#such a stark difference to the previous scenes. they make you stop and go. oh. he ruined hero’s life on a whim | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

crazycookiecrumbles · 2 years

Text

Our Happy Ending

A/N: THE END! Our Final Chapter for Do You Like Pizza? Series. Oh my HEART....it’s sad. But I’m really proud of the ending. Let me know what you think.

I don’t know if I have any plans for a sequel, but if you want one, I guess let me know what you’d wnat to see? I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m surprsied I honestly finished a story lol.

Pairings/Characters: Peter Parker x Reader (Andrew Garfield’s Peter)

Warnings: Swearing, daddy issues, violence, character death, Tony being an absolute nuisance, cummies

****MINORS DNI AS PER USUAL LEAVE MY SHIT ALONE I’M RAUNCHY*****

Summary: Obadiah was dead. His plan to off you and Tony failed. What comes next?

This is definitely post-college, adult Spider-Man

Previous Chapter: Always

WC: 4,570

Peter swore this was going to be a happy ending for you. He had gotten your mother to the hospital in time, the nurses and doctors said so. They said she still had a fighting chance. At a quick first glance, they said it was serious, but it wasn’t impossible. And poor, silly Peter, he allowed himself to have hope. Things were different and changing ever since he came back from that whole Multiverse fiasco. Things were different, and he swore this was a new chapter that had a little bit more light in it.

Peter had dropped you off at the hospital and told you to run in while he got changed. He couldn’t exactly run in in his suit and cause more of a scene for you. It was bad enough Tony Stark’s daughter was running in to storm the castle minutes before Tony and his entourage would. He didn’t want to add Spider-Man to the mix.

When Peter came down the hall he could hear a wailing noise that struck his gut. His heart started racing and his breathing quickened as all the possibilities flooded his brain. Racing to find you, Peter skidded to a stop when he saw you being helped to sit down by two nurses while the surgeon said something else to you before bowing her head and uttering another apology.

“No, no, no, please, god, no…” Peter muttered to himself as he quickly strode towards you, his presence getting the attention of the nurses.

“Are you —“

Peter cut off the male nurse with a nod, “Her boyfriend, yeah, I’m here.”

The nurse nodded, expressing his sincerest apologies as he and the other nurse stood up to leave the two of you alone. Peter quickly raised his hand to grab their attention, quietly asking for them to tell him what happened, rather than ask you and force you to try formulate a sentence at this moment.

“She died on the table,” the surgeon explained to Peter quietly. “There was too much blood loss, and the bullet shattered her sternum and sent bone fragments into her heart and lungs. We did everything we could.”

“Okay,” Peter nodded, his throat tightening as he went over this in his head over and over again. “Was it—was it just too late? Did she not get here fast enough?”

“She came here in the ideal timeframe for a GSW,” the surgeon explained. “But the damage the bullet did, at such a large caliber, there’s nothing that can be done for an injury of that magnitude. I’m sorry.”

Peter nodded and quietly thanked the surgeon. When the nurses left as well, he slowly took the seat next to you. Sliding his arms around you, Peter whispered how sorry he was as you turned into him, hid your face in his chest, and cried, not uttering a single word, just crying, because you too had hope that somehow, through all of this shit, Rosa was going to be just fine. She’d been there your entire life. She was the one with you since the second you were born. You didn’t think through all of this drama that she’d be the one you’d lose.

By the time Tony arrived he was running (or hobbling, sort of) in with Happy, Rhodes, Pepper, and a few SHIELD agents behind him who ended up taking over the entire floor. He was shouting and asking where Rosa’s room was, while Pepper was the one who went to the desk and quietly and politely asked, rather than make a show of it like Tony had done. After a moment, a hand slid over Tony’s shoulder. He looked to Pepper whose gaze suddenly shifted from relief to sadness. Tony stared at her like she was wacky as he took in the redness forming around her eyes and how they started to appear glassy.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Tony stared at her suspiciously. “Don’t do that. It’s wigging me out. What, she’s still in surgery?”

“Room 341,” Pepper replied.

“Huh,” Tony mused. “Thought she’d be in there for, like, six hours with a wound like that. Okay. Let’s get going.”

Rhodey quickly pieced together what that meant. He cleared his throat, “Hey, uh, Tony, man — “

“Yeah, yeah. I know you and Rosa were starting to see each other. It’s fine. I don’t care. You think now is the time to bring it up?”

Rhodes did a double take, completely losing the point he wanted to make, “Hold on. What? How?”

“I know everything.”

“You know — did you hack my phone again!?”

“You’re a very saucy boy, Colonel.” Tony quipped as he rounded the corner and found the room all the way at the end of the hall, separated from the rest of them. He caught sight of Peter leaving the room with his head down. Tony marched over and opened his mouth. “How —“

He stopped as he glanced inside the room. There you were, hunched over her bed, your head resting on her chest as you held her cold hand tightly in yours. Tony promptly shut his mouth, his relaxed demeanor shifting to something more tense and clearly uncomfortable with this.

This was different. Of the two of them, he was certain he was going to be the one to have an early death where Rosa would attend the small, intimate ceremony meant just for close friends and family before she’d blow off the massive rager Tony would wish for. Now Tony was outside the room where her body was on display while his only daughter was in there saying goodbye to the only parent she had her entire life.

“She stopped crying,” Peter said quietly. “They asked her what her plans were. She’s already thinking about funeral arrangements — well, she doesn’t uh, she doesn’t know what to do. So I —“

“I can do it,” Pepper nodded, sniffling back her tears as Happy rested a hand on her shoulder in comfort. “I’ve got it. She doesn’t have to worry. Neither do you.”

“Yeah, yeah. Charge everything to me,” Tony muttered as he opened the door and entered the room.

You didn’t look up. You didn’t have to — you heard Tony all the way down the hall when he made his entrance, as he always did. All you did know was that Tony came to stand next to you and said not a single word as he rested his hand on your shoulder and made some important decisions in that moment. This was when everything was going to change. Tony Stark couldn’t live the way he used to, not anymore. Things were going to change.

~*~*~Two Days Later~*~

As one does, you were sitting in a green room watching Pepper apply makeup to Tony’s face, all the while a SHIELD agent was going over his alibi with him. Somewhere in the crowd was Peter, wearing a press pass that Pepper had gotten for him, ready to take pictures of this announcement. Apparently, the world thought Tony was a superhero.

Imagine?

You were completely in your own head as you stared off to the side wondering what to do now. You had quit your job, you didn’t want to work there anymore. You and Peter were still looking for apartments. Your mother’s funeral was in three days, and your boyfriend was, somehow, still an absolute rock because he had been through tragedy multiple times before in his life. You were grateful for the support, but all the while still sad that Peter knew exactly what to do in these situations because he had already lived them.

“Ms. L/N,” you turned when you heard your name called, and you realized that Tony and Pepper were no longer in the room with you. You glanced up to see the SHIELD agent you had run into a few times before. “I’m not sure if you remember me. I’m Agent Phil Coulson with SHIELD.”

You nodded your head, “Yes, yes. I remember. Sorry, did you need something?”

“Mr. Stark went out, he’s making his statement if you wish to join.”

“I’m okay watching from back here,” you replied with a nod.

He nodded as well and took the seat next to you. After a moment, he cleared his throat quietly and leaned offered in his seat. “Ms. L/N, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how different things are now for you.”

“Nope, I’ve gotten the hint a few times already.”

“Right,” Phil nodded. “I also understand that you were the one who hacked into Stark Industries and released that information about Obadiah Stane publicly.”

You pursed your lips, “I will neither confirm nor deny that insinuation.”

Phil cracked a tiny smile an extended a card to you, “This is my contact information. Whether it be today, tomorrow, or a year from now, if you find yourself wanting to do more for global protection, give me a call.”

You raised an eyebrow as you studied the business card closely, “Are you seriously trying to recruit me while my dad is pretending he’s not some dude in a suit of armor?”

“Recruitment is very, very direct, and what we do is very, very unusual work. Just give me a call when you think you’re ready. I must warn you, though, my boss might be a little more direct if you don’t contact soon.”

“Fun,” you muttered and looked up to the TV just in time to see Tony setting down his index cards. You blinked twice, the rest of you unmoving as you studied him. “Why do I feel like he’s going to do something stupid?”

“The truth is…” Tony began. “I am Iron Man.”

You heard Phil sigh and immediately reach for his phone. You groaned and pinched the bridge of your nose as you shut your eyes.

“This stupid, arrogant, show-off motherfucker.”

~*~*~The Funeral~*~*~

The small group of people that had showed up were all friends and family. You kept a straight face, chewing on the side of your cheek as they all came up to you, one by one, extending their condolences and expressing how much they adored your mother. You sighed heavily, wanting nothing more than to rip off these mourning clothes and slink into a hot bath and disappear from the world for just a little while.

As people began to filter out and you, Peter, and a few others were left alone, you noticed Peter looking off into the distance at a particular plot. You quickly pieced together what he was thinking of and remembering where you were. You leaned over to one of the floral arrangements, grabbed a white rose, and put it in Peter’s hand.

He looked over at you and frowned in confusion, “Didn’t I already throw in a flower? Shit, did I not?”

You snorted and squeezed his hand, “You did, dummy. Go say hi to Gwen.”

He stiffened. He took a deep breath and laughed nervously before shaking his head, “Oh, no. no. I can’t. Not today. I’m here for you and Rosa. I — “

“I’m not gatekeeping grief, Peter,” you said with a soft smile. “Go, please. You’re overdue for a visit anyway, no?”

Peter exhaled slowly as his eyes began to brim over with tears, “You’re an angel. A scary little violent angel, but one nonetheless.”

“Go, charmer,” you chuckled and watched him walk away.

Peter placed the flower at the base of Gwen’s headstone. Sighing, he stood up tall and stared down at it as he spoke to her, “Hey, Gwen. I know it’s been awhile. I’m sorry, I’ve been a little busy. But I guess it’s better than me coming every week. Pretty sure you were calling me an obsessive freak for a little while after that,” Peter joked to himself, glanced over his shoulder to see Tony standing next to you and speaking before he turned back around to look at the headstone. “I met someone. She’s…strange. She’s violent, but sweet, and an absolute genius, and she does stupid, daring things for people she loves. Her family? An absolute mess, but…I really love her, Gwen. She loves me too. It’s the first time in years I feel like, like….like I’m allowed to be Peter and not just be Spider-Man.”

Peter sniffled and wiped under his eye with the back of his hand, “Anyway. I miss you, Gwen, always. I hope you don’t mind Y/N, I think she’s going to stick around for a long time. If you want to give me a sign, that’d be great— who am I kidding? That’s just wacky.” He laughed a little to himself, rubbed the top of her headstone, and went back to join you.

“Hey, cum for webs,” Tony said quietly as Peter joined the two of you. “I’m going to the restaurant now. You guys want a ride?”

Peter looked to you who shrugged, which didn’t give him much of an answer to go off of. “Sure. But it’s not cum, you know.”

“Sure, whatever you say,” Tony nodded and turned on his heel to head to the car where Happy was waiting. “Pepper’s coming with us. Rhodey too. Don’t worry, I’m paying. I know you guys still got an apartment to look for, spawn is out of a job, but, hey, your lab just got funding, right? You can work there full-time now,” Tony said to Peter.

“Yeah…” Peter trailed off. “An anonymous donor funded the rest of our grant.” He frowned, “Wait. Did you — “

“Please, I don’t do charity,” Tony scoffed and waved his hand. “Pepper does, and I have no idea what she picks. Probably not, you, though, you’re not that special, cum head.”

“Thanks, Mr. Stark,” Peter muttered under his breath and looked to see you raising your fist to punch Tony in the back. Peter calmly grabbed your hand and lowered it while you pouted and stared up at him. Peter shook his head, and you sighed and nodded.

“Don’t be such a dickhead you fucking tart,” you told Tony.

“Wow, such language. Where’d you learn to become such a dick?” Tony asked as he climbed into the car.

“Repressed father issues,” you muttered under your breath.

“Clearly,” Peter mumbled as he climbed in after you.

~*~

During dinner, Tony was on his best Tony behavior. He made jokes at the expense of others, ordered far too much food, and kept things mostly about himself. You shook your head and stuck to sitting in a corner with Peter, quietly talking about other things when reminiscing about your mother began to get a little too heavy.

“I got a question,” Rhodes began and he looked to you as he announced this. “Rosa ever tell you what your name was going to be?”

You looked at him confused. “Um, no. I always thought it was going to be Y/N.”

Everyone turned to look to Tony who shrugged, “I have no idea what he’s talking about.”

“Tell her,” Happy goaded him. “Tell her all about you showing up at her birth.”

“Eh, I don’t remember.”

“Your father was drunk as a skunk when you were born. Dude smelled like a brewery,” Rhodes began to explain with a smile on his face. “And he was feeling himself, listening to music, having a party the whole way to the delivery room. When he got there, he burst into the room.”

“Rosa screamed at him and tried to throw the bedside phone at his head,” Happy grinned. “I wanted her to, but I heard a nurse stopped her.”

“Anyway,” Rhodes continued. “He was drunk as all hell and still in party mode. When you popped out, he said he wanted to name you Mary Jane, because it would be funny to have a kid named after drugs.”

Peter choked on his drink, causing everyone to stare at him as he pounded his chest and began to choke on a simple glass of water. You patted his back and asked if he was okay, noticing how his eyes turned red and were glassy.

“I’m fine,” he squeaked. “I’m fine, continue, please.”

“So…” Rhodes gave him a funny look, but continued. “Yeah, he wanted to name you Mary Jane so he could make pot jokes all the time. Rosa screamed at him. He was also in his phase of listening to Michael Jackson’s greatest hits repeatedly in the car ride over, so then he suggested Michael Jackson. When she said no, he said Michelle Jackson, then Mary Jackson, then just MJ.”

“What is with you and the obsessive need to name me after weed?” You looked to Tony who shrugged.

“Really, the jokes write itself. You’d be our little weed growing up. It was funny. I was young. Shut up.”

“MJ,” you shook your head. “Imagine me as an MJ? I don’t think that fits. What do you think, Peter?”

Peter exhaled slowly as he realized the position he was in while he thought back to Peter One and his MJ over there in the Multiverse. Peter smiled softly and squeezed your hand, “Doesn’t matter what your name is, I’d love you regardless.”

“How cute,” Pepper smiled.

“Eh, lame,” Tony muttered.

Peter shook his head an excused himself to the restroom. Happy excused himself for a smoke, and Rhodes wanted to join him just to shoot the breeze. Pepper then decided to excuse herself so she could leave you and Tony alone. Tony took over Peter’s seat and leaned back against the wall as he stared at you.

“So, Stark Industries is officially done with weapons manufacturing and is going to take a totally green approach from now on,” Tony said.

“Fascinating.”

“Could use someone like you in the company, you know,” Tony said. “You seem to have an aptitude for tech, for some reason.”

“That’s… a lot. I can’t, I can’t work for you.”

“Well, think about it,” Tony said. “You’re unemployed so —“

“And my dead mom left me everything, so Peter and I will be okay for a little while while I think about what I want to do.”

“Sure,” Tony nodded. “Been down the dead parents inheritance route, done that.” he cleared his throat. “I also want you to know that I’m stepping up for you.”

“Couple of decades too late, no?”

“I don’t care,” Tony said. “I’m going to be in your life, whether you like it or not, and I’m going to be there for you. Rosa did her job — and my job, really, and I’m going to step up.”

You snorted and raised your glass to him, “We’ll see how long that lasts.” You chugged your wine, ignoring how Tony stared at you like he was making a silent promise to uphold.

~*~Three Months Later~*~

You whined. You gave up hope trying to rip off the plastic covering of your sofa and decided to just lay on the dirty, dusty thing rather than free your sofa from its protective confines. After all, you were just as sweaty and disgusting. You might as well lay in more filth.

You lay there as you grabbed a box, ripped off the tape, and slowly started to pull things out of it. You and Peter had finally found the one-bedroom apartment of your dreams. Unfortunately, the same day you were scheduled to move was the same day there was a break in the project he was working on at work. Peter ran to work, begging your forgiveness, and promised he’d be back as soon as possible to help you. You waved him off, handled the movers yourself, and were now alone in your new apartment without the will to actually unpack and make it a home.

Actually, you had fallen asleep for a little while and woke up two hours later in a panic thinking you missed your move-in date before realizing you had, in fact, moved in and just needed to unpack. You sat up and went to deal with the fun stuff, disregarding everything you had unpacked from that one box. You set up the TV, the internet was connected, all your tech that you’d need to survive was in place. After sitting on the ground and putting on the news, you finally started to unpack and try to get things together.

The front door opened, and in came Peter with bags on his arms and a grin on his face, “Honey, I am so, so sorry for missing the big stuff.”

“It’s fine, you can help me unpack, put shit away, and be in charge of box duty.”

“Done,” He came over to you and dropped to his knees beside you. You looked over to see him smiling at you before leaning down to kiss you. You hummed into the kiss, reaching up to cradle his cheek before pulling away.

“Everything okay at work?”

“We were almost there, and then it exploded,” Peter nodded and reached into a bag, pulling out a small bouquet of flowers, “For my love on our first day in our new home together.”

You beamed, “You spoil me, Peter.”

“I try,” Peter winked as you sniffed the flowers and admired them. “And they’re mostly alive this time.”

“A true achievement,” you nodded in agreement. “I smell food.”

“Gyoza, and some other stuff,” Peter said.

“Yowza,” You sighed, making him pause and remember that horrible joke he had made on your second date. He laughed at you and threw a pair of chopsticks at your face. You gasped and smacked him in the face with the flowers. “Asshole.”

“Your asshole,” he cooed, then cringed. “That wasn’t great.”

“It was something,” You nodded. “We need groceries. And to unpack the kitchen. And —“

“Shhhh,” Peter grabbed your face and pressed his lips against yours before pulling away with a loud pop. “Adult stuff later. Fun food now.”

“Fine,” you chuckled and leaned back against the sofa. “God, I stink.”

“You really do,” he quipped. “Is this what it’s like when I take off my suit?”

“No, your suit is absolutely fucking disgusting. I smell like flowers in comparison,” you teased.

“Hey!”

You two ate together on the floor. It kind of reminded you of being in Peter’s studio apartment. It was a cramped space, but depending on how messy your meals were, you two would be sitting on the floor, watching something on his computer, and being in total bliss together. Now you had more space, more furniture, and a door that actually worked. Considering everything you’d been through together, this felt like a pretty happy ending.

And then there was a knock at your door that made you flinch. Peter told you to stay put as he went to the door. You heard him sigh before stepping aside and letting the front door swing open. Tony waltzed in with a bottle of wine that he thrust into Peter’s chest.

“Nice digs, kiddos,” he said as he looked around. “This place actually looks like it won’t collapse on itself. Is that a stainless steel refrigerator? Whoa. Big leagues.”

“Can I help you?” You groaned from the floor as Tony walked over.

“Yes,” Tony sniffed twice. “First of all, take a shower. Secondly, get dressed. I’ve got something to show you two.”

“Mr. Stark,” Peter began. “It’s the first day —“

“Tony, just Tony. Mr. Stark is weird. I think we’re passed that, cum boy,” Tony said.

Peter rolled his eyes, “Tony, It’s our first day in our new apartment together. I’m sure whatever this is can wait. Besides, why are you even in New York? Weren’t you in Malibu?”

“That’s what i’m trying to say. So? Tell your girlfriend to get cleaned up. I can’t have her in my car. She’ll ruin it.”

“Fuck off,” you muttered as you went to the bathroom. “And don’t eat my food — wait, what box is— fuck!”

Tony chuckled to himself and sat on a pile of boxes and helped himself to some gyoza as Peter stared at him incredulously. Tony shrugged and continued to eat while Peter shook his head slowly.

“So what’s going on, Tony?” Peter asked.

“You’ll see,” Tony said. “How’s work?”

“Fine—“

“You sure? With all that outdated equipment? You know, you’d do great at Stark Industries.”

“I don’t see myself moving to LA,” Peter began. “Thanks, though.”

Tony simply hummed in response. He finished off your food, which had you screaming when you came back after getting ready. Tony avoided the wraith of you throwing an empty box at him and said he’d get more food once you got to your destination.

It was a strange car ride over to Midtown, Manhattan. The three of you found yourself entering a building’s underground garage and taking an elevator up the shell of this massive tower that had little to no furnishings in it and seemed mostly bare bones. The three of you stepped out of the elevator in what looked like a main living room. Tony spun around and threw his arms out.

“You like it?”

“Uh,” Peter looked around. “Sure.”

“What is this?” You asked. “A mid-life crisis? End-life?”

“Rude,” Tony told you. “Congratulations. You are now in Stark Tower, which will be fueled by the one and only arc reactor. I’m going to be the leading name in green energy,” Tony explained. “And, yes, Stark Industries is moving to the East Coast, back where it all began. This way we get a fresh start for the company and for us. I told you, kid. I’m going to be here for you from now on. What do you think?”

You were speechless. Your mouth hung open as you realized that Tony meant his words. He actually followed through, and now he was standing right here in front of you in what was going to be his new headquarters and home. You looked over to Peter who seemed to be lost in thought and staring off to the side.

“I think it’s a cute family affair,” a voice said from the corner of the room. It made you and Tony jump like jumping beans. Tony spun around and stood in front of you as whoever was speaking flipped a switch behind him, the wall sconce illuminating him under a bright yellow glow. There, you could see a man wearing an eye patch, and what looked to be a black leather outfit straight out of the Matrix.

“Who are you?” Peter asked, as he instinctively pushed you behind him.

“‘I am Iron Man,’” he quoted Tony’s words at the press conference he held months ago. “You think you’re the only superhero in the world?”

Peter tensed at that. Fuck, did this man know who he was? They weren’t in danger at the moment, he would’ve sensed it. but who was this guy, and what did that mean for him, for the two of you?

He went on, “Mr. Stark, Ms. L/N, you’ve become part of a bigger universe, you just don’t know it yet.” His gaze quickly danced over to Peter, “Or maybe you have an idea of it.”

Tony noticed how this man looked at Peter. He slowly stepped in front of Peter and glare at this intruder, “Who the hell are you?”

“Nick Fury, Director of SHIELD,” he replied as he stepped towards the three of you. “I’m here to talk to you three about the Avenger Initiative.”

#peter parker x stark!reader #precious peter parker #peter parker x you #peter parker x reader #peter parker #tasm!peter parker #tasm peter x reader #tasm!spiderman x reader #tasm!peter x reader #tasm peter parker x reader #stark!reader #series: do you like pizza?#andrew garfield x reader #andrew!peter parker #andrew garfield x you #andrew garfield spiderman

345 notes · View notes

theconstantsidekick · 3 years

Text

Truth (1) | b.b

Pairings: Bucky Barnes x Stark!Reader, Past Steve Rogers x Stark!Reader, OC x Stark!Reader (brief)

Genre: Fluff with a touch of angst.

Summary: Sam and Bucky call on the only Stark left in the Superhero business—codename Static—to help take down the Flag Smashers. Only problem is, she’s pretty damn reluctant.

(These scenes incorporate y/n into the pre-existing story as a character without making drastic changes to the plot or mythos. All the major plot points from the MCU remain in place with the addition of the reader as Static, who is not only a Stark but also enhanced)

Warnings: Swearing.

a/n: Aight, aight. Here’s the skinny; I function purely on attention and praise, so please leave a comment. I’m a narcissist; I make no apologies. I love reading your hot takes. Entertain me in exchange for all the entertainment I’m providing you. Also oh, the tag list is open.

sidenote: This episode is my favorite one. I'm so very excited.

The Whole World Is Watching (5) | Truth (2) | Series Masterlist

“What the hell happened to you?” Sam asks the moment he spots her walking into the same room of the old wastewater treatment plant where he talked to Karli.

Y/n pushes herself up to sit up on a table to his right. She can spot the shield placed on the table he’s leaning on. On the floor next to his feet, however, are his wings—or what remains of them at least—in a bag. They’re broken and beaten. While she doesn’t know what happened between him, Bucky and Walker, she can venture a guess that it did not end well.

“Well—” she's promptly cut off.

“What the fuck happened to you?” Bucky asks with far more alarm as he makes his way in from the same door as her. He rushes to her side, assessing the damage. Concern etched on his face. She gets it because she feels the same for him and Sam. But... seeing as she’s a grown-up who understands how feelings work; she can also acknowledge her worry for Bucky is far more irrational, and therefore must be stem from a much different place.

“I could ask you both the same thing,” she says.

“We both aren’t fucking super spy ninjas who, apparently have trained with the Dora Milaje,” Sam quips back. “Besides, you can already guess what happened to us.” He looks down at the shield next to him.

She cocks her brow and smiles a bit, both actions make her wince. She’s got a cut on his lip and temple. While her previous gash on the cheek has healed, she’s wearing a couple new ones. She also had a dislocated shoulder, three broken ribs, and a nasty scar on her leg but they don’t need to know about that. She’ll heal... Far quicker than any human can.

“Karli,” she answers easily.

“Karli did that to you?” Bucky asks, clearly not buying it.

“No… five of her Soldiers did—”

“—for fuck’s sake!” Bucky cuts her off again. “And you say I’m the one who runs into fights without thinking?”

“Is this the part where I say, you should see the other guy?” She knows she’s being petulant but the worry in his eyes is doing things to her and she’d rather not go down that road for someone who’s probably not interested. She’s had enough rejections for a lifetime, what with the last man she loved choosing to go back in time for his ex instead of staying… for her.

“Yeah well, I don’t really care about the other guy, do I?” Bucky spits out, angry.

And fuck Bucky Barnes. Man’s gotta stop making her fall for him if he doesn’t even intend to fucking have the courtesy to reciprocate.

“I’ll heal—” she tries but is promptly cut off by Bucky.

“That’s not the poi—”

“Can we change the subject now?” She looks over at Sam, silently pleading at him for an out.

And Sam being the great friend he is, obliges. “Yeah, sure. What did you mean when you said you don’t have your powers anymore?”

Ah, out of the frying pan into the goddamn doghouse.

Bucky finally takes a few steps away—still frustrated—and leans on the table opposite to Sam while being diagonal to Y/n. They’ve all changed back into their normal clothes. Bucky’s back in his bomber jacket, a simple t-shirt, and pants. All of which are black, as per usual. While Sam’s wearing his brown corduroy jacket, blue jeans, and a wine color t-shirt, same as they were before they suited up. Y/n however is still in her fighting ensemble, having been too busy being looked over by the paramedics to have any time to change.

“Exactly what I said,” she replies, her eyes staring at her feet.

This is far from an easy conversation for her. She’d rather talk about the merits and demerits of the damned accords again.

“They were working back when…” Bucky pauses, glancing in Sam’s direction before adding, “you had that tussle with Walker.”

Honestly, she’s really had enough of James Buchanan Barnes’s assault on her very cold, very fragile heart. She’s losing her mind over here. Why does he have to go and be so damn considerate?

“You can call it a panic attack,” she supplies, in a small voice. “It was a panic attack,” she says looking at Sam and after a pause adds, “That’s kinda what I mean.” Both men look at her curiously. She breathes in heavily, gathering up all the courage she has, “I can’t use my powers without losing control… without having a panic attack. I—I... Every time I use my power, I get thrown back to the last time I did...”

The words hang in the air, for everyone to mull over. They all know what she means but just to clarify Sam asks, “The battle with Thanos?”

Both of them know that isn't why she's having a hard time talking about it. Both of them know it's the man in a suit of armor whose absence has left her all raw and beaten. But none of them voice it.

She nods before pausing, and declaring, "I’ve got PTSD.”

“Fuck Y/n, why didn’t you say something?” Sam asks. His brows are furrowed and he seems… disheartened and so very concerned. She’s always liked Sam. From the moment they knocked on his window after having been bombed by Hydra back at Steve’s old army base. He’s always been scarily good at reading a room. He’s an intuitive little bitch. He can read the emotions of the people around him pretty damn well while also being tough enough to kick their ass. The best part is, he’s perceptive enough to know exactly when to talk and when to fight. Which is why she never worried about him going against Karli alone. Which is also why she has been trying her best to keep herself as calm and as cold as possible; to avoid the look of pure agony in his eyes. She doesn’t know what to do with it.

And, don’t even get her started on how avidly she’s avoiding looking at Bucky now.

“I did. I said I didn’t want to come,” she defends pointlessly. She’s just being testy for the fuck of it. She doesn’t really know how to act otherwise right now.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it!” He exhales heavily. His voice is back to a much softer tone when he adds, “If we’d known you couldn’t use your powers, we wouldn’t have—”

“—I was a perfectly capable agent for S.H.I.E.L.D. for over 15 years without using my powers,” she cuts him off. “I haven’t suddenly turned into some fucking damsel in distress now,” she spits back at him. She recognizes that she’s trying to antagonize him into stopping him from caring but she can’t really stop herself. Knowing better doesn’t always translate to doing better.

“I watched you Al Pachino your way out of a hail of bullets. You’re the damsel causing the damn distress! I am not saying you’re weak; I’m saying that if I knew that my friend was going through something I wouldn’t have dragged her into a fucking fight,” he says exasperated, almost at his wit’s end.

She doesn’t actually want to piss him off. She knows where he’s coming from. But she hasn’t been a very open person with people outside of Tony, Peggy, and (to an extent) Nat, so this is all pretty damn new to her. So she concedes, sighing she says, “I’m fine Sam. Well, not fine... but I’m in therapy. I’m functioning. Alright?” She hopes her tone conveys her understanding as well as her guilt.

When she sees Sam nod in response she asks, “Now… What's happening with the Flag Smashers?”

“The GRC is conducting raids to try and find Karli, but so far they've only found her followers. They've searched this camp, and just like the last camp, nothing. She's gone. We'll never find her,” Sam spits out, anger present in every movement of his hand.

Torres walks into the room, “Hey, you got your sleeve back,” he says pointing to Bucky. And then he turns at her and almost stumbles, “And you’re… here. You’re Static… and you’re here.”

She can’t help but smile at how adorable the kid looks. “So it seems,” she says easily.

“Sorry,” he stops in his tracks, fidgeting a bit, “I’m just a—I’m a big fan. You’re... awesome”

Her smile grows. “Means more than you think. Thanks, Torres.”

“You know my name,” he remarks almost to himself.

She thinks he’s too cute.

Bucky, however, seems to disagree. He grumbles audibly before pushing himself off the table and beginning to walk away.

“Are you off to take care of Zemo?” Sam asks pointedly, sitting down on the table behind him.

Bucky turns to look at them, there’s so much anger radiating off of him, Y/n doesn’t know what to do with it. He says nothing, turns around, and walks out the exit he came from.

“All right, good to know you survived,” Torres calls out behind him.

“What's our next steps, Torres?” Sam asks.

Torres turns back to look at him as he says, “Captain America killing a foreign national in public, it's kinda like a big deal. Like international incident big. Folks, uh, higher up on the payroll are all over it now. So, unfortunately…”

“They're taking jurisdiction,” Sam finishes.

Torres snaps his fingers and lets out a soft, “Yeah.” He spots the bag on the floor. He takes a step towards them, leaning down, he asks, "What happened to these?” He pulls the bag along with the wings inside them onto the table.

“So is there anything we can do?” Sam asks, avoiding his question completely.

“Not really,” Torres replies, absentmindedly. He’s too engrossed in assessing the wings. “As you can see, they've cordoned off the whole camp, and Karli's a ghost. After what went down, she is laying extra low. Like, under-underground.”

“And that's why it makes sense for us to get involved. The longer we let her regroup, the harder it's gonna be to find her,” Sam says looking at him.

“She's got people helping her from all over the world, on all platforms. She's really, really good at this thing,” Torres explains.

“Yeah,” Sam breathes out.

“How'd these break?” Torres asks again, caressing the wings.

She knows that look in his eyes. She can spot it from a mile away now, that’s how well she knows that look. A part of her wants to crush it because that’s the only way to make sure the kid survives… But another part of her knows, you don’t walk into this line of work without being absolutely, annoyingly stubborn. So the most she can do is send out a prayer, hoping that whenever he chooses to follow in Sam’s footsteps, he’s well prepared.

Sam, though, just sighs in response.

“Anyway, all we can do now is sit tight and just chill,” Torres supplies. “Sometimes, there's nothing to do until there's something to do.”

Sam says as he gets up off the table, “That's bizarrely wise.”

Both Torres and Y/n chuckle in unison “Well, I'm a bizarrely wise man, Sam,” he replies with a smile.

“Well," she chimes in, "Guess you won’t be needing the muscle anymore, Boss,” Y/n tells Sam, jumping off the table. She puts her hands into her jacket pockets.

“You can call whenever you need, you know that, right?” He asks, his eyes filled with worry.

“I know, Bossman,” she replies with ease and a smile. “I appreciate it.”

“Where will you go?” He asks.

She begins walking backwards towards the exit, “Back to my day job.” She shrugs.

“Which is?” Sam asks, cocking his brow.

“Babysitting.” She exits from the same door as Bucky did.

So she does go back to her life. It’s routine, mundane, and while she absolutely loves it… After having tasted the thrill of the Superhero shindig again, a part of her can’t help but miss it. She’s had an on and off affair with domesticity all her (very long) life. But maybe the hero gig will always be her old lady.

And maybe that’s the exact reason why a sense of pure excitement runs up her spine when she gets a call a couple days later and a familiar name pops up on the screen.

“Hello?” She says picking up.

“Hi,” comes the short reply.

After a few seconds of silence, she says, “Are you gonna tell me who this is, or—”

“Oh fuck, sorry. It’s Bucky—James… James Bucky Barnes,” he manages to fumble out.

Y/n can’t help but chuckle. “I'm just fucking with you, James. I know it’s you.”

“Oh,” he replies sheepishly. “Um, are you busy?”

She’s currently dressed in white wide-leg jeans, a white sweatshirt with a denim jacket. She's leaning on her bike, her precious Triumph Thunderbird Storm as it stands parked in front of the Midtown School of Science and Technology, waiting.

“Yes,” she replies, honestly.

“Oh. Sor—”

She cuts him off, “But for the pretty boy who spun me around on the dance floor I could always make time.”

Look, she’s a smooth motherfucker, okay? She’s always been a smooth motherfucker. But she isn’t flirting to be smooth. She just has a very bad, very annoying habit of getting flirty every time she’s nervous. Now, you would think that sounds awesome. You would be absolutely wrong. Cause right now, she’s flirting with a man with whom she’s pretty sure she doesn’t have a shot.

She’s regretting the words while they’re spilling out but they are far too true for her to take back. Especially when she can practically hear the man on the other side of the phone blush.

“... I feel special,” comes the reply.

“Glad I didn’t miss my target.” Smooth-motherfucker! But she’s gotta reel it back, “I’m presuming nothing’s on fire, seeing as you’re not screaming… So, is this a personal call, James?”

“Um. Well no. Ugh but… Yeah, kind of, I guess,” he stutters.

“You sure?” She asks bemused.

“It’s a bit of both actually. Um, I was thinking about going to see Sam once. I’ve got something I wanna drop off and… I don’t know. I think this whole thing kinda beat him down. So…” he drifts off.

“You want to check up on your partner,” she summarizes with a smile.

“No…” he’s met with silence from her end. So he concedes, sighing, “Fine, yes. You happy?”

“Very,” she replies slyly.

“Will you come along?” His voice is soft.

“Would you like me to?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Seemed pretty pissed the last time we talked.”

“Not at you; at the situation,” he defends. “Not at you,” he reiterates after a short pause.

There’s a comfortable silence that falls between the two.

Until it’s broken by a bell ringing in the background and children spilling out of the gate. One of them makes a beeline straight to her.

“Hey, Miss. Stark! You ready to go?”

“Just give me a sec, peanut,” she tells the kid. She pushes herself off the motorcycle, speaking into the phone, “Unfortunately, my day job’s calling. But I’ll pick you up at the airport and we can drive over to Sam’s together. Does that work for you? ”

“Yeah. Yeah, it does.” Bucky sounds… confused.

“Alright. I’ll see you later, Sarge,” she says as she swings her leg, straddling the bike.

“See you later, sweetheart.”

Motherfucker.

She hangs up with a smile gracing her face and pockets the phone. She hands one of the helmets hanging off the handles, over to the boy while putting the other one on herself.

“Who was that?” he asks.

“None of your business,” she tells him, locking her helmet in place.

“I was just being polite. I know it was Sergeant Barnes,” he says with a smile, as mimics her actions.

She checks the clasp on his helmet and says, “Well, Pete, you should consider changing your name to Nosy Parker, instead.” She pulls the visor on his helmet down.

He gets on the bike, holding onto her shoulders. “Your references are so old, you know that?”

She inserts the key into the ignition and starts the motorcycle. She revs up the engine twice before she says, “I never should’ve introduced you to Harley.”

Peter just chuckles in response as they both speed off… safely.

tag list: @thisisparadisemylove@justab-eautifulmess@intothesoul @buckyisperfect @aryksworld @ceo-of-daichi @ireadthensuetheauthors @fckdeusername @hotleaf-juice@itspetitfantomestuff @jn-wolf@freeflyingphoenix @jeremyrennerfanxxxx123 @geek-and-proud @bduchrnskei

Read part 2 here.

Find series masterlist here.

337 notes · View notes

l0vegl0wsinthedark · 4 years

Text

Sparkle

Here's a little ficlet I wrote based on a random scene that popped into my head and wouldn't leave. Unbeta’ed.

Tags: implied/attempted noncon, alcohol consumption, eighth year fic. Pairing: Draco/Harry

-------

Draco Malfoy came back to Hogwarts after the War.

He was quiet and was nearly always seen in the company of his books. He talked to people, but not unless they addressed him first. He was always in plain sight, and always seemed to be in the middle of the most banal, tedious tasks, and Harry had no reason to be suspicious.

But Harry watched him anyway.

How was he to help it? Malfoy didn't look anything like the Malfoy he was used to warching.

Yes, he was still deathly pale and tall and reed-thin - but he held himself differently now. He didn't swagger around like he owned the school, but still had an air of aristocratic grace about him that made people hurry out of his way.

He didn't wear his hair combed to slick perfection; he had it buzzed down to the scalp on one side, the rest of his sleek, platinum hair pulled over to the other side in an artfully tousled sweep that sometimes fell over his eyes and caught on his long lashes.

He didn't wear his shirt sleeves down to his wrists to hide the Mark. Instead he had them rolled up to his elbows to reveal the pretty little pink and orange blossoms he had tattooed over the ugly, faded skull and snake.

He always had nail paint on - black, green, ruby red, purple.

He wore eyeliner, stark black against the paper-white skin of his translucent eyelids and blond eyelashes.

During the weekends, he wore soft jumpers over crisp white shirts, often in pastel shades that made him appear delicate and almost ethereal.

Draco Malfoy came back to Hogwarts after the War and Harry was obsessed all over again.

It was Christmas in a week. The eighth year common room was in full tumult, the Wireless charmed to blare music loud enough to be heard clearly over the cacophony of dozens of chattering students. Decorated extravagantly by the elves, two tables groaning under food and drink (spiked with an indecent amount of alcohol), and housing every eighth year, over half of the seventh years and a few bold sixth years, the room threatened to burst at the seams.

Harry was pleasantly tipsy, which was very mild compared to the state of some of his classmates. At least he wasn't trying to climb up into the mantel to attempt to jump off of it and land on an overstuffed armchair that was twelve feet away.

He really had to pee, though, and both the toilets attached to the common room were occupied, and when he went up to the dorm bathrooms, he found those occupied too - as well as issuing sounds made by the students inside engaged in various kinds of 'activities'.

Bladder uncomfortably full, Harry jogged back down to the common room and, with a wave at Ron and Hermione, exited the party so he could use one of the school loos. His mind was buzzing very softly and he wasn't worried about homework or, you know, dying, for the first time in a while.

Sighing in relief after having taken a long piss, Harry strolled slowly back towards the common room. It was well past midnight and he knew the seventh and sixth years would be in trouble if caught at the party. He also knew that every teacher was likely aware and chose to let it go. It'd been that way this term after the War.

He was about to pause and take a moment to admire the snow covered grounds and Forest out the nearest window when he heard a sound from the classroom in front of him. There was a soft thud and a garbled human voice.

Frowning, he crossed the corridor and halted outside the classroom, hesitant to walk in on students who likely didn't want to be disturbed. But then he heard, clearly:

"Stop. No."

"Incarcerous."

"No, no, no, I don't want--"

But Harry had already drawn his wand and kicked open the door.

He vaguely recognised the seventh year, tall and slightly plump with a mop of sandy blond hair. He was struggling to contain the thrashing student he had bent over a desk and looked around with a jump, panting softly, when Harry burst in.

"What the f--?" the seventh year began.

"Get out," barked Harry, indicating to the door pointedly with his wand.

The seventh year stepped away and the student he'd been pinning fell to the floor with a thump, his wrists bound at the small of his back, his ankles tied together with the same gleaming, silvery rope. And then Harry started in shock, because-

"Please," panted Malfoy, writhing on the floor as he tried to free himself.

"Go," Harry said in a low, dangerous voice to the seventh year, and there must have been something in his voice or face because the student quite literally pelted out of the room. Harry heard him running all the way down the corridor.

Harry walked forward slowly. "Malfoy?"

Malfoy thrashed again, out of breath and emitting little sounds of desperation. "Pl-- Just let me go!"

Harry quickly bent down and undid the ropes with a wave of his wand. Then he helped Malfoy sit up and lean back against the desk, still panting.

His face was clammy and his eyes bloodshot, eyeliner smudged, his face abnormally pale, likely with fear.

He was also clearly very, very drunk.

Harry suddenly remembered seeing him at the party earlier, flitting back and forth to and from the table of refreshments. And then he'd disappeared altogether.

Apparently, not with his consent.

"You okay?" Harry asked, hesitantly placing a hand on Malfoy's shoulder.

"I don't want to!" Malfoy declared, jerking off his hand.

Harry immediately held both hands up and away. "Okay, absolutely, yes," he babbled. "I'm not gonna-- nobody's gonna..." He didn't know what to say so he left it unsaid.

Malfoy just sat there, still panting quietly, eyes unfocused and rolling around a bit.

"Do... Do you need to be sick? Do you...need to use the bathroom?" Harry asked after long stretch of silence. Malfoy shook his head, hair flopping into his face. There was some colour in his cheeks now, and when he reached up to messily tuck his hair behind his ear, Harry noticed he was wearing sparkly blue nail polish.

"Bed," Malfoy said suddenly, voice hoarse. Harry nodded and stood up. Malfoy looked up at him in bewilderment. "I don't want to," he repeated, slightly plaintively.

The way he looked in that moment, as though pleading for his life, helpless and incapacitated, Harry's chest tightened.

"Nobody is going to touch you," he promised in a low, steady voice. "I'm just going to see you up to your dorm room. Do you need help standing up or are you good?"

Malfoy looked up at him blankly and then looked away with a sigh, uncrossing his legs and making to stand up. "I need help," he mumbled after a beat.

Harry helped him up and then immediately stepped away. "Come on," he said softly, indicating to the door. "This way."

Despite having gone to bed only well after 3am after the party, Harry was up by 8. He found Ron awake with Hermione and the three of them went on a walk after breakfast. In the afternoon, Seamus invited them to a snowball fight with the others. After he'd changed out of his sopping clothes later, Harry found himself entrusted with the task of going down to the kitchens to bring up snacks for everybody.

One flight of stairs away from the Entrance Hall, Harry was stopped by a soft voice addressing him.

"Potter."

Harry turned. Sat on the nearest windowsill was Draco Malfoy.

Harry, for some reason, felt his face heat, and absurdly found himself worrying that Malfoy knew that Harry had spent all day thinking of him.

"Hey," Harry replied, nodding. "Alright?"

Malfoy nodded back, expression neutral. Suddenly, Harry wondered if Malfoy even remembered the events of the previous night.

"Where are you going?" Malfoy asked softly, and there was nothing threatening or malicious about the way he spoke.

"Down to the kitchen to nick food," Harry replied honestly, shoving his hands in his pockets. And then, after a moment of hesitation, "How are you...you know, how're you feeling?"

"I feel fine," said Malfoy, a small line appearing between his brows. "Any reason I wouldn't?"

Yeah, he doesn't remember, Harry decided. Then he wondered why he's talking to Harry at all.

"No," Harry said, mouth curving into a crooked smile. "Well, I guess I'd better-" He indicated to the stairs with his head.

Malfoy nodded and said nothing.

Harry was halfway down the stairs when, "Potter."

Harry turned. Malfoy stood at the top of the stairs.

"Yeah?"

"I-- I just--" Malfoy was very pink in the face. Harry thought him very pretty at that moment. "I'm really grateful for your help last night," Malfoy blurted.

Now Harry went pink. Oh, so you remember, he wants to shout hysterically.

"It was no problem, Malfoy," he said instead. "I'm glad I was there to help." Malfoy just looked blankly at him. "Hermione's always going on about consent," Harry blabbers suddenly. "And you know... You weren't... You didn't...consent."

Malfoy nodded, throat bobbing as he swallowed, his hands fidgeting with the hem of his baby blue jumper. "Well, thank you," he said after a few seconds of silently nodding.

"You're welcome."

They stared at one another. Harry was aware of the seconds stretching on and on but he couldn't look away from Malfoy's artfully styled hair and rosy cheeks and sparkly nails and carefully lined eyes.

Then with an awkward and atrociously stupid wave, Harry turned away.

"D'you want to go to Hogsmeade with me later?"

Harry turned, almost slipping off the step and tumbling down the stairs.

"What?" he spluttered at Malfoy who was now scarlet in the face.

"I... I asked if you--" Then Malfoy abruptly seemed to deflate. "Never mind, Potter. Sorry. And thanks again for last night."

Malfoy disappeared around the banister and Harry heard him climbing the stairs while he himself just stood there.

Then, as though jerked into motion by an electric shock, Harry flew back up the stairs.

"Malfoy!" he gasped as he rounded the banister. Malfoy turned, looking surprised. "I-- I'd love to," Harry said, sounding a bit winded.

"What?" Malfoy asked, tilting his head, glossy hair sliding over his eyes.

"Go to Hogsmeade with you," Harry explained. "I'll-- I'd love to go."

Malfoy went brick red but he smiled as he did so, a small, shy smile that made Harry's heart skip a beat.

"Okay," Malfoy nodded, "Six? I'll meet you in the common room," he added, pointing up the stairs with one finger.

Harry grinned. "Cool."

Malfoy grinned back. And then, just as Harry was about to go back down, "Hey, Potter?"

Harry looked back up. "Yeah?"

Malfoy, still scarlet in the face, seemed to be making a physical effort to gather courage. "You... You have my consent."

Speechless and almost faint, Harry just watched him hurry away. Consent for what, he wanted to bellow after him.

Then he decided he'd rather let Malfoy show him what later.

***

#tw noncon #harry being a saviour as always #soft draco #drarry #my writing

890 notes · View notes

howtosingit · 3 years

Text

Fic: The Nightmare That I Call Myself

His t-shirt is sweat-soaked and twisted around him, refusing to allow his chest to fully expand the way he desperately needs it to. He tears away at it, trying to get it off, and a sob climbs up his throat and out of his mouth when it starts to feel hopeless. Finally, after an hour or a day or maybe even a year, it comes off. TK throws it across the room with a yell before he wraps his arms around himself, his fingernails digging into his sides.

He just wants to feel something.

But that’s not really his problem right now. He’s feeling too much, all at once. It’s a stark contrast from the nightmare that he found himself trapped in moments ago; a nightmare where he felt absolutely nothing. Because he was absolutely nothing.

Because he was dead.

Or, five times TK wakes up disoriented and confused, and one time he wakes up knowing he’s exactly where he’s supposed to be.

Mature | 5.1K | Also on AO3

A/N: Haven’t written a word in two months, got this idea when I woke up this morning and now here we are, 10 hours later. The muse does what the muse wants. Hope you like it!

------

Someone’s screaming.

TK’s eyes fly open, the red and blue lights from his lamp in the corner adding to the confusion that he’s currently feeling. It feels like there’s an elephant sitting on his chest, and when he closes his eyes again to try to make it all disappear, all he sees is smoke and dust and collapsing buildings on fire.

It’s the same thing he’s been seeing on TV for the past few days, even though his mom changes the channel as quickly as possible whenever he’s in the room.

“TK!”

His eyes open again, finally focusing on his mom as rushes into his bedroom, the sudden lights causing him to blink against their harsh brightness. Before he knows it, there are arms wrapped around him, firm hands on his back, and a soft voice in his ear.

“It’s okay, buddy, it’s okay. You’re okay, it’s gonna be okay.”

That’s when he finally realizes that the screams are coming from his own mouth.

He stops instantly, his throat raw, but he can’t quiet the sob rising in his chest. He buries his face in his mom’s shirt, pressing against her, kind of hoping that he can disappear into her, where he knows he’ll be safe.

He closes his eyes again, and a new image appears behind his eyelids:

His dad. Covered in dirt and dust and blood, his firefighter’s helmet falling from his head, his eyes dark and empty and so different from their normal blue.

“Dad,” he croaks, his voice weak and full of pain. His heart hammers in his chest, thud thud thud. “Mommy, where’s Daddy?”

“Oh, honey, he’s okay,” his mom says, her fingers running through his hair and scratching his scalp gently, a shiver running through him. It helps to pull him out of his head, the fear disappearing at her touch. “He’s just in the other room, he’s okay.”

“Can I go see him?” he cries, the words getting lost in another sob. She understands him, though, like she always does. She’s his mom, so she always understands him.

“Of course, sweetie,” she says, holding him closer. “Let’s calm down a little bit though, before we go see him. We don’t want to scare him, do we?”

TK shakes his head, following along as she shows him how to breathe deeper. He can still feel his heart pounding in his chest, but it doesn’t feel as heavy now. The elephant has been replaced by something smaller. A gorilla, maybe, or something like that. He gets so distracted thinking about all the different animals that he’s seen at the zoo, that he almost doesn’t notice when a different pair of arms find their way around him.

He does recognize the smell, though. His dad’s soap has a really special smell.

“Daddy,” he cries, more tears finding their way to his eyes as he pulls his head back to see those familiar blue ones. They aren’t as bright as they were before, but they’re more alive than they were in his nightmare. His dad gives him a small smile, pulling him into his arms and against his chest.

“I got you, buddy. I got you. I’m right here.”

He focuses on the sound of his dad’s heartbeat, hears the way the soft words rumble through his chest. His mom is still there, too, her own fingers crawling up and down his back.

Eventually, they all lay back down, his body tucked between the two of them. He reaches out, grabbing on to each of them, pulling them even closer.

He hears them whispering above him, but their voices sound like they’re at the far end of the big, long tunnel, so he doesn’t really know what they’re saying. He watches the lights from his lamp slowly dance across his ceiling, watches as they catch on the corner of the twin-sized firetruck bed that surrounds them on all sides.

The next morning when he wakes up, he tells his dad that he wants to change his room. There’s a sad look in his eyes, but he just gives him a hug and helps him pack some things away.

-----

Someone’s knocking on the door.

TK lets out a groan, his stomach rolling. Even through his eyelids, he can see that the sun is up and pouring in through his bedroom windows, his mother’s sheer curtains doing little to keep the daylight at bay. The air around him is stale, sweaty, and smells like sex and weed. He scrunches his face, trying to stave off the nausea.

The knocking gets louder, and that’s when he realizes that it’s not at his bedroom door, but further away. Probably on his mom’s front door. Fuck. He’s going to have to get up and answer it before the neighbors complain. He really doesn’t want to have to deal with his mother when she gets home.

He throws the thin sheet off of himself, the blast of cool air making him aware of his nakedness. The back of his hand comes in contact with something solid to his left and he opens one eye to see tanned skin covered in various back tattoos under a head of shoulder-length dirty blonde hair. His gaze moves lower to take in the bare ass resting on top of his mother’s 800-thread count sheets, the outline of a handprint barely visible on one cheek. With a disgusted scoff, he pushes himself up to sit at the edge of his bed, the stranger now behind him and out of sight.

He instantly realizes his mistake as his stomach somersaults and he barely has time to notice the empty vodka bottle on his nightstand next to a little bag of white pills before he empties it onto his rug-covered floor.

He’s stumbling naked down the hallway towards the bathroom to stand under the water for the next hour or so when his brain refocuses on the knocking on the door. Now that he’s out of his room, he can hear his phone vibrating incessantly from the pocket of his jeans where they lay on the floor by the couch. He can now also hear a familiar voice yelling through the door to accompany the knocking.

“TK! I know you’re in there, I tracked your phone,” his dad yells, his knocking turning into an intense pounding. “Open the damn door!”

With a “Calm the fuck down, Dad,” TK stomps towards the door, throwing it open. He can’t help the satisfaction that crawls through him at his dad’s shocked face as he takes him in. TK doesn’t know why he’s so surprised; it’s not like this beats the time his dad accidentally walked in on him having sex with his high school boyfriend a few years ago.

“Jesus Christ, TK,” his dad huffs, pushing him back into the apartment and slamming the door behind him, obviously trying to maintain some sense of privacy. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

TK doesn’t reply, just stands before him with his eyebrows raised and his arms crossed in front of his chest.

“Well? You gonna say something?”

“What are you doing here, Dad?” TK scoffs, rolling his eyes. He immediately regrets it, as the action causes a sharp pain to flare up behind his eyes. Remembering his previous goal of drowning himself in the shower, he turns to walk back down the hallway. “Mom’s out of town, you don’t have to pretend like you give a fuck about me. There’s no one around to impress.”

“Yeah, I know your mom’s out of town, that’s why I’m here,” his dad says, and TK can tell from the consistent volume of his voice that he’s following him towards the bathroom. “You obviously can’t be trusted by yourself for more than a day.”

“Oh, fuck off,” TK yells, rounding on him. “I’m right here, aren’t I? It’s not like I’ve gone missing and you’ve found me dead in an alley or something.”

His dad glares at him for a moment. Then, with a raise of his eyebrow, he points a finger at TK’s face. “You’ve got some vomit on your chin.”

TK feels a blush crawl up his neck, but before he can say anything, his dad turns towards his room, pushing open the door and walking in like he’s been invited to do so.

“Dad, wait!”

It’s too late. His dad has already stepped inside, taking in the scene. TK cringes as the smell of vomit hits his nostrils.

“This a new boyfriend of yours?” his dad asks, gesturing to the naked guy still passed out in his bed. TK says nothing, having no desire to share that he has no idea who the guy is, or that he can’t even remember his name.

His dad circles around the bed, his hand coming up to cover his nose as he spies the puddle of puke on the floor.

“You’re paying to have that rug cleaned,” he says, turning towards the large bay window and throwing it open.

“Where do you get off telling me what to do? This isn’t your house anymore, Dad,” TK spits out, but it comes out with less fire than he had hoped. The smell is really strong here, and the room has started to spin again. He starts backing away towards the bathroom, knowing he’s going to need the toilet in just a minute.

“Not a boyfriend then,” his dad says, ignoring his question. He’s made it over to the TK’s side table, where the evidence of his drug-induced evening sits. He watches as his dad grabs the bag of Oxy, waving it around before pocketing it. “Your mother is going to kill you when she finds out you brought your drug dealer into her house.”

“That’s mine, I paid for that,” TK says weakly, his heart hammering in his chest. He doesn’t want to be here right now, he doesn’t want to be anywhere right now. He wants the room to stop spinning, he wants the stranger in his bed - the one he let touch him in ways that make him suddenly feel incredibly unclean - to disappear, and he wants his dad to stop looking at him like he’s regretting the day he was born.

(But hey, TK thinks, the familiar nasty voice in his head taking center stage, at least you finally got his attention.)

His dad is across the room and standing in front of him by the time he mentally checks back into the present moment. Before TK can say another word, he’s shoving a pair of clean boxers into his hands, a look of intense disappointment on his face.

“Take a shower, son. You stink.”

And with that, he steps out of the room, leaving TK to stare at his vomit-soaked carpet, his unwanted hookup, and every other regret he doesn’t have it in him to name.

------

Someone’s pounding on the wall behind his bed.

He comes to with a gasp, lurching forward in his bed. His breathing is out of control and he claws at his chest, trying to get a grip on his lungs, to squeeze them until they burst. It’s not like they’re working correctly anyway, he thinks as he struggles to breathe through an airway that he swears can’t be any wider than a coffee stirrer, so what’s the point of having them at all.

He just wants to feel something.

Because he was dead.

The image of his prone body on the floor, unmoving, just a mass of useless limbs and wasted potential, flashes through his mind, unbidden. He chokes out another sob, reaching up to fist his hands in his short hair, his nails scratching at his scalp. He recalls a time in his life when his mother would run her fingers through his hair, grounding him with love-laced scratches. How it would settle him, how it would focus him, how it would remind him that he wasn’t alone.

He’s alone now. She’s not here. It’s just him, and the addict screaming and pounding on the wall in the room next door.

Her face comes to him, the one she wore the last time she saw him, the lines of graceful aging marred by fear and hurt and hopelessness. All for him. All because of him. All because he couldn’t get his shit together. All because he couldn’t handle his cushy, privileged existence, with his middle-to-upper class accepting parents.

All because he didn’t want to do it anymore.

Except, he does. He really fucking does. He’s felt that high of life, the one that he can get without the help of pills. He’s loved before, he’s given his all to love, and sure, it didn’t last, but it was good. It was freeing. It was worth it.

He wants to find that again. Find the people that make it worth it again. Find his purpose. He knows it’s out there, he knows it’s waiting for him to get his shit together.

He’s twenty years old and he’s nearly killed himself, but he’s not dead yet. He’s not done yet.

He’s not fucking done yet.

So, yes, he’s here and he’s alone, with only thin walls and an uncomfortable mattress to call his own. But, if this is what he needs, if this is what is going to help him find out where he goes next, then it’s worth it. It’s all going to be worth it.

He cries himself back to sleep, back into the darkness, back into the moments that will haunt him for the rest of his life.

This time, though, as he gives himself over to rest, his lungs expand to fill his entire chest, his airways now clear and fulfilling their purpose, reminding him just how alive he is.

------

Someone’s shouting.

There are a lot of voices, but they all sound muddled and confused. There are hands on him, pressing down hard against his chest, and now that he’s noticed them, he also notices the most intense fucking pain that he’s ever felt in his life, right below his collarbone. It hurts so bad that he wants to scream, he even goes as far as opening his mouth to do so, but he’s not sure if anyone hears him; he’s not even sure he hears himself.

His eyes flutter open when he’s suddenly lifted into the air, the pain spiking to new heights. He sees shadows crawling across his vision, shapes that amount to nothing more than blobs of mass. There are so many of them, and they’re all moving so fast. Too fast for him to really pinpoint.

“TK!”

Those two letters - the two letters he knows better than any others - swim through the molasses to punch him in the eardrum, and he instinctively looks towards the sound. He finds his father there, his face pinched and sweaty and terrified. It’s a familiar face, one he saw just a few months ago actually, one that he never, ever wanted to see again.

Fuck. Another overdose.

But even that doesn’t explain the sharp pain in his shoulder. He looks around, trying to figure out his surroundings, trying to make sense of all of this. He’s clean, he knows he is. It’s been hard, but he’s in a better place now. He’s with better people now. He’s truly felt like he’s finding himself, finally, after all of these years.

There’s no way he threw that away. There’s no way.

He forces himself to focus, to figure out what the fuck is going on. He turns to see Captain Blake on his left - well, his left, her right, maybe, he doesn’t know. She’s barking orders, and he follows her arms down to find her hands pressed to his chest. He wants to shout at her, tell her that she doesn’t need to push so hard, that she’s really fucking hurting him, but he can’t speak. Just like his scream before, his voice is trapped inside of him.

He looks up to see Marjan above him, lines of tears running down her face. She doesn’t bother to wipe them away, just lets them fall as her bottom lip trembles. He focuses on it, wants to tell her that it’s going to be okay, wants to reach out and rub her shoulder gently. But, as hard as he tries, he can’t seem to do that either.

He’s stuck in a world where he can’t do a single damn thing.

Suddenly, the blurry ceiling above him gives way to what looks like a wood-covered porch, which quickly gives way to the night sky. It’s all fuzzy, but he swears he can see stars up there; he never really got to see stars before moving to Austin, save for the inconsistent trips he would take outside of the city.

He likes seeing the stars. He likes the open vastness of it all. It makes him feel equally too large and too small, which is honestly a really freeing, confusing feeling.

There are blue and red lights painting the trees overhead, and he’s reminded of his childhood room, with his firetruck bed and his color-changing lamp that would soothingly move from red to blue, just the way he liked. It feels so long ago, but he remembers it so clearly. It’s the only clear thing he can see right now.

He can tell he’s fading away again, his short reprieve to the land of the living coming to an end. The voices are still both loud and muted, but he no longer cares what they’re saying. The pain is reaching his maximum capacity, the edges of his vision turning white.

It’s okay, he thinks. It’s all going to be okay.

He feels his head drift to the right, and he swears he sees a familiar face, proud nose and perfect lips under a head of soft brown curls and soulful eyes that have seen deep into the very heart of him.

He smiles, perfectly content with Carlos being his final thought before he goes.

------

Someone’s coughing.

It takes him no time at all to realize that it’s him, that he’s the one hacking up a lung. He feels like his chest is on fire and he can’t take a full breath. There’s heat all around him, flames painting his surroundings an unrecognizable, hazy orange. The bed is gone, the dresser is gone. It’s all vanishing, lost to the fire.

But that’s not what causes him to panic, that’s not what stops his breath. That’s not what threatens to shatter him completely.

Carlos is among the flames.

They’re crawling up his body, latching on to his blue shirt, the one that TK thinks makes him look completely unreal. Well, truly that’s anything he wears, but blue always makes Carlos look soft.

It makes him look like home. The greatest one that TK has ever known.

And now, TK watches as his home catches on fire, unable to move, to step forward, to pull Carlos to safety. His boyfriend watches him as the flames rise up between them, his eyes wide and full of fear, his chest heaving from the breaths that he just can’t seem to catch. TK wants to yell out, tell Carlos to come to him, that they can get out of this together if they just hurry, but every time he goes to speak, a cough climbs up his throat, burying the words inside of him.

He knows he’d be crying if he could, but the flames have stolen his tears from him, too. The flames are going to take everything from him. Everything that matters, packaged inside one wonderful, miraculous, unexpected person.

And before he can even blink, Carlos is gone, swallowed whole, no trace of the man that TK chose to give his entire heart to. He’s gone, and TK desperately wants to follow him.

There’s a creak above him and he has just enough time to look up before the entire ceiling comes down on top of him, granting him his final wish.

He jerks awake, the coughs relentless as he folds himself in half, trying to remove the smoke and ash from his body. It’s dark in the room now, the fire finally extinguished. Except, no, that’s not right, because as he looks around, he sees that everything is intact. Nothing burnt, nothing broken.

He reaches out blindly, trying to find Carlos in the dark, but he’s met with only air. He turns, taking in the empty space on the mattress beside him, the untouched pillow.

“No,” he gasps, shaking his head, and finally the tears come, no longer frightened of the untamable heat. “No, Carlos, no,” he sobs, pulling at the sheets, hoping that he can find him hiding somewhere in their depths. He claws at them, desperate, unhinged.

“TK!”

The voice is salvation, the timbre unmatched in its miraculousness. TK whips around, searching and scanning for the source. He lets out a cry when he finds him, standing in the doorway, dressed in nothing but athletic shorts, a bright white towel pressed to his curls, water still trailing down his bare chest.

Whole, untouched, safe. His home.

And TK just loses it.

In seconds, he’s in Carlos’s arms, his firm hands pressed against his back as his shoulders close around him, encasing him. His lips press to the shell of TK’s ear, his voice pouring into him like lava, filling all of his cavities and crevices left behind by the nightmare that took Carlos away from him.

“I’m right here, baby, I’m right here, it’s okay.”

TK sobs, clinging to him, his voice piercing in the quiet of his dad’s guest room. “You were there and you were surrounded by the fire and I couldn’t get to you, I couldn’t move, and I had to watch you, I just had to watch you go and then you weren’t there anymore, and it was like you were never there at all, but I couldn’t do anything, I just--”

“Hey, hey, Ty, breathe,” Carlos says, drowning out his voice with his own, pressing closer. “It was just a nightmare, we both made it out, we’re both here and we’re both okay. We’re both okay.”

“I… I can’t… I just…”

“Baby, you’re shaking, you’ve gotta calm down, okay.”

“I don’t… I can’t…”

“Here, lay back down,” Carlos says, loosening his grip a bit. TK shrieks, holding tighter. “It’s okay, trust me. TK, I need you to trust me.”

It takes him a moment, but finally TK lets him go. He closes his eyes, feeling the way Carlos lowers him back down onto the mattress. TK can still feel himself shaking, but before he can really start to panic again, he feels a weight on him, one that presses him firmly down, grounding him, holding him steady, from head-to-toe.

His eyes flutter open to take in Carlos above him where his face is pressed into his neck. He breathes, taking stock of their bodies, the way their hips rest against each other, the way Carlos firm thighs bracket his own. He brings his arms up around him, wrapping them around Carlos’s wide back before dragging one hand to the back of his neck and burying them in the soft curls there.

It’s a position he’s intimately familiar with, though unlike other times there is nothing remotely sexual about this situation. Carlos turns his head just enough to press his lips under TK’s jaw, dragging his nose along the light stubble there.

All he feels, all he sees, all he hears, is Carlos.

“Just breathe, baby. I’m right here. I’m all around you. I’ll keep you safe. Just like you kept me safe in the fire, just like you kept me grounded, just like you brought me back down when I felt scared and hurt and lost. I’m here for you now. It’s you and me, keeping each other safe, just you and me.”

He nods, letting Carlos drown him in his own form of a sermon, allowing the words to wash over him like a verse. He lets each syllable piece him back together again, remade in the image of the man he’s deemed worthy of loving him. The only man he will ever trust to do so.

He doesn’t need anything else, doesn’t want anything else. This is all he needs. This is all he will ever need.

Just him and Carlos, like this, forever.

-----

Someone’s snoring.

He comes to slowly, letting the world reintroduce itself to him. He hears music first, though it sounds tinny and, if he’s being honest, kind of grating. He shifts his hips a bit, feeling how the movement pulls against some tension in his lower back. He realizes he’s on a very hard surface and not at all on the very expensive mattress that he and Carlos splurged for a few years ago, when his husband started having his own fair share of lower back problems.

He opens his eyes, watching blue and red lights dance across the ceiling from the TV in the corner. A smile pulls at his lips as he shakes his head slightly, amused for no specific reason. Blue and red, he thinks. He’ll never escape them.

He lifts his head just enough to see the children’s TV show currently playing to an audience of none. He remembers when Carlos, fully offended at Netflix asking if he was still watching the same show after a few hours, finally figured out a way to turn that setting off. TK will have to tease him about not turning off the autoplay function tomorrow morning.

He finally focuses on the snoring off to his right, a sound so familiar that he hadn’t really registered it before, his brain just accepting that it was there. He turns his head, his smile growing as he finds his husband asleep next to him, his head resting on TK’s outstretched (and now very painfully numb) arm.

Carlos’s face is so soft, so serene, his brows slightly furrowed, his crease between his eyes just a little more pronounced. His lips are parted just barely, allowing his shallow breaths to escape and fill the living room around them. TK stares at him, overwhelmed by his beauty, overwhelmed by the feelings that are spreading throughout his chest at the sight of the man before him.

Even in sleep, Carlos is mesmerizing.

TK glances down, his heart leaping at the sight of their little boy asleep between them, his face buried in Carlos’s shirt, his light brown curls resting against the pillow beneath him. Carlos has an arm draped over him, his fingers grazing TK’s arm.

A memory flashes in his mind, one from when he was much younger, of his parents surrounding him in much the same way as they all lay together on his firetruck bed. He remembers how safe he felt between them; how between their bodies, he knew he could never be hurt.

He’s surprised to find that he feels that way even now, even as a father himself. He knows it’s because of the man before him; Carlos’s presence has always meant safety to him. He doesn’t see that ever stopping. He wouldn’t ever want it to.

He scoots just a little bit closer, groaning slightly at the numbness in his arm. He holds his breath as his husband shifts, his eyelids fluttering open. Brown eyes meet green, and TK feels the entire world shift into focus in that single moment.

“Hey,” Carlos whispers, dragging his fingers gently along TK’s side.

“We fell asleep on the living room floor,” TK whispers, scrunching his face as he shifts again, feeling the strain on his hips.

“Actually, you fell asleep on the floor, in the middle of Paw Patrol,” Carlos corrects, his hand leaving TK’s side to boop his nose. “We just decided that we would rather stay with you than sleep in our incredibly comfy beds.”

“Your back is going to kill you in the morning, you know that, right?”

“I could say the same thing about your hips,” Carlos replies, raising an eyebrow. TK says nothing, just nods his head and rolls his eyes.

“Grace is taking him tomorrow night, so we can run a bath, work out each other's kinks.”

“The fact that you are saying that and it’s not about sex makes me feel so incredibly old.”

“I never said it couldn’t be about sex.”

TK feels his jaw drop, watching as Carlos’s eyes twinkle in the blue light from the TV. He leans forward, pressing a soft kiss to his husband’s lips.

“I’m looking forward to it, Mr. Strand-Reyes.”

“I’d be offended if you weren’t, Mr. Strand-Reyes.”

TK drags the tip of his nose along the ridge of Carlos’s before letting out a sigh. “Now that we’re awake, should we move to our beds, save ourselves from total regret and bodily mutilation?”

Carlos hums, looking down at the bundle of limbs between them. “It’s up to you. I just want to sleep next to you, wherever you are.”

TK takes him in for a moment, the way his long lashes brush against his cheeks, the peaceful smile that pulls at his lips as he looks down at their son. It’s a stunning image, powerful in its perfection.

“No, I think we can handle one night,” he says, scooting closer. He does remove his arm from under Carlos’s head, replacing it with the throw pillow laying on the ground next to them. “Besides, I think this is exactly where we’re supposed to be.”

Carlos hums in agreement, wiggling a little closer and smacking his lips softly as he drifts off to sleep.

TK stays awake until Carlos’s soft snores drown out all possible distractions, the feeling of absolute love and certainty filling him with a heaviness that drags him back into the darkness of sleep, all nightmares kept at bay for now.

#tarlos #tarlos fic #911 lone star #tk strand #carlos reyes #I wrote a thing #5+1 fic #please let me know what you think - it's been a minute and I tried some new things

90 notes · View notes

just-dreaming-marvel · 3 years

Text

Out Of Time ~ 128

MASTERLIST

< previous chapter

Word Count: 3,500ish

Summary: Tony works to save Dr. Strange and Y/N. The fugitive Avengers find their way to the compound. (gifs aren’t mine)

As the alien started guiding the piece of pavement towards the giant circular ship, the cloak that was around Strange tore itself free and flew the piece of pavement away.

“No!” The alien yelled, following after it.

Iron Man and Spider-Man were both fighting off the large alien in the nearby park Tony had crashed into, when the pavement piece flew passed. All Tony could see was the cloak and the alien following, so he knew it was Strange and that he was in trouble.

“Kid, that’s wizard,” Tony told Peter, blocking an attack. “Get on it.”

“On it!” Peter replied, quickly swinging in that direction.

Spider-Man chased after the skinny alien, who was floating speedily and upright on a small platform of burbling debris. Swinging in between the pavement and the alien, Peter tried to tie up the alien. The alien attacked back, throwing a billboard at Spider-Man.

“Not cool!” Peter responded.

The alien bent all the utility poles in the path of the feeing clock, finally snagging the garment and ripping it loose of the pavement. Spider-Man re-arrived on the scene, finally noticing something.

“Uh, Mr. Stark? We have a problem,” Peter’s nervous voice rang over the comms.

“What is is kid?” Tony replied, still fighting off the larger alien. “I’m kinda in the middle—“

“Both the wizard and Miss Rogers are unconscious on the floating piece of road.”

“What?! I’ll be right there!”

Peter swung down to the pavement and stood on it, careful to not step on Strange or Y/N. Bending down, he went to break Y/N free when a cone of blue light began to pull the group upwards. Spider-Man jumped off, grabbing onto the nearest light post while using his webbing to try and keep the piece of pavement in place. The alien quickly uprooted the light post, sending Dr. Strange, the cloak, Y/N, and Peter on their way to the circular ship.

“Uhhh, Mr. Stark?” Peter called again. “I’m being beamed up!”

“Hang on, kid!” Tony responded.

Before Tony could fly over there, the giant alien he was fighting pinned Tony to the ground by his hammer that doubled as a claw. As the giant jumped towards Iron Man, blades ready to end the fight, he was sent through a portal instead. The alien turned and leaped to return back through the portal, but Wong rapidly closed it and only the giant’s severed hand made its way back to the park. Bruce kicked the hand way with a noise of disgust. Iron Man then shook himself free of the weapon.

“Wong, you’re invited to my future wedding!” Tony exclaimed before beginning to fly towards the large ship. “Give me a little juice, FRIDAY.”

Iron Man’s foot thrusters suddenly morphed together into a single larger thruster, increasing his speed considerably.

Peter, not being able to keep hold of the pavement piece, was hanging onto the ship as it flew up into space. The alien and the piece of pavement with Strange and Y/N on it, had disappeared into the ship. Tony knew that Peter wasn’t going to be able to hold on or breathe for much longer.

“Unlock 17-A,” Tony ordered FRIDAY. “Pete, you gotta let go. I’m gonna catch you.”

“But you said save the wizard!” Peter responded. Gasping from lack of oxygen, Peter ripped off his mask. “I can’t breathe!”

“You’re too high up. You’re running out of air.”

“Yeah! That makes sense.”

Quickly, Peter passed out, free-falling, but not before the pod Tony had set out reached him. It attached itself to him, becoming a new suit. Now being able to breathe, Spider-Man landed on the bottom part of the ship.

“Mr. Stark, it smells like a new car in here!” Peter commented.

“Happy trails, kid,” Tony replied. “FRIDAY, send him home.”

“Yep,” FRIDAY answered.

A large parachute extended from the new Spider-Man suit, spending him back towards earth.

“Oh, come on!” Peter shouted.

Iron Man latched onto the hull and cut a hole to board the ship, looking for wherever Strange and Y/N were taken.

“Boss, I have lifeforms detected in the ship,” FRIDAY informed. “One of them is most likely Agent Rogers.”

“Can you tell me if she’s breathing?”

A pause. “It appears she is.”

“Okay… I need you to—“

“I’m sorry, Boss, but we seem to be losing connection. We’re too far away from—“ Then FRIDAY”s line cut.

~~~

“Still no word from Vision?” The holographic image of Secretary Ross asked Rhodey. Rhodey was at the compound, dealing with the red tape.

“Satellites lost him somewhere over Edinburgh,” Rhodey replied.

“On a stolen Quinjet with four of the world's most wanted criminals.”

“You know they're only criminals because you've chosen to call them that, right, sir?”

“My God, Rhodes, your talent for horseshit rivals my own.”

“If it weren't for those Accords, Vision would've been right here.”

“I remember your signature on those papers, Colonel.”

“That's right. And I'm pretty sure I've paid for that.”

“You have second thoughts?”

“Not anymore.”

Suddenly, the fugitive Avengers (Sam, Wanda, Nat, and Steve) entered the room. Vision was being supported by Sam.

“Mr. Secretary,” Steve greeted, firmly.

“You got some nerve,” Ross said, hologram walking up to the Captain. “I’ll give you that.”

“You could use some of that right now,” Natasha replied.

“The world's on fire. And you think, all is forgiven?”

“I'm not looking for forgiveness. And I'm way past asking for permission,” Steve stated. “Earth just lost her best defender. So we're here to fight.” He took a step towards the hologram. “And if you wanna stand in our way… we’ll fight you too.”

Ross turned to Rhodes. “Arrest them.”

“All over it,” Rhodey responded before swiping off the hologram. “That’s a court-martial. It’s great to see you, Cap.”

The two men hugged. “You too, Rhodey,” Steve responded before Natasha went to hug Rhodey.

“Well. You guys really look like crap. Must've been a rough couple of years.”

“Yeah, well, the hotels weren’t exactly five star,” Sam commented.

“Uh, I think you look great,” Bruce nervously walked in from the opposite end of the room. “Uh… heh… Yeah. I’m back.”

“Hi, Bruce,” Nat greeted softly.

“Nat.”

“This is awkward,” Sam whispered.

Steve looked around. “Has anyone heard from Y/N?” He asked. “She’d want to know—“

“She’s missing too, Steve,” Bruce interrupted. “When I found Tony to get his help, Y/N was with him.”

“She was… she was with him? But Y/N’s a fugitive as well. How—“

“Mr. Stark and Miss Rogers have been sneaking around,” Vision cut Steve off.

“What?!” Steve and Rhodey exclaimed.

“It’s been happening for about a year now.”

“Miss Rogers has been seeing Boss and Sergeant Barnes,” FRIDAY clarified. “Trying to work through her feelings.”

“Thats… and she never…” Steve was at a loss for words.

“You didn’t try to reach out to her either, Cap,” Sam said. “You even knew she was staying in Wakanda. T’Challa told you. And you refused to reach out.”

“What happened?” Steve asked, looking at Bruce.

“She got captured,” Bruce explained. “Tony went after the ship to protect her and the Time Stone.”

“Why don’t we take this into the other room?” Rhodey suggested. “Perhaps get you guys something to drink.”

They went into the next room over, each standing or sitting around the room. Bruce explained more of what happened and the other group explained what happened to them.

“So we gotta assume they’re coming back, right?” Rhodey questioned.

“And they can clearly find us,” Wanda added.

“We need all hands on deck,” Bruce stated. “Where’s Clint?”

“After the whole Accords situation, he and Scott took a deal,” Nat answered. “It was too tough on their families, they're on house arrest.”

“Who’s Scott?”

“Ant-Man,” Steve replied.

“There's an Ant-Man and a Spider-Man? Okay, look… Thanos has the biggest army in the universe. And he is not gonna stop until he... he gets... Vision's Stone.”

“Well then, we have to protect it,” Nat stated.

“No, we have to destroy it,” Vision said. "I've been giving a good deal of thought to this entity in my head, about its nature. But also, its composition. I think if it were exposed to a sufficiently powerful energy source, something, very similar to its own signature, perhaps… its molecular integrity could fail.”

“And you, with it,” Wanda said. “We’re not having this conversation.”

“Eliminating the stone is the only way to be certain that Thanos can't get it.”

“That’s too high a price.”

Vision took Wanda’s face gently with both hands. “With Y/N off world, only you have the power to pay it.” Wanda walked away, distressed. “Thanos threatens half the Universe. One life cannot stand in the way of defeating him.”

“But it should,” Steve said, looking at Vision. “We don’t trade lives, Vision.”

“Captain, 70 years ago, you laid down your life to save how many millions of people. Tell me, why is this any different?”

“Because you might have a choice,” Bruce suggested. “Your mind is made up of a complex construct of overlays. JARVIS, Ultron, Tony, me, the Stone. All of them mixed together. All of them learning from one another.”

“You’re saying Vision isn’t just the Stone?” Wanda asked.

“I'm saying that if we take out the Stone, there's still a whole lot of Vision left. Perhaps the best parts.”

“Can we do that?” Nat wondered.

“Not me. Not here.”

“You better find someone, and somewhere fast,” Rhodey said. “Ross isn't exactly just gonna let you guys have your old rooms back.”

“I know somewhere,” Steve stated. “Wakanda. But someone first has to explain how Y/N has anything to do with the Stone.”

“70 years ago, the Tesseract chose her to be the protector of the Stones,” Vision explained, knowing the story due to housing the Mind Stone in his head. “That’s how she survived the fall. The Tesseract holds the Space Stone. Her powers come for each of the Stones, so she has the power to destroy the Stones, by channeling them. Y/N is able to wield and control the all the Stones.”

“What I showed her…” Wanda said quietly. “It was the Stone… Y/N’s the key to stopping Thanos.”

~~~

T’Challa already knew Y/N was missing before Steve had contacted him. With Okoye and two other guards, he made his way to Bucky’s place. Bucky was throwing bags onto a partly-filled car, being watched by two village children.

“You’ll have the Kingsgaurd, and the Dora Milaje have been alerted,” Okoye told T’Challa as they made their way towards Bucky’s small hut.

“And the Border Tribe?” T’Challa wondered.

“Those that are left.”

“Send word to the Jabari as well. M’Baku likes a good fight.”

“And what of this one?” Okoye looked at Bucky, just down the hill.

“This one may be tired of war. But the White Wolf has rested long enough.”

They made their way to Bucky. The guards set an elaborate and high-tech looking case down on the cart. They opened the lid to reveal the black and gold vibranium arm that Bucky had worn on Valentine’s Day.

Bucky sighed. “Where’s the fight?” He asked.

“On its way,” T’Challa answered. “And, Barnes…” The King glanced over at Okoye. “There’s something else. It’s about Y/N.”

Bucky was immediately alert. “What is it?”

“She’s missing.”

~~~

Dr. Strange was floating horizontally, face down, surrounded by dozens of long, glassy needles, as the alien interrogated him. Y/N was still unconscious, tied to the pavement off to the side.

“In all the time I’ve served Thanos, I’ve never failed him,” the alien told Dr. Strange. “If I were to reach our rendezvous on Titan with the Time Stone still attached to your vaguely irritating person, there would be... judgement.” The needles began to contact Dr. Strange’s face, causing pain. “Give me… the Stone.”

Tony was watching, hiding from above. After receiving a tap on the arm, Tony turned around, hand up and ready to shoot. Tony stood stand after seeing that it was the cloak.

“Wow, you’re a seriously loyal piece of outerwear, aren’t you?” Tony commented.

“Yeah, un speaking of loyalty…”

Tony and the cloak turn, completely shocked, to see Peter dropping down from above.

“What the—“

“I know what you’re gonna say,” Peter interrupted, holding his hands out.

“You should not be here,” Tony stated.

“I was gonna go home—“

“I don’t wanna hear it.”

“But it was such a long way down and I just thought about you and Y/N on the way—”

“And now I gotta hear it.”

“—and I kinda stuck to the side of the ship. And this suit is ridiculously intuitive, by the way. So if anything, it’s kinda your fault that I’m here.”

Both the cloak and Tony looked shocked, again. “What did you just say?”

“I take that back. And now I’m here in space.”

“Yeah.” Tony went to stand right in front of Peter. “Right where I don’t want you to be. This isn’t Coney Island. This isn't a field trip. It's a one-way ticket. You hear me? Don't pretend like you thought this through. You could not have possibly thought this through.”

"No. I did think this through.”

“You could not have possibly thought this through.”

“It's just .. you can't be a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man if there's no neighborhood.” Peter waited to get something from Tony, but nothing. “Okay. That didn't really make any sense, but you know what I'm trying to say.”

Tony let out a shaky breath. “Come on. We got a situation.”

Tony led Peter over to where they could see Dr. Strange, Y/N, and the alien. Peter crouched down to study the situation and the cloak leaned over his shoulder.

“See him down there?” Tony pointed to Dr. Strange. “He’s in trouble. And Y/N laying over there as well. What’s your plan? Go.”

“Um. Okay, okay… uh…” Peter stuttered, trying to think. He and the cloak popped back upright. “Okay. Did you ever see this really old movie, Aliens?”

~~~

Meanwhile, the Stones were talking to an unconscious Y/N.

“You can’t stop what’s coming… it will come, no matter what. You are being saved for the final battle… we will stop you from doing anything to prevent what needs to happen. What’s supposed to happen… someday, you will understand. There are things meant to be learned, things meant to happen, that we will not let you stop… use your powers wisely.”

She gasped quietly, waking up. Y/N quickly studied her surroundings. She could feel the Time Stone close before she noticed the predicament Dr. Strange was in. The glass spikes were pressing into Strange’s skin, causing him to let out a groan.

“Painful, aren’t they?” The alien taunted. Ebony Maw, the name was, Y/N finally getting inside his head. “They were originally designed for microsurgery. And any one of them—“

There was a thump behind Maw, he turned to see Iron Man standing there. Tony’s hand repulsers were ready to fire. Y/N closed her eyes and focused on getting out of the utility ropes without making a big scene.

“—could end your friend’s life in an instant,” Maw continued.

“I gotta tell you, he’s not really my friend,” Tony responded. “Saving his life is more a professional courtesy.”

“Ah, yes. It’s the girl you’re really after.” Maw walked slowly towards Iron Man, beckoning very large metal objects to float behind him. “Too bad you’ve saved nothing. Your powers are inconsequential compared to mine.”

“Yeah, but the kid’s seen more movies.”

Iron Man fired a rocket from his shoulder which pierces the side of the ship to Maw’s right and began to suck everything out with depressurization, including Y/N. She quickly portaled herself to behind Tony, relieving herself from the binds. Maw was sucked out into space quickly. Dr. Strange was pulled loose of his bindings and the needles, also heading for the hole. The cloak quickly wrapped around Dr. Strange, trying to keep him inside. Strange and the cloak lost their grip, but Spider-Man shot a web strand, holding him in place. Or trying to.

The web broke, sending both Strange and Peter towards space. Suddenly, Peter’s suit releases metal spider-like arms, keeping him from being sucked out. Y/N quickly portaled Strange behind her.

“Yes!” Peter shouted, looking at the metal arms. “Wait, what are those?!”

Using the metal arms, Peter leaped to get to a safer place. Tony quickly sprayed nano-particles onto the hole to plug it. Spider-Man landed on his new legs, quickly retracted them. He found the cloak hovering next to him.

“Hey, we haven’t officially met,” Peter said, offering the cloak his hand. It ignored it, going straight to Strange. “Cool.”

Tony’s suit quickly disappeared back into the arc reactor as he rushed to Y/N. He grabbed onto her arms, examining her body for any injuries.

“Are you alright? Are you hurt?” He asked. Tony’s hands found a place on her cheeks. “Tell me you’re—“

“I’m fine, Tony,” she responded. “I’m fine.”

He gave her a kiss before pulling her in for a hug. “I was so worried.”

“I’m fine.” She hugged him back, breathing him in. “I’m fine.”

“We’ve gotta turn this ship around,” Strange stated.

“Yeah. Now he wants to run,” Tony replied. “Great plan.”

“No, I want to protect the Stone.”

Tony walked towards the front window, showing that they were speeding. “And I want you to thank me now. Go ahead, I’m listening.”

“For what? Nearly blasting me into space?”

“Who just saved your magical ass? Me.”

“Technically it was me,” Y/N added.

“I seriously don’t know how you fit your head into that helmet,” Strange scoffed.

“Admit it. You should have ducked out when I told you to,” Tony continued. “I tried to bench you. You refused.”

“I tried to bench your girlfriend, yet she refused as well. And, unlike everyone else in your life, I don’t work for you.”

“And due to that fact, we’re now in a flying doughnut billions of miles away from Earth with no backup.”

“I’m backup,” Peter said, raising his hand.

“No. You’re a stowaway.” Tony pointed his finger between himself and Strange. “The adults are talking.”

“I’m sorry, I’m confused as to the relationship here,” Strange said. “Wh—what is he, your ward?”

“No,” Peter responded. “I’m Peter, by the way.”

“Dr. Strange.”

“Oh, we're using our made-up names. Um... I'm Spider-Man, then."

“Peter,” Y/N muttered, rolling her eyes.

“This ship is self-correcting its course,” Tony stated. “Thing’s on autopilot.”

“Can we control it?” Strange asked, walking closer to Tony. “Fly us home.”

Tony, looking out in space, was lost in bad memories. Of going through the portal, of what Wanda showed him.

“Tony?” Y/N called softly, stepping towards him. She was concerned.

“Yeah?” He responded. He met her gaze briefly, quickly looking away cause it was not the time for him to be freaking out or for her to be reading him.

“Can you get us home?” Strange asked.

“Yeah. I heard you. I’m thinking… I’m not so sure we should.”

“What?” Y/N questioned. “Why?”

“Under no circumstance can we bring the Time Stone to Thanos,” Strange stated. “I don't think you quite understand what's at stake here.”

Tony talked over to Strange. “No. It's you who doesn't understand, that Thanos has been inside my head for six years since he sent an army to New York and now he's back! And I don't know what to do. Because I am not sacrificing Y/N for the sake of the universe, for whatever the Stones have told her is her destiny. So I'm not so sure if it's a better plan to fight him on our turf or his but you saw what they did, what they can do. At least on his turf, he's not expecting it. So I say we take the fight to him. Doctor. Do you concur?”

Strange was silent for a moment. “Alright, Stark. We go to him. But you have to understand... if it comes to saving you or the kid or the Time Stone... I will not hesitate to let either of you die. I can't, because the fate of the universe depends on it.”

“Nice. Good. Moral compass. We're straight.” Tony stepped over to Peter, formally tapping each of Peter’s shoulders. “Alright kid. You’re an Avenger now.”

“You skipped me,” Y/N said, walking up to Strange.

“Excuse me?” He questioned.

“You said that if it came between saving Tony, Peter, or the Time Stone, that you’d choose the Time Stone… but what about me?”

“You and I both know, Y/N, that the Stones will not let you die until you have completed what they need you for. No matter what that may be.”

next chapter >

PLEASE FILL FREE TO SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS AND THEORIES!

DON’T FORGET TO CHECK OUT THE QUESTIONS AND ONESHOTS ON THE MASTERLIST. MANY OF YOU HAVEN’T CHECKED OUT VALENTINE’S DAY, I SUGGEST YOU DO!

NOTES: from now on the taglist when be added by a reblog. I will reblog it using my second account, @just-dreaming-marvel-2. Just so that my main page doesn’t get too cluttered.

If you want to be added to the tag list, please dm me or send in an ask.

#tony stark x reader #bucky barnes x reader #stephen strange x reader #steve rogers x reader #the avengers x reader #avengers x reader #marvel x reader #tony stark imagine #bucky barnes imagine #marvel imagine #marvel imagines #iron man x reader #peter parker x reader #Avengers infinity war #infinity war #the infinity stones

238 notes · View notes

swan-of-sunrise · 3 years

Text

Civil War (Chapter Four)

Summary: In the aftermath of the U.N. bombing, (Y/N) receives a call from Steve and is ‘invited’ to the Joint Counter Terrorism Centre in Berlin for questioning.

Pairing: Steve Rogers X Reader

Word Count: 3k

Warnings/Disclaimers: None

A/N: I’m not too sure about this chapter, it’s all over the place and I’ve rewritten it twice so I can’t tell if it’s good or not lol thank you for reading, I hope you all enjoy!

Chapter Four (Previous Chapter)

While the paramedics finished fastening the bandage around her head, (Y/N) sat in the back of the ambulance and silently watched the chaos unfolding. A fire crew was busy hosing down the still-smoldering ruins and a medical helicopter flew overhead as different government agencies began setting up their base camps on the outskirts of the caution tape. The CIA agent who’d questioned her about the incident had informed her that a large-scale bomb had gone off next to their building, injuring over seventy people and killing twelve; she’d gone on to explain to her that if not for T’Challa’s last-minute warning, many more people would’ve perished in the blast.

Poor T’Challa, (Y/N) thought to herself with a pang of sadness. His father, King T’Chaka, had been the closest person to the blast and was killed instantly. The paramedics completed their work and she thanked them before quickly getting out of their way, knowing that there were many others who still needed to be helped. Shoving her hands into the pockets of her ash-covered blazer, she walked along the edge of the crime scene towards where she’d last seen Natasha and T’Challa; different international news reporters were documenting the tragedy and as she passed by one of them, their words almost made her stop dead in her tracks.

“Officials have released a video of a suspect who they have identified as James Buchanan Barnes, the Winter Soldier. The infamous Hydra agent, linked to numerous acts of terrorism and political assassinations…”

(Y/N) continued walking, afraid that she’d be recognized if she lingered too long, and finally sat down on an empty bench near the CIA’s base camp. Once she got over the initial shock of learning the suspected identity of the bomber, she couldn’t help but feel confused; Bucky had been on the run for over two years, ever since the Battle at the Triskellion and the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D., and there hadn’t been any sign of him since. Steve and Sam had tracked down every single lead they could find but to no avail. To her, it didn’t make much sense that after all that time, the wanted man would suddenly decide to do something as massive as bomb the United Nations.

The buzzing of her cell phone in her pocket jolted her out of her thoughts; pulling it out and glancing down at the screen, her eyes widened in recognition and she was quick to answer it. “Hello?”

“Are you hurt?”

“Um…yeah, a little. My right eardrum ruptured from the noise of the blast and my lungs feel like crap, but other than that I’m okay…” She trailed off, listening as Steve let out a shaky sigh of relief. Try as she might, memories of their recent fight came to mind but she forced aside her irritation with him as she continued. “Listen Steve, I just heard about Bucky and I-”

“You’re gonna tell me the same thing Nat did: to leave it up to the Task Force and stay home.”

She blinked, taken aback by the shortness of his tone. “Well, I think she has a point about staying out of it but what I was actually going to say is that-”

“I’m the only one who can bring him in alive, (Y/N), so that’s what I’m gonna do. I just wanted to call and tell you myself so that you didn’t believe I was hiding things from you.” Steve abruptly interrupted and after a moment of tense silence, the hard edge in his voice softened a little. “Look, I’m…take care of yourself while I’m gone, okay? Don’t forget to change that bandage of yours every few hours.”

The call disconnected as (Y/N)’s head snapped up in shock and she hurriedly scanned her surroundings, but the super-soldier was nowhere to be seen. “Bastard.”

“(Y/N)!” She looked over in time to see Natasha striding over to her, her brow furrowed in worry. “(Y/N), I just got a call from Steve a few minutes ago, and-” The spy stopped herself short as she examined her assumedly-angered expression. “I take it you got one, too.”

“Yep, and I’d rather not discuss it right now if that’s okay.”

Natasha nodded. “Fine by me, hot-shot, but we should be going; our presence has been…um, requested in Berlin. At the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre, to be precise.”

Frowning, (Y/N) stood and walked alongside her. “Our? What’s all this got to do with me?” The spy gave her a pointed look and she exhaled through her nose. “Ah, yes, my ‘association’ with Steve Rogers. They’ve guessed that he’d be the first one after Bucky and since I’m his fiancé, they want to hold me for questioning.”

“Pretty much…but there’s another reason that I’ll let Tony tell you about himself when we arrive. It was his bad idea, after all.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By that point, (Y/N) was well and truly sick of flying; they’d taken the Quinjet to the Berlin-Tegel Airport, where a car had picked them up and drove them to the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre. If her head hadn’t hurt so much and she were in a better mood, she would’ve taken the time to admire all the historical landmarks they passed by. And here I thought that week we spent dealing with Ultron was exhausting, she thought with a humorless smile, getting out of the car and walking alongside Natasha as they entered the parking garage’s elevator.

“When you’re questioned by an agent, be sure to answer as honestly as possible.” (Y/N) glanced up from her dirty sneakers and met Natasha’s serious expression. “Cooperation’s the only thing that’s gonna help Steve and Sam out right now, (Y/N). Don’t let the agent get inside your head, though; make sure that you’re the one in control of the situation, just like I’ve taught you. If I know them like I think I do, they’re gonna try and get more valuable intel out of you than just Steve’s whereabouts.”

She nodded after a brief moment of hesitation and the spy’s shoulders relaxed a little. The elevator stopped at the top floor and its doors slid open to reveal two men; one was Tony Stark, dressed stylishly in a dark-grey suit with a tense smile on his face and the other was an older man with salt-and-pepper colored hair that she didn’t recognize. The stranger stepped forward and shook Natasha’s outstretched hand. “Miss Romanoff, thank you for coming in so quickly.”

“Of course,” Natasha replied before glancing over at (Y/N). “(Y/N), this is Everett Ross, Deputy Task Force Commander of the CIA. Agent Ross, this is (Y/N) (Y/L/N).”

Agent Ross smiled and shook her hand, but (Y/N) got the distinct feeling that he was studying her expression and analyzing her behaviors. “I wish we were meeting under better circumstances, Miss (Y/L/N); my niece and nephew are big fans of your novel.”

(Y/N) murmured her thanks and followed the trio as they walked down a covered sky-way, not noticing that Tony had fallen into step beside her until he quietly asked, “How’re you holdin’ up, Austen?”

“Let’s just say that I’ve had better days.” She remarked, glancing over at the billionaire with a raised brow. “Nat mentioned something about a bad idea you wanted to run by me?”

“Oh, I have a couple of ‘em, but I’ll let you get changed before I go ahead and tell you. When I heard about the bombing, I figured that you and Romanoff would need clothes so I packed some before I left the compound.”

Touched by his thoughtfulness, (Y/N) allowed him to lead her to a private bathroom and quickly changed out of her soot-covered clothing; she felt a little bit like her usual self as she emerged from the bathroom, but the comforting feeling her change of clothes had inspired soon disappeared when the billionaire ushered her into a glass-walled conference room in the middle of what she imagined was a control room.

“Sorry if it seems like we’re sitting inside a fish bowl but this is the only place where we can talk without being overheard.” Tony sat down across from her at the long table, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest. “And I’m sorry about the civilian consultant thing, Austen. We all found out about it last night when Secretary Ross called to ask who’d decided to sign; he seemed crankier than usual when we told him that we didn’t know what you’d decided to do.”

(Y/N) rolled her eyes and leaned her elbow onto the table, resting her head in her hand with an exasperated sigh. “What, does Ross think that if I sign then that’ll make Steve suddenly change his mind and decide to sign too?”

“Pretty much…but truth be told, he’s not the only one.” Her brow rose in surprise as Tony sat forward in his chair, an uncharacteristically subdued expression on his face. “Look, (Y/N), none of us wants to see Rogers gone. The team needs him and we both know how much he needs the team, so…I was hoping that if you signed, you’d be able to convince him that he’d be doing the right thing by signing too. Once Rogers signs them, then Wilson and Maximoff should follow suit and we’d have our Earth’s Mightiest Heroes all back together again in no time. What do you think?”

“You make it sound so easy…and I wish it was, Tony. I really do.” She stood and walked over to the glass wall, her eyes trained on a large computer monitor that bore her fiancé’s photograph on a wanted poster. “But you and I also know that once Steve’s made up his mind about something it’s impossible to change it. I tried telling him that refusing to sign might put our future together in jeopardy, and do you know what he said?” Turning back around, she met the billionaire’s gaze and mirthlessly smiled. “He said that he couldn’t afford to be selfish and he left it at that.” A lump formed in her throat as she blinked away her tears and shrugged. “He respects the hell out of you, Tony, so maybe you’ll have a better change at convincing him. I’ll be there when you do, but…since I haven’t decided what I’ll do yet, I honestly don’t know how much help I’ll be.”

Just as Tony opened his mouth to reply, the glass door of the conference room slid open and none other than Sharon Carter poked her head into the room. “If you’re ready, Agent Ross would like to ask you some questions.” (Y/N) stood and spared Tony a final glance before following the agent down the hall, pointedly ignoring the jealous pang in the pit of her stomach as she did. “Romanoff mentioned that you weren’t much of a coffee drinker, so I brought you some hot chocolate instead.” She looked over to see Sharon holding out a to-go cup out towards her, a hesitant but friendly sort of smile on her face. “Might help settle your nerves before your talk with Ross.”

She accepted the beverage with a murmur of thanks and took a sip as they continued down the hall; giving the agent a sideways glance, she cleared her throat before saying, “I’m sorry about your aunt, Sharon.”

“Thank you…and thank you for everything you said in your eulogy. Actually,” Sharon stopped beside the stairwell door and gestured towards it. “We don’t have much time, but do you mind if we talk for a quick sec?” (Y/N)’s brow furrowed a little but she nodded and followed her into the stairwell, watching as she leaned back against the wall and shuffled her feet. “You meant a lot to Aunt Peggy, (Y/N), but I don’t think you know just how much she appreciated you. Back before her dementia got worse, she’d call me after her visits with Rogers and we’d talk for hours; she worried about him, always telling me that he was deliberately keeping himself from embracing his new life and that there wasn’t anything she could do to help. But then you came into his life and from what she told me, it was a night and day difference; knowing that you were there for Steve, as a friend and then as something more, gave her piece of mind. She really liked you, (Y/N), and she really respected you. I just thought that you should know that.”

“Thank you, Sharon, that…that really means a lot to me.”

The agent nodded, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable. “I would’ve told you all that after the funeral but you and Steve were sort of…well, you know…arguing. I swear I wasn’t eavesdropping, it’s just that you both were kind of loud and the cathedral has crazy-good acoustics.” (Y/N) started to reply but Sharon cut her off with a firm head shake. “You’ve got nothing to apologize for, (Y/N). I’m not exactly a fan of the Accords but just between us? I think that Steve was out of line back there.” Unsure of what to say, she nodded once and took another sip of her drink as the agent looked down at her wristwatch. “C’mon, we should get going before Ross starts looking for us.”

The two of them left the stairwell and continued down the hallway to an office; Agent Ross was seated at a desk and reading through a file, looking up from his work with a friendly smile. “Thank you, Agent 13, that’ll be all.” With one last glance, Sharon turned and left them alone. “Please, take a seat.” (Y/N) sat down in the chair across from him and crossed her leg over her knee, trying her best to remain cool and collected. “Miss (Y/L/N), we have reason to believe that Captain Rogers plans on interfering with the apprehending of the Winter Soldier; can you tell me when you last spoke to your fiancé?”

“A little over three hours ago in Vienna. He called to ask if I’d been injured during the bombing and then he warned me that he was planning on bringing in Bucky himself. That’s all he said.”

Ross nodded and gestured to the bandage wrapped around her head. “And are you okay?”

“Yes, it’s only a ruptured eardrum; the bandage is just keeping the ear from becoming infected.” (Y/N) shrugged, taking another sip of her drink before setting it down on the desk. “Truth be told, I’ve had worse.”

Nodding again, the agent picked up the open file on his desk and scanned its contents. “Yeah, it seems like you have. In March of 2014, you suffered a moderate-grade concussion, GSW on your left thigh and a severe muscle contusion on the other thigh; it also says here that you even needed an emergency blood transfusion upon arrival at the hospital.” He looked back up at her with an arched brow. “Sounds like a lot for a civilian to go through.”

(Y/N) blinked in surprise. “I-it was-”

“And according to witness statements from the Avengers, the Artificial Intelligence known as Ultron targeted you last year because of your close relationship with Steve Rogers, is that correct?” Nodding, she struggled to keep her expression neutral as her fingers began reflexively tracing along her old gunshot wound. “It looks like you were just a pawn in Ultron’s plan to break the Avengers apart, and it very nearly worked.”

Her first instinct was to snap at the agent but after recalling Natasha’s earlier warning, she swallowed her frustration and gave him a fleeting smile. “The CIA certainly cares a lot about historical fiction novelists, doesn’t it?”

Ross chuckled and leaned forward in his seat. “Only the ones engaged to rogue super-soldiers, of course. Speaking of super-soldiers, can you elaborate on the nature of your fiancé’s connection to James Barnes?”

“There’s nothing much to say that hasn’t already been said; Steve and Bucky were childhood friends who fought together during World War II and when S.H.I.E.L.D. fell, Steve and Sam tried searching for Bucky but they never found him.”

Nodding, the agent reached over and moved his computer monitor to face her; on the screen was a blurry image of a man wearing dark clothing, obviously taken from grainy security camera footage. “And is this James Barnes?”

“Yes, although I’ve only seen him in person once and this photo’s a little blurry.”

“Okay, let me see if I’ve got this straight: Steve’s old pal bombs the U.N. meeting that you, his fiancée, was attending and instead of rushing to your side like any other partner would do, he decides to leave the country to apprehend Barnes himself. Does that pretty much sum things up?” (Y/N)’s jaw clenched tightly and she stared silently at the agent in front of her, who tilted his head to the side as he considered her. “You see, the CIA knows that you and Captain Rogers are close but what we don’t know is how far you’d go to protect a man who doesn’t sound like he’s got your best interests at heart.”

Before (Y/N) could finally lose her temper, another agent poked his head into the office. “I’m sorry, Agent Ross, I know you said that you didn’t want to be disturbed but this is urgent.”

“Fine, fine…”

Ross stood and followed the agent out into the hallway, leaving the office door cracked open just far enough for her to make out some of what they were saying. “Rhodes…all of them arrested…Bucharest…ETA in less than six…”

Thank goodness they’re all right, (Y/N) thought as relief washed over her, they’ll both be charged with obstruction of justice but at least they’re alive. Some of her elation disappeared as her mind drifted back to Agent Ross’ line of questioning; Natasha was right, the CIA was taking the golden opportunity to get intel on Captain America with the knowledge that what they were doing was protected under the Sokovia Accords. The thought of being manipulated and used that way infuriated her but what angered her more was that this all stemmed from Steve’s unwillingness to consider the consequences of not signing the Accords. You’re in control here, she told herself with a calming breath, just do everything Nat told you to do and you’ll be okay…

Agent Ross reentered the office and sat back down with an expectant smile on his face. “Well, now, where were we?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: This story’s a little more challenging to write than The Winter Soldier or Age of Ultron, there’s so much angst to deal with and writing these chapters really takes a lot out of me, so any likes, reblogs and comments are really appreciated ❤️

Thank you all so much for reading and commenting, you guys are truly amazing! I’ve created a Spotify playlist inspired by this series, and I’ll be updating it every time I upload a new chapter. Enjoy!

Spotify Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4TsJ2TY1F2HDXhEYOfzCjY?si=f5f309da80a74a63

Chapter Five

Civil War Masterlist

Tagging: @mrs-obrien @lahoete @awkward117 @cminr @natdrunk @momc95 @savedbystyle @miraculouscloud @awkwardnesshabitat @marinettepotterandplagg @khuang3 @supersouthy @benakenalove @brooke0297 @hufflepeople @becausewelie @outoftheregular @supreme-tantrum @ladydmalfoy @mads-weasley @username23345 @crist1216 @aesthethickks

#stumblin' in #civil war #steve rogers x reader #captain america x reader #steve rogers #captain america #natasha romanoff #black widow #sam wilson #falcon #tony stark #iron man #sharon carter #agent 13 #everett ross #agent ross #captain america civil war #marvel cinematic universe

91 notes · View notes

pollenat · 3 years

Text

SEVENTEEN and 5 ways to say I love you

S.COUPS

Droplets of water resting on his cheeks, reflecting moonlight. The rain has surprised you on an evening walk, and right now you’re standing by the crosswalk, his arms holding the coat above your heads while he stares at the red light. You should be shivering and getting annoyed at the discomfort of wet clothes, but you can’t stop staring at his ethereal side profile.

A gentle smile blossoming on his face whenever you compliment him. It’s so powerful, you can never stare at it long enough. He may say “Of course, I know that.”, but that doesn’t make him any less happy. And when you tell him how great he is in the tough moments, Seungcheol doesn’t respond. Instead, he hides his head under your chin, where he is always welcome to regain confidence and comfort.

Kissing him goodbye when he stops the car by your house. It’s lingering, your arms embracing one another to keep it going as long as possible. Neither of you are ready to part ways, despite the late hour. His hands press at your lower back, and after long minutes of being entwined, you pull away with sadness matching his eyes. Seungcheol grabs you once again, for one last kiss, and then finally lets go, his eyes following you until you disappear inside.

Taking a step back when his voice raises. It’s different - an irritating blaring alarm compared to the sweetness of his usual tone. His eyes are also strange. So stark, you feel the pain they’re meant to inflict. But the hurt doesn’t make you close in on yourself. Instead, it’s like a log to your fire. You need to stand up to it, fuel the useless aggression, even if it will burn you in the end.

Carefully spreading the blues of a face mask on his face. His eyes are closed, and open only when you can’t stop yourself from laughing any longer. “What’s so funny?” you genuinely want to explain, but another look at the numerous pigtails sticking out in different directions forces you to hide in one of his shoulders. “What did you do to my face?” his question is trying to be humorous, but the terror is all too evident in it.

JEONGHAN

The sight of snow covering every surface possible. His voice when he complains about the cold. The redness of his nose poking above the scarf you’re tying around his neck. “You’re being embarrassing.”, but Jeonghan fails at hiding his smile behind the material. He doesn’t know his eyes are betraying him. “Yeah I know”, you answer him, now indifferent to the teasing.

Tired smile decorating his face when he visits you in the evening of your birthday. Training clothes crumpled, hair a mess, shoelaces untied and tucked into the sides. You tell him he didn’t have to, he’s done enough for you and needs rest. But truth be told, you’re selfishly happy to have him here. “If it’s for you, I don’t mind giving up few hours of sleep.” he says with calm certainty.

The times you have to wait for him to acknowledge you because of a petty fight. He’s not the person to back down from one, and you sometimes feel like pulling your fingers out from the amount of frustration you’re going through. You know he’ll eventually relent, let you in, lock you in a tight embrace, if only to ask why didn’t you say anything sooner. You’ll want to pick up the fight again, but what for?

Pieces of clothing he deliberately leaves at your place, so he can tease you whenever you put them on. “I was wondering where it disappeared.” “But you-” “It’s okay. I know how good I smell.” “Jeonghan-” “Shh, you can hold on to it for now.” As much as you want to argue, you end the fight with an angry sigh.

The smell of grass during a sunny day. Tree bark imprinting itself on your back, and Jeonghan’s head weighing down your thigh, his breath calm. There’s no doubt - he’s asleep. The guy could doze off anywhere. Somewhere in the back, a guitarist is playing for tips, light melody mixing with distant chatter. Your hands put away the book, tired of holding it in the air. Instead, you let the strands of Jeonghan’s hair entertain you.

JOSHUA

The cheesiness of slow-dancing in a room illuminated by the moon only. A song you came to like is playing, and Joshua’s voice joins the singer every now and then, before he stops himself. You’d rather listen to him singing. He laughs at the idea. “Don’t be cheesy!” but he can be?

Helping him fix his tie and collar before going to theater. His chin is pointing upwards, but his eyes are set on your face. You aren’t sure what he’s looking for, and the constant observation makes you self-conscious. “Why are you staring at me?” the question makes him smile. You take note of that, but remain busy with the tie. “Just admiring my beautiful plus one.”

Sitting by the table, him in front of you. It’s night time, and you’re both tired. It’s crazy how despite a hectic day, Joshua has managed to make you dinner. “Oh, this? It’s nothing!” was what he said after putting the plates of a complicated dish down. You can’t help, but smile to yourself in silence. Joshua’s foot nudges your underneath the table, and you look up to see him frowning questioningly. “It’s delicious.” has him smiling proudly.

The movie being just a background noise, neither of you interested in what it has to present. Not when you’re cuddled on the sofa, almost (!) sleeping. Joshua has his head tucked under your jaw. His breathing is regular and warm on your neck.Your fingers get tangled in the longer hairs on the top of his head. Eyes finally closing, the last thing you register is the characteristic smell of his shampoo.

Seeing his shoulders closing in on him. Head down, eyes empty, lips shut tight. Your approaching footsteps have no effect on his stature. He’s sitting still in his pose. A hand on his shoulder ends up shaken off. Words directed at him earn no response. After what feels like forever of standing dumbfounded by his side, you take a step back and leave him be. Maybe he needs space. Maybe he will call for you when he’s ready. Maybe, maybe, maybe. One thing is sure - you do feel a little hurt by rejection.

JUN

The weight of his hand on your shoulder when you’re standing in a crowded space. It’s a bit suffocating, you can’t lie. Having Junhui’s protective arm embracing you forces your attention to focus on his presence instead. He can’t bring himself to look at you, sure you’ll tease him. Still, he can feel your admiring glances. “I know, I’m very chivalrous.” leaves his mouth before he can bite his tongue. “Don’t ruin the moment.” “Okay.”

Kissing your forehead numerous times when he notices it’s warm. His jumper is already on your chest, shyly given earlier after you commented the weather. Jun’s cold hand rests on your cheek to check its temperature too. After one last peck he finally declares “You have a fever.” in a bewildered tone.

Opening your phone’s gallery to twenty new selfies that Junhui has taken when you weren’t nearby. They’re almost all the same, but you can’t bring yourself to delete any. Even if it means he gets teasing material. “Obviously, I’m just too good-looking, right babe?” “Oh my god, yes you are, Junhui.” “Exactly.”

A noodle hanging from his mouth, and the suggestive wiggle of his eyebrows. You think of the scene that the two of you saw the day before - the connection is obvious. Jun smiles when you hesitate to follow his lead, proud to bring your cheeks the warmth of embarrassment. Then he chokes on the noodle, because you decided to strike back and take the other end in your mouth. As if he was the only one allowed to tease in your relationship.

How odd it is to see him indifferent and actually nervous around you. There’s a fear that it might’ve cemented the incoming end of your relationship. That maybe he wants nothing more to do with you. But Jun’s train of thoughts is far away from the breakup sphere, rather unsure how to make things normal again. It’s only a matter of time, right? And why are you just as strange about everything as him?

HOSHI

Sharing a blanket with each other on the cold wooden boards, your group of friends seated in a circle, as you take turns telling scary stories. Your and Soonyoung’s terrified glances meet every now and then, before he leans on your chest so you can lock hands over his shoulder protectively. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep you safe.” His giggles at your promise score you numerous scolding looks.

You’re not the first one to notice him. Once his silhouette comes into your view, he’s already jumping in place, flailing his arms in the air for attention. A big smile spreads across his face, pushing his eyes almost shut. Soonyoung mouths something, but you can’t read his lips at all. Then he starts running towards you with arms wide open for embrace. Laughing, you do the same. It is embarrassing, but your suffering ends as soon as your face can hide in his neck.

Spoons of your meal disappearing in his mouth, although his half-finished own is resting right next to it. After five pointed glances, you give up to watch him full-time instead. Soonyoung is clearly enjoying his food. “Why are you not eating?” “I’m full already.” “You and your small stomach!” Him and his big stomach!

The collection of old Halloween couple costume’s you’ve collected over the years. Each worn just once, each as memorable as the previous one. Soonyoung throws himself at the mountain of colorful materials, his lips pouting. “You want to get rid of them? Our memories?!” “They’re taking up too much space.” He groans disgusted. “So?” “Get off and help me pack them.” “Make me!”

His sad eyes following your every move as you walk around the room gathering things. There’s a stark contrast between his watery gaze, and your angry stare. Every few seconds he starts senseless sentences, more a product of desperation than solid argumentation. And then you leave him alone, to get lost in his sad thoughts, to wonder what could’ve been done to avoid the conflict altogether.

WONWOO

Eardrum-bursting noise of speeding cars. You flinch in your spot, then shoot a glare to the man that accidentally sat on remote control. “Wonwoo!” He smiles apologetically once you point out the volume. Sighing, you pick up the phone. Its clock reads 2 a.m, but even the realization doesn’t make you tired. “One more mission, come on!”

No matter when and where you’ve agreed to meet, he’s always the first one to appear. It’s not the nicest feeling - being always waited for - but Wonwoo rejects your attempts at confrontation. He says he’s used to it and prefers things that way. Why worry your head, when it’s all figured out. He doesn’t know that you know that he’s very particular about being the first one everywhere. Talk about chivalry.

The avoidance of physical contact. Yes, you are in a disagreement. Yes, some feelings were hurt. Yes, both of you are mad. The tension is thick, waiting for a knife sharp enough to cut through it. Tired of frowning, you reach for the rock you can always lean on, but the rock moves. You’re pushed away without him pushing, and at that moment the word hurt is redefined.

Summery evening spent by a lake. There’s a picnic table, usually posing nude with its graffiti, today dressed in a checkered cloth. A basket of half-finished lunch rests above all, closed, hopefully keeping the fruit away from insects. You watch another stone skipping the surface of calm water. It’s not a record-breaker, but you still cheer for Wonwoo. Sunset glances off of his glasses when he turns to look back.

Going through the pictures you ordered. A large frame is placed on the other end of the table, the blankness waiting for colors. But it’s been hours, and aside from leaning over the pictured memories, no collection has been decided. Wonwoo’s hand closes over yours when you hand him a particularly funny photograph. His deep hum resonates in appreciation.

WOOZI

The look of bewilderment he puts on when your hand offers him a spoonful of food. You don’t mind the public, only nod at him in encouragement, and although shy, he accepts the offering. “Please, stop doing that.” “I can’t hear you because this stew is so amazingly delicious! You should have a taste once more!” Another spoon glares at him under your innocent gaze.

Hugging him tightly as you’re waiting for sleep to take over. The duvet is too cold for your liking, and Jihoon offers the only source of warmth you accept. You know that in the morning you’ll wake up separated, but for now you plan on enjoying being so close to him. Every now and then he leaves lingering kisses on your forehead without saying a word.

The deepness of bass syncing with your heartbeat. Jihoon is facing away from you, propped on his locked hands and gazing at the computer screen. He always closes off to focus on analyzing his tracks. As much as you want to remain silent and follow his lead, you’re convinced you’ve heard the same tune before. Then you recognize it from Jihoon’s humming a week prior.

His tear-strained face after a big argument. You’re shocked to see him so broken, and all the anger that’s been boiling your blood disappears. Jihoon accepts the embrace, his arms closing on you tightly, as he whispers “Don’t argue with me anymore, please. I don’t want you to leave”.

The day you run up the stairs to his apartment. The neighbors nod at you in mute greetings, all offering smaller or bigger smiles. Your fingers quickly put a memorized code in. The front door opens after you press the handle. There’s a pair of slippers already waiting. Jihoon walks into the hallway to welcome you. His hair is still wet from the shower.

The annoyingly omittable grocery store playlists. They’re so subtle in their existence, you hum, but never remember exactly which melody. That is unless that song comes on. Seokmin who’s been pulling the cart from the side, turns to face you with a knowing smile. “Please, not here.” you ask, but Seokmin just turns away and begins singing along. People look, and you’re both extremely embarrassed and eager to listen to his voice more.

Instead of being angry, like you are, he’s sad. Misery written all over his infuriatingly beautiful face. It’s petty to continue attacking him with hurtful words. The ammo you’ve loaded now just a steam coming from na overheated gun. Seokmin doesn’t speak. He’s silent. It’s as if you’re the only one who can decide when will all the arguing end.

Finding a birthday gift a week before. Seokmin is terrible at hiding things meant for you, and although you’re itching to ask him “Your underwear drawer? Really?” you act as if nothing ever happened. Even if your fun was ruined, you do not wish him the same. He genuinely believes your act of surprise later.

Sitting chest to chest, legs around one another, while you’re brushing his hair. He doesn’t shy away from admitting that this tradition is his favorite one. That’s why you run comb through his locks for way too long, to keep him close, and bask in the familiarity of it all. When your eyes fall down, they always catch his big ones, patiently waiting for you to finish, and gift him a kiss.

A surprise backhug when you’re washing the dishes. Seokmin should be drying them off with a towel, but some time ago he abandoned the task, He’s always been quick to lose interest. His head rests on your shoulder, voice impatiently asking when will it be over. You want to laugh at him. Tell him to get back to work. But then again - you’re enjoying the warmth he’s radiating. Like fire in a chimney.

MINGYU

Styling his hair after he has left the shower. Mingyu giggles hysterically as you put finishing touches to his mohawk. “You could be a punk rock guitarist.” his canines come into full display at the comment. Later he tells you to make him a greaser, with a carefully twisted lock of hair falling down his forehead.

A letter he has written when he realized things weren’t completely alright with you at the moment. A collection of words that to you make much more sense than to any other person. The letter itself can’t take the weight off of your shoulders, but the gentleness of his words, the constant encouragement, and the amount of love confessions do give you a new feeling, this time - a good one.

The giddiness when you know you’ll see him a matter of minutes. And as soon as you do, a smile breaks out, because how can it not? His is similar, just as full of warmth as yours. The only things warmer than it are his welcoming embrace and your cheeks rubbing. “I’ve been waiting for you for so long! You’re not late? Well, I was still waiting to see you!”

The warmest and securest of embraces he offers at any time of the day. Mingyu may be busy and still take a moment to hug you when things don’t feel quite right. Just a look, a pout, a sigh, a call of his name, or a hand on his shoulder - Mingyu drops whatever it is he’s doing and opens his arms. Most times, as an added bonus, he offers you quick pecks of pure honey. Anywhere he can reach.

Sneaking hands into one another’s sleeves when the weather is cold. It may not be the smartest move, because there’s not much two adults merged in a pose like that can do. Mingyu giggles at the feeling of your ice cold fingers grabbing his arms, meanwhile almost jumping away from you. Only the hold you have on his limbs stops him from parting ways. “You’re too cold! I didn’t sign up for this!” “You’re supposed to warm my hands, so stop complaining!”

THE8

The warmth of his arm as the two you huddle in front of a painting in the museum. Minghao‘s telling you what he thought of when he saw it for the first time. Then he encourages you to share your opinion. His eyes look genuinely curious. “I didn’t think of it like that!”, but you doubt his words. Still, it feels nice to be appreciated and listened to.

His tendency to fall silent in the middle of argument that does nothing to cease your annoyance. In the back of your mind a voice is telling you that it went too far, and you should follow suit, but the wind’s silence can never extinguish a raging fire. Blinded by rage, you throw the book you were holding on the ground, turn around and storm off, ignoring his voice calling your name. “Stop being childish!” annoys you only more.

The first thing you notice while falling into his arms being his perfume. It’s so rich, and so his, you feel safe and right in place before you can sense the plush of his flesh under fingertips. Minghao giggles at your strengthening grip. His ears pick up on your sniffing and after some time of letting you soak in his presence, he makes you look him in the eyes. You can’t argue - who would reject a kiss of adoration from a man like that?

Sharing a piece of cake in a cafe. It’s a red velvet, with strawberries on the side. There’re no words being exchanged, you just steal small smiles in each other’s direction. The cake disappears slowly, each spoon frugal and shy. It’s not that you can’t afford another one. The cake is an object of sentiment - something shared between two close people.

The delicateness of his fingertip on your upper cheek. It swipes to the side and (sadly) leaves. Minghao’s eyes follow his thumb as he transports a lost eyelash to the front of your lips. “Make a wish.” he says with a gentle smile. Heart fluttering, you struggle to glue together a proper plead. It’s the first dream that came up and you have nothing better to offer. Then you blow the eyelash into the air. Please world, make it happen.

SEUNGKWAN

Trivial words that hurt like a stabbing knife. Now, instead of blood, they’re a source of all-consuming guilt. Even if the argument was mutual, you want to take everything back, because the present feels empty without Seungkwan. Your phone lights up with a message before you can drown yourself in sorrow. “We’ll talk tomorrow.” and tomorrow you hope to see him.

A band-aid that’s turned useless, but cannot be taken off. It’s what remains of Seungkwan’s touch, before he left for work overseas. The material is dirty, and sticking out at ends, and you should just get rid off it, because it’s a stupid reason to hold on to. Yet here you are - just pressing it down every five minutes in silent acceptance.

Poking your head into the hallway. TV is playing in the background, but a singing voice breaks through the noise. You smile in recognition and slowly make your way forward, towards the bathroom door. Seungkwan is in the middle of a shower. Happy to catch him off-guard, you sit down by the wall and listen. No plead is enough to make him sing consciously in your presence.

The melted chocolate you forgot to hide in the fridge. Seungkwan is scowling at his fingertips, sunk in the dark brown smudge. From his eyes alone you can tell he’s about to start scowling you. “Don’t be such a baby! Just go wash them!” He’s about to argue, but you push him out of the kitchen. “We wasted perfectly good chocolate!” We? That’s a first. Although he left, you hear him smacking lips. Seungkwan couldn’t allow the sweets to just waste.

An empty sofa to your side. A soft rug in front of you. Pillows thrown around the room. And yet, you and him are sitting huddled on the armchair, something designed for one (1) user. Seungkwan has his head lying on your shoulder. You’re too engrossed in TV to notice his lack of attention to the show. With passing moments his mouth moves closer to your neck, eyes on your side profile, hands on your hip.

VERNON

Seeing him in a badly sewn beanie that you wouldn’t have given to him if he hadn’t found it in your kitchen cupboard. It’s a mess of unfinished threads and misplaced crosses. Still, Vernon assures you that he loves it. “I look pretty cool in it, right?”, the earnest smile put on display. You look for the signal of a lie, but between the messy fringe, and the perfect pearls on display, you can’t find even a trace of it.

The moment he pulls away for a breather, his eyes hooded, lips swollen. It’s afternoon, though you do not care about the time. You marvel at the shadows, dancing with purple light on his face, but can only take a mental picture. His mouth is quick to return to yours, hands right behind it. The buckle of your belt clings with the button of his jeans.

Standing on a beach during a cold afternoon. The wind plays with whatever it can touch - waves, strands of hair, the lightest grains of sand. Above the howls you can hear Vernon’s breathing. He doesn’t say anything, maybe listening to the same things as you, maybe thinking about the things beyond. But his presence triumphs over the coldness.

The feeling of being watched that pops up randomly. Always with him, always when he’s sure you’re too busy to notice, always without a word spoken, always in your peripheral vision. You can’t tell whether he just gets lost in thoughts or is admiring you, but you never point it out. Others do it for you.

The buzz of adrenaline surging through your veins when he closes the door behind him. He’s mad, but doesn’t use the piece of wood to have the last sound. He rarely raises his voice, never shows anger through strength, never takes it out on the inanimated objects. The observation instantly causes you to miss him. But you can’t decide which feeling you should listen to - fresh anger, or even fresher loneliness.

CHAN

His voice reaching your ears through the phone every night, without a day off. Sometimes it’s tired, sometimes excited, but always there. He protests whenever you tell him to just hang up and go rest. “Don’t you want to talk with me?” “Of course I do. But you sound sleepy.” “Just five more minutes!” A long silence, and then a sigh. “Alright.”

The times when the only source of comfort he accepts is your embrace. You’re lying on the couch, arms opened for his frowning face. Not a full second passes, and he’s placed on top of you, nose in the crook of your neck, hands on your sides, legs digging underneath yours. Questions are avoided with simple I missed you’s.

Collecting tears down his jawline. Offered hug is rejected, but his pushing hands are weak, unsure in their movement. You can read him like a book, though you do not admit that aloud. He wants you to stay and comfort him. Cling to him despite his attempts at rejection. Chan sniffles. This time when your arms circle him, he does nothing to stop them.

The embarrassment you have to bite down. You’re just as flattered, but the latter feeling is much easier to hide. People are watching, some giggling, honestly enjoying the show, some are feeling for the position you’re put in. Chan is still smiling widely, his pupils full of adoration. Too scared to do anything else, you decide to hide in his arms, already opened for an embrace. He’s the best type of both lovely and shameless.

Skipping down the stone stairs hand in hand. The rain has made a prompt run to shelter out of your slow afternoon walk. Suddenly, you can feel his fingers pulling at yours. Not down the stairs, but to his side. Chan slips. It’s a split second, somehow long enough to push heart up your throat. He manages to lean on the other leg to regain balance. Again, for a moment. Chan jumps down the last few stairs, straight into a puddle of rain water, successfully spraying you with the small tidal wave created from the impact. “I’m sorry!” but he laughs, so is he really?

➛ pollenat’s list of reactions

➛ pollenat’s list of shorts

#yes i made another 5 ways to say i love you and what about it?#seventeen fanfic #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagines #seventeen fluff #seventeen reactions #svt fanfic #svt scenarios #svt imagines #svt fluff #svt reactions #kpop fanfic #kpop imagines #kpop fluff #kpop reactions

218 notes · View notes

9worldstales · 3 years

Text

MCU Loki Ep 4 “Nexus Event” intensive analysis

Okay, new episode which is, thankfully, kind of better than the previous. But let’s start with order.

So we’ll start with Asgard, only we aren’t told it’s Asgard nor in which year we are. I hope the fact we aren’t told the year is meaningful, because otherwise it’s just lazy.

We see a child Sylvie playing with toy dragon and toy Valkyrie when Renslayer, at the time a young hunter and other hunters get there to capture her. We don’t know what little Sylvie did wrong. As far as we know she had no magic so, unless she actually did have magic and her adult version didn’t know, it’s not like she was a male Loki who shapeshift into a female so this can be her Nexus event.

She’s just a child playing.

Whatever, Renslayer and the others didn’t care she’s a child, they decide she’s the Variant they were hunting, grabs her and take her away.

At the TVA Renslayer holds her for her arm in what should be an uncomfortable grip for poor Sylvie and doesn’t even look at her or tries to reassure her in any way.

I remember, when we saw all this being done to Loki, wondering if the series would dig into police brutality. Sylvie sees a man getting dragged in, she’s scare she asks for someone to help the man, no one cares. She goes through the same routine Loki went through at the TVA. Mercifully we don’t see her being left naked but we see her being forced to wear the TVA prison uniform for Variants.

For all the people who though what Loki went through was funny and the TVA was justified in doing it, now I want you to look well at what they’re doing at this poor child. It’s the same thing. Is it still funny? Do they still lokk like the good guys.

She’s scared and, as far as she know, she did nothing wrong and, despite her young age, no one is showing her any sympathy.

She’s guilty of the same crime Loki committed, ‘crimes against the Sacred Timeline’. She’s handled the same. If you justified or excused or agreed with what was done to Loki for ‘crimes against the Sacred Timeline’, you were agreeing to what is happening to her now.

Being stripped of her rights, handled like an object for a crime she had no intention or idea she had committed because it was made up by some unknown authority.

Once in front of the judge Sylvie manages to escape to Renslayer’s grip and steal her tempad.

Now, I can excuse the escaping and also the stealing. Maybe Renslayer is inexperienced and maybe she didn’t expect dangers from such a young child but how did she figured she has to steal the tempad and how to use it?

Up till now how Renslayer has used the Tempad for was to recognize her as the Variant they were searching for. She shouldn’t know it’s the Tempad which opens the Timedoors or how to work it. Sure, we can assume it’s really easy to use it but it still makes no sense she knows she has to use it to open the timedoors.

Whatever, Renslayer remains frozen on the spot when little Sylvie escapes and I can wonder if she felt a bit of sympathy for her… only the scene is kinda weird because she looked angry and ready to strike when the Sylvie stomped on her feet so this sudden sympathy when she’s about to escape is out of place. They just stare at each other, NO ONE making an attempt to grab Sylvie before Sylvie escape through the timedoor which, differently from how it had done with Loki in Episode 2, immediately close behind her.

The scene switches to Renslayer who has her eyes closed as if this was her memory.

She then opens them and enter through a golden door, supposedly going to see the Time-Keepers.

We get a glimpse to the Time-Keepers and then the title.

In the next scene the door opens and Renslayer marches out of it, Mobius confirming she went to see the Time-Keepers. He asks her how she feels and she says she’s not well because she had to meet the Time-Keepers in a bad situation and it’s stressing enough to meet them when everything goes well so this is really terrible.

Now… I don’t know. Later in the episode it’ll turn out the Time-Keepers are fake so… didn’t she know? Is she pretending to be stressed for Mobius’ benefit?

She says the Time-Keepers are blaming her for the situation and for how Sylvie and Loki escaped. She doesn’t mention Loki tried to stop Sylvie from meeting the Time-Keepers.

In short although Loki tried to stop Sylvie and used the Tempad to escape only when Renslayer tried to kill them both, through the whole episode they’ll handle him as if he tried to escape with her or worse help her to kill the Time-Keepers.

Renslayers remarks how

The Time-Keepers are all that stand between us and full-scale calamity.

…basically fuelling their own Time-Keepers cult.

Mobius though is more interested in talking with C-20 but Renslayer, with a tragic performance, tells him she’s dead because when she was enchanted this scrambled her mind and basically she began to decline till death. Tissues anyone?

Even Mobius feels a slight scent of b*llsh*t at this story since C-20 seemed fine when he brought her back to the TVA but since he trusts Renslayer he swallows it.

Poor C-20 clearly either got pruned or reset, somehow they didn’t decide to make the smart thing and re-brainwash her, but just preferred to kill her off.

Renslayer persuades Mobius to keep C-20’s death a secret so as not to create panic.

By the way, NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT THE BOMBED TIMELINE AND NO ONE WILL TALK ABOUT IT LATER ON. It felt like the bombed timeline was merely something they did in Ep 2 to distract TVA and the viewers so that Sylvie could sneak in but nothing serious since it gets dropped so easily which is beyond disappointing. I mean, in Ep 2 it seemed to be such a huge problem and now… it’s nothing. All solved, all forgotten, just some extra work done in a short time.

Apparently, resetting the timeline in god knows how many points did nothing.

Really, that feel more like a dropped plot point or a plot hole than anything else.

For all that’s worth I find the acting between Mobius and Renslayer good. Every actor is working really hard in this series and I feel bad if it were to get lost into plot contrivances and plot holes.

Back to the story Renslayer pressures Mobius into tracking Sylvie and Loki.

The scene switches back to Lamentis. A lot more meteorites are falling but none of them close to Loki and Sylvie.

Sylvie is sit on a stone. Loki reaches her and apologizes. Because this episode wants him to be a narcissist but he again shows empathy to her.

Sylvie opens up to him, talking with him about her life.

Now is what Loki said about love being a dagger is something that’s not profound and pompous what about this that Sylvie says?

The universe wants to break free, so it manifests chaos. Like me being born the Goddess of Mischief.

It’s completely her speculation and gives her a sense of grandiosity. SHE’S IN A MISSION FOR THE UNIVERSE! THE UNIVERSE WANTS IT!

Don’t take me wrong, the TVA is keeping everyone prisoner but the universe didn’t create the Loki so as they could become its saviours.

We continue with Sylvie story. We’re supposed to swallow not only she figured the Tempad could open timedoor and how it worked but also how to recharge it and how to escape the TVA despite their many attempts to get her. Sylvie, who was already amazing for teaching herself how to enchant people, is set up to be even more amazing as she’s basically teaching herself everything and escaping from the TVA by centuries from when she was a young kid.

Who’s Tony Stark compared to her?

If this were to be a fanfic we would call her a Mary Sue or a Gary Stu.

She’s simply so awesome it doesn’t seem realistic for no reason at all especially compared to the other Loki Variant with her.

As Waldron is not a young girl writing for free I fear nobody will dare tell him he created a Mary Sue and people will only praise him for the oh so competent Sylvie.

And mind you, we need characters like Sylvie, who’re very competent.

Characters who’re sex fluid and bisexual and with a woman body and can still be strong and competent and above others… but the whole thing feels forced because she’s too good without a logic behind it, from figuring out it’s the Tempad that opens time door without never seeing it to do, to successfully escaping the TVA for so long.

When Loki managed to steal the Time Twister and use it, he has seen it being used previously more than once so it made sense he could use it and he had, to figure out how it worked, all the time Mobius spent discussing with B-15.

It made him smart to realize he could use it and he used it in a clever way but it wasn’t unbelievable because he had a grasp of how it worked, of what it could do.

Sylvie only saw it being used to identify her yet she guessed it was the thing that opened the Timedoors and how to make it work despite the Tempad having more than one function in basically a moment.

Then, although she apparently keeps on causing Nexus events everywhere she goes, she always manages to be one step ahead the TVA, escaping their grasp and, in all this, she also managed to recharge the Tempad using amazing power sources where Loki supposedly has no idea how it’s done. She fed herself, she learnt how to fight, she got herself a sword, she learn enchantment without having any basis whatsoever…

She’s the ‘superior Loki’ in a way, but why she should be superior to all the other Loki is absolutely random.

Anyway she says she grew up among ‘ends of the worlds’ and she will die in one of them, all while the scenery around them didn’t seem apocalyptic but romantic.

And mind you, the visual is really pretty but I feel the romance is misplaced, unnecessary.

And I’m still not sold in how they’re representing the moon.

Meanwhile Mobius is searching for them or better for a Nexus event that will lead him to them.

B-15, who hates variants, suggests they’re gone planning their next massacre… which isn’t true but if it were… can you blame them when you were the one who wanted to kill them in the first place and humiliated and belittled them? Should they have thanked you for your mistreatment?

She then asks about C-20 and Mobius says he has none so, worriedly, B-15 tries to urge him to… do something.

We go back to Loki and Sylvie and to the moon conveniently crumbling above them and yet not hitting them with them perfectly calm and enjoying the show.

Sylvie starts getting depressed.

Sylvie: Not long now. Do you think that what makes a Loki a Loki is the fact that we're destined to lose?

So okay, she feels she has lost but this is kind of a big leap. I mean, if the fact Loki was destined to lose is what made him Loki… then Thanos is Loki and Obadiah Stane is Loki and Red Skull is Loki and Killmongrel is Loki and so on.

Loki counters with something… interesting.

Loki: No. We may lose. Sometimes painfully. But we don’t die. We survive. I mean, you did. You were just a child when the TVA took you, but you nearly took down the organization that claims to govern the order of time. You did it on your own. You ran rings around them. You’re amazing!

Okay… so he knows he died in the sacred timeline. What’s his basis for saying they don’t die? The fact he survived to the wormhole? When he specifically wanted to die? Or that he survived through Thanos? Is the series ever going to touch that or we should pretend it never happened and Loki had a nice holiday with him?

Or a Time Charge hit the timeline in that point and erased that year Loki spent with Thanos?

Whatever, Loki is now busy admiring Sylvie for her efforts and being supportive… but it seems Marvel doesn’t want to count this as him being empathic and supportive with another being because she’s Loki… only episode 3 and the beginning of episode 4 went to great lengths to establish she’s not and hey, technically episode 3 is right in this.

I’ll point it out here and not later on because it’s probably important to discuss it immediately as it’ll come up later on a lot.

The identity of a person is made up by nature and nurture. Part of you is what you physically are, your genetic code that decide if you’re black or white, male or female or something else, human or a horse, tall or short, healthy or sick.

What you are will dictate part of what you will experience so it has a huge impact on you as it will decide part of your skills and part of your weaknesses.

Then, of course, there’s nurture.

Let’s pick twins. It’s worth to mention not all the identical twins share EXACTLY the same DNA because recent studies have proved mutation occurs in around the 15% of identical twins.

It’s also worth to mention that nurture begins really early. Even if we assume the two managed to keep the same genetic code, during development in the womb one twin might not receive the same amount of nutrients and this might affect his development.

And nurture will continue to affect them as they can even experience similar things (same parents, same house, same school) but there will be always differences that will end up affecting them.

Each twin is his own person, they’re not the same.

So now, Loki and Sylvie.

They’re clearly genetically not the same. What’s more we’ll see at the end there’s even a black Loki so basically this series doesn’t require the same genetic code for a Loki to be a Loki. So nature isn’t relevant here.

What about nurture?

We just learnt Sylvie’s story is completely different from Loki.

As a result her powers are different from his own. Her skillsets, her reactions, her temper is different from his own. She has different goals and different wants. As Sophia Di Martino said, she’s Sylvie, not Loki.

She’s as different from him as another person could be.

To me she even looked more like Thor than Loki.

So really, how’s self admiration when she’s actually not him? The only way for it to be self admiration would be if Loki isn’t admiring her for her own accomplishment, but just because he was told she’s him. But in this case he wouldn’t have been babbling for ours about who’s the lesser Loki.

If all Lokis are made equal in his eyes and worth his admiration because Loki then there’s no point to discuss who among them is better.

In short it’s a damn mess.

Anyway Sylvie touches Loki and he’s kind of surprised, in fact he looks at his arm.

In “Thor” the touch of a Frost Giant could turn Loki into his original look but we know Sylvie has touched Loki already when she tried to enchant him and that’s not the problem.

I wish the trick were she has enchanted him but later Mobius will say the problem is that they had started swooning on each other which opens a huge can of worms but we’ll discuss them later.

So now back to Mobius we go and to the timeline which begins to branch, signalling problems on Lamentis 1.

We return to Loki who raises his eyes from his arm and he and Sylvie look at each other for a moment before returning to pay attention to the show of meteorites falling closer. They turn again to look at each other, holding hands this time and smiling.

Back to Mobius we go and to how the branching timeline seems to go on a perpendicular line rather quickly. It impresses Mobius as it’s apparently an unheard event.

Back to Loki and Sylvie we go and to how two TimeDoor open in front of them.

We don’t know if they jumped through them to survive or if the TVA came out, grabbed them and dragged them through and it doesn’t matter.

In the next scene we see that both Sylvie and Loki are collared, held by guard as they struggle and escorted through the corridors of the TVA, Mobius leading them.

They’re then parted and when this happens they look at each other.

As they walk Mobius begins to talk with Loki. Evidently Mobius has no idea that Loki had been trying to stop Sylvie when they were at the TVA and works on the assumption they were accomplices. Maybe. It’s not really clear on which assumption Mobius is working.

Loki accuses him to have betrayed him and Mobius counters it’s Loki who betrayed him.

Actually they’re both wrong, Mobius more than Loki.

For a betrayal to happen, there needs to be a break of trust.

Now, in regard to Loki, trusting Mobius was a mistake. Mobius picked him up from the trial because he needed him for a use and was never honest with him.

Meeting the Time-Keepers? Mobius can’t met them himself, how could he help Loki meeting them?

But whatever, Loki apparently trusted him so I take he feels betrayed by how Mobius had him arrested when he actually didn’t betray Mobius. He tried stopping Sylvie, he tried capturing her, he ended on Lamentis 1 because Renslayer tried to kill them both, he didn’t cause the timeline to branch on purpose, for most of his permanence on Lamentis 1 he wanted to leave the planet and stick to his own plan to bring Sylvie back to the TVA.

So Mobius arresting him clearly feels an act of betrayal to Loki. He doesn’t know Renslayer didn’t report he tried to stop Sylvie and the fact Mobius didn’t trust him to do what he was supposed to but handled him like a criminal likely hurt.

But, as I said before, for all Mobius can say, he’s not his friend, he’s not someone who would trust and support him, Mobius cares about the TVA.

And Mobius feel betrayed because he thinks Loki plotted against the TVA with Sylvie.

This is wrong for two reasons, the first and most obvious being that Loki didn’t plot with her, the second being that, although Loki seemed to have missed it, he was working with Mobius under coercion. The TVA wanted to prune him, Mobius saved him but in exchange Loki had to make himself useful. This was made clear in episode 2 as well. Mobius said if using Loki didn’t work he would delete him himself and he made Loki sure this was his last chance (before being deleted) and that he had to work to make himself useful while Mobius went and have lunch.

You aren’t entitled to expect genuine loyalty from someone when you tell them ‘if you don’t give me what I want I’ll kill you’. I hope no one has forgotten this little talk from episode 2:

Mobius: This is the final step. Your last chance.

Loki: Oh, and what does my desperate last chance require?

Mobius: Work.

Loki: Work?

Mobius: I need you to go over each and every one of the Variant's case files, and then, give me your... How do I put it? Your unique Loki perspective. And who knows? Maybe there's something that we missed.

Loki: Well, you're idiots. I suspect you probably missed a lot.

Mobius: That's why I'm lucky I got ya for a little bit longer. Let me park ya at this desk. And don't be afraid to really lean into this work. Here's a good trick for you. Pretend your life depends on it. I'm gonna get a snack.

Mobius made really clear if Loki didn’t give him what he wants he’s a dead man.

For some weird reasons Loki decided to still be loyal to him (okay, so he wanted to get to the Time-Keepers and might suffer of Stockholm syndrome), but the most logical thing, as many had pointed out, was escape from the TVA first chance he were to get as Sylvie has been doing.

Now… to be honest there are situations in which you could ask this from another.

If Mobius had told Loki ‘Sorry, I know this is unfair and I want to help you but I can’t do more or I’ll get killed too. So I’ll protect you but I’ve to ask you to protect me as well by putting up with this.’

This though would have required Mobius to prioritize Loki’s survival and consider the fact he needed Loki to catch the Variant as an excuse to keep Loki alive.

That’s not the case, Mobius made clear although he has sympathy for Loki, he prioritizes catching the Variant. He didn’t suffer any repercussion when things went wrong.

He’s absolutely safe, his only risk comes from the Variant but this was the same even prior to Loki getting involved.

Mobius is using Loki and, in exchange for using him, he let him enjoy the benefit of being alive, albeit belittled by others around him. As I said talking about Episode 2, they don’t have an equal partnership.

I hate how Mobius says this:

Mobius: You know, it occurred to me that you're not really the God of Mischief.

Loki: Oh, here it comes. The folksy, dopey insult from the folksy dope. What am I? The God of Self-Sabotage, yeah? The God of Back-Stabbing?

Mobius: Just kind of an asshole and a bad friend.

The worst part is that Mobius seems to genuinely believe he’s a good friend to Loki, opposed to Loki who’s a bad friend. He didn’t even listen to his reasons or asked him what had happened. When Loki tries to tell him something ‘the TVA is lying to you��, he merely assumes Loki is lying. Mobius has no idea what a friend is. He’s angry in the way a pet owner is angry when his dog peed on the carpet, he doesn’t view Loki as equal, which is the basis for being friends.

His idea to deal with Loki now isn’t to listen to him, it’s to punish him by having him being beaten and belittled, as well as tossed hurtful words about Loki’s worst fear, being left alone. He doesn’t even dirty his hands with doing it himself, he just traps Loki in a timeloop in which Sif slaps him, kick him in the groins and punches him telling him he is a ‘conniving, craven, pathetic worm’ and that she ‘hope you know you deserve to be alone and you always will be’, all this because Loki cut her hair.

Now, this is based on something the Loki of the myth did, and that Marvel also had Loki do more than once in the comics, either with Sif or with other characters. In the original version and in the Marvel version Loki didn’t just cut some locks from Sif’s hair as he did here, but basically turned her bald.

It doesn’t matter, yes he was an *ssh*le and yes, I think Sif had all the rights to be angry and call him names and beat him.

BACK THEN.

Loki hurt her, she hurt him back, they are even. That’s the end.

Even Sif knows as she doesn’t remain there to beat him further until all his bones are broken.

Of course this is not going to work because beating someone and calling him names doesn’t magically turn that person into a better person, that’s why many countries abolished corporal punishment and considered it an useless torture.

But this doesn’t mean it’s okay for Mobius to take that moment and traps Loki into a time loop so he can get beaten and humiliated to Mobius’ heart content until he says he’s bad, bad, bad, which in real life is equally useless because we know if you start beating a person and won’t stop until he says what you want him to say, people in the long run will say everything to make the beating stop, they even confess crimes they didn’t commit.

That’s why, in many states, if you arrest someone you can’t beat him until he confess and any confession obtained by beating him is null and void.

And I particularly loathe the framing of all this for more than one reason but let’s start digging with the first ones.

“Thor” side material established that Sif is a better fighter than Loki but sadly the idea a girl can’t hit as hard as a man rules so Sif beating Loki doesn’t feel as bad as, let’s say, Cull Obsidian punching him over and over. Some see as fun that a male can be beaten by a girl and hit on the crotch, a rightful demeaning which excuses what’s being done because she’s just a girl and if Loki can’t defend himself it’s his fault… which is a rather disgusting mindsetting.

The fact Sif was, ‘supposedly’ Loki’s friend is clearly chosen to draw a comparison with Mobius… which doesn’t really work really well because we never truly saw Sif and Loki being friends.

In “Thor” she was fast in thinking he was plotting the downfall of Asgard. If the idea is their relation turned sour because Loki cut her hair… well, this is up to speculation because we never saw it being friendly.

And anyway, even Sif knew when to stop while Mobius evidently doesn’t as he continues to let him be beaten, again without even doing the job himself, framing it as if it was all Loki’s fault.

If he had to beat Loki into submission I would have honestly preferred him to just take a whip and beat him, this framing in which he ‘remains innocent’ while his dog gets punished for peeing on the carpet honestly disgust him. But okay, if the series were to use it to make a point about ‘police brutality’ I would have been fine with it. Mobius wants a confession, wants to force Loki to comply and beat him. The viewers will be shown how wrong is this and the message will be that you shouldn’t do it.

It would be great if Mobius were playing the part of the Bernardo Gui of the TVA.

Bernardo Gui: Brother Salvatore... these torments will cause me as much pain as you. You can end it before we even begin. Open the gates of your heart, search the depths of your soul. [Name of the Rose]

Too bad that’s not the case.

The scene switches to Renslayer’s office.

This is how Mobius defines what he’s doing to Loki:

Mobius: He's softening in the Time Cell, but while he marinates, I thought maybe I'd interview the other Variant.

Please, don’t tell me you never heard this sort of excuses in movies that included police brutality. Or outright torture to make you confess you were an heretic or guilty of a murder.

He’s not being beaten into compliance, he’s softening. We’re making him better, we’re making him willing. We’re absolutely not making anything bad in having him being beaten over and over. Because if you beat someone over and over you’ll always have a honest confession, won’t you?

Bernardo Gui: Since the verdict of the Inquisition has been disputed by Brother William... we are obliged to extract the prisoner's confession to murder. Take him to the forge and show him the instruments.

Remigio Da Varagine: I'll confess anything you want, but don't torture me. I can't go through a night like Salvatore!

Bernardo Gui: Very well. Why did you kill them?

Remigio Da Varagine: Why? I don't know why.

Bernardo Gui: Because you were inspired by the devil?

Remigio Da Varagine: Yes... that's it. I was inspired by the devil. [Name of the Rose]

But I’m running ahead.

Mobius would like to talk with the other Variant, aka Sylvie. Would he also torture her psychologically or physically or it would look bad on him to abuse of a woman? We don’t know as Renslayer, rather cheerfully, refuses to let him speak with her. Nobosy should speak with her.

Mobius tries in another way:

Mobius: I mean, if there's a mastermind here, I don't think it's Loki.

The problem I have with this sentence is that it’s not said because geez, it makes no sense Loki willingly escaped with a variant into an apocalypse with no means to leave it, all to create a branch that would allow the TVA to detect them and capture them.

It’s not even said because Loki is his friend and wouldn’t do it.

Or any other logical reason why Loki wouldn’t have done it.

The implication here seems to be just that Loki doesn’t seem smart enough to be the mastermind of all this fiasco, because this is a fiasco, mind you, as they were captured and if they weren’t they would be dead.

Renslayer’s reply isn’t what Mobius wants.

Renslayer: Good. Then he should be the easiest to break. Work your Loki and figure out what caused that spike. Time-Keepers are watching, Mobius.

She at least calls things with their name as she says Mobius is supposed to break Loki. To break him to get the truth. She has figured Mobius is having him beaten and she’s okay with breaking him. Because a regime beat people into compliance.

Then she put pressures on Mobius by telling him the Time-Keepers are watching which reminds me of how, in the past, people used to say to scare others ‘Remember: God is always watching you!’ and it wasn’t meant to be encouraging, as he’s watching you to protect you, no, he’s watching you because if you mess up he’s ready to punish you.

Welcome to the Time-Keepers cult everyone.

Mobius leaves.

We move to B-15 who’s asking to another hunter Sylvie has beaten if she’s Okay because Sylvie is the superior Loki and of course she has managed to beat one of the hunters guarding her.

Mobius joins B-15 and saying the hunter hurt comments:

Mobius: They don't go gently, do they?

WHY SHOULD THEY?

Are you going gently with Loki? You’re having him beaten over and over and my guess is you’re not doing the same with Sylvie because the show thinks it would look bad if they were shown beating a woman over and over.

Anyway B-15 is right when she calls Loki his ‘Variant pet’, as I said that’s how Mobius sees Loki, as a pet who peed on the carpet.

Mobius goes on:

Mobius: You know, we brought in Kree, Titans, vampires. Why is it the two orphan demigods are such a pain in the ass?

I hate this question honestly because it implies two orphan demigods should just go down quietly, that they aren’t as terrible as Kree, Titans, vampires. Why are they opposing to the TVA, why don’t let themselves just be erased. Or reprogrammed as you let the TVA do to you, Mobius.

You know, there’s people that’s not thrilled with the idea you can kill or submit them.

But Hunter B-15 despite looking down on the Variants, is worried so she asks if Loki said anything to him.

Mobius replies Loki told him the TVA is lying him. Oh, think the audacity! The TVA which is so honest. The agency he can believe it’s real because he believes it’s real.

Mobius: Odin, God of the Heavens. Asgard, mystical realm, beyond the stars. Frost Giants. Listen to yourself...

Loki: It's not the same. It's completely different. No. It's not the same.

Mobius: It's exactly the same thing. Because if you think too hard about where any of us came from, who we truly are, it sounds kinda ridiculous. Existence is chaos. Nothing makes any sense, so we try to make some sense of it. And I'm just lucky that the chaos I emerged into gave me all this... My own glorious purpose.

Mobius: Cause the TVA is my life. And it's real because I believe it's real.

Such a solid base. And Loki tells him they’re lying. No, really? His little personal cult, lying TO HIM?

Of course B-15 fears differently but she had an experience Mobius couldn’t share.

We go back to Loki who now is on the ground and is begging Sif to hit him no more. And a side of me facepalm.

Okay, as said before Sif was established to be stronger than him but he knows she’s coming. He could goddamn prepare and put up a fight instead than just stay there and get beaten which, I guess, is painful.

I’ll assume he can’t use his magic so I’ll forgive him for not using that but he could just take a flower vase, hit and crash it against Sif’s head when she enters.

Never mentioning that if he kept on getting punched and beaten, since HE doesn’t rewind, by now he should have a quite bruised check. Again, since Mobius wanted him beaten it would have made more sense if he just had whipped him but no, we needed to get this thing that supposedly tame the beating down so we don’t feel disgusted if we don’t think at it too hard.

Anyway Loki has enough and gives Sif what she wanted to hear.

Loki: Please, please, no more. Please, I beg you. I'm a horrible person. I get it. I really am. I cut off your hair because I thought it'd be funny. And it's not. Uh... I crave attention... because I'm... I'm a... I'm a narcissist. And I suppose it's... It's because I'm scared of being alone.

So let’s talk of all that’s wrong with this.

First of all Loki was coerced in saying this. It means goddamn nothing.

Second if this is meant to be the truth and someone doesn’t point out a little louder how the TVA is a fascist organization that deploy torture and anyway it’s bad to coerce people into saying the truth this way, it basically encourages to beat people to get them to be honest. Which is disgusting.

Third, it makes a HUGE deal of something that it’s relatively minor. I mean, Mobius wanted him to say he’s a horrible person? For cutting Sif’s hair?!? This is his worst crime, something Loki need to regret?

The TVA in Ep 1 was all about pinning on him the blame for the attack on New York but Sif’s hair, oh, cutting Sif’s hair is obviously worse. Only no, because it meant to happen in the Sacred Timeline so the TVA would have punished him hadn’t he done it.

So you can read this in two ways.

Either Mobius’ logic is dumb or the episode’s logic is dumb. If the story is trying to paint Mobius as an idiot and an hypocrite or he’s just trying to confuse Loki so that he’ll say everything and the opposite of everything and it doesn’t matter if it make sense or not fine, I’m cool, but if I’m supposed to run with this instead and think Mobius’ amazingly therapeutic way to get Loki to realize his faults and think at his behaviour and realize what he is, is to have Sif beat him into submission they’ll do better to think it twice.

Now… this part ‘I crave attention... because I'm... I'm a... I'm a narcissist. And I suppose it's... It's because I'm scared of being alone’ doesn’t make sense.

You don’t become a Narcissist because you’re scared of being alone. If you’re a Narcissist you crave attention and are scared to be alone but fears of loneliness doesn’t turn people into narcissists.

Now… is Loki a Narcissist? It’s kind of ridicule Loki would self diagnose it to himself, especially without any competence in psychology which on Asgard doesn’t seem to exist or they would know adopting a child and not telling him he’s adopted ends up badly in 99,9% of the cases. He’s probably using the term loosely but whatever, let’s run with it.

@lucianalight wrote an awesome essay (whose reading I recommend along with the others of the same series) explaining why he isn’t and Cinematherapy who can count on a real therapist, did a video explaining why he is. So who’s right?

Both and neither.

Let’s start with Cinematherapy as they employ a professional.

If you watch the video (recorded prior to the series) you realize they make a HUGE canon mistake right at the start. They assume Loki’s magical powers come from Loki being a Frost Giant.

That’s not bad will from their part, this is actually based on how they’ve watched the movies… and nothing else so they skipped all the additional side material and cut scenes. They didn’t watch the cut scene in “Thor: The Dark World” saying how Loki learnt magic from his mother nor read it in a side material publication or interview. They have no idea Loki’s sceptre was influencing him in “The Avengers” because that’s only written on Marvel’s web and not present in the movies and don’t seem to consider Loki in the year between “Thor” and “The Avengers” had to go through something terrible that could involve Thanos and torture or even death since that was only mentioned in interviews and in pretty vague terms. They consider “Thor: Ragnarok” part of the canon without considering how Taika Waititi deliberately, for his own admission, retconned it.

So their analysis uses the 5 movies and considers Loki in ‘perfect’ psychological state through the 5 of them. And it makes sense Cinematherapy analysis are meant to talk to casual viewers not to fans who knows everything about the movies.

@lucianalight instead considers all the side material included the cut scenes and the interview and discard “Thor: Ragnarok”. As a fan who well knows the story and the authors’ intentions she has access to a completely different set of information that Cinematherapy didn’t use in their analysis.

The result is that Cinematherapy and @lucianalight fundamentally looked at two different stories, albeit rooted on the same movies, and since they analyzed different material, they came up with contrasting analysis in which neither is wrong because they’re basically analyzing two different Variants of Loki.

But what’s the Variant we should look at to understand if the Loki of “Loki” is a Narcissist or not?

The real problem with diagnosing a character of fictional works is that said character is well… fictional. He can’t have a personality disorder, said disorder needs to be scripted into him by the writers… who often know very little of psychology, which is why I prefer to use trope to analyze characters than the effective mental disorders.

But with Loki we’ve a huge problem, because, in addition to the writers not being experienced about disorders, we’re talking about writerS, plural.

There’s more people writing Loki, and each of them can’t agree on how to interpret him.

So we have:

“Thor” in which Loki hardly presents traits of Narcissism.

“The Avengers” in which he presents them.

“Thor: The Dark World” in which he alternates presenting them, depending on the scene being written by Whedon or Don Payne (who also worked on “Thor”) and Robert Rodat.

“Thor: Ragnarok” in which he presents traits of Narcissism.

“Avengers: Infinity War” in which he doesn’t present them, if you read the interview, he’s just saying whatever comes to his mind to try to get a chance to kill Thanos and save his brother aware he can easily get killed… or in which he presents them if you don’t read the interviews and believes he’s persuaded he will come on the top.

If you mix the movies together and take them as they are without checking the additional material, the ones in which he presents traits of Narcissisms ends up colouring the view of the ones in which he doesn’t.

If you consider only “Thor” and “Thor: The Dark World” (the Don Payne and Robert Rodat part) which tried to keep the same continuity as the same scriptwriter was involved in both of them, he doesn’t.

I’ll be honest though, I think Marvel wants to slap that disorder on him.

They’ve discovered it’s oh so funny to have Loki feel so high and mighty and then be humbled down by having the Hulk smash him or Thor tossing him out of a spaceship or electrocuting him or Sif kicking him in his groins.

However I think Marvel is trying to milk their cow too much.

The scenes in which Loki is humbled work wonderfully in “The Avengers” because Loki genuinely felt high and mighty to the viewers to the point we didn’t expect him to be defeated, so seeing him being humbled down by the Hulk, by Hawkeye’s arrow, by Coulson shooting at him, were all powerful moves.

You didn’t expect them, Loki was a real threat in the movie and you’re as surprised as him when he gets defeated.

I mean when Hawkeye throws his arrow and Loki grabs it with no effort, it pushes you to think ‘oh, he’s too strong’ only for it to explode in his face.

You don’t get the same feeling in this series.

Loki is not strong nor particularly competent or bright. His words aren’t profound nor persuasive. His confidence seems baseless, his humbling down becomes expected, here, against Sif, he basically did NOTHING, except being beaten up. His verbal efforts to stop her were pathetic.

You aren’t surprised by Sif beating him, by Sif not being persuaded by his first weak attempts at stopping her verbally, his words aren’t convincing, his attempts at stopping her physically, inexistent.

It gets boring for the viewer as well as it ultimately gets ‘boring’ for Loki who, at a certain point says:

Loki: I've heard it once, I've heard it a thousand times. "You. You conniving, craven, pathetic worm. You did this." Right?

He’s no more affected, it had become routine and it is for us too.

It’s a fail a wasted scene.

Overall I think Waldron doesn’t think highly of Loki. He views him as a Narcissist who thinks highly about himself but in truth is nothing special. A comic relief, an agent of chaos. At the same time… I’m not sure he knows what a Narcissist is, or that he’s thinking at the Narcissistic personality disorder because this Loki shows empathy. In this episode he showed he is not envious of Sylvie and his arrogant behaviour is a cover to cover up his weakness.

So honestly… whatever, I don’t care. No, okay, I do.

I’m sad because I see a lot of people working hard in this series, from the actors to Kate Herron who really love Loki and wanted this job but for me the plot of a story and the characterization of the characters are important and only Sergio Leone can pull out a masterpiece with a man with no name and a poor script.

Mind you, this episode is better than the previous in terms of plot but… overall is weak. I really, really hope the series will improve in Ep 5 and 6 because episode 3 & 4 just weren’t that great.

I really want Loki to have a great series but wanting it and getting it aren’t necessarily the same things.

Anyway back to the plot.

Although after Loki’s confession Sif doesn’t beat him and help him to get up this is what she tells him.

Sif: You are alone and you always will be.

Basically yeah, Loki’s confession meant nothing because he can’t change anything. He can’t get attention or company, not even behaving better. This is Sif’s message in the end. He’s pathetic and this time she doesn’t beat him up because it feels like beating a pathetic person.

Now, I’m not saying she should have forgiven him. Not this Sif. But the overall situation is warped. Although she didn’t mean to, she technically beat him nonstop, he had way more than enough, and if Sif hadn’t been trapped into a timeloop she would have known.

This Sif was used as a toy to do a job Mobius didn’t want to do personally.

It’s overall a sick situation and, since this Sif didn’t know she had been abusing Loki for only God knows how long, although she helps him to stand she rightfully doesn’t feel they’re even.

And though Loki had gotten a break from being beaten, it’s clear his admission ultimately did nothing good to him psychologically. If he’s alone and will always be as such… why should he care he hurts others? Why shouldn’t he take a bit of fun where he can?

And all this is psychological manipulation of course because then Mobius appears like a balm.

LOKI: There's not many people that can sneak up on me. (turns to see NATASHA STANDING THERE)

NATASHA: But you figured I'd come.

LOKI: After. After whatever tortures Fury can concoct, you would appear as a friend, as a balm. And I would cooperate.

Now… I have not the slightest idea of what Mobius is planning to do here. He doesn’t trust Loki, he doesn’t really want the truth, whatever that can be, he wants a truth of his liking and this is not negotiable.

Loki tells him that he’ll give him info only if he’ll let him out of the place and stop beating him and he decides this means Loki previously wasn’t telling the truth because he’s not being submissive enough.

Mobius makes clear he wants to hear about the plan between Loki and the Variant and that he wants Loki to give him the answers he wants, not the truth. Which is stupid because instead he needs the truth.

When Loki tells him the truth, that he wasn’t partner with Sylvie, he’s dismissive of his answer.

Mobius: Yeah, I guess you don't do partners. Unless, of course, it benefits you, and you intend to betray them at some point.

Loki insists on not having a partnership with Sylvie.

Loki: It was a means to an end, Mobius. Welcome to the real world. Down there, we're awful to get what we want.

Mobius: Now I gotta have a prince tell me how the real world works?

I hate this mentality that has started to develop into Marvel movies as if royalty lived a fairy tale life and could have no idea of the real world, especially the part in which ‘we're awful to get what we want’ because it’s dumb. Royalty has an history of being awful to get what they want that’s as long as the start of civilization. If Mobius doesn’t know, maybe he is the one who has no idea how the real world work, how many wars had been declared because a king wanted the land of his neighbour or something else. How they could accuse people of betrayal or of imaginary crimes to get rid of them.

Laufey is a king and moved war to Earth. Odin is a king and drowned civilizations in blood.

T’Chaka is a king and abandoned his nephew so as to cover an unwanted truth.

The Supreme Intelligence of the Kree Empire took advantage of Carol Danvers, altering her memories.

And that’s just the Marvel universe. So really Mobius, are you sure that all royalty is the equivalent of Disney princesses who sings are lovely and have talking pets?

And then Mobius does a really STUPID question.

Mobius: Why don't you just tell me what caused the nexus event on Lamentis?

So the series has gone to a great length to establish people doesn’t know they cause a nexus event. They can’t see the sacred timeline they move at random and SLAM, sometimes they end up doing something they didn’t know they weren’t planned to do and it results in a nexus event. BUT THEY DIDN’T KNOW IT BEFOREHAND! SO HOW IS LOKI SUPPOSED TO KNOW?!?

But anyway they clearly weren’t supposed to be there so everything they do can create a disturbance if it’s not erased by the apocalypse. For example if they sent a missile to destroy the neighbour planet before Lamentis 1 was destroyed they clearly would affect the Sacred Timeline because the neighbouring planet wasn’t meant to get blasted away.

But still… they found them there, waiting for destruction with no means to escape and with no idea the TVA would have appeared because they broke the sacred timeline.

It’s kind of a giant warning sign they’ve no idea what they’ve done.

So Mobius demanding to know feels as if they had dumbed down Mobius as well.

Loki wants to play stubborn and he has good reasons since he fears for his life.

Loki: Let me say this again. I'm not going to tell you just so you can turn around immediately afterwards and prune me.

In reply Mobius decides Loki needs to be tortured by Sif some more.

So Loki does what Remigio Da Varagine did when Bernardo Gui promised to torture him, he tells Mobius what he believes Mobius wants to hear, that of course they were accomplices and of course they had a plan and he was in charge of it.

Only Mobius has decided that Sylvie is the better Loki so he doesn’t believe Loki is in control and, to test him, he tells him Sylvie was pruned.

This hits Loki as he has grown feelings for Sylvie. He tries to play it as he doesn’t care but Mobius guesses he’s affected.

On a sidenote the series painting Loki oh so transparent affects negatively Thor as well as Thor never seems to realize it when Loki is affected, which leads to the implication Thor is either dumb or doesn’t care or… he’s written by someone else who thinks Loki is better at masking his feelings.

Mind you, in the movies Loki has moments in which is feelings are on display for everyone to see but also moments in which they’re guarded. Here they simply are not. In the series his feelings are constantly on display as if he somehow has lost the ability to guard them even if he tries to.

Anyway Mobius decides that Loki caring for the variant means he got a crush on her. I wish I could say he’s wrong but this is what Waldron has to say on the topic:

“That was one of the cruxes of my pitch [for the series], that there was going to be a love story. We went back and forth for a little bit about, like do we really want to have this guy fall in love with another version of himself? Is that too crazy? But in a series that, to me, is ultimately about self-love, self-reflection, and forgiving yourself, it just felt right that that would be Loki's first real love story. The look that they share, that moment, [it started as] a blossoming friendship. Then for the first time, they both feel that twinge of, ‘Oh, could this be something more? What is this I'm feeling?’ These are two beings of pure chaos that are the same person falling in love with one another. That's a straight-up and down branch, and exactly the sort of thing that would terrify the TVA.” [Loki Writer Explains Episode 4's Sylvie Love Story Reveal]

Why there needs to be a love story? A romantic love story? Self-love is different from self-cest. Learning to appreciate yourself doesn’t mean you suddenly wants to date yourself.

Besides, if the whole point was having Loki fall for himself, then let Sylvie be him!

Sylvie is so different from him she could very well be a different person... and it’s actually worth to ponder a bit on this.

As I said before Sylvie is genetically different from Loki. By logic this would mean more than Loki, she’s Loki’s fraternal twin from a parallel dimension. Only, if the TVA prunes whatever diverges by the sacred timeline this means she should have been pruned at birth because the sacred timeline has a male Loki. But no, she gets the time to grow up till… the Asgardian equivalent of 10 years old?

And only because back then she has somehow made something that didn’t fit with the timeline?

What was that, she was told she was adopted and, since her parents this time did things properly she felt loved instead than the monster parents tell their children at night and was about to grow up as a psychologically healthy girl?

Anyway, back to the problem, we’ll see at the end that, among the other Loki there’s also another Loki who clearly doesn’t have the same genetic code of Loki. No, I’m not talking of the Loki played by Deobia Oparei, Loki’s skin colour was supposed to be blue, it’s of course worth questioning why Odin went for black instead than white this time (does he come with an Asgard where everyone is a person of colour?) but it can be just the result of Odin’s magic. What I’m talking about is the Loki alligator.

Because normally who give birth to alligators aren’t frost giants but alligators… that or Asgard was populated by alligators. Or, that Loki was magically turned into an alligator but somehow I doubt it.

So anyway, if Loki might not share the same genetic code with his variants and not being pruned at birth… this works for Laufey too. This works for everyone.

Basically all the Variants could be completely different people who happen to share the same name.

In a way we know about the TVA work as much as we knew before episode 1. Sometimes they accuse someone deciding he broke the timeline… but sometime they don’t care if such break is done. Why? Because the Time-Keepers say so.

Great, whatever, I really don’t see the need of Loki falling in love for a version of himself who couldn’t be more different from himself than Sylvie is. At this point he could have fallen in love for anyone, even B-15.

Couldn’t they put in the show Verity Willis instead than Mobius and Sylvie?

The genuine friendship and appreciation they have in the comic which is also part of what saved Loki in the end was much better than the ‘friendship’ he has with Mobius or the abrupt crush for Sylvie.

And mind you, I like Sylvie as a character. I just don’t like what the series is doing with her.

Mobius too is well done as a character… but he’s the farthest thing from a friend for Loki.

Back to the story Mobius is having the time of his life because Loki is in pain for Sylvie’s supposed death since he has fallen for her.

Because friends obviously love it when you’re in pain when you believe your crush is dead.

Then he goes and say:

Mobius: No wonder you have no clue what caused the nexus event on Lamentis. Both of you are swooning over each other.

Wait so he knew Loki has no clue about what caused the Nexus event? And despite this he tortured Loki? And now he claims Loki has no clue because he and Sylvie were swooning over each other? Because that’s always what happened when a Nexus event happens, isn’t it? People swoon on someone else and don’t realize they’re causing a Nexus event. Loki was probably swooning on the Tesseract and Sylvie on her Valkyrie doll, right? The logic here is big.

Mobius: It's the apocalypse. Two Variants of the same being, especially you, forming this kind of sick, twisted romantic relationship. That's pure chaos. That could break reality. It's breaking my reality right now. What a incredible seismic narcissist. You fell for yourself.

Yeah, the sacred timeline is something that can bear people being turned into slaves, Jewish people being gassed into concentration camps, children being abused, terrorism, the destruction of Pompeii, New York being attacked by the Chitauri, Lamentis 1 getting destroyed, Bucky being turned into a slave of Hydra, Asgard being destroyed, Peter losing his parents, Thanos purging half of the universe, Tony Stark having to die when they could have just wiped away the Thanos that went into the future but God forbid two Loki were to commit selfcest. What are lives lost compared to selfcest?

Much, much better to wipe away half of all the living things than that.

Because…

“These are two beings of pure chaos that are the same person falling in love with one another. That's a straight-up and down branch, and exactly the sort of thing that would terrify the TVA.” [Loki Writer Explains Episode 4's Sylvie Love Story Reveal]

Ah, okay, great, it’s just because they’re two beings of pure chaos. If it had been Captain America falling for a Variant of himself the timeline would have clapped at him. No really, I still hope you take back this somehow and say it was all to mislead us because for me it’s not a problem of selfcest. It’s a HUGE problem of something called LOGIC. What’s this “Alice in the wonderland”? Mobius continues being a good, supportive friend by mocking Loki when she tells him the Variant’s name was Sylvie. Really Loki, with friends like this you were better with Thanos calling himself your dad. Finally anyway Loki manages to have Mobius tell him Sylvie is still alive, which gives him some relief, then Mobius goes on.

Mobius: And was infiltrating the TVA, was that always sort of the grand plan?

Wait, is he implying that when Loki produced his first Nexus event he did it so he could infiltrate in the TVA? Because of course he would know that they wouldn’t prune him but Mobius would come to his rescue? What had Mobius been drinking? Then when Loki tells Mobius maybe the Time-Keepers need to be overthrown Mobius goes:

Mobius: I ought to box your ears.

Because of course, violence is the solution and Loki should only be grateful to the Time-Keepers who kidnapped him and want to terminate him, shouldn’t he? Mobius is simply terrible here… which I don’t like because in a while I’ll be supposed to feel sad for him.

Loki now tries to tell Mobius the truth… only Mobius doesn’t want to listen, he claims Loki already told him 50 lies in the past 10 minutes without even considering he called for them as he tortured Loki to get what he wanted to hear, not the truth and anyway, if Loki isn’t trustworthy why they’re having that discussion?

Plus he belittles everything Loki says by basically downplaying Sylvie. She’s his girlfriend, his female self. She’s not her own. And of course in addition to downplaying Sylvie he has to insult Loki’s feelings because that’s what friends are for.

Mobius: Whatever you want to call her. What, your female self that you have some demented crush on...

Honestly, if Mobius had had a crush on Loki I would have waved this as him being jealous and bitter Loki found someone else but he does not. He took possession of Loki, looked down on him as some sort of pet, tried to manipulate him into obedience and babbled of a friendship that clearly didn’t exist and that had no reason to exist even if he hadn’t acted as a jerk because they barely know each other.

Friendship is something earned over time, not something others own you because you save them from death provided they’ll work for you.

What in the world is the TVA idea of friendship?

Anyway Loki informs him they’re all Variants and all the truth connected to it.

For a moment it seems to work, Mobius seems to be affected.

But this isn’t a truth Mobius wanted to hear because it ruins the basis of the TVA and the TVA is…

Mobius: Cause the TVA is my life. And it's real because I believe it's real.

So Mobius goes and call all of that a lie and since he hadn’t been a jerk enough he felt the need to play Odin’s role and remind Loki of his path in the sacred timeline.

Mobius: You two, what a pair! Gosh! Unbelievable. Wherever you go, it's just death, destruction, the literal ends of worlds.

What a friend, huh? Honestly I think he went for that line deliberately, because he has seen Loki’s life in the sacred timeline and saw Odin tossing a similar line to him and knows it hurt him.

Odin: Do you not truly feel the gravity of your crimes? Wherever you go there is war, ruin and death.

It’s also probably worth to mention this Loki hadn’t caused any of the ends of the worlds he’s been in.

Then he does what everyone expected, he decided he didn’t need Loki anymore and could get rid of him.

Mobius: Well, I'm gonna have to close this case now, 'cause I don't need you anymore. Yeah, or as you might say, our interests are no longer aligned.

Honestly I don’t like the idea of Loki falling for Sylvie but with people like Mobius around him… why am I complaining? Sylvie, who also attacked and belittled him, was much better as she didn’t go and called herself his friend at least. She was more honest than Mobius so congratulation Mobius, you beat the Goddess of Mischief.

On a sidenote the lines red and grey on the wall give me the feeling they’re in a circus tent. So yeah

Loki: The Time-Keepers have built quite the circus, and I see the clowns are playing their parts to perfection.

Anyway Loki is dragged away to be tortured by Sif again. Because Mobius hadn’t had him beaten up into submission enough before killing him. This is just sadistic.

This time Loki though is so angry he’s calm.

Loki: You know, of all the liars in this place, and there are a great many, you're the biggest.

Mobius: Why? 'Cause I lied about your girlfriend?

Loki: Oh, no. That I can respect. I mean, the lies you tell yourself.

Honestly I hate how Mobius continues to call Sylvie ‘his girlfriend’, not because I don’t like the idea of them paired together but because I get it’s Mobius’ way to belittle them both. She’s not her own person, not Sylvie, she’s Loki’s female self that he has some demented crush on. That’s all he makes her to be.

I don’t know what happened to Mobius in this episode. He seemed to have moral standards in Ep 1 & 2. He didn’t seem to enjoy hurting others for no reason. Now he does.

Well, at least Loki gets to call him on the lies he tells himself.

So, a break here. Great acting from both, good direction from Kate Herron, dumb plot.

The idea is that Mobius is questioning Loki to know what caused the Nexus event, right? But instead than his intelligence he uses physical torture. Now it would be fine if he needed to get a confession and didn’t care about the truth but he cares about the truth, he needs it to prevent future nexus events. Only no, he doesn’t care. Whatever.

Then he tries to see if Loki has feelings about Sylvie, which he does and jumps to the idea that Loki must love her because since they’re a male and a female there’s no other way to care for each other if not romantic love. He can’t view her as a sister or have pity of her, no it has to be romantic love and Waldron backs him up so it is and so this has to be what broke the timeline because… the timeline can tolerate any sort of crime but not selfcest committed by chaotic beings?

It must be this because if Mobius find something demented the timeline would as well, we’ve proofs… no we don’t have it is just speculation but Mobius read Waldron’s interview so he knows it’s true.

So Mobius has his answer, the timeline is against selfcest. Case closed. Logic thrown out of the window notwithstanding.

But then Loki really tells him the truth but Mobius doesn’t like it so let’s torture Loki some more. Because Mobius is so intelligent he can tell when Loki is lying, the series has already established it, so this has to be Loki lying right? And Mobius let him be tortured despite claiming he’s Loki’s friend and having tons of doubts about what C-20 saw and how Rendlayer is acting oddly because that’s what friends do. It has Thanos’ seal of approbation after all.

Whatever, let’s go on.

So we move to Hunter B-15 doing calming breaths as she’s clearly very upset. It’s worth to remember she was depicted as hating Variants the most. Her gaze falls on a poster recommending to capture all the variants and make sure to delete them all.

The fun part is that the guy on that poster remind me of the Mobius of the comics… but maybe it’s just me.

After this B-15 turns on her weapon and orders the ones guarding the entrance of the theatre in which they had put Sylvie to let her in. They don’t even discuss or hesitate, they just let her in.

Sylvie acts in the confident manner Loki used to act in “The Avengers” when he was prisoner of the Avengers.

Sylvie: Hello... Oh, I don't know. Your name's a number. Can't read it from here.

As she says so she moves closer. B-15 though put away her weapon, opens a timedoor and tells her to come with her.

Why they go away through a timedoor? Couldn’t they talk there? Isn’t it more risky as not only Sylvie could use this to escape but they might risk altering the oh so sacred timeline? Are there hearing devices in the theatre? Does the guards outside eavesdrop?

Whatever, we’re back to Renslayer’s office.

Mobius is thoughtful, Renslayer is happy because the case is closed. So Mobius really presented as excuse for the branch the fact that Loki and Sylvie supposedly fell in love? Because if Loki cares for someone is romantic love? He cried for Frigga too, for Asgard? Why it has to be romantic love for Mobius? Because Sylvie is a woman and Loki is a man and God forbid a man could care for a female in any other way that’s not romantic? Because the script said so? Couldn’t he care for her like a twin sister? She even acts like Thor here and there but she’s smarter than him. Would the timeline branch anyway?

Whatever, I guess I’m not meant to make questions but if the case is closed why he had to stuck Loki again in that timeloop to be beaten and humiliated? It’s not like Renslayer is checking him and even if she were or the Time-Keepers were which would have been the harm in letting him sit there like Sylvie is?

For which reason Mobius is trying so hard to break him? Revenge? He didn’t seem such a jerk in Ep 1 & 2 and now… why has he changed?

Anyway Mobius is beyond obvious acting weird despite Renslayer being all happy for the case closed and asking him

Renslayer: If you could go anywhere, anytime, where would it be?

She clearly mean for personal pleasure, maybe she plans on letting him have a holiday anywere he’d like but Mobius doesn’t seem to get it.

Mobius: I can go anywhere, anytime.

His reply hints he reduces everything to work, to going anywhere, anytime for work and while Renslayer tries to get him to open up he asks again why she didn’t let him interrogate ‘Sylvie’, which is a mistake as when in Renslayer’s office he usually calls the Variants just Variants, not by name, unless it’s necessary. Besides Renslayer doesn’t know the Variant’s chosen alias so she’s twice as confused.

Mobius has to explain ‘Sylvie’ is how Loki calls the Variant and Renslayer tells him it wasn’t so as to make sure it wouldn’t escape, and when Mobius says she wouldn’t have escaped (because Mobius is so good at keeping the Loki Variants close) she reminds him the other Variant did escape while in his care (yeah, twice, Mobius you aren’t as good as you like to present yourself).

Renslayer tries again to get him to answer her on where he’s like to go and he replies

Mobius: I like being here now, with you, doing the work.

Which is solely because he’s deadly scared of admitting he’d like to be some other place. He doesn’t like his life there, he loves jet ski and would like to ride one but he’s just scared to do so and finds comfort in the monotony of his own life. Which is beyond depressing and is part of the lies he tells himself.

Renslayer gives up and informs him she’d heard the Time-Keepers and they will personally oversee the Variant's pruning and they want Mobius to be there as well. I take that with ‘the Variant’ they mean Sylvie but later we’ll see Loki too is carried in front of them.

Why they want Mobius too though? To make sure he’ll stay put? To prune him as well because he’s being as suspicious as possible?

Mobius seems pleased he’ll finally met the Time-Keeper then oh so discreetly goes back on questioning Renslayer. On C-20 this time. Which obviously makes Renslayer even more suspicious.

She tries to deflect his question by pointing out how everything went well, the Time-Keepers are happy and yadda, yadda and Mobius insists again on wanting to know about C-20… because this was totally smooth and not suspicious at all.

And this is bad because this guy is the one who’s supposed to be at Loki’s same level if not above. If he’s so incompetent it reflects poorly on Loki too.

Yeah, he was very upset by C-20’s death so maybe this is messing him up but still he couldn’t be more obvious, insisting over and over when Renslayer clearly doesn’t want to tell him more. What does he expect, her to admit she lied? She’s not a Variant he can torture, or keep there until he gets the answers he wants, she’s basically his boss.

Anyway Renslayer, probably due to her fondness for him, confirms her previous version and tells him if he’s not allowed to meet the Variant that’s because she’s protecting him from facing the horrible fate C-20 went through.

I think this requires a bit of appropriate singing from another movie:

Shhh.. Trust me Mobius, Ravonna, knows best. Ravonna knows best. Listen to your Ravonna. She's a scary Variant that Sylvie. Ravonna knows best. One way or another. Something will go wrong, I swear. Stabbing, kicking, poison, punching. Stealing, and humiliating, the lies. Also large sword, a woman with pointy teeth. And stop, no more, you'll just upset me. Ravonna's right here. Ravonna will protect you. Darling here's what I suggest. Skip the drama, stay with Ravonna. RAVONNA!! Knows best! Ravonna knows best. Take it from your Ravonna. On your own, you won't survive. Sloppy underdressed, immature, clumsy, Please, they'll eat you up, alive. Gullible, nave, positively grubby. Ditzy and a bit, well, hmm vague. Plus I believe, getting kinda chubby. I'm just saying, 'Cause I wuv you. Ravonna understands, Ravonnas here to help you. All I have is one request. (singing ends) Mobius? Don't ever ask to see the Variant, again.

Evidently Mother Gothel… pardon Renslayer’s performance doesn’t fully win Mobius over.

Mobius: Yeah, if it's the truth.

Intelligence? Or, like with Loki he has already decided with answer he needs to get?

Renslayer now tries to distract him blaming everything on the time Mobius spent with the Lokis, implying that because they lie he came up to think she would lie too and then she gives him an inspirational speech about how their work matter and how they’re special friends.

Renslayer: When we're out there fighting for the fate of the Sacred Timeline we're also fighting for this. For us. Friends against time, allies to the end. You've seen all of existence, same as me. So, you know, friendship like ours is uncommon. And worth fighting for. Same as the Sacred Timeline.

So Mobius has friends.

Or at least he has Renslayer.

Does he plan to close her too in a timeloop for lying to him? Or, since she was used to always humour him (this is apparently the first time she told him ‘no’) he expected Loki too had to play on his tune, especially considering Loki isn’t his boss, and got upset when Loki showed a mind of his own?

Or is Renslayer who taught him who disappoint gets closed in a timeloop where he’s punched and insulted by doing this to Mobius?

I’d like to know.

Whatever, this speech persuaded Mobius so much he distract Renslayer suggesting to find a place for her new trophy only to swap the Tempads behind her back… and then oh so discreetly try to run away because this wouldn’t be suspicious at all.

Smooth, Mobius, smooth.

Okay, so B-15 took Sylvie to the Roxxcart apocalypse since now she knows the TVA can’t detect changes if they happen in an apocalypse.

Sylvie thinks she wants a fight but B-15 is instead tormented by what Sylvie had shown her when she possessed her.

Now, everyone, let’s refresh our memory on how enchantment works.

Sylvie: It depends on the mind. Most are easy and I can overtake them instantly. Others, the stronger ones, it gets tricky. I'm in control, but they're there, too. In order to preserve the connection, I have to create a fantasy from their memories.

B-15 was overtaken very easily with Sylvie fully in control of her as she moved her like a puppet and had her say what she wanted. So why in the world she needed to show her a memory? We saw how things worked with C-20, she used the memory to answer in kind to her questions believing she was with a friend. What she did to B-15 to make her move and say what she wanted, did she had a memory in which she was an actress and Sylvie read her the script?

I’ve no words, they gave the rule 1 episode ago, don’t they remember them anymore?

So anyway Sylvie tells B-15 the truth and B-15, the one who believes talking to Variant is a mistake and they should all be pruned as they’re cosmic mistakes immediately swallows what the Variant who’d been killing TVA agents non-stop tells her and volunteers to let herself be possessed again.

Because this wouldn’t be dangerous at all, I mean, surely Sylvie who has a grudge against the TVA and has been killing TVA agents won’t lie to her and wouldn’t just possess her to steal her tempad and escape leaving her to die in the apocalypse.

Yeah, surely because Sylvie, instead than possessing her, does as she request and shows her those memories and B-15 can be sure they’re true and not a trick because… she too read the script and know they’re true.

So B-15, who had been pruning, abusing and belittling other Variants like her, once knowing she’s a Variant says:

Hunter B-15: I looked happy.

With tears in her voice. Okay, so she also sides with Sylvie but… don’t take me wrong, different people react differently but let’s look for a moment B-15’s reaction at discovering she’s a Variant, a cosmic mistake.

B-15 was the one who hated Variants the most… but knowing she was one all she cares was she looked happy. What’s her problem she was miserable at the TVA? I didn’t notice. She just accepted she’s a Variant so easily… everyone else, even people who didn’t hate Variants will have more problems with it. C-20 was in shock, Mobius goes in denial, Loki basically went mad with grief when he discovered he was a Frost Giant.

B-15 mourns that she was happy and then asks for instructions to Sylvie.

I wonder if she’s the sort of person who can’t think on her own. She did what the TVA propaganda said because she never stopped to think about it, she got an easy to posses mind, and now she’s willing to do what Sylvie says because she can’t think at it on her own.

To be honest… although I feel what the TVA did to the people working there was pretty disgusting, I find hard on an intellectual level to empathize with someone who had been enjoying pruning and abusing Variants and now that she has discovered she’s one she doesn’t regret what she did to the others like her but mourn her old happiness.

Anyway I compliment Wunmi Mosaku for this scene. I’m not persuaded by how they decided she would just swallow she’s a Variant so easily, but still she played well the part.

Empathically, to see another being so grief stricken, causes me to react emotionally, even though logically I feel I shouldn’t care because they didn’t give me reasons to feel sorry for someone who was so happy to be an abuser and doesn’t regret having been one, she still managed to make me feel sorry for her character because her sadness was emotionally involving.

Really, good job, and good job to Kate Herron who played that scene well.

We switch to Mobius who hides among bookshelves to check Renslayer’s tempad.

I love the visual here, how it seems we’re pecking on Mobius by a hole but whatever, might be just me.

Renslayer’s tempad confirms C-20 died so Mobius is about to close it when he decides to check the classified report of the mission on Renslayer’s tempad. Renslayer conveniently recorded C-20 saying:

Hunter C-20: You're not hearing me. I was there. This was real, what I saw. This is a place that I've been. This wasn't the TVA. This was a memory. I lived down there. I went to that bar. I had friends. I had a whole life on the Sacred Timeline.

Interrogator: Calm down.

Hunter C-20: "Calm down"? I'm a Variant. So are you. So is every single person in this place. I'm ending this.

So yeah, Mobius, Loki didn’t lie to you, you moron, that excuse was way too dumb to be a lie.

Also C-20 never went mad as Renslayer said. Because it was Renslayer who lied to you, Mobius. Because in the real world people are awful to get what we want and maybe you should take lessons from a prince.

Just as to remark Renslayer knew this and not just because it’s on her tempad, she also appear on the screen, proof she was listening. To do what I don’t know.

We go back to Loki who’s just being beaten by Sif again because Mobius, his friend, couldn’t let him sit on a chair while he checked if Loki told him the truth. We also see how all this beating isn’t really breaking Loki.

Although he has previously apologized to Sif and accepted his fault, now he’s just annoyed he has to hear her saying such things over and over and beating him.

Because beating people doesn’t make them better.

On another side, since Loki knew what he had to tell to Sif to make her stop I wonder why he didn’t repeat it… or why he didn’t try to think of a plan. Whatever.

Mobius drops there with the dumbest question of the year:

Mobius: What are you doing?

Loki has a sarcastic reply for his idiotic question:

Loki: Passing the time.

No, really, Mobius trapped him there, what was he thinking Loki was doing, playing poker with Sif?

So now is Mobius’ time for another dumb question:

Mobius: Do you care about her?

I mean, after you called her his female self that he, a seismic narcissist, have some demented crush on, of course Loki wants to open his heart to you. Who wouldn’t?

Mobius tells him to shut up and then asks if he really think you deserve to be alone… as if this was Loki’s idea and not something Mobius’ tried to brainwash him into believing. Loki doesn’t reply which upset Mobius as when Mobius says ‘jump’ Loki should only say ‘how high?’, so Loki point out how MOBIUS TOLD HIM TO SHUT UP. Because Mobius is not making any sense and Loki needs to lampshade this.

Mobius asks him if he thinks he deserves to be alone.

Loki replies he doesn’t know which means his pretty words to Sif were all pretty words. He didn’t believe them, not fully. Thanks God.

So now the conversation starts to get surreal.

Mobius: You better figure it out quick, because the nexus event the two of you caused, whatever that connection is, can bring this whole place down.

Okay, I’m not following this, after belittling Loki’s relation with Sylvie now he’s trying to tell him he has to get together with her for the sake of bringing down the TVA? That’s why Loki has to get with Sylvie? Why he doesn’t have to believe he deserves to be alone? So now Loki’s crush is no more demented but a key to throw down the TVA?

What was sticking him with Sif then, an attempt at manipulating him into not getting in relationship with other Lokis? So Mobius knew already he and Sylvie had a crush on each other? Because it looked like he stuck Loki with Sif PRIOR to knowing it.

I’m lost but whatever, Mobius decide THEY have to do something so Loki remarks on the use of plural.

Mobius asks him to swear Sylvie didn’t implant whose memories in C-20.

It’s a dumb question as not only Loki could lie but Sylvie could have lied to him and anyway Renslayer lied so it’s not like she’s safe to trust either.

Loki vouches for Sylvie and Mobius asks:

Mobius: So, I just have to trust the word of two Lokis?

No, please, Mobius, don’t. You’ve wasted everyone’s time questioning Loki when you don’t believe him. Really, I don’t get why you wanted to use someone you don’t trust. What did you come there for if you can’t believe him?

At this Loki, who’s at first hurt, replies:

Loki: How about the word of a friend?

And okay, it has to be Stockholm Syndrome talking. That or masochism. Because friends don’t close you in a timeloop in which you get beaten and humiliated for all that time so really Loki, don’t be Mobius’ friend.

So now Mobius admits Loki was right about the TVA from the beginning, which was damn time and would have realized it sooner had he spared 5 minutes of his time on this and tells him if Loki wants to save Sylvie he has to trust him. Because Mobius never lied and manipulated him, no, really. You’re lucky Loki has Stockholm Syndrome so of course he’ll trust you.

So Mobius goes:

Mobius: Okay. You could be whoever, whatever you wanna be, even someone good. I mean, just in case anyone ever told you different.

Yeah, someone did. Should I refresh you, your memory Mobius?

Mobius: You weren't born to be king, Loki. You were born to cause pain and suffering and death. That's how it is, that's how it was, that's how it will be. All so that others can achieve their best versions of themselves.

Or maybe you prefer this, which includes Sylvie too?

Mobius: You two, what a pair! Gosh! Unbelievable. Wherever you go, it's just death, destruction, the literal ends of worlds.

I mean, if this is Mobius’ way to apologize for all the things it tossed at Loki, it honestly sucks, and it gets worse because he’s merely doing because he needs him to cooperate with him because, guess what? As Loki told him from the start the TVA sucks and had been lying to him and he just didn’t want to see and has exchanged his own belief in the TVA for ‘truth’.

I mean, he’s probably being as sincere as he can be, as we know he has wondered if Loki could be good, but he has been so manipulative with Loki up until now that really, him saying Loki this when he needs Loki to trust him, only feels like him being manipulative.

Are we sure Mobius isn’t another Loki variant, one Renslayer wanted to keep as her pet?

Still I think Loki understood this was Mobius’ way to apologize as he smiles and follows him.

The moment they leave the Timeloop they find themselves face to face with Renslayer and four hunters.

And here it’s where the writer forgot Mobius too is supposed to be smart. For start because it didn’t dawn on him to remove Loki’s collar from him, to continue because when Renslayer points out she has something of hers he returns the Tempad, their only way to leave the place, to her.

I can explain this merely by going under the idea that Mobius still think that the fact they’re friends would push Renslayer to cover up for him, which clearly means he doesn’t know/understand her as much as he thinks.

Mbatha-Raw:

“She’s really worked hard to get where she is, so she’s not going to be reckless with the power that has been hard-earned for her. She, in some ways, is deeply indoctrinated with the ways of the TVA. She’s completely conditioned by their thinking and the idea of the Sacred Timeline, and the concept of free will is quite alien to her. She’s a believer. She believes in law and order, and it’s done quite well for her so far in terms of getting her to where she is. She’s not going to abandon her philosophy lightly.”

[‘Loki’: Owen Wilson Says Renslayer’s Betrayal of Mobius in Episode 4 Was ‘Pretty Shocking’

]

And in a way the situation we’re facing is really funny because Mobius believes Renslayer betrayed him… but she believes he’s the one who betrayed her. And this in a way mirrors Mobius’ relation with Loki.

To Renslayer Mobius had no right to doubt her, to question her decisions, to doubt the TVA even if the TVA is lying and she knows it. To her, Mobius is the dog who peed on the carpet.

Mobius instead somehow believed to be an equal friend, to whom she owed the truth, so he’s hurt by her acting as if he was just her disobedient dog.

She lied to him, manipulated him, demanded from him to be a loyal TVA supporter who only seek for her approbation and when he goes and doesn’t do this, she punishes him by pruning him. She doesn’t even try to beat him into submission again, she just get rid of him because her faith in her cult is more important than their ‘friendship’.

She’s a real Nazi in a way.

But the irony is that Mobius was the same with Loki and now he experiences what it means to be on the other side.

His emotional speech:

Mobius: What's the problem, Ravonna? You know where I'd go if I could go anywhere? Wherever it is I'm really from. Yeah, wherever I had a life before the TVA came along. Maybe I had a jet ski. That's what I'd like to do. Just riding around on my jet ski.

…it changes nothing in Renslayer’s mind, she’s like him, she doesn’t want the truth, the honesty, she wants submission but she’s not even going to waste time to work him into submission again. She probably plans to replace him with another Mobius Variant who’ll be more obedient this time.

Note that pruning him hurts her… but she has it done anyway, the way Mobius had oh so many branches pruned. Because that’s what they did at the TVA.

It’s a damn case of “‘I never thought leopards would eat MY face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party”.

Mobius never thought he would be the one ending up pruned, being a Variant and ending up pruned was other people’s problem, Loki’s problem, not Mobius’, Mobius was one of the good guys, he was created by the TVA so such things wouldn’t happen to him.

Now… this is the same problem I had with B-15.

We are supposed to feel sorry for Mobius and I probably would feel very sorry for him if he hadn’t been a complete asshole to Loki up till 5 minutes ago. I get maybe they were aiming to take advantage of Owen Wilson’s fans, who loved Mobius no matter what they do or to how Loki and Renslayer still mourn him because Stockholm syndrome pushes you to do this and your pet dog is always your pet dog even if you decide to shoot him down because, to you, he’s rabid but all I felt was that Mobius had got what he deserved, what he did to Loki was done to him.

And this is a goddamn shame because I would have been a lot sadder if Mobius hadn’t act in such a way in this episode.

I mean, yes, in episode 1 & 2 he was still manipulative but he had genuine moments in which he was sympathetic and didn’t want to gratuitously hurt people.

Mobius: What are you doing? Hey! These people are scared.

Hunter D-90: They're about to die. They should be scared.

Mobius: Okay. Not of us.

I love this scene because he just stood up for those people even if he had nothing to gain, just because he didn’t want the TVA to scare them even if they were about to die and would have been rest if they weren’t to die. This wasn’t manipulation, this was Mobius being a decent being and… and this episode just tossed it away.

His whole interrogation scene with Loki, from the moment he just had him beaten and belittled to ‘soften him’ to how he ends by having him beaten and belittled again even though the case is closed is nonsense and disgusting. That’s not what a decent human being would do.

On a positive note Mbatha-Raw is very good in the scene. It’s clear a part of her is suffering, yet another remains hard. She turns her face away because she can’t watch when Mobius is pruned, even the way she squeezed her eyes shut and then relaxed them but kept them closed is a nice detail and so is the way she looks at Loki, still hurt by Mobius’ disappearance but firm, how she takes long breaths after saying they’ve to wait for her, how she first looks down, as if ashamed then up, as if to ask the moral support of her gods or whatever and then closes her eyes and mouth as if to swallow it all and go on.

She’s good.

Mind you, I loved how Owen Wilson gave his speech and I love Tom Hiddleston’s reacting to him being pruned which interestingly opposes to Mbatha-Raw’s as he keeps his eyes wide open and he tries to reach for him where she instead close them and kind of tries to ‘hold away’ from him, her body posture close where Tom Hiddleston’s is open and then he closes his eyes, calm down and straighten up before facing her in a ‘it was your doing’ way. He let himself be carried away but he turns to look at her so as to keep eye contact with her and she’s the one who has to lower her gaze.

Now, I personally wish Loki wouldn’t mourn Mobius because really, Mobius wasn’t good to him, but since he’s supposed to do it, I can only say Tom Hiddleston’s performance here is good as well.

Very fitting also the background music, especially when Loki is escorted through the corridor and now he seems to be worn out as he waves a little as he walks and then… he stops, and I’m not sure if there’s a reason or he just waves a little for the sake of him being emotionally hurt and the guards have to steady him and then force him to resume walking. In itself that pause was good to animate a walking scene who otherwise would have been pretty boring… but I don’t know if there’s a reason for it beyond that. But well, Loki had been beaten up till now so maybe he has a right at also being physically worn out.

So anyway Renslayer go to see Sylvie and as soon as she does she claims someone was there with her and wants to know who. Well, I guess the fact Sylvie is soaked was a dead giveaway so really, they should have found her a hairdryer before sending her back there. Besides why not to get inside the Roxxcart where it’s dry, instead than outside?

I get that outside, under the rain, the scene came a lot more dramatic and so technically better but logic is king of important as well. Giving away that Sylvie was taken outside to chat, as Sylvie has no bruises on herself, is dumb. I mean, had B-15 given her a black eye they could have at least pass if for B-15 taking her revenge on her but like this… it’s so dumb…

In fact as soon as Renslayer discovers it was B-15, she decides she too had been compromised and people has to search for her. Not that it matters as they won’t find her. After all she has a Tempad and has learnt she can hide in apocalypses.

Sylvie smiles at her smugly because she is enjoying seeing Renslayer under pressure and how could she not? It was Renslayer who captured her.

Sylvie is then taken away but this time only by two guards because they’ve decided giving her more when the last time she managed to punch one is useless. No, actually Renslayer might have figured if Sylvie has remained in her ‘theater’ (yeah, she and Loki were put into rooms called ‘time theaters’) instead than escaping with B-15, she’s willing to let herself be dragged to meet the Time-Keepers.

Or not, the plot had the characters act in dumb or irrational ways way too often so I don’t know.

Sylvie is anyway taken in front of the same door in front of which Loki is waiting. I love how she whispers to him an ‘You okay?’ even if I would prefer it wasn’t because she’s also crushing on him but because she was touched by how he gave her appreciation and validation. Loki nods once, deeply, but doesn’t verbally replies which is kind of worrisome per se.

Renslayer says she’ll handle things from there and open the door of the golden elevator with her ‘electronic key’ meaning when Sylvie got there the first time, as she was without key, she wouldn’t have been able to do anything. Loki and Sylvie follow Renslayer while the guards remain behind.

Sylvie asks Renslayer is she remembers her and when she answers affirmatively, always calling her Variant, she asks her which was her Nexus event. To Renslayer who asks her what does it matter she replies:

Sylvie: It was enough to take my life from me, lead to all of this. Must have been important. So, what was it?

I feel bad for Sylvie because maybe she doesn’t remember Miss Minute’s video (by the way did Miss Minute had a reason to exist or we’re meant to forget about her?) in which they said to create a Nexus even it’s enough to be late for work. Maybe Sylvie wasn’t meant to be there to play but should have been in the Vault with Thor and Odin learning about how glorious was Asgard for having beaten the Frost Giants. Maybe she was just meant to play ball instead than dolls but in short, what destroyed her life didn’t have to be important because that’s the kind of jerks the TVA is.

They punish someone for doing something completely innocent without having any idea it was the ‘wrong’ thing, ‘wrong’ being a matter of perspective because I bet they pruned all the Lokis who didn’t sent the Frost Giants in the Vault or didn’t try to kill Thor or didn’t attack New York because THOSE WERE THINGS MEANT TO HAPPEN.

The TVA is not about morality, I wonder if it’s about the entertainment of the Time-Keepers.

Anyway Renslayer smirks and then tells Sylvie she doesn’t remember. Honestly I doubt she doesn’t remember and even if she did, she could have made up something but she just prefers to hurt Sylvie by implying her Nexus event was so unimportant it wasn’t even worth remembering.

The door open and they are in a bluish, foggy place. There are two guards giving them their back and two instead facing them and, in front of them there are the three space lizards known as the Time-Keepers. Hum… the impression I get is that the place is foggy because it’s freezing cold since there are white bits that seem ice but… I’m not sure as nobody seems to be feeling cold.

Renslayer announces to the Time-Keeper she had brought them the Variants.

Now I was thinking it was poor effects, as the space lizard talk in a mechanical way and are so still they seem robot and even when their face move as they speak they seem mechanical… but no, it’ll turn out they’re robot. Whatever, I’m running ahead.

The lizards ask them what they have to say before being killed.

Okay, so Loki says and I quote:

Loki: Is that the only reason you brought us here? To kill us? I've lost track of the number of times I've been killed, so go ahead. Do your worst.

And I am WAIT, YOU’VE BEEN KILLED BEFORE? EVEN IF YOU’RE STILL UNDER THE WRONG BELIEF THOR TOSSED YOU INTO AN ABYSS, WHICH HE DIDN’T AS HE WANTED TO SAVE YOU AND YOU LET GO DUE TO ODIN’S HIGHLY MOTIVATIONAL WORDS (really, Odin should write demotivational posters quote along with Mobius) THAT COUNTS ONLY AS ONE. YOU DIDN’T DIE IN “THE AVENGERS”. CAN WE HOPE THIS MEANS WE’LL BE REVEALED WHAT HAPPENED IN THE YEAR IN BETWEEN “THOR” AND “THE AVENGERS”? OR IT’S JUST TO BE MEANT RANDOM BABBLING? PLEASE, LET ME KNOW!

Anyway okay, back to normal.

The Time-keepers tell them they’re no threat to them and Sylvie counters she believes they’re scared. She tries to get closer but Renslayer uses the Time Twister so she can’t.

The Time-Keepers complains they’re just a ‘cosmic disappointment’ why I’ve no idea as it’s not like they created the Variants so the Variants aren’t supposed to please them, and tell to delete them.

Sylvie tries to protest she’s not done with them but Renslayer tries to use the Time Twister and only manages to stop her because B-15 all of sudden comes to rescue because the TVA did a horrible job at tracking her apparently. B-15 disables Loki and Sylvie’s collars, then she mockingly repeats the TVA motto ‘For all time. Always’, before handing Sylvie her sword that originally had been put as a trophy in Renslayer’s office.

The two guards behind immediately knock down B-15 who didn’t even bother bring her weapon or, if she had, didn’t pull it out. Renslayer orders to the four guards to protect the Time-Keepers, so now it’s Renslayers and 4 guards against Loki and Sylvie. Renslayer decides not to fight, to be honest because the guards evidently had been given a better version of the Supersoldier serum and can comfortably stand against Loki and Sylvie with no problems whatsoever.

Really, if I don’t get an explanation on why human Variants are all of sudden strong enough they can stand against Loki I’ll think those guys have never seen “The Avengers”.

In fact the 2 guards fighting Loki are about to overpower Loki who asks for Sylvie’s help as she’s holding against her 2 guards just fine and she hands him her sword. Meanwhile, despite being weaponless, Sylvie… kicks to unconsciousness? Is that what she did? a guard, steals his weapon and instead than prune his companion with it, she stabs her. Because, you know, this is cooler and rule of cool always win.

All while Renslayer watches because whoever rules at the TVA has never read the ‘Evil Overlord list’ rule 75 “I will instruct my Legions of Terror to attack the hero en masse, instead of standing around waiting while members break off and attack one or two at a time.”

Actually there’s a huge list of rules the TVA ignored but this is the most important at the moment.

Anyway while the camera ignores Loki fighting with two guards in the background, we’re supposed to focus on Sylvie and Renslayer. Sylvie gives Renslayer a sporting chance letting her pick up a weapon. No idea why, really. Who cares about sport when you’re there to kill the Time-Keepers?

Besides, who cares about Loki? This is Sylvie’s moment to look cool.

Anyway Renslayer tells her this time she’ll finish the job, they fight, she ends on the ground, manages to turn their positions and punches Renslayer into unconsciousness, just in time for Loki to finish killing his guards. Why she didn’t kill Renslayer? Because the plot needs Renslayer to make troubles afterward so Sylvie, despite having a weapon and having used it to kill a guard, only punches Renslayer, which she should hate as much as the Time-Keepers, into unconsciousness.

Let me facepalm, please.

Now the Time-Keepers go:

Time-Keeper 1: You're a child of the Time-Keepers too, Sylvie. We can talk.

And okay, I’m not following this. Are they implying they created the Variants? Are they trying to pass themselves for Gods? Or it’s just Sylvie they created?

Sylvie tosses against one of the sword Loki gave her back, decapitating him. The Time-Keepers starts laughing as it turns out the Time-Keeper she decapitate was a robot.

I get “Wizard of Oz” feelings and I swear if it turn out this was created by an evil Loki Variant I’m gonna scream.

The Time-Keepers somehow deactivates, not sure if someone did it, or it was Sylvie pointing a weapon at them.

Sylvie picks up the head and, seeing it’s a robotic one and never having heard of Ultron and Vision, decides since they had robotic head they’re fake, mindless androids. Which yes, they have to be because we’re missing 2 episodes and they were beaten too easily but she’s not supposed to be aware of the episode count.

Whatever, Loki decides, I think, this would probably be a good moment to declare his love only they forget Renslayer is alive and she prunes Loki in front of Sylvie. At this point Renslayer forgets her warrior skills and Sylvie easily rips her weapon from her but, instead than pruning Renslayer as she asks, she informs her she’ll tell her everything. Meaning she will use her powers to force Renslayer to be cooperative.

The episode apparently ends, with the ending credit replaced by a love song, “If you love me” by Brenda Lee. Just in case you didn’t get Loki was about to make a Love confession.

When the ending… well, ends though, we see Loki opening his eyes and wondering if he’s dead and in Hel.

He’s told:

“Not yet. But you will be unless you come with us.”

As he looks up he sees four version of himself, a child, an old man, a POC and an alligator.

I can’t help but point out the costume the old Loki is wearing, despite being based on the one old Loki wears in the comics somehow feels like a poor cosplay.

Behind them the ruins of a city which, I bet, is New York. I wonder if they’re in an apocalypse created by the attack of New York succeeding.

And so the episode ends.

Now… this episode is, plotwise, better than the previous, as the previous was basically an excuse to get Loki and Sylvie to spend time together so as for them to fall in love. Oh and the revelation everyone in the TVA is a variant but really, Sylvie could have told Loki that in Ep 2 and we wouldn’t have missed anything big.

This one episode as, instead, a plot… but there are some things that just don’t add up and felt tossed there at random. I mostly mourn how the ruined Mobius’ character because this episode seriously damaged the sympathy I had for him, with that useless decision to have Loki belittled and beaten for… fundamentally nothing since he doesn’t believe him. Then he further insults him for falling for Sylvie before he decides to switch sides and no, Loki shouldn’t believe all the cruel things he told him because… hum… they weren’t true because Mobius is his friend. Not like how he said he was before, this time he’s really his friend the fact he needs him doesn’t matter, he’s not like Loki who uses people he’s one of the good guys of the TVA, you know, the ones who belittle and prune Variants unaware they’re Variants too.

Okay, I’m still very salty on this bit but I just didn’t enjoy the useless abuse of Loki.

It wasn’t funny, it had no purpose and it also ruined Mobius as a character.

It even impacted negatively on Sif which was fundamentally used to beat Loki up over and over when she already had, just for Mobius’ purposes, whatever they were.

Honestly I’m sick and tired of Marvel thinking that abusing of someone is a funny joke, especially if the one doing the beating is a girl.

The only thing it serves was to remark Sif had no love for Loki, which everyone seeing the movie could have guessed already.

Another thing I didn’t quite enjoy was how this is turning into Sylvie’s story. Is the purpose of this series pass the Loki baton to Sylvie?

We have the guards of the TVA being as strong as supersoldiers so far without explanation whatsoever, with Loki, who, in Asgard was trained to fight, in “Thor” could hold his ground against Frost Giants and even fight with Thor and who, in “The Avengers” gets punched by Cap and merely turns his face before he hits Cap with the sceptre and sent him flying and this not with magical powers but merely with his strength. And he does so TWICE, completely able to avoid Caps’ blows. Caps kicks him in the face and Loki remains standing and tosses him on the ground again.

Loki lets himself be arrested because:

a) Iron Man joins and he manages to send him on the ground by shooting at him and

b) because this was part of the plan.

Coulson shot him with a super powerful weapon and still Loki got up and left the Helicarrier on his feet. When Thor tried to hit Loki with his hammer, Loki could stop the blow by having it hit his sceptre without him even wavering on his feet.

And then okay, this Loki hadn’t lived through them but in “Thor: The Dark World” he could hold his ground against elves while in “Thor: Ragnarok” against Hela’s undead Asgardian soldiers.

And now we’ve those Variants of humans who can give him problems? Sylvie even gives him his weapon!

And all this while Sylvie, who had to learn to fight on her own, can hold her ground weaponless against two of them and save time to fight and beat Renslayer too?

Whatever, let’s hope we’ll get an explanation.

And then there’s the romance between Sylvie and Loki, which is useless or the whole idea Sylvie is Loki and all those other guys plus the alligator are Loki and I’d like to know what decides they’re Loki variants since they’re clearly genetically different from him… never mention one of them managed to get old when Loki supposedly died ‘young’ in the sacred timeline so what? The truth is he didn’t die in “Avengers: Infinity War” and grew old?

And why genetically different Variants of Loki were allowed to exist? How come this didn’t cause a Nexus event?

But whatever, let’s put aside my complains about the plot holes or the messed characterization and the nonsense dialogues and talk of the good stuff, like the acting or the director’s job or the music which really fit some scenes. There’s some really good stuff here.

And well, let’s mention the plot is not all to waste.

There were some good ideas in this.

To have the TVA agents discover they’re also Variants like the people they discriminated and pruned could have been great, I mean, one of the best scenes of “Thor” is Loki discovering he’s a Frost Giant so this could have been SO VERY COOL.

The Lokis forming a bond also had potential as idea on paper. If they were the same this could have pushed them to learn to appreciate themselves, if they were different, this could have pushed them to appreciate others. They didn’t need the romantic story and the idea they’re the same only they’re completely different so the fact they’re the same seems an idiocy.

Really, from a series who give space to a lot of female characters, who don’t just talk among them about men but about plot related issues, I don’t see why we need to pair together the two Lokis.

Mobius being Loki’s friend could have been great if he had acted as such and not as an abusive pet owner whose dog has peed on the carpet. But whatever, it could have been great to have Renslayer do the same to him, if this were to be acknowledged, if it were to be acknowledged how they both are poor friends.

Also Mobius’ death could have been a lot more moving if they hadn’t ruined him in this very same episode.

Seeing Sif again and learning of Loki’s past mischief? Could have been great if it wasn’t used for what turned into a torture scene or ‘police brutality’ who however wasn’t meant to be seen as bad as it was because it’s a woman who beat Loki.

Even the police brutality or the fascist agency could have been great plot point if it wasn’t they’re barely brushed over.

Loki reflecting on his behaviour could have been good if it wasn’t inserted into what was basically a torture scene.

Little Sylvie’s backstory could have been awesome if it had been realist, if this little escaping child had had knowledge of a Tempad and had had someone to help her.

I mean, there are some genuine good things in this plot… but then they got ruined by poor planning or poor explanation or abrupt character OOC.

It’s a pity.

We’ll see if episode 5 will redeem himself.

#mcu loki #loki #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #sylvie #mobius m mobius #ravonna renslayer #hunter b 15 #hunter c 20 #hunter u 92 #9 worlds study #9 worlds study mcu loki

32 notes · View notes

perriewinklenerdie · 4 years

Text

Let it snow (Ethan x MC)

Open Heart, Ethan Ramsey x MC

A/N: Hi guys! PB keeps serving us and we sure are eating good, huh? After reading the chapter for the first time (some of you know that I've read it four times now {watch me replay it again before the next one}), I wasn't sure what to write. If you ask me, they skimmed over that scene, kinda rushed it when we all know they have the ability to do better (imma be watching you, PB, step your game up, man).

{@terrm9 I told you it be sooner than you think ;) hope you don’t mind the tag)

Anyway, at first I wanted to do a rewrite to do this scene justice. But after asking my gang (you know who you are, my ride or die bitches) if I should do a rewrite or a round two, they were kinda in agreement that round two sounds fun. And now we're here :D

We have some light fluff, Claire pointing out a thing or two to Ethan and smut. Let the sinning begin

This work is NSFW, you have been warned, proceed with caution.

Summary: Chapter 14 rewrite. Staying away from each other is going to be challenging, but while the storm is still raging on outside the window, they don’t have to worry about it just yet. (Or: round two because they can’t keep their hands off each other)

Enjoy! <3

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

Ethan ran the back of his fingers over the rise and fall of Claire’s back, wordlessly basking in the afterglow of their rise of passion. He’s not sure how much time has passed, the only indication being the growing layer of snow that slowly covered the view out the window. His eyes followed the trajectory of the snowflakes, watching how they danced on the wind before disappearing.

Claire stirred in his arms a bit, falling deeper into his embrace. Their naked bodies were still pressed against one another, barely covered by the soft blanket that helped them to maintain at least a little bit of the heat. Her hand was resting comfortably right over his heart that was still pounding, its pace mirroring how fast his chest was rising and falling. Their breathing felt much louder than they actually were, silence providing a stark contrast.

“That was…” she searched for the right word to express her thoughts. To encapsulate all the emotions that roared in her mind and made her heart swell. “Different. I know it happened before, but… there was something else here.”

He nodded, deeply considering what she said. It’s like she read his mind. “I agree. Different, but in a good way. In a way that I wanted it to be for a long time now.”

Moving slightly to grant himself more freedom of movement, he leaned onto his elbow. His thumb traced her cheekbone, watching from under lowered eyelids how fire cast shadows over her face, making the usually soft lines more refined, casting a spell on him.

“Is this what you want, Claire?” he asked, vulnerability in his voice so clear and evident. Finally, after what felt like years in confinement, he freed himself from the cold grasp of his rules and fell into the warmth of her embrace. Now, he never wanted to leave, and he waited for her answer with a bated breath.

“I want more nights like tonight. Just you, and me, and nothing in between us to keep me away from you.” she confessed, muttering each and every word as she stared into his eyes, lively glimmer in her emerald irises. Delicately, she brushed back a lock that fell onto his forehead, running her fingers through his hair soothingly. “Whatever is going on between us… I don’t want it to stop.”

“I feel the same way.” Trailing away from her face, Ethan ran his hand up and down her arm, smiling softly at the effect he had on her. He held her closer, staring at the ceiling. “We’ll have to be careful, especially around June and Baz.”

“You mean no making eyes at each other across the gurney? No sneaky hand-holding beneath the diagnostics room table?” Claire grinned at him teasingly, her words causing him to look at her again in surprise.

“In what world would that be happening anyway?”

“Oh, so that part isn’t subject to make-believe?”

“My personality? Not really.” He replied, unable to fight the smile that pulled on the corners of his lips. Claire shook her head, turning in his arms and nuzzling her nose against the column of his neck, kissing him everywhere she could reach.

“Then I’ll just have to enjoy the moments when no one else is there to see us.”

“I’d like that.”

“Even if June and Baz already suspect something.” She added, waiting to see his reaction. His movements halted, breath getting caught in his throat. She didn’t have to look at him to know that he was waiting for her next words with panic in his eyes. “You’re not as smooth as you think you are.”

Noticing humor in her words, he relaxed almost entirely. “Excuse me, I like to think I’m very good at ‘being smooth’” he laughed, offended by her insinuations. Her giggle made her whole body shake.

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.” sneakily, she moved her hand slowly, then pinched his ribs, causing him to jerk away with a shriek. He stared at her with mock betrayal, attacking her right back, tickling her mercilessly until tears ran down her face from laughing so much. “Okay, okay, stop!”

They took a moment to let their breaths get back to normal again, all the while keeping their eyes locked on each other. The atmosphere in the room gradually changed, morphing into a more serious one when he sighed heavily, contentment mixing with something more muted.

“I meant what I said at the start of the year.” He began, leaning away so their eyes could meet. “I won’t jeopardize your professional development. Or your reputation.”

All traces of humor were gone, seriousness palpable in the way he spoke, in the way he looked at her, in the strong comfort and conviction in his hold on her. Holding his face in her hands, she stroked his cheeks as she spoke.

“I don’t want you to suffer, either.” All the unsaid words and unexpressed emotions were flowing between them, through them and around them. No words had to be spoken; they both felt it. “So when we’re at work, we’re nothing but colleagues. And when we’re alone, we’re…” she trailed off, smirking suggestively.

“Whatever we want to be.” He finished, choosing this exact word combination. It wasn’t a confession, at least not exactly, but they had time; they’d get there. He’d get there.

Claire pecked his lips a few times, playful and carefree. His fingers caressed her chin as the kiss deepened, slowly but surely stealing her breath. His body pressed against hers hard and with clear purpose, the kiss breaking when a shuddered moan escaped her.

“You don’t seem tired.”

“That’s because I’m not” Ethan grinned, grabbing her hips and helping her roll on top of him, their bodies brushing against each other once more. Laughter that was there when he moved her has now vanished, focus occupying her features. Steadying herself with her hands on his shoulders, she looked down at him fervently.

“Then we should do something about it. God forbid you losing sleep at night.”

“You make it sound like it’s a bad thing.” He panted, letting his hands run up her sides, cupping her breasts. His thumbs brushed against her nipples, eliciting a soft sigh from her, the sensation making her whole body come alive. He pinched the sensitive skin just to get a reaction out of her, her mind kicking into a higher gear when his hips rose up to meet hers, nothing between them to quell the feeling.

“I like losing sleep with you.” Claire whispered, the only thing she managed to do when he was stimulating her in so many ways. Ethan’s grin could light up the room alone.

“Yeah?”

“False humbleness isn’t a good look on you.”

She grabbed his shoulders more firmly, pulling him up so he’d sit. Their hips met with more force than either of them anticipated, groans that slipped past their lips mixing into a symphony. With new position came new possibilities. Ethan didn’t waste even a second of their time, licking around her right nipple, continuing ministrations on the other breast with his hand.

Claire’s head fell backwards, fingers twisting in his hair in an attempt to keep herself grounded. Grazing his teeth over her skin, he continuously sent sparks through her that reached the farthest ends of her body. His mouth latched onto her, working her without letting her catch a break. Pushing her further and further, their hips rolling and pressing against each other in a tantalizing manner.

“Ethan…” her high-pitched moan bounced off the walls, sending a shiver down his spine. Ethan hummed, vibrations enhancing the pleasure he was giving her.

“I love it when you say my name.” he leaned away enough to speak his mind, then immediately went back to his previous task, determined to make her come, again and again. He wrapped his unoccupied arm around her, pressing her down onto him, willing himself not to fall with her just yet. With so much time on their hands, they could have their fun all night.

Her hips were moving against his frantically, chasing the release that was so close that she could almost taste it. She pulled on his hair, her grip vicelike, making him groan, seemingly helplessly. Red-hot desire surged through her veins when she came, a broken string of loud sounds falling from her lips before she could stop herself. Ethan helped her ride it out, abandoning teasing her breast in favor of watching her face as she said his name, over and over again.

Eventually, she fell forward, her forehead resting against his, her breathing elevated yet again. His hands stroked the skin of her back, soothing the places in which he was holding her close to him. When her eyes opened, he saw cheeky spark in them.

“I’m not done with you yet.” Claire said smugly, twirling a strand of his hair around her finger. He nodded, enchanted with her words. In that moment, she could ask him to jump into the fire with her and he’d do it.

“I don’t intend on the night ending here either.”

Her hands slid down his body, grazing his skin with her nails as she went. Muscles contracted at the sensation, his breaths getting shallow, the anticipation of what was going to happen next driving him wild.

Claire lifted her hips a bit, making room for her hand to trace the lines of Ethan’s legs and hips. She massaged his thighs, her knuckles brushing against his length from time to time, slowly but surely making him lose his mind. He was about to protest, to beg her to touch him, when she palmed him delicately.

A choked grumble filled the room, his hips snapping up to press her closer. Claire shook her head, smirking at his impatience, then pressed downwards to keep him in place. Her intention didn’t matter though, because he achieved exactly what he wanted, reveling in the feeling of her fingers against him.

She grabbed his chin and turned his head so they were face to face, then slammed their lips together. At the exact same moment, she wrapped her fingers around him and squeezed him gently, his hiss of satisfaction getting drowned out in the kiss that only climbed in intensity, taking them both higher.

Slowly, she pumped her hand, up and down, establishing a punishingly intense rhythm. At first he tried to control his reactions, but his reason soon flew out the window, triggered by the way she twisted her wrist with each stroke.

Needing to do something to distract himself and prevent ending it all too quickly, he nudged her legs, prompting her to open them wider, and brushed his middle finger against her folds. Initially, she jerked away from his touch, still sensitive from her last high, but after a few of his touches, she began to match the movement of her hips and her hand on him with his ministrations, synchronizing them into a deliciously torturing sensation.

Up until this point, they both managed to remain relatively quiet. Then his thumb brushed over her clit, back and forth, in circles, and a moan slipped past her lips. Determined to hear that sound again, and again, he ran the tip of his finger along her entrance, then pushed it inside, teasing her just enough to make her want to combust. Pressing the rest of the way, he moved it a bit in a variety of directions, guided by the sounds she was making, stimulating her further with insistent touches applied to the bundle of nerves at the apex of her thighs.

His actions inspired her own, her strokes becoming hurried and intense, her thumb caressing the tip in just the way that made him groan in appreciation. They wouldn’t last long like that; of that he was sure. He felt her inner muscles contracting around his fingers, a clear indication of just how close to the release she was, but the look on her face spelled out resolve. Resolve to make this last, even if only for a moment longer.

She broke the kiss, then pulled him by the strands at the back of his head, making their eyes meet and lock in an intense gaze. Guiding him to her entrance, she muttered his name, waiting for confirmation, that that was what he wanted, to appear in his eyes. Mixed with desire, she saw longing and tenderness; that, accompanied by a firm nod he gave her, was the confirmation she needed.

Ethan moved his hands to her hips, stroking her hipbones as she sank down onto him. His lips parted slightly, panting heavily at the heavenly sensations she was subjecting him to. The sounds Claire was making were bordering on being mute, at least at first, as she still tried to keep her voice down. Ultimately, they both failed, as their last-ditch effort to remain quiet fell short after a few seconds.

Her first movement is anything but slow and cautious. With how worked up they both are, it’s a miracle that it hasn’t ended the moment he entered her. As soon as they’re both comfortable, she begins to rise and fall, assisted by his hands, rolling her slightly from side to side every time she goes down. The lock in which their gazes were up until his point is broken when she presses him closer to her, gripping his hair tightly and pulling on it with every thrust his hips make, meeting her halfway.

“Don’t stop.” He growled, attacking her neck with hot and lingering kisses, biting her skin and soothing it with his tongue. Claire grinned, moaning his name louder than before, rising and then slamming all the way down with full force. And again, repeatedly pushing them towards the sweet release that began to dance at the tips of their nerve endings.

Her free hand skimmed over the pronounced muscles of his ribcage, then slid onto his shoulder blade. The pleasure was beginning to overwhelm her, at the same time being not enough. His lips attached to her pulse point and sucked, gently at first, then more insistently, making her almost sure that there would be a mark. In return, partially caused by the way his hips thrusted at a new angle, her nails dug into his back, leaving red skid marks when she moved her hand lower.

Pain enhanced pleasure, pushing him even closer to her and to the tipping point. His fingers gripped her long hair and pulled on it as the strands wrapped around his wrist, allowing his kisses to return to her lips, a futile effort to keep their cries at bay. He should have known that with the amount of time that they were apart for, and with her by his side, there was no way either of them could keep quiet.

As her inner muscles contracted around his length, it became apparent to him that it was all going to be over in a matter of moments. Unable to hold himself back any more than he did up until this point, he broke the kiss so that he could look at her when it all fell down.

“Look at me.” he pleaded, holding his breath until she opened her eyes, irises so dark and enticing, making it impossible to look away. Nose to nose, they stared into each other’s eyes, racing towards their climax recklessly.

She squeezed him again, coming a second later, crying his name into the stillness of the night. His frantic movements expressed just how desperately he searched for release, while he helped her ride out the bursts of energy that sent her into overdrive. Claire never ceased to move, even after the initial sensation subsided, gripping his face with her hands and slamming their lips together.

“Come, Ethan.” She muttered against his mouth, letting him guide her in the direction he needed her in. Growling her name, his voice filled with need and adoration, he finally followed her, moaning frantically with each blinding spark of pleasure.

He fell into her arms, spent and out of breath, pressing sweet kisses to her collarbone lazily. Claire brushed his hair back, gazing wordlessly at the wall. The contrast between the atmosphere in the room now and only moments ago is astounding; she wouldn’t believe anything happened if it wasn’t for her racing heart, heavy breathing and the warm buzzing feeling in her whole body.

“Let’s hope Baz and June aren’t nearby. We weren’t exactly discreet.” She muttered, reminiscing how not-quiet they were, right after deciding that they had to be careful around the two doctors they worked with.

“Practice makes perfect.” He replied in an equally muted voice, somehow managing to put some humor into his it, despite words blending together from how tired he was.

Ethan retreated onto the bed, pulling out before gathering her in his arms, keeping her head at the same level as his so he could kiss her at any given moment. She stroked the side of his face, smiling softly at how comfortable they both were in their new reality.

“This is more than normal plus, you know?” she joked, making him laugh lightly. Gazing into her eyes, he could imagine thousands of nights, just like this one, that they had ahead of them. At the same time, he didn’t know how in the hell was he going to keep his wandering mind and impatient hands at bay when she was so near that he could touch her, but so far because of all the people around them that could see it.

“You’ll never get anything less than that.” He promised, pulling the covers over them and letting her warmth and the sound of hear breathing lull him to sleep.

#open heart #ethan ramsey #ethan x mc #choices

198 notes · View notes

stardust-walker · 3 years

Text

Undying Fidelity

(Loki X Sigyn!OC)

Summary: Sigyn is feeling v stressy and depressy after Loki dies. She volunteers to return to 2012 New York with Tony, Steve, Scott, and Bruce. Her reasons weren’t selfish, she promises. Chaos ensues. Big dorks.

My first time writing for any fandom besides TWD but this idea has been in my head since the Loki trailer came out and I couldn’t shake it so here it is lmao.

Sigyn had felt like the world moved in slow motion from the moment the life had left Loki’s body. The snap had only made things worse. It had been 5 years since she had seen pretty much anyone other than Thor and sometimes the residents of New Asgard. She kept to herself more often than not.

It was almost ironic how Loki had spoken of undying fidelity shortly before his life had been snuffed out. Meanwhile her own undying fidelity had seemed to leave her cursed with never-ending grief.

The talk of time travel had gained her interest almost as soon as the idea was pitched to the team. Asgard was an option but she knew that wouldn’t be the best option for her. Odds were that in the time they would send them back to, the residents would still think that she was dead.

Her heart had done a funny sort of flip-flop as they talked about heading back to New York. Her stomach sank even lower as an image of Loki was pulled up on the screen.

“So Sigyn will come to Asgard with myself and the rabbit,” Thor began to announce.

Her brown eyes drifted over to where Rocket had, once again, slapped himself on the forehead in frustration. “As much as I would love to go back to Asgard, I believe my skills are needed in New York.”

“You sure that’s such a good idea there, Frosty?” Tony quirked an eyebrow.

“Are you sure it’s such a good idea to have two Hulks in one place? No offense, Bruce.”

“She’s right.” Steve spoke up, “I know what you’re thinking, Tony, and it won’t happen.”

Sigyn locked eyes with Tony for a moment before the older man relented. “Fine. But any funny business and I’m leaving your ass back in 2012.”

She hated travel. Whether it was through space or time, it all sucked to her. All the hair on her arms seemed to stand up inside of the suit as she shared one last worried look with Thor before they were off. Something was different about hurtling through space when you were a lot smaller.

“We all have our assignments,” Steve began as Sigyn stood up straighter and began to glance around. She knew he was around but more importantly she could feel him again.

A loud roar jolted her from her thoughts as she took a step closer to the men she had traveled with. There was the Hulk. Or the old Hulk. However time travel worked, there was the previous Hulk from that time smashing up a car like his life depended on it.

A small smirk crept onto her face as she caught the embarrassed look that Banner had on his face. That was the champion she had seen back on Sakaar. A total wild animal.

This Bruce, however, didn’t seem to have any of that in him anymore. Sigyn’s head tilted slightly as the rest of them watched the green man try to get back into how he was before. “Well, he’s a little confused..” She muttered.

“But he’s sure got the spirit.” Tony joked. “Let’s roll.”

Sigyn didn’t even have to ask where they were going. Sure, they had talked about it in the plans but she felt like she was almost in a trance as she scurried after Tony and Scott as Steve split off from them with a flash of a reassuring smile.

After not using her magic for what was probably years, she was surprised that she didn’t stumble as she landed inside the Stark tower right after Tony. As she slipped behind the stone wall to hide from their old selves, she couldn’t help but sneak a peek. Did her hair really look like that from behind? Ew.

“If it’s all the same to you,” her heart leapt into her throat, “I’ll have that drink now.” Tony gripped her arm a little too hard. Her eyes narrowed as she shot him a look.

The 2012 version of her let out a quiet snort of laughter. She remembered the look that Natasha had shot her. “What?” She heard herself say.

“All right, get him on his feet.” The younger Tony Stark ordered. “Uh-uh. Not you, princess. Come on, Point Break. Get him up. We can all stand around posing up a storm later. By the way, feel free to clean up.”

“Wow I almost forgot how much of an ass you were, Stark,” Sigyn hissed through gritted teeth.

“At least I had style. Speaking of! Mr. Rogers, I almost forgot. That suit did nothing for your ass.” Tony shook his head in mock sympathy.

Steve practically sounded like he was rolling his eyes. “No one asked you to look, Tony.”

Sigyn raised an eyebrow and shrugged in agreement as she caught sight of Captain America. That suit really was terrible.

“I think you look great, Cap. As far as I’m concerned, that’s America’s ass,” Scott called out over the line.

“C’mon.” Sigyn whispered, “No one likes a...kiss ass.” She smirked as Tony shot her an appreciative look.

“Who gets the magic wand?” Nat asked.

Thank god that Tony knew his way around Stark tower more than anyone even after years of not living there. Sigyn’s eyes narrowed as she watched the Hydra agents in disguise begin to file into the apartment from their new hiding place.

A laugh nearly slipped out as she watched Loki transform into Steve from across the room. “I mean honestly,” he joked as he turned back into himself, “how do you keep your food down?”

“Shut up,” Thor snapped as he placed a lock over Loki’s mouth.

“I wish I could tell you dearest,” she heard herself say as she watched the scene unfolding in front of her. In spite of Loki being in chains. A prisoner. She watched herself grab him gently by the arm to lead him into the elevator with Thor almost like when they used to walk through the gardens together. “But then I would have to kill you.”

Tony’s grasp on her shoulder pulled her out of the moment as he pulled her back towards the window. The plan flooded back into her mind as she began to plummet backwards towards the ground. She let out a grunt as she was finally able to regain her own balance to drift back towards the ground without Stark’s help.

“What’s-a matter, Frosty? No knight in shining metal armor today,” Stark joked.

“You burn my hair with those flaming feet of yours and you won’t make it back to the future,” she hissed through gritted teeth as the small green embers flickered from her own fingers as she continued on a quick course back to the ground.

“Looking fresh, Stark,” Sigyn mumbled as she walked up beside Tony in her own security outfit. The only difference was her long blonde hair hung out from under the helmet. “Almost didn’t recognize you without the extra few inches of metal.”

“That really hurts me, you know. I would think for someone so old you would want to be a little nicer to the younger gen-ow!” Tony rubbed his arm as he received a hard pinch.

“Shut up. Here we come,” she swallowed hard as she spotted herself again out of the corner of her eye. She walked side by side with Loki with her head held high. It was amazing how she could walk like that when she remembered how she’d felt. She had known that Loki had pretty much signed his own death sentence and yet still she walked beside him with pride. He was her husband and she was loyal to him. It was her gift and her biggest curse.

“Thumbelina, do you copy? I’ve got eyes on the prize,” Tony chirped into the ear piece.

“I’m going inside you,” Scott whispered back after a moment. Sigyn’s eyebrows shot up as she shot an amused glance at Tony.

Sigyn flashed him a delicate smile. “I didn’t realize I would learn so much about your personal life today, Mr. Stark.”

“Quiet down, Glinda. We don’t want Elphaba to hear you.”

“May I ask you where you’re going?” Pierce’s voice made her skin crawl as she watched him approach the group.

“A bit of lunch and then Asgard,” Thor answered cheerfully.

“Perhaps a stop for gas. I hear mileage on the Bifrost is killer these days,” past Sigyn cooed as she shot a look back at Loki over her shoulder.

Pierce stood up a little straighter. “I’m going to have to ask you to turn the prisoner over to me.”

Sigyn could almost feel her throat close up all over again as she watched herself take a defensive step back towards Loki. Her hand came to rest a mere inch away from the handle of her knife.

Tony whispered beside her, “Easy, Sig. We know how this goes, right?” He paused. “I see what you mean by the whole fidelity thing though but the victory thing?”

“Hush!” She hissed back as she watched Loki turn slightly with an annoyed look in his eye. The woman turned to face the other way quickly as chaos seemed to be breaking out behind them again. Pierce had always been an asshole that much was sure. She wished she could’ve said she were surprised when she found out he was Hydra all along. Her stomach churned as more thoughts raced through her head of what they would have done to her husband if they’d gotten a hold of him in the first place.

Sigyn squeezed her eyes shut tight as she heard the crackle through the ear piece and a different sort of chaos broke out. “Oh my gods! Stark,” she heard her own panicked voice and the two of them turned to see herself abandon Loki and reach a hand out to steady Tony.

“Aw, you do care.”

Sigyn resisted the urge to punch Tony in the chest for good measure. Her heart leapt as the suitcase with the tesseract spun towards them. Her pulse quickened as Tony leaned down to pick up the case and her gaze wandered for just a moment. Loki had noticed.

“Good job, meet me in the alley,” Tony mumbled as he began to quickly exit the building. She was just about to take a few steps to follow when another explosion happened. Except it wasn’t so much of an explosion as it was a rampaging green monster busting down a door.

“Oh shit,” she hissed through her teeth as she skittered back. Stark landed at her feet with a groan but a softer noise drew her attention. A soft tinkling noise and her gaze flickered to the case. The tesseract.

Time seemed to stand still again as Loki glanced over his shoulder and locked eyes with her. A confused look crossed the upper portion of his face for a moment before he glanced back towards the chaos ensuing over past Tony. He had noticed.

With one last look back at her, he knelt down to pick up the tesseract. She thought she heard Tony grunt something but her feet carried her quicker than she could ever remember running before.

Just as Loki stood again, Sigyn came within one step of him. The sudden noise behind him made him turn once more. She gritted her teeth into a grimace as she placed both her hands on the tesseract. Sigyn fully intended to yank the damned thing right out of his fingers but before she could, she felt a strange sensation. A wall of blue and black smoke engulfed the pair of them.

She hated space travel.

Loki landed in the sand with a loud grunt despite the muzzle still over his mouth. The tesseract was still in his grasp. Had he even really seen what he thought he had?

A loud scream echoed through the air around him. His eyebrows raised as another portal seemed to open in the sky right above him. A figure all in black fell through it; arms flailed and legs kicked as the ground seemed to raise to meet them.

Another loud grunt left Loki, this time a more pained one as the smaller figure landed right on top of him.

Quickly, the woman rolled to the other side and let out a quiet groan as she pulled the helmet from her head. With a fluid movement, the black object was tossed aside into the sand before she flopped back onto the sand. A grunt beside her alerted her to the presence of the man. Without even a glance to the side, she reached over and pressed a hand to his mouth to deactivate the muzzle.

“Lovely of you to drop in, Sigyn,” Loki coughed as he took a deep breath.

Sigyn let out an annoyed grunt. “A pleasure, as always.”

Loki caught her gaze out of the corner of his eye as he rose to a sitting position. “You should have just let me take it,” he hissed through his teeth.

Sigyn let out a heavy sigh as she sat up and shrugged off the heavy black bulletproof vest and jacket she wore. “And let you cause more chaos and destroy more cities?”

Loki glanced over at her. A nearly imperceptible look of nervousness crossed his face before he smirked at her. “Who says that’s what I was going to do with it.”

Sigyn rolled her eyes as her gaze flickered forward to a small group of people that were moving slowly towards them. “I would like to think I know you better than you know yourself. Whatever you do, we’re in this together now.” She wasn’t about to lose him again. Not so soon.

“I’m positively touched,” he cooed.

“Til death do us part, darling.” And even after.

#loki x reader #loki x sigyn #loki x oc #loki fanfiction #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #loki friggason #loki fanfic #loki fic #sigyn #loki fanDOM HERE I COME #listen im fully aware this might suck but the idea wouldn't leave my ass alone #chaotic space babies #i know the loki series probably wont start with him falling into the desert #but that scene in the trailer with him just waking up in the sand made me cackle #so here this is lmao

46 notes · View notes

chalkrevelations · 3 years

Text

Word of Honor Ep 5, and this is a lot of politicking. (Although not as much as there will be.)

Due diligence, first: If you are NEW or JUST VISITING, this is a re-watch, so there are SPOILERS not just for this ep, but for the entire show. Scroll away and come back later if you haven’t seen all 36.5 eps and want to watch unspoiled.

Before we get to the politicking, let’s talk about what we’re really here for: Date Night For Our Pair Of Merciless Killers. I’m going float a theory about this episode. I’ve talked in previous rounds of this re-watch about how Wen Kexing’s thirst takes on a different dimension when we know his backstory and how he’s trying to get info about Siji Manor and confirm Zhou Zishu’s identity, as well as reacting to him as his one-time shixiong. I’m going to suggest that a lot of the sexual harassment in this particular episode – at least in the back half of it – is about diverting ZZS while he’s trying to figure out an op that WKX’s actual Ghosts were involved in. I think WKX is laying it on so thick here – constant come-ons and physical crowding and repeated attempts to touch ZZS that we repeatedly see ZZS step away from or actually push away - because he’s deliberately trying to make ZZS uncomfortable in order to distract him. More on this in a bit.

Re: the politicking. Straight-up, I’ll admit that I didn’t follow this aspect as close as I maybe ought to have on the first go ‘round because I was distracted by WKX’s thirst, just like ZZS is supposed to be (so, another point to you, show). I’m going to take this in basically chronological order to try to make sense of it: We open on Shenshen fighting Hao Tong and Lv Liu (ugh) to protect Ao Laizi, leader of Tai Shan sect, a lesser sect; the last two living Danyang Sect shidi; and the Danyang Glazed Armor. Shenshen chases Insufferable Grandma and Grandpa away but is kind of an asshole about wanting the Danyang Glazed Armor. He does a credible job of trying to maneuver them all into coming back to the Five Lakes Alliance at Zhao Jing’s place after Zhao Jing shows up with one of the Tai Shan disciples who ran to Sanbai Manor for help. Ao Laizi was not born yesterday and appears to outmaneuver him, although if you pay attention, Zhao Jing actually allows them to slip the snare. I have my suspicions that Zhao Jing wants the Danyang Glazed Armor to stay in the wind, where he’s less likely to be blamed once Ao Laizi gets knifed in the back and gets his newly acquired Glazed Armor took, which I’m assuming – knowing what I know about Awful Yifu from my previous watch – is the plan. This will end up being a big mistake for everyone involved. WKX then gets himself and ZZS invited to dinner at Sanbai Manor, where they get to sit at the head table with Chengling, Zhao Jing, Shenshen, and a dude representing Yueyang Sect, who is apparently Gao Chong’s favorite disciple, despite not being his head disciple, so you lose again, Deng Kuan, sorry. There’s a lot of ostentatious poetry quoting and bullshit toasting of each other at the head table, interrupting ZZS’s actual work of drinking. WKX attempts to feed ZZS by putting a prawn on his plate, which goes over about as well as you’d expect at this stage of their relationship, and which I now have to compare to the New Year’s dinner we’ll see in a later ep, at Siji Manor, which shows just how far their relationship comes. EVERYTHING about how awkward and uncomfortable this banquet is stands in stark contrast to that New Year’s dinner.

Cut to Mu Yunge – oh, this is the guy who was sitting in the back row of the cast during the WoH concert, when I couldn’t figure out who he was or why he was there instead of say, Wang Rong (Han Ying, my beloved …). We saw him earlier with the Five Lakes Alliance contingent that shows up to look vaguely horrified and tearful post-massacre at Mirror Lake. Now, he’s staggering along a deserted street after nightfall, running from Ghost Valley, who appear to be the legit deal this time, in the form of the Department of the Unfaithful. He runs into Ao Laizi and his charges (don’t they have a home to go to?), begging for help, before he gets yoinked away by a red banner that acts an awful lot like a tentacle. Ao Laizi goes running after him. BIG MISTAKE.

Back at the banquet, Shenshen appears to be disgracefully drunk (can none of these Five Lakes Alliance assholes hold their liquor? Damn.) and is busy berating Chengling about learning to drink like a man. There are a lot more weird sympathetic looks from WKX here, along with ZZS. Zhao Jing sends both Shenshen and Chengling to bed like 5-year-olds, and WKX takes advantage of his shameless persona to ask pointedly about the strapping young fellow who escorted ShenShen to bed (aka Song Huairen, Gao Chong’s favorite disciple from Yueyang Sect). There is literally no reason for WKX to need to know this, but it will help us, as the audience, to know it later. Cut to Song Huairen putting Shenshen to bed and leaving, and then we find out, surprise! Shenshen is not drunk! Is not sleeping! Is apparently going to get up and go skulk around secretly …. somewhere. Who knows? We don’t see him again until he has a chance to berate Zhao Jing, which is always a good time, even if Shenshen is insufferable. Pick your fighter, I guess. Back at the banquet again, we and WKX meet … oh. It’s This Guy, Yu Qiufeng, leader of Mount Hua Sect – remember this asshole, he’ll show up again, in various iterations – and his son, Tianjie. ZZS, meanwhile, wanders off, also acting disgracefully drunk, pretending to throw up in the bushes so the maids will leave him alone and he can drink in peace. I’m not sure why we act like WKX is the only shameless one in this marriage. Also, this is … actually not the last time he’ll resemble Shenshen in this episode, now that I think about it. Anyway, ZZS spots Yu Tianjie sneaking away suspiciously and follows him to some part of Sanbai where Tianjie sneaks in then chases out someone in dark robes with his face covered who looks suspiciously like Song Huairen, Gao Chong’s favorite disciple. The banquet gets interrupted by someone who sounds like Happy Ghost berating the Five Lakes Alliance, a maid comes screaming up the stairs, and we all rush out to discover Ao Laizi and two of his disciples, dead, hanging outside the front gate. This really is the worst party ever. Significantly, WKX takes a minute to look around the banquet hall, as if to see if anyone is eying him suspiciously. He does NOT follow everyone to the front gate, but instead ends up outside Chengling’s room when Chengling yells for his shifu because someone’s trying to get him. When they all run to Chengling’s room, WKX is faffing about outside, leisurely fanning himself and saying that surely that wasn’t Ghost Valley, because they were SUCH mediocre fighters and ran away the minute he started fighting. I JUST BET THEY DID.

OK, so, here’s the thing. Back in Ep 4, A-Xiang told Lovelace to take a message back from WKX to tell everyone to assemble at Sanbai Manor. I’m thinking that this time, this is actual Ghost Valley, that they grabbed Mu Yunge essentially as bait to get Ao Laizi, and then killed Ao Laizi and took the Danyang Glazed Armor, so that Ghost Valley is actually IN POSSESSION of a piece of the Glazed Armor, finally. They also, in the process, stole it out from under Zhao Jing’s nose, taking away his chance to have (probably) Xie’er go after Ao Laizi and get it. Ghost Valley then hung Ao Laizi at the gate and presumably menaced Chengling, either as a distraction or to make WKX look good or both.

So, we get Chengling back in bed and see ZZS tell him to go to sleep and not to cry because men don’t cry – thanks, Shenshen. I’ll be sure to remember that when you figuratively stab me in the HEART with your sad little face and crystalline tears later in the show. ZZS has a flashback to telling baby Qin Jiuxiao at Siji Manor basically the same thing, and I’m wondering if this is following Qin Huaizhang’s death? I don’t know, I don’t think we get enough info. ZZS then sneaks onto the roof to listen to Shenshen berate Zhao Jing, who supposedly discovered he had his own piece of Glazed Armor stolen during this ruckus. NOW, LISTEN. Was the dark-robed figure chased by Yu Tianjie actually Xie’er, “stealing” Zhao Jing’s Glazed Armor? Because we know, later, Xie’er wears the Tai Hu Glazed Armor as a necklace. It seems like a lot of trouble to go through, to make him actually “steal” it, when you could just give it to him and act like it was stolen, but Zhao Jing also didn’t know (I think?) that ACTUAL Ghost Valley was going to show up and create a convenient ruckus and an obvious scapegoat to pin the theft on. This is also where I’m unsure about which particular faction scared the shit out of Chengling. I’m assuming it’s actual Ghost Valley, who were “conveniently” driven off by WKX, because also in Ep 4, the Scorpions were told to assemble at Yueyang, not Sanbai Manor, and will make their kidnap attempt there in a later episode.

Anyway, we’re finally back to Date Night For the Merciless Killers, and ZZS chases WKX through the treetops, set to a romantic tune, until they arrive at what will turn out to be a crime scene, where WKX stops ZZS from walking into some Hanged Ghost-style Soul Winding Threads. ZZS remarks this must be the “real” Hanged Ghost, unlike the one at Mirror Lake, because A-Xiang wouldn’t have been able to kill the REAL Hanged Ghost. (SO CLOSE, my friend, but we know that the real Hanged Ghost got got in Ep 1. Although whoever was at Mirror Lake did have access to Soul Winding Threads, as Shenshen and his group discovered them.) At this point, WKX wants to know if ZZS is afraid of ghosts because he’s a VIRGIN, hahaha? He also starts getting up on ZZS, who walks away to continue his investigation of the tree with the Soul Winding Threads. Blood drips from a corpse in the tree down onto ZZS’s sleeve, and ZZS comments that blood “disgusts” him; I think there may be some significance to this word choice, as it correlates to his past breakdown over his work in Tian Chuang and his reaction to the deaths of the Four Sages of Anji - this is the metaphorical blood on people’s hands, including his own, literalized. Anyway, at this point, WKX cuts ZZS’s sleeve. I mean. :hands: He also tries to joke and bet about the identity of the corpse in the tree, who turns out to be Yu Tianjie. ZZS once again will not be diverted and keeps investigating this crime scene like the most devoted Fantasy Ancient China CSI ever. WKX rushes after him, saying that HE’s afraid of ghosts (implying that HE’s a virgin?) and getting right up on ZZS, enough so that ZZS physically pushes him away, as they reach a second body on the ground. Dark-robed, masked, turns out to be Song Huairen, Gao Chong’s (former) favorite disciple, who ZZS theorizes is the traitor who was after the Tai Hu Glazed Armor. There’s a repeated pattern here of WKX really pushing the sexual harassment and other diversionary tactics every time ZZS is working to figure out a piece of this puzzle, which might take him too close to WKX, up until the point when ZZS advances a theory that points away from WKX. ZZS is clearly working his way toward WKX, though, even with some of the wrong turns he’s making. The last thing we do in this ep is move on to the Zhao Coffin Home, where they encounter the Drunk Like a Dream incense and the Drug Men. On entering the place, ZZS pulls WKX back from more Soul Winding Threads, but he then pulls away when WKX tries to put a hand on his shoulder. WKX asks ZZS who he is, again, and it sounds like this time he’s asking more than what the face under the mask looks like. ZZS responds by asking WKX who HE is, and the way he says it – this is where I really begin to think he’s getting suspicious. You can see the wheels turning.

Final observation:

We get two SUPER SIGNIFICANT things at the end of this ep: There’s what I think is the first use of “Lao Wen,” shouted by ZZS in warning when WKX is wandering around high and the Drug Men show up. And WKX calls ZZS “Zhou Zishu” – not Zhou Xu – when he complains about being made to drink the Drunk Like A Dream antidote. ZZS notices.

#zhou zishu #wen kexing #zhang chengling #zhao jing #shen shen #word of honor #word of honor episode reax #will be cross-posted to ao3

15 notes · View notes

angel-of-darkness-3000 · 4 years

Text

That Sounds Beautiful to Me (Loki x chubby reader)

"Hey, you were pretty good." Y/n jumped at hearing a voice call out to her after she exited the back door of the club.

She brought her hands up, reminiscent of the movement to surrender, not that the shadowy figure in the alley would know, but the connotation of the movement was quite the contrary to what it meant to her. She was readying to fight. "Please don't rape me."

"Rape you?!" The man sputtered as he stepped out of the shadows. "I swear upon the wealth of my entire industry that I won't touch you without your explicit permission. I just wanted to know if you were available for private bookings."

Y/n froze at the sight of Tony Stark standing in front of her and she struggled to keep her tongue from tripping over the words that she forced out of her mouth. "Never done any, but sure."

"Cool." He handed her his personal card. "Call if anything comes up. Next Friday, show up at Stark Tower at 5pm, the party doesn't start till 6, but I want to let you get comfortable with the equipment."

He got into his car at the edge of the alley, but before he drove off, he rolled the window down to speak to Y/n once more. "Oh, and I'm paying you $6,000 for this one."

Y/n's jaw went slack as Stark drove off, chuckling to himself.

---

It was through that gig and with the other Avengers present that Tony found out about Y/n's ability to manipulate soundwaves. Tony had made the decision to take her into the Tower with the rest of the Avengers. Tony kept her from Fury's wrath even though she eventually did join the Avengers as unconventional as a plus size lady superhero was. He would do nothing less for the lady he had grown to see as his sister.

That outlook on Y/n was also what made him wary when she had grown close to Loki. Despite being sent to serve Earth as payment for his crimes against it, he was still a trickster. His fears soon proved to be unfounded when he observed the dynamics between the two of them. Instead of Loki corrupting Y/n, it seemed that she was corrupting him in a way. Much like Jane Foster had grown close to Thor, so did Y/n grow close to Loki. She had shown him a wide array of bands and artists that she had favored songs from; Marilyn Manson, AC DC, Aerosmith, and the Beetles, just to name a few. Her favorites soon became his too, and it was common to find them relaxing to seemingly unrelaxing music in the background.

---

Y/n had taken Loki out again, wanting to teach Loki more about Midguardian customs. This time, she was taking him to the American Museum of Natural History, as they had just watched the Night at the Museum movies the previous day. Of course it was different from the movie, something they were discussing in front of the giant Easter Island head.

"You are certain that it doesn't talk?"

"Yes, I'm certain."

"I could make it talk."

"Loki, no." He grumbled under his breath, but perked up at her next offer. "We could buy a mini one at the gift shop and you could make that one talk. We could scare Tony with it too."

Loki grinned at Y/n, who had moved to read the plaque about the statue.

Whispers behind the pair soon drew their attention. A frown forming on both of their faces as they glanced at the couple of girls behind them. One was a blonde, and the other was a clearly dyed red head, each giggling to each other, speaking louder now that they had an audience of whom they were speaking.

"I still don't understand why the Tony Stark would want a fat DJ."

"Yeah, I know. She's so ugly. I think that Mr. Stark would want someone skinnier, some eye candy, not a fat ass who can't control her eating habits."

Y/n turned away, tears brimming her eyes. Loki turned from the two with a sneer, cupping Y/n's face in his hands.

He spoke loud enough for the occupants of the room to hear him, but not enough to be obnoxious. "You may not be as thin as many of the other Midguardians, but that does not mean that you are ugly. You are, by far, the most beautiful woman that I have had the pleasure of meeting. Let me show you."

With that he stepped back, and with a wave of his hand, green tendrils of his magic surrounded her, transforming her jeans and plaid shirt into an emerald green dress to match the dress shirt that he was wearing.

"Now, will you be, as you Midguardians say, my girlfriend, my Queen?" He whispered his last two words as he stepped to his previous close proximity. He formed a delicate gold and emerald crown in his hands and held it between them.

A tear escaped down her cheek, not of sorrow, but of happiness, as she whispered a yes as she nodded her head.

He placed the crown on her head and grasped her hand as they walked out of the exhibit hallway as the other occupants of the room cheered except for the two who had mocked Y/n previously.

Loki smirked as Y/n grinned through a blush on her cheeks.

---

Bonus Scene:

Marilyn Manson's cover of Sweet Dreams was playing quietly in the common room as Y/n lounged on the couch with Loki. The former painting the latter's nails the darkest shade of black that they could find on their stop into a store on their way home. Their purchases were all put away, save for the Easter Island head that rested on the island countertop of the common area kitchen.

Tony came in from the elevator, going to the bar to get a drink before settling down with Y/n and Loki. He paused at the head on the counter, but before he could get a word out to Y/n, the think spoke.

"Dum Dum give me gum gum."

Tony gave a shout of surprise as he fell back, nearly knocking his head on the counter. He swore at Loki and Y/n from his spot on the floor as they laughed from the couch.

#avengers #loki #loki x reader #loki x chubby reader #loki x plus size reader

235 notes · View notes

fluffy-lee · 4 years

Text

The Last Day of June

Part 5 of the series “Vacation.”

This is a TICKLE series.

PLATONIC Avengers x reader

Warnings: Drama, angst, minor injury, bullying, & cute protective!dad!Bucky lol

Summary: Y/n deals with an injured leg the day after her accident, but the previous night’s events seem to bother her a little more.

The morning after you and Peter’s little “adventure” was different than any other mornings on the trip. Your leg hurt and you felt sore and tired. The plan for the day was for everyone to go back to the lake, but you decided to pass. You thought it would be nice to have some alone time to rest and think about some things. The only other person who was staying at the cabin with you was Tony. He claimed that he had some important work to do, even though he was on vacation, but between you and him, he didn’t actually have any work. He just wanted to stay back and rest as well.

You and Tony had been sprawled out on the couch for the last few hours eating snacks and watching a movie. You loved to spend time with Tony. He did adopt you after all, but that changed a bit when Bucky was stabilized. You and Tony were used to it being just the two of you. There was a time when Steve was gone, along with the rest of the Avengers, and Pepper was gone…

“Alright kid, it’s about time to change your bandages.” Tony said, turning the TV off.

“Is it going to hurt?” You asked, nervously.

“I don’t think so. I’ll try my best to be as gentle as possible, got it?

You nodded, trusting him, and followed him upstairs.

You sat on the counter while Tony was helping you change your bandages from last night’s accident. He was really gentle and your injuries were starting to look a little better, but your bruises were dark purple and it was not a pretty sight, but more was on your mind than the scary state of your leg.

“Tony? You know that party Peter and I went to last night?”

Tony slowly looked up at you, concern gracing his face.

“Mhm.”

“Well, there were some, uhh, cute boys there, that we met.” You said, blushing a little. Tony was probably the only person you could talk to this about, besides Natasha, Pepper, or Wanda. Bucky and Steve would freak out. Thor would probably tell everyone. Peter? Well… For some reason though, you felt like talking to Tony about it. He always gave great advice.

“Oh really?” Tony smirked.

“Yes, Tony. Lots of them.”

“So, was there one you liked more than the others?” Tony asked, still smirking. He was thinking you probably met a boy, and it was your first vacation love. Maybe you exchanged numbers and wanted to see him again. Maybe, because of the injury, you didn’t get his number and wanted to find him, Tony thought.

“Yes… there was.” You frowned. You were now feeling really scared. Was this something you should say to anyone, or should keep to yourself? You were really about to say this out loud? You were pulled out of your thoughts when Tony’s hands latched onto your sides, tickling you. You were now consumed in laughter.

“Oooh? What is his name? Huh?” Tony teased, as you laughed. He ceased his tickles to hear your answer, leaning his chin on his hand with a smile. He thought it was cute how you had a crush, but he was failing to catch onto your emotions in the moment. His eyebrows furrowed when he saw your smile fade into a frown.

“It’s Peter.” You admitted, looking down.

For the first time ever, Tony Stark didn’t know what to say.

You played with your hands.

Tony pointed to his ear, tilting his head in confusion. “I’m sorry I’m not sure I caught that. What did you say?”

“I think I like Peter.” You sighed.

“A-Are you sure, honey?”

“I don’t know. I liked him more than everyone there.”

“Y/n, how well did you get to know everyone else?” He asked.

“Not really well. I felt more comfortable with Peter. It was my first time being around so many people my age in a long time.” You explained.

Tony stopped and thought for a bit.

If Y/n really, truly likes Peter, she’s going to get hurt. He likes that MJ girl. He tells me all about her. Y/n may lose her friendship with Peter. I couldn’t bear to see that. But then again, Y/n has only ever known Peter as someone her age. It only makes sense that she would feel so confused. She’s never really been around people her age. It seems like she needs social skills. There’s got to be a way I can help her.

“I think you might be confused, Y/n. You can’t really know until you’ve been around other people your age.”

A frenzy of anger and fear began to swell in your chest. Who was Tony to tell you how you felt or what you needed? You were old enough to know for yourself! …Right?

“Ugh, I know how I feel, Tony! I thought you would help me. I shouldn’t have told you anything.” You grumbled, slipping off the counter and limping away.

“Woah woah woah, now hooold on a second! Come here!” Tony ordered, scooping you up from under your arms, placing you on the bed.

You didn’t even fight him. You just sulked, sitting on the bed, playing with your hands.

“I didn’t mean to upset you Y/n/n. I’m just looking out for you is all. I don’t want you to jump into this. You know what your saying can lead to pretty heavy stuff? You and/or Peter could get hurt.”

“Well, I don’t want that to happen.” You admitted.

“Give it some time. Explore more how you feel. Do you think you can do that?”

You thought for a minute.

Maybe Tony is right. There’s no need to jump into this. I should be careful and sure about how I feel about Peter. I don’t want to ruin our friendship. I will do the right thing, and give myself some time. It should all be okay.

“Yeah, I think I can do that, Tony.” You answered, giving him that squinty smile that he adored.

“I’ll find a way for you to get to know more people your age. You can’t just be hanging around with a bunch of old farts like myself, Steve and your dad all the time. Well Steve and Bucky are waaay older than me. The dudes shouldn’t even be alive.” Tony smirked, causing you to giggle.

“Hey! Who are you calling old, huh? Steve snapped, leaning in the doorway. He had only heard the end of the conversation, but he sensed something was up with you.

“We were calling you old.” You answered absentmindedly, chewing on your lip, staring out the window.

“Oh?” Steve scoffed, collapsing on the bed, laying down next to you and Tony.

His crash to the bed bounced you out of your thoughts. You looked down at Steve with a sheepish smile.

Steve just smirked and snatched you up, holding you above him, making you break out into giggles. You looked down at his mischievous face, knowing he was about to do something. You instantly felt ticklish, curling in on yourself in your vulnerable state. Steve totally picked up on this and started to wiggle his fingers where they were resting at the tops of your ribs. Curse his super strength! You squeaked and kicked, before your giggles set in.

“Mwuahaha!” Steve whispered with wide eyes. He brought you down to kiss your cheek, and lifted you back up to tickle you some more, a soft smile gracing his face.

You still were giggling and kicking helplessly while Tony was leaned back on the pillows, recording the adorable scene on his phone to show Pepper later.

“Tickletickletickletickletickletickle.” Steve teased in a soft voice. He loved how adorable you were like this.

You were trapped in Steve’s grip, forced to look down at him as he tickled you. This made you super flustered. Your giggles were turning hiccupy and your face was pink. Steve took this as an indication to stop the torture. He brought you down to give you another kiss and flopped you down between Tony and himself. You buried your face into the bed and peeked up at Steve, making him chuckle.

“Y/n.” Tony said, turning you over to face him. “You should talk to Natasha. I think she can really help you, better than me.”

Steve and Tony exchanged looks. You nodded at Tony.

“WHERE IS MY CHILD?!” You all heard Bucky yell from somewhere in the house.

You, Tony, and Steve all broke out into laughter.

You heard Bucky’s footsteps approach closer and Steve held you close to him and Tony threw a blanket over you. The super soldier walked into the room, crossing his arms.

“Hey Barnes! How was the lake? Looking for something?” Tony asked casually.

Bucky rolled his eyes and whipped the blanket off of you, your hair falling messily all over your face.

“Give me my kid.” Bucky sighed, lifting you up baby style in his arms. “She’s mine!”

Bucky kissed your cheek and you giggled.

Steve and Tony giggled as well.

“I have to go show this video to Pepper.” Tony chuckled, walking out of the room in pursuit of his wife.

“Thank you, Tony.” You mumbled sweetly.

He gave you a nod and left.

“How’s your leg?” Bucky asked softly, gently examining it.

“It’s okay. A little sore is all.”

“Well, it’s not fair for you to stay in the house all day. How about we drive down to town and get some ice cream or something?”

Your face lit up with excitement.

“You’d like that?” Bucky grinned.

“Yes!” You cheered.

“Steve, you want to go?” Bucky asked.

Steve nodded. “I’ll drive. Make sure you go to the bathroom before we leave. It’s a long drive.” He gave you a look.

You rolled your eyes. “I will!”

Bucky carried you out to the car so you wouldn’t have to walk on your leg. Steve drove and Bucky was in the passenger's seat. You enjoyed being able to spend time with just the two of them. When you arrived at the little town down the mountain, Steve pulled up to an ice cream parlor. You all got your favorite flavors on a cone and sat outside, talking and laughing, enjoying the delicious ice cream and each other's company.

You left to use the restroom. While you were washing your hands, you noticed two really pretty girls, maybe about your age or a little older. One of them was wearing a Captain America shirt and the other one had a Captain America phone case. You felt super happy and excited, because these girls were fans, and you could introduce them to their hero. You were about to say something, when the blonde shot you a dirty look, and she and her friend snickered. You were shocked. You looked in the mirror and didn’t see anything wrong. You didn’t have any ice cream spilled on you. There was nothing in your teeth. You thought the braid Nat did on you this morning looked really nice. They started whispering to each other and looking at you. You felt really self-consious. The blonde finally spoke.

“Nice leg.” She said, but it was clear she didn’t mean it as a compliment.

You couldn’t believe what was happening. “Yeah it was an accident.”

“Oh yeah, we saw the whole thing last night. That was embarrassing.” The other girl chuckled.

You were capable of beating the both of them up, but they had managed to make you feel threatened and humiliated. You were speechless.

“I don’t understand what the problem is…” You finally replied.

“If you can’t handle our friends' parties, you shouldn’t go to them.” The blonde sneered.

“I can HANDLE them fine. You’re just being mean.”

“Well, you did show up with a guy and danced all over him. He didn’t even seem to want to be with you. He was way out of your league.” The other girl spat.

“That’s why he kept looking at us the whole time.” The blonde laughed.

You felt overwhelmed with insecurity, but you managed to stay strong. You started laughing, though your face was red with anger.

“So THAT’S your problem! Jealousy! Well, nice shirt, nice phone case. You like Captain America, huh?” You asked.

“Yeah. What does that have to do with anything?”

You just laughed at them and walked out. You limped all the way out to Steve who had just thrown his trash away and was walking back towards the table. You knew exactly what to do. You reached right up to him and started tickling his chest. Playfulness danced in his eyes and he burst out laughing, crossing his arms over his chest. His handsome, contagious laughter filled the air. It took all of his strength to bring his arms down to pick you up. He snatched you up and held you baby style. Just then, the mean girls walked out of the parlor to see you in the arms of THE Captain America, being tickled mercilessly by him. He tickled your tummy and buried his beard into your neck making you giggle uncontrollably.

The girls were stunned to say the least. If they had known who you were, they certainly wouldn’t have acted the way they did.

Steve stopped and held you in his arms. Before the girls could even think about approaching, you shot them a glare. You began explaining to Steve what just happened, pointing at the girls. They sped off towards their car, hoping to avoid confrontation.

“You know not to listen to people like that, right?” Steve asked.

“Of course.” You smiled.

“It’s taking everything in my power not to run them down right now.” Bucky fumed.

“Trust me, I got my revenge.” You chuckled slyly.

“Gimmie.” Bucky grinned, taking you from Steve.

Bucky sat in the back with you on the way home. You stared out the window in deep thought. It was the last day of June. You’d be going home on July 6th and things would be different than when you arrived at this beautiful place. It was the kind of beautiful that made your heart ache. It reminded you of how it felt to look at Peter sometimes. Why did it have to be that way? You knew that you loved him, but apparently, there were different kinds of love. You’d only loved a few people before Steve found you. In fact, Steve was the first new person you loved in about four years. All you knew is that you loved Peter specifically and unconditionally, but romantically? That’s one thing you don’t know. What a trip.

“Earth to Y/n!” Steve and Bucky said in unison, snapping you out of your thoughts. They had been talking to you and you didn’t even notice.

“Oh! I’m sorry. What were you saying?”

“Do those girls have you upset?” Bucky asked, rubbing your shoulder.

“Oh no! I’m past that, in fact I think it was funny! I can’t wait to tell Pe- ...everyone.”

“Something seems off, kiddo.” Steve stated, looking at you through the rear-view mirror.

“Honestly? I’m still really shaken up about last night. I don’t mean my leg.” You sighed.

“I’m sorry we freaked out so much. We didn’t mean to freak you out.” Bucky apologized.

You nodded, not really sure of what else to say. You gave them a soft smile. Bucky wrapped his arms around you and laid his head on your shoulder.

“We just want you to be safe… and happy.” Bucky cooed, snaking his fingers under your arms and gently shaking.

An even bigger smile cracked on your face. You certainly never minded tickles.

“Now I know this makes you happy!” Bucky teased, shaking your ribs.

You squealed and tried to scoot away, but you were trapped between Bucky and the window. You couldn’t escape if you wanted to.

“Hahaha I got you now!” Bucky laughed evilly while you shrieked with laughter.

Bucky darted his hands all around your tummy while you failed to block his “attack.” This continued all the way back to the cabin and your spirits were definitely lifted.

You limped all around the cabin searching for Peter. You tossed your conflicting thoughts from earlier to the back of your brain. That didn’t matter right now. All that mattered is that you missed him.

You were on the side yard when you heard him sitting on the back deck talking to Sam. You thought of the perfect little prank to pull on the two of them. You’d jump out and scare them! Hopefully Peter’s sixth sense wouldn’t kick in. You weren’t very threatening to him after all. You were hiding at the corner, just about to pounce, when you heard what Peter was saying.

“She’s one of my best friends already, but I just want to be more than that. She is beautiful. I mean so, so beautiful. She doesn’t even have to try, but more than that, she is extremely smart, absolutely hilarious, fascinating, and different than anyone else I have ever known. I just adore her, and I really think she likes me too.” Peter gushed.

There was the conformation you needed all along. You finally just let it go, and then it happened! He likes you. You were smiling ear to ear. You wouldn’t have to worry anymore. You felt overwhelmed by the thought that Peter was talking about you, but what absolutely crushed you is when you heard another girl's name come out of his mouth.

“M.J. is short for Michelle Jones. She’s just cool like that you know?” Peter continued.

You didn’t even think, you just wanted to get away from here. What was happening to your friendship with Peter? Why did you have to feel like it was being ruined because you didn’t understand your feelings? You finally came to what- or should I say who- you had been looking for. You just had to get out before you messed things up any further.

“Thor. I need your help.” You said to the god who was currently relaxing in a hammock. He jumped to his feet.

“Anything for you, Princess!” He said in an up-beat tone, but his face fell when he saw yours.

“I want you to take me to Asgard. I want to go right now.” You almost demanded.

“Now? But what about the others? Wouldn’t you want to tell them?”

“All I need is you, Thor, please. You promised.” You began to cry.

Sorrow and confusion filled Thor’s eyes. He wasn’t sure this was the right thing to do, but he sighed and wielded Mjölnir.

“Anything for you, Princess…”

Thor lifted you up and wrapped you tightly in his arms, lifting the magnificent hammer to the sky.

“Heimdall!”

With that, the two of you were gone.

#mcu tickle fic #marvel tickle #marvel tickle fic #fluffy-lee #bucky barnes tickle #steve rogers tickle #mcu tickle

107 notes · View notes

just-dreaming-marvel · 3 years

Text

Out Of Time ~ 101

MASTERLIST

< previous chapter

Word Count: 3,620ish

Summary: The team hunts down Ultron and takes a hit.

Y/N was in her room, getting ready, when a knock sounded at the door. She had her back turned to it but could hear it open.

“I swear, Tony,” she grumbled. “If you and Steve—“ She stopped when she turned around and saw Natasha, arms crossed and leaning up against the wall. “Oh. Hey, Nat. What can I help you with?”

“You could start by telling me what’s going on,” she responded.

“I don’t know what—“

“Cut the crap, Y/N. Something’s going on. Steve and Bruce told me about why you can create portals. The Tesseract. That makes me want to assume that you also have some sort of connection with the scepter.” Y/N closed her eyes and sighed. “You do. You have a connection.” Nat stepped closer to Y/N. “What is it? Why do these things want you?”

“I don’t know, Nat. Honestly. I’m just as confused as you are… I’ve been told I’m being saved for something.”

“Saved?”

“Something is going to happen and for some reason I’ll be an instrumental part in it all. But I don’t know when or what that is.”

“Your connection with the scepter? Did it… Did it give you any abilities?”

“Yes… I can… I can read and control minds.” Natasha stayed silent for a few moments, simply nodding as she took everything in. “Nat, you have to understand that I’m not making any of this up and that I didn’t ask for this.” Y/N began to panic, the weight of everything suddenly crashing down on her. “I didn’t want this,” Y/N cried. “I didn’t want this life. Any of it.”

Nat rushed over and pulled Y/N into her arms. “I know you didn’t… I know…”

“I don’t know what to do, Nat… I… I don’t want this…”

“Shh… I know, Y/N/N. I know.”

“And Steve and Tony, they don’t understand. They don’t want me to come because of it. But I have to. It’s my job to make it right.”

“It’s not your job.” Nat pulled back, making sure Y/N was looking at her in the eyes. “It’s our job. And since when have you let Stark and your brother stop you? I will support your decision to come.”

“Thanks, Nat.” Y/N pulled her back in for a hug. “I’ve missed you. I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch like we used to.”

“It’s on us both. Nothing like a end-of-the-world scenario to get friends back together.”

~~~

Y/N appeared in the quinjet as they were crossing the Atlantic. She stayed in a corner, avoiding Steve and Tony. And every time one of them tried to get near her, Natasha would step in their way, giving them a threatening look.

The salvage yard was the home of many rusted ships. On of them housing Ulysses Klaue, the man the team was searching for. As the team entered one of the ships, the realized Ultron was there as well.

“—understand. Don’t compare me with Stark!” Ultron spat, kicking Ulysses Klaue down the stairs. “It’s a thing with me. Stark is… He’s a sickness.”

“Ahh, junior,” Tony commented as him, Thor, and Steve appeared. Bruce stayed back in the quinjet and Clint, Natasha, and Y/N snuck onto the other levels. “You’re gonna break your old man’s heart.”

“It I have to.”

“We don’t have to break anything,” Thor stated.

“Clearly you've never made an omelet.”

“He beat me by one second,” Tony commented.

“Ah, this is funny, Mr. Stark,” a young man appeared. From what Y/N could remember, his name was Pietro Maximoff. Him and his Twin, Wanda who showed up beside him, volunteered to be experimented on. “It’s what, comfortable? Like old times?”

“This was never my life.”

“You two can still walk away from this,” Steve told them.

“Oh, we will,” Wanda responded.

“I know you’ve suffered.”

“Uuughh!” Ultron groaned. “Captain America. God's righteous man, pretending you could live without a war. I can't physically throw up in my mouth, but—“

“If you believe in peace, then let us keep it,” Thor stated.

“I think you’re confusing peace with quiet.”

“Yuh-huh. What's the Vibranium for?” Tony asked.

“I'm glad you asked that, because I wanted to take this time to explain my evil plan!”

Suddenly, Ultron’s own Iron Legion bots came out of no where and started attacking. Ulysses men also began fighting them. The team, obviously, fought back.

“Thor! Status?” Steve called over the comms.

“The girl tried to warp my mind,” Thor answered. “Take special care, I doubt a human could keep her at bay. Fortunately, I am mighty…” He trailed off though.

Y/N was suddenly on high alert, realizing that Wanda was using her powers on the team. The young woman appeared in front of her, a red glow in her eyes and coming from her hands.

“We can help you, Wanda,” Y/N said. “We don’t want to hurt you.”

“You already have,” Wanda replied.

Wanda threw her arms towards Y/N, the red glow rushing towards her. Not being able to dodge it, the red entered Y/N’s mind. Shocked that that was even possible, Y/N stumbled back onto the floor. Suddenly, her vision was filled with darkness. Slowly, six spots, each a different color, appeared. The Stones. They floated around until a gold gauntlet appeared and each of the stones found its place on it. The fingers of the gauntlet snapped. Y/N looked around as dust flew around her and the horrified cries of many filled her ears.

“This is what you must stop,” a low, gravely voice stated as the dust and cries continued. “What you must fix… This is what you were saved for.”

“But I don’t want to!” Y/N yelled, in her vision and out loud. “I don’t want to! Take it back!”

“Whoever’s left standing, we gotta move,” Clint shouted, trying to get someone’s attention. “Guys?

Tony was busy trying to get the Hulk under control, who had made an appearance thanks to Wanda. Clint was the only one left in the ship, who hadn’t been affected by Wanda.

“Natasha, I could really use a lullaby,” Tony called over the comms.

“Well, that's not gonna happen. Not for a while,” Clint responded, kneeling in front of Nat who was still stuck in her vision. “The whole team is down, you got no back up here.”

“No! Take it back!” Y/N screamed. Clint snapped his head towards the sound.

“Y/N?!” Clint called, now extremely worried.

“Y/N?” Tony repeated. “What’s going on?”

“I’ll handle the team, Stark. You get Hulk.”

“Please! You should have let me die!” Y/N continued. “Just let me die!”

Tears streamed down Y/N’s face as her vision continued to show dust and screams. Clint hurried, with Natasha in his arms, to the quinjet. He brought it closer to the ship before going back in again. Steve basically woke up from his vision as Clint was rushing up the stairs.

“I don’t want this!” Y/N screamed again.

“What—what’s going on?” Steve said to Clint, trying to gain some of his senses back.

“The witch got into everyone’s minds,” Clint responded. “Everyone’s been pretty quiet except—“

“PLEASE!” Y/N yelled.

Steve was up with Clint as soon as he heard his sister. They ran towards her screams. They found her in a corner, trembling, and crying.

“Y/N,” Steve called, crouching down in front of her. “Y/N, it’s Steve.”

“I don’t want that burden,” Y/N whimpered. “Please take it away.”

“I’ll get Thor,” Clint stated. “You got this?”

Steve nodded, keeping his eyes on his sister, before Clint took off to find Thor. Steve held out his hands to try and calm his sister. But he honestly had no idea how to. Her eyes were open, but she wasn’t there.

“I’m going to pick you up now,” Steve stated, hoping that Y/N could hear him. He picked her up and over his shoulder.

“No!” She screamed, hitting and kicking Steve. “Let me go! Fine! Fine! I’ll do it! Just don’t let them all die! Please don’t let them die!”

“Y/N, I need you to wake up.” Steve headed to the quinjet. “I don’t know what she did to you. But it can’t be good.”

Y/N fought the whole way to the quinjet. Steve had to strap her into a seat for her safety. He sat down on the ground beside her, worn out and hurt by what he had been forced to see himself. When Tony and Bruce returned, Bruce refused to talk or even look at anyone. But honestly, no one was talking to or looking each other in the eye. Y/N was still trembling and whimpering, clearly still wrapped in whatever Wanda had shown her. (Or really, the Stones.) Her eyes were still glazed over when Tony approached her. He couldn’t stop the hurt expression that formed when she flinched away from him. Clint got them into the air while Tony called Maria.

“The news is loving you guys. Nobody else is,” Maria stated. “There's been no official call for Banner's arrest, but it's in the air.”

“Stark Relief Foundation?” Tony asked.

“Already on the scene. How's the team?”

“Everyone’s…" He looked back at the team, spread out around the quinjet. “We took a hit. We'll shake it off.”

“Well for now I'd stay in stealth mode, and stay away from here.”

“So, run and hide?”

“Until we can find Ultron, I don't have a lot else to offer.”

“Neither do we.” Tony switched off the monitor, ending the call. He sighed as he got up and made his way over to Clint. “Hey, you wanna switch out?”

“No, I'm good,” Clint answered. “If you wanna get some kip, check on your girl, now's a good time, cause we're still a few hours out.”

“A few hours from where?”

“A safe house.”

Tony nodded, confused, but decided to let Clint be. He turned around and headed over to his girlfriend. As he sat down beside her, he noticed that her eyes were closed. Her breathes where uneasy and there was sweat forming on her brow.

“What did she do to you?” He whispered, wiping off her forehead.

Tony unbuckled Y/N, carefully, and pulled her into him. He couldn’t tell if she was asleep or not, but it didn’t matter as long as she wasn’t in distress anymore. He held a kiss to her temple.

“It’s going to be okay…” He whispered. “We’re going to be okay…”

~~~

Clint landed the quinjet in a field. He grabbed Natasha, helping her out of the quinjet, as the others followed behind. Y/N was barely aware of her surroundings as Tony helped her out of the quinjet. Clint led them towards a large farmhouse.

“What is this place?” Thor asked.

“Safe house,” Tony answered.

“Let’s hope,” Clint responded. He opened the door, the others still following. “Honey? I’m home.” A very pregnant Laura Barton walked din from the kitchen. “Hi. Company. Sorry, I didn’t call ahead.”

“Hey,” she replied, kissing Clint.

“This is an agent of some kind,” Tony reasoned, holding Y/N tightly to him as he spoke to Thor. Y/N smirked, glad to have been in on the secret.

“Gentlemen, this is Laura,” Clint introduced.

“I know all your names,” she smiled.

The men of the team just stared, with Tony using his free hand to wave awkwardly. Footsteps could be heard coming closer.

“Ooh, incoming,” Clint smiled. Cooper and Lila Barton ran into the room.

“Dad!” Lila squealed.

“I see her!” Clint picked up Lila and kissed the top of Cooper’s head. “Hey, buddy! How you guys doing?”

“These are… smaller agents,” Tony continued, trying to make sense of it all.

“Look at your face! Oh, my goodness!”

“Did you bring Auntie Nat?” Lila asked.

“Why don’t you hug her and find out?” Nat smiled. Lila rushed towards her aunt, who picked her up.

"Sorry for barging in on you,” Steve awkwardly apologized.

“Yeah, we would have called ahead,” Tony added, “but we were busy having no idea that you existed.”

“Yeah, well, Fury helped me set this up when I joined,” Clint replied. “He kept it off SHIELD's files, I'd like to keep it that way. I figure it's a good place to lay low.”

“Mr. Stark, you can take Y/N to an upstairs bedroom,” Laura said. “There’s some clothes from the last time she visited.”

“Thanks, Laura,” Y/N said softly.

“Wait…?” Tony looked down at Y/N. “You knew about this?”

“She needed a place to stay and recover after you threw her out a few years back,” Clint replied.

“I—“

“Tony,” Y/N called, calmly and softly, “right now is really not the time.”

“Right. I’ll just… we’ll just head upstairs.”

~~~

Y/N let the hot water burn her skin as she stood still underneath the shower head. She couldn’t get the imagines and sounds from the vision out of her head. A soft knock on the bathroom door took her away from her thoughts.

“Honey?” Tony’s worried voice come from the other side. “You okay in there?”

“Yeah,” she responded. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

Y/N finished cleaning herself up and got changed before she exited the bathroom. Tony was sitting on the edge of the bed, waiting for her.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled.

“You’re good, honey,” he responded, standing up to meet her. “You o—“

“Don’t ask me if I’m okay. I’m… I’m not. But I really don’t want to talk about it right now. I’m sorry. I just can’t.”

“Okay, okay. Is there anything I can do?” Y/N shook her head. Tony nodded. “Come here.” She willingly came into his arms. “I love you. And whatever she showed you wasn’t real. Okay?”

“Okay,” she whispered.

“I’m going to go take a shower. Will you be okay being alone for a second?”

“I’ll be fine. I’m just going to lay down and try to get some rest.”

“Good plan.” Tony kissed her forehead. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

~~~

“Thor didn’t say where he was going for answers?” Tony asked as him and Steve were outside chopping wood.

Laura and Y/N were sitting on the porch with Lila and Clint was fixing up the porch with Cooper. Y/N was watching and listening to her brother and boyfriend.

“Sometimes my teammates don't tell me things,” Steve answered Tony. “I was kind of hoping Thor would be the exception.”

“Yeah, give him time,” Tony suggested. “We don't know what the Maximoff kid showed him.”

“Earth's Mightiest Heroes… Pulled us apart like cotton candy.”

“Seems like you walked away all right.”

“Is that a problem?”

“I don't trust a guy without a dark side.” Tony swung his axe down. “Call me old fashioned.”

“Well let's just say you haven't seen it yet.”

“You know Ultron is trying to tear us apart, right?”

“Well I guess you'd know. Whether you tell us is a bit of a question.”

“Banner and I were doing research.”

“That would affect the team.”

“That would end the team. Isn't that the mission? Isn't that the "why" we fight, so we can end the fight, so we get to go home?!”

Steve torn a log in half with his bare hands as a phone beeped beside Y/N. She watched as Laura looked down at her phone and stood up. Laura made her way down the porch steps and towards the two men chopping wood.

“Every time someone tries to win a war before it starts, innocent people die,” Steve continued. “Every time.”

“I’m sorry,” Laura interrupted. “Mr. Stark, uh, Clint said you wouldn't mind, but, our tractor, it doesn't seem to want to start at all. I thought maybe you might—”

“Yeah, I’ll give her a kick,” Tony replied. “Don’t take from my pile.”

Tony sent Y/N a smile as he walked over to the barn. Laura came back up the steps and sat next to Y/N.

“What’d you send him to do?” Y/N asked.

“To talk to someone,” Laura answered.

“Talk to someone? Who?”

“Fury.”

~~~

Y/N went back inside not too long later. Still tired from the vision and trying to process everything. She sat on the couch and looked around the room.

“Hey,” Steve greeted, coming to sit beside her, “you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Y/N shrugged. “I miss this…” She looked around. “The domestic life.”

“We haven’t had that in a very long time.”

“I know.” Tony entered the house, pausing behind the wall as he herd the twins talking. “Doesn’t mean I can’t miss it.”

“Did you want this, with Bucky? A home? A family?”

Y/N sighed. “I did. And for a moment there I thought I was going to have it.”

“Do you want it with, Stark?”

“I… I don’t know… I don’t know if he wants it.”

“Doesn’t that worry you? That you don’t know if he sees a future with you?”

“We’re both too busy saving the world. I don’t know if we’ll get there.”

Tony didn’t know what to think. Y/N didn’t know if she wanted a future with him? She doubting that he wanted it with her? Yes, they never really talked about it, but… he was hoping that she was planning on being with him forever. Tony was planning on being with her.

“I honestly don’t know how you’re with him,” Steve said, shaking his head. “Especially after—“

“You don’t understand. He was shown something down there, just like the rest of us have seen. He was doing it to protect the world, to protect us. So that we could have a chance at a future.”

“Still, he should have told us.”

“Yes, he should have. But that doesn’t mean it’s all his fault.”

~~~

After dinner, the team was gathered around, listening to Fury talk.

“Ultron took you folks out of play to buy himself time,” Fury stated. “My contacts all say he's building something. The amount of Vibranium he made off with, I don't think it's just one thing.”

“What about Ultron himself?” Steve asked.

“Ah. He's easy to track, he's everywhere. Guy's multiplying faster than a Catholic rabbit. Still doesn't help us get an angle on any of his plans though.”

“He still going after launch codes?” Tony asked, throwing darts in the room over.

“Yes, he is, but he's not making any headway.”

“I cracked the Pentagon's firewall in high school on a dare.”

“Yeah, well, I contacted our friends at the NEXUS about that.”

“NEXUS?” Steve repeated.

“It's the world internet hub in Oslo,” Bruce explained, “every byte of data flows through there, fastest access on earth.”

“So what’d they say?” Clint asked.

“He's fixated on the missiles,” Fury answered, “but the codes are constantly being changed.”

“By whom?” Y/N wondered.

Clint quickly threw a dart across the room. It narrowly missed Tony’s face and hit the center of the dart board he was playing on. Tony looked at Clint with a ‘did you really just do that’ expression. Clint just shrugged it off.

“Parties unknown,” Fury said.

“Do we have an ally?” Nat asked.

“Ultron's got an enemy, that's not the same thing. Still, I'd pay folding money to know who it is.”

“I might need to visit Oslo, find our ‘unknown’,” Tony said.

“Well, this is good times, boss,” Nat said, “but I was kind of hoping when I saw you, you'd have more than that.”

“I do, I have you,” Fury responded. “Back in the day, I had eyes everywhere, ears everywhere else. Here we all are, back on earth, with nothing but our wit, and our will to save the world. So stand. Outwit the platinum bastard.”

“Steve doesn’t like that kind of talk.”

“You know what, Romanoff?” Steve responded as she smiled mischievously at him.

“So what does he want?” Fury asked.

“To become better. Better than us,” Y/N answered. “He keeps building bodies.”

“Person bodies,” Tony said. “The human form is inefficient, biologically speaking, we're outmoded. But he keeps coming back to it.”

“When you two programmed him to protect the human race, you amazingly failed,” Nat commented.

“They don't need to be protected, they need to evolve,” Bruce remembered Ultron’s speech. “Ultron's going to evolve.”

“How?” Fury asked.

“Has anyone been in contact with Helen Cho?”

~~~

“I’m going with Steve to Korea,” Y/N told Tony as soon as they were alone. “Ultron most likely as the scepter there and I need to be the one to handle it.”

“I knew you were going to say that,” Tony sighed.

“Are you going to try and stop me?”

“No….”

Y/N furrowed her brows. Tony seemed down, more down than usual. “What’s wrong, Tony?”

“Nothing.”

“Tony…” Y/N reached up and forced him to look at her. “What’s wrong?”

“I want a future with you.”

“W-what? Where’s this coming from?”

“I might have heard you and Cap talking—“

“Tony. I—”

“I didn’t mean too! But it got me thinking, I haven’t allowed myself to express my desire for a future with you because I’ve been… well, uh… for a lack of a better word… terrified… Still am… But I want it. I want a future with you.”

“Oh, Tony.” Y/N pulled his face down, kissing Tony lovingly. “I want one with you too.”

“You do?”

“I do. But we can’t talk anymore about it, right now. We need to get Ultron settled with. I can’t get my hopes up in case anything happens.”

“Nothing’s going to happen.”

next chapter >

NOTES: from now on the taglist when be added by a reblog. I will reblog it using my second account, @just-dreaming-marvel-2. Just so that my main page doesn’t get too cluttered.

If you want to be added to the tag list, please dm me or send in an ask.

#avengers x reader #the avengers x reader #tony stark x reader #iron man x reader #tony stark #Tony Stark fanfiction #tony stark imagine #Iron Man #iron man fanfiction #The Avengers #Avengers #avengers age of ultron #age of ultron #marvel #marvel fanfiction #marvel imagine

206 notes · View notes