When Tony's meeting ended earlier then he had scheduled for, he wasn't sure what to do with his free time. Glancing at his watch he decides he isn't that far from Queens. He isn't suppose to see Bucky and Steve til tonight for poker night but hey why not surprise them.
When they told him they got a little place in Queens he was surprised, he pays them well and knows they have the old apartment in Brooklyn still. Would have thought they would have moved closer to Manhattan since he uses them for security-related tasks a lot. But hey they were independent contractors and businesses was going great.
After the drive, he had Happy drop him off and he went up to the apartment. Tilting his head at the keypad on the door, huh, that's not one he designed. He taps his glasses " Okay Friday, let's get this opened up to surprise the boys"
After a few minutes he was finally able to override the system, he would be pissed if he wasn't so impressed. The only reason he was able to get it to open is cause he was able to shut down the power to the device. He opened the door stepping into the apartment and was about to yell out when one of the doors inside flew open.
Out of the door came a soaking wet naked Bucky with his gun in hand pointing at Tony. " woah there Buckaroo"
Bucky blinked and stared at Tony " What the hell Tones. I could have shot you when Karen said someone was powering off the keypad"
Laughing " Well ya didn't, who's Karen? Don't tell me you stepping out on Cap, and where you get that security never seen anything like that before oh and nice bite marks but your getting water everywhere"
Bucky shakes his head sighing, putting the safety back on the gun. He glances down at himself seeing the variety of hickies, bite marks on his shoulder and thigh. Another door opens and out steps Steve from what can be assumed the bedroom, he is thankfully fully dressed.
" Morning Tony. Karen is the -"
" She is the AI I built Mr. Stark. "
Bucky had already went back into the bathroom by this point and following Steve out of the bedroom was the cutest little doe eyed twink Tony has seen in ages. The guy smiles brightly, he was wearing what appears to be Bucky's shirt and boxers. Steve smiles at the kid before clearing his throat and looking back at Tony. " Tony this is Peter. Peter Parker. We uhhh... Bucky and I meet him while he was installing new security systems at the gym we go to... "
Peter smiles up at Steve, standing on his tip toes and gives him a quick kiss on the lips. " Yup! I was falling off the ladder and Bucky caught me! I'm pretty clumsy but ya know it was love at first sight. Oh! Are you hungry? Like something to drink? "
Peter doesn't even wait for an answer as he starts rambling off what he could start making for them, wondering off into the kitchen. Tony blinks several times looking in the direction Peter went then at the bathroom door that Bucky was behind and then at Steve who had a blush on his face.
I hate how acknowledging unfairness in the world is seen as "childish". Maybe children are right. I don't think you should be proud of the fact that you've become complacent with the state of your miserable existence and took on this loser "it is what it is" mentality. Things can be better.
I just want to remind everyone that it is your civic duty to jailbreak your Nintendo consoles and pirate every Nintendo property until the heat death of the universe.
raise a glass to the posts you love that end up deleted. to the fanart and fanfics you lose track of and can't locate. to the blogs you used to look through that ended up unexpectedly disappearing. to the things you didn't archive because you always assumed they'd be there.
If I can recommend you do 1 low-effort thing for the love of God it is this:
Keep 5 cards in your pocket. One will say "yes", the second will say "no."
If you lose your voice, or lose speech, or want to make a dramatic embellishment at the right time, it is an elegant and efficient solution that is right there at hand.
But what if people question you from there? "Why do you have that card? Why would you do this? How long have you had that in your pocket?" For this, or whatever else they say, the third card: "I don't have a card for that."
"What the fuck," they ask. They laugh. They are bemused. You bring the energy back down with the fourth card: "I have laryngitis. I've lost speech. My throat hurts". Whatever you expect to occur.
The joke is over. Rule of threes. Now they are curious. They wonder about logistics. "How did you know I would say that? Is everyone so predictable?"
As a three-part bit, nobody ever sees the fifth card coming.
These two kids are Hamza (the oldest) and Qusai (the youngest).
Their mother shares this video and bids them goodbye. They were both killed by Israeli bombardment 5 days ago. She says:
[Two days before Hamza and Qusai were killed, hamza asked me: "mom, when we die, where will I go?" And I told him: "you will be a bird in heaven, my love." He said: "and Qusai?" "Just like you inshallah."
And indeed, two days later, he left and took his brother with him. It's like he was preparing me for saying goodbye to both of them. Heaven is more beautiful than any place on this Earth, habibi. We will meet and be reunited one day, me, your dad and you two].
Our kids don't deserve to die already thinking about what will happen to them, they don't deserve to die already terrified, anticipating their death because the world failed them and decided their lives mean nothing. We are not numbers. Remember their names and their stories.
the fact that shakespeare was a playwright is sometimes so funny to me. just the concept of the "greatest writer of the English language" being a random 450-year-old entertainer, a 16th cent pop cultural sensation (thanks in large part to puns & dirty jokes & verbiage & a long-running appeal to commoners). and his work was made to be watched not read, but in the classroom teachers just hand us his scripts and say "that's literature"
just...imagine it's 2450 A.D. and English Lit students are regularly going into 100k debt writing postdoc theses on The Simpsons screenplays. the original animation hasn't even been preserved, it's literally just scripts and the occasional SDH subtitles.txt. they've been republished more times than the Bible