#i cannot in tags go into sufficient detail about how i feel about all eight of my siblings

[snipehuntpotatosack]

Unofficial Commentary on the text tagged [Chronic Metaphor] – A Servo-Subsystem Research Program Summary in Four Cantos; with Addendum re site visit

Initial apologetics (if the term is applicable and/or recognized) are due concerning the graphic or “pronunciatory” form in which the material herein discussed was/is presented, even tho the unit(s) generating said material were not at any time under my direct or indirect personal control. Yes, I identify myself as a “person” in the oldest and most trivial sense in addressing you herein, and the form I use will continue to be the prosiest, fussiest and most boringly irritating of proses. As for why precisely a psychoneurotic pseudopoet with a rusty valve stuck open seems to have generated an idiosyncratic 255-line precis of the non-results of an actual very official, time-consuming, and quite expensive archeologic-epistemic study in astrocognitive phenomena in a species of volatile vers libre rather than the usual lethal academic sludge-speak: as part of one of the cyclical waves of good-heartedness affecting managerial disposition toward the treatment of the “semi-sentient,” a random selection of report writers were encouraged to experiment with other linguistic models which might more effectively package complex/banal-seeming information so as to attract more network attention, this being regarded as an a priori goal for some reason…It is not clear whether the composers of the CM text had any particular literary models in mind (and I can assure everyone that no ‘machine’ time has been spent on investigating this uninteresting question); I think it more likely that the inspired creator(s) attempted to place breaks similar to physical speech rhythms – as in the incantations of Druidical sages gone cybermad – into whatever data it occurred to them to convey (partly suggested by the fact that the “speaker-units” under study imitate the rhythms, the rushes and caesuras, of persons talking – while of course making no sense whatsoever).

 Regardless of the semi-bizarre form in which the summary report has been assembled, and even taking into account its various semi-snide sidelights on the assumptions, motivations or delusions of participants in this and other official research ventures, having been called upon unofficially to comment on its usefulness at this stage in our reckoning with what we have encountered, I can only add the following:

I have nothing further to add.

Whatever follows should not be expected to modify our overall evaluation of the project or of any potential for further expenditure or non-expenditure; it represents only my particular, that is personal, inclination to fill in some background details regarding this overall puzzling, unsatisfyingly incomplete area of inquiry. (As intimated in a particular line of Canto C, “breadth” without “depth” of information can be particularly irksome to the curious mind, though whether my extra depths may lead anywhere is doubtful.)

Standard trans-galactic probe techniques did in fact encounter (and retrieve detailed information in a wide range of sensory and mathematical categories), at a date not too far from the beginning of our current technocratic era, with a nearly perfectly planar solid object consisting entirely as far as we know of the element Carbon, in the form graphite, at a location which remains constant though classified. Its planar quality is “nearly” perfect, of course, since the sheet does possess some top-to-bottom thickness – exactly 256 molecules. Otherwise, no limit to its extent has yet been found, by any sensing or calculational means possible, in any direction. (We can, of course, access its “other side”, by approaching from the other direction). The object is thus referred as “finite but boundless,” in the sense that before contact is made with the planar surface, there is no graphite; once contact is made, there is.

 This description would seem to imply that the plane slices the megaverse in half; and so it would, except for its orientation in Riemann space. You will appreciate that this point cannot be expanded on using semantic language.

 The entire “population” of the plane is a transfinite (that is the word, as per Canto A , – and there’s no other; we simply cannot know how many) set of black carbon nano-fiber cubical audio speakers, of an extremely basic design, with one smallish vibrating sound-producing diaphragm each. Forgive me if I slip into homey jargon – each one is about knee high, and they sit there about one-and-a-half arm’s length from each other in a very exact pointillist array, all facing in the exact same direction, if there was a way to define that direction, which there isn’t. Tomography indicates a small disk at the interior base may be their power source, though what activates and deactivates (or uses up) this power source is beyond our ken. In addition, a small white light of the simplest construction on top of the cube lights up with modest wattage when the speaker-unit operates, and goes out afterward.

 Yes, of course we’ve tried to sample the graphite. Of course we’ve tried to disassemble a speaker and microanalyze its parts, in situ or, if it could be arranged, at another location. They cannot be picked up, moved, pierced, bent, melted, dinged, crushed, drilled, lasered, or physically affected in any way. This although they are quite physically real; you can trace its contour through your glove, and if you bang your knee against one of the corners (through the leg of your e-suit) it will raise a lump. It cannot be detached from the surface of the plane by the application through torsion of a force sufficient to propel an object free of the gravity of galactic center. No, we have not attempted to destroy any smaller or larger part of the plane and its population using the most fearsome destructive tools known; logical analysis could not project any conceivable gain in information through this procedure.

 And yes, as the lumpiness of my description indicates, I have been personally to Site F, as the wags call it (short for many possible terms). Only once. Continued data collection of any sort of data anyone or anything could ever dream up obviously continues via automatic installations on site; budgetary questions only arise  concerning whether to continue analyzing this Leviathan of unappealing input as it grows dusty in our virtual ledgers. As for the considerable resources entailed in dispatching any more eyewitnesses to F, in corpore, I suspect the only reason this is not now completely ruled out is a kind of inchoate, cosmic superstition – having never successfully peered into the mind of function f, if any such thing exists, we can’t stop peeking sideways to see what it might do next; and we certainly wouldn’t want it to feel slighted in the meantime.

  Approaching F from a series of eccentric hyperbolics, one’s first impression is of a dimly pearlescent Cupid’s bow, of the radius of a gnat, then an inchworm, then perhaps a comb jelly, performing rather silly flips and inverted rotations in the blackness as your perspective gyrates round that of the approach trajectory. When very close indeed, the sense of a gargantuan flat dance floor – picked out in midnight streaks not by F itself but by our own, stationary illuminators – grows alarmingly, and then vanishes completely as one comes to rest – on an array of cubes, rather than the actual floor, which makes no difference. (An odd sensation, being deposited on a perfectly flat plane – it immediately popped into my head that our own technology approaches nothing similar.)

It is simple to make shoe-soles that love graphite. The environment of F is pure, dead-vacuum, intergalactic space, with a floor to walk on. Unfortunately, the floor is studded with solid shin-busters whose regular spacing will not spare one without considerable practice, so travel groups are collectively lighted from above. There is not much of a walk to reach the Activated Area, no matter when you go, since one can land anywhere; but tourists are given about fifteen minutes approach time to allow the pupils to adjust.

 You are advancing on foot into the maw of trillion-diamond Tiara City, the scintillating illusion building intricately to past fifty, sixty degrees above the horizon even tho every individual photon originates mere centimeters from the surface. The walls and webs of light are thickly constructed to the sides of you and behind you, and seem to be narrowing and crowning upward ahead – the parabolic arch now spanning well more than a billion active electrified entities of unknown origin and purpose. Two hours walk, three, and the illusory multidimensional effect has worn thin as you near the focus; adjusted retina now perceive a flat broad white light everywhere, neither intense nor interrupted, utterly transparent, and yielding a perspective at once completely repetitive and monstrously surreal, as the twinkling cubes march in serried ranks to the horizon.

 Then, your automated guide introduces the next phase of your learning experience. Your earphones, which have been shut completely till now, are slowly – over a period of many minutes – exposed to what is really filling the air around you, reaching and remaining at a level approximating eight percent of the true volume level –

 Did I say the AIR?

 Indeed Madam or Sir, without which there would be no way to hear, record, analyze the Speech of the speaker cubes. In fact, when Site F was first discovered, millions upon millions of active speaker-units were gabbling away freely – as evidenced clearly by the tremblings and agitations of their sound-producing diaphragms - and producing no sound at all in the vacuum of space.

Nor did they, until our researchers filled the surrounding space with ambient gases appropriate to the operation of the speaker units in producing phonemic sound. Verbal sound. Innumerable combinations of gases with and without particulate additives have been tried for this purpose, but only one maximizes F-Site speaker performance: the exact proportions of nitrogen and oxygen found on what our dear dead ancestors were pleased to call home.

Our poetic prologue omitted this as a mere technical detail; the notion that indestructible space-born units would be sent on an eternal mission, i.e. to talk – and not only not given anyone to talk to, but no way to be heard if there was –

did not interest our core analytic cadres compared to the potential or hypothetical mathematics of the mother-ship f function.

.

So now, fellow voyager, we have reached the final revelation, laid bare to our senses. As hovering tanks emit invisible atmospheres toward all and sundry, we finally hear the Star Speech of the mysterious Speakers. They talk, and talk, and talk, in every direction.

As far as anyone can understand, it means nothing at all….

except for one small detail.

There is one other thing about their conversation, which the Poem did not mention.

 They don’t just talk. They whisper, they moan. They bellow, they proclaim in profound orotund baritones. They shriek like the demons of Macbeth’s blasted heath. They burble, grovel, compliment, snarl, sob, ululate, snicker, mimic, plead, project, perorate, bloviate, gargle, snivel, boast, wheedle, insinuate, denounce, exaggerate, hype, summon, denounce, deceive, chatter, natter, blather, yammer, wail, mourn, elegize, mesmerize, scandalize, ingratiate, stutter, sputter, mew, whinge, neigh, hector, harp, emote, ejaculate, envision, exclaim, erupt, elucidate, yowl, yak, jape, jest, jabber, greet, grandiloquize, chisel, charm, chuckle, chitter, crow, brag, argue, segue, toast, threaten, ameliorate, pray, parry, aver, avow, acclaim, attest, affirm, achoo, agree, account, accept, accredit, auction, authorize, augur, theorize, temporize, tantalize, tongue, tang, teeng, tong, and tan two tonsils for every top ticket in town

And there’s one other thing we know. Not from ourselves, because we’d have to die first. But from the machines, who can stay there long, long after we’d wink out.

 If you just stand there, and wait until all the quintillions around you have had their say, they all wink out, night falls; and The Perfectly Clear Light, and then The Trillion Diamond Tiara City, and then The Pearly Cupid’s Bow, move on, on, on into the Inky Way, talking, talking forever

#scifi

[the-chubbiest-dumpling]

Endings and Beginnings: Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen: Rescue

Summary: You’re just an ordinary 25-year-old photographer working in a small studio in downtown Toronto. Your life is as normal as it could possibly be, except the fact that you are given an opportunity most people only dream of.

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

Word Count: 14 600

Warnings: Swearing, violence, torture

A/N: Tbh even though this is over 14k this is the fastest chapter I’ve written yet (4 days). I’m surprised I kept at it everyday 😅

Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Epilogue

Tags: @shamvictoria11 @blazeshira

“Tony do something!” you scream, desperate for his help. But he can’t do anything. In a last ditch attempt, you go running out with your arm stretched, reaching for Maeve’s hand. But it’s too late. Snyders flies up into the air, and leaves you a parting gift as well: an upgraded flash grenade. You’re sent flying back inside, and land hardly on the floor. You yell as you push yourself up and run outside again, even if you can’t see. Snyders flies up into the sky, taking Maeve with him, leaving you standing there helpless, useless, as he takes his prize.

You can’t believe this. You cannot believe your eyes. You cannot believe that your best friend just got kidnapped by a complete lunatic in front of your own eyes and you couldn’t do anything to help her. Your chest feels heavy, and your legs weak. You feel like you’ve just let the entire world down. You kneel down on the cement, the amount of guilt physically weighing you down. You hold your face in your hand, and scream in fury. You’ve never wanted to kill somebody so badly in your entire life. Hot tears wet your cheeks as you rock back and forth, reeling with anger.

Your resolve couldn’t be more clear.

Lowering your hand, you glare at the horizon line and stand up, wiping your years away. You know you can’t just leave her in the possession of a potential mass murderer and innovator of weapons of mass destruction. He said you’d come rescue her.

That’s exactly what you’re going to do.

You turn around and storm back inside the Tower, glowering at Tony and Natasha.

“I’m going to bring her back,” you say hardly, leaving no room for discussion. “Whatever it takes. And no one’s going to stop me.”

“We weren’t planning on stopping you, _______,” Natasha says gently. “We’re going to help.”

“Who was that guy, anyway?” Tony asks curiously. You’re shocked that he’s asking such a thing after what just happened. Tony recognizes your confusion and continues. “He asked you if you knew who he was. And you did. Who was he, _______?”

“Marko Snyders,” you sigh, looking away. You cross your arms and stare at the floor. “He was the target of my solo mission. An enthusiastic fanboy of weapons of mass destruction and has a love for the black market. S.H.I.E.L.D. was supposed to have him in custody. He’s probably making those kinds of weapons by now.”

“Of course,” Tony scoffs, shaking his head. “Of course they give you the shadiest target to apprehend. Now look what’s happened.”

“I know,” you agree. “But I can’t dwell on that now. I need to get Maeve back. Is that new suit ready for a field test? And can you track that son of a bitch? We need to get a read on him right now. I have no clue where he’s going or have any idea about where he’d take her for that matter. So we need to–”

“_______,” Natasha interrupts, walking towards you slowly. “Firstly you need to get your head fixed. Then we can–“

“I don’t give a fuck about myself right now,” you snap. Natasha doesn’t flinch. “What matters right now is Maeve. And if you’re not willing to go after her this very moment, then I’ll do it myself.”

“And then what?” Tony asks harshly. You stop in your tracks as you begin to walk away. “You’re gonna go out on a limb and just start searching this entire city? The next? You need to calm down and think, _______. Like you said, you have no idea where she is or where he could be taking her.”

“Exactly! That’s why–“

“I wasn’t finished,” Tony interjects again. “I said you have no idea where she is. But I do.”

Your heart stops and for a second you want to start crying again. But you stop yourself from doing so. You give Tony an extremely sad expression, which prompts him to go on.

“Whatever he used to shut down the systems,” he says, walking towards the minibar, “–didn’t last for very long. It’s a mystery in itself how something could override my technology, but we’re going to look past that. Instead, we can track him.”

Tony presses the exact same button he did when everything was shut down, and this time, multiple projections of blue lines fill the room. You move away so you can see it in its entirety, and wonder how the hell this is supposed to help you all find Maeve. Tony reaches behind the counter for a remote, and presses another button. Red beams outline where Snyders was standing, and after pressing another button, reveals exactly what he was wearing.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., start the material makeup analysis.”

F.R.I.D.A.Y. scans the hologram of Snyders, and begins downloading and examining the data she’s been given. You stare at the image of Snyders angrily, but also a little confused. You tilt your head in Tony’s direction.

“Was this what was supposed to happen when you pushed that button the first time?” you ask coldly. Tony investigates the data as he answers.

“Yes and no,” he replies smoothly, skimming through what he’s been given.

“And what the hell is that supposed to mean?” You drop your arms and start waltzing your way over to him, intent on giving him a good punch if need be.

“What I mean is that this whole process,” he starts, referring to the analysis, “is what that button is meant to do. It captures an infrared image of the entire room, and breaks down what specific parts it’s made of. In this case, it’ll be Snyders’ armour. The thing you’re probably confused about is the ‘no’ part.” You nod once. “When the power is functioning, the device operates at its full capacity, and is supposed to making a loud clicking noise once it takes the image, but I didn’t hear it. And if it ever unexpectedly shuts down, it only runs on about thirteen percent. It’s better than nothing.”

You crack your knuckles in irritation. You’re glad that there’s at least one thing in the Tower that can work without sufficient power, but you’re still fuming about how little any of you did. It’s just like Steve says: you can’t save everyone. But that’s not going to dampen your determination. You’re not going to let Maeve be killed. Not on your watch.

Natasha silently stitches up your forehead as Tony calculates the exact location of Snyders’ position. The metal he was wearing is awfully generic, making it difficult for Tony to pinpoint him since it’s so common. But thankfully, there was one small detail about his armour that allows Tony to have a general location within a three-mile radius.

“I got it,” he announces. You jump off the counter of the bar and go over to Tony at his work station. He glances at you before focusing on the data again. “How’s the head?”

“’S fine,” you mumble, tracing your eyes over his work. “Where is he?”

“Not too far,” Tony says, projecting the figures in the air. “About an hour’s flight away, in St. Mary’s.” He circles to a patch of rural area in Pennsylvania. “Being the man you claim him to be, he’d need quite a lot of space for his projects. Whether this is a headquarter checkpoint or just one of his manufacturing garages, I’ve deciphered that he’ll be in this building here.” He zooms in on the side of the warehouse. “It’s labeled as a self-storage unit, and it’s off the main road. It gives him the privacy he needs. The pathetic metal he wore is quite common, but it had a small coating of rhenium on the surface. I was able to trace him using that.”

You stare at the blinking red dot on the map, thinking about Maeve. You try to push away the thoughts of her being tortured in any way, but the intrusive thoughts keep forcing their way in. You rub your temple and grit your teeth.

“Save the address,” you growl. “Let’s get going.”

You don’t wait for either of them to answer before you start to make your way to the jet platform outside. You don’t know how much time Maeve has, and you don’t want to think about it. Tony and Natasha join you on the quinjet soon after, with Natasha being the designated driver. You’re completely silent as they come into view, your only thoughts being that of getting Maeve back safely. Natasha starts it up, then flies quickly in the direction of the compound.

“Wait, what are you doing?” you ask, getting up. You know this path. “Where are you going, Natasha?”

“To the compound,” she says. “And before you object, just know that we’ll need everyone for this. Out of necessity, and because they would come anyway. We’ll get there in time, _______. Trust me.”

“You better be right,” you scoff, shaking your head as you take your seat again. Natasha looks at you over your shoulder before pushing the quinjet to it’s maximum speed.

“Hang on,” she warns. It comes too late as you go flying to the side. You grip the straps of the seat belts at the bottom of the seats to keep yourself from sliding. Tony flawlessly contacts everyone at the compound about the situation, telling them to suit up and be ready for when they arrive. Once you find your seat again, you fasten yourself in and pray that everything will be okay.

With the insane speed that Natasha was flying at, you arrive back at the compound in two hours flat. You feel faint after arriving, but you shake it off and speed-walk inside the compound and upstairs to change into your suit. As you’re in the middle of pushing your arms through, there’s a knock at the door. You don’t bother to answer, since whoever it is, they’re not going to change your mind.

“_______?” It’s Bucky. You zip up the front of your suit securely, then begin to tie your hair up. He opens the door and walks inside.

“_______?” he calls again.

“I’m not listening to any complaints about me going,” you say, grabbing a ponytail from your dresser. “She’s my friend, and I’m going to get her back. No one can tell me otherwise.”

“I know,” he says gently. “We’re all going. I’m going.”

“No,” you say, snapping your head around to look at him. “You can’t come, Bucky. As much as I want you to, it’s too much of a risk. You can’t be seen.”

“Stark said she’s being kept in the middle of nowhere,” he counters, trying to reason with you. He lowers his voice when he sees the cut in your forehead. “No one is going to see me.”

“His men will,” you remark, grabbing your mask. “And I’m pretty sure they’d know damn well what the Winter Soldier looks like.”

“You think I’m going to let you go out there by yourself?”

“But I won’t be alone, Bucky,” you argue. “I’ll have Natasha and Wanda and Steve and Tony and Sam and Vision. There’s no reason why you need to put any unnecessary danger upon yourself.”

“And the rest of them aren’t?” he scoffs. “I’d be risking the same things they’d be risking. More on me I know, but I don’t want to be sitting here for hours on end worried the hell out of my mind, wondering if you’re alive or not.”

You drop your hands from your face after putting on your mask and sigh. You don’t want to have an argument before doing this mission. It would be a major distraction for yourself. You approach Bucky, and cup his face in your hands.

“I’m going,” you say softly. You put a finger to his lips to keep him from interrupting. “And you’re coming too, since you’d probably go anyway. But you have to promise me that you’ll stay in the jet. Otherwise I’ll have to strap you down here myself.”

Bucky knows he’s not going to get a better deal. He nods, agreeing with your terms, and kisses your forehead.

“I’ll stay put,” he confirms.

“Good,” you say. “Let’s get going.”

You grab your gun and slide it into your holster before leaving your room and heading down to the hangar to meet with everyone else. You assume they’ve all been relayed the message by Tony, since he said it himself. You don’t need to speak with any of them; you know they have your back.

As you walk down the stairs to the hangar and see everyone, you notice they’ve all geared up: Steve in his Captain America uniform carrying his shield, Sam has his wings, Tony in his Iron Man suit. You put on a brave face (though it can’t be seen), and take deep breaths as you approach them. Not much needs to be said; they’ve all made their decision to help you, because that’s what a family does.

God that really sounded like Steve.

You all board the jet in silence, except for Tony as he will be flying alongside you. You hear footsteps from behind you, so you look over your shoulder and see Bucky jogging to keep up. He’s dressed in what seems like a modified Winter Soldier outfit: it’s still all black attire, but with a vest instead of the intense strapping from his old one. He’s wearing his glove as well, but that doesn’t do much to cover the entirety of his arm. You wait for him, and silence everyone’s concerns with a glare.

“He’s staying on board,” you say simply. “He’s not leaving once we get there. End of story. Vision, you watch him and make sure he doesn’t leave. I don’t want him seen by anyone. Got it?”

“Understood,” Vision says, nodding in compliance. He motions for Bucky to have a seat next to him, and he does. You take a seat by yourself, not wanting to interact for a while, and to cool down a bit. This is the most stressful experience you’ve ever been in in your entire life. There’s only a handful outcomes that you can think of when all of this is over:

1. Maeve is saved, and Snyders and his men are killed and/or captured

2. Maeve is saved, but Snyders and his men get away

3. Maeve is killed, but Snyders and his men get away

4. Maeve is killed, along with Snyders and his men

5. Maeve is saved, and Snyders and his men are killed and/or captured, and someone on the team is killed

6. Maeve is saved, but Snyders and his men get away, and someone on the team is killed

7. Maeve is killed, but Snyders and his men get away and someone on the team is killed

8. Maeve is killed, along with Snyders and his men and someone on the team

Your head hurts from thinking about all of these scenarios. You support your face in your hands and lean your elbows on your knees. You do some breathing techniques to calm yourself down, and tap your foot on the floor. Steve recognizes that you want some alone time, but him being him, he knows that even though you may not realize it, you need someone to talk with you.

He gets out of his seat and settles down next to you. You don’t say anything to him, and he was expecting that. You’re not one to usually start a conversation, which Steve also knows, so he waits a minute or two before opening his mouth.

“How’re you holding up?” he asks quietly, glancing at you.

You close your eyes and breathe deeply before giving him an answer. “About as good as you can expect,” you reply, staring down at the floor. You dig your fingernails hardly into each other, and begin bouncing your knee. Your heart is racing, and you can’t focus. You’re afraid that you’re going to compromise this mission because of your mental state, and that one member, if not everyone, will tell you to stay behind. Steve’s not going to tell you that.

But that doesn’t mean he’s not going to be realistic and cautious about this.

“I can’t tell you that everything is going to go smoothly,” he starts, treading carefully. “But if it’s any consolation, if someone can pull this off, it’s you. You have the skill, the tenacity, and most importantly, the integrity. Complications are going to arise, and there’s no way to avoid that. But this is your mission, _______. You’re calling the shots. It’s going to be rough, but we’re here with you. We’ll get her back.”

Your eyes sting with tears at Steve’s small pep talk. The one hope everyone always has is that everything is going to be okay. But that’s not the case in all scenarios. Steve is Steve, and you’re grateful for his encouraging words. You lift your head, your eyes glassy, and nod in thanks, since he won’t be able to see your smile. He smiles back anyhow, and rubs your shoulder.

“All we need to do is win,” he says.

“Easier said than done,” comes your quiet reply. “But it’s the only option. And I’m not about to let Maeve down. Or any of you down, for that matter.”

“You won’t,” he reassures you. “We’ve seen you in the field. Just get in your zone, and you’ll be unstoppable. Just do what you gotta do.”

“And the same to you guys,” you agree.

Steve continues to speak with you for most of the three-hour flight to Pennsylvania. He wants to settle your nerves, and give you some confidence. He can see in your eyes the terror you’re experiencing, and there’s nothing more nerve-wracking than a person who doesn’t feel like themselves. The pressure and anxiety of rescuing someone close to you is like trying to carry around a stone of slab that weighs a ton. Steve knows exactly how that feels.

Along with you, he’s also worried about Bucky and how he’s going to deal with this entire situation. He originally wasn’t supposed to come, but given the fact that he wouldn’t let you go without him, Steve isn’t surprised that he was allowed to come along on one condition: that he stays in the quinjet. Taking that into consideration… Steve isn’t confident that Bucky is going to stand by that order. He can’t help but want to jump in and help. Especially when your safety is in jeopardy. Whatever happens, Steve hopes that you both come out of this alive.

As you’re nearing the designated location, you stand up and stare out the windshield. All you can see is grass upon grass upon grass, with a single warehouse planted in the middle of it. You wipe your clammy palms on your legs before pulling your gloves out of your pocket. You slide them on as Natasha lands the jet a few hundred meters away from the site. The air is tense, silent, and serious. Natasha opens the door, and you all step out onto the grass. You speak with Bucky before stepping off last.

“For the love of god, please stay here,” you tell him, clutching his hand. “Forget about being killed. HYDRA could get their hands on you again and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if that happened. So please, please promise me you’ll stay in the quinjet.”

Bucky hears the pleading in your voice, but he sees it the most in your eyes. He’s never heard you sound so afraid for him before. He squeezes your hand, and nods with hesitation. He still doesn’t know if he’ll be able to keep that promise.

“I promise,” he whispers, his eyes downcast.

“Okay,” you say. You close your eyes as he places a long, gentle kiss to your forehead. You hug him tightly after, glad that he’s going to listen to you.

“I’ll see you after,” you say, pulling away. You turn to Vision now. “Watch him. Please. Don’t let him slip through your fingers.”

“No need to worry, _______,” Vision says. “He won’t be joining you until you return.”

“Thank you, Vision. We’ll see you after, as well.”

And with that, you turn your back on them and walk out of the quinjet to join the others. You stare out in the field, the warehouse being a spec in the distance. You stand at the head of the group, and lead them towards the goal. Your head and heart race together, so much that it makes you feel dizzy again. But you absolutely cannot break focus. You’re here for Maeve, and you’re going to save her.

The warehouse gets bigger and bigger the closer you get, and you wonder just how massive this place is. You clench your fists in frustration and grit your teeth.

Shut up. Calm the fuck down. Thinking too much is going to screw everything up. You gotta stop doing this or you’re going to fuck everyone over.

You walk faster and take deeper breaths as your anger intensifies. Fighting gives you energy like you’ve never experienced, and you hope to god that it’ll give you the willpower you need to get through this day.

When you come within 50 metres of the place, a voice speaks over an intercom system.

“Take out your earpiece, leave your gun, and come in alone.”

You’d recognize that voice anywhere now. The team stops in place, and you narrow your eyes at the building. If that’s the way it has to be, then you have to do it. You have to comply if you want Maeve to come out of this alive.

“And if I don’t?” you question, curious to see what he’ll say.

“It’s very simple,” he says. “Your friend dies in the most horrible way possible, and then we kill all of you. So make your decision wisely.”

Sighing, you bring your hand to your right ear, and pull out the earpiece, dropping it on the ground. You do the same with your gun, and began walking towards the entrance.

“_______, wait!” Steve calls out, taking a step forward.

“I’m gonna do as he says, Steve,” you tell him, frowning over your shoulder. “If this is the way to save Maeve, then I’m going to do it.” You continue your way forward, but Steve reaches out and grabs your forearm.

“_______,” he pleads.

You tilt your head to the side, knowing he’s going to try and let him come with you, but you shake your head.

“No, Steve,” you say. You take your arm back and turn around to face him. “I’m going in alone. And if you can’t–“

“I’m not kidding around, _______,” Steve argues, his voice firm. “I’m not–“

“Didn’t you say that I’m calling the shots here?!” you yell. He flinches in surprise. He takes a step back and sighs. You huff, and begin backing away. “I am going in alone. And if I’m not out of there within thirty minutes, follow me. But look for Maeve first. She is the top priority, not me. Do whatever you can to get her out of there. That’s an order.”

Steve reluctantly lets you go, but he nods his head in affirmation. You turn your back on them once again, and begin your journey inside. It’s what you’d expect from a typical warehouse: shiny, cement floors, rows upon rows of orange shelving, fluorescent lighting, forklifts. But there’s not a soul in sight. The lights are dimmed, and you’re prepared to light some bastards up. You proceed with caution, walking on your toes and keeping your ears open to even the smallest of sounds. You saunter down an isle, wondering where the hell Snyders is. You know he wouldn’t just let you stroll in here unarmed without a plan in mind. But just because you’re unarmed, doesn’t mean you’re not.

You put your arm up, leveling it with your face. It’s no form of protection, but you can produce flames faster than you did before. You haven’t reached full-body production, but you’re still a work in progress. As you reach the end of the isle, you tentatively look left and right for any sign of human life, but there’s no one. You don’t hear, nor see, anyone.

They all must be in a di–

You hear the sounds of guns being locked and loaded simultaneously. You freeze in place, and look up. About a dozen men come out of their hiding places on the shelves, and point their weapons at you. You lower your arm, but not your guard. Your movements are slow, but careful as you turn around, looking for Snyders.

“Braaavaaa, braaavaaa.”

You whip your head around when you hear his voice and the sound of him clapping. He appears around the corner of the isle, stepping into view.

“I didn’t think you’d do it,” he comments, giving you a once-over. You notice he’s dressed like a normal civilian instead of the armour he was wearing when he took Maeve. And it seems as though he’s found himself a pretty clever makeup artist, since the burns on his face have all but disappeared. That scar on his neck is still painfully visible, though.

“Just one simple proposal and you drop everything to come in here? That’s fantastic!”

He begins a monologue, but you’re too weirded out by his strange behaviour. The unnerving smile, speaking with his hands, and the swagger he’s carrying… it feels like a completely different Marko Snyders than the one you met at the club. But a change in personality isn’t going to divert you from your objective.

“Where is she?” you demand.

He immediately stops talking when you ask for Maeve. His smile slowly falls from his face, and he lowers his arms, tucking his hands in his pockets. He takes a step forward, and you straighten up. You’re not afraid of him. You nearly killed him once; you’re not going to let that opportunity slide again.

“Come,” he says, wrapping an arm around you. “Let’s take a walk.”

Now you’re even more suspicious. You clench and unclench your fists to keep yourself under control as he leads you away from one part of the warehouse to another. He has a look of glory on his face, like he’s just had an epiphany. And you don’t like it at all. You’d rather kick his ass early, find Maeve, and be done with it. This whole ensemble seems fishy at best.

As you walk along with him, you get looks from his men whenever you pass them. The warehouse still looks like one, but the contents in this certain area is completely different. All the shelving is gone, and instead there’s projects placed everywhere on the floor. They all have their own work station, with a handful of men tending to each one. You feel like you’re being given a tour of the entire place, but you know that’s not what’s in Marko’s plan.

He leads you to an elevator, and presses a button for the very last floor, deep underground. You can tell by the old design of the elevator door that the next room you see is not going to be pretty. The silence between you and Marko is deafening, but you suppose that minimal conversation is the best course of action.

When you reach the sub basement of the warehouse, Marko steps out first, and you follow closely behind. The air is colder, mustier, and creepier. Pipes run along the high ends of the walls, and you can see water streaming through the cracks of the brick. It’s dark, dirty, and overall eerie. It makes the perfect place to hide a secret facility.

You can’t tell which way you’re going. Everything looks so similar, yet different at the same time. You don’t even know what half of the old machines do; they look like they were made in the 40s. And they probably were. You swallow the lump in your throat as you get a chill. This place doesn’t make you feel safe at all.

After turning left and right and being lead up and down staircases and corridors, Marko finally stops in front of a big, bulky door. He takes out an ID badge from his jacket, and swipes it in a keypad attached to the wall. He enters a code, his thumbprint, and a retina scan. The power light changes from red to green, and the door opens, welcoming Marko inside. He steps through, and you hesitate before doing the same.

The design is completely different.

It’s perfectly white all around, with glass doors and windows, with the brightest lighting. The people down here dress like they’re doctors, wearing white lab coats over their slacks and dress shirts. You can’t tell what each room is for. In some there’s just people sitting at a desk, staring at a computer and writing things down. But in others, you can only guess they’re doing experiments, given the small, handheld technology they’re using.

“This is where all the magic happens.”

The sound of Marko’s voice makes you jump, and he takes notice of that as he peers at you over his shoulder.

“Didn’t mean t’ scare ya,” he apologizes, giving you that unsettling smile again. “That’s for later.” That doesn’t calm you down any, but he continues on, strolling through his lab. “I’ve always been a fan of perfection and leaving little room for error and failure. I believe it’s the only acceptable form of success. Trial and error? If at first you don’t succeed, try again? Tsk tsk. Not uh. Not in my laboratory. See, I started out big. I was young and naïve, always aiming to make the biggest, most fantastical thing out there. The bigger the better, right? But in these past months, I realized how wrong I was. The perfection is in the detail, not how gigantically I can produce something. No, no, no. It has to be something no one will expect. That no one will see coming.”

After gathering your thoughts and swallowing your nervousness, you open your mouth to see if he’ll answer your question.

“And what’s that? What did you move on to?”

He stops in his tracks again, and hangs his head. Just by looking at his back gives you the vibe that he could snap, and jump you right then and there. You shift on your feet, balancing yourself if he tries anything. He turns around completely, and gives you a smug smile.

“Now why would I tell you that?” he asks curiously, tilting his head. “It would just spoil the surprise.”

His tone is what freaks you out this time. Not much can be read by a human face when three-quarters of it is shielded, but the eyes are said to be the window to the soul. And if you didn’t know any better, you’d say that Marko knows exactly the amount of terror and fear he’s making on you, just by glancing at your eyes.

“Let’s continue the tour, shall we?”

Standing up straight, he turns on his heel and begins walking down the hallway, then takes a left. You trail behind him, that specific encounter giving you a reason to be even more cautious of him. He gestures to certain areas, and announces their designated title: Science Research Unit, Records Management, a Culture Kit room, and even generic things such as a laundry room, the lavatories, and a break room. You have no idea why he would tell you this, but you guess that it’ll all be for nothing in the end.

But only if you let him have his way.

He comes to a door that’s guarded by two men, and just by that you can tell it’s an important room. He gets out his ID badge again, enters a code, does his thumbprint and retinal scan, then enters a longer code before the door clicks open. He beckons you inside when he sees you’re not following suit. You do as you’re told, and step inside. It’s impeccably clean and white like the rest of the place. It has one table and a single chair in the middle of the room, with a small control panel off to the side and bolted to the wall. Most of the room is cut in half by a floor-to-ceiling glass window, like an observation room. You hesitantly approach the glass, and squint to see if there’s anything there besides the blackness. Marko goes to the control panel, takes out a key, and unlocks it before flipping three switches. On the other side of the glass, the lights flicker on in unison, and your eyes widen in shock at what you see.

“Maeve? Maeve!”

You slam your hands on the glass, and call her name over and over, but she can’t hear you. She’s strapped down to a standing metal table, with clasps around her wrists and ankles together. Her shirt has been removed, and you can see bruising around her hips and arms. Her end of the room is just like yours: white floors, white walls, and a door to her right. She’s completely alone in there. She’s unconscious as well, and upon closer inspection, seems to be shining. Her hair looks damp, and she shivers. Both ends are soundproof, but that doesn’t mean you can’t see one another. Marko pushes a button, and two squares of the wall open up, revealing two powerful hoses. Maeve is then drenched in a mountain of freezing cold water; she struggles against her restraints, and spits out any water that forces its way in her mouth. You watch on in horror, once again helpless that you can’t do anything to help her.

“Stop it,” you whisper, making a fist against the glass.

“I’m sorry,” Marko says annoyingly. “I didn’t quite hear that. What did you–“

“I said stop it!” you scream, glowering at him in a rage. He nods his head once, then retracts the hoses to allow Maeve to calm down. You pound your fist on the glass, but it’s too thick to be heard on the other side.

“Maeve! Maeve!”

Finally, Maeve raises her head, and when she sees you, her heart sinks. You’re glad that she’s looking at you, but her expression makes your own falter. She doesn’t look happy to see you. in fact, she wishes you were anywhere but here.

“Go,” she says, even though she knows you can’t hear her. “Go, _______! Go!” Tears sting her eyes when you don’t leave. She hangs her head, her body shaking as she weeps. She’s telling you to go not because she hates you for what’s been done to her, but because she doesn’t want the same things to happen to you. Your anger reaches a boiling point when you see Maeve so distraught.

“Let her go,” you demand, glaring at Marko again.

“Thaaat I can’t do,” he replies.

“I said: Let. Her. Go!”

You lunge at Marko, intending to give him another pretty scar to the other side of his face, but he effortlessly moves to the side. His guards come in then, and take hold of you by both your arms. You instantly light up your arms, and they both let go, but one of them quickly grabs hold of your throat and yanks you backwards. You feel a sting in the side of your neck, and the last thing you see before becoming unconscious is Marko’s haughty expression.

When it’s been more than thirty minutes, Steve starts to get restless. He can’t stop jittering, and his hands are clammy under his gloves. He has the utmost confidence in you, but when he starts doubting the situation, he can’t just stand by and wait for something terrible to happen.

“She should have been out by now,” he says more to himself than the team. He looks at the building left and right, shaking his head. “We can’t wait any longer. We need to go in.”

“Shouldn’t we wait just a little bit more?” Sam suggests, even though he’s worried as well.

“She said if she’s not out in thirty minutes to go in,” Wanda reminds him. “I say we go in.”

“Alright people here’s the plan,” Tony speaks up, pulling his mask back. “Cap and Wilson will go after _______. Nat and Wanda will find her friend. I’ll do an aerial observation and scan the warehouse to be able to find both of them. I’ll lead you all to them once I find them. And if you know what’s good for you, none of you will tell Barnes. We don’t need any more deaths than we need.”

Everyone nods their head in agreement. They accept their given task, and will do whatever they can to complete it without any fatalities on their end. Staring down the building in determination, the team braces themselves for what’s to come, and commence their operation.

You feel extremely weak when you wake up. Your neck is stiff, and your eyes sting. You hiss when you move, as well. You’re absolutely freezing. As your vision clears, you realize you’ve been strapped down to a standing table, just like Maeve. You’ve been stripped of your suit, your mask included. You’re entirely vulnerable. The only thing you can be thankful for is that you’re alive.

And wearing boyshorts.

The room you’re in is bigger than Maeve’s, leaving lots more space for Marko to do whatever he wants with you. You’re getting irritated from all the white; it’s bugging with your eyes, and you try to pull your wrist free. But the clasps won’t budge. It’s made of stainless steel, and the only way you’re going to get out of it is if you melt it. But even you’re not sure you can do that. You still try to free yourself, pulling with all your might and shaking yourself side to side. You yell in frustration, but you stop struggling when you hear someone clapping.

“I can’t believe it,” comes Marko’s surprised voice. You look up, and see him standing behind a wall of glass. You’re trapped in the room, just like Maeve is, and you can bet that Marko has some even worse things lined up for you. He dons a lab coat now, and steps in front of the glass with his hands behind his back. He flips on a switch to turn up the volume on the intercom system. “You’re quite easy to capture, you know that? You’re incredibly impulsive, which makes you clumsy and distracted by all means. I’m perplexed as to why you didn’t try harder to save your friend. After all, she is pretty important to you… or is she?”

“Of course she is!” you bellow, grinding your teeth.

“Are you sure?” he counters. “Because, from the way I see it, she’s not all that significant. Otherwise you would have tried to burn the room down to get to her. But that’s not what happened, is it? You saw her, you panicked that you couldn’t save her, and let yourself be imprisoned. It’s pathetic, really. You’re definitely not the same woman I met all those months ago. Maybe I should just let her out of her misery now and save the best devices for you instead.”

“Don’t you fucking touch her!” you scream, pulling against your restraints again. You bring flames to your arms and try to melt them off, but Marko has other ideas.

“Ah ah ah,” he scolds, unlocking another control panel in front of him. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

“And why’s t–“

You yell in surprise and pain as you feel an icy cold embrace around your wrists. You pant like you’ve just been punched in the stomach. Turning your head to glance at your wrist, your eyes widen in shock as you see a large chunk of ice forming on your wrist and up your forearm. It’s the same on the other side. You try thawing it out, but it’s too cold. It has to be at least -50. It makes your entire body jolt. You glare at Marko as he gives you the most satisfied of smiles.

“Instant frostbite,” he explains, pressing another button. It freezes your ankles this time, and you swear you’ve never felt a pain like this before. It’s so sharp and severe, you’re not sure you can counter it. Your entire body is littered in goosebumps, and you can’t stop trembling. Your teeth chatter, and you can’t bring yourself to speak.

“Quite useful, don’t you think?” he goes on, switching them both off. You’re provided a small relief, but the pain sticks with you. “Against a fire-type like you, anything cold and wet is your weakness. And those things are pretty easy to come by. I just take the local water supply, and convert it into ice. Simple as that. But getting it this cold takes some patience. I could freeze you to death if I wanted. But where’s the fun in that?”

Turning off communications, he turns to speak to one of his consultants, allowing him full access to the control panel. Marko himself strolls over to the right, and your heartbeat quickens when he enters the room with you. He keeps the door open as someone else wearing a hospital mask strolls in, pushing a rolling table with a sheet overtop. You can guess what’s underneath.

“Thank you, Connell,” Marko says to the man. Connell stops when the table is directly in front of you, then nods to Marko, and leaves, closing the door tightly behind him. Marko walks to the middle of the table, grasps the ends of the sheet, and glances up at you before pulling it away. Underneath is all but a single straight back knife. He picks it up, approaches you, and gingerly taps the tip of the knife against your stomach. It’s cold and sharp, and makes you shift uncomfortably. You don’t want that thing anywhere near you.

“It’s not so fancy, I know,” he says, twirling it around in his hand. “But that doesn’t matter. This type of knife is an all-purpose blade. Because the back is not sharp, it allows you to use your hand or fingers to apply additional pressure to increase the cutting force. Overall, it’s good for slicing and chopping. A little on the heavier side, but I have enough strength to complete my tasks.”

He presses it against your stomach again, but with more pressure. You look down in fear as your skin concaves around the knife, before finally piercing you. You groan in the back of your throat, and look away as he pulls the knife down. A small trickle of blood pours from your wound, and he retracts his hand.

“Ahhh,” he sighs, tapping the knife against you. “This is going to be so much fun. And look at that!” He kneels down somewhat to gaze at your leg. “What a wonderful scar I’ve left behind. That bullet wasn’t very nice to you, was it? Packs a punch from a close range.” He becomes suddenly fascinated, and can’t help but give you a few more scratches along your abdomen and legs. You restrict your voice, not wanting him to hear how much pain you’re in. Most of it is coming from the leftover ice, but having multiple stinging sensations in your stomach and legs isn’t any more pleasant.

“I have much planned for you,” he says, watching your blood slide down his knife. “The next installment of fun should be here any moment now. Until then–“

He gives you a good scrape along the length of your collarbone, quick and clean. You hiss in surprise, and find the strength to keep your voice down. He gives you a few more nicks on your arms before amping it up a bit. He digs deeper into your side, deep enough to produce a steady flow of blood, but not enough to kill you. He does the same to your hip and thigh, and is about you go for your stomach when the door opens again. Connell rolls in a smaller table this time, still with a single sheet covering the top. Marko smiles happily, and removes the sheet once more to reveal a small, handheld device. From your angle, it looks like a pen. But it’s thicker, and has a translucent point.

“Thank you again, Connell,” Marko says as Connell makes his way out again. Marko gingerly places the knife down on the table, and picks up the new device instead. He holds it out in front of you so you can see it. “Know what it is?” Even though it’s pointless to shake your head no, you do it anyway. “You look like a visual learner. I’ll give you a demonstration.”

He clicks the top, just like a pen, and the translucent end lights up in a metallic blue haze. You can’t see it, but there’s tiny electric currents flowing through it, indicating its power. Your chest palpitates just at the sight of it. You twist your body to the side when he draws it nearer to your abdomen, adjacent to a cut. As the tip of the device touches you, you can’t stop yourself from yelling in pain. Marko smiles like the sadist he is, and gives you several more pokes in different areas of your body, your screams music to his ears.

“Similar to shock therapy,” he explains, examining it with zeal. “But more powerful. Controlled. All of its energy condensed into this tiny little contraption. Deception is key. It could be labeled as a joke, a harmless prank. Different levels for different shock value. You could either zap someone like one of those cheap buzzer toys, or give a grown man a heart attack! It’s incredible! And since I want to keep you alive, I’ll be using the lowest settings for my convenience.”

You hardly heard anything he said. The searing pain is making it difficult for you to focus on one thing. Your thoughts are all over the place, and your body jerks involuntarily. You wonder if this is how Bucky felt when HYDRA induced shocks in him to activate the Winter Soldier. If it is… you can’t imagine how how got though it all. This is unbearable.

“Why… are you doing this?” you manage to ask, your voice trembling. You weakly raise your head to look at him for when he answers you. “Is this all because… I burnt your face off?”

Marko stops fanboying over his little toy to laugh out loud. He laughs so hard that he keels over and holds his stomach.

“Ohohooo sweetheart,” he coos. “Don’t be so self-centred. You see, I used to work at S.H.I.E.L.D. in the Weapons Development Department. Not exactly Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S., but I had my fair share of intelligence. As you can guess, I was a double-agent at the time. Making weapons for this agency, while also stealing from them and selling to members of the black market. They never suspected a thing. They’re like that, as you can see. Good ole Phil Coulson asked me to do a mock mission for a youngster. A newbie. Nothing too big. Infiltration, detention, end of that. The weapons were real, I made sure of it. I tend to get into my role, so shooting you in the leg was intentional, yet not at the same time.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” you question, raising your voice. You can’t believe what you’re hearing. He could be lying about all of this. S.H.I.E.L.D. wouldn’t play around like that… would they?

“It was all a façade, sweetheart,” he says. “Do I have to spell it out for you? Everyone was in on the project but you. Even agent Knox knew about it. We did all of that just to see what you were capable of. And it was a lot.” He touches his face then, grabs the corner of his forehead, and begins to peel off a facial prosthetic to reveal the scar tissue hidden underneath. “Coulson assured me that despite you not having a gun, you wouldn’t use your power to retaliate. That was the first strike. The second strike was him not reimbursing me for the favour I did for him. Broken promises and a disfigured face? Dick move there. And the third strike was being let go because my precision was slacking and I made more mistakes. Sooo, yeah. Don’t think this is all because of you, princess.”

“If it’s not all about me,” you challenge, “then why did you come after me and my friend?”

“For obvious reasons,” he says, gesturing to his face. “You think I’d let someone get away with ruining one of my best assets? I don’t think so.”

“How did you find me? How did you know where I’d be?” You try to distract him by explaining himself to gain time for yourself. Thawing through the ice is going to take a lot of heat, and it’s still too dangerous for you to start at a really high Kelvin rate. You need to built yourself up before letting it all out.

“I’m more than just a weapons developer,” he says, fiddling with the jolt inducer. You’re very much still wary of it; you don’t want to agitate him into using it again. “I wouldn’t have been working at S.H.I.E.L.D. if I wasn’t. I watched you, tracked you, determined where you’d be. You showed me your face. Do you know the kind of face-recognition hardware I own? Honestly. Finding you was easier than a needle in a haystack. All you gotta do is bring a magnet.”

“Why attack me when you did? Why wait this long to capture me?”

You can slowly feel the heat swirling around inside you, especially in your arms. The ice still has an unrelenting hold on you, but you power through the pain in order to break through it. Marko loves to talk about himself and his accomplishments. Hopefully another speech will buy you the time you need to free yourself.

“Opportunity, coincidence, I was getting tired of waiting,” he jeers, getting a little restless from all the talking. He needs to hear your screams again. “It doesn’t matter. I found you, I got you, and as a bonus, I got your friend as well. Two birds with one stone. Enough of all that. Now, I have to get back to work.”

He jolts you again before you can produce any kind of progress with your flames. You lose your concentration, along with the buildup of your combustion. You choke from being stunned in multiple places in such a quick succession. Clenching your fists, you glower at him fiercely, and when he’s close enough, you spit in his face. His initial shock makes you smirk, but the fury in his eyes makes your stomach churn. He calmly wipes away your saliva from his cheek before plunging the device into your abdomen, keeping it there for a solid ten seconds. He gives you a breather afterwards, and a sinister warning.

“Do anything like that again, and I’ll make sure the last thing your friend says before she dies is how much she loathes you.”

You purse your lips at him, but otherwise silently agree. Anything you do to him could inadvertently be affecting Maeve, or worse. You’d be damned if you let her suffer any more for your mistakes.

“Why don’t we check up on her, hmm?”

You whip your head up at the mention of seeing her again. You lick your lips apprehensively, and your heart thumps painfully hard as a screen lowers down from the ceiling. It flickers as it brings up a live-stream of Maeve’s holding cell. She looks the same from when you last saw her: dripping wet with bruises.

“Let’s see what happens when you think about testing my patience.”

He swings his finger in a circle, indicting to go ahead with whatever he has planned. You watch the feed with immense guilt; Maeve shouldn’t be here right now. She should be back in Toronto, laying on her bed with her papers strewn about. You wish you never had invited her out to the Tower today. But you can’t take that back now. The regret is still there, and there’s no getting rid of that.

A member of Marko’s organization approaches Maeve, directly inside her cell, and uses the same jolting device on her like Marko did you. You can’t hear her screams, but you can see the amount of pain she’s in. You look away in shame, but Marko orders you to look and see what you’ve done to her, not him. You watch on in humiliation. She’s shocked once, twice, three more times before the employee backs away. Maeve pants aggressively, and her body spasms. Marko swings his arm again, and the screen rises back up into the ceiling.

“You see?” he says gently, patting your cheek. “No more misdemeanours, and she won’t be punished. Understand?” You nod in compliance, and Marko takes it sincerely. “Good, good.” He catches you completely off-guard as he begins puncturing you twice as many times as Maeve was. “Because next time I won’t be so lenient.”

You scream and scream and scream, but you know no one can hear you.

Back outside in the quinjet, Bucky is pacing restlessly. He was worried when Tony notified them, he was worried before leaving, he was worried the flight here, but nothing can compare to the anxiety he’s feeling right now. He doesn’t know what to think, what to do. According to you, he’s not allowed to do anything. Not until you come back. He said he’d stay in the jet and wait, but he can’t take this excruciating mission anymore. He has to go in there. He must be able to help in some way. Making up his mind, he stops pacing, and begins to leave the jet.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

Vision flies right in front of him, blocking his path. Bucky still has a hard time believing that Vision is a thing. He’s not sure he’s even spoken to him before. But that doesn’t matter right now. He can’t sit here and be a sitting duck while everyone else is in there looking for you.

“I’m going in there,” Bucky replies, walking around him.

“I believe miss _______ formally instructed you to remain here until the duration of the mission is complete,” Vision reminds him.

“That’s a promise I can’t keep,” Bucky confesses. “And you’re not going to stop me.”

“I will by any means necessary,” Vision chides. “I will not allow you to slip through my fingers, like _______ says. I believe she will be alright. Do you not?”

Bucky stops walking and sighs. He can’t be for sure what’ll happen to you, or what’s happening to you right now. He doesn’t know if you’re going to be okay. He knows you’re strong and determined to save Maeve, but carrying out a mission is anything but perfect. Something goes wrong nearly every time. And he’s not about to let anything happen to you.

“I love her,” he says quietly, biting his lip. “I can’t be sure about her well-being. I don’t know what’s going on in there right now. The others have gone in but… I’m not about to be useless. And I’m definitely not going to stand by while someone dies.”

“You don’t know if–“

“The possibility is always there,” Bucky interrupts harshly. He turns to face Vision, and pleads with him to let him go. “I’m not the same person I was a hundred years ago. And I never will be. But the amount of love and respect I have for someone important to me never changes. It will never falter. I have to do this. Otherwise I’ll beat myself up about it later. And if she ends up dead because I didn’t go in there after her… then I might as well be dead too.”

Vision can’t exactly comprehend where Bucky’s coming from, but the sincerity in Bucky’s voice lets him know that he is a hundred percent serious. Vision also has a protective feeling over the members of the team, and he knows it would pain him deeply if one of them got hurt because of him not being there for them when they needed him the most. Vision nods once, allowing Bucky to leave.

“Go,” he says. “But come back.”

“That’s a promise I can keep.”

And with that, Bucky goes sprinting outside and towards the warehouse, leaving Vision to be the remaining guard outside, and to wonder how this will all turn out in the end.

You nearly pass out from the pain of the jolt inducer. But you remain awake, alive and breathing. Just how Marko wants you. Conscious, but broken. He has so many other weapons he has lined up for you he doesn’t know where to start. You’re surprised you haven’t died from blood loss, but Marko targeted very specific parts of your body to produce the least amount of blood. You can’t imagine how bad of a shape you’re in right now.

By the feel of it, it isn’t good.

You try to at least control the temperature in the room, but you’re even too weak to do that. Marko’s rendered you utterly useless, unable to help yourself, and the team. There’s nothing you can do now. You either wait to die, or wait to unexpectedly live. Whatever happens, you just hope that Maeve gets out of here safe and sound.

You can barely lift your head as Marko begins explaining the capabilities of the new device he has in front of you.

“It can produce pain close to that of a thousand knives piercing you at once,” he says, staring at it in awe. “It’s shaped exactly like brass knuckles, and it’s even used in the same fashion. But no one will be able to expect just how rapidly the pain will course through you. A little tap here and there is like a pinprick to your finger. But when you put some force behind it, and punch with a purpose? Well. We all know what happens then. It’s only activated by this tiny button on the underside, here. If it’s not turned on, then you’re just using regular brass knuckles. Once it’s activated, you’re wielding an entirely different weapon.”

He does a demonstration, of course, using you as his test subject. He slides them over his fingers, gets into a fighting position, and gently punches your side. It’s just plain cold metal hitting you; no feeling of a thousand knives. He smiles proudly, before pushing the button and landing a more meaningful blow on your thigh. You shriek in pain, and thrash around as much as your body will allow from being pinned down. Marko cries with laughter, thoroughly enjoying his Torture Time.

“I seriously have no clue how you’re still conscious at this point,” he comments, pacing in front of you. “Losing blood, being shocked, instant frostbite, and now this? You’re one tough bitch. But you won’t be for long.” You blink long and hard to keep them open. You can’t fall under now. You’ve lasted this far, and you’ll make damn well sure you stay awake until the very end.

“You know,” he starts, looking around in wonder, “despite capturing you and torturing you to my heart’s content, I don’t know that much about you. I didn’t really care for those kinds of things. I just wanted to know where you were, and when would be the most opportune time to take you. However, there is one thing I know about you that you don’t want anyone else to know.”

Your eyes widen in fear when he tells you that. Something you don’t want anyone else to know? You can only think of one thing: Bucky. Outside of the team, no one in the world knows where Bucky is right now. People can make their assumptions and inferences, but they will never truly know. But you do, and now Marko does too. You’re not about to admit anything, so you wait for Marko to continue, praying that he’s talking about something else entirely.

“I’m sure the public are dying to know,” he says. “I was too. What is the one thing that the incredible Hellfire doesn’t want the world to find out? Well, not to brag or anything, but I found that out a long time ago.” You pant with your mouth closed, and shield your eyes from him. You don’t want him to see the defeated look on your face when he says Bucky’s name.

“The only thing in your life worth protecting,” he taunts. “I suppose it’s something that everyone would want to protect with their life, if they didn’t want anyone else knowing about it.”

“Yeah?” you call out. “And what’s that?”

Carefully, slowly, he walks right up to you and whispers in your face.

“Your identity.”

You wait until he turns around to sigh a breath of relief. As far as you’re concerned, he doesn’t know anything about Bucky. He might know and just not be mentioning it, but you’re not going to take the risk to ask.

“I know the identity of the newest Avengers’ member, Hellfire,” he sings. “Or should I say, _____ _______.”

You glare at him as he reveals your name, but honestly, you don’t care. Your identity doesn’t even compare to Bucky’s identity. You’d rather the world find out about who you really are instead of him. Marko seems to be waiting for some sort of reaction for you, like a person who just made a joke and is waiting for someone to laugh. But you don’t give him one. You just keep staring at him with your resting bitch face.

“Oh come oooon,” he pleads. “That’s all I get? A weak glare and silence? I was expecting more of a response like, writhing around or begging or something satisfying.”

“Well I’m not going to give it to you,” you tell him.

“You’re no fun,” he pouts. “I guess I could always just release it to the public and let them have their fun.”

“Snake,” you spit.

That comment earns you a forceful punch to the gut, and Marko gets the screech he wants. He smirks devilishly, and is about to give you another one when there’s an explosion. It’s a little far off so it’s difficult to hear, but nevertheless, it happened. Marko growls in anger and whips around to yell at his staff.

“What happened?!”

While Marko goes off, you try to find the will to keep your eyes open. An explosion could mean that there was an accident. Or that Steve finally decided that enough was enough. You cling to the hope that it’s the team making all this noise, but you’re succumbing to the pain now. As Marko storms out of the room to deal with the situation in a different area of the facility, you hang your head, and let yourself rest.

Steve and Sam are the ones who set off that particular explosion. They’re not exactly watching what they’re hitting, what they’re shooting at, or what they’re throwing people into. Sam is getting edgy about it, but Steve is just desperate to find you. Steve grabs each person he sees and demands to know where you are. When they don’t answer, he strikes them unconscious and moves on to the next one. Tony’s navigational signals have been pretty useful thus far, but being so deep underground is messing with the frequency. Multiple times Tony had to repeat what he said, or had to amp up the connection. Steve and Sam, along with Natasha and Wanda are headed on the right tracks. Natasha and Wanda have their fair share of fighting and swift interrogating, but they’re getting closer to Maeve than Steve and Sam are to you. They’re not far off, though. Natasha and Wanda may have taken an alternate route, but their position to Steve and Sam is only off by a few meters.

“Stark, how much closer are we?” Natasha asks, stunning two men at once.

“Just a–whoa!–about a hundred meters,” he replies. Even though Tony’s job can be handled perfectly well by him alone, it’s a bit more challenging while he’s being shot at.

It’s nothing he can’t handle, however. He wants to get this mission done as soon as possible. He counteracts easily to the firepower using his repulsor beams and propulsion high altitude jets. He asks F.R.I.D.A.Y. how much farther for both Steve and Natasha’s teams, and she relays the message to them separately. They all take their respective routes, and soon enough, Wanda is shouting into her earpiece.

“We found her friend!” she says as Natasha knocks out the last staff member. Natasha uses a key she took from the employee and uses it to unlock the control panel. Wanda enters through the side door and holds Maeve up as Natasha releases the clasps around her wrists and ankles.

“What’s her state?” comes Steve’s voice.

Wanda presses her fingers against Maeve’s neck. “She’s alive,” she responds. “She’s unconscious but she’s okay.”

“Good. According to Stark we’re getting closer to _______. Bring Maeve back to the jet. Sam and I will keep looking.”

“Copy that.”

Wanda drags Maeve out of the room and joins Natasha on the journey back to the surface. Maeve begins to wake up again from all the wobbling around. Her voice is weak, and she can barely walk.

“Wha–What’s going on?” she asks, barely above a whisper.

“We’re getting you out of here,” Wanda replies, giving her a kind smile. Maeve glances at her, but her vision is too blurry to make out who it is. But her voice is gentle, so she’s going to trust in whatever she says. For her sake, she’ll try to stay awake and walk along with her. Natasha has a good enough memory to remember the way back, so she leads Wanda and Maeve in and out of the corridors and stairwells.

Meanwhile, Steve and Sam weren’t having much luck from asking personnel where you’re hidden. Some weren’t willing to talk, and others ran out of there when they saw who was coming their way. But by the thinnest stroke of luck, Steve manages to find someone to lead him and Sam to you. Sam takes care of any others who try to pick a fight with them. He’s surprised from the lack of firearms from the people that operate deep underground. When they reach the modern part of the facility, everyone has already scattered. Taking vital information and destroying the rest via Snyders' orders. After five minutes of speed-walking, the staff member brings Steve and Sam to your holding cell. Once he opens the door to the viewer’s room, Steve starts.

When Marko left you to see what was going on upstairs, the lights remained on. So Steve and Sam can see every little cut, bruise, and scar that Marko graciously gave you. You’re also sopping wet. Without being given orders, the members had some fun of their own and took turns hosing you down, even though you were unconscious. They wanted to see if you’d wake up at all.

You didn’t.

Steve and Sam don’t know how much blood you’ve lost, but they need to get you back to the jet before they begin to decipher what kind of medical treatment you’ll need.

“Open the door,” Steve demands. The member fiddles with the key before opening the panel and unlocking the door. Sam goes through, and lightly taps your face.

“Spyro?” he says. He holds his fingers to your neck. You’re ice cold. “She’s got a weak pulse, Cap! We need to get her out of here!”

“Remove her restraints.” The member continues to follow Steve’s orders in hopes of being kept alive. Sam catches you, but you don’t open your eyes. You’re breathing, and that’s all that matters. Steve marches up to the member and grips the front of his shirt. “What’s the fastest way out of here?”

“T-There’s a passage,” he stutters. “I-It leads to a secondary elevator that goes straight to the surface.”

“Take us there.”

Steve shoves him forward, following right behind him as Sam carries you in his arms. He keeps speaking to you in hopes that you’ll wake up or give him any kind of response. It scares him to see you so still. He’s so used to hear your laughs and listen to stories from your past. He starts sweating from how worried he is.

“Here we go, Spyro,” he says, keeping on Steve’s tail. “We’re gonna get you outta here. You’re gonna be alright. Old man Barnes is waiting for you back in the jet outside. He’s never going to leave your side when you’re getting patched up, when you’re in bed, or anywhere for that matter. He’s going to yell at us for all sorts of reasons, but it won’t matter because you’ll be okay. You’re gonna be okay.”

“How’s she doing, Sam?” Steve asks, voice hard.

“She’s freezing, Cap,” Sam replies, looking down at your face. He turns grim from the sight of you. “We’ve gotta hurry. I don’t know what they did to her, but it wasn’t good. I don't know how much longer she has.”

“She’s gonna make it, Sam,” Steve assures him, voice steady. “She has to.”

“We’re almost there,” the man announces, peeking behind him. Steve returns the look with an icy stare. Suddenly, all the red warning lights turn on, and a voice speaks overhead.

“Warning. Structural failure. Building compromised. Please find the nearest escape route. Warning. Structural failure. Building compromised. Please find the nearest escape route. Warning. Please find…”

The message repeats itself over and over as alarms go off with it. Steve knows there’s no time to waste and ushers the man along. They can all hear the sound of brick and stone crashing above them. The man speeds along, creating more space between him and Steve. He takes a left, and when Steve rounds the corner, he’s pointing an unknown weapon at him.

“I’m the only one getting out of here,” he says. His hands shake from nervousness, but he’s a hundred percent serious. Steve sees the door of the elevator at the very end of the hall, so there’s no need to keep this man around anymore. Whatever he’s got in his hands, Steve can counter it. He takes a step forward, but the man arms himself and raises the weapon higher.

“Don’t move,” he warns. “I’m not afraid to use this.”

“You don’t have to do this,” Steve tries. “We can all get out of this alive.”

“There’s no need for you to come along,” the man explains. “Killing America’s golden boy is sure to promote me generously. Truth be told, I don’t really want to trap you in here, but it’s the only choice. Besides.” He raises his arm a little more and stretches it out to Steve. “You and your little band of misfits won’t be able to sur–“

Just then, the man is body-slammed into the wall beside him, and slumps to the floor, the weapon falling from his grasp. Steve jumps a bit out of surprise, but it’s replaced by confusion when he sees who the saviour is.

“Bucky?”

Bucky stares down the now unconscious man before glancing up at Steve.

“Steve?”

“Barnes?”

“Sam?”

“Sam.”

“Steve.”

“Steve?”

Steve rolls his head in irritation and stops this name calling nonsense.

“What’re you doing down here, Bucky?” he asks. “You were supposed to stay in the quinjet.”

“You know I couldn’t do that,” Bucky replies. “I couldn’t stay in there while _______ was–“

Bucky stops himself when he sees you limp in Sam’s arms. His eyes go left and right and up and down, observing every inch of you. He sees the blood, the scars, the bruises, the water dripping from your hair; his throat closes up uncomfortably from seeing the state you’re in. He slowly approaches Sam, but Steve grabs his arm.

“Bucky, we have to get out of here first,” Steve urges him. But Bucky doesn’t listen. He rips his arm away from him and keeps his eyes on your face as he closes in on Sam. Sam doesn’t back away, nor does he rush Bucky to get it over with. He can guess what Bucky’s feeling right now, so there’s no point in trying to reason with him. It’s best to just let him have a moment.

Bucky’s heart contracts from seeing all of your injuries up-close. Your chest is rising and falling so faintly, Bucky wasn’t sure you were breathing. The bruising resembles hemorrhaging, but he isn’t sure. The immense purple bruises on your wrists is what worries him the most. So many thoughts are racing through his mind, he’s not sure what to do now except to hold you.

“Give her to me,” Bucky says, brushing his fingers along your cheek.

“I got her, Barnes,” Sam replies.

“Give her to me,” Bucky repeats, glaring at Sam. His tone leaves no room for argument, and he doesn’t want to start a fight about it. Sighing, Sam carefully hands you over to Bucky. Once it’s done, Steve beckons for Sam and Bucky to get a move on. Steve presses his hand to his ear, and listens to the message given to him by Natasha. He nods his head and walks with Sam to the elevator. Bucky kisses your forehead and moves your hair away from your face before following along.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

The three of them make it to the elevator, and take the floor all the way to the top. It’s nerve-wracking to be in there, since the closer they get to the surface, the louder the explosions and gunfire are.

“Her friend made it out,” Steve says. “Wanda and Natasha are treating her right now.”

It’s a weight off their shoulders, but the day isn’t over yet. Now it’s your turn. Suddenly the elevator jolts, and comes to a complete stop, two floors away from the top. The force of the movement causes you to groan and shift in Bucky’s arms. You try to move, but Bucky pulls you closely to his chest.

“Shh shh shh,” he hushes. You groan louder, causing Steve and Sam to turn their heads. You stretch your arm and open your eyes, even though it hurts. Your head pounds against your skull, and it takes a few seconds to realize who’s holding you.

“Bucky?” you say. You sound awful, like a new voice has found its way into you. Even Bucky doesn’t recognize it at first. But he smiles down at you anyway. You laugh without humour. “Why don’t you ever listen to me, huh?” you question.

“Bad habit,” he confesses. You turn your head, and feel relief wash over you as you see Sam and Steve.

“Hey,” you say to them.

“It’s good to you're your voice,” Sam says. “Even though you sound like shit.”

“Shut up,” you smile. You feel like falling under again, but you know you can’t. You need to help in any way you can, knowing that they’re alive. “Let me down, Bucky.”

“I can–“

“Just lemme down.”

Nodding, he gently lowers your legs to the floor, but keeps an arm around you for support. You need it anyhow. You can’t find much strength in any part of your body, but as long as you can walk, you’re not complaining.

“Welcome back,” Steve finally says, a small smile on his face. You nod in agreement, and pat his arm reassuringly. As you look in front of you and see how dusty and smoky it’s getting, you address it.

“So what the hell is going on here?”

“We’re leaving,” Steve says curtly. “Right now.”

You’d know Steve’s “final decision” voice anywhere. And it’s not like it needs to be said. You can now begin to hear just how much shit you four are in. Steve steps out first, then Sam, followed by you and Bucky. It hurts to walk and be dragged along at the same time, but there’s no room for complaints. You’re not getting crushed by a hundred tons of steel and brick. You can hear Steve shouting into his earpiece at Tony, telling him where to go. But his voice gets lost with all the stinging, white noise you feel inside your head. You know you’re not well, what with all that Marko did to you, but this is ridiculous. You feel as if you’ve just lost your hearing. You nearly fall over when Steve makes a sharp right turn, and develop vertigo from going up a single flight of stairs. Bucky’s hold on you tightens when you swing the other way.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Bucky asks as he watches you wobble around.

“N-No,” you reply honestly. “But I’m not about to–to slow you guys down. I’m fine.”

“But _______–“

“I said I’m fine!”

You use Bucky to yank yourself forward and keep yourself upright. You’ve never experienced vertigo before, and it’s really kicking you in the ass. Your left and right is all backwards, and your eyes have trouble focusing on anything, really. But you keep forcing your legs to move, in order to get out, and to see Maeve.

Oh my god. Maeve!

“Wait wait wait,” you call, leaning against a railing. You’re panting and sweating and shivering, and time is running out, but she comes first. “We need to go back for Maeve!”

“Maeve is fine, _______,” Steve says. “Natasha and Wanda got her out. She’s safe inside the jet. Now we need to get you there too.”

You nod, and begin running with them as your lungs burn and your legs tell you to stop. You don’t know if you feel dizzy again because of the blood loss, but you suppose it’s everything. You just hope Tony can fix it. After another minute of climbing stairs and running down halls, you finally come by a familiar path, the path that Marko took you on when going to the sub basement. But it’s in ruins.

There’s fires everywhere with collapsed walls and debris scattered around the floor. The heat of the flames diminishes how cold you are, but it’s a small comfort. You watch where you step, while still attempting to run your fastest. It’s a nightmare avoiding it all, but you’re almost at the exit. Getting around a few thousand pounds of stainless steel should be no problem.

But things don’t always go the way you want them to.

Another explosion goes off, and you’re sent flying in the opposite direction of Steve, Sam, and Bucky. You nearly miss being pierced by some broken metal, but instead, you’re thrown against the wall and land unceremoniously on a shattered shelf. Now you’re really not sure you can get up again. You feel an added pain to your left shoulder. As you glance down, you can see a thin metal rod stuck in your skin. You flinch when you try to move. The pain you can deal with (mostly). You just need to get out. And fast.

You scream as you push yourself up, and crawl through the openings you can find. You call for Sam, Steve, and Bucky. When you don’t hear a response, you keep trying. You call their names, and ask if they’re okay. You hear groaning, which is good enough for you. There’s a thick layer of smoke and dust, so you can’t see what’s ahead of you. You trip and stumble and power through the pain, but you don’t know how much longer you can hold out for. It’s getting increasingly difficult to move.

On the other side of the room, Steve, Sam, and Bucky are recovering from the explosion as well. They’re all okay, since they can endure more than you can, but they’re a little shaken too. They recuperate quickly, though, and begin calling out for you.

“_______!” Steve shouts. “_______, are you okay? Where are you?!”

You faintly hear Steve’s voice, but whether you actually heard it or not, you answer him.

“I’m fine!” you shout back. “Got a rod in my shoulder but I’m okay!”

“We’re gonna come get you!” Sam says.

“No!” you say. “You guys get out first! I can find my way!”

“_______, no!” Bucky yells. “We’re not leaving here without you!”

“And I’m telling you I’m fine!” Even though you’re not, you want them out first, knowing you’re right behind them. “I’m ordering you now to get out! And you better follow it!”

“But _______–!“

“James Buchanan fucking Barnes!” you scream. “Don’t give me that shit! Go! When I get out, I’m gonna punch you! Now fucking go!”

The tenacity and anger you give off is enough even to shake Steve. The three of them stare at all of the destruction, the smoke, the ash. You’re in there somewhere, and if you say you’ll be okay, then you’ll be okay. Bucky already went back on his word once. He doesn’t want to breach your trust again. Biting his lip, he regrettably turns his back and walks with Sam and Steve to the exit, leaving you inside.

You yell out of frustration and pain, but you fumble forward, determined to escape. You crawl, limp, stumble, and stagger, but you finally see the bright light outside where the exit is. Grabbing hold of debris, you propel yourself forward, yelling all the while to give yourself some strength and energy. Despite draining both, you’re almost there. You’re almost back to Steve, to Sam, Bucky, Tony, Vision, Natasha, Wanda, and Maeve.

Especially Maeve.

You’re going to give her the biggest apology you’ve ever given. You start mumbling to yourself about what you’re going to apologize for when you hear something ticking. You look all around, but you can’t see where the source is coming from. But it’s not good. You go faster and faster, but you’re only as fast as your body will allow. And it’s not fast enough.

Outside, Bucky is panicking. You said you’d be out after them, but it’s been too long. He hates following such a stupid order, but it’s an order you gave, and he doesn’t want to break it. He promised you he would stay in the jet. He didn’t. That was something he couldn’t obey. But he can’t do that twice. So he waits, waits for you to emerge from the warehouse so he can go running to you and bring you back himself. He can’t stand still. He’s too fidgety. He begins walking back again, but Steve grabs hold of him.

“Let go of me, Steve,” Bucky says, trying to shrug him off.

“She’ll come out alright,” Steve assures him. “You have to believe her.”

“Steve,” Bucky warns, scowling at him. “I’m not leaving her in there alone.” Steve’s grip lessens, but he tightens it again. He’s not about to lose two friends in one day.

“She gave us an order, Buck,” he tries. “We have to trust that she’ll be okay.”

“But she’s not okay, Steve!” Bucky barks, tearing his arm away. “Did you not hear her? She has a metal rod stuck in her shoulder! You call that ‘okay’?! I’m not about to let her bleed out and let her suffer alone in there while I’m standing out here, argu–“

Bucky’s worst fears come to life when the warehouse goes out in one final, gigantic explosion. The fire rises hundreds of feet in the air, the rubble flying in every direction. Bucky’s heart sinks into his stomach. He feels sick, and doesn’t know what to do. There’s a sharp ringing in his ears that he can’t get rid of. His legs almost give out, but Steve keeps him on his feet. Steve tries to talk to Bucky, but Bucky can’t hear him. The only thing his senses are focused on is the burning building fifty meters away, with you still trapped inside.

He moves forward, wanting to get to you, but Steve keeps him in place. He won’t let him go. Even when Bucky’s heart has been ripped from his chest, Steve still won’t leave him. There’s the smallest of chances that you survived, but even Steve doubts that. He knows he wouldn’t. He can’t say the same for you, but the possibility of survival is an absolute zero.

Bucky screams your name at the top of his lungs. It hurts Steve to hear Bucky sound so desperate, but he can’t let him go in there. No matter what, Bucky keeps running towards the warehouse, his arm stretched for you, but Steve holds him back.

“She’s gone, Buck,” Steve tells him. Steve doesn’t sound sure of himself, but it’s important for Bucky to hear. “She’s gone.”

“Don’t you, of all people, tell me that, Steve!” Bucky argues. “Don’t tell me that. Don’t–“

Bucky finally succumbs to his anguish, and kneels on the ground, Steve still holding him. The team looks on in horror and sadness. Inside the jet, Natasha, Wanda, Vision, and Maeve observe from the window. They saw as much as they did when they arrived. When they understand what’s happened, they begin their own grieving process. Maeve begins crying, and Natasha holds her to comfort her. Bucky’s cries can be heard from the outside, and it only causes Maeve to sob harder.

When Tony receives no further word as to what happened, he flies back down to the ground and joins everyone. He saw the explosion clear as day, but assumed nothing as to whether everyone was okay. When he returns, and sees Bucky having a breakdown, and Sam hanging his head. He doesn’t see you with them. Then everything starts to click.

“Cap, where’s _______?” he asks, trying to keep his voice stable.

Steve simply raises his head, and shakes it no. Tony’s heart lurches, and he looks towards the now incinerated warehouse.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., run a human vitals scan on the building,” Tony demands. F.R.I.D.A.Y. thoroughly investigates the entire building, including the sub basement, but she comes up with nothing.

“No vitals detected,” she says grimly.

“Check again,” Tony says.

“Sir–“

“Dammit, F.R.I.D.A.Y. just check again!”

She does a second run, but still has no results. Tony knows F.R.I.D.A.Y. doesn’t make a mistake. He doesn’t want to believe it. He doesn’t want to even think about the idea of you being dead. Not on his watch. Not under his care. He’s felt an incredible responsibility over you; after all, he’s part of the reason why you’re here. You were the youngest of the team, right beside Wanda, and saw potential in you. Potential that he got; but he also got snark, attitude, and an unyielding energy he’s not used to being around. The most liveliness he’s experienced is when–well, never. And now he’s lost you, just like everyone else. He won’t be able to hear your laughs, or be able to give you attitude right back when you poke and prod at him. No more embarrassing dancing videos, and no more smiles.

You’re gone.

Now everyone has to find a way to live with that.

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky fic #bucky barnes fic #marvel fic #bucky barnes #the winter soldier x reader #the winter soldier #james buchanan barnes #james barnes #the avengers #the avengers fic #steve rogers #wanda maximoff #sam wilson #tony stark #natasha romanoff #the vision #post age of ultron #pre civil war #maeve lockette #oc #marko snyders #violence #swearing #torture #death #maywrites

[svushipswap]

The 2017 SVU ShipSwap FAQ

Schedule for the 2017 SVU Ship Swap:

Now thru October 6: Organization, planning & promotion of the exchange

October 6: Ship Nominations Open

October 20: Ship Nominations Close

October 21: Sign Ups Open

November 4: Sign Ups Close

November 6: Assignments sent (if not sooner)

December 18: Assignments due

December 25: Collection Opens (if any/all pinch hits are completed)

December 31:  Authors/artists revealed

What is the SVU Ship Swap?

The SVU Ship Swap is a fanworks exchange dedicated to relationships in the Law & Order: Special Victims Unit tv series. Every participant in the exchange is to make a gift for another participant, and matches will be made based on each individual’s requests and offers.

Gifts are to be either an entirely new fan fiction story of 500 words or greater in length, or a complete piece of original fan art (digital or hand-drawn) featuring at least one requested ’ship.

Ships for this exchange can be of both the friend and family dynamic (“&” ships) or romantic/sexual  dynamic (“/” ships). Canon, fanon, crossover and OC ships will all be welcome (read below for further details.)

While this Tumblr blog will be used for organizational purposes, answering questions and administrative announcements, the exchange itself will be hosted and run at Archive of Our Own (AO3). We will be using AO3’s automated system for nominating eligible pairings, matching requests and offers, the posting of final works, and also revealing all stories and art at the same time.

How will the exchange work?

The SVU Ship Swap will begin with a ’ship nomination period of two weeks. Approved ’ships will then be eligible for requesting and offering during the sign-up period. Requests and offers will be matched using AO3’s gift exchange software and assignments then sent out.

You will have at least six weeks to create and post your work to the AO3 collection for the exchange, where it will not be revealed to other participants until the reveal date. A week after works are made publicly viewable, the creators of all works will be revealed (unless you choose before then to orphan your work for any reason and remain an anonymous gifter.)

What is an eligible ship for this exchange?

Ships which will be eligible for the exchange include:

Ships featuring canonical SVU characters who have appeared in any episode. Regular, recurring and guest characters all qualify. The ships themselves do not have to be canon, so pairings such as Olivia Benson/Brian Cassidy and Olivia Benson/Amanda Rollins would both be equally eligible.

Ships featuring a canonical SVU character in a relationship with an original character (OC). (However, requests can not be made for specific OCs previously written, either by the requestor or the offering author.) You can specify in your request if you want an Original Male Character (OMC), Original Female Character (OFC), or are fine with either or prefer a non-binary Original Character (OC).

Crossover ships featuring at least one character from the SVU universe. Participants will be limited in how many crossover ships they request/offer vs. non-crossover ships, to ensure fewer matching problems, but this year there will be no restrictions on which characters can be requested in a crossover ship. (So, requests like “John Munch & Lennie Briscoe (Law & Order)” and “John Munch/Jack Harkness (Torchwood)” would be equally allowed.)

Are threesome ships eligible?

Yes, you will be able to nominate, request and offer threesomes for this exchange (example: Mike Dodds/Sonny Carisi/Rafael Barba).

Are Real Person Fic (RPF) ships eligible?

No. While the organizer of this exchange has no problem with RPF in general, this exchange is exclusively for the characters of SVU, not the actors involved in its production. So Elliot/Oiliva is fine; Chris/Mariska will not be approved.

If a request is for a “/ ” ship, does it have to feature romance and/or explicit sex?

A romantic/sexual relationship is the implied default for “/” ships in this exchange.  If you match on a “/” request that you offered, the requested relationship should be the focus of the work in some fashion and in a romantic/sexual context. It does not have to feature explicit sexual content, however.

Likewise, if you match on an “&” ship, there should be NO romantic or sexual relationship implied in your story.

So, the request for “John Munch/Odafin Tutuola” would be for those characters in a sexual/romantic relationship. “John Munch & Odafin Tutuola” would be a request for friendship/partnership-only works.

Can other SVU ships appear in what I write or the art I create?

Yes, you can include or reference other ships as long as the requested ship is the central focus of the story. Also be mindful of requesters’ “Dear Author” letters or optional details, to see if there are any ships they explicitly do not like/are NOTPs for them and would prefer not to see mentioned at all in the background of their gift.

What are the nomination limits, and why must ships be nominated before they will be eligible?

Everyone will be allowed to nominate eight (8) ships for the exchange (although only TWO (2) of those requests can include a crossover character.) You will need an AO3 account in order to nominate ships, but participating in the nomination process does not commit you to participating in the exchange.

Once a ship has been nominated and approved once, it does not need to be nominated by anyone else. The list of accepted nominations will be publicly viewable so you can check that list before submitting your own nominations.

Nominations are required in order to:

Make sure all pairings are listed in a consistent format for matching purposes—full character names in a certain order instead of ship “smushnames”, for instance. (Rafael Barba/Olivia Benson, not “Barson”).

Make sure all requests meet the eligibility requirements of the exchange.

Limit requests and offers to ships within a defined tag set.

How many ships must I be willing to request during sign-ups?

You must request a minimum of three (3) and up to a maximum of ten (10) ships in order to ensure we’ll be able to make matches. That means if there is well and truly only one ship in SVU that you are interested in, this may not be the exchange for you. We cannot guarantee that you will only receive works for that one ship of your heart.

One out of every three requests you make can be for crossover ships. So if you make 9 requests, 3 of them can be crossover ships. If you make 6 requests, 2 of them can be crossover ships.

You can count both the “&” and “/” versions of a ship as two separate requests. Example: “Amanda Rollins & Olivia Benson” and “Amanda Rollins/Olivia Benson” could count as two of your three requests, if you would be happy receiving either friendship or romantic fic about them.

With each ship you request, you will be able to indicate if you are interested in receiving fic, art, or either. You will also be able to include optional details such as specific prompts you might have in mind, story or art ideas, and general likes/dislikes, or you can link to an external “Dear Author” letter (just be sure it is publicly viewable!) 

Please keep in mind that optional details are optional, and the person assigned to create a work for you is only required to

fulfill your basic ship request

honor any specific “Do Not Wants” you list

How many ships must I be willing to offer during sign-ups?

You must be willing to offer a minimum of four (4) and up to a maximum of ten (10) different ships. Part of the fun of participating in an exchange like this is to challenge or push yourself to create outside of your usual comfort zone. If there is only one ship you are at all comfortable writing or creating art for, this may not be the exchange for you. However you might wish to submit treats for requestors (see below for more information).

With each ship you offer you will be able to indicate if you are able to create fic, art, or either for it and that will be included in the matching process.

What are the matching requirements?

You will be matched on at least one ship, and the medium requested/offered for it. You have the option to create for any of your match’s requests, whether or not you originally offered it.

You only have to create a work for ONE of your assignee’s requests. If your assignee requested five (5) different ships, you do NOT have to write five different stories. However, you can do so if you really feel inspired! Extra treats are always welcome.

What if no one requests the ships I’ve offered in my sign-up?

Then I will contact you directly to ask if there are any other ships you are willing to offer. If not then regrettably I will have to remove your sign-up from the exchange and you will not be able to receive a gift.

Can I edit my gift after the submission deadline?

Yes, you can edit it even after you have uploaded it to the AO3 collection. But, you must still have a complete gift posted by the submission deadline that meets the minimum word count (or is a finished work of art). I will go through the collection to make sure placeholders are not simply uploaded without sufficient content.

What if I can’t finish my gift by the deadline?

If you cannot finish then you will be in default. If you know before the deadline you will not be able to complete the assignment then please let the admin (that’s me) know immediately so I can send out your assignment to a pinch hitter.  If your gift is not uploaded by the deadline then your assignment will be sent out for a pinch hit as well. The goal is to make sure everyone has some kind of gift that meets minimum requirements by the time the collection goes live.

If you default on your assignment and the person you were assigned to has also defaulted, then your assignment will not go out for a pinch hit.

What is a pinch hit, anyway?

Pinch hits are assignments where either the author/artist has defaulted, or were not matchable to begin with. Pinch hits will be posted to this blog such that anyone who wishes can offer to take on that assignment (either in addition to their initial one, or without having previously signed up for the exchange.) Pinch hitters will not receive a gift for their contribution (beyond whichever gift they may have initially been matched on.)

I defaulted last year. Am I still able to sign-up this year?

Yes. Because we made no specific rules last time regarding bans/make-up assignments for those who defaulted, everyone gets amnesty this year :)

I’m not sure I want to commit to participating, but I’d like to try to offer some extra gifts to participants. Will “treats” be allowed?

Yes! All requests made will be publicly viewable at A03 as soon as sign-ups open. You will be able to browse through them, and if you choose, submit “treats” of whatever kind you wish, be it more fics (of no word count minimum), art, graphics, vids, etc. Consider this a fest to celebrate all possible shippy goodness on SVU!

I don’t have an AO3 account!

The admin has several invite codes she would be happy to give out to any interested participants who might need one. You can also put in a direct request for an invite code at http://archiveofourown.org/invite_requests and you should receive one within several days’ time.

Anything else I should know?

One thing the admin would like to make clear from the start: NO SHIP HATE WILL BE ALLOWED. This exchange is to celebrate popular ships, rare ships, controversial ships, new ships, old ships and all ships in between on SVU. Please do not sign up just to write fic bashing another person’s ship or somehow troll the exchange and its participants. If you do you will be permanently banned from any current or future participation in the SVU Ship Swap.

I’m confused/still have a question not covered here.

Then please use the Ask box to contact the admin, and I will reply either privately or publicly depending on your preference/if I feel the question is a good one to share/address with other possible participants.

#svu #svu shipswap #barson #bensler #rollisi #rollivia #munchfin #barisi #calhoula #bamaro #bensidy #tuckson #cabenson

[airoasis]

My First Semester with the iPad Pro 11 inch: Student's Review

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/my-first-semester-with-the-ipad-pro-11-inch-students-review/

My First Semester with the iPad Pro 11 inch: Student's Review

Hiya guys that is Paul and that i simply finished up my first semester of my freshman year of institution and ever considering the iPad pro got here out in early November i have been using it as my main gadget for university and that i love it! In the pas,t I’ve tried utilizing just about each gadget available in the market for institution however I on no account used something that’s been equipped to essentially trade the way I realized in this kind of huge method which the iPad pro has been ready to do. In order a university pupil, i am taking notes at all times and my favorite process of notetaking is by means of hand considering that if I sort my notes on the pc I just form of zone out and replica down what’s in front of me with out truely paying awareness to what’s happening in the category.I also like having the ability to sort of write out what I visualize in my head in a logical approach that i’m gonna have an understanding of later and also you simply cannot do that when you’re typing your notes. If i am pressed for time, I would make a decision to sort out my notes, but more often than not, I prefer doing them by way of hand. So for the first few months of college, I was once taking my notes just the historical-school way, simply in spiral-certain notebooks, however when the iPad pro came out in November, I made up our minds to provide it a shot and i do not consider i am gonna switch again every time soon. I decided to buy Notability to take all my notes in, I consider it was round $8, and that i heard that GoodNotes is an extra wellknown choice and there is almost always just a few free apps out there which are first rate for word-taking however I determined to go with Notability because I’ve heard nothing but first-class matters about it and that i figured i couldn’t go mistaken with it.And the primary time I truely sat down at school, pulled up Notability, and used my iPad to take notes with, I saw immediate benefits. That will virtually go back and look at that first page of notes I took and you can see that at the beginning, I used the iPad identical to i would use a normal pen and paper, just writing down what I proposal used to be crucial. However as the class went on I started messing round with a few of the elements within the app and that is after I fairly started to fall in love with taking notes on the iPad. I began making use of one-of-a-kind colours to aid me distinguish what I was doing and that i variety of created my possess form of color scheme that i ended up sticking with for the rest of the semester. So i exploit the colour black for normal, simply style of informational notes. I take advantage of purple for key information, green for instance problems given in class, blue for my solutions to these problems, orange for the instructor’s way to the problems, and red for any questions that I could need to ask later. I spotted that taking notes on this method kept me so much more engaged in school on the grounds that I used to be invariably pondering of what we were doing and what color I wanted to be utilising.But more importantly, it made my notes so much easier to learn when I went again to review them later in view that the whole lot was once colour coded and i knew what I used to be watching at instantly. So i do know some of you perhaps thinking that you would just do the identical factor on paper with extraordinary colored pens, and i suppose that would work, you’d nonetheless must fumble round with the entire exclusive pens in school and lift them round all day, however you additionally would not get any of the further advantages which i am about to speak about. The new Apple Pencil, the Apple Pencil 2, has this really cool function where in the event you double tap the facet of the pencil, it switches the writing device that you are using. So if I used to be writing whatever and that i messed something up I could just double tap to change to the eraser software, erase what I simply wrote, and double tap once more to change again to the pen.Again after I took notes on paper, i might become with scribbled out notes far and wide the page so it can be great that i don’t ought to deal with that on the iPad. The Apple Pencil itself is relatively quality. I love the matte finish that they went with this yr and it has a really nice weight to it so it feels satisfactory within the hand. Now some humans do not truely just like the physical sensation of writing on a monitor however i don’t mind it in any respect, I believe it feels fine, so i might say if you are concerned about that, i would endorse going to the Apple retailer and trying it in the market. An additional improvement of digital be aware-taking is the potential to speedily move around and resize something that you’ve got written. So for example, should you desired to return and add anything into something you have already written down, which you can just use the cut device and description probably the most text and pull it right down to make room for anything else that you want to put in writing.And preserve in mind that even as i am talking about my expertise with the Notability app, these are beautiful common points that I consider can be on hand to most observe-taking apps available in the market. But my favorite and i think probably the most useful feature that i take advantage of on a every day foundation is whatever called word Replay. So for those who faucet the little microphone in the prime correct nook of Notability, it starts recording utilizing the built-in mic on the iPad. So I suggestion that used to be pretty cool, I could go back and listen to what occurred in class that day. However once I went again to play it later that day, I saw that it synchronized my writing with what the teacher used to be announcing in school so I would see precisely what I was writing whilst the teacher was talking. In actual fact, this permits me to check the entire category if I wanted to take action, which is an highly priceless finding out instrument for me. And there are much more advantages that include taking notes on the iPad.That you can again your notes as much as the cloud so you can continually have access to them on your whole instruments, i’ve mine backed as much as Google drive, that you would be able to also seamlessly just take a photo and insert it straight into your notes, you can share your notes with classmates just by way of email, and a lot extra that make this, for my part, the first-rate option to take notes in the market. And the whole thing I simply talked about can technically be done on the 9 factor seven inch, simply base model iPad, so you don’t relatively want the eight hundred greenback iPad professional to do this, but there are a few advantages that include this heftier price tag. First off, I consider the 11 inch measurement is best. I was once fairly torn between the eleven inch and the 13 inch when this was once first announced but i am rather completely happy I went with the eleven inch due to the fact that it’s definitely big ample to take notes on, handwritten notes, I had no main issue with that , but it is usually small enough to use like a common pill.It is at ease adequate to keep in a single hand, but also massive adequate for break up-screen use, which I used at all times with my schoolwork. And if you wish to watch films or videos on this thing, consume any style of media, it can be undoubtedly huge sufficient for that as good. I’m additionally a enormous fan of the one hundred twenty Hertz so-known as "pro movement" show, which truly implies that this display refreshes at twice the price of most different monitors out there. And this is relatively primary for observe-taking in detailed given that it makes handwriting your notes just that rather more typical since there may be nearly no delay between your enter and what indicates up on the screen. So that is my experience utilising the iPad pro for school. Now there is so much extra to this gadget, I comprehend it’s an incredibly strong tablet, Jonathan from TLD at present made a exceptional video displaying how this is even competent to edit 4k pictures, which is ridiculous, however I also believe it can be a nice studying software for any pupils available in the market.It maintains me extra engaged in my classes, it makes my notes far more comprehensible, and i’m ready to go back and almost replay each single category, and for me, that makes it valued at the hefty fee tag. If you are in the iPad professional, I think it’s about $forty off on Amazon at the time of this recording, so i will go away a link for that within the description beneath. I additionally get a ton of questions about what equipment i exploit to make my videos, so I’ve began linking all my gear in the descriptions of all my movies, and people are Amazon affiliate links, so if you buy some thing by way of a type of links, I get a small percent back and it rather helps the channel out. Anyhow, should you liked this video, leaving a thumbs up could be greatly preferred, and i will seize you guys in my subsequent video.Deuces, baby. .

[batterymonster2021]

My First Semester with the iPad Pro 11 inch: Student's Review

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/my-first-semester-with-the-ipad-pro-11-inch-students-review/

My First Semester with the iPad Pro 11 inch: Student's Review

Hiya guys that is Paul and that i simply finished up my first semester of my freshman year of institution and ever considering the iPad pro got here out in early November i have been using it as my main gadget for university and that i love it! In the pas,t I’ve tried utilizing just about each gadget available in the market for institution however I on no account used something that’s been equipped to essentially trade the way I realized in this kind of huge method which the iPad pro has been ready to do. In order a university pupil, i am taking notes at all times and my favorite process of notetaking is by means of hand considering that if I sort my notes on the pc I just form of zone out and replica down what’s in front of me with out truely paying awareness to what’s happening in the category.I also like having the ability to sort of write out what I visualize in my head in a logical approach that i’m gonna have an understanding of later and also you simply cannot do that when you’re typing your notes. If i am pressed for time, I would make a decision to sort out my notes, but more often than not, I prefer doing them by way of hand. So for the first few months of college, I was once taking my notes just the historical-school way, simply in spiral-certain notebooks, however when the iPad pro came out in November, I made up our minds to provide it a shot and i do not consider i am gonna switch again every time soon. I decided to buy Notability to take all my notes in, I consider it was round $8, and that i heard that GoodNotes is an extra wellknown choice and there is almost always just a few free apps out there which are first rate for word-taking however I determined to go with Notability because I’ve heard nothing but first-class matters about it and that i figured i couldn’t go mistaken with it.And the primary time I truely sat down at school, pulled up Notability, and used my iPad to take notes with, I saw immediate benefits. That will virtually go back and look at that first page of notes I took and you can see that at the beginning, I used the iPad identical to i would use a normal pen and paper, just writing down what I proposal used to be crucial. However as the class went on I started messing round with a few of the elements within the app and that is after I fairly started to fall in love with taking notes on the iPad. I began making use of one-of-a-kind colours to aid me distinguish what I was doing and that i variety of created my possess form of color scheme that i ended up sticking with for the rest of the semester. So i exploit the colour black for normal, simply style of informational notes. I take advantage of purple for key information, green for instance problems given in class, blue for my solutions to these problems, orange for the instructor’s way to the problems, and red for any questions that I could need to ask later. I spotted that taking notes on this method kept me so much more engaged in school on the grounds that I used to be invariably pondering of what we were doing and what color I wanted to be utilising.But more importantly, it made my notes so much easier to learn when I went again to review them later in view that the whole lot was once colour coded and i knew what I used to be watching at instantly. So i do know some of you perhaps thinking that you would just do the identical factor on paper with extraordinary colored pens, and i suppose that would work, you’d nonetheless must fumble round with the entire exclusive pens in school and lift them round all day, however you additionally would not get any of the further advantages which i am about to speak about. The new Apple Pencil, the Apple Pencil 2, has this really cool function where in the event you double tap the facet of the pencil, it switches the writing device that you are using. So if I used to be writing whatever and that i messed something up I could just double tap to change to the eraser software, erase what I simply wrote, and double tap once more to change again to the pen.Again after I took notes on paper, i might become with scribbled out notes far and wide the page so it can be great that i don’t ought to deal with that on the iPad. The Apple Pencil itself is relatively quality. I love the matte finish that they went with this yr and it has a really nice weight to it so it feels satisfactory within the hand. Now some humans do not truely just like the physical sensation of writing on a monitor however i don’t mind it in any respect, I believe it feels fine, so i might say if you are concerned about that, i would endorse going to the Apple retailer and trying it in the market. An additional improvement of digital be aware-taking is the potential to speedily move around and resize something that you’ve got written. So for example, should you desired to return and add anything into something you have already written down, which you can just use the cut device and description probably the most text and pull it right down to make room for anything else that you want to put in writing.And preserve in mind that even as i am talking about my expertise with the Notability app, these are beautiful common points that I consider can be on hand to most observe-taking apps available in the market. But my favorite and i think probably the most useful feature that i take advantage of on a every day foundation is whatever called word Replay. So for those who faucet the little microphone in the prime correct nook of Notability, it starts recording utilizing the built-in mic on the iPad. So I suggestion that used to be pretty cool, I could go back and listen to what occurred in class that day. However once I went again to play it later that day, I saw that it synchronized my writing with what the teacher used to be announcing in school so I would see precisely what I was writing whilst the teacher was talking. In actual fact, this permits me to check the entire category if I wanted to take action, which is an highly priceless finding out instrument for me. And there are much more advantages that include taking notes on the iPad.That you can again your notes as much as the cloud so you can continually have access to them on your whole instruments, i’ve mine backed as much as Google drive, that you would be able to also seamlessly just take a photo and insert it straight into your notes, you can share your notes with classmates just by way of email, and a lot extra that make this, for my part, the first-rate option to take notes in the market. And the whole thing I simply talked about can technically be done on the 9 factor seven inch, simply base model iPad, so you don’t relatively want the eight hundred greenback iPad professional to do this, but there are a few advantages that include this heftier price tag. First off, I consider the 11 inch measurement is best. I was once fairly torn between the eleven inch and the 13 inch when this was once first announced but i am rather completely happy I went with the eleven inch due to the fact that it’s definitely big ample to take notes on, handwritten notes, I had no main issue with that , but it is usually small enough to use like a common pill.It is at ease adequate to keep in a single hand, but also massive adequate for break up-screen use, which I used at all times with my schoolwork. And if you wish to watch films or videos on this thing, consume any style of media, it can be undoubtedly huge sufficient for that as good. I’m additionally a enormous fan of the one hundred twenty Hertz so-known as "pro movement" show, which truly implies that this display refreshes at twice the price of most different monitors out there. And this is relatively primary for observe-taking in detailed given that it makes handwriting your notes just that rather more typical since there may be nearly no delay between your enter and what indicates up on the screen. So that is my experience utilising the iPad pro for school. Now there is so much extra to this gadget, I comprehend it’s an incredibly strong tablet, Jonathan from TLD at present made a exceptional video displaying how this is even competent to edit 4k pictures, which is ridiculous, however I also believe it can be a nice studying software for any pupils available in the market.It maintains me extra engaged in my classes, it makes my notes far more comprehensible, and i’m ready to go back and almost replay each single category, and for me, that makes it valued at the hefty fee tag. If you are in the iPad professional, I think it’s about $forty off on Amazon at the time of this recording, so i will go away a link for that within the description beneath. I additionally get a ton of questions about what equipment i exploit to make my videos, so I’ve began linking all my gear in the descriptions of all my movies, and people are Amazon affiliate links, so if you buy some thing by way of a type of links, I get a small percent back and it rather helps the channel out. Anyhow, should you liked this video, leaving a thumbs up could be greatly preferred, and i will seize you guys in my subsequent video.Deuces, baby. .