#you've heard of goth or punk or emo

[earlycuntsets]

04/13/2011 milwaukee wisconsin eagles ballroom jen (coble) hopper on flickr

[jellyfishoreo1206]

hey dude! really like ur work lol :3 can you write a tf2 medic with a fem or gn reader who is alternative (like punk/goth?) it can be headcannons or a drabble or whatever u want :) thanks bud!

Medic with an Alt! Reader (gender-neutral)

Notes: Of course! Again, I'm sorry if it seems like I ignored your ask! For that, I'll attempt to make it extra long :3 Please correct me if I get anything wrong about the history of Alternative fashion/music, I mostly referenced Wikipedia, but I don't think there was enough information for me to go on. I didn't know if you wanted this to be a romantic pairing or just platonic, so I'm doing both!

So coming back to this, I realized that the first half of this is talking about Alt Reader, but then the next half it's literally just romance head cannons that have nothing to do with the ask. I've been carried away by the amount of ideas that have been flooding my brain at night that I completely forgot what I was doing in the first place. At this point, I'm just rolling with it, I'm sorry Anon

Warning(s): Medic being medic, cussing, mentions of reader smoking, slight spoilers for the TF2 Comics.

M/C = Merc Class

---

Platonic

Considering that this is the late 60's (and alt becoming a thing somewhere in the 1970's or 80's), Medic would take a keen interest in you.

Whether you take interest in Emo, Goth, Hip-Hop (which apparently is a form of Alt fashion! Good to know), Punk, Rocker or Grunge fashion; all of them have a few things in common, they all stand out from the mainstream fashion going on in that time, some are more artistic and attention-grabbing, and some coming to be as a break from beliefs.

I'm not going to lie to you, at first he thought it was some type of disorder

"I want to find out what's wrong with them" That's what's going through his mind 😭

He's so curious, you're going to be his new subject of interest until he has studied every inch of you

Whether that be operating on you or studying how you behave from afar.

---

Several days have passed since you've joined the mercenaries. You seem to be adjusting well enough to the team, getting along semi-okay with your teammates (if you ignore how the on your first day Soldier nearly killed you because he mistook you as a demon, shouting absolute nonsense). Engineer has been one of the most welcoming out of your teammates, offering to show you around and letting you know what to watch out for.

But there is one teammate that you can't even bring yourself to being around. The Medic.

God, you would think that the Engineer would at least warn you about him and his behavior, dude is seriously all kinds of creepy.

Ever since you got here, he's been watching you like a hawk. Always seeing him out of the corner of your eye, conveniently always being in the same room as you; Hell! Even following you out in the battle field. You even think you woke up to him crouching menacingly in the corner of your room, watching as you slept with a creepy smile on his face and an insane look in those eyes of his. (Desperately wishing that it was some kind of paranoia-filled nightmare and praying to whatever god that is up there that it wasn't real.)

"I swear! Was it something I did??" You decided to express your concerns to the Engineer, considering he is one of the more reasonable one's out of the mercs, and being the first person you hit it off with when you first arrived. He hummed in thought—putting down the sentry gun that he was tinkering with—turning to face you as he pushes his hard-hat back into place.

"Medic is a strange fella, I know tha'. But I don' think I've ever heard him act like this..." His response only seemed to add on to your distress, sitting yourself on the floor of his workshop with a loud groan. Great, so even he doesn't know what's going on either. "I'll hafta talk with him la'er, see wha's up with 'im."

"I appreciate it, Engineer."

"Please, call me Engie."

---

When the Engineer brought up the Medic's behavior to him, he just laughed it off

"Oh Herr Engineer, you must know as a man of science that this is simply an observation!" "...What exactly are ya' observin'?" "Haven't you noticed? How they dress! Is it a form of trauma? Or a type of disorder! I must find out!" *Cue him holding a bloody hand saw in the most menacing way possible* "Then..why don'tcha jus' ask them up front?" "I like my methods better."

Yeahhhh, he has a really bad case of autism

When Engie told you what the Medic told him, you just got even more confused.

What would the way you dress have anything to do with your mental state?

I mean, yeah, you've turned heads whenever you went out to do mundane tasks back home (such as picking something up from the store or returning something to a friend), and you had several people tell you that'll they will pray for you, but you've never had someone assume that it was straight up a disorder??

The thought itself just confuses you

Engie was right about him being weird..

---

A month has passed, and it seems like the Medic's behavior has calmed down a bit. Emphasis on a bit.

He stopped following you around out in the battlefield as much and seems to be getting back into his regular schedule of being the medic for the team; but you're starting to notice something else...

It seems he's attempting to talk to you! The whole entire time you've been here at the base, you two never actually had a proper conversation (mainly it was because you were attempting to avoid him as much as possible at the start, and Medic because he just saw you as another subject). The first time it happened was late at night, almost the early hours of the morning. You were in the kitchen, making some coffee for yourself and the Engineer (who has yet to go to sleep). You were pretty sure it was only the two of you awake at this time, since you didn't hear anything else other than the distant clinging and clanking of the engineer's machinery.

With both hands occupied with a mug of hot coffee, you were about to make your way out of the kitchen when you felt your heart drop. Jesus FUCKING CHRIST, HOW LONG WAS HE STANDING THERE????

Might as well be called The SPY instead with how fucking quiet he was.

You both made awkward eye-contact—awkward for you anyway—he seemed tired, but that didn't stop him from smiling at you—teeth and all.

"Ach, guten morgen!" He offers a small wave, his voice cheery despite his obvious exhaustion.

You didn't say anything, you bolted out of there.

Nope nope nope nope nopenopenope-!

---

The Medic didn't seem to take that reaction personally

If anything, it made him more curious

So he attempts to strike up another conversation, but this time with company around, since he was scolded by the engineer the very next day

Whether it was during dinner-time, before a match, or even game-nights (as chaotic as they can be); he always attempts to strike up conversations, whether you don't respond or you give one-word responses.

Going on to long rants about any topic that comes to mind, whether you want to listen or not; most of them are usually about the human biology or his previous experiments

You wish you could erase the memory when he told you he got a man pregnant with baboons.

When you asked why he wanted to talk to you, he merely gave a shrug and a almost sheepish smile

His response?

"Oh for no reason, I just got bored when I realized there were no results in my observations."

Yeah

You kept your distance as much as possible, still feeling a bit uncomfortable around the man

Though it eventually started to slowly fade away when he kept attempting to talk with you, a big part of it was also due to his birds perching themselves on you whenever you needed something from the medbay, cuddling up to you in a mass of feathers

You actually started to enjoy the conversations when he asked why you dressed the way you did

---

"Let me give you a brief summary," You start, sitting on the worn-out couch with the Medic on the far-end, a freshly lit cigarette in-between your fingers, "-there's a small community of us, people who also dress like me. But like I said, small community, not many of us." Taking the first drag of your cigarette, you see from the corner of your vision Medic holding a scolding look, eyeing the cigarette in your hand with disgust.

Blowing the smoke out in small puffs, you continued, "But, the reason why we dress the way we do, there's several and it varies from person to person."

"It could be a way of self-expression, a break from the mainstream style, or...damnit, I always forget the last one's. But there's many reasons why is what I'm trying to get at."

"What was your reasoning?" The Medic finally spoke, crossing his legs as he (un)discreetly takes out a notepad, writing down the information that you have just stated. The question processes in your brain, taking a long drag, repeating it over and over until an answer formed.

"Mm, nearly everyone dresses the same, no variety in their fashion." Finishing the last of the cigarette, you put it out in the ash tray atop the coffee table, leaning back into the couch with a stretch. "Everyone is always expected to dress the same. I wanted something different."

"Interesting..."

---

Romantic

Now for the romantic part of the relationship, it would take him FOREVER to figure out that he likes you

YEARS if nobody brings it up

He would just brush it off as excess adrenaline from the battles (even if there was a ceasefire)

He would also began to show a certain type of favoritism towards you (his birds especially)

Whether that be storing a jar of lollipops in his office for you to take from (and only you), telling you a in-depth explanation/step-by-step of his experiments before anybody else, scolding you whenever you do something that's unhealthy, or just treating you like a normal doctor whenever it comes time for the yearly check-ups (like not experimenting on you/doing a random surgery or injecting random chemicals into your body to see what effects it'll have on the battlefield.)

---

"Aye, doc! How come you only give M/N loli's!" For what seemed to have been the tenth time that day that Scout has complained about the same thing—over and over again—it was starting to get on the doctors nerves as he attempted (emphasis on attempted) to rescue his beloved bird that has somehow snuck his way inside of the scout and got himself tangled in the intestines while the Medic was preforming surgery.

"And for the last time, Scout." A sharp snap fills the tiled-room, a small piece of the Scout's rib cage in-between the Medic's gloved fingers, throwing it somewhere behind him without much concern for it as he continues with his current task at hand, "They aren't such a nuisance, unlike you."

---

That's his only excuse whenever someone asks really :/

He always seems to enjoy your company the most out of all the mercs and is seen with you more times than anybody else on the team

It's until one of the mercs bring up his favoritism from another point of view that he begins to think...differently

Not a bad differently, but a "What do I do" differently

Like that's the moment when he begins to realize his affections for you

Personally, I believe that man has never been in a romantic relationship/had romantic feelings for someone

So him being in love for possibly the first time in his life, he's stumped

Like what does he even do in a predicament like this???

Would probably go to Engie or Heavy about this predicament for some sort of guidance.

His behavior around you would change a bit

He would still act like his regular self

But with you around he could be seen fidgeting with whatever he has in his hands and stumbling over his words more often, maybe even calling you pet-names in German

There will be times where he'll have a red flush seen on his normally pale face whenever you do something he sees as attractive/adorable (whether that be ruthlessly killing the other team, laughing at something one of the mercs did, cooing at Archimedes, etc.)

Like, flushed to the tips of his ears down to the nape of his neck type of blushing

You can tell he's blushing whenever his glasses fog up <3

---

"Who's a pretty bird? You're a pretty bird!" Said blood-covered dove cooed at the various praise he was receiving from you, flapping his wings in a joyful matter. You came to the medbay to ask Medic for something that the Engineer needed but quickly got sidetracked when a certain dove flew down from his perch and decided to greet you.

Bringing a finger up to the dove, you give him small gentle scratches atop his head, continuing to coo at the bird with a big smile stretched across your lips.

Medic watches as the whole thing happens from his desk, a look of adoration in his eyes as he watches the on-going interaction between you and his bird. A feeling of warmth began spreading across his face, the beating of his heart increasing just from the sight alone.

He's absolutely clueless on what to do—the well-composed Medic, the man who has made a deal with the Devil and tricked him, sowing 8 souls to his very own, and has done many experiments that should be impossible to achieve—is confused on how he should proceed with his arising feelings for someone he considered a colleague and friend.

What a very troublesome situation.

---

He would probably be a bit straightforward when he decides to confess to you, probably in a private space like in the Medbay or when it's late at night so nobody is awake to walk in on the two of you

When I say "a bit straightforward", I mean like he'll beat around the bush for a brief few seconds before just going for it, and keeps eye-contact throughout the whole thing

If you accept his feelings; he's ecstatic! But he doesn't know how to act, to say.

'What do couples do??' 'How does one act when they are in a relationship?' Mainly the questions that are going through his mind

If you reject his feelings; he'll become quiet and distant around you. He might even be a bit mad at himself, whenever he's by his lonesome; staring at his reflection on his bone-saw as his birds attempt to comfort him

Like, you guys will still talk, but it'll just be awkward—a tension between the two of you

Okay moving on.

Once entering a relationship with the Medic, it's best if you take things slow; discuss boundaries with one another, what to do and what not to do, etc,.

Would probably become a bit more touchy? Like, small brushes against your hand or one of your limbs, holding you hand or just linking pinkies with you whenever the two of you are alone

Like those kind of touches, soft.

Kisses would probably start off small too; small kiss to your knuckles or a kiss to the palm of his hand to bring a flush out of him (Though he prefers both of these in private)

Would absolute want to attempt to do your hair and make-up

I feel like he's either the kind of person to keep his love life private, but also not? Like, he would drops hints that he's in a relationship with you, but they are so subtle they fly over a few of the mercs heads

---

Again, Anon, I'm sorry for going off-topic

[xx-emowarz-xx]

Also here's the thing about Taylor Swift calling herself "goth punk". There is literally nothing stoping her from listening to a bunch of goth and punk music for inspiration and making a genre and aesthetic switch. None of us would listen to it and we'd all bully her for it but she's very rich she doesn't have to notice us doing that. But instead of putting on corpse paint she's putting on clown makeup and walking out here like "Better Than Revenge had an electric guitar in it so basically I'm super edgy." And then the egirl Swifties wonder why we gatekeep. It's because the scene is a rich subculture with audacious fashion and experimental music which pushes boundaries and y'all want to demean it until it means a girl in shien leggings who listens to Paramore but only Still Into You and Ain't It Fun. I know the same bitches who are drawing little black hearts on their cheeks and getting mad about us gatekeeping against people who have never even heard a Siouxie song are the same people who threw eraser bits into my hair in middle school when I had it teased up and bullied me for wearing a choker I made out of a belt. You want to be cool and jaded like us but you don't want to actually be cringey enough to dress like and listen to the same music as the freak tranny you went to school with who wore socks on his arms and safety pins in his ears, well guess what that's what goth and emo and punk is. When you're the outcast, and you've been singled out your whole life, dressing scary and listening to loud music and getting angry and using the aesthetics of pain and death become a way to take your power back. They can't accept and embrace that weirdo outsider element and that's why they'll never be genuine. They don't care about that shit they just want to be someone's goth gf.

[randomwriteronline]

THE YESTERDAY QUEST (band) LINE-UP LETS GOOO

ever since i described the hellish possibility of a lesovikk-varian-chiara-zariah-orde-krakua (+ gelu) toa team as an emo band the thought "ok but what if they WERE a band" has plagued my thoughts and hands, so here they are!! in human form bc ive just discovered anatomy and i cant do proper bionicles yet. i dont trust myself

i also have like. Lore about them. sort of. also pls help i need to figure out their clothes

Lesovikk (guitar) looks like he crawled out of a dumpster at all times but he does actually have a place to stay, he's just Not Doing Good. He can shred the angriest riffs you've ever heard but at heart he's a melancholy boy forced (by himself) to be Fucking Mad. Leader on the sole basis that the others would be worse. Usually cranky but turns into a bashful sunshine the second his friends Idris and Sarda show up, and it's super weird for everybody else to see him like that

Chiara (bass) is an old school punk who has bitten at least three people this month and fistfights Orde daily. They met at a concert while she was trying to swoon his sister and he kicked her in the knee. Fixes up the instruments constantly because their hq is a humid basement that messes the wires and stuff all the time. Most competent musically but hellish at human relations

Orde (keyboard/keytar/guitar) swears he had a psychic experience at a rave because the music was just So Good. The only ones backing him up are a bunch of guys who claim he brain blasted them during it and hate him. Cyberpunk guy. The band is named after a 26-books-long mystery-horror-sci-fi-psychological series he failed to write and Chiara will tell EVERYBODY about it much to his hatred

Zariah (drummer) hit a growth spurt at 13 and the rest of his body is still trying to catch up to it. Heavy metal goth who funds the band via his job as an ironmonger and metallurgist. No clue what he or the others are doing, he's just here to beat the shit out of the drums. Despite looking Not Approachable when people want to talk to the band they go to him because he's the least off the shits

Gelu is technically part of the band in that he drives them to places because none of them have a license or a car. His own car is a mad max death trap he built himself in his old days as a member of a fairly peaceful motor gang. Sometimes he still dresses up in "uniform". Universally beloved by the members of the band. Actually likes hanging out at their gigs to watch them perform. Also helps Lesovikk via therapeutic make out sessions (they're not together)

Krakua (vocalist) can fit so much volume in him. He needs to stand six feet away from the mic or he'll blow it up. Every single time he pulls out the heavy metal growl the audience is Blown Away. Scene kiddo, youngest here. His hair is Like That because it used to be shaved and he's growing it out. MIGHT have been in a cult but nobody is sure, it remains that he lives with Zariah for now

Varian sings with them sometimes but isn't a stable member of the band. She and Orde are siblings and he loves her very much but is too angry to express it normally. Goth who hangs with a bunch of normal people and her friend Norik who might have a crush on her which is why the rest get roped into going to concerts of her older loser brother's screamo cover band

[doublelp]

what the "favorite punk subgenre" poll says about you

hardcore: you're not that picky about the stuff that you listen to. there's too many variations of "hardcore" to reasonably discern much. if you only call it "hardcore" without the "punk" then you prefer newer stuff like Sunami or Gel.

cyber/synth/electronic: you prefer raves to shows. you occasionally miss the days of old technology with all of it's bulky monitors and numerous wires, like in Lain.

post-punk/emo: if you chose this for post-punk then you think that punk is fine, it just doesn't have that certain je ne sais quoi. there's a 50/50 chance that you're goth. if you chose this for emo then you know what you are.

horror/steampunk/rockabilly: you are a theater kid and you think the performance of punk is cooler than the music. you are also incredibly homosexual but in an annoying way. if you chose this for horror punk then you have opinions on the various misfits lineups and albums.

folk/anti-folk: you have a lot of preconceived ideas about punk but do not actually like punk music. you also play folk punk and it sounds bad because you think that's what makes it punk. you could probably use a shower.

pop punk: you miss the warped tour, regardless of if you were actually old enough for it. you wear the rose-tinted glasses with pride and barely listen to anything released in the past 5 years except for like Jeff Rosenstock. you prefer the "pop" in pop punk rather than the "punk".

queercore/riot grrrl: you have vaguely progressive social ideas which is why you like these subgenres specifically. you would absolutely go see Kathleen Hanna live despite the terrible Le Tigre song she did for Hillary Clinton. there's a slim chance you've heard of g.l.o.s.s. or even limp wrist.

grind/crust/d-beat: you are fairly well-versed in punk history/subgenres and believe that this is the logical conclusion for the genre; anything else would be like trying to reinvent the wheel. you're also an asshole.

garage punk: you are a little too normal. what bands do you like, The Hives? go back to your desk job.

ska: you get a little annoyed when people make Tony Hawk Pro Skater jokes about ska because there wasn't that many ska songs in those games. and besides, you much prefer 2tone and appreciate the rich history behind the genre. you listened to a few first wave ska songs and while you appreciate it's origins in Jamaican folk music you kind of prefer the punk elements of the second and third waves, which makes you worried that you're maybe a little racist? there's also that one Madness album with the blackface on the cover which you vehemently disagree with but it's still ska history and the album is pretty good so maybe you can chalk this up as a learning experience. you own a pork pie hat but you're not sure if it's ironic or not.

another punk genre: you were annoyed that Oi! or egg punk wasn't on here, but it's fine whatever. if you chose this for cowpunk then i'm a little baffled because what the hell are you listening to other than Meat Puppets?

i don't listen to punk: at least you were honest.

[gatsby-system-folks]

I did it... you've heard of spider punk now get ready for spider goth and spider emo. Their names are Victoria and Horatio Tori and Kit. Tori I went ahead and gave Tori superpowers, because we've been bouncing around the idea of a superhero called Glow Worm, with Controlling Your Hair To Do Cool Stuff Powers. Kit is the Sokka of the band. They might even have a boomerang idk. ALSO TORIS COLORS ARE ASS. HERES THE LINEART

Or.. almost. I realized a little too late that I should photograph the lineart.. her shirt says My Chemical Bromance

[i-lionheart]

k babes here's the results <3

DONT CLICK READ MORE UNTIL AFTER U ANSWER!!! IT WILL RUIN IT!!!

Keep in mind that more than one of these may apply to you!

If You Chose Muffin:

With zero hesitation and no questions asked: - you heard "turn into a muffin" and immediately went "holy shit that'd be hilarious!!!!!" - v chaotic energy - You're impulsive as hell lmao. thats it thats the post - @creativemercinary this is u 100%

Because u hate white clothes: -high chance of being afab (period tings :/) -u are probs emo/alt/goth/scene/punk or a similar subculture that people think of and go "oh yeah the ppl who wear all black" -@alas-the-void-screams-back and @kaz3313, this is you - also a lil bit of @bonkingintensifies

You considered a few pros and cons of each option. and yet still you landed on muffin - smart but also a himbo. u actually thought about it but failed to consider the "if you get eaten, do you die?" aspect of the question. - which is kind of important. how does it feel to have such a low sense of self preservation - v likely to also be a "because u hate white clothes" person -again, kaz, void, and bonk

You asked me (or thought) any of these: "what kind of muffin would I be? Can I be (x) type of muffin? I can? Fuck yeah! What if someone ate me O_o? Lmao it'd be fine" - 99% chance that you have adhd/autism - so,,,impulsive,,,, RIP

White Clothes peeps

"if I was a muffin and someone ate me i would die and that's bad", and/or you asked a shit ton of questions abt (and had a mild existential crisis over) "what would happen if someone did x to me while I was a muffin????" - you are an overthinker To The Max. v practical - this is my result - how does it feel to have high int, high wis, and high anxiety lmao - you've definitely had an existential crisis or five before - @saoirse-1887 gave me these vibes. also @magnetothemagnificent ik u didnt say anything about dying or getting eaten but you still recognized that too much muffin time is dangerous and that counts

i would look so badass in cool white clothes. suits and dresses oooo - u make the best out of a bad situation - ur hot and super cool but refuse to believe it - this is the other half of urs bonk

U chose both

- anxiety to the max - indecisive as shit - people pleaser. always has the middle ground - believe it or not, being a doormat is not healthy. try setting some boundaries for urself babe

backstory: while I was in residential i met this cool as shit dude named Rose who asked everybody this and lo and behold it actually works. ud be surprised how much this question can tell u about people. Rose, if you're out there, you're super cool and i'm really glad I met you <3

fuck the meyers-briggs personality test. I want all my mutuals to answer me this:

Would you rather wear all white clothing for the rest of your life? Or turn into a muffin for five minutes every time you sneeze?

tagging some folks but if you don't want to do it feel free to ignore me <3 @creativemercinary @kaz3313 @alas-the-void-screams-back @bonkingintensifies @aspirationatwork @magnetothemagnificent