your pretty face. “Good girl. Come, let’s get you settled.”

Lifting you up into his arms with ease, Ivar carried you from the room in what seemed like a blur as your eyes rolled shut.

“Are you going to kill me?” You whispered.

“Not yet.” He told you, his voice a low seductive growl. “I’m going to drink you and I’m going to fuck you and then I’m going to make you like me and the rest of my family who live in the shadows.”

The rest? You thought, slipping into unconsciousness as Ivar the Vampire stole you away deep into the confines of his castle.

 Starting awake, you sat up in the darkness and reached your hands out to feel soft silk sheets surrounding you. Looking around and down at yourself, you frowned as you noticed your boots, winter trousers and jacket had been removed, replaced with a white cotton dress that barely covered your thighs.

“You are beautiful, y/n.” Ivar mumbled from the shadows, approaching you slowly as you crawled up towards the headboard and away from him.

“What is this place?” You asked, looking around the large room that had been lit with candles. “What did you do to me?”

Turning your gaze back onto him, you felt something flutter deep within you as he stood shirtless. Viking tribal tattoos littered his strong defined chest, and as you dragged your eyes lower you noted his defined abs.

“These are my private quarters, the part of the castle you didn’t get the chance to intrude on.” He raised a brow at you, a dangerous glint within his eye. “But now, here you are with me. I fully intend on creating a bond with you, one where you will be my progeny and I your master.”

You felt your stomach leap as he crawled up onto the bed after you, his piercing eyes never leaving your face as he reached out and grabbed your ankles. Yanking you down the mattress, he smirked sadistically as you yelped in surprise.

“Are you afraid of me?”

“Of course, I am.” You whispered, though it was not only fear that you felt as you looked into his eyes but a strange lust. Something was terribly wrong with you to be attracted to this creature but he was so beautiful, almost god-like that it seemed impossible not to.

“It’s good to be afraid, fear makes you more aware of what’s happening.” He leaned forward and kissed your thigh, his cool lips lingering against your skin. “I want you to know that I have waited for you for a long time, and now that I have you, I cannot let you go.”

He spread your thighs then and nuzzled his nose between them, eliciting a gasp from your throat and forcing you to arch your back. Reaching down to twist your fingers into his dark braids, your legs trembled as he breathed in your scent.

“Oh.” You sank your teeth into your bottom lip when he finally pressed a kiss against your mound, a jolt of pleasure radiating through you at the feeling.

You wondered if this was all a dream, a terrifyingly beautiful dream that you soon would wake from. Using his palms to pin you down, Ivar lapped at your tender wet cunt until he had you crying out his name.

You came.

Then you came again. Hard.

Feeling spasms ripple through your entire body, you moaned and spread your legs further as he dragged himself up and over you. Strong arms settled at either side of your head and he dipped his hips between your thighs, the feeling of his hard cock brushing against your soaked centre making you buck your hips in response.

“Do you want to be mine?” He asked, grabbing your throat and grazing his thumb against the bite mark he had left in your throat. “Will you give yourself to me completely, my love?”

You felt compelled to say “Yes.”

It was if he was inside your head, making you say and feel these things for him and yet you gladly accepted your fate.

“Good girl.” He growled and thrust inside of you in one hard stroke, splitting you open with a delicious burn that forced a cry from your lips.

You snatched your arms around his broad defined shoulders, digging your nails into his smooth skin as he began an unrelenting rhythm. You moaned and screamed and shuddered beneath him as he fucked you deep, his controlled movements driving you insane with lust.

“Ivar!” You cried as his girth stretched you painfully, the feeling of being unbelievably full of him almost too much. But he held you down, you weren’t getting away from him as he possessed you. “Oh my god!”

He grunted, a low growl rumbling deep within his chest as he took what belonged to him. Pressing kisses against your collarbone and then down to your breasts, your eyes rolled as he sucked one nipple into his mouth and then the other, paying them equal attention.

Your grip on his braids tightened and he licked a trail up your chest, kissing up your throat and chin until his lips found yours. The Viking vampire’s mouth was soft as he licked his tongue into your mouth when you gasped from one particularly deep thrust of his hips, and you could taste a mix of him and you that made you moan into him.

Sliding one calloused hand down to grab your knee, he lifted your leg and forced it up to rest over his shoulder. Arching against him, you whined at the change of position that dug deeper still and brushed against that spongey piece of heaven tucked up inside of you.

“Ah!” You whimpered, feeling yourself tighten around him.

“That’s it, y/n.” He growled lowly, smirking against your mouth as he stared into the depths of your eyes. Knocking his forehead against yours gently, he watched you as he fucked you hard. Skin smacked against skin, the wet sounds of him taking you filling the room and you stiffened.

Hissing, Ivar snatched a handful of your hair and tugged your head to one side as you came around him. Your pussy spasmed, clutching onto his cock tightly, milking him for everything he had and as he was on the verge of his own release he knew it was time.

Burying his face into the crook of your neck, he sank his fangs into the artery he had torn open earlier and began to drink. Your eyes rolled into the back of your head with so much arousal that you weren’t aware of his deadly love bite. He continued to fuck you, his pace slowing just a little as he drank your hot blood down in large greedy gulps.

Soon, you realised that something was wrong. You felt it. Whimpering in a mixture of pleasure and pain now, you pushed at his arms to try and get him to stop but he didn’t plan on it. He drank you deeply, the addicting taste of your life blood filling the void within him.

“Ivar…” You moaned, frowning in discomfort.

He used his free hand to stroke your face gently as if he were reassuring you all would be okay. Blood spilled into the sheets of the mattress and into your hair in a pool and your heart began to stutter, its strong beat fading.

You gasped for a breath and just before you fell into a fatal sleep, Ivar pulled back with a sputtered growl and sank his fangs into his wrist, tearing open his own flesh before pressing the bleeding wound to your lips.

“Drink!” He demanded of you, and with weak gulps you did.

As his cold blood spilled down your throat, he howled out and came inside you in a deep thrust. He grunted and growled at the pleasure of you.

“That’s it.” He hissed, blood spilling from the corner of his mouth as you slurped at him until you fell asleep.

Your head rolled back against the mattress and you were dead to the world, the human version of yourself dying with laboured breaths as Ivar’s blood worked its way through your body keeping you from slipping away completely.

Pulling out of you, he slid an arm under your neck and lifted your frail frame up into his embrace. The sheets were stained red, it looked like a murder scene and he supposed it was for he had killed you and birthed you a new life that soon would come to be.

“There we go, my sweet girl.” He whispered, kissing the side of your face as he stood from the bed and carried you from the bedroom. “No more pain.”

Strolling through the castle, he smirked a bloody smile when he caught sight of his brothers Hvitserk and Ubbe exiting a room down the corridor.

“We heard everything, you know.” Hvitserk eyed the girl in his brother’s arms curiously, a hunger darkening in his features at the sight of you.

“She’s beautiful.” Ubbe murmured.

“I wanted you to hear.” Ivar muttered arrogantly, kissing the corner of your lips as he said so. “She will soon be one of us, I still need to bury her and by tomorrow she will rise.”

“I want one.” Hvitserk grumbled.

“Me too.” Ubbe glanced at his brother and then back to Ivar. “I think we need to venture into town and find more girls, take them back here and turn them.”

“I think that would be good.” Ivar nodded. “Now, I need one of you to bury us.”

“I’ll do it.” Hvitserk volunteered.

“I’ll watch.” Ubbe smirked.

Heading down the staircase with you safely tucked into his arms, Ivar moved with a blur that no ordinary human would be able to see and took you out into the snowy courtyard.

Setting you down on the snow, he dug a grave big enough for two and set you down inside before he turned to glare at his brothers who watched on curiously.

“Okay…” He nodded and lowered himself down to join you, spooning you from behind and tucking his face into your hair.

Hvitserk grabbed a shovel and scooped a large amount of snow and piled it inside the grave. It wasn’t long before the both of you were buried six feet below the earth.

Soon you would rise with your master by your side, forever bonded by blood and death.

tag list:  @punkrocknpearls  @youbloodymadgenius @strayrockette @tgrrose @ISTORKYOU @ivarhoegh @adrille88 @jadelynlace @readsalot73​

[teddy06writes]

Gonna Fix It

requested by this anon: “hi!! could you maybe do something angsty and fluffy with Fundy (or anyone really) where the reader is a trans guy? he/him”  

Fundy x transmale!reader

trigger warnings: transphobes, homophobes, some swearing (I used the words tranny and fag) {I am both gay and technically trans please don’t come for me}

premise: When your dead name is leaked, along with photos of you pre transition the entire internet is quick to judge hypercritically, but your boyfriend is quick to take care of it

(y/n/n)- your nickname

(f/l/y/n)- first letter of your name

(y/d/n)- your deadname

“blep” talking

‘blep’ texting/messaging

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“(y/n/n)!”

“Yes Tommy?” You asked.

“How’d you feel about selling drugs?” 

You snorted, glancing up at your face cam and the messages in chat before turning your character to face Tommy’s, laughing, “What?” 

“Do you want to sell drugs with me and Wilbur?” He repeated. 

You blinked, moving your character to look at the van and then back at him, “Tommy, I would love to sell drugs out of a van with you.” 

“Yes! We have secured another one lets go! Pogchamp!” 

You chuckled as Wilbur joined vc, following Tommy’s character over to the van as he announced, “Gentleman! We have a problem, we need to find a better cover for our operations.” 

You looked around the inside of the van, filled with brewing stands and furnaces, “A hot dog van.” 

“Pfff- a hot dog van?” Tommy laughed. 

“It would be a decent cover.” Wilbur admitted, “We should do it.” 

Almost reluctantly Tommy nodded, and Wilbur moved on, “Next on the order of business, we need new recruits beside just (y/n).” 

You grinned, “I know just who to ask!” 

You started to leave vc when Tommy warned, “No Americans and no women.” 

“You got it.” 

You left vc, talking to your twitch chat as you messed around in discord, “Weird lot, them boys. Anyway- apparently I’m a drug dealer in Minecraft now! And I’m gonna recruit someone else!” 

After a few messages through discord your boyfriend called you, “Hello?” 

Upon hearing Floris’ voice chat started spamming about you being a simp.

“Yeah so Tommy and Wilbur kinda roped me into selling drugs on the smp and they told me to get more people, so I’m calling you.” You explained. 

“Angel why didn’t you just come ask me? Was the call necessary?” 

You rolled your eyes, “Shut up chat I’m not blushing! It was easier than getting up. Are you in or not?” 

“Yeah sure.” 

~~

Child: ‘(y/n) big man’

Child: ‘big (f/l/y/n)’ 

(y/n): ‘what do you want Tommy’

Child: ‘get on the server we’re making plans for our country’ 

You sighed, quickly moving to boot up Minecraft, starting stream along with it and quickly giving an intro before logging on to the smp and joining vc. 

“Ayyy! Big man!” Tommy yelled. 

“Tommy!” You responded, though significantly less enthusiastically. 

“(y/n) come to the hto dog van we’re making important decisions.” Wilbur said. 

“Okay.” You headed down the prime path toward the van, listening to the others chatter. 

“Okay so we need a name for our country,” Wilbur said as you arrived, “Something that fits. I am open to suggestions.” 

“Pog something.” Tommy offered.

“ehhhhh.” 

“Pogtopia!” He exclaimed. 

You punched his character, “That’s so stupid.” 

“Well- hmm, we’re all men here soooooooo Manburg!” WIlbur mused. 

“It needs to be more European.” Eret said, tossing you some of the block to start helping with the walls. 

“L’manburg.” You offered. 

Wilbur and Tommy burst out laughing, “Perfect!” 

“No Americans and no women! Just the way I like it!” Tommy yelled. 

Everyone began to laugh at that, and you grinned, entirely unaware of the chaos beginning to unfold all over twitter, and even in your twitch chat.

~~ Later that night you ended up flopped across the couch, Floris sending you a text from his office, ‘Don’t forget to take off the tibby prison angel’ ‘I’ll be done with this soon and we can cuddle’ 

You chuckled, dragging yourself up off the couch and shuffling off to the bathroom to change out of your binder, and pull on a different hoodie, a bigger one that you had stolen from Floris.

By the time you were done and had come back out into the living room Floris had also emerged from his office, and was staring in horror at his phone. 

“What’s wrong?” You asked. 

“You haven’t been on Twitter lately have you?” 

Immediately you were going for your phone, taking it off silence to be bombarded by notifications, “uhhhh.” 

Floris bit his lip, “I think you should read it for yourself.” 

Quietly you opened twitter, checking first the hashtag that appeared at the top of your mentions ‘#y/nisalie’ 

Your breath hitched as you opened the hashtag, immediately seeing the original tweet, ‘#y/nisalie y/n has been lying to all of us a thread: apparently this tranny didn’t have the guts to put out that “he” was lying’ 

You scrolled through the tweets, ‘Man, I can’t believe (y/d/n) thought (y/n) was a good fake name’, ‘well at least we know Fundy isn’t actually a fag’ and then worst of all, ‘Guys I found what (y/d/n) actually looks like!’ followed by a picture of you, pre transition. 

The world felt like it was caving in as you slowly sank down against the wall, tears starting to flow, “How did this happen?” 

Floris was quick to sit down next to your, pulling you into his arms, “I dunno angel.” 

You turned, sobbing into his shoulder, “Why are they like this? Wha- what am I gonna do?” 

“I’m gonna fix this,” He murmured, “I promise.” 

You curled further into his embrace, tears soaking his shirt as he rubbed circles into your back.

“It’s gonna be okay angel, it’s gonna be okay.” 

~~ You avoided the internet at all costs for the next few days, not streaming, not being active on twitter or any other socials, hardly ever leaving Floris’ embrace for more than a few minutes as more and more notifications filled your phone. 

It took a lot of coaxing from your boyfriend to check your twitter notifications after two days, and when you did you were delighted to see dozens of positive messages from real fans, and messages addressing the situation from all of your friends.

Eret: ‘dudes (y/n) is litterally trans, is you can’t deal with that then get out of this community; it’s seriously not okay to disrespect someone like that.’

Wilbur: ‘guys remember when I said trans rights and trans rights until I’m dead? Well that applies to (y/n) as well so piss off and stop bothering them’

Tommy: ‘listen up, serious tweet for once: you guys really need to learn how to recover someone and there pronouns, stop calling big man (y/n) by his dead name or get off the platform’

Along with countless others, and of course one from Floris as well, who had made a thread as soon as he saw what was going on:

‘Guys, listen. My boyfriend is the most wonderful human being in all the world. Whoever leaked his dead name or went looking for pictures of him before his transition is honestly a monster and I hope you realize the weight of your actions. Apparently we as a community have a few things to go over,

1: respect creators boundaries, if (y/n) didn’t want to tell you he wasn’t born male it’s not your business, 2: respect people’s pronouns, if someone tells you to use he/him they probably know if there right or not, 3: you can’t fucking invalidate someone like that, and put them on display as a fucking hashtag.

4: if anyone ever tries to talk about my boyfriend like this, (using the wrong pronouns, misgendering, using his dead name or in any other way invalidateing him) I will personally make sure you are never allowed on social media again’

You looked up from your phone, “Y- you got them to stop?”

Floris smiled, “I told you I was gonna fix it.”

[pepper-up-potion]

A Day in London (Oliver Wood x fem!reader)

Summary: Oliver and reader start off their weekend together in London. (This is quite possibly the worst summary I’ve ever written)

Warnings: None that I can’t think. Please let me know if you do but I think it’s just fluff

Word Count: 1.3k

A/n: This is (sort of) part 2 to London to Manchester. All you need to know for this to make sense is that they are in a long distance relationship. You don’t have to have read the part 1 to understand the story. Also I wanted to pick a public garden in London but I was tired of researching so I settled with a private garden, it is what it is I guess.

(Y/n) is standing on the platform rocking on her heels impatiently. Every couple of minutes she cranes her neck towards the time panel, and then towards the train entrance. She fidgets with the strap of her bag and chews impatiently on her lip.

The train finally makes itself known. First, she hears it, the horn blaring and the wheels churning. Then it rolls into sight. It takes all her strength not to start bouncing up and down with glee. Soon the wagon doors open and people start to filter out. She scans the crowd looking for one specific person.

“(Y/n)!” Her person shouts from a distance. She turns towards the origin of the sound and their eyes meet. A wide smile forms on both their faces. It’s like everything around them stops, goes fuzzy. It’s just the two of them in the buzzy train station.

“Oliver!” She exclaims, pushing past people and running to him. He opens his arms wide and she jumps into them. She wraps her arms around his neck, his around her waist and he spins her while letting out a cheerful chuckle.

Oliver puts her down but keeps his hands on her waist. They look each other in the eyes smiling wider. His eyes are bright and excited.

“I’m so happy to see you.” He whispers leaning down to touch his forehead to hers. She hums at the delightful feeling of his presence. Oliver pushes a strand of her hair behind her ear. She leans into his hand as he cups her cheek. Oliver looks at her with adoration as he shakes his head in disbelief. It’s been weeks since they last saw each other. They’ve both been so busy with work, Oliver especially with the preparations for the start of the new football season.

“Are you gonna keep swooning or get over here and kiss me?” She asks playfully as she runs a hand from his shoulder to his chest. He laughs lightly before he brings a hand up to her chin, fingers gently rubbing underneath. “I’d love to kiss you.” He tips (y/n)’s head up a little and tilts his head to meet her lips. It’s a soft and short kiss keeping in mind that they are in public. The kiss still sends a thrilling chill down (y/n)’s spine.

“I’m happy to see you too.” She says when they pull apart. Oliver smiles before picking up his suitcase and lacing his fingers with hers with his free hand.

They walk from the station to (y/n)’s appartement where Oliver drops off his bags. (Y/n) waits for him by the front door. Minutes later they’re back out the door and out on the town.

Oliver claps his hands and rubs them together. “So, where are we going my dear?”

“One of my favourite places in town.” She takes his head and pulls him down the sidewalk. She walks quickly, knowing the terrain by heart. They wind down different streets for a quarter of an hour.

“Here we are.” She stops in front of a gated green space. “It’s a private garden.” She explains. Oliver tilts his head towards her, a little confused. “My friend lives here and never uses it so they told me I could.” She adds. She smiles wide and gleefully as she opens the gate and waves him in.

(Y/n) slides her hand in his once more as they walk around the private garden. She shows Oliver her favourite flowers. Then she leads him to her favourite bench where she reads on weekends or after a long day. They sit there for a little while taking in the scenery.

There are kids playing football in a grassy patch of the grounds. (Y/n) can see Oliver itching to join them. His leg is bouncing and his eyes are invested in their game. She smiles softly before patting his arm. “Go.” She says. Oliver’s eyes go bright like a child receiving candy. “Oh thank you, thank you.” He pecs her cheek before running off and joining their game.

She watches him play with them, he’s so kind and attentive to them. He teaches them plays and techniques to improve themselves. He laughs and falls on purpose to give the kids an advantage. Instead of running away with the ball, they jump on top of him as they all laugh together. She can’t help herself from laughing, happy that Oliver loves her happy place as much as she does.

Oliver comes back to entice (y/n) to join their game. “We're short of a player. What do you say? Fancy a game?”

She smiles but shakes her head. “I haven’t played in years.” She’s a little intimidated by Oliver’s skill.

“Ah, this isn’t the big leagues. No one will judge you here.” He offers an outstretched hand which she hesitantly accepts. He leads her to the kids who cheer for their newest teammate.

An hour flies by as they kick the ball around. (Y/n) and Oliver argue whether tickles merit a red card or not. Oliver is a sore loser and (y/n) thinks it’s hilarious. The mother eventually takes her reluctant children home with the soccer ball. The couple decides to move to the next activity on their agenda.

They walk to a coffee shop Oliver visited once and quite liked but found it closed. That is when they realize the time. It’s much later than they anticipated and most shops have already closed for the day. They stop by the grocery store to purchase ingredients for the night.

Back at the apartment they make freshly squeezed lemonade, a beverage much appreciated after all the running they did. They drink it on the patio, looking at the cars and people below. They update each other on their lives, the news from work, the articles they read in the paper, funny anecdotes they experienced over the weeks apart.

They make a simple supper. Spaghetti with fresh basil and tomatoes made into a sauce. They set the table with a tablecloth, a candelabra, and linen napkins. They both change out of their sweaty clothes and into something a little more date appropriate.

“I must say this is quite a romantic setup.” Announces Oliver as he walks out of the bedroom now wearing dress pants and a button-down shirt. The top two buttons are undone. It’s fitting for the setting and suits him well, much better than the uptight suit and tie she first met him in.

“Bonne appétit.” She wishes, raising her lemonade. They clink their glasses and dig in. The warm glow from the candlelight, the good food and company make for a very romantic and delightful evening. They talk, sometimes about more serious topics and other times they joke around. It’s a pleasant date, (y/n) could not have asked for a better Friday night.

After cleaning the kitchen they change into more comfortable clothes and set up on the couch. (Y/n) reads a book while Oliver looks at some football stats on his computer. Sometimes they excitedly explain things to each other. Oliver, happy to see his favourite players doing well or (y/n) wishing to share a funny part of her book or a new word she’s learnt.

(Y/n) is lying on the couch, her head resting next to Oliver and her legs dangling off the armrest. Oliver massages (y/n)’s scalp as he scrolls aimlessly on his computer. The movement of his hands in her eventually makes her groggy. She curls into herself, setting her book aside.

“Sleepy?” He hums. She nods while covering her yawn. Oliver shuts his computer and bends down to plant a kiss on (y/n)’s nose. “Let’s go to bed, yeah?”

She raises her arms and pouts. Oliver smiles, getting up from the couch and picking her up. He carries her to the bed as (y/n) hums delighted she doesn’t have to walk.

They settle into bed, cuddling up to each other. “Goodnight my love.” Whispers Oliver.

“Goodnight.” She mumbles sleepily kissing his arm, being the closest thing to her face and she doesn’t have the energy to do more.

Oliver simply chuckles lightly. “Today was good.” He murmured. She hums in agreement. It’s the perfect start to their well-deserved weekend together after weeks apart.

[harrysweasleys]

a little sunshine never hurt // d.m

Summary: hi alexa!!! if your requests are still open, could i request a draco x reader fic? in it’s the first day of holidays/vacation and the reader and draco are best friends who (obviously) have feelings for the other but think the other doesn’t like them that way, and they’re having a picnic at malfoy manor, relaxing in the sun reading or doing homework and draco just blurts it and confession + kiss?? if you can’t there’s no problem! thanks 🥰💓

Warnings: mentions of food! also v v short but v v sweet (also not proofread/edited so pls dont come @ me)

Word count: 1.9k

a/n: yikes, so completely ignore my message about not posing a fic before christmas because here i am, posting another fic before christmas. hope you all enjoy!!! xx [I DO NOT GIVE CONSENT OR PERMISSION FOR MY WORK TO BE REPOSTED ON ANY OTHER PLATFORM!]

— —

Ah, finally summer break.

The start of the holidays meant that you’d now have a good months time to catch up on rest, relaxation, and obviously, assignments. Though you usually disliked the prospect of doing homework while on vacation, you couldn’t help but feel a little thankful at the fact that you now had something to keep your mind laced on magic while you were away from Hogwarts. 

Though you were staying with Draco for the first two weeks — where magic was very much present — you still liked to learn. You liked to keep that ever-growing passion for the magical arts, and you were most likely going to finish every single project within the first week of the break.

Draco, however, had different thoughts.

“Bloody ridiculous,” he scoffed, raising his hand to move his blond bangs out of his face, “Giving out homework while we’re on break? What kind of git does that?”

“Those are your professors, Draco,” you grinned, turning to face him, squinting slightly in the blinding sunlight, “Have a little respect, yeah?”

He rolled his eyes, laying back down on the freshly mowed lawn, his dark clothing most likely scorching his skin under the blazing afternoon sun, “Is giving out homework a show of respect? I don’t think so.”

You leaned up on your elbows, a fresh summer breeze rolling through and pushing your hair over your shoulder. It wasn’t necessarily a cold breeze, but it did cause you to let out a small shiver. Draco’s eyes followed you as you sat up properly, crossing you legs and reaching into the tiny basket that carried your snacks.

He had asked you to share a picnic lunch with him today, which came as a bit of an odd question, to be honest. A picnic? You knew Draco wasn’t the kind of person to ‘enjoy the fresh air’ so it was a little bit of a strange request coming from him, to be honest. But there was no bloody way you’d complain. An outdoor lunch with him meant that you got to spend more time one on one — it meant that you’d get to continue seeing the side of him that he chose not to show anyone else.

He was quite a complex fellow, if you were to be honest. In school, he closed himself off. He hid away from the world and kept his cold exterior up, not daring to let anyone in. You had gotten through to him — after trying for multiple years, of course — but there really was nothing better than seeing him as relaxed as he was when he was home. Maybe ‘relaxed’ isn’t the proper term; but he did have a totally different air. Less arrogant, less obnoxious, and definitely less pompous. 

It didn’t help your ever-blossoming crush in the slightest.

“Can you toss me an apple?” he asked, now mimicking your position and crossing his legs as well. His knee brushed against yours, and even though you were both clothed, you felt a jolt of sparks rush through your body. 

You let out a small cough to clear your throat, “Sure.”

Completely forgetting whatever it was that you were looking for in the first place, you tossed him the bright green apple that he had insisted on bringing to lunch. You were surprised that the Malfoy family didn’t decide to grow their own apple trees, to be honest, with how often Draco would scavenge the pantries for the perfect one to eat, they’d most likely be better off by growing some in their own vast yard.

“What are your plans for the summer, then?” he asked, taking a big bite, crunching loudly and closing his eyes as he craned his head up to look at the sky. 

Your mouth went dry at the sight of him, his defined jawline and smooth neck looking sharper than ever under the bright sunlight, casting shadows around the base of his neck. His platinum hair hurt your eyes to look at, but even then, you’d love nothing more than to run your hands through it. While he rested his head on your lap, while you made out in bed, while you —

“Are you ignoring me?” he snapped your attention back to reality with the low chuckle in his throat.

“No. No, sorry, just got caught in a daydream,” you turned away from him, hiding the growing redness on your cheeks before trying your best to play it off, “I don’t really have plans for the remainder of summer, honestly. Just taking it one day at a time.”

You laid back down on the grass next to him, resting your arm at your side and brushing your fingers against Draco’s. Your heart jolted and you tried to quickly pull your hand away, but you felt his finger twitch against your skin, his pinky finger locking with yours.

It was as if you totally forgot to breathe.

“I’m happy to have you here,” he said softly, placing the unfinished apple down on top of the closed basket, giving you his undivided attention, “I’m gonna miss you when you leave.”

You could hardly think straight, but you couldn’t give in to his charm that easily. He’d only tease you for the rest of the break, wouldn’t he? But, it was hard not to give in. His finger was awfully soft locked with yours, and you could feel both the heat from his body next to you, on top of your own body temperature spiking. It was way too warm to be in the sunshine.

“I’m happy to be here, too,” you replied, voice awfully quiet. You were almost sure he didn’t hear you, but the way that his hand gave yours a little squeeze, you knew that he did. 

You two were often on the same page, it was rare he didn’t know exactly how you were feeling. And it was rare that you didn’t know exactly how he was feeling. Right now was one of those rare moments. You couldn’t tell if he was honestly just pleased to have you here — mostly to help him deal with his pain in the ass father — or if this was something more. More than friendship, more than just... platonic. You couldn’t tell what he was feeling and it was driving you absolutely bonkers.

How could you even begin to ask him? Could you even ask? How would that go?

“Hey, Draco, I think I like you.” Pathetic, really. What a way to embarrass yourself.

You felt his hand give yours another squeeze, “You alright?”

Turning to face him, you thought that it was now or never. When would you get another moment of privacy with him like this? Where you could tell him the truth without the possibility of being overheard? 

To weight the pros and cons; if he felt the same, you guys could get the next little while together before going your separate ways for the remainder of the holidays. But if he didn’t, you’d have to deal with the brutal awkwardness of spending the next ten days with him, knowing that your feelings were one sided. Then, you’d have to see him again once returned to school. It wasn’t a very balanced list, in your opinion.

“I’m fine,” you turned to face him, forcing a small smile. 

As mentioned before, Draco could always tell how you were feeling. Which is why he pulled his hand from yours, turning over on his side to look at you. With furrowed eyebrows and concerned written across his features, you wanted nothing more than to peel your eyes away from him and completely ignore his gaze. But that was nearly impossible. It’s hard to look away from Draco Malfoy.

“Something tells me you’re lying,” he said softly, eyes scanning your face as if he could read your emotions written into your skin — as if the light freckles dotting your cheeks could give him the answers he was looking for.

You sucked in a deep breath, feeling the expansion of your lungs in your chest — it felt as if you were going to crush your heart any second now. Quite an unpleasant feeling, really.

“I’m not lying,” you said, voice cracking as you spoke. The worst possible lie. There was no way he’d believe that. 

He scoffed lightly, “So you’re just going to ignore your feelings then, yeah?”

It was now your turn to sit up, leaning against one of your elbows as you turned your body to face him. His cheeks were tinted with a pale shade of pink, most likely from the burning sun. It was a rather warm afternoon for summer in England. 

“What feelings?” you asked, averting your eyes, choosing to stare at an ant crawling slowly up a blade of grass. Not fascinating, but better than giving in to Draco. 

“Y/N,” one of his hands reached over and touched your chin, lightly tilting it so you could turn your head up and face him, “I asked you to a picnic today so we could be alone, you know?”

You finally looked over to him, eyes scanning from the base of his throat, slowly up to meet his eyes, “Why?”

“Well, I thought I was being bloody obvious,” he grinned, “I like being alone with you.”

“But why?” you sounded like a child

His laugh was taunting you — effortless and relaxed. Completely juxtaposed to the raging storm of emotions going through your heart and head. How he could say something like that; so heavy and heartfelt, to acting like it was nothing, you could never understand.

“Because,” he scooted closer, his hand leaving your chin, but coming to rest atop of yours, “I don’t know how much clearer I can make this, but I like you.”

You looked over at him, eyes wide and mouth gaped open like a fish. You must look like a bloody idiot, but there was really no other way to respond to that. He liked you back. All this time, he liked you back. And you genuinely had no idea.

There were really no words you could say in response, so you decided on showing him how you felt instead,  placing your hand at the back of his neck and bringing his lips to yours. They were incredibly warm — possibly from the sun — and soft. Softer than the grass beneath your skin, and sweeter than the chocolates melting in the basket by your feet. He tasted like mint and green apple, a mixture that felt odd when spoken, but tasted like heaven when experienced.

You felt him mumble against your lips, “I’ll take it you feel the same way?”

Pulling away to let out a small laugh, you nodded your head, “If it wasn’t obvious, yes.”

“Just making sure,” he gave you a lopsided grin, his hand cupping your cheek to connect his lips to yours once again. 

— — —

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[votederpycausemufins]

another chapter of the ‘we summoned Tommy and now we found out Grian’s family” fic. this chapter is very long.

also warning, there are some references to sui//cide, but it’s never directly mentioned by name.

Phil tried to ignore the way his chest hurt at the name that had been said. Sure, biologically Grian was his son, but it had been years since they had seen each other, and he had grown up with different people who became a new family for him. And he understood that, but it still hurt that the avian thought of someone else as his dad.

“Er, not quite.”

“Oh, okay,” Grian spoke, matter of factly. The two of them stayed quiet for a few moments before he spoke again. “You found me ‘gain.”

“That I did.”

“You didn’t stop lookin’”

“Nope.” Phil replied, though he knew it was a lie. Of course he always wanted to find his son again, but he had given up actually looking a number of years ago. It wasn’t worth focusing on one child and ignoring the others. But he supposed that’s sort of what happened anyway with him and Tommy. 

“That’s what I thought. It kept me goin’ on th’ really bad days.”

“Am I allowed to know what those bad days were?”

Grian was silent before shaking his head. “Hurts too much…”

“That’s alright mate. How about you talk about some other stuff.”

And so Grian did. Talking with Phil about some of the things he had done over the years. Eventually, Stress arrived and helped out, getting the bots up there with Grian and Phil. At that point the stories stopped and Grian focused on his kids, who were glad for all the attention. Mumbo returned with Tommy shortly, also bringing Tubbo along, and soon Grian’s nest was filled, making him quite happy.

“He’s looking better.”

“Yeah, I think it was your admin who gave me the gist of things. He was tired and using his Watcher stuff which made him loopy.”

“Yeah, that would do it.” Mumbo shook his head.

“Hey, you know what that means?” Tommy asked, smirking and focusing his gaze on the bots. Jrumbot smiled and pulled out some pumpkin seeds, which Grian quickly pounced on and started eating. “That part of the bird stuff is great.”

“And what part isn’t so great?” Philza asked, though for a moment he regretted it, thinking the teen wouldn’t respond and just stay quiet or get angry.

But instead he just crossed his arms and gave an over-exaggerated pouting face. “When he gets all mother hen or whatever and is super overbearing. The other shit is fine.”

“Tommy!” Mumbo huffed but the teen just waved him off.

“Oh come on, they’ve heard me say it loads of times. Jrum won’t risk saying anything cause you’ll just take some of his diamonds away.”

“Yeah! I won’t say stuff like that!” Jrum agreed, before suddenly Phil jumped and looked to see a few of his remaining feathers now in the small robot’s hands. “How much would I get for these Tommy?”

“I’m sure if you meet the right people you can get plenty for those. He’s like, trillions of years old, and not many people have them.”

“I’m not that old!” Phil complained, trying to grab the feathers back. He managed to pull one out of Jrumbot’s hand, but the rest ended up disappearing into whatever the kid had for an inventory.

“You’re right. You’re older.” Tommy taunted. “Old as shit. Dinosaurs are younger than you and they’re all dead.”

Philza glared at Tommy before his gaze fell on Grian. The other avian was still out of it, but getting better. Then he looked at Mumbo before rolling his eyes. “Alright Tommy, maybe so. But it means I’ve got more experience.”

Tommy paused, not used to the hardcore player agreeing with him about something like this. He looked over at the bots, who shrugged. It wasn’t like they had grown up with him. “Says the guy who let two mobs get the best of him.”

“Hey that was one time! And that was also years ago!”

“I’m gonna ‘gree, that’s pretty lame.” Grian spoke up, giggling a bit still. “I’m still alive af’er uhhh…” He started counting on his fingers. “I dunno! Lotta years with Sam!”

Mumbo, Tommy and the bots immediately froze up, looking between each other nervously. Tommy moved a little closer to Grian to make sure he had the avian’s attention. “Hey G? You sure that’s okay to talk about? I know normally you-”

“Pfft, it’s fine! Not like I died! ‘Stead I just hurt a lot, killed some pipul, selled some drugs, stuff like that!” Grian looked over to Philza, who was starting to regret staying around when everyone else arrived. “Ya know, almost didn’ make it. But I didn’ wanna disappoint you by giving up. Mmm… plus Gareth freaked me out too much ‘n I didn’ wanna be like him.”

“Okay Grian! I think you should really get to sleep now! We can talk about this more later! But don’t you want to uh…” Mumbo trailed off. 

“I can get the jukebox once you’ve slept!” Tommy continued for Grian who seemed to really like that idea. He finally laid down and before long he fell asleep.

It was still quiet for a bit, no one sure how to react to all of that at first. Phil and Tubbo were the quietest since they had little to no context. Because of that, they easily jumped when Tommy finally shouted and broke the silence. “Okay Mumboli, when the fuck were you going to tell me about that part of all that shit?!”

“First off, that would be something Grian would need to tell you, not me! Second off, I didn’t even know about that!” The anger on Mumbo’s face quickly turned to some sort of melancholy. “He didn’t even tell me. I mean, he had made some jokes, but I assumed that it was just from the situation. It does make sense he would think of… but…” The redstoner became quiet, his normally pale face much paler than before.

“Daddy?” Grumbot spoke up, making Mumbo look at the bots. Jrum was shaking a bit and Grum didn’t look quite so well himself. “I think Jrum and I should leave.”

“R-Right. Let me help you down.” The redstoner picked Jrum up to help him down the ladder, Grum still well enough to go down it himself. Before he left the platform though, he got Tommy’s attention and nodded towards Tubbo and Philza. “Try to fill them in. If Grian wakes up before I’m back, tell him what he did. He deserves to know.”

Tommy nodded, waiting for Mumbo to leave before saying anything. “So… Grian kinda got stuck in a fucked up place for a number of years. He’s told Mumbo a lot of stories and me some as well, but not everything of course. Basically, he had two friends. If he was me, one of them was like you Tubbo. But uh… the other guy was like Dream. Like, Dream’s an admin and all that, but this other guy was for the most part just a fucking normal guy around my age but he went off the deep end. G and the other friend escaped, but not for a long time. That place was a hardcore world, but they didn’t have potions or healing or whatever the fuck. I mean, there weren’t any mobs either, so death wasn’t at every corner. I mean I guess it was for G because the one guy was a psycho and murderer, but whatever.”

“Wait, are you telling me that this guy just lived with someone potentially worse than Dream for years?!” Tubbo asked while Philza was trying to comprehend it all.

“Uh, well they didn’t live with each other all the time, but yeah. But ‘cause it’s probably good for you guys to know, his main triggers are wearing blue as well as rabbits. If someone else is wearing blue, it’s fine, but if he’s wearing blue it freaks him out. With the rabbits thing, some of them being around are fine, but white rabbits especially freak him out ‘cause the guy was a hybrid.”

“Alright, noted.”

“One of the people most frustrated about it is Grumbot because, well you know how he just suddenly knew who you were, right Phil? They kinda first built him to help with the election here- long story, talk about it another time- and he’s able to look into a lot of stuff, but only based on political stuff. There wasn’t really anything like that with G’s first world. I mean, he gets fragments since Grian’s been a campaign manager before, but all that really comes up is empire stuff.”

“Uh, he had an empire? Was it anything like-” Tubbo timidly asked, glancing to the unconscious avian.

“Nah, basically he just built a big thing in the middle of the ocean and decided he would become the Grian Empire. The only other member was his friend- the good one- but he went off and made his own place pretty quickly. The worst he did is the TNT there was really volatile. If you so much as touched it after placing it, it would explode. He’s told the TNT shop story a number of times where he built the shop out of it and made the stock the walls of the shop.”

“Was that the first time he did something like that, or did it never go anywhere?”

“No that’s the thing!” Tommy started laughing. “He did it so many fucking times and someone still fell for it! That’s why it’s such a great story.” 

From there, Tommy continued to mostly tell lighthearted stories Grian had shared with him. He talked about the prank war and following civil war from the Hermits’ previous world. The hippies against area 77, the time machine, the build height battle. After that he brought up the head games, which freaked Phil and Tubbo out when he suddenly pulled out what at first appeared to be a severed head but was actually a very accurate mask. From there the election was talked about like Tommy had promised, and then the following turf war and its minigame battle.

“I showed up right after the turf war which I’m really glad about because it freaked me out enough just hearing about it. I can’t imagine having to learn what wars here were actually like while in the middle of it all. Instead when Grian visited me when I was holed up in his old place, he just kept talking about the mole people. Around then’s when I really started opening up, especially when Zed showed up.”

“Who’s that?”

“Sheep hybrid that makes contraptions instead of redstone. He made me a bed that just kills me instead of what it should.” Grian spoke up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He was still slightly groggy from just waking up, but the three SMP members could tell he looked rested and more lucid than earlier. “Where’s Mumbo and the kids?”

“He had to take them away.” Tommy answered, covering Tubbo and Phil’s mouths before they could say anything, even though they weren’t going to. “Grian, you were like, super out of it earlier.”

“Oh oof, how bad was it?”

“Well,” Philza pulled Tommy’s hand away from his mouth. “You mistook me for some person named Martin and asked me to swear loyalty to your empire. Then you called me some name resembling your admin’s name.”

“X eye sooma void?”

“Exactly.”

Grian laughed a little. “Yeah, a number of the hermits call him some variation of his name so I took it to the next level when I first showed up.”

Tommy put a hand on Grian’s knee and the avian looked over, smile falling from his face when he noticed the serious look on the teen. He immediately sat up straighter, worried for his brother. “Tommy what’s wrong?”

Tommy noticed the way Grian’s hand moved like it wanted to grab a weapon, something he had seen constantly when the two of them were alone at night and the avian was being overprotective of him when he could take care of himself. Well okay there was the factor that all the mobs here seemed to be stronger, but that wasn’t too bad. Grian asking Tommy’s name again pulled him from his thoughts and he immediately stopped Grian who was now actually reaching for a weapon. “No! No it’s nothing that bad! You’re going to freak out Big T if you do that!”

“Then what’s going on?!” Grian huffed, crossing his arms, mainly so he wouldn’t try that again.

“When you were really out of it, you said some things. Specifically from your high school stories.”

Grian looked a bit uncomfortable from that, but didn’t look too worried. “Okay. I- was I screaming? Did I scare the boys from that?”

Tommy shook his head. “No. You said something new. It- god G, not even Mumbo knew about it at first.”

Now Grian looked worried, eyes flicking between Tommy and the other two and he pulled his knees up to his chest. “Wh-which thing did I say?”

Tommy stood up, being the only one standing adding to his already tall height. “You mean there’s more shit you haven’t fuckin’ told anyone about?! Grian what the fuck?!”

Tubbo tried to pull Tommy back down, but the blonde teen resisted for a bit before falling back to the ground. “Tommy please. If it’s been this long and he doesn’t want to talk, it's obviously really bad.”

“No, you don’t know some of the shit Grian’s talked about. There’s nothing that could be that bad!”

“Tommy that’s enough.” Philza spoke coldly, making him and Tubbo freeze. “Grian’s not you. He decides what he’s going to talk about. Maybe to most people the stuff he talks about is worse than the stuff he hides, but obviously it’s different for him. So you’re not going to fucking yell at him and make him even worse.”

Tommy frowned angrily, but stayed quiet and slumped back. Tubbo tried to help calm Tommy down while Phil did his best to do the same with Grian. “So… can you tell me what I said? Grian tentatively spoke up, looking to Tommy, but Phil answered instead.

“You mentioned someone named Gareth and not wanting to be like him. Obviously Tommy and Mumbo knew what you were talking about, but me and probably also Tubbo don’t know anything and are still pretty clueless. We just know that it’s something bad.”

Grian let out a quiet ‘oh’ as he pulled his knees even closer to himself. “Um, after I disappeared, I ended up in a different world and made friends with some people named Sam and Taurtis.” Philza tried not to react as he recognized the second name. “At some point in high school I moved in with them, but before that it was just the two of them. They had a teacher named Gareth. He um… his wife was found killed and a lot of people thought he did it. He… got fed up with it and uh..” Grian shook his head. “The classroom was closed up when people found his, uh, body. They took that away but left… left behind what he used. There was one time I snuck in and thought about… you know. But his ghost showed up and freaked me out so I ran.”

After that, it was quiet, no one really knowing how to respond to that. Grian just ended up letting his feathers puff up and he hid in his wings, Tommy being able to wriggle his way in there. The wings ended up muffling a conversation the two had in whispers, though Tubbo and Phil could both hear a few curses from Tommy. Mumbo finally came up the ladder while they were doing this and was greeted by the two SMP members with a finger to their lips. The redstoner wasn’t planning to be loud since he didn’t know if Grian was awake again or not, but he still of course complied. He moved closer to the avian before putting a hand on one wing, Grian moving said wing out of the way to see who was there.

“Mumbo. A- How are the bots?”

“They’ve gone to bed. They seem like they’ll be fine.” Mumbo replied in a soft voice. “You can go back to what you were doing, I just wanted to let you know so you weren’t worried.”

“N-no, it’s fine. I… Hey Tommy, why don’t you show off your base.” When Tommy looked like he might refuse, Grian spoke again. “Please?”

“Alright, but not my fault if a war starts up!”

That earned a smile from the avian. “Wouldn’t have it any other way. Remember to bring scaffolding with you. I’m sure you can find some in the chests in the basement.”

“You mean the storage system, or the fucking chest monster.” Grian smirked an evil little grin. “Fuck you. Alright come on you two. You gotta see Cobble Tower.”

The two other SMP members each gave Grian a look of sympathy before going down the ladder behind Tommy. He led them down to the fireplace that was centering the main hall, but specifically to one side of it. “Alright, this is the quick way up and down.” The teen opened some trap doors revealing some sort of donut-shaped object. “There’s one on the other side, but this is the elevator or whatever the heck Zed called it. You sort of lie down in it like this.” Tommy climbed in, lying down in the small structure. “Then you just hit that button and-“

Redstone activated and suddenly Tommy was lowering out of view. He quickly pointed towards the other side of the fireplace before pulling his arm in so it didn’t get crushed. It took a few moments, but an identical mechanism appeared there, ready for Tubbo or Phil to get into. Tubbo was the first to get in and was soon following behind Tommy. Philza, on the other hand, took more time getting situated, trying to be careful of his wings so they wouldn’t get caught or pinched on anything. He was mostly sure it would be fine since this was Grian’s place and he was an avian, but at the same time, the hardcore player could never be too sure.

When he reached the bottom, Tubbo was busy freaking out over all the items filling the chests. And there were plenty of them. There seemed to be a storage system lining the room, but also plenty of extra chests strewn about. “Hey, Philza Minecraft! Help us look for scaffolding, or at the very least some bamboo and string!”

The avian rolled his eyes before helping the pair, the three of them gathering enough for each of them to have at least two stacks. From there he led them out of the mansion’s basement and around the back of it in the direction of his own base. “Okay, so I haven’t been here as long as the other guys, so my tower is still in progress, but it’s got a couple floors. I mainly stay at the hobbit hole that’s back the other way.”

Both of the SMP members expected to just see a pillar made of cobble, but instead, standing tall in the distance, was a mostly completed tower that looked like it belonged to part of a larger castle that was nowhere in sight.

“Mate what the fuck is that?” Phil stared at the tower. There was no way that was Tommy’s. Or at the very least, he hadn’t built it. He had been close to Grian and they had all just been at Grian’s mansion which was a feat on it’s own. Obviously the avian had been building this for Tommy.

“I said we were going to my tower. And that’s it.” Tommy gestured to the tower before he continued talking. “I gathered all the cobble myself but bought a lot of the wood. Yeah some of it I got myself and I got gifts here and there, but I got a pretty good business venture so paying for it is easy.”

“Business venture?” Tubbo asked.

“Yeah. Speaking of which, I think Bdubs said the shop was empty so I’ll need to refill. Once I show you guys around, I’ll probably fly over to do that.”

“Could I come with you?”

Tommy paused to look at his friend. “I don’t think that’s a good idea Big T. Everyone’s at the shopping district like all the time, and they fly everywhere too. They aren’t all avians like Phil and Big G, and they don’t use tridents all that often, so instead it’s elytra, and those use fireworks to work. I don’t know how you’ve been since I left, but I’m guessing you and fireworks still aren’t on the best of terms.”

Tubbo crossed their arms. “I can use fireworks when I need to. You know that.”

“Yeah, you can use them fine, but you get jumpy when other people use them.”

Before Tubbo could respond, a voice from further ahead piped up. “Hey Tommy my man! Who’re your friends?”

“Hey Ren!” Tommy ran over to his neighbor. “This is my dad and my friend Tubbo. They’re sort of visiting.”

“Nice to hear.” Ren lowered his sunglasses slightly to look at the visitors. “I’m sure X knows about them?”

“Yeah, I sorta got half kidnapped while hanging with Grian and they followed us back.”

Ren inhaled sharply with a wince, his ears folding back as well. “Oof, how bad did Grian scare them?”

“Phil got freaked out cause he did some shit to piss off Watchers in the past.” Tommy smirked while Philza rolled his eyes. “He kinda tried taking me back again as well as the bots. I seriously thought Grian might kill him until Grum kinda shouted at us.”

“Yikes, how bad did it get for him to do that?”

“We kinda kept interrupting him while he was trying to tell us something important.” Ren winced again from that comment. “Fortunately it helped calm things down a little in the violence department.”

“And in the other departments?”

Tommy pulled Phil over closer to Ren. “So Phil isn’t just my dad.”

Ren nodded. “Yeah, you said you had some brothers.”

“Yeah, he’s also Grian’s dad.”

Again, Ren nodded. “Okay, yeah that-” the wolf hybrid completely froze. “Grian’s dad?! But he’s your dad!”

“Yup.”

“But also Grian’s?!”

“Yeah.”

“So the two of you are-”

“Brothers, yup.”

“You know this explains so much my dude.” Ren ran his fingers through his hair as he stared at the avian with his new knowledge. “Who else knows?”

“Right now, Xisuma and Mumbo. Haven’t really gotten the chance to tell many others.”

Ren nodded in understanding. “Does this mean you two aren’t coming to triple H?”

At this point Tubbo finally spoke up. “What’s that? And also it’s nice to meet you. Tommy said your name was Ren?”

“Yup, Ren Diggity Dawg at your service. And it’s Hermits Helping Hermits. We try to meet up once a week to help out one hermit.”

“You say that, but we haven’t even done it once yet Ren.” Tommy piped up, making Ren frown.

“Well that’s how it’s going to work. Hey, if you want, these two could come along.”

“I dunno. There would probably be lots of flying.” Tommy shrugged before slightly gesturing towards Tubbo. 

“Tommy! I don’t need you acting so concerned for me! A few fireworks aren’t going to freak me out! Plus aren’t there unlimited lives here? Even if I do die I’ll just come back!”

Before Tommy could say anything in response, Tubbo took the elytra that were on Tommy’s back and put them on their own back. Ren seemed to be on Tubbo’s side, because he handed them some blank fireworks. He immediately lit one, which made them flinch just a little, but the next one didn’t cause them to have the same reaction. The only problem was while he was using the fireworks, he wasn’t getting into the air at all. “Uh, how exactly do these work?”

Tommy looked like he wanted to shout, but Ren spoke up before the teen could. “Elytra wings open up on descent, so you have to jump first. I’d say we get you some platform to test with before you try launching from the ground itself. Not even every hermit can do that right since you need to hit the sweet spot. Tommy’s pretty good at it though, but he’s got a good teacher.”

Tommy just rolled his eyes when Tubbo and Ren looked over at him. “Grian doesn’t use elytra, he uses his fucking wings.”

“He had to relearn how to fly in season six when he was still hiding his wings.” Ren pointed out and Tommy rolled his eyes again, though the sentence had caught Phil’s attention.

“Why was he hiding his wings?”

“Someone’s in parent mode.” Ren chuckled, which caught Phil slightly off guard. “I’ve heard that same tone plenty of times from X. Usually around the full moon.”

“Wait, so are you-”

“Werewolf, yeah. I know, most people just assume hybrid, and I kinda am. Anyway, to answer your question, he had apparently already gotten used to it in his older worlds. Even hanging around other hybrids didn’t help. He just had them hidden for so long that his standard was no wings. Iskall was the one to really get him with his wings out.”

“Iskall is Mumbo’s sibling, right?”

“Nah, unless we have another case of a surprise family connection. They had a business venture with Grian and Mumbo last season and the three have been really close ever since. They’re not officially related, but at this point they’re essentially all family.”

“I see, well what did he do?”

“They made a shop for hiring them as a hitman since they did that in the past. Someone ordered one on Grian and he got a plan ready and everything, but it involved outflying Iskall.”

“Good to know. I’ll have to meet with them at some point.” Phil nodded and Ren gave a barely noticeable wink at the avian correcting himself.

“Well, I’m sure I've held you guys up enough. If Tommy gives you any more trouble with flying, just shoot me a message.” Ren looked at Tubbo with his second comment, then he waved goodbye and headed off the other way.

Over the course of the next hour and a half, Tommy briefly showed off his tower, but for the most part it was Tubbo learning how to fly with elytra. Tommy was giving out pointers, but mostly was just freaking out whenever Tubbo did something that seemed even slightly concerning. Phil was doing his best to give tips, but wasn’t completely sure how elytra worked seeing as how he was used to just his own wings and hadn’t had access to elytra since they had been damaged.

By the end of the hour, Tubbo was flying pretty well, and Tommy was following nearby. When he had first gotten into the air, it had made Tubbo jolt, but before long, he had gotten acclimated to the firework’s initial sound with no following explosion. Tommy also ended up getting out a third pair of elytra for Philza to try. It wasn’t enchanted like the ones Tubbo wore or the backups on Tommy’s back, but it would do fine for a quick trip to the shopping district.

“Alright, you can explore the place as much as you want as long as you don’t go stealing anything. Otherwise I’ll have to pay for it.”

“You? Telling us not to steal?”

Tommy crossed his arms. “Yeah, no one does that here. I did a bit at the start, but you don’t really fucking need to. Even if you could just pay for shit at the shops, if you really need something, someone’s gonna show up to help you out.”

“Got it.” And with that the three of them flew over the ocean and to the island in the middle of it all. The place was littered with builds that surprised Phil and Tubbo. “These are all just shops?!”

“Yeah. You saw how big Big G’s mansion is. Just about everyone works at that scale. Even if they don’t fucking need to. You get used to it after a bit, it’s why my place is so big. You’d lose your minds if you saw Cub’s place.”

“I don’t even want to know mate.” Phil replied as they landed, sounding slightly exasperated at the thought.

“Right, well that’s my place over there.” Tommy pointed to a shop that looked more like a skyscraper and was near a number of similar buildings. “Most of the land in the actual shopping district is claimed, but Aquwu town still has lots of property.”

“What the fuck did you just say?”

“Aquowo.”

“Stop.”

“Aquwayway.”

“What’s the place actually called?” Tubbo piped up, making Tommy stop the joke.

“Just Aqua Town, but no one pronounces it like that. Even Scar, and he built the place. He normally calls it Aque Town.”

“I’ll be using that.”

“Suit yourself.” Tommy then walked towards his building. “You guys take the diamonds out and I’ll restock the place, okay? You can even keep a few of the diamonds.”

There were some nods of agreement and the trio went inside. Tommy put down his shulker boxes filled with stock as Tubbo opened the first chest, eyes going wide at the amount of diamonds in them. “There’s twenty-seven diamonds in this chest!”

Phil looked up surprised before looking in another chest. “This one too.”

“Well they said the place was all sold out.” Tommy responded as he opened up one of the shulkers and started pulling stacks of cobble out of it.

The avian noticed just what Tommy was grabbing and stared at it. “Mate, are you actually selling cobble for diamonds?”

Tubbo’s head whipped around to look away from the chest where he too saw Tommy pulling out cobble. “Not just cobble. There’s that, normal stone, andesite and granite.”

“And they buy that?”

“Yeah, at first I thought it was out of pity, until one day I got there to stock up and Bdubs was in there and was happy I was there. They all like building, but when they mine, none of the hermits bother to pick up all the stone since they normally fill their inventories with anything else and let the rest disappear. I make sure to go down with plenty of chests and put everything away, so when they need stone and shit, I’m the one they buy from.”

From there, Tommy and the other two stocked the shop. No hermits showed while they stocked, but one did show up just as they were leaving, Tubbo jumping back a little as the two of them nearly ran into each other, the wide eyed look of the hermit adding to the surprise. “Hey Keralis. Just stocked up so you’re good to go.”

“Why spank you Tommy. Who are your friends?”

“Tubbo and my dad Phil.”

“Will they be staying long?”

“Yeah, but Big G’s got them covered with housing.”

“Ah, Brian does have a good place indeed. But if they need a place to stay, I have plenty of room.”

“Almost too much. They’d be like me the first time I saw your place.”

“All the more reason for them to visit!”

“Right, see ya later.” Tommy followed behind Tubbo and Phil who had already slowly gotten ahead. He pulled out his comm and sent a message to Grian and Mumbo about where they were and where they were heading. Mumbo sent a reply that they would be coming over there soon with the bots, and Tommy put his comm away again. “Alright, I have a bit of land on a different part of the island, but it’s not really a shop. It’s more something I sort of brought over from the SMP.”

Tommy led them through the roads before they reached another area near the shore. Sand had terraformed the nearby land and various tables and chairs and other items were all over the place. But right next to the shoreline was a familiar piece of furniture that had Tubbo tearing up just a little. “You built the bench.”

“Yeah. Made it feel more like home sometimes. The rest of it is based on the beach party I held back in exile.”

Tubbo flinched slightly and looked down at the ground. Tommy was slightly confused and looked at Philza, who just gave a slight nod and wandered off. Once he was gone, Tommy led his friend over to the bench. “What’s up Big T?”

“Your… Your beach party. I- I’m sure you had fun.”

“Not really. Didn’t go the way I planned. Especially since you weren’t there.”

“I didn’t think you wanted me there. I never-”

“I sent an invitation, Tubbo. Ghostbur was supposed to give everyone in L’Manberg an invitation. But no one came. I thought it was cause you all fucking hated me. I mean, I did kinda ruin everything. I remember how mad you were.”

“Tommy…”

“I still thought that when I got here. Starting making friends out of spite instead of because I needed them. But then they made me realize some things. I don’t… Ghostbur wasn’t the most reliable, so I thought maybe he just didn’t manage to get the invitations out. But Grian said since Dream was messing with me the whole time I was there, he probably did something. Made sure you didn’t come.”

“Really? He’s been helping out. With you gone he’s become an ally to L’manberg.”

Tommy essentially growled in response to those words. “He’s not a fucking ally to anyone. He plays mind games and fucks everything up. He lies and tries to make you trust him so he can stab you in the back later. He was trying to make it so I’d only trust him. Unless you’re saying he told the truth when you immediately burned your compass for me.”

Tubbo’s hand immediately moved to hold where he had kept his compass, but it stopped midway there. “I… No. I kept it with me all the time.”

“Kept?”

Tubbo started tearing up a little before forcing the tear back. “I sort of got killed by a creeper and the explosion or something destroyed it. Tommy… I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to lose it. I didn’t want to lose you. But-”

Tubbo was cut off from Tommy hugging him. “It’s fine Big T. We lived in a fucked up place, and now we don’t have to. It’ll be you and me again. I’ll build you a tower for yourself. I’ll-”

A loud sound suddenly rang out along with an explosion. A second and third pair of the noises quickly followed. Tommy and Tubbo jumped up from the bench and looked towards the source of the noises to find three withers in the middle of the shopping district.

“What the fuck?! Why are those there?!” Tommy was immediately pulling out his comm and sending a message in the main chat. 

Tubbo, on the other hand, squinted as something that seemed to be standing behind the boss monsters. They quickly shot open as he realized what he was seeing. “Technoblade?”

[danswank]

yeah!! i think that’s the worst thing about cancel culture. it never cancels people who deserve to be canceled. there are literal rapists and pedophiles who still have careers, yet they focus on canceling someone who made an insensitive and uninformed joke 7 years ago without knowing any better at the time. and if that person shows that they’ve become educated, learned why the comment was wrong to make in the first place, and have moved past making comments like that again, twitter is essentially like “lol we don’t care you’re still a piece of shit no matter what.” there’s a difference between irredeemable offenses and making inappropriate comments because you’re uneducated at the time of making them. there’s a difference between someone who is openly homophobic and racist and has made it very clear that’s how they feel, and someone who made an off-handed comment that they didn’t realize was a slight microaggression that they now know not to make. twitter doesn’t draw a line; all of those people are grouped together in their book. bottom line is don’t just take a twitter thread or post on any platform about why some creator sucks at face value. do your own research. assess the situation from an unbiased pov. don’t jump to conclusions based on what the hivemind is saying.

you’re so so right anon. i believe in pointing out when people have said or done something wrong bc how else are they gonna grow? but it sucks because once the twitter mob takes hold of it it becomes straight up bullying and harassment and nothing they ever say will be good enough. then you don’t even get to see the growth because you bullied them off of social media.