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nona-piccolo · 3 years

Note

Obey Me you say ?? Oh HECK yeah, I’ve been thinking of a bunch of stuff ! Feel free to just respond to ones you enjoy, and I wish I had a preference of the brothers or others but that’s also really just up to you! The gender neutral pronouns are amazing, thank you !!! Now that that is out of the way, on to thoughts and questions!

How do you feel the brothers or others would react to a very blunt and honest MC? Like one that is nice as heck, but will not hesitate to tell you their actual thoughts on things- for example the constant bashing on Mammon or maybe helping Solomon out in the kitchen with friendly suggestions kinda vibe !

How do

Oh I love this one! A part of me thinks that the brothers truly need a blunt MC in their lives, especially with how they treat Mammon and such sometimes LOL Because there is no preference, I decided to only do the brothers for now. But I do feel bad, because my Asmodeus, Beel, and Belphie ones appear to be much shorter… Thank you for the request though, I really hope you enjoy the answer 💗

How the boys react to blunt MC

Characters: Lucifer, Mammon, Leviathan, Satan, Asmodeus, Beelzebub, and Belphegor

Reader: gn!reader

Warnings: none :)

Lucifer

I think it’s well known that Lucifer is not the softest guy when it comes to words.

Not only does he say whatever is on his mind, no matter how harsh it may be, but he also doesn’t care at all whose feelings he hurts in doing so. And yet there has never been anyone else to try and voice their opinions fullheartedly towards him.

So when he first begins spending time with you, truly, he was lowkey shocked at how blunt and honest you were.

Especially when it was towards him.

“Lucifer, did you just hang Mammon from the banister… again??” you ask, barging into his office without knocking. He was quite used to this however, and the demon had long since given up trying to scold you for it; it was no use, you would just keep doing it.

It’s not like he minded though. In fact, your presence made his head feel light after the many hours of paperwork he was going at.

“Yes, I did actually. Why do you ask?” he replied, glancing up to see you situated in front of his desk. You had your hands on your hips, obviously looking displeased. For a second, he thought your irritation was directed towards him.

“Why do I ask?” you replied back, no hesitation in your voice. “This is the third time this week. Mammon clearly hasn’t learned to fix his behavior after the first few times, and it’s obvious that hurting him won’t solve a thing!”

Oh… your irritation was directed towards him

Lucifer blinked up at you, his red eyes trying to read your face. No one ever had a problem with him punishing Mammon in the creative ways he could find; in fact, his younger brothers appeared to love watching Mammon suffer.

Apparently… you had not.

“Y/N, I-” Lucifer sighed, hell bent on just straight up telling you that Mammon will never learn.

“No. Stop doing it. He doesn’t deserve that.” You cut him off, the frustration still showing on your face. And before the demon could reply, you had turned around to whisk yourself out of his office.

The only thing left in the room was him and his thoughts--- and the sound of his pen slipping from his fingers to bounce onto the desk.

Ohhh boy, Lucifer had never had someone stand up to him like that. It wasn’t even like you were trying to be mean, or be the more ‘dominant’ one… you were just saying what was on your mind. And Lucifer wasn’t blind.. He knew how much his other brothers meant to you, so for you to care so much as to voice your opinion to the very avatar of pride himself--- maybe, just maybe, he could give Mammon a break from punishments.

Even though people like to portray Lucifer as someone who is super strict and would want to be around I guess more ‘submissive’ people who would obey him, I think he would certainly not like an MC who allows people to walk all over them. You are the perfect balance between kindness and honesty, making you a trustworthy companion.

And a good ol’ honest comment could never truly hurt Lucifer’s feelings. His skin was as thick as bone, so to finally be around someone who isn’t intimidated to speak their mind around him… it’s almost relieving

I guess you could even say he finds it attractive….

Mammon

Mammon had always enjoyed spending time with you

From the moment he met you, you had always given off a fun and compassionate aura, and so the demon was ecstatic to finally have a partner-in-crime!

Ehhhh… it wasn’t like that though

Although you found humor and joy in going along with his harmless schemes, there were some where you put your foot down without a grain of hesitation.

When you first voiced your opinion on how bad of an idea it was to try and snap a picture of Lucifer when he was sleeping, he instantly thought you were a debby downer with a goody-goody type of attitude. Mammon had groaned out in frustration as if he was a 3-year-old child.

“Oh come on! It’ll be fun! It’s not like Lucifer will even see ya coming,” he responded, pulling out his phone to text Satan and Asmodeus his plans.

You had stared at him after that for a solid minute, your arms crossed and your eyebrows furrowed as if you were thinking. It wouldn’t take a genius to recognize how bad of an idea that was.

“Mammon, you’ll probably be punished again. Respect Lucifer’s privacy please. Besides, I think it’ll be more fun if we watched a movie tonight! What do you say we rewatch the TSL series together?” you had brought up an alternate solution to keep him out of Lucifer’s wrath, hands folded together and eyes wide as you hoped he would agree and listen to you. Mammon was just confused though, looking at you as if you were crazy.

You’d rather watch that series all over again instead of trying to cause trouble for Lucifer??

Ugh… but look at your expecting face… he couldn’t just let you down.

Surprisingly, and begrudgingly though, he had agreed.

And guess who wasn’t thrown from the banister that night?? Mammon.

Your honesty doesn’t just stop there though.

As the family punching bag, Mammon was so used to taking the hits for his stupidity and then moving on. He never fought back. So when you decided to voice out how ridiculous it was that he was being called “stupid” and how ironic it was that Asmodeus was calling Mammon an “attention-seeker” or that Satan was referring to Mammon as an “asshole”, he was whole-heartedly surprised.

Apparently so were his other brothers.

Everyone just sort of sat there in silence as you shot comments back at them, scolding them for treating Mammon like he was dirt. It wasn’t just one instance either; Every. Single. Time. You told them to knock it off.

And just like that, the harsh insults towards Mammon began to disappear, especially whenever you were around.

The avatar of greed never had anyone to stand up for him in the ways that you had. And he feels his heart swell up with warmth as you berate Lucifer of all people for hanging Mammon upside; the fall causing his sunglasses to slip and break, much to his disappointment.

Mammon made it a goal to always be near you when he voiced his opinion around others; because not only would you acknowledge what he said, but you also made sure the others wouldn’t shoot him down for simply being himself

It was like he could breathe when he was around you. Like every single thing he said wasn’t nitpicked apart and thrown away as a stupid thing. You were different. You told him what was wrong and gave him constructive criticism.

BUT-- that honestly doesn’t protect him from himself

No one is safe from your blunt persona, not even Mammon.

I think this is what he truly needs in his life though; because I believe honesty and bluntness comes from a place of love and comfort. You are blunt because you want Mammon to be the best that he can be, you are blunt because you want to see Mammon succeed, you are blunt because you care about him.

Every honest thing you say about him is to protect him.

So whenever Mammon sneaks into Leviathan’s room at night for a limited edition figurine, or slips down Diavolo’s corridors to try and snatch a vintage portrait that could make him some potential money… he always pauses to think of your reaction to his late night greedy urges. So that when he hesitantly puts down the portrait, he can sleep comfortably knowing that you’d be proud of him.

Leviathan

To be honest… I think it would make him very nervous when he observed that you were an honest person

Even though his brothers are equally as harsh to him-- for example, they don’t hesitate to call him a nerd, or a weeb and otaku-- he doesn’t seem to mind it anyways, since Leviathan has fully absorbed and accepted his otaku persona.

But this situation is a bit different… because even though Leviathan is used to his brothers being honest with him, it’s a whole different thing when Y/N does it.

Someone out of his family circle telling him that he’s a weirdo??

Yikes, he doesn’t think his heart could handle that.

So to cope he’ll at first just stay in his room… far away from you… so he could get to his usual activities.

He is already so used to being locked up in his room away from prying eyes and others’ opinions, so as soon as he takes notice of your blunt tendencies (especially when you had first voiced your thoughts to Lucifer), Leviathan shies away from being close to a normie like you. Besides, he doesn’t even need to leave, right? He has an emergency built stash of food for when he needs to eat, and he could just do school work on his own computer.

He has this whole imaginary field of comfort that he had built up for years and years; a room full of figures and merchandise-- his own personal utopia.

Leviathan doesn’t want you to judge him; he doesn’t want you to think that he’s weird or a loser. His poor introverted otaku heart couldn’t handle it

Clearly, he didn’t understand you at all...

That doesn’t stop you from hanging around him either. You insist he shouldn’t have to wait up all night alone for tickets on Zaramela’s new worldwide tour, and you had dragged Mammon along with you to give Leviathan some company.

He felt cornered, deciding to let you in to stay up late with him. And while Mammon had fallen asleep (much to Levi’s anxiety), he was left to try and entertain you to the best of his ability.

Leviathan hesitantly hopped onto his gaming console, turning on a classic favorite of his. It was simple, it was easy, and he was very familiar with it, especially considering he had played it and completed it over 25 times.

Perhaps his movements will be more shaky and unsure, however. When you sat down to watch him play his video games, he may mess up more often, to his dismay. Your distance to him was decent enough, and you couldn’t help but smile as you watched him begin to get absorbed into the game.

“You know, you’re very good at the game…” you mutter, looking down at his fingers flying across the controller. You wonder for a moment how Leviathan can even stare at the bright screen for so long without any permanent eye damage.

Apparently he took your comment as a sarcastic one, lightly scoffing. “Okay I get it… we can do something else… like uhh..” his eyes flitted down to a random CD he had discarded on his floor a while ago. “We could watch The Girl Whose Grandparents Travelled Back in Time to Tell Her She Was a Princess,” he casually brought up airily; already in the process of turning off his video game. He reached over to grab the CD, realizing too late that this was one of the animes he didn’t really like...

You were a bit confused at the offer though. “Um no thanks. It’s a total rip off of The Girl Whose Parents Time Travelled To the Past to Tell Her She Was a Princess.” Your response was automatic, looking at the CD as if you were bored.

Leviathan paused. “What?! Y-You noticed that too??” he questioned, tossing the CD back onto the ground where it originally was. “Finally someone who understands!! The heroine was almost a complete carbon copy, I can’t believe the studio got away with that!”

You nodded your head, a serious expression on your face. “What a let down. Besides, the original had a better soundtrack 100%.”

Leviathan almost jumped on you with excitement.

Apparently not even Leviathan knew how harsh of a critic he himself was. All that harsh judgement he does on animes and video games… Perhaps you being just as blunt would be new to him. You were somehow both one in the same.

All in all, Leviathan didn’t understand how much of a blessing having an honest person in his life could be. Especially as someone who doesn’t judge; your honesty never crossed the line into personal territory.

Instead, you gave him an opportunity to gain feedback on animes that you two binge watch together

And for the first time in forever, Leviathan felt like he had someone to indulge in.

Satan

He really really enjoys this

Satan pegs me as the type of guy that would find humor in hearing your honest opinions--- and you notice that whenever you speak your mind towards Lucifer, you can briefly hear a quiet chuckle escaping Satan’s lips.

Of course, as mature as Satan is, it’s not that he actually finds what you say humorous; he just never thought he’d see the day where some mortal human would stand up to a group of demons as intimidating as they could be.

You remind him of himself in some ways… both of you unafraid to speak your minds and both of you able to stand up for what you truly believe in.

And because of this, he registers the fact that instead of going to Solomon or Asmodeus for opinions on his books or feedback for his many essays, he goes to you.

Especially when Satan needs proper and honest feedback from someone who wouldn’t sugarcoat it. And unlike Leviathan, Satan relishes in some proper assessments.

Satan feels more drawn to you than the rest of his brothers, coming up to you for some of his more diabolical actions--- like the many pranks he kept under his sleeve for Lucifer

“Do you think Lucifer will see this one coming?” he asked you casually, sliding you a piece of paper containing a scribbled down--- yet well thought-out and detailed scheme to cause trouble yet again.

You quirk up an eyebrow, glancing away from your phone and down towards the sheet of paper. With a small sigh, you decided to give in and at least entertain the idea. He just didn’t give up, huh?

“Hmmm… didn’t you try a plan like this similar to before?” you replied, eyes raking through the pencil marks.

“Have I?” he mumbled, leaning in to feign involvement. “Yes,” you answered, dropping the paper and acting like you didn’t need to see any more.

“And it didn’t work that time. I don’t think it’ll work this time either Satan. Sorry…”

“Don’t be sorry,” he grinned.

It’s not like it was just Satan who enjoyed your presence; you would grow increasingly more and more comfortable about voicing your opinions around him. There’s only one thing better than a straightforward honest person--- and that is someone who can actually appreciate the honesty

After you recognized that Satan truly does not get bothered by whatever is on the tip of your tongue, things only got better.

I can imagine late nights where you and Satan would stay up until your eyelids became like lead and you couldn’t continue without sleep. Those nights were filled with honesty and intelligence. He thought you had a beautiful mind. He wanted to hear every opinion that popped up in your head

Asmodeus

Hmmm… Asmodeus is a bit trickier.

As an outward and bubbly extrovert, Asmodeus was bound to hear all types of opinions from all types of different people. And judging by his insane amount of confidence, he doesn’t let any of that negative energy affect him (He says it’s bad for his skin).

It’s not like you’d say anything mean to him to begin with, especially purposefully--- but I feel everyone takes criticism differently, and some take it to heart more than others

Considering you don’t fall for Asmodeus’s mind-controlling charm, your honest and blunt nature just adds the cherry to the cake on what kind of person you are. This just makes you more natural and pleasant to be around.

So instead, he makes his use of it, making sure to drag you along with every one of his shopping sprees around town.

You wouldn’t suck up to him, or brush off his hyper enthusiasm by simply saying ‘yes’ to everything--- much like his brothers do to him

“Y/N, Y/N, do you think this color will look good on me??” Asmodeus excitedly asks, holding up a beige scarf to his neck. Both of you couldn’t care less about the wandering eyes that followed trailed towards the loud demon of lust. “I think this color looks good on me, but definitely not with the outfit I’m wearing currently.”

You smile at his animated gestures, nodding your head in agreement.

“I do think the color suits you, but didn’t you get a beige outfit a week ago? Maybe a cream color will look better,” you mention, shifting through the scarves on the rack.

Asmodeus pauses to pose in the mirror that was conveniently placed on the store wall. “You could be right~ I heard cream is more in style right now anyways. Thank you darling 💗.”

Beelzebub

Beelzebub doesn’t even notice you’re more blunt and honest; like, he doesn’t isolate that as your special quality

Instead, he just thinks that that is how you were as a person.

Honestly, it’s quite cute.

Whenever he eats off of the plates of others, or realizes that he just vacuumed down the cookies that you were supposed to deliver to Luke, you don’t hesitate to voice your disapproval.

“Beel, please don’t eat other people’s food. It’s not nice,” you reprimand gently, noticing that no other brother on the table was going to say anything to reprimand him.

He quietly gulps down the rest of the food that he had finished chewing in time. “Oh… sorry,” Beel mumbled, wiping the remaining crumbs of the cookies that he knew you worked on for Luke.

He didn’t even realize he reached over to take the food.. One moment his stomach grumbled hungrily, and then the next moment he smelled the cookies you had spent all morning baking.

Whenever he ate his brothers’ food, they would always sigh and complain to Lucifer about it---which in turn caused Lucifer to tell them to just grab some more.

He really really didn’t mean it…

You sighed quietly, grabbing a napkin off of the table to aid in ridding the crumbs all over his shirt. “It’s okay Beel. Try not to do it again, kay?” It looks like you needed to throw together another batch of cookies in order to get them delivered to Luke before it got too late.

You glanced behind you, watching as Beel followed you to the kitchen again. The redhead noticed your questioning glance, and he only grinned in reply.

“I’m going to help you make more. It’s the least I can do…” he said.

The gesture must have made you happy, because he could see you return the grin instantly.

Beelzebub also happens to be lowkey blunt in his own way, because while he may hold back in speaking a lot of the time, much of what he does say (besides things food-related) is actually quite honest. He isn’t afraid to tell people what he thinks about them, but on a much lower scale than you.

I think this mixture of two similar people is wonderful---

Remember how I said some people take honesty and criticism to heart more than others?? Well… Beel takes to heart what you say and attempts to fix anything he can within his power.

Belphegor

Ha ha ha… ahhh Belphegor. Okay correct me if I’m wrong, but he’d totally be the type to purposefully do things that would make you snap at him or cause you to be more blunt.

He always knew you were kind-- I mean, you were the one to help get him out of the miserable attic. You were also the one willing to deal with Mammon, so… ya know.

But his level of respect for you rose when the demon took note that you were no welcome mat.

No one could step all over you, and for a human, that was damn impressive to him.

For example, the first time he had fallen asleep in a weird position in front of you was when you, Beel, and Belphie decided it would be fun to bake some muffins for everyone. He was assigned the role of mixing together the mix and well… he fell asleep.

While standing…

You quickly snapped him out of it, voicing your opinion on how it was not the time to be sleeping--- especially if these muffins were to be done before dinner

He liked getting your attention in that way though

Belphegor was another demon with thick skin, and yet another demon who also happens to be blunt and honest (probably one the most in the family)

“You look like shit,” he mumbled into his pillow, watching you trudge into the room tiredly. You had dark under eye circles, probably due to the lack of sleep you had within the past two days, and your hair was unkempt. The strands thrown about your head like a cyclone just hit you. Belphegor had heard that you were taking extra magic lessons with Satan and Solomon, and he only assumed this was a result.

You grunted, flopping down onto the bed right next to him.

“Well, you don’t look too good yourself. But I guess that’s what 10 hours of sleep will do to you,” you bit back, the words were a bit slurred and muffled due to your face plant on the bed.

He chuckled lightly, scooching over to toss his blanket over you.

Belphegor would ask about your little magic experience later on; the loads of opinions you probably had would make due for an interesting listen.

#obey me #obeyme #reader x obey me #Obey me MC #headcanons

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gemstoneconstellations · 4 years

Text

Alternate Timeline for HBAN (Bakugo as the love interest)

Someone asked about what if Hero By Another Name was a Bakugo/Reader fic on Youtube awhile back and I made a hc for it. I decided to post it now cause why not.

all the events that happened in original hban would have still happened. Just no romance feelys with kirishima

just pure admiration between you and your favorite hero

but bakugo thinks they have feelings for each other

after the camping trip, when you start texting him and hanging out, he thinks it’s just because he’s kirishima’s best friend and he thinks of this as an opportunity to push you two together

he didn’t expect to actually enjoy his time with you

“maybe you aren’t so bad, you are a big jerk who really needs to learn his inside voice but you aren’t so bad.”

it was interesting to see someone who was actually as competitive as him, he didn’t think he ever time himself washing the dishes to prove that he’s faster at it

you mentioned off-handedly that maybe you should buy some ground zero merch now that the two of you were friends.

He had a bunch of his hero merch from before they’d been officially released. He usually just gave them to kids at his meet and greet events but he logic it out that he was doing you a favor by giving it to you so your place didn’t look like a shrine to red riot anymore…. It didn’t give him any warm fuzzy feelings at all, seeing you wear one of his shirts or cuddle his grenade pillows, nope.

for some reason, he felt guilty when he hung out with you alone. He always felt like kirishima was watching and he was betraying his best friend’s trust, and tried to keep it to a minimum

movie night was weird to him, he could see you and kirishima had a great relationship and obviously you two would be great together but neither one of you are making any moves.

You fell asleep sitting next to Bakugo and instead of leaning against the guy you clearly liked, you leaned against him. While bakugo was panicking on what to do and how to explain it to Kirishima, he looked over only to see the redhead laughing into his hand and taking pictures with his phone. Who does that while their crush uses another guy as a pillow?!

when you ask him for help with getting the perfect gift for kirishima’s birthday he felt happy that you wanted to rely on him

he thinks you’re an idiot, when he tells you that it was obvious that the two of you liked each other you looked at him with confusion “I think I would know if I liked someone, I can tell you with confidence that the only feelings I got for kirishima is pure admiration. You on the other hand, it’s still up for debate. Sometimes I feel like you are a lot of fun, other times I feel like setting you on fire.”

bakugo actually smiles at you “arsonist firefighter, very original. You always had the firebug, mut?”

“only when you cheat at video games, asshole”

now bakugo was under the impression that kirishima was currently in a one-sided romance with someone that he may or may not enjoy hanging out with.

the ‘magazine incident’ happens. Kirishima feels bad that you got caught up in the media again but thought this was an opportunity to tease bakugo by texting him “hey, I didn’t know you two were dating? Bro, what about the code.”

Bakugo, who was on a mission at the time, didn’t know what the text was about until he noticed his social media account being blasted. He definitely did not panic, not at all, is what he told himself

Bakugo pretended to be too busy to talk to kirishima while on the mission and didnt tell him when he came back, but he forgot since he was on the same mission with Deku, the fucking nerd blabbed about them getting back so the redhead was at his place with takeout cause hes so fucking conciderate and knew Bakuog would be too tired to cook

Kirishima would try to tease Bakugo about the article and Bakugo would finally snap, “Nothing fucking happened and nothing is happening between me and the shitty firefighter! You don’t have to worry!”

Kirishima was shocked and confused. They have a long talk and he explains how you and him are only friends and there is no way he could ever date you. Bakugo tried to point out all the signs that would insinuate that they liked each other but it made Kirishima laugh. “Are you sure you’re not projecting on me and you aren’t the one with a crush?”

“The fuck?! No!” Bakugo denied it, you and him, dating?! No, fuck that, that’s weird.

Now the idea is in his head, he caught himself looking at you more when the three of you hung out. He avoids being alone with you much as possible.

Kirishima notices bakugo’s very obvious behavior. “You know, I was kidding before but now…. You can make a move if you want? Don’t deny your feelings cause you think I like her, which I don’t.”

Bakugo thought about it, unlike with most people, he actually had fun with you and like that you would bounce off of him. Always throwing back a challenge yourself. So instead of avoiding you, he just kind of let things take their course as he figured out how he felt now that he wasn’t trying to get the two of you together.

There was a huge fight with a villain with a fire quirk that caused an office building to catch fire. Bakugo stayed back helping those who got out with basic first aid while waiting for the emts and other heroes went inside the building.

Firefighters showed up on the scene and got quickly to work to rescue people and put out the flames.

You came out, a full grown ass man wrapped in your firefighter coat on your shoulder, walking out of the burning building like a fucking beautiful badass. Bakugo was in awe as you placed the man down on a stretcher near him. “Hey Ground Zero, was this your fault again? Where’s Red Riot to save the day again?”

“It wasn’t fucking me… this time. I beat the shit out of the ass who did.”

You just laughed at him, rolling your eyes “uh huh.”

This is the moment when Bakugo finally makes a move. “So to make up for you cleaning up my mess again, we’re going out. And it’s a date.” he didn’t leave any room for you to argue.

#bakugo katsuki x reader #bakugou katsuki x reader #bakugo x reader #what if hcs for hero by another name

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mrvdocks · 4 years

Text

Redamancy

The act of loving the one who loves you; a love returned in full.

Steve Harrington. Residential popular boy until high school came and went. Now, he was actively clawing to stay relevant or at least, a ladies man.

Steve Harrington. Childhood crush since the sandbox incident in first grade. And perhaps you could throw unrequited love interest into the mix.

Maybe you should’ve read the signs that he wasn’t interested when you saw him and Robin at the mall. Or when he stopped hanging out with you after joining his “cool” gang. Or when he would try to not stare so much at you in algebra or across the room during lunch. You weren't sure about his feelings anymore. He always hid everything.

You didn’t mean to pine for him for so long. You knew you shouldn't have. But that chance encounter after Nancy broke up with him made you think you had some semblance of a chance. You didn’t want to be the rebound, but how your heart swelled when your eyes met his, your lips upturned in an easy smile. The party seemed to slow in front of you, bodies becoming blurry and your eyes only focusing on his figure coming to you.

If this was anything like the movies you’d seen and dreamed of, you hoped it would end with him confessing his mutual feelings for you and not him taking your face in his hands and kissing you sloppily. You could practically taste the spiked punch on his lips.

You pushed him off, staring at him in shock. He inches closer, his sweaty hands trying to bring you back to kiss you again but you refuse. “Steve?” You whisper to him.

He just stares at you, eyes flickering back and forth, you don't recognize the look. But something about it feels so innocent, so soft. It feels like he’s searching for something deep within you. You shake your head, tears brimming in your eyes. “I’m not Nancy.”

He reeks of punch and hairspray. “I know that.” He manages out.

His hands come back, one hand resting at the nape of your neck, his fingers entangled in your hair. The other caresses your cheek. The feeling made you feel so warm, so loved. You were delighted in his gentle yet sloppy touch, internally screaming for more of the connection.

But you weren’t sure about him anymore, about the things he wanted. It seemed to be a shitty year for him.

Certainly, someone who made it their mission to get over you with cliques and drama didn’t deserve you.

But you were anything if not human in your possibly unrequited feelings.

“Steve.” You say again. You break out of the trance to step back. The moment was accompanied by sounds of loud teens and music, you shook your head again and darted for the door.

Steve mumbles out your name but it gets lost in the sea of screams and synths. You’re out the door by the time he searches for you in the crowd.

He can’t stop thinking about you at work. He stares at the chocolate chip flavor ice cream and thinks of how you dropped yours in the sandbox in the first grade. How he gave you his without a second thought. Robin thinks there’s something wrong with him. And it wasn’t just the pathetic attempts at trying to chat up customers. She said he looked - what’s that word again? Forlorn.

This whole time he thought he wanted Nancy back, but he couldn’t get you out of his head. He missed your laugh, the snorts that would follow. The way you smelled followed him and the way you looked at him that night at the party, the tears in your eyes, haunted him.

He regretted so much of his later high school experience. He regretted being such an asshole. What good did it bring if you were locked out of his life?

He sees you pass by on your way to work at the diner in the mall. He tries to bury his feelings by asking out the random girls he serves but every time he’s turned down it comes back full force.

“Whatever happened to that girl you liked?” Dustin asks from behind the binoculars.

“Which one?” Steve asks. There must’ve been so many Dustin was referring to.

“That one that you always talk about, likes the same "nerd stuff" I do? Pretty? Cool?”

“That’s not my type.” Steve dodges the question, but nonetheless has a clear image of you in his head.

“Oh yeah? What is your type again? Not cool?” Dustin deadpans.

Steve huffs. “Alright, time’s up, give me the binoculars.”

Dustin passes them, eager to get on with his Russian mission. Steve scans the area, he’s about to give up on this whole mission when he lands on the sign of the diner you work at. He can’t help but focus on you at the register, deep in conversation with another co-worker and bursting into laughter. A captivated smirk came onto his face.

“You should probably go talk to her. She’s definitely a step up from the girls from the shop - actually from all those girls you've been trying to ask out.” Dustin says.

Steve looks up from the binoculars. “What’re you talking about?”

Dustin laughs. “You’re so obvious. Whatever happened to not letting girls know that you care?”

Steve shrugs. Stupid advice anyways.

Steve tries to not think of you when everything goes downhill in a span of a few hours. If he died without having said anything to you, even so much as an apology, he thinks the guilt would’ve killed him instead.

“Have you.....ever been in love?” Robin’s raspy voice asks him.

They’re just coming down from their highs and sprawled out on the floors of the bathroom. The near-death experience had scared him shitless enough to rethink a lot of things.

“Yup. Nancy Wheeler. First semester, senior year.”

“Bullshit. She’s such a priss.”

He hums. “Turns out, not really.”

“Are you still in love with Nancy?”

“No.” He says, a little too quick.

Robin’s interest is piqued. “Why not?”

“I think it’s because I found someone who’s a little bit better for me.” He fiddles with the frayed ends of his uniform.

“There’s this girl, the one I like. It’s somebody that I.....kind of ignored in high school. I didn’t mean to but I just know Tommy H would’ve made fun of me. Or I wouldn’t have been prom king. It’s all just a bunch of bullshit anyway but when I think about it, this girl knows me. Inside and out. She always has. I should’ve been hanging out with her the whole time.”

He breathes out, hands shaking as he confesses what he’s bottled up for so long.

“First of all, she’s hilarious. She would have me in stitches all the time,” he chuckles. “She’s such a nerd, she likes Star Wars and math and books and things I made fun of. And she’s so smart. Probably much smarter than me. What do you think?”

“Of?”

“The girl.”

“She sounds awesome.”

“Yeah,” he nods solemnly. “And what about the guy?”

“I think there is something seriously wrong with him. To have something real right in front of him and leave it for something so fake.”

“Yeah, I’m an idiot.” He whispers.

“Have you told her? How you feel?”

Steve shakes his head. “I feel like all the bad I’ve done to her...I just deserve the rejection at this point.”

“You never know until you try. Maybe she feels the same.”

“Yeah maybe.” He concludes.

He didn’t think he’d survive the Russians but he does. With one evil defeated, he thinks the worst is over. And it would’ve been until Billy showed up.

The kids are ready for him, shaky, but on guard. Steve can see Billy’s figure illuminated under the neon mall lights and his heart drops when he sees what he’s carrying.

You’re in Billy’s arms, unconscious and beat up but hopefully still alive. Still dressed in your diner uniform, Billy had snatched you up close to after hours and was planning on putting you to good use. He’d laid you down close by but still far from everyone’s reach.

Everyone’s eyes widened when they realized who he had. They hadn’t planned for this. Heather had gone long ago and if Billy’s plan was for you to become the next Heather, then you were in very dangerous territory.

“That can’t be-” Dustin asks but he’s interrupted by Steve.

“That’s it.” He grits. His knuckles are white and he feels the adrenaline rush through him. Nancy glances at him. The sheer determination is what she saw but the fear is what drove him. She signaled El.

The kids alter their plan to distract Billy so Steve has a shot at pulling you away from the danger. If the Mind Flayer gets anywhere near you, you’re as good as dead.

El gets the Mind Flayer going, letting it try its luck at her. She’s got Billy right where she needs him when she gives Steve the signal.

Steve’s never run so fast in his life. He only gets angrier at the eldritch terror as he comes closer to your body, bloody knicks marking your cherubic face, and a bleeding side wound. You clearly put up a fight.

“No, no, no, no.” He utters in shock, lifting your upper body and supporting your neck with his left arm. His hand grabs at your cheeks, shaking you to gain some response.

“Hey! Come on, wake up! Please.” He cries. When he gets no response he brings you up to his chest, hugging you as tight as he can.

The smell he remembers is there but coated in dirt and slime and blood. He’s horrified. He can’t close his eyes for fear that you’ll pass.

“Not you. Please not you. Come on, wake up.” He rocks you back and forth. “You can’t leave me too. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. About everything. I'll do anything please, wake up."

He feels you stir under him just then, wincing in pain and moving as slowly as your body would let you.

“Steve?” You mumble his name incoherently.

It’s a miracle he hears it among the commotion in the background. You feel the stinging pain in your side and your hand shoots up to touch it.

“Hey, hey, no. It’s okay. You’re okay.” He takes your hand in his and squeezes it reassuringly.

He’s thankful, so thankful that whatever being there was beyond the Mind Flayer let you come back to him.

“Am I going to die here?" You cry, unable to move without feeling white-hot pain throughout your body.

“No, okay? Just stay with me."

“Steve.” You groan. Your eyes feel so heavy, but he urges you to stay awake. It just feels impossible.

“No hey, we don’t have to talk right now. Okay? Stay with me, please. When this is all over I’ll take you on a hundred dates. You can yell at me, hit me, do whatever you want but stay with me.” He pleads.

A roar startles you both, and upon seeing the Mind Flayer charge to reap its pound of flesh, Steve accepts his fate. He shields you and buries your face in his neck, bracing himself.

The impact never comes. Instead, he hears screams and wills himself to open his eyes. Billy stands just inches away, tendrils impaling him as El lays on the floor in front of you both.

Steve’s shaking worse than before, he’s in shock. He almost thinks El’s dead but she’s a sobbing mess. Everything stops and the Mind Flayer falls dead.

He can hear Max’s cries for Billy. The silence that follows is deafening. Steve immediately looks down at you, making sure you’re still alive. When you wince in pain, he takes some comfort in it.

He kisses your forehead and utters profuse apologies and thanks. With whatever strength you can muster, you squeeze his hand in reassurance.

You sit in the booth, waiting for Steve to come back with the ice cream. You're humming along to the music coming from the loudspeaker in the shop absentmindedly. Today was part of many recoveries.

Steve smiles warmly when he returns, passing you it and watching as you take an eager bite. Chocolate chip, without fail.

“Final verdict?” He clapped his hands together in anticipation.

“It's gonna be a hard pass from me. Scoops did it better.” You giggle, breaking your faux serious face.

“Damn.” He smirked.

You both broke into a fit of laughter, his shoulders bouncing with glee.

Your hand came across the table to hold his, fingers interlocking. You finally realized what that look at the party meant. That gaze he held. He was in love. Completely and utterly at its mercy.

It’s been three months since the battle at Starcourt Mall. Your side is somewhat healed but the scar will always be there to remind you of the ordeal. Steve’s nightmares about losing you to the Mind Flayer are starting to fade. You managed to get an internship outside of Hawkins doing what you loved and Steve was going with Robin the next day to see if the video store was hiring.

Steve kept his promise. The first date you two had was out of the hospital. It was scary at first, acknowledging bottled up feelings and things from the past that neither of you wanted to own up to before. But when he finally confessed and made it up to you in a million ways, you caved. Since then, dates have become sweeter and funnier, they surpassed the good old days.

You’d like to think things have changed for the better now. Hell, you even managed to convince Steve to start looking at colleges. You wanted to get out of Hawkins as soon as you’d saved up enough and graduated. But for now, you were taking it one day at a time.

You think you’ve earned your soft epilogue, here with him. At least the peace you read about in books. The kind where you can finally breathe. The calm after the storm.

#steve harrington imagine #steve harrington x reader #stranger things imagine #felt so nice to write for my chaotic boy again

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allegra-writes · 4 years

Text

Trivia Night

Harrison Osterfield x Reader

General audiences

Warnings: None

Just a little drabble based on a dream I had. Blame it on @tomsrebeleyebrow she encourages the insanity. Such a bad influence, honestly *shakes head dissaprovingly* 😂💖

It was loud inside the pub, and your table was probably the loudest of all. Trivia was almost over and you knew your team at the very least had to be coming pretty fucking close to winning. The price wasn't much, just the tab, and that sum of money meant nothing to the people sitting with you, but the boys were very competitive. And to tell the truth, so where you after a couple of pints… and you had definitely had way more than that.

It was the very first trivia night you had been invited to, and to be honest you had been a little nervous to meet with all of Harrison's closest friends at once. It had been unnecessary, since they had all been kind and welcoming, but you knew that if you helped them finally win first place, they were going to love you forever. And your boyfriend's mates approval meant a lot to you. For once in your life, the tons of useless knowledge and obscure sci-fi references you possessed might be able to actually help your love life. It was unheard of and it made you very excited.

"Ok, so last question" Sam read, voice slightly slurred, "'This fictional intelligence agency features heavily on the Marvel cinematic universe. What does its acronym stand for: a, Special Headquarters Investigating Enhanced Logistic Department; b, Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division; or c, Strategic Headquarters Investigating the Enforcement of Logistics Division?"

You watched Tom's alcohol reddened face drain of all it's color as everyone in your table looked expectantly at him. He cursed,

"I can't- I can't remember" He confessed, rubbing the back of his neck nervously, "I never… I always… I can never remember this!"

"Come on, mate, are you serious?"

"You're joking. Please tell me you're messing with us!" Harry implored his older brother. Tom shrugged apologetically.

"I'm sorry!"

A hail of paper balls rained down over his head, as both twins and your boyfriend threw their dirty napkins at him.

"You bloody twat! You're embarrassing us in front of the lady! If you make us look like losers tonight I swear-"

Your decidedly unladylike snort drew everyone's attention to you.

"Pluh-ase, I already know you guys are a bunch of losers! Get out of the way, and let 'the lady' show you how it's done…"

You took the sheet from Sam's hands and confidently marked the right answer before returning it.

"Are you absolutely sure?" He inquired, somehow skeptical.

You rolled your eyes,

"Dude, of course I'm sure. It's like, nerd 101, S.H.I.E.L.D means Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division. Honestly," You added, pinning Tom with a look, "you are a disgrace to all nerd kind"

A chorus of "oooh" resonated through the table. The boys had been teasing each other all night, but it was the first time you had dared to, and they seemed pleasantly impressed. The teasing and laughing continued as a waitress picked up the quiz answer sheets from the tables, and you arched a brow at the shamelessly flirty smile she gave Harrison.

"Incredible" Tom complained loudly, "Five blockbuster superhero movies. Five. And I am still invisible next to this guy!" He poked your boyfriend in the ribs.

"Huh?"

"He means the waitress, babe" You explained your clueless boyfriend, "She was making eyes at you. You really didn't notice?"

He shook his head,

"I was too busy looking at the prettiest girl in the bar" He said, eyes never leaving yours.

"Aweeeee" Three ironic voices intoned.

"Don't listen to them," You leaned in to capture Harrison's lips with yours, "You are so getting laid tonight"

You heard someone choke on his beer, as Sam's voice commented,

"Ok, now I feel sorry for us…"

You broke the kiss, laughing.

"Then behave yourselves, and I might introduce you to some of my friends"

"Oh, no, don't do that, love!" Haz argued, "they are your friends! Why would you do such a thing to them?"

"Oi!"

"Fuck you, Osterfield!"

"Hush, no, you two! They're about to announce the winner!"

The racket inside the bar died down, as the little crowd patrons turn their eyes, expectantly, to the leader of the three people trivia committee. The music was turned down as he bellowed,

"Ladies and gents and non binary mates, it is my pleasure to annunciate tonight's Trivia winner" He unfolded a piece of paper, pausing for dramatic effect as some people produced drum rolls by beating the top of the tables with their pens, "Table number eight, "The Mary Janes"!"

"YES!!"

"HELL, YEAH, I KNEW IT! I BLOODY KNEW IT!!"

You gaped in confusion how your table mates jumped from their seats and yelled triumphantly. Tom pulled you up for a hug.

"Wait, what? Your team is called 'The Mary Janes'?" You scream in his ear to be heard above the ruckus

Tom shrugged as he released you,

"Zendaya named us, and who are we to argue?"

That was a valid point, but you didn't have much time to ponder it, as Haz tugged on your arm with enough force to turn you around and crash you into his chest.

"We never won first place before," He wrapped one of his arms around your waist, his free hand coming to rest palm open against the side of your neck, thumb softly caressing your jaw, "this is all thanks to you"

Before you could answer, his lips were on yours again, and he was dipping you low, in a kiss worthy of any classic Hollywood movie, for all the pub to see. You could hear cheers and whistles, but it was hard to feel self conscious with his tongue borrowing its way between your teeth, claiming your mouth like his very own personal prize.

When he finally released you, your head was swimming.

"Awe, come on! I want a celebration kiss too!" Tom's cheeky voice complained, a little closer than you were expecting, his alcohol smelling breath hot against your ear.

It sobered you up like a cold water bucket. He was clearly drunk, and you had long ago learned he was just a natural flirt and didn't mean anything by it. But Harrison was a little bit of the possessive kind. Even the twins stopped clapping, sensing the sudden tension.

Haz took a step towards his friend, placing his body between you and Tom. The whole pub seemed to freeze, anticipating your boyfriend's reaction.

Haz met your eye over his shoulder, throwing a wink in your direction.

"Wha-"

Before Tom could react, two big hands were on either side of his face, holding him in place… as Harrison planted the sloppiest, loudest, most ridiculous kiss right on his horrorized best friend's mouth.

A beat passed, then two, until twin barks of laughter broke you out of your stupor, and you doubled over, cracking up as the entire pub went wild.

"How is that for a celebration kiss?"

Tom didn't answer, instead choosing to take his glass from the table and down the rest of his beer in one gulp, soon as your boyfriend let go of him, of course.

"Oh, come on now! Don't act as if that wasn't the best snog of your life!"

Tom turned his big, traumatized stare on you,

"That's the worst part: I think you might be right!"

Another fit of laughter cracked through your body, tears streaming down your cheeks, completely out of control. God, how you loved these silly London boys!

The end.

#tom holland #harrison osterfield #harrison osterfield x reader #harrison osterfield fluff #harrison osterfield imagine #harrison osterfield fanfiction #reader #reader insert

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marvelgbt-posts · 5 years

Text

Forever

{Peter Parker x Male Reader}

Warnings: none… angst…? slight self hate ig but idk you’ll see…

Summary: a peter parker x male reader where peter gets insecure about mj and readers friendship since he sees how good they look together and knew MJ had a slight crush on reader. Reader fixes the problem by cuddling him, giving him slight kisses on his neck and just some fluffy shit. also cute bby boy peter being all flushed and cute

I really hate giving MJ this role, but ok :/ and also, what do you us think about MJ and Peter in FFH? Personally, i dont like it. I’ll make it it’s own post, it’s mostly a personal preference though.

(not edited)

“OMG, [M/N]. You’re too funny,” MJ said, a slightly happier tone to her voice than usual. You smiled, taking the small smack to your arm with a soft laugh as well. Peter watched across the lunch table while Ned was too occupied with the game on his phone. He pouted; you seemed to be having way more fun with MJ than with him. Lunch was almost over- oh no, wait, that was the bell…

You stood up from your seat as Peter gathered his stuff. He waited for you to walk him to his next class, as you usually did so. MJ also stood up, looking at Peter, “Hey, loser,” Peter had found himself being called ‘loser’ a lot by MJ- probably more than he found himself being called that by Flash- but he knew she was joking, “Aren’t you and I together for History?” Peter nodded, “Oh yeah, I forgot,” he usually had Math right after Lunch, but today was Thursday. Thursday schedule was always weird for him. You began dragging yourself behind and in between them. Ned had already disappeared; his next class was all the way across the hall from where their classes were, so he had to hurry. You spoke up, “I have Biology next anyway. It’s right down the hall from there.”

“Neeerd!” MJ laughed, yelling into your ear. You tried to move away from the noise, a smile playing to your lips, “Oi, idiot, that hurt!” MJ smirked, “Good.” Peter fumed- he felt like he was the third wheel when it was supposed to be MJ. He was dating you, not her. Though, to be fair, not that many people knew. Just the two of you, Ned, Aunt May, Mr. Stark, Happy, and the rest of the Avengers. MJ didn’t, and Peter felt like he should tell her- if not for it being for the reason of ‘she should know because she’s my friend’, then at least for ‘omg stop touching him he’s my boyfriend’. And there she goes, touching you again. Though, this time she used her own shoulder to bump into yours instead.

Peter heard a small murmur, “Doesn’t MJ look really cute next to [M/N]?”

“Yeah, she’s definitely happier around him.”

“She smiled a lot when with him.”

“Their both into the arts; she likes reading and drawing, he likes music and (insert an artistic talent/interest).”

Soon, Peter began hearing things other than just small murmurs and chattering around him. It felt as if he could hear everything everyone was saying. Wasn’t that a side effect of his spider-like abilities? Perhaps it was, Peter couldn’t remember at the moment.

“Yeah, they’re practically made for each other.”

“They make a good couple.”

“Did you hear that MJ and [M/N] got a full score on their project for Art?”

“Oh yeah, they were parters, right?”

“Yeah, MJ made the layout of the sketch and [M/N] finished it up. He did his own thing as well, and they ended up getting their art submitted into the contest happening at the art museum.”

Then, Peter felt as if he couldn’t breathe.

“So cute.”

“Wow, they make a good couple.”

“Peter looks like such a third wheel.”

His own thoughts mixed with the other small talk around him, and it surrounded him in a pit of black.

“He looks like such a loser.”

“Wow, no one would be interested in him anyway.”

“No one likes a nerd.”

“Peter is a loser.”

“Peter is a nerd”

“Peter is lame.”

“No one likes Peter.”

“Peter-“

“Peter!” You shouted in his ear, and Peter jolted up. “O-Oh, yeah?”

“Isn’t this our class?” MJ asked, pointing to the door. Peter nodded sheepishly, looking over at you. You smiled, “Have fun learning about a bunch of dead guys. I’m off to math!” You pumped your fist up in mock excitement. MJ laughed and Peter gave a small chuckle, “H-Have fun.” You nodded, “Sure wont.”

***

3rd person P.o.V.

[M/N] met up with Ned, MJ, and Peter after school. “Hey guys!” He greeted, wrapping an arm around Peter’s shoulders. Peter resisted the urge to lay his head on the other male and just looked at him and smiled instead. [M/N] smiled back, but Peter felt like their was this other feeling in the other male’s eyes he couldn’t quite read. “Uh, hey,” [M/N] started, “Parker, you feeling up to a study session today?” Peter pretended to think, nodding soon after, “Sure, dont have any plans today anyway. Lemme text Aunt May, though, first.”

‘Study session’ was a code name for ‘miniature date at my house’. Peter had grown to love the words very much because then it was just them two, and it was normally [M/N] showering Peter in love and affection for the whole night- if he didn’t have Spidey-duty that day, that is. Peter pulled his phone out from his back pocket, pulling up Aunt May’s number. “Can I come too?” MJ asked, “Or is it just one of your gay things?” MJ huffed in amusement at her own joke, not realizing the irony of it. She tried sounding nonchalant about it, but not wanting to break her heart, [M/N] let her off easy, “Uhh, my house is really messy. I feel like Peter can handle it, but I dont wanna make you run off because you’re scared of my pigsty of a home.” He laughed. MJ chuckled, “Wow, gender equality, dude. Whatever happened to that?” [M/N] shook your head, “maybe next time. You don’t have anything and Peter usually spends the night, so it’d be weird, wouldn’t it?” MJ nodded, seemingly disappointed, “yeah, whatever. It’s cool.”

“Done!” Peter chirped, and MJ began walking off. Ned had also run off somewhere. “Good!” [M/N] smiled, “I have you all to myself for the rest of the evening!”

2nd person P.o.V.

Once the two of you made it home, Peter put his stuff down onto the floor in your room while you prepared some food. Since it was Thursday, you guys weren’t assigned that much homework, so you and Peter would probably finish it in the small intervals before classes. You prepared some snacks like popcorn and candy while Peter changed his clothes. He also took the time to pick out clothes for you- a loose white T-shirt with black basket ball shorts. He wore a white shirt- of course, a nerdy one with a scientific pun on it (the two atoms; one asking if the other is positive it lost a electron)- with one of your boxers. He walked out, socks protecting his feet from the cold floor. He scrunched his nose at the smell, smiling.

“You wanna pick out the movie?” Peter asked, wrapping his arms around your waist. You turned around, wrapping your arms around him as well. They made their way around both his arms, one hand holding the other to trap the smaller boy in an embrace. “No, you can pick,” you smiled, tilting your head to kiss Peters lips quickly, “so long as it isn’t Star Wars or Lord of the Rings again. Please. I can’t go through another marathon again.” Peter whined playfully, “But [M/N]!” You stuck your tongue out, “Too bad.”

Peter reciprocated the action, and you both let out a sigh of giggles. “Anyway,” you continued, “You want anything specific to eat?” Peter shook his head and you nodded. You let him go and he went over to the couch. He flipped though the many channels on the TV before settling on a Disney movie. “Is that Disney?” You asked, walking in with a bowl of popcorn, two sodas, and a plate of cookies. Peter watched in awe as you balanced everything. “Yeah,” he answered, “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.”

“Aw, sweet!” You fist-bumped the air, “love that movie.” Peter nodded, leaning to rest his head on your shoulder, he had been deprived of physical touch for a while. He just wanted to spend time with you, was what he thought as he wrapped his arms around you. Your arm wrapped around his waist while the other ate from the supported the bowl of popcorn on your lap. Peter stole some as well, and you watched as the movie began with its intro of the parents trying to save their defaced child from the protagonist.

“It’s kinda inappropriate, dont you think?” You asked Peter after a while, and Peter looked at you confused, eyes squinted Ashe seemingly judged you. “How? It’s a Disney movie?”

“Well, I mean, it talks about gypsies. Aren’t they visualized as prostitutes? And that seen where Esmeralda dances for that old dude, you can see he’s clearly turned on.” You shook your head, “never mind…”

When the movie was over, you cleaned up the remaining food and placed it down to be cleaned later. You carried a very, very tired Peter Parker up to your room. You laid him on the bed and dimmed the lights. He gripped onto you desperately, “Dont move, dont go anywhere…” he said, “Can we stay like this forever…?” He asked tiredly, and you laughed softly, “No, we have school tomorrow.” Peter whined childishly, “forget school. I can make us enough money by being Spider-Man, we dont need education.”

“Peter, my parents would kill me if they found out i dropped out of high school to piggy back on my superhero boyfriend for money.” Peter let out a huff, and the two of you let out quiet, breathy chuckles. He leaned close to you, noses touching. He then frowned, “Do you like MJ?” The question was sudden and it caught you off guard. “Well, i mean… yeah, we’re friends…”

“No, i mean… like like her…?”

You let out an ‘ohhh’, suddenly realizing Peter’s behavior earlier (the cause of your strange glint Peter noted earlier). “No, baby,” you smiled, “I’m not romantically interested in her, if that’s what you’re thinking.” “But,” he began, a slight pout on his lips. God, he was really tired, “she was all over you today, shamelessly flirting with you. You didn’t seem to mind it though…”

“Peter,” you began, stroking his hair a bit, “I dont like MJ. I like you. No, I love you. A lot. So dont think that.” You moved to lay Peter on top of you, taking his hands and intertwining them with yours as he made himself comfortable on your chest. “I know,” Peter started, playing with your fingers a bit, “its just… everybody says you two look good together. I guess i just didnt like the feeling of you with another person, even if it’s just the public appeal and not reality. Sorry…” You shook your head, “dont apologize, baby. It’s normal to feel jealous…”

Peter was quick to defend, lifting his head up to glare at you accusingly, “I wasn’t jealous!” You laughed, “yeah, and I’m not dating Spider-Man.” Peter sighed, resting in his previous position. He mumbled another, ‘I wasn’t jealous…’ and you just nodded. You began running your hands through his hair, to which he quickly responded by sighing and relaxing even further into your chest.

A few minutes of running your hands through his hair later, Peter got bored and slightly irritated of the position. He moved to sleep next to you, with you spooning him. You wrapped your arms around him and gently played it his stomach, felling up and down his abs. He whimpered lightly, curling a bit at the ticklish feeling. His body began to heat up; you could feel it. “Are you still upset?” You asked softly, and Peter nodded. You sighed, placing soft kisses to Peter’s neck. He leaned back, face flushed red as you continued up his neck to his jaw. He turned his head to face you, and gave you a soft kiss. You to didnt move, instead you stayed there and took in the presence of each other.

When you two pulled away, Peter had the brightest blush on his face. He huffed, eyes falling closed, “I wasn’t jealous.”

“Of course you weren’t,” you smiled, “who said you were?”

You turned off the light once Peter finally fell asleep. The two of you stayed like that for the rest of the night- and, to be honest, if you could, you would stay like that forever if you could.

Panicked gay moment; had no clue what to write for MJ, sry sry sry anon (._.”)

#peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #peter parker x male reader #mlm #mlm imagine #male reader #x male reader #marvel #seme male reader #male reader imagines #spiderman #imagine

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momo-de-avis · 5 years

Text

Wordtober Day 4: Freeze

[This one is a bit longer than the others, mind you.]

My dearest Nieve,

Have you ever imagined what does the world look like when it freezes completely?

It’s something that has never really crossed my mind, curiously enough. Just a concept I never thought of. I saw this movie a while ago, a suggestion by an old boyfriend I think, about a man who had that power. Though not quite… he didn’t freeze the world, he froze time. And there was this voyeuristic element to it, because he was an artist and he enjoyed the peace and quiet of drawing the, I think he called it, ‘intervals of time’, and he went about lifting women’s shirts and painting their breasts, or pulling down their pants—it was a very skewed concept of sexual deviancy, if you ask me. Either way, it was framed around this notion of ‘guy just wants to appreciate women’s bodies so he freezes time’, because maybe the director was too much of a coward to call his fantasies ‘sexual assault’. I hated the movie, truth be told. My ex loved it, though. I wondered why, but never asked. To each his own, I suppose. And then I never thought about it again.

Now, let me tell you a story.

Last Friday, I didn’t really want to leave home at all. It was raining, really cold, and there were a few episodes on The Good Wife I wanted to catch up on. But… Jun was insistent on it. And you know how I am. A good, supporting friend. Plus, I might have been a little lonely. Ever since my flatmates moved out, living on my own, I have been missing that ruckus of two people shouting at each other over a lost game of Trivial Pursuit, or something. So, without them, most of the time, all I had was Julianna Marguiles.

Worst of all, it was Black Friday. And I hate Black Fridays. How the crowd goes ravenous for things, for materialistic things they will just throw away in five years’ time, how they all go animalistic on themselves for a price inflated for the sole purpose of being lowered drastically, with appeasing numbers like ‘50’ or ‘70’, splashed in red or yellow to make it all the more alluring, it just—it transcends me, honestly. I get the whole opportunity thing, of buying something you need on the advent of a big sale, but really? Really? You know what I mean. Those people, punching each other over a coffee machine, or a hair straightener, the majority of them don’t need it. It’s a greedy spur-of-the-moment thing. I try to understand it, really, but I can’t.

So, Jun really wanted to go to Black Friday last week, and I said, okay. I was willing to put up with an event I detested if only I was rewarded with some warm coffee or tea at a cosy shop and some nice catching up. It couldn’t have been too complicated, I thought.

Yet it was… far more than I can describe.

We got there at ten, and the crowd was already raging. If by crowd you imagine just a swarm of people wafting by violently like ants before winter, you’re severely down-playing it. Curiously enough, I noticed there was something new to the place. We went to the local mall, of course, but Jun wanted a new pair of skates, so our obvious destination was the sports store. And there, strangely enough, between Adidas and Nike displays, was a banner. It shined bright in blue and it was written with white letters that, for some reason, seemed to dance.

‘Special Show Today at 11 by Aleneus the Magnificent.’

I laughed, of course. What kind of nerd would name himself that? What bloody LARPing, D&D, con attendee idiot would bother to name himself something straight out of a default Runescape character? And who the bloody hell was Aleneus the Magnificent? I thought: some trashed, bankrupted clown, at the end of his career, who was about to set up a kiddie show in the middle of the sports store. Maybe the manager had thought it would ease the frantic crowd and just take a moment and enjoy a card trick by some weirdo wearing a cape and pulling colourful scarves out of his sleeve.

I mean, this bothered me more than tit-spying lunatic from time-freezing movie.

The air inside reeked of body odour, absolutely unbreathable, and everywhere people ran and clashed against one another. Exactly what you’d expect of Black Friday, I suppose. I saw an older woman, clad in pink and the ugliest pair of crocs I have ever seen, entering a shouting contest with a suburban mum over one of those pairs of child sneakers that lights up at every step. Two guys—one muscly, clearly in the right store for him—and the other slender thought intimidatingly tall—reached over for the same pair of shorts and proceeded to try and conquer it through a game of tug-of-war. The shorts lost, in the end, being ripped at the centre, and nobody even bothered to call a worker or anything, they just tossed it aside into the pile of already discarded items. A group of teenagers started a brawl over a couple of pairs of Nikes, and it escalated to punches and scratching, until one of them bled slightly from the nose and security had to be called in.

Security had to be called in a lot, but the poor fellas waddled through the sea of rage, barely able to move, with warning shouts like you’d hear at a riot. Disperse! Disperse! Insane, I tell you. These poor chaps just marched on, at one point pushing people aside with swift enough force for a corridor to form, though even they weren’t spared the angry screams of customers just dying to get their hands on a 70% discount over some football team’s jersey. Even me, not being one for cops in general, I felt bad.

Now, imagine the poor workers, there. The sea of clothes scattered about, rising up to mountains of products either trashed under a brawl or left forgotten by some middle-aged, self-entitled office worker, who couldn’t even spare a second to fold a t-shirt back into place, just made you angry on sight. You’d see shoes being kicked around, boxes tumbled over, shoelaces spilling out like swarms of snakes, hangers thrown over their shoulders, footballs and basketballs thumping the floors loudly as one petulant child insisted they must try it out before deciding, only to kick it away and watch it hit a rack of sweaters and then the head of another angry customer who would turn back and scream, but got no answer.

I just wanted to get out of there, but Jun was set on getting a pair of skates, since the wheels on hers were too worn out and the boot was starting to come off, or something. So she spotted a pair on a rack, black, hot-pink and purple, and went straight for it. Though when her hand hit the boot, another came flying. This other person had, of course, been a tad too late, and I could vow for Jun’s first arrival, but that usually doesn’t matter to Black Friday attendees. With a violent tug, she plucked the skate out of Jun’s hand and then shoved her hard. She nearly fell, had she not bumped into my chest—but she was having none of it, of course. Even I was ready to throw hands. I mean, the face on that woman… Blistering self-entitlement, believe me.

This stranger—a woman that looked about her age, early twenties maybe, and quite fit—began to turn around, when Jun caught a grip of her ponytail and gave her a shove. Her neck almost snapped, and there was a cry, though in the midst of angry bellows, I couldn’t tell exactly if she had been that hurt. But in that moment, I began to panic, as the woman turned around with eyes glinting in fury and one hand raised. Now, I had not signed up for a fight, and the prospect of it sincerely scared the soul out of me.

Then, the speakers growled. Like someone was trying to use them but either a microphone or an old phone got too close and it wheezed and groaned and pierced all our ears. Everyone flinched—me included—like the sound shattered all our brains. Skaters fell on the ground forgotten, as did almost anything anyone was holding at all. And for a split second, everything was so silent I was starting to believe they did bring in riot gear and they were beginning to… disperse the crowd, I guess. It was just peaceful for one second a half.

It passed, and in the far end, between the sea of heads that jumped right back to tussling against each other for a new backpack, a figure appeared. Something cold then grabbed hold of me. He was a slender man, cartoonishly dressed in a top hat and a cape, and I suppose a typical magician’s outfit, modelled after some 19th century caricature—high-waisted pants and bland, white shirt, as you have. Ready to entertain a bunch of middle-schoolers with some cheap tricks. He smiled, too. And it was his smile that was disconcerting.

Nobody paid mind to him, naturally, but I was enticed. I was even ignoring Jun’s tussle with the woman over the pair of skates, and something drew me in. I walked. Amidst the ravenous tumble of bodies fighting each other, I pushed everyone away and walked ahead.

Have you ever felt you were doing something against your will? Your body is moving, but there’s a screaming voice inside your head that tells you to stop, yet you can’t answer to it. You just keep moving and moving, and the more you fight it, the more suffocating it becomes.

It’s frightening at first. But once you let it settle, it becomes… easy. Like walking up an escalator. It takes you where you need to go, not where you want to be. And to be taken where we need to be can be dreadful, but once you reach the destination, it becomes… comforting.

You might be wondering, at this point, Nieve—why am I writing to you? Why am I telling you this?

Oh, you will see.

The man raised his eyes from the crowd, and against all my expectations, found mine. I suddenly felt bad for all my prior misconceptions, upon reading his name—which, by all accounts, is quite ridiculous—because he was nothing like the stereotypical image I had composed in my mind. Something danced around him. Like the air rearranged itself, particles clashing against one another and atoms rubbing together to rearrange reality, but so faint, so slight, you could barely see it. And I was the only one paying attention to it. A soft vibrancy, like when you hear the humming of a television in another room before actually knowing it’s turned on.

I stopped, and his smile turned into a grin. Between the dimples of his amusement, something sombre fell, and I must admit, it was then I felt terror. Gripping, paralyzing terror. He leaned forward, his eyes now so close to mine I felt every muscle in my body contracting and tensing up, like the lid of a box smacking shut, and I looked into his deep, purple eyes. I remember thinking it was quite the unnatural colour.

He tilted his head and murmured: “Would you like to freeze the world over?”

I realize now he must have summoned me because, in the middle of this inane rumble happening inside a sports store, of people gnawing at each other like wild animals over a pair of sneakers or a new tennis racket, I was the only one grounded enough to pay attention. Because I didn’t want to be there at all. And he knew. Until that moment, I was quite shaken, terrified even, but then it felt like the truest, most honest beckoning amidst the rise of the Apocalypse. Like the archangel Michael handed me the sword of silver himself to decide upon the mortal souls who should enter Heaven. And besides, the confusion was brewing a headache in me. I just wanted everyone to be silent for a moment.

So I answered honestly: “Yes.”

He drew away, tipped his hat and cast one paralyzing glance over the crowd, and the world… froze. It just… stopped.

I cannot express to you, Nieve, how beautiful a sight it is to see a world frozen like God hit the pause button. Maybe tit-spying peeping Tom from the movie was onto something, because I have never before experienced such peace in my life.

Just try to imagine it. Chaos coming to a halt around you, all the sounds of the world sucked out of existence, and there’s only absence The people that, just before—minutes before—existed in a revolution of egoism, fighting and screaming and shouting over owning things, buying things, purchasing things, and things, and more things—suddenly turned into statues. I felt a queen amidst the blind.

I trudged down the cluttered aisles, stepping on discarded clothes and broken hangers, plastic cracking beneath my soles and fabrics caught into my fingers and hairs, and watched: hissing growls frozen mid-scream, clenched fists hoisted in interrupted challenges, even a couple of fingers gripping the hairs of one another. I touched the arm of a woman whose face was cast into stony anger, eyebrows pushed together in ravenous hatred, and she didn’t move.

The magician, or what was he, appeared next to me, calmly placed a hand on my shoulder and said: “Try hurting her.”

I should have fought it, I know, but I was far too curious to deny the opportunity. If one could freeze the entire world over like this, just to bring a moment’s peace, and watch the carved animosity of these brutes clashing over materialism, what else could one do with it? I mean, it’s wrong to do it, to take advantage of someone’s body who’s stuck into a liminal space between life and non-existence. I know that, I’m not a monster. But so is so many of the things these people were doing. You just had to look at the workers and cashiers there to understand it. And who’s to say they don’t deserve a little pain?

The magician produced an ice pick from his pocket; his hand touched mine softly—and, oh, I cannot express to you how cold those fingers were—and placed it gently on my palm. “Try hurting her,” he said again. The voice was tuneful, like a chirping bird, and I almost want to say it carried something charming with it, perhaps an enchantment of sorts (at least, he had the clothes to go along with it). But I’d be lying. I wasn’t moving against my own free will, anymore. I was too curious, and this world was too silent for me to let it go back to that irritable cacophony of screams and aggression from just seconds before.

So I did. I picked up the ice pick and pressed it gently against her puffy white skin; I felt the surface of her arm sink below the sharp tip as it pressed on deep into the flesh until the cold blade hit her bone and a silky thread of red sprouted from the puncture wound. She didn’t move; yet as I looked up at her face, I saw a tear sliding down her eye. Like a wax figure that somehow contained a soul inside of it, and upon the alien touch felt every pain a human could, only twice as hard. I thought I was enacting some proper punishment, I won’t deny. I saw that woman hit a kid with an empty box. It was an accident, but maybe if she hadn’t been so concentrated on shoving aside all and any who got to her precious ugly sneakers first, she wouldn’t have hurt a child—would she?

Do you want to know what I did next, Nieve? To each and every one of them? Because I did things. I simply relished in this immense power I was still unsure where it came from. So I did things.

Alright, I won’t tell you all of it. But I’ll tell you part of it. The muscly guy who played a game of tug-of-war and threw the ripped shorts apart, I poked his eyes out—oh, yes, both of them. That’ll teach him to watch where he throws things, next time. And the slender, tall man he fought—I pierced both his hands and feet. The woman with the ugly crocs? Who smacked three people that I could see with a plastic hanger? I broke every single one of her fingers and watched her tears run silently down her pale, reddish skin. The group of teenagers who had started a brawl? The one stuffing watches in his pockets—well, I stuffed socks down his throat—one, two, three, and four, and five, and six, until his trachea was so filled with cloth his eyes swelled and burst into red as he suffocated. At one point, I even stole money from a few of them and filled the pockets of every single one of the workers there. I think they deserved it.

There were more, but these, I think, are enough to paint the picture. Perhaps I’m more of a pervert than tit-spying freak from the movie.

I asked the magician then, after I had my fun, who had this amazing power. I certainly thought it had to be him, because he had called upon me, he had summoned me. But imagine my astonishment when he leaned into my ear and whispered: “You.” I asked how—how could it be possible, and why hadn’t I just… discovered it before. He simply said: “I gave it to you.”

We walked back to the doorway. Outside, the mall was packed full with people walking up and down the corridors, not minding the hell I had frozen over. As if they didn’t even acknowledge the existence of that store.

“You can do it again,” he said. “Whenever you like.”

I did, a few times, of curiosity, just to see how it works. And every single time, I watched their bodies turn rigid and stony, their muscles constrained by that burning wish of wanting to move, but utterly unable to. And me, their God, deciding what to do upon them as their lives hung suspended before my power.

Though I’m not as greedy as I might sound. I didn’t do anything, this time.

When I was done, the magician chuckled briefly, tipped his hat again and said: “Use it wisely.” I watched him away, sliding through the passing customers, and in between the silhouettes, he disappeared. A flicker of reality, gone within a second. Maybe that’s all he had been.

I think about just what he was often, you know. Maybe he was an agent of chaos, a trickster of some sort. Maybe he was a god, playing a prank on mankind by leaving this gift of immense power in the midst of chaos, waiting to see who would be worthy of possessing it. And he chose me.

When I turned my back to the sports store and walked home, the screams began. I can still hear them, Nieve. I can still hear those bellows of panic filled with just enough of a flutter of confusion as they wondered: where did all that pain come from?

Did you see the news article they published about it? ‘Black Friday Turned Bloody’. They just accepted, with no further ado, that these morons plucked each other’s eyes out and broke each other’s fingers over shorts and sneakers! There were a few mentions of something the press labelled ‘paranormal’, but the police just chalked it all up under ‘trauma’ or something. I mean, who cares, at this point?

I did leave Jun there, for pity’s sake. I didn’t want to hurt her, she’s nice, I like her. You, on the other hand, is quite the different story.

I’m sure, by now, you’ve figured out where I’m going with this. I mean, you’re one monumental bitch, but you’re not daft. Certainly, you remember—don’t you? We used to be friends when we were kids, in year nine, really close too. Until you decided you were too good for me. Oh, far too good for poor, ugly Suranne, with her thick hairs and bushy brows, and all that. Remember how it all ended? That day you invited me over for a study group at your house, only for me to find out it was a set-up?

I still have the scars on my body. They never really went away, and I’ve been forced to look at them every single day of my life since. Worst of all was erasing the mental scars you left me. Leaving school and some good years of therapy just didn’t seem enough. I think I found the right therapy, though. Freezing the world over can be chilling for others, but for me it’s just… peaceful.

But do try to remember, Nieve—how I cried that day and begged you to stop punching me, or how much I screamed when you pressed a burning hot rod against my skin to, and I quote you, ‘brand me like the cow I was’. Please, remember every single instance of pain you inflicted on me—the cuts, the pinches, the poking needles, the slaps—because, in no time, you will be the one feeling them. I will freeze the world—your world—and I will make it last three times more than it did for me, and you will feel every inch of horrifying, excruciating, humiliating pain I felt. And it will go on for so long your frozen body will try to wither and jerk itself free from me and nothing will happen, because that screaming, bristling terror you will feel will be all locked up inside that head of yours like in a panic room. No one will hear your thoughts, and no one will know your pain, and once you wake up, no one will hear your cries for help because I will make sure you will have no tongue for a plea.

You might think it a petty thing, to be given this power and then decide to use it in a quest for revenge, and one that’s over ten years old, but you know what? I’m not really one for heroism, anyway—never was. This world is far too big and complicated for me to go out and just become a vigilante or something. And I just… don’t care like that.

Then again, you did bring this on yourself.

So, please—do remember that day and keep the sordid details in mind because… I am coming for you, Nieve.

From your former best friend,

Suranne.

P.S.: I just remembered the name of the movie! It’s called Cashback, though it’s just dreadfully boring and too voyeuristic for me. Well, but—you know. Men.

Past Challenges:

Wordtober Day 1: Ring

Wordtober Day 2: Mindless

Wordtober Day 3: Bait

#wordtober #writing #my writing #creative writing #fiction #my wordtober

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evenastar-blog · 5 years

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Archery in the Lord of the Rings: The Hobbit

To repeat: This post is from the viewpoint of someone who is an archer, certified archery coach, and literature nerd.

About archery: Archery at its bare basic is about consistency. “Tubing an arrow,” aka shooting a “Robin Hood,” is the ultimate goal of a target archer and occurs when your second shot is the exact. same. as the first shot, and splits the first arrow down the center. Archery is also, as Kisik Lee (the National Head Coach of the USA Archery Team) once said, about confronting your demons: you can not lie to yourself when shooting, especially with a recurve or longbow. Your target will reflect your mental state. A real life archery club we have at my archery range is the 300 Club, where you score 300 points out of 300. Yes, this is a thing, yes there are people who can do it, yes I know several, more than several actually. Yes, some of them did it with recurves and longbows.

Book version:

Smaug is in. the. air. He is HUNDREDS of yards AWAY. COMPLETELY OUT OF REACH. He is being shot at by a ton of archers whose arrows are not hurting him because his body is covered in protective scale. He has a weak point: a small hollow on his left breast. Presumably this is the weakness every hunter knows: the spot right over the heart. On a 3D target, this spot is about the size of a fist. SO Smaug is in the air hundreds of yards above them swooping around setting fire to everything and the weak point is the size of a fist. This is an amazingly difficult shot. My archery range/shop has tons of archers who compete nationally and internationally or who hunt. Maybe 20% of the archers I know can make this shot.

The atmosphere around Bard is thus: “Already women were jumping in the water on every side. Women and children were being huddled into laden boats in the market-pool. Weapons were flung down. There was mourning and weeping [. . .] Now he shot with a great yew bow, till all his arrows but one were spent. The flames were near him. His companions were leaving him.” He’s alone and on the ground and near flames and oh!, he has one arrow left. Note how it’s a black arrow NOT a ballista-type arrow. Because he is shooting with a longbow. He has no ballista. There is no mention of him having a “Wind Lance” ballista in the book.

One arrow. He has one arrow left. The village he has lived in all his life is on fire. People are dead and dying. Trained warriors are panicking and abandoning their posts. HE HAS ONE GODDAMN ARROW. There are not enough words for how traumatic this is. Or how dramatic. There aren’t enough words to describe the immense willpower and composure an archer would have to have to even shoot this last arrow, let alone shoot it well. There are now a handful of archers I know who could make this shot, but there are exactly two I truly believe could have any chance at killing Smaug. This is not “ultimate” difficulty, this is so so so far beyond that.

And Bard does it. He fucking does it. Yes I’m swearing, swearing a lot, but this requires swearing because it is un-fucking-believable and maybe my swearing will in some small way help you who are not archers or archery coaches understand how completely goddamn unreal this shot is.

Robin Hood shot his amazing shot in a competition, no fire-breathing dragons and people dying and sobbing around him. No one attacking him.

Odysseus makes his amazing shot in a competition without anyone, certainly not a dragon, immediately attacking him. His home is not literally on fire when he shoots.

Bard’s shot here is THE shot of literary archers. THE. FUCKING. MOST. DRAMATIC. AMAZING. MOTHER OF ALL SHOTS. OK!?!?!?!?

Movie version:

There is fire, ok. His is alone, ok. But he’s on a tower, he has a better angle from which to shoot. His son appears for more drama. Because THAT wouldn’t distract an archer. Not. At. All. I’m sorry but the chances of any archer making this shot are at least halved by their goddamn kid appearing. You need to be able to concentrate, you cannot make the shot if you’re worrying about your kid. THAT IS NOT HOW ARCHERY WORKS. OK. YOU NEED PERFECT CONCENTRATION. IF YOU HAVE A SINGLE FRACTION OF A SECOND OF THOUGHT YOUR SHOT IS DONE. LITERALLY. NO MATTER HOW EXPERIENCED YOU ARE. Also, can I just say, you are sending the message to your kids that it is ok for them to come back to help when their parent is being attacked. I don’t want any kid I know coming back. I want them to go be safe.

Note also how there are no people screaming and weeping in his vicinity. In the book it was clearly a war zone. In real life in a war or bombing or terrorist zone, there are the sounds of crying and of moaning. JRR Tolkien knew this, he was on battlefields. Well, there is one moment of people screaming but as the focus leaves the people the screaming stops. How convenient and not at all like a real war zone. You want drama and tension? Leaving the screaming in the whole time would have worked. All you had to do was make it quieter than the music and dialogue. Then again, maybe they that’d be too realistic and cause problems for people. . . ? I know they were super careful with how the tower collapsed in Return of the King, they didn’t want it to remind anyone of the Twin Towers.

OH LOOK. SMAUG LANDED RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU. IN FACT HE LITERALLY LINED HIMSELF UP WITH YOUR FUCKING ANGLE. IT IS THE STRAIGHTEST SHOT EVER. ALSO IT IS WELL IN THE RANGE OF THAT BOW. THE DIFFICULTY OF THIS SHOT WENT FROM INFINITE POINTS TO MAYBE 100 POINTS. OH AND SMAUG’S EVEN GETTING CLOSER FOR YOU. HOW KIND OF HIM. THIS IS THE TYPE OF SHOT ALL HUNTERS DREAM OF: BECAUSE IT IS PERFECT AND EASY AS HECK.

Ok, we are just going to casually ignore the problematic physics here because I have no patience to deal with that. Not the physics of the arrow. Not the physics of the bow. Actually no. We do have to talk about this. I’m still ignoring that arrow because it is ridiculous, but I will talk about bows/slingshots briefly. (Anything I say about either of these also applies to the construction of the Wind Lance.) I did a quick google search and made some edits to the photos I found to help you understand this quick detail:

On both a slingshot and bow, you have this oh so important piece connecting your tips. A continuous piece made out of one material.

Here’s a screenshot:

This. This would never work. The reason this doesn’t work is because the force of the shot would catch in the string and bow parts and break everything, BEFORE the arrow leaves. SO the shot would never land. The boy cannot successfully connect the points. It needs to be CONTINUOUS. Bard would just cause everything to break and collapse on top of them. In fact, the bow could very well explode because of the sheer amount of force that would be caught in the limbs instead of successfully leaving with the arrow.

How do I know this? Because I’m a friggin’ archer and guess what we do with broken bows for fun when we’re young foolish archers? Yeah. I have actually done something very much like this (sans setting the arrow on a person because that is so so so dangerous) and it’s SUCH A BAD IDEA. HOLY SHIT IS IT A BAD IDEA. Bad ideas might be ok when being attacked by a dragon if it, you know, worked. Does it work? NO. FUCK NO IT DOESN’T.

And now, let’s talk about the use of the son some more. I liked Bard in the books, I HATE the movie version of him (character, not actor, to clarify). Because this scene is never ever EVER appropriate. I give ZERO fucks about the fact that there is a dragon attacking. ZERO. THIS IS NOT OK. The consulting archers on this movie SHOULD NEVER HAVE LET THIS HAPPEN. You know why? Because as a goddamn archery coach I can tell you: kids emulate what they see on movies. The guy who plays Hawkeye? Causes me real life problems because my kids try to emulate him, which usually means they don’t look at their target when shooting or look away from it as they make the shot because “but Hawkeye doesn’t.” You know what happened after this goddamn Hobbit movie came out? I had two students setting up to try this. I HAD REAL STUDENTS DO THIS SHIT AND THANK FUCKING GOD I CAUGHT THEM BEFORE THEY COULD CARRY THROUGH BECAUSE THIS IS DANGEROUS. ONE OF THEM LITERALLY WAS TRYING TO USE THE SHOULDER OF THE OTHER AS AN ARROW REST. I loved loved loved LOVED Peter Jackson for what he did for the Lord of the Rings. Now though? If I ever meet him in real life instead of asking for an autograph and just gushing about how amazing he is, I would have to ask him some questions. One of which would be who his consulting archers were and why they gave this the ok. Because it is not ok. It will never BE ok. Out of all sports, archery actually has the second least amount of injuries despite the fact that we are using real weapons (if I get shot by one of my students’ arrows it WILL puncture). The reason we’re able to accomplish this is because we take safety very, very seriously. And movies like this make it a lot harder to ensure the safety of both students and coaches.

(No blame goes to the actor of Bard. As far as my movie knowledge goes the director and consultants were in charge of this decision.)

I’m assuming they made the choices they did to add drama. Because obviously the book version was boring. Apparently. And these days in movies audiences love big (the bigger the better) monsters walking directly at them while threatening them. But this is not dramatic. This is not NEAR as intense or dramatic as the book shot, because Smaug was untouchable and out of reach.

They added the son for drama and to reinforce Bard AS A SHITTY FATHER. Sorry, probably they meant to show him as loving, kind father, which he is, in the books.

Instead of focusing on the FORCE of heat (because that much heat close to you? It’s like a physical force that pushes you back), instead of focusing on how it was his last arrow and he’s by himself . . . because they didn’t. Not enough. They focused on adding a bunch of other stuff going wrong like his son coming and the platform he was on falling, and his bow breaking. This all took away from the drama of him, alone, surrounded by fire, with one arrow left.

I don’t think we (generally speaking, like in general in Hollywood) really understand how to create tension and anxiety in films anymore. How to do drama. We’ve embraced the whole idea of “bigger is better” and a direct threat coming directly at you is scary and “the more going wrong the worse things are.” It’s really disappointing how many movie directors are going this route. I’m not going to do a huge analysis of psychology here, or explain the other strategies of creating drama and tension. But sometimes, smaller is more threatening because it is harder to see and hit; sometimes having a threat that ignores you because you’re not even worth its attention is more threatening because it reinforces the message that you don’t matter (whereas if they’re threatening you directly it’s reinforcing your importance as a threat to them, that they feel the need to deal with you); sometimes it’s just one thing that goes wrong that ruins or can ruin everything.

Conclusion: I will never stop being disappointed and frustrated about this scene in the Hobbit. They had such a beautiful moment and they dropped the ball. And it’s all the sadder because of how on point they were with the Lord of the Rings movies. I was so excited for this, because Bard to me as both literature nerd and as an archer and coach has always been a source of inspiration and awe.

Peter Jackson was always so aware of his audience and how his movies would affect them for the Lord of the Rings (again, such as ensuring the collapse of the tower in RotK did not mirror the collapse of the Twin Towers). I’m very disappointed that he was not more conscientious when directing this scene.

I will not apologize for my vehemence. Because setting aside my love of stories as a literature major, stories and entertainment influence reality, and the depiction of archery in movies directly affects me as a coach, and the other coaches I work with. As I have already made clear. Anything that has played a role in causing my students to be in an unsafe situation is something I have to be passionate about because it is my job as a coach to keep them safe.

I hope this post showed you how amazing Bard is in the books and gave you greater appreciation for the Hobbit. But I also hope it has made you think about your art and how it might affect people. If you are going to share your writing and art with the public, you must be aware that you have a responsibility to think of how it will affect the real world. We can’t all be perfect, and we can’t think of everything. But we must be aware that it’s not “just art for art’s sake” or “just for fun.” It has real life consequences. I also do hope this post might have shown you a bit of how complicated movie making is, and help show how much skill and devotion Peter Jackson has sunk into not only the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but also the trilogy of the Hobbit. Even if I personally did not care for the Hobbit trilogy near so well. Peter Jackson and all the people involved in the films have to make a lot of decisions, and their decisions are much more important than just “what would be cooler.” So despite my issues with this specific scene, thank you, Peter Jackson and all who were involved in the making of this movie. All I ask, if any of you happen to see this, is that you remember that kids emulate their heroes (and with heroes as cool as the characters in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings? how can they resist?)

#lord of the rings archery #archery #archery in films #bard the bowman #bard the dragon slayer #peter jackson #tolkien #the hobbit

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jaggedwolf · 5 years

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2018 LGBTQ Recs

The usual yearly list of stuff with lgbtq stuff I’ve consumed this year that I thought were a fun time. Probably will be dominated by queer women because uh, I’m the one writing this list, man. Last year’s list is here. Any media with content warnings usually has said warnings listed wherever it’s linked, or wherever you’d get it.

Games/Interactive Fiction

Heaven Will Be Mine - Made by the creators of We Know The Devil, HWBM is a visual novel about three terrible girls piloting mechas and fighting each other for the fate of space - while occasionally making out with each other. IDK even how to describe how awesomely specific the atmosphere of it is, but it’s such a good spiritual successor to WKTD. If WKTD was about desire that you were certain was an impossibility for you, a forever unsure longing for something out of reach, HWBM’s about having this thing you know you have no right to, power that feels unearned - but you have it anyway, so what are you going to do with it?

Butterfly Soup - Look, it’s literally self-described as a “visual novel about gay asian girls playing baseball and falling in love” do I have to actually say more words about this than that, I guess I can. I adore all four main girls, it gave me the gay high school coming of age stuff I’m always down for + sportsball team feels + two pairings I’m Invested in. I am looking forward to that 2019 sequel so much.

Hustle Cat - Dating sim where you are an employee at a cat cafe and can date one of the other employees but there’s magic things happening you’re trying to figure out??? A very cute game, you can pick your character’s pronouns and one of six protag designs, there are 4 male love interests and 2 female ones so you can knock yourself out with the pairings your heart desires. Would cat again.

Kindred Spirits - Yuna is a high school student used to eating lunch alone on the roof...and one day she’s joined by two female ghosts that are a couple, and want her help with matchmaking a bunch of potential couples they’ve spotted around their all girls’ school, since she’s the only one who can see the ghosts. Super entertaining, and whole host of pairs to get invested in.

TV Shows

One Mississippi - It kicks off with Tig (played by, yep, that stand-up comedian Tig Notaro) returning to her hometown in Mississippi after her mother’s death, dealing with her stepfather and brother as they all settle mom’s affairs. It’s darkly humorous little show with a surprising amount of heart. It also had a surprise!duet of a song from Fun Home that like, messed me up a little in a good way. Still sad it got cancelled after season 2.

Comedy Specials

Nanette - It’s a tour de force of talking about comedy, about Gadsby’s specific experience growing up where she did as who she is but also about the general experience of misogyny and homophobia. There’s a part in the middle where she reveals the darker truth behind a funny story she shared at the beginning that still takes my breath away whenever I think about it. The exploration of that instinctual minimization of experiences of bigotry (hahaha aren’t they stupid) which fundamentally, covers up the very real possibility of violence lurking around those stories. You’re funny, until you’re a threat.

Rape Jokes - idk what to say here, man, it’s a really clever and somehow funny standup special about sexual assault and the culture surrounding it.

Happy To Be Here - It feels a little like a fault of mine that this is the first Tig Notaro special I’ve actually watched/listened to, considering the ones that launched her to fame. But this is such a happy, funny time of a special, with Notaro talking about family life and her new kitten, all with her usual dry take on things. Way way lighter than the previous two specials in this list.

Movies

The Miseducation of Cameron Post - I had my doubts going into this adaptation. My favorite part of the book was certainly the first half, as much as I loved the whole, and knowing the movie would focus on the latter half’s conversion therapy plot put me off. I’m happy to say I was very wrong. The movie’s focus gives it a purpose it wouldn’t otherwise, there’s good usage of contextualizing flashbacks, and it communicates so well that precise horror of the slow erosion of one’s self. Cameron, Adam and Jane can take the piss out of the camp as much as they want, but being there still takes something from them.

Love, Simon - I watched this in theatres twice. For the record, I usually watch like, 5 movies in theatres a year if I’m not being dragged by family to them, so, uh, I really enjoyed this movie, even the ~mystery~ of which guy Simon was emailing, and him jumping to conclusions every time. Simon looks So Done and Tired in 90% of his scenes and honestly if that’s not the one truth about being closeted in high school what is.

Books

Of Fire and Stars - F/F fantasy YA romance, combined with arranged marriages that have to be snuck around and secret magic powers. There’s a subplot about one of the girls learning to ride a horse, is the level of fantasy tropes we’re at here. A quick, fun read.

Queer America: A GLBT History of the 20th century - Read this for my gay and lesbian history class and liked it as the quick reader it was - lots of pointers to other sources, and like you’d want from any good history book, covers lots of different of viewpoints LGBTQ folks have had about lots of issues without ever doing the bullshit “All gay people thought X at this time period” claims. Intra-community arguing, always been a thing.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Spoilers, but the gay romance subplot in this novel uh, doesn’t end happily, but like, I really like Sammy Clay as a character, and the depiction of his life as a gay man writing superhero comics from the 40s well into the lavender scare and the congress hearings about comics promoting bad behaviour (read: gay) to impressional kids.

Podcasts

The Strange Case of Starship Iris - Uh, my new fandom obsession, in case that isn’t patently obvious. Tropey space opera podcast with a small disaster spaceship crew, and a clearly telegraphed f/f endgame that constantly delights me. Queer characters, purple aliens, found family feels, what else could I want from a space opera canon? (The answer is more episodes...please...)

The Penumbra Podcast - There are two main storylines, a sci-fi noir one and a fantasy one. I only listen to the sci-fi noir one but I love it, and the protagonist, angsty PI Juno Steel who suffers so well and also happens to be bi as hell. I also really like the Season 1 one-off episode The Coyote of the Painted Plains, or f/f Robin Hood fun-times. [I started listening to it and the other podcast listed below in 2017, but 2017 iteration of this list did not have a podcast section, because I was a fool]

Queer As Fact: Queer history podcast where every episode is the delightful experience of listening to a bunch of Australian history nerds talk about some cool queer person or object while being really smart and delightful. Apparently they sometimes record while sitting in a literal blanket fort and this makes me rank this podcast even higher in my heart.

#not on the list: critical role now has two canonically not-straight PCs and i love it but i feel like it doesn't quite fit on this list #then again one year i recced supergirl #so who knows #it's just a lot longer of a time commitment #recs #long post

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a-salty-alto · 6 years

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Tony Stark, Served Well Done

[A/N]: This is my fill for the “Hansel and Gretel” square on my Fairytale Bingo card. It was interesting to write, because I don’t usually write full AUs, much less in first person. I hope you like it!

Tony

I always knew this is how I was going to die.

Now you might be thinking Oh, Tony, you’re being hyperbolic, “eaten by a witch” is a weirdly specific way to go, there’s no way you could have expected it.

Yeah well, I’m not.

Ever since I stepped foot in this school I’ve known something like this was going to happen.

Okay, let me backup.

Hi, my name’s Tony Stark, soon to be dinner.

I’m a junior at Shield Highschool. Now, most people in town who don’t go here think that we’re just a bunch of stuck up genius snobs who get away with whatever we want.

That’s not true.

Well, the genius part is true, obviously, I go here. And so does Bruce, and Sam, and Natasha’s scarily good with computers and of course Jan and Bobbi- and I’m getting off topic.

Anyway we’re all actually a group of barely-functioning hot messes. If it isn’t exams, it’s school clubs, homework, the fact that none of us get enough sleep because we have to get up ass-early in the morning to get here on time, everyone’s got something to worry about here. We don’t have time to be stuck-up.

My current worry is the large boiling vat I’m dangling over.

Right, right, moving on. So, as Principal Coulson will tell you, if you’re in the mood for ten minutes of him waxing poetic about what the school, Shield High was built on top of a potter’s field, which is a mass grave for unmarked bodies.

So yeah, school’s literally built on top of a pile of dead bodies of spirits that are probably pissed they never got a proper burial.

The first time I heard that little tidbit, my immediate thought was “some idiot is going to bring a Ouija board here and get us all killed.” It was joke, but I still called it.

So, it was after school, and I was hanging out with the D&D club that my friends and I formed with the help of the BEST PHYSICS TEACHER EVER, Mr. Yinsen, when suddenly the lights went out, a draft picked up through the school an an unearthly screech ripped through the building.

It was pitch black, so, naturally, we pulled out our phones to have some sort of light.

Natasha put her phone to her ear.

It couldn’t have rang more than once before she took it away again and shook her head.

“I don’t have any signal.”

At that, everyone else immediately started checking their phones too.

“No wifi,” Jan announced.

“Landline isn’t working either” Mr. Yinsen sighed

“This can only mean good things.” Clint muttered.

“Why don’t we take a look around?” Steve said, because he’s a giant innocent puppy dog who’s probably never actually seen a horror movie.

“Are you crazy?” Sam practically screeched. “No.”

“Rogers, what are you a, dumbass? This whole scenario screams demon attack.” Rhodey added..

“C’mon don’t we at least want to be in a room with actual, you know, windows? It’s only 3:30 in the afternoon, even if it’s cloudy, it’ll be more light than in here.” Brucie Bear suggested. It seemed like a good point. Mr. Yinsen’s room doesn’t have any windows, which makes the room darker. Even if we did walk into a monster movie, a you’d think a better lit room would have to help right?

WRONG! Oh so wrong, because as it turned out the sky had become, as Clint so eloquently put it, “a fucking bloodbath of hatred and death.”

Instead of the soft gray clouds and light snowfall that would be expected this time of year, the clouds were a hard black, and the sky was a deep crimson occasionally split in two by the crack of thunder and a lightning strike.

Like any sane person, we immediately tried to nope the fuck outta there, but the windows weren’t opening up and it took us exactly 5 minutes to realize we were very lost. In the school most of us have been attending for a little over 2 years at this point.

“Well, fuck.” I announced, because really, what else was there to say? I’m not sure if anyone else had noticed it, but the speakers which usually pumped terrible jazz music through the halls instead were playing a heaving breathing sound. I didn’t really feel like pointing it out to anyone at that moment, though.

“So. What do we do?” Clint panted.

Steve immediately took charge. I don’t remember what he said exactly, I may have been too busy staring at him as he got that stubborn look in his eyes and went into full protective mode and his eyebrows scrunched up just so and UuuuuggGgGHHhhhhhh.

Okay, so I might have a slight crush on Steve. You don’t get to make fun of it, I’m about to be boiled.

Anyway so, I wasn’t exactly paying attention but I got paired up with Natasha. I have this habit of aggressively hoarding snacks in my backpack, so I gave some to each of the pairs. In theory we’d each head in a different direction and follow the food trails back to where we started.

As Natasha and I made our way up the stairs and somehow ended up in the basement, we heard moaning. Immediately we shared a look and then ran after the voice. Who did we find but none other than Justin Hammer.

Now, Justin is a prick, but even he didn’t deserve the sorry state we’d found him in. He was pale, clutching his arm, and he had a black eye.

“Stark. Romanoff,” he grunted, as if the words hurt to say.

“Yeah, it’s us.” I helped him up and slung his arm over my shoulder.

“Justin, do you know what’s going on here?” Natasha asked taking his other arm. We shared a silent look and agreed that we should take him back to the meeting point.

“I was playing Ouija.” he said.

A few hours ago neither of us would have believed we were having this conversation, but now, the evidence was kind of hard to refute.

“Aren’t you not supposed to do that alone?” I said. “Or in a place where people are buried?

“Justin, what kind of spirit did you summon?” Natasha asked at the same time.

Yeah, Nat was probably asking better questions than I was. I decided to leave the interrogation to her.

“A witch,” Justin whispered.

“And what does she want?”

“Him.” Justin said shifting his head in my direction.

“Wait, I’m sorry, what?” I yelped.

“When I summoned her, she wanted to eat my soul, but I knew you’d be here with your nerd club, and she said she wouldn’t eat me if I got you for her.”

“Shit.” Natasha said, and we dropped Justin like a sack of potatoes.

It was too late though. High cackling laughter erupted from around us. Suddenly, an invisible force knocked me into a wall, and everything went dark.

When i came too again, i found myself in my current predicament, tied up and dangling upside-down over a vat.

“More sage.” A voice from the shadows called out, and a very grumpy Natasha was pushed in the direction of the pot.

“Hey! Leave her alone!” i yelled. I like to think I was somewhat intimidating.

The witch just laughed though, and practically glided over to me. I don’t know what she looks like other than she wears a dark robe with the hood covering her face.

“Ah, Iron Man, I’m glad to see you’re awake.” She said, placing a bony hand to my cheek. “This is such a lovely little universe that buffoon called me to. You Avengers all have the same delicious spirit, but none of the pesky toys or skills.”

“I’m sorry, it might be the blood rushing to my head, but that doesn’t make any sense.” I bit back. Avengers? What was she going on about? “And if you just want to eat my soul, why do you need the pots and spices.”

The witch laughed again. “Oh, I want you to suffer. You’ve all wronged me, but you, Tony Stark sealed me away, so you get to feel being cooked alive. Your friends’ punishment is getting to watch.”

With that, she glided back to her corner, silently watching the two of us.

“So, Nat. Don’t suppose you can convince her I’m not fat enough to eat?

***

Steve

This isn’t good. I’m back at the meeting place, and Rhodey, Jan, Clint, Bruce, Sam and Mr. Yinsen have all made it back, but Tony and Natasha are nowhere to be found. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t an artist, because I can picture very clearly what it might be like to find the two of them ripped apart by whatever was causing this.

The school has seemingly become its own dimension. The hallways send you to completely different floors, the walls randomly become soft like flesh, and strange voices everywhere. Creepy didn’t even begin to describe it.

Not only that, the school was empty aside from the eight D&D club members and Mr. Yinsen. No other teachers, students from other clubs, or any janitors or security guards could be found.

I’m completely out of my depth when it comes to occult stuff like this. I wish Thor wasn’t out of town for family business, he’d know what to do. His brother practically lives and breathes this kind of stuff.

“How long has it been?” I ask absently while pacing the hall.

“30 seconds since you last asked, so about 5 minutes since we our agreed rendezvous time.” Bruce says. Oops. I stop and realize the others are watching me. I’m probably worrying them.

“Ok, let’s just go look for them. They did leave a trail.” Sam points out. “Either we’ll find them at the end or bump into them as they head back.”

Right. That sounds smart, why didn’t I think of that.

“Okay,” I say, “but let’s stick together, I don’t want to lose anyone else.”

With that, everyone in the group nods and we head off after Nat and Tony’s trail. We travel in relative silence, everyone’s concern is palpable.

We eventually make it to the end of the trail in the basement, where our missing friends are nowhere to be found.

“Shit.” Rhodey curses. I feel like punching a wall, but I swallow my frustrations.

“Let’s keep going. See if we can find any sign of them.” I say. It sounds like something the leader would say, which I guess I am.

We scour the basement looking for any signs of our friends, but find nothing. At least until Clint literally trips over Justin Hammer.

The guy’s unconscious, and pale in a way that doesn’t look healthy.

Immediately, Mr. Yinsen kneels down next to him and checks him over.

“He’s breathing, but it’s shallow. He needs medical attention.” The teacher’s gaze is stern. “James, Janet, and I found the Nurse’s office while we were searching. I’ll take him there.”

“I can go with you” Bruce offers, but Mr. Yinsen holds up a hand. “No, I want you all to stay together. Find the others, then meet us back at the rendezvous point in a hour.”

“Right,” Steve nods. As we watch their teacher take off with Justin in his arms, I can’t help feeling worried.

And by that I mean I’m screaming internally.

Right. Stay calm Steve. You’re in charge. You gotta at least hide your worry.

I stick up my head, and move onward.

Eventually, we find ourselves in the boiler room, and we hear voices. I motion to the others to be quiet as we sneak through. The voices stop as we enter a room, and see Nat, with her leg chained to the wall and Tony...

Tony’s being strung upside down over a large pot.

Ok. Weird, but could be worse.

"Ah, it seems the rest have arrived." A chilling voice says from somewhere in the room. Clint and Sam scream and grab hold of eachother, but I stand my ground

"Who are you,” I definitely don’t stammer, “what are you doing to Tony and Nat?"

I actually manage to not screech when the terrifying lady appears right behind me and puts a bony hand on my shoulder. Yay me, I’m so proud of myself.

"I only wish for you all to suffer, and for his to be especially painful, and delicious." she whispers, and suddenly Tony screams as he starts dropping closer and closer to the pot.

With instincts I didn't even know I have, I grab the circular lid from a nearby garbage can and throw it.

It whizzes past Tony's head, bounces off of the wall, then another, and finally hits the lady in the face, knocking her down, and stopping Tony's descent.

I guess I meant to do that.

"Um right. Okay. She needs to be focused to do her magic. Clint, you and Jan help Nat, everybody else keep the lady busy. I’m going to get Tony down.” The others all nod and get back to work.

Rushing over to the pot, the first thing I do is try to tip it over.

“Steve.” Tony says.

It's really heavy, but Tony’s counting on me.

“Steve.”

I can’t let him down.

“Steve! It’s still on fire doesn’t that hurt?”

I look down and realize that there’s a fire lit under the cauldron and yeah, it is really hot.

But not as hot as it probably should be. Still, I jerk away.

I look at my hands and yeah, they're a little burnt but not something I can’t deal with. They’re already healing in a few places anyway.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, try snuffing out the fire first.” Tony says, misinterpretting my shock. Suddenly the rope drops some more and Tony screams again.

That weird muscle spasm that let me throw the garbage can lid causes me to jump into the air, do a flip, and catch the rope dropping Tony.

I land balanced on the cauldron, and pull Tony into my arms.

“Impressive Cap, when did you start taking acrobatics?”

“I don’t know and- Cap?” Tony’s never called me that before and Tony looks just as confused as I do.

“Uh, just ignore me. I’m not sure how long I was upside down. Probably just woozy from all the blood rushing to my head. Anyway,” and Tony looks up at me and gives a little smile, “Thanks for the save.”

I can feel my face turning beet red. I try to tug on the rope that’s holding Tony, but it doesn’t budge. Looks like I’ll just have to carry Tony while the others deal with the witch.

It’s fine. This is fine.

I can just feel my face turning beet red.

Damn it massive crush on Tony, I thought we had an agreement where you wouldn’t do this to me anymore.

I try to focus on the others fighting the witch.

Looks like Clint and Jan have gotten Nat out, and they’ve all joined in the fight.

The Avengers are all on the defensive though. We don’t have anything that will actually hurt her, and most of us can’t survive more than one direct lightning blast. I mean none of us can, we’re all humans, what am I talking about?

“Yo, Wicked Witch!” Tony shouts. Oh god Tony please don’t antagonize the angry magic lady when we’re standing over a boiling pot of water.

Still, the witch turns to us and growls.

“You!”

“Yeah, guess you didn’t get me after all. Can’t even beat me when I don’t have my toys?” He mocks.

The witch howls and lunges towards us. Somehow I know the exact moment I need to jump to make sure she smacks face first into her own cauldron.

Her screams as she boils are going to haunt my nightmares for the rest of my life.

She finally stops, and a blinding flash of light envelops all of us. A split second later, Tony’s untied, the cauldron’s gone, and Tony is suddenly really heavy.

I put him down on the ground as the others come over to us, clearly very confused.

“So, what just happened?” Clint asks, “I mean I’ve always been awesome but I don’t think I’m usually able to dodge lightning for that long.”

“It’s almost like we were actually that thing she was talking about? The Avengers?” Tony asks, turning to Nat, who gives a nod.

“Yeah. The reason the witch wanted to eat Tony was because another version of him sealed her away with alternate versions of us. Apparently in another life, we’re superheroes.” She explains.

Superheroes, huh?

“So we accidently absorbed our other selves’ superhero skills? Is that even possible?” Rhodey asks, and Sam just shrugs.

“We just fought a witch, and didn’t die. I think it’s definitely something more than just dumb luck.”

“Cooooooool. We have to try that again some time!” Jan squeals. “I want to design all our outfits.”

Everyone laughs and starts to leave, but Tony hangs back.

“Something wrong, Tony?” I ask.

“Um yeah, I just wanted to give you something better. To thank you properly.”

“What-” And suddenly I’m cut off by Tony giving me a kiss on the cheek and running off after the others.

So today, I got transported to a weird alternate dimension, my friend/crush nearly got boiled alive, I got proxy superpowers, and my crush just kissed me.

Weird day.

Not a bad one though, so I start chasing after Tony.

#capimanniversarybingo #steve rogers #tony stark #stevetony #highschool au #sorta #multiverse shenanignas #original villains #alto writes

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popculturebuffet · 6 years

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Changing the Channel: My History as A Channel Awesome Fan and Why I Unsubscribed

I thank anyone who reads this. As the #changethechannel movement takes the internet by storm and slowly but surely destroys Channel Awesome, I felt I needed to let out some emotions regarding the skeletons tapdancing out of channel awesome’s closet following the revelations in the Google Doc.

A long time ago in a High School Video Media Classroom far away, 8 years ago to be exact, I was a fresh faced young man living the dream of helping produce the school news show Wham TV, a dream I’d had. But as I was just the lowly credits guy, I had a lot of free time on my hands and during one of these down periods I noticed a bunch of the guys watching something on my friends computer. And that is how a young me found the Nostalgia Critic. I was a huge fan, binging every episode I could find at home since the entire series was on YouTube. And if that wasn’t enough, as school ended I soon found out there was an entire SITE full of other people like him, riffing on bad films, comics and just about anything thanks to the crossover film Kickassia. I loved it at the time, and it opened my eyes to all these other people floating around. I watched the crossovers that came out and once I got a computer at home fast enough to actually watch blip without it taking two hours to load, I dove right in.

For the next few years I slowly found my faviorites: Lupa, Linkara, Todd, Spoony, The Nostalgia Chick… I devoured their videos along side Doug’s at rapid pace. And as my first year of Community College went on, I found myself more and more isolated: I was an awkward young man ape, unable to talk to women at all, barely relating to my fellow guys, and finding myself in a very unhealthy online friendship with an asshole that constantly made me feel like crap and insulted me at every turn that I was desperate to impress and was close to my best friend. And in those dark uncertain times.. Channel Awesome was my light in the darkness. A beacon that provided weekly mounds of entertainment to binge at school after class, people like me who were nerdy but had fun making hilarious videos and clearly had a tight knit surrogate family to back them up. I aspired to be one of them, to make my own reviews. I wasn’t great and bottomed out, but I still wanted to be one of the shiny happy people walking by, the nerds who had friends and relationships and were loved by many.

I never made it, a combination of having no camera, little skill, and a huge amount of homework squashed that dream… and in hindsight.. that was a good thing considering just how bad that dream went for the people who did make it. What I never realized is that while Channel Awesome really was a family to some people.. it was also a nightmare of mismanagement, misogyny, and neglect as time went on.

When I saw Suburban Knights I saw a stellar sequel to a movie I loved.. not poor Iron Liz getting starved and being treated like a pack mule, several people being injured, and Doug being Tommy Wiseau levels of dangerously incompetent.

When I saw to Boldly Flee I saw a deep exploration of the fear they all faced in the wake of SOPA and a touching sendoff to the critic. I didn’t know that Doug just outright refused to listen to ANYONE about the script even with it involved characters they made, terribly sexist jokes, horrendous rape scenes, and script bloat, not to mention giant amounts of cast abuse.

When I saw Demo Reel while I gave it a chance, feeling that Doug was finally living his dream I didn’t realize that he was tanking the site and didn’t give one shit what happened to anyone else. And when I heard Allison Pregler, one of my favorite reviewers on the site was being harassed I just naturally assumed that Doug, like just about everyone else, had come to her aid… instead of ignoring said harassment even when it got to the point there were threats on her life. When Fool Fantastic was fired, I assumed he was just some lazy kid, never realizing that instead he was basically forced into video reviewing due to a format change, then went through several months of upheaval dealing with high school graduation and coming out to less than accepting parents.. and then finding himself removed from the site despite having told a staff member about it, and given no sympathy by Rob and Michaud despite having gone through hell. And that, in this inferno of horrible facts coming to light that’s been #changethechannel, what’s gotten me the most. People suffered. People struggled. And I saw none of it. Wether it was due to pressure to keep things under wraps to keep their jobs, as Channel Awesome, or just plain feeling like no one would care due to not having many friends on the site, I was blind. Even when Allison and Phelan came out post firing about their mistreatment, I saw it as just Rob and Mike’s fault. Doug had to be innocent right? He had to be a good person? I can’t have been following a giant sack of dicks for years at this point? But I was so wrong. While Doug wasn’t nearly as bad as these two.. he still didn’t seem to give two shits about anyone outside a select few he’d bonded with. It was all about the Nostalgia Critic to him, it was all about the critic to rob and it was all Michaud said.

The rest of Channel Awesome were just window dressing, minions to be used and discarded whenever they decided they weren’t needed anymore. To be fired for missing ONE video after years of service, to be fired for missing a goddamn Skype call or just for no damn reason. While Doug wasn’t’ nearly as abusive as Michaud he still did jack all to change things at the site or actually talk to anyone. He just let his brother and actual animate sack of dicks CEO do whatever and slowly run the site into the ground. And amazingly despite having the management skills of a flamingo that’s on fire and had it’s brain surgically removed and replaced with a can of tuna with the word “BRAIN” sloppily written on the side that the site still stands today. And it’s amazing that even as quality dipped and it became clearer and clearer just what a waste of space Doug Walker’s work was… I stayed by anyway. Because he was a nice guy and surely it’d turn around. But it didn’t and he sure as shit hasn’t, letting the company twitter send out half assed apologizes and according to one report DEFENDING that heartless mass of diseased rats and spittle. And if he won’t just man up and get his show back, fire this asshole and firmly apologize for EVERYTHING, then why do I need him. After MONTHS of finding out people I liked in movies and such were the worst humanity had to offer... why should I give him ANY sort of chance. And with that I unfollowed channel awesome and spent the next few days beating myself up about watching Doug for so long. I felt terrible, like by supporting the site and him I’d hurt so many people... for ignoring the signs... and so... that’s why I’m here today. Because I felt like I had to get my feelings out and in doing so I realized that while I was a dum dum for giving Doug the benefit of a doubt… I’m not dumb for just HOPING beyond hope someone was a good person. It’s not bad to have faith, but you can’t let it blind you. And you can’t beat yourself up for hoping he’d get better or that things would change… al you can do is walk away, leave Doug to let Rome burn and hope beyond hope that the people still on the site don’t go down with him.

And even with all Michaud has done and the walkers let him do… Channel Awesome WAS still a family. For many of it’s former contributors it was home and they found best friends, spouses and comrades.. .. and if anything all this coming to light has only strengthen those bonds, and shown that no matter WHAT mike did, no matter what he tried to take.. he couldn’t take away their friendship, their audiences or their basic dignity. And he certainly isn’t taking my peace of mind anymore.

#changethechannel #channel awesome #doug walker #rob walker #michael michaud #allison pregler #lindsay ellis #lewis lovhog #that guy with the glasses #phelan porteous #editorials

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dadkingsteve-blog · 6 years

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Back to the Future

“Holy shit, that was the best goddamn movie I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Dustin burst through the doors of The Hawk movie theater, his excitement preceding him.

“Hey man,” Steve lowered his voice, “what’d we say about language in public? There’s little kids here. Littler than you.” Steve walked closely behind Dustin, followed by an equally-ecstatic Lucas, Max, Will, Mike, and El.

“You know what, Steve. I’m not sorry. Back to the Future is hands-down, one hundred percent, absolutely the best goddamn movie I’ve ever seen.”

“You said that about Ghostbusters last year,” Lucas retorted, now leading the group as they started down the street.

“Are you saying you didn’t like Back to the Future? Is that what you’re saying right now? Lucas, is that what you-”

“No, that is not what I’m saying. I’m saying that when we went to see Ghostbusters last year, and as we left this very movie theater, you said ‘Holy shit, that was the best goddamn movie I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“Language!” Steve interjected, wearing a small grin.

Ignoring Steve, Lucas went on, “It’s just the facts!”

“How do you know that’s exactly what I said, Lucas? Did you have a tape recorder, huh?”

“I did not. But it’s wha-”

“Alright, alright. Enough, guys!” Max shouted playfully, “You two argue like an old married couple.” Max threw the board under her arm down on the ground and skated leisurely ahead of the rest.

Mike, El, and Will strolled behind the others, smiling in quiet amusement at their bickering friends.

The sun was setting on another July evening in downtown Hawkins, casting the peaceful streets in a warm orange glow. El relished in the feeling of sunshine on her face, the light breeze that played through her hair, Mike’s hand in her own.

She had gone too long without all of these lovely, simple things.

El had begged Hopper for weeks to let her see Back to the Future with her friends. “It’s not safe yet,” he would say. “A few more months,” he would explain, "You already got the Snow Ball.” Every day she would ask, and every day he would say no.

But finally, Hopper broke down. Maybe El had just beaten him down enough with her incessant pleas, or maybe it was because, ultimately, all he wanted was for her to be happy. All he really wanted was for her to have a normal life, be a normal teenager. And so he had one simple condition: “Just no using your powers, okay?”

El took no issue with Hopper’s request. Why would she need to use her powers on a day like this?

_______________

As El walked, she took in all of the casual wonders of life outside of her little cabin. Windows lined with bright flower boxes, the way the sunlight made the cars glisten, the smell of buttery popcorn wafting from the theater. As she savored her surroundings, she noticed something peculiar amongst it all. Something disruptive. Across the street was a group of six or so older teenagers, gathered around a parked car in an otherwise empty lot. They spoke loudly and blared music from a radio, while clouds of smoke plumed around them.

“Mike, what are they doing?” El asked quietly.

Mike turned to examine the rowdy group. Something about them looked familiar, but he couldn’t place it. “I don’t know. Hanging out I guess.” He paused and thought for a moment before asking, “Steve, do you know those idiots?”

The grin faded quickly from Steve’s face as he looked towards the commotion. Steve did know those idiots. They were Tommy and Carol and all of his other ex-friends. Doing things he used to do.

Steve hesitated, “N-no. No, I don’t know them. Just some assholes. Assholes I don’t know,” Steve averted his gaze, lowering his head as he increased his speed. “Let’s go home, guys. It’s getting late.”

“Aw, Steve, you said we’d get ice cream,” Will spoke, his tone reflecting his disappointment.

“Yeah, El hasn’t had any ice cream yet this summer!” Mike added.

Steve fumbled with his words, “D-Dustin you’ve got ice cream at your house, right? We can go there. Let’s just...Let’s just get outta here.” He hurried ahead, walking quickly now in the direction of his car.

El noticed Tommy and Carol walking towards the group, smirking menacingly. “I think Steve does know those assholes,” she muttered.

It was too late for Steve to try to escape. Tommy and Carol had spotted him. “Well, well, well, if it isn’t the Babysitter’s Club?” Tommy mocked.

“Are these your friends now, Stevie?” Carol chirped.

Steve ignored them, grumbling a small “Come on guys, let’s go,” to the group.

“Excuse you, my girlfriend asked a question. She wanted to know if these little nerds are your friends now.” Tommy’s tone was even more vicious than before.

“S-Steve who are these peop-” Will stammered.

“Let’s just go, I-I’ll explain later.” Steve tried without success to move the kids ahead.

“Explain what, Harrington? That you’re a loser who hangs out with second graders now?” Tommy pushed Steve’s back teasingly.

“Hey, for your information, we’re teenagers, okay?” Dustin stopped and turned towards Tommy and Carol. The others stopped too, no longer able to ignore the pair.

“Yeah, most of us are fourteen now!” Lucas added.

“We’re gonna be Freshmen this year, so you better back off.” Max stepped toward them, her skateboard held up to her body like a shield.

Tommy’s eyes narrowed. “Shut up, nerds, nobody asked you,” he spat viciously.

“Hey!” Steve stepped forward, his posture tensed. He pointed a finger threateningly at Tommy, his voice lowering, “Don’t you dare speak to them like that, you hear me?”

“Or else what, Harrington? You gonna bludgeon me to death with your diaper bag?” Tommy laughed and shuffled toward Steve. Carol stood close behind him, grinning wildly between loud pops of her bubble gum.

Behind the rest stood El, her fists balled partly in rage and partly in frustration, her gaze turned down slightly. Hopper’s words circled through her head: Just no using your powers, okay? Suddenly, his simple request became a challenge to obey.

Steve stepped even closer to Tommy, “I said. Stop.”

“What are you gonna do, Harrington?”

Behind Steve, the group stood frozen. The threat of an imminent fight loomed, the peace of a perfect afternoon ruined. Steve turned towards the kids quickly, “You guys get out of here. I’ll handle this.”

Taking only a small step backwards, the group exchanged silent, knowing glances with each other. No, they wouldn’t be going anywhere.

Steve rolled up his sleeves and raised his fists slowly, while Tommy placed his right foot back and lifted his arms. They paused, poised like this for more than a moment, waiting for the other to throw the first punch. El’s fists balled tighter as Hopper’s words raced through her mind. Steve’s driving heartbeat pounded in his ears. All was quiet except the now-eerie, distant sound of music playing from the lot across the street.

That, and a sudden, roaring battle cry from Dustin.

Dustin lurched forward from the group towards Tommy. Using all the force he could muster, he slammed his body into Tommy’s, attempting to push him away from Steve. After a brief moment, Max, Mike, and Lucas joined in the effort, followed by a hesitant but ultimately ungrudging Will and Eleven.

Exclamations of “Step off, douchebag!” and “Son-of-a-bitch!” and “You don’t mess with us!” were heard from an otherwise indistinguishable cacophony of yells and curses.

“Guys! Guys! Stop it!” Steve shouted as he tried, but ultimately failed, to pull the kids away.

“What the hell!” Carol shrieked as she watched from the side.

Tommy writhed and grunted, attempting to push the kids away. Eventually, after much effort, he was able to pull himself out. He side-stepped and shuffled away, wearing an expression of confusion.

“Bunch of freaks,” Tommy muttered, glancing backward at the group briefly before jogging down the street, Carol close behind him.

“Now you can go back to your friends and tell them you got beat up by a bunch of second graders!” Max yelled in the direction of Tommy. Her words were echoed by a round of shouts in agreement from the group, who watched as Tommy and Carol retreated.

When the couple was out of sight, Steve turned to the kids. “What the hell was that?”

“You clearly didn’t want to kick his ass. So we did it for you.” Dustin shrugged his shoulders as he spoke matter-of-factly. The others nodded slowly, agreeing to Dustin’s account.

“I-I, told you guys to let me handle it.”

Lucas gave a friendly pat on Steve’s back as he began to walk down the street again as if nothing had just happened, “It’s alright, Steve. We won’t tell anyone that you need a bunch of kids to protect you.” The others giggled and joined Lucas.

As the group walked ahead, Steve stayed still for a moment, shaking his head in disbelief. Protect me? Protect me? Psh, I don’t need them to protect me. I can protect myself. I just didn’t want to throw the first pun-

“Steve! Can we get ice cream now?” Mike shouted from halfway down the block, interrupting Steve’s internal dialogue.

No, he didn’t need them to protect him. Or at least that’s what he told himself. But it was good to have a group who always had his back. And, whether he could admit it to himself or not, that was something Steve’s never really had before.

Steve resigned any effort to argue this further. He relaxed his shoulders with a sigh and smiled, “Alright, alright. We’ll get ice cream.”

#in which lucas also says it's just the facts #also in which steve almost gets punched #also i googled it and babysitter's club doesn't come out until 86 but oh well!#stranger things fanfiction #stranger things fic #stranger things #st #st2 #steve harrington #dustin henderson #lucas sinclair #max mayfield #eleven #mike wheeler #el hopper #dad steve in action #dad steve #my writing

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favficarchives · 6 years

Text

Merlin x Reader Headcanons

I have a bunch of ideas for this story, but I can’t seem to make the story come together, so here’s the list of headcanons!

You meet Hamish in the late 1980s, when he’s still getting his feet on the ground with the Kingsman and you’re on sabbatical after a particularly rough mission with your own agency

You met in a crowded cafe one lazy Saturday morning. There were only a few seats open - all of them included sharing a table with someone - and the cute guy in the sweater and glasses reading the morning paper seemed the most friendly

He gladly accepted your company - your nervous smile and apologies for inconveniencing him touching his inherently parental heart

You two clicked instantly

You were both old souls in young bodies

You were intelligent, caring, and sincere people, which was a rare find

After finding out you, yourself, were a bit of a nerd, Hamish asked if you wanted to go see a new science-fiction movie with him, since none of his friends were interested

You eagerly agreed, happy to have a new friend and even happier that the new friend was a cute and sweet nerd

Your relationship picked up from there, and by the time the year was out you two were living together in a flat in London

Neither of you knew of each other’s occupations. Hamish knew you were on sabbatical, and you knew that he worked in information and technology, but that was it

You were the first to find out. As a secret agent, yourself, you recognized the signs in the abnormally long work hours, the flimsy and repetitive excuses, and the “weight of the world” look in his eyes when he’d come back home after a long few days away at work

You didn’t know what to do with the information

Relationships were nearly impossible in this job, anyway.

Intra-agency dating was severely frowned upon

You really probably shouldn’t date civilians

Inter-agency dating got people killed

All in all, you had no excuse letting this go on for as long as it had

You had no idea how you were going to make this relationship work, but you couldn’t bring yourself to end it

Hamish was one of the best things in your life.

Nothing made you happier than waking up with him in the morning.

The world was never as bright as when he smiled.

No music sounded as sweet as his laugh.

No one understood you so naturally like he did.

How the hell were you going to end that?

As it turns out, you wouldn’t have to

A few weeks after you put the pieces together about Hamish’s double-life, he (and the rest of the Kingsmen) found out about yours

Percival thought it was odd that Merlin’s relationship was so perfect. It was almost too perfect. As though it were designed that way

Galahad didn’t want to question his friend’s happiness, but couldn’t quell Percival’s unrest

They found your connection to another agency. Not an enemy, but there were no friends in the spy game

Arthur was convinced you were using Merlin for information and was terribly cross

Merlin had never felt so embarrassed, ashamed, and hurt in his life

He loved you more than he thought possible, and didn’t want to believe a word of it, but the evidence was right there, and he wasn’t naive enough to believe it was all a coincidence

He confronted you about it when you came home that evening after running errands

You greeted him with a bright, innocent smile and a bouquet of lilacs - his favorite flower

It killed him

The smile fell from your face when you saw the look on his

He knew.

“Ya’ve known all this time?”

“No! I just figured it out a few weeks ago!”

“So why didn’t ya tell me?!”

“I didn’t know how to without risking you responding exactly like this!”

It was your first real fight. You both hated it

You hated the look he gave you - as though he’d never love you again

He hated the tears streaming down your face and the strain in your voice

“Ya need to leave,” he said, knowing full-well what Arthur was capable of. “Get out of the country. Don’t come back.”

He refused to look at you when he said it, and you knew that was it.

You swallowed your remaining sobs and packed a quick go-bag

You stood in the doorway of your shared flat, turned back just enough to see the man you loved with all your heart sitting on the couch, eyes burning holes into the floor

“I love you,” you whispered, desperate to hear him say it back.

‘Please,’ you thought, ‘even if it’s a lie. Please.’

He was silent.

You left.

You weren’t gone more than 30 seconds before Hamish broke down into gutwrenching sobs

Harry found him in an old pub two days later, drowning his sorrows in some very expensive scotch

Merlin was never the same after that. The jokes, the smiles, the warmth was gone.

Neither of you moved on.

You convienced yourself that this was the lesson your romantic heart needed. Relationships weren’t meant for people like you. If a relationship so perfect as what you and Hamish had couldn’t survive this job, there was no point in trying with anyone else

Merlin, to put it simply, knew that you were the love of his life and that no one could fill that void, so why bother?

You focused your time and energy on your job, burying the feelings you’d never given yourself the chance to mourn

Merlin would sometimes daydream about coming to home to you after bad days and just holding you, reveling in the love you two shared

He tracked you down after his charge died ‘97, but couldn’t work up the courage to contact you

He almost made the call after Valentine, but convinced himself that it’d been 30 years, and he was likely nothing more than a distant memory to you at that point

You wished that were true, tbh

Your paths crossed again in Cambodia

Ginger had called you - as you were now one of the highest ranking members of your agency - and asked for your help, which you gladly provided

That thing that happened in Cambodia totally didn’t happen, because fuck canon

Merlin had never been happier to see you than in that godforsaken forest

You, on the other hand, were all business, just as he was the night it ended

After all, this is work; it isn’t personal

The lot of you managed to neutralize the threat, and Merlin nearly had a heart attack every time he lost contact with you

Your romantic heart wanted to believe that this meant he still loved you, but your analytical mind refused to give into temptation

It hurt too much before, and you refused to be hurt again

After Poppy was handled, you all returned stateside to regroup

Your agency and Statesman agreed to help Kingsman rebuild

You went over to Scotland to oversee the process, which Merlin was conflicted about

Professionally, it was good to get Kingsman up and running again, but he wasn’t sure about the new direction

Personally, he was thrilled to have you back in his life, but died a little bit inside every time you looked at him with a blank face in place of once-loving eyes and bright smiles

Everyone who wasn’t you two, however, could clearly see that the love was still there

Eggsy worked on Merlin, convincing the older man that all hope wasn’t lost

Harry worked on you, trying to break down some of the defenses you’d spent decades perfecting

“Merlin doesn’t hate you,” he’d told you on multiple occasions. “He never has, and he never will.”

“Pretty sure he does,” you responded flatly, blinking back the tears that the memory of that night, of his silence, brought back.

Merlin spends months wooing you, determined to win you back

You have a new bouquet of flowers in your office every Wednesday, a callback to the fresh flowers that you’d always have on the coffee table in your shared flat

You’d find exclusive merchandise from some of your old favorite movie, television, and book series waiting for you, with inside jokes or even just “thought of you” written on a card

After a few months, it was really starting to get to you

You felt yourself yearning for Hamish, for his love, and for the relationship you shared for the first time in 30 years

You had to put a stop to it

You agreed to go on a date with him, if only to prove to him (and yourself) that the feelings he was expressing weren’t grounded in reality, but a manifestation of the stress he’d been under the past few years

“Nostalgia,” you’d said. “A longing for simpler times. There’s nothing more to this than that.”

Hamish looked at you with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

“Prove it.”

You couldn’t prove it.

The date - the first real date either of you had been on in 30+ years, was wonderful.

An early movie to set the tone for the eveing

(Sci-Fi, of course)

Takeaway at his place

Booze and 80s classics the rest of the night

It was how you’d spent some your favorite nights with him. Carefree, loving, comfortable, intimate, and easy.

Perfect.

You admitted that there might be something worth looking into, and you swear you’d never seen Hamish smile so big

You two moved in together not 6 months later

Hamish has been carrying around a ring since the day you moved in, waiting for just the right time to ask

You were the love of his life, and he didn’t plan to let you go again

A/N: Hot dog, that got longer than I anticipated. In all fairness, though, Merlin needs a little more love, so there ya go.

#merlin x reader #hamish x reader #hamish merlin x reader #kingsman #fic

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verdigrisprowl · 7 years

Text

June 19 Dancitron Movie Night - How It’s Made

Frenzy and Ravage picked How It’s Made segments for everyone but didn’t warn them what the videos were going to be.

There were hysterics over How It’s Made: Giant Valves.

Prowl discovered fossils are really cool, and Soundwave wants Prowl to help make a kaleidoscope for him.

Today ItsyBitsySpyers 7:50 pm *Soundwave's in a not-quite-but-very-close-to-a sprawl on his usual seat, feelers massaging his arms. He tremble-laughs to himself. Tonight should be amusing.* Ratchet 7:51 pm *pops in* ItsyBitsySpyers 7:53 pm *Bobs his helm in welcome.* Bevel 7:53 pm *looks around to see which of SW's crew are here tonight* ItsyBitsySpyers 7:53 pm *Just him and Rumble.* Ratchet 7:53 pm *is there a bug* Ratchet 7:53 pm *aww, no bug :c* Bevel 7:54 pm *will sit wherever Rumble's at then* ItsyBitsySpyers 7:54 pm *Rumble's stretched across the back of a relocated booth seat. Unfortunately, Zori is busy helping melt some rubble over in one of the settlements tonight.* Ratchet 7:56 pm *sits butt down on an empty couch* Bevel 7:57 pm *then she will take the actual booth seat, he can have the back* Bevel 7:59 pm *waves to the Ratchet* Hi! Ratchet 8:01 pm Heya. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:01 pm [[We will be doing something... different, tonight. Consider yourselves warned.]] *Not quite time to start, but very soon.* Bevel 8:02 pm *different sounds interesting* boomtank 8:02 pm -peers in- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:03 pm *Nods hello.* boomtank 8:03 pm -and then in he goes, waves at Soundwave before sitting- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:06 pm ((ok soon as puff is back with food we get goin)) boomtank 8:07 pm ((kaaay Me 8:10 pm ((am here and fooded!)) Me 8:11 pm *arrives just slightly late* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:11 pm //Weapons?// Sits up. *Immediate ping hello from the noodle and his miniature nerd.* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:13 pm //Jus' so ya know, Frenzy 'n Ravage picked alla these. Boss said "find scrap for every mech what comes here Mondays," 'n they said they done it, but we dunno what they got.// Bevel 8:13 pm *is super into this movie even if she knows all this already* Me 8:14 pm *pings back. is soundwave still sprawled?* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:14 pm *He is. Would Prowl like to join him?* Me 8:14 pm *well, he's not going to sprawl. But he'll sit with Soundwave. *he IS somewhat slouched, though.* boomtank 8:17 pm -perks at instrument- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:17 pm *Soundwave tests whether or not he can place an arm behind Prowl. He's not surprised by the slouch. Can't expect an instant mood fix.* [[You're familiar with this, Blaster?]] Me 8:18 pm *no complaints about the arm* boomtank 8:18 pm Huh? Oh, no, not making them I would like to try though...if I ever get time ItsyBitsySpyers 8:19 pm [[Just this or any?]] boomtank 8:20 pm Any really Christine 8:20 pm *plops into a seat with snacks from home* hi guys! ItsyBitsySpyers 8:20 pm //Yo, Impact!// Rumble waves from the back of a seat. Christine 8:21 pm *Return waves!* Bevel 8:21 pm Making instruments is really hard. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:22 pm [[You've tried?]] Bevel 8:22 pm *waves to Impact, actually sees her this time* Christine 8:22 pm *Even more exuberant waving! Is a Bevel!* Bevel 8:22 pm *is indeed!* boomtank 8:23 pm -oh, instruments gone now- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:23 pm *Don't worry, there will be more later. Ravage knows the audience.* Ratchet 8:23 pm [[ there was some kingwood in there too!! ]] Christine 8:23 pm Ooooh, purple heart! ItsyBitsySpyers 8:23 pm //I thought that was a metal.// boomtank 8:24 pm -awesome- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:24 pm [[Visually appealing.]] Bevel 8:24 pm Purple wood 😄 Me 8:26 pm ... That's so inefficient. Christine 8:26 pm But it's pretty! ItsyBitsySpyers 8:26 pm [[...It is? How would you do it?]] Bevel 8:27 pm [[My boss does this as a hobby/side-job boomtank 8:27 pm ...they are pretty Christine 8:27 pm Trains!! 3:D Me 8:28 pm Create a single tool that cuts out the designs for the barrel of the pen in one go. Like a... a mold, except it's for a lathe. Bevel 8:28 pm *oh yeah trains, sits forward a little* Me 8:28 pm That way the creator doesn't have to individually carve each one with multiple tools, and they wouldn't be so inconsistent. There's no way that he can get any sort of consistency if he's making them one at a time. boomtank 8:29 pm That might be the point? Ratchet 8:29 pm It's art, Prowl. Humans like that they're not all the same. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:29 pm *Rumble snickers and makes scissor fingers near Bevel's audials.* //Snip snip, big bit.// [[But he would be able to produce more of them.]] Bevel 8:29 pm Ow. No snipping. Me 8:29 pm The sword was art too, but they used molds and a cutting program to make them all consistent. Christine 8:30 pm I APPROVE OF THIS COLOR CHOICE ItsyBitsySpyers 8:30 pm //How ya feel about bein' a train?// boomtank 8:30 pm I think it might have to do with material used? Bevel 8:31 pm Some swords are made without molds and stuff. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:31 pm //Yeah, sometimes a big fragger jus' whacks crystals until they're all pointy.// Snicker snicker. Me 8:31 pm Yes, the narrator mentioned that blacksmiths used to make them slowly and inefficiently by hand. Bevel 8:32 pm I make them like that. Christine 8:33 pm *smol gasp* You do?! Bevel 8:33 pm Uh-huh ItsyBitsySpyers 8:33 pm //An' you ain't given me none?// Me 8:33 pm *... Prowl is going to shut up now.* Christine 8:33 pm Can I watch you do it sometime?! 3:D Bevel 8:33 pm *it's ok Prowl she ain't mad* I can make you one, Rumble. *nods to Impact* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:34 pm [[Is this how you began your Dinobots, Ratchet?]] Ratchet 8:35 pm Heh. I guess, but the humans did all the fossil digging. We found the bones in a museum. Bevel 8:35 pm Not using molds means I can do custom work and make really cool designs that never look the same. Sometimes consistency is good because if you know a design really works well and need to make a bunch. Like outfitting a whole army or something. Me 8:35 pm *watching in fascination* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:36 pm //Ya stole the bones?// Me 8:36 pm *he's learned more about fossils in the last two minutes than he learned during all his years on Earth.* Ratchet 8:36 pm Of course not. They just gave us the idea, when we saw them. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:37 pm [[What is this? It's beautiful.]] Christine 8:37 pm I think it's a ray! Ratchet 8:37 pm [[ that ind of tedious work is what i live for tbh, i would love doing that.... ]] boomtank 8:37 pm Oh wow Christine 8:37 pm i win! ItsyBitsySpyers 8:37 pm //Oh, pfff. Stealin' woulda been more fun.// ...And Prowl's in the room. //But, uh, illegal. 'Course.// Bevel 8:37 pm Pretty. boomtank 8:37 pm Yeah ItsyBitsySpyers 8:37 pm *Soundwave nods at Impact. So she did.* Me 8:38 pm I don't understand how they don't rot. Ratchet 8:38 pm Can't do much with fossils, though. They're good for looking at, not building off of. Christine 8:38 pm *Has gained the acknowledgement as is delighted.* Bevel 8:38 pm *helicopter and Whirl's not here aw8 Christine 8:39 pm awww Me 8:39 pm ... The helicopter segment is clearly for Whirl's benefit. He's not here. We could skip this segment and watch something else about fossils. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:39 pm [[Perhaps whatever causes disgusting organic rot does not get through layers of rock.]] Bevel 8:39 pm *laughs* Me 8:39 pm *just a suggestion* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:39 pm *Soundwave taps his chin in thought.* Bevel 8:40 pm I was a helicopter once. Me 8:40 pm ((... did it crash?)) ItsyBitsySpyers 8:40 pm [[When we have worked through the list, he will find more videos on fossils for y--]] Me 8:40 pm ((i mean. it DID crash for me. did it crash for others.)) Bevel 8:40 pm [[yes it did Christine 8:40 pm ((did for me)) Ratchet 8:40 pm [[ yes ]] boomtank 8:40 pm ((yup Me 8:40 pm ((okay cool im not alone)) ItsyBitsySpyers 8:40 pm *Soundwave sighs and stretches his feelers out to poke at the wires.* Christine 8:41 pm *takes the opportunity to sit closer to bevel* 3:D boomtank 8:41 pm Um...? Need help? ItsyBitsySpyers 8:41 pm [[No, he doesn't need help.]] Instant Blaster reaction. But... if he wants to butter Blaster up into eventually telling him about That Thing. [[But he would not mind it.]] ((i'm sorry y'all ;; give it a sec, it's obvs bein slow tonight)) Me 8:42 pm ... Whatever's wrong, it's not the projectors. Bevel 8:42 pm :3 Christine 8:43 pm *bounce bounce bounce bounce* Me 8:43 pm Otherwise I would have disappeared. boomtank 8:43 pm -will get up to help then- Christine 8:44 pm *cheers* Me 8:44 pm *there it goes* boomtank 8:44 pm -and there we go- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:44 pm [[Thank you.]] *Pings Prowl a thank you as well for that bit of info.* Me 8:45 pm *return ping* boomtank 8:45 pm Welcome! -and sitting back down- ItsyBitsySpyers 8:45 pm [[Let us try that again.]] Me 8:46 pm *are they skipping the helicopters to see more fossils?* *oh, apparently not* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:46 pm *When the main run is done, Prowl. He won't forget.* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:47 pm //It's a helicopter 'n it got an airplane on a dial.// Me 8:48 pm *watching a bunch of organics assembling what's basically an insentient mech is... bizarre.* Bevel 8:48 pm This is a really small helicopter. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:48 pm *This was probably Frenzy's pick, to be honest.* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:49 pm //Eugh. Imaginin' all them little hands all everywhere - poor Breakdown. Musta been horrible.// Christine 8:49 pm *stiffens* *:(* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:49 pm //...Oh scrap. I'm real sorry, Impact.// Me 8:49 pm You get used to it. Christine 8:50 pm *mumble* s'ok Me 8:50 pm ... The hands, I mean. Not the... *vague gesture that may or may not allude to Breakdown* Bevel 8:50 pm *pats Impact gently* Christine 8:50 pm *leans on Bevel* Ratchet 8:51 pm Hmm. *slides off couch onto feet* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:51 pm *Soundwave looks at Prowl. When did he have human hands all over him?* //You goin', doc?// Ratchet 8:51 pm Time for me to head out, folks. Seeya next time. Bevel 8:51 pm *looks over at Ratchet* Aw, ok. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:52 pm //Aw. Hey, I'll tell Bug you was here, yeah?// boomtank 8:52 pm G'night Ratchet Bevel 8:52 pm Night! Ratchet 8:52 pm Tell him be here next week. Christine 8:52 pm *small wave* Me 8:52 pm Evening. *... that's it that's the only word he's said to Ratchet all night* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:52 pm //Sure! Watch yourself, 'n all.// Ratchet 8:53 pm *it sure is, Prowl* Me 8:53 pm *he's watching how glass lab equipment is made, no time to talk* Bevel 8:54 pm *makes a promise to self that she'll talk to Ratchet the next time she sees them* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:54 pm *Soundwave is learning so, so much. Whatever humans made these shows have his approval.* Christine 8:55 pm Oh! I know about human oil! It's made of old dead stuff! Me 8:56 pm *crude oil! is this more fossil stuff?* ItsyBitsySpyers 8:56 pm //Gross.// Bevel 8:57 pm Messy. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:57 pm //Hey, Boss. Ain't this one of them places ya went to? That whole fossil fight thing.// boomtank 8:57 pm Ew ItsyBitsySpyers 8:57 pm [[Yes. ... It made him slightly hungry.]] Me 8:58 pm Wouldn't this whole drilling process destroy a lot of fossils? Christine 8:58 pm ((bless u prowl)) Bevel 8:58 pm Bet it does. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:58 pm [[Most likely. The humans have an obsession with this product, though. He overhears many, many... MANY political arguments about it.]] Christine 8:59 pm ((sister: prowl is a gift. become soundwave if you agree)) ItsyBitsySpyers 8:59 pm [[It is strange. They do not even consume or inject it.]] Me 8:59 pm I'm well aware. It's a shame. ItsyBitsySpyers 8:59 pm ((*soundwaves stronger*)) Me 9:01 pm ... I'm sorry, what did they say they make with it? Crayons, perfumes, what...? boomtank 9:01 pm What the.... Christine 9:01 pm gross! Bevel 9:01 pm Ugh human food. boomtank 9:02 pm .......... ItsyBitsySpyers 9:02 pm [[Crayons, perfumes, plastic, lubricant, fuel...]] *Soundwave is so not looking at the screen. He'll just listen to this one.* boomtank 9:02 pm -hide face behind data-pad- EW Me 9:02 pm *completely unbothered by the meat slurry* Christine 9:02 pm *just gonna focus on her own snacks, yes* *offers bevel some* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:03 pm *Rumble is both grossed out but totally fascinated, judging by his mixed up expression* Bevel 9:03 pm *forgot to bring anything to distract herself with tonight nooooo-oooo snacks yes plz* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:03 pm //Meatsacks eatin' meatsacks. That's fraggin' great.// Bevel 9:03 pm *...expression? is there an emoji on the visor?* [[never mind reading comp fail XD Me 9:05 pm They can't eat gasoline, even though it used to be meat and plants. And yet WE can eat it—again, despite its origins. Even though it's basically liquid fossils. *yes he's still on about the fossils.* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:06 pm [[It makes sense for our timeline. Given who Earth is.]] Me 9:06 pm *oh! facial reconstruction!* I've seen this done. Christine 9:06 pm ((oooh, true)) ItsyBitsySpyers 9:06 pm [[On humans? Or mechs?]] Me 9:06 pm Humans. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:06 pm [[Can you do this?]] Me 9:06 pm Well—I haven't seen it BEING done. But I've watched videos. No, I don't know enough about human anatomy. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:07 pm *Thinks and nods.* Me 9:07 pm Besides, I'm given to understand that there's as much art to it as science. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:08 pm *Soundwave saves this one for Buzzsaw, just in case that's so.* Me 9:08 pm The videos I've seen didn't explain it in this much depth. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:09 pm [[It is most fascinating. Is it -possible- to do... something like this, with mechs?]] Bevel 9:10 pm This looks cool Christine 9:10 pm mmhmm! Me 9:11 pm Something sort of like this, yes. Although the process is very different. No clay. Christine 9:11 pm EEEEEGS i have eggs! boomtank 9:11 pm ...egg? ItsyBitsySpyers 9:11 pm //The menagerie goin' again?// Christine 9:11 pm Always! ItsyBitsySpyers 9:11 pm *Soundwave takes notes on this.* Christine 9:11 pm My chickens are way happier than these chickens, though ItsyBitsySpyers 9:12 pm //How can ya tell?// Christine 9:12 pm Their noises! And Papa gave me a translating thingy on my birthday so I know they say they're happy Me 9:12 pm Mass-produced faces like mine are very easy to identify by frametype, but once it's identified you can't tell which mech of that frametype the face belongs to. boomtank 9:13 pm Those cages look kinda...tiny Me 9:13 pm Forged mechs are harder to identify, but once they ARE identified the face typically allows you to identify an individual person, rather than a batch of hundreds of people. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:14 pm [[How else were they identified, then? Paint?]] [[The mass-produced victims, he means.]] Christine 9:15 pm D:< Me 9:15 pm Paint, after-assembly kibble, treads. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:15 pm *Soundwave glances at the list and sits up a bit.* Christine 9:15 pm I DISAPPROVE ItsyBitsySpyers 9:16 pm [[Ah. Bevel, would you mind going upstairs and asking Laserbeak where he left his datapad?]] Christine 9:16 pm MY CHICKENS GET TO RETIRE ItsyBitsySpyers 9:16 pm ((*Impact sorry not Bevel)) Christine 9:16 pm Okay! *scoots* Bevel 9:17 pm *sees what you did there SW* Christine 9:17 pm ((CACKLES)) boomtank 9:17 pm -confused noises- ItsyBitsySpyers 9:17 pm *SMALL ENOUGH TO FIT INSIDE THE--Rumble squawks and falls off the couch* Me 9:17 pm *... poker face* Bevel 9:17 pm *covers her mouth and tries really hard to not laugh* Me 9:17 pm *his poker face gets even more neutral every time they say the word "valve"* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:17 pm *Soundwave leans forward.* boomtank 9:17 pm -he doesn't get it- Bevel 9:17 pm *snorts* Valve body. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:18 pm //Make sure the holes're-- fraaaaaag// Christine 9:18 pm ((penetrating)) ItsyBitsySpyers 9:18 pm //Hard fachhghghdjdhaahaha// *He's not even gonna try to stand up right now* Bevel 9:19 pm *stay there it's for the best* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:19 pm [[Primus, there's a human in that one.]] Me 9:19 pm *mumbles* MINE didn't get smoothed... boomtank 9:19 pm -STILL confused- ItsyBitsySpyers 9:19 pm *Soundwave's vents stutter just a smidge at that mumble* Bevel 9:20 pm *giggles* Me 9:20 pm *poker faces even harder* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:21 pm //I'm dyin'. Somebody tell Frenzy he's an aft 'n Bevel can have my games.// Bevel 9:21 pm I do not think this is anatomically correct at all. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:21 pm [[...He was not informed that was a function they performed.]] Bevel 9:22 pm The world is safe. Yay. Christine 9:22 pm *returns with a datapad* What'd I miss? Me 9:22 pm *he pokerfaced all the way through "giant valves"* Bevel 9:22 pm Boring stuff. Christine 9:22 pm *sees Rumble on the floor* You okay? ItsyBitsySpyers 9:22 pm //Ah, jus' some pipe stuff.// Me 9:22 pm *but he sees "retractile cords" and barks out a laugh* Bevel 9:22 pm *cackles* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:23 pm *Soundwave just. Fwooshes. Bright indigo.* Bevel 9:23 pm *SW gets such an amused ping* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:23 pm *He doesn't know which of the two picked this one but they're both in so much trouble.* boomtank 9:23 pm Soundwave? Are you okay? Christine 9:23 pm Soundwave? ItsyBitsySpyers 9:24 pm [[Yes, he's fine. Incoming messages about the latest dinobot riot. Many of them.]] Christine 9:24 pm Uh oh. Well, here's the datapad! ItsyBitsySpyers 9:25 pm [[Thank you.]] *Reaches for it and pretends to read.* @Prowl: (txt): Prowl also flame-resistant? Impact 9:25 pm *Goes to plop by Bevel again.* Me 9:25 pm *affirmative ping* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:26 pm *Small nod. Good to know.* Me 9:26 pm @Soundwave «I don't have that extra layer for electrical shielding, though. Less sensitive.» *points at the drill reversing the coils' directions* For the record, that's VERY uncomfortable. Impact 9:27 pm *found that one kind of boring* boomtank 9:27 pm .... Impact 9:27 pm *if the tubes one was like that she's glad she missed it* Bevel 9:27 pm Cop stuff. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:27 pm *And another small nod.* [[He would imagine so. Ah! Human police work.]] Me 9:28 pm *ooh, handcuffs* Bevel 9:28 pm *the most boring, Impact* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:28 pm *Rumble crawls over the couch again and nudges Bevel and Impact. Scoot over, you two.* Impact 9:28 pm *obliging scoot* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:28 pm //Ratchet's teeth don't look nothin' like that.// Bevel 9:29 pm *laughs* Impact 9:29 pm *giggles* boomtank 9:30 pm -reading now, bored of all this- ItsyBitsySpyers 9:30 pm //Huh, humans must be nicer. Ain't no swivels on any I been clapped in.// //Least I don't got doors or wings or nothin'. I hear Starscream got a super nasty cramp that time he tried goin' Autobot.// Bevel 9:31 pm Not stasis cuffs either. Just cuffs. Impact 9:31 pm He tried going Autobot? 3:o Bevel 9:32 pm [[Naughty children get put in the handcuff wiggler ItsyBitsySpyers 9:32 pm ((LOL)) Impact 9:32 pm ((XD)) ItsyBitsySpyers 9:32 pm //Yeah, once. Didn't work.// Impact 9:32 pm Huh. Bevel 9:33 pm Lord Starscream makes a good Decepticon. Even when he's a really nice one. Me 9:33 pm *... slouches a bit further* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:33 pm *Soundwave glances over again, confused.* @Prowl: (txt): ...Clocks: bothersome? Me 9:34 pm *negative ping* Bevel 9:34 pm *oooo pretty clocks* Impact 9:34 pm Oh! Oh! Bevel, you and Whirl talked about clocks! Tiny geeeears ItsyBitsySpyers 9:35 pm *Tilts his helm. Well, he's learned that particular lesson. If Prowl wants to tell him what it really is, he will.* //Cuckoos don't got wings, or what?// Me 9:35 pm *it was the handcuffs, actually. And the reminder of his old job.* Bevel 9:36 pm The tiniest. I want to see a video about automatons. Do they have one? ItsyBitsySpyers 9:37 pm *Soundwave's started skimming the list to make sure there's no more Surprises. He checks again.* [[Not this time. Perhaps another.]] Me 9:38 pm *... although the clock also makes him think about Whirl's job, and the conversation he had about it with Whirl, which... admittedly doesn't help things* Bevel 9:38 pm Aw. Ok. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:40 pm [[This is strangely discomfiting to watch. More than the assembly of a helicopter.]] boomtank 9:41 pm ............ Impact 9:41 pm brain bits! Me 9:42 pm *little bit, yeah* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:42 pm [[Still. They do make decent audio equipment.]] Impact 9:43 pm 3:D Bevel 9:43 pm Armor! ItsyBitsySpyers 9:44 pm //Heh, that looked like that purple guy. Uh. Tornadus?// Bevel 9:44 pm Chain mail looks really cool when you wear it. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:45 pm //Ratbat useta have a cape like that.// //Wouldn't never shut up about it.// Bevel 9:46 pm Ha. Me 9:46 pm Really? Metal capes were considered... gauche, in my universe. A senator wouldn't be caught dead in one. Bevel 9:48 pm *this makes her miss her old suit of armor look* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:48 pm [[It -was-, if you ask him. But we no longer had access to fabric by then.]] Me 9:48 pm *so this is when humans first decided they wanted to be robots. with suits of armor. disconcerting to watch.* ItsyBitsySpyers 9:49 pm ((i'd meant this one for windchill cuz of their grub, but sadly they are not here today ;; )) Impact 9:49 pm COloooooors ItsyBitsySpyers 9:50 pm [[Hm. Crayons, perfumes, plastics, lubricants, fuels... bricks.]] [[They are creative. He will give them that.]] Me 9:50 pm All that with ancient slurried flesh. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:51 pm *Tiny huff.* [[You have a way with words.]] [[And 'deli meat' with the fresher form. We must not forget that.]] Me 9:51 pm ... So I've been accused. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:52 pm [[Complimented.]] Me 9:53 pm ... That's less frequent. Me 9:54 pm ((who was the lipstick for?)) ItsyBitsySpyers 9:54 pm ((we are on the last few, do not worry y'all)) [[The loss of whoever didn't see.]] ((nobody in particular, i just thought it was interesting)) //...Paint?// Impact 9:55 pm paint to make faces fancy! ItsyBitsySpyers 9:56 pm //Oh! For scarin' opponents. Gotcha.// Me 9:56 pm Wouldn't it be easier to just tattoo their lips? Bevel 9:56 pm Human blood is red. boomtank 9:56 pm Looks interesting Bevel 9:56 pm I think the paint is less painful. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:56 pm [[Perhaps they do not know how to do that.]] Impact 9:56 pm And you can change up your colors! Me 9:57 pm I've seen humans putting on lipstick. They have to continuously reapply it. They know how to tattoo everything else. ItsyBitsySpyers 9:57 pm *He points to Impact.* [[Then it may be what she said - color changing. Wanting more than one choice.]] //What's the pointa colors though? Ain't like they got... I dunno, blue 'n purple blood.// Bevel 9:58 pm Looks cool. Impact 9:58 pm Exactly! Me 9:59 pm Maybe it helps them tell each other apart. *all humans look the same.* Impact 9:59 pm and also tasty! ItsyBitsySpyers 9:59 pm [[Hm. That does make sense.]] And he's snapped forward. *Great. He's hungry again.* boomtank 9:59 pm Oh! Showing food again? Bevel 9:59 pm Yay food Impact 10:00 pm Foooooood~ ItsyBitsySpyers 10:00 pm //Next time, I wanna see gold.// Impact 10:00 pm Yeah! Me 10:00 pm *... mental note, Soundwave likes silver.* *if that snap forward is anything to go by* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:01 pm *Prowl has no. idea.* Bevel 10:01 pm Mythril. Impact 10:01 pm Mithril!!!! ItsyBitsySpyers 10:01 pm [[....Hm?]] Bevel 10:02 pm Silver looks kind of like mythril. Impact 10:03 pm *nodding* Me 10:03 pm What's mythril? ItsyBitsySpyers 10:03 pm [[Tastes better, he'd think.]] Impact 10:03 pm It's a metal from middle earth! Me 10:03 pm *okay, well that answers whether soundwave likes silver aesthetically or culinarily.* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:04 pm *It's both, actually, but shh...* Me 10:04 pm ... The equator? Bevel 10:04 pm Middle Earth is a place. Impact 10:04 pm With mithril! Bevel 10:05 pm It is a really light and strong metal that is really valuable and great for armor and swords and stuff. Impact 10:05 pm I like to lick it. Bevel 10:05 pm It tastes good too. *nods* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:06 pm ((plot twist: mithril is ununtrium)) Me 10:06 pm ((LOL)) ItsyBitsySpyers 10:06 pm //It's so... squishy.// Bevel 10:06 pm [[pft ItsyBitsySpyers 10:06 pm //...I kinda wanna stick my hands in it.// Impact 10:06 pm ((only destroyed by hungry child robos)) ItsyBitsySpyers 10:08 pm //I mean, not really, cuz it'd get all in everythin', but it looks kinda fun.// Bevel 10:08 pm Take forever to get clean. Impact 10:08 pm Mmmhmm ItsyBitsySpyers 10:08 pm //Seriously.// Impact 10:09 pm Bedtime for meeee! G'night everybody! Bevel 10:09 pm Night, Impact ItsyBitsySpyers 10:09 pm //Seeya, Impact!// Impact 10:09 pm You can have my extra snacks, Bevel. Bevel 10:09 pm Thanks! Impact 10:09 pm *Waves on the way out the door* Bevel 10:10 pm *appreciates gift from tiny child friend* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:10 pm *Another kind of insect thread? He settles back to watch.* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:13 pm @Prowl: (txt): Tarantulas' method seems simpler. Me 10:13 pm «I'm sure he made it that way.» *Prowl wonders if Tarantulas's could be used for fabric too* Bevel 10:14 pm How do they keep it from getting tangled if it is so thin and they just pile it on that plate at the beginning? ItsyBitsySpyers 10:14 pm //Wait. So humans wear worm goo?// [[...He does not know why it doesn't tangle.]] Bevel 10:15 pm *ah well* Me 10:15 pm No, they wash the worm goo off of the worm threads. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:16 pm //Still weird.// Me 10:17 pm *points* See. That. Computer-guided milling. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:17 pm *Wonders if Cybertron ever had a version of this.* Me 10:17 pm That's what they should have done with the pens. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:18 pm [[He did wonder what would happen if the human making the pens carved them for too long. They shrank very quickly.]] [[Your solution would ensure that did not happen.]] Me 10:18 pm *nods* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:20 pm @Prowl: (txt): Last file next. Prowl wants fossil information afterward? Me 10:20 pm ... If you still have time. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:20 pm *Nods. He does.* *Ohhhhh that's pretty.* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:22 pm [[...Fascinating.]] Bevel 10:22 pm Cool! Me 10:22 pm *math!!* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:22 pm *Things to look into more often for his work: mirrors.* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:25 pm *Tap tap taptaptap.* Bevel 10:25 pm That was awesome. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:25 pm [[It was. As were most of those. He would like to see more, eventually.]] Me 10:26 pm *fossils!* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:27 pm ((wait do we want this or the bill nye one)) Bevel 10:27 pm *has videos about cool swords if SW is ever interested* Me 10:27 pm ((bill nye is great but also 25 minutes)) ItsyBitsySpyers 10:27 pm ((this one it is)) *Soundwave is still lightly tapping Prowl. Hey. Hey.* Me 10:28 pm *what huh that's him?* Yes? ItsyBitsySpyers 10:28 pm @Prowl: (txt): Kaleidoscope. Math art. Prowl could make? Me 10:29 pm ... I could do the math part. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:29 pm *Soundwave is sorta stunned that these weird print fossil things have survived longer than he's been alive.* *Nods. Okay. Okay, if Prowl can do the math part... nod.* Me 10:29 pm I probably wouldn't have the finesse to... assemble it... or, uh... do the aesthetic bits. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:30 pm [[It -is- insulation.]] Me 10:30 pm *sorry he's also being distracted by the age of these fossils. They're ten—thirty times older than him* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:31 pm [[...Dead statues?]] Me 10:31 pm So it's not the creature at all. Bevel 10:31 pm It turns into a rock. Cool. Me 10:31 pm The creature DOES rot away. It leaves behind a mold that's filled with stone. Bevel 10:31 pm Earth made a copy! ItsyBitsySpyers 10:31 pm [[Fascinating...]] Bevel 10:32 pm Frog. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:32 pm //Praise!// boomtank 10:32 pm Awesome Me 10:32 pm ((praise)) Bevel 10:33 pm These are really old. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:33 pm [[...That fish is 240 million years old?]] Me 10:33 pm *that rock is almost fifty times older than Prowl* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:33 pm *He. He needs a minute, here.* boomtank 10:33 pm Holy.... HOW Me 10:34 pm *almost EIGHTY times older* Bevel 10:34 pm *these things are like 100x older than her or more* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:35 pm *Beeps quietly. He didn't know this cephalopod was that old a creature...* Me 10:35 pm *... did that noise just come out of soundwave* Bevel 10:35 pm Some stuff looks the same. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:35 pm *...It might've.* boomtank 10:35 pm -all of these fossils are older than him- ItsyBitsySpyers 10:36 pm [[The plants can be fossilized as well? But they are not meat.]] Me 10:36 pm *............... cute* Bevel 10:36 pm I think they are made out of the same stuff that turns into rocks in the fishes and stuff. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:36 pm *Shakes his helm. That was - he's - that's gonna take some processing.* [[Does anyone else have anything they wanted expanded on?]] Me 10:37 pm *restrains self from asking for more fossils* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:37 pm *Well, I mean, Prowl -could- ask again.* Bevel 10:37 pm I think everything on Earth is, um, cardon-based so maybe everything can turn into a rock. I want to see more swords. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:39 pm *While we figure out swords and whatnot* Me 10:39 pm *he got more fossils anyway* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:40 pm //Oh, hey, I remember this scrap. That's the Jurassic Park stuff. The bug rocks.// Me 10:41 pm ((I like the "penis -->" label)) ItsyBitsySpyers 10:41 pm ((i'm so sorry oh my god i didn't know)) Me 10:41 pm ((IT'S OKA Y IT'S JUST A BUG DONG)) Bevel 10:41 pm Whoa. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:42 pm [[One last video on Bevel's request, and then he will return us to music for the night.]] Me 10:42 pm *one looks like tarantulas. tarantulas is emulating a species that's at least twenty times older than tarantulas himself* Bevel 10:43 pm ...Gimli is cooler than Aragorn anyway. *accepts this* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:46 pm [[...Unpleasant.]] Bevel 10:48 pm Awesome. Thanks, Soundwave! ItsyBitsySpyers 10:48 pm *Nods.* *Soundwave stretches.* Bevel 10:49 pm *well she has a favorite yt channel now* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:49 pm [[A pleasant break from fiction. He appreciates the indulgence.]] boomtank 10:51 pm That was fun ItsyBitsySpyers 10:51 pm [[It pleases him to know you thought so.]] Me 10:52 pm *it's soothing to watch something designed to plainly and clearly help you understand something new, rather than something designed to confuse you for 75 minutes and then try to make sense of it all in 15 minutes.* *... or maybe his tolerance for recreational confusion has just been shot* *probably by the jet pack umbrellas* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:54 pm *Everyone needed a Sensibility Break after THAT one.* boomtank 10:54 pm -stands and stretches- Bevel 10:54 pm *it's fun being educated about stuff* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:54 pm [[Departing, Blaster?]] boomtank 10:55 pm Yeah. I got a few things left to do before tomorrow I may have kinda put them off... Bevel 10:55 pm I should go too. ItsyBitsySpyers 10:56 pm *Nods.* [[He will not keep you from them. The assistance earlier was]] technically unnecessary no no don't say that [[appreciated.]] [[And farewell to you too, Bevel.]] boomtank 10:57 pm Thanks for the videos, and you're welcome. G'night. -waves and then off to home- Bevel 10:58 pm Night! *waves to SW, Rumble, and Prowl before leaving* ItsyBitsySpyers 10:59 pm *Rumble looks around and... uh. He'll just. Follow Bevel outside, maybe go play poker with some of the minis out back.* Me 11:00 pm *... wait, that wave was in his direction. vaguely nods back after Bevel's already gone and can't see it* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:00 pm *Soundwave pings Bevel with a shot of the nod.* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:01 pm (txt): Question postponed earlier: If Buzzsaw assisted, Prowl would perform precise mirror adjustment? Me 11:03 pm ... If you want? But the math can be done just by eyeballing it, he could probably adjust the mirrors as well himself. Perhaps better, since he's got the fine motor skills for it. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:06 pm (txt): ...Would like, when Prowl: able. If willing. *It might be nice to have something visually pleasing come out of this alliance, just in case it ever falls apart. A tangible memory of a good time. Has to be stolen instead of just erased or lost.* Me 11:07 pm ... Sure. All right. *doesn't see WHY, but okay* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:08 pm *Dips helm.* (txt): Appreciated. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:10 pm (txt): Prowl time: limited? Returns home? Me 11:13 pm It doesn't really matter. *work isn't for a while.* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:20 pm (txt): Understood. Stay welcome if wanted, not unwanted. Presence: soothing. *He's gonna get comfortable curled up on his 2/3rds of the seat and just watch Prowl contently. If all he's got is the avatar, he's gonna work on memorizing more about it than he already has.* Me 11:23 pm ... *slouches more* *leans against soundwave* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:24 pm *Tug tug.* Me 11:25 pm *is tugged?* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:29 pm (txt): Thought: Soundwave given Prowl assistance permission. What best skill, surveillance? Me 11:29 pm ... Delegating to other mechs who actually know how to perform surveillance. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:30 pm *Trembles* (txt): Soundwave accepted delegated work long before. Second best? Me 11:31 pm *... thinks.* *gets tired thinking. gives up.* It's not really one of my skillsets. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:33 pm *Small nod.* (txt): ...Prowl can read monitors, multiple? Me 11:33 pm ... I suppose. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:34 pm *Soundwave taps a nothing pattern, thinking.* Me 11:34 pm ... You don't have to find me more work, you know. Or—different work. Whatever you're doing. You don't have to. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:37 pm *He flicks a hand.* (txt): Starscream gave new opportunity. New opportunity: interesting. Idea forming. (txt): ...Prowl would see station setup? Game information, when played. Personal curiosity. Potential replication reserve. Me 11:39 pm *"opportunity"? was that what it looked like to soundwave? as far as prowl was concerned, all work was the same now.* ... I... No. Not this time, I don't think. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:40 pm *That's - surprising. He would have expected Prowl to jump at the chance to see where he does his work, even in this state. But, all right.* Me 11:41 pm *the thought of preparing for a game left him feeling prematurely exhausted. That wasn't the state of mind he should see it in.* ItsyBitsySpyers 11:41 pm (txt): Understood. Perhaps later. *Bunts shoulder with helm.* Me 11:41 pm *and he felt just a little bit worse, knowing that he couldn't appreciate an offered gift. a small nod.* ... I should head back. ItsyBitsySpyers 11:42 pm (txt): Acknowledged. Acquire passable rest level. Me 11:43 pm *another nod.* *flickers and disappears*

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phanwritings · 7 years

Text

Prayin’

Tittle: Prayin'

Word Count: 6.3K

Description: Dan was a seventeen year old boy with religious parents and a crush on his best friend.

Warnings/Triggers: Being caught, being outed, unsupportive parents, being kicked out, themes of homophobia. (There is a happy ending though!)

A/N: I've spent the past three days writing this, I hope you enjoy it. It has a lot of my life experiences in it. Also, I suck at endings and didn't know how to properly end it. Soz.

Read it on ao3 or wattpad if you’d like! They always get updated first btw

"No, I can't be gay. They don't want me to be gay," he cried, trying to hide his face. Dan didn't want anyone to notice he was crying, even though someone was bound to. He was sat in the principal's office, his English teacher, principal, best friend and maybe boyfriend Phil, and the guidance counselor crowded around him. Dan wished they would give him some space.

Him and Phil had gotten caught kissing underneath the bleachers by the English teacher during 5th period, which was why they were in the office. The office normally would have called their parents but considering the fact that both of their parents were extreme Christians decided against it. The principal had then called the guidance counselor up to come and speak to them. "My parents are gonna kill me. Please don't tell them, please."

Dan tried to hide another sob, shuddering in the chair. He could feel everyone's gaze on him. It was nerve-wracking. Phil hesitantly placed his hand on Dan's back, rubbing it up and down, clearly trying to be soothing. When his parents heard he was going to be kicked out, he was sure of it.

WEEKS EARLIER

"Class! Please pay attention!" The teacher demanded at the front of the class. "For our new assignment we will be studying how music can affect mostly silent scenes in TV shows and movies. This will be a week long project, due this Friday, and will be a test grade. You may pick one partner, I have to approve the partnership before you start working. You will both receive the same test grade, pick wisely. You may begin."

Dan quickly glanced to Phil, knowing for certain that they would pick each other. They always did. His gaze met with Phil's and he nodded, granting Dan permission to get approval from the teacher. Dan walked up to her desk, noticing how Phil quickly moved to get a laptop from the cart. He loved how quickly they worked together.

Dan walked back to their desk, Phil now having the laptop set up. "My place tonight?" Dan asked Phil as he slid into his seat. "We can order pizza and knock this project out in a few hours. If we do it again tomorrow night we'll be done and then we can have this class period for the rest of the week to do our homework during the day."

"I love how your brain works," Phil grinned. "Let me text my mom during break, it should be fine though. We're both guys, not like we'll do anything when your parents aren't home." Phil laughed.

"Yeah," Dan gave a weak smile and tried to give a convincing laugh, probably failing dramatically.

"I can't believe we didn't have any homework today," Dan exclaimed as they started the walk to his house. "That's never happened before!"

Phil laughed, speeding up so he could keep up with Dan who had started to skip. "I know! We might be able to finish our project tonight, then we'd have almost the entire week free!"

"Can you imagine? We could get a start on our homework every day, or maybe read, it would be great!" You could call them both nerds but they loved to stay ahead in school. It was something important to the both of them, and probably one of the reasons they clicked so well together. They had been friends since grade school, meeting after Dan moved from across the country. It was frightening and overwhelming, to say the least.

Dan had just walked onto the playground for the first time. It was a dreadful day. Dan didn't get to start at the beginning of the school year, much less the beginning of the week. He had to be the new transfer student that joined the school on a random Wednesday in March. It was terrible and made a person realize how alone you could be.

Dan had carefully walked through the playground. He didn't really want to go down a slide - he was nine now and much too old for slides, at least that's what his brother said. He saw the start of woods at the edge of the playground. Dan tentatively walked towards one of them, sitting down on the ground. He was out of the way, no one had to talk to him, and he could be alone. It was perfect. Until a boy with ginger hair had come along.

"Hi!" The boy had said, standing in front of Dan and blocking the very little sun. It had been an rather gloomy day, something Dan appreciated. It matched his mood perfectly. "I'm Phil! You're the new kid, right?"

"No," Dan had said, sneering at the boy. "I'm the wildly popular kid, obviously." The boy, Phil, had just laughed before he sat down next to him. How could he! Dan had wanted to be alone and he had thought he made that quite clear. What other type of person sits against a tree away from everyone else?

"You're funny," Phil said. "Do you want to see my Pokemon cards? I just got some new ones yesterday! And a binder to hold them in!" Dan didn't want to admit it but he was rather curious to see his collection. He didn't have loads himself but he enjoyed trading.

"Okay," He said, standing up after Phil and following him to a picnic table. Other kids were surrounding it and Dan tried to remain calm about it.

"You'll get to meet some of my friends too, they're all very nice, I'm sure you like them," Phil assured, sitting down at one edge of the table and grabbing a navy blue binder. "The girl with the long brown hair is Louise and the girl with the short brown hair is Dodie. They're probably my best friends. And then Connor and Troye are over by that tree." He waved to the two boys that were playing ball.

"Why do you have girl best friends?" Dan asked, trying to figure out why Phil didn't say Troye and Connor were his best friends instead.

Phil just shrugged. "Why shouldn't I? They're nice and they aren't rough like some boys. Well, Connor and Troye aren't rough and noisy either. That's why I like them so much." Dan figured that this reasoning was good enough. It actually sounded pleasant to him. He hated when boys were rowdy and destroyed things. It was always better when you could just talk. Dan decided right then and there that he would give Phil and his friends a chance. Phil seemed kind enough.

Ever since that day they had all been friends. However, one thing changed. Dan was now definitely Phil's best friend and it been that way for a long while. Dan would never tell Phil this, but he was so glad that he talked to him on that day. He couldn't imagine where he would be if he didn't have Phil, and he was sure that Phil felt the same way. Dan looked at his best friend, listening to him speak about the latest video game update he had installed. Dan took in the way he kept his gaze on the pavement most of the time but occasionally flickered up to meet his, noticed how he always gave Dan a small smile. He was so lucky to have Phil in his life.

Dan could only hope that never changed.

"Ugh," Phil moaned from Dan's bed. "Can we please order pizza now? I am so done with this project."

"We're almost done. If we order pizza now we'll be nearly finished by the time it gets here. We could finish it and proofread after we eat. Sound good?" Dan proposed. Phil nodded glumly from his bed, an arm flung over his eyes. "Are you tired?"

Phil let out a grunt of confirmation. Dan wished he could go lie down on his bed next to Phil but figured that would be very weird and he didn't want Phil to think that Dan was acting weirdly. He couldn't notice any changes in Dan.

"Are you going to church on Wednesday? My brother is going to be leading the youth group." Dan questioned, going onto their favorite pizza website and starting to place their order. They had studied together so many times Dan knew what Phil always wanted and vice versa. It made Dan happy to know the little things about Phil, more than it did with his other friends. In fact, when it came to Phil, so many things were different about him. Dan automatically cared more about Phil when it came to anything, as terrible as that sounded. It's not that he didn't care about his other friends, it's just that he really cared about Phil. It's not like this was a bad thing, it just meant that they are close. But Dan was starting to wonder. Why hadn't he ever felt this way for anyone else before? Did that mean anything? Dan was shaken out of his thoughts by Phil responding.

"Yeah, we are. Mum doesn't want to miss your brother's first sermon. It's apparently a big deal." Phil spoke up. "I mean what is he even going to talk to us about? It's not like he knows way more than we do, he's only a few years older. Just because he's graduated with a degree from some fancy private school doesn't mean he can magically make a bunch of teenagers listen to him, no matter what they taught him."

Dan laughed, agreeing with Phil's statement. And half an hour later when the doorbell rang and Phil got up and stretched, Dan tried not to follow his shirt as it rose on his stomach. He didn't want to think about what this meant. He really, really didn't.

"Daniel! Time to leave!" His mother yelled up the stairs. Dan quickly slipped his shoes on and ran the stairs. He had known that if he was late his mother would get mad at him. If there was one thing that his family took seriously it was religion. Dan had been baptized when he was seven. His views on Christianity had changed as he grew older but he knew he believed in a God. It just made sense to him.

He knew Phil was kind of similar to him. He had also been raised in the religion, his parents a similar level of conservative to Dan's, which was pretty conservative. Phil had expressed his dislike of the beliefs that most of the church shared. The fact that the girls had to go through a ceremony where they received a flower, symbolizing their virginity and how it shouldn't go to anyone until marriage. The guys had no lesson on this. It was sexist and hetero-normative, something both of them despised.

Both Dan and Phil considered themselves open-minded, especially in comparison to the members of their church. Dan didn't know all of Phil opinions, but he knew they were more liberal than some of the youth group. Troye and Connor, mutual friends of theirs, had come out a year or so ago and Dan knew that Phil was nothing but supportive. Dan didn't know how Phil would react to a guy having a crush on him. Especially if that guy was his best friend. Dan wasn't sure if he had a crush on him, but it would certainly explain a lot. He never liked a girl before but he had just thought that was because he was being a good Christian. His mom had said that some guys don't really like girls until their later teens, but Dan still didn't like a girl, even though he was seventeen. The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. He could remember really liking one guy and wanting to be friends with him, or the one time where he got really jealous when a girl started talking to his old best friend before he moved.

Dan sighed, relaxing against the seat in the car, gazing out the window. He wished his head would just shut up or figure out what he was feeling. He was already looking forward to seeing Phil at church, even though they had walked home together only hours ago. He couldn't talk to him about what was going on in his head but he could figure out his views and opinions. First, he had to listen to his brother's sermon. Maybe he could ask his brother. He couldn't be too obvious about it though, his brother was basically a pastor now.

They arrived at the church, Dan quickly spotting Phil and making his way towards him. Dan had to be there early because of his brother, Phil just came early because Dan would be there early. It made Dan feel warm on the inside.

"Hi!" Phil said, scooting over on the pew so that Dan could sit. They were in the Sanctuary, the room where the services where held on Sunday mornings and the adult service on Wednesday. Dan and Phil would be in the youth room tonight. Dan always liked being in the Sanctuary when no one else was in it. He always felt closer to God. It felt holier without more people in it. Dan sat next to Phil, their shoulders touching. He leaned into him, resting his head on his shoulder. He liked that he could do this, he knew that Phil didn't like most people touching him. He had three exceptions; Dan, his mom, and Sarah Michelle Gellar. Dan was honored to be included in the same group as Sarah Michelle Gellar, who was basically all Phil would ever want in a woman.

"You okay?" Phil asked, probably noticing how much quieter Dan was than usual.

"Yeah," Dan sighed. "I'm just thinking. A lot. And it's annoying."

"Well, what are you thinking about?" Dan sighed again.

"Do think God loves me, no matter what?"

"Considering the fact that the bible says that God has created each and every one of us in His image, loving us unconditionally, would support that claim." Phil said, confident in his answer.

"But do you think that goes for gay people too?" Dan questioned, figuring that he might as well figure out what Phil thought.

"I would think so. If the bible says we are created in His image, why wouldn't that be included?" Phil debated. "If we go by that, God could be anyone. He could be a black trans woman. God is everyone and everything, He is everywhere. I know more and more people are using they/them pronouns for God. I think it makes sense."

"But what about all the people that say gay people go to Hell?" Dan was trying to figure out everything. Phil seemed to have answers to everything he asked so far.

"Well, there are contradicting verses. The bible says that anyone who accepts him goes to Heaven. Why wouldn't that include religious gay people? People in Christianity tend take the two verses in the bible talking about homosexuality to judge an entire group of people. One of those verses weren't even for us, it was for the people of the Old Testament. We don't have to wear one piece of fabric anymore, we get piercings, it's considered okay. We don't follow any of the other rules." Phil sighed, thinking some more. "I think the reason some gay people reject religion is because they've been rejected. Religion is so hurtful to so many people. I know God isn't happy with it. Why would He be? He is love, and that's all He wants for us. The fact that people use the bible, which He influenced, to hate must be hurtful."

Dan let himself relax into Phil more as he rambled on, already feeling better. His eyes caught onto the cross that rested against the wall at the front of the church. He felt at peace in the church for the first time. He let the feeling wash over him, making him feel rested.

"Why are you worrying anyways?" Phil asked, noticing that Dan had closed his eyes.

"Can you promise not to tell anyone? Please?" Dan asked, already worrying like crazy at Phil could say.

"I promise I won't." Phil promised, locking eyes with him when Dan opened his eyes.

"I think I might be gay." He whispered, feeling like there was a lump in his throat. His vision got blurry and he willed himself not to cry. He broke his gaze with Phil, eyes resting on the cross.

"Hey, it's okay," Phil said softly. He moved to hug Dan, their chins resting on each other's shoulders. "I still love you, you're still my best friend. Don't think you're getting out of being stuck with me so easy." Dan let out a watery laugh, closing his eyes and letting himself be held.

"Thanks," Dan said, pulling back.

"What made you start questioning your sexuality? Is it a boy?" Phil asked. He got excited, acting as if he had been struck by lighting. "This is why we never talked about girls! You didn't want to! Now we can talk about crushes!" His voice kept getting louder and louder, Dan getting more and more worried that someone would overhear, like his mom or brother.

"Shh, keep your voice down! We're in church," Dan laughed, Phil apologizing. "But yes, it is because of a boy." Phil got a glint in his eyes, the one Dan knew well. It was the look where Phil was trying to figure something else and he was determined to get it right.

"Who is it?" He asked, clearly curious.

"I'm not telling," Dan said, blushing.

"You have to! I've always told you about the girls I like." Phil turned so that he could pull his feet up onto the pew. If either of their mothers saw him, he would be in trouble. Dan mirrored his movements.

"Ugh, fine," Dan said. "It's, uh . . . it's Troye."

"Oh," Phil said, dejected. Was it just Dan's wishful imagination or did Phil actually look upset? He started to brighten up. "Am I allowed to tease you around him?"

"No!" Dan laughed, already dreading the lie. Phil gave him a smile, Dan smiling back. His mother came to warn them that they had five minutes to get upstairs into the youth room before the adults started pouring into the Sanctuary. They scrambled out of the pew, racing to see who could get up the stairs fastest. Dan ended up winning, but just by a few seconds. They took their seats on the only couch. The youth room had a pool table, table tennis, and a hockey table, but those were all in the back of the room. The front of the room was filled with bean bag chairs and old chairs that they had thrifted over the years. The only couch was basically Dan and Phil's, everyone knew that they sat there every Sunday and Wednesday. It was a low flowery couch with mismatched throws pillows. Dan loved it.

Dan settled close to Phil, looking up at his brother, standing on the platform at the front of the room. Dan could tell that his brother was nervous, it was obvious. His brother was wringing his hands and stuttering every now and then. Dan almost felt bad for him, but it was hilarious. His brother was rarely nervous. Dan was going to enjoy this.

"So, kids, well you're not really kids, so teens, today we're going to talk about something that a lot of guys have probably dealt with, whether it's your friends or social media," His brother started. Dan was wondering what it was, sex, fame? "That something is homosexuality, something that is threatening the youth of our nation."

Dan's face went pale, his limbs stiff. He could feel Phil stiffen next to him. He was not going to enjoy this one bit.

"How was Aaron's service, Dan?" His mother asked as they drove home. His dad was staying later to help take down some decorations with Phil's dad. They were going to ride home later, that way the rest of their families could leave at the normal time.

"It was good, yeah," Dan said, staring out the window, trying to process his thoughts. His brother had said all the things that any other preacher had said before. It still hurt though. Phil had grabbed his hand halfway through the service, the action concealed by a throw pillow. "Very informative."

"Aw, that's good! I'm so proud of you, Aaron. What did you talk about? I bet it was good." His mother said, turning into the McDonald's drive thru.

"He talked about how all gay people are going to hell." Dan bitterly said, not being able to hold back his bitter tone.

"Dan! Tone, please," His mom said, pausing to order. "I'm sure that your brother meant well, I'm sure that he didn't say anything incorrect."

"The bible can be interrupted in many different ways! Gay people can be religious, and he could've hurt someone! What if there was a kid there who had just realized he or she was gay? How do you think they dealt with being told that they are going to hell, even though they believe in God? It could be damaging." Dan argued, trying to get his mom to understand his view.

"Dan, please, people chose to be gay," His brother said.

"No, they don't! Ask literally any gay person, they don't chose to be gay. When did you chose to be to straight?" Dan was hoping that his brother would realize his wrongs, or his mom would at least come to his side.

"Why do even care?" His brother shot back. "You're straight." Dan could not come out, he just realized, he could not do that.

"I have gay friends! I know they didn't chose to be gay." Dan said, he wasn't lying, he just wasn't telling the whole truth.

"Dan, just accept that you don't agree with each other," His mother butted in. "I'm sure that your brother didn't mean to hurt anyone and it was a lovely lesson." She handed Dan his bag of food, ending the discussion.

"Dan! Why aren't you ready for school?" His mother asked, opening his door. Dan startled awake, sitting up in his bed. He must've fallen asleep after his alarm went off. He stayed up most of the night online trying to figure out what to do about being gay. He needed to get comfortable with his sexuality more and then start to slowly come out when he felt ready, at least that's what most people on the internet said. He looked at his mom in that moment, trying to figure out what she would say about him being gay. Would she kick him out? Would she hate him and disown him? Out of his mom and his dad, his mom was definitely the kinder and more compassionate one. If he wasn't accepted by her he'd be screwed.

"I must've fallen asleep again, sorry. I couldn't sleep well last night," Dan sighed, rubbing at his eyes.

"Well, you missed the bus and I have to get to work. You're going to be late either way, do you want to just stay home? Do you have any tests or anything today?"

"No, I don't," Dan said, checking the time, it was 7:20 a.m. His bus came at 7:15 and his school at started 7:40.

"Alright, just stay home today. Your brother will be home today as well, try not to fight. I know how you two get."

"Okay, mom, love you," Dan said, starting to get out of bed.

"I love you, too," She replied, closing the door behind.

"You're a traitor!" Phil shouted the moment he entered Dan's house.

Dan laughed. "What makes you say that?"

"You left me! We had a heart-to-heart yesterday and you didn't even have the nerve to show up to school today!" Phil laughed, taking his backpack off and letting it rest against the wall by the door. "I thought we had something special here."

"I'm sorry," Dan said, laughing at Phil. "I slept in on accident. Mom decided to let me stay home."

"Well, it was still rude," Phil said quieter. "I brought you the homework so you don't get behind."

"Aw, thank you," Dan said, accepting the folder Phil gave to him. "You're like my prince."

"Here to save you from the scary dragon of behind work." Phil giggled, going along.

"My hero," Dan placed a hand over his heart, laughing quietly with Phil. "My brother's home by the way. I don't know where though, just warning you."

"I can't swear, gosh darn it!" Phil joked.

Dan snorted. "I have never heard you swear. Ever."

"Because somebody's always been around!" Phil rebutted. Dan rolled his eyes, walking into the kitchen, Phil trailing behind him. He got out the ice cream and ice cream cones, Phil's favorite snack besides popcorn.

"So, you know how you told me who you like yesterday," Phil started.

"Yes?" Dan raised his eyebrow, scooping out ice cream for both him and Phil.

"Are you planning on telling that person?" Phil asked, voice hesitant. Dan sighed, knowing that he had to come clean.

"I lied to you, I don't have a crush on Troye," Dan made sure to keep his voice down seeing as they were in the kitchen and he didn't know if his brother could hear or not. "I have a crush on another guy."

Phil perked. "Do I know him?"

Dan bit his lip, glancing at Phil from under his lashes. "Um, you do. Really well. He's kind of my best friend."

"Oh," Was Phil's response. Dan couldn't look at him. "Well, if it makes you feel any better, you know my crush as well."

Phil had a crush on somebody? And he didn't mention it until now? Dan felt a little bit betrayed. "Yeah? Who is it?" Dan asked, his voice quiet.

"My best friend."

Dan looked up at him, just now realizing that the ice cream was dripping, and took in Phil's expression. His cheeks were a light pink, his eyes downcast and staring at the floor.

"Really?" Dan asked, trying to not let the hopefulness seep into his tone. It felt like at any moment Phil would jump up and tell him it was a joke, laugh at him, and leave.

"Yeah," Phil looked up, his eyes connecting with Dan's.

"Oh," Dan said, repeating what Phil had said only a bit before. "Well, I'm sure he likes you back."

"Is that so?" Phil said, gaining some of his usual confidence back and cocking an eyebrow. "Would you care to confirm that?"

"I'm sure I could think of some way to," Dan said, leaning over the counter, completely forgetting about the ice cream.

"Yeah, I have a few ideas too," Phil leaned over too, their noses touching.

"Yeah," Dan breathed. He moved his head closer, finally making his and Phil's lips touch. It was unlike Dan had anything had ever felt before. Too soon, Dan was unlocking their lips and looking at Phil. His eyes darted down to his lips, then his cheeks, and back to his eyes. Phil's cheeks were flushed with pink. Dan very quickly decided that he want to do that again. Dan grabbed Phil's hand and dragged him upstairs to his room. They had at least another hour or two until his mom got home, they could kiss quite a bit.

"Are we not talking about this?" Phil asked, following him up the stairs.

"What is there to talk about? I like you, you like me, let's kiss," Dan said, closing the door and shoving Phil against it. He had only made out with one person in his life and he fully intended to have made out with two by the end of the day. Phil shrugged and let Dan kiss him senseless.

They had eventually moved to the bed, taking breaks between kissing and talking about whatever random thing they wanted to talk about. They were cuddling and Dan was loving it. Dan was facing Phil and vice versa, Dan's arms wrapped around Phil's waist. Their legs were wrapped together. Dan felt like he was going to burst into giggles at any moment, which he had been doing for the past half hour. Phil would just laugh with him and pull him closer.

It was one of those moments. Dan had burst into giggles once again when he had realized that Phil liked him back. They had kissed, they were cuddling. It was all hitting him and he couldn't help but giggle over and over. This time Phil had pulled him closer and put a finger under his jaw, guiding Dan's face to his. Their lips met and Dan happily sighed into the kiss, closing his eyes and basking in the feeling of Phil's lips on his.

All of a sudden, his door was being opened, his mother in the doorway, clearly angry. "Daniel Howell! Why is there melted ice cream downstairs on the counter? I know it wasn't your brother, he's lactose intolerant for heaven's sake-" She abruptly stopped when she took in Dan and Phil on the bed. "What are you doing?" Her voice had gone cold, her expression a guarded type of anger.

Dan sat up, knocking Phil's arms off of him. Their legs continued to be tangled together and Dan wanted to untangle them but knew that it would draw more attention. He could tell he was on the verge of crying. He knew his parents' views. "It's not what it looks like!" Phil had sat up as well and Dan could tell that he was scared. Dan's mom was probably going to tell Phil's. Phil had told Dan that his parents didn't care about other people being gay but they didn't want him to be gay. If word got back to them things could go from bad to worse.

"And what does it look like?" His mother asked, stepping into the room. Dan needed to think of a convincing argument.

"We were just tired! Phil came over after school and we were talking and then we laid down! That's all that happened." Dan tried to assure her, convince her that nothing was going on.

"I don't believe you," His mom said. "Phil, I think you should go home. Dan and I need to have a talk." Dan felt like crying as he watched Phil solemnly nod and get out of the bed, walking past his mom and then down the stairs. Dan looked at the bed, refusing to look at his mom.

Dan heard his mother walking closer to the bed and then felt her sit. "Why did you do this?" She asked, her voice fake sympathetic. Dan shrugged, not wanting to tell her about how Phil made his insides squirm more with every passing day. "Are you gay?" He did not want to answer that question, possibly ever, so he just shrugged again.

"I don't think you need to be seeing Phil anymore," His mom decided after more silence from him. "He's clearly influencing you in a negative way. I don't like it."

His mom got up and left the room, leaving Dan to wonder about how his life had changed so dramatically in less than twelve hours.

"What did she say? Why didn't she call my parents? I wouldn't have come out to my parents last night if I had known she wasn't going to call," Phil asked at school the next day.

"She said that we need to stop hanging out and that we shouldn't speak at school but I'm obviously not going to listen to her," Dan replied, leaning into Phil's side. They were sitting on a bench outside of their school while waiting for the first period bell to ring. They had about ten minutes. "I don't know why she didn't call your parents, I was certain that she would have called them. What did they say?"

"I thought they would have cared more but they were completely chill with it. Well, not completely but they weren't mad or anything. I was afraid that they were going to kick me out."

"Well I guess that's good." Dan said, considering what to do about his mom and dad's decision. "I still want to see you. I say that we still hang out but 'forget' to mention it to my family."

"Sounds good," Phil said, snuggling into Dan and hiding his face in Dan's neck. Dan smiled, clasping Phil's hand in his.

Three weeks had passed and Dan and Phil had still managed to hide it from Dan's family. Dan was happier than he had been in a while, despite his family's views. He had Phil though, and his supportive friends, it was all fine.

Dan had come to the conclusion that God didn't hate him or Phil. Why would He? Him and Phil had so many discussions about it. Of course they still believed in Him, they still wanted to go to church. Why would their sexuality change that?

"My parents are considering sending me to a camp this summer," Dan mentioned.

"What?" Phil said, shocked.

"I know, I'm going to have to convince them not to send me. I'd be 18, though, they wouldn't be able to force me to."

"Well, you're always welcome at my house, you know that," Phil reminded him. Dan nodded.

"I know," He said, giving him a smile.

"Good," Phil said, smiling back.

"Hey, I have a great idea," Phil said at lunch, sitting across from Dan. He raised an eyebrow at Phil.

"And that would be?"

"Skip fifth period and make out under the bleachers," Phil suggested.

"And they say romance is dead," Dan said dryly. Phil laughed and Dan cracked a smile. "But yeah, let's do that."

Him and Phil had gotten caught kissing underneath the bleachers by the English teacher during 5th period, which why they were in the office. They normally would have called their parents but considering the fact that both of their parents were extreme Christians it was decided against. The principal had then called the guidance counselor up to come and speak to them. "My parents are gonna kill me. Please don't tell them, please."

Phil took a seat in the seat next to him. He reached his arm over the armrest, it wrapped around Dan's shoulder and pulled him as close as they could be with two armrests between them.

"We have to alert your parents, I'm sorry. You were skipping class and breaking school code, we legally have to inform them," The principal said from his desk. Dan wiped his arms once more, wiping the tears off of his cheeks that were still there. He really wished he hadn't started crying, it was embarrassing, to say the least. Phil had seen him crying but only once, and that was when he broke his arm when he was ten.

Dan closed his eyes, letting his head drop against Phil's shoulder. He wished he had never been stupid enough to skip class to kiss Phil under the bleachers.

"I want you out of this house. If you are old enough to be a homosexual, you are old enough to find a place to live," His dad said, opening the door to the house. "You have an hour to pack."

Dan darted up the stairs, slamming his bedroom door and pulling his suitcase out of the closet and stuffing all the clothes he could into it. Then he grabbed his backpack and packed away his chargers and some more clothes. He quickly texted Phil, telling him he was about to walk over to his house with his stuff. Grabbing his favorite pillow and a toothbrush, he trampled down the stairs. Once outside of the door, he started the walk to Phil's house. He never looked back.

Years had passed, Dan and Phil were still dating and still in love.

After they graduated they went to the same college, even sharing a dorm together. It made them closer and they felt more in love than ever before.

Both of them felt at home in their new church, a place that was accepting to all people, no matter what. They loved it.

Dan was a teacher, something he had always wanted to do. He loves his job, the kids, and his coworkers. He was happy and content and loved going into work everyday.

His parents hadn't talked to him since he was 17 on the day that they kicked him out. He was devastated for months after but eventually became happier than ever before, thanks to Phil and his family.

Phil was a video editor. He worked from home, which is very important considering they had just adopted a three year old from China. She was the light of their world and they couldn't wait for her to grow up with them.

They would be better parents than Dan's had been. He was sure of it. And that's what was important.

#phan #phan au #phanfic au #phanfic #phanfiction

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